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[WoW] Shadowlands: 9.1.5 on the PTR

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Posts

  • admanbadmanb unionize your workplace Seattle, WARegistered User regular
    Dhalphir wrote: »
    im also not sure the point about ffxiv is the gotcha that it is treated as

    if one game has a cash shop that the playerbase hates, is riled up by every time something is added, and memes on constantly

    and another game has a cash shop that is basically the same full of basically the same kind of items, and the playerbase appears to more or less tolerate it and does not get riled up in remotely the same way, then clearly there is something the second game is doing that is making it work for them

    it's not a "gotcha", but it is a commentary on what people claim to/believe they care about vs. what they actually care about. A lot of players criticize the cash shop of WoW as a moral failing, but happily play FFXIV because they don't actually believe it's a moral failing, they believe it's a quality failing. They just don't want to admit that what they actually care about isn't that someone's trying to sell them a $25 3D model and set of textures, it's that someone's trying to sell them a shitty $25 3D model and set of textures.

    TryCatcherDhalphir3cl1ps3htmTynnanKai_SanSmrtnikInfamyDeferredPenumbraShadowen
  • htmhtm Registered User regular
    Dhalphir wrote: »
    im also not sure the point about ffxiv is the gotcha that it is treated as

    if one game has a cash shop that the playerbase hates, is riled up by every time something is added, and memes on constantly

    and another game has a cash shop that is basically the same full of basically the same kind of items, and the playerbase appears to more or less tolerate it and does not get riled up in remotely the same way, then clearly there is something the second game is doing that is making it work for them

    I think a lot of people on this thread just think it's goose-ish behavior to get riled up by the existence of cash shop cosmetics, and the fact that the FFXIV community gets markedly less riled by the FFXIV cash shop is further evidence that the WoW community is pretty damn goose-ish.

    Is there some intangible aspect of FFXIV that causes it to attract less geese than WoW? Maybe, but that doesn't mean it's wrong to decry that the WoW community is a bunch of fucking gooses.

    TryCatcherSmrtnik
  • JavenJaven Registered User regular
    edited November 2021
    The community just has a very proven track record about being disingenuous regarding the things they claim not to like about the game. Many WoW streamers who complained about the mere concept of having a cash shop in an MMO turned around to FF14 when it became advantageous to do so and suddenly a cash shop is nice. It just kind of reinforces the notion that there was a feedback loop in effect for a very long time, where streamers would manufacture outrage, which would then outrage their viewers, who would parrot the outrage, causing the streamer to escalate, rinse and repeat

    And it’s odd because there’s still a TON not to like about the game! M+ changes at least somewhat being moderated based on how it impacts their efforts to turn it into an export! The renown grind still sucked (until very recently). The Deaths Advance/archivists grind SUCKS. Literally the entire story! The fact that the company is flooded to the gills with sex pests! Complain about that stuff!

    Javen on
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  • DhalphirDhalphir don't you open that trapdoor you're a fool if you dareRegistered User regular
    I don't think it's fair to say FFXIV has a different kind of players or a different kind of community than WoW. People are the same everywhere.

    FFXIV has created a different kind of players and community. The way players act in a game is completely dictated and controlled by developers. People aren't different, the games are different and make people act differently.

    If people play FFXIV and don't mind its cash shop while hating WoW's cash shop, that isn't an indication that they're hypocritical, it's an indication that one game is handling it better.

    3cl1ps3CaedwyrhushEvermournLockedOnTargetQanamilWarlock82
  • admanbadmanb unionize your workplace Seattle, WARegistered User regular
    yeah I don't think that gap between what people think they like/dislike and what they actually like/dislike is a WoW problem, an MMO problem, or a youtube problem (though it's exacerbated by all of them.) A friend and I have had maaaany conversations over the years about this cropping up.

