f13.net

From the other thread.

HAHAHAHAHAH YOU FUCKING CALLED IT!!!!!!!! This deserves it's own thread. I'm making one.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6154421.html

So what does all this background mean in terms of gameplay? Simply put: In The Burning Crusade, Alliance players can play as Draenei shamans, while Horde players can play as Blood Elf paladins. Previously, players on either side weren't able to access those character classes: paladins were exclusive to the Alliance, while shamans were exclusive to the Horde.

This should shock no one. However, I think it makes sense not to have faction specific classes in a game with high-end raids and pvp. Having pallies will finally give the Horde better pve balance, and having shamans will basically just give the alliance more options. The latter may not be a good thing, I'm undecided there.

I picked Horde because there were no elves or Paladins.   :cthulu:

From Eyonx:

Golfclap.

I'm not sure what to even say.

Edit: Good luck finding a Draenei that isn't a shaman?

This really fucks raiding shamans, paladins are better buffers and healers.  There would be very little reason to bring more than a token 1 or 2 shamans to any raid.

A+ move right there.  Glad to see Blizzard is willing to back down from a stupid design decision and un-do it rather than sticking to their guns because of The Vision (see: meeting stones, 24 hour clock).  

Personally I welcome this change. It lets them take the shaman in it's own direction without having to deal with the whines to make them equivalent to paladins. As I've seen a lot of lost one shaman type mobs running around it sort of makes sense. Would have been kind of cool to see the blood elves get a slightly different version of a paladin, sort of a shadowknight, but then that'd just open up a whole new can of worms so it's probably better they don't.

A blood elf paladin with ae silence is gonna be nasty in PvP I think.

/goldclap really kinda sums it up, I think.


Apparently a lot of buffs will stack, so I don't really see shaman becoming useless any time soon.

Maybe so but i heard no mention of expanding raids to 45 people to fit a whole other class, someone will have to give up those spots and when it comes to raiding paladins are better versions of shamans.

That would seem worrisome, but this expansion is still quite a few months away.  Smart guilds will either temper recruitment and let attrition take its course, or simply give a lot of incentives for some of their members to reroll.

EDIT: What I'm really worried about is that stacking shaman and paladin buffs might be too advantageous.  Some raid encounters may become far easier for raids that take an optimal amount of pallies/shamans.  What Blizz might consequently do is balance future bosses around this- having a good amount of both classes would become a vital near-requirement.

Which would be annoying.  I find that class balance is finicky enough nowadays.

Agreed, also the aborted windfury totem nerf makes complete and utter sense now.

Boy, I don't know about this. This smacks of realizing the Horde issues with raiding and population but only supplying a bandaid at the last moment. I don't think it's a coincidence that this news comes hot on the heels of all the reasonable (gasp!) but heated conversation on raiding imbalance in various places. I think someone took a look at Horde numbers and stuck this in as a quick fix. I have a sneaking suspicion that most of the content is done for BC at base and is not balanced with this change in mind.

Or they've been planning it all along and only released the information now to quell the imbalance complaints. Depends if you believe them or not when they say they've been talking about it since release.

You really couldn't fix a horde/alliance inbalance without making shamans and paladins almost exactly the same, one is always going to be better than the other.  This is really the best solution, unless of course you are a raiding shaman in which case i'd be worried about losing my spot in a raid.

Ehhhh, my personal feeling is that it sucks.  I enjoyed there being some differences in the factions. Caveat I'm not a raider and I'm more into open world PvP than BG's.  *shrug*

It doesn't surprise me at all.  It just goes to show that ultimately Blizzard will cave if there's enough crying and hang-wringing, and that their much vaunted lorecentric design gets the bitchslap when it comes to the bottom line.  The premise of the expansion is teh weaksauce anyway.  Anthropomorphic demons that crash in their MOTHER SHIP? 


Ultimately all of the game designs or changes implented are based on keeping the treadmill going.  It's true that the expansion and the changes it brings will greatly affect the geography of PvP and raiding, but in the end all it does it make people play (pay) and catass longer.  It's not enough that Blizzard has monopolized the MMO industry, let's apply the sleeper hold.     

I don't buy that planning this all along thing for one second. It's been brought up a million times before and the answer was always an emphatic no. I'm currently trying to think of a faction vs faction rpg that doesn't have exclusive classes to set up difference between the sides. Can't think of any off the top of my head.

Besides, the implications are just fucking huge.

1) You still would never take a shaman if it meant you trade him for a paladin.
2) If you're set on a hybrid and you know even a little bit about how the classes work post-40 why would you take the slow to level no dps paladin?
3) If you have access to 5 of each class who do you sit out for a shaman? Feral druids are the only things that spring to mind since the physical buffage overlaps a little bit but even then I'm iffy.
4) What makes the factions different beyond cosmetics with this change going through? Nothing.

I'm a very firm believer that they needed to do something to fix Horde raid imbalance but this isn't it. Game is going to feel VERY homogenized now.

What I really don't understand here is why they are just litterally applying the same classes.  Couldn't they have made like a "Shadowknight," "Bloodknight" or whatever you'd call it that would at least have a few differences from a Paladin whilst apeing the overall characteristics?  The "lore" excuse for the whole thing is pretty lame and I think that in some ways it really undermines the overall tone that was adopted by the two opposing sides.  I had previously enjoyed how the Horde stood for a shamanistic approach to life in general, they were not presented as evil but as a deeply spiritual people.  The lore's made lots of references to Thrall's respect for Shamans  etc...  And conversely the Alliance always seemed to me to have a fervent devotion in their own beliefs, no matter the practical cost.  I don't think the game should be built around "lore" but I think that introducing inconsistencies of a massive scale against the thematic construction so far isn't particularly bright.

