Would you quit if LFR was removed?

[Baconeggcheese]

Well, based on the fact that raiding is so well-received in Warlords pretty much gives it away that a lot of focus was spent on it to make it well-received. I haven't seen many other well-received features in Warlords. Dungeons certainly weren't, Apexis grind is another and not to mention the lazy design behind Mythic dungeons by slapping higher item level onto it with the "Mythic tag" and deeming it "compelling content" despite being reused from Normal Dungeon loot and content. Oh and professions, hugely tedious and pretty dull.

Raiding was the only diamond in the trough that is Warlords because it so obviously received the most attention, you don't need stats or facts for something so obvious; that's called putting two and two together.

So... based on nothing you're making these assumptions. Despite the fact that there was no increase in bosses this xpac (in fact there was a 13 boss decrease from last xpac), despite the fact that there were only 2 tiers this entire xpac(the least in wows history)... meaning only 2 sets worth of tier etc which is one of the biggest resource hogs, and despite the fact that people complained excessively about tuning and mechanical difficulty issues in normal / heroic... they put more focus / resources into raiding this xpac.

Right.

- - - Updated - - -

This seems to me to be a really bizarre problem. If there is so much demand for groups which don't require linking Curve, why aren't some of the people who don't have Curve forming groups which don't have the Curve requirement?

They pop up and usually almost instantaneously fill.

They're not unheard of, they just don't spend anywhere near the same amount of time filling up as the groups that have ridiculous requirements. Which means they're nowhere near as visible as those groups because if you weren't there for the small window where they were up then you didn't see them.

I'm not really sure why blizzard keeps the aotc achievement for normal / heroic when they full well know that its only real purpose at this point is to cause bad player behavior.

[ls-]

This seems to me to be a really bizarre problem. If there is so much demand for groups which don't require linking Curve, why aren't some of the people who don't have Curve forming groups which don't have the Curve requirement?

They pop up and usually almost instantaneously fill.

They're not unheard of, they just don't spend anywhere near the same amount of time filling up as the groups that have ridiculous requirements. Which means they're nowhere near as visible as those groups because if you weren't there for the small window where they were up then you didn't see them.

I'm not really sure why blizzard keeps the aotc achievement for normal / heroic when they full well know that its only real purpose at this point is to cause bad player behavior.

^This, people form them, they aren't THAT rare as some people claim, they simply get full within couple of minutes, that's quite fast, I mean, Kazzak groups are getting filled with people at slower rate than HFC groups w/o AotC requirement.

[mysticx]

So... in what way did you think they increased focus or resources spent on raiding in this xpac? Where are you getting this information?

Well, the raids are huge (loads of bosses), and they sure as hell didn't spend a lot of resources anywhere else, now did they?

[Deleted]

I made one thread about that, so thats not really "babbling on". And yes i have 100 level 100's now, across TWO accounts, not 50 accounts. My wife needs an account now that she has started to watch me play more often She likes the netflix, but now shes starting to like games a little more.

What the fuck...

[Rezhka]

I don't get why do some ppl still get so much butt-hurt'd by LFR. It doesn't really change the game at all. Elitist jerks still have Mythic content to boast off. While filthy casuals can still enjoy the main raid content. No lifer altoholics can farm and catch up for those tedious legendary ring chain quest without having a hard time to form and failed hard on pug. Gold farmer elitist can even carry and make gold from them casuals to clear some impossible content to them. It doesn't have impact whatsoever to the first world race. It's like win win solution and doesn't have any negative effect tbh. Why so salty about it?

OT: I couldn't care less for LFR. I'd keep playing as long as I have my friends to play with. LFR is like have no impact at all on me.

[Deadite]

OT: I couldn't care less for LFR. I'd keep playing as long as I have my friends to play with. LFR is like have no impact at all on me.

Blizzard removed the need to run LFR but that is still not enough for some of these eejits. Then Blizzard went and added Valor to them and they all came crawling out the woodwork once again. You don't like it so you don't run it is an elegant solution to the so called problem. Sadly some prima donnas want to remove content from the many for reasons.

[Usagi Senshi]

Already quit (after 10 years) to play FFXIV. But, if LFR were removed, I sure as heck would never re-sub.

FFXIV has a much better and more enjoyable LFR modes (that is usually harder than WoW's normal IMO, plus much faster which is even better) than WoW anyway so enjoy.

[Baconeggcheese]

Well, the raids are huge (loads of bosses), and they sure as hell didn't spend a lot of resources anywhere else, now did they?

Of course they did, do you have any idea how much is spent on making the open world? Or have you taken a gander at garrisons?

