Modern Dungeons suck! I hate what Mythic+ is doing to dungeon design.

[RobertMugabe]

You can though because you still get loot. It just downgrades a key and you can't progress to higher levels which is why ignoring it is technically wrong but still a thing you could do. Why would a person care about progressing if they don't like timed modes though? It is also amusing that M+ is the target of all your problems with dungeon design simply because you grew bored of it.

Yet you can still play dungeons as they were before M+ by simply doing M0 or not caring about pushing/timing.

If there were higher non-timed difficulty modes for m0 with better rewards, then your argument would make sense, otherwise no.
M0 is an almost non existent mode at this point, considering you can get better loot in zereth mortis in a matter of hours.

That being said I don't mind m+ too much, unless I am playing a tank.

[rhorle]

If there were higher non-timed difficulty modes for m0 with better rewards, then your argument would make sense, otherwise no.
M0 is an almost non existent mode at this point, considering you can get better loot in zereth mortis in a matter of hours.

So how is that different then prior to M+ being introduced? When dungeons become irrelevant when new stuff got released or were done for badges and not the item level of the bosses? Of course you won't get the same rewards but everything isn't about the rewards, right? Why isn't getting rewards for the content you are doing good enough?

You don't need to progress beyond your content wall.

[RobertMugabe]

So how is that different then prior to M+ being introduced? When dungeons become irrelevant when new stuff got released or were done for badges and not the item level of the bosses? Of course you won't get the same rewards but everything isn't about the rewards, right? Why isn't getting rewards for the content you are doing good enough?

You don't need to progress beyond your content wall.

Well part of the fun of an MMO are the rewards and the challenge (it's not fun to just ignore tactics and oneshot everything).

M0 is a good type of content whenever an expansion releases, but shortly after that this content becomes just completely redundant as it gets too easy and you get better loot elsewhere much easier.

If EVERY dungeon was kept at a difficulty and reward level as the mega dungeons they add every expansion, then it would be fine I guess. They do already bump the difficulty and rewards for these dungeons every patch, but for some reason they buff them so little that it's not worth doing them. Like why would you do m0 for ilvl236 when you can get a full set of 233 stuff through the auction house for just a little amount of gold or get ilvl246 gear in zereth mortis by doing chapter 6 of the storyline.

[Sugani]

There’s a part of me that wonders about a version of Mythic+ that went in a different non-timed direction. One where each boss of a dungeon drops ilvl appropriate loot for the given rank of the key, and like in raids, cooldowns are refreshed each pull. That way people aren’t sitting waiting for cooldowns, just that encounters are designed around cooldowns.

Something that would turn them into 5-man raids, keeping the scaling difficulty of the keys, while also removing the stupid timer, percent trash cleared, and mandatory dungeon completion.

Furthermore, you can probably just ditch normal and heroic modes. Merging them into the keys, +0 being old normal, +1 being old heroic. Hell, then you could also apply these same mechanics to raids if you really want to get crazy with it. Probably ditch the keys entirely, just have the mythic console pop a UI where you just set the key level you want. No grinding keys, or feeling bad getting a dungeon key you don’t like. Targetable loot through boss kills rather than RNG drops and vault. One can dream.

[KrayZ33]

No, gaming does still work like that, you don’t have time for that. We’re all getting old.

No, it doesn't.
People who want to find a group and do 1h+ stuff are a niche. Especially when they don't know the other players.
We have plenty of threads and people saying that M+ take too long already and they are only like 35m long.

Other than dungeon length, there is really nothing different though.
Mega-Dungeons with secrets still exist, the dungeons are often not even linear and even the small dungeons have special things that you can use/not use find and do things in.

[Temp name]

There’s a part of me that wonders about a version of Mythic+ that went in a different non-timed direction. One where each boss of a dungeon drops ilvl appropriate loot for the given rank of the key, and like in raids, cooldowns are refreshed each pull. That way people aren’t sitting waiting for cooldowns, just that encounters are designed around cooldowns.

Something that would turn them into 5-man raids, keeping the scaling difficulty of the keys, while also removing the stupid timer and percent trash cleared.

Furthermore, you can probably just ditch normal and heroic modes. Merging them into the keys, +0 being old normal, +1 being old heroic. Hell, then you could also apply these same mechanics to raids if you really want to get crazy with it. Probably ditch the keys entirely, just have the mythic console pop a UI where you just set the key level you want. No grinding keys, or feeling bad getting a dungeon you don’t like. Targetable loot through boss kills rather than RNG drops and vault. One can dream.

I'm glad they didn't, that sounds awful.
It would fundamentally change dungeons and force a meta even more than right now.

