"Players rarely argue for less convenience." - Ghostcrawler

[Barcasaur]

A small vocal minority has been complaining. The vast majority has not.

I'd call this the core player that you should balance around because the "vast majority" was still there in vanilla/bc and wrath pre-LFD anyway.

the game was so great before, and i started in the later part of BC =/

[Deficineiron]

Yep but guess what? BECAUSE they have to have all these different raid difficulties BECAUSE people who didn't raid complained about it they can't put out more non-raid content as easily, it isn't us raiders who want their cake and eat it too, it's casuals...........they want to raid but they don't want it difficult or to have to schedule time, so they got LFR, but they also want more 5 mans and non-raid content.

It seems to me casuals and bad players (different people) are hypocritical, they sit there and stereotype us as the ones doing all the bitching but it's them, they sit there and say we call them names but it's THEM who calls us all the names (Special snowflakes, no lifers, unemployed basement dwellers etc).



That's a lie, so many complain when they just get gold from LFR, they like to make it seem it isn't about epics but I GUARANTEE YOU if they dropped blues the casuals would complain and stop doing LFR.......look at scenarios.

actually, I think the entire 'make raids puggable' attitude that started with 3.0.2 was imposed from above. there is a blue post (chilton?) saying that naxx 3.0 wasn't tuned as hard as 'we' (blue) would have liked. Given how easy wotlk heroics were on release, how easy outdoor questing was, etc., I think they were told to make the entire game accessible to nearly the entire playerbase, and the way they did this was just by nerfing mob damage across the board. wotlk heroic trash damage appeared to not have numerically increased from tbc lvl 70 heroic levels, despite health pools almost doubling.

Accessibility was literally a mantra with kotick, there is an early 2009 interview with him where he talks about an ATVI game being released and goes into some detail on how they were making the game much more accessible to a larger group of people (potential customers). At the time I thought about how similar it was to how wotlk had been tuned - I think he told blizzard to go to that church (accessibility) too. (I know there is a cult movement here which thinks the atvi ceo doesn't have any ability to give broad market direction for their products to blizzard).

[Seefer]

vanilla and bc had content that remained challenging for 5-mans at max level throughout the expansion. bc heroics in particular would wipe t4/5 groups that screwed up. a few of them were just notoriously hard. once you are spending easily over a hour to clear a dungeon, you find your in-game time quickly taken up, especially if you are putting together a group partially or all pug.

wotlk of course, slowly bled western subs after the spike into q1 2009 (vivendi ceo comments, 12m worldwide), because while china/netease hit new highs and kept growing after q3 2009, the worldwide sub number remained static.

Ok but when Blizz made 5 mans "Challenging" the LFR liking crowd bitched..........so again, who's fault is it?

[Mammoon]

The small vocal minority has been complaining. The vast majority does not communicate with developers at all, but clearly these people who don't use the forums at all want more and more convenience. Ghostcrawler and people in this thread know this because.... uhhh.... they read minds? No, no, I mean... they read the signs!

Like this!

See, if a lot of players use the LFR feature that means they clearly enjoy doing so, it has nothing to do with any of the other perks like free gear... and uhh, people always seem to use their flying mounts over their ground mounts, so clearly they like convenience there to and don't ever want to use ground mounts again, has nothing to do with speed or anything like that, the silent majority just hates ground mounts... and players also enjoy to blow through 5 mans without even thinking, we know this cause the success rates of 5 mans are through the roof... all that stuff means the silent majority likes it, right?

[nekobaka]

I'd call this the core player that you should balance around because the "vast majority" was still there in vanilla/bc and wrath pre-LFD anyway.

the game was so great before, and i started in the later part of BC =/

There has been a lot of overturn, how many of that core are really left?

Ok but when Blizz made 5 mans "Challenging" the LFR liking crowd bitched..........so again, who's fault is it?

Random queue system + griefers = griefer heaven where players whose behavior would have kept them from groups otherwise. Things had to get nerfed and LFR get tuned and designed with griefers in mind so that they do not affect the majority.

[Deficineiron]

I think the only mistakes they're truly accepting now are something like: Removing ICC10N level of difficulty; not implementing new 5 man dungeons; Removing Skirmish Arenas; removing the normal level of difficulty for 5 mans. See the theme here? Removing content is the mistake they've been making, and it's pretty obvious why. By removing content, you remove that focus for those certain types of player, in effect removing their content, the things they enjoy. It's a gamble as to whether they'll find a new focus, or quit. Too many have clearly been quitting.

