You get Valor from Calling Boxes, which is how I got all of my valor.
I specifically said āgrinding for weeks/monthsā. Doesnāt sound like a jumpstart to me, and we are talking about players that may not be playing all day every day like the hardcores, so it may take them the entire patch.
There are dozens of simple solutions to the major problem that Shadowlands developers have intentionally brought about. People are going to have different ideas.
By the way, what would be so wrong about casual players grinding over time to earn iLvl 207 gear, for example? Would all the WoW servers explode? (Well, they may actually explode from all the players playing the game againā¦)
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Nothing.
Iām just wondering where all the threads are from casual players demanding that Blizzard slow down their gearing.
Because thatās what you all keep saying you wantā¦ yet none of you ever ask for it.
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I personally believe everyone should have their own way to get similar ilvl.
Raids mythic pluses and pvp should end up with similar ilvl in the end.
However!!. People that do mythic raids, high end keys, pvp at 2400 rating should be able to acquire it a lot earlier.
Casuals who want gear progression should be faced with a rep grind with a title and mount.
You want to buy mythic level gear.
complete 750 word quests- can upgrade covenant gear to normal raid
Complete 1350 world quests - can upgrade covenant gear to heroic
Complete 2000 world quests - mythic gear
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Solid trolling. 4/10
Pacing matters. WoD progression sucked because they just GAVE us everything without much effort. Shadowlands feels no different.
There are a lot of us who enjoy playing the game, and getting rewarded for playing the game.
Effort > Reward > Effort > Reward
Now, what one considers effort is completely subjective. Some of you think the game begins at group content, some people donāt play this for group content at all, and then there is everything in-between.
Not having anywhere to go with your character within your domain feels bad. Thatās really it. I like having the feeling of growth in my RPG. This is an RPG after all.
I donāt like artificial gates. I said that. Donāt give me a bread crumb every week. Leave me a trail and let me walk it at my own pace, within reason. Theyāve done it before.
In classic, for example, Iām keeping up my professions with my character. I skin/herb for gold, my wife does leatherworking and skinning, those professions on the way up feel like progression. Each level feels like progression, because itās always rewarding in some way, it makes my character feel like itās growing when something happens.
The pace of reward has to be steady and enjoyable. I donāt want huge swaths of time between them at all. But right now their design is either just that, or itās incredibly quick with seemingly no build up. That feeling of steady growth is missing.
Itās kind of grasping at straws.
The initial problem is:
You ding Level 60, and outside of M+ and raids, you got 1 week of actual character/gear progression and then everything comes to a sudden grinding halt other than checking daily for World Quests, praying one of them has a ring, neck, or trinket (or God Forbid youāre a poor shmuck who needs to dual-wield, then you need a weapon thatās actually for your spec).
People in this thread reply āWell thatās because they hand you 197s out of the gate.ā
So, okay, then they need to, like, NOT do that, if thatās what itās going to cause.
I donāt want to ding Level 60, only play for a week and then run out of things to do because Iām not into M+ or raiding.
Is that easier to understand?
I understand just fine. The free set of 197 gear totally screwed things up, and made things like world quests useless.
It was a massive mistake on Blizzardās part.
Iād just like it if a lot more casual players would keep beating the drum that they do NOT want free hand-outs like that in the future.
If itās going to destroy character progression, then, I donāt want them to just give handouts like that.
I mean, thereās a reason why I still have 2 character boosts sitting on my account unused despite me having leveled like 3 characters since I got them. I donāt log into an RPG for instant gratification.
MMOs are supposed to be about spending time in the world, getting more powerful over time as you accomplish your goals.
Thatās not whatās going on, though. Log on, get free handouts, then have nothing to do. Yaaaaay such fun.
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I never asked for casual gearing to be slowed down. The covenant sets (9 slots at 197) are fine as a catchup for alts or for extremely casual players.
What I would ask for is casual players not to be blocked completely from progression past 197. We had alternate gearing paths for years, and lost that in SL.
