"MMO's should abandon Raiding."

[Drytoast]

You are incorrect.

People who disapprove of Garrisons, most commonly describe them as a Facebook game.

Anyone being objective, use the term Time-gated. And understands it's real function.

Also, do i have to repeat myself? Anger and emphasis to annoynace doesn't strengthen your arguments.

Simplicity isn't exactly what makes Facebook games so popular. It's heavily tied into mobility and accessibility. The ability to play candy crush on the toilet, the bus, w/e.

Other then that, if you are by any stretch of the imagination so "hardcore" and "in-depth" of a gamer, Garrisons won't apply to you.

Also, garrisons aren't mutually exclusive to depth.

But i assume you will just keep being angry.

Nooo....I'm pretty sure I am correct. I could get you and explain the game play and regardless if you like, or do not like garrison's, your description of the game play will be close enough to warrant no bias for or against. It is what it is.

Garrison's gameplay consists of clicking a few times and then waiting a long period of time to get your results. That's why people refer to it as "facebook".

Garrison's being the main feature of this expansion represents the direction that blizzard is going with this game.

And we both know at this point that this expansion will have the least amount of raids and dungeons after it's all said and done, and that's a sad state of affairs considering you all paid more for this.

"Anger and emphasis to annoyance?" maybe you would like to explain yourself with regards to this remark?

Your choice of avatars is ironic.

The end.

[Leonora]

It wasnt until TBC that blizzard found it that while most may not be raiding, alot of people are following the raiding guilds progression with great interest and more and more people TRY to get into raiding. [...]

Thats why in wrath blizzard decided to make two difficulties(starting with hardmodes and ending with HC Vs Normal).
[...]
If you dont have raiding, then you basicly just have casualville

That is kinda a history rewrite.

In Vanilla you had plenty raids; 10, 20, 40 man. If you did not wish / had not the people to go for raiding, you could work on your 0.5 gear via a pretty long and tough questline. There were a ton of 5 men, in which were all sorts of challenges - the mounts for paladin, warlock, other fights (like the AQ unlock chain). The timed Stratholm run is still among my most fond memories.
In BC Blizzard decided to make a raiding questchain, and it was mighty to be part of it - just not so fun when you could not raid. There also were a ton of 5 men, just like in Vanilla. Either in vanilla and BC it was quite ok to not raid. Whether you wanted to have fun for 5 mins, 15 mins, 1 or 10 hours, there were tons of tasks to enjoy.

At the end of BC Blizzard decided that their raid approach did not work, it reached too few people. Sunwell was too much aimed for the upper tier of raiders. So they decided to make raiding much more approachable, and at the same time dumbed heroics down. Wrath was way too easy at the start, with the big exception of not dying in Naxxramas. Ulduar shines on the other side. Solo content could still be hard.

For nonraiders the worst was Catalcysm, as all challenging solo content was removed. I rarely level via solo questing since, it is so completely uninteresting. We also see less and less 5 man, and what we see is generally made too easy, only the first weeks after an exp starts they are slightly challenging. At the same time we see that raiding is made much more approachable for nonraiders, with LFR as the top, and Flex (now normal) as a very smart level in between.

Raiding is well grown by now, varying from LFR where barely any personal/team effort is required, to Mythic which puts a high demand on both personal and team skill. If only content outside raiding was as well balanced... CM for me does not make it, as gear is scaled which removes the fun of increasingly better gear.

---

Oh, and re the OP:
Raiding is one of the best aspects wow offers in play. MMO basically works when people socialise, form teams, talk, communicate. All efforts that remove communication make wow suffer, all changes that increase communication make wow survive. So LFD, LFR were in that regard killers (because along with these systems the instances were being dumbed down to the point of no need to discuss). Flex, R BG, Challenge modes, heroic/mythic raid content all work to make wow kept alive as they make people talk which each other.

Raiding too little bang for buck? Be assured that if Blizzard ever thought so, they would remove all raids. The fact that wow has so much raids in it shows you they believe in it as good bang for buck. So your premise does not work.

