"World of Warcraft would be 'in bad shape' without embracing the casual revolution"

[Etrigan]

Haha! You've got a name for yourselves now? "The Casual Revolution!!!!!!" That's cute

[Rathnor The Flesher]

You're confusing casuals with bad players.

Casuals are bad players, or at least lazy ones.

[wych]

Casuals are bad players, or at least lazy ones.

Not being able to play 30+ hours a week isn't "lazy", in fact i'd say spending 30+ hours a week on a game rather than real life activities is far lazier.

[Mythrandir17]

"Raid 20 hours week".
I laugh at this casual logic. You people killed this game--it's just happening much more quickly now.
Greg, Chilton, Zarhym and a host of blues have made their stance clear -- they don't like dedicated players. So we left.
I don't even recognize Midwinter's roster anymore. Is Autopsy even still around? Maveros, Vagrance and Greenranger are all very much gone.
I wonder if Dangles still plays.
Obviously Exodus just surrendered to the thick, unrelenting, suffocating mouth-mist of casual orientation.
Point being : we've been leaving in droves since Cataclysm. This is actually bad for your precious casual-inclined gaming environment. I would *absolutely* love to enlighten you as too specifically why that's the case, so please, feel free to ask.
Am I saying non-casuals leaving is the reason this game is hemorrhaging 500k subs a fiscal quarter with regularity? Not quite. I am saying it's a primary factor to the end result, though.
Keep this in mind, my little snowflakes: WoW isn't dead or going to die. But this company needs to accrue increasing amounts of revenue so that their investors, their almighty publisher, and the financial institutions that back their RMAH (coming to a WoW near you in 6.0) continue to have faith in them. Bleeding out 500k subscriptions every fiscal quarter does not do this.
For god sake, they're down to Burning Crusade subscription levels at this point. A sign of the times? Probably. A sign of implementation error? Definitely.
To finish off, I go back to my opening statement. "hardcore raiders raid 20-30 hours a week, aint nobody got time fo' dat".
Heroic Firelands, as an example. We'd spend 2 hours in there to clear it all. 2 hours for the full week of raiding.
How many hours do you people spend raiding?
Don't lie.
Heroic Madness? 3 hours tops. Start to finish.
You all telling me you spend less than two, three hours in LFR? I wonder whom outside of that belief-shell you hide yourself in so vehemently...will believe that.
Also, stop banning bots. You're murdering the economy by banning them. I'd *would adore* explaining that bit of logic as well. Feel free to ask. BG bots are a different story. Kill them all.

[Deleted]

Also, stop banning bots. You're murdering the economy by banning them. I'd *would adore* explaining that bit of logic as well. Feel free to ask.

Really? There is logic in not banning cheaters?

[Rathnor The Flesher]

Not being able to play 30+ hours a week isn't "lazy", in fact i'd say spending 30+ hours a week on a game rather than real life activities is far lazier.

This game wasn't originally made for you, and people who say what this game should be if they wouldn't have played it during vanilla have no right to say so. This game didn't become more accessible because it was the right thing to do, it's because they wanted to draw in a larger market who would not have normally played it to begin with.

[Darmalus]

Everyone seems to hate the hardcore players, but I think every successful game needs a base of hardcore players for longevity. The more casual a player is, the easier it is for them to move on to something else.

Hardcore an Casual are fuzzy to the point of being nearly useless. I consider myself a Casual player, I neither PvP nor raid outside of LFR. But I've been called Hardcore simply because I can devour quests at tremendous speed and remember them well enough to assist confused guildies over vent months later.

[wych]

This game wasn't originally made for you, and people who say what this game should be if they wouldn't have played it during vanilla have no right to say so. This game didn't become more accessible because it was the right thing to do, it's because they wanted to draw in a larger market who would not have normally played it to begin with.

You haven't refuted any point I made at all.

I've played since early vanilla, this game was made for everybody, and if you think developers decide to ignore massive parts of the market you're clueless.

[Mythrandir17]

Really? There is logic in not banning cheaters?

