wow Mob Scaling Blue Posts: August 28th

[Stan 5,240]

Mob scaling in Battle for Azeroth is a hot topic right now and if you haven't been following the discussion, here's a short roundup of everything we know so far, including the latest blue posts.

Players started noticing that unequipping gear (Heart of Azeroth & high ilvl trinkets) and banking them makes you more powerful in the open world last Wednesday.

Ion Hazzikostas shared his thoughts on mob scaling in the latest Live Developer Q&A on Thursday, claiming end-game outdoor scaling has not changed for the last 15 months. Outdoor content remains more relevant than ever and players progressively unlock better rewards from world quests that's why it makes sense to buff mob difficulty in the long run.

Finally, Ion closed the discussion with more clarifications last Saturday, saying they've seen no reports that a fresh 120 has an easier time with any content whatsoever, than one who has improved their gear. A player in ilvl 330 gear is killing world quest mobs 40% faster than someone who dinged 120 at ilvl 280. At 117 there's a spike in difficulty and players with Argus gear start upgrading their items and wear nearly the exact same gear as players who leveled straight through without doing Legion endgame content.

Here are the latest blue posts by CM Ythisens.

Blizzard (Source)

These guys are killin me. They just love saying "You think you want that, but you really don't."

I understand the concern about wanting to feel yourself get stronger but you still actually do have the ability to feel stronger, the world just feels a little relevant for a little longer while you're doing it and I think it achieves that. On my main I've already far outpaced it and at 341 I feel like a god again. I can pull a large number of mobs and easily handle them all and churn through WQs pretty quickly.

I even leveled an alt up and geared it this weekend up to almost 320 ilvl and it felt just as fine as it did the first time. When I hit 120 I noticed the mobs were a little stronger and I was having to be a little more careful but not by much and that didn't last long at all.

If you're finding mobs that do individually feel strange you should bug report them so the team can look into it but the system as a whole is working fine at least from my experience.

He isn't on the dev/design team. He is providing his feedback as a player.

Exactly. I'm just sharing what exactly my experience was when going through it both times and they both felt the same. I'm leveling a Warlock next so I'm interested to see the difference it makes as a clothie. I'll probably share my thoughts on that experience too but from my guildies they didn't even notice the scaling hardly at all even as a caster.

Casters do have it worse than melee.

Yeah this is what I'm interested in testing out myself and seeing how different it feels.

I'm curious, have you ever played an elemental shaman? ? If so, how was your questing experience compared to other classes/specs?

Elemental is usually always my second alt that I use for alt night raiding. I haven't quested with him yet but I plan on doing that one after Warlock. Historically for me it's always been fine, little slower obviously but still fine.

Oh, shut up. You all are just terrible at this casual game.

Lets not be rude.

This was never an issue in older expansions. People leveled to max level, and had fun when they got gear and stomped everything in the older content. That's what an MMO is, you get strong and go back and have fun lording over all the stupid crap you had to fight before.

The point is it was an issue that always was there but you didn't pay much attention to it as a player nor really care too much about it to be honest. I didn't notice it either until the dev team had pointed it out. It seemed like something they always wanted to try to fix it or change it but never had the chance until now with the scaling tech they have now. 

It feels good to get stronger, to see your avatar in this world crush your foes, and it feels very good to get gear and get upgrades, that's a core feature of an MMO, there is no debating that or changing that. What's great though is being in a place where the content can be as relevant as possible and the rewards still match your time investment. One of the things Ion talked about with this system is that the health pool of open world mobs does get a little higher with your ilvl, but you get stronger in a faster pace. It's not making them infinitely stronger than you or making them comparative to you forever, its just a little bump at the beginning. By the time you're hitting 320 you are already far outpacing them at least from my experience.

I think its a good topic to be aware of and concerned about and I 100% get the concern and agree that going overboard does counter a core feeling of the game, but if the beginning, middle, and end of the system still end with you being able to have that character progression and feel yourself progress then I think the system can work. When it doesn't is where you have the problems and of course the team doesn't want that. Which is why they ask for specifics on any issues you're finding so they can address them and fix it if needed.

So.... you are telling us what we feel? No, you are incorrect. I personally DO NOT FEEL STRONGER.  Please don't tell me what I'm feeling while playing my character.

Thanks for the callout. I should edit that, wasn't my intention to tell you what to feel but rather imply you still have the ability to feel stronger with your effort.

[Ohmybadness 5]

fifth white line gave me the giggles ?

[VictorVakaras 83]

In other news, outdoor mob scaling is still dumb.

