Getting very frustrated with Bliz (rant warning)

[turbopinto]

It seems like every time I am finding my class(es) fun to play, then Bliz is nerfing them due to how well they are performing in some area that I will never see. And I haven't even experienced the actual nerfs yet, they're still in the coming patch. I figure if things continue much more, I'll just end up bailing out even before I get a chance to buy/play Wotlk.
-Affliction locks were topping DPS charts, the voidwalkers were tanking sarth, and affliction was too complicated. => Lose 1dot, nerf drain life (by 40%), lose another dot by making 2 exclusive from each other, drop VW health by 10k+, and still no real PVP issues addressed.
-Mages were doing something wrong apparently, and spirit needs to be had by all. => remove molten armor crit and have spirit try to make up the difference, imp scorch and winters chill both nerfed. Srsly, stack spirit?? that sounds fun. :cursing:
-Rogues mutilate was way too good.=> Back to shadowstep I go.
-Dwarf stoneform (like 40% of my alliance characters are) way too good obviously.

I havent been reading too much of the other classes, but since I am now playing them, feral druids, ele shamans, and retardins will get nerfed into the ground. Pity I wont be able to get DKs nerfed.

[X-Ifist]

PTR=TEST SERVER

its not comming out before a month alot will change in that time

The 60% dmg from Drain life and soul was way to OP
Rogues Mutilate was and still is rly rly good
Lock affliction is getting a nerf for pvp reasons, destro and demon is getting buffed for PvE reasons
The reason for Winters Chill and Imp Scorch was that whit a destro lock elemental shaman 2 mages(frost and fire) bomking druid you would have 60-70 crit chance
Retradins where overpowered 8k each hit ofc they where gone get nerfed, Feral druid isent rly getting nerfed they are getting more stedy dmg.
Ele shamans getting nerfed?O.o 4 instant lavaburst=2500 rating for ellay

[Clanked]

I don't want to come off sounding like I'm flaming you, but you need to re-evauluate why you started playing in the first place.

I'm sure it wasn't because you heard that locks had siphon life, or that mages didn't have to use spirit.

Changes will come and go, but by and large the game remains about the same. If you built your plan on one specific talent or whathave you, you are setting yourself up for failure. If you had, then all you have to do is adjust. The game will still remain about the same. You either find it fun, or you don't.

I personally think the game is fun, and will remain so come nerf or buff.

[simpletom]

i think your getting abit too upset over nerfs, blizzard dont sit their and think 'hey warlocks are haveing too much fun, lets come up with some ideas to skrew them over'. blizzard make buffs and nerfs accordingly for game balance, the problem is blanceing this game isnt exactly easy and noone wants to see 10 classes doing exactly the same thing just to make it fair.

like you said you wont feel the nerfs because your not 80 yet so you dont really have alot to compare the new changes to.

at the end of the day dont get upset over changes even less so if they are in the ptr and not live yet, getting excited about buffs is just as silly as everything can change before live and even then can change again and again according to class balance.

[Bigfish]

I don't want to come off sounding like I'm flaming you, but you need to re-evauluate why you started playing in the first place.

I'm sure it wasn't because you heard that locks had siphon life, or that mages didn't have to use spirit.

It has less to do with why anyone started playing in the first place, and more to do with the fact that a lot of gearing and macro work have to be redone. AGAIN. It's one thing when abilities get tweaked. Its another when your entire gearing philosophy, spell rotation, and hotbars get screwed up. It also doesn't help to see classes get whacked with the nerf bat over something you never did. (ie, pvp adjustments that affect pve, and vice versa)

Seems to me to be completely understandable that people would get upset.

[Ken]

The more that something looks more powerful or better, the more likely it is to be nerfed.

[Tonuss]

It seems like every time I am finding my class(es) fun to play, then Bliz is nerfing them due to how well they are performing in some area that I will never see. And I haven't even experienced the actual nerfs yet, they're still in the coming patch. I figure if things continue much more, I'll just end up bailing out even before I get a chance to buy/play Wotlk.If I'm reading this right, you're worried about nerfs that will have no immediate effect on you because you have not played a character to a level where they would have had these abilities in the first place?

