Build of the Month
Recent Blue Posts
Dark Heart PTR Development Notes
Dark Heart PTR Development Notes
Recent Forum Posts
Official High Elf Discussion Megathread
Melee Healer
Season 11 Ends Oct 20th, Season 12 Starts November 9th
The Everlasting Gobstopper Card Design CompetitionBlizzard Arena in Los Angeles
Blizzard's new arena opened this weekend for the Overwatch Contenders Season One Playoffs!
Game Developer Tweets
Originally Posted by MMO-Champion
From your answer about mistakes new game designers make you mentioned “Not recognizing that they have reached a point of diminishing returns.” Can you explain what that means?As a developer, there are a limited number of hours in the work week (even if you willingly work extra hours, which a lot of Rioters do). If you are spending your time on problem X, then you aren’t spending your time on problem Y.
If you get problem X to a solution that you would grade as an 85% in a day, and it takes you another day to get it to 90%, then you’re only improving it by 5% a day compared to your original output of 85% a day. That’s the diminishing returns part. Your efficiency drops to the floor, particularly compared to other projects you could be working on.
Now I’m not advocating shipping crappy, half-baked, or phoned-in designs. But in this business hitting 100% is almost never realistic, and the cost of hitting 100% isn’t worth it when you consider the opportunity cost of what you’re not doing in the same window. You have probably heard the phrase “The enemy of good is perfect.”
Junior designers mismanage this all the time. They get so excited about their project that they don’t want to live within any constraints. They are completely focused on how awesome their project is and lose sight of the cost of that project (in terms of their time).
I once spent several days setting up a battle between two NPCs that was just background action for players to make it feel like a battle was raging all around them. It looked really cool, but it took a long time to set up. If this was the climax of a big moment, then maybe that expenditure was worth it. Or maybe I should have spent that time to set up two different battles that would have more impact on players in the long run.
Another way this manifests is when a junior designer spends too much time trying to save a flawed concept rather than recognizing that it probably can’t be saved without weeks of work and that they would be better off to consider alternative concepts. (Source)
Heroes of the Storm - Junkrat, Hallow’s End, and More!This week we got a preview of Junkrat, the Hallow's End event, and other things in development.
FinalBossTV - Episode #153: Mythic Dungeon Invitational
Check out FinalBossTV on Sunday for the Mythic Dungeon Invitational episode!
Dark Legacy Comics #601 - Play to Whine
DLC #601 has been released!
This Week in WoW History
We're taking a look back at old MMO-Champion posts and World of Warcraft news that occurred during this time in previous years.
South Park Releases "Make Love, not Warcraft"
The popular animated sitcom, South Park released their eighth episode in season ten. Make Love, not Warcraft was a Primetime Emmy Award winning episode featuring Cartman, Kyle, Stan, and Kenny who became obsessed with the game, making it their quest to stop a high level player from killing others.
World of Warcraft Reaches 12 Million Players
The game peaked at 12 million players worldwide shortly after the Wrath of the Lich King expansion being available in China. The active subscriber numbers have not reached the same levels since, and only came close two years later. Blizzard announced they would no longer be reporting subscriber numbers in late 2015.
Flexible Raid Lockout
The flexible raid lockout system was announced as an upcoming feature for Patch 4.0.1. This new system allowed players to be loot locked to specific bosses each week rather than a specific raid size. This change standardized loot from 10 and 25 man raid size to the same item level, which allowed guilds the choice of which raid size they preferred more. This system had a few restrictions when it came to Heroic raiding, but it marked a great stepping stone towards a better raid system. Today’s flexible Normal and Heroic raid System is largely based on this initial version which we saw implemented in the Cataclysm.
Dragon Soul and Tier 13
Shortly after the preview of Dragon Soul, the Tier 13 Armor Sets and raid weapons were added. This gave us a preview of what the sets in the new raid would look like, as well as the new Rogue Legendary weapons that were obtainable in the new raid. Dragon Soul was the first raid which featured an end boss who only had weapons on his loot table, rather than a combination of weapons and armor.
Arcane Mage Hidden Appearance Discovered
After the beginning of Legion, every class was looking for their Hidden Artifact Appearance. The Woolomancer's Charge was discovered almost two months after the launch of the new expansion. This appearance had multiple steps that needed to be completed to unlock it, making it one of the more interesting ones to be found in the Order of the Shepherd Discord.
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