Blizzard Responds to Netherlight Crucible Feedback

Posted 2017/09/21 at 6:38 PM by Squishei

Netherlight CrucibleNetherlight Crucible

Blizzard

Hey guys!

We’ve been seeing a lot of discussion going back and forth on the Crucible lately, so we’ve had some conversations with the development team and I wanted to pop in and share a few points that came out of it.

Regarding comparisons to Reforging – Reforging was always a simple, mechanical choice. Players were, at the end of the day, simply replacing their worst stats with best stats on every item that didn’t already have your best stats up to a mechanical limit. The Crucible, by comparison, is only affecting a small subset of items and presents much more varied situations than say “change 30 Hit Chance into Haste”.

We’ve also seen a bit of discussion around players desiring the ability to respec the Traits that are locked on the second and third tiers of relics. We feel that the ability to respect Traits would lead to players picking traits based on perfect optimization for any given situation, such as leaving a raid to change to AoE-centric traits for the next fight during raid progression. While we feel that’s a nuisance in itself, this would also make the system feel like a watered-down version of talent rows, and would undermine the choice that is made when selecting your Relic Traits.

That being said, Relics are items and will be replaced; we do expect players to make choices and experiment with this system. Since there is still new content ahead of us in Antorus, better Relics will be available and players who make choices they may not like now will have the opportunity to get new Relics before long with a potentially new set of Trait choices.

As a note, we are also fine with the current state that Relics Soulbind on inspection in the Crucible. We believe the alternative of everyone porting in and out of the raid to pass the relic around and see who it’s best for is far, far worse. Players are smart and will be able to make educated decisions based on the information that’s available to them. As I said, we do expect experimentation however.

A final note: I saw the post on Reddit laying out three choices for Relics, asking players which one they would pick -
Relic A : 930 Ilvl BiS main trait, 3rd BiS bonus trait, but forces worst tier 2 crucible trait
Relic B : 915 ilvl BiS main and bonus trait and 2nd BiS crucible tier 2 trait
Relic C : 940 ilvl 2nd and 4th BiS traits and BiS crucible tier 2 trait.

Vengeance Demon Hunter

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Comment by JimbrooksDon't get me wrong, I like that simc and raidbots exists, but isn't that a fail on Blizz's part when we have to download mods to figure out minor/major upgrades, especially when stat weights fluctuate dramatically with one piece of gear to compete on the high-end of play especially for Mythic raiding/dungeons, where for the most part, the best loot is? Then to not only infuriate those players, which is a lot mind you, they introduce a system that makes that decision harder as well as longer because we have to sit there while we go through all the possible combinations to figure out what benefits us the most?

I miss the simple days where you could tell just from looking at a piece of gear whether or not it was an upgrade...now we have to sim everything :(Comment by Bubblecookie"As a note, we are also fine with the current state that Relics Soulbind on inspection in the Crucible. We believe the alternative of everyone porting in and out of the raid to pass the relic around and see who it’s best for is far, far worse."
Or you know, they could just make us able to preview Crucible stuff the way we can preview artifact traits, without being able to put in points unless you're at the forgeComment by Joker1313As I suspected when I first saw it announced (didn't try it on the PTR) this system is just pure and simple - bad. No, I wouldn't even say that it's bad after getting familiar with it - it's simply terrible, confusing, counter-intuitive...and so on and on, continue the list. After all I've put myself through to get the BiS relics, now all of a sudden they are not exactly that good after all...if I get really bad RNG (as I did on one of the relics) and get crappy 2nd and 3rd tier options...hey, bad luck...get another try on the slot machine...maybe it rolls something you like better...seriously...from bad to worse...

And this is a response? Maybe they should get into politics, so many words saying absolutely nothing on the actual issues with this non-system.

Sorry if I sound a bit agitated...Comment by unawakenedweapon

As throughout this entire expansion you are not meant to FARM AP, it's something you accrue over time by performing the activities you enjoy in game. With the AK system increasing XP gains massively you will likely get to 75 around Antorus release / progression I would think. You are not meant to have it all obtainable immediately and no one is supposed to be anywhere near 75 traits yet. There is no problem here for people to get worked up about.Comment by ash1k1In the situation with the Relic A, B and C wouldn't that mean you take the 940? Because Weapon DPS means higher DPS in general?Comment by 1461072In the situation with the Relic A, B and C wouldn't that mean you take the 940? Because Weapon DPS means higher DPS in general?

Healer/tank specs need to look at more than damage.

Some specs do not rely on weapon DPS for damage (Windwalkers, for example, have no abilities that are based off weapon damage).

Comment by Dblbaconator

As throughout this entire expansion you are not meant to FARM AP, it's something you accrue over time by performing the activities you enjoy in game. With the AK system increasing XP gains massively you will likely get to 75 around Antorus release / progression I would think. You are not meant to have it all obtainable immediately and no one is supposed to be anywhere near 75 traits yet. There is no problem here for people to get worked up about.

Emissary tokens (400 base): 2.52 billion AP

Otherworldly Trophy (75 base): 472.5 million AP

Pious Anchorite's Breviary (green-quality Argus world quest token, 350 base): 2.205 billion AP

Novitiate's Tarnished Arcanoscope (blue-quality Argus world quest token, 520 base): 3.276 billion AP

Headpiece of the Shadow Council (3000 base): 18.9 billion AP

Heart of Zin-Azshari (4000 base): 25.2 billion AP

Blessing of the Pantheon (10,000 base): 63 billion AP

stillComment by glassleoMy main issue with the crucible is that it's really annoying to go to Argus each time you get a relic. Especially if you get a small upgrade in the middle of your raid, you want to use it but it's not worth putting it in if you can't go to the crucible. With reforging we could at least use the reforging mount...

