Shadowlands Covenants - Making the choice. Is it really as bad as people think?

[TorAndre]

If you play a class/spec that is in the bottom tier this expansion you are going to be farther behind the op toptier class/spec than if two people who both rerolled the current top spec and one used a shittier covenant ability than the other. Raiding is already a minority of the playerbase and those who do reroll to be the flavor of the month is even a smaller group then that. Sure your guild may ask you to use your alt in a raid instead of your normal main because they are low on X but they are only going to do that if they know you can handle it.

And even if someone is "optimized" it doesn't mean they are good. That optimized player may be taking more dmg then necessary and draining resources from the healers etc..

This. If you are a good player or not depends more on other factors then DPS output. But people put more weight something that is so easily measured by numbers.

In my mythic guild we took in hardcore raider.io people. Almost consistently they would be horrible on mechanics yet reporting their dps in guild chat most of the time.

Its insane.

[Hitei]

I don't have an actual counterargument, so I'm just going to claim you're wrong

Fair enough.

WoW isn't ever going to be this weird game you want made. Each spec is going to have a vast majority specced into the same covenant till blizzard nerfs it.

No idea what the fuck you're on about, mate. The majority of players don't pick the most optimal race for their class, or the most optimal class for a given patch cycle/expansion, because people are much more concerned with looks, style and gameplay than throughput when the two are tied together. The only covenant that's going to have a vast majority is Venthyr, because people are obsessed with them.

[Meillassoux]

Fair enough.


No idea what the fuck you're on about, mate. The majority of players don't pick the most optimal race for their class, or the most optimal class for a given patch cycle/expansion, because people are much more concerned with looks, style and gameplay than throughput when the two are tied together. The only covenant that's going to have a vast majority is Venthyr, because people are obsessed with them.

Until we see what Necrolords have to offer. Remember that they mentioned something about being able to build your own abo? Can't wait to see how this will be visualized!

[plz delete account]

Before one even talks about the system itself, i'd rather talk about the fact that Blizzard has driven the game away from "meaningful choice" for over a decade by now.

Talents? Swapping them in rested areas is free, else you need a tome, no problem, the entire system is even designed for you to switch around.
Specializations? Fuck Dual spec, a five second cast and you can virtually switch to any spec you like, no CD, no cost, nothing.
Gear? Barring Weapons and Trinkets, any gear is re useable for any spec, you don't need to gather a completely gear set for another spec.
No "choice" of what spec you'll gear first besides those few slots.

All these things are still in the game, none of these are even touched by Blizzard in any shape or form and they are completely detrimental to the principle of "meaningful choice".

And now, Blizzard set themselves up for the 3rd round of that discussion.
We had that in Legion with Artifact Power and Legendaries.
We had that BfA with Azerite powers and respec costs.
We have now the discussion regarding Covenant abilities.

Blizzard cannot expect any sort of "understanding" from me if they keep designing the [current expansion system] around a certain philosophy, which goes completely how the "framework systems" (if you want to call them that) of the actual game has been designed.

That is what upsets me, there is no design coherence present, except for systems that keep replacing each other as they are on a rental basis.

you can literally grind out legion legendaries in a couple days if you know what you are doing.

[Laughingjack]

It would be if changing your talents wasn't something you could do on a whim. As is, people change talents to fit the fight, not tactics to fit their talents. Talents are impactfull, but not choices.

You've got the whole thing backwards.

No I just have a firmer understanding of the game. Weighing out survival options along possible lines of attack make rather large differences in fights it allows for flexibility and adaptation.

The choice you want is near meaningless. It is a blind choice at the start that will either be so small no one will care or will have people frustrated as they reroll to the op one.

- - - Updated - - -

Fair enough.


No idea what the fuck you're on about, mate. The majority of players don't pick the most optimal race for their class, or the most optimal class for a given patch cycle/expansion, because people are much more concerned with looks, style and gameplay than throughput when the two are tied together. The only covenant that's going to have a vast majority is Venthyr, because people are obsessed with them.

