Windows Central Patch 11.1 Interview - Addressing Mythic+ Rewards

Posted 2024/11/15 at 4:35 PM by Archimtiros

interview with Windows CentralA Better Curve for Mythic+ Difficulty and Rewardshow

Ion Hazzikostas, via Windows Central

On Mythic+, I think that this was a season of experiments. We changed the way affixes work, the way progression is structured, and we have been iterating based on feedback. A big focus for the team right now is to smooth out some particular pain points in specific dungeons, while also looking at class balance. We also don't feel like we have a proper on-ramp into the system.

For a lot of players hitting level 8 Delves, you're getting very powerful rewards at that point. When you look across from there to Mythic+, it can feel like there's no point doing anything below a Mythic+7, and 7 and up is actually quite hard. If you're someone without experience of dungeons to begin with, +7 is not the best point of entry, and it certainly wasn't designed to be a point of entry, so we think some players are hitting a cliff wall. So we see a lot of people bouncing off that would have previously had a home in early Mythic+ tiers. So, for Season 2, that's one of the big things we're going to address there. It just wasn't something we could change in the middle of Season 1.
More Intuitive Upgrade Crestsvalor

Ion Hazzikostas, via Windows Central

The Mythic+ Crest gearing system meets almost all of our design goals, save for that clarity and intuitiveness. That is one area we want to focus on in terms of naming them, tutorialization, and so on. We want to make it more logical about what you should be doing with Crests. The idea is to give players of all play styles goals to work towards, with ongoing power advancements, beyond specific item drops. Crests are an important part of the tiered structure of World of Warcraft, helping sure that the best way to get stronger is to push into harder content, rather than just grind basic content massively, as we saw previously with Artifact Power and things like that. You should want to complete higher tier dungeons, but making it clearer on how to get there is something we want to address.
Rebalancing Racial Bonusesbuffs for lesser used racial bonuses in Patch 11.0.7

Ion Hazzikostas, via Windows Central

On racials, I think we are taking more passes at increasing the power of particularly underpowered races, such as the Draenei Light of the Naaru, for example. Things that just don't feel worth even clicking in the current meta. At the same time, we want to keep racial power levels to be low. Just above "pure flavor" is the goal. The race you play should be an expression of your identity and preference in that regard, then I think it's meaningful to have some mechanical flavor associated with different races based on their heritage or physical quirks. We don't want to be at a place where players feel forced to play a specific race. There are a couple of race/class combinations where, at least when it comes to min-maxing, are higher than we'd prefer them to be. Those aren't changes we'd make mid-season, though.
Hero Talent Conundrum

Ion Hazzikostas, via Windows Central

The situation you describe is a big challenge for our combat team, regarding picking specific trees for specific situations like AoE and single target. On the one hand, some players enjoy changing their load outs to solve specific problems. Others may dislike it, though, because they feel a certain tree is an expression of their preference or aesthetic identity. "This is what I think is the coolest, and I want this to work everywhere." That's true for hero talents, and maybe even specs as a whole. We try to strike a balance between strengths and weaknesses. That's why we made Hero Talents and talents in general heavily flexible, moving from single target, to something more AoE-oriented for dungeons, and then more utility-focused for PvP. I think that's the direction class design will likely continue in.
Creating Compelling Characters

Mark Kelada, via Windows Central

In making 11.0, we wanted to make sure that our villains are on par with our heroes. Heroes are only as good as the villains, right? That's why we want to give Xal'atath a strong path through the story. What are the conflicts and successes that we can have? She grew from being trapped in a knife, and is now a focal point of the main story.

On Undermine, it's perhaps not what you might expect from a typical Goblin story, but it does connect to the main arc. We're not giving anything away today, but you will see how big characters from 11.0 feature into 11.1 in Undermine, and how the war between Gallywix and Gazlowe has begun playing out. I will say that we do want to take time to tell lighter stories too, in that vein, because you can create fatigue if we bludgeon you with heavy stories constantly.
Less Factions, More Stories

Mark and Ion, via Windows Central

Ion: I think narratively, there's no question that the Alliance vs. Horde conflict is not the primary theme of WoW at this stage. We dived very deeply into that for Battle for Azeroth, and there is a history of conflict and tensions. But the story has always been about the factions ultimately working together to battle a shared enemy to save Azeroth itself. We found increasingly that trying to shoehorn conflict into those stories, it felt dissonant for players. It's almost not realistic, and almost frustrating to watch the Horde and Alliance snipe at each other while Azeroth is potentially facing apocalyptic destruction. I think that matches how players think. We're making the game more cross-faction so that players can play with their friends regardless of server of faction. We still want the faction anchors, the thematic identity of playing Horde or Alliance, which is why we often hear feedback like "this story is too Alliance focused" or "too Horde focused." We don't swing the pendulum based on the need to tell faction-specific stories, and we think it's important to note that an elvish story doesn't necessarily need to be Alliance-associated, and Undermine in 11.1 doesn't necessarily need to be Horde-associated too. Goblins were a neutral faction long before the Bilgewater Cartel joined the Horde. Obviously Alliance characters like Anduin have been front and center right now, but other characters with other affiliations will come to the fore over the course of the story.

