It's particularly interesting when you consider the problem Blizzard faces when it comes to lockouts. If someone is doing LFR and wants to try Flex raiding, Blizzard wants to encourage this - it'll keep the player engaged and hopefully develop some social bonds. So LFR cannot share a lockout with Flex. Likewise, if someone is doing Flex and wants to try normal raiding, Blizzard wants to encourage this - it'll keep the player engaged and hopefully develop more social bonds. So Flex cannot share a lockout with normal. And if LFR can't share a lockout with Flex and Flex can't share a lockout with normal, LFR can't share a lockout with normal either.
Quite a pretty pickle. And, of course, the people suffering from this are people going in reverse. What do I mean by that?
No one is worried about LFR players being compelled to do Flex or Flex players to do normal/heroic. People are worried about normal/heroic being compelled to do Flex and/or LFR. In other words, the problem is when we start at the top and go down, not start at the bottom and go up.
So can we find a solution? It seems difficult, but there was a very interesting idea proposed by someone named Thels that I ran across while reading this post (relevant section quoted but the whole article is good):
"The idea I’ve liked the most so far is one proposed by Thels. For lack of a better term, I’d call it the “Cumulative Loot System.” In short, when you kill a normal or heroic boss, you also automatically get your personal loot rolls for LFR and/or Flex. You could imagine various permutations of how this would work; maybe a normal kill gives you your LFR roll, while a heroic kill gives you both LFR and Flex rolls. But the simplest case is just that you get both rolls on any normal or heroic kill.
What I like about this solution is that it directly addresses the problem at the source. The problem is that players clearing normal and heroic feel compelled to run LFR and Flex for additional chances at marginal upgrades. The complaint isn’t that the LFR and Flex loot is “too good,” or “more than LFR deserves,” strictly speaking, though I’m sure we could find a small subset of players who would argue those points. The problem is that the extra LFR and Flex clears require more time on top of an already demanding heroic raiding schedule, and that a player with the skill to do heroic modes doesn’t find these watered-down difficulty levels fun.
Rather than trying to take anything away from LFR or Flex raiders, this solution instead just gives “extra” or “free” loot to heroic raiders to remove the additional time sink. And I think that’s a much wiser move at this point in the game’s life than trying to impose more restrictions on the LFR and Flex raid population, which even now accounts for the vast majority of raiders."
To make this explicit, the following would happen:
If you kill a boss in LFR, you get your LFR loot.
If you kill a boss in Flex, you get your Flex loot. If you have NOT killed the boss in LFR, you also get your LFR loot.
If you kill a boss in normal/heroic, the boss drops his or her items. If you have NOT killed the boss in Flex, you also get your Flex loot. Additionally, if you have NOT killed the boss in LFR, you also get your LFR loot.
This means that as long as you'd kill a given boss on normal or heroic each week, you have no incentive to do Flex or LFR. The more I think about it, the more I like it - and it can be summed up like this:
There is always an incentive to move up and never an incentive to move down.
It is the perfect carrot - if you can kill the boss on a higher difficulty, you get those benefits plus all of the benefits from the lower difficulties.
Now, this solution isn't perfect. If Bob needs tier shoulders but needs to sit on the boss during the week, he would still need to go do Flex for that boss. But even when he does Flex, he'll get the LFR chance too.
Best of all, none of this should effectively change what a player chooses to do each week. People who were going to do Flex and LFR will get that loot as long as they do normal - so it does nothing but save them some time. And since they're already investing time in normal/heroic raiding, those aren't the players who need extra time sinks.
It is an extreme incentive to do higher difficulties without taking anything away from the lower difficulties. And that seems to be Blizzard's desired type of solution right now.
Great idea.
ReplyDeleteI'd day a Cumulative Loot System will not happen due to it removes a huge timesink. The impact of multi-raiding on the "upper" players is not enough to remove the required timesink for everyone. A 20 minute queue for dps on each raid a few times a week is a good amount of "playtime" where new content is not needed.
The players who get the benefit will roll through toons faster and the argument might be that it will increase burnout. I've never bought that, but hey.
Er, except you only get to "skip" the timesink if you're killing the boss on a higher difficulty. And if you're regularly killing normal or heroic bosses, you're usually dedicated enough where you have no desire for extra weekly chores on top of the ones that already exist.
ReplyDeleteOn top of that, you won't gear any faster on a weekly basis - so you can't "roll through toons faster."
