Preamble:
I’d like to first start off by stating that I am here to share what I, and many others, feel like would be a positive move forward. It’s important to acknowledge that every action has a reaction and any change to the current system is likely going to introduce new and novel issues. No change will be perfect or without faults. The idea is to end up with a net-positive after all is said and done for the larger M+ community.
Some of the suggestions are carried over from my previous thread, others have been altered, some are new. Real M+ Changes for Real M+ Players
1) Key Charges / Key Depletion:
It’s clear that key depletion is a major point of contention with the player base; however I have always defended that key depletion serves a vital role systematically even though it have a negative impact on the individual. The frequent argument to remove depletion completely will cause severe consequences especially for the pug community.
Score inflation is already an issue where players are in key ranges they are not ready for. We can all agree that score is a major part of the vetting process when pugging and score inflation as the season goes on makes it less and less reliable. A large reason for this is because of the crest system and higher skilled players dropping down in difficulty and carrying the key holder. At first glance this is mutually beneficial. The keyholder gets score and an upgraded key while the higher skilled player gets crests. The same is true for the max vault keys.
I bring this up because it directly correlates to the foreseeable issue should keys never deplete. If it is already happening now, it will happen ten fold if keys if players are able to hold onto the same key no matter how many times they fail it. This will cause a major disruption to the pug community because there will be more and more keys posted that are going to fail. Players will continuously post their key until a group is able to carry them while wasting time for everyone else.
In addition to score inflation, we would see new exploits and toxic behaviors that once again would mainly effect the pug community in the form of kicking. Currently, the major issue that keeps being discussed are players leaving keys; however, no one is being kicked because there’s zero gains from doing so.
Should keys not deplete, we will see a new meta of players continuing to leave and also keyholders now kicking players after the first few pulls for whatever reason. This is a net-negative for pugs.
The only positive for keys not depleting is that they key holder can try again while all of these additional exploits and issues are introduced.
Solution:
Add 2 or 3 charges to each key.
This allows a limited amount of attempts which benefits the key holder, because things do happen and it values their time trying to progress.
It also puts a hard limit on the potential issues listed above. Players could still be kicked, but much less likely if they only get 2 or 3 attempts.
2) Random Key Generator
Pugs and even groups find themselves with keys they don’t need for progression. Yes, they can just run it anyway to get a new key, but it comes back to valuing the time of the player. This is especially important for DPS and off-meta players because they have a much harder time getting accepted. I also remember back in Shadowlands where Blizzard made it a point to say that key RNG is here to stay because they don’t want players to farm specific dungeons with their own key.
Solution:
Randomly generate 2 or 3 dungeons where the key will work.
This still introduces RNG to the system that Blizzard wanted.
It prevents players from farming the same dungeon with their own key.
It provides DPS and off-meta players a higher probability of getting a key that they need for progression.
It even helps teams so it’s less likely that everyone has the same key or 2.
3) Dinars for Every Season:
It’s clear that the player base loves the Dinar system every time it is introduced late into the expansion. The confusing part is why hold onto a system that is almost universally liked for only a fraction of the expansion. This would provide players access to gear as a form of bad-luck prevention. This doesn’t mean to give every player the top tier BiS item. It all depends on implementation.
Solution:credit to Hpellipsis
Introduce 1 or 2 Dinars every .0.5 patch. This way it is naturally time-gated to allow players to experience the content without Dinars on launch, but allows players to get items who had bad RNG from the Vault or Drops.
The ability to purchase BiS items could have limitations so players can only buy items from content they have already completed or based on obtaining equivalent achievements. i.e. KSM-AoTC; KSH-CE.
4) Catch-up Mechanics:
It’s clear that WoW’s focus this expansion was to provide a better experience with alts by introducing Warbands and the ability to share a bank across the entire account. This was a great thing to focus on; however, the player experience has not been able to gain the intended outcome. Part of that is the excessive amount of Crests needed for crafting. In DF, I believe you only needed 60 crests to craft the top R5 piece which was increased by 50% for TWW for no apparent reason. This has a negative impact on the player’s experience who wants to play alts, but is daunted by the idea of having to farm 60+ dungeons mid-season. That’s also if you time all of them.
