Flying is finally the way it SHOULD be: Got it right after 8 long years

[Jervaise]

Who cares about flying? Why would anyone care about it? Air swimming has always been and will always be bad for an RPG - though now that it is not an RPG anymore, there is nothing even remotely important about it.

[rrayy]

Yeah Shure, everyone loves the game the way it is. That's why its nearly dead.

Correlation does not equal causation.So thaqt argument needs to stop because it is a very lazy one.

Also, I never said that people love the game the way it is. What I did say is that the majority of people are indifferent to Pathfinder. That means they they don't feel one way or the other.

[Biomega]

Who cares about flying? Why would anyone care about it? Air swimming has always been and will always be bad for an RPG

Why?

What exactly is the problem with it?

[Elias1337]

That's totally fine.

It's also not what's happening here.

Here's what it's ACTUALLY like:

A: "I like the idea of a 5 hour flight vs. a 4-day drive"
B: "I prefer a 4-day drive actually, it's more scenic and you get to experience the JOURNEY"
A: "Cool, we both like different things and we can each do the one we like."
B: "Actually, no. You are no longer allowed to take a 5-hour flight. You will now only have the option to do a 4-day drive and enjoy the JOURNEY."
A: "Wait what, why does my preference get removed?"
B: "Because it made me feel bad. I could still do what I liked when you did what you liked, but it felt bad and so now we all get to do what *I* like and nothing else. And enjoy the JOURNEY!"

Yeah you can do what you like and have fun. But you as many others wont do it. Becouse it would be stupid to put up with such incoviniences.

[Celement]

Correlation does not equal causation.So thaqt argument needs to stop because it is a very lazy one.

Also, I never said that people love the game the way it is. What I did say is that the majority of people are indifferent to Pathfinder. That means they they don't feel one way or the other.

That is your entire argument that correlation is causation..

It's why I asked if you can give some example of positive game play experiences restricting flying does beyond adding dull down time.

The world offers no dangers and mobs don't pose a threat unless they number past a dozen.

[Biomega]

That is your entire argument that correlation is causation..

It's why I asked if you can give some example of positive game play experiences restricting flying does beyond adding dull down time.

The world offers no dangers and mobs don't pose a threat unless they number past a dozen.

Precisely. And even if there ARE tons of mobs, that doesn't mean people actually fight them. Just look at how ZM was before the flying unlock - hordes of people doing their quests by ignoring giant balls of mobs, flagrantly running and kiting them as they loot chests and quest objectives and then scoot. Nobody actually goes "Forsooth, I am besieged by enemies! Let me vanquish them before resuming my quest!".

This romantic notion of you riding across the glorious landscape, cleverly outmaneuvering marauders and ridding the locals of a nest of gnolls as you retrieve the Sacred Relic of XZY is a complete fabrication. Even in Vanilla things didn't work that way.

Travel is a means to an end, and that end doesn't involve killing the randos that you aggro as you go from A to B. Cutting down on the annoying, meaningless, and time-wasting in-between isn't a loss; it's a gain.

[loras]

When Blizz decided there would be no more flying at the start of WoD, a 1200 page megathread lit up the skies as people who both love and hate flying took to the thread and railed on it from both sides. In that thread years ago we said:

- Add faster methods of travel that flight paths. They did it.
- Make the skies dangerous again. They did that too.
- Restrict it to certain zones, but only after the Lore path was finished and not some REP requirements. Did it.
- Add more interesting transport systems. Done.
- Introduce new flight systems without so much looping. Mostly done.
- Add some ground mounts, but allow most mounts to fly. Did it.
- Remove Pathfinder and ease up with the rep requirements. Done again.

While I know the anti-flight group claims it "ruins the game", I would bet a month's salary they are using flight for dailies, world bosses, rare hunting, and more. So thanks Blizz for actually paying attention and making flight something worth having again, and slow rolling it so it didn't interfere with the initial passes through the zones.

What are your thoughts? Did they get it right? Did they do well enough leaving flight out of Oribos, The Maw, and Korthia? Since Zereth Mortis is essentially the new Timeless Isle, was this the better place to add flight, or should Korthia have been given flight and ZM left on the ground?

I am having cautious high hopes for their dragonriding feature. I hope they roll it out to allold content as well, not as a replacement but as another option. Maybe make it faster or otherwise more beneficial to use to offset the risks associated with more interactive flying?

[Delever]

Lol, that's actually pretty accurate.

