Why flying being gated behind rep grind makes no sense

[Pper]

Grinded through every expansion, didn't unsub once
always one of the first to get everything done
having to use ground mounts to do dailies etc. didn't stop me once

it's still cancer and I would 100% support a change back to the old system, flying for gold
or at least make it available from the start
do not time gate it behind some obscure patches
tell us what to do and let us fly

[CrawlFromThePit]

Actually I never said my argument was more valid than yours. I pointed out that you didn't actually have an argument. And not just because I feel like it, but because I put in the effort to substantiate it where you didn't. My argument may not be correct, but by providing warrants, backing and qualifiers, my argument had actual substance. All you presented was a baseless assertion; the argumentation - showing how you drew your conclusions - was completely absent.

Snipped for space because we're getting in the realm of turbo repetition in this conversation but this is the essence of what I want to get into.

Creating a world in a video game is level design. It can be a level like in Mario Bros. A map like in Starcraft, an open world or a sandbox, you name it, the area where you move around and do stuff is created by level designers. The process of designing a level or a map has to take into consideration the options/tools the players have at their disposal to accomplish the different tasks in the gameplay loop.

Let's put this in a WoW example to be more on point with the topic here.

Say you start making a map from scratch, and this applies to any state of the game throughout its evolution btw (new xpack, additional end game island in a later patch, etc), you gotta ask yourself what kind of tools and metrics you deal with. Those are your constraints, that includes movement speed, jumping height, swimming, different modes of transportation, possible movement abilities, etc. For WoW those are not very restrictive since it's not a platformer, but games like GW2 actually used that more extensively to create gameplay in their navigation puzzles and areas restricted to the mounts and their abilities, stuff like that. Back to WoW, as a level designer, in simple terms, you're gonna start by establishing your hub, at this point your map is bacially empty but you have an idea of where things start. From this hub the player will travel to the questing spots you place on the map. Those are not just thrown around randomly, the place where they are and everything that's between the hub and that place is thought out, analyzed, reworked, iterated on, play tested, modified again, and so on. Through this entire process you look at how players can move from one point to another. This is where it gets messy for WoW.

They are supposed to take into consideration the flying mount, it's a tool just like ground mount, just like walking, just like gliding. At this point they know that the game will have WQs that most people will be forced to repeat almost endlessly, and they know that's end game content, you do that when you're max level. We all agree on that, right? So they decided to entirely take out flying for the leveling process, which is a lazy solution (deciding to ignore a gameplay tool just because you don't want to deal with it is by definition lazy), they could have made flying content, when I say could, I mean should, because flying is a normal tool in WoW, it has to be taken into consideration just like everything else. Either way, no flying while leveling, okay whatever, make ground content for that and for the end game when the player has flying we'll make flying content, right? Nope, everything still on the ground but this time around players are free to use a tool that was NEVER TAKEN INTO CONSIDERATION WHILE DESIGNING THE MAP. So we find ourself with ground only content, navigation, traversal and exploration while being allowed to SKIP ALL THAT. Sure it sounds fun for people who are bored as shit of running around the same areas since the last year before unlocking flying, but this is just where the old cancer is diagnosed, it was in there a long time ago.

It literally all started with the very introduction of flying in TBC and the next step of content right after. You unlock flying and then you go to Isle of Quel'Danas and.... yup, already not allowed to fly. The first piece of world content introduced after the implementation of flying does take flying into consideration. From this moment they already has a blueprint for completely ignoring this tool, arbitrarily deciding they can remove something from the player at will instead of realizing it's now something that's part of the universe. The correct way to deal with this is keeping in mind, at all times, that the player can fly. Design the map around this instead of ignoring it, because when you ignore you just create simple ground map and then these maps become obsolete the very moment players get flying back, because they always get flying back. This of course also mess with WPvP since this entire feature revolves around running into other players. Mathematically speaking, you insanely reduce the chance of player encounters and player interactions if you let them travel on any altitude level instead of everyone on the same level of navigation and on top of that they move 3 times faster and even if they see each others they literally can't do anything. It's impossible to not see this as idiotic. I will doubt the color of an apple before thinking this is not idiotic design that breaks WPvP, because it mathematically breaks WPvP due to the simple fact that it generates less player interactions through the mechanics of how flying works and how the world is never designed with flying in mind because they arbitrarily decide to take it away every new xpack instead of designing around it. It's a domino effect that stems from the first bad decision which is to not commit to either flying alway or ground always, you can't just switch the navigation of the entire game half way through, of course it breaks things.

