Too Late to Return/Start Anew?

[Devia]

Hi there. Long-time off and on player here since Vanilla. I was playing Legion pretty religiously for the first month or so that it came out, and then just other things came up in my life and it kinda went by the wayside. Now I'm sort of interested in returning, but the guild & friends I all had have completely abandoned, and as I was only playing Alliance because of them I have no desire to continue on that server. And my old Horde server is also pretty dead.

So...I was considering rerolling on a new server. But...am I at the point in the expansion where guilds and 5-mans are just going to refuse to ever play with me because I don't know my way around every single instance and I haven't done mythics yet? Am I basically going to be soloing and alt-ing for the remainder of the xpac until we all become on the same playing field again with the next one? Or are people pretty open to new/returning players joining them so long as they're good and do research on bosses/dungeons they haven't done before? Will I also find it impossible to catch up with an artifact or has Blizzard done a good job at making that possible for late-starters?

Thanks!

[Rootkitt]

Hi there. Long-time off and on player here since Vanilla. I was playing Legion pretty religiously for the first month or so that it came out, and then just other things came up in my life and it kinda went by the wayside. Now I'm sort of interested in returning, but the guild & friends I all had have completely abandoned, and as I was only playing Alliance because of them I have no desire to continue on that server. And my old Horde server is also pretty dead.

So...I was considering rerolling on a new server. But...am I at the point in the expansion where guilds and 5-mans are just going to refuse to ever play with me because I don't know my way around every single instance and I haven't done mythics yet? Am I basically going to be soloing and alt-ing for the remainder of the xpac until we all become on the same playing field again with the next one? Or are people pretty open to new/returning players joining them so long as they're good and do research on bosses/dungeons they haven't done before? Will I also find it impossible to catch up with an artifact or has Blizzard done a good job at making that possible for late-starters?

Thanks!

Similar situation as you, and I would highly suggest finding a guild with enjoyable people. Guilds are very likely to help gear you up so that you can start raiding with them. A lot of guilds are in need of more raiders, and it is much more enjoyable than dealing with random group BS.

[Covergirl]

There are still plenty of casual guilds that are always more than happy to have anyone on board as well as help you out.
You may not be able to jump straight in to current raiding, but the catch up system also makes it a lot faster to get back up to the same level as everyone else.

Just get online, find a guild that is aligned with your current needs/wants etc, have fun and then when ready, move up/on if that's what you want to do.

[Devia]

Yeah, I don't have enough free time to be "hardcore" anymore like I did back in college, but it's nice to know there seem to be guilds that are okay with inviting casual players. Thanks for the replies!

[Berserage]

so you're casual but need to know if you can jump into the game at this point in time, do you see how stupid that is?

[Sebian]

Start from level 1!

Let me know if you need any help! I'm on all the time. Sebian#11351

I love leveling a new character from level 1, doing all the quests, exploring all the zones! Hope to see you online.

[Brewhan]

well i recently came back started a fresh shaman and am ilvl 931 with 2 legendaries with 2 days 15hrs /played at 110. Just hit 110 and focus on argus farming everything there until 920+ then do pug heroic raids for legendary chances and try to get into antorous normal. You can catch up pretty easy. IF it really interests you otherwise just wait until 8.0 pre patch to come back because all this current grind etc will be here for another 10+ months until next expansion. You're not really in a rush or anything you wont miss anything out that you couldn't experience 2 months before pre patch.

[Celista]

I came back for two months, already unsubbed (not sure if I'll be back) and I got 73 points in weapon just from quests/dailies. Two legendary items equipped. Lot of ways to get gear. New raid just came out so I'd say it's a very good time to come back if interested in raiding.

I *think* there's a catch-up mechanic with AP via the missions, I noticed that if I stopped doing dailies for a few days that my missions were shorter and cost less order resources. But don't quote me on that.

[makketota]

I'd wait for the 7.3.5 patch, it fixes the currently broken leveling in WoW.

[Devia]

so you're casual but need to know if you can jump into the game at this point in time, do you see how stupid that is?

Hi asshole, thank you for your non-productive contribution to the thread. Nowhere did I say I expected to get into the highest end raiding of any sort, I would just like to be able to maybe participate in some 5-man mythics or something slightly above LFR. Also, why does it have to be "hardcore" or "casual"? I like to consider myself somewhere inbetween. As in, I have time to play a lot, but because I'm an adult and like to do social and adult things, I don't want to commit to a 4-day a week 4-6 hour a night raiding schedule like I did back in Vanilla and TBC.

But yeah, glad I could make you feel good about yourself by allowing you to put me down for no reason. Hope you got something out of that. To the rest of you - thanks for your replies!

- - - Updated - - -

I'd wait for the 7.3.5 patch, it fixes the currently broken leveling in WoW.

