WoW revenue down 54% in seven months

[railven]

You were in Raiding Rainbows? That was a very good guild.

Once again I've done casual and I've done hardcore. I've said above that I don't care if you want to play the game to go fishing. However if all you do is fish and are commenting on raiding mechanics then I'm going to dismiss your opinion. I don't mean you but generally speaking.

Meh I'm bored...

Lets review what I have said in this thread. These are my opinions.

1. The game engine is old, has only been updated to really improve the look of the water, and the hardware requirements are for 2007 machines. Although catering to a wide audience is great when you consider the other problems the game has it's easy to move along to something else that is modern. I linked a world first kill from the current normal mode tier and lets face it the game looks ancient. I never played for the graphics but I think it's an important consideration when you find yourself closing WOW and opening up another game. It's tough to go back to 2007. They should have a game engine that can support better graphics, modern graphics, for those of us who don't have 7 year old computers.

I think you are confusing art style with game engine. WoW's art style hasn't changed much but since inception, they've added almost every current generation rendering effect.
Dynamic real time lighting
DX11 render path (makes a huge difference if you use AA)
HB-AO
Water refraction
Water physics

I actually can't run WoW at max setting on my 2007 PC. So I really don't know what you're talking about the engine being dated.

2. Server depopulation. Worse yet being charged to server and faction change. I don't blame them necessarely for making the default server that you are originally placed on be low pop. I think that's smart business since it spreads out the initial population and probably leads to some income from one server transfer but I do have a serious problem with them not fixing the completely horde dominated servers that exist today. World PVP is all but gone and it's really no fun playing with only your own faction. To me these added fees are really short sighted since I personally saw people simply walk away rather than be faced with either paying more money to move their main but having all their alts elsewhere or paying a kings ransom to move all their characters to a better server.

Why is this a complaint?

3. Deflation of gear. I think others have explained this better but gear today is not epic or legendary. It's very easy to aquire and it is quickly replaced. There have been examples already posted but an item such as the Dragonspine Tropy lasted years and into the next expansion. That ended in Wrath and removed some of the epicness from the game. If you acquired the legendary in Ulduar you replaced it in the next instance. That was a huge disappointment. I had BC legendaries and felt genuinely sorry for our Ulduar healers when their legendary was shit the next patch.

Do you even know what the word deflation means? There is currently 7 ranks for gear, 7! LFR/FLEX/NL/NL+Forged/Heroic/Heroic+Forged/Legendary

The people who do LFR won't see any of the other (well possibly the legendary cape if they put the effort into it.)

This complaints boils down to "Blizzard is releasing content too fast, I can't clear current tier before next tier makes my gear obsolete, waaaaah!"

4. The disappearance of 25 man guilds. This is complex but 25 man guilds are going extinct on every server my friends play on. Most have zero Alliance guilds. That's ruining the game for them. Equalization of gear and welfare epics demotivate people from putting in the extra effort that 25 mans require. 25 man raids require a lot more effort to organize and I always felt that a differentiation between the raid sizes was appropriate.

Isn't this a community issue? You sort of explain why someone who get rid of a 25-man run. Community saw the easier path and gee-golly they took it.

5. Server lag and poor latency or disconnects due to ISPs. Look, we all dealt with patch day lag. I'm not complaining about that. I'm complaining about what started in Ulduar and never ended. Basically a permanent lag problem. We were unable to get into Ulduar for a week on our server and by the time ICC came out the lag was so bad that we had to change our raiding schedule. Instances like TOC had a serious problem and every time Icehowl charged we would have 1-3 disconnects. This continued. Bosses that we should have had no problem to kill became incredibly difficult because maybe a tank was the one suddenly disconnecting on a boss for the first time in 4 years or maybe it was the kiter. It was very frustrating and reoccurring. Try doing 1 light in the darkness with your tank disconnecting. A Tribute to Insanity took us an extra month on 25 man because of disconnects each time the bugs came up.

Why is this a complaint?

6. The quality of players significantly decreased as experienced players quit and wow no longer had a way to teach players to be good. Starting at 5 mans instances used to be challenging. Suddenly in wrath everything was faceroll and if they had a hint of a challenge players would quit after one wipe. LFG introduced a level of anonymity that wasn't there before which made people rude and took away from the learning process. How did I learn how to tank, dps, heal? I got a group together from my guild, friends, and trade chat. You got to know people in all the other guilds. The high end guilds would then offer to teach you how to kill bosses that you were struggling with in say Black Temple. They would help you get attuned. It was a community. LFG and all these easy 5 mans changed that. Case in point: Do you remember The Oculus? Do you remember how people didn't know how to fly the drakes, how people voted to kick, how people afked, and how nobody had the patience to learn the instance? That's what I didn't like. I missed Baron Runs, BRD, and people taking the time to truly teach and help you clear an instance like Heroic Shattered Halls for your attunement. This loss from the game also affected how friends were made and how recruitment was done. I should also mention that the nerfs are generally pretty quick and so extreme that key mechanics can be bypassed and this is also not helping maintain or improve the quality of the players in the game.

