The game, the rut, my possible conclusion

World of Warcraft
1

I used to be able to spend months leveling a toon. That was enjoyable for me. The game is now about 2 weeks long. Everything else is endgame.

The open world combat in SL is at the edge of my abilities. My body can just about handle the adrenalin it requires for me to survive in the open world (and I still die far more often than I’m used to). The highest gear I’m now receiving is ilevel 155 - the covenant gear. It appears that, in order to get higher ilevel gear in order to make open world combat less intense, I’ll have to do endgame stuff, which is even more intense. So, I appear to be stuck in an ilevel 150-155 rut. Sad trombone.

It’s quite possible that this will never change, due to the changes in the game with this xpac. So, it’s beginning to appear that this game no longer has receptors for people like me, and that it might be time for me to move along to a more casual game again. I’m not ready to jump ship just yet and am open to comments, suggestions, etc., in case there are things I’m not thinking about that might be helpful for me to know or remember.

I did just buy myself a new headset for the purpose of grouping with others, and plan to try some dungeons with guildies who are willing to go at something less than breakneck speed with me. We’ll see how that goes.

I’m also looking to see if it’s a class issue. I’ve tried ele shammy and unholy dk so far, but am thinking of trying my warlock and hunter to see if they’re any easier or more survivable (ie: less adrenaline). I have 1 of every class at level 50, so if anyone can recommend a spec that might be more helpful for my issues, please chime in. Learning a new spec and role can be stressful, but I can take my time with it. The other thing I can try is switching to blood dk. I’m concerned that a tank build would make open world combat much longer than it already is for me, which I might find frustrating.

Thanks in advance for any helpful info.

1 Like
2

My favourite class for… A loooong time has always been an affliction lock. For me it’s super relaxing. You just dot everything up and heal :slight_smile:

1 Like
3

I am seeing the same kind of thing. I havnt played in a while and am in mostly ilvl 55 stuff. The combat is definitely geared to much better equipment.

4

@ribbit Hopefully this helps. I completely sympathize. This is where I was after Cataclysm and left the game for SWTOR. When I came back 5 years later, I was astounded that the amount of content available. I’ve been back now for over 4 years, and I have still barely scratched the surface. I have the opposite problem from you in that I have so many options I have to figure out what I want to do next. :slight_smile:

I rarely do endgame (dungeons and raids) content becasue of arthritis in my hands. I go along on one of Prissy’s raids once in a blue moon because they are super laid back and won’t yell at me when I die 30 seconds into a boss. I will also do a dungeon now and then as long as people know I’m not as good as I used to be. And that I will also probably be dead fast. I do not have war mode on so I don’t deal with PVP, unless I choose to. (Used to love it. Just can’t react as fast as I need to.)

There are so many things I haven’t done yet in almost every xpac from Pandaria on. I particularly want to go to Draenor and Pandaria and hit areas I barely opened on the map. There are still so many quests I have yet to do in those areas. I go through phases and focus on different things: alts, leveling crafting (this alone can take a lot of time), getting pets (another fun thing that can take months and months and still have more to do) and mounts (usually need help with those). Mostly I just don’t rush. If I don’t get something done today, I’ll finish it tomorrow.

My main (pally) should hit 60 tonight. I still have all the quests in SL remaining in Ardenweald and beyond, that I will complete before looking at what I want to do next. I have quite a few alts and not all are at 50 yet, let alone 60. Oh and right now pally’s are super easy to play. I have only died like 6-7 times total split between 2 harder quests.

To put this in perspective, when I was leveling my mage way back when, I used to die about 2 dozen times a day, Not an exaggeration. Someone finally around level 50 turned me on to the fact that I had a pet I could use (we were in Legion xpac then, so 60 levels left). I was thrilled because I spent the next 50 ish levels only dying about a dozen times a day. (True story.) I was dreading getting her into Legion because I had struggled with more than one alt in Legion.

THEN I got to Legion and breezed through. I hardly ever died more than 1-2 times a day. Same when I took her to BFA. We shall see how she does in SL.

