That question is really all about opinion, like most are, but I believe that even if my opinion would be yes, as I will explain, my opinion holds water when I say the LFR in its current state is hurting the game as a whole. Or at the very least, is hurting how I play and just maybe some others.
How is the LFR hurting how I play?
Lets say you made me some cookies, pecan sandies because they are my favorite, and you place them down in front of me but they kind of suck. You burnt them a little, they taste a little off, and somehow you managed to make them all warm on the outside but still cold and uncooked on the inside. I might take a taste, I might even eat one or two and say thank you. It would be rude to insult you and just say your cookies suck.
I will appreciate you made them for me but in the end I really do not like them. You could have set the heat correctly so it did not burn the outside without leaving the inside undone, you have have checked that you put he correct measurements in so it tasted, well, edible. In the end, no one can fault you for trying. You did something out of the kindness of your heart and we should still appreciate that.
That is basically what I see the LFR as. Something blizzard did so everyone could get a taste but not everyone has the same tastes. While we all would rather our cookies not burnt, perhaps someone else might like the mixture that was used and the taste, outside of the burning, would be fine for them when it is not for me. But even for the people that did like it, it is still burnt.
The LFR is a burnt cookie. We all might eat it, but most do not like it for one reason or another, even if we will eat it. The next time around when you offer to make us cookies people will say, no thank you. Just like what is happening with the LFR now. I, and so many others, are trying our best to avoid it. We might want to do it, just like we would want more cookies, but we know it will most likely suck, just like burnt pecan sandies.
Each new set of LFRs they work on the recipe. They are trying to make it better adding more of one ingredient while removing some of another, trying to find that best balance that would be suitable for everyone. However, each time they play with the recipe they are making it worse.
Lets move this analogy from cookies, because I am getting hungry, to spices, because it seems more fitting with where I am going with this next actually.
There is a reason when you go to most restaurants the food they serve is bland for the most part. They need to make it for everyone, so they make it a the lowest common denominator. They let you add your own salt or pepper or spices as you want, so you can get that little extra you want out of it.
The LFR is putting the salt and pepper and spices in there and each time they add a new tier to the LFR they are adding more to it instead of taking some out. They have not grasped the concept that every decent restaurant in the world has already noticed. Basic is better, let the customer spice it up themselves.
Now with flex, normal and heroic you have your "add your own spices" raids. LFR needs to be basic, it needs to be bland, but blizzard keeps saying, lets add more salt. Well blizzard, what if I don't like salt in my random group content? Thank you for making it, I do appreciate it, but if I wanted some salt I would add my own and do a flex pug. If I wanted some pepper I would add my own and do normal. If I wanted both salt and pepper and maybe even a little hot sauce I would do heroic.
LFR keeps getting more spices in it when it should be getting less. Blizzard seems to think if they keep adding it that people will learn to like it.
News flash:
No matter how often you say "clear the center" people will still fall when the platform disappears. No matter how often you say "follow the marked person" people will still die to the maze. No matter how often you say "do not attack in defensive stance" people will still unload when they shouldn't.
People are stupid blizzard. They will join LFR even if they can not handle the spices. That is a news flash for you.
None of those mechanics, and many others, had any business being in the LFR. They are the spices, they should only be there for people that want their food spicy. Those people, the ones that seek it out, have the option to do something else, something special, something spicy, like flex or normal or heroic.
It is as if blizzard is trying to add salt to everything they make, lots of salt, and forgetting that some people do not like salt and possibly might even be deathly allergic to salt. But they do not care, they keep adding more salt in the form of mechanics.
There are dozens of reasons someone might not be a raider. Maybe they are slow to react, they are not good at movement, they have a bad memory, they are bad with instructions, they take a while to learn, they have horrible hand eye coordination, they have a bad connection, they have a bad computer, they are still learning, that are self centered and believe they should not have to learn, they do not care, they are hoping someone will carry them, they would rather do something to troll like killing all the tents on spine just for fun, there could be dozens of reasons someone is not a raider as I said, but lets call every single one of those things "allergic to salt".
