So as some of you who frequent this area will be aware, recently I’ve been actively criticising how Wow handles raiding and the player etiquette around it.
I admit, I have been impulsive and based my opinion almost exclusively on my own experience with raiding, but now I’ve come to a realisation.
I don’t despise Wow’s raids, I think if it was more approachable to learn I’d enjoy it more, but that’s besides the point.
The key conclusion I’ve come to is the level of time, effort, and social planning, the reward is not equivalent in the slightest.
In Runescape if you put 3 solid years of playing into it, strive for the strongest gear, obtain the rarest items, that progress still has value several years later, your invested time still has a visible reward, there’s minimal power creep too, so if you’re the strongest, you’re still among the strongest years later.
Wow has no such things, a person who’s played with determination at endgame for 18 years, their progress and their power can be overtaken in a matter of weeks by someone speed levelling and then running M+, and then all that progress is essentially reset when a new expansion hits anyways.
All that time and effort does not retain it’s value any more, return to the game after 3 years and you’re strength is completely irrelevant, your hard earned raid gear and legendaries don’t mean anything.
The reward does not warrant the effort.
So now I’ve highlighted my core issue with raiding, M+, Wow’s progression systems as a whole, I’ll address my hopes for how they’re actively already working on it in Dragonflight.
Professions are back with a bang! Apparently we can even craft mythic gear, which is great! If I can harvest the heart of a raid boss, say some kind of Molten Dragon, and use that powerful reagent to forge a fiery Warhammer, and that specific Warhammer’s power stays relevant through the expansion, that’s great! I’ll happily earn and work towards that reward and upgrade it over time because it feels like a rewarding investment of my time, my time invested still has value, my time hasn’t been thrown in the bin because there’s been 3 progression systems scrapped since I forged it.
“But Bludtooth! How can gear retain value through new expansions!”
Allow me to explain.
Blizzard, I implore you to change Wow’s business model, you charge us the price of a full game per expansion, when that entire expansion becomes irrelevant the moment the next one launches, if we unsubscribe we no longer have access to a product we have purchased.
Follow Runescape and ESO.
Put a cap on levelling at 70 with Dragonflight, no more levelling, minimise power creep so my Warhammer is still strong in 5 years, and just sell expansions in the modular fashion that ESO does, just add a variety of content for us to play with each expansion, adding more options of weapons and gear we can pursue, more talents for more class builds etc.
With the state the game is in right now our invested money does not retain it’s value.
With the state the game is in right now our invested time does not retain it’s value.
With the state the game is in right now your own narrative, quests and gameplay systems do not retain their value.
The approach you’ve had for years now is not sustainable, even without borrowed power there’s only so long you can make stats go up before you want to squish them again, making progress irrelevant and throwing peoples time spent in the bin, again.
I love world of warcraft, and I do want it to thrive, I want more people playing it, I want to keep on playing it!
But ultimately I cannot recommend any one play the game when their hard earned money and all-too limited time is treated so disgustingly.
For the record I’m super excited for Dragonflight, it looks amazing! But if my time invested is rendered null and void eventually, then it’s still a poor investment of a customers money and time.
Runescape’s got it right, please learn from it.