I have to echo Clanked, as long as you are having fun playing a character or class, I would not worry about what Blizzard is or is not doing unless I knew that the change would directly affect my enjoyment of that class (ie, they took away or nerfed an ability that I like to use ).

[Feider]

The reason for Winters Chill and Imp Scorch was that whit a destro lock elemental shaman 2 mages(frost and fire) bomking druid you would have 60-70 crit chanceIs that right? I was under the impression that like-buffs/de-buffs did not stack. You recieved the benifit from only the strongest buff. the mob is only effected by the strongest de-buff. ie: Scorch and Winter's Chill do not stack. (I believe the winter's chill debuff can't even be applied while scorch is up and vise versa)


So. Frost mage, Fire Mage, Elemental Shaman. = +3% crit debuff on mob not the 3+2+2= 7% stack because the ToW debuff is highest.

Have I been way off on this?

[Bigfish]

The reason for Winters Chill and Imp Scorch was that whit a destro lock elemental shaman 2 mages(frost and fire) bomking druid you would have 60-70 crit chanceIs that right? I was under the impression that like-buffs/de-buffs did not stack. You recieved the benifit from only the strongest buff. the mob is only effected by the strongest de-buff.

Have I been way off on this?

I'm pretty sure Improved Scorch and Winter's Chill don't stack, nor do Moonkin Aura and Elemental Oath.

[RobinGBrown]

It has less to do with why anyone started playing in the first place, and more to do with the fact that a lot of gearing and macro work have to be redone. AGAIN. It's one thing when abilities get tweaked. Its another when your entire gearing philosophy, spell rotation, and hotbars get screwed up. It also doesn't help to see classes get whacked with the nerf bat over something you never did. (ie, pvp adjustments that affect pve, and vice versa)

Seems to me to be completely understandable that people would get upset.
Actually I think it's those people who min max that _cause_ the changes. If everyone just chilled out and geared up according to what looks cool then these issues would be very minor.

If you're the sort of person who has to minmax your char in order to 'win' then you've got to be prepared for dissapointment.

It's a vicious cycle but you don't have to be in it if you don't want to, I've NEVER been bothered by any nerfs/buffs/changes and the game just keeps getting better for me.

[Tombs]

Nerfs happen, you adapt and move on. If a nerf truly makes something so bad it is unplayable it'll get readjusted. Blizzard isn't in the business of driving away its players. Personally I like doing the most with what I am given.

Gearing for spirit shouldn't be too hard as a clothy if anything you probably had to go out of your way to get gear that doesn't have spirit. In the future it should be easier to gear up.

[Catamer]

I just love it when someone says ... well your class or spell was way over powered.

instead of knocking down over-achievers why can't they bring up under-performers.
how could they NOT know that what they were doing was going to over power the class?

the sad part is that blizzard is doing these changes shot gun style instead of mild changes, they completely over react.
I don't understand why they cant do a 5% change per month as opposed to a 40-60% change at once only to find they over-nerfed/over-powered something?

[X-Ifist]

Imp scorch and winterchill stack on test:P prob just one of hundred other buggs

[Tombs]

instead of knocking down over-achievers why can't they bring up under-performers.
how could they NOT know that what they were doing was going to over power the class?

If they do that they get some pretty hefty inflation of powers and have to re-tune all content around it.

[Duese]

My biggest problem is not that classes get nerfed or buffed. My problem is when I don't understand the reasoning behind the changes.

For instance, I'm not a warlock, but the change to their voidwalker hp had me furious. Why are they nerfing it? "Because Voidwalkers weren't meant to tank raid bosses." Classic response from blizzard and it's also complete bullshit. The phrase "clever use of game mechanics" will never come from a blizzard developers mouth.

Another example is the change to sacred shield for pally's only being on one target at a time. Oh, but now you can put talent points into it to make it absorb more damage. That's nice, I just took it off my hotbar since it's one good use just got nerfed into the ground.

