Blizzard will let 25 mans die?

[Anonimus]

I raided 25s in Wrath and I still didn't like it and yes, I do believe I deserve the same ilvl loot because the two raid sizes are similar in difficulty regardless of your opinion on the matter saying otherwise. Wheeeeee, raiders clearly deserve higher level loot because they show up to a 25-man that really doesn't require extra individual effort except for the raid leader and maybe a couple officers.

I actually did read that and yes they would be pissing off far more 10-man raiders just to pacify a miniscule amount of 25-man players, thus would most likely result in more subs lost (LOL, insinuating that I want Blizzard dead!) which they clearly DO NOT NEED I might add. Not going to happen, guaranteed. We'll get a restructured raid size before that happens.

I'm interested in what you raided during WotLK, because 10 mans were tuned to be easier than 25 mans, which they generally were. Furthermore, even though an individual player may not be required to put in extra effort in 25 man raiding, the difference between leading and managing 25 players as opposed to 10 is huge. Also, especially in fights were positioning is key, 10 mans have an obvious advantage over 25 mans.

As to be on-topic, I find it sad the bigger raid sizes are dying. My guild stopped raiding after having been around since Vanilla, due to lack of players being interested in 25-man and the pretty much unanimous decision to screw 10-man. I've always loved the more epic feeling of 40/25 man bringing a boss down, instead of 'just' 10. Personal preference I guess. I wouldn't go as far as saying that Blizzard is killing 25-mans, but they sure as hell are not trying to keep them alive either.

[Deleted]

I think it's better. 10 mans are the way to go honestly. 25 man = all the disadvantages of 40 man without any benefit.

[Klingers]

Not everyone can pick a 'card' due to other factors. -Azshira

Nice in-line edit there.

I'll happily debate this point; I'm a big stickler in both self-empowerment and personal responsibility.

WoW is a wholly, one-hundred percent optional recreational activity. Each subset of the game is also a wholly optional activity.

By "other factors" I assume you mean people with limited playtime or playing on dead servers. People who are limited in raid times due to work, children etc need to own their life choices and work with what's available to them. Or move server. Or merge guilds. Or take some initiative and form a 25 man guild of their own, stick with the recruiting and have the tenacity to weather leadership drama. Suffice to say, they have options.

Or as they say, beggars can't be choosers. 10 mans are out there. In abundance. It's simple, common-sense path of least resistance for the vast majority of current raiders. Nobody is expecting nor demanding 25 man fans to toe the line if they don't want to, but the onus is on them to make their own fun. Not the rest of us.

[Anonimus]

Nice in-line edit there.

I'll happily debate this point; I'm a big stickler in both self-empowerment and personal responsibility.

WoW is a wholly, one-hundred percent optional recreational activity. Each subset of the game is also a wholly optional activity.

By "other factors" I assume you mean people with limited playtime or playing on dead servers. People who are limited in raid times due to work, children etc need to own their life choices and work with what's available to them. Or move server. Or merge guilds. Or take some initiative and form a 25 man guild of their own, stick with the recruiting and have the tenacity to weather leadership drama. Suffice to say, they have options.

Or as they say, beggars can't be choosers. 10 mans are out there. In abundance. It's simple, common-sense path of least resistance for the vast majority of current raiders. Nobody is expecting nor demanding 25 man fans to toe the line if they don't want to, but the onus is on them to make their own fun. Not the rest of us.

Does that mean Blizzard should not lend a helping hand to the people who prefer 25-man raiding over 10-man? I agree with what you say, yet by making 10-man rewards the same as 25-man Blizzard has set things in motion. 10-mans are, as you say, a path of less resistance, and thus a lot of people now chose to spend their time raiding 10-mans.

However, it is not necessarily so that 25-man raiding is no longer the main reason for some given amount of players to play this game. I don't see why Blizzard should be letting 25-man die out by letting 'nature' take its course, as opposed to properly stimulating 25-man raiding so that it becomes again attractive to the players who have no profound preference.

[Deleted]

I loved the 25 mans ! Was the best kind of raid setups ever.

[Deleted]

25 mans died long ago, no point at trying to revive them

[Grym]

Warmaster you didnt even need to soak a single twilight blast now!

Did you do 10man on normal?

[Deleted]

Nice in-line edit there.

I'll happily debate this point; I'm a big stickler in both self-empowerment and personal responsibility.WoW is a wholly, one-hundred percent optional recreational activity. Each subset of the game is also a wholly optional activity.

By "other factors" I assume you mean people with limited playtime or playing on dead servers. People who are limited in raid times due to work, children etc need to own their life choices and work with what's available to them. Or move server. Or merge guilds. Or take some initiative and form a 25 man guild of their own, stick with the recruiting and have the tenacity to weather leadership drama. Suffice to say, they have options.

Or as they say, beggars can't be choosers. 10 mans are out there. In abundance. It's simple, common-sense path of least resistance for the vast majority of current raiders. Nobody is expecting nor demanding 25 man fans to toe the line if they don't want to, but the onus is on them to make their own fun. Not the rest of us.

