This is the second in a series of posts about the things that cataclysm hit the nail on the head with this expansion. Many people may like or dislike certain things that where done in cataclysm but sometimes some of the best changes go basically unnoticed or taken for granted. It is always easier to overlook the good things.
Past posts in this series:
Miscues: I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX
Cataclysm Hits: I: Spec Selection
Secondary stats, I own you.
Reforging has made a world of difference in the game. So much so that people do not even realize how much it has done for them. It is the perfect example of something that was so good that it gets over looked. Sure, people notice it, they like it, but do they really realize how much easier it has made the game for them? How much of a huge update to the game this really was?
At face value what reforging looked like to people was just a way to turn one secondary stat into another and really if that is all it was it would still be an amazing addition to the game. If you are a class that heavily favors critical strike and really has no need for mastery you would change that mastery on the item over to critical strike and be done with it.
To most people, that is all reforging is and in a way, yes, that is all it is. You change one stat for another. To people that look deeper into things, reforging is so much more and that is why it is, in my opinion, the biggest hit in cataclysm.
Reforging made upgrading gear a lot easier. How so one might ask? If you were that aforementioned class that favored critical strike you might be hit with a perplexing option when upgrading if you where wearing an item that had 200+ critical strike and something dropped that had a little more of your main stat but no critical strike. It would become something that you would need to research and hope someone did the theory crafting on it already.
Would the small increase of your primary stat be worth the huge loss in critical? Now, with reforging, upgrading is a lot easier. Main stats are main stats for a reason. They are usually huge for any class, so a little bit of a main stat combined with the ability to reforge whichever is highest in the secondary stats on the item into critical strike, 40% at least, made this an easy decision. 99 out of 100 times the higher item is the better item because of the ability to reforge. For people that do not want to spend time researching reforging took a lot of the guess work out of the game.
Another huge advantage that reforging gave people is the ability to customize the plateaus that one might need to be at. You need 8% hit or 960 haste to be at an ideal number, reforge into it. Gone are the days of having to work your butt off for a certain drop because it is a better fit for the numbers you need.
You got a great new pair of bracers with no hit on them but there is another pair out there that has the same main stats plus hit that would make sure you were still at hit cap so farm away it is. This even goes back to the making upgrades easier like I mentioned before. No more, "those bracers would be a great upgrade if they had hit", now it is "those bracers are a great upgrade for me after I reforge all that mastery off them into hit".
The fine tuning of getting those those numbers are made much easier with reforging as well. Need that 960 haste number? Reforging makes it that you can get there as close as possible. The old way to playing around with gems and enchants and hoping to get as close to it as possible are gone. No need for that. Just reforge and get it.
This brings us to another high end concept of reforging to get it that most people do not even consider. If you are looking for that 960 haste number and are sitting at 920 but the only thing you can reforge haste into will give you 80 putting you at 1000 you used can just say, cool, I am over 960 or you can look at reforging haste off of items. Yes, reforging what you need off of items can really help and many people, unless they use a site or addon, never notice that. Reforge the haste off of something else into your next best secondary stat and get closer to 960. Lets say one item has 100 haste, reforge 40 off of it and you are at 960 exactly and you have 40 more of another secondary stats. Remember, 40 more of another secondary stat even if it is your worse secondary stat, is better then wasted itemization elsewhere sometimes, even more so if it is hit because anything over cap on hit is 100% useless.
But wait, there is more. Reforging made our lives easier in other ways as well. Gems and enchants can cost a lot. Anyone that tried to work out the numbers perfectly before reforging was introduced will tell you how often they needed to change two or three or even four gems or enchants when they got one piece upgraded so they could reach hit cap again or that special haste plateau. Now it is more like you gem and enchant for the best stats for you and anything else, you reforge for. No more do you need to change your gems and your enchants on your bracers, hands and boots just because you got a new set of pants that didn't have the ideal stats on them.
It just generally made choosing gear easier. It made choosing gems easier. It made choosing enchants easier. It made writing guides to help people know what to choose easier. With reforging there is now a best gem and best enchant. It is no longer "this is the best gem if you are already hit capped but if you need hit use this one." It just made the game simpler, at least for those smart enough to use it.
With all the additions to the game that have made it easier, for lack of a better word, like flying or instant groups with dungeon finder or what have you nothing has ever made the game easier then reforging without anyone ever complaining about it. People complain about flying in the old world. People complain that dungeon finder ruins community. People complain about many things that made the game easier and they very well might have a valid reason to complain about it. Reforging made the game easier and no one ever complains about it. Maybe the, "I wish it changed it all instead of just 40%", but that is about it. More a wish or a desire, not really a complaint. No one would ever get their panties in a bunch over reforging and lets face it, anything that makes the game easier people will complain about. Everything... except reforging.
So if you are playing cataclysm, like it or not is irrelevant, and ever felt like this seems kind of cool but then dismissed it because it is just something that seems like it has always been there, maybe it is one of the cataclysm hits, like how reforging has made your life so much easier.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Thursday, March 8, 2012
Cataclysm Hits : I: Selecting Spec
This is the first in a series of posts about the things that cataclysm hit the nail on the head with this expansion. Many people may like or dislike certain things that where done in cataclysm but sometimes some of the best changes go basically unnoticed or taken for granted. It is always easier to overlook the good things.
