Front Page should separate 10man from 25man, and a question.

[Deleted]

1. For example most people claim that Ultraxion is fundamentally harder in 25man. I believe they are right. Though to be honest I disagree for their reasons. It's not harder because of numbers, numbers are probably thinner for 10man (because of the restrictions in buffing and indirect buffing) but it's a boss that is simple but does not forgive mistakes from every single person in the fight. Hence with 25man people the frequency of mistakes is much higher (or at least the frequency of inefficient gameplay).

2. A question: Is Zon'Ozz or Hagara harder in 10man?

[Porcell]

They should, but since they are pulling data directly from the Armory there is no way to differentiate.

1) Ultraxion is fundamentally harder in 25m, IMO, because of the DPS requirement and enrage timer. Our 25 man raid, with the 5% buff, are pushing all of our damagers hard and 5 healing (which is standard), and still killing right at the 6 minute mark. Look at 10 man kills and most are at the 5 minute mark, before the "soft enrage" and the healing gets crazy.
The "25 people to screw up" is certainly a factor, I guess, but it's pretty easy mechanics. Sure there are mistakes, and that's exacerbated by 25 people... The real difference is the DPS requirement, the difficulty to heal that last minute, and hitting the enrage timer.
Our 25 man progression was Morchok, Hagara, Zon'ozz, Yorsajh (first week of 5%, first time attempting it, killed in like 6 pulls), then Ultraxion

2) From what I understand, Hagara is more difficult than Zon'ozz in 10 man. On our server's 10 man guilds, everyone did Morchok first (obvously), it's split 50/50 on Ultraxion/Yorsahj for 2nd and 3rd, fourth is Zon'ozz, and fifth is Hagara.

[hempaa]

1. Ultraxion isnt a good fight to say something, ppl just stay rooted basicaly static, if "they" have good dps gg its a kill on 25 or 10.

2.
hagara 25m = joke
zon'ozz = i gess 10m is harder


ultraxion can only be harder on 25 cause u have to carry bad dps all the time.

[Lyreth]

I am not sure if this was fixed, but I was told originally the heroic crystals in 25 man were 2.5mil while 10 man had 2 mil health.

6 dps for 2 mil
16 dps for 2.5 mil

10 people =.5 mil per crystal

I am sure that its got something to do with more people to leave frost patches or something like that. I think hagara is harder on 10 man than 25 man, but tbh its hard for most people to compare this unless they have done all the fights in both raid settings and even then gear, nerfs, which kill it was will all flaw the data. I feel it comes down to the players and not the size. 25 is the "real difficulty" because its harder is kind of BS, its just that 25 man has to overcome more player mistakes to get a boss down.

If you are a 25 man raider going OMG I can't believe he is saying that 10 isn't easier, just remember we have 1 battle rez the entire fight. If our tank dies once we rez him, he dies again we wipe. On 25 man you can lose your tank more than once and still be fine. I have also seen many 25 man first kills where 2-3 people have died, but 10 man if 1 person is dead that enrage timer is generally staring you in the face. I do feel that they need to separate 10 and 25 for world first achieves and things of that nature because I don't care for listening to 25 mans going "you got that because its easy" and the fights will never be the same for 10 and 25 no matter how hard blizzard tries because 25 has a lot of diversity and can stack certain classes without losing buffs and 10 man can use their small size to our advantage by having tanks soak barrages on Warmaster. Ultimately, 10 vs 25 should not be compared because world first was a 25 man guild and yet people say 10 was easier. If this was the case than world first would have been 10 man, but it was not and therefore I feel comfortable saying 10 and 25 are probably pretty close in difficulty, but since no fight can be balanced perfectly don't compare. /stopsoapbox

[Deleted]

^ Don't worry about that, people already do separate them. e.g. the 25man guild that get the world first could get them easier in 10 but they don't attempt it because they know the community will rate it second class.

Also to another poster, notice I didn't say it's just a mistakes frequency, it's also an inefficiency frequency. When you get a 10man together to do heroics, very rarely all the DPSes aren't at least "good to very good". OK, you may end with 1 player that is "good to mediocre" or even bad but that'd be an offliner probably that had a pug or standby in his place.

When those 10people that at least "ok" do a mistake in being inefficient and don't do the max of their DPS, the next pull may have them motivated to do better. And it's much, much, MUCH, easier to have that few number of DPSes have a "good go".