Another community issue. People got tired, moved on. That's Blizzard's fault?

7. All content had to be available to everyone. I understand the developers not wanting to recreate Sunwell. I admit that was a mistake. I doubt most people could kill the trash let alone Kalecogos. It was nuts. I'm fine with everyone seeing all the content. Just not at the same time. It's an entire expansion pack and I don't see the point of creating content that is so easy that even the most inept player can do it. Anyone even partially skilled and in a guild was able to clear a normal mode instance in the first week or two. That's far too fast. The game got boring since the content ran out too quickly and quite frankly it was no fun having to kill normal mode and then the same bosses again on hard mode. I would rather they simply have a progression of bosses thorughout the expansion pack that got harder and harder. I would rather they not nerf them so fast. Karazhan 1.0 was pretty difficult. I farmed the blue dungeon set, got attuned, and worked on clearing it. Was a lot of fun. I then moved on from there. There were guilds killing Illidan when I was in SSC/TK. I kept on progressing though and when Sunwell was released I was killing Sunwell bosses. Today that's not the case. Today each patch makes the previous content null and void since everyone goes to a vendor, or the new welfare instance, gets purples, and then does the new instance. Each patch!

Why does it bother you that, as you call them, casuals get to enjoy the same content as you? Trust me they don't get the same experience as you (I can't stand LFR, but I mindlessly do it when I'm bored.)

8. Welfare epics. The problem here is that it gave people a false sense of skill. Combined with the ease of 5 mans of course. Plus the ease of 10 man over 25 too but not as much since someone killing hard modes in 10 man is perfectly capable of hard modes in 25. Having to weed through the masses of fully epiced out players who had absolutely no idea how to play the game was no fun. The game is not hard. So I ended up right where we were before with attunements and that is recruiting from other guilds that were killing the same content we were. Of course with the depopulation, death of 25 man guilds, etc we were having to bring in server transfers and thus contribute to more people paying more money to compensate for Blizzard having poor server management. Now they have a welfare legendary too it seems. Everyone and their mother has the cloak. I know it's just a color but why not just keep it simple? Blues from 5 mans. Purples from raiding. Highlight the heroics. Make legendaries difficult to obtain. Of course PvP should have access to epics but these welfare epics from 5 mans and vendors is really lame and giving people a false sense of skill. Skill is far more important than gear. We killed raid bosses in blues on first release. Hell we had people with green trinkets. Practically giving away epics to players who then enter a 5 man instance, bypass the mechanics, and never become a good player is terrible for the game.

Why is this a complaint? That's three complaints that are in your head. Dude stop worrying about others. You'll be happier, for reals.

9. Game burnout. No easy solution here but having raids on separate lockouts was a killer. Thank god they got rid of that. I hear they either brought it back or are going to. I hope that's not true. Patches that lasted too long was another problem. Now a lot of game burnout is personal choice. I did 5 day raiding for a while and decided that was incredibly unhealthy and toned it down significantly. Regardless the issue of duplicate raids was an issue. Nobody liked having to run both 10 and 25 for gear and nobody liked killing the same bosses on normal and then again on hard mode. Took away from that epicness somehow that existed before when you were progressing from boss to boss to boss.

Tie this to people leaving and reduction of guild sizes. You did 5 days of raiding? Amateur. And you call yourself hardcore, ha! (Sarcasm by the way, with a friendly jab.)

Of course people are going to get burned out and that affects everything you seem to accuse Blizzard of doing: populations drop, guilds reduce size, and the well of experienced players dries up.

10. Lastly rude players. I had real life friends who quit the game since anyone new is a "noob", nobody has the patience to teach anyone, and nobody will group with someone who isn't fully decked out in welfare epics for even the most simple 5 mans. The community that existed in Vanilla and BC slowly disappeared in Wrath and by the time Cata came out it was pretty much completely gone.

Tell your friend to grow thicker skin or avoid the anonymous avenues. I hate doing dungeon finder and prefer to do anything group related with my guild only because I can't stand the general population that use dungeon finder. They can talk all the trash they want, I blare my music on my headphones and get my valor. Drop group.

I'm actually experiencing this same nonsense in FFXIV and I'm so use to it. Hell just browsing the Internets.

And ironically, you claim rude people but you are the most demeaning person in this thread. Go figure.


Okay, time for me raid Later!

 

[Chiropteran]

You're changing the argument and / or responding where you shouldn't. Of the problems you listed here, welfare epics is not the problem. Its how frequently they release better gear that is easy to get than the gear you spent time earning. The fact that they are epics is irrelevant. If they were blues you'd (likely) be equally pissed.

I'm not sure what your point is. Color is irrelevant, yes. I don't care if they are epics or rares or legendary items. The term is "welfare epics" and I use the term because it is well understood generally, not because it's a problem specific to epic items only.

