WoW & “Alts” in 2020

[scelero]

f(ck an alt. id dont even know what my main is.

[rips]

Nah! You should have a main and, by extension, only a limited number of alternates.

the game is 15 years old. just because blizzard resets the progress every 2years doesnt mean our characters vanish

all they need to do is making Repuatation Account wide. I dont care about the other Stuff but Reps take so fucking long

[Alvito]

When we first played the game our sole purpose was to make our “main” character as strong as possible. Questing took a long time, farming reputation took a long time, and gearing your character took a long time.

As expansions started to come out the leveling process and gearing process became easier (arguably). Today in 2020 we almost ALL have “alts”. In some cases some of us struggle to play the game because we can’t even decide what class to play. We look at logs, rankings and tournaments to help us make decisions as to what class to “main”.

Now almost every WoW related forum is littered with “Blizzard killed alts” with set change. Alts are huge now because metas exist and the meta shines bright early on in a new expansion and patch.

My questions are these:

Would the game/community be better today if players went back to focusing and MASTERING a single class? Maybe 1 “alt” is all we need. Maybe what the game really needs is the player base focusing on their favorite character and not our meta favorites. Maybe playing an “alt” should be hard? This way the game is not littered with mediocre players?

When I first played, in BC, it was about being as useful to my raid and downing as much content as possible. Which meant being extremely flexible with what your played character was. Even out of the gate raiding partially into SWP I didn't have 1 main. Back then it was hard to since what was good, needed or too weak changed with each raid and was altered by your 25 man make up. It might have been about 1 character for you, it certainly wasn't for everyone.

[Vzz]

Legion i had 15 max level characters and 8-9 of them was playable (good gear/rep etc etc)
BFA i have 11 max level characters and 7 of them is playable
BFA essence patch, still 11 characters and 4 of them is playable
BFA 8.3 patch (quest line) still 11 characters and ONE OF THEM IS PLAYABLE (will do one more) so i will stop AT 2 CHARACTERS
And im fking hardcore nerd, playing from actul classic, play time 70% of every expansion. BFA IS A SH T SHOW! Sorry but im MAD ASF

p.s. in legion i had 15 characters and ALL of them got mage tower on all specs and full class campaign quests/mount/gear(Class Hall Set)

I'm actually having fun, because maining a char means a lot of time investment. I need to carefully choose what I want to play. This is how the game should work in my opinion. The progression should be complex and deliver a grind fiesta.

[Tekktra]

Would the game/community be better today if players went back to focusing and MASTERING a single class? Maybe 1 “alt” is all we need. Maybe what the game really needs is the player base focusing on their favorite character and not our meta favorites. Maybe playing an “alt” should be hard? This way the game is not littered with mediocre players?

The game has shifted, and it's about actual gameplay and a more fast-paced action. Less so about any RP aspect, like gear collection, full "worldly" immersion and solid writing.

I think what Blizzard is doing is an excellent job to keep WoW "within the times" of what the playerbase expects.

I think that there's only a fraction of players that are the loudest, that are the haters and they also think they speak for everyone, but they don't. They are a minority, but they make it look like the game is worse than it actually is. We have hundreds of thousands (millions??) of players who log in every day and are perfectly happy with the game.

As a whole, based on the fact that Blizzard are creating the game they are creating, I think everything is where it should be.

They can never please everyone. There are players who will hate the idea of only 1 character, and there are players who will hate not having easy access to alts. I myself would hate the game being non-alt friendly. Confirmed by my recent Classic experience. I myself have changed as a player and as a person. I don't have it in me anymore to sit and farm every single rep and item "just because" like I'm a teenage nerd again. It's not fun. I was addicted back then. Now I'm not.

[ArkantosChampion]

I'm actually having fun, because maining a char means a lot of time investment. I need to carefully choose what I want to play. This is how the game should work in my opinion. The progression should be complex and deliver a grind fiesta.

As i wrote, i am a nerd and usually i got good gear on character werry quick, so thats whay i have so much characters =) (aka 2400 arena and mythic +15 player)

[Marrilaife]

It also requires better balance so you don't just end up stuck working on mastering Windwalker (a historically weak spec) and are held back by that when you could be playing Affliction(a historically very strong spec) instead.

Yep, I'd challenge anyone to try to get recruited as feral, enhancement, ret or survival into a hall of fame guild. And if they manage, compare all these trials and tribulations to ease of accomplishing the same on a mage or warlock with even worse logs.

[Drusin]

When we first played the game our sole purpose was to make our “main” character as strong as possible.

I would say I've had alts since I first started playing back in BC, I've never been "main only

Questing took a long time, farming reputation took a long time, and gearing your character took a long time.

But I didn't know about max level and the game as a whole so the time it took didn't matter, I wasn't working towards a goal, I wasn't leveling to get to max level I was just out there questing to be questing lol.

