Not quite. It falls more in line with the discussion that Guns do not kill People, People kill People.
GearScore is the Gun.
Aside from issues where people have complained about it being off (which they are continuously working on), many of the complaints have actually about the "community" and how it is relying on GS as the sum all of a person's character.
Sure, there are people that do not use GS like that... add them to your friend list, you'll still have plenty of room for others.
For the rest, the ignore list is not large enough...
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Not quite. It falls more in line with the discussion that Guns do not kill People, People kill People.
GearScore is the Gun.
Aside from issues where people have complained about it being off (which they are continuously working on), many of the complaints have actually about the "community" and how it is relying on GS as the sum all of a person's character.
Sure, there are people that do not use GS like that... add them to your friend list, you'll still have plenty of room for others.
For the rest, the ignore list is not large enough...
I don't think gearscore is the gun. I've never had trouble joining a raid when I explain the situation to the RL.
GS is a great addon for leading pug raids, end of story. No matter how good a player is, he wonät cut it in ICC with 4,5k GS. You can't tell how skilled people are by their GS or achievements, but you can tell if someone has a GS that is too low to be useful.
Not quite. It falls more in line with the discussion that Guns do not kill People, People kill People.
GearScore is the Gun.
Aside from issues where people have complained about it being off (which they are continuously working on), many of the complaints have actually about the "community" and how it is relying on GS as the sum all of a person's character.
Sure, there are people that do not use GS like that... add them to your friend list, you'll still have plenty of room for others.
For the rest, the ignore list is not large enough...
I don't think gearscore is the gun. I've never had trouble joining a raid when I explain the situation to the RL.
GS is a great addon for leading pug raids, end of story. No matter how good a player is, he wonät cut it in ICC with 4,5k GS. You can't tell how skilled people are by their GS or achievements, but you can tell if someone has a GS that is too low to be useful.
I keep seeing the no 4.5k GS in ICC. Well duh, that has not been called into question. The complaints are about the people looking for 5.2-5.3 for VoA and lesser raids. It is the people saying folks in that 4.5-5.0k range are too low to run HHoR.
If somebody does a Google for what GS they should have, one of the first sites they will find is wtfismygearscore. If your GS has an iLvl below 245...you are fail. People do not think that the site is setup for characters to be geared for certain raids... they just see fail. So in game, yep - if your GS is blow 5.2k or so - you are fail...period. You are not geared enough to stand in the AH.
GS is the Gun. The wise person can use it to shoot the tards trying to get in their ICC raid, but you have far more tards just running around shooting each other and those that may not be geared for ICC - but sure as Hell are geared enough to run whatever piddly instance the person is looking to run.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Best part is that GS isn't even required. Blizzard has already implemented the addon into their systems. If you don't meet the gear requirement, you can't even ENTER an instance, even if you have some guildies running you for gear. So yes, the addon, even if not installed, has destroyed PvE in WoW. You don't even need "abusive" users to see this now.
I'm just itching to read the GS fanboi responses to this one...
NEWS FLASH! PAYING THE SUB IN F2P = NO DIFFERENCE THAN P2P GAMES!
Best part is that GS isn't even required. Blizzard has already implemented the addon into their systems. If you don't meet the gear requirement, you can't even ENTER an instance, even if you have some guildies running you for gear. So yes, the addon, even if not installed, has destroyed PvE in WoW. You don't even need "abusive" users to see this now.
I'm just itching to read the GS fanboi responses to this one...
You are right: Blizzard quantifies your gear to allow you - or not - into certain heroic dungeons.
It's an intelligent way to replace the attunement and long time requirements to enter the old systems (old Nax, old Onyxia etc).
Far better than the old boring gathering gear systems I might say.
Levels or gear requirements have always been the basis in MMo's. Skill is used on top of that requirement.
Having a system that selects you for heroics in accordance with your "status" is simply a perfected way of gamedesign.
Its embarrassing when an NPC compliments you in an MMo, the only relevant, cool and epic things come from players whispering you Grtz, mate, we did it. copyright Pilnkplonk
For pugs i would say it's the opposite. Here is why: Good gear takes a lot of time, it makes no reason to pug if you invest a lot of time unless you suck so much that no raiding guild wants you. Of course there are exceptions but if you still play wow check dps /gearscore and you mostly will see it proven.
