Why Raider IO is so Addicting

[Matthias]

I seriously used to despise this addon. That's because it came out late Legion and suddenly I'm not getting invites, since I only ran Arcway once a week. Having a tool to measure one's aptitude so late in the expansion made no sense to me.

It began to grow on me in BFA. More times than not if you're group had high IO scores you would make the timer. I came back late BFA and knew I would have to grind out my score so I wouldn't get rejected. My intention was to only get to around 2000 so I could get invited to 15 keys no problem so I could get my chest.

But for some reason....I kept on pushing towards 16, then 17, up to 20. I never had any interest in pushing past 15 in Legion, sure I would do a 16 if that's the key that was available to us, but if it didn't provide higher loot then why bother with the extra difficulty?

It finally dawned on me....it's the TOOLTIP! Yes, when I randomly mouse over people or came across people with a 2.5k rating that was a solid purple "I wanted it". Then when I see people between 3K-4K, nevermind people in the Legendary orange percentile. It essentially gives off that Vanilla WoW feeling of prestige. No transmog, you take a look at someones gear and you know they're likely badass.

I find myself joining groups on my healer just because the scores are high and wanting to see what kind of numbers the DPS can put up, what manuevers and routes the tank will take. What strategies they implement.

Blizzard should consider showing both Arena Rating and IO Score on one's mouseover tooltip. It could put that fire under people again. ^

[Twdft]

I guess everyone has the urge to get better, or get a better thing they had before. Normal human behaviour. Some seek in their job, others in sports, you and me in a video game.

You're right, seeing r.io number go up is satisfactory. Back in Legion it was just to have done a dungeon a level higher than before, now you can see a more detailed statistic. I like it too.

Check out the new group leaderboard. It's a work in progress without regions or even a search function (you have to manually add up the score you did with the same 5 people).

[Tyris Flare]

I understand its shortcomings and why some people don't like it (even if I disagree), but yeah, it has finally given this game a "progression path" beyond just finishing the raid tier. There's actually something to work for long-term!

[Daedius]

Eh, I only care about the max cap for the weekly chest which is +15 (which is currently 2k r.io), no interest pushing past that.

[Corroc]

I understand its shortcomings and why some people don't like it (even if I disagree), but yeah, it has finally given this game a "progression path" beyond just finishing the raid tier. There's actually something to work for long-term!

Funny thing is that Blizzard has been always pushing the idea of people doing bigger and bigger keys but there was never incentive or prestige of doing it past 15. Add a colorful number and there you go.

[arkanon]

Funny thing is that Blizzard has been always pushing the idea of people doing bigger and bigger keys but there was never incentive or prestige of doing it past 15. Add a colorful number and there you go.

I guess the "incentive" is just a "mines bigger" sort of thing for very competitive people. For those who want to really challenge themselves and see how high they can go, the option is there. For some people, there doesnt need to be a material reward for pushing tough content - speed runners being one example. But yes, i do agree it was a strange decision to not include more cosmetic rewards or mounts for completing certain keys.

[Th3Scourge]

Because competition makes you stronger. Same goes for Mythic raiding, high-level arena pvp etc

[Matthias]

I guess the "incentive" is just a "mines bigger" sort of thing for very competitive people. For those who want to really challenge themselves and see how high they can go, the option is there. For some people, there doesnt need to be a material reward for pushing tough content - speed runners being one example. But yes, i do agree it was a strange decision to not include more cosmetic rewards or mounts for completing certain keys.

But that's the thing though. Cosmetic rewards and mounts don't mean to much in this transmog age that's so convoluted. I mean people may rock Mythic Raid sets, Challenge Mode gear, Elite PvP gear which is great. Problem is with so many mounts and sets in the game I may not even recognize that it's special. I can't recognize any tier or pvp sets post Cataclysm that aren't for a Warrior, which I mained since the Vanilla.

In Vanilla, TBC, and WoTLK before xmog and when we had less mounts it distinguished you. Raider IO adding a silly number that's colored depending on your percentile really adds that back to the game. Sure you might have 470 gear....but can you use it to it's proper output?

