Being that I am still level 84, I have not yet had the "pleasure" of stepping into Cataclysm's heroics, but if Allison Robert's look at the unbearable suckhood of pugging is anything to go on, I'm not missing much. I can't say I'm all that surprised that in the wake of Blizzard making some pretty significant changes to heroics in Cataclysm--crowd control is necessary, DPS can't be healed through avoidable damage, triage is more important that fast healing, kill order and interrupts are important again--it seems the playerbase has been less than willing to adapt to these changes. Now, we are still in the first few weeks of the expansion's life time, and given time, players might learn and change their ways (especially when their current ways deny them their epic loot). But if Allison's post and other horror stories I have heard from other players and other bloggers are anything to go on, people really aren't do well in adapting to the changes made to heroics in Cataclysm. But does the fault really lie with those who "refuse" to adapt to the times and the demands of a new era? Or might the fault lie elsewhere?
When heroics were introduced in Burning Crusade, they were difficult, and wiping was common. When Wrath of the Lich King came out, that changed. Heroics were not all that difficult, especially as the expansion wore on, and the fact that we kept running heroics long after we outgeared them lead to players developing some pretty bad habits for running them. It was bad enough when Wrath heroics allowed us to ignore kill orders, not interrupt spells, and AoE down trash at the beginning of the expansion; once the emblem system allowed us to get amazing gear without leaving heroics, it was all downhill from there. Runing heroics took the same amount of skill as doing old-world quests for Loremaster; that is to say, it took none, but people still did it, and as a result, they developed some pretty low expectations for how difficult heroics should be. Players who try to run heroics now using the strategies that they used in latter Lich King era heroics are like level-80 players who try doing Cataclysm quest content using the strategies they use to do low-level quests for Loremaster (which, if you've ever killed low level enemies for any reason, you know would end in disaster). I don't know for a fact that those players exist, but if they did, they'd be comparable to today's heroic runners.
But let's look at Wrath's heroic dungeons more closely. You had heroics, which took almost zero effort and a minimal investment of time and awarded great gear, and raiding, which took a great deal of time and effort and award superb gear. Considering that heroics took infinitely less ability and commitment to run and awarded gear that wasn't much worse than what raids awarded, it's no wonder players flocked to them, even those without the skills that are usually necessary to succeed in group content. And when they went there, they obtained gear that trivialized the very content that awarded it, but they kept playing because they liked these shiny epics they could earn. Because of this design, players associated heroics with zero-effort rewards and started playing under the assumption if their zero-effort approach did not yield victory, it meant someone was playing badly, an assumption which hampers their ability to adapt to today's heroics. The expectation of reward for zero effort also keeps players in heroics who have no business expecting to succeed in a cooperative environment, further hindering our efforts. And whose decision was it to design Wrath's heroics to start out easy, become even easier when the gear they awarded trivialized them, and thus create this mess in the first place? Blizzard.
Now let's fast forward to the development stages of Cataclysm. Wrath of the Lich King is coming to a close, and many non-raiders (a category which includes a startlingly large players, if a poll I ran a while ago on my blog is anything to go by) continue running heroics because that is the only thing they have left to entertain themselves, thus further cementing the bad habits they have developed over the course of the expansion pack. Meanwhile, in all of their interviews and press releases, Blizzard makes clear their intention to make heroics challenging again, to make them require crowd control, kill order, interrupts, strategy, etc. They make this clear at BlizzCon, in miscellaneous interviews, and as a result, us players who keep up with WoW news online are well aware going into Cataclysm that things are going to be different, that the strategies we used for old heroics won't work in this new expansion, and that we're going to have to change the way we do things. We knew this, but the players who don't follow WoW news online didn't.
I don't know exactly when I started following WoW news online, but if I had to put a guess to it, the earliest I would be willing to guess is November of 2008. Now, I started playing WoW in September of 2005. That's sixty three months I have been playing, and I have only been following WoW news online for, at the most, twenty five of them. That's less than half of my time spent playing WoW, and it means it took me more than three years to realize that WoW had an online community. Now, I'm sure the community has grown more robust as the game's popularity has grown, meaning someone who started playing after I did would probably have an easier time discovering WoW's online community than I did. But I bring up the duration of the time during which I was oblivious of WoW's online community to illustrate that not every player is privy to the information we often take for granted. For anyone who did not keep track of news about Cataclysm, the sudden rise of difficulty in heroics is something they had no way of anticipating.
So, we have Blizzard creating a situation that leads to players developing really bad habits in heroics, and then doing nothing to convey to players who don't follow news about WoW online that they are increasing the difficulty of heroics come Cataclysm. It's beginning to look like the fault for these players who didn't adjust to Cataclysm's heroics is resting on Blizzard's shoulders. The question is, was it Blizzard's responsibility to prepare players for this change?
Blizzard hasn't exactly been transparent when it comes to information about their game. When they expanded the armory to include a wowhead-like database of items, it was a big break from convention, to say the least. They have put other detailed information, like boss strategies or walkthroughs, on the official website, the kind of thing you would get on other sites. Sure, they'll release general information about the game, like overall descriptions of the classes and zones, but they've never been one for revealing specifics. This is especially the case in-game, where we go into most situations blind without any of the information we take for granted because we know so much information about the game that we acquire online. We may pick up on general patterns that can help us in entirely new situations (such as, one should generally not stand in the fire), but those assumptions are formed in response to general patterns of game design; they do not influence the game design itself. In other words, we know not to stand in the fire because developers usually make fire harmful; they don't make fire harmful because we usually don't stand in it.
What this means for heroics is that just because we players grow accustomed to certain facts in game (fire is bad, heroics don't require strategy) doesn't mean Blizzard owes it to us to keep those facts consistent or to warn us when they change. They can design the game however they like--within reason, of course, or else they'll lose subscribers--and its our responsibility to adapt. Part of that adaptation process is assembling information in online databases with boss strategies, item statistics, etc., which results in websites like wowhead and WoWWiki, as well as blogs that detail changes to the game, like heroics being made more difficult) This is all part of the process of adapting to changes made to the game, and knowing heroics were going to become more difficult by following Cataclysm news was part of that adaptation process. By taking that knowledge for granted, we took our adaptive abilities for granted, but some players haven't learned the process of adaptation as well as others. Those are the players who struggle in heroics now, and while it might not seem fair that we have to suffer for their inability to adapt, that's just the nature of group content.
