Blame twitch.tv and streamers for WoW's design failures

[Acidz]

Yea, that's why nobody gives a shit about retail on twitch, while the classic streams are booming.

[Maudib]

And BFA release boasted the highest viewer numbers for wow ever, so whats ur point?

Yep... Classic beta beat BfA beta... and Classic RELEASE will very likely eclipse BfA release viewership.

[natpick]

Of course Blizzard would start designing WoW around twitch.tv and streamers. After all, they are the ones who create free publicity and hype for Blizzard's products and get them record sales... but is this publicity really free?

Nope, it comes at a very steep price for the entire game design of WoW.

Some things, by their nature, are fun to experience firsthand but not very fun to watch. Building a character for slower-paced, more strategic combat is not very fun to watch. DHs zooming around at 200% speed and spamming "insta gib" abilities, however, entertains people.

Raids by their design should not be very fun to watch since they require lots of repetition and wipes to complete. Moreover, they have a lot of individual downtime as different players handle different mechanics. Blizzard's solution? Design raids around twitch.tv. One shot raid wipe personal responsibility run rampant all for the sake for satisfying people who want to spam "LOL POGGERS WHAT A LOSER" in chat when someone inevitably fuck ups and wipes the raid. Why bother designing clever mechanics when bosses can just be series of one shot mechanics being spammed in every direction?

There's more. M+ is without a doubt tailored to please the speedrunning community which is, not surprisingly, also found on twitch.tv.

But worst of all? Twitch.tv breeds rabid fanboy culture and it seeps into the actual game. When was the last time you played a raid or a m+ without some 12 year old kid spamming "POGGERS OMEGALUL YIKES SCUFFED" all run long?

Stop designing the game for idiotic twitch culture and you'll see immediate improvement.

i dont blame twitch and streaming fully but you do have some very good points,we know all game devs watch streamers and some will be influenced by them for sure which will influence game development,i would say its more the culture,its like when crazy youtube videos started and slowly influanced tv commercials,now all the ads are nonsensical and dont have anything to do with what they are selling,i think gaming is the same way now,blizz just through any crazy pop culture shit in the game,cos you know its cool right?.

[RaZz0r]

Right for one twitch has nothing to do while the game turning to shit.
Most successful twitch streamers are people who do some of the games highest end content and if you think high end Keys done in the MDI or World first mythic raiding is piss easy meme content then your fucking delusional.

Granted the fact that twitch chat is leaking in to other places is annoying as twitch chat is 90% spergy meme lords and shit posters.

The real problems with the game is because of the special snowflake generation who wants to get everything and do everything.
that combined with the rise of " quick fixes " in games overall that keeps showering you in "rewards" every like 15-30minutes.

This is why we have the RNG casino style shit show of a loot system along with generic currencies and flashy power gains.
All to fill that Quick 15 minute fix gamers crave these days so few people these days want to invest long periods of time in games.

This is also why a lot of older wow players are enjoying classic wow so much because it has that long term goal something clear to work towards.
along with little RNG bullshit.
Even tho the Game play of classic is Super shit its also really slow and grindy and the raids are really basic and pretty dam easy compared to modern raiding.
But the feeling of putting in meaningful work to your character for a clear gain carries it hardcore.

So fingers crossed that classic is successful and it brings back some of the good RPG elements and meaningful character progression.

[MoanaLisa]

Designs change for a multitude of reasons. Assigning blame to Twitch is nuts. I can't remember a lot of streamers being around when Cataclysm went sailing off a cliff. There actually is an argument that the trauma from Cataclysm has driven more design changes than normal over the years but changes in audience, what people want in games and a lot of other things are part of the mix too.

For what it's worth, WoW is still a terrible game to watch. Much, much more fun to play than watch, even with BfA's problems.

[iamthedevil]

They should make a streamers server for classic. Call it Noxxion.

[Mikazukinoyaiba]

Yea blame twitch for making Blizz implement grandma features like Warfront and Island.

[msdos]

I would blame trying to market to women and children before I would blame that. The game became a straight up cartoon over the years.

[Relapses]

Nah, I'd rather blame Canada and their unrelenting niceness. Fuck you, Canada.* You're the reason we can't have nice things!

^{*disclaimer: I love Canada, I'm just pointing how entirely fucking pointless the OP's argument is.}

[Sliske]

aids

M+ is dead on twitch. The only way you can get viewers is if you're literally the 0.01% of the playerbase (world first raiders, best players in the world at m+) and even those struggle to get 500 viewers regularly.

Raids is just as bad. The only way you can get viewers is again if you're literally the best guild in the world.

The exception to this rule is of course Asmongold, but who gives a fuck about the exception. All he did in WoW was stream the raid once, never ever touch mythic+ or pvp and outside of that he AFK'd in Islands or did mount runs.

Speedrunning is also dead on twitch. DEAD.

Why is m+ timed? Simple. The same reason your raid encounters have enrage timers , soft and hard - so you can't just bring in 12 tanks and 8 healers and spend 30 minutes every boss fight to essentially AFK your way through the hardest content in the game.

If you spent every 10 seconds thinking about this shit, you'd of come to this very obvious logical conclusion. But you didn't, because you are what i quoted.

[kaminaris]

You think RNG is fixed. You are being serious?

Should I remind you what kind of bullsh*t RNG was in legion? Or you already forgot?
Arcanocrystal? Legendaries? Uncapped titanforge? People getting max ilvl from LFRs or simple world quests?
RNG mounts from paragon chests?

https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20755635454
https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20752488525
https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20744914351

YES rng is fixed now. Doesn't happen in BfA. And even if it does it's so damn rare its not worth trying to.

[Zeek Daniels]

Of course Blizzard would start designing WoW around twitch.tv and streamers. After all, they are the ones who create free publicity and hype for Blizzard's products and get them record sales... but is this publicity really free?

Nope, it comes at a very steep price for the entire game design of WoW.

Some things, by their nature, are fun to experience firsthand but not very fun to watch. Building a character for slower-paced, more strategic combat is not very fun to watch. DHs zooming around at 200% speed and spamming "insta gib" abilities, however, entertains people.

Raids by their design should not be very fun to watch since they require lots of repetition and wipes to complete. Moreover, they have a lot of individual downtime as different players handle different mechanics. Blizzard's solution? Design raids around twitch.tv. One shot raid wipe personal responsibility run rampant all for the sake for satisfying people who want to spam "LOL POGGERS WHAT A LOSER" in chat when someone inevitably fuck ups and wipes the raid. Why bother designing clever mechanics when bosses can just be series of one shot mechanics being spammed in every direction?

There's more. M+ is without a doubt tailored to please the speedrunning community which is, not surprisingly, also found on twitch.tv.

But worst of all? Twitch.tv breeds rabid fanboy culture and it seeps into the actual game. When was the last time you played a raid or a m+ without some 12 year old kid spamming "POGGERS OMEGALUL YIKES SCUFFED" all run long?

Stop designing the game for idiotic twitch culture and you'll see immediate improvement.

record sales? WoW subs have been declining for years. Your post is delusional.

[Misuteri]

I didn't buy BfA, why would I even give 9.0 a second thought?

nah... Modern WoW is dead to me. I finally realized that there is no hope for it ever being a good game again.

I knew when they announced the end of flight during MOP the game was done.

This isn’t a flying vs. ground reply.

The game became a way to appease designers instead of pleasing players. Bad, bad move.

Since then every expansion has tried to hone in on”trends” in gaming instead of realizing WoW is the trend.

It was New Coke when no one wanted it. It was Biggie Size when people were counting calories. It was an SUV with $5 gasoline.

It could have remained WoW but they thought they needed to be something else.

[Arakakao]

I didn't buy BfA, why would I even give 9.0 a second thought?

nah... Modern WoW is dead to me. I finally realized that there is no hope for it ever being a good game again.

Just wait when Classic becomes a dessert after a few months of its launch.

[Relapses]

I knew when they announced the end of flight during MOP the game was done.

This isn’t a flying vs. ground reply.

The game became a way to appease designers instead of pleasing players. Bad, bad move.

Since then every expansion has tried to hone in on”trends” in gaming instead of realizing WoW is the trend.

It was New Coke when no one wanted it. It was Biggie Size when people were counting calories. It was an SUV with $5 gasoline.

It could have remained WoW but they thought they needed to be something else.

Whoa. Thanks for figuring it out for us. I was wondering when somebody would come by and finally deduce the actual reason the game was over. I only ask one thing: Now that you have unequivocally ended a debate which has raged for eons, can you please lend your superior intellect to helping fight world hunger and bring peace to the middle East?

[Mikazukinoyaiba]

Should I remind you what kind of bullsh*t RNG was in legion? Or you already forgot?
Arcanocrystal? Legendaries? Uncapped titanforge? People getting max ilvl from LFRs or simple world quests?

IDK what you're smoking but all of it still exist in BFA.
Just swap the correct legendary with the correct Azerite lootbox.

YES rng is fixed now. Doesn't happen in BfA.

You played too much Warfront your brain is fried.

[kaminaris]

IDK what you're smoking but all of it still exist in BFA.
Just swap the correct legendary with the correct Azerite lootbox.



You played too much Warfront your brain is fried.

I had all cutting edges in legion, got first on now. Been raiding in top 100-2000 guilds. Been thru all that garbage RNG in legion. Now? No issues.
Im guessing you simply have no clue, or don't actually know what is RNG.

It doesn't exist, you can straight up buy bis one.

[Isilarya]

Should I remind you what kind of bullsh*t RNG was in legion? Or you already forgot?
Arcanocrystal? Legendaries? Uncapped titanforge? People getting max ilvl from LFRs or simple world quests?
RNG mounts from paragon chests?

https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20755635454
https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20752488525
https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20744914351

YES rng is fixed now. Doesn't happen in BfA. And even if it does it's so damn rare its not worth trying to.

I definitely didnt spend 3 months chasing BiS Azerite armor to finally get it then have the trait get nerfed so I had to start farming an entirely different trait when you had 0 way to target farm a trait past the 340 version. But I guess praying to RNGesus to give me one item out of the ENTIRE DUNGEON LOOT TABLE once a week isnt the most hellish RNG ever comprised is it. I quit BFA over it, im aware residuum tried to fix the issue even if it didnt really. Atleast Legions late systems were better bandaids than whats happening right now.

[Relapses]

I definitely didnt spend 3 months chasing BiS Azerite armor to finally get it then have the trait get nerfed so I had to start farming an entirely different trait when you had 0 way to target farm a trait past the 340 version. But I guess praying to RNGesus to give me one item out of the ENTIRE DUNGEON LOOT TABLE once a week isnt the most hellish RNG ever comprised is it. I quit BFA over it, im aware residuum tried to fix the issue even if it didnt really. Atleast Legions late systems were better bandaids than whats happening right now.

At least they attempted to resolve the problem early in this expansion. Blizzard doubled down on the shitty Legion AP grind well into 7.2. Most of Legion's "fixes" were implemented long after I had already burnt myself out of the game. (I hate WQs and the 54-trait Artifact grind pretty much forced me into doing a lot of this content.) It's kind of a shitty situation either way. IMO, neither expansion had a perfect solution to its inherent design flaws. But credit where credit is due at least Blizzard listened to early feedback about azerite armor. Sorry even that was too little too late for you.

[Ielenia]

Streamers stream what people want to see... which is why Classic has WAY outperformed BfA in viewers.

I honestly have to laugh at the dishonesty of anyone who brings in Twitch viewership as any form of reliable metric, here. Want to compare Twitch viewership for Classic with the view numbers for BfA for the same period? BfA had over twice the number of viewers Classic has during its own beta/launch period.

Classic WoW is the newest "new thing" people have been talking about, while BfA has been out for almost a year, now.

Of course people will flock to Classic WoW streams right now. But, do please bring Twitch viewership again for Classic one year from now, and let's see how it still holds up.