It frustrates me to no end why blizzard does this kind of stuff. The players find a use for these types of abilities after being shelved forever, then blizzard changes it. /angry

[Tombs]

Voidwalker got nerfed because it can tank the hardest encounter currently in the game which is something arguably 2/4 tanking classes can't do.

[kadaan]

Sitting out a tank on 3-drake sarth because "we have a warlock with a voidwalker who's can tank it better than you" is retarded. How do you think that having a warlock pet being the best tank class in the game is balanced and doesn't need a nerf?

[Coltimar]

I'm a little miffed too. Blizzard actually sent people to my house in South Dakota to try to nerf me, personally :(

[Bigfish]

I don't pay much attention to the top end raiding scene, but how often did the issue of a VW tanking 3d Sartharian come up? Even then, its not like any Tom, Dick, and Harry warlock can walk in, whip out their voidwalker, and the encounter becomes a walk in the park. Even more so, its ONE gimmick on ONE fight. Seems the whole thing could be fixed by a quick tap instead of a sweeping change.

Edit: Not that I care one lick what they do to VWs. I've summoned mine less than a dozen times. I'm just annoyed that whenever someone finds something clever in some dark corner of theorycrafting, the players get hit with changes instead of the design team saying "whoops, we need to remember that the next time we design an encounter."

[Tombs]

I'm not sure what it requires spec wise, but it does take a set of the crafted frost resist gear (because it has lots of stamina) and just tossing on the highest stam gear you can find. It might be one gimmick for one fight but currently it is the pinnacle of progression. It does become a walk in the park because the tank on the dragon can not longer get insta-gibbed by super breaths, normally this requires a lot of cooldown budgeting and coordination.

[kadaan]

We beat our heads on it for 2 weeks, tried the warlock pet strat and got it on our second attempt. It trivializes the encouter. I have 55k hp fully buffed on my Druid and would still get 1-shot by the breath after the 3rd drakes acolyte came up if I didn't have cooldowns on me. The nerf to VW health is just the bonus health from your stam, it doesn't hit normal warlocks very much at all, only the ones who stacked full +stamina gear at the expense of all else (read: sarth tanks)

I'm all for ranting about nerfs, but at least research WHY they were nerfed.

[Duese]

Voidwalker got nerfed because it can tank the hardest encounter currently in the game which is something arguably 2/4 tanking classes can't do.

So the problem is the voidwalker? Again, this confused me to know end.


I have 55k hp fully buffed on my Druid and would still get 1-shot by the breath after the 3rd drakes acolyte came up if I didn't have cooldowns on me.

Again, so the problem is the voidwalker? It does not make sense.


Sitting out a tank on 3-drake sarth because "we have a warlock with a voidwalker who's can tank it better than you" is retarded. How do you think that having a warlock pet being the best tank class in the game is balanced and doesn't need a nerf?

If thought that a warlock pet was the best tank in the game I would have quit long ago. And if you think that it is the best tank because it can tank ONE encounter in the game that other tanks have extreme trouble with, then your vision of the game is very skewed.

I'm sorry if you have to sit out, but that's not my problem and has nothing to do with warlock pets.

[kadaan]

And if you think that it is the best tank because it can tank ONE encounter in the game that other tanks have extreme trouble with, then your vision of the game is very skewed.

I'm sorry if you have to sit out, but that's not my problem and has nothing to do with warlock pets.So you think that the hardest encounter in the game should be made trivial with a warlock pet? Apparently my vision of the game isn't _that_ screwed, if Blizzard thinks it's a problem and is fixing it.

[Clone]

Part of playing an MMO is that things change. If you dont like that then dont play anymore. Nobody likes having their class nerfed but it is very obvious why classes get nerfed/buffed. The game would get boring very fast if Blizzard purposely balanced all classes. Pvp will probably never be perfectly balanced but if you think it would be hard for blizz to balance PVE damage then you are very wrong. Im fairly sure they make classes OP on purpose then after a while nerf them and buff some other class. It keeps things interesting. I can think of times where every class has been overpowered, so just sit and wait and eventually it will be your turn again.

