WoW XX: It's Not A Recolor, It's An Original Thread

[Resileaf]

I wish I could search for the source right now, but alas I am at work and cannot go in-depth about it. I'll endeavour to do it when I'm back home if someone else hasn't already done it.

[Sian]

Your thinking of this article?

Tried fixing link, on phone

[Resileaf]

Your thinking of this article?

I think you haven't linked the article well, I get an error message. I believe you've only linked the title part of the website rather than the entire website, so might want to fix that.

[Sian]

Tried fixing the link, on my phone and it don’t quite act the way i want it to dince i’m too used to use a proper computer

[Resileaf]

That would be what I was thinking about, yeah. Part of Afrasiabi's first answer.

the players and the factions themselves are not in a great place because there is all of this old animosity that hasn't been resolved. It's time to resolve it.

[Kish]

That article is not going to convince me to get on the "they're ending the game" train.

Though if you assume they're being truthful and serious about every statement they make there, they also say the faction that loses Battle for Azeroth* will simply cease to exist. So yeah.

*Which will likely be different on different realms.

[Resileaf]

It's pretty obvious to me that this particular sentence was made in jest. The one I quoted was much more serious.

[Psyren]

I don't know about them ending the game, but "it's time to resolve {the faction war}" is interesting. I still have no interest in that (the resolution itself) but I might in what comes after. They might end up with multiple factions, or none at all.

[The_Jackal]

It won't happen, sadly. Be great if it did though.

[The_Jackal]

In other news, I completed my arduous reputation grind to max out Argonian Reach, and now I have a shiny new Void Elf rogue! Well, not exactly new, it was my Blood Elf rogue had hadn't touched since MoP, but it looks new, and I'm having fun, which is what counts. Here's some advice, so that others can avoid my mistakes: If you intend on doing a server transfer or other service action and consuming your free level boost, complete the server transfer, etc., FIRST. I'm now stuck on my old server for three days because apparently being boosted locks you out of using services for that long. Another pro-tip: If you have consumed said level boost, or have by other means just reached the level cap, and you want to avail yourself of the free artifact power cap, you need to complete the Argus quests up through Sizing up the Opposition first. Then you'll be presented with a pop-up quest when you next log on. Finally, the Rogue Hall is, for some reason, located 38,000 miles from Dalaran, and you apparently have to walk there every time. I guess it's your penance for being able to stealth complete all those quests.

Oh, and before you call me a hypocrite for using the AP boost when I think it's a bad idea, that's the only way I can score the mage tower dagger 'mogs before they're no longer achievable.

[Androgeus]

Another pro-tip: If you have consumed said level boost, or have by other means just reached the level cap, and you want to avail yourself of the free artifact power cap, you need to complete the Argus quests up through Sizing up the Opposition first.

I don't think so, I only just finished levelling a monk to 110 and the only argus quest I've done is the initial quest to warp to Argus

[The_Jackal]

I don't think so, I only just finished levelling a monk to 110 and the only argus quest I've done is the initial quest to warp to Argus

Did you got to Silithus to cap out your weapons' artifact power?

[Jera]

I don't think so, I only just finished levelling a monk to 110 and the only argus quest I've done is the initial quest to warp to Argus

Correct, I have a Shaman that I've had camping Houlon in the Timeless Isle since patch Broken Shore was released, and haven't touched Argus at all on her, I don't think I've even done more than the introductory Broken Shore quests, her ilvl is in the 840's if that tells you anything, just for completion I went down and knocked out the silithis quests on Saturday morning before putting her back in the Timeless Isle where she'll sit until I get that damned mount. 76 kills since I started counting, and probably a good 30-40 kills uncounted, and I still don't have it.

Speaking of the Timeless Isles, it irks me that I can't go to the north of the Island because I didn't play in MoP. I get that there are limited time events, which I'm all for. What I dislike however is that there is a section of the current game that I can't play, because I didn't do a Legendary questline that is no longer available. I don't even know why we're being locked out, it's not like the World Boss up there drops anything unique.

[Androgeus]

Speaking of the Timeless Isles, it irks me that I can't go to the north of the Island because I didn't play in MoP. I get that there are limited time events, which I'm all for. What I dislike however is that there is a section of the current game that I can't play, because I didn't do a Legendary questline that is no longer available. I don't even know why we're being locked out, it's not like the World Boss up there drops anything unique.

