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 -