Here we go.
Do you raid? Let me assume yes.
How much time do you spend farming herbs for flasks, fishing for food?
Do you even fully buff yourself? Let's give you the benefit of the doubt and assume yes.
*You* might be willing to shell out the free time to gather that material to raid at your optimum. You know whom doesn't want to shell out that kind of time?
Virtually everyone else.
How do I know this? When the herbs and danaio were cheap, people didn't complain. The people getting undercut got blamed, but that's irony in itself:
Botters don't undercut by 50g like you casual do. We undercut by 2 copper, to keep the profit margins high. You guys go out and get all flustered and "GAH DAH BOTS" and undercut by 50g. In a supreme twist of irony, you harm the economy by getting emotional and zealous.
Doesn't just apply to flasks and food either. Ever level an alt?
Of course you have.
Ever level professions? Blacksmithing, JC? Of course you have. Know what it takes to level that stuff? Of course you do! RAW MATERIAL!
This is the part where some purist tells me "I always go out and farm my leveling profession materials, I never use the AH! My one exception to the general rule proves your logic faulty!". Alright. If you say so.
Keeping things cheap *keeps people playing*. Gold is not hard to get, even without botting. People do not wanna go out and farm mana foil and icecap for 4500 friggin' hours, like the "good old days". Or ancient lichen. Remember that crap? Only reliably spawned in dungeons?
tl;dr : Bots are good! BG bots are terrible. We've appealed numerous times to Honorbuddy to get the BG bot module banned. But the greedy asshole won't do it, probably to his own demise. Is honorbuddy even still around?

[Osmeric]

You're confusing casuals with bad players.

You're engaging in the usual hardcore demographic ad hominem, where players can be dismissed as not mattering if they are "bad" in your eyes.

But that's not how Blizzard will work. They don't value a hardcore player more than a casual -- excuse me, a "bad" -- if they pay the same amount of money.

[Deleted]

Sorry, there is simply no logic in not banning cheaters. Nothing at all, whatever bot they use.

[Pull My Finger]

I am far from an objectivist, but when it comes to MMOs I think it only makes sense that there should be exclusive content for the player who dares. Even the "hard mode" dungeons are cheapened because there's just an easier version of it anyone can do. When I first stepped into the game raid dungeons used to have this almost legendary appeal to them where only true heroes dare to tread. Doing raids and collecting epic gear used to be a thing to brag about and be proud of. Now that anyone can do it, what is even the point. It's like putting an escalator up Mount Everest, you can climb up the hard way, but it won't mean anything.

That's a rather delusional way of looking at things. Why should any developer tend to you in an extra-special way just because for some reason, you think you deserve it? I mean, who are you actually, and stuff? It's not like you're paying for extra service or anything. I mean, don't you understand the nonsense of your expectation? Basically, you would like to see dungeons in the game that for some reason, only a few people are allowed to enter. And who guarantees that you'd even be one of them?

Vice-versa, in order for the game to create that little illusion for you, it would also require a whole bunch of people who don't have access to that particular content by default. They're basically just extras for your own little show. How exactly do you sell that to people?

Understand what I'm getting at? Your whole idea of how the game should be in order to be fully enjoyable to you, by default includes deliberate disadvantage of a bunch of other people. Isn't that completely and utterly childish? Why should anyone listen to that? What is it good for, whom does it serve?

If you can afford a big game studio to make you your personal MMO where you get to play the one and only hero who dares step into the myth-enshrouded dungeon, then I guess it's a reasonable thing to expect. If you don't see any point in playing a game if others also can, well then - the only right thing for you is to go away and do something else. That's not a fault within the game, but you obviously needing an attitude adjustment and a grip on reality. I have to share the highway with other drivers as well, I don't get to order me one of those for myself. You know, if you wanna have a custom-made car, you need to go to a company who is willing to build you one, and it'll cost you.

[wych]

You're engaging in the usual hardcore demographic ad hominem, where players can be dismissed as not mattering if they are "bad" in your eyes.