Showing posts with label Allison Robert. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Allison Robert. Show all posts
Friday, December 24, 2010
Monday, November 8, 2010
Writing as if we are being read
A friend of mine, with my help and guidance, has recently taken up blogging as an outlet for all of the thoughts he has and as a way to tell tales of all of the crazy things that happen in his life. It has been quite enjoyable to help him in this endeavor, if for no other reason than that he is my friend and I enjoy helping for that reason, but is has also reminded me of something that is quite common to see in new blogs. In my own blog, as well as the few blogs I saw in their very early stages, I found that the authors of fledgling blogs often write as if they already have readers, even if they have no reason to think they do. Now, granted in some of the situations where I saw that happen, the authors in question did have reason to think they had readers: Larisa of the Pink Pigtail Inn commented on my first post saying this sounded like the kind of blog she would be interested in reading, my friend has already told a few of his friends (including me) about his blog, and the other blog I saw in its infancy was one written by someone I know through a forum, many of the members of which had told him they'd be interested in reading his blog. However, this is something I have also seen in blogs I discover by finding a post via google, blogs that don't have any comments save for one or two on later posts, yet the authors still write as if they have readers.
I couldn't help but wonder, why is this the case? Why do/did we fledgling bloggers write as if we already have readerships, even if we don't? It could just be a matter of wishful thinking. After all, anyone who writes down their thoughts in a blog wants what they write to be read, even if they only want it on a subconscious level. If that weren't the case, they'd find a less public outlet for their writing. Maybe, since bloggers want to be read, they write as if they are already being read, as if there are already people who are reading what they write, since they want it to be the case. After all, having a readership isn't just about receiving comments, but it's also about knowing that people are reading what you write. Without something like Google analytics or the stats tab at the top of blogger (which kind of kills the illusion I'm about to talk about), it's easy to imagine that there are people reading your blog when there really aren't, and thus it's easy for bloggers to write as if someone is reading what they are writing.
It could also be a practical choice. If someone happens upon a blog by chance, what's going to make them more likely to stay and read what the author has to say: a post that actually acknowledges the reader's existence, or a post lamenting about how the blog has no readers? As Allison Robert of WoW Insider says, "The one unshakeable rule I've learned about blogging in general is this: people hate whining." A blog author whining about not having readers would be no exception, so it's easy to imagine how a post written as if no one is reading the author's blog could turn off potential readers. This might not matter in the early days of a blog when no one is reading what's being written, but this is also an issue of habit. If someone blogs for long enough, they will usually accrue readers somehow, and its easier to keep those readers if you are in the habit of writing posts that are inviting to those who find your blog, rather than posts telling those readers they don't exist.
But why not take the middle ground? Why not neither acknowledge those imaginary readers nor write as if they don't exist? Well, as you can tell by the way I am writing this post (what with asking questions as introductions to my points and all), that's quite hard to do. Though it may be bad form to acknowledge the existence of a reader in formal writing, in blog writing, the existence of a reader is integral to the writing style. It's hard to pin down exactly what constitutes the general style of blog writing, but if a set of guidelines were written up to describe how blog posts can best be written, they would include acknowledging the reader in the post. Perhaps new authors who write as if they already have audiences have picked up on that fact and are just copying what they have noticed on other blogs when writing in their own blog.
In my own case, I think it was a combination of the first and third possibility that made me write as if I had readers when I very well might not have. For those of you who are bloggers, did you engage in this habit too when you started writing? If so, what motivated you to do so?
I couldn't help but wonder, why is this the case? Why do/did we fledgling bloggers write as if we already have readerships, even if we don't? It could just be a matter of wishful thinking. After all, anyone who writes down their thoughts in a blog wants what they write to be read, even if they only want it on a subconscious level. If that weren't the case, they'd find a less public outlet for their writing. Maybe, since bloggers want to be read, they write as if they are already being read, as if there are already people who are reading what they write, since they want it to be the case. After all, having a readership isn't just about receiving comments, but it's also about knowing that people are reading what you write. Without something like Google analytics or the stats tab at the top of blogger (which kind of kills the illusion I'm about to talk about), it's easy to imagine that there are people reading your blog when there really aren't, and thus it's easy for bloggers to write as if someone is reading what they are writing.
It could also be a practical choice. If someone happens upon a blog by chance, what's going to make them more likely to stay and read what the author has to say: a post that actually acknowledges the reader's existence, or a post lamenting about how the blog has no readers? As Allison Robert of WoW Insider says, "The one unshakeable rule I've learned about blogging in general is this: people hate whining." A blog author whining about not having readers would be no exception, so it's easy to imagine how a post written as if no one is reading the author's blog could turn off potential readers. This might not matter in the early days of a blog when no one is reading what's being written, but this is also an issue of habit. If someone blogs for long enough, they will usually accrue readers somehow, and its easier to keep those readers if you are in the habit of writing posts that are inviting to those who find your blog, rather than posts telling those readers they don't exist.
But why not take the middle ground? Why not neither acknowledge those imaginary readers nor write as if they don't exist? Well, as you can tell by the way I am writing this post (what with asking questions as introductions to my points and all), that's quite hard to do. Though it may be bad form to acknowledge the existence of a reader in formal writing, in blog writing, the existence of a reader is integral to the writing style. It's hard to pin down exactly what constitutes the general style of blog writing, but if a set of guidelines were written up to describe how blog posts can best be written, they would include acknowledging the reader in the post. Perhaps new authors who write as if they already have audiences have picked up on that fact and are just copying what they have noticed on other blogs when writing in their own blog.
In my own case, I think it was a combination of the first and third possibility that made me write as if I had readers when I very well might not have. For those of you who are bloggers, did you engage in this habit too when you started writing? If so, what motivated you to do so?
Friday, October 8, 2010
It's so hard to say goodbye: Tree of Life
I thought I'd be over it by now. I thought the pain, the sadness, the grieving would have come to an end, but I just couldn't accept it, and I still haven't. When patch 4.0 hits, I really don't know whether I'll be able to enjoy all of the great new additions, because of one little hitch: Tree of Life. I know the point has long run its course. I know this discussion has been held before, and has probably been done to death in every conceivable venue where it can be discussed. I know that those who don't share the sadness of those who will miss this form will probably roll their eyes at this post. But I can't help it, because this blog is a receptacle for my feelings about WoW, and right now, my feelings are those of sadness at the loss of this form.
You might be wondering, if this blog is just a receptacle for my feelings about WoW, then why do I advertise it as a blog where I look at WoW from a philosophical perspective? I do that because most of my thoughts on this game tend to wax philosophical. But take a look at the subtitle of my blog: "The lengthy ramblings of a World of Warcraft player who happens to be into philosophy." I promise nothing about consistently writing about philosophy, but I try to do that as often as possible, because that's the draw I try to give this blog. But right now, I can't wax philosophical, because the grief I feel about tree form is just too great. I suppose I'm going through the depression stage of grief. I've been through the denial stage ("They would never make a change like that; that's just preposterous, and not at all like our class."), the anger stage ("Gah! Why! Argh!"), and the bargaining stage ("Can't they try to improve Nature's Swiftness? Then we'd have a good cooldown and wouldn't have to lose our form."), and now I'm in the depression stage. Perhaps I can move on to acceptance before patch 4.0 hits. Until then, allow me a bit of catharsis in today's post.
