To all the Bellulars, Asmogolds, Preaches, QoL'ers and Fans that want to Design WOW.

[strangehair]

theres a saying: "if you cant measure it you cant improve it". without something like elon musk's neuralink, we have no fucking clue how much fun anyone is having, where why how etc. we cant measure it. so we cant improve it. im talking about the "chip in the brain", a brain computer interface.
so you can all talk around in circles, but the fact is, if you all were having a blast you in game you wouldnt be here. another point is, my principle, and im sure others' too: where there is a seemingly impossible situation, a new technology is needed to change the rules of what is possible, thus find a solution. again, a brain computer interface.
currently humanity knows a tiny amount about how the brain works, that involves psychology, psychiatry, neuroscience and all the rest. all relevant to, you guessed it, creating systems in a game that maximize what you all really care about: how much fun can you get per dollar per unit of time. game companies are simply groups of people in the business of using audio visual means to cause their users to have various types of fun, per dollar, per unit of time.
so you will keep talking around in circles, after all we all know that nearly noone of you came here to learn, from a point of genuine curiosity with no preexisting beliefs, they came to reinforce their own previously strongly help beliefs while shitting on the people who believe the opposite.

[Osmeric]

WoW being run by the lads from elitist jerks and only really giving meaningful content in raids, M+ and PvP was the biggest mistake they could have made. WoW became popular by catering to the casual audience, as well as the hardcores. This hyper focus on hardcore content, as well as pretty much demanding that players log in every single day drives off casual players.

Not only does doing that to a game make the game unappealing to casuals, it also sends those players the message that the devs don't want them. That's a really good way to drive away customers -- you don't stick around if you feel like the devs are spitting on you. This is a major difference from FF14.

- - - Updated - - -

theres a saying: "if you cant measure it you cant improve it".

This is bullshit. You can improve something by feelings. Change it, and see if something feels better or not.

The focus on metrics leads to serious pathologies in business, particularly if the metrics become targets. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_law

[Garymorilix]

Isn't it weird how history repeats itself almost EXACTLY to the letter? Different actors, same lines.

But you did remind me about how the EQ argument was that it was a proper "hardcore" game and that WoW was for casuals, and they'd be back once they got tired of the casual carebear land.

WoW being run by the lads from elitist jerks and only really giving meaningful content in raids, M+ and PvP was the biggest mistake they could have made. WoW became popular by catering to the casual audience, as well as the hardcores. This hyper focus on hardcore content, as well as pretty much demanding that players log in every single day drives off casual players.

Ermh, okay...?

Can you recall all the fun casual things you could do in Classic instead of raiding? Yea, me neither.

First you literally only had raids, then you had proper PvP system and then WAY LATER you had M+.
Up until Legion dungeons were literally "play once too see it and then forget forever".

You're suggesting that WoW at some time had their focus on anything but grouped instanced end-game content which is simply false.
If you are literally only going by quantity of non-raid, non-M+ and non-pvp things to do you have more things to do NOW then ever before.

And by quantity I mean from literally 0 in early WoW (up until MoP).

[Cuppy]

This thread will not go very far.

Just quoting this, second post in this thread, here in page 65

[Raelbo]

Let me stop you right there.


Ok done, had to have a chuckle at that one.

So what exactly are you trying to tell me here? That you're a cynical conspiracy theorist who likes to pretend you're highly informed, but really you have no data or facts to back up your opinion. Stop being smug and bring an actual argument instead of more unsubstantiated tripe. Thanks.

Sure, by way of sheer numbers, little Timmy out there has saved up a month of farming for a WoW token and it was all his hard work, and basically 100% of Chinese gold farmers are bots so Little Timmy offsets that, but the botting community in WoW is MASSIVE. It has numerous bot programs that are looking to take your money for an additional monthly sub to that bot. And the bots range from cheap and easy to spot, to expensive and highly sophisticated that look and act like a real player and even have complex dialog choices to respond to given terms.

So basically you acknowledge my point in the first line here. As for your speculation regarding how huge the botting community is in WoW, it's quite clear that you're exaggerating. While I have zero doubt that botting happens in WoW, this problem would be MASSIVELY WORSE (see I can also use caps for emphasis!) without the token.