Past posts in this series:
Miscues: I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX
Spec Specialization:
When cataclysm was released we were introduced to entirely new skill trees. Some disliked the new version and some loved the new version, but what is not often talked about with the new version was how it starts. Like the smaller skill trees or not, when you get to level 10 and make the decision to choose a spec it now meant something, something a little more meaningful than ever before.
If you are an older player and leveled a new character this expansion you might know exactly what I am talking about. When you are on your brand new priest and decide that you want to level discipline at level 10 and you get penance, you now really feel like a healer. When you are on your brand new paladin and you decide that you want to level protection and get avengers shield you really feel like a tank.
Those little bonus things that define our specs that are given to us as a freebie starter skills when we choose our spec really makes a difference. As someone that has leveled countless new characters and already had every class as 85 to begin with I could still embrace the feeling that choosing a spec really made me feel like this is what I am now.
While the fact might remain true that some spec specialization bonuses just feel lackluster and don't really feel like the ones I mentioned earlier, like intimidation in the beast master spec, the concept of giving a class spec defining ability at level 10 was a major plus that came with this expansion.
With the exception of intimidation and a very few like that, those abilities we get when we choose a spec now are always things you will want to use on every cooldown and that is what makes them so special, that is what makes them define our spec and that is what makes them such a huge thing to have at level 10 now.
If people, like myself, that had experience in the game felt like "now I am a tank" when I got my avengers shield you have to think what that must have felt like to a new player. Getting this class spec defining ability right off the bat, it being strong and useful from the moment you get it, and it being something you will end up using every cooldown from the second you get it until you defeat the last boss of the game it fantastic. Again, with the exception of a few misses like intimidation notwithstanding.
It is just a spec, it is just an ability we always had, but it is now at a time and a place where it means so much more to the player and the characters development into being what it is meant to be. It is something that most people might take for granted. It is something that people would say they always had so whats the big deal. But it is something that changed, at least in the way we where given it and at the time we where given it. It is often over looked because it is something that was always there but in my opinion it was a great change for the game.
So if you are playing cataclysm, like it or not is irrelevant, and ever felt like this seems kind of cool but then dismissed it because it is just something that seems like it has always been there, maybe it is one of the cataclysm hits, like giving you your spec defining ability at level 10.
Past posts in this series:
Miscues: I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX
Spec Specialization:
When cataclysm was released we were introduced to entirely new skill trees. Some disliked the new version and some loved the new version, but what is not often talked about with the new version was how it starts. Like the smaller skill trees or not, when you get to level 10 and make the decision to choose a spec it now meant something, something a little more meaningful than ever before.
If you are an older player and leveled a new character this expansion you might know exactly what I am talking about. When you are on your brand new priest and decide that you want to level discipline at level 10 and you get penance, you now really feel like a healer. When you are on your brand new paladin and you decide that you want to level protection and get avengers shield you really feel like a tank.
Those little bonus things that define our specs that are given to us as a freebie starter skills when we choose our spec really makes a difference. As someone that has leveled countless new characters and already had every class as 85 to begin with I could still embrace the feeling that choosing a spec really made me feel like this is what I am now.
While the fact might remain true that some spec specialization bonuses just feel lackluster and don't really feel like the ones I mentioned earlier, like intimidation in the beast master spec, the concept of giving a class spec defining ability at level 10 was a major plus that came with this expansion.
With the exception of intimidation and a very few like that, those abilities we get when we choose a spec now are always things you will want to use on every cooldown and that is what makes them so special, that is what makes them define our spec and that is what makes them such a huge thing to have at level 10 now.
If people, like myself, that had experience in the game felt like "now I am a tank" when I got my avengers shield you have to think what that must have felt like to a new player. Getting this class spec defining ability right off the bat, it being strong and useful from the moment you get it, and it being something you will end up using every cooldown from the second you get it until you defeat the last boss of the game it fantastic. Again, with the exception of a few misses like intimidation notwithstanding.
It is just a spec, it is just an ability we always had, but it is now at a time and a place where it means so much more to the player and the characters development into being what it is meant to be. It is something that most people might take for granted. It is something that people would say they always had so whats the big deal. But it is something that changed, at least in the way we where given it and at the time we where given it. It is often over looked because it is something that was always there but in my opinion it was a great change for the game.
So if you are playing cataclysm, like it or not is irrelevant, and ever felt like this seems kind of cool but then dismissed it because it is just something that seems like it has always been there, maybe it is one of the cataclysm hits, like giving you your spec defining ability at level 10.
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
"Soon we'll fly together again..."
There is a lot of speculation about what this means floating around today yet no one seems to notice the completely obvious. They are talking about giving a mount to people that use the scroll of resurrection (to one or both I am not sure however).
All the facts add up to that with 100% certainty. I am not sure why people are debating, but some of the things people have suggested they think it means are really good. It sure makes for some interesting reading. People have some vivid imaginations.
All the facts add up to that with 100% certainty. I am not sure why people are debating, but some of the things people have suggested they think it means are really good. It sure makes for some interesting reading. People have some vivid imaginations.
