Leveling Content: The Primary Reason for an MMO

[Deleted]

I've been in favor of only allowing boosts to people with level 90 characters already. Once you've experienced the leveling process once you really don't need to again.

This.

It's bothersome that you have to re-do all the quests that you've already done five times before on different toons.

[Krazzorx]

While you'd never be able to see it, I wonder if instead of having levels in the game, all end game content was gated until you finished the quest line. Eg, you level 1-100 but without actually gaining levels. How would people's viewpoint on leveling content change?

[-Superman-]

Seriously, play a different genre if you can not be bothered to level. It's part of an RPG, be it gear levels, power levels, ability levels or whatever. If you think leveling is boring, please play something else that has no levels. You are clearly playing the wrong game, period.

I would agree if I did not already have one of each class on both factions spread over 3 different server types. When I would get bored, I would do as you suggested, and move to another. This is how I eventually got them all. After 22 times of leveling fully, and hundreds of times leveling partially, I am ready for something that allows me to just get to the meat and potatoes and skip that salad with no dressing.

- - - Updated - - -

While you'd never be able to see it, I wonder if instead of having levels in the game, all end game content was gated until you finished the quest line. Eg, you level 1-100 but without actually gaining levels. How would people's viewpoint on leveling content change?

The uproar about gating would be horrendous and people would tell them this is not an RTS like Diablo.

[Dispraise]

I agree with you, but I'm not going to bother reading through the dissertation that is your poll options. Pretend I clicked the one that best translates into "assuming people will be jolly about grinding through decade-old content a dozen times over is a ridiculous expectation".

[Farabee]

I hate leveling alts, but I didn't always. With the devs basically making every leveling zone a linear theme park that you HAVE to go through in a set order as opposed to the "pick what you want to do" feeling of BC/WOTLK, the complete obliteration of challenging (and rewarding) world group quests, and the addition of CRZ to take the fun out of gathering professions and rare spawns, leveling is worse than ever before.

If Blizzard added more content similar to FF14's Fates or the rares on IoT/TI where other people being there didn't cramp your style, it would make leveling more fun. People love hanging out on Timeless Isle and hunting down rares, working with others on the server of both factions. Hell, even having group tags on most of the quest mobs helps makes the process less tedious. Hopefully they take that route with WoD.

[Warlord Booty]

It depends on the toon for me. Some I push really hard to hit max level, so I can get better gear to put up huge numbers (expansion ruins that) and others I want to experience learning the toon and seeing the world. Really, the game for most of my toons is 1-Max and the story ends at max level and there is no real point to do anything more. I'm not a "the game starts at 90" person for the most part, usually the game ends when I ding 90. I mean, pet battles are always there, PVP is always there, the dungeons are always there. The only thing new at 90 is the raid content, which it's nice to see (LFR) but I only really care when I have a good raid team to play with. I won't just raid to raid.

[Leih]

Like many people, I enjoy the levelling content and questing, though after seeing it 12 times on the characters I already have, I'm not so bothered any more.

The thing that fascinates me most about most of these discussions concerning the level 90 boost is that most people seem to make the automatic assumption that just because someone CAN pay to skip to level 90 it means that every single person is going to do that now.

If people enjoy the levelling content, or they're a new player and haven't seen it before, they can still level through it as they always did. For those people who've done it 10 times before or hate levelling and questing and just want to go to end-game for PVP competition or whatever else, that's what the boost option is for. I don't really understand the whole argument that "I find levelling fun, so what if other people don't? They should be forced to play that part of the game too!"

There's reasons to argue against the 90 boost, but the whole "levelling is fun/immersive/etc so it should be required" thing just isn't a viable one. If you don't like Arenas you aren't forced to PVP. If you don't like hardcore raiding, you aren't forced to join a heroic guild. So at the end of the day I don't think that particular argument holds water.

[Krazzorx]

People don't actually hate leveling. You level once you hit 90 by getting a higher ilvl, you level up your mount collection, or your pvp rank. And that drives so many people to play WoW. There are very, very few people who completely don't care about character progression.

Right or wrong, here's the problem that seems to occur: people don't like walls preventing them from joining whatever form of content they want to do. It doesn't matter how good the content is, pvp players want to pvp. Not spend 12 hrs leveling and then pvp.

Does that mean I think leveling content is outdated? No. But its important to understand people's perspectives.

(I actually don't mind questing).

[Krazzorx]

Look at people's opinions of attunements like in BC (particularly the non-raiding ones): many more people would be content with attunements if they were account wide or optional.

Leveling is essentially an attunement. The amount of people who dislike leveling for the first time is much smaller than those who dislike leveling multiple times.

That is essentially at the core of those who dislike leveling. Did it once, not gonna get anymore story, very easy.

Now the biggest advantage by far leveling has is it makes people value their characters a ton. And that's a massive part about an RPG. The game would be a lot more boring in the long run if you could create any max level character on a whim.

[Casagrande]

Which option do I select for "I enjoy leveling, I don't think it's an important part of the game (at least to me), I will use my free level 90 I get with WoD but will not purchase any more, and I don't give a shit what other people do so long as it doesn't affect me (which buying level 90s does not)"?

[Laurabelle]

Seriously, play a different genre if you can not be bothered to level. It's part of an RPG, be it gear levels, power levels, ability levels or whatever. If you think leveling is boring, please play something else that has no levels. You are clearly playing the wrong game, period.

Actually, improving some abstract quantity, e.g. a "score", is basically at the heart of all video games ever made.

