wow Final Shadowlands Season 4 Covenant Popularity Chart

[Starym 3,800]

 

We're back taking a look at Covenant distribution, for the last time in the "pure" Shadowlands, as the 9.x patches end this week, with 10s arriving! The giant overhaul of the talent system along with many other changes is coming with the next reset and the pre-patch, so while we will continue to have Shadowlands content up until Dragonflight's launch, it will be a mix of systems.

The stats are based on top player data from Subcreation, which takes the top parses from Warcraft Logs, as usual.

We won't be going into as much detail on the stats changes since last time this time around, as the main reason for the article is to be able to compare the stats now to the final pre-patch numbers, to see how much the new talent system and features change things around.

Ranged DPS

There's only one major change in Mythic+ here since the end of Season 3, as Elemental Shamans have gone almost entirely over to Necrolord from Night Fae (a change of just under 60%), basically flipping the numbers for the two Covenants. Aside from that, the dominant purple faction gained a little overall, even when including the other three Necrolord-dominant specs moving away from the Fae a bit.

In Raids we see the opposite for Elemental, as it actually moved the other way, away from Necro, dropping some 20% in favor of the Ardenwealdians. Another big mover is Fire Mage, as it also went to the dark side Night Fae, dropping some 50% and almost entirely moving out of Venthyr.

Data gathered and presented by Subcreation, based Warcraft Logs numbers.

Melee DPS

Interestingly, for Mythic+ Melee everything remained the same, with almost every single spec gaining a few percent to their already dominant faction, leaving the Night Fae outnumbered once again.

The purple folk are still in charge of raids, however, with Frost DKs being the only ones dropping a fair chunk of the Covenant (but still keeping them in a solid majority). The only other major shift here can be found with Subtletly, as it shifted a little over to Venthyr, making the spec no longer almost perfectly balanced between two Covenants, as it moves over into a Kyrian majority.

Data gathered and presented by Subcreation, based Warcraft Logs numbers.

Tanks

Tanks are extremely consistent and loyal when it comes to Covenants, as the largest change in Mythic+ (by far) is a 10%er, with Protection Warriors moving away from Necro to Kyrian (but still remaining mostly bony-bois).

Things didn't change much in raids either, but Blood and Brewmasters did move a bit more, with Kyrian gaining 18% for the DK spec and losing 13% for the Monk.

Data gathered and presented by Subcreation, based Warcraft Logs numbers.

Healers

Healers actually changed a fair amount in Mythic+, with Holy Priest leading the way by moving entirely out of mainly Kyrian (with a bit of  Necrolord), shifting a huge 98% to Night Fae to become entirely purple. Resto Druids followed suit, although not as drastically, as the Ardenwealdians gained 15% there as well. The rest of the changes for the ones keeping everyone else alive are under 10%.

As far as raids go the changes are smaller, but still present, with only sub-10% moves for Discipline and Holy Pala to Kyrian.

Data gathered and presented by Subcreation, based Warcraft Logs numbers.

That's it for the non-Dragonflight influenced Shadowlands, as we'll see what the pre-patch brings! With a relatively short time until the next expansion arrives it'll be interesting to see how much the top players actually bother adapting to and even creating a new meta, but it seems likely we'll be seeing plenty of changes with the new talent tree.

[Ragingwolf 310]

I will not miss this in the slightest.  This system was flawed at the start and hindered players that played multi specializations from Tank, Healer, rDPS, and mDPS.  It created an inclusive meta mindset when players wanted to progress end game content like M+ or Rated PvP due to the hard restrictions of Covenant swapping and Blizzard not giving in till Season 3/4.

If Blizzard would of been more open to the idea of allowing players to swap willingly w/o time gated and hard restrictions in place SL would of been a better expansion to play in imo.

