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  1. #641
    So.. They are giving us choices by limiting us to only one tree, 3/4 of which we would have to fill up before we even have a chance of putting a point in another tree. Am i missing something here? Has the word "choice" suddenly had it's meaning changed to the opposite?

    I'm not against simplifying needlessly complicated game mechanics, but this is clearly overdoing it. Yet they talk about depth.. Filling one tree almost completely before moving to the next is depth? Words quickly change their meaning when Blizzard is using them.

    The funny thing is, they probably feel this will rid us of cookie-cutter specs, yet they don't realize that those kind of specs will be more prevalent then before. Cookie-cutter specs are usually a result of extensive testing of different talents by many people. When the the numbers are analyzed, you get a clear picture of the state of certain talents and how important it is to grab that exact talent.. With talent trees less bloated it will be even easier to figure out "that perfect spec" for a certain role. You can not make a perfect tree. Some talents will always be more favored than the others. That's unavoidable. If you want to raid high tier content you will need to put out max dps/hps/survival possible and you will only do it if you have a certain combination of talents and that is how a cookie-cutter spec is born.

    The thing i do like is getting signature abilities early on. But i would gladly sacrifice that for the ability to pick talents from different trees. I can't even imagine how it would be like leveling a priest without spirit tap. And those 3 points in spirit tap were the only points spent in shadow until i hit 60 and switched to shadow completely. As i love leveling, i really want my leveling process to be as enjoyable as possible, and a great part of that enjoyment is the flexibility i have when picking talents. I guess that will be replaced by "signature ability"

    One more thing. Blizzard should stop catering to beginners. Those who weren't interested in what talents do, and were just clicking them randomly after getting a talent point, wont change with less talents to pick from. I guess you are going with "no mistake whichever talent you pick" route. And i can understand that if it wasn't so already. I can't even remember how many times i've ran into a dude with 0/0/71 or 0/71/0.. So even now people are just putting everything into one tree without even thinking about it, so why are you forcing us, who actually know what we want and how to play, to play as someone who just bought the game and has no idea what's he doing.

    I don't like the change but let's see what becomes of it.

  2. #642
    Quote Originally Posted by Nuronv View Post
    I'm predicting the following specialization abilities
    Paladin:
    Holy - Holy Shock
    Prot - Holy Shield
    Ret - Divine Storm
    Holy Shock is going baseline so that is not going to be the holy baseline ability. It could possibly be beacon or there is the possibility that they give entirely new abilities as the base ability but I doubt it.

  3. #643
    Finally the amount of change I've been expecting all along, maybe it's not time to give up just yet.
    Still, I miss the path of titans, which would have been a "shared" talent tree amongst all players.

    This was sort of what I expected at first when they said they were remaking the talent trees to make each point was valuable, and now that they are stripping the talents down finally, they make it easy for themselfs not having to invent allot of new ones, instead they take away the boring ones and encapsulate them in the already existing ones, which in return make these even more attractive.

    If rend does by default 20% more damage, overpower has 50% increased critical strike chance and a few more additions, then they will be more useful by default and abilities which makes them more useful, such as Taste for Blood in arms, will indeed be more interesting at lower levels by new aswel as veteran players.


    What I feel is a little sad about this change is the fact that you cannot find these "loop holes" that makes everyday playing fun, and it lowers meta gaming.
    If that's a bad or good thing, that's already addressed in the blue post.
    I for one were thinking of leveling as a worgen prot warrior just because they've changed so much how the revenge skill that was in vanilla and most of tbc totally useless, works, that so many talents affect it's damage, now with shield slam at level 10 already it will be different, but less effective? I don't think so, rather, much more enjoyable.

  4. #644
    Quote Originally Posted by Fichek View Post
    So.. They are giving us choices by limiting us to only one tree, 3/4 of which we would have to fill up before we even have a chance of putting a point in another tree. Am i missing something here? Has the word "choice" suddenly had it's meaning changed to the opposite?

