While I agree that being social is ultimately a personal choice, I think it’s worth acknowledging that the broader social atmosphere in the game has changed — and not necessarily for the better.
It’s not just about choosing to say “hello” or “gg.” It’s about whether there’s a meaningful response or engagement when you do. When reaching out becomes a one-sided effort, it starts to feel less like a social game and more like a single-player experience with other characters around.
To use an analogy: you can choose to jump into a pool, but if the pool has no water, it’s not really a swim — regardless of your choice. Similarly, if the social fabric of the game isn’t there, the option to be social doesn’t hold the same weight.
So while yes, individual choice matters, the overall environment still plays a huge role in shaping what’s possible.
Cheers to you as well, and thanks for opening this discussion.
People like to overemphasize how social vanilla really was. You can just as easily make friends now as back then and the only difference is the people themselves not the game.
Same thing happens in new MMO releases and how people interact there.
That, but also “gg” or “wp” is not really any form of communication with is very open for a meaningful response other than repeating the same, optionally in a different wording. So if someone only says “hi” and “gg”, then that person is (in my opinion) extremely passive. And passive communication doesn’t lead to an awful lot. You need to have someone who uses an open form of communication, something you can actually hook into and respond to.
The desire to actually have meaningful communication is just not there in quite some cases. It takes effort, time, and accepting that people are different (or have odd traits).
And honestly? It is real, even if it’s rarer than people think. But once it happens to you, the conservative and careful person comes out.
Allowing people to interact means taking the risk that they’ll be cruel, but also the potential that they’ll be kind. Even fall in love.
Having one but not the other is a pipedream. You can try to moderate it, but it’s very difficult, especially to do it fairly.
So the question must be asked: Do you want to open the gates to player interaction or do you not?
That answer is different for every game, but WoW, being an MMORPG, is defined as a game where the answer is a HUGE yes, and therefore any system that causes social isolation as a natural state rather than something you need to strive for very consciously is a mistake.
Exaggerations make people afraid, yes. And this is also what populism is based on. Exaggerate issues which lie close to someone’s narrative. And voila…suddenly people are against something they don’t even know anything about.
Is it real, sure. It happens. But pfft…it keeps coming up, but I haven’t seen it happen since the year this game was released. Not to me, nor to the ones I play with. Most players are very decent and also just want to enjoy the game.
what? some people spam reporting everyone, even when there is no reason for it
player (A) gets mad about player (B) because he have what player (A) Dont have, or is killing him in PvP, player (A) reports him for everything, and hoping that player (B) gets banned, because of a own created frustration.
its called the Massreport meta, to hope for a automated ban. it´s really that simple.
u should see Bg blitz/ Shuffle, where everyone is scared and wont type anything in the chat, even when it comes to tactics
because everyone reporting each other. especially when someone does a playable mistake.
What new recuperation feature? I feel I am missing game features because I do not follow social media since they don’t seem to be explained or highlighted in game!
I agree with this, people are not the same.
Some simply became old and sour.
Others are still young and toxic.
And others simply are so introvert they probarbly don’t say a word in real life as well…
And others moved on from the game
But if you know were to look you can find a few hidden gems and those we must not forget to add in our friends list
No they dont. I literaly havent spoke to single person for mulitple expansion. Meainwhile on classic alredy talk to 7 people duting my first 20 levels.
Spoken to plenty of people last few days so sounds like a you issue.
I’m not ignoring anything. I lived vanilla and it was amazing but classic wow will NEVER be able to replicate the way it was back then because the people and gaming culture in general is simply different.
I disagree. On a macro-level people are gonna be roughly the same in their core. If people are behaving differently, usually the systems are different. For example I think people play classic today with different tools, that’s why they approach it differently. If they couldn’t use modern tools, they would not play like they play now, and also not necessarily how they played many years ago.
I think Blizzard should research more how players play classic and modern today with different tools. They should filter by people using no addons at all and people using a lot, and then measure how they approach the game differently, but also of course statistically adjust for other correlations like how people behave that are more optimization-driven, assuming they have that data, which they probably do have.
If I had to bet in classic people that use no addons behave in a very different way than people with perfect UI optimization.
For some reason Blizzard really likes Warcraft Logs, which I understand to some degree, but I think it substantually contributes to players optimizing the fun out of the game with metagaming and socially damaging over-analysis of gameplay. I can understand though that having that feedback feels very rewarding though and it helps people a lot, who raidlead or organize many people.
They should also try to measure in wow’s history how boosting has impacted casual cooperative content.
Acting like people just changed in their core is something I will not easily believe, when I think about how many other things have changed that have nothing to do with the average player as a human
