The Reason the WoW Community is Toxic

[Mad_Murdock]

About the underbelly, I actually really really like it. How it changes from FFA to no PvP every 5 to 10 minutes is really interesting. Especially when you can just hire a guard to make you unattackable for 5 minutes. Since it is FFA it isn't affected by faction balance, since every name is re. The underbelly in its current state is actually one of my favorite parts of Legion, and let me make it clear that I absolutely despise ganking.

The good part is that there is no major reward for ganking, though most gankers don't need any rewards to gank, just getting to kill poor near helpless people over and over is all that matters.

When the game The Division announced their Dark Zone and how it would have the best rewards and that in essence it would be a FFA, I questioned how well that was REALLY going to work. Anytime you create something like that without some type checks and balances , goon squads will emerge. And in the case of the Division, they rewarded ganking someone zoning in.

I play on PC and my son plays on PS4 and you started seeing the highly geared players forming teams to camp the various entrances and mow people down. My son reported they even had teams working in tandem to cover all the doors. If you had a slow system you would just find yourself zoning in dead over and over.

The underbelly is an interesting place, though I disagree with it. It seems as usual Blizzard creates environments that cater to those who like to grief the unsuspecting. I still question why PvP needs so many gimmicks

[Deleted]

I'm not sure if there is "The" reason.
One of the many reasons WoW community (I'm not sure there is such thing either) is toxic (this is very subjective term) is because WoW is a multiplayer online game.
Look into a concept called Dunbar's Number (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar%27s_number) and the reason why primates are "toxic" to strangers might become a bit clearer or if Wikipedia isn't your thing, this is rather entertaining read: http://www.cracked.com/article_14990...keysphere.html

[Gutterking]

The toxicity meme strikes again.

[Selky]

It's mainly the PVP and high-end raiding crowd that are toxic, not surprising since the majority of players don't want to do their content and they feel threatened by that.

[Shadowferal]

Blame Blizzard fo creating the situations to begin with.

After all if I'm on a PvE server because of play style choice, and Blizz removes that choice, then yes, they do deserve to lose paying subscriptions.

Seriously, if the Dalaran Sewer FFA PvP shit was voluntary, I'm damn certain only a few, if any, would go PvP on a PvE server. Because the real PvPers are on PvP servers where they enjoy the challenges that other players bring to the table.

[Luckx]

Im seeing toxic ppl mostly on Blizzard and fan-based sites forums.

In game im playing on different servers both Horde and Alliance, and in game there is toxic ppl also in both pve and pvp but in game they are minority. Most insultings and trolling are on forums.

[mhdoe]

The community has generally been toxic since Vanilla but people always think it was better for some reason in the past.

[fearist]

Fist yourself, do u need a safe space in wow boyo? Go afk in your wod garrison

[Mad_Murdock]

"Unsuspecting" as in "I didn't suspect going into a pvp server would flag me for pvp OR "unsuspecting" as in "I didnt expect that going to a DEDICATED pvp zone I would be ganked"

PvP is about gimmicks. Players that kill players. No safety anywhere. If you don't like to be eaten by lions why enter their cage. And please don't start the "we never expected that others wouldn't play honorably".

"Unsuspecting" in that I'm on a PvE server and for just the very reason not to be randomly ganked while on a PvE quest. Not everyone scours over all the notes and changes. That should be obvious with all the same questions being asked over and over. Many people seem to assume that everyone played in the beta and knew all this stuff already.

Let me help you understand PvE players, as you just lumped them all into the World First group. There is a huge number of players who will not show up for wipe night on a boss. There are many players that considers 10-15 wipes their limit and they are done for the night\week\month. You might be surprised at the number of broke players who after 10 wipes say they are done, because they just spent what gold they had on repairs or they exceeded the guild repair limit and they aren't spending their gold to wipe.

I think a fair number of PvE players would agree. They don't want to be a part of PvP unless they explicitly sign up for it. Meaning Explicitly turning on their PvP flag or queueing for a BG. The underbelly was not a PvP zone before, and if you miss that change in notes you wouldn't expect to go down for a fishing quest and get flagged

It's a sad gimmick. You have people not expecting to be flagged going to a place they went many times in Wrath and now they are getting ganked by the rogue types who are sitting and waiting for those folks to stumble down there. I call it sad, because it's obvious when Blizzard is doing all they can to try and get people into PvP, thinking some day everyone is going to wake up and say "OMG PvP is awesome I'm never doing PvE again!"

[Mlz]

Most of the people who call others toxic fit into "toxicity" (retarded buzzword) criteria themselves.

[TheVaryag]

The current Dalaran Underbelly PvP/FFA crisis points up exactly what is wrong with the WoW community and why it is toxic.

