https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comments/a7rrmy/a_letter_to_blizzard_entertainment/
Has anyone else read this?
I read a few another commentator, one being an ex-employee from WOTLK to Cat really opened my eyes on what’s going with the employees of game companies. Really sad.
Yep saw it in another thread, but its a good letter with a lot of bad news… also unsurprising given where this expac is at right now.
I’d still rather they stop messing up the game with new and unwanted systems and just go back and fix all the old stuff. Maybe give BC the Cata treatment.
The world shouldn’t revolve around end game.
I read it last night. Its a very sobering, but unsurprising piece.
“You stopped making an MMORPG years ago. Instead, you turned WoW into an elaborate fantasy-themed casino replicator. It’s a third-person looter-shooter designed to string players out like addicts looking for a fix. Your other titles are just animated shopping carts that feature mini-games people can play in between opening loot boxes.”
Says pretty much everything here.
What in BC wasn’t endgame? Genuinely curious. Also what in BCs endgame wasn’t heroic dungeons or raids or arenas which is way less than now?
Yeah, I cancelled my sub after reading this tonight. It really nailed it for me. Like a zombie I’ve been playing a game that isn’t really “fun”. I keep trying to recapture the nostalgia, but I just need to come to terms with the fact that it was all a sweet dream. I can’t go back. Time to move on.
So long old friend. I’ll miss you.
Just out of curiosity; what kind of response from Blizzard would the community find satisfactory? Because it seems lately every single action these devs take is met with scorn and contempt. Please tell me what Ion could say that would actually make people happy.
Let’s go over some key points raised…
I wasn’t logging on to earn or buy loot boxes. I didn’t finish a dungeon and hope that whatever the final boss dropped would not only be the thing I wanted, but also titanforge into a super-powered version of the thing I wanted.
So you want less sources of end-game loot? You want those BiS pieces to come exclusively from raid bosses? You want to cut off all the non-raiding players from access? And you want less reason to rerun raids? Wouldn’t this hurt guilds trying to gear up lower end or unlucky players once the main tank gets his BiS? Wouldn’t this hurt the entire PuG raiding world?
I didn’t log on so I could fill a bar - though there were plenty of bars to fill. I didn’t play so I could gather some random source of power that would inevitably fade into irrelevance as soon as some goblin miner discovered a new random source of power.
So you want removal of any sort of max level character progression aside from gear…which you just nerfed in the above quoted text? Let’s say the AP system is removed altogether. Ok, now what? How do you earn traits, skills, power-ups, or any sort of advancement?
I didn’t show up to race through dungeons or to replace pieces of gear every other day with gear that was marginally better (or worse) than what I was wearing.
So again with removing character progression? Personally, I like having something to look forward to between raid tiers. I like having reasons to run dungeons beyond the first week when I outgeared M0. Are we really advocating for removing reasons to play the game?
I didn’t log on just so I could tab-out to third-party websites because they were the only way to find out if I had the right talents, the right gear, or to simulate numbers with the gear I did have.
Then you were doing it wrong. Plenty of people were using cookie-cutter builds and gear setups at endgame in Vanilla and TBC. There were several 3rd party websites providing vital information for maximizing your play.
I didn’t pay $15 a month to earn a score from a third-party so I could participate in the game with other people who valued my random score over my experience playing the game.
Then you don’t remember gearscore or “come over here and let me inspect you before I invite you to my group”. Players have always set standards for group content. If it’s not raider io, it’s gearscore, it’s achieves, it’s how many epic items you have. There was never a time when serious raid groups and dungeon groups were just inviting whoever with no consideration for gear or skill.
I played World of Warcraft because just being in Azeroth with a few friends was good enough. I wasn’t worried about leveling up quickly so I could “play the real game” like people are today.
Yet there is a never-ending cry from the fanbase to make leveling quicker and easier. Is that what you want? Or do you want leveling to be slower and more immersive? And what would that look like?
You’re deluding yourself if you think that classic World of Warcraft will bring that all back. It won’t. It can’t.
So even a complete rollback to a version of the game that gives players exactly what they’re asking for will not give players what they want?
Seriously, what sort of response could Blizzard possibly give to this sort of complaint? Even if Ion went line by line addressing this letter it would be dismissed as “Blizz doesn’t listen to their players”. It’s the same kind of response they got when people found out they were sending out a survey asking players what they want, like, don’t like, and care about.