While i played i also often joined in pvp gear, got sometimes whispers why i am in pvp gear yadda yadda but when you tell them its better look at dps they mostly will it accept since the other truth would mean they are lower in dps cause of lacking skill and that's something none of them will accept.
What do gearscore, achievements and similar indicators measure?
The time and effort you have put into the game.
But there is also much speculation from the player's side. Even though a lot of MMO players may have decent knowledge about mathematics only a small percentage of those players have the will and motivation to spend time analyzing the game mechanics (theory crafting).
The rest simply puts up with arbitrary benchmarks without proving if the benchmark is sound and sensible. Numbers can't lie, can't they? Often players max scores beyond a point where there is hardly a benefit. They are simply following the "bigger is better" paradigm. And more often that leads to running content with an overgeared party. It's easier to spend time to get better gear than to improve tactical skills and teamplay.
Besides, as someone already mentioned in this thread. Gearscore and the like are (or should be) less important in guilds. Social factors are more important there. How do people get along? Are there conflicts between guild members? Are key players, who are the "social glue" for the whole bunch, frustrated? What's the overall atmosphere?
Yeah, I pretty much avoid any content that players require a gearscore for. I've never run a heroic instance, and probably never will. Some players might think I'm a bad player or a scrub, but screw them. I play to have fun not to meet anyone else's standards.
Well, it is not really about gearscore. It is just one easy, but imperfect way to estimate performance. You will still got kicked if you are a tank who cannot hold aggro, a dps doing less than 1k dps in a H instance, or a healer than keep going OOM and let the tank die.
I don't see why you even want to play WOW if you don't want to gear up and play with others.
Plus, it is not that hard. Just run the normal dungeons (easier than before with the DF tool) several times and you are geared enough to run H.
I do enjoy playing with others. And I like getting gear upgrades and building my character. I just don't like the attitudes associated with players that check gear. The whole idea of a heroic dungeon is ridiculous to me. It's the SAME damn dungeon with one extra boss and Hitpoints turned up on the trash. I know it's not hard. It's more a matter of principle. And I feel sorry for anyone who thinks that WoW is only about gear and endgame. There are hundreds of other reasons to play the game.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
Originally posted by ChaosInc Best part is that GS isn't even required. Blizzard has already implemented the addon into their systems. If you don't meet the gear requirement, you can't even ENTER an instance, even if you have some guildies running you for gear. So yes, the addon, even if not installed, has destroyed PvE in WoW. You don't even need "abusive" users to see this now. I'm just itching to read the GS fanboi responses to this one...
How about the fact that you are completely WRONG.
You could be naked and zone into any instance you want. How do I know? Because I just did it. I removed all gear and zoned into Heroic Halls of Reflection.
The gear block is for when you do a Random Dungeon, and it is only for ToC and the 3 Icecrown 5 mans. This is I agree with because I dont want some person I dont know that dinged level 80 5 minutes ago coming into Heroic Pit of Saron with quest blues and greens.
Let me guess, you probably heard that you couldnt even enter certain heroics without a high level gear from someone on these boards that doesnt even play WoW who heard it from someone else.
For pugs i would say it's the opposite. Here is why: Good gear takes a lot of time, it makes no reason to pug if you invest a lot of time unless you suck so much that no raiding guild wants you. Of course there are exceptions but if you still play wow check dps /gearscore and you mostly will see it proven.
Of course there is reason. I am in a top guild on my server but i can make it to the weekly 25 man (main event) raid. My gear is way beyond ICC 10 but sometimes i just like to PUG it and have some fun topping meters. I don't even loot L251 items. Think of it as community service that i have fun doing.
And many guilds do not have regular VoA, or weekly raid at set time. Those are left to PUG because they are easy.
I do enjoy playing with others. And I like getting gear upgrades and building my character. I just don't like the attitudes associated with players that check gear. The whole idea of a heroic dungeon is ridiculous to me. It's the SAME damn dungeon with one extra boss and Hitpoints turned up on the trash. I know it's not hard. It's more a matter of principle. And I feel sorry for anyone who thinks that WoW is only about gear and endgame. There are hundreds of other reasons to play the game.
No it is not only about gear. You can collect pets, you can have fun with your guildmates.
However, running H *is* about gear. Again, just run some normal and gear up. It is easy.
The gearscore thing is kind of obnoxious. If anyone excluded me from their group based on such a rating I would consider it a kindness. I like people who are more focused on fun, rather than some number.
