World of Warcraft's SOD's decline is attributed not only to the developers but also to the player base

WoW Classic Season of Discovery
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Toxic Player Bans
Banning players for being “toxic” is a divisive issue. While toxic behavior can be unpleasant, these players represent a portion of the player base that contributes to overall activity. Tools like blocking or muting already exist to help players manage their experience, so outright bans might not always be the best solution.

GDKP Bans
The decision to ban GDKP (Gold-DKP) runs has sparked significant debate. Critics often tell GDKP players to “go play a mobile game,” dismissing the fact that mobile games now dominate much of the gaming market. Moreover, banning GDKP hasn’t effectively addressed gold buying. Many top guilds still purchase gold to keep up with the costs of consumables, highlighting the ongoing economic pressures within the game. The older player base, now balancing real-world responsibilities, also finds it harder to invest time in a game that feels slower compared to modern alternatives. The GDKP ban likely alienated a portion of the community, contributing to the loss of players.

Bot Bans
The lack of proactive bot banning is another glaring issue. If developers had employed active Game Masters (GMs) dedicated to identifying and banning botters, the problem could have been mitigated. Imagine Blizzard hiring even five remote players per server to actively monitor botting behavior. A system where the server is notified in real-time when a bot is banned could energize the player base, showing that the developers are serious about tackling the problem. Unfortunately, this approach wasn’t taken, leaving the issue to grow unchecked.

PvP Issues
PvP has its own share of challenges. Battlegrounds feel stagnant, with only a few classes—Shaman, Druid, Priest, and Paladin—dominating. Many other classes haven’t received balance updates for weeks or even months. Arathi Basin remains the most rewarding battleground for honor, while others are neglected unless it’s Alterac Valley weekend. Queue times are another frustration: Alliance players enjoy 2-minute queues, while Horde players face waits of 25-40 minutes, often just to enter a premade match that ends in defeat.

Lack of Classic-Style Lore Content
One of the greatest missed opportunities is the lack of “from-scratch” content inspired by pre-TBC lore. Classic areas like Grim Batol, the Emerald Dream, Uldaman, and others could have been reimagined and expanded in a way that stayed true to the original game’s spirit. Instead, these zones were later released in a different form, missing the “classic” essence that fans hoped for. Adding such content could have revitalized interest in the game while honoring its roots.

These are all some examples but hey I could just be “crying”.

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Blizzard needs to be more transperant with their ban reasons and should actually pull up the evidence that they apparently got for bans on that end.
It is after all a players right to review that and I have seen cases personally where Blizzard and other parties denied those requests in the past.

It is not what people have said against GDKPs, an issue is the toxicity coming from the players that participate in those GDKP runs and how backhanded they are in certain aspects. May it be:

  • not disenchanting items that were given to them and giving it to their friends without pay
  • unreasonable lootbans
  • scamming people in general if they pre-bought a legendary and do not get it done (Firelands Staff/Atiesh)

Realistically it is a system by scammers and toxic clowns to be degenerate on servers which allow it. There’s no good community coming from that and people who want it to be legal are those who abuse it.

I have honestly given up on that because Blizz makes money from those illegal bots and they cannot be arsed to implement anything that hinders them. There are also players actually defending Blizzards inactions against those which is just mentally insane. Purge both the employees and players who are pro-bot.

Paladin is a joke compared to Shaman, Druids, Priests and Hunters. Horde racials are just another thing ontop.

Even if AV is the BG weekend, I hardly see queues popping in AV that is if any at all. And I am sick of AB, it is a bad BG.

Horde Racials are to blame here, and they need to be tuned towards the WoTLK version if pally bubble got nerfed into WoTLK, those racials can be nerfed to that as well.

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Only for edgelords that enjoy being toxic.

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-the ban on gdkp was a huge win. the argument you presented is literally people left the game because they weren’t allowed to cheat in an attempt to minimize their time investment in the game. it’s such a stupid argument I’m tempted to report for spam. like if you are going to gaslight gdkp at least making a compelling argument. 0/10

-bots are rampant in every ver of the game no evidence it specifically contributed to SOD population decline one way or the other.

-the lack of focus on pvp could be a legitimate reason for some to have left

-the development cycle doesn’t allow for a ton of massive revamps of zones the devs made quite a few changes given the timeframe.

what led to the decline in players base
p1-p2 tourist players leaving which is normal churn

P3 combination of incursions drastically increasing xp and gold gain essentially removing the classic experience, a boring and lengthy raid, shared player base with cata, and the devs basically abandoning sod for several weeks.

Post BWL churn…literally happens in every iteration classic be it era, SoM, or private servers. raid logging stale content just isnt worth the time investment for a lot of people.

