Breakfast Topic: Biggest problem with Warcraft today
by Elizabeth Harper 
Dec 2nd 2006 at 8:00AM
If you read the official forums, you've seen page upon page of nerf this!, nerf that!, and lolcoil is overpowered! threads, some even complete with suggestions on how to bring balance back to the game. However, how can 7 million players agree on a solution when we can't even agree on a problem? So I ask you now: what is the biggest issue facing World of Warcraft today?
Filed under: Breakfast Topics, Features
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Ryan D. Dec 2nd 2006 8:28AM
Gnomes. Little knee-biting bastards. I say, finish the job they themselves started - throw 'em all in Gnomeregan and blow the place up.
Seriously though? The biggest problem with Warcraft isn't anything a programmer can fix. It's the attitudes of a lot of players. It's that flame wars erupt over the slightest thing and quickly descend to childish name-calling, as opposed to a rational soltuion. It's people who can't be bothered to fully type out "you".It's that so few people are willing just take it easy and enjoy that this is a game.
Quite frankly, the biggest problem with WoW is that a few bad apples, of nearly natal maturity and intelligence tend to be the most vocal, and it spoils the whole lot for those of us who just want to have fun.
Rahul Dec 2nd 2006 8:45AM
It's outgrown its design. How do you attract more people once you've reached 7 million, when that's pretty much near the cap of people willing to invest this kind of time in a game?
Blizzard has identified that problem too and is working to fix it by reducing required player investment. But it'll be hard to keep up this growth, since WoW fundamentally wasn't designed to handle this many players.
therandomguy Dec 2nd 2006 8:56AM
I disagree that the fact that I dpell you as u in the game generally means i must be stupid and annoying. I'm a
perfectly reasonable player except when someone is being a complete asswipe.
And for the record, spelling things out fully doesn't make you any more mature. If a 12 year old does that, they are atoumatically much older?
If a 16 year old uses abrreviated words, does that make them 8?Bit of a stupid point to be honest.
Ryan D. Dec 2nd 2006 9:03AM
Thank you for validating my point entirely.
Will Dec 2nd 2006 9:16AM
Yeah, I'm with Ryan. Sorry randomguy, but yes spelling you as "u" does in fact make you annoying, and makes you look immature and yes a little stupid. Maturity is not the same as age. Making a effort to communicate well with other people of course doesn't automatically make you older, but it certainly does make you look more mature.
Geo Dec 2nd 2006 9:51AM
My issues of the game are:
The world is too static. I understand the need of making a consistent environment for new players, but if thousands of people have collected brain stems to research the corruption (Black Fathom Quest) you would think they would have figured it out by now? There should be more world events that advance story.
Along the static lines: I always thought it would be cool if Wow had more of an ecology. Different mobs that spawn at night, or times of year. Or, if too many players are killing wolves in Elwynn, then the quest changes to kill the now exploding deer population.
My biggest problem with Wow is faction grind. Especially with Timbermaw. Grinding is such a huge time suck. Having to kill thousands of Timbermaw just to be able to walk unmolested through a cave and buy a couple of cool items is uninspired. At least with Argent Dawn you have more options with turn ins and running instances.
Dave Dec 2nd 2006 9:59AM
Without climbing onto a soapbox, I agree that WoW's community of users are its biggest problem. I wish every day that special realms existed for people over 25 years old, and who agree to special terms of service not to be complete asshats while playing.
Speaking as a gay player, the fun of playing is pretty much sucked away when you watch LFG descend into a homophobic tirade, and reporting doesn't do any good because Blizzard isn't going to do anything to alienate their core base of users by punishing those involved.
Nienantoda of Draenor Dec 2nd 2006 10:14AM
Well I'm going to have to go with Ryan on this one. If you think saying things like "i c u iz a noob, so L2P" makes you look cool, there is something very wrong with you.That speaks volumes of your ignorance, and idiocy. A lot of people, myself included, use this game as an escape from the everyday hassles of life. Unfortunately, they have to come into a game where the people they are trying to escape from, exist in much larger quantities. The players are indeed the biggest downfall. That why you join a good guild, and turn off general chat and the LFG channel.
