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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsIs Recruit-A-Friend a game-killer?
by Natalie Mootz 
Sep 4th 2008 at 7:30PM
After reading Outland Bound's amusing tale of an encounter with a level 59 "Recruit-A-Friend" player wearing level 26 pants because of the triple-leveling benefit, I got to thinking about the gameplay ramifications of this promotion. As a marketing professional as well as a student of game design, this promotion seems to me at best a bad idea and, at worst, a game-killer. As tight as the Blizzard team claims it is, and as much as it professes to act only in the best interest of gameplay, this promotion may have been poorly conceived. It seems like the Marketing Department had a great idea to accomplish two goals: (1) acquire more accountholders and (2) encourage current accountholders to stay. However, I wonder how well this idea was vetted by the game design team. My guess is: not well at all.
The point of leveling -- at least the way WoW was originally designed, although maybe not so much lately -- is to teach the player how to use class skills. You get spells and talents over time, along with the chance to practice them before you learn more new spells. What happens if you level too quickly? The same thing that happened to me as a Death Knight: you end up having no idea what you're doing, mashing random buttons and crossing your fingers. Pugging instances is hard enough as it is without having to teach level 59 players how to use their spells or wasting all your mana healing them because their gear is too low. Although the Recruit-A-Friend promotion was likely a business response by Blizzard to allay some of the ennui (and ensuing account closures) that has arisen in advance of the Wrath expansion, I wonder how much (not if) it will hurt the game. Perhaps they have the metrics to suggest that a promotion of this type will hold enough borderline accounts to combat churn, but I'm not sure if they anticipated counter-churn, which is what happens when customers leave as a result of players acquired by the promotion.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Leveling
Reader Comments (Page 4 of 7)
sephirah Sep 5th 2008 5:22AM
Following your suggestion WoW will go from 10M players to 10k... yes, I think Blizzard will implement them...
Wasuremono Sep 4th 2008 9:23PM
I don't like it. I don't think it needs to be quite so extreme. Triple experience, granting levels, instant teleport to friend, and a unique mount? Just one of those seems like enough of an incentive but all of them seems riduculous. The worst part is the real people who benefit are powerwowplayers and not new players, making the gap between new players and veterans wider instead of smaller.
Pzychotix Sep 4th 2008 9:40PM
A post about a non-issue, on WoWinsider?
Shocking.
Druss Sep 4th 2008 9:56PM
It just seems people are of the opinion that the only way to level a character is to do it the way they did. And to do it any other way is wrong, and will make you a shit player. Its just more elitists looking for an excuse to bitch and moan about 'their' game being lessened, because a player they may never come across in game got to level a character faster than they did.
suck it up imo.
Kalabus Sep 4th 2008 10:01PM
whats the real problem anyways. hopefully there friend is giving them gold along with lvls with there fancy new xp bonus and such as no mater how fast one can lvl if they choose a proffesions you dont gain much bonus from the Recruit a friend program in terms of being sucessfull. the worst prof. to lvl I find is minning and thats a pain just gathering ore while lvling at reg speed. It would seem such a pain to lvl quickly and wonderfully to get to beter content and then have to go back to starting area's just to get your skills up. LOL
Axxam Sep 4th 2008 10:06PM
Maybe not a game "killer." It is a game "cheapener" though. IIRC, we didn't have the eased levelling curve for 20-60 until TBC had been established for awhile.
I do think that the danger is that if the game gets "dumbed down" enough, long timers will get frustrated that these people with no play skill are where we are.
Original WoW is a pretty solid game if you actually take the time to play it through and not burn through it. There is a lot to do that is interesting from 1-58 in Azeroth, and 58-68 in Outlands, good story lines and so forth.
What Blizzard seems to be doing is turning what made it good into "hurry up and burn through it so we can get to Outland"
That is a mistake. For my first time playing, it was more fun going through the original content with a Draenei Shaman than it was doing Outland on my 60 Warrior. However WOLK doesn't have a new race. It doesn't have a new tradeskill you can only get from the expansion. It's all about 71-80.
Now *That* could be a game killer eventually if not corrected
Axxam Sep 4th 2008 10:09PM
Maybe not a game "killer." It is a game "cheapener" though. IIRC, we didn't have the eased levelling curve for 20-60 until TBC had been established for awhile.
I do think that the danger is that if the game gets "dumbed down" enough, long timers will get frustrated that these people with no play skill are where we are.
Original WoW is a pretty solid game if you actually take the time to play it through and not burn through it. There is a lot to do that is interesting from 1-58 in Azeroth, and 58-68 in Outlands, good story lines and so forth.
