And here we go... Class Order Missions being fleshed out

[sykoex]

Is it sad that theyre recycling garrisons after the poor feedback or a sign that blizz just doesnt care anymore?

I mean when you cant even bother to improve the system, whats the point? Obviously time w/ the mission timers, being semi required, easy to make and...ok, fine, they just dont care anymore, happy?

Not everyone hates missions and followers. Remember WoD had millions of subscribers throughout its run. Blizzard is appealing to their main customer base who enjoys WoD and they're working towards attracting more gamers who enjoy that kind of gameplay. If you ask me it's smart business practice to listen to the people who like your product and give them more of what they want.

[Verdugo]

Remember WoD had millions of subscribers throughout its run.

It LOST milions of subscribers after a first year.

[sykoex]

It LOST milions of subscribers after a first year.

I don't know why you bring that up. WoW still has millions of subscribers and blizzard is focusing on catering to those people who have stuck with the game and are enjoying themselves.

[Verdugo]

I don't know why you bring that up. WoW still has millions of subscribers and blizzard is focusing on catering to those people who have stuck with the game and are enjoying themselves.

So you thing completely changing your gameplay model (that was popular for 10 million people) so that only quarter of that can enjoy it is good?

[Darkeon]

I don't know why you bring that up. WoW still has millions of subscribers and blizzard is focusing on catering to those people who have stuck with the game and are enjoying themselves.

Please, do start a serious business. I'm sure it will be most delightful to watch you run stuff.

[sykoex]

So you thing completely changing your gameplay model (that was popular for 10 million people) so that only quarter of that can enjoy it is good?

Oh wow so you want them to go back to what they did years ago? The old gameplay model was popular to those 10 million people years ago. Now it's 2016 and they have to do something new otherwise the playerbase would be bored to death. If they listened to the haters and reverted everything to the way it was during wrath they'd attract only the small fraction of wrath players who aren't yet bored of that formula. They wouldn't attract any players who want something fresh and modern.

[slime]

Oh wow so you want them to go back to what they did years ago? The old gameplay model was popular to those 10 million people years ago. Now it's 2016 and they have to do something new otherwise the playerbase would be bored to death. If they listened to the haters and reverted everything to the way it was during wrath they'd attract only the small fraction of wrath players who aren't yet bored of that formula. They wouldn't attract any players who want something fresh and modern.

Fresh and modern = garrisons.

[Roar-Powah]

Did you have the same feelings towards garrisons the last year prior when it was pretty evident it was not going to change?

I haven't played much of WoD at all, i stopped playing WoD for a long time once i completed Highmaul heroic due to not liking the raids in WoD and how garrisons where going as well. Now going into Legion we will have pretty much the same crappy follower system that adds a UI element to the game that doesn't belong in it. Quest / daily hubs are a better choice as well as having you own world map pointing to objectives just like Diablo 3 has with the bounty system. This facebook game is lazy design from Blizzard, but it goes without saying i think there is more to it than just Blizzard ignoring it.

Mission development probably went like this:

I think you have hit the nail on the head here, I might try Legion out or i might wait and see how much this follower system gates the world content in WoW before buying. If Blizzard puts any of the Garrions / CH / follower systems into the expansion after Legion i will walk away from WoW for good. For now with Legion I'm very cautious since you cannot trust one word that comes out of any one mouth that works at Blizzard.

- - - Updated - - -

Not everyone hates missions and followers. Remember WoD had millions of subscribers throughout its run. Blizzard is appealing to their main customer base who enjoys WoD and they're working towards attracting more gamers who enjoy that kind of game play. If you ask me it's smart business practice to listen to the people who like your product and give them more of what they want.

You will find that the only reason people liked the Garrison and it's mini game of followers was because you could make a ton of gold by doing nothing, take all this away and you will find no one liked it at all. WoW lost millions of subs because of the Garrison as it bought nothing to the game except sit in your garrison and do nothing, appealing to a hand full of people isn't going to keep the lights on over at WoW. You would be very foolish to think attracting people to this kind of game play is good in a MMO, people play MMO for a lot of reasons and WoD didn't have one bit of the MMO soul in it.

- - - Updated - - -

Oh wow so you want them to go back to what they did years ago? The old gameplay model was popular to those 10 million people years ago. Now it's 2016 and they have to do something new otherwise the player base would be bored to death. If they listened to the haters and reverted everything to the way it was during wrath they'd attract only the small fraction of wrath players who aren't yet bored of that formula. They wouldn't attract any players who want something fresh and modern.

WoD was hyped on the same thing, the old days and the old characters of lore etc and you saw a spike in sub numbers. Then people came to understand it was all smoke and mirrors and that all you got was a facebook game with a WoW coat of paint on it.

[Rivin]

You will find that the only reason people liked the Garrison and it's mini game of followers was because you could make a ton of gold by doing nothing, take all this away and you will find no one liked it at all.

Not true. I really enjoyed garrison missions early in WoD, before they had any decent rewards attached to them. I even refused to use Master Plan for a long time because it was more enjoyable to set them up myself. Eventually, yes, they became tiresome (because they were the only non-raid content the game had) and at this point I only care for the rewards, and I probably won't enjoy the Legion version either, but they were plenty of fun for a while.

