It's official, Valve is turning TF2 in World of Warcraft

[Iggy]

Originally Posted by Suite307

Why would you guys care, you guys are playing FF :P

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Hirohito]

Originally Posted by Suite307

Soldier gets a PickAxe and a Bugle and demoman gets a 16 shot sticky with selective detonation

Don't forget that the pick axe's taunt is that he blows himself up with a grenade that kills anybody near the blast.

[Agent Buckshot Moose]

Originally Posted by Credge

I think Valve is past the trial and error phase. They know exactly what they're doing now.

The pyro, medic, and heavy updates? Those seemed more like a brain storm session than seasoned results. The Spy and Sniper update was another brain storm session that flopped but was quickly resolved by reintroducing the old system and combining it with the new, although the items had specific results that they shot for and succeeded with.

This new update seems pretty solid. They've tied together the new system with another new system and it works. Also, they seem to be doing this update rather right in terms of items. The demonmans sword and shield thing is neat. It doesn't fit fluff wise, but it fits mechanic wise and is funny. The soldier rocket thing is 100% perfect as well.

Maybe they'll really drop the ball on the other items, but so far it's been pretty solid.

Maybe they know what they're doing, maybe not. Personally, the game has kept going downhill for me from what it was originally as they kept adding more of this weirdness in. I prefer FF to TF2 anyway, but sometimes I played TF2 for a change of pace. The crits were bad enough, then they added the stupid achievement system for getting new weapons. That was even worse. I stopped playing really before they did this hat, inventory, and now crafting thing. They're way over-complicating the game, honestly. They should've stuck with a simple way of opening up new weapons for classes and never bothered with any of the rest of it, in my opionion.

[Credge]

I don't really understand complaints about TF2. Crits are valid. There are servers that have them disabled that still allow for weapons with crit mechanics to be used. Most competitive play is played like that.

But then you have people who say it's too simple and now people are saying that it's overcomplicated. I don't really get it. I can understand just not liking it though.

[RocKwell]

Actually, that system is the best option for the other system they've put in place. I don't agree with the original system, but they like it, and the answer to the problem that it presented is a good one.

Now I can take my 140,000 Flareguns and make them in to something I'd actually use.

Like the new class weapons.

Pretty much that ^ . Why are people even complaining? It's obviously geared towards the public players, whom take up most of the game's population. Adding different kinds of updates to a game that is 2+ years old is never a bad thing. Hell, I'm surprised it's going as long as it has. It's pretty clear what Valve's direction is.

Players here have had a vendetta towards TF2 ever since it came out. Even if the latest update to the game printed out hundred dollar bills and turned your keyboard and mouse into gold and strippers, someone would still find something to bitch about.

[Bridget]

I find that I enjoy Team Fortress 2 more when I make an effort to isolate it from the other fortress games. I originally rolled my eyes at the crafting and hats and such, but then I realized I was only doing that because I was holding it to the standard of another game. Now, I treat TF2 as it begs to be treated, as a unique game isolated from the Team Fortress series, despite the name.

From this unbiased and fair perspective, you have to respect what the team has done. Really? A first-person shooter that has achievements that lead to weapon unlocks, which can be also randomly obtained from killed players and through the process of crafting? It's a bit bizarre, but it's a first as far as I can tell, innovative and new for a first person shooter, keeps things fresh and new and interesting, and who can complain about free updates far past its date of release?

I don't care what they do to Team Fortress 2, because I trust the team will make wise decisions, and I always know there's the alternative available at any time with Fortress Forever. People need to stop being so dramatic about this issue, it's really unnecessary.

[GenghisTron]

Originally Posted by Bridget

I find that I enjoy Team Fortress 2 more when I make an effort to isolate it from the other fortress games. I originally rolled my eyes at the crafting and hats and such, but then I realized I was only doing that because I was holding it to the standard of another game. Now, I treat TF2 as it begs to be treated, as a unique game isolated from the Team Fortress series, despite the name.

From this unbiased and fair perspective, you have to respect what the team has done. Really? A first-person shooter that has achievements that lead to weapon unlocks, which can be also randomly obtained from killed players and through the process of crafting? It's a bit bizarre, but it's a first as far as I can tell, innovative and new for a first person shooter, keeps things fresh and new and interesting, and who can complain about free updates far past its date of release?

