How can WoW still justify a subcription model?

[AuronFtw]

WoW is, still, the best MMO by any metric of measurement. Players paying subs, update quality, update frequency, new content added, etc. Obviously the quality varies from update to update, but on the whole, WoW right now is *vastly* better than vanilla WoW was.

Questing is far more streamlined, so much so that some areas are hardly recognizable and many were completely overhauled (some more than once); class/spec viability has never been better than it is currently with MoP, and it's certainly far better than the hilarious joke that was vanilla or the tragedy that was BC; quality of life changes keep getting added to the game, with shorter hearth cd and easier access to faster mounts and mounts at earlier levels; PvP is still a joke, but let's be honest with ourselves, it always was (at least now it doesn't revolve around how much your priest can lean on his mana burn key); PvE raiding content is every bit as good as it always was, with the 14th tier of raiding a huge increase in quality over the 13th (dragon soul was shit), and PvE solo play is far more involved than it previously was in any expansion, with more interesting storylines, plot points and lore bits to gather (including a faction devoted solely to it), and even an entire brawler's arena for 1v1 challenges with tough PvE mobs.

In addition to being the best MMO on its own merits, Blizzard is quick to ape the good ideas brought forth by other games. For example, Rift launched in early 2010 and featured, among other things, rogues that could move at full speed while stealthed. This was a positive gameplay change (from WoW), and it was fairly popular. Magically, the next WoW patch that rolled around removed the movement penalty for rogues in stealth. Several games came out with AoE looting (swtor, rift, etc) and blizzard put in AoE looting.

If WoW has any major fault, aside from tiny balance issues or design decisions, it's that the gameplay hasn't evolved. This isn't to say it's gotten worse, because it obviously has not - it just hasn't done anything different. Every expansion repeats the same formula; level up, rep grind, heroics grind, raid grind. It's been the same since BC (so everyone that says the game got worse after BC, this is why; not because the quality dropped, since it didn't, but because you got tired of the formula).

TLDR: WoW is, right now, all the good things it started with, minus a considerable amount of the shit it started with, plus a lot of innovation from blizz, plus a lot of great ideas stolen from other games that came along in the meantime.

 

[Colt47]

*shrugs*

who knows, but the sooner it dies and people move on to MMOs that actually deserve the attention the better

AAAAARGH GOD.

Please point out those MMOs. Drop a link to homepage. To a video review. To some random fan made video on youtube. Because now I know that there's a better MMORPG than WoW hidden somehwere. And God do I want to play it.

but the Global Cool Down based combat system is incredibly repetitive and turns people into human typewriters. To put it bluntly, they had to build in attention checks just to make sure people aren't falling asleep at the wheel while fighting in combat.

Well people play WoW because of the endgame - raids or pvp and not leveling. Because what you have described is a leveling experience. On a PvE server. Every time i join a pug raid or go out with my rbg team, I constantly hear button mashing and tons of emotion ir people's voices.

As for talents - oh yeah it's simple and primitive. Three choices. You are allowed to choose one. And it's briliant. It's like Aion, except Aion has no skills balance and there's obvious choices on what to pick up.

I'm playing at end game right now, and it's still the same even in raids. They just increase the number of attention checks and lower the opening windows to react at the harder difficulties (ie. Normal mode and hardmode.) There is no instance in combat where you stop doing a rotation. Even when moving the caster is expected to be pressing a number key referencing an attack or a HOT action.

Tactical depth happens when someone has to make the decision between pressing the attack and possibly breaking from routine to observe the boss. Due to the necessary nature of maintaining steady dps on bosses, this kind of situation is either underplayed or completely lost. The best I've seen the developers come up with is trying to fake it by putting debuff like effects on a boss from maintaining a steady dps, such as on Galaron, or the CC spears on the fight directly after.

End game would be a lot better if they increased the boss strategy complexity, killed the stupid enrage timers, and actually added real debuffs and other tactics that didn't involve constantly pressing the same keys in the same order for hours on end. The designers are trying to make it somewhat varied by adding instant procs and some shift in dot reapplication times, but it's pretty much jury rigging at this point.

The game has had this problem for a while, though: possibly a bit before Wrath of the Lich King came out. Fights didn't used to have enrage timers at all and they tended to work out fine. the designers just decided to replace the CC of the trinity with DPS and then forced themselves into having enrage timers and limited player tactics.

 

[Bad Jim]

there are plenty of games that do free to play without a pay to win model.

Examples you say?

League of Legends & Planetside 2 are two brilliant examples and to a lesser degree (because they're buy to play) Guild Wars & Guild Wars 2 could also be listed.

WOW is regularly updated with content and charges money regularly. Guild Wars charges only once but gives you content only once.

I missed you saying 'progress', not everyone has the time to grind, just because a game allows people to bypass it so they can get on to the interesting things doesn't make it bad in the slightest, a lot of us have jobs and other obligations.

If you would rather pay than play a certain part of a game then so be it. But reflect that such a business model encourages the creation of content you would rather skip, instead of content you would rather play.

Because servers cost a lot of money to operate and maintain.

Servers do not cost anything close to the subscription fee Blizzrd charges. Not even a substantial fraction. It's content that costs money.

