The inconsistency that is weapon hands - Incompetence or reason?
A major annoyance for me in this game has always been the large inconsistencies between weapons that have identicle costs and stats, and yet have different restrictions.
My main example is that of the karazhan weapons: [Spiteblade]
Spiteblade and Fool's bane are both ilvl 115, with basically the same dps. Decapitator is ilvl 125, and due to its On Use ability is most definatly in the same class as the other two. I think it would be very fair to say that these weapons are meant to be equivilents of each other for their specific weapon types. The question arises then: Why is one blatently better than the other two? First off, Spiteblade is one handed and not unique. Fool's Bane and Decapitator were both originally main hand and unique, but they dropped the unique off the decapitator a couple patches back (why?). These 3 weapons all seem to be intended main hand weapons, as while spiteblade isnt' limited rogues do not want slow weapons, and fury warrs don't particularly care about offhand speed. Speaking of speed, why is spiteblade also superior there? It gets to be 2.7 instead of 2.6, and slower is generally better given the nature of instant attacks. So the question remains: Why are fool's bane and decapitator limited to main hand and spiteblade not? Rogues don't care, dps warrs don't care, tanks don't care. Only enhancement shamans care. Are these weapons set up this way just to stop enhance shamans from having a decent offhand at this point in the game? Is there any other reason? Or is this just a complete oversight?
Looking at arena weapons and weapons in hyjal/bt, i'm inclined to say there is no reason as blizzard has stopped restricting axes and maces to just main hand (although one must wonder why [Rising Tide] is unique when none of the others are). But if they have stopped, why not fix the items in karazhan? This leads me to believe that it is just general laziness and poor design.
The other weapon inconsistency that leads me to think that is the one of fist weapons, which as everyone knows are also restricted to mainhand or offhand. Not all are though, and the ones that arn't are the ones with symetrical models. Obviously blizzard is locking the majority of them to one hand or another because the models only look right on the specific hands that they are made for. So there is actually a reason, but not a very good one. The majority of the fist weapons in the game have mirrors already, and creating a mirror model for the offhand for the rest is extremely easy. Unless it is completely beyond the game engine to display different models/distort models differently for an item when equipped in different places (which we know it isn't due to weapon enchants and armor/weapon models looking different on different races) then the only conclusion is, again, laziness.
This is an issue that i doubt the majority of the player base cares about as there are very few enhance shamans out there. But it is an issue that is present in most other parts of the game: Blizzard has repeated imbalances and inconsistencies for no reason. I am posting this thread in the hopes that there is a reason, and that sombody can tell me it as i just can't figure it out.
I'm more concerned that there are 6 daggers that no one uses at Vashj level or beyond, and not a single sword that is worth bringing up outside of the legendary.
In addition the game is replete with 2 handers, yet there are maybe 1 or 2 caster weapons total worth talking about. That seems like a bigger itemization issue. But I suppose it beats not having melee weapons dropping.
Every single drop from Prince Malchezaar is ilvl 125, hence the 125 rating of Decapitator/Malchezeen/Gorehowl, whereas the entire rest of the instance is ilvl 115. Traditionally the most diffucult 'final' bosses of raid instances have a higher ilvl tier of gear then the preceding instance.
I don't think this is an issue that needs much discussion and warrants its own thread. Blizzards itemization is often lazy, random and generally bad.
I think when they push out content itemization has quite a low priority ("waste of time") and is something they (very) slowly fix over time whenever new itemization opportunities arise due to players complaining.
The abbundance of daggers shows that the majority of people responsible for itemization just don't know or care too much about raiding. There isn't too much room for interpretation.
I'm more concerned that there are 6 daggers that no one uses at Vashj level or beyond, and not a single sword that is worth bringing up outside of the legendary.
In addition the game is replete with 2 handers, yet there are maybe 1 or 2 caster weapons total worth talking about. That seems like a bigger itemization issue. But I suppose it beats not having melee weapons dropping.
The [Fang of Vashj] may be interesting for (prot) warriors, as it increases your weapon skill by 5 and thus your effective hit by 2%.
Although I don't know how a dagger affects devastate threat generation.
Last edited by sp00n : 09/29/07 at 5:45 AM.
Reason: 2% not 3%, dumbass
Although I haven't tanked in a while I think it's safe to say that devastate does not play a huge role in a good TPS cycle.
Once 2.3 hits some of the daggers might be useful for enhancement shaman as well but I'm pretty sure the itemization team didn't have warrior tanks and post 2.3 enhancement shamans in mind when implementing those daggers.
