Originally Posted by
UnifiedDivide
You guys can link all the pointless graphs you like. Fact is, I still have plenty of community in spite of all the convenience they've added.
Why? I have a guild.
While many of you won't really admit it, that's where real community has always been.
If you actually want a community, try talking to people. There seems to be some misconception that the only replies you'll ever get are "SHUT UP FUCKWAD ITS A GAME!1" or something similar. The truth? Very few people will actually react this way. Most people will engage in friendly chit chat. The problem is the people QQing about community not actually doing anything to help foster it. Rather than make forum posts about it, why not actually play the game and talk to people outside of your guild for a change? Trust me, it works wonder.
Why else do I get both? Keep reading...
LFR? Didn't ruin anything. Quite easily, I manage to talk with and engage with the people in any LFR group I'm in. At most, 9 out of every 10 groups might be a nightmare. Not the ridiculous amount people on this forum make out. Because, you know, if one group is bad, they all are! >_>
LFD? Same thing. I talk to people. The only change I'd make is to have it prioritise people on your server before looking at others when grouping.
Flying? Improved my immersion. Fantasy game... flying on a dragon... yeah, real immersion breaker. I'm a Vanilla player and I still use my ground mounts, love them even. But there is nothing about flying that ruins the game for me. Telling me it breaks my immersion is the stupidest reason you can ever give. I dare you to prove it doesn't.
You can't fly until max level so I also fail to see how it ruins the questing experience. How can people kill the mob, fly up, land on the next one and repeat if they can't fly while questing, anyway? >_>
Make ground mounts more attractive and maybe people will actually use them willingly without having to force them into doing it. Whenever you have to design your game so that you're forcing players to do something they dislike, you're failing as a designer by removing options.
As for the casual argument, I spent the first 5 months of WoW going live by taking the piss out of it's players while I was playing EQ. Why? Because it was piss easy in comparison. Saying WoW was ever hard is a joke. Has it gotten even easier since release? Of course it has. It had to. Would Blizzard be happy with only having, let's say, 2 million subs that were active and always consistant? Who would? lol The problem their is that their investors and such have seen the massive number of people the game could bring in and now assume it should always be that high. So, Blizzard have to try get as many people playing as possible. There is also the FACT that if they actually started merging servers in the traditional sense, idiots on forums like this would declare the end of WoW all the more. It's negative publicity.
The game has always been a casual one and it always will be. You simply can't argue with that.