(Also it's myth that the numbers in overall (on average) are higher in 25man. There are exceptions in some fights maybe but in the majority of the fights 10mans are expected to do more individually on average (this is easily seen on theorycrafting tools that calculate that stuff (one can also do the math very easily, it's just a division after a summation)) This is particularly apparent because 10mans have a very high shortage of bufs and especially indirect bufs (e.g. dark intends, replenishments, etc.)).

[Deleted]

Sinestra was harder in 10, Madness was harder on 10, Ragnaros was harder on 25. 2>1.

Let the games begin!!!

[Kardone]

Yeah I'd say Hagara 10 >> Hagara 25. Same number of icicles to rotate soak, crazy crystal hp, and have to actually move during lightning phase.
Ultraxion 25 >> Ultraxion 10 without a doubt. It's a dps check fight. Mechanics are the exact same to deal with but 25 needs higher dps numbers.
Morchok is... I don't even care.
Yorsahj 25 was harder, they nerfed health a good amount and seems like similar dps checks but I'll give this one to 25 for the green globule.

Haven't done madness yet but from what i hear it's difficult on 10's and faceroll on 25's after you've been through spine.

I haven't really heard much of 10 v 25 spine, zon, blackhorn thoughts?

[Lyreth]

I would say blackthorn is harder on 25 man and spine was harder on 10 since you had to have burst and buffs. Currently I think spine is pretty balanced between the two since it doesn't require as much burst as it used to. 25 man may have a slight advantage with raid cooldowns for the roll, but more people to heal so back to it being decently balanced.

[Dracodraco]

I am not sure if this was fixed, but I was told originally the heroic crystals in 25 man were 2.5mil while 10 man had 2 mil health.

6 dps for 2 mil
16 dps for 2.5 mil

10 people =.5 mil per crystal

Except its 9M per crystal on 25 man without the buff. so 9M/18 dps = 500K per person per crystal (2m per ice phase), and 10 man with 2M/6=333K per person, or 1.3M per ice phase.
Although it is harder to soak the icicles in 10 man, yes.

And for your whole "OMG 1 battle ress" argument - yea, just freaking scrap it. 15 more people = 1.5 battle resses (rounded up) more.
Let me tell you, the first week of DS heroic, we saw the 10 man world first (with not near "perfect" buffs, mind you, considering they had 2 hunters 2-3 rogues and a mage - good singletarget dps, but had to use a BM hunter over a ret pally, would have to use a dragonhawk for magic dmg buff, etc) die 42 seconds before enrage. We saw the world first 25 man kill happen 5.9 seconds after the enrage cast (which lasts 6 seconds).
And just to hammer this one in - our alt run also killed prenerf ultraxion, with the raid (as a whole) having only 4 characters geared to "main" standards - one of them being the druid I used for the first month of DS due to hunters sucking. We had two tanks apart from that with "main level" gear, and all other dpsers (including a 380 avg mage) in less gear except for a hunter who missed the main raid that week. We killed it at 5:23.
Less gear.
Alts (most players perform worse on their alts than mains).
Still much much easier.

When we were progressing on it in my guild, one dead person usually also ment a wipe due to enrage, it was THAT close. Zon'ozz was killed after enrage, prenerf yorsahj killed after enrage by the guilds who managed to GET that far, prenerf spine on my realm was downed by a 10 man guild using a setup that included a warlock and an enh shaman (two of the worst tendon burst classes), while we were stacking 5 mages and 5 rogues on the "good" evenings where everyone showed up.

As for madness - not going to kill it prenerf in the alt run, so can't really comment, but hoping to be working on it next reset if we can have all 3 healers (had to save one for main run due to absenses) - will see then how hard it feels I guess.

I do agree that the two sizes should be seperated - a realm first achivement for both difficulties (with shared lockout) is not too much to ask for, is it?

[Donthealme]

If this was the case than world first would have been 10 man, but it was not and therefore I feel comfortable saying 10 and 25 are probably pretty close in difficulty, but since no fight can be balanced perfectly don't compare. /stopsoapbox

World firsts were in 25 man because thats where all the ultra elite guilds are, the same guilds who were the top guilds the entire last xpac, what were they supposed to run and do 10 mans right off the bat, so that the blizzard community could be satisfied? No they were going to continue raiding what they did, so taking the top 10 guilds, who were pretty much all i the top 15 or so guild in WoTLK and using that as your "evidence" is completely flawed.

