Flying totally ruined this game and Id be shocked of they added it to DF when dragon riding is both upgradable and clearly so, so much better than the old system.
Flying did not ruin the game. Blizzard’s inability to creatively design around it did. Flying was quite good in TBC with lots of fun little places to go and find once you unlocked flying. Places like Ogri’la that were literally only accessible by flying. The netherwing island stuff.
But Blizz started seeing flying as the enemy, shortcutting their content, rather than embracing it and designing the world, quests, and content with flying in mind. It’s their own fault that flying made max level too quick and easy.
So firstly, TBC flying mounts were incredibly slow (access to epic flying was incredibly limited for most/all of the expac). This very simple fact adds texture to world traversal: you can go straight up now, but there is a drawback, it's not very fast. It's not a great design because flying didn't really feel very good when it was this slow. It was cumbersome. But if we're talking about how TBC designed things, that's a crucial fact of just how it worked.
Secondly, they actually did try designing the game around immediate epic flying unlocks - definitely in MOP and I think in Cataclysm too. And it was miserable to play. Because, quite simply, flying is badly parameterized. It is entirely too fast, and too unrestricted, so much so that virtually all traversal is solved in the exact same way. Get on your mount, angle yourself toward your target, and press W. Even at low distances like 30-40 yards this is true, which is where the real problem lies. It gives the game a very jerky, stop and start feel. Also just makes level design extremely wonky since in any open area the player can drop down on top of their quest target directly and ignore all other enemies. It's just way too powerful.
Blizz didn't start shutting off flying due to theories - they actually tried working with it and it failed for really obvious reasons. The mechanics of it just totally suck. But they've been stuck with having it around because players hate getting nerfed, and flying is OP as fuck (and also their mount collections), and slow flying feels bad.
Lest you think I'm exaggerating, I cancelled my MOP sub after a single level of questing, bored out of my mind. That leveling experience was bad for other reasons probably but it was very evident that flying around was sucking all the joy out of it. I haven't actually managed to stick around long enough in future expacs to experience open flying again tbh. It's not a workable mechanic - or more accurately, it's so badly designed that it requires extreme measures and very limited gameplay scope to make the content work around it (basically every zone would either be Storm Peaks or underground).
+3
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
My expected thing going foward is that Dragonflight is gonna be the standard for new expansions simply because you can design zones around them, specifically. Big points to jump off of, zoom around, etc. The designer problem with WoW flying was always that it just lets you ignore the entire area they designed and they kinda want you to take it all in. They have explicitly said this IIRC, that the reason why flying is always a later unlock is because it is coupled with less player engagement with the zones.
Dragonflight lets them have their cake and eat it too: players get to go fast, faster than even epic flying before. Fast as shit. But the tradeoff is they have to be engaged and they can't just power swim to the top of the zone, they have to work with the system and get there. It's also why I assume we'll eventually unlock regular flying at some point: at some point it doesn't matter so much and the convenience of doing either trumps forcing you to engage with the zones.
If dragonflight is a success it becomes an evergreen mechanic that is utilized in every expansion afterwards. And because it lets you go faster than flying, I don't see it ever being irrelevant if they unlock regular flying later.
Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
yeah I mean, the work of designing a zone is kinda wasted if the dominant form of gameplay is 'fly far above it, dropping from the clouds only on a marked point to kill a rare or grab a node or whatever.' This is a problem they introduced in BC and have been trying to design around ever since (to say nothing of the pvp implications.) In recent times they just threw up their hands and disabled it in 'new' content.
we'll see how they do in DF but dragonriding at least feels like gameplay
hold your head high soldier, it ain't over yet
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
The problem is that scenic vistas and those "long way 'round the barn" flight paths and things annoyed players. Long before flying was introduced, players were already in revolt against slow, inefficient flight paths. It's just human nature to want to go fast. To not want to have your time wasted.
I don't think that was ever true. Flying was introduced with the launch of TBC. There were no players rage-quitting at the end of Vanilla because the flight path from Ironforge to Naxx took too long. The Vanilla flight path system was all anyone had ever known. No one playing at the time had anything to compare it against.
And the content "designed for flying" never amounted to anything particularly interesting: just some areas you couldn't run to. And the price for those areas was totally eliminating distance as a gameplay factor. I mean... if you really think player convenience and "gotta go fast" are so hugely important to the player experience, why don't you just advocate for a button that teleports the player to their next objective? Problem solved!
It's a very great pity that Blizz didn't introduce the Flight Master's Whistle in TBC rather than flying mounts. Pre-flying Legion and BFA had the best travel experiences. Plenty of flight paths to get around, and if you devoted a little thought to where you needed to be and when to best use the Whistle and/or your Hearthstone, you could drastically minimize your travel time.
Flying totally ruined this game and Id be shocked of they added it to DF when dragon riding is both upgradable and clearly so, so much better than the old system.
Flying did not ruin the game. Blizzard’s inability to creatively design around it did. Flying was quite good in TBC with lots of fun little places to go and find once you unlocked flying. Places like Ogri’la that were literally only accessible by flying. The netherwing island stuff.