The game encompasses all kinds of activities and playstyles. There is PvE, PvP, crafting, exploration, dungeons, raids, questing, world mini-bosses, etc. There are things for everyone to do even if that is just gathering or fishing. No element of the game should ever be developed at the expense of others in the game community. Sadly, many of you seem to actually enjoy when others are denied their fun and are placed within your grasp so that you can grief them. And this is additionally encouraged by Blizzard that creates content for this kind of shortsighted pandering to one segment of the player base. Its very odd that they pander to a small group that way because their success is entirely reliant on having appealed to a large audience with very varied playstyles in the past.

Most of you are looking at what you want out of something and by all available evidence unable to see how that works out for the other guy. You don't care about the other guy's experience but you should. The other guy is paying just like you are and his money helps keep the game afloat just as much as your money does. The more players they lose, and many are gone already, the worse the game gets and the more pigeon-holed the development seems to become. The target audience is ever smaller and smaller.

If you love the game you must demand that Blizzard develop the game so that you are happy with it but so is the other guy. There is a time and place for everything in the game and you just need to encourage Blizzard to build and maintain the game that way. Letting the other guy get screwed so that you can have some temporary fun is basically cutting off your own nose to spite your face.

I'm just going to press the point one step further and state this problem is not just a problem in the game but a problem in life and society as a whole. You can't ever let any one group of people bully another, because eventually they come for you and yours too.

Most of you don't know me, I only dip a toe in here once in a great while and usually for only a short time. But all I do is PvP in the main. I am exactly the type of player that Blizzard may see themselves as specifically pandering to with the current state of the Dalaran Underbelly. I am not now playing the game, but even if I were I would oppose the way Blizzard is handling this matter. Why? Because I care about the game and I know that when most of the players are happy with something the game is healthy and has a good chance to progress. There are dozens of ways I can indulge my desire for PvP, but forcing it on PvE players is not one I would consider either good for myself or even good for the game.

You need to care about the other guy and his experience in game. If you don't, the game is surely going to die by a thousand cuts that you are cosigning with your indifference.

This is quite literally how a society thrives and survives or how it dies, fractured with each person defending only their own little space. Taken out in the end, one by one until none are left.

It's kind of dying already, what do you mean by "Going to die"?

Legion Is a giant attempt at nostalgia, at giving us what we've wanted, storylines with Alleria, Turalyon, Legion, demons, Ashbringer, legendaries, etc. which of course spits on most of the lore just to appeal to the playerbase and not have us leaving yet as we so desparately were during Warlords.

The Game has become so casual since Cataclysm, that's the main reason. Go look at the sub numbers, when did they drop consistently up until we were told "Oh we won't give out sub numbers anymore"? Since the end of Wrath up until Q3 2015, which was halfway through WoD, consistently, dropping subs, with a slight bump towards Launch of Warlords but with a drastic decline when people found out the long-term of WoD was apphauling. And even now the subs are unknown, only estimates based on personal guesses and "Educated guessing" which Is to be considered, since Q3 2015 the subs were at 5.5 Mil, now a year later, we were still In WoD and no pre-launch, so at that point we can safely assume the subs would be as low as 3 mil even less. The subs might've gone up back to 4 or 5 mil In Legion. But will drasticly decline once again, perhaps even before the new year comes around, when people see how bad Legion Is as well In the long-term at least.

WoW is doomed to fail on this path.

So yes, the game Is doomed unless they stop so casuallifying the game, but they won't, so goodbye wow Stop having all your games so casual Blizz, doesn't work that way. ESPECIALLY Not for WoW,.

[Deleted]

You can replace Toxic in WoW with Toxic in IRL!
Its people in general

Exactly.
Toxic players are toxic persons IRL, nothing we can do about it.

btw, all games have toxic players/ppl

[Crruor]

Ganking and griefing isnt what makes a community toxic, it has nothing to do with that at all (look at eve online (basicely if someone ganks you there you also drop all your gear and what you have in your bags for the killer to loot), its a game actively encouraging scamming, ganking, griefing, guild theft and so on and forth but its community is usually referred to as amazing and extremely nice).

What makes a community toxic is if a new player enter a dungeon and says "first time here, what do i have to do" and the answer is /votekick. Or if you have to have a specific ilvl to join a group or exp to join a guild and so on and forth.


2 people, one never ganks anyone and despises it but if a new player whispers him for help or advice he/she ignores him and would never take some time to help others out. The other loves ganking, loves corpse camping etc but if a player of his own faction needs help, or someone needs advice or someone would like help in 2s or something he is there to help. The first person is what makes the community toxic, the second one is what keeps it alive.