No its actually not. This is a completely false equivalence for WoW where the time it takes for you to arrive somewhere where you need to compete for something is interrupted by this while in real life, this is not necessarily the case. It's more like:

A: "I like the idea of a 5 second flight vs. a 4 minute mount walk"
B: "I prefer a 4 minute mount walk actually, it's more scenic and you get to experience the JOURNEY"
A: "Cool, we both like different things and we can each do the one we like."
B: "Actually, no. You cannot realistically choose the 4 minute mount walk because by the time the rare pops in zereth mortis the people flying will be all over the boss and kill it before you even get half way there"
A: "Wait what, why do ground mounts even exist in the first place then?"
B: "Good question friend"

I am not against flying by the way and I think dragonflight is taking it in the right direction but do not use false equivalencies to make an argument.

The equivalent HYPOTHETICAL real life scenario would be you living in Spain and an interesting conference is spontaneously announced in Denmark the next day. You prefer driving your electric car even if it takes longer but the journey is 26 hours and you will never make it there in time so you are forced to use the plane because the conference was structured around the assumption that people would be flying.

[Okacz]

Who cares about flying? Why would anyone care about it? Air swimming has always been and will always be bad for an RPG - though now that it is not an RPG anymore, there is nothing even remotely important about it.

For "Air swimming" - WoW was slightly outdated even when it came out, let alone almost 20 years after release. A lot of the movement is very simplistic, it was designed like that on purpose to keep things both optimized and super simple. "Air swimming" might look slightly dumb, but it literally demands no tutorials, and always works with the design of the landscapes.

As for it always being bad for RPGs, no idea why you'd go for that one. A lot of the best RPGs ever used simplistic solutions for constant mechanics the player needs to deal with, like movement, fast travel or inventory. Just because its overly simplistic doesn't mean it's bad, it leaves room to add complexity to other game systems.

As for who cares about flying - to be honest, most of the OG WoW players who asked for it. Flying mounts were Blizzards best fix to the fact that they wanted to make travel less of a pain in the ass without making the world feel smaller with teleports (which they fucking did anyway so screw me I guess). Attempts to "correct" the "issue" of flying in WoW were made way later on, in WoD, when most of the original developers/designers either already quit or were on their way out, and the new ones didn't have the context for why WoW had this simple form of flying in the first place, so they wanted to "fix" it. Which created a spiral of pathfinding fuckness that was only untangled very recently (Zereth is probably the first zone where this is handled relatively well).

[Myradin]

Who cares about flying? Why would anyone care about it? Air swimming has always been and will always be bad for an RPG - though now that it is not an RPG anymore, there is nothing even remotely important about it.

Morrowind had air swimming and was a fantastic RPG.

[OMGTwitchTV]

Yup, personnaly is the right term here. Personnaly I'd rather enjoy a nice long trip and enjoy my journey, but each his own. Does that makes me "insane" ?

Not especially. I know a lot of people who prefer to drive instead of fly. I mean if the Hobbits had used eagles, the story would have lasted 4 minutes instead of 3.5 hours. Then again, one would think the urgency to stop a great threat would call for thinking outside the box. Flying for me is like ilvl 300+ gear for raiders. We all have our preferences.

[Lex Icon]

the whole flying thing is pretty shit. but it only really matters on pvp servers and now warmode. having it enabled there just makes things worse.

[arkanon]

No its actually not. This is a completely false equivalence for WoW where the time it takes for you to arrive somewhere where you need to compete for something is interrupted by this while in real life, this is not necessarily the case. It's more like:

A: "I like the idea of a 5 second flight vs. a 4 minute mount walk"
B: "I prefer a 4 minute mount walk actually, it's more scenic and you get to experience the JOURNEY"
A: "Cool, we both like different things and we can each do the one we like."
B: "Actually, no. You cannot realistically choose the 4 minute mount walk because by the time the rare pops in zereth mortis the people flying will be all over the boss and kill it before you even get half way there"
A: "Wait what, why do ground mounts even exist in the first place then?"
B: "Good question friend"

I am not against flying by the way and I think dragonflight is taking it in the right direction but do not use false equivalencies to make an argument.

The equivalent HYPOTHETICAL real life scenario would be you living in Spain and an interesting conference is spontaneously announced in Denmark the next day. You prefer driving your electric car even if it takes longer but the journey is 26 hours and you will never make it there in time so you are forced to use the plane because the conference was structured around the assumption that people would be flying.

All wrong. Rares are not a one time only event, like your hypothetical scenario is. The flyer might make it in time, and might not. The groundy might make it, or might not. The flyer might land as it dies, and wait 3 minutes for the next spawn, by which time the groundy has arrived anyway.

