Horridon nerf a indication on underestimating the boost?

[Radio]

We are, but it has no bearing on my point...

But it does, one of the core tenants of RPGs is that they're numbers games at the core, and in order to do the 'cool' things you have to do bit of homework and optimisation. Not everyone finds it fun, which is why we have action adventures.

[Firebert]

[O]ne of the core tenets of RPGs is that they're numbers games at the core, and in order to do the 'cool' things you have to do bit of homework and optimisation.

Agree with the premise, but there's stuff missing in the middle because your conclusion doesn't directly follow (LFR is a counterexample).

[Radio]

Agree with the premise, but there's stuff missing in the middle because your conclusion doesn't directly follow (LFR is a counterexample).

Let's start again, I expressed myself a little too briefly:

Your claim: The most enjoyable way should be the proper way because it's a game. WoW has, and always will, fail in this regard due to its complexity requiring homework to maximise your character, which is clearly not enjoyable for all.

My argument: This is an RPG, number crunching/optimisation is one of the core tenets of gameplay in the RPG genre. A player (even in LFR) looking to participate in a group activity (which in any genre requires a certain amount of no-how if you don't want to piss off your teammates) who doesn't derive their enjoyment from number crunching/optimisation and actively avoids doing so in favour of deriving their own fun is naturally going to face resistance from the game and other players.

[Firebert]

This is an RPG, number crunching/optimisation is one of the core tenets of gameplay in the RPG genre.

Still a gap exists here. There's no explicit definition of what you describe. The leap from "it's an RPG" to "you must optimise/number crunch" still needs to be defined.

[Totaltotemic]

Still a gap exists here. There's no explicit definition of what you describe. The leap from "it's an RPG" to "you must optimise/number crunch" still needs to be defined.

Do you realize that RPGs started with a pencil and paper adding up numbers and rolling dice? That is the fundamental gameplay of RPGs as a genre, not pressing pretty buttons that light up.

[Firebert]

Do you realize that RPGs started with a pencil and paper adding up numbers and rolling dice? That is the fundamental gameplay of RPGs as a genre, not pressing pretty buttons that light up.

I participated in the pencils, paper and counting and throwing D20s back in the day.

There's no "must optimise/number crunch" in D&D either. It was a game. Having fun was more important, which returns to my point; WoW cannot achieve this with the current status quo.

Automatically switching specs switching your gear is a start, along with the removal of Reforging and the severe curtailing of gemming.

[Radio]

Do you realize that RPGs started with a pencil and paper adding up numbers and rolling dice? That is the fundamental gameplay of RPGs as a genre, not pressing pretty buttons that light up.

This, I'm not going to explain that you have to point and aim in an FPS.

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There's no "must optimise/number crunch" in D&D either.

There's a few places you won't hear that in WoW known as the levelling process, solo content and group content with friends.

The latter matches the description of D&D well.

[Mormolyce]

You get those kinds of groups sometimes. It has nothing to do with the boost.

[Kudos]

Vaelastrasz? Especially when you only got limited attempts on him...

Vael was easy once you got Razor down. At least that was my experience. Hardest aspect of Vael was getting our tanks to use a threat meter.

[Daswolfen]

I leveled all my 90s so far and wont buy the expansion (or at least use the boost) until close to 6.0. I feel it was huge mistake for them to give the 90s now. Horridon and the recent nerf just brought the problem to a more visible forefront. No one bothers to learn the encounter the right way and just tunnels the boss. Before the nerf, bringing my 5th 90 through ToT on the legendary cloak quest, it was one of the worst LFR experiences I have ever had. It was worse than week 1 LFR Garrosh. This past Tuesday, I got into an argument (well more like I called him out and he called me names and said he could do whatever the f**k he wanted) with this idiot with a boosted 90 who did 100% damage on Horridon. We made it through ok but only because of the nerf. When I joined the raid they had wiped on trash for a good 10 minutes (the starting trash, and they were past the first boss and kept pulling the right side trash over). While I appreciate the fact that LFR exists for gearing, I do miss the old days before its existence where there were consequences for being a moron and not playing right.

[Adhemar]

50k dps is also far from acceptable even in LFR

Now, now ... 50k is perfectly acceptable DPS. For Dragon Soul.

No one bothers to learn the encounter the right way and just tunnels the boss.

