Legendarily Legion
One of the biggest changes to the way we'll be playing in Legion comes from the new legendary item system. Random drops around the world will give you a chance to pick up one of many "legendary" quality items. These new legendaries have high item levels, and include an extra ability, which we're told will be of similar power level to the 2 or 4 piece set bonuses we're currently used to.These have not been tuned at all, as far as I can tell, so don't get your hopes up too much if you see a combination that will make you invincible. The devs have mentioned a couple times now that after tuning, none of the legendary items will be so powerful as to render the wearer unkillable, or double their DPS.
With all of those caveats, here's what has been datamined so far:
Nesingwary's Trapping Treads - Survival only
Essentially, when equipped you can place double the number of traps, as long as you place them on concurrent GCDs. That is, if you place an Explosive Trap, the CD will have a 3 second buffer before triggering, in which you can place a second Explosive Trap.
The way SV's rotation is working at the moment, you have some intense moments where you're trying to using all of your Mongoose Bite stacks while the buff remains, and then you have some down time while you're waiting for the stacks of Mongoose Bite to rebuild. So basically, with this item you'll have something to do in those GCDs, and we've been told (for whatever that's worth) that at least Explosive Trap will be powerful enough that we'll want to use it, even in single target fights.
Frizzo's Fingertrap - Survival only
Gives you 30 focus every time a trap is triggered. The current (for the last couple seasons, actually) set bonus from PvP gear gives you a very similar bonus, but this one should be much more valuable, since traps supposedly will no longer be just for crowd control, but should be an integral part of your rotation.
Since SV doesn't have any but passive focus regen, this could become fairly valuable, especially when paired with Nesingwary's Trapping Treads, which would end up bringing you from 0-10 focus to 90-100 focus in 2 GCDs.
Not Yet Named - Marksmanship only
"Your Marked Shot always hits your Currently selected target in addition to its normal targets, even if not affected by hunter's mark." This is a deceptively powerful ability, as it at the very least doubles the damage done of your Marked Shot, which is already a fairly powerful ability. If you add in the benefits of using it while target swapping, with the Patient Sniper or Heightened Vulnerability talents, you've created a huge cleave burst, on demand, with no need to rely on Hunter's Mark RNG.
The Shadow Hunter's Voodoo Mask - All Hunters
You heal for 20% of your maximum health every second when you have feigned death. I think it's safe to assume this is one of those abilities blizzard was talking about when they said they wouldn't go live with any legendaries that would render the wearer unkillable. Flavor text on this is a quote from Vol'jin, after he survived Garrosh's assassination attempt: "If dey want to kill me, dey betta' kill me dead. They betta' kill me da first time. They betta' kill me in my sleep."
Even without the "every second" portion of this, it would be fairly powerful to have a 20% heal every 30 seconds. We also have to remember that we'll no longer have our 2 charges of deterrence, but instead will have one charge of Aspect of the Turtle on a 3 minute CD. So any hope of casting Deter then Feign Death to guarantee a return to full health is unfortunately squashed, as we'll have to be much more stingy with our AotT usage.
Roar of the Seven Lions - Beast Mastery only
One thing that continually annoys me about blizzard's cross-expansion game design, is they often will take nerf or take away abilities at the end of an expansion, and then give them back to us as a "reward". This is the surest sign that they're just out of ideas. Anyhow, this belt serves to return (at a greatly nerfed rate) the focus cost reduction we currently have with bestial wrath. When equipped, all abilities cost 20% less focus during Bestial Wrath.
This is important for a fairly focus starved spec like BM. I'm not trying to say this isn't a worthwhile bonus. It just annoys me that we're supposed to get excited about being an ability being nerfed.
War Belt of the Sentinel Army - Marksmanship only
Each enemy you hit with Multi-Shot increases the damage of your next Aimed Shot by 10%, stacking up to 20 times. I don't know how to make clear how awesome this is. Aimed Shot, an ability that does 250% weapon damage, which is buffed by 150% or 175% (depending on talents) almost passively, and which has an extra 15-25% crit chance from our artifact, will now do up to 200% more damage, based on using Multi-shot, an ability which doesn't cost, but builds focus.
