Recently posted in the community forums:
“ Spark Bots on Mekkatorque were a lesson for us on the experiences of players who don’t have the option of using voice chat. Since then any time we make a mechanic with “hidden information” or other puzzle elements that require players to communicate on the fly, one of our requirements is to confirm through playtesting that it can be reasonably completed without using addons or voice chat. In Shadowlands this requirement has been applied for fights like Mistcaller, Hylbrande, Fatescribe, and Lords of Dread.”
Lords of Dread is absolutely not playable by a casual raid without addons or voice. Communicating in time as to who sees what and counting both to four is too slow, especially on Heroic.
If Blizzard feels that this is a good design for a mechanic, I implore them to rethink their position.
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I think what blizzard is saying is that they expect people who don’t want to use addons like the WA or voice chat can simply use the text chat.
As for heroic, Blizzard treats heroic as the “we want a challenge but not too hard” group of players. Which they don’t consider to be “casuals” in their eyes. LFR and normal mode is for that.
But I do agree that the only alternative method is not great. I always dread (no pun intended) fights that require some form of communication where only a limited about of players can see the information. Mistcaller is fine as everyone can see the symbols and work out which one is missing what the other 3 have. Hylbrande can be colour marked via flags (which anyone can do in a party group) or through text chat. Fatescribe, you could assign which rings people go to on normal and LFR, as anyone can do the rings on those difficulties.
In fact Fatescribe acts as evidence that Blizzard does consider heroic to not be a difficulty for “casual raiders” who just want to go in, kill bosses and get loot. As on heroic it is random who can do the rings. You cannot just assign people to do it in case that person does not get the buff that allows them to move the rings.
Wait are you counting heroic raid as casual?