Where did WoW go right?

[poofph]

instant gratification

[Lubian]

It would probably be easy to write a book on why WoW has been so successful over the other MMOs.

There's no one sole reason why it's successful, but rather a huge combination of reasons.

I guess I'll jump on that on the EQ boards, WoW is misinterpreted as too easy, while realistically the developers have really just removed parts of the game that many players did not enjoy.

For example, in EQ buffing is a chore, especially on P99. Do the buffs need to have a long cast time? No. Do they need to significantly increase your downtime, because of the mana cost? No. Do they need to have so short of a duration, you spend a large amount of time refreshing them? No.

Many things in EQ aren't difficult, as some of you may be led to believe, but rather are just chores in the game. Solo killing a creature and waiting for your mana to return isn't difficult; it's just unneedlessly long and painstaking. Auto attacking and hitting a button on a monk isn't difficult.

There are hundreds of poorly implemented systems on EQ that are like this, that didn't really have much thought put into them.

[Feachie]

the main attraction to wow, i think, is that it doesn't need a huge time commitment. you can pick it up and play for an hour or two and see tangible progress and character progression. and unless you want to do bleeding edge progression stuff, raids can be done with 3-4 hours two nights a week.

wow is for people without much time. in a nutshell, wow is for the masses.

[Messianic]

WoW was able to harness the fan following of every single blizzard line (starcraft, warcraft, diablo) with an already established storyline/lore coupled with a massively renovated interface engine from EQ. Perfect place, perfect time, no real competition came out until it was too late.

WoW Vanilla/BC-ish is probably the best mmo that has ever existed and the best that will exist for a while. I think if someone had really gotten the LotR thing going before WoW with the same dynamic interface engine and combat system, it might have been nearly as successful.

[tops419]

does anyone know if there is a classic WoW server live anywhere with a decent population? maybe something similar to the P1999 community? I think I'd be all over that, atleast for a while.

[Breeziyo]

Originally Posted by tops419 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

does anyone know if there is a classic WoW server live anywhere with a decent population? maybe something similar to the P1999 community? I think I'd be all over that, atleast for a while.

You'll have to torrent a client specifically for the private servers, but yes there are a few. Wow-one is one that I've played and it's pretty decent. Very large russian presence there, but the majority of players speak english. Alterac Valley is for the most part broken unless they've recently fixed it as well, that's pretty much why I quit.

[Messianic]

Originally Posted by tops419 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

does anyone know if there is a classic WoW server live anywhere with a decent population? maybe something similar to the P1999 community? I think I'd be all over that, atleast for a while.

Molten Wow isn't classic, but it's a great set of servers. Community is kind of meh - not horrible, not great though. Nothing like p99 in terms of community.

But I think Molten wow is it if you want emulated WoW with a decent population.

[falkun]

These comments are mostly about Burning Crusade.

WoW (originally) shifted group responsibility to more members of the party. Mages could only CC 1 mob, pretty much every class could only CC 1 mob, so most classes had to help out. Pulls could not be trivialized with lull/FD mechanics. In EQ, a good puller and/or CC could make a decent group amazing.

Karazhan was a fucking amazing instance with great scripts, even if you were overgeared it was still a fun way to screw away 3 hours with friends.

Encounters were more than tank+spank.

Skills were tuned to not be overpowered (or more balanced than a 30 second root) for PVP. More chess-like and less like checkers.

You had multiple classes that could fulfill multiple rolls (sufficiently), yet very differently, a lot less "no cleric, no group".

Multiple, distinct armor looks. No more obtaining plate and seeing the SAME graphic for the entirety of your character's existence.

They made "the grind" a bit more exciting by having quests to do. Now you had a reason to go slay those large_rats for an hour, you needed 4 whiskers for Jaina's stew.

Heroics were originally heroic. You needed some gear, or at least some above-average skill, to do heroics, and they had entrance requirements (faction farming). Decent carrot on a stick mechanic.

But there's a whole list of things they did wrong or too much of while doing all this right, but that's another thread.

[Aceofcups]

I think falkun nailed alot of it.

I personally loved Karazhan and the BC era. However even at the start i disliked how much easier it was than EQ. And every expansion only seemed to make it easier.

Also i really wish WoW hadn't jumped numbers so largely each expac.
Some friends want me to come back and i glance at the game and see +100 sta, on some random ring...which used to be what my old BiS BC pants had enchants/gems decked out...

Edit: On a side note, i'd go back to WoW in under 15secs if they released progressional servers like EQ did.

[Deddar]

Funny people mentioned vanilla wow progression servers and lone behold they are starting a brand new one on AUG 25th that will be very close to how wow was when it was released. Its called Emerald Dream which will be run on Feenix Server Project. I found the info over at wow-one so go check it out for yourself!

http://www.wow-one.com/forum/topic/2...emerald-dream/