Are these foums just in a bubble? (Shadowlands is actually good)

Community General Discussion
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Seeing immense amount of complaining here, but when I log in the game and actually play it, the game is more vibrant and active than it has been since i can remember. Some of the complaints are borderline nonsensical.

All of my WoW contacts from the past 4 years are playing. Everyone seems really positive about the loot changes. Everyone seems positive about just about everything. The raid is fantastic, the dungeons are good, Torghast or the Maw aren’t dealbreakers, and this is the first time we’ve seen a ‘content first’ approach to WoW since Wrath.

I’m just finding it very odd that my playgroup, and seemingly everyone I’m playing with, is enjoying the game, having a great time with it.

Like the common issues I’m reading about don’t exist for me. Loot is fine, and the reduction of gear means that less content is trivial, the patch lifecycle lasts longer, there’s more progression to do, every upgrade feels incredible and sticks around a while, and the high end rewards feel better.

The Maw is a boring daily zone, I don’t care for it, I don’t grind it, I won’t care about it until it’s locking pretty major progression. The mountless thing is whatever, I spend such a small amount of time in the zone that I don’t care too much. I don’t do enough content in the Maw, for me to care about the Maw, or let it ruin my experience.

Torghast is a chore, but that’s all. It’s not bad. Infinitely better than Islands and Visions, while filling the same role of ‘tertiary PvE content’. I do a couple runs at the start or the end of the week as a means to an end. It’s not that bad when you’re playing the game. It’s really good solo content, and the Twisting Coradors will be pretty great for those inclined toward hard single player content. In addition, all you have to do in Torghast is make 1 or 2 legendary items, up to the ilvl you want, and you never have to touch the tower again. I don’t feel pressured to do it, to such a strong extent that I missed half my Ash last week and actually just don’t care at all.

PvP gear vendors coming back has been a godsend, and I filled in every poor slot with a PvP item. With Conq week 2 here, 200 ilvl pvp items are flowing like water, and that’s really nice, esp when you can target the items you want, like I did for my on use PvP trinket, which is really solid for PvP and PvE. I also have a PvP offhand for my Frost set, and used Honor gear as a stopgap in the 170~ range.

I haven’t been genuinely happy about an item drop in WoW since WoD, and getting my axe from Tyrna Scythe yesterday was one of the hypest character development moments I’ve had in games for probably years. The reduced loot means that I’ll hang onto that axe for a LONG time, and the upgrade was absolutely massive. I’m more hyped to have this axe than I was hyped to get any drop in the last few expansions.

So like, I read these forums, and off of that alone, you’d think the sky is falling and the game is terrible, and that various systems break the game, but honestly, it seems like SL may just be one of the best expansions in the game’s history. Never had a WoW launch this fun before. This is the most enjoyable season of WoW I’ve personally ever played.

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Ehh? The expac just launched ofcourse the game will be active and full of people running around everywhere. Talk to me after a month or two when dust settles down. Are you new to WOW or what my dude.

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Gd is like that crazy guy screaming at pigeons in the park. Now imagine every crazy pigeon screamer from all over the world is given a message board to post their screams in.

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The forums have always been an echo chamber of negativity, because most people don’t come in to post things like “awesome game loving it!” they would just be playing the game then.

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Most game forums exist in a bubble because the majority of people spend time playing the game rather than reading and posting on the forums. People usually go to forums to post / complain about issues or they’re simply trying to get information.

I enjoy quite a bit about Shadowlands, but there’s also some stuff like Torghast and and daily stuff which I really dislike.

I mostly come to the forums to look for information and read some of the more controversial topics for entertainment.

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Nah, I’ve been playing for 13 years, which is why I think the negative response is so strange, cause this is like prime WoW content in the game right now. This launch has been straight fire. I’ve played more of SL on launch than any other WoW release to date, because I’m having such a good time of it. I can’t call SLthe best expansion, we’re really early on, but I will call 9.0 the best expansion release patch to date.

I get that GD is usually kind of stupid, but I’d think that if the expansion was good (which I think it overwhelmingly is), that’d be better reflected

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The people having fun are always less likely to come to a forum and make a post that says “I’m having fun!” than the people with something to complain about. This is true for every gaming forum since the dawn of the internet.

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Then you should know after 13 years that game is always very active when new expac launches. The real test comes after first month that’s when players start to unsub due to various reasons.

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Thats the thing though isn’t it you find it to be the best expansion. I personally find it to be one of the worst ever released.

