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No more instant-gratification from blizzard?
xeniar
Member UncommonPosts: 805
Blue posts from blizzard
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
There's a lot of discussion about flying/not-flying and I'd like to try to sum things up and maybe realign the discussion a bit. Some of the other threads are near-cap, some have really gone down tangents, so I'm just picking this one to throw a reply into. Apologies to the other threads.
We intend to disallow flying while leveling from 90 to 100, and have flying become available again in the first major patch for Warlords of Draenor. No flying while leveling has been the case during Burning Crusade, Wrath of the Lich King, and Mists of Pandaria. We allowed flying during Cataclysm because as those zones were mixed-in with the 1-60 world it just would have been really jarring to dismount you as you fly into Hyjal, etc. but we would have disallowed it for Catalcysm zones as well if there was a reasonable solution there.
Flying trivializes combat. A lot of people like to say we're trying to force world PvP, or that we just really want people to look at the pretty trees we made, but those really aren't the reasons that drive this same decision we've made every expansion. Flying allows you to escape or enter combat at-will. There's a reason why flying isn't allowed in dungeons and raids, or battlegrounds and arenas, and that's because it would trivialize the core mechanic of the game in those areas - combat. For much the same reason it trivializes how content is approached in the outdoor world based on the simple fact that you can lift off and set down wherever you like.
So that's the main reason. But sure there are a lot of other problems it can cause for content design such as zones having to get a lot bigger because flying mounts can travel so quickly (and thus making ground travel in them take much longer), it reduces the impact of elevation within zones, it completely removes the ability for us to pace or present content in any structured way, and in general removes our ability to determine how and when players approach a situation, see a vista or location, or charge into/out-of a combat situation. It just greatly reduces any gameplay we want to create by allowing infinite choice in how content is approached to best suit a player's intention to (usually) avoid that content.
I totally sympathize with people's desire to do that, they want to be efficient and have it be their choice, but we have to balance our intent to create a game against creating a sandbox where anything goes. There's a happy medium there somewhere, but flying mounts in most cases just do too much to undermine too many of our core intentions with the game world, the basis of the game: combat, or guiding players through a game experience, and for those reasons we have continually chosen (when we could) to disallow flying mounts in the 'current' outdoor content. In the past that's meant only while leveling, but in our experiences with the Isle of Thunder and Timeless Isle we feel like we can extend that for a bit longer in the new content, and have it be kind of a big deal again once you're able to earn flying in the first big content patch, and in the meantime putting focus on flight paths as well as having some more interesting travel options for players to use.
Update: So a couple things I wanted to bring up in addition to what I posted earlier. The first was that we're of course refining our questing experience, you may have heard a bit about it from BlizzCon, and that expands to max level content as well. In Mists of Pandaria there was quite a bit of outdoor content at max level, but it was almost entirely in the form of dailies. From BlizzCon we shared we're looking to provide something quite a bit more story driven like the 5.1 Operation Shieldwall/Dominance Offensive with some of the exploration lessons we learned from the Timeless Isle, and that extends to the max level experience as well. We want the transition at max level not to be questing and story to a harsh "now you do dailies", but something that's more natural and feels a lot like the leveling experience just at max level for better reward. And so that goes back to all of the reasons I gave before about how flight interrupts some of the core mechanics we think present the best leveling and questing experience, and I thought it'd be good to point out that it'll also play a big role at max level due to our questing refinements.
The second thing is we really like when flying feels like a reward and something you've earned for each new expansion or area. It's such a powerful ability and we look back at BC (at least for epic riding) or Wrath and those were really big keystone achievements for us as players (mainly because they had some pretty huge gold costs on them...). Regardless of the unlock method though it was one of the bigger moments when you unlocked flying, took to the skies, and were able to see the world from an entirely different vantage because for most of us it wasn't easily attainable. Our plan has been to recapture some of that but make it a bit cooler, and while we don't have specifics just yet, it'll be something more involved than just paying gold; something that further emphasizes how powerful flight is. Unlocking it won't just be level 100 on the day 6.1 comes out with some gold, but something you'll be working toward over the course of the initial expansion release, and 6.1 will introduce the final steps to complete it. Think of something like a mini Legendary cloak quest. It's such a enormous power to be able to fly we really want it to be more of a key moment when you unlock it, and something that feels like an accomplishment more than just shelling out some gold like we've had in the past.
Anyway, I felt like those two things were worth spelling out.
Wow i'm truelly suprised.
They always disable flying from the game until you reach max level again in every expansion and is a good thing. Now they want to remove it until the next patch wich is 2-3 months in i geus? I love that idea honestly MMO's should not have flying it even further ruins your world.
But reading this post it seems they want you to work for something. flying being an actual achievment wich is a great step into the right direction. You'd still only have to do a silly questchain to obtain it is my bet but its a step anyway:P
Oh and gotta love the tears over at the mmo-champion forums. People whinign about THEIR flying. It's not their flying its Blizzards flying :P imo they should just remove it entirely:P
PS. sorry for the wall of text.
