It’s definitely a whole lot different if you experience the layering system in person, instead of looking at it from the outside only.
Before the stress tests, i assumed it could be fine in all actuality. Of course i had my doubts, but i was giving it a fair shot, because i think the team is awesome and i really do believe they want the best for Classic.
Unfortunately the experience of layering interfering with the game, and showing the effects it had on the community and the world was really bad to be frank.
It didn’t feel like the old WoW i got introduced to at all. It felt like same old same old, aka retail WoW, but this time with a nostalgia cosplay.
Everything aside from layering was great - but still the overall experience and feeling simply wasn’t the same, and it has to be to be Classic, no?
I really don’t wanna have to wait and see the surprised reaction from all the people currently unaware of this, when millions of them enter the game and then finally get to experience the layered game the moment they start their journeys.
If this goes through, i think Blizzard CM’s should get a big bonus and mandatory vacation after layering is finally gone, cause they are in for one hell of a job
Not a troll. I brought up valid points, and you’ve ignored them. Look at the last thing I said, in those brackets. The ‘bad’ stuff that people do still want in the game. Or just overlook the points I’m making again anyway.
You trade no layering for a harsh launch. Layering IS the technology to make launch smooth, and then will be removed afterward. It’s a necessary, temporary situation.
And as has been discussed already in the thread, they don’t work. Layering is the most efficient option given the timeframe.
I am paying attention. Otherwise I wouldn’t be countering almost every point you’re offering. The current playable portion of the game is in heavy beta testing, and that beta testing is being done on the layering tech as well, leaving inaccurate understandings of how they work. People thinking that other players with magically vanish from their layer are a direct example of this. During the stress tests, devs were actively shifting the number of players within layers to determine the most efficient end result. That’s why they were disappearing, but that won’t be a feature in the finished product.
Haven’t ignored a thing, but you’re doing a good job of ignoring the valid points I bring up. Trying refuting them rather than saying "You’re wrong and you’re not listening. I have consistently. As I have in this post as well. Or will you ignore those too?
“It’s 2019” is a common phrase that is to be taken as “We’ve grown since (insert old year we’re referencing).” Sorry you didn’t catch onto that. I didn’t mean that as an insult to intelligence or anything.
You’ve shown that you want an echo chamber of people that agree with you, considering you haven’t even bothered to try to discuss anything with me. You’ve plugged your ears and repeated yourself over and over without actually offering anything of value (Aside from the aforementioned ‘alternatives’ that have been discussed and do not work). If you wish to continue YOUR underhanded tactics of ignoring every opposition and simply trying to force your opinion on everyone, feel free. I’m open to being swayed. But you have not even come close to budging me with your lack of knowledge and shoddy debating tactics.
Alright, I’ll take you by your word. If you really are open for discussion and about having your mind changed (a rare trait, but i’ll take my chance) let’s see what comes out.
I’d ask you to be at the very least respectful though, because if you are not i won’t bother to be either. I’ve seen where these kinds of discussions lead before and i’ve got no interest in that.
That said, i’ll take back my accusations for the sake of the discussion, and i’d ask you to do so as well so we can get somewhere with this.
Can you agree to that too?
I’ve already addressed this point in my response to you. I’ve not yet even on the #nochanges side of things seen anyone ask for having servers crashing for any period of time, or other hefty issues like that as they happened to some extent in 2004.
There are things that can’t be changed simply due to time, and it’s safe to say that even the purest of the purists don’t wish to receive a reenactment of 2004 on top of the recreation of the game. Those are 2 different things entirely.
What people do ask for, is to get a faithful recreation of the game, Vanilla, in Classic as much as it is possible in 2019. In order for that to be achieved, the games design has to be kept as authentic as possible.
One of those original design pillars of Vanilla was that the world is always just that one world where a set amount of players (3k~) “lived” in at the same time the moment they were online.
Layering will greatly damage that design pillar, as it creates multiple worlds interchangable at will by the players, or by the system where it deems it necessary. Which in turn creates many ripple effects that disrupt the original design that requires everyone to be stuck together in the same world the moment they are online.
There is no trade to begin with for me. I don’t want layering at all, because it’s a very bad deal for me as a player, and so it is also to everyone who wants to play the game currently being advertised as a faithful recreation of Vanilla.
