I played Warcraft: Orcs and Humans way back in 1995. I played WCII the following year and the WCII (my favourite of all) in 1996. I played WC3 and the excellent expansion. Until WoW I had never played a mmorpg in my entire life except for 30 mins of Everquest and Star Wars Galaxies. Neither which I liked. I like the warcraft story (I dont read the books or anything else, just the game story) and the whole concept of dungeons having indentical 25 man and 10 man version existing in the same game is beyond stupid. I don't role play nor am I into fantasy books and stuff, but I do like my computer games to have a story and a concept that makes [b]sense[/b]
What I don't understand is why it matters if people can't off spec in 10 mans. If it is 10 man content, then people should spec something useful. That so called "Pro Fury Warrior" should maybe try out what his class was designed to do. In a 10 man there just isn't room for the off spec which is FINE. When was the last time a ret paladin was absolutely necessary in any raiding situation? It has never been the case. They have always been replaceable. Sometimes the offspec just isn't as useful. That's why there is both a TWENTY FIVE man raid instance and a 10 man. They're not taking out 25 man raids from the game, so I don't see how this affects anyone that wants to offspec or anyone that wants to be a so called hardcore player. Ill use you as an example Walsho because you seem to want there to just be 25 man raids. The fact that there is still 25 man raid instances in the game caters to you. You want people to be able to off spec their class, and you want to do 25 man raids. BINGO there are going to be 25 man raids in WOTLK so i don't see how this change affects you at all. You also complain that having two different versions ruins the story. It doesn't change the story in the slightest! Do you think different events or going to occur in both versions in the instance? Whatever happens in the 25 man will be the same in the 10 man. There is no change to the story at all. So please find a better explanation to why this angers you because your arguments don't make a lot of sense.
Why should harcore players not have unique content designed for them? Why is it only casuals who deserve unique content? Because casuals make up the majority of subscribers? Yes, they do. Will you casuals still be playing WoW in 2013? By pissing off the most loyal and dedicated players now Blizzard are cutting their subscriber base in the long term.
You just answered yourself without even realizing it. You just admitted that casuals make up the majority of the subscribers. Therefore it is them that Blizzard is rightfully most concerned with. It' not that they don't care about the hardcore player, they still give them content aimed at them, however it is the casual player that is the most important because they make up the majority of the subscribers. That's just common sense. It's possible that it could effect the number of subscribers in the long term, but you can't sacrifice the much larger number of subscribers in the short term.
Did you actually read my full post? Casuals are also the players who quit the game at the drop of the hat to chase whatever is new and shiny. I noticed you didn't quote my Everquest example. You can bet the 30,000+ people still playing Everquest are not casuals.
We're already seeing the death of raiding in North America. D&T are dead, or at least are rebuilding and are no longer at the bleeding edge of raiding. Even Euro guilds like Nihilium are expressing unhappiness with raiding. SK Gaming have their beginnings in Quakeworld (online version of Quake 1) but they ditched that as soon as they started losing to the newer and better clans coming through. They moved onto whatever was the next hot gaming title and they'll do the same with WoW.
The realm I used to play on had 12 Illidan killing guilds. Thats a lot of hardcore players. Out of the 4.5 million Euro/NA players a lot are hardcore raiders. So why is Blizzard deliberately trying to piss them off? Wouldn't it be in Blizzard's interest to keep the casuals AND hardcore players happy?
If one group amounts to 51% of a demographic that means theres 49% remaining. If you were a business person would you only try to get the business of that 51% at the expense of the 49%? Now, WoW is not 51% casual and 49% hardcore. It would be more like 67% casual and 33% hardcore. Thats around 1.5 million hardcore players. Thats a lot of players to piss off.
What I don't understand is why it matters if people can't off spec in 10 mans. If it is 10 man content, then people should spec something useful. That so called "Pro Fury Warrior" should maybe try out what his class was designed to do. In a 10 man there just isn't room for the off spec which is FINE. When was the last time a ret paladin was absolutely necessary in any raiding situation? It has never been the case. They have always been replaceable. Sometimes the offspec just isn't as useful. That's why there is both a TWENTY FIVE man raid instance and a 10 man. They're not taking out 25 man raids from the game, so I don't see how this affects anyone that wants to offspec or anyone that wants to be a so called hardcore player. Ill use you as an example Walsho because you seem to want there to just be 25 man raids. The fact that there is still 25 man raid instances in the game caters to you. You want people to be able to off spec their class, and you want to do 25 man raids. BINGO there are going to be 25 man raids in WOTLK so i don't see how this change affects you at all. You also complain that having two different versions ruins the story. It doesn't change the story in the slightest! Do you think different events or going to occur in both versions in the instance? Whatever happens in the 25 man will be the same in the 10 man. There is no change to the story at all. So please find a better explanation to why this angers you because your arguments don't make a lot of sense.
Because it was the casuals who cried and cried and cried and cried and cried and cried that ret paladins weren't raid viable. If you applied to any hardcore raiding guild as ret you would be laughed at. Those in hardcore raiding guilds would spec whatever was needed to clear the content whereas the casuals would spec the way they wanted to play and then complain when they couldn't clear the content. Why would harcore guilds DEMAND that ret paladins, moonkin druids and elemental shaman be raid viable? They were clearing content without off-specs. It was the casuals who didn't want to be "hardcore" and take raid only specs that sucked for farming and PvP who complained. And I'll guarantee you they will complain in WotLK if the 10mans are hard. Its the difference a hardcore player and a casual. The hardcore player will adapt to the challenges ahead, learn to play his/her class, work on gear, read boss strats. The casual will just demand Blizzard change the game to suit him/her because he/she pays $15 a month. Look at the comments in this thread. The whole basis of the casual's argument is "I pay the same money as hardcore raiders therefore I should have everything they have."
Take druids for example. Remember the days when innervate was not trainable at lvl 40 but instead the 31 talent point in the resto tree? Most casual guilds would raid with feral druids healing so they didn't get the benefit of innervate, which back in pre-BC was GODLY. With the massive amount of mana per 5 available now, and with the buff to spirit in 2.4 it isn't such a big deal.
I never said I wanted off-specs to be viable. It has never concerned me because I've always taken raid specs.
If you're a player willing to spec to whatever is needed to clear content then you are not casual.
ZG, AQ20, ZA and even Karazhan are not central to the Warcraft story (the actual bosses in Karazhan are not important even though Karazhan the place is). But having major story characters like Arthas and Malygos in 10 man instances ruins the game for me. Thats my opinion and if you don't like it you can fuck yourself. I'm not against 10 man content for casuals but why does it HAVE to be the same as the 25 man content?. Oh, thats right, you pay $15 therefore you're entitled to everything.
Why same content for casuals as for hardcore? Supposing it is, that has not be confirmed yet, why would you create a lot of content that the MAJORITY of your player base will never see?
It makes no sense and this is the main point here. Everyone knows most of the raid instances of old are some of the BEST content for WoW there is, they were the best designed and took the most effort from the Devs to do. Still, not 33%, BUT something like 1% ever was in Naxx (at its level ,now there are level 70 tourists that go there).
Having lots and lots of devs hours for some incredible content that only 1% will ever see is a waste of resources, period.
This new experiment is a compromise. their Devs hours will go toward a much bigger % of their customers AND there STILL is hardcore raiding content as I expect the 25-man version to be quite harder than the 10 as they already said they will have different loot table, so different Tier equipment and I would think higher difficulty level.
So what if Malygos will be a 10 man encounter? Better THAT than it be a 1% people encounter! Malygos (and Arthas) ARE great advertisement and marketing opportunities! you want most of your customers to see them, not the least!
"If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day, if you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime"
You just answered yourself without even realizing it. You just admitted that casuals make up the majority of the subscribers. Therefore it is them that Blizzard is rightfully most concerned with. It' not that they don't care about the hardcore player, they still give them content aimed at them, however it is the casual player that is the most important because they make up the majority of the subscribers. That's just common sense. It's possible that it could effect the number of subscribers in the long term, but you can't sacrifice the much larger number of subscribers in the short term.
Did you actually read my full post? Casuals are also the players who quit the game at the drop of the hat to chase whatever is new and shiny. I noticed you didn't quote my Everquest example. You can bet the 30,000+ people still playing Everquest are not casuals.
Why is it that when someone can't refute your post, they start their post off with "Did you actually read my full post?" Well as a matter of fact I did read your whole post. Now will you please refute my response? I didn't quote your EQ example because I didn't think the raw numbers were all that important to the discussion, but for the sake of argument, let's analyze your EQ example shall we?