But Blizz started seeing flying as the enemy, shortcutting their content, rather than embracing it and designing the world, quests, and content with flying in mind. It’s their own fault that flying made max level too quick and easy.
So firstly, TBC flying mounts were incredibly slow (access to epic flying was incredibly limited for most/all of the expac).
Not if you had a good gold stockpile from Vanilla, were good at playing the AH, etc.
Officially the unluckiest CCG player ever.
+1
reVerseAttack and Dethrone GodRegistered Userregular
The problem is that scenic vistas and those "long way 'round the barn" flight paths and things annoyed players. Long before flying was introduced, players were already in revolt against slow, inefficient flight paths. It's just human nature to want to go fast. To not want to have your time wasted.
I don't think that was ever true. Flying was introduced with the launch of TBC. There were no players rage-quitting at the end of Vanilla because the flight path from Ironforge to Naxx took too long. The Vanilla flight path system was all anyone had ever known. No one playing at the time had anything to compare it against.
And yet, it was incredibly obvious that some flight paths were just bullshit. It was even further compounded that originally you could only fly from one flight master to another, and then had to pick the next part of the flight manually.
Flying totally ruined this game and Id be shocked of they added it to DF when dragon riding is both upgradable and clearly so, so much better than the old system.
Flying did not ruin the game. Blizzard’s inability to creatively design around it did. Flying was quite good in TBC with lots of fun little places to go and find once you unlocked flying. Places like Ogri’la that were literally only accessible by flying. The netherwing island stuff.
But Blizz started seeing flying as the enemy, shortcutting their content, rather than embracing it and designing the world, quests, and content with flying in mind. It’s their own fault that flying made max level too quick and easy.
So firstly, TBC flying mounts were incredibly slow (access to epic flying was incredibly limited for most/all of the expac). This very simple fact adds texture to world traversal: you can go straight up now, but there is a drawback, it's not very fast. It's not a great design because flying didn't really feel very good when it was this slow. It was cumbersome. But if we're talking about how TBC designed things, that's a crucial fact of just how it worked.
Secondly, they actually did try designing the game around immediate epic flying unlocks - definitely in MOP and I think in Cataclysm too. And it was miserable to play. Because, quite simply, flying is badly parameterized. It is entirely too fast, and too unrestricted, so much so that virtually all traversal is solved in the exact same way. Get on your mount, angle yourself toward your target, and press W. Even at low distances like 30-40 yards this is true, which is where the real problem lies. It gives the game a very jerky, stop and start feel. Also just makes level design extremely wonky since in any open area the player can drop down on top of their quest target directly and ignore all other enemies. It's just way too powerful.
Blizz didn't start shutting off flying due to theories - they actually tried working with it and it failed for really obvious reasons. The mechanics of it just totally suck. But they've been stuck with having it around because players hate getting nerfed, and flying is OP as fuck (and also their mount collections), and slow flying feels bad.
Lest you think I'm exaggerating, I cancelled my MOP sub after a single level of questing, bored out of my mind. That leveling experience was bad for other reasons probably but it was very evident that flying around was sucking all the joy out of it. I haven't actually managed to stick around long enough in future expacs to experience open flying again tbh. It's not a workable mechanic - or more accurately, it's so badly designed that it requires extreme measures and very limited gameplay scope to make the content work around it (basically every zone would either be Storm Peaks or underground).
Again... all these problems are solvable. They are the engineers, the designers, the programmers, and the thinkers of this game code. If something isn't working, they literally have the power to create the solution to it. But they didn't do it. Instead they decided to cower in fear of flying and just make it go away for as long as possible. Avoiding it and ignoring it is one way of dealing with it, but it's the wrong way.
They could have engineered game systems and ways to solve it. Players like to go fast. Player like efficiency. For the last 16 years they have failed to understand that and have been playing a reactionary game, rather than using their brains to come up with a solution.
Dragonflight appears to finally be fixing that. But again... the problem was their to solve. And they didn't do it. Flying itself is not the problem. The problem is a lack of understanding of player psychology and the cross section of designing meaningful content, limitations, and gameplay around that psychology. But dragonriding seems like they're finally willing to step up and put on their thinking caps and solve a 16 year old issue, rather than cowering in fear from it for as long as possible.
I mean I like flying because its nice to not be stuck in shitty ground content? Like all of the maw was like "oh boy this sure does suck to have to wade through all this trash."
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
It's perfectly fine to want to run past all the mobs in an area! Making that desire a reality is called gameplay. Pressing a button and abusing the z-axis is too simple of a solution.
When there are less compulsory outdoor grinds in the game, the people who actually go to those things will likely want to have fun and be challenged. This really intersects with the whole philosophy shift. One version of the game has a lot of pointless required grinding, but a lot of ease and convenience to make those grinds somewhat faster and more mindless. The other version of the game has a lot of optional content, but it challenges the player to think a little and is inherently fun to play.
The problem is that scenic vistas and those "long way 'round the barn" flight paths and things annoyed players. Long before flying was introduced, players were already in revolt against slow, inefficient flight paths. It's just human nature to want to go fast. To not want to have your time wasted.
