Don’t Worry, Blizzard Isn’t Dumbing Down World of Warcraft
By Ron on Wednesday, March 5th, 2008 at 6:05 PM PST In Blizzard, Computer, Editor's Corner, Features, Game Companies, Game Platforms, Games, World of Warcraft
So, as a World of Warcraft player and a person who follows the gaming world fairly closely, I tend to read a lot of forums. With the upcoming 2.4 content patch currently on the Public Test Realms (hereafter referred to as PTR), the WoW Test Realm Forum (found here) is a great place to see how players are liking the upcoming content and class changes.
Judging from the forum posts I have seen, one of the more controversial changes coming in the 2.4 patch is the removal of attunements for the Mount Hyjal and Black Temple 25-man raid instances, and the introduction of gear that can be purchased with Badges of Justice that is on par with Hyjal/Black Temple drops. At first glance, the non-MMO player would wonder why this, of all things, would be a point of contention. Personally, I wonder what mindset makes players think this is a bad idea.
A perfect place to see what I am talking about is this thread. A player named ‘Fsgadgdsafhg’ offers up the following opinion:
All the T6 raiding guilds old and new are dumbfounded and hung up on the insane devaluing of their arcievements. Everything we worked for raidnights after raidnights, week after week is getting handled out for frickin Badges.
Its one thing that attunements are lifted… Trashmobs and early bosses will take care of the trash guilds. But for christ sake why hand out gear, and now gems too for as much effort as running Heroics. How is it comparable to the countless hours of attunement process, the consumables,the effort?
At least pretend that hardcore raiders are important and introduce some kind of reward or recognition.
This represents what I believe to be a fundamentally flawed viewpoint. This represents the elitist, exclusionist attitude that many casual players have long said makes MMO’s less fun for them. The idea that giving more players access to dungeons or loot devalues the accomplishments of those who have already completed those challenges is ridiculous. Why? It’s simple.
Let’s say you hand me a list of guilds that play regularly on my server. With a small margin for error, I have a decent idea of the progression level of most of those guilds. I know that the Alliance side of my server has a number of MH/BT guilds, including 2 of the top guilds in the US. I also know that we have a few guilds on Horde side working on Black Temple as well. After this patch, I will still know who those guilds are, and what they accomplished. I will still know that Risen cleared Black Temple first on our server (Even if they are Alliance, you still have to respect that). No matter what my guild, or any other guild does after this patch, what came before still remains.
To truly understand why these changes are being made, the players have to step back and look at things from Blizzard’s point of view. Blizzard pumps a ton of time and design money into all the content they release, and as such, they want players to be able to experience it. Think back, if you will, to when Blizzard released the 1.11 patch (Patch Notes). They added in what is widely considered to be the best raid dungeon they’ve ever designed, Naxxramas. Unfortunately, due to the difficulty of the dungeon, the gear required, and the looming release of the Burning Crusade expansion, only a minuscule fraction of the raiding population got to experience it.
I’m sure you’ve heard by now that Blizzard plans to move Naxxramas to Northrend for the Wrath of the Lich King expansion, and to make it the first 25-man raid for level 80 players. In an interview with MMO-Gamer.com, World of Warcraft’s Lead Designer, Jeff Kaplan, talked about the move, saying,
“Now, in regards to some of the more difficult raid content, like Naxxramas, or like Black Temple, I think there is some validity to what you’re saying, that not enough people are getting to see the content. In direct response to that, we want to take Naxxramas, what we felt was possibly one of our best dungeons in terms of game design, in terms of cool encounters, great art, it had some of the best music out of any of our zones, and a lot of people missed it, and I think they missed it for a couple reasons: One, it was super hardcore, it was our hardest dungeon of original World of Warcraft, the other reason is that it came only a few months before The Burning Crusade. I think a lot more people would have gotten the chance to experience it if they had the time to progress, but since they didn’t, they missed it.”
As you can see, they want people to experience this content. They want people to see the fruits of the massive labors they’ve put into this content. Honestly, can you blame them? If you had written a spectacular novel, but your publisher said he could sell it to a few hundred people, would you be happy with that? I highly doubt it.
The same goal explains why the new badge gear is on par with tier 6 loot. Simply put, Blizzard wants these players to have a chance in these raids. No one likes to head into a raid knowing that you’re severely undergeared and likely to fail miserably. Not only this, but guilds who have just finished or nearly finished Black Temple can benefit from this as well, making their transition into the newest raid instance, the Sunwell Plateau, much more smooth.
The only people against this change are the hardcore raiding elitists who feel that it is sacrilege to allow guilds that are behind in progression a chance to see content that they might not have been able to see otherwise. These hardcore folks don’t want the vast majority of players to see this content simply so they can feel superior, and that’s just wrong. There are a ton of guilds out there that are playing through Serpentshrine Cavern and Tempest Keep right now, lacking only a Vashj or Kael kill to get into Mount Hyjal. Sure, those fights are difficult, and they help get you ready for the next tier of raids. But keeping those guilds from ever experiencing Hyjal or Black Temple is simply not good business, and Blizzard has the good sense to know it.
Now, this is not to say that all hardcore raiders share these sentiments. On the contrary, I believe the number of people harboring these elitist attitudes to be very small. I know a number of hardcore raiders who are wonderful, nice people, and I am proud to know them. They are willing to help out whenever they can if needed, and the community on our server is better for having them in it. It’s unfortunate that the vocal minority often gives these types of players a bad reputation.
