Itās honestly been a minute since I played WoW and even longer since I felt the need to go gather anything. I just remember my wife and I playing together and both mining the same ore.
But yeah.
10 bites at the apple or active for X amount of time, still better than watching someone train a mob on you and steal your stuff after it knocks you out of your channel.
I think GW2 also does individual instanced nodes for gathering, but its been even longer since I played that than WoW.
PvP. The static nodes, and the loud mining sound were there to encourage PvP and fighting over materials. It is just a by product of what the game use to be before the direction changed.
Imagine yourself a new player mining a ore when a full geared level 60 jump on him one shooting him to dust. The level 60 does not need the ore, he is leaving it untouched as a bait for First Light newbies trying to craft their first gear set. After being ganked many times the humiliated and frustrated new player would leave the game for good - I think this is a very good game to play, correct?
I think they didnt because of world PvP - Kill someone on opposite faction mining a nodeātake node. The personal node is designed to reduce conflict. I think they wanted max conflict here. May change in the future though as few activate PvP when farmingāwhy would you.
I didnāt realize WoW had moved to that method. They probably got it from Guild Wars 2. It can be a solid means of dealing with resources in a game. However, it really needs to be part of a larger approach to gaming and not just an addon.
I donāt like competing with others for nodes, but there is something satisfying about coming up on nodes just in time, or even too late, to harvest.