I’ve prepared a document on the topic. This is the clearest way I can show the imbalance. Despite having access to all this data and more the developers show no real effort to make changes (to do their jobs). The strong specs keep getting stronger, while the weak ones remain where they are. Of course, there should be some differences between classes, but if one spec is doing 30% more DPS than another, that’s just absurd.
On top of that, many of the specs we consider “F-tier” are riddled with bugs. Since they’re rarely played, the devs don’t seem to care. If you’re playing an S-tier spec, losing 3–5% DPS isn’t a big deal, because you’re already dealing 15–20% more damage than the specs you’re competing with for a party slot. But if you’re playing an F-tier spec, a 3–5% DPS loss is huge. It’s like trying to squeeze a lot out of very little.
There are also plenty of absurd differences between specs when it comes to tankiness and defensive tools. For example, try doing a +19 PSF without an Unholy DK, i’d love to see what happens on the second boss. People won’t even go into +16s without a DK these days. Around 85% of high keys are done with the same comp.
Now I learn my Arcane Mager is the best class in the World of War Craft , a delight , and I mention , if they are kicking my in the dungeon because I have died some times , and I have brought the tanker extra creatures , and I have taken an short 4-10 minute break for the restroom, and they have removed me? Now I learn this is an error as they are removing the BESTclass ! Their LOSS!
Blizz actually has a lot more data than you. On top of that the data you are representing are not indicative of overall balance in the least.
Representation in the highest keys will NEVER be balanced:
There are a FEW teams that are pushing the highest keys, and most of them copy each other to optimize almost everything.
Due to that optimization and work that goes into the push, the price to actually “switch” a comp is TOO BIG (having to switch tactics and go back few levels, relearn the specs/find new players, get gear, etc).
For teams to decide it is worth to switch comp, a new comp must be CLEARLY superior. That means that a new meta will form in the spawn of few weeks.
DPS in the highest keys is not indicative of how a spec performs:
In a dungeon while you need all different kind of damage profiles (burst, sustained, aoe, funnel, ST), certain kind of profiles translate to WAY HIGHER overall dps.
In push keys overall dps is not the most relevant metric, since what matters is time saved from a key (example of unholy doing 20-30k burst in aoe, but only killing adds faster that were gonna die anyway, and arcane doing 4-5k st that actually kills a 3 min boss in 1 min less, guess what is gonna translate to more overall).
WoW is not a moba game:
While balance may be way closer, most players will stick to their preferred spec due to familiarity, gearing effort, and time investment which makes switching mains way harder.
This creates a scenario where you expect that the “meta” will be as fluid as mobas, where statistics change every 2 weeks, but because the cost of changing is so great in wow, you do not see that expect when big changes are done (patches).
So yeah, while good job on getting the statistics into a spreadsheet, blizz has way too many things that they are looking for, and way different of a vision for the game than what you expect.
Some of the things you said are true, but others are quite wrong.
We know that Blizzard has a lot of data, we also know they don’t know what to do with it. It’s very clear that the aura buffs or small 10% skill buffs they apply every 2–3 weeks are just to give people false hope. They’re baiting us, nothing more.
The main issue isn’t about whether to change a comp or not, real problem is the absurd differences between specs. As I already mentioned, there should be a meta, but the gap shouldn’t be this huge. One spec shouldn’t be at 100 while another is at 50!
In high keys, one of the most important things is priority and single target damage. If you want, I can prepare a file with logs on that but none of the lowest-tier specs are S tier in this regard. At best, they barely make it from F to D tier.
Also, this level of imbalance clearly has nothing to do with whether the game is a MOBA or not. If you know how to read logs, just go to Warcraftlogs and carefully look at the overall, priority, and single target damage numbers.
They are not, they are balancing so that they bring the bot specs closer to the top without switching the balance too much, and they even fail at that.
For example fire mage was the meta at the start of the season and arcane kept getting 3% and 6% nerfs here and there, was that a bait?
Good, and now do that to the 12-15 range.
Blizzard is not balancing around the top keys, because the data at that level is just too unreliable. Tactics, comps, player skill, etc play too big a factor and they have too small of sample size.