Wasted opportunities:

1. Northrend was the only map that had a logical excuse for gating flying, the weather. We basically had to buy training that "made our flying mounts skilled enough to fly in bad weather". This concept could have been used in gameplay, for example, create a questing spot on top of a plateau, only reachable by flying mount but once you get up there, crazy wind prevents you from using flying mounts. If I can come up with this in 30 seconds, I'm sure a team with more time can do better. Could have been used everywhere in different forms, at the same time it would give ground only mount a reason to exist in end game because as it stands, we use them while leveling and once we unlock flying we can throw them out of our action bar and replace them with flying mounts =/

2. Floating instances, there's the mechanar bunch with The Eye and the Temple of Four Winds or some shit, the one boss raid and one instance, I forgot the names, the stuff south of Uldum. There could have been plenty more cases with floating content that requires flying or stuff on places unreachable by ground, not everything has to float obviously, there's a ton of places with high cliffs that we can't climb, could easily put caverns in there, the possibilities are almost endless to be honest.

3. We already have a map designed around flying, we know Blizzard can do it. Vashjir is mechanically the very same as a map designed with flying in mind. The map has vertical freedom for navigation and exploration, arguably combat sucks in water, as I said in a previous post I think the game could use an aerial combat system in some form to support having flying all the time otherwise we could get in the same issue as Aeon with their garbage aerial battles that insanely advantaged some classes over the others but that's a completely different discussion that revolves more around game design than level design.

4. Nazjatar, while running around the ground level of that map I saw all the stuff over my head and really hoped that for once having flying would unlock something special and really give a reason for gating it. Nope, nothing special up there, all the content is once again only designed with ground navigation in mind. At first it had the same feels as Vashjir but did not deliver, flying is once again just a shortcut that removes a big chunk of WPvP and provides no extra content or gameplay.

Flying affects things in the game, and since Blizzard made the decision to NOT consider it while designing the maps, we get stuck in a spiral of always having flying taken away from us, maps never providing flying content, and ground content becoming trivial as hell, on top of that no flying combat system to support WPvP makes flying an escape instead of an immersion into the feature. Either keep flying and design around it, or take it out and make ground content more engaging and long lasting so people don't get bored of moving around on ground mount. I just strongly believe that the direction they took is detrimental to the game in the same way a cancer is, it makes everything less fun than what it could be because they try to keep everything instead of commiting to one thing and doing it well.

There you go, more substance than you ever provided.

[LuminaL]

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You make a fair point, even if you could have been a bit less rude in your delivery.

I'd certainly agree that flying offers opportunity for extra exploration. That doesn't mean, however, that it doesn't fundamental change the initial sense of discovery and exploration you experience in new zones (in your own example, figuring out your main path).

Either way, your point doesn't invalidate the idea of keeping players on the ground for new content.





It's fortunate then that I didn't try to say this.

Im sorry if it sounded rude, I like both ground and flying mounts. I like to see the world from the ground and go around it, but it gets annoying very fast. 3 months is max for me after that as I said, I go for my automatic routes that is probably only around 20% of the zone.

after unlocking flying, I just realized how beautiful zones are and how I havent really explored all of it, but more like less than half of it. I have seen places in azsuna for example that I didnt even knew existed, same for newer contents like drustvar, stormsong valley, zuldazar and nazmir. (ignoring that how pain in the ass it was to use ground mounts in nazjatar even for someone who isnt bothered by ground mounts at first ) thats 4 out of 6 zones we had, almost one year into them and I saw new places I havent seen before.

overall, Im not fully against locked flying for new content, Im against it taking almost a year or more for each xpack. Im good for up to maybe 3 months, after that it becomes boring very fast and makes me quit the game.

[Raelbo]

There you go, more substance than you ever provided.

While I appreciate the effort, let's not get ahead of ourselves shall we?

Put briefly, you make a decent argument about weaknesses in Blizzard's world design. Your vision of how WoW could have been designed is certainly interesting, but it's way beyond the scope of this discussion, and that's not really something I have any real interest in discussing.

My opinion pertains to the existence of flight within the paradigm of what WoW is and the impact that flight has had in the game in becoming what it is. And to that end, you haven't made a case that flight is the cause of the "cancer" you see in the game. It might be a symptom, but simply put, you're not going to fix any of what you're complaining about by removing flight, and the idea that WoW would have turned out a lot better if they'd never put flying in is complete speculation on your part.

