World of Warcraft: Beta for Azeroth - Not Ready for Primetime - MMORPG.com

SBFord · September 2018

World of Warcraft: Beta for Azeroth - Not Ready for Primetime - MMORPG.com

The latest World of Warcraft expansion has been out since August 14th and while it has garnered decent praise for its story and excellent level design, Battle for Azeroth has simultaneously been plagued by more than a few major technical issues, not to mention a -legion- of smaller woes. After the stellar launch of Legion and other past expansions, players are left wondering if Battle for Azeroth was taken out of the oven just a bit too early.

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6stack_Chris · September 2018

I initially was defending Blizzard with this expansion. I was all about telling people that small things happen, and you just need to give them a week to figure it out.

We are now 1 month into this expansion (3 days away) and I am very displeased with most aspects of this game.

I'm not going to threaten to quit, I'm not going to call out devs for sucking at their job and demand an answer, but I'm going to be brutally honest, and tell anyone thinking of coming back for this expansion to save their money (for now).

The amount of things overlooked, downplayed or outright ignored is not something a AAA mmorpg company should plague an expansion with. There are issues that players have been calling out since beta that were never addressed. This expansion, like the image of Illidan shows, was not prepared. There is easily 2-3 months of development/QA that this expansion still needs. Sadly, we the players are now the paying QA team.

So, while the story is great, the leveling experience is one of the best yet, the amount of issues every where else, leave a lot wanting and the amount of developer to community communication is almost not there.

Melecon · September 2018

6stack_Chris said:

I initially was defending Blizzard with this expansion. I was all about telling people that small things happen, and you just need to give them a week to figure it out.

We are now 1 month into this expansion (3 days away) and I am very displeased with most aspects of this game.

I'm not going to threaten to quit, I'm not going to call out devs for sucking at their job and demand an answer, but I'm going to be brutally honest, and tell anyone thinking of coming back for this expansion to save their money (for now).

The amount of things overlooked, downplayed or outright ignored is not something a AAA mmorpg company should plague an expansion with. There are issues that players have been calling out since beta that were never addressed. This expansion, like the image of Illidan shows, was not prepared. There is easily 2-3 months of development/QA that this expansion still needs. Sadly, we the players are now the paying QA team.

So, while the story is great, the leveling experience is one of the best yet, the amount of issues every where else, leave a lot wanting and the amount of developer to community communication is almost not there.

Whole heartily agree with this post and is stated in a way that's not degrading

MadFrenchie · September 2018

The itemization and progression mechanics are sub-par. Levels 116-120 are akin of taking steps deeper into molasses with every ding. Increasing the importance of things like Haste and nerfing our ability to stack it multiple ways (direct nerf to secondary stat contribution, Azerite armor slots missing secondary stats completely) sends a clear picture that the progression system for BfA was poorly thought out. If you want to downplay the effects of secondary stats in general, don't make them more important than ever to the vast majority of specs at the exact same time.

The end-game systems are unwieldy and spread too thinly. Island expeditions, Warfronts, WQs over twice the number of zones as Legion, mission table, along with the normal M+ and raiding. Not sure why anyone would do island expeditions at this point. Warfronts are cool when you're not waiting on the progress bar to fill up so you can queue it.

The short-duration secondary stat buffs on Azerite armor appear to be what Blizzard was hoping would replace secondary stat stacking. However, it's just a poor idea.

MadFrenchie · September 2018

I enjoyed leveling through the zones, though that will lose its luster now that I've experienced them all. I've also been having fun playing a Marksmanship spec in PvP (double-crit Double-Tap ftw!).

However, I can't see myself playing this a long time with the end-game systems the way they are. Leveling presents nothing of note due to the Azerite Armor being totally passive, and currently the end-game isn't attractive enough for me to want to slog through with a Warlock and a Shaman (GG on what you've done to Shamans, Blizzard).

ragebullet · September 2018

i always find it odd how different ingame opinions are from forums. oh well cant win em all

FrodoFragins · September 2018

I'm going to wait for a free weekend in a year or so, assuming I can level to the cap during that time without owning the expansion. By then there should be multiple tiers of LFR to unlock over time if I enjoy the game.

