Put Immersion BACK Into The Game

[Ihnasir]

Hey buddy, go play on a Vanilla server, I'm sure you'd love it there.

[Aurimas]

Extra points for trolling people while having a disclaimer basically saying that you are trolling them.

That said, I do miss some of those things.

[Deleted]

"Immersion"...what a joke. I'd rather have compelling game mechanics. I have way more fun playing Minesweeper than "Immersive/Story Driven" games like SWTOR. If you want Immersion, read a book or see a movie. I play games to have fun. The success of games like the original Donkey Kong arcade, Pac Man, Pong, Mario, and fighting games (e.g. Street Fighter, KoF, KI) has nothing to do with Immersion. I wish game discussions would purge "Immersion" from its vocabulary.

In regards to OP, I would like to see most of whats on the list reimplemented, but not because of "Immersion". There is a lot of mechanics that, since WoW's release, have been oversimplified/homogenized. Complexity is something WoW could use a lot more of since Blizzard has used the last 9 or so years of development to corrode the game down to a grey inedible paste.

WoW is the wrong game for you. MMORPG the last 3 letters stand for roleplaying game, which are based on immersion.

[championknight]

Convenience > Immersion. I'm playing a game, not living a second life. Maybe do this for RP servers.

This, this, this!

Well then, lets ask Blizzard to:

1) Allow you to teleport anywhere from anywhere in the world just by typing in coordinates instantly because flying there even with crusader aura and an epic flyer is not good enough
2) Allow you to respawn mobs when and where you like it because you couldn't wait 1 min for a respawn
3) Allow raid resets to be done as and when you like it because it didn't drop the item you wanted and you want it now now now
4) Instantly become max level any time you like
5) Condense all your tanking/healing/dps rotations into 1 button for you because it is convenient for you to press 1 button rather than do a rotation by yourself or creating your own macro
6) Create a legal Blizzard bot that allows you to do things for you because it is convenient

That would be such an interesting version of WoW........NOT

[KrazyK923]

So, after some recent discussion, it would seem convenience is destroying immersion. So, I would suggest putting immersion back in the game. Just so we are clear, this is my personal opinion. I speak for no one other than myself, and do NOT believe this will ever be seen by Blizz since this is not their official forum. With that in mind, here are some conveniences which need to be removed in order to improve immersion and bring back the RPG feel to the game:

1. Hunters will now be asked to give up a bag slot in exchange for a quiver or ammo pouch.
2. Ammunition will make its return.
3. Ranged weapons will once again need to be ranged. a 10 yard dead zone will be re-implemented.
4. Weapon and unarmed skills will need to be raised separately once more.
5. Hunter and Battle Pets will need to be fed to keep them happy and to prevent them from running away.
6. Attunements and Keys will be added back into Heroics. If you do not have a key, or a party member with one, you are out of luck.
7. Simple Wood and Flint & Tinder are once again needed to make fire.
8. Spell reagents will be re-implemented
9. Flight will be removed from Azeroth but remain in the newer territories to provide more old world immersion
10. Samantha Swifthoof will be returned to the path in Stranglethorn Vale
11. Certain quest mobs will be given their elite status back and will require a group to kill them.
12. Low level dungeons will get patrols once more who will respawn and can come up behind players without warning
13. Guild perks will be removed
14. Mining, Skinning, and Herbing all have a chance to fail when trying and will once again only give 1 item at a time up to a total of 3.
15. All extra Auction Houses, Mailboxes, and Banks will be removed from Stormwind and Orgrimmar bringing them back to 1 each.
16. Warlocks will now farm shards once more to provide a power base for certain spells.
17. Paladins, Warlocks, Druids, and Shaman no longer get special animals and mounts automatically. There is once again a quest chain to accomplish these means.
18. Druids will be reduced to 3 specs which will once again combine Guardian and Feral into the original Cat/Bear combo.
19. Each class Pet will again require a quest to complete in order to learn how to summon their pet.
20. Training is no longer automatic. You must once again visit your class trainer.
21. Pet trainers will be included in the afore mentioned.
22. Dual specs will be removed as you can only really play one spec at a time.
23. Original talent trees will be implemented and everyone will once again be able to tweak their class
24. Rogues will again be making poisons and applying them as they learn them.
25. Paladins will be removed from the Horde as Shaman will be removed from the Alliance. Too much class/faction homogenization.

Ah, the old "Vanilla will make the game better" argument. Let's see...

