Pathfinder returns for Shadowlands

[MrDaemon]

The ability to fly in Battle for Azeroth didn't come out until over a year after it released, that's what they meant.

If you start now "rather fast" is not really an accurate descriptor. It takes 2 weeks at least, for the rep grind for Nazjatar and Mechagon, and those are just part of the pieces needed for Part 2 of Pathfinder...you would still need to get Part 1 of Pathfinder which would take a while. It's not THAT long, but I wouldn't call it fast either.

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I see what you're trying to say, but there's still a huge amount of content to consume once you hit max level, and there's also no guarantee that you've seen all of the content just by hitting max level.

Pathfinder as a concept I think is fine, but they should split it up and remove the rep grinds. Keep the multiple parts, so that as new zones get introduced you can be grounded, but also allow the zones you've already seen and experienced to be unlocked via Pathfinder and not be artificially time gated behind a rep grind.

Rep grinds are not the problem at all. Problem is them locking it behind first big patch.

Also I should be able to consume content at my pace.

[Katchii]

Rep grinds are not the problem at all. Problem is them locking it behind first big patch.

Also I should be able to consume content at my pace.

I agree on the patch part, but I find reputations to be the most tedious part of it. As I said, I think they should split the achievements, making each one unlock flying in the respective zones they apply to (Part 1 = launch zones, Part 2 = zones added after) and remove the rep grind.

I disagree that you should be able to consume content at your pace, to an extent. I get what you're saying, but there still needs to be limiters to how quickly someone can consume the content in order to prevent someone from being at max level 10 minutes after the expansion drops. Pacing in a game plays just as big a part in the overall experience as other aspects, so I don't agree that players should dictate the pace, the developers should have the reins there. I don't believe they should put in artificial time gates though, that's not pacing.

If the achievement didn't have a reputation requirement and wasn't tied to some major patch an unknown period of time later, you could unlock flying completely at "your pace" at launch.

[SirCowdog]

My issue with Pathfinder is not its existence, but the time-gating.

Both the reputation (which is locked behind dailies) and the fact that it's unlocked several patches into the expansion... but I could tolerate the former if the latter wasn't an issue.

Personally I'd rather it just not exist, but I could tolerate it if it were at least not a "feature" given later in the expansion.

That said, did anyone actually think it was going to go away? Nah, it's Blizzard's favorite thing now. They love locking quality of life features behind tedious achievements and arbitrary time-gates. It forces you to grind for weeks and that makes them think that they can hold onto subs longer... and somehow not burn out players. But, I digress.

It is what it is. If they removed the time-gating I'd be okay with it. But they probably won't, and I'll just have to deal with it. Again. Hopefully the reputation isn't a pain in the ass this time. Or even better, the zones be designed with running on the ground in mind. No more "Highmountains", no more "Stormheims", no more "Nagrands", and sure as hell no more "Naz'jatars". Why can't we have zones like the Jade Forest if Blizzard is going to insist on forcing us to use ground mounts? Sorry, I can't really discuss Blizzard's stance on flying without it pissing me off to some degree.

I think that describes most people.

Even me, one of the most hardcore advocates of flight, would be willing to accept Pathfinder if the ridiculous time-gating was taken out of the equation. Obviously I wouldn't be 100% happy with it, but I'd be willing to tolerate it. ESPECIALLY if it came along with an inclusion of the unlock in the story or lore of the expansion. In Legion, for example, even crafting had quests associated with them. That's literally all it would take: A handful of quests at each checkpoint of the process.

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Just because you don’t enjoy wpvp doesn’t mean it’s bad.

I am an alliance and i have had countless nights where i went ape shit on horde groups with friends and i enjoyed the heck out of it.

And guess what, we no longer can do that because flying was unlocked and everyone can fly a way

how DARE those players not stay and fight you when they don't want to fight!

Are you for real here? Is this REALLY the mentality of a "WPVPer"? How is flying away different from hearthing, or just rezzing and leaving?

Everything I ever hear out of these supposed WPVP advocates always boils down to this: You guys want to be able to shit on people you're already beating, and force people who are trying to leave PVP to stay and continue getting shit on. It's the most toxic approach to "Gaming" that I've seen in awhile.

World PVP is a joke. Not because of flying, but because of the approach of players like this, and Blizzard's almost complete abandonment and mishandling of it. But instead of directing your energy into making suggestions for how to make it better, or being angry at Blizzard, you blame FLYING....of all things. It's so misguided and ignorant and hateful.