I just don't like the theme of the expansion, but they have to deal with Azshara and N'Zoth eventually, I'm just not sure they deserve their own expansion.

Panther2103 · September 2018

I'm honestly still having fun with the expansion, but I can't pinpoint what I'm having fun with. Maybe it's because I largely skipped Warlords and Legion, but I am actually actively playing my capped character still, which the second I hit cap in Warlords and Legion I quit pretty much directly after.

Although some of the design decisions are holding me back from having as much fun as I could be. I really wish you could queue for Mythics, as I don't really want to have to find groups on my server (everyone is pretty elitist). I also wish you could queue for the actual Player VS Player Expeditions instead of requiring a 3 man group, because I would love to not have to fight bots or find groups.

The world quests are pretty boring, but that's what I've mainly been grinding when I log in, and the new dungeons were pretty fun, but after doing every one of them on heroic the whole finding groups for mythics held me back from continuing.

I haven't run into many bugs, but I can see why a lot of people are upset about them not being fixed.

Deadrites87 · September 2018

Let's face it...this is no longer the company that so many of us grew to like over the years. Most of the people that made this game what it is, have either retired or moved on to different projects. The azerite system as a whole is a huge letdown, class design is awful and I don't enjoy playing classes like I use to. Everything just feels like legion 2.0 with worse progression systems, terrible class design and balance.

FrodoFragins · September 2018

Deadrites87 said:

Let's face it...this is no longer the company that so many of us grew to like over the years. Most of the people that made this game what it is, have either retired or moved on to different projects. The azerite system as a whole is a huge letdown, class design is awful and I don't enjoy playing classes like I use to. Everything just feels like legion 2.0 with worse progression systems, terrible class design and balance.

They used to wait until they knew the product would be polished and ready to announce release dates. Maybe times have changed such that they need more lead time for retailers to list their products?

I think the game has been reduced down to a state where they are afraid to expand it again. Skill Rows unlocking every ten(15?) levels is not a rewarding experience. Every class being homogenized isn't good for class identity. The end game system just gets more and more predatory.

This expansion is making Classic even more appealing than ever. Maybe it's success will even get the current devs to rethink their current philosophy.

Albatroes · September 2018

I might've fallen for you a little bit after reading this Suzie. Objectivity is what this industry needs as a whole and this expansion was objectively not ready. The alphas and betas were essentially free PR for blizz so they could funnel that 'saved' revenue into cheaply made commercials that honestly looks like they just had fans of the game participate in (not like that's a bad thing, but to say it was as expensive as say WoD's advertising would be a laugh imo). Its a shame too, cause there were quite a few people, like preacher and the guy from finalboss (forgot his name), that were giving genuine feedback since alpha and actively getting other people together to cross check numbers and bugs etc, yet so many still made it to live.

xykir · September 2018

You forgot to mention a big bug for one progression group. They had done heroic G'huun week 1. However G'huun fell through the floor after dying and no one got loot or credit. However the raid tab and lockout both showed G'huun had been killed. After trying for days to get in touch with a gm they were told "We cannot grant you achievements, if you really killed him do it again next week." despite the fact logs and screenshots were shown. It is very prestigous to get a week 1 pre nerf kill and basically telling the people how legitimately achieved this to bad, do it again and hope it doesn't bug out next time is extremely unprofessional and a big let down.

FrodoFragins · September 2018

SedrynTyros said:

Panther2103 said:

I'm honestly still having fun with the expansion, but I can't pinpoint what I'm having fun with. Maybe it's because I largely skipped Warlords and Legion, but I am actually actively playing my capped character still, which the second I hit cap in Warlords and Legion I quit pretty much directly after.

Although some of the design decisions are holding me back from having as much fun as I could be. I really wish you could queue for Mythics, as I don't really want to have to find groups on my server (everyone is pretty elitist). I also wish you could queue for the actual Player VS Player Expeditions instead of requiring a 3 man group, because I would love to not have to fight bots or find groups.

