The amount of players completing Mythic Dungeons in World of Warcraft has dropped significantly compared to previous data, as Season 2 of Dragonflight enters its seventh week. Though Dragonflight is widely considered to be one of the better World of Warcraft expansions, the numbers haven't been kind since the player exodus in Shadowlands. When measured up against past expansions, fewer players were engaging with endgame content, as dungeon runs in Dragonflight dropped off steeply on a week-to-week basis.
While Dragonflight Season 2 was slated to have challenging affixes, the developers had pivoted back from their initial vision for Mythic Dungeons, nerfing the newcomers down to a more manageable level. The Embers of Neltharion update also brought forth the Aberrus raid, which had one of the shortest races to World First in World of Warcraft history. Despite this, the pattern from Season 1 continued, and Season 2 saw even less engagement from players in Mythic Dungeons, arguably the bread-and-butter of gearing up at level cap.
The chart was posted by NORATHEDESTROYER, one of the more prominent members in the World of Warcraft Reddit community, which compared the numbers for completed Mythic Dungeons in Dragonflight Season 2 and Dragonflight Season 1. The only week it had a better performance than Season 1 was in its second week, largely because Week 2 in Dragonflight's inaugural season had an infamously hard affix cocktail. Week 6 of Season 2 saw less than a million dungeon runs in total, prompting many players to muse about the continued drop.
The main culprits in World of Warcraft's dwindling engagement, at least as far as Mythic Dungeons are concerned, are twofold. May and June saw the release of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Final Fantasy 16, and Diablo 4 – a Blizzard title that keeps breaking sales records. The other factor concerns the major healer nerfs implemented in World of Warcraft, seemingly as a way to reel healers back from their damage-dealing responsibilities. Healers already had a stressful experience in Mythic dungeons compared to other roles, and the new affixes continue to favor them even less.
These factors, coupled with the overall shortage of healers, have made "pugging" an even more miserable experience for World of Warcraft players without a dedicated group. Teams are more content going one-and-done during a Mythic Dungeon night, as the gameplay has slowly shifted from being fun to tedious. Instead of spending an hour on a bricked key, many would choose to boot up their PS5 and go exploring with Torgal in Final Fantasy 16 instead. While it remains to be seen what Blizzard has in store for players in Dragonflight Season 3, it wouldn't be at all surprising if healer buffs played a significant part.
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