If you're wondering why these emotions are coming out now, you can thank Allison Robert, a writer for WoW Insider, whose recent column about the upcoming changes to druids--which was organized in sections by our forms; i.e., it had a "the bear" section, a "the cat" section--included this heading:
The tree
A moment of silence, please.
And I bowed my head, for I am still sad to see this form go. I don't think my first post on the subject did a good enough job of explaining why I feel this way, but then again, I was probably still in denial back then. Maybe now, now that my kvetching can't do anything to change Blizzard's mind, now that everyone's probably over the subject, now that my self-deprecating introduction is probably getting on your nerves, maybe now I can express why I am sad to see our beloved form go.
For me, it has something to do with the fact that shifting is integral to the druid identity. I might be the only one who reads this deeply into it our class mechanics, but something about the very act of shifting itself is what makes the druid class so special. It may cut us off from many of our abilities, but that's what druids are all about; we sacrifice our utility for the sake of gaining new abilities or empowering abilities we already have. Our identity as the "jack of all trades, master of none" class was one we could only lose (in favor of a "jack of all trades, master of all" identity) because our shifting prevents us from being a master of all; we can only be a master of one thing at a time. That concept, the concept of sacrificing most of our arsenal so that we can fulfill any roll, has been integral to the druid class for ages, and our forms are the visual representation of that concept.
Now, I'm not going to resort to appeal to tradition to make my point, for it is one of the logical fallacies that I find most objectionable. Besides, tradition has nothing to do with my grief over the loss of Tree of Life. No, this is not a matter of tradition; it is a matter of mindset. Perhaps I'm more affected than most because I am a long-time feral druid, but the class design of our class has created a very distinct mindset that I will not assume is universal to all druids, but I'm sure is shared by at least a few. The fact that every one of our specs becomes more viable when we shift into its respective form means that when I shift into an animal form (or plant form, as the case may be), no matter what form it is, it's a way of psyching myself up. It's a way of saying, "I'm ready for battle." Caster form is for non-combat situations--repairing, crafting, transportation, running around Dalaran aimlessly, etc. By shifting into a form, I am saying, "It's time to get serious; it's time to fight."
I can't help but think that Blizzard wanted to encourage that mentality in every druid spec. After all, in ye oldie days of vanilla WoW, feral combat was the only spec with shapeshifting spells. Hurricane was the final talent for balance druids until patch 1.8, and restoration druids didn't get their form until Burning Crusade. But Blizzard intentionally added these forms to specs that once did not have them, leading me to believe that they wanted druids to have the mentality of a shifting class, that they wanted us to equate being in a form to being ready to fight. Granted, Tree of Life had a rocky introduction when it was first introduced as a form with enough drawbacks to make people need to seriously consider whether they would use it or not. That rocky introduction was probably what doomed it to its current fate, for Blizzard wanted us to use the tree, so they removed any and all significant drawbacks for Wrath of the Lich King. This, however, made the tree more of an incidental ability than anything, since all it did now was limit our arsenal to healing spells and some balance spells and give us an aura that increased healing received by raid members; it was something we used because it objectively helped us perform better, but something we weren't all that excited to use.
But Tree of Life form fed into that very druid mentality of "shapeshifting = ready for combat" so well that we probably didn't notice that we were excited to use it, that was, until we were told it was going away. Tree of Life, like every druid form, takes on a life of its own once it is donned by the druid. We druids don't have just one personality like some classes, you see; we have many, and those many personalities come from our forms. They have their own sitting animations, their own lying down animations, their own dances (the bast part by far), and though they may not look better as we get better gear (though I went over ways they could look better as our gear got better long, long ago), they are part of our identity. Again, I don't mean to argue this from the perspective of appeal to tradition; all I mean to say is, Blizzard has made shifting an inexorable part of the druid class, and for them to take away one of our forms now just because they didn't give it better bonuses and make it more useful is to take away part of our identity.
And I really can't help but wonder: why was Moonkin Form spared? I don't mean to say that our balance brothers and sisters should suffer the same horrible fate that resto druids have, but Moonkin Form is in an almost identical situation to the one Tree of Life was in. It locks balance druids out of using half of their spells (their healing spells), gimping their utility, and if it were made into a temporary ability that would increase their damage done, it will fill the current hole in the balance arsenal of a throughput-increasing cooldown. The only difference between Moonkin Form and Tree of Life now is that Moonkin Form has more and better bonuses. Honestly, if that's the only thing that spared Moonkin Form the fate of Tree of Life, then I can't help being angry at Blizzard for letting Tree of Life reach the point where it wasn't exciting enough to keep around as a permanent form. And for their oversight, we have to suffer the loss of our beloved Twist-dancing form.
In short, I see shifting as an integral part of being a druid, as part of the druid mentality, and for Blizzard to change that now just seems unnecessary and callous. Yes, there were complaints about how the form locked us out of our offensive spells, but those could have been addressed by changing the form itself, rather than scrapping it, which was basically throwing the baby out with the bath water. And to all the people who say they get tired of looking at the same form all the time (which, again, could be remedied), if that's how you feel, then you picked the wrong class... sorry.
Well, I'm glad I could work a bit of philosophy into my reasoning for why I'm sad to see Tree of Life go. I don't want this blog to become a cesspool of moaning and complaining, but I couldn't distract myself from this train of thought long enough to write about anything else. Hopefully now I'll be able to return to whatever usually distinguishes the posts on this blog as WoW Philosophized posts. Until then, thanks for bearing with me.
You might be wondering, if this blog is just a receptacle for my feelings about WoW, then why do I advertise it as a blog where I look at WoW from a philosophical perspective? I do that because most of my thoughts on this game tend to wax philosophical. But take a look at the subtitle of my blog: "The lengthy ramblings of a World of Warcraft player who happens to be into philosophy." I promise nothing about consistently writing about philosophy, but I try to do that as often as possible, because that's the draw I try to give this blog. But right now, I can't wax philosophical, because the grief I feel about tree form is just too great. I suppose I'm going through the depression stage of grief. I've been through the denial stage ("They would never make a change like that; that's just preposterous, and not at all like our class."), the anger stage ("Gah! Why! Argh!"), and the bargaining stage ("Can't they try to improve Nature's Swiftness? Then we'd have a good cooldown and wouldn't have to lose our form."), and now I'm in the depression stage. Perhaps I can move on to acceptance before patch 4.0 hits. Until then, allow me a bit of catharsis in today's post.
If you're wondering why these emotions are coming out now, you can thank Allison Robert, a writer for WoW Insider, whose recent column about the upcoming changes to druids--which was organized in sections by our forms; i.e., it had a "the bear" section, a "the cat" section--included this heading:
A moment of silence, please.
