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  1. #1

    Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    I’m a casual player in a casual PvE guild (around 70-ish server rank in 10-man progression), so the way raid progression and badge gear interact in WLK is designed to suit me, right? Still, I don’t like it much. Here’s a little story: When I hit 70 back in TBC, shortly before the Kara nerf, I met this guy who was gearing up his 5th alt, and he had geared them all up starting from Kara, through Gruul and Maggi, ZA, etc. up to BT. Good players were still running these raids on their alts, and everyone had to go through raid progression in order to gear up.

    The way badge rewards for 5-man heroics are upgraded with each patch in WLK kills this progression. It not only makes the scrubs who never even survived the Heigan dance flood into PuGs for ToC and ICC with their badge gear, making all ya pros whine. It also makes it impossible for a casual like myself to properly experience the progression. I missed out on half of Ulduar when it still made sense to run it, because my guild had some scheduling problems and I was having other things to do. Even with the 2T8 and 226 badge gear plus 219 Coliseum loot in 3.2, there wasn’t much of a point in Ulduar 10 for gearing up any more, and now come 3.3, it’s simply no longer eligible. Which means that I’ll never see any of the 8 bosses I didn’t see in 3.1 / early 3.2, at least not in a normal raid situation. Maybe I’ll join a “tourist run” at some point but that’s not the same as beating the content (which I’m ridiculously overgeared for now anyway).

    Yeah I know, most of you don’t even consider normal modes as beating the content (or at least so they claim), but my point is: The badge gear upgrades are not good for casuals either. What I propose Blizzard should have done:

    - Let standard 5-man heroics keep rewarding heroism badges.
    - Let ToC 5-man heroic reward conquest badges.
    - Let the ICC 5-mans heroic reward triumph badges.
    - Only sell T8.0 for badges (like they did with T7 and T9)
    - Only sell two pieces of T9 for badges (like they did with T7 and T8)

    That way, it would still make sense to run Naxx 10 and Ulduar 10, instead of just shortcutting via random heroics. Still, casuals who are unable to do Ulduar 10 in Naxx 10 gear could use ToC 5-man and ICC 5-mans to gear up a little before hitting Ulduar. But they can’t just run random heroics for two days straight and emerge in 4T9 + 245 item level gear, which strips away any motivation to still do the lower raids.

  2. #2

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    /applause

    I rather like that idea.

  3. #3

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    I also play in a casual pve guild and while I agree to a certain amount, I can only welcome the changes blizzard made.

    First of all, if you play in a casual guild, I bet there are other people like you who didn't experience Uld completely. My guild organizes these things to beat hardmodes in 10man, just for fun, not for gear (why does loot always have to be a motivating factor?). And tbh, if people weren't able to gear themselves up in 245 gear within a reasonable amount of time, Uld10heroic wouldn't be an option for us.

    Second, same reasoning, you as a casual guild get to experience ICC with that 245 gear you get from running heroics. You can always raid one tier lower, but you can never raid one tier higher. Appreciate that.

    Third, gear and achievements have become the most important factor in joining pugs these days. Blizzard wants everyone to experience those pugs, not just the ones who have been grinding raid instances since 3.1. Also the ones that just hit 80 at 3.3, what are they gonna do? Noone raids naxx/uld anymore, so finding a raid there will be harder than ever (unless it's weekly raid). Your only shot at gearing up now (without running random heroics) would be if you know someone in a hardcore guild who is willing to carry you thru a raid and drop loot on you (and let's face it, it's too soon for that).

    Fourth, as I also play in a casual guild, I'm kinda pleased with the fact that we can say to players "sorry you're a bit low gearwise, go run some random heroics". Cuz if they were low in gear before, there was no other option than running naxx/uld over and over again till all your members are ready for ICC. Which is a bitch since imt people go afk, leave guild, stop playing and you're back to square 1. These days its piss easy (only takes time) to get good enough gear to run ICC and in the end that's what everyone wants.

    I don't think you thought this thru :P

  4. #4

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    No. You're not to person the change is designed for. The reason: you raid. You actually raid at 70ish position, this means you either have not enough time or are not skilled enough to get any higher.
    You are not 'the casual' just because you don't raid regularly (thus casually).
    You got it (Blizzards intentions) wrong. Your post and the there made assumptions/ideas are therefore useless. Have a nice day.

