Has Loot lost it's Pride?

[towelliee]

In Classic WoW and in The Burning Crusade, a lot of people use to take pride in their gear. I was overseeing a conversation from a Warrior who just returned to WoW after being away a few years. He was standing in the middle of Orgrimmar with his Thunder Fury, Full Tier 3 Dreadnaught and HighWarlord. I logged on my Warrior and stood next to him in my only 5/9 Dreadnaught with Conqueror 2.5 gear from AQ40. He /lol at me said "We are very few."

So it got me thinking that now days Loot isn't as prideful as it use to be. It seems like maybe for the first month or so of raiding a few guilds have the premiere gear and then eventually within the next 6 months or so almost everyone has it. You use to be able to stand in the middle of Org or IronForge by the bridge at the AH and just stand there as people circled you like a God in amazement. And it would not only be from the moment you got it till 6 months after. You would be still the only person standing with a certain piece of loot or gear that no one else has. So what took place of that feeling in the past 5 years?

- We have achievements now which isn't that big of a deal to showcase in Org. I don't usually inspect people comparing achievements
- Titles! Titles have become the new rarity in WoW. People will stop at nothing for a title. Who wouldn't want Light of Dawn or Herald of the Titans. Or over at the Paladin forum there was Requital with "the bloodthirsty" from PVP.
- Progression - People use to accept that only a few guilds can down the content, but Blizzard has sorta casualified (lol?) WoW to a point where any guild can down the same content just not faster. And that part is fine too, hadn't they done this their subscription base might not be at 12 Million. World Firsts and Server first also separate the few from the rest.

So asking this. Maybe this is for the old school players who still play now like me. Has your mentality changed from Classic to the present? Has loot never mattered all along? Has it always been progression?

[Lugo Moll]

What a biased poll! All the options are basically "I totally agree with your post".

[NathSB]

Biased poll options, those. Where is the "Loot is awesome fun to get and I like it!" option?

[Deleted]

Having fun matters most.

[Malkhor]

Where's the option: 'Loot never had pride it's just fucking loot you whiner!' ?

[towelliee]

Yep you're right first should be "Loot is still amazing to get and i showcase it with pride" but I guess I fudged that one. How hell do i edit the poll part.

[Lugo Moll]

Also, option 1 answers the question "Has loot lost its pride?" and options 2-4 answers the question "What separates good players from bad?". If you're editing it, you should fix that too.

[Musra]

I dont think that loot have lost some pride. True given that I didnt play during vanilla but from what I have heard it was just painful to get gear if you were casual and if you werent in a awesome guild even killing Onyxia was too hard, correct me if I am wrong but I enjoy it a bit that 'good' loot is easier to get. If a person have full ICC 10 man gear and you think ''ICC 10 is so easy and its practically free loot'' then find a guild/persons that have heroic ICC 25 cause I know that aint the easiest <.<

PS. I want a poll ''Current loot = AWESOME!''

[Mozu]

Loot hasn't lost it's pride. Epic has lost it's pride. [Heroic] is the new epic.

[Irony]

Achievements are a time stamp, how early you got it is all that matters. Loot is only rare for about 2 months, then pugs start to figure these easy mechanics out, I remember getting horde first Zod, felt good, till Blizzard nerfed Ldw to the point of a pathetic fight.

[Ninji]

Gear is just means of progressing, while the progress is the goal itself.

I don't care if someone has Shadowmourne if they still haven't been able to kill other hcs than lootship.

[Mozu]

Gear is just means of progressing, while the progress is the goal itself.

I don't care if someone has Shadowmourne if they still haven't been able to kill other hcs than lootship.

The fact that it was possible to do this will forever irk me.

[Lugo Moll]

Gear is just means of progressing, while the progress is the goal itself.

I don't care if someone has Shadowmourne if they still haven't been able to kill other hcs than lootship.

Thing is, loot is also proof of progress. Like in your example, you can't get Shadowmourne without doing several heroic mode bosses and spending a lot of time raiding ICC.

