With the addition of Inferno dungeons the issues with the RDF system have been exasperated. I can only speak for myself (as a tank) but certain dungeons (DM/SFK for me) are infuriating to run and/or come up in queue almost exclusively. Some common counterarguments I’ve come across:
- “You queued for a random dungeon that offers bonus rewards - the randomness is tied to the reward”
Once you marry RDF to VP it no longer constitutes an “extra” reward; in fact it essentially becomes mandatory. Yes there are other sources of VP but for the average player queuing into random dungeons is a quick event completed at your own pace to progress towards the weekly cap. Provide additional rewards for RDF (more gold/satchels/consumables/whatever) but when the primary currency for gear is strongly tied to 1 convenient (supposedly) activity it’s not exactly optional.
- “It’s really not that long or difficult”
Length/difficulty are important factors but they are by no means exhaustive. DM is not difficult nor excessively long. It is, however, incredibly boring, monotonous, and deficient in fun for a lot of players past their first few clears (no I don’t have stats but player behavior/comments speak for themselves). Personally both remakes (i.e. DM/SFK) irk me. They were stellar in 2004 but the layouts and environments are antiquated, tedious hallways with far too many boss encounters. Not to mention the unskippable RP events and backtracking in DM. I would much rather FULL clear HoO multiple times than run a single DM or SFK - I hate being in there.
- “Just suck it up and complete the run, then you can requeue”
These dungeons pop far too often. Part of that is confirmation bias (and maybe a RDF bug?), but it is certainly compounded by the amount of fillers needed for players who drop instantly or after a certain boss. This is purely anecdotal but out of curiosity I ran 5 random dungeons consecutively without dropping (as tank). The sequence was: DM - SFK - DM - Throne - SFK. That is 1 miniscule sample size but it at least “feels” spot on.
A few solutions I’ve considered/read about:
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Let targeted dungeons also provide VP. Even if it’s less efficient I would utilize this option every week rather than waiting for the inevitable DM loading screen that makes me want to instantly ALT+F4.
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Add extra rewards for the most abandoned dungeons a la Oculus in WotLK Classic.
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Improve the encounters by providing skips/tweaks.
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Add blacklisting (selfishly I would make use of this but I don’t know if it ultimately improves the experience for the most players).
TLDR: Heroic DM (and imo SFK) are beyond lackluster for a significant number of players but VP is heavily bound to the RDF. We need some combination of fixes to the dungeons/encounters/systems/rewards/etc…
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if you’re only after VP then yes these dungeons are awful to run. But if you’re wanting the new currency then it’s fine because both have lots of bosses. This will be the last tier you have to run dungeons for VP. Pretty sure in the last raid tier VP is useless.
I appreciate the response, but “endure until the next phase” seems like a shi%ty solution. When I initially needed some Fissure Stone Fragments I did targeted dungeons (and I do actually enjoy running most of them), but to top off the VP cap you’re forced into RDF. I don’t want to do that for another 3-5 months.
WTB TLDR version to that Great of Wall of TEXT
It’s the last line of the post…
Hm that makes me wonder if queueing only targeted easy dungeons for fissures then going random on the normal heroics for VP might be a reasonable strategy .
Yes and then face the “random” DM/SFK spam as the sole path to VP cap.
I also wouldn’t call them easy - just more enjoyable/less infuriating.
you could… not cap every week.
" …when the primary currency for gear is strongly tied to 1 convenient (supposedly) activity it’s not exactly optional."
it’s always optional. you can gear at your own pace. are you wiping on content to enrage?
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Your line of reasoning is perpetually reductive.
“Why run dungeons? Why level up? Why log in?”
At some point I’m invested in the experience and want to stay relatively competitive.
what you want is all the rewards without doing what it takes to obtain them.
a more fitting term for that would be “lazy”. It doesn’t sound as good as “perpetually reductive” though.
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While i share your view on DM, you can utilize the fragments the same way. If you run a targeted inferno, lets say HoO. 15 frags turns into 150 valor. Sure its less, but no headache.
What I want in your explication is the reward that is only obtainable thru RDF. If it was something truly optional then fair game - it is almost exclusively acquired via random queue. I acknowledge there are ways around this (raids/fragments/etc.) but it only solves symptoms and not the problem.
Do we not get VP for doing raids? 100 VP per boss and with BoT having 5 bosses, BWD having 6, TotfW’s 2 and Firelands 7 all you need to do is raid and you can get up to 2000 VP per week, maybe more if BH bosses also give you VP.
So as it stands there’s no real need to do dungeons for VP anymore.
Stop using rdf and que for specific dingeons otherwise your other options are to stop being a complainer over a video game. Play retail or quit.
Blizzard isnt going to change the dungeons or RDF. There is nothing wrong with SFK or DM if you chain pull.
those rewards are for players willing to do RDF. Maybe there are players who need to run those long dungeons, or want to run those long dungeons and need help finding a group. In your lazy and selfish playloop, you decided they don’t matter, which is why the RDF rewards had to be added.
they weren’t always there, and they had to be created to address a problem you created.
great question. Glad I could answer.
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confirmation bias certainly plays a role in your observation. Thats the nature of negative hits leaving a conscious awareness while positive hits (other dungeons) remain under the treshold.
I had this for Lost City and Shadowforge keep, both dungeons I intensly dislike. It always felt like I would get either of these multiple times on any given evening where I spend a couple hours to grind out my valor.
Only when I started keeping track of dungeon probability did I figure out that statistically neither of them came up any more then the others (in a certain range of margin of course), certainly not to a degree that I FELT was the case (“every second dungeon is one of these I swear”).
Comparing (whining to) with others I found it weird at first that everybody seem to think that different dungeons came up far more often then others. Almost like schrödigers dungeon haha when in reality everybodies personal taste dictated that perception
They could maybe have Cataclysm Classic Timewalking Inferno allowing for Retail players to queue boring instances with relatively few mechanics and mobs with too much health.
There are other versions of the game that are just more fun, and I think that’s the problem you’re having. Some people seem to really enjoy these instances.
I tank these infernos and since i dont need frags and just run them for Valor cap and orbs i do speed runs. I skip pointless bosses to kill the last boss so i can move on to the next.