Exile's Reach was a waste of dev time in its current state

[arkanon]

Its a tutorial and introduction to the game. Thats it. Anyone thinking it was going to be an introduction to raiding or pvp was sorely mistaken. Luckily, we have LFR and random BGs for that, and normal mode 5mans for learning those. I honestly just dont see ANY issue here at all.

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You act like Warcraft has ever had writing that wasn't cringey.

Well, i dont think ALL writing has been cringey. However, its the second sentence that confuses me - wow literally is a "generic fantasy mmo" and thats all it ever was....In fact, i would argue thats one of the reasons it has been so successful - its appeal is quite broad.

[rhorle]

From what i'm seeing, its a great experience for grandma's who will never play wow anyway, but it still lacks what some people really wanted was bridging the gap between newbie players - to being able to join others in LFR raid with knowledge.. there is still a massive gap where new players must go use outside resources or other players to build an addon base... an understanding of using action bars and more advanced stuff that'll keep them engaged.

That isn't something you fit into a 10 level new player starting experience though. Addon's are not needed to play the game or level up and don't need to be taught in the first few levels. The story does connect to the Warcraft universe as much as anything else in the game.

[bloodmoth13]

So you think that the game should hold the wittle pwayers hands? Screw that.....this game started out with ZERO tutorials, it was GOOD LUCK HAVE FUN!!!! That is what made it better and made it thrive, the fact that you werent handed shit and you had to work for it and figure out how to do something.

Its a different game now. Vanilla was significantly slower and significantly simpler. There wasnt as much content and for the most part there wasn't really a right way to play.

[Dazmalak]

I agree with OP. It teaches you almost nothing worth teaching. An infant or grandma might learn something, sure. But that isn't the playerbase. The story for it was written for that same demographic. I actually cringed at how forced and awful the dialogue was with all its "we're a team and friendship always wins!" messaging, though it was more put of place on the Horde side. Add in some cliche villains and no explanation for any of it...then again I suppose that is actually in line with the end game nowadays; cliche villains who get minimal explanation, they just exist for loot.

If Blizzard was interested in retaining players they should have the intro be a "how to" guide on downloading, installing, and using all the add-ons necessary in the endgame since that's what they balance around.

[FelPlague]

Teaches players almost nothing about their class, interface menus, customizing actions bars, basic BG objectives, dungeon threat, healing or tanking, kiting, self-healing and potions, what the different city services are (AH, vendors, daily quests, travel etc...takes you to a class trainer who now do NOTHING), crafting, Chromie new leveling system and its pros/cons, partying, lfg tool, chat, whispers, logs...

If I was a new player I'd have learned almost nothing from that thing, and I would find the writing very cringy. It really does not have a Warcraft feel at all, just generic fantasy MMO setting.

idk if you know, but only super fucking shitty games go "alright you just started, lets teach you EVERYTHING about the game, Auction house, vendors, daily quests, travel, class trainers, raiding, dungeons, reptuation, battle grounds, dungeon threat, healing, tanking, kiting, potions, self healing, cities,.............................................................."

Teaching players the MOST BASIC things of the game, and then letting them learn over their adventure is a million times better then hitting them with a 50 paragraph essay explaining everything about the game right from the start.

literally why a lot of people dont play D&D, cause idiots go right away and give them a million things to read trying to explain every single rules... instead of slowly introducing them.

you are wrong, teaching players a small amount about their class and the game is the best way to keep them interested.





you literally want the tutorial to be the ToS 60 paragraph post that appears that we all quickly scroll through then press "yeah i totally read all it" cause it wont let use continue till we confirm we totally read ALL OF THAT and didnt just skip it all.

[Lucetia]

I agree with OP. It teaches you almost nothing worth teaching. An infant or grandma might learn something, sure.

You are not the target audience for the tutorial. It teaches players a lot of different things. By knowing all these things you can completely overlook anything new it is teaching people.

If Blizzard was interested in retaining players they should have the intro be a "how to" guide on downloading, installing, and using all the add-ons necessary in the endgame since that's what they balance around.

Addons are not required to play the game and they aren't going to teach you how to go to a 3rd party site and download things and then mess up your UI because you don't know what you are installing. Blizzard doesn't balance it around having these addons. The only content that is, is the harder content such as Heroic/Mythic raids, M+, etc. If a person is playing these types of content then they will already know where to get these addons and things by research/asking others. Most of the player base is casual and will do Normal/Heroic dungeons, LFR/Normal raids and won't need any of this ever.

[LuminaL]

best way to ruin your joy in the game is to visit MMO champion hate posters who hate everything and constantly bitch about it. stop with the nonsense threads, its not a waste of time, its actually pretty good and helpful to new players.

were you honestly expected it to make you ready for your weekend raid ?

[Oneirophobia]

I ran through it with some noob friends and it was pretty good. I wish it taught interrupts though.

My mage one taught me what counterspell was for and a bit about kiting as a frost mage. I think it's different for each class.

At the end of the day, the biggest issue is players won't read their tooltips.

[Dazmalak]

You are not the target audience for the tutorial. It teaches players a lot of different things. By knowing all these things you can completely overlook anything new it is teaching people.



Addons are not required to play the game and they aren't going to teach you how to go to a 3rd party site and download things and then mess up your UI because you don't know what you are installing. Blizzard doesn't balance it around having these addons. The only content that is, is the harder content such as Heroic/Mythic raids, M+, etc. If a person is playing these types of content then they will already know where to get these addons and things by research/asking others. Most of the player base is casual and will do Normal/Heroic dungeons, LFR/Normal raids and won't need any of this ever.

I was largely speaking in hyperbole, but we can agree to disagree. I don't think the tutorial teaches anything useful, but maybe you're right and I just don't see it.

Add-ons and external information are required not necessarily by the game, but by the playerbase. Try getting into a mythic+ group without the add-on or understanding the paths and fights. I would further contend that not knowing how to start maximizing your dps is another roadblock into content. If you think people won't kick you for not min/maxing trivial content then you must be lucky or blind. PvP is another ballgame. Want to tank or heal? Good luck without knowing fights ahead of time in many cases. My criticism is largely directed moreso at its playerbase than the game itself, but Blizzard enabled this behavior and encourages it in some cases, so I don't see it changing. And yes, I am aware of "make friends, join a guild, etc" to mitigate these issues, but it doesn't change the fact these problems exist.

I do wonder if the mentor program will pan out well or not. I do think it is a good idea, at least.

[Lucetia]

Add-ons and external information are required not necessarily by the game, but by the playerbase.

It can to extent, but there is no way they will know if you do or don't have most of them.

Try getting into a mythic+ group without the add-on or understanding the paths and fights.

What addon do you need for M+? I ran +15's on all of them and ran multiple last season and you didn't need any addons at all nor did anyone need any. Do they make it easier? Yes, but none required and never saw a group ask for any.

I would further contend that not knowing how to start maximizing your dps is another roadblock into content. If you think people won't kick you for not min/maxing trivial content then you must be lucky or blind.

It's not blind, maybe your requirements are too high? You can run anything and people don't have to be maximizing. I mean as long as you do average amount of work no one is going to care for the most part (unless it is competitive content ie higher raids, etc.) If you are sitting there and doing 10k dps while people at the same ilvl are doing 50k then yes it is a problem.

PvP is another ballgame.

Tutorials aren't really going to help with PvP as much as you think they might.

Want to tank or heal? Good luck without knowing fights ahead of time in many cases.

This can be said for all three roles though. Even then I've seen plenty ask for advice in dungeons on what to do next.

My criticism is largely directed moreso at its playerbase than the game itself, but Blizzard enabled this behavior and encourages it in some cases, so I don't see it changing. And yes, I am aware of "make friends, join a guild, etc" to mitigate these issues, but it doesn't change the fact these problems exist.

I think you are taking a few issues you have here and there and extrapolating how much of an issue it is. The issues exist probably less than 5% of the time and the areas it is causing an issue is more "competitive" type content and usually at that point the guild/friend thing works because pugs will want the path with least resistance and expect you to play at 500% efficiency so they can be lazier.

I do wonder if the mentor program will pan out well or not. I do think it is a good idea, at least.

Right now it is more or less of a joke. Every time I'm on and see it, it is usually just people spamming / chatting in it. Haven't seen much usefulness come from it yet.

[rhorle]

Add-ons and external information are required not necessarily by the game, but by the playerbase. Try getting into a mythic+ group without the add-on or understanding the paths and fights. I would further contend that not knowing how to start maximizing your dps is another roadblock into content. If you think people won't kick you for not min/maxing trivial content then you must be lucky or blind. PvP is another ballgame. Want to tank or heal? Good luck without knowing fights ahead of time in many cases. My criticism is largely directed moreso at its playerbase than the game itself, but Blizzard enabled this behavior and encourages it in some cases, so I don't see it changing. And yes, I am aware of "make friends, join a guild, etc" to mitigate these issues, but it doesn't change the fact these problems exist.

A tutorial and introductory experience does not need to be a college level course. Exile's reach is designed for brand new players to the game. They might not make it to level cap. They might not do Mythic+. None of what you are saying is required is actually need to play the game. Heck you can do most Mythic+ with out addon's as a dps. Good skilled players don't require them for most content.

