The WOD Launch: What Went Wrong and Garrison Stuff

[AdamSavage]

You can take this with a grain of salt, but they do bring up some valid points. Their opinions don't reflect my own, I just thought it was interesting to listen too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZtKkO5b5L4

[Lisaara]

I personally dislike videos like this and negative topics in general. The points are hardly valid to me since the launch was fine aside from the server issues(and lets not forget they got DDoSed at the same time). This video just seemed like a lot of whining, which most negative topics like this usually end up being.

[Danielfboone]

The launch really went the smoothest for me of any expansion ever released. I really had none of those problems except for small queues to get in when they temporarily lowered the population levels. That didn't last long though. I didn't have any issues until they started trying to fix problems other people were having.

[AdamSavage]

The launch really went the smoothest for me of any expansion ever released. I really had none of those problems except for small queues to get in when they temporarily lowered the population levels. That didn't last long though. I didn't have any issues until they started trying to fix problems other people were having.

Unfortunately I did.. I ended up giving up that night, and trying again later on in the day. One of my friends agreed with pretty much everything they said, and she is a Vanilla player. That doesn't mean they are right or wrong. It's simply her own thought on it.

[Lupen202]

I didn't have a ton of problems either, honestly.. I had some lag, as to be expected, as well as the usual launch issues - fighting over quest items and mobs etc. I did crash, but only once or twice. Then of course the queue times.

But I must be either more patient than most players or I'm just used to these kind of things from playing the beta for months... Because it really didn't bug me that much.

And like Junrei said, they also got ddos'ed which didn't help, and that was hardly their fault.

Either way, it's done and over with. No point complaining about it now.

[AdamSavage]

I didn't have a ton of problems either, honestly.. I had lag. I had the usual launch issues - fighting over quest items and mobs etc. I crashed maybe once or twice when it first launched. Then of course. Queue times.

But maybe I'm either more patient or just used to these kind of things from playing the beta for months.. But it really didn't bug me that much.

And like Junrei said, they also got ddos'ed which didn't help. Which was hardly their fault.

Either way, it's done and over with. No point complaining about it now.

I wouldn't calling complaining. It was very annoying back in the day, but we got over it and moved on. I would call this video, more of a reflecting on what happened and thoughts to why. The DDOS attack on top of everything, just pushed it over the edge. It was the tipping point.

[Novikova]

The launch really went the smoothest for me of any expansion ever released. I really had none of those problems except for small queues to get in when they temporarily lowered the population levels. That didn't last long though. I didn't have any issues until they started trying to fix problems other people were having.

You're not on a high pop server or logged in sometime before people got out of school/work. You also didn't run into any bugs. That experience is pretty unique. DDoS hit some of Blizz's servers pretty hard.

For a lot of my friends on MG, Kil'jaden or other realms, it was nigh unplayable and some never got in the first three days thanks to Mr. 3-7k queue. I got in because I was on UK time and logged in at redonk o'clock in the morning. For others of us, it kept lagging so hard I might as well have just given up (which, I did. If lag/whatever is too bad, I wander off). I suspect that bottlenecking people and not really having a choice of two similarly leveled zones (like Hellfire and Zangar for BC) kind of made it tough, too.

It's just an interesting reflection that a lot of these problems keep coming up launch after launch. Yeah, I tend to assume most game launches or MMO launches are gonna be a charlie foxtrot, but does that really need to be the case?

[Lisaara]

High pop servers had issues where as medium/low pop(which there's a lot of those servers too) were mostly fine. All launches have their issues. No launch is ever perfect. If anyone ever expects a launch to be 100% perfect, they're gonna be disappointed every time.

[Novikova]

High pop servers had issues where as medium/low pop(which there's a lot of those servers too) were mostly fine. All launches have their issues. No launch is ever perfect. If anyone ever expects a launch to be 100% perfect, they're gonna be disappointed every time.

That's true enough. I just think it's interesting a lot of similar issues and meltdowns happen each time.

[Lisaara]

It is. Even with beta testing, in truth, you still will never find all the bugs or just how much the system can take until it hits live. Beta is just to preen out as many of the game breaking stupid bugs as possible...which really...Blizz is great at getting rid of a good majority of them. Hell, Pokemon's recent launch needed a whole new patch just to make the game playable, if I recall.

