That part’s obvious lol. But somehow, after hanging with the same crowd for 16 years, Blizzard still doesn’t get that PEOPLE WANT TO SUCCEED. They’ll keep trying to tame the playerbase, and the playerbase will keep hating them, and the cycle repeats until Blizzard messes up bad enough to go bankrupt.
1 Like
Pull the Ripcord, New Devs
2 Likes
Seems like the whole game is designed by spreadsheet nowadays.
Lmao at this nonsense.
Everyone who disagrees with my poorly reasoned opinion = entitled.
2 Likes
Ooof, okay. We are squabbling about the results. But we both know that the game is being reconfigured to push accessibility. So given this perhaps we can agree that this is a driving component of the expansion. GIVEN THIS, its not exactly difficult to conclude the following: First, although the meta will reassert itself, the driving philosophy is not to cater to this. Its to encourage uptake and will very likely be built around this (given we’ve established this as the fundamental reasons for these changes).
Now, they COULD still design around the very obvious reality that elite guilds will have multiple resources to complete the encounter with full and total efficiency, but as we’ve noticed, this isnt the philosophy theyre going for. What it seems to look like (hypothesising, hence the qualifiers) is that theyre going to build encounters based on the ideas of fixed covenants and locked in load outs. And this is what i think you guys need to be looking at because it strongly suggests a nerf to the difficulty level of the content you love.
Second, they’re looking for ways to pull players out of the solo game and into the group/instance game (‘accessibility to what?’ The group game obviously - the solo game doesnt need the barriers pulled down given its faceroll content). I dont think they want to design a single player mmo. But they’ve likely seen the trends of the playerbase into this type of content and its set off alarm bells.
So given these two aspects, the interesting question is how they can do this without completely messing up the most challenging content in game? Because the solution at the moment appears to be one of two things: 1. Make the effort (mythic tax/optimization) v reward (comparative difficulty) completely out of whack (what they seem to be doing). Or 2. succumb to those trends and prioritize the single player game at the expense of the group game (what they are flirting with).
You keep claiming without proof that Blizzard will design encounters around their casual-pleasing power system, and I’m never going to buy it. And, even if they do want to design encounters that would not favor any specific Covenant, they can’t. Even if they just fill a raid with 12 Patchwerk fights that all have 0 unique mechanics to cheese, some Covenants are still going to pull ahead.
There is no solution with their current design. It’s just going to be another power system that feels horrible to play with, and we can only hope the class design and transmogs can carry that system.
Okay, we’ll have to see i suppose. But… you do agree accessibility is a fundamental design philosophy of this expansion. And you do agree that encounters cant be built around optimum covenant abilities and players having 4 fully geared characters of each class without completely undermining this push to accessibility?
Okay, Mister Tough Guy. But here in big boy world, if you want your company to be successful then you focus on delivering what customers want. NOT on telling your customers that they are wrong for not having fun with your product.
2 Likes
I literally just said that EVEN IF THEY DO WANT TO DESIGN ENCOUNTERS THAT WOULD NOT FAVOR ANY SPECIFIC COVENANT, THEY CAN’T. Different boss mechanics will always make certain abilities better, and even if there are no mechanics whatsoever, some abilities will be better tuned for beating up a target dummy for 15 straight minutes.
They may or may not want to try, but even if they do, they’ll fail.
1 Like
More to the point where is ralph these days
That’s not what im talking about. I feel like we’re two ships passing in the night here.
There will be single encounters where certain classes, specs and covenants will DESTROY it. This is a given. But im talking about the entire raid where that person is locked into that covenant and conduit load out for ALL the encounters in that raid. The point is that the lock out means for total optimisation, you’ll be strongly encouraged to have several characters all renowned up, in each of the covenants for the extra power. You’re a hardcore raider, you know how this goes.
I dont believe they will tune around this. Because its an incredibly big ask for the mainstream playerbase (even the mainstream hardcore base). But when we throw in the overriding goal which appears to be accessibility. And now its very obvious this is not something they will design around. I mean, they still could, but its increasingly unlikely.
Again, we’re sort of cross talking here. I get your point. I dont disagree that its possible. Nor do i disagree that i could be completely incorrect. For example, theres no reason why the hardest encounters arent built around the most optimum spec whilst retaining access. The solution would be for those guilds to widen their roster. But 4 of each class per player? Its a heck of a tax to pay. So i dont think theyre gonna make you have to pay it.
ETA: Apologies, i realise i used the term encounters and not ‘raids’. So its my fault for the misunderstanding.
1 Like
To match the players who play by spreadsheets nowadays.
It’s also not new that players hate this. You can’t put the genie back in the bottle especially after the complete free for all that was wod. Current blizz seems determined to blame things they don’t like for the sub drop rather than owning up to the fact people love flying and swallowing their pride and implementing it immediately.
1 Like
The only nerf people cared about EV and that’s because it was the only random proc one that had any possible involvement of player skill even if a very minimal one. I’ve had logs where half are 95 plus others are 60s exact same level of play difference in the 95 plus ones td was 35% of my damage or more. In others it was literally 10% for td6 sometimes. That isn’t fun and very much takes away from any feeling of skill.
Magnificent 
2 Likes
You’ve literally managed to type out an entire essay without saying anything at all. So, what, you think they won’t make more spreadsheet bosses, but they’ll still manage to keep raiding hard? That they’re gonna somehow make challenging content, without challenging the player?
WoW isn’t an action game where you can facetank everything with a good iframe. It’s never going to be that hard to dodge a few boss spells. Without things like DPS check and healing check and priority adds, there will be no skill whatsoever.
Go to bed dude, you’re not thinking straight anymore
Very topical, too.
Blizzard’s “You think you do, but you don’t.” has aged very well… 
2 Likes
You dont get to tell people what they should accept or not. If they’re not satisfied by something they’re paying for then they have every right to complain, whatever Blizzard listens or not is another matter.
2 Likes
The current final boss has two phases where the ideal kill times are literally two 3 to 5 second windows that if you miss on either side make the fight far harder. Now imagine classes have 20% variance due to covenants plus the idiotic concept of variance being added back. Those windows are going to be even more annoying to consistently hit.
1 Like
Windwalker monks have killed nzoth as part of their progression groups multiple in fact by far the worst damage spec in the game. Many casual players have killed mythic nzoth at this point. The term you are looking for isn’t casuals it’s that you want bads to be able to do high end content which no amount of nerfing will ever enable because to hit that point it would no longer be high end content.