#MakeItPermanent

[Kallox-draka]

@Rankin-shandris

The story is what makes them meaningful.

To you, maybe.

[Sabbia-moonrunner (Sabbia)]

@Gnomenclatur-detheroc

I appreciate this thread because it highlights a common misconception people seem to have about covenants; You’re not stuck in your choice, you’re able to change covenants. Many people don’t seem to get that.

Your renown doesn’t go with you.

[Kallox-draka]

@Sarvash-stormrage

And then we got covenants and as advertised and as tested they will completely remove something that shouldn’t be removed. Being able to pick a loadout for the content I want to do is not a unreasonable expectation

Sorry, you didn’t have a class until now? I don’t get how this is a new thing.

P.S. demands like yours are why we got the “bring the player not the class” that led to literally every class and spec getting copy-pasted abilities and feeling like one of a few designs.

[Papercutt-icecrown]

@Sarama-firetree

Ah, not really surprising for a pure DPS to stay put.

I was the guild’s feral tank in BC. Rarely changed spec, gets far too expensive to do so. After a time you gain a reputation of being a good feral druid.

[Rankin-shandris (Rankin)]

If they don’t have any impact on the story, then they don’t have any impact whatsoever. You might as well be picking out the color of your socks at that point.

[Kallox-draka]

No, I’m picking abilities, cosmetics… literally all the things people are discussing. Like what? If there was no choice beyond storyline, this thread wouldn’t exist.

[Rankin-shandris (Rankin)]

@Satryn-area-52

so far we don’t know what’s gonna happen on the upcoming patches

Once we restore the flow of anima, there will be even less reason for covenants to be so picky about who joins them or not.

@Satryn-area-52

how many things besides pets and mounts had any impact in the next expansion?

Pets and mounts don’t just stop working.

@Satryn-area-52

did shadowmourne? did sulfuras? did the legion artifacts?
we’ve always had " borrowed power " talents change, weapons and armor get better, but nowadays it’s a buzzword streamers started using and suddenly everyone thinks we’ve always had some sort of " permanent " power xd

Having an ability suddenly go away because reasons is not a good feeling. Just wait until the pre-patch when people lose corruptions.

[Sarama-firetree]

@Papercutt-icecrown

After a time you gain a reputation of being a good feral druid

I was holy for my guild, but did both prot and holy for dungeons or pug raids. Ret for bgs and other random stuff. The nice thing about the old server setup was you could have a good personal rep.

[Synsha-sargeras]

If this was a solo player RPG, I’d be 100% behind them being permanent. I’d also expect completely different storylines, and would be perfectly fine with power differences.

This isn’t a solo player RPG. This is an MMORPG… where your performance impacts other players. While only a tiny % truly requires the literal perfectly optimized characters to perform… the vast majority of players (imo) in general perform at least SOME level of improvement to benefit their team. There are both external AND internal pressures to at a minimum… not be a detriment to the team.

Because of this… covenants will very likely fail and will very likely be Azerite 2.0. I hope I’m wrong about this… but I’m pretty darn sure that I’m not going to be.

Ask yourself this question… why is it that sites like icy veins, raidbots, and wowhead (particularly their class guide sections) have become popular? It’s simple… people like to know, in general, how to play their class to the best of their ability. Heck, it’s why people even ask these questions in classic… the game that is so easy that a raid boss was killed with an entirely naked raid.

[Rankin-shandris (Rankin)]

You’re picking the colors of your socks and acting like the fate of the world depends on that decision.

[Papercutt-icecrown]

@Satryn-area-52

then covenants should be permanent? the idea behind making them tedious is to make it so you don’t switch constantly and the choice becomes more meaningful but you still have a chance to pick a different one if you regret it, like, I feel there’s a logic behind it
if you could swap freely with no costs whatsoever then you’d do it to be optimal and then what covenant would you be with? idk, the one that does x% more damage

@Rankin-shandris

Especially when covenants have zero impact on the overall story

so far we don’t know what’s gonna happen on the upcoming patches

@Rankin-shandris

nor will they have any existence beyond Shadowlands

how many things besides pets and mounts had any impact in the next expansion?
did shadowmourne? did sulfuras? did the legion artifacts?
we’ve always had " borrowed power " talents change, weapons and armor get better, but nowadays it’s a buzzword streamers started using and suddenly everyone thinks we’ve always had some sort of " permanent " power xd

Yas queen, spill dem truths!

[Kallox-draka]

@Synsha-sargeras

This isn’t a solo player RPG. This is an MMORPG… where your performance impacts other players. While only a tiny % truly requires the literal perfectly optimized characters to perform… the vast majority of players (imo) in general perform at least SOME level of improvement to benefit their team. There are both external AND internal pressures to at a minimum… not be a detriment to the team.

And yet it has had wildly different classes with varying performance in different kinds of content since its inception. Arguably its strong-suit.

[Gnomenclatur-detheroc]

I didn’t say that it did?

Renown does have catch up built in for people who start late or change their minds though. Because the philosophy has always been to allow people to change.

[Synsha-sargeras]

Exactly… So why are we adding ANOTHER level of strong discrimination? It’s unnecessary.

People already complain about X class being FotM, or Y spec being vastly superior to Z spec… Why are we adding another entire level of this?

[Sabbia-moonrunner (Sabbia)]

@Gnomenclatur-detheroc

I didn’t say that it did?

Ok? Guess that went over your head since you are so short. People don’t want to grind that garbage out again, even more so if you happen to be a class/spec that has to rely heavily on their soulbinds.

[Calmaf-sargeras-720927]

@Kallox-draka

I can tell you that even during BC I would never have considered respeccing while leveling, and only very rarely at max. Maybe once per major patch.

It’s not a “myth”.

You can’t compare vanilla-cata era talent trees to this.

The difference is that the talent trees were specific to the specs and lead to an ability that was inteted for that spec. You also had extra points to spend once you were done with your initial build. The classes had most of their abilities baseline and the talents were an extension of those abilities and the class itself. Most individual talents also weren’t as impactful as they are now, e.g. giving you a very powerful ability.

Nowadays we have specs completely separate and the abilites we previously had have been taken away from the class itself and put into talent rows of individual specs in a “pick one” style, which is the reason we can swap them around freely.

The covenant system doesn’t work in the current state of the game because it doesn’t fit with the class and spec system. Most covenants abilities only work well for one spec, and some only if you build that spec around that ability. So the covenant ability is essentially a soft lock to your spec and talent build, because the are clear synergies.

[Kallox-draka]

“just because you suck at making gold earning renown doesn’t change the fact it wasn’t cost prohibitive.”

Do you still wanna stick with that dumb sentiment?

[Sabbia-moonrunner (Sabbia)]

Not sure why you are targeting me, I never mentioned myself in any of that.

@Kallox-draka

Do you still wanna stick with that dumb sentiment?

[Kallox-draka]

I’m not targeting you, just pointing out your glaring inconsistency in the space of like 10 minutes.

You claimed gold repairs in classic were fine, because all the people in the thread who said they found them prohibitive just “suck” or were in guilds that “sucked”.

But then you think re-grinding renown to respec covenants is not okay.

[Synsha-sargeras]

@Calmaf-sargeras-720927

You can’t compare vanilla-cata era talent trees to this.

There’s another reason for this… the game literally isn’t the same as it was back then. And it hasn’t been anywhere close to the same for a very very long time.

If you want vanilla… go play classic. I hear they’re going to be releasing a classic BC as well. Go play that (I know I’m going to).