"Catering to 5% of your player base will leave you with 5% of your player base"

[munkeyinorbit]

The best games are the ones where Devs make the game they want to make and cater to nobody. When you start catering to your playerbase your game becomes a confused mess a mechanics trying to make everyone happy.

Imagine what the Souls Series would be if they catered to what the 90% cried for. Instead they stuck to their guns, made the games they wanted to make and look at it now, a huge commercial success.

If commercial success is what makes a game great then wow is not a confused mess a mechanics trying to make everyone happy..

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Yes, look at PoE, WoW back in it's prime, God of War, Diablo back in it's prime, Soulsborne series etc. etc. All such failures. Yet look what happened to WoW when they started trying to satisfy everyone, look what happened to Diablo when they started trying to satisfy everyone.

The best games have all been ones where the devs made the game they wanted to make, not the one that tried to satisfy everyone.

By your definition, wow and diablo are great games in their current form.

[Johnjohn]

Surprise. So do the Raiders and Dungeon players. The only reason why their content looks like it is more is because it is harder and thus needs more effort and time to complete. The casuals in this thread do not want difficulty, they don't want to learn fights or even their own rotation, they do not want effort. So, what is the solution? Blizzard would have to patch every two month at minimum to keep delivering content that the casuals can run through in a day before they can complain again that there is no content.
Casual content would have to be delivered at a much higher pace then non-casual stuff, because it is consumed much faster. I am sure you know that it is simply not realistic to expect that.

Comments like this make my brain hurt. It really shows silly this has become. Casual players used to get their gear through dungeons and LFR. Now its dailies. They complain about this, and get told they want it easy. LFR should not drop good gear, but dailies should! What? Want to make more casual content? How about making the leveling process last 25x longer? Why such an obsession to get the end game? Is this really what mmorpgs are about? Blizzard spends years creating content only for people to level through it in a few weeks max and then treadmill it on different difficulty levels for 2 years. Its idiotic and the antithesis of what a RPG should be. This game really has become diablo online.


Either way its just pointless arguing at this point. What casual player in their right mind would play the game in its current state? I would rather watch paint dry. Welfare dailies and pet battles is all that is left. Even logging in at the end of an expansion for catching up is pointless as it all resets anyway next expac.

[munkeyinorbit]

Not really. Asking persistent questions is just people liking to be on forums and debating, trying to be vigilant. That's not trolling. Sealioning is doing so without any intent of having a real conversation.

We really need to stop branding people as trolls incorrectly. Conversations can get heated but that does not mean the person intended to cause an issue, they just got a little worked up is all. I know "Well, I'm not a mind reader, I cannot tell someone's actual intent" is a likely response but if you cannot clearly tell someone's intent, you're just creating unnecessary stigma.



He's right though.

Many hugely successful games were created by NOT taking what players say into account. BotW is another.

Listening to what the gamers want has lead to some good games developed like FF7 remake but has lead to a lot more tragic failures like modern WoW.

But, according to what makes a great game then wow right now is a great game. It is a commercial success. You can have opinions of whether you like a game but to say if game is great then commercial success is s good a meter as anything.

[Fitsu]

If commercial success is what makes a game great then wow is not a confused mess a mechanics trying to make everyone happy..

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By your definition, wow and diablo are great games in their current form.

I'm not sure what you mean? I never said the best games are the ones that sell the most copies. I don't think either WoW or Diablo currently are bad games but once upon a time WoW was one of the best games in the world, Diablo 2 was one of the best games in the world.

WoW has fallen from grace, as the company behind it is more focused on using tactics to try and keep people playing.
Diablo 3 was initially bad due to greed (RMAH etc.), I actually quite like the original concept of Inferno. RoS on release was quite frankly a masterpiece. But then people wanted more power, easier drops, infinite level scaling and by catering to these needs we end up with the D3 we have today. Where gear is overshadowed by XP grinding, where you get your full set in 1 day.

I can only speak from personal experience, but every game I have played that I have truly loved was when the devs were making the game they wanted to make and I have seen time and time again where these images have been warped by either corperate greed or simply a desire to fulfill everyones requests. The very thing they think they are doing to retain players is what makes them all leave because once your goal becomes "keep as many players as possible, make as much money" instead of "make the best game we can make" your game is doomed to fail.

