Should raid difficulties and LFR be retuned and consolidated?

[Kaver]

I've seen some suggestions from people that the 3 raid difficulties and the 1 tourist mode that we have right now is too many.

Do you agree? If so, how should Blizzard go about retuning and possibly reducing the amount of difficulties in the game?

It actually seems like a lot of people want another difficulty between normal and heroic as they keep complaining about heroic being too hard.

[Athulua]

Difficulties are fine, you don't have to do all of them.

If you raided mythic in 9.0 then there was little reason to start in Normal Sanctum because the ilvl was the same (226). Very few things would give you any upgrade. You immediately started heroic and there you had a good chance at getting significant upgrade.

[crusadernero]

Replace LFR with a torghast-like (or mage tower, you get the idea) solo mode. That way you can actually make it somewhat challenging, but easily accessible. Still make it give gear a tier below normal-mode.

Inb4 "bUt iT'S aN MMO, yOu sHouLd hAVe tO plAy wItH OtHEr pEOpLe!" - it's just a genre, it's just a category. You shouldn't build the game around adhering to the platonic ideal of those three letters.

Though if they do that - they do need to make it scale properly with a group. Unless the other player has way weaker gear than you - getting a bigger party should always make it easier.

I wish they'd do this for dungeons too. People should be able to experience all the story & PvE content solo - at their own pace. Without having to endure the brain-dissolving LFR and other such hells. Keep the hard, high-Ilvl-gear-rewarding stuff multiplayer only. That's fine.

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Eh, I found ulduar hardmodes ludicrously contrived. It's much simpler and cleaner to just flip an interface switch. This is a game, it has an interface. Not everything has to be forced into the actual game.

And IMO LFR is "that bad". In a random group - you wipe over and over again. And may still wipe over and over no matter how well you play - because it's a group of random f*cks. And raid bosses have a ton of HP - so you lose like ~5 minutes of your time every wipe. There are lots of better ways to do a "story mode" - like by solo-mode idea.

TBH, I agree with this. I used to dislike the idea of a solo raid option in wow, but at this point I wouldnt mind. LFR as it is in the game right now, does nothing in gameplay value. People dont communicate and if they do its a toxic shitshow. I bet alot of people do LFR once and forget about it.

If the sole purpose of LFR is to let people see the raid/Story, might aswell put in a solo option for those that want to. Better gear can drop from the raids were you group with others.

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i am not sure if the question not comes down to, in reality, a more important question:

should they really tell story arc and cinematics in raids, instead of quests ?

explanation:

i dont have data, but my assumption is that A LOT of ppl cleansing LFR is doing this for „cinema“. and so i would ask myself, how many would still go LFR when there is zero (or 10%) story, no cinematics and all the cinematics and story (and important story elements) is told by quests?

this would way better answer, if there should be some LFR or not.

linking raids to story is one of the most prominent failure they did with wow imo.

Agree with you. For the last years i've done each new raid on LFR once to see the story and finish up quests. Never returned, not even on shit geared alts, unless there was some nice gear reward tied to a raid quest.

[munkeyinorbit]

No, the ilvl would just drop by 26 total, not 26 X 3. That's not how math works...

hahahahaha

Oh no. You're serious.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Lets do a math problem here. Lets use very easy values. Difficulty increase is 10. Season increase is 2 x difficulty increase so 20.

S1
LFR = 110
Norm = 120
H = 130
Myth = 140

new season
LFR = 130
Norm = 140
H = 150
Myth = 160

new season + 1
LFR = 150
Norm = 160
H = 170
Myth = 180

new season + 2
LFR = 170
Norm = 180
H = 190
Myth = 200

No Mythic (or heroic or LFR. It doesnt matter)
LFR = 110
Norm = 120
H = 130

new season
LFR = 130
Norm = 140
H = 150

new season + 1
LFR = 150
Norm = 160
H = 170

new season + 2
LFR = 170
Norm = 180
H = 190

There's the fucking arithmetic, its not even proper math.

