- 2,363
- 695
That is just an update on changes to flex raiding and LFR. How is that newsworthy enough to think people are subscribing for?
World of Warcraft: Current Year
- Thread starter hodj
- Start date
Qhue
Trump's Staff
- 7,477
- 4,420
This is a bad idea. LFR with decent but lower powered rewards was fun and entertaining and kept me subscribed to the game for a year even though I had no active guild. A few buddies of mine did the same and one even started playing for the first time and went all the way up to doing SoO in LFR.
Making LFR into a leper colony is not going to win friends and keep subs. This might actually be the dumbest idea they've had since they decided to hemmorage subs by having no content for 12+ months.
Making LFR into a leper colony is not going to win friends and keep subs. This might actually be the dumbest idea they've had since they decided to hemmorage subs by having no content for 12+ months.
- 7,879
- 507
I don't recall a whole lot being written about group finder before, so I consider it pretty newsworthy (and yes, being able to easily join pick up raids without going through OQueue bullshit will help me make a decision about purchasing and resubscribing).
Daidraco
Golden Baronet of the Realm
- 9,210
- 9,314
Correct me if Im wrong, but are you saying you couldnt be bothered to just spend a few hours in Timeless Isle and just queue your ass up for SoO-LFR? You make your friend sound like he has some huge amount of dedication to make it that far. LFR is already a leper colony, nothing new there. So...? They changed the look of the rewards, because (in my opinion) with the addition of the current LFR, they had a group of people that never aspired for more. People ran LFR, got the tier gear and didnt see the point in going for +gooder and dropped their sub. Now that the armor is altogether different, people that are going to do WoD LFR will feel exactly how they should feel - that they are doing easy, handicapped content and should aspire for more and stay subbed for a longer period of time. Dont worry ~ if you arent a fucking moron, you will be done with LFR quickly and will be raiding Normal.
I personally, am glad that they are making more raids with the Flexible Raid Size technology. The benefits of a Flexible Raid Size just make things way less stressful. I hope they can eventually come up with a way to tightly tune Mythic raids to incorporate the tech, too.
Yeah to be fair, LFR is only going to be considered a 'leper colony' by raiders anyway. Any player who would consider finishing LFR their endgame won't give a fuck or know any better. If they happen to see other players running around in actual tier pieces with actual trinkets and get jealous, well shit that's called incentive, that's a good thing.
And from the other end of it, players looking to gear up for normal raids should be spending a lot less time in LFR. Heroic dungeons give equivalent gear, LFR drop rates are getting increased substantially, and it sounds like LFR is going to be tuned to be a lot easier in general. Hopefully you won't need to spend over an hour with a 5 determination stack on a single boss in a 6 month old raid. I have absolutely no problem with LFR being pants-on-head retarded easy, because before LFR there was Sartharion, Archavon, the first wings of Kara and WotLK Naxx, etc.
As for Mythic going flex, there's no chance of that happening without a complete restructuring of the entire difficulty system again. Their reasoning is that 20 players lets them assume you have every single class covered. I would HOPE that means they bring back things like the High King Maulgar fight, but who knows.
And from the other end of it, players looking to gear up for normal raids should be spending a lot less time in LFR. Heroic dungeons give equivalent gear, LFR drop rates are getting increased substantially, and it sounds like LFR is going to be tuned to be a lot easier in general. Hopefully you won't need to spend over an hour with a 5 determination stack on a single boss in a 6 month old raid. I have absolutely no problem with LFR being pants-on-head retarded easy, because before LFR there was Sartharion, Archavon, the first wings of Kara and WotLK Naxx, etc.
As for Mythic going flex, there's no chance of that happening without a complete restructuring of the entire difficulty system again. Their reasoning is that 20 players lets them assume you have every single class covered. I would HOPE that means they bring back things like the High King Maulgar fight, but who knows.
bixxby
Molten Core Raider
- 2,750
- 47
Hey at least the PvP changes are nice for early season/gearing up and no more being conq restricted by dumb as shit RBGS:
War looms on the horizon, and although the Iron Horde poses a substantial threat to all of Azeroth, old grudges between the Alliance and the Horde are not so easily set aside. As Warlords of Draenor development continues, we wanted to share some exciting changes coming to PvP gear and how you'll earn it in the expansion.