And I bowed my head, for I am still sad to see this form go. I don't think my first post on the subject did a good enough job of explaining why I feel this way, but then again, I was probably still in denial back then. Maybe now, now that my kvetching can't do anything to change Blizzard's mind, now that everyone's probably over the subject, now that my self-deprecating introduction is probably getting on your nerves, maybe now I can express why I am sad to see our beloved form go.
For me, it has something to do with the fact that shifting is integral to the druid identity. I might be the only one who reads this deeply into it our class mechanics, but something about the very act of shifting itself is what makes the druid class so special. It may cut us off from many of our abilities, but that's what druids are all about; we sacrifice our utility for the sake of gaining new abilities or empowering abilities we already have. Our identity as the "jack of all trades, master of none" class was one we could only lose (in favor of a "jack of all trades, master of all" identity) because our shifting prevents us from being a master of all; we can only be a master of one thing at a time. That concept, the concept of sacrificing most of our arsenal so that we can fulfill any roll, has been integral to the druid class for ages, and our forms are the visual representation of that concept.
Now, I'm not going to resort to appeal to tradition to make my point, for it is one of the logical fallacies that I find most objectionable. Besides, tradition has nothing to do with my grief over the loss of Tree of Life. No, this is not a matter of tradition; it is a matter of mindset. Perhaps I'm more affected than most because I am a long-time feral druid, but the class design of our class has created a very distinct mindset that I will not assume is universal to all druids, but I'm sure is shared by at least a few. The fact that every one of our specs becomes more viable when we shift into its respective form means that when I shift into an animal form (or plant form, as the case may be), no matter what form it is, it's a way of psyching myself up. It's a way of saying, "I'm ready for battle." Caster form is for non-combat situations--repairing, crafting, transportation, running around Dalaran aimlessly, etc. By shifting into a form, I am saying, "It's time to get serious; it's time to fight."
I can't help but think that Blizzard wanted to encourage that mentality in every druid spec. After all, in ye oldie days of vanilla WoW, feral combat was the only spec with shapeshifting spells. Hurricane was the final talent for balance druids until patch 1.8, and restoration druids didn't get their form until Burning Crusade. But Blizzard intentionally added these forms to specs that once did not have them, leading me to believe that they wanted druids to have the mentality of a shifting class, that they wanted us to equate being in a form to being ready to fight. Granted, Tree of Life had a rocky introduction when it was first introduced as a form with enough drawbacks to make people need to seriously consider whether they would use it or not. That rocky introduction was probably what doomed it to its current fate, for Blizzard wanted us to use the tree, so they removed any and all significant drawbacks for Wrath of the Lich King. This, however, made the tree more of an incidental ability than anything, since all it did now was limit our arsenal to healing spells and some balance spells and give us an aura that increased healing received by raid members; it was something we used because it objectively helped us perform better, but something we weren't all that excited to use.
But Tree of Life form fed into that very druid mentality of "shapeshifting = ready for combat" so well that we probably didn't notice that we were excited to use it, that was, until we were told it was going away. Tree of Life, like every druid form, takes on a life of its own once it is donned by the druid. We druids don't have just one personality like some classes, you see; we have many, and those many personalities come from our forms. They have their own sitting animations, their own lying down animations, their own dances (the bast part by far), and though they may not look better as we get better gear (though I went over ways they could look better as our gear got better long, long ago), they are part of our identity. Again, I don't mean to argue this from the perspective of appeal to tradition; all I mean to say is, Blizzard has made shifting an inexorable part of the druid class, and for them to take away one of our forms now just because they didn't give it better bonuses and make it more useful is to take away part of our identity.
And I really can't help but wonder: why was Moonkin Form spared? I don't mean to say that our balance brothers and sisters should suffer the same horrible fate that resto druids have, but Moonkin Form is in an almost identical situation to the one Tree of Life was in. It locks balance druids out of using half of their spells (their healing spells), gimping their utility, and if it were made into a temporary ability that would increase their damage done, it will fill the current hole in the balance arsenal of a throughput-increasing cooldown. The only difference between Moonkin Form and Tree of Life now is that Moonkin Form has more and better bonuses. Honestly, if that's the only thing that spared Moonkin Form the fate of Tree of Life, then I can't help being angry at Blizzard for letting Tree of Life reach the point where it wasn't exciting enough to keep around as a permanent form. And for their oversight, we have to suffer the loss of our beloved Twist-dancing form.
In short, I see shifting as an integral part of being a druid, as part of the druid mentality, and for Blizzard to change that now just seems unnecessary and callous. Yes, there were complaints about how the form locked us out of our offensive spells, but those could have been addressed by changing the form itself, rather than scrapping it, which was basically throwing the baby out with the bath water. And to all the people who say they get tired of looking at the same form all the time (which, again, could be remedied), if that's how you feel, then you picked the wrong class... sorry.
Well, I'm glad I could work a bit of philosophy into my reasoning for why I'm sad to see Tree of Life go. I don't want this blog to become a cesspool of moaning and complaining, but I couldn't distract myself from this train of thought long enough to write about anything else. Hopefully now I'll be able to return to whatever usually distinguishes the posts on this blog as WoW Philosophized posts. Until then, thanks for bearing with me.
Friday, October 23, 2009
My take on "The disappearance of the bear"
There was recently a post of Shifting Perspectives, wow.com's weekly druid column, in which Allison Robert discussed the reasons that bear form druids are underplayed brought up in a thread on the official forums. You can find the post here, and it's an interesting read. It also depressed me badly, because most of the reasons are true, though some are more relevant than others. Being a druid tank myself, I thought I'd give my thoughts on the reasons listed. All of these complaints and the accompanying quotes are taken verbatim from Allison's post; they are not my own creations. The one exception is when I replace words to make them more child friendly, in case any kids are reading this.
Complaint #1: Bears just aren't as visually compelling as other tanks.
"If I'm going to tank, I don't want to stare at a bear [butt] all the time, especially a LARGE bear [butt] that takes up half the screen."
WoW is a very visual game, but I am surprised that players actually have time to look at their characters during raids. With all of the enemies that need to be kept track of, the difficulty of positioning them correctly, and all of the numbers flying across the screen, I wasn't even aware my bear had a butt. That said, the essence of this complaint was about the unchanging bear model and the lackluster animations of bear abilities. I have already gone over ideas of how to make bear form scale with gear in this post, so I'll let you read that if you are interested. I suppose I am biased in this issue, since any dedicated druid will have long given up on their forms being as cool as other people's armor. Like I said, though, time spent in combat leaves little time for admiring your character's shiny gear, and if you really want to see the gear, you can spend time out of combat in caster form. (Doing this also allows you to take advantage of Furor.) Armor is cool, but there is plenty of time for admiring it when you are going from place to place on a mount or waiting between a wipe and the next pull. These times are much more appropriate for thinking about how cool your armor is than during battle. The same goes for animations, which seems to be such a petty complaint to me. Sure, they may not look cool, but all abilities end up looking stale when you use them long enough. I think this is just a case of people trying to come up with a justification for why they think bears aren't fun to play and making one up.