And daggers are just one of the many issues, granted a bigger one than some of the arbitrary weapon restrictions.
There are a billion problems with itemization everywhere. Weapon-handedness is far from being the only example. Caster weapons have just as many egregious problems.
This could be, without breaking any currently existing rules:
+45 Stam
+16 Int
+236 Spell damage
+64 Spell crit rating
+33 Spell hit rating
Red socket
Yellow socket
Yellow socket
+5 Spell damage socket bonus
This would be an upgrade of (assuming socketing 2x Potent Pyrestone and 1x Runed Crimson Spinel):
+29 spell damage
+23 spell crit
+33 spell hit
at the cost of:
-31 stam
-36 int
I think every caster would make that trade.
'War' is too small a word for what I'm fighting. Like a candle in front of the whole burning Sun. Now, I am not going to die today. I have other projects, and other options.
I've also been baffled too many times to count when it comes to some of the itemization in WoW. Both before and after Burning Crusade. It seems like the teams working on itemization are just guessing sometimes.
Well with the addition of Hyjal trash drops they added some needed gear like mp5 healing cloak or a t6 tank cloak.
Shamans also have a problem with getting a t5+ healing weapon if you dont do vashj anymore or she just doesnt drop it. The next upgrade you can get is the illidan mace or the paladin t5 weapon.
Well with the addition of Hyjal trash drops they added some needed gear like mp5 healing cloak or a t6 tank cloak.
Shamans also have a problem with getting a t5+ healing weapon if you dont do vashj anymore or she just doesnt drop it. The next upgrade you can get is the illidan mace or the paladin t5 weapon.
There is really no shortage of healing weapons with vashj, illidan and the hyjal drop, that seems just fine to me. Priests and druids have two pretty decent staffs as well. Plus there is hardly a really good reason for shamans to always use a shield. Using archimonde/gurtogg staff and having a sta/tanking weapon along with a sta/tanking shield keybound to switch in case to in case you are getting hit (random adds, trash, whatever) won't make a difference in almost all encounters.
Sad thing is that for some reasons the staffs are itemized heavily towards stats and manatic atm. That makes it already rough for them to compete with the good 1h+off hand combinations and that is going to get even worse wih 2.3. Druids and priests get 30% mana regen and shamans get a ridiculous buff to water shield. Even if they do not change the globes at all, that is more then 350 mana each minute as they announced it right now. That means people will shy away from massive manatic even more and want high amounts of +healing.
The huge number of rogue-only daggers and the non-existing caster weapons are an issue that got discussed extensively in the arena weapons thread as well.
Agreed, itemization is just weird, especially for weapons.
Staves are almost universally poorly itemized, meaning that most casters go for MH/OH combos. But for DPS casters who can't use swords (like, say, shadow priests), once you get the dagger from Prince at the start of T4, your next upgrade comes from...BT. Meanwhile, casters who can use swords get one in Kara, Gruul, Leo, and so forth.
Healers are slightly better off; they merely get a gap of Prince to Vashj, which is still large, but not ridiculous. And at least with the 2.3 changes healers get a vaguely useful staff from Solarian...
My theory is that the itemization "team" isn't; that there are instead 2-3 people doing itemization, and they never ever talk to each other, and that's why we see oddities like this.
Rumor has it ZA will fix some of the more glaring itemization holes in the ~T5ish range...
Tokens that yield 3 sets total for one grouping, 7 for another, and typically there are more people represented in the latter
Various representation errors like Feral DPS Staff above Tier 4 completely missing, but 2h weapons being overabundant
Could go on and on but I think I'm understood.
"You are better than I am," Inigo admitted. "So it seems. But if that is true, then why are you smiling?"
"Because," Inigo answered, "I know something you don't know." "And what is that?" asked the man in black. "I'm not left-handed."
Perhaps spiteblade vs the other can be explained by this:
While the weapons are designed for mainhand use, bliz wants to be as permissive as possible and allow you to use it sub-optimally, just so long as this doesn't make another "good" choice for how to use it. This means they want to put 1H instead of MH on all of the, but the only one they can is the sword because of enhancement shamans: those are actually pretty good offhands, but bliz would rather make dedicated offhands.
Which really makes no sense either, but slightly less no sense than just going "huh?"
Staves are for people who want stats. 1H+OH are for casters who want damage. So, staves are for PvP and 1H+OH are for PvE? Probably unintended but that's how it sorts out.
