Yesterday, I made a post about Valor, Reputation, and Daily quests in Mists of Pandaria, and it really got me thinking... "How would I handle valor gear, solve the problem of players wanting more to do, while hopefully making the experience seem epic instead of grindy?" Surprisingly, it didn't take long to come up with something I personally think would be incredible. So here goes...
Here's my idea: First, I'd throw out the concept of valor all together. Second, I'd put in maybe 3 or 4 different repeatable quests-chains. I'm talking serious quest chains which would hit upon various types of game play, but I'll get to that later. To get at the rewards for these quest chains, I would divide the would-be Valor gear up based on it's cost, and therefore the expected time investment. I'd make a quest chain for the 1250 pt. items, say bracers, necks, rings; a chain for 1600 pt. items, say boots, gloves, trinkets; and a chain for 2200 pt. items like chest, legs, helm. Aside from the gear, I would offer a lump sum of gold, as one of the reward choices for each quest, thus giving players a reason to continue doing them after they've gotten all the gear.
These chains should play out like miniature legendary quest chains, except instead of taking months, they would take somewhere from 8-16 days. They would be mutually exclusive, so players can only work on one at a time, but there is no requirement to do any one before the others.
Anyway, the quests would be gated, obviously, so players can only make so much progress per day, and they would progress something like this: the first 3-4 days would involve completing some basic daily quests. After that, you might be tasked with completing special objectives in different scenarios for a few days, then maybe you need to collect drops from the end bosses of dungeons for several days. Maybe there's a day or so somewhere when you get to do multiple parts of the chain in one day - where you travel around to different zones hit some lore/story points, and finally at the climax of the quest chain, you're tasked with killing a specific raid boss, which can be completed on any difficulty from LFR to Heroic. Maybe at some point you get an item that works like a Mysterious Egg or Disgusting Jar, basically an item with a gestation period that will give you a few days break from working on the quest chain. The whole point of the chain should be variety, so I would even consider random inter-changable parts for all the quests chains, so you never really know what's next- aside from perhaps the last quests in each chain, the rewards, and the overall number of days required to complete them.
In the end, you'll have put in the effort. While you might have had to do a few daily quests or whatever it might be that you personally don't like to do, it was only for a few days and then you moved on to something else. You'll have experienced a variety of content, and you'll have a choice of rewards based on which quest you chose at the beginning, and hopefully that will also come with at least a minor feeling of having accomplished something. Then, you can pick one of the others quests, or do that one over again.
Each time there's a new content patch, I would add new quests that tie into the story hooks of each new content patch/raid tier. The old quests will still be there and can be done independently of the newer ones. I would probably even nerf the old quests so that they take less time to complete (and reward less gold) but I would plan for that and have a strategy for applying nerfs to the quest chains.
As for factions and rep grinds, I agree with Blizzard that tabards were a flawed system. However, I think faction-based daily quests could reward a consumable that would provide rep gain for a single dungeon clear. It would encourage players seeking maximum daily rep, to do dailies as well as dungeons. As for rep rewards, I think this a good place for a limited amount of gear, but should be primarily for cosmetic items, heirloom or otherwise account-wide items, and profession recipes or rare materials. Account-bound items, in particular, make the most sense for faction vendors for the simple fact that very few people want to do a rep grind on more than one character.
Hit that comment box below and tell me what you think, and how you might do it better.
MoP: Valor, Rep, and Daily questing.
So, I haven't had much to post here in some time, but today is the big 5.0.4 patch for World of Warcraft which will bring many of the Mists of Pandaria expansion changes to the game. While the servers are down, I just thought I'd like to talk about somthing that I'm afraid will keep many players from really enjoying the new expansion: The intersection of Reputations, Daily quests, and Valor rewards.
Let me first start by saying I personally don't have a problem with the way Blizzard chose to design these systems in Mists of Pandaria, but having talked to a lot of people, some people are clearly not going to be happy if I am understanding correctly how these systems will work. So, let's start with Valor point. Valor is your basic currency for buying epic-quality gear that will generally be equal in power to normal mode tier 14 raid gear. One of the big selling points for the Valor system in MoP is that there are many different ways to earn Valor points. You can do any combination of raids, dungeons, daily quests, scenarios, and perhaps other things that all reward valor and contribute to a weekly cap on how much Valor you can earn - just like today. That's pretty good news for people who like to do certain things, but not others.
Now, allow me to change gears and look at what MoP has in store for players via various factions which players will be able to earn reputation with. The biggest change is that using tabards as a means for earning reputation is going away. This is where it gets somewhat muddy for me because I don't think anyone really knows yet how players will get reputation with these factions. One possibility is that they will work like they did in The Burning Crusade. Back then, players earned rep in dungeons and each dungeon was affiliated with a faction. So, if you wanted Honor Hold rep for example, you needed to run the Hellfire Citadel dungeons. However, it doesn't appear this will be the case for Mists of Pandaria. The primary means for players to earn reputation in MoP will be via daily quests, and there-in lies the problem.
