WoW revenue down 54% in seven months

[Sheep221]

Nobody truthfully raids for enjoyment. Not in the usual sense of raiding, which involves 4+ hours a night for 3+ nights a week for months on end.

Some will claim they do it for the "fun", or a sense of accomplishment, but come time they see a drop they can use, are they going to pass on it because they aren't in it for the gear? No way, never happens.

For a real example of raiding for enjoyment, look at the people who raid older content. How many of them raid with the same sort of rigor, schedule, and commitment of a progression guild? How many raid 6 nights a week for 6+ hours every night? ZERO. You might randomly through together a pug to do an old raid, you might even do it a few nights a week, but absolutely nobody spends as much time "raiding for enjoyment" when there aren't any potential upgrades on the line.

Now, I will say I enjoyed raiding because of the potential item drops. I had fun on a raid even if I got nothing, because I knew it was a chance of getting a nice shiny upgrade. This chance was exciting, because an upgrade would last. It was like a permanent enhancement to my character. That enjoyment is gone now, because getting an item isn't even exciting anymore. It's like "oh great, a little boost until I get my tier+1 welfare epic upgrade next patch, joy". It's hard to get excited over something so temporary and unimportant. It's even harder to find enjoyment based on a small chance of getting such a temporary boost.



ENDLESS TREADMILL. Oh, your old epics you worked 3 months to obtain are now worthless, but you can work another 3 months and get new better epics! Except after you get them, there will be another patch to render those epics obsolete.

Only hardcores raided 6 nights a week, doesn't matter if it's vanilla or pandas.

WoW was quite alot of fun before, not just because the instances were more challenging, or collecting gear was more difficult and lasted longer but also players were more nice and helpful. While this was truth that hardcore and good players had much better gear etc than the newbies, both of these respected each other. Since everything became too casual, people lost repect towards the game and towards each other, which is what I would call the destroyed game experience. As the content was more challenging the players also helped each other in obtaining various gear, achievements and more.
Cross server raid and group searching systems till certain point randomized interactions between players, you no longer obtained friends within your server and you were no longer required to search for people, communicate with them etc.
And since you most of the time met random people, you probably don't even meet again as they are from other servers randomly mixed up, you didn't care about them nor they didn't care about you, which makes the whole situation unfriendly.

I don't know what is now situation in the game because I quit gaming long long ago, at the time I quit(start of cata) the situation was already like I described.
I think it's not just about WoW, blizz, etc but I also feel about present gaming this way in general, when the games and internet were new, games were of much better quality either by their philosophy/lore and software alike and it was new and exciting to the people so they wowed much greater respect to the gaming and to the skills. Social aspect of online gaming went downhill very much and not sure if it will ever get better.

 

[nageov3t]

I like the idea of the LFG system, and honestly, I'd find it hard to play another MMO without it. when I'm playing with limited time, I can't really be bothered with sitting in a capital city spamming trade chat trying to put together a group for a leveling dungeon or pestering guildmates to run with me.

that said, I think there's a middle ground between a free-for-all LFG and having to spam chat. perhaps, a LFG that's only within-server (or a small cluster of servers to benefit those playing on low-pop realms)

WoW is obviously sunsetting at this point, and that's inevitable for any game... just thinking about WoW 2.

 

[Veliko]

Nobody truthfully raids for enjoyment. Not in the usual sense of raiding, which involves 4+ hours a night for 3+ nights a week for months on end.

Some will claim they do it for the "fun", or a sense of accomplishment, but come time they see a drop they can use, are they going to pass on it because they aren't in it for the gear? No way, never happens.

For a real example of raiding for enjoyment, look at the people who raid older content. How many of them raid with the same sort of rigor, schedule, and commitment of a progression guild? How many raid 6 nights a week for 6+ hours every night? ZERO. You might randomly through together a pug to do an old raid, you might even do it a few nights a week, but absolutely nobody spends as much time "raiding for enjoyment" when there aren't any potential upgrades on the line.

Now, I will say I enjoyed raiding because of the potential item drops. I had fun on a raid even if I got nothing, because I knew it was a chance of getting a nice shiny upgrade. This chance was exciting, because an upgrade would last. It was like a permanent enhancement to my character. That enjoyment is gone now, because getting an item isn't even exciting anymore. It's like "oh great, a little boost until I get my tier+1 welfare epic upgrade next patch, joy". It's hard to get excited over something so temporary and unimportant. It's even harder to find enjoyment based on a small chance of getting such a temporary boost.

