Shadowlands is worst then BFA

[KOUNTERPARTS]

welcome to MMO Champion

It's just sad that, even dedicated bait posters like him (just check his thread history), don't even try anymore.

[cparle87]

I mean so called "hardcore sandbox" content. Blizzard wouldn't do it, if it wouldn't be "popular". But yeah, Nazjatar was more about current WQ system with very limited choice (choose 4 of 5, yeah), while choice was meant to be essential feature of WQs.

What choice do we have with world quests that we didn't have with dailies? The only benefit I can see is we don't have to manually pick them up or turn them in, but then we have fun downsides like stepping one toe of the designated area and stopping the getting of credit?

[shise]

Correlation and causation.

It's not like that the biggest issues that WoW has requires some divine insight, most are low hanging fruits, frankly

True that, and holy crap my writting on that lol

It just sucks that youtubers influence so much on people in general. People should see the issues themselves and go on the forums to complain/give feedback.

[Orby]

to be fair, wotlk was the raidlog expansion until icc came out
but that's basically all people remember lol, like the people on here who be praising ulduar def weren't running it live (ulduar had one of the lowest participation percentages as current content)

I think you are wrong here, I think those that praise it were there raiding it and generally enjoyed it that just sounds like a bitter argument, but it's still one of my favourite raids. Our guild completed it and unlike most raids I was there as a fill in when we downed Yogg with 0 keepers, it was one of my favourite moments in my time in WoW. I would often joke to my guild how I was the sole reason they did it because it took them so long to do it and the one time they did it was when I was there to do it with them... good times.

WotLK I do agree wasnt that great as a raid expansion, recycled Naxx, Trial of the Crusader (which I secretly enjoyed), Ruby Sanctum which no did, ICC which was over rated and just dragged for too long, and the other two dragon raids which were fine. Except Malegos because dragon flying wasnt a fun mechanic. but levelling, questing, PVP (at least for me), the value of time, the world, the zones, the lore, were all great and more satisfying to work with than in Shadowlands.

I will not have a single good memory about Shadowlands, only that it was the first expansion in 17 years to make me unsub, I stopped playing in Cata but I at least remained subbed. So Achievement unlocked I guess.

[Tesshin83]

I have found that the less time I spend on this forum. The more I enjoy the game. Strange stuff

[Alduin]

I have found that the less time I spend on this forum. The more I enjoy the game. Strange stuff

I have found that the less time I spend ingame the more I enjoy cooking. Delicious stuff.

Back to topic:
Issue with Shadowlands is that it is (still) super casual/alt unfriendly aka there are way too many systems in place to keep track off (Classes, Speccs, Covenant Ability - Covenant Soulbind - Legendary) plus multiple thousand time sinks in addition to a community that has become way too toxic plus no efforts from Blizzard to change e.g. boosting. Paired with seriously good alternatives the numbers are going down - increasing the toxicity of the community in compare.
Lets see if 9.2. will change any of that.

[Kralljin]

It just sucks that youtubers influence so much on people in general. People should see the issues themselves and go on the forums to complain/give feedback.

I doubt that would change much in the grand scheme of things, as said, it's not like those content creators reveals some unseen truths to those people.

You don't need a content creator to realize that Torghast sucks, that's self evident to most people, they get however popular because the criticism resonates with a lot of players.
I don't think you'd get much more nuanced or varied opinions without content creators, because a lot of people wouldn't be bothered to voice it at all.

This entire concept of "People need to think for themselves" is always a bit naive, a lot of people do think for themselves, they just happen to agree with those content creators.
If they thought for themselves, i doubt their opinion would be much different.

[Biggles Worth]

and im SURE you have sub numbers to support this and not just repeating some youtubers asspull...

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but people on forums are saying it since vanila...

You know as well as I do Blizzard doesn't post WoW subscription numbers anymore. People get their metrics from factual logs of player participation. This won't be 100% accurate because no everyone logs but we can paint a very clear picture.

[Ange]

I aint here to tell you you are wrong for liking Shadowlands.. I am very aware people like it, and I envy you. I wish I could. I am just out here having fun with things that are not Blizard games and for once I am feeling very happy, WoW wasnt making me happy and I don't want to keep playing games that are not making me happy.

Just enjoy what makes you happy.

I dont like the whole WoW theme/lore/story that much, never did, so my bar for a "good expansion" is pretty low - if the gameplay is untouched and there is some part of the game that is fun for me, I like it.

I did not play SL that much, just checked out the raids (heroic only) and did my weekly chores to keep gearprogression going. Not really the games fault, I just like the new Flight Simulator in VR a lot and it eats up a lot of game time, because its ridiculous immersive.

