To all the Bellulars, Asmogolds, Preaches, QoL'ers and Fans that want to Design WOW.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

No, the response happened in 5.1 when they added additional ways to gather reputation and future reputations not having the same restrictions.

The issue you are talking about is primarily limited to 5.0, not MoP as a whole.

I take it you didn’t play mop then? While the launch reps were fixed people were still up the wall about having to do other reps and other content to progress.

In 5.1 people complained that they had to grind black prince rep and do landfall daily’s to unlock the brawlers guild(which they didn’t).

In 5.2 people complained about having to grind more black prince rep as well as getting shadopan rep and that the isle of thunder was gated behind daily’s and server progress.

Even in 5.3 when things were at a minimum people complained about going to the timeless isle to get a hand full of coins.

There was no point in mop where people weren’t complaining about being forced into world content or scenarios and the like to being forced to do daily’s for rep.

The response to all the complaints was Wod which then lead to a larger subsect of people complaining about the lack of things to do other then raid.

[Kralljin]

I take it you didn’t play mop then? While the launch reps were fixed people were still up the wall about having to do other reps and other content to progress.

What "other" reps?
5.1 introduced one, which could be done alongside the Black Prince and essentially just offered [gear], you didn't have to engage it unless you needed the gear.
So, if you were a Normal raider, you could get side grades from that rep faction at best.

Same goes for the 5.2 faction.

In 5.1 people complained that they had to grind black prince rep and do landfall daily’s to unlock the brawlers guild(which they didn’t).

Considering the Brawler's guild didn't award any useful gear, what is your point?

And as said above, if you were a raider, you could only get side grades at best from that faction, that faction was not for raiders but players who didn't raid.

In 5.2 people complained about having to grind more black prince rep as well as getting shadopan rep and that the isle of thunder was gated behind daily’s and server progress.

Shado-pan Assault was the Raid faction, which was primarily gathered within the raid and for the Kirin Tor offensive / Sunreaver onslaught, the above applies again: That faction had only relevant rewards for non raiders.

Even in 5.3 when things were at a minimum people complained about going to the timeless isle to get a hand full of coins.

5.3 introduced the whole Barrens shenanigens, not the Timeless Isle, that was 5.4.

There was no point in mop where people weren’t complaining about being forced into world content or scenarios and the like to being forced to do daily’s for rep.

As said multiple times, that world content was only relevant for non raiders, if you were a raider, you could pass on most of this as it was either equivalent or inferior to raid quality loot.

The sole exception is the Black Prince, but that was really not a problem as you could easily grind that out within a few hours with a group if you want to get it done asap - it wasn't even timegated.

So please, don't throw this "you didn't play MoP" around when you have clearly no clue how the Ilvl of those factions looked in respect to the current raid tiers.

[jellmoo]

"Hasn't worked yet," is such a weird way to describe something they've been iterating on since Legion. If it "isn't working," then why do they keep building on it? Yeah, people on forums love to bitch about systems and needless complexity but they've always done that (and they always will). Clearly there is some kind of driving force behind Blizzard's decisions to continue iterating on their systems-driven approach to the game. Cynics love to say its Activision or some dude in a dark room looking at an Excel spreadsheet and figuring out what works best (and back in Legion I thought this myself) but I don't know if it's that nefarious in reality. Blizzard is making the game they think will be liked by the most people. The game is a result of the development team's vision and while we, as players, often feel like we have very little agency over how Blizzard makes the game, we do have the ultimate power to simply stop consuming the product if it fails to deliver a meaningful experience for us.

It's that specific disconnect that really seems to be at odds with a lot of what I see on forums like this. To me, it seems like there's a lot of people still playing the game but clearly disliking it quite a bit. But rather than, you know, stepping away from it and admitting it's no longer for them, these people rage against the dying light of the sun that Blizzard has wronged them personally and they are owed the exact game they feel is owed to them. And now, with Blizzard actually making these changes to the game, these same people are smugly pretending like they were right all along and Blizzard just doesn't understand.

Full Disclosure: I unsubbed near the start of SL. Above and beyond any mechanical issues the game might have, the setting wasn't for me. Which is fine, not everything needs to be my cup of tea, and I'm perfectly happy sitting out an expansion because I'm not a fan.

