Ion Hazzikostas on leveling and pristine servers

[Ornerybear]

if they slow down leveling by 25% but they add the level scaling and allow me to level wherever i want, I would enjoy leveling a lot more than i do now, and I still enjoy it now, but if i run dungeons I sooner reach a zone, than i'm leaving it, which i guess is good for getting flight paths but not much else.

[procne]

As far as I'm concerned, Ion nailed what was wrong with leveling right now and he very strongly alluded to what would be my ideal fix. Here's the breakdown of what I believe he's suggesting they'll do:

* Deploy the scaling tech to all of the leveling regions (i.e. all Vanilla mobs/quests scale from 1-60, all BC mobs/quests scale from 58-70, etc.)
* Tune mobs so that they take 10-15 seconds to kill instead of being instagibbed
* Bring heirlooms more in line with drops so that heirlooms are consistently maybe 20% better rather than the 200% better that they currently are at low levels (up past 60 or 70 the difference stops being so large)

As far as I'm concerned this completely covers it. This gives them the flexibility to tune experience gain so that the game can be more challenging without also taking additional time, and more importantly, gives them the room they'll need in the future to further speed up the experience curve without breaking anything. I would absolutely love to be able to do 1-20 in Elwynn Forest, 20-40 in Red Ridge, and 40-60 in Eastern Plaguelands, or any other progression like that. I would love to be able to do things like start (and probably) end my Pandaria experience in the Dread Wastes; how often does anybody touch that zone anymore? Right now you out-level all of Pandaria before you've even finished the Jade Forest.

To me it completely nullifies the idea of leveling. If enemies everywhere are of the same strength as yours then just scrap leveling and player levels completely and just let everyone quest wherever they want, with the exact same difficulty.

To me the point of leveling was that you start weak, grow stronger over time and overcome obstacles which were too difficult at first.

[Krom2040]

To me it completely nullifies the idea of leveling. If enemies everywhere are of the same strength as yours then just scrap leveling and player levels completely and just let everyone quest wherever they want, with the exact same difficulty.

To me the point of leveling was that you start weak, grow stronger over time and overcome obstacles which were too difficult at first.

To say it "nullifies leveling" is a huge oversimplification. Levels have important ramifications even if outdoor leveling quests and monsters scale. Here are a few of the reasons for leveling:

1) Players continue to gain skills and talents over time, starting with a fairly simple experience and growing into something more complex as they become more familiar with the game.
2) Not all monsters and quests are scaled, as max-level quests and areas would typically still be at a fixed level (although for content that's effectively "obsolete", like for example Apexis quests in the Western edge of Blade's Edge in Burning Crusade, it probably makes sense to throw those into the scaling pool as well).
3) A lot of old legacy content still needs to be stratified, like specifically Molten Core should still be much much easier than Dragonsoul, and the target levels for those help to accomplish that.
4) A lot of gear and items still have target levels that differentiate them as being designed for old content vs. new content.

The list goes on, but those are some major ones.

It's the easiest thing in the world to write off scaling as "I don't like this so it's bad" without offering any other sensible alternatives, but it solves a lot of problems. It lets people experience the leveling content basically as it was designed to be played without burdening them with stuff that gets obsolete very quickly, it lets players group together and still have fun, it lets the game designers play around with the experience curve without also worrying about the problems associated with content obsolescence, and so on.

This is a good solution. It maintains the essential character of all of the different expansions while smoothing over a lot of the huge inconveniences we currently deal with.

[JustRob]

I'd rather they just scaled Outland and Northrend, I'd be worried that the old world (our home) would lose some of it's connection or value if you couldn't associate zones with danger level. What I mean is, if I am level 14 I wouldn't attempt to run through Arathi Highlands without being killed, therefore there's a some sense of progression.
Obviously I might be completely wrong.

I actually went through the Arathi Highlands on a level 1 human not too long ago, didn't die a single time. With the chauffeured chopper mount you can outrun any mob you aggro. I only died when entering Hillsbrad because there's Horde NPC's there.

[Foj]

Every time I see the bolded genius argument, I just know that whoever I'm talking to is (to appease to MMO-C forum rules) less than intelligent.

The more annoying leveling is, the more likely you are to buy a boost just to avoid it. Leveling should be fun - it being slow does not necessarily mean it is.

You have numerous options, only one of which involves paying for a boost.

* Level however you level.
* RaF + heirlooms
* 300% potions + heirlooms
* Use a free L100 boost
* Use a free L90 boost
* Buy a boost
* Quit WoW because there are too many options

[rda]

You have numerous options, only one of which involves paying for a boost.

* Level however you level.
* RaF + heirlooms
* 300% potions + heirlooms
* Use a free L100 boost
* Use a free L90 boost
* Buy a boost
* Quit WoW because there are too many options

Four of the options involve paying money (you pay for your "free" boost in increased expansion price), one (last) is a non-option, one requires grinding either potions of gold for tons of time, defeating the purpose of saving time during leveling, and the remaining option (first) is slow.

