Mogu’Shan Palace - Raid Preview

[Nesingwary-Eliada]

Cataclysm was supposed to have 4 tiers like WotLK (which interestingly enough was supposed to have 3 - ToC was a last minute decision so we ended up at 4):
4.0 - Throne of the 4 Winds, BWD, BoT, Firelands
4.1 - Abyssmal Maw
4.2 - War of the Ancients
4.3 - Temple of Earth AKA Deathwing

My point wasn't about tiers, it was about each expansion since Wrath starting off with 3 raids. The below poster was misreading the preiview information and thought we were only get 3 raids in total, which is simply not true. We'll be getting 3 raids with launch.

Under epic raids it says three raids. And this raid has 6 bosses... It doesn't seem like it's referring to three at launch but three in total

3.0- Naxxramas, Eye of Eternity, Obsidian Sanctum

4.0- Blackwing Descent, Throne of the Four Winds, Bastion of Twilight

5.0- Mogu'Shan Palace, ?????, ?????

3 seems to be the magic number for launch raids for Blizz at the moment. 3 is manageable and will likely be finished sooner so we can get MoP by maybe the summer and won't have to raid DS for another 11 months.

[bbr]

3.0- Naxxramas, Eye of Eternity, Obsidian Sanctum

4.0- Blackwing Descent, Throne of the Four Winds, Bastion of Twilight

5.0- Mogu'Shan Palace, ?????, ?????

3 seems to be the magic number for launch raids for Blizz at the moment. 3 is manageable and will likely be finished sooner so we can get MoP by maybe the summer and won't have to raid DS for another 11 months.

Well, the big difference between 1.0, 2.0 and the later expansions was that they didn't have 10 man raids yet.

3 raids is good "if they are difficult", it gives players a good amount of time to get into the content and spend time progressing while blizzard works on the next raid tier.
It'll also allow players to clear half an instance, and start working on another if they are stuck on a particular boss - which is nice for a quick diversion. so you're not banging your head on a wall all week and not getting any extra loot / progression.

[Azshira]

Most likely a trend will be, x2 'small sized raids' and 1 single raid encounter(or a 2 boss mini raid).

So for the single/mini raid: Something like a Malygos/Magtheridon encounter or perhaps a Gruul/Al'kir type raid.

Then 2 bigger, but quite small in terms of size. Example BoT/BWD. So Mogu’Shan Palace & other raid will be around the 4-6 bosses each. I think that is a very good amount of bosses on launch. But I prefer QUALITY bosses over QUANTITY.

You'd be talking about: 1-2 bosses (mini raid/single raid) + 6 (palace) + 4-6 (other raid) = 11-14 bosses. If going by trend.

Also having 3 raids, allows you to have different environments so you don't need to look at just 1 big raid every week. I would like to have 2 raids per patch to spice things up, and I know Blizzard wanted that in the past. Let's hope this time, the possibilites are endless. And yes, this is speculation based on past expansions.

[wariofan1]

Looks really bland to me, at it looks to be even shorter than BoT! Will be another Dragon Soul I guess, just that we're in a new place. Still, I hope it will be enjoyable at least, as the above poster said quality over quantity. Still, the bigger raids have all been of high quality, so I'd definately soon want a big raid again, tired of only 6-8 bosses.

[Drilnos]

If I had to guess, I'd say that concept art #3 looks like the room labeled "Library" on the map. The second concept art has the shape of the Titan repository room - which would make sense, since metallic discs with encoded knowledge are pretty common Titan artifacts. I can't place the first concept art - it might be a view of the raid entrance.

[micho]

Looks really bland to me, at it looks to be even shorter than BoT! Will be another Dragon Soul I guess, just that we're in a new place. Still, I hope it will be enjoyable at least, as the above poster said quality over quantity. Still, the bigger raids have all been of high quality, so I'd definately soon want a big raid again, tired of only 6-8 bosses.

they said they had 3 raids planned for launch only one was annouced tho so chill

[Zafor]

I miss long raids that actually had vast halls and levels. Remember how massive Kara was? Or Icc? More than 10 bosses. Who cares if they took more than four hours to clear, thats why you have a guild, to clear the rest the next day. When I first saw the layout for this dungeon, I was like hmm, ok, nothing too exciting. I'm begging for raids with 10+ bosses in 5.1, 5.2, and 5.3 patches. Yes, you heard me, a new and exciting raid every patch, just like BC times. Mogu Shan Palace looks great, but it is just to small for me. I personally like trash. Its like a warm up for the boss fights. Gets you ready and alert.

