Players with store helmets being kicked out of LFR and LFG

[Yarathir]

The "kick itemshoppers from LFR"-protest for me is an intricate and complex protest that involves making people and Blizzard aware of multiple things:
1. Making them and people realize that their LFR votekick system might suck
2. Making them and people realize how many people are so heavily upset about the itemshop
3. Making them realize that putting a bunch of anonymous people from different realms together to do content only creates toxic environments and experiences

Since the first half of your post was just more of your meaningless and inane gibberish, I decided to debunk this fun list.

1. Making them and people realize that their LFR votekick system might suck

Fair point. Wrong way to go about doing it.

2. Making them and people realize how many people are so heavily upset about the itemshop

Again, wrong way of going about doing it, just hindering others because you might not agree with it. Would be way more productive and handy to just make a thread. It would not mean harassing others just because you didn't get what you want. Shocker, huh?

3. Making them realize that putting a bunch of anonymous people from different realms together to do content only creates toxic environments and experiences

It only happens when people are already toxic. There is no issue with the system. There's an issue with the people. People like you who feel they and their viewpoints are more important than those of others and thus are justified in forcing it down people's throats and "punishing" the heretics that don't agree, for example.


Blame the person, not the system. Because the person is at fault here.

[unholyness]

If the backlash against the store and people who bought the transmog items is great enough to lead to successful vote kicks, doesn't that say something? It IS a majority vote, after all.

Also, one of the reasons that I dislike the store is that they intentionally make the items very eye-catching for attention-seeking purposes. Take the Heart of the Aspects, for example. An incredibly bright model, animations that make it dart all over the place, a HUGE model size and the ability to be used even where other drake mounts aren't (which, quite frankly, is outright bullshit). The helmets also like this; bright colors (even the hood has bright spots on it) to ensure that it catches attention and the fancy motion of the particle effects. Cash shops for cosmetics on principle is one question, but seeing someone paying money just to draw attention makes me want to kick out the stand from under their feet. I find it distasteful.

It only takes 5 out of 25, not the majority.

[Holtzmann]

The problem of waiting until they add stats to start complaining, it will be too late. Did you notice how long it took them to put these helms in the in-game store from announcement? Five days. Not enough time for people to give enough feedback to stop it, do you think they maybe planned it that way? What's to say they won't do the same thing IF (I really don't like "what if") they do add gear/items with stats or increase the effectiveness of your game play? There is no doubt they released the content as fast as possible to avoid a lot of the uproar, and once it was up there, there was no going back from it. The cost to refund everyone and take the item back would be far to great.

I understand that the people making the helms weren't taken off any projects (That we know of), my point was more along the lines of: If they make a substantial amount of money off of these helms, they won't need to worry as much about content as these quick items will fill in the blanks for lost subscriptions. Yes, it is speculation, but it's the kind of speculation that needs serious consideration from the player base. You can't just sit there and hope Blizzard isn't doing it this way because it will be too late once they are actually doing it this way.

The problem with your reasoning is, of course, that there is still no precedent for Blizzard selling any sort of performance enhancement in their cash store. The slippery slope ends in a brick wall. Blizzard is smart enough to know selling actual power boosters is always ridiculously unpopular measure. Other games have tried it (hello, Gold Ammo in World of Tanks!) and it always blows up in the devs' faces. On the other hand, cosmetic stuff sells like hotcakes in pretty much every game out there that supports them.

The point is that there's a market for cosmetic items. A huge one. And selling pretty gear to people who want to buy it is no sin. It's a win-win situation. Blizzard gets more money by releasing things that were likely gear concepts that had to be abandoned at some point or another (seriously, those fire horns must have been a scrapped piece of Cloth gear from Firelands 2.0), and players get more shiny toys to play with.

And you do realize they should have just made the helmets available on the store as soon as the announcement was made, right? The delay made no business sense. In fact, they should have released at least 6 helmets (I would have preferred around 10 at least) so there would be more variety. If anything, they went at it too timidly. They should have kicked the door and yelled "GOOD NEWS, EVERYONE!" instead of ringing the bell, putting the box down and running away from the rabid dogs.

[Eats Compost]

It only takes 5 out of 25, not the majority.

It takes 5 to initiate a votekick. Then the actual vote happens, which needs a majority to pass.

[Deleted]

People are starting to get kicked from guilds for having the helm.

[Thage]

People are starting to get kicked from guilds for having the helm.

And people wonder why guild raiding is on a decline.

[shanthi]

People are starting to riot in big cities like Los Angeles and London because of the helm.

I hope Blizzard is seeing this.

[brunnor]

Except it won't. People aren't going to be conditioned Pavlovian-style against cash shop items because they were booted from groups. All it's going to do is sour them to you, not to Blizzard or the cash shop. To think otherwise is to afford far too much import to what some random douchebag booting you from the group has on someone.

