Buying BFA but still having to "Unlock" Allied Races - your thoughts?

[Mask]

Buying BFA but still having to "Unlock" Allied Races - your thoughts?

The unlocks seem too easy. I would prefer an unlock that was more difficult and/or time consuming so it felt like an actual accomplishment to unlock one of these races. As it is currently I will just have them all unlocked by default as soon as they are available. Yawn...

[Flarelaine]

I disagree. If I never had a phone and buy a Nokia phone made in 2000, while it's "new" to me it's still an old phone compared to the current time. Players may be experiencing Legion for the first time, but the content is old compared to what they could be doing and progressing for.

I understand your reasoning here, but any player doing content outside of BfA when it's released is doing old content. That's always been the problem with World of Warcraft. A new expansion releases, and it virtually makes everything in the previous expansion worthless to current progression. It's always been like that, but for some reason they're making a large selling point of the new expansion a part of old content this time around with BfA.

In your example, the phone would be old in its capabilites. It is a tool to perform functions.

Game content is not a tool assisting an activity, it is the target of an activity - playing the game. As such, any difference between previously unplayed content from different expansions is a matter of labeling. Since scaling was implemented, previous content even gives experience which you would need anyway at the start of a new expansion. Also, while we do not know what item level gear boosted characters start with, but there's a chance Argus world quests will drop better loot.

[SirCowdog]

Well that's a definition of player demand, players said "we want to skip leveling content" and blizzard said "okay here you go a level boost". I also have to remind you about "level boost beta", aka recruit a friend, where your with you friend could dump levels at each other and fill you account with level 60 characters in days, which was extremely popular to the point of people buying a second wow account and leveling their alts this way.

Yes, but what creates the player demand? Is it laziness and not wanting to play the game, or is it a desire to play the most current content and not waste time with stuff that's largely irrelevant?

Remember that this tangent was started by the suggestion that "Not having to work for anything" was the primary reason for these types of things being implemented. It's not that players don't want to work for anything, it's just that they want to spend their work and focus their efforts on something that matters.

This is why people are arguing against having to return to older content's reputation grinds and quests in order to unlock races for use in CURRENT content. It's not that they don't want to work to unlock a new race. They just want to put their work in on BfA content.

- - - Updated - - -

Game content is not a tool assisting an activity, it is the target of an activity - playing the game. As such, any difference between previously unplayed content from different expansions is a matter of labeling. Since scaling was implemented, previous content even gives experience which you would need anyway at the start of a new expansion. Also, while we do not know what item level gear boosted characters start with, but there's a chance Argus world quests will drop better loot.

I disagree with this. Because WoW has a VERY social-based dynamic to it, playing content when its current is extremely important to how it's experienced. And the way in which classes change, and more powerful gear becomes more easily obtainable, the difficulty often changes as well, further altering the experience.

For instance, I could take a character to Cata content today and have a VERY different experience than I would have when Cata was still the cutting edge. Not that the cata content today doesn't have some value, but it's not the same as when it was current.

Another example is soloing old raids. There's definitely something to be said for the enjoyment of doing that, but it's VERY different from the enjoyment of taking on new boss encounters with 19 other people when it's still challenging.

It's very much not just an issue of labeling.

[Flarelaine]

I disagree with this. Because WoW has a VERY social-based dynamic to it, playing content when its current is extremely important to how it's experienced. And the way in which classes change, and more powerful gear becomes more easily obtainable, the difficulty often changes as well, further altering the experience.

For instance, I could take a character to Cata content today and have a VERY different experience than I would have when Cata was still the cutting edge. Not that the cata content today doesn't have some value, but it's not the same as when it was current.

Another example is soloing old raids. There's definitely something to be said for the enjoyment of doing that, but it's VERY different from the enjoyment of taking on new boss encounters with 19 other people when it's still challenging.

It's very much not just an issue of labeling.

Finally, real arguments!

Yes, the social approach is worth consideration. Cata, however, is several expansions back and game mechanics have been overhauled multiple times since. Cata content also does not scale. I can not brush aside your arguments, simply because we do not know how doing Legion content in BfA will feel - we do not how much of an impact new mechanics will have on the game and how much of that scaling will mitigate. There will be scaling, though, so you will still se mobs of your level, not 30 levels below like on Cata maps. Also, you can take time to grind out these reps while still leveling your main and that should make the experience even more similar.

