The future of mythic plus

Community General Discussion
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Mythic plus is a very successful feature implemented in legion, it has a huge number of following and people love it to the point that blizzard made an esport out of it.

However, I feel like lately m+ is going in the wrong direction, and it’s heading towards the wrong path, while BFA m+ has done a lot of good changes, it also did some very bad changes too.

So what do I think M+ should be? simply, an alternate progression path that is focused on fun, challenging oneself, mastery and most importantly skill.

One of the very strong aspects of PVE in World of Warcraft is anticipation and calculation, you rarely react, most of the time you know there will be fire coming soon, X/Y/Z ability coming soon and it is a very fun part of the pve system, kinda like a 3d chess.

However having double that in both raiding and M+ in my opinion is the wrong way to go, nowadays M+ routes, paths, objectives, tactics, mobs are all well studied and predetermined even the emissaries are known.

This burnsout people fast, makes m+ boring and stale once you reach a point where you are fighting with human error rather than trying to overcome a challenge, it also creates some annoying side effects like meta comps, community perception.

Another problem I have with M+ is that it rewards very fast and then you reach a point where you are barely progressing, on the very first day of a season people are clearing +10s, in the very first week of a season people are getting fully decked with heroic tier gear, which kinda collides with heroic raiding and makes it much easier and sometimes even invalidates it, it also affects Mythic raiding negatively too in the same way that players are getting into mythic raids with mythic gear level items way too fast.

Another problem I have with M+ is that it ruins immersion completely, I really feel like it should have a lore explanation and some quests that tie in with it.

So what should be done for M+?

1 ) Mythic plus naming and lore revised :

The bronze dragonflight deals with time, they have a problematic enemy in the infinite dragonflight and I feel like that problem could be expanded into the M+ area, as such the M+ should be different " instances " of time that the players clear through.

The Keystones represent time fragments that have been manipulated by the infinite dragon flight and the players try to restore balance by clearing the keystone, and as such the bronze dragon flight will reward the players by the end!

This in my opinion is much more immersive, interesting and more fitting than the battle arena system we currently have.

2 ) Live Dungeon layout :

One of my main problems with M+ is that each M+ is the exact same, I feel like blizzard should bring the dungeons more into life by changing mob placements, opening hallways / new doors / hidden paths / new type of mobs in every instance of a dungeon.

This would change the M+ drastically and makes it more reactive and tests a different kind of player skillset, it would be fun if you started seeing new abilities and had to think how to deal with them on the fly.

Also like I mentioned a cool thing blizzard can do is add new sections to the dungeon, open new doors / hidden hallways, wouldn’t be fun if the seasonal affix that a new hidden area in each dungeon is now open and a boss awaits inside?

These changes aim to make the dungeons more exciting to tackle and cut of things like meta comps, predetermined routes etc etc.

People would now want versatile comps and start thinking of strengths and weaknesses, it would be interesting if a scenario like this happened

A party consists of three players, a Priest, a deathknight tank and a resto shaman, the player may want to bring a warlock and a mage, warlock for the portals and mage for the arcane brilliance, they may want to bring a demon huner for the extra magic damage and more often interrupts, they may want to bring a rogue for the heavy control they offer, and because they don’t know exactly what’s coming at them they won’t have some predetermined meta comp that they will stick to no matter what.

3 ) M+ levels and difficulty :

Mythic plus should really be more skill based, atm the way M+ operates is that everything can be neglected and face tanked, the higher you go up in the ladder the more important abilities become and not dealing with them becomes problematic and can wipe the group.

I think this approach is wrong, while It’s fine that the numbers get bigger every level I don’t think it’s fine that they go grow exponentially.

A linear number growth coupled with added complexity to the dungeon should be the way to go.

Added complexity can be many things, new special mobs, new mob abilities, some mobs become CC immune, a certain boss gains some abilities and so on, this would make skill more valuable and reduce frustration in being face to face with numbers.

