Can we agree that crafted legendaries failed?

[Dalinos]

I rather the classes just be balanced. I think legendaries were never a net positive for the game.

If you want to balance an expansion around a weapon go the artifact route were cosmetics are unlocked rather then power.

That hardly answers the question posed in my post eh. I too agree that the Legion artifact weapons were AMAZING. For the FIRST TIME IN WOWS HISTORY, my Guardian Druid could legitimately use Fist Weapons like the Druid of the Claw unit does in Warcraft 3. I still mog any weapon I get to Claws of Ursoc - why wouldn't I? They are the literal claws of a fucking bear god. And I'm a bear.

All that is, however, beside the point. I completely agree with "Legendaries for everyone as long as you earn them" because I spent EIGHT FULL YEARS, from 2004 to 2012 (MoP release) hardcore raiding, clearing all content the game had to offer, and I was never rewarded with a Legendary, not because my guild/group didn't want to, but because NO FUCKING LEGENDARY EXISTED FOR BEAR DRUIDS.

[KrayZ33]

You're divorced from reality, but that's okay.

If I can pay the game company irl money and receive player power back in said game, it's P2W. Period.

No amount of small novels you decide to write me can't change that simple fact.

Sure, but that's not the case in WoW.
Good thing we agree.
Or are you implying because you pay for your sub, it's P2W, since you are ignoring like half of the things involved and dumbed it down to basically that level? Silly.

Lets say a game exists where no loot is bound to players. You load your credit card and bank account details onto your game account. Now, once in game, you just buy items directly from other players and they receive money in their account for said items. What you are saying, is this game is NOT P2W?

Since everything is player generated, pretty much yeah.
I mean, it's far removed from how it actually is in WoW but I get what you are pointing at.
All you are saying is that the game has an *official* platform for players to interact with RMT.
The game design doesn't change in the slightest just because it is there or not (unless they changed it for that purpose, which they did not).
Inofficial or not.

Diablo2 for example is not really P2W in my opinion, just because instead of shady 3rd party sites, you now could theoretically use an official one.
In WoWs case, you can't even do anything with the money other than buying store products or game time if you use the official platform. That's important as well.

I mean... Diablo 2 is a good example actually. Do you consider it P2W? The way it is right now? Nothing added to it?
If so, did you always consider it to be that way?
And isn't it weird that no one says or said it's P2W?
Or Diablo 3? Without the RMAH?

[Dalinos]

Sure, but that's not the case in WoW.
Good thing we agree.
Or are you implying because you pay for your sub, it's P2W? Silly.




Since everything is player generated, pretty much yeah.
I mean, it's far removed from how it is actually in WoW but I get what you are pointing at.
All you are saying is that the game has a platform for players to interact with RMT.

Diablo2 for example is not really P2W in my opinion, just because instead of shady 3rd party sites, you now use an official one.
In WoWs case, you can't even do anything with the money other than buying store products or game time. That's important as well.

But...my dude. Hold up. I don't 100% agree that WoW is P2W because you literally can't buy armour sets (with stats) that don't exist in game from the blizzardstore.

HOWEVER.

Step 1) pay 100 euroes to buy 5 WoW tokens
Step 2) Sell 5 WoW tokens on the AH, get a million gold+
Step 3) Find the Raid Leader of the best Mythic guild on the server and offer 1M gold for a full 11/11 Sepulcher clear
Step 4) Join the raid, trade the leader, give the 1,000,000 gold
Step 5) Congrats, you have now cleared Mythic Sepulcher.

Is a sequence of events that can happen. Sure, you're paying a player, not blizzard directly, and sure, it's players clearing the raid for you, not blizz GMs. But you can't deny that that exact sequence of events can and does happen. So you can see why people consider this P2W I hope.

[arkanon]

Since everything is player generated, pretty much yeah.
I mean, it's far removed from how it actually is in WoW but I get what you are pointing at.
All you are saying is that the game has an *official* platform for players to interact with RMT.
The game design doesn't change in the slightest just because it is there or not (unless they changed it for that purpose, which they did not).
Inofficial or not.

Diablo2 for example is not really P2W in my opinion, just because instead of shady 3rd party sites, you now could theoretically use an official one.
In WoWs case, you can't even do anything with the money other than buying store products or game time if you use the official platform. That's important as well.

I mean... Diablo 2 is a good example actually. Do you consider it P2W? The way it is right now? Nothing added to it?

So just to be super clear - a game where you can buy the most powerful gear in the game, with cash, is NOT P2W?

[KrayZ33]

So just to be super clear - a game where you can buy the most powerful gear in the game, with cash, is NOT P2W?