This solution makes me mad at Blizzard for not implementing it already. I haven't yet read the source article because I wanted to comment, but I will read that as well.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Andrew, players could burn out slower because they won't be seeing the same instance multiple times (once per difficulty).
I run LFR because my guild dissolved with MoP. I still want to see the content, but not change guilds/servers, etc. My hopes are with 5.4 bringing more players together so at least Flex is an option.
ReplyDeleteAs a LFR healer, I love it when the tank is normal/heroic raid geared. It's not so much a wipe-fest when the tank actually knows what he's doing and is geared for the typical LFR zerg-only mode. IMHO, taking away the incentive to run these would sadly kill LFR.
"In response to Andrew, players could burn out slower because they won't be seeing the same instance multiple times (once per difficulty)."
ReplyDeleteIndeed. That's why raid lockouts exist in the first place and why things like the "I'm going to run TOC four times a week" were changed.
"It's not so much a wipe-fest when the tank actually knows what he's doing and is geared for the typical LFR zerg-only mode. IMHO, taking away the incentive to run these would sadly kill LFR."
But is forcing a normal/heroic raider into LFR when they loathe being there a good thing? Or would it be better to adjust LFR so that it's not a wipe-fest if those people are missing?
I mean, think of the difference between a Tues/Wed LFR run and a Saturday LFR run - it's already night and day.
Hmmm so if you do normal mode, you get normal mode loot, plus THERE'S MORE! GET THIS FREE FLEX AND LFR LOOT FOR NOTHING! RING NOW! I can't see Blizz doing it though, because (a) it would badly impact LFR, as mentioned above, and (b) why would they give extra loot for doing nothing?
ReplyDeleteAt the moment, you do normal mode, you get your normal mode loot. If you add LFR, which is much faster and easier, you add some supplemental loot, which is also less valuable than normal loot. Reward is basically proportional to effort - you want more loot, you have to do more. So - if you want to raid heroics, you basically have to accept you're going to have to work harder. And like most things, if you want to compete for the top, you have to work a LOT harder. It's easy to say, "Blizz is forcing heroic raiders to run multiple difficulties to keep up," and for others to say, "Blizz isn't forcing you, it's your choice," but the truth is somewhere in between. Blizz does recognise that people feel they have to do everything possible to gear for heroics - that's why they've limited lockouts in the past. But it's also true that someone who signs up to raid heroics has to recognise that in choosing heroic raiding, they're CHOOSING to do a lot more than a normal raider - that's the way the game is made, it comes with the territory. Blizz has very little motivation to give 4 times as much loot (heroic + normal + Flex + LFR) to heroic raiders as they give to LFR raiders since that is sure to upset the majority of players (who don't raid heroics, and probably don't even raid normal).
"Blizz has very little motivation to give 4 times as much loot (heroic + normal + Flex + LFR)"
ReplyDeleteSay what? Who said anything giving normal and heroic loot each week - those are already on the same lockout, effectively. You can't run heroic AND normal on a given week.
"If you add LFR, which is much faster and easier, you add some supplemental loot, which is also less valuable than normal loot."
No, LFR is slower. Unless you queue with basically a pre-made group, in which case you're not helping the average LFR run. It's a painful, boring drudge that kills my desire to play WoW.
"But it's also true that someone who signs up to raid heroics has to recognise that in choosing heroic raiding, they're CHOOSING to do a lot more than a normal raider - that's the way the game is made, it comes with the territory."
Let's even say you're right for a moment. But how does being required to run the same raid three times a week in a game EXPLICITLY designed about only letting you do a raid once per week fit into that?
Then, I'd like you to name a time in WoW's history besides ToC (which was decisively changed because it was so terrible) where you had to run a raid three times a week.
Hell, except for WotLK and Dragon Soul specifically you could never even do a raid TWICE per week prior to MoP.
Hi Balkoth - answering your answer here. OK, I misunderstood, I thought you meant cumulative loot would apply all the way to the top. Even if a heroic raid only gave you Heroic + flex + LFR loot (no normal loot), I still think it's not a proportional, fair, reward. You get better (heroic) loot for doing heroic raids. Getting loot from things you didn't actually do (flex and LFR) seems over the top.
ReplyDeleteI understand heroic raiders feel forced to do LFR / flex, and don't want to be - maybe the answer here is to put in a different sort of raid lock so if you do heroic, you CAN'T do LFR / flex, and vice-versa. This would make heroic raiding a 'clean' choice - either you do it and nothing else, or you don't - which puts it back like it was when there was only heroic and normal and they shared a lock.
