i think you’re comparing MMORPGs to pure RPGs a bit too much
you seem to want the ‘‘freedom’’ of a game like the elder scrolls or something, but that doesnt work in ANY mmo ever made
even hardcore late 90s/early 2000s MMOs like Everquest or Runescape has a ‘‘meta’’, if you dont want to worry about the best covenant or whatever, then don’t, just pick what you want and go about your business
Yes. An ability that can be planned around and increases the effectiveness of another class ability in it’s future use, scaling into execute…
…against a dot, a slightly different dot and an AoE dot.
Also for example as a ret paladin i get to chose between:
Kyrian - aoe judgement, good for aoe… judgement on a 1 minute cd for ST, boring and useless ability.
Venthyr - 4 min cd 30 second static ground aoe, this is going to be wasted half the time on movement fights… blizz could cut it in half duration and cd and it’d be good, but no.
Night Fae - 45 second blessings, 30 sec duration, this was nerfed multiple times and it’s still annoying to use, it also has 2/4 buffs which are useful for the user. Micromanagement is NOT fun, being a buff bot is not fun either, especially if at some point you’ll be require to buff the top dps at your expense
Necrolords - 30 sec cd that when using a ST is going to generate aoe, so i basically have to ST in an AOE fight to get the bonus, clunky and counter intuitive especially since it also costs 1 HP, so it disrupts my gameplay.
TL;DR Blizz failed designing these abilities, they’re all useless or annoying/cumbersome to use. At this point i’ll probably pick the least annoying one… this is good design? rofl
Ok thanks for the info. And as for the covenant cluster F, i really want to go venthyr everything about them i love (yes even the sexy party), but i really like Decimation bolt aswell. Dont get me wrong from all the 4 “meaningfull choices” Maldraxxus was the second best imo aesthetic wise but i just really really wanted to go Vampire, however knowing Blizzard it might end with us going Night Fae (the actual worst imo) out of pure number value. Its not even min/maxing at this point, we are looking at 20-30% performance losses between abilities and not tacking into acount the soulbinds.
with captain maths at the helm its no surprise this will just get doubled down on
hes quite literally THE min/maxer
That’s another point of failure. A lot of the abilities just don’t fit into each specs rotations. For example demo doesn’t have a covenant ability that would fit. All of them feel out of place for demo. They’re just some extra button you press every 40-60 seconds because it would be wasted otherwise.
Forgot to mention, Soul Rot, the NIght Fae warlock ability, for some stupid reason, costs 20% max health to use. 30% with a conduit. All for a dot on a 1 minute CD.
Because they’re set on this stupid mantra of designing for classes and not specs… which is idiotic and harder to balance.
They tried to make it “thematic” and “special” i guess, but their lack of imagination makes them just making it have downsides… i mean really?
Blizzard: We are going to focus more on the classes instead of specs.
Also Blizzard: We didnt meant the class stuff is coming to the classes themselves lol, we meant the borrowed power will be class themed, enjoy your meaningfull choices. Btw keep paying the 15$ a month.
It’s not an idiotic idea, but a system designed for classes in a game that isn’t designed around classes, but rather specs. They had an idea of more class identity, started designing systems with that idea in mind, but forgot to put class over spec first. It’s like deciding to cut off a branch from a tree but forgetting that you’re standing on that branch.
I was kinda excited when they said they’re moving back to class identity, because my idea of my character is that I’m a warlock, not a destruction warlock. But the way they ended up designing covenants resulted in more spec identity than ever before with maybe the exception of artifacts, which were however at least grindable to a state where eventually you’d be able to swap specs seamlessly.
Also Blizzard: we’re going to unprune things for your class, that your spec will rarely if ever use.
Also here are these 3 other useless things that you’ll seldom if ever use.
You will get 1 useful ability though, so be thankful!
And in the case of ret paladins, convert 2 of our passives that we’ve had in BFA to auras, that we have to activate and exclude between to get the benefit instead of having them up 100% by default… “unpruning” at its finest. 
You forgot to mention that they are on a GCD XD.
“Oh, your artifact ability was the very thing that enabled the playstyle the spec was designed for? Don’t worry, it’s now a talent in the same row with another ability that was baseline and that also happens to be crucial for the spec to function.”
So you want RPG aspects which means meaningful choices. Blizzard gives you that in the form of covenants, and yet you say you cannot make this meaningful choice because you want to be part of the META.
Covenants gave us RPG elements where choices actually matter, but WoW is competitive (for those who choose to be) and this becomes conflicting.
You can’t be in favour of RPG elements where choices matter and you are free to choose what you want and also be part of a META, so pick one. You are contradicting yourself.
Find a nice guild or community to play with.
We don’t all play this way. I play alone atm so I can do things at my own pace.
Hey atleast they got to keep theirs in a way.
Also at the start of BfA it took them months to fix the demonoloogy Skull to be able to speak again (even tough Knifu and Arcane mage staff were perfectly able to from the start).
Ah yes… here is this thing you need, you can pick against your other thing that you need. Enjoy having a half-working spec!
This is not how they should design… make the classes function at the basic, having a flavorful and joyful rotation.
Now you add stuff to make it have some oomph, or an interesting twist to the rotation.
Give me an example where a RP/story/identity choice also came with massively gameplay altering consequences, and where one clearly resulted in better, stronger and more interesting gameplay over the others.
Theres barelly any RPG elements in covenants, and how its designed as of now its either meningfull or a choice.
Covenants?
Seriously?