Iwould add many smaller things they have removed or made trivially easy -

1) special grinds with useful or attractive rewards - timbermaw exalted, frostsaber trainers, etc - the players who worked hard and long for these goals got things no one else had. blizzard made it MUCH faster so many more people could get them quickly. I would more generally add every reputation in classic - none of these were mandatory, and there are players who are attracted to grinds. is this good design in a game which wants to keep people busy paying subs monthly?
2) removing the exalted city rep req for mounts - this was done to enable an achievement, but going and getting all 4 other city mounts took what, 60 minutes? folks grinding out the runecloth spent weeks or months incrementally getting each city down. it kept people busy.
3) 10/25 lockout. STILL don't see the upside for blizzard here.
4) linear questing - some folks love it, but the rest find the replay value extremely limited.
5) leveling used to be a real time investment - avg sub might spend 6 months or more (RL) getting to max - paying a sub fee each month.
6) dungeon content going from being a 1-2+ hour attention-required event to a 20-minute aoe walkthrough, I mean all leveling dungeons.

- - - Updated - - -

Ok but when Blizz made 5 mans "Challenging" the LFR liking crowd bitched..........so again, who's fault is it?

blizzards. they set the bar very, very low from 3.0.2 on, and LFD simply made it IMPOSSIBLE to complete a heroic from that system. Hell, imagine having today's LFD system in 2.0? you would be lucky to kill the first boss in 10% of the heroics you zoned into.

you cannot combine brain-on, marked pull and cc content with LFD. I am sure many people inside blizzard saw this train wreck coming, but they went live with it anyway.

[Seefer]

Iwould add many smaller things they have removed or made trivially easy -

1) special grinds with useful or attractive rewards - timbermaw exalted, frostsaber trainers, etc - the players who worked hard and long for these goals got things no one else had. blizzard made it MUCH faster so many more people could get them quickly. I would more generally add every reputation in classic - none of these were mandatory, and there are players who are attracted to grinds. is this good design in a game which wants to keep people busy paying subs monthly?
2) removing the exalted city rep req for mounts - this was done to enable an achievement, but going and getting all 4 other city mounts took what, 60 minutes? folks grinding out the runecloth spent weeks or months incrementally getting each city down. it kept people busy.
3) 10/25 lockout. STILL don't see the upside for blizzard here.
4) linear questing - some folks love it, but the rest find the replay value extremely limited.
5) leveling used to be a real time investment - avg sub might spend 6 months or more (RL) getting to max - paying a sub fee each month.
6) dungeon content going from being a 1-2+ hour attention-required event to a 20-minute aoe walkthrough, I mean all leveling dungeons.

- - - Updated - - -



blizzards. they set the bar very, very low from 3.0.2 on, and LFD simply made it IMPOSSIBLE to complete a heroic from that system. Hell, imagine having today's LFD system in 2.0? you would be lucky to kill the first boss in 10% of the heroics you zoned into.

you cannot combine brain-on, marked pull and cc content with LFD.

I agree with all this, and the reason they removed it was for "Convenience" and "Accessibility"

[Dazzy]

This has to be the most infuriating tweet I have ever seen from Ghostcrawler

Either the community managers are doing an atrocious job, or the designers are pretending complaints don't exist

I mean, players have been complaining about WoW being more and more casual-friendly since WoTLK, complaining about its accessibility and convenience. This story really begins with the implementation of LFD towards the end of WOTLK, then flying mounts in cataclysm, and finally LFR. Dozens of LFR threads are made weekly, how come players rarely argue for less convenience?

A small portion of players have been complaining, and only the blizzard forums count. They probably don't even have half the subscribing population registered on the forums. Maybe half of that ever go to them, and probably 1/10th of those actually post.

In short, the whiners are a VERY small minority.

[Seefer]

A small portion of players have been complaining, and only the blizzard forums count. They probably don't even have half the subscribing population registered on the forums. Maybe half of that ever go to them, and probably 1/10th of those actually post.

In short, the whiners are a VERY small minority.

Yep and what about the ones who don't say shit and just leave? Are they a minority as well?

[metasine]

I generally dislike these kind of threads because people automatically assume that its a casual vs. hardcore debate, even though the definition of those two terms is so spongy.

To say that, "Players rarely argue for less convenience." I think is a bad misconception on behalf of CG and blizzard (if that is their idea of how the game should progress.) There are tangibles that have changed since vanilla, some of the most obvious being the 5 min paladin blessings and certain classes/specs that were useless for a long time, Retribution paladins in particular.

However, as many others I think in this thread have alluded to, "convenience" comes in many different forms, and none of us here seem to be able to define what features fall under what categories. It's not good to tie convenience to difficulty in wow because not everything that is easy is convenient and visa versa. It's better if we focus on convenience in relation to the easibility of getting into a certain system/activity and the time it takes to complete it.