[Tojara]

Ultraxion is harder on 25 man for sure, but it's just because of the DPS requirement. Mechanically it's asking the exact same thing of two raids.

They low ball DPS numbers not because 10 man players aren't capable, but because they can't assume every raid buff is present, which is a more than fair assumption. When a very skilled group of 10 man raiders do come with pretty much every buff they make a fight like Ultraxion look incredibly simple. In MoP I assume they themselves can ASSUME that all buffs will be present and tweak the numbers accordingly.

The tough thing about balancing 10 man is +/- a healer or a tank makes an enormous difference compared to 25 man. That alone can tip the scales of balance and it's a very fine line.

Likewise mechanically things can be a bit more dicey on 10 man when you have mirrored mechanics being performed by less players. Numbers can help with the tuning, but they can only do so much. Take these examples with a grain of salt as I am just narrowly focusing on one individual mechanic, so don't take it as me proclaiming that the entire encounter is more difficult on 10 man (although in some cases, like every encounter you can come to a conclusion that 10 or 25 man is in fact harder).

Hagara spawns 3 ice beams that focus 3 random players on both formats. Rotating with 6 players on each difficulty is a bit more challenging on 10 than 25. Similarly smoke bomb can trivialize these beams, and most 10 mans run with 0 or 1 Rogue.

Sinestra has a few mechanics that are rather obnoxious on 10 man. Twilight cutters targets two players on each format, which is more of a DPS loss in 10 man as opposed to 25. Addtionally Wrack is FAR more of a pain in the ass to deal with on 10 than it is on 25 for variety of reasons. Lack of CDs to extend the initial of subsequent wracks, in addition to the % of your healers it occupies compared on both difficulties.

I won't give anymore examples as there are a lot but take note of the Sinestra one. This is a good example as to why 10 man is asked to do less overall DPS than a 25 man. It's a little bit more acceptable on this encounter that a 10 man finish the encounter quicker and be asked for less overall DPS. Why? Mechanics. Twilight cutters can (and does) have a direct impact on your kill time for a 10 man raid, I like to think that the lower DPS requirements offsets this. Therefore you see balance. Wrack is an entirely different beast, and I think that all things considered, this alone is what makes Sinestra a harder boss on 10 man than 25. It's not a huge difference, bit it's there.

Note there are times where the inverse is true as well, and mechanics become incredibly dumbed down when going down to 10 man. Mostly because of that fine line I talked about earlier. You either make it incredibly difficult or way too easy. The comparison is HLK, which isn't completely fair as they purposely made 10 mans easier in WoTLK. I can say that overall if you actually used the correct gear for each difficulty that the encounter was probably pretty balanced in P1 and P3. The problem was P2 was insanely more difficult on 25 man. The margin for error on Valkyrs in combination of defile was just devastating for 25 man guilds. The problem here is that you can't really downsize P2 properly in 10 man. I guess you can make a compromise and just accept that defile will be easier on 10 man, but how do you translate Valks in 10 man to have the same difficulty. Having 3 Valks drop completely changes the game and would probably make 10 man impossible unless you were incredibly lucky. Maybe they could have balanced it if they were inclined to do so, but it's just one of those mechanics that don't translate well.

[Zeta333]

I think something most people dont get is regardless if one is more difficult with than the other, which is argueable for many different fights this expansion, The pure and un argueable fact is that THEY ARE DIFFERENT. Regardless of the bullshit bliz spouts about them being ballanced and being the same, giving both the same loot.

These fights are not the same, they should not be grouped as the same achievment wise or else. 10 does not = 25.

[Harsesis]

It has to be taken on a fight by fight basis. Some are harder on 10. Some are harder on 25. For the sake of Ultraxion 10 is easier because tuning wise Blizzard can't assume certain buffs/debuffs like they can for 25. So if your raid happens to have the right comp the fight is much easier on 10 than if you didn't/

[Stevoman]

If this was the case than world first would have been 10 man, but it was not and therefore I feel comfortable saying 10 and 25 are probably pretty close in difficulty, but since no fight can be balanced perfectly don't compare. /stopsoapbox

World firsts are 25m because the top talent is all in 25m guilds.

