SL ruined for casuals to appease hardcore community

Community General Discussion
226

I disagree.

In PvP it’s an improvement, we have vendors again and depending on your rating upgrades to mythic item level. We can choose our items in the order we want now and everything is working better than it was in BFA.

In M+ the weekly loot upgrades to a mythic item level. The end of dungeon loot is worse than in BFA (BFA gave out far too much gear made the game M+ or die.) but causals are not farming M+ for a full set week 1-2 so it does not matter.

Raiding lost bonus rolls and you get less loot there, I don’t see how you think this makes it raid or die for loot. It did gain slots in the vault, like PvP and M+ to make up for it.

For people that don’t do any of the main progression paths, there is a covenant set (I think 200 item level at max?) that also gives a nice set bonus. WQ gear get’s upgraded over time as you gain more renown so there is a progression path for them too.

People act like casual players are trying to push world first in raiding or +25 keys. With 184 item level, something very easy to get even for casual players. World content is extremely easy outside of a few locations full of elites.

Doing a few M+ or raid bosses and not getting a drop sucks yeah, but with the vault, you get a guaranteed weekly item that will be just as high of an item level or better in the case of M+ then the end of dungeon loot.

It sounds like people want BFA handouts and that just ruins the game.

227

Ooof, you went IN! And i appreciate you doing so. Its nice to see the dichotomy clearly delineated and the motivations uncovered.

The covenant system is a really good illustratio… actually, lets go back… TITANFORGING is a really good illustration of the problems in design.

Hang on, quick intermission, i want to clarify some terms (so we are all on the same page with definitions: you dont have to agree to the definitions, but its more so we dont get distracted by the ‘what actually is a casual and hardcore player?’ discussion):

  1. The hardcore: Mythic cleared. +15 keys. 2400 arena. (not all at once, but most often one or all of these).

  2. Aspiring hardcore: AotC, probably struggling for cutting edge. Decent arena score, possibly glad carry. Looking to break into a pro guild. Maybe currently a big fish in a small pond guild, maybe the instigator of 90% of preach’s drama time stories. For some reason or other, not quite there, but really wants to be.

  3. The average player: Probably the important criteria to be honest, because this is really the big meaty pile of wow players and is often called the hardcore. LFG, is on the progression ladder but for reasons (time, skill, social skills etc), never quite has the full dedication. But has a lovely time playing the game, progresses well, gets most things done, but not really the cutting edge stuff (except now and again with a bit of luck). Basically, your average wow player playing all spheres of the wow game with decent success). Will struggle to understand (or even attempt to understand) why players dont just do what they do.

  4. The crypto-casual: With a bit of luck, sometimes looks like the average player. But mostly just chills in pugs treading water. Might have a nice 2s arena team. Might never really play arena. Probably pwns noobs in BGs. Maybe buys a carry for their chest/aotc now and again. Not necessarily skilled, not necessarily unskilled, maybe just lacks the time investment or something else to make this a routine thing. Likely logs on, does their chores, does a few other things, then off they go until another playtime window opens up.

  5. THE CASUAL: Does not do LFG content. Very likely does not have their discord set up. If asked will tell you they dont have a mic. Plays the game completely at their own pace in a solo universe. Other players are basically glorified AI NPCs. Will happily queue up for a dungeon, bg or lfr. Will happily spend HOURS in game just doing ‘stuff’ in the world. Is allergic to LFG. Plays the game so long as its fun and entertaining. Stops when it isnt.

The bottom 3 likely account for around 90-95% of the total playerbase with no doubt a solid [casual] 3:2:4 [average] ratio (numbers (and terminology) sourced from the land of pure imagination).

Now lets go back to titanforging with those 5 in mind.

  1. Im gonna have to be clear. Id need timba in here to explain this (being the closest thing to a true hardcore player on the forums - i dont see many of them to be honest). Its not my wheelhouse. But i assume all titanforging, though annoying, is still an overall guild advantage at the end of the day. ‘That it could be everyone!!!’ is likely a wish, but any advantage in cutting edge content is an advantage. And anything that helps kill this boss and drops their loot and puts this on farm invariably helps everyone else in the guild in the long run.

