i have actively read through every post i could find about this subject so that i could get an idea of what people are thinking out of curiosity, so you cant speak for me in saying what i have and havnt seen/read.
and you might think it only affects the very top end but thats not the case, it affects everyone that actively takes part in both dungeons and raids, or even PvP and PvE content, wether or not they care about it is another point completely, but it literally affects everyone, and my genuine opinion and the same opinion with literally 95% of the people i play with as well as the majority of what i have seen through most forum and reddit posts about it is that it will have an overly negative affect, because it makes the most sense to give the players choice, player agency is something that has been thrown around a lot and is the main reason they are planing on making changes to the mythic dungeon weekly chest, and yet they are going against the exact same philosophy they were talking about by refusing to make such a simple change.
and in all honesty i genuinely believe that them refusing to make the change and give us the choice to use the skills as we see fit is a terrible decision that will lead to a lot of hate and cause people to just automatically assume the expansion is a failure like with BFA and azerite,
im not saying we should be able to swap between the covenants at will, i just think that the abilities we get from them should not be linked to the specific covenants, they should act as another talent row or something similar to that. and i also
considering that you are saying that the game would be better if the choice of players is removed and we cannot change the abilities to fit the situation you are literally telling me that i cant play the game the way that i want to, because thats exactly what this system is doing, its telling me that im not allowed to optimise my character, which is part of playing an RPG, collecting gear and at least having the option to optimise your character is a staple part of RPGs that should not be removed for the sake of blizzard being awkward.
i think that you are being exceptionally naive by thinking it does affect a much larger section of the playerbase, its not as big of a problem for people that are not raiding mythic, i know that, but saying that it doesnt affect us is stupid, and just incorrect. you dont have to be a mythic raider to want your character to be optimised and be set up for different content.
That’s all.
It’s okay. I’m not blaming you for anything. But you need to understand that ‘your perception of this problem’ is skewed. It is.
Sounds ‘fine’ with me dude. I hope you get that.
I personally don’t want that though. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you for the last several replies.
I’m saying ‘I FEEL’ the game would be better. I’m not saying it’s a fact.
Like I said: I’m well aware that many players would NOT like it. But I would.
But then again; I’m NOT trying to get this actively changed. I’m just throwing my voice out there.
If I’m completely honest, yeah I think that would be better. It would eliminate ‘problematic behaviour’. But again; I’m not advocating for it. It’s just my opinion.
I know it’s not. And I’m not claiming that it will affect ‘us’ the same as it affects ‘them’. Not at all. But that doesn’t mean it DOESN’T affect us. There’s a clear difference between those 2 statements. I NEVER claimed the former.
No, true. But the difference is; you also don’t HAVE to do that. It’s a choice.
I think I would like the option to side with gothed-up Mr Freeze as none of the covenants really appeal to me.
Please, for the sake everything that’s good, stop repeating this lie already. Have your opinion, fine, but stop spreading this notion that only a small minority will be significantly affected. I’ve looked at the numbers because I wanted to see if I’m right, and I am. I’ve written a lengthy response about it yesterday in the other post on this topic. If you want the proof, either find the post or google it yourself. Even if the the top players actually playing the game at that level are a minority, the people interested in this are not. It’s in the hundreds of thousands. Hundreds of thousands of players watching PvP tournamenrs, MDIs and WF races. Every single class discord (ran by the top players) is filled with tens of thousands of online members.
The top ones are a large driving force in keeping the game interesting.
Besides, you keep saying how the top players are the MOST impacted, why is it okay that hunderds of thousands others are still being negatively impacted, even if on smaller levels. It doesn’t matter if a system is 100% bad for some, 50% bad for many and 20% bad for someone else. It’s still generally bad.
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It’s gonna be the same as always, covenants are gonna start out really strict and then by patch 9.2 or 9.3 they’ve “heard our concerns” and have some changes in the making that will be announced shortly.