  • Eat it You Nasty Pig.Eat it You Nasty Pig. tell homeland security 'we are the bomb'Registered User regular
    edited November 2021
    overall I think they have done okay with transmogs in shadowlands, at least compared to BFA; a lot of the covenant sets are good. I haven't counted it up or anything but I feel like in the first couple tiers of shadowlands there's been about as many at least somewhat interesting sets as comparable times in legion, they just aren't coming from the raids.

    re: the cash shop stuff, I just think the main lens a lot of 'communities' now see the game through is that everything sucks and all new developments must be discussed through that frame.

    ed: I mean WoW barely even has armor sets in the cash shop; there's like three of them and one is that weird half-finished-looking butterfly set

    Eat it You Nasty Pig. on
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  • JavenJaven Registered User regular
    They’ve definitely done way more of ‘this item/gear set is specifically for cosmetic purposes’ in Shadowlands, which is definitely cool.

    TryCatcherSproutDhalphirTynnanMunkus Beaver
  • TryCatcherTryCatcher Registered User regular
    Javen wrote: »
    They’ve definitely done way more of ‘this item/gear set is specifically for cosmetic purposes’ in Shadowlands, which is definitely cool.

    Yeah. Like, a big thing on Shadowlands is that Covenants throw a lot of very good looking cosmetic gear and mounts just from doing quests, and can get recolors if you want to.

    But if is not "prestigious" aka hard to get is bad. The textbook example is t3 mogs, they look ugly and outdated and tacky, but they can only be gotten on the BMAH now so they are cool. Is a point of view that says that is more important to impress other people that having actually good looking cosmetics on your character.

  • DhalphirDhalphir don't you open that trapdoor you're a fool if you dareRegistered User regular
    edited November 2021
    TryCatcher wrote: »
    Javen wrote: »
    They’ve definitely done way more of ‘this item/gear set is specifically for cosmetic purposes’ in Shadowlands, which is definitely cool.

    Yeah. Like, a big thing on Shadowlands is that Covenants throw a lot of very good looking cosmetic gear and mounts just from doing quests, and can get recolors if you want to.

    But if is not "prestigious" aka hard to get is bad. The textbook example is t3 mogs, they look ugly and outdated and tacky, but they can only be gotten on the BMAH now so they are cool. Is a point of view that says that is more important to impress other people that having actually good looking cosmetics on your character.

    For me, I've always felt that there's largely 3 kinds of people when it comes to transmog (and it applies to glamour in FFXIV too)

    1. People who enjoy the process of assembling a cool look themselves and thrive on the creativity.
    2. People who just wanna look cool
    3. People who don't care and will literally be untransmogged entirely, or unglamoured.

    I'm not gonna talk about #3 because those people frighten me and if it was up to me they'd be banned from playing because they are disgusting. Get them OUT of MY GAME.

    People from #2, I think these are most people, who just wanna look cool - these are the people who get excited over new tier sets looking good, who like having T3 off the BMAH, because sometimes part of looking cool is looking different, and a rare set is hard to get so less people will look like you. There's an element of cool in seeing someone in full original T3 because of how rare it is. Even if the set, in a vacuum, looks trash. This is a wide range of people though and not all of them will agree about how they play. It's just a catchall to collect everyone who doesn't care enough about transmog to actually spend time mixing and matching sets, but still doesn't wanna be no-transmog clown-suit. Shadowlands cosmetics have been pretty good for these people.

    People in transmog & glamour communities usually fall into #1. These people appreciate a good looking tier set but they are not gonna use it themselves, because the entire point is creativity. It doesn't really matter if a tier set looks bad because they were never going to wear it. These are the people who appreciate the effort and creativity that goes into a good outfit because of how much time can go into making good pieces fit together.

    I'm pretty sure most of the people in #1 have quit WoW and just play FFXIV now. If you're #1, WoW sucks and has for a long time.

    Dhalphir on
  • JavenJaven Registered User regular
    I’m meh on the tier sets, but the new Broker gear sets look amazing.

    Penumbra
  • htmhtm Registered User regular
    Dhalphir wrote: »
    I don't think it's fair to say FFXIV has a different kind of players or a different kind of community than WoW. People are the same everywhere.

