Has raiding become too overcomplicated/convoluted for it's own good?

[Fluttershy]

Compare attumen to stone guards.

Now,

Brutallus
>meteor slash -> Deal's 20,000 damage split between everyone 65 yards in front of brutallus, fire damage taken is increased by 75% afterwards
>Burn -> Deals increasing fire damage, can affect other allies within 5 yards
>Stomp -> Deals 10,000 physical damage and reduces armor by 50%, removes burn.


Paragon's of the Klaxxi
Paragon's Purpose – Whenever a Klaxxi Paragon is defeated, all other active Klaxxi Paragons heal to full and gain a 10% damage bonus.
Paragon's Purpose – Whenever a Klaxxi Paragon is defeated all other active Klaxxi Paragons heal to full. All active Paragons gain a stacking 10% damage bonus every 30 seconds.
ImportantReady to Fight – Klaxxi Paragons with this aura on them will be the next to join the fight. Before the fight begins, three Klaxxi Paragons will have this aura. When the encounter begins all three of these Paragons join the encounter and one other Paragon will gain this aura to indicate that they will join the fight next.Everytime a new Klaxxi Paragon joins the fight, one of the inactive Klaxxi Paragons will gain this aura.
ImportantPower of the Paragons

After a Paragon has been defeated, one player may take the fallen Paragon's powers to use as their own. Only one player can take any one Paragon's power, and a player may only take a Paragon's power once during the encounter.Each Paragon's powers can only be acquired by particular class roles.


TankKil'ruk the Wind-Reaver
TankExposed Veins – Kil'ruk the Wind-Reaver's sharp blades expose the blood vessels of his victims, making them more susceptible to the attacks of Xaril the Poisoned Mind.All damage taken from Xaril the Poisoned Mind is increased 10% for each application of Exposed Veins
ImportantTankHealerGouge – Kil'ruk the Wind-Reaver incapacitates his current tank target. This attack is followed immediately by Mutilate.
DeadlyTankHealerMutilate – Kil'ruk the Wind-Reaver lashes out with both of his weapons for a devastating attack.
Death from Above – Kil'ruk the Wind-Reaver leaps into the air over a random player and then crashes down. Kil'ruk inflicts Physical damage to all enemies within 5 yards upon landing.
TankReave – Kil'ruk leaps to a random player and begins to spin in place. All players are drawn toward Kil'ruk and suffer Physical damage for 9 sec. The damage each player suffers during Reave is decreased as the player gets away from Kil'ruk.
DPSReave – Players of the damage dealer role may acquire this power. Activating this ability causes the caster to leap forward a fixed distance and inflict Physical damage to all enemies within 10 yards of the impact.

4 If a Hungry Kunchong with a Thick Shell is in the area of impact, the Thick Shell will be disabled.
TankXaril the Poisoned Mind
ImportantToxic Injection – When Xaril joins the encounter, he randomly injects all players with one of three different toxins: red, blue, or yellow.
TankCaustic Blood – Successful melee strikes from Xaril inject a caustic poison into the victim. The injection inflicts 50000 Nature damage per application to the target every second for 12 sec. If the injection is allowed to stack to 10, a Bloody Explosion occurs.Caustic Blood will fail to hit tanks who are using their Active Mitigation abilities.
DeadlyBloody Explosion – Allowing Caustic Blood to apply 10 times results in a Bloody Explosion, inflicting 600000 Fire Damage to the entire raid.
TankTenderizing Strikes – Xaril's dagger strikes tenderize the flesh of his victim. Any attacks received from Kil'ruk the Wind-Reaver will inflict 10% more damage for each application of Tenderizing Strikes.
ImportantChoose Catalyst – Xaril the Poisoned Mind selects a catalyst at random and strikes all members of the raid with a toxin that matches the color of the catalyst. This catalyst causes all targets' toxins to react according to the type of toxin.
Catalytic Reaction: Red – When this toxin reacts to a red catalyst it explodes for 390000 to 410000 Fire damage to all players within 10 yards.
Catalytic Reaction: Blue – When this toxin reacts to a blue catalyst it explodes for 800000 Frost damage divided among all players within 10 yards.

