Throne of thunder ranked towards older raids

[Deleted]

Now that the PTR testing for 5.4 has started and most people who are interested have done it, I think it's a good time to start an analysis of Throne of Thunder.

now, where do you rank throne of thunder compared to previous raids? I won't ask you to rank all raids, but just to state how high you think it ranks. I'm adding a poll with rank 1 - rank 5 and worse than rank 5.

[Lethora]

My personal biased opinion.
Ulduar > Throne > Sunwell > AQ > Icecrown

[Deleted]

Mechanics: 1st
Atmosphere: 4th (after Ulduar, ICC, BT)
All in all: 2nd. (after Ulduar)

[Ninotchka]

If it weren't so linear and if the difficulty progression were more smooth I would rank it above ICC, but as it is I'm ranking it Ulduar > ICC > Throne.

[Wildmoon]

I wouldn't say it's 1st 2nd or 3rd because it's hard to rank it like that but I would say it's amongst the best raids WoW ever had.

[shanattah]

Karazhan > Ulduar > Sunwell > Throne

[Mifuyne]

I would have to say either 2nd or 3rd.
Ulduar is still unbeaten tho.

[Nurabashi]

Not very good at ranking, but I'd say it's one of the top ones so far.

[Sesto]

My only real problem Throne of Thunder is that it is linear. Other than that, it was good.

[mahananaka]

I said 5th best so far. I'd list Karazhan and Ulduar as my favorite 2. I've complaints with ToT but not many.

I think the trash was annoying in spots, I don't mean it was difficult I mean just plain annoying. Horridon's trash takes way too long for how little is there. Maegera trash just seems annoying running back and forth to get bells. The trash pull before Animus we wiped to more than animus. I'd actually like to see trash between bosses as only like 1-3 pulls but that actually took coordination and skill. If you were smoothly killing everything in a raid to me around 1/4 to 1/3 should be spent on trash.

Another complaint is lack of choice. I like when raids have a few bosses I can choose between to do. I loved Uldar in this; FL had to die but then you could choose between 3. After that you again had options between 2. Then after crazy cat lady, you were open to 4, before the final two. So much choice there was nice to me.

The above helps fix the 3rd complaint I have with the zone which is how the difficulty seems backwards. The second, fifth, and seventh bosses account for 4/5 of the time we've spent in the zone. Durumu was the worst boss in there and he was just past the 1/2 way point. I really feel like a zone raid boss should be the hardest, every time no matter what. Which goes towards my lasts comments.

My last complaint is that Lei Shen himself doesn't feel epic enough. Like getting to Yogg-Saron was very intense to me the first time. Maybe part the build up through the whole place to finally find him or just the challenge of him. The mechanics of the Lei Shen are fine its just the fight seems easy compared to most zone bosses. I'm still surprised the fight didn't actually have a 3rd intermission with some crazy fourth phase that involved him doing crazy stuff with whatever the last conduit that was left up. I would have loved the pick your poison aspect of that.

[Xucuroz]

I'd rank it pretty high, nice environment, good selection of bosses with interesting mechanics. Not going to top Ulduar, as that holds top spot for me. There's a lot less mystery going into ToT and its also so damn linear.. The art in places can be a bit repetitive also.

I don't like writing lists and assigning numbers personally. So i focus more on what i like and don't like.

[silentk59]

Love the Ulduar sheepism.

Pretty sure most of the people never even saw Yogg, or half the other bosses. Keep it coming guys! XD

OT; ICC

[Deleted]

When I rate raids I only consider art and not mechanics since you cannot really compare mechanics from 3-4 years ago to what WoW is now.
The encounter mechanics in ToT were really good. Probably the best and most diverse Blizzard has ever done. Artwise however it was only the forth best raid (imo) and that's what I rated it as.

The raids I liked better were:

-Karazhan
-Ulduar
-Black Temple

[Sylf]

I'm still surprised the fight didn't actually have a 3rd intermission with some crazy fourth phase that involved him doing crazy stuff with whatever the last conduit that was left up. I would have loved the pick your poison aspect of that.

Go and do him on heroic then :P

[Deleted]

ICC > Throne > BT > Karazhan > Ulduar

it would have been higher, except for the linear aspect of it. ICC lower down, just because it was the top tier for SO long! Apart from that the bosses in ICC were good. Kara will always be one of my favorites, just because I loved the environment. Ulduar, just because <3

[shanthi]

In terms of encounter mechanics, it's at the top. In terms of art and atmosphere, I'd place it behind (but not far behind) Ulduar, ICC and Karazhan. Since mechanics (i.e. how fun the fights are to play) matter most to me, Throne of Thunder is probably tops, followed by ICC and Ulduar.

[russykh]

Again, its too linear, something Blizz recognise and hopefully wont repeat with SoO. Its one of the better ones, top 5 easy. I still prefer Kara for the atmosphere, and how the bosses (some anyway - like the opera event) were really cleverly fitted into the place. Ulduar is still top dog though. ICC....has a better end boss, and I really like the storyline moving through there, but overall ToT has better fights. I didnt really see BT at the time it was relevant, so its a bit unfair to say, but I imagine that would have been up there too. Of the ones I have done properly, it probably sits behind Uld and Kara, and just before ICC.

[Xalzel]

I've had a bad experience in ToT personally so it feels worse. But looking at it subjectively I would say it's got to be one of the best, either 1st 2nd or 3rd. (My personal fav is still Kara)

[Tobedeleted123]

Uld > ICC > ToT

[re1gn1te]

The trash pull before Animus we wiped to more than animus. I'd actually like to see trash between bosses as only like 1-3 pulls but that actually took coordination and skill.

The mechanics of the Lei Shen are fine its just the fight seems easy compared to most zone bosses.

Uh you contradict yourself.... you complain that the trash before Animus is difficult and requires coordination, then complain that you want to see less but harder trash? Only valid reason to wipe on that trash is if you don't know how to do it.

As for Lei Shen I fail to see how he's not the hardest encounter in ToT normal... no other boss was really harder. You mention bosses 2/5/7 : Horridon post-nerf is a joke there should be no reason , Megaera only kill green / red and coordinate healing CD's it's not much of a dps check, durumu don't fail the maze and win.