[Charge me Doctor]

Yes, but what creates the player demand? Is it laziness and not wanting to play the game, or is it a desire to play the most current content and not waste time with stuff that's largely irrelevant?

Remember that this tangent was started by the suggestion that "Not having to work for anything" was the primary reason for these types of things being implemented. It's not that players don't want to work for anything, it's just that they want to spend their work and focus their efforts on something that matters.

This is why people are arguing against having to return to older content's reputation grinds and quests in order to unlock races for use in CURRENT content. It's not that they don't want to work to unlock a new race. They just want to put their work in on BfA content.

It depends. For those who haven't experienced said content it's still new content. Some skip it due to laziness, some skip it because they want to play with their capped friends. Some want to skip it it because they already did that numerous times and can't be bothered anymore. Some want to skip it because they don't have that much time on their hands. Some find it boring. There are a lot of reasons for it. There is no definitive answer to that, because of how different players are.

[SirCowdog]

Finally, real arguments!

Yes, the social approach is worth consideration. Cata, however, is several expansions back and game mechanics have been overhauled multiple times since. Cata content also does not scale. I can not brush aside your arguments, simply because we do not know how doing Legion content in BfA will feel - we do not how much of an impact new mechanics will have on the game and how much of that scaling will mitigate. There will be scaling, though, so you will still se mobs of your level, not 30 levels below like on Cata maps. Also, you can take time to grind out these reps while still leveling your main and that should make the experience even more similar.

It was just an example of how older content will be experienced differently. It could be Cata, or TBC, or MoP, or even Legion once BfA launches. The primary point being that WoW is very much a progression-based game. Requiring players to go backwards to old content in order to unlock something is a bit strange.

Now, full disclosure: I have to admit that I'm a MASSIVE proponent of re-using older content. I think Blizzard SHOULD be updating, remastering, rebalancing, and re-releasing older content in a form that will be relevant to current players. Maybe scaling tech will accomplish this, with current-level rewards for doing previous expansion content. Maybe you'll get [Azurite Dust] or something from completing older quests at level cap. Who knows? But I think that sort of thing would mitigate a LOT of the complaints about having to run older content.

[Flarelaine]

I think Blizzard SHOULD be updating, remastering, rebalancing, and re-releasing older content in a form that will be relevant to current players. Maybe scaling tech will accomplish this, with current-level rewards for doing previous expansion content. Maybe you'll get [Azurite Dust] or something from completing older quests at level cap. Who knows? But I think that sort of thing would mitigate a LOT of the complaints about having to run older content.

Legion quests already scale rewards to your level. I expect them to apply this to old quests as well as part and parcel of scaling technology.

[Deleted]

I can see both sides of this argument, but I definitely agree that reputation grinds can't even be considered content anymore. WoW just refuses to innovate and step up their game. it took them 13 years to come up with 5 man dungeons that become progressively harder? come on now.

I have every faction at exalted and I've hardly played legion, put maybe a week of total playtime over 2 years into WoD, and played a fair amount in MoP but only pvp'd. I played 12+ hours a day from age 12 in vanilla all the way to the end of cata. I never liked the grinding, and as soon as I discovered endgame it's very hard for me to go through any kind of questing experience even though I absolutely love the universe, and once I hit max level I completely ignore it unless it's required for end game progression.

Since allied races are a feature of the new expansion the people are paying for, it is stupid to put them behind a massive reputation grind that also requires you to have access to legion's content, meaning a major feature of an expansion is locked behind not only having a level 110+ character, but then sinking 10s of hours into each reputation to unlock each race.

Well first, this does not mean that the Legion reputation hurdle will still be there when BfA launches. And even if it will stay in place - it's not that hard to farm reputation in Legion. Yes, getting reputation from dungeons / tabards would have been better, but overall, it was a much better experience then rep farming in WoD. That was bad. It's also a better experience than farming reputation for factions like the Timbermaw, which I also have on Exalted with my main. You just won't be able to get these on day 1 after your character reaches 110. But since these races don't have exclusive classes tied to them, I don't see this as a big problem. At least with Zandalari and Dark Irons, we all will be in the same boat, because they will only unlock when the new zones are available. Anyway, unlocking an Allied race is much less work than the damned pathfinder.