But if I really cared about how I measure up I wouldn't be logging into a videogame. I'd be working all the over time I can at work and moving up the corporate ladder. Having the highest gearscore on my server probably wouldn't impress my wife, family or coworkers. Quite the contrary.
When has WoW required even tiniest bit of skill? The instances depend quite solely on team cordination, took me year to form raid skill with enough skill to do largest raids. Then the old raids benefit nobody so none do those except mayby for some pvp weapons.. But the again the lvl 60-70 pvp gear has gone far beyond lvl 60-70 pvp gear. So now when we got lvl 80 cakewalk raids and cakewalk instances...
I trained a lot mages, locks, rogues, warriors, huntards, shammys, healers for arena, instances and raids.. By teaching how to smash buttons in correct order and when to move, when to drop agro. Made few tutorial videos for new pople with narnation on topic "How to survive this raid boss for first timers." I have spent countless hours estimating and valueing my guild member gear and how to develop new people to get more raiders each week and who can be used to boost overall perfomance of others. etc.etc.etc. But not once i have found WoW difficult, not buildwise, not gearwise, not classwise. I have also grinded countless hours to make perfect raid foods and potions etc... Gazillion hours spent on grinding gear and boosters for others and myself. All grind, no customiszation, not enough customing gear, not enough choices, not enough hard bosses... WoW is nowadays simply an insult towards my intellect and talent.
And about pvp? That depends a lot on skill yes, it's not something that one can really learn in my opinnion, naturally talented pvper are naturally talented. They have constant idea of surrounding and understanding on every class's functionality. Few Best pvpers I know in WoW seem to have 6th sence for danger and psychological understanding on reaction of others. They own mental contoll on stresfull situations. I have tried to teach many guildies/people how to pvp efficiently, but arenas have proven that it's not possible to teach other how to become best, it's all about experience and hard work for non pvp talented people. For talented people experience means usually combat superiority. I am not saying that naturally non talented can't become true master through expertise and gradually learned leasons.. Those people proove to have mentality and natural talent for hard work.
Only good thing in wow is casual roleplay.. But other than that, i seen it all done it all, experienced it all. The game has nothing to offer to me aslong it insults my talent and demand for challenge.
The gearscore thing is kind of obnoxious. If anyone excluded me from their group based on such a rating I would consider it a kindness. I like people who are more focused on fun, rather than some number.
People use GS don't focus on a number .. they focus on if you can perform in a raid. It is no fun if you just wipe and wipe.
The gearscore thing is kind of obnoxious. If anyone excluded me from their group based on such a rating I would consider it a kindness. I like people who are more focused on fun, rather than some number.
People use GS don't focus on a number .. they focus on if you can perform in a raid. It is no fun if you just wipe and wipe.
lol you're doing the exact thing everyone is complaining about... equating a high gear score with the ability to perform in a raid. You're cute.
I played wow for 5 years and not once did it matter about what gear i was sporting. I did entire MC runs in vanilla wow without one piece of FR gear and didn't die once. Gearscore comes about and no one wants to group because they think my GS = skill. I wish i could find the guy who made GS and backhand him for ruining my game. I can't tell you how many times Ive gotten tells "Your GS is too low. Sorry u cant go." Scince when did this themepark game have a sign "You must be this tall to ride the rides."
I call bull on the above post. Not only did you not breaze your way through MC, you probably didn't go at all without the FR gear. People don't want to help you through something that you're not equipped to handle. And judging people based on their gear is nothing new to WoW. It was in place from the beginning. It's how you keep improving after hitting the level cap. It's the same reason you can't run max level dungeons when you're 10 levels short. Stop expecting handouts, and do the legwork. Or go play a F2P where the legwork only involves getting your parents' credit cards.
All gearscore did was streamline what everyone was already doing.
Important facts: 1. Free to Play games are poorly made. 2. Casuals are not all idiots, but idiots call themselves casuals. 3. Great solo and group content are not mutually exclusive, but they suffer when one is shoved into the mold of the other. The same is true of PvP and PvE. 4. Community is more important than you think.
I call bull on the above post. Not only did you not breaze your way through MC, you probably didn't go at all without the FR gear. People don't want to help you through something that you're not equipped to handle. And judging people based on their gear is nothing new to WoW. It was in place from the beginning. It's how you keep improving after hitting the level cap. It's the same reason you can't run max level dungeons when you're 10 levels short. Stop expecting handouts, and do the legwork. Or go play a F2P where the legwork only involves getting your parents' credit cards.