That shit is insanely resource intensive, it was probably one of the most resource intensive things in the entire xpac. They had to make all the tech for that from scratch.

[heef]

You could've just as easily taken your friends through normal. It's not harder, you just can't walk them through it on a leash and have them literally just watch.

That's actually what "harder" means. I looked it up and everything.

[Lutris]

But people don't want the current model, you can see for yourself from the sub numbers. They're doing LFR (until they quit) because the current raid instance is the only relevant content in the whole game. How low do the sub numbers need to fall before people start accepting this? 1 million? 100k?

i'm only like halfway through this thread but this comment really stood out to me so i'm gonna address it/elaborate on it

no, people don't want the current model. do you want to know why? not only was lfr neutered/dumbed down to truly trivial (it used to have mechanics, which mattered to some degree, and that was good for those of us with lower skillsets or disabilities), but every single other form of content casuals would usually be occupied with was removed because the raiders whined about being forced to do it

reputations? gutted and butchered, with no worthwhile rewards so that raiders wouldn't feel forced to participate. no decent gear, no crafting recipes, not even the mounts were worth grinding those reps for.

valor/justice points? removed, because the raiders hated being "forced" to farm them. that was a system that never should have been removed, because it allowed casuals to work towards and improve gear that would help them move into new areas that are tuned to give the raiders a challenge (i.e., tanaan is near impossible on a fresh 100 with no 650 gear on).

dungeons and scenarios? with the removal of valor/justice, there ceased to be a reason for heroic dungeons to even exist. with no incentives to run them and bland, useless gear drops even for non-raiders, it took the re-implementation of valor to even get people to run them again. scenarios were scrapped outright outside of like one solo quest at the end of gorgrond.

professions? once again gutted, with only a handful or so of recipes. bop mats with severely limited crafting meant that creating even one piece of gear took forever-- and you could only ever equip three, so forget gearing yourself up with your profession. the existence of the garrison also killed most of the demand for raw materials, and even if it hadn't, actually farming anything is damn near impossible without a flying mount because of how the world itself is structured (nodes are super spread out, and the terrain was simply not built for ground-only travel-- the sheer number of impassable cliffs and tiny, impossible to climb ledges prevents any sort of exploration that isn't the paint-by-numbers achievement kind)

there isn't any one reason 5 million players quit over the course of a few months. it was the near-complete removal of everything casual players enjoyed doing, because raiders cried about being "forced" to do things that weren't raiding. this isn't even a comprehensive list; it's 5am and i'm tired and probably forgetting a lot of things.

in short, you can't pin the massive sub drop on lfr's existence alone. if anything, it's probably keeping the game on life support right now.

[Fuubakusatsu]

I would resub. But I'm coming back for Legion either way, the thing is I don't know if I can keep engaged when I know that community is a thing of the past. Playing MMOs alone isn't exactly fun.

While I'd rather have LFR removed, I don't know how to fix people with ridiculous requirements to join their raids. If LFR should stay, MoP's difficulty (before nerfs) would be ideal. Punch people enough and they'll learn how to block.

I mean, FFXIV's version of LFR has much more competent players than WoW. Why? Because they know it's that way or no way.

Insane more participation on the content.
The LFR participation (70%) is proof of one of 2 things:

1)People want queueable content
or
2)People want easy content

I like to believe the insane participation of LFR is simply because is queuable. I hope it's not because is easy and AFK'able...
But i think LFR should stay in the game for players who want something easy and chill.
Just make normal+ raiding queueable to see what happens.

As Cata proved, allowing incompetent people to queue for content that requires coordination just ruins the experience for everyone.

[Otimus]

i'm only like halfway through this thread but this comment really stood out to me so i'm gonna address it/elaborate on it

no, people don't want the current model. do you want to know why? not only was lfr neutered/dumbed down to truly trivial (it used to have mechanics, which mattered to some degree, and that was good for those of us with lower skillsets or disabilities), but every single other form of content casuals would usually be occupied with was removed because the raiders whined about being forced to do it

reputations? gutted and butchered, with no worthwhile rewards so that raiders wouldn't feel forced to participate. no decent gear, no crafting recipes, not even the mounts were worth grinding those reps for.

valor/justice points? removed, because the raiders hated being "forced" to farm them. that was a system that never should have been removed, because it allowed casuals to work towards and improve gear that would help them move into new areas that are tuned to give the raiders a challenge (i.e., tanaan is near impossible on a fresh 100 with no 650 gear on).

