Are the first 2-3 bosses of SoO morchok levels of difficulty?

[Deleted]

My teammates just ran out of the dungeon lol. I tried to finish it b myself.

[Deleted]

Nobleshield, just a quick question aimed at you.

If normals are past heroics (as you say it) and flex now covers the role of the normals you used to raid, why does it matter that you now raid flex? Is it because of the name? Because of the itemlevel? You're still seeing all content you saw before and at the level of difficulty you played before.

Reading his posts (and I don't want to put words in his mouth but I think i'm right) it's because of his raid as a whole.

I've seen the same thing - people who were perfectly able to raid earlier versions of wow being edged out by the increasing complexity. It kinda sucks balls if your goal is to raid with people you like. The more hardcore of you might not get this, I realise, but "they suck, ditch them" is actually a painful process for some of us to go through - and the longer a period of time you've played with someone and the more you get on with them, the worse it is.

[Deleted]

Flex is going to be a good tool for every type of raider, from the more casuals to the hardcore ones. It will take the place of what LFR should have been, a slightly easier version of the normal bosses. Also it will make up for the shared lockout, and put flex at the level of ICC 10, and let people get down to it to get this or that piece of equipment, help some1 to catch up for normal/hc, and last, gear up you alts at a faster pace. Imo this is the key to Flex, because it will be a community friendly tool, and will help growing it back. Then many of the most casual players will have a chance to group with good, commited players that are for example gearing alts, and get the chance to learn from them, and maybe expand their horizons to a more competitive way of playing. I miss that from ICC, beind farming HC 25 lich, and leveling and gearing all my alts, meeting all kind of players and even being helpful to them. This of course can be turned upside down, there will be always people trying that will not accept this, and can lead to old plagues like the "looking for 1 DPS for ICC 10, min 5700 GS" and such, but overall it will be an excelent feauture, but ONLY while it remains out of "Looking For X" queing.

[Fluorescent0]

Reading his posts (and I don't want to put words in his mouth but I think i'm right) it's because of his raid as a whole.

I've seen the same thing - people who were perfectly able to raid earlier versions of wow being edged out by the increasing complexity. It kinda sucks balls if your goal is to raid with people you like. The more hardcore of you might not get this, I realise, but "they suck, ditch them" is actually a painful process for some of us to go through - and the longer a period of time you've played with someone and the more you get on with them, the worse it is.

I never said that he had to ditch his raid. If normal has become increasingly complex to the point (still according to his words) the difficulty is what heroics were in the past, and therefore flexible is taking the place of what normal used to be, the difference only becomes nominal, and you're effectively doing the same content at the same difficulty you're used to.

[Deleted]

I never said that he had to ditch his raid. If normal has become increasingly complex to the point (still according to his words) the difficulty is what heroics were in the past, and therefore flexible is taking the place of what normal used to be, the difference only becomes nominal, and you're effectively doing the same content at the same difficulty you're used to.

Oh sure.

But what if you are capable of the new normals but the people you are with aren't?

Creates a certain pressure and could cause unhappiness, no?

I';m actually delighted with flexi, means I can jack normals in except as an afterthought and (apparently) take who I like. I won't miss normal modes at all, the recent raids have been an overly tuned pain in the arse clusterfuck but I can see how someone would think they were selling themselvs short by not doing them.

[Fluorescent0]

Oh sure.

But what if you are capable of the new normals but the people you are with aren't?

Creates a certain pressure and could cause unhappiness, no?

I';m actually delighted with flexi, means I can jack normals in except as an afterthought and (apparently) take who I like. I won't miss normal modes at all, the recent raids have been an overly tuned pain in the arse clusterfuck but I can see how someone would think they were selling themselvs short by not doing them.

That means he either improved or he always was. The situation would have changed regardless.

[Deleted]

That means he either improved or he always was. The situation would have changed regardless.

Not if the normal modes had remained at their original tuning. His friends would still be able to do them, and he would be at a place where his skill and social life met.

What changed was the tuning, remember.

[Fluorescent0]

Not if the normal modes had remained at their original tuning. His friends would still be able to do them, and he would be at a place where his skill and social life met.

What changed was the tuning, remember.

Nope. If flex is going to cover the place normals left empty (still quoting him, should be obvious by now but why not state it again), it means flex is what normals used to be. If he's become too good for flex in its current implementation, it means he would have become too good for normals in their past implementation, which would have caused the same problem regardless, just with different names (he could have raided heroics in the past, he can raid normals now).