Hardcore raiders make up a small percentage of the players in MMO’s like WoW, and they represent the least profitable players for the company running the game. However, they are often catered to as the ‘core’ audience in MMO’s. Luckily, this obviously isn’t the case in World of Warcraft, and the game and the vast majority of its players are better off for it. Let the folks in casual guilds get their badges, and their gear, and their shots at the top raid instances. They’ll have fun, and Blizzard will reap the rewards of a happy playerbase. That’s something we can all benefit from. Remember, it’s a game, and we play it to have fun. If everyone playing an MMO could hold that thought foremost in their mind, they’d be better off for it.
What do you think? Should Blizzard be opening these areas to a larger percentage of players, or should these high level areas be the exclusive preserve of the raiding elite?
Yadifricking da.
Open up the damn content for all players.
I don’t see anybody still yapping about the fact they removed TK and SSC attu.
And that you can get T5 for Badges might make it a bit more difficult to motivate people to raid, but still.
Best,
I know I, as a casual player, will never experience these things.. and honestly it doesn’t bother me but it is this exact attitude among the hardcore that drives people away from WoW. When I have to apply for membership in a video game social group, present references and then commit to it like a paying job - that is a sign I’ve got the wrong hobby and I hope someone shoots me.
As a writer or creator of content I kow my appreciation comes from knowing people can experience it. It sucks that some of the hard work the designers do is never viewed by most of the players - acts like this reduce that and give back to the players who stick it out and also offers a dangling carrot to those who bridge the casual/hardcore gap.
Plus the fact the expansion is coming out soon means it all be worthless in the end
Instances like TK and Ssc will become opsolete. No one will fight Vashj or Kael anymore, oh wait there is anotehr version of Kael on the new 5 men instance. Good going, degradating the lore like this. Illidian is a boss that only the worthy should be able to see in my honest opinion, or u can allways see him while doing the attunement. It actually seems that Wow is getting Dumber. Even arena gear is better than BT and that’s before the release of patch 2.4, I can’t imagine what season 4 will give. I guess it will do the same as the last patch before expansion. Making raiding guilds disband because of pvp. It seems eSport is more important than been an mmorg. Now people will go from Kara directly to BT. I’m just happy I have seen all the content allready, I guess they will be nerfing the encounters soon too so the “dumber” can see more of the hard work the designers did making it tank and bash encounters
I’m not happy about this change, the quest lines are meant for something. It makes u discover and taste the lore, taking this out of the way, is just another game where you do stuff without other reason than getting loots. Oh wait, Hell, why raid I can do arenas, get gear and go on a killing spring in Nagrand, where pvers try to do their quests with their pve gear which is useless against pvpers. I’m sorry the game is going down the drain pretty fast. and with 10 mill subscribers the only thing we soon will see is just 5 men instances, daily quests and pvp rewards, goodbye to raiding and goodbye to wow. (btw, the vast majority on my realm have allready downed Illidian, only one not raidig are the farmbots and the pvpers) 
What I hear are the rants of people who only experienced raiding and PvP in TBC. People who played almost since Day 1 (with legacy PvP ranks and full tier2/3 sets on perpetual level 60 toons to prove it) remember how compelling this game once was on a social level and lament the very fact that TBC was ever pushed to the masses.
It brought a slew of “hand-holding” new garbage to what was once a great experience in loyalty, politics, negotiations and leadership. I can write an essay on the changes from WoW to TBC and their impact on me and my in game experiences. My biggest points will have to suffice:
Loyalty went out the window when you make a guild able to run end game content with 10-25 people max. You know what Kara was called back in Old WoW? It was called Upper Black Rock Spire. Know what BT was called? Zul’ Gurub. Anyone remember how horde was the faction that had an insanely difficult attunement to Onyxia quest chain and still we had to practically sell our soul to get one of the limited Drakisath’s Blood drop or the single spawn per instance of the quest item that popped on the floor in any random boss room in the hellhole that was LBRS?
Seriously, in the heyday you had like 3-7 top guilds per faction, per server doing end game stuff and the rest weren’t even capable of killing Ragnaros. Gold was hard to get, loot systems were flawed and biased, and although they still are, who cares about the instance drops when you can get just as good crap from badges and faction galore from every instance run. Mods were even just beginning to be useful (anyone remember the first time they got to the big rock ele boss in MC? We had no icons and nobody could keep track of crap).
You had to be a good politician to even remain a member of top guilds. You had to stick to your guns and make enemies with a couple of the 80-200 people in a guild (numbers being huge since fielding 40 people for new content (wipe) day rather than farming bosses (lootwhore) day was a taxing chore sometimes). You had to not take shit personally, accept criticism of the both constructive and asshatish variety without crying, and NOT GUILD HOP. You couldn’t leave a top guild since a lot of times your name became mud, you were known as a loot whore and no other top guild would allow you to join their core team (although you might get in as a benchwarmer or asskisser). Hell, now not only can you hop around three guilds doing ssc or the eye in a single day and nobody would give a fuck but you can literally ninja loot and scoot, pay for a name change and then rejoin the same guild and do it again for shits and giggles.
Officers were grown ups who led their classes and guilds with fairness and respect of their peers and underlings. Nowadays you have little kids leading raids and the words fail or failure is tossed around a lot more than it should be (yes failures existed pre-TBC too). By grownups I mean mature people and by little kids I mean immature people. My best bud in WoW was a class officer for warriors and our MT and was only 14 at the time, yet he was very respected as a c/o because of his mature attitudes. Leadership meant something then and it doesn’t now.