So every time blizzard adds mechanics to a fight it is like they are added salt and there are many people, a great many people, that are just allergic to salt that are going into the LFR and this is what is usually happening when someone gets a bad run. They are in there with a bunch of people that are allergic to salt and it is the salt that is killing them, not the floor disappearing, not the maze killing them and not the fact they are hitting through defensive. It is because there is salt there that should not be there.
With each new release of the LFR it seems like blizzard is trying to convince people, "you like salt, just try it". They do not understand that there will always be people that are allergic to it and as long as those people can enter the LFR just by simply hitting a button they will not care that their aversion to salt is going to hurt the others they are with, they will still use it. So the LFR needs to be made without salt.
The people that want those spices can do flex or normal or heroic. They are making a conscious decision joining a hand assembled group where someone, hopefully, took the effort to see that everyone can handle the spices of that level of difficulty.
I understand the argument that some people have, some actually good and even very good players that love the LFR. They do not have the time for assembled content. They want to pop on and enter a queue and see the raid. They can handle the spices that the LFR offers and they might even think it should have more. In the end however, as I mentioned, as long as anyone can get in there, including the people that can't handle the spices, you have to make the LFR with them in mind. The LFR should be bland.
Each time they release a new tier of the LFR they keep adding more spice to it. They keep making it involve more mechanics. They keep thinking people will just get used to the salt and sooner or later they will be able to handle it.
News flash:
They will never be able to handle it. There will always be people that are not raiders in there. There will always be people that will troll and try to get people killed. There will always be people looking to do as little as possible and get carried to free loot. In other words, there will always be people allergic to salt in there.
Because of this the LFR should be designed around them. So they and their special snowflake attitude does not ruin the time of 24 other players around them. LFR should be a basically salt free zone. A bland representative of the actual finished product. To people that can handle spices, the minimal salt that is in the LFR seems like nothing. But unless you queue up with a complete group of those people you are at the mercy of the true nature of random and getting those allergic to salt groups is what is ruining the LFR experience for most people.
If they release it without the salt the chance of a failure would drastically be reduced and this would increase both the enjoyability of randomed raid content and the usefulness of it as a tool for the average player that just does not like spices.
The LFR, in my opinion, is going in the wrong direction adding more mechanics hoping that people will learn from it. When will they get the concept that random and any level of difficulty do not go hand in hand. They need to be separate.
I know somewhere in there offices someone knows that. I believe even ghostcrawler said it once or twice with reference to difficulty in random content, how it doesn't work. It is not often I agree with our friendly neighborhood crab but he is right on target here. Now all he needs to do is let the raid design team learn that. Take the spices out of the LFR and you will have a much bigger hit on your hands. Adding more levels of difficulty to it is not the answer. Some people just can't handle the salt and no matter how you try, you can not teach them to handle it. Just make LFR salt free.
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As I started to read this I was with you 100%...salt bad!
ReplyDeleteBut as I continued reading, and thoughts started pouring into my head, I've come to the conclusion that maybe 'light salt' might be better.
My meaning is this...and to try to continue on with your analogy...why not take the salt they have used and call it 'sea salt'? We all know that sea salt is a stronger, more flavorful salt. So, why not have Blizz replace that with ordinary table salt? Keep the mechanics but make them less flavorful?
A certain section of one of the raids came to my mind that made me think of this. I cannot tell you which raid, nor which section (I have a piss-poor memory at times) but it is the boss fight that takes place in a semi-narrow hall that has tornadoes moving in random order along the hall that you have to dodge/run past to get to the boss.
My one an only time in that encounter ended in failure. Try as I might I could not make it to the boss. The sea salt was just too much for my palate...meaning too many tornadoes.
Had they used table salt (meaning less tornadoes) my outcome would have been different and I know I would have made it to the boss. Even with the sea salt version I did manage to get closer to the boss each time after being swept down the hall by a tornado. Had it have been a table salt version I know I would have made to the boss alive and could have assisted in killing it.