1.) God no.
2.) God no.
3.) Stupid
4.) Ridiculous
5.) Nope
6.) Fuck no, attunements are dumb as shit. Artificial time wasting is SO FUN AND IMMERSIVE!
7.) This serves no purpose
8.) As a Warlock, you can go to hell with this one.
9.) LOL no.
10.) Who cares, sure.
11.) God no.
12.) No.
13.) Whats the point of this other than to be spiteful?
14.) Dumb and time wasteful.
15.) This doesn't even make sense in your own convoluted fantasy. Cities have more than 1 mailbox.
16.) As a Warlock, fuck off. Shard Farming is bullshit. Always has been.
17.) Hint: We already got them at level 40 for free.
18.) No.
19.) No.
20.) No. This does nothing.
21.) LOL no.
22.) Stupid and no.
23.) The Old Talent trees never allowed customization. It was "Look up online and pick that."
24.) Why? Screw that.
25.) LOLOLOLOL. No.

Thank god they fixed this shit.

[Randomdude17]

I'm sorry but you want vanilla WoW, some stuff like mobs respawning actually break inmersion, removing flight in azeroth too. The old talent trees sucked actually, with the new ones there's more customization, if you can't see that i don't know what to say.

[Toiran]

"*Also, don't take this list too seriously. It was all in good fun. Mostly a farce to show how much things have improved."

This thread has worked perfectly.

[Randomdude17]

"*Mostly a farce to show how much things have improved."

I skipped just that part, darn op, touché.

[Wixwix]

Not happening.

Blizzard has been clear for the last two expansions who they are catering to and what they want to do with their game, and this expansion is no different.

The future of WoW is going to be even more casual than now, even more dumbed down, way easier etc.

[Herecius]

I skipped just that part, darn op, touché.

Part of the problem though is that while it shows how everything has improved so much, the OP is touting all of those things as somehow having to do with 'immersion,' thus painting the idea of immersion in a negative light, when none of those things have anything to with immersion anyways. They're mostly specifically designed gameplay hurdles meant to inconvenience the player in some manner, and Blizzard did a good thing dumping them.

[checking facts]

it's hard to have immersion when story and gameplay diverge so much.

dalaran is now on the alliance, I take a pandaria portal to dalaran and they all seem pretty friendly to my horde characters.

the black dragons of azeroth are practically extinct. I fly over badlands and there are so many black dragons over there from all ages.

et cetera, et cetera.

I miss the time when blizzard would make the story of the game in a way that you could visit an old zone and still feel immersed instead of having to imagine everything in a time bubble, stuck at some point in the past while you seamlessly time-travel around.

[Randomdude17]

Part of the problem though is that while it shows how everything has improved so much, the OP is touting all of those things as somehow having to do with 'immersion,' thus painting the idea of immersion in a negative light, when none of those things have anything to with immersion anyways. They're mostly specifically designed gameplay hurdles meant to inconvenience the player in some manner, and Blizzard did a good thing dumping them.

I love the new talents and transmogrification specially because they boost inmersion for me, my warlock looks like a classic warlock (even wears a bitching pointy hat) and i can choose powerful demons for him for example, that adds a lot of flavor.

[Herecius]

I miss the time when blizzard would make the story of the game in a way that you could visit an old zone and still feel immersed instead of having to imagine everything in a time bubble, stuck at some point in the past while you seamlessly time-travel around.

There has never been a point in the game's history when this has been the case. Westfall was always overrun by Defias, for example.

Moreover, phasing tech means that what you're talking about actually goes on in the more recent zones... Jade Forest is not the same zone that you landed in at MoP's launch, and Krasarang Wilds are now dramatically different along the coastline thanks to the war that went on down there during ToT.

[Randomdude17]

Part of the problem though is that while it shows how everything has improved so much, the OP is touting all of those things as somehow having to do with 'immersion,' thus painting the idea of immersion in a negative light, when none of those things have anything to with immersion anyways. They're mostly specifically designed gameplay hurdles meant to inconvenience the player in some manner, and Blizzard did a good thing dumping them.

I love the new talents and transmogrification specially because they boost inmersion for me, my warlock looks like a classic warlock (even wears a bitching pointy hat) and i can choose powerful demons for him for example, that adds a lot of flavor. I find it sad that some other people want to get rid of these and other quality of life changes.

[Herecius]

I love the new talents and transmogrification specially because they boost inmersion for me, my warlock looks like a classic warlock (even wears a bitching pointy hat) and i can choose powerful demons for him for example, that adds a lot of flavor.

Transmogrification especially is a great immersion tool. It means your character can now actually wear the gear you feel that they should wear, rather than simply wearing whatever is the most powerful, even though in gameplay terms you're obviously still wearing what is the most 'powerful' gear... but with transmog, it looks like your character is wearing their signature outfit, which is cool and makes better sense in this kind of fantasy setting.

