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Sunday, March 11, 2007
Non sequitur - 11-March-2007
This is an experiment, tell me how you like it. I got a number of small news items and thoughts, which I am going to bundle up in one post. They got no relation to each other, thus the title of "non sequitur", latin for "it does not follow".
WoWinsider reports the first bit of "news" arrived at by using the Armory spying tool: Death & Taxes, one of the major raiding guilds in World of Warcraft, has all paladins spec'd for healing, while the priests are all shadow. Something is wrong with class balance.
Social networking in WoW is all the rage, but some people have come up with a seducingly simple solution. Friendnet is an addon which allows you to share your friends list in WoW. Too bad my friendlist only contains my alts (for faster mailing). To keep contact with friends I'm using guild chat and self-made chat channels for non-guild friends.
Fair Game is a project to promote fair trade products with Machinima movies. Their World of Warcraft clip can be found at YouTube.
MMO Evolution has a How to get into a raiding guild guide. Quote: "Step One: Know the need, and pick your class accordingly". So true, but right now it's hard to say which classes are needed most.
Personally I've been in the world strangest group with my warrior. Besides me as tank, there was a druid, a shaman, and a paladin. And we never started, because, you won't believe it, "we haven't got a healer". All of them, even the pally, were dps spec'd, and nobody wanted to heal. I'm beginning to wonder whether the whole "you can freely decide between 3 talent trees" isn't a mistake. I can fully see why a pally would want to spec dps for leveling up, but where does that leave groups?
- posted by Tobold @ 7:09 AM Permanent Link
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On the issue of freely deciding between talent trees I have to say that after playing Guild Wars for the last six months I have become totally convinced by the free and unrestricted total respecs that GW offers. It used to be different but now you can respec your character freely any time you are in a town. I think it actually leads to more variety in builds because people are prepared to try stuff out and don't just get stuck in a rut. Of course GW balances this ability very well by limiting the number of skills you can carry to eight at a time so there is still plenty of opportunity for creativity in choosing the correct build for any given mission.
You might argue that free respecs ruins the feeling of character immersion and role play. I would counter that it could quite easily be incorporated into game lore by suggesting that a character can learn many skills but can only carry the equipment for a certain number at any one time.
You might argue that free respecs ruins the feeling of character immersion and role play. I would counter that it could quite easily be incorporated into game lore by suggesting that a character can learn many skills but can only carry the equipment for a certain number at any one time.
First you comment about strange class balance, and then you pick on pallies for not speccing for healing? Why not shamands or druids (or priests, you know, the primary healing class) Double standards ftl .
Maybe pallies want to have some fun too instead of being somebody else's healing slave?
Paladin healing should be tied 100% to their melee combat - like Warrior Priest class in WAR, to stop the current nonsense. A plate class standing at the back casting heals. Furthermore, paladin tanking should be fully equal to warrior's (but with different tools). Currently there are weak points (same with druids) that must be fixed. Single-class tanking must be completely phased out!
Maybe pallies want to have some fun too instead of being somebody else's healing slave?
Paladin healing should be tied 100% to their melee combat - like Warrior Priest class in WAR, to stop the current nonsense. A plate class standing at the back casting heals. Furthermore, paladin tanking should be fully equal to warrior's (but with different tools). Currently there are weak points (same with druids) that must be fixed. Single-class tanking must be completely phased out!
# posted by 
: 11/3/07 11:12
: 11/3/07 11:12
On the subject of raiding guilds.
Oddly, there seems to always be a lack of at least 1 DPS class per recruitment post, Either Warlocks or Mages, but often filled quickly.
Aside from that, Everyone always seems to want a Druid, A Shaman/Paladin (and moreso for the "new" opposite faction) and Priests..
So its fairly easy to pick accordingly, watch the realm forums a while before you reroll. Or just pick the class you want to play, theres always a place for you somewhere.
Oddly, there seems to always be a lack of at least 1 DPS class per recruitment post, Either Warlocks or Mages, but often filled quickly.
Aside from that, Everyone always seems to want a Druid, A Shaman/Paladin (and moreso for the "new" opposite faction) and Priests..
So its fairly easy to pick accordingly, watch the realm forums a while before you reroll. Or just pick the class you want to play, theres always a place for you somewhere.
Regarding group set-up, why would the ability to choose talent trees be at fault here?
Either the people in the group are not flexible enough to adapt to the situation or the game mechanics is at fault to not allow that adaptation to be a viable choice - perhaps a bit of both.
