Dragon Soul Difficulty Reduction
MMO Champ JUST published a blog about how effective the 5% nerf was. As the graph indicates, progress is continuing at a healthy, linear rate. It hasn't leveled off. Why are you nerfing heroic mode, again? You explicitly told us that you would not continue with blind nerfs on auto pilot.
We're not "nerfing blindly." Keep in mind that, the debuff can be disabled. So if you and your Raid choose to do so, you can take on the encounter without it. We also explained our thought processes in the original announcement blog about the debuff
here.
Despite arguments to the contrary, there is a choice involved here. You can choose to leave the debuff on or turn it off. If you're looking for the challenge that doing the raid gives you without the debuff and your raid group isn't interested in turning off the debuff, that is still a choice that is being made. No one is forcing that on anyone. If you personally feel forced, then it may be an option to find another group that is interested in the challenge of doing it without the debuff.
Meanwhile, the debuff affords those that want to progress a bit, who have experienced difficulty, more of a leg-up.
It's fine to disagree with us on this, but please make sure that you continue to do so in a constructive manner and refrain from starting flame wars or posting harassing/defamatory language toward posters in the thread. (
Blue Tracker /
Official Forums)
Dragon Soul Difficulty Reduction
And yes, maybe I'm a special snowflake who likes recognition. But I argue that the game is now somewhat built around recognition since achievements were added to the game.
We understand that there are players out there who do what they do for recognition and--dare I say it?--glory. Since we'll likely continue to use a model where we introduce a raid, then slowly remove roadblocks over time, there's a possibility that we could do something akin to adding a feat of strength for players who defeat an encounter in a non-debuffed incarnation, or possibly time-stamps on the armory raid progression section. At the very least, there are options on the table for the future. These aren't things we'll be able to do for Dragon Soul though.
Nobody is getting held up by 5% or 10% damage and health on bosses, they're getting held up by mechanics.
When a group is really close to taking down a boss, but just can't seem to manage it, a bump like this is sometimes enough to see them on to the next challenge. (
Official Forums)
PTR Scheduled Maintenance 2/23/12
In addition to the maintenance going on today (2/22/12) the PTR realms will also be down tomorrow morning (2/23/12) from 5:00am-7:00am PST. (
Blue Tracker /
Official Forums)