4 ) Mythic Plus and loot :

Like I stated above, I think mythic plus loot system is bad, it feels like a rushed meal, there is just a burst of happiness at the start of each season then frustration piles up as players fish for warforges/sockets/titanforges/tertiary stats.

I think the M+ loot system should be redesigned, loot should be more scarce, and resources should be added, players should start with M+0 version of gear and then work on it to improve it using drops that came from the end of run cache.

The end of run cache should drop several resources that players gather and invest them in their gear, some resources add a random tertiary stat, some add a socket, some increase the ilvl, some changes stat weights, some adds stats, some add special effects, some improves visuals etc etc.

I also think loot should be updated every season, and loot should change depending on M+ level, for example at +10 the trinket gains an additional effect, or at +6 the boss starts dropping X item.

This should make progression linear, makes it feel rewarding and makes it feel like it was worthwhile investing in your character.

5 ) M+ and affixes :

I think blizzard did a job well done on the M+ affixes in BFA, while beguiling is obnoxious and so was infested, all others are fun and good.

While the balance can be a little bit crazy I think it adds another layer of depth, however.

I think the affix pool is too small, blizzard should start adding more affixes and it would be nice if there was risk/reward affixes and more unique non numbers related affixes, raw damage or raw " take it easy " affixes are imo not fun and not interesting.

4 Likes
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This would remove one of the attractive points of M+ for me. I like M+ as an alternative gearing path that isn’t linked to IDs or other forms of time-gating and that is repeatable. Every run can reward you with an item that doesn’t require any “follow up”.

Adding resources would make it another entry on a list of chores where you have to do something X number of times to get the reward. We already have this in form of Titan Residuum, which combines time-gating with RNG, a pretty un-fun combination. What you propose (gathering resources that add stats/etc) would probably add another gambling/RNG element: hoping to get resources, hoping to get the right resources, hoping the “enchant” will be the one you want, etc.

I would like to see less emphasis on trash and on skipping said trash, more class balance, and less tedious seasonal affixes. Beguiling isn’t hard, just tedious and punishing PUGs more than organized groups. It decreases the accessibility of M+.

3 Likes
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Honestly, mythic plus and any other content is built on a foundation and that foundation is how classes play.

Until they fix the gaping imbalances in output and utility they are closing the game off (to some extent) to a large portion of the playerbase.

I also think it rewards a little too much if I’m honest. Not in quality, but in quantity.

6 Likes
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I just wanna ask, you say infested & beguiling to be obnoxious

I dont know a single person who liked reaping, and i know multiple who liked both infested & beguiling, so i wanna ask why do you like reaping? what IS THERE to like?

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Because it made my dps feel yuuuge when it happened, was a great feeling (for me) :sweat_smile:

2 Likes
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I don’t understand how you came to think of it as time gating, you would always get resources at the end of the run, There would never be a situation where you can’t do anything to progress.

And at later parts it would overtake M+ in gearing as currently M+ ( once you get full 430 gear ) becomes super RNG dependant and timegated ( residuum for Azerite pieces ) while the resource system would be linear, slower ( much needed tbh ) and way less random.

As for the resource drops themselves, there will always be RNG in loot drops, it’s the essence of MMORPGs and a lot of RPG games, it doesn’t make sense to remove it, and it also doesn’t make sense to take it to the other extreme, I think a medium point and a system where it’s actually fun to grind RNG loot drops is the way to go.

What I have in mind is the satisfaction people would get after amassing a huge amount of supplies to get a legendary upgrade on their gear, they are always moving in the direction of upgrading no matter what but time spent / rng can shorten / lengthen the time needed within a reasonable margin.

A +20 player will gear significantly faster than a +10 player, and a +10 player will gear faster than a +4 player, while it’s currently true in the current state of loot in the game it’s far to random in nature and you don’t feel like you are progressing, most of the people I play M+ with above +10 don’t even think of loot anymore, if it drops then cool if not then just another day which in my opinion is wrong.