  2. Titanforge drops! Whee! More claim to a spot in a cutting edge guild. Titanforge doesnt drop! OMG BLIZZ, this is so unfair that im being held back by RNG! Id definitely be in a world first guild if you just shut down this RNG BS!!!

  3. Actually, 2 and 3 are pretty much the same story. No need to dwell on it. Theyre all playing the ladder game to some degree and all jostling for position…

  4. See above.

  5. Titanforge drops! Whee! Total bonus. Awesome! That’ll speed up my stuff a bit. Titanforge doesnt drop! Whee! I got new loot! That’ll speed things up a bit.

Its just a part of the game that doesnt particularly affect 1 and 5. One is THE GUILD (it doesnt matter (immediately) about the individual (they will get theirs eventually because we’re a team)), 5 is SOLO (it doesnt matter about other people, im not in competition with them). Everything else is a pitch battle of jockeying for position and status (to a greater or lesser extent).

So i guess we need to address the issue of titanforging. A huge swathe of the playerbase clearly believes they are being cheated by it (and will only see the negatives). A minority dont. So it kind of had to go.
The concern is that this discussion mirrors to an extent the covenant/conduit/soulbind trifecta, which as a casual player i genuinely love, but i can also see the sense of being cheated out of ‘their rightful place’ that groups 2-4 also likely feel (again, 1 will just do what needs to be done, whilst 5 will just be ‘i like this!’ (mostly - the exception proves the rule so to speak)).

So long as we keep in mind the myriad of playstyles, theres no reason at all that a compromise shouldnt be reached. But so long as we consider the myriad of playstyles theres also no end to the complaining. Blizzard kind of need to just bite the bullet and design the game they want to design. If it means sacrificing their casual base, so be it. If it means ‘breaking the meta’ then so be it.

I think this is the longest fence sitting, “no point” post ive ever made. :slight_smile:

To be honest, i just wish they had the foresight to open up the weekly chest a bit. Why only three criteria based exclusively on the ‘three pillars’ (which multiplies the gear discrepancies and could be predicted by anyone with an ounce of foresight? Why not 4 or 5? Why not make catch up more of a weekly thing instead of every other major patch? Why not throw some mythic 2 gear at casual players to incentivise them to a) engage with the systems as they are weekly; and b) maybe with that extra gear boost, have them queueing for LFG content? I dunno. It seems silly. If the real end game is mythic dungeons, rated pvp and raiding (normal-mythic), then just get them on the ladder. You dont need to break the ladder, but just get them a foot on it.

3 Likes
228

Go buy a lotto ticket imo.

229

i would probably make a killing tbh.

230

I’ll go 50/50 with you.

231

Probably you

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232

i was talking to a friend about this thread and me not being believed about my luck and my friend told me this really interesting aussie (inappropriate lol) phrase that describes people like me. so there’s that. being lucky is not being skilled though. unfortunately.

233

And that’s why I haven’t brought it and not going to until they fix it up. Some of us are not 20 anymore and like to potter around doing our own things.

234

I’m 30ish and am enjoying the game at.my own pace. Leveling a alt right now and having a blast.

235

Well, but that’s kind of the point. Blizzard wants to retain enough of both the casuals and the hardcores in order to optimize the size of the subscriber base, knowing full well that they will always err on one side or the other, because it can never satisfy both sides equally well. I don’t think they will ever completely “write off” one side or the other, but they are certainly tolerant of designing a given expac to lean in favor of one side or the other, and then switching that to the other side the next expac. Again, it can swing in a way that is very similar to elections.