Alliance raiding collapsed to the point they could not muster enough guilds for a good amount of time to unlock cross realm mythic from top end players abandoning the faction from racials...

Recently they have started to recoup now that racials have been brought into line again. Your ignorance is a paper shield when confront with someone who knows what they are actually talking about.

[Orwell7]

You know what the problem REALLY is?

Blizzard killed every competition they STOLE from. Every single one of their games was based on some other guy's idea, Blizz just polished it.
Now it's time to use their own ideas, which are utter bullshit most of the time.

See, WoW was THE MMO which was easy to jump into. Easy combat. Easy travel, easy compact dungeons (yes, even BRD was a simple dungeon compared to the ones in EQ2 for example), easy raids, easy gearing, etc.

Unfortunately this "easyness" is just like sugar: if you blindly compare 2 products, the sweetest will be your choice usually. But if you need to eat that shit day-by-day, it doesn't fulfill you anymore. That's what happened with WoW and MMORPGs in general.

And this is what we see here: when bring the player, not the class happened, it was REALLY good, because you could EASILY REROLL!!
So either make rerolling easy and not time-consuming, so we can enjoy the content THE WAY WE WANT and not based on some stupid spreadsheet, don't tell me HOW I enjoy my game,
OR
make a sub-class system instead of Covenants, where Mages can choose to be Pyromancers, Chronomancers, Archmages with like 15 different abilities and a new talent tree, which is MEANINGFUL choice.

And.. you know what it needs to be done, to eradicate min/maxing? To tune raids easier over time. It was "solved already" with gear being the prominent power-progression of a character, but Blizz decided to have infinite sources of RNG gear, which are far from deterministic, so if you have a meta character you can farm gear easily, if not, go reroll and spend another month gearing that char up.

It's starting to get pathetic...

[Advent]

No I just have a firmer understanding of the game. Weighing out survival options along possible lines of attack make rather large differences in fights it allows for flexibility and adaptation.

The choice you want is near meaningless. It is a blind choice at the start that will either be so small no one will care or will have people frustrated as they reroll to the op one.

They would maybe, if talents weren't mathed out already. Most talents are set and forget because the community has already figured out which one is the best. And because they're so easy to swap out, players expect others to follow the unwritten rule of having the best talents. If it wasn't as easy to swap them, maybe some could be tuned to be more niche, more people could differentiate themselves among others of their same class/spec based on talents, and as a result Blizzard might have to design content where these niche options can shine and be met with acceptance and inclusion instead of whatever we have now.

Ultimately, the choice of covenant is meaningful to us because what some of us are hoping for is to be unique based on our choice of covenant not just visually, but in terms of gameplay as well. I'd personally enjoy it if, as an enhancement shaman, I was meaningfully different in some way to another that I grouped with, even if it was something as small as a single ability. Otherwise we'll likely have the exact same talents and abilities because community perception and expectation dictates that we're not accepted without proper builds.

I'd like to move away from the idea that everyone can be 100% optimal in all facets of the game, because it essentially prevents any real element of surprise from another player in regards to their class choice. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt what talents/abilities they're running because they're "calculated out" already, and it's expected of them. I find that to be incredibly uninteresting these days. I'd like some flavor that the game once had, and covenants are just one step in that direction.

[Zorish]

eh. i guess community nowadays are more leaned towards "i don't want any customization in my character gameplay. Only look", that's why they gravitate to FFXIV i guess (don't get me wrong, game is good enough, and god those animations are pleasing to eye), where your class do only one role, you don't have stats to customize, you don't have talents to choose, and even more you can switch class on single character, if your class end up in dumpster after balance patch...

not like it's wrong mindset, human society mind are build for that, but eh... where is RPG in that...

[LorDC]

Blizzard killed every competition they STOLE from. Every single one of their games was based on some other guy's idea, Blizz just polished it.
Now it's time to use their own ideas, which are utter bullshit most of the time.

