Discussion: Skill-Based Difficulty, Time-Based Difficulty, and Value Preservation

[Marohnak-llane]

@Qyune-exodar

You telling me that the X-45 Heartbreaker and MoP World Boss mounts are rare is the exact same thing as me telling you that Mythic raiding is difficult. Both statements are true. Neither content is designed for ‘most people’. This is a very small fraction of content for people who really enjoy a particular style of gameplay. However, at least with the mounts, everyone has a chance for them to drop (meaning the barrier to entry is low, but the demand for consistency will be high).

While the design of Mythic raiding or any other ‘‘high skill-based content’’ is for sure tailored for the minority of the playerbase, I don’t think it compares exactly well to an activity like pursuing drop chance mount that only a minority of players will see.

Let’s say we take off all the incentives of those activities. No gear drop from raiding, no achievements, titles, mounts and all the good stuff. I’m sure a lot would still enjoy raiding. I even personally know people who raid and don’t care about any of the rewards (shoutout to the friends who traded me mounts and transmogs). But I doubt people would spam kill Apothecary Hummel hundreds of time if it didn’t drop a mount.
You can even use your own example of poker and slot machines. The rewards for both activities is a fun part. However, a simple game of poker alone, without playing for money, is fun (for some), while the penny-slot machine (assuming it would be free to spin it) would be seen as a boring, waste of time if it didn’t have a prize. While I’m sure you could have some fun ‘‘trying your luck’’ a few times to see if you theoretically win, you wouldn’t spend hours doing it if it wasn’t for the for the actual prize. But poker can be played both for fun or for the money.
With that in mind, can you honestly answer this:

Would you be willing to sit (somewhat AFK) for about 15 minutes to kill Sha of Anger a thousand times if its Heavenly Cloud Serpent didn’t exist?

I’m not trying to be rude either, just hoping my perspective on the whole thing is understood.

@Qyune-exodar

Allow me to clear this up. You present this as if anyone to puts in that much effort toward the Sha of Anger mount is a degenerate, which is simply demeaning and insulting. All the while, this example is masquerading as if there are not people out there putting this level of time and effort into any of the first three activities listed is dishonest.

This is the general kind of things I’ve heard in the past after telling my attempts to other people. I’m not trying to be mean here, but I can sort of understand why people see it this way.

While I understand any type of behavior can be pushed to an extreme where people will go ‘‘that’s insane’’, including Mythic raiding, I believe there are two types of scenarios, one being arguably good, and the other one just being bad. Let me try to put in words what I mean here:

1. Someone practicing the piano 10 hours a day
   While this can be considered degenerate behavior by some (if not the majority), at the very least you progressively get something out of it - skills. Unless you’re somehow one of those child prodigies, you don’t start playing Beethoven the first five minutes you stand in front of the instrument. Obviously this can comes with risks. If you skip meals and stop taking care of yourself to play the piano, then it’s not a good obsession to have - which is why it’s arguably good. But it’s a good thing if you can strike the right balance between spending time playing and stay physically and mentally healthy.
   You can apply this scenario to competitive raiding in WoW, which I’m sure some of us went through. It’s okay to quit mid-progress if you don’t feel okay anymore. Even if you don’t reach your original end-game goals (let’s say, Hall of Fame for instance), at the very least you probably learned a lot and became a better player, made some friends and hopefully had fun. I don’t wanna go too deep into this, but hopefully you understand what I mean.

2. For the case of the Heartbreaker:
   It’s the bad ‘‘insane way’’ because you don’t really get anything out of it. You either have or don’t have the mount. You don’t get better at the game, you’re not really interacting with people (considering the length and difficulty of the actual instance). The only thing you’re getting is an increased to your Rarity attempt count. To me, it feels like I could open a Word document and spam the word banana 10 000 times to ‘‘beat the game’’ - except for Heartbreaker, you don’t even know how many times you need.

With that in mind, this is why I’m saying that skill-based difficulty > time-based difficulty. Something that is hard and challenging will effectively takes time to master as well, less for certain people and more for others. And even if you don’t end up becoming the next Beethoven or a world first raider, the time you invested doing those things reflect the rewards you got, and as long as you did it in a healthy way, nothing is lost.

There’s simply very little to gain from the Valentine dungeon or camping MoP bosses. And just because something takes no skill to complete, it doesn’t means that it should be compensated by taking considerably more time than it has to. Arguably, you could say that you ‘‘gained’’ things because of these bosses: ended up leveling more alts, met people leveling, played new specs and roles, etc. But feeling forced to have alts to have more chance to get something my main character cannot get just because of RNG shouldn’t be the main thing that drives me to play alts.

@Haelsing-stormrage

Any change or lack thereof would anger a portion of the playerbase. The devs are kinda screwed either way.

There’s no argument to be made here. I don’t think you could change something in the game without at least making one player unhappy. But in my opinion, if that change did make 99 more players happy, then I think it’s for the best.

