I remember running BWL back in Vanilla on my Druid. We were assigned priests and were to only innervate the priests! I had a macro that would target cast innervate and then after the cooldown send another tell so he knew the innervate was available again. Those were some crazy days. This all reminds me of our first Nefarion kill to. We had a few first timers in the raid and decided to do a dry run (no consumables) so people could get the feel of it. Turns out the dry run ended up being out first kill. It was pretty freaking epic.
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reVerseAttack and Dethrone GodRegistered Userregular
edited April 2010
There was an interview with someone, Kalgan I think, where he said that he played every class to level 10 or 20 and then designed talent trees for all of them based on those few levels of experience with the classes. So, from that perspective some of the crazy-looking talent trees make sense. Balance, for example: back then you ended up meleeing a lot because mana regen back then was shit and spells cost a whole lot more, so it makes sense that they'd get a weapon damage talent and Omen of Clarity activated on melee hits.
There was an interview with someone, Kalgan I think, where he said that he played every class to level 10 or 20 and then designed talent trees for all of them based on those few levels of experience with the classes. So, from that perspective some of the crazy-looking talent trees make sense. Balance, for example: back then you ended up meleeing a lot because mana regen back then was shit and spells cost a whole lot more, so it makes sense that they'd get a weapon damage talent and Omen of Clarity activated on melee hits.
There was an interview with someone, Kalgan I think, where he said that he played every class to level 10 or 20 and then designed talent trees for all of them based on those few levels of experience with the classes. So, from that perspective some of the crazy-looking talent trees make sense. Balance, for example: back then you ended up meleeing a lot because mana regen back then was shit and spells cost a whole lot more, so it makes sense that they'd get a weapon damage talent and Omen of Clarity activated on melee hits.
The thing is, there weren't any talents. The level cap was 15 at the point that he made the trees. I mean, yeah, they were unbalanced, but people keep bringing up that he only played 10 levels of each like there was something else he could have done. He didn't put off content, there was no content to play. They were just making it up as they went.
Now, they should have had content up to 60 before making talents, because that makes sense, but they didn't at that point.
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L Ron HowardThe duckMinnesotaRegistered Userregular
edited April 2010
Was? Still is. He's still completely in charge. I think GC just takes the front while he sits behind the scenes and continues his silly goosery.
Edit:
Langly, he didn't come until halfway through Vanilla. That was when he was made the Lead Class Fucker-upper. He was still ruining UO in the development and beginning of WoW before he was fired/quit...
Was? Still is. He's still completely in charge. I think GC just takes the front while he sits behind the scenes and continues his silly goosery.
Edit:
Langly, he didn't come until halfway through Vanilla. That was when he was made the Lead Class Fucker-upper. He was still ruining UO in the development and beginning of WoW before he was fired/quit...
I can't read the interview right now, but what I remember reading is "At the time the level cap was fifteen. I remember playing through all the classes till about 10, and then thinking of cool shit for them to do."
And if he wasn't there in the beginning, why is he associated with the talent system at the beginning?
Was? Still is. He's still completely in charge. I think GC just takes the front while he sits behind the scenes and continues his silly goosery.
Edit:
Langly, he didn't come until halfway through Vanilla. That was when he was made the Lead Class Fucker-upper. He was still ruining UO in the development and beginning of WoW before he was fired/quit...
I can't read the interview right now, but what I remember reading is "At the time the level cap was fifteen. I remember playing through all the classes till about 10, and then thinking of cool shit for them to do."
And if he wasn't there in the beginning, why is he associated with the talent system at the beginning?
Because that's what he was tasked to do once he got onboard.
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L Ron HowardThe duckMinnesotaRegistered Userregular
edited April 2010
I don't have access to wowwiki, seeing as how it's 'fun' and all, but IIRC, the talent system, as it was at launch, was developed by someone else, mostly because they couldn't get other systems to work very well. So they added the Diablo-esque talent system that is in place. The original designer threw a bunch of things together, and left it as that. Then Kalgan came along and started playing around with it. I don't have access to any time frames of this, but I'm positive he wasn't employed by Blizzard at launch.
Ya, I can't remember exactly but my understanding was early in the beta talents worked much like EQ's AA where you got points and then invested them in a large list of things to improve. Even weapon skills and such. Fairly late in the process (for Blizzard anyway who takes two years to make sure tree is properly placed) they scrapped that went with the talents we have now.
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GrobianWhat's on sale?Pliers!Registered Userregular
Ya, I can't remember exactly but my understanding was early in the beta talents worked much like EQ's AA where you got points and then invested them in a large list of things to improve. Even weapon skills and such. Fairly late in the process (for Blizzard anyway who takes two years to make sure tree is properly placed) they scrapped that went with the talents we have now.
Those weren't talents. That was the Skill system. (I THINK that's what it was called)
You got Skill Points for every X number of experience you earned and even got them after max level. And skill points went to all sorts of stuff like Weapons, Stats and Professions. (There were also no Profession restrictions. You could EVENTUALLY learn them all, it just took alot of skill point grinding)
But that wasn't the Talent system they had planned. That was more like Stat Points in D2 (I think that's what they are called. THe ones you improve Str, Agi, etc with) and the Talent System was always meant to be like the D2 Skill Trees.
