I’m wondering if it might be a good idea to try to shift the narrative on the discussion surrounding the recent MoS/WCB change, and subsequent reversion. From Blizzard’s own post…
Maybe we can give them some of that discussion?
A lot of different folks with different goals play Classic Era so I think it would be useful if we could just outright accept the following…
- There are people specifically play Classic Era because they want a game that is a reasonably faithful reproduction of the Vanilla game.
- There are Alliance players who feel that, in order to remain competitive, they need to currently jump through hoops to get WCB for their raids.
To the latter group, MoS was fantastic because it was a huge time saver. However, to the former group, it was a deviation from the original Vanilla design that felt like an intent to have a Horde exclusive buff. I think it’s also fair to say that while it’s easy to proclaim #nochanges, sometimes we as players do need to be protected from ourselves. We certainly can fall into the trap of behaviours that we feel are necessary, but that in the end cause an overall negative experience for both us and other players. To this end, some changes could be worth considering.
So if we can all make an effort to accept the above two statements, which reflect opposing viewpoints of Classic players, can we envision a possible solution surrounding this? One that alleviates the strain the players in the second camp feel while also respecting the desires of the players in the first camp?
Even if we don’t land on a solution, I do feel this is a conversation worth having 
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Yes, I’d argue that the “trap of behaviors” in this situation is so many players having allowed parse culture to convince them that getting rend buff is 100% mandatory in order to clear raids and enjoy playing the game.
…and accordingly I’d argue that the “changes worth considering” are not changes to the vanilla game mechanics, but rather that players should change their priorities if they think the entire game is supposed to be tuned around the quality-of-life for parsers.
People need to break out of the behavioral trap of chasing buffs, not have the game altered to further facilitate the otherwise damaging patterns that have been developed.
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Convenience is a slippery slope. Nobody would be playing Vanilla unless it were a good game in the first place, and I certainly don’t trust the devs or community majority to make decisions that would improve on Vanilla’s theme. There’s literally nothing wrong with having a version as faithful to Vanilla as possible and starting new servers every year or so. Remove Layering, Remove Chrono, reinstate old ranking system.
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Alliance players expecting to have WCB on top of every other world buff in the game is a consequence of Chronoboon. Remove it from the game.
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While I agree with you, I also think people shouldn’t smoke. Yet they do, in spite of the health problems and warning labels everywhere all over the packages. I think sometimes people can’t help themselves.
Something else someone pointed out to me, which I think is fair…
Being competitive in WoW DPS is a fine thing to do. There are people who just like to try to be the best and I think that’s a good thing. However, if even one of those people then start getting WCB for that extra edge, now everybody who wants to compete for the best DPS has to do it also.
I think this is separate from parse culture… it’s normal for people to want to compete to be be the best, where parse culture comes in is that everybody else decides they also need to do it. People who have no intention of competing still pressure themselves, or others, into getting these buffs. That’s the behaviour that can, and should change, but it’s still hard because humans.
So for this reason I just accept that people feel compelled to get it and I can wrap my head around why this is maybe detrimental. Once you accept that though, I think you can start considering a change that could align with both types of players.
For example, my current thought is… what if Blizzard just disabled the buff entirely for Alliance? It doesn’t seem like Alliance was intended to get the buff to begin with, they just can through a quirk of mechanics interactions. I think that those exist in Era is a really cool thing, but they could disable this one thing specifically as a one-off if they wanted to. This would keep the design intent of the game intact but also keep the competitive Alliance dps scene on equal footing.
I’m not saying they should do this… it’s just what springs to mind when I accept those two statements above. It doesn’t seem to violate them in big ways and could be something that helps. I feel it’s worth considering at any rate.
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Behavioral traps are often the results of flaws in game design, and human psychology wont change just because we recognize them as traps, as evidenced by all of human history. Changing the systems and incentives is much more effective than expecting psychology to change.
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Alliance can only get the buff through a “clever use of game mechanics”. Its a horde buff, it was intended for the horde only. The alliance should be happy they can get it at all, let alone their own version of it.
What alliance parsers want is not something that warrants overriding Classic’s mission statement. There is no solution.
The answer for them is what it was a week and a half ago.
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This is why I wanted to start this conversation. We are Era players, we know what’s important to us and why we’re here. I think that if we can accept each other in spite of our differing goals for playing the game, perhaps we can consider something that would benefit all of us.