When it comes to events like the maze table salt could work better as well. The amount of damage you take from the maze wall could be lessened, made less flavorful, so that even if you hit a few it won't mean death. It would still afford you to learn, if you want to, how to manage the maze without being a burden to yourself or your group/healers.
I've always seen the LFR as a place to learn to raid, which in my eyes is sorely needed because god knows we don't get that from the watered down version of questing/leveling we now have compared to how it used to be.
With that in mind, a little salt should be there. It will allow players to learn/see what a real raid contains and allow them to prepare for real raiding should they choose. By using table salt instead of sea salt the final dish might taste better to anyone who takes a bite.
For those that do not care about learning I just have this to say, please go back to your Easybake Oven (console games) and leave the gas grill (WoW) to those of us that want to learn how to be better cooks.
The light salt idea could work.
DeleteIf you get caught on the falling platform you get ported out for 2 minutes and can do nothing. If you get hit by the maze it causes a debuff that reduces your stats by 50% for 30 seconds stacking up to 10 times. During defensive damage done to the boss is reduced to 10%.
All things like that would be light salt.
I think with the addition of flex there is an avenue for people that really do want to learn. They can get their "catch up" gear from LFR and then enter a flex to learn to really raid the way raiding should be done. In a organized way with strategy and communication. Because LFR can not offer that organized way with strategy and communication I think it hurts the content as a whole trying to make it something that teaches and they keep making it harder and harder for the people that enter it.
Sure, I have gotten luck that I have done all the real bosses before I entered the LFR version so of course the LFR was a joke to me. But when you think that less than 5% of the player base raids and then less than 10% of that 5% is actually decent at it, the LFR is not going to have raiders there. Even more so when there is flex now for those said raiders.
"But when you think that less than 5% of the player base raids and then less than 10% of that 5% is actually decent at it, the LFR is not going to have raiders there."
DeleteThis is factually wrong.
If we look at WoWProgress, we see that 48649 guilds have killed normal Stone Guards at this point. Plenty of PUGs have done it as well, but let's ignore those and focus solely on guilds.
Now let's say the average guild has 15 people (10 mans have 12ish and 25 mans have 30ish).
48469 * 15 = 730k people who have killed normal Stone Guards without counting PUGs.
Now, last count I heard was that WoW had 7.7M subscribers with east plus west combined -- and these 730k are in the west alone.
But let's even say 75% of players are in the west (probably far less, but whatever) -- that means we have 5.8M western players. And 730k of them have killed normal stone guards -- or 12.5%. This still isn't even factoring in how something like half the playerbase isn't even max level or how many max level players don't do raids OR LFR.
In other words, far FAR more than 5% of the playerbase raids, ESPECIALLY when you factor in the people who aren't going to do raids OR LFR (and thus are irrelevant).
Stone Guards is not a good measure because it's old. You need to look at current tier. Immerseus shows 17000 and 16000 of those are 10-man, so using 15 people per guild is not valid. Furthermore, that's not necessarily 10 unique people per guild because some people have toons in multiple guilds, but let's just say they're each unique. Therefore, that's 170k, which using your estimate is 3% of the players... Sure, it's actually higher than that 3%, but it's not 12% of the playerbase.
Delete"You need to look at current tier."
DeleteNo, you don't, because there are many normal guilds who haven't even stepped foot in SoO yet because they're still working on the nerfed ToT. But we can look at Jin'rohk the Breaker if you prefer -- hell, we can even use Horridon (which is still 30k guilds).
This is ESPECIALLY true with Flex -- because there are also many guilds who did normal ToT who are doing Flex SoO now.
And let's assume they're all 10 man if you want, with 12 people per guild (it's more than 10). Sure, some might be duplicates, but we're also not counting any PUGs or guilds that aren't even on WoWProgress.
So 30k * 12 = 360k, which is 6.2% of our hypothetical 5.8M western playerbase. And of course it's less than 75% of the playerbase in the west, many people have multiple accounts, half the playerbase isn't even max level, etc.
