Key Squish: You probably aren't a M+ PUG player any more

Community General Discussion
1

I’ve tried. I’ve tried, people, to PSA the message out that lays out what happened with the key squish.

I’ve poked at this in thread after thread, but y’all are still letting yourselves be miserable.

So I’m going to say this really slowly (Imagine me talking very slowly) once and for all (until I do it again with another thread) for the benefit of those still letting themselves suffer:

Mythic. Plus. Is. Not. Meant. For. PUGs. Any. More.

The key squish was a response to the temporary nature of “low key PUGing’s” relevancy. There was absolutely a point where you could start at the wrong time in the season, and as a game that wants to be ever-welcome to returning players, that was a problem.

So they put those “lower end but still well above normal” difficulty dungeons into heroics. Their mistake was still calling them heroics, and it’s a mistake that persists, but that’s what happened. If you PUG’ed low keys, and are wondering why you can’t any more, it’s because there are no “low keys” in the pre-DFS4 context any more.

Every M+ key level in TWW is relevant enough that, yes, it CAN be PUG’ed, but that’s not its intended audience any more.

The community designation of M+ as an “everyone mode” is no longer relevant. That’s delves. Delves are the everyone mode.

The shifting meta, in the context of M+ PUGing, is not WoW’s problem any more because you’re not supposed to PUG M+. You can, but it’s not the intent.

You don’t have to believe me, but they don’t have to take questions on this, they don’t do live Q&A’s any more (thank the “don’t you guys have phones” moment) and saying any of this officially or out loud would be a PR nightmare, but

-Heroics use the seasonal dungeon spread
-Heroics Populate the great vault
-Heroics are harder than they’ve been before

Because they are essentially pre-DFS4 low mythics. The communication was just… lacking becuse how do you tell your players “you’re a heroic player now, sorry” without a PR eruption.

You don’t. You just throw it out there… and let nature take its course.

Delves existing let them do this. Anyone can get “good enough” gear, but yes, for most (not all) players, you will need a premade of friends that can laugh at wipes, bring the class you love, and accept your ceiling this week to consistently find success in M+.

See you next PSA. But please, don’t suffer needlessly. Just squint and see “mytheroic” or something.

3 Likes
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As a new to M+ player, perhaps I don’t understand. I timed all dungeons on a 2. Then a 3. 4. So on and so forth. Now I’m timing 9s.

I’ve done all this pugging. Perhaps once I start doing 10+ that will have to change but so far pugging has been mostly enjoyable for me.

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Yes it is and no I don’t.

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Heroics are still queueable and therefore unfailably easy though. They aren’t even comparable to anything that is or has ever been part of mythic+

They’re even missing boss mechanics.

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Most people don’t do this but should

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I want to be the best I can be and it was painfully obvious when I first started that I sucked really bad, so it seemed the most logical approach. I’m happy I did it this way. I still make goofy mistakes but it’s mostly because I feel this game does a poor job at telegraphing everything in a way that I can always see.

I’d love if they put an outline on all ground mechanics.

2 Likes
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Outline woah there don’t go crazy.

I would settle for is the ground Aoe was a different color of than the ground

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You can pug, you just need to be REALLY good. You can’t make mistakes. You need to understand both the trash and bosses at a high level. You need to know your rotations, your cooldowns, and have good specs.

And remember…this is the start of a new expansion. At the end everything is always easier. Don’t compare the end of an expansions difficulty to the start.

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Heroics are able to be soloed though, so I am not sure they are on par with a low M+. I don’t remember being able to solo a low key.

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You can still pug M+, but it’s going to be more of a time sink and time gamble without a premade, more so than previous expac. Environment is certainly harsher for pugs, but it’s still doable. The question you have to ask yourself… is it worth the time investment, and most importantly… are you having fun?

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I wholeheartedly disagree with this statement. I walked into, and solo’d, heroics on two different tank classes in just the gear I obtained while leveling; Only two because I haven’t leveled the others yet.

While not the easiest dungeons I’ve ever done, they don’t require CC, careful pack planning, line of sight, or major defensives to complete. I will concede though that the bosses take longer solo now than in some previous expansions.

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Yes! I’m color blind and even with color blind settings turned on the coloring is a nightmare for me.

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its probably better off for the vast majority of casual players. delves are far easier and less annoying to do and give better gear.

though i still find delves need more content to not be so boring but maybe thats just me

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But… but… they have “really cool” contests involving nerds who spend 23hrs a day in some dark basement. That’s what it’s all about right?

Not keeping people subbed contiguously for a given game tier.

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high keys are still puggable, you just never know what you’re going to get with randoms. same problem as any other multiplayer game.

to your point though, I do think delves need to be relevant in some way beyond 8s. Blizzard clearly wants it to be a staple feature since they stated its continuing beyond tww, its got its own vault track, etc. The obvious answer is to give gilded crests on 11s (and probably make them harder to compensate.)

Don’t necessarily think they should be giving myth track gear or even heroic gear beyond what they already give you, but it is odd that they give you gear on hero track but almost no way to upgrade it. The pittance of gilded crests you get from the maps aint it.

My only guess as to why they don’t is they dont want it to feel “required” if you dont like them. Doesnt make sense to me but it would line up with the way they have talked about endgame content for tww

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Mucduck You’re also a shaman which is one of the top performing classes at the moment. Good luck on a class that the tier list shows under performing unless you make the group yourself.