Pathfinder and the slow quit

Community General Discussion
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I know that there’s plenty of people out there that don’t have a problem with Pathfinder, I know that there’s people out there that really love it, and I do get it, it is a challenge.

But for me personally, as much as I love playing of World of Warcraft since Pathfinder was introduced in WOD found myself playing less and less time every expansion. I didn’t even start playing Warlords until they got the flying issue sorted out because I so annoyed that you couldn’t just buy it at level 100.

I did come back, I did the Pathfinder achievement it was very annoying, I did it but I hated it. Then it was Legion, a spectacular expansion, one of the best if not the best, but all I could think about was oh look I’m riding around “all vanilla” again. I was going to play all the way through, but gave up shortly before 7.1 was launched, it was 7.3 before I came back because I wanted to make sure that there was a clear way to get to flying, and I really didn’t seem the point in being subscribed until I could push for flying. This expansion, I bought it for 8.0, I played for a week, then I didn’t come back until about six weeks ago. I’ve probably played the least of any other expansion. It’s not the best, but it’s not the worst either, there’s things to do here, gear to get but, places to explore, but I find myself playing less and less.

Now, I probably will buy Shadowlands, maybe, I’ll see what the game is like with the new mechanics, but after I level some old low level toons to level 50, I’m probably not going to stick around very long. If I could level those characters without buying the expansion I don’t see that there’s any way I will buy it. I’m wondering if it will just be worth it to wait until it’s free 2 or 3 expansions down the road, I just subscribed periodically when I miss the game.

People out there keep saying flying ruined the game, and how much they like being on the ground at the start of every expansion, but World of Warcraft has been around for 15 years, flying has been around for 12. That’s a game mechanic that’s been there for 80% of the game’s lifespan.

I used to love reputation grinding too, I always got my name character 2 max reputation with all of the new factions, but that was when it was a choice, I can’t even stand getting to revered right now, because it doesn’t feel like it’s a choice anymore. If I want this 12 year old much-beloved game mechanic back, I have to rep grind and it’s not my choice.

They say it to enjoy the content, but we know that’s not why. Removing flying is time gating, we move slower on the ground, Pathfinder is more time gating, to make you play the content, to keep people subscribed. But for me I have maybe spent a total of 11 months subscribed over the last 4 years. I know I’m not the only one, I’ve been playing since 2006 and I haven’t seen too many old friends on. People will come back and disappear again. I do get that people are going to stick with it, and people are going to keep loving Pathfinder and saying how great no flying is and all this but for me, it’s just just seems to be utterly pointless, spending a year working in waiting for something, that’s just going to get taken away again A year later.

I’ll keep working on it, but it’s funny, I always thought my world of Warcraft experience but end with a rage quit, but now I know it’ll be slow and drawn-out, until one day I don’t even miss the music anymore.

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An xpac has so far become free when the next one comes out. And since I only play through the story since WoD I have always waited. Since this lvl squish will affect everuthing that is current, it will probably be released right before the xpac. I think their wont be any problem to play through 1-50 without it.

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Fair enough point. I didnt realize one of the reasons I liked dark souls so much (until I really looked at it a few weeks ago) was because there is tons of complex stuff I can do and still ignore almost all of it. I certainly understand where you come from.

I do think wow is better without flight but that’s really a personal opinion and should be made a personal choice. Ie, have flight servers and no flight servers. Or at least a mode toggle like war mode.

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Pathfinder has been the biggest joke of WoW since they introduced the concept of being able to fly in classic zones. They really have no idea of what direction they want to go in. TBC, let’s have everyone fly as soon as you come on in and buy it. WOTC buy it for more. MOP do some quests and buy it for more.

WOD: Let’s make everyone who hates this expansion quit because it’s such a terrible xpac that we’ll force them to walk through it on some of the largest zones since TBC :smile:

Legion: Well, I’m glad we’re done with Mafia Wars style mission tables as a requirement. Oh, you made that part of pathfinder? I’m sure no one will notice. But this time let’s do two pathfinders before they can fly. That way they can EXPERIENCE the content! :smile:

BFA: Ok boss. They really don’t want the facebook game anymore. Ok got it no problem, we’ll just do two pathfinders and make them grind up rep in the most absolute tedious way possible since they cannot fly to each WQ until they’ve unsubbed. Perfect!

