What rewards does raiding need to make it more appealing?

[Beefhammer]

Nothing. Most people are just not interested in large organized activities that take significant amounts of time. Even with Flex and cross server grouping, people still don't want to do it en masse. They would rather do tourist mode in LFR.

If I really think about it, it's typically the raid leads, the unfair loot systems, guild rules, and all the minutiae involved to do it is what puts many off of it. That along with difficulty. And please don't go into the people have no reason to get better with LFR. They had plenty of "reason" from vanilla through LK, and still no one raided.

[Kralljin]

They've explained in detail why they did away with tier sets and M+ has nothing to do with it. So your guess is wrong.

Ever considered that Blizzard doesn't tell you the whole truth?

They're not fools, they're not going to sic a certain portion of the community on another one with saying "we would love to but we can't because of those guys".

Take Classic servers, before actually announcing them, Blizzard never said "Classic doesn't run on our new server infrastructure due to technical difficulties that we can't solve and see no financial benefit in running them on two seperate servers".
They said: You think you do, but you don't.

Their explanation was bogus to begin with, Tier set items could titanforge in Legion and due to the 6pc Sets, you had a lot of flexibility when it came to choosing your set pieces.
It was quite likely in Legion to switch your Tier set gloves for high titanforged nonset pieces, if you could still keep the bonus via another slot.

[Sorrowseer]

Cosmetic items or resources for my player house... wait a minute.

[Big Thanks]

I totally accept, by design, considering "Raiding" the "master race" of players, or at least the upper echelons of the gaming world.

With that said, i think raiding should drop "smething extra", now what? I have no idea. Zero idea.
Maybe a prestige system of some sorts.

[Mirishka]

Ever considered that Blizzard doesn't tell you the whole truth?

They're not fools, they're not going to sic a certain portion of the community on another one with saying "we would love to but we can't because of those guys".

Take Classic servers, before actually announcing them, Blizzard never said "Classic doesn't run on our new server infrastructure due to technical difficulties that we can't solve and see no financial benefit in running them on two seperate servers".
They said: You think you do, but you don't.

Their explanation was bogus to begin with, Tier set items could titanforge in Legion and due to the 6pc Sets, you had a lot of flexibility when it came to choosing your set pieces.
It was quite likely in Legion to switch your Tier set gloves for high titanforged nonset pieces, if you could still keep the bonus via another slot.

I mean, you're welcome to think whatever you want. But yeah I'll pass on further entertaining random forum conspiracy nonsense like 'Mythic+ cost us tier sets!'

[Ealyssa]

So with no class sets or tier bonuses coming in Shadowlands what rewards do you think blizzard should add to raiding to make it more appealing for both casual and hardcore players? Or do you think raiding rewards are fine as is?

If you don't like raiding, don't raid.

Forcing people to do it just for "a special reward" is stupid. The activity itself is really fun. And the gear is reward enough.

[Kralljin]

But yeah I'll pass on further entertaining random forum conspiracy nonsense like 'Mythic+ cost us tier sets!'

When did Blizzard say M+ becomes more of a core feature?
BfA.
When were Tier sets removed?
BfA.
Who complained over Tier set bonuses during Legion (which used the same loot structure as BfA)?
M+ Players.
Who would be screwed over the by re introduction of Tier sets?
M+ Players.

I'm sensing a pattern here...

I mean, feel free to explain: what's the difference between Legion and Shadowlands in that regard?
Why were Tier sets okay in Legion but aren't in Shadowlands? It's not like people complained "oh no, i'm locked into a slot by this set!".
Azerite Armor is gone, so that doesn't work anymore.

[Shadowsgrace]

So with no class sets or tier bonuses coming in Shadowlands what rewards do you think blizzard should add to raiding to make it more appealing for both casual and hardcore players? Or do you think raiding rewards are fine as is?

they didn't say at all for Shadowlands, "Tier sets will not be returning in the initial patch of Shadowlands." That's taken directly from the BlizzCon 2019 - FinalBossTV/Preach Developer Interview Recap, still front page of MMO-C as of this typing.

[Zantos]

Well, lets see. Unique transmogs would be nice. I am talking super awesome sets designed around the raids theme. No class restrictions on it. Each piece having a chance to drop on anymore, once per week. Higher chance per difficulty. That would get some people in. More unique pets for some bosses. Unique mounts as well.

Cosmetic rewards are super strong reasons, and they are the best reason since they are 100%, totally optional.

[Dilbon]

Get rid of the progressive formula, make raids easier and shorter and make loot more rare. Basically make raid nights something that people are always looking forward to.