That's the thing though, I don't care what people think of me in game. Most think I'm some elitist douche since I've killed Ra-den anyway without even talking to me. I can be a douche but normally not without cause. Not like I've practiced in this anyway as I have no desire to run LFR or LFD for any reason. I doubt it'll help much at all, but as I said, if it does make just a single person not want the next thing in fear of being kicked, all these kickers work will have paid off.

[Deleted]

And people wonder why guild raiding is on a decline.

That's mostly because of the ridiculous apps guilds demand.

[Gsara]

Million man blizzard helm march in Irvine California.

[OrcsRLame]

The problem of waiting until they add stats to start complaining, it will be too late. Did you notice how long it took them to put these helms in the in-game store from announcement? Five days. Not enough time for people to give enough feedback to stop it, do you think they maybe planned it that way? What's to say they won't do the same thing IF (I really don't like "what if") they do add gear/items with stats or increase the effectiveness of your game play? There is no doubt they released the content as fast as possible to avoid a lot of the uproar, and once it was up there, there was no going back from it. The cost to refund everyone and take the item back would be far to great.

I understand that the people making the helms weren't taken off any projects (That we know of), my point was more along the lines of: If they make a substantial amount of money off of these helms, they won't need to worry as much about content as these quick items will fill in the blanks for lost subscriptions. Yes, it is speculation, but it's the kind of speculation that needs serious consideration from the player base. You can't just sit there and hope Blizzard isn't doing it this way because it will be too late once they are actually doing it this way.

5 Days is PLENTY of time to get something changed. Google "real ID forum controversy" for an example of Blizzard caving to overwhelming amounts of player complaints. And as I said, if for some ridiculous reason, Blizzard decides to add pay to win microtransactions and they decide to commit financial suicide by not removing that immediately; I would unsub, and when the little box pops up that asks you why you're unsubbing I'd say, "I have cancelled my subscription because x microtransaction has made this game pay to win".

And Blizzard can be dumb sometimes, but they're not pants on head retarded. They're not dumb enough to think that they can make lower quality content and make up the lost sub money with cosmetic microtransactions. For one, any idiot can tell you that's not sustainable. For two, Blizzard is greedy; they want the money that comes from having high subs, (that they get through quality content) and microtransactions.

Here's some quick math. Note that this is merely an example, not representative of actual numbers.

Let's say 1 in 3 players buys a $15 microtransaction every quarter. At 6 million subs, that's $30,000,000 per quarter from microtransactions. However, if the 1 in 3 statistic stays the same, then at 14 million subs that's $70,000,000 per quarter.

Maximizing subs, (through good content) maximizes the amount of money earned through every microtransaction that Blizzard makes.

I agree that Blizzard is greedy. That's why they'll make the smart business decision and not kill their game off overnight.

[Holdodlig]

So you're ok to kick someone because he used his way of spending his money ? It's like someone fired because he's gay / he wears different clothes than you (I don't talk about skin color because you don't choose this).

And Blizzard don't give a shit if you kick players that already bought their helmet. They already gave their money to blizzard. If you want to pass a message, don't be a fucking retard, do it correctly, and unsuscribe to make blizzard loose the 15 dollars they believed to make on the helmet.

[BukkaKid]

The helmets are well beyond looking fucking horrible, while I don't condone kicking people for buying from the Cash Shop I honestly can't say I'm against kicking them for terrible, horrible tastes.

[Pandragon]

Seriously? Kicking people for buying the helms? OMFG I'm sick of these helm-haters. Blizzard DID NOT create the "you pay us monthly but here's something else to buy as well". You're cable company does it. You pay them close to $100 a month, but still have to buy the movie channels. Amusement parks charge you $50+ to get in, but you still have to buy food and souvenirs.

Now while $15 is kinda high for a cosmetic item, Blizz is doing nothing wrong with the item shop. Now I say this as someone who can't really afford the stuff in the store, but wish I could get them. IDC if blizzard puts stuff in there. Example: The Chromatic Dragon when I first saw it I went "omg I need that", then I saw it was a store mount and I went "wtf, thas bs..dammit....w/e.." and my life moved on. Now I barely care about the mount anymore. I want these helms, but I can't afford it. But it doesn't bother me. People are buying them? Who cares. Just means I'll look different without them.

Blizz is not ripping people off. Ripping someone off is making them pay for an overpriced serviced. Mechanics rip people off. Lawyers rip people off. Blizz is giving you the option to buy some kool stuff so they can continue to function as a business and continue to make WoW, and Hearthstone, and Starcraft, and other stuff they make that people play and enjoy.

