does anyone else see MP5 as an artificial stat? i have always considered this stat to be redundant and w/o real identity. it is also the reason why Spirit has become such an issue since vanilla.
MP5 is also one of the stats that doesn't have a tangible lore to it. it would seem to me that every other stat has a value to every player. to some that value may not be very significant but it is still greater than zero. if you told a rogue that a piece of armor gives him '10mana per 5sec', he would say "no it doesn't" even though the piece does indeed say so. i cannot think of any other stat that works in this misleading way.
MP5 is also one main factor in todays 'mana issues'. the modifying of Spirit across the board does nothing to balance pallies and similar classes. if a class/spec is having 'hp issues' the devs can easily modify the effect of the Stam stat from the bottom or middle to create the desired effect. MP5 adjustment is relatively unchangable and not easily modified.
my understanding of MP5's introduction was to be an in-combat regen whereas Spirit was the ooc regen. this definition is obsolete now.
so, i pose this: What is the purpose of MP5 when the Spirit stat lingers?
MP5Follow
Said it before, will say it again.
Think then post.
Think then post.
Bode - 100 Holy Paladin - Lightbringer
GC when talking about Replenishment(http://blue.mmo-champion.com/27/15443248148-a-plea-to-remove-replenishment.html)
in the ever-morphing quest to homogenize the classes, i would predict MP5 gets the chop in the near future. this doesn't seem like anything for pallies atm...until you factor in the DP changes to come. welcome to the renaissance of mana regen.
Edited, Mar 11th 2009 12:19am by tommyguns
Quote:
But mana regen stats are something we are taking a bigger look at. Either Spirit or Int or mp5 always feels like the queen stat and it is probably not tenable to have so many regen stats in the long term.
in the ever-morphing quest to homogenize the classes, i would predict MP5 gets the chop in the near future. this doesn't seem like anything for pallies atm...until you factor in the DP changes to come. welcome to the renaissance of mana regen.
Edited, Mar 11th 2009 12:19am by tommyguns
Welcome to a month ago.
With itemization in end game TBC (think SWP) healers started to reach a point where they literally couldn't go OOM. For example I could downrank FoL to 6 and do the same effective healing and my mana would go up in raids. As in casting heals and my mana going up like a hunter with AoS up. This led to fights like Twins where they had to throw insane amounts of raid damage to challenge us or fights like Brutallus where they put in Stomp which would hit the best geared tanks in the game for all their health. They backed themselves into the same corner with Wotlk.
Any healing class can roll their face across a raid ui and heal the entire fight and not go oom. Which leaves all kinds of design problems they didn't have to deal with in SSC/TK or T6. So they are nerfing DP for pallies, nerfed CoH for priests, are rolling back Spirit changes implemented in 2.4 and looking to bring shaman healers out as a raid healer. They have talked about addressing Replenishment or even Illumination if that didn't solve the problems and bring healing back to where they wanted it. Losing Mp5 may or may not be another step in this but for pallies its really not all that much of a problem since the stat went out the door the second we got DP even if it does get nerfed to hell.
Blizz is trying shots in the dark to come up with a solution to fix healing, which is good even if it is a nerf to a class or the removal of a stat because healing in WotLK is a joke. That is mainly due to the encounter but also in part to endless mana. They need to fix it and make it challenging again without making it a spam whackamole heals on raid ui.
With itemization in end game TBC (think SWP) healers started to reach a point where they literally couldn't go OOM. For example I could downrank FoL to 6 and do the same effective healing and my mana would go up in raids. As in casting heals and my mana going up like a hunter with AoS up. This led to fights like Twins where they had to throw insane amounts of raid damage to challenge us or fights like Brutallus where they put in Stomp which would hit the best geared tanks in the game for all their health. They backed themselves into the same corner with Wotlk.
Any healing class can roll their face across a raid ui and heal the entire fight and not go oom. Which leaves all kinds of design problems they didn't have to deal with in SSC/TK or T6. So they are nerfing DP for pallies, nerfed CoH for priests, are rolling back Spirit changes implemented in 2.4 and looking to bring shaman healers out as a raid healer. They have talked about addressing Replenishment or even Illumination if that didn't solve the problems and bring healing back to where they wanted it. Losing Mp5 may or may not be another step in this but for pallies its really not all that much of a problem since the stat went out the door the second we got DP even if it does get nerfed to hell.
Blizz is trying shots in the dark to come up with a solution to fix healing, which is good even if it is a nerf to a class or the removal of a stat because healing in WotLK is a joke. That is mainly due to the encounter but also in part to endless mana. They need to fix it and make it challenging again without making it a spam whackamole heals on raid ui.
Bode - 100 Holy Paladin - Lightbringer
/agree
my fear is that unless they standardize the mana regen system it will forever be exploited and trivialized. Spirit has always been the stepchild of stats. over the course of developement Spirit has undergone minor resurgences for some specs, yet still doesn't have a solid identity. WotLK was ripe to make Spirit the 'regen stat' but instead it got pushed further backseat by most.
so many talents already are sponsored by +Spi and so many more could make great use of it. but standing in the way are things like Replenishment and DP which benefit more when rediculous amounts of +Int are involved. which leads to the main culprit: Intelect. a stat that increases the mana pool, adds crit, benefits many talents, IS benefitted by many talents/buffs, and now acts as the main regen tool. in the land of balance, cries of OP should be heard.
i already said my piece on MP5.
i lay out my concerns not as a pally but as a Disc priest who is awaiting the fate of my Holy gear vs my Shadow gear. for instance, atm Spellweave > Moonshroud, though i'd rather have some crit.
my fear is that unless they standardize the mana regen system it will forever be exploited and trivialized. Spirit has always been the stepchild of stats. over the course of developement Spirit has undergone minor resurgences for some specs, yet still doesn't have a solid identity. WotLK was ripe to make Spirit the 'regen stat' but instead it got pushed further backseat by most.
so many talents already are sponsored by +Spi and so many more could make great use of it. but standing in the way are things like Replenishment and DP which benefit more when rediculous amounts of +Int are involved. which leads to the main culprit: Intelect. a stat that increases the mana pool, adds crit, benefits many talents, IS benefitted by many talents/buffs, and now acts as the main regen tool. in the land of balance, cries of OP should be heard.
i already said my piece on MP5.
i lay out my concerns not as a pally but as a Disc priest who is awaiting the fate of my Holy gear vs my Shadow gear. for instance, atm Spellweave > Moonshroud, though i'd rather have some crit.
It is like you realize there is a problem, but don't understand what it is. Then you start talking. Let me refer you back to my first post. Or you can go back to making unsubstantiated claims about a design approach that is barely even more than half an idea floated about and make any number of logical fallacies.
Please stop, take a second and try to understand what is really the issue with healers and how blizzard is trying to resolve it with changes in 3.1 to healers (and tanks!). You aren't contributing to the conversation by making a laughable attempt at sounding thoughtful on the subject when you clearly are talking in a manner that shows you just don't get it, like at all.
Please stop, take a second and try to understand what is really the issue with healers and how blizzard is trying to resolve it with changes in 3.1 to healers (and tanks!). You aren't contributing to the conversation by making a laughable attempt at sounding thoughtful on the subject when you clearly are talking in a manner that shows you just don't get it, like at all.
Bode - 100 Holy Paladin - Lightbringer
bodhisattva wrote:
It is like you realize there is a problem, but don't understand what it is. Then you start talking. Let me refer you back to my first post. Or you can go back to making unsubstantiated claims about a design approach that is barely even more than half an idea floated about and make any number of logical fallacies.
