How did Achievements' introduction affect WoW?

Community General Discussion
21

In Vanilla and TBC people felt like they are joining some big IRL event when going raids. Few days preparation, few days of remembering tactics, alot of farming for pots etc. Raiding was so exclusive, everybody was interested about that. Most people knew each guild progression. Raid day was like an Sunday for people who go to church. Whole world stops around you, raid team and boss is all that matters :smiley:

2 Likes
22

People were farming for the resistance gear to, from those world dragons in vanilla the nature resistance one for AQ and in TBC from the mobs in the world for shadow resistance one for Mother Shahraz in BT.

1 Like
23

There were things to do, you needed X to be able to Y so you could be able to Z, that took so much time and was fun. You felt prepared, not like today, go ah, buy 2/3 flasks, 10 potions, rune and gg.

1 Like
24

But somebody still needs to do the grind to put them in AH .

25

Usually bots, but not only ofc.

26

Ok so now only bots farm herbs and make flasks and potions amazing what these bot programmes can do now and also get runes from LFR and place them on AH times have changed from classic when bots just used to farm herbs :thinking:

27

Bots are farming herbs and sell them on AH, they are not involved in crafting.

28

exactly like classic then .we used to make cheap leather balls and throw them at the bots and fill there bags up quicker .

2 Likes
29

In terms of social interactions it doesn’t affect World of Warcraft in anyway.

If you ask the average player about their experience in Raids and or Dungeons, it’s almost always never positive.

And it doesn’t have anything to do with achievement requirements but everything to do with being Forced to interact with other players.

The players are the ones that enforce these requirements, be it achievements or item level or…

30

I have never felt to need to prove myself worthy to fellow players.
Such a silly notion imo.

I remember raid/teamleaders asking possible invitees to come for an inspection of gear. I remember people actually stating tactics for some bosses to prove they did them. But gear of course was the obvious choice.

1 Like
31

Once upon a time you’re hero was the achievement. Now your hero is a nobody with achievements. ^.^

1 Like
32

I met people whilst doing pug runs. You’d go to capital cities and spam /2 LFM daily HC, need two dpsers or whatever.

If you ran with competent people you’d probably befriend them, as you’d want to run with them again.

If you were in a decent guild you’d probably end up inviting people to the guild.

This is all pre 3.4 which killed server rep, ofc.

1 Like
33

Curve wasn’t a thing when achievements came.

You couldn’t clear a normal (now heroic) raid as easy with a pug group.

There wasn’t toxic sites like Raider IO because the Armory never existed at the start.

Nearer the end there was Gearscore but when we made pugs it was show us what you could do on a dummy.

I got recruited as a tank for my first raid guild for not being bad during one of the weekly Frost emblem raids!

34

Slightly off topic perhaps but - I don’t like achievements.
On some level it encourages you to do something you probably normally wouldn’t have - but for the wrong reasons.
I think of Achievements as directed gameplay. You do something because the unearned achievement tells you to, not because you use your imagination. Then the game suddenly becomes a checklist instead of an adventure.

Take something as simple and silly as the turkey-killer one in Howling Fjord. Now you kill a bunch of turkeys for an achievement, not because you randomly thought you’d do something different on a whim.
As a result, you don’t do anything similar anywhere else in the world - “because you don’t get anything for it”

2 Likes
35

Once upon a time, a long time ago, you actually had to know people on your server. And you did, you met them in dungeons, read about them in the trade-channel and you always saw them standing outside of the AH in the major cities just before 8PM raid times - secretly inspecting them to know what gear they’ve got (you know, you actually had to do specific content to get good gear…). You knew certain guilds, certain players and of course how they performed and about their reputation.

Then you had of course perks of having friends. A well-known friend of yours who recommended the group he’s in inviting you to a run.

And of course being in a good guild meant quite a lot, more than it does now I’m afraid. First of all to clear the content in a guild-group, secondly “Oh he’s in [guild name], nice, let’s get him”.

I remember leveling up quite a bit later than the actual release of WotLK, and someone actually recognised me in a dungeon from me standing in SW (when I was Alliance…) with my t5/t6 :rofl:. That basically sums it up.

36

So I’m special? :sunglasses:

37

If achievements don’t appeal to you, you can just ignore them. They are mostly just fluff. I have some friends with very low achie scores because they just don’t care for them. Most of the achies they have they just got passively doing content.

I guess if a rewards from an achievement appeals then it would make someone go out of their way to do it.

Obviously things like Pathfinder feel more compulsory and the unlocks for new races etc.

2 Likes
38

Yea that’s what i do. I do what looks like fun (maybe has fun reward or such) or i “have to” (pathfinder…) but just randomly doing them to get points, nope. Doesn’t really matter in my style of gameplay anyway.:smiley:

2 Likes
39

Before Gearscore etc. the Leader of a Raid would meet up with you and inspect your Gear, then decide if he wants you or not. If there where more than 1 Contender for a Spot he would pick one.
Trust me, it was even more degrading than it is today.

People tend to forget how crappy Vanilla-WoW was (or they didnt really play it, IDK).

1 Like
40

What has this got to do with achievements though?