Your kind is the worse amongst the entire playerbase.
For things that realy matter you would find worthy opponets to fight, and you would lose, because your pride and arrogance is blinding you.
Keep living by your ideals of homo superioris and you being one of them, it is stimulating yet vague and meaningless, keep walking with nose up and you will fall stumbling at the next stone on the sidewalk, or a pigeon will relief itself flying above you and laws of gravity will do the rest.

[Klingers]

Does that mean Blizzard should not lend a helping hand to the people who prefer 25-man raiding over 10-man? I agree with what you say, yet by making 10-man rewards the same as 25-man Blizzard has set things in motion. 10-mans are, as you say, a path of less resistance, and thus a lot of people now chose to spend their time raiding 10-mans.

However, it is not necessarily so that 25-man raiding is no longer the main reason for some given amount of players to play this game. I don't see why Blizzard should be letting 25-man die out by letting 'nature' take its course, as opposed to properly stimulating 25-man raiding so that it becomes again attractive to the players who have no profound preference.

I agree with you to a point. I do think shared lockouts should be removed. But beyond that, any possible form of incentive you could conceive falls somewhere between emotional blackmail and the stick-end of carrot-and-stick. If you award more points, if you award better gear, then you just create a whole new problem.

Despite my apparent attitude, let me make one thing clear: When I think of 25-man raiders, the only thought I genuinely have is "Good on them. Let them have their fun." And that's exactly what the game does. This is purely a people-problem. People, free-thinking bags of squishy meats that we are, perform subconscious cost/benefit ration calculations on almost every aspect of our lives.

It's not that some people are lazy so much... Sometimes that person on the other end of the internet is some impatient kid who's mum wants him off the net by 11. Some people are adults with busy lives, jobs, kids, mortgages, weekend family activities... Their small WoW window is supposed to be their stress release and their enjoyment. At some point last year, Blizzard sat their player base and said "Guess what guys, the great equaliser is here. You choose your raid size". And they did. Overwhelmingly.

If Blizzard can come up with a viable incentive to make 25 man raiders happy, power to them. As long as it doesn't in anyway trivialize or disincentivize 10 mans.

[Purpleurza]

I've honestly not had time to read every post in here, however I've seen threads like this before.

I'm the GM of a casual 25 man guild, we're 8/8 because we don't want the hassle of heroic raiding interfering with our fun.

In December 2011, we didn't have enough people logging in regularly to even make a 10 man raid, I took over, managed to attract a few people into the guild and we got some 10mans going.
By mid February, we were approaching 20 people online able to raid on our raid nights, and I made the decision to try and go 25. It's not been smooth, we still tend to have to pug one or two of the last slots, but we manage.

We're by no means top 100, not to say some of us couldn't be if we wanted, but we're here to have fun. The argument that 25 mans are dead is a fallacy. If in 3 months I've managed to bring together a group of people and build up a 25 man guild so can you.

So what if we go at the pace of the slowest person, some of the people in our guild had NEVER raided before they joined.

I guess what I'm trying to say, is that Blizzard DON'T NEED to change anything to make it work. You need to change your perceptions. If YOU want to raid 25 man, then now is a very good time to start recruiting. All those people coming back on SoR, they're there for you to pick up and throw into a guild. All those people in guilds winding down between now and Pandaria who want to raid, grab them up too. Pretty soon, you'll have 25 people who want to raid.

Sure if you're on a low pop realm, you might have some issues in this regard, but hell, go find a realm, reroll or transfer, and raid the way you want to. If YOU want it, don't expect it to just be handed to you on a plate, go out there and make it happen. I did, and I'm more than happy with the results.

[Klingers]

I've honestly not had time to read every post in here, however I've seen threads like this before.

I'm the GM of a casual 25 man guild, we're 8/8 because we don't want the hassle of heroic raiding interfering with our fun.

In December 2011, we didn't have enough people logging in regularly to even make a 10 man raid, I took over, managed to attract a few people into the guild and we got some 10mans going.
By mid February, we were approaching 20 people online able to raid on our raid nights, and I made the decision to try and go 25. It's not been smooth, we still tend to have to pug one or two of the last slots, but we manage.

We're by no means top 100, not to say some of us couldn't be if we wanted, but we're here to have fun. The argument that 25 mans are dead is a fallacy. If in 3 months I've managed to bring together a group of people and build up a 25 man guild so can you.

So what if we go at the pace of the slowest person, some of the people in our guild had NEVER raided before they joined.

I guess what I'm trying to say, is that Blizzard DON'T NEED to change anything to make it work. You need to change your perceptions. If YOU want to raid 25 man, then now is a very good time to start recruiting. All those people coming back on SoR, they're there for you to pick up and throw into a guild. All those people in guilds winding down between now and Pandaria who want to raid, grab them up too. Pretty soon, you'll have 25 people who want to raid.

Sure if you're on a low pop realm, you might have some issues in this regard, but hell, go find a realm, reroll or transfer, and raid the way you want to. If YOU want it, don't expect it to just be handed to you on a plate, go out there and make it happen. I did, and I'm more than happy with the results.

This Guy. Good on you for sticking to your guns. You're making your own 25 mans by putting the time and the effort into it and finding like-minded players. Good luck to you.

