Hey now even your DPS is RNG : D
Just watch that terrible guldie suddenly top dps meters because he got lucky and got the bis corrupted effect while you didnt
1 Like
Youâre building a strawman here and itâs pretty ridiculous. While most people have specifically referred to aspects that are âtime-gatesâ youâve expanded it to say that every aspect of the game is a time-gate. Therefore, anyone arguing against time-gating is complaining about an entire game-genre.
Except no one is making that argument. In fact, specifically, people have said that (as an example) instead of re-running the introductory quest chain for essences, cloaks, etc on every character they want to play, theyâd rather not have a singular item that is an overarching requirement and be allowed to run dungeons - the content they want to play - to get gear.
Using your version of time-gating, running dungeons for 3 hours (or PVPing, or whatever) is somehow equivalent to spending 3 hours repeating the introductory quests to get azerite essences for the (basically mandatory) necklace or the legendary cloak.
Thatâs completely ridiculous, because as a player theyâre clearly NOT the same experience. Time-gating - as people have used it - is not the same as character progression and it is certainly not the same as time-sinks (for some of the other EverQuest examples).
Time-gating tends to describe things that limit the ability to pursue character progression by requiring objectives that are locked behind time periods. These are often repeated for the sole purpose of being repeated and rarely related to any of the core game mechanics (PVP, Dungeons, Raids, Quest Storylines, etc).
Not all time-gating is necessarily a bad thing in my opinion (I think Pathfinder for new content is applied a bit heavy-handedly but isnât a bad concept). But itâs disingenuous to pretend these current time-gates have always been part of the game. In earlier expansions there werenât hindrances to flying (other than cost and level), nor were there artifact weapons, necklaces (and essences), and magical cloaks that were - in essence - requirements for pursuing core gameplay.
1 Like
I am not building a strawman. My argument is specifically against the usage of the term âtime-gateâ, because I think itâs a garbage term just in general or at the very least is being misused or mis-blamed by a lot of people.
The problem that you are pointing out is actually one that I fully agree with. The heart and cloak systems are extremely alt-unfriendly to an absolute absurd degree and should be far more centralized than they currently are. You wonât get any kind of disagreement from me on that front. Even if they have to invent a new kind of daily quest that only allows you to run it once per day, per account and completes it for all toons on that account.
âŠthough I feel like that system would have to be extraordinarily complex to make it work correctly. Though I do NOT, in any way, feel like it would be impossible or not worth the effort.
Youâre putting words into my mouth here.
This is what Iâm talking about. My feeling based on reading the comments of posters across the forums is that there are people who want things right now. That is how they purport themselves in their posts, and it looks to be what theyâre whining about. If itâs not, their lack of clarity is not my fault.
I have zero problem waiting for rewards. I donât mind having to put in repeated effort for inconsistent outcomes so long as I can eventually get what I want in some kind of reasonable time-frame. Iâve got no problem with people âgetting luckyâ or with people getting screwed by the system so long as there are equal chances for both and most people fall somewhere in the middle.
In the case of the lucky ones, it means I have something to look forward to if I keep playing, and so far as the unlucky ones go I get someone to laugh at. âŠeven if itâs occasionally myself Iâm laughing at BECAUSE THE STUPID BOSS WONâT DROP ME A TRINKET (as an example).
We agree on this.
We agree here as well. Iâd like to see them relax pathfinder in old content.
âŠLegion and WoD for example.
Youâre right. They used to be worse.
And the cost hindrance was a lot worse than pathfinder is today.
I remember trying to help my brother earn 5k gold for epic flying during TBC and completely calling it wrong and setting him back about two weeks of gold grinding on a bad AH flip.
Flying during Vanilla? That was expensive training. People forget how much money 1000 gold was in vanilla. The rose-colored glasses are real. 1k gold was like 2 months of grinding back then, and âclassic wowâ is NOT in any way a good yard-stick today just because of how much we have learned about this game in the past 15 years.
