Preach Gaming - Punish Them! - Lack of Failure Doesn't Prepare For Mythic+

[klepp0906]

You forget, they sometimes come here to say, "Raiding and/or Mythic+ is ruining the game for..." or "Raider.IO is ruining the game..." etc, etc.

They don't always quit. Sometimes they obtain a sense of false entitlement that is hard to watch.

well to be fair (only trying to be objective - be gentle) they are the majority. The lions share. Money comes before all to almost all businesses and definitely to blizzard. They know their demographic or at least which one garners them the most cheddar.

[Calfredd]

Is that why WoW had 12M subs during WotLK ? So many people leaving.. oh OHHHHHH

With 10 pages already, is it too late to point out Wrath didn't have Vanilla-style progression? Wrath had dungeons that dropped gear equivalent to the previous tier's item level. This meant that instead of having to start from Naxx to Ulduar to Trial to ICC, they could run a few dungeons and be okay to go for ICC as opposed to Vanilla where you had to start at MC (actually earlier because of resist gear and such) before even dreaming about stepping foot in to Naxx-40.

In short: Wrath-style tier progression=/= Vanilla-style tier progression.

[Deleted]

Like someone with 360 gear and no dungeons in the dumb io site would even get accepted into a group.

The answer is not to take people's loot/progression away, but to have individual progression levels per content type. I don't know why Preach still plays WoW. The system that is the answer to his wishes is the GW2 fractals.

[La]

well to be fair (only trying to be objective - be gentle) they are the majority. The lions share. Money comes before all to almost all businesses and definitely to blizzard. They know their demographic or at least which one garners them the most cheddar.

Which is why a lot of the things in the game that would not otherwise be so, are so. Because the game became less about a sense of accomplishment or progression, and more about ways they can give people things, and keep people playing. The game isn't for the players anymore, it's about "How can we make this game cater to the majority, while making the most money possible?" I mean shit, this game doesn't have a community at all, least of all one that isn't toxic. You only get that from being in a guild, so why do things that promote team play and MMO qualities?

[Kalcifur]

I don't get why people are popping blood vessels over this video when it's pretty much just a query to his audience over what's been happening over the forums rather than a defined thesis with a stance to defend.

I also don't get why people don't allow for even the tiniest bit of nuance in their discussions of pretty much anything on this forum.

People are allowed to seek both challenge and relaxation in their gaming experiences, that's why WoW has such diverse content. There are definitely elements of WoW that are too easy and others that are, relatively speaking, far too hard. But in order for actual discussions to occur a lot of people here need to learn how to take a deep breath and really consider what's at stake here.

Hint, pretty much nothing. This isn't any kind of battle to the death with the fate of the World of Warcraft as we know it on the line. But it is a very important discussion that can be used for players from many different gaming lifestyles to learn about how others experience the game. Stop trying to strangle anyone who infringes on your armchair philosopher/designer perspective and take a moment to understand where they might be coming from.

[klogaroth]

I mean if you are doing, let's say, mythic+ and you are grouped with these bad players that are never challenged in normal and heroic dungeons, and now you are there in a group with them, and you have to clear the dungeon with them, then wouldn't the fact that they are in mythic+ with you right now motivate them to rise to the challenge?

The reason people don't is because the gap is too big.

People rise to challenges that are just beyond what they could previously achieve. In queueable/solo content you can reasonably get to the point where you're looking at something round mythic +4 for upgrades. The gap between something like warfronts and mythic plus 4 is cavernous, and compared to how long it takes to get there, there's not all that much game content inbetween them. There's a lot of minor lessons that could've been learnt somewhere in the dozens of hours it takes to get to that point, but you can get by without learning them. So people don't, and they arrive at the gap between queueable and non-queueable content and it's this huge mountain. With the potential to have to do all the learning in content that doesn't even necessarily offer any rewards. Is it any wonder people don't make the jump?

[xcitng]

Who?

/tenchar

How pathetic....

Good to see people miss the point completely or comment on just the title... sigh....

[Wingspan]

People play video games to relax. If you are looking for a challenge in a video game, that is most likely to make up for a lack of challenges in real life.

Probably true.