They are balancing around 12-15s where almost all the specs have representation and their sample size is actually big enough.
From the points you brought up, the one thing I will agree is defensive balance. Blizzard still sticks to the rule that some specs have the identity of being more “defensive” (mage, lock, dk), while others have a fantasy of being more “glass canon” (hunter, druid, shaman, and without that translating to any other advantage). Sure the gap is not big in most keys, but it will impact the high end meta.
TLDR the game is impossible to balance and always will be unless they delete all the classes and just make one class with one spec you can play with no talent variation.
Because the truth is, you can play UDK. You can play meta, you have access to it. But you choose not to. If you care so much, play UDK. The meta will always exist.
Arcane Mage wasn’t as bad as people claimed at the start. It was at least a B tier spec. And even if it had been weak, Mage class overall remained meta, just like in every expansion and every season. Maybe it’s because one of the developers mains Mage, nobody really knows yet.
The +12 to +15 key range is far from what I’m talking about. That’s casual content to me. You can literally just move with W, A, S, D and use Hekili to easily time +16 keys. With the next reset’s item level boost and Dinars, even +18s will be easy.
There are plenty of people like me who want to push the highest M+ keys with the spec they enjoy. Most just don’t bother because they don’t want to deal with the struggle. When I compare dungeon sims between my Unholy DK and Survival Hunter, the 2 million damage gap represents major negligence.
That’s a you problem mate. You understand that +16s and +17s are title cutoff range right? That’s literally 0.1% of the population. Ofc and blizzard is not balancing for that percentage.
At that level having a team is way more important than the spec you play. You legit have the whole chinese meta slavers, and some random teams that have players like squishvegan and ellesmere that are pushing top keys with off meta.
It literally CAN be done, you just need friends that also wanna do the same thing.
But blizzard cannot balance for that specific key range, because the only way to do that is just change the meta, so that your spec becomes meta, and then some other spec cries.
The top keys with how it works with the chinese, it is that the winner takes all, you cannot have a diverse field. They are so hyperfocused in coming up with new strats, that even if one group comes that is 0,1% better in timing the higher keys, the top teams instantly will change, without impacting the off meta teams at all.
I’ve been explaining from the beginning how absurd this is. Why do I have to play the meta just to get the 0.1% title? Sure, there’s an achievement for it, but if you’re playing Survival Hunter, Shadow Priest, or Affliction Warlock, you simply can’t get it or you become one of the very few players, most of whom are people who bought a title boost.
If those are the specs you enjoy, why would you want to grind it out without enjoying the game? Not everyone wants to play DK, Mage, or Druid.
Getting the top 0.1% title isn’t even that hard, it just requires inhuman patience. If you don’t have a dedicated team and your spec isn’t meta, you’re already being gatekept from high keys. And that’s because one spec is doing 6 million overall, while another barely hits 3.5 million. I’ve been playing since Legion, and I know for a fact that this is something Blizzard can fix. We’ve had much more balanced seasons in the past, so clearly they’re capable of it they’re just choosing not to.
I’ve been saying this from the beginning, there should be a meta, there always will be. But the fact that the gap is this wide is just ridiculous. The difference between a DK and a Survival Hunter or Shadow Priest is nearly half. If that gap were 15% instead of something like 40%, we might actually have a chance to close the gap through skill. That would also allow people to make different choices when pushing keys in pug’s.
There have always been metas. Are you new to the game, or have you never played a season to realize this?
On the other hand, yes, the meta should change more often, because it’s often mage/boyfriend… in meta compositions.
There are classes, for example, like Monk Tank, that have never been meta in high-key.
You can choose one of the above. You cannot expect other players that are also trying to be in the top 0.1% to take something they do not want, just to “trust you”. You either get a team, get better, or play meta in order to pug.
It is a title for the top 0.1% of players -.-, it is as hard as the competition is.
You have to go all the way back to DF S1 to have more diverse field. Every single season from there on had less diversity than now.
Last time was BFA S3.
At the moment it is pretty ok to change every 2 months with the patch. Any faster than this and it would actually hurt the game. The time to gear up a character, especially at the start, takes enough that if you change the meta faster then you risk losing more players.
