What does Blizzard need to do to hold subscribers throughout this expansion?

[Yig]

I don't think it's possible to maintain the same sub number they have at the opening of an expansion, but their 160 member team now working on 2 different content patches at the same time seems to be a good way to keep people around more than they did with CATA.

5.1 style lore and filler patches every 3-5 months or so with 4.3 style major patches a couple of times a year seems a welcome change to me. I may let my sub lapse myself in a few weeks to a month, but I will be back for 5.1 with bells on.

[Cryonic]

Making dailies into an instance where I can do them alone

[Oogly]

Subscriber churn is a big problem for MMO games. WoW recently had a nice resurgence of subscribers thanks to the release of the MoP expansion. Since people who came back for MoP are already leaving, the total subscriber base is likely to have peaked again, until next expansion release. If you were in Blizzard's shoes, what changes would you implement to slow population decay? Do you foresee more subscription-padding measures like Annual Pass and Free Lvl 80 & Free Realm Transfer Scroll of Resurrection? Or do you see Blizzard focusing on releasing quality content that will keep players interested in the game?

I think that the staggered release of this current raid tier is an excellent way to keep players logging in. However, I have my doubts that the Brawler's Guild is going to tide people over through the holiday season. And daily quests may have looked good on paper, but I think they've pushed a fair number of people away from the game.

How do you see this expansion playing out?

Essentially more of the same thing they are doing atm. They are staggering release of all their content now by gating it to come out over a period of months in a trickle until the next patch is due for release. Its the only way they can artificially keep subs holding on until they throw them a new carrot. As others have said in the thread already Tier11 cata raids all came out at once and the worlds best had them smashed in a matter of weeks then could optionally unsub until the next major raid patch arrived (this loses Blizz revenue over the quarter). With MoP they are releasing one third of Tier14s raids at a time, once a month roughly, to keep players subscribed for a longer period and also to see them financially through the slower period of the year. This allows them to then release their next tier of raiding content 1 week before the end of the next fiscal quarter to to keep subs rolling and numbers high for marketing and PR.

September (end qtr) : MoP release 1/3 raids open >>> October : 2/3 raids open >>> November : 3/3 raids open >>> December (end qtr) : New patch promise entice players to stay on. In this case Brawlers Guild and new dailies etc

January : Nothing new expected >>> February : Nothing new, maybe more dailies, more changes in landscape for the war >>> March (end qtr) : New patch with 3 new gated raids comes out before end of month plus another faction to grind rep from. MOAR DAILIES!. 1/3 raids open >>>


You get the idea.


If they are indeed bleeding subs prior to the next major content patch then Blizzard will just get their sales and marketing team brainstorming ways of generating additional revenue streams. You'd expect to see more sales on already existing store minipets or mounts with something like upto 50% off the original price for a limited time only (any revenue, even 50%, to entice sales is better than none). Also you'd likely see some new special MoP mount and minipet go on sale in the store as they are always a guaranteed fast cash injection to blizzards coffers should they need it. If they start losing subs really bad (unlikely to happen as bad as Cata as they've learnt their errors and gating content now artifically solves the problem.) they will resort to stepping up marketing incentives like the super SoR etc.

[painweaver]

Blizzard take their time because they like to provide quality content, they do endless testing internally and on the PTR every patch that is released to make sure that its as bug-free as possible.

Maybe the blizzard from 10+ years ago rigorously tested internally, but not this abomination. It's pretty obvious that they DON'T test internally at the level they should be, and rely on the PTR/beta to do their dirty work. This lack of internal testing on their part has resulted in a lot of problems that "can 'just' be patched" (because this is their mindset now, "oh, we'll just patch it-fuck it") come release, which causes a whole other clusterfuck of problems that could have been avoided.

[Synstir]

Difference might have been big but not big enough to matter in heroic dungeons or LFR, they were easy enough as it was anyways (except for during BC of course). Also as I said, everyone just looked these up on the Internet anyways, then never looked at them again, it's as if they were never even there. Not all that interesting design.

eeehhhh the main point of talents I had was manually setting it...... that made the difference and that created a sense of progression.
we got to some sidepoint, which is not really relevant in this regard... but still I think even in wrath hc's when a players was speccedc in the wrong way, it was noticebale very uch. There was a huge dps loss. I am just wondering how much lower the dps would be if we ignored talents now? I just have to try it out some time.