I don’t exactly want to play an interactive movie... but at the same time I have never considered computer gaming as something I want to be challenged in. I don’t mind an occasional hurdle that takes me an hour or so to get past through some sort of strategy change, but for the most part, I just prefer an easy ride (questing, grinding, overgearing a dungeon).

Life has plenty of challenges, so when I encounter one that I must face, I would prefer that it means something... games really don’t have a lot of meaning to me, so I really don’t want them there.

[bloomy]

Let's just admit something here. Vanilla-style tier progression would not make these players better. Terrible players will always be terrible players. If you remove LFR, crank up the difficulty, and tell them "git gud" they'll just hit a wall after Heroic Dungeons and quit.

your idea that terrible players will always be terrible is just wrong. most terrible players are just new or inexperienced players, they might not be amazing once they get to know the game better and get some experience, but they won't be terrible.

and the point you completely missed is that newer players who are "terrible" are somewhat expected at the dungeon level of classic, when you first hit 60 and are gearing out with pugs you will run into some new players who are "terrible," and you can teach them or let them learn by doing since the content is fairly casual. if you threw that same player who didn't know their ass from their elbow into AQ40 or BWL they would be a much bigger problem and letting them figure out the game at that point is unacceptable to the 39 people around them who aren't lost.

so when someone queues up for a +10 weekly key and they happened to mcforge their gear up to 375 ilvl they are expected to know what they are doing since that's the story their ilvl is telling. you might think anyone with a brain would look into their class and dungeons and start low to learn them and gradually work up to doing their own +10 keys but that's not how most people work, they can see that they can't get upgrades until a +8/9/10 or whatever so they go for that and end up ruining the fun for everyone else.

gear in vanilla is rare, and i know that eventually you could buy a carry, but try buying a carry with loot from an early run off any vanilla guild and see what their response is. you don't get accidentally fully geared out in vanilla, with mcforging though you definitely have some shitcan players running around with heroic/mythic gear for no reason.

[Wingspan]

The concept guaranteed success should never be anywhere close to anything that actually yields rewards.

The problem then becomes deciding what is guaranteed success. Some people (more than you would think) actually get a reasonable level of challenge from questing... while to some people there is no challenge to it whatsoever.

So to follow your suggestion, you would need to make a system that rewards the bad (but challenged) player and the better player (who had no risk of failure) gets nothing for doing the same task.

Challenge levels are entirely relative to the skill caps of those playing.

[Broken Fox]

Since people here didn't understand yet, I'll make it in paint


hope this helps

It’s a common problem with modern MMOs. 90% of FFXIV is absolutely braindead and then you hit the level cap and it’s like “woah, there’s an actual game here”

[klepp0906]

Which is why a lot of the things in the game that would not otherwise be so, are so. Because the game became less about a sense of accomplishment or progression, and more about ways they can give people things, and keep people playing. The game isn't for the players anymore, it's about "How can we make this game cater to the majority, while making the most money possible?" I mean shit, this game doesn't have a community at all, least of all one that isn't toxic. You only get that from being in a guild, so why do things that promote team play and MMO qualities?

spot on. i mean it stopped being an mmorpg and about community when you began being able to teleport everywhere, queue for everything, and shard/xrealm/instance into every single facet of the game. among other things.

but yea. The only reason i still play (and begrudgingly so) is due to guildies/long term friends. Even then im out once pantheon comes out. Unfortunately thats still a year out.

Still enjoying watching blizzard backtrack and fix or try to fix the beta we're paying for ;p

[nothingsjim]

Okay. So, the way I understand the argument is this.

There are people, that aren't performing that well. These people are doing certain content, so that other people play together with them and are subject to their bad performance. These bad players are not improving their gameplay. But they would if they'd be challenged in the content they are doing.

But isn't the content they are doing already too hard for them? Otherwise they wouldn't fail and be a problem for other players, right? So then they are already faced with a challenge.

I mean if you are doing, let's say, mythic+ and you are grouped with these bad players that are never challenged in normal and heroic dungeons, and now you are there in a group with them, and you have to clear the dungeon with them, then wouldn't the fact that they are in mythic+ with you right now motivate them to rise to the challenge?

