Advertisement
Dual talent specs in next WOW update? News
MMO PC News by Oli Welsh
Blizzard has said that the ability for World of Warcraft players to switch between two concurrent character builds, or "talent specs", could arrive in the next major content update.
A Blizzard poster on the official forums said: "We hope to have this done for the next major content patch, but it's a big feature and takes some time."
In WOW, talents are a layer of character customisation that typically takes every character class down one of three paths. For instance, a Druid can be configured for healing, magical damage, or physical damage and tanking.
At present, you can only have one talent build at a time, and changing builds by reallocating all your talent points is time-consuming and expensive in in-game currency.
The new feature will allow players to create two builds to switch between. The post reveals that this will be possible away from cities as well as in them, but that this will be more difficult.
"It will be trivial to do in town. You will also be able to do it out of towns, but not as trivially," said the Blizzard poster.
It will also allow the player to switch between pre-set action bars and Glyphs (spell customisations) automatically when switching between specs.
It's a major change to WOW that will greatly increase the flexibility of all character classes, and make it much easier to compose balanced groups for taking on the game's dungeons.
Also coming in the next content patch will be a new raid dungeon for 10 or 25 players, called Ulduar. The post says it "will be more difficult" than the current raids, which have been criticised for not challenging the most dedicated raiding guilds.
Advertisement
Are you excited about World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King on PC?
View Eurogamer readers most anticipated games
Thanks!
Related Games
World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade
World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King
Latest Features
-
World of Warcraft Interview [47]
-
World of Warcraft Review [120]
-
World of Warcraft Hands On [22]
-
World of Warcraft Interview [4]
-
World of Warcraft Interview [13]
Latest Videos
World of Warcraft: Call of the Crusade [1] 5 August, 2009
World of Warcraft - Ulduar [4] 14 April, 2009
Latest News
-
Blizzard on 15 years of Warcraft, 5 of WOW [41]
-
BlizzCon moving to Vegas in July? [2]
-
Battle.net now required to play WOW [8]
-
Blizzard keen on WOW micro-transactions [37]
-
WOW patch 3.3 in "coming weeks" [27]
Latest Screenshots
28 June, 2008 [19]
Want to comment on this article? Log in, or register!
Poster
|
0
Certainly takes away one of my reasons for prefering Guild Wars, in which you can have as many specs as you want saved.
If I could switch from "Super hunter with bow that is better than Legolas and Robin Hood put together" to "Ultra pet owner with a pet more powerful than Godzilla and King Kong combined", it'd be awesome. Plus restricting it to 2 gives some freedom, and as Eraysor says means it'd be easier to have PvE and PvE builds. |
|
Stupid_Fat_Hobbit
10/12/08 @ 13:42
0
It doesn't take away the whole point of speccing; choosing two talent builds out of the many possible isn't much less restrictive than choosing one.
I think the main advantage of this will be to make more healers available. A lot of people who don't like to play a dedicated healing character would happily switch to their back-up healing spec on occasion if required. |
|
farticusmaximus
10/12/08 @ 13:53
0
"The game doesn't need to get any easier than it already is."
This is catagorically NOT making the game any easier. What it is doing is cutting out the gold and inconvenience cost of respeccing for most healer and tank classes, they do it anyway so why not just make it less cumbersome, expensive and time-consuming? This way there will be more tanks willing to tank instances, and it will also swell the numbers PVPing. Without a shadow of doubt, this is the single best change to the game since release. |
|
farticusmaximus
10/12/08 @ 13:57
0
"making dungeons less challenging."
Come back and comment when you know the first thing about the game. You currently do not. |
|
0
farticusmaximus
stop acting like a moron, merkdot is right... it will be much easier to adapt depending on the situation, therefor thousends of players will be able to do lots of diferent things making, just by that principle, the game easier, dungeons, PvP etc... you will have chars that can be powerfull healers and powerfull tankers at the same time, now wtf is that???
Edited 6 times,
most recently on 10/12/08 @ 14:07
|
|
farticusmaximus
10/12/08 @ 14:05
0
@Apologie
No it bloody wont. It will make it easier to get parties. It will make the game cost less time for people, but the SAME people with the SAME talents and the SAME gear will be running the SAME dungeons. Do. you. understand? "you will have chars that can be powerfull healers and powerfull tankers at the same time" Edit: Obviously not.
Edited 1 times,
most recently on 10/12/08 @ 14:06
|
|
hula hoops
10/12/08 @ 14:06
0
how on earth does, "more tanks and healers around" is "making dungeons less challenging."?
It will make the game less frustating for me yes, but not easier. At the moment, it's hard getting tanks and healers. Everything that alleviates this is good in my book. |
|
0
Not at the same time, they've said it'd be possible, "but that this will be more difficult". So you're not going to be running around switching between tank and healer. It will not make the game easier, because all it is doing is allowing you to have 2 specs level up within the same character.
The only real difference is you won't have to level up to characters, or spend all that cash to respec. |
|
iokthemonkey
10/12/08 @ 14:07
0
Well, I'm sure the Hunters will be pleased to hear that soon they'll be able to have two ultra-nerfed specs.
