Can we agree that crafted legendaries failed?

[neescher]

Just played a new alt today, after ~2 - 2.5h I was ready to start m+ at ilvl 225ish, played my own key at +2 up to +5 then +8, got a couple small upgrades, sitting at almost 230 now at exactly 4 hours played. Played my friend's +2 (who's sitting at 210 ilvl, so even worse). Created group "+2 new alts", and invited people around 225 - 250ish, so no carry runs. TBH for those low keys you don't need to be carried at all, I was top dps with my shit gear once, and almost top the other times, and we still easily beat the timer for +3... the real advantage when inviting a higher ilvl character for low keys is the guarantee they'll be able to trade if something drops.

I don't think getting to 250-260 within 10 hours played is as hard as I thought, especially if you get a vault in these 10 hours.

But I did send a shitload of Soul Ash and Cinders from my other characters, as well as ~3k gold for gear from the AH and another few k for consumables.

[Mestalis]

To me, it failed, because you literally can't figure out how to do it properly without reading an out of game guide. I don't care about the cost, or the grind, or the implementation, as much as I care that it was so unnecessarily convoluted that I'm pretty sure I still don't understand how it works or why it works that way.

[Uk Lok-Narash]

The only thing I don't like about legendaries is that they are called "legendaries".

[arkanon]

I deleted all my alts and settled for a single character. Life is so much better now for me. I no longer wanted to keep track of all that shit that was necessary to keep my alts somehow relevant/viable. It also made me better at the one class I chose even though I play since 2005. Didn't expect that tbh.

Can I ask why you DELETED them? No offense at all, but was it purely a lack of self control?

[arkanon]

And all that pseudo content Blizz might bring in the future that "incentivizes" someone to play alts or roll toons on the opposing faction... I will just skip that because I don't like such tricks.

I'm sorry, I appreciate your honesty, but to then immediately try and put blame back on Blizzard for creating content like that is..........proof there are some issues on your end. Now, if you are a mythic raider at the higher end, and that incentive boosts power on your main, i can see some issues for sure. But its still not really Blizzard fault, and it certainly isnt a TRICK.

[Lex Icon]

since the arrival of the token anything with a hefty gold price is a big no no for me. i don't play often enough to have a lot of spending gold so whenever i can it get's converted to tokens.

[Niwes]

I realize it was an attempt to step away from the RNG legendaries that we had before, but the way it turned out to be was more a cash grab for blizzard.

Crafters profit is near 0 with all expensive secondary mats needed, while buyers have to be spending anywhere from 40-200k just to be relevant with their maxed leggo slots for one spec. If we start getting into off specs and alts, i think people are easily spending towards 1m gold.

How do average players make that much money? They don't, they buy tokens.

I'm already spending 15 euros a month to play, i dont really want to be spending another 20 euros to equip my must-have gear.

inb4, yeah have fun grinding out that gold with dailies. Nobody got time for that.

Failed, for whom?

When you declare a game part, needed to be competitive, as „20 bugs token ppl have to buy“… well then for sure it’s not a fail for Blizz. I am sure they made a good bunch of profit with that.

For the players, yeah ofc it sucks.

the REAL question is: will it cost more players that are sick of such a greedy game design, and therefore profit, than it brings profit with sold tokens? that’s the real question.

so, let’s look into this. i am also curious about. so let’s do some comparissons here:

lets say, in this moment, wow has 5 players. in the actual 1 year the following happens: 1 player quits, after 6 months, cause of family, old, whatever. but 1 new player shows up in this year, after 6 months and plays wow. lets calc the profits: 12 months of 12 bugs from the non changing 4 players = 576 bugs. 6 x 12 bugs from the leaving player = 72 bugs. and 6 x 12 bugs from the new player = 72 bugs. profit at end of year: 720 bugs.

now lets compare, with a token situation:

lets say, in this moment, wow has 5 players. in the actual 1 year the following happens: 3 players quit, after 6 months, cause of greedy token game design. but 1 new player shows up in this year, after 6 months and plays wow. lets calc the profits: 12 months of 12 bugs from the non changing 2 players = 288 bugs. 3 x 6 x 12 bugs from the leaving players = 216 bugs. and 6 x 12 bugs from the new player = 72 bugs. everyone has buyed a token for once for 1 legendary in that year: 6 x 20 = 120 bugs. profit at end of year: 696 bugs.

same example with 2/5 ppls leaving, cause of token, instead of 3/5:

lets say, in this moment, wow has 5 players. in the actual 1 year the following happens: 2 players quit, after 6 months, cause of greedy token game design. but 1 new player shows up in this year, after 6 months and plays wow. lets calc the profits: 12 months of 12 bugs from the non changing 3 players = 432 bugs. 2 x 6 x 12 bugs from the leaving players = 144 bugs. and 6 x 12 bugs from the new player = 72 bugs. everyone has buyed a token for once for 1 legendary in that year: 6 x 20 = 120 bugs. profit at end of year: 768 bugs.

