I'm gonna bitch about Legion legendaries for a bit. Won't you please join me.
*sets up a podium complete with Personal Spotlight, takes out note cards, taps them on podium, clears throat*
I am, to say the least, not a fan.
There are two good ways to do legendaries. One, make them extremely rare and expensive to get. Two, make them accessible to every player, but make them take a lot of time and effort to grind out. Either of these makes something called a "legendary" feel ... well, legendary.
Blizzard, you had legendaries nailed down alllll the way back in vanilla. You went a bit into the weeds during BC, yes, but the Wrath and Cata legendaries were honestly pretty great. Cata, for the record, had the best legendaries by far, in terms of effort-to-reward ratio. Both of the quest chains were so cool, and the items themselves were really special.
Of course, the major drawback to Approach One is that only a small fraction of players will end up seeing the content. Granted, a DPS staff and a healer mace will see pretty wide play, but the Fangs of the Father were for ... rogues, and only rogues. Weird.
Anyway. I get why this approach is suboptimal, from a "game design" perspective. So that's why you do option 2, and make the legendary available to everyone who's willing to put in the time and effort. I didn't end up getting either the cloak or the ring, because I really hate LFR, but that's okay -- I could have done if I wanted to, and so could anyone else.
To be worthy of the name and the power they bring, legendaries need to be either super rare or super hard to get. Since I'm in general opposed to the RNG for things that actually affect gameplay, "super hard to get" seems the way to go. And I think, Blizzard, you really nailed it down in Warlords.
So why oh why did you fuck it up so hard?
Listen. I know that you didn't want to do a super-hard legendary grind for Legion. I know that that's what the artifacts are all about. The artifacts are, in effect, the "legendary" for this expansion. And that's cool, that's what it should be, the artifacts are a Big Deal. But that just means you either leave the legendaries out, or you make them super duper rare, like they were in BC.
You do not make them into what epics used to be.
The problem with legendaries as they are now is that they're common enough that encounters can be tuned around them, because if you don't, people will raid-stack to trivialize the content. But since now you need a legendary (and not only a legendary, the right legendary) to bring the deeps, you effectively can't do the content without one.
It wouldn't be so bad if some of the legendaries weren't so powerful for their class and spec. If they weren't fifty ilvls, effectively two tiers, above everything else people have. (My druid's first legendary drop, a week and a half after hitting 110, was a 120-level upgrade. 120 item levels. That's not a tier, that's an expansion-level upgrade.) But of course, if they weren't obscenely powerful, with game-breaking procs, you couldn't really call them "legendary."
And the drop rate, ugh. I do not, as a rule, have the best luck with RNGsus. There have been some notable exceptions (*cough*Experiment 12-B in two consecutive runs*cough*), but as a rule I only get rare drops when I'm not looking for them. So you can imagine my frustration, having run the Withered scenario every single time it's popped since September and still not having the hidden appearance for Truthguard or the fox mount. My very first legendary this expansion dropped in mid-January, just a few days before 7.1.5 was released. Four months of world quests and world bosses. So it's a bit "salt in the wounds" that my druid, a throwaway character that I only leveled because owlkitty, got his first legendary a week and a half into 110 and his second the very next fucking day. Hell, I had his second legendary before I even had owlkitty!
One of the ways in which I like EVE better than I like WoW is that in EVE, it's never really that hard to get the gear you want. Most of it can be manufactured or earned through missions, and all of it can be bought and sold. It's not really a model that would work within WoW's paradigm but at least it takes the randomness out of it. Kind of like the old badges, or valor points, or what have you -- sooner or later you would get gear.
It's probably fair to say that I'm just salty because I don't have good luck with drops. It's true, I'm salty because I have rotten luck. But that doesn't make me wrong -- it just means I'm in a place to see the flaws.
I know that artifacts were supposed to fill the role of "legendary" in this expansion. I just think that was a mistake. I think artifacts are kind of a dud. The flavor aspect I like, but the rest? It's basically the pre-Mists talent system without any variety, and it makes quest rewards feel really boring. All of those cool treasures lying around the world in Warlords? Gone, in favor of, oh good, some more AP.
Artifacts are leveling that you have to do even after you hit max level, and legendaries are OP epics distributed by a cruel and capricious daemon. It's like Blizzard took the worst of the two possible legendary gameplay systems and implemented them in the same expansion. Nothin but love for you, Blizz, but this one was pretty fail. Pret-ty fail.
Monday, February 20, 2017
Wednesday, October 26, 2016
Content Flood
I'm kind of surprised that 7.1 dropped already. I mean, what, six weeks in? How many people have seen Emerald Nightmare? I haven't.
Haven't been blogging much because reasons. Perhaps most pertinent to this blog is there isn't a whole lot for me to say about Warcraft at the moment. Underneath the new shiny, it's the same game it's always been -- go out, kill stuff, collect rewards, repeat until you get bored.