[Onikaroshi]

Get rid of the progressive formula, make raids easier and shorter and make loot more rare. Basically make raid nights something that people are always looking forward to.

Shorter? Ew, nty, raids are already too short, I miss the epic long raids of old like ICC and Ulduar. These 8-9 boss raids are /barf.

[Butterland]

I don't think the problem is raiding. The problem is every other system out there. There's just so little incentive to do Normal or Heroic when World Quests are giving out equivalent gear in 4 weeks.

[korijenkins]

Remove LFR

Seriously, there's a lot of people who only want to raid to see the story and the content, and putting in a mode that is so trivial that people can basically AFK it takes away from it.

Also way too many difficulties. Was fine with just Normal, Heroic. Then they added LFR, then Flex, and then renamed them all. Also if they want to incentivize raiding, give it limited rewards. People are going to sell carries regardless of what they do, but limited rewards would get people in the raids much easier.

(Rewards like unique titles for AOTC/CE and maybe unique gear sets.)

[Halyon]

Not Titanforging, that's one thing.

This. Mostly just this.

I also need motivation, but that's my problem lol.

[Onikaroshi]

Remove LFR

Seriously, there's a lot of people who only want to raid to see the story and the content, and putting in a mode that is so trivial that people can basically AFK it takes away from it.

Also way too many difficulties. Was fine with just Normal, Heroic. Then they added LFR, then Flex, and then renamed them all.

And then they go back to questioning why they spend money on something less then 20% of the population sees, would be the death of raids. The larger the audience, the more money a piece of content can receive.

[Slowpoke is a Gamer]

No gear will make it more appealing for me. For me it's a time thing.

[huth]

So with no class sets or tier bonuses coming in Shadowlands initially what rewards do you think blizzard should add to raiding to make it more appealing for both casual and hardcore players? Or do you think raiding rewards are fine as is?

It's appealing enough as is. People that aren't raiding are not doing it for lack of incentives, but because they either have no interest in that sort of activity or lack the the ability to participate in it.

- - - Updated - - -

Remove LFR

The question was how to increase participation, not how to lower it.

Blizzard tried to get people to do harder content before. All that achieved was reducing participation rates. You're working off a flawed premise.

[Selastan]

The ability to 'buy' gear rather than just have it drop. Literal in-game DKP. Just throw it in on top of current system, just keep the BiS gear in the vendors, bought with raid currency. Guilds decide who gets how much currency, or it is calculated in-game. More damage done, less damage taken, tanks and healers get more, that kind of thing.

Also have things to do in the raid that aren't exactly combat focused. Maybe a boss can have a shield that is damaged from grenades they carry that can be pick-pocketed by a rogue, meaning that even if they aren't that great, they still might get a spot, as their presence is more valuable than their dps. Just have enough of these in a raid for a wide variety of classes or professions. Even if it is just a way to wipe out some trash quicker, it might get more people in the door AND spice up some raids with options and flavor. Have a boss with Arachnophobia, and a spider-pet will frighten them and give em a big debuff, but you have to defeat their pet lizard to get close, giving a challenge: Defeat boss critter with a spider pet.

[Marrilaife]

Raiding would be more appealing if it wasn't such a massive headache to organize.

Blizzard is known to overtune normal / hc for 10 man groups so groups have to be at least 15-20, not even saying about what kind of headache is mythic to organize on many dead and semi-dead servers.

Obviously I know this is never gonna happen and old glory days won't return, but I would say raids scaling between 10-15 players and being more friendly for 10 man groups, not putting any mechanics that only 1 class can counter so every group has a leeway to counter it with at least 2-3 different options, and not putting 30 different overlapping mechanics, just put let's say 5 but more meaningful would go the long way.

People enjoy Classic and Classic raiding has extremely simplistic bosses, there are mechanics that will kill you, but these are few, and rest is a gear check.

You can have big raids with a lot of people if the bosses are more forgiving because nowadays lots of people = lots of lag with all the graphical fancy shmancy they added across 15 years. Bosses having 5 gazillion mechanics also contributes to graphical clutter, and often requiring people to run extra boss mods and weak auras to make sense out of all that, and lots of addons = even more lag.

So the only way to make it less of a clusterfuck is to reduce the number of overlapping abilities and condense them into fewer but more important ones, and reduce number of people that need to be present on everyone's screens. Would also reduce queue time for lfr / fill up time for pugs / recruitment problems for guilds.

[smityx]

So with no class sets or tier bonuses coming in Shadowlands initially what rewards do you think blizzard should add to raiding to make it more appealing for both casual and hardcore players? Or do you think raiding rewards are fine as is?

Why rewards? Are you not doing it for the challenge and not shinier purps?