Why is end game tailored so much against the casual player?

[Nootz]

Shadowlands is probably the most casual/alt friendly expansion in the last 10 years. No need to farm anything, no increase in player power can be endlessly farmed except for Stygia and that is such a small increase that it only matters for the absolute min/maxing, which casuals aren't doing anyway.

Covenants are similar. Sure they have an impact, because otherwise why would you even have them, but their impact is small enough that it's still completely fine to use an off-meta covenant unless you are doing +20 Mythics and Mythic raiding, which is hardly a thing casuals do anyway.

For example, I am playing all 3 specs on my Monk, depending what the group needs. I am Kyrian. Pelagos is the unbeatable zenith of soulbinds for every spec. But I am not gonna go through the trouble of constantly switching conduits, so I just picked a Soul Bind for each spec. Pelagos for Dps, Kleia for Healing and Mykanikos for Tanking.
This way I have done my KSM with several +15/+16/+17 keys and got my Curve + a few Mythic kills in the raid with no problem. Am I 100% min-maxed like this? No. Do I need to be for the content I do? No.

So unless you are telling me that your "casual" goal is to get Cutting Edge Denathrius and a +20 key in time then I can only say that your problems are simply imagined. You read online how this and this spec/covenant combo is bad, but don't realize that for the usual meta-slavery that it is. People will say something is "bad" if it performs 2% less then the meta combination and such a difference simply does not matter for 95% of the playerbase.

And as you see on my own example you can perfectly fine utilize all specs of a hybrid class like Monk. It's just a matter of practice as everything in life.

Biggest truth in this entire thread.

You are not in any way "required" to play a specific way unless you are pushing hall of fame, CE, or very high keys.

[Lolites]

Biggest truth in this entire thread.

You are not in any way "required" to play a specific way unless you are pushing hall of fame, CE, or very high keys.

couldnt agree more, i helped R3 in my guild and offtank raid as one of their tanks had some irl issues and i literaly just switched soulbind and weapon, had the dps trinkets and legendary (just for stats as i dont have tanking legendary and trinkets) and we had no issues... some people think its "meta or bust"
but then again, i know how to play my offspec...

[Tradu]

That is why I said that cap protects high end players from gaming to death, but it's very limiting from casual perspective, as with a cap you can't even upgrade your weapon from bottom to the top.
Gearing this expansion is faster for high end players only. Casuals don't go around doing high end rated pvp, raid and m+ while purchasing boes.

I am biased against gear progression anyway as I progress content rather than gear, but i'm a minority so w/e.

I think the issue with valor is more that the numbers are a bit off, not that it's capped. For PvP it takes 1-2 weeks' worth of conquest for 1 item, which is pretty reasonable. For M+ it takes 2-3 weeks depending on the slot, assuming you get the item at 210(which you might not). If it was the same number of weekly caps as PvP, I think that'd help a lot.

[vsb]

WoW has changed.

It used to be a social game designed for mediocre players. You did not need skill to reach anything, only persistence. Whether something is hard or easy - did not matter. The whole point of raids was to gather some people and let them have some fun killing bosses together. There were some exceptions: gladiator PvP ranks, top 1 realm guilds.

This is not the case anymore.

Nowadays if you want to complete the content, you have to be an exceptional player and you have to play with exceptional players. If you're playing in a casual guild, you'll bang your head against wall bosses and your guild will disband. You can hop around those casual guilds, but every one of them is the same.

It is expected from casual player to complete brainless daily and weekly chores and be done with it. If you want to complete a raid, you're expected to pay to excellent players for carries. M+ did not completely embrace this playstyle yet, you still can finish M+15 with enough dedication, but I'm sure that devs are working on it.

There're few weeks at the beginning of major patches, when heroic raids are somewhat challenging and casual players can have some fun completing it. But it turns into brainless weekly chore pretty quickly.

[Tradu]

Is end game really that terrible for casuals? You might be able to claim you don't like end game but it being tailored only for hardcore players? Two very different stories.

Raiding has 4 difficulty levels that range from piss easy group assembled for you and the bosses just fall over LFR then to normal, then heroic, then mythic. So raiding is totally accessible to EVERYONE. So tailored for no one.

