Edited the post to have less words and be more readable, as it was a wall of text. Thank you for your patience in reading all of this.
Edit #2: Someone else on /r/competitivewow did a better job explaining the issue at hand and how big of an issue Covenants and Soulbinds are going to be, here’s the link
My initial concerns about Shadowlands were the Covenant Class Abilities (signature Abilities are fine, but could be an issue as well) and their Soulbinds. Yes it is Alpha, but we know what happened with BFA’s “this is just alpha bro, wait for launch” situation.
here’s the tl;dr for ya’ll:
Covenant Class Abilities and Soulbinds will create situations where:
Ability X is BiS for Specc Y but terrible for Specc Z OR Ability A is BiS for Content B but terrible for Content C.
Not to mention balancing 4 Abilities, just the covenant Abilities alone(not including soulbinds) would require to Balance it for 172 different specc + covenant ability combinations. Not including Legendaries, Content balancing, Soulbinds etc.
They should instead be completely scrapped or shifted towards Thorhgast/Legendary forge so people can decide on their Covenant without limiting themselves for future content.
I don’t want Shadowlands to be a contender for the Top 3 of Worst expansion, fighting for the Top 1 between WoD and BFA.
Legion & BFA were tested thoroughly by Alpha testers and alot of community feedback had been given to Blizz, regarding this new “borrowed power/timegated system tragedy” that blizz is trying to force upon us. They are frustrating, create tension in the community and have been extremely alt unfriendly. This has to stop. I want to play alts again, have my decisions feel meaningful but not punishing.
Some people are even willing to Multibox 4 Characters of the same class, to stay competitive in Shadowlands because of the Covenant Abilities.
Now, in Shadowlands i’m a Warrior and want to pick the Venthyr because they look cool, have awesome characters in there like Kael’Thas for example, their Plate Transmog is wonderful.
I get the Execute enhancing Ability , that is great on Arms and only in Raids + PvP , but is absolutely terrible on Fury and Prot and M+. I want to apply for a M+ run, but lo and behold:
“LF WARRIOR NECROLORD BANNER + X SOULBIND ONLY”
Or i want to play my Frost Mage again, Kyrian Ability is great in my eyes, but is literally terrible in every content but PvP. What do i do now if i want to raid and do m+? Am i now forced to play pvp only ? But i could just swap my specc right? Oh wait a minute… that Ability is absolutely terrible for both Arcane and Fire, what now?
See where i’m getting at? This won’t just affect the hardcore players, this will affect everyone, Altoholics, Casuals, Raiders, World Raiders, PvP’ers, People who like all of those different aspects of the game or those who just focus on 1. There is no meaningful decision to make anymore, as Blizz had advertised Covenants to be.
This will force me as a player, to make a decision that is neither meaningful nor out of my own want. Not to mention balancing 4 Abilities, just the covenant Abilities alone(not including soulbinds) would require to Balance it for 172 different specc + covenant ability combinations.
Balancing is hard and i can’t expect Blizzard to be able to Balance Soulbinds and Abilities for every specc and different content. It would be extremely hard, most likely impossible considering how often Blizzard puts out Balance patches in wow compared to other games.
If we compare this with a BFA experience i had on my Resto shaman:
If i want to compete in PVP, scrap that, JUST TO SURVIVE on my Resto Shaman i’ll need Pack Spirit x3 , Versatile T3 Corruption, X Essences, especially Conflict of Strife R3.
It is pretty much the same thing just different, i will be losing all of that in Shadowlands, which is great and good. But what now?
I have new Covenant Class Abilities, Soulbinds and god knows what else Blizz will come up with that will force me to pick them to compete/survive/have fun.
I’d honestly rather have Covenant Class Abilities and Soulbinds be shifted away from Covenants and instead be tied to Thorghast or the Legendary Forge as that is apparently going to be a major thing for the whole expansion. And thus not have them be a limiting factor for future Content, because i picked the wrong Covenant. Without any negatives that come through community pressure/lfg pressure, competition, conflicting RPG/immersion reasons, etc.
And thus not have been a waste of resources for Blizz, while still keeping their vision for the future but albeit at a more consumer friendly experience. If they were not willing to scrap this alltogether.
Like i wouldn’t mind not having a borrowed power expansion AT ALL and just have Blizz focus on the real issue at hand because they are still neglecting core and fundamental class issues and focusing on borrowed power tragedy again rather than making our classes baseline: fun and cohesive in design. Just look at Feral’s supposed “unpruning” it’s actually a joke. If Feral goes live in Shadowlands like this, then i believe every feral player will be extremely disappointed.
I don’t want Shadowlands to end up as BFA 2.0, but i digress.