"No more Grinds" & "Account wide progression" philosophy going forward?

[Venziir]

So the gameplay experience itself is not content. I've never seen someone make the argument that making it easier to play different classes and specs at a reasonable level is the opposite of alt-friendly. Interesting.

And I'm not making that argument either jeesh. My argument is, that when the content is exactly the same, regardless of class/faction then I have 0 reason, to level another class, besides simply getting X class to 70, for the sake of doing do. But since you are so stuck on the concept of gameplay, then I'll humor you. No, the classes simly aren't different or varied enough in WoW, to make the gameplay seem like "major content". A ranged class feels like a ranged class, a melee class feels like a melee class. Some classes are easier to level due to specific elements of their toolkit, and some harder, but all in all it's pretty much the same.

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Were there ever class campaigns in the past? I would not exactly call the SL Covenants class campaigns since it was not specific to any class, granted rewards were better suited to some.

I admit there are no specific Horde/Alliance questlines. But the counter arguments is that unless the player has a high level character on both sides, they will miss out.

I personally found it much more alt friendly in that I do not have to repeat the same level process once it is done once. The dragon flying is also unlocked for all chars including all the points so alts does not need to redo the same process.

Nor did I call Covenants campaigns class campaigns. But there were still 4 of them, which - until later in SL - meant that if I wanted to play those; I'd have to level four characters. Which usually means one main and three alts.

[chiddie]

Nice more of the same because I like the theme way more than SL theme but i unsubbed 2 weeks ago or so.

Again, zero char power progression in open world.

With D3 S28 starting and D4 in 3,5 months, I honestly don’t see me playing WoW anymore apart from occasional popping up next year to go on with campaign.

It took a while but I finally surrendered to the idea that this game will never have a proper solo self found power progression path.

[Yooginava182]

I never forced myself to do content I didn't want to do or grind because "that's what you're supposed to do" so I don't really care about borrowed powers stuff, I liked it BFA so I did it and I didn't like it in shadowlands so I did other things or unsub for a while. I don't think expansion only systems are bad, the class hall thing in Legion was great and engaging. Dragonflight looks good, dragonriding is cool but besides that, it feels very very bland. I also find the professions rework confusing and I prefered how it was before.

So I wouldn't say it's a bad expansion I would say that so far it's ok minus.

The problem with "expansion only systems" is that its wasted development time that never really gets touched again. 1: Class halls. Could've been something that was brought forward. Keeping the class fantasy alive within the expansion even if its just a small side story. Im sure they have devs who would love to simply just make class questlines that are involved with the expansion. 2: Island expeditions. Easily could've been brought forward. SL? Imagine working with the brokers to go off to the different realms of the afterlives that they said were there but we never visited and instead of the objective being Azerite, be gathering souls or information about the lore. 3: Warfronts. This could've been a great PVP adaption / mix into it. Plenty of options to choose from to make a warfront out of. Maw vs Covenants for SL / Dragonflights vs the primilist. 4: Torghast. Its seems like they are bringing this system forward with the 10.0.7 patch with the different caverns on the Forbidden reach. Point is: All great content that demanded a lot of their time a resources that just instantly gets left behind with no extra love or dev time to really bring it to life.

All this does is add to the QOL features to the game that can continue to expand and grow for all types of players. 1: Class hall for the casuals (Mostly just story). 2: Island expedition For casuals / PVP / PVE 3: Warfronts PVP / PVE 4: Torghast style dungeon crawl Should purely be fun and cosmetics for everyone.

[Chickat]

My only.... observation about DF stems from my own limited understanding of professions. I appreciate the overhaul to make them a more compreehensive and long lasting experience, but I'm still a bit all over the place in truly understanding how they work, specifically how to max them. I basically only have mining maxed, whereas BS, JC and enchanting are nowhere near that.

This isn't exclusive to DF, but I think they should cut the middleground approaches and just make reps account wide. If I've maxed them in one character, they're maxed for all. None of this "when you reach X, you gain rep 20% faster in other characters" stuff.

I agree if they can add a meaningful reason for alts to still grind a little rep now and then. Maybe buff the boxes you get from them with even more mounts, pets, gold etc.

[Nymrohd]

Maybe buff the boxes you get from them with even more mounts, pets, gold etc.

Even more? Paragon boxes in DF have no collectibles at all. Just gold and random mats (low quality ones at that). They added a chance at dragon shards and sparks in 10.0.5 but that's it (and it must be pretty tiny for sparks).

[kanagawa]

The problem with "expansion only systems" is that its wasted development time that never really gets touched again.

if it's good for the duration of the expansion it's fine, not everything has to last forever. Like it made sense fo the Heart of Azeroth to have an expiration date story wise, when it's not needed anymore it disapear, I don't think there is anything wrong with that and I don't see it as a wasted development since it was in line with the story during a specific time.