All gearscore did was streamline what everyone was already doing.
I never had FR gear either, so you're going to have to try harder.
I call bull on the above post. Not only did you not breaze your way through MC, you probably didn't go at all without the FR gear. People don't want to help you through something that you're not equipped to handle. And judging people based on their gear is nothing new to WoW. It was in place from the beginning. It's how you keep improving after hitting the level cap. It's the same reason you can't run max level dungeons when you're 10 levels short. Stop expecting handouts, and do the legwork. Or go play a F2P where the legwork only involves getting your parents' credit cards.
All gearscore did was streamline what everyone was already doing.
Thanks for trolling. But you have no clue as to my MMO experience and its highly pretentious of you to assume my level of skill in any game.
Vanilla WoW was cake mode for the highly skilled. You could raid in greens and still survive content. My first MC raid i main handed a Barman Shanker with a green +agil OH weapon. Most of my gear was a mix of Shadowcraft armor and other odds and end greens..... which werent even enchanted at the time. I think i placed like 3rd in DPS behind 2 other rogues in slightly better gear. Stuff like this is why blizzard raised the level cap to 70 and changed the dynamics of thier raiding. Blizzard didnt want people bragging about spanking thier "hardmode" content with little more blue/green armor and weapons.
I played wow for 5 years and not once did it matter about what gear i was sporting. I did entire MC runs in vanilla wow without one piece of FR gear and didn't die once. Gearscore comes about and no one wants to group because they think my GS = skill. I wish i could find the guy who made GS and backhand him for ruining my game. I can't tell you how many times Ive gotten tells "Your GS is too low. Sorry u cant go." Scince when did this themepark game have a sign "You must be this tall to ride the rides."
Gearscore is a crock of sh1t tool for the gear whores who want to min/max and for those of u who support it are douchebags yourselves.
Really? Go to ICC in blues & greens and see what happens. There is a theoretical dps limit to any gear setup (use RAWR to help figure it out).
No amount of skill can get you above that limit.
Not enough performance = wipe in ICC. It is that simple.
The gearscore thing is kind of obnoxious. If anyone excluded me from their group based on such a rating I would consider it a kindness. I like people who are more focused on fun, rather than some number.
People use GS don't focus on a number .. they focus on if you can perform in a raid. It is no fun if you just wipe and wipe.
lol you're doing the exact thing everyone is complaining about... equating a high gear score with the ability to perform in a raid. You're cute.
No .. high gear score = a CHANCE to perform.
If you don't have the gear, you cannot perform no matter how skillful you are. You are just not going to pull 9k dps in blues & greens. If you don't believe me, do take a bunch of people in blue/greens into ICC and see if you can down any boss.
Well, GS may not be an indication of skills, it certainly *is* correlated with performance.
Take a sample of dps with 6k GS, and take a sample of dps with 5k GS, and go up to any ICC boss and i bet there is a statistical difference between their DPS performance.
Clearly, a small difference in GS does not mean much. There are so many variables. But a big difference is useful information. No matter how good a player is, i probably don't want to group with a 4K GS dps for ICC 25 content, unless he/she is a friend I am wililng to carry.
There is a right way to use GS.
This. And kick anyone who has a sparkle pony and you're going to filter away most nublets.
I still kind of like the fact that the iLvl 264 Medallion of the Alliance has a GS of 278...153 Res and remove impairing affects. If you target /gs somebody, and as all know - Res is discounted on that GS (since GS is concerned with PvE as opposed to PvP gear). So you have an iLvl 264 item giving a GS of 278 while offering the samve PvE value of the iLvl 115 item. Where it gets even better is a human equipping it (since it shares the cooldown with the racial). Basically, it is a 278 GS buff for getting into groups if they do not check...and for some, it is much easier to get than running ICC or collecting enough Frost Emblems.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Best part is that GS isn't even required. Blizzard has already implemented the addon into their systems. If you don't meet the gear requirement, you can't even ENTER an instance, even if you have some guildies running you for gear. So yes, the addon, even if not installed, has destroyed PvE in WoW. You don't even need "abusive" users to see this now.
I'm just itching to read the GS fanboi responses to this one...
How about the fact that you are completely WRONG.
You could be naked and zone into any instance you want. How do I know? Because I just did it. I removed all gear and zoned into Heroic Halls of Reflection.