The point being that the frequency in which easy-to-get better gear has increased to new raid releases instead of just expansion pack releases or some other longer interval. Ultimately, at some point your hard earned gear becomes worthless with or without "welfare epics".

Yes. When the level cap is raised, there kind of has to be a gear reset of some sort. That is acceptable, I am not arguing that raid epics should remain "good" forever and ever. I am arguing that 2-4 months is an insanely short period of time for them to be "good", though.

As far as bad players, it doesn't matter how good / bad other players are other than when you try to raid with them. Another complaint being listed here when trying to recruit for guilds / raids. Try to follow the thread.

I am following the thread. It's not a valid complaint. If you don't like bad players, don't invite them to your raids. If you can't field a raid with enough good players, it's almost certainly your guild's fault.

Not sure i understand. So you want either less content patches or the removal of lfr? Do you want to clear content and then just sit on your gear for a year?

No. New content every 5 months in itself is okay. What isn't okay is when the new LFR joke raid gear is equal or better than the real raid gear from the previous tier.

Going back to vanilla examples, I loved ZG and AQ20. When ZG was released, suddenly lots of epics were available in an easier 20 man raid compared to Molten Core. However, ZG gear didn't obsolete MC gear. The people who spent months farming MC for a set of gear didn't immediately throw it in the trash when they started doing ZG, because ZG gear was generally worse, as it should be.

Alternatively, there is Blackwing Lair. Blackwing Lair did have gear that was better than Molten Core, but it should have- it was a much harder raid. Again, Molten Core gear wasn't suddenly obsolete, because BWL wasn't realistically doable until your raid was at least mostly geared from MC optionally with some ZG gear.

To me, that is the correct way to add new content.

Then there is new WoW, where the new *easier* content also drops better gear. It makes the old content completely obsolete and pointless. That is the wrong way to add content.

I personally found it acceptable for there to be a gear reset every 2-3 years when a new expansion was released, that was fine, but a gear reset every content patch is just stupid.

 

[railven]

No. New content every 5 months in itself is okay. What isn't okay is when the new LFR joke raid gear is equal or better than the real raid gear from the previous tier.

Going back to vanilla examples, I loved ZG and AQ20. When ZG was released, suddenly lots of epics were available in an easier 20 man raid compared to Molten Core. However, ZG gear didn't obsolete MC gear. The people who spent months farming MC for a set of gear didn't immediately throw it in the trash when they started doing ZG, because ZG gear was generally worse, as it should be.

Alternatively, there is Blackwing Lair. Blackwing Lair did have gear that was better than Molten Core, but it should have- it was a much harder raid. Again, Molten Core gear wasn't suddenly obsolete, because BWL wasn't realistically doable until your raid was at least mostly geared from MC optionally with some ZG gear.

To me, that is the correct way to add new content.

Then there is new WoW, where the new *easier* content also drops better gear. It makes the old content completely obsolete and pointless. That is the wrong way to add content.

I personally found it acceptable for there to be a gear reset every 2-3 years when a new expansion was released, that was fine, but a gear reset every content patch is just stupid.

So you basically don't like the new implemented catch up mechanic? Because basically that is what LFR is now.

This is basically how you'd "catch up" a serious player:
Let them run LFR on their own, and guild run them through old content. This maximized their speed up.

Non-serious players can LFR to their hearts content, they're still never going to get the same gear someone who raids HM does and I'm not sure about the loot you wear, but my HM TOT gear isn't going to be replaced by LFR SoO. Maybe Flex SoO, but that is a guild experience (and quite frankly a nice one if you ask me.)

If you are dedicated to raiding your gear isn't going to be instantly invalided by LFR. A new tier, sure, but you have to work at it unless you are super elite and clearing tiers in a week. If you are, you're working on HMs and LFR gear is a joke.

EDIT: TL;DR

New tier only invalidates your current gear (ie LFR drops) if you sat on your hands. No one is going to replace HM TOT stuff with LFR SoO junk. You'll be aiming for normal SoO and possibly Flex SoO at minimum.

The only people who'd care about LFR are the ones who run LFR exclusively or guilds that struggle at Normal.

 

[Chiropteran]

New tier only invalidates your current gear (ie LFR drops) if you sat on your hands. No one is going to replace HM TOT stuff with LFR SoO junk. You'll be aiming for normal SoO and possibly Flex SoO at minimum.

Nope, you are making a flawed comparison. You are comparing heroic items to LFR, that is two difficulty tiers lower.

Heroic gear from one raid *is* obsoleted by regular raid gear from the next, just as regular raid gear is obsoleted by LFR gear from the next content patch.

The only way your gear remains "good" is if you adjust your raid levels downward, and that only works twice. You do heroic raids one patch, new patch you adjust down and do LFR, your heroic gear is still better, cool. But now when you go on to the next raid, there isn't anything lower than LFR, your gear is obsolete again.