Complaint #2: Gear consolidation had a more demoralizing effect on druids than other tanks. "In BC the tanks talked the drops over and took care of each other. Now I'm fighting half the raid for gear while the other tanks get everything handed to them. That's not fun."
This is a more reasonable complaint. The short version of it is that plate tank gear is plate tank gear, no if's, and's, or but's, but we druids need to share our tanking gear with our kitty and rogue compatriots. This is a result of the gear consolidation of Wrath of the Lich King that made more classes able to use the same gear, which reduced the incidences of unused drops, but had the unfortunate effect of increasing competition for us druids. Now we need to compete with DPS for our tanking gear, and I will admit, that does make it harder to gear up.
The heart of this issue lies in the fact that the three other tanks have their own separate gear from other classes, but we druids, as leather wearers, don't. It would be unreasonable to expect Blizzard to give us unique itemization again, since that doesn't fit in with their new design philosophy, but where can the happy medium be found? Perhaps if Blizzard made more leather armor with high amounts of stamina and less agility, it would mark it as tank gear without making it useless to rogues and kitties. This would allow bears to have a sense of which gear was all their own and which gear the rogues and kitties should get first dibs on. Perhaps this gear could also be more likely to have +hit or +expertise than other gear, in order to make it more like tank gear and less appealing to a rogue, who are also looking for +haste and +armor penetration on their gear (though they won't be looking for armor penetration after the expansion hits). At this point, its uncertain how reforging will affect the way gear is distributed, so any sort of change to the system will need to wait until after Cataclysm hits.
Complaint #3: The need to use DPS leather has resulted in an uncomfortable opportunity cost associated with gearing bear tanks.
"My raid leader's a rogue, and he's sick of sitting around waiting for me to get my stuff. We're going for hard-mode Jaraxxus-25 this week and his three options are a warrior, a death knight, and me. Guess who'll be coming as resto?"
The essence of this complaint is that DPS are bitter about bears taking their gear, and that it takes longer for bears to gear up because they are competing with so many other people. Allison downplays this issue as one that solves itself with time, but I think it's an unreasonable one because we should only be competing with rogues and kitties for our gear. The article mentions competing with hunters and warriors for our drops, but they should be rolling on mail and plate, respectively, and not our leather. Why? Because allowing them to have the same priority for leather that we do gives them an unfair advantage in getting gear. It allows them to role on gear that is below their tier, but we can't role on gear that is above ours. If a warrior can role on plate, mail, and leather, but a druid can only role on leather, then it is unfair to let the warrior role on gear outside of his armor type. In short, a druid should never need to compete with a hunter or plate wearer for gear.
That said, what about the fact that we do still need to share our gear with rogues and cats? Like I said in my response to the last complaint, this would be less of an issue if there was clearer itemization for tank leather and DPS leather, so these two complaints could be solved together. Until then, its a legitimate concern, more so than Allison makes it out to be.
Complaint #4: Early Wrath weaknesses in 5-mans left a bad impression on players, and this bled through to raid content.
"Who's your least favorite tank to heal and why?" "My least favorite in a 5 man is a druid. It's not their fault and I still love them to pieces but they have the biggest challenge for maintaining aggro on groups. In a Pug situation, I will outright decline if the tank is a druid."
The issues of balance have been solved since Wrath was launched, but the damage has been done. Not only have players lost trust in the druid class as a tanking class, but I'm sure many bears started going to raids as boomkin, cats, or trees, thus falling behind in their tank gear. As such, their tank set is probably woefully outdated, making them unable to hop back into taking easily if they haven't been tanking through the new content. More on this with complaints seven and eight.
The real issue here, though, is the general perception of tanks, and the fact that old prejudices die hard. It probably won't be until Cataclysm is released that players are willing to rethink how they think about druid tanks, and like it or not, we are stuck with the existing perceptions.
Complaint #5: Bear gameplay is boring. Too much of the bear's effectiveness is baked into talents rather than being determined by player skill.
"I wore the letter off my Swipe hotkey."
Like Allison said, this is mostly an excuse written by people who don't actually play a bear tank, but its still a legitimate point. We druids have a ton of abilities open to us, but we can only use one fourth of them in bear form. It would be nice to see some variety, but the problem is in shifting out of bear form to use our other abilities. Yes, we have rebirth, innervate, cyclone, and other awesome abilities, but we can't shift out of bear form to use them.
Perhaps Barkskin could be the key to this problem. As it stands, Barkskin doesn't reduce damage by enough in order to use it to shift out of bear form, but what if it did? What if the talent Protector of the Pack was edited to include something like this:
Also, when Barkskin is used in bear form, it causes 33/66/100% of the bonuses you receive to your damage taken and threat to apply to your caster form as well.
This would allow you to pop barkskin and rebirth a fallen healer or innervate a caster. A talent like this would really go far in making druids closer to their nature. After all, we are masters of shifting, and it seems quite un-druidic to stay in one form for the whole battle.
Complaint #6: Gear consolidation often results in druids looking insanely stupid in caster form.
Allie: (In Ulduar), all of the non-set melee leather was oriented toward rogue tier, which had the effect of making druid (tanks) look like a postmodern clown on the run from Cirque du Soleil. Matt Rossi: Druids look like they got into the craft bin at the local thrift shop.
I suppose if I'm going to call complaint #1 bogus then I need to acknowledge this one as legit. I don't really look at my armor very often, personally, but I will agree that the druid set pieces look very different from the rogue pieces. This problem could be addressed if Blizzard took my advice concerning complaint #2 and then made the tank-oriented pieces look more druidish, while making the DPS-oriented pieces look more roguish. Its a simple complaint, really, so I don't think it warrants much thought.
Complaint #7: If the raid needs more tanks, it's easier and faster to gear up a plate class than a druid. "The plate +defense gear's been going to offspec for weeks, but the hunters get dibs on the next Twin's Pact or Hellion Glaive, and the rogues are still rolling on non-set. We need another tank, but they'll just respec one of the death knights for the next boss."
This is closely intertwined with complaints #2 and #3, and perhaps my suggestion for solving complaint two would address this as well, but the essence of this complaint is in the fact that plate wearers can easily build an off-set for tanking by picking up unneeded drops in raids, whereas druids do not have that option. Thus plate-wearers are more likely to be taken when an extra tank is needed. That said, if you are DPS'ing and are picking up a tank set in your spare time, what are you doing complaining about not being able to tank? I find DPS'ing to be more stress-free and more enjoyable than tanking, so why are DPS druids worried about being picked to tank? This complaint only applies to DPS who are picked as extra tanks, but I personally would not want that role if I were lucky enough to be a permanent DPS.
Complaint #8: A druid who's dual-specced into healing or DPS has more difficulty returning to tanking than other classes.