Ok, you say that EQ has about 30k current subs. How many did they have at their peak? According to MMORPG.com which is about the only source we have on this it was around 500K. Let's assume these numbers are fairly accurate. Your theory is that those 30K are EQ's hard core players. Ok, I'll buy that. But that means that over 90% of EQ's subs at it's peak were casuals. I'm defining casuals here as those people who would drop EQ at the drop of a hat. Now lets apply that to WoW. Since WoW has over 10 million paying subs, that would mean that about 1 million are hard core, stick to the very end kind of folks and about 9 million are the quit at a drop of the hat folks. So you honestly think that Blizzard should worry more about pissing off the 1 million, rather than the 9 million? If you honestly believe that, then there's no point in discussing it with you anymore because we just don't agree.
Now, I doubt those number are relevant in the least because even you yourself said that it's probably more like 1/3 hardcore to 2/3 casuals and I'll even buy that. But that means your EQ example doesn't fit now does it? But it doesn't really matter because that was never my argument in the first place. My argument is that the majority of WoW subs are casuals and not hard core and you agree, it doesn't matter whether it's 10% or 33%. It doesn't make any sense to cater to the hard core when they are not the majority.
Even if that weren't true and let's say it was closer to a 50/50 split. Would it make more sense to piss off the casuals who are more likely to drop your game at the drop of a hat or piss off the hard core ones who are more likely to stick it out to the very end no matter what you do? I'm sorry, but I think it makes more sense to cater to the casuals than it does to the hard core even in this case.
Why same content for casuals as for hardcore? Supposing it is, that has not be confirmed yet, why would you create a lot of content that the MAJORITY of your player base will never see?
It makes no sense and this is the main point here. Everyone knows most of the raid instances of old are some of the BEST content for WoW there is, they were the best designed and took the most effort from the Devs to do. Still, not 33%, BUT something like 1% ever was in Naxx (at its level ,now there are level 70 tourists that go there).
Only 1% ever saw any content in Naxx? Thats rubbish and you know it. A LOT more than 1% saw some of the early (and quite easy bosses) in Naxxramas. Most of the bosses in Naxx were a lot more simple than C'Thun (past patch). I knew a lot of guilds who didn't down C'thun that managed to do 1-3 Naxx bosses. So you are talking out of your uniformed butthole.
And the real reason so few people saw Naxx was BECAUSE IT WAS RELEASED SO LATE. It was released on June 20th 2006. By the time patch 2.0 was released in early December most guilds had stopped raiding because the expansion was only a few weeks away. I don't think many guilds downed Kel' Thuzad for the first time post patch 2.0 if any at all. So we only had 5 to 5 and a half months of raiding Naxx.
Having lots and lots of devs hours for some incredible content that only 1% will ever see is a waste of resources, period.
Whats with this 1% bullshit? As I in an earlier post there are 12 Illidan killing guilds on my realm, a medium sized PvP realm. Soon there will be 13 since a guild is on the Council. So stop talking rubbish. Check wowjutsu. There are 30% of players who have seen Hyjal and climbing rapidly. Theres already 4% of players in Sunwell and its only been out a few weeks with plenty of Illidan guilds currently gearing to hit SWP.
And who said the casuals can't progress to the harder 25 man content? As I've said a thousand fucking times they should have two 25 mans. One the casuals to farm to gear up and do the harder 25 man content. Take SSC and TK for example. Make SSC the casual instance and TK the hardcore instead of them both being tier 5 level (but expand TK to 6 bosses as well). The casuals can farm SSC and to do TK where the harcore raiders can skip straight to TK and do SSC at their discretion. But the hardcore instance is the only instance that will contain "lore" bosses. So that means no Vashj for SSC.
And there cannot be a massive gear difference between 10 mans and 25 mans. Why? It will ruin 25 man raiding if 10 mans have much lower gear quality. Because since most players will be taking the ezy mode, epic loot train, when 25 man guilds need to recruit they will have to recruit players doing 10 man instances. Since there will be much less players doing 25man content they will need to draw from the larger pool to replace those who quit the game. Even if 25man guilds poach players from other 25 man guilds someone is going to have to a replacement, just trading players doesn't increase the pool size.
Now, if the 10 man loot is not good enough to be competitive in the 25 man instance then the 25man guilds are FORCED into farming old content to gear up the new players. Blizzard knows that by having only good gear drop from the high end instances it slows guilds down by continually having to gear up new players. I LOVE badge loot. It allows guilds to recruit new players and not have to worry about gearing them up. So either 10 man content in WotLK or badge loot (which would nullify 10 man loot if 10 man loot wasn't up to standard) has to be of a 25 man raiding standard otherwise raiding guilds will spend more time spinning their wheels in old content gearing up new players.
Maybe Blizzard is trying to help the hardcores to save them from their self-destructive tendencies.
I used to consider myself in that category, finally decided to give it up. Got a promotion to VP, my family started to love me again, and I began a program of running 5 days a week for the past 2 years.
I know, I'm not helping.... but its Friday, how bad can things really be today?
I think I once read a statistic that in the old days less than 20% of players were active raiders, and when it came to Naxx that number went down to like 5%.
I can see why Blizzard has moved focus from the hardcore crowd to the casual, thats where the big money is.
I did see a statement that someone made about casuals going from one game to another more frequently than hardcore players. I disagree.....seems to me the hardcore chew through new content way too fast and quickly become bored and move on, leaving the casuals behind who still play for years.
Now, there is always a diehard crowd in every game, who play it for 5, 6, or more years, way beyond any practical reason, and they are loyal, but small in number.
Most large developers are now avoiding the niche markets, those who love large scale raiding, or FFA PVP w/looting because that's not where the money is.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I'm not against 10 man content for casuals but why does it HAVE to be the same as the 25 man content?. Oh, thats right, you pay $15 therefore you're entitled to everything.
Where did Blizzard state that the 10 man instance would be the same as the 25 man? They only said that there would be a 10 man version and a 25 man version, they didn't say they would be the same. In fact they said they would NOT be the same because they said that each would have it's own loot table and tier set. I think it's safe to assume that there will be other differences as well although it's possible that the same bosses may appear. Most likely although the bosses will look alike and have the same name, they obviously won't be exactly the same. I can pretty much gaurantee you that the 25 man boss will be much tougher to defeat than the 10 man boss, hence the better loot table.
So what again is your problem? Oh, you think that you as a hard core player is entitled to something more than the casual player beyond the fact that you already get better loot.
I did see a statement that someone made about casuals going from one game to another more frequently than hardcore players. I disagree.....seems to me the hardcore chew through new content way too fast and quickly become bored and move on, leaving the casuals behind who still play for years. Now, there is always a diehard crowd in every game, who play it for 5, 6, or more years, way beyond any practical reason, and they are loyal, but small in number.
You are wise beyond your years Kyleran (that's not to say you are old). I believe I fall into the diehard crowd. I play pretty much 7 days a week for a couple hours a day and yet I've never been to many of the 40 or 25 man raid instances. I simply have my alts and love getting them all to level 70 and getting all the professions and getting them all up to 375. I couldn't care less about tier sets or best of slot items. Heck I don't even know what the loot tables look like in Kara.
I recently had a discussion with a buddy of mine that is a fairly hard core raider. He plays about as often as me, but we are actually nothing alike. He leads our Kara runs and I had complained in the past that he doesn't give people long enough to decide on whether or not we want to roll on the epics that drop. We started talking about it and he said that he knew the moment he looked at it whether or not he wanted it and couldn't understand why I took me so long to decide until I explained to him that I can't simply look at the name and instantly know whether or not it's an upgrade. I have to compare the stats on the item that I'm wearing (which I may or may not even be aware of) and the stats on the item that just dropped and then I decide. He was amazed. He thought that EVERYONE just knew what dropped from EVERY boss and knew exactly what was an upgrade and what wasn't. THAT my friend is the definition of hard core or casual in my opinion. It has nothing to do with time spent in the game or whether they would want to off-spec or whatever. There's simply a different mind set with some people. To them it's all about the loot. They know exactly what they have, what they want and where they can get it. For us casuals running Kara, each boss is like Christmas. You can't wait to find out what present Moroes is going to bring you. Hard cores just don't understand that.
ZG, AQ20, ZA and even Karazhan are not central to the Warcraft story (the actual bosses in Karazhan are not important even though Karazhan the place is). But having major story characters like Arthas and Malygos in 10 man instances ruins the game for me. Thats my opinion and if you don't like it you can fuck yourself. I'm not against 10 man content for casuals but why does it HAVE to be the same as the 25 man content?. Oh, thats right, you pay $15 therefore you're entitled to everything.
I think it comes down to this. You still failed to explain how casual players playing the same content in a different format affects you at all. It seems like you're just upset that you can't say to yourself," I spent a shit load more time playing this game than someone else, and I am better at the game because of it, and get to see content they don't get to." Why are you so worried about what others are doing? Just worry about your guild, what they need, and how you are progressing as a player. Who gives a fuck what everyone else is doing? It seems to me you need to stop worrying about other people and just play the game for your own enjoyment. The same goes for other hardcore players. I myself used to play the game hardcore, yet I see that other people didn't have nearly as much time as myself to devote to the game. I was a high school kid and didn't need to work on anything because i was pulling a 3.5+ without any effort, so I played a lot of wow. Some people on the other hand have jobs, kids, relationships, etc. I think it's great that they will be able to see the story line of WoW. I didn't necessarily like playing WC3 that much, but I beat every mission in excitement to see each cut scene. The story is what makes Warcraft so great and I'm glad they're giving everyone a chance to see it.
