I doubt it’d be that much work. For level requirements, that’s just overwriting a number in a database. 7.3.5 had shown that it’s logistically possible - they had to change the required level for pretty much all lvl 10-90 quests. Professions required much more work on the split than they would with level squish - they’d just change at which level you can start which branch.
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It’s still a pointless change.
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Every time there is any squish there are always some unforeseen issues. They tend to get ironed out eventually.
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There’s still many other better options that are far less intrusive.
I fear that a squish would not really improve the levelling experience. However, I’m curious, what would yous suggest?
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That too. It would change nothing. It’s only a visual change.
Both you and Blizzard asked for this, so brace yourself… it’s going to be a long read.
My views on how you can fix leveling would start with bringing back the old talent system (but revamped with updated talents that are relevant to today’s game and is larger than 51-points) that gives 1 talent point every level. This system gave players a lot of choice. Do not mistake me saying that for claiming that there was no Meta; of course there was, but there is always going to be an optimal spec, regardless of what system you implement.
What I love about the Original talent system is that you could build your character however you wanted. Hybrid classes were literally just that. Even as a warrior I could choose to go arms but still put 20 or so points in to protection so that i would become much sturdier than any other warrior that chose to go pure Arms because I would have Last Stand …as ARMS! Can you believe that?! It was amazing! It may not have been optimal, but it was cool! and… It was my choice to do so.
This is what this game used to be so much about: the choice and the freedom to do whatever you wished. To truly build your character the way you wanted and to set yourself apart from other players of the same class.
The next thing that I would want are Class quests that reward a strong blue item that can not upgrade in quality. Maybe even make it epic, the point here being that these quests reward are something to look forward to.
Something that would last you for a while, items such as Whirlwind Axe for Warriors back in the day. Something that is obtained through hard work from a long quest chain that took you all over the place. A reward completely guaranteed and outside of the bitterness of RNG.
This – for all classes every 10 or 20 levels starting at lv10 (lv-10 being an introduction class quest similar to your first totem quest as a shaman or defensive stance for warriors up to lv120 with a final class quest at lv120 that gives you a weapon cosmetic for each spec that is unique to your class. Consider it something similar to Herritage armor; A reward for reaching max level but it’s for weapon-slots only and class-specific instead of race-specific.
You could even make the lower-level class quests reward an ability. Again the prime example being the Stance quests for Warriors, Totems for Shamans or Forms for Druids. Having to unlock these truly made you feel like you deserved these abilities and like you were truly a druid, warrior or shaman in training.
Next up they should bring back RPG elements such as spell ranks and actually having to go to a Class Trainer to learn new abilities and skills. While this may seem tideous at first it gives you a reason to visit a city aside for just the auction house and it really gives a purpose to capital cities once again aside for the economic aspect of the game (e.g. the AH).
Every adventurer has to come back to base camp every once in a while to re-stock on supplies, after all!
I also propose an experience-gain revamp. Currently the amount of experience that is required to gain a level ramps up the higher level you become, while this ís logical I do feel that this is one of the reasons why people hate leveling so much: At a certain level it starts to become tóo tideous and time consuming especially if you are forced to level in a zone you dislike (more on this later).
Blizzard should figure out a specific number of quests that you need to complete to gain a level. Currently at level 20 you require 44K experience to level up to level 21 with every quest giving around 4K experience which means that you need to do about 11 quests. I do feel that 11 is too little seeing as how this doesn’t take in to account experience gained from mob kills, looting chests, killing rares or deliver-quests but this is just an example.
Make it so that players have a rough idea on how long each level takes. As for the previous example of lv20 to lv21 it’s about 15-20 minutes. I would suggest around 40 minutes per level past level 20 as level 1 to 20 is pretty much considered the “trial” / “learning” period. It would line up perfectly with receiving your first mount as well.
To go along with the Experience-gain changes I would also like to see them increase the damage that mobs deal. Right now I can pull 10 mobs on a fresh allied race without heirlooms and be out-healed just from victory rush because I am able to kill a single mob within 3-4 seconds without them actually dealing any real damage to me. So increase their damage and health pool to the point that they actually pose a threat to me and that I have to be at least somewhat careful with how much I pull.
I want to be afraid!!
Alongside this I want to have them buff the damage and health of rare mobs even further. Rare mobs are supposed to be mini-bosses and right now they’re complete pushovers that grant you free loot. Completely undeserved.
With normal and rare mobs out of the way, I want to see Elite monsters back in the open world. It gives the world a sense of real danger; enemies that I would never be able to defeat alone and for which I need to group up with other players for. This would of course also mean giving us back 3-5 player Elite quests that would grant significantly more experience than regular quests and would have some cooler rewards.
Lastly, I want them to remove the minimum level requirement of all outdoor zones past level 20 (So every zone except for starter-zones such as; Durotar, Elwynn Forest, Tirisfal Glades, Mulgore, Dun Morogh, etc…)
The reason that I want this is because I want full control and complete freedom to decide where and how I want to level up my characters. Not only that, it would also fit incredibly well with Allied races.
