Valor reward discussion

[bldavis]

all i would want is something like the amber things for klaxxi, eggs for OotCS, and harvesting for tillers
i guess the caches count as that for golden lotus, but they give basically nothing for rep(150 i think), where as harvesting is 100/200/300 per day depending on rep level, and eggs are 500
(i dont know what the klaxxi turn in is, i havent finished one)

[KysenMurrin]

Klaxxi Dread Amber Shards are a very rare drop with a small reward, hardly worth mentioning.

[Darielle]

It really comes down to balance. The Klaxxi work well up to Revered because you do the storylines, do a couple of days of dailies and then you get new story tidbits with the new Paragons. That's fine.

After that, you get into "grindy" as far as Exalted goes, but fewer people have that as a goal.

With GL, you have a one-two quest intro, leading into dailies that give very small returns, which makes the "repetition" or "grind" more noticeable. If they also had a more involved questline at Friendly, followed by a more significant questline at Honored that got you maybe 10 or so quests around the place, then it would feel more involving.

Another aspect is also HOW the story/daily lines is done. With the Klaxxi, as you're unlocking Paragons, you view different personalities and stuff like that, which helps, you feed the Kunchong, it grows, you use it on a rampage, Wind Reaver guy lets you go up and powerbomb down, etc. With GL, not so much. The couple of quests that involve the personal evil guy in the Halls is about it, aside from that it's a bunch of mobs like any other mob.

I think that's a bit of a reflection on the act that the Mogu themselves don't really come across very well; it would have been a great opportunity for a storyline that involved treachery, dark magics and excessive cruelty as is their nature (think Mogu capturing a bunch of people in battle, beheading them in front of your very eyes, putting thier heads on spikes as you're powerless to stop it, using dark magics on their corpses type affair). Instead, the Mogu are like this IDEA of a cruel, overlordy race that you don't really experience, you just get fed bits of info on how bad they are while they do nothing special, so they just feel like overdramatised and incompetent remodeled Draenei.

[benebarba]

I think that's a bit of a reflection on the act that the Mogu themselves don't really come across very well; it would have been a great opportunity for a storyline that involved treachery, dark magics and excessive cruelty as is their nature (think Mogu capturing a bunch of people in battle, beheading them in front of your very eyes, putting thier heads on spikes as you're powerless to stop it, using dark magics on their corpses type affair). Instead, the Mogu are like this IDEA of a cruel, overlordy race that you don't really experience, you just get fed bits of info on how bad they are while they do nothing special, so they just feel like overdramatised and incompetent remodeled Draenei.

The following may be better in a different thread, but I agree.

After doing the lorewalkers stuff, this really is a big point and not just for the Mogu. I had this chat with a guildie: what the Lorewalkers tell you and what the quests represent are pretty stark contrasts for some of the races. Some of the 'mob' races: the Yongol, the saurok and the hozen you don't really get to see much other than what is presented in the Lorewalkers but they seem to line up pretty well. The Mogu are built up to be these uber baddies, but they seem just incompetent buffoons who managed to get to power somehow. I'm pretty certain if they had mustaches they'd twirl them. I feel like the Pandaren fall flat at 90 when you are doing what seem like more minor tasks than the stuff you'd done while leveling too: the Shado Pan (Uber protectors of Pandaria) apparently can't reclaim minor footholds even with the assistance of the very heroes who killed Deathwing, The Lich King and assorted other baddies. The Golden Lotus seem to be in a similar issue in the Vale.

Maybe it's me, but I felt that most of the dailies at level 90 seemed less 'epic' than most of the stuff I did while leveling. Saving villages, establishing alliance footholds, winning hearts and minds and what not certainly was more enjoyable than 'slowing' the march of the mogu/mantid by offering up some minor inconveniences that provide no discernible change.

Needless to say I feel like the grind comes less from the action of doing quests on a daily basis and more from what seems like a development choice of making the results of your actions essentially invisible (and quest series nearly identical) for the sake of gameplay.