Like, maybe not, but I figure it’s at least worth the effort 
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…and accordingly I’d argue that the “changes worth considering” are not changes to the vanilla game mechanics,
I agree that changes to game mechanics should be completely off the table. Chronoboons and MoS are not changes to game mechanics since the buffs can be obtained in original Vanilla, the changes are just shortcutting the process of obtaining them. Druids using polearms is a change to game mechanics as druids could not use polearms in any context in Vanilla.
Part of the reason that any achievement in classic era has perceived significance is due to the investment of sizable amounts of time necessary to attain said achievements.
Being competitive in WoW DPS is a fine thing to do if the player finds that fun/rewarding/entertaining then great- but taking the time to go the extra 10 miles out to crossroads and getting mind controlled for a chance at getting the rend buff is directly part of the time investment required to make the achievement of a high parse meaningful.
Those who truly desire to perform their best are going to put the time in to get the rend buff regardless of the steps necessary, as they have been for years.
Is the original rend buff relatively inaccessible to the general alliance playerbase? Yes, and I’d argue that’s good game design because the buff was designed for horde players, not min/maxing alliance.
I’d completely support this. Disabling the buff entirely or making a ‘no worldbuff’ server where players can just raid with their gear/consumes and not feel compelled to chase buffs daily. And surely there would still be some parse leaderboards for that mode even despite it not having worldbuffs. I agree it seems evident at face value that the original rend buff was simply intended for horde players. Alliance being able to catch it while being mind controlled was likely oversight.
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I do think this whole situation reinforces why Blizz should not make changes before a feel from the community is made. It’s giving a kid a lollipop and then taking it back. Of course they are upset, you took their lollipop, they have every right to be. I don’t blame any person upset over losing MoS, heck using it on my rogue to level was amazing, but it should not have leaked into the game willy-nilly. Rend is a delicate buff for many reasons and the alliance equivalent was not only more in-supply but also superior in its accessibility and lack of restraint.
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nobody is talking about or mad about other changes to WCB that came in phase 2 of sod, why should they be mad at MoS?
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There’s lots of stuff that came with that patch that has yet to be reverted, but I think it’s a good idea to focus the conversation. If there’s stuff you have thoughts/opinions about, make a thread
I certainly have opinions of my own, but I wanted to focus on MoS here, and dig a little deeper than the current “GIVE BUFF PLZ” or “NO BUFF PLZ” split we seem to have now.
may i ask why it’s acceptable for one side to get a boon over the other?
what does alliance have that horde doesn’t?
and if faction balance wasn’t an priority why did alliance have a race/class combo removed pre-launch just to keep the race/class combo even between the two factions?
The core reason is because that’s part of the game’s design. Horde get WCB and Alliance don’t. Alliance get Paladins and Horde don’t. Horde get Shaman and Alliance don’t. And so on for many other gear items and racial abilities.
It wasn’t intended in this version of the game for both factions to be equal, or even equivalent. Whether we like that or not, that’s just how this game is and it’s part of the design that a lot of people are here for.
Not many games these days offer this kind of asymmetrical balance. Indeed, retail has even made it so both Horde and Alliance can group and guild together. Which is absolutely great from a balanced gameplay perspective but Classsic Era represents something that is tough to find. Losing that is undesirable for a large group of people who have come here specifically fo find that type of game design.
Hopefully that helps explain
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Its a horde only buff. Like, that was the whole point.
The alliance have access to it, its just not as convenient.
Lots of stuff and that cuts both ways so Id rather not make a giant list of every difference between the factions.
You’d have to ask Blizzard, I didnt make that change.
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in two of your three examples there are equals on the other side
as i mentioned in that post that you ignored, blizzard removed a race/class combo pre-launch to keep the factions race/class combos equal
So why is this the one thing that isn’t allowed to be equal?
We already know why they removed it, for faction balance they even said so themselves, and now people keep saying faction balance wasn’t a thing.
Faction balance was a thing in Vanilla, people just don’t want it in classic because “no changes” but there were constant patches and buff and nerfs for the 1.5 years it was live. for people to demand a bubble on a game where the player base is make or break seems silly.
sod phase 4 just came out, im talking about phase 2 changes to era nobody is even talking about or mad at!
it goes to show how the people mad about such change rly dont know what they are talking about, its just no changes for the sake of it…
revert every change including making wcb drop in more locations.
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