Is Blizzard actively trying to kill the raiding scene?

[Whatever Dude]

just a different way of enjoying the game.

why does raiding have to be the only way to progress ur char?

because aside from high M+, it's the only challenging type of content.

world content that takes 2 minutes to complete should not give comparable gear to heroic/mythic quality raid stuff

[Pua]

Ultimately, tier bonuses are causing more harm than good; they're just another tuning knob that makes life harder for everyone before we even bother about the discrepancies in their relative power, cross-class/spec. For those reasons alone, I had a feeling we'd see the back of them with the next expansion coming up. Other supporting evidence includes the sheer multitude of ways in which players can now get loot, and the arguments from those not raiding that there should be other ways to get those bonuses.

The only people who will likely be unhappy are the dud class designers, who now have to fix class problems patch to patch, rather than letting a tier bonus do it for their raiders while everyone else suffers from their piss-poor design.

But I do think the "Blizzard don't give a fuck about raiding" comments are pretty funny. They tried to only cater to that part of the playerbase in Warlords of Draenor, and the game almost hit a skid it couldn't recover from as a result. They've spent so much effort ensuring raiders got their content over the years, that much of the rest of the game got little more than table scraps of design time.

Legion showed they were learning. Maybe Battle for Azeroth will be when they finally get it.

Social exclusion is practically a necessity for competitive raiding, and it's something most people naturally want to avoid for the sake of their psychological health.

Fingers crossed they have learned.

[adamzz]

With the announcement of eliminating tier sets, it feels like Blizzard wants to kill off raiding. I know what you are thinking, another player screaming "the sky is falling". But, with BfA and other changes from Legion, it seems Blizzard is steering the game to a more casual, open world sandbox and away from a structured game style, which is what raiding is.

Loot and gear is raining down all over the game. You can even obtain better gear from non raiding content as compared to raid drops. I am a heroic raider but my character probably about 50% non raid gear equipped. These pieces are from my mythic weekly caches, bonus week caches, emissary quests and relinquished gear from the Argus vendor. Heck, if you get lucky enough you can even top mythic level gear from some sources. Really, the only gear that is obtainable only from raiding is tier gear.

Ion said they are not getting rid of titanforging and other mechanics to increase item level from drops. This mechanic plus all the new sources for gear that is equal to or better than raid gear and eliminating tier sets, tells you where they want to take this game.

Raiding is about testing yourself against some of the toughest content in the game. Raiding is what brings people back week after week in order to progress and finally kill the end boss. But loot and gear was the carrot on the stick. It kept you coming back. And the satisfaction of finally downing that boss your team has struggled with is the reason we raid. But getting that epic tier piece, weapon, trinket, etc was the icing on the cake. Tier sets are unique to raiding. If you look at a player and see they are item level 930 but have no tier you can tell they dont raid. But if you look at a player with item level 930 and you see heroic or even mythic tier gear, you know they have beaten some of the hardest content in the game.

Some pieces of your gear can't titanforge in BfA, the only way to get the highest ilvl on those pieces is doing mythic raids. So no, raiding isn't getting killed.

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because aside from high M+, it's the only challenging type of content.

world content that takes 2 minutes to complete should not give comparable gear to heroic/mythic quality raid stuff

World content doesn't give comparable gear to heroic/mythic quality raid stuff, good try though.

[Sanguinerd]

For years they cater to the raiders.. one little change and people whine like hell.

But hey, we lost our PvP set bonus too.

[Dangg]

heroic is on par with most 10man encounters that were available.

Lol at that shitpost

it's just like current heroic, that's why Paragon finished SoO/ToT heroic progress in a day.
Oh wait..

[Nnyco]

problem with set bonuses is that 4 slots are literally occupied by tier making all other items for that slot obsolute, a good change specially since we still get bonuses from necklace

[Deleted]

wow the special snowflake syndrome strikes again LOL
cmon it's not like not having unique piece of gear will make raiding less challenging but i guess that a lot of ppl do it only to show their super rare shoulder XD
you still have a chance of doing this via mounts and titles so save the tears for something more relevant.

[Soon-TM]

You're comparing GW2 and FF14 to WoW? Both games active playerbase isn't even a fraction of that of WoW. Seeing even 20 people in a zone at any given time is a testament to that. Not to mention without seeing numbers for the playerbase the argument is invalid. I can with certainty as a person who played GW2 that zone population is dismal in comparison to WoW. Not to mention active streamers of WoW content is higher. Raids, and I know this hurts people's feelings, ARE the difference and is what highly contributes to WoW's success. The vast majority of posts on this site are about raids and itemization for them. It has EVERYTHING to do with raids.

No shit Sherlock, of course many people here talk about raids, it's literally the only thing that separates WoW from its competitors. And how comes you are privy to Blizz, Arena and SE's numbers? Because there are none publicly available atm. But those two games are doing just fine without raids, which is the whole point I am making: raids =! success

[h4rr0d]

World content doesn't give comparable gear to heroic/mythic quality raid stuff, good try though.

Devilsaur Shock-Batton would like a word with you. (trinkets in general, rolling for UAC in the relinquished casino is another outlier)

[Caerule]

Honestly, I'd applaud this change normally. Not being locked to a lower level tier piece would be nice.