But that's not how Blizzard will work. They don't value a hardcore player more than a casual, if they pay the same amount of money.

Your point would make sense if I was hardcore, I am not, I have been a casual since TBC.

I raided 3 times a week 3-4 hours and didn't log on much outside of that during TBC yet I still killed Illidan and raided into the sunwell.

I had my best friend who raided 1-2 times a week and his guild got into SSC/Loot Reaver pre-nerf, it was never "required" to be hardcore to see content since vanilla.

[Osmeric]

Your point would make sense if I was hardcore, I am not, I have been a casual since TBC.

So, are you saying "bad" players should be ignored, or not? If not, why did you even bring it up?

[dd614]

Did Vanilla WoW through WOTLK(the high-point in subscriptions) embrace the casual revolution?

[Mythrandir17]

Sorry, there is simply no logic in not banning cheaters. Nothing at all, whatever bot they use.

In a *delicious* twist of irony, your logic is faulty. Not mine / the botters.
They don't cheat.
They use tools you refuse to.
The default response? Cheating is wrong / immoral / unethical.
Bullshit, my previous little snowflake.
Without de-railing this thread, ethics and morals are not static. They're dynamic. They change depending on the person and situation.
Now, back to the topic.
THE REAL REASON most people don't bot is Blizzard administers discipline, typically in the form of a permanent ban.
See what I'm getting at here? You don't "cheat" because it's "wrong", you don't cheat because you might get caught.
If you sit there, with a straight face, and tell me you WOULDN'T want to make 1.3 million gold a week and either buy every mount ever -OR- sell the gold at a bottom-minimum price of ~.50 $USD per 1000 gold to the chinese, I'll re-sub and buy you a plagued proto-drake (BMAH cooperation pending).
It's not actually cheating. You just won't go through with it.
Blizzard labels it cheating, but guess what my beloved snowflakes? Blizzard already sells gold directly in one game, and indirectly sells gold in another (charms of fortune or whatever the hell they're called now in the Asianic online store).
Those directly translate into gold or gear. It's "indirectly" not selling gold or gear by proxy. Nice PR, Activision-imbued Blizzard.
The very people to whom you turn as a reference as to what is "right" or "wrong" are doing the "wrong" thing.

[wych]

So, are you saying "bad" players should be ignored, or not? If not, why did you even bring it up?

See the rest of my post.

You're creating a strawman and assuming my position to suit your agenda.

If you raided let's say 9 hours a week (I assume we can both agree that is casual) and were stuck in Karazhan for (I can't remember the exact length of TBC but i'll say 17 months for arguments sake) that's 612 hours.

If it took you 612 hours and you were still stuck in Karazhan then I really feel sorry for you.

Again the words casual and bad are NOT interchangeable.

Was it harder to see every raid in TBC if you were casual? Yes. Was it impossible? Definitely not.

[Tekkommo]

It was considerted a casual game on release, and compared to other MMOs on the market back then, it was.

WotLK brought a whole new meaning to casual though.

To me casual doesn't mean a bad player, just a player who can't spend endless time grinding.

[MoanaLisa]

It's only astonishing that common sense seems so astonishing when you read it on a forum. It speaks loudly about how distortions get solidified in people's views that then pass as 'fact'. This applies to fans, haters and everyone in-between.

Appealing to the masses is good business. Yep. Players that play a below-average game which should be just a little south of 50% of the players should have a game they can enjoy as well.

You'd never know it reading some of the swill that gets posted as fact in just about any forum you can imagine.

[DarkstarG]

There is also the balance between being not quite hardcore and not really casual, which fits my perspective. We still raid current content, although a bit slower than many other guilds.....but we all have fun and find things to do as a guild. Wow in it's current form allows people with all kinds of commitment levels to play in a way that is fun for them and to me all I see from the OP is blah blah blah blah. Things are good as they are and the only people I hear complaining are the ones that want their shiny unique snowflake. Well.....too bad so sad. Someone else's gear has no bearing on you unless you have an ego problem. If that is the case.....you are the problem, not the other way around.