I find Suramar exhausting. The "withered training" scenario is dull, but apparently we're supposed to keep doing it? Need to do it to get the "secret" appearance for Truthguard unless I decide I don't care about that. Which I might. Having a bad case of the wandering alts right now. Not sure who I want to play. Nothing is really grabbing me.
Outlaw is the most fun rogue spec but I'm a big fan of how Subtlety doesn't take falling damage. I couldn't say why exactly but that's a big deal for me. But Outlaw, oh, Outlaw has "find treasure" as a special. As always, I am presented with a difficult choice, because neither of the available options has everything I want. I suppose that's deliberate design, but as a player who doesn't really like to fiddle with my spec it makes things a bit more tedious.
At least there's nothing about Ret that I miss when I'm playing Prot. Just my invincible, indestructible flurry of AoE damage. Oh, I guess I wish I had the blessings under Prot. But again, can't have everything.
I think my biggest annoyance so far is that they're keeping content "fresh" by simply making it harder -- Mythics and Mythic+? What the hell is Mythic+? And for that matter, why can't we use LFG for Mythics? Asinine. I mean I recognize the game is and has always been about group content, but to have so much of the ostensibly "solo" game gated behind various dungeons ... sucks, for us antisocial types.
Granted, if I could make friends with other players, this wouldn't be such an issue.
Not sure who I want to level next. I have a wide variety of characters to choose from, all of whom I'll "need" to level sooner or later. My lock and my shaman both need leveling for professional purposes, but I'm not super into either one of them. I think I'm going to use my warrior for an Algalon group, so I'm not going to focus on him. The two most likely "third alts" right now are my druid and my hunter -- there are lots of hidden goodies on the druid side of things, while the hunter is by far my fastest toon now that Pathfinding has been updated. Decisions decisions. Monk, mage, and demon hunter? Big fat "meh."
The druid's travel form being updated to mount speed is a big plus. And I really want to get the owlcat form. So. Druid next, I guess.
More to come. Thanks for reading.
Haven't been blogging much because reasons. Perhaps most pertinent to this blog is there isn't a whole lot for me to say about Warcraft at the moment. Underneath the new shiny, it's the same game it's always been -- go out, kill stuff, collect rewards, repeat until you get bored.
I find Suramar exhausting. The "withered training" scenario is dull, but apparently we're supposed to keep doing it? Need to do it to get the "secret" appearance for Truthguard unless I decide I don't care about that. Which I might. Having a bad case of the wandering alts right now. Not sure who I want to play. Nothing is really grabbing me.
Outlaw is the most fun rogue spec but I'm a big fan of how Subtlety doesn't take falling damage. I couldn't say why exactly but that's a big deal for me. But Outlaw, oh, Outlaw has "find treasure" as a special. As always, I am presented with a difficult choice, because neither of the available options has everything I want. I suppose that's deliberate design, but as a player who doesn't really like to fiddle with my spec it makes things a bit more tedious.
At least there's nothing about Ret that I miss when I'm playing Prot. Just my invincible, indestructible flurry of AoE damage. Oh, I guess I wish I had the blessings under Prot. But again, can't have everything.
I think my biggest annoyance so far is that they're keeping content "fresh" by simply making it harder -- Mythics and Mythic+? What the hell is Mythic+? And for that matter, why can't we use LFG for Mythics? Asinine. I mean I recognize the game is and has always been about group content, but to have so much of the ostensibly "solo" game gated behind various dungeons ... sucks, for us antisocial types.
Granted, if I could make friends with other players, this wouldn't be such an issue.
Not sure who I want to level next. I have a wide variety of characters to choose from, all of whom I'll "need" to level sooner or later. My lock and my shaman both need leveling for professional purposes, but I'm not super into either one of them. I think I'm going to use my warrior for an Algalon group, so I'm not going to focus on him. The two most likely "third alts" right now are my druid and my hunter -- there are lots of hidden goodies on the druid side of things, while the hunter is by far my fastest toon now that Pathfinding has been updated. Decisions decisions. Monk, mage, and demon hunter? Big fat "meh."
The druid's travel form being updated to mount speed is a big plus. And I really want to get the owlcat form. So. Druid next, I guess.
More to come. Thanks for reading.
Friday, September 30, 2016
A Month of Demons
So Legion's been out a month now. In that time I've gotten my paladin to 110 and through the Order Hall campaign plus two of the artifacts. I'm now dividing my time up between my druid and my rogue, leveling, and bumbling around on my other toons as I see fit. Here are some thoughts.
Beware: unfocused rambling ahead.
The reputation grind is fucking brutal. The Nightfallen storyline is kind of fun but waaaaay too long. I've been at it for three weeks now, admittedly not on a daily basis, and I'm still at 8/11 for the storyline. Sneaking around the city without flying is just tedious, and trying to figure out how to navigate the blind alleys and different layers all while avoiding getting dog-piled by demons and city guards is ... look, if I wanted to play Assassin's Creed I'd play Assassin's Creed. I am pointedly not looking forward to having to do this again on every ... single ... toon. And you kind of have to, don't you? Opening two of the dungeons is done via getting to a substantial reputational position with the Nightfallen.
