...
...
... just wait! This just in! WoW always has issues on patch day! EVERY GOD DAMN MMORPG TO DATE HAS ISSUES ON PATCH DAY! Welcome to the "real world" and now let us continue with our regular scheduled programming.
There were some significant changes with the patch and I'm not talking about the Shaman/Paladin gear drops.
- Arena System introduced
- Honor System revamped
- The Burning Crusade talents introduced
- Massive UI changes
The Arena system was introduced and subsequently has crashed. The Arena is set for small teams to do battle against each other while competing in a ladder type competition among all players within your Battle Group. Currently the Arena is set up for practice matches only. It requires a team of all level 70's before you can advance in the ladder. So the Arena system can't really be judged until after The Burning Crusade is launched.
The other part of the PvP changes comes in the form of a new, but not really new Honor System. Honor decay is gone and Battleground faction grinding has been removed. In their place has come a static Honor system where you never lose points and a Battleground reward system built around completing goals. For example to earn the top rewards for Alterac Valley you may be required to win 30 matches and turn in the tokens to an NPC. The current feedback is that it is much easier than grinding faction which is a great change for casual gamers.
The main complaint with the PvP changes has come from the hardcore rank grinders who were pushing for rank 14 prior to the 2.0 patch. They feel cheated because all their hard work was washed away when Blizzard reset honor back to ZERO. The only thing I have to say to these idiots is; "You got what you deserved. Blizzard announced the changes in plenty of time for you to stop, but you continued to grind. Someday you will wake up and realize what a waste your life has been and maybe then you will go out and do something with it." Yes, that is exactly what I would say and I believe I've just said it.
The Burning Crusade Talents
Every class has had their talent tree updated in preparation for The Burning Crusade and level 70. Of course this has introduced a plethora of bugs and outright overpowered classes. Warlocks kill with a single DOT spell. Paladins can actually do damage now (like they couldn't before???). Pretty much a case can be made for any class being overpowered at this very moment.
This isn't shocking considering how much the game will change when The Burning Crusade hits and people start to reach level 70. WoW wasn't exactly balanced to begin with. In a classes most basic form without tweaked talent sets and green gear there may be balance, but when epics and uber talent templates get involved it is all tossed out the window. I will leave this topic here because I believe it will take a month for the community to adjust to these changes and then it is a mute point because The Burning Crusade will be ready for launch.
Massive UI Changes
With the 2.0.1 patch there has been upgrade to the LUA scripting laguage used for the WoW UI and this takes me to my title for this post. WoW players can't play the game without their easy mode UI add-ons. Decursive, ClickHeal, CTRaidAssist, and on and on and on are now completely broken and most likely won't be fixed. Most of these gamers will scream at Blizzard for the lack of a decent UI to play the game. I will blame the players for letting UI mods dominate their play style.
The cry is heard the loudest in the raiding community. Their precious raid schedules are screwed because easy bosses that they used to defeat in minutes are now wiping their raids without UI mods to hold their hands. I personally applaud Blizzard for finally putting their foot down and forcing people to play their game.
I am happy that it now takes two button presses and manually clicking a target to remove a curse, poison, or disease. I am elated that healers now have to communicate to heal. I am glad that players with skill will now be rewarded with a better experience. I laugh at raiders that suddenly found out that they can't and could never play this game.
This changes the game and I'm glad for it. I have never used anything, but a few minimalistic UI add-ons. A cleaner quest tracker (MonkeyQuest), Auctioneer, and the Census+ mods have been my staples since launch. Everything else has been done through the standard UI. I have never relied on a UI mod to make my class easier to play and I strongly believe I am a better player because of it. I play a Shaman and there is no shortage of UI mods that could of made my life easier.
Conclusion
Let me conclude this with a bold statement. Fuck the whiners. I've whined a good bit in my days and almost always I was told to stuff it. Let me return that advice to the current WoW community. Blizzard has shown a remarkable knack for getting World of Warcraft up and running after a few patch delays just like any other MMORPG out there. The only difference is that Blizzard does it for 6 million users.
You know, I'm with you on that. Having played a few MMOs prior to World of Warcraft, I know how people lean on UI addons to add to their games and then outcry when they break.
ReplyDeleteHaving never played with add-ons myself other than Auctionner and other non-gameplay altering, I've not seen my way of playing changed from the last patch. For now, it's an advantage.
No point in them whining now, they knew this was comming. The only mods I used are UI related - things to clear the clutter of my screen. I had a couple of utility mods like Auctioneer, Mass Email and an auto-make mod for crafting.
ReplyDeleteI declined to use Decursive when I hit the upper 50s because the news was already out that it wouldn't work for BC, so I didn't see any point in getting used to it. People kept trying to push me to use it when I was a bit slow in dispelling - again, no point in doing that when I'd have to learn to be self sufficient eventually.
It's going to be harder for people who've been asleep at the wheel during raids. I don't envy them the transition. Spammin buttons isn't fun for anyone. But they should have been pushing Blizzard to reduce those types of encounters instead of picking up bandaides.