Please stop, take a second and try to understand what is really the issue with healers and how blizzard is trying to resolve it with changes in 3.1 to healers (and tanks!). You aren't contributing to the conversation by making a laughable attempt at sounding thoughtful on the subject when you clearly are talking in a manner that shows you just don't get it, like at all.
Please stop, take a second and try to understand what is really the issue with healers and how blizzard is trying to resolve it with changes in 3.1 to healers (and tanks!). You aren't contributing to the conversation by making a laughable attempt at sounding thoughtful on the subject when you clearly are talking in a manner that shows you just don't get it, like at all.
It is like you realize that you understand that he doesn't understand the problem, and although he is trying to be thoughtful and sound good, he just doesn't get it, yet instead of explaining what the actual problem is and why he doesn't get it, you pretty much just say, "You just don't get it, L2anaylze the problem noob!"
To be fair, you did have one post where you stated what the problem is, which is that all healers currently have pretty much endless mana and face-roll/whack-a-mole healing isn't fun or challenging. You also stated that Blizzard is taking pot-shots in the dark trying to resolve the issue.
Well, what do you think are some potential solutions to the problem?
Edited, Mar 26th 2009 3:03pm by jeromesimina
Hey, welcome to the paladin forums!
The reason why I don't take the time to explain the situation to Tommy is because, simply put, he doesn't understand elementary fundamentals of an easy video game that most people take for granted. He has dropped gems as epic as "1% less hit is 1% less dps, right?" to "I am going to talk about Ret dps and use my BG dps charts as the basis for all of my examples". Over the last 2 years of posting on the paladin boards he has made me kick myself each and every time I have tried to have an honest discussion about gameplay with him. The best analogy is that it would be like holding a conversation about geography with someone who truly believes the earth is flat. You would be talking past the person until you explained and convinced them of a very fundamental truth that they just didn't see. The few times I have taken the time to explain things have been more for the audiences benefit than for his own.
As for my response 2 weeks ago and things are starting to shape up.
First step make real content, there has never been easier raid content released than Naxx wotlk. That is a statement of fact, not opinion (deal with it). Hopefully Ulduar hardmodes rectify this, though I fully expect most successful guilds will full clear Ulduar in less than a month leaving 4-5 months of ******** or guild erosion due to people quitting from boredom. The number one issue is mana regen. Not encounters, Malygos pretty much sums this up. Malygos has spike damage and is pretty much designed so if healers don't top people off relatively quickly that you will lose people if you are undergeared (less than 20k health) losing people when under geared means 10 min enrage timer is gonna hit you. This tried and true raid mechanics that has been around in a number incarnations for a long time now is completely trivialized by unlimited mana, and no need for mana bar in P3. Plus blizzard has stated unlimited mana led to SWP fights like Twins which they don't want to have to do again.
So you can only balance fights so much around the mana issue before you finally have to pay attention to the elephant in the room. Mana. So we have located the problem, now how do we fix it? Blizz is going for a scatter shot approach, though not an overall bad approach of fielding small nerfs at healers with promises of more until they get to a place they feel comfortable with. While changes to mana regen are the primary source of a solution, its not the whole thing. Properly balanced content that is in line with gear and mana regen that is balanced in a way that actually forces healers to use their mana and conserve it will be key.
Fathom Lord Karathress in SSC was in no way the hardest fight I have ever done, but it forced me to learn to watch my mana bar, use potions and not just overheal the snot out of a tank but rather to heal smart. That is because it was balanced to the gear the avg raider would have while attempting it (and even balanced so that if you out geared it, it could still spank major mistakes and wipe raids). Which is what we are not seeing now, with a mix of blues and epics the content is pretty forgiving in T7. With full epics its like doing Kara in T6 which is not good balance at all. You can ignore mechanics, you don't worry about mana and you see zero challenge content because gear and mana regen completely trivialize the nerfed content.
So end of the day its a Multipronged attack, you have to bring mana regen inline with the content, you have to bring content inline with both the gear and mana regen. It might seem like the same thing but it is not. Both approaches need to be taken to work on content that is dynamic and accessible without being complete skilless loot pinata bosses that can be steamrolled while ignoring the fight while undergeared or even just wearing the same tier level of gear with little or no skill involved.
Edited, Mar 26th 2009 11:00pm by bodhisattva
The reason why I don't take the time to explain the situation to Tommy is because, simply put, he doesn't understand elementary fundamentals of an easy video game that most people take for granted. He has dropped gems as epic as "1% less hit is 1% less dps, right?" to "I am going to talk about Ret dps and use my BG dps charts as the basis for all of my examples". Over the last 2 years of posting on the paladin boards he has made me kick myself each and every time I have tried to have an honest discussion about gameplay with him. The best analogy is that it would be like holding a conversation about geography with someone who truly believes the earth is flat. You would be talking past the person until you explained and convinced them of a very fundamental truth that they just didn't see. The few times I have taken the time to explain things have been more for the audiences benefit than for his own.
As for my response 2 weeks ago and things are starting to shape up.
First step make real content, there has never been easier raid content released than Naxx wotlk. That is a statement of fact, not opinion (deal with it). Hopefully Ulduar hardmodes rectify this, though I fully expect most successful guilds will full clear Ulduar in less than a month leaving 4-5 months of ******** or guild erosion due to people quitting from boredom. The number one issue is mana regen. Not encounters, Malygos pretty much sums this up. Malygos has spike damage and is pretty much designed so if healers don't top people off relatively quickly that you will lose people if you are undergeared (less than 20k health) losing people when under geared means 10 min enrage timer is gonna hit you. This tried and true raid mechanics that has been around in a number incarnations for a long time now is completely trivialized by unlimited mana, and no need for mana bar in P3. Plus blizzard has stated unlimited mana led to SWP fights like Twins which they don't want to have to do again.
So you can only balance fights so much around the mana issue before you finally have to pay attention to the elephant in the room. Mana. So we have located the problem, now how do we fix it? Blizz is going for a scatter shot approach, though not an overall bad approach of fielding small nerfs at healers with promises of more until they get to a place they feel comfortable with. While changes to mana regen are the primary source of a solution, its not the whole thing. Properly balanced content that is in line with gear and mana regen that is balanced in a way that actually forces healers to use their mana and conserve it will be key.
Fathom Lord Karathress in SSC was in no way the hardest fight I have ever done, but it forced me to learn to watch my mana bar, use potions and not just overheal the snot out of a tank but rather to heal smart. That is because it was balanced to the gear the avg raider would have while attempting it (and even balanced so that if you out geared it, it could still spank major mistakes and wipe raids). Which is what we are not seeing now, with a mix of blues and epics the content is pretty forgiving in T7. With full epics its like doing Kara in T6 which is not good balance at all. You can ignore mechanics, you don't worry about mana and you see zero challenge content because gear and mana regen completely trivialize the nerfed content.
So end of the day its a Multipronged attack, you have to bring mana regen inline with the content, you have to bring content inline with both the gear and mana regen. It might seem like the same thing but it is not. Both approaches need to be taken to work on content that is dynamic and accessible without being complete skilless loot pinata bosses that can be steamrolled while ignoring the fight while undergeared or even just wearing the same tier level of gear with little or no skill involved.