dungeons and scenarios? with the removal of valor/justice, there ceased to be a reason for heroic dungeons to even exist. with no incentives to run them and bland, useless gear drops even for non-raiders, it took the re-implementation of valor to even get people to run them again. scenarios were scrapped outright outside of like one solo quest at the end of gorgrond.

professions? once again gutted, with only a handful or so of recipes. bop mats with severely limited crafting meant that creating even one piece of gear took forever-- and you could only ever equip three, so forget gearing yourself up with your profession. the existence of the garrison also killed most of the demand for raw materials, and even if it hadn't, actually farming anything is damn near impossible without a flying mount because of how the world itself is structured (nodes are super spread out, and the terrain was simply not built for ground-only travel-- the sheer number of impassable cliffs and tiny, impossible to climb ledges prevents any sort of exploration that isn't the paint-by-numbers achievement kind)

there isn't any one reason 5 million players quit over the course of a few months. it was the near-complete removal of everything casual players enjoyed doing, because raiders cried about being "forced" to do things that weren't raiding. this isn't even a comprehensive list; it's 5am and i'm tired and probably forgetting a lot of things.

in short, you can't pin the massive sub drop on lfr's existence alone. if anything, it's probably keeping the game on life support right now.

I absolutely agree with this. The biggest thing for me is the metric atom bomb on dailies. Why the hell would they do that? The MoP model was pretty much perfect for telling a story and inciting player engagement. The only change it needed was the removal of items earned with rep costing valor. That was mainly what people hated. Instead, nope. Nope nope. REMOVED DAILIES ENTIRELY. Have one quest like MoP's dailies in the game, and make it only ONE a week. Yep. That makes soooooooo much sense. I seriously fucking hate how almost everything Blizzard does is wild sweeping changes.

[Baconeggcheese]

but every single other form of content casuals would usually be occupied with was removed because the raiders whined about being forced to do it

This is so insanely detached from reality I can't even begin to comprehend how someone reaches that conclusion.

- - - Updated - - -

The biggest thing for me is the metric atom bomb on dailies. Why the hell would they do that?

Because the overwhelming consensus from the community was that the mop daily model was flawed. Not raiders mind you, because raiders were affected the least by the problems with that system.

Blizzard as per usual completely missed the mark on what peoples complaints were and ham fisted the issue by basically just removing them all together. I have 0 clue why blizzard always overshoots fixing problems instead of just addressing the underlying causes, but they do it every time. LFR is actually a product of that exact behavior, since the problem they were fixing with LFR was giving content back to the 10 man normal wotlk pug / F&F community when they accidentally removed that difficulty when making the two sizes parallel difficulties. Instead of just adding a difficulty back under that one... they overshoot and create more problems by adding a new system instead of just fixing the problem.

[Tharkkun]

This is so insanely detached from reality I can't even begin to comprehend how someone reaches that conclusion.

- - - Updated - - -



Because the overwhelming consensus from the community was that the mop daily model was flawed. Not raiders mind you, because raiders were affected the least by the problems with that system.

Blizzard as per usual completely missed the mark on what peoples complaints were and ham fisted the issue by basically just removing them all together. I have 0 clue why blizzard always overshoots fixing problems instead of just addressing the underlying causes, but they do it every time. LFR is actually a product of that exact behavior, since the problem they were fixing with LFR was giving content back to the 10 man normal wotlk pug / F&F community when they accidentally removed that difficulty when making the two sizes parallel difficulties. Instead of just adding a difficulty back under that one... they overshoot and create more problems by adding a new system instead of just fixing the problem.

Oh it was definitely the raiders that bitched the most about MOP dailies. They wanted to raid and be competitive. Purple gear was gated behind reputations, which were gated behind dailies which were also gated behind reputations. So in order to get this gear you needed to raise a specific reputation in order to unlock additional reputations all gated behind dailies. That frustrated players. After the raids opened the competitive advantage (of reputation gear) was dissolved by acquiring raid gear most of the whining stopped.

But Blizzard still used their shotgun approach and eliminated dailies altogether while also removing meaningful rewards from reputation vendors.

[Jaylock]

I would rejoice really. I'm a casual right now due to work and other time constraints but I hate LFR with a passion and feel my brain getting numb when I play it. So its removal would be just fine with me.

Unfortunately you will get people responding to this: "oh herpa derp, dont do LFR then, herpa derp" They dismiss any logic that with the current end game model that Blizzard has fostered, it forces players to essentially run LFR as it is the path of least resistance to the legendary ring. Its the path of least resistance for the casual players to see end game content. Its the "easy way."