The potential for a gear upgrade is one part of it, yes.

But the fact remains that you enjoyed that time you spent raiding with your guild and the introduction of a new tier doesn't change that, unless you are in possession of a time machine.

 

[lupi]

You wouldn't be surprised to see an expansion released, that's one hell of a position to take. I mean, it's not like we're talking about a product already 12 months in age from a group whose stated desire is to produce a new expansion every 18 months, even though the best they've done is 22.5, but that is one bold stance to declare.

 

[smackababy]

The potential for a gear upgrade is one part of it, yes.

But the fact remains that you enjoyed that time you spent raiding with your guild and the introduction of a new tier doesn't change that, unless you are in possession of a time machine.

It seems to me like his major complaint is he feels the reward for the investment of time in raiding current content is worthless when a future patch will yield as good gear for "free". His major problem seems to be that he feels as if the value of raiding is in the gear, when it should be in the experience of the content.

I guess people don't understand, regardless of the outcome, skill, gear obtained, PVP rank achieved, whatever, gaming is a waste of time. The value is that in wasting time, you gain entertainment. And if your only source of entertainment is obtaining better, shinier, epic-er gear, you're playing the wrong game with WoW. I'd suggest a loot finder like D3 or PoE.

 

[railven]

Woof, that elitist mentallity...gotta love it. "I raid 80hours a week, I'm better than you!" Haha.

I remember when I was one of the "chosen" belonged to a guild that was rank 5 in my server. I spent more time with my guild than I did with my GF.

I don't even know why, I guess I wanted to experience that last portion of the game that very few belong to. After experiencing, I'm glad I did because I can look back at it as my worst experience in WoW.

Yelled at by GMs, strict hourly schedules, strict everything. Nah, this is a game first and if I was going to subject myself to that nonsense just to be "we're the best of the best" I'd best be getting paid!

Watching those two defend their position made it hilarious. Their bitter sweet tears realized no one cares about them. And that is frankly what scares them the most - no one cares anymore. Before the top dogs "where you get that gear? it looks cool." Now everyone looks the same. They've lost any real value in the social aspect. They don't stand out, they have no recognition, look at the top tier guilds - even they are falling from public eye.

No one cares. And good, cuz I can continue to run my little guild and have fun with our casuals. Flex raiding is a god send for us little guys. We can bring 17 people or if some can't make it drop to 12.

We all can't dedicate 40+ hours to this game, but thankfully with my 6 hour dedication per week and knowledge, I'm wearing the same gear some of you elitist are.

SUCK IT!

 

[chadashcroft22]

Woof, that elitist mentallity...gotta love it. "I raid 80hours a week, I'm better than you!" Haha.

I remember when I was one of the "chosen" belonged to a guild that was rank 5 in my server. I spent more time with my guild than I did with my GF.

I don't even know why, I guess I wanted to experience that last portion of the game that very few belong to. After experiencing, I'm glad I did because I can look back at it as my worst experience in WoW.

Yelled at by GMs, strict hourly schedules, strict everything. Nah, this is a game first and if I was going to subject myself to that nonsense just to be "we're the best of the best" I'd best be getting paid!

Watching those two defend their position made it hilarious. Their bitter sweet tears realized no one cares about them. And that is frankly what scares them the most - no one cares anymore. Before the top dogs "where you get that gear? it looks cool." Now everyone looks the same. They've lost any real value in the social aspect. They don't stand out, they have no recognition, look at the top tier guilds - even they are falling from public eye.

No one cares. And good, cuz I can continue to run my little guild and have fun with our casuals. Flex raiding is a god send for us little guys. We can bring 17 people or if some can't make it drop to 12.

We all can't dedicate 40+ hours to this game, but thankfully with my 6 hour dedication per week and knowledge, I'm wearing the same gear some of you elitist are.

SUCK IT!

You do realize that sooner rather than later you and or your guildmates will become bored with the ease of welfare epics. When there is no work the reward is meaningless. And don't even pretend like it's work to roll threw normal mode dungeons or lfr. My grandmother could do it.