Edited, Mar 26th 2009 11:00pm by bodhisattva
Bode - 100 Holy Paladin - Lightbringer
I have long believed that different healing casting classes rely on different mana-based stats in order to be successful. Case in point: the druid (albeit one of the main bad-guys in the battle against unlimited mana). A druid specced boomkin is forever casting, and thus has little use for Spirit relying on massive mana pools. A tree druid, on the other hand, can largely ignore intellect, because between their HoTs and high spirit ratings, they're regening mana as quickly as they're burning it. To bring this thread on topic, a paladin - who's healing style is largely direct heals and Blessing of Wisdom - will likely be relying on mp5 above spirit and int. To my memory, there are no spirit-based talents for palas like there are for druids and priests; one of the points of spirit for healing classes is not just its base mana regen, but its collatoral effects with various talents that really make it the distinction between caster-dps and caster-healing gear for other classes.
Now it could be that the reason for this is a simple armor-barrier. Clothadins aside, a healadin will be looking for plate gear; and indeed any plate with mana-based stats on is ONLY going to be for a paladin; and indeed plate with mp5 is likely to also be of advantage to Retridins aswell. This all harks back to Blizz trying to make more gear suitable for more classes; and the fact that paladins are the only healing class to use mp5 instead of spirit for regen means that Blizzard can largely balance paladin-specific healing gear separately from the other classes.
I'll be honest, I've never played a healadin, so I have no idea whether or not the "healers have too much mana" includes us or not. Presumably not, if this is the reason that spirit is being nerfed not mp5. And I have to say from my resto druid that yes, I have too much mana; and yes, I love spirit as a stat; and yes, I do tend to massively overheal things because I can afford to. So it is my theory that in balancing healing, Blizz aren't focusing on the paladin and their mp5-plate too much. And I personally like the distinction between mp5 and spirit; as mentioned before, ever since spellpower was merged it remains the one thing that distinguishes healer and dps gear for the caster classes.
Anyhow, after all this I'm not quite sure where I was going with this post. Hopefully though, I've bought up a few points relevent to the discussion, as well as offered an answer to the original post (as in: why have both mp5 and spirit, and what's this got to do with paladins?). Just my $0.02.
Edited, Mar 27th 2009 12:51pm by Lansdowne
Now it could be that the reason for this is a simple armor-barrier. Clothadins aside, a healadin will be looking for plate gear; and indeed any plate with mana-based stats on is ONLY going to be for a paladin; and indeed plate with mp5 is likely to also be of advantage to Retridins aswell. This all harks back to Blizz trying to make more gear suitable for more classes; and the fact that paladins are the only healing class to use mp5 instead of spirit for regen means that Blizzard can largely balance paladin-specific healing gear separately from the other classes.
I'll be honest, I've never played a healadin, so I have no idea whether or not the "healers have too much mana" includes us or not. Presumably not, if this is the reason that spirit is being nerfed not mp5. And I have to say from my resto druid that yes, I have too much mana; and yes, I love spirit as a stat; and yes, I do tend to massively overheal things because I can afford to. So it is my theory that in balancing healing, Blizz aren't focusing on the paladin and their mp5-plate too much. And I personally like the distinction between mp5 and spirit; as mentioned before, ever since spellpower was merged it remains the one thing that distinguishes healer and dps gear for the caster classes.
Anyhow, after all this I'm not quite sure where I was going with this post. Hopefully though, I've bought up a few points relevent to the discussion, as well as offered an answer to the original post (as in: why have both mp5 and spirit, and what's this got to do with paladins?). Just my $0.02.
Edited, Mar 27th 2009 12:51pm by Lansdowne
Quote:
The reason why I don't take the time to explain the situation to Tommy is because, simply put, he doesn't understand elementary fundamentals of an easy video game that most people take for granted. He has dropped gems as epic as "1% less hit is 1% less dps, right?" to "I am going to talk about Ret dps and use my BG dps charts as the basis for all of my examples". Over the last 2 years of posting on the paladin boards he has made me kick myself each and every time I have tried to have an honest discussion about gameplay with him. The best analogy is that it would be like holding a conversation about geography with someone who truly believes the earth is flat. You would be talking past the person until you explained and convinced them of a very fundamental truth that they just didn't see. The few times I have taken the time to explain things have been more for the audiences benefit than for his own.
reading this, all i can picture is Eric from Billy Madison...the know-it-all with the little cutout of Billy's head, poking the eyes out, gettin all flustered by everything he does. seriously, you made a whole half post about me when i thought this thread was dead 3wks ago. ima search your posts for more hidden homages to me. +epeen for me.
Quote:
So you can only balance fights so much around the mana issue before you finally have to pay attention to the elephant in the room. Mana. So we have located the problem, now how do we fix it? Blizz is going for a scatter shot approach, though not an overall bad approach of fielding small nerfs at healers with promises of more until they get to a place they feel comfortable with. While changes to mana regen are the primary source of a solution, its not the whole thing. Properly balanced content that is in line with gear and mana regen that is balanced in a way that actually forces healers to use their mana and conserve it will be key.
you're not offering anything insightful, just talking in circles. the current state of mana regen is a joke and will continue to be unless major changes are made. standardizing the way it is handled would be a start. unfortunately, we have too many factors that affect mana and mana regen. Spi, Int, MP5 all have a strong impact on mana usage(depending on spec). then you have side effects from talents, abilities, and glyphs that further divide the homogenization of mana design.
Ulduar is going to drop lots of pally gear with loads of MP5...wasted stats as +Int will still reign as king since Illumination, Replenishment, DP, etc still exist. Holy pally pvp is broken atm and one of the main reasons is the stupid-large mana pool and easy regen. there are alot of changes coming in this regard, but i fear it will end up being clusterfock of bandaid fixes and cause undesirable effects.
if you wanna fix the problem, you start from the ground...you don't just pop the pimples on the surface cuz then they just ooze all over your face.
Once again I will post what I point out…
While some people have absurdly advanced knowledge of this game, they ought to watch how they post it.
Quote Borsuk:
I’m starting to wonder if some of these posts are no longer in the realm of Elite vs Casual – and moving into the realm of simply D-Bag vs The World…
*Edit: Within the Paly I've mostly found what Tommy and Jer have said to be helpful. Most of the stuff Bodhi posts can be attained with far less attitude and far more statistical evidence from sites like EJ. (Ironically - the EJ site advertises itself as an EJ, but Bodhi is the guy who comes off as one...)
Edited, Mar 27th 2009 9:47am by Borsuk
While some people have absurdly advanced knowledge of this game, they ought to watch how they post it.
Quote Borsuk:
Quote:
However – making these weird ranting posts which are half filled with actual comments and half filled with self aggrandizing BS is really annoying to read. Post questions, post replies, post opinions, but when you start writing a post that turns into – “I’m great, the game sucks, if you’re not great like me then you suckâ€â€¦. Just erase that before you put it up. For all your knowledge about the game – which most people appreciate your advice and input on – no one wants to hear you tell us what idiots we are, how we’re noobs because our account wasn’t opened in 2004, or how you can out-gear/skill some section of the game. Posting that stuff – despite all that good knowledge – Makes you look like a jerk (an elitist one :) – and while you might be supported by some players – remember 95% of us aren’t elite.
I’m starting to wonder if some of these posts are no longer in the realm of Elite vs Casual – and moving into the realm of simply D-Bag vs The World…
*Edit: Within the Paly I've mostly found what Tommy and Jer have said to be helpful. Most of the stuff Bodhi posts can be attained with far less attitude and far more statistical evidence from sites like EJ. (Ironically - the EJ site advertises itself as an EJ, but Bodhi is the guy who comes off as one...)