Pappy also made a good point that I've been saying in my previous posts. Just play the game for fun, and have fun downing bosses with a good group of people.
I'm going to say this again just in hoping that maybe you will post a viable response. You just keep saying it pisses you off that some 25 man content will be in a 10 man format without any reason whatsoever. Your ignoring the fact that your style of gameplay is not going to change one bit because 25 man content will STILL EXIST AND THE GEAR WILL STILL BE BETTER. This is what makes you happy right? I'm going to go fuck myself now.
I did see a statement that someone made about casuals going from one game to another more frequently than hardcore players. I disagree.....seems to me the hardcore chew through new content way too fast and quickly become bored and move on, leaving the casuals behind who still play for years. Now, there is always a diehard crowd in every game, who play it for 5, 6, or more years, way beyond any practical reason, and they are loyal, but small in number.
You are wise beyond your years Kyleran (that's not to say you are old). I believe I fall into the diehard crowd. I play pretty much 7 days a week for a couple hours a day and yet I've never been to many of the 40 or 25 man raid instances. I simply have my alts and love getting them all to level 70 and getting all the professions and getting them all up to 375. I couldn't care less about tier sets or best of slot items. Heck I don't even know what the loot tables look like in Kara.
I recently had a discussion with a buddy of mine that is a fairly hard core raider. He plays about as often as me, but we are actually nothing alike. He leads our Kara runs and I had complained in the past that he doesn't give people long enough to decide on whether or not we want to roll on the epics that drop. We started talking about it and he said that he knew the moment he looked at it whether or not he wanted it and couldn't understand why I took me so long to decide until I explained to him that I can't simply look at the name and instantly know whether or not it's an upgrade. I have to compare the stats on the item that I'm wearing (which I may or may not even be aware of) and the stats on the item that just dropped and then I decide. He was amazed. He thought that EVERYONE just knew what dropped from EVERY boss and knew exactly what was an upgrade and what wasn't. THAT my friend is the definition of hard core or casual in my opinion. It has nothing to do with time spent in the game or whether they would want to off-spec or whatever. There's simply a different mind set with some people. To them it's all about the loot. They know exactly what they have, what they want and where they can get it. For us casuals running Kara, each boss is like Christmas. You can't wait to find out what present Moroes is going to bring you. Hard cores just don't understand that.
Its easy. Purple > Blue > Green > Grey
Sorry forgot about the Greys.
Don't be terrorized! You're more likely to die of a car accident, drowning, fire, or murder! More people die every year from prescription drugs than terrorism LOL!
Its easy. Purple > Blue > Green > Grey Sorry forgot about the Greys.
It's when they are both the same color that I start to have trouble.
Oh damn is purple 1 better than purple 2? Should I roll on that ring because it has +20 to AP and mine has +10 to agility? What's the formula for Agility to AP again? Crap!! What if I roll and it's not better than what I have, I can't give it back then. What if I don't roll and then my buddy whispers me after they've given it away why I didn't roll? CRAP!!!!
Does anyone else have this problem or is it only ME!!!
Hell yeah, you should at least know the basics of your class and know the value for AP/AP/crit for your gear lvl.
It would also only take you the time of writing a post here (which you find the time for as it seems) to look up drops in atlas loot and make yourself a wishlist. No need to let 9 other ppl wait until you have made up your mind.
Hell yeah, you should at least know the basics of your class and know the value for AP/AP/crit for your gear lvl. It would also only take you the time of writing a post here (which you find the time for as it seems) to look up drops in atlas loot and make yourself a wishlist. No need to let 9 other ppl wait until you have made up your mind.
/soapbox
Well I'm not talking about 5 mins. I'm talking like giving me 10 seconds to look at the 2 to compare the items and decide. They give you like 3 seconds. You want this roll.......ok goes to..... Like waiting an extra 6 seconds is gonna be making everyone wait. Hell we are gonna be in here raiding for 3 hours. I don't think an extra 12 seconds per boss fight is really gonna slow the whole thing down. And I do know the basics of my classes, but I have 3 toons that I raid with, so forgive if I'm sometimes not exactly sure just exactly what the difference is between 10 agility and 20 AP. Can you tell me now, right off the top of your head? Well you probably can, but I'll bet that not everyone who raids can. And besides it's never that simple or I wouldn't really have a problem. You usually have to look at several things like Armor rating, Stamina, Agility, AP, +Crit, +Hit, +mana/5, +int, how many slots and what color are they? That's a lot to decide in like 3 seconds. They only know because they've got the whole damn thing memorized like it's some sort of life or death information. My buddy thinks you should not only know this stuff, but should keep an excel spreadsheet with all your toons and check them off when you get them like some kinda of shopping list. I'm sorry, but that just takes away from the whole fun of being in the instance in the first place for me. Why make it so complicated? Can't we just be here to kill some stuff and let the loot be a nice little bonus? No, the hard cores won't allow that. It's all business. You have to have your shit together, you have to have spent 4 hours pouring over the loot tables and deciding what you need, who gives it to you etc. Perhaps I have the time to post in these forums because I don't do that. My buddy is on the internet every day deciding what he needs next and how to get it. I prefer to waste my time talking on these forums. To each his own.
/soapbox off
Edit: Oh and here's the real funny part. Whenever an epic drops from a random mob and they don't know the loot table for that mob, we'll sit there for like 30 seconds trying to figure out who wants it because they are in the same boat with me then and they have to compare what they got to it and make a decision. And you can bet your ass that whenever something drops that my buddy can't quite make up his mind about that he'll sit there for as long as it takes to make a decision because he's the master looter. No, it's got very little to do with being considerate of those around you, it has everything to do with not being tolerant of those around you and giving them the same courtesy you offer to yourself.
hey Pappy, I give you a little tip. Download the ace2 addon Geardps, it gives you a score in the items tooltip about how good an item is, it even scales agi and crit value depending on your gear lvl and considers if you are hit capped or not. Also the gem slots are considered if you setup which gems you use for every slot colour.
I think it comes down to this. You still failed to explain how casual players playing the same content in a different format affects you at all. It seems like you're just upset that you can't say to yourself," I spent a shit load more time playing this game than someone else, and I am better at the game because of it, and get to see content they don't get to." Why are you so worried about what others are doing?
I have explained how it affects me. I don't like the concent of turning the game into a glorified single player game with easy mode turned on. Just because I'm not rapped and bashed by someone doesn't mean I can't like something. I will not renew my subscribtion once WotLK because of this as I originally planned. Blizzard can create as many 10 man instances for casuals where they only have to roll their faces across the keyboard to get their epics and be happy. The major storyline should always be raids that epic to match the bosses that are contained within the instance.
Just worry about your guild, what they need, and how you are progressing as a player. Who gives a fuck what everyone else is doing?
Can you spell H-Y-P-O-C-R-I-T? Why are YOU so obsessed with what the hardcore raiders, who put the time and effort in, are doing? All I see is casuals crying "WAAAAAAAAAAA HARDCORES HAVE MORE GEAR AND I WANT THE SAME!". Personally, I couldn't give a flying shit if your guild can't get past 5/6 SSC 3/4 TK so why are are all the casuals crying about attunements and the like? Why did the casuals DEMAND that Blizzard remove the Hyjal/BT attunements? Because they pay $15 a month and therefore they're entitled to everything the players who put more time and effort without actually having to put any time or effort into game. THE WHOLE CASUAL ARGUMENT IS "MY LIFE IS TOO COOL TO PUT ANY EFFORT INTO RAIDING BUT SINCE I PAY $15 A MONTH I DEMAND EVERYTHING THAT THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE PUT THE TIME AND EFFORT INTO ACHIEVING THEIR IN-GAME GOALS BECAUSE THOSE PEOPLE ARE NO LIFE NERD LOSERS AND I'M IN THE POSITION TO MAKE SWEEPING, GENERAL STATEMENTS ABOUT THE STATE AND LIFESTYLES OF OTHER PEOPLE.
So what if I have more time to raid and have better gear and seen more content than you? So what if I have the stupid Hand of A'dal title and you don't? Shut up and play the game and stop demanding Blizzard give you everything people who have worked harder than you to obtain because you're life is super cool and you only have 0.0000000000005 nanoseconds a year to play, coz, ur life is so coool.
It seems to me you need to stop worrying about other people and just play the game for your own enjoyment. The same goes for other hardcore players. I myself used to play the game hardcore, yet I see that other people didn't have nearly as much time as myself to devote to the game. I was a high school kid and didn't need to work on anything because i was pulling a 3.5+ without any effort, so I played a lot of wow.
