Nazjatar Gear - A casual player dream?

[Nikkej]

People thought M+ was a casual players dream too, but we're realizing it isn't sustainable, well, I realized it a while ago.

People realizing they're gonna have to rebuild their IO score every season and every expansion should be enough to kill M+. The power of M+ is how puggable it is, but if people just completely move to IO and in-house M+, it'll kill it. Treated like a god one season, a scrub the next. Getting declined with a really high IO score because your class isn't in the meta (what was the point then?). There is no skill attrition, you don't get worse at the game over time and the mechanics/prefix they add are all the same: interrupt, dodge, soak, use stupid item, etc.
How is that sustainable? Basically you need a constant flow of prefixes and procedural generation and rewards and tiers of loot.

Whatever WoW thinks it needs to do, it's already being done on Path of Exile and Diablo and other games.

Well, that ppl just picka fotm classes and only go after IO score aint blkzzard faults. Thats completely down to The players trying to find ways to minmax their time cus they think whats in a list is allways best for them instead of think for themselves.

Same with people allways picning The 2z trinkets that sims highest. Yeah they sim highest... But ar ethwy The best for you?

[SirCowdog]

Its a fallacy that "raiding" is the only "worthwhile" content. Says who? Cataclysm? One of the worst and complete raid or die expansions?

Then, you yet again disregard my argument of "timing" (unless my english is so bad i dont understand)

Benthic gear chinese farmers will only get this gear LATE into the patch.
We will only enjoy this gear 1 month or less.

Heroic Raiders will have this gear
1) Playing the content they love
2) Much earlier into the patchd.

Where did I say raiding was the only worthwhile content? I simply said that 430 gear was EQUIVALENT to a raid drop iLVL.

And you mention chinese farmers, and yet what will you do with Benthic gear once you have it, if you don't raid or do M+? Farm MORE?

I understand the point you're trying to make with the amount of time it takes to get 430 gear. But what I'm saying is that point doesn't matter because spending time on anything prior to 8.2 content is pointless in light of the existence of 430 gear.

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Benthic gear farm will last months

Doubtful. Gear is not content. Everything that comes along with 8.2 might keep players occupied for a little while...until 8.3 invalidates it all again. A point which you seem intent on ignoring. :/

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If you play the whole time you get each major patch gear at the time that patch is current. Do you really want a new patch that gives you no new gear because your precious old patch gear would be invalidated?

No, absolutely not. What I want is to actually have to PROGRESS through the content in order to obtain that gear instead of just skipping ahead every couple months. I want content which is designed to last and be valid for more than JUST the current patch!

That's a nuanced difference, but a massively important one!

And keep in mind here that I've already stated that having a full reset is perfectly fine when it happens at the beginning of an expansion. That's one the scale of once every 18-24 months. The problem is when it's happening on the scale of 2-3 months.

Now before you go off on me about that, I'm going to clarify and say that I think it's perfectly fine for new content to be RELEASED every 2-3 months. Just get rid of catch up mechanics that invalidate previous content within the expansion.

[Big Thanks]

Where did I say raiding was the only worthwhile content? I simply said that 430 gear was EQUIVALENT to a raid drop iLVL.

And you mention chinese farmers, and yet what will you do with Benthic gear once you have it, if you don't raid or do M+? Farm MORE?

I understand the point you're trying to make with the amount of time it takes to get 430 gear. But what I'm saying is that point doesn't matter because spending time on anything prior to 8.2 content is pointless in light of the existence of 430 gear.

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Doubtful. Gear is not content. Everything that comes along with 8.2 might keep players occupied for a little while...until 8.3 invalidates it all again. A point which you seem intent on ignoring. :/

Wait a second...are you complaining 8.2 content invalidates 8.1.5 content?
Im trying really hard to understand your point...
Every new patch invalidates the old patch. Its been like this for years. Are you compaining about that?

And you mention chinese farmers, and yet what will you do with Benthic gear once you have it, if you don't raid or do M+? Farm MORE?

