Is Garrosh Hellscream the most difficult raid boss in WoW history?

[chronia]

I think you need to see boss difficulty in their own perspective with time. Take for example MC in vanilla, When we started on that place there was no deadlybosss mods telling you what to do, there was no grid/healbot showing everyting there is to show, the only thing we had was i think the CT raid suite, which had simplified unitframes and some real basic timers for stuff, even stuff like decursive took a while to get out in the open, and decursing without it was a real pain. Gearing was no where near as easy as it is now "BiS" blue gear was still even a challenge to come by, and the itemisation was a joke (spirit on warrior gear to name something). Also classes werent nearly as steamlined as they now are (hence the first real class "makeovers" started only a few months in during vanilla). Also there werent really tailor made tactics available or a gazillion movies to watch. ofc there were bits available from the top US guilds back then as they had a headstart but it was no where as easy to find as it is now. Same for classes, BiS/Classguides werent really around, tools like simcraft werent available so each player/class had to figure everything out for themselves.

Does that make the bosses more complicated then they are now, no ofc not. Were bosses still a challenge back then, well some were, some werent (just like it is now). Its easy to say that vanilla raiding was a joke but in reality it wasn't, it was just a different playing field that you can't compare with raiding now. And yeah i have to say, i was never a top raider (i have no vanilla rankings, but the best i did i think was around top 500 world wide in TBC on Vashj/Kaelthas). Nothing to brag about but still decent imho.

I do think though that if you would take 25 resonably good Raiders now, that never raided for example in TBC, deck them out in TBC blue gear, give them the addons from back then and put them on a TBC patched server with only access to the information we had back then they wouldnt magically go on a one shot everything spree because it is so easy.

Maybe this thread should be is Garrosh Hellscream the most complicated or Epic boss ever, instead of is it the most difficult one, as difficulty in a dynamicly changing game like WoW is very hard to rate properly taking all the variables that have ever excisted in raiding into account.

[nyxtyr]

That list is irrelevant, both time spent raiding and player skill have increased tremendously. Also, that list includes bosses in gated raids.

I think a list like this with ALL raid bosses would be damn interesting.

[Deleted]

Until it takes longer than the bosses on this list, I'd doubt it.

http://www.sk-gaming.com/content/163...rld_first_list

It's still VERY early yet. A further breakdown from this link:
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2794651519

#1 'enterhurrdurr list here'

Seems like someone has done theyr homework...

[vep]

Sorry I cant bother with trying to argue about a boss being hard mesured on how many days it did take to kill it /facepalm

Ok, seriously, what the fuck is up with all the ignorance in this thread?!
Are you really arguing that bosses are not hard based on how long it took to take them down?! Ever since Vanilla there were dedicated raiders who spent a looooot of time on downing bosses. In TBC more so than Vanilla. So now you're telling me a boss is harder now than it was in TBC because it has way more mechanics? Ok, yeah, let's take that road. Do you know what sunder armor is? Do you know what the phrase "wait for two sunders" means? Do you remember healers pulling aggro off of tanks? Do you remember that PW:S caused Warriors and Druids to not get rage and thus being unable to generate aggro? And that's just one part of the PvE scene. Let's look at some other class designs - Paladins, for example... Where was Exorcism back then? Where was Templar's Verdict? What kind of Crusader Strike did Paladins play with?

The point is... Yes, the mechanics were simpler back then. But our characters were SO FREAKING different from now. You couldn't just pop cooldowns at the start of the fight. That would mean a wipe. Tanks struggled to keep aggro - when was the last time you had to worry about that? Look at Warlocks now, for example. So much surviability without really any consequence except losing a global cooldown. Mages too... Mages didn't just get Ice Block in TBC... You had to be frost to use it and no one raided as frost because it wasn't the raiding spec.
Our classes weren't as powerful back then. That means that all those "simple" boss mechanics were much harder to deal with. Get that in your head for god's sake!