1: Class halls. Could've been something that was brought forward. Keeping the class fantasy alive within the expansion even if its just a small side story. Im sure they have devs who would love to simply just make class questlines that are involved with the expansion. 2: Island expeditions. Easily could've been brought forward. SL? Imagine working with the brokers to go off to the different realms of the afterlives that they said were there but we never visited and instead of the objective being Azerite, be gathering souls or information about the lore. 3: Warfronts. This could've been a great PVP adaption / mix into it. Plenty of options to choose from to make a warfront out of. Maw vs Covenants for SL / Dragonflights vs the primilist. 4: Torghast. Its seems like they are bringing this system forward with the 10.0.7 patch with the different caverns on the Forbidden reach. Point is: All great content that demanded a lot of their time a resources that just instantly gets left behind with no extra love or dev time to really bring it to life.

Yea I agree, espcially for the class halls since the classes remains as we move froward from one expansion to another, players are attached to their classes and it brought a lot of flavour to it, they could have built some kind of housing system related to it or something.
Obviously Blizzard like to try things and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't and its hard to predict exactly was it going to be a hit or not, so the whole wasted ressources thing is debatable. Now the thing I don't understand is why do they abandon a feature that clearly works and players like.

[Venziir]

Even more? Paragon boxes in DF have no collectibles at all. Just gold and random mats (low quality ones at that). They added a chance at dragon shards and sparks in 10.0.5 but that's it (and it must be pretty tiny for sparks).

Huh, didn't even know there were paragon boxes in DF. Which reps do the even affect? Wrathion/Sabellian and...?

[Nymrohd]

Huh, didn't even know there were paragon boxes in DF. Which reps do the even affect? Wrathion/Sabellian and...?

The four Renown reps. Once you max them out, every 7500 rep you get a box.

[Venziir]

The four Renown reps. Once you max them out, every 7500 rep you get a box.

Ah right, I've yet to reach that point with any of them.

[Tentim]

Yea that ain't casual. That's probably all thats left playing wow but it's better to call those people what they actually are. Raid loggers or m+ heroes. Its not clear why you want to design a game to appeal to them but thats what they've done and its harmed the actual casual player base once again.

Because any game with a proper risk reward curve will never appease people who want instant gratification.

They have raid shadow legends. Sometimes it's best we take different paths when we come to a fork in the road.
I mean look at this thread... people are complaining 395 gear isn't a suitable enough reward for mercing some defenseless world rare.

[Accendor]

Good for you that you enjoyed it I guess. But now look from the perspective of someone who didn't enjoy it ... whether they liked it or not they were forced into it or pass out on significant power increases.

... and now you are forced into m+ because there is nothing else that gives you a power increase...

[Sinx]

Not trying to start any flame war here, as I'm actually genuinely curious, for those who do not want to raid, or do pvp or m+, and are asking for further gear progression. How does this look in your ideal world ? It seems somewhat logical to me that gear progression follows a scaling difficulty in a game such as WoW, given that's how it works in all of the group content, so what's the ideal content for you ? Some kind of scaling solo content where you can't trivialize it by grouping with others ? I'm curious why people elect to play a game like WoW if they're not interested in the group content. I mean the game was never aimed towards solo play in the past either.

[kranur]

... and now you are forced into m+ because there is nothing else that gives you a power increase...

Except raiding and pvp ... which are basically the core of this game ...

[Throwme]

I'm curious why people elect to play a game like WoW if they're not interested in the group content. I mean the game was never aimed towards solo play in the past either.

Could it possibly have something to do with them maaaaaaaybe, you know, liking what's possible to do as a soloplayer in the game?

[Grimbold21]

I'm curious why people elect to play a game like WoW if they're not interested in the group content. I mean the game was never aimed towards solo play in the past either.

I think we do the discussion a disservice by not clarifying certain nuances.

Specifically that when we talk about group content, we often do so thinking about tightnit groups of people doing said content, which a lot of people don't do. I'd wager that a great deal of players do group content via the tools the game as available. Dungeons and mythic with the LFD/LFG tools. Same for BGs and arenas now.

I enjoy m+, but I would enjoy it far more if I did it with friends. But doing with randoms is, well, much like going for a group quest, getting in and getting out.

So, outside of guild groups and whatnot, group content is quite impersonal and, personally, that detracts from its enjoyment, so it's no wonder that for some people they'd rather play alone.

[Twdft]

... and now you are forced into m+ because there is nothing else that gives you a power increase...

Primal Storms exist, you can solo grind 359/385 gear for all slots, just the same as you could do in Zereth Mortis etc

on topic: I love it. There is only one thing I miss and that's some kind of catch-up for profession knowledge. Doing all the stuff on one or two chars is alright, but once you have 5 and want to keep up with PK on all of them it gets a bit much.