What Blizzard seems to be doing is turning what made it good into "hurry up and burn through it so we can get to Outland"
That is a mistake. For my first time playing, it was more fun going through the original content with a Draenei Shaman than it was doing Outland on my 60 Warrior. However WOLK doesn't have a new race. It doesn't have a new tradeskill you can only get from the expansion. It's all about 71-80.
Now *That* could be a game killer eventually if not corrected
Axxam Sep 4th 2008 10:09PM
Sorry for the double post
Shkam Sep 4th 2008 10:56PM
I for one welcome our new stripey overlords.
It's been great though, it's given me the chance to level a warrior in preperation for Wotlk, and after levelling like that, I don't think I could go back to the way it was before and do it the old way.
Fontane Sep 4th 2008 11:45PM
I started a second account for this promotion and the first character I leveled was a hunter, a class I had never had about level 23 gaining regular xp. I had absolutely no trouble learning how to play the class. I am currently leveling a paladin, another class I never got very high, and again am having no problems learning how to play. If anything it has been easier for me to learn. I would say that if anything, it has helped me learn the class better, since I have grouped for the vast majority of my leveling instead of soloing most of the time. Not only do I learn the basics of my class, but I learn what my role should be in a group setting.
Skyflur Sep 4th 2008 11:50PM
1-60 is boring as hell, it's repetitive and old. To new players, on most servers it's a one player game for good amount of time, during those levels. Honestly, they should just give you lvl 55 classes. Here's the thing though, the new players won't be leveling fast, because they're not doing the recruit-a-friend.
Recruit-a-friend is so you can, guess what? Recruit a friend, so hopefully you'll be playing with him, hopefully the couple of years you've been playing the game you picked stuff up. So that you can help your friend with questions he/she might have. Since skills and spells are just understanding on how they affect you or the target and when the situation arises to use them.
On the part of players been unable to understand their skills because they're leveling so fast... Seriously I wonder if any so call gaming experts that happen to take a writing course in high school, have any idea on what they're talking about. I seriously can understand how confusing it could be because you happen to get a new skill every 2 levels... Oh wait most of them are crap like underwater breathing or an upgraded version of the older one you spam anyways.
"What happens if you level too quickly?"
You avoid all the unnecessary crap and get to the core of your skills as fast as possible, don't even bother doing your own talent spec, because it'll suck, because obviously you're new the game. Reason why there is armory. Sure there is some tiny variety on the top specs, but they're all about the same, depending on what you want to do in your class. All this information, hopefully your friend would let you know all this information, since you're actually "playing" with him.
The recruit a friend is for you to make a second account, kill it, leaving it at lvl 1 and have it follow you as a ghost while you turn quests in group for 3x experience before the 14 day trial is over.
At the end of the day, this doesn't affect anything or anyone in anyway possible. I can't even understand why anyone would think it would. BC is plenty of time to get used to your skills, when it takes almost a work day to get a level.
Uly Sep 4th 2008 11:56PM
The game is simply on a slippery slope of being whored out. Soon enough they'll implement micro-transactions so you can buy epics with real world money.
Deathgodryuk Sep 4th 2008 11:58PM
This is the stupidest article I've ever read on WoWInsider. Kudos you.
YòuOTSS Sep 5th 2008 1:09AM
I don't think this is a game killer, or even a damaging force in the game. The player base is already in the millions, how many of those "incompetents" do you think will be added by the system? The majority of players will still be experienced, and will guide the less advised should they hit level 70 before they know what the game is truly about. IMO, as stated above, it IS from 60-70 that you really learn the ins and outs of your character. I have played since release and I never felt as 'into' my character as I do since BC release because it added a lot of skills and playstyles that were previously uncommon or unnecessary.
Also, as stated above, it is said that most people are using this to level alts. I agree that this claim is true, and think it is even more useful than leveling alts. A lot of players who, like me, started anew come BC, whether it be on a new account like myself or on a new server from before. I'm not by any means a "casual" player in the sense that I spend a lot of time playing and tweaking this and that, and finding out what works and what to macro, item hunting, questing, etc. but I find it hard to level an alt really only in the time sense. The time it takes to level an alt is time that I could be racking up arena points or working on raising money to horde up for LK. The recruit a friend is an Elune-send for this.
I've played my share of everything before, and I know almost every class to the point where if you handed me a 70, i wouldn't be running around like a chicken with my head cut off. A lot of players fall into this category, I'd imagine, and so having the ability to level an alt that you didn't want to before makes a world of difference.
There's only three kinds of people I can see getting angry about this; those who put an insane amount of work into the game to level characters, and I applaud the effort, but still, a lot can't play that way. Second is people who have no friends to recruit. Finally, people who have never had to farm on a priest.
Rugo Sep 5th 2008 2:01AM
I couldnt really care less about these.
Why if everyone has a max level char of each class?
Its still not my business or my problem.
