Would I have a place in WoW if I returned?

[Tadkins]

I've been out of WoW for the last couple months due to a botched computer upgrade, though I've been paying attention to forums and whatnot. Over that time I've reflected on my time during the last couple expansions and how much I struggled. With the game being so number-driven and competitive (parsings, raiderio, PvP rating and all that stuff), is there really a place in the game left for someone who can't compete?

To sum up, I'm a player who...

-Struggles to use the LFG tool due to social anxiety and confidence issues.
-Doesn't have much luck in the social department finding kind and understanding friends and guilds to run content with.
-Always had problems understanding things like simming, parsing, weakauras and such.

I just get kind of depressed when I remember how I had a hard time with things in Legion and BfA that pretty much everyone else around me seems to have no issues whatsoever with. And with what I'm hearing about Shadowlands, it is feeling even more like if you're not a winner and a champion, you're not really welcome here.

I just don't know anymore. Should I think about coming back?

[A Chozo]

the game being so number-driven and competitive (parsings, raiderio, PvP rating and all that stuff), is there really a place in the game left for someone who can't compete?

The game is not number-driven nor competitive, that's your anxiety talking. Shush that voice and look at WoW for what it is: this weird multiplayer rpg with many difficulties and varied degrees of interaction between you and the other players.

Almost all Shadowlands content can be done without any communication or optimization on your part. Normal / Heroic dungeons exist, LFR exists, questing can be done solo, Torghast too. The more you increase the difficulty, the more you can use those tools you mentioned to improve your performance, but your average player doesn't do any of that and is fine. Keep in mind that the average player also doesn't do Mythic+ or all the other harder difficulties, but that doesn't mean they don't have a place in WoW.

It only becomes competitive when you start comparing yourself to random people you'll never see again. So if you start avoiding that, you will have your place. Imagine that WoW is like any other RPG that you try - you don't know shit, you don't wanna know shit, you just want to play the game.

[ceall]

How did you get along pre-legion?

I'd say, if you had no problems before legion, you shouldnt have had any problems from legion onwards. Just play the game like you always have.

[Tadkins]

I suppose it's hard to think otherwise when being on the forums so long, and seeing all the log/armory/etc shaming going on.

My biggest concern is that the game now just seems catered to only the champions of the game. If I ignored M+ and the like, I wouldn't have access to the great vault or anything like that, meaning my gear would always be bad compared to everyone else. Normally that wouldn't be too bad, but that just means I'd probably have to give up PvP and warmode entirely, because literally every single other person would be able to trash me. My best hope in those settings would be that the ones giving the beatings are female characters wearing black leather transmogs, lmao.

It isn't that I hate organized content. I'd love to be included, it's just hard to find that sort of inclusion in this game without deferring to those things I posted above.

- - - Updated - - -

How did you get along pre-legion?

A little bit better because from late Vanilla onwards, there was always good competitive gear to be attained through casual PvP. From what I understand, that's not the case in SL. Only high ranked content and rated PvP seems to matter there.

[Depakote]

I've been out of WoW for the last couple months due to a botched computer upgrade, though I've been paying attention to forums and whatnot. Over that time I've reflected on my time during the last couple expansions and how much I struggled. With the game being so number-driven and competitive (parsings, raiderio, PvP rating and all that stuff), is there really a place in the game left for someone who can't compete?

To sum up, I'm a player who...

-Struggles to use the LFG tool due to social anxiety and confidence issues.
-Doesn't have much luck in the social department finding kind and understanding friends and guilds to run content with.
-Always had problems understanding things like simming, parsing, weakauras and such.

I just get kind of depressed when I remember how I had a hard time with things in Legion and BfA that pretty much everyone else around me seems to have no issues whatsoever with. And with what I'm hearing about Shadowlands, it is feeling even more like if you're not a winner and a champion, you're not really welcome here.

I just don't know anymore. Should I think about coming back?

Play to your own pace. IF you think you would have fun playing the game sure, come back. At no point should the way others think about the way you play the game have any say in whether you come back or not.

[Paperfox]

Please don't compare yourself to other people. It's a great way to set yourself up for failure, regardless of who you think is better.

Should you play again? Remember that this is entertainment, and so you should - in some way - enjoy it.