I will do the same thing a Heroic raider does with his gear once he gets it.
I will be doing the same thing a Mythic raider does with his gear once he gets it.
Why are "we" different?

In my case i will be doing PvP and jerking off to my good DPS in random groups of outdated content.

[arkanon]

Doubtful. Gear is not content. Everything that comes along with 8.2 might keep players occupied for a little while...until 8.3 invalidates it all again. A point which you seem intent on ignoring. :/

This is quite an interesting comment, and one i agree with. I think the pacing of gearing is all wrong now, and that is part of the devalued loot issue. A big part of this is WF/TF, however the issue is bigger than just that. EVERYTHING rewards loot now, and much of it scales to a certain point, and i believe that point is too high.

I personally would like to see a return to a linear, slower paced gearing process - i WANT to work towards items, not complete some mindless warfront and have a 420 thrown at me with next to no effort. Even if i really "try" in a warfront, my effort is barely equal to that of soloing an old wrath raid.

People have been moaning for years about Blizzard invalidating raid tiers each time a new one comes out, and now they have doubled down and done the same to gear. My guild has absolutely no interest in pushing further through BoD progression when we know any gear we get will be replaced very quickly with random WQ shit and RNG drops.

None of us are new to the game - raid team has been together since BC, so we seen some shit. This is the first time we have felt this way. Sure, you can disagree, but you cant change the fact this is how we feel, and we are instead farming the content on alts.

[SirCowdog]

Existential stuff aside, there are way too many variables in this for any of us (and possibly even Blizzard) to make that assessment based on anything more than a leap of faith.

You mention that you don’t like content invalidation and pushing everyone together, which is a valid feeling/complaint. However, as the player base continues to shrink, this becomes MANDATORY for the health of the game. Less people doing the same things, makes it harder to get people to do them with you when someone needs them... which is far more dangerous than easier gear access, because it creates a legitimate perception that the game is dying. Perception is a beast in MMOs... it’s why Blizzard shouted it from the rooftops when the game was doing great, and it came to a dead halt on it when it started to break.

The more subs decline, the faster people will need to be caught up in order to fill the gaps of those that left... it is self-feeding cycle. There is almost nothing capable of changing the course now. Classic is the best hope, but I’m pretty sure that will be all but dead within a year.

It’s going to be interesting to watch though.

I don't agree that it has to be a leap of faith, especially when it comes to observable effects and outcomes.

If Blizzard keeps focusing on disposable content, then it creates an almost paradoxical problem. Players will feel forced to sink more time in order to stay on the bleeding edge, which causes the content to be consumed more quickly. Which, in turn, causes them to run out of content and get bored, forcing Blizzard to release more content more quickly to keep them satisfied. When new content is released it invalidates all the time and effort players spent previously to keep up. THAT causes burn out and lack of interest as players realize there's no point in sinking the time and effort to keep up because they can just skip ahead. But they fear missing out if they don't keep up.

It's a MESS of conflicting interests that isn't sustainable, and I think it's fair to say that the current design philosophy is deeply flawed. I don't necessarily know a perfect plan to fix this, but I do have some ideas. Taking the risk of designing longer-lasting content, and moving away from catch-up mechanics would allow players a more stable environment to invest their time in. Players wouldn't have to fear having their work as badly invalidated, and could pace themselves without having to also worry about missing out if a break of a month or two was needed. It would also alleviate the need for Blizzard to constantly release new content every couple months, burning out their devs.

Granted, the hardcore basement-dwellers would still complain because they live in the game 23 hours a day. But the vast majority of the playerbase would have more substantial content with more depth to spend their time on.

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Wait a second...are you complaining 8.2 content invalidates 8.1.5 content?
Im trying really hard to understand your point...
Every new patch invalidates the old patch. Its been like this for years. Are you compaining about that?

