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A Co-Op Brawl This Week - A New Year Bash

Twitch Drops Return for the Clashes

Patch 8.0.1 - Build 27291: Group Finder Addon Changes
The latest live build made a few more changes to the Group Finder. This was likely to combat group finding addons, such as the LookingForGroup addon.

  • Searching for groups now must be done manually.
  • Entering text into the search box now must be done manually, you can't paste in text anymore.
  • Accepting group members now must be done manually, as the Auto-Accept functionality has been disabled.


Stromgarde Warfront Unlock Timing
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
We’ve seen some confusion about when Battle for Azeroth’s first Warfront, Battle for Stromgarde, will open and would like to give some clarifications.

Similar to other types of endgame content such as raids and rated PvP, the Battle for Stromgarde will not be immediately available at launch. Instead, it’ll open a few weeks later. Initially, the Alliance will control Stromgarde Keep (which allows access to certain outdoor content in the Arathi Highlands), while the Horde begins preparations to assault. Once those preparations are finished, Horde players will be able to queue for the Battle for Stromgarde Warfront.

A few days afterward, the roles will reverse: the Horde will control Stromgarde (thus gaining access to the outdoor content), and the Alliance will begin their own preparations to retaliate. This process will continue to alternate between Horde and Alliance on a regular cadence.

Zappi Boi Stats
Blizzard shared a chart that demonstrates how character names with Zap at the beginning spiked after the release of the cinematic.



Patch 8.0.1 Hotfixes - August 8, 2018
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
Classes
  • Death Knight (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
    • Gorefiend's Grasp correctly functions on transports such as elevators.
    • Unholy
      • Risen Skulker from All Will Serve will now properly change targets to assist while in combat.
      • Summon Gargoyle and the Dark Arbiter variant will now properly assist in combat and change targets.
  • Warlock (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
    • Succubus will no longer automatically cast Seduction when the Warlock is affected by crowd control effects.

Dungeons and Raids
  • Tomb of Sargeras

    • Dresanoth’s Icy Talons ability no longer deals excessive damage.
    • Lylth the Silent no longer deals excessive damage with Lunar Blast, Shadow Blast, and Star Barrage abilities.
    • Lieutenant Silvermight no longer deals excessive damage.

Player versus Player
  • Arathi Blizzard
    • The number of bases controlled by each faction is now displayed correctly.

Professions
  • Herbalism
    • Fixed a bug that made Frost Lotus require a Herbalism skill of 400 to be successfully harvested.

Warcraft Secrets Website Launch
The Warcraft Secrets website launched recently, with the goal of documenting the hidden secrets in WoW.

  • The Secrets Database documents all the secrets that have been completed by the community, as well as hidden collectibles and other interesting vanity items.
  • Guides are articles on elaborate secrets such as Uuna, Lucid Nightmare and Sun Darter Hatchling
  • Hunter Pets section includes guides to secret-related or hard-to-find and challenging hunter pets such as Lightning Paw and Fenryr.
  • Mysteries documents uncovered hidden secrets, as well as Battle for Azeroth secrets in the process of uncovering.

If you decide to register an account, you will also be able to sort your collection based on obtained secret mounts, hidden collectibles and vanity items.


They are currently hosting a giveaway for 5x Blizzard Shop Mounts on their front page, as well as several others on their Website Discord for MMO-Champion Premium and other websites.
This article was originally published in forum thread: Group Finder Addon Changes, Zappi Boi, August 8 Hotfixes, Warcraft Secrets started by chaud View original post
Comments 291 Comments
  1. SupBrah's Avatar
    Searching for groups now must be done manually.
    Whelp, rip world quest addons completely now. Honestly I expected nothing less from Activision-Blizzard when LookingForGroup and WorldQuestList added workarounds that allowed you to search and create groups based on QuestIDs. This just proves that they either

    A.) Their sharding tech is such un-optimized garbage that it can't even handle the tiniest of QoL automation (remember how they even removed the right-click feature from THEIR OWN UI??)
    B.) Activision-Blizzard really just wants to pad those active user statistics for their shareholders by making mundane tasks take as long as possible
    C.) Both.


    Accepting group members now must be done manually, as the Auto-Accept functionality has been disabled.
    LMFAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO WTF???


    No seriously, I want to hear the reasoning behind this. Yeah the first part of my comment might be kinda harsh but at least I have an idea of why they did it. I honestly have no idea why they removed auto-accepting. Are their servers unable to handle auto-inviting 4 other people to a group?

