A critical analysis of the impact of Dual Spec in World of Warcraft

WoW Classic WoW Classic General Discussion
21

Have you played classic in the last 1-2 years?
It’s metagamed to death. Things like this will catch on weeks after they release dual spec.
There are also a massive amount of mages and to reference my previous argument - why should I invite a gimped mage to my run?

This change affects casual players more than hardcore players. I have no issue adapting to the gameplay, like I did in SOD, but why should it exist in the first place in a VANILLA server? It goes against what people voted dual spec in for - which is to make healers/pvp specs more accessible.

2 Likes
22

Oh really, but when fire mages had to pay 50G several times to play MC with friends it wasn’t detrimental and against the essence? Of course this wasn’t part of your “critical analysis of the impact of dual spec”.

People like you are the worst when it’s not about themselves.

23

Then the problem lies with you, not with the Dual Spec QoL.
What some people fail to understand is that Blizzard often makes bad decisions, but it’s always the community that runs the game into the ground.
RMT would not exist if people didn’t buy in the first place. Dual Spec wouldn’t be an issue, and everyone could have a PvE and a PvP spec if they wanted, if not for the kind of sweatlord attitude you’re showing right now.

I can’t wait to see the LFG chat in a few weeks asking for mages with opti fire AND frost spec on a MC pug.

24

I do not agree with the part that says anyone would be forced to maintain 2 specs. It simply doesn’t sound realistic for vast majority of the guilds.

As someone who likes dual spec, I kinda can see that many Classic enjoyers think that being locked to a spec means you are making an impactful RPG-like choice that is not simple to just wipe out without paying harshly (up to 50 gold per respec).

…But same time, I’ll likely be playing a healer character this time around, and having to cast baseline spells without any spellpower equivalent (or talents!) because healing gear does not yield any power to damage spells…That sure is a sacrifice, but I don’t save time or sanity if my fellow players merely pay their respects for my choice. I did level a holy priest in a healer spec around 2019 from 1 to 60 though, so I’ve done it once…But come on, druid healers do not use wands :frowning:

25

Your argument is coming from a place that simply doesn’t exist.
‘RMT would not exist if…’
Yes, but it does. And we can’t do anything about it. The community can and will metagame this aspect if we don’t stop it.
This is the same exact deluded viewpoint as the ‘GDKP is fine as long as nobody is goldbuying!!1’ which simply doesn’t work in 2024 meta classic.

Nobody is going to be advertising for mages with a dual spec. Any mc pug early on will get at least 20-30 mages signing. An optimal raid will take 5-6 and pugs, as seen on SOD, are the ones who attempt to minmax the most for least chance of failure. Therefore, pug leaders have the right to choose the ones that are willing to dual spec for better dps.

This isn’t even remotely a sign of sweatlord attitude - people will always just pick the best options when hosting pugs, the same way that nobody takes a ret over a rogue or warr in 2019 classic. There are more mages than pugs that exist, and guess what, the mages that choose to spec for more damage will get invites over those that dont.

26

What about some of us who need a PvP spec?

you are on Firemaw, and you don’t think about PvP???

what a shame, @fakePvPersFromPvPservers

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27

Classic was never vanilla to begin with.

28

there’s no such thing as unique talent builds, everyone opens up wowhead and copy.

translation: i’m bad at pvp and want to attack players in pve spec.

you fail to realize that retail does not equal bad.

29

They fail to understand dual spec is not even in retail.

2 Likes
30

In my opinion it’ll enhance the experience.

I’ve mained healer for so many years. But in vanilla and TBC I was dps. I’ve never enjoyed pvp. I played classic for a while to experience the raids as a healer. But my it was pure sh-it to rely on a group for every friggin thing!

As dual specs won’t be a thing from the start, I don’t know of I’ll make it to 60 this time either. Probably/hopefully I can if I stick to a dps spec, then respec when I’ve got to max lvl…

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31

Utter nonsense.