That being said, when I say "hasn't worked yet" I mean the system is getting the same complaints for the third expansion in a row. I'm not saying they don't have their reasons for implementing it and continuing to try and iterate it, but I am saying that it's perfectly reasonable for people to express frustration and displeasure when they see Blizzard attempt the same system *again* when it was heavily criticized in the previous two expansions.

Our options are literally to either:

1) Offer critique and criticism in hopes that we end up with a product to our liking

or

2) Speak with our wallets

The only other option is to say nothing, continue playing, but hate the experience. And that is not something anyone should be doing.

- - - Updated - - -

The thing is you can achieve the same by just gating it with a reputation. I mean Renown is essetially just condensed down to that. It's a glorified reputation system with smaller Integer numbers than the odd 42k reputation you usually need to reach maximum. Though I will not deny that it's another aspect, ableit a rather cynical one, of the current temporary endgame systems.

Oh it's all different versions of the same thing, really. The big difference right now is that we have these additional grinds ON TOP OF that original rep grind. It may be a cynical point of view, I admit, but it's getting harder and harder not to be cynical with this company.

[Triceron]

I take it you didn’t play mop then? While the launch reps were fixed people were still up the wall about having to do other reps and other content to progress.

In 5.1 people complained that they had to grind black prince rep and do landfall daily’s to unlock the brawlers guild(which they didn’t).

In 5.2 people complained about having to grind more black prince rep as well as getting shadopan rep and that the isle of thunder was gated behind daily’s and server progress.

Even in 5.3 when things were at a minimum people complained about going to the timeless isle to get a hand full of coins.

There was no point in mop where people weren’t complaining about being forced into world content or scenarios and the like to being forced to do daily’s for rep.

The response to all the complaints was Wod which then lead to a larger subsect of people complaining about the lack of things to do other then raid.

I can see that being a huge issue. As someone who entered MoP merely weeks before WoD came out, I ran into zero of those problems.

I had a fresh Cata character jump into MoP . I did all the content and obtained all the reps, and I went straight into Siege of Orgrimmar once I picked up my necessary 'catchup' loot within a week's time. No gating, no real rep grind to worry about. I could literally farm Warbringers for rep tokens and get them maxed within a week. I could PVP and build towards a couple nice high ilvl Belt/Bracer pieces to boost my gear score enough to enter LFR. I could do Timeless Isles and do all the exploration and treasure chest shit, or farm gulpers for coins till I got all everything I need. I was able to hit up Heroic Orgrimmar and obtain my heirloom weapon within the 2nd week of play.

But that's also the problem, because if you really look at the amount of content there is in the game for the entire 2 years of development they put in, without any of the gating systems or grinds, all the content would last less than 2 weeks. I don't really know if there's any real solution to the problem, because the amount of work they put in doesn't really fit the speed a player is able to consume it. That's why they always have to rely on artificial means of drawing content out or designing convoluted systems that give the 'illusion of progress', when in reality you can get it all done in a very short amount of time if gating were not a thing.

[Shoukyatwo]

Spot on like everyone is saying. Bunch of armchair developers that don't know the first thing about what it actually takes to do this. Meh about Preach, but Asmon would be worse then the current lawsuit Blizz is dealing with.

This cliche nonsense again. First off, by critiquing something fundamentally broken and or wrong does NOT mean you are trying to be a developer. Secondly, you don't need to be an actual developer to do aforementioned critiquing. Especially over something CLEARLY not working, or flat out bad. Get over this stupid attempt at a non existent talking point.

[Relapses]

This cliche nonsense again. First off, by critiquing something fundamentally broken and or wrong does NOT mean you are trying to be a developer. Secondly, you don't need to be an actual developer to do aforementioned critiquing. Especially over something CLEARLY not working, or flat out bad. Get over this stupid attempt at a non existent talking point.

Thanks for letting us know that your opinion about a system in the game is the only thing that matters.

[Darkeon]

Rule Number 1 of arguments over WoW design: The argument will always degrade into food service analogies.

You have to be an engineer to critique the quality of a road.

There, Rule Number #2 - it always degrades into construction working analogies. Either that or the dude you quote was right and used a perfect analogy.