[amarrite]

I haven't had a sub since a few months after SL due to resource and story complaints I have. Anytime a game jumps into the afterlife I get bored pretty quickly. And the Azarite power system (that was started with artifact power in Legion) is the worst time sink in the game. I absolutely cannot stand being forced to farm some magical power resource to get me to login to the game. I actually miss just doing a few dailies when I felt like to for reputation, which we still have anyway, and logging in when I feel like it. This was one of the reasons I stopped playing, I just don't have the time to sit in the game every day for hours. It just seemed like they were trying to force me to login every day to keep the money coming in when I would have kept my sub anyway. Sadly, I would still be playing if it wasn't for that, and I may return just to see if it's gotten any better.

Then there's the conduits and other systems. I'm not a fan of those systems for some reason. I actually liked the system they had in legion (minus the artifact power farming) that was much simpler to use. Get a weapon, change spec, get said ability. It was pretty simple for new and returning players to understand and use. The convoluted mess they have now is just a confusing mechanic.

Then you throw in the alt unfriendly climate of the game now and you have a pretty glorious mess to handle. I used to enjoy playing my alts during the gap between content. hopefully they learned something from this expansion.

[Relapses]

You know as well as I do Blizzard doesn't post WoW subscription numbers anymore. People get their metrics from factual logs of player participation. This won't be 100% accurate because no everyone logs but we can paint a very clear picture.

When the picture being painted ignores an entire facet of the game (M+), one can reasonably assume the picture it's painting is... what's the word I'm looking for? Oh right: Wrong.

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True that, and holy crap my writting on that lol

It just sucks that youtubers influence so much on people in general. People should see the issues themselves and go on the forums to complain/give feedback.

Some YouTubers provide constructive feedback for the game. Others provide hate-porn for ex-WoW players. For whatever reason, ex-WoW players need to be told, repeatedly, that the current game sucks and they made the right decision to stop playing.

[Wavebossa]

I actually enjoy Shadowlands alot.

My biggest issues are the lootdrop and lack of catchup methods up until 9.1.5
Glad they finally added some, but they could have been there sooner imo

But the covenant system is my favorite system they've ever added to WoW.

[Lolites]

You know as well as I do Blizzard doesn't post WoW subscription numbers anymore. People get their metrics from factual logs of player participation. This won't be 100% accurate because no everyone logs but we can paint a very clear picture.

yes it paints a very clear picture of people wanting to present incomplete data ar proof of whatever it is they WANT TO BELIEVE...
only truth is we have no idea how many people play and how it changed during shadowlands... anyone claiming something else is lying, simple as that

[Angrie]

You know as well as I do Blizzard doesn't post WoW subscription numbers anymore. People get their metrics from factual logs of player participation. This won't be 100% accurate because no everyone logs but we can paint a very clear picture.

lol, what? How can something not be 100% accurate and also be a very clear picture?

If anything it's personal experience that's driving people's assumptions that the game is dying. Once my guild got AotC, the very next raid was empty. No one talked about a joint exodus, it just happened. I still had 3 months left on my sub. Logged in the day before it expired, Guild of over 650 people has guild chats from July still in the history. The lack of QUALITY content, the lawsuits, homogenization of classes, it's just not great now. I don't think Blizzard realizes their core demographic is 30+, most of their life circumstances have changed in the past 17years; most cannot play a video game for 12+hours a week in raid progression + 1 hour each day to stay relevant + torghast + renown + 5 hours of M+ to maximize vault + x hours to pvp.... like ADULTS cannot do that. Man-childs do that in their 30s. Blizzard needs to rethink their strategy, the whole "language" 9.2 timegate thing is going to backfire; they haven't learned that their core demographic doesn't want that crap anymore. MOST of us aren't 18 anymore where we can stay up to 6am every night with no consequences.

Shadowlands is a disaster, it's a shame. If Covid didn't happen the expansion probably would have been great, but most of its development was unsupervised and this is the product we got.

[spalernTJ]

BFA made me quit and come back occasionally to try out new raids and content, but I overall disliked it a ton. Shadowlands couldn't keep me for more than a month or two, and I haven't had any interest in coming back since. They're both just about equally bad.

[Garthul]

I had way more fun in BfA than to the same point of time in SL. And that's saying a lot coz BfA was pretty crap. Shadowlands is just.. really disappointing

I would say I probably had more fun in BfA because more of my friends actually hung around and played at least intermittently. Everyone I know checked out really quick on SL and they're all on FFXIV now, but personally I just didn't like that game at all. Don't care for the gameplay, the characters, the story, the interface, idk none of it was clicking with me. At the same time though, there's really nothing to do in WoW right now unless I want to do dungeons/raids with randoms, which isn't really what I'm looking for from an MMO.