On top of all this, we're still not considering people who DIDN'T raid in ToT but are now doing Flex.
In short, more than 5% of the playerbase raids.
@ Balkoth
DeleteWhat is with the obsession of calling everyone wrong instead of just saying you disagree?
Less than 5% of the player base raids and the only way your opinion otherwise holds water is if you are including LFR, which I am not.
A few tid bits of actual numbers for you (even if old).
In cataclysm ghostacrawler once said less than 5% of the player base raids.
In Cataclysm ghostcrawler, when talking about the great success of the LFR said that 7% of the population has finished DS on some level. This was toward the end of DS.
Now lets consider your guesstimated number of 730K raiders and go over every little bit of information you conveniently omitted, over looked or ignored.
Most raiders have 2-5 raiding characters. Most guilds are 10 man. Shared achievements throw off numbers. Wowprogresses and guildox are not valid sources of data.
All of those things greatly effect your 730K number.
Examples:
My guild on one server has bosses in SoO down. My guild on that server has not stepped into a raid this entire expansion. It is where me and friends keep alts, yet it has guild progress and bosses down.
My server has roughly 40+ raiding guilds. 10 of them are credited for downing stone guard that never actually downed stone guard but because people in the guild did, their guild gets credit for doing it.
That means that nearly 25% of the guilds on my tiny little server that never has any pugs going are said to have downed stone guard that never did. Can you imagine a large server with lots of pugs going on, that number could be upwards of 50% of the guilds that got credit for a stone guard kill didn't actually kill it but were just alts of characters that did or pugs here or there.
I am a member of seven guilds that are credited with finishing ToT in normal mode last tier. Only 2 actually did. That is less than 30% of the guilds wowprogress says I am in that cleared it that actually cleared it. Anecdotal, sure, but I am certain that I am not a unique person in this aspect.
Once you remove the alt factor, the shared achievements factor and the many other factors you might realize your 730K number would most likely be closer to 146K.
Again, a guesstimate just like yours, but unlike yours my guess include actual facts like ghostcrawler saying less than 5% raid (back in cata and we all know there is less raiding going on now) and considering all data like the fact there are tens of thousands of guilds on wowprogress that have been credit for killing things they never killed.
So you can believe more than 5% raid, that is your right, but I completely disagree because your data does not make any sense what so ever unless you are talking about the LFR.
I believe flex will greatly increase the number of raiders, I have so many new players raiding now that never stepped into ToT with us, but it would still be way below 5%.
But the key to this post was, before you changed it, that the actual raiders, be it 5% or 10%, will be doing flex or normal or heroic and there will not be enough real raiders to carry the people in the LFR so the LFR needs to be made easier, not harder like it has been drifting toward.
"What is with the obsession of calling everyone wrong instead of just saying you disagree?"
DeleteBecause we're talking about facts.
If you say you like the atmosphere of SoO more than ToT I might disagree -- but I won't say you're wrong because that's a matter of taste.
If you say you think hunters are more fun to play than priests, I might disagree - but I won't say you're wrong because that's a matter of taste.
But if you claim hunters do less damage than priests on a certain fight when the data shows otherwise, I will call you wrong because it's simply not true.
"In Cataclysm ghostcrawler, when talking about the great success of the LFR said that 7% of the population has finished DS on some level. This was toward the end of DS."
Can you find me that link? Because I was under the impression the number was closer to 25-30% of the playerbase.
"Most raiders have 2-5 raiding characters."
Do you have anything to back up this statement? Speaking from personal experience, looking back across the years throughout the two main guilds I've been in, only like half of my guildmates had more than one character who did at least normal and less than 25% had three or more. This mainly occurred in patches like ICC or DS with nothing else to do and massive nerfs to normal content as well.
"But the key to this post was, before you changed it, that the actual raiders, be it 5% or 10%, will be doing flex or normal or heroic and there will not be enough real raiders to carry the people in the LFR so the LFR needs to be made easier, not harder like it has been drifting toward."