[Avataris 10]

  Ppl in 2018 are fragile is f*k. 3 weeks into a game which will last around 2 years with not even 1 single raid opened and they started crying for everything. Even for that they have to actually fight with mobs, not sprinting trough them. The same ppl want WoW Vanilla to come back. Exactly because whiners like those the game became such a trash and easy as never before. 
  Generally the whiners wants to get all the gear in 3-4 days, if its possible in 1 HC run to titanforge even the air around them. To oneshot every Elit WQ, casual mobs doing ritual suicide when they pass near them, getting billions of gold by selling selfies. After that whining how boring the game is and how there is no content. 
   I hope once Blizzard Dev team and Ion Hazzikostas will look at the ppl actually enjoying the game and will make the things interesting for them as well. Whiners will always whine.

Edited August 28, 2018 by Avataris

[jinsu2301 273]

1 hour ago, VictorVakaras said:

In other news, outdoor mob scaling is still dumb.

That's, like, your opinion, man.

People always say how "oh it's not in the spirit of an RPG" simple because it's always been this way in video games. In a proper Pen-n-Paper RPG, a good GM is always trying to challenge you. If WoW would have launched with this, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

Apart from that, it seems to me the people who complain about it are those who pull 10 mobs and barely survive, calling the game broken for they are not able to faceroll through the content the moment they ding max level. It's always been that way, but now that scaling is a thing, it's suddenly an issue even if it doesn't affect shit. From ilvl 300 to 340, the mobs went up by what, 5k health, that's 10 percent? Meanwhile my dps went up by 25% (I still have a shit weapon, so there's that). Once we get to raiding, WQ will again be trivial, but not to a point where you one shot everything, and that's good IMO. If you make things too easy, you defeat the point of having that content. You either have to make things harder, or make it completely unrewarding for high level players.

[Dxn1350 4]

Yeah I hope this keeps getting track and they ditch it. Its a dumb system. In paper sounds good but in reality is not as fun as going to a higher level zone as we could do before (or easier zone). I don't feel im getting stronger at all and that's the whole point of having a leveling system

[Seksi 208]

Never had any problem with this. Being able to go everywhere in BfA content and do content is great, as it already was in Legion!

[Jperry21 16]

59 minutes ago, Avataris said:

Whiners will always whine.

 

[Demenzel 29]

It's like ppl didn't undertand that if the WQ reward scale with you ilvl, the mobs in the WQ will scale too... it's how the game ALWAYS worked.... harder content = better reward

[CerealKiller08 2]

I personally find the scaling mobs to be a good thing. I know everyone has different likes and dislikes in how they play the game, but I feel having the scaling difficulty of mobs in the world not only makes every encounter feel like an actual fight, but it promotes playing together. There are a number of named creatures and WQ bosses that I wasn't able to defeat earlier on in the grind and it forced me to meet new people and at least for that particular activity, play with them. I do agree that as you gear the scaling falls off. I am only 327 right now and I can already feel the mobs in quests getting easier and easier. Now if only Blizz would take those damn tornadoes away from the Faithless!

[Ragingwolf 310]

I have had zero problems nor complaints about the mob scaling in this expansion while leveling my Demon Hunter.  Had it much worse in other MMO's.  Example, I remember in Aion where an 8 hour grind on quests, dungeons, and mobs alike only gave you 1/3 of a bar of experience.  Or in GW2 where each map you zone into auto scales you for that content where you can not 100% solo everything and rely on other players to help complete Meta content (specially Heart of Thorns expansion).  WoW is rather a bit soft on mob scaling imo.

[geofferson 33]

I'm ilvl 339 and killing mobs isn't harder.

 

Sure, WQ bosses have 300k health instead of 200k health, but they still die way faster than they did a week ago.

[Highfather 8]

Why play a game if it hasn't got some type of challenge? Do you remember any game in the past you played through and never died in? Why is Darksouls so popular? Hell, I wouldn't remember Mario Bros if I didn't die a few times in those castles. Saving the princess wouldn't haven't meant anything if I hadn't. WTF is wrong with ppl. (I will admit mobs need a little more A.I. though, they are right about clothes, I didn't even take damage as a dk but got 2 shotted alot as mage).

[PatrickHenry 293]

8 hours ago, Stan said:

Please don't tell me what I'm feeling while playing my character.

omg... tone it down miss sassy pants...

[PatrickHenry 293]

6 hours ago, Dxn1350 said:

I don't feel im getting stronger at all

So at the end of Legion you felt just as weak as waltzing into Emerald Nightmare Day one normal?

ETA:  heck even day one portal down to Argus and end of Burning Throne saw 0 improvement?

Edited August 28, 2018 by PatrickHenry

[BlindfireJP 0]

This whole argument is just wasted time. Who cares if at most you save what, 2-3 seconds at 250 compared to 315? The content isn't getting harder, and if you believe it is, then get better at the game. If you're worried about time spent on an MMO, why play one then? It's not a great system, but it's definitely not one worth complaining about. They shouldn't have to explain their ideas on scaling ilvl gear and scaling HP (NOTE: It's just HP getting increased, you will do MORE DAMAGE with MORE GEAR than the HP THE GET FROM MORE ILVLS)