If you’ve watched the discourse on delves and now follower dungeons, there’s this strain of commentary, you know you’ve seen it, where some schmoe throws in something to the tune of “This is an MMORPG! Why do we need AI dungeon pals? Who is this for? Those people should play solo RPGs!”
I hate (not really) to tell y’all, but this translates in my head every time as “hang on, this is an MMORPG and THE COMMUNITY should get to gatekeep people! Soloization robs us of that! O NOES!”
It is in the game’s best interest to take that “power” away from everyone who demands it because, news flash, no one is paying the community for entertainment. They’re paying Blizzard, one account at a time (unless they’re multi boxing).
WoW will benefit on so many fronts from follower dungeons and delves, ESPECIALLY if The War Within offers follower dungeons for its new normal mode dungeons at launch or shortly after, following up on Dragonflight and its follower dungeons being presumably extended to run from level 10-70 (as dragonflight replaces BFA as “the default leveling experience”), when the War Within takes over from 70-80. A pipeline that goes from a follower dungeon leveling game to a Delve-powered endgame will be the best thing to happen to this community that literally hates each other, for years hating by design, and have created crazy levels of gatekeeping that are toxic and counter to growth.
Every time someone says any variation on “this is an MMO, you shouldn’t be able to play alone,” what they’re truly saying is “you should need the community, and by community I mean me, as in I should get to control your access to content!” … And, no. That’s… that’s not how a subscription service game should work.
Play with your friends! The PVE content for groups isn’t going anywhere! Heck it’s being extended to include groups as small as TWO players! No one’s taking away Mythic Plus or raids, they’re just providing options that, yeah, I imagine some people will migrate from M+ PUGing to do so, but so what? No one who truly doesn’t want to be there should be in PUG content, and I don’t know about y’all, but I will gladly, GLADLY turn down my target item level goals if it means the hassle of dealing with divergent standards of playstyle and ettiquette among “the community” goes away!
Hell, imagine this: Damage meters will become far less relevant when people just… hang with NPCs! That’s a good thing! Damage meters bring toxicity!
Anyway, that’s my rant pointing fingers at the “all the socialization is bleeding out” crowd, because no it’s not, it’s being given an escape valve into a place where “socialization” (often a dogwhistle for gatekeeping) has no power any more, and that’s a good thing!
Play with friends, or play alone. The 3rd option (while still present) isn’t a mandatory pilar of the modern gaming internet, which is a cesspool and no longer novel.
Every WoW player owning the time they buy is a wonderful net gain for the game in general, objectively.