Solution:
Increase crests drop for out-of-time runs. Completion runs only awarding 5 crests is not valuing the player’s time. Bring it up to the full amount, or at least 80%.
Similar to the Dinar solution being introduced every .0.5 patch, double Crest drops since it is now mid-way through the season. This would encourage more players to invest time into alts which would also increase metrics of time played.
Remove the crest cap at the .0.5 patch.
Lower the crafted requirements back to 60.
5) Interrupts and Stops:
The change to stops not resetting CDs for casting units made a negative impact for pugs. Teams are still able to lock-down packs by using voice coms and being coordinated so the intended impact was not achieved. Instead it is only making it more difficult for the players who were already struggling. Another issue is wasted interrupts because other players use theirs or other stops at the same time. When two interrupts are used at least they are prevented from re-casting, but when it overlaps with a stop they just re-cast immediately.
Solution:
Reintroduce CD resets for stunning, pulling, pushing, and blinding priority casts.
Provide a CD reduction to overlapped interrupts.
Potentially 25% CDr for interrupts with 12s CDs or less and 50% for longer CDs.
You are probably not wrong about the consequences of eliminating key depletion entirely but thats a whole different conversation and list of changes that would need to go in together to try and fix the cesspool that is pugging these days.
It was increased because myth track went from 4/4 to 6/6. The additional crests needed to craft the top tier item now is to cover those added levels. not changing the crafting crests needed would have essentially been giving away Ilvls for free. easy math there 15x4 = 60, 15x6 = 90. Both myth track levels and crests needed to craft top tier items were arbitrary changes in my opinion and much like my views on drop points for top tier crests and myth vault pulls, they need to revert to the DF S3/S4 formula, put myth track back on 4/4 and perhaps look into lowering hero track to 4/4 and champ track to 6/6 to lower the overall crest grind burden a smidge. Also, timed runs should give a full 15 crests instead of 10 to 12. One timed one, one upgrade respects our time. One timed run, most of one upgrade is just petty. If they insist on making us run a dungeon twice for a single upgrade then at least put a static value on the run. Personally I think it should just be 1 timed = enough crests to upgrade an item, 2 not timed = enough crests to upgrade an item. progression is still being made and our time feels respected at the very least.
Personally I liked the awakened vendors with the weekly bullion drops that came with DF S4. Those that dont raid depend on dungeon drops and vault RNG for gear. I’ve personally gone multiple seasons with multiple toons and never saw a specific item drop in dungeons or in vault that would have been BiS for the toon. I would also add that if the great vault is to be dependent on RNG that the tables items are pulled from be limited to dungeons the player actually ran that week to narrow the field a bit and give players a little better of a chance to get the items they are looking for. Or perhaps a re roll system for drops and vault like we had circa Mists of Pandaria…or all of the above. You get a reduced crest cost on alts once for each level crest you have the harbinger achieve for. Just makes the game all the more alt friendly.
./golfclap
scream this from the rooftops at as many people you can get to listen. I dont know wth blizz was thinking with what they did in TWW S1 here…
Thank you for a post with some really great compromise suggestions. I especially like a reduced CD for overlapped interrupts. This would also help those like myself who get kicks constantly sniped by a pally shield.
These are actually some good suggestions that I think would help address the issues with M+ currently without creating more problems in the process.
Either way, I do agree with those who think something needs to be done. It’s clear that the fun factor is lower this season and its negatively affecting the amount of people playing.
probably the biggest reason this season was a huge turn off coming from the dragonflight xpac.
The thing is, Ion is a theorycrafter…instead of experimenting and then applying any player feedback in alpha/beta phases, his team likes to mix things up in the middle of a season, or completely change directions every expansion.
Aug is probably the most extreme, but players were vocal about M+ in beta, and they haven’t done anything about it. It’s not incompetence at this point, I think it’s all ego…and they’re doing so at their own peril i guess.