In 10 Player Difficulty, the maximum number of targets that can split the damage is limited to 2.

In 25 Player Difficulty the maximum number of targets that can split the damage is limited to 3.
Catalytic Reaction: Yellow – When this toxin reacts to a yellow catalyst it creates a cloud of Noxious Vapors for 30 sec. Player caught in the cloud suffer 146250 to 153750 Nature damage per second.
Catalytic Reaction: Orange – When either a yellow toxin or a red toxin reacts to this catalyst, a ring of Fire explodes outward. Players do not see or need to react to the ring that forms at their own feet; but must avoid those rings that are created by their allies.
Catalytic Reaction: Purple – When either a blue toxin or red toxin reacts to this catalyst the victim will be forced to run forward, leaving a trail of Canned Heat in their wake for 40 sec. Players stepping into the area suffer 121875 to 128125 Fire damage every second they remain in the area.
Catalytic Reaction: Green – When either a blue or yellow toxin reacts to this catalyst a small cloud of Eerie Fog will form and wander about randomly. Players who enter the area suffer 121875 to 128125 Nature damage per second for 9 sec. Entering the area Chills victims to the Bone, increasing the damage received from the Eerie Fog by 30% for 1 min.Every time a player enters the area the fog reduces in size. When it has been reduced in size 3 times it will dissipate.
HealerVast Apothecarial Knowledge – Players in the healer role may acquire this Paragon Power. When Apothecary: Knowledge is activated, all healing done for the next 10 sec will leave a Volatile Poultice on the target for an amount equal to the healing done. The next time the target is damaged, the Volatile Poultice releases the stored healing on the target.
Kaz'tik the Manipulator
Hungry Kunchongs – These Hungry Kunchongs are summoned by Kaz'tik the Manipulator. Whenever one dies Kaz'tik will summon another to take its place.
ImportantDPSDevour – When Kaz'tik the Manipulator Mesmerizes a player, a Hungry kunchong is selected to feed on the victim. While the Kunchong Feeds the victim suffers 100000 Physical damage and the Kunchong gains 7 Energy each second. If the Kunchong suffers 30% of its total health in damage from the time it began to Feed on the victim, the Feeding will stop and the victim will be freed of the Mesmerize.
DeadlyDevour Whole – Hungry Kunchongs will instantly kill any player who gets too close. The process energizes the Hungry Kunchong to full.
Thick Shell – When not in the process of Feeding, Hungry Kunchongs are immune to all damage.The impact of the player ability, Angel of Death, gained from Kil'ruk after he has been defeated will disable a Hungry Kunchong's Thick Shell.
DeadlyMolt – A Hungry Kunchong that reaches full energy will Molt. The process transforms the Hungry Kunchong into a Mature Kunchong.
Mature Kunchong – Mature Kunchongs will ignore normal attempts to control them and attack any players nearby with their newly acquired ability: Swipe.
Swipe – The Mature Kunchong swings both of its massive pincers, inflicting 600000 Physical damage to all targets in front of it.
DeadlyMesmerize – Kaz'tik selects a random member of the raid and forces them to walk toward one of his Hungry Kunchongs. If the victim is allowed to reach the Kunchong they will be Devoured Whole.
DeadlySonic Projection – Kaz'tik selects a random member of the raid and fires a sonic wave in their direction. Player caught in the path of the wave suffer 346875 to 403125 Physical damage.
Master of Puppets – Players of any role may acquire this power. When activated the player summons an Immature Kunchong to fight at their side for 40 sec.
TankKorven the Prime
DPSEncase in Amber – If Korven the Prime or any other active Paragon is below 50% health remaining Korven will Encase them in Amber for 10 sec. If the amber is not defeated within 10 sec the target will be restored to full health.This ability cannot be used more than once every 30 seconds.