I've Got the Power!
In Mists of Pandaria we introduced the PvP Power stat, which allowed PvP gear to be functionally superior to raid and dungeon gear in PvP combat without exceeding the value of its equivalent PvE gear in PvE content. That was largely a success in instanced PvP Arenas and Battlegrounds, but we think we can do better-while also granting players those same benefits in outdoor world PvP. So, in Warlords of Draenor, we're taking a different approach.
PvP gear in Warlords will no longer have PvP-specific stats. Instead, it will scale up to a higher item level as soon as you enter a designated PvP area, such as an Arena or Battleground, or as soon as you enter PvP combat anywhere else in the world. If you're out questing with PvP gear, your items' base item level will be used while fighting back the Iron Horde, but the second that raiding Druid tries to gank you, your higher PvP item level kicks in and you'll have the upper hand. Each piece of PvP gear will have its PvP item level displayed clearly on its tooltip, so there's no guesswork involved.
On top of that, all gear-even gear found in PvE content-will be scaled up to a certain minimum item level in any designated PvP area. That minimum is still lower than any of the actual PvP gear, but a fresh level-100 character who's just wearing some dungeon gear, or even whatever they picked up while questing, will not be at quite as severe a disadvantage should they choose to step into a Skirmish or Random Battleground.
One added benefit of this new system is that most PvE gear will no longer need to be downscaled in PvP areas, as the equivalent PvP gear is already a higher item level in PvP situations. Instead of making players wearing PvE gear feel weaker in PvP, this makes it so players wearing PvP gear feel stronger. The only exception is Mythic raid gear. Mythic's PvE item level and Conquest's PvP item level are very close, so we'll be downscaling Mythic gear slightly in designated PvP areas just to make sure that Conquest gear remains the best available for PvP.
What's In the Box?!
The Warlords of Draenor expansion will also bring some major improvements to the way PvP gear is earned. For starters, we're vastly improving the bonus rewards you can earn from doing Random or Call to Arms Battlegrounds. At the end of a match, you'll earn a Bronze, Silver, or Gold Strongbox-or possibly all three. Which Strongboxes you earn depends on how well your team did in the match, but you can still earn them even if your team doesn't win.
Take Warsong Gulch,for example. If your faction captured at least one flag before the game ended, you'll get the Bronze Strongbox. Capture a second, and you'll earn both the Bronze and Silver. And if you capture all three, not only do you win the game, but you'll also earn all three Strongboxes. We'll be restructuring the scoring of other Battlegrounds slightly (such as changing Arathi Basin to end at 1,500 points) so it's easy to figure out what you need for each Strongbox.
Inside those Strongboxes could be any number of rewards: Honor points, Conquest points-even gear. Better Strongboxes can have better rewards, so even if your team is behind in the match, it's worth keeping up the fight to try to earn the best reward you can.
Of course, Skirmishes (the unranked Arenas we announced a little while back) will have rewards as well. We're still discussing exactly how we want to hand them out, but you'll be able to earn gear and Honor by playing Skirmishes if you'd prefer.
A Veteran's Honor
Another issue on our radar is the ever-increasing item level gap between the gear you can purchase with Honor and Conquest points. To help bridge that gap, in Warlords we're going to have three separate tiers of PvP gear.
It starts with an introductory set of a quality similar to today's Honor gear, except you'll earn it much, much faster. That set comes primarily through the Strongboxes, and you've got a high chance of getting a piece in each Strongbox you earn. After that starter gear comes a new set: Veteran's gear. There's a small chance to find a piece of Veteran's gear in a Silver or Gold Strongbox, but you can also purchase Veteran's gear with Honor points. That gear's PvP item level will be halfway between the starter gear and Gladiator's gear.
