What is a MMORPG?

This question is easily answered by pressing control + T or, control+shift+N for the night enjoyers; but for now.

Whenever I think of the current state of WoW, aside from the class balancing, PvP or PvE goals and meta, it makes me think that we’ve lost the path of what a MMORPG is.

I don’t want to be the melancholy guy, however, allow me to say that I really miss the involved and self-aware community that we had in the firsts phases of the game. Along with the pass of the years, it’s obvious that the WoW enjoyer player base has grown, we all have responsabilities, less time, and most of us, in average, are more worried in our current IRL more than a MMORPG life.

The MMORPG path deviation from WoW, however, even if we’d like to state that it’s a self-created community problem, it’s more like a design problem, and to prove so, let me throw some questions to you, that might make you consider wether this is our problem as a community, or a game design problem:

1.- How many players do you play/interact with regulary? I’m not talking about fix-scheduled groups such as raids, m+, arenas or RBGs; I’m talking to actual players who doesen’t share your gameplay preferences, but you enjoy to play with them.

To my experience, it’s almost zero, because all I do is wait in valdrakken for queues, or LFG groups to invite me, to press buttons, say 2 or 3 or 5 words in a group to sort the communication, and call it. Which differs from the old feeling of real human interaction and connection with players.

2.- How many people have you played with, lately, in order to help them to achieve their goals even if they were not your objective or, an already assumed goal?

I’m talking about helping somebody farming certain object/reputation/transmog/whatever that you are not interested in, but the fact of helping a 3rd would create a possitive relationship and both-ways happyness, and a quid pro quo with that player, knowing that he’ll be there for you whenever you too need him for something, or just for casual gaming.

3.- Do you feel alone in the game? How many “yoo how are you doing” messages are you receiving every day when you connect? How many “yoo how are you doing” messages are you sending when you see someone connect?

4.- How many players do you play with per day (raids, LFG, m+, arenas, solo shuffle, rbgs, outdoor farming groups…), and how many of those players end in your friendlist, or even better, with how many players do you end having a friendly conversation after that content.

5.- With how many players, even if they were kind to you and you to them, have you played again another day because some one of you both has asked the other to play with him?

By responding this questions, I believe that you will picture a world where you and the other players, passively, are aiming for a “selfish” gameplay, where players use players to reach their own goals, annonymously, with the least interaction possible, as if the game was a factory of items/achievements rather than a social-engaging game that a MMORPG should be.

MMORPG is many men online role playing girls.

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cool, no one cares. Another pointless wall of text.

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3 words can describe what’s changed
Access of information.

It’s not just WoW that has changed due to the widespread access to critical information. Everything has.

Today for an example, there is no need to ask someone a question. Just Google it.
We can always stay up to date, we have powerful tools available to us to help us in all aspects of life.

There is no need to learn things as a group anymore, just go to Youtube and watch a guide. Mechanics are not vague like they used to anymore.

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This, so much this, gone are the days of exploration and know its alt out to find what to do.

Massively multiplayer online role playing game, but you already know what you’re talking about.

You’ve noticed, as many others have, that WoW has become very focused on instanced content and group finding to the point where you really don’t meet other players in the world, and that the server merges and CRZ constantly breaks the community so you never meet anyone you’ve met before ever again, and even if you do it’s difficult to do everything with them. You likely won’t be able to trade, they’ll likely disappear suddenly during a breadcrumb quest, and so on.

They’re all sitting in major cities queuing for dungeons and that’s about how it’s going.

There’s nothing massively multiplayer about M+ or raids. It can still be fun, but yeah. Unless you’ve found them in the open world, which lets be honest you didn’t, then it’s not an MMO activity.

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I suppose all the answers boils down to having a guild and communities. I am having a lot of social interaction. I am even now at work and in my guild discord.

I have more social interaction in the game now than when I first started.

I started during TBC and the playerbase was horribly toxic and unhelpful. It’s a miracle I kept playing. To be honest it’s what made me not want others to suffer the same fate. So if someone has a question, I’m more than happy to explain stuff, if I can or if I can’t, then point them in a direction that they can find that information.