Imagine the following: Creating your Dark Iron Dwarf for the first time and your first leveling zone being Searing Gorge. Learning more about the history of the race that you are playing through the first zones that you choose to level through or how about creating a Zandalari and choosing for being sent to Stranglethorn Vale just like how the Trolls of Yojamba Isle first were back in Vanilla: To deal with the threat in Zul’gurub.
These are the main changes that I would want to see instead of some random level squish that will not change anything relevant anyway other than the number on my portrait.
This is not to say that this is all that should be improved upon; All of the above would only be a very good start.
In the future after these changes were to be implemented I would also like to see a complete Profession system revamp so that those too can be utilized while leveling.
So why do people currently hate leveling? It’s uneventful, mind-numbing and boring.
Everyone that I have discussed or argued with in these threads about this topic have one thing in common with each other and that is that they all say “I want to say “DING!” and have it mean something again.”, but they forget the most important thing: The reason why that it meant so much back in the day when you leveled up was because you survived in a dangerous world full of adventure.
This is an MMORPG.
I want to have adventures in dark forests and deep caverns.
I want to group up with players and make friends because we managed to make our way through the sludge fen in The Barrens together. Those darn Venture Co. goblins! So much aggro!
I want to have that true sense of progression: not just progressing in a linear fashion like how Blizzard seems to want us to; but to progress in any direction that I wish.
I want to find my own place in this dangerous world.
You should all read https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-gb/start. It’s the starting page for World of Warcraft.
“Choose your destiny in a boundless realm.”
None of what I just wrote is even remotely close to impossible to achieve.
All it requires is for Blizzard to understand and make the decision to proceed.
I’m sorry that this was such a long post.
Just know that it all stems from a place of great passion and love for this game and franchise that I have played and been a part of for over literally half my life.
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I’ll be lazy and just copy/paste what I’ve written in another post. ![:grin:](https://d1bg94bbsh66ji.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/grin.png?v=6" ":grin:")
I don’t think we need a level squish but even then that alone wouldn’t solve the boring quest chains, the redundant quests or side quests that sometimes are hard to distinguish from actual storylines, the inconsistency in quests between expansions, the rewards that nowadays don’t compete with heirlooms, the way you interact with NPCs and the annoying talking head dialogs that cover the screen while in action, the cutscenes that you are forced to see over and over again without a built-in option in-game to disable it and many other things that just destroy the experience, at least for me.
More to the point, I don’t think that new spells or talents should be the reward for a new level because it seems like it wouldn’t scale well so I think that a better way to do this is by adding some special perk on rewards you get from quests that make your leveling experience better and more fun, it can be an active/ passive ability on gear where each quest reward would give you a different kind of perk depends on the item, maybe even depending on the quest, class and/or spec, I think that they should encourage people to use rewards they get from quests and maybe then heirlooms can be changed to be an addition to leveling gear and not as a replacement, so say you get a chest piece from a quest, you can then use heirloom item for said chest to upgrade it to give you the extra experience buff and maybe more but the point is the item that you got from the quest sticks with you for as long as you want (again, strictly for leveling) until you find another chest with a different perk that you like more and replace it.
In addition, I’d want to see a system where items you get from quests can be improved by professions so say I got a gun from a quest and I’ve picked up engineering, could be awesome if I could use it to modify the gun and I don’t mean adding a scope to it but upgrade the same item to a better quality or something.
I’d love to have a character history for quests that I’ve done and maybe even see quests that I haven’t done in an area, I know we have Wholly, this isn’t the point, I want for something like this to be built-in.
I’d love to click on NPCs and read about their background whether it’s a friendly or an hostile one in a dungeon or the open world, maybe it’s something they can add to the journal.
I want a world where things I do have an impact on my character, I want the world to feel more integrated and cohesive so I think that revamping the questing experience is more important than a level squish but maybe it goes hand in hand and it might be required.
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Level squish and old style talent tree please.
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personally i would love a level squish for the same reason we get stat squish, bring the numbers down a bit for a new player or existing players thinking about leveling from 1-120 does seem a lot even if its rather quick over all, bringing the numbers down even if the leveling speed is roughly the same would feel better i believe, and over all it would not have any effect on what we do on max level so i see no reason not to do it, max level will still be max level
In my humble opinion, this game is too old for this kind of change.
So if we looking further I doubt next expansion will have any changes in 2020, and in 2022 game will be 18 years old ! So my quess to retire WOW and make WOW 2, and I know its a stretch but still.
So is the reintroduction of old “talent trees” you campaign so much for. Getting a talent point was exciting maybe for the first char, when you did not knew it’s a pointless bonus you will barely notice and only mattered when you actually unlocked some ability (which you now gain anyway, if it survived the sountless expansions).