No.
I don't consider D2 or D3 P2W. Where I can do exactly that at this moment with official tools
Just no token involved, but real money through real account information through battle net.

Actually, just about no one does.

But...my dude. Hold up. I don't 100% agree that WoW is P2W because you literally can't buy armour sets (with stats) that don't exist in game from the blizzardstore.

HOWEVER.

Step 1) pay 100 euroes to buy 5 WoW tokens
Step 2) Sell 5 WoW tokens on the AH, get a million gold+
Step 3) Find the Raid Leader of the best Mythic guild on the server and offer 1M gold for a full 11/11 Sepulcher clear
Step 4) Join the raid, trade the leader, give the 1,000,000 gold
Step 5) Congrats, you have now cleared Mythic Sepulcher.

Is a sequence of events that can happen. Sure, you're paying a player, not blizzard directly, and sure, it's players clearing the raid for you, not blizz GMs. But you can't deny that that exact sequence of events can and does happen. So you can see why people consider this P2W I hope.

Again, this applies to just about every other game you can think off.
It was never a discussion before the WoW Token became a thing. That's the point.
The WoW token is a way to make the same thing happen "easier". It didn't enable it, nor did it implement it.

If I could use that cash to "generate" something, than that's something that wouldn't have been possible before and that would've turned the game into something it wasn't before.
Why is it that no one (as in at least 1 in 10.000) ever said WoW was P2W before the token?

edit: why is it, that when I google "Diablo p2w" I get headlines like:

"Diablo fans concerned that Immortal is a “pay to win” Diablo 3"

When I can gift you Bnet balance right now for whatever item you just found with me in your group that is super good?
Or I pay you 20 bucks just so you farm GR with me for 5h and I get all the drops - or something.
I'll only use official tools provided by Blizzard to do all that.

What's the reason, what is different? That it isn't as "targeted"? Does that make a difference in the principle of the matter?

As for your example with the Mythic clear.
I can do the same thing in Starcraft 2. Again, only using official tools provided by Blizzard.
Someone can carry me to Grandmaster in 2v2 or something.
But I give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you are talking about mostly loot here (and thus player power) and not actually the clear achievement/grandmaster rank or whatever. So SC2 - a game in which literally no one ever said anything about P2W - wouldn't fit anymore.

[Trend]

You're divorced from reality, but that's okay.

If I can pay the game company irl money and receive player power back in said game, it's P2W. Period.

No amount of small novels you decide to write me can't change that simple fact.

Why does it matter if the RL money is going to the company that runs the game versus other places? I don't follow your logic on that. Either RL money matters or it doesn't. Saying your opinion is a fact doesn't make it so and end the discussion, especially when you're being illogical. It is not that I disagree with your objection to trading RL money for player power, it's that I believe you're making a very artificial and unwarranted distinction based on where the dollars go.

Every game worth playing is P2W by a reasonable extension of the argument you're trying to make. Even if you're not paying cash for items, do you have a better computer or Internet connection or chair? Are you able to pay the AC bills to keep your room more comfortable? Can you afford not to work as much so you can game more? These things all give you an advantage that is based on your access to RL money. And long before the token, people were paying money either directly or to buy gold to buy boosting services. Clearly, WoW has always been P2W if any power from money is P2W.

I would prefer boosting wasn't a thing. I would have chosen for Blizzard to be smarter and more diligent about punishing gold sales rather than just giving into it. But I don't personally consider people buying boosts to be winning and I guess that's the biggest reason I'm not angry about it and why I wouldn't say WoW is P2W. Sure, you may have the paying, but being a bad player with better gear isn't much winning in my book. And I do think it's a matter of degrees. If there is a continuum, certainly WoW could be less P2W-ish, but it could certainly be with a lot of games that are much worse in this regard. Part of that problem is Blizzard and part of it is the community.

[arkanon]

No.
I don't consider D2 or D3 P2W. Where I can do exactly that at this moment with official tools
Just no token involved, but real money through real account information through battle net.

Actually, just about no one does.

Explain the D3 system to me.

note - please take more care quoting - nothing below the top quote was said by me.

[KrayZ33]

Explain the D3 system to me.

An item drops, you can give it to another player (who was in your group).
I gift you 10/20/30/custom amount of $ via Bnet currency.
Same thing, no one talks about it.
Not quite sure if "ancient whatever" pieces are tradable, it's been too long. But the currency did exist for longer than that as far as I remember.
Obviously, other services are possible as well. Such as GR200 carry runs for 3h / 10 times (or whatever the current number is)
At that point it's basically buying "loot boxes" with hurdles from players. But how is that different from buying M+ runs. It's not like upgrades are guaranteed. I sure as hell didn't recieve any for 4 weeks straight even though I had a lot of slots in old +15 gear from last season.