[Arcling 898]

Making power related to a faction choices was a bad idea. I said it in the beginning that such choices should have been only tied to story and cosmetic stuff like transmog. Many players felt forced to pick a Covenant they do not like, only because it gave them better ability. A good alternative would have been to give players a choice of a talent, so they could pick an ability, independent of their current Covenant. Regardless, we might not see another system like this. Which is good, but can also mean that they are downscaling the team and development of the game, as next expansion is rather light on systems.

So I was in one of these 1% choices. Interesting.

[Q 200]

Good riddance to such a lousy system.

[Starseed 113]

36 minutes ago, Arcling said:

Making power related to a faction choices was a bad idea. I said it in the beginning that such choices should have been only tied to story and cosmetic stuff like transmog. Many players felt forced to pick a Covenant they do not like, only because it gave them better ability. A good alternative would have been to give players a choice of a talent, so they could pick an ability, independent of their current Covenant. Regardless, we might not see another system like this. Which is good, but can also mean that they are downscaling the team and development of the game, as next expansion is rather light on systems.

So I was in one of these 1% choices. Interesting.

i still cant understand why people felt so pressured to play the covenant that gives the max bonus instead of playing what they like.

im pretty sure most people arent running the highest m+ dungeons or raid mythic so what is the problem in my eyes the diffrence was so small i never looked it up wich would be the best for my classes

[DahkCeles 18]

Fire mages were night fae to be surrounded by lots of flammable trees.  If there was a dps boost to it, also cool.

[Topman 9]

1 hour ago, Starseed said:

i still cant understand why people felt so pressured to play the covenant that gives the max bonus instead of playing what they like.

im pretty sure most people arent running the highest m+ dungeons or raid mythic so what is the problem in my eyes the diffrence was so small i never looked it up wich would be the best for my classes

Such a dam truth you said in that first line that people would die by the sword defending it. Played  Tank/Healer/DPS paladin for 7 years then mained Demon hunter for 3. I could complain to hell about Holy shield complete gone from being a 8 charge to nothing.  Mastery worst thing blizzard ever done? I played with friends and each of us played good as a team. calling for interrupts rotations and stuns and los pulls. Played put up the crap because the fun was way more then the worst.

[Arcling 898]

1 hour ago, Starseed said:

i still cant understand why people felt so pressured to play the covenant that gives the max bonus instead of playing what they like.

im pretty sure most people arent running the highest m+ dungeons or raid mythic so what is the problem in my eyes the diffrence was so small i never looked it up wich would be the best for my classes

It's a pressure from groups, people often get their info from guides that are written from the perspective of top guilds. So people want to min-max even if there is no need because most of them aren't going to do the highest level of content.

[Starym 3,800]

5 hours ago, Starseed said:

i still cant understand why people felt so pressured to play the covenant that gives the max bonus instead of playing what they like.

im pretty sure most people arent running the highest m+ dungeons or raid mythic so what is the problem in my eyes the diffrence was so small i never looked it up wich would be the best for my classes

This is the problem in ALL of gaming right now. Everyone wants to play the "best spec, best build" regardless of whether a) they absolutely suck at it, b) they don't like the playstyle and c) they literally stop playing the game because they don't like it/can't get the class and spec to perform well enough. It's a fucking tragedy of people destroying their own enjoyment of a game (Lost Ark being the No.1 culprit here) just so they can be meta and so they can maaaybe be invited to groups.

It's really turned MMOs specifically into asocial places (the irony is insane here) as players force other players to play a shitty way or they won't accept them. And this is coming from a World First raider mind you - I KNOW this mindset, I LIKE this mindset... WHEN YOU'RE RAIDING FOR WORLD FIRST. It has NO place if you're not aiming at some sort of high score, which 99% of players are not. But they still fuck their enjoyment of their game up... sometimes even for single player games lol..

[Starym 3,800]

5 hours ago, DahkCeles said:

Fire mages were night fae to be surrounded by lots of flammable trees.  If there was a dps boost to it, also cool.

So, they wanted to be Sylvanas?