[Castile]

It is. Even with beta testing, in truth, you still will never find all the bugs or just how much the system can take until it hits live. Beta is just to preen out as many of the game breaking stupid bugs as possible...which really...Blizz is great at getting rid of a good majority of them. Hell, Pokemon's recent launch needed a whole new patch just to make the game playable, if I recall.

Wow really? Hmm i was going to buy omega ruby (i think thats what we're up to ^.^)

I remember massive queues for oceanic and alot of bugs but that had to do with servers being moved to Sydney and lots of "OldCaelestrasz" named servers on armoury too. The DDoS didn't help but weren't too bad for us as they were mostly centred on the US. The 8hr queue was abit fail though - haven't seen stuff like that since vanilla! I basically didn't play for 3 days because it was just too long. But I went bought some concrete from bunnings and got over it

[zedxrgal]

I know the launch SUCKED on my server. People waiting in queue for HOURS to get in. Then when they did get in the game crashed because the servers couldn't handle it etc etc. I simply gave up trying to get in launch day, which sucked balls even more because I stupidly took the day off work, because my queue wait time was three hours. When I was finally able to get into the game it constantly lagged and crashed out. The game was pretty unplayable for the first three days of launch on my main server.
You know it's bad when videos like THIS are made poking fun at the launch. Which carbot's videos aren't exactly quickly created and cranked out.
Yes it's in the past n blah blah blah.

But they should have known and been ready for the massive comeback that people would have made for this.

[AdamSavage]

I'm going to say a few things, that I'm sure not everyone will agree with me.. That's ok though. I personally think this expansion was rushed to some degree, and I think it's due to the updated character models and the bugs they had to deal with. This ended up consuming quite the chunk of time. Overall, the expansion feels like it's missing something. The Garrisons are neat, and where a cool idea at first. However, they went to the extreme with it.

Not even 2 months in, and the herbs and ore are almost pointless to sell on the AH. They wanted us to be out in the world, but give us the option of never leaving the garrison. Come the next patch, they are talking about more ways to keep us in them. I don't even need to do the garrison daily anymore, if I don't want to. I only have two followers that are still blue. I don't even need LFR cept for the stones. I log in and do my garrison stuff and I log out.

I don't know what else to do really..Even if they gave us flying back, that would also get boring quickly. The world is really small when you are flying. I do agree, that they have had 4 expansions to iron out the problems with so many people being in a single area. Granted, we don't know how much the DDOS attacks actually effected the servers either. They didn't even test what would happen with the world bosses on Beta. They simply pushed them straight to Live. That was another part of the problem with the servers later on, and that was squarely on Blizzards shoulders.

[peanutbuttercup]

Not even 2 months in, and the herbs and ore are almost pointless to sell on the AH. They wanted us to be out in the world, but give us the option of never leaving the garrison. Come the next patch, they are talking about more ways to keep us in them. I don't even need to do the garrison daily anymore, if I don't want to. I only have two followers that are still blue. I don't even need LFR cept for the stones. I log in and do my garrison stuff and I log out.

I guess I'm one of the exceptions. I don't feel like I have nearly enough time in a day to do everything I want.

In the morning, I do garrisons and a bit of AH browsing. In the evenings I'm either raiding or doing old content runs (multiple Ulduar, Firelands, Dragon Soul, MSV/Pandaria world bosses). Then I need to find time to do my apexis daily quest, fish up lunkers, pet battle, or rep grind.

I haven't even begun to work on alts yet. My highest is 96.

I do agree herbs and especially ore are worthless - just too easy to get. It might have been better if they let you choose which side building you wanted first (mine, herb garden, fishing shack, etc) rather than throw mines at everyone right off the bat. I'm just vendoring draenic stone at this point and ore will soon follow.

[Lisaara]

@zed - They did anticipate a large comeback but a prediction is NEVER 100% correct(weather forecasting anyone?). They got way more than anticipated so I don't find it fair to get angry at them for something they could never tell.