I understand getting rid of the reward, but it would have been nice to leave the quests in so players who weren’t around at the time could experience the story. I feel the same about the legendary ring quest line from WoD

[The_Jackal]

I understand getting rid of the reward, but it would have been nice to leave the quests in so players who weren’t around at the time could experience the story. I feel the same about the legendary ring quest line from WoD

I find myself wondering if the purpose of all this content invalidation isn't to promote some kind of 'urgency' mentality, like a Black Friday sale for finishing WoW content, because I feel like the game is really doing itself a disservice by constantly making itself obsolete. After all, the rest of WoW is certainly strongly influenced by operant conditioning theory, so why shouldn't the 'get it before it's gone' guff be part of the plan to keep the player base racing down the treadmill?

This isn't to say I'm averse to the idea of using psychological research to make these games feel more fun and rewarding, but I wonder at the trade-offs that this approach creates in terms of eroding the value of the years of development work they've invested into the game.

[Psyren]

I agree, axing quests/dungeons/bosses is stupid.

[The_Jackal]

I agree, axing quests/dungeons/bosses is stupid.

Like, I think there's still merit to doing events to encourage people to run certain classes of content together, like how we use timewalking today to revive some of the older dungeons, but I also feel like pulling the plug on old content, instead of making it scale, and leaving those rewards available (and still challenging) to everyone, would be really nice to have.

I guess, though, I did answer my own question in another context: Testing. Is part of the reason they don't have everything scale is that the Blizzard developers and QA team don't want to be on the hook for testing every bit of content they've created in the last 14+ years? Ugh.

It's when I start contemplating this stuff that I start to wish that they'd plan for a transition to a new fantasy RPG, with new IP and a new game engine. If you're just going to throw Legion on the junkheap of history, to occasionally get trotted out for some timewalking dungeons, why not leave off the long tail of WoW, and do something new and exciting? That's kind of my big beef with WoW, and in fact the entire MMO genre: It just doesn't feel exciting anymore, and that's mostly because we know what to expect. The brain releases dopamine when we encounter novel experiences for the first time (or other neurotransmitters, if the experience is not positive). Because WoW has become so predictable and familiar, that is just not happening anymore.

Look, I won't lie, I'm enjoying WoW at the moment, I've got my Void Elf rogue (now with best-in-slot shoulders!), and there's progress to be had, and things to do, but a big reason why we all don't feel those great feels that we remember from Vanilla through Wrath is that WoW has kind of lost the ability to surprise us. It can be as good, or maybe even a bit better than it was, but because it's not new, that dopamine rush just isn't as strong as it used to be.

[Jera]

Look, I won't lie, I'm enjoying WoW at the moment, I've got my Void Elf rogue (now with best-in-slot shoulders!), and there's progress to be had, and things to do, but a big reason why we all don't feel those great feels that we remember from Vanilla through Wrath is that WoW has kind of lost the ability to surprise us. It can be as good, or maybe even a bit better than it was, but because it's not new, that dopamine rush just isn't as strong as it used to be.

I think one of the biggest reasons we're not getting that experience anymore is the pug style raiding/dungeoning that the game has developed. Don't get me wrong, I love group finder, it makes actually playing the game way more accessible, especially LFR. However it's changed the nature of the game. I treat WoW mostly as a single player experience, yes I'm in a guild, and I raid with them, but I'm not really close with anyone in the guild, and when I finally cleared Heroic Kil'Jadeen it wasn't even with my guild, it was with some guild I found in Group Finder who wanted a pally healer.

All of my most memorable moments in WoW is playing with friends from High School/College from 2007-2010, yes there's a bit of nostalgia there, but some of my best memories aren't of raiding or anything like that, I didn't do any raiding at all in BC when it originally dropped. It's all doing stupid stuff with friends, like attacking Crossroads or the weekend we got geared up 5 level 19 twinks, threw a LAN party, and got every achievement in WSG. Nowadays the only person I know who plays IRL does nothing but Mythic+, no pvp, no raiding, the bare minimum of pve. There's no sense of community anymore on a lot of servers, plus it doesn't help that my original server(Dunemaul) is pretty much a ghost town these days. I actually switched to a RP server and that helped a bit, as sharding isn't quite as egregious as it is on non-RP servers, but I'm not invested in the server really, to the point that I can't even remember the server name off the top of my head.