Really doesn't have anything to do with learning, in this case. Even your most brain-dead LFR scrub knows he should kill other mobs when they spawn during an encounter. I've told at least 20 LFR scumbags to stop tunneling the boss and kill the other enemies and had them ignore me entirely. For the last few times I've gone through Horridon LFR, I have insisted that my groups either vote-kick me or start vote-kicking anyone with over 90% damage on the boss after the first wipe. The vast majority of them are not people who don't know better, they're people who want their recount number to be more impressive. And for the most part, their recount numbers are pathetic anyway (sub-100k while sitting on a boss who takes double damage ... really?).

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You get those kinds of groups sometimes. It has nothing to do with the boost.

So a massive influx of minimum item level people with no enchants doesn't have any impact on the overall quality of groups running LFR? Something doesn't seem to fit here. I think it's pretty obvious that Blizzard's wipe-counter for LFR Horridon exploded right after they started shipping boosts.

[Daswolfen]

I participated in the pencils, paper and counting and throwing D20s back in the day.

There's no "must optimise/number crunch" in D&D either. It was a game. Having fun was more important, which returns to my point; WoW cannot achieve this with the current status quo.

Automatically switching specs switching your gear is a start, along with the removal of Reforging and the severe curtailing of gemming.

Sorry, but I have been gaming since 1979 and min/maxing has been around pretty much since the beginning. It was worse in some RPGs (Shadowrun 2nd Ed, I am looking at you) but it was there and the min/maxer (or power gamer) is a classic archtype of player. Besides, there is lots of number crunching in every form of D&D. From bonuses to hit and your armor class to later editions with a detailed skill system.

Obviously, you have never had to calculate the to hit or armor class of a mounted caviler with a +2 lance and +1 plate mail vs a barbarian in leather armor and a 17 dexterity with a battle axe (my response, the same as when it came up 3 decades ago is the same, forget the guy in the metal suit, whats the armor class of the horse?)

[Mormolyce]

So a massive influx of minimum item level people with no enchants doesn't have any impact on the overall quality of groups running LFR? Something doesn't seem to fit here. I think it's pretty obvious that Blizzard's wipe-counter for LFR Horridon exploded right after they started shipping boosts.

You think a lot of people in LFR were enchanted before? LOL.

I've got 22 toons and I ran about 8 of them through LFR to gear for CMs in the last few months. Didn't gem, enchant or reforge anything until I was finished. I leveled all those alts myself BTW

Stupid anyway, the number of people paying for boosts is very small compared to the large existing base.

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Sorry, but I have been gaming since 1979 and min/maxing has been around pretty much since the beginning. It was worse in some RPGs (Shadowrun 2nd Ed, I am looking at you) but it was there and the min/maxer (or power gamer) is a classic archtype of player. Besides, there is lots of number crunching in every form of D&D. From bonuses to hit and your armor class to later editions with a detailed skill system.

Obviously, you have never had to calculate the to hit or armor class of a mounted caviler with a +2 lance and +1 plate mail vs a barbarian in leather armor and a 17 dexterity with a battle axe (my response, the same as when it came up 3 decades ago is the same, forget the guy in the metal suit, whats the armor class of the horse?)

I remember how many old D&D games assigned your stats via random rolls. So you'd sit there rerolling until you got optimal stats.

I think the real D&D community used to frown on min-maxing. "It's supposed to be about the story!"

[Firebert]

Obviously, you have never had to calculate the to hit or armor class of a mounted caviler with a +2 lance and +1 plate mail vs a barbarian in leather armor and a 17 dexterity with a battle axe (my response, the same as when it came up 3 decades ago is the same, forget the guy in the metal suit, whats the armor class of the horse?)

No, I was calculating the armor class of a rockfallen wall with one of my party members inside a warpforged cave that they had themselves used to try to escape by using a magical dagger against a wall, whilst the trapped player was required to work out the best way to get out and roll the best saving throw he could.

All the while the saving team were being attacked by high level barbarians getting their own attacks of opportunity.

It was fun. It required no min-maxing. The dualwielding cleric lost his own arm during that fight due to a critical miss.

