Should flying have DIED with TBC?

[Soisoisoi]

The problem with flying is that some people use it as a scapegoat for problems that it is not responsible.

- Flying killed WPvP!

WPvP fans complain flying enables people to avoid WPvP, but somehow they fail to ask why it is that people want to avoid WPvP in the first place.

Because they're either:

• Abusing Warmode bonuses, or;
• Abusing flying to kill (lower level/geared) people and then avoid people fighting back
• Abusing Class/race mechanics to get away when they otherwise wouldn't be able to. i.e. CC > Fly away.

It's really not a difficult concept to understand that flying does fuck up WPvP.

[Cronzee]

I personally enjoy the game way more with flying mounts then with out. I don´t mind having to run through the zones while leveling but once at max level I just want to do things with out having to worry about daze from a random mob. Just my 2cents on it

[Schattenlied]

I'd prefer no flying, but if it needs to exist they really should just go back to the TBC/Wrath model of you buy flying when you hit max level. Was much better that way, also served as a gold sink.

[XDurionX]

Yes. Flying is what ruined WoW, hands down.

[tangers58]

Garrisons died with WOD. Should flying have died with TBC as well?

Weird how the no flying crowd keeps using to even when its optional... almost as if it has nothing to do with not wanting flying... they just don't want others to have it.

[Nachturnal]

Absolutely not. Flying is one of the best features of the game and no other MMO has done it as well as WoW. It allows you to really see how much work in put into the world and admire the sights from up on high.

[Battlebeard]

No, flying was amazing. The only thing I hate is the stupid Pathfinder achivs and that you can't fly instantly. I would prefer if flying was avaliable always, even when entering a brand new zone.

[HateTrain]

Lol, nope.

[Davaca]

Flying is the best single thing added after Vanilla.

It only have benefits and not a single drawback.

NOT A SINGLE DRAWBACK. NONE!

Not for the players, but there are some drawbacks for the design team. For example, there were some cool/fun puzzles in legion for finding some treasures, that were made irrelevant once flying hit. There are some less obvious examples, but the point is that designing quests/maps/features with flying in mind takes a lot of resources from the development team.

That being said, I do think that more resources should be allocated to make flying a core design element, and they should be designing a lot of aspects of the game (maybe even instanced content) with flying in mind and as a priority.

Of course, hindsight is 20/20. But, imagine that the resources (time and human resources) allocated to, for example, war fronts, had been devoted to designing for flying instead. Maybe at the conceptual stage we would have supported war fronts. But in retrospect (i.e. with the power of hindsight), we could have gotten a better experience from a flying-friendly design.

[Relapses]

Another flying thread! I can't wait to see the same exact arguments from the same exact posters about the same exact subject.

Flying is fine. Not flying is fine. Being obsessed about either opinion is not fine. As such, Pathfinding provides a perfect middle ground between both extremes. You'll have people in the latter camp arguing that it negatively impacts "muh immersion" and all sorts of bullshit -- they're right, to an extent; and then you'll have people in the former camp arguing that flying is a necessary convenience and the inconvenience of magically losing it at the beginning of every expansion is a deal breaker -- they're also right, to an extent. The reason this subject is never settled, however, is that people in either camp cannot for the fucking life of them accept that other people have viewpoints different from their own so they bitterly quote block each other ad infinitum in the vain hope that maybe one day they'll be on the same page.

edit: And then there's the super fucking unique argument that "Blizzard is too lazy" to develop content around flying. If you actually think that it has anything to do with "laziness" and not a conscious, intentional design choice I don't know what the fuck to tell you. This kind of cynicism is wholly ineffectual and provides absolutely nothing of value to the discussion.

[trimon]

I don't think they should kill flying, but I do think they should limit flying to non warmode only. If you play in warmode, you have to use ground mounts, and maybe bump up rewards by another 5-10% to make up for how much slower things are vs flying. This should appease most crowds. The crowd that likes to fly to see things and do things quickly = non warmode. The crowd who hates flying just plays in warmode and gets extra rewards for not using it. This would also improve warmode by forcing people to fight run across each other more often and help to lower the groups of 10+ people who fly around zones look for newer players who have not unlocked flying yet to swoop in and kill / grief them.

