Meanwhile Korthia and Torghast between them nearly killed the game because everyone was logging in to do an hour of chores and that was their time for the day.
Either people enjoy going through the motions of open world content, or they don’t. If they do, they’ll be happy enough; if they don’t, it needs to be optional. Open world can never be given “meaningful” (player power) rewards because it will push away a lot more players than it hooks in. We saw this with how unpopular the “systems” in Shadowlands were. (We barely even use the word systems in DF.)
When cosmetics are too rare, people get bored and stop trying (see druid forms). When they are too plentiful, people complain there’s nothing left to grind for after the first month. I really think Blizzard need to implement a slow but reliable currency grind, e.g. every rare drops a mote, you need 100-1000 motes to purchase a cosmetic of your choice and there should be enough cosmetics that you’d literally have to grind 8 hours per day for a season to buy them all.
If the grind feels too much, don’t do it. If it doesn’t feel too much, then there’s some gameplay with a purpose. It is optional, reliable, deterministic.
I used to be on the side that hated thorghast and chores and mandatory content.
Dragonflight has done away with all forms and shapes of player power besides tier set piece bonuses. And I guess this is the trade off that we get, From everything we said and where so sick of back in BfA and Shadowlands.
This is the trade off we had to make to get the game more alt friendly. It means less Mechagon and nazjatar. Khortia and Zereth mortis. and of course no more maw or Thorgast content for player power.
It is nice though to be able to pick up alts like now. And not be months of grinding and farming behind in order to catch up. I am not hating the new evergreen content stuff, I hope Blizzard finds balance in it all.
If MoP challenge modes hadn’t been fun, people wouldn’t have tackled it just for mounts and transmogs. They only had gear progression attached AFTER they’ve proven to be fun enough to stand on their own feet and take their place among the “big 3”.
World content became a ghost town when player power was removed, proving the fact that nobody enjoys it for its gameplay value. Which “In My OpInIoN” is a big issue in a video game.
DF open world content is not well handled. Rares and Events can’t be soloed, so everyone is funneled into peak times (Wednesday and Saturday). They only offer rewards once per week, which is fine since most of them aren’t engaging (fun) enough to do more than once a week anyhow.
World Quests are no longer a suitable content (if they ever were). The rewards aren’t worth the travel time (50 rep and some item that’s lower than even I have and I’m a very low intensity player - I’m 441 and WQs give 415).
If they do add a grind let it be something like Netherwing in TBC or Bee mount in BFA, something you grind out over 6 weeks and get a worthy mount (not another recoloured horse).
Delves could be fun, I’ll check them out. But if they have timers and scores like Visions and Torghast did than I’ll likely not do much of them. If they have timers and scores let that be at their highest level and for achievements and titles.
The lesson from DF should be that open world content needs to be better, not that players need to be forced into it with AP grinds.
This is not quite correct.
I’m getting Veteran pieces (and at least one Champion piece from World Boss) from Superbloom and seed planting weekly. I’m getting Flightstones and Crests from all sorts of content (the rate of acquisition in 10.5 has been improved upon over 10.1). So I’m progressing my gear.
I’m 441 now, which I think is pretty good for my activity in game. I do wish we had a vendor for the Veteran pieces as I didn’t get any upgrades this week but meh.
You’re more likely progressing your gear through M+ which provides better gear and more abundant crests and flightstones.
You’re choosing how to progress your gear and I’m choosing how to do mine. This is good.
The only way to make open world content feel rewarding to someone who does M+ is to nerf M+ so it doesn’t out-shine open world. I dount many M+ players would consider this a good solution.
Exactly but there are those that would damned you to hell for speaking up against it. As if every single player is wrong and they are absolutely correct. Nothing in any season has been " I want to come back and try and finish this". It has been extremely lackluster and boring to do.
I have a couple of dreamsurge tokens and I might use them on trinkets as not sure the other world content gives those.
I would like a vendor for the Veteran gear though (441+) as that’s what I’m getting from the other sources but it’s all RNG so this week I got only items I already had thus no upgrades. We have 4 sources of gear, Worthy Ally rep grind, Superbloom event, Plant 5 seeds weekly and the world boss. With four shots I got nothing and last week I only got a ring. I’ll be away over xmas so I won’t get much gear in the next month. So by the time 10.2.5 hits I’ll still be gearing up 10.2 items. I kind of hope we don’t get a new gearing season then, I just want to finish my gearing path and be done.
Nha… Put some cool transmogs in there we can buy like we did in Thorgast. Class fantasy mogs for all. Not one single theme at a time like Thorgast and Death knight armor. And the Emerald dream and everything druid looking.
Allot of m+ players would definitely do open world content for stuff like that, And find it worth doing.
I am not quite sure where we get eachother wrong here. When I say Dragonflight got away with all way shape or form of player power besides tier set bonuses. I mean there is no Soul ash grind for legendaries. No Artifact power to grind… No twilight devistation or whatever to get. It is just, get your highest gear level possible.
And by ilvl 441 your already able to do any keys from 2+ to at least 11+ if not more.
You could also get a bit higher if you want to afk the superbloom event. You should get 450+ gear from that event. The boss does not always give you a piece but it is worth a try if that is your thing.
That’s just where I am now, I got the Do 5 Upgrades tick in the trading post yesterday so I must have done at least 5 upgrades this week. Back in 10.1 I was doing 1 or 2 upgrades a week so this is better. Still not where it should be though probably. With ~16 slots each with 8 upgrade levels that’s 128 upgrades to do. So @ 12 upgrades a week that’d be 10 to 11 weeks, nearly 3 months and I’m not getting 12 upgrades a week.
I still need Shoulder, Feet, Hands, Wrist, 2 trinkets and a ring at Veteran. And then a whole bunch of stones and crests to upgrade them.
So a vendor with Veteran gear and slightly increased Crest and Stone acquisition would be good. We’re in a better place than back in 10.1 but I still think it could do with tuning.
Maybe 10.2.5 will bring a Vendor rather than increase the item levels. This would be fine.
Depends what 10.2.5 brings.
Does this start us off all over again or does it just bring more sources of gear (perhaps with a vendor) and crests.
If so then I’ll be happy enough, I can get so far in 10.2 and complete it in 10.2.5.
Saying that I’m still not sure that 5 months to gear up is a good rate but meh.
Seasons are half a year. No worries. It will probably be indeed again another forgotten reach or some other event that will give catch up stuffs.
And we are used to never reach your endgoals while gearing anyway. Not even in 9-10 months seasons like in shadowlands. We gear by the RNG god of the vault. It never happens to be fully done.
I never did even one of them since they were implemented - well, apart from the world boss one. Don’t get what for… they hardly give any rep, instead of spending time goign those daily I’m better off waiting another week for an additional Superbloom and the rewards are worse than the stuff from the weekly bags or campaign quests…