"Look, I know you really want to tank this fight, but all three of our tanks have excellent attendance and I don't want to leave any of you out of the raid. The warrior's going to tank, the pally's going DPS, and I'd like to have you come boomkin or heals because melee sucks on this fight. Would you seriously rather be benched?"
The essence of this complaint is that druids can be every role in the game, and the pressure to fill those roles tends to squeeze us out of the tank slot. As Allison says, its the classic druid dilemma of "do I change my spec to fit around the group, or do I force the group to fit around me?" and most people will do the former. That, after all, is the greatest strength of the druid class; to be able to fit yourself around the group. Warriors and Death Knights, the two most popular tanking classes currently, both can only be tanks and DPS, but paladins and druids, the classes that are currently lacking representation in the tanking community, can be healers as well, another in-demand role. Because healing leather is much easier to pick up than tank leather, it's not unreasonable to expect a druid to be able to pick up a healing set in a quick amount of time (it happened to me), thus forcing that avenue open for him, making him less likely to be picked as a tank.
Unfortunately, this it just par for the course when it comes to druids. Because we can fill any role in the game, we will be expected to, and considering that it is easier for us to gear up for healing or DPSing than tanking, and it's easier for plate wearers to gear up for tanking than it is for us to do so, I guess that's going to be our lot in life. Because of dual specs, its harder for us to put our foot down and say that we will only fulfill one role. Perhaps if Blizzard can solve the issues above and make tanking more lucrative for Druids, this issue will solve itself.
Until then, I will wear my tank gear with pride, for tanking is the role I am best suited for, and I will not let circumstance push me out of that role. I hope other feral tanks make similar commitments, for considering how far we have come as a class, we cannot let ourselves die out. It took a long time for us to become viable in all four roles (tanking, melee DPS, ranged DPS, healer), and we cannot let our victory become our demise.
Complaint #1: Bears just aren't as visually compelling as other tanks.
"If I'm going to tank, I don't want to stare at a bear [butt] all the time, especially a LARGE bear [butt] that takes up half the screen."
WoW is a very visual game, but I am surprised that players actually have time to look at their characters during raids. With all of the enemies that need to be kept track of, the difficulty of positioning them correctly, and all of the numbers flying across the screen, I wasn't even aware my bear had a butt. That said, the essence of this complaint was about the unchanging bear model and the lackluster animations of bear abilities. I have already gone over ideas of how to make bear form scale with gear in this post, so I'll let you read that if you are interested. I suppose I am biased in this issue, since any dedicated druid will have long given up on their forms being as cool as other people's armor. Like I said, though, time spent in combat leaves little time for admiring your character's shiny gear, and if you really want to see the gear, you can spend time out of combat in caster form. (Doing this also allows you to take advantage of Furor.) Armor is cool, but there is plenty of time for admiring it when you are going from place to place on a mount or waiting between a wipe and the next pull. These times are much more appropriate for thinking about how cool your armor is than during battle. The same goes for animations, which seems to be such a petty complaint to me. Sure, they may not look cool, but all abilities end up looking stale when you use them long enough. I think this is just a case of people trying to come up with a justification for why they think bears aren't fun to play and making one up.
Complaint #2: Gear consolidation had a more demoralizing effect on druids than other tanks. "In BC the tanks talked the drops over and took care of each other. Now I'm fighting half the raid for gear while the other tanks get everything handed to them. That's not fun."
This is a more reasonable complaint. The short version of it is that plate tank gear is plate tank gear, no if's, and's, or but's, but we druids need to share our tanking gear with our kitty and rogue compatriots. This is a result of the gear consolidation of Wrath of the Lich King that made more classes able to use the same gear, which reduced the incidences of unused drops, but had the unfortunate effect of increasing competition for us druids. Now we need to compete with DPS for our tanking gear, and I will admit, that does make it harder to gear up.
The heart of this issue lies in the fact that the three other tanks have their own separate gear from other classes, but we druids, as leather wearers, don't. It would be unreasonable to expect Blizzard to give us unique itemization again, since that doesn't fit in with their new design philosophy, but where can the happy medium be found? Perhaps if Blizzard made more leather armor with high amounts of stamina and less agility, it would mark it as tank gear without making it useless to rogues and kitties. This would allow bears to have a sense of which gear was all their own and which gear the rogues and kitties should get first dibs on. Perhaps this gear could also be more likely to have +hit or +expertise than other gear, in order to make it more like tank gear and less appealing to a rogue, who are also looking for +haste and +armor penetration on their gear (though they won't be looking for armor penetration after the expansion hits). At this point, its uncertain how reforging will affect the way gear is distributed, so any sort of change to the system will need to wait until after Cataclysm hits.
Complaint #3: The need to use DPS leather has resulted in an uncomfortable opportunity cost associated with gearing bear tanks.
"My raid leader's a rogue, and he's sick of sitting around waiting for me to get my stuff. We're going for hard-mode Jaraxxus-25 this week and his three options are a warrior, a death knight, and me. Guess who'll be coming as resto?"
The essence of this complaint is that DPS are bitter about bears taking their gear, and that it takes longer for bears to gear up because they are competing with so many other people. Allison downplays this issue as one that solves itself with time, but I think it's an unreasonable one because we should only be competing with rogues and kitties for our gear. The article mentions competing with hunters and warriors for our drops, but they should be rolling on mail and plate, respectively, and not our leather. Why? Because allowing them to have the same priority for leather that we do gives them an unfair advantage in getting gear. It allows them to role on gear that is below their tier, but we can't role on gear that is above ours. If a warrior can role on plate, mail, and leather, but a druid can only role on leather, then it is unfair to let the warrior role on gear outside of his armor type. In short, a druid should never need to compete with a hunter or plate wearer for gear.
That said, what about the fact that we do still need to share our gear with rogues and cats? Like I said in my response to the last complaint, this would be less of an issue if there was clearer itemization for tank leather and DPS leather, so these two complaints could be solved together. Until then, its a legitimate concern, more so than Allison makes it out to be.
Complaint #4: Early Wrath weaknesses in 5-mans left a bad impression on players, and this bled through to raid content.
"Who's your least favorite tank to heal and why?" "My least favorite in a 5 man is a druid. It's not their fault and I still love them to pieces but they have the biggest challenge for maintaining aggro on groups. In a Pug situation, I will outright decline if the tank is a druid."
The issues of balance have been solved since Wrath was launched, but the damage has been done. Not only have players lost trust in the druid class as a tanking class, but I'm sure many bears started going to raids as boomkin, cats, or trees, thus falling behind in their tank gear. As such, their tank set is probably woefully outdated, making them unable to hop back into taking easily if they haven't been tanking through the new content. More on this with complaints seven and eight.