Edited, Mar 27th 2009 9:47am by Borsuk
Once again though, I am stuck in the position of having to do explain and prove things that have been basic fundamentals of the game since vanilla wow that most people take for granted and then having to argue their validity with some who clearly doesn't get it but feels that their length of time in the game somehow correlates to actual understanding of the game itself.
Which leave a cranky Bode who is demeaning and hurts your e-feelings. Is their opinion really worth any weight when it has repeatedly, over the course of years shown huge fundamental glaring gaps in knowledge about the basics of a video game which lead to butchered hamfisted opinion that are in their own little bubble because they are built up on a layer of misunderstanding and misconceptions that completely invalidate the opinion/theory since it was built off a flawed understanding of how a video game works.
At times it can feel like I am being asked by people to prove that 2+2 = 4. Repeatedly over my posting history you will see that I have engaged in a number of rather complex talks about paladin or wow, whether it be mechanics of the game or helping people on strategy for say Felmyst in Sunwell Plateau. But when someone is close minded and clearly doesn't even have a clue what they are talking about but is in no way open to actually learning you really can't give it the same respect, feedback or indepth response because its simply listening to your own voice bounce of a wall.
Edited, Mar 27th 2009 11:17am by bodhisattva
Edited, Mar 27th 2009 11:18am by bodhisattva
Which leave a cranky Bode who is demeaning and hurts your e-feelings. Is their opinion really worth any weight when it has repeatedly, over the course of years shown huge fundamental glaring gaps in knowledge about the basics of a video game which lead to butchered hamfisted opinion that are in their own little bubble because they are built up on a layer of misunderstanding and misconceptions that completely invalidate the opinion/theory since it was built off a flawed understanding of how a video game works.
At times it can feel like I am being asked by people to prove that 2+2 = 4. Repeatedly over my posting history you will see that I have engaged in a number of rather complex talks about paladin or wow, whether it be mechanics of the game or helping people on strategy for say Felmyst in Sunwell Plateau. But when someone is close minded and clearly doesn't even have a clue what they are talking about but is in no way open to actually learning you really can't give it the same respect, feedback or indepth response because its simply listening to your own voice bounce of a wall.
Edited, Mar 27th 2009 11:17am by bodhisattva
Edited, Mar 27th 2009 11:18am by bodhisattva
Bode - 100 Holy Paladin - Lightbringer
Regardlesss of how perfect one's own logic can be, to reduce yourself to lengthy ad hominum attacks adressing the poster rather than the post adds nothing to a discussion.
I'm not disagreeing with you; I'm just disappointed that since I posted what I thought was a well thought-out and written contribution to the topic at hand, people generally have chosen to completely ignore it to instead propogate a private war with each other.
No, I don't want to hear whose fault it is.
I'm not disagreeing with you; I'm just disappointed that since I posted what I thought was a well thought-out and written contribution to the topic at hand, people generally have chosen to completely ignore it to instead propogate a private war with each other.
No, I don't want to hear whose fault it is.
Coming back to the topic at hand it is hard to have a discussion about raid balance and itemization, stats and how they affect mana regen because we are currently viewing raiding through a bubble. We have just come through an expansion, 10 new levels, new itemization and all we are left to chew on is Naxx. Naxx is something we have never seen before on an instance level in WoW. Guaranteed loot. The dungeon has been tuned to the lowest common denominator, there are no gear walls and most fight mechanics have been tuned to the point that even major and glaring mistakes will have little to no consequences in terms of borking the attempt at an encounter. So 15 of the 17 new bosses can't even be used as discussion on the current state of raid mechanics.
Which leaves OS and Malygos. Malygos went the raid damage route trying to test healers. However with unlimited mana that failed, just like Twins with 5 shamans, to be a challenge. It also led to crying which mean that the only successful challenge for healers on the fight is going to be removed. The need to top people off from landing from the whirlwind to eating the first breathe (gone in 3.1). Hard mode on sartharion allows the to keep challenge since bad players can still raid 0-2 drakes fairly easily and get loot and feel like they are beating a boss (and not a loot pinata) while keeping hard things like 27k health spikes on tanks and an actual need to control adds that punish you if they are loose (unlike anything in Naxx for example).
This isn't an insight, it is something we saw as basic observable fact within 2 weeks of the expac being released (3 days for Nihilum/SKgaming) Now we come to Tommyguns soulcrushingly learning disabled epiphany about this problem
MP5 is also one main factor in todays 'mana issues'.
If this statement doesn't clearly define his complete disconnection and inability to understand the actual problem with itemization, raid balance and mana regen then the rest of the paragraph hammers it home like you couldn't ask for. Whether it is his complete lack of understanding about what blizzard was trying to do for Druids and Priests in 2.4 with changes to Spirit. His misunderstanding of itemization between the healing classes and how changes to spirit for druids and priests didn't matter for paladins, true, but we never got gear for it either so the whole rogue argument is facetious at best, at worst is just another of hundreds of examples of a kids inability to reason out basics of an easy video game to a logical conclusion.
So in the end it touches tangentially at the problem at hand, but also misses the actual issues entirely.
We are suffering from a poor balance of mana cost on spells (with the changes to cost being a % of base mana in 3.0 rather than set) as well as an overabundance of regen that completely trivializes healing current content. This also has to be balanced with the fact that current content is inarguably the easiest ever released in any MMO to date. So balancing to Naxx is terrible, which is what Blizz saw and why they left the changes to healers until 3.1. However at the time I responded it was clear Blizzard didn't have a clue how to approach it and were taking a shot in the dark type response of minor nerfs until they got it right, rather than just dramatically overshooting it with a knee jerk reaction.
At the same time we still suffer the issue of where we will put the balance?
This is the problem. They want everyone to experience the content, which means a certain amount of dumbing it down to almost full on ****** level but they want to challenge the end gamers that bring prestige to the game. Current mana regen is but a symptom of a bigger problem, easily fixable in itself (so much so that talking about it can be summed up with 'nerf mana regen and make fights harder') however until blizzard has a clue on where they are going with content it is meh. As for Uldaur its getting better. 10 man, non hardmode is terrible. 25 man, non hardmode feels a little bit tighter say S 1d or 2d in difficulty rather than Sarth zero. As for hardmodes, well they set a lot of stock in 3drakes and it was a relatively easy fight. But we will see how things scale up. Right now 25 mans aren't a mana issue on regular mode either but its less of a joke than T7 was.
Which leaves OS and Malygos. Malygos went the raid damage route trying to test healers. However with unlimited mana that failed, just like Twins with 5 shamans, to be a challenge. It also led to crying which mean that the only successful challenge for healers on the fight is going to be removed. The need to top people off from landing from the whirlwind to eating the first breathe (gone in 3.1). Hard mode on sartharion allows the to keep challenge since bad players can still raid 0-2 drakes fairly easily and get loot and feel like they are beating a boss (and not a loot pinata) while keeping hard things like 27k health spikes on tanks and an actual need to control adds that punish you if they are loose (unlike anything in Naxx for example).
This isn't an insight, it is something we saw as basic observable fact within 2 weeks of the expac being released (3 days for Nihilum/SKgaming) Now we come to Tommyguns soulcrushingly learning disabled epiphany about this problem
Quote:
MP5 is also one main factor in todays 'mana issues'.
If this statement doesn't clearly define his complete disconnection and inability to understand the actual problem with itemization, raid balance and mana regen then the rest of the paragraph hammers it home like you couldn't ask for. Whether it is his complete lack of understanding about what blizzard was trying to do for Druids and Priests in 2.4 with changes to Spirit. His misunderstanding of itemization between the healing classes and how changes to spirit for druids and priests didn't matter for paladins, true, but we never got gear for it either so the whole rogue argument is facetious at best, at worst is just another of hundreds of examples of a kids inability to reason out basics of an easy video game to a logical conclusion.