Gameplay wise I don't care to much, though I wish they would maintain at least some uniqueness.  I do agree with others that Shaman are getting fucked when it comes to raiding, though this is an impression since I don't raid. And as far as PvP goes I think the Horde will probably still dominate and I don't think the Horde domination has ever sprung from an imbalance, but more because the Alliance seems to attract morons.  Of course, if Blood Elves become 60% of the Horde I guess they'll achieve that.

Speaking of "lore": Did I miss something? Since when were Elves, or just Blood Elves in particular, ever Paladins? They don't even have anything close to the same gods or religion. Whether they be good or evil.

Not that I play, but I'd rather see even more race/faction specific classes. Not less. Where are the Wardens, Shadowhunters, and Blademasters?

Blood Elf Paladins? That's just fucking lazy.

Blood Elves captured a Dranei paladin and cut him up, thereby figuring out the source of his powers and taking them on. That's fucking ridiculous and proves that God must truly be blind or something. From a lore standpoint this is a travesty and I don't even read much of the lore. It's completely incongruous.

There are some good things as far as possible raid designs go in the future; they'll no longer have to design encounters with Horde's weaker mana regen or Alliance's weaker melee white damage in mind. They can make encounters where a paladin or a shaman is required which probably makes them happy.

Thiss does mean that the transition to a pretty much wholly PvE game is likely complete. I have to think the guys at Mythic are licking their lips in anticipation with this news...

Yes, because EA's history of managing PvP MMOGs is such a shining and bright example.  :-D

I'm working under the assumption that GW/Mythic had most everything sorted before the buy out. If Blizzard is going more PvE with a dash of PvP then WAR has a chance to offer a high profile release that's PvP with some PvE... in other words what alot of people thought WoW would be like.

The lore for the Warcraft universe could be recreated by any frustrated 8th grade boy in about 3 hours, just like the lore of just about any video game ever created so who fucking cares about lore?

As for the "people will not want shamans on raids when they could have paladins" we'll have to see what the classes are like at 70 to know for sure.  This at least allows them a lot more flexibility in design for those two classes.

Faction specific classes were a stupid idea to begin with, anyone with a clue knew they'd end up identical, worthless, or seriously imbalancing.  I'm glad they aborted this experiment rather than consigning themselves spending half of their development time trying to ensure content is seperate but equal and slapping dozens of band-aids on the same problem every patch. 

I don't know why anyone things this reflects some deep change in PvE v PvP focus in the game.  You can't swing a dead cat in a PvP forum without hitting (a) some solo world PvPer bitching about shamans or (b) some battleground grouper bitching about paladins.  This improves PvP balance too, now we are back to just bitching about racials!

Yuck! I don't like this at all.  What was wrong with having something that sets the factions apart?  And what pathetic lore to back up their laziness.  Bliz gave in to the whiners.

Yay!  Now as Horde I can make my gay-ass re-skinned evil Night Elf Paladins!  Cept, they're not evil they're uh..wait..they are.. but know how to channel Holy abilities because they dissected a Paladin. Uh WTF?

WAR is going to be another 300k sub game unnoticed beneath Blizzards' boots.  Period.  Who gives a shit?

Crazy talk.  There's not a single alliance v. horde pvp discussion that doesn't boil down to paladin v. shaman.


Why? Blizzard takes balance seriously.  They will do whatever they need to maintain a balanced game.  Seems to be working out rather well for them. 

Balance in Dark Age was a goddamn joke.  How the hell do you balance the equation when you've got 3 realms and around a dozen classes per realm?  And now WAR is going to have 2 sides, 3 races per side and 4 classes per race?  Hah (at least they took out stealth, right?).

I don't see how things could be so "identical" if they followed their own games as a template. Wardens, Mountain Kings, Shadowhunters , or Deathknights could be just as standout concepts as Paladins or Shamans.

That's what I mean, Rasix. You have a game with bland meaningless PvP. The only thing that got the masses fired up beyonf "must grind more honor brrraaaiiinnnssss" in this game was the whole paladins/shamans piss me off so much! thing. That's gone leaving you with... what? It's that whole metagame argument that's been going on since day one: is it a game or a world? This is an exclusively gamist thing to do. It doesn't SHOCK me, mind you, since we all know Blizz wants to make a game first but it removes on of the last world first considerations they had.

As for the whole WAR thing... they don't have to beat Blizzard. It doesn't have to be balanced. All it has to do is offer the illusion (or reality if it's actually good) that they have meaningful, fast PvP with differences between the sides to be profitable. 300k? WAR breaks 1 mil, write it down.

I didn't say they'd end up identical, I said identical OR worthless OR a neverending balance nightmare.  Seeing as all three options suck, I think they did the right thing by eliminating the source of the problem.

Balancing a MMO with up to 40 members of many different classes interacting in different environments is about a kajillion times harder than balancing a RTS with 2 or 4 sides playing on fixed maps.  In WoW, paladins and shamans are somewhat different, and a neverending balance nightmare.  Read any of the threads spawned by the proposed windfury nerf and you will see that many of the apparently minor variations between the two classes have resulted in pretty significant balance issues.

Even if you think it should be easy to make them separate but equal (it isn't, it's fucking hard), Blizzard has shown consistently that it is far, far, far beyond its ability to make them separate but equal.

