Tuesday 24 July 2018

Legion review

I didn't like it that much

There are several reasons why, and not all was bad, but the fact is that I actually almost stopped playing World of Warcraft since my last blog, and that has not happened since 2007.

So, why did that happen, partly maybe because I have played this long, partly because I am also playing some other games these days, but mostly because Legion didn't grab me. So why did that happen, again, just like in air crashes, not one thing, but a lot of little things. So let's look at stuff what you can do in Legion, and what I think about it.

The raids where not the problem, I liked them all, and that was actually what I was doing the last months, log in, raid, chat a little, and log of. I didn't really need stuff anymore, I just wanted to be in the guild for a few hours, having some fun. I would have liked to do some Mythic Raids, but after clearing the raid on 3 difficulties, I can see why people in Innovation got sick of learning a fight..again. I still think Normal raids can be scrapped by now, their niche of being flex-raids is no longer applicable, and we could do with a difficulty less.

Pet-Battles... yeah.. I don't know. I used to do them a lot in WoD, but somehow I stopped doing them in Legion. Actually I stopped doing them because I had so much else to do at the start in Legion, and I just didn't picked it up again.

The same applies to Archaeology, although I did do all the quests once, I just stopped after that. Same for Fishing, get to max, get the Artifact a little bit up, and that's it. Ran out of time.

I still don't PvP.

Now, another beast, Dungeons. I used to like them a lot. I ran a Gazillion dungeons in TBC and Wrath. And I still did them at the start of Legion, but after that, not that much. I don't like mindless pushing through dungeons and AoE-ing everything down. And than there is the go-go-go mentality everyone has these days, chill down people. Really, people do need to take some breaks now and then, don't explode...

I used to like the tactics in dungeons, the CC-ing, the fearing adds, the MC-ing adds. These days, trash does hardly anything... that's why running low level dungeons, especially the TBC ones gets interesting  :)

And than there is this Mythic+ Dungeon stuff, did I already hinted at the fact that I don't like rushing? And now you put a timer on it? Great...not for me.

World Quests... yeah, I liked them at first, and I really did a lot of them the first few months of Legion. But the moment I started having time to play some of my alts, I started to hate them. As far as I know, WQ's where introduced so people didn't have to do the same dailies every day, to change it up a little, because make no mistake, that daily emissary is basically your daily. And now you have 10 alts..with the same daily emissary... so instead of having to do the same quest everyday, you know can do the same quest 11 times on the same day.

But wait, can't you do different quests on your alts? Yes, you could, but unless a certain WQ gives something nice for that alt, I tended to go for the biggest rewarding ones, which in 95% made me do the same WQ's on all alts..guess what...that didn't last long.

And then we have the Artifacts, if something isn't alt-friendly, it was the artifacts. In previous expansions you could play your alt on the level you wanted, And yes, it did take a little longer for your legendary ring, cloak, but that didn't matter too much. But your Weapon being the thing you need to upgrade all expansion, that is a big thing. And it also took a long time.. so most of my alts have hardly any fully upgraded Artifacts

I did like the leveling, the first time around. The level any where you want idea is a good idea, but it becomes a little more strange if you really look at it. They definitely designed the Broken Isles to do in a certain order, it's like Cataclysm again. Yes you can choose between two zones, Mount Hyjal or that underwater zone, but you better do MH, because it gives the most reputation.

The same applies here. Most professions starting quests where in Aszuna. To advance in your Order hall, and your Artifact, you had to completed the Dying Dragon quest in Val'Sharah, and Help the other dragons in Aszuna. Some of my alts started their journey on the other side of the continent, and still haven't completed these two.. So, it is nice that you can level any where you want.. but you'd better do these zones first...

Legendaries....  right... let's introduce a system of randomly dropped gear with big bonusi..bonuses? well.. and have some classes be completely useless w/o certain legendaries.. great Idea.....At least, you didn't have to juggle several Leggo's at the start. For me it felt like I got two more talent rows.. and if you look to a post a few moths back..you can see what that meant.

It all comes down to time. I normally have 4 hours a day to focus on WoW, this includes all the stuff you don't do in a game, like theory-crafting, reading up on changes, and *cough* blogging. And that is just not enough to do all the stuff you can do. Which is not bad. But I like to play some different classes, and then it does become a problem.

Basically, I am a raider, and will do as much as possible to be a good raider. But, doing stuff I dislike is something I really want to avoid. But still, with the stuff I did like, or didn't dislike that much, most of my time was filled with Mardah, and just not enough time to do anything meaningful with alts, especially because they where all over the place with profession, artifact, legendaries, order hall stuff, brokenshore, suramar, argus.

And by the time the catch-up mechanics came around I was already exploring other games, so I allotted some time to those, there is only so much time you can spend a day playing games, and Legion didn't hold me.

Let's see if a Battle for Azeroth does, at least it has the best feature yet in a long time,

Guild Chat Back logs