In any case, every raider's gear becomes obsolete. Heroic raid gear is obsolete because *easier* to obtain normal raid gear of the next raid is better, while normal raid gear is obsolete because *easier* to obtain LFR raid gear is better.

So you basically don't like the new implemented catch up mechanic? Because basically that is what LFR is now.

Why the hell should there be a catch up mechanic? It's not that I don't like the implementation, I don't like the idea of a catch up mechanic at all, in any way. The way you should catch up is by progressing the same as the previous players, not skipping ahead and suddenly being on their level in a fraction of the time it originally took.

When you are leveling from 1 to 90 or whatever max is now, and you take 4 months off after reaching level 30, there is no mechanic to instantly boost you up to level 60 to "catch up" with someone else who was leveling with you, as there should not be.

When you are doing a long quest chain of, for example, 9 quests, and you are on the 3rd quest, you can't just group up with someone on the last quest and "catch up" with them without doing the quests in between. As it should be.

Yet when it comes to raiding, you can take a year and a half off, and come back and catch up after a few short weeks of raiding in LFR and collecting badge/rep gear. Why does raiding need this extra hand holding mechanic? What is so bad about making raiders do the easier raids first, to collect gear needed to progress into the harder raids? It worked in vanilla, it worked in BC, and player numbers were fine.

 

[yottabit]

I'm actually really curious what Blizzard would be capable of doing if they created an entirely new game engine (Say, for Project Titan)

Pretty much everything we've seen from them in the past 10 years has come from some derivation of the WC3 engine, including Starcraft 2, WoW, etc.

 

[Veliko]

Why the hell should there be a catch up mechanic? It's not that I don't like the implementation, I don't like the idea of a catch up mechanic at all, in any way. The way you should catch up is by progressing the same as the previous players, not skipping ahead and suddenly being on their level in a fraction of the time it originally took.

When you are leveling from 1 to 90 or whatever max is now, and you take 4 months off after reaching level 30, there is no mechanic to instantly boost you up to level 60 to "catch up" with someone else who was leveling with you, as there should not be.

There's rested XP, the nerfing of stronger NPCs, and the lowering of the amount of XP needed to level, etc.

When you are doing a long quest chain of, for example, 9 quests, and you are on the 3rd quest, you can't just group up with someone on the last quest and "catch up" with them without doing the quests in between. As it should be.

Yet when it comes to raiding, you can take a year and a half off, and come back and catch up after a few short weeks of raiding in LFR and collecting badge/rep gear. Why does raiding need this extra hand holding mechanic? What is so bad about making raiders do the easier raids first, to collect gear needed to progress into the harder raids? It worked in vanilla, it worked in BC, and player numbers were fine.

Because it ends up with hardly anyone actually being in a position to do those later raid tiers, which renders development a waste of time.

Why does it even matter to you? It doesn't make the slightest bit of difference to your game.

 

[Tweak155]

<snip>
I am following the thread. It's not a valid complaint. If you don't like bad players, don't invite them to your raids. If you can't field a raid with enough good players, it's almost certainly your guild's fault.

<snip>

If you were following the thread, you'd realize I didn't make the complaint.

 

[railven]

Nope, you are making a flawed comparison. You are comparing heroic items to LFR, that is two difficulty tiers lower.

Heroic gear from one raid *is* obsoleted by regular raid gear from the next, just as regular raid gear is obsoleted by LFR gear from the next content patch.

The only way your gear remains "good" is if you adjust your raid levels downward, and that only works twice. You do heroic raids one patch, new patch you adjust down and do LFR, your heroic gear is still better, cool. But now when you go on to the next raid, there isn't anything lower than LFR, your gear is obsolete again.


In any case, every raider's gear becomes obsolete. Heroic raid gear is obsolete because *easier* to obtain normal raid gear of the next raid is better, while normal raid gear is obsolete because *easier* to obtain LFR raid gear is better.

Well I did mention you'd aim for current tier gear (Normal/Flex minimum). But this is current tier, your example didn't introduce a new tier set, as you said it was an in between tier set. It was the Mogu'Shan Vaults of Vanilla. It's there to help you get into the tier raid content.

Where is the happy medium for gear value? I for one love getting new gear and hold new real sentimental value towards the gear I wear. (It's just virtual loot. ) Shoot, RNG was so bad to be I was using an LFR i476 shield which just finally got replaced with a Flex i540 shield. If you want to argue value of an item that thing held it's worth for two tier sets haha.

I personally didn't like end of TBC/WOTLK where I was sitting on the same gear for over a year. MoP's release schedule felt almost perfect for my liking. And currently working through 2 raids (Flex/Normal) with Heroics in probably 2-3 weeks, I already know my gear is going to get replaced, but chances are mostly by heroic versions not normal versions unless RNG dicks me again.

Why the hell should there be a catch up mechanic? It's not that I don't like the implementation, I don't like the idea of a catch up mechanic at all, in any way. The way you should catch up is by progressing the same as the previous players, not skipping ahead and suddenly being on their level in a fraction of the time it originally took.

