They’re harder numbers wise than previous expansions. Players just have access to bigger tool kits now and a lot of players have become a bit better at the game because of it.
A 20 in Dflight is between a 22 and 23 in Slands. A 23 in Dflight is a little bit harder than a 26 in Slands. By the numbers.
Yes it’s inflated compared to season 1 because our power outpaced the non-boss mob hp. Timers just don’t matter til like 24, 25s.
Hopefully their hp is higher relative to our power in season 4. If not it’ll need buffed.
I feel like you got this backwards.
I agree that raider IO scores and in-game ratings aren’t indicative of someone’s experience. I feel the chief reason for this is how the score is calculated.
The system only considers your single highest key for a dungeon and mode (F/T). It doesn’t matter if you’ve done a dungeon fifty times at +20 or only once, the points contribution to your total score is the same.
The result is that lucking into a good group (as Rita wrote), buying boosts, or getting carried by friends will give you the same rating as if you had slowly worked your way up or gained experience by running keys of a certain level often.
The built-in score system doesn’t consider this at all. You can buy 8 runs and have the same score as someone who ran 100 dungeons. Raider IO at least provides additional information, but you need an add-on for this and you need to go a little out of your way to check deeper. It’s harder if you join someone’s group and don’t see names other than the leader’s before applying.
I main a healer (EU, can’t post here with my resto shaman) and have been pugging a little more in the past few weeks, and the discrepancy between people’s score/gear and their evident experience is frequently substantial. It ranges from absurdly low damage for the item level to and not knowing mechanics to not even knowing the dungeon layouts.
This is fine in a +6 or even a +11, but not in a +18 or +20 or beyond (it’s probably not as much of an issue past +20). When I geared up my healer, I started with low keys too. I could have asked friends to boost me, but I didn’t, because I wanted to gain experience.
Anyway, the solution is probably to change how rating is calculated so that the score for someone who has done every dungeon at +20 one time isn’t the same as the score of someone who has done every dungeon 10 times at +20. You’d still get boosted people, but probably fewer.
This probably won’t happen, so the actual solution is to mostly play with friends, guildies, or people from established Discord communities, and avoid doing M+ through the tool completely.
Having done both, I think that’s not quite right. Season 1 was definitely harder, but 2 was a step down and this season is downright ridiculously free.
Sounds like raiding, lockouts, and the whole running back after a wipe
That’s why I stopped doing M+, lol, I tanked and healed and couldn’t take the DPS-brained anymore.
That’s also why I stopped healing Solo Shuffle as well, easily the worst content you can do in WoW, as a whole. Terrible.
It sucks because I enjoy healing, but all the endgame content doesn’t interest me except Rated Battlegrounds, but those are mostly dead.
Funny, most people tell us its to do dps and throw heals when only necessary. I agree with this and that’s how I play. But I’m also a druid and everyone has hots on them anyway so if they fudge and don’t get one shot they are fine.
I get your frustration, but the problem mainly lies with timers/affixes in M+ and not being able to take a breather during the dungeon to clarify things with people because you are practically speed running the dungeon to make the timer for IO.
I never trust rating this late in the season unless the player is 3k+
Season 1 was harder because Thundering increased the dungeon’s HP by 5% every time it activated, and at most the “buff” of Thundering was 9 effective seconds of casting–giving you a window 4-5 abilities with 30% increased damage. In short, the the buff was terrible and equated to basically nothing because the dungeon actively scaled everytime it activated.
By the numbers, Dflight does scale significantly higher. ~https://www.wowhead.com/news/impact-of-new-mythic-scaling-in-dragonflight-10-scaling-starting-at-keystone-11-329269~
You will have to work the link out yourself, as WoWForums are user unfriendly unless you somehow get trust level 4.
Edit: Season 2 was also easier because Aug was introduced and overtuned. As I recall it, the season was being played to around the same levels as S1 and not much higher. IO has historically crept as an expansion progresses and players gain access to better gear, but for S2 the introduction of Aug was so overtuned that you could essentially cheese dungeons with good Breaths and a Fire Mage, who at the time was one of the only classes in the game to have 8 target aoe before reductions, to nuke pulls for 80M damage in under 10 seconds. It added up and fast. Breath did this for a lot of comps, but worked best with Fire mage. Then it was nerfed
I know about the scaling change, but that’s kind of irrelevant. All difficulty is relative. I’m telling you from having done both and experienced both. A 24 in shadowlands with the tools available to me in shadowlands was more difficulty than a 24 in Dragonflight with the tools available to me in Dragonflight, season over season.
Yeah, the scaling being higher/lower doesn’t mean much by itself because it depends on the base scaling “anchor” point.
If the base is low, higher scaling doesn’t mean more difficult.
I think DF season 1 was done pretty well for difficulty to rewards with keys. Season 2 was easier and season 3 is definitely very easy compared to SL.