Dungeons, ugh. I hate how Mythic difficulty still requires you to find a group. LFG has spoiled me. And all the different "levels" of Mythic? Mythic+? "Level 15" keystone? What is all that about? Eventually the quest chains start to run into "do this Mythic dungeon" and ain't nobody got time for that. Gated content, woo.
As usual, DPS queues are abysmal.
I've done the "intro" class quest chains now for paladin, rogue, druid, mage, warlock, hunter, monk, shaman, and demon hunter. I've obtained the Ashbringer, Truthguard, the Dreadblades, the Kingslayers, the Fangs of whatever, the Claws of Ashamane, Felo'melorn, the Man'ari skull, the Titan gun, the brewmaster staff, the Doomhammer, and the DH tanky warglaives. Some impressions:
Beware: unfocused rambling ahead.
The reputation grind is fucking brutal. The Nightfallen storyline is kind of fun but waaaaay too long. I've been at it for three weeks now, admittedly not on a daily basis, and I'm still at 8/11 for the storyline. Sneaking around the city without flying is just tedious, and trying to figure out how to navigate the blind alleys and different layers all while avoiding getting dog-piled by demons and city guards is ... look, if I wanted to play Assassin's Creed I'd play Assassin's Creed. I am pointedly not looking forward to having to do this again on every ... single ... toon. And you kind of have to, don't you? Opening two of the dungeons is done via getting to a substantial reputational position with the Nightfallen.
Dungeons, ugh. I hate how Mythic difficulty still requires you to find a group. LFG has spoiled me. And all the different "levels" of Mythic? Mythic+? "Level 15" keystone? What is all that about? Eventually the quest chains start to run into "do this Mythic dungeon" and ain't nobody got time for that. Gated content, woo.
As usual, DPS queues are abysmal.
I've done the "intro" class quest chains now for paladin, rogue, druid, mage, warlock, hunter, monk, shaman, and demon hunter. I've obtained the Ashbringer, Truthguard, the Dreadblades, the Kingslayers, the Fangs of whatever, the Claws of Ashamane, Felo'melorn, the Man'ari skull, the Titan gun, the brewmaster staff, the Doomhammer, and the DH tanky warglaives. Some impressions:
- I hate everything about the warlock starting experience. This random demon shows up, says he's your friend, and we just go about trusting him? That seems unwise. If I'm being honest the whole campaign feels like we're being set up. Fortunately I have little to no interest leveling the warlock so I'll avoid being made to look stupid.
- On the subject of my warlock, I'm annoyed to the extreme that professions are gated behind the leveling process.
- Ashbringer and Kingslayers are tied for my favorite opener so far. Infiltrating Stormwind is hella badass, as is going to find Tirion and fighting off a demon.
- Interacting with Lich King Bolvar on the Felo'melorn quest chain was pretty cool too. Overall the mage questline was alright, though I'm oddly disappointed that Khadgar wasn't a bigger part of it.
- The Doomhammer questline was lame. The Doomhammer itself is lame. Enhancement shaman as a class plays fine but flavor-wise it's ... weird. And it feels like the Doomhammer was shoehorned into the spec rather than being spec-appropriate.
- The monk experience was a punch to the gut. Doesn't make me want to actually play the spec but it was emotional, for sure.
- The Demon Hunter campaign beginning felt rushed, and a bit too "tell-not-showy."
- I love the Dreamgrove, the Dalaran sewers, and the Sanctum of Light.
Overall it looks like trying to manage too many alts is going to be very punishing this expansion, unless Blizz introduces a reputation "catch-up" mechanic. It almost seems like there's too much to do, which I guess is something of a good problem to have; I just can't imagine being as far along as I am if I had a job and responsibilities.
Saturday, September 10, 2016
Legion Thoughts Reloaded
Agh. As much as I love being "the Ashbringer," the spec is just too fragile. Meanwhile in prot I'm a sexy shoeless god of war.
An aside: my greatest "first world problems" annoyance right now is the lack of a decent armor set that goes both with the Lightbringer shoulders and bare feet. Like. All of the legs that match the chests that match the shoulders are breeches, and while bare feet are perfectly sensible, bare shins are dumb. Yeah, I can go with the T6 legs I guess, but meh? For some reason the T6 armor just doesn't work for me, except for the shoulders and to a lesser extent the gloves. Granted, I'm never looking at my character from the front, so to an extent I guess it doesn't matter too much, but it still bothers me.
The main problem is I don't like the pre-Cata/Panda armor textures. The newer armor sets are so much more detailed -- there are a few older armor sets that I still dig, like the Judgment set, but in general? The Sunsoul armor is nice, and would be ideal for me because it happens to match the PvP variant of the Lightbringer shoulders, but the pants are breeches. Feh. And I've looked through all available leg sets in the game and there is not a single one that really meets my needs.