[Constraint]

I hate these threads because it's just a bunch of people who never raided in in Vanilla/TBC yelling about bosses being so much harder now. Honestly if you think four horsemen, Gothik, C'thun and others were easy, you clearly don't know what you're talking about

Mm, pretty much this. So, so few people who raided those bosses back then are still playing. Next to none. You didn't have a boss mod telling you exactly what to do, when to do it. Every class didn't have numerous "escape death" abilities. DPS had to watch aggro or get one-shot. So many mechanics would one-shot you without forgiveness. Healers didn't have near infinite mana. The "5-second rule" was king for healers for a longggg time for a good reason. Healers couldn't magically top the raid up within a couple of seconds by blowing a few cooldowns. Tanks didn't just have to stand near mobs to magically have AoE threat on everything from one Thunder Clap/HotR/DnD/Thrash. Tanks had to FIGHT for aggro, ALL FIGHT. Why do you think Fetish of the Sand Reaver etc were such good trinkets? Because they had a cool name? You didn't have the luxury of taking a mere 10/25 people. It was just a completely different game.

I must say though, people discrediting how difficult a few of the older bosses are - you really have no idea what you're talking about, and you're simply making yourselves look foolish. I know because I've been a progression raider since it was possible, and those bosses were BRUTAL. The thing is, it was taken for granted that bosses would be hard. Wiping for weeks/months on certain bosses was a given. Nowadays, it's simply classified poor design on Blizzard's behalf. How times have changed.

I don't remember half the world (of warcraft) whining when they couldn't kill twin emps, or mag, or mu'ru in a week. You simply kept at it, gave it your all, and eventually killed it.

Oh and I think I even saw some noob saying Nihilum didn't use voice communication in Vanilla. Mmk. Whatever you say, champ.

[Haloswin]

Ok, seriously, what the fuck is up with all the ignorance in this thread?!
Are you really arguing that bosses are not hard based on how long it took to take them down?! Ever since Vanilla there were dedicated raiders who spent a looooot of time on downing bosses. In TBC more so than Vanilla. So now you're telling me a boss is harder now than it was in TBC because it has way more mechanics? Ok, yeah, let's take that road. Do you know what sunder armor is? Do you know what the phrase "wait for two sunders" means? Do you remember healers pulling aggro off of tanks? Do you remember that PW:S caused Warriors and Druids to not get rage and thus being unable to generate aggro? And that's just one part of the PvE scene. Let's look at some other class designs - Paladins, for example... Where was Exorcism back then? Where was Templar's Verdict? What kind of Crusader Strike did Paladins play with?

The point is... Yes, the mechanics were simpler back then. But our characters were SO FREAKING different from now. You couldn't just pop cooldowns at the start of the fight. That would mean a wipe. Tanks struggled to keep aggro - when was the last time you had to worry about that? Look at Warlocks now, for example. So much surviability without really any consequence except losing a global cooldown. Mages too... Mages didn't just get Ice Block in TBC... You had to be frost to use it and no one raided as frost because it wasn't the raiding spec.
Our classes weren't as powerful back then. That means that all those "simple" boss mechanics were much harder to deal with. Get that in your head for god's sake!

The changes to aggro are so easily dismissed it's not funny. The lack of raid wide buffs and the sort (need for Shammies), the homogenization of classes.... Those things all greatly impacted how the game is played and made the need for more complexity necessary. Is that game harder now? I don't think so, there is more to do -- and many more ways to tackle it.

The game is very different, and that difference has been both good and bad... those changes make it very difficult to compare.

[cyqu]

Until it takes longer than the bosses on this list, I'd doubt it.

http://www.sk-gaming.com/content/163...rld_first_list

It's still VERY early yet. A further breakdown from this link:
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2794651519

