Feeling compelled and actually doing anything about it are two different things. I personally feel compelled to run M+ to get gear. Do I actually every put more than 1 or two runs in per week with the express intent of farming TF? No, in fact it got to a point last tier where 2 months before it ended I was only logging in only to raid because an abysmally bad drop chance of a TF is a bad incentive for grinding. I might as well not be playing and better use my time elsewhere. If there was a deterministic way to upgrade my gear to get there, I might have an incentive to play more. You may disagree, the only people who have statistics on it besides anecdotes are Blizzard, so the best inference I can make is using well established psychology.
Currently yes it does. The loot has been designed to make ilvl the key indicator of whatâs the best piece of gear. At base ilvlâs, an itemâs ilvl with âbad statsâ will generally still be a dps boost even if it has a poor stat distribution. This is an explicit design choice theyâve been trying to achieve so that gear is as usable as possible with the introduction of PL. All of my spec sets currently have stat weights of ~1.0, so if I get something with a socket, like my current 410 gloves, any base ilvl gear out of BoD will be worse. So functionally I have no upgrades available to me from BoD without hoping and praying for a titanforge on a boss that drops gloves. Thatâs reduced the overall content available for me and accelerated my gear progression.
Did I ever say everyone? It was just an example of how peoples reactions are manifested by that theory. To provide another example of how this is generalist and not really subjective per person - this is the same reason people get more and more toxic the longer youâre stuck on a boss and why pugs will resort to kicking low performers. Youâve spent more effort and your reaction to failure gets more intense, more effort will solicit a more intense response, whether itâs positive or negative. This isnât a debatable fact. The extremeness of it might be and what an individuals threshold is but the principal stands.
Iâm not saying that some people wont enjoy the current iteration of titanforging, but logically when you look at it there are blatant conflicting design principals within the gameâs existing systems. The current iteration of TFing is probably the easiest thing to address as itâs been implemented for long enough to actually collect peoples experiences the respective upsides and downsides of the system.
I mean, weâve answered this already, havenât we? I and others have given you the answer, and you just whittle down with rationale.
It sucks both to know that a potential upgrade is out there and that youâre ignoring it, and it also sucks to get that upgrade, because then the odds your current content will have an upgrade decrease.
The whole point of titanforging is that those 8 levers are always there. It doesnât matter who you are. Thereâs always a chance that youâll get something out of it.
I donât want that chance. Other people in my position donât want that chance. Weâre also tired of paragon rep for the same reason. We want to be able to say, holy crap, you know what? Iâm actually done with something in this game and I have no reason to do it again.
The smartass in me really wants to say itâs a drinking bird on his keyboard, but the smart person in me knows thatâs not how drinking birds work, and the nice person in me knows that Bornakk is really trying here and likely doing the job of 3 people two weeks ago.
Actually, maybe this is all really only hinting at the real problem.
Many of us are, or were, completionists. We want to do everything in the game. In the past, this was doable. You could max out your gear. You could hit Exalted. You could farm that pet.
Nowadays, not so much. With forging, your gear could almost always be better. Azerite Power doesnât cap. It DOESNâT END AT EXALTED. Pets are thrown into the game faster than any sane person can collect them.
I donât complete anything anymore. I donât finish anything anymore. Thatâs probably why I have one level 120 and half a dozen 110s. I canât finish this character.
But after waiting in the queue in HOTS for 10 minutes I can get a game in.
If you donât like titanforging, great, more power to you. Iâve said that numerous times in this thread. Everyone is entitled to any opinion they want to have.
But this is a discussion thread. It doesnât mean everyone can come in and say whatever they want and no one can ever engage them on the things they say. And if you say something thatâs extremely hyperbolic or flat out objectively false in support of your opinion, do you think people should ignore that? Are we obligated to not point out, âhey, wait, that thing you said isnât trueâ or âthatâs an extreme exaggeration that isnât an honest appraisal of what happens in game.â And I know, you have your opinion and itâs contrary to mine, so youâre not jumping on the people in this thread who are responding similar to me but from the other side of the fence. You should go give your unsolicited advice to them.
I speculate a lot have, because I know I have. Itâs why I rapidly slow down in my M+ participation 2 months into any given tier and borderline stop playing the game - I canât imagine Iâm the only one. If I didnât have a core group of friends to raid with Iâd be inclined to quit because to me the game is all about character progression, and 45 minutes for what feels like a 1% chance of an upgrade is the equivalent of having no more progression. Give me a tangible goal to pursue (instead of hoping for a low proc) to upgrade my gear so I have an incentive to play beyond friends and can continue advance my character. (just dont make it AP please, use something creative within professions or a different game mechanic).