I don't care what they do to Team Fortress 2, because I trust the team will make wise decisions, and I always know there's the alternative available at any time with Fortress Forever. People need to stop being so dramatic about this issue, it's really unnecessary.

The entire reason why I made this thread was because Team Fortress 2 is becoming the first first-person shooter to adapt the features of MMORPG's that keep casuals playing the game. Crafting, achievements, dailies, etc., are all things that keep casuals interested in the game, because skill is clearly not the only motivation for players that play FPS's. When you have a game that has as many players as TF2, you'll eventually have large segments of players that get bored, because naturally they're casuals. Stuff like crafting and achievements adds a new dimension that negates the need for skill in skill-based games, and gives casual/bad/etc., players a reason to keep playing the game.

Thus why I made this thread. Valve is turning TF2 into World of Warcraft, minus the spells and lore, and is giving it guns and a facelift. I personally view that as a bad/silly thing--I find that the eSport direction of FPS's to be an objectively correct path to follow, whereas these new measures water down competitive and skill-based platitudes that basically make these games what they are.

[Circuitous]

Here's the thing, though. TF2 is a casual game. That's really all there is to it.

Here's the other thing. Most video game players are casual players. The first-person shooter genre has a slightly "better" ratio than most genres (fighting games and RTSs are the only better ratios I can think of), but there are still tons of players who would rather craft weapons from random drops and get lucky crits than do whatever-the-hell-it-is people who try to take TF2 seriously do.

That said, if TF2's competitive scene disappeared today, it wouldn't change TF2 in the slightest. Why does it matter? There are plenty of FPS games that are actually geared toward competitive play that you or any of the people who bitch about TF2's casual nature could play, and yet every one of them is slowly stagnating or outright dying as months pass. Just move on. TF2 isn't for you, and it never was.

[GenghisTron]

I don't disagree, I tried TF2 and never played it again. This thread was merely a rusing, and I just find it offensive that Valve is doing everything in it's power to kill it's game in the same fashion as Blizzard is doing to World of Warcraft. However, in hindsight I probably shouldn't have even made this thread, considering it affects me personally in the least--at least when I complained about WoW being watered down, I played it.

[Circuitous]

WoW is dying?

Haha, what?

[GenghisTron]

No, WoW is not dying, what is dying is the competitive spirit of the game. The casualization of WoW is what drove people like me away from the game, but hooked many more times the amount of casuals. Making games more casual will increase the bottomlines of the companies that make them, but they also drive away players who seek skill-based gameplay and essentially kill the spirit of 'games' themselves, and instead turn them into social constructs similar to Habbo Hotel and GAIA Online.

And before someone asks, I was a 5-time Gladiator and was in two separate US-100 PvE Progression guilds in my time. I think I have a pretty good grasp of the game.

[squeek.]

What is your definition of skill, Genghis? And which parts of that definition does WoW require? How is one WoW player better than another?

For me, any game with artificial limitations (such as global leveling, global items, and abilities/combat that don't/doesn't require aiming) create an artificial perception of skill, but those elements don't actually require much else other than knowledge (what skill to use and when) and the existence of working hands. Of course, there are exceptions to that; MMORPGs can both require skill and have RPG elements (GunZ has global leveling and items but also requires some form of skill, and so does Rakion [both are MMOFPS-ish, though]), but, as far as I can tell, WoW doesn't (I played to level 40 and did battlegrounds a bit when BG first came out).

[GenghisTron]

Obviously it's different from an FPS, where a lot of your skill comes from movement and aiming. WoW was a game where once you reached the level cap your actual 'journey' began. Sure, levelling and all that jazz blows, and yes it is a humongous grind, but don't let that fool you, the game (took) an exceptional amount of skill to be the best at endgame. The grind to get to the endgame didn't really take any skill at all, but once you reached max level and into the upper echelons of the PvP/PvE community the skill curve dramatically rose.

