Endgame for Casuals: New Thread with Summary Suggestions for WoD (Updated)

[rda]

Though they aren't other wise 25 Players Progression wouldn't be the one that counts. The more People the more difficult to organize. The more people to progress with together as a guild, the more fun. Small groups and Solo content take that type of fun with a big amount of other Players away from the game. ... Nothing could be more fun to a dedicated raider than raiding with a big amount of players, Progressing through a Raid until you bring down that big, evil Guy at the end of it. ... When I take a look into my Bank I don't see Phat Lewtz. I see the Big accomplishment my Warrior has made back in Classic, by seeing a Full Set of Tier 3 Armor with the Corrupted Ashbringer just next to it. God how we bitched and bickered about who would get those things first. But in the end everyone was fine with the decisions our Leader made.

I said exactly the same - downing a boss together as a team is a reward in and of itself, even if / when you don't get any gear out of it. Many raiders raid because of this. I agree with you.

Noone is suggesting to REPLACE raids with small-group or solo progression content. We suggest that Blizzard ADD that type of content, while leaving raids where they are.

This way those who raid because they enjoy raids would be able to continue raiding, no? The rewards and the amount of skill required would be the same, that's the goal. Raids would have an additional burden to overcome in that they would require an additional effort to organize. But they would also have a huge additional reward which you are talking about above, which is the whole reason many raiders raid in the first place - working shoulder to shoulder with others, feeling that you accomplished something together.

Are you saying raiders need those extra ilvls because if they don't get them, they won't group as the entire working together thing isn't so valuable to many or even most? Because I know that some would stop raiding and some would continue raiding, the point is that those who'd prefer non-raid progression to raids are perhaps genuinely better suited by non-raid progression and those who'd continue raiding are better suited by raids. It's a win-win.

[Odina]

Neither is a progression FOR MYSLEF, similarly to pet battles.

Edited that one for ya! You cannot lump all causals into "what I think is progress / what I belive casuals want" as you only fall into a very small part of the causal population. Just like myself i play 4 hours a week I considermyself casual and I don't want ANYTHING you want and I view pet battles as a charecter progression if I chose to do them as my charecter would have stronger pets if I leveled them and I coudl compeete with others with them. How is being more powerfull with pets if you train them up vs the one that does not do pet battles not equal charecter progression?

[Deleted]

The simple answer is no one does because "Casuals" are not one single group but rather a combination of MANY smaller groups. It's easy to look and go "only 10% raid the rest of the player base does not raid and does not want to". That's fine and dandy now find something that 11% of that 90% all do and want to do and you will find something that can replace raids. As it is now the second largest % of player base is into PVP but as you can tell from teh attention it gets that is less than raids. Untill you can find somethign that a large % of non raiders want to do and actually do on a consistent basis staying subed like raiders do then naturally Blizz will try to funel people into what 10% of it's playerbase is already doing and likes doing as they have to and knwo how to keep that 10% happy!

Harder to come up with and stay ontp of constant progress if you have to do it for Group A that is 6%, B 4%, C 7%, D4% etc etc when you can go "raiders make up 10% and we know how to keep 10% happy so we will make that! However group A is only 6% so we can give it some attention but b,c,d don't like A at all and raiders are just mildly atracted by A.

It's easy to give opinions on what you believe would retain a casual player from a casual personal players POV (like the OP) however it's just a fraction of the casual population that would be into what was posted above so again a good % would feel ignored and right back to square one.

Exactly what I meant with my last post and the "Cycle of Demand". Fractions are Fractions and will keep being Fractions. If one Fraction gets something, the others will still feel ignored, and thus whine the fuck out of every Forum. Now, when the Idea of Reward for this Idea would be taken up a notch to Normal mode, it might as well work, but take away a big part of off the Fraction currently catered to the most: Raiders. Thus it will lead to some of them feeling ignored as well. Whatever Blizz does most Players will complain. At the end of the Day nearly EVERYONE will look like a Special Snowflake, because every Fraction would be unsatisfied except for one. So Blizz keeps with the current Model and caters to the largest of the many little Fractions withing the 2 Factions of Players. Subs will bleed regardless of what Blizz does. So they might as well stand tall and go through with what THEY feel like is best for the Game. Because nothing is truly the "Best" for WoW. There's just always one Option that'll buy the Game some more time.

