The Proving Grounds were added in MoP and carried over into WoD. I honestly believe that the Proving Grounds was the most important content Blizzard has ever made simply because it is the closest thing to an in game tutorial we have ever had. In WoD, in order to que up for most group content you had to complete the silver difficulty in the Proving Grounds and that was a great system that was forgotten in a lackluster expansion. In order to complete silver in the PG, a player had to learn about a few things that are essential to group content. Such as: positioning, interrupting, and stunning. These three things can be lost on casual/new players who play with zero addons and/or never bothered to look up how to play wow on a third party site. I believe there needs to be systems in the game that allow players to learn the game in a non-group environment and they do not have to go to third party sites. But the Proving Grounds raises the overall skill level of the whole community when you make it a prerequisite like in WoD. Today, it is not uncommon to get into a pug M+ group and only one player is doing all of the CCing/interrupting and i think it is because many casual player don’t even know to look for that. But the proving grounds (though not very difficult on silver) made players learn about these things which made completing group content in WoD much easier. I think this system should be brought back each expansion to help curve toxicity in pugs. Proving Grounds allow players a place to improve without having to deal with group members.
The biggest success of the PG came in Legion in the form of the Mage Tower. The Mage Tower was nothing more than a more complicated Proving ground more tailored to your class and spec. I have been raiding at a decently high level for over a decade in wow and i still learned a lot about my alt classes while trying to clear the mage tower on all of them. Now obviously the mage tower is much harder than clearing Silver in the PG but we need some content in the game that forces players to get better. I think the silver difficulty of PG is perfect because it covers the basics while not shutting off group content to the majority of the casual player base. This way new or casual players don’t have to learn everything in a group environment that would open them up to toxicity and flaming.
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Normal lfd should require bronze.
Heroic lfd silver.
Raid finder, gold.
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If Blizzard could really put effort into improving the proving grounds, they’d be an incredible tool. But when I say effort, I’m not talking about a few extra obstacles or mechanics, I’m talking about designing a proving grounds that actually TEACHES you your class and puts you in situations where you’re prompted to use your abilities in a certain way, and the mechanics are tuned for that.
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I honestly think if you make gold a requirement it would prevent a large part of the player base from playing content they want. I think Raid Finder should still have the silver requirement because most people who can complete gold will never que for LFR anyway.
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PG if I understand correctly we’re indeed tuned to teach all the basic mechanics of MoP and WoD raids. Do they still do that for BfA raids? Probably not but they still teach the basics of positioning/kiting, don’t stand in swrillies, don’t stand in bad, interrupting, priority targeting, and to maximize your damage during burst windows. It’s a good tutorial.
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You know… I did not know Blizz had removed the proving grounds… it WAS a super place to practice healing for DAMN sure. I think they made a BIG mistake, and they are wrong. New players don’t DARE go into a random dungeon wondering what healing is all about? I went into a dung just last night and the tank was bullying all the new players about how stupid they were. If I was a GM I would have literally kicked him to the ground. Bullying in the real world is bad enough, but he needed a butt whooping. Proving grounds? I never healed any dungeon until I practiced there many weeks. I wanted to learn every spell, and practice everything. Damn those… humans and humanity. I was a good healer… ah… BRING the proving grounds BACK Blizz! But make it all fit with chromie time and levels and all the technical stuff you all do. MAKE it FIT. Just bring it back for all levels. I loved it for healing but add more realistic spell dispels, debuff dispels… All the real world (WOW World) stuff a new player needs to practice. And from level 10 to 60! Love the game but healers and tanks need to practice before facing the humans of earth in a REAL situation… MOBS will kill your pixel character but HUMANS will kill your REAL character. Yes bullying exists here also… in random instances!!! So make the proving grounds real again so newbs can just see what it all means in a party. Make tanks and damagers allowed to group with random AI party members… YOU can do it Blizz! PLEASE???
I think everyone forgot how terrible the proving grounds actually were. They didn’t teach anything close to what was needed to survive in the world. Instead you had to re-spec and put things on your toolbar you would never use again just to get through them.
Their scaling based on gear was also not tuned properly… Some things never change.
True. I still decline people with bad Proving Ground achieves.
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Arena is the new proving grounds. If you cant hit 1800, you cant get gear. I’d love to see the average item level of players these days. I’ll guess its right around 200 when it should be coming up on 220 at this point.
Is a 2 year necro bump better or worse then making a new thread?
Serious question, not trolling. I generally don’t bother using the search feature. If it isn’t on the first page or 2 I make a new one.
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