WOW- Now pay to win?

[Kumorii]

Do you not consider false advertising as an economic issue?

Nothing that is or has been worse in time... False advertisement or even lack of advertisement and transparency of games has been a thing since Atari days. There is no downward spiral in that regard. Some still do it because it's something that will always happen. I'm not saying accept it and take, i'm saying it's not a new trend.
I mean, we still have Daikatana as a reference for games doing this, which started in 1995 and released 2000.

A game which has a cash shop will almost inevitably warp the normal progression of the game in order to "Encourage" use of said cash shop. Not always. Nothing is absolute. WoW, for example, has no need to press people towards the cash shop because they can directly manipulate revenue by virtue of timegating(any form of it, not just hard locks)in a subscription-based model. And as much as I like to harp on it, WoW is fairly mild in terms of monetization. I think that's why I fight so hard against it. Because I don't want to see it slip any further down that spectrum.

Deadspace 3 is a good example. Despite being a single-player game with co-op, it had a MTX model where you could pay real money for extra resources. Resources could be found in game in limited quantities. The rate of finding these resources was, of course, designed in such a way that it was clear they wanted you to use the MTX shop. Players got around it by exploiting a bug.

Assassin's Creed Odyssey is a more recent example. Again, warping the player experience in order to press people towards the cash shop. Experience gains were reduced to the point where a player without a paid boost would have to complete virtually every activity in the game just to keep up with the level/difficulty curve.

Both of these were technically high-quality productions. However, the degradation of "Quality", in my view, is to the overall experience, not just the technical aspects. Things like poor launches, pre-order bonuses, and live-service failures add into this.

Yeah I've heard about Odyssey and the issues it had, frankly I never noticed them myself... people said you didn't get enough experience yadda yadda and it was becaue they wanted to promote XP boosts and stuff. Which, yes it's bad, although I can't relate to it. I never had experience problems and the overall of that experience to me were great. Quality of the game itself was good in my experience, which once again...doesn't mean I defend the idea of selling Xp boosts and try to alter progression for that reason, but in this case it didn't affect the game in a manner you describe to me, or what other experienced.

Which circles back to my point that Quality and exploitive schemes are and should be separate. Great games can have awful schemes and bad games can have generous schemes. We can say that it sucked for you because of the XP boost MTX while for me it was a great game despite it, it played well...and I can tell that the developers like what they do and it's shown in the actual gameplay DESPITE the cash shop.

As for the "war on MTX", I think there are some battles being won. But the war is still very much up in the air. AAA publishers are just getting more advanced and more clever about how they manipulate players. Activision's infamous patent on matchmaking tech, and EA's patent on "dynamic skill adjustment". These are EXTREMELY powerful, complex, and intelligent tools to manipulate players out of their money.

I think a lot of people REALLY badly underestimate just how important this topic is in gaming. This industry is making billions of dollars. High-end publishers are not going to be friendly, fair, reasonable, or moderate about their approach to getting that money. And quite frankly, I find it absolutely disturbing that all it takes is a couple of screenshots, a new game announcement, or a hollow corporate apology to get players to forget this.

The more politicans get replaced by a younger generation the harder it will be for companies to do exploitive schemes but then we also have to take into account of free market in which companies and anyone should be able to sell almost anything and it's up to customers to determine if it's valuable or not. Where would the line be drawn? If developers make new content, may it so be only cosmetics I think it's fair that they should be able to sell it. Should they be able to do false advertisement or tricking people into buying things to make the game work? Nope absolutely not.

It's also a very complex issue since you have to prove intent which is hard to do.

[Rogue Karl]

I never said any such thing. But sure go ahead and twist what I did say to suit your narrative.

What I do find odd is your need to resort to dishonesty in such a discussion....



What should decide if you can be the best or not are traits like

• effort,
• skill,
• commitment,
• determination,
• perseverance

And if there are multiple competitors who are all scoring similar on these measures, it's fine that it can come down to a combination of a bit of luck, or who played better on the day.

So, to answer your question:

• Gold is a resource that is acquired in-game. It classifies according to the list above as a perfectly valid factor.
• "Crazy RNG" tends to balance out when you're talking about a group of 20 people that qualifies according to the list above.
• Cash isn't a factor as proven by Method and Complexity Limit who spent gold they obtained without using any tokens.