4 The explosion from the Hurl Amber ability acquired from Ka'roz after he has been defeated will destroy the amber summoned by this ability.

In Heroic Difficulties the Amber summoned by this ability is immune to all player abilities.
TankHealerShield Bash – Korven the Prime slams his shield into his primary tank target, knocking them down and stunning them for 6 sec. The victim is defenseless for the duration.Immediately after using Shield Bash, Korven the Prime unleashes a Vicious Assault.
TankHealerVicious Assault – Korven the Prime follows up his Shield Bash with 6 different strikes at all targets in front of him. The first strike causes the victim to suffer 200000 Physical damage every 3 seconds. Each successive strike inflicts greater and greater Physical damage.
TankMaster of Amber – A player of the tank role can acquire this Paragon Power. When activated the caster Encases a friendly target in Amber for 5 sec. While the amber holds the target is immune to all damage.
Iyyokuk the Lucid
Calculate – When Iyyokuk the Lucid enters the fight he perceives the general attributes of all players and notes the result of his calculations on each target.These calculations are noted with a shape, a color, and a number.Possible shapes are:- Mantid- Sword- Staff- Sonic Ring- AmberPossible colors are:- Red- Purple- Blue- Green- YellowPossible Numbers Range from 1 to 5.
Diminish – Iyyokuk uses his command of the arcane to alter the victim's health by 34% of its current value. If the target is below 25% of their maximum health they will die instantly.
ImportantInsane Calculation: Fiery Edge – Iyyokuk peers through the veil of his previous calculations and selects an initial target, then all other targets based on the initial target's criteria to spawn lines of fire between them. All targets and any victims caught in the lines between them suffer Fire damage every second. The damage decreases as the endpoints of the line get further away from one another.

In 10 Player Normal and Raid Finder Difficulties, Iyyokuk selects all targets that match one of the intial target's criteria.

4 In Flexible Raid Mode, Iyyokuk selects all targets that match either of one or two of the initial target's criteria.

In 25 Player Normal Difficulty, Iyyokuk selects all targets that match any of two of the initial target's three critera.

In 10 Player Heroic Difficulty, Iyyokuk selects all targets that match any of two of the initial target's three critera.

in 25 Player Heroic Difficulty, Iyyokuk selects all targets that match any of the initial target's three criteria.

In Heroic Difficulty, each target creates a line of fire between themselves and two other targets.
HealerIngenious – Players of the healer role can acquire this Paragon Power. When activated the caster heals the initial target. The heal is then copied to other members of the raid.

In Normal and Raid Finder Difficulties the heal is copied to anyone that shares the race or class of the initial target.

In Heroic Difficulty the heal is copied to all other raid members who share the class of the initial target.
TankKa'roz the Locust
Flash – Ka'roz charges around the raid toward random targets. All players caught in his path are afflicted by Whirling.
DeadlyWhirling – Player caught in Ka'roz's path as he Flashes around spin around and suffer 200000 Physical damage per second. Any other players caught in the vicinity of a Whirling victim also suffer this damage.
Hurl Amber – Ka'roz will periodically jump up to one of the platforms located about the room and Hurl Amber down at his enemies. Wherever the amber lands a pool of Caustic Amber will form. Players that enter a pool of Caustic Amber will suffer 138750 to 161250 Nature damage every second they remain in the area.

4 In non-Heroic Difficulties, Ka'roz hurls three pieces of amber.

In Heroic Difficulty Ka'roz hurls four pieces of amber and the pool of Caustic Amber persists for the duration of the encounter.
Strong Legs – Players of the damage dealer role can acquire this Paragon Power. When activated the player leaps to one of the platforms Ka'roz used to Hurl Amber from. If there is an amber at the platform the player leapt to they have the opportunity to throw the amber down to create an Amber Explosion for 300000 Nature damage to all enemies within 15 yards of the impact. If there is no amber at the platform or when the player successfully throws the amber they will jump back down automatically.