[Tombs]

Duese:

The way Sarth 3D works is when each drake comes into play they summon an acolyte that brings a new effect into play. One of them makes Sarth's breath attacks hit for ~60k. That'll kill any tank no matter the gear. The only way not to die is use cooldowns, to boost your health or cut the damage. If you don't kill the drake/acolyte before you run out of cooldowns you lose. A voidwalker with 90k health doesn't have to do anything but take it and your raid no longer has to go all out to kill the adds extra fast thus breaking the "Do or Die" theme of the fight, it trivializes the encounter.

So yes, I am going to say that this is a problem with the voidwalker. It should not ever need to have 90k health, it was an oversight that if left uncorrected would become the only way shit gets tanked.

[Bigfish]

We beat our heads on it for 2 weeks, tried the warlock pet strat and got it on our second attempt. It trivializes the encouter. I have 55k hp fully buffed on my Druid and would still get 1-shot by the breath after the 3rd drakes acolyte came up if I didn't have cooldowns on me. The nerf to VW health is just the bonus health from your stam, it doesn't hit normal warlocks very much at all, only the ones who stacked full +stamina gear at the expense of all else (read: sarth tanks)

I'm all for ranting about nerfs, but at least research WHY they were nerfed.

None of which changes the fact that someone got clever, and instead of adjusting the encounter or design philosophy of future content, they drop the nerf bat. Maybe its because I like to innovate new ways of doing things, but it bugs the hell out of me that players can come up with something completely unexpected and creative and then get punished for it.

[puppychow]

and for those who say "its just PTR! chill!" thats been classically a bad attitude towards PTRs. Basically around this time (2-3 weeks before patch release) the features are fairly locked down and not much is gonna change except boss tweaking and bug fixes. Blizzard also tends to go to extremes on buffs/nerfs and not reverse them for months.

For example prot pallys were good tanks in SSC/TK/Hyjal/BT but Sunwell pretty much destroyed them (except for Felmyst) due to block mechanics and HP differences (prot pallys were significantly below other tanks). Mages and ele shamans scaled poorly into Sunwell and you didn't want to bring too many (of course bloodlust/chain heal was king so you wanted as many healers as possible to be shamans). There are dozens and dozens more examples of this where the encounters became easier and easier if you simply left out some classes and stacked others.

So every time a class sees a nerf to them, there is the kneejerk fear of their class dropping to the bottom of the pack and not getting any fixes for months. So far in WOTLK its been fairly decent, as they have quickly tried to balance PVE dps (not done so well in PVP). Hopefully that continues in 3.1, especially since Ulduar will be more challenging than Naxx.

[Malekyth]

Blizzard's "testing" team needs a wake-up call. That's the problem.

The goal is not to "check functionality" - its to BREAK THE SOFTWARE you're testing. That's how to find bugs.I don't think we're talking about bugs -- these are balance issues, where the game's function isn't impaired but still doesn't feel quite right. Blizzard's testers can find some of that, and WoW is a weirdly un-buggy game for its amount of content, but it takes a ton of clever min-maxing hardcore freaks to really start exposing how the game works. I'm not surprised nobody caught the voidwalker tanking strat before it went live, though I bet the in-house guys put more emphasis on testing pets at tanks from now on. :)

[kadaan]

None of which changes the fact that someone got clever, and instead of adjusting the encounter or design philosophy of future content, they drop the nerf bat. Maybe its because I like to innovate new ways of doing things, but it bugs the hell out of me that players can come up with something completely unexpected and creative and then get punished for it.Why should they adjust the encounter and design philosophy of future content to accommodate for something they don't believe should be allowed?

Back in early classic WoW you could make a macro to use backstab and swap in a sword at the same time, letting you backstab with a 2.8 speed sword. You're saying because someone got creative they should have allowed anyone who figured that out to backstab with swords? No, that's stupid. If the "clever" strategy is something that breaks their intended design, they fix it, not work it into future content.

