Lets stop right there shall we. Tons of games out there have had achievement and title awards for YEARS. City of Hero players have been getting/using them since 2004. Warhammer had the Book of Knowledge in Sept 2008, and Blizzard didnt' put it into WoW until Oct 2008. Blizzard did nothing more than steal yet another idea from someone else and make it part of WoW.
Of course. No problem. )) Read further and see where the logic is .....
----------------------
The difference is that the mechanics introduced in WOW this way... works.
Joining BG's from anywhere (while you do open world content quests) and gaining experience from doing PvP Bg's is just one example.
But in WOW these mechanics are mostly well thought out and better integrated. In War these mechanics were one of the reasons the RvR didn't work.
Like the mentioned PVE achievements in WOW Raids are given to SCALED difficulty or the above examples of joining BG's come ... COMBINED with one click dual specs (PVE/PVP spec for example) with gear changer and cross server battlegrounds.
You see the difference? Of course you do now.
It is the integration package that makes it ALL work, not the IDEA, it's the package in which the idea is integrated.
That's why Blizzard takes AGES to develop and polish game mechanics.
That's why it is SO interesting to follow WOW's progress in those detailed design decisions. Epic gear is only a means to an end these days. It is the system that changed from 2004 to 2009.
The more I see these integration packages, the more the WOW and Blizzard hating crowd are up to an extreme wall when seeing what Blizzard will do in the next years.of 1.2 billion yearly revenu.
In the last months I am beginning to think that new game will just blow everything out of the water (as if WOW was not even enough).
I guess even then 1% fools would consider it an epic fail .... ))
Your sure your playing WoW?? Oh wait, thats right, you are playing the new and improved WoW. Oh hey yeah, about that, you are aware that approx. 30% of every patch updates content came from reworked UIs into the core game mechanics? Another 30-40% of those patch updates ideas came from the player community. The last 30-40% are things that will anger a majority of the comminuty and be changed/removed in one or two patches later, these are the ones they come up with on thier own.
This continuous banter from you about how Epic gear being only a means to an end only shows how much you must have actually hated the real WoW before they nerfed it to ulta-easy mode with welfare gear handouts at every corner. The gloating about actually being able to get through certain bosses may have meant something back in BWL, right now it just means your not a pug run.
Personally I think your posts are, as you put it, an epic fail...when you want to put less blind fanboy and more credible facts in them let us know please. Right now though your head is so far in the fantasy clouds that you can't see whats directly in front of you. Yes, we know, your all kinds of happy that Blizz has made WoW babycakes easy mode, we got that from your last 5 posts. Got anything worhtwhile to contribute?
(DISCLAIMER - The use of the word YOU in the above post is not directed at any one person in particular, but towards those who fall into the category itself - there is no personal attack here, neither intentional nor implied.)
Your sure your playing WoW?? Oh wait, thats right, you are playing the new and improved WoW. Oh hey yeah, about that, you are aware that approx. 30% of every patch updates content came from reworked UIs into the core game mechanics? Another 30-40% of those patch updates ideas came from the player community. The last 30-40% are things that will anger a majority of the comminuty and be changed/removed in one or two patches later, these are the ones they come up with on thier own. This continuous banter from you about how Epic gear being only a means to an end only shows how much you must have actually hated the real WoW before they nerfed it to ulta-easy mode with welfare gear handouts at every corner. The gloating about actually being able to get through certain bosses may have meant something back in BWL, right now it just means your not a pug run. Personally I think your posts are, as you put it, an epic fail...when you want to put less blind fanboy and more credible facts in them let us know please. Right now though your head is so far in the fantasy clouds that you can't see whats directly in front of you. Yes, we know, your all kinds of happy that Blizz has made WoW babycakes easy mode, we got that from your last 5 posts. Got anything worhtwhile to contribute?
I do not think you have completed the hard mode encounters in TOC or Ulduar. Please stop stating WoW is easy mode if you have no experience of beating the tougher hard modes. Under 1% of the player-base has successfully defeated the harder hard mdoe encounters.
Lets stop right there shall we. Tons of games out there have had achievement and title awards for YEARS. City of Hero players have been getting/using them since 2004. Warhammer had the Book of Knowledge in Sept 2008, and Blizzard didnt' put it into WoW until Oct 2008. Blizzard did nothing more than steal yet another idea from someone else and make it part of WoW.
Of course. No problem. )) Read further and see where the logic is .....
----------------------
The difference is that the mechanics introduced in WOW this way... works.
