Sorry, Blizz doesn't balance based on QQ

Player 1: Blizzard balances around QQ!
Player 2: Blizzard doesn't listen to us!

Q u o t e:
You have been playing both sides (of the opinion pool) regarding many requests for changes for some time now. Its frustrating for you and for many of us. If you dont want to speak like a politician (which you have referenced in past posts) dont play the public opinion card.

The balancing act is obviously an extremely difficult job.

1. Lets accept that class balance for PvP when it comes to this forum (Healing) is at an all time low.

If you mean there are too many paladins and not enough other healers, then we agree.

Q u o t e:
2. Lets agree that by opening up the raiding content to everyone by easing its difficulty level you have increased the number of players who will express their opinions about the state of their class.

We also agree. We also think this is a good thing.

Q u o t e:
3. We all already agree that balancing classes around both Arena and PvE is what creates many of the problems here.

It creates problems, sure. I’m not sure I would argue it is the overwhelming factor though. Many players are worried about, e.g. whether their raid buff merits being invited to a raid, which has no PvP ramifications. Many players want to have more CC or CC breaks, which has very few PvE implications.

Q u o t e:
4. Lets agree that Recount stats and WWS reports dictate how players feel their class stands up against others and that you re-balance spells based off this data. (Dont take this to mean only effective healing/damage numbers)

Players place too much emphasis on this. It’s a tool. Balancing around recount stats is like using a thermometer to predict the weather.

Q u o t e:
5. Lets agree that out of the thousands of posts made to expore ideas for balancing a specific class that only 5-10 posts, made by extremely knowledgeable individuals who have skill at being able to express their ideas in written form, merit your full attention.

I disagree a little. Sometimes the most misinformed, confused players are the ones who will benefit most from a blue post. There are plenty of players who don’t speak English as their first language who may be extremely knowledgeable but can’t express their ideas as clearly as a native speaker. Their posts are not invalid.

Q u o t e:
6. If every so often you made a post which outlines all the core issues the developers are concerned with it might alleviate some of the frustrations players have of trying to pick your brain.

We do, but probably not as often as you would like.

This gets a little bit into the player 2 mindset though (less so this specific post than similar comments in this thread). Usually when players say this they mean “I didn’t like that you responded to that post and I think you should have responded to this other post.” (Many but not all times “this other post” is theirs.) This is why I implore players to not raise a stink about where I post. It's not productive and not really the intent of this forum. When we want to outline the issues we are concerned with, we'll do that. Selfishly, we get a lot more out of player posts than we get from offering a Q&A. I don't mind a Q&A from time to time, but understand that 90% of my motivation to be here is selfish -- it helps us make the game better.

Q u o t e:
I think the majority of posters need to realize that there is a more complicated decision-making process involved in improving a game like WoW than simply looking at pages of angry threads and saying "ok, we'll do this".

Believe it or not, Blizzard eats its own dog food. They understand pretty well how their game works and if 10 million+ players see a problem with something, chances are PRETTY good they do too. Community feedback always happens and is encouraged, but that shouldn't automatically translate to a decision to appease the masses. Blizzard doesn't make changes to shut you up. They make changes to improve the game. If improving the game shuts you up, bonus.

Well said.

Q u o t e:
My recount pretty accurately predicted the weather. Go figure.

Q u o t e:
1. Day is hot. Hot thermometer says day is hot. Predictive value = just fine.

"Hot" is not the weather. That might be all that a particular day brings, but it also might be windy or cloudy. That is weather. The thermometer only tells you temperature. If you watch the thermometer enough and correlate its behavior with other things you experience then you might notice, for example, that the temperature tends to drop before a storm. But its predictive value is still limited. It won’t tell you what the weather will do in 6 hours or a week. Satellite imagery is a very powerful tool for predicting the weather. A thermometer is not (though it is far from useless).