No mage specs fire during MC and BWL and it’s not because they have or don’t have dual spec. It’s because at that stage of the game, with the available gear (before getting full bis) fire is vastly inferior to frost, due to lacking the gear that gives you sufficient hit AND crit.

Once AQ hits, mages go fire and don’t use frost again.

It sounds like you’re the problem, not dual spec or whatever.

Hilarious, caring about specs in MC. Could clear it with everyone in pvp spec / gear and 20 people afk as long as tanks have adequate fire res for a few encounters.

The only thing that’s going to happen thanks to dual spec is that healers and tanks are going to be able to grind/pvp if they so desire without having to pay a 100g fee for that privilege.

https://classic.warcraftlogs.com/character/eu/shazzrah/ultranuke?zone=1006#

This was my mage in the previous iteration and I’d like to see the guild or pug who’d tell me to bring two pve specs, so I can laugh at them.

If anything - and assuming that buffs aren’t reset between respec - there’ll be a couple of healers who will be asked if they can dps on a few encounters that don’t require much healing. Oh, no, someone will be casting mind flay instead of smite on a target dummy! The horror!

2 Likes
32

Ok I’m completely derailing the thread, but is this a thing? I was thinking of rolling mage this time around and leveling as fire for fun. To me the base damage on fire spells seem kinda high compared to frost spells.

Anyways as for dual spec I completely agree with you and disagree with OP. I’m not going to link my logs, but I speedran all through of 2019 classic. There is no way dual PvE spec will become a thing and if it does I’m finding a new guild. Have some self respect guys! Finally we can send a BG or two for fun without having to invest into a respec. It’s just going to increase engagement with the game. Same as chronoboon.

On which boss in MC or BWL would you use a fire spec? AFAIK pretty much all of them have fire resistance if not immune. And do you think stopping to channel a spec change into 0 mana into drinking for a boss encounter is time efficient versus just using the same spec and pulling continuously?

I googled a bit and apparently all MC bosses are resistant if not immune. In BWL you could use fire on Razorgore, Broodlord and Chromaggus. And all non fire elemental trash is ok for fire as well.

Then don’t take. It’s a completely arbitrary requirement, but you do you. And now the 2h warrior in PvP spec can be in PvE spec in your pug without constantly investing gold into it.

33

  1. Fire is only effective with ignites.

  2. Unlike frostbolt (binary spell; meaning it either hits for the full damage or it “misses” (gets resisted)), fire spells can also be partially resisted (meaning that they can hit, but for half the damage or even less). This is made worse by a lot of bosses in MC/BWL either being entirely immune to fire or having fairly high fire resistance. Because of these things, frost is the safe & steady option at low levels of gear - it’s consistent and it works.

  3. Fire becomes better - much better - once you’ve got the hit and crit to roll ignites. That’s simply not possible with MC gear, as you go into BWL. Sure, world buffs help, but they’re just…not enough to keep it going. At that point, you’re probably not even hitcapped because the gear doesn’t allow you to be.
    I mean, you’ve got access to tier1 - arcanist set. 5 out of 8 pieces have neither hit nor crit. Same thing applies for tier2 (netherwind). 5 out of 8 pieces have neither hit nor crit.

  4. Fire is sustainable when you’ve got plenty of crit thanks to Master of Elements (refunding some mana on crit), but for that you need to crit. With MC gear, you’ll crit once in a blue moon and you’ll actually go oom on plenty of fights (during progression) in average guilds (as in, guilds which don’t have 10+ warriors with rank 14 weapons to carry the dps on day 1). Even as frost, on Ragnaros, you struggle to keep up, often using 2-3 gems and mana pots + evo.

Once you’ve got full BWL bis (NOT tier2, but BWL - we’re talking Bracers of Arcane Accuracy, Mish’undare, not t2 helm/bracers; Neltharion’s Tear etc) you can start looking at fire and once you move to fire, you stay there until the end (for AQ and Naxx).