Joining BG's from anywhere (while you do open world content quests) and gaining experience from doing PvP Bg's is just one example.
But in WOW these mechanics are mostly well thought out and better integrated. In War these mechanics were one of the reasons the RvR didn't work.
Like the mentioned PVE achievements in WOW Raids are given to SCALED difficulty or the above examples of joining BG's come ... COMBINED with one click dual specs (PVE/PVP spec for example) with gear changer and cross server battlegrounds.
You see the difference? Of course you do now.
It is the integration package that makes it ALL work, not the IDEA, it's the package in which the idea is integrated.
That's why Blizzard takes AGES to develop and polish game mechanics.
That's why it is SO interesting to follow WOW's progress in those detailed design decisions. Epic gear is only a means to an end these days. It is the system that changed from 2004 to 2009.
The more I see these integration packages, the more the WOW and Blizzard hating crowd are up to an extreme wall when seeing what Blizzard will do in the next years.of 1.2 billion yearly revenu.
In the last months I am beginning to think that new game will just blow everything out of the water (as if WOW was not even enough).
I guess even then 1% fools would consider it an epic fail .... ))
Your sure your playing WoW?? Oh wait, thats right, you are playing the new and improved WoW. Oh hey yeah, about that, you are aware that approx. 30% of every patch updates content came from reworked UIs into the core game mechanics? Another 30-40% of those patch updates ideas came from the player community. The last 30-40% are things that will anger a majority of the comminuty and be changed/removed in one or two patches later, these are the ones they come up with on thier own.
This continuous banter from you about how Epic gear being only a means to an end only shows how much you must have actually hated the real WoW before they nerfed it to ulta-easy mode with welfare gear handouts at every corner. The gloating about actually being able to get through certain bosses may have meant something back in BWL, right now it just means your not a pug run.
Personally I think your posts are, as you put it, an epic fail...when you want to put less blind fanboy and more credible facts in them let us know please. Right now though your head is so far in the fantasy clouds that you can't see whats directly in front of you. Yes, we know, your all kinds of happy that Blizz has made WoW babycakes easy mode, we got that from your last 5 posts. Got anything worhtwhile to contribute?
Want me to make you a list on how all BC bosses were harder than all vanilla bosses before AQ40 and Naxx was released?
So from what I understand from this statement and your previous one, no other games have rewards and progression other than gear. You are making it sound like WoW is the only one in this regard which is clearly false. Yes we know that gear is a means to end, it is that way for every single game out there (except perhaps CoH). Achievements, titles, and other vanities have been in other games for years. Look that's great that WoW is expanding the game to allow other rewards but don't make it sound like it is the only game that is doing this. You discredit yourself by doing that.
Even if Zorn may sound fanboyish from time to time, he has a point here.
WoW items are far more based on ilvl now, compared to what they've been back then when only the highest ilvls were epics.
Oh guys, I wonder if you could get epics only from hardmodes, would it matter if blues from the next tier of raiding were better since they had higher ilvl?
Read my last two sentences. Blizzard only makes ideas work within its framework. While a lot come up with ideas and "potential" without taking the time to polish these ideas within its framework (example of War and the experience in BG"s).
What is wrong with Warhammer and experience in scenarios? And what has WoW done differently with their recent addition of adding xp to BG's? When I played Warhammer the system was fine, worked great imo. I can't imagine how WoW could improve upon that. What are some other examples that WoW has taken from other games and improved upon them, not just make it comparable but actually improved upon the idea and system since you are making this claim.
This thread is excellent... to the OP.. I agree 1000%..
I have serious hope for Mortal Online and I hope they fill the void that wow has burned into my soul.. when the good days of WoW left to go to sleep after pressing the easy button.
Several problems. And a simple example makes that clear.
Some basic words: read pls..... in War BG's experience killed the central RvR that was crucial to the game mechanics. Wow didn't have that problem since its limited RvR was concentrated to one zone Wintergrasp which was no central point of focus of the game mechanic. In WOW BG's experience were coupled with dual specs (Pve/PvP), so the join from anywhere coupled with in game gear changer with one button and respec with one button (for dps classes PvP/PVE for example) was well integrated. Add the server clustered BG's in WOW which simply means you have NO waiting times to join a BG. So the mechanism of joining a good PvP fight between some PVE leveling had a good impact in WOW. It destroyed the RvR in War by creating empty RvR zones (too much spread out and everyone was leveling i BG's). And when the people left even the BG's did no longer open (because they weren't clustered). I could go on, but this simply shows WHY a Blizzard game takes forever to publish.
