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  1. #681
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    Quote Originally Posted by Soon-TM View Post
    That it is not too RPG when your choices don't change anything. Why include them in the first place, when you are risking to !@#$ up with gameplay in the meantime?
    1 - it change the storyline your character experiences.
    2 - Several RPGs have choices that don't change much like WoW. Quite common.

    Blizzard is including Covenants because they think it's fun and fitting for a RPG like WoW.

    Since we too think it will be fun, we are fine with it.

  2. #682
    Quote Originally Posted by Kralljin View Post
    I don't think there are any hard numbers on WoW itself out there, we don't even have sub numbers for like 5 years by now.
    That aside, they've also been increasing the amount of MTX, so there you go.

    And taking the reports from late 2018 into account...i don't think Activision is that happy with Blizzards performance.
    AB not being happy has nothing to do with shareholders. We don't have sub numbers but we have sub revenue numbers in their quarterly reports. And those have been going down. WoW revenue in general has been going down as well but stock prices keep going up. So please tell me how shareholders can care so much about WoW, see it declining, but still buy AB stock?

  3. #683
    Quote Originally Posted by SirBeef View Post
    AB not being happy has nothing to do with shareholders.
    ...not it doesn't, they're totally fine if someone else drags down their profit.
    Quote Originally Posted by SirBeef View Post
    So please tell me how shareholders can care so much about WoW, see it declining, but still buy AB stock?
    The better question would be what will happen to Blizzard if WoW continues to decline.

    Like, i'm telling you again: Simply because others make up for Blizzards shortcomings, doesn't mean Blizzard is "doing fine".

  4. #684
    Quote Originally Posted by Kralljin View Post
    ...not it doesn't, they're totally fine if someone else drags down their profit.

    The better question would be what will happen to Blizzard if WoW continues to decline.

    Like, i'm telling you again: Simply because others make up for Blizzards shortcomings, doesn't mean Blizzard is "doing fine".
    I understand and it's a different question than where the discussion came from, which was basically shareholders care about covenants. I'm not concerned about Blizzard, OW, HS, even Hots Storm make money, D4 will print money, as well as other games they are working on. My original point is despite WoWs decline, ABs stock continues to grow. Blizzard is only 29% of ABs revenue and WoW is around a third of Blizzards revenue. While huge on it's own, it's not much in the overall scheme of AB. Shareholders that hold voting shares do not care about decisions made by devs. They care about profitability of the company. AB is profitable, so they invest. All of this despite perceived bad decisions by devs and shrinking WoW revenues.

  5. #685
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    Quote Originally Posted by DemonDays View Post
    Wanna do Mythic+? Pick this Covenant or be severely disadvantaged in fun and performance.

    Wanna do PvP? Pick this Covenant or be severely disadvantaged in fun and performance.

    Wanna do well in the cleave heavy Raid? Pick this Covenant or be severely disadvantaged in fun and performance.

    Wanna do well in the single target heavy Raid? Pick this Covenant or be severely disadvantaged in fun and performance.
    However, it's Blizzard, so all of the Covenants are going to fluctuate wildly, randomly, and often absurdly in power - if Corruptions are anything to go on. I think we're putting too much worry into "my Covenant is permanently bad" instead of "my Covenant could change dramatically at any moment, likely will multiple times, and I'm mostly stuck with it."

    We're probably better off picking the one we like because at least when it goes from "the best" to "trash" after one patch, we still have aesthetic or theme to fall back on.

  6. #686
    Quote Originally Posted by SirBeef View Post
    They care about profitability of the company. AB is profitable, so they invest. All of this despite perceived bad decisions by devs and shrinking WoW revenues.
    But the fucking point i keep telling you: it's a significant portion of Blizzard revenue, they need to be profitable in their own right and not piggyback on Activision, else Activsion comes down on them.

  7. #687
    Quote Originally Posted by Echocho View Post
    Okay some of you have completely derailed the thread and is now arguing over whether wow is a RPG or not.

    WoW is described by Blizzard themselves as a MMORPG, you have it right there in the genre, R P G.