[bldavis]

WARNING - inc wall o' text
and i agree with brekkie, this belongs in the lore thread, but w/e

well we are pretty big badasses
i mean we took down the leader of the scourge - at the height of his power AND in his throne room, where he is the most powerful!
we have ended not just 1, but TWO dragon aspects (ok ok , we ended one, we assisted thrall with the other)
we have taken down the brood mother of the black dragon flight 3 times now? and her brother twice
we have taken down 2 elemental lords (MC ragnaros was merely summoned to our realm, we sent him back, it was in firelands that we killed him finally)
hmm lets see....
we took down 2? Eradar lords of the burning legion ...no 3, archimode, KJ, and Jarraxis, granted 2 were leaders of the Eradar, and Jarraxis was an officer in the army but still, they are powerful demons.

we have raided the scourge's flying citidel Naxxramas TWICE
we have ended Illidan, Kael'thas, and Lady Vash'j during their reign of power

these are all pretty big baddies
not to mention 3 old gods have been killed
one by the titans, which in turn created the sha, and 2 by US
all we need now is an old god on EK and we have all the current continents covered! (crap, i just spoiled Garrosh's corruption, it happens while in UC calling Sylvanis a bitch again) - btw i will be laughing my ass off if this happens

so all in all, we are pretty bad ass
we are the heroes of legend
i mean you figure most of the normal populous is a farmer, trader, blacksmith, etc
not everyone is a super powerful being like the player character is
in the lore, the player characters are rare and really REALLY powerful

maybe this says something about how powerful the sha truly are?
they need a group of some of the most powerful beings on the planet to take them down, mere fighters like the shado-pan monks arent enough
they can hold the sha back, but cannot defeat it or even advance on it until we have a concentrated strike

[Skye1013]

i guess the caches count as that for golden lotus, but they give basically nothing for rep(150 i think)

Caches have two possible rep items, a rare and an epic. Granted, even getting both in a single cache that's only ~600 rep.

[Fetzie]

Jarraxis was an officer in the army but still

He one-shotted one of the most powerful demonologists the Alliance had to offer, and then proceeded to get his ass kicked by us. That alone shows how powerful our characters actually are when compared to even the best NPCs.

[Darielle]

He one-shotted one of the most powerful demonologists the Alliance had to offer, and then proceeded to get his ass kicked by us. That alone shows how powerful our characters actually are when compared to even the best NPCs.

Let's be fair, in all these cases it's suspension that causes game mechanics to overdo "lore". "Lore" may have dictated an epic battle, but given that they can't erally do that in the middle of a raid, they had to play the "But I'm in charge .... hrrrgk".

Kinda like how the Lich King shows up and all the Lore figures sit there sipping their tea.

In the wider context of lore, our characters aren't all THAT powerful. In every single major figure, while for game purposes, we did the grunt work, in lore purposes, we were either helping or being helped by other figures. Illidan involved Akama and Maiev. KJ involved Kalec and Anveena. Archimonde involved Tyrande and the Wisps. Lich King had LolTirion. Malygos had the Red Dragonflight. Rag had DROOD POWER. etc. We're not run of the mill, but character power level is being a bit overstated. Some things we did ourselves, but even that's game implement logic.

they need a group of some of the most powerful beings on the planet to take them down, mere fighters like the shado-pan monks arent enough
they can hold the sha back, but cannot defeat it or even advance on it until we have a concentrated strike

According to Lore, the Sha were under control until we messed it up. All we're really doing is doing exactly what the Shado-Pan already did before we superfed the Sha.

[halabar]

they need a group of some of the most powerful beings on the planet to take them down, mere fighters like the shado-pan monks arent enough
they can hold the sha back, but cannot defeat it or even advance on it until we have a concentrated strike

According to Lore, the Sha were under control until we messed it up. All we're really doing is doing exactly what the Shado-Pan already did before we superfed the Sha.

I don't buy that. It's not our fault the mantid race is corrupted, and there were many problems running amok long before we showed up. Garrosh's rage may make things worse before we put him down to make everything better, but it wasn't all roses before we showed up.

[Skye1013]

Only real example I can think of it being our fault is when we caused the destruction of the statue at Jade Temple. Now, I'll be the first to admit I don't follow the lore extremely closely, but everywhere else it just looked like we were helping clean up messes already in progress to gain favor with the factions there.