What I’m defending concerns 100% of the player base. I support the existence of a meta, but I’m saying the performance gap between specs should be 10–15% max, not 40%. That way, people can play the specs they enjoy and still have fun while pushing for the title.
The same thing applies to players who just do weekly keys, why should their enjoyment be limited because they’re doing less damage with an F tier spec they actually enjoy playing? Please understand the difference here.
No, it really does not. Thats just a blatantly stupid statement.
A boomy is relatively bad at weekly keys (and a weekly is an 8 for a decent amount of people) yet it rocks at title range keys. Yet you somehow think 28 specs should magically be even at the spot where 1 in 1000 people participate. I don’t even have words for this kind of stupidity.
You’re missing the point. I’ve already explained everything very clearly above.
The top 0.1% title is actually very easy to get if you play meta and are patient. I still don’t think you understand what I’m saying. Why does there need to be such a huge gap between specs? F tier spec shouldn’t be doing only 3.5m DPS while an S tier spec does 6m. That gap is way too big, F-tier spec should be able to do at least 5-5.3m. That way, people can push for the title with the spec they actually enjoy playing. A 1 million DPS difference can be defined by player skill. This isn’t hard to understand.
Last season had the worst balance I’ve ever seen, and there isn’t much difference now. We’re headed down the same path.
Some past seasons actually had dps gaps much closer than what we’re seeing now. Maybe not exactly as small as I suggested, but definitely more balanced. This proves that the developers can get it right when they want to. I’m genuinely surprised you’re having a hard time understanding that.
If seen classes complain about inbalance when they aren’t even fully utilizing their kit, its hilarious but yeah still they could do a much better job, these gaps are way to big when they should be much smaller.
Why they so afraid of buffing demo warlock while at it as well, and hanging onto designs that most players do not even understand, like the concept of aoe dps that is target capped by 5 but can do big dps faster then some non capped aoe dps that can do aoe dps with slow ramp up time but do more ? it simply does not work, let alone that anyone understands, so why even bother.
I am not getting invited for my summons, why should i put up a summon stone, when there is literally one at the entrance, maybe move it inside, not like i will ever get invited just fur a summon, just take a look at dps tier list and it says enough about what players think.
Oh your not S tier ? decline, oh you did not time a +10 yet ? decline, oh you did not time 80+ +10 for the +10 you signed up for decline.
Whats funny is people prefer S tier while most B tier at avg will outperform a meta class, because usually these players do not understand the class and switched to meta class.
the real meta is bringing the player not the class except for few classes, that are in such bad position they really need big bandaid to be viable.
For a lot of people, the weekly key is +10, and for those who dislike the affix, it’s +12. If you genuinely believe that Boomie is bad in weekly keys, then I won’t continue this discussion with you. I honestly think you don’t understand the game.
I suggest you take a look at the logs. In every +10 key’s top 15 logs, you can see at least one Boomie. And I highly doubt people are really pushing their DPS in weekly keys. When I’m running keys on my Unholy DK, I’m literally watching a tv show on the side and when I check the DPS, even when Blood is Life doesn’t proc, I’m still doing twice as much damage as the second guy.
Shadow is completely unbalanced after nerfed and nobody invite shadow priest when you are trying to find +13 group for 3k rio. It is mission impossible!
Yet another Stockholm syndrom victim defending blizzard, being aggressive to someone who wants to make the game better, but not understanding it because of lack of critical thinking.
What is the reason you dont want blizzard to do their job? Its not rocket science to check data to see that some specs are clearly overpowered and some are underperforming by a lot and try to bring them closer. Not even talking about regular meta shaking to keep the game alive and not boring.
These 99.9% of people also depend on meta, because you will simply be invited less frequently to a key if party leader wont see your spec on first page of raider io. So balancing for high keys literally has direct impact on lower keys. Its not only about actual power, its about peoples perception too.
There are a lot of people who are not 0.1% but still push their keys, maybe around 10%, and feel like they are dragging their team down by not playing udk or mage or balance druid. Should we also ignore them?
And also talking about 99.9%. All of balance tunings this patch were based on data from mythic raid which is also played by low % of all players. Why nobody cries how it impacts normal and heroic raiding then? Maybe balance tunings are good after all?