[Psyren]

Like, I think there's still merit to doing events to encourage people to run certain classes of content together, like how we use timewalking today to revive some of the older dungeons, but I also feel like pulling the plug on old content, instead of making it scale, and leaving those rewards available (and still challenging) to everyone, would be really nice to have.

I guess, though, I did answer my own question in another context: Testing. Is part of the reason they don't have everything scale is that the Blizzard developers and QA team don't want to be on the hook for testing every bit of content they've created in the last 14+ years? Ugh.

Thing is, if everything scales you run into the Oblivion problem - where leveling paradoxically makes you weaker because the enemies scale to gear you're expected to have rather than gear you actually have. It also ruins the power fantasy of going back to a lower area that gave you trouble (or a lower dungeon with that mog you wanted/boss you hated) and soloing it.

I think Timewalking is actually the best of both worlds - it lets them keep the non-scaling (or rather, scaling-capped) content for those who find that enjoyable, and those who want to experience it at or near max-difficulty can do that too, and moreover get relevant rewards/incentive to do so for the part of the game they're actually running.

It's when I start contemplating this stuff that I start to wish that they'd plan for a transition to a new fantasy RPG, with new IP and a new game engine. If you're just going to throw Legion on the junkheap of history, to occasionally get trotted out for some timewalking dungeons, why not leave off the long tail of WoW, and do something new and exciting? That's kind of my big beef with WoW, and in fact the entire MMO genre: It just doesn't feel exciting anymore, and that's mostly because we know what to expect. The brain releases dopamine when we encounter novel experiences for the first time (or other neurotransmitters, if the experience is not positive). Because WoW has become so predictable and familiar, that is just not happening anymore.

Look, I won't lie, I'm enjoying WoW at the moment, I've got my Void Elf rogue (now with best-in-slot shoulders!), and there's progress to be had, and things to do, but a big reason why we all don't feel those great feels that we remember from Vanilla through Wrath is that WoW has kind of lost the ability to surprise us. It can be as good, or maybe even a bit better than it was, but because it's not new, that dopamine rush just isn't as strong as it used to be.

I think you're overestimating the demand for novelty a bit. If the people like the gameplay enough, they're quite happy doing the same things over and over - just look at Fortnite, Overwatch, Diablo, or hell, even Madden and CoD. WoW's big problem isn't lack of novelty, rather it's that the core gameplay is getting increasingly dated in a world with increasing alternatives.

I think one of the biggest reasons we're not getting that experience anymore is the pug style raiding/dungeoning that the game has developed. Don't get me wrong, I love group finder, it makes actually playing the game way more accessible, especially LFR. However it's changed the nature of the game. I treat WoW mostly as a single player experience, yes I'm in a guild, and I raid with them, but I'm not really close with anyone in the guild, and when I finally cleared Heroic Kil'Jadeen it wasn't even with my guild, it was with some guild I found in Group Finder who wanted a pally healer.

All of my most memorable moments in WoW is playing with friends from High School/College from 2007-2010, yes there's a bit of nostalgia there, but some of my best memories aren't of raiding or anything like that, I didn't do any raiding at all in BC when it originally dropped. It's all doing stupid stuff with friends, like attacking Crossroads or the weekend we got geared up 5 level 19 twinks, threw a LAN party, and got every achievement in WSG. Nowadays the only person I know who plays IRL does nothing but Mythic+, no pvp, no raiding, the bare minimum of pve. There's no sense of community anymore on a lot of servers, plus it doesn't help that my original server(Dunemaul) is pretty much a ghost town these days. I actually switched to a RP server and that helped a bit, as sharding isn't quite as egregious as it is on non-RP servers, but I'm not invested in the server really, to the point that I can't even remember the server name off the top of my head.

If your friends were still playing then you'd still have those goofy/fun experiences. Queues/matchmaking are not to blame, your friends leaving are. In fact, those friends leaving are what made the queues necessary in the first place. And your friends leaving is itself a symptom of a larger problem as noted above.

[Jera]

If your friends were still playing then you'd still have those goofy/fun experiences. Queues/matchmaking are not to blame, your friends leaving are. In fact, those friends leaving are what made the queues necessary in the first place. And your friends leaving is itself a symptom of a larger problem as noted above.