You see there will always be players who are happy to cheat and break the rules to get ahead and are happy to take a risk in order to do so. For those people goldsellers will always be the preferred the option. But by offering a safe and rule-compliant alternative, tokens undercut the demand for illicit gold significantly by appealing to any player who is either honest or doesn't want to risk losing their account. And this has a MASSIVE positive effect on the game by reducing goldseller activity significantly. The fact that it hasn't eradicated the problem entirely is down to two factors:

1) Douchebag players who will buy from goldsellers
2) Blizzard failing to take enough action against botters

I could resub to WoW for one month, bot for that month, buy 5-6 WoW tokens, bot for 3-4 months, clean out the Blizzard store and start buying hearthstone packs. But why would I do that? I want to PLAY the game, not bot it.

You also don't want to risk your account. I mean really, anyone who has invested any significant amount of time and effort into their WoW account would be an idiot to resort to botting just to save a few $$. That doesn't mean such players don't exist, simply that they're a relatively small minority.

The botting problem just further underlines why the M+, raider, and PvP drop off is so severe. A big portion of the subs that do remain are pretty much bots.

Another unsubstantiated claim.

And we know how WFR guilds fund their consumables, BoEs, etc. I lost count of how many scandals broke about WFR members buying gold before WoW token. Now they just buy WoW token and/or sell carries.

Interesting though this point is, I really don't see how this pertains to the discussion at hand.

"You are not buying gold from us, you're buying from another player!" while technically true is a deflection.

Again with the conspiracy theory talk.

At the end of the day, Blizzard gets 100% of the money, and the person who bought the token can never "cash out". The whole "You're buying gold from other players, not us!" schtick is to wipe Blizzard's hands from any accusations that they're the ones selling gold.

The fact that "Blizzard gets 100% of the money, and the person who bought the token can never "cash out"" does not mean that Blizzard are "the ones selling gold".

Admittedly, it would be far far far worse if Blizzard was just outright selling NEW gold because that would create mass inflation in the economy.

And this, my friend, is about the only point of relevance you've made. It's core to why tokens are fundamentally good for the game, where selling gold directly would be fundamentally bad.

But Blizzard doesn't want to let that sweet sweet profit fly by them, so to solve both problems they allow players to sell gold to each other for "Blizzard bucks". You exchange gold for a month of WoW, or for some hearthstone card packs, or for something else from the in game store. That and Blizzard won't even give you the full $20 for the exchange. $5 is the "tax" for this. But they're still getting the other $15 anyway, and they don't have to expend anything other than some 1's and 0's getting added to your account... well, Blizzard's account that they're letting you use. Because let's not forget that in the EULA all user accounts are technically Blizzard's to do with as they want.

You say this as if it's some kind of revelation or something. But this has always been abundantly clear to anyone and everyone able to rub two braincells together. I mean it's not like Blizzard have ever even tried to hide it. And why would they?

The only issue here is that, for some bizarre reason, people like you want to make it into an issue. Stop trying to sell this ridiculous narrative that we're all getting screwed by the evil greedy Blizzard. They're providing a service to players, a service that no one is obliged or pressured to participate in. When Blizzard sells a token, all three parties involved are getting benefit - Blizzard gets $20, one player gets free stuff, and the other gets gold. Everyone gets exactly what they sign up for, and honestly, if they don't think it's a fair deal, their trivially easy solution is to simply not buy a token.

And you know what is even better? Even those players who don't participate in the token trade benefit. This happens on two fronts:

1) Tokens help to fund the game development. All players benefit from this.
2) Tokens give more players the ability to participate in the economy, which is good for any players selling consumables

1) Blizzard is sanctioning gold selling

So what? You say this as if it's a given that this a bad thing. It's not. You need to substantiate that - but you don't want to because you're fully aware that you don't really have an argument beyond appealing to outrage.

2) They are the sole profiteers of this gold selling

Again, you say this as if it's a given that this is a bad thing. It's not. You need to substantiate that - but you don't want to because you're fully aware that you don't really have an argument beyond appealing to outrage.

3) Sure it's safe, but I'd just prefer no gold selling in my MMO.

And you're totally entitled to that preference. But by equal measure, other players are entitled to their preferences. Importantly though, what you're not really entitled to is to dictate how other people should play, especially when, as is the case with tokens, their preferences have zero negative effects on you.

It should be risky. You should think twice about doing it. Or three or four times. You should be scared that you're going to get your account hacked or that you'll get banned for doing it.

No.