Who the hell are YOU to decide what is fun and enjoyable for me? Since when did you become the God of all things fun? Millions of people watch American Idol and have fun. I hate the show and would rather have my fingernails be torn off than watch it. But just because I get no enjoyment from watching it doesn't other people don't get immense enjoyment watching it. So fun is subjective.
Some people on the other hand have jobs, kids, relationships, etc. I think it's great that they will be able to see the story line of WoW. I didn't necessarily like playing WC3 that much, but I beat every mission in excitement to see each cut scene. The story is what makes Warcraft so great and I'm glad they're giving everyone a chance to see it.
I have a job. Lets say between working and travel and preparation it totals 50 hours a week. I sleep for roughly 50 hours a week. That leaves 68 hours free. 20-25 of which I used to play WoW (12 hours raiding, the rest farming). I didn't play Friday or Saturday nights. But unlike casuals I'm not a multi-millionaire living a rock star life and I can't afford to go out more than twice a week. After alcohol, movies, food, entrance fees for nightclubs or bands and transport I can't afford it. I'm not like you, I have an average job and I don't live the high rolling lifestyle. WoW is a perfect hobby for me, fun, entertaining and cheap. I've never had to ignore friends, family or lifestyle for the game and still see content.
I'm going to say this again just in hoping that maybe you will post a viable response. You just keep saying it pisses you off that some 25 man content will be in a 10 man format without any reason whatsoever.
Why do I need a reason other than I don't like it? Do you need a reason and a letter from your parents on why you didn't like a movie? It ruins the game experience for me and you're obviously too ignorant and blind that your own arguments can be used against you. Why don't casuals just shut the fuck up and run Karazhan and stop complaining about hardcores see more content? How does me clearing BT affect you in Karazhan?
Your ignoring the fact that your style of gameplay is not going to change one bit because 25 man content will STILL EXIST AND THE GEAR WILL STILL BE BETTER. This is what makes you happy right? I'm going to go fuck myself now.
Who the fuck are you to decide what is appropriate gameplay for me? Not that you ever bother to fully read or understand my posts (most likely beyond you) but identical 10 mans of 25 man content is going to create new problems.
Phew, only addon I evere use is that one that shows your aggro, anything else just takes away all the fun from finding things out for yourself, at least for me. Well, lately I'm just PVPing so I don't use addons anymore.
I wonder if people will ever realy get what is WoW about. I mean, if it was possible to make a true virtual world with all the rules, consequences and interaction, that would run on an average PC and be intuitive enough for almost anyone who played at least one game in their life to get in and have fun, Blizzard would be the first to tap that shit.
As that isn't possible, we get WoW, the next best thing (in a way), a fun GAME, with game rules and game reality that lets people have fun. You can like whatever kinky shit you want, but for most people, fun is very rarely tied to punishing yourself.
Well I'm not talking about 5 mins. I'm talking like giving me 10 seconds to look at the 2 to compare the items and decide. They give you like 3 seconds. You want this roll.......ok goes to..... Like waiting an extra 6 seconds is gonna be making everyone wait. Hell we are gonna be in here raiding for 3 hours. I don't think an extra 12 seconds per boss fight is really gonna slow the whole thing down.
No, but if EVERY single person in your raid took an extra 10-20 seconds, on top of the 10-20 seconds given to decide, for EVERY single piece of loot that drops in Karazhan (10 bosses + chess but excluding the pointless animal boss) it starts to add up when you are working against respawn timers. Now apply that to 25 man raids.
When doing guild runs (progression content with DKP or farmed non DKP stuff) I would always expect people to quickly decide if they want to bid/roll. Quite often I used to pug Karazhan and things would be different. I expected things to go slower and for people to take longer.
On one hand you are being a selfish in holding up a raid because you feel like it. If the 9 other people in the raid are getting frustrated then you're in the wrong raid.
I think I once read a statistic that in the old days less than 20% of players were active raiders, and when it came to Naxx that number went down to like 5%.
More than 20% of lvl 60's saw at least some of ZG, MC and Onyxia. So that is wrong. The 5% of Naxx would mostly be those who cleared it. Of which I am not part of that 5%. Oh, no, I didn't get to see Sapphiron or Kel'Thuzad. WAAAAAAAA DAMN YOU TO HELL BLIZZARD! I WANT MY $15 BACK! I mean, those people who busted their hump getting past the Four Horsemen don't deserve anything more than what I had, do they?
I can see why Blizzard has moved focus from the hardcore crowd to the casual, thats where the big money is.
Because your $15 is worth more than my $15? Catering to a majority by pissing off a minority is NOT good business sense.
I did see a statement that someone made about casuals going from one game to another more frequently than hardcore players. I disagree.....seems to me the hardcore chew through new content way too fast and quickly become bored and move on, leaving the casuals behind who still play for years.
Thats a different issue and one that is currently discussed by the community with Death & Taxes disbanding. But compare this
July 2005: Blackwing Lair is released with patch 1.6 (8 bosses) Sept 2005: Zul'Gurub (20 man) is released with patch 1.7 (6 bosses with 2 optional and 2 summoned bosses) Jan 2006: Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj (20 man) and Temple of Ahn'Qiraj (40man) released. Ruins had 6 bosses and Temple 9. June 2006: Naxxramas released with patch 1.11. 15 bosses. Dec 2006: Blizzard release 2.0.1 in preparation for the expansion. The vast majority of raiding is stopped, and virtually all Naxx raiding ends.
In the space of 11 months Blizzard released 3 40 man instances with a total of 32 new bosses and 2 20 man instances with a total of 16 bosses. Compare that to the amount of content being release now.
May 2007. Black Temple is released and the only new raiding content between Sunwel Plateau in March 2008, 10 months later, is Zul'Aman, a 10 man instance with 6 bosses. In the 10 months after Black Temple Blizzard released 2 instances with a total of 12 bosses.
Now, there is always a diehard crowd in every game, who play it for 5, 6, or more years, way beyond any practical reason, and they are loyal, but small in number.
And diehard doesn't = hardcore, hmm? The diehards are the hardcore players. As I've pointed out there are still 30,000 to 40,000 people still playing the original Everquest. How many of those have been subscribers for 9 years? Quite a few. $15 a month for 12 months a year x 9 years that game has been released = $1620 plus cost of expansions. Some of those players would have spent close to $2000 on everquest.
Now you're a VP of a company so I'll leave it to you to work out how important customer loyalty is. Having 1 person play the game for 9 years paying $15 a month plus the costs of expansions and the original game compared to 20 casuals who play for 3 months and then cancel their accounts because some other new game has been released.
Most large developers are now avoiding the niche markets, those who love large scale raiding, or FFA PVP w/looting because that's not where the money is.
Doesn't make their business plans automatically right does it? Why does Blizzard need to piss on the hardcore players continuously? Are the casuals going to threaten to quit unless Blizzard does everything they can to make Hardcores quit (removing attunements, identical 10 and 25 instances, welfare epics, no new content because the casuals can't clear the old content etc) How is forcing all the hardcores to switch to AoC or War going to help Blizzard's profits?
10 mans will be more flexible for casual players, casual guilds, and will help fill in the loot for players who can't get upgrades for their spec from other places.
The 25 mans will still be tons of fun, give the best loot, and be the main progression chain, but now we aren't as limited to schedules or the like.
Looking forward to raiding naxx with my guild with 25 people, then having our group go into the 10 man version the next day off the raid schedule, and get more loot =D
If i pay 15$ a month for any MMO, I expect to get as much as I can for that money period. If they so call cater to casual gamers. Everyone of those that leave i'm sure there as many that come and play as well because of new changes. The more a MMO is flexiable the better it can be. At the same time i dont see WoW backing off way too far from the hardcore crowd either. In fact i see blizzard mostly focusing on the Arena just because they feel they will be taken seriously as a esport. All MMO's go through the peaking and then just keep the gaming going phase. That is where WoW is entering now witht he next expansion just keep it going and hopefully arena will be taken seriously as a esport then they will have a whole new area to focus on fulltime lol.
Smarter than the average bear? That is assuming bears are smart.
10 man Arthas? Thats a bloody joke...If 25 measly mortals can take down Illidan (according to Blizz apparently they can) how can 10 measly mortals defeat a demi-god....? Blizz seriously needs to stop screwing up their once-good game. 40 man raids is where it was at back before the cursed expansion.
And another thing, ever since Blizz lowered the raid capacity, a lot of people have been out of a job really causing lots of people to quit. This game wasn't created casually, so why should It should it change to casual when most people i know love the old way? If you want casual play, go play Guild Wars or something...WoW wasnt meant for slow people.
OP: first off, tone done your swearing. It is not permitted and it is going on my nerves, I am sure you can put your point across without insults or bad words, savy?