[Shoukyatwo]

"Hasn't worked yet," is such a weird way to describe something they've been iterating on since Legion. If it "isn't working," then why do they keep building on it? Yeah, people on forums love to bitch about systems and needless complexity but they've always done that (and they always will). Clearly there is some kind of driving force behind Blizzard's decisions to continue iterating on their systems-driven approach to the game. Cynics love to say its Activision or some dude in a dark room looking at an Excel spreadsheet and figuring out what works best (and back in Legion I thought this myself) but I don't know if it's that nefarious in reality. Blizzard is making the game they think will be liked by the most people. The game is a result of the development team's vision and while we, as players, often feel like we have very little agency over how Blizzard makes the game, we do have the ultimate power to simply stop consuming the product if it fails to deliver a meaningful experience for us.

It's that specific disconnect that really seems to be at odds with a lot of what I see on forums like this. To me, it seems like there's a lot of people still playing the game but clearly disliking it quite a bit. But rather than, you know, stepping away from it and admitting it's no longer for them, these people rage against the dying light of the sun that Blizzard has wronged them personally and they are owed the exact game they feel is owed to them. And now, with Blizzard actually making these changes to the game, these same people are smugly pretending like they were right all along and Blizzard just doesn't understand.

The only disconnect is yours. The only smug person is yourself. You are a hopelessly addicted fan boy loaded with defense mechanisms who lies, manipulates data or flat out refuses to accept that along with reality and then blames it on the MILLIONS of other people who have quit over the past 5 years (for more than valid reasons) as being wrong and fOlLoWiNg StReAmErS. There is NOT "a lot of people still playing the game". You put in the pre text "to me". Everything is TO YOU. Not what IS. It is CLEAR AND INARGUABLE the game has massively declined. It is CLEAR AND INARGUABLE it's for good reason due to their constant deceit, greed, broken systems, arrogance, UNWILLINGNESS TO LISTEN TO THE PEOPLE WHO PAY FOR THEIR PRODUCTS. You're right, people DO have the power to simply stop consuming the product. And they have. People have spoken loud and clear. But according to you in your made up statistics, they haven't and "engagement" is higher than it's ever. Which is a flat out lie. The problem with people like you isn't the fact you still want to play this god awful game. To each their own. It's the fact you have the audacity and nerve to defend the company and game as a whole no matter what despite the OVERWHELMING evidence in their shady business practices, way they treat employees, and clearly shit product they are putting out time after time year after year then proceed to blame everyone else around you and tell them they are at fault. You're immature, biased, one sided, and completely void of the capability of being reasonable. If you want to continue purchasing their stuff have at it. It's your money. Just be an adult and say I will play despite what everyone else thinks. Don't sit on your self righteous imaginary self appointed throne and tell everyone else by the millions they are the problem when clearly they aren't. Grow up.

- - - Updated - - -

Thanks for letting us know that your opinion about a system in the game is the only thing that matters.

It isn't my opinion. It's the "opinion" of millions of more people greater than yourself. The only person that thinks their opinion matters is yourself.

[Relapses]

The only disconnect is yours. The only smug person is yourself. You are a hopelessly addicted fan boy loaded with defense mechanisms who lies, manipulates data or flat out refuses to accept that along with reality and then blames it on the MILLIONS of other people who have quit over the past 5 years (for more than valid reasons) as being wrong and fOlLoWiNg StReAmErS. There is NOT "a lot of people still playing the game". You out in the pre text "to me". Everything is TO YOU. Not what IS. It is CLEAR AND INARGUABLE the game has massively declined. It is CLEAR AND INARGUABLE it's for good reason due to their constant deceit, greed, broken systems, arrogance, UNWILLINGNESS TO LISTEN TO THE PEOPLE WHO PAY FOR THEIR PRODUCTS. You're right, people DO have the power to simply stop consuming the product. And they have. People have spoken loud and clear. But according to you in your made up statistics, they haven't and "engagement" is higher than it's ever. Which is a flat out lie. The problem with people like you isn't the fact you still want to play this god awful game. To each their own. It's the fact you have the audacity and nerve to defend the company and game as a whole no matter what despite the OVERWHELMING evidence in their shady business practices, way they treat employees, and clearly shit product they are putting out time after time year after year then proceed to blame everyone else around you and tell them they are at fault. You're immature, biased, one sided, and completely void of the capability of being reasonable. If you want to continue purchasing their stuff have at it. It's your money. Just be an adult and say I will play despite what everyone else thinks. Don't sit on your self righteous imaginary self appointed throne and tell everyone else by the millions they are the problem when clearly they aren't. Grow up.

