My overall opinion on hero talents is what is the point? What is the long-term goal?
Blizzard developed the new talent tree system in DF to fix the long-term issue of borrowed power coming and going every expansion. So instead of adding new rows of talents they want to make 3 separate “Hero Talents” for each class. So what comes the expansion after? Another type of Hero Talents… more talent rows?
What about 4 expansions down the road.
I want to think that eventually they will stop vertical power gain and just go horizontally.
So instead of having 2 choices for Hero Paths, perhaps you unlock another hero Path talent tree option at max level each expansion.
Each new Hero Path talent tree might just focus on a particular spell or method to play and enhance it to the point where you may drop other spells entirely as they would no longer compete.
So essentially this would act like a prune without a prune. It would simplify class and specs without removing spells and abilities as it would instead just disincentivize you from using abilities that are not the focus of the Hero talent tree path you choose.
One idea for another talent tree after this Hero Path talent tree was something like a cross mix spell alteration similar to the PvP talent system where you modify the effects of a particular spell to add more functionality in the PvP environment but instead of a specific talent for a specific spell, you would build up multiple modifiers for a particular spell.
For example…
Take Mind Blast for example. In this example, Mind Blast would be a multiple choice keystone node where you pick from a pool of spells your class/spec has access to and then the following talents can be added modifiers that can be applied to any spell of your choice.
Think of how in Diablo 2 Runeword system works. You get runes you can slot on a socketed piece of equipment where each rune adds a specific modifier. But add particular runes together in right order and right piece of gear and you get a Runeword where even more added modifiers are applied to the piece of equipment.
So back to WoW, you take a base spell and then follow up talents add a modifier to that specific spell.
These modifiers can range from a whole slew of different interactions like…
Then the capstone can be a smaller pool of very unique and elaborate effects similar to interactions you would see like on a tier set bonus.
Additionally, perhaps add 2 more vertical talent paths alongside your initial one where you get 3 total abilities you can customize.
Each section can have its own pool of modifiers as well as having a cross mix of modifiers.
Or each level of modifiers you add to the spell comes in a quality grade pool so you can’t just stack the best modifiers.
Similar to the grading system of the essence system in BFA but instead it will be modifiers classified in each class of quality and you can only have 1 class of quality to modify a single spell.
This type of system would grant the player a great level of customization for a particular spell they are fond of most and that spell for that player will be favorable in use over other spells because of how much more power they choose to put into it.
So back to Mind Blast, perhaps the final powered up version of Mind Blast would look something like this (different per players choices)
It essentially becomes build a spell type of system with a mix of spell types and spell modifiers ranging from different pools of spell power up enhancements.
Edit:
Here are some more spell modifier ideas…
Oh, I wanted to clear up that I do actually agree with Marcelian that many of the proposed hero talent trees could try to be better fits thematically with wow lore and history dating back to the RTS games. I just think Oracle didn’t fit his general critique as it is a great fit.
For example Warrior’s “slayer” sounds pretty vague and is already a term that was used to refer to demon hunters. So why not Blademaster?
On the other hand, I’ve always wanted Sentinel, but I feel like it deserves it’s own class rather than just being a twist on hunter. Chakrams and glaives were so iconic in WC3
But yeah anyway thematically I like oracle! Just want to stress that to the devs.
It was not the theme of foretelling the future that was the problem with Oracle. That is perfectly fine and thematic with ingame lore and western mythology (Delphi anyone?).
There was however a lot of dislike for the gameplay of Oracle revolving around support in a class that had only a little above zero support built into the rest of it’s kit. Support is a contentious decision but as there are 2 trees I can live with it despite disliking it as I can always take the other tree.
Finally there was the blazing and near universal hatred for the actual mechanical implementation of the support which can most charitably be summed up as:
'Would make a great new class built from the ground up to work this way but is hell on hell on earth when shoehorned over a very tightly tuned ramp (Disc) or a very busy spec (Holy)"
Expanding on this for holy, holy priests have to cast nearly 50% more healing spells than other healers like Shaman/Monk/Palain/Disc in mythic+ runs so there is not much bandwidth or GCDs for the very clunky implementation of the core mechanic.
On the other hand for disc their ramp up to big healing windows is so tightly scripted that taking even a few seconds out to try to use this mechanic would have been a disaster to healing throughput or resulted in mistiming the buff so other players gain little.