Third party goldseller activity is a blight on the game that causes a great deal of harm. Tokens are completely benign. You're trying to equate the two on the basis of the ends, but you're failing to see that what actually matters is the means.

[sam86]

You can rant and rave all you want, but the fact that it hurts your feeling this is irrelevant. Study after study shows that diverse workplaces have significantly higher levels of productivity.

It is not the job of a corporation to appease your weird political hang ups. It is the job of corporations to make money. Diversity leads to productivity. Productivity makes money. That’s what the data shows. Those are the facts. Refusing to accept that just demonstrates that you do not care whether it makes more money. You care that it gets under your skin when minorities are hired. Once again, your feelings are irrelevant.

provide a link then of said study, that says that if 70% of ppl who work are white, u have a 'higher' pool of candidate for jobs in the 30% left
and in case u missed that, i'm neither american nor even white, i just don't have my head shoved up my a88 to know that saying u hire for skin color and sexual orientation instead of actual qualification is sure not good for any type of job

[Garymorilix]

Tell me you never played Vanilla without telling me you never played Vanilla.

I've probably ran Stratholme Dead as current content more than any dungeon since.



It was there, whether you were engaging with it or not. Molten Front, Argent Tournament, Sunwell Isle, Netherwing Ledge, Tyr's Hand, Skettis, Tol Barad, Wintergrasp ... I mean, your statement of "literally 0" is so inaccurate it borders on a flat-out lie.

The fact that you ran Stratholme all day does not mean most people did.
And you're right, I started in TBC but I did try Classic.

You didn't really just try to compare things like the Molten Front or the Argent Tournament to the Timeless Isle or Mechagon.
Most of what you listed players didn't even do, only a small minority who actually cared enough (as they were irrelevant).
Wintergrasp and Told Barad were battlegrounds for all purposes so it is a bit of a technicality here.

[NineSpine]

provide a link then of said study, that says that if 70% of ppl who work are white, u have a 'higher' pool of candidate for jobs in the 30% left
and in case u missed that, i'm neither american nor even white, i just don't have my head shoved up my a88 to know that saying u hire for skin color and sexual orientation instead of actual qualification is sure not good for any type of job

Just because something fits your political hang ups doesn't mean it is true. Now, I'm going to give you three studies, but there are plenty more. You will then have a choice: Change your opinion because reality doesn't match up with it, or double down because your political feelings are more important to you than reality:

"A recent study by the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) has found that diversity increases the bottom line for companies. The study found that "increasing the diversity of leadership teams leads to more and better innovation and improved financial performance." It looked at 1700 different companies across 8 different countries, with varying industries and company sizes. They have found that increasing diversity has a direct effect on the bottom line. Companies that have more diverse management teams have 19% higher revenue due to innovation."
https://www.forbes.com/sites/annapow...h=2e2203f506f3

This one is great because it also analyzes how ignorant people who refuse to accept diversity can counteract the positives. In other words, diversity increases productivity while attitudes like yours DECREASE productivity. YOU are the detriment:

"The researcher after examining the literature and various research papers, concluded that workforce diversity is strength for any organization but people still stick to their views related to caste, religion etc and so consider diversity as a problem but if managed properly, can increase the productivity."
https://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...12567114001786

This one is fantastic because it shows that the most important diversity is upper management diversity, which means not only should the workforce be diverse but the leadership itself should be diverse:

"...organizations with high levels of racial diversity in both upper and lower management (i.e., high–high racial diversity congruence) realized superior productivity compared to organizations with low levels of racial diversity in both upper and lower management (i.e., low–low racial diversity congruence). Results also revealed differences across levels of racial diversity incongruence between upper management and lower management (i.e., asymmetry effects) whereby firms with a more racially diverse upper management than lower management outproduced firms with a more racially diverse lower management than upper management. "
https://www.businessinsider.com/new-...ctivity-2020-6

[Kharadin]

Why can't it be both? I think the random youtubers would suck at making games, and I also know that Blizzard are currently doing a shit job.

I think that's a pretty reasonable position.

[Soon-TM]

Why can't it be both? I think the random youtubers would suck at making games, and I also know that Blizzard are currently doing a shit job.

I think that's a pretty reasonable position.

Pretty much this. That's why I find it so funny when one of those overzealous Blizzard fans try to deflect the blame away from Blizzard, and its self-inflicted woes, by pointing fingers at random YTers.

[Rageonit]

The fact that you ran Stratholme all day does not mean most people did.
And you're right, I started in TBC but I did try Classic.