I am sorry your precious TBC raid content is ruined by Blizz making it even more easy to play this game, but I haven’t even touched on other issues like PvP. I grinded for months to get HWL because if I frigging stopped, I lost rank. Besides that you had to deal with PvE allies using their sick gears to whack out the pure PvP players since their was no such things as resilience and the changes to items for PvP and PvE. The best sword that could slay interweb dragons could slay people just as easily.
If you hadn’t seen the pattern developing though, Blizz made changes all over before TBC, like the dumbing down of the Ony quest chain or faction gains in plaguelands brought with Naxx (real players had exhaulted Argent Dawn from 5 manning Strat and Scholo before blackwing lair was even out). Even since the war of the sands (which is a world event that I am happy to have experienced, nothing like it before or since) the grand epic nature of the game has been declining to help ease players who don’t understand or have never played a game like Everquest or Final Fantasy Online. I mean, WoW was never, ever as insanely frustrating as anything in those games, but even as player friendly as it was to begin with, you don’t get a 10 mil subscriber mark that has yet to even peak catering to the few who enjoy challenges and frustration. You get that from catering to a more casual player base and over time allowing even more loose restrictions to entice a player base made up of almost anyone even people who hate RPG’s or the notorious “durr I hate to read games I just want to shoot people”. When WoW peaks at whatever number of millions of subscribers, the decline is inevitable, even if it takes 20 years or more, (all subscription based games rise, peak and then decline). At that point you will see them change things a lot more to cater to those they have left. Ultima Online still has people playing. Why? Because after it peaked, it never had any delusions about being a contender anymore and just opted to cater to the players who stayed and still enjoy it. We will see what the future of WoW brings, but it’s not a game that will last forever like this, be it 5, 10 or 20 years down the line it will convert from cash cow to player pleaser. In all likelihood the peak will come from another Blizz MMO of some sort, hehe. They know how to make games
The rant above mine is relatively troubling.
The whole reason I quit wow was because people bastardized it into real life. They kept telling people “Well life isn’t fair.” But fact of the matter is that real life doesn’t have dragons and orcs either.
I think if WoW moves from a time consuming bitch fest to something a little more constructive and creative they will not lose any players, at least not people worth keeping. People think that the complaints they hear are the majority, but many of the times the only people bitching are the minority in the subject at hand.
WoW is no different, a tiny group of raid whoring whiners will bitch about the change and the rest of the millions of players will smile and enjoy themselves.
- Rico -
In contrast to what Grundy says above, I’d say that raiding is far better in TBC than it was in the original game. 25-man raids are far easier to organize, set up, and manage. Additionally, the raids are more challenging now than they were in the 40-man days.
Besides, anyone who experienced raiding back then knew that you could bring 25 quality raiders to a 40 man raid, and the other 15 were inconsequential. You could succeed on the strength of the 25. Blizzard saw it too, and made the fights more complicated, more challenging, and most importantly, MORE FUN.
Fuck Raiders. they are a minority and their flawed logic of time invested = skill is more evidence of their stupidity and short sightedness
You wall of nerd crti text does not help yout argueent, it makes it worse. To suggest that “real players” earned rep by repeating, ad nauseum, the same instance over and over is a ridiculous suggestion. How does farming the same instance make you any more “real” than any other player? It doesn’t. YOu just happen to think, for what reason I do not know, that because you ran instances and raids, that you are better? what is this based on? Many people are much more highly skilled than you they just don’t have 8 hours everyday to play.
You fail at life.
Blizz removing attunements? You’re no longer ’special’ because other people can get into BT/Hyjal? Outraged that badges can buy loot that doesn’t revolve around a random drop system, but is equivalent? Are you CRAAAAAWLING INNNNNNN MY SKIIIIIIIIIN?
The choices for you are very simple. If this is so horrible for you, *quit playing.* Otherwise, cry me a river, build a bridge, and get over it.
It’s that simple.
In response to the OP and others who advocate these changes, I take the opposing viewpoint on this issue.
I find the OP’s post to be more or less colored by the likely extent of his play, namely, his achievements are not going to be devalued by the changes.
I support Blizzard’s desire to open up a great deal of the raid content to all players, however, the only method of doing this currently, with fights no longer based on the gradual accumulation of necessary stats but of execution, there is simply no way short of nerfing the actual fight or allowing players to bypass it.
I support leaving instances such as BT and Sunwell as the rewards for those who choose to devote time and energy to PvE (whether you value that form of play or not, many do) as the lore and superior gear are the rewards for a great deal of organization, time, and frustrated effort.
The OP gives us a rationalization of “triumphant capitalism”, he justifies Blizzard’s decision to attack its hardcore players with these changes as economically sensible, which on paper they are. Attacking the hardcore player-base, be it Arena players frustrated over gross imbalances or PvE players upset over opening the floodgates for the proletariat to rip off chunks of their months-earned achievement, the result will be the overall degradation and failure of the game as future prospective players will be deterred from taking up the game due to its increasing superficiality and unchallenging and unrewarding nature.
The question is, is this elitist? Yes, in a sense, but not totally. I believe many changes to content have been for the better, and I dislike the fact that Pre-BC the virtually ALL raid content was locked away from the majority of players. Currently TK/SSC is by no means unassailable, and the new 25 man format allows for smaller more casual guilds to more easily gather the logisitics to zone in. Badge gear, while needing to be kept in check, is not a terrible idea so long as it does not grow beyond the point of reason (and it looks to be) and gives casual guilds the gearing options to progress to new content. The mechanics of the game itself have changed for the better, fights are based on execution rather than the accumulation of stats over months, opening up possibilities for many players.