Which it’s not going to be, due to layering changing the game fundamentally.
As in for the purpose of layering, a smooth launch is a desirable aspect of it, but not what it’s ultimately here to do.
Yes, it will make it smoother, reducing (not eliminating!) queues, and gameplay wise it will allow efficient levelers to layer fish right from the start (get an invite from a less populated layer to reduce mob competition) which will help escape the initial mass slaughter ob mobs in the starting areas.
Layering’s actual purpose however is to attempt to create healthy realm populations by the time it has to be removed.
It’s a system meant to damage control the loss of tourists (which Blizzard expects to be very high currently), by letting any given realm fill up way beyond it’s normal population (3k~) at launch and beyond, while still providing a technically playable game that is played on the same realm.
In order to do that, the system creates multiple worlds on a realm, each of which can hold a whole realm’s population.
To be able to filter out players who Blizzard expects to leave, the layers are dynamic, meaning they can automatically adjust to the population demands of a realm. It can create worlds and destroy them where needed. It will redistribute players each time they start a new play session (or even when active in one) to a layer that is currently appropriate for them to play in, given the current population demands.
The idea is, that eventually enough people will leave over the first few weeks and months, so that all the layers will collapse down to only 1 layer, as in, 1 normal healthy realm population. That however requires players to drop off a whole lot. Supposedly, if they don’t drop off enough by the time P2 comes out, and the layers have to collapse anyway, any overflow of players will become a queue as far as it’s know atm.
However, if you mean it’s necessary to have this system in place in order for the game to survive, i disagree.
Simply because this game has proven to hold it’s own in times with much less tech available to Blizzard, as have early expansions after it, regardless of the messy launches.
It’s been proven a smooth launch is not necessary for the games success and reception. Legion and BFA both had the smoothest launches ever, yet they are poorly received. Vanilla had a disastrous launch, TBC also had a messy one, yet both are 2 of the most successful iterations of WoW ever, beloved so much we get the same game 15 years later.
This is an approach that hasn’t been tried before, just like layering.
No one knows if it’s going to work. But one thing is clear, one of them (our suggested alternative(s)) may require more effort on Blizzards part, but still provides a relief to the tourist issue, while allowing the game to stay authentic (Blizzards highest goal) because the workings of this solution stay outside of the game altogether.
Additionally, even in case of emergency merges, the damage done to the community is vastly lower compared to layering, because communities already will have been able to form and play according to the games original design from the start (with the alternative).
Whereas with layering, since they will only release only a couple realms at the start, all of them will be packed sporting multiple layers for the first weeks (and in case of not failing, months even on high pop realms), not allowing communities to form according to how they’re supposed to given the games OG design, therefore disrupting the whole game experience in every aspect while not even allowing for people to have significant social impact because of the dynamic function of layering.
Also, in order for layering to work, it has to present itself in the game directly, and also heavily damage the foundational pillars of game design of WoW during it’s stay, to MAYBE allow for a healthy realm by the time it’s removed _(in order for that to happen, the game needs to fail enough to get excess people out quick enough to let players collapse down to 1.
If there’s too many people by the end, aka the game actually wins, then we’re back to square 1 to queues and server transfers)._
Layering doesn’t even fulfill a longterm sucess for realm health.
The moment it’s gone, Blizzards left with the same realm health tools again. For the whole rest of the game (2 years?) they’d have no layering.
Whereas if they had the alternative approach they’d even have longterm server health tools available in case of emergencies.
Is layering more efficient from a technical perspective? Oh yea. Absolutely. But it comes at a big, unacceptable price.
Which is massive changes to the games foundations for weeks and months in, at a time where Blizzard tries to convince people that it’s the same game they remember, or heard about. Meanwhile, there’s alternatives, or good old queues even, and their new ability to open servers very quickly if demand requires them to.
So no, layering is not a necessity. It’s a choice Blizzard has made atm, but it’s not required to make the game successful, as i mentioned earlier.
Absolutely. I do my best to offer the same respect I’m given. I hope for a good discussion between us.
