Mists of Pandaria

[Sjofn]

Where is my redone Stratholme. 

[Fordel]

In the Caverns of Time?

[Sjofn]

That doesn't count. :(

[Evildrider]

[Margalis]

Yes, people will play TOR and totally say "oh that other game was silly, let's never play that again."

Just like they never laugh at fart jokes after watching a harrowing drama.

 

Want to bet money that WOW sub numbers will stay the same after SWTOR launches?

Didn't think so.

Yes, WoW has always been silly to some degree but as I said this definitely looks to be doubling down on that. The two big features are Pokemon and Kung-Fu Panda. Those are both children's properties.

[Merusk]

My you've been a disagreeable shit, reading more into what's said than is there lately. 

Oh wait, no, that's always.

I wasn't saying that WoW's numbers weren't going to tank. They will and deservedly so at this point.  Your analogy however, was about as good as one of Sand's.

[Margalis]

My you've been a disagreeable shit, reading more into what's said than is there lately.  

Oh wait, no, that's always.

I wasn't saying that WoW's numbers weren't going to tank. They will and deservedly so at this point.  Your analogy however, was about as good as one of Sand's.

Dear god lighten up. (I didn't even make an analogy, that was you...)

By the way, I'm pretty sure I'll be able to find a review of SWTOR that specifically mentions that the reviewer appreciates the more mature storylines and situations in comparison to the light fare of WoW and specifically to the Pandaren expansion.

[Kitsune]

So their bangup plan for talents is to take away stuff that a player could have all of before, then offer them back 1/3 of them.  Yes, that's going to go over great.  When I canceled my account last night, it was just because I hadn't played in a long time and needed to save the money.  I wish I'd known about this then so I could have listed it as the reason for canceling.

[Paelos]

My idea would have been to remove talents altogether and make everything standard.

Because speccing is stupid.

[sinij]

Yes, WoW has always been silly to some degree but as I said this definitely looks to be doubling down on that. The two big features are Pokemon and Kung-Fu Panda. Those are both children's properties.

Interesting, so you think they are going after sub-12 audience? If so, they are on the wrong platform.

[sinij]

Never say the word reality again. Even when you're accidentally right you aren't entitled to use it.

In reality, feel free to go fuck yourself at any point during, or after reading this post.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Wow, I'm one of the first to get on wow's case for shit but you lot are a bunch of sandy cunts tonight.

I ought to point out, anyone who liked pokemon when they were 12 is 20-something now(red came out 15 years ago)

[Sjofn]

I ought to point out, anyone who liked pokemon when they were 12 is 20-something now(red came out 15 years ago)

Jesus, it's really been that long?

[SurfD]

So their bangup plan for talents is to take away stuff that a player could have all of before, then offer them back 1/3 of them.  Yes, that's going to go over great.  When I canceled my account last night, it was just because I hadn't played in a long time and needed to save the money.  I wish I'd known about this then so I could have listed it as the reason for canceling.

Not quite.  Its more like they take out all the talents, and refund them in different ways.

If you really look at a talent tree:

60% of it passive stuff like: "buff your spec spells by X", "increase your hit by Y", "make spell crits apply a dot" type things.  Another 30 % of it is spec specific spells you unlock by spending talents (dragons breath, blast wave, etc).   They can take all of that, and bake it into your actual spec choice at level 10, with some of it coming as passive abilities you learn as you level up.

The last 10% are class defining abilities that were previously only available by speccing a specific way, which they thought would be better served as being allowed to be optionally chosen by all specs, or unique utility abilities that would be awesome in one spec, but always unavailable due to the way the old system worked.  Now they can let you chose neat talents regardless of what spec you are.

Personally, i think that if they polish it properly, the new system is likely to end up much better then the old.

[Margalis]

Are talent changes really about improving the game as much as changing it to make the experience feel a little fresher, similar to Magic: The Gathering cards rotating out?

[Rokal]

I think the Cata talent changes were a legitimate reaction to how bloated the trees had gotten.

This time around? Who knows. I guess it's the only way they can make old classes feel new again, beyond the 1-2 new spells everyone will get.

[Simond]

Yes, WoW has always been silly to some degree but as I said this definitely looks to be doubling down on that. The two big features are Pokemon and Kung-Fu Panda. Those are both children's properties.

"Critics who treat adult as a term of approval, instead of as a merely descriptive term, cannot be adults themselves. To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence.... When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up". - C. S. Lewis.