    I think that the demographics of the FFXIV player base are very different from WoW's. I've played WoW since F&F alpha, and FFXIV off and on since ARR's launch. Admittedly, this is all anecdote and no data, but in my experience that FFXIV audience skews a bit younger (more Millennial, less Gen-X), has considerably more women, and very few PvPers. And WoW is PC only, which is huge demographic difference, even ignoring non-verifiable observations.

    All of those contribute to big cultural differences between the respective communities.

    TryCatcherSmrtnik
  • BahamutZEROBahamutZERO Registered User regular
    edited November 2021
    honestly the material difference between the WoW and FF14 cash shops for me is that FF14's engine and dev team priorities allow them to make cool looking clothes to sell on it and WoW's don't
    I never hated the WoW cash shop for existing though, just felt apathy towards it because there was nothing on it that interested me

    BahamutZERO on
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  • EvermournEvermourn Registered User regular
    I have never seen a commentator say the FF14 cash shop is a good thing. What I have seen is a lot less people get riled up about it because it’s better handled than in WoW, and the game isn’t having all the issues WoW is. My own view is that any game with a box price and a sub shouldn’t have a cash shop, but that ship has sailed so it’s all about how it’s done.

    Dhalphir3cl1ps3Beyond NormalLockedOnTargetShadowen
  • BahamutZEROBahamutZERO Registered User regular
    the FF14 cash shop is way overpriced and I have bought a significant amount of stuff from it because it's very appealing
    the WoW cash shop is way overpriced and I have never bought anything from it because it all sucks

    BahamutZERO.gif
    DhalphirKevin Crist
  • admanbadmanb unionize your workplace Seattle, WARegistered User regular
    the FF14 cash shop is way overpriced and I have bought a significant amount of stuff from it because it's very appealing
    the WoW cash shop is way overpriced and I have never bought anything from it because it all sucks

    hey now, one of my guildies gave me the cat mount for my birthday and it is adorable. Some of the other mounts are decent too

    but yeah it's nothing compared to FFXIV.

    htmBigityTryCatcher
  • BigityBigity Lubbock, TXRegistered User regular
    the FF14 cash shop is way overpriced and I have bought a significant amount of stuff from it because it's very appealing
    the WoW cash shop is way overpriced and I have never bought anything from it because it all sucks

    Aw some of the mounts are ok when on sale.

  • DacDac Registered User regular
    People lose their minds every time there’s a new item in the shop regardless of any other circumstances, so

    I mean, the charity ones are fine, but I don't think it's unreasonable for people to be angry that there's cash shop items that gate cool stuff when they're already paying a sub. That's been the basis of a lot of it for a while. Doesn't help that the cash shop stuff is usually way better designed than normal game stuff.

    The fact that some of us don't even think twice about it anymore, or in some cases make excuses or even defend companies for this behavior, is kind of an indictment of the times in general.

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  • TryCatcherTryCatcher Registered User regular
    edited November 2021
    Dac wrote: »
    People lose their minds every time there’s a new item in the shop regardless of any other circumstances, so

    I mean, the charity ones are fine, but I don't think it's unreasonable for people to be angry that there's cash shop items that gate cool stuff when they're already paying a sub. That's been the basis of a lot of it for a while. Doesn't help that the cash shop stuff is usually way better designed than normal game stuff.

    The fact that some of us don't even think twice about it anymore, or in some cases make excuses or even defend companies for this behavior, is kind of an indictment of the times in general.

    "Way better designed". What? No, seriously, what? Most of the mounts are just models that get reused on the next expansion or the next zone (Vulpine Familiar), and from the original designs, there has been some big stinkers, like the pajamas and the Spongebob Boatmobile.

    TryCatcher on
    htm
  • Eat it You Nasty Pig.Eat it You Nasty Pig. tell homeland security 'we are the bomb'Registered User regular
    also, none of the stuff in the cash shop is as expensive as various mounts available exclusively for gold. You can have any cash shop mount (for example) for less gold than you'll spend on the lightforged mech thing, the frog mounts in bfa, etc.