[Deleted]

This is quite literally how a society thrives and survives or how it dies, fractured with each person defending only their own little space. Taken out in the end, one by one until none are left.

the issue of every "performance society" (aka hierarchy: WoW is a performance society, rewards depend on performance) is Klassenkampf, which Bourdieu (Pierrre, Die Feinen Unterschiede) analysed as the true motivation for separation: to keep the distance to the others (, even - and Bourdieu reminds often- if there is more commom ground from individual to individual than differences. Simmel (, Georg, Die Tragödie der Kultur) went farther by verifying individuality as nonexistant, cuz the social person is exclusively the crossing of social circles, in fact the individuum is a dividuum, our social position (aka Charakter) is just a reflection of the collective in this special position):
to distinct from the others. Bourdieu explicitly states that not the difference of the classes r responsible for Klassenkampf, but Klassenkampf produces those social (and artificial) differences. its not the person, its the system, the performance hierarchy.

usually humans tend to teamwork, but as Serif (Mustafar, The Robber Den Experiments) verified that competition compromises the human herde-instinct into an artificial context of hierarchy:
he divided youths of the same white suburbia into 2 groups and forced them into a "competetive context" (aka compete 4 reward).
hey, wait a moment, sounds familiar: WoW (2 factions)?
those youths, that spend their childhood together in friendship started fighting each other physically for an extra-piece of cake, cuz only one group could win.
the experiment was aborted, and it took weeks to neutralise the damage inflicted by this artificial performance reward system.

so how to neutralize performance society in WoW?

ACESSIBILITY.

buizzard is much better in reforming the structure of distribution (cuz u r what u have, if u have nothing, u cant do anything, right? maybe crime, but... even this is socially produced and capitalized: u r ur capital, which is a specified (and not unique) position in a social structure) than current social systems, that already have been neutralised by the neoliberal agenda of the happy few:
welfare legendarys? maybe, but they still have to be earned. and pro-raiders still distinct via skill and titles from the player base (the majority is and will always be casul - y? well read bourdieu, as it would mutate this brief explanation into a textwall).
this approach is the only know therapy 4 any performance society at current state of social psychology: integration via accessibility. but does integrations means to destroy the wall, most pl r bricks in?
NO, cuz u integrate those pl into said wall.
it wont be enough to give everyone a chance to compete for world firsts (pole position in hierarchy), cuz itz limited to the happy few 20m.
so even with welfare legendarys most pl wont be able to achieve this superior goal of every hierarchy: to reach the top!

u see the problem? accessibility to hierarchy doesnt help, but escalates the negative tendencies of performance societies (Stone, Robert, The Inflation Of Honors; Elias, Norbert, Über Den Prozess Der Zivilisation). so is blizzard increasing toxicitiy with accessibility?
no, WoWs mechanical evolution tries to stabilize and to give everyone the means necessary for mythic and rated.

most pl cant change their mind set, cuz they dont have access to these basic informations on society, they were deselected (brainwashed/streamlined) via educations system and before even joining school via the income (representative 4 habits=taste=habitus in general) of their parents. they will never raid mythic, never achieve R1, they r Natural Born Losers (by definition of the hierarchy). this is a global issues, and s itz a politic one:
after 1973 the inner competition pressure exploded, as the wars on the outside of the first world, Reagonomics, stock crashes etc: the system of capitalism found its limits and is struggling for survival, due to itz caste system (the happy few just dont want to share, cuz if they did, all would be happy, but not few, see distinction), which is a product of the inherent competition.
WoW got more toxic over the years (any1 remember the term carebear? havent met them for years), the single-player mentality is just a symptom, as toxicity is, cuz there will always be a difference in skill:
this skill is a product of the distribution of work, which is capital, capital is the result of work.

some r born rich (full access 2 capital), while others strive to learn for their whole live and never get a chance due to social barriers, aka classses.
as verification had every revolution their intellectual caste to lead, even Ghandi was upper class (btw-look at todays India, caste-system has only slightly changed, at least 20% pariahs evolved into middle class).

u have to change the system, or at least distribute sufficient knowledge, which also means to change the system.
but wow without rewards?
itz a BRAVE NEW WORLD in the underbelly :D

/latedit: "Die Ausgeburten ihrer Köpfe sind ihnen über die Köpfe gewachsen (Marx, Karl)

[JMulla2016]

I think it pertains to WoW a bit more than it pertains to most MMOs today because WoW has something for everything and being people pay for it, there's bound to be something not to their liking. Of course, most of those are straight up being ignorant, but you can't dismiss valid concerns and reasoning when you people pay for it. I guess it's a pragmatical view, but shouldn't be a problem filtering out the real vs fake complaints.

The game is huge and it has been for years, it surprises me that the situation isn't worse.

[Deleted]

1. The Underbelly situation is not a "crisis."
2. PvP is a normal and valued aspect of the game. PvP players are not "toxic."
3. If you don't like PvP, avoid the Underbelly.
4. It is physically impossible to please everyone. It is not the consumers responsibility to look out for the interest of others.