I agree with OP whole-heartedly. I came back in 8.2 from fully geared out MOP when I took a break. I’ve gone through the content. I have 0 pathfinders, but I have the loremaster for each of the BFA zones save Najatar because what’s more fun than doing 3 dailies to level up the combat exp of a useless NPC that talks more than they do damage/heal?

Watched Blizzcon live. They said, “Eh, probably something like pathfinder for Shadowlands.” I lol’d at the boos as a reply. I don’t get it, I’m sure some people can make a case for it, but it ain’t for me. Shadowlands is probably my last xpac because I’m getting too old for gaming but either way, hope eventually blizz wakes up. FF, ESO, etc. all have better ways of jamming down content while not putting these stupid restrictions on for half of an xpac. Figure it out. Damn.

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If the world content was at least somewhat engaging it would be less of an issue. But they design the world to be as annoying as possible; essentially a “level” in a video game; rather than a world that you can roam around in.

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On every character individually, when they reached that level.

With Pathfinder, you do it once and EVERY CHARACTER on the account gets flight, even those below max level.

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No such thing.

As for Pathfinder, I like doing a one-time achieve that earns flight for all my characters, current and future, from the moment they enter an expansion. They can level with flight instead of grinding along on the ground and purchasing flight only when they’re ready to move on to the next expansion.

What I don’t like is the artificial time gating of having two parts, the second of which is held back for half the expansion. Make part one give flight in part one areas, part two give flight in part two areas. Also, give more ways to earn rep besides limited dailies.

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Is this a “dear diary” thread? I read the first few paragraphs and seems OP is only talking to themself.

They did pathfinder but hated it. They played Legion, loved it … they’re playing BFA … they’re probably going to buy Shadowlands …

Okay?

Yes, pathfinder blows; however, you only have to do it once … on ONE toon … and it’s unlocked account wide.

The rest of what was written had very little to do with Pathfinder. Odds are you’d feel the same way with or without it in the game. Amirite?

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Sort of.

Every character gets flight unlocked in the expansion zone even if underlevel.

Every toon that does not have flight gets free $250g basic flight.

But the cost of area flight licenses was easy to earn while leveling. So not really a big deal.

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You don’t stop playing games because you get old.
You get old because you stopped playing games.

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The big deal is that with the older expansions where you bought flight at max level (or close to it) is that each character was grounded until they reached that level.

With Pathfinder, once you do it once with a max level character, all your other characters ARE NOT GROUNDED when below max level.

I prefer the Pathfinder method over individual purchases at max level.
My main gripe is the long wait time between part 1 and part 2.

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I never minded leveling while grounded. Former expansions (pre WoD) had more than enough content so that my alts could do stuff my main hadn’t.

Pathfinger makes you cover every single pixel in the game before you can fly, ntm the increasing wait between parts 1 and 2.

I would much prefer to fly the moment I max so I can enjoy flight for the life of the expansion instead of when it’s half over and I’m burned out on the thin gruel that passes for content.

Consequently, I favor a one part pathfinder;
flight unlocked at launch
max level/gold or pathfinder complete = fly

I would like to see options. Those who like PF, more power to you. I’d rather just pay and fly. No good reason not to have both. Those who pay get locked out of PF; those who do PF get the perks

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Blizzard are such morons, they still have no flying in old content. Friggin idiots…

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There is no challenge to getting pathfinder. It’s not like pushing a high key, or a mythic raid, or ranked PVP. It’s just a boring grind. I guess the challenge is to stay motivated long enough to get the annoying slog out of the way. There is zero benefit to it. Despite seeing dozens of threads, I’ve yet to see one single benefit mentioned. The pro PF crowd almost exclusively says “its not that bad”, “just do content you were doing anyway”, etc. No one says “yeah, it’s definitely more fun” (until specifically challenged with that). Forced grinds to get what you already had aren’t fun. If you were going to do the content anyway, then you didn’t need to lock flying behind it. If you enjoy the ground more you can not hit space on a flying mount. Most of the best, most participated in, sough after content is instanced (dungeons, raids, PVP). The story drops through world content, completing that on the ground is fine. Having to run manually to a WQ is not increasing fun for literally any person.