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Edited that one for ya! You cannot lump all causals into "what I think is progress / what I belive casuals want" as you only fall into a very small part of the causal population. Just like myself i play 4 hours a week I considermyself casual and I don't want ANYTHING you want and I view pet battles as a charecter progression if I chose to do them as my charecter would have stronger pets if I leveled them and I coudl compeete with others with them. How is being more powerfull with pets if you train them up vs the one that does not do pet battles not equal charecter progression?

Because sadly, in the End, you won't stand there, covered in Epic loot. I kinda get the feeling now there is no Passion behind it all.. just again all about the Phat Lewtz.. just covered by some degree of "meaningful" Demand.

[Struggle]

Also, people seem to misinterpreting here.


MMORPG (Read: Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) is defined as, via Oxford Dictionaries, an online role-playing video game in which a very large number of people participate simultaneously.

You don't want to PvE or PvP on massive scales (hence the games genre)? That's perfectly fine. However, this isn't the game for you.

[Lyoncet]

I'm thinking most of the casual-haters didn't read the OP. It was about putting in content and meaningful progression that appeals to people who don't like raiding or WoWkémon. It doesn't even necessarily involve getting free epics. In fact a lot of the suggestions are things that even hardcore players have been clamoring for since MoP (like meaningful heroic dungeons). Not sure why that ruffles so many feathers.

It makes one wonder.

[Deleted]

LFR is endgame for casuals. You don't want to deal with the hassels of LFR? Spend an hour researching your character, another hour researching the endgame raid. There, now you can Flex/Normal.

Are people honestly complaining about this? I understood after Sunwell the casuals having an argument but now you're just whining...

this rofl, I think casuals should really just stop now. Blizzard already stated apology towards hardcore players since MoP has been very casual based. So either accept what they gave you or quit seriously.

It's hilarious really, is like wanting to get rapped by not going to the gym.

[Odina]

. It was about putting in content and meaningful progression that appeals to people who don't like raiding or WoWkémon. .

So don't hate on casuals that don't want to raid while I hate on people that view pet battles as legitimate progression ? I mean why else would you call it "WoWkémon" if not to single it out as something you don't like and belive should have stayed in pokemon and not wow!

It makes one wonder.

[lunchbox2042]

I've never understood why Blizzard caters to the crowd that quits a month or two into the expansion/patch anyway. If anything they should be catering to the players who stay subbed the longest.

[Seefer]

I'm thinking most of the casual-haters didn't read the OP. It was about putting in content and meaningful progression that appeals to people who don't like raiding or WoWkémon. It doesn't even necessarily involve getting free epics. In fact a lot of the suggestions are things that even hardcore players have been clamoring for since MoP (like meaningful heroic dungeons). Not sure why that ruffles so many feathers.

It makes one wonder.

On top of your hypocrisy with the WoWkemon thing, the OP did mention getting raid and heroic raid level gear for the things he mentioned, he also mentioned in another thread getting heroic raid ilvl gear from solo content.

[Lyoncet]

So don't hate on casuals that don't want to raid while I hate on people that view pet battles as legitimate progression ? I mean why else would you call it "WoWkémon" if not to single it out as something you don't like and belive should have stayed in pokemon and not wow!

It makes one wonder.

I have nothing against pet battles having been put in or people who enjoy them. But plenty of people (including me) don't like them. I enjoy Pokémon for its strengths, and I enjoy WoW for lore (well, less, lately) and core gameplay.

I just called it WoWkémon because I like the term. Sorry if that's the impression I gave off.

On top of your hypocrisy with the WoWkemon thing, the OP did mention getting raid and heroic raid level gear for the things he mentioned, he also mentioned in another thread getting heroic raid ilvl gear from solo content.

Don't most if not all of the suggestions involve ways they could ensure non-raid play doesn't just become necessary raid grind or a way of getting welfare epics? Even if not (I read it pretty much first thing in the morning so I admit I may have garbled things), meaningful content ≠ necessarily top-of-the-line ilevel rewards.

[rda]

The simple answer is no one does because "Casuals" are not one single group but rather a combination of MANY smaller groups. It's easy to look and go "only 10% raid the rest of the player base does not raid and does not want to". That's fine and dandy now find something that 11% of that 90% all do and want to do and you will find something that can replace raids. As it is now the second largest % of player base is into PVP but as you can tell from teh attention it gets that is less than raids. Untill you can find somethign that a large % of non raiders want to do and actually do on a consistent basis staying subed like raiders do then naturally Blizz will try to funel people into what 10% of it's playerbase is already doing and likes doing as they have to and knwo how to keep that 10% happy!

The only reason we are saying that we kinda know what proportion of the players raids and what proportion does PVP is because these activities are in the game and are well defined.