Sorry, no dice. Forced open world PvP is not a "normal" aspect of playing on a PvE server. So pipe down.

Let's make this very clear: PvP on a PvE server should always be optional. Forcing PvE players on a PvE server to engage in world PvP just so they can complete PvE content is bull. The only "toxic" players in this debacle are the ones wishing for the forced PvP to continue.

No forced PvP has been a main-stay of the PvE server community. In the same way that world PvP whether you like it or not has been a mainstay of the PvP server community. Get it? The hypocrisy here is astonishing - people QQ'ing about being ganked on PvP servers is common place, yet these QQ'ing players are rightfully informed that if you don't want PvP don't roll on a PvP server.

And the problem isn't the underbelly in itself, it's the guards - they're bugged. Fix the guards, no problem.

[Mad_Murdock]

To set all this aside:

I went in yesterday for JC quest part 2. Hired a guard went in people were killing each other did my job killed a rare got more coins left. All the bother for me was that I had to put on the stopwatch to check the 5 min guarded time I had.

I think there is no more reason for complaints hire a guard and its all good. Guard bugged? Ok report bug. 1g per min too expensive? Time to rethink gold making strat then. Lets solve problems not prolong them for the sake of arguing.

I do agree, grabbing the guard for 5 gold is a easy enough fix. I'm not thrilled that if one doesn't know about underbelly and just rides down for their quest, they are in for a rude surprise. Glad someone else reported it before I went.

So far I have had 1 case (I'm thinking 2), where I bought a guard went down and when the message popped up that guards were on going on break, my guard also disappeared and I wasn't more than 2 mins in. A little surprise there isn't a timer as part of the buff, but I imagine whoever designed this is hoping folks will lose track of time

[Thelin]

It's toxic because its become a game that's filled with people of all ages some who've been around since the start 10 years ago and others who are just starting so you've got a pretty wide age range certainly more than I'd say existed in Vanilla and TBC. Plus the spamming of racist, political and other dumb shit in trade chat is probably the worst I've ever seen now.

I honestly can't wait until anonymity on the internet goes away. There will be far fewer trolling asshats and keyboard warriors when their real name is visible.

- - - Updated - - -

I do agree, grabbing the guard for 5 gold is a easy enough fix. I'm not thrilled that if one doesn't know about underbelly and just rides down for their quest, they are in for a rude surprise. Glad someone else reported it before I went.

So far I' have 1 case and I'm thinking 2, where I bought a guard went down and when the message popped up that guards were on going on beak, my guard also disappeared and I wasn't more than 2 mins in. A little surprise there isn't a timer as part of the buff, but I imagine whoever designed this is hoping folks will lose track of time

I didn't know about the guard until afterwards when I was doing the forge quests down there. I got wrecked in about 5 seconds lol.

[Absintheminded]

The community was shit even in Vanilla.

I want to know what server you played on, because Skywall (US) had an amazing community.

[Thelin]

Relative Anonymity is the basic "right" given by the internet ofc you are free to use your name (I use it on twitter facebook etc) I don't think it would change much if anything and especially in a game where there is more to be jeopardized than a trade chat (hackers would love to know your real name).

There is supposedly a silence system operating haven't heard of anyone getting silenced though maybe thet scrapped it due to other concerns (system was not fail-proof).

I think a lot of toxicity was removed by multi-tagging (no more arguments about stealing mobs etc) and I guess the sewers kind of removed a lot of gankers from the world.

I mean don't get me wrong I like a good ganking here and there but I never saw a point in me being max level and making the life of a new leveller a misery. Sure if we re bunch of 110s in Suramar and theres some hostility I will join.

As for the sewers, I like that there are guards because obviously quests must be done asap, however I like the idea of FFA and the randomness. If you check it out you will see every min there is something spawning or someone spawning something or fun items rares even etc. You can participate for a small ticket (5g for guard) or just get in kill and get killed. I think its one of those things that keep being relevant in the long run which is nice.

Yes I get its a basic "right" but I think the moment someones real name appeared next to their avatar they would say half the shit they do now. Granted I don't think it needs to get to that point just yet but people at least the younger crowd have no problem hurling insults, racism and derogatory statements at others under this veil of anonymity. Blizzard needs to take a tougher stance on the spamming and language that people use in the game. I'm 27 and I get sick of seeing it. I've probably ignored so many people to filter it or I typically just leave the chat channels all together because its the same crap every day. "Dicks out for harmabe", "Anal + whatever" Trump this Hilary that. etc etc. Never ends. Throw in the occasional hate speech and you've got your trade chat.

As far as multi-tagging It's fine until people come over and tag your stuff and don't loot if you're a skinner its annoying as hell. I literally had some dude following me on purpose and doing it. Then he'd run back and skin stuff or use the aoe skinning knife to steal them. I ended up just leaving and going to another area after he followed me for about 10 minutes.