[Pakheth]

The problem with flying is Blizzard can’t be bothered to design around it.

This. We had terrain designed for it in TBC, Wotlk and cata and arguably a few places in Pandaria(mostly Jade Forest) then they just stopped. A real shame if you ask me. Made the world feel huge and interesting to explore.

[Lex Icon]

i think they should do more with it.. right now it's just a way to move from point a to b a little faster. most of the time i just use taxis and alt tab while traveling so the little amount of flight time i get might aswell not be there really. as someone earlier mentioned it really only feels good when playing a druid.

[crakerjack]

No, flying makes for faster tedious content. WQ's aren't fun for the most part, but if I'm grinding rep and I need a specific emissary or it's a fresh alt, I'll slog my way through them. Flying allows me to zip through that type of content faster, therefore having to spend less time doing it. That being said, I'm perfectly fine with them gating flying and forcing players to use their ground mounts. There's countless mounts I don't ever use out in the world simply because they're ground mounts. This allows me to enjoy some of those mounts without feeling like I'm wasting my time for not using a flying mount. I also enjoy the immersion of seeing everyone else on their ground mounts running along the same paths as me. Sometimes you'll see people off and exploring trying to run up some hillside as if there's some secret stashed away. I'm pro flying, just not a pro-flying snob.

[Thage]

As Netherwing, Storm Peaks, Icecrown, and Order of the Cloud Serpent demonstrated, designing content around flight makes it fun. The problem is developer laziness, not the mechanic in and of itself. Furthermore, flying makes long-term travel tolerable in the zones from WoD onward, especially zones like Nazjatar and Frostfire Ridge where the minimap indicates a quest nearby but at a different verticality, only for the path there to be as obtuse and roundabout as humanly possible for seemingly no other reason than for its own sake.

[ravenmoon]

apples and pears dude.. apples and pears

You mean pears and apple dude... apples and pears

[unbound]

Garrisons died with WOD. Should flying have died with TBC as well?

Flying should be designed for like they did with Wrath, Cata, and MoP.

Blizz PR keeps trying to push back against flying for one simple reason...Blizz doesn't want to have to complete the build out of the zones. In other words, it's laziness.

They tried this in WoD. They were adamant against flying (for the reason above), but only caved in after the pressure got to them. Since they were lazy and didn't build out WoD completely (not from a flying perspective), they created this pathfinder nonsense to give them time to complete their work (which, again, they were able to do in BC, Wrath, Cata, and MoP at launch).

Furthermore, if Blizz wasn't focused on being so lazy, they would have found ways to integrate flying better into the game world. After all, that is actually what Blizz used to be known for...taking existing concepts and taking them further.

[Relapses]

Flying should be designed for like they did with Wrath, Cata, and MoP.

Blizz PR keeps trying to push back against flying for one simple reason...Blizz doesn't want to have to complete the build out of the zones. In other words, it's laziness.

Because any design decision that Blizzard makes which doesn't jive with the community is laziness, right? This kind of cynicism is so banal and pointless, I cannot for the life of me understand why it's so popular on this forum.

[maulgryve]

If garrisons had been account wide - I would have loved them.
If garrisons had let your party come inside your garrison - I would have loved them.
As it stands garrisons are terrible.
Flying is an awesome addition to the game. I like it how you have to be grounded at the start of the expansion and you earn flying once you have pathfinder. I love the net gun also that allows you to knock someone off their mount. I have zero complaints about flying as it stands in the game now.
I liked the mechanic back in the day that you could upgrade your flying. slow ground > fast ground > slow fly > fast fly > even faster fly. I wish something like that would come back. Not to make it even faster, but maybe expand on the equipment that we already have. Some goal to strive for each expansion, vs just unlocked and done.

I also would like to have ways to make mounting more unique. Like on my demon hunter jumping up in the air to mount the bat. Or my rogue calling in the raven. Instead of just unlocking another mount that I wont use - let me make my current favorite mounts more special.

[Mardux]

Because any design decision that Blizzard makes which doesn't jive with the community is laziness, right? This kind of cynicism is so banal and pointless, I cannot for the life of me understand why it's so popular on this forum.

Because most of the people on this forum are either to lazy to come up with any other reason or they are to lazy to even start to comprehend that other people can and are allowed to like something even if they don’t.