THey need to time gate the story to an extent but need to do it in a way that it doesn’t feel gated . There needs to be more side quests and WQs but not just in what ever the new zones are . There needs to be side and WQs that send us to areas of Azeroth that are not a part of what ever the current expansion is.
There needs to be an actual World in World of Warcraft instead of just Endgamesystemgrinds of Warcraft
A decade.
Imagine.
Entertain the notion that it’s actually you.
The World in WoW COULD have been brought into existence within the Shadowlands zones.
That this “lived-in” even by the dead was NOT even attempted is proof that WoW does not deserve the current Blizzard development design team.
THAT is the real effort: if, and until, Azeroth, even in the Shadowlands, feels like a Living World, there’s not enough effort into selling the experience the game is attempting to present.
By all means when have they actually done their best effort to try and bring Azeroth to us, their paying customers, as a living, breathing, playable experience?
I know it’s not me.
I have asked myself every day along the way.
Blizzard just does not choose to LOVE Azeroth.
Their efforts to date are all the proof that I need.
It’s called ‘the flow’. Every game designer in the world is trying to capture that subjective experience, and every gamer is looking for it.
When anything, timegates, bugs, nonsensical story lines, bad terrain, etc etc, Knocks you out of that ‘flow state’ your players start to look at the game objectively and once lost it is difficult to regain.
All that’s left for me is to quit, there is no reaching a ‘flow state’ in this game for me any more.
IMO systems and timegate are fine as long as they are systems only not the now systems upon systems 
That’s not how it worked. Special cloths had day long CDs. That’s not because the material was rare, that’s what MADE the material rare.
I understand it was still clearly gated. But the WotLK ones for instance were directly connected to the tailoring specialization you chose. Created once a day to craft an item you would use in game.
Versus an invisible wall because you hit the daily/weekly cap. No rp.
Even if it wasn’t a material you found rarely, it was presented as a rare material with high value. And it didn’t involve a Torghast run with no direct reward, or anything else of the sort. Just some mats!
Yeah, if we forget the fact that half of the “time gated” stuff in Shadowlands is due to research and construction lengeth… both of which are RP reasons even if you personally don’t like them.
Profession crafting CDs were an invisible wall. Just like Valor points were. And a bunch of other systems in WotLK.
Did you even play WotLK?
Yes I did. I played the expansion that was regarded as the best by many. Which you seem to think did things in the same way as SL.
It seems like you missed the point. There is always an invisible wall. The point is it doesn’t feel the same when it’s disguised.
It did – both expansions, and every expansion in WoW actually, have time gating. Very obvious and very clear time gates.
And you’ve yet to clearly communicate how it was disguised back then and how it no longer is now.
All of us that actually played back then knew it was an arbitrary time gate. People even complained about it back then just as they do now.
I played back then. This is a really dumb hill to die on. This was one of my semi-active characters from back then: https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/character/us/deathwing/sonyon/achievements/dungeons-raids/lich-king-raid
Can see dates if you scroll down. Some 2009 achieves in there.
If you don’t think its tie to specialized crafting was a solid disguise, how about obtaining max riding speed/mode? Idk about you, but I was not always able to buy flight or the higher speed whenever I hit max level. The need to save gold was disguised gating. The literal inability to fly now until a renown level is accessible is not. Granted, that’s not gated anymore.
There is nothing Blizzard can try that the playerbase won’t see straight through. Those days are over.
Just ease up on the timegates.
You know my favorite part about Renown?
The fact it was such an obvious timegate mechanic that it made people quit logging in and ruined a ton of guilds.
Such fun right?
You say you want gear drops, but it seems to me that retail is 1000 times better at dropping gear than classic. Most of your points make zero sense. Time gating is needed to keep most players from being blown to insignificance by players that play 16 hours per day.
Attunement wasn’t a time gate. It was attunement. There was nothing preventing me from getting the key to UBRS other than my ability to put a group together that could help me. There was no arbitrary outside of game IRL Facebook style block on my ability to progress the quests required. Same goes for opening the gates to AQ. Farm the mats at whatever speed you can, do the grind and the quests and boom. Done. One server might do it in a day. Another might do it in a month. Neither is time gated. Only gated by their player resources and dedication.
They forgot it because the masses of players don’t want to earn it anymore.
Blizzard really doesn’t know when to stay put when it’s right and when to change due to bad game design decisions.
Earning it, throughout the game, is not a debatable point if the game is to thrive, let alone survive.
Just about all they DO stick to their guns on is the wrong choice, oddly.
So you’re saying they should ignore the angry mob and the ragers, I agree.
Sort of, they should have a viable, realistic and functional “Sacred Vision” for WoW.
Sadly, they currently do not.