I dont like that Blizzard is removing so much 5 men content (cf. no of 5 men instances from Vanilla to now) and has removed so much solo content. Thoug the latter is actually less true since a little in MoP and more in WoD (rares, scenarios).

[Zka]

"Why did Turbine stop designing raids for Lord of the Rings Online? Because no one played them.

Maybe their raids were junk. Maybe that's why they don't have 10M subs and WoW does.

[Drusin]

It's too expensive in terms of resources

"When WildStar announced that it was scaling its biggest raid down from 40 people to 20, commenter Belladonna did some math. The short version is that every single person who was playing the raid in its 40-person incarnation had personally cost $2,500 based on a handful of reasonable assumptions, which would require fourteen straight years of subscribing for Carbine to even break even on the money that the raid cost to develop. It's sort of a weak investment."

It's designed for a tiny portion of the people playing the games

"Why did Turbine stop designing raids for Lord of the Rings Online? Because no one played them. And that isn't a recent development, either. Sure, maybe Lord of the Rings Online is unique in that regard, but it sure doesn't seem like it.

There are plenty of data to be unpacked in this post when it comes to raiding in World of Warcraft, some of it outdated, but at the height of the game's popularity (Wrath of the Lich King), it still makes a pretty clear argument that raiders made up about 10% of the population: About 1.1 million players were killing the first boss of the highest tier of raids available while the game's overall populace was upwards of 11 million."

http://massively.joystiq.com/2014/11...27286446180475

It's a little dated, and I don't see six reasons, but it does bring up some interesting points. What do you think of this? What would the alternative be if there is any?

Personally I've always wondered what people that don't raid or PvP do in the game.

If Blizz took out raiding I don't know what I'd do, I don't want to say I'd quit because I don't want to be one of those people lol . But really all I do is raid, collect battle pets, farm achievements and mounts. You get locked to raids so you can only farm mounts so many times a week(I'm at 254 mounts), most of the achievements I need are those Draenor quests ones that are RNG based on the daily and pvp achievements (I don't pvp that much, 21.2k epeen points), I have 623 unique pets the ones I need are CollectorEdition/TCG/Alliance specific so that's another thing I'd be limited in doing. I'd say at least 80% of my time is spent raiding, running dungeons to gear for raids, leveling more alts to do dungeons to raid So without raiding I'd have to either find a filler hobby outside wow (boo) or do something new in wow, make more gold maybe?

[melodramocracy]

Yes, Xfire activity on WildStar dropped off 3 to 4 times faster than it did for SWTOR. It was remarkable to watch.

It's remarkable to see folks base anything off of xfire numbers.

Wildstar was never going to be anything other than a very niche MMO product, like many other titles out there. It will likely hang around, make tweaks, and slowly build a small but stable base of players. (or go through many mis-steps, and wind up like Darkfall).

And there's nothing wrong with any of that, the genre needs these sort of games around.

[kamuimac]

they shouldnt - but there should be ton of content to do outside of raids - and atm there is none null zero nada - not even 1 quest which would give u source of personal progress outside of raiding - terrible design which will drove people away to take a break very soon after new year.

[Powell]

Carbine just needs to stop blaming everything and everyone else for its own failures.

Raiding is a mandatory aspect to any MMO. Sure, not everyone takes part in the raid, but the idea that there is an engame, and all your effort to level/gear up can get you someplace is what makes it important.

In many MMOs, i would level and gear up, just because i might actually do it at some point.
If there was nothing to strife for, i would lose interest much, much faster.

[Deleted]

What a load of rubbish.

[Osmeric]

It's remarkable to see folks base anything off of xfire numbers.

Why is that remarkable? The Xfire numbers have proved to be rather predictive. In the case of WildStar, they were clearly predicting, from the first few weeks, that the game was going to do terribly. And there were people like you who tried to dismiss the data. While Xfire has seen a steady erosion of its usage, the trends it reveals are still very useful.