Which is, of course, the upside. Up until nnow they've ostensibly had to tune encounters to the weakest of the two factions in a given situation. All the lore, world, blandness whatever considerations aside it's going to make for more interesting end game encounters.

Same thing as you had before: horde v. alliance.  Except now all of the arguments will focus on racial abilities and battleground layouts. 

WoW has always been willing to sacrifice their worldly elements for the glory of the game.  Because... it's a game. I've really never thought of it as much more than that.

Putting aside the lore concerns for a moment, I really wonder what it's going to end up doing to the actual mechanical balance.


Windfury + Strength of Earth + Kings + Might = HolyShit Melee DPS


Assuming they let it all stack to begin with.

They said that most of the buffs will stack but not all. I tend to think Mana Spring might not stack with Wisdom, same with Tranquil Air and Salvation. Just my guess though.

Well, according to a quote from the WoW Europe boards (Curse Gaming article (http://www.curse-gaming.com/en/news-264-1-blizzard-announces-horde-paladin-and-alliance-shaman.html)), they'll be adding in racial abilities for Paladins and Shamans, so that would help out with differentiating between Alliance and Horde raids.

Blood Elf paladins get fear ward. You heard it here first.

They have the same amount of time as every other Horde player to level up a Belf paladin. Hopefully Blizzard wll remember to change the code that prevents paladin set drops for Horde and shaman set drops for Alliance.

Pally on Pally PVP will be great. Imagine a AB match with nothing but pallys. Basically, it'd go on until one side got bored and quit.

I think this proves Godel's incompleteness theorem applies to gaming communities too.  There will never be an end to the bitching because if all the reasons to bitch go away, you people will bitch about the lack of things to bitch about.

This is extremely sig-worthy in a nerdy kind of way ;-)

So they say.  I suspect the racial abilities will end up being inconsequential so the raids will be identical. After all, they already had racial abilities that differentiated the raids - paladins and shamans.

Touche, Jayce. Though it should be noted that I don't bitch about pallies or shamans. I bitch about the fact that their pvp system is so fucking lifeless.

Between you, you've just postulated that this puts an end to all the things to bitch about in WoW, making you perhaps the most deluded fanboys ever.

I thought only 1 unique class per faction was weak from the get go, fuck a 9 class total is freaking weak, even if they're fairly unique. They have always taken the easy way out, that's what has made this game so boring for me. I'm the type of player which finds it fun to explore builds, item combinations etc. However EVERYTHING is so normalized in WoW that this little meta game doesn't exist. I've never seen a MMORPG with so boring loot for example.

Druid?

Diluted, please.

orc casters with concentration aura :/

This is a stupid move. Why even have different sides now? This would be like allowing both Ts and CTs in CS to buy the same weapons.

"Player created content".

I never really anticipated this move, but to me it makes sense.  Horde bitches about Paladins, Alliance bitches about Shamans, and the only way any of that will ever stop (or at least be reduced, because of course now there will be bitching that 3 Horde races can be Shamans compared to Alliance's 1, and 3 Alliance races can be Paladins compared to Horde's 1) is to just give both sides each others classes.  I've never been a big fan of trying separate-but-equal classes either, since in the esoteric world of Game Balance, you can't exactly just assign a point value to each ability and have them match up.  Abilities are much too complex for that.

Balance like that seemed to work in games like Starcraft and Warcraft III for the most part because units were collections of stats.  There was very little creative application of abilities possible.  It's nowhere near as easy to balance different but equal abilities in the field of gameplay of an MMOG like WoW.  Most importantly, shamans and paladins are two completely different roles, never designed to counter each other or be similar in the first place.

In my opinion at least, it's not a bad move.  It'll let them get off at least some of the Horde Vs. Alliance crap, and continue making real content instead of trying to balance shamans and paladins against each other.

I'll never understand Blizzard's penchant for caving in to people crying on their boards....I mean, WTF, who is the developer here?

Well....The alternative sucks far worse. I'll say that much.

Well, when the difference in high-end raid progression is so stark... yeah, whoever the developer is, they've done something wrong.

February 24th, 2013
Blizzard unveils World of Warcraft: Rise of the Machines

The storms of change are roiling Azeroth.  The war of the Elder Gods and the remnants of the Burning Legion have ripped a hole in the very fabric of the multiverse itself.  Through this vortex have come a new scourge- strangely armored humans, an incredibly advanced race known as the Protoss, and the ravening bioweapons known as the Zerg.  Battle it out in the skies of Azeroth in armored warships, as either the races of Azeroth or the new invaders from the far end of the multiverse.

P.S. Also Picard will be there, so the ships have teleporters and photon torpedoes.  He came via Vortex  Kel'Thuzad vibrating molecules rift etc.   

Don't joke.

I never understand this logic.  Nine's no good, so...what..add nine more?  Then if that doesn't work, maybe shoot for 30?  Maybe each individual spec should be its own class?  Its about the total range of play options, not the number of classes.

I think it's a good idea, and I am interested in seeing how it all sorts out.  I don't think the sky will fall.

But then, I don't play a shaman nor a paladin.  If I did, I might see things differently.

My paladin friends are all excited on the theory that now they'll be able to branch out the paladin a bit more, specifically into the off-tanking role, now that they have another support class to bolster the raid balance.

