Why does Warlords of Draenor have to be completely written off?

[dextersmith]

Because it was completely garbage.

[Marmot]

Because it was completely garbage.

Is that enough reason to leave the players with no content for two thirds of the expansion's lifecycle though?

[Tomana]

I get your point, and I agree, but I mostly meant from a technical standpoint. I think adding more content before Legion is released would complicate development of Legion (I'm not 100% sure on that though, but the way wow is held together with virtual band aids at this point, this probably would be the case).

I'm obviously not a technical expert on WoW's insides, but if they were able to do it in BC with the scourge invasion event, I see no reasons why it would not be doable.

Now, they ARE already planning something like that for the pre-patch event (see e.g. http://blizzardwatch.com/2015/11/09/...mbitious-ever/) but that will require new assets, talents etc. to be rolled out. OTOH, you can knock something up using existing assets much earlier to ease the wait (and perhaps provide some gold sinks of some kind, if necessary).

[Lahis]

Why can't they salvage the content they wasted over a year developing in the first place? They cut off Mists of Pandaria to get Warlords of Draenor out sooner and it turned out utter shit due to lack of consideration for actual repeatable content. Fix that problem and throw a few bones every couple of months. I'm not asking for raids, just things to do and reasons to visit places they would've otherwise wasted time developing.

Wait, what?

In what way did they cut MoP short? It had 3 great tiers fo raiding, with in between content patches and plenty of actual outdoor content for people to do.

Not to mention 5.4 lasted for way too damn long too.

[Marmot]

Not to mention 5.4 lasted for way too damn long too.

You answered your own question.

[Pua]

Without wishing to be controversial, look at it like this:

Since the Siege of Orgrimmar, World of Warcraft will have had two major patches in THREE YEARS if Legion releases next September.

Just let that sink in for a second.

A major patch at an average of every 18 months.

That alone (and immediately) tells you why they've bailed on Legion. They knew players were bored of it early, they knew it was a rush-job prior to release, and knew that subscriptions were tailing off so badly that they're no longer going to announce them. The game is in terminal decline, and the only way they can keep monetizing it at a reasonable rate is through box sales and microtransactions.

Two content patches in three years is inexcusably bad when it comes to content provision. Inexcusably bad. Even those who argued that Warlords was a decent enough expansion can't defend the turnaround in content provision, because it's completely indefensible.

My advice is to do what most people are doing - unsubscribe until there's something you want to play, then reassess when new content actually arrives. Staying subscribed to World of Warcraft indefinitely is a mug's game, and it's why fewer and fewer people are willing to do it.

TL, DR?

They haven't just bailed on Warlords of Draenor.

They've bailed on World of Warcraft.

You answered your own question.

That doesn't mean they cut Mists short. Quite the opposite, in fact.

[Deleted]

The day they have decided to let Grommash and Gul'dan live through it, is the day they decided to write it off.

[Lahis]

They haven't just bailed on Warlords of Draenor.

They've bailed on World of Warcraft.

And it's no wonder when smaller teams working HS, HotS and soon Overwatch (you can bet your ass the game will have skins to buy) bring in much better profit margings.

[Marmot]

That doesn't mean they cut Mists short. Quite the opposite, in fact.

The expansion itself wasn't short, no, but the support of it ended abruptly with Siege of Orgrimmar, which was the point I was trying to make.

This also makes me wonder why they spend so long trying to develop huge expansion releases which people burn through rapidly anyway, instead of doing significantly smaller but more frequently released patches.

[Lahis]

The day they have decided to let Grommash and Gul'dan live through it, is the day they decided to write it off.

Gul'Dan I can get, he was a tool to bring Legion on Azeroth. He was gonna survive this expansion from the earliest of drafts which were fleshign out the WoD -> Legion storyarcs.

Grommash living and going unpunished is just a cop out and clear sign of Blizz abandoning ship way faster than they had originally planned.

[Dread Pirate Phayde]

I think they missed an opportunity to plan a mini patch, like Ogre island (or mysterious Faralon) to break up the content drought until Legion. It would have been a good test for these new developers.

[Lahis]

The expansion itself wasn't short, no, but the support of it ended abruptly with Siege of Orgrimmar, which was the point I was trying to make.

This also makes me wonder why they spend so long trying to develop huge expansion releases which people burn through rapidly anyway, instead of doing significantly smaller but more frequently released patches.

5.4 itself was a good final patch. They could've added 5.4.x to bring us the Garrosh trial ingame, but there wasn't really need for more Pandaria content. The real problem is again WoD: this abomination of ineffiency has somehow too damn much of Blizz time and resources with really sparce results. SoO should've lasted for maximum of 8 months, with 6 being more reasonable.

[Pua]

And it's no wonder when smaller teams working HS, HotS and soon Overwatch (you can bet your ass the game will have skins to buy) bring in much better profit margings.

Ultimately, that's it. MMORPGs are expensive to make, require a lot of overheads, and are no longer "in vogue". The unique circumstances that World of Warcraft originally launched into don't exist anymore, and a raft of bad decisions since Cataclysm have irrevocably fractured a community that, more or less, got along. When the game is put on life support, Blizzard will continue the franchise with Warcraft IV and probably never go near MMORPGs again - certainly not ones the scale of World of Warcraft.

It's a potentially ignominious end to such a gaming titan.

[Deleted]

SoO should've lasted for maximum of 8 months, with 6 being more reasonable.

Way too short for a final tier.

[Sundreamer]

They haven't just bailed on Warlords of Draenor.

They've bailed on World of Warcraft.

which is heartbreaking...

[Lahis]

Way too short for a final tier.

Why? "Regular" raid tiers last around 6 months. No rule says the last tier should be any longer. Only reason we have year long last tiers is Blizzard's unbelieably inefficient Expansion production speed.

[Marmot]

Why? "Regular" raid tiers last around 6 months. No rule says the last tier should be any longer. Only reason we have year long last tiers is Blizzard's unbelieably inefficient Expansion production speed.

Pretty much.

[Iflash]

They gave up on Warlords even before Warlords came out. Remember how back in Beta they kept cutting everything? Even storylines. Garrosh died, the bronze dragon died, Kargath died. They had no intention of a 6.1/6.3 even before Warlords launched.

[iindigo]

They gave up on Warlords even before Warlords came out. Remember how back in Beta they kept cutting everything? Even storylines. Garrosh died, the bronze dragon died, Kargath died. They had no intention of a 6.1/6.3 even before Warlords launched.

If you watch a couple of videos on Youtube, you’ll see just how far these changes went. Early on, Tanaan was mostly complete and an entirely different beast (zero fel corruption) that was going to be available at launch. We were going to arrive on the planet through a device that looked to be either Titan or Bronze Dragonflight in nature that was nestled in some of the mountains between zones. There was no Dark Portal because it had yet to be built — originally, the whole reason we were going to AU Draenor was to prevent Garrosh from finding allies in the AU orc clans and thus, the construction of the Dark Portal.

But something caused Blizz to shift the story in an entirely different direction halfway through, meaning that they had to scrap what progress they had made and basically start over. And so, here we are now.

Between this bizarre mid-development story change and the shocking lack of productivity being displayed by a team that’s the largest it’s ever been, one has to wonder if there isn’t something fishy going on internally at Blizzard.

[tuesday the paladin]

New Xpac can bring back more players, and give a large injection of cash. It's easier to change boats than right a sinking ship.

They finished telling the story, any other content would just be filler.

Which is pretty BS because there's a lot left unsaid in WoD.