Plan to resolve WoW dungeon issue casual vs raider

[Zuuljin]

I dont even play WoW. I'm basing my experience off of EQ1 and EQ2. Shortly before I quit EQ1, which was right around GoD, I pickup-raided myway into elementals. My hours at work and school never let me be on during prime raiding time, so me and a friend who would play late, decided to help out others who never had time to raid. So usually starting at 11:00 or 12:00, we would form late night raids to get people into the elementals. It was hard finding people at first, but after a week or so once the word got out, we had over 100 people wanting to join nightly. Everyone from n00bs to guild members who needed to be backflagged to anyone who just wanted to have fun. And you know what? It worked out pretty damn well.

Anyways, I dont know about WoW, but from my experience, anyone can raid and get uber gear, they just have to be on at the right time, and have enough time to play.

One more thing id mention, is alot of guilds will say how hard so and so is, and how n00bs just cant do it. A big part of that is that raiders have gear which helps them out, whereas the n00bs do not. I would be willing to bet a pickup raid could beat any raid mob given the same gear. And if I got the same people nightly on a pickup raid, to learn the encounter, then I have no doubt it I could beat it. Just because your in a uber guild doesnt mean everyone else sucks.

[Throag]

That's forgeting about the fact that in EQ, you could zerg anything to death until Plane of Time and the coming of instanced raiding.

[Duppin]

Why is this utterly retarded thread even still going?

"Casuals" need to shut the fuck up already. I say this BEING one at this point.

[Brodda Thep]

I have yet to see a game where non-raiders are given the same amount of progression content. In EQ, raiders typically got two levels of item progression each expansion, while non-raiders got one. In Velious it was quest armor -> NToV, casuals got quest armor. In Luclin we had ssra+ -> Vex Thal, non-raiders got Umbral plains. In PoP raiders got elemental planes -> Time, non-raiders got another quest armor.

I don't actually know if there is demand for that type of progression for the so called casual. I think a lot of people say that only 25% of the 60 players raid. Since they don't raid, they then think that they represent the other 75%.

If they had 5-10 man dungeons with long lockouts and encounters so hard taht you wanted to group with the same people week after week, how much use would they get? I think the majority of the non-raiders wouldn't appreciate such a system and would prefer to be able to log on and group with any random group and still accomplish their goals.

I honestly cannot believe they aren't collection massive amoutns of information about what their player base spends their time doing.

[Etadanik]

I imagine that chatting is the way most people spend their time in WoW.

[Antarius]

Originally Posted by Pilsbane

Maybe I'm just the wrong kind of player for World of Warcraft.

You aren't alone, I'm another guy in your exact situation. Even worse is that I've been in the same boat for almost 5 months now... Would love to come back to the game, but I guess I realize that I'm just another bob and for the moment, anyways, my "wow life" is over.

[Zehn - Vhex]

I led several open raids in EQ. All you needed in order to kill every boss pre-elementals was a PoTime geared tank, 3 clerics and roughly 50-120 random shitheads.

Even in the Eplanes the only fight that took any mediocrum of skill was ~maybe~ Rathe. And that's just because sometimes, 'Stop killing at 5%' isn't obvious enough.

[Angrier]

Originally Posted by Zehn - Vhex

I led several open raids in EQ. All you needed in order to kill every boss pre-elementals was a PoTime geared tank, 3 clerics and roughly 50-120 random shitheads.

Even in the Eplanes the only fight that took any mediocrum of skill was ~maybe~ Rathe. And that's just because sometimes, 'Stop killing at 5%' isn't obvious enough.

Hmm you forget Xegony and Coirnav; Ofossa to some extend.

[Zehn - Vhex]

Correction, some fights you needed a slightly more intelligent puller as well.

Happy? 8(

[splok]

would be willing to bet a pickup raid could beat any raid mob given the same gear. And if I got the same people nightly on a pickup raid, to learn the encounter, then I have no doubt it I could beat it.

That's lovely, but that's not a pickup raid.

[Alamando]

Originally Posted by Brodda Thep

I have yet to see a game where non-raiders are given the same amount of progression content.

Thread over?

[Elerion]

Originally Posted by Quineloe

A common misconception about economics. You either try to keep as many players as possible OR you use the least amount of resources possible. You don't combine both.

Eh...no. First off, in a monopoly or near monopoly, you will be aiming to maximize total revenues by maximizing prices/customers while minimizing costs. Your sole purpose is to maximize total revenues from the available consumer base. Blizzard don't quite have monopolistic powers, but they're not far from it due to the innate extreme brand loyalty in the genre.

What you're talking about, is strategic groups in highly competetive (or open) markets, where the options for differentiation are usually far greater than in the current MMO market. Besides, modern business literature and empirical evidence shows that the fear of being "stuck in the middle" (not going for a pure high differentiation strategy or a pure low cost strategy) is largely ungrounded, it's just a harder balance to find.

About raiders being demanding customers? They sure are. But they still provide externalities in increasing interest in the game by providing distant goals and symbols to look up to for true casual players. That increases their enjoyment and fascination with the game, which leads to them assigning the product a higher personal value. Content that everyone can do doesn't accomplish the same.