I was more insulted that you claimed everyone but the top 0.5% of the playerbase sucked (since you claimed at least 99.5% of players weren't even "decent").
I'm going to back Balkoth here, not his facts necessarily (although they look okay) but that he's putting forth numbers that you can point out errors regarding but otherwise can't dispute. Specious claims without basis can't argue against facts.
DeleteUnless you can argue that his numbers or calculations are factually wrong, the conclusions stand as written even if they don't mesh with the fiction you've created.
And claiming that only 10% of raiders (as Balkoth points out, with your sketchy, made-up numbers, 0.5% of the overall player base) are decent is just ridiculous... apparently 9 out of every 10 raiders in a boss kill are being carried? In what world?
I do like the feel of SoO more than ToT. ;)
DeleteI had found that link a while back, I will try to dig it up again.
The 25-30 percent you are thinking might be "level 85" whereas the 7% was the player base, as in all players, even ones without max characters.
That is just guessing however, but when I hear "player base" I believe it to mean all players, not just max level ones.
Anecdotal evidence only. Every guild I have been in and all guilds I have been in on alts the majority of the raiders had at least 2 raiding characters.
Since wrath it has been that way, at least from everyone I know and have played with. This expansion had really killed that however, there are not as many with multiples, at least in my circle, as there used to be.
There is only 1 person on my 10 man that has only 1 raid geared character. Two only have 2 and the other 7 all have at least 5.
@R
Raiding is a team effort. Unless everyone is on the same level you do not down a boss. Sure, some can be carried and some bosses it is easier to carry people than on others.
But, with that said, if I am 5/10 in a raid, it is not a judgement on my skill or ability, it is a group effort. Maybe I would be 10/10 in a different group because they are holding me back, or maybe they would be 10/10 without me because I am holding them back.
Any group is only as strong as its weakest link. So, while it is possible to carry people once you over gear content and out skill it, usually first kills or early kills, no one is carried to, they earned it, as a team. Because if their team as a whole had a weak link, they most likely would not have downed it.
@ Both
Not even sure where the .5% thing came from but there were no insult to anyone there.
I do not judge people by their "raid progress" or their PvP Arena wins. Those are just numbers, and like I said to R, they need a team and have absolutely no bearing on a personal level. Except maybe who you choose to play with. But that is your decision.
However, with that said, it is true that the majority of the player base sucks. It is just a flat out fact. One look through the LFR will show you how bad most players are. Sure you can say they are slacking on purpose, or not trying and they are really better, but I believe, if they really were better they would do better even in LFR. That is the majority of the max level players, and yes, they do suck.
However, if you wanted to talk truly exceptional players, the ones that put in the time, effort and have the dedication to playing the game that makes them that good, then absolutely 0.5% would be right. The really good players are so small in this game, and that is why I often say, stop catering to them. Even if they lost all 0.5% of the player base today, you would never notice them gone.
"I had found that link a while back, I will try to dig it up again.
DeleteThat is just guessing however, but when I hear "player base" I believe it to mean all players, not just max level ones."
Please do.
And I assume player base to mean everyone as well -- which includes the 40-50% without max level characters. Then Blizzard effectively said 20-30% of the playerbase (or about half of max level players) had done at least Dragon Soul LFR from what I recall.
"Anecdotal evidence only. Every guild I have been in and all guilds I have been in on alts the majority of the raiders had at least 2 raiding characters."
Keep in mind they'd also have to actually raid in another distinct guild to "double dip" on WoWProgress. Raiding in a true PUG or in an alt group in the same guild wouldn't inflate the numbers.
"Not even sure where the .5% thing came from but there were no insult to anyone there."
You said less than 5% of players raid -- this means there can be at most 5% raiders.
Then you said at most 10% of those players were decent -- this means at most there are 0.5% decent players, apparently.
"Sure you can say they are slacking on purpose, or not trying and they are really better, but I believe, if they really were better they would do better even in LFR. That is the majority of the max level players, and yes, they do suck."
