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  1. #1

    How could we utilize existing zones more?

    The cycle of fresh new patch of landscape, that becomes obsolete and lifeless in 2 years, except for those who are leveling saddens me, all the time.

    I know it's impossible to ask for story updates unless it actually gets updated with purpose like Arathi Highlands.

    But couldn't some zones can maybe have like, WQs that definitely feels like a side line stories, that might not cross the main story line, but at least show what's happening on the other sides of the Azeroth or others?

    I'm probably in the minority who cares so much about the zones that did its job, but when I went through Legion and BfA, revisiting old zones with purpose felt just so damn immersive to me.

    At the same time though, I wouldn't want players to feel so overwhelmed by too many daily things to do.




    So what do you think? If Blizzard were to revitalize some old zones, what do you think would be a healthy way to do it?

  2. #2
    Quote Originally Posted by Scrod View Post
    I think the healthiest way to do it is to have servers for old expansions.

    Wow's business model for a long time has been to wipe out all existing content before releasing new content. I get the business reason for doing so but it sucks. Imagine if TBC, Wrath, Cata, MoP all had servers sitting there you could play on.
    That doesn't fix the problem the OP is talking about though. That old zones are lifeless. They would still be lifeless in retail servers.

  3. #3
    -> Guild Wars 2 has been doing this for almost a decade, and it feels as fresh today as it did when it came out.

    Every zone has mini-events that happen by themselves or triggered by people.
    Everyone can get rewards, whether regular currency or items you can disenchant as well as XP and special items for special events.
    Some of these mini-events grow into bigger and bigger events until they sometimes spawn a giant zone boss that requires a ton of people to kill.

    If you go play GW2 now (I think the regular game is free to play), you will be ASTOUNDED at how full of life and players even the shittiest zones in the game are (and there aren't really any, the creators have put a ton of love into that game.

    People do these events because they're huge and they can easily join other people which is what MMOs should be all about. They're fun, even if the rewards aren't always incredible.

    Moreover, there are websites tracking world boss timers and huge groups literally go around zones as they spawn and fighting them, and considering how many bosses there are it's almost non stop around the clock fun, as much as you want.

    -> Elder Scrolls Online does this too, same concept as GW2. People of all levels run around in every zone, joining together to fight bosses and have fun playing with each other.

    -> Pretty much every MMO today does this...except WoW...because....who the fuck knows. They want to force people to focus on their new content? Bobby The Antichrist Littledick forces them not to? Some shitty game phylosophy by one of their new age millenial tumblerina managers?

    In conclusion, if the events are fun and/or the rewards are worthwhile, people will do these events.
    However when it comes to the shitstain WoW "community", you will always have the piece of shit vocal minority fighting tooth and nail about how "it's not worth it". And that's how you get WoW to where it is today.

    Good day.
    Last edited by Pandaria was a scam; 2020-10-19 at 12:43 AM.

  4. #4
    World Events that arnt just tied to holidays

    X might happen every so many months
    like for the next month elementals are going crazy (make it tie in with azerite or something) and have a bunch of WQs scattered around the zones where elementals are a big presence and scale the mobs up so their tougher. Make a "boss" for each zone thats a decently hard fight

    another example might be that the Bloodsail are gaining strength and for a month they are attacking coastal areas all around

    could also do a Hemit Hunt quest that takes you to a random zone out of all the playable ones and fight a tough beast that Hemit wants to kill


    could probably come up with more but these are just thrown out there

  5. #5
    This is not a solution but I want to mention RP realms. I played in a RP realm for some time in the past, never did any rp. But there were people doing some random stuff, mostly walking slowly on the road, in every zone. Wherever I went, there we some people and the world felt much more alive compared to normal realms. So if you want to experience that you can just go and spend time in those realms for now. I wanted to tell this because I was amazed by the activity of players not focusing on current content, so you can feel the same if you haven't done this already. Also, there was a good amount of people doing the current content as well so I never felt an issue regarding that.

    Edit: Don't go to Goldshire by mistake tho, don't even go near

  6. #6
    Dreadlord Kyux's Avatar
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    I've suggested this before and still like the idea:

    I think we should have random, non-impactful class quests that send you to random zones.

    I don't see the devs adding a new campaign that leads you over the world, or a new system of invasion like events for every zone. But they could repurpose old rares or quest mobs. I also think the rewards should be low-impact and the main draw factor should be lore. Many people may not like having to globe-trot.