Most people really don't like doing daily quests. Now, granted I didn't do any scientific polling, or focus group testing to support that claim, and so it's entirely based on the conversations I have with guild mates, other people I know who play, and a vast majority of topics on the subject in various WoW forums. That being said, I personally think daily quests are great. I look back on places like the Argent Tournament, Sons of Hodir, Sholazar Basin, Tol Barad, and (especially) the Molten Front with fondness. I really like having something to do that I can do on my own or with friends, that I don't have to wait in a queue for, and where I get a feeling of making progress toward some big reward (especially mounts!) For others, daily quests feel like a job. Instead of daily quests being something extra to do when logging in every day it becomes the sole reason for logging in on days when you otherwise wouldn't for fear of falling behind. Now you might be thinking, "Maybe you're right and maybe not, but what does ignoring doing daily quests and not getting rep have to do with Valor points?"
Answer: The valor gear will be spread amongst several different factions and will only be available for purchase by players who are revered or higher with each faction. There was a blue post recently where Ghostcrawler sort-of addressed this issue, as it really seems to conflict with some of their self-declared design philosophy. He basically says that by making daily questing less optional, it will in effect lessen the degree to which players feel like there's not enough things to do in the game. He goes on to say that daily quests are still optional and that since similar gear can obtained from other sources, the valor gear itself is optional too. Personally, I think that's absurd. If Valor gear were really supposed to be optional, then you wouldn't play up all the different ways players can earn Valor points. It seems rather disingenuous to say you're giving players the freedom to earn Valor however they wish, when access to the vendors needed to spend those points has to be unlocked via several daily-quest-based reputation grinds.
Personally, I think Valor rewards and Rep rewards should be separate beasts. That's what real options are. I would still probably grind the rep and farm the valor for the rewards I really want, but I know other players who are going to be really disappointed when they realize that the value of the Valor points they've earned is entirely dependent on whether or not they choose to do daily quests to unlock the vendors.
Let me first start by saying I personally don't have a problem with the way Blizzard chose to design these systems in Mists of Pandaria, but having talked to a lot of people, some people are clearly not going to be happy if I am understanding correctly how these systems will work. So, let's start with Valor point. Valor is your basic currency for buying epic-quality gear that will generally be equal in power to normal mode tier 14 raid gear. One of the big selling points for the Valor system in MoP is that there are many different ways to earn Valor points. You can do any combination of raids, dungeons, daily quests, scenarios, and perhaps other things that all reward valor and contribute to a weekly cap on how much Valor you can earn - just like today. That's pretty good news for people who like to do certain things, but not others.
Now, allow me to change gears and look at what MoP has in store for players via various factions which players will be able to earn reputation with. The biggest change is that using tabards as a means for earning reputation is going away. This is where it gets somewhat muddy for me because I don't think anyone really knows yet how players will get reputation with these factions. One possibility is that they will work like they did in The Burning Crusade. Back then, players earned rep in dungeons and each dungeon was affiliated with a faction. So, if you wanted Honor Hold rep for example, you needed to run the Hellfire Citadel dungeons. However, it doesn't appear this will be the case for Mists of Pandaria. The primary means for players to earn reputation in MoP will be via daily quests, and there-in lies the problem.
Most people really don't like doing daily quests. Now, granted I didn't do any scientific polling, or focus group testing to support that claim, and so it's entirely based on the conversations I have with guild mates, other people I know who play, and a vast majority of topics on the subject in various WoW forums. That being said, I personally think daily quests are great. I look back on places like the Argent Tournament, Sons of Hodir, Sholazar Basin, Tol Barad, and (especially) the Molten Front with fondness. I really like having something to do that I can do on my own or with friends, that I don't have to wait in a queue for, and where I get a feeling of making progress toward some big reward (especially mounts!) For others, daily quests feel like a job. Instead of daily quests being something extra to do when logging in every day it becomes the sole reason for logging in on days when you otherwise wouldn't for fear of falling behind. Now you might be thinking, "Maybe you're right and maybe not, but what does ignoring doing daily quests and not getting rep have to do with Valor points?"
Answer: The valor gear will be spread amongst several different factions and will only be available for purchase by players who are revered or higher with each faction. There was a blue post recently where Ghostcrawler sort-of addressed this issue, as it really seems to conflict with some of their self-declared design philosophy. He basically says that by making daily questing less optional, it will in effect lessen the degree to which players feel like there's not enough things to do in the game. He goes on to say that daily quests are still optional and that since similar gear can obtained from other sources, the valor gear itself is optional too. Personally, I think that's absurd. If Valor gear were really supposed to be optional, then you wouldn't play up all the different ways players can earn Valor points. It seems rather disingenuous to say you're giving players the freedom to earn Valor however they wish, when access to the vendors needed to spend those points has to be unlocked via several daily-quest-based reputation grinds.
Personally, I think Valor rewards and Rep rewards should be separate beasts. That's what real options are. I would still probably grind the rep and farm the valor for the rewards I really want, but I know other players who are going to be really disappointed when they realize that the value of the Valor points they've earned is entirely dependent on whether or not they choose to do daily quests to unlock the vendors.
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