First world problems, like I said.
So I've been changing my outfit once, maybe twice a day. I've spent so much money on transmog since Legion started you'd think I was rich.
The Light's Heart questline is the most amazing thing. The only part of it that annoys me is it's so obviously a paladin questline, but it's used for all the classes. Oh well, in the end we're all soldiers of the Light. I don't quite understand how warlocks or death knights can be soldiers of the Light but here we are. It would have been really legit for Blizzard to come up with a separate story for each of the classes, TOR-style, but I can only imagine the outcry since they'd have to do it at the expense of a main leveling experience. Probably.
One thing that's struck me about the leveling content is the whole "bad guy snatches victory from your grasp" trope shows up an awful lot. At least once per zone. It's extremely frustrating. But then, that seems to be this expansion's calling card -- frustration. Frustration and the slaying of sacred cows. Making it personal for us. Big lore figures dying, invasions hitting us where we live, I gotta give credit to the writers -- I'm invested. I am going to find Gul'dan and end him rightly.
So I had to go prot. Which is working out pretty well, honestly. I'm vaguely annoyed that I can't transmog the sword if I'm using the shield appearance, but I've felt appropriately sturdy since making the switch and the heartbeat playstyle is just as soothing as I remember. Fairly decent damage, too, especially if I can pull a pack, and when I pop wings and Seraphim I can bring down the hurt.
I find myself itching to continue the Light's Heart campaign. It's soooo irritating that it's throttled, or gated behind something I haven't unlocked yet.
World quests are neat too. I mean, to a point I guess they're basically the same as doing Tanaan or Timeless Isle content, but across the entire world. And there are so many of them! Always something to do! Even if I haven't finished up Suramar or Val'sharah yet. Should probably get on that.
Not sure who I'm going to level next, honestly. Mage wasn't as bad doing the artifact quest as I thought it was going to be, since fire is traditionally pretty fragile, so I might go mage and see how that works. Or rogue, I suppose -- I remembered I could transmog the second sword into an axe or something, which isn't so much classic fencing but at least it's better than two-sword style. Don't care for the rogue campaign so much so far. Mage was fun. Druid was ... somewhat tedious. But at least kitty plays basically the same as it always did. A bit more fragile perhaps.
That about covers it, I suppose. More as it comes to me.
 |
| I mean every word of that statement |
An aside: my greatest "first world problems" annoyance right now is the lack of a decent armor set that goes both with the Lightbringer shoulders and bare feet. Like. All of the legs that match the chests that match the shoulders are breeches, and while bare feet are perfectly sensible, bare shins are dumb. Yeah, I can go with the T6 legs I guess, but meh? For some reason the T6 armor just doesn't work for me, except for the shoulders and to a lesser extent the gloves. Granted, I'm never looking at my character from the front, so to an extent I guess it doesn't matter too much, but it still bothers me.
The main problem is I don't like the pre-Cata/Panda armor textures. The newer armor sets are so much more detailed -- there are a few older armor sets that I still dig, like the Judgment set, but in general? The Sunsoul armor is nice, and would be ideal for me because it happens to match the PvP variant of the Lightbringer shoulders, but the pants are breeches. Feh. And I've looked through all available leg sets in the game and there is not a single one that really meets my needs.
First world problems, like I said.
So I've been changing my outfit once, maybe twice a day. I've spent so much money on transmog since Legion started you'd think I was rich.
The Light's Heart questline is the most amazing thing. The only part of it that annoys me is it's so obviously a paladin questline, but it's used for all the classes. Oh well, in the end we're all soldiers of the Light. I don't quite understand how warlocks or death knights can be soldiers of the Light but here we are. It would have been really legit for Blizzard to come up with a separate story for each of the classes, TOR-style, but I can only imagine the outcry since they'd have to do it at the expense of a main leveling experience. Probably.
One thing that's struck me about the leveling content is the whole "bad guy snatches victory from your grasp" trope shows up an awful lot. At least once per zone. It's extremely frustrating. But then, that seems to be this expansion's calling card -- frustration. Frustration and the slaying of sacred cows. Making it personal for us. Big lore figures dying, invasions hitting us where we live, I gotta give credit to the writers -- I'm invested. I am going to find Gul'dan and end him rightly.
So I had to go prot. Which is working out pretty well, honestly. I'm vaguely annoyed that I can't transmog the sword if I'm using the shield appearance, but I've felt appropriately sturdy since making the switch and the heartbeat playstyle is just as soothing as I remember. Fairly decent damage, too, especially if I can pull a pack, and when I pop wings and Seraphim I can bring down the hurt.
I find myself itching to continue the Light's Heart campaign. It's soooo irritating that it's throttled, or gated behind something I haven't unlocked yet.
World quests are neat too. I mean, to a point I guess they're basically the same as doing Tanaan or Timeless Isle content, but across the entire world. And there are so many of them! Always something to do! Even if I haven't finished up Suramar or Val'sharah yet. Should probably get on that.