I apply this to heroic, because the issue seems to be about heroic raiders - some normal raiders I know would feel obliged to do LFR / flex as well, but the vast majority just do what they want. There's no race to get through normal mode first, and most do as much or as little as they want to... If they did feel that burning desire to be at the top, they'd be in heroic guilds...
As for LFR being slow - I suppose if you do normal with heroic raiders, randoms in LFR could seem slow. For us lowly non-heroic raiders, LFR is WAY faster then normal - you can do all of LFR in a couple of nights, we can't manage all of normal ToT in a couple of weeks...
"Even if a heroic raid only gave you Heroic + flex + LFR loot (no normal loot), I still think it's not a proportional, fair, reward. You get better (heroic) loot for doing heroic raids. Getting loot from things you didn't actually do (flex and LFR) seems over the top."
ReplyDeleteKeep in mind that, theoretically, you *should* replace all of that Flex and LFR loot with normal and heroic gear very quickly...according to Blizzard, at least. And, in practical terms, you're usually doing LFR AND Flex for a specific trinket from a specific boss (or a single tier item). So unlike the "typical" LFR and Flex raiders, you're replacing that gear extremely quickly for the most part. So it's a lower reward, proportionally speaking, for the normal/heroic raiders.
"I understand heroic raiders feel forced to do LFR / flex, and don't want to be - maybe the answer here is to put in a different sort of raid lock so if you do heroic, you CAN'T do LFR / flex, and vice-versa. This would make heroic raiding a 'clean' choice - either you do it and nothing else, or you don't - which puts it back like it was when there was only heroic and normal and they shared a lock."
If you can figure out a way to make that work and get Blizzard implement it, I'll send you a check for $100. Speaking for 99.9% of the serious heroic raiders (aka, not someone who only gets 1-2 heroic modes during an entire tier), we would be very, very happy with that.
"I apply this to heroic, because the issue seems to be about heroic raiders - some normal raiders I know would feel obliged to do LFR / flex as well, but the vast majority just do what they want."
Funnily enough, as Theck mentioned in his post, it'll probably be a worse problem for some normal guilds - because they won't have all normal bosses on farm and thus benefit more from LFR/Flex loot. So it'll be even more important to them.
"For us lowly non-heroic raiders, LFR is WAY faster then normal - you can do all of LFR in a couple of nights, we can't manage all of normal ToT in a couple of weeks."
We booted up our alt run last week - first run since the summer began. Went 11/12N in ToT in about 3 hours and finished Lei Shen in 30 minutes on another day. We had some people below 500 ilvl and I'm not sure anyone had the 600 ilvl cloak. That's much, much faster than LFR in a random group.
These are very good ideas. The design intent seems against them, though-they would work fine, and improve the game, but I think Blizzard is more concerned with LFR raiders' QoL than heroic raiders. The simple fact is that of the heroic raiding community, a wide majority of them WILL run the LFRs and flex raids if loot needs force them to. Therefore, blizzard will not gain anything tangible by making this change-so it's already on their backburner next to placating the slighted-pvp-class-du-jour.
ReplyDeleteAs far as time goes, though, there is a slight wrinkle. If you consider a WoW subscription as a gym membership, then the proposed system here definitely does hasten the loot acquisition process. Despotism knows better than most how much of a time sink LFR is, and flex certainly will be; I KNOW that for a significant portion of WoW's population, the amount of time consumed by LFR is prohibitive. Only two chances this week for an uninterrupted 2-3 hours or two of play? That won't get you a full clear of LFR and a normal raid, but with a good group it could easily finish one or the other. The problem I see is that the current model of WoW raids has one workout machine per room, and the rooms are all at least 20 yards apart(needlessly detailed poor analogy is needlessly detailed and poor, sorry), where the change proposed here places all four machines adjacent to each other. The gym still leases all of the space(dev time constructing and debugging LFR/Flex-specific mechanics), but the members are not compelled to use it.
Lockouts dont have a magical transitive property. Just because flex/lfr don't share a lockout and normal/flex don't share a lockout doesn't mean normal and lfr can't.
ReplyDeleteJust institute a normal/lfr lockout. Problem solved, no more raider bitching about being forced to do more.
"The simple fact is that of the heroic raiding community, a wide majority of them WILL run the LFRs and flex raids if loot needs force them to."
ReplyDeleteSure - and some of those will also burn out and quit and LFR's atmosphere will be even more toxic. But the same could be true of 10 man ICC and 25 man ICC. Now they're somewhat regretting merging the ICC lockouts - but NOT because players can't do the same raid twice a week, but because it left no easy raid mode (ICC 10).