The one thing I dislike is how the game is now more for those that have 2 or more characters playing currently.
It used to be more about full completition and achievement on 1, as your "true" main.
I go better with that style,so I would still play like that.And the game started to feel worse in BC.
As long as everyone understands that the super leveling is jut a feature but not the standard way of playing wow itll be ok.
Rainhio Sep 5th 2008 2:38AM
I've alredy seen new titels like RaF. It is taking over titels like noob and newbe. lol
Turtlehead Sep 5th 2008 2:53AM
1) WoW is designed to be soloable entirely to max level by people who have no idea what they're doing. On that score, nothing has changed.
2) TBC was a fatal blow to the old content. There's really no way around this. (No, dumping huge resources into adding content people will enjoy once on alts on the way up is not a solution. It's a nice bonus.) Lich will do the same albeit to a lesser extent. The gear jump looks to be less and very powerful gear is much easier to gather in TBC than it was in old anyway(smaller raids, shorter raids & instances, insane PvP gear, etc).
3) Most toons being powered this way will be alts on additional accounts or being powered by someone already high level. Think about that a second: the new player already has someone they know who can teach them how to play or they can't be power leveled. Granted, that person may be an idiot. See #1.
4) If your idea is taken as a given, the increased XP added for 10-60, which decoupled level gains from the curve of existing old content--without requiring a more experienced player's involvement (#3)--was far worse. Any "game breaking" has already happened.
What your post should have been about was Death Knights breaking the game. That's a real issue, in the way you mentioned and more. The friend promotion is not.
"Perhaps they have the metrics to suggest that a promotion of this type will hold enough borderline accounts to combat churn, but I'm not sure if they anticipated counter-churn, which is what happens when customers leave as a result of players acquired by the promotion."
What's the possible counter-churn? I'm simply not seeing anything beyond trivial, and those likely looking for an excuse to leave anyway. Again, if it's an influx of idiots not knowing how to play it's death knights that are the upcoming disaster. Incompetent death knights will outnumber incompetent other classes by orders of magnitude early on, made worse because they are a tank class and most will refuse to tank or have no idea how to do so. (Yes, people can be powered to 58 to DK, but see #4.) That's my guess and I'll bet my account on it. That's going to be a s***storm, PvE and PvP.
kieran Sep 5th 2008 4:58AM
I'm levelling a team of five. Their gear is shit, the co-ordination is crap as they're five different classes, and it doesn't matter because there's five toons there to go up against roughly same-level mobs. They die FAST.
Wowwiki and EJ hold the info I need to learn to play the classes individually, and I'll be soloing them from 70 to 80 (if not 60 to 80) which should be plenty of time to practice.
Mats Sep 5th 2008 3:39AM
Well, as a long time player, who recently got a friend into wow, this system has been great. He plays a warrior, and I have great experience with that, so I give him all the inside tips if there is anything he did not understand while leveling.
The best part of the 3x XP is that I get to cherrypick questlines, skipping any sort of droprate issue that will bore him. I pick the best zones and the coolest instances. Everytime I see something that might be annoying, we just skip past it.
When I'm not there, he can toddle along and gain XP the normal way like everyone else. Experience the horrible droprates on some quests, see some really annoying mobs. And even if he gains a level while I'm gone, he just gives me one when join up.
As for gear, we'll, I have 3 level 70 and over 10k gold, so I can buy him some new pants if the need is there.
All in all, good try at seeing holes in this program, but you should have tried it out with a friend that wanted to get into wow. Also, your own inability to learn a class fast is not shared by all players.
naivri Sep 5th 2008 4:10AM
your argument is flawed in sooo many ways
I bet you think its acceptable to roll a DK at level 58 ! but unacceptable to level a hunter to 60 with level 26 greens.........hmmm
I have power levelled a few chars to 60 using this. U only get triple xp if they are together at the time. (so suitable for dual boxing or introducing a totally new player to the game)
My main was probably about as geared up as I could get without doing 25 man raiding. I don't see the point getting into that with an expansion round the corner so I had got myself into a bit of a rut in wow. Refer a friend comes along, all of a sudden I am levelling like mad again.
"I am a GL and I have concerns too" - *sniff* *sniff* - elitist
I am guessing the OP played wow since the beginning and continually says things like "you have it easy these days, it used to take so long to level to 60" "mount at 30.....in my day we had to slog it out to 40 and quests gave half the XP" "Mudsprocket? We didn't have Mudsprocket when I levelled, we had to grind on ogres for 20 days barefoot in the snow to ding 40 and get our mount" "bah.....flight point at Rebel Camp? We used to have to run all the way to Booty Bay or all the way from Darkshire when we had to quest at the top of STV"
As for the argument that it leaves people at 70 unable to play their characters