You know all those times your raid leader said to focus a target, not to spam AoE? Well forget about it. Spam that AoE until you're at full focus, then dump some Aimed Shots on your priority target for more priority burst than any spec in the game.
This pairs very well with Lone Wolf and the yet-to-be-named legendary which lets you cast Marked Shot without first getting a Hunter's Mark proc.
Helbrine, Rope of the Mist Marauder - Survival only
Based on the tooltip, this doesn't sound like the most exciting ability: "The first time Harpoon hits a target, your damage done to the target is increased by up to 30% for 8 seconds, based on your distance form the target".
"The first time harpoon hits a target" means this isn't really going to be useful for overall damage against a boss, but instead, the purpose of this legendary is to increase your on demand damage to priority adds. The problem is, there's really very little chance that this will be enough to make you better at bursting priority targets than SV's ranged siblings, primarily MM.
There are some fights where there are too many ranged mechanics for priority target bursting, where a melee like SV could thrive with this ability. Primarily I'm thinking of Mythic Gorefiend, where you could harpoon out to the Essences, and harpoon back to finish off a Corrupted Soul (with the added benefit if anyone went into the belly while out of place, giving you the max range harpoon opportunity), or put some burst damage on the big tank add.
Still, I'm not excited about an ability that will encourage me to run away before harpooning toward someone. Depending on how this legendary's ability will scale with distance, that might be the only way to get the most damage out of it.
Not Yet Named - All Hunters
These legendary bracers reduce the cooldown of all Aspects by 50%. This includes for all specs:
BM and SV will both have extra bonuses from this legendary, as both have major offensive CDs that are aspects, Aspect of the Wild and Aspect of the Eagle, respectively.
Qa'pla, Eredun War Order - Beast Mastery only
The tooltip for these boots reads: "Dire Beast reduces the cooldown of Kill Command by 3 seconds". I think it's safe to assume this means each time you cast Dire Beast, not for the duration of Dire Beast. I'm not sure how I feel about this. It's not the most exciting ability, and a lot of BM mechanics are already tied to Dire Beast, but, more Kill Commands is never a bad thing, I suppose.
One of the kind of odd benefits of this, is you'll have an easier time making sure you always can cast 2 Kill Commands during Bestial Wrath (getting the most out of the damage increase), because most of the time, Bestial Wrath will be coming off CD immediately after casting Dire Beast (which reduces the CD of Bestial Wrath by 15 seconds per DB cast). That means, the most CD you'll ever have left on KC after casting Bestial Wrath (assuming you cast it the GCD right after casting DB) will be 1.5 seconds, giving you plenty of time to always get off a second KC during BW.
One of the kind of odd benefits of this, is you'll have an easier time making sure you always can cast 2 Kill Commands during Bestial Wrath (getting the most out of the damage increase), because most of the time, Bestial Wrath will be coming off CD immediately after casting Dire Beast (which reduces the CD of Bestial Wrath by 15 seconds per DB cast). That means, the most CD you'll ever have left on KC after casting Bestial Wrath (assuming you cast it the GCD right after casting DB) will be 1.5 seconds, giving you plenty of time to always get off a second KC during BW.
Not Yet Named - Marksmanship only
Every damaging ability you cast reduces the CD of Trueshot by 1 second. Combined with the Marksmanship 4 piece set bonus (which, as it currently stands, reduces the CD of Trueshot by 1 second for every 20 focus you spend) we'll be seeing a lot of Trueshot usage.
There's not much complexity to this one, and it may feel a bit lackluster since it is incredibly similar to one of our set bonuses, but it should still be a significant DPS increase, and it will give us more opportunity to use Trueshot as needed, instead of using it on CD regardless of phase or priority targets.