Same thing in D2. But here it's without any restriction whatsoever.
You build your Enigma, I see it, talk to you, make you an offer. You accept. You give it to me, I give you 20$ Bnet currency.
No one talks about it.
Seems to be a non-issue.

The token is nothing but Bnet currency, am I right?

[arkanon]

An item drops, you can give it to another player (who was in your group).
I gift you 10/20/30/custom amount of $ via Bnet currency.
Same thing, no one talks about it.
Not quite sure if "ancient whatever" pieces are tradable, it's been too long. But the currency did exist for longer than that as far as I remember.
Obviously, other services are possible as well. Such as GR200 carry runs for 3h / 10 times (or whatever the current number is)
At that point it's basically buying "loot boxes" with hurdles from players.

Same thing in D2. Without any restriction whatsoever.
You build your Enigma, I see it, talk to you, make you an offer. You accept. You give it to me, I give you 20$ Bnet currency.
No one talks about it.
Seems to be a non-issue.

The token is nothing but Bnet currency, am I right?

How confident are you this is how it works? Are you SURE all loot in D3 is tradable with any player? Do Blizzard support this, or is it against the rules?

Or, are you actually talking about buying a full loot carry through content, by paying real money - and again, is this supported by Blizzard, or against the rules?

[Chilela]

IMO, you're missing the bigger issue with it, that being that it effectively made running Torghast mandatory, and on a weekly basis before they allowed for catchup on legendary reagents at that. Overall, it was a net upgrade over Legiondaries, but they really needed alternate methods of acquisition.

[arkanon]

IMO, you're missing the bigger issue with it, that being that it effectively made running Torghast mandatory, and on a weekly basis before they allowed for catchup on legendary reagents at that. Overall, it was a net upgrade over Legiondaries, but they really needed alternate methods of acquisition.

To be fair, i believe there needs to be SOME system of acquisition, so no matter what system they use - raids, pvp, m+, custom system like torgast - SOMEONE is going to feel left out and disappointed. What i personally DONT want to see is farming WQ and dailies and mindless content like that to suddenly start rewarding Legos. Im fine with it being a factor in the system - maybe you could slowly upgrade them or something, but killing 10 rats every day and getting a lego just doesnt work for me.

[KrayZ33]

How confident are you this is how it works? Are you SURE all loot in D3 is tradable with any player? Do Blizzard support this, or is it against the rules?

All I need is your Battletag ID and I can gift you money.
https://www.reddit.com/r/diablo3/com...party_members/
Reading that, I have to believe that the rarest and most powerful items are tradable (Ancient Primal or something is what they were called) - as long as they are in the group while they dropped. Just like how I can only get mythic items when the right ones are in the Vault this week or when they drop from "my Mythic carry run"-

But you certainly gain playerpower anyway by getting pushed through Greater Rifts you weren't able to clear yourself and you'd basically "win" that way.
You can upgrade gems, you get more powerful gems etc. etc.

I can just buy *your services*, with my Bnet wallet I charged up. I'm using the official client. I just don't use a "platform" for it like the Token Auction house where everything is fully automatic... but that certainly doesn't define P2W?
I can whisper you, I can know you, I find out who is able to do it and ask him... It's just an extra step. The game has chats.

As for Blizzard's stance on this. I don't think there is any. At least I couldn't find it. Maybe you can?
I can only find something about WoW.
https://us.battle.net/support/en/sea...ce=all&q=Money
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/d3...read/29304/107
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/d2...n-item/32099/6

There seems to be no stance at all, or no actions taken whatsoever. They literally talk about a third party RMT site on the official forums and there is no one saying anything.

I mean, D2 is build around trading with other players as you can't get what you want if you don't.

[Raelbo]

No. P2W means that those who use irl money get an advantage in game and/or player power. You people keep writing me small novels trying to confusticate the issue here. What it means to 'be ahead' of any other player can be subjective and muddy the waters, which is my assumption why I keep hearing people who are defending P2W (or just outright denying it's existence) go on these long tangents in why or why not.

Again, it's real simple.

Yes, it IS real simple.

P2W is when you need to spend money to be competitive. Simple, simple, simple. As simple as simple can be

And you're still getting it wrong.

We're not "confusticating" (sic) anything. We're trying to explain it in ways that even the simplest of folks can understand it. So really you have zero excuse. You're just being difficult for the sake of it. You're ridiculous trying to argue that "getting an advantage" is somehow more clear than "getting ahead". Nonsense. Both terms are equally ambiguous in a way that "gaining a competitive advantage" is not.

