Conduit Weekly Lockout is Still a Huge Problem and Should be Removed

Community General Discussion
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A long post that reiterates what others have said and likely get buried, but still feel like I need to do my part :smile:

For those of you who that don’t care how conduits will impact your day-to-day game play, this post is not for you (or maybe it is, if you’re willing to keep an open mind), but for everyone else, we really need to keep pushing Blizzard into recognizing the problem with conduits, especially the weekly lock out. It’s going to be a huge problem for almost everyone, and certainly not just the top 1%.

But why is the weekly lockout a huge problem for almost everyone? I mean, I know it’s obvious and already been said, but I think it’s important to keep reminding them in hope they see it and fix it before hand.

  • If you make a mistake, and accidentally socket the wrong conduit and want to switch, you can’t. You’re screwed.
  • If you’re new and unsure of which conduit to use and simply want to test a few of them out while you’re questing, you can’t. You’re screwed
  • If you play multiple specs and want to use a different conduit in the same slot, you can’t. You’re screwed.
  • If after you socket a conduit, you get a better (different) one of the same category and want to upgrade it, you can’t. You’re screwed.
  • If you want to use one conduit for one form of content one day, but another conduit for different content (ie, pvp and raiding) in the same week, you can’t. You’re screwed.

And if you haven’t connected the dots, let me skip to the end for you … There is no form of content you can do in the game that won’t result in being confronted with any or all of these problems. Some people might ignore it, but I’m certain most people will not. And just wait for the first few weeks to months of launch. We’ll see endless forum posts echoing the same thing.

But for those of you still reading this saying, “well who cares, whatever, screw those people”. Again, we’ve already established this feedback is not for you. But if you are that person … Outside of being triggered or wanting to troll people that do care about this, can you find a reason to defend this? Can you explain how the weekly lockout system is a good thing for everyone except the casuals that would play with any system ? And then ask yourself, if those people would play with any system, why is important to design a system that caters to them who don’t really care and screws over the vast majority of everyone else? And for the RP’ers in the crowd, can you explain how it makes more sense from RP standpoint that we can only change conduits once per week, but we can’t change them a Tome of Clear Mind like we did with essences in BFA? Or, explain how seeing a prompt in game that says, “You won’t be able to change any applied conduits until after the next weekly reset” is immersive RPG experience? Yes, in game, we actually have a warning that refers to the weekly reset!! LOL, come on people, this is so convoluted.

Also, worth mentioning, this post for me id NOT about rage, or ERMERGHERD!! CHANGE IT!! I’m going to play shadowlands regardless (how long I play will depend). But it’s merely to reiterate that we’ve been here before (ie, BFA Azerite gear, random Legion Legendaries, MoP and endless dailies, etc.). What they all have in common is that Blizzard later admitted they were bad and had to update/redsign them. So why are they doing this again? That’s my point. Maybe, just maybe they will see it for themselves before its too late. Fingers crossed.

9 Likes
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TL:DR

Blizzard is “doubling down” on the concept of commitment to choice in Shadowlands. You have to commit to your Covenant, you have to commit to your Soulbinds.

I don’t like it either. It’s not only locking you into a specific gameplay style (e.g. I am built for raiding or I am built for Mythic+ and I will be suboptimal, to some extent, in the content I am forsaking) but with the nature of both craftable and upgradable legendaries AND locked-in Soulbinds, it feels like you’re being forced into one SPEC also.

It’s bad. But it’s the current direction of the game. Blizzard didn’t ask you, or me, whether we liked it or not. They have their vision for the game and they’re realizing it. At this point either shut up about it and play the game, or quit in protest.

This also goes for The Maw. And PvP Vendors. And Mythic+ loot. And Pathfinder.

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This post is not about being locked into covenants and covenant specific abilities . Blizzard put a nail in that coffin with their post a few weeks back. But in that post, they didn’t put a nail in the coffin on conduits and the weekly lockout. Unlike locked covenants and how changing that would be a huge update to the system, changing the weekly conduit lockout would be a very easy and quick change to the system and would still preserve the vision of choice they have with “Venthyr paladin vs Kyrian paladin”.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, covenants are going to flop, but they will flop much harder and much quicker with the weekly conduit lockout. There is still plenty of time for them recognize this and change it.

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While theres a lot of things I am on Blizzard’s side for with this expansion, this is not one of them. I’d prefer consumable conduits to this system.

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Time gates, bro. Its expected from Blizzard

They will remove it after they have dragged you through it for several weeks or months then patch it.

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azerite respec cost is still a huge problem and will be removed only with shadowlands

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how is it a problem when you could farm multiple pieces and swap them out?

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I’m right there with you. The problem is blizzard has so many cucks and simps who live for nothing but wow and defending it on the forums, will come here and try to reduce your perfect post to ash.

Everyone knows its a bad, and arbitrary mechanic with no value.

I think the only way to get the fix in is have millions of players cancel their subs until its done. If you haven’t noticed, blizzard communication has been horrible. I mean, LOL we don’t even know when the prepatch will hit.

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Conduit design like this is a monkey’s paw result of us wanting indestructible conduits.

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how is conduits are problem when you can level up 12 copies of your class to always have bis conduit in bis covenant for each spec

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that didnt even make sense to you lol

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Or continue exercising your freedom of speech and voice your objections.

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It’s working?

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Out of all the problems with the conduit lock in, this is the one that just completely baffles me. It means that you basically can’t swap conduits until you exhaust all possible sources of conduits and upgrades, otherwise you can get an upgrade and get locked out of using it until the next week which makes zero sense.

2 Likes
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It’s worked in the past - it just takes time.

But that doesn’t mean people should all of sudden just be quiet about it. They have a right to speak and the forums are one means to communicate their thoughts.

If you don’t like it, then don’t click on their thread and reply. Otherwise, I guess you can tell people to be quiet - but that’s not really adding anything productive to the thread.

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We have 50 other threads on this topic.

Blizzard is aware.

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These are still a player’s fault. Less so for the “new player” but there are so many third-party resources available for this game that having an “oh crap, i made a mistake” moment is entirely on players.

The other three points you made are flaws of the design and should be changed while there is still time.

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The only thing that will make blizz blink is $$$.

But this community is too dependent on wow for entertainment to ever make an actual stand for content they want.

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I appreciate you acknowledge the flaws in the other three points. But just to provide some context on the first two … Imagine you’re a new player. Imagine you’re someone that doesn’t enjoy looking on third-party sites. Imagine you haven’t really been paying attention to the intricate details or come to the forums and then you’re confronted with this. This will be a much bigger problem for these types of players than anyone.

Also, you’re trying to make the argument that the correct answer is to completely research the meta for your conduits in order to prevent this problem. I mean, really? So, there shouldn’t be any wiggle room? Casuals need to play the game in a way they’re not comfortable and those more competitive don’t get a chance to test different builds?

I mean, it’s not a very strong argument and regardless, people are going to make mistakes and people will want to play around and test things out. This isn’t something that should be punishable for an entire week.

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I guess I should’ve said the first two points are in players’ control, versus the last three that are design issues.

But to be honest, blindly playing the game without seeking information on third-party sites is a diminished player experience. For the brand new player this might be a possibility, but by the time a brand new player has leveled to 60 it’s very likely they would’ve already sought out information beyond the game itself.