Player Engagement - Very Low

[Grogo]

There is a lot of threads on LFR (the good and bad) and subscriber wins or losses and so forth. I feel that the main underlining issue is player engagement, it has really taken a hit. This is tied directly to the difficulty levels currently in WoW along with not meeting the desires of various target groups.

Player Engagement = Motivation = Engaged = Fun. Clarity creates control. Most players know what they don’t want, fewer know what they really do want. Relationships are the central nervous system of any MMO. This is the largest hit within WoW, compared to where it used to be.

Many players are un-engaged, not because they have a great reason to be, but rather because they have not been given a great reason to be motivated & engaged in today's WoW.

I do not feel Blizzard has done a good job with:

1. Having a vision of where they want to get to.
2. Clearly and persuasively communicate that vision to players
3. Be consistent in their behaviors

This post is about my opinion and how I feel about Blizzard's direction in the past 2 years or so. I believe that direction has been poorly envisioned at times, unclear at times, and I also believe that unhappy or ex-players are potentially Blizzard's best source for learning.

[melodramocracy]

I think the past 2, possibly 3 expansions have been a 'lets see if this works' experiment outside of several mainstays of the game (raiding, instanced pvp). In the face of some decisions that didn't sit well with the community (see: Cata sub loss), the reason you see a lack of focus is because they're trying to find a good formula to proceed with.

As an easy example, I look at dino isle as the first trial run of what would eventually be TI. There's a few similarities between the two (number of elites, world boss, no flying, very long term optional grind present), but TI offers way more other stuff to do. Given it's popularity, you'll certainly see another TI system being used again.

I'd be mighty surprised if the next expansion didn't have some form of what oQueue does baked in it as well.

[Horizon]

In my opinion this is because they are so afraid of scaring people away that they don't dare to challenge them (the challenge is what I believe created engagement) so instead of perhaps telling some people “hey what you did now wasn't very good, you must improve” they are trying to portray everyone as superheroes...

[Grogo]

I really think there is a serious lack of direction and the game tries to be too many things to too many demographics. Jack of all trades and master of none.

[Kainh]

I think the lack of engagement is from the fact that people simply don't have to engage with the world all that much any more. So much of the game has been automated through quality of life menus. Players don't interact with each other as often as they did in prior expansions.

Cata introduced LFR, which was a pretty decent tool and worked fairly well in the beginning (far less AFK'ers and trolls, and I remember a lot more people were kicked back then for either of those reasons). The only real complaint with the tool then was the loot rolling windows causing drama over items--mainly weapons vs. role. Still, I preferred the windows to having items automatically put in my bag. I think if the logs showed who else actually got loot after a boss was killed, I'd feel less angry when I got nothing but a sack full of gold. I think those could probably make a come back with the introduction of choosing 'roles' before the boss is engaged, and the bonus/extra rolls could be per player loot.

WotLK was probably my favourite expansion, mainly because I loved the raids and the dungeon/rep grinding--the tabard system worked great--which was awesome for quickly gearing up alts. It didn't feel as punishing as either Cata or MoP to get an alt up to the current tier of content. Ulduar, ICC, ToC and Naxx are still among my favourite raids (except HM Mimiron and heroic Anub) and have some great transmog gear. Ulduar also had hardmode bosses which were unlocked through mechanics. Why they changed it in ICC to a menu option is beyond me.

TBC was also a lot of fun, but heroic five mans were a lot more frustrating than current heroics (especially SH). Raiding content was gated through the use of raid keys, so this expansion got me more actively involved with other players (outside my guild) because it introduced the LFG tool. It's unfortunate it saw limited use, but I liked that iteration (before it was renamed to the Dungeon Finder in WotLK) because it was restricted to your realm. Sure you could be lazy/troll, but you were somewhat accountable since you would still likely run into those players again. Heroic daily groups were huge on my realm, and it was a lot of fun

Player engagement between players in Vanilla was almost completely restricted to either /g, or to Trade chat in your faction's main capital city. I remember a brief period when players would go somewhere else other than Ironforge/Orgrimmar (e.g. Undercity, Thunderbluff, Stormwind) simply because the Auction Houses and trade chat were all linked.