So, no, no one here is "defending P2W". We're telling you that you don't know what you're talking about when you try to label WoW as P2W.

Now we can argue to what degree wow is P2W because there are surely more egregious examples out there, and wow isn't really all that bad in the P2W department all things considered in today's market, but to deny that it's P2W at all is just flat.out wrong

Or, you know, you can just accept that there is a certain threshold at which a game becomes P2W. And that threshold is the point at which players become obliged to start spending money in order to be competitive. And by every reasonable interpretation of that criterion, WoW is nowhere near that.

I mean seriously, what is even the point of arguing that WoW is completely benign P2W when you're simultaneously complaining about muddying the waters?

Your money goes to blizzard, not other players lol. Please tell me you knew that

No shit Sherlock. Why do you think I said (in Italics) "effectively"? I even explained it by saying that "it (the token) simply facilitates the transaction between players".

[Flaim]

since mop the legendary systems have been a joke.
mop: cloak. looked good, but did nothing interesting
wod: ring. did nothing interesting and didn't even have a model
legion: participation award due to everyone getting them. essentially an extension of the gutted talent trees and therefore as interesting (situationally), with the drawback of having to acquire them via rng, meaning that you're essentially down a tier in performance if you were not lucky enough to get your BiS leggo in the first few weeks.
bfa: another cloak. see mop.
sl: legion, with improved aquisition, but worsened progress experience due to having to constantly upgrade them via dumping a boatload of gold and and even more for switching them around.

if everyone has a leggo, nobody has a leggo. might aswell make their respective abilities passive and turn the item into a purple. boils down to the same effect.

[Runicblood]

Sure, but that's not the case in WoW.
quote

You can say anything you want, as long as the token exists, the game is p2w. nothing you argument against it will change the fact. you are delusional if you think otherwise.

- - - Updated - - -

Every time someone tries to pass off their own opinion as a group consensus with "Can we agree that XXXX" it just boggles me. Can't you just be honest and write it as "Who here agrees with me that XXXX"?

Then in before ass numbers, the claim that nobody actually earns money they all buy tokens, then the claim that the OP somehow is FORCED to buy tokens, then the claim that legendaries are inordinately expensively when even the highest ones aren't and the reality that the largest part of their power is available from the lowest rank.

english no first language sory for bad titel, i try my best to translate from native tong, thank you for being understandable !
edit;

my mind is boggled by how many people are bothered by my wording. It's a way of opening discussion, man. "Can we agree that WHATEVER?"
>insert pro or con arguments.

Sorry that you feel that some random on the forums is trying to invade your mind or something by sparking a controversial discussion to see how so many people totally agree, apart from you few english post graduates.

- - - Updated - - -

But on the lower end of raiding, I just used a lower tier legendary. It costs you a few item levels

Too bad that, on my server atleast, the lower ilvl pieces are literally just as expensive, if not more expensive.

[KrayZ33]

You can say anything you want, as long as the token exists, the game is p2w. nothing you argument against it will change the fact. you are delusional if you think otherwise.

I think I made it pretty clear that this is not the case. You are delusional if you think the token introduced P2W mechanics.
The removal and the introduction of the token will not change how the systems work in this game.

See the argument made about D2/D3/SC2 not being considered P2W even though it can uses the same system etc.
First you have to explain to me why these games are not considered P2W in regards to BattleNet Balance.

The only difference is that there is no token involved, but you can buy the other "player", "title" or "item" with battle.net balance (real money) just the same

[Aydinx2]

Can I pay irl money to the game itself and receive player power? If the answer is yes (which it is in wow 100%) then the game is technically P2W.

"No MY definition of P2W is correct!"

It's called "Pay 2 Win", not "Pay 2 Achieve Power". Saving time does not make you win.
WoW is objectively not P2W.

- - - Updated - - -

You can say anything you want, as long as the token exists, the game is p2w. nothing you argument against it will change the fact. you are delusional if you think otherwise.

"If you disagree you're wrong."

Why even make the thread? Go shout at clouds.

[Coldkil]

It failed only because it was (badly) tied to professions and the leveling up was tedious as hell (as a crafter). If it was just a matter of you farming the needed resources and go to Thorghast and craft it, it wouldn't have been an issue at all (much like the tier crafting system is now, which works really really well).

[cparle87]

You can say anything you want, as long as the token exists, the game is p2w. nothing you argument against it will change the fact. you are delusional if you think otherwise.

