Tin foil hat theory - did they make shadowlands horrific on purpouse?

[Electric Lighter]

Shadowlands is NOT a bad xpac. WOD and BFA received significantly more negative feedback and in hindsight so has Cata. Except for WOD (where players dropped out after a month), its become the norm for players to quit after 3-4 months or take a break and downscale their participation until the next patch (which is super LATE). And, it's definitely hard, if not impossible to discern between the two.

Truth be told and I believe the majority will agree, It's better than Cata, WOD and BFA, but not as good as Legion, WOTLK and BC. That puts the xpac somewhere in the middle which is where it belongs right now. For everything Shadowlands gets dead on target, they manage to get something else really wrong, flashes of brilliance (Torghast, Covenants, Trials of Fate) and flashes of stupidity (Lack of Rewards in some parts, the entire pvp gearing system (again) and a long overdue 1st patch). Is Blizzard taking their time to come up with better ideas, fixes and solutions or is the largest MMO out there stalling because of a "lack of resources or is Covid genuinely restricting Blizzard's Dev time?" A reasonable assumption is that it's a combo of all the above.

To me it feels like the systems they make get in the way of their own success...

If I look at the content for shadowlands outside of the maw zone I don't really see many faults. I just wish they didn't make gearing up feel so terrible and had so many collect X for Y upgrade systems like legendary items, relics, and renowned.

If they just settled on renowned and had a loot system similar to the past outside minor issues ( mythic dance fight shouldnt be 10 mins long) I would be singing the expansions praises.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

fewer milions then FF14 has.

FF14 unlike wow gained 1,5 mln active players when wow kept loosing them - even though they didnt release new expansion yet.

Where are you getting these numbers from?

[LordVargK]

PvP loot isn't "the best", it's just the most reliable when it comes to acquisition. M+ is no longer an independent way of gearing up your toon, it has been degraded to an additional grind which nets you more vault slots. Casual players have $&#@ all to do if they want to progress their character - inb4 "git gud", because I've already heard that before, do you know when? In the good ol' times of Cata/WoD, the epitome of the raid or die approach.

M+ is exactly the same as it ever was, just with an added bonus. And m+ still gives better gear than a raid for a progressing raid. Source? We're currently stuck on Sludgefist hc and most people can't use the 213 gear of the previous bosses. But the 220+ gear from m+ vault still gives huge upgrades and is easier to aquire.
So I argue that it's more "m+ or die" rather than "raid or die".

[ellieg]

PvP loot isn't "the best", it's just the most reliable when it comes to acquisition. M+ is no longer an independent way of gearing up your toon, it has been degraded to an additional grind which nets you more vault slots. Casual players have $&#@ all to do if they want to progress their character - inb4 "git gud", because I've already heard that before, do you know when? In the good ol' times of Cata/WoD, the epitome of the raid or die approach.

Casuals can get 197 cov gear, 197 honor gear, 207 worldboss gear, 203 calling gear, 200 conduits, and sockets from the maw. What else are casuals looking for? A +4 will award 207 gear once a week from the vault and they don't even have to time it. They also get a 235 legendary. And if they are doing the daily wins from dif types of regular bgs, they are slowly acquiring conquest to buy 200 conquest gear with no rating.

Casuals are running around with the same ilvl as normal raids. What else do they truly want from or expect from unrated, queued content? At some point they have to step into more difficult content if they want to progress, just like everyone else

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M+ is exactly the same as it ever was, just with an added bonus. And m+ still gives better gear than a raid for a progressing raid. Source? We're currently stuck on Sludgefist hc and most people can't use the 213 gear of the previous bosses. But the 220+ gear from m+ vault still gives huge upgrades and is easier to aquire.
So I argue that it's more "m+ or die" rather than "raid or die".

Thata true at heroic level if you are stick at 8/10, but once u move into mythic raid, it definitely gears faster than m+.

[Yriel]

I don't think it's horrific, it think it's very corperate-y.
If you let an AI or algorithm design a wow expansion it would look very similar to Shadowlands.

[LordVargK]

Casuals can get 197 cov gear, 197 honor gear, 207 worldboss gear, 203 calling gear, 200 conduits, and sockets from the maw. What else are casuals looking for? A +4 will award 207 gear once a week from the vault and they don't even have to time it. They also get a 235 legendary. And if they are doing the daily wins from dif types of regular bgs, they are slowly acquiring conquest to buy 200 conquest gear with no rating.

Casuals are running around with the same ilvl as normal raids. What else do they truly want from or expect from unrated, queued content? At some point they have to step into more difficult content if they want to progress, just like everyone else

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Thata true at heroic level if you are stick at 8/10, but once u move into mythic raid, it definitely gears faster than m+.

Yeah that might be true. But 90% of players never set a foot in mythic, so until then they are benefitting very much from m+ giving better, easy loot each week.

[Dhrizzle]

Just because people play it doesnt mean they like it. cutting down on develeopment/costs/staff etc is making the game horiffic on purpose. but nowadays wow cant be bad enough for invested players to stop playing it - they just accept the fact and go on with it. stockholm syndrome and sunk cost fallacy plus whatever personal reasons that fuel the need to escape to a known, safe, universe they have known for years.

How many developers have been cut from WoW over the past few years?