Second, my numbers were just example, but let's go with yours. so 30% has seen Hyjal? and Burning Crusade has been out for oh, 18 months? And you do not find anything strange in that?
Why not?
I mean Hyjal is the pinnacle of Content, or almost, and still only less than 1/3 has SEEN that content AFTER 18 MONTHS!
How many before the expansion get released? will we ever get to 40%?
Third: Blizzard ALREADY said 10-men and 25-men will have separate progression and separate gear. with 25-men being one notch higher than 10-men but BOTH starting off easy and ramping up all the way to harder than the hardest we have right now. If you do not believe them, well, then why are we discussing at all?
Fourth: "I do not like XXXX, period" is good when you talk with your friends, but if you want to have a discussion in a forum, like here, it is pointless. If that is ALL your motivations, then stop posting. nothing positive will EVER come out of it, you will remain fixated in your position, as it has no reason to be beside your own will, and we will all have a bad time throwing virtual rocks at each other.
Fifth: Hardcore Vs Casuals has been going on since day 1 of MMorpg and will prolly go on like that since the very end. Certain games cater to one type, certain to the other and most still tries to cather to all to not lose customers. World of Warcraft has always been, since day 1, a game catering to many Casuals. It has many features that Hardcore players did not need, like less grind and much faster levelling, that are part of the core principles of this game. Blizzard of course also tried to cather to the Hardcore by offering end game Raids and very competitive PvP. Infact, before Burning Crusade, it was common knowledge that 1-59 was Casual and 60 was totally Hardcore.
I would think anyone sees the problem there, you are cathering to a certain crowd for most of the game and then switch off,and Hard, to the other at the very end.
In Burning Crusade and now in WotL they are trying to make this switch much softer, first we had 25-men raids and lots of content that did not require a raid like dailies and Heroic dungeons so that even people not part of a raiding guild could do something once at max level, this just increase on that.
Sixth: So casuals live the life of the millionarie rockstar? you DO realize that usually THAT is how hardcore are defined? Because in one way or the other they CAN play much much much more than casuals and so they need to have disposable income to throw away?
Is that true? None in the least and neither is your accusation. Let's stop stereotyping people, shall we? Casuals laments the fact they cannot see content in a game they are currently playing, what is wrong with that? Would you like to buy, say, Mass Effect and then be told before the climax of the gameplay that "hey! you need to repeat the whole game 5 more times before you can see the very best ending ever!!" ?
See? Single player games got the concept right. The WHOLE game is available to anyone, BUT for those that really likes the game and plays it for hours, there are EXTRAS! You get some special boss, or some achievement, BUT nothing of this is part of the actual storyline of the game. So why in a MMorpg, Hardcore cannot be happy with those? But they NEED to be superior and they NEED to have areas of the games Reserved Exclusively for them? Most of the time areas that are the very pinnacle of the game/Expansion? (Like Illadan and the Blöack temple).
Yes, I just turned the tables on you, now the ball is yours.
"If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day, if you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime"
Comments
I played Warcraft: Orcs and Humans way back in 1995. I played WCII the following year and the WCII (my favourite of all) in 1996. I played WC3 and the excellent expansion. Until WoW I had never played a mmorpg in my entire life except for 30 mins of Everquest and Star Wars Galaxies. Neither which I liked. I like the warcraft story (I dont read the books or anything else, just the game story) and the whole concept of dungeons having indentical 25 man and 10 man version existing in the same game is beyond stupid. I don't role play nor am I into fantasy books and stuff, but I do like my computer games to have a story and a concept that makes [b]sense[/b]
What I don't understand is why it matters if people can't off spec in 10 mans. If it is 10 man content, then people should spec something useful. That so called "Pro Fury Warrior" should maybe try out what his class was designed to do. In a 10 man there just isn't room for the off spec which is FINE. When was the last time a ret paladin was absolutely necessary in any raiding situation? It has never been the case. They have always been replaceable. Sometimes the offspec just isn't as useful. That's why there is both a TWENTY FIVE man raid instance and a 10 man. They're not taking out 25 man raids from the game, so I don't see how this affects anyone that wants to offspec or anyone that wants to be a so called hardcore player. Ill use you as an example Walsho because you seem to want there to just be 25 man raids. The fact that there is still 25 man raid instances in the game caters to you. You want people to be able to off spec their class, and you want to do 25 man raids. BINGO there are going to be 25 man raids in WOTLK so i don't see how this change affects you at all. You also complain that having two different versions ruins the story. It doesn't change the story in the slightest! Do you think different events or going to occur in both versions in the instance? Whatever happens in the 25 man will be the same in the 10 man. There is no change to the story at all. So please find a better explanation to why this angers you because your arguments don't make a lot of sense.
You just answered yourself without even realizing it. You just admitted that casuals make up the majority of the subscribers. Therefore it is them that Blizzard is rightfully most concerned with. It' not that they don't care about the hardcore player, they still give them content aimed at them, however it is the casual player that is the most important because they make up the majority of the subscribers. That's just common sense. It's possible that it could effect the number of subscribers in the long term, but you can't sacrifice the much larger number of subscribers in the short term.
Did you actually read my full post? Casuals are also the players who quit the game at the drop of the hat to chase whatever is new and shiny. I noticed you didn't quote my Everquest example. You can bet the 30,000+ people still playing Everquest are not casuals.
We're already seeing the death of raiding in North America. D&T are dead, or at least are rebuilding and are no longer at the bleeding edge of raiding. Even Euro guilds like Nihilium are expressing unhappiness with raiding. SK Gaming have their beginnings in Quakeworld (online version of Quake 1) but they ditched that as soon as they started losing to the newer and better clans coming through. They moved onto whatever was the next hot gaming title and they'll do the same with WoW.
The realm I used to play on had 12 Illidan killing guilds. Thats a lot of hardcore players. Out of the 4.5 million Euro/NA players a lot are hardcore raiders. So why is Blizzard deliberately trying to piss them off? Wouldn't it be in Blizzard's interest to keep the casuals AND hardcore players happy?
If one group amounts to 51% of a demographic that means theres 49% remaining. If you were a business person would you only try to get the business of that 51% at the expense of the 49%? Now, WoW is not 51% casual and 49% hardcore. It would be more like 67% casual and 33% hardcore. Thats around 1.5 million hardcore players. Thats a lot of players to piss off.
[quote]Originally posted by jbdub1
Because it was the casuals who cried and cried and cried and cried and cried and cried that ret paladins weren't raid viable. If you applied to any hardcore raiding guild as ret you would be laughed at. Those in hardcore raiding guilds would spec whatever was needed to clear the content whereas the casuals would spec the way they wanted to play and then complain when they couldn't clear the content. Why would harcore guilds DEMAND that ret paladins, moonkin druids and elemental shaman be raid viable? They were clearing content without off-specs. It was the casuals who didn't want to be "hardcore" and take raid only specs that sucked for farming and PvP who complained. And I'll guarantee you they will complain in WotLK if the 10mans are hard. Its the difference a hardcore player and a casual. The hardcore player will adapt to the challenges ahead, learn to play his/her class, work on gear, read boss strats. The casual will just demand Blizzard change the game to suit him/her because he/she pays $15 a month. Look at the comments in this thread. The whole basis of the casual's argument is "I pay the same money as hardcore raiders therefore I should have everything they have."
Take druids for example. Remember the days when innervate was not trainable at lvl 40 but instead the 31 talent point in the resto tree? Most casual guilds would raid with feral druids healing so they didn't get the benefit of innervate, which back in pre-BC was GODLY. With the massive amount of mana per 5 available now, and with the buff to spirit in 2.4 it isn't such a big deal.
I never said I wanted off-specs to be viable. It has never concerned me because I've always taken raid specs.
If you're a player willing to spec to whatever is needed to clear content then you are not casual.
ZG, AQ20, ZA and even Karazhan are not central to the Warcraft story (the actual bosses in Karazhan are not important even though Karazhan the place is). But having major story characters like Arthas and Malygos in 10 man instances ruins the game for me. Thats my opinion and if you don't like it you can fuck yourself. I'm not against 10 man content for casuals but why does it HAVE to be the same as the 25 man content?. Oh, thats right, you pay $15 therefore you're entitled to everything.
Why same content for casuals as for hardcore? Supposing it is, that has not be confirmed yet, why would you create a lot of content that the MAJORITY of your player base will never see?
It makes no sense and this is the main point here. Everyone knows most of the raid instances of old are some of the BEST content for WoW there is, they were the best designed and took the most effort from the Devs to do. Still, not 33%, BUT something like 1% ever was in Naxx (at its level ,now there are level 70 tourists that go there).
Having lots and lots of devs hours for some incredible content that only 1% will ever see is a waste of resources, period.
This new experiment is a compromise. their Devs hours will go toward a much bigger % of their customers AND there STILL is hardcore raiding content as I expect the 25-man version to be quite harder than the 10 as they already said they will have different loot table, so different Tier equipment and I would think higher difficulty level.