That's part of the reason I've warmed to the idea. All of this is moot since we don't know what 70's going to be like. General concensus is that the new abilities between 61-70 are going to drive the classes in new directions. Not having to have shamans and paladins be some sort of couterweight to one another lets Blizzard refine their skills more. I'm thinking paladin tanking, +spell damage totems, etc.

It also really opens up larger dungeons design since they won't have to worry whether Horde mana regen/Alliance melee dps can keep up with the other side.

I agree with that, but I'd suggest that the total range of play options in WoW is poor by this genre's standards. Blizzard may have excelled in their implementation of a number of MMORPG themes, but flexibility of character definition wasn't one of them. Not only are there "more classes" in many other games, but the ability to differentiate one's character within a class is often greater. In WoW, you define yourself by your possessions, and in that respect it follows EQ closely. If the equipment types and sources were more varied, and a greater range of equipment were to be viable late ie game, it would likely offer more play options. As it is, the equipment defines play as either the raiding game or battleground grinding with little variation in the results.

Are we discounting the role of talent specs, or are we just assuming that since everyone raids they have at best 2 possible choices?

Yeah, see, I always felt wow offered more differentiation than most games.  Almost every class has several viable talent builds that can drastically alter how your character plays.  On top of that, as Righ mentioned, your equipment can help define you as well.  This is why I have several sets of equipment I use depending on the role I'm jumping too.  Different sets of gear can really change how your character performs in a given role. 

Maybe it's just my MMO background, or the fact that I played a paladin, or the fact that I played no higher than level 39, but I ended up feeling like WoW had almost no differentiation whatsoever.  Pick race, pick class, and you're basically done.  Equip the best items you find, and occasionally sink a talent point into an obscure abstract ability that gives you a 2% greater chance for this or that.

Other than a couple of crucial abilites like Seal of the Crusader and Spiritual Focus, I felt like I could have been putting my points anywhere without it making a real difference.  I'm nowhere near the sort of number-cruncher who would notice that his critical hit chance had increased by 5% or that his healing spells took 8% less mana, or whatever.

Most likely that's the issue. Some classes like warlocks and mages are essentially different classes depending on talents. Actually most classes - hunters, rogues, druids as well - are like that. Paladins not so much...

Pretty much yeah. I have a 60 pally, and a 60 lock along with a 60 warrior. I'd have to say that paladins are the most boring and unfun class to solo, *ever*. They kick all kinds of ass in groups though.


-- Z.

Hey all... new to these boards and late to this thread, but here goes:

My paly in WoW was my frist 60... started him at launch and finally burned out on the game somewhere between BWL and AQ40.  A few points:

- RE: "Lorecentric design"  Blizzard already displayed its willingness to compromise lore in favor of gameplay with the addition of one of the new races in the expansion.  I'm not enough of a warcraft lore dork to remember exactly where the contradiction was, but suffice to say a lot of nerds were pretty pissed.  Basically, they want to have a compelling story line, but gameplay balance comes first.  Remember, BWL didn't even have a story line associated with it... you were just sort of supposed to deduce that nefarian was engineering dragons to do something involving Kalimdor....So blizz continues to play lip service to lore while introducing solid gameplay mechanics, no change here.  The lore has always been secondary to the game itself.  Maybe it was just because I didn't play on an RP server, but I never knew any determined endgame player to bitch about how something was inconsistent with the greater WoW plot... they were all focused on gmaeplay balance.  Many people even made fun of me when I would introduce them to anecdotes from the plots of warcraft 1-3.

- RE: Class/raid balance:  I too fear that come level 70, shamans will become pretty rare.  Before 1.11, shamans were always much worse than paladins as healers, and worse ass offtanks, while still being an inferior DPS class.  The were recently patched to be better healers, but paladins are still more efficient, have better raid buffs (class specific and not as geographically dependant (auras have a much larger radius than totems,)) and they can cleanse.  Now, shamans might be favored in level 70 5- man instances for their superior DPS, and because healing efficiency is not as important there, but 5 man dungeon design allows for a lot more flexibility in strategy and group compsition than raiding instances do, so a paladin's ability to offtank and heal better than a shaman will probably allow for their substitution to a large degree.  In raid instances however, whether they are 40 or 45 man, I can't see shamans being in high demand, unless people are just too lazy to reroll pallies on old servers (a senitment I fully understand, having leveled a paladin once...)  Class roles are just so specialized in raid instances... neither a paladin or a shaman can offtank, only warriors and some feral druids can do that.  They will be reduced to their ability to heal, where a paladin will always win out.  A few token shamans should be kept around for their buffs, but I see paladins being favored overall by a considerable margin.

-RE: "Shadowknights" or slightly differentiated versions of paladins/shamans:  WoW's class system precludes this.  WoW has a very limited number of classes, most of which are very differentiated from each other in terms of their role.  A hunter is very different from a warrior, who is different from a priest, etc.  Blizzard may have shot themselves in the foot when they originally created shamans and paladins because they are so similar in terms of role, yet subtly differentiated from each other.  They are both offtanks/healers with slight differences in implementation.  Given that people are already discussing the fact that it will be confusing to have shamans and paladins in the same raid, I really don't see how there is room in the blizzard class system for some sort of "shadowknight" hybrid.  The class just would not be able to differentiate itself enough from paladins and shamans to feel as though it really fit within the WoW class system.  Either the differences would look and feel superficial, would be game breaking, or be wholly ineffective.  The only real implementation of a "shadowknight" I can see is to eliminate the paladin and the shaman classes altogether and replace them with a "shadowknight," a class with the ability to heal and do dps, purge and cleanse....obviously imba.