I don't think that was ever true. Flying was introduced with the launch of TBC. There were no players rage-quitting at the end of Vanilla because the flight path from Ironforge to Naxx took too long. The Vanilla flight path system was all anyone had ever known. No one playing at the time had anything to compare it against.
And yet, it was incredibly obvious that some flight paths were just bullshit. It was even further compounded that originally you could only fly from one flight master to another, and then had to pick the next part of the flight manually.
Memories of Moonglade to Thunder Bluff.
Well, time to go grab a bite and catch up on my DVR'd shows.
+1
Kai_SanCommonly known as Klineshrike!Registered Userregular
Flying totally ruined this game and Id be shocked of they added it to DF when dragon riding is both upgradable and clearly so, so much better than the old system.
Flying did not ruin the game. Blizzard’s inability to creatively design around it did. Flying was quite good in TBC with lots of fun little places to go and find once you unlocked flying. Places like Ogri’la that were literally only accessible by flying. The netherwing island stuff.
But Blizz started seeing flying as the enemy, shortcutting their content, rather than embracing it and designing the world, quests, and content with flying in mind. It’s their own fault that flying made max level too quick and easy.
So firstly, TBC flying mounts were incredibly slow (access to epic flying was incredibly limited for most/all of the expac). This very simple fact adds texture to world traversal: you can go straight up now, but there is a drawback, it's not very fast. It's not a great design because flying didn't really feel very good when it was this slow. It was cumbersome. But if we're talking about how TBC designed things, that's a crucial fact of just how it worked.
Secondly, they actually did try designing the game around immediate epic flying unlocks - definitely in MOP and I think in Cataclysm too. And it was miserable to play. Because, quite simply, flying is badly parameterized. It is entirely too fast, and too unrestricted, so much so that virtually all traversal is solved in the exact same way. Get on your mount, angle yourself toward your target, and press W. Even at low distances like 30-40 yards this is true, which is where the real problem lies. It gives the game a very jerky, stop and start feel. Also just makes level design extremely wonky since in any open area the player can drop down on top of their quest target directly and ignore all other enemies. It's just way too powerful.
Blizz didn't start shutting off flying due to theories - they actually tried working with it and it failed for really obvious reasons. The mechanics of it just totally suck. But they've been stuck with having it around because players hate getting nerfed, and flying is OP as fuck (and also their mount collections), and slow flying feels bad.
Lest you think I'm exaggerating, I cancelled my MOP sub after a single level of questing, bored out of my mind. That leveling experience was bad for other reasons probably but it was very evident that flying around was sucking all the joy out of it. I haven't actually managed to stick around long enough in future expacs to experience open flying again tbh. It's not a workable mechanic - or more accurately, it's so badly designed that it requires extreme measures and very limited gameplay scope to make the content work around it (basically every zone would either be Storm Peaks or underground).
Again... all these problems are solvable. They are the engineers, the designers, the programmers, and the thinkers of this game code. If something isn't working, they literally have the power to create the solution to it. But they didn't do it. Instead they decided to cower in fear of flying and just make it go away for as long as possible. Avoiding it and ignoring it is one way of dealing with it, but it's the wrong way.
They could have engineered game systems and ways to solve it. Players like to go fast. Player like efficiency. For the last 16 years they have failed to understand that and have been playing a reactionary game, rather than using their brains to come up with a solution.
Dragonflight appears to finally be fixing that. But again... the problem was their to solve. And they didn't do it. Flying itself is not the problem. The problem is a lack of understanding of player psychology and the cross section of designing meaningful content, limitations, and gameplay around that psychology. But dragonriding seems like they're finally willing to step up and put on their thinking caps and solve a 16 year old issue, rather than cowering in fear from it for as long as possible.
It's so incredibly puny to say shit like "they are smart, they could have just thought up a solution just by wanting to". Like you can't just will a bunch of people to to something because you really, really badly wanted them to do it.
You also have no fucking idea if they tried or not. You are only going to see the stuff they want you to see. For all you know, they iterated on many, many attempts at solutions. But oh, we only saw the results so let's assume they were "scared".
Game development is easy right? We all figured it out they just need to listen to us, pull up their sleeves, and do the thing. Why can't anyone do this???
It's perfectly fine to want to run past all the mobs in an area! Making that desire a reality is called gameplay. Pressing a button and abusing the z-axis is too simple of a solution.
When there are less compulsory outdoor grinds in the game, the people who actually go to those things will likely want to have fun and be challenged. This really intersects with the whole philosophy shift. One version of the game has a lot of pointless required grinding, but a lot of ease and convenience to make those grinds somewhat faster and more mindless. The other version of the game has a lot of optional content, but it challenges the player to think a little and is inherently fun to play.
If your argument is "this game should be fun to play; have no sections that are at the same time (a) not enjoyable to play, (b) provide negligible in-game rewards, and (c) are mandatory; and no means of bypassing content with the press of a button (like flying)", then I am probably 95% in agreement with you. Right on, I'll sign the petition, let's go.