They eventually scrapped the whole Skill System idea because it didn't really work that well and generally people just dumped everything into 1 stat. So they instead went with the current system where your Base Stats (which back then remember were REALLY powerful since gear didn't have many stats on it) are increased by a predetermined amount every level.
This caused alot of howls of no customization and blah blah blah. But they said that's what the Talent System was for.
Ok, yeah. So it was a mashup in my head. He came in when the level cap was 15, then once there were spells and things up to 60 he came in and made the talents. I got the time frame of those two things mixed up. I thought he came in, and just bam was going to work on talents at the start.
Wow, can you imagine how terrible some pugs would be if they had to spend their own stat points?
(That's without taking into account how annoying balancing everything would be when you've got a bunch of different classes with 3 different talent trees and who knows how many viable stat allocations)
"I put all my points in Stam because I'm a tank!" "But now you have no Str and hit like a wet noodle and generate no threat." "I AM TANK HAVE HIGH HEALTH"
I kind of liked that aspect of Diablo 2. My character truly felt like my own and not just another necromancer. Of course, my necromancer was weird and was pure melee. >.>
If this happened in WoW, we'd have battle mages. Mages decked out in str and spellpower. Battle mages would be kind of cool now that I think about it.
That only works if you have abilities to support your crazy stat distribution. What good is a battle mage if you still end up sitting in the back going pew pew becauee all you have are ranged abilties and no way to soak up any damage in the front lines?
All I said was that a melee caster would be kickass. Like the battle mages in Strat. Like, "I'm gonna hit you with this sword and then throw a fireball at your face point blank."
Yeah, totally kickass.
Edit: What I was saying is, if players were allowed to pick where their stats go, I bet we'd see mages with str. People can be THAT stupid.
All I said was that a melee caster would be kickass. Like the battle mages in Strat. Like, "I'm gonna hit you with this sword and then throw a fireball at your face point blank."
Yeah, totally kickass.
This is what Enhancement Shaman do, basically. Just with lightning bolts instead of fireballs.
edit: And heck, in Cata when Lava Burst is added to Maelstrom, they'll be doing it with humongous balls of lava.
Didn't Blizz at one point or the other say that Runemaster was "on the list" of hero classes but they were not sure hot to make it fresh and unique? I also want to say, but this is much more hazy, that at one point in time Runemaster was going to be the class in Wotlk but did not fit the theme of the xpac so DK was born from that. It kind of makes sense when you look at their resource system.
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reVerseAttack and Dethrone GodRegistered Userregular
edited April 2010
My personal pick for a new class would be something akin to Spellbreaker: a melee DPS "caster" with sword n' board.
Never gonna happen, but playing a class like that would be so great.
Didn't Blizz at one point or the other say that Runemaster was "on the list" of hero classes but they were not sure hot to make it fresh and unique? I also want to say, but this is much more hazy, that at one point in time Runemaster was going to be the class in Wotlk but did not fit the theme of the xpac so DK was born from that. It kind of makes sense when you look at their resource system.
Didn't Blizz at one point or the other say that Runemaster was "on the list" of hero classes but they were not sure hot to make it fresh and unique? I also want to say, but this is much more hazy, that at one point in time Runemaster was going to be the class in Wotlk but did not fit the theme of the xpac so DK was born from that. It kind of makes sense when you look at their resource system.
But there's runemasters all over northrend...
Right. Like I said, I am a little more hazy on that one. In fact I may be completely making this up but part of me wants to believe that I read somewhere that Blizz wanted to do Runemaster first. I don't know though.
Back to adding new classes I imagine at this point it's going to be tough to for them to inroduce something new that does not feel like a rehash of one of the current classes. I mean all of your basic archetypes are covered so it comes down to making another hybrid and as it stands now they struggle to find good balance within the current hybrids.
That's true. I imagine a Runemaster working off of combo points that makes his offensive spells more powerful. So it's really just a rogue, but with magic.
Pretty sure it's speculating. I think with the two new races, plus the new race class combinations including opening up previously restricted classes like druids, shamans (Alliance), and paladins (Horde) are going to be enough to keep people busy.
That and the fact that all of the current classes are getting a workover.
Didn't Blizz at one point or the other say that Runemaster was "on the list" of hero classes but they were not sure hot to make it fresh and unique? I also want to say, but this is much more hazy, that at one point in time Runemaster was going to be the class in Wotlk but did not fit the theme of the xpac so DK was born from that. It kind of makes sense when you look at their resource system.
I believe I remember it that they were making both the Runemaster and Necromancer but that they eventually combined them because they didn't have a unique playstyle for the Necromancer in mind.
Hence the blood, plague, frost, death runes, runic power, and runeforging.
*edit
Reading some of the previews for the Death Knight it seems to support this: You would actually carve your runes onto your weapon and you would have those resources. You could carve three frost runes, and three blood runes or two, two, like we have now, or four and two, or all frost etc. etc.
After the debacle that was the Death Knight class right after launch I would guess that Blizzard isn't looking at releasing another hero class for a while. A long while.
