Mythic+ was a Carrot on a Stick that Blizzard Can’t Back Out Of

[NineSpine]

Sure, I can tell you what I disagree with. Whether or not you think the game was "seasonal," it definitely had seasonal elements from the start. In my view, the tiers were a seasonal element. The whole concept of "elements" is that it has aspects of a thing without necessarily fully being that thing--just as games that are not RPGs are often said to have "RPG elements" if they have things like skill trees and/or equippable/customizable items and/or level progression. I would certainly say that WoW had elements of seasonality right from Vanilla.

I do agree with your second statement that those elements have expanded over time.

You definitely said the things I mentioned, but we can focus on the above disagreement since "No, I didn't," "Yes, you did" is not compelling conversation.

Saying that just adding new content with new rewards is a "seasonal element" seems very silly to me, and it reduces the definition to meaninglessness. If adding new content is a "seasonal element" then we could say Elden Ring has "seasonal elements" because it got an expansion. I don't understand the point of making the term that absurdly broad, much like I don't think it would be valuable to say every game where you play as a character has "RPG elements" just because you play as a character in an RPG.

[Tech614]

Also to clarify something blizzard did not "add more seasonal elements" to the game. A game is either seasonal or it ain't there isn't some variable shit here.

What they did do was add more progression paths to the game, what they did do was ramp up the pace at which they release new content.

Don't use lame arguments about how blizzard ruined the game by making it seasonal and then try to move goal posts at every turn and get surprised when people you call you on it.

[NineSpine]

Also to clarify something blizzard did not "add more seasonal elements" to the game. A game is either seasonal or it ain't there isn't some variable shit here.

What they did do was add more progression paths to the game, what they did do was ramp up the pace at which they release new content.

Don't use lame arguments about how blizzard ruined the game by making it seasonal and then try to move goal posts at every turn and get surprised when people you call you on it.

Nobody said Blizzard "ruined the game". Do you want to address things people in the real world said, or are you too busy raging at the voices in your head?

If you think that M+ is just as seasonal as Deadmines was at launch... ok bud.

[shanthi]

Saying that just adding new content with new rewards is a "seasonal element" seems very silly to me, and it reduces the definition to meaninglessness.

It's not just adding new content. It's adding new content with a new progression track. I think that a schedule of new challenges with added progression tracks each time certainly counts as a seasonal element. Tiers are eventually what Blizzard renamed seasons (granted, with further expansion of the progression tracks...but it was an expansion of what they were already doing). The tier system of Vanilla and BC wasn't a fully-formed version of what WoW does now, but I certainly think it qualifies as an element of what they do now.

[Doomcookie]

I have been making one point this entire time:

WoW started without seasonal elements. It has gained more seasonal elements as it developed over expansions.

Can you tell me what you disagree with, or are you just going to go on another random tirade against shit I never said?

It's pretty much without point, if they started seasonal elements early on. It didn't have seasonal elements for less than 5% of its existence.

[Rageonit]

It's pretty much without point, if they started seasonal elements early on. It didn't have seasonal elements for less than 5% of its existence.

Imagine still arguing after 20 years that the game should be like 20 years ago Exercise in futility, if I ever saw one.

[Doomcookie]

Imagine still arguing after 20 years that the game should be like 20 years ago Exercise in futility, if I ever saw one.

Seasonal content is the only way Blizzard has managed to continue to exist. It saved D3, and it may save D4. Seasons are about faster rewards, and catching up to those who have been playing longer. We could say that all started with ZG and the tier .5 sets. I don't hate seasonal content, because it becomes an incentive to go back to a game.

The other poster was trying to create their own definition, then seemed to get upset when people pointed out just how much stuff fell under that definition.

[Osmeric]

The issue is that a lot of people like Mythic +, so Blizzard wanted to continue to give incentives for doing it.

Isn't that backwards? If people want to do the content, Blizzard can reduce the incentives to do it, since they aren't as needed.

[Doomcookie]

Isn't that backwards? If people want to do the content, Blizzard can reduce the incentives to do it, since they aren't as needed.

No, the goal is to get people to play as much as possible. It jacks up engagement numbers without much effort on the part of developers.

[Osmeric]

No, the goal is to get people to play as much as possible. It jacks up engagement numbers without much effort on the part of developers.

Why is that the goal? I'd have thought the goal was to have as many people spending as much money as possible. In a P2W game, that might mean keeping them playing a lot, but in a subscription game, that just means having them playing at all, even if not very much.

