If you played legion there were Relics, did you destroy relics in legion for different relics? That’s all I’m saying for this system, people kept the same relics and didn’t destroy them to change them out.
Under this system, conduits can be changed without destroying them, but it’s on a CD.[quote=“Thunderçatz-zuljin, post:184, topic:596576”]
Well thats the thing, Blizzard is incorporating the Relic system and Essence system into one. It is not actually that terrible. Unless you literally are destroying Relics in Legion and hoarding the Relics, this system is a good balance between them both
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Sorry for confusion, should have made the point clearer initially. Referenced it more down the post, my mistake.
You style out your character for the highest possible content you hope to achieve. So for example, if you are an heroic or mythic raider, you optimise for this in both covenant choice and conduit load out on x-soulbind.
You are now locked into that covenant so you then have to either adapt with your current soulbind (and be sub-optimal), or use one of the other soulbinds to also be sub-optimal for the other content in game you do. And through this we break the meta in the more casual spheres because you have to decide on that load out every week and make a choice about your personal priorities that week. And the most difficult content is going to take priority by default.
And… i think its silly. One of the things you can point to in making the overall case for covenants is that the compromise of open conduits should allow for near optimal, or as-good-as-can-be optimal without a fully open covenant system.
Let me explain:
a) weekly lockout: You have one main loadout. If this isnt your mythic playstyle or spec, you have to use one of the other two soulbinds to create another workable spec.
b) No weekly lockout: You have one main loadout. You can still use any of the three soulbinds to create another functioning spec.
In the case of b) you have more control and options even within the restrictions placed on you by the covenant system itself. This seemed like a fair compromise. It allows Blizzard to say ‘you’re over-reacting’. You can still do exactly everything you already could do. But with this… well… it seems like its only going to make people even more vocal about opening up the system fully. Because, well, are they over-reacting?
I highly recommend reading the replies over there as well. There are some really good reasons that I haven’t seen in this thread for why the 1-week cooldown is bad. Things like:
Acquiring a brand new conduit but not being able to try it / reorganize around it for a week
Not being able to experiment with different combinations (at a training dummy, say) over a given play session
The issues about pure dps classes getting burned really hard by this, even in a single type of content
I can’t imagine this 1-week restriction makes it to live. They even make it clear what their goal here is, and why it doesn’t make sense:
Talent tree implementations are per-spec, and this currently is not. That alone should raise a red flag for them.
Yeah but let’s be honest here, when has that ever been the case? Maybe back in MoP/Cata? That blizzard no longer exists sadly.
I feel the same way. The more I hear about Shadowlands, and the more that is revealed, the more unsettling it becomes and the more skeptical of it being a good expansion I become.
That is the worst design I’ve ever heard of in my entire life…
Basically, they want us to be able to change if we change our minds entirely on how we want to play, or a major buff/nerfs happens. That kinda thing.
It’s less like Essence swapping and more like… what they said they’d do if people whined too much about the Azerite Trait Reforging costs (make it more restrictive [so people trying to abuse it can’t do that then whine about it], not less).
But you can just go swap your essence whenever you want. There is no cooldown on it, and I couldn’t imagine there being one. Azerite reforging costs never should have been a thing either. Just let people change stuff. I don’t get it.
No, I’m looking for some good explanation. Maybe I’m missing something.
So you’re saying that not being able to change your conduits makes it so that your choice in that is less impactful on your in game performance, and that you picked it because it’s fun to you? Ok, I see a lot of holes in that theory.
For starters, what if you pick it and it’s not that fun and you’d like to try something else? Oh dang, you can’t. Not for another week. Oh well.
I don’t mind RP elements in the game, in fact I encourage them and would love to see more of them. Not being able to change your conduits is in no way shape or form an “RP” element at all. It’s an arbitrary time gate. That’s literally it. The game would be better off without it and it’s only there to… well, uhm… I’m not sure on this.
No one is complaining about nothing. People are complaining about things that they find important and care a lot about, in hopes that they be changed for the better. No one was asking to not be able to change conduits, and no one was saying that they don’t want the ability to swap soulbinds or anything like that. It does nothing positive for the game, there is no net overall enjoyment increase with it being in place.
I hated random legendaries in legion, that’s not what legendary items should be. Some random enemy dropping legendary gear? Absolutely absurd nonsense.
I don’t run to websites either. I just play the game, and if I feel like it and want to get more out of the spec I’ll check around and see if my build is “optimal” and if not, what changes I can make will change it in what ways. Do I skip over a fun talent for a 1.82% throughput increase to something that’s less enjoyable? No.
Nothing is wrong with a guide.
However there will be even more strict and rigid guidelines on conduits when you’re unable to change them. If you can just go back and swap them over, then it’s no big deal. But if you’re not able to change them often and can only do it once a week, people will be seeking out these guides more often than they would have. It’s simple logic.
You love using the word spreadsheet. What’s wrong with spreadsheets?
You said yourself that an MMORPG is supposed to be dynamic. How do you react dynamically to a situation or encounter when you can’t change your conduits? How is that dynamic? That’s the opposite, …cimanyd? Yeah, it’s that.
I’d love to hear those three reasons of how having a cooldown on conduits makes the game better. Really, I would.
stupid system. unless they can absolutely guarantee that affliction and demonology, or outlaw and assassination etc etc etc are going to perform equally… Then I want to be able to change specs.
It’s just going to force people into meta builds and going on a website to find the best ones. Especially now because of this. It’s just going to reinforce something that Ion himself said he was trying to move away from. It’s seriously like they don’t understand how human nature works. Everyone is going to try to fit in as to not stand out so they can play with everyone else. This change makes it absolutely more viable than a system like essesences even though those are also kinda crap. At least you can freely chang them. This is more set in stone. Think about Vanilla and how certain classes are memes because of the meta and that is what will happen to specs. As they are now, but worse because it takes a week to change them. It’s things like this that make me question why I still play this game.
Exactly. It seems that they think not being able to swap around conduits will encourage players to just “pick whatever” when in reality it does the opposite. You can only pick once? Better be damned certain you pick the right ones.
That is because the game design lets players do it.
It is not even about human nature it is the system they got in place that does it.
If they make it where you can’t share acheivements, and armory is private for everyone. Breaking raider Io and other addons. forcing it to only work for guild members, And making it where building a group you can only go by item level not anything else. Slowing down the flow of info into puggings. I bet you that would FORCE the community to either change, or make groups a ton slower than they do now.
Speed or quality. Group finder has done both, and taken the place of guilds. I’m hoping Blizzard understands this one day.
Ok but why not? Still no one has provided even a semblance of a reason for their “vision” in regards to the 168 hour lockout on conduits. I don’t see any valid reason for a cooldown at all.