For the infested affix, you either burst it down / stun the worms or just cc it and kill it’s friends, there is nothing smart about that, it’s literally a time consuming affix with outright no way to " play it better ", people liked it because it rewarded certain classes, while reaping rewarded heavy aoe classes, that’s a fault on blizzard.

As for beguiling it’s the same, the void emissary you just nuke / pop defensives / hide, it’s as straight forward as it can be.

The enchanted ( reflect ) emissary cancels out 1 dps player in pugs, or takes some time from your healer and some classes can outright ignore it and thus are more favourable ( Rogues / Fury warriors / DHs )

The tides emissary ( CC immune ) is just nuked with it’s group, you can’t stun / cc any more so it becomes less straight forward, the only skill a tank can have is to LoS casts, which they can do even without the emissary being there, or if the group the emissary is in is problematic you just have someone spam CC it, preferably the healer ( druids can spam root ) which makes druids more wanted.

As for reaping, reaping was generally easy however at the higher difficulties you wouldn’t time the run if you didn’t pull packs with reaping and that’s where it was fun.

You’d be dodging smashes, interrupting/Losing bolts, kiting the debuff all the while dealing with the packs you pulled, the better you were at dodging / handling pressure and interacting the more you got out of reaping.

While ordinary groups just finished the reaping alone ( which was super easy ).

With reaping there was always room for improvement, there was always things you could do, people who didn’t like it was because it invalidated a lot of classes, but I don’t think that’s the fault of reaping.

Rather it was the fault of blizzard’s class design, MM hunters are capped at 5 targets, fury warriors are capped at 5 targets, and because the reaping died way too fast at lower levels dot classes didn’t even have time to do anything.

There is also the obvious

It is fun when you see huge numbers yes, it would’ve been more fun if more classes were viable.

1 Like
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I loved reaping. It was pure awesome fun ! Also I hated infested and I do not mind emissaries - they make use of stealth and pulls more varied. Makes M+ fun even for tank, who otherwise needed to be like some monotonous robot not thinking.

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Well if the paths were random i dont think it would be that much of a fun…u cannot prepare for it u dont know wtf is waiting for you and that, in the world where u fight with a timer, isnt very cool idea…

Also since they focus so much on that war/rog/druid/dk/ww clown fiesta called mdi i dont think they will ever change that.

Also infested was dogno mostly because the worms were sorta retarded running trough walls floors pillars straight up to los…and it also just favored bursty classes which were and still are melees.

Reaping was kinda …ok.

Beguiling on the other hand…idk tides emissary and void ones are fine…but enchanted are soo anoying to deal with…also random positioning every week isnt that much fun either…for example this week freehold, where void emissary is on every step you make.

I would love afixes to be random during the week… u finish or deplete key …the key rerolls with different set of afixes… curent state just brings weeks where i would rather cut my leg of than doing m+… for example sanguine, quaking fortified in waycrest manor and stuff like that…

Rewards feel way too much imo. Maybe im still living in the past, but for me …raiding should reward by far the best eq. M+ should be like a hobby you do during the week when you are locked and you can farm some currencies there. I also think that weekly reward rng cache should accept what it actualy is for many many players and thats the only resource of hope for some upgrade - every week when you open it it should open a window where you get option to pick one of three items that it offers…higher key the more items to choose from.

They also have to do something with class balance and they should do it on weekly basis …not once per 6 months. Ye i know all classes are playable in m+, but watching mdi just creates this mindset where every johny making +4 key needs a tripple roug druid and a war or insta decline… In lfg tool half of the groups have “need rogue” in the description. Shroud just needs to go…

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I liked Reaping because it didn’t interrupt the flow of the dungeon crawl. Beguiling feels more “disruptive” to me, for lack of a better word.