When you are leveling from 1 to 90 or whatever max is now, and you take 4 months off after reaching level 30, there is no mechanic to instantly boost you up to level 60 to "catch up" with someone else who was leveling with you, as there should not be.

When you are doing a long quest chain of, for example, 9 quests, and you are on the 3rd quest, you can't just group up with someone on the last quest and "catch up" with them without doing the quests in between. As it should be.

Yet when it comes to raiding, you can take a year and a half off, and come back and catch up after a few short weeks of raiding in LFR and collecting badge/rep gear. Why does raiding need this extra hand holding mechanic? What is so bad about making raiders do the easier raids first, to collect gear needed to progress into the harder raids? It worked in vanilla, it worked in BC, and player numbers were fine.

You do realize this is a game, right? This isn't real life where your efforts reflect your worth. Are you seriously going to tell me it should take months (if not years) to get a new player at a similar gear level as you (note: gear != skill.)

Not sure if you're GM, but I don't got the time to wait for someone to spend going through ALL the content if they really want to join the raid roster. I get a group of guildies (mostly their alts) and we run said person through older content (MV>HOF>TOES>TOT (thank god for the nerf ) and at the same time we're running them through they get loot, experience, and we get to judge their value.

The quest analogy is pointless since you don't need catch ups for quests, if it is a quest chain for a legendary you damn right they need to do the steps, but don't act like the steps weren't nerfed to accelerate their progression through it.

I don't get this mentallity people have that "I should have more prestige because I did it first" or "it took me longer." I got one of those Winterspring mounts in like a week, took my GF a few months, not like she's all "you casual prick I hope you die!" Dafuq is wrong with people, seriously.

Focus on yourself and you'll find this game is so damn much fun. I did Flex raid last night with 17 members, two of us were drunk. Vent was a blast. We two healed the first boss since one of our healers (who's sick) died due to blowing her nose. LOL! Funny! Have fun!

 

[Subyman]

Why do you guys care so much?

 

[Tweak155]

Why do you guys care so much?

I think for a lot of us, WoW took a lot of time / dedication out of our lives (I know I'm not the only one with 100+ days logged time). Ultimately we'd like to see it change for the better, not watch it wash out.

 

[Chiropteran]

There's rested XP, the nerfing of stronger NPCs, and the lowering of the amount of XP needed to level, etc.

Which is on par with the old tier raids being nerfed somewhat over time, which is how things went in vanilla and BC. I had no problem with this.

Because it ends up with hardly anyone actually being in a position to do those later raid tiers, which renders development a waste of time.

"renders development a waste of time."

Really?

You realize that adding a new tier of a joke raid in LFR mode renders ALL prior raid development a waste? If you actually had to raid the old raids in order to gear up for the new raids, all that work wouldn't be put to waste.

I don't get the logic. Need to make sure everyone sees the new raid, so the solution is to make it so nobody will ever bother to do any of the old raids!

Why does it even matter to you? It doesn't make the slightest bit of difference to your game.

Well no it doesn't, since I don't play anymore. This is a thread about a 54% revenue drop. I was explaining my opinion on why so many players have quit. It doesn't make a difference to my game, it makes a difference to Blizzard's revenue, which is what we are supposed to be discussing in this thread.

If you were following the thread, you'd realize I didn't make the complaint.

I was responding to this:

Originally Posted by Tweak155 View Post
As far as bad players, it doesn't matter how good / bad other players are other than when you try to raid with them. Another complaint being listed here when trying to recruit for guilds / raids. Try to follow the thread.

If you don't want a response, why did you even mention it?

 

[Veliko]

"renders development a waste of time."

Really?

You realize that adding a new tier of a joke raid in LFR mode renders ALL prior raid development a waste? If you actually had to raid the old raids in order to gear up for the new raids, all that work wouldn't be put to waste.

I don't get the logic. Need to make sure everyone sees the new raid, so the solution is to make it so nobody will ever bother to do any of the old raids!

You don't understand the logic that if you have a far higher percentage of the player base doing the raids, then it means development is more worthwhile than if a much smaller percentage were doing the raids...?

Seriously?

Well no it doesn't, since I don't play anymore. This is a thread about a 54% revenue drop. I was explaining my opinion on why so many players have quit. It doesn't make a difference to my game, it makes a difference to Blizzard's revenue, which is what we are supposed to be discussing in this thread.

Well it clearly matters to you otherwise you wouldn't be on here saying things like "I don't like the idea of a catch up mechanic at all, in any way".

It seems that the figure of a 54% drop in revenue is an incredibly suspect claim anyway.

 

[justoh]

In other news, 11/14 hc bosses killed on first day... http://www.wowprogress.com/

Remember when bosses took months to kill? Why am the only person who cares about these races? Wonder what these guys will do for the next 8 months...

