Is the new PvE game going to be too easy?

[Chunes]

Angelus your tone is hostile.

How so?

i jumped right in this convo at his post and it didnt seem hostile to me at all. I think you read too far into some of his caps.

[Zironic]

I think top tier content like sunwell and the original naxxramas needs to exist in order to define the rest of the content. The game becomes very pointless if everything is easy content and there is nothing to look up/forward to.

However the question is, how challenging does the content need to be?

Currently less then 1% of guilds cleared sunwell pre 3.0 (post 3.0 wowjutsu tells me 1.5% have killed Kil'jaeden and 4.78% Kalecgos).

That's a rather miserably low number.

[Elsie]

Remember not all guilds are designed for raids or end game raids. Those numbers are out of the general population of guilds, and are not very useful from there to construe normative statements.

[Zironic]

Remember not all guilds are designed for raids or end game raids. Those numbers are out of the general population of guilds, and are not very useful from there to construe normative statements.

Well, it's the best number I can get hold of. Blizzards numbers seem to be even worse though, I think they stated Karazhan saw 10,000 times more activity then Sunwell with the same development budget (can't find the quote right now).

[knaughty]

Blizzard have said that they think that 2.4 version of Sunwell was too hard, especially M'uru.

I have to agree.

We're the "hardest core" horde guild on our server. There's an equivalent alliance guild. There's only one "super hard core" guild per faction on our server. Neither guild could kill 2.4 version of M'uru - couldn't even get him out of phase 1. Both guilds had no competition for recruits - other guilds in each faction weren't even in Sunwell. The server is PvE (carebear) and high-population - we have short queues at peak times.

When an entire server faction for a mainstream high-pop server can't put together 40-50 people "hard core" enough to kill a boss... the boss is too hard.

Something like a quarter-million Australians play WoW? Assume they're mostly on the Oceanic servers, and the hard-core guilds have 50 members (probably high estimate). In 2.4:
• 10 guilds killed KJ (0.2% of population)
• 14 guilds killed M'uru (0.28% of population)

Sunwell past Brute was too hard.

[Mishakal]

However the question is, how challenging does the content need to be?

Enough of a challenge so that the highest % possible of players (subscriptions) keep paying to play each month.

However spending the development budget on Sunwell and having so few complete it doesnt seem to be a good long term plan

They will cater to the masses (its a business) and hopefully find a balance so the elite (nuts) can get something out of it also.

They seem to get alot more right than wrong for the masses, a growing subscription rate and an XPAC that is like a licence to print money all point to this.

But its like everything in life, the people that have to wear the wrongs complain louder than the people who got what they wanted, they often say nothing at all.

[mavfin]

But its like everything in life, the people that have to wear the wrongs complain louder than the people who got what they wanted, they often say nothing at all.

Yes. In this case, the people who like it aren't posting on forums. They're too busy playing. I'm only on this forum when I'm at work. Draw whatever conclusions you like from that!

No, really. I feel like I'm one of the types of players the WotLK changes caters to: I'm near 40, have a life/kids/job/stuff to do, and can only play 2-3 days a week, and I love the changes. Being able to raid with my 'core' guildies who I know I can depend on makes it so much better. No more bringing in little brats to fill a spot because we have to have numbers, and then having to hear them whine when they don't get their way.

Oh, and btw, 'brats' has nothing to do with age, and everything with maturity. We've got a 14-year-old (Alliance side, for those who read here from the Lurkers) who does great, keeps an A average and fills a spot on one of our two raid nights for one of the adults who can only come on the other night. He's a great kid to play with. He asks questions, he tries hard, and does well. OTOH, we've got a couple near-30ish types who whine like little children. One of them we booted from the guild just a couple days ago for being a little childish loot whore, because he took an upgrade away from a new player who was getting his first Kara epics, when it was just a 'shiny in the bag' for him, he didn't even need to wear it! (No, wasn't the first time for him, either. He had been warned before.)

[oldboyz]

seems Blizz is trying to put more social in the game (aka less hardcore content) :
more social = more link = less departure

hight-end raid are not social at all. it is only needed to make noise and feel the game is pushed to the limit (as someone mentioned it already : those guys will always ran after something : too hard /not enought elitist. in fact Blizz dont care that much about them, they bring 0,1% of the total $$$)

with achievement, Blizz try to propose an alternative to the only one previous objective = stuff your character !! (in order to be prepared for the next boss who will give you stuff allowing you to beat next one etc)
now blizz make us run after reward and glory : stuff&farm become less priority. 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

[Listrac]

Think about the ZA Time Run, thats a way to do content for both the hardcore and casual players. I can see something like that coming.

[vschiano2008]

ZA bear runs were very challenging at one point.

Kara was also very challenging at one point.

C'mon am I the only one who wiped on moroes for a whole night? Ya know, everyone was in mostly blues, epic gear was, well, epic...

I'm not too worried- i mean, when BC was fresh and new, it took atleast a month to clear kara, with 10 hours a week in there.

In honesty- if you are progressing the 'right way'- not getting carried, or farming 2.4 Badge gear so you are suddenly OP, the game balances itself.

[vschiano2008]

next big thing Blizz should do will be around guilds

The guilds on my server are very competitive- the "real" guilds anyway.

only 5 pre-3.0 BT clears, and zero KJ downs.

we had our top horde side guild transfer- the ENTIRE guild, because the difficulty of recruiting sunwell geared players..

theres a lot of bad blood between the remaining top 4 guilds, and we're all racing to hit 80 and get the server firsts. i hope its not like, the first guild that gets there wins- i hope there is some challenge, and requires atleast some skill. I dont want to down KT my first night in naxx

[Levantine]

Sunwell past Brute was too hard.

I agree with this to a point. There were no guilds that had downed Felmyst on my server until 3.0 hit. It wasn't because they lacked the skill to do it (mostly), but the strict class requirements crippled four guilds progress. Apparently there are almost no (skilled) Priests on Caelestrasz. o.O

[Elsie]

Sunwell past Brute was too hard.

I agree with this to a point. There were no guilds that had downed Felmyst on my server until 3.0 hit. It wasn't because they lacked the skill to do it (mostly), but the strict class requirements crippled four guilds progress. Apparently there are almost no (skilled) Priests on Caelestrasz. o.O

Beyond the "must have 4 priest" rule, the fight was just another "Don't stand in the fire."

[Worldie]

3 priests for felmyst.


The major guildkiller were two, the retarded class stacking (hello shamans?), and the setups which were too much different from boss to boss.

[Elsie]

3 priests for felmyst.


The major guildkiller were two, the retarded class stacking (hello shamans?), and the setups which were too much different from boss to boss.

What you mean every guild doesn't have a spare 7 shamans sitting around?

(yeah you could do it with 3, but 4 was infinitely better. And 5 allowed one of them to die without wiping the raid).