Comments
Blizzard made an error by including flying everywhere.
----
In TBC the introduction was great, many people played for weeks if not months to get their epic Dragons from that excellent quest line in Shadowmoon Valley.
Redesigning Azeroth from scratch to include flying on that planet too was a mistake, certainly in view of the fact it costed 3 times more to design landscapes you can explore in full 3D without fake borders.
So they should have restricted flying to the planet Outland only.
Azeroth should be restricted to flight Masters only.
---
Imagine a typical quest: you need to find a treasure on top of a hill, but a tribe is camped around the hill with 2 wandering Eltes and countless mobs. In a non flying zone you need to adapt according to your class: pull mobs with a ranged class, go in steatlh mode and try not to agro or choose a small defined path to brute force as a warrior/paladin ...
In fly mode, you simply mount, land on the hill, take the treasure and fly away ...
--- No wonder Blizzard includes now several no fly zones (mostly pvp ones) and the fact in the next expansion is ground based only during the first 4 months (patch period) is simply GREAT.
Because ... once you did the above quest, it is rather useless to do it again with a third or fourth alt after 4 months.
rpg/mmorg history: Dun Darach>Bloodwych>Bards Tale 1-3>Eye of the beholder > Might and Magic 2,3,5 > FFVII> Baldur's Gate 1, 2 > Planescape Torment >Morrowind > WOW > oblivion > LOTR > Guild Wars (1900hrs elementalist) Vanguard. > GW2(1000 elementalist), Wildstar
Now playing GW2, AOW 3, ESO, LOTR, Elite D
What happens when you log off your characters????.....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFQhfhnjYMk
Dark Age of Camelot
If flying is disallowed, then they damn well better make sure there are relatively uncluttered paths to most of the places players need to go. Nothing pisses me off more then having to fight off thirty or forty mobs on the way to a quest location, grabbing the quest item (or whatever task needs doing), and having to slog my way back through an army of wolves, giant insects, humanoid beasts, NPC Horde / Alliance, etc. which has somehow mysteriously regenerated.
Sorry, but to me fighting hundreds of meaningless battles with no purpose other than to slow me down trivializes combat far more than being able to skip over those same battles with a flying mount. While Blizzard most certainly isn't the worst offender in this regard *cough*LOTRO*cough*, I had a decent number of frustrating moments while playing MoP after realizing that I had to backtrack through an area I'd just 'cleared' a few minutes prior.
Ah well. My WoW days are over anyway, so I guess it matters little. I wish Blizzard the best of luck with WoD; they made a fine product overall with MoP (better than Cata or WotLK IMO) and I don't see them faltering here.
AN' DERE AIN'T NO SUCH FING AS ENUFF DAKKA, YA GROT! Enuff'z more than ya got an' less than too much an' there ain't no such fing as too much dakka. Say dere is, and me Squiggoff'z eatin' tonight!
We are born of the blood. Made men by the blood. Undone by the blood. Our eyes are yet to open. FEAR THE OLD BLOOD.
#IStandWithVic
Yeah, same reason why GW2 failed quite badly for me in the end. It does not feel like an immersive world where you adventure when you just click somewhere and appear there. Flying is not quite the same thing but it's in the same league imo.
WoW's world became a lot smaller place after flying everywhere was allowed. It creates at least some immersion when you actually have to spend a moment to get somewhere, and when you get back from that place it feels like you actually were somewhere.
This is a problem unique to Blizzard as no other MMO that has flying disables it during expansions. In fact the new EQ2 zones require a flying mount to even move around in so are designed from the ground up with flying in mind.
There are other ways to solve these issues.
Agreed
Death is nothing to us, since when we are, Death has not come, and when death has come, we are not.
I just don't understand why people find flying bad?
It makes the world feel more like a world. The more restrictions on the path a player can take to get from point a to point b, the more it feels like a game than a world. IMO.
It has nothing to do with instant gratification, it's about time. If my time is limited and I need some shopping, I'm going to use the fastest method of transport to get to the shops. It should be the same in the virtual world too.
If there is some lore reasoning behind it, fair enough.
The thing is, it's a game and not a world. Why would you want to bypass content in a game?
Change is bad, the game should have stayed forever perfect with no flying, like in Vanilla. Because, you know, no one every complained about anything back then.
Anything most people like, I hate. Most people like flying. A lot. So it must be really bad.
Back in my day we had to walk to our quests... Uphill. Both ways. Through piles of enemy bodies. If it didn't take two hours to get somewhere, it wasn't worth doing.
Take your pick, I guess. Personally I've never gotten it either.
What's really mind boggling, if perhaps sadly unsurprising, is what it's really about is trying to control what other people do. There's nothing stopping anyone from not using flying mounts -- or, hell, never use any mount at all -- but what the anti-flying crowd wants is for no one else to be able to use them.
