Ex Wow Players: This or WoW?

[Shrapnel]

I got a week long break coming up and I want to veg out - been thinking of going back WoW classic but I played this game in its beta and like it too.
I would like some ex WoW players to tell my why they're here and not looking back.

[Killance]

Right now this. WoW is currently on a content hiatus and even the current content isn't that good due to lack of loot.

[Oof]

This Im a PvPers in woW casually and its ruined for me. So im just chillin doing PvE stuff in ESO You can do alot in this game. But if you get it dont get it on steam. Buy it on there site. There are alot of times I wished I did when us steam users cant log in. But im super invested in my account now both irl money and time.

[老友出品]

14 years of wow, and ive played this for around 3 - 4 years on console and now transitioning into the pc, i would say this game is in no way perfect... but comparing to how wow is now, this would be 100% my go to... if that helps make up your mind?

[Halcyform]

WoW turned to garbage with Draenor, then turned to complete dog $hit with Legion. I regret sticking around to finish Gul'dan. Left and never looked back. No interest in Classic.

If your only choices are WoW or ESO, go with ESO. No question.

[Sylveonica]

You should ask same question on WoW forums, clearly 99% of people seeing this thread will say ESO as its the ESO forum.

[Halcyform]

Originally posted by Sylveonica:

You should ask same question on WoW forums, clearly 99% of people seeing this thread will say ESO as its the ESO forum.

And Chicoms at Blizzard will delete the post faster than a twitter mod censoring conservative posts.

[Shrapnel]

Hmmm, it seems you guys arent here because this is better but because WoW is getting worse...still, I think I'll give this a try
Thanks

[JeffreyFo]

It depends.
Quests are way better than in classic or retail WoW. There's no "kill 5 boars" quests, quest quality is generally quite high. The NPCs show a lot of personality, the quests simply feel more like actual RPG quests and less like "heres an arbitrary thing you do in an MMO for experience", etc.

In many ways, end game group PvE is a lot worse than retail WoW. Not as bad as FFXIV, but different tanks and healers are a lot more samey. You dont have the huge gameplay differences of say, Resto Druid vs Holy Paladin vs Discipline Priest. And the tank/healer gameplay itself is not as deep, but its not bad. Healing does utilize lots of resource management and sensitive timing. DPS has way less fancy spec-specific mechanics than say, retail WoW/FFXIV. DPS also tends to feel pretty homogenuous. In retail, Fire Mage and Windwalker Monk and Unholy DK all play fundamentally very different. DPS just dont vary as much in ESO, and it mostly comes down to keeping dots/buffs up.

Instanced PVP is probably better than retail WoW and classic, but I'm not as knowledgable on this. World PVP vs classic WoW, i'm not sure.

QOL and stuff is a mixed bag. Some things better than retail WoW, some things worse. Much more QOL than classic WoW, of course.

Open world is insanely easy compared to classic or retail. Obviously retail open world can be quite easy, but pulling lots is an easy way to make challenge and certain places like the Maw are challenging. And plus in ESO you have so few abilities that you dont have room to bring things like CC/utility/movement abilities very much, and there's not many abilities like that anyway, the design space really overemphasizes DPS buttons. So the open world combat is often really boring, aside from worldbosses which are pretty fun with decent mechanics and grandoisity. When you're not as powerful it can be pretty fun though, like when you're first leveling and new to the game, its pretty easy to enjoy a public dungeon before some random super powered character runs through and one shots the boss you were fighting. But as you get more power and get used to the game, it makes things faceroll and it never quite compares to having like 10+ defensives+cc+movement+utility skills as a WoW class alongside your DPS kit.

I think accumulating and spending gold is a lot more rewarding in ESO than in retail, and somewhat more than classic. Auction house in ESO is hot garbage though.

Frankly, going from one MMO to another is never a "not looking back" situation unless the player has very specific desires. FFXIV, ESO, GW2, retail WoW, classic WoW each have strong niches. Nobody has healer variety like retail WoW. Nobody has open world combat like GW2. Nobody has quests as good as ESO, and its also just generally more immersive than gw2/retail wow/ffxiv. Nobody has as amazing main story as FFXIV expansion. Etc etc.

People like to act dramatic but the big MMORPGs aren't blatantly superior to each other, and retail WoW has some absurdly strong strengths like tank/heal design and M+ that ESO cant hold a candle to, just like ESO has some strengths retail WoW cant compare to, and of course classic WoW is a different comparison. The real question is: What do you want to focus on right now? If you're here for some novelty, yeah, jump in and just keep in mind to avoid focusing on the things that ESO is weak on. Emphasize enjoying quests and exploring, deemphasize expecting any challenge from open world or expecting top of the line group PvE gameplay, etc.