[Bigfish]

Why should they adjust the encounter and design philosophy of future content to accommodate for something they don't believe should be allowed?

Back in early classic WoW you could make a macro to use backstab and swap in a sword at the same time, letting you backstab with a 2.8 speed sword. You're saying because someone got creative they should have allowed anyone who figured that out to backstab with swords? No, that's stupid. If the "clever" strategy is something that breaks their intended design, they fix it, not work it into future content.

There's a difference between a code bug (namely using a dagger only skill with a sword via creative macros) and no one giving a flying crap about a 90k HP VW until someone does something interesting with it.

[Duese]

So you think that the hardest encounter in the game should be made trivial with a warlock pet?

Sorry, I don't feel that using a voidwalker pet trivializes the encounter. It may make it more manageable and take a huge amount of frustration away from the warrior and pally tanks because we flat out can't do it without relying on perfectly timed cooldowns and having enough of that class and spec to last long enough.

Our guild has the DPS for it, we have the healing for it, but we don't have the tanks for it, which is sad considering we have 3 warrior tanks and 3 pally tanks that all are damn near best in slot. We're getting the first drake down before the second one even lands. We're blowing our cooldowns but it's just not giving us enough time to get the second drake down before our MT ultimately gets 1-shot.

Our guild is basically giving up on it because we don't have any DK or Druid tanks. This voidwalker tank is pretty much the only light we've seen in the tunnel and now that's it. We've wiped enough on that boss that our raiders aren't showing up anymore to attempt it because only with insane amounts of luck are we going to beat it. And I can't stand fights completely based around luck.

So, again, the voidwalker is not the problem with that encounter.

"bring the player, not the class"

[kadaan]

So you think that the hardest encounter in the game should be made trivial with a warlock pet?

Sorry, I don't feel that using a voidwalker pet trivializes the encounter. It may make it more manageable and take a huge amount of frustration away from the warrior and pally tanks because we flat out can't do it without relying on perfectly timed cooldowns and having enough of that class and spec to last long enough.

Our guild has the DPS for it, we have the healing for it, but we don't have the tanks for it, which is sad considering we have 3 warrior tanks and 3 pally tanks that all are damn near best in slot. We're getting the first drake down before the second one even lands. We're blowing our cooldowns but it's just not giving us enough time to get the second drake down before our MT ultimately gets 1-shot.

Our guild is basically giving up on it because we don't have any DK or Druid tanks. This voidwalker tank is pretty much the only light we've seen in the tunnel and now that's it. We've wiped enough on that boss that our raiders aren't showing up anymore to attempt it because only with insane amounts of luck are we going to beat it. And I can't stand fights completely based around luck.

So, again, the voidwalker is not the problem with that encounter.

"bring the player, not the class"You do realize that:
a) The voidwalker is immune to the debuffs, so gets none of the fire/shadow multipliers
b) Pets don't trigger the "off the island" pyroblast buffet, so the VW can tank him OFF the island, never having to dodge flame waves, and giving the rest of the raid the entire island to move around on
c) He gets 90% magic reduction when the lock is specced, glyphed, and channeling the heal thing on it
d) Ghostcrawler himself said "The health boost was largely for PvP reasons and the damage avoidance was to make up for limitations in pet AI and master control, not to let you opt out of having to manage tons of incoming damage on your main tank. :) (http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=14990446882&pageNo=4&sid=1#69)


Also, once our dps got high enough we no longer needed a druid/dk MT. Shadron is usually around 10% when Vesperon lands, so one guardian spirit is enough to save the warrior from the insta-gib breath. The rest of the time we have a disc priest and pally on him. PoM + Shield prevents the shadron breaths from killing him.

[Souca]

Blizzard is going through a rather large change to game mechanics ever since they released 3.0.2 before Wrath. One the of the intended goals has seemed to be a standardization of how spells and abilities are classified and used. A prime example is the homogenization of buffs and debuffs. They were trying to make similar things behave the same way. This is a large change from the way things were handled in Vanilla and BC. Previously there was most likely one chunk of code to handle how a Cheap Shot stun worked and a completely different pieces of code that handled the stun from something like Shadowfury. From a logistics point of view, when you have lots of different parts, it's hard to make changes that cover more than just one piece and keeps thing consistant.