Sorry, that's not meant to be a disparage against the 10m guilds, it's just a simple fact. All the top talent moved to 25m when 40m died, and has yet to trickle down in the <1 year that Cataclysm has been out.

The top talent has consistently performed well on either raid size mode (Paragon getting WF 10m in FL, Paragon/Exodus still ranking near the top on 10m during their week ban). It has nothing to do with the size and everything to do with individual and group performance.

[Desdonde]

2. A question: Is Zon'Ozz or Hagara harder in 10man?

Hagara just slightly, especially after the 10% nerf today

[Deleted]

World firsts are 25m because the top talent is all in 25m guilds.

It's simpler than that. 25man format is fundamentally harder hence it's more prestigious to win in it. Sure, 25man could be nerfed anormously and be something like LFR but in practice if you try to require same "numbers" in 10man and 25man, 25man will "win" in being harder and more prestigious to win in it since simple, the probability of something going wrong or not all playing efficiently is just much higher.

(Also notice combat ressing in unimportant. This concept exists even with no deaths. The efficiency of 10mans is just easier to be kept up at a high level even if you compare it with a 25man that had no deaths.)

In fact, look at most of the bosses in the game. Ultraxion may be an exception or it may be not, but at least most bosses require an individual average in numbers to be higher in 10mans. Why? Because simply 10mans can pull their shit together more reliably. They're just 10. They have a higher probability for that "one good try". Good luck putting 25 player doing "one good try with all 25 following the high quality" unless you are in the world first or top 100 category.

I honestly don't know why this topic is dragged so much. more players = more things to go wrong. I'm in a 10man, but obvious things are obvious.

--

This is not to say it's "harder" for individual players. The very fact it's hard to keep efficiency high in 25man makes it the one with most slackers in its ranks. Those last 5 in the dps meter that don't know how to play the game. You have to be in the top 500 in the world to start seeing ALL players in a 25man being good. A 10man has to have all or almost all being high quality even if it is top 1000-2000.

[Deleted]

Sigh more 10v25 stuff. Without getting into overall explanations of the instance or raid formats as whole, I'll stick to your questions:

1) Not at all true. Ultrax 25m is harder purely because of the numbers, pressing a button is not difficult and mechanically its one of the simplest fights in the game. Do not underestimate the difficulty of maximizing DPS and HPS in a fight, Ultrax 25m is a huge cockblock because of the numbers required not because of missed Fading Light clicks. Ultrax 10m is a complete joke because the numbers required are way way way lower. And for the record I'm a 10m raider, I freely admit that Ultrax 10 is a joke.

2) Zon'ozz and Hagara are of similar difficulty in 10m, both are harder than Yor/Ultrax and both are easier than ship. Hagara is more about execution and individual player awareness whereas Zon is more about a perfect strategy and DPS/HPS output. Just two different types of challenge.

[Zeta333]

It has to be taken on a fight by fight basis. Some are harder on 10. Some are harder on 25. For the sake of Ultraxion 10 is easier because tuning wise Blizzard can't assume certain buffs/debuffs like they can for 25. So if your raid happens to have the right comp the fight is much easier on 10 than if you didn't/

No it shouldnt, we could argue till we are blue about which is harder, but the fact is "they are not the same". Cut dry and simple, they need to be seperated.

[Hean]

-Snip-
I do agree that the two sizes should be seperated - a realm first achivement for both difficulties (with shared lockout) is not too much to ask for, is it?

That, so very much that. As far as I can tell, there's no real reason why there shouldn't be a 10 & 25man realm first. There's no real perk in the end for 25man guilds, at least not compared to 10man guilds, even if a couple of the encounters are harder on 10man.

[Deleted]

The bias of 10 man raiders in their efford to believe that they re doing the hard content never seizes to amaze me.

The hole balancing difficulty is plain stupid goal set as an excuse for a new raid model that also failed.
There has been fights that were harder in 10
And Fights that were harder in 25.
There was not a single fight that it was 100% balanced in the hole expansion as people knew it would happen.
Yet the achievements are the same.
I wonder if the guys that came up with cataclysm raid model idea still have a job in that company.
They certainly did a misservice to a lot of people, that had to suffer for 15 months because of their choices.