Thank you Ion for pushing for more RPG customization

[Ràlph-barthilas]

@Gaebriell-baelgun

While I think you are putting to much faith in Blizz balancing

I wouldnt say that, I know they balancing hasnt been great but the reason I support this is as an attempt to fix the broken community, less about the balancing choice aspect.

Though with how covenants work with soulbinds, conduits and abilities I feel the likely hood of one covenants to be good for everything pve isnt as likely or if it is it will end up having some conduit/soulbind swiftly nerfed which will instantly affect the entire covenant.

Though have you checked the soulbinds, venthy felt rly strong with the whole 4%, 15% stat buff from stuff, longer posts etc but after checking the other ones most of them have some interesting form of combat passives

Rn mostly aiming for the necrolord blacksmith since 20% crit for 10 seconds(with 1min icd, every 10th crit you do) can feels rly huge for some classes, though conduits and their power might change things but honestly the options if you go through them definitely are not as clear cut.

Mathematically best option will be found, no doubt about it, but I dont feel it will be the same every content/spec

[Sunne-area-52]

Oh dear, this isn’t a drinking game is it?

I don’t know if i could survive a GD one.

[Whiting-stormrage]

I drank every time I read community toxicity and I’m currently on the floor depending on auto correct to fix this sentence

[Sunne-area-52]

You’ll be in our thoughts and prayers

[Gaebriell-baelgun]

I guess we’ll find out. Either way it should be interesting. I used to be very against the system because I was worried about having to choose between fun class mechanics and personal story/rp/mog progression, but my thoughts have changed a bit so I’m more open towards it.

I still don’t think it’s going to go the way blizz is saying it will, I genuinely think they are pushing this so hard because they want to boost their time played stats. If they wanted to really go for an important choice/rpg route, I feel like there was better ways of doing it.

But once again, we’ll see.

[Monori-bleeding-hollow]

Do I honestly think that someone playing wow for the first time going from someone in their group getting loot every dungeon boss pre M+ is going to notice when their group gets 1 piece of loot for the entire dungeon. Yes, yes I do lol.

[Baridorielor-malfurion (Baridorielor)]

@Ràlph-barthilas

His latest interview with Bellular had him talk about the nature of soulbinds and conduits and their design goals,

Pretty interesting that your happy for Ion for speaking to somebody whom you described as this in this comment 11 days ago

@Ràlph-barthilas

Because unlike Bellular he isnt a spineless sub obsessed baby that never stands for anything because he might upset and lose follower count.

…Where you essentially call Bellular that, while praising the Tailsman guy.

But hey, I guess he’s good when it’s convenient.

@Ràlph-barthilas

and like I repeatedly said, the devs are going to a more heavy RPG DIRECTION,

A choice between multiple flavors of reps/order halls to be associated with, have access to varying powers/rewards to choose from and it’s own story to go though.

I know this isn’t the only thing that adds RPG elements to WoW, but i think your over-exaggerating it here by calling it heavy.

@Ràlph-barthilas

Ion understands that and he wants to add more interesting choices in game where people choose their own build because they gravitate towards that gameplay instead of copying what a guide tells them to.

Well sad to say, there are going to be some people out there that are are still going to copy from what a guide tells them to.

Though not everybody who copies it isn’t necessary a bad player. Like the medium of video games where Paradox Interactive copies EA’s city builder and get success, so can some players who does understand what the guide is in there. Will there be mindless followers? sure. But you lift up the good players who actually understands and succeeds, even if all he done was reading up a guide.

@Ràlph-barthilas

“The decision of how to customize your soulbinds in a way that hopefully makes you a little be different than other people”

Can’t help but feel that even Ion knows the “covenant identity” isn’t really all cracked up to be.

@Ràlph-barthilas

“The build you have gravitated towards that has these strenghts and weaknesses that ther eis a core of RPG customization that lies in those differences”

Okay Ralph, can you least do a post edit to fix some of the spelling mistakes here and there on your posts? I can read it just fine for the most part, but it just doesn’t look good for the viewer, especially when your quoting somebody.

I’m glad for that there’s gonna be strength and weaknesses whenever we pick something in Shadowlands. I like the idea the Corruptions were going for being pros and cons you pick in an RPG like you would for traits.

Just don’t be sad when guides come out to either point players in a direction, or a guide where it essentially details the choices and leaves the player on how to tackle it themselves, if the player desires to follow the guides.

@Ràlph-barthilas

*"“As opposed to if it is just a checklist

Regardless what you do, for some people it’s still gonna end up as a checklist. And it’s not really a bad thing. It can be fun for some people, cause, fun is subjective.

@Ràlph-barthilas

and everyone ends up ultimately being identical

Well yeah. You’re no different then the some shadow priest who joined the same covenant as you.

@Ràlph-barthilas

and you are either following the ““right”” path or you are doing it ““wrong””

To speak objectively, WoW does have group based content, and there’s real people playing the toons. Shocker, i know.

But regardless if you just copy the guide or just played your own way, if your lagging behind, or actively dragging the group behind with deaths, afk and so on, people don’t tend to like that and kick you out for it.

And regardless if you just copy the guide or just played your own way, if you do well or decent, or better, then you did just that and there’s no problems.