I'm not sure what you're referring to so I will try to read up on those patch notes!

- - - Updated - - -

Start from level 1!

Let me know if you need any help! I'm on all the time. Sebian#11351

I love leveling a new character from level 1, doing all the quests, exploring all the zones! Hope to see you online.

That is so nice of you! I will add you on b.net. Name is Devia there like here.

[Halicia]

Don't worry about the artifact weapon, once you hit 110 the boost you get "catches you up".

[FuxieDK]

Artifact is a joke now..

You need 2.278.xxx.xxx AP to get every trait, including 1 Concordance.. A single WQ can yield 3-4 billion AP.

[Deleted]

I don't think coming back now has many drawbacks, since AP-farming is a shadow of what it once was. You will very easily fill our your artifact to gain most advantages.
It slows down around artifact level 70 or so.

Legendaries are still a bit wonky and will be your biggest drawback; albeit these are obtained rather quickly... especially considering all the ways you can stack up your bad-luck protection lately.

Gearing up shouldn't be much of an issue either...

Casual guilds are still around and kicking. For instance: a month ago i was randomly invited into a guild on my old server, which clears heroic Antorus... (I later found out it's made up of ex-guildies from WoD; albeit neither of us knew that before they invited me )

[Flarelaine]

Hi there. Long-time off and on player here since Vanilla. I was playing Legion pretty religiously for the first month or so that it came out, and then just other things came up in my life and it kinda went by the wayside. Now I'm sort of interested in returning, but the guild & friends I all had have completely abandoned, and as I was only playing Alliance because of them I have no desire to continue on that server. And my old Horde server is also pretty dead.

So...I was considering rerolling on a new server. But...am I at the point in the expansion where guilds and 5-mans are just going to refuse to ever play with me because I don't know my way around every single instance and I haven't done mythics yet? Am I basically going to be soloing and alt-ing for the remainder of the xpac until we all become on the same playing field again with the next one? Or are people pretty open to new/returning players joining them so long as they're good and do research on bosses/dungeons they haven't done before? Will I also find it impossible to catch up with an artifact or has Blizzard done a good job at making that possible for late-starters?

Thanks!

There is still a year or more left of Legion. Leveling is a breeze these days and gearing up is bloody fast with World Quests. AK increases every week now, so artifact catch-up is easy, too. Go for it, mate.

Also, non-keystone mythics are piss easy, you can learn dungeons that way.

[Lasombria]

OP: People vary. Some will be jerks, and some won't. Like others have said, look around for a friendly guild - not just for people to do stuff with, but people to answer questions about what's changed when you're away. It's really easy to miss something because, well, it wasn't there earlier and you weren't reading the release notes when it was introduced.

Also, take advantage of Twitch and Youtube. Watch videos of the dungeons so that you'll have at least a general sense going in, and things can be a lot less intimidating. Or at least it works that way for me.

[yetgdhfgh]

You can get to 60 AP in a day easy with the catch up mechanic

If you go balls to the wall you can get to 890 ilvel pretty easy in a few days then spam LFR and hope for leggos to drop

that should put you around 900 then find a nice casual Argus Normal guild and try to get to around 930 before hitting up heroics.

[Amerrol]

Should be easily able to find casual guilds running heroic raids. Those type of guilds are usually pretty laid back, lots of their members have families or just can't commit to a regular schedule. Family and friends guilds are usually a good place to meet friendly people as well, though usually those guilds are less skilled as a whole. I joined one of those after a break in Cata, and they were fun to play with, though ultimately I wanted more out of raiding. If I didn't keep in touch with my old Mythic raiding friends, I'd probably join one of those small, close-knit guilds when I occasionally return to WoW for a month or two since I'm not into raiding anymore.

Be careful of the wanna be try hards that are trash at the game though, but run heroic raiding guilds like some sort of personal dictatorship. I'd stay away from the massive 1000 member guilds as well, since that hardly becomes better then pugging, and you get a lot of drama from kids in those.

[Tavanh]

OP: It's pretty easy to get back into WoW. Any raid / dungeon has guides or Youtube to help you learn the instance. The Artifact system is so easy now that you'll be caught up within a couple days. My fresh 110 alt nearly caught up to my main in a few days. Gearing to 910 will take roughly 2-4 weeks depending on how many WQ's you do for Veild Argunite. The game itself is pretty open but you'll always meet a jerk every now n then.

[Berserage]

Nowhere did I say I expected to get into the highest end raiding of any sort, I would just like to be able to maybe participate in some 5-man mythics or something slightly above LFR.

thanks for making my point for me

[Devia]

Thanks for all your replies! Aside from the one jackass you've all been very helpful and encouraging! I'm looking forward to jumping back in...hopefully the game keeps my attention for longer this time haha.