#1 Ouro - 87 days from the Twin Emperors' death. 26th April 2006.
#2 C'thun - 86 days from the Twin Emperors' death. 25th April 2006.
#3 tied Chromaggus - 74 days from Ebonroc's death. 25th September 2005.
#3 tied Ragnaros - 74 days from Majordomo Executus' death. 25th April 2005.
#5 Yogg-Saron, Alone in the Darkness - 70 days from Stars' first pull. 7th July 2009
#6 High Astromancer Solarian - 59 days from Magtheridon's death (unlocking the Eye). 24th April 2007
#7 The Four Horsemen - 56 days from Gothik's death to D&T's kill. August 25th 2006
#8 Al'ar <Phoenix God> - 48 days from Magtheridon's death. 13th April 2007
#9 The Lich King (Heroic 25) - 42 Days from Heroic Putricide's death (first pull). March 26th 2010
#10 Heroic Al'Akir 25 - 36 days from Heroic Conclave of Wind's death. January 22nd 2011.
#11 Kael'thas Sunstrider <Lord of the Blood Elves> - 31 days from Solarian's death (first pull). 25th May 2007
#12 Magtheridon - 29 days from the first level 70 25-man raid. 24th February 2007
#13 Lady Vashj <Coilfang Matron> - 17 days from being unlocked. 29th March 2007
#14 Leotheras the Blind - 16 days from Hydross' death. 4th March 2007
#15 Loatheb - 14 days from Heigan's death. 17th July 2006
#16 tied Heigan the Unclean - 13 days from Noth the Plaguebringer's death. 3rd July 2006
#16 tied Hydross the Unstable <Duke of Currents> - 13 days from Gruul's death (Unlocking Serpentshrine). 16th February 2007
#16 tied Heroic Cho'gall - 13 days from Heroic Ascendant Council's death. 15th January 2011.
#16 tied Heroic Nefarian - 13 days from Heroic Atramedes' death. January 9th 2011.
#20 tied Archimonde <The Defiler> - 10 days from Azgalor's death. 9th June 2007
#20 tied Gothik the Harvester - 10 days from Instructor Razuvious' death. 30th June 2006
#22 tied Mimiron Firefighter 25 - 8 days from Ensidia's first pull. May 1st 2009
#22 tied Sapphiron - 8 days from Four Horsemen dying. 2nd September 2006
#22 tied Gruul the Dragonkiller - 8 days from Maulgar's death. 3rd February 2007
#25 Reliquary of Lost Souls - 6 days from Gurtogg's death. 2nd June 2007
#26 tied Kel'Thuzad - 5 days from Sapphiron's death. 7th September 2006
#26 tied Kil'jaeden <The Deceiver> - 5 days from the opening of the third Sunwell gate. 25th May 2008
#26 tied Sinestra - 5 days from Heroic Cho'gall's death. January 20th 2011.
#29 tied Heroic Anub'arak 25 - 4 days from Heroic Twin Val'kyr's death. September 6th 2009.
#29 tied M'uru. 4 days from the opening of the second Sunwell gate. 4th May 2008

other then the ulduar bosses not really being counted properly from when they were first available instead of when they were first pulled, the list still stands for what it is the longest standing bosses, era of wow, bugs and what not really shouldn't matter if you actually have knowledge of these bosses difficulty its simpley stating how long the bosses stood till they were first killed.
everyone can agree that yogg0, Hrag, and H lei shen are all way harder then ouro ever was, this list doesn't say hardest bosses ever it says "Top bosses that stayed unkilled the longest."
learn to read

[Tikken]

The amount of days is irrelevant really, the amount of attempts is probably more accurate.

C'thun and Ouro, for example, had corpse runs that took 5 minutes, you even couldn't rez anyone on C'thun. Each group had to be buffed individually, and with 40 people the odds of having to wait on someone in between attempts was higher.

Now, corpse runs put you basically at the boss room, that is if you don't rez the entire raid in one click (assuming the debuff is down), buffing everyone takes seconds, and you have to wait for less people to get ready.

Not to mention people are simply faster, and better at this game. I raided during vanilla (Tikken on Stormrage, guild was In Aeternum at the time, became Critical Mass), moving quickly on C'thun, for example, you could get in 10 or so good attempts in a night. The guilds on heroic Garrosh are putting in FAR more than that, not to mention all the mechanics being in the dungeon journal/boss timers etc.

Imo, that is.

[Deleted]

Method's Feral said on stream that Garrosh is harder than Lei Shen.

[Trix]

Until it takes longer than the bosses on this list, I'd doubt it.

http://www.sk-gaming.com/content/163...rld_first_list

It's still VERY early yet. A further breakdown from this link:
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2794651519