The real issue here, though, is the general perception of tanks, and the fact that old prejudices die hard. It probably won't be until Cataclysm is released that players are willing to rethink how they think about druid tanks, and like it or not, we are stuck with the existing perceptions.
Complaint #5: Bear gameplay is boring. Too much of the bear's effectiveness is baked into talents rather than being determined by player skill.
"I wore the letter off my Swipe hotkey."
Like Allison said, this is mostly an excuse written by people who don't actually play a bear tank, but its still a legitimate point. We druids have a ton of abilities open to us, but we can only use one fourth of them in bear form. It would be nice to see some variety, but the problem is in shifting out of bear form to use our other abilities. Yes, we have rebirth, innervate, cyclone, and other awesome abilities, but we can't shift out of bear form to use them.
Perhaps Barkskin could be the key to this problem. As it stands, Barkskin doesn't reduce damage by enough in order to use it to shift out of bear form, but what if it did? What if the talent Protector of the Pack was edited to include something like this:
Also, when Barkskin is used in bear form, it causes 33/66/100% of the bonuses you receive to your damage taken and threat to apply to your caster form as well.
This would allow you to pop barkskin and rebirth a fallen healer or innervate a caster. A talent like this would really go far in making druids closer to their nature. After all, we are masters of shifting, and it seems quite un-druidic to stay in one form for the whole battle.
Complaint #6: Gear consolidation often results in druids looking insanely stupid in caster form.
Allie: (In Ulduar), all of the non-set melee leather was oriented toward rogue tier, which had the effect of making druid (tanks) look like a postmodern clown on the run from Cirque du Soleil. Matt Rossi: Druids look like they got into the craft bin at the local thrift shop.
I suppose if I'm going to call complaint #1 bogus then I need to acknowledge this one as legit. I don't really look at my armor very often, personally, but I will agree that the druid set pieces look very different from the rogue pieces. This problem could be addressed if Blizzard took my advice concerning complaint #2 and then made the tank-oriented pieces look more druidish, while making the DPS-oriented pieces look more roguish. Its a simple complaint, really, so I don't think it warrants much thought.
Complaint #7: If the raid needs more tanks, it's easier and faster to gear up a plate class than a druid. "The plate +defense gear's been going to offspec for weeks, but the hunters get dibs on the next Twin's Pact or Hellion Glaive, and the rogues are still rolling on non-set. We need another tank, but they'll just respec one of the death knights for the next boss."
This is closely intertwined with complaints #2 and #3, and perhaps my suggestion for solving complaint two would address this as well, but the essence of this complaint is in the fact that plate wearers can easily build an off-set for tanking by picking up unneeded drops in raids, whereas druids do not have that option. Thus plate-wearers are more likely to be taken when an extra tank is needed. That said, if you are DPS'ing and are picking up a tank set in your spare time, what are you doing complaining about not being able to tank? I find DPS'ing to be more stress-free and more enjoyable than tanking, so why are DPS druids worried about being picked to tank? This complaint only applies to DPS who are picked as extra tanks, but I personally would not want that role if I were lucky enough to be a permanent DPS.
Complaint #8: A druid who's dual-specced into healing or DPS has more difficulty returning to tanking than other classes.
"Look, I know you really want to tank this fight, but all three of our tanks have excellent attendance and I don't want to leave any of you out of the raid. The warrior's going to tank, the pally's going DPS, and I'd like to have you come boomkin or heals because melee sucks on this fight. Would you seriously rather be benched?"
The essence of this complaint is that druids can be every role in the game, and the pressure to fill those roles tends to squeeze us out of the tank slot. As Allison says, its the classic druid dilemma of "do I change my spec to fit around the group, or do I force the group to fit around me?" and most people will do the former. That, after all, is the greatest strength of the druid class; to be able to fit yourself around the group. Warriors and Death Knights, the two most popular tanking classes currently, both can only be tanks and DPS, but paladins and druids, the classes that are currently lacking representation in the tanking community, can be healers as well, another in-demand role. Because healing leather is much easier to pick up than tank leather, it's not unreasonable to expect a druid to be able to pick up a healing set in a quick amount of time (it happened to me), thus forcing that avenue open for him, making him less likely to be picked as a tank.
Unfortunately, this it just par for the course when it comes to druids. Because we can fill any role in the game, we will be expected to, and considering that it is easier for us to gear up for healing or DPSing than tanking, and it's easier for plate wearers to gear up for tanking than it is for us to do so, I guess that's going to be our lot in life. Because of dual specs, its harder for us to put our foot down and say that we will only fulfill one role. Perhaps if Blizzard can solve the issues above and make tanking more lucrative for Druids, this issue will solve itself.
Until then, I will wear my tank gear with pride, for tanking is the role I am best suited for, and I will not let circumstance push me out of that role. I hope other feral tanks make similar commitments, for considering how far we have come as a class, we cannot let ourselves die out. It took a long time for us to become viable in all four roles (tanking, melee DPS, ranged DPS, healer), and we cannot let our victory become our demise.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Ideas on how to make the new cat/bear forms scale with gear
One of the biggest complaints of the druid community has been that, while everyone else gets to see their characters look more and more awesome as they progress through content, us druids are left looking at the same old animal forms. It wasn't too bad back in the days of vanilla WoW, when the only way druids could contribute to raids was to heal and Tree of Life didn't exist. Since we spent all our time healing, we spent all our time in caster form, so we got to see our armor change like everyone else. Fast forward to BC, and there was a shapeshifting form for every spec. Sure, there were Dreamstate healers who healed in caster form with healing touch, but for the most part, every druid spent most of his or her time in a shapeshifting form. It was here that boredom began to creep in, as everyone was getting decked out in their T4, 5, and 6 armor and we looked exactly as we had since level 10/20/40/50 (bear/cat/moonkin/tree, respectively).
The new forms that we are getting in patch 3.2 will certainly help to alleviate our boredom with our current forms, but Blizzard still has not unveiled any plans to make our forms change as we get better armor. Some may question the necessity of such a system, but I doubt that there are many non-druids out there who would be happy with their armor never changing on a cosmetic level. If they get to see their character become progressively more cool as they get better armor, why shouldn't we?
There was an entry of wow.com's Shifting Perspectives column that detailed the issues that such a system would create. (I ♥ Allison Robert, by the way.) According to that post, there could only be two systems for druid forms to scale with gear: the first is that our forms would improve as we got better gear (or from some other indicator), and they would continue to improve as our gear got better, getting more and more cool as we went through the various expansions. The other system is that we would start over with the most basic versions of our forms every time an expansion came out, meaning if you had all best-in-slot gear and had the best druid form, when the next expansion came out, you would start from square one. The first system presents the problem of creating more work for the art department. It also presents the issue of how the art department can keep expanding on our forms. To paraphrase the article, after they've added as many symbols as they can, how else will they change our forms? Adding more bands? gems? tufts of hair? rockets? As for the second option, if we simply started over with our most basic form every time we started a new expansion, druids would eventually get tired of progressing through the same cycle of changes to our forms.