    I'm not against simplifying needlessly complicated game mechanics, but this is clearly overdoing it. Yet they talk about depth.. Filling one tree almost completely before moving to the next is depth? Words quickly change their meaning when Blizzard is using them.

    The funny thing is, they probably feel this will rid us of cookie-cutter specs, yet they don't realize that those kind of specs will be more prevalent then before. Cookie-cutter specs are usually a result of extensive testing of different talents by many people. When the the numbers are analyzed, you get a clear picture of the state of certain talents and how important it is to grab that exact talent.. With talent trees less bloated it will be even easier to figure out "that perfect spec" for a certain role. You can not make a perfect tree. Some talents will always be more favored than the others. That's unavoidable. If you want to raid high tier content you will need to put out max dps/hps/survival possible and you will only do it if you have a certain combination of talents and that is how a cookie-cutter spec is born.

    The thing i do like is getting signature abilities early on. But i would gladly sacrifice that for the ability to pick talents from different trees. I can't even imagine how it would be like leveling a priest without spirit tap. And those 3 points in spirit tap were the only points spent in shadow until i hit 60 and switched to shadow completely. As i love leveling, i really want my leveling process to be as enjoyable as possible, and a great part of that enjoyment is the flexibility i have when picking talents. I guess that will be replaced by "signature ability"

    One more thing. Blizzard should stop catering to beginners. Those who weren't interested in what talents do, and were just clicking them randomly after getting a talent point, wont change with less talents to pick from. I guess you are going with "no mistake whichever talent you pick" route. And i can understand that if it wasn't so already. I can't even remember how many times i've ran into a dude with 0/0/71 or 0/71/0.. So even now people are just putting everything into one tree without even thinking about it, so why are you forcing us, who actually know what we want and how to play, to play as someone who just bought the game and has no idea what's he doing.

    I don't like the change but let's see what becomes of it.
    your problems with the change are all based on the faulty premise that you really had choice before.

    you technically had choices, but it basically allowed you to choose to suck, if you were inclined. as far as actual good specs went, there was very little wiggle room even within the same tree, and pretty much no room between trees.

    if the good spec didn't take the bottom of the tree, that's a failure of design, not a matter of choice. if that is the good spec, then taking the bottom isn't really a choice unless you wanted to suck.

    the blue poster called them traps, and that's what they were.

    they intend to design the trees in such a way that you want to fill out that tree eventually anyways. the choice comes in within that tree. sure, i doubt there will be an overwhelming number of possibilities, but their stated goal is that each possibility will be about on par with the others, meaning you might have fewer things to choose from but actually more valid selections among them.

  5. #645
    So how much does this improve your flexibility and choice in choosing talents.

    At level 10: Very important choice, very meaningful choice.
    At any odd numbered level below 80: No talent, total loss of choice.
    At any even numbered level below or at 70: Restricted to the same tree you chose at lvl 10, much more restricted choice than you have now.
    At even levels above 70 or any level over 80: The same amount of choice you have now.

    For the vast amount of levels you will gain this restricts your choice. If you want to respec at lvl 80 or higher your choices will be far more restricted.

    Yes, this will probably improve the levelling experience but what percentage of your game time is that? 5%? 10%? If you are playing most of your time on a max level char your choices have been curtailed greatly. There are now 3 fixed talent specs for each class with only minor variations between them.

    For the 30 talent points after the first, your choice in where to spend them has, at best, been reduced by 66%. If you like the design fine, but be realistic, at level 85 you will have less talent points and more restrictions on where you spend them than you had at level 60. I think people are getting a bit carried away, dreaming of how meaningful that first talent will be and forgetting that extra meaning for that one talent comes at the cost of losing over half your talent points and most of your choice on where to spend the next 30 talent points.

