I think the class balance was so bad this season with prot paladins, disc priests and aug evokers being the only classes that can push high keys that it had a severe negative effect on mplus being overtuned specifically with regard to the nerfs handed to all the other tanks and healers.
I think this game needs an entirely new class balance team that is completely independent from the current one with a fresh set of eyes.
Its one thing in a new expansion with new hero powers to have some overperformers but when you reach midseason and youre looking at nerfing a holy paladin by 5% heal nerf and then instead giving them nerfs to the mana cost of their beacon while discpriests are killing it in mplus and evokers were at the top of the hps charts in raid, it just seems like the current class balance team doesnt play the game.
I would start by reversing literally everything done this season from the key squish, to the tank nerfs to the nonsensical incongruent ramps in difficulty around affix buffs disappearing plus double modifiers.
The people I timed my 12 nw with still did not know the mechanics of the 3rd and 4th bosses. Its pathetic.
Watching madskillz fail hopelessly in a 12 on an hpal on ptr when he had timed 13s and 14s on his rsham was entertaining tho. “why would anyone play this”
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Every season will have preferred specs if you push key level high enough.
You can do a 15 right now as pretty much any spec in the game. It’s actually far more balanced than it appears.
Blizzard is never going to balance around the top .01% of players doing 3300+ M+, nor should they.
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Sorry but I’ve got to agree for once with the “Fix the balance plz” guy
Since Augmentation release (which was a mistake btw) balance has been horrible, with them being tier SSS+ on every patch and making the gap between specs even bigger than they used to be
I’ll double it. If augmentation didn’t exist prot paladins would be replaced by warrs and dudus this season, same for disco, who would be replaced by both rsham and MW
Except that they are balancing around the top 5% with the recent changes, that isn’t much better or all that different.
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The lack of changes and unusual amounts of spec dominance definitely made the season worse
Aug being giga S tier every patch is just getting exhausting
I mean at this stage, just fire Ion. His goals are erratic, and he rarely if ever listens to real feedback
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If he survived Shadowlands, then he’s not going anywhere.
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Yeah, I doubt he’s going anywhere as long as this relic of a game remains profitable. He is essentially achieving stuff that no one has ever done before. I mean, there is no other game out there this old that can still demand a sub
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FF14 is 6 years younger, but still going strong… so not necessarily true.
So its not “this old”? Quantification is important. Also, 6 years is HUGE in game age. And FF14 actually re-released in 2013, so its really 12’ish years old vs 20. Which is even more drastic
Aug just isn’t that big of a deal this season until 12+. And that’s the top 1% of players. Next season it’ll be just another ranged dps spec.
Not sure what you mean. What are they doing around the top 5%?
FF14 also plays like molasses whereas WoW has played amazingly since the early days. It’s one of the core reasons this game has survived to today whereas FF is struggling to make content harder/more dynamic without outright agitating their player base. IE: the fall guys event.
Sure but there’s a reason some specs are meta and preferred by the top end…they’re just better for M+ and that trickles down to 10’s and below.
No matter the key level why wouldn’t someone favor the best specs to make the run easier?
One suggestion I’ve seen to is to remove Lust/Hero from the current classes and give it to every healer spec. That way it’s always available. At least it would be a start.
Why do that when they can just add extra action buttons to every dungeon/raid and then everyone has it.
If its not tied to class fantasy then dont tie it to any class
A lot of the time the reasons specs are chosen for 20s doesn’t make them good for 10s and below. Aug is a good example - it’s really not a great spec in lower end M+. Not until 12+ does it become super strong, and that’s only when you’re running it with other specific specs. People copy the meta and that’s an issue, but it’s not always because of raw strength. And they just need to make drums almost as good as lust. Drums giving 20-25% would make it not a big deal to skip lust.
I’ve been posting for 3 years now that they need to hire just 1-2 ML / AI engineers to design a class balancing tool.
Don’t listen to anyone who says perfect balance is not achievable
That’s garbage.
Class balance is very much achievable with the amount of data we collect in Warcraft logs and raiderio and it wouldn’t be that hard to develop a ML model that can arbitrarily tune the classes in all content.
How many classes/specs are making it to title in M+? Are any of them not represented in Mythic raiding?
I’d say that’s all that matters balance wise. Else the issue with random pugs is IO > ilvl > spec. Playing a non-meta class and/or not having lust has a chance to diminish your odds of getting into a group.
Nearly all the balancing being done is based around high mythic keys, higher rated PVP, etc. Typically anywhere from 5-10% of the game population.
Hahahahahahahahahahahaha.
Current AI gets even basic things wrong all the time now. There’s no way that they could balance 39 specs to be equally potent across all skill levels, gearing compositions and encounters.
Because it fits an RPG to have Lust be an ability brought by a Class instead a gamified solution. Giving it to healers would also make it more punishing to go without a healer.