Also it has never been this complicated to figure out exactly which items are actually upgrades or not. That's more of a general thing but the Crucible didn't exactly make it easier, especially if you play a class where weapon damage isn't that important.Comment by Retron2Boy I would love to actually care about Netherlight Crucible...if I had the obscenely high artifact level necessary to actually make use of the new traits. I may not be a progression raider, but I've been playing regularly since launch and mostly focusing on one main with one spec, but I only just managed to unlock the first second row trait.Comment by InterestSpeaking of, leave it to this community to take any kind of bonus and %^&* all over it. Seriously, you're getting free item levels, even more ranks to your artifact traits, and some all-new traits on top of that, and you still can't help but complain about min-maxing.another layer of randomnesssuch as a substantial amount of Artifact Power to reroll a relic's Netherlight Crucible traitswhich means they're still willing to pay a cost and not be handed something for freeComment by reverandmaniacOut of all the hardcore raiders i know and all the people i know it seems most people are at 62-63 traits right now. I'm currently at 65 and 1/2 a bubble from 66 to fully unlock my 2nd tier all together. I also have 12 110's who all have completed the class hall campaigns including getting thier mounts and on every single one of them i have at least concordance unlocked on 1 sometimes 2 specs or in the case of my mage 3 specs. My main is a dh and has concordance on both specs as well. that said its super super easy to get concordance on pretty much any artifact and can be done right now in a day with some left over. and by a day i mean just doing the class hall ap missions and the available wq missions throughout broken isles and argus. The one guy I know who is furthest right now just purchased trait 69 2 hours ago and he has only played one spec on one class since legion launched. As for me while I occasionally run mythic + its maybe once a week for one dungeon and often times i Don't bother. I do however do a full clear of tos every week and occasionally raid nighthold tov or en for the ap tokens. On my main though i do have 18 legendaries and need 3 more plus the new ring that isn't even out yet and across all my characters i have close to 80-90 legendaries. Most of the raiders I know who have put any real work into their mains have at least the 2nd rank of tier 2 unlocked. Also keep in mind at week 55 we are supposed to be getting something like 650 million % bonus ap. That means that a token that gives 100 will give 6.5 billion it will not take long after that for everyone to have 75 traits purchased even if they hadn't put much time into it beforehand.Comment by pankracI feel the same - but given the levels of artifact power that are ahead of us, I think it's just a matter of time before we all get there, no matter how much we play. It's like the first artifact power token your alt gets after reaching level 110 - now it gets your weapon instantly 40 or so levels.Comment by JeremySAll this design with Netherlight Crucible goes diametrally other way that Blizzard stated: get your loot and use it right away if you wish. Think they can just make "empowerment" of relics unlocked on all dropped relics as soon as you opened Crucible so people can see what options available on relics roght when it drops and set the chosen options once they put it into the relic. IF there need a "fantasy backgroud" for this - easy way, your Articat is already empowered by Neither and Light,

Also Blizzard still fails to make their own tool in game that tells people is this particular piece of gear better or worse fo your class or even have clear guides for the classes. Generally it looks like if several engineers got together, combined their "mad machines" together but not pretty sure how it with work as a system.Then they inviting 3rd party specialist and tell them - ok, now try to write and instuction how to use it...Comment by Camberwellits quite frustrating when you have a 915 relic, then you get a 920 relic that night from raid, but its not an upgrade because it got crappy 2nd row traits, a higher ilvl relic of the same type should allways be an upgradeComment by Nirdana“I play a fire mage so I want Critical Strike”

the problem is.... if you are a fire mage, you dont want critical strikeComment by TombsvThey are fine with no one trading relics ever again apparently.

For example for BM hunter the traits are way more important than ilvl.Comment by InterestAll this design with Netherlight Crucible goes diametrally other way that Blizzard stated: get your loot and use it right away if you wish.Comment by duranoxThe major problem for me with this system is not the RNG but the fact that i cannot check what traits i'll get from it without binding it to me thus screwing a guildie out of a potential upgrade. Allow us to see what it fully gives by just looking at the damn thing.Comment by Wanderer999I was happy when I reached concordance because I figured I had kind of maxed out my weapon. Every new level of concordance was going to be a bonus so the ap grind was over!
And then the crucible came. And because I'm raiding I am expected to farm ap to get stronger. I liked m+ a lot, but I do not like the decision to make the m+ harder months before the new raid tier is opening. We won't be progressing beyond +10s because 'we need antorus gear for anything higher' So our progress group has hit a brick wall as well.
Broken Isles has become laughable so easy, emissaries are done in about 10 mins, I blink my eyes and I already killed a rare elite on BI. And I play afflock!
Broken Shore has become the same, Argus will be like this too most likely when the new raid tier comes out. But Argus is currently no challenge either. It takes some time to kill the mobs but they hardly pose any real threat.
And I feel all this is because of the huge ilvl differences between level 101 and someone progressing through the latest current raid. At 101 you get 760 gear, we're now rushing toward 960 gear. Why do we need 200 ilvls difference in merely one expansion?
I am considering ending my sub, at least for a bit because I think a break will be a very good idea right now.Comment by 1623198In the situation with the Relic A, B and C wouldn't that mean you take the 940? Because Weapon DPS means higher DPS in general?

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