Oh boy so ticked off, much hate.
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I know. Calm down Bruce Banner.
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That’s my secret, Cap’.
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In theory. But 15 years of poor balance has proven otherwise.
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Indeed, and so will shadowlands bring and keep more casual people who are into decent rpg systems like covenants and fun solo content like Torghast while the number of tryhard wannabe elitists that will be making ragequit posts in the forums won’t be relevant.
The game is becoming better, the high end can leave if they can’t handle not being optimal at everything
Covenants is not a decent system, also is this game MMORPG not only RPG which maybe explains this further to you so you might know why this system is doomed to fail.
Torghast no one actually has a problem with it sounds fun for every kind of player.
No one cares about casual ragequit posts too. It is just that the forums are full of casuals and think that they’re entitled enough to cater the game to themselves.
And with this sentence you can’t prove yourself more wrong than you already are.
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I’m scared to know what your version of the game would really look like.
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I agree with Hazel’s take on this. I hope they listen to them instead of preach.
But as it stands if you choose the wrong talents and gear you won’t even get to raid at the highest level in most cases since you won’t be hitting hard enough to even get to the highest level.
The difference now if you choose the wrong AZ pieces, talents, corruption and essences at the same iLVL could be as much as half what the top players are doing. It could be even less, like my druid sitting at 468 iLVL and doing 30K in feral and balance spec because my AZ and corruption is not the best for DPS.
Compare that to the top DPS doing 4 times as much and not only will I struggle to get into a raid group, but with that DPS I would not even be able to down many, if any bosses.
There is a reason why we sim stuff and why we choose what works best.
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I think the key to Preach’s philosophy is player flexibility. Players deserve to be able to experiment with their class at little or no cost to their time. Keep the game play in the utilization of your character and not in the customization.
Preach raised the example of experimenting with your abilities dictated by covenants as frustrating for the player. This experience makes the player feel as though they have wasted their own time or that they have to sacrifice time they have already committed to this covenant or another.
I’m a fan of covenants being a thematic divide for quests, cosmetics, achievements and other forms of permanent progression. I don’t feel they should be used as a grind mechanic that places a cost on mechanics customization.
I’m inclined to agree with Mike in this circumstance. Just my 10 cents.
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Look a little further past just the covenant and conduit, what if the class and spec you choose is no good? What if you need to start again because the warrior tank you have been playing all BfA is all of a sudden X% worse than other tanks and it only becomes prevalent when you start doing keys or raiding, than not only will you need to grind your covenant and conduits again, but your level and gear on top of that.
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Because Overwatch is a PvP game. Preach is mainly interested in PvE high-end raiding. I’m not aware of any MMO that has a team focused on end-game raiding content. That is dedicated to releasing periodic high-end raid content.
Agreed. I felt the visible frustration on Mike’s face when Ion was describing Azerite Armor change costs. Preach was visibly confused when Ion described the dev teams implementation of resource gating azerite trait changes without any valid reason.
Ion told him if he wanted to experiment they could make an area where they get to play around with stuff.
The issue is Preach doesnt want to “experiment”, he said it himself that he wants to spend some time playing 1 covenant in pvp because it is better there, then another for some other type of content and then another for some 3rd type of content again, because they are optimal in that kind of content.
Ion flat out tells him that you are MEANT TO HAVE STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES, YOU ARENT MEANT TO BE GOOD AT EVERYTHING
That isnt about “experimenting before making a final choice”, that is "I want to be optimal at everything and because the game allowed me to do this before It should so again"
I see your premise. But Ion’s argument about player agency seems to be a fallacy. There’s a difference between being optimal at all tasks at ‘all times’ and being optimal at some tasks ‘at specific times’ if you have planned for that circumstance.
Interpreting Mike’s argument to mean that he wants to be fully optimized at all activities at all times is not 100% accurate. Mike wants to be able to change the outcome based focus of his characters based on the activity he is doing.
This has in previous iterations of the game been completely within the players control and to be frank, I can see why some people simply see Covenants and Conduits as Azerite Armor 2.0.