[Mozu]

Thing is, loot is also proof of progress. Like in your example, you can't get Shadowmourne without doing several heroic mode bosses and spending a lot of time raiding ICC.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you don't need to kill any heroic bosses to get a Shadowmourne.

[Gaexion Ramza Beoulve]

This is not your typical qq post. In fact it seems to be far from it. Ty for stating your opinions clearly. I did play in vanilla but i fell just short of the level cap before quitting and thus never got into raids.

I understand what you are getting at. But you are a bit jaded. To be honest there is still rare gear...and at the same time the entire bracket of legendary/endgame loot has been brought down a notch. Allow me to articulate.

Thundefury was incredibly rare, but not as rare as Atiesh or however you spell it. Valynir the epic caster mace from Ulduar was rare, extremely rare then got less so, then 1 or two of them server transfered and then ToC and ICC dropped and i have only seen 1 post icc. Point being that experiences vary from realm to realm. But they are more rare than Shadowmournes on my server.

Which is my next point. Shadowmourne is less rare than thunderfury. but it still stands out. i still type /inspect everytime i see one.

But I would also like to point out that hardly anyone has any gear from Algalon the observer. that gear although it was outtiered was still hard to get and rare. No one even looked back at ulduar when faceroll toc came out. So there are still some wotlk equivalents of vanilla rarity.

You also have to understand that since the population has exploded and because of the restructuring and "casualization" or raiding what has essentially happened is all the gear has been downgraded.

Legendary became Epic 1-2 Thunderfuries on a server/ 5-6 Shadowmournes on a server
Epic became Rare full vanilla raid set held by only the most dedicated and top guilds/3-4 guilds having icc25Heroic on farm,dozens of players with 4/5 277
Rare became uncommon Strathholme gear and other blue gear which everyone had/full t10 or 232 from dungeon grinding alone
[/B][/U]Uncommon became Common[/B][/U] meaning crafted gear was almost as hard as the first dungeon sets except that you could farm for them/in wotlk everyone had access to crafted BIS at every tier of raiding, with the increase in gold sellers and account sharing this gear became easy as pie to get not to mention all the recipes basically had standard list of components making them easier to produce.

So I partially agree with OP. But seriously the caster dagger from Algalon more rare than Shadowmourne. What i would like to see in cataclysm is harder to get legendaries and more(or less) bosses like Algalon with gear that is unique to that raid but still relevant to the highest tier.

[Brittany]

Grinding gear for the sake of having the best gear is now stupid and meaningless. It meant something back in Vanilla, and maybe at the start of TBC, but since badge vendors and things came in, it's pointless.

Like, you could have sat out the whole of Wotlk, come back now, do and see every instance one time, get gear that others pass on, and it'll be like you've spent the last 2 years raiding heavily.

Loot is meaningless now. You can get the best gear but there will be better coming in a few weeks, then a few more, then a few more. If you aren't playing the game for fun, then you're going to be disappointed. The hardcore edge has gone.

[Bakis]

Too bad BLZ screwed players over with Realm First LK 25hc.
The last badass boss for the expansion and they remove realm first title...
That would have been some serious Im-not-like-everone-else

---------- Post added 2010-11-27 at 12:31 PM ----------

This is not your typical qq post. In fact it seems to be far from it. Ty for stating your opinions clearly. I did play in vanilla but i fell just short of the level cap before quitting and thus never got into raids.

I understand what you are getting at. But you are a bit jaded. To be honest there is still rare gear...and at the same time the entire bracket of legendary/endgame loot has been brought down a notch. Allow me to articulate.

Thundefury was incredibly rare, but not as rare as Atiesh or however you spell it. Valynir the epic caster mace from Ulduar was rare, extremely rare then got less so, then 1 or two of them server transfered and then ToC and ICC dropped and i have only seen 1 post icc. Point being that experiences vary from realm to realm. But they are more rare than Shadowmournes on my server.

Which is my next point. Shadowmourne is less rare than thunderfury. but it still stands out. i still type /inspect everytime i see one.

But I would also like to point out that hardly anyone has any gear from Algalon the observer. that gear although it was outtiered was still hard to get and rare. No one even looked back at ulduar when faceroll toc came out. So there are still some wotlk equivalents of vanilla rarity.