I also think SL is one of WoW’s strongest xpacs. I think the areas are gorgeous. The quests have been fun.

Legion was good, but hard. Much of that was because that was when I was returning to the game, and I had to relearn a lot of stuff.

Not sure any of this is helpful, but might at least spark some ideas.

2 Likes
5

im not a fan of end game crap. thats why i mostly do older content

1 Like
6

Bring Doomfinger out of retirement and spec him Destruction.

I was having issues with Affliction not killing things fast enough before the Blueberry would die. I changed to Destruction and my upfront damage is so much better. I’ll be happy to walk you thru my talents and why i did them anytime you want to.

Gear - yep, i am seeing 158 as the cap on WQ, Heroic dungeons at 171 will be your best bet for gearing up. As we continue to increase our gear score, more of us will be able to help you thru heroics anytime you want to run them. We know you need to go slower and its a relief sometimes to go slower and learn the fights better. i still haven’t seen them all yet.

Covenants - Doom should go Night Fae for Soul Rot. This is a time gated system, you are in no rush to do these all in a day. Again, if there is anything you want help understanding, you know you can always ask us. This was not a straightforward learning curve. I feel Beta players were already comfortable with how everything worked and didn’t need a walk-about to re-learn it. I am just know getting comfortable with it all myself.

Maw - some of this will be required story prgression, some of it can be ignored if you so desire.

Torgast - actually is pretty fun. You will like that (with the exception if you get the Assassin curse of spawning randomly) you can take your time and go at your own pace. There is no rush to the end boss.

Developing your covenant abilities over time will make content easier in the long run along with gear upgrades. It just takes time.

1 Like
7

In affliction haste is more important stat after intelligence. In destro its crit

8

I am allowing my voidie to tank for me, but the trick I’ve been told is to let him get aggro, stand back and just dot, dot, dot then blast away with the appropriate blasts, drain soul, drain life, etc. By the time the voidie gets to 1/4 health, I just start healing him because I can without issue due to the aggro he still has on the mob. Works pretty well if you don’t rush in.

So far in SL the key for me is to follow other folks around regardless if they are guildies or not and just dot everything they are attacking and act like you are part of their parties. :grinning: Also I take advantage of Horde being in the area because sometimes they will inadvertently draw the mob aggro away if I get jumped.

The major benefit of this follow gambit is that you won’t have to worry so much about the stray mob coming out of no where and catching you off guard. If that happens, just run toward the folks ahead and allow them to grab the aggro off of you then swing around again to a distance far enough to be safe from melee range and go at it.

Its difficult for me to solo in the Maw unless there are a bunch of other players around, including Horde because I just don’t have the melee capability to ward them off. Last night I encountered one, then around a rock came two others with their insane stun-lock attacks. Game over at that point because both me and my voidie were toast. This is the only reason I dislike the maw…I can’t solo yet because of my gear score.

I feel your frustration, Ribbit, I do. The person I have asked for help, if you are looking at warlock, would be Trevain. He has been extremely helpful by providing me a ton of suggestions for how to setup my skills to be better synchronized for optimum damage. I am sure, however, any one else who is running a warlock would be happy to help you out.

But if you are thinking of using your hunter (which I am planning on bringing in next) I suggest snagging Crazie because he has crazy skills and usually is available when hunter questions arise. He is actually the one I plan to ask for hunter help due to all the changes that have occurred for the hunter this xpac.

1 Like
9

Aha, I wondered about that. You helped me so much on Trevain with my affliction spec that I see what you mean now that I’ve been fighting the death god with my voidie. Even though I’ve managed to work with it, I do think affliction might just be better with a stronger voidie…which I suspect has been nurffed into the ground recently. I really dislike Bliz for doing that nurf on our pets that they become wet paper dolls instead of the amazing partners they used to be. Used to do pretty well end of the BfA xpac when I finally got my spec right (thanks to you).

