Reason why people say TBC was harder

[voidillusion]

Are you kidding me? Tank design was AWFUL back then. Block tanks WERE the only viable tanks 'cuz every other tank would randomly get 1-shot in raids to crushing blow. There's a reason you never saw bear tanks. We brought one to karazhan and prayed to RNGesus that when Prince Malchazar started swinging 'dem axes he didn't randomly one-shot our tank with double crushing blow.

...I was that bear tank. I was forced to change mains soon after.



I played FFXI for 10 years - that shit was my jam. I still pop onto privy servers occasionally to play around. I absolutely loved XI. That being said, that game was piss easy to play once you got the basics down. You didn't have a 'rotation', you mostly auto-attacked. You didn't really have many abilities, you could legit play completely out of your spell book - and many players actually did. That game was more about resource management than technical skills. It's a very different monster from BC WoW.

Everquest just had real challenge frequently that anyone could have access to. Very different style from WoW's Mythic raiding or M+5 and higher dungeons.

My main was a feral druid in TBC, didn't MT kael and Illidan because that was a warrior's job, apart from that, from what i remember i really dont know what you're talking about, we could tank pretty much everything.

[Tasttey]

Frozen shadowweave was better itemized, though.
So it's not like you really lost anything using frozen shadowweave.
Ret straight up didn't have any good gear most of the expansion due to the "lol if im not a blood elf I actually need spellpower" bullshit.

That was the best thing about the FSW set, craft it for Heroics and stockpile that DKP for 2 tiers.

TBC Ret was hilariously bad if you were Alliance, old Seal of Casino.

[Dhrizzle]

So, bad players and bad tanks, good logic, i repeat:

Nothing in TBC was remotely hard dungeon wise, the only "hard place" was 1 pack in Shattered Halls with 6 mobs inside the room with the beds with the chance to pull extra and the about 7-10 stealth dudes in Shadow Labyrinth which you probably never experienced since they got reduced to 2-3 before most people were 70, even the "Hard Arcatraz" was a joke if you werent half retarded.

Just because something is considered hard by the average player, it doent mean it was ever hard.

Let me explain basic dungeon thinking : Does it have mana and its name sounds like a healer or looks like a healer if humanoid? Probably heals, kill first.. Oh wait Captain name in there probably buffs the rest, or makes them immune, kill first, then healer second--> None of those exist --> Mana user first since they die faster.

Apply this to every dungeon ever existed in WoW and your chance to wipe drops by 90%

Sure, you are gonna wipe the first time you are somewhere to some different thing from waht i wrote above, like the 5 second stun in Sethekk Halls the first time you meet that pack which can surprise you, but guess what? Good healer, tracked debuffs from then, dispelled, i never actually wiped there cause my healer wasnt bad.

Okay I get it, you and your friends were super-1337, overgeared and min-maxed composition so you didn't find TBC heroics hard. For the rest of us average plebs in content-appropriate gear, PuGging or playing with friends who aren't mages and prot-pallies the game posed challenges that have been absent since the WotLK pre-patch.

[Sliske]

That's not even remotely true. Wtf you on about? Block actually only blocked for the amount of block value you had. Yeah, don't remember that stat existing, do you? Block was pretty much used only to avoid crushing blows. Don't remember them either?

i mention it in the post you quote and you say i don't remember it existing.

enough said

[Angrie]

So why has NO one mentioned Naxx60? I know it's not from TBC, but most guilds only killed 2 bosses in Naxx60.
I was lucky enough to be part of a KT farm guild since my guild at the time was one of the best in the world.
Having said that no one can deny the difficulty of that raid...


The games difficulty in TBC is parallel to Legion. HOWEVER, in my opinion, TBC was more fun.
Seeing Illidan for the first time was an epic experience. He was the poster child of TBC (and pretty much the entire game), and not everyone got to see him.
Fighting Kael'thas and using legendary weapons was EPIC. When he smashed the window and the whole raid was flying, it was EPIC.

Killing Xavius, wounding Cenarius, Nighthold, Trials of Valor is just not epic. Even having the weapons like the Ashbringer or Doomhammer is not epic.
Epic is seeing Nef land for the first time, going beast mode on Vael, killing world dragons, or 1 Shotting noobs with your Zin'Rohk.