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I ask you this: Who truly benefits from this? It’s certainly not the player base, as that’s already evident. Let me also ask: When, in the history of gaming, has buying items with in-game gold been considered “cheating”? The answer is simple—never. Purchasing reputation gear from a vendor, for example, is not cheating.

What is cheating, however, is buying gold from third-party sellers. The real issue lies with those who purchase gold, not with players who spend the gold they’ve earned legitimately to acquire items. This has always been the case.

The root cause of the problem is the gold buyers. Botters only exist because their operations remain profitable due to these buyers. If there were no demand for third-party gold, botting wouldn’t be nearly as rampant.

The solution is not to punish legitimate players or restrict how they can use their hard-earned gold. Instead, there needs to be severe consequences for gold buyers. The focus should shift to addressing the actual issue—those enabling the system by purchasing gold—not penalizing players who utilize gold they’ve earned through legitimate means.

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This is just false. Just because people are lazy to learn their classes, dosen’t mean these classes are OP. Druids especially are not OP since they only received the tools they need to do their job viably instead of being a complete trainwreck in vanilla.

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My melee swing timer 3.7 seconds hits for 500 crit but starfire hits 3,5k Not OP i get it

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  1. they arent buying it with in game gold they are buying with botted gold.

“The older player base, now balancing real-world responsibilities, also finds it harder to invest time in a game”

where is the initial gold coming from if they arent investing their time into the game farming it? they arent gdkp carries if they dont have gear and a gdkp leader isnt going to invite someone who neither has the ability to carry nor the gold to purchase.

  1. If youre purchasing a BOP item that is intended to be earned you are cheating. the whole system promotes the carries raid logging and the people being carried to not improve at the game. why get better at the game when you can open your wallet. its a net negative on the entire game.

  2. banning gdkp only punishes the RMTers and Botters by denying them a revenue stream. Regular legitimate players can join a guild or do traditional pugging and earn the gear through time investment and personal skill. the only thing that changes is the decrease in commodification of BOP items.

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gdkp = good game, easy pug life and we keep playing
No gdkp = bad game, loser LC ‘s, degen raid leaders and we quit playing

Compel me bro

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lol

Go back to era, cata, or retail if you’re so desperate to swipe credit card for purple pixels

Good news, there’s a game for people who don’t have time to play, it’s called “retail”.

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Pretty much every MMO. Buying in-game currency for real money and then using that in-game currency to buy power upgrades is always considered, at the very least, cheapskating your way through the game, if not outright cheating since the TOS usually does not permit the sale of in-game currency for real money.

At the end of the day, you’re swiping credit card for an in-game advantage that the developer did not intend or design around.

And GDKPs are always going to be fueled by gold bought from third-party sellers, there’s no getting around that. Expecting all GDKP gold to be legally-acquired is insane and will never happen.

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Just look at the anniversary servers. Not even a month and there is a lot of gold going around. lol

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it never stopped gold buying now they just buy consumes and epics off the AH lol

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The epics from the ah compare nothing to let’s say full tier 2.5? Or idk, how’s that Krol blade from the ah holding up? Don’t say but but professions. You can’t get a full set of aq40 equivalent gear by “buying epics from the ah”

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ok

i rather you quit then have gdkp be a thing.

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Calling pug raid leaders degens

What does that make gdkp raid leaders? When their literal life depends on making gold

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Sucks a war can only slow walk to targets and white hit melee. With no other attacks or abilitys and things to adjust dmg and or attack speeds. You guys should really have something else to offset that one attack every 3.7sec

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You dont have to swipe to gdkp. Ive always enjoyed them in versions that had and at start of sod. The ban of gdkp just means the 3 chars I leveled and played in them I no longer did. I have always had 2 guild chars i raid with and others I would use in gkps. Played game since vanilla day one never had the need to buy gold. Played GDKP in real TBC not classic remake. Also been in plenty of gdkps where not a single person had brought gold since every item would only go for the min. Been in some where ya no doubt items went so high had to be a gold buyer. If you dont like them dont do them but bannning them didnt help your game or morals any. Bots still happen Gold buying still happens Just less players over all doing gdkp. Mostly it hurt the alt market nothing else.

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Most people that actually enjoy the game are running around with more alts than ever. Only the people that feel they had to be “paid” for their time are upset.

There’s a reason blizzard banned it for anniversary realms, and it’s not because it didn’t work.

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Lol at #1

I have no sympathy for toxic players getting banned, especially the ones who start talking a bunch of !&#% and blowing up your whispers for dumb reasons like asking them to play objectives in BGs or losing a duel in front of Orgrimmar. No sympathy whatsoever for those clowns. I don’t care if you can just simply use /ignore, if you’re gonna act like a 12 year old don’t be surprised if you get treated like one.