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    hold your head high soldier, it ain't over yet
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  • DacDac Registered User regular
    Some of the datamined models for 9.2 are looking pretty sweet.
    wooo denny time. Even more smarm!

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  • Munkus BeaverMunkus Beaver You don't have to attend every argument you are invited to. Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPA regular
    Once again I'm stuck looking at the plate mogs coming up and seeing how awesome paladins and DKs are and how dinky and dunky the warrior set is.

    it's like there's extra padding so we don't hurt ourselves

    Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
  • 3cl1ps33cl1ps3 I will build a labyrinth to house the cheese Registered User regular
    Once again I'm stuck looking at the plate mogs coming up and seeing how awesome paladins and DKs are and how dinky and dunky the warrior set is.

    it's like there's extra padding so we don't hurt ourselves

    I mean...

    SmrtnikTryCatcher
  • fortyforty Registered User regular
    edited November 2021
    also, none of the stuff in the cash shop is as expensive as various mounts available exclusively for gold. You can have any cash shop mount (for example) for less gold than you'll spend on the lightforged mech thing, the frog mounts in bfa, etc.
    You could buy at least half the mounts in the cash shop for the cost of the Auction House Dinosaur converted into WoW tokens.

    I've never bought a thing from the shop, but I don't really get the clamor over it as things are in WoW. It'd be one thing if everyone were forced to look like this
    Rainbow_gear_2085.jpg
    and ride plain-ass horses if they weren't spending money, but the devs have put a veritable shitload of cosmetics (mounts, pets, gear transmogs) that you can earn just by playing the game enough (/getting lucky with the random drops).

    I complain about all sorts of things in this game, but a handful highly optional, non-power based goodies for whales to blow money on if they feel like it in a game that is absolutely laden with free, highly optional, non-power based goodies that can be obtained doesn't even move the needle on my bitch-o-meter.

    forty on
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  • DacDac Registered User regular
    "Free" is a weird as fuck way of describing something you have to pay a sub to do. But I get the feeling we're not going to agree on this.

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  • SmrtnikSmrtnik job boli zub Registered User regular
    Dac wrote: »
    "Free" is a weird as fuck way of describing something you have to pay a sub to do. But I get the feeling we're not going to agree on this.

    You can buy a sub with in-game gold too, i know folks that haven't paid $ for subscription in years.

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    TryCatcher
  • DacDac Registered User regular
    Smrtnik wrote: »
    Dac wrote: »
    "Free" is a weird as fuck way of describing something you have to pay a sub to do. But I get the feeling we're not going to agree on this.

    You can buy a sub with in-game gold too, i know folks that haven't paid $ for subscription in years.

    Yeah that ain't me, or I would wager the majority of players. No shade! I wish I could, but I never had it in me to do the gold grind. Heck, I chose my main's professions (alch and herb) specifically to minimize as much of the passive need to get dat cheddar as possible.

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  • fortyforty Registered User regular
    Dac wrote: »
    "Free" is a weird as fuck way of describing something you have to pay a sub to do. But I get the feeling we're not going to agree on this.
    What a pointless detail to get hung up on. Yes, this MMO has a sub fee, as did all its contemporaries when it released, as did many of the MMOs that came and went during its lifespan, as does FFXIV today. The obvious point is that the game is chockablock with cosmetics, and over 95% of them can be obtained through the game that you've already committed to paying for if you're playing the game anyway.

    Officially the unluckiest CCG player ever.
    Smrtnik
  • EnigmedicEnigmedic Registered User regular
    most of those people who had a ton of gold to buy years worth of game time was from WoD garrisons. blizzard really axed a lot of the good ways to make a bunch of gold.

  • BahamutZEROBahamutZERO Registered User regular
    I was able to make enough low effort gold from the mission table to coast on a free sub in legion but not after they completely gutted mission table gold in BFA

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    forty
  • DacDac Registered User regular
    forty wrote: »
    Dac wrote: »
    "Free" is a weird as fuck way of describing something you have to pay a sub to do. But I get the feeling we're not going to agree on this.
    What a pointless detail to get hung up on.