WoW took an exceptional amount of skill to be considered good and/or the 'best'. You had to be able to think on your feet (In both PvE and PvP) and be prepared to mash buttons to avoid dying. In PvP you had to know literally every spell of every class, you had to know resistances, weaknesses and strengths of your class versus others, you had to learn how to lockdown other classes. You had to adapt to the playstyles of other players, most PvP'ers don't play the same way. I'm mainly talking from a perspective of PvP'ing, if you haven't noticed. Anyways, WoW PvP used used to be like chess, kind of, but with many more moving parts. PvE wasn't as difficult, it honestly depended on how good your collective raid was, and really the only thing that separated US-100 guilds from US-200-1000 guilds was they invested more time into raiding, and of course had a relatively higher skill raid to work with, but it wasn't huge. PvE did present a few challenges, but like I said, it was mostly on the shoulders of the collective raid, such as communicating, doing the right things at the right time (Leadership), etc.

Now, WoW has turned into a game that rewards mediocrity, no longer will terrible guilds and terrible players go without clearing the new raid instances, or get the newest PvP gear! They'll get gear that isn't quite as good as the best, with relatively minor discrepancies in stats between the two. You can now get the Tier armor without even entering the raid instance it's supposed to drop from. In PvP if you play from one of the many flavor of the month classes, you can pretty much 2-shot people if you crit, or you can outheal the damage of 4+ people. The battlegrounds are now 'vehicle combat' battlegrounds, taking even more skill out of the game. Literally everything they did with WoTLK watered the game down to a casual's dream.

[Etzell]

What's a developer to do?
If you cater to the people who want the game to be all about skills, you get FF: A game with a dedicated, but dying, community. You get people in the community who criticize the game for a perceived lack of a fan base, people tell you your game is too hard to get into, and so forth.

If you want the game to be casual, you get a lot of players and a dynamic fan base (TF2). You get people who like playing, but you get ridicule from the competition for not being as pro as they are.

If you attempt to mix it, you get bitched at from both sides: People who think you're making it too easy to cater to the people who don't know every single thing about the game, and people who think you're making it too hard to cater to the people with hours upon hours of time available to play the game (WoW).

Obviously, the games I've chosen aren't perfect examples, but the bottom line is the community will bitch at you no matter what you do. It's a problem with the players, more than with the devs.

[squeek.]

Originally Posted by GenghisTron

WoW took an exceptional amount of skill to be considered good and/or the 'best'. You had to be able to think on your feet (In both PvE and PvP) and be prepared to mash buttons to avoid dying. In PvP you had to know literally every spell of every class, you had to know resistances, weaknesses and strengths of your class versus others, you had to learn how to lockdown other classes. You had to adapt to the playstyles of other players, most PvP'ers don't play the same way.

To me, knowledge is not skill. It's separate (But they are related. Sometimes you need knowledge before you can increase in skill; conc aim is a good example of that). However, I see your point about PvPing. But, there are too many confounding factors for me to believe that one player beating another in PvP is down to skill. Each player will have different items, different abilities, etc. and to me, MMORPGs (and specifically WoW) are made in such a way that differences in items/levels/abilities make a real difference (and could easily overpower differences in skill).

[GenghisTron]

All your points are valid, but I also counter (In PvP) that gear differences aren't a problem at the level of PvP I was playing at. I and the people I played with put most of their energy into PvP, so those hardcore PvP'ers always got their gear in the same increments as everyone else. Of course the different abilities make PvP much more dynamic, and some classes (Even when WoW PvP was in it's prime) are going to be overpowered against a plurality of classes. WoW Developers were never that good at balancing. That being said, there are certain combos (Rogue/Mage for 2v2, and Rogue/Mage/Priest for 3v3) that, while they are very strong, and any idiot can do decent with the comp, it takes extremely high amounts of coordination/reaction, as well as thinking on your feet--to play the comp to it's fullest. Comps like RM and RMP will fail if you don't have coordination between the team members. Which is how it should be, the comp is almost entirely skill-dependent, but when played right it will win against a team it is better than, and will lose against a team it is worse than.

There was still a lot of things wrong with WoW PvP, but my main grievance is the direction they took the game, which is what Valve is doing to TF2.

[Suite307]

It's official, <Insert Game Company Here> is turning <Insert Game Here> in World Of Warcraft.