Barrett Dec 2nd 2006 10:22AM
I agree, people are the biggest problem. However, it is not entirely those annoying immature "bad apples" fault. They pick shadow priest and warlock, not because they like the play style, but because they are the most powerful. Ganking is the same mentality, they don't gank 20 levels below because they enjoy it, they do so because they need to. Society at large is to blame, we seek out the most powerful positions and exploit it. We need a more socialized game play!!! Those capitalistic pigs will pay for there crimes.... a comrades?
g|ffo Dec 2nd 2006 10:54AM
the problem with wow is that real people play characters in the game and everyone of them has an opinion ^^
Quomotos Dec 2nd 2006 10:59AM
As a leisure player the biggest problem I find is getting into groups to do quests. Main problem here is stated above in that most people turn off LFG and General chat because of the immaturity of a certain percentage of the population. This makes it difficult for the non hardcore WoW player to have fun every time they log on.
An easy way around this issue should be the ability to ignore a player easily. Right click the name click ignore and then have the selection for 30min, all day, forever. If you have ignored a person previously say for 30min or a day, then next time you go to ignore this person, that player will be flagged to indicate that you have ignored this player before and you may want to ignore forever (say color the previous choice a different color).
As for people you say ignorant crap about race or sexual preference. Let them. Free country, should be a free system. They should just give you the choice to ignore them easier.
If this is nto viable, then I think abuse of a channel should not be tolerated. Such as abusing LFG should get a player suspended. Start with warnings and then move up the punishment. Should be easy enough to do, just by saving the logs and reviewing abuse reports.
Then again, instead of an LFG channel there should be an LFG window where you can put your name in a list that everyone can access where it lists those who want to do a particular quest or a particular instance. You open the window, look through the list and join up. I'm sure there are good ways and bad to do this, but just start it and tweek it until it gets good.
Whew...I think I'm done.
zeroNth Dec 2nd 2006 11:22AM
Ummmm... Quomotos, I don't know where you've been for the past month, but you're really going to love Tuesday, December 5th.
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/burningcrusade/townhall/lookingforgroup.html
White Rabbit Dec 2nd 2006 5:29PM
what r u talkn bout! I r cool this way! QQ L2P! LOLZ
JReado Dec 2nd 2006 1:10PM
My main problem with WoW right now is that one person that always ends up in your group who believes he can take the whole instance at once. I am sick of the 12 year olds who won't work as a team through an instance. They will just keep attacking new pulls even if the healer has no mana or if half the group needs to be afk for a moment. These are the same people that piss off the mage by attacking the sheep first. I've even had someone get mad because we were telling him to slow down and ran and aggroed a whole room, including the boss and tried to bring them back to us. Luckily he was a moron and died quickly. From this I actually have a do not run with list of people that just plain piss off me and the rest of the group.
Obsidian Dec 2nd 2006 1:57PM
What's the biggest issue with WoW?
I don't agree with the whole thing that the "WoW Community" is the real problem. Because WoW is a relatively new MMO, there are bound to be a few bad apples, but for the most part if you avoid the forums and game with a select few friends, then WoW is great.
What are the real issues plaguing WoW?
1) Lack of real world changing PvP
- What's world changing PvP? First, It's when my guild gets a raiding group together and takes control of a region. Now this would be kinda lame if a group could just storm the place at 4am, (or anytime that your not on) but if there would set raid times when guilds could fight it out to see who gets ownership, that would be awesome. Something along the lines of Castle Sieges like in Lineage 2... but maybe instead of a castle, we could get a guild hall and have some select rights to the surround area.
Now I'll agree that WoW was never designed for that type of PvP, but with the introduction of Outlands and soon to be Northrend, I truly believe that Kalimdor and Azeroth are places that should be left to 1-60 and nothing more. With new areas for high level players I see no point in continuing to use these locations.
2) Lack of guild unity
- Whats the real reason you join a guild? LOOT! LOOT! and oh wait... what was it? OH I KNOW LOOT!!! Now granted there are secondary reasons for joining a guild, but the vast majority of WoW's player base only joins a guild to raid so they can get items. THIS NEEDS TO CHANGE. I don't mean change raiding, its still good for loot, but whats the point of raiding all our lives for loot when the loot serves no purpose but to get us to the next step, to what? TO RAID MORE!
I think guild related quests, that require guilds to work together for the sake of the guild and the guild alone should be implemented. It's like a team building quest. Maybe introduce Guild Levels. Upon completion of a guild quest, you can raise the level of your guild and get access to new content such as instanced guild halls, guild bank, repair discounts, guild auction house. This would also work great by building more PvP oriented guilds that would work together to raid for loot so they would have some good gear to take on the other faction and show some real war skills on the battle field and not in some stupid BG for honor the doesn't even matter.
