has anyone else noticed the "ripcord" that blizz pulled?

[Kumorii]

It is normal, but normally this stuff is held hostage till X.3.5 patch and they promise they have learned, aaaaand it repeats from first patch in alpha of next expansion.

Only reason its released now is that somebody broke the "in case of emergency" glass box with all these quality of life stuff.

dunno, if it's normal to release at 9.1.5 I don't think it's normal for it to be held to x.3.5... but that's just me.
Then again it could be, but I don't really indulge in "what ifs" or speculation to much because it can only make you mad, for no real reason you can't be sure about.

[StillMcfuu]

They are listening to feedback, clearly.

But like I said, these days Blizzard gets thrashed by the mmo/4chan-champ edge lords for just about anything

They aren't listening to feedback, these changes were asked for over a year and a half ago during SL Beta. It went live anyway and no changes were made until now that they've been shamed.

[munkeyinorbit]

Nope. I don't buy sub mounts or store mounts. The two I have were gifted to me many years ago. Haven't been subbed in a few months either and especially not since this whole lawsuit debacle started.

To me it's just that I and many others are tired of this obvious pattern and it doesn't even seem you bothered to read what I and the person I quoted said. We are simply tired of this repeated behavior that is so obviously blatant. And like I said, third time's the charm.

Also they didn't respond "fixing" it considering it was a deliberate choice all the time due to "lore reasons". They were warned in beta in both Legion, BfA and SL and choose to ignore and not fix the systems. When they do that three times in a row you don't find that slightly annoying/suspicious? Because many of us did/do. I you're okay with that then good for you, many of us are just tired of having our feedback ignored. It's a long time since beta was actually beta and not just a glorified demo.

That's not what you said. You said that Blizzard doesn't listen to feedback. At all. There was a blue specifically about the covenants explaining why they have decided on their design choices. They even said that they will revisit their decision at a later date.

What's happening here is that you've decided to be a Betty Bandwagon and you are the one not listening. I couldn't care less about the changes but I will call out people who become hysterical with the lies.

[Pakheth]

That's not what you said. You said that Blizzard doesn't listen to feedback. At all. There was a blue specifically about the covenants explaining why they have decided on their design choices. They even said that they will revisit their decision at a later date.

What's happening here is that you've decided to be a Betty Bandwagon and you are the one not listening. I couldn't care less about the changes but I will call out people who become hysterical with the lies.

Now you are just being pedantic so whatever you want to tell yourself.

[ceall]

yes, we're finally getting covenant swapping without a huge hassle being involved. that said, why is it behind a time gate? the blizz post said you need a high renown to unlock this. even with the catch up systems, why time gate this? they are basically trying to say they were wrong but don't regret being childish about the feedback in the process. why can't we just get things we actually asked for?

some examples:

valor points: nobody wanted a weekly cap upgrade system. we wanted a catch up gear vendor. congrats, you made it even more annoying to get gear from m+ because now you need to get that lucky drop AND not spend your very limited pool of upgrade points.

covenant ripcord: timegated.

korthia: just more grind and grind without actual interesting things to do.

tier sets: remember when we were promised they were coming in 9.1? instead, we got domination sockets and tier sets were pushed back to 9.2.

JUST GIVE US THESE SIMPLE THINGS ALREADY!

Okay, some lemme get this straight up-front. I'm not trying to defend blizz or anything, but I'm trying to debunk the bs you're spreading.

Going through it bullet point by bullet point:

-valor: yes, there were a few people asking for a mechanic to directly buy gear as a kind of bad luck protection when not timing a key meant less loot, but that has been fixed a long time ago. The Valor we got can be seen as pve conquest points, which by me is fine. Haven't seen any complaints about this since like the week it was implemented.

-covenant ripcord: what timegate are you talking about? The "high renown" phrase? Lemme tell you sth. By the time 9.1.5 releases, you'll already be having the required amount of renown. Also, you said it yourself, plenty of catchup. Even if you didn't play since January, you'll be caught up on renown within a week of playing the game. That's not what I would call a time gate.

-korthia: timeless isle version XYZ. People praised TI (i didn't, I think it was super lame), can't see why you're hating on it. Also once you're done with "the grind" (which FYI you can take easy if you're not in a hardcore top 100 mythic raid guild), you can ignore it for everything but the weekly quest, which you will have to do for a measly 8 more times if you want to stay up to date with renown.

-tier sets: source? All I heard was something among the lines of "later during the expansion". Never seen or heard a word about "it will definitely be in 9.1 when you will have tier sets back". I've lived without them for 5 tiers now, I can wait a little longer.

[ChairmanKaga]

Why don't the players who hate the beginning of an expansion when everything is timegated and more rigid etc simply wait until the .2 patch to start playing it? Everyone seems to be in agreement that this is the structure they have been following now for three expansions.

[Soon-TM]

they pulled the ripcord while already on the ground.

Well... Technically they did pull the ripcord, even if it wasn't attached to anything

But seriously, this "defective by design" approach is quite obvious by now and there is a sizeable amount of people who don't like it, despite what the BDF drones may say.

