Weaponquickswap Authenticity for Classic stance swapping and weapon swapping

WoW Classic WoW Classic General Discussion
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I’m generally a heretic to the #nochanges crowd because I only care about changes that impact gameplay, but I’m strictly #nochanges when it comes to gameplay and this gameplay mechanic is dear to my heart as a warrior.

TL;DR: swapping 1 or 2 weapons in combat, including weapons swaps accompanying a stance change only consumed 1 Global Cool Down in vanilla and should work the same in classic.

Prior to patches 2.4 and 3.3, two weapons or 1 weapon and a shield could be traded for other combos of weapons while switching stances and only consume 1 GCD . Patch 2.4 changed how it worked and Patch 3.3 ended it completely.

There were two major addons that focused on this in vanilla: “stancesets” and “weaponquickswap”. Additionally itemrack and outfitter both fostered this functionality, but addons weren’t required as it could be macro’ed to work and was used by most raiding warriors.

The changes to this were made in post vanilla particularly because of rogue “poison swapping” addons and not really in reaction to the way it worked for warriors or other classes.

This ability is vital to classic warriors playing authentically as they did in vanilla. It greatly enhances the ability of dps warriors to swap a shield on and tank in emergencies as well as augmenting tanks’ ability to dps. It also significantly impacts the ability of druids to peform multiple roles.

If this ability isn’t authentically replicated in classic, it’s a huge nerf to all melee classes and, in particular, it handicaps warriors and druids as the effect it has on stance swapping (a core warrior/druid mechanic in vanilla) in both PVE and PVP.

I’m just pointing this issue out here in hopes that others will take note and hopefully ensure that it isn’t overlooked by blizzard in their quest for authenticity. Breaking this functionality would be a much larger game play change than the removal of spell batching would have been in both PVE and PVP.

For reference taken from wow.gamepedia:
patch 2.4.3
Equipping an item will now cancel any spell cast currently in progress.

API_EquipItemByName
When in combat this function now "picks up" the item instead of equipping it, similar to PickupInventoryItem. Out of combat, the function behaves as expected. This change was made to address the issue of rogues using "poison swapping" addons to increase their DPS.
Modern equip macros work like this:
/equipslot 16 Weapon Name
/equipslot 17 Shield Name

/equipslot is the same as dragging an item from your inventory into your character sheet.

I know that this issue isn’t as widespread as spell batching because it’s limited to melee classes and most impactful to warriors, but I hope that it’s not overlooked because it is a hugely impactful vanilla mechanic and core gameplay for melee classes.

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I can see no reason why they shouldn’t re-implement this into the game. It will be critical for avoiding wipes in raids. That couple of seconds difference can make all the difference if the MT dies and one of the OTs who is swinging nightfall needs to pick up the boss without getting crushed.

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You’re 100% correct this must be preserved.

I did some research and found that in early Vanilla there was no GCD at all but this was added because rogues were actually able to ambush with swords due to the lack of a GCD.

Both states are authentic, but the game state with only the GCD is has the longest in game persistence so it’s the most logical if the two real Vanilla game states.

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Some Follow up from the classicwow subreddit, Creddit to u/BlorgWithAPan:

reddit thread is at https:// www. reddit. com /r/classicwow/comments/b77cs6/weapon_quick_swapping_a_no_changes_issue_i_am/ek16m8w/?context=3

I did a fair amount of research on vanilla realms and on the Demo engine that Blizzard gave us. I simply wrote the same as above in my own words to make the concept understandable.

The following is how GCD’s should work in Classic.

Any weapon or item that is labeled as an “Off Hand” does not trigger a GCD upon equip. -this includes shields

Any weapon that is labeled as a “One-Hand” or “Two-Hand” triggers a GCD when equipped during combat. A GCD that is started by equipping a weapon during combat, causes no other weapons to be able equipped until the GCD has completed.

If a spell or ability is used while in combat a GCD is triggered as always. However ANY WEAPON can be equipped during this GCD. The act of equipping the weapon disregards the ability/spell GCD and begins a new weapon based GCD during which no action can be taken. Any weapon swap can take place during a cast and causes no GCD.

The following is how GCD functions on the Demo Engine:

Weapon swap during cast is impossible. Offhand swap causes GCD. -includes shields

If you use an instant ability such as Hamstring, and swap to an “offhand” or “one hand” during the GCD. The weapon is equipped instantly.

This last one seemed very broken but was how the game responded.

Going to do much more research but it’s High Time that a conversation gets going about this. We can’t let this slip through the cracks

To which I noted: Appreciate your in-depth analysis on this and your help in keeping this alive I think there maybe an error in what you said is how it should work in vanilla but it may just be my tired brain not understanding correctly

In vanilla you could go from a two-hander to dual wield in one gcd and change stances or go from 1 set of dual wield weapons to a to a different set of dual wield weapons
. . .

“In vanilla you could go from a two-hander to dual wield in one gcd and change stances or go from 1 set of dual wield weapons to a to a different set of dual wield weapons” This is correct, i believe I just worded differently and didn’t include stance swap possibility.

I main a warlock so I felt strange testing this but I tested for quite a few hours before becoming positive of my work/research.

The main two things that are the most drastic are that items labeled “Off-Hand” shouldn’t trigger any form of GCD ever. And they do on the new engine. (Biggest problem presented here is that warriors cannot go from Dual-Wield to Sword/Shield without having to wait on a global. And rogues would not be able to swap from a PvP item such as from a ‘Skull of Impending Doom’ to an Off-Hand dagger shout waiting on a global.

And that weapons should be able to be swapped during a cast with no GCD, but with the new engine they can’t be swapped during cast.

I’ll write up a strongly and clearly worded summary tomorrow and post that on the Blizzard Forums. I have also brought this issue to the attention of Two Classic Content Creators in YouTube I hopes of sparking a larger conversation as it IS something that NEEDS to be verified and/or fixed by Blizzard.

In any event, we need to keep this issue alive not only for how it affects the core game play of warriors and druids, but also for the impact it has on casters and rogues.

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I’ve tried everything so far and if you Open with an Ambush with a Dagger obviously and try to swap, I’m not sure if its a bug or what but I just cant get it to swap a Sword into my main hand at all until I’m out of combat. I’m wondering if its a GCD issue?