-RE: no MMO has different classes for different factions:  Perhaps you meant to say no GOOD MMO has different classes for opposing factions.  Though I left SWG right before the Jedi revamp (pre expansions) the game does have light and dark jedi on opposing factions.  Granted, the game had no long term overarching consistency or vision, the devs swung the nerf and buff bats around like crazy, and the overall "Star Wars" feel was simply lacking, but it is an example of a game with opposing sides having differentiated classes.  Maybe someone with more experience with that game and its current Jedi system can speak to the matchups.

Good discussion here, I predict many hours of procrastination at work...

Those are probably the most interesting parts for me, this isn't some C-rate fantasy on the official site, but it's small, relatively consistent anecdotes throughout the game. I always found it great how when you go into SM Library, there are actually books you can read in there :P. (Ashkandi (http://www.thottbot.com/index.cgi?i=51920) is another good example.)


Well, the "token" slots are also becoming very apparent for Warlocks (Curses of Doom, Shadows, and Elements) as well. You'll probably still want a Shaman in the Main Tank's group, along with one in any of the melee DPS groups, so we'll still be seeing at least 3-4. That said, Shamans are still really nice, and if a raid is hurting for healers, or support, you're still valuable outside of your token abilities, no question.


I agree with you there, that we really don't need a different class proper for Blood Elf Paladins, just as we don't have a different class for Undead Priests, but they are differentiated rather well via racial spells. So, we'll probably see very offensive (maybe even requiring you to take damage to do so) Class Racials for the Blood Elf Pallies so they feel different from their Alliance counterparts.


During the Force Ranking System (think WoW's Honor System, but more of a PITA, and much more open to exploitation), there wasn't a difference between an Imperial (Dark) or Rebel (Light) Jedi at all during the experience "grind" part (and a Rebel Jedi could choose to take Powers, Lightsabers, and some Enhancement if he wanted, same as an Imperial could go Lightsaber/Healing/Powers). Once you reached Knight (well, you had to kill certain factional targets in an instance for example during your Knight Trials, but they were just mirrors of each other) you actually were considered Light or Dark. Post-Knight, the differences were merely bonuses to say... Dark Jedi Knights had bonuses to the Powers tree (Force Choke, Lightning, etc.) while Jedi Knights had bonuses to Healing and Enhancement (Force Healing, Force Run, Force Speed, etc.). Minor bonuses in mechanics, but at least the robes were different looking.

Directly after the NGE, there was no difference between Light and Dark, but you could wear robes/cloaks with different colors :roll:. Now, with their Expertise system (think talents, but with only two sets at the moment) you can choose to take both light and dark abilities (say, have Force Choke and Improved Healing) or you can choose to take your Dark abilities to a certain level, and then focus on your Neutral abilities.

Think like an Elemental Mage pre-Mage Review... yeah. Most people are taking Core abilities + Light or Dark.

But no, SWG has never really had solid differentiation between Light and Dark Jedi (apart from saying, "This is a Dark Jedi Knight, scary looking, no? He will always be flagged for PvP as an Imperial... untill he drops out of the FRS and redoes his Knight trials that is."), now, you have some in terms of the skills you can choose, but then, you can always respec.

hehe.

I am sure that the side with the most paladins in its group is destined to lose a given WSG.  Most paladins "do damage" it seems and offer little support.  This is one theory I have as to why alliance sucks in WSG.  Now that suckage will be shared.

Not really, and that was the point I was making. The itemization in WoW is staggeringly bad given that its fundamental to the design.

For tanking on raids this is true.  If you don't have the resist gear - it's not going to happen.

going to have to agree with Jpark onthis one

Most of the trees for pretty much every class do have some fairly good distinction between them.  I mean, sure, they really need more breadth to their itemization, but even with the curent stuff, there is still a lot of distinction between class specs.

Large raids is not really a good place to look for build playstile distinctions, since your role is fairly basic. In smaller groups, or 1 vs 1 situations (pve or pvp) spec has a drastic effect on playstle.   Dagger rogues play very differently then sword rogues.  Ice mages play differently then fire mages (and both mage flavours play differently depentind on how much arcane you have).  Protection wariors are VERY different then Fury warriors.

Shamans are are fairly varied, since enhancement / resto is a very effective party buff / heal build, while elemental shaman with good gear can approach mage like dps, and play COMPLETLEY differently.

Druids also have wide flexability (but good feral gear seems to be only available from 40 man shit.)

Warlocks and hunters?  Completely different playstyles depending on spec.

If they actually had the gear diversity to really push people to wildly different builds, it would be very interesting.  Perhaps with the expantion, and 2 new talent tiers, we may see signifigant diversity if the gear comes with it.  Only time will tell.

Compared to other games, it's a very weak game when it comes to classes imo. I can agree that the ones in there are very fleshed out, but when you PvP it's all to easy to see the shortcomings. Learning the diffrent abilities that may be thrown at you and how to play vs the diffrent classes took very little time. Here comes a rogue, okay he started with that skill, now I know he's on a backstab build and all that comes along with that, if he took the x remaining points in +x% crit or +x% dodge or whatever, it doesn't really change how you kill him or how you perceive him. In general there were a PvP build and a raid build for the classes. Then of course there were people who would spec something shitty, either because they didn't know better, or because they wanted to be diffrent. These were a minority though. I played a shaman for example, if I wanted to raid seriously I needed to be heavy restoration. If I wanted to PvP I had to spec heavy elemental. Another thing which adds to this problem is that races mostly does jack shit in the larger picture.