    What's next? Are they going to remove the ability for addons and/or the UI to automatically send out invites when we click a button? Are they going to make us manually type out /invite [Name]-[Server] in order to invite people to raids?


    If this is due to server performance, then i'm sorry but FIX YOUR SERVERS! Stop removing stuff from the game as a bandaid to poorly optimized server load balancing. I hate to invoke the "small indie company" meme but jesus. Activision-Blizzard is a multi-billion dollar company. Hire/contract Google/Amazon/Facebook engineers to fix your load balancing issues if your in-house devs are unable to do it.
  1. Penuruloki's Avatar
    Based on the way it's being done, and the limited communication, this is clearly a "bug" that they will get around to fixing a week or 2 after BFA launch.

    I.e., they're nerfing group finder during xpac leveling because they don't want people leveling too fast and their servers can't handle it anyway. They'll probably bring it back once it's just grouping for elite WQ again; at least, they will when it becomes clear that people won't PuG world content without it and casuals start unsubbing.
  1. mmoc74e2a8ce98's Avatar
    My bet is they disable the auto accept because of the supplydrop farm. People were chaining several groups to get a ton of chests and it is very convenient with the auto join since you dont have to bother the leader, he just has to sit there.
  1. Alayea's Avatar
    I don't know why the surprise about these changes (except for auto-accept's removal, very bizarre). Saw it coming a mile away as people tried to get around the patch 8.0 changes. Remember this blue post from 2010 (news source):
    Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
    If we find that the AVR mod (or any mod attempting to replicate its functions) are usable after 3.3.5 we will take further, more drastic steps.
    That bit about "more drastic steps" applies equally to any addon(s) that they don't like.

    (FYI I'm not defending Blizzard's decisions in regards to Group Finder addons, just explaining my overall lack of surprise.)
  1. Ciadia's Avatar
    The more bothersome they make the content/features, the more i will just skip of their "little" content in BFA, besides raiding.

    They are turning the game more and more into a single player experience, removing group features like this isn't going to make me more social, it will just let me be less social not bothering to group up.

    Maybe people will start waking up and realize how little content BFA actually have, when everything has to be spread this thin / everything has to take forever.
  1. Queendom's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Holydruid View Post
    My bet is they disable the auto accept because of the supplydrop farm. People were chaining several groups to get a ton of chests and it is very convenient with the auto join since you dont have to bother the leader, he just has to sit there.
    Because this is what Blizzard is good at, you know, fixing the symptom and not the problem (in before "Group Finder removal").
  1. Bullarkie's Avatar
    Really hoping the /lfg changes are to temporarily reduce server load during BFA launch.
  1. ragerblade's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Bullarkie View Post
    Really hoping the /lfg changes are to temporarily reduce server load during BFA launch.

    My friends are talking about hosting a server wide protest on some servers about this. Since the servers can't even handle large scale pvp. Maybe players should start protesting in game?
  1. therealbowser's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Eleccybubb View Post
    Meh I threw the fellow on ignore dude.

    Can't be bothered with people who have the "Blizz never do nothing wrong" attitude then proceed to insult someone for being critical.

    Just as bad as those who mindlessly bash the game without actual critique. (Not you of course haha)

    I mean as I said I think you are taking your "quit the game" thing too far imo but I can imagine there are people who are a bit frustrated with some design decisions as of late.

    Hell for me it was Legendaries in Legion and the early AP system. And Broken Shore. That zone just urgh don't get me started on it....
    Heh, it's rare to run across someone that belligerent even here; I find it more amusing than anything else. But hey, I do appreciate your support all the same!

    I actually support a lot of Blizzard's decisions but some of them I simply cannot understand the logic behind; such as this one. I do not 'whine' about issues (as a certain other poster who can no longer post suggested); I always do my best to bring up the full issue with all valid points. And I'd like to think I'm at least a little open minded... most of the time.

    I'm not quitting the game over this, but if things continue to go downhill at this rate (I do not believe they will, tedium has peaked to incredible levels after the experience nerfs and now group finder) I would definitely consider quitting until things became tolerable provided the game itself didn't make up for it. I'm blowing a little steam to be fair but most of the time the I only consider quitting if it's a short term break.

    I've only had a handful of cases from Blizzard that bugged me enough to consider moving on from the game; the latest issues are starting to look that way, if Blizzard's new game design is to make the game as tedious as possible to keep people playing longer (which is a notion I can't fathom the logic of, it won't work that way ).