Fight Length: What is too long or too short?
Have you ever felt like a fight seemed so anticlimactic when it was done that it was not even worth doing? Then the length of the fight was too short.
Have you ever felt so defeated after a few wipes and you see that 2 hours have passed already and you start to think if it is really worth it? Then the length of the fight was too long.
We all have our own points where we start to think things are too short or too long. We also have four completely different thresholds for what it too short or too long when it comes to fights.
The four major fight lengths are for PvP, leveling, dungeons and raids. The following is my personal opinion of what I think are the perfect length of times for fights to make to feel comfortable. For me this is how I define comfortable. Long enough to make the fight feel as if it was a fight worth fighting and short enough to make you willing to do it again because it never felt like it dragged on.
PvP Fight Length:
When PvPing I think that two good players should be able to act and counter act each other enough to make the fight fun but not so much that it makes the fight take forever. Yes healers and your 20 minute fights, I am looking at you. My opinion of a good one on one PvP match is 1 minute. Anything longer than one minute seems like you are dragging it out and anything substantially less seems like it was not even a fight worth fighting.
The one minute number also translates nicely into arena in my opinion. A two on two fight should be two minutes. A three on three fight should be three minutes. A five on five fight should be five minutes. While my arena experience is limited to only a few hundred matches I can say that it is rare any arena match ever falls in that range. My team either sucks and gets destroyed faster or my team is better and destroys them faster. Usually when we are well matched, the matches go a little longer then the 1 minute per person that I think is best.
Leveling Fight Length:
This is something I think is wrong with the game right now. Even without heirlooms the average fight length is three globals at best. Five would seem better if not even more. I think for leveling fights should be between 10 and 20 seconds when one on one. Not the 3 second kills they are now on many characters. My disc priest is the other end of the spectrum, some fights are 40 seconds to a minute each, which feels way too long.
I understand that balancing would be hard and if they made the fights harder so DPS actually lasted more than 1 shotting many mobs it would make my disc 2 minute fights instead but leveling disc is a choice for me. Leveling should be balanced around DPS leveling and those fights should be 10 to 20 seconds each in my opinion.
Dungeon Fight Length:
I'll break this into two different things, trash and boss. Trash should be no more then 30 seconds to clear. Trash is trash and should never be time consuming. The hardest of hard trash should be 30 seconds. 20 seconds for three DPS and a tank to handle 4 or 5 mobs would be reasonable. If trash packs ever reach the one minute mark I think things are way the hell out of hand. It is trash and should never take that long.
For boss fights I would say one and a half to two minutes would be ideal. Last boss, maybe two and a half to three. No more, ever. These are dungeons, they should be long enough to be a noticeable battle but not so long that it feels like work. Anything less then one and a half minute makes the boss seem more like really annoying trash and not really a boss.
Sure, I love going into the original heroics now with a guild group that is geared and seeing how fast we can down a boss. 17 seconds might be really fun to laugh at but that is exactly what it is, a laugh. But we out gear it by a huge margin so we are not a fair assessment. My numbers are based on gear appropriate times. In this case, with everyone wearing 329 item level gear, it should take 2 minutes max. Do you recall some of the epic battles you had in randoms when everyone was 329 item level? I bet you hoped and prayed and wished the fights where only 2 minutes.
Raid Fight Length:
For me, again at appropriate gear level, I think raid boss fights should be around 4 - 5 minutes. Last boss, maybe as high as 8 minutes. Anything less makes it feel like you over gear it before you even start which is nice sometimes but does not really give that "we beat a challenge" feeling and anything more feels like you are banging your head against the wall asking "when is this guy going to freaking die already".
The longer ones become worse when you wipe. There is nothing more annoying then doing a 10 minute fight and wiping just at the end. It feels like you wasted 10 minute of your life for nothing whereas if it is a 4 minute fight and you die after 3 minutes you feel like you can just run back in there and get back at it.
I understand for most people it is different but for me I would rather wipe at the 2 minute mark 100 times than wipe at the 10 minute mark 20 times even if the time investment is the same. The two minute mark makes you feel like you failed but you are jumping right back in with both feet whereas the 10 minute mark makes you feel like you invested all that time for nothing. Again, my opinion only.
I could have went deeper with the too long and too short of things. What is too long for a rep grind? Molten core maybe. What is too short of a rep grind? Anything you can throw on a tabard for and never really work for rep. What is too long to travel between questing areas? The old 25 minute flight between darn and tanaris. What is too short? Instant portals to where ever you want to go. For the time being however, I am just voicing my opinions on fight length and those where them.
We all have our own thresholds on what we think is too long or too short, what are yours?
Have you ever felt so defeated after a few wipes and you see that 2 hours have passed already and you start to think if it is really worth it? Then the length of the fight was too long.
We all have our own points where we start to think things are too short or too long. We also have four completely different thresholds for what it too short or too long when it comes to fights.
The four major fight lengths are for PvP, leveling, dungeons and raids. The following is my personal opinion of what I think are the perfect length of times for fights to make to feel comfortable. For me this is how I define comfortable. Long enough to make the fight feel as if it was a fight worth fighting and short enough to make you willing to do it again because it never felt like it dragged on.
