Is this a singleplayer game?

[erifwodahs]

I'm currently leveling a new character after I quit mid Legion and just reached level 40 the other day. In these 40 levels I had zero interactions with other players and saw maybe one other player in the zone I was in. The world chat is dead and all you see in trade chat is people spaming their boost adverts. This can hardly be called an MMO anymore. Now you could say: "Just play Classic then". And I tried that and it's even worse. Good luck finding people that are willing to do quests or run a dungeon normally. What has happend that the game became so asocial?

Well... people play endgame? There aren't that many new WoW players around and most veterans already had they characters leveled in Legion/BfA so they only need to do last 10-15 lvls. Anyway, find a guild.

[ZazuuPriest]

The political situation right now is horrible. My wife and I quit our long-time guild just so we wouldn't have to interact with anyone.

If it wasn't possible to play the game solo, we wouldn't be playing right now at all.

25% of people are fascists, and 25% are enablers of fascism. We are the scapegoat. Given these odds, we prefer to not interact with anyone at all.

wtf are you talking about?

[clevin]

I know it's the playerbase and it's making me sad. It's just not how it used to be. I remember playing on a private server a year before classic launched and it was totally different. The chat was full people invited you causually into a group to do quests and later you would add them to your friendslist. There was always someone to play with.

I went back to Classic when it launched and leveling was much like it was in vanilla so it's not just the people. Some of it is, of course but some is influenced by design. In classic, combat tags were personal. If you tagged a mob, I would not get credit for helping to kill it if I wasn't in your group. People could be selfish and not invite, but they'd then see others doing the same thing... so people tended to invite when we were both doing a Kill X Mobs quest or a Kill Elite quest.

By contrast, retail is a faction tag system. As long as it's tagged by your faction, you can get credit for just damaging it. That system makes a lot of sense in terms of efficiency - I was in Ardenweald doing a quest where I needed to clear an area to fill a bar... and I would just pull tons of mobs to myself and some others in the area and we'd all AOE them down. But we weren't in a group and didnt need to be.

This is just one example of how game design influences the community. I don't need to invite people to a group for that kind of quest, so I don't.

[oldgeezer]

It kinda boggles my mind people think of wow as a single player game. It would be a rather mediocre one if it was.

I disagree with that. It's one of the best singleplayer games out there. Why? There's a practically infinite amount of things to do, even aside from the stuff that needs a group, i.e. alts, WQs, roleplaying, mog/mount collection, crafting, the economy, just, you know, exploring and enjoying the world. Different strokes for different folks. There's no need to be competitive at all if you don't want to be.

[dope_danny]

Its become a "multiplayer, if you are in a guild" kind of game. Guilds have become sort of gate communities to avoid the wider playerbase with a more curated and controlled stable of people to play with. The cost naturally came to the "world" of warcraft basically being a treadmill to endgame instances. World Quests have obviously helped to a degree but whats done is done.

[Simple Rick]

I disagree with that. It's one of the best singleplayer games out there. Why? There's a practically infinite amount of things to do, even aside from the stuff that needs a group, i.e. alts, WQs, roleplaying, mog/mount collection, crafting, the economy, just, you know, exploring and enjoying the world. Different strokes for different folks. There's no need to be competitive at all if you don't want to be.

I guess. I would just run out of things to do rather quickly. While wow is vast its pretty shallow in terms of difficulty.

[Afrospinach]

Stop this bs already.

To the second part: you literally said nothing.

Eh, speaking of saying nothing.

Blah blah blah blah if it has been proven then where is the proof? At this point I do not really give a shit about your personal opinions or experiences. Put up, you know the rest.

[kail]

As others mentioned, it's mostly social via guildmates. The world is less punishing for solo play with shared tagging and gathering nodes. Almost any class could solo well whereas, in Classic, every warrior I met during the launch was throwing party invites as their lives depended on it.

Overall, it can be a single-player game if you want. But, the content you can complete entirely solo is extremely limited compared to group content. If you want to socialize in WoW, find an active guild that meets your playstyle.

[Yarathir]

Seems like the only ones who think the game lost its social side are the ones who don't even bother to look for it.

[Garymorilix]

Eh, speaking of saying nothing.

Blah blah blah blah if it has been proven then where is the proof? At this point I do not really give a shit about your personal opinions or experiences. Put up, you know the rest.

My "personal opinion" is how the game is played today.
I pug more than enough to know.

I can guarantee you are one of the '10 y old sticker' people who don't even play the game.
Your contribution to anything here is null.

[Ragnarohk]

I'm currently leveling a new character after I quit mid Legion and just reached level 40 the other day. In these 40 levels I had zero interactions with other players and saw maybe one other player in the zone I was in. The world chat is dead and all you see in trade chat is people spaming their boost adverts. This can hardly be called an MMO anymore. Now you could say: "Just play Classic then". And I tried that and it's even worse. Good luck finding people that are willing to do quests or run a dungeon normally. What has happend that the game became so asocial?

It can also be purely multiplayer if you want to.

I tend to level almost exclusively via BGs and Dungeons. Multiplayer content only

[Nak88]

Yes, it has been like this since 2016 (Legion).