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
edited April 2010
For sure, I just wanted to clarify. Because I know Blizzard made it a point to say "no new class" for Cata.
If we do get another class at some point, it will likely be a caster or healer. I doubt we'll get another melee class, as the first hero class was melee.
Unfortunately, I can't think of any sort of niche role off the top of my head a new class could fill. It would simply have to be a new twist on a pure role, like DK is, or would have to be some kind of whacky hybrid.
After the debacle that was the Death Knight class right after launch I would guess that Blizzard isn't looking at releasing another hero class for a while. A long while.
I wouldn't call DK a debacle. It's hard to define a role for a new class in to a system with 9 pretty tight classes, and then keep that class balanced. Plus I think it was obvious from the start they were going to err on the side of the DK being strong at WoTLK release, so it was a draw for people to play them, and to show off "Hey, look how awesome our new Hero class is".
Posts
Haha, that prot tree is great. Oldschool Reckoning and Repentence in the same tree.
"Hold still, you aren't going to like this"
Kalgan was a fuckmuppet of the largest caliber.
The thing is, there weren't any talents. The level cap was 15 at the point that he made the trees. I mean, yeah, they were unbalanced, but people keep bringing up that he only played 10 levels of each like there was something else he could have done. He didn't put off content, there was no content to play. They were just making it up as they went.
Now, they should have had content up to 60 before making talents, because that makes sense, but they didn't at that point.
Edit:
Langly, he didn't come until halfway through Vanilla. That was when he was made the Lead Class Fucker-upper. He was still ruining UO in the development and beginning of WoW before he was fired/quit...
But that could be because he's from UO.
I can't read the interview right now, but what I remember reading is "At the time the level cap was fifteen. I remember playing through all the classes till about 10, and then thinking of cool shit for them to do."
And if he wasn't there in the beginning, why is he associated with the talent system at the beginning?
Hey. I'm from UO too...
...oh wait.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
Because that's what he was tasked to do once he got onboard.
Those weren't talents. That was the Skill system. (I THINK that's what it was called)
You got Skill Points for every X number of experience you earned and even got them after max level. And skill points went to all sorts of stuff like Weapons, Stats and Professions. (There were also no Profession restrictions. You could EVENTUALLY learn them all, it just took alot of skill point grinding)
But that wasn't the Talent system they had planned. That was more like Stat Points in D2 (I think that's what they are called. THe ones you improve Str, Agi, etc with) and the Talent System was always meant to be like the D2 Skill Trees.
They eventually scrapped the whole Skill System idea because it didn't really work that well and generally people just dumped everything into 1 stat. So they instead went with the current system where your Base Stats (which back then remember were REALLY powerful since gear didn't have many stats on it) are increased by a predetermined amount every level.
This caused alot of howls of no customization and blah blah blah. But they said that's what the Talent System was for.
(That's without taking into account how annoying balancing everything would be when you've got a bunch of different classes with 3 different talent trees and who knows how many viable stat allocations)
Mmmmm...agility...
If this happened in WoW, we'd have battle mages. Mages decked out in str and spellpower. Battle mages would be kind of cool now that I think about it.
Yeah, totally kickass.
Edit: What I was saying is, if players were allowed to pick where their stats go, I bet we'd see mages with str. People can be THAT stupid.
This is what Enhancement Shaman do, basically. Just with lightning bolts instead of fireballs.
edit: And heck, in Cata when Lava Burst is added to Maelstrom, they'll be doing it with humongous balls of lava.
Never gonna happen, but playing a class like that would be so great.
But there's runemasters all over northrend...
Right. Like I said, I am a little more hazy on that one. In fact I may be completely making this up but part of me wants to believe that I read somewhere that Blizz wanted to do Runemaster first. I don't know though.
Back to adding new classes I imagine at this point it's going to be tough to for them to inroduce something new that does not feel like a rehash of one of the current classes. I mean all of your basic archetypes are covered so it comes down to making another hybrid and as it stands now they struggle to find good balance within the current hybrids.
That and the fact that all of the current classes are getting a workover.
I believe I remember it that they were making both the Runemaster and Necromancer but that they eventually combined them because they didn't have a unique playstyle for the Necromancer in mind.
Hence the blood, plague, frost, death runes, runic power, and runeforging.
*edit
Reading some of the previews for the Death Knight it seems to support this: You would actually carve your runes onto your weapon and you would have those resources. You could carve three frost runes, and three blood runes or two, two, like we have now, or four and two, or all frost etc. etc.
If we do get another class at some point, it will likely be a caster or healer. I doubt we'll get another melee class, as the first hero class was melee.
Unfortunately, I can't think of any sort of niche role off the top of my head a new class could fill. It would simply have to be a new twist on a pure role, like DK is, or would have to be some kind of whacky hybrid.
I wouldn't call DK a debacle. It's hard to define a role for a new class in to a system with 9 pretty tight classes, and then keep that class balanced. Plus I think it was obvious from the start they were going to err on the side of the DK being strong at WoTLK release, so it was a draw for people to play them, and to show off "Hey, look how awesome our new Hero class is".