So Blizzard did what all companies do when they are faced with this problem, they started standardizing parts, or in this case spell effects. This isn't a short term process. This is a change that will pay off more in the next expansion than it will in Wrath, it's just that big of a change. What we are experiencing right now is Blizzard discovering what spell effects can't be the same even though they seemed the same when they started this change. At the same type they are trying to make classes distinct even if they use the same mechanics. It's kinda of like making 10 lego castles that don't look similar and only using the Pirate set.

This is a growing pain. It's perhaps one of the largest transitions in software to date, and certainly the largest within an MMO. This is the make or break for WoW. If they pull this off, they will be in a position to roll out content much faster. If they don't get past this, they'll have a 10 classes that feel the same.

Even looking at it from this perspective, I find the entire thing maddening. Just thought I'd share my take on what they are doing and why.

- Souca -

[Poetry]

It has less to do with why anyone started playing in the first place, and more to do with the fact that a lot of gearing and macro work have to be redone. AGAIN. It's one thing when abilities get tweaked. Its another when your entire gearing philosophy, spell rotation, and hotbars get screwed up.

LOL I think this is me. When I'm looking at the lists and lists of possible changes all I can think is ugh, just when I finally got it all working! A little frustrating but part of the game. As long as they don't pull a SWG NGE/CU thing I think I'll be ok. :P

[Poetry]

Actually I think it's those people who min max that _cause_ the changes.

I agree that a lot of the changes are driven by min/max'ers and I think it's a little unfortunate. Sometimes I feel like things are being tuned to the top tier rather than the typical player. 11 million players...we're not all the best! And I don't mean the old "casual vs hardcore" thing. Just that when I hear that they want to nerf mana regen, and I'm already having mana issues on my holy paladin, I'm wondering who they are observing. I don't consider myself a bad player. Anyway, they'll change what they need to and I'll adjust my techniques and roll with it as always. But I still can't help to ask who drives some of the changes that they feel are required to make the game more challenging. Sure isn't me!

[Souca]

Actually I think it's those people who min max that _cause_ the changes.
I agree that a lot of the changes are driven by min/max'ers and I think it's a little unfortunate. Sometimes I feel like things are being tuned to the top tier rather than the typical player. 11 million players...we're not all the best! And I don't mean the old "casual vs hardcore" thing. Just that when I hear that they want to nerf mana regen, and I'm already having mana issues on my holy paladin, I'm wondering who they are observing. I don't consider myself a bad player. Anyway, they'll change what they need to and I'll adjust my techniques and roll with it as always. But I still can't help to ask who drives some of the changes that they feel are required to make the game more challenging. Sure isn't me!I don't think it's that the min/max crowd causes them to change things, but that the min/max crowd will be the ones to find the flaws in the system and display them in the largest light. Blizzard has to balance encounters for the hard core professional players as well as the casuals. It's a very large range to work with and Blizzard has stated that as their goal. You can't blame it on the min/max and say they ruin it for the casual or vice versa because Blizz has stated both are acceptable play styles.

The flip side is that a lot of hardcore blame the casual as being the reason for changes they don't like ;)

When I was raiding Naxx 10 I didn't even have a single piece of tier and I never really worried about mana healing on my druid. Whether we should have to worry about mana as a core of healing is debatable, but mana isn't in short supply once you get some gear and the other healers pull thier weight.