Of course, since we basically never had a more or less complete non-raid progression path in the game, we can't say how many players are into that kind of thing. Maybe there is a way to estimate that number somehow with what we can already gather from the armory, maybe there is no such way. Maybe Blizzard have the numbers, they can capture a lot of stats on what happens within the game, not to mention they have that exit poll which was presented to a large number of people who left the game over the years. Maybe they don't have the numbers, but can design a feature that would provide a reasonable estimate. That's up to them.

It just seems that the number of people who are interested in progression, but are dissatisfied with raids, and would like a non-raid progression option is large. Yes, the options in the list in the first post look quite different, but that's only because people are trying to be creative and provide many different options. The gist of all options is largely the same - being able to progress on your own time and schedule, similarly to raids, but in small groups or solo.

What to do with all this is for Blizzard to decide, of course.

[Shahad]

The endgame needs to be more exciting not just for casual players, but for hardcore ones too.

Currently, the only endgame PvE content in the game are the four difficulties of raiding. Dungeons are uninspired and way too easy with gear being as high as it is right now to offer any kind of fun. There is so little damage going out that there is little need for a dedicated tank and healer. Scenarios are not really repeatable content as there is no real reason to run them more than once or twice and they are also so easy they don't require a tank or healer. The Timeless Isle only lasts for so long and is basically mostly a solo grind.

What made dungeons so fun, at least for me, was that they managed to be both quick, have a good balance of difficulty and were very social. The small group made it very easy to chat with other group members and have a good time and often enough some of the members would stay for a requeue, adding on to the social experience. The small group also offered a sense of responsibility as it was much easier to spot slackers or poor players and either kick them or give them a hand. Flex and LFR simply cannot compete with the experience of a good dungeon in that regard. In addition, as a raider, I really don't find much fun in running the same instance I already clear on Normal/Heroic every week if I want any sort of group content.

What I think needs to happen, is having some Normal mode dungeons for the purpose of leveling, which would then have an Heroic version, and then have other Normals for level capped characters, also with an Heroic difficulty. The Heroic difficulties would function similarly to Heroic Scenarios currently do by requiring a premade group (so as to avoid the ZA/ZG situation with LFG), and offer an actual challenge. The level cap Normal dungeons would be a bit harder than what Heroic is currently. The Heroic versions would of course offer gear like it has in the past, but it could offer very good rewards (perhaps just a few ilvls under the current tier LFR) to warrant for the increased difficulty. And then either new dungeons would be introduced every patch, or new wings added to existing dungeons with new gear to keep them relevant. On top of this could be Challenge mode dungeons, though I would like seeing how them reworked, as well as their reward scheme.

I believe such a dungeon-focused progression scheme would make for a much more pleasing endgame for many players as it would be much more varied than the pure LFR/Flex/Normal/Heroic experience in terms of group content, which should always be the focus of any MMO in my opinion.

[Lyoncet]

What made dungeons so fun, at least for me, was that they managed to be both quick, have a good balance of difficulty and were very social.

This right here. For all the bashing that goes on, there are some fundamentals that would benefit both casuals and hardcore raiders would benefit from. This is one of them.

[Thunderball]

Well, two questions I keep waiting for the the answer on. 1) Why do you people need gear if you dont raid? Everything the difficulty of single player content may be based on is execution. And execution is stupidly easy in this game, and gear will make it even easier, efficiently killing any difficulty of the content you might ask for. Gear has never been the main factor for success in raiding, however. 2) How do you plan to make it challenging? There are a ton of ways to make raids harder but in small scale group content or solo the margin for error is very small and it's either massive execution reqirements: VERY long fights with one mistakes equating a wipe or speedruns.

[Seefer]

This right here. For all the bashing that goes on, there are some fundamentals that would benefit both casuals and hardcore raiders would benefit from. This is one of them.

Quick and any form of difficulty other than easy do not go together especially in LFD.

[Vanisari]

This thread makes me sick:
http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...citing-endgame

I don't understand what casuals want anymore. Not only do they have access to watered down raids that are easier than Mists of Pandaria Heroics, but they still want more.

Honestly, when LFR first started, here's how it went:

- The majority of people knew what they were doing but didn't care since they didn't know anyone in the group.
- They would tag the boss then AFK
- They would continue to AFK and refuse to roll on items.
- If they could, then they would hit need on the item.
Rinse and repeat.

Sure, LFR isn't in the best spot now, but I am so tired of people saying "tanks get abused in LFR"... no they don't. The worst part is, every single thread I've seen of a tank complaining has been a tank with no reforges, no enchants, no gems and they usually don't know the fight.