Whoa whoa whoa. If LFR is the majority of max level players, then that means we can safely multiply their percentage by 2 to find the total players at maximum level (or the maximum of those number, rather). So if only 7% do LFR, that means only 14% (at most) of players are max level.
Sounds pretty fishy to me.
"However, if you wanted to talk truly exceptional players, the ones that put in the time, effort and have the dedication to playing the game that makes them that good, then absolutely 0.5% would be right. The really good players are so small in this game, and that is why I often say, stop catering to them. Even if they lost all 0.5% of the player base today, you would never notice them gone."
Probably closer to 1-2%, but yes, it's a small percentage.
Of course, that 1-2% is also responsible for 90%+ of UI mods, things like DBM/Recount, guides for bosses, PTR boss testing, and more -- so I rather suspect you'd notice our absence.
Okay, I get what you mean now. But saying it like 0.5% is displaying it to mean something different than what it really does. You can not include people that do not raid at all into consideration for if they are good raiders. So it is 10%, not 0.5%.
DeleteAnd I completely believe that to be accurate. I am what I call an 80%, I play at 80% of my potential most of the time. There are few, very few, that play at 90% of their potential of better. That is the 10%.
" So if only 7% do LFR, that means only 14% (at most) of players are max level."
So that means 14% of max level players. Later on it was mentioned, and you even mentioned that you thought it said around 25% - 30% had done it.
The 25% number was max level characters. The 7% (14%) number was player base.
Now take people like me that did DS on 15 different characters.
It is completely reasonable to believe that 25% (characters, not players) equals 14% max level players (as in people, not characters).
It is a matter of wording, but your 25-30 is the same exact number as GCs 7%.
"Of course, that 1-2% is also responsible for 90%+ of UI mods, things like DBM/Recount, guides for bosses, PTR boss testing, and more -- so I rather suspect you'd notice our absence."
Do /ver DBM in LFR and try to tell me that most people use it. Seriously. That is why there are so many bad players, they are not smart enough to learn on their own and they are not smart enough to look for an addon to help them. So most people would not know if DBMs disappeared because they do not even know it exists to begin with.
I personally would miss the addons like bartender, ataholics, etc.
But I could raid without any raiding addon, I can figure out a fight without anyone needing to show me how it was done. All that stuff is just a short cut to make the learning process easier.
There is nothing in the game that can not be figured out easy enough by trying it and working it out on your own and as a team.
Addons are nice, but they are not needed. I actually wish some would go away because people get dependent on them and it turns them into bad players.
Example from the other night. Someone dies to bad, I ask them why they did not move out of it, they said their GTFO might not be working. I said, if you need GTFO to know when you move you are not a raider. Learn to move when you are taking damage. Heck, learn to move before you take damage. So not wait for an addon to scream at you.
Sometimes raiding addons made for lazy raiders.
I would not miss some of them if they were gone. The one thing I would miss most are the timers but anything else is simple and you should not need an addon for it.
"You can not include people that do not raid at all into consideration for if they are good raiders. So it is 10%, not 0.5%."
DeleteYou said, and I quote:
"But when you think that less than 5% of the player base raids and then less than 10% of that 5% is actually decent at it, the LFR is not going to have raiders there."
You specifically said less than 10% of the 5% that raids is actually decent at raiding. Which means 90% of raiders completely suck.
So you're right, I apologize, you technically only claimed 90% of raiders suck. You made no claim about the total percentage of players.
Which is still an awful and insulting thing to say.
"It is a matter of wording, but your 25-30 is the same exact number as GCs 7%."
No, it's not. Normal modes came about because only about 1% of players saw Naxx 40. I doubt they'd be touting LFR as a huge success if only 7% of the playerbase did it given the far increased popularity of raiding in general since then.
You said you were going to try that 7% quote -- any luck?
"So most people would not know if DBMs disappeared because they do not even know it exists to begin with."