[Cybran]

Maybe the blizzard from 10+ years ago rigorously tested internally, but not this abomination. It's pretty obvious that they DON'T test internally at the level they should be, and rely on the PTR/beta to do their dirty work. This lack of internal testing on their part has resulted in a lot of problems that "can 'just' be patched" (because this is their mindset now, "oh, we'll just patch it-fuck it") come release, which causes a whole other clusterfuck of problems that could have been avoided.

I remember a tweet from Ghostcrawler where he said he was part of their Diablo 3 inferno "internal task force"... I blame him for "Doubling it" (Hp and Damage of inferno mobs) and the shitty state that Diablo 3 was launched. Their internal testing is just awful.

[Deleted]

Making dailies into an instance where I can do them alone

I want it NOW!!! seroussly some of these dailys as such a pain in the ass when you compare with other 100 people, I wish all of them just die.

[Deleted]

It's pretty obvious that they DON'T test internally at the level they should be, and rely on the PTR/beta to do their dirty work.

And then they ignore the bug reports they get from the PTR/beta.

[Ferocity]

Blizzard need to implement some kind of long-term AA. Since t9, if to take out expansions from equation, we only get raiding content (far from everyone is raiding), and not even much of it. And current raiding model is based on treadmill, you gear up and in few monthes you are walking around like in greens, need gear up again. And you can skip gearing up in previous tier and jump straight in new one. Dailies aren't really a replacement to AA, they also award gear which becomes obsolete in few monthes. Mounts, titles, pets - they don't advance your character.

So people don't really have much reason to play outside of expansion switches. I don't know for anyone else, but for me 6 hard resets with relatively small delay since t9 are not really encouraging to continue progress on my character on constant basis. Why bother? You are always equal to most other players, if you play 10 hours a week or 10 hours a year (!) - it doesn't matter. WoW became very easy to walk away from.

Oh and Blizzard should walk away from dexterity-based raids or they will lose everyone who is still left from mature raiding population. As I wrote in other thread, preCata raids were never about high reaction times and excessive dances. Only Heigan was a dancy boss, but thankfully "exploit" wasn't fixed till people were already overgearing even Heigan #2. Dexterity "skill" and high reaction times should be faded away, as it is RPG and not 3D Action/Arcade.

[Wildtree]

What does Blizzard need to do to hold subscribers throughout this expansion?

The answer is actually super simple...
Blizzard shifted away from a niche player base, and is catering to the mainstream now. To the masses. or if you will, to the casual player. To get them is one thing.
To keep them is a complete different ball game.
If they want to keep the more laid back, casual player base, and increase it, they must do what they are hesitant to do at least still for now.
They have to govern the game. They have to moderate the game. The immature anti social douchebag mentality in the game is soaring. It's getting out of control
If they'd put an end to it, the subs would actually rise.
WoW as of now has a very very bad reputation out there in the real world. And not because of it's content, but the community.
As for chat channels. No problem, I could disable them, if I wanted to..
But it's draining into the game play too. Oh, it's your mob? Guess what, I don't give a shit.. I take it, if I can. And if I succeed, I laugh in your face.
Not working for Blizzard as a business in the long run. That costs them customers left and right.. Not to mention new ones.
Every single customer quitting the game over that will spread the message to their friends, and family... And they will not become customers either..

[Numeanor]

Blizzard take their time because they like to provide quality content, they do endless testing internally and on the PTR every patch that is released to make sure that its as bug-free as possible.

Blizzard game, bug free? Are we living on the same planet and playing same game in same reality?

[Deleted]

Blizzard focusing on releasing quality content that will keep players interested in the game

Honestly, I lost my shit here. Best joke I've heard this year by far.

[Deleted]

Blizzard need to implement some kind of long-term AA. Since t9, if to take out expansions from equation, we only get raiding content (far from everyone is raiding), and not even much of it. And current raiding model is based on treadmill, you gear up and in few monthes you are walking around like in greens, need gear up again. And you can skip gearing up in previous tier and jump straight in new one. Dailies aren't really a replacement to AA, they also award gear which becomes obsolete in few monthes. Mounts, titles, pets - they don't advance your character.

So people don't really have much reason to play outside of expansion switches. I don't know for anyone else, but for me 6 hard resets with relatively small delay since t9 are not really encouraging to continue progress on my character on constant basis. Why bother? You are always equal to most other players, if you play 10 hours a week or 10 hours a year (!) - it doesn't matter. WoW became very easy to walk away from.

