Premium Cross-Realm Party System Coming to World of Warcraft

[Tom Goldman]

Premium Cross-Realm Party System Coming to World of Warcraft

In the future, just because you have a friend on a different World of Warcraft server won't mean you can't play together.

The separation of players between servers in MMOs is a necessity so that network infrastructure doesn't become overwhelmed, but it often leads to a division between friends that play the same game in a different world. However, a new World of Warcraft [http://www.amazon.com/World-Warcraft-Battle-Chest-Mac/dp/B000H96C9M/ref=sr_1_3?s=videogames&ie=UTF8&qid=1305737721&sr=1-3] initiative may change this common aspect of the genre.

Blizzard community manager Nethaera posts on the World of Warcraft forums that the company is working on a way for players from any realm (Blizzard's term for "server") to play with each other without having to pay for a transfer. It would be an extension of World of Warcraft's Dungeon Finder group system.

"We wanted to give you a heads up about a new feature currently in development," the post reads. "[It'll] allow players to invite Real ID friends of the same faction to a party regardless of the realm they play on, and then queue up for a 5-player regular or Heroic dungeon."

Real ID is Blizzard's social service that connects players across all of Battle.net instead of just a single game. Nethaera calls the cross-realm system "fairly complex to develop" and adds that some parts of it may come at a premium cost. However, only the player sending the invitations will need access to the premium service, so the cost could potentially be shared.

Blizzard isn't sure when cross-realm invites will be enabled, but aspects of the system will likely show up on the public test realms first. Though players on separate servers may never get to dance naked in public together, they'll at least have the opportunity to invade dungeons to acquire phat loot.

Source: Battle.net [http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2548785589]

Permalink

 

[John Funk]

The idea is great. I have tons of friends on other servers who I'd like to play with.

It being premium, not so much. Look, I *get* why some things cost money - the mobile AH/guild chat, faction/race/server transfers. This I'm not all too sure about.

 

[Warrior Irme]

Back in 2008 I believe blizz took the stance that any premium services should have no affect on gameplay. Things like Mounts, non-combat pets, server transfers are acceptable, but keeping a segment of the population from a portion of a game that they already pay a subscription for is in poor taste.

 

[Charli]

Yeah this isn't going to fly. Pets, Mounts, Phone apps. Fine.

This is ingame territory. You do not go premium based with ingame stuff in a subscription based game. I don't like where this is headed and neither do alot of players, the outcry on the EU forums is far more overall negative than the US forums surprisingly. (Haven't commented but reading it has been informative)

 

[Proteus214]

This will do wonders for guild recruitment. We can give trials to potential applicants without having to have them transfer to our server. I kind of like this idea.

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

Real name=no thanks.

I don't want my real name in any databases, I don't want my connections to any friends being analyzed by some marketer.

IMO WoW jumped the shark with BC and has been coasting downhill ever since.

 

[Versuvius]

Someone got to the "Blizz promised no premium gameplay changes" before me. This is a glaringly obvious reaction to losing 600k of subscribers.

 

[Cartographer]

Of course, the "premium" service could be getting to choose the instance, whereas everyone else has to live with a random one.
Good news, but more info needed.

 

[Nimcha]

Well this is to be expected, really. Along with all those crappy mounts, pets, titles and whatnot for cash, these sort of things are a natural consequence. Can't say I blame Blizzard either, from what I've seen the game is in steady decline. People only coming back for new patches and then unsubscribing after a month when they've done all the new stuff. They're still top though, so why not milk it as long as you're ahead?

 

[The Human Torch]

I can remember a quote from one of the head honcho's at Blizzard from 2008, saying that they will never consider a thing like micro-transactions because they already charge a subscription fee. How times have changed. I will see if I can dig up this quote somewhere.

Good thing I left the sinking ship that is WoW some time ago. Blizzard was already a greedy corporation, but after since their merger with Activision, it has just gotten worse.

Edit: Found the quote!

We chose to go with the subscription-based model instead of that approach. We've taken the approach that we want players to feel like it's a level playing field once they're in WoW. Outside resources don't play into it -- no gold buying, etc. We take a hard line stance against it. What you get out of microtransactions is kind of the same thing and I think our player base would feel betrayed by it. I think that's something else you have to decide on up-front instead of implementing later.
--Rob Pardo, Blizzard's Senior Vice President of Game Design (2/20/2008)

 

[Archemetis]

Can't say this'll overly affect me since the only friends I have on WoW are my friends in real life. So really if I want to group with anyone I know I just ask them...


Now if they were to implement a system where people can group for dungeons Cross Faction.

That would be something I'd be interested in.

[sub][granted it wouldn't make much sense in the current World of the game, but still I'd like it.][/sub]

 

[GiglameshSoulEater]

Erhem. World of Warcarft?

World of warcraft, methinks. Sloppy, Escapist, sloppy, especially after the geth/husk thing.