Not sure who I'm going to level next, honestly. Mage wasn't as bad doing the artifact quest as I thought it was going to be, since fire is traditionally pretty fragile, so I might go mage and see how that works. Or rogue, I suppose -- I remembered I could transmog the second sword into an axe or something, which isn't so much classic fencing but at least it's better than two-sword style. Don't care for the rogue campaign so much so far. Mage was fun. Druid was ... somewhat tedious. But at least kitty plays basically the same as it always did. A bit more fragile perhaps.
That about covers it, I suppose. More as it comes to me.
Friday, September 2, 2016
Legion Thoughts
Meh.
I was really enjoying myself during the demon invasions. Charging a pack of demons with a huge fucking greatsword was good times. ... Of course, the boss fights were really shitty for melee. Not having played the beta, I really hope that the raid bosses aren't as punitive.
Leveled the shit out of my alts too. All told I gained 179 levels spread across seven or eight alts. Granted, most of them I will probably never touch again, but hey! Levels!
*sigh*
I haven't gotten all that far into it, and I'm not going to stop playing, but I don't like this expansion much so far. The lead-up to getting the Ashbringer was pretty satisfying, if a bit short and underwhelming, and having the Order of the Silver Hand declare me Highlord because of how awesome I am was rad (even if it didn't give me a title, and even if I know every other paladin in that room had also been named Highlord) ...
Did the rogue startup too. That was kinda cute I guess, in that as I'm walking through the thieves' den under Dalaran, I could hear other rogues gossiping about my exploits. But that's when the disappointment really set in. The "Dreadblades," rather than being the elegant rapier and main-gauche combo that I'd been expecting from last time I looked into it, are a pair of ugly swords. Sure you can mog them, but only into two swords, and the elegant rapier and main-gauche are restricted to an alternate appearance that I'm not even sure how to get.
AND after spending all that money on illusions, you can't even apply illusions to the artifact weapons unless you mog them. Or at least, not to the Ashbringer.
It's pretty nice being back in Dalaran, although I'm not a fan of the new music and I could only shake my head in wry amusement that the Legerdemain Lounge has become a coffee shop, complete with steampunk espresso machine.
The main leveling plot is, I'm just gonna say it, lame. Find the MacGuffins? Really? Game's going on fourteen years old and that's the best you could come up with? The Draenor leveling experience had me in tears in places. Velen's sacrifice still gets me choked up. Contrast that with my early experiences in the Broken Isles, where I'm involuntarily forced to participate in aggressive action against the Horde. Literally forced -- entering Stormheim puts you into a scenario where the Alliance conducts a sneak attack on Sylvanas' forces, and you have to complete the scenario to enter the zone. Not okay.
As I said, I'm gonna keep at it, because what else am I gonna do. It just feels to me like the game took a giant step back from Draenor. The invasions got my hopes up that this was gonna be the best expansion since Wrath, but I'm just ... really not a fan of the artifacts, or the story.
Well, whatever. Back to it, I guess.
I was really enjoying myself during the demon invasions. Charging a pack of demons with a huge fucking greatsword was good times. ... Of course, the boss fights were really shitty for melee. Not having played the beta, I really hope that the raid bosses aren't as punitive.
Leveled the shit out of my alts too. All told I gained 179 levels spread across seven or eight alts. Granted, most of them I will probably never touch again, but hey! Levels!
*sigh*
I haven't gotten all that far into it, and I'm not going to stop playing, but I don't like this expansion much so far. The lead-up to getting the Ashbringer was pretty satisfying, if a bit short and underwhelming, and having the Order of the Silver Hand declare me Highlord because of how awesome I am was rad (even if it didn't give me a title, and even if I know every other paladin in that room had also been named Highlord) ...
Did the rogue startup too. That was kinda cute I guess, in that as I'm walking through the thieves' den under Dalaran, I could hear other rogues gossiping about my exploits. But that's when the disappointment really set in. The "Dreadblades," rather than being the elegant rapier and main-gauche combo that I'd been expecting from last time I looked into it, are a pair of ugly swords. Sure you can mog them, but only into two swords, and the elegant rapier and main-gauche are restricted to an alternate appearance that I'm not even sure how to get.
AND after spending all that money on illusions, you can't even apply illusions to the artifact weapons unless you mog them. Or at least, not to the Ashbringer.
It's pretty nice being back in Dalaran, although I'm not a fan of the new music and I could only shake my head in wry amusement that the Legerdemain Lounge has become a coffee shop, complete with steampunk espresso machine.
The main leveling plot is, I'm just gonna say it, lame. Find the MacGuffins? Really? Game's going on fourteen years old and that's the best you could come up with? The Draenor leveling experience had me in tears in places. Velen's sacrifice still gets me choked up. Contrast that with my early experiences in the Broken Isles, where I'm involuntarily forced to participate in aggressive action against the Horde. Literally forced -- entering Stormheim puts you into a scenario where the Alliance conducts a sneak attack on Sylvanas' forces, and you have to complete the scenario to enter the zone. Not okay.