The one area where your argument remains poorly structured is your assertion about flying's affect on WPvP:

This of course also mess with WPvP since this entire feature revolves around running into other players. Mathematically speaking, you insanely reduce the chance of player encounters and player interactions if you let them travel on any altitude level instead of everyone on the same level of navigation and on top of that they move 3 times faster and even if they see each others they literally can't do anything. It's impossible to not see this as idiotic. I will doubt the color of an apple before thinking this is not idiotic design that breaks WPvP, because it mathematically breaks WPvP due to the simple fact that it generates less player interactions through the mechanics of how flying works and how the world is never designed with flying in mind because they arbitrarily decide to take it away every new xpack instead of designing around it

In spite of the volume of words here, you haven't really built a complete argument. Your entire paragraph can be summed up as:

"With flying, you run into a lot less players. WPvP relies on players running into other. Therefore flying kills WPvP"

The nice thing about condensing your argument like this is that it's suddenly easy to break it down and analyse it: You have a fact (With flying, you run into a lot less players) linked by a warrant ( WPvP relies on players running into other) to a conclusion (Therefore flying kills WPvP).

So let's take a look at this shall we:

Firstly, your "fact" is dubious.

"Mathematically speaking, you insanely reduce the chance of player encounters and player interactions if you let them travel on any altitude level instead of everyone on the same level"

This is demonstrably false.

Yes, the odds of randomly running into players in arbitrary spots in the world is reduced. But mathematically modelling player behaviour (and where they will be in the worl) as random is a critical flaw. You are not reliant on randomly wondering around the world hoping to bump into someone else randomly wondering around the world. If you're looking for WPvP, it's hardly going to be difficult to find players because you know they will congregate at WQ points. Furthermore, flight makes it easy to scan for and drop onto victims from the sky.

Essentially, if you have players who are interested into WPvP, they will find each other and engage in combat.

Now let's take a look at your warrant:

"this entire feature revolves around running into other players"

Aside from the fact that this warrant is somewhat dubious as it stands (The feature doesn't revolve around running into players, it revolves around the desire of players to engage in PvP) it is a fair point to make that the feature requires that players encounter each other. And as demonstrated above, if they want to, they will.

Therefore, we lead to the inexorable conclusion that I have been presenting all along: If players are successfully avoiding each other and thus WPvP, it's not because of flying, it's because they don't want to engage in WPvP.

Arguing that flying needs to be removed because it will force those players into WPvP is just asinine at this point.

[SirCowdog]

C It felt like I had an invisible hand slapping me when I wanted to play the game I wanted to that said "NO THATS NOT THE WAY TO ENJOY THE GAME DO IT LIKE THIS".

"You think you do, but you don't".

I REALLY wish Blizzard would understand that the way they want us to play isn't the only way, and that sometimes players actually do know what they want. You'd think that the success of Classic would have driven home that point stronger than anything, both in terms of players knowing what they want, and that giving players what they want is often very profitable.

Blizzard has spent a lot of time and effort creating a game which caters to, and facilitates, many different styles of play. But for some highly suspicious reasons, the one single playstyle of flight(which was part of the formula of the two most popular, and populated, expansions) is somehow now incompatible with current open world design.

I really hope the next expansion shows Blizzard pulling the stick out of their collective asses about flying. Stop treating it like an afterthought, and go back to including it in the design of the open world from the beginning. Show some innovation or creativity. Overhaul the underlying mechanics, if that's what it takes.

[Ihsan997]

I REALLY wish Blizzard would understand that the way they want us to play isn't the only way, and that sometimes players actually do know what they want. You'd think that the success of Classic would have driven home that point stronger than anything, both in terms of players knowing what they want, and that giving players what they want is often very profitable.

Maybe they will once they see the sustained success from Classic. There were private vanilla servers for years before Blizzard finally caught on and gave those players what they want. Perhaps that will serve as extra encouragement for them to, you know, listen to what most of the player base seems to want in terms of flying.

[SirCowdog]

Maybe they will once they see the sustained success from Classic. There were private vanilla servers for years before Blizzard finally caught on and gave those players what they want. Perhaps that will serve as extra encouragement for them to, you know, listen to what most of the player base seems to want in terms of flying.

Like I said, I hope they change their stance on flying. But all the same leadership for WoW development that made the decision to not use flying are still in place(Hazzicostas, Afrasiabi, etc). They just don't want to admit they're wrong about flying, or are too stubborn to change their formula. They probably view Pathfinder as a resounding success....which it probably is on paper, in terms of forcing people to spend more time. The key word here is "force", however.