[JeffreyFo]

Originally posted by Killance:

Right now this. WoW is currently on a content hiatus and even the current content isn't that good due to lack of loot.

Bit of a side point, but didnt they buff the loot a couple days ago in the patch?

[Spec: Hazy Shade]

ESO is a lot better than WoW, basically just because it's a lot more casual. I can hop into a semi-serious guild and get a group together to run veteran dungeons, whereas in WoW (I'm not sure in Shadowlands) for the previous expansions you had to do a helluva grind to get to content I would consider "fun" or challenging. I recall having to grind for such a long time on dailies and the same few dungeons that I wanted to gouge my eyes out.

I also find ESO crafting to be a lot less tedious overall especially since it only requires one character. I also just think WoW looks butt ugly, but that's personal preference.

I'm also not gonna suck ESO's ♥♥♥♥ too hard, there's a lot of problems, frustrations, and whatever, but I feel like they'll eventually get fixed or closer to the ideal. When ESO first started it was bad, and when I first started (ESO during Morrowind) I really didn't care much for it, but recently getting into it I feel like I can tackle whatever content I feel like doing & work at experimenting with my build constantly. Whereas WoW has fairly generic Tank/DPS/DPS or Tank/Healer/DPS etc classes with fairly railroaded abilties & no ability to really mix abilities together afaik.

Like, I said I'm not sure how much of this has changed in Shadowlands, but the way Blizzard treats its playerbase, scraps the game at every expansion, and doesn't support the game nearly enough were turnoffs alone.

[Wanderer]

I used to play wow. I don't think I could go back to that. It had cooldowns on abilities and the quests were a lot of kill X of this monster kind of deal. Man seems like forever ago.

[Pipe]

TESo is simple for people love to live in the Morrowind theme or in the Daggerfall theme.
It is not for panda's lickers in the World of elves and orcs.
If you need panda in love to gnome or elv - World of Warcraft awaits for your money.
If you need to pay much more money and for atmosphere - TESo wait you.
But Wow and TESo is not done for be perfect for all of us, because alll in this life you must to choose by yourself.

[Shrapnel]

Originally posted by Alexander Van der Bellen:

ESO is a lot better than WoW, basically just because it's a lot more casual. I can hop into a semi-serious guild and get a group together to run veteran dungeons, whereas in WoW (I'm not sure in Shadowlands) for the previous expansions you had to do a helluva grind to get to content I would consider "fun" or challenging. I recall having to grind for such a long time on dailies and the same few dungeons that I wanted to gouge my eyes out.

I also find ESO crafting to be a lot less tedious overall especially since it only requires one character. I also just think WoW looks butt ugly, but that's personal preference.

I'm also not gonna suck ESO's ♥♥♥♥ too hard, there's a lot of problems, frustrations, and whatever, but I feel like they'll eventually get fixed or closer to the ideal. When ESO first started it was bad, and when I first started (ESO during Morrowind) I really didn't care much for it, but recently getting into it I feel like I can tackle whatever content I feel like doing & work at experimenting with my build constantly. Whereas WoW has fairly generic Tank/DPS/DPS or Tank/Healer/DPS etc classes with fairly railroaded abilties & no ability to really mix abilities together afaik.

Like, I said I'm not sure how much of this has changed in Shadowlands, but the way Blizzard treats its playerbase, scraps the game at every expansion, and doesn't support the game nearly enough were turnoffs alone.

This is what I was looking for - I used to be in that constant search for BiS, and 5+ hr raids and all the prep time - those days have past but I still want something that I feel is worth my time (especially crafting), so much so my only real decision is ESO+ or not, but after seeing all the crafting materials and the allotted space for non ESO+ members, even that question is deciding itself

[Shrapnel]

Originally posted by Pipe:

TESo is simple for people love to live in the Morrowind theme or in the Daggerfall theme.
It is not for panda's lickers in the World of elves and orcs.
If you need panda in love to gnome or elv - World of Warcraft awaits for your money.
If you need to pay much more money and for atmosphere - TESo wait you.
But Wow and TESo is not done for be perfect for all of us, because alll in this life you must to choose by yourself.

This contributed almost nothing to the discussion but thanks for your time.

[Dex]

I tried to play WoW but it was just such a weird experience. 90% of the content was now out of date and provided no actual progression to a new character. I hear end-game is fun but man, it was a weird, lonely journey while leveling.

It sucks beacuse WoW has so much content. I might try it again when the level squish happens (when is that btw?)