Then you got PVP. Again a good number of just que up and the group is just made for you BGs. Rated PVP that might require some social interaction but if you look for simular skill level people via rating it's not hard to find people with a group finder tool. So everyone and anyone can do it.

Then you have mythic plus that litterially has the whole gambant of skill levels. Entry 1 to 5s that just about anyone can do. 5 to 10s that build up the challenge level a bit. 11s to 15s the press you a bit. Then the sky is the limit beyond that. Hell a 1 and a 2455 key even reward the same valor.

Now we can also say the open world is total shit and I will go along with that. But it's total shit for everyone pretty evenly. I don't know anyone ranging from super hardcore to total casual that is really enjoying it. So its hard to say it's tailored for hardcore players. More it's just trash.

Over all everything is tailored for everyone to be able to participate. Casual to hardcore. I hear a lot of rumbles about mage tower type things but I remember that being casual rage when it was new because only people with good gear and mild skill could do it. Sure, patches went by and out gearing it became a lot easier but that can go for everything in the game.

I do think they made a few mistakes for casuals though. Transmog farming was clipped because for some reason they refused to scale the old raid buff correctly for Legion. I know my wife was PISSED about that as a major casual. At first mythic plus was WAY to punishing and drove a lot of people off combined with no valor system progression that also drove people away. I also don't think the gate for upgrades should be achievement bound. I think valor earning gates it to hard already. Its better now but the damage is done. The open world does suck ass. Just has no life to it and I hope the Maw rework finally gives a little something to do everyday under the sky.

So tailored purely to hardcores? Negitive. Maybe a shit expansion though. I don't think the two are exclusively tied together.

It has to be bound to something. Presumably next season it'll be M+ score instead, which makes it a bit more convenient in case you're missing a dungeon for KSM or whatever.

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Ok let me remind some people, here. Back after Cata, I remember threads of elitists complaining that they were no longer unique for having epics or whatever. They cried about it en-mass. Next expansion, LFR gets nerfed and split into released segments over weeks. Over time, release date of even the first wing of LFR is pushed clear back to a month after release of a raid, and the gear nerfed further. (Hell, M2 dungeons sometimes give better, back in Legion, and that's easier than LFR.)

This myth people seem to have that it's casuals is laughable. You'd find most people who even wanted things like LFR weren't exactly asking for Heroic Raid gear. Just something that is an upgrade. It was the elitists who were mad that the so-called casuals could get pretty purple letters on their gear.

And fine, I am still butthurt about the delaying people not in raiding guilds had to deal with. Life got busy. I wanted to keep up with story content, but was gated behind a literal 2 month wait to do the final tier of a raid people did weeks ago who had more time.

FFXIV? Just fuckin' que for the raid and do it on release day. And look at that, there is still the hardcore content for people who want it. Hell, I've done some savage/extreme content. Amazing. It's like devs don't have to punish less active players. Wow.

That's fine, the way to do that is to make WQ and normal/heroic/mythic(not M+) dungeon gear worse, so LFR gear is an upgrade over those types of content. In general, the problems with gear progression for casuals stem from the easiest content being too rewarding so stepping up to the slightly harder content(LFR, normal, low M+ keys) has no incentive left and the only place to go is content that's probably too hard(heroic raid, M+10 etc).
WQ gear was fine where it was before the Renown upgrades, but with the Renown upgrades it short circuits the incentive to do other content.

[LordVargK]

conceptually, this type of game (RPG with combat and loot drops) exists only to increase the power of your character - while i'm sure there are a few exceptions, nobody ever logs into a game like WoW just for the experience of interacting with the game for its own sake.
power progression is the carrot that we're all chasing, and everything in game is either an end goal you're working to reach via better gear or an activity you're engaging in on account of the gear you already got.

Well, maybe I'm just one of those exceptions, idk. But I'm currently wiping at hc denathrius since a few weeks and I'm certainly not after the gear he (probably does not) drop

rest of post

You make very valid points here. Though I disagree with your idea of character power progression, if it is implemented like AP was. Personally I liked renown very much, Blizz could have tied more open world power increases to it (or any of the covenant buildings, really). After a while open world rares should be soloable (since less and less players are in the open world to help you) and it should not take the next patch for that. I would welcome something for open world players, that does not affect m+, PvP or raiding.