Lets compare to for example Anarchy Online. There's 14 classes, I would guess every class has about the same amount of abilities and spells that the classes in WoW have. Depending on how you spec you get access to diffrent lines of these, you can get them all if you want to sacrifice points in other areas. On top of this you have a perk system which adds another layer. Races in Anarchy Online also makes loads of difference. And since there's loads of options when it comes to equipment you're differentiated further.

Find me a AAA MMORPG released this millennium with as many clones as you find in WoW and I'd be surprised.

Yes, every class has the ability to spec into two or possibly three different areas to get a differentiated play style and unique abilities, synergies, and efficiencies.  The complaint about lack of character customization comes from the fact that beyond the few talent builds, there really isn't a way to differentiate your character.  Yes, ice mages and fire mages play differently, but most fire mages are built according to the SAME talent build as each other, in the same way that most frost mages are similar.  (though I may be an exception: my mage is specced 7/0/44 heavy frost...)  The point is, however, that for most classes there are two and at most three common builds.  That really isn't a lot of differentiation when compared to other games with much more comprehensive hybridization systems.

I honestly don't see what you guys are complaining about.  I've played almost every other game and none of them had the variety in the classes that wow does, they might have had a higher number of classes but most of them felt and played exactly the same only with different names and numbers on their abilities.  In wow every class is like a different game, in some cases every spec.  The rogues energy/combo point/finisher system and the warriors rage based system for example, in every other game a warrior is a rogue with less dps and more armor/hps, a warlock isnt just a mage with less damage and a pet its a completely different way of playing the game.  Druids (with the right equipment) can make viable nukers/healers/tanks/dps, and not just suck at all of them but actually excell and in some ways be better at the role they are trying to emulate rather than a half assed version of a rogue/mage/priest/warrior.

Just because a game has warriors, knights, berzerkers, skirmishers, rogues, corsairs, assassins, brawlers doesn't mean it has more varied playstyles when they all play exactly the same.  Wow has more variety than any of the other games ive played, the only class that could use some help in this are the paladins who aren't much fun to play.  Itemization could use some work but raiding gear has always been designed with beating the next challenge in mind so it will always be tailored for raiding specs.  It would be hard to make raiding_intance_017 a challenge when raiding_intance_016 was full of shadow priest, feral druid and fury warrior gear.

The class distinctions in this game are extremely well done.  I give wow top marks for this.

Other  games that have done a great job with classes in terms of dintinctions were Shadowbane and City of Heroes.

A great example of a shitty implementation of classes (becoming less shitty overtime) is EQ2.

Time for a little test:

Review the cinematics for WoW and EQ2.  How easily can you identify the classes depicted in each?  How many different classes can you identify?

Saying a class exists on paper is one thing.  Depicting a vision of what that class actually does that can speak to a viewer and immediately tell us who he is and his purpose is quite another matter.  Classes on paper do not mean that these are classes players actually can really even notice or have a visceral reaction to.

This should really be the litmus test for class design:  if a player cannot identify what the hell class it is based on the actions depicted - then the class is not distinct enough to warrant implementation.

I don't know why this would be the case.  I can make some supremely differentiated classes by giving one plate mail, one leather armor, and one a robe.  Hey, great, you can tell that they're different just by looking at them in a cinematic.  Does it mean anything in terms of gameplay?

What I'm hearing from Sairon and foobar is that having very precise, clean, clear-cut class distinctions is not a universally good thing because it stifles customizability.  You have a Rogue in WoW, he does these five things.  They're very distinct, very identifiable, they set the class apart from the others, and so on.  But they also limit what the class can do, they limit the extent to which you can customize your character, they limit your ability to surprise your opponent or to think creatively.

WoW's classes are quite distinct and defined, but that isn't an argument against the claim that there isn't much variation within the classes.

More classes != more options necessarily. I'll point to DAoC as an  example. With all 3 realms and expansions there's what - 45 classes? But they essentially all boil down to 3 or 4 tactics. There's the PBAE class, the range nuker, the defensive tank, the offensive tank, buffers and the stealthers. Admittedly DAoC does have more variety than WoW but in the PvP environment it was still very predictable - and within the classes themselves specialization choices were *more* limited than WoW's in most cases. (hampered further by the respec model). Fighting a caster? Go for interrupts. Fighting a melee? CC is the win. etc. Late additions such as warlocks and banshees added more variety but also horribly unbalanced the game. I'm not saying WoW is stronger - i think Shadowbane had the best set of balanced but unique classes - but I do think it's important to realize that choice is not equal to quantity. It's got more qualitative components than just Game X with 15 classes is better than Game Y with 8.

EDIT: One other thing I like about WoW that DAoC frustrated me with and Shadowbane did as well to a lesser degree = in WoW your character still has access to most abilities of the class without being specialized in them. For instance my Rogue can still produce pretty decent DoT damage without spending talents in the 2 DoT attacks - Improved Rupture and Improved Garrote, although less effectively than someone who had those talents. In DAoC you couldn't use even the baseline skills if you hadn't specc'ed in a tree - particularly as a caster - due to the damage and resist model. So you might have 35 spells, but you could only effectively use 15 of them. Shadowbane wasn't quite as frustrating as you had more pick and choose ability for the skills, but some classes were hampered by bad design decisions *cough*Wizards*cough*.