I can't really argue in pvp terms because since 1.5 there has always been BG's and since 2.0, we've had arenas. Those are not long in the time it takes to do a single arena or bg. Getting the gear needed to accomplish said things is different, but this is a gear based mmo and we as players choosing to play a gear based mmo are privy to accepting certain things. But a basic set of pvp has never been too difficult to obtain since BC, and I don't think anyone here would argue that convenience in getting a basic set of pvp gear is bad for the game.

Most of the arguments I've read here are in pve as suspected, and I think we should ask ourselves as a community about where and when we want our convenience to happen. I don't disagree with CG when he says, or when other players argue in favor of some convenience. But you risk the core of your game when you extend said attitude to all aspects. Unfortunately, I feel as if the game as it currently stands is a bit too convenient when looking at the rate of progression. I am not arguing for making the game more difficult, that is a separate matter. But the rate of progression is so rapid now you can go from bare-bones to ~420 at such a high rate that it doesn't surprise me when I read that people are leveling their 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th alt and going through LFR because they have maxed on progression on their other characters.

The biggest draw to RPG's and MMO's is the a) social aspect and b) sense of progression (the journey) In both areas we've seen that wow has afforded us the opportunity to be less social when it comes to daily interaction with other people on our servers. And, the journey is much shorter now than it was in in Vanilla/BC/Wrath.

Honestly, I believe the best spot for an MMO such as wow draws from all expansions and styles. Off the top of my head I would say the: Sense of newness and raw emotion from vanilla, the progression style of BC, the story and environments from LK, the UI/Class refinements of Cata, and the secondary content (Tillers, Scenarios, Challenge Modes) from MOP. I guess in my perfect world wow would mostly draw from the Vanilla/BC/LK side. But just remember, convenience is appropriate if you apply it critically in the right areas, or else you risk washing out your game into blandness.

[Deleted]

Yep and what about the ones who don't say shit and just leave? Are they a minority as well?

This, 8 million times! Just because the majority doesn't come to the forums doesn't mean they have opposite views to those who complain vocaly. They too have their own oppionion on wow, be it that they are satisfied or unhappy with the game. There sure are players like myself, who are unhappy with some parts of the game, but content with others.

I don't understand how so many on here, and even GC, draw the conclusion that just because someone doesn't complain on a forum (most of them never heard of) they are happy with things like LFR or other stuff. But then again, you too are all minorities and therefor by your own perception not important.

[MrSerious]

A small vocal minority has been complaining. The vast majority has not.

No but the vast majority have been quitting the game, millions in fact. Not everyone takes time to complain - they just quit.

Only the passionate players complain because they hope their complaints might actually be listened to. Others just quit. If he is gauging the success of convenience on forum posters complaints then he needs to get a new job.

[Normie]

I don't understand how so many on here, and even GC, draw the conclusion that just because someone doesn't complain on a forum (most of them never heard of) they are happy with things like LFR or other stuff. But then again, you too are all minorities and therefor by your own perception not important.

How exactly do you draw your conclusion about what conclusions GC is drawing?

[Schroedinger]

There is only one type of real feedback, it is the wallet one. You can say, write, tweet or sing whatever you want, the only time any company changes things is when the money flow stops. So if you are not happy with the game, or want a dramatic change, unsubscribe, as each time you pay your fee, you say "Good job, Greg, please do continue."

[Seefer]

How exactly do you draw your conclusion about what conclusions GC is drawing?

The direction of the game for starters, his tweets and articles on the WoW website for another.

[Normie]

The direction of the game for starters, his tweets and articles on the WoW website for another.

But he's not responsible for any of that other than his tweets.

[Budong]

Why would anyone aside from a masochist argue for LESS convenience? Do you force yourself to sleep on the ground, take only cold showers and eat uncooked food you have to scrape off the road everyday? Do you routinely open your window and scream into the night "I'm as mad as hell and I'm not gonna take this electricity anymore!" ?

[Deleted]

They don't seem to understand the difference between what we say we want, and what we actually need.

[Deleted]

But he's not responsible for any of that other than his tweets.

Did you just write that GC ist not responsible for the direction of the game? If so, no point in argueing with you anymore. You've perfectly disqualified yourself.

[Omega10]

"Only the passionate players complain"

False. Many of us passionate people take the time to praise Blizzard for what they have done, defend Blizzard when we feel they are unfairly attacked, and to thank Blizzard for putting out such a high quality game.

I guess you could argue that, since you write say 100 posts talking about how much you detest Blizzard, and that I write only say 10 posts defending/praising Blizzard, that your hatred of Blizzard counts 10 times as much as my love for Blizzard. You could argue it, but it doesn't make it true.