…it’s an 18. Why would a single wipe warrant a total and utter failure? Yes, this season is “easier” than others, but it’s just more accessible. So what? If you want harder content you push harder that’s all. Being able to recover from a wipe and still time is part of the M+ experience. Not every group does recover from wipes like that.
This is already being “squished” with S4’s redesign of the key system.
With the nature of M+ ratings, there are people over 3k who still don’t know how boss mechanics work that would just fake it until they make it. Yet at the same time, a competent group in current gear (380+ vastly outgears +20 keys) can AFK for ten minutes in a dungeon at +20 and still time it easily, just as they were able to last season.
So, I don’t disagree that Dflight is easier. My first post you mentions exactly that keys are easier because we have access to more and better abilities!
That being said the top 1% of players is almost the same number of players expansion over expansion relative to M+ runs completed. It is also worth mentioning that in Dflight, keys over 11 give more rating than previous seasons. The IO of top players, with this in mind, remains relatively the same.
Another interesting data point is that in previous expansions, rewards stopped M15 which was also roughly the level of key you needed to do get KSM. These were also, without a doubt, far easier to complete than Dflights max reward, which stops at M18, however this is roughly the key level to hit KSH.
Dflight is also experiencing the most popular seasons of M+ to date. This naturally leads to a larger population of players in all of the ranges. Let’s compare Slands S3 and Dlfight S3
Slands S3
Total Runs: 19,923,281
.1%: 1,027
1%: 10,261
10%: 102,604
25%: 256,511
40%: 410,418
Total: 780,821
Dflight S3
Total Runs: 31,902,160 and counting
.1%: 1,396
1%: 13,958
10%: 139,584
25%: 348,948
40%: 558,315
Total: 1,062,201
Do the math…theres 36% more characters playing Dflight S3 than Slands S3. Coincidently, the population of each bracket has grown by about the same amount. If we want to talk about relativity, then the skill ceiling of players has remained relatively the same.
Like. Data talks. If Dflight is so much easier then we’d see larger growth in <10% brackets! But its relative.
You claim to have been gone for a year or more. Which means you last played sometime around March of last year. Season 2 started May 9th and ended November 7th. Which means you missed out on it entirely, but you claim to know so much about what people were doing during that time frame.
After reading the thread we all agree to somewhat level that M+ keys are bloated.
Some of you brought out really good points. This expansion really opened the breath for PVE, that is good.
What I think we as a community should work towards is maybe dig deeper in topics like this.
For eg : how about a ranking system ? Which is calculated based on a number of wins per run percentile.
Like if i do 1 run per week, and you do 20. Me and you cant in the same league. I woudl be Rank 4 and you would be Rank 1 in that range of IO level.
Does this make sense. Just trying to think out loud so they see and actually do something to improve the quality.
All they need to do on their part is give us a fair ranking system. Who we play with is our choice.
2000 IO - Rank 4 - DPS
2000 IO - Rank 1 - DPS
I pick 2000 IO - Rank 1 - DPS for my key. We need a second multiplier. And i stress this rating should come from blizzard because I do not trust external parties. Framework should be laid out by Blizz.
If you guys have any constructive feedback. Add -
At the moment, unless you dont have a guild or freinds. You cant que higher thank 25.
So true tbh.
I’ve seen 3700 players who play MUCH worse than 1400io players who have never had a KSM in their life.
Had a 3496 mage the other day, no time warp, no ice cold, 80k overall dps, and complained when he died bc of him shooting a dreadpetal pack way ahead of the tank.
Well, that may be a sliiiight exaggeration unless the 3700’s you ran into were just trolling it. Though Ice Cold is a coin flip because there are situations where the true immunity outweighs the DPS gain of just having damage reduction in some situations though 80k overall and not using CDs is obviously trolling.
I generally encounter Augvokers that are 300~500 rating above what their knowledge would get them as any other spec.
Believe me, I ain’t lying.
It’s ALWAYS the frost mages too. I’ve yet to see one single frost mage who isn’t a total idiot.
See how M+ is irrelevant for this community.
Key 18 - Rewards Max 480
HC Raid - Rewards Max 476
So if me and you raid together and I dont know basic LFR mechanics. But I am leading HC raid, that is acceptable by you ?
If you go through my post. I am asking for a better trusted ranking system which takes all dynamics of the players skillset during his M+ run. How they design it, it is up to them. But the system now is not fair.
As of now. I am capped for my box. I get a 483 from M+. SHould i do more, or should i have the attitude like the rest and do once a week M+.
This is not me thinking. This is game forcing me to think this way.
I am now contemplating if i should go back to OW2. This is not me thinking. THis is the game devs who are forcing me to think this way. They have all my history, they see how many hours i have logged. If they dont utilize that data how will they retain ‘‘Loyal cusotmers ?’’
I have over 60+ keys timed from +16. But my IO and the person who has 20+ keys timed.l WE are in the smae IO level.
I dont care about gear. We all should get gear. I ojnly care about skill ranking.