You don't even have to know about The Law of Unintended Consequences to know what the result of this will be if Blizz goes ahead and does it.
Hint: It won't be any of the supposed good things the "flying is bad" crowd claims will happen.
the problem is that combat in WoW is already trivial so that argument is stupid.
if flying is not going to be enabled until the first patch I wont be playing until the first patch, if at all.
Well they also laughed at the notion of buying a max level account,yet here we are.
I would say this stance changes at some point,we never really know what they are thinking behind closed doors,one man's word doesn't mean a lot,if others inside the team want it in,then it probably makes it in.
I would hardly say that for now it is Blizzard steering away from instant gratification as a no fly zone has nothing to do with gratification ,they are still a hand holding game and have a LOT of work to do to get away from that stigma.
I see Blizzard being a premier EASY,hand holding game right to the end of it's existence,the only changes i see for the future is when it goes f2p and starts selling all those EASY or easier options.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
The solution is never found in taking things away...
just add ennemies in the sky, the longer you fly, the bigger the chance that they get to you and throw you of your mount plummetting to certain death and making the mount useless for a few hours.
And add safe flying zones, i.e. If you are high enough level, you cant be thrown of your mount, and even higher level, you will not get attacked.
And add mounted combat in certain PvP zones.
they once and for all need to try and ballance things with game mechanics.
just taking flying mounts away is stupid, because they are fun to collect and to fly... And taking it away temporary tells me they dont care for content older then 3 months.. Which is even a more saddening conclusion.
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)
This has always been my opinion as well. Not just with mounts but with all conveniences that have been brought to the genre over time.
People want to restrict other players and force them to play the game their way. It's a terribly selfish and greedy attitude that affects all games in the genre now.
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
Or you just put flying elites that defend the treasure from getting stolen by air. Sometimes good design requires a little bit more than ctrl + c, ctrl + v and several invisible walls.
well the point i was trying to make is that they are delaying flying.
and that you ahve to do a questline in order to unlock it again. just hitting 100 is not good enough. wich is a step towrds people working for a goal again. instant of the hand holding we are used to. still the quests will be retardidly easy but its a step imo in the right direction.
Blizzard want to remove flying completely but they can't. its too incorperated into the game and player backlash would be horible. Check the MMO-champion forums. there already is so much crying because it has been removed for a patch (3-4 months) instead of the 2 weeks needed to get too 100.
For people saying that the non flying people (me) are forcing the rest to the ground its not entirly true.
The pro-flying people keep telling us that we can choose to use your ground mount and that is false. Yes we could only use our groundmounts but, A human being works on efficiency we try to do everything in the fastest way often or easyst way. The path of least resistance. Flying mounts compared to ground mounts is too big off a diffrence in speed, you can just go straight accros a zone dont need to climb a mounting via a path etc. It's too big too say that we have a choise in using our groundmounts to do that.
1. You didn't refute any of the points I made.
1.a How is flying at the start "instant gratification" when we already had to unlock it several times..and yet not locking ground mounts ISNT instant gratification?
2. The entire game is a grind fest, how is locking flying suddenly making it not?
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
try to read the first paragraph again... its in there...
It boils down to one thing and one thing only..."Choice".
If you don't like it, don't play it.
Period.
All the whining, crying, and complaining falls on deaf ears with Blizzard. They will continue to do as they always have.. whatever they want to.
Personally fly.. don't fly.. who cares. If the content is there it doesn't matter.
Lets see your Battle Stations /r/battlestations
Battle Station
How is that a refute?
We had to unlock flying with WotLK...and it still does NOT say how having flying from the start is instant gratification in a GRIND GAME. You ALSO are ignoring how not locking ground mounts isn't somehow also instant gratification.
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
Well, something smart from blizz devs? Sorry, just feels like they are pretty... lets say 'durrr' at times with their choices. Pretty much though the blue post is EXACTLY why I feel flying mounts were a bad idea. They just trivialize the pacing and over-all end up undermining the design of the world. Sure, it was cool getting one in TBC, but in the end I could even tell how iffy they were at that point, and it only became worst as the game continued, having to have flying taken away in a rather 'forced' manor which always felt so silly despite knowing it was for the best.
Honestly though, I'd say don't read to much into them taking away 'instant-gratification'. So far blizzard has shown that its been their key business model for some time. Unless they come to some suddenly realization that they have been making bad choice after bad choice, its very unlikely they will change things much as they have that false belief that casuals will stay around if you give free 'wins' as I'd call it.
We had to ulock it how? by buying it? honestly your not reading what im typing at all. the thing wich has been changed is that you need to do a specific long questline in order to unlock it now not just handing over some gold. wich means that you have to work abit to get it unlocked. workign for something is the opposite of instant-gratification.
its a very small step away from the hand holding but it is a step.
the issue here is flying who said anything about groundmounts?
I never said this makes the game less of a grind game. I'm saying that by this action blizzard took a small step away from holding evryone's hand.
My god learn to read please.