When being condescending you might want to spell out the words and not use text message speak.
Dual spec has nothing to do with experience in battlegrounds, at least in relation to Warhammer. I has a much greater affect in WoW since there is such a disparity in talent builds for pve and pvp. Warhammer not so much so I don't think that is a valid criticism of War, both games have different goals and systems in which it operates. Currently RvR gives greater amount of experience and renown than running scenarios so that is not a valid point either.
The one point you do make that I agree with is the cross server implementation of participation in battlegrounds. It is something that I think Warhammer should put in (although they would have to change some zone locking mechanics).
Still leveling from minute 1 all the way to max level just by pvp is something you cannot do in WoW.
5 years later... I remember at release when we were promised hero CLASSES that were supposed to be hard to obtain, and meaningful. 5 years later, we have one imbalanced as hell hero class that totally sucks. The honor system was a joke, now replaced by the arena system that is more of a joke. Arena is exploitable on multiple levels, class combinations > skill and all that kinda stuff. Some class combinations have absolutely no chance regardless of skill, that is not how a meaningful PvP system that gives rewards as good as these ones should work. Think how pissed people would be if their prescious raids just wouldn't work without 5 of your 20 people being hunters or something dumb like that.
Raids, if you call thm raids... These raids are not raids. I can rant on for years about this. A raid dungeon is not something that you should be able to walk into and clear the place on your first week. I don't care if there is a heroic mode, you shouldn't be able to clear it the first week even on easy mode. What is the point? People are getting so used to being handfed easy epics that it has ruined the MMORPG community, not just in WoW, but now people expect easy mode whiney baby carebear crap in every game. It makes me sick. I would like to see HARD raids, you know like when you kill the mob you are like damn that was a fight, and you feel good about winning. Onyxia and Molten Core were great at release. They were hard. From then on it just got so easy that it was boring.
I don't play this game anymore, it bores me to tears, the only reason I'm posting this is because the millions of subscribers that play this boring game are getting bored, and I don't want to see the other developers shoot for the carebear crowd and try to make a new MMORPG marketed at these types. Gamers don't want their hands held, we want a challenge. WoW kiddies can get free epics from blizzard.
Actually the raid vs arena is a bad example. To be highly succesfull raiding you would have certain class combinations as well. Sure, you don't need certain classes like back in the day but to increase efficiency you would still gather certain ones. Arena is the same way no different.
Dual spec can be a VERY core mechanic in that switch to play PVE / PVP on the fly. it is just another extra integrated mechanic for WOW for classes if they WANT it. The same goes for the in game gear changer. Two buttons to a fight.
Blizzard takes perhaps ideas, but they implement it within the framework of their games. And don't underestimate this game btw. Every itemisation has a reason. Every talent point that can be recuperated or polished will get fixed. And sometimes, well sometimes a real breakthrough comes along with very simple implemented ideas (orignal or not). One of these is the announced clustered dungeon servers in patch 3.3. The impact and implemantation for WOW will be enormous. Add CAT to these leveling dungeon servers with LFG tool of a potential 80.000 people and you have again a winning combo for dungeon crawling group play. QQ's what you want: looking into these ever changing "simple" mechanics is exciting. For every bored QQ 5 year long playing dude, stand 3 more new people who are spoiled to death by Blizz.
I'm not QQing, I'm just debating on your assertions and absolutes.
Cross server dungeons are a good idea I agree. It will be interesting to see how it is implemented with all the potential pitfalls it could have. Maybe you'll actually get that Sunken Temple run for your alt...well that might be too much to ask.
Whether or not you like WoW or not... it's not a fail. If/when it dies which would be a long time from now... looking back on it, you still couldn't say it was a failure.
Several problems. And a simple example makes that clear.
Some basic words: read pls..... in War BG's experience killed the central RvR that was crucial to the game mechanics. Wow didn't have that problem since its limited RvR was concentrated to one zone Wintergrasp which was no central point of focus of the game mechanic. In WOW BG's experience were coupled with dual specs (Pve/PvP), so the join from anywhere coupled with in game gear changer with one button and respec with one button (for dps classes PvP/PVE for example) was well integrated. Add the server clustered BG's in WOW which simply means you have NO waiting times to join a BG. So the mechanism of joining a good PvP fight between some PVE leveling had a good impact in WOW. It destroyed the RvR in War by creating empty RvR zones (too much spread out and everyone was leveling i BG's). And when the people left even the BG's did no longer open (because they weren't clustered). I could go on, but this simply shows WHY a Blizzard game takes forever to publish. The "think tanks" in Blizzard HQ's don't copy per se, but they integrate it within the game mechanics. That's why WOW succeeds in having that 80% marketshare of paid subs MMO's. And that's why the OP has been playing it for 5 years and doesn't see his one line opinion is worthless to those other millions who play it ... now.