However, Blizzard is definitely going to make sure that the tier pieces for your class that drop in the raid, have abilities that play off each other for maximum efficiency. So the Chest, Shoulder and Shoulders that drop in the raid are definitely going to be the best combo to have. Not doing so will make raiders feel unrewarded.

But doing so is just replacing the standard tier set bonuses for collecting 4 out of 6 parts, with a requirement to get 3 out of 3. Something a lot harder. So I'm not sure I like this.

[Queen of Hamsters]

Seeing as how raiding has always been about downing bosses with a guild rather than gear to me, I'm welcoming this change. I currently have 3 different sets sitting in my bags, as a result of needing tier from PREVIOUS tier sets, having to swap out tier pieces depending on my legendaries etc etc.

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because aside from high M+, it's the only challenging type of content.

world content that takes 2 minutes to complete should not give comparable gear to heroic/mythic quality raid stuff

I'd love to see the player decked in optimized Mythic quality gear all around from doing World quests alone.

The one piece I have that's higher up than gear I currently get from raids, is a 950 titanforged ring I got from a Relinquished token. That's 1 piece, out of the rest that I got from HC/Mythic raiding alone.

While I hate the Titanforging system, players are blowing it way out of proportion in the name of being whiny bitches.

[SupBrah]

Plot twist - the 3 slots affected by Heart of Azeroth will drop only from Raid instances

You joke but this could be a very good compromise to the loss of set bonuses

Obviously you'll get filler pieces for those slots from, say, quests.

But you'll need to do raids (or maybe even rated PVP for the PVPers) if you wish to update those slots.

[Soon-TM]

I am an avid raider, and have been since good ol' MC. But there are lots of things that must be fixed or tweaked, which have never been done with the classic excuse "it will cost you a raid tier". The devs' first and foremost priority have always been raids, to the point that even a notoriously incomplete xpac like WoD had decent raids. Talk about catering to casuals...

Perhaps they have learned the lesson now. Perhaps...

[Deleted]

I'm with with this. I got half a dozen better itemized or higher item level pieces sitting in my bank I can't use cause I'd lose my 2pc/4pc combo. I was saying all the way back in MoP when you kill a "tier" boss you should get a reusable scroll that lets you assign any set piece you want as tier. Kill the glove boss, get the glove scroll. Kill the helm boss, get the helm scroll. You can wear the gear that's best for you, and have your tier bonus.

This is actually a fantastic suggestion, I wish this was how they moved forward with it.

[Deleted]

Stop whining about the raiding scene and the sets.

Sets create imbalance, and either too OP bonuses that get carried over into core gameplay or useless bonuses and people ignore them.

Also its not fun getting a max ilvl item that you cant wear cause of set bonuses, or wearing stupid stats for the same reason.

Plus personally i love the change, i want to play my alts and not feel that i have to pug raids with idiots for a month unless i get lucky the first week to get the set bonus so i can manage.

Next step, make trinkets that arent completely broken OP and without them the class is useless for the next months, CoF/ Crit trinket from Lei-Shen for Warlocks, etc etc.

There was a time where sets were fun and interesting. I would rather have them drop in high m+ dungeons than getting removed from the game. Sets create imbalance? Well then lets give only 1 spell to every single class to deal damage /s.

Tier sets are a core part of the RPG aspect and seeing how people are bringing ITLVL as an argument to delete them from the game it's honestly sad. It's much more enjoyable have some pieces of gear that modify your gameplay and add some depth to it rather than a higher itlvl piece that grants you "+1% dps".

[Kelathos]

With the announcement of eliminating tier sets, it feels like Blizzard wants to kill off raiding.

The problem for me is, in Legion, with Legendaries and 6 pieces of tier I "loose" choices in HALF my gear slots.
I am locked into 2 Legendary, 4 piece current tier, and 2 piece previous tier.

I swear, to maximize my frost Mage DPS for Antorus I'd need to farm Nighthold weekly for Titanforged tier. If it reached 930 or above it'd probably be BIS still. I am very happy to end that lockdown on my gear choices.

[Lochton]

just a different way of enjoying the game.

why does raiding have to be the only way to progress ur char?

Indeed so, as well, thought it was only the set bonus that was gone.

[Deleted]

Raiding is what brings people back week after week in order to progress and finally kill the end boss.

But loot and gear was the carrot on the stick. It kept you coming back.

So which is it?

The reason raids are frequently made easier, more accessible, and more flexible, and that alternatives always become instantly more popular is that despite the loud protest of the people who genuinely like raiding (and more power to 'em!), most people don't like raiding.

Keep making great bosses. Give the people who like the complexities of playing with 19 others fantastic challenges to overcome! Great!

But don't make it the be-all and end-all of character progression. Just give those alternative progression paths something meaningful to do with that gear. More five man dungeons. More scenarios. Don't give what would currently be raiding gear to people who do the same old max level content they did two weeks after release. Instead, also give new challenges to go along with that gear.

[Deleted]

Plot twist - the 3 slots affected by Heart of Azeroth will drop only from Raid instances

nope from mythic+ also.

[Zequill]

So far, without counting Antorus, half the raid had no set gear in them... did raiding died?