    To clarify, the 'casual' blizzard designed the emblem change for is the one who a) raids rarely or even b) never raids but still wants progression.
    Yeah, finally there is progression outside of raids (also through new instances). I hope they keep it in Cataclysm.
    by the way, the most important reason for the change is, that NEW players don't have to spend weeks in naxx, then weeks in ulduar and then weeks in ToC to enter ICC. They spend a bit time in heroics, maybe do a few raids and are ready to aid YOU in your casual ICC pug. It would take a casual (guildless or raidguildless) player months to get enough gear to enter ICC. This is complete bullshit design and really is a bummer if you're new. People like you who complain about these things simply forget NEW players or think gearing the first time is the same as gearing an alt.

    Try it, create a char on a realm where you know nobody and try equipping the "progression way", first naxx and heroics, then ulduar, then toc. Of course you downgrade each looted emblem to the one you "should" have got in that dungeon/raid. Try it and you'll see what a pain it is getting only T7 for running ulduar. Then substract your knowledge about the game/class/boss mechanics to the level of a freshly dinged 80 and tell me again that you want this change. (possible not doable because a) nobody runs old raids b) if they do, almost nobody needs the loot so you don't simulate the 'competition' you would normally have and c) get probably carried by iLvl 232+ players)
    Samin
    Quote Originally Posted by Ashrana View Post
    So, what would be your reaction, if you found out, that come cata release first patch, blizzard were planning to kill everyone by sending a bear through the mail?

  5. #5

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    Quote Originally Posted by Reucht
    Also the ones that just hit 80 at 3.3, what are they gonna do? Noone raids naxx/uld anymore, so finding a raid there will be harder than ever (unless it's weekly raid).
    That's exactly my point. That's what would no longer be the case with the changes I proposed above.

  6. #6

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    Oh, so, you are the one Blizzard murdered my game for?

  7. #7

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    Quote Originally Posted by Borakh
    but my point is: The badge gear upgrades are not good for casuals either.
    However you never really said why it was bad..... for Casuals.... care to?
    Signature removed. Please read our guidelines. Venara

  8. #8

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    I agree with some of that but I don't think Blizz will ever be able to keep every group of players happy. The game provides so much more choice today, then it did in TBC and shed loads more than in vanilla, so I think this is very welcome.

    The raid progression you had with TBC is definately not here in Wrath. I would have been in favour of a limited account wide attunement, which meant you had to complete a boss in Naxx in order to go to Ulduar, a boss in Uld > Totc, a boss in Totc > ICC. Like yourself, I missed out on the final few bosses in Ulduar but now you can jump straight into a Totc without stepping foot in Ulduar which seems illogical to me, but by this point you will not find anyone to run the older raids, so at some point you just got to let it go.

    It doesn't feel right, that you can pick up full tier sets from running heroics. I'm not being elitest with this comment, in fact I did the same on my Shaman, I just think it should be limited to 2 pieces.

    But on the flipside, it is truely fantastic if you have alts, and a great system for at least getting to see content which you would otherwise never have seen in the TBC or Vanilla days.

    The one great thing about the game at the moment which is very welcome, is the flexibility you have to play the toons you spend so much time developing. You can gear up quickly to raid higher tier content with multiple toons if you wish, which deepens your understanding of other classes and makes the game more enjoyable, because you are not stuck and forced to play one toon throughout the entire end game.

    One other thing, I think Blizz do a fantastic job at changing the goal posts as content is added. It gives the lesser ability players a chance to progress and see the developed content and I think this is good in the long run. A lot of players get the hump with this though, for instance, the thought of a nub getting the chance for T9 gear and raiding tier 9 content, after they sweated, and shed tears and blood to complete it only months earlier.
    WHEN I POST IN CAPS CURSE SPEAK FOR ALL PALADINS AND REFRAIN FROM PUNCTUATION EXCEPT AT THE END OF MY SENTENCE WHERE I USE EXTRA YOU CAN'T ARGUE WITH MY LOGIC!!!!!!!

  9. #9

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    Quote Originally Posted by Borakh
    That's exactly my point. That's what would no longer be the case with the changes I proposed above. Wink
    Don't think that will change with your changes, sure some bored people might join your runs, but 75% of the current playerbase is geared enough and doesn't need anything from naxx/uld. And those other 25% are casuals and prolly not online at the same time (maybe once a week?) so coordinating a raid with these people is damn right impossible.

    tl;dr version:

    Instead of zero naxx/uld runs a week, you might see one now. Doesn't weigh up.