You didn't really just try to compare things like the Molten Front or the Argent Tournament to the Timeless Isle or Mechagon.
Most of what you listed players didn't even do, only a small minority who actually cared enough (as they were irrelevant).
Wintergrasp and Told Barad were battlegrounds for all purposes so it is a bit of a technicality here.

Argent Tournament got old pretty quick - because of very little diversity and no meaningful rewards. Was just another "Lets get it done asap for the mount tokens" kind of activity. Can't recall anyone being excited with it - but I do remember this particular patch getting lots and lots of criticism for lack of content and bad filler raid.
While I wouldn't say WoW had zero casual content back then, it had a lot less than it has today.

[Kharadin]

Pretty much this. That's why I find it so funny when one of those overzealous Blizzard fans try to deflect the blame away from Blizzard, and its self-inflicted woes, by pointing fingers at random YTers.

Yeah, I mean I'd consider myself a bit of a Blizzard fanboy but it's just kinda getting dumb. If you wanna milk me for sub money and MTX at least be subtle about it and give me some fun content that isn't only geared around maximum engagement time.

I was way more addicted to this game before Blizzard started trying to make me addicted.

[Zantera]

Argent Tournament got old pretty quick - because of very little diversity and no meaningful rewards. Was just another "Lets get it done asap for the mount tokens" kind of activity. Can't recall anyone being excited with it - but I do remember this particular patch getting lots and lots of criticism for lack of content and bad filler raid.
While I wouldn't say WoW had zero casual content back then, it had a lot less than it has today.

I also strongly disliked Argent Tournament. Not only were the joust dailies boring but you had dailies designed to stretch out your game time like flying from Icecrown to Howling Fjord and back again. People think Korthia is bad but I feel like had Argent Tournament been a thing now, people would have been even more vocal. There's definitely more options for casual content these days. Back then you either sucked it up and did the daily zone (which could be fun or boring depending on if you liked the zone) but if you didn't like it then there wasn't really much else of interest either.

[Relapses]

Pretty much this. That's why I find it so funny when one of those overzealous Blizzard fans try to deflect the blame away from Blizzard, and its self-inflicted woes, by pointing fingers at random YTers.

Nobody's deflecting blame away from Blizzard, we're telling you that if you get your WoW news from a YTer who has built an entire platform talking shit about Blizzard and makes money from being negative about the game then you shouldn't be surprised when people call into question the sincerity of that YTer's claims.

[Soon-TM]

Nobody's deflecting blame away from Blizzard, we're telling you that if you get your WoW news from a YTer who has built an entire platform talking shit about Blizzard and makes money from being negative about the game then you shouldn't be surprised when people call into question the sincerity of that YTer's claims.

Tell me that you have never seen Bellular's videos without telling me that you have never seen them. The "negativity" trope is old and tired, try something new /yawn

[Cthulhu 2020]

Ermh, okay...?

Can you recall all the fun casual things you could do in Classic instead of raiding? Yea, me neither.

First you literally only had raids, then you had proper PvP system and then WAY LATER you had M+.
Up until Legion dungeons were literally "play once too see it and then forget forever".

You're suggesting that WoW at some time had their focus on anything but grouped instanced end-game content which is simply false.
If you are literally only going by quantity of non-raid, non-M+ and non-pvp things to do you have more things to do NOW then ever before.

And by quantity I mean from literally 0 in early WoW (up until MoP).

There was no "casual" MMO out there, and WoW was by far the easiest MMO in 2005 and 2006. For the casual players, leveling up WAS the experience. RPing, running UBRS, LBRS, Strat, Scholo, were the casual content.

In TBC, the more casual players did Karazhan, a relatively easy 10 man raid as well as heroic dungeons. Dailies and more accessibility to crafting and gathering also became a thing.

By wotlk, WoW was focusing heavily on casual content, but up to that point WoW had always been the most casual friendly game on the market. It's not as if vanilla WoW was at 12m subs either. That didn't happen until wrath. An increase in casual accessibility was what brought people to WoW. And back then, it was the most rewarding leveling experience considering that, while it was a grind, it was still much easier to do than pretty much any other MMO at the time.

[NineSpine]

Argent Tournament got old pretty quick - because of very little diversity and no meaningful rewards. Was just another "Lets get it done asap for the mount tokens" kind of activity. Can't recall anyone being excited with it - but I do remember this particular patch getting lots and lots of criticism for lack of content and bad filler raid.
While I wouldn't say WoW had zero casual content back then, it had a lot less than it has today.