The game needs to bring new players. These small exciting things may help them to stay in game instead of getting bored in leveling their alts.
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so in place of turning 120 to 60 you suggest a MAJOR change to the talent system ?
yes please blizzard give me my +1 crit talent where I can put 5 points in to fill up this is so exiting …
the current talent system is much superior and much more choice friendly then that old crap.
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While i do think the lvl squish is good for the overall health of the game, just like the two last ilvl squish were , and that current talents offer more meaningful choices (you needed between 11 & 21 talents points to obtain an ability back in the days right?), I do agree with the lack of risk while leveling.
Although i did die a lot leveling my demo lock, it was mostly because i ended up taking more than i could take down, but it was meaningful to me to push my caracter to the brink of what he could do.
There’s something i’d like to discuss though : could a “Heroic lvling mode” work in wow ?
Something along the lines of increased aggro range, New abilities, +50% hp, +100% dmg and +200~300% xp, all scaling with party size.
I don’t know if the numbers add up to something coherent but the goal would be to make the content harder, taking X% more time to do yet rewarding X% more xp and offering the option to make lvling as a party far more epic than solo.
Just like WM one could opt in & opt out but not on the spot.
How does that sound ?
I don’t think it would mess up that much to be honest.
the level is just a number, if they reduce the max levels to 60, they just need to halve everything else…
- for example allied races would start at level 10 (previously lvl 20)
- Death Knights would start at lvl 29 (previously lvl 58)
- Demon Hunters would start at 35 (previously lvl 70)
- Professions wouldn’t change, because they have their own levels
- Item levels are their own thing too, so they wouldn’t change either, besides, we had an Item level squish resently, and it didn’t change that much
- Gear stats don’t have to change either, because level is just a number, as well as the gear stats, these numbers are their own thing as well
- Free-to-Play limits would just be halved, that’s it
Also about the spells and talents, they would be way closer to each other, reducing the downtime, where you do not learn anything… at the moment you have a lot of downtimes, because you level up, but nothing changes, due to the linear growth at leveling , the stats, barely change… I leveled up a void elf recently, and the stats from 60 to 70 barely changed, if they changed at all… at level 70 I was still wearing level 58 gear, because the gear doesn’t become better… due to the stat and item level squishes… this makes the levels between 60 and 70 useless
so a level squish would be a really good Idea
also even if it would not be faster, it would look way better, due to as you said new skills more often, things would feel more fluid, when you gain something, as it is now the levels between 60 to 80 is just horrid, nothing happens, gear is usless, it just takes time for no apparent reason at all, but if you notice you hit 60 you know you are getting closer to the finish, what would make things look way better, it might be an artificial experience, but it feels that you do getting closer to max level, where not the feeling jsut aint there.
also if the cap the hole world at max level or atleast to legion level, where on only bfa would be higher, there would be more options on what to level and where, heck they could after that put in dailies, incursions/Assults, in everyother zone in game so people would go and visit them, no FP no problem a portal opens for that zone, then you are there, some might even end up in there questing after it, this would most likely be the easiest way to do the item level squish, whitout making to many zones redundant.
It allows you to decide for yourself what stats that you want to have. If i want to main Crit, i’d pick the crit talents. If you want less crit but prefer faster attack speed then pick the 5% haste instead.
So yes, you can try to argue that “1% stat increase is insignificant”, but it’s actually not. It’s also much more interesting that any of the abilities currently in my talent tree because my talent tree only gives me abilities that should actually be baseline which means that rather than adding to my class and making me stronger it’s only making me how warrior is just normally supposed to be.
The best part about a lvl squish would be that skills would be unlocked faster.
Shamans get their mobility at 80… FREAKING EIGHTY!! That is so mental.
And even then it’s just a quick snare remove, 1min cd, and you can instantly be rooted or stunned again.
So more important than a lvl squish would be to redesign all class skills so that they would all have some aoe/mobility/cc/anti cc skills as soon as lvl 15-20 when you get into BG/LFD. And than gradually allow players to improve and branch out the skills further, every (on a current scale) 10-15 levels so that you would still look forward to unlocking new properties in augmenting your toolkit further.
But for the love of god, give people those basic mobility/aoe skills SOONER.
Warriors aoe lvl 40 jesus christ…
I’m somewhat up for a squish if it makes levelling quicker.
If its the same experience but takes twice as long to go up a level and feel any sense of reward then it would be a pointless downgrade.
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Has nothing to do with a level squish.
You get something at 80 now? you would get it at 40 - after having done as many hours and things to get to 40 as you do to get to 80 now.
As I said elsewhere: if you really want a level squish, just write an addon to display all level numbers as half of what they are. Job done.
EVERYTHING ELSE that people are talking about is the kind of unthinking feverish hopefulness that breaks out every time Blizzard pre-announces a change. People get so hyped, because they think their wishes are going to come true. Why? they never have before.