Convenience has made it a lot easier for me to play even as I've grown up. I was 15 when I started, now 24. I still play the game but in a very different way. Enjoy it a lot though even though I don't use many of the new features. But because of the convenience, I can still get a good night of playing even in my limited time.
Looking back on it now though, did they really lose that bet? Or did they just lose a single hand then fold on the table too quickly? The number losses weren't anything huge like we have today. There were other reasons for people leaving at the time beyond those we are talking about as well I'm sure. The relatively small number they lost due to "get better or quit" seems like it would have been the better choice in the long run.
And I do agree with their attempted fixes being far worse than what was shipped. The thing is though, they HAVE TO understand that now and they still are reluctant to do anything major about it. I know I've lost faith in their ability to put this game on the right tack again in my eyes.
There was nothing stopping them from playing how they wanted. The problem is when they want to play how they want AND do everything in the game at the same time. No one cares how you do your dailies or what spec you are in BGs or 5mans and that is where the content for those people should be. When they want to do raiding, ie a step up in difficulty, they need to step it up a little bit.
Use any other competitive hobby out there. Car racing, football, jogging, BMX, chess, etc etc, you can't get to the next level in any of those things without improving. You paying for your running shoes, car, bike, board/pieces or whatever only allows you to do the activity. If you want to do all the activity has to offer there is some form of practice or natural skill you need to have to do so. The same should be the case in WoW, but it isn't.
That would be nice if the 5-man content wasn't soloable by tanks. In the famous preach video no one even noticed that his rogue wasn't doing any damage because most likely everything was dead before he even got within melee range of the mobs. If you want casual players stuck in 5-mans then give them 5-mans to do. Unfortunately that's not what Blizzard did. Instead they decided that their end game was going to be all raid all the time. That means they have to give casuals raids to do as well.
That doesn't even make sense. Most of those activities aren't hosted, and when they are it's purely in a competitive sense. Blizzard runs WoW as a business, not a league. If there were such a thing as league raiding I would agree that only the best should participate. Come to think of it, that's how the WoW PvP leagues work. When you're a business attempting to entice the largest number of subscribers possible, however, making all your content exclusive makes no sense. You can get 16 raid bosses in three months at the expense of heroic dungeons, but the flip side of that is the rest of the customers need something to do too. That's why there's LFR.
Last edited by Ronduwil; 2013-07-17 at 11:38 PM.
You know what I meant. Blizzard, the company responsible for developing and hosting WoW, is a business. WoW is their game, but the servers on which it is hosted are part of a business. MMOs can't separate the two. MMOs aren't like chess tournaments that you open to a select few. You can't compare WoW raids to televised NFL games that are consistently viewed by millions of fans. They're more like restaurants where patrons come and go at will. No patrons = no money.
If you insist on making comparisons, however, let's do that. Everyone who plays chess gets a king, a queen, two bishops, two knights, two rooks, and eight pawns. New players aren't told that they have to make do with a king and eight pawns until they get a few wins under their belt, at which point they gradually acquire the rest of their pieces, but that's pretty much what you're advocating for when you insist that only raiders should get good gear with set bonuses. Each chess board doesn't come with rewards for the best players; that's left up to organizers of tournaments. Why should Blizzard provide you rewards just for playing their game? This is another reason these analogies never hold up.
Last edited by Ronduwil; 2013-07-17 at 11:47 PM.
Unless they want to attempt to placate, and therefore hang onto, a population that never stops asking for increasing amounts of said convenience.
The primary purpose of a game is to entertain. The fact that many can make money is of real benefit of course, but that isn't the primary objective. An un-entertaining game makes no money.
You have it backwards. The primary purpose of a MMO is to make money. The best way to make money is to make the game entertaining for the largest population possible. I agree that an unentertaining game makes no money, and that's why Blizzard strives to make the game entertaining. By that same token, however, a game that only entertains 10,000 people in the world isn't going to make as much money as a game that entertains 10,000,000 people.
"There is a pervasive myth that making content hard will induce players to rise to the occasion. We find the opposite. " -- Ghostcrawler
"The bit about hardcore players not always caring about the long term interests of the game is spot on." -- Ghostcrawler
"Do you want a game with no casuals so about 500 players?"