I may just bribe you to help me do my destro setup too, if you are providing lessons. :rofl:

10

^^^ this so much. I am doing Night Fae and love it. That soul Rot along with the morph to fox speed/blink capability finally gives locks something they’ve been needing…movement speed. Definitely go Fae well worth it for those skills, not to mention the region is absolutely beautiful.

I have been chuckling through it recently when I started hearing some of the silly npc commentaries. I was slowing down in one area because, of course, I got lost. That is when I realized that some of those silly npcs are actually funny. So I make it a point to keep my in-game npc speech sound on so I can listen to what is being said. :rofl:

Oh, and one more thing, Ribbit. I think we have been spoiled with being “pointed in the direction” rather than suss it out ourselves. Although I have a hard time with the text comments being so obscure that I’ve had to actually take my time now to read something more than once to understand what the quest is telling me. More often tho I’ve found myself having to look it up because I truly did not understand something.

Last night in game folks were trying to help me when I got frustrated because I just could not find the targets of one of the quests I was on. They said that the game is offering up puzzles and clues instead of straight forward directions. I used to be really good at word puzzles, but that changed years ago when my car accident happened. The result of which was my learning style changed considerably and I had to relearn how to learn again.

From then on I found that I was not as good at scavenger hunts because you have to solve a puzzle to get to the answer just to find the direction you need to go. I learn by seeing and doing now, so its harder for me to figure out some of these.

11

Thanks, all. I rolled a new Affliction lock and got comfy with the early kit, then brought Doomfinger to Bastion as Affliction. Not having any trouble yet. Voidie hasn’t lost any health in a fight yet (Even Herculon), but she’s still only at the Temple of Purity. Doom usually runs Destro, so switching back if I have to will be easy.

I took yesterday off from my higher level toons, so I feel a bit refreshed and am looking forward to playing her. I’d already figured Soul Rot was the way to go, after looking over the abilities. Thanks for the corroboration on that.

@Lyn - I have a “quiet” chat tab that only shows whispers, group chat, and npc chat so I can blot out everything else when I get overwhelmed and also read npc stuff if I miss it or don’t understand it. It’s a nice qol improvement for me. Also, youtube video guides ftw - for people who learn by watching, which sometimes is me, too. :slight_smile:

12

Seems we are in the same book, if not on the same page. Its always comforting to know there are others experiencing similar or the same issues. For me its made me more careful with what I say to folks and how I interact. I feel free to just be me in this guild, which of course, is evident when what I think spills out in voice chat and I hear Crazie chuckle or Chantillary segue into a funny response.

As for my own chat, I’ve one tab setup as OTG, which only has guild chat, whispers, etc., similar to what you have. Works beautifully!

13

My quiet tab is separate from my OTG tab so I can get away from the noise of guild when I need to.

14

I would counsel a bit of patience before getting too discouraged.

I think one problem is many of us have forgotten what open world content felt like when BfA was new. We got used to flattening everything with ease outside of, say, raids and M+ progression. I’ve had to remind myself that I freakin’ died quite a lot on simple, open world content when I first got to cap in BfA.

Also, my understanding is that you can upgrade the gear you get from your covenant, eventually. I haven’t looked into it, so IDK what kind of content will be required to enable that, but I know that it is possible.

Lastly, I’m sure there will be ilvl advancement and “catchup” mechanics. Hopefully not as absurdly out of hand as in BfA, but certainly some path to delayed gear progression that doesn’t require raiding, M+, or other “end game” content. It just sound business sense from Blizz.

2 Likes
15

I played WoW for 8+ years. Didn’t die once.

3 Likes
16

There’s one in every group!!! :rofl:

2 Likes
17

Standing in the auction house isn’t playing, Dread.

5 Likes
18

:rofl: :grin: :joy:

19

WTH, Splutty, I’d never stand in the Auction House. /dance, maybe.

2 Likes
20

You’re being silly (afaict), but I’m going to be serious. The primary reason I game is to have experiences of accomplishment and success because I rarely get to have those in real life. It’s not easy for me to get beyond equating death with failure because it feels so much like my RL experiences when it happens.