You also have to understand that since the population has exploded and because of the restructuring and "casualization" or raiding what has essentially happened is all the gear has been downgraded.

Legendary became Epic 1-2 Thunderfuries on a server/ 5-6 Shadowmournes on a server
Epic became Rare full vanilla raid set held by only the most dedicated and top guilds/3-4 guilds having icc25Heroic on farm,dozens of players with 4/5 277
Rare became uncommon Strathholme gear and other blue gear which everyone had/full t10 or 232 from dungeon grinding alone
[/B][/U]Uncommon became Common[/B][/U] meaning crafted gear was almost as hard as the first dungeon sets except that you could farm for them/in wotlk everyone had access to crafted BIS at every tier of raiding, with the increase in gold sellers and account sharing this gear became easy as pie to get not to mention all the recipes basically had standard list of components making them easier to produce.

So I partially agree with OP. But seriously the caster dagger from Algalon more rare than Shadowmourne. What i would like to see in cataclysm is harder to get legendaries and more(or less) bosses like Algalon with gear that is unique to that raid but still relevant to the highest tier.

"Legendary became Epic 1-2 Thunderfuries on a server/ 5-6 Shadowmournes on a server" ??
Most decent raiding guilds got 2-4 SM per guild mate...

Anyway, loot as a mean to stand out is gone and its not by chanse its a business decision from BLZ part so nothing to argue about really

[Deleted]

Titles still matter, not as much as they should and not as much as they used to, but they still matter more than anything else you mentioned. Actually, they are pretty much the only thing that separates good from mediocre PvPers, same goes for PvErs - just with the slight difference that instead they separate shit from mediocre ones.

Loot is free, nowadays.

[Seldirion]

What really has ruined WoW is the badge armour and tiers.
I mean c'mon!
The belts and the non-tier chests are better than 10m ICC loot?
Where's the meaning?!
Get a different set from badges that isn't as good as raid sets, but good enough to start raiding.

It's the Power Rangers mentality I really hate(make 1 set with x colour variations and slap a minor stat upgrade on the higher item level tiers)
The only example that was fine with me was Naxx 2.0 gear. Lower tier had another colour and other details + different shoulders.
I mean the execution of this, I do know that the gear is just a re-painted version of the old Naxx gear
Before WotLK and the ridiculous badge gear, you didn't see too many people with nice sets.
And one thing I really miss is a gear threshold for raiding. I really hate that you have to stand in Dalaran etc. and inspect people to be sure they meet the requirements for a raid if you're PUGing. Make it so that you need a certain gear level and have gems and enchants to join raids.
Then the inspection and rude behaviour against badly geared players will no longer be an issue, as they will have to meet the requirement to join.
This has nothing to do with elitism, but the fact that badly geared players ruin for the rest of the raid.

A good example:
Yesterday a mate of mine joined a PUG for OS 3D.
There were people with blue and ungemed gear there, resulting in a lacking DPS.
The leader couldn't be arsed to kick them and get new ones, so they failed several times before the badly geared players
got their daily doses of rude language and acronyms tossed in their direction(I fart in your general direction!).
That's how many PUG raids end...
Even if they would kick the players with bad gear, someone will always be negative and comment that, hurting the raids moral.
And also worth mentioning: the players who get kicked and only receive rants etc. will NEVER get better.
Constructive criticism is the key to help other players out.

So...
Make an interface that you use when making a raid where you select the destination etc., so that players who join must meet the requirements.
If they don't meet the standards, they will get a message explaining why the can't join, eg.:
YOU NEED BETTER GEAR TO JOIN THIS RAID
YOU WILL NEED TO GEM YOUR GEAR BEFORE JOINING THIS RAID
YOU WILL NEED TO ENCHANT YOUR GEAR BEFORE JOINING THIS RAID

Or at least make this and option which the raid leader can turn ON/OFF.
A bit off-topic at the end, but that's my two cents - I wanted to throw it out there and see what you think ^^

[Wozarib]

Having fun matters most.

This pretty much sums it up for me