Sigh...I'm not "complaining". I'm pointing out the flaws with the design. Saying "well that's how it's always been" doesn't make it any less of a flaw. :/

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This is quite an interesting comment, and one i agree with. I think the pacing of gearing is all wrong now, and that is part of the devalued loot issue. A big part of this is WF/TF, however the issue is bigger than just that. EVERYTHING rewards loot now, and much of it scales to a certain point, and i believe that point is too high.

I personally would like to see a return to a linear, slower paced gearing process - i WANT to work towards items, not complete some mindless warfront and have a 420 thrown at me with next to no effort. Even if i really "try" in a warfront, my effort is barely equal to that of soloing an old wrath raid. .

Yes, exactly! WF/TF is absolutely exacerbating the issue, invalidating progress on the scale of dungeon to dungeon, raid to raid or, even quest to quest, albeit with random payouts. It is one of the worst things to ever happen to WoW.

[Jastall]

Alright if someone can tell me how killing 10 mobs to get the 5 manapearls in Nazjatar is equivalent/on the same level as killing a Heroic raid boss do let me know.

I mean maybe if those 10 mobs are all raid bosses then sure.....

How's that much different from getting Normal (= current Heroic, more or less) raid and tier gear from badges in Wrath?

It's 25 ilvls below the cap and will probably take a long-ish time to obtain in any case. This is decent gear at best, not great at all, and does not include the most vital slot of all; weapons.

[arkanon]

How's that much different from getting Normal (= current Heroic, more or less) raid and tier gear from badges in Wrath?

It's 25 ilvls below the cap and will probably take a long-ish time to obtain in any case. This is decent gear at best, not great at all, and does not include the most vital slot of all; weapons.

What was the best way to farm badges in Wrath?

[Jastall]

What was the best way to farm badges in Wrath?

Chain-running totally faceroll Heroics. Why do you ask?

[Elias01]

How's that much different from getting Normal (= current Heroic, more or less) raid and tier gear from badges in Wrath?

It's 25 ilvls below the cap and will probably take a long-ish time to obtain in any case. This is decent gear at best, not great at all, and does not include the most vital slot of all; weapons.

Those items were 1 entire tier below current one. Also it isnt 25 itemlvl difference but 15. If you want it compare to wotlk it is like getting normal icc 25 man gear for doing quests in open world.

I am casual. I wanted swap to play warrior tank in BFA. When exp launched i did leveling and 120 i start doing heroic dungeons to be decked as possible i could for mythic dungeons. When i start tanking mythics i learned bosses and my itemlvl was rising. Then first warfront opened and all my effort and time what i put into my character got destroyed. So i start doing casual raiding but when i saw again how i am getting same or even better items by facrolling world q i completly.lost any interest in instanced content and eventualy quit game.

This nonsense that casual players like welfare spoonfeed is absolute myth. You cant be never ever happy or about gear what you earned by luck or becouse Blizzard throw it at you.

[Big Thanks]

Chain-running totally faceroll Heroics. Why do you ask?

The best kind of badge came from heroic dungeons?
The ones that gave 2 pieces of tier?

I cant remember.

[Jastall]

Those items were 1 entire tier below current one. Also it isnt 25 itemlvl difference but 15. If you want it compare to wotlk it is like getting normal icc 25 man gear for doing quests in open world.

It's 15 below Mythic and 25 below the TF cap which is what the best players trend towards late in a tier.

You got 10N gear from badges, here you get 25N-equivalent gear instead. The difference isn't humongous, it's not for every slot, and we still don't know how much time it will take. I'd wager most raiders would be able to pug Heroic and get equivalent gear far faster once Palace is out.

[Elias01]

It's 15 below Mythic and 25 below the TF cap which is what the best players trend towards late in a tier.

You got 10N gear from badges, here you get 25N-equivalent gear instead. The difference isn't humongous, it's not for every slot, and we still don't know how much time it will take. I'd wager most raiders would be able to pug Heroic and get equivalent gear far faster once Palace is out.