Adding the Veteran's tier accomplishes a lot of things for us. First, it helps make sure that someone who wants to step into rated PvP later on in the season isn't nearly as far behind their opponents in gear. Second, since the basic gear is earned so quickly, that helps ensure players get those important set bonuses, trinkets, and so on without too much trouble, and helps put everyone on a decent baseline in their ability to compete. For players who enjoy PvP but aren't really interested in jumping into rated competition, earning Veteran's gear will feel a lot more rewarding.
As for Gladiator's gear, we've been pretty happy with how Conquest points have worked in Season 15, but we are making one small change: Rated Battlegrounds and Arenas will have the same base Conquest cap. That cap can then be increased by your rating in either Arenas or Rated Battlegrounds (whichever is higher). Instead of giving you extra Conquest points, winning a Rated Battleground will allow you to use a bonus roll token for a shot at a piece of Gladiator's gear, similar to the Celestial world bosses on the Timeless Isle. This tweak makes the weekly Conquest cap easier to understand, while still providing an extra incentive for running Rated Battlegrounds and letting you use your bonus rolls on PvP gear through PvP.
The Island
While these changes will bring some pretty exciting changes to World of Warcraft PvP, there's still another major piece to this puzzle: Ashran. We'll be sharing more details on what you can earn from Ashran soon. In the meantime, we look forward to seeing you on the battlefield!
I've Got the Power!
In Mists of Pandaria we introduced the PvP Power stat, which allowed PvP gear to be functionally superior to raid and dungeon gear in PvP combat without exceeding the value of its equivalent PvE gear in PvE content. That was largely a success in instanced PvP Arenas and Battlegrounds, but we think we can do better-while also granting players those same benefits in outdoor world PvP. So, in Warlords of Draenor, we're taking a different approach.
PvP gear in Warlords will no longer have PvP-specific stats. Instead, it will scale up to a higher item level as soon as you enter a designated PvP area, such as an Arena or Battleground, or as soon as you enter PvP combat anywhere else in the world. If you're out questing with PvP gear, your items' base item level will be used while fighting back the Iron Horde, but the second that raiding Druid tries to gank you, your higher PvP item level kicks in and you'll have the upper hand. Each piece of PvP gear will have its PvP item level displayed clearly on its tooltip, so there's no guesswork involved.
On top of that, all gear-even gear found in PvE content-will be scaled up to a certain minimum item level in any designated PvP area. That minimum is still lower than any of the actual PvP gear, but a fresh level-100 character who's just wearing some dungeon gear, or even whatever they picked up while questing, will not be at quite as severe a disadvantage should they choose to step into a Skirmish or Random Battleground.
One added benefit of this new system is that most PvE gear will no longer need to be downscaled in PvP areas, as the equivalent PvP gear is already a higher item level in PvP situations. Instead of making players wearing PvE gear feel weaker in PvP, this makes it so players wearing PvP gear feel stronger. The only exception is Mythic raid gear. Mythic's PvE item level and Conquest's PvP item level are very close, so we'll be downscaling Mythic gear slightly in designated PvP areas just to make sure that Conquest gear remains the best available for PvP.
What's In the Box?!
The Warlords of Draenor expansion will also bring some major improvements to the way PvP gear is earned. For starters, we're vastly improving the bonus rewards you can earn from doing Random or Call to Arms Battlegrounds. At the end of a match, you'll earn a Bronze, Silver, or Gold Strongbox-or possibly all three. Which Strongboxes you earn depends on how well your team did in the match, but you can still earn them even if your team doesn't win.
Take Warsong Gulch,for example. If your faction captured at least one flag before the game ended, you'll get the Bronze Strongbox. Capture a second, and you'll earn both the Bronze and Silver. And if you capture all three, not only do you win the game, but you'll also earn all three Strongboxes. We'll be restructuring the scoring of other Battlegrounds slightly (such as changing Arathi Basin to end at 1,500 points) so it's easy to figure out what you need for each Strongbox.
