Why is Exclusive content a bad thing to some people?

[Aquamonkey]

There's actually zero proof that the previous model worked. To quote myself from earlier post in this thread:

The game continuously growing throughout the old model says otherwise. WoW became the biggest MMO on the market using the old model. There was nothing wrong with the old model. Blizzard just wanted to go in a different direction and concentrate the players into the newest tier. There's nothing wrong with the new model either.

[MoanaLisa]

Perhaps it's incorrect to call it ROI but in a very large game that has many moving parts and in which design priorities clearly play a role, content usage matters. There's no point in assigning resources to content that only a very small percentage of players will ever see in a game that has crested in popularity and is now on a glide path to something a bit more realistic in terms of subscribers in a very competitive marketplace.

Dumping resources into something that few people are ever going to see is wasteful. And there's simply no evidence whatsoever that the reason that the game became what it was during the early years is exclusively or even primarily related to raiding.

[ComputerNerd]

How about content that gets completely skipped because Blizzard boosted people past it?

And if blizzard did not provide that catch up, then with every content patch, with every expansion there would be an ever increasing curve on the progression to end-game.
It would benefit long-term players and hurt the play of any new player, getting worse over time.
As old players burned out or got bored, and new player progress died then game would die very quckly.

[vesseblah]

The game continuously growing throughout the old model says otherwise. WoW became the biggest MMO on the market using the old model. There was nothing wrong with the old model.

And that goes into the realm of "Correlation does not imply causation".

There is zero proof that the old raid model worked. Only that there was something done right in WoW which increased subs.

In hindsight it's easy to say that one big something that boosted WoW is that all other MMORPGs launched soon after sucked donkey balls big time.

[JohnBrown1917]

And that's how you end up with washed out artists like Kesha and other bands like [insert misc good band here].


Blizzard used to be a dev that created what they want, with integrity. I understand how a business works. You should understand how operating like a business is why people hate companies like EA or Activision.

I do understand that. But at the moment I actually think blizzard is still doing a good job with WoW(You disagree, but you know, opinions..). But you really shouldn't be surprised a company caters to the customers who contribute most to the profit.

HC raiders get what they want. The normal raiders get what they want, and the non raiders get what they want(well, not all of them). I don't see the problem.

[Aquamonkey]

And that goes into the realm of "Correlation does not imply causation".

There is zero proof that the old raid model worked. Only that there was something done right in WoW which increased subs.

And the old raid model didn't diminish the game in the slightest. *cough* continuous growth *cough*

[KidCanuck]

I never really understood why some players consider exclusive content a negative thing for this game. Lets be frank about what exclusive means. This means content that required a certain dedication to the game, and time commitment. Being able to play well and organize with other players to accomplish legendary feats.

Skip all the talk about TBC and Vanilla being the "least accessible content blizzard created," lets talk about the here and now.

1) Having exclusive mounts and cosmetic items that disappear after the end of an expansion. Why is this bad? Should rewards not be tied to the context of the content they relate to? In other words, if cosmetic and vanity items are rewarded to players who do extremely difficult things like heroic raid bosses, or gladiator PvP, why shouldn't they be removed from the game when new expansions trivialize the content?

2) Raiding with only 1 mode of difficulty, and 1 form of raid. Yes im looking at you TBC. Why is it a bad thing to have this content aimed towards players who are on a higher echelon of playing or commitment? Even though only "1%" (insert any other low percentage from thin air here) of the player base raided, the game substantially grew in subscriptions. What was keeping people subscribing, when they "never got to see end game"?

And please, dont give me "the flair and excitement of a new game" or "the game was new back then" The game is new to anyone who picks it up for the first time even now days.

Last point:

The game is here for you (us) the players to have fun. Now if all you consider fun is "raiding" in whatever difficulty you "raid" in, then perhaps the game would lose your subscription. This is not however the case with World of Warcraft at all. In fact, even though more characters (not players) have seen "end game" content, it is still a minuscule number of people "raiding" compared to the population of WoW. I guess though since blizzard has trained players to think that all end game consists of is raiding, the problem lies in their own court. The real question you have to ask yourself.. what did end game consist of for all those players in Vanilla, TBC, and early WoTLK if only "1%" of them raided?

Because it's a waste of Blizzards limited resources to make content that very few people will ever see. People who don't raid won;t care how cool the new raid is, and will feel like Blizzard hasn;t done anything for them.

[Deleted]

Right now Blizzard has a fine solution to exclusize content, at least with respect to raid mounts. We get a 100% drop on the final boss during current progression, and then a reduced 1 or so % drop chance when the content is trivialized. This preserves the rarity of the mount (for some time) while still giving people motivation to do older content. And to be perfectly honest, if it weren't for raid mounts I wouldn't be raiding.

Who cares about mounts really?

[vesseblah]

And the old raid model didn't diminish the game in the slightest. *cough* continuous growth *cough*

There is no direct link between raids and subs that anybody outside Blizzard would know.