Overall these changes are positive, however, taking the final bone from the mouth of the hardcores, BT and Sunwell, will have an ultimate negative effect upon those players that have worked to clear it and the game itself. In a sense we need incorporation of both elitist and populist attitudes to keep the game sufficiently approachable, whilst at the same time keeping it challenging with meaningful end-goals for those that choose to pursue them.
I didn’t realize that there was a WoW mafia. A couple of the posts seem to be saying that you had to fight your way up the ranks of a mafia-style guild, and then you had to pick fights with your own guild mates just to keep your position. Then, you have to be “loyal” to a guild, who no doubt requires a regular tribute in order to keep you around. I’m with Shawn. This sounds like that elitist (mafia-style) guild speak where you’ve got to apply for a position in the guild, complete with references in order to be accepted. And then they expect you to play eight hours a day to prove your loyalty to the guild instead of playing the game for fun.
I’m a hardcore gamer, but even I see the benefits of helping casual gamers to enjoy the game. If every MMO catered to the elitists, they’d all fall apart within the first year (two tops). I am against dumbing down any game for any reason. However, the new content patch doesn’t appear to be a “dumbing down”, but rather an attempt to rebalance the game so others can enjoy it.
Blizzard is definitely dumbing down the game. I recently stopped playing the game due to my new job and would definitely consider myself amongst the hardcore when I played (our guild has had Black Temple/Hyjal on farm since June I believe it was).
You guys are sort of missing the point really and this article is definitely written by someone who plays/played casually and did not achieve anything before content got nurfed.
Basically, the problem is with Blizzard’s timing. After all the hardcore guilds spent countless hours trying to progress, Blizzard waits until they get it on farm and then decide to nurf the content to shit. The hardcore are mostly upset that they spent all the time to get through the “harder” portions of the game and now it’s just being handed out to everyone else with no effort involved. Over the past few patches all the bosses have been nurfed - another issue amongst the hardcore guilds - so that casual players can have an easier time with them. Once again, poor timing by Blizzard to wait till AFTER the hardcore guilds had to go through it.
It’s sort of like going to school for 10 years to become a Brain Surgeon because that was how you HAD to do it and then once you graduate the system is changed to where you can get it in 4. Do you get the point now?
If the changes that are coming in 2.4 were standard when TBC hit, I don’t think it’d have been as huge of a problem. But since Blizzard made gamers bust their ass through difficult content only for them to see it get nurfed so all the casual gamers can get it without blinking it presents a problem and hardcore gamers feel like they were robbed on their time and effort.
If anything, Blizzard should do some sort of title or recognition for those that beat the content BEFORE it got set to Noob Mode as a standing achievement for what they had to go through. That’s the very least they could do and at the same time I think would at least make most of the hardcore feel a bit better.
@Badwabbit: As the author you’re referring to, I’ll let you in on my WoW perspective. I’m currently a member of a semi-serious raiding guild. I have well over 200 days played between my two 70’s, and I raid on a protection warrior.
My guild has a raiding force larger than that of most hardcore guilds, as we open our raids to our friends (be they guild members or not). We are currently 5/6 SSC, 3/4 TK, and working on Kael & Vashj. The odds are that we will have both of these down prior to 2.4 coming out, as it is still several weeks away.
Does this make me hardcore? Nah. We only raid 3 nights a week, 3-3.5 hours a night. I rarely raid more than two of those nights. However, we are still progressing, and we’ll be ‘over the hump’ before the attunement is lifted.
If you want to know what the real benefit of this change is, consider this: We routinely pull raiders from a pool of about, oh, 60-70 people. Can you imagine how long it would take us to get our raid force keyed for MH/BT? However, with these changes, Blizzard will allow us to actually see content that we might not have seen.
This is a change that Blizzard should have made prior to the TBC release, and maybe they wouldn’t have to reuse Naxx to get enough people through it to make the investment in it worthwhile.
You said “The hardcore are mostly upset that they spent all the time to get through the “harder” portions of the game and now it’s just being handed out to everyone else with no effort involved.”
No effort? Learning the fights still takes time. Executing the fights still takes effort. If a “casual” player wants to buy all the useful pieces of the 2.4 badge gear, they need some serious time running heroics and Kara to accumulate those badges.
I’m not detracting from the effort that hardcore guilds put in. I can’t imagine the dedication it takes to spend 6-7 nights a week raiding 5-6 hours a night. In fact, I couldn’t do it even if I wanted to. I have a wife and a child that would both be after me if I did. However, I respect the accomplishments of those guilds, and can’t see how these accomplishments are diminished by these changes.
Did you get upset when Blizzard changed UBRS to a 10 man raid and gave the mobs a little nerf? It’s the same concept, and a smart move on Blizzard’s part.
Be proud of your accomplishments, but don’t let that pride color your judgement. Just because other people fight the same bosses doesn’t diminish your standing in the least.
Look, if you are spending 5-6 hours a night raiding… hell, if you are even just PLAYING 5-6 hours a day you seriously need to seek psychological help.
Quit whining about your effort and try putting some effort into the rest of your life. Then you might actually have “real” friends that you can do some “nonfantasy” stuff with.. like…oh…have sex!
@Ron
The whole point of my previous post was not to bash any player base or glorify a certain player base. I totally agree with your post above in that people like you and me have good memories from accomplishments and pride in our selves for it. And yes, that is pride in a game. I could give a fat baby’s dick about the general negative attitude of people who say we have/had no lives or whatever. Most of those kinds of folks think that having a large gamer score in Live! means they are Dirk Diggler IRL and are hypocrites since they honor one type of virtual accomplishment and spit on another.