So how can we scale our forms with our gear? How can we druids show off just how phat our loot really is? I personally think that the idea of coming up with a new set of druid form artwork with each expansion isn't that bad of an idea. (Sorry, Allison.) That said, I don't think they should completely revamp our forms with each expansion. Rather, Blizzard could keep the basics like colors and models the same and simply change the details. Specifically, they could change the symbols above the front legs and the necklaces.
Currently, the symbols on bear form are a circle with a dot in the middle and an arc under it. It is the same on cat form minus the circle. I think that cat and bears still leveling in Azeroth could keep this symbol, and new symbols could be given the druids who are mostly decked out in gear from one of the other continents. Perhaps a crack to represent Outland's fragmented structure and an ice crystal for the frozen wastes of Northrend. If the next expansion ends up being the Maelstrom as people suspect, we could get a whirlpool design. You may think that this kind of theme-based symbol design may be somewhat cliché, but since druids are masters of nature, it's not unreasonable to expect their forms to mimic the world they inhabit in some way.
(Edit: Since I wrote this, the next expansion has been confirmed to be taking place in a sundered Azeroth. A crack would probably better represent that level of gear than Outland gear.)
I also think the symbol could change color to reflect the quality of the gear the druid is wearing. Due to the eclectic nature of vanilla WoW gear, this may not be practicable for pre-60 druids, but once they get to Outland, I think this would be rather easy to implement. After all, in both Outland and Northrend, the lowest level blue-quality gear tends to be just a smidgen better than the equivalent highest-level green gear. Thus Blizzard could set up a scale by which the symbol gets brighter as the average ilevel of the druid's gear increases. The symbol could also change color as the druid moves from mostly greens to mostly blues to mostly purples. Since the same shade of green that would look good on the white cat model would probably not look good on the black cat model, Blizzard would probably need to come up with different shades of greens, blues, and purples for the different models. The symbols could change their design based on which level of content the majority of the druid's gear comes from: mostly Outland gear would be a crack, mostly Northrend gear would be an ice crystal. The symbol could also keep its brightness relative to the content it comes from, so someone in the best Outland gear possible would keep a bright purple crack until they upgrade to Northrend blues and get a blue ice crystal.
As for the necklaces, because they are a more subtle feature of the design, they could simply be designed after the kind of trinkets (in the sense of tchotchkes, not equipment) the druid would pick up in their respective continents. Perhaps burning legion paraphernalia in Outland or Vrykul artifacts in Northrend. The necklaces could then simply become more detailed as the average ilevel of the druid's gear increased. Perhaps more gems could be added or certain parts made bigger.
These are just some ideas. I do not think it would be very hard to implement something like this in the game. However, after looking at the same cat for at least three years, I'm happy with the changes we are getting and promise not to complain for at least another expansion pack.
The new forms that we are getting in patch 3.2 will certainly help to alleviate our boredom with our current forms, but Blizzard still has not unveiled any plans to make our forms change as we get better armor. Some may question the necessity of such a system, but I doubt that there are many non-druids out there who would be happy with their armor never changing on a cosmetic level. If they get to see their character become progressively more cool as they get better armor, why shouldn't we?
There was an entry of wow.com's Shifting Perspectives column that detailed the issues that such a system would create. (I ♥ Allison Robert, by the way.) According to that post, there could only be two systems for druid forms to scale with gear: the first is that our forms would improve as we got better gear (or from some other indicator), and they would continue to improve as our gear got better, getting more and more cool as we went through the various expansions. The other system is that we would start over with the most basic versions of our forms every time an expansion came out, meaning if you had all best-in-slot gear and had the best druid form, when the next expansion came out, you would start from square one. The first system presents the problem of creating more work for the art department. It also presents the issue of how the art department can keep expanding on our forms. To paraphrase the article, after they've added as many symbols as they can, how else will they change our forms? Adding more bands? gems? tufts of hair? rockets? As for the second option, if we simply started over with our most basic form every time we started a new expansion, druids would eventually get tired of progressing through the same cycle of changes to our forms.
So how can we scale our forms with our gear? How can we druids show off just how phat our loot really is? I personally think that the idea of coming up with a new set of druid form artwork with each expansion isn't that bad of an idea. (Sorry, Allison.) That said, I don't think they should completely revamp our forms with each expansion. Rather, Blizzard could keep the basics like colors and models the same and simply change the details. Specifically, they could change the symbols above the front legs and the necklaces.
Currently, the symbols on bear form are a circle with a dot in the middle and an arc under it. It is the same on cat form minus the circle. I think that cat and bears still leveling in Azeroth could keep this symbol, and new symbols could be given the druids who are mostly decked out in gear from one of the other continents. Perhaps a crack to represent Outland's fragmented structure and an ice crystal for the frozen wastes of Northrend. If the next expansion ends up being the Maelstrom as people suspect, we could get a whirlpool design. You may think that this kind of theme-based symbol design may be somewhat cliché, but since druids are masters of nature, it's not unreasonable to expect their forms to mimic the world they inhabit in some way.
(Edit: Since I wrote this, the next expansion has been confirmed to be taking place in a sundered Azeroth. A crack would probably better represent that level of gear than Outland gear.)
I also think the symbol could change color to reflect the quality of the gear the druid is wearing. Due to the eclectic nature of vanilla WoW gear, this may not be practicable for pre-60 druids, but once they get to Outland, I think this would be rather easy to implement. After all, in both Outland and Northrend, the lowest level blue-quality gear tends to be just a smidgen better than the equivalent highest-level green gear. Thus Blizzard could set up a scale by which the symbol gets brighter as the average ilevel of the druid's gear increases. The symbol could also change color as the druid moves from mostly greens to mostly blues to mostly purples. Since the same shade of green that would look good on the white cat model would probably not look good on the black cat model, Blizzard would probably need to come up with different shades of greens, blues, and purples for the different models. The symbols could change their design based on which level of content the majority of the druid's gear comes from: mostly Outland gear would be a crack, mostly Northrend gear would be an ice crystal. The symbol could also keep its brightness relative to the content it comes from, so someone in the best Outland gear possible would keep a bright purple crack until they upgrade to Northrend blues and get a blue ice crystal.
As for the necklaces, because they are a more subtle feature of the design, they could simply be designed after the kind of trinkets (in the sense of tchotchkes, not equipment) the druid would pick up in their respective continents. Perhaps burning legion paraphernalia in Outland or Vrykul artifacts in Northrend. The necklaces could then simply become more detailed as the average ilevel of the druid's gear increased. Perhaps more gems could be added or certain parts made bigger.
These are just some ideas. I do not think it would be very hard to implement something like this in the game. However, after looking at the same cat for at least three years, I'm happy with the changes we are getting and promise not to complain for at least another expansion pack.
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