Meh...given the way the entire company has been going downhill and competing with EA for the title of "Worst corporation in gaming", my hopes are probably misplaced.

[Raisei]

From a buisness standpoint it is incredibly smart that it takes a while to get rep and make flying bound to that. I know many here hate them for not working for free but Blizzard needs to make money and since they are selling muuuuuch fewer things in the cash shop then other MMOs, that money comes first and foremost from subs. This means that things take time. And hell, it is a one-time grind of two Reputations to Revered! That is a joke.

If you can't handle having to play the game to get what you want, you probably should go, personally I LOVE that you have to earn stuff by actually playing and not by throwing money at a shop. If you want to see the counter-example check out SWTOR. Their cashshop is pretty much the only thing still being developed.

[Itori]

Its one of the main reasons i cant stand to play this game for more than a few weeks, i just got my hunter to 120 having not really played at all since cata, and now that i hit max i have to look back at the weeks worth of grinding ahead of me just to be able to do something other games just give you aftet a few hours of work.

I can understand the pathfinder achievements being something special, i agree it should award something special like a mount, maybe even a special cosmetic set for your class, but flying? Something that you can just buy for lvl 60-80 then magically lose unless youve grinded an achievement or 2. Thats pretty lame no matter how you look at it. Instead why cant it be you just do certain quests in each zone of the expansion to unlock it? Tie it to story quests or something.

[Evangeliste]

I mean, they do make sense because since flying has been introduced, it has had some gating mechanic... Whether level, gold, location, something.
You could buy tome for example in Wrath to fast track alts into flying because you had to be max level to do it - you got loan reins in Storm Peaks to be immersive but only for there.

I find this need for more effort as a way to combat previously dumb design decisions that scolded them in terms of time, money, resources as well as people simply consuming content so fast that in the same turn they complain about "content drought". For me, the whole "content drought" concept encapsulates people's willingness to look at the whole picture and awareness. An example It's like when someone plays solely one faction, you are actually missing 50% of the game itself, or doing your class hall and complaining you wanted more story on your 1 character you played, ignoring that Blizzard made 11 more with 30+ other specs. And in reality, the game is designed as of late to be more accepting of having multiple characters more so than Vanilla and has been for about decade I would say.

I get the enjoyment and self-efficiency that comes with flying but it does really trivialise the game and the developers hard work - you can see that in levelling an alt where you fly round mobs, obstacles and whatnot for a faster and easier route in completing quests.
If you were in the same position, where you made something and someone glanced over with a "meh" and no actual appreciation for your work, you'd be despondent too.

I do miss flying when I don't have it but in the end, I pay to play the game. I don't like everything but the minor things should not greatly out way the major things that I invest in.

[Greengrim]

This topic was one of the reasons for me to quit retail to be honest. Together with the endless artifact and titanforge grind. And in combination with the complete class homogenization and the retarded GCD change. It's all just one big pile of "NOPE" which is stopping you from enjoying the game....

[CrawlFromThePit]

While I appreciate the effort, let's not get ahead of ourselves shall we?

Put briefly, you make a decent argument about weaknesses in Blizzard's world design. Your vision of how WoW could have been designed is certainly interesting, but it's way beyond the scope of this discussion, and that's not really something I have any real interest in discussing.

My opinion pertains to the existence of flight within the paradigm of what WoW is and the impact that flight has had in the game in becoming what it is. And to that end, you haven't made a case that flight is the cause of the "cancer" you see in the game. It might be a symptom, but simply put, you're not going to fix any of what you're complaining about by removing flight, and the idea that WoW would have turned out a lot better if they'd never put flying in is complete speculation on your part.

The one area where your argument remains poorly structured is your assertion about flying's affect on WPvP:



In spite of the volume of words here, you haven't really built a complete argument. Your entire paragraph can be summed up as:

"With flying, you run into a lot less players. WPvP relies on players running into other. Therefore flying kills WPvP"

The nice thing about condensing your argument like this is that it's suddenly easy to break it down and analyse it: You have a fact (With flying, you run into a lot less players) linked by a warrant ( WPvP relies on players running into other) to a conclusion (Therefore flying kills WPvP).

So let's take a look at this shall we:

Firstly, your "fact" is dubious.

"Mathematically speaking, you insanely reduce the chance of player encounters and player interactions if you let them travel on any altitude level instead of everyone on the same level"

This is demonstrably false.

