Cracks starting to show?

[Lantyssa]

Yeah, Cata is a lot of big changes, but even casually comparing it to NGE is ludicrous. It's not a ToA by any stretch of the imagination either. I don't know offhand what ToA did to DaoC subs in the end, but it was pretty (haha) cataclysmic.

I said soon or later.  WUA sums up my feeling on it succinctly.  They're slowing down, making mistakes, making mistakes they shouldn't be this late in the game, and the polish is starting to wear off.

They'll still be top dog for a long time, even if SWTOR, GW2, or a surprise hit go gang-busters.  You don't lose millions of people overnight.

[Xanthippe]

WoW polish is certainly thing of the past.

Well, until you try out any other MMO by comparison.

Yep. 

Although WoW polish has always been a matter of comparison to other MMOs.  And let's not look at the past through rose-colored glasses - there have always been bugs and problems and whatnot.  Remember the mail retrieval bug?  The loot bug?

I don't think this expansion will be WoW's ToA, although I also don't think it will be the hits TBC or Wrath were.

[Ratman_tf]

I'm no longer sure that the Bilzzard Polish ever really existed. They have lots of bugs, and make wonky design decisions just like every other developer out there. I think it's more that they've managed to build up so much good will with their consumers. Blizzard's average performance is still usually better than most company's best.

[Nebu]

I'm no longer sure that the Bilzzard Polish ever really existed. They have lots of bugs, and make wonky design decisions just like every other developer out there. I think it's more that they've managed to build up so much good will with their consumers. Blizzard's average performance is still usually better than most company's best.

This sums up my feelings well.  I enjoy WoW, but it still feels like it's lacking.  I think that's why it doesn't ever keep me longer than 2-3 months at a time.

[Hawkbit]

I'ma bout to send a bunch of people off to WAR, lest ye forget.  What a bunch of jaded gamers. 

[dusematic]

People should be jaded. The game is five years old.  I mean, to still be obsessively playing the same game 5 years on is almost full retard.  The stink of it is nothing close to comparable has come out in that 5 year time span.  I know.  I played  Aion.  


It's less that WoW is a bad game or the designers are losing their touch and more that even beating off gets old after awhile.  MSNBC's Lockup has taught me that.  In the desolate prison of our lives, WoW was our only release...and things are starting to look pretty grim.  

[Sjofn]

The reason I am still playing is because of something several people in this thread have been bitching about. I love that they're willing to entirely revamp a class that still sucks. I love that they'll rebuild a system that is no longer working in the game at present instead of trying hard to continue to force it into something vaguely not shitty. I love that they say to themselves, "This sucks, change it," even if I don't always agree 100% what sucks.

Jesus, if everything played the way it did at release, I would've quit years ago. In fact, I did, until they realised there was a lot of shit about the end game that sucked, we better change it. I'm apparently the exact person they're building this game for.

[Lantyssa]

Sure that's great, but it's changing things that don't suck which boggles me.  And making that decision before there's actually a replacement tested.

[ghost]

I would daresay the Blizzard folks know that they need to make changes to the game over time to keep the fanbase from feeling that the game is getting too stale, e.g. graphics, new raids and dungeons, game mechanics, etc.  I personally expect to see great swathes of changes from this expansion.  Nonetheless, this is the first expansion that I won't be buying and playing right out of the gate.  In fact, I don't think I'm going to buy it at all unless there are some significant changes to some of the grind and, well, grind. 

[Sjofn]

Sure that's great, but it's changing things that don't suck which boggles me.  And making that decision before there's actually a replacement tested.

You and I have a greatly different view of what sucks in this game, I'm pretty sure we established that. The old talent system was starting to suck in WotLK, and I totally believe them when they said it sucked even harder to try and make work in Cataclysm.

I'm also curious how they can make a replacement and test it before deciding it needs to be done in the first place.

[Lantyssa]

Prototyping.  Certainly not a live environment.