- - - Updated - - -



english no first language sory for bad titel, i try my best to translate from native tong, thank you for being understandable !
edit;

my mind is boggled by how many people are bothered by my wording. It's a way of opening discussion, man. "Can we agree that WHATEVER?"
>insert pro or con arguments.

Sorry that you feel that some random on the forums is trying to invade your mind or something by sparking a controversial discussion to see how so many people totally agree, apart from you few english post graduates.

The answer is obviously no, we cannot agree, because there are people who do not believe it to be a failure. "Can we agree", by its very usage, implies that the decision or consensus has already been reached.

- - - Updated - - -

It failed only because it was (badly) tied to professions and the leveling up was tedious as hell (as a crafter). If it was just a matter of you farming the needed resources and go to Thorghast and craft it, it wouldn't have been an issue at all (much like the tier crafting system is now, which works really really well).

Except making legos WAS just a matter of farming the needed resources and going to Torghast to craft it, I'm not sure what the distinction is here. That soul ash was easier to get than crafting mats? Soul ash was timegated weekly, crafting mats never were.

- - - Updated - - -

I've done this simple arithmetic for so many people, I'll do it for you too my dude. How to farm gold without farming gold in SL.

1) Daily Callings. Each one of these dailies takes literally 15 minutes to complete, since we can fly in all 4 original SL zones, and it is 9.0 content which means the mobs you gotta kill have between 8k-12k HP. These award, minimum, 2k gold. You get 7 of these per week. 7x 15 minutes = 1h45 mins per week for 14k gold per week.

2) Mission Table. The mission table in SL is the most balanced we've had ever since it was introduced in the garisson in WOD. You spend 5 minutes when you log in and 5 minutes when you log off, to set it up. That's 1h10 minutes per week. The mission table awards anywhere between 1-3k gold per day, depending on which missions you've set. Let's take the midpoint of 1k and 3k which is 2k per day. That's another 14k per week.

3) ANYTHING you gather while doing your daily callings and harvesting your mission table goes on the AH. That's another 5 minutes per day before you log off every night. Pop to your Capital, open your Reagent bag (yes you can set your bags for different purposes in the default blizz UI nowadays), go to the AH and start right clicking every single thing you have gathered/harvested in your daily adventures. This income can vary, so let's low-ball it at 1k/day for 5 mins per day meaning we're at 7k/week for 5x7 = 35 mins a week.

In total we have:

14k + 14k + 7k gold per week = 35k gold per week, for

1h45 + 1h10 + 35 mins = 3h30 of effort per week.

You heard that right folks. Dalinos' Shadowlands gold-farming method without farming gold. 35,000 gold per week for a time investment of three and a half hours a week. 3h30 mins is 210 minutes / 7 days is...you guessed it. Half an hour a day. For half a fucking hour per day you can have 35,000 gold per week.

And the best part? You don't even do all this shit for the gold. The gold is a bonus. You do it for Reputation, you do it for Anima for cosmetics, you do it for mounts, you do it for paragon chests that reward their own mounts, you do it for Renown (back in 9.0 and 9.1), you do it for achievements, you do it for 50 different reasons OTHER than farming gold. You just...get the gold passively. 1 Daily Calling, if you're lucky with which one it is, can be not a double-dip, not a triple-dip, not even a quadriple-dip, but a fuckin grand QUINTIPLE-dip in the rewards you are getting. Rep-Anima-Mounts-Transmog-Gold. From 1 damn activity. With Warmode On of course, cause we want that juicy +25% resources when we farm.

Now, if you weren't wasting your time on MMO-Champion complaining about legendaries, and you used your 30 minutes playing the game we all love, you would have no money issues in SL.

Thank you very much for this post. I don't know if it was in this thread or another but someone was doing the whole "Evil ActiBlizz deliberately makes legendaries expensive to make us buy tokens cause no one can afford them without buying a token" angle and you put it so much more clearly and thoroughly than I did.

[Coldkil]

Except making legos WAS just a matter of farming the needed resources and going to Torghast to craft it, I'm not sure what the distinction is here. That soul ash was easier to get than crafting mats? Soul ash was timegated weekly, crafting mats never were.

The need for a base crafted item. Crafting materials were really expensive and required a lot of effort to grind out the ranks for a crafter - which ranslated in huge prices as returns were abysmally low. It only fixed itslef in last patch when all this crap got basically nerfed/removed.

The tier crafting station is just ways better because you can farm yourself the materials and base item without the convoluted crafting loop. The Soul Ash/etc part is just fine and wasn't really an issue other than being forced to go into Thorghast which was content not appealing to everyone.

I'm just a huge fan of what they did in 9.2 and imho it's just how it should be forever onwards.