Well no shit you're getting abused, I would kick you too. As a tank, you can't come to a fight and expect everyone to be patient while someone explains the fight to you. You have 24 other people in there who are ready to go and want to get out of the cesspool (raiding lol) that LFR is.

If you honestly think a tank is getting abused in LFR, please join a competent normal or heroic guild. You'll find that your "tank abuse" is far better in LFR than it is in a guild. You see, in LFR, they just boot you and be done with you. In Normal, you've got 9 to 24 other people pissed off because they brought an incompetent tank who didn't know what they were doing. So if you really think you being removed from a LFR is abuse, I urge you to join a normal guild and try your crap there.

Honestly, LFR in my opinion is far more than they should be offering for casuals, but apparently that's still not enough.

Casuals Have:
- Unrated Battlegrounds (and now access to high end pvp gear that anyone can get)
- Pet Battles
- Watered Down Raids That AFKers Can Complete
- Heroics That Take 5 Minutes To Finish
- BoA Gear Out The Bazinga To Level To 90 In A Week

WHAT MORE DO THEY WANT? Good god man.. I honestly hope Rob Pardo and the new team working on the expansion says "sucks to be you all" and does the following:

- Cans LFR: Just removes it completely...
- Brings back some form of attunements
- Brings back CC and challenge to Heroic Dungeons.

If you don't have a couple of hours a day to devote to a MMORPG... then don't pay $15 a month to play a MMORPG.. it honestly makes no sense to me why people who have no time to play the game would continue to pay for it..

/rant

Now proceed to flame me, tell me how your $15 matters, how wrong I am, how LFR is a wonderful tool, how casuals run this game, how I'm an elitist prick, etc.

Yeah! Bring back all the shit that made people quit the game in the first place! We don't need those 7 million casuals!

Who the hell cares what the casuals want? Are you really that butt hurt that some random dude has the LFR version of your heroic weapon? It's like ~50 ilvl difference. It's complete garbage compared to what you get. Who cares?!

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this rofl, I think casuals should really just stop now. Blizzard already stated apology towards hardcore players since MoP has been very casual based. So either accept what they gave you or quit seriously.

It's hilarious really, is like wanting to get rapped by not going to the gym.

MoP hasn't been casual friendly. Remember the rep grinds that required you to log everyday? How many casuals killed heroic sha, Lei shen, or Garrosh, or any heroic for that matter? It's been a nightmare for alts as well, which is something many casuals enjoy. Outside of LFR, they have nothing. Now at least they can do flex.

[Shahad]

Quick and any form of difficulty other than easy do not go together especially in LFD.

Did you not bother to read my post?

[fengosa]

Can we keep the philosophic echo chamber to a minimum? There's already 120+ pages of that in the thread linked in the op.

[Deleted]

Wow i'm suprised by all the animosity towards rewarding solo or small group content. I myslelf am a heroic raider and that's really the only aspect of the game that truly interests me but i can fully appreciate how a wider variety of meaningful endgame content would probably be very benficial and well recieved by a large section of the playerbase.

I think some of the ideas have real merit, to chime in with one of my own:

The warlock greenfire quest has already been cited as being one example of rewarding endgame content, it was soloable so had no time/schedule commitments. It was difficult so required practice and skill to complete. It rewarded, imo at least, a decent reward. Fair enough it was a vanity item to all extents and purposes but i would imagine many saw it as a resonable reward for the effort used to attain it.

With all that in mind how about expanding on that idea and the similar proving grounds by tieing in lesser glyphs. I relaise the reward doesn't allow for character progression but i thought it was at least a nice extension of the green fire reward that could be applied to all classes and be based on a system already present in game.

[Koreche]

Yeah! Bring back all the shit that made people quit the game in the first place! We don't need those 7 million casuals!

Who the hell cares what the casuals want? Are you really that butt hurt that some random dude has the LFR version of your heroic weapon? It's like ~50 ilvl difference. It's complete garbage compared to what you get. Who cares?!

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MoP hasn't been casual friendly. Remember the rep grinds that required you to log everyday? How many casuals killed heroic sha, Lei shen, or Garrosh, or any heroic for that matter? It's been a nightmare for alts as well, which is something many casuals enjoy. Outside of LFR, they have nothing. Now at least they can do flex.

Heriocs isn't for casuals, so saying that was dumb.

The dailys were optional, as a casual raider I didn't even do them until I killed sha of fear normal...

if you are not raiding why do you need the legendary cloak so bad? GTFO it....