I chose that particular analogy carefully. I did not say recount was useless as a tool – far from it. My suggestion was that it measures one particular thing and it measures it very well. But that one particular thing is not the sum total of “was this guy a good player or not?” Healing in particular has a lot less to do with total amout healed and a lot more to do with who you healed and when. (I love all the healers whose most healed target is... them!). You can heal a lot but ignore decursing. Or heal a lot, but only because you were propped up by mana pots and every Innervate in the raid. Players can top the damage meters but wipe the raid or require excess healing or require too many explanations on a boss fight or cause loot drama or go AFK a lot or offend other good players who might choose to bail on you as a result. Recount (et al.) is a tool. It is not the whole toolbox.

Q u o t e:
Id love to know, why was down ranking removed from healing ? It removed a choice from us that too this day I do not see the point of. Wasn't choosing the right rank of a heal a valid tactic in a healers strategy ? This also affected some classes a lot more than others. If this was for PvP reasons its the single worst healer related choice ever, if it was for PvE reasons I'm sure we would all like to hear what they were.

This requires a long answer, and you can probably find our response from previous posts. The short summary is that it was taking more and more of our development time to balance spells where the new ranks still looked appealing. Early LK beta testers just ignored the new ranks of spells because their mana costs were huge and their spellpower was high enough that the lower base healing on a lower rank was irrelevant to them. The math problem was getting difficult and after many meetings we decided we could better spend our design time on more pressing issues.

Q u o t e:
GM's / raid leader and players put alot of emphasis on this - thats the reality. You say its like predicting the weather, I'd venture to say that a lot of GM's / raid leaders use it to predict (sic) who's getting a raid invite.

I think it’s great if your officers are discussing two players and agree that one is a better choice because her dps is consistently high. I think a raid leader who just invites the 15 highest dps and 8 highest healers with no other considerations may have a rough night.

Q u o t e:
But what are YOU going to do about it? Yes YOU. They pull it out constantly during runs, after fight people get scolded for not doing their best (even if all mobs are dead) - over and over.

It’s a social issue. The player base will eventually figure out the most appropriate way to use it because they will get laughed at enough times if they “do it wrong.” I once had a tank way back in UBRS who kept posting how much damage he had taken as proof of what a good tank he was. I mean I guess I can follow that line of thinking… a little… kind of. (Sorry dude for calling you out in public like this.)

Q u o t e:
You liked the teachers pet, eh.

I know. It’s shocking that we might agree with players who agree with us. :)

Q u o t e:
I will direct one comment back at GC, however: UBRS is NOT Wrath. Think about it. It would actually be perfectly valid for a tank to post giant DPS in Wrath, and in the case of Bears as one example, it is a primary source of threat. Particularly on taunt-immune creatures and bosses. It doesn't take a lot of imagination to see a player being told they have to bring more DPS if they want to tank 'X' encounter. Things have changed...

Sure. My point was that the dude who takes the most damage is not the best tank. The best tank is the person who takes the least damage while still locking the mobs onto them quickly and thoroughly. Standing in the fire is not the sign of a good tank. Ignoring your Shield Block or Barkskin is not the sign of a good tank.

A healer who heals mostly themselves, overheals a lot, runs out of mana, needs to borrow candles, forgets to cleanse and lets the tank die is not a good healer, even if they have the highest number.

The damage-dealer who tops the chart, but pulls aggro, stands in the fire, breaks CC (lolwut?), and argues with all of your strategies is probably not the guy you want in your raid.

But all other things being equal, higher numbers in damage and healing are still better and do have a strong correlation to player gear and skill.

Q u o t e:
Meteorologists primarily note the barometer dropping before a storm, not the thermometer.

That was my point. :) A thermometer can tell you one thing about the weather: the temperature. If you are trying to predict whether it will rain or storm tomorrow based solely on temperature changes your precision and accuracy will be low.

There is no need for us to keep exploring every nuance of this analogy. Like all analogies, it might be able to communicate a complex idea in shorthand, but it is going to have limitations. I just wanted to clarify where I was coming from because there seemed to be some misconceptions that I was saying A) thermometers (and therefore recount) were excellent at predicting the weather, or B) because thermometers cannot predict the weather, they (and recount) are dumb and pointless. Neither extreme is true from my POV.