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While leveling only the pvp battlegrounds seam to offer any challenge these days
OkhamsRazor
Member Posts: 1,047
I was recently pursuaded to give WoW another try , It had been nearly two years since i last played and given I never thought I would be back I deleted my level 80 characters . No biggie really because my friends where playing on a different server to the ones I last played on . I rolled a Priest and a Druid . One of each faction . I found questing offered very little challenge compared to what I remember although it is still enjoyable and will be interesting to see if the mobs become significantly more powerful after the Cataclysm . What amazed me is the raiding , it really is a cakewalk these days and the xp from it is unbelievable . You can go up one level just by doing one raid which to me seams far too simplistic comaperd to other mmos on the market and even to Warcraft just after the Lich King was released . The pvp however while leveling still offers some challenge even if now you can teleport straight back to a graveyeard when your corpse running to your body . I'm by no means a hardcore gamer . If i have a single player game I never play it at the highest difficulty setting .I don't seam to be alone in the game in hoping there will be some challenge put back into it with the new Xpac not just at the endgame but while leveling because the PVE side of the game is starting to remind me of that twilight zone episode where a gambler dies and ends up in what he thinks is heaven because he wins all the time only to find its the other place . Going into a raid instance knowing it going to be a cakewalk is no fun at all .
NB this post only relates to the leveling side of Warcraft and not the endgame . I acknowlage there may well be some very challenging instances as the game progesses .
Comments
I think you are talking about normal instances not raid instances.
Blizzard realized most players don't run content for challenge, they run it for gear and have designed the game so that re-running the same content endlessly is as quick and painless as possible.
It's all about the gear these days baby.....
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Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
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Heroic 25man Lich King is pretty tough....
He who keeps his cool best wins.
The latest Raids in Heroic 25 man mode were always very challeging. No one can discuss this.
It is - however - the road up to that path that is designed in an open and very casual way.
--- REASON ---
So there are 2 possibilities here: OR Blizzard's designers are stupid OR they watched the player data and have seen some interesting trends.
In your every day's activities ... do you always go out and take the biggest challenges every day ... or do you have a lot of fun by doing rather mundane things and be satisfied and simply do "fun" things.
By designing it this way, Blizzard assures that individual players can always be playing on the "edge" or just relax and have something fun and easy to do.
I think they struck a "core" new design mechanism that simply didn't exist in video games a decade ago: the success rate of the player makes him want to go ... back.
20 years ago: you played a game until you were stopped by the mechanics (Pac Man, DK, Mario).
In a "world you play in and pay for", you are encouraged to play ... more.
I could go on with different angles to this (alt play where you need to be motivated and you are not "strong" yet, easy grouping of players (pugs) don't allow for too much hardcore play, etc ...), but I think you get the picture.
But: every player can "seek out" his limits anyway: be that in competitive PvP in Arena or BG's, be that in heroic Raid modes etc, be that in world quests doing 5 levels above your capactiy (great fun this last one).
Blizzard simply found a solution to everyone's "limits" of play. Whatever the gender or age.
The pre-level 80 5-man dungeons are now far too easy for MMORPG veterans like most of us. However for someone like my wife, who is completely new to MMORPGs, the difficulty is perfect.
I think Blizzard have the challenge level spot on. The end game raids are NEVER easy and take insane amounts of knowledge, practice, coordination and preparation. Post-ultimate-patch-pre-expansion WoW is always weird in terms of difficulty.
Blizzard have the MMORPG genre polished better than anyone, the concerns of difficulty for vets are inherent to the genre. The 'hardcore' games have their space, but my wife isn't a hardcore computer nerd like me and would not enjoy the Everquest era of "challenge" (read: time).
Still waiting for your Holy Grail MMORPG? Interesting...
I've been speaking to people in game about this . Most of them (actually all of them) agree the level 1-60 pve is far too easy and there does seam to be a firm belief the Cataclysm may offer a harder more challenging type of gameplay . I get the feeling if Blizzard fail to deliver this it will be a big mistake on thier part . As for the wife who finds this difficulty level perfect is this her very first game ? because the only way I think anyone would find this difficult in any shape or form is if they had had no experiance in gaming what so ever as in this being thier very first week in trying it . Also if this is the case when she comes to level an alt she will find it far too easy as well . Maybe these early level dungeons need a difficulty setting .
Just wait for the expansion at the moment the class talents and abilitys and stats have all be re-balanced however quests and mobs etc havnt just wait for the next patch 4.0.3 or cata and that should fix the problem.
The current dungeons where designed for new level 80s and not for people with 1 years worth of progression on there character also. Plus the new dungeon finder tool lets people get into groups much quicker which means everyone is doing dungeons more so everyone has had alot of practice with the current dungeons.
Heroic Raids are very challenging more challenging than any other game out there to be fair, to be able to even get a group/guild for a heroic raids you need to know you class very well which means geeking out on thorycrafting websites etc
if blizzard were smart theyd have two different difficulties with there dungeons, Normal and hard. im talking about normal instances not heroics. then the vets would be able to get a little more challenge on hard while the new players can hone there skills through normal instances.
They are easy because most people you group with is decked out in heirloom & blue gear. Those dungeons were calibrated with a lot lower gear in mind.
At level 44, my hunter can do ~300 dps on a boss, and most other players can do that in similar gear. That is like 700-1000 dps for the whole group. A boss at that level (Maraudon and the likes) has like 15k health. So you can down a boss in like 15-20 seconds.
Obviously the bosses were designed for people to have much much less power. I am sure a group of fresh toons, without any heirloom items, and only deck out in green items may have a tougher time.
They are already doing it at max level. I think the amount of work is huge if they need to create a hard mode for every dungeon. Otherwise, they probably would have already done it. They are very much in favor of different difficulties for the same content.