Excepting maybe the Vale, since we convinced them to reopen it, which allowed the Mogu back in (though a gate is hardly an obstruction for the Mantids, unless the closed gate represented some magical seal that was broken on the entire zone.)

[degre]

Sounds logical to try and promoe cross-activity. More content, so longer play time before we get bored... Now did they over-do it? I'd be inclined to agree - 4 reps is way too much when you have the opportunity to do all 4.

Maybe some sort of weekly cap for rep gains would be appropriate. Or simply a weekly daily quest cap.

Why cap it? If some people have the time and will to do dailies every day let them do. You don't have time to do all? Pick one and start there, with time you'll do them all, if you want.

[Sagara]

Sounds logical to try and promoe cross-activity. More content, so longer play time before we get bored... Now did they over-do it? I'd be inclined to agree - 4 reps is way too much when you have the opportunity to do all 4.

Maybe some sort of weekly cap for rep gains would be appropriate. Or simply a weekly daily quest cap.

Why cap it? If some people have the time and will to do dailies every day let them do. You don't have time to do all? Pick one and start there, with time you'll do them all, if you want.

Let me amend that - when the opportuniy is there and a potential use exists, people will do it as if they were forced.
What we need is a cap on the rewards you can get, like the 150 first dailies of a given week grant rep, valor and baubles. The rest just grants gold, and why not Justice (even though that's pretty useless...).

[Klaudandus]

Sounds logical to try and promoe cross-activity. More content, so longer play time before we get bored... Now did they over-do it? I'd be inclined to agree - 4 reps is way too much when you have the opportunity to do all 4.

Maybe some sort of weekly cap for rep gains would be appropriate. Or simply a weekly daily quest cap.

Why cap it? If some people have the time and will to do dailies every day let them do. You don't have time to do all? Pick one and start there, with time you'll do them all, if you want.

Let me amend that - when the opportuniy is there and a potential use exists, people will do it as if they were forced.
What we need is a cap on the rewards you can get, like the 150 first dailies of a given week grant rep, valor and baubles. The rest just grants gold, and why not Justice (even though that's pretty useless...).

There is already a cap of sorts, the number of total dailies you can do in a week with a given faction. The point of the cap would be benrficial if a secondary method of earning rep existed. Just to keep dailies more attractive.

[melisandyr]

I think that an elegant solution to this would be that you have two separate gear progression paths.

Either: (i) you can buy VP gear that week
or
(ii) you can get loot from bosses in normal or heroic modes

Both (i) and (ii) should be able to get lower ilevel loot from LFR, as now.

That way, there's progression for solo players under (i), knowing that it will take many months to get epics on a par with even normal mode.

Players who would usually choose (ii) could swap out for a week to pick up gear to fill a gap that never dropped, but would loose looting rights from 16 or so bosses. Likely to be much less attractive, and would separate the gear progression paths.

Clearly, some of the practicalities of making a system like this work would require extensive development, but in theory, wouldn't it make all of the player base happy?

[degre]

Sounds logical to try and promoe cross-activity. More content, so longer play time before we get bored... Now did they over-do it? I'd be inclined to agree - 4 reps is way too much when you have the opportunity to do all 4.

Maybe some sort of weekly cap for rep gains would be appropriate. Or simply a weekly daily quest cap.

Why cap it? If some people have the time and will to do dailies every day let them do. You don't have time to do all? Pick one and start there, with time you'll do them all, if you want.

Let me amend that - when the opportuniy is there and a potential use exists, people will do it as if they were forced.
What we need is a cap on the rewards you can get, like the 150 first dailies of a given week grant rep, valor and baubles. The rest just grants gold, and why not Justice (even though that's pretty useless...).

Why? If people are willing to go the distance, let them...

There are only two reasons why you would want to place a cap is because you feel compelled and can't stop. You feel like you have to do it and can't stop. I don't see any other reason for imposing an unnecessary cap, as currently you have already a system in place and is called will, it works that whenever you've had enough, you stop.

Well, another comes to mind, you might actually stop and simply being annoyed at other who have more time, and I don't see this either as a good excuse for placing a cap.