Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Recap

Things are getting a little confused over the last few posts, so I thought I'd state my positions on raid content clearly:

1. Attunements are unnecessary, and should be removed for every instance except Karazhan.

2. Reward bosses should be buried deep in the heart of an instance, not placed near the beginning.

3. Guilds should do raid content in order, and not chase after "easy" bosses.

4. If you have a choice between putting in attempts on a new boss or farming for extra gear, you should put in more attempts on the new boss.

5. Trash should not respawn.

Hopefully that makes things clearer.

6 comments:

  1. Your assessment of the attunement situation seems to be based less on concrete reality and more on a personal interpretation of how raiding instances are organized.

    Vashj and Kael'thas are the end-bosses of two high end instances. By definition, they are going to be very complex and tough fights, no matter what, especially when you consider how important they are in lore.

    However, who had heard of High Warlock Naj'entus before Black Temple? No one. He was made up for that might. And he's the first boss of an instance, not the final one. Of course he's going to be easy when compared to Vashj and Kael.

    People have interpreted the natural drop in difficulty after defeating the final boss of a dungeon as a "reward system" designed by Blizzard, when in fact it is nothing of the kind. It's simply how it works. You cannot reasonably assume that a fight right after a boss with a difficulty such as Kael'thas to be equivalent to that. It would be ridiculous and terribly painful for guilds.

    Not every fight CAN be as hard as Vashj, Kael, Archimonde, Illidan, etc. For a fight to be so hard, it cannot be common. For there to be hard fight, there must be easy fights. Blizzard simply puts the hard fights deep into the dungeon. It's a natural, logical system, one that makes perfect sense.

    Kael'thas continues to give even hardcore guilds in T6 gear headaches. They can say all they want about how nerfed it is, but it's still a pain-in-the-butt fight.

    As with mountains, there is an easy downhill slope after the peak. But the downhill slope was not created for those who reached the peak. It's simply the natural path the mountain--and the climber--must take. What goes up must come down.

    It's very fallacious to interpret the downhill slide as a reward. Most climbers consider getting to the peak the reward. Going downhill is simply the way to get started on the next peak, and a way of recovering one's energy and spirit.

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  2. where is everyone rohan? it seems to me like you and me are the only one posting now adays regulary

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  3. On your points, I state the following:

    1: Concur 100% the deaths that players will face when attempting content beyond them will be a harsh reminder of their relative skill.

    2. Concur 100%

    3. Concur 110%! It is important to hone skills rather than chase after 'easy' loot before youre ready.

    4. Concur in part. While I am a proponent of skill>gear, the fact remains that gear does play a part in the equation and sometimes you have to farm a bit to make that happen.

    5. Concur 100%. If you kill it once, it should stay dead which will allow for more attempts at the boss.

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  4. I would agree that Rohan's proposed changes are "a personal interpretation of how raiding instances are organized".

    On the other hand, the positioning of Vashj and Kael as an attunement barrier, with some easier bosses at the beginning of the next raid, are simply an implementation of the WoW designer team's "personal interpretation of how raiding instances are organized"*.

    *One might also replace "personal interpretation" with "business decision". Many people, including myself, interpret the current TBC raid implementation as sets of content with various attunement barriers to extend the life of the content. Later the barriers are taken down (and nerfs given) to allow more access to content as hardcore content is added in a stair-step for an "every raider gets something new" feel to patches.

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  5. @Apathyinc:

    "You cannot reasonably assume that a fight right after a boss with a difficulty such as Kael'thas to be equivalent to that. It would be ridiculous and terribly painful for guilds."

    Actually, it isn't so unreasonable an assumption. Compare the Ragnaros fight to Razorgore followed by Vael. Rag was a joke compared to the organization needed for Razor.

    Part of this can be attributed to Blizzard still learning how to implement raiding, but not all of it. There were "loot pinatas" further into BWL as a reward for defeating the harder bosses, and as an opportunity to gear up for the last two fights.

    @Rohan:

    While I understand the attitude behind #4, I don't see that happening. Guilds that have been struggling on Kael'thas for the last month / 6 weeks are going to FLOCK to MH. Anything to break the frustration of wiping over and over again to an extremely difficult encounter.

    You say: "keep beating your head against the wall until the wall falls down". They say "we'll go into MH, get a hammer, and then come back and take down that wall".

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  6. dorgol, in my view, those guilds think they're getting a sledgehammer, but they're really ending up with a basic claw hammer. It'll help, but really, it's not that much help.

    Mastering strategy, execution, and skill is like activating a jackhammer, and one that will help you out on the rest of the content.

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