[Frosteye]

Flying didn't kill WPVP, battlegrounds did (Patch 1.5)

Blizzard tried to incentivize "World PVP" again in patch 1.12 by releasing PVP Content in EPL/Silithus. On my server nobody really participated though after the first couple days lol.

[Lamortykins]

An lets start the same discussion for the one millionth time. They won't change it. Get over it.

the existence of pathfinder is literally because of this discussion. they were going to stop flying altogether. people post about things they're unhappy with. are you new to the internet?

[SirCowdog]

You completely misinterpreted what i was trying to say. There is a lot of action in the ground than on the air. That is my reasoning. You don’t get to meet a lot of horde while flying and the ground feels empty.

I think I understood perfectly well what you were trying to say. You think that flying is to blame for the lack of WPVP because targets don't stick around to get ganked.

But do you know the real reasons why the ground feels empty?

Because every single person you see flying has, by design of the exhaustive requirements of Pathfinder, already fully drained the content where you're trying to PVP in. It's not that you can't find players BECAUSE of flying. That's just something you're correlating because it's right in front of you. The real reason you can't find players to PVP is because everyone who is flying has been forced to do the content so many times during the grind that they're SICK of it and have gone somewhere else.

Also it's because Blizzard repeatedly fails to give the content any meaning, and then completely abandons it with each new patch. That isn't the fault of flight. it's the fault of a shallow content design and a lack of objectives or rewards that actually encourage players to stay in an area long enough for PVP to happen naturally.

Look at Nazjatar. Blizzard attempted to create WPVP objectives with NPC generals and "The Battle for Nazjatar". Both were immediately exploited by people hopping between phases to gain a steamroll victory without any opposition from the opposing faction. And even the times when players didn't abuse phasing, the NPC targets die so fast that it's more of a race to reach them and get credit than it is an actual fight.

NEITHER of those situations is a failure caused by flying.

And blizzard reasoning for not allowing flying is completely different from my reason. They said and i’m paraphrasing “we want players to experience the terrain and the design that we put most effort on. We dont think it makes sense for players to experience the terrain once and then never walk on it again

I repeat: If Blizzard wants players to spend more time on the terrain they're designing, then they need to make objectives, quests, story, or other content that's worth a damn. Whether a player is flying or not, nobody gives two dirty rat testicles about the weaksauce WQ they're doing to finish an emissary or grind AP. And that's all the open world has to offer these days: Shallow, disposable, short-term, insignificant, disconnected WQs that have NOTHING to do with anything besides rep grinds.

It's no wonder people want that crap over as fast as possible.

But rather than acknowledge that the content they've been releasing is bottom tier trash, they'd prefer to force players to spend as much time in it as possible by slowing them down, dazing them, dismounting them, and taking away abilities that let players actually perform (GCD and Flying). There's numerous reasons why BfA is in competition with WoD for the title of "Worst Expansion", and the entire no-flying philosophy is one of them.

And before you even say it: No, I don't think flying will solve this problem on its own. It does, however, make the open world less irritating. And that's a positive. But as I've said in multiple threads, several times: Blizzard REALLY needs to step up their open world approach. Facing the challenges that flight creates for their weaksauce formula will be a good step forward, and maybe spark their brains into some semblance of creativity. One of the biggest reasons I believe the open world is such shit since WoD is that they've gotten complacent. They're not challenging themselves. They've gotten lazy. No matter how pretty the god damn skybox is(Argus), if all we're doing is a host of boring WQs and waiting for invasions, it's still just the same weak shit.

FFS...

[Beefhammer]

It was never a problem before WOD until Blizzard artificially created a problem RE: flying

Legion was tolerable since it was a quality expansion (surprise surprise, Ion wasn't in charge back then)

BFA was horrible and drove me to quit in the first 1-2 months.

Shadowlands addresses some problems (RNG, Leveling, Class pruning), but looks underwhelming in the story department. Also very little news about PVP which is my main interest. I did not feel excited about the expansion at all even before the pathfinder announcement in Q/A.

Pathfinder is just the last straw, there are plenty of other reasons for me not to play.

Having access to flying would just make the game more tolerable

It was always a problem for the devs, GC even talked about it during a Blizzcon, mentioned that devs wanted to keep flying restricted to TBC but fans loved it so much the kept it in. They noticed how players skipped and avoided content and just mounted up and dropped in on objectives. They knew it was bad from their design perspective but as GC said, they had already opened Pandora's box, it's hard to get everything back inside it.

