Is the new PvE game going to be too easy?

[Nemuria]

Being a casual Blizzard actually never address our concern regarding game design. We don't want thing to be easy and we don't want them to be broken as well.

They are giving free epics yet you couldn't zone BT/Sunwell and being casual. The progression was artificially made difficult while we could have the gear. I guess they follow this pattern:

1) slow progression with attunments (attunment are fun,achievement and so on...)
3) slow progression with group/raid setup (players get along bringing useful class)
3) slow progression with gear check (again players getting along)
4) slow progression with well scripted boss and encounters (actual content)
5) nerf everything + give free gears and go to 1) for next Tier

If you have passed this learning curve successfully there is no more content that Blizzard could give and being that hard.

[sherck]

Achievement don't care about your stuff

full hardcore player will spend less time in easy mode instances but blizz propose them to go fish as an alternative!!
and they will go ^^


next big thing Blizz should do will be around guilds

You SO hit the nail on the head with this one.

My RL friend who got me into WoW is on his 3rd or 4th end game character (sold a couple of level 60 accounts in old WoW and is on his way to 80 with his Prot Warrior) and is a perfect example of this.

With his current toon, he never had to opportunity to raid SWP and maxed out with some out-of-guild BT runs and T5 guild runs. In the months leading up to the XPAC, he wanted to play less and less because there was literally nothing for him to do.

He did not want to change guilds to a SWP raiding guild (only 2 on our server on the Horde side) because he liked his friends in his current guild. He had every slot upgraded as far as he could without drops and all his skill maxed out and money sitting in his bank and was grinding rep because, well, he had nothing else to do.

Enter.....achievements.

He has been an achievement b!tch since the patch and earned like all but 80 of them prior to the XPAC. He really, really enjoys getting them, even if it requires him to go do quests in the Barrens that he had never done before.

But, even that will get old doing solo, so achievements based around groups of the people you associate with anyway will be key to keeping those hard-core guys happy with the game. It is the new "look at me" thing.

I personally am meh on achievements because I only play about 4-5 hours a week one night a week and will never see end game. I expect it will take me until Jan/Feb to reach level 80, another month to gear for Naxx and then a couple of months to get guild "gearing" runs at T7 before I am ready for T8 which might very well be on farm for the guild by then.

I will always have that next boss to look forward to because I am a casual.

But for the hard-core, the PvP or achievement game is a must have.

Nice observation.

Cheers,

[Passionario]

I find that the new raid achievement are not entirely unlike the system that single-player games have been using all along to increase replayability and cover a broader target audience.

For example, take Final Fantasy X. The main story mode had its challenges, but they were relatively easy to overcome - you didn't have to stare at the 'Game Over' screen after every second or third encounter. On other hand, it also had optional unlockable encounters (Arena bosses/Dark Aeons/Penance) that required hundreds of hours of preparation and dozens of attempts to get them right. Sound familiar?

In WotLK, simple clearing out a raid instance is the moderately hard "main story mode", and raid achievements are the 'ludicrously hard optional content'.

[vschiano2008]

I'm pretty sure it has to do with Blizz wanting to push Arena's down our throat as well.

Dual Specs + Easy/Boring Raid content= .. one of two things
1) People quitting
2) People finding others things to do - Like PvP.

If you clear all of the raid content in 3 days, what else do you do 4 nights of the week?

I was a 'hardcore' raider BC. I raided 25-30 hours per week with my main raid group, plus bear runs on offnights and kara/gruul/mag runs on alts. I think i raided 40 hours a week- like another full time job.

With a new 50 hour work week and full time college all night classes- i only have 3 nights a week to play now. I guess i'm going to fall into the 'casual' raider, like blizz is trying to 'target' and make the game more enjoyable for.

Its ok i guess. I hope they make T8 and T9 a little more difficult.. and put attunements back into the game! (for a little while- then pull them off again) Who really gives a shit about achievements.. my epeen is big enough.

[Helenia]

Achievements are so dumb.