They also need to get rid of that challenger’s peril thing - literally nobody asked for it.
looks like folks are getting their wish for crafted top tier items next patch. goin back to 60 from 90 so I guess they didn’t mind the free ilvls afterall. trade up crests are going to 45 from 90 as well… so instead of just moving the goalposts back to the bracket folks were digging in Dragonflight you can grind lower keys to trade runed crests up to gilded at a 45 for 15 ratio. eye roll
Going to Myth 6/6 wasn’t arbitrary. It accomplished 2 things. First, it lengthened the power curve for Mythic raiders. The second, and more important thing for me, was it now allowed a mainly M+ player to reach ilvl parity with CE Mythic Raiders given enough Great Vaults and some luck.
When Myth was 4/4 in Dragonflight, the Very Rare items off the last 2 bosses weren’t on any track at all. Not only were those very rare items BiS because of the special effects, they were also 7 ilvls above anything else making them that much more powerful.
At least now, even though I can’t get the Ring from Mythic Ansurek, I can get a Myth track ring from my vault(which I was lucky enough to get this season) and push it up to 639 and at least match that Ansurek ring in ilvl.
I think the mistake they did make when moving Myth to 6/6 was not making Hero 8/8. If Hero was 8/8, then end of dungeon loot from M+ would be more useful that it is now.
If you are saying Myth 6/6 just makes the grind too long, then my answer to that would be increase how many crests drop.
I also think the Dinar system should be added every season as soon as HoF closes, but should also include M+ items and not just Raid items.
Well, looks like Blizzard heard you loud and clear on the crests. UNFORTUNATELY I traded up all my runed/crafted my weapon this week or I could have been getting ready to make my 3rd piece of 636 isntead of 2nd. Lol
The increased drop in higher keys is nice. It will make players want to do 12s more, but I can see this also drive players to skip 11s more than they already do and also more players trying to do 12s that aren’t ready for it.
The lowered cost of enchanted whatevers was the best news for me. 5 keys to get a guatanteed upgrade? I’m about that life. 8 seemed a bit much, I probably don’t do 8 keys in 2 weeks usually.
Increased crest drops past 12 aren’t going to get more people doing keys above 10 who weren’t already attempting to push their score. It’s a welcome change but won’t be influential.
I’d rather see some boon to meaningful gear progression for pushing higher keys; if you only do m+ and only raid at heroic level, relying on vault for key myth track items such as trinkets is horrible.
Idk I think for the players who need crests and are pushing they can kill 2 birds with one stone. Getting 20 crests per run compared to 12 from a +8 or even 16 from a +10 is pretty big on top of getting that vault credit.
10s right now are filled with people who have no idea what they are doing. Literally 30 minutes ago I was in a failed +10GB where we had a rogue and a hunter not use Soothe a single time and landed under 5 interrupts by the time we got to the 2nd boss. They hilariously tried to gas light me for their failure.
I think 12s giving more crests and vault will let us hang around the higher tiers to avoid the bads.
Grim Batol is a bad vault-filling key, you only invite second-class/third-class citizens instead of first-class citizens. 630-635+ with 2800-3000 pretends GB does not exist for them and they are only interested in Ara-Kara/Dawnbreaker/Mists. I pretend Grim Batol does not exist for doing +10 dungeons.
My main is 636ilvl with 2950 IO, I still apply +10 for easy weekly vaults. I have around 90-95% success rate for timed +10 because the group leader can literally invite 630-635+ with 2800-3000 IO then 2-3 chests these dungeons.
It doesn’t matter because 630-635+ with 2800-3000 IO doesn’t die to the first boss puddle placements and they are fast enough to phase before the puddle covers on the ship. +10 Dawnbreaker is easy 3 chests for 630-635+ with 2800-3000 IO and Dawnbreaker is the best dungeon for the weekly vault.
It’s not about covering the ship, it’s about how 2800 players are dropping the puddle on the tank/boss who is finicky to move around. This makes it so I have to cover for their massive mistakes so they don’t get lasered in half.
Obviously DB is easier than GB, but it doesn’t change that people just don’t know mechanics. Even in the ones that they probably have the most experience in if they are only farming the easy ones for vault.