Do you think Ion/devs understand their player base?

[Advent]

Not at all. But I do see how it would be soul destroying for those who don't understand how to exercise self restraint and self moderation. Of course the Benthic system seems terrible if you are forced to play RNG to get the right version with a socket for every slot, but that really isn't the only mode in which Benthic can or should be used.

For most players, the requirement for benthic gear is simply to get an effective upgrade path, not the best possible upgrades. You use Benthic gear to fill the gaps in the gear you already have from other sources and then it's up to you to decide how far you want to go with it.

For my main character (heroic raider) I made the effort to get the correct bracers with a socket and upgraded them fully. I could have done the same for my boots, gloves and belt, but it just seemed like far too much effort for such a small upgrade. I would rather spend my manapearls on mounts and pets and gearing up some alts than chasing a 1% dps gain in a raid tier.

On my alts I just sent benthic drops to those who needed the upgrades in those slots and spent minimal manapearls to get the gear the decent ilevel (not all the way to 425) on several items. Why? Because it's good enough for what I want to do on those alts, and I'd rather spend my game time doing something other than farming manapearls.

The whole point of "open-ended grinding" isn't to grind mindlessly forever. It's to set your limits intelligently based on your personal set of requirements, constraints and desires. If the grind is becoming soul destroying, you're doing it wrong. It's that simple.

This is exactly what some of us have been saying for a long time now. But nobody wants to listen. It's like they're going to an "All You Can Eat" buffet, eating until they're sick, and then being mad at the restaurant and all the patrons for their own life choices.

[Daffan]

There is an interview article done by Ion back in 2008 before he joined Blizzard that outlines like ALL the problems in the game today.

So yes, I'm sure they know but don't care because there are so many pay piggy who just don't care because there is little competition / too much personal investment already etc they'l play through garbage.

[Ihsan997]

I’m thinking now...how can we prove what the majority of the player base wants?

We all have our opinions, myself included. Some of us are quite convinced. But via what means can evidence be shown?

[Volitar]

I can't tell if they are just tonedeff or forced to make the game grindy to fill some average playtime quota or something anymore.

[Hey There Guys its Metro]

Absolutely. Its the playerbase that doesn't understand itself.
Just because their circle of friends all think something is objectively broken doesn't mean it is.
Its pretty obvious thats the case.
This is essentially the expansion everyone was asking for for a year, and people still find ways to complain.

THAT is the playerbase.
Everyone wants the opposite of the person next to them, and they will find anything to complain about, especially when it comes to actually having to play the game to get something out of it.

[Aggrophobic]

I think they understand they cannot ignore casual players any longer. Warlords put the capstone on that. I don't know that they understand how to deliver what casual players want.

I think they understand high-level raiders very well. That is not surprising.

One of their problems is trying to predict two years in advance what features players might be interested in. I don't think there's any solution to that.

Rightfully, I think they ignore everyone who falls into the category of "chronic complainer background noise" and "superfan everything is great" at the other end of the spectrum. Their feedback is essentially useless.

Most of us have no idea what really goes on in the game. I'm personally convinced that there is a vast group of players who are completely invisible to anyone who posts regularly on forums. They play a lot of stuff solo. They occasionally run dungeons and LFR and generally putter around. Their design works very well for players who play a few times a week.

They have a good read on what's going on in the game and I think it's not at all what people believe it is who post here every day.

They have litteraly never ignored casual players. It's been the main focus since the very first expansion and even in WoD.

[HailArthas]

Yes, but their hands are tied as to what they can do.

[Very Tired]

I’m thinking now...how can we prove what the majority of the player base wants?

We all have our opinions, myself included. Some of us are quite convinced. But via what means can evidence be shown?

Honestly, the easiest way is to simply program in a polling feature in game so that players can vote on how they feel about certain features, or even what they think about potential future ideas.

In game metrics are unreliable. Just because a player is in a raid doesn't mean they are enjoying it. That's just how these grind games can be.

[Sezh]

Definately, they do. They just don't have the luxury of pretending that their own personal wish list is the objective truth on what the game needs.

[Muajin76]

I can't tell if they are just tonedeff or forced to make the game grindy to fill some average playtime quota or something anymore.