So in the end it touches tangentially at the problem at hand, but also misses the actual issues entirely.
We are suffering from a poor balance of mana cost on spells (with the changes to cost being a % of base mana in 3.0 rather than set) as well as an overabundance of regen that completely trivializes healing current content. This also has to be balanced with the fact that current content is inarguably the easiest ever released in any MMO to date. So balancing to Naxx is terrible, which is what Blizz saw and why they left the changes to healers until 3.1. However at the time I responded it was clear Blizzard didn't have a clue how to approach it and were taking a shot in the dark type response of minor nerfs until they got it right, rather than just dramatically overshooting it with a knee jerk reaction.
At the same time we still suffer the issue of where we will put the balance?
This is the problem. They want everyone to experience the content, which means a certain amount of dumbing it down to almost full on ****** level but they want to challenge the end gamers that bring prestige to the game. Current mana regen is but a symptom of a bigger problem, easily fixable in itself (so much so that talking about it can be summed up with 'nerf mana regen and make fights harder') however until blizzard has a clue on where they are going with content it is meh. As for Uldaur its getting better. 10 man, non hardmode is terrible. 25 man, non hardmode feels a little bit tighter say S 1d or 2d in difficulty rather than Sarth zero. As for hardmodes, well they set a lot of stock in 3drakes and it was a relatively easy fight. But we will see how things scale up. Right now 25 mans aren't a mana issue on regular mode either but its less of a joke than T7 was.
Bode - 100 Holy Paladin - Lightbringer
Lansdowne wrote:
To bring this thread on topic, a paladin - who's healing style is largely direct heals and Blessing of Wisdom - will likely be relying on mp5 above spirit and int. To my memory, there are no spirit-based talents for palas like there are for druids and priests; one of the points of spirit for healing classes is not just its base mana regen, but its collatoral effects with various talents that really make it the distinction between caster-dps and caster-healing gear for other classes.
Now it could be that the reason for this is a simple armor-barrier. Clothadins aside, a healadin will be looking for plate gear; and indeed any plate with mana-based stats on is ONLY going to be for a paladin; and indeed plate with mp5 is likely to also be of advantage to Retridins aswell.
Now it could be that the reason for this is a simple armor-barrier. Clothadins aside, a healadin will be looking for plate gear; and indeed any plate with mana-based stats on is ONLY going to be for a paladin; and indeed plate with mp5 is likely to also be of advantage to Retridins aswell.
Leaving aside the issue of tuning content, prevailing current wisdom is that, as far as paladins are concerned, none of this is true since WotLK. The primary reasons for this:
- For Holy, active mana regen (divine plea, replenishment, mana spring) trumps passive mana regen, and it scales with int, and not with mp5 or spirit. With all active mana regen sources in play, a point of int provides more mana regen (in addition to its other advantages) than a point of mp5 for fights lasting less than (conservatively) five minutes.
- Spirit-based mana regen only happens outside the five-second rule. Paladins in general are never outside the five-second rule (and if they are, they're probably using divine plea during that time). Therefore spirit is a non-issue, even if there were any spirit on plate/mail, which there basically isn't.
- For Ret, primary mana return comes from JotW, which is based on base mana, and (pre-3.1) Spiritual Attunement, which isn't stat-based at all.
Which all leads to the standard conclusion... For Holy: int is king - the primary regen stat and a supporting throughput stat; mp5 is not wasted itemization as it is still the same as it ever was, but it's suboptimal; spirit is the province of cloth casters, and they are welcome to it. For Ret: mana regen isn't even a question of gearing, but of skill trees and battle tactics - they don't gear for int, mp5, OR spirit.
Looking forward, Blizzard seems to have in mind more nerfs to active mana regen for Holy - and as has been heavily discussed elsewhere, including elsethread, it frankly needs it. Experienced (I won't use the other "e" word at the moment) raiding guilds have zero mana problems and for even casual/casual-core guilds like mine, mana is last on the list of concerns (personally, I haven't come close to OOM in 10/15 Naxx and OS1D). Presumably, MP5 would have a bigger role - the prevalence of it on T8 gear implies something of the sort. Longer fights would presumably also be part of the plan, along with movement and/or periodic raid damage to prevent Divine Plea use on cooldown, as well as to provide an opportunity for skilled Holy to squeeze some regen out of small windows of opportunity and distinguish themselves from lesser-skilled Holy.
This is the problem with playing a protection paladin; I admit my knowledge of the other two trees is lacking. I don't expect Ret to have any mp5 either for anything other than light questing; however it's true to say I never realised quite how much more powerful Int is than Spr. In which case, on plate gear, perhaps Tommy is right, and mp5 is a useless stat.
That's not to say it doesn't have advantages to other classes of course (specifically dps ones); the discussion here seems focussed on healers. This is understandable, playing a healer myself, it is true that I almost never go OOM.
Anyhow, I apologise for my lack of insight into the Holy tree.
That's not to say it doesn't have advantages to other classes of course (specifically dps ones); the discussion here seems focussed on healers. This is understandable, playing a healer myself, it is true that I almost never go OOM.
Anyhow, I apologise for my lack of insight into the Holy tree.
Lansdowne wrote:
This is the problem with playing a protection paladin; I admit my knowledge of the other two trees is lacking. I don't expect Ret to have any mp5 either for anything other than light questing; however it's true to say I never realised quite how much more powerful Int is than Spr. In which case, on plate gear, perhaps Tommy is right, and mp5 is a useless stat.
That's not to say it doesn't have advantages to other classes of course (specifically dps ones); the discussion here seems focussed on healers. This is understandable, playing a healer myself, it is true that I almost never go OOM.
Anyhow, I apologise for my lack of insight into the Holy tree.
That's not to say it doesn't have advantages to other classes of course (specifically dps ones); the discussion here seems focussed on healers. This is understandable, playing a healer myself, it is true that I almost never go OOM.
Anyhow, I apologise for my lack of insight into the Holy tree.
Don't - informed is what everyone should be at the end of a thread, not the beginning...
3.1 is going to be even more fun, since SA is being removed from Ret, which is being rebalanced around Judgements. I wouldn't be surprised to see Holy get another nerf to DP (please, God, just don't let it be that it goes from total mana back to base mana!) while Prot will have 100% DP uptime. Basically, the three specs will all use mana, but in a fundamentally different way - which I would expect to kill "true hybrid" builds once and for all. And all three ways will be different than any other mana user, even though in some cases we share gear with them.
Quote:
At the same time we still suffer the issue of where we will put the balance?
This is the problem. They want everyone to experience the content, which means a certain amount of dumbing it down to almost full on ****** level but they want to challenge the end gamers that bring prestige to the game. Current mana regen is but a symptom of a bigger problem, easily fixable in itself (so much so that talking about it can be summed up with 'nerf mana regen and make fights harder') however until blizzard has a clue on where they are going with content it is meh. As for Uldaur its getting better. 10 man, non hardmode is terrible. 25 man, non hardmode feels a little bit tighter say S 1d or 2d in difficulty rather than Sarth zero. As for hardmodes, well they set a lot of stock in 3drakes and it was a relatively easy fight. But we will see how things scale up. Right now 25 mans aren't a mana issue on regular mode either but its less of a joke than T7 was.