Clearly the amount of effort that world first contenders are required to put in if they want to win is massive. And yes, clearly, acquiring a massive amount of goal is a significant part of that effort.

The Nya'lotha world first race was absolutely a case of a guild winning on the basis effort and commitment. It had nothing to do with "luck" and nothing to do with buying any kind of advantage from Blizzard.

Now maybe you'd like to argue that the game should provide different avenues for such guilds to expend effort on, but I would counter that the real issue here is simply that the competition has escalated to the point where those top guilds have basically gone outside of the scope of what the game was designed to cater to. Simply put, the crazy shit that happens in the world first race is not a good indicator of whether the game and it's systems are good are not. That should rather be measured on the other 99.998% of the playerbase.

We are at the point where items selling for 8 million gold are doing more damage then what drops off the last mythic boss...

The lack of game knowledge i'm being shown here is truely staggering.

I'm getting the weirdest arguements for " there just a boe bro them doing more dmg then any spell you cast over a fight doesn't mean you need then for content bro".

I honestly don't believe they were designed for pay to win but rather were just extremely I'll conceived but blizzard shouldn't be given a pass because of that.

These items make as much sense as barring lfr behind the mythic clear achievement for the tier.

[Raelbo]

The lack of game knowledge i'm being shown here is truely staggering.

What is truly staggering is how you're so focussed on your own argument that you're completely failing to read what the other person (ie me) is saying.

I'm getting the weirdest arguements for " there just a boe bro them doing more dmg then any spell you cast over a fight doesn't mean you need then for content bro".

I never said anything like that...

That being said, you also need to learn to differentiate between what is needed for content and what is desirable if you want to push your limits. No one here is arguing that an 8M BoE epic can't give a player an extra few % dps over the next best item. But that doesn't mean that they're "must have" items.

I honestly don't believe they were designed for pay to win

Which is really the main point I have been arguing all along.

but rather were just extremely I'll conceived but blizzard shouldn't be given a pass because of that.

That's debatable, but an entirely different point to what I was talking about.

[SirCowdog]

frankly I never noticed them myself...

.... yes it's bad, although I can't relate to it. I never had experience problems

.... it didn't affect the game in a manner you describe to me,

Ok. Look. I need you to understand something. Personal experience, or anecdotal experience, in this regard literally doesn't matter. What these kinds of business and design models do is take a shotgun approach. They literally do not need to hit everyone. They don't even need to hit most players with it. All they need is to hit the whales.

.They are operating on the same basic formula as casinos. Regardless of what you, your friend, their friends, or someone's third cousin they heard about someone hitting a jackpot. Even if you were right there when it happened, the REST of the time the house is making money. To which you'll probably respond with some form of: "Well you can play responsibly in a casino". To which I would respond, "Yes, but even casinos have rules and regulations. AAA companies like EA literally want to addict children to gambling, and currently have no such laws or oversight like casinos do!


If you want to see and understand how this effects the industry as a whole, you MUST stop thinking in terms of individuals, and start looking at the larger scale.

Which circles back to my point that Quality and exploitive schemes are and should be separate.

Again, you have to look at the larger picture. When the entire game has it's balance and progression warped to suit a predator business model, that's effecting the quality of experience.

The more politicans get replaced by a younger generation the harder it will be for companies to do exploitive schemes

Judging by the overall response every time this subject gets brought up, and judging by the amount of people who pre-order, and buy into mobile game ripoffs, and how people even today still support and defend stuff like Fallout 76.....I find it difficult to believe that the next generation is going to be more savvy about this. They're the ones supporting it and making it successful, FFS!

[Rogue Karl]

What is truly staggering is how you're so focussed on your own argument that you're completely failing to read what the other person (ie me) is saying.



I never said anything like that...

That being said, you also need to learn to differentiate between what is needed for content and what is desirable if you want to push your limits. No one here is arguing that an 8M BoE epic can't give a player an extra few % dps over the next best item. But that doesn't mean that they're "must have" items.



Which is really the main point I have been arguing all along.



That's debatable, but an entirely different point to what I was talking about.

I find quoting every reply rather then simply responding to the spirit of the objections to be more efficient ( the perils of typing on a phone) I meant no offence.