The flyer might fly over, no rate, fly off to somewhere else and the rare spawns as the groundy arrives, and the flyer can't make it back in time.

There are infinite possibilities and outcomes based on travel speed, and the actions of the player. But the amazing news for groundies is, there is a fantastic solution to their entirely fabricated and self inflicted "problem".......fly.

[Tentim]

Not blaming anyone or saying if its a good or bad thing - simply stating that a LOT of D3 style systems already have been implemented into wow, and this would be yet another.

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Or, do the one thing the groundies refuse to accept is an option - just do what everyone does and ride straight through them. Groundies like to pretend they have slogged up the side of Everest killing entire armies of mobs, having adventures, and discovering hidden treasure on the way to their destination. Truth is the hit autorun and ran through everything as fast as they can to the top of the mountain. They forgot to equip one of the items to stop them being dismounted, so they got dismounted once, but they just kept autorunning in the same direction for 8 seconds and mounted back up.

True but it's still slower then flying.

[Powerogue]

Flying is incredibly convenient, the issue is how the world is designed almost universally to be played without flying, with the level design, monsters as obstacles, etc, all overridden by being able to go over it effortlessly. I'm very curious how they'll handle the flying style of Dragonflight, but honestly I find my favorite time in a zone to be almost universally when I'm exploring with creative methods from the ground level, like glider kits, that Stormheim/Maw hookshot, mugging the Maw patrols for temporary mounts, stuff like that is neat and makes traveling interesting.

But definitely curious how dragonflight will handle the flight mechanics. If the movement of it is more interesting than just "swimming" effortlessly/safely through the air directly to every objective, that should make a big difference, but it leaves me curious if "convenient" flying will still come back later for people who really just want to max efficiency farm herbs for their flasks.

[arkanon]

True but it's still slower then flying.

If speed is a priority for you, then fly.

[WowIsDead64]

Flying is incredibly convenient, the issue is how the world is designed almost universally to be played without flying, with the level design, monsters as obstacles, etc, all overridden by being able to go over it effortlessly. I'm very curious how they'll handle the flying style of Dragonflight, but honestly I find my favorite time in a zone to be almost universally when I'm exploring with creative methods from the ground level, like glider kits, that Stormheim/Maw hookshot, mugging the Maw patrols for temporary mounts, stuff like that is neat and makes traveling interesting.

But definitely curious how dragonflight will handle the flight mechanics. If the movement of it is more interesting than just "swimming" effortlessly/safely through the air directly to every objective, that should make a big difference, but it leaves me curious if "convenient" flying will still come back later for people who really just want to max efficiency farm herbs for their flasks.

With mount armor ground monsters can be ignored the same way, flying ones are ignored when flying. Blizzard have to add extra crutches to make them more challenging. Like forced root, slow and dismount abilities to mobs. Or just increase density of mobs to remove space for dropping aggro.

Core problem is that this aggro/combat games with "creative methods to bypass them" - is very niche content. But it's forced by Blizzard on all their playerbase. Such design makes this content "not for you" for many players, while outdoor content should be base MMO's content, accessible to all players. It's also one-time content. Yeah, it's more like metroidvania, than MMO. But metroidvanias are usually one-time games. Once you've solved all navigation puzzles - you're done. It turns into speedrun or 100% completion game, that is even more niche.

I personally like metroidvanias, but for me Wow is game, that is about another things. This is problem, Blizzard can't understand. Some ground challenge - isn't only motivation for players to play outdoor content. For me it's about completing quests/dailies/WQs for character progression. Ground traveling is just waste of my time. Ultimate solution - to completely separate fly/no-fly content, like it was back in old times of Wintergrasp and Tol Barad. But such content should be 100% optional! Not mandatory, as Maw is.

But Blizzard are too lazy for it. They think, that they're wasting Bobby's money their resources, when they make something, that isn't ultra-hardcore mess, suitable for super-hardcore ultra-competitive elite players, that will take months and years of grinding to complete it.

It's the same problem, as making game purely for 1% of raid/M+ players. Something like "We make our game for some VIP elite and all others have to agree or GTFO".

TL;DR Blizzard have some syndrome of wasted content. They think, that if content isn't hardcore enough - then it's wasted, as players complete it too quickly and easily. They don't understand, that way too overtuned content is also wasted. Because it isn't accessible for many players. Ultimate solution - to separate fly/no-fly content. But Blizzard are too lazy to do it.