  6. #646
    Deleted
    Quote Originally Posted by Xenryusho View Post
    Sigh... So they want to remove the feeling of "Oh great I leveled and got 1% hit" and replace it with "Oh yay I level and get absolutely nothing". The entire reason I played WoW was because of the talent trees and I have no desired to go back to 31 talents to a tree.
    So only thing you did in-game was playing with talent trees? Umm...

  7. #647
    Quote Originally Posted by butterbumps View Post
    uh, some people seem to be under the impression that spending 31 points in a tree will get you all of the talents, so there will be no choices between talents any more. At no point is this stated or implied.
    pay attention people

  8. #648
    If I get DW on my shaman right at lvl10 I'll be happy! Might finally finish leveling one...

    Anyways... Sounds very interesting and intriguing.Can't wait to see this...

  9. #649
    Dreadlord Kenai's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by dek View Post
    your problems with the change are all based on the faulty premise that you really had choice before.

    you technically had choices, but it basically allowed you to choose to suck, if you were inclined. as far as actual good specs went, there was very little wiggle room even within the same tree, and pretty much no room between trees.

    if the good spec didn't take the bottom of the tree, that's a failure of design, not a matter of choice. if that is the good spec, then taking the bottom isn't really a choice unless you wanted to suck.

    the blue poster called them traps, and that's what they were.

    they intend to design the trees in such a way that you want to fill out that tree eventually anyways. the choice comes in within that tree. sure, i doubt there will be an overwhelming number of possibilities, but their stated goal is that each possibility will be about on par with the others, meaning you might have fewer things to choose from but actually more valid selections among them.
    Please listen to this post. It's exactly my problem with the talent trees as they are now.

    Being "unique" is nice to a point, but when your choices actually make your toon terrible because of a crappy talent spread, it's not a real choice, and everyone suffers when you decide to join a group (whether you are 5/5/5 or 71/0/0). Yes, it is your choice to play how you want, but there should be a limit on the detriment you cause to others, and when a newb gets talent choices how can they know any better? This talent revamp is literally trimming the fat. I don't think this is going to remove cookie cutter specs, but if all of the talent choices are more useful overall, then a non cookie cutter spec can still be viable. Let's just admit they really aren't right now, with the exception of maybe 1-2 odd talents points, which isn't a huge devation.

    The other aspect I like is that a toon getting a class/spec defining ability at low levels means:
    a) They have a better understanding of what this job will be expected to do as they level, so the choice of whether or not to continue at level 10 becomes more meaningful, and
    b) They can practice those class defining roles at an earlier level to get better at it sooner.

    I really don't see the problem here.

  10. #650

  11. #651
    This sucks.. No intention at all of playing cata now anymore.

  12. #652
    But... You have 45 points. A tree have what... 45-47 points? So IF you decide to fully spec into Prot, lets say, you can be 0/45/0 but be fully prot... and get all the talents.

  13. #653
    Quote Originally Posted by dek View Post
    your problems with the change are all based on the faulty premise that you really had choice before.

    you technically had choices, but it basically allowed you to choose to suck, if you were inclined. as far as actual good specs went, there was very little wiggle room even within the same tree, and pretty much no room between trees.

    if the good spec didn't take the bottom of the tree, that's a failure of design, not a matter of choice. if that is the good spec, then taking the bottom isn't really a choice unless you wanted to suck.

    the blue poster called them traps, and that's what they were.

    they intend to design the trees in such a way that you want to fill out that tree eventually anyways. the choice comes in within that tree. sure, i doubt there will be an overwhelming number of possibilities, but their stated goal is that each possibility will be about on par with the others, meaning you might have fewer things to choose from but actually more valid selections among them.
    Your entire post is based on a faulty premise that i was talking about end-game. No, in actuality it was almost completely directed at leveling experience. But let's get back to your post.
    If we didn't have a choice before and we obviously don't now, what exactly did Blizzard to? So, nothing is changed, more talents are meshed together, some talents become passive bonuses of certain tree, and we are left with is less clicks to get to the bottom of the tree. And they are advertising that as a revolution in talent trees design. Ok.