This is what people who didn't play back then won't understand. The 'feeling' of accomplishment in vanilla and TBC was much higher. The last time i had that 'feeling' was killing the Lich King.

Cataclysm, MoP, and WoD all promised the 'feeling'. Never came. Deathwing could have been a lot better. MoP was just horrible. WoD was just missing something.

[Sliske]

Well you had to be a warrior on illidan cus lol shear, but yeah.
People forget about block value and block rating. Stack BV gear and trash mobs don't do damage to you. Too much BV gear and you don't generate rage and have to tank without pants on.

that depended on if your dps were good or not. most dps didn't do enough damage to over aggro me on trivial content and on high end content the bosses hit hard enough that i didn't have to remove gear.

if you ran heroics or badge runs with good dps guildies you'd lose aggro for sure though and need the rage.

most players had multiple sets of gear (or rather just multiple trinkets and such to swap out)

[Tasttey]

My main was a feral druid in TBC, didn't MT kael and Illidan because that was a warrior's job, apart from that, from what i remember i really dont know what you're talking about, we could tank pretty much everything.

IIRC Kael required a warrior MT to reflect the fireball and Illidan had Shear that had to be Shield Blocked, other than that and Stance-Dancing Archi (which could be dealt with with a tremor totem/fear ward rotation) Druids could tank the other encounters just fine with a large enough health pool.

The reason why Ferals usually got shifted over from trash pack tank to dps on single tank boss fights was because unlike the Prot Warriors/Pallies they could go kitty and actually contribute dps to the fight.

[Zka]

Except they were faster than base MS and would gib anyone they caught AND were immune to slows. Unless you ran a hunter, you were SOL.

Yes, we had a huntard almost everytime. But never 2 healers, that's just absurd. I think they were maybe stunnable, not sure... I tanked them so many times but it was 10 years ago.

[kary]

that depended on if your dps were good or not. most dps didn't do enough damage to over aggro me on trivial content and on high end content the bosses hit hard enough that i didn't have to remove gear.

if you ran heroics or badge runs with good dps guildies you'd lose aggro for sure though and need the rage.

most players had multiple sets of gear (or rather just multiple trinkets and such to swap out)

But... no pants party...
No pants party?

[Sliske]

So why has NO one mentioned Naxx60? I know it's not from TBC

You answered yourself, but Naxx40 was really nothing special.

The problem with Naxx40 was that it took MONTHS of raiding to even get the gear required to raid the place as well as exalted with AD.

So right off the bat, you have two giant gateways to even enter. But lets assume you were geared and ready to enter the second naxx opened, well then you easily cleared around half of the raid in a week or two. Lets not forget 8 bosses (i believe) died in under 10 days on its release. Then the giant wall of needing 8 warrior tanks with t3 4 piece for the taunt spell hit. Once you poached all of the other guilds' tanks, you steamrolled down 4Horsemen and then the next big boss was Sapphiron which you needed a ton of frost resist for.

After that , Kel'Thuzad was a 2-3 day progression boss.

The problem with naxx is its STUPID requirements in both gear and number of tanks. This is what content's difficulty used to be. Not mechanics, not challenge, numbers. 8 fucking tanks with t3 4piece! In an era where max you'd have 2 tanks and another 1-2 as reserve with terrible gear.

This is the cause of the "2 boss" nonsense. Every warrior tank in Naxx40 faced an ultimatum:

1. Ditch their guild to be hoovered up by a much better guild so that they can ride the gravy train to free loot and progression, or
2. Wait for months and hope another 5 warriors show up ready to progress in your guild.

- - - Updated - - -

But... no pants party...
No pants party?

Wasn't that mostly vanilla anyway?

[kary]

You answered yourself, but Naxx40 was really nothing special.

The problem with Naxx40 was that it took MONTHS of raiding to even get the gear required to raid the place as well as exalted with AD.

So right off the bat, you have two giant gateways to even enter. But lets assume you were geared and ready to enter the second naxx opened, well then you easily cleared around half of the raid in a week or two. Lets not forget 8 bosses (i believe) died in under 10 days on its release. Then the giant wall of needing 8 warrior tanks with t3 4 piece for the taunt spell hit. Once you poached all of the other guilds' tanks, you steamrolled down 4Horsemen and then the next big boss was Sapphiron which you needed a ton of frost resist for.