[melodramocracy]

People who disapprove of Garrisons, most commonly describe them as a Facebook game.

Anyone being objective, use the term Time-gated. And understands it's real function.

Invasions, follower acquisition, tasks that can be considered dailies (such as barn work orders, inn tasks, pvp bones), and the fairly infrequent campaign quest are the only 100% interactive aspects of garrisons. The rest of it revolves around setup and maintenance, very much like a social media game.

A year from now, when this expansion is still trucking along, I'll be curious to see how many players want garrisons back for the next expansion.

- - - Updated - - -

Why is that remarkable? The Xfire numbers have proved to be rather predictive. In the case of WildStar, they were clearly predicting, from the first few weeks, that the game was going to do terribly. And there were people like you who tried to dismiss the data. While Xfire has seen a steady erosion of its usage, the trends it reveals are still very useful.

All this, but polls on MMO-C are irrelevant.

[Mukki]

I'm quite sure it was the raiding in WoW that brought in 500k+ in those first few months. /sarcasm

You clearly haven't play FF14 then which nails the story parts and feel like almost like SP FF title before you get to the HM dungeons/raids and other multiplayer bits (you still play and group with others along the way mind you). So there goes that made up percentage of yours.

FF14's story I find to be incredibly dull compared to any other Final Fantasy game, save for perhaps 12 (or 1, but that's not fair). Mifina is the epitome of a borind one-dimensional character. Yoshida really needs to step up his storytelling IMO, because as a Final Fantasy fan, I will say ARR's story is one of the most boring I've seen.

"Oh, hey guys, the Primals are pissed AGAIN." Amazing story. lol.

- - - Updated - - -

Because everything should be in a raid, right? I've seen bigger baddies die in lesser ways in other venues. Not really a big deal.

Did you honestly think waiting 5-10 minutes for someone watching intro cutscenes while people wait on you is a good thing? You can go back and watch those in your room in your own time. At least the ending bit for each dungeon can be watched uninterrupted.

Changes nothing though, story was still there and fully intact regardless.

I watched all the cut scenes and played a ton of ARR with high hopes. The story is boring. Where are the plot twists, the character development, you know, things that are typically the core of a true Final Fantasy story?

- - - Updated - - -

Which is pretty funny to be honest, it plays like WoW with a Final Fantasy theme but you know, with more shit to do outside of raiding (and better class/profs systems, all classes can be leveled on the same character, actual epic HM dungeons and solo content, etc etc). Maybe you're thinking of typical Korean grinder MMOs?

Did you also hate the excellent MoP because it was Asian themed?

FF14 as I recall has one battleground and one arena. You have no incentive to go out into the world aside from beastman dailies, and the world is still stuck in the FFXI-era zone-based gameplay (which went out of style I want to say a decade ago?).

I get that you love ARR no matter what, but to completely ignore its flaws is asinine.

[Deleted]

I think its wrong to focus on raiding. Blizzard should move the focus to broad audience content, as like the garrison or 5 mans.

Raids should have no focus, but should just be one of the components which offer gameplay. You should also be able to gain the same gear by other means.

WoW is too raiding centric.

[Pascal]

It's delusional to think that WoW needs to follow in the footsteps of games like Wildstar or Lotro. You want to know what would actually kill WoW? Try this, and see what happens.

The thing that gets me the most about this is treating the game as if its content is some right given to the players. It focuses around this idea that players who don't raid are somehow paying taxes toward a game they don't play, and they can't do anything about it. The article states, "If you don't raid for whatever reason, you are expected to subsidize the players who do," when in fact your reaction to a game not providing substance that you enjoy is that you should not play it. You are not being forced to pay for content that you aren't going to experience, you could not pay for it.