Also: http://awkwardzombie.com/index.php?page=0&comic=032910

Besides, I think SWTOR is going to have one of the same problems that Wrath and especially Cataclysm had - you play through once, and it's "Wow, fun and engaging storyline". Play it through again and it becomes "Yeah, yeah, I can see the rails now you know". (Which is why Mists moving back to hub+spoke quests rather than linear appeals to me).

[luckton]

*walks into the thread after driving 8 hours yesterday and catches up on all the Day 1 stuffs*

Hmm...yep, pretty much what we all expected.  If TOR tanks, we're all coming back to this game until GW2 is out, and if we do come back, it'll still be fun.

Still, Azeroth has become a silly place.  Like Camelot  

[Margalis]

"Critics who treat adult as a term of approval, instead of as a merely descriptive term, cannot be adults themselves. To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence.... When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up". - C. S. Lewis.

Pokemon and Kung-Fu Panda are literally properties for children and drunken pandas that originated as a joke are silly. I'm not using those terms to be derogative; those are the terms that apply.

In politics the idea of triangulation is that you have your own strengths and you negate the strengths of your opponents by claiming to have them as well. One thing WoW could have done is announced that in the new expansion everything would be voice-acted and introduced a more involved plot. Tried to dial down a bit of the random humor and throwaway stuff and dialed up the world cohesion, plot relevance, etc. Instead this is the opposite direction, throwing in something that is humorous fan service.

I'm not saying that SWTOR will be more "mature" and thus a better game. I just find it interesting that rather than reacting to SWTOR with "we have these things too" instead they are doubling down on the WoW-ness of WoW. And again, I feel pretty confident saying that this point will be brought up specifically in SWTOR reviews.

[Simond]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warcraft_III:_The_Frozen_Throne
2003

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0441773/
2008

"Blizzard is totally copying Kung Fu Panda, guys!".

As for the "MOAR GRIMDARK" thing - previous expansions:
TBC - Oh shit the Burning Legion has reopened the Dark Portal and is going to invade again and kill everyone.
WotLK - Oh shit the Lich King has woken up and is going to invade again and kill everyone and then raise them as his slaves.
Cata - Oh shit Deathwing has woken up, wreaked the planet, and wants to commit omnicide in the service of Elder Gods.

Hell, Metzen even specifically said that the shift from "EARTH SHATTERING PERIL" to a smaller, more personal, scale was a deliberate decision for the expansion.

[Tannhauser]

Yeah because how much trouble can pandas be?  Oh no our bamboo grove has been nibbled on!

[Margalis]

Do you really think you are making some sort of novel point I'm not aware of by pointing out that Pandarens predate Kung-Fu Panda? (Even though I referred to their origins in my posts?)

Nobody said anything about grimdark, you were the first person to bring it up. Nobody said that Blizzard copied Kung Fu Panda, again that was all you.

I note that for all the hand wringing nobody is willing to disagree with my assertion that reviews of SWTOR will specifically contrast the tone and narrative of SWTOR to WoW and specifically the to Pandaren expansion.

It seems Blizzard is doubling down on the difference between WoW and SWTOR at least thematically.

Does anyone believe the opposite? That Blizzard is trying to obfuscate and lessen the differences between WoW and SWTOR at least thematically? (Which is a pretty common strategy in the video game industry and most industries really)

Edit: My original post did read a bit "OMG WOW is a game for babiez now!" but that's jut me being me I guess...my real point here is that Blizzard is not trying to move in the direction of SWTOR at all to maybe take the edge off the differences.

[Nevermore]

So their bangup plan for talents is to take away stuff that a player could have all of before, then offer them back 1/3 of them.  Yes, that's going to go over great.  When I canceled my account last night, it was just because I hadn't played in a long time and needed to save the money.  I wish I'd known about this then so I could have listed it as the reason for canceling.

Not quite.  Its more like they take out all the talents, and refund them in different ways.

If you really look at a talent tree:

60% of it passive stuff like: "buff your spec spells by X", "increase your hit by Y", "make spell crits apply a dot" type things.  Another 30 % of it is spec specific spells you unlock by spending talents (dragons breath, blast wave, etc).   They can take all of that, and bake it into your actual spec choice at level 10, with some of it coming as passive abilities you learn as you level up.

The last 10% are class defining abilities that were previously only available by speccing a specific way, which they thought would be better served as being allowed to be optionally chosen by all specs, or unique utility abilities that would be awesome in one spec, but always unavailable due to the way the old system worked.  Now they can let you chose neat talents regardless of what spec you are.

Personally, i think that if they polish it properly, the new system is likely to end up much better then the old.

So you missed the part where they've made some of the abilities a spec can currently get mutually exclusive so they can't get them all anymore?