[Tradu]

Nothing about your example has anything to do about being casual or not...

The game became anti casual around roughly legion I would argue though it creeped in as early as MoP. Wow used to be be way,way back when about how good you were at the game not how long you played it for.

Then slowly like an infection the idea of grind tied around time played mattering more and more slowly sunk their way into the game. Suddenly it wasn't about simply being good enough to do mythic. No you had to do mythic then grind X were X was currency from challengeless and easy content.

This took a couple of forms from AP to corruptions to azerite traits to conduits.

The point was to min max a character took more and more "chore" level content rather then being a natural part of gameplay progression. The reason as far as I can tell for this is a desperate bid to try and get more sub money out of players who have no real interest in end game group content but want to progress even if progression to them means doing the exact same thing forever.

Yes, that's exactly why, and they've stepped back from it a bit in Shadowlands. People complained that they had to do harder content to get better gear. They wanted to just keep doing the same content they were already doing but get rewarded with better loot.

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Yeah sry didn't consider your not mentioned arbitrary which expansion is it ok to compare line.



Wat.
This game literally got more skill-based and less gear (which was the grind, maybe you werent aware of it because there was no bar) based since every expansion including TBC

Like its literally the exact opposite what you said lmao

Did we play the same Legion and BfA? Are we just going to pretend that grinding AP, legendaries and titanforged trinkets/gear in general didn't make a massive difference?

[Tradu]

Slow clap.

Also the gear cycle hardstopping at 200 without normal+ or M+ (aka, non queue content), means there's absolutely no carrot.

WotLK style points for gear is such an easy an obvious solution for this it's clear they've decided to provide no path forward from 200 until the next patch.

Me personally, I've been playing daily since the TBC launch but I've never felt less invested, far worse for me personally than the ends of WoD and MoP (which were bad). I like the dungeons for the most part, but hate M+, so there's no path.

Obviously, if you hate group content there's going to be an end point that's much lower than if you did group content. That should always be the case, because solo content isn't difficult enough to warrant it.

[Aurabolt]

Where have you been? They already did.

...This x1000.

I consider myself Semi-Casual but stopped playing as seriously after Cata. Turns out it was more fun for me when I did that. Until Cataclysm, I did Endgame content when it was current. I prefer to play WoW at my own place personally. I haven't played Retail as much as I'd like since Legion due to hardware problems (I need new computers LOL). When the opportunity comes and I'm able to get new computers, I plan to return to WoW.

Getting back on topic though. The main reason Devs have been leaving WoW in droves--and they have said this themselves--is because in their minds, the game is becoming more Casual. They recognize times have changed since the early days but between that and content updates having hard deadlines, they no longer want to be involved. Each expansion, we've seen a few more people leave.

Chris Metzen, who is the voice of Thrall (and Varian Wrynn) recently started a new studio and a lot of former members of his Blizzard team are joining him. This is not the same Blizzard it was 15 years ago but that's not a bad thing. We all know nothing lasts forever. LOL.

[Tradu]

Dude, gated behind KSM.

Just like PvP gear is gated behind rating. Not sure what your point is? Just like with other high ilevel gear, if you want it you have to do harder content.

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conceptually, this type of game (RPG with combat and loot drops) exists only to increase the power of your character - while i'm sure there are a few exceptions, nobody ever logs into a game like WoW just for the experience of interacting with the game for its own sake.
power progression is the carrot that we're all chasing, and everything in game is either an end goal you're working to reach via better gear or an activity you're engaging in on account of the gear you already got.