Either the people in the group are not flexible enough to adapt to the situation or the game mechanics is at fault to not allow that adaptation to be a viable choice - perhaps a bit of both.
You can freely respec on WoW, it just cost gold to do it.
Most pally builds can offtank well and heal the group as their primary function. Besides the fact they also buff/aura and occasionally help DPS (rare case lol) pallys are a multi-functional class to begin with. The problem lies in the mind of the players as a 5 person PUG is the trifecta of tank/heal/dps and priests/pally are almost always expected to be the "heal" part of that triad, (and rightly so as they simply are the best at it in many ways).
Now gameplay-wise a holy pally really is not a burdon to play. I have tried many other pally setups and always end up respecing back to holy because it feels more like a pally instaed of ie half-azz warrior, half-azz tank, or a generic bufftagalong helper. Holy pallys can DPS very well(most ppl dont realize this, ie judgement of righteousness = 1500 hits every 6 secs if u have enough +spelldmg/int) and they dont go down very fast at all (offtank very well also).
For a heroic instance a holy spec pally is a token piece of the strategy, a more valuable piece in comparison to a single functioned "DPS" or "TANK" a pally can cover more than a single group weakness, people who put alot of time into the game expect pallies to do more than a single role and thats why even PUGS usually give a baleful stare at the paladin for being the healer vs even a druid/priest/shaman.
Most pally builds can offtank well and heal the group as their primary function. Besides the fact they also buff/aura and occasionally help DPS (rare case lol) pallys are a multi-functional class to begin with. The problem lies in the mind of the players as a 5 person PUG is the trifecta of tank/heal/dps and priests/pally are almost always expected to be the "heal" part of that triad, (and rightly so as they simply are the best at it in many ways).
Now gameplay-wise a holy pally really is not a burdon to play. I have tried many other pally setups and always end up respecing back to holy because it feels more like a pally instaed of ie half-azz warrior, half-azz tank, or a generic bufftagalong helper. Holy pallys can DPS very well(most ppl dont realize this, ie judgement of righteousness = 1500 hits every 6 secs if u have enough +spelldmg/int) and they dont go down very fast at all (offtank very well also).
For a heroic instance a holy spec pally is a token piece of the strategy, a more valuable piece in comparison to a single functioned "DPS" or "TANK" a pally can cover more than a single group weakness, people who put alot of time into the game expect pallies to do more than a single role and thats why even PUGS usually give a baleful stare at the paladin for being the healer vs even a druid/priest/shaman.
Tobold, great choice of articles;)
I like the method DnT has chosen to adapt. They've proven it works. It's cool to see that people have figured out alternate ways to spec and play their toons. I played a Druid for awhile(before BC) and at that time there was no leeway in allowing a druid to spec feral. It burned my muffins real good!
Great post and blog, I added you to my list of favs..
I like the method DnT has chosen to adapt. They've proven it works. It's cool to see that people have figured out alternate ways to spec and play their toons. I played a Druid for awhile(before BC) and at that time there was no leeway in allowing a druid to spec feral. It burned my muffins real good!
Great post and blog, I added you to my list of favs..
Lol, the irony to me is that none of them were willing to heal. That strikes me as... unintelligent.
# posted by : 12/3/07 00:37
: 12/3/07 00:37
I have absolutely no sympathy for people who play a class with healing abilities and refuse to heal for a group.
I am specced feral (still leveling, what I do at 70 depends on my guilds needs I guess), but if I get a little Shaman or Paladin backup for Healing I will give my best to heal my group.
Interesting that bit about D&T up there. But well it's the same in our guild and we don't raid.
I am specced feral (still leveling, what I do at 70 depends on my guilds needs I guess), but if I get a little Shaman or Paladin backup for Healing I will give my best to heal my group.
Interesting that bit about D&T up there. But well it's the same in our guild and we don't raid.
Depends what you mean by "heal" - should a shadow priest be allowed to "heal" the group with DPS+VE - or are the narrow minded group going to expect them to bung on a load of +Heal gear and pretend they are holy ?
Refusing to stick VE on a mob as you "don't do healing" would be unintelligent, to politely refuse to be a healbot is just playing the way you want to play. And until such time as someone else is given rights to tell another play what to do, that is their right. Accept the consequences of not getting as much instance work, perhaps.
Refusing to stick VE on a mob as you "don't do healing" would be unintelligent, to politely refuse to be a healbot is just playing the way you want to play. And until such time as someone else is given rights to tell another play what to do, that is their right. Accept the consequences of not getting as much instance work, perhaps.
