Why not?
I wouldn’t mind.
Between the WoW Token, the level boost, and all the cosmetics and services, Blizzard pretty much sells everything imaginable already.
So inflating the shop with more of what already is there, and getting rid of the subscription in return, sounds pretty sweet to me.
But again, it won’t happen, because Blizzard will always prefer the free money that the subscription is.
Have you seen ESO? That has a sub and while you can play without one. Its very much needed if you want unlimited craft space. ESO has lots of mounts and pets but hardly any are earnable. About 90%, maybe more are store bought only. They sell transmog and potions in store too. Plus the houses which can cost upwards of £75.
Yes? Give me 1 example of a bug with proof. (not something you make up)
Learn to farm gold effectively and free yourself from the subscription fees, problem solved. It´s not hard, and it doesn´t take anywhere near as much time as most seem to asume. I haven´t paid real money for my sub in at least 2 years, and won’t for at least another 2, and I don´t even have to go out of my way as a raider /occasional m+ player /part time crafter to earn any of it… it´s all either quick clicking on the crafting table when I happen to walk past it, or running content I was going to run anyway.
As far as expansion length, I much prefer a shorter 18 month expansion of the quality we´ve seen so far than a 2 year dumpster fire like BFA or shadowlands with a 6 month content drought at the end.
While I agree with the entire rest of hte statement, this part is n longer entirely true, as with the buyout last lear ABK stocks were “dissolved” as ABK ceased to exist and Activision, Blizzard, and King are now wholly independent subsidiaries of Microsoft. Blizzard CEO (Who even is that currently, now that Ybarra is gone? I seem to have missed that…) now answers to Phil spencer, who in turn answers to Brad Smith, who in turn answers to the MS shareholders.
And Xbox Gaming /Phil Spencer is historically very hands off on their game developers unless they´re consistiently pooping in someone´s salad, because the primary reason all of them exist is to provide content for X-Box live, not necessarily to run a huge profit in and of themselves. Of course that´s always nice to see, but it is simply no longer their primary goal as a MS-owned game studio. MS will, at least currently, happily take a 10 or even hundred million dollar loss if it leads to a fantastic product that they can plaster all over the homepage and social media and get more people to sub to X-Box live because of it. 
I’d rather they stopped charging for expansions and keep the sub.
No. I dont trust blizzards monetization not becoming extremely p2w
Its not my job to point out obvious bugs to you. Blizzard even acknowledged many bugs themself. Just read statements made by blizzard and stop playing with your eyes closed lol.
Just as I thought. You are a clown.
Cosmetic have nothing with game progression. Just because you Asmongold cult thinks cosmetics r p2w that dont means is true.
No thank you, we dont need more ingame monetization and pay to win.
Id rather pay $10 more for the expansion but nobody gets early access.
Oh, lemme tell you as a Destiny 2 player, the moment we allow such things to happen, the paid content looses quality, because the game store is priority then.
I lived through that BS for the last 5 years. Store items and transmogs became more and more impressive, while the stuff from raids looked more and more like re-skinned garbage.
You don’t want to pay 80$/€ for an expansion only for the best set to look inferior to a store set. You really DON’T want that.
That is fundamentally Apples and Oranges
This is an MMO, unlike a normal game that will have a few updates and hopefully a few DLC’s, it has a shelf life of content
An MMO being a persistent and living creation needs one (or both) of the two main funding options to keep the DEDICATED servers running and the teams who non-stop work on it and update it. that means either a paid subscription OR a cash shop that includes pay to win items that frankly ruins the game.
Yes things like the Auction House are woefully broken, but we all know they’ll be fixed cos the team will get to it, compared to some other non-MMO’s that have remained utterly broken beyond release because they release then move onto another project
Now, I am all for the conversation of the basic Expansion pack being free and we then have options to buy premium stuff, but thats actually a different conversation. Either way, you are paying not only to keep the servers up and the staff working on it, but for the expansion, you’re paying for the writing, story, huge workload one of the two teams has done
Keep denying the truth and simping for Blizzard if that makes you happy:)
But it’s worth noting why it happens.
It happens because the game loses popularity. And when there are fewer players, then there’s less money coming from subscriptions as well. So then the business model shifts toward whales and store sales, which is why the store gets expanded and the subscription gets removed (so the game opens up to more players who can check out the store).
WoW has its subscription because the game is popular enough to warrant it. But the moment the popularity dwindles enough, Blizzard will do the same shift in business strategy.
From a consumer point of view though, there is no benefit to paying for a subscription, because you don’t get anything for it.
It’s not the subscription money that guarantees the game’s quality - it’s the popularity.
But it’s a hypothetical discussion, because the subscription isn’t going away because any player wants that. Its business and business alone.
Actually we do by now.
The subscription is basically a rent-fee for high level characters, otherwise you are stuck with the “free trial” of WoW which is limited to lvl 20, alongside limitations of social features.
You are definitely getting something for the 12,99€ per month.
No one seems to have said this, so I’ll mention it.
With the removal of a susbcription and place it to a box purchase, you will then vastly increase the amount of payment fraud from gaming websites, which would sell the codes. This means a company will lose money due to that!
It also will vastly, and I mean in the hundreds of thousands of bot accounts being created by more of the same Turkish/Iranian companies to sell gold even more than they already do.
Also, you’ll have the average Joe who will also dabble in botting. This in turn will just completely screw over the game’s economy and Blizzard being Blizzard will not really do anything for a while because they will publish the metrics that “omg we know have 10+ million players again.”
WoW, at some point will go f2p, but by that time there will be something on the market, which will have pulled away all existing customers.
These are customer retention schemes to get you to keep your subscription each month. They’re not things you get for subscribing.
Same quality servers that Blizzard’s other games use - for free.
…that we already paid for.
Ergo why it’s stupid to have. But alas, it is what it is.
Are you really asking them why don’t they charge you less money after they just added a 90% bonus fee for the box price with an early access, splitting the launch for some extra money? You’re completely out of your mind, their goal is to make as much money as is possible and if they think you will pay it, they will continue to add more and more costs over time to condition you to the practice.
The idea of a successful game removing a subscription when they don’t need to is ridiculous, from their business point of view. They are trying to find more ways to milk you, not less. The game makes more money than ever despite much lower sub numbers than in the old days, and that only encourages them to find more ways to increase profits.
To address World of Warcraft’s financial needs, two approaches could be considered: expanding the player base to leverage economies of scale or introducing value-added features that offer more benefits beyond the standard expansion price.
It’s worth noting that WoW’s cash shop is relatively conservative compared to many other games and includes parental controls to disable it, which I have used for several years. If there were significant concerns about the cash shop, more players might have utilized these options.
With a large development team working on three expansions simultaneously, any substantial reduction in revenue would need to be balanced by compensating for costs elsewhere. This approach is more about managing logistics and budget constraints than corporate greed, given the tighter profit margins in the gaming industry compared to other tech sectors.
Sub + Expansion cost is double charge.
Keep the sub, remove expansion costs.