How this excuse that people get gear slowly by doing world q is somehow relevant? Nobady cares. You still got it. It doesnt matter how long it takes. If you get it you get it. And doi g raids is far more time consumig than doing few world q so tell me again how are world q slower when raiders have to play play more so their play time is actualy higher?

[Wingspan]

I don't agree that it has to be a leap of faith, especially when it comes to observable effects and outcomes.

Simply put, if Blizzard, with the enormous amount of resources at their disposal cannot crack this code, then we (you and I and everyone on these forums) have no real chance. We use our feelings... we use our limited experiences... and we use logic given what little information that we have... and we make a leap of faith, where we firmly believe something without absolute proof.

I do it to. I, for instance, believe that changing up the flight rules in WoD put us on the road to destruction in ways that you might never even consider. I am sure of it... but in the end it is still my leap of faith (belief without conclusive proof).

If Blizzard keeps focusing on disposable content, then it creates an almost paradoxical problem. Players will feel forced to sink more time in order to stay on the bleeding edge, which causes the content to be consumed more quickly. Which, in turn, causes them to run out of content and get bored, forcing Blizzard to release more content more quickly to keep them satisfied. When new content is released it invalidates all the time and effort players spent previously to keep up. THAT causes burn out and lack of interest as players realize there's no point in sinking the time and effort to keep up because they can just skip ahead. But they fear missing out if they don't keep up.

But what if the market is shifting in exactly that direction? Consume, move on, repeat. The growing market for phone games and quick matches could be the legitimate future of gaming. It is entirely possible that by making these changes that WoW has actually retained a far better player base than they even should have. (We don’t have enough data to know.)

On that topic, it brings up one of the most underrated WoW stats, and we as players do not have a clue about its impact. In a word “retention”. It was easy to look at early WoW and say, “Damn... millions of people here... they know what they are doing”. But did they? It was not uncommon for them to have a net gain of 100,000 subs or more in a quarter back then, but how many were they losing? If they gained 300k but lost 200k, it was still a net gain of 100k... so it looked stunning on the marketing side (bringing people in) but could have been failing miserably with retention.

And that’s the thing... for all of the net loss of subs over the last several years, it is still a mathematical possibility that retention is actually better now than in Vanilla or BC or whenever. And we will never-ever know, because we do not have that data and we never saw how many we lost while we were still getting new people in.

Even scarier, if this is actually true, then there is zero reason for them to change course. Keeping people is a developer job... bringing people in is a marketing job. If the retention is better (which is actually possible), then the developers have done their job and you will be getting more of the same.

It's a MESS of conflicting interests that isn't sustainable, and I think it's fair to say that the current design philosophy is deeply flawed. I don't necessarily know a perfect plan to fix this, but I do have some ideas. Taking the risk of designing longer-lasting content, and moving away from catch-up mechanics would allow players a more stable environment to invest their time in. Players wouldn't have to fear having their work as badly invalidated, and could pace themselves without having to also worry about missing out if a break of a month or two was needed. It would also alleviate the need for Blizzard to constantly release new content every couple months, burning out their devs.

Granted, the hardcore basement-dwellers would still complain because they live in the game 23 hours a day. But the vast majority of the playerbase would have more substantial content with more depth to spend their time on.

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I will agree that it is a bit of a conflicting mess. Lessons that were once touted as learned (example: “bring the player, not the class” and “we don’t release it until it’s done”) are now being tossed out in a full 180 degree fashion. There are clearly some HUGE design philosophies that are butting heads.

[SirCowdog]

Simply put, if Blizzard, with the enormous amount of resources at their disposal cannot crack this code

It's not that Blizzard CAN'T figure it out, but what's in their best interests to do. Keeping players continuously riding a wave of fear of missing out is going to benefit their business model. The problem is that it's not in the players' best interests to run it this way. It's a game being designed by spreadsheet, which results in game systems and mechanics which probably look REALLY good from a business standpoint, but none-the-less result in boring or not fun gameplay.