Inside those Strongboxes could be any number of rewards: Honor points, Conquest points-even gear. Better Strongboxes can have better rewards, so even if your team is behind in the match, it's worth keeping up the fight to try to earn the best reward you can.
Of course, Skirmishes (the unranked Arenas we announced a little while back) will have rewards as well. We're still discussing exactly how we want to hand them out, but you'll be able to earn gear and Honor by playing Skirmishes if you'd prefer.
A Veteran's Honor
Another issue on our radar is the ever-increasing item level gap between the gear you can purchase with Honor and Conquest points. To help bridge that gap, in Warlords we're going to have three separate tiers of PvP gear.
It starts with an introductory set of a quality similar to today's Honor gear, except you'll earn it much, much faster. That set comes primarily through the Strongboxes, and you've got a high chance of getting a piece in each Strongbox you earn. After that starter gear comes a new set: Veteran's gear. There's a small chance to find a piece of Veteran's gear in a Silver or Gold Strongbox, but you can also purchase Veteran's gear with Honor points. That gear's PvP item level will be halfway between the starter gear and Gladiator's gear.
Adding the Veteran's tier accomplishes a lot of things for us. First, it helps make sure that someone who wants to step into rated PvP later on in the season isn't nearly as far behind their opponents in gear. Second, since the basic gear is earned so quickly, that helps ensure players get those important set bonuses, trinkets, and so on without too much trouble, and helps put everyone on a decent baseline in their ability to compete. For players who enjoy PvP but aren't really interested in jumping into rated competition, earning Veteran's gear will feel a lot more rewarding.
As for Gladiator's gear, we've been pretty happy with how Conquest points have worked in Season 15, but we are making one small change: Rated Battlegrounds and Arenas will have the same base Conquest cap. That cap can then be increased by your rating in either Arenas or Rated Battlegrounds (whichever is higher). Instead of giving you extra Conquest points, winning a Rated Battleground will allow you to use a bonus roll token for a shot at a piece of Gladiator's gear, similar to the Celestial world bosses on the Timeless Isle. This tweak makes the weekly Conquest cap easier to understand, while still providing an extra incentive for running Rated Battlegrounds and letting you use your bonus rolls on PvP gear through PvP.
The Island
While these changes will bring some pretty exciting changes to World of Warcraft PvP, there's still another major piece to this puzzle: Ashran. We'll be sharing more details on what you can earn from Ashran soon. In the meantime, we look forward to seeing you on the battlefield!
Needless
Toe Sucker
- 9,171
- 3,268
LFR won't have any actual raiders in it beyond the first tier of content on the initial release of the expansion, it'll probably end up getting tuned even lower because it'll be like mentioned above-a leper colony from then on, as any actual raiding guild would be sticking to normal/heroic/dickbutt difficulty or whatever they're called now since LFR won't benefit them outside of going from heroic dungeon gear -> LFR gear && Tier 1 normal raid gear.
Separate iLevels on PVP is long overdue, it helps control and prevent inbalances regarding required ilevel for PVE things, where people cheese PVP gear to get required ilevel. It also allows PVP players to have the upper hand on equally geared or better PVE players in world pvp, which should entirely be the case anyway.
Separate iLevels on PVP is long overdue, it helps control and prevent inbalances regarding required ilevel for PVE things, where people cheese PVP gear to get required ilevel. It also allows PVP players to have the upper hand on equally geared or better PVE players in world pvp, which should entirely be the case anyway.
Qhue
Trump's Staff
- 7,477
- 4,420
People who play LFR as their endgame do so because they don't have the time or remaining connections to do Normal raiding. Massively increasing the drop rate while also making the items less desired actively encourages customers in that category to cancel their subscription. Cool effects from set bonuses is what kept people repeating the LFR raids each week, not because they wanted an X+5 ilevel chest. How many people kept their subs active just because they wanted to finish their set or finish the cloak? Probably quite a few based on my own personal experience and furthermore I bet a good number of those people did LFR with multiple characters in a given week and really felt they were getting their money's worth.