I always thought that for differentiation's sake, the idea was that staves gave more stats, especially Stamina (and Spirit in some cases) whereas a 1h/offhand combo yielded more damage (ignoring the obvious advantage/bane of being able to upgrade seperately).
This can be seen from dungeon blues onwards. Edit: Actually, from MC onwards.
I always thought that for differentiation's sake, the idea was that staves gave more stats, especially Stamina (and Spirit in some cases) whereas a 1h/offhand combo yielded more damage (ignoring the obvious advantage/bane of being able to upgrade seperately).
This can be seen from dungeon blues onwards. Edit: Actually, from MC onwards.
Yeah, I agree with that. I think what he's getting at, though, is that there should be a place for a properly-itemized staff in the min/maxing that goes on in endgame raiding.
I always thought that for differentiation's sake, the idea was that staves gave more stats, especially Stamina (and Spirit in some cases) whereas a 1h/offhand combo yielded more damage (ignoring the obvious advantage/bane of being able to upgrade seperately).
This can be seen from dungeon blues onwards. Edit: Actually, from MC onwards.
The problem being, in this day and age stats are close to worthless in comparison to the multitude of ratings, damage and regen attributes.
Regards to staffs, the ones in BT/MH are alot better than what things used to be like, but still the best combo is a 1H/OH.
One thing im concerned about, as ilvl goes higher and the only real way to move things on is to increase stats or add different things to the pool.
However this means we are slowly moving towards a cap where things will stop improving beyond 2-3 points each tier of upgrade (worse than now).
Unless they change the increasing ilvl cost of stats and other modifiers then as our level increases our items will start to get fucked over royally.
There is really no shortage of healing weapons with vashj, illidan and the hyjal drop, that seems just fine to me.
The problem is that while the weapon from vashj is as good as the illidan weapon for me (or nearly so) that most guilds only kill vashj very few times and her loot table is pretty big (like all zone end bosses). So it's really a very slim chance to get even 1 healing weapon from vashj (we don't have one). More importantly as has been stated before in this thread staves are nice, but for Druids 1h + offhand is alot better than wearing a stave (even though I currently were a stave^^) imho.
Indeed, the best combo for me is Vashj+EoS, then Apostle, then Vashj+Archi OH, then Gurtogg Staff. (Not accounted for the 2.3 spirit value change, but it shouldn't change things)
I'ld imagen the Illi mace replacing Vashj one would just knock each combo down a peg below where it would be with the Vashj one, sad really.
Icetro: Correct, but my point is, if it's a design decision for staves to have high hitpoints/mana whereas 1h/offhand has more damage, the problem would be too many staves dropping, too few 1h/offhand options.
Playered: There -are- a few fights where a minimum HP threshold makes the fight less cancerous. I do get your point though, and I agree.
I think what Blizzard is saying basically is, if you want stats, grab a staff. If you want max damage, go 1h/offhand. They likely aren't going to break out of that itemization standard, just like specifically feral body pieces (i.e. non-ring, non-cloak, non-neck) continuing to have both dps stats, armor, and a little bit of Int; from the Heroic epic drops, to T4/Zierhut's, all the way up to T6/Treads of the Den Mother.
Edit: Playered brought up item inflation, which is an interesting topic of discussion in itself. We're fast approaching the max ilvls for TBC, in the form of Sunwell gear. After that, nothing will matter, because everything higher is probably going to be balanced in context of the lv80 metagame.
My personal observation is that after 2 years of endgame at 60, the final peg point as a starting design blueprint for player power levels at 70 is more or less 2x what it was at 60. We went from lv60 greens/lv~85 epics to lv120 greens/lv~170 (I presume, from endboss) epics, tanks went from roughly above 10k to roughly above 20k hp, etc.
The prediction I have, then, is that lv80's final peg point will be 2 times that of what it is at 70. Green items going up to 240, tanks having above 40k hp at the end of WotLK raiding, etc. This means tiers past whatever they put into Sunwell will not only be played at lv80 rating conversion rates, but have much bigger ilvl leaps between the tiers. We're not going to end up with a non-existant upgrade from T11 to T12 with a measly item level jump from lv500 to 510, or whatever.
All I'm saying is I'm glad I'm not a dps caster who needs a weapon. That seems to be a rather annoying hole at the moment. Or a sword rogue looking to beat the game with something better than a tidewalker drop.
09/29/07, 12:39 AM
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