Now, that is not to say Blizzard could not have done things like have aerial defenses like sky patrols that will dismount you in areas they don't want you to skip, or a multitude of other things that would encourage you to stay grounded until a time they see fit. I do like this Pathfinder method, it's like the best of both worlds, you get flying once you explore and do the quests on ground. Mixed with the Flight Master's Whistle, it does seem like getting places is quite easy prior to flying. The one thing I will say is once you meet part one, you should get flying. Part 2 disable it in the new zones until you meet the requirements for part 2 and so on as the expansion progresses.

[Greengrim]

Flying should not be restricted after you have leveled 1 char to max level. After your 1st char, you should be allowed to fly. Simple as that.

[Kufell]

I don't mind the whole being on ground mounts for much of the expansion, in fact I quite like the time spent having to traverse the landscapes. The grind to unlock it doesn't bother me all that much, but I can understand that it's not for everyone, and especially for people that may skip expansions, it can be a bother to have to have to go back and unlock something if they want to fly within those zones.

Frankly, I'm surprised they just haven't gotten rid of the grind, and just had flying get unlocked for all previous expansion content, seems like a better compromise to me.

[SirCowdog]

it's like the best of both worlds,

No...no, it's REALLY not the best at all. God...I swear every time I read this I wish I could reach through the internet and slap the person who wrote it. Maybe shake some critical, objective thinking into their brain.

you get flying once you explore and do the quests on ground.

Except you actually don't. Because that 8 month window of time where you've already finished everything, but have to wait for that ONE zone which contains another rep grind in it, that Blizzard can't be assed to put in its own instance so flying could be done on a zone by zone basis. If you actually got flying immediately after doing the work, this wouldn't be an issue. But it is. Because Argus...or some other such bullshit that Blizzard regurgitates to rationalize keeping the carrot just out of reach.

I'm sorry if that's coming across as aggressive, but I REALLY am sick of seeing the same misguided, misrepresenting lines used over and over.

[Beefhammer]

No...no, it's REALLY not the best at all. God...I swear every time I read this I wish I could reach through the internet and slap the person who wrote it. Maybe shake some critical, objective thinking into their brain.



Except you actually don't. Because that 8 month window of time where you've already finished everything, but have to wait for that ONE zone which contains another rep grind in it, that Blizzard can't be assed to put in its own instance so flying could be done on a zone by zone basis. If you actually got flying immediately after doing the work, this wouldn't be an issue. But it is. Because Argus...or some other such bullshit that Blizzard regurgitates to rationalize keeping the carrot just out of reach.

I'm sorry if that's coming across as aggressive, but I REALLY am sick of seeing the same misguided, misrepresenting lines used over and over.

I know, hence the second part of my comment, The one thing I will say is once you meet part one, you should get flying. Part 2 disable it in the new zones until you meet the requirements for part 2 and so on as the expansion progresses. which you conveniently left out. Next time show the whole thing in context.

[SirCowdog]

I know, hence the second part of my comment, The one thing I will say is once you meet part one, you should get flying. Part 2 disable it in the new zones until you meet the requirements for part 2 and so on as the expansion progresses. which you conveniently left out. Next time show the whole thing in context.

Just because you say one thing that's right, doesn't mean the entire post was.

But you're right, I should have also pointed out the part in bold as being an acceptable(and popular) solution. As I said, I'm just really, REALLY tired of seeing "It's a compromise" or "It's the best of both worlds", when neither of those is true.

[Beefhammer]

Just because you say one thing that's right, doesn't mean the entire post was.

But you're right, I should have also pointed out the part in bold as being an acceptable(and popular) solution. As I said, I'm just really, REALLY tired of seeing "It's a compromise" or "It's the best of both worlds", when neither of those is true.

But it is and you seem to only be viewing it from a player perspective. The devs want players to engage with the world they made. Not level up through PvP or dungeons and then get flying and skip past most of it. Players want to do content as fast and as efficient as they can. Most do not want to be bothered by find in paths to get up the mountain or dealing with trash mobs on the way to the objective. So Blizzard compromised, they will still keep flying in, but you must see the content their way once.

Now we can argue whether adding flying deterrent mechanisms, or making content for flying while leveling would be a better option, I believe i could be. But that is not what this pathfinder argument is about. But again, no matter how you may feel, it was a compromise. Otherwise we would no longer have flying.