PvP Fight Length:
When PvPing I think that two good players should be able to act and counter act each other enough to make the fight fun but not so much that it makes the fight take forever. Yes healers and your 20 minute fights, I am looking at you. My opinion of a good one on one PvP match is 1 minute. Anything longer than one minute seems like you are dragging it out and anything substantially less seems like it was not even a fight worth fighting.
The one minute number also translates nicely into arena in my opinion. A two on two fight should be two minutes. A three on three fight should be three minutes. A five on five fight should be five minutes. While my arena experience is limited to only a few hundred matches I can say that it is rare any arena match ever falls in that range. My team either sucks and gets destroyed faster or my team is better and destroys them faster. Usually when we are well matched, the matches go a little longer then the 1 minute per person that I think is best.
Leveling Fight Length:
This is something I think is wrong with the game right now. Even without heirlooms the average fight length is three globals at best. Five would seem better if not even more. I think for leveling fights should be between 10 and 20 seconds when one on one. Not the 3 second kills they are now on many characters. My disc priest is the other end of the spectrum, some fights are 40 seconds to a minute each, which feels way too long.
I understand that balancing would be hard and if they made the fights harder so DPS actually lasted more than 1 shotting many mobs it would make my disc 2 minute fights instead but leveling disc is a choice for me. Leveling should be balanced around DPS leveling and those fights should be 10 to 20 seconds each in my opinion.
Dungeon Fight Length:
I'll break this into two different things, trash and boss. Trash should be no more then 30 seconds to clear. Trash is trash and should never be time consuming. The hardest of hard trash should be 30 seconds. 20 seconds for three DPS and a tank to handle 4 or 5 mobs would be reasonable. If trash packs ever reach the one minute mark I think things are way the hell out of hand. It is trash and should never take that long.
For boss fights I would say one and a half to two minutes would be ideal. Last boss, maybe two and a half to three. No more, ever. These are dungeons, they should be long enough to be a noticeable battle but not so long that it feels like work. Anything less then one and a half minute makes the boss seem more like really annoying trash and not really a boss.
Sure, I love going into the original heroics now with a guild group that is geared and seeing how fast we can down a boss. 17 seconds might be really fun to laugh at but that is exactly what it is, a laugh. But we out gear it by a huge margin so we are not a fair assessment. My numbers are based on gear appropriate times. In this case, with everyone wearing 329 item level gear, it should take 2 minutes max. Do you recall some of the epic battles you had in randoms when everyone was 329 item level? I bet you hoped and prayed and wished the fights where only 2 minutes.
Raid Fight Length:
For me, again at appropriate gear level, I think raid boss fights should be around 4 - 5 minutes. Last boss, maybe as high as 8 minutes. Anything less makes it feel like you over gear it before you even start which is nice sometimes but does not really give that "we beat a challenge" feeling and anything more feels like you are banging your head against the wall asking "when is this guy going to freaking die already".
The longer ones become worse when you wipe. There is nothing more annoying then doing a 10 minute fight and wiping just at the end. It feels like you wasted 10 minute of your life for nothing whereas if it is a 4 minute fight and you die after 3 minutes you feel like you can just run back in there and get back at it.
I understand for most people it is different but for me I would rather wipe at the 2 minute mark 100 times than wipe at the 10 minute mark 20 times even if the time investment is the same. The two minute mark makes you feel like you failed but you are jumping right back in with both feet whereas the 10 minute mark makes you feel like you invested all that time for nothing. Again, my opinion only.
I could have went deeper with the too long and too short of things. What is too long for a rep grind? Molten core maybe. What is too short of a rep grind? Anything you can throw on a tabard for and never really work for rep. What is too long to travel between questing areas? The old 25 minute flight between darn and tanaris. What is too short? Instant portals to where ever you want to go. For the time being however, I am just voicing my opinions on fight length and those where them.
We all have our own thresholds on what we think is too long or too short, what are yours?
Monday, March 5, 2012
Monday Random Thoughts
- I finally won the fishing tournament on my main and it was exciting.
- When I caught the shark I actually got nervous about it.
- I kept thinking, someone is going to beat me, someone is going to beat me.
- I hit my hearth, switched to cheetah for a speed boost and ran to turn it in, before anyone else.
- The achievement popped up, I got my brand spanking new BoA ring, and it felt great.
- My blood was pumping, it was exhilarating, and I was actually excited.
- Damn, this is what I play the game for and it has been so long since I felt that good about it.
- The game needs to find a way to add more moments like this.
- After an adrenaline pumping moment like that you are left asking, Now what?
- That is the one bad thing about exciting moments like that. Once they pass there is no place to go but down.
- I had been waiting until I won that before I went out of my way to try and get the one that did not get away.
- That is the last one I need for the meta achievement for fishing.
- I've caught near 15,000 fish on my main.
- At an average 10 seconds per catch that means I have spent 2500 minutes fishing.
- 2500 minutes is 41 hours and 40 minutes spent fishing.
- For the one that didn't get away that fish is doing a darn good job of getting away.
- On my main at least.