I'm not sure how to get thru the barrier on this guys head, so many assumptions, so many based off a fundamentally wrong preconceived notion.
First off, WAR didn't have BGs, WoW has BGs. Warhammer had scenarios, these, when won by a side created a shift in that sides bonuses, WoWs BGs only provide instanced PvP minigames - they have NO effect on the world (except for Wintergrasp, which is a BG but allows you to access a special dungeon instance if you control it). Oh and just a point of fact, WoW does not have RvR, they have PvP - there are no world Realm Vs Realm aspects to any content in WoW. The BGs and Arenas do not effect the overall game as the content of DAoC, WAR, and now Aion does.
As for the clustering of the servers to eliminate the wait in the WoW BGs, that is exactly why they did it. For the longest time after the BGs were implemented, the lack of balance between sides on a particular server made for extremely long wait times on whichever side had the highest pop. As a result of this, the side with the highest pop would have the lowest PvP points as they waited hours for each match, the side with the lowest pop had back to back matches. By listening to the literally hundreds of thousands of complaints on thier forums, Blizzard implemented the server clustering system to help eliminate the need for single server side balancing.
Recently, because the players have become to lazy to dedicate to either PvP or PvE, Blizzard has implemented two other changes. The first is a dual spec system. This again has been a long asked for system by the players in order to eliminate the need to constantly respec your character to meet the needs of your guild runs, or to switch between PvE and PvP content. (we all know nobody actually plays team spec when they PvP in WoW, its everyman for themselves mode when your in BGs - arenas are different though). The second change was again, at the request of literally hundreds of thousands of posts on the forums, and that was to allow instant access to the BGs from anyplace. By doing this they also free up the PvP side of the game to the PvE players. A PvE player no longer has to decide if they want to go out and quest/farm OR PvP, they can now do both.
You are correct in one thing though, Blizz doesn't do any of this fast, it takes time to figure out how to make someone elses ideas work within thier game. And they dont' 100% copy anyones ideas, that would be illegal - they do reverse engineering, and rebuild it within thier games confines. Its still someone elses idea, just reworked to fit thier game.
Lastly, stop exaggerating without data please. WoW does NOT control 80% of the market. I know you would like to think it does, but your wrong. I also can see you would like everyone else to believe it does, but again...
Oh and for the record, I played WoW from BETA on until the 5th of this month when I finally cancelled my subs. I've been in 4 top raiding guilds and accomplished pretty much everything but the newest content (my last guild has left to play other games and I just dont feel like looking for the 5th one anymore or running this one myself).
(DISCLAIMER - The use of the word YOU in the above post is not directed at any one person in particular, but towards those who fall into the category itself - there is no personal attack here, neither intentional nor implied.)
Gamers don't want their hands held, we want a challenge. WoW kiddies can get free epics from blizzard.
QFT, exactly how I feel and why I quit WoW. It was no longer possible to distinguish player skill (albeit it wasnt that great before) by looking at their gear. Everything is too easy to obtain as the game progresses.
Oh, and WoW definitely was a success by Blizzard and I commend them for it but its no longer my cup of tea. More power to you guys who still find enjoyment and maybe even that hint of challenge while playing the game.
Want me to make you a list on how all BC bosses were harder than all vanilla bosses before AQ40 and Naxx was released?
I don't see how the bosses could be any harder in vanilla WoW, when the game didn't even have a raid interface at the time. Once the custom made raid frames became a common place for raiders, the raid content became progressively harder.
Even today, the default UI raid frames are pretty generic. I doubt anyone in a high rank raid guild is using them (perhaps a DPS class that can't remove debuffs can live without raid frames). In the history of WoW's UI, they've been carbon copying the best player made addons available.
I would have expected from Blizzard to totally revamp their interface and include all the addons that they themselves take for granted when designing the raid encounters. Surprisingly enough, they never did that. Instead, they expect players to hunt down third party sites in order to make the raid sub-game functional. And before you start an argument about how it's possible to play without addons, I'm curious to know how many of you actually do it.