The Apex Predator's Claw - All Hunters
This is essentially a watered down version of the current Adaptation talent, giving your pet the passive abilities of tenacity, cunning and ferocity specs. Unfortunately, passive abilities means it's leaving out some the most desirable abilities, like Last Stand, Bullheaded, Roar of Sacrifice and Heart of the Phoenix, which I'm assuming will remain spec only. That's not really a problem, as the only times I would really like to have all of those abilities would be fore extreme soloing. Still, the ring would feel much more "legendary" if it included those on-use abilities as well.
Prydaz, Xavaric's Magnum Opus - All Hunters
This is kind of a weird item, that appears to be usable by all specs (from the datamining, at least). It gives you an absorb shield equal to 30% of your maximum health for 30 seconds, any time you go 5 seconds without taking any damage.
In raiding, a lot of the time when this could be really useful will be during phases where there's too much raid wide damage to ever get the shield up anyway. Though I can imagine some situations where you'll be able to perhaps cheese a soaking-type mechanic by using this and a mild damage reduction. So there could be some points where it's fairly useful.
In raiding, a lot of the time when this could be really useful will be during phases where there's too much raid wide damage to ever get the shield up anyway. Though I can imagine some situations where you'll be able to perhaps cheese a soaking-type mechanic by using this and a mild damage reduction. So there could be some points where it's fairly useful.
I'm also really curious how this will affect PvP. If this is a prevalent item that lots of people have, I imagine it will make DoT classes/specs much more valuable, as if you aren't playing against a dot class, you could hide behind a pillar for a few seconds and get what's essentially equal to a 30% heal.
Roots of Shaladrassil - All Hunters
While standing still, you heal for 5% of your max health every 5 seconds. That's... something. Really, it's hard to care about any healing compared to 20% every second while feigned death. While some passive healing is nice, this is only 1% of max health more than Spirit Bond currently gives us (which will be gone in legion), so like several others, this legendary doesn't exactly feel legendary.
I have one concern about these actually... can we transmog over them?? It'd be SUPER awkward to have just one item out of place like that :x
ReplyDeleteI assume that since we can transmog over the artifact weapons, that we could transmog over these as well. As Blizz would say, so long as your class would normally be able to equip the item =P
DeleteI have some very significant problems with the new paradigm of legendaries coming in Legion. Sure I can list them all, but a little framing is in order before I do. My criticisms will be debateable unless you understand the root of the criticism. To that end, let me define what legendaries are for me.
ReplyDeleteLegendary items are those items that add, modify, or replace a character's ability or function such that their performance with the legendary effect redefines how that character plays (through various mechanisms: raw power, ability modification, rotational priority changes etc., animation changes) and require significant investment in obtaining. It is a clear goal for which you strive and overcome many challenges; the investment being particularly important in developing an emotional value to the item beyond "stat stick."
Lets use the two most familiar (from a playing perspective) legendaries, the Ring and the Cloak. (Analysis will speak from a DPS perspective as we do not have tanking of healing specs, though I think the core framework translates). The cloak didn't alter rotation, but it did have two significant effects. First, the visual pattern that glowed over head and the activation animation were special and instantly translated the idea of a powerful item. Further, the raw dps gained from the cloak which was at times over 20% or more was so significant, you inherently felt more powerful as things in your solo life died much quicker and your position on the meters improved. There were some more minor tweaks to rotation as the cape brought its own cleave potential to each fight allowing for more focused targeting as the cape cleaved small adds etc. Taken as a whole, it felt epic.
The ring, likewise, follows this same path. It has an interesting animation that clearly speaks of power when activated along with a corresponding huge increase in DPS. While we had no control over the cape procc'ing, there is skill involved in maximizing the ring's window of opportunity, which makes the interplay a little more interesting as you figure out ways to best coordinate cd's with the ring and the specific encounter. Though, here the biggest draw back is the on activation for ALL DPS which means 90% of the time, I don't use the ring in raid unless melee is all dead. But all the same, it feels powerful both visually and within my gameplay.