Yeah, Massively.com is reporting an incoming nerf for Hunters, as they're "too powerful" apparently. |
|
0
I don't know if it will lead to more tanks and healers, since it's a playstyle choice and people who are primarily damage dealers aren't going to want to spec for tanking or healing, even if they could.
I suspect it's aimed at getting more people involved with PvP, which would be a boon to Blizzard since they wouldn't have to put the effort into creating content. They're already "pushing" players into it by empahsising they expect people to PvE and PvP for gear, and now they have made PvP rewards require Arena points. |
|
DoctorZoidberg
10/12/08 @ 14:11
0
Sound's okey to me.
When I play (not that often) I'm a shaman (melee DPS) and I hate it when I have a quest in a dugneon and can't get a healer etc, So it would be handy to have that option that I could fill in if needed. |
|
0
@iokthemonkey
What? Have you got a link for that, I'd seriously just give up on WoW if they nerf my character any furthur. I do agree, at one time, even at low levels I, as a hunter, was nigh-on unstoppable before they tweaked Concussive Shot and most of the other skills. But they already balanced that out, I really hope they don't go on a nerfing spree. |
|
0
Apologie
And how does that make things harder or easier, I play a warlock if someone needs to respec and they Hearth(or mage portal) respec then we summon them back, did that make thing easier, No all it did was make less annoying, Having a dual spec will allow you to change to match the situation your in (assuming that one of your too specs match it) but you can't change the talents in your spec on switch too that you have set up. The encounter still remains the same. Your reasoning about not having to find a player is not a measure of difficulty thats a measure of palyer patience. |
|
iokthemonkey
10/12/08 @ 14:13
0
http://www.wowinsider.com/2008/12/09/the...
Didn't read it as I don't play WoW any more but it might shed some light on it. |
|
farticusmaximus
10/12/08 @ 14:21
0
@DFawkes
From what I hear the nerf is definite, and imminent. It is also very, very needed. I believe the nerf is primarily hitting PvE though. We have 2 completely, utterly imbalanced classes in PvE right now: Hunters and retridins. There are only 2 characters that can currently break 2.5k DPS in our raid guild and they are a hunter and a pally, who both pulled 3.9k DPS in our Sunday Naxx-25 run. Utter, utter craziness. The hunter is 51/20/0 BTW. |
|
0
this could be the single best change to wow, if it is implemented correctly - I'm on two popular servers and getting tanks and healers (especially under max level) is difficult - i think it will also make the utilty classes (shammy, pally, druid) very popular - still have to carry two lots of gear around with you though
|
|
actionfitz
10/12/08 @ 14:30
0
it'll mean many like me who generally avoid pvp will now start trying it out - rather than be penalised for stepping into the fray with the 'wrong' spec, or paying 50g a go for respecs - necessitating hours of gathering/dailies to support, which in turn means i may even stick around long ebough to build up some res. gear Oo
What im not looking forward to is grouping in non-guild groups after this... "omg I needz for my pewpew spec" "omg i needz that too for my healer spec" "omg tank items! needzors!!" \ all from the same pally / druid :) |
|
farticusmaximus
10/12/08 @ 14:50
0
"So its either 1 button spamming in affliction... or one button spamming in destro hmmm hard choice"
It's fun to spot people who don't know what the hell they are talking about. That's 3 now, do I win a prize? |
|
farticusmaximus
10/12/08 @ 15:05
0
@Benno
"maximus, why take the bait from the same idiots who post in all the wow comments threads? Just ignore them" Yeah, you are right I should just ignore them. I find it hard to tolerate the presence of idiocy though, and their retorts are often as amusing as their initial gaffes.. "I cant wait for this change. I will be able to play resto or elemental, with no gear change at all (thank you spell power) " Shammies really did get some much needed love recently didnt they? :) Now then Blizz, next up for the loving is rogues. They need a basketful of hugs as the poor little stabby guys are all but extinct on our server... |
|
0
I breifly played a shaman all the way back in vanilla wow, and its so refreshing now to have an instant cast heal, ultra quick healing waves among the other changes.
I have been leveling as elemental, and i am still able to heal just fine in instances as 31/0/4X. In violet hold I was 3rd on damage as well as the only healer :D I guess that says more about my slacky DPS friends :/ |
|
farticusmaximus
10/12/08 @ 15:16
0
"and next up for loving is definetely warlocks, especially in pvp"
Would be nice (my main is a raiding lock), but I can't really complain at the moment. Apart from aforementioned hunter and pally the DPS charts seem fairly even in my raid guild. Saying that, I rarely PvP unless it's on my rogue and I havent PvP'd since the expansion hit. |
|
0
@Apologie
"farticusmaximus stop acting like a moron, merkdot is right... it will be much easier to adapt depending on the situation, therefor thousends of players will be able to do lots of diferent things making, just by that principle, the game easier, dungeons, PvP etc... you will have chars that can be powerfull healers and powerfull tankers at the same time, now wtf is that???" Just to clarify, you will have two specs, you can pick one to use at any given time but only one so you can't be a powerful healer and tank at the same time. They can at the moment respec at any trainer and switch specs but that costs gold, which just dissuades people from doing it; "hi, we need a healer, want to do dungeon X", "can't, I'm feral :(". @merkdot "as you say, it'll mean more tanks and healers around too, making dungeons less challenging." Yes, because the "challenge" of finding a tank or healer for your group was always the best part of running instances in WoW. As was the "challenge" of respeccing your druid from tank to healer for a dungeon run, or the "challenge" of building up three or four different sets of kit: one for your druid for healing, one for tanking and one for DPS (or possibly two for DPS, one caster one feral). I'd rather the challenge was in doing the instance and not finding the group, tbh. Maybe I'm odd. Oh and when was "challenge" changed to mean "tedious busywork and the grinding required to finance it"? |
|
farticusmaximus
10/12/08 @ 15:28
0
"Dual spec is the confirmation that Blizzard can’t balance their classes .. such a shame."