ultimately this is where WoW's core design model fails: there is no power progression outside of ilevel.
ilevel goes up, character power goes up. anything else besides an increase in ilevel does not result in any increase in character power.
(an exception to this being the beginning of an expansion with a 'borrowed power' system where you're still in the process of acquiring said power)

i think that ultimately what many of these kind of gripe threads really come down to is the issue that the way WoW is designed means that once you hit about 200 ilevel there is no system to improve your character other than M+ or raiding, both of which require a fairly specific mindset and skillset to be able to enjoy.
furthermore, the issue is that the way ilevel progression has been implemented means that once you hit about 200 ilevel you're not optimized for end content play that doesn't involve gear chasing - IE world questing, the maw, torghast.
at 200 ilevel you're still going to struggle a LOT with (for example) soloing some maw quests, or world rares. but the thing is, at about 210-215 ilevel, ALL of that becomes a breeze - so there's this substantial gap in quality of life that kicks in from a fairly tiny ilevel difference, but the gameplay required to get from A to B is intolerable for some people.


and if doing raiding and M+ is fun to you that naturally works out - but a lot of the bitching you see in these threads are from people who don't like raiding or M+ and are stuck being rather gimpy (in terms of character power relative to the 'open world' content), but have no viable means of improvement.

what WoW needs for its long term systemic health is character power progression that isn't tied to ilevel gains that are tied to M+ and raiding.
some kind of point system for the post-leveling game, like paragon points from D3 or alternate-advancement talents like in EQ or something

Which is a very weird problem, because they can literally tie effects to help with that issue to the gear from WQs. They did to some extent with the covenant gear, it just isn't powerful enough. Add open world health regen, extra damage to open world elites, movement speed while mounted etc to the gear available from WQs. That way you can progress to be stronger against the content you're actually doing without it impacting other paths of progression.

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Because lead content designer is a former hardcore raiding guild member and a mod on a forum called "elitistjerks" where you could get infracted for asking a simple question about a spell

Because that wasn't the purpose of that forum, yes. Weird how breaking forum rules causes you to get banned/infracted.

[Antontein]

Is end game tailored so much against the casual player?
There, i fixed that for you. You're welcome.

And the answer is: no.

You wanna casualy raid? There is LFR, normal or heroic.
You wanna casualy run dungs? There is M0 or low keys.
You wanna casualy PVP? There is RBG and arena skirmishes.

For nothing of that you need bis covenant or spec. Remember you are casual player. You dont need to be top performer. You just need to enjoy the content that is ment for you and dont try to push yourself into content that is not ment for you.

[Tradu]

Honestly I feel this problem is more a content drought right at the start of an expansion. If we were in 9.1 a month ago or so people would be progressing forward with the catch ups and newer entry level gearing options combined with the newer systems they added in with 9.05.

It's definitely a contributing factor. People who wouldn't have been "done" in past expansions are now done because the next set of content/progression/carrots is still months away.

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Well, maybe I'm just one of those exceptions, idk. But I'm currently wiping at hc denathrius since a few weeks and I'm certainly not after the gear he (probably does not) drop



You make very valid points here. Though I disagree with your idea of character power progression, if it is implemented like AP was. Personally I liked renown very much, Blizz could have tied more open world power increases to it (or any of the covenant buildings, really). After a while open world rares should be soloable (since less and less players are in the open world to help you) and it should not take the next patch for that. I would welcome something for open world players, that does not affect m+, PvP or raiding.

Yeah, Renown is another obvious place to put open world power, alongside covenant gear and, you know, the actual gear you get from doing world content like WQs.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

It has to be bound to something. Presumably next season it'll be M+ score instead, which makes it a bit more convenient in case you're missing a dungeon for KSM or whatever.

I disagree. I challenge you to get all your loot from +1 though +5s and upgrade it all to 220 and tell me it wasn't an insane level of dedication and investment to get there. It would take a long long time and tons of grinding. The reward for doing high keys is you only have to upgrade from 207 or 210 instead 187 which is a TON less valor. My alt upgraded a chest from 200 grinding on low keys and it was like 450 valor a stage like 6 stages of upgrades (and I don't remember exact numbers so sue me if it's not perfect). That's nuts to be honest. Like 20 keys. Thats from 200! For ONE piece. So it motivates you to try high keys to skip upgrade levels.

Then consider in a new season valor caps will be lower at the start. You probably will be able to jump to high levels in lower keys. It offers a pretty long grind system to anyone to get reasonable gear and 220 still isn't capped by any means so not a path to being better than a mythic raider or super high end pvp or m+ player.