For your point on what is desirable and what is needed we differ. I read up quite throughly on logs. While with increasing ilv it might be theoretically possible to clear mythic without corruptions it would be a tighter check on dps then even what method faced.

I think I am to invested in this argument it might be best I take my leave of it. I said what points I have and anything further would descend in circular arguments.

I do agree with you that I doubt blizzard thought through the effects of this system.

[Kumorii]

Ok. Look. I need you to understand something. Personal experience, or anecdotal experience, in this regard literally doesn't matter. What these kinds of business and design models do is take a shotgun approach. They literally do not need to hit everyone. They don't even need to hit most players with it. All they need is to hit the whales.

.They are operating on the same basic formula as casinos. Regardless of what you, your friend, their friends, or someone's third cousin they heard about someone hitting a jackpot. Even if you were right there when it happened, the REST of the time the house is making money. To which you'll probably respond with some form of: "Well you can play responsibly in a casino". To which I would respond, "Yes, but even casinos have rules and regulations. AAA companies like EA literally want to addict children to gambling, and currently have no such laws or oversight like casinos do!


If you want to see and understand how this effects the industry as a whole, you MUST stop thinking in terms of individuals, and start looking at the larger scale.




Again, you have to look at the larger picture. When the entire game has it's balance and progression warped to suit a predator business model, that's effecting the quality of experience.



Judging by the overall response every time this subject gets brought up, and judging by the amount of people who pre-order, and buy into mobile game ripoffs, and how people even today still support and defend stuff like Fallout 76.....I find it difficult to believe that the next generation is going to be more savvy about this. They're the ones supporting it and making it successful, FFS!

You seem to miss the point... remember what my original post was about. A commentary on how lists of "bad" games shows a downward spiral in QUALITY of games is faulty to begin with because you can find bad games in all periods of gaming history and same as you can find good games.

I've stated constantly that I'm with you on the exploitive part, so not sure why you keep harping on about it. Alien Colonial Marines have nothing to do with EA or other companies trying to target whales through MTX since that game had nothing to do with it... it was just a trash developed game, not a trend or a game that's showing QUALITY has gone down in general.

Why do you take it that just because you need to separate quality and exploitive systems in games as me defending or not understanding predatory exploitive mtx systems?
I've been pretty clear on that point and shown constantly that games can be incredibly well made and still have bad MTX schemes same as there are BAD games that have no MTX schemes.

And OFC people will defend some games no matter how bad they are... that's how subjectivity works which is heavily entwined in what people perceive is good quality or bad quality. You thinking it's a bad attitude or not doesn't change the fact that that's how it is for some.

But I can tell you are getting frustrated, although I feel that's self inflicted, so I just leave it at that.

[Raelbo]

For your point on what is desirable and what is needed we differ. I read up quite throughly on logs. While with increasing ilv it might be theoretically possible to clear mythic without corruptions it would be a tighter check on dps then even what method faced.

I am not suggesting that anyone try to participate in mythic raiding without corruptions. I am simply saying that the corruptions you're going to get during mythic progression will be sufficient without the need to resort to buying BoEs on the AH.

I do agree with you that I doubt blizzard thought through the effects of this system.

Again, not something I ever said....

My honest opinion - players are (as usual) hyperbolising the impact of having the perfect set of corruptions vs what they're likely to get. Sure, when it comes to winning the world first race, you're going to use every resource at your disposal, and guilds like Method and Complexity Limit understand that they can leverage the considerable gold that they can make over the course of a raid tier and convert it into an edge that could be the difference between winning the race and not.

For the rest of us, though, those items remain totally unnecessary.

[Katchii]

A difficult experience requires a different approach, a different approach is a different experience.

As I said, it's not different ENOUGH to make it interesting or worthwhile. Just like playing the same game on a higher difficulty doesn't change what game you're playing, it just changes how you approach it. But the end result is the same; you're playing through the same game, same enemies, same story to reach the same ending.

The slightly different experience from a higher difficulty isn't enough for me, it obviously is for many people...I'm not one of them.

[Specialka]

As I said, it's not different ENOUGH to make it interesting or worthwhile. Just like playing the same game on a higher difficulty doesn't change what game you're playing, it just changes how you approach it. But the end result is the same; you're playing through the same game, same enemies, same story to reach the same ending.