And your judging because you where in a nazi guild is how all top tier guilds operate. Quite the assumption my friend.

 

[railven]

You do realize that sooner rather than later you and or your guildmates will become bored with the ease of welfare epics. When there is no work the reward is meaningless. And don't even pretend like it's work to roll threw normal mode dungeons or lfr. My grandmother could do it.

Who said anything about LFR/Dungeons? We got progression. Normal into Heroics. Your point?

Again, not everyone is cut from the same cloth, so in my little guild I satisfy all of us:
Flex for those who want to enjoy raiding in a guild setting (ie not LFR)
Normal for those of us who like a little more challenge
And eventually heroic for those of us who continue to like a little more challenge.

And since we aren't raiding 40+ hours a week, we can stretch this content out for a loooooooonnnngggggg time

I'm reminded of the people who complain a game has nothing to do after logging in 150 hours only a week after game release.

Come on, really?

And your judging because you where in a nazi guild is how all top tier guilds operate. Quite the assumption my friend.

After reading all your posts, you saying this is freaking HILARIOUS. HAHAHA.

 

[smackababy]

You do realize that sooner rather than later you and or your guildmates will become bored with the ease of welfare epics. When there is no work the reward is meaningless. And don't even pretend like it's work to roll threw normal mode dungeons or lfr. My grandmother could do it.

And your judging because you where in a nazi guild is how all top tier guilds operate. Quite the assumption my friend.

The same thing can be said of pushing content. By the time my guild was doing Heroic LK in ICC, I was already bored of raiding. I had done all content at the highest level except Heroic LK (and at the time we started, the top guild on our server hadn't even downed him yet). I literally logged on 30 minutes before raid time every day we had raids, did some AH stuff, said 'hi' to a few guildmates, raided, then logged off.

It wasn't fun even being at the highest of the high. The only hunters on my server that were better geared than me were in Blood Legion.

 

[Aikouka]

It seems to me like his major complaint is he feels the reward for the investment of time in raiding current content is worthless when a future patch will yield as good gear for "free". His major problem seems to be that he feels as if the value of raiding is in the gear, when it should be in the experience of the content.

I guess people don't understand, regardless of the outcome, skill, gear obtained, PVP rank achieved, whatever, gaming is a waste of time. The value is that in wasting time, you gain entertainment. And if your only source of entertainment is obtaining better, shinier, epic-er gear, you're playing the wrong game with WoW. I'd suggest a loot finder like D3 or PoE.

If "experience of the content" is all that we should value, then why ever do a raid more than once? It's always been about the end result, which has been things such as loot or titles. However, in vanilla, you had to treat content as a stepping stone. Oddly enough, I don't recall many people complaining about it. My brother's guild was far behind mine; I think we had BWL beaten when they finally started raiding MC. None of them cared nor felt the need that they had to jump to the latest and greatest content.

What's interesting about that approach is that arguably, all of the content was in use. Now, Blizzard effectively makes their own content worthless and obsolete with every patch release. Why go back and farm tier gear the "proper way" when you can get it through easier channels? The only people that will go back are min/max'ers who need some random item because it's just too good.

Oh, and yes, it was rather nice that even though I quit during AQ40, my Rogue's tier 1 and tier 2 gear was still good and represented his true level of accomplishment throughout all of vanilla. I didn't get it from running BRD (what would be an equivalent of valor rewards if done in vanilla); I got it from clearing MC and BWL.

 

[waggy]

lol the only argument people have against LFR is "OMG THEY HAVE THE SAME LOOKING EPIC AS ME!? IM NOT A SPECIAL SNOWFLAKE!"

Really there ain't much difference if the gear was purple or blue (people would just transmog the shit. also i feel the new tiers are fucking ugly).

IF poeple are really bitching they should go back to only herioc would have purples. then VERY few would really have much in them.


not that it matters. who has what gear really does not matter on what gear you have.

The same thing can be said of pushing content. By the time my guild was doing Heroic LK in ICC, I was already bored of raiding. I had done all content at the highest level except Heroic LK (and at the time we started, the top guild on our server hadn't even downed him yet). I literally logged on 30 minutes before raid time every day we had raids, did some AH stuff, said 'hi' to a few guildmates, raided, then logged off.