[Selby]

The old talent system was starting to suck in WotLK, and I totally believe them when they said it sucked even harder to try and make work in Cataclysm.

The *only* thing about the new talent system I dislike compared to the old one is that abilities you used to get at 60 now have to wait until 69 (Shockwave, Titan's Grip, etc).  Other than that, the new system is SO much better than the old one.  I had my worries that it would suck based on what they did in beta\alpha, but what's up so far is actually REALLY nice.  I absolutely hated playing a class a set way until some magic level and then *poof* a new ability changed the entire way it played.

Granted, I've been playing since release and the fact that this game is still the only one worthy of my time and money is really fucking sad and the gaming industry shouldn't be proud of themselves for it.

[kildorn]

I had my hissy fit about "you idiots don't test/change randomly/should have seen this was a problem earlier" in vanilla, quit in a huff with an irritated forum post, got over myself and play a bit now. The game is still fun. As much as it annoyed me to have a core piece of my class ripped out from under me for a bullshit excuse, it was still for the best, and the changes to in combat rez strike me as the same thing. The ONLY reason I said half assed is the lack of a good UI indicator yet. That's all Blizzard is missing from this change: an icon.

Me? I threw a fit over the change to negative resists, which were incredibly broken, because it was stated to be an unintended bug instead of just broken bullshit. My complaint was that they'd added polish to it by making negative resists show properly in the combat log, then said "oh god, where did that come from?!" instead of just admitting that it was overpowered and being removed.

[Ashamanchill]

Yeah, cracks are starting to show. No one's saying that there is a giant gaping hole in their armor, only that some of their latest ideas have people scratching their heads. Like the soulstone/combat rez thing. Yes that may have been an issue for those guild on the sharp end.........but for the giant majority of those struggling on NON heroic Blood Queen (yeah my guild can't down her)....much less most PUGs which fall apart well before putricide; those combat rezzes make the game MORE bearable: they are not an issue to be dealt with.

Like the changes to Pallies. Blizzard just up and said 'Hey! You Fucks need a new mechanic! I don't care what you have to say, you're just deluding yourself into thinking you're having fun right now... but don't wprry about that, we'll fix everything in a fun way. And for those who don't like it, you can just hide your kids, and hide your wife!!!

[Simond]

So your agreement is combat res is needed because it gives people a  better chance at a boss as long as you stack classes, while Blizzard has said they don't want people to stack classes just so people can throw human wave rushes at bosses.

That's not bad design, that's the point. Also, not being mean but if you haven't killed non-heroic Blood Queen by now (with the buff and so on) after months of trying then, well, you're probably not going to. Sorry.

(Paladins should be used to being redesigned in every release by now - it started two weeks before the game originally launched and repeated in every single expansion and most of the big class balance patches.  )

[Ashamanchill]

What didnt you get when I said the word PUG? It's not a case of stacking druids, it's a case of taking whoever shows up. And as for throwing human waves a boss, lol, I would say about nine out of ten combat rezes die instantly due to boss mechanics anyways. Those battle rezes aren't so much an exploit as a second chance for that dope that you watched stand in the fire, not move from the bosses cleave, but dammit you need his heals even though you snagged him from trade chat. Is it needed in the game? No, not really, but taking it away in this hamfisted manner is just admitting that 'Hey, we can't balance this, so fuck it, we'll just yank it from under you.'

No, it's not one of those getting to Tier 3 in Warhammer moments, that result in thousands of CDs being chucked into the trash almost simultaneously, but it is another self inflicted cuts, one of those that has most of the community saying 'Why are you doing this again? Was this really needed?'

[caladein]

There is only one way to balance them in the end though and that's to cap them.  If you give them to a lot more classes to discourage Druid/Warlock stacking, in general or for specific encounters, you're going to have raids swimming in them all the time.  It's the same as the changes to Bloodlust and Vampiric Touch with WotLK.