.... Recently, because the players have become to lazy to dedicate to either PvP or PvE, Blizzard has implemented two other changes. The first is a dual spec system. This again has been a long asked for system by the players in order to eliminate the need to constantly respec your character to meet the needs of your guild runs, or to switch between PvE and PvP content. (we all know nobody actually plays team spec when they PvP in WoW, its everyman for themselves mode when your in BGs - arenas are different though). The second change was again, at the request of literally hundreds of thousands of posts on the forums, and that was to allow instant access to the BGs from anyplace. By doing this they also free up the PvP side of the game to the PvE players. A PvE player no longer has to decide if they want to go out and quest/farm OR PvP, they can now do both. ....
Dual spec was a blessing for pure raiders. A purely raid specced healer or tank couldn't do much of anything outside the raid instances without respeccing to a less painful spec. The dual specs and the change in +spellpower +healing were things that brought healer fun outside raids closer to what DPS classes had been enjoying all along. The change was not directly PvE to PvP related, although it could facilitate that aspect as well.
WOW isn't the only epic fail mmo. WOW just made it popular to play a game that focuses on giving you imaginary "things," where the more things you have the better you are. Now all the mmos that seem to come out emphasize getting cool things to drape on your character while content, story, lore, balance, you name it take a back seat. This isn't the type of mmo I wanted to play when I started playing WoW back in 2004...when exploring Darkshore, Stranglethorn Vale, etc was itself epic. Did anyone care about "things" you were accumulating back then? Doubt it. Now every time a new mmo comes out we have a generation of players asking: How's endgame? How are the raids? Is there lots of cool uber looking gear? Hardly anyone asks: Is the world immersive? Is there an underlying storyline driving my character's action forward? Yeah...most post-WOW mmos suck, not just WOW.
I completely agree with you!! And the OP!! So far, that's the question I even caught myself asking, but I've come to the point of not caring about Endgame, and just playing MMOs that I find fun, and right now, I'm completely ADDICTED to Champions Online. Each area has a story going on, and they're just fun to look at and explore. I also bought Aion already, but I'm not too sure if I wanna play it now after playing the beta, it just seemed WAAY too much like WoW and each area is not really capturing to me, a bit too restrictive I guess in where you can go or fly... so I dunno yet. I'll play it more when it comes out and make a better judgement then.
Champions has a great foundation to easily add expansions to, like Villians, more areas, etc. So I have high hopes for this to happen.
As for a game that I'm VERY excited for that's said to have an immersive world and story as major points is Star Wars TOR. I can't say enough how excited I am to see if this game will fix something that has been sorely missed in recent MMO's.
As far as WoW goes, I'm a 4 year player that quit playing about 3 months ago for all the reasons already stated in these 2 posts among others. I have NEVER grinded Arenas... I tried them when they first came out, and hated every second I was in them, again, for all the reasons already said. lol Gear > Skill, unbalanced teams etc.
Dont play dumb mate, you seen those figures posted before here, and you know they come from the offical ncsoft q2 figures.
Then it sure will be no problem top produce the link where it states they have 3.5 M subs too.
I want the NCsoft links that produce the confirmed numbers of 3.5 M subs please.
You simply can't.
But back on track: be sure a hell I will produce the Xfire links in the upcoming months. Because here in the west we HAVE the tools to view player atcivity.
Show me a post where I claim Aion has 3.5 million players?
im just quoting you for YOUR error in server numbers and please bore me with your xfire stats because i cant give a freaking shit how many western people will play Aion.
Asia will keep Aion up for a long time so even if the west have 2 servers people can fully enjoy it.
Comments
Zorn, I'm waiting for your explaination about WoW being the only game that doesn't have gear and level progression.
Heh, that is strange. Gear and level progression is what WoW is all about.
Of course. No problem.
)) Read further and see where the logic is .....
----------------------
The difference is that the mechanics introduced in WOW this way... works.
Joining BG's from anywhere (while you do open world content quests) and gaining experience from doing PvP Bg's is just one example.
But in WOW these mechanics are mostly well thought out and better integrated. In War these mechanics were one of the reasons the RvR didn't work.
Like the mentioned PVE achievements in WOW Raids are given to SCALED difficulty or the above examples of joining BG's come ... COMBINED with one click dual specs (PVE/PVP spec for example) with gear changer and cross server battlegrounds.
You see the difference? Of course you do now.
It is the integration package that makes it ALL work, not the IDEA, it's the package in which the idea is integrated.
That's why Blizzard takes AGES to develop and polish game mechanics.
That's why it is SO interesting to follow WOW's progress in those detailed design decisions. Epic gear is only a means to an end these days. It is the system that changed from 2004 to 2009.