Lets return to the original point. What are my problems with this paradigm:
1) There's absolutely no investment. Randomly dropped items, whether they are farmed at length or just happen to drop, have little to no emotional investment beyond the time dedicated to farming. Kill 10,000 mobs, stumble over a rock which turns out to be a legendary; its all the same, some undefinable # of kills to get a random drop that might be the random legendary you sought. I am not involved in a quest (in the larger sense) to obtain this legendary so I can combat the expansion's challenges and overcome.
contd
2) These effects largely (not all) are pathetically weak compared to previous legendaries. They are slight modifications to existing game play, slight variations. Even more to the point and thumb in the eye, they are bringing back weaker versions of abilities or skills we had removed. How is a weaker version of a CORE ability/function of a class supposed to feel legendary?
Delete3) There will be a limit on the number of "legendaries" you can wear (rising as the expansion progresses). By setting a limit that changes, it clearly implies that these legendaries are not so strong, that the addition of a second or possibly third later in the expansion are tenable. You couldn't, for instance, put the Cape in for early MoP and add the ring for the second half of MoP. These two items are so powerful, that the scaling separation between those without and those with would be so drastic as to effectively making the player with tiers ahead of the same player without.
4) I cannot address the animations and visual appeal of these effects, as I have no alpha access nor desire to search around for possible youtube video. Regardless, are they adding an animation for passive effects like a 1s reduction in cooldown? Are they going to invest enough time and money into making a super cool animation for each of these legendaries that match their status as legendaries?
5) The fact that I am aware that the method of obtaining them is intended to provide incentive for going out into the world, a fairly direct response to Garrisonville criticisms. The participation rates of Apexis daily quests fell dramatically after the initial couple months of the expansion, and in my opinion, the analysis for their failure is flawed. While yes, generally adding incentives to do an activity, results in more participation, and what better incentives can one have than legendary items; I do not think the god aweful apexis gear, outgeared possible blues, and trash items were good incentives the failure lay in the complete lack of anything interesting happening on these quests. The only one I will actually enjoy doing, though I have no reward as incentive, is The Pit because of the entertaining guns, cannons, iron stars, and air strikes that change the experience of slaughter random mobs until bar fills up to. Kill the mobs protecting the largest ammo supplies so I can shoot more things.
In fact, I resent that legendaries were co-opted by random world content to "make me want to play" that content. Rather than design interesting mechanics and story to invest me, they simply randomize drops that I will be obligated to farm.
5) Obligation to farm. While none of these effects are as powerful as the cape and ring have been, they are still very significant upgrades that provide tangible benefits for progression. I resent the dual pressure of needing to farm massive numbers of mobs (which all scale to me, so I cannot simply go to an earlier zone where I can better handle high numbers of mobs) and raid performance should I and another's ability and time availability differ drastically.
6) Randomness. So, we now have to commit (not 100% but largely) to an individual spec. These legendaries are in significant number of cases spec specific. So, assuming we will always get a class specific item, will they automatically be spec specific as well? If not, its conceivable that I can farm thousands a mobs for that slight chance, and when it finally does drop, its the wrong spec? Yeah, I can see how everyone's going to be copasetic about that!
There's more but the dissertation has to end sometimes, before the TL;DR ppl hang me up by my toes!
As for several of your points above: It's going to problematic that these are called "legendary" items. They have almost nothing in common with the last two xpac's legendaries. But they do have a lot in common with the legendary bow from Kil'jaedan. That just freed you from the grind of getting ammo, and was a bit more powerful than other hunter weapons; its relative power was nothing compared to the current fully upgraded rings we have now.
DeleteAnyhow, if you try to think of these as Legendaries as we currently know the term, they'll only be disappointing. That's why I mentioned that these are more like set bonuses. If we can adjust our expectations to more along those lines, instead of comparing them to the cape/ring, then these kind of turn into more interesting items (with the caveat that we can't get them from raiding, and have to rely on miserable rng, which I'll get into below).
Also, these are currently set at only 15 ilvls higher than raid gear, nothing at all like having your legendary being 50-65 ilvls higher than your other gear, as the ring is. This, I think, is further evidence that these aren't at all Legendaries as we currently use the term, but are just a new thing.
