There needs to be more single player content

[Relapses]

World team is separate from the dungeons and raid teams. Hire a few more developers and quest writers for the world team. Meanwhile, try and open up 'normal' (not heroic or mythic) dungeon content so it's possible for groups smaller than five to participate. Leave raids as they are.

I was speaking more on the player side of things rather than development. For every 10 players now progressing themselves via whatever solo progression system Blizzard adds that's 10 fewer players available to interact with group content.

The problem with abuse is 1) it drives people away from that content, often forever. It doesn't take all that many bad experiences for people to shrug, say fuck it and never bother with it again (as a pug) and 2) it drives people away from the game altogether. You don't need that much of it for it to badly affect player experience. As for Blizzard and their efforts to do something about toxic players, good for them and I'll believe it when I see something that works.

I've noticed a lot fewer angry whispers post player contract but that's obviously anecdotal. I've seen a few people post about getting their accounts banned then having their appeals denied because of the social contract, too. It'll take awhile before we see any major shifts in general behavior but it does seem like they're at least trying to combat the worst offenders.

[MoanaLisa]

I was speaking more on the player side of things rather than development. For every 10 players now progressing themselves via whatever solo progression system Blizzard adds that's 10 fewer players available to interact with group content.

You're implying that forced socialization is necessary to prop up group play. To the extent that that is true it's a problem. Blizzard has been extremely lax about policing player behavior. I hope they are planning to do better but I can't say that I hold out much hope at this point. It's a problem they've let metastasize for years and won't be easily turned around now.

Communities were an interesting idea for social interaction in the game. Blizzard tossed them out there and hasn't said anything about them since. One would not be remiss to think they've abandoned the concept of doing anything to make non-pug group play any easier or more interesting.

[Celement]

You're implying that forced socialization is necessary to prop up group play. To the extent that that is true it's a problem. Blizzard has been extremely lax about policing player behavior. I hope they are planning to do better but I can't say that I hold out much hope at this point. It's a problem they've let metastasize for years and won't be easily turned around now.

Communities were an interesting idea for social interaction in the game. Blizzard tossed them out there and hasn't said anything about them since. One would not be remiss to think they've abandoned the concept of doing anything to make non-pug group play any easier or more interesting.

I've only seen boost communities work out. It's an interesting idea but locking mythic raids to realms kills it for raiding and mythic plus has it's own elo system in place for pugging that works far better then a non curated system.

Community's could maybe work but they need a reason to exist... maybe if you could work out resources like a guild for cross faction raiding?

[Venziir]

No, it really hasn't been. Solo content post-leveling has always been pretty much an afterthought with WoW, especially once they got instanced PvP rolling.

Yes, there has always been things to do solo, like farming materials, but they've never been particularly engaging or rewarding. Outside of a short period of time from mid-Cata (Molten Front) through the end of MoP, solo content has always been sorely lacking as anything other than a grind for grinding's sake.

You may be confusing the fact that WoW was less punishing to players as being solo-friendly, e.g. death penalties. It also included much of the quality of life enhancements that various games had been making up to that point and continued to add more as other games developed them. Both of these things made solo play more fun, but the heart of the game has always been dungeons/raids and, later, battlegrounds.

I disagree. I've been a solo player since the closed EU vanilla beta, and it wasn't really until SL that I felt that I ran out of things to do.

[Loveliest]

The problem I see isn't that people don't want to play with other people but that there's a steep increase in difficulty and not much in-game to help player conquer it. If you're not already a high skilled player, then you won't get into groups to become one.

Skill is a 3-fold thing. Awareness, which won't ever change for a player. Time and willingness to practice the content you want to play (not something else). Time and willingness to research - your class and the content you do. And the last two - not a lot of ppl willing to do that.

And for getting in a group - one more thing is needed. Perseverence. To do the group content often enough and from early enough to keep up with the gear and group requirements (achi, rio etc). And not a lot of ppl willing
to do that either. Pugging does not support once in a while play.

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I disagree. I've been a solo player since the closed EU vanilla beta, and it wasn't really until SL that I felt that I ran out of things to do.

What content were you doing solo in Cata, for example, after finishing the initial reps?

[Triceron]

What content were you doing solo in Cata, for example, after finishing the initial reps?

Cata had some great solo stuff.

Vial of the Sands was a crazy effort put into getting the recipe and farming up the mats to make one. Professions were pretty good overall back then, and could fill in a lot of solo play time easily.