[Dug]

I'd rather just pay a lump sum of gold but pathfinder as it works is fine BUT we shouldn't have to wait until the 2nd major patch. Have it unlockable at the start that way you unlock it by the time you're level cap or shortly after.

[SirCowdog]

But it is and you seem to only be viewing it from a player perspective. The devs want players to engage with the world they made. Not level up through PvP or dungeons and then get flying and skip past most of it. Players want to do content as fast and as efficient as they can. Most do not want to be bothered by find in paths to get up the mountain or dealing with trash mobs on the way to the objective. So Blizzard compromised, they will still keep flying in, but you must see the content their way once.

Of course I'm seeing it from a player perspective. But I'm not seeing it ONLY from that perspective. I've been arguing this topic for a LONG time now, and looked at it from just about every angle there is. Calling Pathfinder a compromise is only true in the barest of technical definitions. Calling it "The best of both worlds" is a fucking joke.

Blizzard is getting everything they want. They get to build a world without flying. And I mean that in terms of content and encounter design. Not only that, but they're getting players to spend more time in that design, and consume more of it, by using flight as a "Reward". Which in turn gets them more months of subscription while people grind away at the requirements. All while putting the best and most detailed mounts in the cash shop!

But here's the problem: Flying is hardly a reward in any reasonable sense. Players don't get to experience the a game which actually uses flight like it did in previous expansions. Players who want to enjoy flying have to wait until the expansion is two-thirds of the way complete, and then suffer through a bunch of nonsense makework tasks that have nothing to do with flying.

Flying itself is never referenced or otherwise included in the game. And even once flying is finally achieved, either every piece of remotely relevant content is already consumed, or placed in a later patch WHICH DOESN'T ALLOW FLYING! Even if you're leveling an alt, you're not getting flying content; you're just flying over and to GROUND content!

The "reward" of flight is so utterly and completely hollow as not only barely fulfill the "compromise" of having flight in the game. In other words, flight might technically be in the game, but it's not PART of the game.

So how, exactly, is that a compromise, where both sides give up something but also get something? What, exactly, is Blizzard giving up while getting everything they want out of the deal? And how, in the everloving FUCK, is that the best of both worlds?

[Beefhammer]

So how, exactly, is that a compromise, where both sides give up something but also get something? What, exactly, is Blizzard giving up while getting everything they want out of the deal? And how, in the everloving FUCK, is that the best of both worlds?

A compromise is just an agreement where both sides make concessions. Concessions: Blizzard kept in flying, players have to jump through different hoops to get it. What both sides got: players get to have a game where flying is still available. Blizzard get to have players play the content they way they want at least one. Compromise.

[Lei]

A compromise is just an agreement where both sides make concessions. Concessions: Blizzard kept in flying, players have to jump through different hoops to get it. What both sides got: players get to have a game where flying is still available. Blizzard get to have players play the content they way they want at least one. Compromise.

Removing flying completely was most likely a bluff that made the players easily and happily accept the "compromise".

Players should really educate themselves in marketing and psychological strategies of businesses......... sigh.

[SirCowdog]

A compromise is just an agreement where both sides make concessions. Concessions: Blizzard kept in flying, players have to jump through different hoops to get it. What both sides got: players get to have a game where flying is still available. Blizzard get to have players play the content they way they want at least one. Compromise.

As I said, only in the barest, most technicality fueled sense of the word. Splitting hairs.

BLIZZARD: "Here, we shit on a piece of bread, and smeared it into the shape of a bird. Flying is still in the game. Shut up and give us your money."

If you want to call that a compromise, I don't know what to tell you. It is a garbage situation, and frankly Blizzard deserved the boos they got at Blizzcon about it. But more importantly, I'm not sure how well Retail is going to retain players if they keep abusing the situation like this. Classic is pretty much carrying the franchise right now(according the quarterly reports), and once that wears thin, I don't think the weaksauce content formula of retail is going to hold up.

[Lei]

But more importantly, I'm not sure how well Retail is going to retain players if they keep abusing the situation like this. Classic is pretty much carrying the franchise right now(according the quarterly reports), and once that wears thin, I don't think the weaksauce content formula of retail is going to hold up.

BC servers, WotLK servers. They are pretty much good till MoP. That's like 6-8...10? more years to surf on the back of old expansions.

[Deferionus]

As long as it’s not time gated or gated behind a reputation I agree.

I don't even care if it's not implemented the day of launch, but it should be in the 9.1 patch and not 9.2 or 9.3. Going a year without it is too long. 3-6 months would be acceptable.