- I have an alt that I never had fishing on that I decided to pick up fishing just to do the daily with.
- He trained fishing, bought a level one pole, picked up the quest which was to thunderfalls, and went to go catch some fish.
- First cast, having just learned fishing, bing, achievement attained, the one that didn't get away.
- AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!
- Another character, same story, never fished before, took the thunderfalls quest, at around skill level 15 just from doing the fishing dailies, bing, the one that didn't get away popped up after a couple of casts.
- AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!
- You think it stops there?
- My mage, who at least had fishing for a bit but it wasn't high, grabbed the thunderfalls quests and bing, achievement again, you have gained one level and your fishing skill is now 38.
- AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!
- Another character got it around level 80 fishing.
- Still don't have it on my main but I have it on four other characters, none of which even have the 100 fish caught achievement.
- This is one of those cases I am looking forward to achievements being shared across accounts.
- There are a few achievements I have on alts that elude my main no matter how much I try.
- The one in HoO where you have to kill the four mini bosses in a certain time?
- I have it on all my tanks because I tell people, do not touch the throggs, we are going from boss to boss, I will handle the throggs, you kill the bosses.
- My main has not met a tank that was capable of doing that yet. So no achievement for my main.
- The moonguard one where the healer can not be hit?
- Every time I heal that with my priest I get the achievement for the whole group. As a priest it is easy. Well timed fade, knowing what heals to use and when, making sure to never use any HoTs that could tick and get you aggro, as a priest, this is super easy.
- I have not met a priest, or any other healer, that could do that yet in any of the randoms I have done.
- I have so many achievements on alts I do not have on my main.
- It would be nice to see them shared, to some extent.
- I know what some will say about those achievements, go with guild and get them.
- That is like cheating, where is the achievement in doing something I know I can do.
- Doing them with random people is half the fun, it makes it a real achievement.
- I do it with guild when I give up on random people and just want to get it done.
- That is, if I can find people that want to do things like that.
- Not everyone is into the whole achievement run thing.
- I love that stuff.
- I'll run to get it myself, to get it on alts, to help others get it, just to hear the ding achievement pop up, just to have fun.
- I like doing that type of stuff.
- It is better than fishing for another 41+ hours to catch something it feels like I never will, that's for sure.
- Have a nice day.
- When I caught the shark I actually got nervous about it.
- I kept thinking, someone is going to beat me, someone is going to beat me.
- I hit my hearth, switched to cheetah for a speed boost and ran to turn it in, before anyone else.
- The achievement popped up, I got my brand spanking new BoA ring, and it felt great.
- My blood was pumping, it was exhilarating, and I was actually excited.
- Damn, this is what I play the game for and it has been so long since I felt that good about it.
- The game needs to find a way to add more moments like this.
- After an adrenaline pumping moment like that you are left asking, Now what?
- That is the one bad thing about exciting moments like that. Once they pass there is no place to go but down.
- I had been waiting until I won that before I went out of my way to try and get the one that did not get away.
- That is the last one I need for the meta achievement for fishing.
- I've caught near 15,000 fish on my main.
- At an average 10 seconds per catch that means I have spent 2500 minutes fishing.
- 2500 minutes is 41 hours and 40 minutes spent fishing.
- For the one that didn't get away that fish is doing a darn good job of getting away.
- On my main at least.
- I have an alt that I never had fishing on that I decided to pick up fishing just to do the daily with.
- He trained fishing, bought a level one pole, picked up the quest which was to thunderfalls, and went to go catch some fish.
- First cast, having just learned fishing, bing, achievement attained, the one that didn't get away.
- AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!
- Another character, same story, never fished before, took the thunderfalls quest, at around skill level 15 just from doing the fishing dailies, bing, the one that didn't get away popped up after a couple of casts.
- AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!
- You think it stops there?
- My mage, who at least had fishing for a bit but it wasn't high, grabbed the thunderfalls quests and bing, achievement again, you have gained one level and your fishing skill is now 38.
- AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!
- Another character got it around level 80 fishing.
- Still don't have it on my main but I have it on four other characters, none of which even have the 100 fish caught achievement.
- This is one of those cases I am looking forward to achievements being shared across accounts.
- There are a few achievements I have on alts that elude my main no matter how much I try.
- The one in HoO where you have to kill the four mini bosses in a certain time?
- I have it on all my tanks because I tell people, do not touch the throggs, we are going from boss to boss, I will handle the throggs, you kill the bosses.
- My main has not met a tank that was capable of doing that yet. So no achievement for my main.
- The moonguard one where the healer can not be hit?
- Every time I heal that with my priest I get the achievement for the whole group. As a priest it is easy. Well timed fade, knowing what heals to use and when, making sure to never use any HoTs that could tick and get you aggro, as a priest, this is super easy.
- I have not met a priest, or any other healer, that could do that yet in any of the randoms I have done.
- I have so many achievements on alts I do not have on my main.
- It would be nice to see them shared, to some extent.
- I know what some will say about those achievements, go with guild and get them.
- That is like cheating, where is the achievement in doing something I know I can do.
- Doing them with random people is half the fun, it makes it a real achievement.
- I do it with guild when I give up on random people and just want to get it done.