[Venziir]

Skill is a 3-fold thing. Awareness, which won't ever change for a player. Time and willingness to practice the content you want to play (not something else). Time and willingness to research - your class and the content you do. And the last two - not a lot of ppl willing to do that.

And for getting in a group - one more thing is needed. Perseverence. To do the group content often enough and from early enough to keep up with the gear and group requirements (achi, rio etc). And not a lot of ppl willing
to do that either. Pugging does not support once in a while play.

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What content were you doing solo in Cata, for example, after finishing the initial reps?

Well the reps themselves took quite a while, the Tol Barad one for example wasn't exactly done in a day. Other than that, I did archaeology and re-did all the altered zones, leveled a goblin and a worgen to see their zones, and tried out some of the new race/class combinations and when I was done with all that, Molten Front came about - so yay.

[cparle87]

I would like it to be more like Torghast so you aren't running the exact same thing every single time.

I was referring specifically to the loot only once a week thing. You could only get one piece per reward tier (5-mask, 4-mask, .... 0 mask) each week.

[Celement]

I was referring specifically to the loot only once a week thing. You could only get one piece per reward tier (5-mask, 4-mask, .... 0 mask) each week.

I mean one piece of mythic loot then 3 pieces of heroic?

Let's be honest with one another here... a heart to heart.

This isn't about single player content. We have that in droves arguably everything in the game minus dungeons, warfronts, pvp, and raids is single player.

This is just loot whores wanting to fuck the risk vs reward curve into the ground yet again to satisfy their loot lust.

[Biomega]

This is just loot whores wanting to fuck the risk vs reward curve into the ground yet again to satisfy their loot lust.

It is, but we need to ask ourselves where this comes from. And it's because everything has been reduced to gear - all the rewards from activities are laser-focused around gear and pretty much nothing else. If it doesn't give gear, it's relegated to obscurity; even cosmetic rewards like mounts or whatever can't prop up side content on their own. Mage Tower is pretty much the only thing even remotely successful in that respect, and I'd bet anything that the actual participation numbers in that across the population are WAY lower than most people think. Plus it's not a repeatable activity either.

As long as everything is purely about gear, people will only look at gear. We DESPERATELY need some kind of meaningful horizontal progression system that isn't just character power or recolored dragon mount #503003.

[Celement]

It is, but we need to ask ourselves where this comes from. And it's because everything has been reduced to gear - all the rewards from activities are laser-focused around gear and pretty much nothing else. If it doesn't give gear, it's relegated to obscurity; even cosmetic rewards like mounts or whatever can't prop up side content on their own. Mage Tower is pretty much the only thing even remotely successful in that respect, and I'd bet anything that the actual participation numbers in that across the population are WAY lower than most people think. Plus it's not a repeatable activity either.

As long as everything is purely about gear, people will only look at gear. We DESPERATELY need some kind of meaningful horizontal progression system that isn't just character power or recolored dragon mount #503003.

No we don't. These morons can go play diablo immortal if they want a never ending grind. If people don't enjoy the game the solution is to tell then to fuck off.

Ruining the game for people who do enjoy it just has them leaving as the hopeless miserable depressing sad addict keeps screeching like a banshee.

It's best to think of loot whores as less then people and more a horrible ghoul. All they know is hungry but once they grab their prey drag it down and rip it apart with their teeth they don't eat it. They simply look for another innocent to butcher. It's best we simply strike them down. For us and them.

[Triceron]

Ruining the game for people who do enjoy it just has them leaving as the hopeless miserable depressing sad addict keeps screeching like a banshee.

The thing you don't understand is that everyone who plays WoW enjoys the game. Yet nit everyone enjoys the same thing, so once the content they enjoy is consumed they simply unsub and wait for a major content patch or next expansion. And a majority of these people who enjoy the game are casuals who only care to quest.

So really, you're just assuming that 'people who enjoy the game' are raiders or people who do end game group content, when that's extremely far from the truth. It can be argued that Blizzard's laser focus on loot progression and end game raids instead of compelling story content is ruining the game for the millions of players who literally come back every expansion just to explore the world and enjoy the story.

[Celement]

The thing you don't understand is that everyone who plays WoW enjoys the game. Yet nit everyone enjoys the same thing, so once the content they enjoy is consumed they simply unsub and wait for a major content patch or next expansion. And a majority of these people who enjoy the game are casuals who only care to quest.

So really, you're just assuming that 'people who enjoy the game' are raiders or people who do end game group content, when that's extremely far from the truth. It can be argued that Blizzard's laser focus on loot progression and end game raids instead of compelling story content is ruining the game for the millions of players who literally come back every expansion just to explore the world and enjoy the story.