- Souca -

[Poetry]

Actually I think it's those people who min max that _cause_ the changes.
I agree that a lot of the changes are driven by min/max'ers and I think it's a little unfortunate. Sometimes I feel like things are being tuned to the top tier rather than the typical player. 11 million players...we're not all the best! And I don't mean the old "casual vs hardcore" thing. Just that when I hear that they want to nerf mana regen, and I'm already having mana issues on my holy paladin, I'm wondering who they are observing. I don't consider myself a bad player. Anyway, they'll change what they need to and I'll adjust my techniques and roll with it as always. But I still can't help to ask who drives some of the changes that they feel are required to make the game more challenging. Sure isn't me!I don't think it's that the min/max crowd causes them to change things, but that the min/max crowd will be the ones to find the flaws in the system and display them in the largest light. Blizzard has to balance encounters for the hard core professional players as well as the casuals. It's a very large range to work with and Blizzard has stated that as their goal. You can't blame it on the min/max and say they ruin it for the casual or vice versa because Blizz has stated both are acceptable play styles.

The flip side is that a lot of hardcore blame the casual as being the reason for changes they don't like ;)

When I was raiding Naxx 10 I didn't even have a single piece of tier and I never really worried about mana healing on my druid. Whether we should have to worry about mana as a core of healing is debatable, but mana isn't in short supply once you get some gear and the other healers pull thier weight.

- Souca -

Druids use mana for healing? ;) I don't think I mean that "it's the fault of min/max'ers", more like what you said...they amplify the problems and then things change. I think my main point is that I hope that when things are re-tuned it doesn't hurt joe average too much.

I'm interested in some of the comments about "creative" solutions to some fights. What comes to mind for me is people kiting the boss in Oculus with green drakes. To me kiting sounded like a valid strategy (although I never tried it) but Blizzard didn't agree. Anyway, their game, their vision, and they'll guide us to play it the way they want and I'll keep playing it. :)

[Souca]

I'm interested in some of the comments about "creative" solutions to some fights. What comes to mind for me is people kiting the boss in Oculus with green drakes. To me kiting sounded like a valid strategy (although I never tried it) but Blizzard didn't agree. Anyway, their game, their vision, and they'll guide us to play it the way they want and I'll keep playing it. :)
This has always been on of the things that I wonder about. How does Blizzard want us to handle encounters? I mean, we know how they don't, since they patch it or nerf it so we can't do it, but have they ever come out and told us the designed strategy for any encounter? I'm not expecting them to tell us how to beat Ulduar now, but surely they could tell us what they had intended to happen on fights in BWL, MC, and Ony? Heck, even Sunwell strats wouldn't be game breaking.

We spend a good deal of time trying to figure out how to beat these things, but we never know if we are really doing it the way they had intended. Kinda of seems like the blind getting mad cause the blind was leading them.

And everyone knows druids use the souls of gnomes to cast spells.

- Souca -

[Poetry]

We spend a good deal of time trying to figure out how to beat these things, but we never know if we are really doing it the way they had intended. Kinda of seems like the blind getting mad cause the blind was leading them.

There have been *so* many fights where we've said "I'm sure this isn't what they had in mind but wow, that worked great!" lol



And everyone knows druids use the souls of gnomes to cast spells.


HAHA I totally lost it when I read this. It might end up being the new guild message of the day.

[Gadzooks]

Funny, it was the nerf bat that made me shelve my Rogue, when the Hemo nerf happened. Back to combat, and a very boring playstyle, so I picked up this MB thing. :)

The one thing that irked me, is that Blizzard's very vague statements on it was that they wanted more players in another spec. As it all turned out, that spec, Shadowstep, was pretty cool for a lot players (although not my cup of tea), it was how they shifted the focus and killed a viable off-spec that angered people. It struck me that they were'nt doing it for balance so much as they were saying "we spent a lot of time on this new talent (and ego), and dagnabbit, you're going to try it!" I think they've improved a lot since then, explaining some of the changes and philosophies going on.

Seriously, remember 3 years ago? Some classes held regular revolts in their class forums because they'd get changes that made no sense, and got NO feedback at all. The class reviews would generate 50 pages threads, and none of the discussion would be reflected in the changes. It's gotten a lot better since those days!

I guess we have to keep in mind that it's their game, and they don't have to tell us anything. Ghostcrawler's new role in communicating the theory and ideas behind changes has done a LOT of good, even if the guy loves his ban hammer a bit too much. I always thought that they should have a blog or regular posting to discuss the "vision" that they always refer to, but never discuss. We're supposed to follow this vision...but we don't know what it is? Nah. That dog don't hunt.

