Felt like such a shame for this well-written essay from the SoD Head Dev to only be seen by those on Twitter, so I’m crossposting it over.
Frankly, I agree with Aggrend’s sentiment in this response. Playing with a guild or group of friends is and should continue to be the best way of playing World of Warcraft, especially Season of Discovery. I know I for one would not even still be playing SoD if it wasn’t for my guild and my friends. They’re the reason I’ve had so much fun in this experimental version of WoW.
That said, I’m also aware that there’s something of a tug-of-war going on right now between a portion of SoD’s playerbase and the Classic Dev Team.
A lot of you want pugging to be the best way to play the game. You want to be able to mostly solo everything and in the case of raids and instanced pvp, you want to have an easy time of completing the endgame content without actually having to communicate with your teammates through discord or in-game chats.
Needless to say, it doesn’t seem like the Classic Dev Team wants this. It seems like they want to continue promoting playing with guilds and friends as the best way to play SoD.
But will they hold the line for the next Phases? Will they stick to their guns and stay true to their beliefs in Phase 3 and 4 and beyond?
Yeah its one of those terms that people throw out but means nothing. Nobody can gatekeep you in the game. I just add it to the list of buzzwords that mean nothing alongside elitistism and wokeness.
The big question I suppose is, is it better to try to schedule around reset days, or around a 2-day set schedule, and whatever happens for the other reset when it happens, happens?
People often are the ones responsible for gatekeeping themselves because they are inflexible and unwilling to do/meet/perform certain things or conditions. That’s the sad part about it.
Should make it easier to join guilds. Maybe some guild perks. But not built in such a way that was done in Cata where everyone joined the super guilds. Maybe some clearly defined more ‘casual’ type guilds. Maybe even some type of official newbie guild on each server for each faction.
Just spitballing. I don’t disagree with him, but I think a lot of players are just overwhelmed and don’t know how to find a guild that works for them. Make the process easier somehow.
The perk is that you are with like minded people who can meet your times and dont care what class you play. There doesnt need to be any perks outside of this. People are just their own worst problem trying to be anti-social in a social game.
That’s nice on paper, but let’s deal with reality.
I think another problem is this Megaserver culture, where everyone is a stranger. There’s just a mass of nameless people swarming around you. Most of which you don’t even see as they’re spread over all these layers. But that’s another issue. The point is that there is no server community. If Blizz wants people to pretty much just play with their guildies, then at least make it easier to find guilds.
The reality is the perk is that you are with like minded people who can meet your times and don’t care what class you play. Soak was 100% correct. Some players are just stupid.
There is no server community because its a temporary version of the game in a temporary phase where people stop playing and others start. You cant expect to build any community around 2-3 month windows.
Ironically , and not that this pertains to a WoW elite gamer like myself. These social casuals had a friendly raid mode for their caliber. GDKP. The game mode they chased off. No matter to me I’m still clapping 99s with my fellow deep state gatekeeping WoW elite. But man GDKPS allowed you guys to quest some gold (I have quested 600 at lvl 40) and get all the items to fill the gaps of your requirements.
Those hosting gdkps didn’t turn to you make pugs; they came back to me to join competent guilds…. Hahahahahaha.