I cancelled my sub one month into Cata and then reupped right before Mists and then kept it active for the next 18 months. I did so because I felt in LFR their existed an 'endgame' for me that fit my former uber now casual playstyle. Right now based on everything they have stated I can see myself playing WoD for a month or maybe two and then dumping the sub. From a pure profit standpoint this is a terrible business move on their part...
I cancelled my sub one month into Cata and then reupped right before Mists and then kept it active for the next 18 months. I did so because I felt in LFR their existed an 'endgame' for me that fit my former uber now casual playstyle. Right now based on everything they have stated I can see myself playing WoD for a month or maybe two and then dumping the sub. From a pure profit standpoint this is a terrible business move on their part...
Valderen
Space Pirate
- 4,451
- 2,623
I'm in total agreement with Qhue, LFR kept playing Mist far longer than I ever thought I would. I think it's the expansion I stayed sub the longest since TBC.
It feels like Blizzard is pushing too hard for it to be a progression from LFR->Flex->Heroic or whatever it is gonna be, heven't followed it so much. I personally think that it's not a progression for most people...it's the end game for different group of people.
It feels like Blizzard is pushing too hard for it to be a progression from LFR->Flex->Heroic or whatever it is gonna be, heven't followed it so much. I personally think that it's not a progression for most people...it's the end game for different group of people.
Qhue
Trump's Staff
- 7,477
- 4,420
The thing is that people for whom LFR was endgame do not go to the Blizzard forums, they don't go to Blizzcon or even PAX. They don't go to MMOchampion, hell they probably don't even read Kotaku or Polygon.
I had a few buddies who tried and enjoyed WoW before and during the Cataclysm era who got to max level, did all the dungeons and then said "okay... what next? What is raiding?" and then promptly never logged in again once I answered their question. Friends who came back to WoW for Pandaria or came into the game fresh got to max level, did the dungeons, and then earned their ilevel to go to LFR and had a blast. They might not have stayed super active, but theykept their subsand would rely on me to tell them when a new patch was released with new content and then they played the crap out of that stuff eager to obtain their set bonus gear and a couple even went so far as to get their cloaks.
When oQueue became a thing I introduced a few of them to it... and they rolled their eyes and never touched it. Flexible raiding is great for smaller more casual groups, but it is still a huge barrier to entry to the super casual player who was really enjoying LFR as endgame. I know from watching them play other games like Diablo3 or Starcraft that as soon as they run the WoD LFR a couple times and see that the items available to them are only a little +gooder they will just walk away.
These are not people who ever touched the Tillers farm, they absolutely WILL NOT GIVE A DAMN about the garrison. They like playing the game to kill things and get cool stuff. Not higher ilevel stuff, cool stuff. I think Alex Afrasiabi and his team are blind to exactly how many subscribers are tied into this group and what motivates them.
I had a few buddies who tried and enjoyed WoW before and during the Cataclysm era who got to max level, did all the dungeons and then said "okay... what next? What is raiding?" and then promptly never logged in again once I answered their question. Friends who came back to WoW for Pandaria or came into the game fresh got to max level, did the dungeons, and then earned their ilevel to go to LFR and had a blast. They might not have stayed super active, but theykept their subsand would rely on me to tell them when a new patch was released with new content and then they played the crap out of that stuff eager to obtain their set bonus gear and a couple even went so far as to get their cloaks.
When oQueue became a thing I introduced a few of them to it... and they rolled their eyes and never touched it. Flexible raiding is great for smaller more casual groups, but it is still a huge barrier to entry to the super casual player who was really enjoying LFR as endgame. I know from watching them play other games like Diablo3 or Starcraft that as soon as they run the WoD LFR a couple times and see that the items available to them are only a little +gooder they will just walk away.
