1.3 million sub drop

[Vulcanasm]

http://files.shareholder.com/downloa...ss_release.pdf

Unexpected but understandable.

The biggest problem I see is that WoW doesn't attract new gamers. It repels them. The opposite used to be true.

The difference is that new players start on the 1-60 experience, then ram headlong into the Cataclysm revamp: a disastrously mishandled, ultra-linear rail rider. Then they quit. It's an in-game tribute to itself, whose in-jokes and nuances are incomprehensibly alien to anyone who hadn't played since Vanilla. It's exactly what you'd do if you *wanted* to make the game only accessible to long-time players.

[Example: Does a new gamer care who Mankrik is or how the Banshee Queen makes more doodz? They want a world of possibilities. They get "kill 10 boars. Now kill the crown prince of boars. Now go to the next whistle-stop and do the same again." They go play Skyrim instead.]

Be honest with yourselves...if you had to do the current 1-60 climb more than once, would *you* keep playing? I wouldn't. I leveled alts because I had things left to discover. Now Azeroth feels bland, boring, and sterile. Leveling my Monk, I nearly rage-uninstalled. I *couldn't* do that again. The world, frankly, needs another revamp -- keep the zones that needed reworking (here's looking at you, Badlands, Desolace and Felwood). Revert everything else (Barrens, Tanaris, Searing Gorge, for God's sake Feralas and Thousand Needles).

Very secondarily, Mists of Pandaria is two disparate game systems tenuously linked together: An excellent, better-than-ever leveling game from 85-90, with an endgame that's raid-focused, gear-dependent and demanding. The transition zone is daunting enough to be a dealbreaker -- even to people who did endgame content in old expansions.

[Example: My guild lost several new 90s to this -- people who won the game with us during WOTLK. By that, I mean "Light of Dawn", not "Kingslayer", roughly 200th US/1000th world, and our server's first. The transition is *that* daunting. People who wiped to H LK 25 with me for 4 months found it too tedious.]

The biggest culprits are things even Ghostcrawler admits were flawed: mandatory dailies and double-gated Valor rewards. Those changes were due in 5.1. Changing them in 5.3 is too little, too late -- though, still better than the loot shower of HoT/ICC 5-mans.

That Blizzard feels the need for a gearing guide, and that the guide itself is such a tangled mess, is *precisely* proof of concept. Blizzard needs to do two exercises with that gear guide: (1) make an alternate "gearing plan" that they *would've* adopted if this expansion was released when 5.3 came out...and (2) make that their plan for next expansion. This kind of clumsy, half-hearted ret-con speaks of game-breaking short-sightedness.

[steveyboy]

There are a number of posters who insist that because Cata Heroics were difficult at launch, Cata was exactly like BC.

Lol implying TBC heroics were hard, good one.

[Mawnix]

I don't want to get into game vs game - My full post was just in response to the guy I was quoting saying some "wow killer" would put the nail in the coffin. Rift was merely for a subjective comparison to make my point. No "wow killer" will affect the game for more than a month or two.

Yeah, Rift is great, but the developers seem to have pulled a Cataclysm on us vets for "new" content release cycle. For new players, there is tons to do. Just go download the desktop app from raptr.com, install the app, play the lite version for like 15 hours or so and get a free copy of Rift, expansion, and 30 days. It's worth at least $45 in play time as the game stands now. Don't sub for more than 3 months if you like the game, however. You can check the Rift channel for some vids I made on You-Tube.

Hmm, thank you. I wasn't asking in a game vs game fashion in case that was how it came off. My apologies.

Off topic but usually over the summer, aside from playing WoW, I sometimes delve into another MMO or game to pass some of my free time when I'm not busy.

Thankies!

[Arbs]

If Asia is main point of Sub lose, it will have to eventually stop. lets say US & EU have 2.5 / 3 Mill each that is 5-6 Million Subs. Like even that is still alot. "But that is also half of what we had in Wrath aswell". The point comes that maybe WoW is only successful in the Western Market now & Eastern Market is being taken over by F2P games.

[Duridi]

They shouldn't have had any valor gear whatsoever. It should have gone back to "you run dungeons and get gear and then you raid and get gear."

JP/VP should have been for upgrading ilvl from the start
Rep should have given crafting patterns and transmog gear

My opinion, anyway. Still gives a way to steadily upgrade gear (upgrade 4 pieces of gear = outweight bad ilvl on a piece that refuses to drop), makes dailies more of something to do rather than being as mandatory but still gives lots to do there.

Speaking as someone who has grown old, grumpy and tired, I can agree on that.

Grinding points isn't interesting.

(...and yes, I do remember why the points was added in the first place. I used to be one of those that just couldn't get that one drop I needed even after having farmed all tiers for months).

[Mawnix]

If Asia is main point of Sub lose, it will have to eventually stop. lets say US & EU have 2.5 / 3 Mill each that is 5-6 Million Subs. Like even that is still alot. "But that is also half of what we had in Wrath aswell". The point comes that maybe WoW is only successful in the Western Market now & Eastern Market is being taken over by F2P games.

I'm glad I'm not the only one who realized this from the summary of the financial report.