If EVERYONE was forced to do normal or higher, I guarantee you, engagement in those modes of difficulty would be highly ramped up because that would be the ONLY way to get your legendary ring. There would be way more normal mode raids available, and thus more opportunity for casuals to experience what real raiding is like. You would see very very very casual pugs getting together to experience the content and figure the raids out. And logic and my hunch would say, more guilds would form and people would be more willing to carve out an hour or two a night to do some sort of end game progression through raids. Players would be more engaged because they couldnt just faceroll their way to boss kills.

Think of it like flying. Giving everyone flying is a bad thing because it takes away from the obstacles of the world. It trivalizes the content. You cant just say "herpa derp, then dont fly, herpa derp" because naturally people will always take the path of least resistance if the option is available. So its invalid to say that.

[Glorious Leader]

Oh it was definitely the raiders that bitched the most about MOP dailies. They wanted to raid and be competitive. Purple gear was gated behind reputations, which were gated behind dailies which were also gated behind reputations. So in order to get this gear you needed to raise a specific reputation in order to unlock additional reputations all gated behind dailies. That frustrated players. After the raids opened the competitive advantage (of reputation gear) was dissolved by acquiring raid gear most of the whining stopped.

But Blizzard still used their shotgun approach and eliminated dailies altogether while also removing meaningful rewards from reputation vendors.

Been that way for awhile. Raiders whine blizzard guts shit to cater to them every one else suffers.

Valor vendor gutted
10/25 man raiding scene where 10 hand a handful of bis. Gutted
Dailies gutted

The developers have been bending over backwards with theirs balls tied in knots attempting to please a super awful minority of raiders and always at the expense of other people's content. WoD is simple the final extension of this backwards design and it cost them dearly.

[AwkwardSquirtle]

Note that the population of this site is unlikely to be LFR's primary audience, and therefore the poll will be biased in this regard. Those who want LFR to stay generally won't have the interest level in the game to visit fan sites.

[Baconeggcheese]

Oh it was definitely the raiders that bitched the most about MOP dailies. They wanted to raid and be competitive. Purple gear was gated behind reputations, which were gated behind dailies which were also gated behind reputations. So in order to get this gear you needed to raise a specific reputation in order to unlock additional reputations all gated behind dailies. That frustrated players. After the raids opened the competitive advantage (of reputation gear) was dissolved by acquiring raid gear most of the whining stopped.

But Blizzard still used their shotgun approach and eliminated dailies altogether while also removing meaningful rewards from reputation vendors.

Mmmno. Most of that gear was outdated before you even had access to it which was silly but not a big deal for most raiders. There were blues gated behind rep that was worse than dungeon blues, which made no sense but really didn't hurt raiders at all. Raiders didn't *need* any of that gear, so it really didn't matter if the design was horrible for how you got it.

Who it disproportionately affected was non-raiders who had an ever expanding massive number of dailies to do. People felt obligated to do ALL of them if they didn't want to fall behind and the rep gear (which was the only tangible way they could progress gear if they didn't raid) was gated behind both rep and valor. Average players (both raiding and non-raiding) threw a fit that there was an excessive number of dailies to do every day and the reward structure was horrendous, which is why blizzard did what they did.


I never get why people think blizzard caters to raiders, do you realize how different this game would be if they did?

[Deadite]

If EVERYONE was forced to do normal or higher, I guarantee you, engagement in those modes of difficulty would be highly ramped up because that would be the ONLY way to get your legendary ring. There would be way more normal mode raids available, and thus more opportunity for casuals to experience what real raiding is like. You would see very very very casual pugs getting together to experience the content and figure the raids out.

Yeah because organized raiding have proven to be soooo popular in the past. They added LFR to the game due to the fact that no bugger was raiding. Remove LFR and you go back to 5% of the player base raiding. I guess that is what all the elitist prima donnas are after tho?

[AwkwardSquirtle]

Mmmno. Most of that gear was outdated before you even had access to it which was silly but not a big deal for most raiders. There were blues gated behind rep that was worse than dungeon blues, which made no sense but really didn't hurt raiders at all. Raiders didn't *need* any of that gear, so it really didn't matter if the design was horrible for how you got it.

Who it disproportionately affected was non-raiders who had an ever expanding massive number of dailies to do. People felt obligated to do ALL of them if they didn't want to fall behind and the rep gear (which was the only tangible way they could progress gear if they didn't raid) was gated behind both rep and valor. Average players (both raiding and non-raiding) threw a fit that there was an excessive number of dailies to do every day and the reward structure was horrendous, which is why blizzard did what they did.


I never get why people think blizzard caters to raiders, do you realize how different this game would be if they did?

I don't agree. Raiders feel obliged to get things, non-raiders can play at their own pace, since nobody depends on their progression.