This is the problem. They want everyone to experience the content, which means a certain amount of dumbing it down to almost full on ****** level but they want to challenge the end gamers that bring prestige to the game. Current mana regen is but a symptom of a bigger problem, easily fixable in itself (so much so that talking about it can be summed up with 'nerf mana regen and make fights harder') however until blizzard has a clue on where they are going with content it is meh. As for Uldaur its getting better. 10 man, non hardmode is terrible. 25 man, non hardmode feels a little bit tighter say S 1d or 2d in difficulty rather than Sarth zero. As for hardmodes, well they set a lot of stock in 3drakes and it was a relatively easy fight. But we will see how things scale up. Right now 25 mans aren't a mana issue on regular mode either but its less of a joke than T7 was.
you have stated what you think the problem is but offer nothing in the way of an idea of solution. more talking in broader and broader circles.
casual play vs hardcore play is NOT the issue. they introduced 10 vs 25 mans to assist that. now they are giving us Hardmode to further distinguish the difference.
the problem is they F-ed all the stats and talents, made specs OP, and in the process ruined the game itself. ima give you a good example of an interesting fight gone bad:
Grand Widow Faerlina
a fight that had alot of potential to show off the strengths of having a diverse raid. you have poisons, splash dmg, spike tank dmg, CC, multi-tanking, dmg and healing urgency. on paper Blizz thought they had a winner of a raid battle. what happened? they let stats and talents run wild and every class became OP. now the fight is a relative tank n spank. in retrospect they have no way to balance that fight without reverting the classes.
do you think Ulduar will be different than this failure? Blizz will try endlessly to try to balance the game on the surface when they really need to be making changes from the core.
DKs make some portions of the game trivial due to their particular mechanics and abilities(remember the mana decay/increased healing from Reliquary of Souls = imp Runetap playground). the current state of threat and dps is obnoxious. dps is able to go from 0 to 60 as soon as the tank taps the enemy with no consideration for self-preservation. tanking has been reduced to blind rotations with no regard for watching threat levels and relying solely on healers for mitigation. healing is spamming and overhealing, nuff said.
the devs are not about to tone down dps output. if a warlock drops from 6k to 5.5k dps, the community will QQ til the tauren come home. tanking has become so homogenized between the classes that its almost too late to change, besides tanking is only trivialized by OP healing. which brings us to the main topic.
healing is OP because of mana regen. without putting effort into longevity, we are able to focus on more bang. druids and holy priest are gettin taxed soon through Spirit nerfs. pallies are essentially left unaffected. they can change DP to 100%...we just wont use it in combat. MP5 will continue to be worthless as long as the +%mana regen are in place.
with all these brain dribbles i unloaded i will ask what i asked in my OP:
if MP5 only benefits a few specs, why keep it in the game? you could just as easily use Spirit as the main regen stat. make it more usuable through talents(like with spamming mages). balance the whole healing game using this one stat. MP5 was put in as an afterthought for pallies since they didn't conform to the OO5SR. now it is merely a PITA for Devs. Holy Pally gear sucks when you are a Ret, Prot, War, or DK...MP5 is pretty much worthless. +Spi would have more uses to with a couple tweaks.
i suggest do away with MP5(period)
Read harder Tommy, I stated that the solution is mindnumblingy easy.
Scale content to gear, and scale gear to content. Also nerf mana regen to bring it back inline at a reasonable level with current content/gear. Also read Elmuneco's post who actually took the time to quiet eloquently state the obviousness of simple game mechanics. Also, a pre-emptive 'read harder' on that one. It really is a good post. However Blizzard tuned T7 to basically the lowest common denominator in terms of raid boss balance, because they want to see people steamroll the easiest content ever released and feel like they are good at the game. The point is that until Blizzard realizes on where they want to go with the 'guaranteed win button' its really beside the point. How far are they really going to tune back mana regen and the content that challenges it? Not far, even as of right now on the ptr if you are halfway decent (and by no means excellent) most bosses in Uldaur aren't an issue at 25 man level for mana. When they leave room for mana regen so even the worst healer with no mana control can clear content its going to leave a situation with mana regen where its out of control
We have a problem with multiple facets. Mana regen is out of control, this is exacerbated by perhaps the most skilless nerfed content ever released. Both are caused by Blizzards new raid design philosphy, ****** proof raiding so skilless people feel like they are good and in order to increase sales and subscription revenue.
Edited, Mar 29th 2009 12:31pm by bodhisattva
Scale content to gear, and scale gear to content. Also nerf mana regen to bring it back inline at a reasonable level with current content/gear. Also read Elmuneco's post who actually took the time to quiet eloquently state the obviousness of simple game mechanics. Also, a pre-emptive 'read harder' on that one. It really is a good post. However Blizzard tuned T7 to basically the lowest common denominator in terms of raid boss balance, because they want to see people steamroll the easiest content ever released and feel like they are good at the game. The point is that until Blizzard realizes on where they want to go with the 'guaranteed win button' its really beside the point. How far are they really going to tune back mana regen and the content that challenges it? Not far, even as of right now on the ptr if you are halfway decent (and by no means excellent) most bosses in Uldaur aren't an issue at 25 man level for mana. When they leave room for mana regen so even the worst healer with no mana control can clear content its going to leave a situation with mana regen where its out of control
We have a problem with multiple facets. Mana regen is out of control, this is exacerbated by perhaps the most skilless nerfed content ever released. Both are caused by Blizzards new raid design philosphy, ****** proof raiding so skilless people feel like they are good and in order to increase sales and subscription revenue.
Edited, Mar 29th 2009 12:31pm by bodhisattva
Bode - 100 Holy Paladin - Lightbringer
Quote:
However Blizzard tuned T7 to basically the lowest common denominator in terms of raid boss balance, because they want to see people steamroll the easiest content ever released and feel like they are good at the game.
this is so not true. if you believe this then you have been brainwashed by Senator Ghostcrawler's EotM(Excuse of the Month). "works as intended"
the content was created way before they put any thought into player design. this includes raids, quests, BGs, and world. because the current Dev team doesn't put enough effort into pre-PTR testing, classes are left too powerful when they get to the masses.
Naxx content was probably created with Kara-like difficulty. it was probably designed to be dynamic and interesting as you are learning it and then a pushover once on farm. instead the classes are so powerful that you can forego any strat and just bang away til its done. this sentiment is shown throughout the entire WotLK.
there is no reason as a Ret pally i should have been able to solo everything(incl all 2-3man quests and one 5man) while leveling. 5man heroics should not be doable with a 4man PUG. WG and SotA are merely races with no skill to be exercised. Vault is wtf. Sarth 3D should not be successfully tanked by a VW. Arena is just teh suck atm.
at least Malygos is challenging with a less than ideal group makeup.
i have a feeling Ulduar will end up being more gimmicky than challenging based on the PTR feedback. i foresee a lot of mechanic exploiting and a lot of stacking....with that will come plenty of kneejerking. hopefully i eat my words and we get quality content.
FWIW to Blizz: Live is not the PTR...give me a finished game to play.
Ummmmm yeahhhhhhhh.
/facepalm.
I could goto ghostcrawlers post (but who needs that when you make things up based on no personal experience!), or link Nihilum/SK downing all content in three days of release. Or try to explain through WWS and incoming damage how aoe traps, splash damage etc have been made so trivial (even in comparison to Karazhan) that it poses no problem to healers. I could talk about how Naxx is three year old content that is pretty straightforward and completely outdated and worse has had health/damage reduced to the point that its not even the same fights even if it is the same bosses?