[Andelai 24]

8 hours ago, Starym said:

This is the problem in ALL of gaming right now. Everyone wants to play the "best spec, best build" regardless of whether a) they absolutely suck at it, b) they don't like the playstyle and c) they literally stop playing the game because they don't like it/can't get the class and spec to perform well enough. It's a *filtered* tragedy of people destroying their own enjoyment of a game (Lost Ark being the No.1 culprit here) just so they can be meta and so they can maaaybe be invited to groups.

It's really turned MMOs specifically into asocial places (the irony is insane here) as players force other players to play a shitty way or they won't accept them. And this is coming from a World First raider mind you - I KNOW this mindset, I LIKE this mindset... WHEN YOU'RE RAIDING FOR WORLD FIRST. It has NO place if you're not aiming at some sort of high score, which 99% of players are not. But they still *filtered* their enjoyment of their game up... sometimes even for single player games lol..

I feel it when I say I find Arms Warrior the best melee spec. Everyone around me is like "just play fury, it's better, it's this and it's that". But I am a player who did a 15+ mythic ONCE in my life and I played since Legion. I don't give a damn... I mained Shaman in SL and at the begening there were times I was kicked from like a +5 because I was a Venthyr Resto. But I didn't care. I played what I enjoyed and most people should do it. But as you say... some, I think I can even say - most - people destroy all the fun for themselves even in singleplayer games with choices because some speedrunner or other "pro" defined the "meta". It's sad. Mostly because it's not a game desing issue... It's how people have changed

[Starseed 113]

8 hours ago, Starym said:

This is the problem in ALL of gaming right now. Everyone wants to play the "best spec, best build" regardless of whether a) they absolutely suck at it, b) they don't like the playstyle and c) they literally stop playing the game because they don't like it/can't get the class and spec to perform well enough. It's a *filtered* tragedy of people destroying their own enjoyment of a game (Lost Ark being the No.1 culprit here) just so they can be meta and so they can maaaybe be invited to groups.

It's really turned MMOs specifically into asocial places (the irony is insane here) as players force other players to play a shitty way or they won't accept them. And this is coming from a World First raider mind you - I KNOW this mindset, I LIKE this mindset... WHEN YOU'RE RAIDING FOR WORLD FIRST. It has NO place if you're not aiming at some sort of high score, which 99% of players are not. But they still *filtered* their enjoyment of their game up... sometimes even for single player games lol..

exactly it makes no sense to plan your char and play like you are in fro the world first if you just run your 2 hours a week guild runs.

in my guild we always had a chill attitude and did things at our own pace. most of the time we would finish nhc when most other guilds are half way throu hc. in shadowlands one of our mates started to watch streams of the big guilds and every evening he would not stop talking about guides  and wich spec is the best blablabla. we actually talked with him about leaving the guild cause he got so agressive when we where stuck at one boss for two weeks. he inspected every char in the group and started a big wuzz about how that talent is wrong ant that spec is wrong it was really gross

[Mugendai 48]

2 hours ago, Starseed said:

exactly it makes no sense to plan your char and play like you are in fro the world first if you just run your 2 hours a week guild runs.

in my guild we always had a chill attitude and did things at our own pace. most of the time we would finish nhc when most other guilds are half way throu hc. in shadowlands one of our mates started to watch streams of the big guilds and every evening he would not stop talking about guides  and wich spec is the best blablabla. we actually talked with him about leaving the guild cause he got so agressive when we where stuck at one boss for two weeks. he inspected every char in the group and started a big wuzz about how that talent is wrong ant that spec is wrong it was really gross

Even tho it doesn't make sense, it's still how it is, and it's still how people will play, and everyone knows it, and there's not much you can do about it.
And once you know that, then you know the covenant system will be horrible and the vast majority of player will hate it for this.

[Helvorn 57]

Lets not forget, even Icyveins does TOP3 DD/Tank/Heal etc. Weekly charts of what is FOTM in M+  and so on. Even when they use a big disclaimer, people are heavy influenced by this. This way of thinking has turned M+ and many things into a toxic minefield. I do play WoW since back in classic. There were always elitists, but it reached extremes I´ve never seen before, even in other mmo´s.