I wasn’t saying they were. My intent of that point was to outline that I understood what you meant by people wanting the bad(Those bads being things like the designed imbalance of classes, the lack of QoL(that’s community breaking anyway), etc). That kinda stuff. I know no one wants to have crashing. However…
This is where the issues comes to be. These layers are supposed to take in a general servers’ population (Likely slightly less so as not to overload any one given layer). Meaning if there’s cause for layering, there will be nearly as many players still stuck in said world playing together. And the only way to leave is to be engaging with other players (Or resetting, in which case whoever was left on that layer won’t be of any concern. You probably don’t want to play with a layer hopper, and they very clearly did not want to play with anyone on that layer).
It was intended as a museum and to give an Vanilla-like experience. Not the direct quote, I’m sure. But they made it very clear that Classic =/= Vanilla. Similar, but not the same. And this is an important distinction:
These are not mutually exclusive things. One can exist with the other, and the intent is for both. Smooth launch (Yes, understanding that there will still be queues due to layer limits), as well as population mitigation down the road.
The layers/system itself will not redistribute people onto new layers for them. They will either log into a layer, or that layer becomes no longer necessary and they merge with the non-layered world. The only exception IS when a layer is going empty, in which case it pours back into the main layer. Not a great situation, but it’s far from the worst outcome. There will be non-zero chances of missing out on nodes(negligible) or a rarespawn(Very frustration, I’ll fully admit), but the benefits(That I’ll try to remember to go over at the end if needed) outweight the low chances of that.
As Blizzard has done in the past, they are most likely to open new servers. Offer free transfers to them from the others. Or offer transfers to the low pop servers that already exist post P1.
To survive, absolutely not. Layering isn’t needed for Classic to get off the ground. But it is, from what I can tell, the most efficient way to ensure the launch and early crowd shuffling is as smooth as possible. There are definitely other methods, but at this point in the chain, it’s too late to scrap layering and implement something from scratch. The discussion at this point should be tweaks to layering - anything possible that can mitigate layering’s negative effects.
Do note the differences in time and competition. In the years back yonder when I was but a wee … teen? Something like that. We didn’t have the tech, and thus it was expected that launches would suck. Launches continued to suck for many years after that. Legion and BFA launches were clean, but that has nothing to do with most players disliking them due to the content.
People miss the classic feel to games(Pun intended). If Blizz came out and said “The launch will be hell because we’re releasing it in as close of a condition to original as possible” the forums would either be rife with hate, or more players would jump on the “I won’t play until it’s stable” train, since they have other things they can do to fill the time. Speculation, but a pretty easy one considering the general entitled atmosphere of ‘gaming’ and ‘gamers’ nowadays.
I think the community damage of layering is incredibly overestimated. You’re talking thousands of people. And in the best of times, you’ll be in zones of 100+ people. I don’t know any sane person that can juggle all those people, make friends, track baddies, etc. Let alone if you tried to do it with people shoving past you cause they spent 2 hours in queue, crashed, had to spend another 3, and just caught up to your quest after rushing content. There will be no lack of community if you take the time to get to know the folks you’re helping. And if you don’t have the urge to do so in the moment, then it really didn’t matter, right?
I could be wrong, as I’m quoting third party at this point: Blizzard has never merged servers. They’ve connected some, where you still have your native server, but it perma CRZs with another. But that is not a suitable solution.
^Above to the community bit a lil ways up. Not trying to disregard, but better than I don’t messy my way through another para of it.
Tourists leaving is not a game failing. In this day in age, Classic is… a fine cheese. It’s made for some specific folks out there, but far from the masses. However, with the hype of the interweb, it’ll spread like wildfire. “Oh my gosh! This game was so good! You have to play it with me!” And so on and so on, but some of those players might just… hate it. It’s harder. Doesn’t hold your hand. Requires a lot of time commitment. It’s a game that will surge and (likely) fall. I’m no psychic, so I can’t say for sure. But I’d rather be prepared than not.
