A season without timer

It would be nice if Blizzard experimented with a Mythic+ season without timer.

Part of the player base who would like to continue progression through the more accessible 5-persons format of dungeons as their end game currently self-excludes from the experience because of the time pressure element in Mythic+. This pressure is experienced as a source of anxiety for individual players and a factor for disputes, toxicity, exclusion or degenerate gameplay in groups, especially pick up groups. The introduction of a time pressure element in dungeons also feels at odds with the original RPG vision of the game, where dungeons were primarily experienced as an environment to explore and overcome rather than a time-trial optimization challenge. Finally, the time pressure makes the Mythic+ experience uniquely vulnerable to real life distractions or server or client issues.

An experimental season of scaling difficulty and affixes without timer would be a much less alienating experience for a significant number of players. It might allow many new players to engage with Mythic+ in a more welcoming, benevolent and gentle format with friends or pick up groups. It would constitute a significant gesture to include rather than exclude the anxious and the stressed in the more accessible 5-players scale of dungeons. Meanwhile, it wouldn’t compromise the ability of groups who wish to organize, optimize and speed through dungeons to still engage with dungeons in this way.

45 Likes

Just do the dungeons without worrying about the timer. Removing the timer won’t stop people from leaving if it’s going to be a 3 hour run.

19 Likes

Without the timer it isn’t a challenge though. It’s just a test of patience.

8 Likes

Just complete the dungeon as fast as you can even if there’s no timer?

6 Likes

Timer is the best part about keys. Just go away please

18 Likes

That same sentence doesn’t apply to what I said lol. You’re asking for M+ with no timer, you basically want to remove what makes it difficult.

Like, it’s infinitely scaling. If a key is too difficult then one has the option of doing a lower one.

4 Likes

Isn’t the timer pretty integral to the whole M+ experience? That’s like saying remove the score from warsong gulch.

Maybe its something they could play around with in the last patch of an expansion, when it doesn’t matter as much for score/progression

1 Like

I would still want to finish it as fast as possible. If i have 4 hours for dungeons per week, id much rather complete 8 than just 4. Removing the timer changes nothing from my perspective, it would just remove the competitive nature from it.

2 Likes

Timer is the best part. And it makes it easy when I’m in a time crunch bc you gotta do these dungeons fast, so way easier for me to get em done during the week.

I actually stayed home from work on monday for bereavement and got all 8 of my mythics done in that period I was supposed to be at work lol

(Side note, mythics are a GREAT way to cope when you’re grieving. I almost forgot it happened while doing them!)

1 Like

Yeah, something that I like about bgs and dungeons to a lesser extent is the reduced (relative to raiding) time commitment. Getting locked in a dungeon for 3 hours doesn’t sound fun at all.

3 Likes

While I generally agree with you, the majority of the community does not. I like going slower in dungeons, but players smashing through dungeons as fast as possible pre-dates Mythic+.

Removing the timer won’t change player behavior; it just takes a number off your screen.

There’s not really a solution for “slow dungeons” other than making your own group with friends who also want to go slow.

3 Likes

But the absence of timer doesn’t magically make the dungeon slower on its own. If you are able to form a group with the intent and ability to clear the dungeon in 20 minutes, you’ll still clear in that time whether the timer exists or not.

The timer acts as a barrier to entry, but its removal does not. Arguments in favor of the timer feel like they want to co-opt the timer to enforce the default experience being a speed clear, at the cost of excluding another player segment.

@Silicå Sorry for your loss :’(

4 Likes

They could remove the timer only if you still received credit based on how quickly you complete the dungeon. That is how io score is built and is integral to the system.

There is going to be a barrier to gaining score based on time whether it’s up on the screen are not. Removing time from the score factor, if that’s what you are ultimately suggesting, just takes the competive nature out of a gameplay feature that is designed for competitive players.

i just want seasons to go away, ive always hated how much of a Esport competitive seasonal game wow has become.

12 Likes

Same. I just dropped out of Overwatch entirely when they introduced ranked play. We don’t need scores, we just need a cool RPG and boss loot.

You could still calculate a score based on time without time having any bearing on dungeon or seasonal rewards. In this model, completing the dungeons at a certain difficulty is what matters, while score can be used as an indicator of an individual player’s achievement and that’s it, like on ye’ olde arcade machines.

2 Likes

i feel just the opposite the timer needs to be there but not down.

it needs to count up. ratings and score are based on the finished time. maybe being the opposite people not feeling like they failed a key but they completed it and got a score based on the time which would then encourage them to finish the key an shooot for faster runs. idk but eh

7 Likes

no. the timer is a good thing because without it we’d just get 3 hour long dungeons cause blizz would have to increase the scaling difficulty and give mobs more health and damage, meaning either the dungeon would require multiple tanks or solo pull each pack with CC just like old school TBC/Cata heroics.

This is just a player retention strategy and its effective for a lot of games. Rotating the dungeons out each season or getting to climb the ladder in pvp again is exciting for me. I couldn’t play this game if there were no seasons, personally.

so you dropped out of Overwatch during the beta for the first game?