[Shamanberry]

I enjoy leveling content. I look forward to new expansions. However, after doing it 2-3 times, I start to get bored of it.

That said. If you're coming from the previous expansion at max level, leveling takes a couple of days. Even if you're starting from level 1 for the first time, leveling takes maybe 2-3 weeks, if you're playing very casually and not in any sort of rush.

Once you hit 90, there's dungeons, PvP, raids, challenge modes, max-level quests/storylines, professions, side content like pet battles/farms/etc, and so on. The first patch of each expansion lasts a few months, and then new max level content is released which lasts another few months. That repeats itself 4-6 times before the next leveling content comes in.

If you started in MoP and spent a whole month leveling, you have had 1.25 years at max level since then.

So, I'd say that leveling is maybe, being extremely generous, 5% of the game.

[Ciddy]

As far as WoW goes, I think it used to be, back when end-game content for the average player basically amounted to casual BGs, a few dungeons, and maybe Kara with your friends. Making new characters and experiencing Azeroth meant a lot more back then; the idea of a vast world brimming with life was much more of a selling point than it is now.

Very much this. Especially for veteran players who have gone through questing multiple times over the last 9+ years.

As far as I'm concerned, 1-90 is the most fun part of the game. Sure, it eventually gets boring once you've got multiple characters going, but so does...pretty much every other part of the game.

I'd like to see more development attention on the 1-90 stuff myself. I loved what Cataclysm did with revamping the old 1-60 experience, all the initial racial starting quests, and so on. I actually rolled new characters of each race just to do those. Cataclysm was my least favorite expansion as far as the "current" content (as in 80-85), but I really loved a lot of the old world stuff. Would also love to see class-specific quests come back, as they made alts more fun/unique to level.

That all being said, I give no shits whatsoever about the paid boost to 90. Some people only care about endgame raiding and will love it (especially those world-first guilds that require their raiders to have multiple geared alts), and that's fine. Knock yourself out for all I care. I'm not going to think any less of anyone who buys a 90.

[The Yeti]

The last time WoW focused specifically on older content was Cataclysm, pretty much widely accepted as the worst expansion in the game... why?

Leveling is important, or should I say, was important, in the early stages of this game. Most people who play now are at max or near max level, and those who join typically power through using RaF or something along those lines. Leveling is just not nearly as important as it once was.

Fact is, a game that's nearly a decade old needs to focus it's efforts on newer content, because this is where you spend the most time playing. Otherwise, what's the motivation to level? Because you want a bigger number on your name? No, you want the end game content!

[Strakha]

I love leveling but I also understand that some people do not. I enjoy taking a character and going through all of Kalimdor, then another and doing Eastern Kingdoms.

Also I run into so many rares since most people seem to skip questing at 15 or so to focus on dungeon grinding. I prefer to mix it up and do a dungeon once just for the quests, then go back to a zone to quest again.

[Shuji V2]

Actually, improving some abstract quantity, e.g. a "score", is basically at the heart of all video games ever made.

You do not improve a RPG by removing the RPG-aspect.

I would agree if I did not already have one of each class on both factions spread over 3 different server types. When I would get bored, I would do as you suggested, and move to another. This is how I eventually got them all. After 22 times of leveling fully, and hundreds of times leveling partially, I am ready for something that allows me to just get to the meat and potatoes and skip that salad with no dressing.

Perhaps you need to look for a new game, not change what a game is about because you've seen it all.

In any case, I have no problem with Blizzard removing the leveling aspect of WoW if they chose to do so. I can no longer be passionate about a game which betrayed it's own roots so I don't care anymore. But I do feel that Blizzard needs to change the genre of WoW, because it simply does not fit an RPG anymore. If WoW would get rid of leveling, it would become an adventure game.

edit:
Guys really, if you become bored of leveling after doing it for the fifth or so time, perhaps you need to find another game to play if it bores you.

[Tiev]

There's one option missing: I love doing the content ONCE. The rest I might boost past it.

Levelling content is fun. Once. Even in Swtor where the class stories were a lot of fun, I couldn't be arsed to level more than one character since you still had to do regular quests and those type of quests are beyong boring if you did them once already.


Also people need to just STOP telling other people to look for other games when they are bored of the levelling. Wow has a LOT MORE than just levelling and one might even say that it's strengths are at the max level. So seriously, just stop it. Makes you look bad.

[Puri]

So, in your opinion, is the leveling content in WoW the primary content? Also, is it good, bad, or OK and could use improvement?

Sorry, but where is your question answered in the answers of your poll?
I really enjoy leveling very much, but I would not call it the primary content in wow.

[Orange Joe]

I've been in favor of only allowing boosts to people with level 90 characters already. Once you've experienced the leveling process once you really don't need to again.

Same here. I enjoy leveling myself, but at the same time I can see how going through it 2-3 times can get boring. I'm ok with the boost. I wish they weren't $60, but I understand why they priced it there also. I just won't be buying it myself.

[jbombard]

If you want a new character you should have to do the content. If you don't want to do the content again, don't make another character.

My answer to the OP would be that I used to like leveling before they sped everything up so much that it is no longer a journey, interesting, an achievement or an accomplishment of any sort. With how stupidly easy and fast it is to level in the game currently it is mind boggling to me that anyone would pay to do it. If leveling in the game mean anything I would be against selling levels. That said similar to how they screwed up the talent trees so bad that people welcomed it's demise and replacement with meaningless talent toggles, they have screwed up leveling so much that at this point who gives a crap what they do to it.