As expansions started to come out the leveling process and gearing process became easier (arguably). Today in 2020 we almost ALL have “alts”. In some cases some of us struggle to play the game because we can’t even decide what class to play. We look at logs, rankings and tournaments to help us make decisions as to what class to “main”.

That's easy. Play whatever you want to play if you aren't a high end mythic raider or pushing 20+ keys or competing for R1

Would the game/community be better today if players went back to focusing and MASTERING a single class?

Fuck no it'd be a drought of a DROUGHT of available players lol. Even worse than it is now. Can't find a tank? I'll get on one of my alts. But with your change, can't find a tank? Well, guess we aren't doing it then.

Maybe 1 “alt” is all we need. Maybe what the game really needs is the player base focusing on their favorite character and not our meta favorites. Maybe playing an “alt” should be hard?

Maybe they aren't playing meta favorites, maybe they like every class.

This way the game is not littered with mediocre players?

I don't know how you came to that conclusion, they would just be mediocre on that one character. Are you going to sit here and tell me that there aren't players with 1000 days of play time on a single class that's still mediocre?

[GreenJesus]

Good thing about FF14 is you can play every class and profession with one character.

[Amarys]

The best example for me was WoD.
There was very little to do outside of raiding... so I ended up having a max level of every class and I even raided on a handful of them.
In BfA however I find it really hard / too time consuming to have more than 2-3 max level characters.

On the other hand, I probably would've gotten annoyed if there wasn't enough stuff "to do" on my alts in BfA too, because I might not feel like investing in too many characters at once right now. I'm kinda satisfied that I -had to- refarm some of the essences and reputations. It kept me busy and engaged with the game... But other people clearly are getting annoyed with having to do it all over again on a second character.

I had the opposite experience. WoD had loads of stuff to do, the garrison campaign, unlocking Harrison Jones. Doing all the profession building stuff like trapping elite animals. Minining out the mine and herbing the garden each day. Now that I think about it, I can't remember any other expansion that had so much stuff you could do and I enjoyed it all, all the millions of gold pouring in. However I only managed to raid on one character outside of LFR, a warlock and I really hated it as I usually get bored of a "main" in a month and wanna play something else.

Legion on the other hand had so much less to do, I actually managed to raid on 6 characters there, same with BfA before the essences. Get to 120, kill Arathi rares, raid normal Uldir with the guild(we had casual Uldir raids any alt could join as long as they were above certain item level). There is actually not much to do on alts even now aside from the essences and even those, you don't need to get them all on alts.

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Good thing about FF14 is you can play every class and profession with one character.

What does that have to do with anything? If WoW becomes too boring or I disagree with the changes too much in the future, I'd rather just quit MMOs than play an Asian "anime" game. I'm sure many others feel the same way.

[Drusin]

Good thing about FF14 is you can play every class and profession with one character.

I'd still have alts because they allow me to redo content with lockouts. Tell Blizz to remove the lockouts from legacy raids, heroic dungeons, Mythic dungeons, seasonal dungeons (Big Love rocket dungeon), world rares, and anything else that has a lockout and let me repeatedly farm the content as much as I want and I would have less of a reason to have as many alts. Though we'd still need to do something about things like the Timewalking quest rewarding 500 badges on your first dungeon. Having 46 120s do 1 dungeon each timewalking event means in 10 months I have 5000 badges on 46 characters. With these I've upgraded all my heirlooms to 120 for "free"

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What does that have to do with anything? If WoW becomes too boring or I disagree with the changes too much in the future, I'd rather just quit MMOs than play an Asian "anime" game. I'm sure many others feel the same way.

I don't have anything against FFs theme but I'm never playing another MMO because I've invested so much time in wow that I wouldn't want to "start over" somewhere else. If wow dies my mmo life dies with it.

[TheRainman]

The devs just do not simply understand why people play alts. They want you to commit all your lifetime to play one char only, and build their whole univese around this bias.

What? It's been incredibly easy and fast to gear alts and it has been for YEARS. Even this patch, where arguments stand that it is harder than before...is still way easier and more efficient to gear alts than it was in the beginning. A slow step backwards doesn't mean all of a sudden it's hard. Let alone that the devs don't take alts into consideration... let alone "They want you to commit all your lifetime to play one char only, and build their whole univese around this bias."

[Dakara]

When we first played the game our sole purpose was to make our “main” character as strong as possible. Questing took a long time, farming reputation took a long time, and gearing your character took a long time.

As expansions started to come out the leveling process and gearing process became easier (arguably). Today in 2020 we almost ALL have “alts”. In some cases some of us struggle to play the game because we can’t even decide what class to play. We look at logs, rankings and tournaments to help us make decisions as to what class to “main”.

Now almost every WoW related forum is littered with “Blizzard killed alts” with set change. Alts are huge now because metas exist and the meta shines bright early on in a new expansion and patch.