[DisposableHero]

I can't emphasize this enough. Double Gating with dailies and slow valor accumulation is killing the game for normal players

In Wrath and Cata they lowered the level of commitment required to raid successfully in normal modes. People who didn't raid began raiding, people who raided before spent less time on the game to maintain their success. They filled their time with other things and became accustomed to the less committed schedule. In MoP they jacked up the time requirement again, people didn't have the level of success on low time commitment they had before, they had other commitments, and they unsubed. You can't go back on casual accessible raiding, MoP tried to, and blizzard is paying the price for it now.

[Deleted]

I thought it would be more Well its a boring game these days. Quit myself some months ago and have no urge at all to play.

[Deleted]

Extremely difficult endgame.

5 mans being rewarding.

Epics being "epic" (though I disagree with this 100%).

Lack of dailies.

Dungeon grind for Rep.

No LFR.

LFD had no use unless you were queing up with Guildies, and even then communication was needed in Heroics.

Etc, etc, etc.

old forumla is NO LFD,no flying in Azeroth,difficult edgame(it was kinda hard for maybe few weeks in Cata,untill they nerfed it),epics weren't epics in Cata,adding transmog where everyone has coolest gear ever,can't even see what person has now,25 raids,etc etc

[Mawnix]

You can't go back on casual accessible raiding, MoP tried to, and blizzard is paying the price for it now.

I don't understand this. How have they gone back on it?

That was the purpose of LFR. Even Normal mode is easy once you have the gear for it from LFR.

[MAXCAVALERA]

Did you even read the report? It was EASTERN subs. Asia. The people who have the attention span of an ADD kid on crack when it comes to mmos. Their numbers won't affect our numbers here.

They only people saying "WAHH my server is going to suffer" are jumping on the bandwagon when the see the title and don't read.

Get real , in my server 1 year ago orgrimmar was full packed anytime now its 2/3 /4 guys around.

This happens in most servers.

[docterfreeze]

Is this the biggest drop WoW has ever had in a quarter call?

[Klutzington]

Tbh, servers need to be condensed. There's no reason for there to be so many servers.

[Mawnix]

old forumla is NO LFD,no flying in Azeroth,difficult edgame(it was kinda hard for maybe few weeks in Cata,untill they nerfed it),epics weren't epics in Cata,adding transmog where everyone has coolest gear ever,can't even see what person has now,25 raids,etc etc

Hence why I said the Etc, etc, etc.

I'm extremely glad they added Transmog.

I don't think Flying Mounts have ruined the game in the slightest. I saw it coming a mile away when the hype was building for BC.

Cata tried to go back to its Vanilla roots, and a large chunk of the player base was lost in the process.

Obviously based on your points too, it didn't completely shift back to that era, but it did halfway, and that was enough for millions to abandon ship.

[Jtbrig7390]

I personally feel come the next epac one of two things will happen.

1) The f2p part of wow will change and let people play up to lets say like level 80 so they get hooked on wow.

or

2) Wow will have a Sub/F2p system like a lot of other mmo's do.

The basic pay 15$ to play is no longer worth it when people have so many choice's for the same amount or cheaper in cost. Even tho its not a MMO hell look at PSN if I spend 50$ right now for a year worth of PSN I get 18 game for free and another 12 over the course of the year.

There is so many B2p/F2p MMO choice's out there that is what is hurting wow why pay 15$ a month when you can play something for free or a one time buy.

There is no one mmo that is hurting wow or killing it all of them are doing it because players now have choice.

[Syran]

Expected a drop, not that big though.

Failed design choices take their toll, I think everyone can agree on that and Mists wasn't a savior, it was just the continuation of late Cataclysm model with some sparkles added. And more dailies.

Maybe Blizzard will slowly realize that making the game too easily accessible to everyone and their grandmother isn't so brilliant of a plan after all to keep your costumers playing the game.

[Mawnix]

Is this the biggest drop WoW has ever had in a quarter call?

No. During Dragon Soul the game lost around this much, too. Actually I think it was 1.5 million.

[Szemere]

Bit more than I expected, but still far more than any other MMO. It of course also depends where in the patch cycle this snapshot was made, probably not just after a release. Still a respectable number though.

[Faroth]

Extremely difficult endgame.

Heroics were, raids weren't. Heroics were overtuned. They were ALL Shadow Labyrinth rather than having one or two difficult.

5 mans being rewarding.

Again, overtuned. If they hadn't gone too far, heroics would and should be rewarding.

Epics being "epic" (though I disagree with this 100%).

I see no difference. 1 epic from the last boss in TBC, Wrath, and Cata? Or did Cata do a heroic from every boss?

Lack of dailies.

Dailies were in TBC, Wrath, and Cata. Nothing changed. Ever.

Dungeon grind for Rep.

Never changed

No LFR.

There was no LFR, so how did Cata return to no LFR?

Kinda confused how these are examples of Cata "returning to the old formula" unless I'm misinterpreting something.

[Deleted]

This game keeps losing more and more subs and people think the current Siting SW or Org and play World of Queue craft is actually an improvement. Blizzard may want to rehire the old talent back... Blizzard North, Matt Uelman etc.

Gotta admit that is more fun then playing "World of spamming in chat for healers for 2 hours"