"Dragonflight is the best expansion in a long time"

[Justaroll-area-52]

@Minnienuker-grobbulus

What is good about having content that .0001% of the player base ever gets to clear?

te challenge. Heroic raids are easy and pretty much face rolled. People do Mythic raid for the challenge/Gear.

[Chillproof-moon-guard]

I guess the statement is true, if you consider ~5 years a long time. DF beats SL and BfA easily, and it beats the first half of Legion, which was misery if you played more than one spec and/or got unlucky legendary rng. Assuming the spec you enjoyed didn’t get “class fantasy’d” to the point you no longer enjoyed it.

[Legionisbest-mannoroth]

@Grumbles-hellscream

more time in WoD than Dragon Isles lol.

I spent more time in Korthia than Dragon Isles lol.

I didnt even like Korthia, but I still somehow enjoyed it more than whatever this is …

@Chillproof-moon-guard

, and it beats the first half of Legion,

I mean, looking at player numbers, it clearly didnt lol. In fact even BFA did not have this massive of a decline in player numbers. Unpopular opinion, but looking at numbers the only expansion DF might be better than is probably Shadowlands… Which given the fact Shadowlands was cut short to develop Dragonflight is… uhm… Very unimpressive.

[Herné-moon-guard]

@Topad-skyfury

Simply put, the game isn’t made for the WoW player of yesteryear. It’s why they don’t play anymore.

Not only doe sit not appeal to WoW’s aging player base, but it doesn’t appeal to a newer generation of gamers either. One of WoW’s biggest problems is over reliance on RNG and artificial difficulty, rather than what made WoW good up til WotLK and even parts of MoP: the vast creative world building and the social community.

Even cosmetics feel like a chore to attain, and that’s not even gear, just the stuff that’s supposed to make the game somewhat more fun and creative. When you take the social atmosphere out of an MMO AND the creative freedom out of an RPG, what are we left with?

It’s so bad that their quest text even makes no sense for certain race/class combinations or even just one or the other alone. Try SL as a DK or a Forsaken and tell me any of that makes sense with NPCs constantly calling you LIVING MORTAL.

Drac’thyr, IN THEIR OWN EXPANSION, suffer a similar issue with other Drac’thyr NPCs calling you “mortal”, or soft skin, or any other thing the in-game narrative makes them say… there’s also things like Khadgar’s dialogue in Azure Span among many many others.

[Nikolo-proudmoore]

@Minnienuker-grobbulus

@Nikolo-proudmoore

but I doubt that you have a convincing argument for why having multiple raid difficulties is bad for the game.

So, you think the game was bad when for the bulk of its existence it only had 2 difficulties. I’m not including LFR here, because it isn’t really raiding.

The game was fine with normal and heroic, they changed it when Ion became director, imagine that.

Why do you think it is healthy for a game that only 20k players are 9/9 mythic towards the end of a patch?

What is good about having content that .0001% of the player base ever gets to clear?

None of that describes why the existence of mythic raiding is actually “bad for the game.” 20K players have completed it and I’m sure that many more are in the process. If anything, that shows that a portion of the player base enjoys Mythic raid content so it should be left in place.

[Minnienuker-grobbulus]

@Justaroll-area-52

You want something you dont do and your bad at deleted? lol

I was a mythic raider for 2 expansions, and I was a heroic raider prior to Mythic raids being introduced into the game. I don’t think having content that only .001% of the player base gets to clear is good for the game.

Ironic, that the height of the games popularity was when the hardest raids were accessible to average players. So many WoW vets talk fondly of their heroic 25 man ICC clears.

Mythic raiding is horribly inaccessible these days, I’m talking about the entire raid here too, so many people defending it are just 3/9 mythic raiders, they too, will never get a 9/9 clear.

[Topad-skyfury]

@Herné-moon-guard

When you take the social atmosphere out of an MMO AND the creative freedom out of an RPG, what are we left with?

World of Warcraft: Dragonflight

[Minnienuker-grobbulus]

@Nikolo-proudmoore

None of that describes why the existence of mythic raiding is actually “bad for the game.” 20K players have completed it and I’m sure that many more are in the process.

Of course it does, you’re just too blind to admit it.

I’m not going to be dragged into to some long boring discussion with another WoW fanboy here, you guys all parrot the same boring cliché talking points.

The game was fine without Mythic raiding in the past, and don’t be fooled, Mythic raids are way tougher compared to when they were called heroic raids prior to Legion.

[Topad-skyfury]

@Minnienuker-grobbulus

I don’t think having content that only .001% of the player base gets to clear is good for the game.

The difficulty in the game came primarily from finding a dedicated group of people to raid with. The raid is a formality, or rather, a reason to make friends in the vast MMO world. I think they’ve lost sight of this a long time ago. In their mind, a raid only exists to drop phat loot and to get phat parses. Social aspect be damned, if the players dont raid, make the loot PHATTER!

[Justaroll-area-52]

@Minnienuker-grobbulus

Ironic, that the height of the games popularity was when the hardest raids were accessible to average players. So many WoW vets talk fondly of their heroic 25 man ICC clears.

the raid is still accessible to average players, but the hardest part of mythic raid is getting 20ppl, and you still cant pug it untill 100 guilds clears it

but the reality now, is that the average player is the casual, the ones who doesntt raid, doesnt do mythic +, the typical FFXIV enjoyer

[Nikolo-proudmoore]

@Minnienuker-grobbulus

I’m not going to be dragged into to some long boring discussion with another WoW fanboy here, you guys all parrot the same boring cliché talking points.