- - - Updated - - -



It isn't my opinion. It's the "opinion" of millions of more people greater than yourself. The only person that thinks their opinion matters is yourself.

Fucking hell dude, ending that completely unsolicited tirade with "grow up," may actually be one of the single most ironic things anybody has ever uttered on this forum.

FWIW, I get it. If I hated a game development company as much as you seem to hate Blizzard, it'd bother me too if somebody were trying to be reasonable in their approach to discussing the game's issues. But that's not an issue my end, friend. : - ) And if my opinions are so bothersome for you I strongly encourage you to use some introspection to understand exactly why it upsets you this much.

[anon5123]

Spot on like everyone is saying. Bunch of armchair developers that don't know the first thing about what it actually takes to do this.

Yep, the fans don't know anything and Blizzard is doing everything right

oh wait, WoW lost 50% of its subs in the past year or so

LMAO

Rule Number 1 of arguments over WoW design: The argument will always degrade into food service analogies.

"lol you made a food analogy so you are wrong and dumb!"

Food is the easiest thing for humans to relate to. Anyone can relate to it. That's why food analogies are so common and often the first go-to choice. Shoo.

[Shoukyatwo]

Fucking hell dude, ending that completely unsolicited tirade with "grow up," may actually be one of the single most ironic things anybody has ever uttered on this forum.

FWIW, I get it. If I hated a game development company as much as you seem to hate Blizzard, it'd bother me too if somebody were trying to be reasonable in their approach to discussing the game's issues. But that's not an issue my end, friend. : - ) And if my opinions are so bothersome for you I strongly encourage you to use some introspection to understand exactly why it upsets you this much.

You're not reasonable. At all. In any capacity whatsoever. Once again. You are biased, flat out lie, and you make up statistics to defend this thing you are addicted to then blame it on everyone else that sees it for what it is and tells them they are incorrect. You don't have an honest, reasonable bone in your body. You just defend the company no matter what they do, and shit on everyone else and act like they are imagining things. There was no irony there. People like you DO need to grow up. YOU are the problem with companies like Blizz/Activision. You will take whatever turd wrapped in a bow that's presented while the company is busy harassing it's employees then smugly and venomously defend them while completely lacking the ability to be objectionable to anything they do and screaming the rest of the world is wrong.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

What "other" reps?
5.1 introduced one, which could be done alongside the Black Prince and essentially just offered [gear], you didn't have to engage it unless you needed the gear.
So, if you were a Normal raider, you could get side grades from that rep faction at best.

Same goes for the 5.2 faction.

The black prince rep for legendarys.
Land fall rep thinking it’s how you got a bawlers pass (it didn’t people still complained)
Shado-pan offence for progress gear.
Kirin tor/sunreavers offensive, rep wasn’t needed but daily’s to ungrate the isle of thunder.

Considering the Brawler's guild didn't award any useful gear, what is your point?

And as said above, if you were a raider, you could only get side grades at best from that faction, that faction was not for raiders but players who didn't raid.

people complained about gated access to the guild not that it gave rewards.

Shado-pan Assault was the Raid faction, which was primarily gathered within the raid and for the Kirin Tor offensive / Sunreaver onslaught, the above applies again: That faction had only relevant raiders for non raiders.

shado-pan rep was massively farmed by pug groups clearing the first few troll packs before resetting just like icc, because the gear was good for starting progress people complained they needed to do it just like the launch reps.

The offensives also unlocked the isle which in turn unlocked a world boss raider wanted for an extra chance at loot.

As said multiple times, that world content was only relevant for non raiders, if you were a raider, you could pass on most of this as it was either equivalent or inferior to raid quality loot.

I take it you haven’t progress raided before?

Because this isn’t how most progress raiding works. You don’t pass on easily obtainable upgrades when trying to progress. For an example going through say 5.2 next to no one is going to look at shado-pan upgrades when starting the tier and just ignore them because better or equivalent items might drop while progressing and they might get them.

If this was the case people would have no problems with things like pvp gear being equal to raid gear or people buying gold to get BOE’s

The sole exception is the Black Prince, but that was really not a problem as you could easily grind that out within a few hours with a group if you want to get it done asap - it wasn't even timegated.

no it wasn’t hard and wasn’t time gated people still complained about it because raiders didn’t want to farm mobs just like they didn’t want to do 2 BG’s for the quest line.