The whole ‘oh the playerbase was amazing earlier in the game’ is a pure myth to me. No one helped me with anything. On the other hand I don’t think the playerbase has gotten any worse either. For me LFD was the most amazing thing to be introduced to the game. I finally got to take part in dungeons at the right level. Even going back to Classic to endure the tedious group forming, spamming some channels with what you were looking for, inviting the appropriate classes and going and completing a dungeon was not a mind blowing social interaction. It was mostly just Hi and bye. People leaving mid run was also a nightmare to go and replace them.

Ironically the game that is hailed to be the be all and end all in friendly social interaction (Final Fantasy) also lets you do dungeons solo with a team of NPCs. Automated anything is not the reason social interaction dies.

I still get asked to help in game from time to time by total strangers. Providing I notice the whisper I will usually answer.

I have built up a network of friends over the years that I have met through various guilds, communities, discords, friends of friends, even the forums.

Some people believe that forced interaction somehow makes it a social interaction or even meaningful. It does not, in my experience. It just puts barriers in the game. Social interactions that aren’t forced are so much more meaningful. Spamming a channel for something is not social, it’s tedious. I’ve had far more meaningful interactions in modern Retail.

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Interesting. If they don’t share my gameplay preference, where would I expect to interact with them? In the AH like howdy partner! I’ve made a few more friends recently just by being friendly and myself and dropped my Bnet I.D. With how WoW is at the moment, it is up to the player how much they want to interact with others

You can’t expect everyone else to carry conversations | and i’m not suggesting you are

Met a guy in Revendreth last week. He needed to spawn a mob for back transmog maledev or something. I had the conductor level, so helped him out and he got it 1st attempt lol. Became friends, and he helped me to get it as the char with the conductor wasn’t that high level so struggled with the mob. It’s all about your outlook / being nice and putting yourself out there. Also played BGs with him and had a fun time

Not massively nah. I spam solo shuffle and look for mounts I like to go off and farm. Always try to be friendly and if people don’t engage oh well next

Solo Shuffle will always have a toxic element to it, but i’ve met some chilled out players where everyone had a good time bar maybe 1 player but it always give me a good laugh. One guy super toxic and flaming raging, while the others are like right Kill X lets go gl hf haha

I’m actively offering people to add me when I have good interactions with them. Most people add me so again, you can’t expect the world around you to change, while just standing by and waiting for it all to happen for you

What you described is a very rare experience. I’ve been playing WoW since vanilla, and especially in TBC and most of the people I played with say the opposite. Still anecdotal evidence on both sides, though so no point arguing.

Thing is, I still remember experiences with other people in the outer world from that time, I haven’t had one single memorable experience outside of a guild raid in retail.

So ‘no’ to all questions of the OP. WoW isn’t an MMORPG imo, that’s why I’m back to classic again. By the time I got my warrior to 15 I’ve had more engaging and interesting interactions than I had all of DF season 1 (and I played it plenty, up to mythic raiding and 2.4 io).

I’d also note that yes, it wasn’t easy to do a dungeon, to find people, to replace them, even to travel there, but it was part of the experience that some people like me enjoyed. Doing anything has weight and substance to it, a random lvl 28 mage handing me 5x healing potions cause he didn’t bother to sell them helped me survive RFC tanking on lvl 13. That’s the type of stuff that creates stories and adds immersion. That’s lost forever in retail because of convenience.

Ten m+ runs have less meaning than a single classic dungeon where u finish a couple of quests. They took the worst parts of mmorpgs which is rushing through content for the sake of gear and made it the focal point of a fantasy world.
That’s what I believe is the biggest immersion killer today.

Edit: to answer the OP more particularly, I haven’t met anyone outside my guild. I haven’t helped anyone because I hadn’t seen anyone in need of it. And yes, I feel lonely in the world. Moreover, because of layering and individualised quests, even the people I see are fleeting shadows that don’t add anything to my experience, but a sense of discombobulation.

