Was MOP peak wow?

[Wondercrab]

In many areas (class design especially) I think it was. Overall I always felt like WoW was improving up until the end of MoP, despite the odd misstep along the way. They might've made the odd bad choice here and there, but for the most part the game was being iterated upon and expanded in interesting and compelling new ways that showed a lot of promise for the future.

The WoD-Legion period has had some good quality of life improvements too, and Legion in particular has many systems that are definite steps forward, but the *overall* direction of the game feels to me like it's been meandering in experimental and somewhat gimmicky directions rather than fundamentally improving on the game at its core. Garrisons and Artifacts, for example, feel like completely temporary gimmicks that serve to stimulate engagement with their individual expansions without adding much to the game long-term. The handling of reward structures in WoD was shockingly poorly done, and Legion hasn't yet managed to solve all of those problems either. You also have things like the treatment flying's been given, which continues to prove far more contentious than the alternative that existed prior to WoD.

I feel as though WoW is an experimental era right now, with the devs trying out a lot of significant and often gimmicky changes to see if they can strike gold with something. It's a little concerning to me, since a twelve year old game should probably be beyond such inconsistent swings in design at this point. The spec revamps we saw in Legion are probably the biggest example of this, seeming to have been guided by a mindset of "let's try this out" as opposed to "let's make this better".

[Shiny212]

No, it was abysmal.

Class design: Pathetic, homogenization of every single class.
Gear progression: Literally NOTHING new, same old same old.
Challenge modes: Cool idea, too bad it was in the thematically most revolting zones ever.
PvP: Was a joke, and has been a joke since cataclysm.
All patches were garbage. The game was garbage. It was the lowest point WoW has ever been. Describing it as "peak" is ironic since it presided over the greatest plummet in sub-losses ever, and the lowest overall sub-numbers out of all expansions. Go figure.

[Deleted]

MoP was definitely one of the better expansions, probably second to Legion. It had great raids and decent class design, however I often felt that I didn't have much to do (outside daily quests) whereas in Legion I can always run Mythic plus if I'm bored.

[Queen of Hamsters]

No, it was abysmal.

Class design: Pathetic, homogenization of every single class.
Gear progression: Literally NOTHING new, same old same old.
Challenge modes: Cool idea, too bad it was in the thematically most revolting zones ever.
PvP: Was a joke, and has been a joke since cataclysm.
All patches were garbage. The game was garbage. It was the lowest point WoW has ever been. Describing it as "peak" is ironic since it presided over the greatest plummet in sub-losses ever, and the lowest overall sub-numbers out of all expansions. Go figure.

WoD saw the greatest sub loss of any expansion. MoP actually had good retention rates throughout several patches which is no small feat considering how polarizing the theme of the expansion was.

And if it was garbage in your mind, I suppose WoD was amazing in your mind.

[Deleted]

Big fan of MoP. Meaningful reputations and rewards, interesting lore and tone change, flex raiding, good legendary chain, ToT, my farm and my dog, dominance offensive with lore bit quests in them, Heroic Scenarios, move while casting shamans, TI...
There's a lot to love in MoP, some people were not enthusiastic about the Pandaren stuff but if you could overcome prejudice it was great.

[Queen of Hamsters]

Befitting that the x-pack that got so much shit (lol Pandas etc) now gets the "peak" treatment.

When did we hear that before? Oh, right...WotLK, after which Cata was hailed as the saviour. And just look at the polls today.

But in seriousness, I enjoyed MoP and it does get fairly high votes in polls here (toe to toe with TBC)

People never know how good they had it until what they had is gone.
Although I find it hard to believe that Cata or WoD will EVER lead any positive polls.

[melodramocracy]

Great class design (better than anything legion)

Meaningful gear progression

3 good tiers

Challenge Modes

PvP WAS ACTUALLY PLAYABLE

TI and Landfall and IoT all great patches

Was MoP the best it will ever get? Why were classes so drastically changed when they were so much better?

God no. MoP was the start of awful class design (which has continually gotten worse since then), and pvp was often a matter of chain cc. The dungeons sucked, half the bg's sucked, and there was 1 good raid.

[Deleted]

raiding and class design was very good in MoP. The introduction of challenge dungeons were good.

Aesthetics were poor. Quality of Life problems.

I would say that LEGION is the better addon if it weren't for the huge amounts of RNG

[Shiny212]

WoD saw the greatest sub loss of any expansion. MoP actually had good retention rates throughout several patches which is no small feat considering how polarizing the theme of the expansion was.

And if it was garbage in your mind, I suppose WoD was amazing in your mind.

Technicality. WoD also saw one of the largest increases at launch. WoD was also garbage but at least it was cool. Same thing for cataclysm. MoP was both garbage and not cool at all.