To say something on topic, @chirop, why is it that your arguments don't seem convincing to people?

Do you honestly think subs are declining because of the game becoming casual friendly? Aren't most players casual? If anything it probably slowed its decline. The average ilvl of people in high end guilds is like 560 and will be pushing 600 soon, so they shouldn't be bothered about lfr giving heavily gimped 522 gear.

The people who complain about casuals are usually in the 0.02% minority, so it wouldn't affect subs very much.

 

[Anteaus]

I think for a lot of us, WoW took a lot of time / dedication out of our lives (I know I'm not the only one with 100+ days logged time). Ultimately we'd like to see it change for the better, not watch it wash out.

Not to twist what you say, but you make it sound like you trained for the olympics or something. I'm not trying to minimize the time some of the older players (game wise, not age) like you have put into the game, but it's a zero net gain world when it comes to virtual entertainment and you will have nothing to show for it at the end of the day. If anything, it makes people sound like Al Bundy and his X touchdowns in a single game.

I apologize for picking on your post specifically, but I think it applies to some of the people here and I think it's a sad state of affairs when so many people get so emotional over what is arguably so inconsequential in reality. It's good to be a fan, but some here take it way beyond that.

As one of my favorite fictional characters said:

"I'm a fan. I'm a sports fan. I'm a music fan. And I'm a Star Trek fan. All of them. But here's what I don't do. . . . Let's list our ten favorite episodes.Let's list our least favorite episodes. Let's list our favorite galaxies. Let's make a chart to see how often our favorite galaxies appear in our favorite episodes. What Romulan would you most like to see coupled with a Cardassian and why? Let's spend a weekend talking about Romulans falling in love with Cardassians and then let's do it again. --- That's not being a fan. That's having a fetish..."

Five points to the first person who can tell me who said that and what tv show (hint)!

 

[Red Storm]

Josh from West Wing.

I totally Google'd it.

 

[Veliko]

Not to twist what you say, but you make it sound like you trained for the olympics or something. I'm not trying to minimize the time some of the older players (game wise, not age) like you have put into the game, but it's a zero net gain world when it comes to virtual entertainment and you will have nothing to show for it at the end of the day. If anything, it makes people sound like Al Bundy and his X touchdowns in a single game.

I apologize for picking on your post specifically, but I think it applies to some of the people here and I think it's a sad state of affairs when so many people get so emotional over what is arguably so inconsequential in reality. It's good to be a fan, but some here take it way beyond that.

I know what you mean, but for a lot of people it was their first MMO and they started when they were around 14 or so and carried on playing it through college and university.

You're definitely correct in that people take these things far too seriously though.

 

[Tweak155]

Not to twist what you say, but you make it sound like you trained for the olympics or something. I'm not trying to minimize the time some of the older players (game wise, not age) like you have put into the game, but it's a zero net gain world when it comes to virtual entertainment and you will have nothing to show for it at the end of the day. If anything, it makes people sound like Al Bundy and his X touchdowns in a single game.

I apologize for picking on your post specifically, but I think it applies to some of the people here and I think it's a sad state of affairs when so many people get so emotional over what is arguably so inconsequential in reality. It's good to be a fan, but some here take it way beyond that.

As one of my favorite fictional characters said:

"I'm a fan. I'm a sports fan. I'm a music fan. And I'm a Star Trek fan. All of them. But here's what I don't do. . . . Let's list our ten favorite episodes.Let's list our least favorite episodes. Let's list our favorite galaxies. Let's make a chart to see how often our favorite galaxies appear in our favorite episodes. What Romulan would you most like to see coupled with a Cardassian and why? Let's spend a weekend talking about Romulans falling in love with Cardassians and then let's do it again. --- That's not being a fan. That's having a fetish..."

Five points to the first person who can tell me who said that and what tv show (hint)!

I have no vested interest really. It would be cool if it was around forever, but no skin off my back.

I can just understand why people get into heated discussions though. You're looking at it logically (as I agree you should), but not everyone will.

 

[Chiropteran]

You don't understand the logic that if you have a far higher percentage of the player base doing the raids, then it means development is more worthwhile than if a much smaller percentage were doing the raids...?

Seriously?

No, I get it. You don't get it.

If you had to run the old raid instead of the new raid in order to gear up first, are you "doing the raids"? Why yes, you are.

Making the old raid obsolete by adding in a new easier raid that gives better gear simply makes players focus on FEWER raids than they would otherwise, not more.

Sure, the devs might feel happy briefly because it is a way to force more players into the brand new shiny raid, but at the same time it is forcing those same players out of the old raids because those old raids are now completely redundant and might as well be removed from the game.

Overall, this isn't a provably superior system. You are just moving people around from one raid to another, not necessarily bringing people into the raid who wouldn't be raiding already.

Also: monthly fee is not based on raiding. TBH, I think this strategy of pushing everyone into raids is stupid and pointless. If 90% of the players never enter a raid, so what? They still pay $15 a month, what difference does it make?