- That is, if I can find people that want to do things like that.
- Not everyone is into the whole achievement run thing.
- I love that stuff.
- I'll run to get it myself, to get it on alts, to help others get it, just to hear the ding achievement pop up, just to have fun.
- I like doing that type of stuff.
- It is better than fishing for another 41+ hours to catch something it feels like I never will, that's for sure.
- Have a nice day.
Friday, March 2, 2012
Ditch The PvP Gear Already
The worst thing that ever happened to the world of PvP is resilience and soon we will be saying good bye to it. Or that is what blizzard is trying to make people believe.
They are renaming resilience PvP defense and telling people it is different. I know I am usually the first to say that the majority of the WoW player base can barely tie their shoes themselves, but does blizzard really think they are that stupid? I say it as a sarcastic joke but blizzard really seems to believe it.
So they plan to replace resilience with PvP defense and PvP power. Maybe there is some factor I missed with breezing over it quickly but it sounds like they just turned resilience into two stats instead of just one. How is adding more to it removing it?
I believe that it would be better for everyone involved if there were no such thing as PvP gear at all.
I like the idea of the 30% built in resilience for all characters. I also think this is an incredible idea for helping them balance PvP. Say holy priests are seen as too squishy they can up the base resilience of priests that are speced holy to 38% or 40% or 42% or whatever as needed until they feel that priests are more in line with everyone else. Say they think that blood death knights are too durable, they can lower their base resilience to 15% or whatever is needed to keep them in line.
They can tweak the base resilience on a class and spec basis and that would be amazing in helping them create balance. But will they do that? I doubt it. A design like that is way to intelligent for their design team or they would have come up with it 8 years ago.
There is one problem I can see if they remove resilience on gear as a stat. PvPers would feel the need to PvE to get gear. Again, that can easily be addressed to some extent. Just make conquest and valor mean the same thing and buy the same things and justice and honor mean the same thing and buy the same things.
Of course this would not address the issue with items that are not for sale in the valor vendor, so add them to the valor vendors. Having to save up 2000 valor (which at 100 per boss in a raid is 20 kills) to buy the item you want is a lot more "fun" then killing a boss over and over for weeks on end hoping and praying it drops and then hoping and praying you win the roll. So adding every single item that can drop in the raid to the valor vendor is not a bad idea. All it does is remove the luck factor for those that are unlucky.
Which brings us to heroic gear, how would that be handled. It wouldn't. Remove heroic gear completely. Heroics are there for the challenge, the achievement. You want a challenge, do it in normal gear. There is no need for heroic gear. If anything, just make it that heroic boss kills do not count toward your weekly valor cap, so if someone is downing heroic bosses they can go over the 1000 weekly cap because no heroic kills count toward the cap. The prestige, the titles, the achievements, and the extra valor would be heroic raiding benefits. Gear is not required.
Not to mention the wonderful side effect of removing heroic gear, it would remove another level of gear each raid tier which in effect removes a nice little chuck of the stat inflation. Also, it would make tuning heroic raids easier because they would just tweak the normals to have higher numbers on everything instead of having to redesign the whole heroic tier with heroic gear in mind.
So now PvP gear and PvE gear would be the same thing. It would be attainable in the same way no matter which way you play the game and the classes could be easier to balance for both PvP and PvE because people will always be wearing the same gear for everything.
It is about time blizzard, you are making changes, make them right.
Changing resilience to PvP defense and PvP power is not removing resilience. It is making it two stats instead of one.
There would be a lot of good side effects to this change too.
More bag space. No longer will my shaman have to carry a resto set, a resto PvP set, an enhancement set and a enhancement PvP set.
No longer will PvPers get the easy route to buying all their new gear the second they hit max level (377 set for example) whereas a PvEer has to work for their items (378 for example) to be roughly in the same ballpark.
No more people complaining about people PvPing in PvE gear and no more complaining about people PvEing in PvP gear.
No more people spending time trying to decide if wearing the 390 PvP helm is better then wearing the 378 PvE helm. You did say you wanted to make peoples choices easier right?
It would make it easier for a PvEer to start PvPing because they can switch at any time and have the gear already. Same goes the other way around as well.
Removing PvP gear just makes sense. Lots of it.
If they are redesigning all the stats and redesigning how resilience works then now is the time to make this fix. Now is the time to set everything straight. Do the right thing blizzard. Fix it now while you are fixing it. Don't compound the error by removing one problem and replacing it with two.
Ditch the PvP gear already.
They are renaming resilience PvP defense and telling people it is different. I know I am usually the first to say that the majority of the WoW player base can barely tie their shoes themselves, but does blizzard really think they are that stupid? I say it as a sarcastic joke but blizzard really seems to believe it.
So they plan to replace resilience with PvP defense and PvP power. Maybe there is some factor I missed with breezing over it quickly but it sounds like they just turned resilience into two stats instead of just one. How is adding more to it removing it?
I believe that it would be better for everyone involved if there were no such thing as PvP gear at all.
I like the idea of the 30% built in resilience for all characters. I also think this is an incredible idea for helping them balance PvP. Say holy priests are seen as too squishy they can up the base resilience of priests that are speced holy to 38% or 40% or 42% or whatever as needed until they feel that priests are more in line with everyone else. Say they think that blood death knights are too durable, they can lower their base resilience to 15% or whatever is needed to keep them in line.