Yes, the odds of randomly running into players in arbitrary spots in the world is reduced. But mathematically modelling player behaviour (and where they will be in the worl) as random is a critical flaw. You are not reliant on randomly wondering around the world hoping to bump into someone else randomly wondering around the world. If you're looking for WPvP, it's hardly going to be difficult to find players because you know they will congregate at WQ points. Furthermore, flight makes it easy to scan for and drop onto victims from the sky.

Essentially, if you have players who are interested into WPvP, they will find each other and engage in combat.

Now let's take a look at your warrant:

"this entire feature revolves around running into other players"

Aside from the fact that this warrant is somewhat dubious as it stands (The feature doesn't revolve around running into players, it revolves around the desire of players to engage in PvP) it is a fair point to make that the feature requires that players encounter each other. And as demonstrated above, if they want to, they will.

Therefore, we lead to the inexorable conclusion that I have been presenting all along: If players are successfully avoiding each other and thus WPvP, it's not because of flying, it's because they don't want to engage in WPvP.

Arguing that flying needs to be removed because it will force those players into WPvP is just asinine at this point.

You're still not saying a single thing that proves flying is making the game better. You're juggling words trying to make my point not real and it's not working at all. Flying greatly reduces player interaction in the world which inevitably reduces WPvP action, there's no way around that regardless of how coward players are with their motivation towards fighting other players.

There's a button for that.

[SirCowdog]

From a buisness standpoint it is incredibly smart that it takes a while to get rep and make flying bound to that. I know many here hate them for not working for free but Blizzard needs to make money and since they are selling muuuuuch fewer things in the cash shop then other MMOs, that money comes first and foremost from subs. This means that things take time. And hell, it is a one-time grind of two Reputations to Revered! That is a joke.

If you can't handle having to play the game to get what you want, you probably should go, personally I LOVE that you have to earn stuff by actually playing and not by throwing money at a shop. If you want to see the counter-example check out SWTOR. Their cashshop is pretty much the only thing still being developed.

I think if yoo look at where most people are coming from, you'd see there's no lack of desire to work for the unlock of flying. In fact, there are many people who WANT to work for it. Sure, there are a few holdouts for a gold barrier, but most people find a more substantial task to be preferable.

And even though I disagree with the way in which flying is being handled and implemented with Pathfinder, I can appreciate the formula for what it's meant to do: Get people to fully explore the intended experience. I think the experience should include the air from the beginning, but that's a whole side topic.

What people DON'T appreciate, however, is the completely unnecessary 8+ month delay tacked onto the unlock which has nothing to do with the grounded experience, and nothing to do with player efforts or accomplishments. This is where the vast majority of the complaints and criticisms rest, even from many of the pro-pathfinder camp.

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Therefore, we lead to the inexorable conclusion that I have been presenting all along: If players are successfully avoiding each other and thus WPvP, it's not because of flying, it's because they don't want to engage in WPvP.

Arguing that flying needs to be removed because it will force those players into WPvP is just asinine at this point.

I would add that players can not only turn off WPVP at will with War Mode, but that Blizzard has done a poor job of providing WPVP objectives to fight over, or even easons for players to congregate in one place long enough to have WPVP occur.

We have only to look at the utter failure of the Battle for Nazjatar to prove this. Rather than actually fighting over objectives, players would simply abuse phasing/sharding to hop to an instance where their faction was steamrolling. Is flying to blame for this? Does flying in ANY way contributing to the abuse of sharding/phasing?

The idea that flying is harming world PVP is ludicrous in the face of such larger issues.

[Raelbo]

You're still not saying a single thing that proves flying is making the game better.

At this point it's not my fault if you can't follow the argument.

You're juggling words trying to make my point not real and it's not working at all.

I have acknowledged that you have an argument regarding certain fundamental problems with the game - but pointed out that it's beyond the scope of this discussion. But you continue to fail to construct a valid argument to support your initial assertion that "flying is cancer".

Flying greatly reduces player interaction in the world which inevitably reduces WPvP action, there's no way around that regardless of how coward players are with their motivation towards fighting other players.

Lol. I deconstructed your argument and explained exactly why you're wrong. You still haven't constructed an argument that addresses what I said, you're just repeating the same assertion.

There's a button for that.

Yes, there is absolutely a problem there. I am not refuting that. But it's not a problem with flying. Not even in the slightest.

It's a problem with WPvP, a true cancer to this game, which Blizzard feel is so fundamental to this game that they need to bribe people to do it, and even tried to build an entire expansion around - to disastrous effect. But that's another topic for another discussion.

[ornichi]

It's a problem with WPvP, a true cancer to this game.

yea, but no. It's actually one of few things in this expansion that most people, who opted for it, had fun with.

