350g Black Lotus is insanity

[Amelioratus-aegwynn]

Ok. I believe you you weren’t trolling.

Since you believe we had rose-tinted glasses, I have to ask you a few questions about retail, to see if your eyes are clear.

Do you enjoy grinding azerite neck levels separately on all your alts?

Do you enjoy grinding essences separately on all your alts, untill very recently?

Do you enjoy grinding cloak levels separately on all your alts?

Do you enjoy grinding reputations to unlocking flying?

Do you enjoy grinding reputations to unlock allied races?

And importantly, do you enjoy almost all of these being timegated via limited, repetative, daily and weekly quests?

…

You come to Classic forums and dare say that Classic is a grind? Classic is a breath of fresh air compared to the chore that is retail. Black lotus being 350G is outrageous, compared to the original vanilla prices. But even with that price, I, as a healing priest, can grind that gold in 5 hours, doing multiple different methods. And I can do it half an hour each day if I wish, or 5 hours in one sitting if that suits me.

In retail, I must play 1 hour a day. Every single day. Or I am PERMANENTLY behind.

So no. Classic isn’t grindy. Retail is. You need to “grind” a bit more in classic than you had in vanilla, due to mismanagement of the same dev team which leads retail. Color me surprised. But that’s why the Classic player base is distressed: they don’t want to grind more than they did in vanilla! They despise the grind retail has become, and they ran away to a 15 year old game to escape it.

And yes. Retail competes with Classic. And the only rose tinted glasses around here are worn by retail defenders who ignore daily candy crush mini games in retail, and act distressed about soloing dungeons for 5 hours.

[Esimpure-whitemane]

@Amelioratus-aegwynn

So no. Classic isn’t grindy. Retail is. You need to “grind” a bit more in classic than you had in vanilla, due to mismanagement of the same dev team which leads retail. Color me surprised.

Classic is absolutely grindy, but it’s a different kind - it’s a raw grind. I vastly prefer it, steady progress and you can very easily pick up and go. Retail is an awful grind.

[Kerg-bloodsail-buccaneers]

I’m sure population is a factor. But I think the bigger factor is parse culture. I think the majority of raiders in vanilla simply didn’t use them for farm content. There was no point. They only used them when they were learning new bosses. But now everyone feels like they have to have maximum buffs to compete on the logs, even when the content is pi$$ easy.

[Amelioratus-aegwynn]

But the thing is, imagine time gating is removed from retail. Whenever you complete a daily quest, another one spawns. Even then, the RAW grind you have to do in retail is vast. Time gating just hides it.

Lets look at a toxic rep to grind in Classic: timbermaw rep. You have to kill mobs. A lot of mobs. It gets boring. But you can group up, and the rep gain is faster. It naturally makes you socialize, like an MMO should. If you are on a PvP server, the mobs are a resource. A resourse worth fighting for. Emergent wpvp happens. Again you need to group up, this time to survive. And all of a sudden, you are fighting huge packs of mobs, in a 5 man dungeon group, straining your resourses, and fighting the opposite faction. All of a sudden, if you treat this game as an MMO, this toxic grind becomes fun. And fast.

Now lets look at BFA. Tortolan rep. A turtle made it to the water. Play the same minigame a thousand times*. The end. Can you speed it up by grouping? Of course not. Just as a raw rep grind, tortollan rep is more toxic than timbermaw rep grind.

*Disclaimer: the thousand quests number is totally ad hoc and almost definitely widely inaccurate.

[Supertroll-atiesh]

I’m going to be so rich.

[Qpon-smolderweb]

@anon83864117

People toss this idea around, “it is different server populations” - But where is the evidence? 2004 evidence with 2019 evidence to show they are different?

@Kaivax

There are also, as many have pointed out, game-economy concerns. It’s true that we allow more simultaneous players onto a Classic realm than were allowed in 2005, thanks to both hardware and software improvements, but this means that Black Lotus is more rare on a per-capita basis than it was 15 years ago

from the horse’s mouth. you can shut up now

[anon83864117]

I agree with you those things you mentioned are grindy in retail. I think there are differences in classic and retail though.