I'm pretty sure anyone interested in getting accurate statistics would draw from better sources than an open forum. That fact alone makes what you just said incredibly ignorant.
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What you and others like you seem unable to comprehend is that what you consider to be a problem other players consider to be good for the game.
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Just as we don't need 4 buttons for the sake of having 4 buttons. Why can't it be a balance of both? In fact I think that is something GC has spoken about quite often and the difficulties involved in trying to compromise but for some reason all you people hear is "hurr durr letz dumb down the game".
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You are right it does need to be addressed. Anyone making threads whining about the existence of LFR need a perm ban from both forums and game.
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Uh...that would be because that zone doesn't exist in the open game world. It wasn't done for player convenience.
"There is a pervasive myth that making content hard will induce players to rise to the occasion. We find the opposite. " -- Ghostcrawler
"The bit about hardcore players not always caring about the long term interests of the game is spot on." -- Ghostcrawler
"Do you want a game with no casuals so about 500 players?"
LFR isn't a problem except in the minds of those whose only enjoyment is in takin content away from others. If you don't like LFR don't run it and d something you enjoy. Other people doing LFR doesn't make existing challenging content cease to exist. If you are so god damn good at the game go do that and show us how awesome you are and stop fucking whining about LFR.
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You are exactly what is wrong with this game. Attitudes like yours is toxic and does nothing but drive people away from the game.
They wanted to raid, but they didn't care about getting to the "next level". I asked in a previous post, but I'll ask it again: Where in the ToS did it say WoW should be about getting better and better constantly? That's how YOU play. Why impose that on others? They deserve to have raiding content, too.
But there should be a reward for those that consistently get better and raid hard. That's something that should be there, just to give incentive and have that "whoa, they did that?!" factor. That still exists! Where's normal Ra-den? Where are LFR raid titles? Even heroic gear has a different color to separate them out.
People who raid for different reasons still deserve to raid. They deserve a raid instance that's easier and enjoyable for them. And those that raid hardcore deserve a challenge with some exclusive perks. This all exists.
Mmo gaming has always been a niche market and Wow is the exception to the rule. Typically mmos only get at most a million subscribers and for a majority of their product life rarely go above 500-750k. Anyone who was going to play Wow has already played it with very few actual new players coming into the game. It isn't an indictment on the quality of Wow nor is it an indictment on the mmo market as a whole. It is just a niche market with limited opportunity for growth. New gamers doesn't necessarily mean new mmo gamers and most certainly doesn't necessarily mean new Wow players. The game is 9 years old and it has gotten as big as it is ever going to get.
I appreciate that you agree that different raiding mindsets and playstyles also deserve content. However, don't attack his attitude as the reason people are leaving. That's completely inaccurate. Look, brunnor is advocating the idea that raiding is about getting better and performing at a high level. That should exist in the game. But so should less performance-oriented raiding. They are equally valuable.
Edit: Actually, I'm glad that WoW presented such a challenge in Vanilla/BC. Performance-oriented playstyles found a challenge. That is a huge boon to the game, and I'm glad brunnor-like players continue to spear-head heroic raiding. It really just needs to be acknowledged that their playstyle is not the only way to raid, nor is it more valuable than other styles. They all need to be addressed.
If we can arrive at a place where brunnor-like players acknowledge that other raiding styles should have content, then we can continue with a discussion of how Blizz introduced that content. But the statement that 'other players should get better, because that's what raiding is all about' is just bullshit and shows a complete misunderstanding of people and why they play.
Last edited by Manhands; 2013-07-18 at 01:38 AM.
Thanks god ur not in charge at Blizzard or Activision... people like u who stick their fingers in their ears and live in a fantasy world r not good for the health of the game. MMOs r forever moving and changing and its plain ignorant to think that every single decision in moving that game forward is correct. I am releived that Blizzard dont employ people like u who are dont understand how progress works.
I will repeat the point u fail to understand, thankfully most other readers of this forum will understand. That point is that LFR has become the most discussed aspect of the entire game, 2 years which have generated more forum pages of discussion than ANY other aspect of Wow. That shows loud and clear that something isnt right, something needs addressing.