    And this quote..
    ..meaning you might have fewer things to choose from but actually more valid selections among them.
    .. is somewhat wrong. Like i said, certain talents will always be more suitable for certain roles and therefore will always be picked before some other talent. If you have a talent that improves your dps greatly and on the other hand a talent that increases it moderately and in addition to that you gain survival, you will always pick the first one for pve, and second for pvp. Illusion of choice is a wonderful thing. You never actually had a choice if you wanted to max your performance. So i ask you again, what has changed exactly? Nothing. You will use the same skills as before (in addition to new ones which you would get even with the bloated talent trees), you will "choose" the same talents as everyone else of your class/spec and all the while you will be thinking how deep and full of choice this new system is. On the other hand, while leveling you are heavily restricted, limited to one tree and you will miss some great talents for leveling in other trees that you would otherwise take. That is my biggest beef with the new system. They could do it that you only get the "signature ability" if certain tree is 3 points ahead all other trees.. That way you are a bit punished for building a hybrid, but in the end it's still your choice to make, and most importantly, you can make that choice..

  14. #654
    if tons stopped playing before wrath of the lich king then just wait, even more will quit now.

    i'm confused as to how many talent points we get, 51 works out right but i hear 41, 45, or 51 points.

    they just screwed me so bad when it comes to my priest...
    i'll probably need to be a 24/26/0 or 23/24/0 but no their probably gonna make me a worse priest by forcing me to not be able to pick the talents i need in another tree.

  15. #655
    Quote Originally Posted by dek View Post
    your problems with the change are all based on the faulty premise that you really had choice before.

    you technically had choices, but it basically allowed you to choose to suck, if you were inclined. as far as actual good specs went, there was very little wiggle room even within the same tree, and pretty much no room between trees.

    if the good spec didn't take the bottom of the tree, that's a failure of design, not a matter of choice. if that is the good spec, then taking the bottom isn't really a choice unless you wanted to suck.

    the blue poster called them traps, and that's what they were.

    they intend to design the trees in such a way that you want to fill out that tree eventually anyways. the choice comes in within that tree. sure, i doubt there will be an overwhelming number of possibilities, but their stated goal is that each possibility will be about on par with the others, meaning you might have fewer things to choose from but actually more valid selections among them.
    If you believe that there won't be cookie cutter DPS (or tank, or healing) specs for every class then you are being a bit naieve. If you play a DPS class a talent is only interesting if it translates into increased DPS. A reduced cooldown on Death Grip for example, while no doubt fitting Blizzards definition of an interesting talent is utterly useless in a raid DPS build. So Blizzard are faced with a fail fail situation. If someone ends up with so few DPS boosting talents in the tree that they end up taking utility or "fun" talents instead they will feel like they are wasting those talent points. Do you really think people will be cheering when they realise there is so little useful stuff to take that they have to spend some of their (now much fewer) talents on things that provide no benefit whatsoever to what they are doing? On the other hand if all the talents somehow translate into extra DPS there will, in very little time, emerge cookie cutter specs just like we have now.

    How "interesting" is defined from a talent perspective varies based on the goal. If you want to do more DPS any talent that doesn't provide that fails to be interesting by definition and if you are forced to take it because of a lack of interesting options it will feel like you have been forced to waste talent points. The problem is while one person sees having 10 talent points left over after getting the interesting options as an opportunity to pick something useful to something else (bgs, 5 mans, arenas, etc) another will see having 10 talent points left over as being forced to waste 10 talent points on useless crap.

    I am sure many specs now have a point where you need to spend 2 or 3 talents to get to the next level down without anything worth spending them on. When you spend those few points on something that provides no real benefit to you just so you can reach the talents that do provide a benefit does that feel like an interesting choice to you? Putting people in the situation where they have to do that a lot seems to be the goal of this talent overhaul.