Paticularly the leveling experience is much more engaging in retail. That’s one reason I personally enjoyed catacylsm so much (when it was new). There is never a dry moment in retail leveling.

Another difference is that retail offers a wide range of play styles. You can be super causual like me (if you look at my gear it is terrible compared to other players) but I can still solo Q content and have a good time. Or you can do all the things you mentioned like pathfinder to unlock flying in the 2014+ expansion zones. I think that might be comparable to Kirby nintendo games, you can play Kirby’s Adventure for example and beat it and call it a day or try beating it on expert without saves and unlock sound test.

My point is retail WoW offers a wide variety of engaging content for players. Classic is a much more slow game. I think classic is fine for its time, but it evolved and changed into retail.

And there is no way to avoid the grind in classic. It is built in. I have a level 56 & a half character there and I log in- I can go play AV for rep, or I can go defeat monsters over and over again to level. People are not forming groups either, I gave up like in October of 2019 finding those.

[Funkflex-tichondrius]

@Gaige-hyjal

people sitting around on 8g just lost their raid spots

nature protection pots , gl getting into aq if youre not a druid or shaman

[Gythriel-windseeker]

@Rombell-yojamba

Just stop buying them, make them worthless

This.
Dont buy them, dont buy the flasks.
Yes, your raid will take a bit longer.
Ok fine, you will still finish it unless you were relying on flasks to barely pull through.

After a while, the flasks and the lotus will become worthless.

Change the meta, you have them, they dont have you.
You just dont know it yet.

[Labathor-fairbanks]

Booom /endthread

[Khlause-kurinnaxx]

@Trogdorstwin-faerlina

Thoughts on a solution being to add them to a flower vendor in Stormwind and Thunder Bluff for 50g each to end this insanity?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=dSpOjj4YD8c

[Yolomaster-felstriker]

nO ChANgE!

[Drinknblink-whitemane]

I never asked for a change.

[Thundathighs-remulos]

@Pekel-frostmourne

Having lotus go from the 45-75 minute respawn to something like 15-25 minutes would fix most economy problems.

actually it wouldn’t.
Herb camper picks up one lotus for 100g an hour.
Herb camper gets 4 lotus an hour, sells each for 100g still.

Even if they don’t sell all the lotus they pick they’re still monopolising the supply and lets be honest, Demand is only going to increase in later phases.

[Wunderland-grobbulus]

The solution is easy, say black lotus is being farmed by premades, it’s having an effect on horde AV and that the picking of black lotus is tied to some ism and goes against the spirit of WoW.

Do it on a horde character and blizzard will hot patch it in a few days.

[Robokappa-sargeras (Robokappa)]

@Gythriel-windseeker

@Rombell-yojamba

Just stop buying them, make them worthless

This.
Dont buy them, dont buy the flasks.
Yes, your raid will take a bit longer.
Ok fine, you will still finish it unless you were relying on flasks to barely pull through.

After a while, the flasks and the lotus will become worthless.

Change the meta, you have them, they dont have you.

is this a rip on the war on drugs?

[Rombell-yojamba]

I wouldn’t not not tell you to not take them.

[Gythriel-windseeker]

Nah, just simple economics.
If the consumer refuses to buy, then the merchant must lower prices or cease to exist.

[Rustle-kromcrush]

stop replying to braindead retail characters

[Killchan-faerlina]

@Gythriel-windseeker

@Rombell-yojamba

Just stop buying them, make them worthless

This.
Dont buy them, dont buy the flasks.
Yes, your raid will take a bit longer.
Ok fine, you will still finish it unless you were relying on flasks to barely pull through.

After a while, the flasks and the lotus will become worthless.

Change the meta, you have them, they dont have you.
You just dont know it yet.

Part of the issue here is that some BiS gear requires flasks as crafting ingredients. As long as there are Warriors looking to compete, they’ll be looking to make Titanic Leggings.