What a list, ROFL. :-)

[Segus1992]

You have numerous options, only one of which involves paying for a boost.

* Level however you level.
* RaF + heirlooms
* 300% potions + heirlooms
* Use a free L100 boost
* Use a free L90 boost
* Buy a boost
* Quit WoW because there are too many options

You seem like you've missed the point where this entire thread is about WoW devs talking about making leveling slower. Now I'm sure you're not great at math, but that'll mean it's slower with RAF or heirlooms as well.

Oh, and let's not pretend like free boosts exist. You get one when you buy the game, which cost extra because of it, so unless you're suggesting people buy the game again to get a "free" boost, there's no free boosts.

In other words, the only option that DOESN'T inconvenience people if the intention with the change is just to make leveling slower (and not more fun) is buying a boost.

Do you get the original super simple comment yet?

[procne]

To say it "nullifies leveling" is a huge oversimplification. Levels have important ramifications even if outdoor leveling quests and monsters scale. Here are a few of the reasons for leveling:

1) Players continue to gain skills and talents over time, starting with a fairly simple experience and growing into something more complex as they become more familiar with the game.
2) Not all monsters and quests are scaled, as max-level quests and areas would typically still be at a fixed level (although for content that's effectively "obsolete", like for example Apexis quests in the Western edge of Blade's Edge in Burning Crusade, it probably makes sense to throw those into the scaling pool as well).
3) A lot of old legacy content still needs to be stratified, like specifically Molten Core should still be much much easier than Dragonsoul, and the target levels for those help to accomplish that.
4) A lot of gear and items still have target levels that differentiate them as being designed for old content vs. new content.

Only 1) relates to leveling

It's the easiest thing in the world to write off scaling as "I don't like this so it's bad" without offering any other sensible alternatives, but it solves a lot of problems. It lets people experience the leveling content basically as it was designed to be played without burdening them with stuff that gets obsolete very quickly, it lets players group together and still have fun, it lets the game designers play around with the experience curve without also worrying about the problems associated with content obsolescence, and so on.

I'm writing it off as "it's not fun for me". I'm not saying it's objectively "bad". It would still kill the main point of leveling for me. I wouldn't see myself growing stronger (except for some abstract number which no longer has any real meaning), as enemies would all the time be equally strong.

Sure it would solve many problems and I can give even more examples for that - devs could remove stat growth completely and wouldn't have to worry about balancing issues at different levels. This, in turn, would solve problems with big numbers and make it easier to introduce legacy realms by, for example, introducing separate gear progression for each expansion, with the same base stats and scaling.

I would still not find leveling fun. Many people would love it. I would not

[derpkitteh]

i think they should redesign the whole leveling process, like swtor did it.

you got a story quest and planetary story quest. each one gives you huge amounts of xp, and you're capped at the max level of the planet you're on, but you still gain levels.

so, have the zone story quest be a different color and give the amount of xp needed to level through that zone at the appropriate speed, and have level scaling of the mobs and quest xp.

[Kazgrel]

My PERSONAL preference and I know people WILL disagree with me.

For leveling I would like them to maybe double the Exp needed for 1-60, 60-70 maybe a 1.25 to 1.5 increase, 70-80 is fine as it is, 80-85 maybe a 1.25x increase, 85-100 is fine. But what I would want the most is leveling scaling tech of Legion zones applied across the game. I would love to be able to go 1-90 purely by just doing the zones of Kalimdor or Eastern Kingdoms.

With Scaling tech I could do dungeons without out-leveling an Area, I could also 100% an area and see all the story without quests going grey even with an heirloom Exp Boost.

With Scaling Tech I would likely level a bunch of characters and take a nice leisurely level through the stories of the low level zones. Since at the moment since I know I won't complete an areas quest I have no motivation to care about the story since I only see like 1/5th of it.

Leveling should be a tad slower 1-70 but with Heirlooms and scaling tech should still not feel like quite the massive grind of leveling in Vanilla BUT would also give you the ability to explore and have fun without constantly thinking you are going to be leveling subpar/suboptimal since with scaling you would be gaining the same exp exploring Duskwood at 75 as you would exploring Sholozar, which would be AMAZING.

All and all the one thing I loved most about Guild Wars 2 was being able to full experience each area at my own pace without really screwing my leveling speed. This is what I would love in WoW.


P.S- I would also love that instead of level requirements for dungeons, you scaled to dungeons so say you could queue for all Kalimdor/EK dungeons as soon as you hit say level 20 or so.

I don't see how these ideas would draw a lot of adversity, really. Not so keen on the xp nerf, especially 1-60 (amount wise)...I'd rather see dungeon xp nerfed a bit, or simply move more of it onto the quests from the dungeons, so that way it's only really worth running them once as far as leveling up goes.

The whole scaling tech idea is spot on. That's one beautiful thing about GW2; the amount of different ways to level up is insane when compared to WoW.

Having level sync similar to GW2 and/or FF14 for dungeons would be neato, too.