[Deleted]

Was waiting for this comment. Saying LFR is not for me when it's one of two progression paths available and by far the more efficient of the two and saying LFR is not for people who can't be asked to meet the basic requirements of playing the game are not the same thing, so there is no hypocrisy in my rhetorical question. The other guy wanted to exclude people because they participate in higher tier content, I just want people to be moderately competent and not /AFK when they queue for group activities. Thanks for your constructive argument.

basic requirements to do LFR:

1) Be ilvl whatever it is, 489?
2) Know how to open raid finder
3)Hit queue


Have you tried submitting a ticket suggesting that the lack of uptime on players lvl 90 talents should be considered a form of griefing? I doubt Blizz would agree that this is what theyre doing. Ultimately it doesn't really matter what reason you use to justify why people shouldn't be in LFR, you're still saying person X who currently is able to do LFR should not be able to do it for reason Y, when reason Y is not that they have not successfully completed the above 3 challenges.

Personally i hate LFR, boosted a monk to 90 a week ago, currently only ilvl 512, so still doing LFR untill 520 or so and i can move on to forming flex groups on OQ, but anyone that wants to be able to do LFR should be able to, thats the whole point of LFR.

[Juicebox]

The nerf is more because overgearing Horridon just makes the fight "harder"...

[Pua]

Vaelastrasz? Especially when you only got limited attempts on him...

I tend to side with Horridon being the worst offender. Not because I think your point is invalid (it certainly isn't), but more because a far higher percentage of players had the opportunity to fight the encounter compared with Vael.

Plus, Horridon is clearly the more convoluted encounter. That's not taking into account the relative ability of the current playerbase, of course.

Honestly Horridon is just a terrible horrible unfun fight for a random group.

Yeah. Unfortunately, there are a lot of encounters that (even when translated to LFR) are too punitive on new or more casual players. It's one of the reasons LFR doesn't really "work" other than funneling free loot to players and letting them see a bit of content. Hoping it'll do anything else is asking too much.

[Totaltotemic]

It was fun. It required no min-maxing.

You don't need to min/max in WoW to play the game properly, but you do need a passing familiarity with numbers and being able to tell when one is bigger than another and what all of the stats do. Not knowing what buttons to press or what stats to have is the same as asking what happens if you roll a 20 when you're 100+ hours into a D&D game. Annoying everyone else by refusing to learn the rules of the game is just as bad in any one genre as it is in another. Being able to work with numbers and understand what they mean is just a fundamental requirement of RPGs. You don't have to tryhard all the time and act like a heroic raider, but it should be pretty obvious to, say, look at Ele Shaman and think "well gee, if my main nuke crits all the time more crit chance probably isn't very good" and if you can't realize something like that just by looking at the spellbook then RPGs really aren't for you.

[Deleted]

These days ToT LFR is filled with groups that have a half dozen DPS at 150k+.

Now, you CAN find that in SoO, but *lol* wow is that ever NOT guaranteed.

Last night I was 4th in damage on my disc priest doing 110k... on Jin'rokh. I stayed in there though because most people there knew the fights but just didn't know their class or rotation yet. They were also a lot nicer than all the random people yelling at everyone for everything they do wrong. We killed everything without wipes, every fight just took a fair bit longer.

[kamuimac]

Still a gap exists here. There's no explicit definition of what you describe. The leap from "it's an RPG" to "you must optimise/number crunch" still needs to be defined.

ofc there is not one and only definition of mmo but the gearing up is the core of cores of mmorpgs - u gear up to be more powerfull to overcome difficulty which would be not doable at first - if u go towards the direction of gear anything u like and the hardness is in "dancing" between fire long enough till the enemy die then u no longer play rpg only some king of arcade game - which could be fun of but its going away from the rpg principles towards arcae principle and this is where wow is heaing atm - look at the changes to WoD gearing dumbing down all proffs to the most basic simplies thing dumbing down gear dumbing down numbers cause idiots cant comprehend anytign what is more then 4-5 digits -

so far WoD look like a plug&play arcade game dumb down eveyrhting and leave only difficulty as "dont stand in bad shit". even the healing changes are cause idiots couldnt grasp the ide of execute mechanic correckly so we need to nerf dmg so that we could instal milion of arcade mechanics into encounter only make them hit significantly less -

vanilla/TBC bosses had like 3-4 main ablities - now bosses have 5-6 abilities for each of role to pay attention to and people are geting lost and wonder where the f. is the classic rpg model :/