The slightly different experience from a higher difficulty isn't enough for me, it obviously is for many people...I'm not one of them.

Which difficulty are you comparing? mm0 to mm1? LFR to normal? LFR to MM raiding?

[Katchii]

Which difficulty are you comparing? mm0 to mm1? LFR to normal? LFR to MM raiding?

I wasn't specific, but the conversation was about Mythic and Mythic+.

I personally don't find ANY of those examples different enough to make doing the harder difficulties worthwhile simply because they have more and/or harder mechanics. The gear reward is what would make me interested in them, not the experience of the higher difficulty. But because I don't really see much worth in doing higher difficulties just because it's a higher difficulty, the gear rewards don't really entice me either because if I'm not going to do the higher difficulties I don't need the gear.

More power to those that do enjoy those things though, I'm not claiming anything other than that scene not being for me, play and enjoy what you want.

[nocturnus]

Paying for a boost, paying for carries, paying for gold. All with a credit card. They're not actually playing the game in any recognizable fashion. What is the point of playing a game if all you're actually doing is just throwing your real world credit card at it? That's not playing. That's spending. The context of the game is almost entirely being ignored.

How did you jump from players making ridiculous demands when forming groups, to players buying boosts? You're either shifting goal posts or there was some kind of misunderstanding.

The problem with that is that in a community based game like wow(which is what it is, regardless of the ability to play solo), the actions of other players DOES effect individuals. The desires of others(personal loot is a perfect example of this, regardless of the outcome) WILL influence how you play the game.

Everything affects you some way or the other. But the fact that some people have a particular set of requirements before they invite anyone to their group, doesn't affect you beyond receiving an invitation or not. Ergo, troubling yourself with how others play they game, is a waste of time.

This of course, is in reference to our conversation about the criteria people have when forming groups. I'm not talking about buying boosts, gold, items or whatever. Eventhough I don't think that's necessarily ever been a bad thing.

That's like a flat earther claiming that the world would be the same "to me". You can have whatever personal subjective opinion you like. You can claim the sky is a psychedelic mix of different colored eyeballs and tentacles. That doesn't change what the sky actually is. Dark Souls is a phenomenon in the gaming world. It is so because of the effects of it's difficulty on the gaming community, and the experiences of those players. That is an effect that would NOT be the same if it had an EZ mode. That isn't a subjective opinion of mine. That's fact.

A. Flat earthers are idiots. Don't even mention them in a conversatio with me
B. All opinions are subjective
C. Adding an easy mode to Dark Souls would not be the same as removing the normal mode unless you'd - here it comes - would actually remove it. This is a fact.

Blizzard has very specifically gone out of their way to make WoW accessible to as broad of a player as possible. But that wasn't the point I was making. I was making a conditional statement. If you try to make a product that appeals to everyone, then your product will likely fail to appeal to anyone. That's the extreme that it appears Blizzard is aiming at in order to cast a more broad net while fishing for addicts and whales.

This is a straw-man argument. No one has every claimed Blizzard is attempting to please everyone. Its utter impossibility would make it a fool's errand and Blizzard, doesn't consist of fools.

Most people don't have to! That's not how the business model or tactic works. You only need a small proportion of whales to normal players, and maybe a handful of super-whales, in order to be profitable.

Great. So why are you complaining about how a negligible proportion of the player base behaves?

By the way, me saying you were being overly dramatic was based on a bit more than you chose to quote:

People are not withdrawing from public grouping. If anything, people are grouping up more than ever thanks to the tools developers gave them to facilitate the logistic procedures.

You're projecting your personal experiences and the way you interpret individual changes onto the game and its community. Not unlike people who kept shouting 'wow is dying' merely because they were gradually losing interest.

[Sansnom]

What should decide if you can be the best or not are traits like

• effort,
• skill,
• commitment,
• determination,
• perseverance

Interesting points. So people who play the AH and amass vast amount of gold are considered rich player. Not necessary a skillful player.

So in a similar vein, people who used that gold to acquire gear is also not a skillful player, just a rich player.

Gear is just an item, like gold, that players acquire during their play. It is not a measure of anything. So people buying such gear should not be considered to be pay to win?