For me it’s the theme and the gameplay…
Prophet is even a better name for the hero talent. As we already have Prophet Velen as an example.
But I don’t like the idea of prophecies and future vision… It is quite boring. Give me Priestess of the moon or Pyremasters or Clerics…
I’m not a fan of Power Infusion primarily because of the constant begging for it through whispers and chat, I should be in control of how I use my abilities and make decisions without others telling me what to do with it. Honestly I’d prefer Power Infusion be updated and useful for the group instead of one player in the party.
Really looking forward to seeing what they come up with, also very interested in the Archon.
Thank god they’re reworking
15th they’re showcasing more hero talents so we’ll probably see Archon and maybe Oracle 2.0.
I could have sworn they said the 14th, but now I can’t find the article. Oh well.
I’d be surprised if we see the new oracle yet unless they had plan B ready to go to begin with and pulled it out of the drawer.
Dying to see Archon, so hopefully that comes out. Very curious to see the shaman ones too, especially totemic because I feel like it’s going to be more support stuff.
I still got a picture of it. 14th is the Development Update (guessing they’re announcing 10.2.6 release date).
Yea I sadly checked the ones out today and unless I miss em I didn’t see archon or updated oracle. Isn’t alpha soon and do they need to have them all out by then?
Also sorry for late reply I don’t frequent the forums much. I more so a reddit gremlin lol
While Oracle absolutely need to be sent straight to the trashcan(even the name should be scrapped for either Prophet or Clairvoyant), it is a bit unnerving that neither Archon NOR Voidweaver was presented. This leaves priest(and especially shadow) as the only class with no idea what is going on from here.
Seriously, every class but shaman, priest, and rogue now have 50%+ of trees show, with paladin, dk, druid(all 4 trees), evoker, and warrior having all shown.
On top of that I would say that only Mage so far is 2/2 ‘hits’ as far as thematic and fun go.
Edit: Unless of course the worst case scenario was true, and the “triple down on PI” joke meant that all 3 priest hero trees revolved around that hot garbage.
Oh I love it.
We are gearing up to be the biggest home run or the worst catastrophic failure and disappointment.
Hold on to your seats and take your bets everyone, we are looking to be like Icarus now. Will we get burned or will we make the landing?
Oh I am so here for this haha. Technically the only class that has no direction given. They are cooking up something fierce or about to toss it out the back and hope nobody notices lol.
I am firmly expecting melted wax and a priest shaped splat on the ground right now. I have been looking through all the trees released today and I am starting to see a strong pattern of terrible design that is at best boring and mechanically dull every time they have 2 specs that share no common talents or have a clear theme like frostfire to link them.
This makes me think that anything mixed with shadow will be trash for at least one of the specs similar to the Diabolist from warlock or amazingly dull for both specs like Shamans Farseer.
I was thinking more Hindenburg. Honestly at this point I wish they had just added 1 or 2 talents to each band and then given us 5/5 from leveling.
It really does feel at this point like Hero Talents were created for Mages and most other specs were an after thought, and that “Hybrid” hero trees like those for shaman, paladin, priest, and to a lesser extent druid all just kinda suck.
Thematically, I like Farseer. I’m also a pet class guy so I don’t mind having a spirit summon help out.
In terms of gameplay, I agree that most of these seem like utterly boring passives. Percentages that you’ll never see or care about in most cases.
The only real winner so far seems like DK’s Apocalypse Rider spec. It just looks incredible in terms of thematic and gameplay design.
I’ve mentioned this in other threads, but the whole system is akin to soul-binds and azerite traits. It’s going to be a balancing nightmare.
The new trees are more akin to soulbinds if anything, but instead of getting 3 for each spec, you only get 2. Also, it’s very likely that one tree is going to be meta for every spec kind of how it was during SL.
I think short term during the next expansion the trees won’t be hard to balance because Blizzard is pretty good at tweaking/adjust classes with hotfixes and patches. I just don’t want to see another situation like that ridiculous god comp crap during S2 this expansion.
Long-term I want to know what the plan is because 3-4 expansions from now what are the talent trees goign to look like? Are we going to have the regular talent tree, hero talents, and 2-3 other systems squashed on-top of it.