[SurfD]

So you missed the part where they've made some of the abilities a spec can currently get mutually exclusive so they can't get them all anymore?

True you might lose access to a few of your old spec talent abilities, but you gain access to a few you never would have had before (and they have mentioned they want talent swapping to be fairly easy, which means situationallly chosing talents for specific fights / situations may be much easier and more desireable then it is now), so itwill likely all balance out in the wash.

Under the old system, Spec A got abilities 1, 2 and 3, but could never get 4, 5, or 6, because those were for spec B or 7, 8, and 9 because those belong C.  Now, you get to chose your flavour of X from each of the trees as you go along down the talent trees.  

Looking at most of the classes, the choices at each talent level usually seem to have a theme:  Tier one might be flavours of faster movement, or croud controll; Tier 2 might be Different types of self healing; Tier 3 might be different methods of Resource regeneration; Tier 4 might be a flavour of damage increase (Flat damage bonus / Stacking buff that you then blow for burst / Large bonus during execute phase) etc.

In the end, I will reserve judgement for when they have announced a full list of what abilities are baseline for each class, what are Spec only, and what the final talents end up looking like, but currently I am quite happy with the direction where they seem to be takeing this.  Yes, you might have to sacrifice access to an ability or two you are used to having in Spec X to gain access to another one typically from Spec X, but in return you gain access to an equal or greater number of abilities that you never had access to before.

[Fordel]

I think the new Talent Trees are highlighting how some classes had abilities spread so damn thin, and others are an overflow.

[Merusk]

The part that bothers me is the removal of core abilities.  DKs had 3 methods of resource regen because their system is slow and sometimes you needed that rune tap just to stay alive as a tank.  "Access to stuff you never had before" sounds great UNTIL you realize "oh that means things that were crucial were stripped just for this novel idea."   

Unless the class is getting an entire resource overhaul you're going to see big problems there.  Ditto for stripping the core ability of death pact and the talent vampiric blood.   This used to be a core combo survivial ability for DK tanks.  What now?  Is raid damage being evened out, is DK survivability being upped since they don't have block? What's being done to make sure they aren't splattered?  I don't see Feral Healing on the Druid talent tree, for example, something that's been marked as very needed for them as a tank.

Similarly boned are pallies who now have to choose between Ardent Defender and Sacred Shield.  Oh wait, that's not really a choice as a tank you're going to take AD but lose all possibility of acces to SS.  Fantastic.

Removing shockwave and bladestorm from warriors then not allowing access to it again until L90? Heh.  I feel bad, every other tank class seems to have gotten some pretty cool new l90 abilities.  Warriors get theirs back.

Oh.. and stealing Force Choke and calling it Asphyxiate.. 

[Azuredream]

Oh.. and stealing Force Choke and calling it Asphyxiate.. 

Baron Ashbury in SFK has the same thing, so their stealing of force choke predates this new expansion.

[Paelos]

I like a lot of what they propose in the expac, the pets thing is a great idea especially.

They just need to prove that they recognize exactly how big of a failure that Cataclysm was, and make public promises not to do it again in this xpac.

[Fordel]

We still don't know the spec abilities awarded by picking your tree too.


But I mean, looking at my Moonkin, I'm going to have access to shit I would have never had before and I lose very little if anything.



Of course, new talents don't help if casting still feels like ass and shit. 

[Merusk]

We still don't know the spec abilities awarded by picking your tree too.


But I mean, looking at my Moonkin, I'm going to have access to shit I would have never had before and I lose very little if anything.

It's a druid, they never feel the full force of nerfs other classes do. 

[Nevermore]

We still don't know the spec abilities awarded by picking your tree too.


But I mean, looking at my Moonkin, I'm going to have access to shit I would have never had before and I lose very little if anything.

It's a druid, they never feel the full force of nerfs other classes do. 

Splitting Feral into two separate specs sure feels like a nerf to me.

[Fordel]

Splitting Feral will fix a lot of shit that's been holding both halves of the spec back. It should have been split back in Vanilla even, Cat, Bear, Caster... instead of CatBear, Casting Healer and throwrandomshitintotreeandhopenoonenotices. 

[sinij]

Why each class _has to have_ 3 specs? Mages for example can conceptually support only 2 - hard nuker and controller. Third one always felt like doubling on ether of these.  Druids  on other hand can easily accommodate 4.

[Fordel]

Mostly tradition at this point. Thematically, it would be quite a blow to say "sorry mages, you can't be fire anymore" or whatever. People are very attached to their spec identities for good or for ill.

[luckton]