It wasn't fun even being at the highest of the high. The only hunters on my server that were better geared than me were in Blood Legion.

/this i did it up to LK. it stopped being fun. I lost the desire to raid day after day for hours.

I love LFR. less stress and i get to see the boss's. sure the gear is nto on par with full raid and far less then Herioc. but fuck i don't care.

I'm having fun in LFR.

though i am excited about flex raid

 

[Veliko]

If "experience of the content" is all that we should value, then why ever do a raid more than once? It's always been about the end result, which has been things such as loot or titles.

Since when? As has already been pointed out, the end result is just part of it.

When you read a book, is it to enjoy the story or do you just skip to the last page?

 

[justoh]

Predictions on world first garrosh? EU or Merica? US realms up in an hour or so and then the race is on. EU raiders have to wait until tomorrow, sadly, though the rankings take this into account (time stamps).

EU normally wins. Any ideas why euros are better at wow than americans? hehe.

 

[styrafoam]

EU normally wins. Any ideas why euros are better at wow than americans?

They only work 3 days a week so they have more time for WoW?

 

[BoberFett]

If "experience of the content" is all that we should value, then why ever do a raid more than once? It's always been about the end result, which has been things such as loot or titles. However, in vanilla, you had to treat content as a stepping stone. Oddly enough, I don't recall many people complaining about it. My brother's guild was far behind mine; I think we had BWL beaten when they finally started raiding MC. None of them cared nor felt the need that they had to jump to the latest and greatest content.

What's interesting about that approach is that arguably, all of the content was in use. Now, Blizzard effectively makes their own content worthless and obsolete with every patch release. Why go back and farm tier gear the "proper way" when you can get it through easier channels? The only people that will go back are min/max'ers who need some random item because it's just too good.

Oh, and yes, it was rather nice that even though I quit during AQ40, my Rogue's tier 1 and tier 2 gear was still good and represented his true level of accomplishment throughout all of vanilla. I didn't get it from running BRD (what would be an equivalent of valor rewards if done in vanilla); I got it from clearing MC and BWL.

If there's no way to catch up to people who have been raiding forever, how would anybody new ever catch up? How easy do you suppose it would be for people to progress now if the only way to do the new raid was to start at the beginning and do every raid with a competent, dedicated 40 person group, limited to players on their server?

Good luck with that. Some of you are just mad that you're not special little snowflakes.

 

[AViking]

They only work 3 days a week so they have more time for WoW?

I used to think that until I moved here. They work here. They just happen to get long vacations.

They're most likely better because the internet is better over here. We might have invented the internet but it sucks in America. I have 1000Mbps and phones get 80Mbps here. It makes a huge difference.

 

[chadashcroft22]

If "experience of the content" is all that we should value, then why ever do a raid more than once? It's always been about the end result, which has been things such as loot or titles. However, in vanilla, you had to treat content as a stepping stone. Oddly enough, I don't recall many people complaining about it. My brother's guild was far behind mine; I think we had BWL beaten when they finally started raiding MC. None of them cared nor felt the need that they had to jump to the latest and greatest content.

What's interesting about that approach is that arguably, all of the content was in use. Now, Blizzard effectively makes their own content worthless and obsolete with every patch release. Why go back and farm tier gear the "proper way" when you can get it through easier channels? The only people that will go back are min/max'ers who need some random item because it's just too good.

Oh, and yes, it was rather nice that even though I quit during AQ40, my Rogue's tier 1 and tier 2 gear was still good and represented his true level of accomplishment throughout all of vanilla. I didn't get it from running BRD (what would be an equivalent of valor rewards if done in vanilla); I got it from clearing MC and BWL.

You hit the nail on the head that all these casuals can't seem to understand. When you get epics for breathing you don't value them. You will lose interest and move to the next game that gives you shiny items. The person arguing us is proof that this is true. He is playing gw2.

 

[AViking]

If there's no way to catch up to people who have been raiding forever, how would anybody new ever catch up? How easy do you suppose it would be for people to progress now if the only way to do the new raid was to start at the beginning and do every raid with a competent, dedicated 40 person group, limited to players on their server?

Good luck with that. Some of you are just mad that you're not special little snowflakes.

They could do it the way we did it before.