[Deleted]

Nope.

Yep.

If flex is going to cover the place normals left empty (still quoting him, should be obvious by now but why not state it again), it means flex is what normals used to be. If he's become too good for flex in its current implementation, it means he would have become too good for normals in their past implementation, which would have caused the same problem regardless, just with different names (he could have raided heroics in the past, he can raid normals now).

Nope. Read what i wrote again and have a think.

[Nobleshield]

I never said that he had to ditch his raid. If normal has become increasingly complex to the point (still according to his words) the difficulty is what heroics were in the past, and therefore flexible is taking the place of what normal used to be, the difference only becomes nominal, and you're effectively doing the same content at the same difficulty you're used to.

Quite frankly, and at the risk of coming off like a douchebag, because I hate feeling like I "can do better" than where I'm at; it makes me frustrated with the game as a whole, it makes me frustrated with the people I play with (my "friends"), and it makes me frustrated that we struggle in things that the general opinion seems to be is easy. I don't like feeling like that because it plants doubt (pun?) in my mind, and makes me want to guild hop again. I spent most of Cata guild hopping trying to get "just a bit more" in progression, because the guilds I were in were sometimes decent but not quite good enough. Most of the time though the game-life balance was too much (e.g. I can't raid until midnight 4x nights a week) so none of them lasted, which is honestly a shame because at the end of Cata I had been in a pretty good guild, since I got Heroic Morchok on the second week of DS (but again, 4x nights a week until midnight is more than I was willing to do). Part of the issue is having to choose between personal progression and "having fun". Since raiding+progression = fun to me, it's a very hard choice when the guild I'm with, who I've returned to all the time, just isn't up to snuff anymore but nothing can really be done about it without adopting a hardcore mentality that nobody seems to wait to do, and I don't want to be "that asshole" who is like "You guys are all scrubs, I'm going to a real guild".

I have nothing against Flex personally; I think it's a great idea that should have been around much earlier. However, I know that my guild isn't going to be happy with it. We don't WANT to be relegated to Flex, when we used to do Normal, even if the dynamics have changed. For me personally, it's not an acceptable option, and should it arise it'll be that much harder for me to even care about logging on for Normal if I know it's going to pretty much be a wipefest on a boss for the whole night without any progress being done (that is, I don't mind wiping on a boss when you are actually progressing through the fight. But say a wipe at 10% and then five wipes at 70% isn't progress, it's people being stupid). As I said we just BARELY downed Lei Shen last week; I think it was more luck than anything else, and it's very unlikely we're going to get to kill him a second time before 5.4 hits (so in my mind, the kill was a fluke. I never consider a kill to be "legit" until it's at least twice, the first time could be dumb luck). Every new boss we encountered (once the guild passed Horridon, which they were wiping on for at least a month I think; I was still retired from the game at that point so I don't know for sure) has usually taken at least 2-3 weeks to finally down, and we still struggle on some bosses that we've downed (Tortos, Durumu, Animus and Iron Qon spring to mind; sometimes we can barely beat Qon). While only a small amount of guilds have downed Lei Shen on normal (and we now number amongst them), I can't help but have this nagging voice in the back of my head telling me every time we wipe on Tortos to someone being late kicking a turtle, every time we had to call a wipe on Lei Shen because we had Diffusion adds eating people and two of our guys died from Static Shock, or the same healer dying to Thunderstruck four attempts in a row, "You can do better than this".

I mean, the issue is clearly ME and MY expectations, there's no doubt of that at all, I just don't know how to deal with it without either being burned out by lack of progress or being a dick.

[Uglytoes]

I don't want to be rude or anything, but if you have people in your raid dying to thunderstruck, than normals are not for your group. That is a predictable mechanic, it has a cast time, and a huge glowing graphic.

Maybe the best route for your guild is clear the first wing of Flex that opens with patch 5.4, learn those bosses in Flex, then hit the normals the next night. Just because normals seem harder doesn't mean that you are confined to Flex. Flex could easily be a learning stage and a gear boost before normals. Maybe your guild can only clear the first 4 bosses on normal? Clear the rest on Flex to learn the mechanics.