Lets get down to it though, have you touched an Ulduar fight, or are you yet again going off of third party opinion to make up your own? Did you down Gruul/Mag and get T5 attuned while it was still there. In fact what toon are you using as a main now since Tommy hasn't even cleared Naxx. Because I really don't care to have a conversation with someone who thinks their opinons based entirely on suppositions about content they haven't touched somehow holds weight.
Edit - Class balance is one thing, and something they have worked on for last 2 patches. Mana regen is another and something they had to leave until Ulduar because Naxx truly is a raid bubble in that you simply balance mana regen around it since it is inarguably the easiest raid instance ever released. In fact even the worse loot pinata bosses of Vanilla WoW and TBC make the hardest fights in Naxx Wotlk seem easy. Once again though, feel free to look around. It isn't just top 100 guilds talking trash about Naxx, its pretty much the entire raid community in NA and EU in agreement which is what forced the limp wristed response from Ghostcrawler in the first place.
Edited, Mar 29th 2009 5:14pm by bodhisattva
/facepalm.
I could goto ghostcrawlers post (but who needs that when you make things up based on no personal experience!), or link Nihilum/SK downing all content in three days of release. Or try to explain through WWS and incoming damage how aoe traps, splash damage etc have been made so trivial (even in comparison to Karazhan) that it poses no problem to healers. I could talk about how Naxx is three year old content that is pretty straightforward and completely outdated and worse has had health/damage reduced to the point that its not even the same fights even if it is the same bosses?
Lets get down to it though, have you touched an Ulduar fight, or are you yet again going off of third party opinion to make up your own? Did you down Gruul/Mag and get T5 attuned while it was still there. In fact what toon are you using as a main now since Tommy hasn't even cleared Naxx. Because I really don't care to have a conversation with someone who thinks their opinons based entirely on suppositions about content they haven't touched somehow holds weight.
Edit - Class balance is one thing, and something they have worked on for last 2 patches. Mana regen is another and something they had to leave until Ulduar because Naxx truly is a raid bubble in that you simply balance mana regen around it since it is inarguably the easiest raid instance ever released. In fact even the worse loot pinata bosses of Vanilla WoW and TBC make the hardest fights in Naxx Wotlk seem easy. Once again though, feel free to look around. It isn't just top 100 guilds talking trash about Naxx, its pretty much the entire raid community in NA and EU in agreement which is what forced the limp wristed response from Ghostcrawler in the first place.
Edited, Mar 29th 2009 5:14pm by bodhisattva
Bode - 100 Holy Paladin - Lightbringer
its not just Naxx thats broken! its the whole game.
my disc priest spams Holy Nova on heroic Loken for a 1 min kill everytime...wtf is that?
Naxx is tuned the same way the rest of the game is atm. the players are to powerful for the content that is neither fun nor challenging. this applies to dps, healing and to a lesser extent tanking.
at least in BC, even geared in T5 some of the heroics posed a challenge. you had your easy heroics, the medium ones, and the more difficult dungeons. in LK you have the easy ones the really easy ones, and the annoying ones. QD Isle was an addition to the content, not a replacement. after a mere 4 months, the entire LK content has become stale.
class balancing and class designing are two different issues. class balancing is comparing and adjusting a class to compete with a similar class. this is simple side to side adjustments and is often give and take. class design is the real problem we face. once you give someone something, it is REALLY hard to take it back. when you build a class that can pump out 6k dps on a regular basis as standard, you cannot simply say sorry and put them at 5k dps.
Naxx was originally designed to accomodate 2 tanks, 7-8 healers, and dps(this is from a blue). it was thus tuned for that type of raid makeup. however, tanks are too mighty, healers are too powerful, and dps is too strong. i guarantee if they cut everyone's output in half Naxx would be played the way in which it was designed, instead of a giant tank n spank spamfest.
Ulduar is going to repeat this. the changes going into effect are not enough.
-tanks will still blindly spam rotations
-dps will still recklessly output 100%
-healers will still stack Int and overheal their heads off
i give em 4 days for Ulduar(due to server downtime)
you show one aspect of WotLK that has not been trivialized. even your precious 3-drakes has been pwned by undergeared PUGs
my disc priest spams Holy Nova on heroic Loken for a 1 min kill everytime...wtf is that?
Naxx is tuned the same way the rest of the game is atm. the players are to powerful for the content that is neither fun nor challenging. this applies to dps, healing and to a lesser extent tanking.
at least in BC, even geared in T5 some of the heroics posed a challenge. you had your easy heroics, the medium ones, and the more difficult dungeons. in LK you have the easy ones the really easy ones, and the annoying ones. QD Isle was an addition to the content, not a replacement. after a mere 4 months, the entire LK content has become stale.
class balancing and class designing are two different issues. class balancing is comparing and adjusting a class to compete with a similar class. this is simple side to side adjustments and is often give and take. class design is the real problem we face. once you give someone something, it is REALLY hard to take it back. when you build a class that can pump out 6k dps on a regular basis as standard, you cannot simply say sorry and put them at 5k dps.
Naxx was originally designed to accomodate 2 tanks, 7-8 healers, and dps(this is from a blue). it was thus tuned for that type of raid makeup. however, tanks are too mighty, healers are too powerful, and dps is too strong. i guarantee if they cut everyone's output in half Naxx would be played the way in which it was designed, instead of a giant tank n spank spamfest.
Ulduar is going to repeat this. the changes going into effect are not enough.
-tanks will still blindly spam rotations
-dps will still recklessly output 100%
-healers will still stack Int and overheal their heads off
Quote:
Nihilum/SK downing all content in three days of release.
i give em 4 days for Ulduar(due to server downtime)
you show one aspect of WotLK that has not been trivialized. even your precious 3-drakes has been pwned by undergeared PUGs
The biggest problem I see with the game overall at this point is that Blizzard is trying to please too many people all at the same time, and really not having much success.
It is kind of like having one classroom with one teacher and splitting the students into 3 sections and saying, "ok kids, we have the remidial english class on the left side of the room, the regular english class in the middle of the room, and the Advanced Placement english class on the right side of the room." Then we have that one teacher trying to teach all three classes at the same time, and everybody (especially the teacher) fails.
I went from the opinion that Naxx was at least somewhat tough to the opinion that Naxx is too easy in 1 week. How did this happen? Did my guild suddenly master new mechanics and figure out complex stuff? Umm... no. We simply told anyone that repeatedly failed in Naxx that they were not going this past week. We stacked the deck with 10 raiders who are all competent and all pay attention. We breezed through the place with one wipe, and that was because of a botched pull on Faerlina where the tank took Faerlina too far from the followers and she never got widow's embrace and wiped us on the first frenzy. Epically stupid of US, and we really shouldn't have had a single wipe the entire run. It was pretty much a joke. Even KT, who I had never killed before, didn't even vaguely come close to wiping us. I don't think anyone got below 50% health that entire fight.
I appreciate people like Bohdi. Some of his posts do come off as incredibly jerky/insulting, but that is usually from extreme frustration I think. The fact is, he is very good at the game, has been playing the game forever, and he cares about the quality of the game and the fact that the quality of current end-game content is pretty ****-poor. He cares that most class mechanics are out of whack compared to the content. In attempting to cater to the masses, Blizzard made it so that if you have half a brain your character is a demi-god, and if you have a full brain, your character IS a god. For a lot of people that is fun for a brief time, but it gets old really quickly.
