So I think we can agree there are a large number of players that never venture beyond LFR and get into raiding, and there are obviously a lot of different reasons for this. Some people don’t have the time or the ability to commit themselves to a schedule or just don’t have interest in doing so.
I think however there is a good sized chunk of that player base that simply lacks experience and/or has performance anxiety because of a lack of hands on experience and I think the entire game would be better off if we could find a way to get those players over that hump and into normal raiding and hopefully beyond. So stick with me here…
when you play a team sport like baseball, nobody really wants you on their team if you’re bad… so they have mechanisms for screening out those players (try outs). The raiding community has it’s own ways of screening out those players but it is more oriented towards higher end play (heroic/mythic), when those methods get applied to normal it makes it more difficult than it needs to be to start normal raiding. so how do you get good at baseball without playing on a team you aren’t on and thus can’t play the game to get better?
you train, you practice throwing, hitting and train yourself to play and you get better and eventually you have the confidence to try out for the team and if you put the effort in, you get on the team. Many guilds have try out processes of various types and that’s great but not many people want to take the time and build you up as a raider from a complete noob and it’s not something you can do by yourself very easily at the moment… sure you can read guides and watch videos, but it’s never going to be the same as building real experience by doing… This is where I think Blizzard could help.
Blizzard… we need a training sim. Somewhere a player can enter and practice individual boss mechanics. Where I could for example enter and select shriekwing, I select my role and have a raid group of bots (like the ones in exiles reach, I know it can be done) doing the other roles so I can practice dps and hiding behind pillars to avoid earsplitting shriek, or a tank could que up Sludgefist and practice steering him into pillars and tank swapping. Allow the player to do this for any boss so they can get hands on experience with the individual fight mechanics.
no loot, no rewards, just practice and if I’ve completed the mechanics to kill the boss, I’m given an achievement for that boss in the training mode that I can show when I apply to a guild or a pug to show that I have the basic comprehension of the fight mechanics required to do the fight on normal. This room should only be allowed to be completed by a single player so that others cannot carry them to the certificate, but it would be nice if it would allow observers as it could be a really useful in game training tool when paired up with a mentor watching and coaching via discord.
now you might be telling yourself “that’s what LFR is for” and that is partially what it was intended to be, but here has been my experience with LFR from the perspective of someone that has been teaching and observing a completely new player I have been trying to get into the game…
You que into LFR and either your team has enough people who know the fights to carry the rest of the raid or you don’t and you wipe until enough inexperienced (or flat out malingering) players leave and get replace by enough experienced players and/or enough determination stacks to finally down the boss. There isn’t any time to read the individual fight explanations right before you engage the boss and there isn’t enough punishment for failing the mechanics to reinforce learning. The only boss mechanics my new friend picked up on our LFR training sessions were the ones that I took the time to explain and point out during the fight. Most of these new players do not have direct mentors like this.
Think of this like the proving grounds, but specifically for learning raid fights.
I think getting as many people into normal raiding as possible is best for the health of the game, but only if they are prepared to play and aren’t going to negatively impact the playing experience of those already familiar with raiding. Smoothing out this entry process and giving as much opportunity to succeed to new players as possible is the best way to encourage a healthy influx of players and reduce conflict and toxicity between old and new players in the raiding community as a whole.
This idea is a napkin doodle and obviously needs a lot more thought and polish but I think it’s an idea that really has some great potential for the game.
please share your thoughts.