Since I dont play world of warcraft, this has limited relevance but since you already pay to play why not a few pounds more, right?

 

[XT inc]

This is what we as consumers call A dick move, blizzard is king of dick moves and dick ways to charge money.

I mean you pay 15 bucks a month you should be allowed to do most of the things they charge money for, for free. I mean everything costs money.

I know why things cost money to curb people changing factions and server swapping and name changing, but that is all stuff that should just have a timer on it and be free. I mean how many death knights are there because you make new friends on different servers and want to play with them sans hassle.

If Blizzard was still one with gamers and not with their bloated profit margins, you'd get to server change for free on a timed cool down same with faction and name changes. I know people who have spent literally hundreds of dollars just in this administrative bullshit.

want to play with a friend who just so happens to be on a different faction and server than you. It will cost you I think 30 bucks to faction and server change, what a load.

 

[Formica Archonis]

... Warcarft?

(Edit: I hath been ninja'd, forsooth!)

want to play with a friend who just so happens to be on a different faction and server than you. It will cost you I think 30 bucks to faction and server change, what a load.

... really? Holy hell I didn't realize it was that high. The cost of two months of gameplay to switch around? And no cooldown so you could just fork over again and change again a few days later?

 

[Delusibeta]

Yeah. This is only going to strengthen the "Activision = Blizzard" argument, really. Didn't Blizzard say they would not do something this?

 

[KeyMaster45]

Real name=no thanks.

I don't want my real name in any databases, I don't want my connections to any friends being analyzed by some marketer.

IMO WoW jumped the shark with BC and has been coasting downhill ever since.

Your real name would already be in their database from when you first signed up for a WoW account, unless you were paranoid and subscribed under a false name. Hell, your real name is already in hundreds of databases across the world so I think Blizzard is the least of your worries if you're as paranoid as you sound.

OT: I think I'd have to see what the benefits of the system are to ever consider paying extra for cross realm grouping with friends. Until then I couldn't say anything meaningful on it. One one hand I don't see why such a feature would require an extra fee since cross realm groups are already established via randomization and your friends list already allows you to talk with close friends cross realm. On the other if it starts letting you quest in the same zone as a friend and share quest credit across realms then I can see where an extra charge might be necessary.

Again though whether or not I cry bullshit on this depends on what they unveil the features of it to be in the future. The greater WoW community is, if nothing else, well known for it's knee-jerk rage mentality to anything Blizzard decides to announce they "might maybe sometime in the near future be introducing X feature if the stars align on the 5th night of the Yogg-Fack festival during the blood ritual of headless chickens".

 

[John Funk]

This is what we as consumers call A dick move, blizzard is king of dick moves and dick ways to charge money.

I mean you pay 15 bucks a month you should be allowed to do most of the things they charge money for, for free. I mean everything costs money.

I know why things cost money to curb people changing factions and server swapping and name changing, but that is all stuff that should just have a timer on it and be free. I mean how many death knights are there because you make new friends on different servers and want to play with them sans hassle.

If Blizzard was still one with gamers and not with their bloated profit margins, you'd get to server change for free on a timed cool down same with faction and name changes. I know people who have spent literally hundreds of dollars just in this administrative bullshit.

want to play with a friend who just so happens to be on a different faction and server than you. It will cost you I think 30 bucks to faction and server change, what a load.

I actually think the pay-to-switch is a much better way than cooldowns. It lends a financial weight to it which makes it not a decision to be taken lightly. Blizzard doesn't *want* people jumping all over the place. The people you know who have spent literally hundreds of dollars never had to spend one single dime on it if they didn't want to. How many times would they have switched if they hadn't had to pay? Probably a lot more.

This new program, though, leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Admittedly, we don't know how it will work yet - it could be something as simple as a single $5 fee to "flag" your character to be able to invite cross server. But, eh.

 

[fundayz]

They already charge players $15 a month for a service that costs them pennies to provide and they want to charge MORE?

Ridiculous

Someone got to the "Blizz promised no premium gameplay changes" before me. This is a glaringly obvious reaction to losing 600k of subscribers.

This isn't a "glaringly obvious reaction" to anything, it's just a company squeezing money out of their customers.

A company with 12 million subscribers doesn't even break a sweat because 600k people leave when a new game comes out.

 

[Cowabungaa]

The idea is great. I have tons of friends on other servers who I'd like to play with.

Except that it keeps on chipping away what little server community feel there was, something that Blizzard has been doing for a while now.

I'm not one for nostalgia in WoW, as the gameplay has simply improved so so much, but I do remember fond times of having an actual community on the server, when at least a portion of the Alliance players (because it was still the Alliance of course) actually felt like a group and wanted to kick Horde ass in PvP, especially World PvP, which is my favourite kind of PvP as it makes the game feel massive.

And to me, this community feeling is one of the things I like most about MMO's. That comradery between faction members, the way you made friends and found guilds through doing dungeons. But in WoW this is coming to an end more and more, which is a damn shame in my book.