4 Hurled Amber will destroy the amber summoned by Korven to heal himself or his allies.
TankSkeer the Bloodseeker
TankHewn – The attacks of Skeer the Bloodseeker leave the victim more susceptible to the meddling of Rik'kal the Dissector's attacks. The victim suffers 10% more damage per application from Rik'kal the Dissector.
TankBloodletting – Skeer swings his weapon in a mighty arc, inflicting Physical damage to the target and causing blood creatures to spawn around the room.Each blood moves to a Paragon and will heal that Paragon based on the remaining health of the blood.

In 10 Player Normal Difficulty 2 bloods are summoned.

In 25 Player Normal Difficulty 3 bloods are summoned.

In 10 Player Heroic Difficulty 3 bloods are summoned.

In 25 Player Heroic Difficulty 4 bloods are summoned.

In Raid Finder Difficulty 1 blood is summoned.

4 In Flexible Difficulty 2-3 bloods are summoned.
DPSBloodthirsty – Players of the damage dealer role can acquire this Paragon Power. When activated all attacks over the next 10 sec have a chance to spawn blood orbs that persist for 30 sec. If any player walks through a blood orb they will heal for 10% of their maximum health.
TankRik'kal the Dissector
TankGenetic Alteration – Rik'kal's meddling with his victim's genetic makeup leaves them more susceptible to the attacks of Skeer the Bloodseeker. Victims suffer an additional 10% damage from Skeer the Bloodseeker for each application of Genetic Alteration.
TankInjection – Rik'kal Injects his victim with a virus that inflicts 10000 Nature damage per second per application. When the virus expires, several Parasites will burst from the victim and attack players at random.Injection will not hit tanks that are actively trying to mitigate damage.
DPSAmber Parasite – Amber Parasites are Genetically Modified and fixate on a random player when they spawn. The Amber Parasite Feeds on the fixated target.
Genetic Modifications – Rik'kal's Bioengineering abilities have given these parasites the ability to fully regenerate every 10 seconds.
Feed – Amber Parasites inflict 97500 to 102500 Physical damage each second.
HealerMutate: Amber Scorpion – Rik'kal tosses a vial at a random player, causing them to mutate into an Amber Scorpion. While transformed, the victim suffers 50000 Nature damage per second and only has access to the abilities of an Amber Scorpion.Damage inflicted as an Amber Scorpion is based on the player's Attack Power, Ranged Attack Power, or Spell Power, whichever is largest.
DPSClaw – Amber Scorpions can lash out with one of their claws for 100% damage.
DPSSwipe – The Amber Scorpion sweeps both of its claws in front of it, inflicting 150% damage to all targets in the area. Targets currently under the effects of Sting suffer double damage.
DPSSting – The Amber Scorpion Stings the target, causing it to suffer Nature damage every second.
DPSPrey – Mutated Scorpions can instantly kill an Amber Parasite with this ability.

In Heroic Difficulties mutated victims must use this ability or perish from Faulty Mutation.
HeroicDeadlyFaulty Mutation – In Heroic Difficulties, mutated victims suffer a Faulty Mutation. If the victim fails to Prey on an Amber Parasite before the Faulty Mutation expires they will perish.
Mad Scientist – Players of any role can acquire this Paragon Power. When activated the caster mutates into a giant amber scorpion. Damage inflicted by the scorpion is based on the highest available attack or spell power of the caster. While mutated the caster suffers 50000 Physical damage per second from the shock. The mutation lasts for 30 sec.
Hisek the Swarmkeeper
HealerMulti-Shot – Hisek the Swarmkeeper fires a shot at several random players for Physical damage.
Rapid Fire – Hisek fires several volleys in rapid succession, with each successive volley moving slightly faster than the previous one. Players caught in the path of the volleys suffer 285000 to 315000 Physical damage each second they are in the volley.
ImportantAim – Hisek the Swarmkeeper selects a player at random and stuns them for 5 sec. If the target is too close they will be knocked back until they are 45 yards from Hisek.After Hisek is finished aiming at the target he will Fire a beam of 1400000 Physical damage at all targets between him and the victim. Damage is shared between all targets equally and each target hit by the beam will create a field of Sonic Resonance at their location that inflicts 92500 to 107500 Physical damage to all targets within 0 yards of the victim.
DPSCompound Eye – Players of the damage dealer role can acquire this Paragon Power. When activated, the player fires a shot at the target that inflicts greater Physical damage the further away the target is. Successfully hitting the target afflicts it with Marked for Death, increasing its damage taken by 15% for 10 sec.



