With how many community-disliked features tried Ion to get away in BfA?

[Vintoleth-ghostlands (Vintoleth)]

@Symy-draenor

That’s because they were scared to remove flying becaus people whined. They should not have been and I’m still hoping that we don’t get flying in 8.2.

They were not scared. they removed flying for about a year before realising their mistake from player backlash, and restored it in a painful way so they were able to have a spiteful dig at the playerbase for forcing their hand. they could have brought back flying in the form it had been for 8 years. buy it once 6.2 hit, then make it available on level cap. but no, they attached rep grinds to it, and the 1 year~ timegate into an expansion. im not against completing a pathfinder containing:
a) complete the storyline main quests, and
b) explore all the new world on foot.
but that should be all that pathfinder contains, and the rep and timegate should be removed so it is available to work on, AND achieve on level cap.

there is a strong argument to be made for flying being one of the big factors why WoD dropped nearly half its subs. if flying had never been introduced back (grudgingly) with pathfinder in 6.2, and we had had no flying for the last 4 years~ that means there is also a strong argument that sub numbers would never have recovered and at this point in mid 2019, BfA could have far less players than it even has.

is this really what you would have wanted? with WoD and Legion being greatly reduced, the resources allocated to BfA, 9.0 and beyond could have been drastically slashed.

and your specific use of the word

@Symy-draenor

whined.

does show you as being in the bitter portion of the “no flying” side. at start of WoD, flying had been around 8 years. people were used to it. people liked it. there was no need to remove it. the only reason why it was removed was because Ion “time played metrics” Hazzikostas saw it as a way to increase our time spent actually doing nothing by proxy. ie. ground travel time between A and B. as people say for many aspects of this game: if you dont like “insert feature” (flying), then dont participate in “insert feature” (flying).

interesting side note, and im not sure if i’ll make a post on this some time. i was talking to a irl friend a few days ago who quit in late WotLK or early Cata. he was trying BfA for 3 months around the christmas and the beginning of this year. he quit again the moment his time ran out. he didn’t level beyond around 114 or something. he spent most of his time looking at old content and doing legacy raids.

he had a few issues with why he would not be returning. one interesting one was the removal of any progression with artifact weapons in the legion content. i told him a similar thing was done with the WoD and MoP questlines for the legos, and this made him shake his head for the same reason why artifact weapon progression was removed.

BUT, another big one that really bugged him was that flying was not available in WoD and BfA content, and the reps needed to be grinded didn’t seem connected to the initial main storyline. of course this is the case cause the reps required are connected to the patch they came out in: namely 3 tannan factions, and armies of legionfall.

so this is an example of 1 less player because of blizz’s silly decision. obviously there are many more. WoD lost, what, 5M+ players? and while not all of them left solely because of flying. i would propose that many left because of flying, or flying was one of the reasons.

[Symy-draenor]

I’m on a mobile so quoting is painful and I can’t reply every patr of your post individually so I’ll give a short and really general answer, sorry for that.

I said Blizzard was afraid and as you pointed out it was phrased wrong. What I meant is that they then reintroduced flying after the so called whining from players, but they should not have.

Yes, it was already too late to remove flying after it had been in the game for so long and that indeed did cause alot of players to quit. I think introducing flying to the game is one of the biggest regrets Blizzard has, and in my opinion flying should not be part of a MMORPG. I do, however, get why so many people like it and naturally I personally will also get pathfinder 2 asap as not doing so would put me in a disadvantage.

I already forgot most of your points because I’m watching a movie while writing this. I’ll try to remember to read it again tomorrow and give you a proper answer as it was a well written and thorough. Deserves a like.

[Burton-xavius]

@Symy-draenor

Yes, it was already too late to remove flying after it had been in the game for so long and that indeed did cause alot of players to quit. I think introducing flying to the game is one of the biggest regrets Blizzard has

I dont think it was a regret from blizzard, i think it was a ‘regret’ from the new dev team compared to the team that brought us flying, which was a big success, i would say that flying was one of their best decisions to give us, their biggest mistake was to take it away, so many left the game, and i think as the poster above you that it is a big reason wow have lost so many subs, not the sole reason, but a big part of it

Blizzard should try to introduce flying from start next expansion and see how that work out, because so far the no flying expansions is not doing too well.

Edit: and also let players buy flying for WoD and Legion its old content… i have all pathfinders, so it dont affect me except it might mean new players hate it and might quit, which do affect everyone.

[Brianboru-outland]

@Redoctober-frostmane

Removal of pvp vendors, though that’s a legion thing but still Ion’s brainchild.

But but but you can’t find the vendors, and yet amazingly you can find the weekly M+ chest. I wonder if they brought back a “vendor chest” would it help those poor PvP players to find the vendor point. It could be a workable solution to this horrific problem?

[Brianboru-outland]

@Punyelf-draenor

The removal of tier

I actually despise tier, all great if it drops for you, but it too often becomes “essential” to your class.

