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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsGhostcrawler on the Path of the Titans
by Mike Schramm 
Sep 3rd 2009 at 2:00PM
He clarifies the idea more later in the thread as well. The different paths of the Titans are meant to be class-independent, but GC says that they do want players to debate which path is best for which class, even if they do end up with a "best" solution in the end. Archaeology is meant to be a part of it, so GC agrees that it could be more of a mandatory secondary profession than Cooking or Fishing has been in the past, but they're aware of that danger. And just because the paths may be tied to dailies or instances doesn't mean they'll work the same: the time in which you can progress might be longer than the daily quest limit or shorter than the weekly raid limit. The idea, as above, is to give players who don't necessarily raid or PvP something else to do with character progression at endgame.
Should be interesting to see what they come up with. Personally, this sounds a little bit to me like D&D's prestige classes -- not nearly as powerful or varied, but a way of separating your character out from the rest of those that chose the same class you did. That's just me being hopeful, though -- Blizzard seems to have a lot of development before we see this as a finished product.
World of Warcraft: Cataclysm will destroy Azeroth as we know it. Nothing will be the same. In WoW.com's Guide to Cataclysm you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion. From Goblins and Worgens to Mastery and Guild changes, it's all there for your cataclysmic enjoyment.Filed under: Items, Blizzard, Leveling, Forums, Cataclysm, Archaeology
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 3)
Scien Sep 3rd 2009 11:36PM
No, I think it is just it catches people off-guard. Once you go through it once or twice, it does get pretty clear, IMO.
Andrew R. Sep 3rd 2009 2:18PM
If anything I hope elitist jerks can't turn this into a "cookie cutter path" like the specs. If you're doing your job and nobody complains then why follow what a website says because it's the best?
Here's to hoping the cookie cutter spec goes away with Cataclysm.
alpha5099 Sep 3rd 2009 2:26PM
I have a similar hope. Given that Blizzard is trying to prune out the boring talents, there should hopefully be a lot more freedom to take what you want (rather than what you need) in your talent builds. I'm quite excited by the prospect of taking Improved Ghost Wolf without having to sacrifice DPS.
I'm sure there will be those who conclude that such-and-such is the right path or spec, but hopefully Blizzard will do such a great job that veering from the bests won't be L2P mistakes but personal choices.
kabshiel Sep 3rd 2009 2:33PM
Unless they make every talent exactly the same, there will always be a mathematically best spec.
theRaptor Sep 3rd 2009 2:41PM
Sorry removing cookie cutter spec is simply impossible with the dual constraints of this being a game based in maths and the limitations of end game raiding. In raiding as is class utility is pretty much unimportant asides from buffs and therefore the only thing that "matters" is maximising DPS/HPS/Threat/Damage taking. Therefore some combination of abilities and talents is always going to give you more than other combinations.
The thing to realise is that EJ's guides are really only for those interested in maxing out their potential at their raiding role. Most of the time you can divert from The Spec™ a fair bit and maybe lose 10% total DPS/HPS/Whatever. The problem is the immature children who make up the major proportion of the player base can't differentiate between "not having EJ's spec" and "having a terrible talent build" and so spam stuff like "lololol this guy took Improved ghost wolf in his PVE spec what a scrub" in trade.
My hope is that the Path of the Titans doesn't end up like Inscription were before WotLK they said it wouldn't just be straight damage buffs but instead additional effects and cosmetic changes, but on release Inscription was mostly just boring "+10% damage to frostbolt" glyphs.
Dolan Sep 3rd 2009 3:58PM
Blizz could certainly eliminate the cookie cutter spec. As long as there are more talent points than there are "pure" buffs, then the allocation of those talent points to less quantifiable talents, like improved speed or cc, highly situational talents, etc, is not subject to min-maxing, once all the pure buffs are taken. Also, by reducing the number and impact of "pure" buff talents, the difference between the ideal spec and a wacky one is less, because the contribution of talents to a character's overall dps, healing, threat, whatever, is a lesser percentage. This is exactly what they are planning, according to reports from BlizzCon.
With this approach, there would still be a cookie-cutter baseline spec, (although Blizz could undermine that by offering mathematically equivalent but non-stacking alternatives - i.e. if you take X you can't take Y), but additional selections could then be made to "customize" the character in non-min-maxing fashion.
Also, there could be more synergistic talents, such that similar results can be achieved through different combinations of talents. Especially relevant for hybrid classes, I think. These would complicate min-maxing further, creating the possibility of multiple, different specs which are not meaningfully distinct from a min-max perspective.
And this all assumes that "cookie-cutter" specs truly exist today. Much of the analysis on EJ and elsewhere is done based on target dummies, which, as many on EJ freely admit, do not represent the nature of boss encounters, nor value all aspects of a character's skills (and PVP adds even more intangibles). A theoretical 100 dps improvement doesn't do a player any good if he can't shake an add and ends up dead, or can't respond to a rogue's burst. And players themselves are different - a twitch gamer with fast reflexes might be more effective at employing a positional talent, or one requiring tight coordination with other effects, while a more cerebral player might be more effective managing cool-downs for maximum effect. Good talent tree design should present those sorts of trade-offs.
theRaptor Sep 3rd 2009 4:55PM
Actually Dolan you will find analysis on EJ for every aspect of a boss fight. They will figure out which spec works best PER BOSS depending on fight factors. Eg if the fight is movement based and outdoors than Improved Ghostwolf becomes the cookie cutter spec. There is a whole thread arguing the merits of movement speed enchants vs straight DPS enchants for melee.