Mark: We are cognizant of the feedback of course, but the discussion often revolves around what cultures or characters are best conduits to tell aspects of the story as it develops. Gazlowe is a character players might recognize from Battle for Azeroth with a bit of Heroes of the Storm too, and now we have an opportunity to build him up beyond that legacy experience.
Exploring Famous Locations

Mark and Ion, via Windows Central

Ion: We can say pretty confidently that we didn't just do Undermine because we felt like "it was time to give goblins their spotlight," but rather really because we're already underground. What are some known locations from beneath the surface of Azeroth? Obviously, one of the big ones was the Nerubian Empire, which we'd barely seen. The second big one was, of course, Undermine. Figuring out how to lead the story arc to Undermine was an early challenge, but it would've been a horrible injustice to make an expansion underground and miss out on Undermine. It was a labor of love for everyone to pull together and figure it out. The humor, the intrigue, the "fun" that comes with goblin culture, and it's a really deep exploration. We're going well beyond the surface.

Mark: Undermine was a weird sort of turn, but the team was hyped to make it work. We wanted to follow the "rule of cool" while also making sure the story develops in a way that doesn't make people go "huh?" It's a cultural story, but we're pulling different Azerothian races in too, we want to serve players and the characters they're playing too. We're excited to go deeper on a culture when the story allows us to make sure we're doing it justice, and not just try to shoe-horn things into a position.

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Comment by Craynz1305the team is going to focus on smoothing out pain points within dungeons and class balance.Comment by TheWiseDwarfSo from what I can understand from Ion's words here, in 11.1:

- Delve itemlevel rewards will be lower in comparison to this season
OR
- Mythic+ will reward higher item level at lower keys in comparison to this season

Right?Comment by ShiyokaThe Mythic+ Crest gearing system meets almost all of our design goals, save for that clarity and intuitivenessComment by SkalorMythic plus are trash and theres no reason to do something above an +10. Theres no special mounts, no transmogs, nothing. If you do something between +10 and +15 youre just wasting your time, since you wont receive NOTHING having like 3500 io on the end of the season, as the 0.01% title usually closes in 3650 or so.
Gear progression bad af at moment. We are like 2,5 months into the season and we still havent a fully gear upgraded because we need 90 crest to craft something and 6/6 track upgrades. It's insane. Even if you do mythic end raid bosses you still need at least 2 more weeks to be 638ilvl.
The rest is good in fact. I do think we need more rewards for Mythic plus, as Mounts or transmogs recolors. If you keep pushing score and still have no enough points to get the 0.01 title you literally WASTED your time. So what about those ppl? between the 10's and the high end titleComment by EndoshivaI love the cope that delves are even a little bit relevent this season like the single piece of hero gear a week does a god samn thing and that the dgs are not jsut waaaay tf more harder then before for less reward. good joke. s3 and 4 were fine we had no reason to try and reinvent the wheel just eat the L and go back ffsComment by LemistioThey should make crafted gear less crest hungry, and get rid of that stupid death affix, it would fix half the stuff alreadyComment by KerathrasOnce again they’re saying all the right things, especially about the delve to M+ pipeline, but I remain skeptical that they will actually address it in a meaningful way.Comment by Setsuna665m+ this season is worse than dragonflight season 1 which was compared to sl season 1. my keys group died super early in df season 1 but i kept pushing with pugs even on alts. this season i have timed my 10s and were pretty much done nobody really felt the motivation to push that far let alone farther. hell i dont even have a alt at 2k just my main. by now i would have 3-4 toons farming 7/8s. it doesnt feel fun at all, its easier to do 4 delves and pug raids and what ever gear i get i get. we got till feb and im not seeing anything to justify my sub atmComment by ArchimtirosMythic plus are trash and theres no reason to do something above an +10.alwaysshouldIf you keep pushing score and still have no enough points to get the 0.01 title you literally WASTED your time. So what about those ppl? between the 10's and the high end titleneedsComment by aerithscarMythic plus are trash and theres no reason to do something above an +10.alwaysshouldIf you keep pushing score and still have no enough points to get the 0.01 title you literally WASTED your time. So what about those ppl? between the 10's and the high end titleneedsComment by EndoshivaMythic plus are trash and theres no reason to do something above an +10.alwaysshouldIf you keep pushing score and still have no enough points to get the 0.01 title you literally WASTED your time. So what about those ppl? between the 10's and the high end titleneedsComment by TryndisMythic plus are trash and theres no reason to do something above an +10. Theres no special mounts, no transmogs, nothing. If you do something between +10 and +15 youre just wasting your time, since you wont receive NOTHING having like 3500 io on the end of the season, as the 0.01% title usually closes in 3650 or so.
Gear progression bad af at moment. We are like 2,5 months into the season and we still havent a fully gear upgraded because we need 90 crest to craft something and 6/6 track upgrades. It's insane. Even if you do mythic end raid bosses you still need at least 2 more weeks to be 638ilvl.
The rest is good in fact. I do think we need more rewards for Mythic plus, as Mounts or transmogs recolors. If you keep pushing score and still have no enough points to get the 0.01 title you literally WASTED your time. So what about those ppl? between the 10's and the high end titlealwaysshouldComment by GodsFaith11.0 worst m+ season in a long timeComment by furos72Another useless interview that didn't ask why the Alliance is always in the foreground and the Horde is the sidekick...

