Item level grinds between tiers and seasons in World of Warcraft have been a staple of the game for years, but it’s time to consider that this game loop is becoming dated and could use some changes. Destiny 2’s decision to remove item level grinds between seasons serves as a compelling justification for this argument. Here’s why:
Player Experience: The item level grind between tiers and seasons in World of Warcraft can often feel like a repetitive chore. Players are required to repeatedly engage in content they may have already exhausted simply to keep their gear relevant. Destiny 2’s move shows that it’s possible to keep the player experience fresh and exciting by removing this grind.
Accessibility: Grinding item levels can be especially challenging for casual players or those with limited time to dedicate to the game. World of Warcraft has always prided itself on being accessible, and by reducing or eliminating item level grinds, it can attract and retain a more diverse player base.
Content Variety: The current system often leads to players concentrating on a narrow set of activities in pursuit of item level upgrades. Destiny 2’s decision has encouraged players to explore different activities and engage with new content. World of Warcraft can benefit from a similar approach to diversify the gameplay experience.
Balancing and Power Creep: Constant item level grinds can lead to power creep, where gear from previous tiers or seasons becomes obsolete. This can create challenges in balancing the game and ensuring that content remains challenging for players. By adopting a system that doesn’t rely on continuous item level increases, World of Warcraft can focus on more meaningful content updates and better balancing.
Community and Competition: Removing item level grinds can also foster a healthier community and competitive environment. Players won’t be as pressured to grind constantly, and the game can focus on other aspects of competition, such as skill and strategy.
It would be fascinating if Destiny 2’s system was explained, not just vaguely alluded to in this declaration. You know, for the uninitiated.
You could argue complex rotations are an expression of skill, yet more are increasingly arguing against this, opting for a simplified rotation (4-5 buttons?). What skill does the average WoW player want to focus on?
LMAO from a level 60 priest. Yea op you’re right, it blows and is unironically part of why wow isn’t so popular anymore. Its a waste of time. Playing games in general is a waste of time, but you can’t expect people to do the gear treadmill forever.
I would love for items and gear to be relevant longer but people would complain that they’re being forced to run old content, which is understandable. I hope they just add more gear substitutes from more sources.
It would be cool if different tier sets could be made to be relevant through ilvl upgrades, some tiers change the way you play significantly and being forced to switch talents to match the new tier isn’t always so fun.
With the most recent seasons of Destiny 2, the dev team decided to test how removing power level (item level) progression would land with the community. it was positively received and will be the standard going forward.
previously, the system was similar to WoW in that every season, you’d hop on the treadmill and grind out to the new power cap.
Instead, power level increases will occur between expansions instead of between seasons.
The result is a larger focus on “play your way,” with multiple activities awarding gear of similar power.
Gear has been refocused towards horizontal progression, with a Seasonal Artifact providing generalist powers that shakes the meta, and freely swappable gear mods allowing for better build diversity.
There are some new chase items with Raids, Dungeons, and Seasonal activities, but one of the biggest benefits being a long time player is you can hop back in and play with almost no impact to your viability.
Isn’t that game mostly dead? Why would we take design decisions from a company that chose to remove entire planets of content and only just now is desperately trying to get players back?
Some of us around here specifically asked for the new upgrade system, because it’s rewarding and engaging. We get to choose which pieces we keep and upgrade them throughout the season.
No it isn’t. Every single level of content has an upgrade path.
Except every part of the game has activities to get upgrades and it’s even extended to PvP next season. People also go out into the world to get currency, as well.
And yet it really hasn’t.
This community will always find something to judge off of.
Complaining about chasing item levels just seems like something people who can’t or don’t like doing high keys and mythic raiding do because they see someone with a higher ilvl than them.
The game makes it easier than ever now to kit yourself out in champion-level gear purely through world content amd obtain upgrades for that gear without ever having to venture into anything terribly difficult.
Other than eeking out the last few item levels by doing hard content, what else do players want?
I haven’t raided above LFR this expansion and have only done a few mid-upper keys, and yet I’m sitting in mostly maxed out Hero gear. If a casual like me can do it, I don’t understand what the complaint is.
i think this is the fallacy a lot of people run into.
you still get gear. the team can focus on more compelling item modifiers and sets.
but the ilvl chase is removed between expansions.
the honus falls on gear being interesting rather than gear just being a higher stat stick, but “getting gear” would still very much be a part of the game, just with more brainpower behind it.