Since the rogue nerf that made me lose interest in my rogue, one of the benefits of MBing is that I'm not tied to one class - if the nerf bat hits bad enough, then I can grow another. :)

Maybe there's a better way - and maybe that will be part of the new sooper secret MMO they're working on - but this is what we have, so we have to work with it, or move on. I'm wondering with Tigole out of the loop, that things wills change even more - it's one way to keep life in the game, as frustrating as it is. (And one must wonder how much of the issues were from Tigole himself...he was, after all, very vocal about his opinions on classes and their roles, before coming to Blizzard). The game has to evolve and change, that's the #1 reason I keep playing - I remember the years I spent on Diablo II playing the same maps, the same gear, the same specs, the same everything...and why to this day I have no interest in installing and playing that game again. Yeah, the nerf bat sucks, but when they buff...it's goooooooood. :)

As for the min/maxers being to blame? Of course - we know the core developers and leads are min/maxers, no doubt the development team is full of them. I can't see anyone who was'nt in part a min/maxer having any interest in developing and designing that kind of thing. They look to their own when looking for feedback, they even say as much, they talk to the top guilds and select players for feedback, and you know they're not asking some dude slowly leveling a Paladin in Dustwallow Marsh on weekends, they're talking to the min/maxers.

I don't know. I tend to think they make it up as they go along. :) I also believe that they had their best and brightest leave for the new MMO, so we get the second and third string effort - and I know that if they have any really, really good ideas, they'll go to the new MMO.

[Poetry]

Does anyone ever feel like lately Blizzard is using WoW as a place to experiment with little things that they want to do in their "next gen mmo"?

[Tonuss]

Does anyone ever feel like lately Blizzard is using WoW as a place to experiment with little things that they want to do in their "next gen mmo"?Yes and no. I'm sure that they'll take whatever they learn from WoW to their next MMORPG, and that there are likely to be things that they do specifically to see how well they work. But I doubt that they will implement a change just to test something for their next MMO regardless of the impact it would have on WoW.

Blizzard seems to like pushing the envelope, and with so many variables they're bound to break things. The impression I get is that their attitude is to implement changes they want to make (or feel that they have to make) and then deal with any fallout as it occurs. Like with boss fights in raids, they probably have a general idea of how they want it to be beaten and they don't mind if players find different ways to do it. But there will be some things that they didn't consider, and when players find those methods, they make changes. And that will always make people upset.

I don't know if it's that they're dumb, or inexperienced, or if their attitude is what I implied above. It could also be that their desire to tailor the game to all playstyles is having a detrimental effect from a design and development standpoint. I guess it's hard to really analyze it from the outside, because the game is so big and so popular. Most other MMORPGs seen much more focused. Then again, that hasn't kept a lot of them from sucking pretty bad...

[Bigfish]

Does anyone ever feel like lately Blizzard is using WoW as a place to experiment with little things that they want to do in their "next gen mmo"?

Not really, no.

[Souca]

That dog don't hunt.
Gotta give you props for using this phrase ;)

As for testing ideas in WoW, I think they are testing things more for the next exapansion than another MMO. Mark my words, swimming and aquatic mounts will be important next expansion.

- Souca -

[Poetry]

Does anyone ever feel like lately Blizzard is using WoW as a place to experiment with little things that they want to do in their "next gen mmo"?

Not really, no.

Too much X-Files I guess. Mulder, Scully? Where is the conspiracy?! ;)

[Simulacra]

QQ my <insert class here> got nerfed and <insert class here> is way too OP

yawn, yeah...whatever

[Souca]

QQ my <insert class here> got nerfed and <insert class here> is way too OP

yawn, yeah...whateverSo glad you read the thread before making your startling generalization. So being clever, how's that working out for you?

- Souca -

[turbopinto]

QQ my <insert class here> got nerfed and <insert class here> is way too OP

yawn, yeah...whatever

Wow forums are that way>>>