 

99% of success in raid/m+ is communication. But this too has been reduced to hi/bye and insults.

[Prophet001 598]

12 hours ago, Starym said:

This is the problem in ALL of gaming right now. Everyone wants to play the "best spec, best build" regardless of whether a) they absolutely suck at it, b) they don't like the playstyle and c) they literally stop playing the game because they don't like it/can't get the class and spec to perform well enough. It's a *filtered* tragedy of people destroying their own enjoyment of a game (Lost Ark being the No.1 culprit here) just so they can be meta and so they can maaaybe be invited to groups.

It's really turned MMOs specifically into asocial places (the irony is insane here) as players force other players to play a shitty way or they won't accept them. And this is coming from a World First raider mind you - I KNOW this mindset, I LIKE this mindset... WHEN YOU'RE RAIDING FOR WORLD FIRST. It has NO place if you're not aiming at some sort of high score, which 99% of players are not. But they still *filtered* their enjoyment of their game up... sometimes even for single player games lol..

Well stated and I agree.

[Starseed 113]

1 hour ago, Mugendai said:

Even tho it doesn't make sense, it's still how it is, and it's still how people will play, and everyone knows it, and there's not much you can do about it.
And once you know that, then you know the covenant system will be horrible and the vast majority of player will hate it for this.

i would even say that doing the covenant system how it is was the right call from blizz. the people that are in the top5% where it mattersare not that attchet to there chars cause they change class spec and race to what is best in raw numbers. for everyone else it doesnt matter and maybe people should start thinking when they are mad cause they dont want to go with the fairys with there andead mage and should just go with what they like cause they run +10 max and maybe do hc raids

 

[Mugendai 48]

1 hour ago, Starseed said:

i would even say that doing the covenant system how it is was the right call from blizz. the people that are in the top5% where it mattersare not that attchet to there chars cause they change class spec and race to what is best in raw numbers. for everyone else it doesnt matter and maybe people should start thinking when they are mad cause they dont want to go with the fairys with there andead mage and should just go with what they like cause they run +10 max and maybe do hc raids

 

No, because in the end it absolutely didn't change how people play and want to build their characters, and it just ended up being a hated system that no one will miss. So it wasn't a right call at all

[TheJayco 17]

20 hours ago, Starseed said:

i still cant understand why people felt so pressured to play the covenant that gives the max bonus instead of playing what they like.

im pretty sure most people arent running the highest m+ dungeons or raid mythic so what is the problem in my eyes the diffrence was so small i never looked it up wich would be the best for my classes

Every time I logged in during the first two seasons I would have at least one person asking why I didn't change to the "BiS" covenant. Every time I was in raid the same guy (who had an item level way higher than mine and played for 6 hours a day) would always complain I didn't change covenants because I would do 5% more DPS. Every time I did an M+ PuG, even if I was the top damage dealer, people would tell me I should be doing the single target build because X class is AOE. It didn't matter if we timed the dungeon, killed the bosses, got the acheivements. Every time I was told I was "playing the game wrong". I just stopped playing completely.

[Dahaka99 49]

that 1% necro prot paladin damn...i like to be necro prot for raids cause fleshcraft gives +stat and shield , also vanquisher's is good aswell im more tanky and i feel comfortable with it.

[Starseed 113]

2 hours ago, Mugendai said:

No, because in the end it absolutely didn't change how people play and want to build their characters, and it just ended up being a hated system that no one will miss. So it wasn't a right call at all

ofcourse it didnt worked because people are stupid and always think they play top tier. i have even seen people saying thinks like: well in the streamer community you use only the best builds. from a guy that doesnt even stream 

[Mugendai 48]

1 hour ago, Starseed said:

ofcourse it didnt worked because people are stupid and always think they play top tier. i have even seen people saying thinks like: well in the streamer community you use only the best builds. from a guy that doesnt even stream 

That's what i'm saying since the beginning. Blizzard cannot change this, so, they should play along with what the community is, rather than trying to push something people will hate.