#1 Ouro - 87 days from the Twin Emperors' death. 26th April 2006.
#2 C'thun - 86 days from the Twin Emperors' death. 25th April 2006.
#3 tied Chromaggus - 74 days from Ebonroc's death. 25th September 2005.
#3 tied Ragnaros - 74 days from Majordomo Executus' death. 25th April 2005.
#5 Yogg-Saron, Alone in the Darkness - 70 days from Stars' first pull. 7th July 2009
#6 High Astromancer Solarian - 59 days from Magtheridon's death (unlocking the Eye). 24th April 2007
#7 The Four Horsemen - 56 days from Gothik's death to D&T's kill. August 25th 2006
#8 Al'ar <Phoenix God> - 48 days from Magtheridon's death. 13th April 2007
#9 The Lich King (Heroic 25) - 42 Days from Heroic Putricide's death (first pull). March 26th 2010
#10 Heroic Al'Akir 25 - 36 days from Heroic Conclave of Wind's death. January 22nd 2011.
#11 Kael'thas Sunstrider <Lord of the Blood Elves> - 31 days from Solarian's death (first pull). 25th May 2007
#12 Magtheridon - 29 days from the first level 70 25-man raid. 24th February 2007
#13 Lady Vashj <Coilfang Matron> - 17 days from being unlocked. 29th March 2007
#14 Leotheras the Blind - 16 days from Hydross' death. 4th March 2007
#15 Loatheb - 14 days from Heigan's death. 17th July 2006
#16 tied Heigan the Unclean - 13 days from Noth the Plaguebringer's death. 3rd July 2006
#16 tied Hydross the Unstable <Duke of Currents> - 13 days from Gruul's death (Unlocking Serpentshrine). 16th February 2007
#16 tied Heroic Cho'gall - 13 days from Heroic Ascendant Council's death. 15th January 2011.
#16 tied Heroic Nefarian - 13 days from Heroic Atramedes' death. January 9th 2011.
#20 tied Archimonde <The Defiler> - 10 days from Azgalor's death. 9th June 2007
#20 tied Gothik the Harvester - 10 days from Instructor Razuvious' death. 30th June 2006
#22 tied Mimiron Firefighter 25 - 8 days from Ensidia's first pull. May 1st 2009
#22 tied Sapphiron - 8 days from Four Horsemen dying. 2nd September 2006
#22 tied Gruul the Dragonkiller - 8 days from Maulgar's death. 3rd February 2007
#25 Reliquary of Lost Souls - 6 days from Gurtogg's death. 2nd June 2007
#26 tied Kel'Thuzad - 5 days from Sapphiron's death. 7th September 2006
#26 tied Kil'jaeden <The Deceiver> - 5 days from the opening of the third Sunwell gate. 25th May 2008
#26 tied Sinestra - 5 days from Heroic Cho'gall's death. January 20th 2011.
#29 tied Heroic Anub'arak 25 - 4 days from Heroic Twin Val'kyr's death. September 6th 2009.
#29 tied M'uru. 4 days from the opening of the second Sunwell gate. 4th May 2008

Fights are tuned differently these days, they are made killable in current gear, your list has bosses that were bugged and unkillable due to gear issues.

Boss difficulty is an entirely different issue.

[Orcindauh]

The bosses which were not killable until fixed/nerfed should not even belong on that list.

[Kowloon]

I raided with very competitive progression guilds in vanilla and in BC. I think the most difficult part about vanilla raiding was assembling 40 players to be online and willing to retain focus for several hours while trying to kill bosses in MC, BWL, or Naxx. Many fights touted as difficult back then would not seem so difficult now however it is important to remember that 40m raiding basically required double the mechanics and double the class stacking in comparison to 25m raiding. Boss fights that now require 2 tanks back then required 4+ on some fights. In my experience, it was more difficult amassing the proper players and group composition then the boss fights themselves once you got in there and put some solid attempts in.

BC raiding was tough and nobody who tells you different obviously didn't progress through Sunwell. Wiping on M'uru for 3 months was like a brick wall to the face every night. In my opinion, BC raiding is more like today's modern raiding then an older 'vanilla' model of raiding. End boss fights like Vash'j or Kael'thas required a decent amount of raid coordination in order to push boss phases efficiently and effectively without wiping the raid.

[mkultra55]

I think you need to see boss difficulty in their own perspective with time. ......

Agreed. That sums it up nicely. Things have changed so much since Vanilla..

The only way to make comparisons is in relation to other Raid Bosses of the same time frame to really determine difficulty.

[brirrspliff]

#1 Ouro - 87 days from the Twin Emperors' death. 26th April 2006.
#2 C'thun - 86 days from the Twin Emperors' death. 25th April 2006.
#3 tied Chromaggus - 74 days from Ebonroc's death. 25th September 2005.
[...]

the list is irrelevant. and if garrosh is the hardest boss? we will know when he is dead.

[mixerii]

Best quote about boss difficulty i found a while ago and saved.

Hell yes, things would die significantly faster. Not only are people way, way, way better at the game, but something that's often ignored are the tools that players use. Those have gotten _massively_ upgraded over the years. Anything from addons to analyzing what's happening to .. well, anything. Those things help a ton when players just play _a lot_ better than even at the start of Wrath.