Instead what is known for sure is that raiding is today more popular than ever before which means the current raid model works better. (confirmed in multiple blue posts)

[Alopex Major]

But enough about pet battles.

I dunno about you, but I know waaaay more people who do pet battles than raid. Even LFR-raid.

[Aquamonkey]

There is no direct link between raids and subs that anybody outside Blizzard would know.

So that gives you the proof to claim that the old raid model didn't work? The old model worked just fine for half of WoW's lifetime.

[MathAddict]

There is no direct link between raids and subs that anybody outside Blizzard would know.

Instead what is known for sure is that raiding is today more popular than ever before which means the current raid model works better. (confirmed in multiple blue posts)

This statement is so true. We can only speculate and create opinions off of those speculations. At the end of the day, none of us know unless we work or worked for Blizz.

---------- Post added 2013-06-07 at 04:10 PM ----------

So that gives you the proof to claim that the old raid model didn't work? The old model worked just fine for half of WoW's lifetime.

It does not. However, nobody, without the proper information, can claim that it did work or if it would work today.

[vesseblah]

So that give you the proof to claim that the old raid model didn't work?

It worked at the time when all other MMORPGs were outdated shit in comparison, but the current one works better today. Proof is that raiding is today more popular than ever before.

[melodramocracy]

I have a hard time coming up with a justifiable reason to deny large portions of a game from the people that have purchased it. That's reason enough for me.

I have a hard time coming up with a justifiable reason as well. The good news is that you don't need to, because nothing in this game is technically 'exclusive' outside of store bought pets and mounts. To say anyone is getting denied anything is a bit unrealistic. They might not want to pursue it, but that is a different matter entirely.

Nor are these portions of the game actually large. They seem large, and seem important, because they are what's deemed currently 'unattainable'. This, again, is unrealistic.

Exclusivity in this game is little more than player perception. And what happens is that as a more casual experience is leaned towards (in terms of increased drop rates, shorter times from objective a --> b, less impactful decision making, etc), players simply start demanding more of the same sort of thing. There's no bottom to that particular slippery slope.

[TheTaurenOrc]

Who cares about mounts really?

Exactly, because everyone and their mothers alt have them now.

[fangless]

I do understand that. But at the moment I actually think blizzard is still doing a good job with WoW(You disagree, but you know, opinions..). But you really shouldn't be surprised a company caters to the customers who contribute most to the profit.

HC raiders get what they want. The normal raiders get what they want, and the non raiders get what they want(well, not all of them). I don't see the problem.

Well, I would argue that the previous progression design catered to everyone, while still producing the SAME content we have now.

If you're old enough of a player, you would remember server forums (god, to think I have to reference back to those...), they track progression from the ENTIRE tier. Why? Because it was all relevant. You could have guilds working on Sunwell, the 1%. And you could have players still doing Karazhan, or Gruul's Lair, or whatever. That was progression for EVERYONE, and no special easy modes.

It's hard for a lot of people to grasp ways of being that aren't the current, because they didn't experience anything else.

[Aquamonkey]

It worked at the time when all other MMORPGs were outdated shit in comparison, but the current one works better today. Proof is that raiding is today more popular than ever before.

Then why did you go on a tirade about how the old model didn't work?

[shise]

Skip all the talk about TBC and Vanilla being the "least accessible content blizzard created,"

Ye, it's not even true, it's a lie.

TBC was open for everyone. You could be a hard core raider and be in a top guild (that's top 5 server wise, by then those were the TOP guilds and hard cores could be found even on the top 7-8 in some realms).
Or be a casual raider bellow the top 7-10 but still close, yet a tier lower fighting the other 5 or 6 guilds at that level.

It's fun how with less players we had more competitive 25m guilds


Then people come trash talking how elitist BC was... seriously.

[vesseblah]

I have a hard time coming up with a justifiable reason as well. The good news is that you don't need to, because nothing in this game is technically 'exclusive' outside of store bought pets and mounts. To say anyone is getting denied anything is a bit unrealistic.

Content was actually getting exclusive at the end of vanilla and TBC due to the lack of catchup mechanisms. Game was clearly divided to people who started at the launch (of the expansion) and who started later. Those who started later were effectively denied the content of later patches.

[MathAddict]

Well, I would argue that the previous progression design catered to everyone, while still producing the SAME content we have now.

If you're old enough of a player, you would remember server forums (god, to think I have to reference back to those...), they track progression from the ENTIRE tier. Why? Because it was all relevant. You could have guilds working on Sunwell, the 1%. And you could have players still doing Karazhan, or Gruul's Lair, or whatever. That was progression for EVERYONE, and no special easy modes.

It's hard for a lot of people to grasp ways of being that aren't the current, because they didn't experience anything else.

It did not cater to everyone. A large portion of the player base still did not raid, at all.