Knowing fights won't be taught in a level 1-10 introductory experience. Most of what you and others keep saying should be taught in 10 short levels can be better covered by guilds, fan sites, discord, communities, etc.

[Doffen]

I think its a nice addition and I am leveling races I have not leveled before now and all of them will go through exiles reach. And I really doubt it took that much of resources to make. Its quite basic both in terms of tutorial and zone design.

[Garretdejiko]

I liked it, but I imagine it getting old after the 2nd or 3rd time, which is the case with every other starting zone.
What I absolutely hated was the tutorial tips that won't disappear after doing what the tip said. AAAAAAAAAAAAH!

[Dristereau]

I enjoyed it honestly. I'm not who it was designed for it but it had good prompts to equip gear, dragging abilities onto actionbars, questing, using the minimap, bags and parts of the menu. I was really impressed with one of the quests as a Druid where I had to spar with the commander and it made you use Moonfire just as it was about to fall off whilst spamming Wrath so you got used to the idea of keeping the debuff up. I think the first combat dummy could have done with slightly more pointers in regards to targeting and auto-attacking, but I did like the next quest where you're sparring with an NPC and he jumps around you and says always face your target.

For a player just getting starting and picking up the game for the first time, I like it. I actually liked the experience in general. A new player will probably still get confused after this experience with longer dungeons, varied quests, flight paths aren't mentioned as well as M+ and Arena, but that was never the goal. Also there's the NPE Chat Channel for people.

[Dakara]

I got my wife to play through it and honestly she learned very little about the “real WOW”, and she’s already levelled a few toons to 120 (50). The problem with WOW as it teaches you nothing about the endgame.... then you get booted from LFR because you didn’t study some 3rd party site on how to play.
Honestly, watching the Mrs, who has zero prior MMO experience, try find her way around WOW has taught me a lot about how heavily Blizzard relies on 3rd parties (websites and add ons).

Many veterans quickly forget just how much the game has evolved over the years and how systems we think are simple, are actually far more complicated when you don’t have X years of learning already invested in the game.

A bit like the Warcraft movie really. If you watched it with a bit of background knowledge it’s wasn’t so bad, a good fan service. If you knew nothing about Warcraft, it was a terribly paced pile of garbage with poorly developed characters and a confusing story arc.

[Polybius]

I agree with OP. It teaches you almost nothing worth teaching. An infant or grandma might learn something, sure. But that isn't the playerbase. The story for it was written for that same demographic. I actually cringed at how forced and awful the dialogue was with all its "we're a team and friendship always wins!" messaging, though it was more put of place on the Horde side. Add in some cliche villains and no explanation for any of it...then again I suppose that is actually in line with the end game nowadays; cliche villains who get minimal explanation, they just exist for loot.

If Blizzard was interested in retaining players they should have the intro be a "how to" guide on downloading, installing, and using all the add-ons necessary in the endgame since that's what they balance around.

Sounds like something a carry who only cares about parses would say.

[ek0zu]

Nah i think it is a fine addition that has been implemented into the game.

[Selah]

Hot take - MMOs shouldn't teach you about every system in the game but should let the community around you do that. New players should be armed with the basics (which the experience does well) and then turn you loose into the world.

[MrLachyG]

Hot take - MMOs shouldn't teach you about every system in the game but should let the community around you do that. New players should be armed with the basics (which the experience does well) and then turn you loose into the world.

and that's exactly what Blizz want, given the addition of the newcomer chat

[rhorle]

I got my wife to play through it and honestly she learned very little about the “real WOW”, and she’s already levelled a few toons to 120 (50). The problem with WOW as it teaches you nothing about the endgame.... then you get booted from LFR because you didn’t study some 3rd party site on how to play.
Honestly, watching the Mrs, who has zero prior MMO experience, try find her way around WOW has taught me a lot about how heavily Blizzard relies on 3rd parties (websites and add ons).

How could a level 1 to 10 experience cover LFR raiding and complex encounters/strategies? Blizzard also gives you pretty much all you need to know in the encounter journal. You don't even really need DBM if you are just doing LFR but it helps with situational awareness. The problem is that Blizzard can't teach the things you and others want at levels 1 to 10. Even more advanced ways to play your class won't work because you don't have your full abilities.

Blizzard could create a more advanced proving grounds with scripted scenarios to teach things but it still will be worse then a guide, videos, or what ever else you can find out of game. And there is nothing wrong with using outside tools to learn. That really is the best thing a player could learn if they want to do more advanced end game activities.