Hmmm… better than wod… perhaps marginally. But let me, quote something i posted in an earlier thread, make the points why they mirror the current wow covenant/renown system, and then ask for your feedback:
Yes, this was Ion specifically addressing the lack of world content in 6.2.
Now, i would argue we are in a similar situation in 9.0.2. Here’s my evidence:
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Callings drop (on a very predictable cycle, ive followed this for several weeks now): 2 gold quests (1k gold each), and 1 conduit upgrade. Very rarely (incredibly rarely, ive seen one drop since i started - a mace, for my sin rogue), they may drop an item. RNG is RNG, but so far, thats my personal experience with callings, and im willing to bet its very similar to everyone else’s.
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Nothing outside of 128ish greens drop from world quest mobs. Nothing. No conduits. No lego patterns. Nothing but gold, cloth and trash. Again, RNG is RNG, but so far, so very predictable.
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Ive had great success off world bosses thus far: a 207 item. A 200 covenant conduit. And an outlaw lego pattern.
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The world quests rarely if ever offer a gear upgrade. Even at rank 19, the upgrade was still below the majority of my gear (next upgrade is in… 4 weeks?).
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In the meantime, through covenant upgrade system and just general calling farming, i have happily upgraded my gear from 170ish to 180ish. If i did my currently available covenant quest story (thats been chilling in my toons quest log since wednesday), i think i’d probably be around 184. Purely doing the bare minimum (weeklies - covenant weekly renown boosts, 2 wings of torghast, world boss, great vault lfr), i believe i would be around ilvl 200 by the time patch 9.1 arrives.
I bring this up for a good reason.
Because it begs the question: How is this any different from the problems ion originally outlined in the quote i just gave you? Dexter made this nice constructive feedback post on the ‘world’ in world of warcraft which you can find here (and i think, genuinely deserves a bump): What happened to the world in ‘world of warcraft’?
That’s question 1. But i’d like to now ask question 2.
Who benefits from these changes?
Im a super casual, you’d automatically think its me, right. Im getting showered with a guaranteed loot cap. I get literally free ilvl 200 gear purples by just doing the absolute minimum in this game. I must be stoked, right!?
But… im not really incentivised to go off the beaten path am i? My renown isnt some bar i work on throughout the week to try and keep up. The mob drops are regular. The renown comes in a front loaded weekly outlay. I cant suddenly decide “i have the whole weekend free, im gonna run islands for a bazillion ap!”. Im on a schedule. Every wednesday i wake up, get three hours of meaningful content that boosts my character for a week. Then i can run whatever else (LFG) - if i want - and i dont want, to be clear. And then next wednesday we repeat the process. Thats… my wow life.
So again, how is this any different from wod? A lot of the content (gear drops, rng, rep grinds) that were once served by the outside world are now served by your garris… i mean, covenant renown system. So who is this for? Im literally being discouraged to play the game in the way i formerly did. Theres no reason at all, outside of my weekly quests to even bother with the world game? Theres nothing remotely rewarding in doing so. So who is it for? (The answer is alts and catchup for the 3 pillars real end game, just so we’re completely on the same page here).
Can you perhaps see why people are maybe a little concerned that we’re going down the path you yourself believe to have been a mistake?
Again, perhaps im assuming too much. Perhaps you just really disliked the time travel stuff and not the core underlying game play motivations for a diffuse playerbase. But im assuming you know that wod was flawed because the world was dead. Well, thats whats happening. Some people can already see it because they already saw it in wod. Some people are still 'oh wow! I can upgrade my pvp gear to 184 and next week i can upgrade my covenant gear to 197! This is free loot!). But then what happens to that world game? Arguably the same thing thats already happened to 171 gear heroics or 184 pvp gear. Players stop doing it for the rewards. Its DEAD content. And what else do they have? Funny you should ask… LFR (until theyre missing only a few pieces and the drops (187) versus the vault (200), looks pointless… That happens to leave:
- mythic dungeons.
- raiding
- conquest pvp.
Which, should i remind you, are all community gated through LFG. And casuals dont, on the whole, engage with LFG. So perhaps they have a right to be slighly angry, (no?), that the game is forcing them into this content 10 weeks into the expansion to actually progress their character in any meaningful (ie. NOT TRANSMOG AND PETS) way.
So thats why you need to say why this is the correct course with details. Because people like me are going to point out, strongly, why they are making a clear mistake and need to course correct if they want to keep that wider playerbase into the next patch, or expansion. If you believe strongly that we’re chaff or that the game can reach new heights without us dragging the game down by free epics (we never asked for them, but go off), or grindy boring content to bring you into your instance portals, you need to make the case strongly! I URGE YOU to make the case strongly. Im still not convinced that ‘catering to casuals’ helps this game grow. Wow is known in the game world as the absolute greatest in its genre for challenging, complex end game. Its arguably one of the worst mmo’s for all the stuff i love doing. So make the case!