They can tweak the base resilience on a class and spec basis and that would be amazing in helping them create balance. But will they do that? I doubt it. A design like that is way to intelligent for their design team or they would have come up with it 8 years ago.
There is one problem I can see if they remove resilience on gear as a stat. PvPers would feel the need to PvE to get gear. Again, that can easily be addressed to some extent. Just make conquest and valor mean the same thing and buy the same things and justice and honor mean the same thing and buy the same things.
Of course this would not address the issue with items that are not for sale in the valor vendor, so add them to the valor vendors. Having to save up 2000 valor (which at 100 per boss in a raid is 20 kills) to buy the item you want is a lot more "fun" then killing a boss over and over for weeks on end hoping and praying it drops and then hoping and praying you win the roll. So adding every single item that can drop in the raid to the valor vendor is not a bad idea. All it does is remove the luck factor for those that are unlucky.
Which brings us to heroic gear, how would that be handled. It wouldn't. Remove heroic gear completely. Heroics are there for the challenge, the achievement. You want a challenge, do it in normal gear. There is no need for heroic gear. If anything, just make it that heroic boss kills do not count toward your weekly valor cap, so if someone is downing heroic bosses they can go over the 1000 weekly cap because no heroic kills count toward the cap. The prestige, the titles, the achievements, and the extra valor would be heroic raiding benefits. Gear is not required.
Not to mention the wonderful side effect of removing heroic gear, it would remove another level of gear each raid tier which in effect removes a nice little chuck of the stat inflation. Also, it would make tuning heroic raids easier because they would just tweak the normals to have higher numbers on everything instead of having to redesign the whole heroic tier with heroic gear in mind.
So now PvP gear and PvE gear would be the same thing. It would be attainable in the same way no matter which way you play the game and the classes could be easier to balance for both PvP and PvE because people will always be wearing the same gear for everything.
It is about time blizzard, you are making changes, make them right.
Changing resilience to PvP defense and PvP power is not removing resilience. It is making it two stats instead of one.
There would be a lot of good side effects to this change too.
More bag space. No longer will my shaman have to carry a resto set, a resto PvP set, an enhancement set and a enhancement PvP set.
No longer will PvPers get the easy route to buying all their new gear the second they hit max level (377 set for example) whereas a PvEer has to work for their items (378 for example) to be roughly in the same ballpark.
No more people complaining about people PvPing in PvE gear and no more complaining about people PvEing in PvP gear.
No more people spending time trying to decide if wearing the 390 PvP helm is better then wearing the 378 PvE helm. You did say you wanted to make peoples choices easier right?
It would make it easier for a PvEer to start PvPing because they can switch at any time and have the gear already. Same goes the other way around as well.
Removing PvP gear just makes sense. Lots of it.
If they are redesigning all the stats and redesigning how resilience works then now is the time to make this fix. Now is the time to set everything straight. Do the right thing blizzard. Fix it now while you are fixing it. Don't compound the error by removing one problem and replacing it with two.
Ditch the PvP gear already.
Thursday, March 1, 2012
A Public Service Announcement for DPS in LFR
"It is only the LFR" is not an excuse for being bad.
"It is only the LFR" works for some situations like 5 healing it instead of 6 healing it or going while missing two or three damage dealers. You can make due because "it is only the LFR".
"It is only the LFR" is not an excuse for ignoring basic mechanics.
If you do not go to the bubble on the first boss, which in turn makes the healers work more, you are a bad damage dealer. Yes, "it is only the LFR", but if everyone does exactly what you are doing it would make the LFR hard. If everyone ignored mechanics like that it would make the LFR hard. In other words, if everyone were you, it would make the LFR hard. Hell, if everyone were you it would make the LFR impossible.
Now think about that for a minute.
If everyone is you and it is impossible, that must mean you really suck.
If you are not capable of doing easy mechanics you are a bad player. Plain and simple. Sorry, there is no nice way to say it.
On the slime boss, if you do not switch to the slime, you are a bad player.
What is even worse is when the fight is over and you decide to brag about your DPS when you never got off the boss. Do you understand what you are really doing when you brag about your DPS in a situation like that? I would guess not.
You are bragging that you are a bad player. Seriously, that is exactly what you are doing, you are screaming, hey, look how bad I am.
You are publicly declaring that you are horrible at what you do. When you brag about your DPS on the slime boss the first thing anyone that knows better will do it hover over your numbers and when they see you never attacked a mana void and never attacked any slime you are saying to the world, look at how bad of a player I am.
Do not use the "it is only the LFR" line because again if everyone did exactly what you just did that would mean a wipe 99 out of 100 times in the LFR.
To have the right to brag you have to look at it like this.
If everyone did exactly what I did would we have downed the boss nice and super easy like it should be in the LFR? If the answer is yes, and you where top dog, then you have the right to brag.
Guess what? You still should not brag even if that is the case.
What are you bragging about really? You are bragging that you can follow super simple mechanics that are not tightly tuned to the point where if you make even the slightest mistake it would mean a wipe. They are super simple for a reason, so everyone will be able to do them.
