2 Faction MMOs are an outdated concept

[Zoreyai]

It's not, this is one of the only faction mmo's left. BFA is garbage, but factions need to stay.

[Kithelle]

Make it 120 lvl only and it's the other way around.

Same goes for this guy:


Filter the stats for 120 only and it's even more drastic difference.

Guess your thick heads just exploded.

Are you surprised, it looks better when the numbers are skewed in their favor!

Horde has it better in every way...so there are more Horde players...but the hand wavers would have you think Horde isn't treated better in any way...even seen people claim recently the devs were showing a Alliance bias.

[Halicia]

It's not, this is one of the only faction mmo's left. BFA is garbage, but factions need to stay.

Its never really felt like a faction mmo to me, so much as an artificial separation of players. No matter what the other side's players do, the story is going to go how Blizzard determines.

[Mellrod]

It's a 15 year old game with 14 years of crap piled on top of it. The game is mainly about mounts, toys, and transmogs now anyway. A true virtual dollhouse.

Sad, yet incredibly accurate.

Nobody wants to admit that all their doing is dressing up their dollies.

I'll go first. I log in the game to dress up my dollies and to find more things to dress my dollies up with. I also look for things for my dollies to play with and things for my dollies to ride on. Because Barbie has to have her horse and her pink Corvette.

I have no shame in admitting this. Infact it's not even something I have to swallow my pride and "admit," just a way of life for me. I've enjoyed my virtual doll since '07. Ever since BC my preferred form of gameplay would just be to collect mounts, pets, and cool items. Other than that i'd interact with the community on my server, make friends in many different guilds, and enjoy the occasional PUG raid/BG/dungeon. It's just something I enjoy more than the other stuff WoW has offered. I have no shame in playing like a "CaShUaL NOOB" because i've had fun with my years of playtime and all the amazing memories i've made doing it. Sue me.

All that being said, for me, the only change i've really noticed is that there's more cool shit for me to collect, but less interacting with the community on my server, less friends to hangout with, and less people to show all that cool shit off to. And that, my friends, is what truly sucks here imo.

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On topic: They could add a 3rd faction, but I don't think that would bring any players back, and people might complain because of such a drastic change to the established system. Players hate the system but also hate when it changes. Their best hope is to create an entirely new MMO from the ground up. Abandon all the habits and patterns they've locked themselves into with WoW, all the things that players expect from them that remove their wiggle room for new concepts. Only when they're free of these things can they break new ground and possibly create something great.

[kiramon]

Blizzard decided to go with a PvP expansion this time around, which is fine and all, but it highlights some of the fundamental issues with Blizzard's 14 year old game. Namely, their 2 faction system.

2 Factions will almost never be balanced. Especially when they have different races with different bonuses on each side. One side will invariably get the upper hand, and this will cause a snowball effect where people who actually want to enjoy the game mostly all switch to that faction.

WoW has been Horde dominated in PvP since Vanilla. This didn't matter as much because Alliance had a slight upper hand in PvE. But once BC hit and gave the Alliance's PvE bonus to the Horde, it had a landslide effect with the Horde population massively outweighing the Alliance. Horde has dominated both PvP and PvE ever since.

In a Faction War expansion, that basically means 1 side gets to dominate, and the other ends up opting out. Thus, less fun for both sides.

All the other PvP focused MMOs have realized this, and either gone with a no faction system (Guild Wars, FFXI) or gone with a 3 faction system (ESO, Camelot Unchained) to help balance this issue. 3 factions isn't perfect, but it does make it less likely one faction will completely dominate, and if they do, the other two factions can make truces to help balance this. Personally, I believe the no-faction system is the best. That way, all PvP is done between guilds and communities.

Blizzard needs to reassess what their game is supposed to be. If they want it to become a PvP centric game, they need to do something about their lopsided, 2-faction system.

Haha “slight” pve in vanilla hahahha

Grats on viscidus horde... too bad about the other 90% of the content you suck at it lol ok

Slight haha

[Flutterguy]

No one is thinking through what a third faction would require in this game. You'd have to build content from 1-120 or 130 if we're presuming this as future content. That means designing quests and zone presence for multiple expansions of content. That's way too much work and would never happen.

[Halicia]

Adding a 3rd faction to an already shrinking player base seems incredibly dumb.

You make it sound like WoW is some small/indie MMO out there with only 20 people playing.

If they're willing to forgo the income they gain by artificially separating players by race/server/whatnot, there's more than enough players to support dozens of "factions".

I don't think Blizzard will do this, however, they've grown accustomed to raking in cash for entirely automated processes.

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No one is thinking through what a third faction would require in this game. You'd have to build content from 1-120 or 130 if we're presuming this as future content. That means designing quests and zone presence for multiple expansions of content. That's way too much work and would never happen.

Blizzard doesn't have to, and they probably wouldn't. They've ignored "old content" in the past, so why would they in the future ?

[Archmage Alodi]

Most alliance players are casuals, lfr heroes and roleplayers anyway.

[Deleted]

He's right. You're wrong. http://warcraftrealms.com/census.php

Unless, of course, you have actual proof and a reason why we should accept it over the information in that link. Hint: Your internal fantasies are not proof.

Doesn't count all the accounts. You're both wrong.

[Appelgren]

no... its not an outdated concept...

good vs evil... west vs east... heaven vs hell...

it will never be outdated...