The game was fine without Mythic raiding in the past, and don’t be fooled, Mythic raids are way tougher compared to when they were called heroic raids prior to Legion.

lol. I am not parroting any talking points. I just asked a simple question about your comment. Why is mythic raiding bad for the game?

But it seems that I was correct to doubt that you actually had an answer.

[Slotmachine-sargeras]

I mean its not bad i havent canceled sub yet like SL

[Chillproof-moon-guard]

You almost got me. Then I saw the name. Nice try

[Minnienuker-grobbulus]

@Topad-skyfury

WoW game design as its been for a while has shoved quite a lot of players into the ‘end-game loop’. I

Welcome to the world of Diablocraft. M+ gets players to repeat a limited amount of pre-existing content.

The game has been slowing being push into some weird hybrid MMO slash AARPG now since Legion. This has been done to save on development resources and keep the small amount of players left grinding away on the gear treadmill. Looks great for investor reports, pads MAUs and doesn’t require the developers to make new content.

M+ was a slam dunk for Blizzard, problem is, players are wising up to how boring it is.

[Legionisbest-mannoroth]

@Chillproof-moon-guard

Nice try

You cant win a debate against numbers.

DF has lost so many players during S2 it is unbelievable. Can´t even blame Shadowlands for that drop. It happened after the release of Dragonflight.

S3 numbers will probably be even lower, and you won´t be able to blame summer or BG3 anymore.

Sorry.

[Kynladoria-maladath]

@Topad-skyfury

Anyone else baffled by this statement?

Not at all. DF is the expansion that got me into M+ because I didn’t have to grind artifact power, azerite power, or covenants/legendaries to do it.

There’s a lot of supposition that “people aren’t engaging with it like they used to” and a bunch of other sentiments that really are unfounded. DF has had better retention than previous xpacs, they’ve reported this themselves. People who are playing it, are continuing to play it more.

DF is definitely a great xpac to me. I haven’t unsubbed once and have not yet felt the desire to do so like I have for the past 6 years.

[Legionisbest-mannoroth]

@Minnienuker-grobbulus

M+ was a slam dunk for Blizzard, problem is, players are wising up to how boring it is.

Oh yeah definitely. M+ was carried entirely by casino loot system of Legion developed by Diablo devs.

Top players somehow convinced Blizz the game mode could survive with a terribly boring deterministic loot system.

60 % drop in players during S2 says otherwise.

[Topad-skyfury]

I’m glad you enjoy it. If anything in the OP resonates with you, I’d like to know, if not I’d still like to know. I want to gauge the subbed communities opinion about some of the problems outlined.

@Minnienuker-grobbulus

Looks great for investor reports, pads MAUs and doesn’t require the developers to make new content.

You know, I used to think this cynically about Blizzard, but after watching Ion’s interviews with various people about game design over the years, I’m convinced that it’s simply the developers screwing the pooch.

[Minnienuker-grobbulus]

@Topad-skyfury

The difficulty in the game came primarily from finding a dedicated group of people to raid with.

Try finding a Mythic team these days that doesn’t require some crazy requirements. Add to that the time investment to even be able to make it in a Mythic raid. Mythic is horribly inaccessible, it has no business being in this game.

What they need to do, is just make the last few bosses in heroic a tad more difficult, and increase the difficulty in normal for the last few bosses.

[Minnienuker-grobbulus]

@Kynladoria-maladath

DF has had better retention than previous xpacs, they’ve reported this themselves. People who are playing it, are continuing to play it more.

This report came out in the spring investor report. Old information.

From the investor report from July

• In the second quarter, Blizzard segment revenue grew over 160% year-over-year and operating income more than tripled year-over-year, each setting new quarterly records, driven by the launch of Diablo IV.
• As of the end of the second quarter, Diablo IV had sold-through more units than any other Blizzard title at an equivalent stage of release. Over 10 million players experienced Diablo IV in June, playing for over 700 million hours, and retention trends for the title are particularly strong.
• The launch of Diablo IV marks the start of a live service plan designed to deeply engage the Diablo community and create opportunities for continued player investment. July 20 sees the release of Diablo IV’s first quarterly season, Season of the Malignant, bringing new themes, content, and fresh gameplay to the community. Blizzard’s teams are also making strong progress on expansions that will deliver major new features and continue the game’s acclaimed narrative for many years to come.
• Following the launch of Diablo IV, Blizzard also saw increased engagement in Diablo Immortal ™, with June monthly net bookings for the mobile and PC title reaching the highest level since January. Elsewhere on mobile, Warcraft: Arclight Rumble ™, an action strategy game internally developed at Blizzard, continues to progress through testing ahead of its regional soft launch.
• Blizzard continued to engage the Overwatch ® and Warcraft ® communities with live operations in the second quarter. While engagement and player investment in Overwatch 2 declined sequentially in the quarter, the Overwatch team is looking forward to the August 10 release of Overwatch 2: Invasion. This will be the largest seasonal update yet, planned to include new PVE Story Missions, a new game mode, and a new hero progression system as well as an additional hero.
• The World of Warcraft ® team is delivering more content faster than ever before following the November release of the Dragonflight™ expansion for the Modern game, and subscriber retention in the West remains higher than at the equivalent stage of recent Modern expansions.