As I said, I'm gonna keep at it, because what else am I gonna do. It just feels to me like the game took a giant step back from Draenor. The invasions got my hopes up that this was gonna be the best expansion since Wrath, but I'm just ... really not a fan of the artifacts, or the story.
Well, whatever. Back to it, I guess.
Thursday, January 21, 2016
The Nadir
The more I hear about Legion, the less interested I am in playing it.
Maybe it's just grumpiness over Blizzard yet again messing with tanking and healing. The endless pendulum swing between little hits, little heals, and HO SHIT THE TANK GONNA DIE BETTER BLOW A COOLDOWN is just ... I'm over it. Every damn xpac it switches back and forth at the beginning, and by the end it's "pull the dungeon lol" because you outgear everything. Whatever.
I talked before about not particuarly liking the artifact weapons. That hasn't changed. And now there will be legendaries also, which are random drops? Fuh.
I mean I don't think I'm "done," exactly. I do know my interest is waning. If I weren't working on the dragon staff and the ring on my druid, plus earning a couple thousand a day from garrison missions, I probably wouldn't be logging in at all. But that's genuinely all I can seem to dredge up motivation for.
I don't think I'm going to pre-order Legion. Not this time. Not unless I rediscover the passion between then and now. It's all a question of what I'm still getting out of the game -- I don't have friends who play, I don't have a guild, I don't really care about the story anymore. I should be putting my time towards more productive ends, pursuing hobbies that will, I don't know, be meaningful. WoW isn't improving my life in any way, it's just a time sink. Time sinks are okay in moderation but ... I don't know. I think about how much time and effort it'll take to gear up my toons yet again come Legion and I just don't fucking want to.
WoW's always gonna be there, for certain values of "always." Maybe it's okay for me to leave it behind, and only come back to visit every so often.
Maybe it's just grumpiness over Blizzard yet again messing with tanking and healing. The endless pendulum swing between little hits, little heals, and HO SHIT THE TANK GONNA DIE BETTER BLOW A COOLDOWN is just ... I'm over it. Every damn xpac it switches back and forth at the beginning, and by the end it's "pull the dungeon lol" because you outgear everything. Whatever.
I talked before about not particuarly liking the artifact weapons. That hasn't changed. And now there will be legendaries also, which are random drops? Fuh.
I mean I don't think I'm "done," exactly. I do know my interest is waning. If I weren't working on the dragon staff and the ring on my druid, plus earning a couple thousand a day from garrison missions, I probably wouldn't be logging in at all. But that's genuinely all I can seem to dredge up motivation for.
I don't think I'm going to pre-order Legion. Not this time. Not unless I rediscover the passion between then and now. It's all a question of what I'm still getting out of the game -- I don't have friends who play, I don't have a guild, I don't really care about the story anymore. I should be putting my time towards more productive ends, pursuing hobbies that will, I don't know, be meaningful. WoW isn't improving my life in any way, it's just a time sink. Time sinks are okay in moderation but ... I don't know. I think about how much time and effort it'll take to gear up my toons yet again come Legion and I just don't fucking want to.
WoW's always gonna be there, for certain values of "always." Maybe it's okay for me to leave it behind, and only come back to visit every so often.
Tuesday, December 1, 2015
First thoughts on Artifacts
TL;DR I don't like what I'm seeing and it makes me kind of unhappy.
Let's unpack.
When I first heard about Artifacts, I thought it sounded awesome. This is because the first few artifacts that were announced (cmon, Ashbringer? awshum) were pretty cool. Also, there was a vacuum of information. We didn't know all that much.
Now?
Now we have artifacts announced for all of the classes. And nine tenths of them are, frankly, underwhelming.
Let's backtrack a bit to the concept of legendaries. Legendaries were awesome back in the day. You could tell some thought went into them. The sword of a wind god, the hammer of a fire lord, and the staff of the greatest archmage ever to live? Hell yes! Note, however, that there were only three for the entire expansion.
Moving on -- Illidan's warglaives? A bow that shoots witches? Fuck yeah. But oops, only two sets of legendaries for all of BC. In Wrath we had a healer hammer and a hella nice axe. Only two, again. And in Cataclysm we had a bitchin' caster staff that turned you into a fucking dragon, and a pair of knives made from the teeth of Deathwing himself.
I'm sure you're seeing a pattern here.
The Mists legendary, on the other hand, felt ... boring. Woohoo, a magical cape. And look! There's one for everybody! Meh. Ditto the rings. One for everyone. By being inclusive, Blizzard made legendaries boring.
And now, not only does everyone get alegendary artifact, everyone gets a different artifact. Everyone's a special snowflake! Never mind that this means you need to come up with thirty-six different weapons, thirty-four of which are completely new, never been heard of before. All this new lore, all this new "excitement" ... for things we've never heard of before and will be discarding once Legion ends. Frankly, I'm completely underwhelmed. Particularly because we don't actually have to work for these weapons -- they're just given to us. In fact, they're the only weapons we get all expansion!
