We know this information. The item designers have plenty of spreadsheets too. If you're saying creating said spreadsheet takes an equivalent amount of time as coding a system in the game whereby item distribution accounts for the spec you're fulfilling in a dungeon, you're wrong.


We're not that naive. We knew from the start of designing the Raid Finder system that we'd need to build a smarter loot distribution system to regulate fair play. It was also really important to us to get Raid Finder working and implemented with the Dragon Soul raid. We had to be realists about it.

The loot system will be improved in upcoming updates -- including in patch 4.3.2, where it'll no longer be possible to win two of the same item for a single boss kill. But we're really happy with the implementation of Raid Finder and feel it's a great new feature for the game, and one we'll continue refining over time.

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I usually hate it when people decide to read into what I've said and translate it into some other meaning, but this was pretty fair, lol. ;)

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This is well said. Money isn't nearly the overarching, limiting factor people love to claim it is. And the common argument I see in response to the above quote is "hire more people then." But I think it's pretty easy to understand that looking for the perfect fit for a position is not always a quick process, nor is the training of new employees. This is particularly true when one is speaking about development studios generating creative media. Expertise, design philosophy, synergy, etc. are very important to the success of a project, not sheer headcount.

Our development teams are quite modest in size compared to a lot of studios, but it's because we genuinely feel it's not always good to have so many hands on a project. If that means we have to make tough decisions about how and when to release a product or feature, so be it.

That said, we do still have plenty of positions we're looking to fill. ;)

There are several things that we want to follow-up on and clarify:

• We noticed Retribution DPS was higher than we expected. We investigated and realized Gurthalak was the cause. We further realized (and several players independently discovered) that the weapon proc was activating twice as often for Retribution as intended.
• Retribution was getting more than twice as many proc chances than we intended. This was caused by the application of Censure, not the dot itself ticking.
• This was not an accidental bug fix of some sort. The proc was happening more often than we expected and desired, leading to damage higher than we expected and desired, so we took steps to fix it.
• We changed the duration of Gurthalak's proc some time ago. The 4.3.2 tooltip change simply acknowledges this fix. The weapon's damage should not change in 4.3.2.
• Gurthalak is still a fantastic weapon for Retribution paladins and any other two-handed DPS plate-wearers. The average DPS reduction is lower than the 10% figure some have quoted. The sword's damage can be quite variable, and there are isolated cases where it may have briefly contributed 20% or more of someone's damage, but those are statistical outliers.
• Being nerfed is never fun. We get that. The increased proc chance was our mistake, as always, and we apologize for not catching it sooner. Retribution paladin damage for players without Gurthalak is where we intended it to be. We expect Retribution damage with this change to also end up where we intend it to be. If damage falls unacceptably low for some reason, we will certainly consider taking additional measures.

Again, thank you very much for all of the useful feedback. We pay close attention to these things.