The gear block is for when you do a Random Dungeon, and it is only for ToC and the 3 Icecrown 5 mans. This is I agree with because I dont want some person I dont know that dinged level 80 5 minutes ago coming into Heroic Pit of Saron with quest blues and greens.
Let me guess, you probably heard that you couldnt even enter certain heroics without a high level gear from someone on these boards that doesnt even play WoW who heard it from someone else.
Xia is quite correct. The "GS restriction" is only on RLFD tool ... goto the instance actual and you can zone in with any (or no) gear on, you just have to be at the physical location of the instance to zone in. Used to gear my friends alts alot doing this with fresh 80's in craptastic gear.
GS is lame anyway. I resubbed to WoW after about a year off, made 80 in about 2 weeks and using the LFD tool I had a GS of 5K within a couple of days. ICC 10 was new so I started pugging them and tossing Frosties towards more gear and in under 2 months I was sitting at ~5700GS. Its really NOT hard to get your GS to a decent level very fast once you hit 80. Hell standard T9 gear (from badges) will put you a little over 5K.
My biggest issue with GS is that its more focused on ilevel than the actual gear. People have already mentioned that you can put on basically worthless higher ilevel gear to inflate your GS so that alone invalidates it as a ranking system to me. Some of the I245 trinkets are utter trash yet I seen alot of people using them over more valuable I213-232 trinkets just for the GS. Bad message to send IMO.
Then theres Fury warriors .. talk about inflated GS. Using 2 decent 2handers they can way over inflate thier GS over other classes since a good 2hander can sport a GS of 900-1000+ alone !!
GS is at best a "rough" guide to how far someone has progressed. Acheievements tell a better story although they dont account for alts, so unless your making prospective raid members log on alts for you to check as well your gonna be taking thier word for it anyway.
The best "tell" is run an encounter and check recount etc. Watching what they are doing and checking the meters tells the real story (note I said watching what they are doing too .. the meters alone wont tell the whole story) Of course by then your on a raid lock so meh what can you do. Make friends and run with people you know or run the risks.
BTW- I quit WoW a few months back but friends still play and they say that on my old server anyone under ~6000 GS is concidered a "noob" now .. so I guess my 5.8 Pally is SoL even though I've lead raids since back in Vanilla - tBC and Wrath .. glad i have no plans to go back since GS > All now apparently.
EDIT - Oh and on the topic of RWAR. Its DPS numbers are "perfect situations" Initially you have to toggle off all the buffs / debuffs etc that it initially puts on you. RAWR will "assume" that you have every buff running etc thats why the numbers are so high. It also assumes a perfect rotation with no lagg and no interuptions (ie never having to move, pot, or do anything other than the DPS rotation) which pretty much never happens. So the actual DPS you do will be a fair amount lower than RAWR's predicted figures.
I still kind of like the fact that the iLvl 264 Medallion of the Alliance has a GS of 278...153 Res and remove impairing affects. If you target /gs somebody, and as all know - Res is discounted on that GS (since GS is concerned with PvE as opposed to PvP gear). So you have an iLvl 264 item giving a GS of 278 while offering the samve PvE value of the iLvl 115 item. Where it gets even better is a human equipping it (since it shares the cooldown with the racial). Basically, it is a 278 GS buff for getting into groups if they do not check...and for some, it is much easier to get than running ICC or collecting enough Frost Emblems.
wow-heroes has more accurate scores. They reduce your score if the piece is PvP. If wow-hero has an addon, i would prefer to use it over GS.
Comments
Not quite. It falls more in line with the discussion that Guns do not kill People, People kill People.
GearScore is the Gun.
Aside from issues where people have complained about it being off (which they are continuously working on), many of the complaints have actually about the "community" and how it is relying on GS as the sum all of a person's character.
Sure, there are people that do not use GS like that... add them to your friend list, you'll still have plenty of room for others.
For the rest, the ignore list is not large enough...
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%
I don't think gearscore is the gun. I've never had trouble joining a raid when I explain the situation to the RL.
GS is a great addon for leading pug raids, end of story. No matter how good a player is, he wonät cut it in ICC with 4,5k GS. You can't tell how skilled people are by their GS or achievements, but you can tell if someone has a GS that is too low to be useful.
I keep seeing the no 4.5k GS in ICC. Well duh, that has not been called into question. The complaints are about the people looking for 5.2-5.3 for VoA and lesser raids. It is the people saying folks in that 4.5-5.0k range are too low to run HHoR.