The more I see these integration packages, the more the WOW and Blizzard hating crowd are up to an extreme wall when seeing what Blizzard will do in the next years.of 1.2 billion yearly revenu.
In the last months I am beginning to think that new game will just blow everything out of the water (as if WOW was not even enough).
I guess even then 1% fools would consider it an epic fail ....
))
Your sure your playing WoW?? Oh wait, thats right, you are playing the new and improved WoW. Oh hey yeah, about that, you are aware that approx. 30% of every patch updates content came from reworked UIs into the core game mechanics? Another 30-40% of those patch updates ideas came from the player community. The last 30-40% are things that will anger a majority of the comminuty and be changed/removed in one or two patches later, these are the ones they come up with on thier own.
This continuous banter from you about how Epic gear being only a means to an end only shows how much you must have actually hated the real WoW before they nerfed it to ulta-easy mode with welfare gear handouts at every corner. The gloating about actually being able to get through certain bosses may have meant something back in BWL, right now it just means your not a pug run.
Personally I think your posts are, as you put it, an epic fail...when you want to put less blind fanboy and more credible facts in them let us know please. Right now though your head is so far in the fantasy clouds that you can't see whats directly in front of you. Yes, we know, your all kinds of happy that Blizz has made WoW babycakes easy mode, we got that from your last 5 posts. Got anything worhtwhile to contribute?
(DISCLAIMER - The use of the word YOU in the above post is not directed at any one person in particular, but towards those who fall into the category itself - there is no personal attack here, neither intentional nor implied.)
That Guild Wars 2 login screen knocked up my wife. Must be the second coming!
I do not think you have completed the hard mode encounters in TOC or Ulduar. Please stop stating WoW is easy mode if you have no experience of beating the tougher hard modes. Under 1% of the player-base has successfully defeated the harder hard mdoe encounters.
Of course. No problem.
)) Read further and see where the logic is .....
----------------------
The difference is that the mechanics introduced in WOW this way... works.
Joining BG's from anywhere (while you do open world content quests) and gaining experience from doing PvP Bg's is just one example.
But in WOW these mechanics are mostly well thought out and better integrated. In War these mechanics were one of the reasons the RvR didn't work.
Like the mentioned PVE achievements in WOW Raids are given to SCALED difficulty or the above examples of joining BG's come ... COMBINED with one click dual specs (PVE/PVP spec for example) with gear changer and cross server battlegrounds.
You see the difference? Of course you do now.
It is the integration package that makes it ALL work, not the IDEA, it's the package in which the idea is integrated.
That's why Blizzard takes AGES to develop and polish game mechanics.
That's why it is SO interesting to follow WOW's progress in those detailed design decisions. Epic gear is only a means to an end these days. It is the system that changed from 2004 to 2009.
The more I see these integration packages, the more the WOW and Blizzard hating crowd are up to an extreme wall when seeing what Blizzard will do in the next years.of 1.2 billion yearly revenu.
In the last months I am beginning to think that new game will just blow everything out of the water (as if WOW was not even enough).
I guess even then 1% fools would consider it an epic fail ....
))
Your sure your playing WoW?? Oh wait, thats right, you are playing the new and improved WoW. Oh hey yeah, about that, you are aware that approx. 30% of every patch updates content came from reworked UIs into the core game mechanics? Another 30-40% of those patch updates ideas came from the player community. The last 30-40% are things that will anger a majority of the comminuty and be changed/removed in one or two patches later, these are the ones they come up with on thier own.
This continuous banter from you about how Epic gear being only a means to an end only shows how much you must have actually hated the real WoW before they nerfed it to ulta-easy mode with welfare gear handouts at every corner. The gloating about actually being able to get through certain bosses may have meant something back in BWL, right now it just means your not a pug run.
Personally I think your posts are, as you put it, an epic fail...when you want to put less blind fanboy and more credible facts in them let us know please. Right now though your head is so far in the fantasy clouds that you can't see whats directly in front of you. Yes, we know, your all kinds of happy that Blizz has made WoW babycakes easy mode, we got that from your last 5 posts. Got anything worhtwhile to contribute?
Want me to make you a list on how all BC bosses were harder than all vanilla bosses before AQ40 and Naxx was released?
WoW is indeed an epic failure.
It just happens to be the best epic failure available atm.
Don't like it? Bugger off.
Still waiting for your Holy Grail MMORPG? Interesting...