[Tentim]

With mount armor ground monsters can be ignored the same way, flying ones are ignored when flying. Blizzard have to add extra crutches to make them more challenging. Like forced root, slow and dismount abilities to mobs. Or just increase density of mobs to remove space for dropping aggro.

Core problem is that this aggro/combat games with "creative methods to bypass them" - is very niche content. But it's forced by Blizzard on all their playerbase. Such design makes this content "not for you" for many players, while outdoor content should be base MMO's content, accessible to all players. It's also one-time content. Yeah, it's more like metroidvania, than MMO. But metroidvanias are usually one-time games. Once you've solved all navigation puzzles - you're done. It turns into speedrun or 100% completion game, that is even more niche.

I personally like metroidvanias, but for me Wow is game, that is about another things. This is problem, Blizzard can't understand. Some ground challenge - isn't only motivation for players to play outdoor content. For me it's about completing quests/dailies/WQs for character progression. Ground traveling is just waste of my time. Ultimate solution - to completely separate fly/no-fly content, like it was back in old times of Wintergrasp and Tol Barad. But such content should be 100% optional! Not mandatory, as Maw is.

But Blizzard are too lazy for it. They think, that they're wasting Bobby's money their resources, when they make something, that isn't ultra-hardcore mess, suitable for super-hardcore ultra-competitive elite players, that will take months and years of grinding to complete it.

It's the same problem, as making game purely for 1% of raid/M+ players. Something like "We make our game for some VIP elite and all others have to agree or GTFO".

TL;DR Blizzard have some syndrome of wasted content. They think, that if content isn't hardcore enough - then it's wasted, as players complete it too quickly and easily. They don't understand, that way too overtuned content is also wasted. Because it isn't accessible for many players. Ultimate solution - to separate fly/no-fly content. But Blizzard are too lazy to do it.

Every single thi g you said was incorrect. It is startling to me you have this view point.

World content is relevant to people who do world content much like mythic raids are relevant to mythic raids.

Wanting them to be equal would break the game.

[WowIsDead64]

We don't know if they did get it right. We have to experience it first. But yeah, on paper it sounds good to me as well. Also I don't think that new system will replace the current one in total.

Current flying system is a joke (swimming through air). Even when it was introduced back in the day in TBC I disliked it -- only used it as a means of a pause button to safely stay away from mobs while being afk mixing a drink.

I actually also liked the AION flying system where you could only fly for certain amounts of time and you had to make decisions on when to use it. But they managed to ruin that as well with flight prolonging potions that became necessary.

Anyway, looking forward to experience Dragonflight flying first hand.

Yeah, that's, what happens, when there are no pilots amongst devs. Whole flying problem isn't about flying being good or bad. It's about devs, not even understanding physics of flying. Gliding, drag, thrust, angle of attack, alt<->speed trading, etc. Their Cata's Hyjal daily quest "realistic" version flying clearly shows it. And this terrible "flappy bird" version was actually used as excuse for "No flying content" for years.

[Biomega]

No its actually not. This is a completely false equivalence for WoW where the time it takes for you to arrive somewhere where you need to compete for something is interrupted by this while in real life, this is not necessarily the case. It's more like:

A: "I like the idea of a 5 second flight vs. a 4 minute mount walk"
B: "I prefer a 4 minute mount walk actually, it's more scenic and you get to experience the JOURNEY"
A: "Cool, we both like different things and we can each do the one we like."
B: "Actually, no. You cannot realistically choose the 4 minute mount walk because by the time the rare pops in zereth mortis the people flying will be all over the boss and kill it before you even get half way there"
A: "Wait what, why do ground mounts even exist in the first place then?"
B: "Good question friend"

While this has many problems as an analogy (a number of which were pointed out by others already), the most important issue is just glossed over here:

Even IF we just take this at face value (and we shouldn't, see above), there is nothing here that says the consequence should be the longer option over the shorter option. It's tacitly assumed by many flying proponents to just be self-evident - "we have problems if flying and non-flying coexist yada yada QQ etc. AND THEREFORE WE SHOULD ONLY HAVE ONE OPTION: NO FLYING". But that's a colossal fallacy, because it makes an argument by assuming one side of the argument to be superior from the get-go, without proof or reasoning. And this analogy here, however colorful, doesn't solve this either.

With flying, we have A and B, and people can choose whichever they want. If you want to take away either A or B, you better show us WHY - you can't just go "well A + B at the same time has problems, therefore let's only have B".