it was your #1. And i addressed the other points. Those items existed BEFORE the keyring, ppl complained, they created the keyring. It became obsolete, the keyring was removed, but the systems didnt change. You still need to get the items to gain access to areas. Nothing has changed.
You would LOVE mythic+, its based entirely around keys! You need to complete entire quest chains to unlock some BfA dungeons. Once you have killed certain bosses a certain number of times, you gain a skip, like you mentioned. Like i said, you are pretending like the game went through some fundamental change when they removed the keychain. It didnt.
As someone else in the thread already mentioned, "paragon levels" already exist in the form of Artifact Power. The only problem with AP is that it's expansion specific, and not a persistent part of character or account progression. The moment the next expansion releases, all your "paragon levels" disappear.
In that regard the game could definitely use something more permanent in terms of level-capped progression. But leveling past cap, whatever form it takes, will be a completely separate system than basics leveling from 1 to cap, and I don't think it has much bearing on the discussion about a level squish.
Blizzard does need to be VERY careful about what form they present the level squish in. If it's just the exact same content, but levels take 5x the amount of time ding, then it will end up being worse, in a lot of ways. At least with 120 levels you get the illusion of progress by gaining each level quickly. If they change it to a smaller number, like 60, but make each level take longer to get, people will get discouraged and feel like they aren't making any progress.
Personally I almost think they should do away with the concept of experience entirely, and just award levels with the completion of story progress in each zone. That way progress would shift from an arbitrary experience value to actual progress through the story of each expansion.
I don't feel the squish accomplishes much outside of just making a number smaller. The journey has no adventure. No danger. It tells you where to go. Doesn't matter how you do it. You pretty much just show up, clock in, and get to 120. Sure if you are good at leveling or fast it can be done quicker. If you are horrible you just kind of get there too. It means nothing.
I guess we are dealing with some sort of physiological problem with the number? I guess it fixes that.
its not like 130 is even a high number... Ive seen MMOs with level 200+
if the number doesn't matter (which is some peoples argument FOR the squish) then why squish it at all if it doesn't matter...
Maybe its just too hard for people to count and so maybe a lower number will help those people.
With paragon levels, you can make it so that those aren't really required as gear can take over for max level. You can use concordinence from Legion as your example. That is automatically 100 times better than removing a bunch of levels because a few whiners are afraid of big numbers.
As for what progression other than numbers is being taken away, none because the big progression is taken away. All you have left is gear and the squishes there aren't so bad because level numbers still remained to preserve progression as it was from day 1. Squish levels and progression is totally destroyed.
Last edited by rrayy; 2019-06-18 at 03:06 AM.
I guess I don't know who to feel about this. What's the need or want to make this change? Does it make the math easier and faster for the game to run?
If going from this new Level 60 ( currently 120 ), to max level now being 70 takes the same amount of time as keeping it level 120 to 130, what's the point?
If it's to change to the talent tree with this level squish I sort of get that, but instead of changing the level numbers, just redo the talent tree differently
I feel it's just a visual change i highly doubt the amount of time it take to reach lvl 120 now will be reduced if they change it to 60 and also the premise that new players don't start wow cuz they had to level a char to 120 instead of 60 (or whatever would be the new cap) is laughable that will only affect a small group of veterans that get pissed when they want to level an alt.
New players won't join wow cuz is an old game, with an outdated graphic and in general because mmos aren't hot stuff anymore.
“Do not lose time on daily trivialities. Do not dwell on petty detail. For all of these things melt away and drift apart within the obscure traffic of time. Live well and live broadly. You are alive and living now. Now is the envy of all of the dead.” ~ Emily3, World of Tomorrow
Words to live by.
You seem to be under the assumption that a level squish is squishing stats as well.
Let's say they half the levels
So you are now level 60
The only progression you lost is the "illusion" of progression.
I get it though. You place value in the big numbers
But it's basically a cosmetic change.
We don't lose stats
We lose like a number in a counter that is basically used to mark "hey I'm closer to the cap"
Paragon levels make me just feel bleh because it's 0 progression outside of what you said like concordance.....who liked that mechanic??
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Personally I just think it's to help with the perception of the leveling being a "huge grind"
I'm ok with something like the levels being halved because let's face it....if you go to BFA content and you see "3leveling zones" with 10 levels you may feel thrown off.
Telling a player they just need to get 5 levels it may feel better and heck I think it even makes more sense since we've been 20 levels with 0 permanent character progression.
New talent tree can be like 1 every 5-10 levels in a 60 level system which could be a tree similar to classic
Current speed from 1 to 110 is ~20-30 hours. Of they jack that up to 120 hours no one will ever roll an alt without a boost ever again.
This isn't vanilla. Classic has It's own dynamic for people who want that level of stupid grind. It has no place in modern wow.
Then again, judging by how money grubbing and design-by-spreadsheet they've been in the past few years, maybe they want it that way. Maybe they think it's a good idea.
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It actually really depends on what rewards you get for each paragon level. If it's an increase in stats then it's worth doing, especially if you gain paragon levels passively by doing any activity at cap.
But it could be other things: Reputation with various factions, emissary chests, mounts, pets, gold, gear, unique xmogs, etc. Blizzard could use paragon levels to apply almost any kind of reward the game currently has, or they could do something completely new with it.
Last edited by SirCowdog; 2019-06-18 at 08:55 AM.
No, I place value in what I earned and don't want it taken away from me. Level number gives me a visual reminder and real feeling of how far I have come all I have accomplished becuase I started back in classic. A level squish takes that feeling away regardless of what stats are. I don't want that feeling taken away from me because a small number of whiners don't like big numbers. You want to fix the leveling problem? Give more rewards/talents as you go along and try to make the levels a little quicker to achieve. The number of levels isn't the issue. It's the time it takes to earn those levels. Fix the latter, don't touch the former.
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This. Far superior idea than the idiotic level squish.