And finally: This is a story-based approach to add new races to the game. You should be grateful, because WoW already had lost so much RPG elements that it hurts.

- - - Updated - - -

It depends. For those who haven't experienced said content it's still new content. Some skip it due to laziness, some skip it because they want to play with their capped friends. Some want to skip it it because they already did that numerous times and can't be bothered anymore. Some want to skip it because they don't have that much time on their hands. Some find it boring. There are a lot of reasons for it. There is no definitive answer to that, because of how different players are.

Beside the marginal effect that racials would have on your gaming performance - if people want to skip content to play with they capped friends or whatever, they still have the option to select from the base 7 races available to every faction, which cover every class out there.

[Florena]

It's not a huge deal for me. I already have the requirements met based on data mining. But in principle I'm against locking races and classes behind arbitrary walls like this. We've never had to unlock new races before. Why they join their faction was always explained in their starting quest. I think that the quests we do to unlock them should have instead been told from the new character's perspective. If blizzard has to insist on starting them at level 20, then unlock them for new players at level 20 similar to how dks/dhs work.

I don't see any particular reason why these races have to be special. It's all arbitrary gating with no real need behind it. It's completely unnecessary and serves no real purpose.

It's not the end of the world but I don't see how it adds anything to the game either. New races ought to be something to help bring in new players not something targeted at vets of the previous expansion.

If the datamining is true that the unlock requirements are account wide, then this gating isn't really for any sort of continuity purpose, because you can then do the quests on a character who never interacted with these factions anyway. And there's really nothing so special about these races they couldn't have explained in the new character voice over and an instanced starting quest before setting them out into the world. So I really don't see any sort of benefit to this approach.

[Snackpack]

Remember that this tangent was started by the suggestion that "Not having to work for anything" was the primary reason for these types of things being implemented. It's not that players don't want to work for anything, it's just that they want to spend their work and focus their efforts on something that matters.

This is why people are arguing against having to return to older content's reputation grinds and quests in order to unlock races for use in CURRENT content. It's not that they don't want to work to unlock a new race. They just want to put their work in on BfA content.

Pretty much this. The vast majority of people aren't complaining about having to unlock the new races, it's more the way that Blizzard is having you unlock them. Even if you've never done the required quest chains before, I can see how that is new content and would make sense (if you want them early and only pre-BfA), but having to grind rep to exalted is not new content, especially if you still have to do it post-launch.

As someone who has already completed all the requirements months ago, I would have been happier to see a new quest chain to unlock them, rather than passively gaining them.

[h4rr0d]

The more I think about it, the more I don't really care about it. Even if they locked it just behind the questline, as a new player, you'd still have to level a char all the way up to 98 (or 110 for the ones that require argus/suramar), complete the quests, abandon the char and reroll to your desired race. No one in their right mind is going to do that.

So imo either remove the requirements altogether or whatever.

[Florena]

The more I think about it, the more I don't really care about it. Even if they locked it just behind the questline, as a new player, you'd still have to level a char all the way up to 98 (or 110 for the ones that require argus/suramar), complete the quests, abandon the char and reroll to your desired race. No one in their right mind is going to do that.

So imo either remove the requirements altogether or whatever.

Yeah it feels weird to me that they're pushing people to play alts with these races. Expansions have had varying degrees of alt friendliness but they've never before forced you to play an alt to get a reward like this outside of faction exclusive stuff like the fifferent tier 9s etc.

[Zyrinx]

It's not a huge deal for me. I already have the requirements met based on data mining. But in principle I'm against locking races and classes behind arbitrary walls like this. We've never had to unlock new races before. Why they join their faction was always explained in their starting quest. I think that the quests we do to unlock them should have instead been told from the new character's perspective. If blizzard has to insist on starting them at level 20, then unlock them for new players at level 20 similar to how dks/dhs work.