But what if the market is shifting in exactly that direction? Consume, move on, repeat. The growing market for phone games and quick matches could be the legitimate future of gaming. It is entirely possible that by making these changes that WoW has actually retained a far better player base than they even should have. (We don’t have enough data to know.)

I fully recognize the business value of the mobile market. I think that in the near future, as china increases it's gamer population, we're going to see more and more of that influence. I read a quote that said something like in 5-10 years China will have more gamers than the entire population of the USA. That's just a fact we, as gamers ourselves, are going to have to reconcile.

However, what I don't agree with is turning core PC games INTOmobile games, then trying to sell them to core PC gamers. They're different markets.

It's entirely possible that mobile gaming may be the direction that Blizzard wants to go. However, that needs to have NEW games made for it. Trying to turn WoW into a mobile game for people with short attention spans is only going to kill it.... Unless they can somehow make a version of WoW that runs fully off a phone? I don't know, maybe.

On that topic, it brings up one of the most underrated WoW stats, and we as players do not have a clue about its impact. In a word “retention”. It was easy to look at early WoW and say, “Damn... millions of people here... they know what they are doing”. But did they? It was not uncommon for them to have a net gain of 100,000 subs or more in a quarter back then, but how many were they losing? If they gained 300k but lost 200k, it was still a net gain of 100k... so it looked stunning on the marketing side (bringing people in) but could have been failing miserably with retention.

And that’s the thing... for all of the net loss of subs over the last several years, it is still a mathematical possibility that retention is actually better now than in Vanilla or BC or whenever. And we will never-ever know, because we do not have that data and we never saw how many we lost while we were still getting new people in.

Even scarier, if this is actually true, then there is zero reason for them to change course. Keeping people is a developer job... bringing people in is a marketing job. If the retention is better (which is actually possible), then the developers have done their job and you will be getting more of the same.

I think what we're actually seeing is a move away from retention and into monetization. What I've seen is that Blizzard is focusing more on monetizing the dwindling playerbase rather than attempting to keep existing players, or bring in new ones. Blizzcon ticket price increase, expansion pack box price increase, allied races for more paid race-changes, more store mounts than ever before, gold token along with super-expensive mounts, etc, etc. Frankly, I'm surprised we haven't seen loot boxes in WoW yet(I suspect there's a strong legal reason, probably china-based, for that).

Again, this strikes me as being a result of designing by data and spreadsheet rather than actually considering what designs and mechanics would actually be enjoyable to play.

I will agree that it is a bit of a conflicting mess. Lessons that were once touted as learned (example: “bring the player, not the class” and “we don’t release it until it’s done”) are now being tossed out in a full 180 degree fashion. There are clearly some HUGE design philosophies that are butting heads.

It's not enough to be successful and make a lot of money. Blizzard has to make ALL the money, and I think we're seeing the ramifications of that.

[Wingspan]

It's not that Blizzard CAN'T figure it out, but what's in their best interests to do.

If they could have, they would have... if for no other reason to stop the competition. Because competing games should have fairly similar data (just smaller sample sizes) and they would have used it to crush WoW if it were at all possible to do so. It supports my theory of "too many variables", so I guess I have developed a new leap of faith during this conversation.

Keeping players continuously riding a wave of fear of missing out is going to benefit their business model. The problem is that it's not in the players' best interests to run it this way. It's a game being designed by spreadsheet, which results in game systems and mechanics which probably look REALLY good from a business standpoint, but none-the-less result in boring or not fun gameplay.

Fundamentally, I agree with the "There is too much business in my game" stance. But I am not sure that fear is really affecting people all that much. Honestly, catch up mechanics usually have the opposite affect, reassuring people that it is always possible to return and continue. This was not the case (not easily anyway) back in the days of attunements and linear raid progression... which was why those practices were dropped in the first place I would imagine.