The problem with the store will ONLY begin when you can start buying high end raiding/pvp gear. That's it. No sooner. A few cosmetic items, or even exp potions, or even gold. It does nothing to the end game at all. You will still have to work to get the uber raiding gear.

[ACES]

People are starting to get kicked from guilds for having the helm.

That's completely ridiculous, then again those people are probably better off not being in a guild that would kick them for spending their money the way they want.

I don't know what you're talking about. I got a huge friendslist in WoW and have many many RL friends too, many of which (casually) play WoW with me. You're just grasping at desperate straws and assumptions now and nothing you're saying has any relevance to the topic at hand, but are nothing but meager attempts at insult.



Very certain about it, and knowing it is exactly what reassures me that the reality usually is that I might be more right or have better foundations for my believes and values than others, and that statistically speaking, even if 50.000 people would disagree with me, that I still have a very realistic shot at being right. Just because you claim that people's protest needs to be limited to the account cancellation page, doesn't make it so. Protest can be fought on multiple levels, and it's much more effective when you involve other people, involve the environment their customers pay for, and just for your information at the end of this month, my subscription will be cancelled indeed, as I've planned on doing since a while ago now with as reason: "Itemshop", but until then I feel it's purposeful to protest at different levels to at least create awareness.

I'm sorry, but your sig makes me laugh every time I read it.

[TS26]

Probably kicked by the fashion police for wearing these ugly helms. Just sayin'

[serravenger]

Just heard that quite a few ppl have now been kicked out of both LFRs and LFGs for wearing the Blizzard store helmets they bought for 15$. What do you guys think of that ?

All I can say about it is that I can well understand ppl for doing that. There are some very heated discussions going on and I think Blizzard just went totally overboard in implementing these items, their pricing and the fact that most players are now realising that in game micro transaction is soon to follow.

Right now I think there is a big majority of players that do not like WOW to have this ingame store on top of subscription. So Blizzard forcing these items in without actually having laid the ground for it - just backfired badly.

Personally - I think it can only be a good thing to see players flex their power in game like this. It will hopefully get the developers and the corporate minds actually thinking about the players before they decide to create a new business model for a game .... without even asking the players what they thought of it.

Edit. Adding a link to gamebreaker.tv where they talk about one such incident and the general effect that the helms and the talk of ingame store are having in the community.

http://www.gamebreaker.tv/video-game...legendary-135/

So your saying is you hate someone for spending 15 bucks for something that is purely cosmetic, so this whole thread is you vs over limit on your credit card.


and what the fuck dude. this whole thread is then based of the "oh a friend of a friend of a friend said that he knew a guy that was" idea, you fucking tool, i bet your one of those people that thinks the "he say she say" is a valid way of determining who said what, you clown

[Thage]

That's the thing though, I don't care what people think of me in game. Most think I'm some elitist douche since I've killed Ra-den anyway without even talking to me. I can be a douche but normally not without cause. Not like I've practiced in this anyway as I have no desire to run LFR or LFD for any reason. I doubt it'll help much at all, but as I said, if it does make just a single person not want the next thing in fear of being kicked, all these kickers work will have paid off.

Like I said, it won't. They'll requeue and continue on, and probably forget you exist by the time they wake up tomorrow morning. This goes for Anarchor, too, who seems to think his being a jerk to people will matter beyond sunrise. Blizzard will roll in the money made from these helmets, likely release more, and people will buy those, too, because pretty things make money and sell well. Vote-kicking didn't stop people from buying the sparklepony or its cousins, and I will put money on this (like I've put money on helms for friends just to spite people like you and Anarchor who support being sociopaths in LFR as some righteous protest): they'll release more stuff, and people will buy that, and guys like you ultimately won't matter.

[brunnor]

Because of this post, and others like it, I decided to purchase all three of them for myself, then for my girlfriend, and another friend of mine who has been lusting after at least two of them.

I will probably never use them, but I never had a problem with the cash shop. I never really much cared about it either. But I don't like this sentiment, so at least Blizz benefited from it.

Can I put this statement in my sig so I can forever remember the day I made someone mad enough on the forums over a post to go out of their way to spend $135 on useless things to spite me?

edit - Same goes for Callei!

And back on topic though, doesn't $15 for a no stat items seem a bit high? People can buy a ToT heroic helm for that much from almost any guild. I just don't see the appeal at all in those kind of things to warrant spending that much time and effort on them at the cost of actual game play items, read: why the tier sets look so terrible this coming tier. So in essence, you all supporting these helms IS affecting my game play because I get crappy items because they aren't extra money due to them wasting design time on those.

[RaoBurning]

I think it's hilarious!

This is why I stay in Tempe.

Terrible reason to kick folk, but some folks get off on being the faceless thug type. C'est la vie.