    I don't consider it pointless, though. I am aware that, in the grand scheme of things, the actual content that's locked behind it is excruciatingly small. I just find the practice objectionable on principle.

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  • Eat it You Nasty Pig.Eat it You Nasty Pig. tell homeland security 'we are the bomb'Registered User regular
    it isn't 'locked behind it'; anyone who wants to can buy a token with gold and get the store mounts/pets/whatever. In gold terms they are actually cheaper than many in-game prices of similar items (even setting the brutosaur aside since that was presumably a one-time thing.)

    this is why the wharglebargle over the store is so ridiculous; if you want the item just buy it with gold as we do for any number of other things

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    hold your head high soldier, it ain't over yet
    that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
    Dhalphirhtmforty
  • DhalphirDhalphir don't you open that trapdoor you're a fool if you dareRegistered User regular
    again - it can't be a coincidence that the two most prominent MMOS both have very similar cash shops (save the token which is unique to WoW) and yet is treated entirely differently by the playerbases of both games

    either the cash shop is significantly different or the players are significantly different

    SmrtnikCaedwyrTynnan
  • DacDac Registered User regular
    it isn't 'locked behind it'; anyone who wants to can buy a token with gold and get the store mounts/pets/whatever. In gold terms they are actually cheaper than many in-game prices of similar items (even setting the brutosaur aside since that was presumably a one-time thing.)

    this is why the wharglebargle over the store is so ridiculous; if you want the item just buy it with gold as we do for any number of other things

    I.... yeah. Alright. Fair point.

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  • DhalphirDhalphir don't you open that trapdoor you're a fool if you dareRegistered User regular
    it isn't 'locked behind it'; anyone who wants to can buy a token with gold and get the store mounts/pets/whatever. In gold terms they are actually cheaper than many in-game prices of similar items (even setting the brutosaur aside since that was presumably a one-time thing.)

    this is why the wharglebargle over the store is so ridiculous; if you want the item just buy it with gold as we do for any number of other things

    this is how i've always felt about it too. this new stargazers pack is what, $55 USD when not on sale? Let's call it $60 to make my maths easy - that's four tokens, since each token is $15 of bnet balance. Tokens are just over 200k right now in USA region.

    If they added all this stuff into the game for 800k people would be ecstatic.

    3cl1ps3htm
  • LockedOnTargetLockedOnTarget Registered User regular
    Can you actually use WoW token to buy cash shop items?

    I thought you could only use them to buy subs.

  • DhalphirDhalphir don't you open that trapdoor you're a fool if you dareRegistered User regular
    Can you actually use WoW token to buy cash shop items?

    I thought you could only use them to buy subs.

    you can exchange them for $15 of battle.net balance. you've been able to do that for a long time...several years at least.

    BigityBahamutZERO3cl1ps3SmrtnikMunkus BeaverfortyhtmTynnanShadowen
  • BahamutZEROBahamutZERO Registered User regular
    it's been usable that way since they added the token system, people were turning their gold hoards into like, hearthstone packs back when people cared about that

    BahamutZERO.gif
  • DhalphirDhalphir don't you open that trapdoor you're a fool if you dareRegistered User regular
    it's been usable that way since they added the token system, people were turning their gold hoards into like, hearthstone packs back when people cared about that

    It definitely wasn't launched with tokens. I wanna say mid-Legion was when they added the ability to go bnet balance. Tokens predate Legion for sure, I don't remember if it was start of Warlords or middle.

    fortyBigityShadowen
  • fortyforty Registered User regular
    It was pretty early in Warlords when they were added, and yeah you could only get +30 days with them then.

    Officially the unluckiest CCG player ever.
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  • Eat it You Nasty Pig.Eat it You Nasty Pig. tell homeland security 'we are the bomb'Registered User regular
    edited November 2021
    yeah initially you could only exchange them for sub time, but iirc by the end of warlords you could get bnet balance.

    ed: guess it was actually mid-legion that you started to be able to get bnet balance

    Eat it You Nasty Pig. on
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