If somebody does a Google for what GS they should have, one of the first sites they will find is wtfismygearscore. If your GS has an iLvl below 245...you are fail. People do not think that the site is setup for characters to be geared for certain raids... they just see fail. So in game, yep - if your GS is blow 5.2k or so - you are fail...period. You are not geared enough to stand in the AH.
GS is the Gun. The wise person can use it to shoot the tards trying to get in their ICC raid, but you have far more tards just running around shooting each other and those that may not be geared for ICC - but sure as Hell are geared enough to run whatever piddly instance the person is looking to run.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%
Best part is that GS isn't even required. Blizzard has already implemented the addon into their systems. If you don't meet the gear requirement, you can't even ENTER an instance, even if you have some guildies running you for gear. So yes, the addon, even if not installed, has destroyed PvE in WoW. You don't even need "abusive" users to see this now.
I'm just itching to read the GS fanboi responses to this one...
NEWS FLASH! PAYING THE SUB IN F2P = NO DIFFERENCE THAN P2P GAMES!
Why the hell can't the whiners comprehend this?
You are right: Blizzard quantifies your gear to allow you - or not - into certain heroic dungeons.
It's an intelligent way to replace the attunement and long time requirements to enter the old systems (old Nax, old Onyxia etc).
Far better than the old boring gathering gear systems I might say.
Levels or gear requirements have always been the basis in MMo's. Skill is used on top of that requirement.
Having a system that selects you for heroics in accordance with your "status" is simply a perfected way of gamedesign.
Its embarrassing when an NPC compliments you in an MMo, the only relevant, cool and epic things come from players whispering you Grtz, mate, we did it. copyright Pilnkplonk
For pugs i would say it's the opposite. Here is why: Good gear takes a lot of time, it makes no reason to pug if you invest a lot of time unless you suck so much that no raiding guild wants you. Of course there are exceptions but if you still play wow check dps /gearscore and you mostly will see it proven.
While i played i also often joined in pvp gear, got sometimes whispers why i am in pvp gear yadda yadda but when you tell them its better look at dps they mostly will it accept since the other truth would mean they are lower in dps cause of lacking skill and that's something none of them will accept.
Pi*1337/100 = 42
What do gearscore, achievements and similar indicators measure?
The time and effort you have put into the game.
But there is also much speculation from the player's side. Even though a lot of MMO players may have decent knowledge about mathematics only a small percentage of those players have the will and motivation to spend time analyzing the game mechanics (theory crafting).
The rest simply puts up with arbitrary benchmarks without proving if the benchmark is sound and sensible. Numbers can't lie, can't they? Often players max scores beyond a point where there is hardly a benefit. They are simply following the "bigger is better" paradigm. And more often that leads to running content with an overgeared party. It's easier to spend time to get better gear than to improve tactical skills and teamplay.
Besides, as someone already mentioned in this thread. Gearscore and the like are (or should be) less important in guilds. Social factors are more important there. How do people get along? Are there conflicts between guild members? Are key players, who are the "social glue" for the whole bunch, frustrated? What's the overall atmosphere?
I do enjoy playing with others. And I like getting gear upgrades and building my character. I just don't like the attitudes associated with players that check gear. The whole idea of a heroic dungeon is ridiculous to me. It's the SAME damn dungeon with one extra boss and Hitpoints turned up on the trash. I know it's not hard. It's more a matter of principle. And I feel sorry for anyone who thinks that WoW is only about gear and endgame. There are hundreds of other reasons to play the game.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
You could be naked and zone into any instance you want. How do I know? Because I just did it. I removed all gear and zoned into Heroic Halls of Reflection.
The gear block is for when you do a Random Dungeon, and it is only for ToC and the 3 Icecrown 5 mans. This is I agree with because I dont want some person I dont know that dinged level 80 5 minutes ago coming into Heroic Pit of Saron with quest blues and greens.
Let me guess, you probably heard that you couldnt even enter certain heroics without a high level gear from someone on these boards that doesnt even play WoW who heard it from someone else.
Of course there is reason. I am in a top guild on my server but i can make it to the weekly 25 man (main event) raid. My gear is way beyond ICC 10 but sometimes i just like to PUG it and have some fun topping meters. I don't even loot L251 items. Think of it as community service that i have fun doing.
And many guilds do not have regular VoA, or weekly raid at set time. Those are left to PUG because they are easy.