All things considered: I personally don’t care too much if some value is lost overtime by making certain things easier for other players. If a piece of content is widely seen as boring, unrewarding, unfun, unfair, too repetitive or too grindy, then they can either turn it into something that’s fun and exciting, possibly even challenging if it was easy, or reduce the time it takes to do those boring activities. so that players can sooner go back to do things they actually enjoy while still having made progress on things they’re working for.

@Haelsing-stormrage

But either way my money’s on things staying the same, with legacy content left on the waysides while they focus on Dragonflight.

Hopefully we can see some changes in past content, but I have greater hopes for the future. While I can’t say whether or not they’ll change the drop rate on the Heartbreaker, I pray that we simply don’t get a new similar case in DF.

[Qyune-exodar]

@Marohnak-llane

Would you be willing to sit (somewhat AFK) for about 15 minutes to kill Sha of Anger a thousand times if its Heavenly Cloud Serpent didn’t exist?

No, if Sha of Anger did not drop a mount, then I would not even sit there for 10 seconds. At that point, it is just the same as any other mob that I don’t stop and kill. I also would not raid if there were no loot rewards. I would not complete any M+ if there were no rewards. I would not PvP if there were no rewards. I would not level characters if there were no levels. I would not complete fights in ridiculous manners if there were no achievements. I wouldn’t taste all the foods of each expansion if there were no rewards.

Measuring the value of content in a game by whether you would participate without a reward seems to an odd way to measure anything in any game – especially an MMO. The entire concept in any niche of the game is that we either do something enough times without RNG to finally earn a reward, or we do something enough times with RNG to finally earn a reward. We run raids and M+ content in hopes of eventually getting whatever it is we are chasing (whether it is gear or KSM). We grind reputation so that we can finally get to exalted (again, for whatever the reward may be). So, yes, if you remove the mount from Sha of Anger, I will move on to the next bit of content that does have a reward.

@Marohnak-llane

This is the general kind of things I’ve heard in the past after telling my attempts to other people. I’m not trying to be mean here, but I can sort of understand why people see it this way.

Honestly, if they meant that in demeaning way toward you, then I hate that for you. If you find something as silly as RP walking up and down Eastern Kingdoms to be the most fun you have in WoW, then you do that. Who cares what someone thinks of what you find fun in a game. As long as your bills are paid, your RL responsibilities are met, and your life is sorted, then enjoy the game the way you want.

Now, conversely, if you hate leveling as well as farming for mounts, and you are leveling more alts to farm more mounts, then maybe you need to reconsider how you play the game.

@Marohnak-llane

With that in mind, this is why I’m saying that skill-based difficulty > time-based difficulty. Something that is hard and challenging will effectively takes time to master as well, less for certain people and more for others. And even if you don’t end up becoming the next Beethoven or a world first raider, the time you invested doing those things reflect the rewards you got, and as long as you did it in a healthy way, nothing is lost.

I think I get what you are trying to tell me. You think that Skill-Based Difficulty > Time-Based Difficulty, because of the following:

1. Some people don’t need rewards to play the game (they just need the challenge)
2. Skill-Based Difficulty improves your skills
3. You can become a better player
4. You can become a more social player
5. You might even make friends

In response, I am saying that there are many players within the community who:

1. Cannot participate in mid to high level Skill-Based Difficulty content
2. May not want to improve their skills
3. May prefer long-term style gameplay and rewards
4. Do not want to socialize
5. Are not looking to make online friends

Ultimately, it does not matter why you see Skill-Based Difficulty content superior to Time-Based Difficulty content, because of the exact same reason it does not matter why someone else sees Time-Based Difficulty content superior to Skill-Based Difficulty content. This is an MMO with millions of players with varying strengths and weaknesses, and there should be content available for all. Therefore, it is necessary for the communal value of items / content to be preserved within the game as they transition from current content to legacy content.

@Marohnak-llane

But feeling forced to have alts to have more chance to get something my main character cannot get just because of RNG shouldn’t be the main thing that drives me to play alts.

If this is not fun for a player, then they should not do it. “Feeling obligated” or “feeling forced” is wonderful phrase that allows a player to shed the responsibility for their own actions. If I “feel forced” to level up an alt to for my raid team to have the perfect composition (for example, in case we need to switch out for bosses during progression), then maybe I am participating at a level that is not enjoyable for me. So, the natural response would be for me to either stop entirely or find a group that is more on my level of intensity.

Players who play a game at a portion and to a point of their own dissatisfaction should not be able to dictate what other players find fun.

@Marohnak-llane

All things considered: I personally don’t care too much if some value is lost overtime by making certain things easier for other players.

Again, this is why the preservation of communal value system is so important. It protects the content from being devalued from players who do not care if the value is lost – keeping in mind that this value contains other players’ time and effort from a community standpoint.