It seems part of the problem is some people equate acquiring good gear to be a good player, yet your list demonstrate that is not the case. Gear is just something is acquired.

Maybe Blizzard should really consider some form of score or titles. I know they already exist but something a bit visual. Maybe Blizzard could make the player glow pink if they are in the top 50 guilds that cleared mythic. Glow brown between 50 - 100 etc.

[SirCowdog]

@nocturnus @Kumorii

Just wanted to thank you guys for being very reasonable, because I know I sort of haven't. It's been a rough week for me without much sleep.

I will be taking the day to think about my stance in a general sense. This is due to a combination of your arguments and by me reading my own posts again compared to another argument I was having about The Division 2's new expansion, wherein I was criticizing someone for overreacting about their business model(which was pretty damn hypocritical of me, given my stance in this thread).

Thanks for the discussion. It's what I come here for.

[nocturnus]

@nocturnus @Kumorii

Just wanted to thank you guys for being very reasonable, because I know I sort of haven't. It's been a rough week for me without much sleep.

I will be taking the day to think about my stance in a general sense. This is due to a combination of your arguments and by me reading my own posts again compared to another argument I was having about The Division 2's new expansion, wherein I was criticizing someone for overreacting about their business model(which was pretty damn hypocritical of me, given my stance in this thread).

Thanks for the discussion. It's what I come here for.

Hey, don't worry about it bud. Take care and thanks for the interesting chat!

[Ali Sam]

I believe that nowadays it is almost impossible to reach high lvls especially in WoW without buying any boosters.

[Elias01]

So your definition is solely on the power of the items? Then this tier is and was the only that was p2w? Saying "but the items can have a strong effect!" doesn't it more or less p2w (if you think it is p2w at all).
BoEs have always existed, people always bought gold, but in your vision it is only p2w when blizzard makes a broken mechanic (corruption) that can go onto those BoEs? This selective "it's only if i want it" makes no sense.
It either was always (or since the introduction of tokens, since buying gold illegal before) or was never p2w. Saying that only a VERY specific proc makes it p2w is just nonsense

In past people did not buy gold as it would get them banned. And yes game become pay2win since token introduction but as with everything it become aparent in 8.3 becouse of world first stream. Blizzard managed to hide it until 8.3 becouse its indirect trade. You kinda just get gold for token than do w/e with that gold. Transaction is more hidden from publicity compared to just selling gear in cash shop. Thats why it was ignored for so long. But with corruption being 20%+ dps increases and Method showing 100k+ people how they spend hundreds of dollars to buy boes from ah exposed this practice to masses.

[rhorle]

Thats why it was ignored for so long. But with corruption being 20%+ dps increases and Method showing 100k+ people how they spend hundreds of dollars to buy boes from ah exposed this practice to masses.

https://blizzardwatch.com/2019/02/08...first-raiding/

This isn't the first time that the "world first" guilds have stated how much gold they have spent. People, or rather the outrage culture, only cares now because of corruption mechanics. The world first guilds have not been shy in how much they spend to get any advantage they can. They spend tons of gold every time there is a race and have for years.

[Elias01]

https://blizzardwatch.com/2019/02/08...first-raiding/

This isn't the first time that the "world first" guilds have stated how much gold they have spent. People, or rather the outrage culture, only cares now because of corruption mechanics. The world first guilds have not been shy in how much they spend to get any advantage they can. They spend tons of gold every time there is a race and have for years.

Race change and boe gear what straight up boost your dps by 20% are completly different things. Oh Method player spend 20 dollars to get 0.5% more dmg from racial vs method guy buying 10 tokens for 200 dollars to buy bis boe item.

[CrawlFromThePit]

WoW is Pay to Lose now.

When you pay you support the bad design they are doing right now so you either lose the game you once liked by quitting, or you keep playing the crap they do today. There's no winning in this for us.

[taheen74]

When i say WIN. I mean WIN DPS meters. Haveing good dps helps out alot. Both in raids and arena. And NO BOE have never been this strong. When could a BOE do 30-50% of your total damage almost by itself? Its not normal anyway .

You can have all the BIS in every slot: that doesn't mean you are going to auto win dps meters.

Not how that works.