    For the record, I definitely hated the legendary system with an absolute passion. And I was never a fan of artifact power. But yeah, I agree with pretty much everything you posted here.

    PS: Never mentioned it before, but you are one of the more notable posters for me here since you use the avatar of a game series I'm a big fan of. Kudos to you!
  1. Vyzzle's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Ciadia View Post
    The more bothersome they make the content/features, the more i will just skip of their "little" content in BFA, besides raiding.

    They are turning the game more and more into a single player experience, removing group features like this isn't going to make me more social, it will just let me be less social not bothering to group up.

    Maybe people will start waking up and realize how little content BFA actually have, when everything has to be spread this thin / everything has to take forever.
    LMAO. Cmon guys. Give me a break. Removing auto-accept is not making this a "single player experience." In fact, the auto accept WAS making it a singer player experience. Bullshit you guys actually talk and interact in your auto queues to complete WQs and the like.


    If anything this is a good thing. BS to all you crying about it being anti-social, no, LFG/Easier Content has encouraged anti social behavior since you never even have to communicate to get group content done. Just ports you to the dungeon with 4 other people you wont even talk to.

    First you all complained about how hard leveling got after 7.3.5 (lol if you think leveling is hard now) and now this?

    Damn Wrarh Babies and others like-minded trying to kill the RPG part of MMORPG. Yall just want to press one button and have everything done for ya. Want to AFK through WQs, teleport to the dungeons, and hit max level after 5hrs.

    Complain about a lack of content that doesnt drive you to find a group to complete it, not the fact you cant auto group through content you dont want to do.
  1. ragerblade's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Vyzzle View Post
    LMAO. Cmon guys. Give me a break. Removing auto-accept is not making this a "single player experience." In fact, the auto accept WAS making it a singer player experience. Bullshit you guys actually talk and interact in your auto queues to complete WQs and the like.


    If anything this is a good thing. BS to all you crying about it being anti-social, no, LFG/Easier Content has encouraged anti social behavior since you never even have to communicate to get group content done. Just ports you to the dungeon with 4 other people you wont even talk to.

    First you all complained about how hard leveling got after 7.3.5 (lol if you think leveling is hard now) and now this?

    Damn Wrarh Babies and others like-minded trying to kill the RPG part of MMORPG. Yall just want to press one button and have everything done for ya. Want to AFK through WQs, teleport to the dungeons, and hit max level after 5hrs.

    Complain about a lack of content that doesnt drive you to find a group to complete it, not the fact you cant auto group through content you dont want to do.
    Yes it is, by making things tedious making grouping tedious it makes the game more single player. You people who don't understand how great making groups with ease will understand soon enough when Group Finder will be lacking in groups. Making content more tedious is a old tedious game is a sure fire way to lose subs. It is not just this, it is many other things piled on.


    We told Blizzard in WOD, and BFA is wod 2.0. Again I will smile and say told you so again.
  1. Explicit Teemo Nudes's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Reathyr View Post
    You know what I'll bite (and probably get my head bitten off in the process) you all tell me exactly why this is such a horribly, world ending, "Blizz kicked my puppy in the process as well", bad thing, especially considering that Blizz have said there were problems with bots, and it was straining and overloading their phasing and sharding tech too.
    All I've seen it used for, and I used world quest tracker's group finder too, is just insta, 30sec to 2min WQ groups, no interaction, no talk just group, kill, ungroup, next quest, group, kill, ungroup, repeat ad nauseam.

    Maybe I'm just blinded by the "olden days" when things were so much worse that anything that removes that level of grouping horror seems better, maybe the better that replaced it has become the new horror of grouping tedium, so please elaborate and help me understand.

    What makes you think it'll be different by changing it this way? You're fooling yourself if you think this will change things.
    Blizzard set this up themselves; fast, cheap content will attract people that like that type of thing.
  1. Vyzzle's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Ragerblade View Post
    Yes it is, by making things tedious making grouping tedious it makes the game more single player. You people who don't understand how great making groups with ease will understand soon enough when Group Finder will be lacking in groups. Making content more tedious is a old tedious game is a sure fire way to lose subs. It is not just this, it is many other things piled on.


    We told Blizzard in WOD, and BFA is wod 2.0. Again I will smile and say told you so again.
    I played before group finder pal, I wont be saying I told you so

    Like I said. Complain about content if you will, not group finder.
  1. Ciadia's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Vyzzle View Post
    First you all complained about how hard leveling got after 7.3.5 (lol if you think leveling is hard now) and now this?