@Adam - You're really trying hard to make garrisons look like a prison when they're not. I'm out of my garrison A LOT. Stuff doesn't skin themselves. Raids don't run themselves. Dungeons don't run themselves. Followers don't come to me. I love we have an abundance of ore and herbs. Makes leveling professions for alts a breeze. I hated having to level them while leveling cause I needed different things for each level. With the stuff in WoD, I leveled from 1 - 600 LWing on my druid in one day. Took a lot of leather grinding, to be sure, so it wasn't just handed to me. But it made the process smoother. I'm excited to level my paladin cause I can just wait til my garrison to level engineering.

@PBC - I never have enough time either. I've got two 100s and it's hard to keep up sometimes. I'm working on others little by little.

[AdamSavage]

@zed - They did anticipate a large comeback but a prediction is NEVER 100% correct(weather forecasting anyone?). They got way more than anticipated so I don't find it fair to get angry at them for something they could never tell.

@Adam - You're really trying hard to make garrisons look like a prison when they're not. I'm out of my garrison A LOT. Stuff doesn't skin themselves. Raids don't run themselves. Dungeons don't run themselves. Followers don't come to me. I love we have an abundance of ore and herbs. Makes leveling professions for alts a breeze. I hated having to level them while leveling cause I needed different things for each level. With the stuff in WoD, I leveled from 1 - 600 LWing on my druid in one day. Took a lot of leather grinding, to be sure, so it wasn't just handed to me. But it made the process smoother. I'm excited to level my paladin cause I can just wait til my garrison to level engineering.

@PBC - I never have enough time either. I've got two 100s and it's hard to keep up sometimes. I'm working on others little by little.

I'm not trying to make it look like a prison. If you chose to stay in your garrison, then that is your choice. Raids and Dungeons, don't require you to physically leave the garrison. You simply port out and port back in. Aside from Raids and Dungeons, if you chose to never leave then that's your choice. As for the followers coming to you ? They do come to you. 1x a week you have the option to chose a new follower from a Inn, that is level 2 or higher. If you have one or want to do it that way. I'm sure I've mentioned before, that everyone's personal experience will vary.

[Castile]

I find lvling followers is taking awhile - from blue to epic is just so slow imo. But then i came to the party abit late then. I do have 6 with ilvl 645 gear (not all are epic tho) so I guess it just depends on what buildings you picked.

I do agree that you don't actually have to leave your garrison at all if you don't want to as everything is pretty much there (apart from an ah as im too tight to buy the expensive bits for my trading post one) but i need to force myself somedays to venture out as my patten is to log on - collect my work orders and log onto an alt. but then thats my choice and isn't really blizz's fault.

I have to say tho the most painful thing so far is the opening quests and doing them over and over on alts. Its just boring and painful now - once the garrison bit is finished its ok but getting the motivation to do that starting bit to lvl alts is just i dunno abit of a pain. Where as before we could just jump into a zone (the pandaria start was alot shorter I think) and away you went. But thats my only major gripe so far.

[SpiritBinder]

@Adam - You're really trying hard to make garrisons look like a prison when they're not. I'm out of my garrison A LOT. Stuff doesn't skin themselves. Raids don't run themselves. Dungeons don't run themselves. Followers don't come to me. I love we have an abundance of ore and herbs. Makes leveling professions for alts a breeze. I hated having to level them while leveling cause I needed different things for each level. With the stuff in WoD, I leveled from 1 - 600 LWing on my druid in one day. Took a lot of leather grinding, to be sure, so it wasn't just handed to me. But it made the process smoother. I'm excited to level my paladin cause I can just wait til my garrison to level engineering.

I'm not trying to make it look like a prison. If you chose to stay in your garrison, then that is your choice. Raids and Dungeons, don't require you to physically leave the garrison. You simply port out and port back in. Aside from Raids and Dungeons, if you chose to never leave then you do. As for the followers coming to you ? They do come to you. 1x a week you have the option to chose a new follower from a Inn, that is level 2 or higher. If you have one or want to do it that way. I'm sure I've mentioned before, that everyone's personal experience will vary.

