Will Antorus last another 9 months?

[Deleted]

Gonna be the same as with icc, soo and hfc: lots of people quit, some will come back with new expansion, some won't; rest plays the game more casually or focuses on alts. Would personally really like another ToV style raid (limited environment, no irrelevant bosses, well tuned endboss) but doubt that's worth it in regards to the general populace.

[Cracked]

False. Legion was only in Beta for 7 months.

You seem to be confused because for the first time ever Blizzard gave alpha access to content creators. For all we know, they aren't doing an alpha period at all this time, because BFA doesn't have the massive system changes that Legion had.

Alpha/Beta, call it whatever you want, our guild got access shoftly after Blizzcon and the game came out in September.

[meroko]

November at the latest, Dec would either throw launch into the holidays or raiding into the holidays, neither of which their probably too keen on.

Which either way, no matter when it releases, it'll be the shortest end of expansion in years.

You do realize Antorus came out for the holidays? Devs don't give two shits.

[Shakari]

Cataclysm was released in December and did just fine. A December release increases the likelihood of the game being purchased as a Christmas gift and is hardly a bad time to release a Triple-A project.

That said, Blizzard has campaigned on the idea in Legion that they will have shorter release cycles than ever before and so far has generally kept up on that bargain. Personally, I think it's a bit cynical to predict a Q4 2018 release for BfA; but it's also somewhat understandable given that Blizzard is also known to be perfectionists, preferring to delay releasing a product "too early," even if that means a content drought.

Indeed and I hope they continue doing this, better a delay and a better game then release early and it be unstable and poor.

Blizz are one of the few big companies that has always delays a release if there not 100% happy with and I have always prefered this approach, unlike others that work to a fixed release date and release the game regardless of bugs and stability and then patch like mad when the game is live.

[Onikaroshi]

You do realize Antorus came out for the holidays? Devs don't give two shits.

There's a huge distinction between release DURING the holidays and BEFORE the holidays

[sam86]

And when they did Ruby Sanctum there was a huge outcry of *scoff lol filler raid who cares?*

yes and they are right, but the option here isn't 1 year of icc + filler raid in mid or only (the what should be norm) 6 months of icc then new exp
the option here is 1 year antoros and a filler or just 1 year of anotoros, of course 1 year + filler is better than just 1 year
Back then it was first time and we weren't really expecting it to stay a year in first place, it was 'weird' that an end raid stays for a year after it was released, now blizz not just keep it 1+, they don't even give fillers anymore

[Deleted]

It seems pretty indisputable that the next xpac will be launched in September/October.

This means that we're gonna be raiding Antorus for another 9-10 months. The raid has been out for a while so what's your take on this?

Is the raiding community going to be fine or will there be a drop in activity and loss in subs?

Antorus is pretty bad, but so far every Legion raid has been, so no surprise there.

And long droughts at the end of an expansion are a good thing. I used to raid all the time, and my only breaks were the few months of no content after the last patch. We need these content droughts to catch up / catch a break.

[Zka]

Companies just aren't avoiding summer anymore, and people need to stop parroting it.

I think summer isn't a valid reason to delay launch by months. Subscribers will purchase it no matter when it gets released. Some might delay purchase by a few weeks because of vacation, so what? That's not a valid reason to delay a multimillion dollar revenue and renewal of millions of subs by months.

It's gonna be released when it's finished and that's going to be - unfortunately - Q3-Q4 imho.

[cparle87]

yes and they are right, but the option here isn't 1 year of icc + filler raid in mid or only (the what should be norm) 6 months of icc then new exp
the option here is 1 year antoros and a filler or just 1 year of anotoros, of course 1 year + filler is better than just 1 year
Back then it was first time and we weren't really expecting it to stay a year in first place, it was 'weird' that an end raid stays for a year after it was released, now blizz not just keep it 1+, they don't even give fillers anymore

I'd rather have a year plus of the last raid than 6-8 months like we had for Naxx and Sunwell. Give more than sub 5% of people time to see it.

[kamuimac]

It seems pretty indisputable that the next xpac will be launched in September/October.

This means that we're gonna be raiding Antorus for another 9-10 months. The raid has been out for a while so what's your take on this?

