I strongly disagree with the difficulty proponent. Casuals are very much able to do challenging content; it will just take longer to accomplish than hard core gamers. Saying casuals can’t do difficult content is frankly demeaning.
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If it’s difficult content that doesn’t rely on group coordination–sure. But it’s not demeaning to say casuals aren’t doing organized difficult content. It’s time and time again the case we see.
The most well defined definition here is that casual players don’t do hard group content. It’s pretty apparent. If you take 100 players who identify as “casual” what would the break down be by ilvl? I’m totally willing to believe the break out would be 40% below 190, 40% 191-197, 15% 197-215, 5% 215+.
I mean if you’re in a lineup and you’re only 1 of say 10 in 225+ gear and you’re claiming you’re casual–I think one of these things is not like the other.
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Then you are clearly looking at casuals in a binary way. It is more of a spectrum of casuals. There are casuals who only pug because they don’t play at a set schedule or with a set group. They can however have the skill to push keys with the little time they do have to play. They are casuals none the less, even if they are pushing high keys.
So now casuals are unable to coordinate in groups. Your definition of casuals are getting more and more demeaning.
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Speaking only for myself, it’s a compounded time issue. There’s the block of time per day between work and bed where I can physically sit down and play, but also other responsibilities that make it hard to carve out a couple hours to dedicate to raiding.
When all I had was one baby, it was easy, but not so much now. And that’s 100% a ME problem. But I’ve primarily PvPed during the 14 years I’ve played, and it never felt less rewarding than it does now.
That’s my option. I can sit down in 10-15 minute increments that most BGs take because that’s a much smaller block of time for me to be unavailable if someone needs me. That used to work fine. I could do BGs off and on for a few hours, gear my characters, not feel hopelessly behind on a bunch of random systems, etc…
During Shadowlands, all that play time I had felt dedicated to chores every evening just to get my characters to a point of being playable. Playing the game just to prepare to play the game isn’t a terribly constructive use of time. lol
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The end game has always been dungeons, raiding, and PVP. The world content is filler.
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Can’t speak to PvP but it’s very possible to have cleared CN and gotten KSM in a couple hours a week, especially at this point.
Heck, you can do CN in one session.
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Completely agree with you. Casual for me is also just time played. With 2 hours a day, or cumulative 8-10 in 7 days, you can accomplish quite a bit.
In BfA I managed to clear Heroic Nya while having 2 jobs, newly married, new house, + caring for my parents. 1-2 bosses in 1-2 hours at like, 1 AM in the morning when all was quiet. No long stretches, some weeks with no activity at all. Not sure how that does not count as casual.
I know some people purely just define casual as solo content. In that case, yes, there’s a drought of meaningful solo content. Maybe LFD Heroics are okay since the “other players” never say anything and you can pretty much pretend they’re just relatively advanced AI lol. Beyond that, yeah, most of the “fun” (for me) is in grouped content.
Then others go and define it by the “difficulty” of the content. This one confuses me because what 1 person thinks is difficult varies wildly. Some people think needing to interrupt in order to not wipe on a boss is too difficult and therefore not casual friendly. This is the definition I disagree with the most.
Solo and time-played make the most sense to me, based on how we use the word ‘casual’ irl.
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6 months is plenty of time to get KSM and AoTC as a casual.
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You can call yourself a casual all you want but again someone else pointed out to you, not me, that being in 225 gear is not casual.
Why the hostility here? You’re not a casual player congratulations.
I mean it’s like you’re trying to be the Swan who’s raised by ducks and then realizes he’s a swan but wants to be a duck because of reasons.
And yes casual players are not completing coordinated group content because of the 2 criteria I listed out before
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Difficulty- Casual players aren’t doing content like this because it often involves multiple tries on multiple different nights.
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Time- If casual players had more time, 1 wouldn’t be an issue, but here we are both are connected.
So yes; Casual players aren’t doing hard group coordinated content it’s not demeaning. I’m not saying their incapable of doing it, I’m saying they’re not doing it. So again you can be “casual” all you want if your comparison is to World First players and players who compete in the dungeon tournaments. Sure. But to the vast majority of the player base you’re not a casual anyway you cut it.
Real life example: You make 200K you claim you’re in the middle class. Most people in 70-120K are in the middle class.
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Depends on your definition. For many who consider themselves casual, neither of those is in the cards ever, no matter if you can do it in 6 months or not.
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What are you calling “hard group content” though?
Just because casuals are limited on time does not stop them from using their time on challenging content. Someone can pug raids 1 or 2 bosses every other night. Maybe even once a week and still get AoTC. Someone can run 1 key every other day and still get KSM. What they do with their limited time is on them, it has nothing to do with skill.
Your definitions of casuals are demeaning no matter how you look at it if you are saying they are incapable of doing hard content just because they are limited on time and incapable of working in a coordinated group.
Casuals are players with limited time, they can choose what to do when they are able to play. If they want to do part of a raid or run a key, more power to them. Casuals are players who do what they want and when they want to. They don’t run on a schedule or with set groups.
By your definition, Mythic raiders are casual. IMO, this is a better way to look at it:
I wonder, however, how they manage to find fun in a game that pretty much caps their progression two weeks in. I mean, I don’t care to get BiS either, but I still like having a sense that my character is getting better each week. The current system doesn’t provide that for casuals.
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sits on the sidelines of the conversation, unable to spot any stereotype in the discussion that I can self-identify with
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Just throw your own definition in! It makes the conversation more exciting!
This my point, there is no definition. Yet, it’s thrown around left and right to identify masses of people. It’s a term that needs to go straight into the garbage.
Plus WQ’s didn’t forever to get to, were fast and easy and not take forever to run back to FP, the fact they give us whistle and take away shows how much they want to waste peoples time and drag out time metrics.
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You’re FAR from a casual.
What’s your definition of a casual?
a casual is somebody who plays less than the average player.
even WoD was super fun solo. they went out of their way to make sl miserable. i tried to "git gud’ but realized i actually hate mythic+ and their community, heroic raiding is too hard, and normal doesn’t give decent rewards even if i cleared every week. gg blizz. enjoy your game full of sweaty beards. i have 11 days.
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