Is this another the majority will pick whatever they want and covenants are an amazing idea?

You will never ever keep those players you just fuck up the game and piss people off like bfa and sl.

[rrayy]

I havent posted on this forum in ages but reactivated just to tell you that individuals like you are the reason that this game and various genres of games have become absolute trash.

If you want single player go play an RPG

GUess what WOW is an RPG. Notice the last 3 letters of MMORPG. And who made you sole arbiter of what is in the game? What is actually ruining the game is toxicity like this by holier than thou players trying to dictate what the game is and telling players to get lost if they don't like it.

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You're implying that forced socialization is necessary to prop up group play. To the extent that that is true it's a problem. Blizzard has been extremely lax about policing player behavior. I hope they are planning to do better but I can't say that I hold out much hope at this point. It's a problem they've let metastasize for years and won't be easily turned around now.

Communities were an interesting idea for social interaction in the game. Blizzard tossed them out there and hasn't said anything about them since. One would not be remiss to think they've abandoned the concept of doing anything to make non-pug group play any easier or more interesting.

Agagin, Blizzard cannot force players to play in a group or be social. Niothing they do is going to make players who want to play sol suddenly join a group, especially with how toxic the player base is.

[Biomega]

Agagin, Blizzard cannot force players to play in a group or be social. Niothing they do is going to make players who want to play sol suddenly join a group, especially with how toxic the player base is.

I agree on the principle, but but that second part is a problem.

They could absolutely do things to make players who want to play solo suddenly join groups - just make it so devastatingly rewarding they feel like they HAVE to even over their own dislike of it.

That's happened before. It's called PvP gear and Warmode rewards (and things like certain essences in BFA), which made people who absolutely hate PvP with a passion do it anyway and be miserable doing it, just to get the rewards.

[VMSmith]

That's happened before. It's called PvP gear and Warmode rewards (and things like certain essences in BFA), which made people who absolutely hate PvP with a passion do it anyway and be miserable doing it, just to get the rewards.

That might be a solid plan if your goal is short-term stability for a game mode. But, over time this method of persuading participation will not just drive people away but push them away in such a manner as to leave them vocally bitter. Which is the path Blizzard took and now "hating on WoW" is an industry in itself. Not only is the player base dwindling, but those who leave are encouraging others to avoid Blizzard products completely because their not leaving out of boredom or disinterest, but out of active loathing.

When bribed into doing things they hate people tend to hate those things ever more vociferously.

[Biomega]

That might be a solid plan if your goal is short-term stability for a game mode. But, over time this method of persuading participation will not just drive people away but push them away in such a manner as to leave them vocally bitter.

Oh, I'm not saying in any way that it was a GOOD thing. Sorry if that was ambiguous. I myself was one of those PvP haters and I resented every second of it in BFA where the essence was PvE BiS.

I'm just saying, it's not like they COULDN'T do it. More that they shouldn't.

[VMSmith]

Oh, I'm not saying in any way that it was a GOOD thing. Sorry if that was ambiguous. I myself was one of those PvP haters and I resented every second of it in BFA where the essence was PvE BiS.

I'm just saying, it's not like they COULDN'T do it. More that they shouldn't.

Yes, I fully agree with this. Sorry if it seemed like I thought you approved of that system, I was more just expounding on the concept.

[Triceron]

Is this another the majority will pick whatever they want and covenants are an amazing idea?

You will never ever keep those players you just fuck up the game and piss people off like bfa and sl.

Other MMOs manage it just fine. Why can't WoW?

GW2 literally has both options and keeps both types of players. Hell, Blizzard even stole Mythic Plus from GW2.

[Relapses]

Other MMOs manage it just fine. Why can't WoW?

GW2 literally has both options and keeps both types of players. Hell, Blizzard even stole Mythic Plus from GW2.

This whataboutism is the most infuriating aspect of this argument. If other games do it, that's good. If you're looking for a specific experience provided by that game then play that fucking game. Why is the onus on WoW to provide an experience that is tangible for every single person who's ever played a video game? Why is it implicitly a bad thing that WoW does not have progression systems for solo content? Why do we have to make WoW into the messiah of all video games and pretend that if Blizzard doesn't satisfy every aspect of the playerbase that's ever existed (or ever will exist) that it's a fault of the developers or (worse) that they're intentionally designing the game in spite of certain demographics?