I don't see any particular reason why these races have to be special. It's all arbitrary gating with no real need behind it. It's completely unnecessary and serves no real purpose.

It's not the end of the world but I don't see how it adds anything to the game either. New races ought to be something to help bring in new players not something targeted at vets of the previous expansion.

If the datamining is true that the unlock requirements are account wide, then this gating isn't really for any sort of continuity purpose, because you can then do the quests on a character who never interacted with these factions anyway. And there's really nothing so special about these races they couldn't have explained in the new character voice over and an instanced starting quest before setting them out into the world. So I really don't see any sort of benefit to this approach.

So much this. New Players for BfA, if they exist, are going to have to go backward to unlock what seems to be a major feature of the Expansion they just bought. I'm against that in principal as well though it doesn't affect me at all.

_These should have been Barbershop options._

[Raelbo]

Yes, but what creates the player demand? Is it laziness and not wanting to play the game, or is it a desire to play the most current content and not waste time with stuff that's largely irrelevant?

Remember that this tangent was started by the suggestion that "Not having to work for anything" was the primary reason for these types of things being implemented. It's not that players don't want to work for anything, it's just that they want to spend their work and focus their efforts on something that matters.

This is why people are arguing against having to return to older content's reputation grinds and quests in order to unlock races for use in CURRENT content. It's not that they don't want to work to unlock a new race. They just want to put their work in on BfA content.

I hear exactly what you are saying, but I would argue that the point is fairly moot when you consider how this content will actually play out.

The fact is that most people who are going to play BfA will already have the requirements for unlocking the content fulfilled by the time BfA releases. We have either completed it already, or have the opportunity (and incentive since we know it will be required) to do so still during Legion while it is still current.

Really, the only people who understandably might object about the requirements are new players and those who missed Legion altogether.

In the case of the former I have to question whether accessing new races would even be a big deal. The whole point of adding new races to the game is to add new stuff for people who have run out of stuff to do because they have already done everything else that the game had to offer that interested them. This is not going to be an issue for someone who has never played WoW before, they have more than enough content which they haven't experienced yet.

And for someone who skipped Legion, well let's just say I don't have a lot of sympathy for players who are happy to skip entire expansions but want to argue that they need new content. Nor should the devs. They should be focussing their efforts on keeping their loyal supporters happy first and foremost, and that is exactly what the design intent behind the requirements to unlock the new races is: a way to reward the people currently playing Legion.

- - - Updated - - -

So much this. New Players for BfA, if they exist, are going to have to go backward to unlock what seems to be a major feature of the Expansion they just bought. I'm against that in principal as well though it doesn't affect me at all.

For new players all the existing races are still new races, making the issue of not having access to a few more pretty moot.

[SirCowdog]

Legion quests already scale rewards to your level. I expect them to apply this to old quests as well as part and parcel of scaling technology.

Scaling to level alone really isn't enough. I mean...it's a start, don't get me wrong. But so much of the progression at level cap is based on gear. I suppose it allows Blizzard to tune level-capped enemies like we saw when Angus first launched. Previous open world content on the Broken Shore was made very easy, and leveling content in regular zones was a joke at that point.

This is what I fear that scaling older expansion content will result in: Joke difficulty. Meaninglessly going through the motions without any real difficulty. What's the point of scaling things to cap if the end result is still players steamrolling through the content?

I would REALLY like to see something like M+ or Torment levels from D3 applied to the open world. Let the players choose to play at a higher and higher setting, with better and better rewards.

[SirCowdog]

The fact is that most people who are going to play BfA will already have the requirements for unlocking the content fulfilled by the time BfA releases. We have either completed it already, or have the opportunity (and incentive since we know it will be required) to do so still during Legion while it is still current.

We know that it's PLANNED to be required. It's a minor point, but keep in mind Blizzard has a bad habit of changing things that they've shown during the planning stages of games.

But I agree that players who are already heavily invested in Legion right now are very likely to already have all these requirements cleared, or be very close, with a minimum amount of effort needed to finish.

Really, the only people who understandably might object about the requirements are new players and those who missed Legion altogether.

