Where have all the Raiders Gone?

[Deleted]

Zero prestige left to raiding when you can just gear up in pvp and melt belfs(sorry other players) in the world.Pve gear your stuck to being a recount hero and getting your ass handed to you in the world.
Also i can see it all in LFR without the need to even try.Being a melee in a raid is just a pain in the ass these days anyway with all the flashy spell crap thats ingame now,seriously try raiding as a melee with all the sparlkle crap and see how fun it is.

[Gandrake]

i have more important things to do now, didn't like the expansion

obviously doesn't speak for all players, but many people don't realize how old this game is. back when a lot of us started playing it, we were like 14 to 18 years old. now we're like 20 or 24, have other things to do. for some people, it's just a matter of moving on to bigger and better things.

[Drfireburns]

The content isn't as challenging as it used to be (Vanilla, TBC) but saying it's TOO challenging now isn't an excuse. Personally I agree with others saying "why do normal/heroic when you can do LFR and get slightly lower stats on gear and still see all content"? I'm coming back to the game soon, but I don't have time to commit to a fulltime raid schedule while having a 12 hour a day job and a wife who wants to spend a lot of time together.

LFR is perfect for me. Log on, knock out some bosses, do a few dailies and log out. I'm definitely a casual player now, so it fits my style and schedule much, much better.

[Otimus]

I'm pretty sure the amount of raiders has never been all that large anyways. If you discount LFR, it's probably a bit smaller than it used to be, if you count LFR, it's larger than it's ever been, by about 20 miles. That should tell people a lot of things right there. Most people don't want to "real raid".

[judgementofantonidas]

I'm pretty sure the amount of raiders has never been all that large anyways. If you discount LFR, it's probably a bit smaller than it used to be, if you count LFR, it's larger than it's ever been, by about 20 miles. That should tell people a lot of things right there. Most people don't want to "real raid".

No thread conserning "raiders" is complete until otis tells you "how it is" lol.

[Iso]

People grow up.

I still raid actively, but most of the people I've raided with in the past have moved on, be it jobs, social life or just getting bored of the game after 5+ years.
It's a given, and it will most likely continue to fall for a lil while. It's hard to get into serious raiding, and it's very easy to get tired of it.

[Anathaema]

I like to keep things simple so when raiding made a mess out of my life I called it quits.
For good (I hope!)

no, browsing this forum doesn't make me want to return

[Wælcyrie]

Moved onto other games.

[McCronCronz]

Sorry but LFR shouldn't be considered raiding. Yes you kill bosses, but all you do is stand there and don't even need to know the mechanics. People even afk during boss fights and it doesn't even matter.

[Otimus]

No thread conserning "raiders" is complete until otis tells you "how it is" lol.

Are you denying that is the truth? (at least the first part of what I said, the last part is mostly opinion)

[Nasriel]

I used to raid during Cata and WotLK but I'm finding I have 0 desire in MoP. If I enjoyed the LFR raids I'd be compelled to do them on normal, but I find even LFR a chore these days so I don't even want to consider comitting myself to a guild and having to raid 2 or 3 nights a week

[Eisenstein]

What excellent input! I started this because I was really doubting my approach with my guild. I only play this game to do progression raiding yet I haven't made any progression. Always short a healer or dps and what is scary is you can't find even a close to serviceable pug anymore. Not only that but when you try give some constructive criticism players just leave guild because they are LFR hero's.

This whole situation makes me very sad. I started WoW during the height of ICC when you could literally say in trade what boss you are on and you could find a raid group down to now where it seems WoW is going to become a giant land of matchmaking. Might as well go play Halo since at least I don't spend my whole night on that searching the depths of WoW for the last few remaining people who actually like a good challenge. I say that because PvP makes me vomit in my mouth a little bit.
BOOM HEAD SHOT!

[Noorri]

raiding

• Present participle of raid.

raid (plural raids)

• A hostile or predatory incursion; an inroad or incursion of mounted men; a sudden and rapid invasion by a cavalry force; a foray.
• An attack or invasion for the purpose of making arrests, seizing property, or plundering; as, a raid of the police upon a gambling house; a raid of contractors on the public treasury.  
• (online gaming) A large group in a massively multiplayer online game, consisting of multiple parties who team up to defeat a powerful enemy.
• (sports) An attacking movement.

From Wiktionary.

Sounds alot like LFR to me.... the fact that you don't like it doesn't make it proper raiding.

[Deleted]

Casuals mang.

Facebook Farmville commercial banners for wow.

[HardCoder]

Raiding in WoW is about min-maxing, efficiency, theorycrafting, optimizing ... most people don't want that in a game that they play for fun and to relax.

I am sure that in the early days of WoW, Blizzard never expected that the "efficiency" culture would come to control a segment of its "role playing" game.