You may have to adjust your expectations and that's fine, I've had to. One thing my friends and I have discovered is that you almost need to have wowhead up on another screen while in SL as some things are poorly explained.

[Ninesquirrels]

I am not quite sure I understand your dilemma. LFG and LFR are exactly what you use if you basically want to play a low stakes game where you don't need to parse or compare yourself to anyone. The goal is to simply just get through the content and it isn't particularly difficult content. If you don't perform well you will easily be carried and no one cares. The only people who flame in LFG and LFR are douchebags which while they do exist they are not super common. You mention wanting to be well geared but if you don't want to do high difficulty content then it's not exactly being put to use. You don't need high ilvl gear if you aren't planning to do content that needs it.

This sounds less like a problem with the game and more of a struggle with social anxiety that is now interfering with your ability to enjoy a game. It sounds like you actually kind of do want to tackle some difficult content but find yourself unable to handle the stress of needing to meet dps minimums and letting down or being rejected by a group because of them. Which is to say that there is a place in the game for you the only person stopping you is you.

Its normal to be anxious and its normal to fail but do not let fear of failure rule your life. If you're not seeing a psychiatrist and/or therapist I suggest you go out and seek help so you aren't denying yourself things you enjoy because of anxiety. Cognitive Behavioral therapy is a big mainstay of treatment which medications can be a big help in making more manageable but ultimately few people can get by with medications alone in improving their anxiety.

Sorry for the rather wordy reply. I could be completely wrong in which case disregard me. Hope this helped.

[Osmeric]

Don't return. You will regret it.

[Triceron]

ands, it is feeling even more like if you're not a winner and a champion, you're not really welcome here.

I just don't know anymore. Should I think about coming back?

The game can absolutely be played as a singleplayer game.

Just play catchup and do the quest content and don't mind yourself with the raids and whatnot. Don't bother with the end game. Just take a breather from the game once you've done the content you're happy with. No need to stay subscribed forever for content that makes you feel uncomfortable to do.

[Jonnusthegreat]

I've been out of WoW for the last couple months due to a botched computer upgrade, though I've been paying attention to forums and whatnot. Over that time I've reflected on my time during the last couple expansions and how much I struggled. With the game being so number-driven and competitive (parsings, raiderio, PvP rating and all that stuff), is there really a place in the game left for someone who can't compete?

To sum up, I'm a player who...

-Struggles to use the LFG tool due to social anxiety and confidence issues.
-Doesn't have much luck in the social department finding kind and understanding friends and guilds to run content with.
-Always had problems understanding things like simming, parsing, weakauras and such.

I just get kind of depressed when I remember how I had a hard time with things in Legion and BfA that pretty much everyone else around me seems to have no issues whatsoever with. And with what I'm hearing about Shadowlands, it is feeling even more like if you're not a winner and a champion, you're not really welcome here.

I just don't know anymore. Should I think about coming back?

If you are a tank or a healer, the LFG tool is incredibly stress-free to use. Everyone will join your groups. If you are a DPS, tough luck with it. Lots of people (most?) will ignore single-dps groups, but if they see a tank or healer is secured, people will join. (This is about M+, which is the main casual progression line)

I'm a post CE (x3 in MoP) raider that has refused to use external resources since the Garrosh encounter and I still find I'm extremely competitive. Haven't seen a kill video in like, 10 years. I still raid and quit every few months to save my boredom so I get gkicked a lot, but I haven't found finding a guild difficult as long as you remember you are a casual.

[clevin]

I suppose it's hard to think otherwise when being on the forums so long, and seeing all the log/armory/etc shaming going on.

Remember that most forums, esp this one, are populated by people who are REALLY serious... and the other 90% are tryhards who do the log and armory shaming.

Look, yeah, if you want to time a +15 key, people will expect performance, etc. But aside from M+ and serious raids... eh. If you just want to see the content you can queue for regular and heroic 5s, you can LFR and disappear into 25 people.

Might you run into an asshat know it all? Yep. I did last night. So I left the group, queued and in 10 mins had another that we ran a 2nd one with.

AS for performance, look at the Icy Veins guide for your spec and learn which primary stat is important for you (AGI for rogues etc). Easy sims: raidbots - https://www.raidbots.com/simbot/stats. Put in your char name and get stat weights. it will give you a string fort Pawn, the add-on. Install that and import the string above. Pawn will then show you whether something is an upgrade and by how much. It's not perfect, but it's close enough for most of us.