I was mainly referring to normal raiders, not people in LFR. And sure, you can eventually learn it (and people literally would resort to using stopwatches back before "modern" add-ons) but it's kind of a waste of time.
Though given that Blizzard says they design encounters assuming people use add-ons, they may telegraph things more if DBM didn't exist.
"The one thing I would miss most are the timers but anything else is simple and you should not need an addon for it."
I've basically just been talking about timers and the /range function. Not even sure how GFTO works, never looked at it.
Good analogy, bad application of it.
ReplyDeleteHeroic raiding is homemade cookies, very tasty but require a lot more effort. Normal raiding is Costco cookies (they're surprisingly good but require some driving and a long lineup). LFR raiding is Dare boxed cookies (can get them anywhere, at any time, and they're cheap).
Your analogy would be better for a boss like Horridon... you're getting homemade cookies so you expect something good but you run into issues that ruin the experience. That doesn't apply to LFR at all, there's no uncertainty about what experience you'll have in LFR... it'll take longer than you want, there'll likely be wipes and the group quality will vary GREATLY from run to run. That's LFR. And it's VERY consistent in those areas. A good LFR run will never be as satisfying as a good normal or heroic run. It can't be, it aims lower.
Taking your argument to its logical end, you have 25 absolute noobs who have no idea what they're doing fighting bosses that have no mechanics and don't actually require fighting against, they have a "fall-over" timer where if you haven't done a certain amount of damage by that point, they just fall over dead. Salt-free diet. Fun, right? Nobody would want to play that. The whole reason that people play games (or sports, for that matter) is that they provide a challenge. Without a challenge, there's no reason to do it, you may as well just watch a movie.
Noobs will always be noobs until they learn, that'll happen. Slackers, morons and trolls who just want to suicide as quickly as possible will always fall in the hole or stand in the bad, they have no intention of helping, that won't change. Quality folks will overcome the obstacles and will help the group succeed. It's always been this way, it always will be this way. Occasionally mechanics slip through that shouldn't (the defensive stance rage mechanic shouldn't have gone into LFR as it did and it's now been mostly hotfixed out) but those are the exceptions, not the norms. I had a recent first wing SoO LFR run where we 2-shot each boss, first attempt taught the fight, second attempt killed it relatively cleanly. Had someone comment late in the run that it was the worst LFR run he'd ever had (as a criticism, not as an "I've been really lucky in the past" comment). Perspective is ridiculously warped right now. To me, it was an almost perfect LFR run for this early in the cycle... new people came in, learned the fight, executed it well enough on the next attempt and will carry that experience over to their next group. It's a good thing. One-shotting fights, expecially ugly wins, doesn't teach people as much since they don't get a chance to put anything they learned into action, they don't, in tennis terms, have the chance to break back after being broken. They're more likely to remember the right approach if they have a chance to put it into effect. Neutering all of the challenge and interesting mechanics from LFR would make it useless to anyone. They can't do that, nor should they.
"Nobody would want to play that."
DeleteSpeak for yourself. That is exactly what I would like. I would do LFR all day every day on all my characters if it was like that. It would be those cheap cookies. They are something to eat, not great, but a munchie none the less.
It would be the perfect way to pass some time and not have to end up stressed about it. If it were like that I would run LFR all the time. Now, when I reach that "nothing to do" moment I will log out. Sure my alts can use a lot of gear from LFR but I would rather go get elective root canal from the dentist with no anesthetic than do the LFR.
I would go in and get my valor, rep, quest items, gear, whatever and get out. That is exactly what I want. I want a group that works, even if it is a bad group.
I know there is a chance to get a good group, I have gotten many. But there are just as many bad groups. And as long as there is a 50/50 chance of failure, then it is a failure to begin with and not worth doing at all.
I am not a gambler. I do not want to gamble my free time to see if that 1 hour in queue was worth it. I want to know it is worth it and I did not just waste my time.
It is random content, you can not make it assuming that there will be better people in the group. You know what they say about people who assume right?