[MoanaLisa]

But when the game has been the way it has for 5+ years, maybe its time to move on. I've been hearing wow is dying since 2004.

A good portion of that five years has been BfA and Shadowlands. Tell me that another five years of the "game being that way" is the best forward path. I never said or even implied that WoW is dying. It's doing fine. It could do even better if it provided an engaging and long-term end game for players who don't do M+ or raid. Why so afraid of change?

[arkanon]

Why so afraid of change?

The same question could be asked of those...........requesting changes to the current model?

[MoanaLisa]

The same question could be asked of those...........requesting changes to the current model?

Don't think so. How does advocating change square with being afraid of it? That doesn't make any sense.

[arkanon]

Don't think so. How does advocating change square with being afraid of it? That doesn't make any sense.

Because you are afraid of the changes that have been made - you said yourself (or at least agreed) the changes have only been over the last 5 years - change is good, isnt it?. You are also making a huge assumption that the changes you suggest, which none of you can even agree on, would be good for the game overall.

What it really sounds like is "change is good, you shouldn't be afraid of change. Except for those changes they made 5 years ago. Just changes I personally want, those should be made, and anyone who doesn't agree is afraid of change. Not me though, change is good!!!! Except those changes they made half a decade ago, I don't like those"

[munkeyinorbit]

More like "New content that people will go 'Ooooo' at for 10 minutes then forget it exists"

Blizzard needs to create activities for non raiders to do. If someone doesn't want to play PvP, raiding, or M+ then they quit the game, because there's nothing beyond mount and pet collecting after that point.

Many people often say they don't care about Blizzard making content other than raiding, but healthy MMO communities are made up of players who do all sorts of things. And yes, 95% of Blizzard's player base could be casual players if they had casual content to keep them engaged. But there isn't. So they don't.

But they have added non instanced content. You just refuse to see it.

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It's true. No one is saying that. What some are asking for is a more rewarding and interesting end game for players who, for whatever reason, cannot raid or do not have the skills to do high-level M+. It's not a huge ask. Despite the questions about whether or not Hazzikostas and his team can deliver such a thing it's good business to maximize the time that players who buy expansions stay around for.

What would that look like for you. Waving your hands and saying more rewarding and interesting game play for users means nothing. M+ hasn't had any substantial new content since 9.0. Raids get around 10 bosses every 6 months. The world gets at least 100 new quests every patch. That's a lot more story and more interesting than a raid. Or are you actually trying to disguise "where's my mythic level loot" as a request for more rewarding gameplay?

[arkanon]

But they have added non instanced content. You just refuse to see it.

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What would that look like for you. Waving your hands and saying more rewarding and interesting game play for users means nothing. M+ hasn't had any substantial new content since 9.0. Raids get around 10 bosses every 6 months. The world gets at least 100 new quests every patch. That's a lot more story and more interesting than a raid. Or are you actually trying to disguise "where's my mythic level loot" as a request for more rewarding gameplay?

Considering how casual friendly SL was, from a loot power perspective, I honestly don't think some people will stop their crusade until they can literally get mythic raid loot for farming a few WQ per day. Then they will realise if everyone is powerful, noone is powerful, and that will be that.

I don't remember a time in wows history, outside of some prepatches or final patches months after the final raid was done, when players had access to gear of such a high quality compared to raid and pvp gear. Still not enough.

[munkeyinorbit]

And what was taken away? Dungeons, battlegrounds, professions, reputations.... All of those things were rendered pointless for progression for casual players. It was replaced with fucking world quests and other horseshit, time gated farming.

Did you miss the mega dungeons? Did you miss the new reputations? Did you miss the new recipies? It's like you don't even play the game at all and haven't since wod.

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Glad to know you are content with the non-raiders having the leftovers while the "superior beings" that are raiders, enjoy full access to the game while artificially gating others from it too.

Are you on a different sub? What sort of price is the sub where you don't have access to any organised content because I would prefer to pay less to have heroic raiding up and pvp content removed. Or are you just lying again.

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Blizzard needs to create content that isn't raids, dungeons, or pvp.