[wariofan1]

they said they had 3 raids planned for launch only one was annouced tho so chill

I know, but I want all 3 raids to be cool, not have one that is awful and 2 others that I like doing, then I'll gladly keep away from doing 1/3 raids, leaving me with only 2 raids. This one looks really boring, more like a 5-man from this preview, definately doesn't stand up to raids like Blackwing Descent, Serpentshrine Cavern or Black Temple, just throwing random raids out there. Blizzard has to try and make every raid better than the previous ones, it sure doesn't feel like they're trying to do that, how would this place ever beat the atmosphere of Black Temple? No way it can, and pretty much no raid has ever done so since it's release.

I miss long raids that actually had vast halls and levels. Remember how massive Kara was? Or Icc? More than 10 bosses. Who cares if they took more than four hours to clear, thats why you have a guild, to clear the rest the next day. When I first saw the layout for this dungeon, I was like hmm, ok, nothing too exciting. I'm begging for raids with 10+ bosses in 5.1, 5.2, and 5.3 patches. Yes, you heard me, a new and exciting raid every patch, just like BC times. Mogu Shan Palace looks great, but it is just to small for me. I personally like trash. Its like a warm up for the boss fights. Gets you ready and alert.

They said that they'd prefer to release more raids with less size in content patches, they didn't keep that promise though and have taken the opportunity to slack on content. I agree, raids like ICC and Ulduar felt massive and added to the atmosphere, and thus also added to the experience of a good raid. Tbh I hate trash, I'm there for the boss battles, even though without trash the raids would feel like ToC which would be awful.

[Imnick]

Honestly Wariofan I don't think you've got enough information about the raid to compare it to any other yet.
All we have is a floorplan and a handful of concept art, not even a single screenshot.

You are jumping the gun by a wide margin.

[Drilnos]

Honestly Wariofan I don't think you've got enough information about the raid to compare it to any other yet.
All we have is a floorplan and a handful of concept art, not even a single screenshot.

You are jumping the gun by a wide margin.

This exactly. Concept art #3, the Library, has a few player figures in it for scale. The place may not be terribly complex floor-plan-wise, but make no mistake, it is gigantic. The raid as a whole looks about the size of the Iron Concourse section of Ulduar, with neither vehicles nor teleports to make it quicker to traverse. There's plenty of room for trash in a room that big. And if we're going to compare MSP to SSC or BT, we have to throw out everything we know about the latter instances' finished states and only put up their concept art and first-draft floor plans for judgement.

[artem123]

Damn why do you hate pandas so much?

DEY TOOK OUR JOBZ
No but really whats there to hate? 0.o

[bbr]

DEY TOOK OUR JOBZ
No but really whats there to hate? 0.o

Most are against them because it was supposed to just be an april 1st joke that was added to the Warcraft RTS.

China was "supposed" to be against it because pandas are a religious symbol, and having people fight them and be able to kill them raised many questions.

And perhaps, people were simply expecting something "cooler".

[Drilnos]

Most are against them because it was supposed to just be an april 1st joke that was added to the Warcraft RTS.

China was "supposed" to be against it because pandas are a religious symbol, and having people fight them and be able to kill them raised many questions.

And perhaps, people were simply expecting something "cooler".

Er...pandas are not a religious symbol in China. They're the national animal, like bald eagles in the US.

And "cooler," as we have all learned at this point, is 100% subjective.

[Porimlys]

Just food for thought to people complaining about the layout, when they unveiled that picture at blizzcon the dev talking said: "This layout has actually already changed".

Whether it's better or worse to your standards is another story, but it's something to think about.