Bullshit.
Now let's talk about the mechanics. Looking at the calculator on WoWhead, what I see is something that looks suspiciously like the old talent system. You know, the one they got rid of because it presented players with a bunch of false choices? Well strap in, because it's back. Only now, instead of earning points every time you level, you'll be, I dunno, picking them up from quests or whatever.
It is currently unknown whether it'll be possible to earn enough "points" or runes or what have you to totally fill the tree. If no, then there will be some hard choices to make -- at least, until Elitist Jerks calculates the top DPS spread for each weapon, at which point there will no longer be choices. If yes, then the only "choices" are which pseudo-talents you want to put your points in first.
Doesn't sound too amazing, if you want my honest opinion. Sounds tedious, in fact.
And then there's the question of "off specs." Blizzard is apparently giving us "tri-spec," or quad-spec if you're a druid. They're also making it easier than ever to swap out our talents. They've been pushing us towards swapping specs and talents for every fight for a couple of expansions now, pretty much ever since dual-spec came out.
If you continue that line of thinking, that means you could potentially be carrying three legendary artifacts around with you. And ye gods, the difficulty of leveling each one of them up. You're giving us mixed signals here, Blizzard -- you want us to have choices, flexibility, but it really feels like you're locking us into one spec. Certainly thematically, even if you have decent "catch-up" mechanisms.
That's the big difference between character power and object power. It has always been true that when you respec, you get to reassign all of the points that you've earned into new talents. If your specs can share gear, it's even easier to multispec. Artifacts, though ... I don't know if there's going to be a respeccing. I expect there will be, but it sure sounds like the points are locked to the single artifact. Want to switch specs? Too bad! Better do some more grinding!
And then there's the investment of the class fantasy. Blizzard has been making a big to-do about class fantasy this expansion. Wanting to make sure each class and spec have a distinct feel to them. What I see, though, is the removal of choice. Hope you like your artifact models! If you don't, you're stuck with what's come before, since there aren't going to be new weapons for transmog in Legion.
I don't know. For all that we've gotten so many options, so many new knobs and wheels for character customization the last few expansions, it really feels like Blizzard is tightening its grip. Forcing us to play the game how they want us to play it, forcing us to buy into their fantasy, rather than letting us find our own way. First they took hybrid specs away from us, then they took a whole pile of our spells and abilities. Now they're forcing us to use the weapon they want us to use, a weapon which reinforces the fantasy they've picked for the class.
And the very idea that they're plugging is somewhat nonsensical. Forcing us all to use a single weapon is all fine and whatever. Paired weapons also make some sense. But then there are the sword-and-board classes. Granted, there are only two of them, but still -- the artifact for both paladins and warriors is the shield, that just happens to come paired with a sword. And what about fire mages and shadow priests? All they get is a main hand -- does it come with a matching off-hand? If so, I haven't seen any indication.
And don't even get me started on Enhancement's "elemental Doomhammer." That is just the stupidest idea.
I also have to wonder how mandatory raiding is going to be. I mean, granted, there's always been mandatory raiding for the legendaries. That's fine, that doesn't bother me -- legendaries are meant to be special, the result of a lot of hard work and dedication. But in other expansions, there were other options, dungeon gear, token gear, badge gear, world drops, so on. What about with artifacts? Will raiding be mandatory, lest we be stuck with a shitty, non-upgraded version of our special snowflake stick? Will we be able to fill the tree with dungeons and solo content?
I've been making my home in Azeroth for more than a decade right now. None of this grousing is going to keep me from buying and playing the expansion. I guess I'm just pissed off at how heavy-handed and addle-headed it all is. It's like they thought, "Hey, we can give paladins Ashbringer!" and then decided they had to come up with something equally awesome for all the other classes.
I posted quite a while ago about an awesome idea for a tank legendary. That idea still has mileage. You don't need a legendary for all the classes every expansion. It's okay for one role to get the spotlight for a patch cycle. We went through four expansions like that and it was fine.
I don't want this system and I resent that it's being forced on me if I want to continue to play a game I've loved for ten years. Maybe I'm in the minority here, but I think that artifacts are a thoroughly bad idea. I hope that the gimmick for 8.0 is a bit more in line with letting the players choose how they play the game, rather than forcing us all along one narrow bridge.
Let's unpack.
When I first heard about Artifacts, I thought it sounded awesome. This is because the first few artifacts that were announced (cmon, Ashbringer? awshum) were pretty cool. Also, there was a vacuum of information. We didn't know all that much.
Now?
Now we have artifacts announced for all of the classes. And nine tenths of them are, frankly, underwhelming.
Let's backtrack a bit to the concept of legendaries. Legendaries were awesome back in the day. You could tell some thought went into them. The sword of a wind god, the hammer of a fire lord, and the staff of the greatest archmage ever to live? Hell yes! Note, however, that there were only three for the entire expansion.