[Ilookfly]

And I'm not making that argument either jeesh. My argument is, that when the content is exactly the same, regardless of class/faction then I have 0 reason, to level another class, besides simply getting X class to 70, for the sake of doing do. But since you are so stuck on the concept of gameplay, then I'll humor you. No, the classes simly aren't different or varied enough in WoW, to make the gameplay seem like "major content". A ranged class feels like a ranged class, a melee class feels like a melee class. Some classes are easier to level due to specific elements of their toolkit, and some harder, but all in all it's pretty much the same.

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Nor did I call Covenants campaigns class campaigns. But there were still 4 of them, which - until later in SL - meant that if I wanted to play those; I'd have to level four characters. Which usually means one main and three alts.

Someone made that argument. Maybe I mixed you guys up when reading this on my phone. Either way, I think the classes are varied enough to at least offer a different game feel for the content I'm doing. Then again, I'm heavily invested in m+ and to a lesser extent raiding. You're entitled to your opinion tho.

[Nymrohd]

Not trying to start any flame war here, as I'm actually genuinely curious, for those who do not want to raid, or do pvp or m+, and are asking for further gear progression. How does this look in your ideal world ? It seems somewhat logical to me that gear progression follows a scaling difficulty in a game such as WoW, given that's how it works in all of the group content, so what's the ideal content for you ? Some kind of scaling solo content where you can't trivialize it by grouping with others ? I'm curious why people elect to play a game like WoW if they're not interested in the group content. I mean the game was never aimed towards solo play in the past either.

I think people want some kind of progression to be available on the long term. For people who mostly enjoy world content, progression is capped very fast, often within the first month of the season (e.g. with Zereth Mortis people who grinded through that system were capped as early as week 3-4). You are then left doing collection/achievement hunting which can be fairly frustrating without other activities between the wait for some rare to spawn etc.
I'll present three older models that were engaging.
First, Throne of Thunder patch. Valor rewards came to just a tier below max ilvl. Capping Valor actually took some time; you could not do it in 30mins like e.g. the current weekly quest that gives rep and a bag. Valor would buy you a piece of gear about every week and a half. You would get a full set in about 18 weeks so it kept you busy for the better part of the season. Imo this system was ideal in HOW the reward was earned; you could gain Valor doing pretty much everything (even pet battles) but you still needed to play a decent amount of time. Raid loggers capped super fast since raids were very rewarding when it came to Valor so if they wanted to use the system as catchup they could without extending their playtime.
Second, BfA Conquest system. Possibly the best reward track for casual gameplay. You could cap conquest by doing a couple of assaults, picking chests and doing the Nazjatar/Mechagon quests (in 8.1 you had to do most of the assaults to cap). But what was best was the pacing of the rewards. Eight weeks of Normal Raid ilvl rewards and then Heroic Raid ilvl rewards for the rest of the season. You would eventually cap at Heroic Raid ilvl but only far down the season (you'd really only get everything by the end of the season) yet it was still engaging every single week.
Third, Visions in 8.3. A fairly challenging gameplay mode that was available for both solo and groups (like Torghast) but was very rewarding at the highest difficulty levels, albeit affecting very few gear slots (just 5). For a solid challenge your character had a chance at a piece of gear that was nearly at the level of Mythic raiding. That said, the entire mode was definitely frustrating for raid loggers (since they had to do it for many weeks, if not for the gear then to level their cloaks).

Imo a Valor-like track that you have to complete every week, that actually takes a while to complete and rewards dipping your toes in multiple activities (Heroic dungeons, LFR, world quests, maybe world pvp or even pet battles giving extra Valor for the first time you do them per week) that gives you rewards akin to the BfA Conquest track would both be very rewarding for world players, revitalize some modes that people don't do nearly as often (e.g. Heroic Dungeons) and the rewards would be gained slow enough to not really ever be useful to people who raid or do M+ at a decent level.
Now something like Visions, a solo or small group challenge mode that can give very high powered rewards would also be interesting (it could perhaps open a tenth slot at the Vault that is capped below Mythic Raiding/high M+ so as not to compete with them) for a different set of players (those who used to play at a high level yet are not up for it anymore for whatever reason).

[Accendor]

Primal Storms exist, you can solo grind 359/385 gear for all slots, just the same as you could do in Zereth Mortis etc

on topic: I love it. There is only one thing I miss and that's some kind of catch-up for profession knowledge. Doing all the stuff on one or two chars is alright, but once you have 5 and want to keep up with PK on all of them it gets a bit much.

Who tf cares about 385 gear?

[loras]

This is the best expansion:

I level up
I only do the content i enjoy doing
I have everything i need and am not left out of anything related to power
I level up an alt character to enjoy new gameplay, to come back to the content i enjoy doing
I burnout
I play other games
I come back to WoW
(repeat)

This is an appreciation thread from my part, and i think we need one to not go backwards in future expansions...

But what about you? Any problems? Appreciation OR Depreciation?
Am i missing something?

Dragonflight:

I am actually considering playing for my third month in a row.
Hasn't happened since Legion.

Kinda bummed how only solo shuffle is available if i want to gear through pvp, especially since bgs are great, but other than that it's no real complaints from me.