Anyhow, I don't mind the farming aspect of it at all. I even like having something to farm / a reason to log in. But I totally agree that content should be compelling for its own sake. I should be out in the world because I want to experience the story and I'm having fun completing challenges. This is just like adding in valor to get people to do dungeons when they were too cheap and/or lazy to just make new dungeons that people would actually want to do (I think this is just more evidence that we're experiencing the end of wow, that Blizz is doing just barely enough to keep the diehards paying, while investing as little as possible in the game).
I feel more excited about a quest that takes 200 hours to complete with a guaranteed way to complete it, than a random drop that takes on average 100 hours to farm. The feeling of progression is what keeps it interesting. If I have no indication that I'm moving toward my goal, then it just feels miserable. It's bad game design.
The current crop of wow devs seems to think that completely random things are more exciting. Which I guess is fine, I mean, if that's what they enjoy. But it is most definitely not what I enjoy.
I'm not sure about the spec thing. I'll ask and see if they only drop for the spec you're playing or not. It would be weird if you got, say, a random SV "legendary" and then felt compelled to play SV because it was then the most powerful spec you had available.
So, we are agreed. The term Legendary is a poor choice. It sets up expectations that aren't realistic. Perhaps it would have been much better to give them a new color and call them Relics! Thus, expectations are free to make up, and they seem powerful enough to be called relics, especially with the flavor some seem to have.
DeleteUnfortunately, then that would mean there's no Legendaries, and the question would be, where are the legendaries? So its a way of removing the need for story, cut scenes, art assets, development to speak to the legendaries! Here's some flavor text, ta-dah!
I think your point about investment is spot on. They are morphing the loot system as much as they can into a diablo-esque system because lots of people find it fun there. But I would argue there is a specific difference between the games and players who play them, that of investment. MMO's and RPG's in general scew to long term plans development investment and reward. There may be chances and wild swings of fortune along the way, but you walk a path to that reward however long. I think the shift in thinking hollows out the gaming experience, because you put it best.
"If I have no indication that I'm moving toward my goal, then it just feels miserable."
Hopefully, the "relics" will drop spec specific (the specific or general all spec ones as a pool). There were initial rumors they weren't even guaranteed to be of your class, though I never saw anything debunking it, I've never seen anything in support either.
I really like that idea. The name relics really fits with how alot of the storytelling is being done for legion, and a lot of the flavor text they have now. It's also what they're calling the artifact weapon upgrade token things, which may be a bit confusing, but i think that would all fit together well, and perhaps they could tie the story of the (so called) "legendaries" in with the artifacts a bit more. (however, that messes up my plans of putting "legendaries" in quotation marks in every post, guide and forum post I do for the entire xpac... :-P )
DeleteI haven't heard at all what the plans are for the artifacts after the first tier. I hope there will be new artifact abilities to unlock, or something interesting. Assuming that we're building it up over the entire xpac, I think that might fill the void left by not having the MoP/WoD style legendaries. And as these weapons all have actual legends associated with them (at least most of them do, a couple are fairly contrived), it would make much more since to call them legendary, and call the new "legendaries" artifacts or relics.
They are not "morphing" anything, legendaries used to be RNG drops before WotLK.. It's not a surprise many find it more exciting to have a potential legendary dropping at any time, than doing a long grind where you will get with 100% certainty the "legendary" sooner or later, nothing exciting about that. I understand that you like the idea that legendaries are for everyone, you just need to put in the "grind" and complete whatever questline, but really, how is it legendary when more or less everyone has it? For me the MoP and WoD legendaries where just a necessary, pretty boring grind, since I always knew i'd get the legendary sooner or later. Sure, I still think the legendary questlines were cool, but it's a small loss considering legendaries becoming as they used to be and even better since you don't need to raid to get a shot for legendaries, but can get them anywhere in the world. Raid or die - days in an MMO is hopefully over, for me a MMO should capitalize on the open world, not closed instances where only raiding matters.
DeleteBest header image ever.
ReplyDelete