The world quests are pretty boring, but that's what I've mainly been grinding when I log in, and the new dungeons were pretty fun, but after doing every one of them on heroic the whole finding groups for mythics held me back from continuing.

I haven't run into many bugs, but I can see why a lot of people are upset about them not being fixed.

For Mythics, I'd recommend you try using the "pre-made" group feature. I stumbled upon it in Legion; didn't even realize it was there. It allows you to create cross-server groups for whatever content you want to participate in. It's a very handy feature that makes creating or joining pickup groups relatively easy.

Those groups made me quit Legion. You apply to enter them as a DPS warrior and get endlessly rejected. WOW has a serious tank/healer shortage that could be partially alleviated by rebalancing dungeons for say 6 men with 4 DPS. They've refused to do so.

And yes I could get a tank spec but I'd rather play a different game and genre than do that. Life's too short to play an MMO in a class/spec you don't want.

I would have stayed longer if they had automated group finders for M+ that required you to prove you were ready via trials or whatever other metric they came up with.

I also never understood why they made made later LFRs have such minimal ilvl increases. While I don't think LFR should yield ilvls close to actual raids, each successive one should be enough of a boost to provide an incentive to do them. But once you did the first tier there was little point in doing later ones more than once to see the content.

Albatroes · September 2018

Also, I honestly think anyone interested in the mythic scene should honestly be a bit pissed about the warfront thing. If you're thinking about it from a mythic raid perspective (bis for your spec completely irrevelant), you can get alts geared up without having to do anything with them. This ends up having a lot of backend characters ready to swap out or at least extras to help funnel other characters with heroic gear (cause if you didn't pay attention during legion, people in the mythic scene were that hardcore, going as far to boost/level new character if they didn't get a 'good' legion after their 'bad luck' protection). The only 'good' thing I guess is that the top '100s' are faction based now. But still, if you're not going to implement a system available to both sides at the same time when it comes to tangible rewards that give gear slightly inferior to some of the hardest content in the game atm, just dont implement it. As someone said on the forums, blizzard has 'nice' ideas but is horrible at execution. Another 'interesting' thing this will do to the veiled crystal/enchant market since you're guaranteed a 340 (epic) piece of gear every warfront. Right now they are about 2k per crystal on my server, so that's 2k gold you're making every 15-20 mins as a horde while you afk and watch netflix until the warfront ends.

FrodoFragins · September 2018

Torval said:

The long term fix to this is to end the progression at some point. Progression needs to have a conclusion or it loses its point. The game is trying to endlessly recycle progression when it should end it.

If they do that they can once again make that curve interesting and rewarding. Why was Vanilla and BC progression interesting? The curve made sense and had an end point. That's why it was called "end game". Moving that goalpost continues to hurt not only the game but the entire industry (because they're all doing it too).

The idea of endless progression is a lie that they've sold themselves and bought at a markup (AH fees ).

Well their goal back then was to try and get the next raid out at the right time to keep people subbed as long as possible. They've simply added additional, seemingly endless, grinds to the mix.

Their goals never changed and end game never had an end as there was always another raid or expansion coming up next.

seraphis79 · September 2018

This isn't the Blizzard team we've grown to appreciate over the years with quality expansion releases. I'm wondering if all the good devs moved on to an unknown project or another blizz game.

Pesonally, I enjoyed the story and getting back to the Alliance vs Horde was a long time coming, but that's where my satisfaction ends. The allied races are locked behind rep grinds in old content, levels are meaningless only affecting quest progression, scaling was a disaster, end game content is mostly more rep grinding and WQs, and tradeskills are mostly pointless.

I'm sooo tired of running the same daily world quests over and over and over and over and over and ... you get the point.

I feel like I got my money's worth, but I'm having a hard time logging back in to the game just to farm the same WQs for rep.

hikaru77 · September 2018

How we can describe BFA in one word? : TEDIOUS!. Warfronts are the most bored thing on the WoW history. It was good the first 15 days, but the magic is gone, now is all about grinding rep to get useless rewards.