Oh and Blizzard should walk away from dexterity-based raids or they will lose everyone who is still left from mature raiding population. As I wrote in other thread, preCata raids were never about high reaction times and excessive dances. Only Heigan was a dancy boss, but thankfully "exploit" wasn't fixed till people were already overgearing even Heigan #2. Dexterity "skill" and high reaction times should be faded away, as it is RPG and not 3D Action/Arcade.

Wow, this is one of the worst reasons ever. Why are you even playing games when all lthat matters for you is ending. (I guess you "play" games on youtube)
Treadmill is the reason why this game is so succesfull for all those years, it gives people a reason to play. What you would prefer chillin in your T3 to this day? and maybe get gear "for the looks"? recently one game tried that and it's a massive fail.

[Cybran]

https://twitter.com/Ghostcrawler/sta...78758755639296

I'm not on the D3 dev team. I lead an Inferno strike team. All the designers bounce ideas off each other. We're a family.

Do you remember how shit Diablo 3 inferno was? Their internal testing is terrible and there is no bug report/feedback option like there was in Cataclysm and Starcraft 2 betas. Their Betas and PTR are only PR events to hype up their products. Bugs reported for months make it live time and time again. You have to blind or willfully ignorant to not see this.

[mosely]

And why are we arguing about how many subscribers Rift has? This is about WoW's subscribers!

Drawing parallels can be useful. Companies learn from each other's successes and failures. I played Rift, but quit almost immediately after hitting 50. On the other hand, I played Age of Conan a fair amount after hitting max level, and have returned to that game a few times after quitting. I think having a strong theme and unique mechanics drew me back to one game over the other. Also, the Age of Conan starter zone (imo) is the best leveling experience in any MMORPG.

[Deleted]

The answer is actually super simple...
Blizzard shifted away from a niche player base, and is catering to the mainstream now. To the masses. or if you will, to the casual player. To get them is one thing.
To keep them is a complete different ball game.
If they want to keep the more laid back, casual player base, and increase it, they must do what they are hesitant to do at least still for now.
They have to govern the game. They have to moderate the game. The immature anti social douchebag mentality in the game is soaring. It's getting out of control
If they'd put an end to it, the subs would actually rise.
WoW as of now has a very very bad reputation out there in the real world. And not because of it's content, but the community.
As for chat channels. No problem, I could disable them, if I wanted to..
But it's draining into the game play too. Oh, it's your mob? Guess what, I don't give a shit.. I take it, if I can. And if I succeed, I laugh in your face.
Not working for Blizzard as a business in the long run. That costs them customers left and right.. Not to mention new ones.
Every single customer quitting the game over that will spread the message to their friends, and family... And they will not become customers either..

funny thing is I was in the process of typing something along these lines few minutes ago.
Yeah I think it would be better for WoW if Blizzard stopped trying get all these new people on the board, stop catering for everyone, and be more focused on current playerbase. Would WoW had less players? - yes it would, but If it was 5 millions of loyal playerbase that is satisfied with the direction it woul be much better then having 10 milions when half of them are just constant whiners.

[Deleted]

Updated character models and animations would bring many people back to WoW. But they shouldn't look much different than current models.

[Fahrenheit]

I don't think there is a single thing that Blizzard can do to keep up subs at this point in it's life cycle. The kids that grew up on Warcraft 1-3 are now well in their late 20s or 30s, myself included, and some of us, again, myself included, have been playing this game for nearly 8 years now.

[Deleted]

Well the other raid was diablo 3

Sorry had to say it i still personally feel D3 was ment to be the next Ruby sanctum

You can make that claim if you wan't but you know as well as I do that it's complete crap. If they had given D3 to everyone with an active subscription to WoW, fair enough... but as someone who was never duped into buying the annual pass and had no interest in buying or playing Diablo 3 whatsoever, there was no extra content for 10 months.

We got that same stale raid, gradually made easier and easier to compensate for the growing infestation of spoiled little bastards who think they are entitled to everything without a minimum of effort. Not only did Blizz fail to give us more content, but they actively destroyed the content that was available. (Nerfing normal and HC so much when there was already LFR for the terribads to "see the content"?!?! really?!?)

[Cerebrate]

The ability to gear alts. Increase rep gain is a joke of a solution.