So from what I understand from this statement and your previous one, no other games have rewards and progression other than gear. You are making it sound like WoW is the only one in this regard which is clearly false. Yes we know that gear is a means to end, it is that way for every single game out there (except perhaps CoH). Achievements, titles, and other vanities have been in other games for years. Look that's great that WoW is expanding the game to allow other rewards but don't make it sound like it is the only game that is doing this. You discredit yourself by doing that.
Even if Zorn may sound fanboyish from time to time, he has a point here.
WoW items are far more based on ilvl now, compared to what they've been back then when only the highest ilvls were epics.
Oh guys, I wonder if you could get epics only from hardmodes, would it matter if blues from the next tier of raiding were better since they had higher ilvl?
What is wrong with Warhammer and experience in scenarios? And what has WoW done differently with their recent addition of adding xp to BG's? When I played Warhammer the system was fine, worked great imo. I can't imagine how WoW could improve upon that. What are some other examples that WoW has taken from other games and improved upon them, not just make it comparable but actually improved upon the idea and system since you are making this claim.
This thread is excellent... to the OP.. I agree 1000%..
I have serious hope for Mortal Online and I hope they fill the void that wow has burned into my soul.. when the good days of WoW left to go to sleep after pressing the easy button.
When being condescending you might want to spell out the words and not use text message speak.
Dual spec has nothing to do with experience in battlegrounds, at least in relation to Warhammer. I has a much greater affect in WoW since there is such a disparity in talent builds for pve and pvp. Warhammer not so much so I don't think that is a valid criticism of War, both games have different goals and systems in which it operates. Currently RvR gives greater amount of experience and renown than running scenarios so that is not a valid point either.
The one point you do make that I agree with is the cross server implementation of participation in battlegrounds. It is something that I think Warhammer should put in (although they would have to change some zone locking mechanics).
Still leveling from minute 1 all the way to max level just by pvp is something you cannot do in WoW.
Fuck your QQ. Stop saying that, fucking annoying.
Actually the raid vs arena is a bad example. To be highly succesfull raiding you would have certain class combinations as well. Sure, you don't need certain classes like back in the day but to increase efficiency you would still gather certain ones. Arena is the same way no different.
I'm not QQing, I'm just debating on your assertions and absolutes.
Cross server dungeons are a good idea I agree. It will be interesting to see how it is implemented with all the potential pitfalls it could have. Maybe you'll actually get that Sunken Temple run for your alt...well that might be too much to ask.
Whether or not you like WoW or not... it's not a fail. If/when it dies which would be a long time from now... looking back on it, you still couldn't say it was a failure.
I'm not sure how to get thru the barrier on this guys head, so many assumptions, so many based off a fundamentally wrong preconceived notion.
First off, WAR didn't have BGs, WoW has BGs. Warhammer had scenarios, these, when won by a side created a shift in that sides bonuses, WoWs BGs only provide instanced PvP minigames - they have NO effect on the world (except for Wintergrasp, which is a BG but allows you to access a special dungeon instance if you control it). Oh and just a point of fact, WoW does not have RvR, they have PvP - there are no world Realm Vs Realm aspects to any content in WoW. The BGs and Arenas do not effect the overall game as the content of DAoC, WAR, and now Aion does.
As for the clustering of the servers to eliminate the wait in the WoW BGs, that is exactly why they did it. For the longest time after the BGs were implemented, the lack of balance between sides on a particular server made for extremely long wait times on whichever side had the highest pop. As a result of this, the side with the highest pop would have the lowest PvP points as they waited hours for each match, the side with the lowest pop had back to back matches. By listening to the literally hundreds of thousands of complaints on thier forums, Blizzard implemented the server clustering system to help eliminate the need for single server side balancing.
Recently, because the players have become to lazy to dedicate to either PvP or PvE, Blizzard has implemented two other changes. The first is a dual spec system. This again has been a long asked for system by the players in order to eliminate the need to constantly respec your character to meet the needs of your guild runs, or to switch between PvE and PvP content. (we all know nobody actually plays team spec when they PvP in WoW, its everyman for themselves mode when your in BGs - arenas are different though). The second change was again, at the request of literally hundreds of thousands of posts on the forums, and that was to allow instant access to the BGs from anyplace. By doing this they also free up the PvP side of the game to the PvE players. A PvE player no longer has to decide if they want to go out and quest/farm OR PvP, they can now do both.
You are correct in one thing though, Blizz doesn't do any of this fast, it takes time to figure out how to make someone elses ideas work within thier game. And they dont' 100% copy anyones ideas, that would be illegal - they do reverse engineering, and rebuild it within thier games confines. Its still someone elses idea, just reworked to fit thier game.