Wrath had significantly more meaningful content for casual players than we have now.

[Kralljin]

That didn't happen until wrath. An increase in casual accessibility was what brought people to WoW.

Oh c'mon, this argument is just so damn disingenuous.

Subcount has been growing since Launch but started to plateau in Wotlk, disregarding the entire growth during TBC to just to changes made in Wotlk is plain dishonest.

Even Morhaime admitted that this constant increase of accessability has actually taken a toll on the game.

[Cthulhu 2020]

So what exactly are you trying to tell me here? That you're a cynical conspiracy theorist who likes to pretend you're highly informed, but really you have no data or facts to back up your opinion. Stop being smug and bring an actual argument instead of more unsubstantiated tripe. Thanks.

It's not exactly a secret that there was and still is a massive botting population in WoW. I also botted for a short time in MoP. So I got an eye for the details of the harder to spot bots. Big difference is that now with the WoW token, there's huge incentive to bot. You claim that players don't want to risk old accounts, but guess what they do? Use burner accounts, or heck, many even DO use their main account because Blizzard does absolutely jack shit to ban botters. Every time they make a token ban wave of 100,000 bots, it's more like a shotgun than a targeted sniper. They seem to just randomly fire and hit a lot of innocent players in the process and seem to rarely get the actual bots. That and they haven't done one of their ban waves in a long time.

Hmm... wonder why...

The funny part about the rest of your post is, you just scream "YOU HAVEN'T SUBSTANTIATED OR BACKED UP YOUR CLAIMS" when you yourself have made numerous nebulous claims that you provide absolutely no backup or context for. So same to you. Not worth my time if you're going to hand wave me away when I can just do the same to your uniformed and mostly naive claims.

Stop trying to sell this ridiculous narrative that we're all getting screwed by the evil greedy Blizzard. They're providing a service to players, a service that no one is obliged or pressured to participate in. When Blizzard sells a token, all three parties involved are getting benefit - Blizzard gets $20, one player gets free stuff, and the other gets gold. Everyone gets exactly what they sign up for, and honestly, if they don't think it's a fair deal, their trivially easy solution is to simply not buy a token.

You're right, nobody is forced to take part in it. Which is why WoW is at an all time low in players and Blizzard is looking for schemes to monetize to keep the shareholders happy, rather than bring players back.

But you are correct. Everyone is happy. The whale who buys tons of tokens gets lots of gold to buy carries through the hardest content in the game. The botter gets lots of Blizzard Buxxxxx for hearthstone card packs, and Bobby Kotick gets another yacht this month.

- - - Updated - - -

Oh c'mon, this argument is just so damn disingenuous.

Subcount has been growing since Launch but started to plateau in Wotlk, disregarding the entire growth during TBC to just to changes made in Wotlk is plain dishonest.

Even Morhaime admitted that this constant increase of accessability has actually taken a toll on the game.

Not at all. I've played MMOs since UO and EQ days. WoW was by far the most casual friendly game on the market for 2004-2010, and an enormous number of people started in TBC and wotlk, many of them super casual. I had several friends with cata and MoP that took their time leveling through say the entirety of TBC and didn't even really experience end game til wotlk.

And again, yes, there was a gradual increase in the more casual content from expansion to expansion. 10 man raids in wotlk were mostly a joke in difficulty, which made it perfect for casuals. Plus Karazhan is only "hard" when you jump in right at the beginning of TBC with blues. It becomes substantially easier with every patch that Blizzard added better loot to badges of valor - which could also be earned from heroic dungeons.


God it's so weird to think that people have forgotten how much the more "hardcore" gamers of much harder games made fun of and shit on WoW for how easy purples were to get. Blizzard experienced backlash from the community when TBC rained down purples at the end of every heroic dungeon onto its more casual player base.

[florclorbromiod]

Asmongold has no business designing WoW. For the last 5+ years he's been getting carried by people infinitely better, being given gold and consumes. He's completely detached from the typical playing experience.

I want Blizzard to focus more on endgame, hard content and less on casual stuff with no difficulty that everyone can play. Asmongold and Bellular can go play their Single Player MMO in Final Fantasy 14 and they can leave the actually hard multiplayer content to us WoW players. Thanks.