If the game wants to give people who like progression raiding something to enjoy, then that is what the game does. Every game is not for everyone, if you want to play an MMO that doesn't provide raiding options, play Lotro. The article goes so far as to compare paying for WoW to paying for other services, "Would you go to a restaurant where everyone paid the same amount of money, but 10% of the patrons got access to a better menu and better service? Would you pay for Netflix if 10% of subscribers had access to the movies that you spend a good chunk of time cursing about why they aren't already available via streaming?"

Here is the kicker - everyone is in fact able to raid. Whether or not you choose to invest in participating in and experiencing that raiding content is entirely up to how you choose to utilize your playtime in game. This isn't comparable to Netflix only allowing 10% of its subscribers access to movies, this is comparable to Netflix offering every single one of its subscribers access to movies, and only 10% of them watching them. I actually pay for Netflix and actually don't watch any movies on it, and that's how I choose to use the money that I pay for my Netflix subscription, just as players choose to not raid with their WoW subscription.

I'm tired of the entitlement that people have toward this game. The content of the game available will be based on what the developers of the game want for it. The content that comes out is related in part to what the players of the game want, but at the end of the day, this game is a product and a service being provided to people that they can choose to pay for or not. If the game isn't giving you what you want, don't pay for it, and find a competing product that you would rather support with your money. The game cannot and will not ever provide everything that every single person playing it wants. That is impossible. It's absolutely absurd to look at this game or any game and wonder "why doesn't this game provide exactly what I want it to?" Look at how hard they've tried to make all aspects of the game all-inclusive, accessible and available to everyone, and then look at how many people are still stark-raving furious about how much they don't like about the game.

[Grummgug]

"the most popular stories in major league baseball were kate upton and fans taking beer baths on the kiss cam. few people read box scores. we're eliminating box scores from our everyday baseball publication and focusing more on girls and beer. it just makes sense."

"the most popular news stories here at CNN were kim kardashian and did your name get put on a coke bottle? few people read the business section. we're eliminating the business section and focusing more on girls and marketing. it just makes sense."

[FobManX]

I don't really understand why people even play WoW if they don't raid(unless they PVP)at endgame. I mean what else is there to do?

[Bamboozles]

What is lacking in logic about the articles? He supported all his thoughts with logical thinking.

Just because it's not the kind of thinking you agree with doesn't make it stupid.

no he didn't. he really didn't. he attributed Wildstar's and LOTRO's fall to raids despite there being a huge number of the playerbase saying there were other gamebreaking issues that weren't addressed. He just saw "well, they both have raids in common. it must be raids!" and that's that. his entire argument is built on a horrendously flawed premise and really, a horrendous lack of logic.

[Huehuecoyotl]

Raiding is a mandatory aspect to any MMO.

It's a shame that your thinking is so narrow that you believe this to be true. There are a multitude of things that could be the core of an MMO, raiding is just one of the simplest to develop and manage. Seems like it isn't just WoW developers that need to start thinking outside of the box, I guess the players should try it as well.

[Aeula]

What's the point in it being an MMO without raids? Might as well just make it single player with online functions, if raiding dies the MMO genre will too outside of PvP based games.

[draykorinee]

Played GW2, lost motivation, end game needed it imo.

[Deleted]

Wildstar's issues wasn't the raids themselves, but the things you had to do in order to enter the raids (ie. doing the long attunement). It's a mix of poor execution and bad decisions, which they are fixing, just so ya'll are informed.

Personally I only play games to raid, so it's hard for me to be objective about this subject, but I don't think you can say "here, there's 10% of players who are doing our raids. That ain't a lot, so why do we continue these raids?" Raids are a part of a bigger picture. They help to create this epic feel in the game, whether you're raiding or not. A lot of hype is made for these raids and people are very vocal about these raids. I personally see a ton more than 10% actively talking about raiding on the internet. Some kind of player made PR, I mean even the Paragon vs Margok mythic video which was released a week ago hit 400k views on youtube as of now.

Also games like Guild Wars 2, which has gone for what, 2-3 years without raids has now decided that they want to make raids for GW2? That is pretty telling to me.