Your kind is the worse amongst the entire playerbase.
For things that realy matter you would find worthy opponets to fight, and you would lose, because your pride and arrogance is blinding you.
Keep living by your ideals of homo superioris and you being one of them, it is stimulating yet vague and meaningless, keep walking with nose up and you will fall stumbling at the next stone on the sidewalk, or a pigeon will relief itself flying above you and laws of gravity will do the rest.

...Huh? o_O

If you're saying you think I'm a snob because I believe people need to show initiative to change things they don't like instead of whining about it, OK I guess... Not that what you're saying makes much sense.

[Brett Skullcrack]

But beyond that, any possible form of incentive you could conceive falls somewhere between emotional blackmail and the stick-end of carrot-and-stick. If you award more points, if you award better gear, then you just create a whole new problem.

Why not just release two different raids each patch: one 10-man only raid, one 25-man only raid. Different instance, different bosses, different lore, different gear. That way people that just want to raid 10-mans with a small group of friends can do that, while people that want to raid larger size actually have meaningful content that can't be cheesed in 10 man mode.

<Infracted - Warning is on the last page.>

[Klingers]

Why not just release two different raids each patch: one 10-man only raid, one 25-man only raid. Different instance, different bosses, different lore, different gear. That way people that just want to raid 10-mans with a small group of friends can do that, while people that want to raid larger size actually have meaningful content that can't be cheesed in 10 man mode.

They used to do that... I'm just kind of operating on what I think I remember from four year-old interviews here, but I'm fairly sure they moved away from that due to a) extra work for the encounter devs, art teams, etc; and b) Players were complaining about missing big lore moments by being locked out of major story moments if they didn't have 24 friends.

[Sambal]

I dont think they will let them die but they should put some effort into making them more interesting for sure. You almost never see any 25 man DS pugs while this should be supported by blizzard so its more attractive for the players.

[maky13]

I'm the GM of a casual 25 man guild, we're 8/8 because we don't want the hassle of heroic raiding interfering with our fun.
(...)
If in 3 months I've managed to bring together a group of people and build up a 25 man guild so can you.

Without trying to bash, the "8/8 normal" scene is different. It is great for you if everyone in your guild is enjoying the level of progress, because, like you said, the hassle of heroic will interfere with your fun.
However: the situation is about recruitment and heroic modes. A guild that`s actually aiming to clear content (heroic) needs players. That can`t happen if you have to pug 1-2 last spots, or if you get someone who never raided before. Also, DS was a pretty bad instance, so a lot of people (raiding both 10 and 25) have simply quit the game.
Thus, (applies to both 10 and 25), you have to play "the recruitment game", and this has become harder and harder for a 25-man guild.

[Brett Skullcrack]

They used to do that... I'm just kind of operating on what I think I remember from four year-old interviews here, but I'm fairly sure they moved away from that due to a) extra work for the encounter devs, art teams, etc; and b) Players were complaining about missing big lore moments by being locked out of major story moments if they didn't have 24 friends.

Extra work is no excuse, Blizzard put out half as much content in Cata as they used to before, there's plenty of room to start putting out twice as many raids per tier (especially now that they only release half-tiers anyway). As for lore moments, all the big lore has been used up and Pandaria won't have a main boss anyway. Just make sure both formats have interesting lore and it's fine -- e.g., while 25 mans fight Garrosh in Org 10 mans can fight Sylvanas in UC or whatever.

[Crispin]

lol, this reminds me of when they downsized from 40 -> 25 man raids, people will adapt or not.

[maky13]

lol, this reminds me of when they downsized from 40 -> 25 man raids, people will adapt or not.

Not the same thing, because they didn`t remove 25-mans (yet). In fact, that`s what the whole topic is about.

[Archermit]

Can I ask, how many wrath 25 man raiders were happy in 25 or how many were only doing it because thats where the progression and best gear was. It annoys me so much when I hear "blizzard are killing 25 mans" they didnt, they gave people that prefered 10 mans a chance at real progressions and a shot at the best gear, the fact that a lot of 25 mans died was not blizzards fault.

As for difficulty, so many people claim that 25 mans are harder, I do not believe that for a second, for every fight that is easier on 10 than 25 man there is a fight that is easier on 25 than on 10 see baleroc and rhyolith or ultraxion and warmaster

[Anonimus]

This Guy. Good on you for sticking to your guns. You're making your own 25 mans by putting the time and the effort into it and finding like-minded players. Good luck to you.

It's iconic how this guy had to go through means of playing 10-man first and taking around 3 months to be able to play 25-man casually.

There is clearly a lack of incentive to play 25-man besides personal preference, and all the numbers right now illustrate it. It's not of utmost importance to me as I've quit playing when my guild stopped raiding, but it is clear that without interference, the 25-man guilds, especially competitive, are going to disappear. I think in that sense the 200-1000 ranked 25-man guilds are going to be hit the hardest, since the 25-man raiders that are still left will, naturally, try to join the best guild that their time schedule allows them.

Whether this is a good or bad development, or whether this is something Blizzard should or should not interfere in, that's all subjective.