After that , Kel'Thuzad was a 2-3 day progression boss.

The problem with naxx is its STUPID requirements in both gear and number of tanks. This is what content's difficulty used to be. Not mechanics, not challenge, numbers. 8 fucking tanks with t3 4piece! In an era where max you'd have 2 tanks and another 1-2 as reserve with terrible gear.

This is the cause of the "2 boss" nonsense. Every warrior tank in Naxx40 faced an ultimatum:

1. Ditch their guild to be hoovered up by a much better guild so that they can ride the gravy train to free loot and progression, or
2. Wait for months and hope another 5 warriors show up ready to progress in your guild.

- - - Updated - - -



Wasn't that mostly vanilla anyway?

In this vein, I remember how annoying hydross gearing, and shahraz gearing were. Illidan FR gearing wasn't that bad since you could get that off a vendor but jeez.

Also didnt you pmuch have to have plate tanks for Hydross bc there was no frost or nature resist leather? And warriors cus paladins had that stupid reverse taunt mechanic

[Deficineiron]

Can you Imagine..... Current Huntards in TBC? Barrage + having to control aggro? It would lock out 90% of hunters just on the fact you have to use your brain a bit.

add in being able to trap properly (and keep trapped, or double-trap when that was possible)....

[Roar-Powah]

Classes can do every damn thing now, back then you couldn't self heal or tank mobs as a non tank. If classes had all ability's they do now back in TBC it would of been a joke. Also you had to gear for +hit and also +defense as a tank etc. The game has changed for the worse over the years, it's been really dumb down way too much and will bite Blizzard in the ass ( it already has the last few years ).

You also had to communicate with your group in 5mans back in TBC, now it's just aoe tank / dps / heal, it's a fucking joke. The more Blizzard try's to bring this "class fantasy" into the game the more they are fucking it up. Blizzard are clueless now, the game doesn't even resemble what it use to be like and i don't think this game will last many more years. Legion is a decent expansion but fucking hell Blizzard has made one bad decision after another YET again.

I want the good old WoW that i fell in love with, and spent way too much time playing.

[Joeydivision82]

You pretty much said it was harder because it required more skill and thought instead of just slamming your face on your keyboard and getting max level gear. That's what we have been saying all these years.

No one has claimed that the mechanics were much more complex, but the raid took everyone to excite their job very well if not flawlessly deoendig on the fight. If adds weren't managed right they would 1-2 shot people, players had to focus fire more than they have ever had to since and people couldn't tunnel bosses. The basic idea was like a mythic raid now with less crazy mechanics being thrown at you(few exceptions) but also a whole lot less utility.

There are a lot of claims that "oh it was tough because you had to farm so much resist gear" I'm 99% sure most of the claims are from people who didn't play back then because you would go to the AH and spend like 200-300 gold on level 52 greens that had shit stats but had the required resistance and you'd be fine. There were only tanks who needed the entire sets and those were typically handled with guild funds and ready wel before the required time.

[Sliske]

In this vein, I remember how annoying hydross gearing, and shahraz gearing were. Illidan FR gearing wasn't that bad since you could get that off a vendor but jeez.

Also didnt you pmuch have to have plate tanks for Hydross bc there was no frost or nature resist leather? And warriors cus paladins had that stupid reverse taunt mechanic

i've pretty much vaporized SSC from my brain i hated that place so bad especially since lurker never dropped the mace and the stupid naga accent

[Roar-Powah]

You pretty much said it was harder because it required more skill and thought instead of just slamming your face on your keyboard and getting max level gear. That's what we have been saying all these years.

No one has claimed that the mechanics were much more complex, but the raid took everyone to excite their job very well if not flawlessly deoendig on the fight. If adds weren't managed right they would 1-2 shot people, players had to focus fire more than they have ever had to since and people couldn't tunnel bosses. The basic idea was like a mythic raid now with less crazy mechanics being thrown at you(few exceptions) but also a whole lot less utility.

There are a lot of claims that "oh it was tough because you had to farm so much resist gear" I'm 99% sure most of the claims are from people who didn't play back then because you would go to the AH and spend like 200-300 gold on level 52 greens that had shit stats but had the required resistance and you'd be fine. There were only tanks who needed the entire sets and those were typically handled with guild funds and ready wel before the required time.