[Deleted]

easy solution
once you hit max level on any character, then a npc opens up in each start zone. This NPC can only be accessed once per "max level" and at level 1 for free, so 1, 60, 70, 80, 90, 95, 100 are free to access. if you want to change after that free access, it costs a large chunk of gold

when you speak to them they give you the following options.

Leveling XP at current Speed
Leveling XP at half current speed
Leveling XP at Vanilla speed.

Choosing one of the options will give you a persistent buff to your XP gains, and the BOA leveling gear has no effect, nor does any other means of XP gains. So you are free to choose to level with the BOA, or the Leveling Buff, but not both.

This would give people the choice between the three xp speeds, or using the BOA.

[Oneirophobia]

I've said it all along:

-Have a long, challenging, fun levelling experience for those of us that enjoy that.
-Also have a free max-level boost option available for those of us that don't.

That's the only way they're ever going to satisfy everyone.

Path of least resistance, that would literally empty the game world. Nobody would level.

[derpkitteh]

oh, and they should also make it so that you don't queue for leveling dungeons as a specific tank, healer, or dps. just queue for dungeons, and go in with or without heals or tank or whatever.

they gotta do something to speed up these queues, it's to a ridiculous level right now.

[Thimagryn]

I've said it all along:

-Have a long, challenging, fun levelling experience for those of us that enjoy that.
-Also have a free max-level boost option available for those of us that don't.

That's the only way they're ever going to satisfy everyone.

Already, that doesn't satisfy me, who wants to efficiently run through the leveling experience without bypassing it. Being long and challenging is inefficient to progress. Boosting bypasses any feeling of accomplishment.

I'd consider myself a power gamer. I want to level as quickly and efficiently as possible. Finding efficient ways to level is what I consider challenging, like grinding a particular rare spawn that grants high exp. I want high EXP incentives through daily dungeon runs. I want elite mobs in dungeons to grant high exp in a moderate grind and I'll find 4 others who want to level in an efficient way. I want open world bosses similar to GW2 Events or FFXIV Fates.

I find questing tedious because it's not ideal for a group situation. Collection quests waste time, travelling between areas wastes time, waiting for people to read through quest text wastes time. Leveling to me is about efficiency to reach end game. It's not about bypassing it just because I don't like questing.

[GrimThunderbrew]

I have been leveling a char by only using level 1 gear, and it's quite fun. While exp is still pretty fast for my taste, at least some challenge is restored... I can only take on 1 mob at a time, barely two if I use cds. On some bigger quest bosses I might have to cheat on by using some greens or whites. Right now I'm level 45 with a little over 1 day /played. Only time I've leveled past the zone max level was once in wetlands, but that's because the exp is really fast in the first few zones. But I am playing a rogue, so even though I am trying to kill most mobs I come across, naturally I skip some. So yeah if I wasn't a rogue I might've overleveled more.

[Mifuyne]

Ah yes, playing the same game I was playing back then. so much fun.

[procne]

I have been leveling a char by only using level 1 gear, and it's quite fun. While exp is still pretty fast for my taste, at least some challenge is restored... I can only take on 1 mob at a time, barely two if I use cds. On some bigger quest bosses I might have to cheat on by using some greens or whites. Right now I'm level 45 with a little over 1 day /played. Only time I've leveled past the zone max level was once in wetlands, but that's because the exp is really fast in the first few zones. But I am playing a rogue, so even though I am trying to kill most mobs I come across, naturally I skip some. So yeah if I wasn't a rogue I might've overleveled more.

Don't you miss some excitement of finding better gear?

[enragedgorilla]

He actually talked about that. They want it to feel epic, but it can't feel epic if you keep oneshotting mobs before they even engage you (for example).

Take away Heirlooms until level 55 ,Don't make greens,blues or purples drop for anything under 55 or usable by anyone under 55 ...tune the mobs, bam enjoy the game how "it was meant to be played in all it's grindy glory"

[GrimThunderbrew]

Don't you miss some excitement of finding better gear?

Yeah... it sucks to not get new stuff. I'm not saying this is an ideal way of leveling, I think they need to adjust leveling. I guess this is something you can do while waiting for that
Also, I forgot to mention that I don't pick the OP glyphs or talents, like the one that refreshes slice'n'dice and recuperate. So clearly they do need to make some class adjustments.

[Bigbazz]

The problem is that making the leveling experience longer and boost sales kinda go hand in hand. If they did it while removing the boost option I'd believe them but I'm skeptical. The low level game needs to be the relevant journey that it used to be, that means making it more difficult and reducing the XP dramatically.. That also means not allowing dungeons to be turbo mode levelling like they are now.

One of the biggest issues is Heirlooms, they drastically speed up leveling via player power and bonus XP, on top of the fact that they completely screw PVP for new players who don't have them.. In addition to that they make almost every upgrade you have during the levelling process meaningless, making the reward system worthless.

Something needs to be done about all of these things to make the levelling experience an actual gameplay journey, a well balanced experience both PVE and PVP. and not a 1 day dash through dungeons with 5 players so geared they could all near solo the place at a decent pace.