Lastly, stop exaggerating without data please. WoW does NOT control 80% of the market. I know you would like to think it does, but your wrong. I also can see you would like everyone else to believe it does, but again...
http://users.telenet.be/mmodata/Charts/MarketShareMMOG.png
Oh and for the record, I played WoW from BETA on until the 5th of this month when I finally cancelled my subs. I've been in 4 top raiding guilds and accomplished pretty much everything but the newest content (my last guild has left to play other games and I just dont feel like looking for the 5th one anymore or running this one myself).
(DISCLAIMER - The use of the word YOU in the above post is not directed at any one person in particular, but towards those who fall into the category itself - there is no personal attack here, neither intentional nor implied.)
QFT, exactly how I feel and why I quit WoW. It was no longer possible to distinguish player skill (albeit it wasnt that great before) by looking at their gear. Everything is too easy to obtain as the game progresses.
Oh, and WoW definitely was a success by Blizzard and I commend them for it but its no longer my cup of tea. More power to you guys who still find enjoyment and maybe even that hint of challenge while playing the game.
Playing: EVE Online
Old figures, try the more recent quarter report and you see 43 korean, 154 chinese, 19 taiwanese and 9 japanese servers.
But then you already knew that but that means you have to admit that AIOn is growing.
You only use figures if it works your way.
Want me to make you a list on how all BC bosses were harder than all vanilla bosses before AQ40 and Naxx was released?
I don't see how the bosses could be any harder in vanilla WoW, when the game didn't even have a raid interface at the time. Once the custom made raid frames became a common place for raiders, the raid content became progressively harder.
Even today, the default UI raid frames are pretty generic. I doubt anyone in a high rank raid guild is using them (perhaps a DPS class that can't remove debuffs can live without raid frames). In the history of WoW's UI, they've been carbon copying the best player made addons available.
I would have expected from Blizzard to totally revamp their interface and include all the addons that they themselves take for granted when designing the raid encounters. Surprisingly enough, they never did that. Instead, they expect players to hunt down third party sites in order to make the raid sub-game functional. And before you start an argument about how it's possible to play without addons, I'm curious to know how many of you actually do it.
Dont play dumb mate, you seen those figures posted before here, and you know they come from the offical ncsoft q2 figures.
And if its only about the west why post Aion figures at all?
1 more week then you can get a booner becasue Aion wont be even close to your precious WoW numbers
Dual spec was a blessing for pure raiders. A purely raid specced healer or tank couldn't do much of anything outside the raid instances without respeccing to a less painful spec. The dual specs and the change in +spellpower +healing were things that brought healer fun outside raids closer to what DPS classes had been enjoying all along. The change was not directly PvE to PvP related, although it could facilitate that aspect as well.
I completely agree with you!! And the OP!! So far, that's the question I even caught myself asking, but I've come to the point of not caring about Endgame, and just playing MMOs that I find fun, and right now, I'm completely ADDICTED to Champions Online. Each area has a story going on, and they're just fun to look at and explore. I also bought Aion already, but I'm not too sure if I wanna play it now after playing the beta, it just seemed WAAY too much like WoW and each area is not really capturing to me, a bit too restrictive I guess in where you can go or fly... so I dunno yet. I'll play it more when it comes out and make a better judgement then.
Champions has a great foundation to easily add expansions to, like Villians, more areas, etc. So I have high hopes for this to happen.
As for a game that I'm VERY excited for that's said to have an immersive world and story as major points is Star Wars TOR. I can't say enough how excited I am to see if this game will fix something that has been sorely missed in recent MMO's.
As far as WoW goes, I'm a 4 year player that quit playing about 3 months ago for all the reasons already stated in these 2 posts among others. I have NEVER grinded Arenas... I tried them when they first came out, and hated every second I was in them, again, for all the reasons already said. lol Gear > Skill, unbalanced teams etc.
One of the few things that we don't need official links and game announcements, since we can check them on our own are the number of servers.
Then it sure will be no problem top produce the link where it states they have 3.5 M subs too.
I want the NCsoft links that produce the confirmed numbers of 3.5 M subs please.
You simply can't.
But back on track: be sure a hell I will produce the Xfire links in the upcoming months. Because here in the west we HAVE the tools to view player atcivity.
Show me a post where I claim Aion has 3.5 million players?
im just quoting you for YOUR error in server numbers and please bore me with your xfire stats because i cant give a freaking shit how many western people will play Aion.
Asia will keep Aion up for a long time so even if the west have 2 servers people can fully enjoy it.