I actually don’t think that FOMO is inherently bad in an MMO, especially when we’re talking about something available for months.
It’s totally fine that some things are time-exclusive.
I feel like FOMO is one of those meaningless terms on these forums now, just like “timegate” and “borrowed power.” Spooky! 
Agreed, I often see cool mounts or transmogs and I’m like “WoW, how can I get that? SO cool!!” Then I find out it’s no longer obtainable.
Certainly it does drive away younger players like me, just cause I’m young and haven’t been playing since birth basically I can’t work to get the cool awesome things that used to be available.
No, it’s cool because it’s cool. Most players won’t know where something came from, only that it looks cool.
Think of all the cool new things you can get.
it adds a since of heritage to the game though. there’s always somebody out there scratching their head as to why some punk is in a particular ride or something out there in the world. if you can’t have it and they do be happy they do at least and you got to witness it.
Like the “%, the Reconciler”.
Legacy/Feats of strength are exactly what they’re intended to be: Souvenirs or Collector’s Items from a time past. If you want cool unobtainable stuff do current seasonal content and then in a few months you’ll have something nobody else can get that was challenging to do.
As a digital game it’s not restricted by finite resources when it comes to producing rewards. They also have the capabilities of preserving the difficulty in multiple ways so that the said content doesn’t become trivial.
As for pvp, the difficulty of pvp is other players. Class design and balance only dictate the pool of classes most commonly found in pvp, not who gets on top of the ladders.
Both of these negates the reason of limiting the rewards to one specific period in time. Had it not been predatory, then they would all have followed the vicious saddle system, as in do the prerequisite requirement to receive a token that lets you pick a new or old reward from it’s relevant reward pool.
That way players who might come in late or is still too inexperienced won’t be permanently screwed over for failing the one season that rewards what they fancy.
I’m still failing to see how it’s predatory just because it’s not obtainable to everyone.
Like, the original grand warlord stuff was predatory because you had to devote literally hundreds (if not thousands) of hours just to even have a chance of obtaining it. But, like what’s predatory about “You had to play while it was up?”
This seems an extreme exaggeration of things. There’s always seasonal stuff that will go away and we haven’t had a challenge mode in a while.
There’s thousands of things that exist in the game to earn for titles, mounts, pets, transmogs, etc. The few that are limited time challenge modes or seasonal awards is okay to be left as that.
To be fair you probably wouldn’t have gotten Faceless One even if you did play during BFA, it was very hard to do. You basically had to be capable of carrying people through 5 mask runs on that toon. If you want a similar challenge you can try the current Mage Tower boss on your main.
I agree, ever since McDonalds got rid of those collectable cups and plates, it’s just hard to eat there.
Honest question. what makes fomo predatory? and how is it driving players away from the game?
In Shadowlands I missed 2 KSM achieves and 3 AOTCs because I ended up taking a break because at the time I didn’t enjoy game, I came back in Season three and since because I missed those 2 KSM achieves and AOTCs, it didn’t drove me away from the game.
I also started playing FFXIV around 2021 and there were a couple of things prior before me playing that game that are also no longer obtainable but in the end, it didn’t drove me away from that game either.
Nowhere did I dictate what should make you or your sister happy. Nor did I attack your mental health. But it’s utterly reasonable to remark that if the unavailability of a reward in an online game (that’s gone on for many years) makes you unhappy with that game, then that game is not good for your mental health, because that aspect will never go away.
Big difference between attacking mental health and recognizing when something is unhealthy for it. The FOMO stuff is bad for the mental health of some players. Just like overly-RNG-reliant games are bad for the mental health of some players.
Using RNG as an example: Gambling addiction is a real thing, and a developer like Blizzard isn’t much different than a casino half the time, just having players gamble their time instead of money (and since that time is paid with money…). If I knew a friend was a gambling addict, the last thing I’d do is recommend WoW to them where they can spend hours chasing after endless rewards to roll the dice for, usually with no bad luck protection and with drop rates regularly set at 1% for valued cosmetics.
Aspects of online design can often be predatory. It is reasonable advice if someone is particularly vulnerable prey to one of those predatory designs that, for their mental health, they should avoid it. Whether it’s RNG or FOMO. I’ve warned friends (and family) away from WoW who I love playing other games with precisely because I knew it would be bad for them.
clearly you do not, considering the 5 year gap.
Could you imagine the level of butthurt if they made the OG mage tower mogs available again? All of 3 people would actually be extremely angry. Of course it would probably look like a lot more people because asmonbald would post a rage vid about it. But thankfully 95% of his audience don’t actually play wow 
.
Good lord, you people need to get a grip.
If this stuff is so inconsequential that they should never consider keeping it exclusive to the people who were around when it was current…why are you getting so bent out of shape about it?
Probably because it is Sunday, DDOS attacks are happening, so people troll the forums for funsies?
If my unobtainable items were made available again, I’d probably just quit on the spot lol.
The sunken cost and the memories I’ve made getting those items are largely why I still play.
I don’t chase the current carrots, the old carrots are all I have to show off, really.
“The memories I made getting those items …”
Except if someone logged in and got that item right now … your memory doesn’t change. What you did to get that item then … doesn’t change. NOTHING about your attachment to that item should change.
And if you’re one of those really special snowflakes that really does qualify the value of your life based on doo-dads acquired in a video game, then there’s good news!!! If you ID someone and wonder if they’re “cool like you” or just some scrub who picked up something off the BMAH, etc … the ACHIEVEMENT SYSTEM already tracks that info!!!
If you REALLY want to know if someone “put in the work”, you can see when their Achv is timestamped. That proves if “they were there!”, or they just bought their way into glory.
There is NO REASON to lock things out in this game. Not with the Achv system.
After 5 years, BRING IT ALL BACK.