[Fincayra]

No, it was abysmal.

Class design: Pathetic, homogenization of every single class.
Gear progression: Literally NOTHING new, same old same old.
Challenge modes: Cool idea, too bad it was in the thematically most revolting zones ever.
PvP: Was a joke, and has been a joke since cataclysm.
All patches were garbage. The game was garbage. It was the lowest point WoW has ever been. Describing it as "peak" is ironic since it presided over the greatest plummet in sub-losses ever, and the lowest overall sub-numbers out of all expansions. Go figure.

Every single patch in MoP was a feast of content for all player levels.
Some of the class designs of MoP have been the best since WoD released. Pruning for the sake of pruning killed MANY classes.
Challenge modes were amazing. The only thing frustrating about them is the fact that many people sold them to people, thus rendering what i earned through bliid sweat and tears irrelevent.
PvP, something I don't really take part of, was still fun in MoP. It was the last time when pve gear was much better than pvp gear. My friends and I would roll in with a 5 man crew and mop the floor with every single team.
Gear progression outside of raiding was nonexistant, I agree. Working for valor points to buy upgrades was stupid beyond belief. They have learned from that mistake. Unfortunately they went too far in the other direction now. Crushing nuts in Val'sharah can award 925 epics.

/shrug

[epLe]

What did MoP really bring to the table ?

Story wise it was OK, bar Garrosh who really was the bing thing besides the pandas.

Flexible raids ? - casualization, all in all it only brings more problems for organized raiding.

Welfare Legendaries got introduced with the cloak, which again evolved to WoD-ring and then to the really legendaries everyone loves in Legion.
None really whined about them before MoP, nor did people feel entitled to them.

So what MoP did to the playerbase is making it into one of the most destructive expansions beside Cataclysm.

[Kazgrel]

Tossing my hat into the "TBC through WotLK" category as the peak.

That said, MoP was WoW's last great hurrah to me.

OP also left out one of my favorite things from MoP: Warlock green fire quest

[Aggrophobic]

Great class design (better than anything legion)

Meaningful gear progression

3 good tiers

Challenge Modes

PvP WAS ACTUALLY PLAYABLE

TI and Landfall and IoT all great patches

Was MoP the best it will ever get? Why were classes so drastically changed when they were so much better?

It probably was.
It was at least better than what we have now.

[Raetary]

It was the lowest point WoW has ever been. Describing it as "peak" is ironic since it presided over the greatest plummet in sub-losses ever, and the lowest overall sub-numbers out of all expansions. Go figure.

wat

[ceall]

Cataclysm was the start of the decline. Fyi.

But cata also was the expansion, where subs had their peak.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

I see a peak as having 3 sides. /\

You have the final rise (WOTLK)

The tip (CATA)

Then the start of the fall off (MOP)

You can continue the idea by the other rising points as classic, BC still on an upward angle.

Then you have WOD still going down.

Legion I will not judge until we are done with Legion.

This of course is based off my opinion and not based on numbers or data. This topic is way to subjective in my opinion to be based on fact.

[micwini]

MoP was a peak in a time where the game went downhill.

[Queen of Hamsters]

But cata also was the expansion, where subs had their peak.

Does that make Cata the best expansion?

- - - Updated - - -

What did MoP really bring to the table ?

Story wise it was OK, bar Garrosh who really was the bing thing besides the pandas.

Flexible raids ? - casualization, all in all it only brings more problems for organized raiding.

Welfare Legendaries got introduced with the cloak, which again evolved to WoD-ring and then to the really legendaries everyone loves in Legion.
None really whined about them before MoP, nor did people feel entitled to them.

So what MoP did to the playerbase is making it into one of the most destructive expansions beside Cataclysm.

Going by your logic, WOTLK was the expansion where people truly whinged about "welfare" and "casualization". Just so you know.

[tankbug]

(Disclaimer :These are just opinions, not universal facts)

MOP introduced a cool class and some great gameplay additions!

BUT....

Worst lore in WoW. Pandaren don't melt into the existing lore at all, and all those crazy asian stories and folklore is just a silly mess when introduced into the warcraft universe. Also giving up on Garrosh and almost destroying the horde felt incredibly forced to get progression in the main story.

Every new race (playable or unplayable) was annoying. I still today want to go back to Pandaria and exterminate the ooking dookers.

Music is still the "worst" in WoW. Of course the quality is as high as ever, but that asian sound is very piercing and the style feels like it's all the same all over. Not much variety. Got sick of it quickly.

[Dracullus]

Such a lack of creativity. You should name this thread: "Which expansion was the best?", this would be something new here.

And funny that all I see in this kind of threads is same people constantly bashing current expac. Legion will not get better or worse if you repeat: "Legion is shit, BC was the greatest, DERP" twice a day.