However, WoW as it currently exists, has sections that are all three of (a) not enjoyable to play, (b) provide negligible in-game rewards, and (c) mandatory. I am not convinced that Blizzard will be able to design future content that avoids this pitfall, but it sounds like they want to. I'm not writing them off on it, but I'll believe it when I see it. However, I am 100% sure that they will not go back and re-design, re-tune, and re-implement Vanilla and 8 expansions' worth of content. Until the game doesn't have extensive, tedious crap, I will keep my "take to the skies instantly" button, sorry.
When I was starting my first WoW character in Vanilla, I didn't know anything about the game, like, at all, but at the character creation screen I saw that Rogues get stealth, and I thought "well, I'm bad at games, so this will be a nice panic button when I get in over my head". That character is the only one I've been able to play with any amount of consistency since Vanilla, because whenever I try playing another class, I am reminded of how excruciatingly boring and long most of the content in the game is. "Go deep into a cave and kill some creature in there" - cool, this will take two minutes with my rogue and fifteen with any other class, because I'll have to fight my way in, and then fight may out. This was OK when I was a college student with zero responsibilities, but I can't swing that kind of thing anymore.
Back in the day the devs asked players to report flight paths that were messed up (needlessly indirect, penetrating terrain, etc.). So even without free flight, people were aware that there were flight paths that were horrendous and needed to be fixed.
I mean I like flying because its nice to not be stuck in shitty ground content? Like all of the maw was like "oh boy this sure does suck to have to wade through all this trash."
arguably blizzard should make the ground content more appealing. Including a built in "skip" is weird!
I mean I like flying because its nice to not be stuck in shitty ground content? Like all of the maw was like "oh boy this sure does suck to have to wade through all this trash."
arguably blizzard should make the ground content more appealing. Including a built in "skip" is weird!
It's an MMO, making ground content appealing is damn near impossible. Players will always be wanting to do something other than deal with a mob that just hit them they didn't care about. Like for me the biggest annoyance in WoW is at end game when I'm trying to do some world quests and with a ground mount shit takes a while to get from place to place. Its not engaging to me, it won't ever be engaging to me. I will never go "Oh man I'm glad I mis remembered the height in this area and now have to waste more time going back up and around."
Its weird people are super anti flying in WoW when its been in WoW longer than it hasn't been. Flying mounts are a key part of WoW. Just like LFG that also has a bunch of derision tossed its way online.
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
admanbunionize your workplaceSeattle, WARegistered Userregular
edited July 2022
I’m fine with ezmode flying being a part of legacy zones, which in WoW is basically anything before the current patch.
Flying for current content I consider a failure of the design. GW2 is much smarter about it, and Dragonriding feels inspired by that.
Most WoW ground content is already trivialized by how much stronger players are then they used to be, so I don’t really buy that we need easy flying so we can jump from quest objective to quest objective without interference.
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I am pro flying, but I also understand the developer POV where they avoid it because they want people to appreciate the work they’ve done. Which is why I am tentatively excited about dragon flying, because if it goes well we get zones designed from the ground up with a type of fast flying in mind.
Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
Normal flying is not going away. All the things we can currently do (afk, autofollow, druid form gathering, etc) that's all still going to be in the game. It just won't be as fast.
In Tali's video he touches on a lot of that. You give up a bit of convenience for a lot more speed and dynamic gameplay. It's a tradeoff. Do you want to travel a really far distance in a short amount of time? Dragonriding is your option. Are you out on a leisurely herbalism jaunt? Normal flying might be your answer.
Eventually we will get it back is what I remember him saying. Meaning, no flying at first.
Flying totally ruined this game and Id be shocked of they added it to DF when dragon riding is both upgradable and clearly so, so much better than the old system.
Flying did not ruin the game. Blizzard’s inability to creatively design around it did. Flying was quite good in TBC with lots of fun little places to go and find once you unlocked flying. Places like Ogri’la that were literally only accessible by flying. The netherwing island stuff.
But Blizz started seeing flying as the enemy, shortcutting their content, rather than embracing it and designing the world, quests, and content with flying in mind. It’s their own fault that flying made max level too quick and easy.
So firstly, TBC flying mounts were incredibly slow (access to epic flying was incredibly limited for most/all of the expac).
Not if you had a good gold stockpile from Vanilla, were good at playing the AH, etc.
Flying totally ruined this game and Id be shocked of they added it to DF when dragon riding is both upgradable and clearly so, so much better than the old system.
Flying did not ruin the game. Blizzard’s inability to creatively design around it did. Flying was quite good in TBC with lots of fun little places to go and find once you unlocked flying. Places like Ogri’la that were literally only accessible by flying. The netherwing island stuff.
But Blizz started seeing flying as the enemy, shortcutting their content, rather than embracing it and designing the world, quests, and content with flying in mind. It’s their own fault that flying made max level too quick and easy.
So firstly, TBC flying mounts were incredibly slow (access to epic flying was incredibly limited for most/all of the expac).
Not if you had a good gold stockpile from Vanilla, were good at playing the AH, etc.