Sorry, that was the point I was making, I guess it didn't come out the way I intended. Maybe I just haven't found the right guild, because a lot of those experiences happened with guildmates as well. Part of it is simply I don't have the time or inclination to play as much as I did in college. Which is probably a good thing as I played an unhealthy amount of wow during those years.

Though thinking back to how much I played then, it might just be a matter of scale. There were times when I was playing 40+ hours a week for months on end, sure there are a few standout great memories that I have of playing at the time, but most of it is lost to time. For example I raided ICC weekly for months and I can only remember two events the entire time, downing the Lich King for the first time, and getting blamed for popping Stars in the antechamber as a resto druid. We're probably talking about over a hundred hours of play time boiled down to one good and one bad memory.

[Psyren]

Yeah - even if all my friends were still into WoW and were all in the same guild on the same server, I physically could not sink the kind of time into it that I did during college. You can't go home again.

But dammit, I have enough time for something. WoW wasn't it, Destiny wasn't it, Warframe wasn't it, Diablo was it for a while until I got my last stash tab and they gave up on content. Something.

Guild Wars 2 has come closest thus far to being that something, but somewhat ironically, finding a decent guild has been less fruitful than I'd like. My fingers are (foolishly) crossed for Anthem since I have the best chance of getting IRL friends to give that a go.

[The_Jackal]

I think you're overestimating the demand for novelty a bit. If the people like the gameplay enough, they're quite happy doing the same things over and over - just look at Fortnite, Overwatch, Diablo, or hell, even Madden and CoD. WoW's big problem isn't lack of novelty, rather it's that the core gameplay is getting increasingly dated in a world with increasing alternatives.

Sure, I'm not suggesting that if you simply transported Vanilla WoW into 2018, and could magically wipe the memory of the entire populace of the concept of the post-WoW MMORPG, that it would launch to the kinds of rave reviews it did in 2004. The target is always moving, and in a post-assassin's creed world, I don't think it's too much to ask to put more behind your game engine than just 'roll vs hash table'.

Yeah - even if all my friends were still into WoW and were all in the same guild on the same server, I physically could not sink the kind of time into it that I did during college. You can't go home again.

But dammit, I have enough time for something. WoW wasn't it, Destiny wasn't it, Warframe wasn't it, Diablo was it for a while until I got my last stash tab and they gave up on content. Something.

Guild Wars 2 has come closest thus far to being that something, but somewhat ironically, finding a decent guild has been less fruitful than I'd like. My fingers are (foolishly) crossed for Anthem since I have the best chance of getting IRL friends to give that a go.

Honestly, I think the problem boils down to monetization. Say what you like about WoW, they deliver a ton of content, and competing with that scale of content production is really quite hard, which is why I'm still kind of pinning my hopes on Blizzard to revitalize the genre, rather than leaving it up to an indie publisher. So many games have foundered on the subscription fees rock, that I think it's going to be hard to get anyone to pony up cash for a WoW killer so long as Blizzard keeps tossing out WoW expansions. Free-to-play is DOA, I think for a MMO, because it corrodes the very reward structure that makes these games engrossing to begin with. I've been struggling with that in Star Trek Online, for example. I like the space combat, and there's some good mission material in there, but so much of the best rewards in that game are relentlessly gated on 'click and wait' Facebook-style gameplay, it makes WoW's mission table look positively tame by comparison. Wildstar had an interesting experiment with CREDD, that basically was a precursor to the WoW token, but I think that such a system still needs to have a strong foundation of paid subscribers who are invested in the game and enjoy it, before a demand for the in-game currency can be sufficient to fuel the gold to cash pump.

[Psyren]

Sure, I'm not suggesting that if you simply transported Vanilla WoW into 2018, and could magically wipe the memory of the entire populace of the concept of the post-WoW MMORPG, that it would launch to the kinds of rave reviews it did in 2004. The target is always moving, and in a post-assassin's creed world, I don't think it's too much to ask to put more behind your game engine than just 'roll vs hash table'.

Indeed.