    Done, can we get back on topic now?
    The reason this happened is because Blizzard used RPG as one of their justifications for what they have planned. When in reality what most people mean when they say RPG is "game with stats" not "role playing game".

    People are then using the "role playing" side to justify poor decisions on the "game with stats" side. Picking a covenant is from the "role playing" side. The powers are from the "games with stats" side. Tying them together and making them unswappable, in an MMO environment, is absolute hubris.

    Before people start talking about classes again, allow me to explain classes. Classes are there to facilitate the MMO. The reason there are tanks and healers and DPS and different classes is so that you will want to group with other people to do things. They also provide a difference in kind for gameplay, so we don't get into a situation where everyone levels up every skill and ultimately every character plays the exact same given enough time to level everything. Even in games where you can level multiple classes, like FFXIV, you don't play them simultaneously. Swapping classes in FFXIV is kinda similar to logging an alt in WoW, you don't have access to all the classes abilities all at the same time.

    Covenant abilities do not do facilitate MMO play. Covenant abilities are like talents, rather than classes. They provide the same difference in kind as talents. Making talents stick was known to be overly punishing and ultimately bad for the game, especially a multiplayer game, even as far back as the 90s and early 2000s. If you're gonna make a character power choice stick in a persistant multiplayer game, there had better be a damn good reason.

    So far I have only heard reasons to make covenant stick. I have seen zero proper reasoning as to why the equivalent of a new talent point should stick for the next 2 years. It is bad design. It is known to be bad design. If you consult any design advice on building a talent system, especially for a persistant multiplayer game it will tell you not to do this.

    "We'll balance it" is the most pompous thing anyone could say about such a bad decision. No, it won't be balanced. There will be a wrong choice. In the event that someone plays multiple specs or does various types of content (like the game encourages you to do) there will only be wrong choices. Every choice will be wrong, unless 1 covenant is allowed to be universally OP for all specs, in all content, all expansion.

    The best people interested in the MMO can hope for is that for the classes they play there is one covenant that remains OP for every spec they play, in every bit of content they do.

    Stop trying to design WoW like it's a visual novel. It is not.
    Last edited by klogaroth; 2020-07-04 at 12:41 PM.

  8. #688
    Quote Originally Posted by Kralljin View Post
    But the fucking point i keep telling you: it's a significant portion of Blizzard revenue, they need to be profitable in their own right and not piggyback on Activision, else Activsion comes down on them.
    I don't give a shit about your point since it has fuck all to do with shareholders caring about the game or rather decisions made by devs that piss off a small portion of a vocal minority.

    Not sure if it was you originally, but shareholders 1, don't care at that level. 2, even if they did, there is not enough, 9%, to vote to make changes to WoW. 3, despite WoW revenues shrinking, AB stocks have continued to rise, whichbis the direct opposite of the original point Inwas countering.

    So excuse me if I don't recognize a point that has nothing to do with my argument. But I'll humor you. Yes if WoWs revenue massively tanks, then it may be enough to make AB act on monetizing it more or move to replace it. But again I fail to see hownitnis relevant at all to the paragraph above, since how has been on the dowslide revenue wise, AB has not come out against it, nor have shareholders done anything or even said a word about.

  9. #689
    Quote Originally Posted by SirBeef View Post
    I don't give a shit about your point since it has fuck all to do with shareholders caring about the game
    Considering i originally quoted you on
    Quote Originally Posted by SirBeef View Post
    2, subs don't matter as a metric to Blizzard, only to some players.
    And there the discussion goes back to point one: The shareholders DO care about subs.

    And if you want to hear my honest prediction on this entire covenant subject: Blizzard will now stonewall only to then cave in later to drive engagement later down the line.

    Happened with Legendaries in Legion.
    Happened with Essences & Corruption in BfA.
    Will most certainly happen in SL again.

    So yeah, how about we just skip the drama, the 3-6 month wait time and implement the obvious QoL change right away?
    Quote Originally Posted by SirBeef View Post
    piss off a small portion of a vocal minority.
    I fucking love it whenever people call the opposition a "vocal minority", it's such a cheap way to deflect criticism.