All I was trying to say is that whining over any content nerf at this point is irrelevant in comparison to the humongous overall nerf to the game post-tbc to make it more easy for people to play. Whining wasn’t as bad then because we had a glorious new land to explore and new 5 mans as we leveled. Like the first time you hit Wailing Caverns or Uldaman and it’s just like you want to do and see everything as far as new sights go. It’s only when it came down to the values and attitudes of end game content by the people of this MMO that I stopped this addiction pretty easily. I play now just to pvp a couple BGs every once in a while.
My level 60 hunter is still at level 60 along with his trophies from 40 man days and I will not level him. I replaced him with a rogue who I use for TBC content and am very happy to see my orc hunter still looking as pimp as back when I was class officer of one of the better guilds on my server every time I login.
I just fail to see why people are whining about a new patch and, I guess, was drawn to it because it was a headline on my favorite gaming news site. That didn’t make much sense to me anyhow but I guess this particular patch and set of nerfs are making quite a few people complain all over the net. Just have some dignity and pride in yourself and your toons and take personal solace in it instead of cry and bitch and moan. Imo.
@RON,
Like I said, had these changes come into play at TBC’s release, there would have been an uproar, but no where to the extent that it is now. The point still stands that Blizzard is seriously dumbing down the game, but more importantly it’s just bad timing. This should be a change effective in WOTLK and not in the current expansion. They are still robbing the hardcore of all their time and effort.
Sure, we beat it first so that’s a standing accomplishment for ourselves. But, that sort of becomes a moot point when content is nurfed (as I stated, previous patches have slowly been making SSC/TK/MH/BT a hell of a lot easier than what we had to do) and, whereas we might have had to spend days or weeks on a single boss, everyone else should be able to get them down relatively easy in comparison to what we had to.
Adding to that, BADGE items are as good/better than T6 in 2.4? Um, wtf? I’m sorry, but a Heroic requires very little effort because that’s how they are designed. They are designed to be pug’able. Sure, a bad pug can still fail miserably at a Heroic, but if you’re playing the smart way, you’re more than likely doing these Heroics with friends or members of your guild, which makes a Heroic easy mode. In the end, you’re basically giving a gamer who may not have the skill/guild capable of receiving BT/Hyjal gear and you’re putting them on the same playing field as a T6 geared member (who worked a lot harder than the Heroic gamer) minus a few set bonuses.
I can totally understand that the hardcore are a very minor portion of the game. I even think the last statistic released by Blizzard was something like they only make up 4% of the WoW population. Sure, Blizzard needs to cater to the masses and that would be the casual gamer. Hell, I’ve even said for a long ass time that I’d like to be a casual gamer simply because raiding hardcore felt like a job at times, but unfortunately I’m a very competitive gamer so hardcore was the only way to go for me as I’d like to get through content fast, efficient and not wait till the next expansion was coming out before I saw all the content in the current expansion. Still, the problem is poor timing.
As I said, had this been done at the release of TBC or delayed until WOTLK, it’d not be as big of a problem, but even I felt robbed when I saw all these changes. Doing all of those fights before they got nurfed was a pain in the ass at times and then to first see them get nurfed so that others could do it more easily was one thing. Then after that they started to remove the attunements. Then they started nurfing the trash in Black Temple. Then they nurfed the trash before Kaelthas and then finally nurfed the Kaelthas fight and practically every other fight. Blizzard has slowly been nurfing the entire game and it just happened to be after all the hardcore guilds did the game on ‘Dante Must Die’ mode and now it’s been set to ‘Semi-Pro’.
Sure, Sunwell is around the corner and it’s suppose to be for “T6 geared” people. So that must be something the hardcore has to look for right? Oh shit, I forgot. Badge items in 2.4 are T6. Welp, there goes that. Basically, the entire game as of 2.4 is officially for the casual gamer. So, the masses can rejoice, but all those that worked so hard to get everything are basically robbed on their time and effort.
In the end, it’s bad timing and a big F’U to the hardcore. As of 2.4 there really little reason to be a hardcore WoW player. Everyone is virtually on the same playing field. Hell, Blizzard even screwed up on PVP. Why are some of the PVP weapons for certain classes the best weapons in the game? That makes no sense whatsoever. PVP gear should never be viable in a raid environment and vice versa. The whole game is slowly desolving.
@DownWithElitists
Why does the word hardcore or elite always mean “someone with no life”? Sure, I played quite a bit. But, I also work full time, have a girlfriend, support my family and continue to do my “real life hobbies” (airsoft, snowboarding mostly). I just know how to manage my time. Don’t always assume that the hardcore have no life. Some people’s situations are just better than your own. You’re the typical “A-Gamer” who probably cries when he gets sniped in Halo or screams “HACKER!” when you see someone get more than one headshot in a row.
This article appears to be lacking the breadth of topic to give reason as to why it’s outside the official WoW forums. I play WoW, have done for years, but this seems like the comments of someone who didn’t want to respond in an existing thread and wanted their own to be read.
As to the topic itself, Blizz has made itself clear - it’s going to use attunements as a pacing mechanism, and when that’s no longer necessary they’ll open up the content for the wider populace to experience. Given that’s not a new policy, I don’t know why people are complaining - be happy with what you’ve got, or find a game provider who shares your views on keeping the elite elite, as it were.
Mabus made a good point.
Our guild starting raiding really late, after months of raiding and farming MC, Ony, and BWL, I had finally completed my Tier 1 set and some Tier 2 in the bank… then TBC came out and all of my set pieces were replaced by the time I had hit 61.