Right now, let's say you're doing a Plaguefall. You'll need DPS classes that can do AoE for trash, ST for bosses, and cleave for the last 2 bosses.
In your system, since you no longer care about trash, you no longer need dps who can do AoE, and you can probably also get away without cleave by just hard swapping, or getting a class that can funnel damage from adds into boss / the other way around.

And that's just dps, you also no longer care as much about CC since trash doesn't matter, so you can get away with less of that too.

Or, since there isn't any enrage, you can bring 2 healers to TRIVIALIZE the entire dungeon until you start getting 1shot by mechanics


What you want is raids, not dungeons. Should they make raids doable in smaller groups? Sure, why not. But why remove a content source that has proven popular with one that is just a copy of raids, but with fewer people?

[froschhure]

Honestly dungeon only have improved, i can understand that 2, dungeons per "theme" is kind of boring, but thats it. Combat is so good right now. I wish for some grind system like azerite but it is also okay, to relax for a while

[Grax]

I'm glad they didn't, that sounds awful.
It would fundamentally change dungeons and force a meta even more than right now.

Right now, let's say you're doing a Plaguefall. You'll need DPS classes that can do AoE for trash, ST for bosses, and cleave for the last 2 bosses.
In your system, since you no longer care about trash, you no longer need dps who can do AoE, and you can probably also get away without cleave by just hard swapping, or getting a class that can funnel damage from adds into boss / the other way around.

And that's just dps, you also no longer care as much about CC since trash doesn't matter, so you can get away with less of that too.

Or, since there isn't any enrage, you can bring 2 healers to TRIVIALIZE the entire dungeon until you start getting 1shot by mechanics


What you want is raids, not dungeons. Should they make raids doable in smaller groups? Sure, why not. But why remove a content source that has proven popular with one that is just a copy of raids, but with fewer people?

Those are potentially valid concerns. . . If you're running an old dungeon, Plaguefall, under the proposed new ruleset. One would hope that would be taken into account while designing new content with a new ruleset. The idea of chucking three different difficulty levels in the bin and streamlining it with the system described above sounds like a win.

[Sugani]

I'm glad they didn't, that sounds awful.
It would fundamentally change dungeons and force a meta even more than right now.

Right now, let's say you're doing a Plaguefall. You'll need DPS classes that can do AoE for trash, ST for bosses, and cleave for the last 2 bosses.
In your system, since you no longer care about trash, you no longer need dps who can do AoE, and you can probably also get away without cleave by just hard swapping, or getting a class that can funnel damage from adds into boss / the other way around.

And that's just dps, you also no longer care as much about CC since trash doesn't matter, so you can get away with less of that too.

Or, since there isn't any enrage, you can bring 2 healers to TRIVIALIZE the entire dungeon until you start getting 1shot by mechanics


What you want is raids, not dungeons. Should they make raids doable in smaller groups? Sure, why not. But why remove a content source that has proven popular with one that is just a copy of raids, but with fewer people?

You misunderstand, it’s just removing the percent trash cleared. Like in most dungeons, most trash is still unavoidable, and offers variety in size, type and layout. If anything, CC would become more prevalent, and strong AoE, Single Target, and Cleave would still be important. Let’s be honest, you can’t force a harder meta than what we have now, that’s how it always works, they always exist. To which I say, fuck ‘em. But that’s just me.

And if the 1% will just abuse invisibility potions and cloak of shadows. Let them. Blizzard needs to stop designing the game around the top 1%.

And in regards to the enrage, this would be under the precedent that bosses would be designed around the lack of timer. You could argue you open up the design space for new mechanics.

- - - Updated - - -

Those are potentially valid concerns. . . If you're running an old dungeon, Plaguefall, under the proposed new ruleset. One would hope that would be taken into account while designing new content with a new ruleset. The idea of chucking three different difficulty levels in the bin and streamlining it with the system proposed above sounds like a win.

Exactly that, new system means new design requirements. Shadowlands dungeons won’t play as nicely with a system like this because of how they were designed to play with Mythic+.

[Temp name]

You misunderstand, it’s just removing the percent trash cleared. Like in most dungeons, most trash is still unavoidable, and offers variety in size, type and layout. If anything, CC would become more prevalent, and strong AoE, Single Target, and Cleave would still be important. Let’s be honest, you can’t force a harder meta than what we have now, that’s how it always works, they always exist. To which I say, fuck ‘em. But that’s just me.

And if the 1% will just abuse invisibility potions and cloak of shadows. Let them. Blizzard needs to stop designing the game around the top 1%.

And in regards to the enrage, this would be under the precedent that bosses would be designed around the lack of timer. You could argue you open up the design space for new mechanics.

But again, even if you fix all the stuff you say, you're still removing a source of content that people enjoy, and replacing it with raiding lite.

[Sugani]

But again, even if you fix all the stuff you say, you're still removing a source of content that people enjoy, and replacing it with raiding lite.