What’s the threshold tolerance of bad? now that’s subjective from person to person.

@Ràlph-barthilas

Honestly THANKS ION, this is a serious issue WoW has been suffering from a long time so fixing it by adding more real customization options for us non meta slaves is great.

I’l believe him when i see for it myself, and i’l thank him if it all works amazingly.

[Mellin-bleeding-hollow]

@Monori-bleeding-hollow

Do I honestly think that someone playing wow for the first time going from someone in their group getting loot every dungeon boss pre M+ is going to notice when their group gets 1 piece of loot for the entire dungeon.

And that person will either continue grinding for loot and feel satisfied when they get something, or they’ll get pissed off. It’s subjective, and not ALL new players, or even most I’d argue, will be turned off from that.

[Elementalry-boulderfist]

I’m convinced that the op works for blizzard…

[Korette-feathermoon]

Bellular video I won’t watch - pretty sure some fool at MMO will watch them all and put them in a nice condensed format that takes 3 minutes to read instead of making us waste 5 hours listening to someone akin to a used car salesman.

@Ràlph-barthilas

Ion understands that and he wants to add more interesting choices in game where people choose their own build because they gravitate towards that gameplay instead of copying what a guide tells them to.

If he truly wanted to do that he wouldn’t make everyone waste weeks of play time earning these. They could just give them to us day one and let people just do the content they are paying them for.

[Monori-bleeding-hollow]

Or they will quit because the game is dumb and takes too long to gear up. I’ve already broached the subject to people I was trying to get to come back covenants made them wary and the reduction in loot ended in me getting the nah we’re good which means I still have to play ff14 to play with rl friends sometimes sigh.

[Mellin-bleeding-hollow]

Then go play 14. Idk what to tell you lol.

[Oakenshroot-durotan]

@Theodas-hyjal

People are just going to use the conduits that give the most useful utility, the strongest survival and the highest DPS. Given the choice, people will always optimize the fun out this game.

Those things ARE fun, though.

@Hãwk-stormrage

@Nippyss-barthilas

It’s not just the mix max crowd

It’s pretty much anyone who’s highest priority isn’t RP

Nah.
It’s only tryhards and min max crowd.

On the flip side, if you care about the abilities you get about as much as an amoeba cares when it bumps into food, wouldn’t you be happy no matter what system they put in place?

[Stagspyre-wyrmrest-accord]

It doesn’t matter what they try to push in terms of customization. The player base decides what is going to be allowed and what isn’t. I don’t know why Ion doesn’t understand that. No matter what they do you WILL be x covenant or you won’t goto content.

[Epoch-azjolnerub (Epoch)]

@Korette-feathermoon

Bellular video I won’t watch - pretty sure some fool at MMO will watch them all and put them in a nice condensed format that takes 3 minutes to read instead of making us waste 5 hours listening to someone akin to a used car salesman.

Yeah, i despise looking up stuff for wow now, they are all youtube videos where I have to listen to someone drone on about crap i dont even care about. Its like going to a meeting at work, something they could put in an email they have to have 20 people there wasting an hour of everyones time. I miss the days of everything in text.

[Sallinia-emerald-dream]

@Epoch-azjolnerub

I miss the days of everything in text.

Wowhead has you covered there though. Bell is a bit droney but i think there are some pretty good content creators. When Preach did his first looks at classes in Alpha most of those videos were these short and sweet 5 minute snaps.

[Sallinia-emerald-dream]

@Ràlph-barthilas

You know very well that if covenants became talents the toxic wannabe elite problem would be even worse since they would change them for a m+, every single raid boss or pvp.

That would be ok if they community wasnt filled with toxic wannabe elitists who pretend they are world first raiders/m+ers while they are doing mythic months after its launch or at m20s rn.

I generally agree with your point. The problem that i see, though, is that the current system doesn’t prevent this situation from happening. That same group of people you describe are going to see their favourite MDI players playing with X covenant and Y soulbinds, and are going to gatekeep bsaed on that.

At least if it was a talent then it would be like 2 button presses if you wanted to do a dungeon for some reason with those people lol.

I just don’t see the “More RPG” thing as a valid reason. There are some Covenants abilities that you could say thematically fit a class. Maldrax as an Undead or DK, Bastion as a Paladin, Night Fae as a Druid. On the other hand, a Mage using Night Fae shifting power is “Drawing nature energy from bneath you”… like a Shaman. A Holy paladin being a conduit for Shadow Damage via Venthyr Ashen Hollow is pretty non-sensical. Sure it’s a meaningful choice, but it’s not really one you would see given for those classes in an RPG.

[Synsha-sargeras]

I’m going to link back to all these threads Ralph made about this system when he inevitably creates a thread about ‘tryhards’ and ‘elitist’ gate keeping him from participating in M+.

At that point… sleep in the bed you made.

[Nippyss-barthilas (Nippyss)]

And stop making the same post over and over again.

[Buz-alterac-mountains]

In before, it gets changed during 9.1 due to unpopularity with majority of the player base.

@Ràlph-barthilas

he wants to add more interesting choices in game where people choose their own build because they gravitate towards that gameplay instead of copying what a guide tells them to.

Oh, Blizz when will you learn.