So what if Malygos will be a 10 man encounter? Better THAT than it be a 1% people encounter! Malygos (and Arthas) ARE great advertisement and marketing opportunities! you want most of your customers to see them, not the least!
"If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day, if you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime"
Did you actually read my full post? Casuals are also the players who quit the game at the drop of the hat to chase whatever is new and shiny. I noticed you didn't quote my Everquest example. You can bet the 30,000+ people still playing Everquest are not casuals.
Why is it that when someone can't refute your post, they start their post off with "Did you actually read my full post?" Well as a matter of fact I did read your whole post. Now will you please refute my response? I didn't quote your EQ example because I didn't think the raw numbers were all that important to the discussion, but for the sake of argument, let's analyze your EQ example shall we?
Ok, you say that EQ has about 30k current subs. How many did they have at their peak? According to MMORPG.com which is about the only source we have on this it was around 500K. Let's assume these numbers are fairly accurate. Your theory is that those 30K are EQ's hard core players. Ok, I'll buy that. But that means that over 90% of EQ's subs at it's peak were casuals. I'm defining casuals here as those people who would drop EQ at the drop of a hat. Now lets apply that to WoW. Since WoW has over 10 million paying subs, that would mean that about 1 million are hard core, stick to the very end kind of folks and about 9 million are the quit at a drop of the hat folks. So you honestly think that Blizzard should worry more about pissing off the 1 million, rather than the 9 million? If you honestly believe that, then there's no point in discussing it with you anymore because we just don't agree.
Now, I doubt those number are relevant in the least because even you yourself said that it's probably more like 1/3 hardcore to 2/3 casuals and I'll even buy that. But that means your EQ example doesn't fit now does it? But it doesn't really matter because that was never my argument in the first place. My argument is that the majority of WoW subs are casuals and not hard core and you agree, it doesn't matter whether it's 10% or 33%. It doesn't make any sense to cater to the hard core when they are not the majority.
Even if that weren't true and let's say it was closer to a 50/50 split. Would it make more sense to piss off the casuals who are more likely to drop your game at the drop of a hat or piss off the hard core ones who are more likely to stick it out to the very end no matter what you do? I'm sorry, but I think it makes more sense to cater to the casuals than it does to the hard core even in this case.
Only 1% ever saw any content in Naxx? Thats rubbish and you know it. A LOT more than 1% saw some of the early (and quite easy bosses) in Naxxramas. Most of the bosses in Naxx were a lot more simple than C'Thun (past patch). I knew a lot of guilds who didn't down C'thun that managed to do 1-3 Naxx bosses. So you are talking out of your uniformed butthole.
And the real reason so few people saw Naxx was BECAUSE IT WAS RELEASED SO LATE. It was released on June 20th 2006. By the time patch 2.0 was released in early December most guilds had stopped raiding because the expansion was only a few weeks away. I don't think many guilds downed Kel' Thuzad for the first time post patch 2.0 if any at all. So we only had 5 to 5 and a half months of raiding Naxx.
Whats with this 1% bullshit? As I in an earlier post there are 12 Illidan killing guilds on my realm, a medium sized PvP realm. Soon there will be 13 since a guild is on the Council. So stop talking rubbish. Check wowjutsu. There are 30% of players who have seen Hyjal and climbing rapidly. Theres already 4% of players in Sunwell and its only been out a few weeks with plenty of Illidan guilds currently gearing to hit SWP.
And who said the casuals can't progress to the harder 25 man content? As I've said a thousand fucking times they should have two 25 mans. One the casuals to farm to gear up and do the harder 25 man content. Take SSC and TK for example. Make SSC the casual instance and TK the hardcore instead of them both being tier 5 level (but expand TK to 6 bosses as well). The casuals can farm SSC and to do TK where the harcore raiders can skip straight to TK and do SSC at their discretion. But the hardcore instance is the only instance that will contain "lore" bosses. So that means no Vashj for SSC.
And there cannot be a massive gear difference between 10 mans and 25 mans. Why? It will ruin 25 man raiding if 10 mans have much lower gear quality. Because since most players will be taking the ezy mode, epic loot train, when 25 man guilds need to recruit they will have to recruit players doing 10 man instances. Since there will be much less players doing 25man content they will need to draw from the larger pool to replace those who quit the game. Even if 25man guilds poach players from other 25 man guilds someone is going to have to a replacement, just trading players doesn't increase the pool size.
Now, if the 10 man loot is not good enough to be competitive in the 25 man instance then the 25man guilds are FORCED into farming old content to gear up the new players. Blizzard knows that by having only good gear drop from the high end instances it slows guilds down by continually having to gear up new players. I LOVE badge loot. It allows guilds to recruit new players and not have to worry about gearing them up. So either 10 man content in WotLK or badge loot (which would nullify 10 man loot if 10 man loot wasn't up to standard) has to be of a 25 man raiding standard otherwise raiding guilds will spend more time spinning their wheels in old content gearing up new players.
<modedit>
Maybe Blizzard is trying to help the hardcores to save them from their self-destructive tendencies.
I used to consider myself in that category, finally decided to give it up. Got a promotion to VP, my family started to love me again, and I began a program of running 5 days a week for the past 2 years.
I know, I'm not helping.... but its Friday, how bad can things really be today?
I think I once read a statistic that in the old days less than 20% of players were active raiders, and when it came to Naxx that number went down to like 5%.
I can see why Blizzard has moved focus from the hardcore crowd to the casual, thats where the big money is.
I did see a statement that someone made about casuals going from one game to another more frequently than hardcore players. I disagree.....seems to me the hardcore chew through new content way too fast and quickly become bored and move on, leaving the casuals behind who still play for years.
Now, there is always a diehard crowd in every game, who play it for 5, 6, or more years, way beyond any practical reason, and they are loyal, but small in number.
Most large developers are now avoiding the niche markets, those who love large scale raiding, or FFA PVP w/looting because that's not where the money is.
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"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Where did Blizzard state that the 10 man instance would be the same as the 25 man? They only said that there would be a 10 man version and a 25 man version, they didn't say they would be the same. In fact they said they would NOT be the same because they said that each would have it's own loot table and tier set. I think it's safe to assume that there will be other differences as well although it's possible that the same bosses may appear. Most likely although the bosses will look alike and have the same name, they obviously won't be exactly the same. I can pretty much gaurantee you that the 25 man boss will be much tougher to defeat than the 10 man boss, hence the better loot table.
So what again is your problem? Oh, you think that you as a hard core player is entitled to something more than the casual player beyond the fact that you already get better loot.
You are wise beyond your years Kyleran (that's not to say you are old). I believe I fall into the diehard crowd. I play pretty much 7 days a week for a couple hours a day and yet I've never been to many of the 40 or 25 man raid instances. I simply have my alts and love getting them all to level 70 and getting all the professions and getting them all up to 375. I couldn't care less about tier sets or best of slot items. Heck I don't even know what the loot tables look like in Kara.
I recently had a discussion with a buddy of mine that is a fairly hard core raider. He plays about as often as me, but we are actually nothing alike. He leads our Kara runs and I had complained in the past that he doesn't give people long enough to decide on whether or not we want to roll on the epics that drop. We started talking about it and he said that he knew the moment he looked at it whether or not he wanted it and couldn't understand why I took me so long to decide until I explained to him that I can't simply look at the name and instantly know whether or not it's an upgrade. I have to compare the stats on the item that I'm wearing (which I may or may not even be aware of) and the stats on the item that just dropped and then I decide. He was amazed. He thought that EVERYONE just knew what dropped from EVERY boss and knew exactly what was an upgrade and what wasn't. THAT my friend is the definition of hard core or casual in my opinion. It has nothing to do with time spent in the game or whether they would want to off-spec or whatever. There's simply a different mind set with some people. To them it's all about the loot. They know exactly what they have, what they want and where they can get it. For us casuals running Kara, each boss is like Christmas. You can't wait to find out what present Moroes is going to bring you. Hard cores just don't understand that.
ZG, AQ20, ZA and even Karazhan are not central to the Warcraft story (the actual bosses in Karazhan are not important even though Karazhan the place is). But having major story characters like Arthas and Malygos in 10 man instances ruins the game for me. Thats my opinion and if you don't like it you can fuck yourself. I'm not against 10 man content for casuals but why does it HAVE to be the same as the 25 man content?. Oh, thats right, you pay $15 therefore you're entitled to everything.