On my server in BC one of the top US guilds would run attunements on weekends and be pretty awesome about teaching other guilds how to clear content. If you sucked they threw you out and you weren't invited back but they were patient. They outlined the entire attunement process and went through it. Eventually pugs formed. I used to raid lead pugs for Vashj and Kael. Vashj I could raid lead successfully each time but Kael was really tough. Only got it done 3 times in a pug. Hyjal was pretty easy and if anything hilarious because of the trash. BT we would do partly just for the fun of it but the end wasn't really puggable and I definitely didn't want to deal with a warglaive drop in a pug. Not that I think we could have gotten there. I tried council in a pug and that was a giant mistake. To get your blessed medallion you pretty much had to be in a raiding guild and doing Illidan legit. Black Temple was finished by a mix of alts and mains from the top guilds and each respective warglaive was designated to one player ahead of time. So you'd bring 2 Rogues who each needed one to finish their set. Was great if someone missed a week, great for less elite guilds, and great for alts.

So those that wanted to catch up could get a top end guild to run them, they could learn to pug the content, or they could join a guild who was progressing through the content. This need to go from the beginning to the end is all dependent on your time frame. Why does someone who can't kill Patchwerk in Naxx need to be in the following raids? Nobody who was stuck on Nightbane was asking to kill Illidan as far as I remember.

 

[Aikouka]

If there's no way to catch up to people who have been raiding forever, how would anybody new ever catch up?

Who says there's absolutely no way to catch up? Sometimes, people (such as my brother) were behind simply because they started far later. Raiding in vanilla actually got a bit easier after Blizzard introduced Zul'Gurub, which actually came after Blackwing Lair. The problem was that while the blue gear was sufficient for raids, there was still a modest jump in effectiveness between the dungeon and raid gear.

How easy do you suppose it would be for people to progress now if the only way to do the new raid was to start at the beginning and do every raid with a competent, dedicated 40 person group, limited to players on their server?

When did I say that 40-person raids were a worthwhile system to go back to? The only benefit in those raids was that it was easier to carry a bad DPS or healer, which was part of what allowed the weaker gear to still work. Guilds actually had to work their butts off to try and get certain gear for their tanks and such. I have no qualms with 10-man and 25-man raids.

What if people had to go back to get the gear? Well, I guess they'd have to suck it up, buttercup, and put some actual work in to get those shinnies that they think they deserve.

Good luck with that. Some of you are just mad that you're not special little snowflakes.

I really love how people just degenerate to attacks on others because people are supposedly selfish for wanting gear to actually retain the same level of effort in attainment. If we were truly selfish, we would care that you had it regardless of the method of attainment. I didn't care that I saw other rogues in T1 or T2, and hell... even T2.5 and T3 after I quit raiding. They put in the work for it, and were good players. I'd know, since back then, you pretty much knew everyone.

EDIT:

I'm also rather surprised that no one has brought up easy epics helping gearing up alts. That's what I used it for....

 

[smackababy]

They could do it the way we did it before.

On my server in BC one of the top US guilds would run attunements on weekends and be pretty awesome about teaching other guilds how to clear content. If you sucked they threw you out and you weren't invited back but they were patient. They outlined the entire attunement process and went through it. Eventually pugs formed. I used to raid lead pugs for Vashj and Kael. Vashj I could raid lead successfully each time but Kael was really tough. Only got it done 3 times in a pug. Hyjal was pretty easy and if anything hilarious because of the trash. BT we would do partly just for the fun of it but the end wasn't really puggable and I definitely didn't want to deal with a warglaive drop in a pug. Not that I think we could have gotten there. I tried council in a pug and that was a giant mistake. To get your blessed medallion you pretty much had to be in a raiding guild and doing Illidan legit. Black Temple was finished by a mix of alts and mains from the top guilds and each respective warglaive was designated to one player ahead of time. So you'd bring 2 Rogues who each needed one to finish their set. Was great if someone missed a week, great for less elite guilds, and great for alts.

So those that wanted to catch up could get a top end guild to run them, they could learn to pug the content, or they could join a guild who was progressing through the content. This need to go from the beginning to the end is all dependent on your time frame. Why does someone who can't kill Patchwerk in Naxx need to be in the following raids? Nobody who was stuck on Nightbane was asking to kill Illidan as far as I remember.

