This coming Thursday marks the release for the latest World of Warcraft expansion, Warlords of Draenor. It has been over a year since Mists of Pandaria’s release, and fans of the game have been sitting in eager anticipation for the opportunity to see this long-time-coming new content. As with most MMO expansions, it is more than an opportunity to simply add additional levels: It is also a time to rebalance the structure of the game and attempt to improve it on a mechanical level. So, what is the next big change in Warcraft?
To put it simply: Blizzard is intently focused on trimming the fat on this 10-year-old game. A term being used lately is “ability bloat” or the idea that players have too many spells to choose from. For some classes, the amount of spells offered is simply too much to fit on your keyboard, and many players were getting more and more confused as to what the most efficient use of these spells was. Blizzard’s approach to solving this issue was twofold: remove unnecessary abilities and restrict who can use necessary abilities.
It sounds scary to long-time players to think that spells are being removed from the game, but it isn’t actually a terribly new concept. Most of the abilities being taken away are practically duplicates of other spells. For example, healing in Mists of Pandaria was a bit cumbersome because of the number of healing spells available. Most classes had a mana efficient heal that cured small bits of HP, a mana-costly heal that recovered large bulks of HP, an area-wide heal that could heal groups, and spells that would heal slowly over time. Blizzard recognized that these four types of heals were all that was necessary and opted to remove spells that filled in the middle ground between these basic archetypes.
Last month’s patch allowed players to get used to the new systems in place ahead of the expansion’s release, and I can say that the healing in the game has become much more approachable and reasonable to manage. It isn’t just an improvement for healers, however. All classes have seen some spells removed, but usually in the sense that old abilities that were passive are now combined with others still in the game, so some spells have actually just been sorted and organized in a more logical way that allows players to figure out what they’re supposed to do that much easier with all the information in one area. Overall, it has been an improvement to Warcraft’s bloated spellbook problem.
The second half of the plan, restricting who can use abilities, is where most players are growing a bit more frustrated. The idea was to take certain spells and attacks and limit them to a class’ specialization. For example, taking the mage’s fire spells and making sure most of them are used only by fire mages, leaving frost mages with an emphasis on icy spells. On paper it makes a lot of sense and should help those fire mages feel special and those ice mages feel special since now they are so different. The end result, however, is that every class has less spells to choose from.
A prime example is the bear druid. A druid in World of Warcraft can shapeshift into a handful of creatures, and if players choose to focus on playing as a bear, they gain many defensive perks and can very effectively tank for their group. This new update, however, took a couple of the bear attacks like “Swipe” and restricted them to only the cat druid specialization. Blizzard took the spells focused on damage and gave them to cats, and took the spells focused on defense and gave them to bears, so everything’s according to plan. That is, until players logged in to their favorite bear character and discovered their spellbook of bear attacks was essentially reduced to only five important buttons. There is a roar to get enemies’ attention, a nature-themed shield to prevent damage, and a couple useful clawing and biting attacks, so the theme is still where Blizzard wants it to be. It simply isn’t entertaining to play.
Druid players are complaining fairly uniformly that their favorite class is now too boring. When fighting an epic boss and leading the group, players need only tap a couple buttons to maintain their efficiency, robbing players of the complexity that makes a fight interesting. A similar complaint is coming from warriors, death knights, paladins, and shamans. Each of these classes typically used a variety of attacks for various situations, and though perhaps a shaman is specialized in melee attacks it was always useful to have a powerful ranged attack for when an enemy is too far away. With optional spells removed in lieu of the more “important” ones, it removes a certain level of complexity many veteran players have grown accustomed to.
I can agree with Blizzard’s intent. Before the update, my rogue had 25 spells I needed to know how to use properly if I wanted to be an effective player. That can be a lot to ask of a new or casual gamer, so it makes a lot of sense to simplify some of the seemingly unnecessary bloat. On paper, the approach Blizzard took does make sense, but if Warlords of Draenor is released, players climb to level 100, and only then realize they are bored of their character and want something more it will be difficult to maintain a solid subscription rate.
MMOs are an odd form of game in that they are always living, moving, and being updated over time and Blizzard is certainly hearing the complaints players are making about their bears and whatnot. But, if you plan on playing this Thursday and you log in to discover half of your spellbook is missing, don’t panic. All new level 90 players get a brief tutorial that offer an opportunity to learn their class’s new ins and outs, and it might just grow on you. Though I heard a lot of complaints from druids, I also smiled when I read someone’s differing opinion: “Oh, hey, I can play a bear, now. This makes a lot more sense.”