2 Likes
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To everyone who loved reaping ( Replied to my comment )

I guess its a dps thing, i play tank & healer and i found it nothing but a pain, probably why x)

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I mained a tank in S2 and I played a disc priest in s2 too, I loved it a lot.

I guess it’s more of a personal taste.

1 Like
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ah, i suppose then

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Spot on. /10char

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Blizzard probably already knows that mythic+ drops too much loot. Take raiding for example. 7~8 bosses, with 2 coins per week. If you clear the whole thing, you may expect one or two gears weekly. And that’s RNG too. You might get nothing at all.

Dungeons however, you can spam 50 of them daily and they all have a drop chance. 430 for 10 too. Which is basically heroic raid gear for a dungeon. and then a guaranteed weekly chest drop.

I’m sure blizzard already knows this. They realized how inflated the gearing system is, but they’re intentionally sacrificing other aspects of the game, such as pvp vendors, etc. to balance the amount of gears out there, instead of toning down mythic+. Because i can’t imagine a group of developers, not realizing how ridiculous this is, unless it’s intentional.

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I liked reaping as a paladin tank. Just bubble-taunt and AoE them all down. Easy. :slight_smile:

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This ID, I killed seven raid bosses and used three bonus rolls, and I got one item that was 10 item levels lower than what I had in the same slot. I far prefer a system where I can run a few dungeons a night and have a chance to get something that improves my character, in spite of the slot machine mechanics. Getting optimal, let alone perfect gear is not trivial or effortless in spite of M+, but raids just feel very unrewarding from the gearing perspective.

Whenever I took a break from the game or burnt out on it, it was never because I got too much potentially usable loot. It was always because of time-gated content and only having one chance per week to improve my character that also required me to play with a larger number of people, which is not always convenient or feasible.

M+, as a design, feels much more modern and appropriate for many people’s lifestyles than the EverQuest-esque raid/ID system from two decades ago. I’d much rather see them revamp how raids work than a change to M+ to be closer to raids. (I don’t disagree that +10 may well be too low for heroic level item levels, though.)

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That’s the problem. Mythic+ made gears lose value because of how much of it is out there.

There was a reason as to why the old system worked better than the new one.

Back then, you had once a week to get lucky and get something. When you got it, it felt amazing.

Now? Meh. Mythic+ dropped 10 of those for me already. It’s not titanforge so it’s garbage. It doesn’t have a socket so it’s useless. this made getting gears very underwhelming and bad. I understand. We all want BIS gears left and right. We all want to lvl to 455 right now. But there has to be a balance. Mythic+ isn’t the solution.

An enhanced version of benthic gear, that provides currency for raiding, pvp, mythic+ and other world activities depending on the difficulty could be the modern substitution, if you hate RNG so much. But not this.

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[gently pats the worgens cheeks] I was blood dk tank and monk brew tank. Trust me - everyone, but my dk tanked those mobs. But since I planned when reapings come (i.e. pulled more to get reaping sooner to do a LOS with them and round them up more easily), it was that even when dps tanked them I was able to get enough control and pick the harder mobs and so on.

For me reaping offered a breather while running a race against timer. I was not very well geared on my monk at start (rerolled blood dk into monk mid season for raid) and I struggled initially, but for me reaping was relax mode, compared to the anti CC emissary that make tank have a mental stress on some packs, where incoming damage will be worse than worst.

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You have to remember that mythic + was designed for small guilds and groups of friends to start with before it turned into MDI/RIO/loot hell .
I don’t think nerfing the loot will help .

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It isn’t a problem for me, it’s a plus. The vast majority of items that I get from M+ are not upgrades, but I still enjoy getting something after an activity. Who is it a problem for? Do you enjoy going weeks without getting anything that improves your character?

On the other hand, every week you didn’t get something, it was a frustrating experience and also meant that six out of seven evenings there was nothing to do that improved my character. I felt it was a boring situation.