3) Lack of ingame politics.
Simple here.. drop this stupid chat barrier for the Horde/Alliance. IT'S TOTAL BS!! Whats the point of being on a PvP server if you don't even PvP, or you get in useless fights with the other faction because it's always kill or be killed when neither of you really want to fight each other in the first place. If guilds had real BEEF with each other we could get some real competition on these pansy servers. Its lame when you have absolutely no idea which guilds on the enemy faction are any good b/c the horde/alliance are in their own little worlds. It's only when we are in BGs that we get to see some of the other sides colors... but in the end its all for not.
I WANT A WAR! I WANT TO SEE WHICH GUILDS CAN BRING THEIR PVP SKILLS TO THE TABLE! YOU CAN RAID ALL YOU WANT, BUT IF YOU CAN'T SHOW ME WHAT YOU GOT, WHO CARES!
I want a reason to join a guild and build relationships with those guild members, instead of joining a guild that can farm Naxx so I can get geared up. I want gear.. but I also want to use the gear in a meaningful way. PVP PVP GUILD UNITY GUILD UNITY POLITICS POLITICS!!!
ok I'm done! :D
therandomguy Dec 2nd 2006 2:15PM
Right, so Nien, obviously your life rquires very little writing, but sadly I still go to school, so i spend the whole bloody day writing in full sentences.
I think thats why people use nice, shortened words that can be understood, dont make you look like a noob, and because its a chore wrting out full sentences. But your interpretation is the moronic view to abbreviations, when non-asswipes use abbreviations, it tends to follow this role.
Normal "Well mabye you can and mabye you can't"
Abbrv. "well mbye u can n mbbye u cant."
Note: i c u iz a noob, so L2P, wow, if people say things like that then i agree, but doing small abbreviations that still get the message across, and dont say things in a stupid fashion like a chav (British term for teenagers who liter around train stations and annoy the fuck out of everyone, and talk like what you put) then does it really matter??
FrozenHeart Dec 2nd 2006 2:30PM
I think people can be one of the biggest problems sometimes.
Ex:
This Shaman ask me to duel. I'm a hunter. We start, I send the pet on him and fight. When we are in the fight he is healing himself with spells. At on point I used a Potion to heal myself. I have no spells like that. In the end I win and he start wining about the fact I used a potion in the fight. Calls me a noob and such. It's ok to use spells but I can't heal myself with potion when my class has no spells for healing myself? Please.. people like this can make the game suck sometimes.
Jonan Dec 2nd 2006 5:43PM
I think the biggest problem with WoW is that itemization has made class not matter. Every class has a lolcoil, but not every player has full tier 4 plus. The expansion will level the playing field for a bit, but the fact will remain that in 6 months from now, if you don't have full tier *highest*, you are going to get smoked in PVP. Skill only goes so far, class is irrelevent at this point.
Jonathan Mead Dec 2nd 2006 3:10PM
randomguy: It's a "chore" writing full sentences? God you're pathetic! Don't want to type in proper English? Then get the HELL off an MMOG then you illiterate fool.
Anyone who uses u for you and all that gets immediately added to my ignore list, never to be removed until the next time the list is wiped. I'm a writer by profession and people like you disgust me. Your attitude stinks of complete laziness and disregard for those around you who you expect to read what you've typed. "I can't be bothered to express myself properly, but I expect you to listen." You make me sick.
The biggest problem with WOW is NOTHING EVER HAPPENS! One of the best times I ever had in WOW was the first time someone kited one of the dragons (forget which one) to SW. THAT was awesome. It was new, it was exciting, and I died many, many times, and loved every minute.
Blizzard are quite happy to sit on their asses and let the world stagnate. It should NOT be down to players to make interesting stuff happen. You've got all those bad guys out there. Why the hell, from time to time, can Teremus not get up one day and say "Think I'll go torch Stormwind."
Nothing ever happens. The scourge invasion would have been great, had Blizz not A) told us it was coming, and B) utterly cocked it up.
Kerni Dec 2nd 2006 3:39PM
@FrozenHeart
Yes, potting during duels is considered cheap. So is using cooldowns like Lay on Hands, Recklessness, Divine Shield etc., It's just the duel etiquette that has evolved over time.