SL developers seem to think that gear envy will push casual players to do hardcore content, or they caved to the players that donāt want to do any kind of world content at all for an immediate power advantage.
Apologies for the lateness of the quote, but as someone who trains, and hears these statements frequently, I have to ask: How many hours do you put in on the NES games now compared to back then?
Because in my experience there is this false impression that even OW League level gamers can take a few months off and then be right back at it. As one former OW League member stated: āNo, man, just no. It takes drills. It takes hours of practice day in day out to get back to that level.ā Thatās someone half your stated age.
Unless you have a diagnosed issue - itās not as age related as everyone wants to use as the excuse. Unless you want to state: āIām at that age where I have better things to do than perfect my twitch fibers.ā Thatās fair.
WoW is not a high physical skill game. Itās not Starcraft, or FPS.
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#ProudPaidBetaTester
What alternate gearing paths?
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Warfronts, titanium residuum.
Iāll tell you a story about āThe Day I Was Awesome at Gamesā:
Way back when, Nintendo came out with the Top-Loading NES. I was a gamer who had occasionally played two games in my library: TMNT2 and Battletoads. I didnāt play them constantly, and I had a selection of, probably a couple dozen games for both NES and SNES at the time, as both consoles were hooked up to my TV.
I had just gotten out of Marine Corps Boot Camp (which I failed when I discovered my thalassophobia when I almost drowned on the Slide-for-Life after falling from the ropes) when I was bored one day. My frontloading NES had stopped working almost entirely and I had the top-loading NES hooked up to the TV.
I was really in a hankering for some Battletoads, as it was one of my favorite games. I had always played it with a Game Genie, though, and Iād use codes to warp through the levels just to have a little fun with the game. But, the Game Genie would not fit in the top-loading NES, but I figured āScrew itā and I loaded the game up without it.
I had an amazing run of Level 2, got loads and loads of extra lives off the birds, and more levels passed, and a couple hours later I found myself getting through the Terra Tubes with more than 5 lives (the game only shows 5 hearts, but you can have more than that), my palms started to get sweaty. I got through the Clinger-Winger stage, only got killed once or twice, still had 5+ lives. I was really starting to get antsy. This was without the Game Genie. I had never done this before. Ever. And just coming back from Boot Camp, I hadnāt really been drilling for this whatsoever. I got to the Queen with 4 lives left, and my heart was pounding.
In the end, I won. I actually beat Battletoads.
Right after that, I popped TMNT2 in, I felt like I was on fire. And I was. Because I beat that, too with only the Konami code and no Game Genie.
This was when I was 18.
I didnāt drill for either game, I only played them casually, on-and-off.
These days, platformers like Hollow Knight, Ori, etcā¦ Iām not very good at, at all. These kinds of games, I used to rule back in the day when I was in my 20s.
As for WoW?
I get hit by stuff when I try to avoid it sometimes (also happens in FFXIV), sometimes I forget where Iām at in a rotation, and end up making silly mistakes on classes I play often, and my DPS just seemsā¦ kinda low.
I find myself doing similar stuff in FFXIV, too. Iāll sometimes cast a non-dualcast Verthunder on my RDM or doing a Dualcast Jolt, and going āwtf man, whyād I do thatā¦?ā
Iām just losing my edge, is all.
Maybe for a while but itās going to hit later quarter results in the second year after the launch of each classic expac hard. I honestly donāt see anything beyond WotLK being of enough interest to enough people to keep sub numbers up to a sufficient amount to prop up retail.
The nostalgia for classic stuff tends to take a big hit within a year of the launch. People get their fill and realize the 10 year old graphics are starting to get ugly to look at among other things and they drop out.
Itās not a sustainable model and if retail expac sales start dipping below a certain amount there will be trouble. Corporate isnāt going to continue investing money in development for retail if itās classic stuff bringing in the majority of the income. Theyāll start slashing expacs to the bones, less features, buggier, less content, maybe two major patches being the norm, etc. Once that happens you have a death spiral. And once retail is really gone the game itself will be really gone too I think. Store sales prop up too much of the profitability so I guarantee they will port over store sales and purchases to classic game versions (at least later ones like BC/WotLK) to try and keep that cash flow if retail flounders (so yes this concerns the no-changes purists as well). I have no doubt the lights on WoW will be left on for the next 10 years or more as there will always be enough die-hards to pay for server and network costs but the question is whether they can at this point with the twin failures of BFA and SL even make a come-back. Increasingly it looks like they may not want to.
Then by that definition, levels are a rating system. And Races are a rating system.
And Class colors are a rating system. And any and all achievements are inherently a rating system.
Players will rate people against people for anything they can. That doesnāt make it a rating.
People who donāt want IO are either ignorant of how it works, or they are ignorant of the benefit from it. IO doesnāt exclude people, IO shows your qualifications.
Not displaying your IO isnāt going to suddenly get you invited to a key you arenāt qualified for. People thinking this way are simply incredibly ignorant of how pugs are formed. No IO = no invite for anything above +5.
Imagine a business where you want someone to hire you without you listing your job history or experience? By comparison wanting to hide IO is the same as wanting to hide character level and complaining that no one is inviting your level 10 to Castle Nathria. Further itās quite literally the same as wanting someone to invite you to mythic Denathrius and complaining that they want to know if you have ever done it on heroic or normal before. Itās frankly naive and silly.
I am a pretty casual player. I have not timed a single +15 yet. Up until a couple weeks ago I hadnāt killed a single heroic boss. I have no issues with IO because I understand it has nothing to do with rating, it is simply a measure of experience. It shows that you have done something, it doesnāt show how well you did when you did it. It doesnāt show if you were carried or carried someone else.
Raising your IO is simple and easy and has very little to do with your own performance, you do keys you havenāt done before. Focus on the smallest keys and try to go up ONE level. Each week you do a key, you will get a key. There is no question it is easier on a tank or a healer, but it is entirely doable on a dps.
I know several very low performing dps who have raised their IO to be better than my own despite me consistently out performing them. They have even achieved KSM. Because IO isnāt a dps meter, it isnāt a mechanics check, itās an achievement. You can buy it up to and beyond KSM. It helps to be a good performer, but it isnāt some mythical goal even for the most casual of players.
Like any achievement or collection of achievements you focus on one level at a time and it will go up.
War fronts gave a single piece of decent ilvl gear through a one time quest if I remember correctly.
Titan residuum was for azerite gear, yeah? 3 slots and very pricey.
Iām not seeing how either are an actual gearing system thatās so much better than covenant gear.
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I would encourage you to take up meditation with an emphasis on focus. Iām not being sarcastic, or trying to poke fun at you. Iām just trying to acknowledge that todayās environment is packed with distraction and constant background noise. This leads to a slip in focus, and then the āwth momentā happens. (granted, a bit of that isnāt a big deal, at any age)
I feel that this is a fair āage relatedā issue. When weāre 18-25 (depending on luck, of course) itās so very easy to focus on what we want to experience to the exclusion of all else. Itās a skill we lose as we grow older in this society. Especially since mindfulness, the art of harnessing the mind, is not something that we are typically exposed to.
Anywayā¦ could I have gotten off-topic any further if I had tried? 
I just want to encourage older players to not settle for poor performance because they feel that is their lot in life now. If that makes sense. (Also - very cool gaming history! Thank you for sharing. )
What is a breadcrumb with no timegate but still has solid progression , yet easy because itās casual content?
Sounds like farming anima to me.
I dun know, maybe someday once my work schedule softens up a bit, and I get some time off, Iāll try and dip my toes into something.
Problem is, I am not social and I donāt really know anybody, I have zero IO whatsoever, and I donāt want to yoink my characters out of their guilds.
So eh.
That, and I think I only have 1 character whoās remotely geared enough, and even then Iām only really experienced with the DPS side of it.
She can tank, and I have a āmehā shield and sword for her, but almost zero experience tanking in Shadowlands (I think I did, like, one normal dungeon).
Sheās only 180 avg anyhow.
But someday I might try a little something when I feel I have exceptional energy for it.