[Odina]

The more I read this it seems like Blizzard intends for non-hardcore 10-man guilds to be doing Flex (that is, the 10-mans of the Wrath era that would have a core 10 and PUG a 25 for usually the first 4-6 bosses for bonus loot), hardcore 10-mans to be doing Normal (and Heroic) and 25-man to be doing Normal (and Heroic). That still doesn't sound like a good prospect while I would prefer 25-mans, nobody in my guild wants that and prefers a 10-man, but it seems unless we want to go more hardcore and serious then normal mode "isn't for us"

I have been saying it for a long time and I believe it's starting to soak in but many that think they are "normal mode raiders" from back in TBC and WOTLK were not "normal mode raiders" of today. The 10 man groups in WOTLK need to realize that todays normal mode are tuned to those eras 25 man raids. they were much harder than that time's 10 mans for both normal and heroic. Today there was no equivalent to that level untill they introduced flex mode!

If you were not doing 25 man normal's then you were not a normal mode raider and were a 2nd class citizen back then and it's easy to see in the discrepancy of the gear between the two size's.

The main issue now is peopel still look back years going "I use to be a normal raider and did normal modes now the game is way harder" ... then you look at there achives and they cleared the raids when they were a tier or 2 old or it was 10 mans but they look back with rose tinted glasses and not take the change to make 10 and 25 man the same into consideration and realize that that version of the raiding game was GONE untill flex was reintroduced.

Just think of flex like 10 man WOTLK and think of 10 normal as 25 man normal raids. If you were doing 25 man normal ICC pre nerf to the instance then you should realize that normal mode is still normal and there was one shot mechanics that far back as well on NORMAL!

Not singeling you out Nobleshield but looking back at your achieves you were a 10 man raider back in the day and now are having issues with what would have been 25 man normal raiding. To myself this is normal as many could not do 25 man raiding that were able to do 10 man as there was more requirements then ...and it shows now. Flex is the old 10 mans and will help many stuck in this situation!

Your problem is not the difficulty in the raids either... reading your posts your problem is you are ina guild you personally like but is not on the same page when it comes to progress. You are with those you like but are not with those that are like minded. This is always a heart breaker and in the end you got to think what you prefer to spend your hobby time on... is it with friends or is it progressing further in raiding.... and that only you can decide!

PS: You are not an asshole if you leave in a decent way! If you say "you are all shit im out" then yes but if you explain that you really enjoy raiding and want to push yourself to your limit but that most don't seem to want to push that hard in your group and you wish them well" then most will bid you good luck...

[Nobleshield]

I don't want to be rude or anything, but if you have people in your raid dying to thunderstruck, than normals are not for your group. That is a predictable mechanic, it has a cast time, and a huge glowing graphic.

That is part of why I have these frustrations, that people die to it, or because they get Diffusion while running to their quadrants and the adds eat people, or they completely miss the bouncing balls, or stand in the electrified quadrant at the start of P2 (no joke we had someone do that and die two attempts in a row)

[Milkyz]

The way I see the levels are:

LFR - You get to "experience" the content. Chance at loot and you get to immerse yourself in the lore for that instance. No real stringent HPS/DPS requirements, nothing that can really kill you easily. You basically have to AFK in damage and not even get periodic healing from someone to die.

Flex - Your mom and pop guild. You guys like to raid with friends over skilled people but still want to not do it with a bunch of randoms. Mechanics might not wipe you in 1 shot, but repeated mistakes will.

Normal Mode - Mechanics will one shot you. DPS/HPS requirements minimal for decent geared group (no need to parse >75% to get a kill). Must follow mechanics to get the kill however.

Heroic Mode - Mechanics will one shot you along with relatively steep DPS/HPS requirements. This requires players to perform optimally while also following mechanics to the letter.

Mechanics are not a problem. People that cant multi-task are.

This is also how I see the new difficult levels, and I believe Blizzard plans relies on something along these lines. Maybe I'd adjust that Normal Mode - Mechanics will one shot you. with Normal Mode - Mechanics will/might one shot you..

Overall, I like the upcoming new model. I can't think of a player common stereotype who isn't provided with something on his playstyle. As Nobleshield pointed out, many guilds who nowadays struggle in Normal Mode will have players claiming they won't accept being downgraded to Flex. To this, I advise each player to face reality. Either you/your group is good for Heroics or you should step back to Normal. Then either your group is good for Normal, or you should step back to Flex. No hurt feelings, just accept that you/your group isn't coordinated/geared/experienced enough to play at a given level and find where you/your group should be.

One thing I'd like to point out is that in a Multiplayer Cooperative Game environment, Playing with Friends and Playing at High Level can't always happen. It doesn't mean that they are mutually exclusive, but sometimes it just won't happen. There are times you just have to make a choice between either of them.