[Dexter]

Originally Posted by GenghisTron

Obviously it's different from an FPS, where a lot of your skill comes from movement and aiming. WoW was a game where once you reached the level cap your actual 'journey' began. Sure, levelling and all that jazz blows, and yes it is a humongous grind, but don't let that fool you, the game (took) an exceptional amount of skill to be the best at endgame. The grind to get to the endgame didn't really take any skill at all, but once you reached max level and into the upper echelons of the PvP/PvE community the skill curve dramatically rose.

WoW took an exceptional amount of skill to be considered good and/or the 'best'. You had to be able to think on your feet (In both PvE and PvP) and be prepared to mash buttons to avoid dying. In PvP you had to know literally every spell of every class, you had to know resistances, weaknesses and strengths of your class versus others, you had to learn how to lockdown other classes. You had to adapt to the playstyles of other players, most PvP'ers don't play the same way. I'm mainly talking from a perspective of PvP'ing, if you haven't noticed. Anyways, WoW PvP used used to be like chess, kind of, but with many more moving parts. PvE wasn't as difficult, it honestly depended on how good your collective raid was, and really the only thing that separated US-100 guilds from US-200-1000 guilds was they invested more time into raiding, and of course had a relatively higher skill raid to work with, but it wasn't huge. PvE did present a few challenges, but like I said, it was mostly on the shoulders of the collective raid, such as communicating, doing the right things at the right time (Leadership), etc.

Now, WoW has turned into a game that rewards mediocrity, no longer will terrible guilds and terrible players go without clearing the new raid instances, or get the newest PvP gear! They'll get gear that isn't quite as good as the best, with relatively minor discrepancies in stats between the two. You can now get the Tier armor without even entering the raid instance it's supposed to drop from. In PvP if you play from one of the many flavor of the month classes, you can pretty much 2-shot people if you crit, or you can outheal the damage of 4+ people. The battlegrounds are now 'vehicle combat' battlegrounds, taking even more skill out of the game. Literally everything they did with WoTLK watered the game down to a casual's dream.

this is entirely off-topic BUT
I don't know what comps you run but show me how to out-heal 4+ dps ok !With people getting globalled this season I take it you havent played since season 5

Anyway, I don't disagree with you entirely. But a lot of things in vanilla were just plain stupid mechanics. There is nothing elite about spending hours on trash in AQ, etc. A lot of things like that they moved away from which was a good idea. But the 'everyone wins!' approach to tier gear is kinda dumb. At least a lot of the 'look I'm strong as hell in wow' stuff you seem to miss has moved from exclusive gear to hard-mode titles and acheevies.

[GenghisTron]

Dude, I know what PvP is like now, you don't really need much skill. I know it's hard to heal in PvP, that's why you just roll some FOTM comp and global people. That was my point--PvP is mostly just comps that can faceroll the hardest. You don't have awkward comps anymore like you did in BC or Vanilla, like Warrior/Shaman or something that took a lot of skill and coordination. You basically just roll a warlock and 2 shot people. That's the summation of WOTLK PvP.

And yea, I'm not saying Vanilla or BC were perfect--you're right there was a lot of fucked up mechanics in both, but it was far better than WOTLK's level of easiness. Those were things that could be fixed easily. WOTLK just completely changed it's philosophy to cater to casuals.

[Lost]

Something you're missing about giving casual players the same relative gear available to hardcore players is that despite their gear level, they lack the skill to compete with the upper echelon. Give two players the identical gear and the better player will always come out on top, so now, rather than having a huge discrepancy between gear available to casual players and that open to hardcore players, skill takes the front seat.

But really, they have to continue to manipulate the game in ways to attract more and more players in order to ensure the game will continue to live on. They know they will lose the die hards and their hope in business is to attract and keep the next generation of die hard players who will eventually rage quit to keep the cycle going.

The Blizz dev's don't spend thousands of hours on the content just for the few elite players to enjoy. But now, they offer rewards far greater for those players than what the casuals will see until they're over geared or tagging along with a well experienced group. As you can probably attest to, the mentality of the 40 man raid days is long gone and there are few, if any, that miss it.