You know, Avagon, both Bornakk and the other posters are probably more interested in why you like titanforging than in having you pick apart their posts. If people are being hyperbolic, try to translate it, like I did for Bornakk in explaining âzero effortâ.
Just be careful when you sound like you are speaking for others. Personally, Iâm more focused on getting my average item level up. Sometimes a good WF/TF makes it so I donât need to worry about a single slot for a while but it doesnât happen much. I mainly have been trying to use titanforges to fill in some slots that I feel unlucky in (hi trinkets!) and that has resulted in such success that I have zero titanforges on my main spec atm, heh.
That is also why I was asking so many questions on this topic to try and understand others, their play style, their interests, etc. There are a very wide variety of opinions and preferences that have come up here and there is a lot to consider.
There are many reasons as to why I dislike TF/WF. It makes gear insignificant to me, and diminishes a sense of progression or accomplishment for me. Thereâs no âYes! I finally got the Titansteel Destroyerâ or âWoot! BiS!â moments anymore. More so I almost feel a bit of guilt because I didnât earn it.
It feels like I got a special participation award on top of just getting loot from the boss. Some people didnât get any loot and I got buffed loot, but we did the same thing. Why not TF/WF the amount of loot a boss drops?
I feel robbed of any meaningful progression and accomplishment because there is no longer a real obtainable BiS. I want to conquer a tier, I want the absolute best gear I can possibly have in each slot, with the best combination of stats. That simply is not obtainable with the current loot structure. I can get a high TF piece with terrible stats and feel OBLIGATED to put it on because technically itâs an upgrade. This feels especially terrible early in a tier because it may be amazing for another player, but I canât trade it.
Gear used to be iconic. I remember strolling around Dalaran and seeing my first Shadowmourne. Everyone knew that player earned it and that was the best they were going to get for that expac. They were decked out in ICC-25H gear, strutting around like an MMO god. That feeling of envy drove me to want to be like that. They werenât given any freebies, they earned every bit of that and it showed. That sense of pride filled me when I started to get to that level, realising all the effort it took to accomplish my feats.
Also it really muddies the waters with ilvl. Players used to know their limits and would either stop at that wall or become better players. Nowadays with the abundance of loot and chance to just flat out out-gear situations, players are overcoming obstacles in the worst way possible. Just blindly zerging without adapting. A player could be invited to raid purely on ilvl and just be terrible because they have never had to progress as a player. They just keeping smashing into situations until their gear carries them. This also raises the gear scaling at an alarming rate as we are already half-way near legion numbers in the middle of the next expac. EDITED: On top of this you have the top players going to lesser content fishing for TF/WF items. That furthers some players getting through content above their ability because they are getting carried, and thus making the barriers to entry that much easier. This is the reason completely uncoordinated pug groups can eventually just zerg down 2-3 bosses on Mythic difficulty because the whole encounter has become completely trivialized by gear.
So my suggestion is to keep the TF/WF system but alter it. Blizzard is correct that it is nice to occasionally get an unexpected prize, but it should not drastically change your path of progression/gearing. Let items TF +10 and WF +5 above their base item levels. However, gear that does not TF/WF can still be upgraded to maxed out TF/WF potential with a currency such as Valor points. This way players are still excited to get a free bonus upgrade, but are still able to min/max in their chosen path.
I do hope you pass along this suggestion to the team. I do not take credit for this suggestion as I have heard it throughout the community and agree with it.
I only jumped on you because your posts make up literally 10% of the thread, and thatâs baffling to me. No one else is even close, whether I agree with them or not. I know Iâm being crappy to make jabs at you personally but Iâm tired of this tread being nothing but âvarious people argue with Avalonâ for huge stretches.
I feel you unduly glossed over probably the most important part of Bouncyâs post; the very last sentence.
âBeing hungry and eating, but then never being full.â
I enjoy feeling wholly fulfilled so I can focus on my favorite aspect without gearing differences being a consideration I have to add as a caveat to that aspect. No permanently fulfilled, but temporarily, much like actual hunger.
Youâre arguing semantics. Lots of people fish for forges. Lots of people have made that point here in this thread. Iâm not arguing over whether something is simply compelling. I was disputing your claim that forging by itself isnât compelling enough to get people to fish for it. Blizzard has stated that forging was implemented for exactly this reason, to provide people some incentive to do content they normally wouldnât do because they on longer have a reason to do it without forging. Weâre multiple expansion into its implementation so if it didnât do what it was intended to do, do you honestly think it would still be here in game?