[Azuredream]

Blizzard does a lot of nerfs that are aimed at a particular area of the game that end up affecting another part, this is nothing new.

[Lantyssa]

There is only one way to balance them in the end though and that's to cap them.  If you give them to a lot more classes to discourage Druid/Warlock stacking, in general or for specific encounters, you're going to have raids swimming in them all the time.  It's the same as the changes to Bloodlust and Vampiric Touch with WotLK.

Funny how GW2 thinks everyone should be able to rez at any time.  It'll be interesting to see how the difference in philosophy works out.

(I've never actually been talking about rezzes, but since people seem fixated on this I'm throwing this out there.)

[Chimpy]

Funny how GW2 thinks everyone should be able to rez at any time.  It'll be interesting to see how the difference in philosophy works out.

(I've never actually been talking about rezzes, but since people seem fixated on this I'm throwing this out there.)

That is NCSoft there. Aion had no rez limitations other than the following:
You had to have enough rez stones in your inventory (they were bought at a vendor), or be a priest subclass.
Self rezzes via items or spells had a cooldown. (1h usually)

You came back with rez sickness which was up to 5 minutes of slow movement speed and less health. It worked fine, and I think I actually prefer that mechanic to the WoW "no rezzes in combat except a soulstone or druid" mechanic. But that could be me.

[Rendakor]

WoW is (one of) the first MMOs to limit combat rezzing to a single class. EQ1, EQ2, CoH, and WAR all had unlimited use combat rezzing by anyone who had a rez.

Ashamanchill, you must join some terrible PUGs. All it takes to do 10/12 in ICC10 is decent gear (4.8k gs or so) and a raid leader who knows the fights.

[Ashamanchill]

It's true  Oh well.

[caladein]

There is only one way to balance them in the end though and that's to cap them.  If you give them to a lot more classes to discourage Druid/Warlock stacking, in general or for specific encounters, you're going to have raids swimming in them all the time.  It's the same as the changes to Bloodlust and Vampiric Touch with WotLK.

Funny how GW2 thinks everyone should be able to rez at any time.  It'll be interesting to see how the difference in philosophy works out.

(I've never actually been talking about rezzes, but since people seem fixated on this I'm throwing this out there.)

Yes, but 1-3 is basically the status quo whereas 10-25... isn't.  Capping and homogenizing battle rezzes both achieve the same result of not encouraging class stacking; but one requires a complete overhaul of raid mechanics and the other just sticks it to people who were cheesing Heroic Putricide with them (or Vashj back in ye olden times when Soulstones got changed to raid-only).  I prefer a low amount of rezzes when the raid game focuses on "Don't stand in fire."

Also, since Rendakor brought up other MMOs: LotRO is basically the long-cooldown version of the current WoW model.  Rune-keepers get a 1m duration/15m cooldown Soulstone, Minstrels and Captains get ~30m cooldown Rebirths, and Lore-masters get a 10m cooldown Reincarnate with one of their pets.

Edit: Grammar.

[kildorn]

WoW is (one of) the first MMOs to limit combat rezzing to a single class. EQ1, EQ2, CoH, and WAR all had unlimited use combat rezzing by anyone who had a rez.

Ashamanchill, you must join some terrible PUGs. All it takes to do 10/12 in ICC10 is decent gear (4.8k gs or so) and a raid leader who knows the fights.

It's limited to make dying a problem in a fight. Do we all remember Molten Core and the out of combat rezzer, and how much it completely broke the encounters?

"hey, fred died. Oh well, have the paladin rez him and get him back in the fight!"

Basically it's hard rez limitations, or much more crippling enrage timers/effects.

[Rendakor]

I'm not saying that limiting combat rez is a bad thing, just that it's a problem unique to WoW. It makes more sense to limit it to "X brez per encounter" than "X brez per (druid+lock)"; the former is consistent, while the second encourages class stacking.