[Unholyground]

Literally who? Bellular does nothing but shit on Blizzard 24/7 these days and his entire channel has basically become a fucking waiting room for Asmongold reaction VODs.

Nah his content is pretty good generally and he even said like, don't forget there are humans behind the games making them, they are in the pandemic too.

[Tradu]

I disagree. I challenge you to get all your loot from +1 though +5s and upgrade it all to 220 and tell me it wasn't an insane level of dedication and investment to get there. It would take a long long time and tons of grinding. The reward for doing high keys is you only have to upgrade from 207 or 210 instead 187 which is a TON less valor. My alt upgraded a chest from 200 grinding on low keys and it was like 450 valor a stage like 6 stages of upgrades (and I don't remember exact numbers so sue me if it's not perfect). That's nuts to be honest. Like 20 keys. Thats from 200! For ONE piece. So it motivates you to try high keys to skip upgrade levels.

Then consider in a new season valor caps will be lower at the start. You probably will be able to jump to high levels in lower keys. It offers a pretty long grind system to anyone to get reasonable gear and 220 still isn't capped by any means so not a path to being better than a mythic raider or super high end pvp or m+ player.

Dedication and investment alone shouldn't be rewarded with almost the best gear in the game(and realistically next patch they'll cave and let you get the best gear from valor upgrades). You don't get full 220 gear from just playing 1400 rating arenas either, you have to reach 1800. This is the exact same thing except for M+.
And again, if it wasn't capped, mythic raiders would spend the entirety of heroic week farming M+ in order to have full 220 gear going into mythic. That's degenerate gameplay and negates an entire raid difficulty entirely. There needs to be a skill check and a weekly gated component to it, otherwise it short circuits the entire reward structure.

[Belloc]

So time invested equals to skill, by this logic. Good to know.

Time invested equals effort, not skill. The more effort one puts in, the higher the potential reward. The logic is solid.

Any player can have the skills for the end-game, but only the ones that put in the effort should get the rewards.

[BeepBoo]

Any player can have the skills for the end-game

Disagree. Especially in the context of larger groups that ALL have to work together.

but only the ones that put in the effort should get the rewards.

Again, disagree. All that should be required to get high parses (the reward I was personally after) is skill at gameplay. Of course, it will take effort to clear the raid, but how much effort is a direct function of how skilled you and your group are. Effort is secondary to skill (and power from gear... but I'd love for that to go away).

[Dazu]

in what world utilizing a hybrid class that has tank/dps/heal or 2xdps/heal or tank is min maxing?
It is already in the game, I'm not a developer. It was this way from 2004 and basically is like a false advertisement of your class,
it's like saying you will get 3 in 1, but you don't, and before you discredit me again, my point is:
switching a spec is not a small feat,
and if it was, a lot of smaller guilds could play their raids, mostly mythic difficulty would benefit,
but also I could see it being good for any guild there is,
no matter the level they are playing on.

Switching spec used to cost 50g and some item adjustments,
now it cost an arm and an leg,
pros will always adapt, they no life this game, we all know it.

and as many posters touched before:
casuals bring the most revenue, it is a fact, that's not something one can discuss.

Lastly, as a long time gamer, it really saddens me to see how this community became so elitist and entitled.
People only care about themselves, and nobody cares about hanging out with them boys,
like in the good ol' days.
Nobody would suffer, if you could switch your spec on the fly,
but as no lifers don't need it, they won't support it, because it would take from their elitist factor,
honestly - l2p.

Switching spec is incredibly easy, most so than almost any other time in this games history.
Lets see, seeing as you bring up old talent tree respec costs. So I need to swap spec to perform a role in raid - 5-10 minutes to get to the trainer and respec, full set of enchants/gems (and at one point glyphs) and I also needed 2-4 full sets of gear depending on class (4 for druids, 2x for warriors, 3 for paladins, 2-3 for priests, 3 for shamans) seeing as the stats and item type wasnt always suitable (not unsually to have cloth or leather healing gear on paladins after all, but sure as hell cant tank with that).
So all up, 100g for respec fees and the additional upkeep cost for gems and enchants on multiple sets of gear (provided you collected it). That was 100g when making that 100g from farming took a decent chunk of time. 100g in TBC is more equivalent to 5k gold now (100g was roughly 10+ dailies, 3-4 world quests gives you 2k+ gold daily now).