Or were a druid.
Iirc that was patched in later, the Sethek Halls bird boss was not in at release
Flying totally ruined this game and Id be shocked of they added it to DF when dragon riding is both upgradable and clearly so, so much better than the old system.
Flying did not ruin the game. Blizzard’s inability to creatively design around it did. Flying was quite good in TBC with lots of fun little places to go and find once you unlocked flying. Places like Ogri’la that were literally only accessible by flying. The netherwing island stuff.
But Blizz started seeing flying as the enemy, shortcutting their content, rather than embracing it and designing the world, quests, and content with flying in mind. It’s their own fault that flying made max level too quick and easy.
So firstly, TBC flying mounts were incredibly slow (access to epic flying was incredibly limited for most/all of the expac).
Not if you had a good gold stockpile from Vanilla, were good at playing the AH, etc.
Or were a druid.
Iirc that was patched in later, the Sethek Halls bird boss was not in at release
Druids got normal flight for free (and at level 68 if I remember correctly) so they effectively got a discount on buying epic flight (I forget if owning epic flight was needed to get epic flight form).
I am pro flying, but I also understand the developer POV where they avoid it because they want people to appreciate the work they’ve done.
If a developer did think this way they need to cut it out. Players don't pay for a game in order to give the developers an ego boost. They pay to get a fun experience. It's the dev's job to give them one.
+2
Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
I am pro flying, but I also understand the developer POV where they avoid it because they want people to appreciate the work they’ve done.
If a developer did think this way they need to cut it out. Players don't pay for a game in order to give the developers an ego boost. They pay to get a fun experience. It's the dev's job to give them one.
Not requiring you to do pointless busywork content is a far better development solution to flying trivializing busywork than chasing some ephemeral method of level design to make flying fun.
I've never enjoyed one second of my open world WoW gameplay, and requiring me to do anything more than base levelling in each expansion I consider a failure.
Flying totally ruined this game and Id be shocked of they added it to DF when dragon riding is both upgradable and clearly so, so much better than the old system.
Flying did not ruin the game. Blizzard’s inability to creatively design around it did. Flying was quite good in TBC with lots of fun little places to go and find once you unlocked flying. Places like Ogri’la that were literally only accessible by flying. The netherwing island stuff.
But Blizz started seeing flying as the enemy, shortcutting their content, rather than embracing it and designing the world, quests, and content with flying in mind. It’s their own fault that flying made max level too quick and easy.
So firstly, TBC flying mounts were incredibly slow (access to epic flying was incredibly limited for most/all of the expac).
Not if you had a good gold stockpile from Vanilla, were good at playing the AH, etc.
Or were a druid.
Iirc that was patched in later, the Sethek Halls bird boss was not in at release
Druids got normal flight for free (and at level 68 if I remember correctly) so they effectively got a discount on buying epic flight (I forget if owning epic flight was needed to get epic flight form).
Yes, not much, but better than nothing. Especially since it was counted as our 'power gain' vs other classes that got some other ability.
I mean I like flying because its nice to not be stuck in shitty ground content? Like all of the maw was like "oh boy this sure does suck to have to wade through all this trash."
arguably blizzard should make the ground content more appealing. Including a built in "skip" is weird!
It's an MMO, making ground content appealing is damn near impossible. Players will always be wanting to do something other than deal with a mob that just hit them they didn't care about. Like for me the biggest annoyance in WoW is at end game when I'm trying to do some world quests and with a ground mount shit takes a while to get from place to place. Its not engaging to me, it won't ever be engaging to me. I will never go "Oh man I'm glad I mis remembered the height in this area and now have to waste more time going back up and around."
Its weird people are super anti flying in WoW when its been in WoW longer than it hasn't been. Flying mounts are a key part of WoW. Just like LFG that also has a bunch of derision tossed its way online.
I can't say I've really run into people that are anti-flying, unsure what their arguments look like.
LFG is a cesspool and there's nothing you can say that will convince me otherwise. Just like boss addons, all it does is spawn a bunch of slackers that can't be bothered to learn anything about the game whatsoever.
Yes yes, I'm not allowed to tell other people how to have fun. I'm sorta maybe going to silently judge you if your fun is a little too weird.
tip.. tip.. TALLY.. HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
0
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I mean I like flying because its nice to not be stuck in shitty ground content? Like all of the maw was like "oh boy this sure does suck to have to wade through all this trash."
arguably blizzard should make the ground content more appealing. Including a built in "skip" is weird!
It's an MMO, making ground content appealing is damn near impossible. Players will always be wanting to do something other than deal with a mob that just hit them they didn't care about. Like for me the biggest annoyance in WoW is at end game when I'm trying to do some world quests and with a ground mount shit takes a while to get from place to place. Its not engaging to me, it won't ever be engaging to me. I will never go "Oh man I'm glad I mis remembered the height in this area and now have to waste more time going back up and around."
Its weird people are super anti flying in WoW when its been in WoW longer than it hasn't been. Flying mounts are a key part of WoW. Just like LFG that also has a bunch of derision tossed its way online.