The more you post the more stupid you sound. Please do continue... :) |
|
0
The raids aren't just too easy for hardcore guilds. My brother's guild downed 10-man Naxxramas already. That was the instances our guild wiped on for 3 months, just to down 5 bosses!!! It's a shame they made it this easy already. It's almost an insult to the original Naxxramas.
Edit: My brother now plays a warlock while I used to. I quit before TBC. He now reports that he does more (raid) damage with a destruction spec than with an affliction spec! How retarded is this? It's incredibly hard to play an affliction warlock right, it should do the most damage, like it's always done.
Edited 1 times,
most recently on 10/12/08 @ 15:51
|
|
farticusmaximus
10/12/08 @ 15:52
0
@Canyarion
I know many people who are dissapointed with Naxx, however a lot of them have only done 10 man or only got as far as spider wing in 25 man. 4 horsemen is still quite hard I've heard. It's true that Naxx is not the ball-breaker it was, but it's place in Wotlk is as a 'training' raid instance. You are right though, it feels odd going there and not coming out with a 40g repair bill each night! ;) "Racoon Vs Robocop." I'd buy that for a dollar! |
|
0
Dude the whole point of an MMO is the cooperative play, the relation of complementarity between classes that have different specs and features is the most interesting and challenging thing at the same time, Dual talent specs cuts a big half of that because now you can do compleatly different things in a very competent way... in my opinionl that's not good. if you want that, level 2 different chars, dual talent specs is just cheap. accuse me of being a troll, i dont care, that's just the way i see it.
Edited 1 times,
most recently on 10/12/08 @ 15:53
|
|
farticusmaximus
10/12/08 @ 16:06
0
@Apologie
Aha! Finally a reasonable post! Ok, here's the thing, as has been explained by others in this thread already: The dual talent change is no different to what we currently have. You can currently hearth to Org, respec and be back within 5 minutes. However, it will cost you some gold and you might have to replace some glyphs. That 5 mins, along with glyph and gold cost is now not needed. However, you won't just be able to switch specs like 'poof - healer. poof - tank. poof - DPS' as there will be some kind of as yet unspecified cooldown to talent changes. So, the change is simply one of convenience, not altering the game's balance in any way at all. You still have exactly the same 5, 10 or 25-man dynamic in an instance. |
|
0
@merkdot
"actually, I take it back, it's not even hard with a badly organised group anyway." I was just going to say that. :) The challenge came from getting people to do their parts at the right time, the difficulty that I remember was more in filling the groups for raids rather than dungeons. A lot of that was that we had to have the cookie cutter group specified in whatever guide the raid leaders had read, we needed prot warriors, feral druids, resto druids and holy priests and the annoyance was in the hassle and cost of switching from one to the other for a raid and back. It's just tedious. It's the same in heroics, a prot warrior and specialised healer is required for a lot of them, especially when your gear isn't that great, and the gold cost of switching over and back between specs just meant that more and more of our priests and warriors just went PVP or PVE, they didn't switch over and back, they just dropped one half of the content. That is not good. Not to mention that there are few sights sadder than watching a holy priest or prot warrior trying to level. :) @apologie You can do two different things very competently anyway, you just have to go to a trainer, pay your gold and respec. A lot easier than levelling up (and equipping) a second character. Edit: Damn! I'm a slow typist. :)
Edited 1 times,
most recently on 10/12/08 @ 16:22
|
|
0
@Apologie
""as there will be some kind of as yet unspecified cooldown to talent changes" ...if there is a big cooldown "like 1h", then i agree and support." Yep, I like the sound of that, Blizzard said "it will be trivial to do in town. You will also be able to do it out of towns, but not as trivially," I imagine that will mean that you can go to the trainer in town and switch over and back at will but outside of town there will be a hefty cooldown. Allowing frequent changes wouldn't work, an obvious problem would be with druids: a mod that switches talent builds when you switch between feral form and caster, *bing* bear - full 71 pt feral, *bing* caster - 71 pt healer/nuker. Now that would be broken. |
|
bigbadbeasty
10/12/08 @ 16:41
0
Will it change armour too?
Could be a another clever time/money sink, but I can see it being a need or greed nightmare. |
Want to comment on this article? Log in, or register!