I do enjoy playing with others. And I like getting gear upgrades and building my character. I just don't like the attitudes associated with players that check gear. The whole idea of a heroic dungeon is ridiculous to me. It's the SAME damn dungeon with one extra boss and Hitpoints turned up on the trash. I know it's not hard. It's more a matter of principle. And I feel sorry for anyone who thinks that WoW is only about gear and endgame. There are hundreds of other reasons to play the game.
No it is not only about gear. You can collect pets, you can have fun with your guildmates.
However, running H *is* about gear. Again, just run some normal and gear up. It is easy.
The gearscore thing is kind of obnoxious. If anyone excluded me from their group based on such a rating I would consider it a kindness. I like people who are more focused on fun, rather than some number.
But if I really cared about how I measure up I wouldn't be logging into a videogame. I'd be working all the over time I can at work and moving up the corporate ladder. Having the highest gearscore on my server probably wouldn't impress my wife, family or coworkers. Quite the contrary.
When has WoW required even tiniest bit of skill? The instances depend quite solely on team cordination, took me year to form raid skill with enough skill to do largest raids. Then the old raids benefit nobody so none do those except mayby for some pvp weapons.. But the again the lvl 60-70 pvp gear has gone far beyond lvl 60-70 pvp gear. So now when we got lvl 80 cakewalk raids and cakewalk instances...
I trained a lot mages, locks, rogues, warriors, huntards, shammys, healers for arena, instances and raids.. By teaching how to smash buttons in correct order and when to move, when to drop agro. Made few tutorial videos for new pople with narnation on topic "How to survive this raid boss for first timers." I have spent countless hours estimating and valueing my guild member gear and how to develop new people to get more raiders each week and who can be used to boost overall perfomance of others. etc.etc.etc. But not once i have found WoW difficult, not buildwise, not gearwise, not classwise. I have also grinded countless hours to make perfect raid foods and potions etc... Gazillion hours spent on grinding gear and boosters for others and myself. All grind, no customiszation, not enough customing gear, not enough choices, not enough hard bosses... WoW is nowadays simply an insult towards my intellect and talent.
And about pvp? That depends a lot on skill yes, it's not something that one can really learn in my opinnion, naturally talented pvper are naturally talented. They have constant idea of surrounding and understanding on every class's functionality. Few Best pvpers I know in WoW seem to have 6th sence for danger and psychological understanding on reaction of others. They own mental contoll on stresfull situations. I have tried to teach many guildies/people how to pvp efficiently, but arenas have proven that it's not possible to teach other how to become best, it's all about experience and hard work for non pvp talented people. For talented people experience means usually combat superiority. I am not saying that naturally non talented can't become true master through expertise and gradually learned leasons.. Those people proove to have mentality and natural talent for hard work.
Only good thing in wow is casual roleplay.. But other than that, i seen it all done it all, experienced it all. The game has nothing to offer to me aslong it insults my talent and demand for challenge.
Kindest regards,
DKW
People use GS don't focus on a number .. they focus on if you can perform in a raid. It is no fun if you just wipe and wipe.
lol you're doing the exact thing everyone is complaining about... equating a high gear score with the ability to perform in a raid. You're cute.
I played wow for 5 years and not once did it matter about what gear i was sporting. I did entire MC runs in vanilla wow without one piece of FR gear and didn't die once. Gearscore comes about and no one wants to group because they think my GS = skill. I wish i could find the guy who made GS and backhand him for ruining my game. I can't tell you how many times Ive gotten tells "Your GS is too low. Sorry u cant go." Scince when did this themepark game have a sign "You must be this tall to ride the rides."
[Mod edit]
I call bull on the above post. Not only did you not breaze your way through MC, you probably didn't go at all without the FR gear. People don't want to help you through something that you're not equipped to handle. And judging people based on their gear is nothing new to WoW. It was in place from the beginning. It's how you keep improving after hitting the level cap. It's the same reason you can't run max level dungeons when you're 10 levels short. Stop expecting handouts, and do the legwork. Or go play a F2P where the legwork only involves getting your parents' credit cards.
All gearscore did was streamline what everyone was already doing.
Important facts:
1. Free to Play games are poorly made.
2. Casuals are not all idiots, but idiots call themselves casuals.
3. Great solo and group content are not mutually exclusive, but they suffer when one is shoved into the mold of the other. The same is true of PvP and PvE.
4. Community is more important than you think.
I never had FR gear either, so you're going to have to try harder.