I can't say I've really run into people that are anti-flying
I mean I like flying because its nice to not be stuck in shitty ground content? Like all of the maw was like "oh boy this sure does suck to have to wade through all this trash."
arguably blizzard should make the ground content more appealing. Including a built in "skip" is weird!
It's an MMO, making ground content appealing is damn near impossible. Players will always be wanting to do something other than deal with a mob that just hit them they didn't care about. Like for me the biggest annoyance in WoW is at end game when I'm trying to do some world quests and with a ground mount shit takes a while to get from place to place. Its not engaging to me, it won't ever be engaging to me. I will never go "Oh man I'm glad I mis remembered the height in this area and now have to waste more time going back up and around."
Its weird people are super anti flying in WoW when its been in WoW longer than it hasn't been. Flying mounts are a key part of WoW. Just like LFG that also has a bunch of derision tossed its way online.
I can't say I've really run into people that are anti-flying
yes ok, ONE GUY!
But even then I didn't find the argument compelling. "I wanna go slow and be restricted", ok, well then don't use the flying mount.
tip.. tip.. TALLY.. HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
+1
admanbunionize your workplaceSeattle, WARegistered Userregular
edited July 2022
The argument against flying is that it makes the open world irrelevant and kills one of the last areas of WoW where the "RPG" almost exists, in exchange for some convenience. I mostly don't agree (I mostly don't care about the RPG aspects of WoW at all -- I'm too old for that shit) but I'd prefer long-distance travel be easier but more interesting than VTOL.
I mean I like flying because its nice to not be stuck in shitty ground content? Like all of the maw was like "oh boy this sure does suck to have to wade through all this trash."
arguably blizzard should make the ground content more appealing. Including a built in "skip" is weird!
It's an MMO, making ground content appealing is damn near impossible. Players will always be wanting to do something other than deal with a mob that just hit them they didn't care about. Like for me the biggest annoyance in WoW is at end game when I'm trying to do some world quests and with a ground mount shit takes a while to get from place to place. Its not engaging to me, it won't ever be engaging to me. I will never go "Oh man I'm glad I mis remembered the height in this area and now have to waste more time going back up and around."
Its weird people are super anti flying in WoW when its been in WoW longer than it hasn't been. Flying mounts are a key part of WoW. Just like LFG that also has a bunch of derision tossed its way online.
LFG is a cesspool and there's nothing you can say that will convince me otherwise. Just like boss addons, all it does is spawn a bunch of slackers that can't be bothered to learn anything about the game whatsoever.
Yes yes, I'm not allowed to tell other people how to have fun. I'm sorta maybe going to silently judge you if your fun is a little too weird.
I'm not sure if Blizz comms phrased their perspective badly, or if the game of telephone going on in the community distorted the original nuance. Because clearly the idea is that level designers can't deliver the fun gameplay they want to if the player is hovering over the level. The game isn't Star Fox, the core combat and gameplay mechanics don't work in that context.
I have to wonder what multiplayer looks like with dragon riding and network synchronization. It's extremely difficult to do good synchronization at those speeds and I wonder what other players will look like on their dragons, or if they'll even appear correctly. If you can do group riding and actually see your fellow dragonrider doing barrel rolls alongside you and it doesn't look janky I'll be extremely impressed. Apparently getting the technology to work at all was an enormous undertaking.
The last few expansions have had a good compromise on flying. Ground first when it matters and you're experiencing the story, flying later when you're traveling to do world quests and doing disconnected missions.
Dragonflight looks amazing through. Alpha testers seem to love it and it seems fun just zooming around the zone.
I'm not sure if Blizz comms phrased their perspective badly, or if the game of telephone going on in the community distorted the original nuance. Because clearly the idea is that level designers can't deliver the fun gameplay they want to if the player is hovering over the level. The game isn't Star Fox, the core combat and gameplay mechanics don't work in that context.
I have to wonder what multiplayer looks like with dragon riding and network synchronization. It's extremely difficult to do good synchronization at those speeds and I wonder what other players will look like on their dragons, or if they'll even appear correctly. If you can do group riding and actually see your fellow dragonrider doing barrel rolls alongside you and it doesn't look janky I'll be extremely impressed. Apparently getting the technology to work at all was an enormous undertaking.
Yeah, I'll be very interested to see how the client-server syncing works as well. I'm curious how much of the flight state on your client is pure client side vs. updates from server. Like is the bar that fills when you're in "blue flight" (dunno what it's called) or the various speed states all coming from the server?
Very directly related to that, I'm curious how responsive it'll be if you (or the server) are lagging.
The last few expansions have had a good compromise on flying. Ground first when it matters and you're experiencing the story, flying later when you're traveling to do world quests and doing disconnected missions.
That "flying later" there belies a really long portion of time. I feel like they've still taken way too long to open up flying for most of the last few expansions. Like it's always after months and months of dredging through the same World Quests on ground.
I think what annoys me the most is some classes have more fun methods of traversing. Druids travel forms, demon hunters floating flaps, monks with roll. But most of the other classes get like temporary charges at best. So there if you don't want to give us flying, then give other classes more fun methods of traversing the shitty ground.
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
I think what annoys me the most is some classes have more fun methods of traversing. Druids travel forms, demon hunters floating flaps, monks with roll. But most of the other classes get like temporary charges at best. So there if you don't want to give us flying, then give other classes more fun methods of traversing the shitty ground.
Tell me you are DK without telling me you are DK
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admanbunionize your workplaceSeattle, WARegistered Userregular
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
Can Hunters use Disengage like a trickier version of Druid Travel Form Wild Charge?
Officially the unluckiest CCG player ever.
+1
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
Posts
So firstly, TBC flying mounts were incredibly slow (access to epic flying was incredibly limited for most/all of the expac). This very simple fact adds texture to world traversal: you can go straight up now, but there is a drawback, it's not very fast. It's not a great design because flying didn't really feel very good when it was this slow. It was cumbersome. But if we're talking about how TBC designed things, that's a crucial fact of just how it worked.
Secondly, they actually did try designing the game around immediate epic flying unlocks - definitely in MOP and I think in Cataclysm too. And it was miserable to play. Because, quite simply, flying is badly parameterized. It is entirely too fast, and too unrestricted, so much so that virtually all traversal is solved in the exact same way. Get on your mount, angle yourself toward your target, and press W. Even at low distances like 30-40 yards this is true, which is where the real problem lies. It gives the game a very jerky, stop and start feel. Also just makes level design extremely wonky since in any open area the player can drop down on top of their quest target directly and ignore all other enemies. It's just way too powerful.
Blizz didn't start shutting off flying due to theories - they actually tried working with it and it failed for really obvious reasons. The mechanics of it just totally suck. But they've been stuck with having it around because players hate getting nerfed, and flying is OP as fuck (and also their mount collections), and slow flying feels bad.
Lest you think I'm exaggerating, I cancelled my MOP sub after a single level of questing, bored out of my mind. That leveling experience was bad for other reasons probably but it was very evident that flying around was sucking all the joy out of it. I haven't actually managed to stick around long enough in future expacs to experience open flying again tbh. It's not a workable mechanic - or more accurately, it's so badly designed that it requires extreme measures and very limited gameplay scope to make the content work around it (basically every zone would either be Storm Peaks or underground).
Dragonflight lets them have their cake and eat it too: players get to go fast, faster than even epic flying before. Fast as shit. But the tradeoff is they have to be engaged and they can't just power swim to the top of the zone, they have to work with the system and get there. It's also why I assume we'll eventually unlock regular flying at some point: at some point it doesn't matter so much and the convenience of doing either trumps forcing you to engage with the zones.
If dragonflight is a success it becomes an evergreen mechanic that is utilized in every expansion afterwards. And because it lets you go faster than flying, I don't see it ever being irrelevant if they unlock regular flying later.
we'll see how they do in DF but dragonriding at least feels like gameplay
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
I don't think that was ever true. Flying was introduced with the launch of TBC. There were no players rage-quitting at the end of Vanilla because the flight path from Ironforge to Naxx took too long. The Vanilla flight path system was all anyone had ever known. No one playing at the time had anything to compare it against.
And the content "designed for flying" never amounted to anything particularly interesting: just some areas you couldn't run to. And the price for those areas was totally eliminating distance as a gameplay factor. I mean... if you really think player convenience and "gotta go fast" are so hugely important to the player experience, why don't you just advocate for a button that teleports the player to their next objective? Problem solved!
It's a very great pity that Blizz didn't introduce the Flight Master's Whistle in TBC rather than flying mounts. Pre-flying Legion and BFA had the best travel experiences. Plenty of flight paths to get around, and if you devoted a little thought to where you needed to be and when to best use the Whistle and/or your Hearthstone, you could drastically minimize your travel time.
And yet, it was incredibly obvious that some flight paths were just bullshit. It was even further compounded that originally you could only fly from one flight master to another, and then had to pick the next part of the flight manually.
Again... all these problems are solvable. They are the engineers, the designers, the programmers, and the thinkers of this game code. If something isn't working, they literally have the power to create the solution to it. But they didn't do it. Instead they decided to cower in fear of flying and just make it go away for as long as possible. Avoiding it and ignoring it is one way of dealing with it, but it's the wrong way.
They could have engineered game systems and ways to solve it. Players like to go fast. Player like efficiency. For the last 16 years they have failed to understand that and have been playing a reactionary game, rather than using their brains to come up with a solution.
Dragonflight appears to finally be fixing that. But again... the problem was their to solve. And they didn't do it. Flying itself is not the problem. The problem is a lack of understanding of player psychology and the cross section of designing meaningful content, limitations, and gameplay around that psychology. But dragonriding seems like they're finally willing to step up and put on their thinking caps and solve a 16 year old issue, rather than cowering in fear from it for as long as possible.
pleasepaypreacher.net
When there are less compulsory outdoor grinds in the game, the people who actually go to those things will likely want to have fun and be challenged. This really intersects with the whole philosophy shift. One version of the game has a lot of pointless required grinding, but a lot of ease and convenience to make those grinds somewhat faster and more mindless. The other version of the game has a lot of optional content, but it challenges the player to think a little and is inherently fun to play.