Some have speculated it's that way on purpose to lengthen time for subs. Hopefully the shareholder's motto every expac isn't *time-gate every possible thing that we can!*

[Ange]

Why would we keep LFR, when there's a quiet consent on loot-trading and AFK-fests?

Stop with LFR blaming. You dont have to do it. You dont have to do petbattles, you dont have to do many things in this game. If its played, blizzard will keep it, if its not played blizzard will drop it from the core content.

And let's be clear. Numbers dropped since the release of WoD when they peaked to 14 millions IIRC. It's not because somehow there was an massive exodus due to storytelling or something. It's because the game became dramatically unattractive and failed to satisfy the playerbase.

This is now lying.
WoW peaked WotLK and not after it.
WoD had ONLY garrisons and everything else CM's/Raiding/Legendarys grind was for the "above" playerbase. You could only grind gold in your garrison or quit the game if you did not raid. Yes and people did quit. And worse, since the casual players quit playing, many raiders quit too. Even raiding was difficult with the massive absent of players.

Did you not play WoD? Raiding was fun, CM's were fun and the theme of the expansion was fun. And still it was a massive failure and forced blizzard to many changes of the core game. I really dont get how can you say what you say if you played WoD at all.

[Niwes]

pp like ion can not win on his position. because he see

- management that want him to do most money possible via cash grab systems, quarter number priority, binding most possible players for 2-3 months and sell most possible xpacs via clever marketing to profit via max mesh calculations

- blizzards own data, showing a giant broad audience from solo players, casual players, still subbed ppl that play once a month, casual gamers, hardcores, pet battlers, achievement hunters, solely classic players, classic and retail players, solely retail players, and and and... wow has the broadest audience a game ever had. so, what is his target audience ? no chance to hype 50% without also fuck up 50%.

- players/community, that do NOT have blizzards data and just see the reflections of the forum minority and the influencers. so they offer their own perspective at the game and even if that perspective and wishes are totally clear to Ion, how will you show that ppl that you can not solely deliver to them, when you are the only one who see point 1 and point 2 above ?

YOU WANT NOT TO BE ION HAZZIKOSTAS. thats for sure. i know ppl in positions like his and you have literally no chance to do it „right“. the only thing you can do, is try to cater as good as possible to all above 3 points evenly. finding the mid ground of all of that is hard stuff.

so, in the end of the day, that said, i think Ion made always a good job on his position.

[Ihsan997]

Honestly, the easiest way is to simply program in a polling feature in game so that players can vote on how they feel about certain features, or even what they think about potential future ideas.

In game metrics are unreliable. Just because a player is in a raid doesn't mean they are enjoying it. That's just how these grind games can be.

I agree with this, including your reasoning against in-game metrics. I hope that something like this could be suggested to the devs at a corporate level.

[Nebron]

Stop with LFR blaming. You dont have to do it. You dont have to do petbattles, you dont have to do many things in this game. If its played, blizzard will keep it, if its not played blizzard will drop it from the core content.


This is now lying.
WoW peaked WotLK and not after it.
WoD had ONLY garrisons and everything else CM's/Raiding/Legendarys grind was for the "above" playerbase. You could only grind gold in your garrison or quit the game if you did not raid. Yes and people did quit. And worse, since the casual players quit playing, many raiders quit too. Even raiding was difficult with the massive absent of players.

Did you not play WoD? Raiding was fun, CM's were fun and the theme of the expansion was fun. And still it was a massive failure and forced blizzard to many changes of the core game. I really dont get how can you say what you say if you played WoD at all.

There are basic principlew you seems nit to understand, and you conciously ignore what I write with your confirmation bias turned on.

I don't need to do all the things in the game, that's true. Nor I have to play LFR. Nevertheless, pet-battles have no negative impact on the game, quite the opposite, while Looking For Raid provides itemization for no effort, for which I wrote an entire paragraph you ignored. You are a perfect example of a person who literally have no clue about what is essential and healthy for the game. It'd be a lie to say that LFR can be associated with fun. I know no person who goes there to progress anything. It's just a free loot everyone is willing to grasp. It may be difficult for you to understand as you begin you reasoning with a concept "the more, the better", which absolutely undermines the fundaments of the game. Is it really that hard to get that giving players free loot is not even perceived as fun by these players in a long-term?

