Layering is ruining beta

Heidene-kelthuzad · June 11, 2019, 8:08pm

First, i just wanna say thanks for bringing such a refreshing attitude to the table. I really appreciate it Always awesome to just discuss these things together on a friendly, honest basis.

On topic,

Assuming they do put it in, i agree that it’s important to make sure the layers always have a balanced population in them, to prevent incentives for using layers (and players!) as resource gathering method(s) and other abusive behaviours that advantage someone’s gameplay in weird ways.
If im not mistaken, the queues already work in alignment with trying to have enough people ready for the next layer, but i’m not sure just how many a new layer would start off with.

I’d suppose to go with an amount in the range like you proposed seems like a healthy approach overall, cause it prevents it from being too empty.

But i do see also that it would increase queue times quite a bit, and if anyone from Layer 1 get’s switched over to the new Layer 2 cause the system thinks it’s necessary to put more people in Layer 2, they’re gonna have a lot of people spawn in at the same time That could look very odd.

Oh yeah, it will help with the initial access of the game, i don’t doubt that one at all. It’s gonna prevent you from #feelsbadman’ing with an umbrella all alone in the rain, because indeed, you’re going to have a better chance to play with your friends quickly at the start. There will still be queues, but not as heftily, that’s true!

But here’s the thing. In the big picture, this launch is for a whole community, and a whole lot of curious people who may also want to become a part of it if they get enchanted by the game as they play.

If Blizzard uses layering, they enable a ton of people to access the game easier and faster, but it comes at the cost of tremendous change to the game design, which in turn gives those who play during layerings stay for the first weeks or months a “wrong” first impression to the game.
Why? Because they don’t actually play the “full” version of Classic, but rather, the “layered” version of it, which is an extremely untimely version to present to your audience when they will judge your whole game on it in the first couple days/weeks. (and also the attitude from Blizzards towards the game)

Basically, people will judge the game they actually get to play when they enter the world.
And if Classics success, determined by the judgement of both old and new folk about their experience in the first few days or weeks, is going to hinge on a version of it that’s not even the same thing, aka the “layered Classic”, things look really bad for the game compared to what’s possible.
Many people are not going to come back after they initially checked out the game for a couple days, or have waited for it for years only to see it changed. Many won’t even know that this is a temporary measure of weeks/months, and assume this is the actual game they’re gonna invest their time and energy into.

Keep in mind, these people expect “World” of Warcraft, not “Worlds”.
It’s the whole premise of the game, to be one unique world, with it’s unique inhabitants, and it’s so believable that you completely lose yourself in it. It’s designed around that. It’s the WoW magic.
And that’s not even going to be what people will get to experience and base their judgement on! That’s really damning for the game. At least have people judge the full version right from the beginning, i’d say.
Otherwise, WoW’s enchanting spell will have a much higher resist chance overall on the audience checking it out, be it new or old, cause the people come in with modern gear into an old game that was never meant to handle that. It messes everything up with it, it’s out of place. So, what do do?

In order to allow WoW to do it’s magic effectively, Blizzard will have to choose the other option:

No shlayering. That, even with very good tech, will bring it’s own challenges with it because of the big initial wave of people.
On your sides PoV, you’ll have to get your PepeHands ready as you might end up choosing a realm with your friends that’s gonna be very full, and the queues will be reflecting that for sure.
Many shoulders will be cried on in discord that day, but i promise you, your pain will be shared by me. It’s for the greater good of WoW at least. We’re gonna be okey very soon! Anyway!

Blizzard can absolutely pull this off.

They said in recent interviews, that they have the ability to open up new servers very quickly depending on demand, and are well prepared this time around (they also have name reserves which can help a little).
However, opening up new servers quickly brings the risk that many people who just come to check out the game and pick those servers would leave soon after, which a good portion of those is really likely to do.

In order to combat that, they’d have to manually attempt to balance out populations early on while communities are still forming, perhaps offering free transfers when they detect a good amount of tourists leaving.
If there are still queues on particular hotspot servers, they could offer said free transfers early on from those servers, to less populated servers who just had a tourist dropoff, and so on.

It would require a lot of effort from them, and also likely cost more, but it would secure the authenticity of the games design, and in the big picture, have an overall increased success chance with the audience, old and new.
Why? Because they get to judge the game in it’s best (and only!) authentic state, as the full on Classic game right from the beginning, no shlayering shenanigans attached.
It would be a big win for the community, as it can establish itself as originally intended on their realm right from the get go, and balancing adjustments in terms of server health can be made without interfering with the game design itself by using free transfers from hot spots to tourist exiting servers early on while communities are still fresh and adjusting.
Except like this, they can properly experience the game by sharing their 1 world, and meet eachother not just under certain conditions, but everytime they are online in this world they share. Basically, the game can work as intended.

If you and your friends are on a realm where you’re in a fat queue, chances are you might be able to transfer off early on onto a less busy realm, and play with eachother sooner that way. Either way, it’s only going to be temporary, the spook is very soon over and thing settle in place.

Will Blizzard do things this way? Do they dare?! I have no idea!
There is a chance though. It’s gonna require a lot of stamina, preperation and courage from them, i can assure you.
Either way is definitely not perfect. But no one expects it to be i hope. Because if you at any point leave people up to populating a server for the longterm by themselves you’re inevitably in for imbalance issues anyway (seeing as layering will affect the first stage of the game, but not the whole rest) as there will be plenty opportunities once again for instability after it’s removed.

I certainly hope they will be up to the challenge regardless and take the risk, cause i think they’d have much better success rate with Classic following this style of approach. The community would trust them for once, also loving Blizzard for letting them play Classic this way - the authentic way. The only way

New people would also get to judge the game in it’s prime state, increasing their chance to sign up for the long ride, because what they see and experience the game as is the same at launch until it’s last minute.
Most of the people who would complain are going to be those who forgot what massive MMORPG launches actually look like. Let them experience that! They may just end up liking it after anyways.
Also, me and many other devoted purists wouldn’t have to wait months in the worst case to finally get to play Classic, which helps