Op you’re trying to reason with people who have fallen in love with the maze they’re made to run. They no longer see it as a way of extending game time and pushing people to buy the new expac, they take pride in the gear treadmill.
To throw a wrench in OP’s request we already had two expansions with perceived static gear slots. Legion and bfa. All throughout legion and bfa people whined about how they didn’t swap out their weapon (while ignoring what relics did and that you can mog said weapon differently) or neck.
In a hypothetical wow expansion with horizontal gear progression, you would UNDOUBTEDLY have long stretches of time where you would never change out the gear in said slot. And in that case how would that be any different from legion artifacts or bfa’s neck+cloak?
People play wow for the gear grind, the only questions are how much grind are people willingly to tolerate to get said gear and how long they can use said gear before they have to grind again. Having too short of a period for the latter creates burnout and apathy.
All what you said ironically sounds like corporate talk full of buzzwords. Tell us why or how ahieve what you want? No more seasons? No ilvl so how do you measure item strenght? How do entice people to do new content? What other content are you refering to that should give non ilvl based player power?
as someone who raided mythic at the beginning of legion and grinded artifact power, i think you’re half correct.
While Legion introduced borrowed power, it did not eliminate item level between tier, and instead transfered the power chase.
again, people can continue to play for the gear grind. this argument isnt for removing gear. in fact, i think more gear with interesting modifiers and set bonuses would be a more compelling gear grind than raw stat sticks with an ilvl chase.
as for burnout and apathy. if you search Warcraft or World of Warcraft’s interest on Google Trends, youll see theres a strong negative trend. burnout and apathy are already here.
This is something I don’t understand why so many gaming companies fail to see. I wouldnt call video games a “waste of time”, because they are entertainment after all and if you are entertained and having fun, your time wasn’t wasted.
Problem is far too many games seem to be developed purely with the intention of wasting your time. They aren’t developed in a way where players “fun” comes first, they are developed in a way to either get as much money out of players, by creating grinds that players don’t want to do and would rather pay to skip… or they are developed to timegate you into keeping your sub active longer.
More and more games seem to continuously come out and flop now because people don’t have the patience anymore for doing these repetitive copy and paste grinds every game seems to come out with.
I dunno if as you get older (I’m 36), you start to value your time more with so much more responsibilities in your life, that you can’t justify logging onto a game that feels like a job. Or whether you really begin to see the tactics these companies use to siphon money from players with as little effort as possible to the point it’s hard to support it anymore.
I think you put the nail on the head. Most gamers have gotten wise to it. You etiher make the power climb so incredibly easy it turns into a dad game with the power chase, or you fundamentally rethink your approach to gameplay with a focus on the qualitative rather than the quantitative. I think WoW has been striving for a better qualitative approach, but its hampered by this vestigial power grind.
That’s not what I am saying. I repeatedly heard from people here on forums, twitch chat, twitter, reddit and elsewhere from people who then left to play classic that legion felt bad because the entire expansion you did not change your weapon. The simple act of dropping a new icon in the gear slot was all they wanted to feel like they were making progression. But that feeling was ruined/obfuscated in their opinion by having relics. I am not talking about the artifact power grind system or the tier resets.
And the same thing being for the neck and cloak in bfa. Those were static items that were not replaced throughout the expansion for the former and 8.3 for the latter.
So what that boils down to is that people just want some new looking thing every once and while in their character panel to feel like they are making progress. When that doesn’t happen they feel like they aren’t.
Again this sentiment is completely independent of artifact power and the tier resets that existed back then.
So like I said in a horizontal gearing expansion, blizz would undoubtedly design gear systems like artifacts/neck and/or having overly-bis items being bis for excessively long times. Think onslaught girdle from mc. People wanted that early cause it was good for a very long time.
That became a problem in the back half of legion, especially as the flow of new skins for artifact weapons dried up and there wasnt a horizontal chase anymore to satisfy players.
Theres a reason the trading post, a horizontal progression system, has become so praised. imagine if most of the game was like that instead of some crazy power chase just to be included.
Imagine resubbing 3 months later and being included right from the rip, and not having to do a chore list.
Well, the more people refuse to engage, the more likely that strategy changes too.
The problem may be that a lot of wow players seem to have plenty of time for it, and they want a product that sustains their 100 hours a week too. Who should blizz decide to screw over, the guy that wants to be done in 3 hours week or the one who clamps his eyes open like clockwork orange just to be able to run that 50th alt through SOO?