These are not people who ever touched the Tillers farm, they absolutely WILL NOT GIVE A DAMN about the garrison. They like playing the game to kill things and get cool stuff. Not higher ilevel stuff, cool stuff. I think Alex Afrasiabi and his team are blind to exactly how many subscribers are tied into this group and what motivates them.
Needless
Toe Sucker
- 9,171
- 3,268
you're right, and you're also wrong heh.
LFR was and probably will continue to be my "endgame" from this point on outside of pvp because i don't have any desire these days to ever step foot into a heroic raid ever again. I'm a player whom was at one point a "hardcore raider", I still have a curiosity for new content, and getting new gear-but i have no interest in wiping 150 times to kill a heroic boss anymore. LFR allows me to do the content relatively quickly, and still get upgrades without having to deal with some overzealous virgin kid yelling at people over ventrillo. When i gear that character up in his shitty LFR loot, i can unsub until the next tier is released and do it again without any hassles or commitments.
There are tons of players like this now, and there are also tons of players that you mentioned above, whom have no knowledge of anything really other than the fact that they got level 90 and think the game is now ever lol.
I personally like the fact that they're making it easier to get drops, this encourages playing alts as it will gear them up faster unlike this shitty and incredibly "un-alt-friendly" expansion.
I don't however like how its entirely different loot tables though, I can see why they do it-to encourage people to do normals and what not but if somebody enjoys LFR and not doing normal/flex/heroic, putting that carrot infront of them probably isn't going to change that. Which in turn will like you said make people not give a shit either way.
LFR was and probably will continue to be my "endgame" from this point on outside of pvp because i don't have any desire these days to ever step foot into a heroic raid ever again. I'm a player whom was at one point a "hardcore raider", I still have a curiosity for new content, and getting new gear-but i have no interest in wiping 150 times to kill a heroic boss anymore. LFR allows me to do the content relatively quickly, and still get upgrades without having to deal with some overzealous virgin kid yelling at people over ventrillo. When i gear that character up in his shitty LFR loot, i can unsub until the next tier is released and do it again without any hassles or commitments.
There are tons of players like this now, and there are also tons of players that you mentioned above, whom have no knowledge of anything really other than the fact that they got level 90 and think the game is now ever lol.
I personally like the fact that they're making it easier to get drops, this encourages playing alts as it will gear them up faster unlike this shitty and incredibly "un-alt-friendly" expansion.
I don't however like how its entirely different loot tables though, I can see why they do it-to encourage people to do normals and what not but if somebody enjoys LFR and not doing normal/flex/heroic, putting that carrot infront of them probably isn't going to change that. Which in turn will like you said make people not give a shit either way.
Add in some watered down feature to loot other players in one restricted area, everyone loses their minds
Looting players in Ashran - Forums - World of Warcraft
Looting players in Ashran - Forums - World of Warcraft
Sounds great, at the very least it's a different game mode. Always nice to add more ways to play a game that's been out for almost 10 years.
Between this and garrisons, it sounds like Blizz is throwing out little tastes of how niche game styles could work in an MMO like WoW. Maybe one of them will be hugely popular and we will see it expanded in the next iteration.
Between this and garrisons, it sounds like Blizz is throwing out little tastes of how niche game styles could work in an MMO like WoW. Maybe one of them will be hugely popular and we will see it expanded in the next iteration.
I would even say that most of the people doing LFR never aspire to do any higher difficulty. However, I disagree that this is a bad thing. Blizzard stopped making non-raid content, but LFR has managed to keep many of the non-raiders and super casuals supplied with enough new loot to keep them subscribed. Adding incentives not to do LFR seems like a good way of losing a lot of players.
To be fair, none of thecurrent, pre announcement,LFR crowd I have seen complains about missing set bonuses. It's normally "gold again ;(" and loot drop rates are one thing they are tweaking.