Why don't the players who hate the beginning of an expansion when everything is timegated and more rigid etc simply wait until the .2 patch to start playing it? Everyone seems to be in agreement that this is the structure they have been following now for three expansions.

That's what I'm probably going to do with 10.0, it really looks like the most sensible way to go.

[dacoolist]

yes, we're finally getting covenant swapping without a huge hassle being involved. that said, why is it behind a time gate? the blizz post said you need a high renown to unlock this. even with the catch up systems, why time gate this? they are basically trying to say they were wrong but don't regret being childish about the feedback in the process. why can't we just get things we actually asked for?

some examples:

valor points: nobody wanted a weekly cap upgrade system. we wanted a catch up gear vendor. congrats, you made it even more annoying to get gear from m+ because now you need to get that lucky drop AND not spend your very limited pool of upgrade points.

covenant ripcord: timegated.

korthia: just more grind and grind without actual interesting things to do.

tier sets: remember when we were promised they were coming in 9.1? instead, we got domination sockets and tier sets were pushed back to 9.2.

JUST GIVE US THESE SIMPLE THINGS ALREADY!

Blizz does this every xpac: they release new systems, they get "fixed" until the system get dropped at the end of the xpac.. It's been happening for over a decade.

The issue I have is with people saying this is anything NEW.. this has been happening since at least MOP.. This isn't anything new here and tbh since the end of WoD the game has been alright but the people in charge of creating systems have been kind of messing with us that give feedback that it REALLY needs to be different FROM THE BEGINNING so that people like or ENJOY playing the game.. but time and time again they keep doing this.

For what its worth, I still play the game because I personally enjoy myself in the little things I do - but for a lot of people - especially all the bad thats been going on: I think the games in a really tough/bad spot and they need a fucken hail mary or whatever they call it to bring in something to the game to keep it going other than all of us big time players who are just basically ADDICTED..

[froschhure]

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The inability to form your own groups does not make your spec unviable. It just makes you a bad player. All specs are viable in SL. This isn't Classic.

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Like Forming a group was ever an issue here, i am talking about numbers and Meta. Which you clearly have no clue about. whiteknight blizz bubble prob. a triggered booster.

[Osmeric]

I hope the numbers go down even more it'll make them turn towards free to play which will be better for the health of the game in the long run because they'll actually have to make engaging content and systems that don't suck to keep people playing the game even though it's free.

I suspect that would make them focus mostly on whales.

[Swnem]

That's exactly what OP said: the thing we want is timegated for no reason.

Another tell that the devs have not changed at all.

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Why don't the players who hate the beginning of an expansion when everything is timegated and more rigid etc simply wait until the .2 patch to start playing it? Everyone seems to be in agreement that this is the structure they have been following now for three expansions.

You are correct. The right way to play WoW has been to not play it, for years now.
Sure, come on the .3 or .4 patch, do all the raids you missed and the latest one with fixed systems and skip until the next xpac. Buy the xpacs on the cheap too.

But, that is not really a good game is it? That is trying to make the best of a bad game.

[Exkrementor]

If you can switch, more or less like talents, we will see people switch per fight in raids, maybe even dungeons.

And why exactly is that bad? Let people have fun with these stupid systems that are gone with 10.0 anyway. Why must everything be restricted? Its a game, make it fun.

[Stickiler]

And why exactly is that bad? Let people have fun with these stupid systems that are gone with 10.0 anyway. Why must everything be restricted? Its a game, make it fun.

It's bad because the community is a trash dumpster fire pit, who believe every shitty raid and M+ is the race for world first/MDI, and will bitch incessantly if you don't learn the four rotations(1 for each covenant) and play them perfectly.

[Soon-TM]

It's bad because the community is a trash dumpster fire pit, who believe every shitty raid and M+ is the race for world first/MDI, and will bitch incessantly if you don't learn the four rotations(1 for each covenant) and play them perfectly.

Honestly, you can't expect anything different from the dumpster fire that is the pug world. Right now, it's either stick with guild or gtfo - and has been for quite some time.

[Nzx]

It's bad because the community is a trash dumpster fire pit, who believe every shitty raid and M+ is the race for world first/MDI, and will bitch incessantly if you don't learn the four rotations(1 for each covenant) and play them perfectly.

This shit just doesn't happen anywhere near often enough for the amount of complaining it gets around here. I've pugged KSM on three different characters now and I regularly pug normal/heroic SoD on all three of them, and not once have I ever seen someone say "lmao wow look at this necrolord mistweaver/venthyr hunter/kyrian druid/necrolord mage"/whatever. I've seen DPS spreads of like ~3-4k between top and bottom and very rarely do any of the low DPS get kicked. I have never seen a pug raid stacked like a world first group. I've never seen someone leave a pug raid and say "lmao two brewmasters gl with tarragrue".

These things are in your head. Even if they weren't, there are solutions to these "problems" that are entirely within your control - get a guild, make friends, or list your own groups. Put together an entire raid of off-meta picks if you want. No one gives a shit about your talent choices or your covenant or whatever else, they just care that you pull your weight, and if you think people should be forced to group with you despite you doing less damage than the healer then there's nothing about the game design or the community that is the problem - you are the problem.

