Hiring People from the Elitist Jerks site was a mistake.

[Kralljin]

majority of WoW players don't stick around to raid. They sub at the start and drop off till new expansions come. The majority are casual players who do not raid. The core audience is the one Blizzard chooses to appeal to, and they're not very casual focused.

Core audience is not equal to majority.
Core audience is your most dedicated audience, not your biggest audience.

Won't know if they never try.

Yeah, trying around with a multi million product that is 16 years old and the last leg of a company to produce revenue is surely a realistic scenario.

But I can tell you that the majority of WC3 players were people who bought the game to play singleplayer and never even touched multiplayer. Multiplayer accounted for a very small percentage of sales. Most players treated Warcraft 3 like typical 10-hour games that they play once or twice to go through the story, like an RPG.

If you know this for a fact, i want to see the stats of people that purely bought Warcraft 3 for DotA.

And yes, this has nothing to do with the actual discussion, i am bringing this up to point out how asinine it is to talk about the player behavior of a game that was sold almost two decades ago.

Disregarding that an RTS game with a single player campaign is not compareable with an MMO, when people buy an MMO and are surprised that it places an emphasis on playing with other players, then you bought the wrong game.

WoW is the same for many people, only that they have little reason to stick around after questing content is done. This is why we see groundbreaking sub numbers at the start of an expansion, but those numbers easily halve and halve again over the course of the game.

You can attribute this to many factors
(1) Blizzards marketing campaigns for WoW have massively grown since WoD, it's not just some TV adds anymore with a snippet from the trailer
(2) People don't have an interest playing WoW for a prolonged amount of time
(3) People don't like the system heavy focus that WoW has nowadays
(4) Any content besides dungeon and raids suck ass

When was the last time crafting ever mattered in WoW end game? It's always been a stepping stone for raids or for making consumable enchantments and raid buffs.

Classic and TBC.

Which, by the way, i have no issues with, altough if you want to tell me that those got solely removed "because of raiders", then that's once again a huge asspull.

They focus on raiding because that is what they consider core, all the while feeding off the whales who then feed off the gold sale community.

I'm not going to defend the WoW Token, but using that as an arguments against raiding is just plain stupid.
Raids (and a focus on raids) existed before the WoW Token.

The WoW killer is WoW itself.

Okay, now what?

I am not saying that the current direction of WoW is good, i am saying that the hate some people throw towards raiding is misguided.
This is WoD all over again, raiders are the only people that get quality content (because this is unfortunately the only thing Blizzard is good at) and people instantly assume "Blizzard throws everything at raids".

No, they throw too much at pointless systems like covenants, conduits / soulbinds and anything else they then have to balance.
Then they also throw universal power progression into game modes that shouldn't have one (Visions, Maw, Torghast, Island Expeditions) spoiling those completely in the process because they then have to work for the enterity of the WoW audience, which does not work.

And to emphasis that, a large portion of the raiding audience dislikes anything i mentioned above, it's dead content to them that wastes time but have to engage in order to progress their character.
If Blizzard would truly only care about the wellbeing of raiders, they would also delete that content because there are raiders that have thrown the towel because of all that, frankly unnecessary, bullshit involved in optimizing your character.

Imagine if Blizzard would take all those resources that they throw at systems and use it to build new content, it doesn't have to be raids, just anything else.

[Echo of Soul]

No, they throw too much at pointless systems like covenants, conduits / soulbinds and anything else they then have to balance.
Then they also throw universal power progression into game modes that shouldn't have one (Visions, Maw, Torghast, Island Expeditions) spoiling those completely in the process because they then have to work for the enterity of the WoW audience, which does not work.

This is definitely it. Imagine if they spent all that time and energy on developing actual content instead, then we'd have a very different game.

The core of WoW consists of dungeons, raids, pvp and world content like quests and bosses.
Focus on making that core experience as good as it possibly can be.

Don't lock the best rewards behind premade content like m+ and raiding, it'll just create a toxic mess if casual players feel forced to get in to that content in order to have a meaningful character progression. It's okay to have valor points from casual content that'll allow casual players to get high quality gear over a long period of time since heroic raiders will get that gear in like a month anyway so it doesn't affect them.

[Yriel]

Collection farming (Mounts, transmog, toys, pets)

There are really not that much of those in SL. I got all pets fist time leveling, i got most toys and mounts not much later. Some mounts have rare spawns like the ghost horse but thats not really something to do. They are either there or not.

Pet battle dungeons

There aren't any in SL.

LFR

Sure but how long until we can play the new raid complete in LFR ? 6 months?

Weekly Events

What?

Korthia research/rep farming (currently)

Not playing now so i don't know how much this is (i heard 3 dailies and 2 weeklies). I had all covenants max, didn't really take long since first you are limited and then you get a level for basically everything you do. Every covenant had a few quests, was nice but was content for maybe an afternoon.

Achievements

I have most non raid/m+/pvp related.

And Maxing out lego crafting.

Did that with cloth/enchanting. Totally pointless, there are so many crafters, legos are sold in the AH for the price of the materials. I never could sell a single lego, even my guild didn't bother since it was faster buying them in the AH.

Decently varied types of PvE endgame for casuals honestly.

Yeah for maybe a month. If you include the initial leveling to max.

- - - Updated - - -

Second, citing raiding as the "big reason" why subs dip is pretty much a case of confirmation bias.
WoW has become a more seasonal game, this isn't just "because of raiding" but actually because to cater towards more casual players that aren't constantly subscribed and don't play the game on a regular basis.

They why not make content for them so they play on a regular basis. If thats really what Blizz is thinking they are really dumb. But i doubt that. My guess is that they think raiders are the core audience and if thats the case then the game must be overflowing with players right now since a new raid just was released.

[Kralljin]

They why not make content for them so they play on a regular basis.

Because that would entail making gear progression more linear without catchups.

In Classic, raids kept you playing pretty consistently because so many of them were relevant for the progression of your character.
Even by the very end of Classic, people were still doing MC & Ony on a regular basis.
Meanwhile the modern game throws every raid into the bin with the newest patch because the Ilvl from the previous raid cannot compete with the new one.

Which, by the way, is done so that more casual players do not have to progress through each previous tier but can jump right into the newest raid whenever it launches.

They also do not release more raids because Blizzard believes every raid must be full of unique art assets.
But that's in my opinion another symptom of Blizzard throwing money into the wrong direction, they create super unique assets / enviroments for content that has a very short lifespan by their own design.

My guess is that they think raiders are the core audience and if thats the case then the game must be overflowing with players right now since a new raid just was released.

Again, core audience is not equal to a majority of the playerbase.

[OrcsRLame]

Absolutely not. The only reason I play WoW these days is that their raid design is by far the best and most complex of any game.

If the game still had Vanilla~WOTLK era encounters that any moron could do I'd not touch the game at all.

Mythic Raids are the best part of WoW.

Just sayin', but FF14 has raids that are more or less as hard as mythic raids in wow.

This is an example of an FF14 ultimate boss.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eowGglNPGw0 - guide

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLoko-TILLk kill video

[starstationprofm]

Just sayin', but FF14 has raids that are more or less as hard as mythic raids in wow.

That kill video sounds like what you'd hear in a pug.

[Struggle]

Yeah, trying around with a multi million product that is 16 years old and the last leg of a company to produce revenue is surely a realistic scenario.

Not to derail you and dude's debate or anything but this isn't the case at all. ActiBlizz owns Call of Duty, Candy Crush, and more. Hearthstone has out-earned WoW for quite some time now.

If you continue to see this kind of reaction to major patches, I think it's reasonable to suspect ActiBlizz willingness to be a little experimental with a revenue-stream property that pales in comparison to the titles I just listed.

[justandulas]

So what's Reforged's excuse?

Didn’t blizzard hire a 3rd party to develop wc3 reforged?

[Osmeric]

Hearthstone has out-earned WoW for quite some time now.

Blizzard doesn't break out earnings per game like that, so where did you get that information?

[justandulas]

Not to derail you and dude's debate or anything but this isn't the case at all. ActiBlizz owns Call of Duty, Candy Crush, and more. Hearthstone has out-earned WoW for quite some time now.

If you continue to see this kind of reaction to major patches, I think it's reasonable to suspect ActiBlizz willingness to be a little experimental with a revenue-stream property that pales in comparison to the titles I just listed.

Cod has more in common with WoW when it comes to management and declining quality over time than people realize.

They practically mirror each other and the only common thread is atvi

[Vorkreist]

Funny how we can't even agree on simple things like this. Is it raid or die?

For the record how much casual content there is and how much relevant casual content there is

At least come out and say it so people can point and laugh. You want top gear for stupid activities outside raiding and m+ .

To come here and say wow has little casual content is so mind numbing considering how many things you can do but you always put the accent on that "raid or die".
Why can't you get bis from fishing and pokemon battles. That is your core issue with the game.

[Kralljin]

Not to derail you and dude's debate or anything but this isn't the case at all. ActiBlizz owns Call of Duty, Candy Crush, and more. Hearthstone has out-earned WoW for quite some time now.

Activision Blizzard will not to bail out Blizzard, each branch still needs to pull their own weight.
If Blizzard fails to achieve revenue, then
(1) Activision Blizzard will move in and clean house until they're back on track
(2) Dissolve Blizzard, layoff its employees and hand the IP's to another studio within Activision Blizzard
(3) Sell Blizzard or its IP's

Either way, the heads of the executives of Blizzard will roll if WoW sinks when Blizzard has no other game to compensate for it, which will also reflect on Activision Blizzard as a whole (and thus tank their stocks) as Activsion Blizzard put those people in charge of Blizzard.

If you continue to see this kind of reaction to major patches, I think it's reasonable to suspect ActiBlizz willingness to be a little experimental with a revenue-stream property that pales in comparison to the titles I just listed.

Or they just choose the easy option and pump it full of microtransaction.

After all, why develop a full fledged AAA title when you can charge the same amount for a character boost + mount in a 15 year old game?

Didn’t blizzard hire a 3rd party to develop wc3 reforged?

They hired a 3rd party for models, which were under Blizzards directions.
Blizzard approved all of their work.

Stuff like this is pretty common practice, it's not that Lemon sky studios (who did the Reforged models) fucked up, it's the incompetent people at Blizzard choosing that art style.

[Crimson Spears]

Just sayin', but FF14 has raids that are more or less as hard as mythic raids in wow.

This is an example of an FF14 ultimate boss.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eowGglNPGw0 - guide

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLoko-TILLk kill video

I've played in shadow bringers and killed alexander on every mode. It isn't as hard as mythic bosses in wow beyond maybe gimmie bosses like some of the first ones. Even then those are easier.

A few things about FF different then WoW damage doesn't go out till an effect ends not when the light shows up. The damage inflicted is also massively different. It is rare an ability flat out kills you in ff where in wow mythic its more often the norm. Alexender is roughly on par with something like remnant heroic currently. A little bit easier but on par.

[Glorious Leader]

I can't recall a single patch that didn't add a quest. I can recall .5 patches that didn't add raids.

Check and mate gg

The amount of investment required to add a quest relative to a raid is obviously much different. You aren't that stupid so ill accept this as an admission that you cant really make an argument.

[Triceron]

Didn’t blizzard hire a 3rd party to develop wc3 reforged?

No, it was done inhouse.

You must be thinking of the models being outsourced, but that has been happening for years and was not the problem with Reforged. Same art was outsourced for SCR and now D2R. Even Overwatch skins are outsourced these days.

[kaminaris]

There are really not that much of those in SL. I got all pets fist time leveling, i got most toys and mounts not much later. Some mounts have rare spawns like the ghost horse but thats not really something to do. They are either there or not.

There aren't any in SL.

Sure but how long until we can play the new raid complete in LFR ? 6 months?

What?

Not playing now so i don't know how much this is (i heard 3 dailies and 2 weeklies). I had all covenants max, didn't really take long since first you are limited and then you get a level for basically everything you do. Every covenant had a few quests, was nice but was content for maybe an afternoon.

I have most non raid/m+/pvp related.

Did that with cloth/enchanting. Totally pointless, there are so many crafters, legos are sold in the AH for the price of the materials. I never could sell a single lego, even my guild didn't bother since it was faster buying them in the AH.


Yeah for maybe a month. If you include the initial leveling to max.

- - - Updated - - -



They why not make content for them so they play on a regular basis. If thats really what Blizz is thinking they are really dumb. But i doubt that. My guess is that they think raiders are the core audience and if thats the case then the game must be overflowing with players right now since a new raid just was released.

Im agreeing with you here so

I always find funny when people who have no fukken clue about casual activities tries to list them as if there is "plenty to do",
When it all boils down to:
"uuuuhhh you can always run around in circles or wait in that spot for hours"

[Wangming]

At least come out and say it so people can point and laugh. You want top gear for stupid activities outside raiding and m+ .

To come here and say wow has little casual content is so mind numbing considering how many things you can do but you always put the accent on that "raid or die".
Why can't you get bis from fishing and pokemon battles. That is your core issue with the game.

Ahhh....man thanks for the laugh, dude.

FYI: the point of side content is not to give you gear that will be replaced next patch, to help you clear stuff faster. The point is to be fun.

You know: the opposite of a pointless grind.

[Triceron]

Core audience is not equal to majority.
Core audience is your most dedicated audience, not your biggest audience.

So, the Whales then. Since they are who are most dedicated by paying the most money?

Raids are going to be what they choose to design for because its the thing they do best, and they are effectively alienating the majority of players by not providing (casual-friendly end game progressive) content that appeals to their sensibilities.

FF14 is a strong example of an MMO that doesn't only appeal to a raiding 'core audience'

And I don't even play FF14 or WoW so I don't have any obvious bias towards or against either game
Its just easy to see why people are choosing to leave WoW and take up Ff14 which has worse raids but better story content, and end game alternatives like crafting or guild housing. FF14 is practically built like a singleplayer game that you can experience as an MMO, and that's how WoW actually started out in its roots, where solo content was plentiful and diverse and the end game raids/M+/PVP were not something that casuals were urged to do as a means of end game progression. It may not replace WoW for some people, but it's definitely becoming an appealing alternative to those who are becoming disenfranchised by WoW's stagnating content cycles.

It's kinda like pointing out why people play Path of Exile instead of Diablo 3. You could talk about Greater Rifts or playing through the same content multiple times through multiple difficulties is what the core audience wants instead of more actual content. Path of Exile exists as an example of a similar game that actually offers new content on a regular basis, and services a need that Diablo 3 failed to deliver on. That's not a 'core audience' issue, its a game design decision issue.

[loras]

Im agreeing with you here so

I always find funny when people who have no fukken clue about casual activities tries to list them as if there is "plenty to do",
When it all boils down to:
"uuuuhhh you can always run around in circles or wait in that spot for hours"

While i do not agree with you 100% or even close to it, i do wish to say that i very much enjoy that stereotyping of our in-house "casual" elitists.

[Kralljin]

So, the Whales then. Since they are who are most dedicated by paying the most money?

This one of the most dishonest view i've seen.

Not people that have played the game for over a decade, not the people that have dumped thousands of hours into it, that have collected a ton of achievements and engage in almost any game mode that exists within it.

No, the people that swipe their credit card the most often are the ones i'm talking about when referring to the "core audience".

FF14 is a strong example of an MMO that doesn't only appeal to a raiding 'core audience'

...Okay?

WoW and FF14 are two different games, however.

and that's how WoW actually started out in its roots, where solo content was plentiful and diverse

And this is why i so heavily criticize this narrative of "blame the raiders", it's often presented by people that have no fucking clue what they are talking about.

Vanilla is arguably the version of the game that placed the heaviest focus on social interaction, more than any expansion that followed.
The most basic Elite quests were not "solo content", so many places in the world (such as caves or enemy encampments) were designed to be a massive pain as a solo player, to encourge further interaction between players.

Doing dungeons, let alone raiding, was far less accessible for more solo inclined players because one just couldn't hit a button and be presented with a full group.
And here we haven't even touched upon the minor details such as the PvP rewards, legendaries or world bosses that were completely out of reach for anyone but the organized players.

If you want WoW more to like Vanilla, i am completely on board with this, but don't sit there and pretend that Vanilla was somehow a game that appealed to a casual, solo content focused player, because outside of leveling their character & crafting, there wasn't much.
And even there Blizzard also pushed people towards grouping up with other players, not play solo.

If you want that the game should be more like Vanilla, i am completely fine with this, but don't sit here and pretend that Vanilla welcomed the current casual, "i want to progress my character without interacting with people" and "i want to see everything even as solo player" audience with open arms.
Because that's just plain false.

The entire criticism towards the focus of raiding is unfortunately very often voiced by people that frankly treat WoW as a single player game and want that every piece of content is designed around their single player playstyle, despite their interest clashing with the spirit of an MMO, which is about playing with other people.

And frankly, the worst part of this post of yours is that you just flatout ignored the fact that Blizzard has thrown a lot of dumb shit in the past 4-6 years into the game that the "raider audience" at large despises, yet you just completely ignored this aspect entirely.

The game doesn't suck because it caters to a certain audience, it sucks because the people developing this game are just incompetent, with the exception being the people designing raids & dungeons.

If Ion had this fetish for solely caring about raiders (like so many people claim), then
Covenants would not exist (which, i might add, a lot of more casual players openly defended, because it's so unapppealing for raiders)
Conduits would not exist
Conduit energy would not exist
Torghast would not be mandatory to craft legendaries
Maw would have not yielded sockets
Fucking Masterloot would exist

And so forth, there is so much dumb shit in this game that the entire narrative of "they only care about raiders" is so damn stupid, the reality is rather that dungeons and raids are the only thing that Blizzard is good at and the rest just sucks.
And WoW being known for good dungeon and raids isn't also something that only started recently, WoW dungeons and raids, were in the grand scheme of things, always good.