    For example:
    a) a druid needs go to Desolace to help regrow plants
    b) a Rogue needs to infiltrate Jintha'alor in the Hinterlands to steal an item (disable flying with a 'troll magic' debuff that requires them to stealth through the whole area)
    c) a Paladin needs to kill and then purify the spirit of a rare in WPL
    d) a DH needs to fight a rare elite in some barrow dens in Felwood

    It would be like a contract system. Maybe it awards a decent amount of gold, like 1k? And there would be one quest per day. Maybe it rewards a token to buy transmog gear. OR! Maybe it rewards you with books that expand on the lore and you build up a library.

    I think this would be a low-impact, non-mandatory, easy to implement way to get people visiting old zones.

    Edit:

    Quote Originally Posted by Kajitheninja View Post
    World Events that arnt just tied to holidays

    X might happen every so many months
    like for the next month elementals are going crazy (make it tie in with azerite or something) and have a bunch of WQs scattered around the zones where elementals are a big presence and scale the mobs up so their tougher. Make a "boss" for each zone thats a decently hard fight

    another example might be that the Bloodsail are gaining strength and for a month they are attacking coastal areas all around

    could also do a Hemit Hunt quest that takes you to a random zone out of all the playable ones and fight a tough beast that Hemit wants to kill


    could probably come up with more but these are just thrown out there
    I really like this idea ^^ I think they should occur without warning. You log in one day and this week the bloodsail are attacking. And it would happen on a random day, not a weekly reset. Then a few days later the Black Dragonflight are attacking Azshara, then Furbolgs are going crazy in Feralas, then there's a rare elite rampaging in Hillsbrad. Love this.
    Last edited by Kyux; 2020-10-19 at 12:50 AM.
    Quote Originally Posted by Akhlys View Post
    Once upon a time, boats were full of leaks. Now, our leaks are full of boats.

  7. #7
    Just add Assaults like we had in BFA every 10 hours or whatever was an Assault on a zone, do that with every zone, rotate zones being Assaulted make it multiple zones being Assaulted, and make the Assaults useful. Don't make it pointless rewards.

  8. #8
    The Lightbringer Cæli's Avatar
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    I mean...they're good?
    1)they're leveling zones and are used for that and leveling is good especially in 9.0
    2)each zones is filled with stuff to do, if you don't want to do it to progress your character advancement well it has nothing to do with the game
    3)each zones reflects your nostalgia too so it's always a pleasure to go back and just chill there
    4)old zones and dungeons usually have valuable boes/stuff to farm for gold or transmogs
    5)there's holiday events all the time there (I'm sure there's one at this very moment)
    6)blizz occasionally sends you there for max level content (uldum and vale in 8.3 for instance)
    7)they're releasing classic servers (tbc likely and maybe more)

    I'm stopping there, so I just don't get it, older zones are fine
    what do you want more from older zones, high level power gear? that would be bad design. uhm actually, they sometimes do it, for alts or main catchup (vanilla anniversary, maybe more examples exists)
    so really, I see no issue
    Last edited by Cæli; 2020-10-19 at 12:52 AM.

  9. #9
    Dreadlord Kyux's Avatar
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    The issue, or the point this thread is making is that 90% of the playerbase (those at max level) use only ~5-10% of the zones in game. It makes the world feel small. In 8.3 you only ever went to Boralus, the Vale, Uldum, or SW. (Excuse the mass generalisations here)
    Quote Originally Posted by Akhlys View Post
    Once upon a time, boats were full of leaks. Now, our leaks are full of boats.

  10. #10
    The issue is, most people will only do the things they 'need' to do.

    Unless you have some reward like transmog, mounts, pets, toys, etc. The Majority wont do it: just look at Micro Holidays.

    Now if the rewards are good, theres a ton of zones. People will complain they 'have' to do all these mega lump of things.


    One idea that came to me writing this.
    If every zone had something to do, but it was all tied to one specific reward vendor. Like Timewalking. Each day a different zone has a 'thing to do', but the rewards are not dependant on that zone, just the currency from all the zones.

    I could see that working, balancing between 'too much to do' and 'make all the zones alive'

  11. #11
    Immortal TEHPALLYTANK's Avatar
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    Add zone-wide events that provide cosmetic rewards+chance at any mount that is has below a 1% drop-rate or a mount that drops from mobs with 24+ hour respawn timers (with the provision that the mount pool checks against and excludes mounts you already have learned, cause it sucks getting duplicate mounts).

    Having most mount farming being instanced content or crazy long spawn timers really kills player engagement within world zones, the former scenario is just literally putting people in their own instance and the latter is too unreliable and time-consuming for your average player to even participate in. I'm thinking a model similar to the N'zoth invasions, but without having any power rewards from it. Have it rotate on a weekly or monthly basis, with a weekly lockout on the chance at the mount.

