I think Covenants enhance player agency. Some players just don't wanna make a hard choice

[Battywash-area-52]

if it aint meta IT AINT NOTHIN!!!..lol, i’ll be taking all 47 characters i have now into random ones, and then mostly going with whichever is more fun

[Amorallus-area-52]

Except the Horde doesn’t give you a class-changing ability.

True but Covenants do it with abilities. Factions do it with racials and sometimes even what class is available to certain races.

Races themself do this in some people’s eyes.

"I want to play race X, but I can’t be class Y on it… "

[Rhoven-area-52]

Last expansion we literally had a raid where top guilds were race swapping entire teams to Goblins for Rocket Jump. Racial spells have always had an impact on performance.

[Kalzhun-thrall]

@Amorallus-area-52

True but Covenants do it with abilities. Factions do it with racials and sometimes even what class is available to certain races.

Racials aren’t as impacting as these abilities. Sorry.

That’s a true example of a 1% difference. The current state of Covenants looks to be a much bigger difference.

@Rhoven-area-52

Last expansion we literally had a raid where top guilds were race swapping entire teams to Goblins for Rocket Jump. Racial spells have always had an impact on performance.

Yes. I know that.

Let’s use an example. Let’s say we have two groups. Group A is a usual raid group, but they’re missing their big cooldowns like Recklessness for Fury Warriors or Combustion for Fire Mages. Instead, they are given rooting abilities.

The other group, has those usual big cooldowns.

You know which group will do better damage.

[Rhielle-sentinels (Rhielle)]

Races themself do this in some people’s eyes.

Racial spells have always had an impact on performance.

And races can still be swapped easily and quickly.

Covenants cannot.

[Rhoven-area-52]

So there would be no problem if you could pay $3 every time you wanted to swap covenants?

[Idun-wyrmrest-accord (Idun)]

How does picking a class not also lock you out of other paths? Should every class also perform identically?

Hasn’t that been one of the major complaints, that the classes all feel the same?

[Evevica-bloodsail-buccaneers]

How does picking a class not also lock you out of other paths? Should every class also perform identically? I thought WoW was an RPG not a fashion simulator.

The difference is you’re making that choice at the character creation screen. Everyone that picks your class performs at the same baseline ability as you do. You can change your spec and gear at will to perform optimally for pvp, M+, raiding, etc.

Covenants are different. What’s the point in swapping my spec if I picked a covenant that only has abilities that are optimum for my original spec? Now I feel locked into my spec. Ruining a major part of the game that enabled you to change specs on the same class.

Also what if I want one covenant story, theme, aesthetics… but like a different covenants abilities? We’ve already done this “experiment” with racials and its still killing the Alliance faction to this very day. Turns out people really do love to play their characters at the most optimum capability.

I wonder how many of those people in a top 100 guilds wish they could play their favorite race or faction and still be competitive…

[Fumu-malganis]

Why is anyone even arguing about this? Wether the difference is 20% or .2%, the playerbase will react the same exact way.

The hardcore and core players will look up on icyveins or whatever what the strongest Covenant for their given spec and role is and choose it mindlessly. The casuals will choose whatever looks the best with their tmog/mount/battle pet.

So it forever was, and so it shall be.

[Karat-anubarak (Karat)]

For me, a feature being compelling is a large part of it being fun. If it’s just a reskin of what we’ve always had… bleh. We have a ton of options for visual stuff already. It’s like piling yet another pet onto our mountain of 10k pets. It’s as common as water.

Now say if covenants opened up something big and new like (just spitballing here) armor dyes or major character model customizations or something, ok now we’re talking. But in their current state if you strip away the soulbind/ability stuff, covenants are about as interesting as soggy wonderbread.

Why does splitting the cosmetics from the abilities make choosing between abilities any worse if you don’t find cosmetics interesting in the first place?

For example, say you had a choice of one craftsmen’s guild from the factions that gives you the cosmetics and one warrior’s guild from each that give you an ability. You still have a meaningful choice between the covenants; you’re just not stuck with ugly 'mogs because you want an aoe ability over a pvp utility ability.

[Rhielle-sentinels (Rhielle)]

So there would be no problem if you could pay $3 every time you wanted to swap covenants?

It doesn’t solve the issue of people who like the aesthetics and storyline of a Covenant and hate the gameplay mechanics it gives. While it would at least be an easier way to swap, it does not in any way solve the problem.

[Hamstar-draktharon (Hamstar)]

Absolutely Blizzard would never nerf something after people went through the work of unlocking it! You should apologize right now to Blizzard for even trying to claim they would do such a thing!

[Rhoven-area-52]

If you want to play your character at the most optimum capability then half the classes are effectively worthless based on the content you are doing. You have to make sacrifices to be the best, that’s how being competitive works. Your choices aren’t dictated by personal preference it’s decided by the meta. If that’s what you value the most then that’s a choice you have made, I personally will be doing whatever I want.

[Stonegrove-moon-guard-940286]

What’s wrong with some choices not being as powerful as others in specific situations? As long as, generally across the board, they are fine abilities on their own, why does it matter that much?

If I’m building a shed in my backyard I’m not going to want to choose one and only one tool out of a hammer, a saw, a shovel and a screwdriver. Especially when I also have to worry about people rolling through and breaking it after I’ve chosen one. I’m going to want to choose the tool that’s best for the job that I need to do.

[Hamstar-draktharon (Hamstar)]

I keep seeing “player agency” being tossed around. That isn’t the choice between ascetics or abilities, that would be the choice of ascetics AND abilities. Do people not remember the Aldor and Scryers in BC? This is that x 10.

So in short I love the ascetic choice, but I hate how our new abilities for the xpac are tied to the choice.

[Amorallus-area-52]

And races can still be swapped easily and quickly.

Covenants cannot.

Rhoven was talking about something different.

I’m talking about Races restricting what classes can’t be played. You can’t play every class on every race.

“Races themself do this in some people’s eyes.”

[Amorallus-area-52]

You shouldn’t have to put up with less DPS just because you really like creepy skeletons.

There’s no need to have a positive and a negative rather than just two positives.

Race X has better racial for Class Y.

I like Class Y but I want to be Race Z.

This is exactly the same thing. Players don’t care if you can swap races or classes. They want to play Race Z and be Class Y but they’re not going to be as good.

This already exists in the game.

[Rebhe-whisperwind]

Please no. Wanting a change of scenery is one thing, we don’t need even more services as an excuse for poor design.

[Tywín-illidan]

I think the players are all outraged by the Covenant system because it means that you will be locked into what you choose. This is just what player agency is. Because YOU chose this covenant, it was YOUR choice to not go with the others, whether it be for gameplay reasons, power level reasons, or aesthetic reasons.

It’s the degree of restriction of this choice, in a game with hundreds/thousands(?) of combinations of content (Arena/BG’s/Raid/M+), class composition, and specs, where it seems unreasonable in it’s current form.

If all this game had was raiding and everyone was expected to select in particular class/spec for the duration of an expansion - then ok, the system would likely be ok.

But a lot of players choose their classes specifically because of the range of roles/specs that class offers - combined with the desire to want to play the game in it’s various forms across those roles/specs.

This is where the contention comes into play.

Player Agency can still exist if you allow for the flexibility of being able to change the covenant abilities - because the consequence of not having the other covenant abilities to use while you’re doing a piece of content will exist.

Choice and consequence; but confined to content - not an expansion. This is what players are asking for; in a game with TONS of content and a wide-array of ways to play it.

[Kalzhun-thrall]

@Amorallus-area-52

This already exists in the game.

But to a degree that hardly makes a difference.