results:
1 lost player and 1 new player, but no sold tokens: 720 profit.
3 lost players and 1 new player and sold tokens: 696 profit.
2 lost players and 1 new player and sold tokens: 768 profit.

what does this mean:

it means that you can make even more profit, with tokens, even when loosing players. but it also means, there is some fine borderline when it becomes the opposite effect. if you loose 2/5th players, because they don’t like greedy token game design, you still make more profit than having no token. if you loose 3/5th players, because they don’t like greedy token game design, you loose money.

this means:

Blizzards monetization team will steadily adjust their game design to actual situation. because, dependent on the players opinion about it, they will make more or less money. but it also means, per default, even when loosing a specific amount of players, they will earn more money with smart cash grab systems like token, than not. as long as it not crosses a specific line.

so, that’s the answer to the REAL question.

PS:
should add here that legendaries is a smart profit boosting mechanism, at start of xpac, when masses are back in wow. to compensate player loss over the xpacs lifetime (see post below). it’s smart.

[Nymrohd]

One one hand they did not create all the many issues the legiondaries did.
On the other hand, they were a bit boring.

And yeah, they cost too much and the gold cost of the reagents was insane. Definitely meant to drain gold from the economy.

[Niwes]

One one hand they did not create all the many issues the legiondaries did.
On the other hand, they were a bit boring.

And yeah, they cost too much and the gold cost of the reagents was insane. Definitely meant to drain gold from the economy.

ehm, no. definitely meant to support smart cash grab systems. because UNTIL the situation starts to go downhill (see post above), they make absurd profit. 90% of players will buy a token to buy their legendary stuff from AH. means: when wow has 3 million players x 20 bugs from token = 60 extra millions. or at least 24 millions (8 bugs profit, when considering the AH token buyers, that pay their sub then with token, which is a 13 bugs loss). not mentioned the ppl playing different characters in 1 expansion. in short: it’s meant to boost quarterly profit at start of xpac, to push up incomings to get a revenue, that’s fine, even when doing low content over the year and loosing customers.

you can look at it that way: “get 1 extra sub from every player in the first few months of the xpac, to compensate losses, over the xpacs lifetime.“

it’s a rather smart strategy, to be honest, because Blizz ofc knows, when an xpac launches many ppls come back for a few months. they also know they will loose a lot of ppls while the xpac is running. so they grab extra money from the masses at start, to compansate losses in forefront.

the „economy gold drain“ is just a sweet side effect. but for sure not the main reason (because it makes no profit and also just targets maybe 10% players).

[tomten]

This thread is hilarious... You can easily see who the buyers are and who the sellers are...
Understandable, you're making millions and some billions from the leggos...
I've seen the spreadsheets lol...

- - - Updated - - -

the „economy gold drain“ is just a sweet side effect. but for sure not the main reason (because it makes no profit and also just targets maybe 10% players).

Great idea and all but the people making money stop paying their subs and only pay it with gold.

[arkanon]

For you it's not. For me it is. Maybe there is no universal truth. But the Diablo Immortal debacle might open some eyes that had been closed for too long so people are re-evaluating. I am okay with repetitive and even arguably "unfun" stuff if it gets me more ingame power. To an extend. Trying to force me to play both factions to experience the full story (without resorting to offline videos) is just not the way. Calling this proof that I have issues is kinda weak too. I encourage you to be more open minded. Not everybody having a different opinion on stuff from yours has issues.

Edit: Also, that "pseudo" content I mentioned has nothing to do with the reason I now resort to playing one character only. As mentioned, I just can't be arsed to keep an army of alts geared. It's too much hassle and tracking for me personally.

If you dont have a problem, and its not a YOU issue, why did you remove proffs before deleting?

[Olawf]

I think it's just too difficult to juggle all the different systems they implemented. Purge is the word. I kinda like legendaries but would prefer good BiS and talents that varies the gameplay instead.

[Mic_128]

The main issue i have with the legendaries is the gold cost. Regardless of 'everyone can make gold', expensive things are just simply out of reach for the average casual player.

I can tell you right now, as someone who was more towards the casual end - at least in terms of gathering gold - unless the appearance of the Legendary looked amazing, I would pass on spending a lot of gold on an item that would last the expansion, and would rather spend it on something that would be useful forever, like a mount.

[Thunderball]

Miles better than dropped legendaries and all the RNG involved, that's for sure.

[Celement]

Failed for who? I bet token sales went up a good percentage thanks to SL legendaries...

And sl die off rate looks to be one of the worst from what we glean from limited data...

The problem with profiteering ruthlessly is eventually the product suffers to the point of collapse. SL had a lot of things I've not really seen in wow before. Blatantly unfinished raid fights lots of visual bugs and a host of other problems.

I think they are suffering massively from brain drain. The people who made wow so good are mostly gone. People wouldn't complain so much if the game was in a good state but its not.

Hell not even many people are complaining anymore it's just silence...

