Reflections and Insights from Season of Exploration Phase 1 - Warcraft Logs Blog Post

The Warcraft Logs team, known for its popular logging and analysis platform for World of Warcraft raid encounters, has recently released a blog post reflecting on Phase 1 of Season of Discovery and discussing their plans for Phase 2. As the first phase of Season of Discovery comes to a close, the team at Warcraft Logs takes a moment to reflect on the challenges they faced and the valuable lessons they learned along the way. In this blog post, they share their insights into issues such as accurate spec detection and encounter standards, and provide a glimpse into their approach for the upcoming phase. Read on to discover what the development team has in store for Season of Discovery Phase 2!

SoD Phase 1: Reflections & Lessons Learned

As the first phase of Season of Discovery winds down, the team at Warcraft Logs wanted to take the opportunity to share their interpretation and thoughts on their experiences, both in Blackfathom Deeps and Gnomeregan. This blog post serves as a comprehensive reflection, delving into the reasoning behind their decisions, the lessons learned from those choices, and their plans moving forward into Phase 2 of Season of Discovery.

For those interested in engaging in discussions, the Warcraft Logs Discord server is the perfect place to join like-minded individuals. Additionally, if you have any questions or require support, you can reach out to the team via email at [email protected].

NOTE: WE ARE PARTITIONING BFD FOR ALL REGIONS WITH NA WEEKLY RESET ON TUESDAY 6TH FEB - AT 3 PM UTC!

Pre-Release Thoughts

Like everyone else, the Warcraft Logs team approached the release of Season of Discovery with limited information. With no Public Test Realm (PTR) available, their only reference point came from older Vanilla World of Warcraft experiences in terms of implementing spec detection and analyzing complete raid encounters. The team faced various challenges due to incomplete combat logs from the Vanilla era, as many team members joined after the release of The Burning Crusade (TBC). Talent information was absent in the logs until TBC, leaving them unsure about what to expect in the Season of Discovery logs. As a result, they decided to adopt a Vanilla approach as a preliminary measure.

Prior to any release, extensive preparatory work is required to ensure smooth support. This entails adding raids, bosses, and specifications, among other elements. In anticipation of a Vanilla version, the team opted to continue utilizing Vanilla Era spec detection, which focuses on identifying a player's role rather than their specific specialization. The exception to this rule was Mages, who previously required separate detection due to the mechanics of Ignite. However, Season of Discovery has addressed this issue, rendering the additional detection unnecessary. The current state of spec detection can be found in the SoD Spec Detection and Rules article on the Warcraft Logs website.

At level 25, the team encountered difficulties in accurately recognizing specs and roles. This was a consequence of content being too easy and not requiring dedicated tanks or healers, as well as the absence of reliable information from the COMBATANT_INFO event in the logs, which provides details on equipped runes.

What's Changing Moving Forward

• Season of Discovery Landing Page

One notable change is the addition of a new navigation feature and a dedicated landing page for Season of Discovery. This update allows the team to publish articles specific to Season of Discovery and facilitates user access to rankings and updates pertaining to this season. Although Season of Discovery content is still accessible on the Vanilla Warcraft Logs site, the landing page exclusively showcases raids and articles from this season.

• Tank & Spec Detection

While there are no plans to add or remove any current specifications for Season of Discovery, the team intends to revisit the requirements for tanks and healers. In hindsight, basing the requirements on Classic WoW was not the most ideal approach due to the ease of tuning in Blackfathom Deeps (BFD), which sometimes made tanks unnecessary. Moreover, certain boss designs proved to be confusing in combination with these relaxed requirements. The team plans to shift towards a new set of requirements that revolve around two key considerations:

1. Did the player intend to tank?
2. Did the player actually tank?

More details regarding tank detection and rules will be shared on Discord, and an updated article specifically addressing specs will be released soon. As tank detection and rules heavily rely on community feedback, the team encourages everyone to participate in the discussions once the raid is released.

• Discord

To facilitate smoother and more focused discussions surrounding Season of Discovery, additional channels have been added to the Warcraft Logs Discord server. These dedicated channels, namely #sod-gnomeregan and #sod-spec-rules, aim to streamline communication and encourage wider community participation in the discussions.

• Boss Parsing Rules

Due to the lack of a PTR, limited preparation time, and the overlap with the Christmas period, enforcing boss parsing rules (such as determining which adds should count or removing downtime on Gelihast) proved challenging for the team. However, they are committed to improving boss rules support in Phase 2 and welcome all suggestions via Discord or the support email: [email protected]. The team emphasizes that most changes are initiated by community input and suggestions, underscoring the value of early participation in discussions.

• Speedruns and Complete Raid

Prior to the release of Season of Discovery, the team hoped to avoid elaborate trash requirements. However, players began exploiting boundaries to clear trash beforehand, compelling the team to implement trash requirements for speedrunning and completing the raid. BFD presented unique challenges in this aspect, with random trash spawns and stealth patrols. The diverse player base, including those from the Vanilla era, Classic Wrath, and even retail, brought varying experiences and expectations to the concept of "speedrunning" and trash requirements. The team's philosophy and approach toward speedrunning have evolved significantly since The Burning Crusade, with changes such as imposing time penalties instead of categorizing runs as "with" or "without" skips, and generally requiring players to clear all trash and disallowing invisibility potions, bubbles, or summons to skip encounters. However, limitations in enforcing these rules through the combat log restrict what the team can regulate. Ultimately, the Warcraft Logs team aims to prevent out-of-bounds exploits and skips. More trash requirements will be introduced in Gnomeregan, but their creation without a PTR can be time-consuming. In light of this, the team encourages individuals interested in speedrunning to actively participate in discussions and provide feedback as early as possible.

Summary

Thank you for taking the time to read through this extensive reflection on Phase 1 of Season of Discovery by Warcraft Logs. The team hopes to apply the valuable lessons learned to better support Gnomeregan in Phase 2. As always, they appreciate any thoughts, feedback, or questions from the community. To join the ongoing discussions, head over to the Warcraft Logs Discord server or send an email to [email protected].

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