[Xanthippe]

After playing more, and reading more blue posts about changes made and what is to come, it seems to me that there is a completely different team working on the various mechanics in the game this expansion than last or the one before.  Maybe I am missing the overarching vision of what the devs are trying to hit - no, I know I'm missing the overarching vision.  I just don't have a clue.

I assume that I'll be happy with one of my characters, although my main (hunter) is once again my least favorite.  I have no idea where they're going with hunter, which seems completely broken, and there is zero communication from Ghostcrawler (other than to chide people for fishing for blue responses).  He's such a dick; I don't understand why they still let him talk to the community at all.  I tend not to follow blue posts anymore because I can't stand him.  He has time to play forumwarrior but doesn't have time to actually answer any of the pleas for information?

From all that I have read and heard about beta, it does seem that this will be the least finished of the expansions to date when it launches.  Blizzard will benefit from the incompetence of the rest of the MMOs out there - there simply isn't anything else to play.

tl;dr: this is my yearly rant on how I hate my hunter and Ghostcrawler but will play nonetheless.

[Hawkbit]

I'm not down with all the hate on Blizzard right now, maybe I'm just not that invested anymore.  But I will say that back in '04 my hunter was the first class in an MMO that felt 'right' to me... but now, like you, it is my least favorite of my 4 toons.  I think they have focus with the class now, but it's just not a very enjoyable result for me. 

It is time for another developer to step up to the challenge, unfortunately nothing on the horizon is looking to step in.  Rifts has the closest shot and I would suggest to their team to not launch until 110% prepared. 

[Paelos]

SWTOR 

[Nebu]

The only team I see putting out a better MMO than WoW right now is Blizzard.  It sucks to say that, but I just don't see anyone else having the resources and clout to release a game when it's at a reasonable state of polish anymore.  At least for a mainstream title.  

My personal hope is for some niche titles to start showing up.  I want to find the next EvE, DAoC, or Tale in the Desert done better.

[K9]

I could see Valve turning out an incredibly good MMO, although it will probably arrive in 2022 if they start now.

[Paelos]

Minecraft, the MMO

[Lakov_Sanite]

I forsee an entire city made of dicks.

[Paelos]

I forsee an entire city made of dicks.

Dalaran?

Oh, you mean cock palaces.

[Azazel]

I'm no longer sure that the Bilzzard Polish ever really existed. They have lots of bugs, and make wonky design decisions just like every other developer out there. I think it's more that they've managed to build up so much good will with their consumers. Blizzard's average performance is still usually better than most company's best.

That's part of the polish. I owned Diablo 1 and 2 (and Lost Vikings and Blackthorne). Played WC2 and part of SC1 at some stage, but I wasn't a Blizzard "fan"by any means. They made games, some of which I bought and/or played. No different to EA or what have you. I did, however play EverQuest for a while.

Go from that, (or LOTRO, today) to WoW and you'll see the "polish". And maybe the Polish if you're lucky.

[Sheepherder]

I said soon or later.  WUA sums up my feeling on it succinctly.  They're slowing down, making mistakes, making mistakes they shouldn't be this late in the game, and the polish is starting to wear off.

They're not slowing down, they've never been fast, and they've always managed to miss some shit with each major change.

(This part is not necessarily directed at you Lantyssa) A lot of the shit just emerging now as a problem has always been lurking there, and it's emerging now because the game is ridiculously fucking old to still be in active development and Blizzard has gone through three almost complete mechanics overhauls because they really would like us to not notice that we're still playing a game made in fucking 2004.

But I will say that back in '04 my hunter was the first class in an MMO that felt 'right' to me...

Back when arcane shot scaled off of +arcane spell damage, serpent sting scaled off of +nature damage, instant attacks clipped your auto-shot timer, and at some point top hunter DPS was achieved by main-handing a Thunderfury and running into melee range to fish for TF procs by hammering on Wing Clip and Raptor Strike.