Thanks for trolling. But you have no clue as to my MMO experience and its highly pretentious of you to assume my level of skill in any game.
Vanilla WoW was cake mode for the highly skilled. You could raid in greens and still survive content. My first MC raid i main handed a Barman Shanker with a green +agil OH weapon. Most of my gear was a mix of Shadowcraft armor and other odds and end greens..... which werent even enchanted at the time. I think i placed like 3rd in DPS behind 2 other rogues in slightly better gear. Stuff like this is why blizzard raised the level cap to 70 and changed the dynamics of thier raiding. Blizzard didnt want people bragging about spanking thier "hardmode" content with little more blue/green armor and weapons.
Yer welcome for your history lesson.
And yes .....Gearscore still sucks.
Really? Go to ICC in blues & greens and see what happens. There is a theoretical dps limit to any gear setup (use RAWR to help figure it out).
No amount of skill can get you above that limit.
Not enough performance = wipe in ICC. It is that simple.
No .. high gear score = a CHANCE to perform.
If you don't have the gear, you cannot perform no matter how skillful you are. You are just not going to pull 9k dps in blues & greens. If you don't believe me, do take a bunch of people in blue/greens into ICC and see if you can down any boss.
This. And kick anyone who has a sparkle pony and you're going to filter away most nublets.
I still kind of like the fact that the iLvl 264 Medallion of the Alliance has a GS of 278...153 Res and remove impairing affects. If you target /gs somebody, and as all know - Res is discounted on that GS (since GS is concerned with PvE as opposed to PvP gear). So you have an iLvl 264 item giving a GS of 278 while offering the samve PvE value of the iLvl 115 item. Where it gets even better is a human equipping it (since it shares the cooldown with the racial). Basically, it is a 278 GS buff for getting into groups if they do not check...and for some, it is much easier to get than running ICC or collecting enough Frost Emblems.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%
Xia is quite correct. The "GS restriction" is only on RLFD tool ... goto the instance actual and you can zone in with any (or no) gear on, you just have to be at the physical location of the instance to zone in. Used to gear my friends alts alot doing this with fresh 80's in craptastic gear.
GS is lame anyway. I resubbed to WoW after about a year off, made 80 in about 2 weeks and using the LFD tool I had a GS of 5K within a couple of days. ICC 10 was new so I started pugging them and tossing Frosties towards more gear and in under 2 months I was sitting at ~5700GS. Its really NOT hard to get your GS to a decent level very fast once you hit 80. Hell standard T9 gear (from badges) will put you a little over 5K.
My biggest issue with GS is that its more focused on ilevel than the actual gear. People have already mentioned that you can put on basically worthless higher ilevel gear to inflate your GS so that alone invalidates it as a ranking system to me. Some of the I245 trinkets are utter trash yet I seen alot of people using them over more valuable I213-232 trinkets just for the GS. Bad message to send IMO.
Then theres Fury warriors .. talk about inflated GS. Using 2 decent 2handers they can way over inflate thier GS over other classes since a good 2hander can sport a GS of 900-1000+ alone !!
GS is at best a "rough" guide to how far someone has progressed. Acheievements tell a better story although they dont account for alts, so unless your making prospective raid members log on alts for you to check as well your gonna be taking thier word for it anyway.
The best "tell" is run an encounter and check recount etc. Watching what they are doing and checking the meters tells the real story (note I said watching what they are doing too .. the meters alone wont tell the whole story) Of course by then your on a raid lock so meh what can you do. Make friends and run with people you know or run the risks.
BTW- I quit WoW a few months back but friends still play and they say that on my old server anyone under ~6000 GS is concidered a "noob" now .. so I guess my 5.8 Pally is SoL even though I've lead raids since back in Vanilla - tBC and Wrath .. glad i have no plans to go back since GS > All now apparently.
EDIT - Oh and on the topic of RWAR. Its DPS numbers are "perfect situations" Initially you have to toggle off all the buffs / debuffs etc that it initially puts on you. RAWR will "assume" that you have every buff running etc thats why the numbers are so high. It also assumes a perfect rotation with no lagg and no interuptions (ie never having to move, pot, or do anything other than the DPS rotation) which pretty much never happens. So the actual DPS you do will be a fair amount lower than RAWR's predicted figures.
wow-heroes has more accurate scores. They reduce your score if the piece is PvP. If wow-hero has an addon, i would prefer to use it over GS.