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He also mentioned complete freedom removes choice because many people would go “Oh its X boss, time to change covenants to the one that fits the situation better”
What you are saying isnt wrong, but that isnt what Ion was saying, Ion and the team DOESNT WANT people to change based on circumstance, which is why he viewed the azerite reforger as a failure because it didnt deter people enough to stick to their advantage:disadvantages.
That means it is something I ve been saying for a long time, in an RPG similar to dnd you build your character for an adventure, you specialize, you have strengths and weaknesses and then it is up to the group to find how to deal with circumstances.
You arent meant to change everything to fit circumstances, you arent meant to play the game by stacking 10 fire mages for example in a raid fight because of course blizzard hasnt balanced the fight against people stacking fotm, they have balanced it around a healthy comp of different specs
One would argue abomination link for DK is going to be the absolutely meta best choice for pvp, now he didnt give another example but if he went “Oh and this aoe ability is rly fun for m+ and I want to use it in m+” it is pretty much about optimization.
If he said oh i would like to use abomination’s limb in a pve environment I would concede where it is up to creative non meta uses, but he went str8 to pvp so I have doubts he didnt honestly clearly imply he wanted to use what is best for each content.
windwalker this tier disagrees so does marks and survival
I’m actually in favor of systems not being changeable on the spot. In most circumstances I can imagine players don’t play at a level where re-building your conduit and changing your covenant abilities per dungeon or raid boss is necessary.
However; timegating or placing arbitrary expensive costs on changing your covenant can’t be the solution to this. Blizzard have already prevented players from re-speccing their classes when not in rested zones and this solution is more elegant.
My (and I’m certain Mike’s) concern predominantly revolves around restricting player flexibility on a macro level as opposed to a restriction that prevents a player from min-maxing ‘in the moment’.
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That is the issue the community needs to realize, the ONLY time where people NEED to do something like that is at world first level which like Ion said is a whole different thing, and ultra high m+ aka 25+.
Anyone doing anything below that doesnt NEED to rebuild everything, but many WANT even though they dont need to, and refuse to accept they shouldnt be allowed to play the game in such a way even when the lead dev repeatedly says you are meant to be optimal at some stuff, sub optimal at others, not optimal at every circumstance by changing things.
Like Ion said this wont happen, they learned their lesson from azerite reforger which is why they said they wont do that with conduits so we are expecting them to have a system where there’s some sort of semi permanence.
So maybe timegating, changing conduits every week? Dunno
I dont feel that Mike is saying that if he coincidentally ends up playing AoE heavy covenant for 2-3 days on m+, single target damage covenant for 2 days for m+, and pvp looking covenant for 2 days for pvp, that is still optimizing for circumstance.
Let me explain what Ion seems to be saying because I ve been saying the same.
You build a character for your entire wow journey, not just one encounter, you have strengths and weaknesses and play the ENTIRE game like that, you may choose to change your playstyle by playing around with soulbinds, talents, conduits if you dont enjoy it anymore to find a different build you enjoy. You are meant to GRAVITATE by his words towards a build, not make your build to fit circumstances.
Example, I ll be playing necrolord Spriest, their ability is AoE focused, that means I ll be optimal for m+ but sub optimal for pvp and any long single target fight from tyrannical m+ to many raid bosses.
But I will still be doing keys during tyrannical as well as raid as well as casual pvp, will I be sub optimal for some single target bosses like shadhar? Yes, but that is how you are supposed to play the game.
I see your points and if this is indeed going to be Blizzard’s approach to ability and player power customisation then that’s fine. It’s good to see that Ion addressed the rollback of conduit item destruction - but I don’t see how this addresses or allays players concerns with player covenant progression itself?
Your above example makes sense to me, and just to clarify - if you are able to effectively switch your characters effectiveness from Mythic+ optimisation to PvP optimisation without having to essentially re-grind covenant abilities, then I am all for this.
Time will tell I suppose, but Ion’s rhetoric makes it sound like he is dug in on Covenant investment as a ‘player choice’ that cannot be easily adjusted to suit a players preferences with ‘reasonable’ cost to the player.