For example, I just got block-capped on my Prot Paladin (103% total avoidance with HS up) and ran as the tank in a PuG H UK run. The healer was a brand new level 80 Priest in all greens and blues that had never even done UK on regular let alone heroic. The healer was doing more "raid-healing" than "tank-healing" for the entire run until phase-2 of the last boss, at which point they finally had to worry a little bit about healing me. On most of the trash pulls I was taking maybe 2k damage total by the time we got the trash pile down. If I had had an experienced healer with me that had decent gear, I probably could have pulled 3 groups of trash at a time and been fine, and that probably would have been the only way to make an experienced healer run low on mana in the slightest. Whoever made the post that qualified the current heroic content as "really easy, easy, and annoying" as the three different levels of difficulty was right on, and raiding is the same way. You have really easy raids, easy raids, and annoying raids that really aren't all that difficult.
As a relatively "casual" raider, I don't need impossible content (although I hope the people that want that sort of challenge at least have options for content of that level) but I do at least want content that pushes me to perform at my highest level. When I am tanking and can do 6-7 initial moves and then eat a sandwich while hitting consecrate every time it comes up while the DPS just mass-AoEs everything down, it is nice if I am hungry, but it isn't pushing me to do my job well as a tank. I am sure most competent healers are feeling the same way at this point.
It is kind of like having one classroom with one teacher and splitting the students into 3 sections and saying, "ok kids, we have the remidial english class on the left side of the room, the regular english class in the middle of the room, and the Advanced Placement english class on the right side of the room." Then we have that one teacher trying to teach all three classes at the same time, and everybody (especially the teacher) fails.
I went from the opinion that Naxx was at least somewhat tough to the opinion that Naxx is too easy in 1 week. How did this happen? Did my guild suddenly master new mechanics and figure out complex stuff? Umm... no. We simply told anyone that repeatedly failed in Naxx that they were not going this past week. We stacked the deck with 10 raiders who are all competent and all pay attention. We breezed through the place with one wipe, and that was because of a botched pull on Faerlina where the tank took Faerlina too far from the followers and she never got widow's embrace and wiped us on the first frenzy. Epically stupid of US, and we really shouldn't have had a single wipe the entire run. It was pretty much a joke. Even KT, who I had never killed before, didn't even vaguely come close to wiping us. I don't think anyone got below 50% health that entire fight.
I appreciate people like Bohdi. Some of his posts do come off as incredibly jerky/insulting, but that is usually from extreme frustration I think. The fact is, he is very good at the game, has been playing the game forever, and he cares about the quality of the game and the fact that the quality of current end-game content is pretty ****-poor. He cares that most class mechanics are out of whack compared to the content. In attempting to cater to the masses, Blizzard made it so that if you have half a brain your character is a demi-god, and if you have a full brain, your character IS a god. For a lot of people that is fun for a brief time, but it gets old really quickly.
For example, I just got block-capped on my Prot Paladin (103% total avoidance with HS up) and ran as the tank in a PuG H UK run. The healer was a brand new level 80 Priest in all greens and blues that had never even done UK on regular let alone heroic. The healer was doing more "raid-healing" than "tank-healing" for the entire run until phase-2 of the last boss, at which point they finally had to worry a little bit about healing me. On most of the trash pulls I was taking maybe 2k damage total by the time we got the trash pile down. If I had had an experienced healer with me that had decent gear, I probably could have pulled 3 groups of trash at a time and been fine, and that probably would have been the only way to make an experienced healer run low on mana in the slightest. Whoever made the post that qualified the current heroic content as "really easy, easy, and annoying" as the three different levels of difficulty was right on, and raiding is the same way. You have really easy raids, easy raids, and annoying raids that really aren't all that difficult.
As a relatively "casual" raider, I don't need impossible content (although I hope the people that want that sort of challenge at least have options for content of that level) but I do at least want content that pushes me to perform at my highest level. When I am tanking and can do 6-7 initial moves and then eat a sandwich while hitting consecrate every time it comes up while the DPS just mass-AoEs everything down, it is nice if I am hungry, but it isn't pushing me to do my job well as a tank. I am sure most competent healers are feeling the same way at this point.
/nod
When I say there has never been easier content than Wotlk Naxx, I mean it. And since it is 15 of the 17 new bosses of wotlk it overwhelmingly sours the content.
Classes are still balanced in a way that allows skilled players to get more out of what they have. For example I killed 10 man 3d OS in January with 10 man pieces still on and it took the next guild just over 2 months later in full best in slot gear to down the fight. Rogues poison, hunters, mana regen on healers are things that need to be looked at, since class balance is something that is continually changing.
The balance between what classes are capable of and what the content demands is just so wide that its remedial. Even in comparison to Karazhan, which wasn't hard but where there was a learning curve, gear walls and much more dynamic fights that were extremely well balanced to release gear expectations.
When I say there has never been easier content than Wotlk Naxx, I mean it. And since it is 15 of the 17 new bosses of wotlk it overwhelmingly sours the content.
Classes are still balanced in a way that allows skilled players to get more out of what they have. For example I killed 10 man 3d OS in January with 10 man pieces still on and it took the next guild just over 2 months later in full best in slot gear to down the fight. Rogues poison, hunters, mana regen on healers are things that need to be looked at, since class balance is something that is continually changing.
The balance between what classes are capable of and what the content demands is just so wide that its remedial. Even in comparison to Karazhan, which wasn't hard but where there was a learning curve, gear walls and much more dynamic fights that were extremely well balanced to release gear expectations.
Bode - 100 Holy Paladin - Lightbringer
I wonder (Hopefully some of the more informed players could enlighten me) if part of the problem is the ever existing balance of PVP vs PVE.
Yes – Bliz is trying to get more players into more content.
Yes – Bliz is looking to rebalance PVE – Mana is not the only problem, but it’s the one we’re discussing here…
However – When Bliz tries to do this – we all need to remember that they are operating in an environment where they must always keeps PVP in balance too. I wonder if this concern is causing problems balancing PVE. (I envision it like the stupid restrictions on soldiers – where the government tells them they have to hunt down the enemy, but they must do it while working under rules of engagement that just make zero sense.)
I mean nerfing the Mana for Palys. Ok – PVE says they need that. Well that might kill PVP paly Healers. Let’s remove the recoil from Ret palys – well that might make them OP in PVP…
For a long time, I’ve argued that the game needs two separate systems. I’m not smart enough to tell them how they ought to separate the games, but it seems like a lot of solutions are vetoed by the requirement to keep PVP balanced. (Yes – I know PVP itself is imbalanced now…)
Yes – Bliz is trying to get more players into more content.
Yes – Bliz is looking to rebalance PVE – Mana is not the only problem, but it’s the one we’re discussing here…
However – When Bliz tries to do this – we all need to remember that they are operating in an environment where they must always keeps PVP in balance too. I wonder if this concern is causing problems balancing PVE. (I envision it like the stupid restrictions on soldiers – where the government tells them they have to hunt down the enemy, but they must do it while working under rules of engagement that just make zero sense.)
I mean nerfing the Mana for Palys. Ok – PVE says they need that. Well that might kill PVP paly Healers. Let’s remove the recoil from Ret palys – well that might make them OP in PVP…
For a long time, I’ve argued that the game needs two separate systems. I’m not smart enough to tell them how they ought to separate the games, but it seems like a lot of solutions are vetoed by the requirement to keep PVP balanced. (Yes – I know PVP itself is imbalanced now…)
from mmo-champion:
imagine that.
however, a few other stats got the axe too. so w/e
Edited, Aug 21st 2009 9:32pm by tommyguns
Quote:
Mana/5 sec is gone. Spirit now regenerates mana.
imagine that.
however, a few other stats got the axe too. so w/e
Edited, Aug 21st 2009 9:32pm by tommyguns
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