I hope this is not the case with the next xpac.
Bliz, hold the phone, cancel the patch that will allow for 99% of their players to continue playing and see all the purty contents the designers have poured countless hours sweat and tear into.
Badwabbit
Someone wearing T6 comparable gear won’t clear Hyjal or BT without the knowledge and experience. I’ve pugged with players in t4 that couldn’t out-tank a squishy or a dps that couldn’t out-dps anything holy or resto.
I clap for your achievements Badwabbit - [clap] [clap] you are #1, go you!
Now… where can I buy my T6 comparable gear using my badges that I obtained through 2 hours a night 3 nights a week running heroics and kara.
I have to disagree with some of the points of this article. First off, I’m not a hardcore WoW player - my highest level character is only level 30. I’m all for making WoW accessible to gamers of every type and skill. But WoW is a game, and games are competitive. There is nothing wrong with rewarding those who are more skilled or who are willing to devote more time and effort to the game than others. Yes, I agree, elitists are pricks that shouldn’t be catered to. But I have to believe that not everyone who objects to changes like this are elitist jerks and it sounds like the changes discussed in this article are undervaluing their efforts. I’m totally fine with the fact that I may never see some of these dungeons. I’m also fine with the fact that I can’t ski black diamond runs but I don’t expect ski resorts to turn their black diamond runs into blues and greens.
The more skilled are rewarded with the rights to say, yes we cleared Hyjal and BT and points beyond and can stand in front of the major cities wearing their T6+ gear so all others can see and go ‘wooooowwww, that person is awesome!!!!’.
CasualPlayer, what is your goal in this game? Obviously it’s not to see what all the game has to offer as a whole. At level 30… you haven’t seen anything yet and probably never have a chance to.
Our guild is a casual one, all of us are adults with jobs, we all would like to see all that WoW has to offer. We all would like to get there, with out the expense of giving up our real life responsibilities in doing so.
Lets remind all those that are hissy fitting patch 2.4… if your feelings are hurt that others will be given an opportunity to see the same content that you are seeing from the same game and paying the same monthly fee as you. WoW is a game.
All that being said… now… focus your competitiveness and devotion to something that will make a difference in your life, and everyones around you… and this entire conversation will be laughable.
Go go hardcore gamers!!
Badwabbit, you just want others to know what you’ve achieved in a video game? lol…
hahah… omg… thats so sad but funny.
Dude, go outside.
I agree with everything that this guy said. I was stuck in a casual guild with alot of skill and couldnt progress well because of gear and that hurt we could have done so much more. but i tried to get out and join a better guild a semi- hardcore raiding guild but they wouldnt accept me for 2 reasons my age and my gear and I had a good reputation as a great tank to but i couldnt get into guilds so i just quit.
Oh and your missing the key point of this even if they take attunements out people still have to progress through bosses and everythign hardcore people did. and the gear from badge of justices you still have to earn that to last i heard Heroic dungeons are still hard for casual people.
The hardcore raiders can FO. Its there attitude of “we spend alot of time in play, we deserve the best loots” is driving people away and ruining the game. Some people have lives beyond the game and can’t spend 6 hours a night, 6 days a week dedicated to raiding (Hello Nihilum at TBC launch until Illidan died).
Blizzard lifted the attutments to get people into all these raids. From the statistics I’ve seen running around only about 2% of guilds are the MH/BT level of stuff. Its this vocal minority that is screaming bloody murder and the funny part most people don’t really care.
As for the badge loot in 2.4 (and the increase in badge loot since TBC launch) I think is indication of fundamental change in loot progression that not only will carry over in WotLK and be expanded. Going away are the days of running raid after raid hoping an item to drop and say hello to getting tokes to turn in for comparable gear to help keep you geared on par with the people getting the drops.
Being further progressed than me doesn’t mean your a better player, it justs means you have more time.
Hopefully when WAR and AoC come out all the elistist dicks in WoW pissed off about the “dumbing” down of it will go play those games.
They won’t they’ll still complain how Blizzard ruined their game and how they can’t have all the lore content to themselves
“It’s sort of like going to school for 10 years to become a Brain Surgeon because that was how you HAD to do it and then once you graduate the system is changed to where you can get it in 4. Do you get the point now?”
I understand that this game means different things to different people, hardcore and casual alike. I’m not going to take a side one way or the other in that debate, but when comparisons start being drawn between a video game and neuroscience education… well, we might just have lost our way at some point.
I just posted the same thing on my blog
It’s elitism & exclusionism at it’s worst
The funny thing is that with people who think like this they’d be happy playing dungeon runners if they could still be ‘leet’
BadWabbit nailed it, perhaps unintentionally:
“As of 2.4, there’s really little reason to be a hardcore WoW player. Everyone is virtually on the same playing field.”
Exactly. There never WAS a reason to be a ‘hardcore’ player. That’s not what WoW is about, or for. And having everyone on the same playing field—! The horror! The horror! (sarcasm)
WoW is the MCDonalds of PC gaming, just because everyone eats it, doesn’t mean its any good.
# DownWithElitists says:
March 6th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
Look, if you are spending 5-6 hours a night raiding… hell, if you are even just PLAYING 5-6 hours a day you seriously need to seek psychological help.
Quit whining about your effort and try putting some effort into the rest of your life. Then you might actually have “real” friends that you can do some “nonfantasy” stuff with.. like…oh…have sex!