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I don't think it's horrific, it think it's very corperate-y.
If you let an AI or algorithm design a wow expansion it would look very similar to Shadowlands.

In what way?

[Echo of Soul]

It's not too farfetched. The youtubers and streamers have been complaining about the game for years claiming to know exactly what's wrong with it and not realizing that they exist in a bubble and that they're horribly out of touch with the community. I could very well see Blizzard saying "let's give them exactly what they want and see what happens".

We now know what happened, the game is horrible for the vast majority of the playerbase and most casuals have quit at this point. The ones that the game is great for are said streamers and the people they represent.

[Darsithis]

It's not too farfetched. The youtubers and streamers have been complaining about the game for years claiming to know exactly what's wrong with it and not realizing that they exist in a bubble and that they're horribly out of touch with the community. I could very well see Blizzard saying "let's give them exactly what they want and see what happens".

No they didn't. I don't have to even be an employee at Blizzard to know they didn't do that. I've been a software engineer for 21 years, across a number of companies, and never, ever, ever, in my career, have I or a peer ever said that and meant it. Yes, sure, we've joked before about giving a client exactly what they want, but in the end, we have pride in our work and wouldn't give it less than our best. I can't imagine the development team at Blizzard is any different as a whole.

We now know what happened, the game is horrible for the vast majority of the playerbase and most casuals have quit at this point. The ones that the game is great for are said streamers and the people they represent.

[Citation needed].

Horrible for the "vast majority"? Where did that come from? Most casuals have quit? Who? Where is the evidence of that?

[ellieg]

It's not too farfetched. The youtubers and streamers have been complaining about the game for years claiming to know exactly what's wrong with it and not realizing that they exist in a bubble and that they're horribly out of touch with the community. I could very well see Blizzard saying "let's give them exactly what they want and see what happens".

We now know what happened, the game is horrible for the vast majority of the playerbase and most casuals have quit at this point. The ones that the game is great for are said streamers and the people they represent.

I think ppl put too much stock into streamers. We are on a wow fansite in our free time. I believe a higher % of posters here are into streamers based on that fact. I dont believe the average wow player watches much less follows streamers

[Yriel]

In what way?

It's not creative, it's very formulaic. All checkboxes for maximum player retention are checked, all expected content is there but thats it. It seems to me if you ask a machine to design an expansion that would be it.

[Subrias]

NO - they made it horrible because Ion is a hardcore raider and he made expansion solely for hardcore raiders.

thats why end product is toxic pile of garbage that has atm less players then FF14. and this is 3 months into expansion.

it complete unmitigated failure - that most likely got already axed and resources already got moved to 10.0 because nothing can save it atm.

you will see that 9.1 will be last tier of expansion and thats why it wont come out untill septemeber

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he is not wrong though .

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fewer milions then FF14 has.

FF14 unlike wow gained 1,5 mln active players when wow kept loosing them - even though they didnt release new expansion yet.

thats because ff14 is a better game for the most part. it has been ever since heavensward. i have some minor gripes with it but the main reason i dont play it is because i have no real friends who play it. therefore back to wow.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

It's not creative, it's very formulaic. All checkboxes for maximum player retention are checked, all expected content is there but thats it. It seems to me if you ask a machine to design an expansion that would be it.

The maw
Torghast
Covenants
Threads of fate
Chromie time.

We have never had stuff like this in any past wow expan, shadowlands is a lot of things but it’s not formulaic.

[deenman]

you can ban me also
OP is 100% right and you know it

that's the real life wow business strategy:
oldfags go -> classic
newfags go -> get lost in spoonfed shit for 2-3 months, then go -> classic

90% pay subscription to have access to classic

Im pretty sure this is just an obvious troll but,the classic servers capacity isnt enough to house half of the active playerbase,let alone 90%

and OP is wrong by default because for profit companies have LEGALY BINDING fiduciary duty to act in the best interest of the companys profit,they arent making stuff bad on purpose,its literaly against the law

[Zenfoldor]

I don't think they tanked it on purpose, but I do think it was much more boring than they(anyone?) anticipated, and though it wouldn't have fixed everything, a new class would have given the expansion significantly more legs.

[Soon-TM]

The maw Terrible
Torghast Terrible
Covenants Half assed class halls
Threads of fate More D3 $&#@ ham-fisted into WoW
Chromie time.Irrelevant at max level, aka the real game

In other words, the "novelties" of SL are either irrelevant, a shameless D3 ripoff or straight out awful.

[keelr]

you can ban me also
OP is 100% right and you know it

that's the real life wow business strategy:
oldfags go -> classic
newfags go -> get lost in spoonfed shit for 2-3 months, then go -> classic

90% pay subscription to have access to classic

Obvious trolling, if not super high.

[Afrospinach]

>50% like it
>50% don't
>Somehow that makes it horrific instead of just average.

Well even though it is straight form someone's ass, yeah 50% of a dedicated customer base hating a new thing is pretty horrific.

I have not got to the "bad bit" in shadowlands but I really enjoyed what I did do.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

In other words, the "novelties" of SL are either irrelevant, a shameless D3 ripoff or straight out awful.

How you or I personally feel about these things doesn’t really matter to rather the expan is formulaic or not, good or bad no past expan had things like these.

[kranur]

In what world will a company invest resources into a product only to make the buyers use another product that doesn't require anywhere near as many resources.