Really now.

[itsdub]

Lots of words -> Looks complicated
Actually -> not hard at all

[Deleted]

and people still pretend vanilal and bc was harder

[Fluttershy]

Literally every boss up to the end of BC had 1-3 mechanics at most (except for sunwell), most vanilla bosses only did 1-2 things at most.

For pandaria you have a dungeon book with 10 mechanics just so people can keep up, the average mid-level pandarian guild can easily kill kael'thas and Vashj in 2 weeks tops if you could revert time back again.

[Erolian]

Basically there are tons and tons of throw away abilities on bosses now that you don't normally have to pay much or any attention to. They basically just serve to prep your raid for the things that do matter. They'll be a light aoe or something just to make sure you aren't 100% health and mana when the bad things do roll in. Besides that though yes sometimes there really is just a little too much happening I think. Not that its really a problem to deal with though. They also like to have tanks/healers/dps doing completely different mechanics so it may seem overwhelming but really you only need to pay attention to your own role normally.

[Deleted]

and people still pretend vanilal and bc was harder

Vanilla was harder just because you needed 40 people. Just managing that was really difficult. Another thing which complicated raiding was the need (not needed but often required by the guild) for a wide range of materials/potions/buffs/... which had to be farmed. On top of that you often needed 'keys' to enter certain raids and raids were the only source of good gear. The combination of all this made raiding a lot more ... inconvenient.

Raiding now is much more convenient and user friendly, but the mechanics are harder. It is just a different type of hard.

[Deleted]

I've raided every tier since Vanilla so far and raiding has definitely become more complex, overall, than it used to. The complexity is derived in part from the actual encounters being more complex, but also because of the increased availability of detailed encounter information, due to the Dungeon Journal.

However, has it become TOO complex? I don't think we're at that point yet. Like Paragons, a lot of fights have a multitude of mechanics and can seem extremely daunting on paper, but in reality most mechanics can be dealt with on the fly and don't require extensive planning and practice beforehand. Obviously this might be radically different on Heroic, but so far only a handful of guilds can testament to that.

Don't confuse complexity with difficulty though. Old encounters might have been less complex, but were often more difficult: lack of information, having to schedule 40 people and manage them at the same time, necessity of resistance gear/certain specs due to immunities or bad encounter design. Old raids weren't mechanically difficult like the current content, they logistically difficult.

[Deleted]

and people still pretend vanilal and bc was harder

You do ofcourse realise that the amount of abilities and boss has says nothing about the difficulty about the boss.

Literally every boss up to the end of BC had 1-3 mechanics at most (except for sunwell), most vanilla bosses only did 1-2 things at most.

For pandaria you have a dungeon book with 10 mechanics just so people can keep up, the average mid-level pandarian guild can easily kill kael'thas and Vashj in 2 weeks tops if you could revert time back again.

You mean just like how the LFR types of BC can easily kill heroic garrosh in one week tops. See how easy it is to mkae things up without having proper comparison at all?

[Syran]

Literally every boss up to the end of BC had 1-3 mechanics at most (except for sunwell), most vanilla bosses only did 1-2 things at most.

For pandaria you have a dungeon book with 10 mechanics just so people can keep up, the average mid-level pandarian guild can easily kill kael'thas and Vashj in 2 weeks tops if you could revert time back again.