I'm 1000% serious on this. "Casual" players don't really want easy raids. Easy raids are just a ride at a theme park that you do a couple of times then get bored of. LFR, for all its controversy, was probably one of the most useless tools in player retention overall. It does nothing for more serious raiders, and casual players only ride it a few times before they're bored of it. Most only do it once. I realize that WoW is "raid or die" mentality, but you're leaning too much into "die" right now.

Healthy MMO communities have a huge diversity of players. People who participate in one aspect of the game, people who participate in another, etc. I've had guilds where all of us did somewhat different things. But we were friends who came together and had fun together in a shared space. Some were casual, some were hardcore. Some were raiders, some were not.

You remove all of those players who don't want to raid, dungeon, or pvp? You're left with a dead game, because most of the higher end raiders, aside from WFR, clear the raid then don't log in for the next 8 months. Either that or or they're a midcore raid and they raid every week, but even then they really only log on to do daily grind. If they didn't have the daily grind and consumables to farm for, most of them would only log in for raid (Source: entire experience of vanilla through MoP)

Player communities are insanely important to the health of an MMO going forward. Blizzard could develop tools to promote communities again. They could focus some of their energy on cool stuff to do that anyone can do. Fun and exciting group content that's repeatable, that gives you a reason to log on and play outside of your raid obsession.

But I get the feeling they're just going to make this expansion all about raids, dungeons and pvp like they always do, then wonder why their revenue is way way down. That and I get the feeling that most of the toxic parts of the community have been distilled down and concentrated into WoW, as most of the people are leaving for other games where you can't be toxic.

Maybe they should create a new zone with over 100 quests with treasures and progression through gear and a world boss and rares and an upgrade system and dailies and a reputation and world quests and optional world pvp and lore...

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No you can't. I basically got everything i was even remotely interested in SL in 2 months. And that included leveling 3 alts. That's hardly "forever".

Yes you can. Just because you got what you wanted doesn't mean there isn't more to get

[arkanon]

Glad to know you are content with the non-raiders having the leftovers while the "superior beings" that are raiders, enjoy full access to the game while artificially gating others from it too.

What on EARTH are you talking about? Seriously this is so, SO delusional. CHOOSING to do raids does not grant you access to ANYTHING that is not also avaialble to people who CHOOSE not to - its the CHOICE that the player makes. There is no 'artificial gating" there are people forming groups, and you might not get invited if you dont meet their standard. If thats the case, you can gear up to a level never before seen in wows history, outside of prepatches / final patches after the expansion is done, do some LFR, and get into normal.

ACCESS..........holy shit dude, this is next level confusing. Do raiders pay a "raiders sub" and you pay a "non raiders sub" which means you cant physically get in the raids?

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No you can't. I basically got everything i was even remotely interested in SL in 2 months. And that included leveling 3 alts. That's hardly "forever".

So you CHOSE to stop and thats someone elses fault? Back in the day, if i went to the local blockbuster, and rented a movie, i left with one movie which i chose. That doesnt mean blockbuster only had one movie....

[MoanaLisa]

Because you are afraid of the changes that have been made - you said yourself (or at least agreed) the changes have only been over the last 5 years - change is good, isnt it?.

In that case BfA and Shadowlands have been really splendid and quite popular with players. Right?

One can observe change in something over time and make an assessment as to whether or not it's been something good or otherwise. That has zero to do with fear. I don't even know how one comes to that conclusion.

After the endless bitching about the last two expansions this sudden outlook that change might be a bad thing is bizarre.

[arkanon]

In that case BfA and Shadowlands have been really splendid and quite popular with players. Right?

One can observe change in something over time and make an assessment as to whether or not it's been something good or otherwise. That has zero to do with fear. I don't even know how one comes to that conclusion.

After the endless bitching about the last two expansions this sudden outlook that change might be a bad thing is bizarre.

Bizarre? Change is what put you in this situation. And yet you claim that more change is good? You need to acknowledge some change can be good, some bad. You claim the previous change was bad, and also ASSUME your proposed change would automatically be received well. Its just bias, nothing more.