Changes go live and we might even get an interface attachment on our talent tree where we can change between the covenant abilities with some restrictions of course because blizzard were hesitant about the change but listens to the community.
We praise blizzard and wait for the next thing in 10.0.
A few days ago you were advocating for me to watch a video where this is said, literally. What’s up?
It’s true. Very very true.
They’re not affected. They’re sheep watching other sheep eat grass.
I don’t agree with that. I view them as a toxic part of this game.
And it’s fine you don’t agree. Just don’t say it’s lies. It’s an opinion.
That really DOES matter.
If a game is only bad for 20% it’s a good game, because the vast majority enjoys it. You’re giving yourself and likeminded players too much credit, I’m afraid.
I’m sorry you feel so strongly about this. I genuinely think it’s going to be fine.
And if not; then so be it. We’ll get to that when it actually happens (which again, I don’t think it will; for the vast, vast majority of players).
Anyway, I see people getting heated again. I’m out!
I don’t care enough, but at least my voice is again part of the ether. 
Cheers!
I was wrong. And I think Preach was wrong as well. I’ve since spoken to people looked deeper into it and I’ve seen that it’s not just the top 1% as Preach has said. He’s sort of going against himself with that latest video of his, but fairly he makes very good points in there. I don’t know if he’s correcting himself with it, or if he’s changed his opinion, but I don’t really care. I base my opinion on what I see from all angles, not on a video. I’ve changed mine my opinion. I thought then what you still think now in terms of the affected players.
Based on?
What the hell is wrong with you. You’re literally insulting people because they enjoy what you don’t. I don’t like watching it, but what the hell, if someone does, running around insulting them for it is so damn pathetic.
Entire top guilds and players have quit because of the insane requirement that keep stacking up for them. If this community ends up dying, it still affects those hundreds of thousands because the end up losing something they’ve enjoyed enough to watch it live. Holy hell tho, how can you even compare this to sheep is honestly beyond me. Moving to insults just because you aren’t interested in it. Pathetic, honestly.
Some people’s think that the earth is flat and the the government is hiding it because it’s ran by alien lizard-human hybrids. Just don’t say it’s lies. It’s an opinion.
- I never said it’s bad FOR 20%, I said if the top end have it the worst by far, a lot of people only having it only 20% as bad as the top end doesn’t make it okay. It’s still a step backwards.
- 20% is a lot. If wow has something like 2 milllion active subs, 20% is 400 000.
- 20% is not a minority, it’s 1/5 of the full playerbase
- You keep throwing around the term “vast majority” while that could be anywhere from 51% to 99.9%. So do you think of vast majority as 80%? So if every fifth player doesn’t like a change, then it’s a good change? Do you think Blizzards is fine with subs dropping by 20%?
okay… ill try and explain this again, please read this carefully, i spent a hell of a long time over the past 2/3 weeks reading through the forums here, and on mmo champ and through endless reddit threads talking about these changes, looking at EVERYTHING i could, people that share my opinion and people that do not share my opinion, and from what i have seen the vast majority are on the same side as me, so i think its fair to say that the majority agree with me, i know its not as large a sample size as it could be, but its the largest i can personally find,
you have said repeatedly here that you feel a certain way on the matter and i have said repeatedly i disagree with you an i genuinly believe you are just wrong, for the health of the game and considering how much blizzard have previously said they are working towards player agency i think they are going agaisnt their own philosophy on this situation and to me it is a complete and utter fact that them limiting it is incorrect, telling me your feelings on this will not change my mind so dont bother trying again its not worth it, you are wrong.
i dont see the problem here you are literally agreeing with me, i dont think its as big of a problem for the rest of the player base but it still is a big problem. im saying that it does affect us,
literally the next line after what you quoted is me agreeing with your reply please read what im typing correctly and stop wasting my time and your own time. i shouldnt have to constantly repeat this when your arguing a point we literally agree on
this is completely inccorect, if i want to optimise my character and play an RPG then yes i do need to make my character the best it can be, and this stupid system refusing to allow me it stopping me from enjoying the game, i want to make my character the best it can be, i want to try and clear the top content that i can, im not that interested in mythic, but i clear heroic and curve each raid and have done since legion, i try and push the dungeons as high as i can and go for keymaster achievement, and this system as it stands right now has the possibility that i just dont get the chance to do that.
lets not even take into account class balance as a whole here, because depending on how the dungeons are designed it limits certain classes anyway, (casters with longer cooldowns on their interrupts and lack useful utility for example). if they are limiting me and not allowing me proper access to the covenant ability that will then force me to play something suboptimally that could and very well might be the factor that leads to me not being able to complete the achievemnts im after and there fore has a major impact on my gameplay and ruins my experience of the expansion,
is that a good enough explaination of why this system sucks and why it should never be put into the game in its current form. it could have most likely will have a majorly negative impact on a lot of players throughout the casual and more hardcore player base and considering their current philosophy from last years blizzcon about player agency they are chosing to go agaisnt that and potentially ruin the experience of a lot of players.
yes you might prefer it to stick as being locked, but you still very much have the choice to lock yourself to a specific covenant and there fore you if its changed to MAKE IT BETTER. then it will have no affect on your as you will still be able to play the exact same way, compared to it being the way it currently is on alpha and not giving alot of the playerbase the choice to play the way they want to
I didn’t mean it like that.
You can swap out ‘sheep’ and put ‘panda’ there. Or whatever else.
Ok.
Calm down. Just a poor choice of words, I guess.
Way different. We’re talking about a game.
No, sounds fine to me.
Still ‘only’ 20%
Ehmmmmmmm… You do understand how numbers work, right?
20% is LITERALLY a minority. 1/5th is LITERALLY a minority.
I don’t ‘keep throwing it around’. I used in there. In that context.
But since you seem to be bad with numbers… This particular ‘vast majority’ would then be the other 80%. Because that’s how numbers work.
Anyway, those numbers don’t matter, because they were made up by you. Not factual numbers.
Now… calm down please. The system is going to be fine. Just wait and see. 
I already knew that and I already gave you the reason why that seems to be the case.
People who post about this game are the more fanatical ones. Usually (not always) the more active ones, the ones who do the top end content.
Of course they’re going to be vocal about this. They are the ones affected most.
The people who aren’t affect don’t care, so you won’t hear them as much.
So then it SEEMS as if wayyyyy more people are negative about the system than they are positive.
That makes sense, yes?
Yeah, and I genuinly believe you are just wrong.
So who of us is right? Me? You? Both? Neither?
Does it matter, since we’re not the ones making the decisions?
Indeed. To you. To me it’s not a fact and it’s just your opinion. To me THAT is a fact. We’re never going to agree on this one.
Same goes for you. Also; No, you are wrong.
No. Sorry mate, but you’re comprehension fails you here.
We are talking about 2 different things here:
- I’m talking about ‘us (meaning me and likeminded players) being affected’ when YOUR wanted changes get implemented.
- You are talking about ‘us being affected’ by the system as it is at the moment.
But you don’t NEED an optimized character. Unless you do the absolute top end of the available content. You really don’t. You can do all of it without being completely maximized. So the fact that you still WANT to be maximized, is a choice.
It’s a FACT that you do not need to be maximized to clear heroic. So no, you will be able to do it just fine. You need to relax, my dude. It’s really not as bad as you think (it IS that bad for mythic raiders, sure).
Classes are never balanced. Literally never.
So I’m not even going to consider that a thing.
Thanks for the explanation, but as you can see from my replies; I still disagree with you. Not ONLY because of my personal opinion/taste, but also because of a few facts.
There you go again. Don’t do that. You don’t know this.
You have no clue how I play. 
I don’t get it, how can you say “only” 20%…
You’re right, I have no idea what I was thinking with that statement.
Doesn’t change the fact that it’s a lot of people tho.
But my point is exactly that… it’s A LOT of people. You’re still completely fine with taking away a hobby from 400 000 people with a change that didn’t need to happen.
The numbers don’t have to be factual. WoW subs are in the millions and I think it’s a very fair guess saying 20% won’t like the many limitations of this system.
Look at Barry. He isn’t a hardcore player, he doesn’t raid mythic at all, he’s nowhere near a top player. He likes all three of his specs, including the least optimal warlock spec in M+, but he optimised that to the best of his ability, because he felt like it, because he could and because it’s fun for him to do from time to time, but not always. Why do you think designing a system that takes this away from someone like him is a good thing?
Yeah, i also wanted join the paladin order hall during legion (as a shaman), but blizz denied me…
How dare they!..
maybe if you didnt just take a small snippet of what i was trying to say and you actually payed attention to all of it, the context there might have made more sense,
based purely on the fact that they said outright that they were changing the philosophy and that they were aiming for more player agency them deciding to limit us is wrong. that is a fact, because they have said one thing and gone the oposite direction, that isnt up for debate. please stop just taking a small snippet of what i have said out of context
so you are saying im wrong for playing the game the way that i want to, i dont need to do something because its the way i play the game, even though im just flat out wrong on giving my opinion because it conflicts with the way you want to play the game, are you actively just trolling now?
but again my opinion on the matter which you seem to think is so important is that it is a big problem, considering that i play with some people that are not that good means that i have to try and maximise what im doing in order to not spend months clearly through content, so the devs and the game flat out refusing to allow me to do this is wrong.
more like “fact” though honestly
other than that FACT that you have said it wouldnt affect you and you dont care about wanting to change stuff, you said you want to find something that fits the fantasy of your character and you are fine with sticking to that, or you saying that you pick talents you like not neccesarily the ones that are the best.
so im sorry if im taking you at your word about it not affecting you, considering you literally said it wouldnt affect you, maybe next time be more clear about this so you are not causing confusing,
or again are you literally just trying to troll me now by constantly changing your stance on stuff, because its starting to get over frustrating, you are willing to state facts when you cant possibly have all of the information needed to know if something is factual or not
take
and that i as i have previously said, i play with people that i enjoy playing with, not all of them are really good enough for heroic and get carried, so making sure my character is maxed out and putting out as much damage as i can is very important, me and a few other people at least, so to us it makes a huge different and clearly you are wrong in telling me i dont need to do these things, but you are claiming facts and clearly dont know anything about the specific situation
If so, there is no point having 4 covenants. Just have one. Wait no. There is no point having even one covenant then.
I’d get this was a Classic where it takes time to level up the alts, but it is not. Most people are running with tons of alts as it is really easy and fast to level them up.
Yeah. But don’t get me wrong; I’m also fine with them getting their way. I’ll be disappointed, sure, but I’ll get over that. It’s not a dealbreaker for me.
Why isn’t it?
Why can’t I just one shot bosses in current Mythic raids solo…
…if I think that is fun?
Why can’t I just receive free gear upgrades in the mail every week…
…if I think that is fun?
Why am I limited by the game with this?!
See what I’m getting at? Not all forms of playing are as healthy/good/normal/wanted/accepted as others. Does the game need to cater to everyone? No it doesn’t.
Does it suck to be one of the people affected? Yeah.
I’ve been one such affected player plenty of times before.
But again, let me repeat this: I’m also fine with them getting their way. I’ll be disappointed, sure, but I’ll get over that. It’s not a dealbreaker for me.
But I will never stop sharing my opinions on this forum. Because I feel it needs to be said.
Heroic raiding is not top end content. I check the profiles of a lot of the people here just so I have a little idea who I’m talking to, and most barely even set foot in mythic.
Or they don’t know that they are affected because they don’t look up the news, because they are casuals and don’t want to know. And instead they just don’t assume that Blizzard would come up with a system that screws over things that have been possible for 12 years. It’s going to hit them once they realize what’s going on.