 

[Toy Master Typhus]

Because there is such a stigma against Free2play in the gaming community. So much so that they are all automatically labeled as Pay2win before they even scroll what is in the shop.

 

[Darmy647]

if players are paying for the subscription, then it works i guess. I used to pay for it myself until i saw how completely dumbed down shit was getting after wrath of the lich king. It kept toning down the depth and the difficulty and the real skill i saw back in the burning crusade, so i quit. Should they keep charging? If it works and people still want it, why the hell not? Did you know square still charges and has a large following for Final fantasy 11?

 

[Gnoya]

I much prefer a subs based MMORPG.. I wish Lotro stayed 100% subscription based..

Sadly when they went with some F2P or "Pay to WIN" mechanics it has hurt the community and the quality of the players in the community. If you cant accept the cost of a simple monthly subs that is no diff that a magazine subscription.. then play one of the other Zillion completely F2P games.

 

[theultimateend]

People pay for it? For one reason or another people will pay for it. Why I don't know or care, but I have seen some pretty crappy justification for it.

The reason I come back to wow is when I play other games I think "This is kinda like wow but less enjoyable." so I go back to wow.

GW2 is literally the only exception, yet I still find myself playing wow instead (but I'll be the first guy in a crowd to preach about how great GW2 is).

Because there is such a stigma against Free2play in the gaming community. So much so that they are all automatically labeled as Pay2win before they even scroll what is in the shop.

And then see that the shop is full of P2W >.>...

GW2 is the only exception of all F2P titles I've checked out.

Not to say they don't exist, but other than GW2 (and perhaps LoL) its mostly the rule.

WoW is, still, the best MMO by any metric of measurement. Players paying subs, update quality, update frequency, new content added, etc. Obviously the quality varies from update to update, but on the whole, WoW right now is *vastly* better than vanilla WoW was.

- - -

TLDR: WoW is, right now, all the good things it started with, minus a considerable amount of the shit it started with, plus a lot of innovation from blizz, plus a lot of great ideas stolen from other games that came along in the meantime.

Yeah, if you stay away from their forums its basically nothing but a delightful experience.

MOP has been one of the best online gaming experiences of my life. I play it with my wife and their decision to not let you fly immediately was perfect. You get to see all the effort put in to the zones, hear the stories, and just have a grand ole time.

We actually read the quests and for the most part it was actually interesting >.>...

Plus the animation quality of the monk class has me hoping they'll update characters and animations for the old classes and races now .

 

[V8 Ninja]

Because it's WOW, the game that almost killed all subscription-based MMOs and is still going strong nearly a decade after release.

Also, things about WOW's overall game design being pretty good and stuff. (I have yet give my soul to WOW, so I can't confirm those statements.)

 

[Darmy647]

Peeps keep talking about pay to win...ive only played mmo's mostly for the PVE...

 

[KiKiweaky]

I have tried to pull a few people I know away from wow and get them to play other mmo games but they wont leave something they have invested so much time in... shocking state of affairs

 

[II2]

Because they can; because people will still pay for it.

That sounds like circular logic, but I think it's basically just cornering a particular market... Sorta like how COD and Battlefield can charge the extra 10 on retail and also sell their season pass / expansion DLC at full cost, regardless of popular sales.

That's not the best comparison, but it's what I got as someone who doesn't really follow trends in MMO games...

 

[Lunar Templar]

For a less dickish answer; Cause people are still (foolishly) paying for it, not to-mention it's got very little chance of gaining ground if it went F2P.

What I mean by that is, anyone who wanted to play it, probably has. every one knows what WoW is about, unlike ToR ,Tera or Aion (which i won't touch with a 10" pole cause fuck NCsoft) which could and have seen an improvement. WoW doesn't have the advantage of being 'new' or even 'newish', it's age will probably be a huge factor against it if it ever goes free to play cause it'll have gone from 'the game is how old and people are still paying for it? must be good' to 'it's how old? pass, not gonna get in on this sinking ship', not when there are a dozen other games doing the same thing with pretty pictures

Course, this also mans WoW is pretty much fucked, being the 'old man' on the block, sure its got the advantage of 'lots of content', it's also horribly dated looking and becoming increasingly mechanically inferior, with more 'action' base MMOs like Vindictus, Tera, GW2 and RaiderZ out there, why would one want to stand there watching an auto-attack animation and waiting on 'cool downs' and hoping your gear is good enough to protect you cause moving out of the way of the sword doesn't help, when you could play a game where your ability to avoid damage is based on how well you can get out of the way and not a number in your stat screen

 

[mooncalf]

But still, the gear was not completely obsolete in most cases.

That could be so! Perhaps the players who quit after that were looking for a point where they could retire and rest on their laurels a bit, in other MMO's you may not get regular supplementary additions to the end game, but there is a prestige to being in a sense 'finished.'

 

[TheEndlessGrey]

The reason everyone else went F2P is because consumers were unwilling to pay for WoW *and* another game. As shown by the failure of every subscription MMO since 2006. WoW still charges a subscription because they're the only ones who still can.