    However, here's the damn flaw that you and almost any person who defend this system has made (and it has been brought up countless times in this thread):
    Blizzard themselves are the people who have removed these RPG features from the game and aren't going to put them back in.

    This system is very similiar to how:
    Talents worked Pre Wotlk / Pre MoP (where dual spec was effectively neutered and you could swap talents on the fly).
    Gearing (since all role specific stats have all been removed)
    ML (After all, if you join a guild as a healer, they won't hand any powerful Dps Caster Loot to you)

    And a handful of other QoL changes made over the past 10 years, by calling these people in opposition to these things a "minority", you are indirectly saying that a not to insignificant portion of the game has been designed towards a minority since Wotlk (which would be a rather odd thing to say).

    I personally have no damn issues with going into a more rpg direction (Matter of fact, it's where i enjoyed the game the most), but they need to start at the fucking bottom, not at the top which is the current rental power system of the current expansion.
    Last edited by Kralljin; 2020-07-04 at 06:09 PM.

  10. #690
    Speaking of RPGs and respecs....Here we have a single player RPG campaign. Heavily story driven. And what's this here.....



    I wonder what happens if I click this mirror?

    Oh look. 100% free, any time respec of any of the characters in my party.

    In a game where you can make significant decisions about who lives and who dies, who you will side with in conflicts. The combat system is detached enough that you can respec whenever you want (after the intro). If I want to change the abilities I can cast, I don't even have to visit the mirror. I can do so at any time out of combat. Completely for free.

    "iTs A rPg" - yet even CRPGs let you respec your abilities these days. This thing of RPG meaning you HAVE to be locked into 1 combat ability for 2 years, where the fuck does it come from? Because it DOESN'T COME FROM RPGS.

    Yes, lock the covenant. Lock it more than it is now, where you can't change it. At all. Not even once. But divorce combat abilities from it, like RPGs do.
    Last edited by klogaroth; 2020-07-04 at 06:36 PM.

  11. #691
    Quote Originally Posted by Kralljin View Post
    Considering i originally quoted you on

    And there the discussion goes back to point one: The shareholders DO care about subs.

    And if you want to hear my honest prediction on this entire covenant subject: Blizzard will now stonewall only to then cave in later to drive engagement later down the line.

    Happened with Legendaries in Legion.
    Happened with Essences & Corruption in BfA.
    Will most certainly happen in SL again.

    So yeah, how about we just skip the drama, the 3-6 month wait time and implement the obvious QoL change right away?

    I fucking love it whenever people call the opposition a "vocal minority", it's such a cheap way to deflect criticism.

    However, here's the damn flaw that you and almost any person who defend this system has made (and it has been brought up countless times in this thread):
    Blizzard themselves are the people who have removed these RPG features from the game and aren't going to put them back in.

    This system is very similiar to how:
    Talents worked Pre Wotlk / Pre MoP (where dual spec was effectively neutered and you could swap talents on the fly).
    Gearing (since all role specific stats have all been removed)
    ML (After all, if you join a guild as a healer, they won't hand any powerful Dps Caster Loot to you)

    And a handful of other QoL changes made over the past 10 years, by calling these people in opposition to these things a "minority", you are indirectly saying that a not to insignificant portion of the game has been designed towards a minority since Wotlk (which would be a rather odd thing to say).

    I personally have no damn issues with going into a more rpg direction (Matter of fact, it's where i enjoyed the game the most), but they need to start at the fucking bottom, not at the top which is the current rental power system of the current expansion.
    1, was from on ongoing discussion regarding the initial topics I mentioned, which if subs mattered as much to Blizzard as it does to a subset of fans/haters, thennthey would still be reporting them. They are not, because MAUs are a better metric for player engagement and success.
    Shareholders didn't say squat when Blizzard stopped publicly reporting them and as far as I know, sub numbers have never been officially mentioned as a success point in quarterly reports. So again, they do not care. It's average joe player who dabbles in buying a few shares that seem to care.