Blizzard cannot win with these players. That’s because people are more concerned with ‘pwning’ the company than having a mature conversation.
You misunderstood me. Just because BC was end game once, doesn’t me we can’t go back and fix it now that it isn’t. BfA is unnecessary when there’s so much content that’s better. Even class design was clearly superior to how it is now. Everyone prefers mop classes to the crap classes we have now.
I read the letter as a cry to nostalgia.
Unfortunately, there is always only one first time.
Except he spoke as a casual player ![:slight_smile:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/slight_smile.png?v=6" ":slight_smile:")
and everyone here hates casuals ![:rofl:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/rofl.png?v=6" ":rofl:")
None of the things you said were specific about anything? Can you give me one specific thing about one class that’s so much better. That might be hard for you since you’re playing a demon hunter which didn’t exist in MoP. Also what does BFA is unnecessary mean? I don’t understand this.
Nah, Legion was the best time in Wow ever for me and my playstyle (random mainly solo/do whatever casual type.)
BFA improved a lot for me, with this patch.
If by “casino” he means stuff like me getting a 390 helm from a boss, or a 380 weapon from an incursion (or something, forget), then “go casino!”
Also, “people that used to work there” is about the worst source for valid criticism.
This. You can never go home again. Not really. Same with all things.
Time moves on and so does everything.
Pretty sure belfs didn’t exist in vanilla. We can all use that argument. Tbh I actually started day 1 vanilla but quit b4 BC dropped (not this account). Either way, you only need to go to any class subforum and ask there. They’ll all tell you far better then I can. Specifics and all.
I want classic, I really do; however, they’re on the mark once again. I can’t recapture ignorance. I can’t recapture not knowing my class, or dungeons. The reason I want classic is to reintroduce what WoW used to be to new players. Show them that the reward isn’t an item in game all the time. Let them see why WoW became top dog.
As far as people would not believe anything Blizz said, or that it would be acceptable. Well therein lies the biggest issue of all. How many times do you keep giving passes for obvious screw-ups? How many times can people hear, “Oops, our bad”, or “We’re letting you know we screwed up, because we didn’t see it coming.” While not exact quotes to be sure, it’s a pretty good paraphrase. Most of the people I know who are upset with the direction of WoW, are trying to have a mature conversation, but are tired of feeling like they’re being talked to like a 3 year old.
Complaining to a company, posting on forums about one’s dislike on the game, or even calling out some rather glaring issues, as well as the BS…well that’s accountability. As fans, as well as players, we should hold them accountable. As for who holds us accountable? Well that’s easy, we do. So long as the community for WoW exists, we are held accountable.
However, in truth, players and fans alike aren’t the problem here. We’ll always be at odds with our community because we care about WoW. Without us, the game will end, that’s why we have to hold Blizz accountable with either our voices, however incongruent they may be at times, and our wallets.
BiS was implied in the line complaining about titanforging and the “never-ending” loot chase. The implication is that OP wants to be done getting better loot. That means having your BiS. If you don’t have BiS, then there is a loot chase.
I, too, enjoy the experience of raiding moreso than the reward. But the complaints about ML, titanforging, and everything else loot related seems to indicate that the community is focused on loot. If that wasn’t the case we wouldn’t be having this discussion. We wouldn’t give one flying whit about Azerite gear.
I’m not redirecting. I’m asking a question. Azerite gear sucks. AP sucks. Should Blizzard just remove it? Should there be any form of max level character progression aside from standard gear upgrades? Because that doesn’t seem to be the consensus. It seems people want a progression system at end game, just not one that requires effort and time. They seem to want a progression system that you can finish in a weekend. Once again, you’re asking Blizzard to remove incentives to play apart from the first couple of weeks after a patch. Once you clear the new content, then what? Should WoW really be designed in such a way that you can play two weeks out of six months and have absolutely no reason to log in between?
Like I said above…people have no idea what they want. But they sure as heck know what they don’t want. So you don’t want an RNG fest for gear distribution. Fine. What system do you want? And how fast should we be able to get the top gear? Would you rather have a currency grind that takes months on end for the set you want? What if you desperately need an upgraded set of gloves? Would you really rather spend the next three weeks grinding one specific type of content in order to earn the coins, badges, points, or woobies to buy the one item that you need? Or would you rather have a chance to get that upgrade every day from any one of half a dozen sources?