When my score was blue I wanted to get it to purple now that it's purple I want to get it to that this weird pinkish color. And I likely won't get to Orange, I can easily respect those who have.

[ID811717]

I seriously used to despise this addon. That's because it came out late Legion and suddenly I'm not getting invites, since I only ran Arcway once a week. Having a tool to measure one's aptitude so late in the expansion made no sense to me.

Funny thing is that Blizzard has been always pushing the idea of people doing bigger and bigger keys but there was never incentive or prestige of doing it past 15. Add a colorful number and there you go.

Actually, the scores were introduced quite early in Legion, but it took time till they became as widespread as they are now. Also, the high key pushing meta did not exist at first; people were a lot more interested in speed-running low keys at the very start of Legion.

Legion was released in August 2016. Nighthold was released in January 2017. End of January 2017 was the first time I saw someone requiring "1600 or do not sign up" in the LFG tool for some +16 key. I asked them to clarify what is 1600 and they ignored me. It took a week till I saw more people start using similar requirements to join their group, and figured out what it means. That was wowprogress M+ score. (It still exists, people just no longer use it). In October 2016 wowprogress announced it started to show some character M+ information, but it is not clear when exactly it added M+ scores.

Apparently raider.io added M+ support in April 2017, and released the addon in October 2017. I think the first time I learned about raider.io was around the beginning of November 2017. At that point wowprogress was very widely used for group requirements, but some people started using raider.io score instead. The two scores were calculated differently, which caused some confusion when forming groups. Compared to wowprogress, the creaters of raider.io improved the formula for computing the scores and provided an addon, so it quickly took over as the score used by the community. I think it was settled by December 2017. (Meanwhile the wowprogress admin, Kernel, was furious with raider.io for "stealing" his idea to provide M+ scores. He caused a lot of discord drama, and lost a lot of respect in the community.)

[Your Mommy]

I don't know about addicting... I have never used it... never will (I hope!)

[Corroc]

I guess the "incentive" is just a "mines bigger" sort of thing for very competitive people. For those who want to really challenge themselves and see how high they can go, the option is there. For some people, there doesnt need to be a material reward for pushing tough content - speed runners being one example. But yes, i do agree it was a strange decision to not include more cosmetic rewards or mounts for completing certain keys.

I mean you can make easy comparison to any competitive game mode where you can "rank up". You get flashy icon in your profile. This time its just implemented by addon instead of the game. Still considering that the addon gets the information from the game and you cant cheat around it, its as legimitate as it would be with Blizzard implementing it.

[Aphrel]

yeah, m+ rly needs more incentives to be run at higher levels beyond the ilvl rewards. And getting 0,4 more loot per lvl isnt nearly enough.

[Mysterymask]

Small easy to show off numbers that can say "Im better than you" is usually pretty popular in the human mind and can drive competition

Look at leaderboards in arcades, IQ tests, even "how much can you bench?"

[Matthias]

Small easy to show off numbers that can say "Im better than you" is usually pretty popular in the human mind and can drive competition

Look at leaderboards in arcades, IQ tests, even "how much can you bench?"

Haha well said.

[SoundOfGuns]

I think people so heavily into things like Raider i.O. like you explain should see a shrink.

[LordVargK]

As long as raider IO mainly shows the combined scores of all dungeons it is useless to me.
But the prestige part is actually pretty nice for people that care about such stuff, that I agree on.

[Twdft]

I think people so heavily into things like Raider i.O. like you explain should see a shrink.

Do you think wanting to get better in an activity is mental only in video games or everywhere? If not, explain the difference.

[Packmule]

How can anyone even think it matters?

Should their be a addon to show off how often you ran a particular dungeon? How much wq you done? How much tmog runs you did? Now people should flex at your presence? Please, raider IO is pathetic attempt for a bunch of insecure people that wanna feel better for their lack of morals, integrity, and social skills. Most people that use it are i....s Good day to you peeps tho!

[Beatman]

Good for you. However, please realise that you are part of a minority.

[Djuntas]

Eh, I only care about the max cap for the weekly chest which is +15 (which is currently 2k r.io), no interest pushing past that.

This. I can see why somebody find it fun, but meeh. Freehold meme +15 is easy life.