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5-6 hours?
when someone goes out partying, lets ay they leave at 10, get home at lets say 5? how is that better then raiding 5-6 hours? and, how is it better to lets say,
call a friend and walk around mindlessly in stores looking at stuff, then just talking over vent pvping or instancing together?
and, my RL friends are still my RL friends even though theyre in wow when i speak to them…
tard.
and, who the hell has sex with there friends?!
Richard, you know nihilum gets paid for what they do…
this is like giving noobs in CS auto aim
or giving noobs in RTSes 10000% more resources.
I agree with everything that this guy said. I was stuck in a casual guild with alot of skill and couldnt progress well because of gear and that hurt we could have done so much more. but i tried to get out and join a better guild a semi- hardcore raiding guild but they wouldnt accept me for 2 reasons my age and my gear and I had a good reputation as a great tank to but i couldnt get into guilds so i just quit.
___________________________________
thats like saying: look i got this new game! halo 3 wow cool, ill just use this cheat so i can get to the end and see the epic ending.
I like it,make it easyer to get gear make it more fun and less time comsuming for people that have a life other than live in a fanatasy world
24/7..one reason im looking forward to like age of conan
so i can get good gear and still have fun without have to play months to be able to get some gear that maybe good enough,and still get some challenge get it..
and other thing:
its enough work in real life to get money
i dont want to spend the same time get fantasy gold and gear.
so im happy that they make it easyer..good news:)
I have read all the comments above and not 1 seems to actually be from a hard core raider.
I have played WOW from day 1 raided and completed every instance there is, I have spent hours researching tatics, hours implementing those tatics, hours upon hours of wiping improving those tatics. No once have I pushed this in anyone face.
Yet all I see above is disdain and un-necessary use of swearing that is uncalled for and shows more about the person her wrote it than what they actually say.
From I “hard core raider’s” point of view I dont mind blizz removing the attunements, at the end of the day Blizz has made TBC 1 long rept grind anyway so this to me was just another grind.
What I object to is that things that I have work so hard for are now given so easily, this is not elitest. The person who started this loves examples so here is 1. You work hard for an entire month on building a house, you use your own money to buy materials to build that house and despite set back after set back you finally succed, only for the bank to give that house to someone else because the havent worked hard…sound fair? What Blizz should do is, for example, through badge gear set people up so that they can attempt BT or Hijal and then through their hard work and progress get the rewards.
People are so quick to slag off hard core raiders but I will bet my last £ that you have all watched the videos and read the tatics made by hard core raiders in order to find out what you should be doing not one of you will actually go in blind and try to work it out for yourselves. So if the hardcore raiders disappeared who would then do the hard work for you bums!! saying that I bet you would all moan and Blizz would have to make it even easier for you
What people are forgetting is that the nex exp will bring new gear new attunements, new well everything, my guild has a lot of players who have been around since well the start, they are true hardcore and they don’t give a crap about the devaluation so that others can get to all availble, they just say “hey we were 1st and we know it” and leave it at that. They know they are the best and help us that want to go to BT they don’t mind the nerfs at all. I however would like to suggest to Blizz that could they just add 1 monster of a dungeon for these guys, I mean they are loyal, give them something that the need to work their asses for, maybe give them a special titel as reward on completion so that they can strut their stuff if they want. This way the game will be 99.99% open to people like me and some of the other posters here. And if those like me want that reward we will have to work for it or just leave it and most will because we wouldn’t care eitherway.
SO let me get this straight, people are moaning because,
a. You no longer need to complete a special quest to enter certain raids.
b. You can now buy equivilant Armour/Weapons for badges.
Why is this a problem to Hardcore Raiders, if they do it correctly then it means that raiding guilds no longer have to hold new players hands to get through certain dungeons and they can recruit anyone without having to worry about if they’re attuned for high level dungeons.
In other words, more guild members who don’t have to be supported though their first raids.
It’s responses to perfectly reasonable fixes like this that make me remember why I prefer to play CoX.
If this means I will be able to see the inside of Black Temple some day without devoting my life to Raiding, then by all means dumb it down.
rly i like pre-tbc better some points:
the raid instances in pre-tbc was more fun, AV was not a farming place but a REAL warfare!,onyxia was more fun the gruul (you see that fight is nearly same only in easy mode if you not taking him slow down)
what i like with Tbc
not hell much rep grinding to you puke(YAY!)dailys for repair, better loot, cool new spells, new talents (MM to hunter is still lame after 20 point T.T) more easy to get xp before hit ourland and best of all was honor gear
now in 2.4:
attunment…fine its okey as still! its hard, free badges….rly to be honest….i not see point in give them all free….but HEY! none said 100 % drop rate right? but to have them a few parts is okey, not like they can get a fulls et out of badges^_^
but my advice…..now that we got new dailys….don’t grind after badges…..farm the MONEY!…..learn form last expansion! LEARN! as i did fall for honor farm trap
I sure as hell won’t be picking up losers in Badge gear for my raids, Wow you can do 5 mans who bloody well cares, you have learned nothing about raiding in a 25 man environment. In fact I have put on our recruitment thread bads and losers need not apply.
Hand out free epics and people think they actually deserve it and are good, LOL many aren’t. Open Hyjal and BT sure i worked my ass off to get attuned to SSC, the Eye, Hyjal and BT but guilds can’t get far there if they don’t have the coordination but don’t give them gear equal to or better than mine so they think they deserve a spot in my guild, they don’t.