Is the raiding community going to be fine or will there be a drop in activity and loss in subs?

well tbh lets not kid ourselves

lets see when competition will have any big releases in autumn/winter subtract 2-3 weeks and you will have 8.0 release date

its not exackly rocket science with blizz

[Deleted]

More like 8 months

[HuxNeva]

And long droughts at the end of an expansion are a good thing. I used to raid all the time, and my only breaks were the few months of no content after the last patch. We need these content droughts to catch up / catch a break.

I tend to agree. People would be completely burned out with the game f it went on and on and on without pauze. "Content Droughts" are part of what made this game thrive for so long.

[Tech614]

Alpha/Beta, call it whatever you want, our guild got access shoftly after Blizzcon and the game came out in September.

They literally gave invites to anyone with a mythic archimonde kill, instead of weaving through who was a streamer and who wasn't so it's not like you're anything special. It was still an alpha. It wasn't in beta until 7 months before launch.

The fact you think Alpha and Beta are even remotely similar is laughable. Blizzard opened up the Legion alpha because of the massive system changes, they have never opened up alpha testing before and leave no reason to think they will do it again.

[Cracked]

They literally gave invites to anyone with a mythic archimonde kill, instead of weaving through who was a streamer and who wasn't so it's not like you're anything special. It was still an alpha. It wasn't in beta until 7 months before launch.

The fact you think Alpha and Beta are even remotely similar is laughable. Blizzard opened up the Legion alpha because of the massive system changes, they have never opened up alpha testing before and leave no reason to think they will do it again.

I don't know if you are actually serious, or if you don't remember Legion alpha at all, but when it switched from alpha to beta, there wasn't even a data build, it was a build that changed JUST THAT LABEL from Alpha to Beta. Legion Alpha was Beta. Alpha is F&F only, exactly what is going on with BfA now.

Whatever you wanna call it doesn't change the fact that Legion was widely playable with most systems available for 11 months. That's a beta in IT jargon, doesn't matter what Blizzard called it.

[Deleted]

yes it will last that long
no thats not a good thing.

its not a complaining post form me btw but in general i think 10months + on any piece of content that is know the be followed by a new xpac is way to long.
i thought siege was a great raid. i enjoyed HFC and i also like Antorus but after getting your curve and your third alt up to par ur done. Unless you maybe do mythic raiding but thats not on my list of interests.

On the bright side: it gives mediocre guilds loads more chance to get their curve or cutting edge.

[sam86]

I'd rather have a year plus of the last raid than 6-8 months like we had for Naxx and Sunwell. Give more than sub 5% of people time to see it.

the reason only 5% of sub (and in case of end boss of either, not even 1% of playerbase) saw the raids wasn't due to time, it was due to brutal difficulty and how hard it was to raid in first place back then, now the % of ppl who raid are far more (also nowhere near wrath numbers but still) and raid itself doesn't need to cannibalize other guilds or do every single raid in order to get gear to be ready to finally do Naxx or Sunwell (also in TBC the 'badge gear' did exist, it still needed an INSANE amount of hcs to even get a single piece) so again no comparison
now almost anyone who wants to raid can raid as soon antorus was released, in TBC anyone who wanted to do sunwell needed to farm BT/MHJ for months to get gear 'ok' for sunwell, I still remember Brutallus caused ppl to buy elixir of demon slaying - the vanilla elixir - for AP instead of TBC version because it gave extra +20ap (I was herber), that's how brutal raiding was
Even if the game stayed for 2 years in vanilla wow or TBC, ppl who raid would still be stuck, maybe a little more than 1% would see KJ getting flushed like toilet sh8t, but it won't be anywhere near as close as ppl who saw Antorus in first month alone
And I don't count 'mythic' as another different raid, painting a peugeot 305 red doesn't suddenly make it a BMW, it is still a peugeot, even if u add an mp3 player to it, and the concept of 'mythic' raiding is one if not worst additions to game imo