I fully recognize the business value of the mobile market. I think that in the near future, as china increases it's gamer population, we're going to see more and more of that influence. I read a quote that said something like in 5-10 years China will have more gamers than the entire population of the USA. That's just a fact we, as gamers ourselves, are going to have to reconcile.

However, what I don't agree with is turning core PC games INTOmobile games, then trying to sell them to core PC gamers. They're different markets.

True but, as they say, times change. 15 years ago, console gamers were seen as a blight in the world of gaming (by many PC gamers) but one gaming generation faded and the next accepted the changes, so here we are now... watching the exact same thing. Now, dual console/PC gamers are extremely common and often look down on the mobile market as trash gaming. This too, will pass. And the mobile market will fold into the next iteration (I will probably be dead by then, so who knows what that will be).

It's entirely possible that mobile gaming may be the direction that Blizzard wants to go. However, that needs to have NEW games made for it. Trying to turn WoW into a mobile game for people with short attention spans is only going to kill it.... Unless they can somehow make a version of WoW that runs fully off a phone? I don't know, maybe.

I agree with this. Keep in mind though that a ton of PC/Console gaming is already taking steps towards this, so it may ease the transition. PvP games are designed more and more as shorter encounters... Questing games requires tons less time to complete objectives... everything is moving towards a faster experience for gamers in general.

This is not really a bad thing as much as it is a natural progression. A huge part of the lure of gaming over other types of entertainment is the speed and ease to which it could be done. Little to no travel involved, minimal physical requirements, minimal/relatively cheap special equipment (a computer or console costs a bit but nothing compared to decent golf gear). And you could usually be doing it within minutes of deciding to do so. As gamers, we were heading down the path of convenience on day one.

I think what we're actually seeing is a move away from retention and into monetization. What I've seen is that Blizzard is focusing more on monetizing the dwindling playerbase rather than attempting to keep existing players, or bring in new ones. Blizzcon ticket price increase, expansion pack box price increase, allied races for more paid race-changes, more store mounts than ever before, gold token along with super-expensive mounts, etc, etc. Frankly, I'm surprised we haven't seen loot boxes in WoW yet(I suspect there's a strong legal reason, probably china-based, for that).

Again, this strikes me as being a result of designing by data and spreadsheet rather than actually considering what designs and mechanics would actually be enjoyable to play.

I agree here too.


It is entirely possible that they have determined that WoW is a lost cause, so milk-mode is the most logical option. Maybe that is what the data strongly suggested... and it might even be true. We will still never know for sure though because we just don't have enough data to go on.

[arkanon]

Chain-running totally faceroll Heroics. Why do you ask?

So doing group content. Comparing it to solo content seems a bit strange.

[Has lost its way]

Casuals in wow are dead... they died pounding on the gates of raiders who in turn are in full blown decline.

This gear isn't good for casuals it rewards extensive play time and just creates a even higher raider io wall as people can't tell if your able to do a heroic dungeon much less a meaningful mythic until your full mythic raid geared.

The casuals are dead and the bads that killed them wear their skin in mockery.

[Elias01]

If they could have, they would have... if for no other reason to stop the competition. Because competing games should have fairly similar data (just smaller sample sizes) and they would have used it to crush WoW if it were at all possible to do so. It supports my theory of "too many variables", so I guess I have developed a new leap of faith during this conversation.






Fundamentally, I agree with the "There is too much business in my game" stance. But I am not sure that fear is really affecting people all that much. Honestly, catch up mechanics usually have the opposite affect, reassuring people that it is always possible to return and continue. This was not the case (not easily anyway) back in the days of attunements and linear raid progression... which was why those practices were dropped in the first place I would imagine.








True but, as they say, times change. 15 years ago, console gamers were seen as a blight in the world of gaming (by many PC gamers) but one gaming generation faded and the next accepted the changes, so here we are now... watching the exact same thing. Now, dual console/PC gamers are extremely common and often look down on the mobile market as trash gaming. This too, will pass. And the mobile market will fold into the next iteration (I will probably be dead by then, so who knows what that will be).