[Yriel]

So you CHOSE to stop and thats someone elses fault? Back in the day, if i went to the local blockbuster, and rented a movie, i left with one movie which i chose. That doesnt mean blockbuster only had one movie....

So it would also be ok to only put in only one m+ dungeon since you can always play it on a higher difficulty and never run out of content to do? And no new raids, too, apparently barely anyone kills the last boss on mythic, there is enough content out there for raiders until the majority did that.

[arkanon]

So it would also be ok to only put in only one m+ dungeon since you can always play it on a higher difficulty and never run out of content to do?

That has absolutely NOTHING to do with what i said. At all. Thats some max tier strawmanning right there.

[stansted12]

I'm very disappointed with whole announcement. No single world about casual and solo players.
Imo Ion again will focus on raiders and make ppl quit fast.

Not unsympathetic to this argument but Wow has always been excessively focused on elitism. If you weren't a raider you didn't see the end of the expansion. F***ing dumb to cut 80% of your players out of that when lore is literally nothing to do with raiding, I suppose at least there is lfr for that now.

But if they changed it so that most people could actually participate in endgame, you'd get asmongold et al crying about how the game used to be difficult and now it caters for special snowflakes who suck etc.

[ellieg]

I'm not a casual player so no quest, to me, is hard. I just want to be clear that I personally didn't use the word 'hard' when describing quests.


I would say that there are definitely some challenging quests back then, like Mankrik's wife. It could be considered easy if you knew where to look. You literally just have to find the corpse and click it and go back to get your reward. The quest itself isn't hard. But it could be considered hard if you didn't know what you're looking for, and it could take you months to figure out where to look. The challenge is in your persistence in exploration, in your resourcefulness to look for clues or answers, and in your own luck. If you're lucky or particularly intuitive or have friends who know where to look, then it's an easy quest. If you don't, then it might be a hard quest. Overall, I call that challenging, because it's a quest that challenges the player to find their own solution. Today, a quest like that would be a marker on your minimap with arrows pointing you the way.

Otherwise, if you are asking what kind of hard content I was doing, the greatest solo achievement that comes to my mind that felt compellingly rewarding is probably getting the Sandstone Drake Archaeology/Alchemy mount, or the Blood Sail Admiral achievement and rewards. Again, I'm not a casual player, so the content I was doing back then isn't reflective of what other people were doing with their time and the content we had at the time. I am more of a power gamer/speed runner type of player, so I cheese my way through content as fast and efficiently as possible.

I enjoyed that style of game too but those things were so long ago. I guess my point is that the game has changed away from that a very long time ago people would be better off accepting that instead of fantasizing about wow returning to that style.

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Yeah but back then it wasn't true. The game started dying in cataclysm, that's when they started to lose subscribers and then it started to accelerate greatly when Ion's design philosophy started to show back in MOP and it's been dying at a steady pace since then.

If its been dying at a steady pace since mop, which was released in 2012, im really not too worried lol

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A good portion of that five years has been BfA and Shadowlands. Tell me that another five years of the "game being that way" is the best forward path. I never said or even implied that WoW is dying. It's doing fine. It could do even better if it provided an engaging and long-term end game for players who don't do M+ or raid. Why so afraid of change?

You talked about ppl saying wow is failing.

My point is im not the one afraid of change. The game changed in a big way years ago and there's ppl on here still not accepting that. Ppl want to go back to how the game used to be and not this "esport driven" style it is now as some refer to it.

If the game changes away from what I enjoy about it, ill simply stop playing it and find a game that I do enjoy. You won't catch me on mmochamp 5 years afterwards still demanding that the game goes back

[Osmeric]

If its been dying at a steady pace since mop, which was released in 2012, im really not too worried lol

I'm reminded of Heminway's comment about the two ways to go bankrupt: gradually, then suddenly.

The game could appear to be doing ok, but declining toward a state where it can no longer sustain sufficient reinvestment. At that point, it collapses.

[ellieg]

I'm reminded of Heminway's comment about the two ways to go bankrupt: gradually, then suddenly.

The game could appear to be doing ok, but declining toward a state where it can no longer sustain sufficient reinvestment. At that point, it collapses.

If i had a dollar for every time someone predicted the downfall of wow, id have more money than the doomsayes think wow is worth.