    2, forum posters are but a tiny fraction of a vocal set of players. They in now way, shape, or form, are a true representation of the overall player base. Most of whom, just play the game and don't seem to care about the same stuff we do on the forums. Or if they do, they don't have any desire to communicate that with Blizzard or others on the official or fan forums. So yes, the vast majority times you have people speaking out on the forums, it is a vocal minority.

    3, it matters not that Blizzard removed systems in the past. They are adding them back for whatever reason.

    4, raiders and high end PvPers have always been and will always be the minority. They are the ones who were opposed to queue from anywhere BGs, cross realm BGs, access to better gear through BGs, 25/20/10/flex raiding, LFR and easier difficulties, cross realm raiding, and changes to post and flasks so players didn't have to farm for weeks or feel they needed to buy gold to prepare for raids.

    So yes, they were the minority, and a huge part of endgame was catered specifically to them. Hence the while reason those QoL changes were made.

  12. #692
    Quote Originally Posted by SirBeef View Post
    which if subs mattered as much to Blizzard as it does to a subset of fans/haters, thennthey would still be reporting them.
    Okay, now you just confirm how naive you actually are.

    They stopped reporting them for a very specific reason, the reason is not "we don't care about sub count", it's because it made them look rather bad during those investor's calls, hence their last report also incidentally reported the biggest drop in the history of the game.

    If it wasn't for the investor's calls, Blizzard might have never shared those numbers at all.
    Quote Originally Posted by SirBeef View Post
    3, it matters not that Blizzard removed systems in the past. They are adding them back for whatever reason.
    They are?
    They're just adding covenant, rest i've just described won't change (or be reverted) in SL.
    Quote Originally Posted by SirBeef View Post
    4, raiders and high end PvPers have always been and will always be the minority.
    Once again, you miss the point.

    Specifically mentioning raiders and high end PvP'ers highlights your black and white thinking, as i pointed out that Blizzard started with these QoL changes in Wotlk - and Wotlk is certainly not the expansion famous for "catering towards the hardcore audience".
    The changes i've mentioned were QoL for the overall audience, most raiders just dealt with them one way or another before but were most certainly not done at the solely behest of those players at the expense of the average player.

    This mindset reveals how much you're dug into this them vs. us conflict, while you also fail to realize that a lot of the "casual friendly" aspects that have been introduced into WoW were absent when the RPG aspect of the game was much bigger.

    Other posters have also said it, a lot of these "Pro covenant" people are seemingly just happy with the system because it pisses off other people - not unlike Trolls really.
    Last edited by Kralljin; 2020-07-05 at 10:00 AM.

  13. #693
    Quote Originally Posted by SirBeef View Post
    Again, that is 9% of investors. And WoW is just one cog in a much larger machine that prints money. As long as AB is doing well, parts not doing as well doesn't matter.

    - - - Updated - - -



    Thank you. I can't find those quotes, but I know they exist. Also goes to show how much some people just don't know about how companies work.

    - - - Updated - - -



    All a role playing game is assuming a role of a character. There is no definition of what the systems have to be. Sure, people have placed high priority on things like stats, abilities, traits, races, classes, quests, choice, rewards, and so on. But those are all preferences. Is Skyrim an RPG? It is a dumbed down version of Oblivion which is a dumbed down version of Morrowind. There are many who think Skyrim is no longer an RPG. WoW was a very dumbed down version of EQ at launch. Many though WoW was not an RPG back then.

    Just becasue one feels it no longer is one doesn't make it so. You can not like the direction, but it doesn't remove it from being an RPG.
    Once again.

    I have stated FACTS about features they have SYSTEMICALLY removed that DIMINISH the RPG ASPECT of this game.

    Stop talking about your feelings(which is clearly some weird deep seeded love for Blizzard). Also stop cherry picking your responses. It's pathetic.

