Late to the party
by Mike Schramm 
Aug 16th 2007 at 3:38PM
Tobold's got a good post up today about players 8,999,999 to 10 million-- folks who've come late to the party that is World of Warcraft. Lots of people like to brag that they started playing on the beta, day one (Tobold's one of those), but I didn't-- while I watched WoW news with close attention, and remember watching a livecast of someone playing a gnome Mage on Winamp, I didn't actually pick up the game until the May after it came out. Still, I was early enough that there were still some newbies to level up with-- I remember grouping at level 5 in Teldrassil with four other people who were discovering the game just like I was.Nowadays, says Tobold, things just aren't the same-- if you're just coming on board, you might wonder where all the nine million players in this game are (answer: Outland). And with every expansion, the real action will get farther and farther away from the starting zones-- would you come to this game when WotLK releases if you knew that you had 80 levels and two expansions to get through before you joined the rest of the world?
There are probably benefits to coming late to the party as well-- nowadays, we have guides aplenty, and you don't have to suffer through any of the old bugs or balance problems that have already been fixed. And if you're looking for single-player content, there's plenty to go through. But joining up with the other 10 million players now isn't nearly the same experience that everyone had a few years ago.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Virtual selves, Expansions
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
dotorion Aug 16th 2007 3:46PM
If Blizz keeps playing tricks like they did with Outland and Trainers & AHs, you'll see plenty of people still in the old capitals, cursing over having to come to Azeroth for something like that and having to blow a HS to get back (unless you like long flights).
Except mages. They can portal to the capitals and back. Lucky bastards ..
Baluki Aug 16th 2007 3:51PM
I feel sorry for all the people trying to get groups together for WC and SM and ZF and all those. I got to hit most of the dungeons numerous times on my way up, but that was back when the game was still new. Now, you can't even find a group for a normal Ramparts run. The biggest mistake Blizzard has ever made is not coming up with a way to keep the early game relevant. Each new expansion is a dam in the river, and soon there'll be nothing but stagnant water at the end, and even that will dry up, causing WoW to die before its time.
I'm sure that'll be the big lesson they learn for their next MMO. But that's a LONG way off.
Saftey Dancer Aug 16th 2007 3:53PM
learn2play WoW when it comes out
Angry Joe Aug 16th 2007 4:00PM
Tobold got some nice insights back in the good old days, but lately, he's not getting anything right.
I believe he jumped the shark when he got an Alienware pc, telling us how much better it is than his previous Dell.
Dprice Aug 16th 2007 4:03PM
This article is full of win. I didnt see ANYONE my level when i was making my rogue a few weeks ago. Neither did any of my other friends when they were leveling their alts to 70 last month.
Wait...if i was just leveling a brand new character, and my friends were too...plus all the new players..../brainexplode
Fact of the matter is, there are always people making new alts, trying new classes, new races, whatever. It might be "more difficult" than it was 2 years ago to get a SM group, but not by much, i'd wager. I certainly had no problem doing all my instance quests with help from my friends and guildmates.
Hank Aug 16th 2007 4:10PM
I swear, I postred something similar to that as a comment within the last week...
Yes I did, #8 here http://www.wowinsider.com/2007/08/13/bring-on-the-horizontal-changes-please/
RaydenUni Aug 16th 2007 4:11PM
Joining now means catching up to all your 70 friends so you can join them raiding. Perhaps this is why Blizzard wants to speed up leveling? Our guild has several new members who are leveling as fast as they can but get bored from leveling alone.
Runstadrey Aug 16th 2007 4:48PM
I was riding my alt Orc Shaman last night and needed to do RFC and was dreading the wait when I put out the LFG call. Less than 2 minutes I was 5 player PuG and 5 mins after that we were talking to Maura Runetotem.
Maybe we were all riding alts, the content was new to me as I'd always been alliance. That's the way to keep the game fresh.
RogueJedi86 Aug 16th 2007 4:24PM
Didn't Blizz say at BlizzCon that they hope to add an XP Bonus to the Refer-A-Friend program, so your friends that you recruit to WoW can get to the top and play with you more? That would really help.
rick gregory Aug 16th 2007 4:25PM
Sigh... so...
1) there's no one in Azeroth
but
2) Blizz should spend time developing new content for Azeroth (as argued by many people).
Contradiction anyone? The problem is that population varies by server. On some servers #1 isn't true, so you can argue for #2. For example, I'm levelling an alt and see plenty of folks in the 1-30 zones so far. The difference might be that my server (Alleria) is fairly high pop and is 2:1 or 3:1 Alliance, which I am.