I mean, it wouldn’t be the first time Blizzard removed something players enjoy from the game. Jokes aside. It might be for the better as dungeons, in the past, were used as an entry for raids. Having some crossover could be a bet positive. It seems there is some fragmentation happening in the player base where players choose a specific pillar and stay within in.

And at the end of the day, people won’t mind losing something if what replaces it is still enjoyable, fun and engaging. You might even open it up to more people.

[Rumex]

I actually kinda like the dungeons in Shadowlands, i like them more than BFA. But my biggest issue is the amount of time it takes to get in a +14 or +15 group. Specially if you only have 2-3 hours a day, spending 1 to 2 hours to even get in a group and complete a +15 is not good game design. And people treat it like it is some +20 key. If you don't have 2.5k rio, completed minimum a +17, if you don't play the right class, if you don't have tier sets etc. All those kind of things just don't make the experience fun what so ever, specially when you know that you DON'T need all that shit to complete a +15. And then you have people that feel like they need to be carried, tanks that feel entitled and act like babies, 1 tank leave after someone ask why he won't take CR, in a perfectly timed key btw. His reply 'Don't talk when you bad' and left. You have people that watch too much Twitch, and their perception of the game and their own skill is completely wrong. Because you seen someone push a +30 key on stream don't mean you can do it yourself, even if you copy the route or strat, that shit takes practice and the amount of people i see that think they can do this and that just because they see a streamer do it is actually insane, and in the long run it creates a very bad game experience when you have to pug.

Remove m+ and make it into Challenge mode like Pandaria, you can still push score and get the prestige. Because let's be real, most of the people that push high keys don't really do it for the gear, they do it for the prestige and to challenge themselves. Make a currency like Valor that you use to buy gear, then let higher keys reward more Valor or whatever so people that really wanna focus can gear faster, and people that maybe only can do 1 or 2 dungeon per day can still feel some type of progression. I just think Blizz need to rework it abit, because right now i don't think m+ is in a good place, specially not for pugs or new players. Like one of my friends tried the game, but gave up after some time because he kept getting denied to every single dungeon he signed up to, because he don't have previous raider.io score or much raid experience, and he said he would spend like 50% of his playing time just trying to get in groups and he basically gave up after some time and started playing other games, and i can't really blame him at all. Game design is absolutely trash for new players.

[Glorious Leader]

I actually kinda like the dungeons in Shadowlands, i like them more than BFA. But my biggest issue is the amount of time it takes to get in a +14 or +15 group. Specially if you only have 2-3 hours a day, spending 1 to 2 hours to even get in a group and complete a +15 is not good game design.

It was shitty in tbc as well

[Shiekyerbooty]

Honestly, my biggest gripe with Shadowlands is just how lackluster dungeons feel. They felt so sterile. "Each zone has two dungeons, one is leveling, another is end game, they all feel the same with their semi-linear path, and feature no interesting or fun optional/bonus encounters or side quests." Why, because Mythic+ is forcing design into a very narrow path. You cannot have dungeons like Upper Blackrock Spire or Halls of Origination under this new system; design-wise, the philosophies behind them contrast one another. This is why they are limited to one-off 'mega-dungeons' once per expansion. The target should be a Tazavesh or Mechagon, and not in regards to its length, but in terms of feel.

Dungeons used to feel like dangerous places with secrets to uncover, truly non-linear in giving the player control on where they wanted to go, and which bosses to kill, places that felt lived in. I think back to the greats and can't help but look at just how shallow these modern dungeons have become. It sucks, and I hate it.

I think the problem is not Mythic dungeons, but that the loot from mythic dungeons is far too strong...


Doing a 15 minute dungeon should never reward you gear on par with a Raid

Welfare mythic gear has made raid gear trivial... and screwed up the entire gearing system

There is nothing special about mythic dungeons... in fact dungeons have been neutered to make mythic dungeons seem hard.... interrupts, cc's... this was simply standard practice in older heroics

[BobAwesome]

I think the problem is not Mythic dungeons, but that the loot from mythic dungeons is far too strong...


Doing a 15 minute dungeon should never reward you gear on par with a Raid

Welfare mythic gear has made raid gear trivial... and screwed up the entire gearing system

There is nothing special about mythic dungeons... in fact dungeons have been neutered to make mythic dungeons seem hard.... interrupts, cc's... this was simply standard practice in older heroics

Do you actually run mythic+ at the level that awards loot at the same ilvl as raids? Because you can't do them in 15 minutes.

[Tinary]

I think the problem is not Mythic dungeons, but that the loot from mythic dungeons is far too strong...