I will wait for your apology.

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It most certainly cannot be the most popular this expansion as anyone worth a damn outgeared it before it was released.

Just like ecery expac since WoD. Your feelings do not make a fact.

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tourist mode certainly is not the most popular form of large group content.

raiding has and always been more popular than tourist mode.

I will wait for your source on your feelings. It is an accepted fact that LFR is more popular than all of the other raid difficulties put together. Its a commonly known fact in the community. Please look up "Does it need a source" in your reply. This will help you out.

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i want 10/25 man hc which is now mythic we cant realy get any new players sadly

then you're not really a Mythic guild. Its OK. Not everyone is a Mythic guild. Just do Heroic and be happy. Deleting LFR or Normal or Heroic will not solve this. Being a shitty 10 man guild with "Mythic" kills doesn't make you a mythic guild. It makes you a welfare guild. Do you ant to be a welfare guild? If you do then just piss off and buy your gear.

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I know but some people are so keen on having difficulties removed and whatnot, LFR is - sadly - one of the needed difficulties as 'story mode', and Mythic isn't as needed, and if people wanted a challenge, you could add HMs to HCs to make it tougher if people are so eager to cut anything.

that just makes it mythic with extra steps. Difficulty inc means inc in gear. Why bother? mythic is mythic. The raid deletion is at the normal/heroic level.

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Not convinced that we need a change at all but if something had to change condensing LFR and Normal seems the most logical. They're the closest in difficulty and the primary difference is the lack of a queue option.

normal heroic is the most logical. Blizzard has tried to make lfr more normal like and has failed at every turn. At least the guys doing normal (the intended audience) can stomache a wipe or 4. IF LFR became harder then the forums would flood with tears.

[Zantos]

If it's tough to maintain 4 difficulty levels I'd probably go down this priority list:

1. Cut Mythic
2. Cut LFR
3. Cut Heroic

Funny thing is, since late wrath, they've always had 4 difficulties. They tried reducing it once before and it ended up right back to the same amount of difficulties. Back in wrath, it was 10, 10H, 25, 25H. No real room for flexing back then.

I also doubt they would ever cut LFR. Its the most popular and used mode. Even if some bosses are purely impossible on LFR due to people not listening + carrying afks.

[Lochton]

that just makes it mythic with extra steps. Difficulty inc means inc in gear. Why bother? mythic is mythic. The raid deletion is at the normal/heroic level.

Why would normal and heroic need deletion? I believe they still have more attention than Mythic overall.

If anything could be cut, it would be Mythic, and you just stretch normal and heroic to fill the chart.

[Vorkreist]

I've seen some suggestions from people that the 3 raid difficulties and the 1 tourist mode that we have right now is too many.

Do you agree? If so, how should Blizzard go about retuning and possibly reducing the amount of difficulties in the game?

By removing the worst feature in mmo history. LFR

[Delever]

I think normal should honestly go. And normally I wouldnt have a problem with 4 difficulties but they serve in inflating ilvl and whenever a legendary like sylv bow is included in the mix you are kinda forced to do all of them to get a better chance at getting the bow.
In an ideal scenario only heroic and Mythic would exist but the difficulty would change a bit so that heroic is a bit easier in the beginning and have a steady ramp up in difficulty where eventually casuals can outgear the raid and finish the last boss as mechanics get less punishing. Then mythic stays as it is.

[Elias1337]

No. Raid difficulties are fine, leave them alone.

Do you like wow being seosanl? Do you like insane power creeps? Do you like not having players to play with becouse everyone just settle for easyest difficutly levels? Do you like having ruined community and toxic enviroment? Do you like having fragmented playerbase? Becouse all this and more is caused by existence of difficulty levels.

Back in TBC where there was only 1 difficulty raiding and guilds were in way way heathier state becouse you have millions of people all with same goal getting into same content with same difficulty. It was way easyer to find players to play with back in TBC then now as playerbase is fragmented into this bunch of smaller groups.