I agree with this. Keep in mind though that a ton of PC/Console gaming is already taking steps towards this, so it may ease the transition. PvP games are designed more and more as shorter encounters... Questing games requires tons less time to complete objectives... everything is moving towards a faster experience for gamers in general.

This is not really a bad thing as much as it is a natural progression. A huge part of the lure of gaming over other types of entertainment is the speed and ease to which it could be done. Little to no travel involved, minimal physical requirements, minimal/relatively cheap special equipment (a computer or console costs a bit but nothing compared to decent golf gear). And you could usually be doing it within minutes of deciding to do so. As gamers, we were heading down the path of convenience on day one.






I agree here too.


It is entirely possible that they have determined that WoW is a lost cause, so milk-mode is the most logical option. Maybe that is what the data strongly suggested... and it might even be true. We will still never know for sure though because we just don't have enough data to go on.

If wow would be lost cost they would not spend money on creating classic.

[Wingspan]

If wow would be lost cost they would not spend money on creating classic.

They aren’t creating it so much as updating it for modern systems... which is probably about as low cost as game production can be.


That said, I am not sure what you were getting at. You quoted a large post of mine and your comment does not seem to relate to it.

[SirCowdog]

If they could have, they would have... if for no other reason to stop the competition. Because competing games should have fairly similar data (just smaller sample sizes) and they would have used it to crush WoW if it were at all possible to do so. It supports my theory of "too many variables", so I guess I have developed a new leap of faith during this conversation.

What competition? Really.

FFXIV? The game that's willing to completely tear down the entire game and start over from scratch to make a better game for its players? That's a totally different philosophy. WoW and FFXIV don't even compete in the same arena. They have different goals.

ESO? What does ESO have...maybe a million players? Even now, after a decade of decline, WoW still has more players and payers than ESO.

GW2? Different business model entirely.

At this point WoW doesn't need to compete. It's got a super-hardcore, entrenched, tribalistic, fanatical, apologistic core of players that absolutely will not stop giving Blizzard money no matter what they do. What does any other game provide that will pull these players away? Nothing. Because other games are not WoW. Granted, that's not every player. There are always going to be casuals and cyclical players who come and go. But at this point I think it's absolutely fair to say that a large portion of people who are still playing WoW are not going to leave short of something colossal.

Fundamentally, I agree with the "There is too much business in my game" stance. But I am not sure that fear is really affecting people all that much. Honestly, catch up mechanics usually have the opposite affect, reassuring people that it is always possible to return and continue. This was not the case (not easily anyway) back in the days of attunements and linear raid progression... which was why those practices were dropped in the first place I would imagine.

Sure, you can return whenever. But you'd be doing so by dropping into the middle of an expansion with zero context. That has some value, but I think not nearly as much as a person starting from the beginning of an expansion and working their way forward. If other players were also not skipping forward with catch-up mechanics, especially casuals or other non-cutting edge players, you wouldn't even be THAT far behind. You would have players to progress with, even coming in late to the expansion.

True but, as they say, times change. 15 years ago, console gamers were seen as a blight in the world of gaming (by many PC gamers) but one gaming generation faded and the next accepted the changes, so here we are now... watching the exact same thing. Now, dual console/PC gamers are extremely common and often look down on the mobile market as trash gaming. This too, will pass. And the mobile market will fold into the next iteration (I will probably be dead by then, so who knows what that will be).

Eh...some misguided elitists may have shat on console gamers, but consoles have always had a very strong place in the market. We like to joke about console peasants, but console games have been a driving force in gaming for a long time.

I think the mobile market will continue to push forward as a device, but I also think that as streaming technology and infrastructure increases, we're likely to see services like Stadia move in to promote some types of core games onto mobile. If a person could run WoW from a tablet or large phone with the same level of performance as a PC, I think "mobile" gaming wouldn't be so bad. A LOT depends on the business models involved, however.