[SpilledStars 71]

23 hours ago, Starseed said:

i still cant understand why people felt so pressured to play the covenant that gives the max bonus instead of playing what they like.

im pretty sure most people arent running the highest m+ dungeons or raid mythic so what is the problem in my eyes the diffrence was so small i never looked it up wich would be the best for my classes

For anyone who feels like their hands and reflexes are just not up to this 
(and it doesn't matter if it's true, or imposter syndrome, or they really need to M+ like a racecar driver)

every little boost helps.

For the avid RP'er, I am sure it could be frustrating to have one's motive tie well to a given Covenant, and the power that's in it not match one's successful play style on the ground.

It's not even about "look it up" (to be fair, you are ON one of the finest sites to look it up), the four covenants are parked in the Oribos halls to pour it out to the wandering player.  

Threads of Fate RP for getting into it was cool (you are touched by greatness == ahem, your player has done this before, your Fate is tied to others) but the powers Offer can feel like just another talent row with four options instead of three.

"What they like" is to succeed.  

[Starym 3,800]

14 hours ago, Starseed said:

exactly it makes no sense to plan your char and play like you are in fro the world first if you just run your 2 hours a week guild runs.

in my guild we always had a chill attitude and did things at our own pace. most of the time we would finish nhc when most other guilds are half way throu hc. in shadowlands one of our mates started to watch streams of the big guilds and every evening he would not stop talking about guides  and wich spec is the best blablabla. we actually talked with him about leaving the guild cause he got so agressive when we where stuck at one boss for two weeks. he inspected every char in the group and started a big wuzz about how that talent is wrong ant that spec is wrong it was really gross

I would go berserk on that guy. Talk about ruining things for everyone else. And just to add, there is NO better feeling in gaming than blind progressing a brand new hard dungeon or raid with your guild that also hasn't watched 1 second of boss guides etc. It's what MMOs are meant to be and it's when they're at their best. Ah, but no, because Johnny McAwesome needs his loot in 2 hours and thus the best part of MMOs gets transformed into a damn chore right from the start.

[Starym 3,800]

12 hours ago, Helvorn said:

Lets not forget, even Icyveins does TOP3 DD/Tank/Heal etc. Weekly charts of what is FOTM in M+  and so on. Even when they use a big disclaimer, people are heavy influenced by this. This way of thinking has turned M+ and many things into a toxic minefield. I do play WoW since back in classic. There were always elitists, but it reached extremes I´ve never seen before, even in other mmo´s.

 

99% of success in raid/m+ is communication. But this too has been reduced to hi/bye and insults.

Well here's the thing, cos it's literally me that does the rankings. I do them cos they're interesting to me - I would NEVER EVER use them to plan what I play or how I play it. I like knowing that Demo is broken as hell right now and dominating everything, and that Feral is down in the dumps and needs major buffs etc. But you'd better believe if I liked Feral gameplay and was good at it (or bad at it tbh) I'd be playing the spec forever and a day, giving 0 fucks about the rankings. And I'd find likeminded people and play with them - that's the beautiful thing about MMOs with large communities - you WILL find the 4 other people that think like you (raiding may be tougher to get going).

[Starym 3,800]

9 hours ago, Mugendai said:

No, because in the end it absolutely didn't change how people play and want to build their characters, and it just ended up being a hated system that no one will miss. So it wasn't a right call at all

It's interesting because I'd say it was the right call for the GAME but was not the right call for the COMMUNITY. Basically I agree with the system for some imaginary game I'm making for myself and people like me, but I knew from the start that it'd be a disaster for WoW (also one of the biggest mistakes ever was the lie Blizzard used to sell it, the whole "we want to make choices matter" thing).