Ideas are worthless. It's only execution that matters. As an example, all ideas required to built nuclear reactor are taught in middle school, but less than a dozen companies in the whole world can build one.

[Eapoe]

The problem with this “lasting, meaningful choice” bs people keep talking about is nonsense. WoW is not a traditional RPG, where if you make a choice you still progress and complete the game and have fun. It’s also not something you can restart to make up for said choice. The choice doesn’t remain stagnant.
WoW is continuously changing. Content is constantly being buffed/nerfed. You can make a choice to be the best at raiding just to have that choice be swept away from you as it gets nerfed into obscurity to allow other choices be better. This doesn’t make your choice meaningful, it makes it a mistake or a setback by nothing in your control.
Also, another argument I’m tired of is the “unless you’re part of the 1% your choice doesn’t matter.” This is flat out wrong. Some people like playing to the best they can, whether that’s world quests, Arena, BG, LFG, normal, heroic, or mythic. Not everyone has the same skill level, but many people like playing with the strongest choices for their content they enjoy. Even some normal raiders like to play to the best of their ability with the strongest choices they can pick. You can be in a bottom of the barrel guild but if you’re playing to the utmost of your ability with like minded and skilled people then it stands to reason some of them like to pick the top things because it helps them.
Covenant choices are an issue. Blizzard can’t balance things and keeps changing power values thru the life cycle of the xpac. So that alone is cause to be concerned. Some people will pick their covenant based on xmog (this is the 1st xpac I’m taking this stance of not caring about power level) or aesthetic, but some will pick based on power values in hopes of being the best player they can be.
TLDR: meaningful choice doesn’t and can’t exist in WoW. There is nothing that makes things permanent, so therefore any type of choice you have is an illusion.
Some players will choose things based on being the best.

[Niwes]

Yes, next question.

lol, yes. exactly this. great answer. /cheer

[Gorsameth]

you can literally grind out legion legendaries in a couple days if you know what you are doing.

Not at the start of the expansion tho where most people's impressions were formed.

Hell you had top raiders who would roll a new character if they didn't get a good legendary at the start because levelling a new character was faster then grinding out a 2nd legendary.

[Cosmic Janitor]

The problem with this “lasting, meaningful choice” bs people keep talking about is nonsense. WoW is not a traditional RPG, where if you make a choice you still progress and complete the game and have fun. It’s also not something you can restart to make up for said choice. The choice doesn’t remain stagnant.
WoW is continuously changing. Content is constantly being buffed/nerfed. You can make a choice to be the best at raiding just to have that choice be swept away from you as it gets nerfed into obscurity to allow other choices be better. This doesn’t make your choice meaningful, it makes it a mistake or a setback by nothing in your control.
[...]
TLDR: meaningful choice doesn’t and can’t exist in WoW. There is nothing that makes things permanent, so therefore any type of choice you have is an illusion.
Some players will choose things based on being the best.

I have to agree with this. A choice does not become meaningful just because you get punished for it 2 years down the line. It's a not a choice, it's a gamble and everything about it is out of your control after the first mouse click that locked you in. WoW is also not a game where the "wrong choice" leaves you with options to creatively use the thing you picked to make up for it in other ways. You can't outsmart the system or make up for it with other things, the missing utility will always be the missing utility, the missing damange will always be the missing damage. There is no creative gameplay in WoW. This "choice" will just boil down to people either not caring about it because they never cared about anything past the first page in their spellbook anyway or it will be an annoyance for anyone who enjoys even the most vague sense of competion in the game or wants to be the most usefull to their team.

Also I can't state it often enough, WoW is a themepark MMORPG. If the whole game is built around the premise of participating in a diverse set of rides, then it just doesn't make sense to force people to only enjoy one of them.

[Kralljin]

you can literally grind out legion legendaries in a couple days if you know what you are doing.

Travel back to late 2016 and say that again.
There was even a softcap after the 4th legendary that disabled the bad luck protection.