And lets not get started on the freaking attunement questsâŠ
1 Like
So it seems I misunderstood your post and for that I apologize. In fact, we seem to agree on most things and I think we just became friends. We both hate the current alt-unfriendly nature of the current system. Your description of it is perfect - extremely alt-unfriendly and absurd. And I agree with waiting for rewards - sometimes you need to kill a boss 100 times to get an item (but man, after it keeps failing to drop I start to wish there was a sympathy drop system - just cut me a break and increase the odds of Ashes of Alar dropping).
I donât believe we disagree on this, but my point regarding the difference in the time it took for character progression in early expansions vs now is that prior expansions allowed progression to be accomplished (mostly) via the content of your choice. At max-level character progression for characters could be done in raids or PVP - if they wanted to get gear for raids or PVP respectively - and it (mostly) didnât require venturing into the content.
This isnât simply a nostalgia bias either. BC and WotLK had their warts. Buying flying in BC was a bankrupting experience, having mounts take up actual space was obnoxious, and the concept of key rings is laughable now. Flexible raid scaling, mythic dungeons, cross-realm groups, and a number of other features have been amazing developments that open up even more opportunities for players to play the content they desire and that content helps their character develop in a way that helps them continue playing the content they want (Iâm still pretty torn on LFR, because in Cata it was basically free epics and I think that oversaturation of gear led to some of the current system - but it also allowed folks to experience content without requiring 24 friends).
That said, there werenât things like essences (for example) that have to be obtained through PVP but are best for some specs in PVE (as far as I can recall at least). PVP items would still have value in PVE (they werenât useless) but it wasnât even close to a necessity. And if you wanted to do quests, have fun, but it wasnât really necessary outside of some min-maxing and of courseâŠ
That memory just made me die a little bit inside. Between getting attuned to the Eye and Black Temple it was so much work. Thatâs not even accounting for every other bit of unlocking. Thatâs the biggest wart Iâm glad they removed. It didnât even survive BC.
On a side note, I also wish they would remove pathfinder from old content. I havenât seen many folks disagree with that to be honest. But Iâm actually very interested in how theyâll handle flying when Shadowlands makes each expansion an equally viable path to level. Only WoD or Legion require Pathfinder, so unless there is some account-wide benefit then I would expect most people to avoid leveling in those areas (except for those who want to experience that content for the first time perhaps). To avoid that, the devs could add a version of Pathfinder to prior expansions, but that would be a lot of work that would seem to engender more ill-will than positive feedback (and I honestly have no idea how they would handle players who are currently max-level but may not have played certain expansions - all of a sudden they could no longer fly in Outland?). Logically it seems the best path would be to remove Pathfinder for WoD and Legion with Shadowlands.
Of course logically doesnât mean it will happen. Logically they would have centralized the necklace system months ago when players pointed out the absurdity of it and all the negatives that arose from it (and wouldâve tried to avoid those mistakes again with the cloak). Doing so would again put the onus of character development on gaining items (and developing skill) from content you enjoy.
But this is all just a mix of the best of my recollection, my opinion, and maybe some facts in there somewhere. Iâm pretty sure attunement being awful is actually a fact.
I donât think they said this. I think what they said is that they acknowledge that some players see this as âextreme alt unfriendlinessâ.
They see the problem as unreasonable player expectations.
There was never flying in Vanilla. This is something you would know, had you actually played then.
Vanilla epic ground mounts were 1000g.
Flight didnât come to WoW till TBC, the level cap was 70 and the cost was 1500g for basic flight, which was far from a âbankrupting experience.â
Perhaps you meant 270% speed flight, which was 5000g.
1 Like
Itâs irrelevant what Blizzard thinks are and are not âreasonableâ expectations. Customers will decide what they expect/demand and whether a given product delivers.
Other games have no difficulty producing alt-friendly content that donât involve endless unreasonable grinds for rental power.