[Queen of Hamsters]

Of course you would, especially as a solo player there really shouldn't be a problem.

The best way to find out is to just play, rather than asking strangers about it.

[Tadkins]

At no point should the way others think about the way you play the game have any say in whether you come back or not.

They would just have a say when they decide to stick their giant swords up my backside in PvP, or if there happens to be an AotC mount I really want in the future and resolve to try and get it.

Hi, I would suggest you to pick a RP server and play on Alliance side - community will overall be better and less likely to give you a hard time while doing random dungeons and stuff

Honestly did consider this one. I'm not much in the RP department, but I do have a name reserved on Moon Guard just in case. Do RP servers not have their own insular cliques and stuff like other servers do though?

You may have to adjust your expectations and that's fine, I've had to.

Yup for sure. One of those expectations is just never being allowed to do PvP again.

You don't need high ilvl gear if you aren't planning to do content that needs it.

Non-rated PvP requires it. I don't think I'd be able to have much fun getting trashed every which-way every time I queued for a random battleground. That's primarily why I think there should be gear accessibility beyond the toughest content. The other solution would be to have an ilvl bracket for random BGs. I'd accept a higher queue time if it meant not getting trashed by organized groups of gladiators and mythic raiders.

This sounds less like a problem with the game and more of a struggle with social anxiety that is now interfering with your ability to enjoy a game. It sounds like you actually kind of do want to tackle some difficult content but find yourself unable to handle the stress of needing to meet dps minimums and letting down or being rejected by a group because of them. Which is to say that there is a place in the game for you the only person stopping you is you.

Can you elaborate? It is true, I'd love to find a good and kind group of people to run raids and M+ dungeons with, who are understanding of my fears and anxiety and would continue to invite me even after messing up or not playing perfectly. I haven't had much luck in that department, is all.

Its normal to be anxious and its normal to fail but do not let fear of failure rule your life. If you're not seeing a psychiatrist and/or therapist I suggest you go out and seek help so you aren't denying yourself things you enjoy because of anxiety. Cognitive Behavioral therapy is a big mainstay of treatment which medications can be a big help in making more manageable but ultimately few people can get by with medications alone in improving their anxiety.

I was taking some free counseling on the matter, and yep my anxiety does affect my RL quite a bit as well, especially in regards to getting a job. That's all been put on hold due to COVID though, and I'm already terrified to leave the house until we can get vaccines.

- - - Updated - - -

If you are a tank or a healer, the LFG tool is incredibly stress-free to use. Everyone will join your groups. If you are a DPS, tough luck with it. Lots of people (most?) will ignore single-dps groups, but if they see a tank or healer is secured, people will join. (This is about M+, which is the main casual progression line)

Which sucks because I planned on coming back as a fresh reroll, as a demonology warlock.

- - - Updated - - -

AS for performance, look at the Icy Veins guide for your spec and learn which primary stat is important for you (AGI for rogues etc). Easy sims: raidbots - https://www.raidbots.com/simbot/stats. Put in your char name and get stat weights. it will give you a string fort Pawn, the add-on. Install that and import the string above. Pawn will then show you whether something is an upgrade and by how much. It's not perfect, but it's close enough for most of us.

I know how to look at an icy-veins guide, but then most folks on the class discords would recommend their own, far more detailed and far more complicated guides. At least that's how the mage discord worked when I mained one. That's where I primarily struggled with. If I could just follow an icy-veins guide I'd be fine for the most part.

The raidbots thing is what I struggle to understand a lot of the time. It's sad but every so often I still need folks to occasionally explain to me how to make it work. It's the same deal with warcraftlogs and weakauras.

[baskev]

I've been out of WoW for the last couple months due to a botched computer upgrade, though I've been paying attention to forums and whatnot. Over that time I've reflected on my time during the last couple expansions and how much I struggled. With the game being so number-driven and competitive (parsings, raiderio, PvP rating and all that stuff), is there really a place in the game left for someone who can't compete?

To sum up, I'm a player who...

-Struggles to use the LFG tool due to social anxiety and confidence issues.
-Doesn't have much luck in the social department finding kind and understanding friends and guilds to run content with.
-Always had problems understanding things like simming, parsing, weakauras and such.