[Caliph]

Mission development probably went like this:

1. Wrath is current content. Cata is being worked on in secret. On the drawing board is MoP. At some point, someone comes up with an idea for Sunsong Ranch at this time and it goes on the MoP whiteboard.
2. Cata is released. MoP is starting to get serious work in secret. Sunsong Ranch gets fleshed out as a way to build up a plot of land. WoD goes on the drawing board, and someone expands on the idea of Sunsong Ranch to possibly use it as a form of player housing instead of a plot of land.
3. MoP is released. Blizzard gets a lot of positive feedback regarding Sunsong Ranch. WoD is now getting serious work in secret. Because of the positive feedback of Sunsong Ranch, they decide to flesh out the idea and go beyond player housing in WoD and add garrisons with gathering profs, missions and legendaries and shipyards to it. At this time, Legion goes on the white board. Class halls as a new twist on garrisons is one of the first things added.
4. WoD is released. At first, there isn't a lot of complaints about garrisons because not a lot of people have really taken it very far. Legion is now getting more focus in secret. They plan out class halls as integral to player development, establish that halls will be in various places in the world, try new missions. The xpac after Legion goes on the whiteboard and likely adds some sort of class hall theme as well.

5. At this point, we start to see very negative feedback coming in regarding garrisons. But too many big wheels are turning for Legion. Class halls are likely core to Legion gameplay already. At best, they might be able to lessen the importance of class halls but not rip it out entirely or it would delay Legion. The xpac after Legion might get a serious revision at this time to remove most/all of the garrison theme.

So very bad feedback on garrisons might impact the game 2 xpacs from now, but not Legion.

I might be able to buy all that but for the simple fact that i don't believe they plan 2 expacks ahead. I think they're dumb and have some stories they want told, albeit badly, and they plan stuff around them.

in short, i blieve they're incompetent and arrogant.

[Cæli]

WAAAAAAAAAAH blizzard is making me do stuff in a game, WELL ATLEAST THAT'S WHAT I THINK, NOT WHAT I KNOW!

Seriously chill.

I think most peoples problems with garrisons are being addressed, we aren't going to log in, do class order hall stuff, then log out.

We're going to log in, do class order hall stuff, get a mission from them, go do the missions + adventure/daily stuff, come back and see if anything update, and get the rewards from the missions that offer them, and then get another mission from it to go out and do stuff.

Big difference.

I also think this fits here - A tier of rewards of sort from the mission hall.

Is that the reintroduction of the iconic old talent tree backgrounds that I've just seen ? :D Feral druid in that case

[Lei]

Hm. This is fascinating, in a way.... The garrison backlash happened pretty soon in WoD. Around 6.1. And they ALREADY played this "we didn't have time to change things" excusecard when we got the shipyards. So no, I don't buy that they didn't have time to do something cool with the Class order halls that is not a garrison 2.0 thing.
With that being said I'm already sick of the garrisons, if I have to start over from collecting through leveling and gearing (10% faster missions boots?) and do it for an another entire expansion (~2 years) I rather hang myself. :/

[Maudib]

I have almost 12 years of experience playing since closed beta. I have no issues with Garrisons other than it took us out of the world. Order Halls will not be like Garrisons with the town building and professions tied into them. Sure yo may need to do some OH activity for artifact progression but there is so much more in the world to do and most of the OH missions send you out into the world to do stuff. So while there may be some similarities, there is too much the sky is falling hyperbole.

"Most of the OH missions send you out in the world"

Lol. No, no they do not. Quit spreading misinformation.

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Oh wow so you want them to go back to what they did years ago? The old gameplay model was popular to those 10 million people years ago. Now it's 2016 and they have to do something new otherwise the playerbase would be bored to death. If they listened to the haters and reverted everything to the way it was during wrath they'd attract only the small fraction of wrath players who aren't yet bored of that formula. They wouldn't attract any players who want something fresh and modern.

10 Million people came back to WoW looking for a return to the BC/Wrath gameplay... they got garrison missions. They quit and now we have a projected less than 3 million players.

Yeah.. we NEED to back to the gameplay that is so addictive and enjoyable despite how many years it has on it. CLEARLY all the innovative CRAP Blizzard is bringing is garbage.

[Yunzi]

Hm. This is fascinating, in a way.... The garrison backlash happened pretty soon in WoD. Around 6.1. And they ALREADY played this "we didn't have time to change things" excusecard when we got the shipyards. So no, I don't buy that they didn't have time to do something cool with the Class order halls that is not a garrison 2.0 thing.
With that being said I'm already sick of the garrisons, if I have to start over from collecting through leveling and gearing (10% faster missions boots?) and do it for an another entire expansion (~2 years) I rather hang myself. :/

I think the answer is a bit more nuanced. Blizzard is a very conservative, corporate, profit-maximizing game company. What they do as a "creative" enterprise is to let another developer build a genre, like Magic: The Gathering did for collectible card games, League of Legends did for MOBAs, Counterstrike/Team Fortress 2 did for online FPSes, Ultima Online/Everquest did for fantasy MMOs, and then step in to cash in with their own highly polished popularized version - Hearthstone, Heroes of the Storm, Overwatch, and World of Warcraft, respectively.

We can "blame" this corporate strategy on World of Warcraft - neither Warcraft: Orcs vs Humans, Diablo, nor Starcraft followed this model. It was the tremendous success of World of Warcraft that solidified Blizzard's new strategy that continues to this very day.

They certainly had *time* to change things, but in a behemoth of a game company which sets out to do what they think will maximize profits change is like moving a mountain. They are the farthest thing from the "nimble indie developer" possible.