Other games award your character growth through talents, and abilities, while providing supplemental power through gear.
Other games do not deploy idiotic scaling schemes where everything in the world grows with your characterâs level and even item level, which defeats any gains you might have gained.
Other games arenât designed so that the last five years of gameplay have seen your character grow and gain in ability and power as well as level.
WoW? Your characters today are the same toons you had at the end of WoD. Your level is irrelevant and all your newly gained power is rental and the entire game is now centered on Pathfinger and endless grinds to increase your rental power.
they could literally reset to cataclysm and it would be a land of wonder vs what it is now.
Other games seem to fail miserably and get sunset.
Other games seem to still struggle to get the playerbase WoW does
How many blizzconâs have we had were we heard âWe know we did , we will try to do betterâ ? How many times have they tried to do better. At this point itâs just words.
You do understand that with statistics thses days, Blizzard know exactly what is played by who in the game. They already know what is popular and less popular zone, mechanics, dungeons, spec, build, etc., in the game.
You no longer need to use your voice here or elsewhere.
They already know.
The game is changing toward what the majority of the player in-game find fun and entertaining.
Might as well be a free to play mmorpg atm with all the gates they got not even buy to play games like ESO have any thing as bad as this
Stalking profiles while yours is hidden, this is pure gold.
1 Like
They stopped focusing on fun so their only idea of keeping players subbed is content, content being huge boring grinds with mountains of rng on top of rng on top of rng to the point even your dps is rng thanks to corrupted gear now
1 Like
The game doesnt require you to do 3 to 5 hours a day. You are just imagining, LFR guy.
You are just burdening yourself with multiple alts. Why dont you just do 1 toon? When your main toon maxâd out, you could get an alt. You havent maxâd out your main toon (reach Mythic raiding), and you keep on making alts. What for?
1 Like
In reality it does require hours a day for 1 toon.
I have stopped doing anything on alts and everytime I get a boa piece of gear from the game that can be sent to an alt - it is like salt in the wound because it just sits in the bank until I just vendor it.
You know the game is about grinding and until you have your neck to 80 and your cape maxed each week and until you get 3 sets of dailies done and until you get maxed in rep and until you have done your 15âs for the week and until you have done your islands and until you have done the invasions and until you have done your raids and until you have done your farming of mats and until you have done⊠That is for just 1 toon each day/week.
Blizzard HATES alts, simply hates them. For this reason alone, we need new leadership at the top that appreciates the customer and realizes it is the customers that keep them employed.
2 Likes
Technically youâre correct, but right now thereâs a lot of semi-mandatory time sinks that add up. The challenge for me at the moment is finding time for anything other than the daily assaults so I maintain the ability to go into Horrific Visions and upgrade my cloak. Last night I hopped on a single character to do assaults, but noted there were two Emissaries with potentially useful rewards. Lots of travel. Then more travel. Then assaults/lesser visions.
And the stick only works if the person youâre trying to hit with it canât just get up from the computer and do something else.
Blizzard: âTake this, paypigs!â Swings stick
Customers: âUh, Iâm just gonna⊠log off now?â
Blizzard: âNANI!?â
1 Like
Bold words from someone who has their profile hidden.
1 Like
Nope. The game doesnt require you anything. You are just imposing requirements to yourself.
I reached maxâd HoA level on last season with half of my attendance playing WoW Classic not BFA and yet 3 weeks before 8.3, I still maxâd out my HoA. Modern WoW is not grindy. Most people get Revered/Exalted in 3 weeks. I am halfway honored to Uldum and Vale reps and we will playing 8.3 for more than 8 months? Come on.
Yup, the game is not alt-friendly. I realized this 2 weeks after playing when BFA started. I didnt plan to have alts becoz of such mechanics. Good thing I never did big efforts on my alt. I only played only 1 alt just to try its specs⊠never happy with it so the toon is just there receiving Benthics and Account Wide 8.3 gear.