Moving on -- Illidan's warglaives? A bow that shoots witches? Fuck yeah. But oops, only two sets of legendaries for all of BC. In Wrath we had a healer hammer and a hella nice axe. Only two, again. And in Cataclysm we had a bitchin' caster staff that turned you into a fucking dragon, and a pair of knives made from the teeth of Deathwing himself.
I'm sure you're seeing a pattern here.
The Mists legendary, on the other hand, felt ... boring. Woohoo, a magical cape. And look! There's one for everybody! Meh. Ditto the rings. One for everyone. By being inclusive, Blizzard made legendaries boring.
And now, not only does everyone get a
Bullshit.
Now let's talk about the mechanics. Looking at the calculator on WoWhead, what I see is something that looks suspiciously like the old talent system. You know, the one they got rid of because it presented players with a bunch of false choices? Well strap in, because it's back. Only now, instead of earning points every time you level, you'll be, I dunno, picking them up from quests or whatever.
It is currently unknown whether it'll be possible to earn enough "points" or runes or what have you to totally fill the tree. If no, then there will be some hard choices to make -- at least, until Elitist Jerks calculates the top DPS spread for each weapon, at which point there will no longer be choices. If yes, then the only "choices" are which pseudo-talents you want to put your points in first.
Doesn't sound too amazing, if you want my honest opinion. Sounds tedious, in fact.
And then there's the question of "off specs." Blizzard is apparently giving us "tri-spec," or quad-spec if you're a druid. They're also making it easier than ever to swap out our talents. They've been pushing us towards swapping specs and talents for every fight for a couple of expansions now, pretty much ever since dual-spec came out.
If you continue that line of thinking, that means you could potentially be carrying three legendary artifacts around with you. And ye gods, the difficulty of leveling each one of them up. You're giving us mixed signals here, Blizzard -- you want us to have choices, flexibility, but it really feels like you're locking us into one spec. Certainly thematically, even if you have decent "catch-up" mechanisms.
That's the big difference between character power and object power. It has always been true that when you respec, you get to reassign all of the points that you've earned into new talents. If your specs can share gear, it's even easier to multispec. Artifacts, though ... I don't know if there's going to be a respeccing. I expect there will be, but it sure sounds like the points are locked to the single artifact. Want to switch specs? Too bad! Better do some more grinding!
And then there's the investment of the class fantasy. Blizzard has been making a big to-do about class fantasy this expansion. Wanting to make sure each class and spec have a distinct feel to them. What I see, though, is the removal of choice. Hope you like your artifact models! If you don't, you're stuck with what's come before, since there aren't going to be new weapons for transmog in Legion.
I don't know. For all that we've gotten so many options, so many new knobs and wheels for character customization the last few expansions, it really feels like Blizzard is tightening its grip. Forcing us to play the game how they want us to play it, forcing us to buy into their fantasy, rather than letting us find our own way. First they took hybrid specs away from us, then they took a whole pile of our spells and abilities. Now they're forcing us to use the weapon they want us to use, a weapon which reinforces the fantasy they've picked for the class.
And the very idea that they're plugging is somewhat nonsensical. Forcing us all to use a single weapon is all fine and whatever. Paired weapons also make some sense. But then there are the sword-and-board classes. Granted, there are only two of them, but still -- the artifact for both paladins and warriors is the shield, that just happens to come paired with a sword. And what about fire mages and shadow priests? All they get is a main hand -- does it come with a matching off-hand? If so, I haven't seen any indication.
And don't even get me started on Enhancement's "elemental Doomhammer." That is just the stupidest idea.
I also have to wonder how mandatory raiding is going to be. I mean, granted, there's always been mandatory raiding for the legendaries. That's fine, that doesn't bother me -- legendaries are meant to be special, the result of a lot of hard work and dedication. But in other expansions, there were other options, dungeon gear, token gear, badge gear, world drops, so on. What about with artifacts? Will raiding be mandatory, lest we be stuck with a shitty, non-upgraded version of our special snowflake stick? Will we be able to fill the tree with dungeons and solo content?
I've been making my home in Azeroth for more than a decade right now. None of this grousing is going to keep me from buying and playing the expansion. I guess I'm just pissed off at how heavy-handed and addle-headed it all is. It's like they thought, "Hey, we can give paladins Ashbringer!" and then decided they had to come up with something equally awesome for all the other classes.
I posted quite a while ago about an awesome idea for a tank legendary. That idea still has mileage. You don't need a legendary for all the classes every expansion. It's okay for one role to get the spotlight for a patch cycle. We went through four expansions like that and it was fine.
I don't want this system and I resent that it's being forced on me if I want to continue to play a game I've loved for ten years. Maybe I'm in the minority here, but I think that artifacts are a thoroughly bad idea. I hope that the gimmick for 8.0 is a bit more in line with letting the players choose how they play the game, rather than forcing us all along one narrow bridge.
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