I’m fully convinced that essentially every person who speaks out against the removal of PF isn’t doing it because they want it, but because they just want others to have a worse time.

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I support retaining Pathfinger as an option, along with an option for max level/gold flight license

But Pathfinger definitely must undergo severe changes:

  • only one part
  • let players select sub-achievements and include all in-game activities not just PvE and rep grinds
  • flight must be baked in at launch so players can fly when eligible
  • players have to elect paying or PF but can’t do both
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For me it’s not so much about how I earn flying. I don’t care if I have to buy it with gold or complete an achievement. The problem is how long it is gated.

Pathfinder pt1 would be okay if it unlocked flying but, having a Pathfinder pt2 unlock flying 6-8 months after the xpac launches just causes me to unsub for a large portion of the xpac’s cycle.

I really wish Blizz would go back to designing the world with flight in mind. Zones like Storm Peaks and Icecrown were very interesting and fun because of this.

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I hate pathfinder. So far, have not been able to bring myself to complete it for WoD, Legion or BfA.

Yet I absolutely LOVE flying. It adds so much to the game.

I don’t mind completing the quests prior to flying. I don’t mind paying for it, but jumping though so many seemingly endless hoops (most of which I totally do not enjoy) is just not something I do.

I play for fun, not to do content over and over that is not fun. Up to WoD I enjoyed grinding rep, and did it just for fun actually. Or sometimes for a mount, but I still enjoyed it. I disliked the grind content in WoD, it was worse in Legion. And BfA? Oh gee, no way.

I pretty much ignored all end game content. There are other games I enjoy more. I took a year off WoW, now I’m back for a while, but probably won’t stick around long as while I totally enjoy parts of WoW, there is also a lot of content I dislike far too much. If I could fly to WQ’s it wouldn’t be so painful, but no… I have to do those first. So 15 minutes to reach a destination for a 3 minute quest, then 15 to get to the next. And either I’m out of playtime at that point without even completing all of them for that day, or if I have tons of time: I do all of them, have time to spare today but nope, can’t do any more until tomorrow when I have very little to no time. :sob: :confounded:

I don’t bother any more. If there is something I want to do I do it, otherwise I log off and play a different game that isn’t so linear, that has different play styles, lots of freedom on how you want to play and what you want to do.

I would think, Blizz would like to keep us around and playing. Not send us off to some other game.

For some it is difficult as we have zero time for dungeons or we really hate doing them. And mythic + is not available for me anyway due to time/real life demands. I honestly do like to actually pay the bills and eat… lol :wink:

Also I don’t do well in group content. So most likely would just be kicked all the time.

I think it’s great that there are people who have no issues with Pathfinder and can fly. Terrific!

However I also think it’s rather crude on Blizz’s part to shut out a percentage of their players. At least let us have it in a previous expac. Such as WoD or Legion. They are previous content, let us fly there. Then when Shadowlands comes out let us fly in BfA. As we did prior to WoD.

If you don’t wish us to fly in current content ok. But previous content? Why not? I don’t get it. You removed the artifact system, you removed the mage tower (I didn’t do that anyway but many did.) Why not remove Pathfinder for those expac’s as well?

{Gets off soap box now and goes to fix supper.) :taco:

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I pushed through Legion pf and Naz during the previous WQ rep bonus week and am glad I did. Then I went to Mechagon…to hell with that. I have no intention of playing through BfA ever again so it’s not terrible, but it sure is horrible design.

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I’m in the same boat as the OP and my play patterns throughout the years mirror his exactly, been playing since 05 and flight blew my mind when it came out. Shadowlands is the first expansion I haven’t preordered since becoming an adult that can buy my own expansions, and hearing their unflinching stance on Pathfinder is why.

Pathfinder is trash. Having a part 2 is trashier. Designing the zones to be tiny labyrinths stuffed with mobs to make ground travel as irritating as possible (NOT challenging, mind you, just tedious) is the trashiest of all.

I’d rather crawl around Kalimdor end to end on my 60% mounts in classic till the lights go out than ride through another Highmountain or Nazjatar.

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PF isn’t even a challenge, it’s just a chore. There’s nothing even remotely challenging in farming WQ’s for a month. Current PF is such a nothing burger Blizzard might as well remove it and just continue with it’s ridiculous 1 year hard time gate policy and save us the hassle.

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