Now in shadowlands (and much the same for BFA) - I go to my spec, and hit change. I may need to alter a enchant or 2. Change my weapons/trinkets and legendary and im pretty much ready to go. Oh we also have saved sets so the changing of weapons etc is 2 clicks! Costs nothing either. I have 3x hybrids at 60 (soon 4). Also many classes have a choice in legendary thats more universal for a hybrid to use, as with a covenant. My shaman for example is necrolord because it matched 2 of my specs the best and isnt bad for the 3rd. My DK went Kyrian because it works well and I made a legendary (3x diseases) that has benefit to all 3 specs even if it isnt the best singularly for all 3. My DH also Kyrian, and once again same gear and same legendary for both specs as my 1st legendary. Over time ill make multiple legendaries for all different roles.
Cost in SL - few hundred to 10s of thousands of gold for the legendaries and thats it. You also make a rediculous amount of gold per day if you so choose for very easy content.

Anyone who doesnt think switching spec on a hybrid right now is easy, is just wrong. The hardest part is knowing how to play the other specs to a sufficient level to perform.

[Tradu]

Switching spec is incredibly easy, most so than almost any other time in this games history.
Lets see, seeing as you bring up old talent tree respec costs. So I need to swap spec to perform a role in raid - 5-10 minutes to get to the trainer and respec, full set of enchants/gems (and at one point glyphs) and I also needed 2-4 full sets of gear depending on class (4 for druids, 2x for warriors, 3 for paladins, 2-3 for priests, 3 for shamans) seeing as the stats and item type wasnt always suitable (not unsually to have cloth or leather healing gear on paladins after all, but sure as hell cant tank with that).
So all up, 100g for respec fees and the additional upkeep cost for gems and enchants on multiple sets of gear (provided you collected it). That was 100g when making that 100g from farming took a decent chunk of time. 100g in TBC is more equivalent to 5k gold now (100g was roughly 10+ dailies, 3-4 world quests gives you 2k+ gold daily now).

Now in shadowlands (and much the same for BFA) - I go to my spec, and hit change. I may need to alter a enchant or 2. Change my weapons/trinkets and legendary and im pretty much ready to go. Oh we also have saved sets so the changing of weapons etc is 2 clicks! Costs nothing either. I have 3x hybrids at 60 (soon 4). Also many classes have a choice in legendary thats more universal for a hybrid to use, as with a covenant. My shaman for example is necrolord because it matched 2 of my specs the best and isnt bad for the 3rd. My DK went Kyrian because it works well and I made a legendary (3x diseases) that has benefit to all 3 specs even if it isnt the best singularly for all 3. My DH also Kyrian, and once again same gear and same legendary for both specs as my 1st legendary. Over time ill make multiple legendaries for all different roles.
Cost in SL - few hundred to 10s of thousands of gold for the legendaries and thats it. You also make a rediculous amount of gold per day if you so choose for very easy content.

Anyone who doesnt think switching spec on a hybrid right now is easy, is just wrong. The hardest part is knowing how to play the other specs to a sufficient level to perform.

Your comparison to Classic/TBC is beyond stupid, because of course it was bad back then too. The relevant comparison would be to expansions where it was actually good, like WoD/MoP or late Legion/BfA. And in past expansions you could eventually reach a point where you had all your offspec gear. You can't ever have all your offspec soulbinds or covenants in SL, because we're locked to 1 covenant and some moron at Blizzard came up with conduit energy.

[Dazu]

Disagree. Especially in the context of larger groups that ALL have to work together.



Again, disagree. All that should be required to get high parses (the reward I was personally after) is skill at gameplay. Of course, it will take effort to clear the raid, but how much effort is a direct function of how skilled you and your group are. Effort is secondary to skill (and power from gear... but I'd love for that to go away).

Parses can be toggled to ilvl so skill > time and effort in that. If all you want is the highest parses on WC logs for example than its your skill that matters when broken down.
Getting the best gear/most gear most certainly should be a benefit of effort and time investment mixed with skill.