[Squigglyo]

I can tell you right now, as someone who was more towards the casual end - at least in terms of gathering gold - unless the appearance of the Legendary looked amazing, I would pass on spending a lot of gold on an item that would last the expansion, and would rather spend it on something that would be useful forever, like a mount.

Exactly.

I have raided with players who live 'raid to raid'. Barely able to afford the flasks/food. Probably spent their gold on 'fun' things they wanted rather than saved it for the 'neccesary' unfun things.

And then there are players like me, who have plenty of gold, but still hate to spend it. I sit on about 1.5m but would never buy anything that cost more than 25k.
I didnt get a legendary until a few weeks in, and didnt upgrade for a few more. And that was while raiding/mythic+. Even still, it felt terrible being 'forced' to part with the gold just to play the game.

Gold doesnt equal time. Gold takes time to get, but once you have it, its more valuable to most people than the time spent getting it.

[Tojara]

I think they're boring for sure, but from a gameplay perspective 'lol RNG' was way worse in Legion. See lots of people in this thread loving that design, when all I can remember in guild chat was people saying grats or RIP when one popped up for half of the expansion.

Legendary items in both expansions just boiled down to extensions of your class that could've been rolled into talents. Part of me hates Legendary items for the sole purpose that they take up gear slots, and it's just one less item on loot tables for you to be excited about. This also extended into set items, but the new system they released at the end of SL has me excited for the future of that if they keep going in that direction.

As far as tokens are concerned, I don't know. What I do know is that the base effect is what's important, and that spending an immense amount of gold for the max rank of that particular tier was peanuts in regards to pure gains. Gains are gains though, I guess.

From what I can tell legendary items are removed in DF, but they're revamping crafting completely to critical acclaim by some people. Are people going to be mad when crafters can plop some sick BoE items on the AH that are BiS for your class and you have to spend tons of money for those as well? I remember playing Classic WoW and pretty much anything that DPS warriors would use and could be posted on the AH were incredibly fucking expensive lol.

[MrFrag]

I realize it was an attempt to step away from the RNG legendaries that we had before, but the way it turned out to be was more a cash grab for blizzard.

Crafters profit is near 0 with all expensive secondary mats needed, while buyers have to be spending anywhere from 40-200k just to be relevant with their maxed leggo slots for one spec. If we start getting into off specs and alts, i think people are easily spending towards 1m gold.

How do average players make that much money? They don't, they buy tokens.

I'm already spending 15 euros a month to play, i dont really want to be spending another 20 euros to equip my must-have gear.

inb4, yeah have fun grinding out that gold with dailies. Nobody got time for that.

They shouldn't have forced players to buy base legendary items. It was a cash grab for both Blizzard and crafters. When they have 1st intruduced Progenitor Essentia's , I have sent a suggestion to increase the drop rate of the item. I have also told them prices would be around 100k-200k but they didn't bother. So regular people wasted lots of gold for a must item. So yes it was a disappointment.

The main issue is, they should have never let people to put a price tag to a legendary item. If you let people to decide a price, then you should regulate it by increasing the chance and amount of the crafting materials. It's like a central bank increasing rates to tame inflation. They had the tool but they used it too late. I hope they evaluate market economy much better in Dragonflight. What is done is done, gotta look forward.

[Sosuke Aizen]

I realize it was an attempt to step away from the RNG legendaries that we had before, but the way it turned out to be was more a cash grab for blizzard.

Crafters profit is near 0 with all expensive secondary mats needed, while buyers have to be spending anywhere from 40-200k just to be relevant with their maxed leggo slots for one spec. If we start getting into off specs and alts, i think people are easily spending towards 1m gold.

How do average players make that much money? They don't, they buy tokens.

I'm already spending 15 euros a month to play, i dont really want to be spending another 20 euros to equip my must-have gear.

inb4, yeah have fun grinding out that gold with dailies. Nobody got time for that.

I don’t think crafted legendaries failed; this made some huge changes to some classes and many specs. The materials/time investment for crafters could have been tweaked but solely discussing the failure of crafted legos - they hit the spot.

So much so that they already have quite a few coming back as talents.

[agentsi]

I realize it was an attempt to step away from the RNG legendaries that we had before, but the way it turned out to be was more a cash grab for blizzard.

Crafters profit is near 0 with all expensive secondary mats needed, while buyers have to be spending anywhere from 40-200k just to be relevant with their maxed leggo slots for one spec. If we start getting into off specs and alts, i think people are easily spending towards 1m gold.

How do average players make that much money? They don't, they buy tokens.

I'm already spending 15 euros a month to play, i dont really want to be spending another 20 euros to equip my must-have gear.

inb4, yeah have fun grinding out that gold with dailies. Nobody got time for that.

Can we all agree that when a dumbass making posts assuming everyone shares the same shitty opinion as him is getting old.

Not only that, no one shares your opinion. 18 + pages of people telling you they don't agree, and you're still arguing it. Stop it. Get some help.

Crafted legos were 100% better than going 6 months and not getting the drop for the specific lego you needed for your spec. So its no fucking wonder no one agrees with you.