I think it comes down to this. You still failed to explain how casual players playing the same content in a different format affects you at all. It seems like you're just upset that you can't say to yourself," I spent a shit load more time playing this game than someone else, and I am better at the game because of it, and get to see content they don't get to." Why are you so worried about what others are doing? Just worry about your guild, what they need, and how you are progressing as a player. Who gives a fuck what everyone else is doing? It seems to me you need to stop worrying about other people and just play the game for your own enjoyment. The same goes for other hardcore players. I myself used to play the game hardcore, yet I see that other people didn't have nearly as much time as myself to devote to the game. I was a high school kid and didn't need to work on anything because i was pulling a 3.5+ without any effort, so I played a lot of wow. Some people on the other hand have jobs, kids, relationships, etc. I think it's great that they will be able to see the story line of WoW. I didn't necessarily like playing WC3 that much, but I beat every mission in excitement to see each cut scene. The story is what makes Warcraft so great and I'm glad they're giving everyone a chance to see it.
Pappy also made a good point that I've been saying in my previous posts. Just play the game for fun, and have fun downing bosses with a good group of people.
I'm going to say this again just in hoping that maybe you will post a viable response. You just keep saying it pisses you off that some 25 man content will be in a 10 man format without any reason whatsoever. Your ignoring the fact that your style of gameplay is not going to change one bit because 25 man content will STILL EXIST AND THE GEAR WILL STILL BE BETTER. This is what makes you happy right? I'm going to go fuck myself now.
You are wise beyond your years Kyleran (that's not to say you are old). I believe I fall into the diehard crowd. I play pretty much 7 days a week for a couple hours a day and yet I've never been to many of the 40 or 25 man raid instances. I simply have my alts and love getting them all to level 70 and getting all the professions and getting them all up to 375. I couldn't care less about tier sets or best of slot items. Heck I don't even know what the loot tables look like in Kara.
I recently had a discussion with a buddy of mine that is a fairly hard core raider. He plays about as often as me, but we are actually nothing alike. He leads our Kara runs and I had complained in the past that he doesn't give people long enough to decide on whether or not we want to roll on the epics that drop. We started talking about it and he said that he knew the moment he looked at it whether or not he wanted it and couldn't understand why I took me so long to decide until I explained to him that I can't simply look at the name and instantly know whether or not it's an upgrade. I have to compare the stats on the item that I'm wearing (which I may or may not even be aware of) and the stats on the item that just dropped and then I decide. He was amazed. He thought that EVERYONE just knew what dropped from EVERY boss and knew exactly what was an upgrade and what wasn't. THAT my friend is the definition of hard core or casual in my opinion. It has nothing to do with time spent in the game or whether they would want to off-spec or whatever. There's simply a different mind set with some people. To them it's all about the loot. They know exactly what they have, what they want and where they can get it. For us casuals running Kara, each boss is like Christmas. You can't wait to find out what present Moroes is going to bring you. Hard cores just don't understand that.
Its easy. Purple > Blue > Green > Grey
Sorry forgot about the Greys.
Don't be terrorized! You're more likely to die of a car accident, drowning, fire, or murder! More people die every year from prescription drugs than terrorism LOL!
Oh damn is purple 1 better than purple 2? Should I roll on that ring because it has +20 to AP and mine has +10 to agility? What's the formula for Agility to AP again? Crap!! What if I roll and it's not better than what I have, I can't give it back then. What if I don't roll and then my buddy whispers me after they've given it away why I didn't roll? CRAP!!!!
Does anyone else have this problem or is it only ME!!!
Hell yeah, you should at least know the basics of your class and know the value for AP/AP/crit for your gear lvl.
It would also only take you the time of writing a post here (which you find the time for as it seems) to look up drops in atlas loot and make yourself a wishlist. No need to let 9 other ppl wait until you have made up your mind.
/soapbox
Well I'm not talking about 5 mins. I'm talking like giving me 10 seconds to look at the 2 to compare the items and decide. They give you like 3 seconds. You want this roll.......ok goes to..... Like waiting an extra 6 seconds is gonna be making everyone wait. Hell we are gonna be in here raiding for 3 hours. I don't think an extra 12 seconds per boss fight is really gonna slow the whole thing down. And I do know the basics of my classes, but I have 3 toons that I raid with, so forgive if I'm sometimes not exactly sure just exactly what the difference is between 10 agility and 20 AP. Can you tell me now, right off the top of your head? Well you probably can, but I'll bet that not everyone who raids can. And besides it's never that simple or I wouldn't really have a problem. You usually have to look at several things like Armor rating, Stamina, Agility, AP, +Crit, +Hit, +mana/5, +int, how many slots and what color are they? That's a lot to decide in like 3 seconds. They only know because they've got the whole damn thing memorized like it's some sort of life or death information. My buddy thinks you should not only know this stuff, but should keep an excel spreadsheet with all your toons and check them off when you get them like some kinda of shopping list. I'm sorry, but that just takes away from the whole fun of being in the instance in the first place for me. Why make it so complicated? Can't we just be here to kill some stuff and let the loot be a nice little bonus? No, the hard cores won't allow that. It's all business. You have to have your shit together, you have to have spent 4 hours pouring over the loot tables and deciding what you need, who gives it to you etc. Perhaps I have the time to post in these forums because I don't do that. My buddy is on the internet every day deciding what he needs next and how to get it. I prefer to waste my time talking on these forums. To each his own.
/soapbox off
Edit: Oh and here's the real funny part. Whenever an epic drops from a random mob and they don't know the loot table for that mob, we'll sit there for like 30 seconds trying to figure out who wants it because they are in the same boat with me then and they have to compare what they got to it and make a decision. And you can bet your ass that whenever something drops that my buddy can't quite make up his mind about that he'll sit there for as long as it takes to make a decision because he's the master looter. No, it's got very little to do with being considerate of those around you, it has everything to do with not being tolerant of those around you and giving them the same courtesy you offer to yourself.
hey Pappy, I give you a little tip. Download the ace2 addon Geardps, it gives you a score in the items tooltip about how good an item is, it even scales agi and crit value depending on your gear lvl and considers if you are hit capped or not. Also the gem slots are considered if you setup which gems you use for every slot colour.
Now you can impress your buddy
I have explained how it affects me. I don't like the concent of turning the game into a glorified single player game with easy mode turned on. Just because I'm not rapped and bashed by someone doesn't mean I can't like something. I will not renew my subscribtion once WotLK because of this as I originally planned. Blizzard can create as many 10 man instances for casuals where they only have to roll their faces across the keyboard to get their epics and be happy. The major storyline should always be raids that epic to match the bosses that are contained within the instance.
Can you spell H-Y-P-O-C-R-I-T? Why are YOU so obsessed with what the hardcore raiders, who put the time and effort in, are doing? All I see is casuals crying "WAAAAAAAAAAA HARDCORES HAVE MORE GEAR AND I WANT THE SAME!". Personally, I couldn't give a flying shit if your guild can't get past 5/6 SSC 3/4 TK so why are are all the casuals crying about attunements and the like? Why did the casuals DEMAND that Blizzard remove the Hyjal/BT attunements? Because they pay $15 a month and therefore they're entitled to everything the players who put more time and effort without actually having to put any time or effort into game. THE WHOLE CASUAL ARGUMENT IS "MY LIFE IS TOO COOL TO PUT ANY EFFORT INTO RAIDING BUT SINCE I PAY $15 A MONTH I DEMAND EVERYTHING THAT THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE PUT THE TIME AND EFFORT INTO ACHIEVING THEIR IN-GAME GOALS BECAUSE THOSE PEOPLE ARE NO LIFE NERD LOSERS AND I'M IN THE POSITION TO MAKE SWEEPING, GENERAL STATEMENTS ABOUT THE STATE AND LIFESTYLES OF OTHER PEOPLE.
So what if I have more time to raid and have better gear and seen more content than you? So what if I have the stupid Hand of A'dal title and you don't? Shut up and play the game and stop demanding Blizzard give you everything people who have worked harder than you to obtain because you're life is super cool and you only have 0.0000000000005 nanoseconds a year to play, coz, ur life is so coool.
Who the hell are YOU to decide what is fun and enjoyable for me? Since when did you become the God of all things fun? Millions of people watch American Idol and have fun. I hate the show and would rather have my fingernails be torn off than watch it. But just because I get no enjoyment from watching it doesn't other people don't get immense enjoyment watching it. So fun is subjective.
I have a job. Lets say between working and travel and preparation it totals 50 hours a week. I sleep for roughly 50 hours a week. That leaves 68 hours free. 20-25 of which I used to play WoW (12 hours raiding, the rest farming). I didn't play Friday or Saturday nights. But unlike casuals I'm not a multi-millionaire living a rock star life and I can't afford to go out more than twice a week. After alcohol, movies, food, entrance fees for nightclubs or bands and transport I can't afford it. I'm not like you, I have an average job and I don't live the high rolling lifestyle. WoW is a perfect hobby for me, fun, entertaining and cheap. I've never had to ignore friends, family or lifestyle for the game and still see content.
Why do I need a reason other than I don't like it? Do you need a reason and a letter from your parents on why you didn't like a movie? It ruins the game experience for me and you're obviously too ignorant and blind that your own arguments can be used against you. Why don't casuals just shut the fuck up and run Karazhan and stop complaining about hardcores see more content? How does me clearing BT affect you in Karazhan?