My questions are these:

Would the game/community be better today if players went back to focusing and MASTERING a single class? Maybe 1 “alt” is all we need. Maybe what the game really needs is the player base focusing on their favorite character and not our meta favorites. Maybe playing an “alt” should be hard? This way the game is not littered with mediocre players?

The game is different in 2020.

We're always one patch away from disliking our current/class spec due to changes and/or viability in a Tier. I don't agree with FOTM re-rolling, but I don't think players should be "forced" to stick with a spec they don't enjoy either.

Also, many of us have accumulated our Alts over 10+ years. The big grind (once upon a time) was 1-60. After that, it wasn't overly time consuming to cap each expansion... it wasn't until MOP (IIRC) that I accumulated a high level alt of every class.

Admittedly it has gotten a tad silly in recent expansions with ridiculously OP levelling events (e.g. Korraks). In many ways, (as much I dislike it) Blizzard have moved the grind from levelling to endgame (AP/Essences).

[Drusin]

What? It's been incredibly easy and fast to gear alts and it has been for YEARS

Let's say there's no cars in the world. Then let's say cars are invented and they are fucking great, they look nice and run well. Now let's say I "upgrade" the cars and they are a bit worse than the original. People bitch, and I'm like alright my bad, then I fix what was wrong but only just enough, not as good as the original. One person says "why won't Drusin fix these shitty cars?" and another person says "what are you talking about? He did fix the cars, they are much better than they were".

This is the same thing, no one gives a fuck how good the current system is, it's not as good as it was originally.

[TheRainman]

Let's say there's no cars in the world. Then let's say cars are invented and they are fucking great, they look nice and run well. Now let's say I "upgrade" the cars and they are a bit worse than the original. People bitch, and I'm like alright my bad, then I fix what was wrong but only just enough, not as good as the original. One person says "why won't Drusin fix these shitty cars?" and another person says "what are you talking about? He did fix the cars, they are much better than they were".

This is the same thing, no one gives a fuck how good the current system is, it's not as good as it was originally.

You seem to have missed the entire point.

I don't think the system is good. I said the system was easy. I never equated one with the other. All I said was that alts are still easy to level, and that one patch that slows their progress marginally (and that's arguable) does not mean that the devs do not want us to have alts, nor does it mean they expect us to devote our entire lifetimes to one character. His post was incredibly hyperbolic, and the implication behind mine was that since alts have been easy for years it's absurd to say that the devs feel they way he said they must.

[Drusin]

You seem to have missed the entire point.

I don't think the system is good. I said the system was easy. I never equated one with the other.

I didn't say you did the example was just to illustrate the line of thinking. I'll modify it to reflect

Let's say there's no easy to drive cars in the world. Then let's say easy to drive cars are invented. Now let's say I "upgrade" the cars and they are a bit harder to drive. People bitch, and I'm like alright my bad, then I make them easier to drive but only just enough, not as easy as the original. One person says "why won't Drusin make these cars easier to drive?" and another person says "what are you talking about, he did? They are much easier to drive than they were".

They are easier to drive than they were but they aren't as easy as they were at their easiest

[Mojo03]

The devs just do not simply understand why people play alts. They want you to commit all your lifetime to play one char only, and build their whole univese around this bias.

And stupid people still haven’t figured out that they value you having reasons to spend time playing the game above all else. They want those subscriptions active.

Progression being separate on all characters forces you to spend more time on the game.

I literally can not rationalize why subscriptions exist, especially with this last garbage fire of a patch, but they do.

[Tradu]

What? It's been incredibly easy and fast to gear alts and it has been for YEARS. Even this patch, where arguments stand that it is harder than before...is still way easier and more efficient to gear alts than it was in the beginning. A slow step backwards doesn't mean all of a sudden it's hard. Let alone that the devs don't take alts into consideration... let alone "They want you to commit all your lifetime to play one char only, and build their whole univese around this bias."

Gearing alts was never really the issue, that could always easily be fixed by getting boosted. The problem is with things like AP, legiondaries, essences, WoD ring, MoP cloak, and reputations, although some of those had decent catchup(legiondaries for basically the entire expansion and essences being the 2 that really didn't/don't)

[Drusin]

Progression being separate on all characters forces you to spend more time on the game.

I've been playing wow since 2pm saturday, it's 6am now, not sleepy so I'll probably be on till like 9 I guess, I can't really play more than I play now

[MoanaLisa]

I have two mains. One on each faction. That's it.

I view those that have created a dozen alts--and they are usually very proud of that--that complain about how Blizzard is fucking them over for having so many alts as good theater.

I'm all for opening all professions up to any character that wants to take them. That way purely profession alts could go away. Personally I'm onboard with any system at all that reduces the incentives to have a dozen or so alts.