The guild i was in for Vanilla / TBC supplied everyone with the required resist gear, it wasn't that hard to get due to the WHOLE guild working together and everyone farming the mats needed. This was the goal of Blizzard, to make guild work as one big team. Now guilds these days all fight over silly shit and it's one of the reasons i gquit the guild i was in since the start of MoP( I was Lead Officer / CO-GM )

I remember running with the guild tanks ( I played a MM hunter in Vanilla ) through Mara for the poison resist gear, fun times.

[Deficineiron]

Yeah, well, sorry but there isn't really much reason to debate with people who say melee taking damage thus requiring attention from healers who are already OOM, isn't a factor in difficulty.

I think it was proven some time ago that what you describe is in fact not difficulty, but rather Tedium. Care to chime in, Kary?

- - - Updated - - -

Yeah, well, sorry but there isn't really much reason to debate with people who say melee taking damage thus requiring attention from healers who are already OOM, isn't a factor in difficulty.

an aside about the numbers/difficulty/tedium - In mid-wotlk I started an experiment leveling a ret paladin by solo'ing instances that were still in my xp range. Once I got to the early wotlk instances, I was able to slowly clear some or mostly clear the lower level wotlk instances, but bc heroics faceplanted me. ( I assume was low-mid 70s at that point).


Interestingly, when I tried Kara (assume around 74 or so), I had remembered the pony's in the stable doing 8k or so dmg, but they had apparently been nerfed.

- - - Updated - - -

Hellfire ramparts trash was retarded.
Blood furnace packs, especially the ones before the last boss with the felguards
Sethekk halls twin packs with the birds that used to hulk out (forgot the npc name, talon guards maybe?)
Auchenai crypts melee draenei ghosts with the staves
Any mob with mortal strike (which there were a lot)
Any mob that stunned (less frequent than MS, but frequent enough)
Mana tombs in general.

id say that trash was prob harder to heal than the bosses. I didn't do much heroics on my druid till the nerfs came in, though, so my recollection could be off.

add in the pulls in shadow labs in blackheart's room.

durnholde lookouts on heroic.

[Extremities]

Classes can do every damn thing now, back then you couldn't self heal or tank mobs as a non tank. If classes had all ability's they do now back in TBC it would of been a joke. Also you had to gear for +hit and also +defense as a tank etc. The game has changed for the worse other the years, it's been really dumb down way too much and will bite Blizzard in the ass ( it already has the last few years ).

You also had to communicate with your group in 5mans back in TBC, now it's just aoe tank / dps / heal, it's a fucking joke. The more Blizzard try's to bring this "class fantasy" into the game the more they are fucking it up. Blizzard are clueless now, the game doesn't even resemble what it use to be like and i don't think this game will last many more years. Legion is a decent expansion but fucking hell Blizzard has made one bad decision after another YET again.

I want the good old WoW that i feel in love with and spent way too much time playing.

Welcome to the instant gratification, spoiled child, I want it now, I want everything now, I want to be able to do everything now generation that Blizzard is 100% catering to. Rather sad, right? It's alllllllll about the $ now. Not that it wasn't before but it's even more emphasized now. Cater to a larger group = more money for them. Sad sad days for the genre. It's one reason I've been enjoying the online survival games now. They're brutal with no catering

[voidillusion]

It wasn't.

Players were not as good and it felt harder as a result.
The game was much simpler in BC.

I would love to see many of today's game that consider themselves above average playing in a game where their class has almost none or even none self healing, few or none defensive cds, surrounded by mobs that if you agro from a tank that doesnt facerolls threat just get near you and close to one shot you.

Context ppl, context! Game was simpler yes, that doesnt mean easier and in many cases means harder cause you had less tools.

[lordzed83]

What can i say I miss tbc.

When You finished SSC TK or even Dungeons like SH SL Aca or MT you felt good cause u had accomplishment of something harder feeling.

Now i got tank some +8 mythic plus aoe the fuck out of it and queue for next one 30 minutes later.....

O and when You had EPIC drop like fucking SUN EATER from mechanar you ware in heaven. now purplez everywhere...