"If you consider a WoW subscription as a gym membership, then the proposed system here definitely does hasten the loot acquisition process."
But it doesn't - because normal and heroic raiders are going to replace every LFR/Flex piece eventually anyway. The time to get full normal/heroic gear does not change (technically it does because you'll kill progression bosses faster but I don't think that's what you meant). You're still looking at months of farming normal/heroic either way.
The weekly lockout on normal/heroic gear means it'll still take the same number of weeks whether you do LFR/Flex or not (leaving aside getting the issue of killing bosses faster).
"Lockouts dont have a magical transitive property. Just because flex/lfr don't share a lockout and normal/flex don't share a lockout doesn't mean normal and lfr can't."
Except that would prevent someone from doing LFR and then jumping into a normal PUG (and skipping Flex - and I think it would be a reason question to ask "Why can I do normal and Flex but not normal and LFR - LFR drops lower item level gear anyway!"). It would also stop someone from doing LFR, then trying Flex, and then moving up to normal within the same week.
It would still disrupt upward mobility to some degree which Blizzard does not want.
I'm not saying they want to or should do it. I'm saying it's clearly an option.
DeleteSure. But by that logic, LFR/Flex could share a lockout and Flex/normal could share a lockout. Blizzard has said they do not wish to do this. It's clearly an option, though.
DeleteAh, I get it. I'm not sure why hard core raiders should be rewarded with extra rolls they didn't earn, though.
ReplyDeleteSeems to me if we're going to start tweaking things because they don't want more "work," then more loot is the wrong way to do it - it's providing more reward for less work. Bad.
Why not have a normal/heroic "loot lockout"? You only get one shot at either the normal OR heroic version of the boss loot each week.
The lockout goes by whichever version of the boss you encounter first.
All the top raiders will go for heroic, and they can save 15 hours of playing time each, since they don't get rolls for normal, flex, or lfr, so they won't have to run any of those raids.
Everyone else can do LFR, and flex if they wish, and normal if they wish (provided they run normal after the others).
Problem solved and hard core raiders get clearly needed time off.
If normal guilds feel compelled to then run LFR ---> Flex ---> Normal, fine. Seems like many "normal" raiders are already treating LFR as optional, I highly doubt they'll tolerate a regimented three raid requirement each week.
"Why not have a normal/heroic "loot lockout"? You only get one shot at either the normal OR heroic version of the boss loot each week."
ReplyDeleteThis is the exact current system. If you kill Boss 1 on normal, you cannot do it on heroic, or vice versa. You have described as a concept the way that normal/heroic is structured right now. The problem is that an all-heroic clear is not feasible the first week-literally, given that a few guilds do quite seriously leap into it the second the servers open and log off only to sleep, shower and scarf down some food.
That aside, the idea has merit. Tagging loot for LFR/flex bosses together with normal/heroic, or some mixed iteration on that concept, solves the problem to an extent. Theck did mention, in the linked post here, that this punishes or at least limits LFR/flex raiders. The rare chance such people may have to do normal, they will be punished for getting their LFR/flex raiding done before their normal raid goes, or vice versa-people do exist who do LFR as a group, in lieu of normal+ raiding, and flex is sure to birth more teams who do just that. Any fix to the problem of heroic raiders incentivized to run LFR/flex must avoid damaging the existing benefits that it affords to people who primarily run LFR/flex.
aww you don't have time to do lfr or flex due to you raid heroic content you poor baby. Really this is a problem for people? your prolly the guy in every lfr calling everyone else the idiots. ya know the pro of wow type. this is a sad discussion be happy your in a heroic group finding that kind of team is hard nowdays
ReplyDeleteoh and no you shouldn't get free loot just because your in heroic you should have to sit through the hell of lfr with everyone else.
DeleteWell, I *made* my heroic team pretty much from scratch, so yes, I'm aware of the difficulty.
DeleteNor have I even done LFR this patch on my main -- thankfully, none of the trinkets were broken enough to be better than other higher ilvl trinkets (unlike, say, a rogue for whom the only trinket better than the Sha of Pride one is...a better Sha of Pride one. 528 Sha of Pride trinket > any non-Sha of Pride trinket). Hell, I've only done one SoO LFR boss, period, on any character this patch and that was on an alt for the last Runestone I needed (queued for both Lei Shen and Sha of Pride).
More to the point, I only call people in LFR idiots if it's clear they're AFK, intentionally dying, or otherwise griefing the raid. Nice assumptions, though.