The problem is, the "Challenge" they are facing is too steep a gradient, and thanks to Blizzard handing out free epics here and there, they can only gain upgrade from those "Challenge".

Players are reward-driven, if they see they will only get upgrade in +7 (For instance), they won't try to do lower keys because they are suppose to be "Better than that level", and they were right to felt that. Except the chasm of difficulty between a +7 and Warfront is like comparing Glass Joe with Mike Tyson.

[SirCowdog]

The mage tower works because it's not important for character progression. M+ is. I am all in favor for content to be a little bit harder and to teach people some mechanics, but what we say is that a lot of players dislike that. What we see is that a lot of players dont want to do harder content.

I really dont know if this problem has a solution, or even if it's a problem in the first place.

Cap out gear rewards earlier in the M+ progress and put cosmetics ahead of the curve or cutting edge style.

[Powerogue]

A fair criticism. My monk who has never done any dungeon above heroic or raid above raid finder is more geared than my heroic raiding rogue due to pure luck. Hasn't given me many opportunities to "git gud" as it were.

[Doffen]

Since people here didn't understand yet, I'll make it in paint


hope this helps

Holla ballers, that's nicely illustrated!

[PaladinBash]

Well yeah, if you reward lots of things for doing fuck all of anything (Warfronts most notably), you're going to have to convince people to push through anything hard. It usually just doesn't happen unless they already know people or find people that are nice/fun to play with. Chances are the kind that welcome them are cesspool guilds that do nothing and that's fine but it's not what Preach really deals with or the point he puts forth.

There is practically no difference for a good player between a +10 and a +7, for instance. Do you guys really feel it? Maybe if you're on a super ungeared alt you do. Maybe on a really fucky dungeon/affix combo you do as well but still, in general, the difference for a skilled player is negligible. Did you guys really feel that Heroic was notably harder than Normal raid? Were free loot bosses like Taloc and Mother so much harder on Mythic than Heroic? For anyone remotely good, there is no real difference. Again, maybe if you did this on an alt with fuck all gear you'd feel it was harder to do but that's not really the issue.

For new/unskilled players, the difference between a 7 and a 10 key is a gigantic chasm they can never get over, that's why they try to get carries either with gold or using that raiderio shit to find 'good' people to run them through it. Fair enough really but it doesn't help them develop as players. It encourages them to stay bad but with free gear being thrown at them, they won't run lower content because why would they? Why run something that doesn't give you anything to 'get good' from when you can just easily find people to carry you? I mean this sincerely. I wouldn't do that and don't expect someone even lazier than me to do it either. I don't think there's an easy fix by cutting back gear because it'd shit me and make me do Mythic+ even less. I do my 10 every week for a Veiled Crystal and that's it. I think it's just an inevitable consequence of how the system works and nothing's really going to change it.

[darklogrus]

So it's bad when they try and bad when they don't?

You just said that they refuse to try, so why try to weasel into a part of the game, when you refuse to even try..

[Naked Snake]

The problem is, the "Challenge" they are facing is too steep a gradient, and thanks to Blizzard handing out free epics here and there, they can only gain upgrade from those "Challenge".

Players are reward-driven, if they see they will only get upgrade in +7 (For instance), they won't try to do lower keys because they are suppose to be "Better than that level", and they were right to felt that. Except the chasm of difficulty between a +7 and Warfront is like comparing Glass Joe with Mike Tyson.

So it's too big of a challenge?

[RickJamesLich]

Let's just admit something here. Vanilla-style tier progression would not make these players better. Terrible players will always be terrible players. If you remove LFR, crank up the difficulty, and tell them "git gud" they'll just hit a wall after Heroic Dungeons and quit.

Not sure if Wow has gone in a good direction where people feel "if the game tries to make the players use their brains, they will just rage quit" lol. Perhaps part of the problem is that WoW focused so much on catering to this demographic that it slowly pushed away players that actually wanted some level of challenge and maybe part of making the game better once more would be to try to attract these types back.

For example, Cata wasn't the only time the game had "difficult dungeons" as one of the main ways of progressing your character, BC and vanilla had dungeons that could be very punishing and interestingly enough the base of players only grew accordingly.