They need to make LFR as if it is being done by 25 of the worst players that will queue up for it.
What is comes down to is that LFR is a tool. Nothing more, nothing less. A completely broken tool that causes more damage than it fixes.
I do not want to do progression in LFR. That is what my guild is for. I do not want to wait for hours to get into one because tanks do not want to queue for it because they always get abused. If it was laughable easy then tanks would queue up for it because they would be a nice quick in and out procedure.
No one, and I repeat, no one ever wants to wipe with people they do not know and will never see again in that abusive environment. They might put up with it, but they do not want to do it.
Neutering all the challenge out of LFR is the only way to save it. It is the LFR, there is not supposed to be any challenge in there.
And lets face it, what is "fun" about yelling do not attack the boss in defensive 400 times and wiping over and over? Seriously, what is fun about that?
If I ever found myself guildless and the LFR was my only option to raid I would quit in a heartbeat. There is nothing even remotely resembling fun or interesting in the LFR.
I had a really good rant going here but I'm pulling it back, it just isn't worth the fight. Agree to disagree, vehemently. I didn't realize you just wanted Blizzard to hand you gear without you having to put forward any effort, based on that there's really nothing left to discuss, they simply can't design the game around that philosophy or there wouldn't be a game left.
Delete(and while the natural response to that is that you only want LFR to be like that, why would it be any different for a normal raider who wants a brain-dead flex for gear? Or a heroic raider who wants a brain-dead normal for gear? Or as has been proposed elsewhere, if you get a heroic kill, you just get handed the gear from the lower-level difficulties from the same kill... I mean, hell, why even play the game at all at that point?)
(alright, a bit of rant crept back in there, apologies, I'm just going to stop reading the responding to LFR complaints going foward, not worth my aggravation)
I don't want them to hand me gear, I want them to make random content for random players.
DeleteLets say on the scale the average players is a 50. LFR is designed to be an 80. When you fill it with so many 50s it makes it a lot harder than it needs to be being the people using it can't handle it.
I do not want gear handed to me, I want the content designed for the player it is intended for. The 50s.
My response to that is simple.
Flex, normal and heroic are assembled groups. They should have difficultly levels preset for it and then you, the person making the raid, finds people of that skill level to do that content.
The problem with LFR is that it is random content designed for people and people that do not meet the minimum standard requirements to be there are going there making it artificially harder for the people that are there.
Blizzard either needs to find a way to remove these people, which there is no way, or to nerf the content to the point that these people will not disrupt the fun and game play of others.
To do that, LFR needs to be like heroic dungeons. Quick and easy in and out and collect your loot.
If the LFR was not using the random system and was just super easy mode, I would have absolutely no problem with it. I think it would be awesome. I would do it with every character I had every week because it is easy enough that it is a great place to learn and get gear.
What kills the LFR and needs the LFR to get much much easier is the people in it. Being you can not fix the people, fix the difficulty level.
When the platform falls, LFR should yank you over before you fall and stun you for some period of time. You get penalized for not following the mechanic, but it's not death.
ReplyDeleteThe maze could have a similar mechanic or give a debuff as Grumpy said.
For Nazgrim, he could stun you if you attack him.
Stuns are annoying as hell, so I think they are good punishment that doesn't directly burden healers.
The prisons should be unlockable with one person instead of two
Blizz could keep the mechanics and use creative penalties to teach players the mechanics, but not kill them or wipe the group if they screw up.
Raid progression occurs because you keep the same group of people and you learn together through multiple attempts. In LFR, you always have fresh people who don't know the fight and the group is totally random; you can't learn as a group and having more than a couple of wipes is not acceptable in a random group. Also because it's 25 people, it's worse than 5 map content because they're less accountability. In that sense, it should probably be easier than 5-man content for that iLvL.
And as we mentioned in the other post, the requirements for entry should be higher.
DeleteA 510 item level to start would have been better. But I agree, it is mostly about the mechanics and requirements. Things just need to be salt free, or salt light in LFR.
Delete