[Kithelle]

If it's so outdated then where are these mmos with numerous factions?

Pretty much every mmorpg I've ever played has had either one or two factions...only mmo I can even think of with more than two is ESO, with a whopping three.

[stomination]

Well... i guess we know you won't be resubbing then.

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Do you not find racials fun though? Having played MMO's without them i can say that it isn't very interesting.

I find racials to be fun, but i don't find having the player base split to be adding anything that improves the experience. What exactly are we getting from having seperate factions? Different locations and questlines? Now think if we hadn't. Everyone that doesn't play both would now have double the content.
I think factions spilting has been proven to not work. Not many mmo's use it anymore and as population dwindles it becomes a more visible issue. Actually, WoW is the only sucessful mmo that has it, and honestly, it's not making the game any better.

Now, i'm not saying the factions should merge lore wise, but cooperation should be a thing, as it's been for most of WoW unnoficially.
Added to that remove War mode "% incentives" and let people who want to do world pvp do world pvp but outside of war mode and in instanced content, let people play together and get rid of the imbalance and faction biases.

So remove factions like most mmos do...but not the racials like most mmos have done as well.

So what does this fix? People will still go to the better racial.

[Deleted]

So remove factions like most mmos do...but not the racials like most mmos have done as well.

So what does this fix? People will still go to the better racial.

So? Faction unbalance is the problem. In a merged pool everyone has access to all the races.

But tell you what, even though i find them interesting i'd be fine with it if they removed them. I just think it makes things a bit boring.

[prwraith]

Meh I liked everquest, like 15 factions as it were.

No real PvP though because PvP in mmo's is awful and moronic. Factions were for lore, nothing else. I could talk to anybody I wanted.

The idea of factions in wow takes the cake for monstrous stupidity on the developers part.

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I think allowing opposite factions to do co-op PVE would be nice. I don't think the factions have to be removed, but a more sandbox world where reputation is more fluid would be cool. I want to be friendly with Orgrimmar AND Stormwind like Khadgar is!

That's what I liked about games like Everquest. If you put the effort and time in, as an evil or good race you could walk into any city with no real problems (barring some exceptions, looking at you corrupt qeynos guards)

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Realmpop.com/us & realmpop.com/EU also disagree with you. So does statista.com

Isn't realmpop based off characters, not accounts?

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no... its not an outdated concept...

good vs evil... west vs east... heaven vs hell...

it will never be outdated...

The idea of it being a 100% binary yes or no system, is absolutely the out-dated part of that.

[Doffen]

Battle of Dazar'alor("faction change" for bosses) is just the start of the big change that is coming in 9.0.

Just wait and see.

[Nomads]

If it's so outdated then where are these mmos with numerous factions?

Pretty much every mmorpg I've ever played has had either one or two factions...only mmo I can even think of with more than two is ESO, with a whopping three.

Well, reading the thread passed the title would help. I listed 4 MMOs... two of which are considered very successful and have sub numbers that (theoretically) rival WoW's.

[Kithelle]

Well, reading the thread passed the title would help. I listed 4 MMOs... two of which are considered very successful and have sub numbers that (theoretically) rival WoW's.

Except theoretical doesn't mean fact, just because a few games exist that are different doesn't mean 2 faction mmo's are outdated.

[Deleted]

Well, reading the thread passed the title would help. I listed 4 MMOs... two of which are considered very successful and have sub numbers that (theoretically) rival WoW's.

Based on information pulled off the internet:
- one of the listed games is a game in beta (Camelot Unchained)
- one of the listed games knows no subscription (GW2)
- one boasted about a year ago to have 2.5 million active players (note: this number also takes into account free players); and saw a year over year decrease to that number (based on what trend steam charts show)
- the most comparable one being FFXIV, but having the same issues with also counting free players

So i fail to see the relevance of your theory.
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[Nomads]

Except theoretical doesn't mean fact, just because a few games exist that are different doesn't mean 2 faction mmo's are outdated.

The logical fallacies in this sentence are screaming at me. I'll just try to make two points in reply:

First, I wasn't saying "because these games exist, 2 factions are out of date". I quite clearly used these games as examples to illustrate my point that the more recent MMOs are taking this new direction (either no faction or at least 3 factions).

Second, these games were just examples as ESO, FFXI, and GW2 are the most played MMOs other than WoW. Since none of them are publishing their sub numbers anymore this is why I said it is theoretical. There are more games currently in development which further prove my points. Crowfall (no factions) and like I mentioned before Camelot Unchained (3 factions) being the most anticipated from Western developers.

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Based on information pulled off the internet:
- one of the listed games is a game in beta (Camelot Unchained)
- one of the listed games knows no subscription (GW2)
- one boasted about a year ago to have 2.5 million active players (note: this number also takes into account free players); and saw a year over year decrease to that number (based on what trend steam charts show)
- the most comparable one being FFXIV, but having the same issues with also counting free players

So i fail to see the relevance of your theory.
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Current estimates (some with leaked data to back them up) put WoW's current sub numbers from 2-4 million. Could be more, but also could be less. See the relevance now?

[gaymer77]

Isn't realmpop based off characters, not accounts?

Isn't the population is ANY game based off characters and not accounts? Not quite sure what point you're trying to make here...