I completely agree.  I much prefer a game with fewer classes that have no gimps or uber-broken classes to a game with many classes and Thanes/Berserker's. 

Oh look, the former Thane is still bitter.

AO had 14 classes or so.  They were all superficially distinct, but many lacked core differences that were balanced or any good.  It would unfortunately take years for some of them to get a review or any real attention at all.  So yeah, I'm probably not as unique in WoW, but I get a heckuva lot more attention.  I'll probably take the latter after having to deal with playing a pet class whose pet didn't path properly for quite some time.

Another game I would give high marks in variety to is AC1.  Some combinations of abilities were not even discovered until a year or so into the game.  The only bad part was that some of these builds that were discovered were not really capable of doing damage, ergo leveling until something stupid like level 90.  I hear that they implemented full respec now, which probably changes things for the better in that regard.

I think you can't compare the gamey world of WoW to the worldy worlds of say, UO or Eve, whose systems are a lot more varied and customizable than any of the diku crowd.  Comparing apples to apples, AC1 and DAOC are good examples of games that have a lot of diversity but as previously noted, have run into balance issues and the occasional useless class.  On the other side we have EQ, where your class is basically on rails until you hit max level and start getting AAs (or so I gather).  I think WoW does a pretty good balancing act.  It does not have the most variety of anything out there, but its variety is manageable.

Is the 24 hour clock gone? That really sucked given I could only play past 9 PM or so. I saw the world in daylight ONCE ever. Retarded.

Personally I like the 24 hour clock.  It's a lot better than an entire day/night cycle lasting an hour or two.  At least to me, on an RP server.  It seemed a lot more appropriate to me to have my character around at certain times of the day, and not around at others.

I agree with what was said that more character classes != gameplay variety.  Obviously, as you add more classes into the mix, the distinctions between each class will begin to break down, and you will end up with a bunch of hybrids, with each class having more than a few similarities to other classes.

I also agree that WoW does a great job of creating distinct classes with unique roles and playestyles, while still allowing for some leeway in group composition (for 5 man pve anyways, which is dead till the expo...)  My main criticism is that within those classes, players are pretty much confined to one of very few "cookie cutter" builds.  You are either an ice mage or a fire mage; a feral druid or resto; fury, arms or prot warrior...

Compare this system to a game like Diablo 2.  There were few classes, and each had 3 talent trees.  However, not all fire sorcs played the same: you could get hydra or meteor, and you could further chose to spend points to create uber-synergies or you could spread them out to be more diverse.  Even though there are a similar number of classes in WoW and D2, there is a LOT more room for character customization in D2, both through gear and through character spec.  IMO, what really makes an RPG worth playing in the long run is the ability to create a unique character that feels powerful and fun.  What fun is it when you have some standard talent spec (give or take a few trivial points) and are going for the same gear as everyone else?  Give me rare, powerful, distinct drops with powerful bonuses to stats and abilities over generic specs and armor anyday.

"actions" mate, not just "looks".

I'd rather have fewer, broader, better-balanced classes than a ton of imbalanced, narrowly specialized classes.  Frankly, I'd like WoW more if they folded all the interesting talent abilities into the base classes (balanced as necessary, of course) and axed talent trees alltogether.

Different strokes I guess.

Can you spot what's changed? (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/burningcrusade/townhall/bloodelves.html)
Hint: Legolas.

Yeah they'd said a while back that Hunters would be an option.  Considering how freaking many there already are it's double crazy that both they and Draeni can be Hunters.   The last thing my guild currently needs is more hunters or rogues, and yet that's all that applies.  I love the class, but they're becoming less and less useful in the endgame of things and there's more and more every day.

I plan on rolling a Horde Pally. Willing to flip servers if any of you high end raiders' guilds wants it. I at least know a pallys role isn't Crit/Ret spec. and will hotkey "Cleanse" to 1 and "short heal" (From  best-friend healer (http://www.curse-gaming.com/en/wow/addons-4219-1-best-friend-healer.html)) to 2.  :-D

Back at Blizzcon last year Blizzard said hunter or rogue...but definately warrior. Then at E3 they said rogue and warrior, but no hunter. Then they announced paladins friday before last (bringing the roster up ro 6 classes)...and now, today, Blizz went "Did we say warriors? We meant hunters!" (http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general&t=9307050&s=blizzard&tmp=1#blizzard).

And there was much rejoicing, except amount the people who already have L60 NE hunters called 'Legolaz'

> character classes != gameplay variety
DAoC and GW added new classes later that added more options.  I think most developers are creative enough to add new classes with different play-styles, but they loathe to do so because it may upset the balance they work so hard to prefect.

Hang on, so Blood Elves won't be able to play as Warriors?  That seems a bit wierd.  Wouldn't that make them the only race in the game with that restriction?  I'd always pictured Warriors as kind of like the "base" class for the game.  Hunters fit the Elf stereotype more, but still... seems wierd.

Yeah, it is a bit weird, but they're getting Pallies so they do get one plate class.  I suppose the twisty logic is that BEs are Magic-addicts, so having a class that doesn't use mana doesn't make sense... but then that doesn't explain Rogues.

Rogues have more style than warriors.  :-P

Interesting.  If that happened I would quite WoW.  I love the talent trees - however minor they are - it gives you a chance to experiment and try to customize your character.  I love experimenting with the trees and seeing which combination of talents are best for raiding, 5 mans, pvp and soloing (and different roles with some of those contexts on top of that).