Personally I feel with this expansion thus far, I personally tend to agree with Adam on most of the points he has raised. Never in any prior expansion have I felt so pinpointed to just one location for so many tasks, and on a daily basis. I don't find it overly negative, but I don't get out much . The Herbs, Ore, the 5+ Buildings that require crates to be emptied and new materials handed over, the missions that finish for your followers at a multitude of different times, All have to be done with your garrison. The Apex crystal daily get you out, but you must pick up and return it to your garrison, you can Q for any raid/dungeon with your garrison, etc.

Most people I know have/use their Garrison hearth stone as their means to getting to Draenor, and their main hearthstone set to the shrine still, to have access to Dal/Shat/Capitals. When you use your garrison hearth... "Oh look missions complete!" "Oh look new items to upgrade them" etc. I find when Wain and I run our weekly "Retro Raids" chasing mounts and what not, we are for ever saying to each other "Oh yeah, sorry I'll be right there. I hearthed and got distracted, just 2 more missions to send off!"

My play style though can be very very different to others as I am fairly casual these days and also don't run that many alts at all. This means most of my wow time consists of exactly what Adam mentioned to keep my one main up to date. So I can't say this is the same for everyone, but it certainly if the case for myself too.

This however, will change/ease. As with anything new, the system will change and needs/priority's will too. Who knows what is still to come, Blizzard might add faction cities at a later date after all, they may add new resources that require us to spend very little time within our garrison and can only be obtained from a different hubs/zones (Like the molten front). The one this we can guarantee is that it will change somewhere down the track. How much and in what direction I'm not sure, but I also doubt Blizzard want us to feel too "Garrison Bound" and will do their best to alleviate this if they also see it as a valid concern.

[Castile]

I'll just add to SB's post by saying as a casual player too I feel you have to choose certain buildings in the garrison to get ahead gear wise or even just keep up with the normal mode raiders. So it kinda adds to the garrison bound/dependency feeling.

I choose the bunker on two toons just because the chance to upgrade to an epic is just too good to miss out on, the barn for savage blood and leather production, lwing for the work orders, eng for the gun. As I hunter i felt I HAVE to have these to have a decent chance at gear atm. I also need the banker cause all those mats need to go somewhere! So yeah i've kinda ended up with two almost identical garrisons (my horde is a hunter too) with the exception of the stables/trading becoming inn/barraks. Maybe its just me but thats how its worked out for my toons this time.

[Lisaara]

@zed - They did anticipate a large comeback but a prediction is NEVER 100% correct(weather forecasting anyone?). They got way more than anticipated so I don't find it fair to get angry at them for something they could never tell.

@Adam - You're really trying hard to make garrisons look like a prison when they're not. I'm out of my garrison A LOT. Stuff doesn't skin themselves. Raids don't run themselves. Dungeons don't run themselves. Followers don't come to me. I love we have an abundance of ore and herbs. Makes leveling professions for alts a breeze. I hated having to level them while leveling cause I needed different things for each level. With the stuff in WoD, I leveled from 1 - 600 LWing on my druid in one day. Took a lot of leather grinding, to be sure, so it wasn't just handed to me. But it made the process smoother. I'm excited to level my paladin cause I can just wait til my garrison to level engineering.

@PBC - I never have enough time either. I've got two 100s and it's hard to keep up sometimes. I'm working on others little by little.

I'm not trying to make it look like a prison. If you chose to stay in your garrison, then that is your choice. Raids and Dungeons, don't require you to physically leave the garrison. You simply port out and port back in. Aside from Raids and Dungeons, if you chose to never leave then that's your choice. As for the followers coming to you ? They do come to you. 1x a week you have the option to chose a new follower from a Inn, that is level 2 or higher. If you have one or want to do it that way. I'm sure I've mentioned before, that everyone's personal experience will vary.

That's one set of followers and I still have to go somewhere to talk to someone to get them. The better followers are the ones you need to leave the Garrison to get(example: Leorajh or Ishaal). That's the ones I was referring to. I had to hunt and/or work my butt off to get them.

I will say it is tedious doing the garrisons on alts but I will never say making herbs and ore plentiful is a bad thing because I'm benefitting from it on those said alts that need to level their professions.