Your server was far and above the average server then. I played on a very large server and it took like 8 hours to pug Vashj. No guilds did attunement runes (at least not for free). I am fairly sure before WotLK nobody on my server pug'd BT. We spent like 6 hours on Kael once with half of us in raiding gear to kill him. If you were behind, you did Kara and that was it. Rain content, even after attunements went away, was seen by so few players, Blizzard completely redid how it was.

The only people who are upset are the elitists who think their time is worth more than the "casuals". They are upset people can get equivalent gear doing something "easier". They don't appreciate the content, the just appreciate the feeling they get by having something others can't.

 

[Aikouka]

They don't appreciate the content, the just appreciate the feeling they get by having something others can't.

So, now you're going to try and tell me how I felt when I killed Ragnaros or Nefarion for the first time? How it felt to finally take down Razorgore after around a month of trying to figure out a proper strategy (no shaman = no EB totem)?

 

[AViking]

Your server was far and above the average server then. I played on a very large server and it took like 8 hours to pug Vashj. No guilds did attunement runes (at least not for free). I am fairly sure before WotLK nobody on my server pug'd BT. We spent like 6 hours on Kael once with half of us in raiding gear to kill him. If you were behind, you did Kara and that was it. Rain content, even after attunements went away, was seen by so few players, Blizzard completely redid how it was.

The only people who are upset are the elitists who think their time is worth more than the "casuals". They are upset people can get equivalent gear doing something "easier". They don't appreciate the content, the just appreciate the feeling they get by having something others can't.

SSC? I'm pretty sure we started at around 6pm and finished at 1am. That shit took time. We would go with something like 17-20 who had already cleared the instance but on alts (with a few mains helping) and that left only 5-8 who needed to learn the fights. I had macros setup that streamlined everything as much as I could for assignments but ultimately with Vashj you needed to get everyone to a spot where they were effective and that took wipes to figure out. Wasn't a cake walk. Was doable though. We generally skipped the water boss since we didn't always have resistance geared tanks with us so that might be where the extra hour is saved. I'm really just trying to go off memory of how long it took though. That was a long time ago and I just remember being up really late to finish.

I made a lot of friends and was casual before I went hard core. You're right, they didn't go past Kara. They didn't do it because it was hard and they didn't have the time for 25 mans. Kara was a 10 man raid. I think that was one of the nice things in Wrath - the introduction of 10's. They screwed up though by having them on separate lockouts since that forced competitive guilds to do both and that burned out players. I hear they seperated them again. How's that working out?

 

[chadashcroft22]

The only people who are upset are the elitists who think their time is worth more than the "casuals". They are upset people can get equivalent gear doing something "easier". They don't appreciate the content, the just appreciate the feeling they get by having something others can't.

So somebody that dedicates 4+ hours a night doing hardcore raid progression shouldn't be rewarded more than a scrub in lfr that does 40k dps in 30 mins worth of time? Thank you for enlightening us all on your casual opinion. Seems pretty fair to me while where at it would you like a discount on your sub since you play so much less?

Whatever you do please keep your kind out of everquest next and that is all I ask. Thanks

 

[smackababy]

So somebody that dedicates 4+ hours a night doing hardcore raid progression shouldn't be rewarded more than a scrub in lfr that does 40k dps in 30 mins worth of time? Thank you for enlightening us all on your casual opinion. Seems pretty fair to me while where at it would you like a discount on your sub since you play so much less?

Whatever you do please keep your kind out of everquest next and that is all I ask. Thanks

Somebody that dedicates so much time to hardcore raid progression shouldn't worry about what other people have. You are clearing content other people can't. Why is that not enough reward? In fact, you're getting titles and achievements others aren't. But you also need some kind of special members only club gear as well?

Yeah, I won't be playing EQ Next, because EQ was for carebears back in the day, and it still is. I prefer not to play with entitled hardcore wannabes. I am sure you use DeadlyBossMods and still think you are such a leet player.

 

[justoh]

apparently nobody cares but blood legion leading as expected: http://www.wowprogress.com/

Seems a lot more fun to watch the best than argue about the merits of being an elitist snob.

There's a great documentary out there called "race to world first" featuring all the top wow players. Very short trailer! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkLosQzcYDk