MMORPG.com World of Warcraft Correspondent Dan Growns writes the ways that he feels that Blizzard is moving toward keeping its share of the MMO market and gives his opinions on what the gaming giant will have to do to maintain it in the future.

'Cataclysm' the third expansion in the World of Warcraft series, was announced on the first day of the annual Blizzcon event. The expansion brings back one of the mightiest and the maddest of dragons, Deathwing. The theme for this expansion is a cataclysmic event that redefines and reshapes Azeroth as we know it. This expansion will bring us five new levels instead of the ten we saw in both previous expansions. There are some large additions and changes happening to the game that will improve character choice and game play quality.

Read Keeping the Market Share

very nice article

 I'm just curious, is there some particular reason why we should want to help Blizzard maintain its market share?

Originally posted by Clattuc

 I'm just curious, is there some particular reason why we should want to help Blizzard maintain its market share?

Because some of us want to see Blizzard/WoW thrive maybe?

Well, for a start, they should add more level 80 dungeons and give them loot on par with what heroics in WOTLK drop, in normal mode. These special normal dungeons would be doable just one per day, with difficulty equal with current heroics. However, on heroic mode, these dungeons would be very challenging, needing a lot of coordonation to be done. They will need decent CC, interrupting and plenty of tricks that will require extensive moving and thinking. These heroics would drop normal dungeon item's ilvl+10-20 and would be objective of attunement's quests.

Then, each raid setting would have a heroic option(for both 10 and 25 man, just like TOTC system works). Heroic option would mean very challenging bosses, on par with BT/Hyjal and end-bosses with Sunwell difficulty. To be able to enter in heroic setting, you'd have to do attunements who involve killing the endboss of normal setting and getting certain items from heroics mentioned earlier. Attunements will differ: there will be attunements for 10 man version of the instance and 25 man version of the instance.

Each time a new raid is released, one of two of early mentioned dungeons would be released, so new attunements can be at least a little bit different. However, in the new raids, attunements will also include quest items from previous hard setting raids and will involve summoning a "gearcheck" style boss, which drops no loot, other than the quest items necessary to finish the attunament. This will add a feeling of progression for guilds. Again, attunements will differ from 10 man to 25 man, being completely different chains.

Each heroic setting of a raid will also include 1-2 extra bosses for itemisation, especially in the 10 man part where things can get fishy from time to time. Of course, these bosses will match the heroic setting and will be very hard.
Ilvls should not be way too increased, otherwise people doing normal modes would start complaining, but heroic drops from 10-man raids should be better than drops from 25 man normal raids.

With this approach, people who want a hard WoW will have it hard. Of course, guilds like Ensidia or STARS could do them very fast, but even them will sweat a little, just like they did in Sunwell and old Naxxramas.

Originally posted by bigsmiff

Originally posted by Clattuc

 I'm just curious, is there some particular reason why we should want to help Blizzard maintain its market share?

 

Because some of us want to see Blizzard/WoW thrive maybe?

 

 

some of us want MMO companys to stop trying to copy WoW but with how well its doing that wont happen for along time

The expansions have ruined WoW.  Theme-parks and expansions just don't mix.  Everyone still playing this poor excuse of an MMO are all a bunch of mindless automatons.

Originally posted by Ruyn

The expansions have ruined WoW.  Theme-parks and expansions just don't mix.  Everyone still playing this poor excuse of an MMO are all a bunch of mindless automatons.

Pst, chain quoting random things you heard on forums then jumping in the bandwagoon isn't good.
BC is the best thing that happened to WoW and even if WOTLK was subpar until now, it's still better than the mess which was vanilla.

Hi Everyone,

Due to the unfortunate clash between BlizzCon and the process of editing I had to make many quick changes to this article to update it. The original article was written before BlizzCon and the announcement of a new expansion. I have done my best to be thorough in updating the article and retaining the highest possible standard in quality.

Hopefully you enjoy my article regardless, my next article will not be time sensitive

Thanks,

D.J.G.

Originally posted by bigsmiff

Originally posted by Clattuc

 I'm just curious, is there some particular reason why we should want to help Blizzard maintain its market share?

 Because some of us want to see Blizzard/WoW thrive maybe?

I'm sure most of us wish Blizzard well and want to see WoW continue successfully.  I'm just not sure that automatically means maintaining whatever gynormous market share they currently hold.  Personally I'd rather see three or four strong games competing for the top spot.

Originally posted by Thenarius

Originally posted by Ruyn

The expansions have ruined WoW.  Theme-parks and expansions just don't mix.  Everyone still playing this poor excuse of an MMO are all a bunch of mindless automatons.

Pst, chain quoting random things you heard on forums then jumping in the bandwagoon isn't good.
BC is the best thing that happened to WoW and even if WOTLK was subpar until now, it's still better than the mess which was vanilla.

I disagree.  Everything that you have done, is undone with a patch or new expansion.  Something is wrong with that imo. 

Great article Dan!

The announcing of the new expansion will shake up the player base and as we have already seen there are split opinions as to whether it will be a sucess or not.

I personally cannot see player housing being implemented anytime soon, it's been an option that has been suggested since early on in the game's creation but never been used however I would love to see further customization to gear - an aspect that would truly enable players to differentiate their character from similar others.

Originally posted by Ruyn

The expansions have ruined WoW.  Theme-parks and expansions just don't mix.  Everyone still playing this poor excuse of an MMO are all a bunch of mindless automatons.

IOW, "I was having so much fun when MMO was a small community of geeks who thought they were l33t, but Blizzard has ruined things by making a casual game millions of ordinary folks can enjoy.  WAAAAH!''

News flash: Blizzard isn't making games just to be your personal sandbox.  They're a company trying to make MONEY by selling a product to the largest number of people they can. And they've proven to do their job very well... your measly opinion doesn't rate much when compared to the billions they've collected.

I've got a few problems with WoW right now so I've pretty much stopped playing, but they're my problems not Blizzard's.

Originally posted by Ruyn

Originally posted by Thenarius

Originally posted by Ruyn

The expansions have ruined WoW.  Theme-parks and expansions just don't mix.  Everyone still playing this poor excuse of an MMO are all a bunch of mindless automatons.

Pst, chain quoting random things you heard on forums then jumping in the bandwagoon isn't good.
BC is the best thing that happened to WoW and even if WOTLK was subpar until now, it's still better than the mess which was vanilla.

 

I disagree.  Everything that you have done, is undone with a patch or new expansion.  Something is wrong with that imo. 

Don't forget:
-Most of the specs were useless. Discipline? What the hell was that. Feral and prot paladins tanking? You'd get laughed at. Shamans having a viable spec? Nope, just put totems and do w/e you want, we don't need your damage/healing lol.
-Itemisation. Was barely fixed in AQ40 and Naxx. Until then, spirit on everything, random strenght on cloth, etc.
-Raids: all BC raids and most WOTLK hardmodes are harder than anything in vanilla, bar old Naxx. MC was just...something I'd never want to experience again. BWL was meh, that if you managed to get past Razorgore's bugged stances that weren't fixed until today. Most vanilla raids were tank-and-spank but bosses dealt a huge amount of damage and health, calling for a shitload of buffs and world buffs.
-PvP: Grind 15/24 to get high warlord(mostly with account sharing, since if you didnt get bored in 3h, you got amazing willpower, if you didnt get bored in 6h, you were not a bloody human being). Grats, you got the equivalent of tier 1.25 and you'll still get destroyed by players with t2+. Stats played a huge role, even higher than res and every class got an oneshot/close-to-one-shot trick. If not, in case of SP, you needed 3 people to solo them, since PW:S absorbed 1k+ dmg, a huge amount at that level.
-Bugs: Undead shadow priests stacking all ranks of ToW=instant 1k damage. Bosses randomly despawning. Doors bugging out. Abnormal respawns. These things could make someone ragequit in an instant.

BC and WOTLK at 60, as progression after Naxx or an alternative...dude, WoW needed a full revamp on most former raid items, dungeons and anything. Just to fix the bugs. Don't think Blizzard enjoyed that.

I personally think Blizzard needs to shift their focus with WOW if they want to remain at the top...

People are starting to get disillusioned with the fact that every piece of gear they raid for is replaced by a new, better piece of gear within a couple of months. It completely devalues the gear players work so hard for and eventually leads to them quitting. This is what happened with me. I used to raid a great deal in Vanilla WOW and the Burning Crusade, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it all again when WOTLK came out. I raided a little bit and got my set of all epics in Northrend, but I could not justify the time commitment when the next set/raid begain.

If Blizzard would shift their focus away from constant gear progression and towards a gameworld that is actually changeable based upon the actions of the players, I think this would make many people want to play again. If I were in charge, I would start implementing a heavier focus on PvP and try to get some meaningful RvR-style battles going. I would STOP the gear progression after one or two VERY difficult raids so that the hardcore raiding guilds are the only ones who can complete it, but also make an easier version of the same dungeons (with slightly less powerful rewards) so that everyone can experience the content.

I think the constant progression in gear sets is killing the game at present because many people (like me) recognize that there is no point in even trying to stay competitive unless we have MASSIVE amounts of free time.

Originally posted by Anubisan I would STOP the gear progression after one or two VERY difficult raids so that the hardcore raiding guilds are the only ones who can complete it, but also make an easier version of the same dungeons (with slightly less powerful rewards) so that everyone can experience the content.

I think the constant progression in gear sets is killing the game at present because many people (like me) recognize that there is no point in even trying to stay competitive unless we have MASSIVE amounts of free time.

At the same time if players aren't interested in PVP what do they do when they get their gear? They're cut off till next xpac?

I'm sorry but your vision of WoW is limited to what would be a good way to turn WoW into CoD4. Grind till gear level 55 and then pvp till modern warfare 2. I don't play WoW for CoD4 I play CoD4 for CoD4.

Plus if they don't add any loot who would honestly want to go continue progression when the next instance came out? Or are you suggesting they should have never released Uld, or TotC? And shouldn't Release Icecrown Citadel?