But until the end of BWL, as a mage, you’re going to be frost during progress, it’s not even up for discussion. Once it’s on farm and people have close to full bis gear, sure, some of them might go fire and do close to nothing on half the bosses in there.

I 100% agree with you. You can’t even dual spec as a mage, because before AQ you’re either frost or useless; after AQ, you’re either fire or useless.

Like every anti-dual-spec guy on the forum, he made up an imaginary scenario that’s never going to happen in any half-decent guild. It’s how they operate. “don’t touch my thing (which isn’t theirs) because look, in this impossible scenario, this might happen”.

It’s utter nonsense, like I said and clearly coming from someone who knows nothing about vanilla/classic mages anyway.

I’m sure there’ll be a few tryhards switching between fire and frost just because they can, on the few MC/BWL bosses where that’s even an option, but NOT because a guild will demand it.

Besides, at that stage, even if you DID have the gear for fire, even if you COULD somehow roll ignites, your tank would most likely not have the gear to hold aggro because their MC/BWL is crap too (other than TF).

By the time you’ve got the gear for fire (say, after you have full BWL bis gear), there’ll be no reason for any guild to ask you to have a secondary frost spec. Before that, there’ll be no reason for any guild to ask you to have a fire spec.

As a matter of fact, in FULL BIS BWL and MC gear, your gear grants you 8% crit and 4% hit (5% with ringo, which are for frost only)

Trying to play fire with 4% hit and 8% crit from gear would be hilarious. Sure, Elemental Precision helps with hit (up to +6% more), but that’s still waaaay too low. Sure, you’ve got Critical Mass and Combustion in the fire tree. But you’re still way under hitcap and nowhere near being able to reliably crit - and without that, you can’t get mana back from Master of Elements, nor are you able to keep up ignites.

With DMT buffs, Onyxia head and Songflower, you might be able to roll ignites with 3 other mages in the raid (all in bis gear, all world buffed) - so 4 mages, it’s just maths - but even then, hit chance is way too low and some bosses are still immune.

Besides, nobody’s going to force mages into anything. Their contribution to the raid dps is too low to even matter. With the buff/debuff limit removed, mages are mostly going to be brought to raids because there’s only going t be one druid (faerie fire bot) in a naxx raid and he won’t be able to decurse both sides at Sapphiron. For DPS reasons, look to wars and warlocks (now that they’re going to be able to use corruption and possibly CoA/CoD, if they’re not on CoR/CoW/CoE duty).

34

Death knights also existed since wotlk. They should add DKs too because I dont want to start from level 1 again.

35

Yeah in vanilla for a time rouges scaled from weapon speed and could one shot people, should we bring that back?

36

Do you have any grey matter up there, or is it just in hibernation for the winter?

37

There are many things that detract from immersive experience. For example usage of bank alts. Yes, I could handicap myself and not use them, but basically I am forced because there is so much stuff I need to save.

Yes, Dual Spec has many downsides. But personally I don’t mind it too much.

Of course it makes sense that in pvp we need different spec. But some hardcore guilds won’t allow you to take any talent that isn’t 100% efficient for raiding.

38

Imagine that healers does not have to jump through the fiery hoops just to farm raid consumables now. Oh no we absolutely must not allow this.

Quit this nonsense. Without gdkps you already will be hunting for healers as if they are unicorns but now you want to roll back a feature that would make it less painful.

One would ask if you guys are masochists?

1 Like
39

With removal of debuff limit and dual spec we will have alot more warlocks and they will all be SL in PvP. Most of them will go horde because of racials and not having to deal with WOTF.

In BG’s every paladin will be ret. Every shaman will have a pvp-optimized elemental spec.

Alliance BG’s are going to be more miserable than ever before.

40

unfortunately, that’s true… (unless Blizzard wake up and give alliance shamans)

TBC waiting room