Both. You should have your meaningful choice and we should have the ability to keep customizing our characters as we always have been without massive obstacles. These should have never clashed together. It’s a result of a good idea badly implemented. But now we’re cornered and compromise is the only way to not lose the interest of a ~fifth of a playerbase that hasn’t been doing anything to deserve it.
no u
Same as you don’t NEED a system full of choices that impact literally everything aspect of the game. You’ve never had it in this game. We’ve had optimizable characters for 12 years. For a lot of people it, just feels better to beat the other damage dealers after put the effort into it. Which is why corruption is generally disliked, because random procs can win over effort.
And now you’re going to unbalanced legendaries on top of unbalanced conduits on top of unbalanced soulbinds on top of unbalanced covenant class a abilities on top of unbalanced signature abilities on top of unbalanced specs on top of unbalanced classes. It’s pouring gasoline into an wild fire.
at least someone here seem to understand what im trying to say.
all im asking for is blizz to stick with their initial mission statement from blizzcon last year, “more player agency” its the reason we are getting a choice of items from the mythic weekly chest and even a chance to take currency should we not need gear, its the same reason they are making the game more alt friendly, so we have the choice to play more characters should we want to, why do they have to be so arogant on this specific problem and remove all agency from players, especially those that it matters the most to…
there are a lot of players that are more than happy to be locked into one specific covenant ability, and even if we are given the choice to change they still have ability to lock themselves into one, so literally everyone wins, why is that so difficult to understand, why is it that people who dont care about their characters power are trying to force everyone who does care into having to possibly be worse at the content they enjoy playing, or some people even some casual players i know have genuinly considered rolling multiple of the same class so it is not that big of a problem for them,
even simple things like being able to swap spec might end up being a big problem, what if one of the abilities is very good for affliction and demo but crap for destro, so i take it and then just give up on playing destro for an entire expansion?
and im aware that you agree with me clairisse, it was just easier to quote and reply that way
Bad example and a hyperbole, seriously doubt there’s anyone who seriously wants to do this. Go and ask, see how many want to one shot bosses. Unless it’s the cases where people have managed to do something similar this thanks to clever use of certain game mechanics, at which point it’s honestly just impressive to figure it out and pull it off.
Rextroy comes up with some funny stuff like that if you’re interested.
Another bad example. Go and ask people if they actually want to get free gear for doing nothing.
Again, just skewed view of what we want. We just want the freedom we’ve always had. That doesn’t NEED to go away with new systems. Never have I seen a forum thread saying “please take the option to reset talents away from me!”. Never have I seen or heard anyone say “I hate that I can try out all this different stuff!”…or “I wish I was not able to try that cool ability this other shaman is using!”… For 15 YEARS since the very release of the game you could customize talents and the most you would ever have to pay was 50 gold and you’d only reach that if you respecced every single day. Azerite has tried to change this, people didn’t like it, Blizz tried to double down, people hated that even more and eventually it had to be eased down. It still sucks but it’s better now. Unfortunately it took two BFA patches to “fix”.
You have a community that has been using to being able to do something since day one and now they can’t.
No. You’ve given two terrible examples that are nowhere near reality.
So wanting to have an fun character in all contents as opposed to just one is unhealthy and not normal… got it.
Yeah. It’s more player agency in terms of the whole package, but at the cost of overall player agency which is already in the game and always has. I don’t really get it.
Has anyone yet mentioned that this meaningful choice also means that friends who have chosen different covenants won’t be able to do any covenant related activities together? That was the one part of class halls that I didn’t like. “Oh, sorry buddy, but I have to go do my single player class campaign so you’ll have to wait 30 minutes until I’m done”. Except this is worse. It’s daily and weekly content that won’t be doable with friends who are not in the same covenant. You and your friends don’t like neither dungeon nor raids nor Torghast. Too bad, enjoy your single player MMO. They’ve taken the worst out of class halls and garrisons and clumped it together.
This might change but so far it looks bad for these players.