    As to what the events should be, just make them zone-specific and come up with a set of objectives that contribute towards completion. Say 1-4 active zones per rotation per expansion area. WotLk for example probably would be suited to having 2 or 3 active zones, Cata only 1, and classic zones being 4.

    So a rotation would look like this: 4 zones in EK+Kalimdor(2 per continent), 2 zones in Outlands, 2-3 zones in Northrend, 1 Cata zone, 1 WoD zone, 1-2 Legion zones, 1 BfA zone. That would be 11-13 active zones per rotation, so I'm thinking an unsynchronized monthly rotation. Would keep the rotation limited to 2 expansions having zones cycle per week (ie. Classic rotate on week 1, Cata+Legion rotate on week 2, TBC+BfA rotate on week 3, WoD+WotLK rotate on week 4).

    I think I more or less outlined a workable reward structure and rotation for driving player engagement in the world. Oh, and for the drop rate on mount have it 1% baseline with a 0.005% or 0.0025% increase that resets upon getting a mount. The mounts would still remain fairly rare, but the presence and knowledge of bad luck protection gives people hope which should help reduce player participation attrition.
    Last edited by TEHPALLYTANK; 2020-10-19 at 01:31 AM.
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  12. #12
    As someone having been leveling characters steadily throughout BfA, I'll say old zones are fine. There's always been players around.

    Not every f-ing zone NEEDS to be relevant, but if they do one day revamp EK and Kalimdor again, they should incorporate max-level usage into some of the old zones.

    My way of playing takes me all over the in-game world. Others are sat in cities. The person sat in a city isn't forced to, even less so since MoP onward.

  13. #13
    I actually put thought into this before. As I been wanting Azeroth to get some love again. I was thinking..well world quests aren't that fun but..there is that and world bosses. Anyways, they already attempted this in BFA. The problem was they didn't put everyone on the same map. So the old players wouldn't be in the same area as new ones. So it fails in making it lively. The rare kills a long with WB were nice added touch. (Maybe they could've added more quests in there too.) I wish they got around to other zones. I think a Barrens one would've had potential to bring a lot of smiles to a lot of players faces. (For obvious reasons..) It's just one example..still having everyone phased into the same map is conflicting. I understand how it is hard to fulfill, due to the scaling on mobs. Still it would really bring Azeroth to life again if it was possible.

  14. #14
    The Lightbringer Jazzhands's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Pandaria was a scam View Post
    -> Guild Wars 2 has been doing this for almost a decade, and it feels as fresh today as it did when it came out.

    Every zone has mini-events that happen by themselves or triggered by people.
    Everyone can get rewards, whether regular currency or items you can disenchant as well as XP and special items for special events.
    Some of these mini-events grow into bigger and bigger events until they sometimes spawn a giant zone boss that requires a ton of people to kill.

    If you go play GW2 now (I think the regular game is free to play), you will be ASTOUNDED at how full of life and players even the shittiest zones in the game are (and there aren't really any, the creators have put a ton of love into that game.

    People do these events because they're huge and they can easily join other people which is what MMOs should be all about. They're fun, even if the rewards aren't always incredible.

    Moreover, there are websites tracking world boss timers and huge groups literally go around zones as they spawn and fighting them, and considering how many bosses there are it's almost non stop around the clock fun, as much as you want.

    -> Elder Scrolls Online does this too, same concept as GW2. People of all levels run around in every zone, joining together to fight bosses and have fun playing with each other.

    -> Pretty much every MMO today does this...except WoW...because....who the fuck knows. They want to force people to focus on their new content? Bobby The Antichrist Littledick forces them not to? Some shitty game phylosophy by one of their new age millenial tumblerina managers?

    In conclusion, if the events are fun and/or the rewards are worthwhile, people will do these events.
    However when it comes to the shitstain WoW "community", you will always have the piece of shit vocal minority fighting tooth and nail about how "it's not worth it". And that's how you get WoW to where it is today.

    Good day.
    I played at launch and it was tons of fun. I started playing again in Path of Fire, and quite frankly outside of the expansion zones I saw very few people. The expansion zones were great, people everywhere, groups for skill points, events getting cleared easily. But leveling was pretty bad, I think I quit again around 50 on my Thief because I simply got bored, at most I'd have maybe 1-2 people for some events and I'd see people that just looked like they were farming mats because they'd almost never leave their spot. I also don't remember any event I'd call "huge" before like, level 55? when I fought the first dragon. Everything before that was piddly generic shit.