[Vantricular]

At the height of Cata my guild had 4 raid groups, a Saturday alt run and a Sunday/Monday RBG team. Now we are having trouble fielding teams on our evening and late night groups. When MoP dropped we had a wealth of players that were frothing at the mouth for a chance to raid. Literally 40+ players on everyday. We figured Fielding 1 team wouldn't be an issue but fielding 3 teams might be difficult. With in the first 3 months we were one of many guilds endlessly spamming trade to find 1 more dps or 1 more healer for raid. I have seen some of the other guilds that we used to compete with going through the same issues.

My main reasoning in posting this is I'd like to know from players, guilds and realms outside of my own if the number of actual people raiding is way down. I wish there was a way to see how many players are actively participating in non-lfr raids on a realm.

Is the only option left to leave mid to low pop realms all together. Maybe join the masses on the high pop realms along with the que time to play?

Like myself, a lot of players have been around since vanilla, and have been raiding for almost 8 years now. Despite the different mechanics of fights, the way the new scenery looks, the way new talents have been implemented..... the whole thing has become pretty stale.

If we are still playing the game, we are PvP'ing, because its funner, more stimulating, and takes so much more skill(then doing the same fights over, and over, and over, and over again. Yes, despite heroics, and different raid comps.)

Straight up, its become a game of who is highest on recount

Screw that. Gimme PvP all day because it actually stimulates the brain

[spectrefax]

Like myself, a lot of players have been around since vanilla, and have been raiding for almost 8 years now. Despite the different mechanics of fights, the way the new scenery looks, the way new talents have been implemented..... the whole thing has become pretty stale.

If we are still playing the game, we are PvP'ing, because its funner, more stimulating, and takes so much more skill(then doing the same fights over, and over, and over, and over again. Yes, despite heroics, and different raid comps.)

Straight up, its become a game of who is highest on recount

Screw that. Gimme PvP all day because it actually stimulates the brain

I actually know quite a few long-term players that have switched from raiding to PvP. Which amazes me with some of them.

Not to derail thread, but I've always wanted to give it a fair shot but never have any PvP gear (and I probably suck more than I think) and I get beat down quite a bit whenever I have tried it. I dunno, the idea intrigues me, but WoW PvP just always seems like a game of stunlock with rock, paper, scissors and I'm always scissors and everyone else seems to be rock.

[Deleted]

Well, i stopped playing 1,5 years ago, then, two months ago, i restarted to play, but this time, i chosed to play only for PvP.

Why ?

-Because i can play when i want, i don't have to be there X days per week no matter what.
-Because it's way more challenging than PvE (I'm not saying that PvE is not challenging, hardmode are probably hard, i'm only saying that no matter the game, PvP will always be more complex than PvE where you have a pattern & blablabla)
-Because i'm tired of dying X time on X boss when i never done any error, and when it's always the same one who makes everyone dying. Many peoples here would say "Kick him from the guild" but ... honestly, you can't kick someone when you don't even have another guy to replace him.

All thoses constraints made me hate PvE.
And now i have to farm LFR (which is boring) to get a gear and enter a guild/raid...

[dlouhys]

I started raiding in T1, became an officer, lead raids for a few tiers and I would like to raid normal+ but I tell everyone that my schedule is what it is. I've sat in for dps the last 2 tiers and gotten invites but when I told the guilds up front they can't bank on my attendance they decided to pass. Completely understanable, and I don't want to advertisement myself as a raider if I have to duck out 1/2 the time.....it's just the way it is.

[RaoBurning]

Where have all the raiders gone, and where are all the kills?
Where's the boss wise Juggernaut to fight the tide of mobs?

Isn't there a Warlock upon a fiery steed?
'fore reset I toss and turn and dream of what I need!

I need a raid guild
I'm holding out for a raid guild 'til the end of the patch
It's gotta be l33t
and it's gotta be ranked
and it's gotta earn loot every night
I need a raid guild
I'm holding out for a raid guild 'til Garrosh's fight
It's gotta be Horde
and it's gotta be geared
and it's gotta be top ten on WoL

Somewhere after maint'ance
In my Orcish fantasy
Somewhere just outside my range
There's a guild looking out for me

Charging through the new patch and choking on dailies
It's gonna take a raid leader to squeeze out my best deeps


Close enough.

---------- Post added 2013-03-17 at 09:19 AM ----------

Raiding in WoW is about min-maxing, efficiency, theorycrafting, optimizing ... most people don't want that in a game that they play for fun and to relax.

I am sure that in the early days of WoW, Blizzard never expected that the "efficiency" culture would come to control a segment of its "role playing" game.

Well, in the earliest days plate had strength and spirit and people were woefully ignorant of the back end mechanics of the game. Add-ons were in their infancy, and Blizzard didn't communicate nearly as often or as thoroughly as they do now. That "efficiency culture" couldn't have existed in it's modern form in the early days. Now, I'm a long time single player-RPG type, so I'm all down with tossing out the junk stats, but generally it's just not 100% necessary.