I already have losers who think their welfare pvp epics make them raid worthy this will make it worse, can’t wait for something better to come out and grats to End game guilds like Risen who are quitting wish I was a touch less addicted.
edit: forgot something” best of all was honor gear FOR the pvp players who not wanted to raid and stuff to be able to kill”
A noob with some t6 gear will stay a noob, so don’t cry about it. For some people PVE Is unreachable during their reallife, would you say that they aren’t allowed to few a big part of the game? They pay the same amount of money, to get less content? This patch will save you alot of time, you might have the time to search a girlfriend and get kids, or you can PVP. The game is made for PvP, and PvE is only to get the gear. Blizzard has seen the light and saw that 99% of the players didn’t have the time to PvE, and added the new stuff, and nerves.
It’s just great!
What competitive players grave for is recognition, it’s not really so important how it comes, but it should come and should not be devalued.
What i would like is some title system, currently one can get PvE titles for doing quests like killing Magtheridon, while some pvp titles are not accessible (try to get to high warlord nowadays ..). What i would propose is to give out titles for pve achievements before date X. (like, if You happened to kill Illidan before november 2007, You’ll get epic slayer of illidan as title, and if You happened to kill it a bit later but before 2.4 You will just get slayer of illidan without epic). It would’nt really make game less accessible for more casual players while still giving hardcore players something others can’t get (anymore…:P)
And well, when anything fails there is still wowjutsu
@Ron
“A perfect place to see what I am talking about is this thread. A player named ‘Fsgadgdsafhg’ offers up the following opinion:”
It’s funny how this article would take a outside source from a player named ‘Fsgadgdsafhg’ on the forums.
It just goes to show people will take information from anywhere just to try to prove their point.
I totally disagree with whats said here. In fact it’s quite pathetic.
A perfect place to see what I am talking about is this thread. A player named ‘Fsgadgdsafhg’ offers up the following opinion:
@DownWithElitists
As far as some of the comments that have been made. I find it funny people comment on how if you play a game for 5-6 hours you need to seek help. Then suggest having sex instead. Great solution.
truthfully it dont matter to me what blizzard does but comming from a casual raiding perspective its bull crap to take the attunment completly out. why put them there in the first place if you was just going to remove them? there’s still mc attunment and ony attunment as well as bwl and naxx. they wernt that hard to complete just took a little time a little bit of your precious time to get somewere you wanted to go. i mean for real anyone who plays even casually how many times a week do you do a heroic instance? pretty much only takes 3 to get ssc attunment done so whats that 1 day worth of your time to go somewere you want to go. but yet that was to hard for some people to do i guess. now to take out bt/hyjal lol the trash will soon show you that your not ready just like ssc has done in the past. i just hope that blizz relises that they will take attunment out in the long run so not put it in in the next expansion!
BTW for thse who feel they deserve to see bt/hyjal without the prior raiding have fun (thems going to be some nasty repair bills)!!!!!!!!
as a not quite hardcore player who worked his ass off to get semi raid quality gear and my guild is almost at the point where we will be looking at vash and kael anyway (we downed fathom lord on our 3rd weekly look at him, 5 or 6 tries overall.. with the downing itself being a flawless win. 1 pally died, but was SS’d and self rezzed mid-fight, so everyone was technically alive when he died), I look at the 2.4 patch as a mixed blessing.. we’ll be close to hyjal attuned anyway when it comes out, and the 2.4 badge gear will make the transition into the early hyjal fights that much smoother.
removing the attunement reqs will open the floodgates into hyjal/BT, that much is true.. as will allowing guilds to go right to vash and kael in SSC and TK.. doesnt mean many of these unprepared guilds will have any success against them. the 2.4 badge gear will no doubt help there. but if they were having problems taking down hydross/VR, they’ll have no chance against vash/kael, even with the new badge gear.
what the attunement removal really does is lets raiding guilds that are close enough to being attuned anyway get an early look at them (any guild that is 4-5/6 SSC and 2-3/4 TK shouldn’t have much of a problem with the early hyjal trash/first boss or 2 perhaps).
but we wont know about that till 2.4 comes out, will we?
I’m not a hardcore player by any means; I’ve done 3 Heroics total and no raids. However, I can appreciate the raider’s viewpoint. I actually WANT BT/Hyjal to be hard to get into and very hard to do. It seems as if everyone wants to have an equal shot at the top end gear/content, but if that happens, where does the epic feeling of this game go?
Back in “classic” WoW (I started playing about 1.5 years before BC), I liked walking past the people in their T1/T2 in IF and drooling over their gear. Sure, I wanted to get into MC/AQ/Naxx, but I didn’t mind that I couldn’t unless I was willing to expend a lot more time. It was the wide breadth of gear and experience between me and the guy next to me in T2 that made the game feel epic.
Sure, from what I’ve heard, 40-mans were a bit much to manage, and yeah, the ranked honor system was broken, but I can’t help but look at BC and think Blizz went too far. 25-man raids, fine, but nerfing the entry requirements and now even the instances themselves? I WANT that challenge there. A PvP system where just being in the BG and moving around a bit guarantees enough honor for epic PvP gear in a few weeks?
My point is this: for WoW to feel epic, for the grand sense of scale and adventure to be there, I believe there must be strong barriers between what is accessible to casuals, semi-casuals, and hardcore players. Those barriers shouldn’t be insurmountable, but neither should they be practically nonexistent. Remove the attunements, give high-level epics for Heroic badges, create a “welfare epic” system like they’ve done with PvP, and it just doesn’t do it for me. I want to work HARD for my rewards, and if certain rewards are out of my reach because I don’t care to raid multiple nights a week or hone my PvP skills, I’m fine with that.
Being able to admire Bret Farve’s accomplishments is far better in my book than looking around and seeing 75% of the people around me easily achieving what he worked hard for.