SBFord · September 2018

https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comments/9ep0pp/so_youre_probably_wondering_how_i_ended_up_in/

OMG this picture... XD Speaking of bugs....

KalebGrayson · September 2018

I saw a post or two above about making mythic groups. I'll happily tank for mythic + groups if I'm online. Currently a 340 ilvl Demon Hunter Tank. Let me know if interested and we'll meet up in game or discord.

Panther2103 · September 2018

SBFord said:

https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comments/9ep0pp/so_youre_probably_wondering_how_i_ended_up_in/

OMG this picture... XD Speaking of bugs....

Oh wow, I actually had this exact thing happen to me! There was a mine in the middle of a river with a current, I could almost get there so I disengaged to get to it, and it threw me into a small hole with rocks around it and I had to hearth out, got the 3 monelite ore though!

laserit · September 2018

Hmm

Finally had some shitty weather this weekend, so I got my priest to 110 ready to start BfA

Now you guys are all pissing on my parade

/jk

What's the deal with Shadow priests and Shamans?

MadFrenchie · September 2018

laserit said:

Hmm

Finally had some shitty weather this weekend, so I got my priest to 110 ready to start BfA

Now you guys are all pissing on my parade /jk

What's the deal with Shadow priests and Shamans?

Best I can tell, Blizzard only had so long to do all the class reworks. Shadow Priests and Shamans (in general), apparently, were at the end of that line, and the expansion was released before the batter was baked. Guess what that meant for the reworks at the end of the line?

Kyleran · September 2018

xykir said:

You forgot to mention a big bug for one progression group. They had done heroic G'huun week 1. However G'huun fell through the floor after dying and no one got loot or credit. However the raid tab and lockout both showed G'huun had been killed. After trying for days to get in touch with a gm they were told "We cannot grant you achievements, if you really killed him do it again next week." despite the fact logs and screenshots were shown. It is very prestigous to get a week 1 pre nerf kill and basically telling the people how legitimately achieved this to bad, do it again and hope it doesn't bug out next time is extremely unprofessional and a big let down.

Pro tip: there is nothing "prestigious" about accomplishing anything in a video game.

Don't believe me? Ask if you would put such an "accomplishment" in your resume, biography or obituary?

Albatroes · September 2018

Kyleran said:

xykir said:

You forgot to mention a big bug for one progression group. They had done heroic G'huun week 1. However G'huun fell through the floor after dying and no one got loot or credit. However the raid tab and lockout both showed G'huun had been killed. After trying for days to get in touch with a gm they were told "We cannot grant you achievements, if you really killed him do it again next week." despite the fact logs and screenshots were shown. It is very prestigous to get a week 1 pre nerf kill and basically telling the people how legitimately achieved this to bad, do it again and hope it doesn't bug out next time is extremely unprofessional and a big let down.

Pro tip: there is nothing "prestigious" about accomplishing anything in a video game.

Don't believe me? Ask if you would put such an "accomplishment" in your resume, biography or obituary?

Depends on the accomplishment? Unless you dont think universities like the University of Michigan dont offer 4 year scholarships to LoL players.

ConstantineMerus · September 2018

Kyleran said:

xykir said:

You forgot to mention a big bug for one progression group. They had done heroic G'huun week 1. However G'huun fell through the floor after dying and no one got loot or credit. However the raid tab and lockout both showed G'huun had been killed. After trying for days to get in touch with a gm they were told "We cannot grant you achievements, if you really killed him do it again next week." despite the fact logs and screenshots were shown. It is very prestigous to get a week 1 pre nerf kill and basically telling the people how legitimately achieved this to bad, do it again and hope it doesn't bug out next time is extremely unprofessional and a big let down.

Pro tip: there is nothing "prestigious" about accomplishing anything in a video game.

Don't believe me? Ask if you would put such an "accomplishment" in your resume, biography or obituary?

It depends on what your accomplishments are. I'd put EVE and the amount of Platinum trophies I have on my obituary and tombstone. And I already have my EVE tenure and my eSports career on my resume.

Ghavrigg · September 2018

I guess I'm lucky. Only had some minor issues here and there, but have been having a blast for the most part.

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