I just get kind of depressed when I remember how I had a hard time with things in Legion and BfA that pretty much everyone else around me seems to have no issues whatsoever with. And with what I'm hearing about Shadowlands, it is feeling even more like if you're not a winner and a champion, you're not really welcome here.

I just don't know anymore. Should I think about coming back?

- LFG etc tools. Still the same. Either silent and succes, or silent and wiping. Or toxic version of it.
- guilds: also the same. Best i think for you to join a large guild. Less focus on 1 single person online because you eb away in the masses.
- Simming is useless if you do not do very high end stuff. Parsing same. weakauras...just get preach addon pack and your done. no need to make your own.


I think the things you have problems with will always be there in WoW. But i do think if you play social and just play the story etc. you can still have a lot of fun. 1 of the better expansions non raid/dungeon wise i have had in a while.

[Gaidax]

It's just a game, sheesh...

[GreenJesus]

I suppose it's hard to think otherwise when being on the forums so long, and seeing all the log/armory/etc shaming going on.

My biggest concern is that the game now just seems catered to only the champions of the game. If I ignored M+ and the like, I wouldn't have access to the great vault or anything like that, meaning my gear would always be bad compared to everyone else. Normally that wouldn't be too bad, but that just means I'd probably have to give up PvP and warmode entirely, because literally every single other person would be able to trash me. My best hope in those settings would be that the ones giving the beatings are female characters wearing black leather transmogs, lmao.

It isn't that I hate organized content. I'd love to be included, it's just hard to find that sort of inclusion in this game without deferring to those things I posted above.

- - - Updated - - -



A little bit better because from late Vanilla onwards, there was always good competitive gear to be attained through casual PvP. From what I understand, that's not the case in SL. Only high ranked content and rated PvP seems to matter there.

From unrated PVP you still get conquest points which equals 200 ilv gear which is equal to normal raid difficuly. At your comfort level in terms of group/solo content that should be more than enough. You can also join any 2's group/guild group with "Low CR just having fun" groups and get to 1400 easily since you don't lose rating if you lose and be able to ugprade to 207. You will eventually reach that point just due to disconnects or your partner getting a lucky kill or something. That is halfway between normal and heroic which is honestly pretty damn good. But I'm sure titanforging LFR/world quest heroes from Legion/BFA are malding that they can't be mythic geared.

[Tadkins]

I'd say give it a go. PvP gear is super easy to acquire. The daily BGs give conq. There are weeklies that give conq as well. The great vault gives you conq gear based on honor earned so you're not locked out of it either. The nice thing is that ANY PvP gear you acquire can be upgraded VIA honor too, depending on your rating. It's 200 base(normal raid) if you get to 1400 in any rated arena you can upgrade that gear to 207, 1600 to 213(heroic raid equivalent) etc...

From unrated PVP you still get conquest points which equals 200 ilv gear which is equal to normal raid difficuly. At your comfort level in terms of group/solo content that should be more than enough. You can also join any 2's group/guild group with "Low CR just having fun" groups and get to 1400 easily since you don't lose rating if you lose and be able to ugprade to 207. You will eventually reach that point just due to disconnects or your partner getting a lucky kill or something. That is halfway between normal and heroic which is honestly pretty damn good.

From what I understand, you don't get great vault access unless you do rated PvP. And rated PvP requires having friends (not to mention skill and coordination). My trouble there is finding ones who won't run away screaming after a few games because historically I've always been really bad at arena.
Everything SL related seems to rely on having access to a good group of friends or a guild, both of which I've always greatly struggled with.

[Jonnusthegreat]

Which sucks because I planned on coming back as a fresh reroll, as a demonology warlock.

I would really reconsider. The game for a casual is much more enjoyable as a class that can tank, dps, and heal (Or at least do 2 roles). With pure dps specs, people typically find one that they like best (or IS the best) and ignore the other two. You burn out faster. With a Tri-role class (Monk, Pally, Druid) you can just re-role (get it : ) and experience the world again in a new sense. Of course, you are at Blizzard's whim as to whether or not your spec is properly balanced.

[Tadkins]

I just really like the whole theme of it all, being a master summoner commanding my own infernal army. And I already have a sick transmog concept set aside that's warlock-only.

If I could transfer that to a tanking class I'd gladly reconsider.