But if Blizz is seeing 160k new players per month, I'm not sure there's a lack of people... it might be that they're spread out too much. Or it might be that some of you are on low pop servers or in a faction that's very much in the minority.
Dah Cheet Aug 16th 2007 4:34PM
As someone who just joined the party (right before the release of BC) and a casual player it is sometimes hard to find groups for instances. I just got my first character to level 40 and I'm LFG for SM and RFD with a little difficulty. I haven't been on in a couple days though so things may have changed.
Oh, and just to toss it out there, I'm looking for a guild that actually helps out its players and wants to group with them. I'm on Aggramar. Send me a tell if you've got room and are willing to help a noob.
g8rCody Aug 16th 2007 4:38PM
or blizz can finally release some new realms, and then we'll all be leveling up together again. That's what I'm waiting for anyways, before I reactivate my account. Come on blizz, it's been 7 months since you gave us a fresh realm. We used to get them every month!
Arp Aug 16th 2007 4:39PM
I discovered WoW shortly after BC was released. I have not leveled past 40 yet and I get very discouraged seeing 70's all around me. With the level cap raising to 80 and new end game content coming out I think its ridiculous that blizzard is doing this. Of course I could already be at level 60 by now if I had not wasted gameplay time with professions and AH stuff but I did and I have about a week of gameplay time invested and I am still not to level 40. (38).
Basic Aug 16th 2007 4:50PM
I think the worst thing about leveling up late is habitual twinking. I am an avid alt-aholic and experience the joys of being twinked thru VC by lv 44 noob hunters. Not only am I failing to learn to play a new class in a group setting, but so are the 3 other lv 17-25 players in my group. These players are going to want to instance and raid with me... and are probably going to be terrible for quite a while.
I don't know what an appropriate solution to this is... it would require a lot of effort to keep it fun and unless it was optional there would be a ton of crying over it. I would favor some kind of "reverse heroic" mode where high level characters could choose to have their HP/stats/dmg/effective level reduced by some amount (perhaps in exchange for a gold reward modifier).
rick gregory Aug 16th 2007 4:51PM
@arp... well, how is it Blizz's fault that you spent time playing the AH vs leveling? And time to 60 (or 70 or 80) isn't the measure of you as a player - it's whether you're having fun. Heck I took 30 days played to 70... and had fun!
@10 - Part of grouping is being on at the right times. Morning is poor (for my server), evening after dinnertime (US) is best. There are a few people in my guild whose schedule puts them on late... and they have a hard time finding groups, even though they're 70... because it's 11pm-1am throughout the US when they start. If that's when they can play, it's when they can play, but it does make groups harder to find as does any off time
Siva Aug 16th 2007 4:57PM
I don't believe this article is right. as a player that just started a couple months ago, I'm in a great guild of similar lvl players, and I haven't felt for a second that I'm missing out on a lot. Sure I look in envy at all the lvl 70s running around the IF bank with their cool armor, but I have my own goals before that.
As a warrior, I was so happy to get my first helmet, or getting my hands on all the herod drops after running the armory half a dozen times. WoW has so much content, you could probably spend a couple months just discovering everything up to lvl 30.
Epiny Aug 16th 2007 5:10PM
This happens with all MMO's. Stream lining old content is the best way to fix the problem. Mid level content, while neat, would be wasted on the majority of the player base.
When they run out of ideas and levels WoW 2 will come out. It's a never ending cycle. Most WoW players will leave it for another MMO only to return when they create a good sequel.
Khallah Aug 16th 2007 5:18PM
I've recently introduced two friends to the game, and will be interested to see what their experience is. I must admit, I've been concerned that there would be a lack of other players to progress through the early content with.
Sophey Aug 16th 2007 5:31PM
It seems to me that people tend to put a little too much stock in Tobold's often irrelevant opinions on matters. He used to have some good discussion material and to an extent still does, but alot of what he says these days seems to be more oriented to drawing attention to himself than anything else.
That having been said, I levelled a Draenei post-expansion from 1-70. If your server is either somewhat healthy it shouldn't be a problem, I was never alone in my journey and had little trouble finding groups for instances and quests. Tobold might try going to those zones and seeing that the situation is rather than doing a /who from Ironforge and proclaiming it a problem.
Milktub Aug 16th 2007 5:52PM
I was a late joiner. Didn't get going until November 2006 on a server that opened January of that year.
As much as I can be wistful for the idea of seeing a whole new world for the first time with everyone else, I don't feel my experience was all that much different than those who were there on day one of the server.
However, I suppose it would have been nice to have had some context to the Cloth Donations thing. Why does Orgrimmar want all my Silk??