  10. #10
    The Lightbringer
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    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    I bet it's also your fault I can afford to have epic mounts on my alts, can queue for battlegrounds anywhere in the world and even -of all things- be taken to raids to tank all content rather than just a given boss or trash? You evil bastard...I liked going to Uldaman to level my Enchanting :-\

    But seriously...being a casual doesn't mean you're bad. I show up to raids, I do my job and I log out. I don't have the dedication or desire to join a more successful and intensive raiding guild. All that this badge gear has given me is the option to very quickly gear up alts (or off specs) to a workable level to succeed in current raids where all the recycled Naxx bosses brand new exciting content is. If you want to do older content because you didn't experience it (I personally got bored of it after doing it a while but that's just me), then join/create a guild that raids those things in the gear level proper for it- hell, there's even a title in Ulduar for doing just that.

    There's guilds that still stop their XP at 60 to raid oldskool raids and I say more power to them. What you would like, from the sound of it, is a version of this at 80 where you simply run older content in appropriate-level gear. Would that be possible? Sure...just find 9 other people eager to do it (or 24 if you're feeling lucky). Yes...I know it's annoying when awful peope come along to raids in their heroic-farmed gear but hey...guess what? My alts wear that junk too. You can't tell someone is a moron until he stands in a cleave, Soulfires a spell reflection (okay I did that earlier today and killed myself) or some other moronic thing that they never asked about. People need to be welcoming to those who are returning to the game or new...and take the couple of minutes it takes to explain to them what to do. Chances are someone told you how to do a fight the first time...or you were with a group of 24 others that jumped in there and were willing to sit through wipes to learn what it is like. That's not the nature of random raids today.

    So yeah...a little off track but I believe badge gear is wonderful for casuals like myself to gear my alts up to my level and raid. I don't have a guild that can feed them gear from Grand Crusader. I don't need that gear to perform adequately in ICC normal modes.
    Paladin Bash has spoken.

  11. #11

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    Who ll do heroics for heroic emblems? no one!!! As much i would like to have a reasson to do old content your idea wont work.

  12. #12

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    There is one big big reason, why the current system is best:

    PEOPLE PLAY

    Every time, new emblems drop in heroics, everyone starts doing them again.
    The new lfg system makes it easier than ever to find groups, so people do heroic all the time.

    Before conquest emblems began dropping, the game seemed to be at a dead end to me.
    Raid or die. Raid 1 day as casual, 2 days a average raider or 3 as a hardcore and the other days...
    Now, no matter what time and day it is or what characteri like to play that moment i can push the group button and improve my charcter a little bit.
    Can't be more awesome.

    If there is a problem with tiered progression, its that almost all heroics are made for blue geared people.
    Blizz should have introduced themed heroics with the associate raids (Ulduar + HoL HoS ) so there is a 5-man progression.
    Howevery, dropping the 2nd newest emblems everywhere is what keeps people running those dungeons.

    The game may give gear to people who don't derserve it, but at least its alive and at least to me it feels like it has never been so alive like today.
    Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment

    Artefacts:
    • In ordner to better fit the current post-truth zeitgeist, we are going to rename alle occurences of "artefact" into "artebelieve".

  13. #13

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    if you are that good now, get 9 alts or sumthin from your guild, and go do it?
    Wait, why does it matter?

    Jesus was black, the government did 9/11, Ronald Reagan was the Devil and WoW is a game

  14. #14

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    @ Astray, good point. If technically possible, this could be solved by giving gear score appropriate "quest" rewards for random heroics.

  15. #15

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    Quote Originally Posted by Thorold
    if you are that good now, get 9 alts or sumthin from your guild, and go do it?
    Yeah I suppose I could do that, go in there with my alt to get the T8.0 stuff the hard way, but it feels kinda pointless. Let's face it, loot is a major part of WoW's reward system. It's not the same if you know that you can get way better gear, way easier.