I don't know how I feel about LFR. I started back about 2 weeks ago, and in that 2.5 weeks I took my warlock from level 80 to ilvl 535ish. The biggest problem is looking ahead to eventually doing more normal and starting heroics, my thoughts are already, "Oh good, Immerseus and crewagain" My Tuesday-Thursday routine for two weeks has basically been: Do Celestials, LFR 1-4, do Flex 1, 2 and try to find a 4, look for normal 1 and 2" and then I'm basically locked out of doing any more flex/normal that I'm geared for and kind of shrug and log off until next Tuesday.
On one hand, it's nice I was able to play catchup without grinding a zillion AA or whatever ala EQ, but on the other, LFR/Flex/Normal have all felt pretty much like the same thing run 3x a week, and I'm guessing if I keep playing and join a raid guild that heroic will be more damage in the puddles, more boss hp, and less tolerance for derping, but more or less same shit different day with a lot more wipes involved. I guess part of it is that people are overgeared this late in the expansion and there's wellfare island and all and a lot of the excitement is probably gone.
Still, I think I liked it better when it was PoP style shit where you enter a new tier and have no idea whats waiting and it's new and exciting and fresh. I've only run the SoO stuff a handful of times and I'm already kind of sick of it and it feels like each tier up just weeds out a handful more of the turboderps and is slightly more of a gearcheck at best. Running the same content in four different levels is a little frustrating when I feel like I could have slept through the LFR and flex versions and still won. This wouldn't be a problem, but I feel like you kind of have to do LFR and flex multiple times to get to the point where people will consider you for normal due to ilvl. At which point it's the same stuff with +biggerer numbers.
It's made me think that someone should try an MMO that's just a shitload of raid content and no more of the 1-90 grind, because that shit goes by in the blink of an eye and then you never look at it again and run the same endgame dungeons week after week. Maybe less focus on gearchecks and repeating content in different difficulty tiers and more the fact that higher level bosses would have more challenging mechanics.
The best thing I witnessed in LFR was where half the raid was arguing with the other half of the raid on whether or not to burn nazgrim in defensive stance, so half the raid was dpsing and the other half just getting flustered and mad mid-fight, and we won anyway. Everyone's a winner, holy shit.
On one hand, it's nice I was able to play catchup without grinding a zillion AA or whatever ala EQ, but on the other, LFR/Flex/Normal have all felt pretty much like the same thing run 3x a week, and I'm guessing if I keep playing and join a raid guild that heroic will be more damage in the puddles, more boss hp, and less tolerance for derping, but more or less same shit different day with a lot more wipes involved. I guess part of it is that people are overgeared this late in the expansion and there's wellfare island and all and a lot of the excitement is probably gone.
Still, I think I liked it better when it was PoP style shit where you enter a new tier and have no idea whats waiting and it's new and exciting and fresh. I've only run the SoO stuff a handful of times and I'm already kind of sick of it and it feels like each tier up just weeds out a handful more of the turboderps and is slightly more of a gearcheck at best. Running the same content in four different levels is a little frustrating when I feel like I could have slept through the LFR and flex versions and still won. This wouldn't be a problem, but I feel like you kind of have to do LFR and flex multiple times to get to the point where people will consider you for normal due to ilvl. At which point it's the same stuff with +biggerer numbers.
It's made me think that someone should try an MMO that's just a shitload of raid content and no more of the 1-90 grind, because that shit goes by in the blink of an eye and then you never look at it again and run the same endgame dungeons week after week. Maybe less focus on gearchecks and repeating content in different difficulty tiers and more the fact that higher level bosses would have more challenging mechanics.
The best thing I witnessed in LFR was where half the raid was arguing with the other half of the raid on whether or not to burn nazgrim in defensive stance, so half the raid was dpsing and the other half just getting flustered and mad mid-fight, and we won anyway. Everyone's a winner, holy shit.
People don't seem to realize or don't want to admit that WOW is essentially one step above Candy Crush and Farmville in terms of casual gaming. It's long past the time the game could turn back to a more "serious" MMO or whatever you want to call it.
Not sure what that has to do with anything. WOW is a fine game, but let's not pretend the majority of the content could be done on a smart phone on the shitter if only it had better controls.