[Utrrabbit]

we will see how 9.2 goes but from what I'm hearing Blizzard is going full time gates and another system(I had to roll my eyes). Community is almost barren and major content creators have already left the game. Remember when Blizzard said they learned from their mistakes from BFA, well it turns out they didn't and made the game worse with contrive systems just have keep playing longer like Convents and Conduits. The story is a mess, no one still knows what Sylvanas's motivations are and we see Blizzard pulling I was being controlled by the Jailer motivation out of nowhere. People are moving to FF 14 in droves.

I doubt Blizzard will make an easy recovery from this like they did in the past and I would be surprised if we see the next xpac for a while if Blizzard doesn't go under first. A lot of unknowns with this Activision and with the recent scandals they are involved with I predict it will get worst.

You heard wrong by a lot of people that CAN NOT READ.

9.2 cypher system is not time gated and also is 100% optional as it gives 0% player power. It is just a way to explore and as you do you unlock new mounts/pets/toys.

People saying it is gated are the ones not understanding.

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Is this what they call "post-Bellular clarity"?

As much as I give bell crap for some on his opinions. Even he is saying that cypher and 9.2 is looking good and he is liking what they are doing. So it can not be people coming from him.

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When you think WoW has hit rock bottom it somehow sinks lower.

When you can not read or have to let people form an opinion for you.

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Hmm... i find this very ODD since im currently leveling my 10th 60 in RAPID speed compared to BFA and i've finally had loads of time to play alts compared to previous expansions due to these systems being pointless / having heavy catch-up mechanics that makes you ready for atleast raiding SoD Normal within a week, all you really have to do is Korthia dailies every day after hitting 60 and it gives you a full 220 ilvl item set with items and i hit 50+ renown even before reaching 60 with the new 9.1.5 heirloom items at flight master.

BFA had so much mandatory content for a new char that wasnt skippable and infinite grinds, shadowlands doesnt.

I would like to compare Shadowlands with WoD, it lacks content.

My renown was 71 when I hit 60 on my shaman yesterday.

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I have found that the less time I spend ingame the more I enjoy cooking. Delicious stuff.

Back to topic:
Issue with Shadowlands is that it is (still) super casual/alt unfriendly aka there are way too many systems in place to keep track off (Classes, Speccs, Covenant Ability - Covenant Soulbind - Legendary) plus multiple thousand time sinks in addition to a community that has become way too toxic plus no efforts from Blizzard to change e.g. boosting. Paired with seriously good alternatives the numbers are going down - increasing the toxicity of the community in compare.
Lets see if 9.2. will change any of that.

You clearly do not play. Nothing you mentioned is true as 99% of that you do while leveling.

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lol

No. Wrath was decried by many because, by what was available up to then, it did a few things poorly. Remember that Vanilla and BC both had stellar growth...Wrath merely kept subscriptions steady.

There has been decline ever since Wrath with only increasing level of spikes of expansion sales because *far* too many people get suckered by corporate PR which constantly says that they learned their lesson and how this next expansion will go back to the old ways (heard that for the past 4 expansions now).

Anyways both MoP and Legion were regarded pretty well by most when they launched (not all players, but faired better than most other expansions post Wrath). WoD, BFA, and Shadowlands all took very hard nosedives in subscriptions not long after launch.

Your facts are wrong. Wrath had the highest growth and the subs fell during cata.

[Accendor]

You heard wrong by a lot of people that CAN NOT READ.

9.2 cypher system is not time gated and also is 100% optional as it gives 0% player power. It is just a way to explore and as you do you unlock new mounts/pets/toys.

Thats another mistake on their part, creating a whole new zone and a patch around it and making it 100% useless.

I don't get what their intention behind that is. I get it, people like pets and mounts, but people also like character / power growth, which is a core aspect of RPGs.
It's completely fine to create content that does NOT cater to power growth, but making that the main focus of a whole patch, that will most likely need to hold out for more than a year and that comes directly after a massive content drought which came right after a terrible expansion is just mind boggling to me. It feels like they are not even trying tbh.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Your facts are wrong. Wrath had the highest growth and the subs fell during cata.

They aren’t wrong classic went from 0 to 6-7m and tbc went from 6-7 to 10-11, wrath then went to 12m.

Here a old sub report where you can see all the numbers. https://www.mmo-champion.com/content...on-Subscribers

[Doffen]

Thats another mistake on their part, creating a whole new zone and a patch around it and making it 100% useless.

I don't get what their intention behind that is. I get it, people like pets and mounts, but people also like character / power growth, which is a core aspect of RPGs.
It's completely fine to create content that does NOT cater to power growth, but making that the main focus of a whole patch, that will most likely need to hold out for more than a year and that comes directly after a massive content drought which came right after a terrible expansion is just mind boggling to me. It feels like they are not even trying tbh.

Give something aka artifact weapon progression back, simple. How many failed versions have they gone for since? All of them? Yeah.

Except few vocals, artifact weapon was a success. BfA had too many, too powerful. Shadowlands has many, but not powerful at all.