For healers this will suck. And people think it's just as easy to click someone's name, it's not. You can barely see you're screen in a raid. You have mods up, meters and player health bars so it's going to be a pain in their butt to squint thru all those items to find a player that has a specfic icon on their portrait that needs dispelling. It's not picnic, but hey, it's part of the game.
Like I said in the post. These people will blame Blizzard for having a bad UI or bad encounters or whatever.
ReplyDeleteFact is these players have come to rely on a UI mod. That is their fault.
If it turns out that content is too hard without the UI mods then Blizzard can adjust. Currently any creative encounter Blizzard tosses out is modded down to a scripted event played solely within the margins of the UI.
WoW is in a better place the more restrictions are put on the UI mods like Decursive, ClickHeal, or anything that allows you to "just spam buttons".
Finally true gaming skills become important.
ReplyDeleteTake that ass whining bitchies!
How about Shut The Fuck Up Douche Bags Your probably some 12 year old fucktard who couldnt play to begin with. Now get it right by saying your an ass, and felt it nessacery to show everyone who you truly are underneath all the blubber!
ReplyDelete"Loud Fart" Oops did you get any on ya?
welllll whine some more
ReplyDeleteWe can see obviously the person before me is a whiner. Deal with it . Learn to play the game. My guild on alliance had NO issues playing post patch we raided we kicked butt and so what if our mods broke ..we still know how to play so we did not have issues...so STFU this is the new wow DEAL with it ..the big thing i've not seen put here
ANYONE NOTICE THE LACK OF BOTS!!! MATS ARE FARMABLE AGAIN!!!
(btw my ui mods ...auctioneer to speed up posting auctions ...and thats it. 60 warroir and 60 lock, and a 60 pally.
I'll be honest my guild is having a hard time at the moment, been wiping on primary encounters of BWL when prior to the patch we had just got the place on weekly farm, and we were just making inroads into aq 40, since patch i must say that healing has been on the low side (not just to blame the healers though) but i imagine we'll pick up, l2play and move on - thats the nature of WoW, so whilst wiping now we are only getting better at the game! btw I use lots of mods (though most for info since i'm a hunter), ct-raid assist, ktm threatmeter, bigwigs / la vendetta etc... Using mods etc isn't cheating, if it had been Blizz would have slapped us with EULA violations, and despite comments saying that they allowed people to autopilot encounters then why is it that only a small % of any server has bwl / mc on farm...
ReplyDeleteI'm not whining, indeed i'm looking forward to the challenges involved as a result of the patch!
happy hunting!
You may not be whining, but I bet half or more of your guild is bitching up a storm.
ReplyDeleteIMHO Blizzard should never have rewarded guilds such as yours. If you can't play without your hands being held then you shouldn't get rewarded for it.
fair play - you're entitled to your opinion and you may even be right about half my guild, but i know that we'll stay together and get back to where we were before, Blizzard never 'rewarded' our guild anyway, encounters are tough even with mods and i'm sure they'll be somewhat harder now - but i like to think(i would hope) the majority of my guild will be looking forward to the extended challenge and a sense of a new experience in overcoming them.
ReplyDeleteI dont see the need to berate guilds for using mods, but if its really so important to you then thats your issue... incidentally what class and server do you play on heatless?
Tanglefoot - Troll Shaman - Azgalor
ReplyDeleteGo to their message boards and ask about me. Nothing but love.
Also let me clear up my statement about getting rewarded.
ReplyDeleteI am a fan of the open UI that Blizzard has created. It makes the game far more enjoyable because there really is a UI mod for everyone. That builds a sub-community all in itself which is great for a game that really lacks a community building aspect.
In a game like EVE Online you get rewarded by knowing how to use the UI. In EVE the UI is your first and biggest learning curve to master. The better you are at the UI the better that you will be at the game. The game rewards you by letting you get out of sticky situations with your ship still intact.
In WoW the UI has gotten to the point where it has become another game separate of its "parent". A healer never has to interact with the virtual world... they just need to hit buttons and click on UI elements. That splits the healers into two groups... those that use the UI to heal and those that don't. Unfortunately no matter how great you are at healing you will never be as effective as someone who is UI healer. It is just far too easy for them to let the mods make all the important decisions and let them know when it is their turn in the healing line.
Sadly Blizzard started balancing encounters so that these UI mods were required. The only way for these encounters to work is if Blizzard can beat the UI mods... not really the players.
By no means do UI mods equal an automatic win, but they remove almost all need for player skill in operating a character. Any healer with the right UI mods can be plugged into a raid as long as they don't AFK randomly.
That is both good and bad. It is great knowing that an average gamer can step in and be part of a raid because the UI mods will give them a huge step up.
However, it is a slap in my face when these players get rewarded for their time spent. I probably spent the same amount of time playing as they did, but because I decided that I wasn't going to be a UI slave I don't get the same time vs reward quotient. I have to put in more time and effort to get substandard awards.
Just as raiders don't like it when epics are opened up for solo players... solo players don't like it when a raid can drag along 10 people who really don't have any skill, but have the right UI mods and then get great rewards simply because they were there and had DKP or lucky rolls.
I love the fact Blizz has stopped a lot of UI addons. They really did make things too easy. Taking your hand and guiding you rather than you being forced to make the choices.
ReplyDelete