[Treeskee]

Surprised "Give us vanilla servers" wasn't on this list >.>

[Deleted]

Well then, lets ask Blizzard to:

1) Allow you to teleport anywhere from anywhere in the world just by typing in coordinates instantly because flying there even with crusader aura and an epic flyer is not good enough
2) Allow you to respawn mobs when and where you like it because you couldn't wait 1 min for a respawn
3) Allow raid resets to be done as and when you like it because it didn't drop the item you wanted and you want it now now now
4) Instantly become max level any time you like
5) Condense all your tanking/healing/dps rotations into 1 button for you because it is convenient for you to press 1 button rather than do a rotation by yourself or creating your own macro
6) Create a legal Blizzard bot that allows you to do things for you because it is convenient

That would be such an interesting version of WoW........NOT

You just went full retard, I want to play a game, I don't want to feed 200+ pets every hour because they hungry, I don't want to click 3 times to get a mining node, I don't want to spend a bagspace for my ammo pouch -> more time flying to the bank 'nd shit, dual spec being removed? Nah, I respec like 2x each hour, don't want to spend that much gold/time traveling/respeccing.

I do agree with some notes on the list, but not with all of 'em.

[ComputerNerd]

Immersion is a personal experience, not something you can simply say is created by a certain feature.
Some people like ground mounts for exploration, some people like flying mounts.
It is about an enjoyable experience, which will vary from one person to the next.

Forced interaction with something a player does not enjoy is not going to make it immersive for them.

Convenience when done right can improve the immersion, can reduce tedious or fiddly aspects that simply get in the way of actually playing.
But in the end it won't suit everyone, so anybody who calls on a certain feature to be a certain way, and against the wishes of other because they deem it "more immersive" is simply being selfish.

[volescue]

S
1. Hunters will now be asked to give up a bag slot in exchange for a quiver or ammo pouch. Yes to quiver, no to giving up bag space... there is no point in that.
2. Ammunition will make its return. Sure.
5. Hunter and Battle Pets will need to be fed to keep them happy and to prevent them from running away. Eh, why not. Might make fishing worth something again.
6. Attunements and Keys will be added back into Heroics. If you do not have a key, or a party member with one, you are out of luck. All for it.
7. Simple Wood and Flint & Tinder are once again needed to make fire. That's fine. Petty, but fine.
10. Samantha Swifthoof will be returned to the path in Stranglethorn Vale Don't remember who that is or the significance, but sure.
11. Certain quest mobs will be given their elite status back and will require a group to kill them. YES.
12. Low level dungeons will get patrols once more who will respawn and can come up behind players without warning Was never a big factor in dungeons except maybe BRD. Definitely add faster trash respawns in raids.
13. Guild perks will be removed Sure to mass res and anywhere guild bank, but the others don't break immersion.
14. Mining, Skinning, and Herbing all have a chance to fail when trying and will once again only give 1 item at a time up to a total of 3. Was annoying, but sure.
15. All extra Auction Houses, Mailboxes, and Banks will be removed from Stormwind and Orgrimmar bringing them back to 1 each. Fine.
17. Paladins, Warlocks, Druids, and Shaman no longer get special animals and mounts automatically. There is once again a quest chain to accomplish these means. Mounts are cheap nowadays, so I am fine with that.
19. Each class Pet will again require a quest to complete in order to learn how to summon their pet. Sure for the first time you play that class.
20. Training is no longer automatic. You must once again visit your class trainer. Seems you never have to go to cities when leveling nowadays. I am fine with this.
22. Dual specs will be removed as you can only really play one spec at a time. But how do I just magically forget everything about healing when I am dpsing and have to go get training in it again? I just healed 2 hours ago! This change is less immersive.
23. Original talent trees will be implemented and everyone will once again be able to tweak their class There has always been cookie cutter specs. Nothing immersive here.
24. Rogues will again be making poisons and applying them as they learn them. Make it more interesting than going to vendor and buying some stuff then.

Please feel free to add to this list. I'm sure there are plenty of immersive type items I am missing.

A lot of the suggestions had nothing to do immersion and thus the reason they were changed to be more convenient. Making a player do something just to do it is pretty lazy game design, and blizzard realized it. Could they have changed some things to make them more interesting? Sure. Things like having a lock farm a couple shards 10 minutes before the raid just so he could make a soul well and summoning stone was worthless.

[Kayb]

1. No.
2. No.
3. Yes
4. No.
5. Yes for hunter pets, but that's excessive for battle pets.
6. Yes.
7. Yes.
8. Yes.
9. Absolutely no need at all. You can't fly until 60 anyway, and by the time you can, you aren't likely to go back to lower zones anyway.
10. Don't care either way.
11. Yes.
12. Yes, and they won't be shortened anymore, like Wailing Caverns etc.
13. Why? There is no need for that.
14. No.
15. No. Again, totally no need.
16. Don't care either way.
17. Yes.
18. Yes.
19. Yes, but not for Hunters.
20. Undecided.
21. Undecided.
22. No.
23. No freakin way, but something that allowed for hybrids to return would be nifty.
24. Yes.
25. No freakin way.