Who the fuck are you to decide what is appropriate gameplay for me? Not that you ever bother to fully read or understand my posts (most likely beyond you) but identical 10 mans of 25 man content is going to create new problems.
wow hows that junior high life treating you?
Phew, only addon I evere use is that one that shows your aggro, anything else just takes away all the fun from finding things out for yourself, at least for me. Well, lately I'm just PVPing so I don't use addons anymore.
I wonder if people will ever realy get what is WoW about. I mean, if it was possible to make a true virtual world with all the rules, consequences and interaction, that would run on an average PC and be intuitive enough for almost anyone who played at least one game in their life to get in and have fun, Blizzard would be the first to tap that shit.
As that isn't possible, we get WoW, the next best thing (in a way), a fun GAME, with game rules and game reality that lets people have fun. You can like whatever kinky shit you want, but for most people, fun is very rarely tied to punishing yourself.
No, but if EVERY single person in your raid took an extra 10-20 seconds, on top of the 10-20 seconds given to decide, for EVERY single piece of loot that drops in Karazhan (10 bosses + chess but excluding the pointless animal boss) it starts to add up when you are working against respawn timers. Now apply that to 25 man raids.
When doing guild runs (progression content with DKP or farmed non DKP stuff) I would always expect people to quickly decide if they want to bid/roll. Quite often I used to pug Karazhan and things would be different. I expected things to go slower and for people to take longer.
On one hand you are being a selfish in holding up a raid because you feel like it. If the 9 other people in the raid are getting frustrated then you're in the wrong raid.
More than 20% of lvl 60's saw at least some of ZG, MC and Onyxia. So that is wrong. The 5% of Naxx would mostly be those who cleared it. Of which I am not part of that 5%. Oh, no, I didn't get to see Sapphiron or Kel'Thuzad. WAAAAAAAA DAMN YOU TO HELL BLIZZARD! I WANT MY $15 BACK! I mean, those people who busted their hump getting past the Four Horsemen don't deserve anything more than what I had, do they?
Because your $15 is worth more than my $15? Catering to a majority by pissing off a minority is NOT good business sense.
Thats a different issue and one that is currently discussed by the community with Death & Taxes disbanding. But compare this
July 2005: Blackwing Lair is released with patch 1.6 (8 bosses)
Sept 2005: Zul'Gurub (20 man) is released with patch 1.7 (6 bosses with 2 optional and 2 summoned bosses)
Jan 2006: Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj (20 man) and Temple of Ahn'Qiraj (40man) released. Ruins had 6 bosses and Temple 9.
June 2006: Naxxramas released with patch 1.11. 15 bosses.
Dec 2006: Blizzard release 2.0.1 in preparation for the expansion. The vast majority of raiding is stopped, and virtually all Naxx raiding ends.
In the space of 11 months Blizzard released 3 40 man instances with a total of 32 new bosses and 2 20 man instances with a total of 16 bosses. Compare that to the amount of content being release now.
May 2007. Black Temple is released and the only new raiding content between Sunwel Plateau in March 2008, 10 months later, is Zul'Aman, a 10 man instance with 6 bosses. In the 10 months after Black Temple Blizzard released 2 instances with a total of 12 bosses.
And diehard doesn't = hardcore, hmm? The diehards are the hardcore players. As I've pointed out there are still 30,000 to 40,000 people still playing the original Everquest. How many of those have been subscribers for 9 years? Quite a few. $15 a month for 12 months a year x 9 years that game has been released = $1620 plus cost of expansions. Some of those players would have spent close to $2000 on everquest.
Now you're a VP of a company so I'll leave it to you to work out how important customer loyalty is. Having 1 person play the game for 9 years paying $15 a month plus the costs of expansions and the original game compared to 20 casuals who play for 3 months and then cancel their accounts because some other new game has been released.
Doesn't make their business plans automatically right does it? Why does Blizzard need to piss on the hardcore players continuously? Are the casuals going to threaten to quit unless Blizzard does everything they can to make Hardcores quit (removing attunements, identical 10 and 25 instances, welfare epics, no new content because the casuals can't clear the old content etc) How is forcing all the hardcores to switch to AoC or War going to help Blizzard's profits?
I think this is a brilliant idea tbh.
10 mans will be more flexible for casual players, casual guilds, and will help fill in the loot for players who can't get upgrades for their spec from other places.
The 25 mans will still be tons of fun, give the best loot, and be the main progression chain, but now we aren't as limited to schedules or the like.
Looking forward to raiding naxx with my guild with 25 people, then having our group go into the 10 man version the next day off the raid schedule, and get more loot =D
If i pay 15$ a month for any MMO, I expect to get as much as I can for that money period. If they so call cater to casual gamers. Everyone of those that leave i'm sure there as many that come and play as well because of new changes. The more a MMO is flexiable the better it can be. At the same time i dont see WoW backing off way too far from the hardcore crowd either. In fact i see blizzard mostly focusing on the Arena just because they feel they will be taken seriously as a esport. All MMO's go through the peaking and then just keep the gaming going phase. That is where WoW is entering now witht he next expansion just keep it going and hopefully arena will be taken seriously as a esport then they will have a whole new area to focus on fulltime lol.
Smarter than the average bear? That is assuming bears are smart.
10 man Arthas? Thats a bloody joke...If 25 measly mortals can take down Illidan (according to Blizz apparently they can) how can 10 measly mortals defeat a demi-god....? Blizz seriously needs to stop screwing up their once-good game. 40 man raids is where it was at back before the cursed expansion.
And another thing, ever since Blizz lowered the raid capacity, a lot of people have been out of a job really causing lots of people to quit. This game wasn't created casually, so why should It should it change to casual when most people i know love the old way? If you want casual play, go play Guild Wars or something...WoW wasnt meant for slow people.
OP: first off, tone done your swearing. It is not permitted and it is going on my nerves, I am sure you can put your point across without insults or bad words, savy?
Second, my numbers were just example, but let's go with yours. so 30% has seen Hyjal? and Burning Crusade has been out for oh, 18 months? And you do not find anything strange in that?
Why not?
I mean Hyjal is the pinnacle of Content, or almost, and still only less than 1/3 has SEEN that content AFTER 18 MONTHS!
How many before the expansion get released? will we ever get to 40%?
Third: Blizzard ALREADY said 10-men and 25-men will have separate progression and separate gear. with 25-men being one notch higher than 10-men but BOTH starting off easy and ramping up all the way to harder than the hardest we have right now. If you do not believe them, well, then why are we discussing at all?
Fourth: "I do not like XXXX, period" is good when you talk with your friends, but if you want to have a discussion in a forum, like here, it is pointless. If that is ALL your motivations, then stop posting. nothing positive will EVER come out of it, you will remain fixated in your position, as it has no reason to be beside your own will, and we will all have a bad time throwing virtual rocks at each other.
Fifth: Hardcore Vs Casuals has been going on since day 1 of MMorpg and will prolly go on like that since the very end. Certain games cater to one type, certain to the other and most still tries to cather to all to not lose customers. World of Warcraft has always been, since day 1, a game catering to many Casuals. It has many features that Hardcore players did not need, like less grind and much faster levelling, that are part of the core principles of this game. Blizzard of course also tried to cather to the Hardcore by offering end game Raids and very competitive PvP. Infact, before Burning Crusade, it was common knowledge that 1-59 was Casual and 60 was totally Hardcore.
I would think anyone sees the problem there, you are cathering to a certain crowd for most of the game and then switch off,and Hard, to the other at the very end.
In Burning Crusade and now in WotL they are trying to make this switch much softer, first we had 25-men raids and lots of content that did not require a raid like dailies and Heroic dungeons so that even people not part of a raiding guild could do something once at max level, this just increase on that.
Sixth: So casuals live the life of the millionarie rockstar? you DO realize that usually THAT is how hardcore are defined? Because in one way or the other they CAN play much much much more than casuals and so they need to have disposable income to throw away?
Is that true? None in the least and neither is your accusation. Let's stop stereotyping people, shall we? Casuals laments the fact they cannot see content in a game they are currently playing, what is wrong with that? Would you like to buy, say, Mass Effect and then be told before the climax of the gameplay that "hey! you need to repeat the whole game 5 more times before you can see the very best ending ever!!" ?
See? Single player games got the concept right. The WHOLE game is available to anyone, BUT for those that really likes the game and plays it for hours, there are EXTRAS! You get some special boss, or some achievement, BUT nothing of this is part of the actual storyline of the game. So why in a MMorpg, Hardcore cannot be happy with those? But they NEED to be superior and they NEED to have areas of the games Reserved Exclusively for them? Most of the time areas that are the very pinnacle of the game/Expansion? (Like Illadan and the Blöack temple).
Yes, I just turned the tables on you, now the ball is yours.
"If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day, if you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime"