I feel optimistic about WoW

[Relapses]

If blizzard loses players, and worse, fans, because the writers didn't take a moment to consider what might be best for us, then there is is no heart to forgive. Did none of the writers cringe and stop and look around the room at the others and say, "but what about the players and fans? Players and fans have been waiting for this moment for many years, are we sure we want to do this, it seems like we're throwing them away."

It's a game where you slay internet dragons for imaginary loot. Nobody stopped to care about the lore because it doesn't matter nearly as much as people who write 5,000 essays about it would lead you to believe. It's important, to an extent, but Jesus dude. Step back for a minute.

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No, because of the same reason you do.
These changes are bad ideas outright, that compromise the structure they have built, and are only happening to placate an audience that is fickle and selfish.
They do not actually want any one change, instead they just want as much as possible for as little effort as possible, and wont stop until the game is transformed.

Its quite funny to me actually, that this has transpired this way.
Because in the heat of the Nostalrius days during Wod into Legion, the most common complaint I heard about the game was "it is too dumbed down."
That everything basic about the game has been made irrelevant and only the absolutely top level of the game was challenging.

Obviously foolish, but true in a way as well.

Now the community has seemingly completely done a 180.
Are any of those people shouting "the game is too easy" in WoD still here?

I don't know, but after 5 years of them trying to add more and more to do in the game in an attempt to placate the origin of THAT complaint, we are now doing the opposite again.

I hope people will actually be happy, and the game can enjoy another period like Legion where things seem stable and progressing, but sadly I do not expect this to be the case.

Far too many people just listen to influencers and go along with other people's opinions instead of create their own.
The game is no longer able to be created as envisioned, and that will do nothing but harm to the game itself.

The players may be happy, but you can not design a game like this to always be 100 percent in the benefit of the players.
Its just not possible, and trying to do so is what led to the mediocre middle years of this game.

I think a lot of people simply forget how bad the game was at the end of WoD. There was barely anybody playing. WoW had a lot to lose. Legion brought a lot of people back to the game but it's still nowhere near as bad today as it was back in WoD when players were making these complaints. You are 100% correct in that a lot of people aren't thinking for themselves but I don't know if Legion "good times" are possible unless Blizzard intentionally lets the game get as bad as it was in WoD again.

[Mysterymask]

Who are you op and why are you here...
We dont use the word optimistic and World of Warcraft here unless it's optimistic that it will fail this is MMO Champion where we make 200 page threads on how Actvisions stock price going down 5 points is upmost proof that LFR is destroying gaming as we know it

[pahbi]

We can only hope shadowlands is never repeated.

[Rucati]

I don't know what would make you optimistic tbh. It's just Blizzard fixing things the entire community told them were bad decisions in the first place.

Man we can switch covenants freely? Almost like everyone said that should be the case in beta. Man Torghast should be grindable so we can just get it over with? Almost like everyone said that in beta.

This is what Blizzard does. They make horrible choices that make the game no fun, everyone complains and tells them not to do it that way, Blizzard refuses to listen and says they know best, and then months later they realize they were wrong and changes.

It happened in Legion with both the random legendary system, legendary cloak catchup on alts, and the artifact weapons essentially locking you into a spec at first. Then it happened in BFA with the azerite gear being terribly designed, then essences not being account bound, and then corruption being random without a vendor. Now it's happening in Shadowlands with covenants, torghast, tier sets, etc.

This is what Blizzard does. They purposely make the game bad so that they can look good when they "fix" it a patch or two later. They don't get credit for that. If they had listened to the community in the first place then yeah, sure, we should be happy about it. But they don't. And in 10.0 it'll be exactly the same, they'll introduce new cool and interesting systems but then destroy them with either a massive grind, or tons of RNG or something, and then everyone will complain about how the system could be great but they're ruining it, and then in 10.1 or 10.2 they'll do what the community wanted. But again, it'll be too late at that point.

If anything the 9.1.5 patch just makes me more pessimistic, it proves that once again the community was correct but Blizzard only listens when it's far too late.

[Niwes]

With all the positive changes to the game coming in 9.1.5, I can't help feel optimistic about the game and the direction they are heading in with it.

I'm excited to see what 9.2 brings, and 9.3, and eventually a new expansion in 10.0. I bet they will plan some massive expansion for 10.0 to celebrate 20 years of WoW.

Do you feel optimistic about WoW and where its headed?

real honest ? no.

i do not trust this company since years. and i not will do again.

and as soon as some eye blending shit works (and i would not declare 9.1.5 as such, since its obviously just cheap changes and fixes that should be rdy since a year), they will fall back to their milk the cow mode and again bet more on smart cash grab systems, cost effective development and cheap shit instead quality, which means we again see „systems“ instead of real content and far less stuff, than we expect.

hope is always there. but imo they will never change. there is no way back. they are big business now and pressing out the least possible cent is their main concern. not making good high quality games.

but thats just me.

[arkanon]

We can only hope shadowlands is never repeated.

Wait till you realise this is the 3rd VERY similar expansion in a row - they have already repeated the same thing 3 times, it just took people a while to realise what was happening. They also somehow managed to make each iteration, imo, substantially worse than the previous.

[ohwell]

Shadowlands is a turd. No amount of polish will make it shine. The very foundations of this expansion are flawed. Thus, only an expansion has the potential to change the structure enough to warrant interest from people who were turned off by Shadowlands.

I like the tone that these most recent changes set, but it’s impossible for them to “turn things around” at this point in the cycle.

Asked to explain, but instead just continues to not do so. You literally can't explain your blind hatred without resorting to memeing and use of vague things like "unfun".

[Kalocy Jim]

all they did was what they would have normaly added in last shadowlands patch,they did it early this time because of desperation,losing milions of players is pretty bad

when an expansion launches with these changes and no bs systems maybe they can get some credit

I chuckled. No evidence that they "lost millions" of players.

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no flying in the current content
anima effort to rewards still too low for me
too many systems and pointless farming (e.g.legendary crafting mats)
no badge system beyond something for M+
WQ's that just feel drawn out for the sake of keeping you logged in
shitty drop rates (or RNG hates me)

off the top of my head.

Oh, in other words, you want to breathe and have the game cater to your exact wants, which looks to me you want little to no effort necessary to obtain rewards.

Gotcha.

[arkanon]

I chuckled. No evidence that they "lost millions" of players.

Well actually, there is, and quite a lot. When the data is dug into, it shows clearly a substantial loss of players, or, for some reason, all those players stopped doing any content. There have been some well presented and interesting analysis completed using the data we do have, and it shows a HUGE loss in players.

I think its really sad that you asked a question, but only accept one answer, anyone saying anything negative is getting attacked by you because it doesnt fit your narrative. If you want a positive echo chamber, this isnt it.

[Kalocy Jim]

Who are you op and why are you here...
We dont use the word optimistic and World of Warcraft here unless it's optimistic that it will fail this is MMO Champion where we make 200 page threads on how Actvisions stock price going down 5 points is upmost proof that LFR is destroying gaming as we know it

I'd rather be optimistic about a game I love instead of joining the blind hate train that seems to have pervaded lately.

[arkanon]

I'd rather be optimistic about a game I love instead of joining the blind hate train that seems to have pervaded lately.

So its totally ok for you to be blindly optimistic, but not ok for others to join the "blind hate train". This is what extreme bias looks like. Again, why ask a question you dont want to hear the answer to? If you are excited and happy, good for you! thats great! but not everyone is.

[Relapses]

I'd rather be optimistic about a game I love instead of joining the blind hate train that seems to have pervaded lately.

Careful, you'll get accused of "toxic positivity."

Because lord fucking knows, asking people not to share how much they hate this fucking game at every God damned opportunity is somehow on par with believing everything that Blizzard does is perfect.

[highroller1962]

Of all the things in 9.15, the easing of the requirements to unlock the allied races is probably the most appealing to me, as I can finally unlock the last three.

[arkanon]

Careful, you'll get accused of "toxic positivity."

Because lord fucking knows, asking people not to share how much they hate this fucking game at every God damned opportunity is somehow on par with believing everything that Blizzard does is perfect.

But they did leve the door wide open to all opinions: "Do you feel optimistic about WoW and where its headed?"

This is a pretty open question, and although I agree there is a certain group who just seem to hate wow and only say negative things about it, its equally as toxic to attack anyone saying something negative about the game when you ask an open question like that.

[cuafpr]

I chuckled. No evidence that they "lost millions" of players.

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Oh, in other words, you want to breathe and have the game cater to your exact wants, which looks to me you want little to no effort necessary to obtain rewards.

Gotcha.

nope just more in line with WotLK which is generally one of the top periods of wow.

[Kalocy Jim]

But they did leve the door wide open to all opinions: "Do you feel optimistic about WoW and where its headed?"

This is a pretty open question, and although I agree there is a certain group who just seem to hate wow and only say negative things about it, its equally as toxic to attack anyone saying something negative about the game when you ask an open question like that.

No where did I attack anyone. You really like putting words in people's mouths that quite frankly aren't there.

Is it not common sense if someone makes a claim to back it up with FACTUAL information? Blizzard doesn't release sub numbers anymore, so its plain false to claim they lost millions of subs.

[arkanon]

Looks like an attack to me. It certainly wasn't a flattering impression of the poster you quoted.

EXACTLY the post I was referring to.

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No where did I attack anyone. You really like putting words in people's mouths that quite frankly aren't there.

Is it not common sense if someone makes a claim to back it up with FACTUAL information? Blizzard doesn't release sub numbers anymore, so its plain false to claim they lost millions of subs.

So the dramatic and never before seen dropoff in players participating and VARIOUS activities, from season to season, and compared to similar patches/seasons before, is not data? You seem to be confusing factual with official - data can be factual without coming from an official source.

[Paperfox]

They've replaced JAB with two co-leaders, and some of the staff have been let go. Who they didn't let go are those in the executive suite and those are the ones who dictate the direction WoW takes. The whole goal of WoW is to maximize shareholder value/return. Someone compared two slides for ActiBlizz's quarterly reports, one was from 2016 and the latest one, these slides showed revenue and MAUs. The interesting thing is that despite the MAUs dropping in about half, the revenue was pretty much the same.

While I have no doubt that the development team have the capability of turning things around now and in the future of making a truly great 10.0, I would be pleasantly surprised if those in the Executive allowed them to do so.

While they don't release sub numbers anymore, they do release MAU numbers. So while impossible to see how one franchise is doing, you can see how Blizz is doing as a whole.

[Irian]

I get a bitter taste in my mouth when I think of how long we had to wait for simple cosmetic options and mid-patch updates to old content. I'm not going to feel optimistic until I see this actually continue once sub numbers crawl back up, if they even do.

[khazmodan]

Shadowlands is a turd. No amount of polish will make it shine. The very foundations of this expansion are flawed. Thus, only an expansion has the potential to change the structure enough to warrant interest from people who were turned off by Shadowlands.

I like the tone that these most recent changes set, but it’s impossible for them to “turn things around” at this point in the cycle.

This is really true, the covenants were doomed to be grindy and annoying and Choreghast is only fun with friends over voice chat. After a couple of alts, the idea of doing the maw beginning quest chain again made me want to hire a Chinese sweat shop to do it for me. Everything looked like the same old boring grindy crap with a different coat of paint so quitting the game a few weeks after expansion release was easy to do. Mike Ybarra was a good choice to run WoW but the combination of huge losses of talent and Mike "nodick" Kotick still steering the ship like its the Costa Concordia, adds up to not much hope for the future of WoW.