    People raved like this about FF14 for me as well, so I tried it and it was essentially the same thing. I solo'd more Fates than I did multiplayer. At least with WoW you know what you get, every established MMO has shitty low-mid game but their communities like to say otherwise.

  15. #15
    there was several good ideas tru the years, but blizzard will never do it. I truly hope shadowlands can be my last expac and after that ill be free. 16 years is a lot of time.

  16. #16
    Artifact weapons utilizing old areas with new story was a lot of fun, I'd love more short stories that take us back to see what our old zones have been up to. It's a good excuse to see real "wow" areas like the hunter questline that took us through Mimiron's still-as-epic-as-ever wing of Ulduar.

    Warfronts count I guess but there was little to no actual story going on. Tyrande's night warrior transformation, but then the actual quests in Arathi and the remainder of Darkshore were very generic.
    Last edited by Powerogue; 2020-10-19 at 01:53 AM.
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    Having the authority to do a thing doesn't make it just, moral, or even correct.

  17. #17
    I slept last night and thought about this in my dreams.

    Another issues is that games like ESO and GW2 were built from the ground up supporting people going back to old zones all the times, through adaptive levels, rewards and content that remains challenging.

    Blizzard has to add these features into WoW, and if Cataclysm is any indication, they got shit upon for the immense work they did to revitalize the old world, and they did a fucking great job at it, the quality of the quests are night and day compared to the originals for the most part.

    So as with all things in WoW, blizzard are damned if they do, damned if they don't. I wish they would just stop listening to this cesspit of a "community" and do what they used to do before WoW: whatever the fuck they want, it's their game.

  18. #18
    ESO provides a pretty good baseline for maintaining activity across all the zones. One of the most basic things are repeatable quests and world bosses that have a chance of dropping cosmetic rewards. WoW could definitely use something similar, whether it be for transmogs, pets, toys, etc. Perhaps within a weekly/monthly rotation system of some sort given the vast number of areas to make sure the playerbase isn't too diluted for any group content in these things.

  19. #19
    Scarab Lord
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    Quote Originally Posted by Pandaria was a scam View Post
    -> Guild Wars 2 has been doing this for almost a decade, and it feels as fresh today as it did when it came out.

    Every zone has mini-events that happen by themselves or triggered by people.
    Everyone can get rewards, whether regular currency or items you can disenchant as well as XP and special items for special events.
    Some of these mini-events grow into bigger and bigger events until they sometimes spawn a giant zone boss that requires a ton of people to kill.

    If you go play GW2 now (I think the regular game is free to play), you will be ASTOUNDED at how full of life and players even the shittiest zones in the game are (and there aren't really any, the creators have put a ton of love into that game.

    People do these events because they're huge and they can easily join other people which is what MMOs should be all about. They're fun, even if the rewards aren't always incredible.
    Really? What changed? I was playing GW2 heavily 2 years ago and that was completely untrue then. Most non-endgame zones were completely dead - you might not see another player for hours. Only zones which had boss events in them had other players appear, and then went away as soon as the boss event was done.

    Quote Originally Posted by Pandaria was a scam View Post
    -> Elder Scrolls Online does this too, same concept as GW2. People of all levels run around in every zone, joining together to fight bosses and have fun playing with each other.

    -> Pretty much every MMO today does this...except WoW...because....who the fuck knows. They want to force people to focus on their new content? Bobby The Antichrist Littledick forces them not to? Some shitty game phylosophy by one of their new age millenial tumblerina managers?
    Man what the fuck? Loads of ESO zones are dead AF. And the "game philosophy" you're so mad about isn't "new age milenial (sic) tumblerina", it's 1999-style EverQuest-type design. I don't even know how a "new age milenial (sic) tumblerina" would work - new agers are 60+ years old, Millennials are mostly between 45 and 30-something and "tumblerinas" is usually used to insult 20-somethings. Did you just randomly decide to insult like, literally everyone under 80 years old? Wtf? By raging about a type of design that dates back to 1999 (i.e. before "tumblerinas" were born even probably).

    I'd love to see more world events in WoW. The ones we have had were cool.

    But the idea that they make old zones particularly lively in the longer-term is shown to be wrong by GW2 (unless something massive changed in the last two years). Plus the schedule of events GW2 gets real old real fast (again, based on two years ago).
    Last edited by Eurhetemec; 2020-10-19 at 11:31 AM.

  20. #20
    The Lightbringer Highlord Hanibuhl's Avatar
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    Old World-World Quests.

    Just as archeology caused players to venture into the old zones once again, so can Old World-World Quests

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