  16. #656

  17. #657
    Quote Originally Posted by Multigasm View Post
    I highly doubt that they would make Arcane Mage the only DPS class to not get a DPS talent in the 31st point spot, if they did that would be the biggest slap in the face to everyone that plays arcane. With that being said I dont know if I should be exictied or scared that Mages are the only class they didnt make reference to in the Blue Post :-|
    They did make a reference to Water Elemental's in there somewhere, I picked slow because because it would really add some layer of control to a spec that would otherwise be without it whilst levelling. I would say on second thought Arcane Missles would be a better choice, what do you think of when you think of Arcane mages? PEW PEW PEW.
    I was actually going to put shadowstep for Sub Rogues but then i thought the exact thing that you commented on slow about. You are suggesting you give a DPS class a utility ability. But i do agree, when i think what defines a Subtlety rogue it is Shadowstep.

    Holy Shock is going baseline so that is not going to be the holy baseline ability. It could possibly be beacon or there is the possibility that they give entirely new abilities as the base ability but I doubt it.
    It was going to be baseline but that was before they announced this talent shake up, also they stated Prot Warriors would be getting Shield Slam as theirs which is currently baseline. It would also be a very good levelling spell as it provides two purposes.

    Chaosbolt is likely, and Unstable Affliction is a possibility (though I doubt it).
    Demonology not a Felguard. You are still collecting demons then so giving a demon lock the be-all end-all pet right at the start is asinine.
    The Demon tree is centered around beefing or using your pet powers. So any of the talents that beefs pets is most likely to be added: Master Dem., Dem Emp. or Dem. Pact are much more likely candidates to start off with from the start.

    They could also emphasize the link with the Demon and give the Fel Synergy, Manatap or Dem. Knowledge talents to give a more dynamic link with the demons.

    Honestly I'd love Demonic Pact for early locks. It's currently a signature ability of Demon Locks, even more so then the Felguard or Meta.
    I would agree, Warlocks are my weak spot (the only class I don't have at the mo) , my train of thought was that if you see a Warlock with Felguard you instantly know its a demonologist. Meta seems a bit too potent, you don't want to give people the most exciting ability straight away. I agree with what you say about emphasizing the link between the Demon and Pet
    >:7

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  18. #658
    Elemental Lord Spl4sh3r's Avatar
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    People whine about getting less choices when they actually get more. Most people don't even choose their talents they just go with what everyone else thinks is best (which mostly is the best :P) where is the choice in that? Now that there is no math in the new talent system (atleast not from the beginning) you get to choose alot by yourself plus there will be no more choice between bad talents and good talents since there won't hardly be any bad talents.

    Also for those who QQ about having to pick 31 talents in one tree before going into the other don't even know why there are three different trees in the first place. You are meant to specialize in one tree. Think of it as choosing between 3 different jobs. Doctor, Chef and Lawyer. Would you rather be bad at all 3 jobs or good in one of them?

  19. #659
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    Quote Originally Posted by lordcanyon View Post
    if tons stopped playing before wrath of the lich king then just wait, even more will quit now.

    i'm confused as to how many talent points we get, 51 works out right but i hear 41, 45, or 51 points.

    they just screwed me so bad when it comes to my priest...
    i'll probably need to be a 24/26/0 or 23/24/0 but no their probably gonna make me a worse priest by forcing me to not be able to pick the talents i need in another tree.
    I think you've been just skimming over the blue posts without reading them fully. They've already said they're going to be moving certain talents amongst the different trees so that stuff fits better. You won't have to spec halfway down another tree to be the best at your spec. Though it may still be legit to do so at higher levels.

  20. #660
    It reads like:

    1 year ago: Yeah we remove all shitty talents and replace them with cool one's where you have to choose between
    Now: Yeah our designers got nothing cool into their minds in the last 12 months so we still remove half of the talents and half your talentpoint pool, too



    I'm stil curious about the new talent trees, though.

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