I have no characters (and I have 10 at 120 right now) that stat weights are even like that across any spec I play. 5 ilvl and sometimes even 10 ilvl difference on non-ring/trinket slots can still result in the lower ilvl piece being the upgrade. Rings/trinkets are different, obviously due to no mainstat on the rings and the special impact of trinkets. Plus you used a socket example which is a cherry picked for the largest impact. My point about ilvl is true regardless of how much you want to pretend itâs not. ilvl is not the indicator as to whether a piece of gear is better or not. Itâs a good general gauge, sure, but anything with 10 ilvl you should probably sim or compare stat weights on.
But the rest is going down an endless hole thatâs a lot of philosophical waffling. Particularly so because your example is context specific and youâre trying to apply that to multiple reward systems broadly. The things that motivate players in a raid are not going to be the things that motivate casual players out in the world. They value and are driven by different things. An explanation canât just be handwaved across every player in the game as if one size fits all. It doesnât.
I do want to say, of course there are conflicting design goals. Not all content is designed for all people and thus those reward systems arenât intended to be the same thing to everyone. We have people upset about reward systems designed for other people because they donât feel other people deserve those rewards (not valid at all) or (and I do see this as a valid complaint) how that reward system conflicts with their own personal motivation. The problem is the solution put forth isnât people accepting that the system is there to serve other people, itâs people demanding (often times from a fallacious position of majority) to have that system removed.
Iâm not certain what response you expect. Without being snarky, seriously, if me posting bothers you ignore me. Iâm not going to change how I post because a stranger on the internet doesnât like that Iâm engaged with the discussion.
I think a lot of the passionate folks that are replying to your post are the same folks wondering where this discussion was when Blizzard decided to remove Master Loot and change the loot system all together. There never was a thousand+ post discussion to get player feedback pre this change. This somewhat angers folks when theyâre now being drilled with questions on why it should come back when it wasnât their (our) choice to get rid of in the first place. Again, there was no constructive discussion before that change.
My guild is the same way, yes weâve adapted but it just doesnât feel as rewarding with personal loot. The feeling of a Raid Leader giving loot out is missing and was a fun aspect of raiding.
The way it is now is âClothie A got a 415 Titanforged with bad stats for their spec but canât trade since their equipped item is 410 so itâs higher and Clothie B in the raid needs it but got gold onlyâ. Weâve never had this issue in the past and it was a great feeling for Clothie B, who contributed just as much during the raid, to receive that item from Clothie A or the Master Looter.
In all honesty, this change seems to be a direct result of big business wanting us to be logged in longer. If we all get geared up by being able to trade items quicker then big business is worried weâll unsub and theyâll lose revenue.
In fact, it seems to be having the reverse effect. People are so frustrated by the change and not getting lucky with personal loot that they decide enough is enough and leave. Iâve lost many raider friends to this and the frustration of not being able to trade higher ilvl than their equipped items to someone that needs them who are still sitting on -20 ilvl items due to bad personal loot luck.
If Blizzard big business is hellbent on leaving Personal loot at least tweak it so that there is a unlucky loot protection like there was on Legion legendaries. Or something of that nature, for each slot, because looting the same boots 5 times and resetting the bad luck protection would be just as bad.
Thatâs one of my main gripes with WF/TF. Youâre hoping for a random bonus that is decent enough to be an upgrade. Running more difficult content should be a viable way to upgrade gear (and it is), but moving up a difficulty tier often isnât possible for players (Why donât more LFR Heroes go into Normal mode? â They donât want to, or simply cannot, usually due to limited time).
Bonuses are fine. Mega Jackpots are silly. A +15 max bonus is rare enough, but also achievable. You can use your own experience and figure out if youâll reach your maximum item level in 4-5 months. +15 also has the benefit of feeling like âHey! thatâs BiS!â where as a 420 TF from a 400 is âHey!, thatâs pretty goodâ BiS feels better.
Hey, Iâm not opposed to deterministic reward systems. I will agree that everything seems very RNG nowadays. Understand, Iâm not opposed to alternative systems or even a revamp of forging to more deterministic systems. Iâm opposed to removing progression paths from player B because player A didnât like that player B was progressing too much or because player A didnât like the progression path player B was using. And Iâm talking more about things like Emissary quests, world bosses, warfront rewards, invasion gear, and then forging on top. The water has gotten muddied this far in and all of these things have come up here.
Personally, Iâm more focused on getting my average item level up. Sometimes a good WF/TF makes it so I donât need to worry about a single slot for a while but it doesnât happen much. I mainly have been trying to use titanforges to fill in some slots that I feel unlucky in (hi trinkets!) and that has resulted in such success that I have zero titanforges on my main spec atm, heh.