[Gourbaak]

By removing the worst feature in mmo history. LFR

One of the best you mean.

[lolmmofuture]

go bk to two modes only

normal and hc

which in todays terms would be heroic and mythic thats it

[Vorkreist]

One of the best you mean.

Yes one of the best at keeping players away from the game.

[Flaim]

let's go the m+ route with keys
/s

[Gourbaak]

Yes one of the best at keeping players away from the game.

lfr keeps no one away from the game and attracts a lot to it

[Lady Atia]

go bk to two modes only

normal and hc

which in todays terms would be heroic and mythic thats it

More like LFR and Heroic. That's what we would get if Blizzard would have to cut 2 difficulties.

[lolmmofuture]

More like LFR and Heroic. That's what we would get if Blizzard would have to cut 2 difficulties.

or just make it like wow used to be, before adding lfr and another hard difficulty.
it was only 2 and lfr wasnt apart of it

[MrLachyG]

Do you like wow being seosanl? Do you like insane power creeps? Do you like not having players to play with becouse everyone just settle for easyest difficutly levels? Do you like having ruined community and toxic enviroment? Do you like having fragmented playerbase? Becouse all this and more is caused by existence of difficulty levels.

bahahahahahahahahaha oh that is the funniest thing I've heard all day. are you actually that naive to think that toxicity and ruined community started with WoD? or Wrath for that matter?? or that you think that difficulty levels ruined that? also you can't compare BC to now because there is only one difficulty level; so people don't have a choice as to what difficulty they choose

[loras]

I've seen some suggestions from people that the 3 raid difficulties and the 1 tourist mode that we have right now is too many.

Do you agree? If so, how should Blizzard go about retuning and possibly reducing the amount of difficulties in the game?

Just retuning the loot would suffice.
Like make LFR drop the "base" level items, make normal drop a partially upgraded item, heroic a more upgraded item and mythic a "complete" item.
Then also make it drop currency on every level that can be used to upgrade items, its amount determined by difficulty.

This way all drops will matter, yet the gap in ilvl-power does not need to be so absurd.

(oh and if you have a hardon for thresholded gear - make upgrading dependant on clear X bosses of the appropriate level or something)

[Advent]

Do you like wow being seosanl?Yes, it's very predictable.

Do you like insane power creeps? Yes. Power creep is fun for me.

Do you like not having players to play with becouse everyone just settle for easyest difficutly levels?I have plenty of people to play with. This sounds like a YOU problem

Do you like having ruined community and toxic enviroment?Ruined for who? Get off the forums and find people in the game. I'll bet most of them don't talk like a youtube comment section like fansites do.

Do you like having fragmented playerbase? Becouse all this and more is caused by existence of difficulty levels. Oh boy. This already happened when the factions were introduced, and having different servers. Welcome to 2004, you're only 17 years behind.

Back in TBC where there was only 1 difficulty raiding and guilds were in way way heathier state becouse you have millions of people all with same goal getting into same content with same difficulty. It was way easyer to find players to play with back in TBC then now as playerbase is fragmented into this bunch of smaller groups.

Back in TBC a lot of people were still new to MMOs, so the novelty of playing with a person in a persistent world was still incredibly exciting. That excitement wore off a long time ago. Remember the first time you did something exhilarating, like riding your first bike, or buying your first car? I'm willing to bet it's not that exciting anymore after 17 years doing it. Novelty wears off, more news at 11.

[Osmeric]

Back in TBC a lot of people were still new to MMOs, so the novelty of playing with a person in a persistent world was still incredibly exciting. That excitement wore off a long time ago. Remember the first time you did something exhilarating, like riding your first bike, or buying your first car? I'm willing to bet it's not that exciting anymore after 17 years doing it. Novelty wears off, more news at 11.

Yep. Initially, even running around Elwynn Forest listening to the oboe music was gobsmacking for an MMO newbie.