Most games have a core streamlined experience where the progression of skills is incremental and logical. You learn to play your class from level 1 by using the one skill you have and then adding to the pool as progression/leveling adds to the pool of skills.
In WoW the core experience changes drastically as you level making the curve for some classes nigh impossible to learn properly. What procs of what and when, cooldowns are hard to keep track of and when skills get added your muscle memory needs retraining, what worked before doesn´t work anymore.
One of the problems is that early game is too easy not forcing the player to use all skills at his/her disposal, with the changes between levels it becomes a nightmare at times to understand the skill paths available. I believe this is why a lot of people use addons, I tried Hekili yesterday and it improved my dps with about 30%, guess I suck but I know I am not the only one.
Leveling is a core experience for many people, it should be a much smoother ride in every aspect. Why can´t I make potions or gear in the Dragon Isles for my character? After all, the game keeps telling me to go there and this applies to skills as well, a much more streamlined approach to all aspects of leveling should be a core mechanic in all expansions.
The only class I sort of understand is the Devastation Evoker, the mechanics, the things I need to do to get the class to work âokayishâ without any help, I prefer to know what I am casting and when/ where I am supposed to react instead of looking at an addon which I am forced to do with my Warlock.
I was looking at my nephew doing mythic+, I don´t think he has seen his character in ages, the whole screen is filled with bars and numbers. That really shouldn´t be how the game is meant to be played, I guess PvP´ers have an edge in all of this, âmostâ need to know the class they are playing (I think) and they probably don´t see leveling as a problem.
Every game should at the bare minimum guide a player on the intended gameplay mechanics. Be that with a tutorial, or with gently introduction of new abilities and mechanics so that the player can adapt.
WoWâŚtries to do both, and fails miserably at both.
The introduction island for a new character teaches you the absolutely basics, nothing class specific.
The leveling speed is so fast, you donât even have time to learn new unlocked abilities, because youâre accumulating them too fast.
The game does an extrmely poor job at being consistent. We have classes where combos do not highlight, where the link between abilities is not obvious or where cooldowns/pools/charges are not communicated effectively.
Iâm trying out many classes right now, and while I get the basics of most, I canât perform any of them at a level where I would feel confident to even try a random dungeon because thereâs simply too much going on at any time.
Then thereâs the UI.
I donât know how to word this any better, but the UI is absolutely horrible, especially when it comes to healing.
I have close to NO indicators whether something is dispellable, or even something I should be paying attention to. Either players have a million icons on them, or they all look the same and itâs impossible to tell whatâs a debuff and whatâs not.
And yes, I can start installing hundreds of addons to accomodate for every flaw that I am struggling with, but where do we draw the line? When is too much, too much?
I wish I didn´t have to agree, but yes, the NPE isâŚrough, to put it mildly.
Some classes like ret have everything blinking all the time so you don´t even know what buttons to press, others like aug are supereays in 5 man, but the way they work is not explained even remotely well, so that you sometimes have to ask âare they pushing any buttons at all?â when you see prescience and EM uptimes of 25% or less over the course of a dungeon or raid fight, and yet others like mage are somewhere in the middle where some stuff lights up but others need a WA to track properlyâŚ
That said, compared to when I started back in TBC, it is still MUCH improved.
But it needs more work to properly lead people into the game without relying on external resources like WoWhead guides⌠especially since those are mostly geared towards a level of player that generally doesn´t really âneedâ them to begin with, which then often causes further frustration for the casual Open world newbie who has no real use for Shifting Power or mass barrier but would benefit from at least knowing about Blast wave and Dragon´s breath as âemergency buttonsâ for overpull situationsâŚ
I do believe some of this could be rectified by forcing players to spend say 50% longer leveling and making it possible to die again in the process, requiring them to get more accustomed to pushing more than just 1 or 2 buttons ⌠but it´s definitely not going to be a standalone âthis solves everythingâ solution, as the diversity of the issues requires a mutlitude of smaller changes as opposed to one sweeping one.
I somehow wish, they would cap the lvling at some point⌠For what WoW tries to do, the whole lvling process each expansion, seems non-relevant.
(a lot of) people rush to max lvl each expansion and the ones that donât enjoy the story, quests, zones more than the lvling (From what I know).
There is already a problem with lvl-squish, where you get weaker pr. lvl as you go, so why not cap the lvling, and let people do it once. You can still make it mandatory to complete the new story line each expansion, but what this could allow is to slow down lvling againâŚ
Make mobs hurt so you have to use ice barrier, turtle, cloak of shadows etc. while you play, let the players actually learn their spells while they lvl and familiarize themselves with it
Good luck trying to use kill shot as a new hunter while lvling⌠the mob is dead before you even realize itâs available
But then the game adds 10 different traps, that all work differently, and doesnât show case that some mobs are not CCâable, leaving you again with a bunch of spells you probably donât use a new player while lvling
I consider thatâŚbasic.
It does the same for tanks in trying to teach you about damage mitigation.
And weâre probably biased as veteran players here, since we know the stuff, I just find itâŚlacking.
Maybe itâs fine for a new person.
My main gripe lies in the complexity of the classes and how all abilities play together.
Iâve got three bars of buttons, purely abilities as a Protection Warrior.
And I need to use some additional WAâs to track the soak on Ignore the Pain and uptime of my Shield Block for the bashâŚ
And the default UI does absolutely NOTHING at explaining those mechanics.
For me the leveling part is extremely relevant and often the part of an expansion I enjoy the most - at least the first time around.
The fact that many people rush through it, doesnât mean itâs irrelevant. Those people choose to experience it that way: Itâs not meant to be experienced that way.
ânothing class specificâ, is the part that I was mainly addressing.
Of course. We wonât ever have an objective truth here.
But do you enjoy the lvling or the adventure through the new zones, quests etc?
Is it the âOh I went from 60 to 61â ? or is it the story line? The second, I can understand. But for me, it wouldnât take away any of my excitement for the new content, that I am max lvl and experiencing a new story line.
Well that depends. Game changes, and if the game is designed more and more towards end game, who is to say âhowâ things are to be experienced?
Again⌠Story line =/= lvling
As much I rarely level more than once or twice per expac (not big into alts) levelling is a useful way of offering up story that wouldnât be told if people ignored the zones and just went into keys and raids.
I feel without levelling, storytelling would be even weaker.
All of the above. Plus experiencing content for the first time. Itâs something special.
The fact that it has leveling says enough, doesnât it?
I get ârushing throughâ once youâve already done it once, maybe twice. But the first time? I really donât get that mindset.
Well, I was reacting to the thing that is relevant for me.
Iâm not a new player; so I canât comment on that experience. None of us can, honestly.
You donât have to lvl just because there is a story to be told. You can still enjoy the story, without having to feel like you go from a strong warrior to a weaker and weaker player until you hit max lvl
?? I donât get the point youâre trying to make.
It was made optional because time and again people rolling a character on a pvp server, and not knowing what they were getting into exactly, complained.
And because some PvP servers were SO imbalanced faction-wise that they were unplayable for the smaller faction.
Leveling is NOT optional.
So⌠Like I said: What is your point exactly?
Yes you can, but leveling is FUN (to me).
Is WoWâs level scaling borked? Yes, yes it is. And it should get fixed.
You should feel stronger as you level; not weaker.