While I agree with much of what you say about titanforging, I think the analysis overlooks the importance of all of the emotions of the issue, from the perspective of the totem pole. Very generally speaking, people on higher rungs of the totem pole (1 through 4 but especially 1 through 3 in your hierarchy) tend to have a strong visceral negative reaction to seeing someone below them on the pole getting a titanforge level that equals, or even exceeds, their own ilvl, if that titanforge is based on “lesser content”.

This creates an emotional sense of “injustice” in the higher totem pole player, and the intensity of the feeling is directly related to the difference in totem pole rank, such that while I agree that rank 1 players are relatively unaffected by that system, the visceral emotional reaction remains intact – it is emotionally disturbing to them that a rank 5 player can get access to raid level ilvl loot via titan forged emissary reward. That is the core emotional visceral reaction that is the undercurrent to the anti-titanforging coalition: the strong desire to have those who are “under where I am” on the totem pole receive “lesser gear for lesser content”. This is where WoW players of the less casual variety (and the higher in your hierarchy one goes, the less casual one gets) tend to hang their “fairness” hat, as it were, in terms of how they view what outcomes are “fair” and “not fair” – and it is not fair that someone “lower” than me gets gear for doing content that is “lower” than me, when such gear is at the same level or higher than the gear from the content I am running. That sense of “hierarchy based fairness” reasoning tends to shut down openness to compromises on these kinds of issues, because things quickly become zero sum in the sense that something either awards strictly based on a hierarchy, or it doesn’t. The fact that so many gamers have IT backgrounds, which tends to produce more binary thought tendencies than average, only serves to exacerbate this, I think.

WoW has built into it a rather rigid hierarchy, and as we all know the community polices this very strictly. Blizzard benefits from it, and I personally think they do so intentionally, because they believe it drives player engagement to have players competing hard with each other, being irritated and annoyed at each other over gear, crawling over each other in the hierarchy and so on – it may be unpleasant, but it keeps people engaged, and people who are engaged are people who are subbed. That’s the psychological “dark underbelly” of WoW – it has a fundamentally different “emotional hook” on its players than, say, a game like Runescape does (to take one example of many). I honestly think that Blizzard wants to design things in an effort to keep this tension, but also to retain enough players on both sides to optimize the subscriber base, while at the same time realizing it will always lean one way or the other – and, critical for this approach, never too long in one direction or the other, otherwise the tension is broken, and a part of the player base is lost.

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236

Gratz I’m happy for you but I’m 60 and don’t raid or do dungeons anymore as I hate letting a side down. So SL isn’t for me! sad cause I have invested 12 years into this game I loved once.

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237

…idk what changed from bfa to now that makes you sad.

There is still a bunch to do outside of it.

238

Idk to be honest haven’t brought it but reading this forum it’s all about Mythics, Raiding, Dungeons runs. Hence even now to get conquests you need to rated BG’s.

239

I wouldn’t judge the game just based on the forums. But I’m sorry that you feel that way

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240

Totally agree OP. I believe it is because our game director himself is/was an elitist/hardcore player.

The massive middle finger he is showing to us “casuals” is glaringly obvious and really starting to turn me away from the game.

There is almost no fun left in the game without putting in massive amounts of slog/effort that a lot of us just can’t do.

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241

Not necessarily no. I’d consider myself on the more casual side of the spectrum, but a vast majority of precedent shows that putting things into LFG gets them nerfed until a random LFG group can reliably complete them. It isn’t that I want to stand head and shoulders above the peasantry in LFG, it’s that I don’t want content that I consider fun and challenging being tanked in difficulty which I think is fairly reasonable.

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242

Callings are a good way to get a free sub next month

243

The problem is that a number of these changes were not aimed towards any real audience. The mythic+ loot changes seemed to be trying to appease the raiders while screwing over the mythic+ runners but that’s it. The rest of the changes we got were really not asked for by anyone.

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244

And then they are nerfing raid loot today so idk wtf is going on

245

mythic+ was far too lucrative for what it was. if it were me i’d get rid of the box completely and cap it at 1 play through of a particular key at a level per week.

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