The last paragraph seems like a huge misconception to me, just like the one which said that raiding the old content (lets say on working private servers) would get boring soon because people would clear everything in few days, since the game is so much more complicated now. The last one couldn't be farther from truth (witnessed by my own eyes).

[Khorm]

Vanilla was harder just because you needed 40 people. Just managing that was really difficult. Another thing which complicated raiding was the need (not needed but often required by the guild) for a wide range of materials/potions/buffs/... which had to be farmed.

Raiding now is much more convenient and user friendly, but the mechanics are harder. It is just a different type of hard.

Well no, you needed 25 people in vanilla. The 15 other people would of been LFR heroes if it had been around.

[Dakara]

and people still pretend vanilal and bc was harder

Basically this.

Whenever you mention how overly complex the game is becoming, you're met with "LOL n00b, WOW is ez brah, Vanilla and TBC were so hard, now it's just ezmode" blah blah BS. I imagine half of those mouth breathers either weren't around for the those days, or were but couldn't get into a raiding guild so just assumed it was hard.

Now days, if you can't beat a raid within the first few weeks, you'll eventually be able to brute force it with gear upgrades. Even Heroic eventually gets brute forced (usually after a string of nerfs however).

Back in the old days, itemization was crap, there was no reforging, and your endgame BiS often contained gear from all Tiers because the ilvl jumps were minimal and you couldn't reforge. There were no (or hardly any) gear catch up's and players needed to be attuned to most raids, which in many cases required clearing the previous tier. Bottom line was, Raiders were scarce, and gear was sub par.

Anyway, one of the reasons I don't miss raiding is the amount of prep work required these days to be in a competitive guild. It wasn't why I gave up, IRL is to blame there, but seriously, back in Vanilla/TBC, the real work took place in the raid, not on youtube.

[Khorm]

The last paragraph seems like a huge misconception to me, just like the one which said that raiding the old content (lets say on working private servers) would get boring soon because people would clear everything in few days, since the game is so much more complicated now. The last one couldn't be farther from truth (witnessed by my own eyes).

The raiding system has changed. Vanilla/BC bosses used to be gear checks, bosses these days are skill checks.

[Deleted]

Problem is also that OP is comparing a council fight with a single boss ofc there's gonna be more mechanics

[Deleted]

The raiding system has changed. Vanilla/BC bosses used to be gear checks, bosses these days are skill checks.

if this was to be even remotley true then why did such an small percentage of the playerbase(what was it like 6%? if not less) see naxx40?

Cause with your logic people should've been more then capable of getting enough gear to ezmode waltz through there eventually. yet that wasn't the case. weird.

[Syran]

The raiding system has changed. Vanilla/BC bosses used to be gear checks, bosses these days are skill checks.

It's not that black and white.

They might have been more gear / potion / consumables dependant but the classes had vastly different sets of abilities (or lack of them) to deal with things that seem mundane now.
You can't just say people would zerg everything old now, even with gear, largely because of that last reason.

The main complexity increase has been ability bloat, which means they can add more mechanics at once because the raid is better-equipped to counter them.

This sums it up pretty well I think. The relative difficulty has stayed about the same probably.

[Deleted]

Lots of words -> Looks complicated
Actually -> not hard at all

This is very true. Since Ulduar boss design has focused a lot more on explicit mechanics. Most of them are just existing tactics expressed in more detail though. Raiding is still mostly "stand here, you stand there, move when this happens".

Brutallus was one of the simplest bosses on paper and mostly a DPS race. But the fight was also nasty because the burn debuff would tick for a lot at the end which meant you needed well-timed big heals to keep people alive from it, and you only had 1 healer on that person because of the DPS requirement and tank healing requirement. Also you needed people with the debuff to run to a safe spot without getting close to anyone to spread it, if it got spread just once it was often a wipe.

The main complexity increase has been ability bloat, which means they can add more mechanics at once because the raid is better-equipped to counter them.