[FuxieDK]

And why exactly is that bad? Let people have fun with these stupid systems that are gone with 10.0 anyway. Why must everything be restricted? Its a game, make it fun.

Making choices that matters IS FUN.

[sunxsera]

Theyre making the systems unbearable, so plenty of people will praise them after they do changes that should've been there in the first place.

Simple action to make the company look good - fixing their own mistakes(that they know they're making), so they could say that they're "listen to the feedback"(even though that feedback was written almost a year ago and there was a heavy outbreak with it on the official forums ).

Sadly the truth. Imagine any other company absolutely not listening to their customors and then, 1 year later, having the audacity to say "we hear you".
No, you did not.
On the beta realms a lot of people, including me, sent feedback regarding cunduits and other systems. Conduit system was also constantly broken on beta ...

It's no conspiracy that a lot of players / streamers & other community members quit this time ... and you see blizzard's damage controll in action.

[Dhrizzle]

That's exactly what OP said: the thing we want is timegated for no reason.

It's not for no reason, like pretty much everything else in Wow it's timegated to stop players from blasting through too quickly and complaining there isn't enough to do.

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And this is why a lot of people are fed up with how Blizz do things nowadays.
It felt kinda ok in Legion since there was so much new stuff, and it honestly felt like the Devs were listening and needed time to figure the systems out. Then BfA rolled around and the exact same thing happened again with azerite gear but it was a lot more blatantly obvious the Devs were just ignoring the feedback. And with Shadowlands third time's the charm and people now just say fuck it, this isn't fun.

It's similar to free to play games with heavy incentive on shop stores; inventing problems and selling you the solution, just that the solution in this case is time punishing you if you want to play early.

That seems like a player problem though. If you don't like the amount you need to do to complete content early on you can wait and do it when Blizz make it easier. If you want to put in the time you can complete it earlier.

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Sadly the truth. Imagine any other company absolutely not listening to their customors and then, 1 year later, having the audacity to say "we hear you".
No, you did not.
On the beta realms a lot of people, including me, sent feedback regarding cunduits and other systems. Conduit system was also constantly broken on beta ...

It's no conspiracy that a lot of players / streamers & other community members quit this time ... and you see blizzard's damage controll in action.

Blizz always need content later in the expansion for people who want an easier ride. Even back in TBC they nerfed the rep you needed for getting in to Heroics. Lop

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I'm so sick of hearing about 'meaningful choices'. It's such a subjective term to begin with, what is meaningful to me may mean all, but shit to you. The devs trying to build their game around 'meaningful choice' is just code for 'let's time gate the shit and inconvenience the hell out of the player

There is nothing meaningful about me having to pick a covenant and gimping my player automatically in several different ways. (maybe I want bis pve dps covenant, but that means if I ever want to tank Im fkd, or if I ever want to pvp Im fucked. Yeah so 'meaningful choice' to Blizz is how the player chooses to go fuck him/herself...)

This really isn't such a bad thing, if you want to be the absolute best at multiple things you should expect to put in a lot of work. If you can't do that just stick with content more suitable to your level.

[Okacz]

Lemme tell you sth. By the time 9.1.5 releases, you'll already be having the required amount of renown. Also, you said it yourself, plenty of catchup. Even if you didn't play since January, you'll be caught up on renown within a week of playing the game. That's not what I would call a time gate.

"You" is the key word. A lot of players aren't playing day by day. A lot of players quit, and might wanna come back if they learned that things are getting better. A lot of players switched mains because their covenant choice turned out bad and they felt it's too much of a hassle to change it. All those players will now have to grind out Renown in order to get back to what they wanted? Why?

-tier sets: source? All I heard was something among the lines of "later during the expansion". Never seen or heard a word about "it will definitely be in 9.1 when you will have tier sets back". I've lived without them for 5 tiers now, I can wait a little longer.

Minor, but that's company babble for you. No one ever says the words "definitely", but if they throw out suggestion that tier sets may be coming back, they do it for a reason. Players get excited. Seems they simply got baited.

And living without them for 5 tiers - damn, it's so easy to update a game nowadays, aint it. Just remove stuff people like. In 2 years they will forget all about it, and you can bring stuff back as a new, exciting feature.

[Gaidax]

The old blizzard: We give you content to keep you subbed

The new blizzard: We promise you content to keep you subbed

They are also a stubborn bunch whereas they fuck something up, don't realize it due to stubborness then figure it out because subs drop like crazy then they try to patch things up without losing face. Feels like the "yeah we had a Cosby suite but we are going to eliminate toxicity in the community and things will be fine again".

Being so politically correct screws everything up.

I think the "old blizzard" meme is a bit overused.

Old Blizzard had no issue offering us remastered raid in WoTLK and then following up Ulduar with what amounts among the weakest, least effort raid tier ever made in WoW - ToTGC.

It's just back in the day - gaming did not quite catch up yet and WoW as a MMO and even a game was head and shoulders above everything, while new popular genres were only starting.

It's just over time others both caught up and overtook Blizzard when it comes to gaming, while Blizzard just stagnated trying to keep afloat by wooing boomers like me with yet another rehash of same old.