They are watered down to the point that even the worst player in the world should be able to do them. So even if you do them you are basically bragging that you are at least as capable as a monkey. Ah, congrats I guess.
Yes, it is nice to be able to say you did the best but if that is really what you are seeking then why not try to do the best while doing it as it is supposed to be done.
I might be alone in this coming statement but this is how I look at people in the LFR.
If you can not do the mechanics in the LFR version of the fight there is no way in hell you can do them in the real fight and it would take an act of god, a miracle, before you would ever have a prayer of doing them in heroic mode.
I don't care if you have heroic gear. If you can not do simple mechanics in the LFR I will automatically label you as a horrible player that got carried for that gear.
Actions speak louder then words and if you can not follow mechanics in the LFR it speaks volumes about you, about how bad of a player you are, and it says that any piece of gear you own was something you where carried for and nothing, not one single thing, one single achievement you have ever gotten was earned by your own ability.
So if you want to really shine as a damage dealer in the LFR then do it the right way.
1) Top the damage done meters.
2) Obey the mechanics
3) Stay low on the damage received meters.
Then sit back and take pride in the fact that you did well. You do not need to tell people you did well. Anyone that would actually give a crap probably already looked at all those factors and knows.
If you really seek the accolades of others seek them from your friends or guild mates while laughing at the person that did 28K while never leaving the slime boss while you did more damage done, 36K and took less damage while switching to the mana void and slimes ever time.
Trust me. There is no better feeling in the game then knowing you did the job well and right.
Be a good damage dealer and stop saying "it is only the LFR."
Do the right thing.
"It is only the LFR" works for some situations like 5 healing it instead of 6 healing it or going while missing two or three damage dealers. You can make due because "it is only the LFR".
"It is only the LFR" is not an excuse for ignoring basic mechanics.
If you do not go to the bubble on the first boss, which in turn makes the healers work more, you are a bad damage dealer. Yes, "it is only the LFR", but if everyone does exactly what you are doing it would make the LFR hard. If everyone ignored mechanics like that it would make the LFR hard. In other words, if everyone were you, it would make the LFR hard. Hell, if everyone were you it would make the LFR impossible.
Now think about that for a minute.
If everyone is you and it is impossible, that must mean you really suck.
If you are not capable of doing easy mechanics you are a bad player. Plain and simple. Sorry, there is no nice way to say it.
On the slime boss, if you do not switch to the slime, you are a bad player.
What is even worse is when the fight is over and you decide to brag about your DPS when you never got off the boss. Do you understand what you are really doing when you brag about your DPS in a situation like that? I would guess not.
You are bragging that you are a bad player. Seriously, that is exactly what you are doing, you are screaming, hey, look how bad I am.
You are publicly declaring that you are horrible at what you do. When you brag about your DPS on the slime boss the first thing anyone that knows better will do it hover over your numbers and when they see you never attacked a mana void and never attacked any slime you are saying to the world, look at how bad of a player I am.
Do not use the "it is only the LFR" line because again if everyone did exactly what you just did that would mean a wipe 99 out of 100 times in the LFR.
To have the right to brag you have to look at it like this.
If everyone did exactly what I did would we have downed the boss nice and super easy like it should be in the LFR? If the answer is yes, and you where top dog, then you have the right to brag.
Guess what? You still should not brag even if that is the case.
What are you bragging about really? You are bragging that you can follow super simple mechanics that are not tightly tuned to the point where if you make even the slightest mistake it would mean a wipe. They are super simple for a reason, so everyone will be able to do them.
They are watered down to the point that even the worst player in the world should be able to do them. So even if you do them you are basically bragging that you are at least as capable as a monkey. Ah, congrats I guess.
Yes, it is nice to be able to say you did the best but if that is really what you are seeking then why not try to do the best while doing it as it is supposed to be done.
I might be alone in this coming statement but this is how I look at people in the LFR.
If you can not do the mechanics in the LFR version of the fight there is no way in hell you can do them in the real fight and it would take an act of god, a miracle, before you would ever have a prayer of doing them in heroic mode.
I don't care if you have heroic gear. If you can not do simple mechanics in the LFR I will automatically label you as a horrible player that got carried for that gear.
Actions speak louder then words and if you can not follow mechanics in the LFR it speaks volumes about you, about how bad of a player you are, and it says that any piece of gear you own was something you where carried for and nothing, not one single thing, one single achievement you have ever gotten was earned by your own ability.
So if you want to really shine as a damage dealer in the LFR then do it the right way.
1) Top the damage done meters.
2) Obey the mechanics
3) Stay low on the damage received meters.
Then sit back and take pride in the fact that you did well. You do not need to tell people you did well. Anyone that would actually give a crap probably already looked at all those factors and knows.
If you really seek the accolades of others seek them from your friends or guild mates while laughing at the person that did 28K while never leaving the slime boss while you did more damage done, 36K and took less damage while switching to the mana void and slimes ever time.
Trust me. There is no better feeling in the game then knowing you did the job well and right.
Be a good damage dealer and stop saying "it is only the LFR."
Do the right thing.
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