Doing a 15 minute dungeon should never reward you gear on par with a Raid

Welfare mythic gear has made raid gear trivial... and screwed up the entire gearing system

There is nothing special about mythic dungeons... in fact dungeons have been neutered to make mythic dungeons seem hard.... interrupts, cc's... this was simply standard practice in older heroics

So doing a 3m boss where you afk mostly cause you have nothing to do and hardly use your abilitys should award you more than doing a 20-30m dungeon run where you have to use most of your kit? I see

Interrupts and cc in old heroics? You mean BC? There was some CC but even if it was standard practise, then most of those "old school" dungeon people still dont know what interrupt is, neither a def cd or proper damage rotation. Times change, so does the dungeons and the way it is run, while it might not "feel" hard, I do have to say, tanking a mythic plus high key is alot more fun than raid. In the end, its the matter of personal preference.

[jeezusisacasual]

I think the problem is not Mythic dungeons, but that the loot from mythic dungeons is far too strong...


Doing a 15 minute dungeon should never reward you gear on par with a Raid

Welfare mythic gear has made raid gear trivial... and screwed up the entire gearing system

There is nothing special about mythic dungeons... in fact dungeons have been neutered to make mythic dungeons seem hard.... interrupts, cc's... this was simply standard practice in older heroics

So you do not like an alternative to gear that directly competes with raids? Raiding like mythic plus now, is a pillar of endgame progression allowing you to avoid raiding completely if you so choose which is what makes me even play the game. If you enjoy raiding just raid but if you want to min/max to your hearts content then understand your going to cause yourself some pain and spend even more time then ever before but once you realize that going hard makes very little sense considering the lottery system of the great vault you will be better for it.

I would say that i have used my kit far more in Mythic plus then in any raid in recent memory, from using Clash / Paralyze for a ghetto kick or using RoP to move mobs in a spot to allow the dps to have an easier time. The variety and pressure that a timer presents is also fun as i feel people try harder under a more stressful ( timer related ) situation.

Just tell your guild nah im not going to do it, its that simple also. Being 100% optimal is not the only way to progress your toon either and as more and more players realize that the better but still people are competing in a PvE game so it might take a bit longer i guess.

But if Raiding was so fun and fantastic it would not need everything else to be worthless to stand on its own 2 feet.

[Mimiru]

I'm mainly annoyed with it because everything is just a gold race.

[Goatfish]

But if Raiding was so fun and fantastic it would not need everything else to be worthless to stand on its own 2 feet.

Again, the problem is 2-fold. First that a 15 is far and beyond easier than even a heroic raid and awards better gear (except tier in this case), and secondly that you are going to push people who would rather just raid into doing dungeons. Sure, you could say that raiders don't HAVE to do dungeons in the same way dungeoners wouldn't NEED to do the raids for gear either. I would assume the majority do both in some fashion because that is how you get the biggest benefit while also enjoying a larger variety of content keeping things from getting stale. A solid majority of people I raid with only do a single 15 a week for the vault, but would rather not have to log in to get even that done, let alone 10 a week. Perhaps the biggest but maybe a separate problem is that we get a pool of 8 dungeons to spam on repeat for 2 years, where at least the raid is a bit longer and used to change up every 6 months or so.

I would argue that the balance is skewed a bit too far towards dungeon supremacy right now. We would ideally have gear be reasonably close to equal, possibly even offset with crafting or reputation gear as a third option for certain slots. Rescaling dungeons so that 10 is normal raid, 15 is heroic, and 20 is mythic level loot would probably be more representative of the loot-difficulty ratio, but the crying would be unbearable.

As far as dungeon design, I don't blame M+, I solidly blame the people designing the dungeons. Being legion mythic week I spent a lot of time in Eye of Azshara and I think it's a better example of where dungeons could go to make them more interesting in repeated runs. A more open layout with bosses that add zone effects that differ based off which bosses you kill. Some elitists might still make up the ideal strategy, but it gives theorycrafters more to play with and gives people the option to change up the dungeon a little. At this point I'm almost falling asleep doing the same guided rail dungeons for the 100th time almost regardless of key level.

[dragonflight10]

Honestly, my biggest gripe with Shadowlands is just how lackluster dungeons feel. They felt so sterile. "Each zone has two dungeons, one is leveling, another is end game, they all feel the same with their semi-linear path, and feature no interesting or fun optional/bonus encounters or side quests." Why, because Mythic+ is forcing design into a very narrow path. You cannot have dungeons like Upper Blackrock Spire or Halls of Origination under this new system; design-wise, the philosophies behind them contrast one another. This is why they are limited to one-off 'mega-dungeons' once per expansion. The target should be a Tazavesh or Mechagon, and not in regards to its length, but in terms of feel.

Dungeons used to feel like dangerous places with secrets to uncover, truly non-linear in giving the player control on where they wanted to go, and which bosses to kill, places that felt lived in. I think back to the greats and can't help but look at just how shallow these modern dungeons have become. It sucks, and I hate it.

they felt like that because people were clueless xD