This is what we call an unsubstantiated claim. And considering that WoW has supposedly lost a vast majority of its players in recent years, it makes me doubt there are more people min-maxing today. But I’ll be happy to look at your evidence.
Personal experience is not definitive. I remember being rejected for MC runs because I was in all blues. And players having a better understanding today of the game mechanics and needs to overcome a challenge is hardly the fault of Blizzard. Unless you intend to blame them for implementing actual challenge to the game in total. Should we roll back raid mechanics and high end M+ mechanics to faceroll level in order to make raider io irrelevant? Do we really need to dumb the game down for the sake of inclusion of bad players?
Again, personal opinion. I have seen just as many complaints that leveling from 110 to 120 takes too long. That’s why there are debates about how much or how little XP is gained from Island Adventures and Incursions. You simply cannot make the leveling experience quick and easy but also slow and immersive at the same time.
Blizzard has the dilemma of trying to develop this game for several different types of players. They need to provide compelling content for Johnny No-Life who plays 18 hours a day for months on end. Then they need to allow a method for Timmy Two-Jobs to be caught up when he can only play one hour a month. After all, why should Timmy who pays the same $15 sub fee have to spend the next 30 years to get to where Johnny got in a week? Now Johnny need challenging end game content that pushes his l33t sk!llz and allows him to show that he is one of the top 100 players of all time. But that content also needs to be easy enough for Timmy to clear with no talent and in the midst of a minor stroke.
We need an immersive leveling experience that tells an intricate story and teaches you how to master your class by slowly introducing new abilities. It also needs to introduce you to game mechanics that become more central to end game content. But this experience needs to be totally skippable on demand for current players, players that want to play with current players, returning players, or anyone who just wants to skip it.
Because new players will be drawn in by rep grinds, gold grinds, no flying, poor questing design, broken specs, limited choices, elitist raid guilds, and a clear cutoff point to how far you can progress without raiding…all rendered in loving 14 year old detail? Maybe next we can bring back playing with a stick and hoop.
That is just flat out not true. The community screams ‘X is broken, no fun, boring!’ Blizzard says ‘we’re fixing X’. Community says ‘Blizzard doesn’t listen’. When was the last time you saw a thread complementing them, thanking them, or even acknowledging the obvious feedback related changes they’ve made? Want an example or seven?
Blizzard reversed their decision to restrict AZ gear trading.
Blizzard implemented many class changes and tuning.
Blizzard put in an AZ gear vendor.
Blizzard is planning to remove AZ traits on gear in 8.2
Blizzard put in a player choice in the Horde war campaign questline.
Blizzard implemented a doubloon vendor.
But yes, Blizzard doesn’t listen to their community. You try stacking all this new code on top of 14 years of old code and see if you don’t dig up a few bugs. Of course there are mistakes. But they are acknowledged and fixed. Yet the people want more. They want to live in a world where everything goes exactly as planned the first time around. Anything less just proves they are incompetent greedy ActiBlizz scum.
You’re held accountable in what manner? You (the non-specific poster) get to anonymously post whatever nonsense, ill-informed opinion, cherry picked extreme example, or outright lie suits your mood. And there are no consequences. Is your boss scrutinizing every word you post? Is your ability to make rent or feed your kids dependent on your behavior on these forums?
There was a popular and poorly researched discussion a couple of months back about falling sub numbers. The same unsubstantiated source was passed around like VD. Who was held accountable for that? If I want to post that “Shamans are broken and unfun” I don’t need to know what I’m talking about. I don’t need to provide examples, stats, or a coherent thought. I don’t even need to have ever played a shaman. If a Blizzard rep posts “We’re fixing shamans” he needs to know what he’s talking about. He needs to be able to explain how they’re fixing shamans, when, and how it will impact every other class in the game.
There is a clear double standard when it comes to the community and the devs.
That may be true for some. But a lot of people simply like conflict. They like being edgelords who are too cool to actually like WoW. They are smarter than you, me, the devs, and the entire industry. And they want to make sure that you know it. These are the same people who sit on their couch and tell Bill Belichick what plays to call for the NE Patriots offense. These people are experts on everything and we should be grateful they’re sharing their wisdom with the rest of us.
“No king rules forever my son”
Don’t bother responding to Crowlay. He’s a troll who does nothing but purposefully misunderstand, post straw man arguments, and try to lead criticism of the game to off topic tangents.