[Belloc]

Simply put: If you cannot be social, you cannot be an end-game player. Participating in competitive content requires regular communication. You don't even have to worry about your skill at this point, because mythic raiding just doesn't work without the social aspect.

Your skills (or lack thereof) can be managed. You've had no luck with the technical aspects of improving your performance -- the simming, parsing, and weakauras, but that's not a huge issue. I'm going to be frank: You don't need to know how to sim. It's a solid toolkit for min-maxing, but worrying about that before you start working on your actual gameplay abilities is pointless. If you know how to play your character, you won't have to worry about parsing, because it'll just happen... assuming someone is logging, and logging is essentially as easy as signing up for an account, launching an app, and clicking a button. When you're ready to start recording your performance, you shouldn't have any trouble setting it up.

Weakauras, though, is a big one. To be competitive, you either have to have an unreal internal clock to keep track of timers and cooldowns, or you have to have a UI that presents that information to you. The difference between someone who has their spells and attacks placed in bars all over their screen vs someone who has all of their key abilities placed centrally, immediately visible, with clear, distinct animations and modifiers on display is immense. Weakauras can show you which attack to use, the best time to use it, when you're standing in something dangerous, when you need to use a defensive or immunity. It can tell you when debuffs need to be reapplied and show you exact timers for boss abilities. If there's information that could help you out in any way, Weakauras can be used to present it to you in precisely the way that would be most beneficial to you, specifically.

And, yeah, it can be intimidating at first

Fortunately, you don't need it to be perfect right away. Download the mod, go to wago.io, click on your spec, and just see what there is to see. You will see popular UI setups and you'll very likely find one that looks good to you. Click the big red-lined "COPY ..." button at the top-right of the page. In-game, open weakauras and you should be able to find an import button that'll open up a big text box ready for your code. Paste it, hit okay, and it should show up in a form suitable for your chosen spec and talents.

Read this if you want more details on Weakauras. They are very powerful and very useful. You don't need to know every little thing you can do with it, but being able to create buttons, bars, text, and other graphics is fairly simple and very effective.

What it really comes down to, though, is your ability to play and your ability to communicate. Ignoring gear, are you a good player? Do you know how to play your class? Have you read and followed guides for your spec? Have you succeeded in Mythic+? Have you killed heroic raid bosses? Are you usually high on the DPS meter? Middle? Low?

It's not fun, but heading out to the training dummy, opening up an icy-veins or WoWhead class guide, and practicing what you read... it's extremely effective! Yeah, you're probably going to suck at first, but if you haven't gone through this process, then it's one you need to go through. Practice and practice and practice until you see improvement in your numbers. They're never going to reflect the numbers you see in raids, but it'll still give you an idea of your performance. Practice the raid boss dummies, practice your AOE on the grouped dummies. Practice it all and keep practicing. IMO, once you start feeling comfortable, that's when you should start using Weakauras. At this point, you know which buttons you're pressing as a part of your rotation, so now you get to visualize them at the same time, which will make you that much more consistently high on damage.

So, really, that just leaves the social aspect -- the communication. This is the one skill that truly determines how far you can go in WoW. I can't fix social anxiety, but I can ask you this: Can you look at it from a different perspective? I've never been the best at communicating socially, but I am solid at doing it professionally. What about you? Got a job? Any other situations where you are able to communicate without anxiety? It might help to look at WoW as a job.

Or, maybe you can be someone else while you're in WoW. Have you ever tried a voice changer? If no, why not throw one on, talk to yourself, see what you sound like, and then maybe you can pretend to be someone who isn't quite so anxious? Or maybe I just said something incredibly offensive/inconsiderate and, if so, I sincerely apologize! I'm just trying to toss out ideas for overcoming the social barrier, because that's the key one.

If you can work out a way to be able to talk to your fellows -- not a lot, but enough -- then you can probably compete. If you can't do that, then don't come back to WoW unless you are willing to settle for solo content.






I had a friend that used to play... I remember that he let me play his character for pug GDKP runs. I had that warrior geared and pumping out serious damage in no time... but my friend, even with that gear, would have never been able to handle much more than a heroic dungeon... because he just sat there and had fun! He didn't always hit a button when it came off cooldown. He didn't care about his GCD -- sometimes he wouldn't even push a button for a few seconds.