Honestly, I think the problem boils down to monetization. Say what you like about WoW, they deliver a ton of content, and competing with that scale of content production is really quite hard, which is why I'm still kind of pinning my hopes on Blizzard to revitalize the genre, rather than leaving it up to an indie publisher. So many games have foundered on the subscription fees rock, that I think it's going to be hard to get anyone to pony up cash for a WoW killer so long as Blizzard keeps tossing out WoW expansions. Free-to-play is DOA, I think for a MMO, because it corrodes the very reward structure that makes these games engrossing to begin with. I've been struggling with that in Star Trek Online, for example. I like the space combat, and there's some good mission material in there, but so much of the best rewards in that game are relentlessly gated on 'click and wait' Facebook-style gameplay, it makes WoW's mission table look positively tame by comparison. Wildstar had an interesting experiment with CREDD, that basically was a precursor to the WoW token, but I think that such a system still needs to have a strong foundation of paid subscribers who are invested in the game and enjoy it, before a demand for the in-game currency can be sufficient to fuel the gold to cash pump.

But you're not mentioning the most obvious form of monetization - sell expansions, get your money up front, use it to make more expansions. Maybe throw in some paid cosmetics and character services. No subscription needed. This seems pretty feasible to me.

I know you don't like Guild Wars 2, but they still have one of the most popular MMOs on the planet doing many of the things you describe.

[The_Jackal]

Indeed.

But you're not mentioning the most obvious form of monetization - sell expansions, get your money up front, use it to make more expansions. Maybe throw in some paid cosmetics and character services. No subscription needed. This seems pretty feasible to me.

I know you don't like Guild Wars 2, but they still have one of the most popular MMOs on the planet doing many of the things you describe.

I agree, the trouble seems to be getting the publisher to forego walletgrabby lockbox shenanigans.

[Resileaf]

Seeing as I'm done for the expansion with the endless grind, I'm going to now spend my time doing old raids for transmogs, methinks.
Probably sell off my many stacks of various mats. Or use them all to level my alts' professions as much as I can.

[The_Jackal]

Seeing as I'm done for the expansion with the endless grind, I'm going to now spend my time doing old raids for transmogs, methinks.
Probably sell off my many stacks of various mats. Or use them all to level my alts' professions as much as I can.

I would definitely try to flush your back-catalog of materials, unless you want to use it to bootstrap alt professions down the line. However, it's unclear to me how old raids transmog farming does not also qualify as grind.

Myself, I'm still working on knocking out my Mage Tower on my new Void Elf rogue, and yeah, this is a tough challenge, make no mistake. I gather there's a rogue legendary that will give back health every time you use feint, but I don't have that, so I'm having problems keeping up with the juggling act of countering 4 different mechanics at once. This one is Sigryn, so it's "Keep dots on fools, stun/kite Jarl, Blind Sigryn, Break barrier and interrupt caster, step on runes, and dodge Valkyrie deathrush". And that ignores the problem of not stepping in green stuff, which can be rough when the caster is standing in the damned stuff.

[Resileaf]

I would definitely try to flush your back-catalog of materials, unless you want to use it to bootstrap alt professions down the line. However, it's unclear to me how old raids transmog farming does not also qualify as grind.

Let me rephrase myself as "The current content grind" then.

[The_Jackal]

Let me rephrase myself as "The current content grind" then.

Right. Fair enough. Well, I managed to complete the Assassination Mage Tower fight, and now have my shiny daggers. I also picked up the Bindings for the Hidden Outlaw appearance, which was a nice surprise, so now I'm contemplating messing around with Outlaw for a while, just for a change of pace. I do like the way those Windseeker blades look, plus I have to admit, I'm tickled by the concept of the cannon barrage talent. Now, to work on my class mounts (Mage done, Warrior and Rogue next).

[Resileaf]

Today is the beginning of the end. New story events, new mechanics, no more artifacts. Soon there won't be a Night elf homeland either, and that makes me very sad.
Hope everyone managed to get the challenge appearances they needed! I had to do a couple of challenge for other people myself yesterday, and more people tried to beg for me to keep doing it for them. Kinda feel bad I had to say no, but there's only so much work I can do in a single evening.

[Androgeus]

Today is the beginning of the end. New story events, new mechanics, no more artifacts. Soon there won't be a Night elf homeland either, and that makes me very sad.
Hope everyone managed to get the challenge appearances they needed! I had to do a couple of challenge for other people myself yesterday, and more people tried to beg for me to keep doing it for them. Kinda feel bad I had to say no, but there's only so much work I can do in a single evening.

I’ve still got like 8 hours. I’m sure I’ll manage.