The Horde is always used as a punching bag and to this day no Alliance character dies!

The Horde is still in ruins without a Warchief and its races are not evolving!Comment by Ravenoflogic"for the challenge and personal satisfaction of overcoming said challenge"

Stop the cap.
We all know people only do it for bragging rights.
It's an ^&*!@ and the bigger it is the cooler you are.Comment by allstardotits great to see they talk about new content when we still have a s*** ton of bugs
maybe blizz should invest more into fixing things rather then talkin about new content just sayin...Comment by SeveredTongueSO they are gonna nerf Delves to cap out sooner to try and force those players into M+ which they will stretch back out to the old 1 - 20s?

Bunch of $%^&*s.

They should have never changed M+ from Dragonflight S3 at all.
They should ADD more to delves to put them inline with M+ as something you can do solo OR grouped but still be able to progress to Myth track.

No ones doing Delves after hitting the 619 roadblock at this point because there is no rewards AT ALL and the Delve gear is very poor.Comment by Tastelikelemon- Remove Valorstones - its useless after 2nd week and farming it on alts for upgrades is tedious and boring
- Gilded Crests and hero level track gear to drop from +6 , myth track gear for vault to be at +8 or +9 max - dealing with tyrannical + fortified on +10 early on with pugs especially is nightmare and majority of playerbase cant even dream of getting myth vault first 3-4 weeks unless boosted
- Increase crest rewards per M+ dungeon done to 15-20
- Reduce upgrade tracks of gear
- Remove crests requirement from crafted gear or reduce their cost - 90 crests for max crafted item is madness
- Make crafting materials abundant so people are not forced to spend 500k-1 mil first month for crafted gear and enchants alone
- Make gear for alts to be extremely reduced in cost to be upgraded also make crests transferable to alts via Warband

If all of this happens the game gona be buttery smooth and extremely enjoyable.Comment by SnekofVoldunIon: We can say pretty confidently that we didn't just do Undermine because we felt like "it was time to give goblins their spotlight," but rather really because we're already underground. What are some known locations from beneath the surface of Azeroth? Obviously, one of the big ones was the Nerubian Empire, which we'd barely seen. The second big one was, of course, Undermine. Figuring out how to lead the story arc to Undermine was an early challenge, but it would've been a horrible injustice to make an expansion underground and miss out on Undermine. It was a labor of love for everyone to pull together and figure it out. The humor, the intrigue, the "fun" that comes with goblin culture, and it's a really deep exploration. We're going well beyond the surface.

Okay, what about the giant Sethrak underground? The stuff you see in the Temple of Sethraliss? Sethrak culture? That's a pretty well known location.Comment by OmegachungyDon't make people do tyran+fort for mythic vault slots. Nobody cares about M+ being hard they want to enjoy the game but you guys enforced a timer into the system so you have to deal with the consequences. Anyone who cares about difficulty should be doing +12 and stop crying that people get a chance at a mythic item that is probably garbage. As if Titan forging wasn't in the game for years.

Like Ion said it was an experimental season and I would say a majority of the community sees this season as failing to do what was intended.

Also what is this absurd keystone system dudes? Why is it still here? Wildstar had a better dungeon entrance system ( basically delves ) AND had delves where loot could titanforge to max ilvl. Literally just copy Wildstar stop making people reroll it's a pointless time wasting mechanism. Stop this garbage constant gear gating dude it is killing the average playerbases enjoyment of the game. We already have to grind crests constantly and any alt has to do trash content constantly to get valorstones.

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