The War Within: Tier Set and Hero Talent Concerns (Illusion of Choice)

Community General Discussion
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Last night I was pondering how tier sets are going to be handled in The War Within. As I thought about it, I started having some concerns about how tier will be handled with the addition of the upcoming Hero Talents.

Currently, tier sets have bonuses that are specialization specific. However, as more of the hero trees are revealed, we are seeing that each Hero tree is leaning more heavily into certain talents and/or active abilities for the classes.

My concern is that, depending on how tier sets bonuses are designed in TWW, there might be some issues with the hero talent trees and the “illusion of choice.”

For instance, let’s take a look at some of the Hero Trees released for Restoration Druid. They’ll have access to Wildstalker, a hero tree that interacts more heavily with their HoTs and DoTs. Alternatively, they’ll have access to Keepers of the Grove, which leans more heavily into their Grove Guardian ability.

To illustrate my concern: let’s say the tier set bonus for Resto Druid is based around Grove Guardians. This will inherently put Wildstalker at a disadvantage, because the hero talents won’t directly interact with the tier set. In this scenario it is likely that Keepers of the Grove would be significantly stronger due to increased interactions with the tier. Hence the “illusion of choice”.

However, the hero talents provide Blizzard another interesting way to implement tier bonuses in TWW. There will be the same number of “hero trees” as there are specializations. Instead of handling tier bonuses based on specialization, they could instead create tier bonuses based on hero specializations. So instead of Restoration, Guardian, Balance and Feral tier bonuses they would instead make Keepers of the Grove, Wildstalker, Druid of the Claw and Elune’s Chosen tier set bonuses.

This would prevent the aforementioned scenario from occurring and would alleviate concerns that a hero specialization might be “forced” (optimal) due to tier set bonuses.

I know I would dislike being relegated to use a certain hero tree just because my tier bonuses made me use it.

What are your guy’s thoughts on this?

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I doubt we will see Tier bonuses based on Hero trees. More than likely they will still be revolving around spec and class specific abilities/talents. If they do involve hero trees I can see them changing depending on Hero spec.

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Maybe they just shift tier sets to the hero trees instead of to spec like you said.

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They have said previously they are fine with designing tier sets that steer you into certain talent choices.

I for one think this is fine considering the seasonal nature of the current content schedule, but I can see why you might be left with a bad taste in your mouth if you have to play a hero spec you really don’t vibe with.

Ultimately you’re playing Blizzard’s game. :upside_down_face:

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Then we’re back to the same problem that covenants presented…

And some classes have Hero Talents that present a new ability, like Lightsmith for Paladin. Tier sets that continue to only benefit baseline abilities will mean hero trees like Lightsmith would likely not be competitive. Alternatively, a tier set that only interacts with Holy Armaments would make Herald of the Sun less competitive.

It gets worse when you consider some hero trees are already generating a lot of disdain. Holy/Prot paladins being forced into Lightsmith due to a tier set would be problematic, as that hero tree is already looking to be problematic, and is considered DOA unless it’s changed.

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This is actually a rather clever way of circumventing the issue, and since the Hero Trees are already tied to a certain style the Tierset could play into that same style a bit further.

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I know for a lot of players covenants presented a major issue in the shadowlands progression system, and I feel the same, but to compare the two is silly.

Covenants had an arduous time-wasting process for changing literally ANYTHING if you wanted to minmax. You had to go to Oribos, flight path to your sanctum, change your conduits/soulbinds, fly ALL THE WAY BACK to wherever you’re going, then you can do the content.

Secondly, god forbid you wanted to change your covenant. FLY TO ORIBOS, ABANDON, GET A NEW ONE, FLY TO SANCTUM, CONGRATS NOW YOU HAVE A WHOLE QUEST LINE AND REP GRIND TO RE-DO.

Compare this to hero talents.

With hero talents, you swap them out freely. If one is stronger, your character has to glow blue even though you prefer red. You might have an extra button you’re not used to pressing.

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Yes, hero talents can be changed on a whim.

But the illusion of choice presented by tier and how it will interact with hero talents is still a problem. You can dismiss it as not a problem, which you clearly have.

But if TWW launches and I am “forced” to play Lightsmith when I want to play Herald of the Sun because a tier set made me to play optimally or remain competitive I will consider the hero talents a design failure.

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And likely an equal number of players will be stoked that lightsmith gets cool stuff.

