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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsOfficial class forums to be replaced with role forums [UPDATED x2]
by Alex Ziebart 
Oct 30th 2008 at 2:30PM
Want to hear something frightening? There will be no more class forums. Nethaera announced it a bit earlier on the official forums, and I'm still not sure what to think. They're breaking down the class forums and replacing them with role forums: Tanking, Healing, and Damage Dealing. For those players that have been afraid they're homogenizing classes a little too much, this really isn't helping.Personally, I think this is a horrible move. The official class forums were bad enough, and now they've thrust all of the classes together. Have you seen those really cruel, gross videos where they put two scary looking bugs together in a glass cage and let them kill each other, and they'll do it every single time just because it's in their nature to defend themselves? This is the WoW forum equivalent of it. This is going to be a disaster. The walls are going to be painted with blood.
On the other hand, this might turn out to be a good thing in that you're going to see a lot more community-made class forums such as ShadowPriest.com and Maintankadin cropping up. Places like that are generally far more useful in my experience, but come on. Does removing the class forums really sound like a good idea? It's just spreading the venom around instead of trying to find an antivenom. I could understand this if they added these three forums in addition to the class forums, but in place of them? Yeesh.
We're really interested in what all of you think about this as well, so we've made a handy dandy poll. Do you think they should have kept the role forums? Do you like the switch to role forums? Do you think they should have both?
EDIT: Blizzard poster Tyren later said they're not adverse to keeping the class forums, and may do so all depending on the feedback they receive. So we'll see what actually ends up happening, but I have a feeling class forums aren't going anywhere.
EDIT 2: Blizzard has taken only a few hours to decide to they will be keeping the class forums as well as the role forums. Crisis averted. Put down you dot shockers and step away slowly.
| Class forums! | |
|---|---|
| Role forums! | |
| They should have both! |
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Forums
Reader Comments (Page 7 of 7)
Llowe Oct 31st 2008 5:34AM
This is stupid. Agree that they should introduce role forums without removing class forums.
Shadowfire Oct 30th 2008 7:11PM
The WoW forums are horrible, I cant stand the people on them, so I don't really care if they merge the forums or not.
Random Cow Oct 30th 2008 7:41PM
Warlocks are not going have as useful feedback on cat dps as other druids would have. A rogue talking about mutilate is not going to interest a Mage very much.
Very bad idea.
p3ngu1n Oct 31st 2008 12:06AM
I'm tired of seeing multiple threads about the same topic OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN (even on the first page). I don't see how reducing the forums would help that.
Phantomwolf Oct 31st 2008 3:06AM
And the plot thickens....
This seems like a ploy to keep people busy fighting over the forums, rather then focused on any class issues that have been a thorn in the side of Blizzard.
Any person that would raise a class related issue in a forum structure like they plan to implement will draw so much trolling from other classes that it will drown out the original complaint or comment completely.
I for one think this is exactly why its being done. And even if its not, the result will be the same. Either way Blizzard wins and the players get shafted.
Saelie Oct 31st 2008 5:19AM
''Yes, you're correct in pointing out that not every thread will perfectly relate to every class, just as not every thread on the class forums necessarily relates to every talent specialization for that class. This argument is ineffective.
We still feel having these new forums provides us a better way of more effectively communicating with all of you. With that said, we have decided to keep the class forums along with these new forums. ''
^^ Blizzard Post. http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=12065380610&pageNo=1&sid=1#8
Marveen Oct 31st 2008 6:47AM
I don't like the idea. I play a resto druid, levelled as resto from lvl10 and I love it. Currently, I go to the class forums when I'm looking for new druid-related info: any new tricks anyone's learned since the latest patch, how to use Nature's Grasp now it's a core ability, etc. With the proposed system, where will I go to read up on how to become a better druid? Sure, I can read up on how to max my healing, and to compare it to priests, shammies, paladins.. but if I want to read up on how to use feral/balance abilities to be a better druid do I go to the dps forum? Or the tank forum? I fear I will lose access to new information on class tricks.
One of the main reasons I love being a druid is that I have a big bag of tricks to play with. I may be a healing druid at heart, but I play a druid first. Function forums, as opposed to class forums, will focus on min-maxing your main function first.
RizziNUp Oct 31st 2008 11:11AM
My thoughts:
For PvE, this is a great idea. All the blue posts should be consolidated into the designated DPS, Tank, or Healing forum. Any intelligent discussion about Raiding should be about Healing, Tanking, or DPS'ing. Blizzard thinks of PvE as a 3 role system, therefore, they should discuss any changes, as a 3 role system. As a guild leader, I'm consistently turned off by the forums simply because everything is horribly scattered. Everyone is too terribly focused on their specific 'class' that they forget that the role is more important. Hopefully, with the role forums, we can have discussions on how to improve the role as a whole (i.e. tanking changes) rather than improving (or nerfing) a specific class.
Of course, the class forum is important as well to speak about individual bugs, nuances, rotations, gear optimization, etc...
It's funny this is coming about because I changed my guild ranks around this idea about 3months back. Instead of having individual class leaders, I've consolidated it into 4 roles: Tank Leader, Healer Leader, Ranged DPS Leader, and Melee DPS Leader. I split up the DPS to alleviate the amount of researching one DPS leader would have to do. I believe this will strengthen my leaders knowledge in how a raid is run, and how to keep everyone happy and on top of their game. It also helps out the guild as a whole by not having 12 leaders in a guild of 30 (and it relieves the stress of me having to do everything!).
For PvP, there is no other way than individual class forums. I found it shocking that they were even thinking about reorganizing the forums into PvE roles.
Ven
Rize of Gorefiend