[driveby]

I was at the Daemon Temple in UO the other day, when I met a guy who would have been identical to me if he had dropped Parrying for Battle Focus.  Other than that, no one I've met has come close.  Even then, his robe-and-quarterstaff outfit looked nothing like my red and black plate.

[/driveby]

I sort of see the Blood Elf Hunters as akin to say... English Longbowmen (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_longbow), in the sense that the Blood Elf populace was either trained in the use of Magic, or in Archery from an early age (English boys would hold stones out to train their left arm, to the point that, if someone was a longbowmen, it was pretty obvious from their skeleton). For mechanical purposes, they have Paladins, so the Plate doesn't go to waste and they do have the foot soldiers (very magically-attuned ones, like WC3's Spell Breakers (http://www.battle.net/war3/human/units/spellbreaker.shtml)).

But, I guess (ignoring Rogues, although since there isn't a mana-based a melee DPS class, you're essentially stuck using Rogues to fill that mechanical hole), the BE Hunters are very much the other race's Warriors, the mainstays of the peasant defense (that, and the whole Ranger Lord thing).

Then again, why apply logic to the expansion that will give us Space Paladins!

I have never quite understood why no MMOG except UO has given us dyes and dyeable items.  It adds customizability without the possibilty of player-introduced peen pictures.  Sure there would be some hideous combinations, but you take the good with the bad, right?

There was a blue post about it long ago, the short answer is that WoW's engine can't support it, or it would be in right now.

EQ and DAOC both have it as well.  EQ added it in aroun Luclin, which was "coincidentally" around when DAOC launched.

SWG had colored variants, but I think you could only do that to certain items, and only at creation.  Otherwise I'd have seen Orange Stormtroopers and Yellow Composite-armor "Bannana Troopers."  Oh that would have been fun. 

You just couldn't do it factional armors or uniforms (like Stormtrooper armor, when they finally made it craftable) and the palettes left a lot to be desired on armor (but yes, you could have Bright Yellow Composite, thankfully, I never ran into platoons of Bananatroopers).

Pre-CU there was this bug/feature where Composite's color could be changed on the fly from the radial menu (which was apparently a solution to a previous problem that reset all the Composite in-game to a ugly brown color), but apart from that, yes, it was only at creation. (Although, to be honest, a big part of my custom orders and repeat business as a Tailor was based solely things like, "I like this skirt, but make it match this top" kinda stuff. That's neither here nor there though.)

Asherons call had a fairly in depth dye system also.

I imagine the problem with wow is that everyone starts to look the same at certain stages, simply due to the fact that everyone is collecting set gear at the top levels.  Once you have a 3 / 5 / 8 piece set, you generally dont like to break it unless you get some really good gear to replace that set bonus.

Personally, im not sure why the wow engine cant support dyeable gear.  I mean, 2/3 of their gear models in various level ranges are pretty much identical except for palette changes.  Maybe it has to do with some gear having a large number of different colour elements on them?

If I recall that was part 2 of their reasoning behind not doing it.   It was some months ago, that the discussion was had, though.

It's still silly, and I think it's just the influence of the more hardcore elements of Blizz's staff.  They wanted the high-end to look unique from the plebes, and in early production the colors were the only way of doing that.  The T1 and T2 models weren't added in until what.. 3-6 months after the actual armor was in game and being looted?

Let's be honest tho :  If they did it, how many would dye the Valor stuff to be Heroic ?

:)

Agreed, but I will take a break from my rampant WoW fanboism to say that if color is all that separates two tiers of your armor, then you have a real art asset problem.  I know Blizzard is hurting for money and all, but please.

Tip: Never, ever play EQ2. :D

Minor note upon character customization.  Last couple days in UO, first I met a guy who had almost the same character setup as me.  If he swapped out one skill for another we'd have been identical.  It's the closest anyone I've met so far has come.  Then today I met my first paladin/tamer hybrid.  Ever.  He would sic his dragon on the target, then rush in beside it to melee.  I've never seen it before, but I'll be damned if it wasn't working.

Someone please give me this level of differentiation plus shiny.  Please?

AC1 is really incredible for the variety of builds out there - the only thing limiting you oftentimes is your imagination.  I met guys that had specialized Sword and War Magic, or fought only with Life Magic, or all sorts of other weird combinations - and yet, you could usually make something effective and working with it.

AC1 and UO are, IMHO, better models for the future than the 'hard classes' approach favored by DAoC, WoW, etc.

Though to make this WoW related, since you're right, I feel bad about bringing up AC here:  One thing I liked in WoW (and that was perhaps more significant to me since I never got beyond level 6) was that the different races started you out in different newbie areas, adding another level of differentiation beyond just what class you selected, and making it so the race you pick isn't just about what bonuses you get.  Everyone having their own unique "Homeland" memory, of 'this is where my character comes from', is cool even if past a certain level I'm sure you don't really feel it in gameplay terms.

WUA has been around the block enough to know that AC1 is not his personal nirvana. He didn't say "Somebody please wax lyrical about their favorite games",  did he? He wants a new MMORPG, one that he hasn't already played and dismissed as utter shite. We're all quite aware that AC1, Shadowbane and UO have more customisation than WoW or DOAC, and that they have more than EQ2 or new SWG. For some reason or another, we don't want to play them, and no matter how many threads you ejeculate to while pounding your AC mantra, it isn't going to change that.

And balance.  Please.  And within the first two years.



And as a side note, I'd put H/M/T and WUA in the same class with regards to using this thread to beat their dead horses in a place that we don't care about them.