Obviously people like it, it has it’s good sides of course. But for someone who is used to a slower pace, someone who played Warcraft 2&3, and seen the rise and change of internet culture, the restrictions of old games that ‘forced’ you into interaction s yielded a more genuine mmorpg experience

Even in classic where the ‘Lfg tool is not there’ people dont do small talk. So community problem not game.

Alot its called a ’ guild’.

None but tbh idc.

A few of them so it does exist.

Personally i don’t intract with people unless i have to and it’s the way i’ve played since base wow i never felt the need to socialize with strangers in a video game if i need social intraction i get of my computer and go talk to my family :stuck_out_tongue: granted my kids interrupt my game sessions pretty often as it is :smiley:

if you want social intraction join a social guild granted those are often failures too since no one talks :smiley:

We were, generally speaking, clueless back in the early stages of wow’s history. Which is why raids there were the ultimate challenge in 2005 were shreded in hours when Classic versions were released.

I remember on my initial character (an orc warrior) being out in the barrens and being /w by a group wanting a tank for Blackfathom Depths. I rocked up with my 2 handed sword and probably no protection talents and proceeded to tank the dungeon. Nobody said anything about it. We wiped a couple of time but nobody complained and we ended up doing the dungeon, probably took us an hour or something.
We were all clueless. But perhaps we had all the more fun for that state of cluelessness…

Depends how many of my guild are online that day. I mostly play with guildies, and that does involve doing mostly M+/raid (both scheduled and not), chatting in guild chat, chat-typing on discord, and hanging out in the discord voice channels. My guildies are my friends.

This, though…

If one of my friends wanted to go to a knitting group but I despised knitting, I wouldn’t go with them just to hang out with them. I’d tell them to have fun doing their thing and we could get together later to do something we both enjoyed together.

Hard to quantify really. I help guildies out with stuff from time to time, I tanked the social raid last week, even though I didn’t need it, because the usual tanks were off playing Diablo and they needed someone to step in. (Plus, the social raid is a laugh.)

No.

I don’t. I usually say ‘hi’ in guild chat when I log in. People who ask “yoo how are you doing” don’t actually care for an answer other than “fine, how about you” and I cba with that nonsense.

I don’t keep count.

I don’t need to add them to my friends list. They’re in my guild and easy to contact in game whenever they’re playing (or on discord if they’re not playing).

Again, I don’t keep count. I play with my guildies.

Weird questions.

im trying to be social in guild and in trade. even friendly :stuck_out_tongue:
but alas no success.

I haven’t found it is rare tbh. People either had this blissful experience that they still rave about today (which is great) or they had my experience. Similarly going back with the Classic reboots the playerbase had not improved. However the Classics were a great trip down memory lane for a month of quiet time and it made me appreciate going back to Retail, you realise how much the game and it’s systems have improved.

Retail is really good fun, for me, and that’s why I play this version the most. People are all different. While I find Retail the superior game by miles, others will feel differently and like it in Classic. I think it’s great that Blizz provide all the various version so people can pick and choose and that they are going to be doing their own Hard Mode.

We are like polar opposites. M+ much more enjoyable than any classic dungeon. Gearing is no different in either game, people are working to a bis list, if anything people are far more aware of what to target. I find Classic a much more lonely experience with too many restrictions and if anything I’m more immersed in the world today than back then.

This was mostly my experience going back. No one talks, unless you are with friends. But then I think gaming has just evolved in that way tbh.

Never have I felt so offended, by something I 100% agree with.

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And I am sure most people here love you exactly for that :smiley:

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Not true… Its her smelly feet that dulls their senses.

“Who is th… OH MY GOD WHAT IS THAT WHIFF!!!”. choking sound followed by unconsciousness

Then a shadowy figure hurriedly puts their boots back on, comes to their prone figure and places a website link crudely written in gaudy lipstick but not before it rifles through their pockets.

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Sounds like a lot of projecting to me.