So please, don't throw this "you didn't play MoP" around when you have clearly no clue how the Ilvl of those factions looked in respect to the current raid tiers.

I can’t say you’ve helped your case on you playing mop when you act like people didn’t care about unlocking world bosses or being able to get more slots of raid quality gear from a rep vender on the isle.

[Eosia]

Be careful what you wish for.


You're basically Homer in this episode.

Yup. They never heard of a little game called "Star Wars Galaxies" either.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

I can see that being a huge issue. As someone who entered MoP merely weeks before WoD came out, I ran into zero of those problems

Mop had great catch ups and a great amount of content for people like me who don’t mind doing daily’s or getting reps.

For people who just wanted to raid though it was filled with a ton of stuff they felt forced into and there was a shit ton of back lash.

While alot of people might sing it praise (my self included) and for good reason there’s a reason it continued the downward sub trend.

[Relapses]

You're not reasonable. At all. In any capacity whatsoever. Once again. You are biased, flat out lie, and you make up statistics to defend this thing you are addicted to then blame it on everyone else that sees it for what it is and tells them they are incorrect. You don't have an honest, reasonable bone in your body. You just defend the company no matter what they do, and shit on everyone else and act like they are imagining things. There was no irony there. People like you DO need to grow up. YOU are the problem with companies like Blizz/Activision. You will take whatever turd wrapped in a bow that's presented while the company is busy harassing it's employees then smugly and venomously defend them while completely lacking the ability to be objectionable to anything they do and screaming the rest of the world is wrong.

Brother if you think I'm defending Blizzard you simply aren't reading my posts. I'm criticizing easily incensed people like you who write unsolicited paragraphs of nonsense because they simply can't cope with somebody having an opinion of the game which is different than their own. That's fine, though. To quote you...

To each their own.

[Ianus]

Fucking hell dude, ending that completely unsolicited tirade with "grow up," may actually be one of the single most ironic things anybody has ever uttered on this forum.

FWIW, I get it. If I hated a game development company as much as you seem to hate Blizzard, it'd bother me too if somebody were trying to be reasonable in their approach to discussing the game's issues. But that's not an issue my end, friend. : - ) And if my opinions are so bothersome for you I strongly encourage you to use some introspection to understand exactly why it upsets you this much.

"Doing the same thing repeatedly, and expecting different results is the definition of insanity,".. Einstein

[Zenfoldor]

Talent is one thing(and talent is a pursued interest), but I've always thought the issue was less with talent(we aren't reinventing the wheel with wow) and more to do with priorities.

Imagine if you were a WoW developer a year ago. Now what is your priority? Fun for players, or MAUs?

[Relapses]

Imagine if you were a WoW developer a year ago. Now what is your priority? Fun for players, or MAUs for this quarter?

These two things don't need to be mutually exclusive.

[Shoukyatwo]

Brother if you think I'm defending Blizzard you simply aren't reading my posts. I'm criticizing easily incensed people like you who write unsolicited paragraphs of nonsense because they simply can't cope with somebody having an opinion of the game which is different than their own. That's fine, though. To quote you...

I already addressed the opinion thing. I don't care what your opinion is. Nor does anyone else. You do you. It's YOUR money. What I DO care about, is people like yourself and the OP who want to pretend everyone else is the problem, and daddy Blizzard has done nothing wrong and you point the finger at everyone but the company who is the root of all that is happened up to this point. They have clearly for years now released sub par, unfinished products (see Warcraft Reforged for the Optimus Prime example). They have been caught flat out lying to the public on numerous occasions. They have openly displayed their greed in the form of copious amounts of store items on top of sub fees and expansion costs. They have refused countless times to listen to players say something is incorrect or not working from the jump only to a year and a half later go "Daddy's got you." They have openly mocked people in an unprofessional, immature fashion on social media many times. They have been arrogant, stubborn, and inept at their jobs while being flat out pathological lying dicks to the people who pay their bloated salaries all the while trying to do virtue signaling for BLM and the LGBTQ community and on the same token supporting China and physically harassing their own people. But you, the OP, and others desperately defending this trash company are right. It's everyone else, and they are just FoLlOWiNg StReAmErS. Nothing I am writing is "nonsense". It's reality.

[rybat117]

These two things don't need to be mutually exclusive.

Funny enough, Blizzard doesn't seem to be succeeding much with either.