I'm sure there is a large percentage of players who have never played a hunter, should they remove the hunter class? Or maybe they should add an easy-mode "Looking for Hunters" mode to the next patch to encourage more people to play hunters, so hunter development time isn't wasted?

No, obviously not. Not everyone likes everything, and this is okay.

Well it clearly matters to you otherwise you wouldn't be on here saying things like "I don't like the idea of a catch up mechanic at all, in any way".

I don't like it, but I don't play WoW so it doesn't effect me anymore. Due to other available games holding my interest, I doubt I would return to WoW even if they changed things back, but it's fun to discuss it.

To say something on topic, @chirop, why is it that your arguments don't seem convincing to people?

Why would you say that? My arguments are very convincing. Maybe you are reading them wrong.

Do you honestly think subs are declining because of the game becoming casual friendly? Aren't most players casual?

Nope. By any measure, when I played last I was a casual. As a casual, I was annoyed by the idea that my gear would be forever obsolete, because anything I collected would be replaced a few months later when the next content patch was released. Like I said, I preferred the older days of WoW, when you could work hard to obtain a nice item but that nice item would remain useful for a very long time.

 

[Sureshot324]

Eventually, this game will die off, but it will leave a very large hole in gaming. LoL, and now Dota 2, are what is killing WoW. F2P fantasy MMOs don't threaten them at all, they can out WoW the WoW clones with ease. They can't beat games that offer vastly different experiences though. At least until we get Blizzard All-Stars. >_>

Yeah. When you've been playing an MMO for a while, the novelty of a huge virtual world wears off. Games like LoL and DOTA 2 are in a way like a natural evolution of the MMO because they do away with the whole virtual world that nobody cares about anymore, have similar but improved gameplay, and still have the medieval fantasy setting that MMO players love.

 

[Chiropteran]

As a casual, I was annoyed by the idea that my gear would be forever obsolete, because anything I collected would be replaced a few months later when the next content patch was released. Like I said, I preferred the older days of WoW, when you could work hard to obtain a nice item but that nice item would remain useful for a very long time.

Here is another writer's explanation for what I am talking about:

http://greedygoblin.blogspot.com/2011/11/gear-reset-bane-of-casual-gaming.html

 

[flexy]

Yeah. When you've been playing an MMO for a while, the novelty of a huge virtual world wears off. Games like LoL and DOTA 2 are in a way like a natural evolution of the MMO because they do away with the whole virtual world that nobody cares about anymore, have similar but improved gameplay, and still have the medieval fantasy setting that MMO players love.

This may be true *to a certain extent* but, IMO, is not the problem. A "virtual world" such as the WoW world is STILL interesting. For example, the WoW world is huge enough that even after many years of playing there is still things to see and to explore.

The PROBLEM is that the game companies actively discourage people to actually explore those worlds. It starts with giving out flying mounts, quick-travel etc..etc.. LFR systems and in general turning the game into a DUTY where people do chores at certain times where the EXPLORATION ASPECT is not even part of the game anymore.

What you do..you just sit idle on your screen and then wait til a "queue" pops, but you are not "out in the world" anymore, so to speak.

Once people are not interacting with the world anymore, the world likewise becomes boring..because ANYONE ELSE will also just sit idly around and wait for queues to pop.

I remember many, many years ago when WoW meant to walk many hours, and I remember that I sometimes walked to areas I have never seen before (the WoW world STILL is *huge*)...and was awed by the "atmosphere" and also how the world was implemented, with what detail etc.

You cannot beat the experience walking as an Alliance for hours until you get to some strange Horde area where you never know what's behind the next corner etc..etc.. Such experiences today don't exist anymore.

And for me, the free and open exploration and adventure is one of the most important aspects, "chores" to obtain gear etc. is second.

It's NOT that the MMORPG concept is "dead" (as some people suggest), it's really more on account of how companies actively turned the games into abominations. People will ALWAYS enjoy virtual worlds, the rest is only how they are implemented. (In 10 or so years we may live in "hyper-realistic" 3D worlds with the 5th gen Oculus Rift, the principle is still the same).

It also my opinion that "less" is more. Less "chores" but more flexibility and freedom to interact with players and an "open world". A "real" open world where people interact and there is adventure everywhere doesn't need crap like "dailies". You know when a game or virtual world is dead when people log-in merely "because dailies reset in 20 mins".

 

[Aikouka]

To turn the conversation completely on its digital head, you know what my favorite thing has probably been? Some of the enemy voice overs. To this day, I cannot eat a pear without thinking about Falric from Halls of Reflection:
http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/HF1D5VrkEnY/hqdefault.jpg

I've always liked C'thun's vocal torture during his fight. He's probably been heard by the great majority of WoW's player base regardless of whether they've been in the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj since his sound effect "You... Will... Die." was used in Deadly Boss Mods as a threat threshold warning. Although, my favorite is probably, "Your friends will abandon you...."