In the case of the former I have to question whether accessing new races would even be a big deal. The whole point of adding new races to the game is to add new stuff for people who have run out of stuff to do because they have already done everything else that the game had to offer that interested them. This is not going to be an issue for someone who has never played WoW before, they have more than enough content which they haven't experienced yet.

Hmm...yes and no. If they use the level boost that comes with their purchase of the most recent expansion, they'll have exactly the same amount of new content as everyone else.

Going back and playing old content isn't going to be the same experience as players who have been there when it was still cutting edge. This was the point that was made earlier. While it's going to be their first time experiencing it, that experience will be HIGHLY skewed due to the way older content becomes obsolete.

What's worse is that if a new players takes advantage of the level boost, they might reach cap then decide to go back and unlock an allied race. They'll grind out all the requirements on a capped character, robbing themselves of the potentially scaled experience of leveling up from ground zero. Granted, leveling is still badly out of whack right now, but this is what Blizzard is attempting to address with scaling.

It's kind of an ambiguous case. I'm not arguing for or against here, just pointing out that it's going to be VERY weird for a newer player.

And for someone who skipped Legion, well let's just say I don't have a lot of sympathy for players who are happy to skip entire expansions but want to argue that they need new content. Nor should the devs. They should be focussing their efforts on keeping their loyal supporters happy first and foremost, and that is exactly what the design intent behind the requirements to unlock the new races is: a way to reward the people currently playing Legion.

Cyclical players are definitely a thing, and it's a group that's growing larger each expansion.

But again, I think this is less of a case of complaining about wanting new content, but rather pointing out how awkward that content is being implemented. We all know that WoW is HEAVILY based on progression. Having to go backwards in that progression in order to unlock a feature of the current expansion is very un-intuitive.

Again, this could be mitigated by scaling tech. We just don't know yet. If I can go back to older content, yet be faced with enemies that are scaled for 120 characters and gear, and get rewards on par for the same, then I think this entire issue is largely as you put it: Moot. But if going back to Legion(or older) content results in a steamrolling grindfest, I think Blizzard should take it back to the drawing board.

[CreatureLives]

It's not even that hard. How are you not exalted with everything by now? Do you just not do World Quests?

[Kluian05]

I seriously doubt that many of those "brand new players" you guys seem so fond of even exist, by now. After 14 years, I would expect anyone even remotely interested in this game would have tried it already, and then he/she would not be a brand new player anymore. Are you guys seriously convinced that people who never wanted to play WoW before suddenly changed their mind because of their burning desire to roll a Void Elf? C'mon.

When I say "new" players I mean players coming to the came we weren't playing when the requirements were introduced, such as playing Legion.

[Rogalicus]

Yes, the social approach is worth consideration. Cata, however, is several expansions back and game mechanics have been overhauled multiple times since. Cata content also does not scale. I can not brush aside your arguments, simply because we do not know how doing Legion content in BfA will feel - we do not how much of an impact new mechanics will have on the game and how much of that scaling will mitigate. There will be scaling, though, so you will still se mobs of your level, not 30 levels below like on Cata maps. Also, you can take time to grind out these reps while still leveling your main and that should make the experience even more similar.

I'm sorry but I don't really understand. Are you implying that Legion will scale beyond level 110? May I ask on what premise do you base this assumption?

[Flarelaine]

You quoted a post that I did not post. It says my name on it, but when you click to go to the original post, it is completely changed. What are you trying to do? I'm pretty sure that's against forum rules. Post reported. If you want to quote me, don't change what I said to suit your narrative. You basically re-wrote my post so you could further your stance, and I don't know why.

I was commenting in a hasty manner and neglected to turn off the multi-quote from my previous reply, then failed to pay attention when cutting the quote down to the phrase I specifically replied to. The quote in question is indeed not from you, but from ro9ue in ponst #152. I apologize.

- - - Updated - - -

I'm sorry but I don't really understand. Are you implying that Legion will scale beyond level 110? May I ask on what premise do you base this assumption?

I was merely assuming that it would be the logical extension of Blizzard converting all the old zones to scaling. I think it would at least mitigate Legion zones being "old" content if they were level-appropriate.