 

[Colt47]

The reason everyone else went F2P is because consumers were unwilling to pay for WoW *and* another game. As shown by the failure of every subscription MMO since 2006. WoW still charges a subscription because they're the only ones who still can.

Well, that AND the fact that they all ended up playing exactly the same with a different paint job. It's like how there are different versions of monopoly: Star Wars Monopoly, Simpsons Monopoly, Star Trek Monopoly, etc. They all are just classic monopoly with a different paint job.

The ones I ended up playing for a decent amount of time next to WoW were Shin Megami Tensei: Imagine, Maple Story, Tribes Ascend, and now Planetside 2. Each of those games are kind of their own thing and don't really mimicking WoW all too much.

 

[RhanathShadowhand]

What exactly do you think the word "canon" means? You have said several times in this thread that having been established in the setting for over a decade doesn't count, so there's no way you could possibly be using the dictionary definition. Although since you also seem to think "only appears in an easter egg" is the same thing as "joins the main party in an unavoidable scripted event" I'm guessing English isn't your first language.

"Joins the party in an unavoidable scripted event". Sure. Optional quests are unavoidable.

You also keep going back to what they were originally intended as. OK, in that case the night elves are not part of the alliance but are an independent faction as powerful as the horde, alliance, and scourge while Illidan is a misunderstood good guy. Well spotted.

Would you mind reading the books? Thank you. Also yes, Illidan is misunderstood. That still doesn't make him a good guy and justify what he did though.

EDIT: While Night Elves are quite strong, they'd not be able to survive against the Horde and other evil forces, because half the night elves are druids, and they are not tied to Alliance, but nature.

 

[Rariow]

You have to understand, at this point WoW is a cultural phenomenom. People KNOW WoW, and I don't mean just "core" gamers like us. The great majority of people who play games aren't "core" gamers. People who go on forums and discuss this stuff make up an important and vocal, but small part of the population. Most people aren't aware of MMOs other than WoW, and that's the one they try first, and usually stick with (Because, let's admit it, it's the best at what it does, or damn close to it). It's the exact same reason people stick with Coca Cola and Pepsi when there are hundreds if not thousands of copycat brands that taste the exact same and might be sold for cheaper: It's become part of our collective culture at this point. That's why TOR was such a big deal: It combined Star Wars, something even more ingrained in the general consciousness and BioWare, a company that "core" gamers (used to?) adore to create something that might knock WoW out of its place. Even that was not enough to do it.

It's kinda a snowball effect. WoW was popular when it came out because it was the best thing available at the time. So people started knowing about it. So it grew. So more people found out about it. So it grew more. Rinse and repeat. It really does come down to it being so popular that people know about it, whilst most people probably don't know about TERA, PlanetSide 2, Secret World, or Guild Wars 2. If you ask a random person off the street, chances are they've at least heard about World of Warcraft, but it's quite unlikely they've heard about any of the other MMOs I've mentioned.

 

[deviltry]

It might still be snowball effect, but how about skills? You know, the core gaming mechanic, what makes your character, how you experience raids and pvp?

Mage in other MMORPGs - stand, cast, blink, root. Where's fun skills like Alter Time? Varied skills that can be used both defensively and offensively like Ice Block?

Warlock - a lesser mage with a pet. You cannot summon a second one to assist, you cannot sacrifice it for added power. DoTs still do not scale with haste in SWTOR. Really? 2008 game design lol. Or going into demon form - it's not a cooldown with 20 sec duration (like in Rift - Lich Form, boring skill is boring), it actually drains your secondary resource, so you can stay in it for defensive bonuses and cast nothing for lasting longer or just drain all resources and go all out - variety, again. It also changes your skills. You no longer casting same skills, but with 20% increased damage, like in Rift...

Talents - WoW has primitive talent system, and yet you have no idea whether this warlock is going to insta fear you, or coil you, or stun you... Because people just don't use cookie cutter builds...

 

[Darmy647]

It might still be snowball effect, but how about skills? You know, the core gaming mechanic, what makes your character, how you experience raids and pvp?

Mage in other MMORPGs - stand, cast, blink, root. Where's fun skills like Alter Time? Varied skills that can be used both defensively and offensively like Ice Block?

Warlock - a lesser mage with a pet. You cannot summon a second one to assist, you cannot sacrifice it for added power. DoTs still do not scale with haste in SWTOR. Really? 2008 game design lol. Or going into demon form - it's not a cooldown with 20 sec duration (like in Rift - Lich Form, boring skill is boring), it actually drains your secondary resource, so you can stay in it for defensive bonuses and cast nothing for lasting longer or just drain all resources and go all out - variety, again. It also changes your skills. You no longer casting same skills, but with 20% increased damage, like in Rift...

Talents - WoW has primitive talent system, and yet you have no idea whether this warlock is going to insta fear you, or coil you, or stun you... Because people just don't use cookie cutter builds...

I dont know. In SWTOR i see all kinds of crazy ass builds. But then again, in both WoW and in some other MMOS that use the skill tree function, there are elitests, even in guilds that NEED you, DEMAND you choose a certain path so your EXACTLY what they need. The WoW skill tree honestly isn't so Unique anymore.