[Nobleshield]

I have been saying it for a long time and I believe it's starting to soak in but many that think they are "normal mode raiders" from back in TBC and WOTLK were not "normal mode raiders" of today. The 10 man groups in WOTLK need to realize that todays normal mode are tuned to those eras 25 man raids. they were much harder than that time's 10 mans for both normal and heroic. Today there was no equivalent to that level untill they introduced flex mode!

That's kind of sinking in. I was only ever in 10-man guilds, none of them could ever field 25 people to begin with, I think I was 25 only at the start of Cata and the end in DS, everything else was 10.

[Deja Thoris]

Quite frankly, and at the risk of coming off like a douchebag, because I hate feeling like I "can do better" than where I'm at; it makes me frustrated with the game as a whole, it makes me frustrated with the people I play with (my "friends"), and it makes me frustrated that we struggle in things that the general opinion seems to be is easy. I don't like feeling like that because it plants doubt (pun?) in my mind, and makes me want to guild hop again. I spent most of Cata guild hopping trying to get "just a bit more" in progression, because the guilds I were in were sometimes decent but not quite good enough. Most of the time though the game-life balance was too much (e.g. I can't raid until midnight 4x nights a week) so none of them lasted, which is honestly a shame because at the end of Cata I had been in a pretty good guild, since I got Heroic Morchok on the second week of DS (but again, 4x nights a week until midnight is more than I was willing to do). Part of the issue is having to choose between personal progression and "having fun". Since raiding+progression = fun to me, it's a very hard choice when the guild I'm with, who I've returned to all the time, just isn't up to snuff anymore but nothing can really be done about it without adopting a hardcore mentality that nobody seems to wait to do, and I don't want to be "that asshole" who is like "You guys are all scrubs, I'm going to a real guild".

I have nothing against Flex personally; I think it's a great idea that should have been around much earlier. However, I know that my guild isn't going to be happy with it. We don't WANT to be relegated to Flex, when we used to do Normal, even if the dynamics have changed. For me personally, it's not an acceptable option, and should it arise it'll be that much harder for me to even care about logging on for Normal if I know it's going to pretty much be a wipefest on a boss for the whole night without any progress being done (that is, I don't mind wiping on a boss when you are actually progressing through the fight. But say a wipe at 10% and then five wipes at 70% isn't progress, it's people being stupid). As I said we just BARELY downed Lei Shen last week; I think it was more luck than anything else, and it's very unlikely we're going to get to kill him a second time before 5.4 hits (so in my mind, the kill was a fluke. I never consider a kill to be "legit" until it's at least twice, the first time could be dumb luck). Every new boss we encountered (once the guild passed Horridon, which they were wiping on for at least a month I think; I was still retired from the game at that point so I don't know for sure) has usually taken at least 2-3 weeks to finally down, and we still struggle on some bosses that we've downed (Tortos, Durumu, Animus and Iron Qon spring to mind; sometimes we can barely beat Qon). While only a small amount of guilds have downed Lei Shen on normal (and we now number amongst them), I can't help but have this nagging voice in the back of my head telling me every time we wipe on Tortos to someone being late kicking a turtle, every time we had to call a wipe on Lei Shen because we had Diffusion adds eating people and two of our guys died from Static Shock, or the same healer dying to Thunderstruck four attempts in a row, "You can do better than this".

I mean, the issue is clearly ME and MY expectations, there's no doubt of that at all, I just don't know how to deal with it without either being burned out by lack of progress or being a dick.

It's ok to have decent expectations. Expecting a person not to lick thunderstruck isn't a high expectation. Like was said, its on a timer, dbm screams at you and the circle it makes is brighter than a neon sign. I recognise that people have different abilities and don't belittle people based on progress etc but to die to that repeatedly you have to blind, deaf and a little bit dumb.

I think it comes down to a social problem / impressions. People want to raid normal but aren't really cut out for it, whether that be through abilities or the willingness to invest a little time. Flex somehow has a stigma attached to it. Hell, I'm 11/13HC and I'm looking forward to flex a lot, I'll run it with no qualms. I think what I'm saying is people need to accept what level of play is appropriate for them. If that's flex then so be it.

I also think that nothing good will come of your situation where you are likely better than the majority of the people you raid with. You need to raid with people whose company you enjoy and who are at or about your skill level. anything else isn't sustainable. It's not a selfish attitude. It's your time and its your hobby. You don't go out for morning jogs with a person who makes you idle at 50%, the same applies to raiding.
The way I see it you need to accept where you are or make changes, whether that be moving or kicking out serial thunderstruck lickers.