I may have missed a link to the alternative suggested, but I still don’t see a better way. Opening too many servers ends with dead servers (Either by players leaving, or others transferring to bigger servers.) Layering really isn’t that big of an issue (And I know that video is going around. Some exploits that need to be dealt with, of course, but that’s any game ever). Remember, they are beta testing. This isn’t early access. There are bugs. Issues. Things to tidy up. And as many have noted, there haven’t been any big patches to the client. They’re consolidating, is my best guess, to put the big changes in all together after private testing. Seeing players zip in and out of existence, as I have surely mentioned prior, were in the stress tests, where they were actively changing layering caps. The others in open world/non stress tests were likely players joining groups.
Okay, my stuff for a minute here. Layering is NOT as bad as people are making it out to be. It’s an exploitable system for minor gain(Remember that they still have to fight the other existing, populated layers to get tags on mobs/nodes/etc so it’s not like someone’s free to mosey around and collect everything) sure. There is a hint of missing community, but let’s be honest, no one can really tell the difference between 100 people in your quest zone/city and 300. (Obvious exceptions for mass events, but that’s not a big part of the gameplay experience). So with layering, you have better chances at healthy server sizes, a system that mitigates early queue times and crashes allowing more players to play in general, and the promise that it will be removed - to which, if it’s not, then Blizz will have a lot of angry players with flaming pitch forks).
Keep in mind, and this is important, the people supporting layering STILL DON’T LIKE IT. Most of us just understand it as a fair trade. Kinda sucky probably, but the alternatives generally suck more.
Improving on layering, however, would be greatly welcomed. There have been some neat ones, sure. And some that don’t work with the tech yet. But it’s a start. I think the most healthy thing for community and “purist”(Feels dirty having to label that term, but bleh) alike is to shift the discussion to bettering layering. Be it:
*Limitations on node interaction after shifting layers (Intentionally if possible?)
*Finding a way to actually limit it based on zones
*Disable the ability to move layers while in combat/recently been in combat(for the Wpvpers)
*Having layers based on levels(Likely disabled on RP realms or maybe this idea just sucks, but I’m trying here)
Things like those (I hope the formatting worked? Might have to edit to do it). Small changes that fix a lot of issues. But still allow for the mitigating properties of layering to avoid dead servers, CRZing servers, and queues/crashes.
For the most part, we’re stuck with layering. Yelling at Blizzard about it this late either won’t do anything or will force a more scuffed system since they don’t really have the time to put in a completely new system. It’s better to shift into trying to improve layering for the limited time we have it, and go from there. That’s my opinion, at least.
The possible Layer Hopping, ‘community issues’, and buggy nature of layering in the beta tests aren’t really enough to push me to wanting it outright removed. They can either be resolved, or are much smaller issues than they seem to be. Much better than having the first few months exist of multi-hour queues and frequent crashes.
The choice right now appears to be “Play a slightly less authentic version” or “Willingly accept a sloppy launch, queues, and crashes until enough people quit in frustration to stabilize”
Yes exactly. Layering isn’t some minor nuisance that we can just brush off until Classic actually comes and see how it is. It’s something that’s clearly bad and we need to be loud enough so Blizzard actually does something about it unlike BFA where not enough people spoke up during beta and we got stuck with awful class design and awful game design.
You were not seeing the finished product of layering. Seriously, do any of you grasp that this is beta and there’s bugs and they’re working on fixing things?
The point of the Beta is for us to give feedback. We’re giving feedback. Layering shouldn’t make it too Live the same way current retail class design shouldn’t of made it out of BFA Beta.
Considering the #nochanges, it’s definitely more for bug reporting and such. There’s no feedback to add when they’re not changing the gameplay. The testers are there to find the bugs, and test out the new layering tech. Which is still in active development.
Sadly, too many people are treating it like early access.
Yes. Exactly. Most of the game isn’t really being tested for content, just bugs, and even then most of those were already ironed out by patch 1.12 anyways. Literally the main system they’re testing in the beta is layering. We’re here saying it needs to go.
Get out of here with your logic and understanding. Don’t you know layering is antithetical to classic now off with you.
Seriously though, it’s coming. People should shift the convo to trying to better it rather than eliminate it. Also realize that even those who are accepting layering don’t like it we just understand its purpose and are “ok” with the trade off.
![:stuck_out_tongue:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/stuck_out_tongue.png?v=6" ":stuck_out_tongue:")
![:wink:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/wink.png?v=6" ":wink:")