I also doubt Blizzard would go the route of additional complexity because they struggle with balance at the moment with fairly easily quantifiable talent builds. The talent tree rebuilds they have talked about are only getting boring "+10% shadow damage" talents out of the tree, but procs and new abilities which affect DPS will remain. I am sure most classies will have more than the 2/3 "free" points we have at the moment, but they aren't going to let us have our cake and eat it (meaning they still won't "spec to matter").
For a "synergy" class look at shadow priests. IIRC our base shadow damage is based on about five different synergistic buffs. But it isn't particularly more fun to play than a straight "+50% shadow damage" because you would want every ability that has synergy up anyway. The only thing it affects is how you initially load DoT's.
Dolan Sep 3rd 2009 7:03PM
Exactly - my point is, in part, that there is no cookie cutter spec if no one spec is ideal, but different specs are preferred for different situation, even different bosses within the same raid. And I've read a lot of those threads, and many of them diverge away from any definitive answer, and end up to be "X works best for me."
I don't mean to suggest that the EJ and broader WOW community are going to stop _arguing_ over what is best, but the OP's wish (which I share) was that cookie cutter specs would go away--meaning, I believe that there would less class trees in which blind followers of EJ math they often don't understand or spreadsheets have less reason to look at someone's build and reject them because they moved a point from one place to another. Of course, since that is not really a defensible view as it is, I don't know why I think that game design is going to convince those people otherwise.
I think what Blizz is trying to do is reach the point where you can allocate perhaps 2/3 of your points to pure buff talents, thus establishing your specialty within the tank/healer/dps structure, but still have plenty left over to either get one of several more unique, but roughly approximate, high level talents, or emphasize certain aspects like cc or survivability, or what have you, without notably gimping your ability to perform in that role.
Clbull Sep 3rd 2009 7:14PM
@theRaptor
Hence why Blizzard are trying to do away with mandatory talents and instead implement a Mastery system giving passive buffs for how deep you spec into a certain tree. As well as that, they're trying to uncomplicate stats by removing ArP, AP, SP, and MP5 and instead integrating them into the current base stats.
I think there will still be "cookie cutter specs" but they won't be an absolute requirement to play. Just a requirement for making out your character.
alpha5099 Sep 3rd 2009 2:22PM
Is it my imagination, or is that the glyph panel for an Undead Druid?
Mynarc Sep 3rd 2009 2:24PM
Its an undead character but that druid paw could just be the sign of the titan's path that hes following
jealouspirate Sep 3rd 2009 2:26PM
It's definitely an undead with the druid claw symbol in the center...
They've reused icons before though. Perhaps it's really the symbol for the particular Titan group that he's following?
Prophetik Sep 3rd 2009 2:51PM
At Blizzcon he made a note to say "this doesn't mean there will be Undead Druids"....it was just a quick example of what it may look like. He did note however that Glyphs on the Glyph panel will have icons representing what abilities they are affecting, as shown in the picture.
jfofla Sep 3rd 2009 4:11PM
It is an Undead Druid. They used that at Blizzcon, which I found odd.
Rubitard Sep 3rd 2009 2:32PM
"Our good friend Ghostcrawler (I can say that now, because we all got to meet him at BlizzCon the other week)"
Look, I shook Jan-Michael Vincent's hand once, but did that bastard ONCE let me fly the Airwolf? No. Did he ONCE offer any of that primo stash of his (pre-rehab) or lame stash (post-rehab, divorce, broke)? No! So, I'd hold off on the friend thing with Ghostcrawler. He'll stab you in the back for a sandwich before you know it!
mtsadowski Sep 3rd 2009 2:39PM
I bet Jan-Michael Vincent will give you that ride now... heck, you can probably make him dance while you throw quarters at him now.
naiosc Sep 3rd 2009 2:40PM
I was a blizcon, when they showed that screen on the big monitor and I think it was GC who jokingly said, "yes thats an undead druid".
Wyldecat2002 Sep 3rd 2009 2:41PM
DO NOT SPEAK ILL OF JAN-MICHAEL!
Mike Schramm Sep 3rd 2009 3:09PM
No! GC is our friend! Just because we saw him walking by the next day, and he started walking faster when we yelled out his name, and then ran behind a curtain when we chased after him doesn't mean that he was just being polite when he said he was happy to meet us! He really was happy! Those big security guards at BlizzCon had it all wrong -- we just wanted to talk to our friend Greg!
zappo Sep 3rd 2009 3:58PM
Wasn't that one of the points of Airwolf though? I thought it had something to do with him being one of the few pilots skilled enough to fly it. He totally should have given you a ride in it though.