I’ve noticed two particularly striking trends since the first day and I feel like they are both at the hands of where WoW was taken from like MoP onwards. They are as follows:
I nearly never see anyone in the “wrong” armor class. I play Horde, so I don’t get to see Paladins (who used to wear robes all the time) but I basically never see Warriors in leather anywhere in their equipment. It’s all mail. There are factually several drops from the 10-30 range where you could or should be wearing leather as a mail class, statistically, and you are just going to find random upgrades that have way better stats than your current loadout. I distinctly remember swaths of pallies in high Int gear way back and it was usually robes because… robes tend to be Int gear
The [Tank/Heal/3DPS] mentality seems to have been cemented into peoples’ brains, as if any other composition cannot complete a dungeon, and all deviation is bad, and this one drives me a bit nuts. A lot of people have said to me that offheal-dps is no good and a secondary tank is no good. They are staunch and adamant about only running the exact formula that LFG forced. Also had groups just give up dungeons because “we can’t clear it with four people” which was a bit ??? for me. There is poison in peoples’ minds about how dungeons work.
Note that on the second point, this is not all people, just a lot of them. I’ve had most groups I’ve been with on my hunter actually request I have pet Growl turned on for emergencies, and that made me very happy. But it feels like so many people have been put onto train tracks either without realizing, or, they are unwilling to move off of them afterward. I’m really hoping that this can be changed over time, and I guess I wasn’t expecting it going into Classic for some reason.
I see so many Alliance Paladins in dresses, I’m starting to think they prefer the look.
To be fair, its the “optimal” one but yes it isn’t the only way. Dungeons without a healer are impossible though, and without a tank are far more difficult than people want to invest the time in for strangers. You’re more likely to get flexible groups with a guild team etc, but there are some configurations that really aren’t worth the time investment.
Cant speak for everyone but I have seen a lot more str on the mail items that drop then on the leather.
Also most pallies i assume are leveling ret so the healing cloth gear isnt as important and they just heal in there dps gear.
Also if you are solo leveling armour reduces the damage from all the mobs you face tank so if you have two similar peices the higher armor is actually pretty useful.
I’m levelling Feral which means that I want Agi/Str and my only options are Cloth or Leather. While there is cloth with Agi, it’s few and far between so primarily I’m in leather due to necessity not convention.
I wear whatever offers the stats I need. Armor type is irrelevant especially at lower levels.
Hypothetically you can complete a dungeon with any group of people aslong as you adjust playstyle properly but 1 tank, 1 heals and 3 dps make it substantially easier especially with pugs to successfully complete a dungeon.
All your complaints are not a result of “brainwashing” they are the result of the game changing. Classes wear the “right” armor class in retail because Blizzard fixed itemization. Tanks/healer/3 dps has always been the way five mans were designed; the odd compositions are the results of players being creative.
To me, it plays into the fantasy aspect of the game to have a tank and a healer in dungeon groups. But I’m not one of those people that thinks it HAS to be that way. And as a healer in most groups, I don’t mind healing dps with aggro at all. I even prefer a mob or 2 on dps sometimes.
I started playing on release day, and quit during Cataclysm. I played a warrior, shaman, warlock, druid, and hunter. My best friend and roommate at the time played a shaman, paladin, mage, and hunter. All in Vanilla mind you.
At least how it went on the three servers we played on in Vanilla, the convention was to only roll need automatically on the heaviest armor you could wear. You would ask the group regarding lower weight armors if you were competing against other need rolls, or announce your intention if everyone greeds an item.
As a warrior, I never too leather (or mail past 40) a leather or mail wearer already rolled need on. My pocket holy pally healer (best friend) did likewise that. And I cannot remember an instance where anyone did without asking first. I’m sure my fury warrior wore some mail and leather post-40. But I always deferred first and asked. Everyone else did too. You know… As far as sweeping generalizations can be made and all.
What are you talking about? If someone isn’t looking at what is optimal that’s a player issue, not a problem with retail. In retail as far back as when Blizzard started itemizing armor better players still had to choose the optimal stats. They still do today.
I’ve done a couple of dungeons with no tank so far…they went fine for the most part. I think sticking with the standard setup of tank/healer/3dps is just safer. Definitely have been in groups with alternate setups myself though…