    Damn Wrarh Babies and others like-minded trying to kill the RPG part of MMORPG.
    Leveling being hard? no, but oh so damn tedius, slow and time consuming, and most of all _BORING_, yes it's faster than vanilla, but that game was almost something completely different than what we have today, or any of the last 5-6 expansions.

    I played back in vanilla -> now, i know damn well how the game was back then, and it's not something i got the time-commitment for these days nor a special desire to have in the current game, that's what the legacy servers are for.
  1. bonewax's Avatar
    only memetards ran out and made zappyboy shamans. How's the basement kids?
  1. ragerblade's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Vyzzle View Post
    I played before group finder pal, I wont be saying I told you so

    Like I said. Complain about content if you will, not group finder.

    I played also. It was a worse game. Removing tedious elements made wow a better game. Taking steps back to being a worse game is not cool.
  1. mmoceb1073a651's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Darkguyver2020 View Post
    This change can be blamed entirely on server hoppers who constantly abused the system. Aim your vitriol at them rather than at Blizzard.
    This was a different addon, called server hop. With the changes they have implemented in Legion, server hopping was already dead or close to dead. There was no need to shut down other group addons.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Darkguyver2020 View Post
    Surely the people who are willing to put in the effort to manually create and search for their own groups instead of being so reliant on addons would be a more admirable quality to recruit them into a Guild?
    Effort should be reasonable in comparison to the outcome. I don't want to write an essay just to kill a loot pinata world boss.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by bigjason View Post
    they want you to create groups/guilds/communitys to do content.

    because when you find a group/guild/community to play the game with its more likely that you will keep playing the game even if you dont like it that much anymore but you like the time spend with those people.

    so they want you to create a group with wich you then go on to do worldquests... great isnt it?
    How do you think this is going to work? I have my plan in which order I want to run my quests. Other people in my guild have other plans. We often cannot even manage to have the same plans beyond "clear all quests because we need all of them". We can go questing and leveling together just fine, but as soon as you don't have daily quest hubs like we had in TBC-MoP and switch to the world quest model, the group questing implodes, because people have different priorities. There is a reason why these addons have been so popular, because they allowed group matchmaking by quest, allowing maximal flexibility. It's not fun to join a group which is done with half of the quests you want to do in a zone, and then having to look for replacements mid-way. Just like it's not fun looking for replacements mid-dungeon or raid. I know what I talk about. I play since Classic. I don't want to return to this tedium ever again.
  1. Vyzzle's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Ciadia View Post
    Leveling being hard? no, but oh so damn tedius, slow and time consuming, and most of all _BORING_, yes it's faster than vanilla, but that game was almost something completely different than what we have today, or any of the last 5-6 expansions.

    I played back in vanilla -> now, i know damn well how the game was back then, and it's not something i got the time-commitment for these days nor a special desire to have in the current game, that's what the legacy servers are for.
    That's why I said complain about the content now how to do tedious things faster lol....

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Ragerblade View Post
    I played also. It was a worse game. Removing tedious elements made wow a better game. Taking steps back to being a worse game is not cool.
    Group finder auto accept didnt remove tedious elements. That's my point. It just made doing tedious things quicker, that doesnt solve the problem of you not enjoying the content.

    Complain about the content.
  1. mmoceb1073a651's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Vyzzle View Post
    That's why I said complain about the content now how to do tedious things faster lol....

    - - - Updated - - -



    Group finder auto accept didnt remove tedious elements. That's my point. It just made doing tedious things quicker, that doesnt solve the problem of you not enjoying the content.

    Complain about the content.
    But it did remove tedious elements. Do you find it is a good way to spend your time sitting there, staring at your screen, waiting for people to appear in your group interface? No matter how good or bad the content it, it only gets worse if you add tedium into the mix. we don't need paperwork in a game. I have more than enough paperwork in my job. You know, games should be fun.

    If creating a group takes longer than actually running the quest (even on your own), then something is wrong.
  1. Vyzzle's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by scubistacy View Post
    But it did remove tedious elements. Do you find it is a good way to spend your time sitting there, staring at your screen, waiting for people to appear in your group interface? No matter how good or bad the content it, it only gets worse if you add tedium into the mix. we don't need paperwork in a game. I have more than enough paperwork in my job. You know, games should be fun.

    If creating a group takes longer than actually running the quest (even on your own), then something is wrong.
    I dont stare at my screen. I just do the WQs, or invite people from my guild, make friends in the game who are around and make content enjoyable by their company.


    Comparing group finding to paperwork?? Weird job ya have then.

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