I didnt particularly feel excited to be forced into throw glaive talents on my main, a DH, but it’s fine because it’s just for one (now two, lol vote) seasons and it’s not like blizz tried to intentionally cramp my style. And eventually I came around to it anyway because, surprise, they made it pretty strong (probably too strong).

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I think you have a valid concern OP, but I do feel the need to point out that there will always be an absolute best setup, and that holds true even now on live.

I think theres a REAL chance that the community will, as it always does, take offense if someone is playing suboptimally, even in content where it doesn’t matter. A possible example being that a pally gets removed from a 20 for being the wrong hero tree.

And that pushes further the higher you climb, with many specs at any given time being “unplayable”.

Hero talents are just another layer on an illusion of choice that has been here for almost as long as the game has. But i am obsessed with higher end content, the moment I saw hero talents I knew I would be picking the most optimal, and not the most cool.

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Please review the feedback threads in the Paladin forum and related wowhead articles about Lightsmith and get back to me on that. :roll_eyes:

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These forums are not a majority of the playerbase lmfao its mainly sweats, nerds, and furries.

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Paladin players are also notoriously crybabies if they cant be daddy’s perfect spec at all times.

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I don’t think the Tier sets will be Hero talent based, as the Hero talents are meant to be cosmetic and playstyle. With that thesis, it does not make sense for them to “force” players into the Hero talents at all, much less a specific branch, because of the gear.

I think they’ll leave them alone and the Tier bonuses will focus on other talents.

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I mean to some extent, yes, most players aren’t playing the game to a level where being entirely “optimal” is even a requirement. And many players are likely not even playing “optimally” even when specced as such.

But many players do at least want to remain competitive. The concerns about how tier and these hero talents will interact might, depending on how they are handled, create a lot of unwanted friction among players.

There’s already a slew of complaints about being forced to take certain talents people don’t like with how tier has been handled in DF. It would be a shame for the shiny new hero talent system to be similarly tainted and create possible backlash towards the game/expansion because people will feel compelled to take a certain hero tree they don’t actually want to play.

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I actually 100% agree with you. I def have a very biased view of the game, I’m that sweaty mythic raider, and I absolutely skip the middle man and pick the biggest number.

Because of that, I have been very aware of the lack of choice when being optimal, and after yesrs of exposure I treat it as an unaddressable flaw with the game. But I would like to know how others feel about it, so I do appreciate this thread! I often feel as tho the more standard wow player (like heroic raid, highest key is maybe a 22) cares more than I do about optimization being annoying. My assumption is because they value theme more.

In example, I think shadowlands would have been way more liked if covenants werestrictly cosmetic. I played lock the full xpac, and night fae was set and forget, wouldve loved to be necrolord.

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You act as though talents and even playstyles are optional here and now…this is only true up through queue content or at least until you reach general pug content. Once you reach even the beginnings of non trivial, it is more or less expected that you are following what the spreadsheet dorks have tabulated and say is the best and unless you got a friend group or are willing to be “that guy”, you’ll do it.

And we already see tier sets requiring us to pickup and use niche talents. My S3 set is losing a lot of power if one doesn’t use soul reaper…which is a capstone talent I’m not picking up even in a raid setting. In fact, for blood DKs specifically, they had to gut the S2 tier set hard enough to make us switch because the S2 set was more impactful and arguably powerful.

I fully expect content pillars and tier sets to otherwise force builds on players to the same degree we already have…1 notch below forcing the spell in your book and/or on your bar but absolutely tuned/undertuned with/without it.

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I literally acknowledged this in an above post…so no, I’m not “acting” like anything. And I’ve acknowledged that there is already disdain in DF from some players with how tier sets and talents have been handled.

A problem doesn’t go away just because it’s “been that way”, nor does go away when it’s doubled-down on with a new system that potentially may repeat the same mistakes.

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Given the opportunity, players will optimize the fun out of your game. This is just fact.

It’s mathematically improbable to devise two unique options that are precisely equal, let alone do that 40~ times with hundreds/thousands of different combinations.

Its a player problem if you want to call it that, not a design flaw.

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Just offf the top of my head: Tier sets could buff a 3rd class-wide ability not covered by the 2 hero specs.
Maybe druids will get a buff to… IDK Moonfire? an ability all druids regardless of spec can use.
Although this means that the tier will be class gear and not spec gear.