There has been a lot of gaming media coverage about players feeling forced into one covenant or another due to their abilities. There are quite a few reasons not to fret over this, besides the obvious it gives you ulcers and leads to drinking problems.
You’re OTG. You’re here to have fun. Play what is fun!
These covenants are balanced around SO many different things that spread out the benefits. Things such as instance covenant perks, soul binds, etc. will encourage greater variety than the doomsayers are predicting.
For us numbers crunchers, what if ‘x’ covenant with ‘y’ soulbind is .2 % better than the others? To that, I say, so what? I’m certainly not performing at 100% of capacity (I’m not a robot), so unless it’s HUGELY better, it doesn’t realistically matter to me. I’m not in a .2% guild doing world first content crunching in that raid within the first day.
Playstyle. Many players have a playstyle they prefer. If the “best” doesn’t match your comfort level, it won’t be better for you.
Did I mention fun?
A quote from a Bliz MVP to someone insisting they will be forced into a certain covenant:
You need to look into the Soulbinds.
The ability is strong and I am sure it will have a dramatic impact on your character, but you will be surprised to see how much power and customization will come from the Soulbind system.
It already looks insane and its not even in a testable state atm.
In the end, the only one who gets punished is the player worrying more about what other players think of them than what they find fun.
Nothing in the game is ever balanced around you maximizing to the 99th percentile.
It only exists in social-driven competitive circles, and only really matters in the top levels of these with the MDI or World First Race.
Your plea will be heard, but my plea should be too.
Please do not compromise this system just because players who do not need maximization worry about the complications of their lack of maximization.
It has the potential to be a very unique and interesting concept and I would like to be able to enjoy it without knowing 9.1 will feature a total remake of the system because players forced their hand.
I agree with you. I may pick the one that helps me the most in M+ or I may pick the one with my favorite transmog. I don’t know yet.
The issue isn’t my fear of missing out. The issue is similar to my 10 year old son being pressured to get a $300 bat for Little League because his peers think its what the Pros use.
Look at Shamans throughout all of Legion or Shadow Priests now. Good luck getting into PuGs if they can snipe your covenant and it doesn’t match their expectations. It doesn’t matter that Spriests are amazing at 15s and below, public perception is all that matters.
And I’m a 90% PuG player. We don’t have a consistent M+ team on Horde side.
Thanks for this Hashberry, I think many players get caught up in the hype for “BiS” when “Amazing” is good. I raid with Prissy and have found myself pushing to do better on my affliction warlock spec.
I really like my affliction spec but realize its a dot with limited bursting capabilities. When it does well I am pleased, but I have been guilty of being too hard on myself. I think that is probably what I need to keep in mind and not worry so much. I think this might be true of many players as well.
They fix many of our Affliction issues in Shadowlands. We get a stronger AOE component to make us more viable in Mythic + groups & Raid Trash. We also get to cast 2 separate Curses on the Raid Bosses to make the fights easier, so they will always want 2 Warlocks in the raid.
That being said, I am going to want my Covenant to be NecroLord to pair their special ability with certain Legendary Item Effects which makes us even stronger. Muhahahaha (wait did i say that out loud)
oh, & don’t forget the Cookies…everyone wants the Cookies.
lol… Beedub, you really need to be careful…I’ve discovered over my years that when you critique something, someone always volunteers you for a solution. Happened to me all the time when I went back to college. That’s the price I paid for being the only other adult in class besides the teacher.