[VinceVega]

I'm currently leveling a new character after I quit mid Legion and just reached level 40 the other day. In these 40 levels I had zero interactions with other players and saw maybe one other player in the zone I was in. The world chat is dead and all you see in trade chat is people spaming their boost adverts. This can hardly be called an MMO anymore. Now you could say: "Just play Classic then". And I tried that and it's even worse. Good luck finding people that are willing to do quests or run a dungeon normally. What has happend that the game became so asocial?

The communication moved from the open world to guilds and the pug scene.
There is no reason to linger in the leveling zones as they have not impact on anything and you blaze through them like nothing.

Wow is endgame focused. Not leveling focused. 3/4 of the players have all theri characters they want on at least 50 allready.

You will see more people in the current packs zones. But that is not new. It has been that way since BC where you had no reason to even go to the old world except kara.

If you want a game that is more focused on the levelingprocess i would recommend ESO. Swotor is even worse with meeting others and FF14 is... well basically wow but weeby.

[Zephire]

There's a non-insignificant portion of the playerbase on this forum who think that dungeons should have NPCs instead of players so they can continue living out their single player MMORPG fantasy. That said, there's plenty of human interaction in modern WoW if you seek it. I've made a number of friends just PuGing M+. Sometimes I'll go on twitch and find people with low viewcounts and offer to join their groups.

To be fair, I would not mind AI characters (done well ofc!) to fill spots for auto-grouping after some time. Both for PvE and PvP, IF a long queue means more players needed. Who wouldn't mind lower q times?

But the AI has to be good enough to not bother you and I think it's not there yet. Isles AI was okay but pretty bad imo. It played decently but just had no heart if that makes sense.

[Kaver]

I'm currently leveling a new character after I quit mid Legion and just reached level 40 the other day. In these 40 levels I had zero interactions with other players and saw maybe one other player in the zone I was in. The world chat is dead and all you see in trade chat is people spaming their boost adverts. This can hardly be called an MMO anymore. Now you could say: "Just play Classic then". And I tried that and it's even worse. Good luck finding people that are willing to do quests or run a dungeon normally. What has happend that the game became so asocial?

Leveling is pretty much single player.

You will have plenty of social interactions at max level if you want to.

[crusadernero]

well yeah, the whole game can be played solo. From lvl 1 to the very last raid boss of current xpac. Theres no need to utter a word during the whole process.

Thats sort of been the thing with wow for years now though, its not new. The leveling process is very easy now so theres no need for a group there. All dungeons are queuable and easy, no need to talk. If someone does bad, remove them and the automated feature brings in a new one. No words needed.

The "raiding" with LFR is there so you can see the story without having to put any effort into building a community(guild/friends) to do it.

I dont blame Blizzard for pushing the game in this direction. I think most gamers want it like that. Hop in and out of the game without a set schedule for raids/dungeons/pvp, and be able to quest without the need of others. That said - the option to find someone to play & chat with are there. Guilds and communitys are everywhere, for everything in the game. If you cant be bothered to look that up, you probably dont want it that much.

When I put my nostalgia glasses on, I do miss the old days were you randomly walked upon someone and started chatting. Or grouping up for quests while getting to know the people behind the characters. But we gotta remember when wow came out 16+ years ago, it was a very different time. We didnt have Facebook, instagram and all these other social media platforms.

It was a big deal for many to be able to play a MMORPG and talk to someone else. It was like a huge and awesome chatroom in Azeroth. YES, I know MMORPGs was nothing new when wow launched, but the masses started playing wow. The MMORPGs before that was not nearly as popular as wow became. So just to log in and see your friends characters and random people about was a huge thing for many. Personally I had played several multiplayer & online games, but nothing like wow. It was a whole new experience and a whole new world. Interacting with people on this scale in a game was such a knew venue for many people.

These days people have other places to connect, talk and find friends. Guilds im in now is often dead in /gchat, but when I hop into Discord its blowing off left and right.

Now people play the game and have other platforms to communicate, find friends and like minded people. wow is not a strange big world anymore were you venture out with the people you meet.

[Nephod]

Mythic raider here. Got a guild etc. They are a means to an end. I get to see and take part in challenging content. However, the best thing about WoW is leveling and experiencing the world at my own pace.

WoW is a singleplayer game that offers group content that you can pug or do with a group. The game has, sadly, become so easy that those "suggested 5 player" quests are soloable. No need to group up (until you want to do endgame content).

[crusadernero]

Mythic raider here. Got a guild etc. They are a means to an end. I get to see and take part in challenging content. However, the best thing about WoW is leveling and experiencing the world at my own pace.

WoW is a singleplayer game that offers group content that you can pug or do with a group. The game has, sadly, become so easy that those "suggested 5 player" quests are soloable. No need to group up (until you want to do endgame content).

yeah its a best of both worlds really. You can perfectly fine play the game solo, but the option to actually play with others are there.

[Viikkis]

"Times change" - Garrosh Hellscream

In 2004 people were amazed by the fact that you were playing with millions of people around the world in this fantasy world (yes there were mmorpgs before WoW but WoW was the first to hit mainstream) so just chilling and socializing with players was part of the fun. Nowadays we're all used to online games and the charm of playing with actual people has worn out. This is why classic was not that much different from retail.

[Baine]

The game is mostly single player for me. Sure I do content with other players in dungeons or LFR or in certain WQ. But most of the stuff I do is solo. Not that I am anti social, but I am a strategy/simulator /sandbox gamer first and foremost. Those games are heavily single players. I just dont have the habit of playing with others