[Cracked]

the reason only 5% of sub (and in case of end boss of either, not even 1% of playerbase) saw the raids wasn't due to time, it was due to brutal difficulty and how hard it was to raid in first place back then, now the % of ppl who raid are far more (also nowhere near wrath numbers but still) and raid itself doesn't need to cannibalize other guilds or do every single raid in order to get gear to be ready to finally do Naxx or Sunwell (also in TBC the 'badge gear' did exist, it still needed an INSANE amount of hcs to even get a single piece) so again no comparison
now almost anyone who wants to raid can raid as soon antorus was released, in TBC anyone who wanted to do sunwell needed to farm BT/MHJ for months to get gear 'ok' for sunwell, I still remember Brutallus caused ppl to buy elixir of demon slaying - the vanilla elixir - for AP instead of TBC version because it gave extra +20ap (I was herber), that's how brutal raiding was

No, I actually agree that it was mostly due to short time between patches combined with the fact that you had to actually play THROUGH the game instead of skipping to latest content instantly. I joined somewhat late in Vanilla (I think it was around 1.9?) and I simply didn't have enough time to get my gear up to par to see naxx (unless I wanted to guildhop hardcore) before TBC prepatch came.

In TBC, I was in a guild that raided 3-4 times a week (1 day for 10 mans) and we cleared hyjal + bt before WotLK prepatch and only touched first boss in SWP, because it was a constant uphill battle to have people with enough gear to raid instead of boosting them through T5 and T4, I would say we killed good 75% of the raid times doing stuff you just don't have to do today in terms of gearing.

It was a much better design that had you coming back to older raids and you had to actually deserve seeing newest content, but the burnout rate was insane. We had a core of maybe 13-15 stable people and then rotated 10 warm bodies, some of which just wanted to guildhop once they got gear / attunement and some of which outright stopped playing when we finally gave them gear.

[kennyrogers]

Indeed and I hope they continue doing this, better a delay and a better game then release early and it be unstable and poor.

Blizz are one of the few big companies that has always delays a release if there not 100% happy with and I have always prefered this approach, unlike others that work to a fixed release date and release the game regardless of bugs and stability and then patch like mad when the game is live.

People thinking Multi-Billion-Dollar-Company "GoodGuy ActiBlizz" would release Content "when its ready" and not when theres the most money to make are the sole reason this Company can get away with basically anything...aka throw shit in people´s face and expecting them so say "thank you, can i have more please".

[Battlebeard]

I don't want a long Antorus, nor do I want the new expansion either.

I wanna keep playing Legion, cause I have tons and tons of stuff to do before BFA, but Antorus will bore me as well.

I hope for some extra raid, like SWP was added in TBC or something.

[cparle87]

the reason only 5% of sub (and in case of end boss of either, not even 1% of playerbase) saw the raids wasn't due to time, it was due to brutal difficulty and how hard it was to raid in first place back then, now the % of ppl who raid are far more (also nowhere near wrath numbers but still) and raid itself doesn't need to cannibalize other guilds or do every single raid in order to get gear to be ready to finally do Naxx or Sunwell (also in TBC the 'badge gear' did exist, it still needed an INSANE amount of hcs to even get a single piece) so again no comparison
now almost anyone who wants to raid can raid as soon antorus was released, in TBC anyone who wanted to do sunwell needed to farm BT/MHJ for months to get gear 'ok' for sunwell, I still remember Brutallus caused ppl to buy elixir of demon slaying - the vanilla elixir - for AP instead of TBC version because it gave extra +20ap (I was herber), that's how brutal raiding was
Even if the game stayed for 2 years in vanilla wow or TBC, ppl who raid would still be stuck, maybe a little more than 1% would see KJ getting flushed like toilet sh8t, but it won't be anywhere near as close as ppl who saw Antorus in first month alone
And I don't count 'mythic' as another different raid, painting a peugeot 305 red doesn't suddenly make it a BMW, it is still a peugeot, even if u add an mp3 player to it, and the concept of 'mythic' raiding is one if not worst additions to game imo

How about you look at it this way, then? Mythic is the super hard classic/BC version only a handful got to saw. If we translate BC raid setup to current over 50% of raiders would still be doing EN or ToV (T4), some would be doing NH and ToS (T5), and only the current mythic raiders would even get to see Antorus (T6). Consider all the other modes besides mythic as an easy mode so raiding isn't locked to 95% of the players. That's why we got LFR. Blizz looked at the numbers and they were coming back that raids were not worth the money it cost to make them if so few people got to see them.