I was optimistic about it to begin with, but with each change they make I realize I am no longer the target audience.

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Forums are indeeed just a bubble, a bubble filled with gnats if I’m being honest.

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Who are you trying to convince that everything is great, yourself or someone else?

You’re saying the Maw is boring, Torghast is a chore, but it’s actually all great content. Getting no loot is actually great, because I was excited to get the thing I got and it’ll last me a long time… because I won’t get anything else for a long time. I didn’t get all my soul ash last week, but it doesn’t matter because I don’t even care enough to play to get it.

If you were going for murder by faint praise it kinda worked.

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Or, if they do praise it, the response they get is “shut up, fanboi, you are just a white knight!”

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Exactly, most folks love just hating on Ion and the dev team but the game is in the best state it’s ever been in. Shadowlands overall was a commercial success, and I can’t wait to see where they take us for the rest of the expansion!

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It’s simple human nature. People who are content have no reason to speak because they’re busy enjoying what they’re content with

People who are upset have every reason to talk about it because why would they sit quiet and deal with something they don’t enjoy? That’s why no matter how successful something is it will always sound like it’s the end of the world - because the people who do enjoy it are too busy enjoying it to talk about it

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Those things actually don’t matter though. Like I spend maybe 1/16 of my WoW time concerned with those activities. I see them as major talking points, so I put my thoughts down on them. Like that content actually just doesn’t matter to me. It’s not what I focus on, it’s not a hangup for me. I’d rather put my attention on raid or m+ or PvP.

I can outplay a 5%~ differential, I still don’t have a legendary and I really just don’t care. I may not even craft one this week. I need a Danny kill first. Soul Ash and Torghast just aren’t pressing issues for me. I don’t care about them.

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Remember the good old days when GD was just worgens asking for tail

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Its really fun to run 30+ heroic dungeons and still be stuck with a BFA weapon and not able to keep threat as a tank. If there was more gear even of lesser quality at least I wouldn’t be totally screwed and could start mythics as every other piece of gear but a trinket is 171 ilvl. Will I be happy when a weapon does drop? Nope it will be a feeling of relief for the briefest of time and then the sinking realization that I now need to get one to drop in M+…

Torghast was incredibly fun but they had to go changing it because they don’t want people to consume content to fast. And thats the odd part they don’t want to make enjoyable content because then people burn through it and ask for more. Make it a chore and people do it as little as possible. Thus extending the life of the content with no additional dev time. See the recent tank changes that make little to no sense.

Covenant balance

I would love to be able to choose the covenant based on transmog and ideology rather then performance. For this toon it lined up but for every other one I like the worst possible choice.

Transmog sets

Why are we not able to transmog the maw set? And why are the covenant sets liked behind tons of renoun? Being able to transmog into these sets would cause a feeling of being part of the shadowlands and or covenant. Instead I’m dressed as Garrosh or a Horde warrior in spiky plate that does not match the ascetics of this expansion.

Pet Charms

More stupid changes that seem to have no reason.

Currencies

Far to many currencies that can only be farmed from one activity. Its far preferable to have everything tied to the same currency so that players can choose how to spend their time instead of being forced to do what the devs want them to do instead.

Balance

Because of the amount of layered systems the devs are finding it difficult if not impossible to balance anything. Something they were warned about in alpha and gained popularity in the pull the rip cord movement.

Raid tuning

How this made it live the first week I don’t even know. It doesn’t take a guinness to understand that one shot mechanics that are unavoidable to those without an immunity on the second boss of normal is probably not a good idea.

I could go on with a whole list of other things but to be honest the people who feel the same don’t need it and the people who don’t agree wouldn’t read it anyway.

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No matter what Blizzard does, some will love it, some will hate it, and some will be neutral.

The ones who hate it he most flock to this forum, to post their outrage. Nobody else bothers to post.

So yes, this forum is full of anti-(whatever Blizzard did) posts.

And yes, that has nothing to do with the real game.

Remember there are MILLIONS of players. Have you seen MILLIONS of “hate it” posts? No. You only see 0.1%.

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ill take two of whatever OP is taking

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We’ll never truly know. I do think a lot of things get blown up here in the forum. any evidence people will give including myself will be anecdotal at best, and you always have to take that with a grain of salt.

Most people seem to like the expansion but I am hearing a lot of grumbling about torghast in and out of the forums. Not so much grumbling about covenants other than being pigeonholed