In general, any effort that makes a player happier than the minimum needed to keep them subbed is wasted effort.

[Doomcookie]

Why is that the goal? I'd have thought the goal was to have as many people spending as much money as possible. In a P2W game, that might mean keeping them playing a lot, but in a subscription game, that just means having them playing at all, even if not very much.

In general, any effort that makes a player happier than the minimum needed to keep them subbed is wasted effort.

That's done through engagement. The more people play a game, the more they feel they are getting their money's worth for their subscriptions. It also means it is easier for them to justify further expenditures.

Blizzard wants people to feel invested in the game, they want people playing longer. It's the sunk-cost fallacy, and it may be the single biggest reason WoW has lasted 20 years.

[Biomega]

Why is that the goal? I'd have thought the goal was to have as many people spending as much money as possible. In a P2W game, that might mean keeping them playing a lot, but in a subscription game, that just means having them playing at all, even if not very much.

In general, any effort that makes a player happier than the minimum needed to keep them subbed is wasted effort.

Very important distinction, to be sure. In fact, Blizzard's ideal customer stays subbed but doesn't play at all. Because that's less work for them, less demands for content, less strain on the servers, and so on.

This is somewhat more complex these days because WoW does have MTX, so it's not purely sub money that they're after. Which might explain things like crafting costing hundreds of thousands of gold, I don't know.

But it's always, always essential to keep the actual goal in mind: maximum profit (over whatever time frame they want to focus on). Not maximum engagement, not maximum player counts... profit. Anything else is only important insofar and as long as it leads to that end. More players only matter if they're more profit. More playtime per player only matters if it's more profit. Better class balance only matters if it's more profit. And so on.

And it really is profit, not revenue. That's why Blizzard doesn't just add something like, idk, player housing or something that players like to think would be "such an easy W". Maybe it would be. But it costs money. So while revenue might go up, profit might go down. And that's why they're not doing it.

[Osmeric]

That's done through engagement. The more people play a game, the more they feel they are getting their money's worth for their subscriptions. It also means it is easier for them to justify further expenditures.

Blizzard wants people to feel invested in the game, they want people playing longer. It's the sunk-cost fallacy, and it may be the single biggest reason WoW has lasted 20 years.

This feels a lot like an instance of Goodhart's Law: when a metric becomes a target it ceases to be a good metric.

If players enjoy M+, they will play it. You can't measure enjoyment, so one uses a surrogate metric, engagement. But now if you optimize for engagement, you find this does not actually work in reverse to induce enjoyment.

Bribing players to play M+ doesn't suddenly make them enjoy M+ if they didn't before. And players who are being bribed eventually realize at some level they aren't really into this, and either require even-increasing bribes, or they cease responding to the bribes.

[Doomcookie]

This feels a lot like an instance of Goodhart's Law: when a metric becomes a target it ceases to be a good metric.

If players enjoy M+, they will play it. You can't measure enjoyment, so one uses a surrogate metric, engagement. But now if you optimize for engagement, you find this does not actually work in reverse to induce enjoyment.

Bribing players to play M+ doesn't suddenly make them enjoy M+ if they didn't before. And players who are being bribed eventually realize at some level they aren't really into this, and either require even-increasing bribes, or they cease responding to the bribes.

The issue is that players want improvements, they want progress. That's done by better gear, and higher keys. it's cheap and easy for Blizzard, and players log more hours.

The same goes for raiding, dungeons, PvP, and pretty much every aspect of the game. There's a reason people stop raiding when their character gets fully geared. Either that, or they run alts. Blizzard has failed at a lot of things, but they understand that part of the game.

The longer people play, the busier the game looks. The more people play, the more time they spend with others in the game.

[Jastall]

Why is that the goal? I'd have thought the goal was to have as many people spending as much money as possible. In a P2W game, that might mean keeping them playing a lot, but in a subscription game, that just means having them playing at all, even if not very much.

In general, any effort that makes a player happier than the minimum needed to keep them subbed is wasted effort.

Because social engagement drives a lot of subs, and people remain socially engaged by doing things together. If there's nothing to do things together, or the things to do give shit rewards so they aren't worth the bother for most, and there's no reason to log in besides a bare minimum, they'll log in less which can create a cascade effect for more social players. This can also affect less social players, fewer people running pugs can eventually affect how often one finds pugs and create another cascade from there.

Plus, WoW isn't only kept afloat by the sub fee, even if it does a lot of the heavy lifting of course.