When was that? They did not balance WoTLK around Dual Spec.
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Yes. If you read the forums daily, it certainly gives us reason to pause.
However, I don’t think that the posts here are seen without the lens of data that Blizzard employees have access to (actual game and subscriber data).|
Obviously they don’t share individual customer data with the public.
Did they balance TBC around it? Is there any reason to believe that it would be a healthy or positive addition to TBC?
Maybe!
I’m not making such a claim though, so I have no obligation to back that claim.
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I think major elements of WOTLK were balanced around dual spec e.g. specialized loot bags in LFG. Things were implemented to offset the loot issues that are inherent with dual spec.
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That refers to class balance, not game mechanics like LFG loot bags. Also, in WOTLK they had 10 man raids which made gear and content more accessible, reducing loot conflicts in general. The game was more adequate to support dual spec. Actually, gear was just easier to get all around in wrath.
That’s a lot of supposition.
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I agree 100%, but I would still rather dual-spec than the current system because the current system is that terrible. Though I would rather they just lowered respec costs.
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It’s not really a lot of supposition. One of the primary concerns listed for TBC dual spec is loot. WOTLK had mechanics woven into it which significantly reduced the possible friction points between dual spec and loot.
If you’re pedanticly focusing on whether Blizzard TECHNICALLY balanced any element of the game around dual spec, I think you’re choosing a strange hill to die on. Because whether it was intentional or not, the mechanics of loot acquisition and general gameplay was undeniably more supportive of dual spec.
The loot boxes were only for lower-level instances. The loot system itself really didn’t change between TBC and WOTLK other than WOTLK having multiple tiers of badge gear.
The main difference between TBC and WOTLK is that most of the unique buffs/debuffs in TBC became shared across multiple classes. Which means there was less need for dual-spec in WOTLK because raid comps were far more flexible.
I do. Not everyone PvPs and giving PvP players alone Dual Spec is a mess.
And for the record, if we do get Dual Spec, one spec is for raiding, one spec is for solo play. I wouldn’t ever put both specs on raid specs.
Also the necessary game balancing changes to conform the “bring the player not the class” model happened mostly in the WoTLK prepatch - before dual spec. Dual spec fits into that paradigm. But they didn’t need to rebalance classes around it because that work had already been done.
I don’t know if they balanced the expansion around dual spec or whether they just felt it was now time to slot it in - that it fit with the existing design. But we know they wanted to implemented before that midway through TBC and they didn’t - citing it would be too difficult.
Now, it is definitely not a difficult thing to code - so why was it too difficult? I think it is credible to assume that they may have had concerns about game balance. It then makes sense why they waited until shortly after the class rebalance in WoTLK.
The only thing we can say with certainty is that the classes were dramatically rebalanced for WoTLK, and there had been an earlier stated intention to explore development of a dual spec feature. It seems a bit absurd to conclude they didn’t try to align both.
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So was your post though. And you don’t have a citation for it. Just an image that nobody can verify.
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https://www.bluetracker.gg/wow/topic/eu-en/8041844862-talent-dual-spec-qa-with-ghostcrawler/
Nethaera : Why are we allowing players to dual spec after all this time?
Ghostcrawler : We really felt like this was a great way to increase the flexibility available to players and encourage them to take part in more aspects of the game. To use just one example, some players like to participate in both raids and Arenas, which is awesome behavior that we want to promote. But, there are some talents which are more useful in one part of the game than another. Currently, players have to pay respec costs and go through the process of setting up the desired talent spec and action bars whenever they switch.
The new system makes this a much more logical process, saving on time and cost and allowing players to easily move from one aspect of the game to another.
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Yes I’m aware of that. Bear in mind it’s partly marketing for them. While that link is informative it is not exhaustive. It doesn’t tell us everything behind the decision.
We have no choice but to extrapolate and make educated guesses as to why they felt it was a good idea then and not earlier when they had already expressed a desire to implement it.
But the fundamental fact here is that this happened after a major class rebalance and design method shift. The WoTLK game was different to TBC in fundamental ways at this point in time. Would they have said the same things if it was still TBC? I think not else they would have done so at the time.
He clearly is saying that they added dual-spec so people could play the game, and that the old system limited or prevented them from playing. What is there to extrapolate?
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Absolutely. That’s also why he pushed the “bring the player not the class” design focus in WoTLK. The whole expansion was the new Lead Game designers answers to the problems he felt TBC had.
But this is TBC classic and not WoTLK classic. The design imperatives of TBC are fundamentally very different to those of WoTLK. Before GC took the helm midway through TBC the development focus was to create niches and promote meaningful choice - much like MMOs of that time.
GC and co saw that as a flaw - but for the team that designed TBC it was a feature. Unless we want to go straight to WoTLK let this play itself out. Wait for Wrath classic.
He says that dual-spec was added so people could play more aspects of the game. Nothing he says could be interpreted to imply that the change wouldn’t have happened if not for the other changes. But rather that both changes happened at the same time and for the same reason.
But the change did happen after those changes - so whether that was intentional or not you can’t say it is tested in a TBC like game. I also think it’s a fairly unnuanced reading of events to assume that this change took place in a vacuum. It’s safe to assume there is a reason they dropped it then and not earlier.
If I were to take your position I would have to assume that even though Dual spec had been discussed for years prior they decided to drop it then on just a hunch - thought it was a good idea at the time - and the decision was completely divorced from the major class rebalance and move toward less niches and giving more access to casual players taking place in the game at that time. That seems implausible to me. Dual spec and the reasons given for it fit very neatly into the “bring the player not the class” paradigm GC was working with in the design of wotlk. It doesn’t fit so neatly against the backdrop of TBC and the previous lead developers (Jeff Kaplan I think it was: an ex EQ player/dev) stated objectives moving into that expansion.
Edit: There’s this thing called induction which allows you to draw logical conclusions from inference. If x is the base case and y is the implication of x then z can be assumed to follow from y in all cases where the base case holds. That’s all I’m doing here essentially - you call it “assumptions” I called it inference. Short of having quotes of everything that was going on in the developers heads at the time we are left with no other option than to infer things from the base case of what we know actually happened.
Change happened after changes?
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