[Rucati]

I agree and disagree at the same time. Overall, the bosses are probably harder now, however there were some really hard and complex bosses back in BC as well.

Kael'thas, for example. 4 adds, one at a time, each doing something unique. Then a bunch of weapons that did something unique. Then pick up and equip weapons (then die and remember to equip your normal weapon...) then all 4 adds spawn at the same time, still with unique abilities. Then the boss himself, with mind control and the air phase and such. There was a lot too that fight, it was on par with any Pandaria fight in terms of complexity.

Vashj had a lot going on as well, the cores that had to be passed around, different adds requiring different things, etc.

Black Temple had quite a few interesting fights as well. And all of Sunwell was really well designed in my opinion.

Obviously it's easy to look back and think of how simple those fights were, but at the time they were really hard. And it's not just because players were worse back then, it's because the fights were less forgiving and very difficult. The only difference is there were a lot of easy bosses as well, while now it seems every boss is somewhat moderately hard (arguably). It's also because a lot of things are getting reused, so to make it interesting again they need to add more complexity. In vanilla something like tanks swapping at 2-3 stacks of a debuff was new, now it's second nature and everyone knows exactly what to do. Something like the cores on Vashj was new, now there's an extra action button for it and everything (protectors in SoO, same idea as with the core). So yes, there's more mechanics now, but a lot of the mechanics are things we've seen before.

I'd actually go so far as to say that the majority of boss mechanics are things we've seen before, and bosses have more of the same mechanics to make up for that. Another good example would be in Tempest Keep, the boss on the right after A'lar (I'm bad with names) she puts a debuff that explodes a player into the air. At the time that had only been done in Molten Core once, and people weren't stacked on that fight. But against her everyone was stacked and one person had to run out, that was the big mechanic. Now that's another second nature mechanic, so they toss that into a fight like Protectors (with the mind sear debuff) because it's something everyone can easily do now. But at the time it was new to people.

[Fluttershy]

You do ofcourse realise that the amount of abilities and boss has says nothing about the difficulty about the boss.



You mean just like how the LFR types of BC can easily kill heroic garrosh in one week tops. See how easy it is to mkae things up without having proper comparison at all?

I've spent 16 hours a week raiding progression early in BC, and in retrospect I don't really see why it was so hard.

What exactly was hard about vashj that it took some guilds 3-5 months to kill her (aside from doing like 1k dps and the inability to use an item) while nihilum/whatevertheguildthatbrutforcedthebuggedencounter were using crafted 115 blue gear and epic tailoring/bs patterns?

Was it seriously so hard to kill a green water elemental and throw a tainted core to someone without taking an eternity? The guild wiping so much on vashj would've probably wiped endlessly on a lootbag like ultraxion.

[Dakara]

if this was to be even remotley true then why did such an small percentage of the playerbase(what was it like 6%? if not less) see naxx40?

Cause with your logic people should've been more then capable of getting enough gear to ezmode waltz true there eventually. yet that wasn't the case. weird.

Well... yes and no. Just getting into Naxx itself (the attunement) cost more time and/or gold than your average player could afford in those days, but also, with no catch up mechanics, apart from a late game Honor grind, most players spent all of Vanilla in blues. So even it were just a gear check, most players would still have been excluded.

However, the gear checks in Vanilla were mostly for tanks. Itemization was crap, and it was much harder to brute force an encounter "later in the game" because it was impossible to outgear it with welfare gear.

[agtek]

As a vanilla/BC/mid Wotlk raider and now a casual LFR guy I think that even LFR fights are more complex (NOT more difficult, just more complex!) than vanilla/BC fights. LFR just don't require farming/class stacking(dispels/fear ward) and gear. In Vanilla, half of the (40s) raid could be bad and still kill bosses (MC bosses), in LFR too.

I'm not bad at dodging things but doing good DPS the same time requires me the same concentration as raiding in vanilla because now the screen just seems like a ton of fireworks in a bottle.