  14. #694
    Quote Originally Posted by klogaroth View Post
    Speaking of RPGs and respecs....Here we have a single player RPG campaign. Heavily story driven. And what's this here.....
    D:OS 2 sticks out like a sore thumb in that regard within the CRPG community, because few if any (not any game I can recall, but I haven't played them all) allows respecs to any greater scale, let alone free and unlimited respecs. And the mirror has been highly contentious within the games playerbase as well.

    So it's definitely a CRPG thing. The classics that defined the genre like Baldur's Gate and Fallout didn't allow respecs at all, and even if modern game has started to lean into it, they're usually very restrained with it, like in Witcher 3 where you can find a handful or respec potions for one-time use, which is a far cry from respecs being free and unlimited.

    The fact that ONE of the newer games allows it is the rule to the exception, not something you can point towards going "Well this definitely doesn't come from CRPG, look at this one example here."
    Last edited by Thrif; 2020-07-05 at 09:16 AM.

  15. #695
    Quote Originally Posted by Thrif View Post
    The classics that defined the genre like Baldur's Gate and Fallout didn't allow respecs at all, and even if modern game has started to lean into it
    There is a reason modern games have started to lean into it. Also, it is no small coincidence that DOS2 has considerably more developed multiplayer features and has a respec option. When you combine modern design with the presence of other people the reasons for allowing respec skyrocket.

    People are using the fact that WoW is a game with stats to justify doing things that only make sense in a single player only game with a heavy focus on dialogue, choices, and multiple solutions to problems.

    The reason you can't respec in D&D based video games is because the system they were based on didn't allow it. The reason that didn't allow it is because it was a pen and paper role playing system, not an MMO. Picking something in that environment can change how you approach a problem, it isn't necessarily a waste. In WoW you can't beat N'Zoth with a conversation check, you can't stealth by, you can't try and lure him into a trap, you don't have the option to side with him. You have to take the combat approach, every time. You have to do this for pretty much every single encounter in the game. Every quest, every mob, every dungeon, every raid, all of them.

    This means that in group play any game element which is designed to allow you to further specialise into something is specifically about combat. And because it is group play, sometimes you will need to adapt that specialisation based on what the group is doing, and who is in the group.

    This is why talents have be able to be respecced for the past 16 years. Because Blizzard knows, and have always known, that locking you into a system of that nature isn't appropriate in an MMO environment.

    But now the game is suddenly such an RPG, despite having never been so in the past, ever, anywhere, that combat related choices must be binding, and must be tied to a story related decision???? Where has that come from? What is WoW going back to? From everything I can see what it is going back to is not MMO design, it's not WoW design, it's not video game design.

    It's someone who has a hard on for older editions of D&D. The rules of which were written to facilitate a completely different type of game.

    We might as well based Shadowlands on Monopoly at that point.

  16. #696
    Although, in dd 5.0, you can respec but it takes time and money to do so and you can't respec everything.

  17. #697
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    Quote Originally Posted by klogaroth View Post
    We might as well based Shadowlands on Monopoly at that point.
    Or we can let Blizzard base it on some cool, traditional and modern RPG values instead of moving the goalposts of the definition of RPG like you keep doing.

    Also, choosing one of four distinct factions with strengths and weaknesses feels like an awesome call back to Warcraft 3.

  18. #698
    Quote Originally Posted by A Chozo View Post
    Or we can let Blizzard base it on some cool, traditional and modern RPG values instead of moving the goalposts of the definition of RPG like you keep doing.

    Also, choosing one of four distinct factions with strengths and weaknesses feels like an awesome call back to Warcraft 3.
    And a terrible choice gameplay wise. Even in a solo rpg, I want to be able to respec to try something else. Choice that matters in the story, why not ? Even if sometimes, some choices backlash in the end, and there was no warning (and that sucks).

  19. #699
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    Quote Originally Posted by Specialka View Post
    And a terrible choice gameplay wise.
    For the rest of us it totally isn't tho, which is why it's fine if they do it.

    Can't please everyone.

  20. #700
    Quote Originally Posted by A Chozo View Post
    For the rest of us it totally isn't tho, which is why it's fine if they do it.

    Can't please everyone.
    Gameplay wise, they should not try to please lfr hero or non competitive players.

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