  16. #16

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    Quote Originally Posted by Samin
    the most important reason for the change is, that NEW players don't have to spend weeks in naxx, then weeks in ulduar and then weeks in ToC to enter ICC. They spend a bit time in heroics, maybe do a few raids and are ready to aid YOU in your casual ICC pug. It would take a casual (guildless or raidguildless) player months to get enough gear to enter ICC. This is complete bullshit design and really is a bummer if you're new. People like you who complain about these things simply forget NEW players or think gearing the first time is the same as gearing an alt.
    I see your point. I would however ask you to consider the following:

    1) If someone hits level 80 with their main right now, why wouldn’t they want to start with Naxx and go through all the raids before they hit ICC? (Maybe not for months, but for a couple of weeks for each raid?) Personally, I know I wanted to see Kara when I hit 70 (after Sunwell release) so I was glad people were still running it regularly. I wouldn’t have wanted to go straight to BT. (Yeah I know, BC was different and everything was harder, but still.)

    2) If players don’t raid, not even casually, why would we want to equip them ready for ToC or ICC? Note that I like how there is progression in 5-mans, I did not suggest to abolish that, I only suggested to tune it down and not make it fully overrun raid progression. So as a casual who wants to see the raids, you’d run some heroics for heroism badges, get your 2T7, then do a few Naxx runs to replace the remaining blues, run Trial of the Champion for a few conquest badges and 219 items, then go into Ulduar, that’s the idea. Of course it’s harder if you’re guildless, but PuGs with random guildless players who never raided before will be fail anyway. I guarantee you that even in 232+ badge gear, a PuG of players who are casual by your definition will wipe on Ignis for all eternity.

  17. #17

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    There is a reason people are called casuals. Because THEY DONT HAVE THE TIME TO RAID like others do.
    Why then should casuals be able to gear up to what the hardcores are at? Why should they get free T9 in literally 2 days when everyone else had to do weeks upon weeks of ToC to get their T9.

    To all the casuals who whine about gear and what not.
    YOU are a CASUAL player. Not a hardcore player, not even a raider.
    There is plenty of other things to do in WoW besides raiding and gearing up. (Cheeves, dailies, quests, farming, PvP, etc)

    I have nothing really against casual players, they dont have the time to do raids and whatnot, and thats perfectly acceptable, because it really is only a gameand real life obviously takes priority.
    But you need to understand that you shouldnt get free 232-245 epics from doing 5 mans when raiders worked at it to earn the gear.

  18. #18

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    Having been far too lazy to actually read anything here, I believe you're taking the wrong outlook on the entire situation.

    There's nothing wrong with casuals and being handed gear. There is a problem, however, with scrubs/ebayers/retards and bad players being given epix and then wasting other peoples time.
    Signature size violated forum rules.

  19. #19

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    Still waiting to find out why it is bad for casuals..... More or less what Ushra posted... Im a casual raider. We do what we can when we can.

    Im happy for the extra "loot" emblems provide to both my mains and alts.

    So how is that bad for me?
    Signature removed. Please read our guidelines. Venara

  20. #20

    Re: Badge Gear and Raid Progression from a Casual’s Point of View

    Quote Originally Posted by Arcangel14
    There is a reason people are called casuals. Because THEY DONT HAVE THE TIME TO RAID like others do.
    Why then should casuals be able to gear up to what the hardcores are at? Why should they get free T9 in literally 2 days when everyone else had to do weeks upon weeks of ToC to get their T9.

    To all the casuals who whine about gear and what not.
    YOU are a CASUAL player. Not a hardcore player, not even a raider.
    There is plenty of other things to do in WoW besides raiding and gearing up. (Cheeves, dailies, quests, farming, PvP, etc)

    I have nothing really against casual players, they dont have the time to do raids and whatnot, and thats perfectly acceptable, because it really is only a gameand real life obviously takes priority.
    But you need to understand that you shouldnt get free 232-245 epics from doing 5 mans when raiders worked at it to earn the gear.
    How do you define "no time" if you farm T9 in two days? /sigh. Hypocrite.
    Run HoR with complete iLevel 200 and lower (=levelling gear) group. Fuck you have no idea how much fun and challenging those instances are with avg. iLvl 219 because you always raid on progression and thus are overequipped which makes the instances easy. Having these instances "on progression" was really fun. Yay for CC.
    You just prove my point that you've lost every relation to realism when it comes to difficulty of instances in starter gear. You probably don't even know what true starter gear is. If you don't get carried by your ToC+ equipped guild members through instances to equip your alt it wouldn't be that easy.
    Samin
    Quote Originally Posted by Ashrana View Post
    So, what would be your reaction, if you found out, that come cata release first patch, blizzard were planning to kill everyone by sending a bear through the mail?

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