Because personally I quit because naxx was boring and I came back for uld. I did not want a rehash of an instance that I bashed my face against the first time. It trivialized my previous effort.

P.S. CoT Will never be used to rehash instances. Heroic modes will. CoT is used to relive epic moments in the history of Azeroth that could not normally be fit into the plot. There's no way players could go back 4 years before WoW release to participate in the Battle at Mount Hyjal So they had to make a way to do it. 

There's no way  We could go back to the Culling of Stratholme or the opening of the dark portal, or Thrall's escape from Durnholde Keep without CoT, but to go to deadmines in lvl 80/85 format. Heroic mode.

I have a feeling it would be fun if they did that but it would get old fast. (Although I could run SM indefinitely I love that instance for some reason) I think that's why they are rehashing a few instances at a time(Ony ond I think I heard Deadmines was being redone correct me if I'm wrong), so you don't have to grind lowbie instances for gear, but you can do a few out of boredom to relive the content.

Edited to add Note that was relevant to OP.

Progression through gear is the only logical way to determine people do instances in a game like WoW(aka with its design). Progression through skills? Blizzard tried to do that with 60 tomes giving new ability ranks, it wasn't the brightest idea ever.
Progression through...fun? You won't see it in MMORPGs.

Originally posted by Vatigu

Originally posted by Anubisan I would STOP the gear progression after one or two VERY difficult raids so that the hardcore raiding guilds are the only ones who can complete it, but also make an easier version of the same dungeons (with slightly less powerful rewards) so that everyone can experience the content.

I think the constant progression in gear sets is killing the game at present because many people (like me) recognize that there is no point in even trying to stay competitive unless we have MASSIVE amounts of free time.

 

At the same time if players aren't interested in PVP what do they do when they get their gear? They're cut off till next xpac?

I'm sorry but your vision of WoW is limited to what would be a good way to turn WoW into CoD4. Grind till gear level 55 and then pvp till modern warfare 2. I don't play WoW for CoD4 I play CoD4 for CoD4.

Plus if they don't add any loot who would honestly want to go continue progression when the next instance came out? Or are you suggesting they should have never released Uld, or TotC? And shouldn't Release Icecrown Citadel?

Because personally I quit because naxx was boring and I came back for uld. I did not want a rehash of an instance that I bashed my face against the first time. It trivialized my previous effort.

That's why it's a failed model.  Sandbox>theme-park.

Originally posted by Ruyn

Originally posted by Vatigu

Originally posted by Anubisan I would STOP the gear progression after one or two VERY difficult raids so that the hardcore raiding guilds are the only ones who can complete it, but also make an easier version of the same dungeons (with slightly less powerful rewards) so that everyone can experience the content.

I think the constant progression in gear sets is killing the game at present because many people (like me) recognize that there is no point in even trying to stay competitive unless we have MASSIVE amounts of free time.

 

At the same time if players aren't interested in PVP what do they do when they get their gear? They're cut off till next xpac?

I'm sorry but your vision of WoW is limited to what would be a good way to turn WoW into CoD4. Grind till gear level 55 and then pvp till modern warfare 2. I don't play WoW for CoD4 I play CoD4 for CoD4.

Plus if they don't add any loot who would honestly want to go continue progression when the next instance came out? Or are you suggesting they should have never released Uld, or TotC? And shouldn't Release Icecrown Citadel?

Because personally I quit because naxx was boring and I came back for uld. I did not want a rehash of an instance that I bashed my face against the first time. It trivialized my previous effort.

 

That's why it's a failed model.  Sandbox>theme-park.

Well, a well implemented sandbox MMO would be a huge hit.
But, dear devs, if you call it a MMORPG, then make it both a MMO and a RPG, otherwise it won't end up well.

Originally posted by Ruyn

Originally posted by Vatigu

Originally posted by Anubisan I would STOP the gear progression after one or two VERY difficult raids so that the hardcore raiding guilds are the only ones who can complete it, but also make an easier version of the same dungeons (with slightly less powerful rewards) so that everyone can experience the content.

I think the constant progression in gear sets is killing the game at present because many people (like me) recognize that there is no point in even trying to stay competitive unless we have MASSIVE amounts of free time.

 

At the same time if players aren't interested in PVP what do they do when they get their gear? They're cut off till next xpac?

I'm sorry but your vision of WoW is limited to what would be a good way to turn WoW into CoD4. Grind till gear level 55 and then pvp till modern warfare 2. I don't play WoW for CoD4 I play CoD4 for CoD4.

Plus if they don't add any loot who would honestly want to go continue progression when the next instance came out? Or are you suggesting they should have never released Uld, or TotC? And shouldn't Release Icecrown Citadel?

Because personally I quit because naxx was boring and I came back for uld. I did not want a rehash of an instance that I bashed my face against the first time. It trivialized my previous effort.

 

That's why it's a failed model.  Sandbox>theme-park.

I like WoW the way it is, I just did not like that particular ride. Naxx was not fun for me. I preferred TBC WoW's model of difficulty but because I quit for 4 months I'm struggling to catch up while avoiding naxx and it's scaling the difficulty back up xD