And yes some Azerite traits are the same.

Why not just like normal gearing in every slot with optional reforging?

[Redoctober-frostmane (Redoctober)]

Yes no idea how we can find the Azerite vendor either, but that pvp vendor was too obscure, hiding or something.

[Brianboru-outland]

@Redoctober-frostmane

Yes no idea how we can find the Azerite vendor either, but that pvp vendor was too obscure, hiding or something.

Blame the art team, I told them at beta that a rogue in stealth wasn’t a suitable vendor for PvP gear

[Ryura-defias-brotherhood]

It seems that in patch 9.0 they will again remove the progression gear we had, so it seems like they learned nothing at all.

Instead of expanding on the systems they will just remove them, what a disappointing travesty.

Because of this i am already weary of 9.0.

[Burton-xavius]

Yes a moving rogue in stealth vendor is hard to find

[Brianboru-outland]

My list to be brought back:

1. Flying at max level and worlds designed with flying in mind, not the tiny little counties we get today that are supposed to pass for countries.

2. Give me back classes as they were in LK, MOP or even WOD, reverse pruning.

3. Drop scaling, it is horrible, makes you feel like you aren’t progressing at all and while they are at it drop dazed.

4. Make it possible to traverse roads again without picking up six million scaled mobs on your tail.

5. Bring back PvP vendors just like in WOD, drop ilev awards for higher rating, win your 10 games and get your PVP piece.

6. Bring back WOD style PvP gear.

7. Fix old raids so you can actually make some gold from running them again. Believe it or not but this used to be a fun and worthwhile activity for a lot of the player base.

8. All tanking classes should be highly viable as tanks, there are too few tanks in the game without the farcical situation where Guardian and to a lesser extent DH were practically useless.

9. Fix that stupid issue where a myriad of quests still give AP power and not gold once you level your god awful neck.

10. Ditch the “ledgendary” item for everyone entirely, it is just an alt unfriendly grind. Have it like Lich King where Shadowmourne was ultra cool to get if you worked for it but not essential.

11. Bring back reforging, that was nice and so what if it made me a little OP, Method and friends will clear your mythic raid in a week anyway.

[Burton-xavius]

@Brianboru-outland

Drop scaling, it is horrible, makes you feel like you aren’t progressing at all

Yes Remove scaling, the idea that you can level and choose where you want to level is in itself not bad, but the scaling that makes you weaker when you level up is horrific ! for gods sake blizzard just add some ‘hidden power or bonus stats’ for a level so you get stronger and not weaker when you level up.

I absolutely detest feeling weaker after i get a level

[Zarwea-argent-dawn (Zarwea)]

The one thing i want be gone from WoW atm and biggest is CRZ.

[Postura-kazzak (Postura)]

Titanforging is still a cancer to this game, Also removing master loot was dumb as hell. World scaling atleast in endgame. If i lets say raid mythic i wanna be able to 1 tap normal mobs in world. Azerite was really dumb.

[Odeone-silvermoon (Odeone)]

Im tempted to give Punyelf the new MVP award for most honest posting.
Hoping he/she will continue to resist being infected by fanboy disease.

On topic…countless features has been added to prolong each patch, here is hoping they will come up with a sustainable solution to keep people interested, not only adding time-sinks.

[Azwraithz-kazzak]

You geat gear more easly but that doesnt mean its good as well, also take in consideration how many times you got same item…etc etc.
If you put all that together is almost dame time spent.

Also you try to gear 5 alts as hard as min…would be hell. Not that isnt already since you still have to do most of the rep and other stuff in order to have certain access. So in the end you spend much more time.

Also keep in mind that the majority of wow dont get that easly geared like certain people that are either lucky or know what to do.

I can say that i understand the fact of players getting the same ilvl and neck so easly compared to you that spent hours and hours to get it. Makes you thing how pointless the game is and that you should always try to play at the end game cus thats the fun but actualy isnt since the content gets dead fast since blozz doesnt know how to keep it alive a good example are the previous raids.
But we are entering in a different topic so il stop cuz i already went way over the topic .

[Eridu-argent-dawn (Eridu)]

When you get overwhelmingly negative feedback on alpha and beta and still think the feature is good, whose fault is it exactly?

[Keyur-draenor (Keyur)]

Look at the person who can fire him!!

We don’t have old people who’s were running blizz.

[Punyelf-draenor (Punyelf)]

I have always been opinionated but I am still regularly called a fan boi and a shill

[Gannet-twisting-nether (Gannet)]

@Leafkettle-argent-dawn

The world scaling and, no matter how much iLV you had, will also scale the monsters with you will spend more time with them.

Are you actually complaining that outdoor mobs take too long to kill?

[Leafkettle-argent-dawn (Leafkettle)]

@Gannet-twisting-nether

Are you actually complaining that outdoor mobs take too long to kill?

Yes. It depends on the class but cloth-wearers receive the end of the stick here. I have every class at 120, some hit it hard this expansion.