[Deleted]

I think it comes down to a social problem / impressions. People want to raid normal but aren't really cut out for it, whether that be through abilities or the willingness to invest a little time. Flex somehow has a stigma attached to it. Hell, I'm 11/13HC and I'm looking forward to flex a lot, I'll run it with no qualms. I think what I'm saying is people need to accept what level of play is appropriate for them. If that's flex then so be it.

I think the issue here has been more along the lines of "people want to raid with people they like*" and normals have been the only option.

Tbh though I think strict normal guilds are dead men walking in 5.4. The split will be between flexi and HC. The way normals are tuned you need a bench tp get through them, and flexi means anyone who puts you on the bench is an asshole.

My 2 cents.


*i..s not LFR trolls and douches.

[Odina]

That's kind of sinking in. I was only ever in 10-man guilds, none of them could ever field 25 people to begin with, I think I was 25 only at the start of Cata and the end in DS, everything else was 10.

Correct it's easy to see when you go to the achivements on the armory. Another thing is it's been YEARS since then and peoepl don't remeber how far back they wer or wtv.

An example is you were an ICC Raider but it was 10 man. From your posts in this thread I asusme (not a good thing to do I know) that you were under the impression you were a decent raider back then and cleared stuff in 10 man thus a normal mode raider at a good pace. However looking at the achievement dates is what peopel need to go back and look.


I'm not doing htis to single you out just a s a referene as many seem to only think back and go "yea I cleared that no problem but raids are way harder now I cant do them now and I could then!!"

you got heroic frostwing halls 10 man on 08/22/2011
I got heroic frostwing halls 25 man on 11/26/2010
8 month difference

Even something like Onixya lair 10 man
You got the kill 06/10/2010
I got it on 09/24/2009
Just about 9 months difference

If you go back to TBC you can see that back then raids were like today
SSC
you got the lady vashj kill on 10/09/2011
I got it befor 10/14/2008 but that is the earlyset the achieve can go back so were talking years not months

Even the black temple
10/10/2010 vs 10/14/2008

This isnt a "Im way better than you" but I feel many that are in the same boat as you fail to go back and look at those dates and fail to realise they were tiers/ months behind the raiders of that era! They also had allot of valor gear and or in some cases the next tier gear buffing them in many cases and allot of them did things with a huge buff ala ICC... ALL things you will not have in current tier raiding on normal mode and this is what is steem rolling the previous "normal mode raiders".

[Nobleshield]

I think the issue here has been more along the lines of "people want to raid with people they like*" and normals have been the only option.

Even more than that, I think it's more like being told that normal is the right option, and now it's Flex. If Flex had been around from the start, I don't think there would even have been this issue as those of us who used to normal and now can't would never have tried normal, we would have been content with Flex. However, what we have right now is something like an amusement park with a "you must be this tall" sign that all of a sudden raised the minimum height by 6", so a lot of people who used to be able to get in now are shown away towards a different ride that's similar but not quite the same enjoyment.

Basically, Flex should have been thought of and done at the start of Cataclysm, with the statement that 10N is now tuned much harder than before due to the shared lockout, so if you were a 10N raider in Wrath, you want to focus on Flex and dabble in Normal modes. Instead, that was never really mentioned so you had and still have a bunch of 10-man guilds that were comfortable in Wrath struggling in normal modes in Cata and Mists (DS notwithstanding ofc), when in reality from T11 on, 10N wasn't the right content for them at all (however as we know there was no alternative).

For me at least, the goal is going to be reasonable progress in Normal, and Flex to supplement. Have some real life issues coming up (girlfriend and two young children are moving in with me) that might affect raiding seriously, so have to see. I do know that I probably won't be content to struggle in Normal and treat Flex as the new content though, so if and when that comes I guess I will have a choice to make

[blackhammer99]

The issue won't be difficulty of mechanics, it will reside in gear.
The raid was tested at like 520 ilvl, maybe even lower for the first few.
Any serious raider is at least 535-540, with high end being closer to 550.

What pugs do you expect to find with 520 ilvl?
Maybe they exist on the server you are from, but there are zero people on my server outside any of the better guilds that are anywhere near the ilvl as those that are in it.
That's just how gear has worked these last tiers.
So pugs will likely be 500 ilvl, and you WILL struggle, if not because of dps requirements but because health pools.
Can probably kill the first boss. Wouldn't expect the get farther than that.

The people saying the bosses are "faceroll" mean their 25 man guild that has farmed 13/13h for months won't have any issues.