The PROBLEM is that the game companies actively discourage people to actually explore those worlds. It starts with giving out flying mounts, quick-travel etc..etc.. LFR systems and in general turning the game into a DUTY where people do chores at certain times where the EXPLORATION ASPECT is not even part of the game anymore.

When an old college colleague of mine started playing WoW, the first thing he did was explore almost anything that he could. He didn't care if the mobs could sneeze and kill him, he wandered around everywhere. He definitely died quite a few times.

It's NOT that the MMORPG concept is "dead" (as some people suggest), it's really more on account of how companies actively turned the games into abominations. People will ALWAYS enjoy virtual worlds, the rest is only how they are implemented. (In 10 or so years we may live in "hyper-realistic" 3D worlds with the 5th gen Oculus Rift, the principle is still the same).

It also my opinion that "less" is more. Less "chores" but more flexibility and freedom to interact with players and an "open world". A "real" open world where people interact and there is adventure everywhere doesn't need crap like "dailies". You know when a game or virtual world is dead when people log-in merely "because dailies reset in 20 mins".

By simplifying the nature of leveling and getting "to the end", Blizzard had to offer different carrots to keep their metaphorical horses trotting in line. Games like EQ epitomized the grind, which made that a lofty yet visible goal; however, in WoW, getting to max level was really more of a hurdle, and it only became easier after the first time.

I think for a lot of us, WoW took a lot of time / dedication out of our lives (I know I'm not the only one with 100+ days logged time). Ultimately we'd like to see it change for the better, not watch it wash out.

Pretty sure I had well over a year played when I quit. I remember when they game had been out for a year, I had around 115 days played, which was close to 8 hours a day average.

 

[railven]

Here is another writer's explanation for what I am talking about:

http://greedygoblin.blogspot.com/2011/11/gear-reset-bane-of-casual-gaming.html

This opinion piece contradicts itself:

The true casual on the other hand is devastated progress-wise. He did not have time to finish last season gearing and when he was nearly reaching the "standard", all his efforts were nullified and he is beyond the curve again. No matter how long he is playing, he is permanently behind, despite he is the optimal customer.

Who is he permanently behind? The Elite?

PS to those who claim "but gear resets allow casuals to catch up to the elite: the casual doesn't want to catch up with the elite the casual knows that he is casual and don't expect to be equal with someone who plays 3x more or better than him. He doesn't envy the hardcore. Actually more tiers mean more content for him.

If the casual is never intending to catch up with the elite (which frankly, they never will) why is he claiming they are always behind?

I'd have to consider myself a casual if the guide line is <7 hours a week. Yet, my gear is never "behind." If the author (or anyone) is struggling to clear content and thus slowing down the acquisition of gear, who's fault is that?

Like Justoh keeps posting, 11/14C HM on day two. This game has gotten so easy I don't understand how any one is "behind" outside of not being able to dedicate time to it. And by that point said people come off as the thing they are arguing against "give me give me give, make my gear last longer since I don't have more time to play!"

 

[railven]

Why do you guys care so much?

Job switched proxy providers, everything and it's mother is blocked so I have to find other means to make slow work days go faster.

What else than argue opinions on forums

 

[Veliko]

No, I get it. You don't get it.

If you had to run the old raid instead of the new raid in order to gear up first, are you "doing the raids"? Why yes, you are.

Making the old raid obsolete by adding in a new easier raid that gives better gear simply makes players focus on FEWER raids than they would otherwise, not more.

No, because as the new raids are released less and less people are geared for them so less people do them.

Sure, the devs might feel happy briefly because it is a way to force more players into the brand new shiny raid, but at the same time it is forcing those same players out of the old raids because those old raids are now completely redundant and might as well be removed from the game.

Overall, this isn't a provably superior system. You are just moving people around from one raid to another, not necessarily bringing people into the raid who wouldn't be raiding already.

It's astonishing how quickly you so-called hardcore raiders contradict yourselves.

First of all you're saying that the current system means people do less raids, and yet now you're claiming that people are moving onto the newer ones all the time.

Also: monthly fee is not based on raiding. TBH, I think this strategy of pushing everyone into raids is stupid and pointless. If 90% of the players never enter a raid, so what? They still pay $15 a month, what difference does it make?

I'm sure there is a large percentage of players who have never played a hunter, should they remove the hunter class? Or maybe they should add an easy-mode "Looking for Hunters" mode to the next patch to encourage more people to play hunters, so hunter development time isn't wasted?

No, obviously not. Not everyone likes everything, and this is okay.

If we're going to discuss stupid and pointless strategies, I think it's safe to say that putting considerable effort into creating content that 90% of your player base isn't ever going to see is right up there at the top of the list.

I don't like it, but I don't play WoW so it doesn't effect me anymore. Due to other available games holding my interest, I doubt I would return to WoW even if they changed things back, but it's fun to discuss it.

You need to make your mind up here - it either matters to you or it doesn't.