# posted by : 12/3/07 09:37
: 12/3/07 09:37
I can fully see why a pally would want to spec dps for leveling up, but where does that leave groups?
It leaves groups at a state wich told its players "everyone can solo". This is the downside of the "feel free to"-design.
I have absolutely no sympathy for people who play a class with healing abilities and refuse to heal for a group.
You do know that for every def warrior there are 10 who refuse to tank cause they pew pew?! It's even worse than dps paladins, cause def warriors had/have zero competition while healers have.
Many paladins rolled the class for its original description wich did not mention healbot, it's not the players fault, that this class only has one viable talent tree. Don't like tank/dps paladins? Tell Blizzard to fix those talent trees then.
It leaves groups at a state wich told its players "everyone can solo". This is the downside of the "feel free to"-design.
I have absolutely no sympathy for people who play a class with healing abilities and refuse to heal for a group.
You do know that for every def warrior there are 10 who refuse to tank cause they pew pew?! It's even worse than dps paladins, cause def warriors had/have zero competition while healers have.
Many paladins rolled the class for its original description wich did not mention healbot, it's not the players fault, that this class only has one viable talent tree. Don't like tank/dps paladins? Tell Blizzard to fix those talent trees then.
# posted by : 12/3/07 10:49
: 12/3/07 10:49
Here's a novel idea:
Spec for versatility.
If your class can heal, then put a few points in that tree to increase your HPS. Regardless of your leet DPS, there will be a time that you will be needed/expected to play healbot. Refusing to do so, will cause other players to dislike you for not filling your expected class role.
My main and only character above 30 is a 70 Priest speced: 0 disc/18 holy/43 shadow. I carry both DPS and healing gear at all times, never have difficulty finding groups, and am invited to every guild raid because I can effectively DPS and/or heal as the situation requires.
If you rolled a healing or hybrid class, don't expect to be treated as a pure DPS class.
Spec for versatility.
If your class can heal, then put a few points in that tree to increase your HPS. Regardless of your leet DPS, there will be a time that you will be needed/expected to play healbot. Refusing to do so, will cause other players to dislike you for not filling your expected class role.
My main and only character above 30 is a 70 Priest speced: 0 disc/18 holy/43 shadow. I carry both DPS and healing gear at all times, never have difficulty finding groups, and am invited to every guild raid because I can effectively DPS and/or heal as the situation requires.
If you rolled a healing or hybrid class, don't expect to be treated as a pure DPS class.
# posted by : 12/3/07 13:49
: 12/3/07 13:49
Very narrow-minded players you were dealing with there.
I'm a PvP-oriented Arms warrior. And I would prefer to keep my two-hander out during instance runs. However, that doesnt mean that I cant slap on a one-hander and shield, switch to defensive gear and play a tank when needed.
I'm a PvP-oriented Arms warrior. And I would prefer to keep my two-hander out during instance runs. However, that doesnt mean that I cant slap on a one-hander and shield, switch to defensive gear and play a tank when needed.
I have a hunter alt, and decided to give pugs a try, on slow game hours, and gave use to the LFG system. One of those times I was in queue for ages, and ended up being in a full group where we had a druid, a shammy and 3 dps classes (including myself). The group ended up never setting foot on Ramparts because though the druid mentioned he wouldn't mind tanking or healing, whatever was required (he was feral), the shammy insisted he shouldn't heal. Now, the only guy there that could tank was the only one of the two that volunteered to heal, which was pretty ridiculous. It got to the point where after 30 min of party chat, someone suggested my pet should tank.
I'm all for people playing their characters as they like them, but though I enjoy healing with my main (holy pally), I've never refused off-tanking when needed (even though I don't like it), because in instances you have to learn to do what's required.
It's all a matter of mostly doing what you enjoy but not being narrowminded enough to refuse doing different tasks. (and before you mention it, the reason I did not volunteer taking my pally instead was because it was a PUG. I switch all the time for guild groups when needed)
Sophia the Healadin
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I'm all for people playing their characters as they like them, but though I enjoy healing with my main (holy pally), I've never refused off-tanking when needed (even though I don't like it), because in instances you have to learn to do what's required.
It's all a matter of mostly doing what you enjoy but not being narrowminded enough to refuse doing different tasks. (and before you mention it, the reason I did not volunteer taking my pally instead was because it was a PUG. I switch all the time for guild groups when needed)
Sophia the Healadin
# posted by : 13/3/07 18:19
: 13/3/07 18:19<< Home