Memories of Moonglade to Thunder Bluff.
Well, time to go grab a bite and catch up on my DVR'd shows.
It's so incredibly puny to say shit like "they are smart, they could have just thought up a solution just by wanting to". Like you can't just will a bunch of people to to something because you really, really badly wanted them to do it.
You also have no fucking idea if they tried or not. You are only going to see the stuff they want you to see. For all you know, they iterated on many, many attempts at solutions. But oh, we only saw the results so let's assume they were "scared".
Game development is easy right? We all figured it out they just need to listen to us, pull up their sleeves, and do the thing. Why can't anyone do this???
However, WoW as it currently exists, has sections that are all three of (a) not enjoyable to play, (b) provide negligible in-game rewards, and (c) mandatory. I am not convinced that Blizzard will be able to design future content that avoids this pitfall, but it sounds like they want to. I'm not writing them off on it, but I'll believe it when I see it. However, I am 100% sure that they will not go back and re-design, re-tune, and re-implement Vanilla and 8 expansions' worth of content. Until the game doesn't have extensive, tedious crap, I will keep my "take to the skies instantly" button, sorry.
When I was starting my first WoW character in Vanilla, I didn't know anything about the game, like, at all, but at the character creation screen I saw that Rogues get stealth, and I thought "well, I'm bad at games, so this will be a nice panic button when I get in over my head". That character is the only one I've been able to play with any amount of consistency since Vanilla, because whenever I try playing another class, I am reminded of how excruciatingly boring and long most of the content in the game is. "Go deep into a cave and kill some creature in there" - cool, this will take two minutes with my rogue and fifteen with any other class, because I'll have to fight my way in, and then fight may out. This was OK when I was a college student with zero responsibilities, but I can't swing that kind of thing anymore.
Stealth and flight for everyone.
arguably blizzard should make the ground content more appealing. Including a built in "skip" is weird!
It's an MMO, making ground content appealing is damn near impossible. Players will always be wanting to do something other than deal with a mob that just hit them they didn't care about. Like for me the biggest annoyance in WoW is at end game when I'm trying to do some world quests and with a ground mount shit takes a while to get from place to place. Its not engaging to me, it won't ever be engaging to me. I will never go "Oh man I'm glad I mis remembered the height in this area and now have to waste more time going back up and around."
Its weird people are super anti flying in WoW when its been in WoW longer than it hasn't been. Flying mounts are a key part of WoW. Just like LFG that also has a bunch of derision tossed its way online.
pleasepaypreacher.net
Flying for current content I consider a failure of the design. GW2 is much smarter about it, and Dragonriding feels inspired by that.
Most WoW ground content is already trivialized by how much stronger players are then they used to be, so I don’t really buy that we need easy flying so we can jump from quest objective to quest objective without interference.
Eventually we will get it back is what I remember him saying. Meaning, no flying at first.
Or were a druid.
Iirc that was patched in later, the Sethek Halls bird boss was not in at release
Druids got normal flight for free (and at level 68 if I remember correctly) so they effectively got a discount on buying epic flight (I forget if owning epic flight was needed to get epic flight form).
Not requiring you to do pointless busywork content is a far better development solution to flying trivializing busywork than chasing some ephemeral method of level design to make flying fun.
I've never enjoyed one second of my open world WoW gameplay, and requiring me to do anything more than base levelling in each expansion I consider a failure.
Yes, not much, but better than nothing. Especially since it was counted as our 'power gain' vs other classes that got some other ability.
I can't say I've really run into people that are anti-flying, unsure what their arguments look like.
LFG is a cesspool and there's nothing you can say that will convince me otherwise. Just like boss addons, all it does is spawn a bunch of slackers that can't be bothered to learn anything about the game whatsoever.
Yes yes, I'm not allowed to tell other people how to have fun. I'm sorta maybe going to silently judge you if your fun is a little too weird.
yes ok, ONE GUY!
But even then I didn't find the argument compelling. "I wanna go slow and be restricted", ok, well then don't use the flying mount.
what the fuck are you talking about
I have to wonder what multiplayer looks like with dragon riding and network synchronization. It's extremely difficult to do good synchronization at those speeds and I wonder what other players will look like on their dragons, or if they'll even appear correctly. If you can do group riding and actually see your fellow dragonrider doing barrel rolls alongside you and it doesn't look janky I'll be extremely impressed. Apparently getting the technology to work at all was an enormous undertaking.
Dragonflight looks amazing through. Alpha testers seem to love it and it seems fun just zooming around the zone.
Very directly related to that, I'm curious how responsive it'll be if you (or the server) are lagging.
Zereth Mortis was done right, IMDO.
pleasepaypreacher.net
Tell me you are DK without telling me you are DK
Warrior gets one Heroic Leap every 45 seconds
Charge. Intervene.
hunters can do the 180 disengage trick to move forward, yes. They've been able to do that since TBC or whenever disengage got put in the game.