Back to the numbers. Yes, that's true. WotLK and Cata reached it's peak at 12m, while WoD returned to 10m, and since the release it dropped by a half.

Legendary was for top raiders? You gotta be kidding me. It could be done via LFR... who's lying now man? Didn't I say that the right balance in the content requires a possibility for casuals to catch up to leading players? I did. And you purposefully omitted it, well done. You know why WoD was a failure so why did you even brought that concept up? Apart fron raiding snd doing Challenge Modes there was literally nothing to do. No campaigns, no alternatives to power up, no daily quest hubs. Nothing. Did I ever say that Blizzard should only provide raiding? You are such a dishonest person it's really hard to discuss it with you.

I guess your next move will be to tell me howI I contradict myself, that Blizzard provided alternative ways for progression like Artfiact Power, Azerite Power etc.
So in advance, I already pointed out why these mechanics ruin the game.

Peace.

[Lane]

Yeah, I thought that Suramar and the Mage Tower were a real breath of fresh air for solo players. Walking over stuff is fun sometimes but a steady diet of it isn't my cup of tea either. I just play with friends now and because of scheduling and real life things we can only rarely make up a dungeon group, much less a raid group. So stuff like this is welcome.

My issue with Mage Tower was you still needed to raid to have the gear to do it. Once artifact weapons were jacked up it was doable with Argunite gear (helped if you'd gotten lucky with legendaries from emissaries), but you still would have had a much easier time with raid gear. I'd argue if you can't gear for the activity without doing group content then "solo" is a technicality. This is why I'm reserving judgment for Torghast because I'm concerned it's going to be another "solo" activity you need to do instanced group content to get the gear to do.

Honestly, the easiest way is to simply program in a polling feature in game so that players can vote on how they feel about certain features, or even what they think about potential future ideas.

In game metrics are unreliable. Just because a player is in a raid doesn't mean they are enjoying it. That's just how these grind games can be.

Amen. Legion was the worst about this. As much as I otherwise loved class halls, I hated the mandatory dungeons to complete the campaign and mandatory raid to complete Pathfinder. I've often theorized that many of those "toxic" players people complain about in dungeons most likely don't want to be there, but Blizzard usually doesn't offer alternative gear progression. It's group content or nothing.

[Xath]

Ion absolutely does it's why he's able to constantly figure out how best to take a dump on the alliance next. See's high elves as the alliance representatives at caverns of time anniversary event sighs and logs out.

[Micronetic]

My issue with Mage Tower was you still needed to raid to have the gear to do it.

And btw this is not the only one who did the mage tower with this low ilvl.

[Ange]

So in advance, I already pointed out why these mechanics ruin the game.

Peace.

I dont know why you hate LFR that much. Nobody needs to do LFR for anything but for its storymode. You get better gear from WQ, holiday events and timewalking. Doing LFR for gearprogression is the worst possible way.

And still, blizzard says the participation is there and they keep the difficulty mode in the game. You cant just post things like "It'd be a lie to say that LFR can be associated with fun." because people clearly have fun, because there is nothing else to gain from doing LFR.

LEGIONs bad-luck-protection had its issues with the need to do every lower difficulty including LFR for the weekly min-max but it was an issue across every difficulty modes. Broken tier sets are gone for the same reason, the need to do lower difficulty modes to gain advantage was not healthy nor "fun".

And thats gone in BfA. No tier set, you raid essences are capped in mythic>hc>n>lfr and even the ilvl you get from LFR is beyond other and easier content. Nothing but a storymode.

[Gelannerai]

No. The fact that they appeared surprised when people cheered for Sylvanas burning Teldrassil means that, at the very least, they are terrible at telling the story/message that they want to tell. That’s the kind of thing that happens when you rely on rule of cool/story-driven characterizations as opposed to character-driven storytelling.

[rowaasr13]

Count cases when players complained right from the alpha, dev's handiwork still went into release and then they admitted they fucked up and only fixed shit half-expansion later. There's your answer.