[ymirsson]

it just doesn't make sense to force people to only enjoy one of them.

That heavily depends on the definition on enjoyment. And this thread, among hundreds of similar ones, proves that there is more then one answer to that.

[Soon-TM]

That heavily depends on the definition on enjoyment. And this thread, among hundreds of similar ones, proves that there is more then one answer to that.

If you enjoy being subpar, either because you will be getting carried or because the content of your choice doesn't require optimization, fine enough. But don't act like everyone should share your mindset. Freely swapping covenant skills would have exactly ZERO impact on your gameplay.

[ymirsson]

. Freely swapping covenant skills would have exactly ZERO impact on your gameplay.

No, but it's not about gameplay. It is about the question whether a freely, easily swappable Covenant with its ability would make it a impactful decision for character definition. I'm not saying people who play to reach the highest highs are to be summarily dismissed, but the game might make more fun for other people if you couldn't just change story decisions because you can do more cleave damage then and change back for single target.

[Beefhammer]

It would be if changing your talents wasn't something you could do on a whim. As is, people change talents to fit the fight, not tactics to fit their talents. Talents are impactfull, but not choices.

You've got the whole thing backwards.

This is the thing. The complainers here that participate in multiple activities change out some talents for each activity. They act as if this one covenant choice will supersede all their talents or that they will be unable to change talents again. IT"S ONE FUCKING ABILITY PEOPLE. Choose the one you like the most. If you choose the ST one for raiding, nothing prevents you form making the best AoE build for M+ and using that ST ability on bosses in M+. Again, the sky is falling and you have about 33% of the total information available to you.

[LorDC]

This is the thing. The complainers here that participate in multiple activities change out some talents for each activity. They act as if this one covenant choice will supersede all their talents or that they will be unable to change talents again. IT"S ONE FUCKING ABILITY PEOPLE. Choose the one you like the most. If you choose the ST one for raiding, nothing prevents you form making the best AoE build for M+ and using that ST ability on bosses in M+. Again, the sky is falling and you have about 33% of the total information available to you.

Well, in MoP we had Horde racials which were "ONE FUCKING ABILITY" and that was all it took to kill Alliance raiding scene.

[Laughingjack]

They would maybe, if talents weren't mathed out already. Most talents are set and forget because the community has already figured out which one is the best. And because they're so easy to swap out, players expect others to follow the unwritten rule of having the best talents. If it wasn't as easy to swap them, maybe some could be tuned to be more niche, more people could differentiate themselves among others of their same class/spec based on talents, and as a result Blizzard might have to design content where these niche options can shine and be met with acceptance and inclusion instead of whatever we have now.

Ultimately, the choice of covenant is meaningful to us because what some of us are hoping for is to be unique based on our choice of covenant not just visually, but in terms of gameplay as well. I'd personally enjoy it if, as an enhancement shaman, I was meaningfully different in some way to another that I grouped with, even if it was something as small as a single ability. Otherwise we'll likely have the exact same talents and abilities because community perception and expectation dictates that we're not accepted without proper builds.

I'd like to move away from the idea that everyone can be 100% optimal in all facets of the game, because it essentially prevents any real element of surprise from another player in regards to their class choice. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt what talents/abilities they're running because they're "calculated out" already, and it's expected of them. I find that to be incredibly uninteresting these days. I'd like some flavor that the game once had, and covenants are just one step in that direction.

You won't be unique. You won't ever for a moment be unique in this game so banish the thought. You are actively harming game play in your absurd desire to be a snowflake. If you want a lol so random game go and play one but wow will never ever be that game.

If you want to be unique just only cast one spell you will be met with the same amount of disdain as your goal with what you want covenants to be. You are actively supporting systems that harm game play in a absurd effort to make the game into something it never was.

Have you considered getting good? It is one of the few ways to be unique in WoW. I know I haven't actually ran into another character using my elite mog in the past 5 years. Getting good is the one true way of standing out in a crowd.