[Raelbo]

I would add that players can not only turn off WPVP at will with War Mode, but that Blizzard has done a poor job of providing WPVP objectives to fight over, or even easons for players to congregate in one place long enough to have WPVP occur.

We have only to look at the utter failure of the Battle for Nazjatar to prove this. Rather than actually fighting over objectives, players would simply abuse phasing/sharding to hop to an instance where their faction was steamrolling. Is flying to blame for this? Does flying in ANY way contributing to the abuse of sharding/phasing?

The idea that flying is harming world PVP is ludicrous in the face of such larger issues.

Exactly.

The proverbial elephant in this room is that players don't actually like WPvP. Yeah, sure a lot of players like the idea of gloriously defeating the opposing faction through superior skill and prowess, but as soon as it looks like they're going to get their ass handed to them, most would rather not participate. It's only nice when you're beating up on a weaker foe, not when you're on the receiving end.

This is why WPvP cannot work. WPvP requires that you have two consenting parties who will participate. But if each will only participate when they know they will win, and because there can only be one victor, you're never going to land up with that mutual consent.

[Tang0]

I still dont have flying as I need 11k rep for mechagon and I absolutely detest the place gnomes everywhere i just hate everything about mechagon and tbh I dont think ill get flying because i really don't like going there.

As in you hate gnomes specifically? Their character models? Or mechagnomes character models? Do you spaz out when you see a gnome in open world? just a very specific thing to not like.

Regardless mechagon is the least time-consuming of them all, you just spend 5 minutes doing the only world quest there is. The rep payoff per time spent is the greatest of all the bfa reps.

[Kaver]

The hardcore no-lifed it in a record time anyway, so gating didn't stop them from zooming through it. The losers are the casuals who support this game, yet they get treated with repetitive boring chores every day leaving them no time to really enjoy the game. It makes absolutely no sense.

I quit several times and even when I reactivated, I played once, or twice max per week, no longer than 1 hour a day and couldn't stand looking at the same zone anymore.

Who thought of this anyway? What's wrong with simply just not giving flying to anyone until a certain time has passed rather than make people hate your own game. This is beyond ridiculous.

It’s a business decision. Blizzard’s analysis has most likely shown that time-gating flying will result in more subscription dollars. It’s all about money.

[VinceVega]

Flying is cancer to the game and completely ruined player interaction.
Same thing goes for instant queues, group finder & summoning stones.

New patch should stripe flying from the game.

I agree. Except summoning stones

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It’s a business decision. Blizzard’s analysis has most likely shown that time-gating flying will result in more subscription dollars. It’s all about money.

Well yes. Blizzard ist not a Non profit... also it is a mmo. Of course there are grinds. Have you ever played an rpg that long which was not an mmo? Grinds are an Integral part of every mmo

[SirCowdog]

It’s a business decision. Blizzard’s analysis has most likely shown that time-gating flying will result in more subscription dollars. It’s all about money.

The main crux of the matter is not that Blizzard can't make profits. No one thinks they shouldn't make money. However, it's the manner in which that money is made, and how it's reflected in the game design, that's the point of contention.

Certainly, on paper, squeezing your players and exploiting them for as much money as possible is a very profitable method. But it comes at the cost of your long-term reputation, community good will, and customer loyalty. Maybe Blizzard doesn't care about those things anymore. It certainly seems that way with their clearly stated intent to focus on mobile games and the asia market.

But people need to recognize that this is the sort of driving force that creates side-effects like locking popular features of the game behind excessive time-gating like we see with Pathfinder part 2. And that it's not being done for any legitimate game-design reasons, nor with the the intent of improving the player experience.

You had it 110% accurate when you said "It's all about money". I just wish Blizzard would realize that delivering a better product, and actually treating their players with respect, would make them just as much. We've seen this in other titles. The Witcher 3 comes to mind. The most recent God of War game is another example. God help me...even Borderlands 3 is doing a better job of respecting the players than Blizzard has done with WoW since WoD.

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Well yes. Blizzard ist not a Non profit... also it is a mmo. Of course there are grinds. Have you ever played an rpg that long which was not an mmo? Grinds are an Integral part of every mmo

The 8 month arbitrary time-lock - that has nothing to do with player efforts or accomplishments - is not a grind, though.

Certainly, there would be some people who would complain regardless of the situation, but without the delay on flying, I highly suspect almost no one would seriously be criticizing the Pathfinder system(I would, but on completely different grounds than "it takes too long to grind").