I still remember raiding the original Naxxramas. I'm not blinded by the shiny goggles of nostalgy. I remember the countless wipes on Sapphironand whatnot. You remember what a joke that encounter was at the start of Wrath? You had one thing to dispel, then you had to dodge the PAINFULLY SLOWLY DROPPING BOMB. Anyone who died to it in Wrath more than once or twice was a total scrub, tricked by that Brewfest drink or by a mage, right?

Back then, however, we had easily one hundred wipes to that same stupid shit. To that damn bomb alone. Not to mention people forgetting to dispel the curse? Like, literally forgetting that it just existed in the whole fight and we wiped. The addons pretty much had no restrictions even back then, so you could make a macro that dispelled anyone in range with the same damn key that you shot Fireball from without having to do anything else. We had a priest who refused to use PoH; he was Greater Healing people in a fight where everyone takes AoE damage and GHeal heals for less with lower efficiency. We had people who put out less than half the damage of what some people playing the same class did with the same gear. We had people who were dirty clickers. We had a feral druid doing DPS back when there were no goddamn real talents for it.

Worst of all, we were a top guild. Just let that sink in for a moment. What I described was something like the 4th or 5th kill of Sapphiron _total_ in the whole world.

I do not miss those times. I'm not going to even start ranting about the world buffs, 50 elixirs and flasks stacking etc.. pretty much everything was just horrible.


The game and the players were both just significantly worse. Raids were a shit ton easier. They just consumed more time because you had to farm, farm, farm and farm and get world buffs which doubled your hitpoints and gave +50% damage.

Sometimes there's people who haven't even been there, or people who were absolute scrubs claiming it was the hardest shit ever. It most definitely wasn't. It was just painful to anyone with the slightest clue. I suppose I was quite masochistic back then.

Oh and I think I even saw some noob saying Nihilum didn't use voice communication in Vanilla.

That is true tho, there was a vent and teamspeak but it was not mandatory for raiding, usually it had cliques in each channel talking about nongame stuff in their own languages.

[Xisa]

It's very hard to compare bosses from the older game, especially given how much higher the play celeing is not.

Also, even bigger than that...saved Lockouts were introduced in WotLK. Any boss from then onwards you could save your kills and just run attempts for weeks if need. No need to clear the whole raid again. That makes a huge difference.

[iggie]

Until it takes longer than the bosses on this list, I'd doubt it.

http://www.sk-gaming.com/content/163...rld_first_list

It's still VERY early yet. A further breakdown from this link:
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2794651519


#3 tied Ragnaros - 74 days from Majordomo Executus' death. 25th April 2005.
#5 Yogg-Saron, Alone in the Darkness - 70 days from Stars' first pull. 7th July 2009

The earlier ones were all bugged/impossible without sploits.

[Wildberry]

Why are people still trying to compare raiding now to raiding then?

Sure fights may have been "less complex" back then, but by the standards of Raiders back then, things were incredibly hard.

I'm not saying raids aren't hard today, or that "Raiding is soo easy", all I'm saying is you might as well be comparing MoP raiding to EQ raiding, because that's about how different they are.

Back then, certain classes had certain roles, there wasn't a Simcraft or Plug-in-your-own-stat-weights Mr. Robot, the friendly forum theory crafter wasn't handing you a BiS List, gear came at a much slower pace, talent trees weren't completely dumbed down (Not saying that's a bad thing, looking at the things people have done in the past [Warlock's "Improved Healthstone"] is a bit ridiculous.) And gear was horribly statted at the time. Nowadays, there's no need for Winterfall firewater, warlocks aren't farming Soulshards and contemplating suicide, and people are doing a lot less "figuring out" and a lot more "reading up" in regards to their Classes/Gear.

Also, comparing MC or AQ to H LK 25 or H Lei Shen is laughable at best..."The birth of modern day raiding was Naxx" I've heard this statement a few times, and agree with it to an extent, look, though, at how raiding has evolved from "Shadows of the Necropolis" to "Siege of Orgrimmar" Honestly, as far as comparing raids nowadays go, I'd say the furthest back a person could go while still having a fair comparison would be Ulduar.

Oh and as far as "easy" TBC bosses go, wasn't M'uru known as the guildbreaker? Hell, isn't having had your guild split on M'uru a badge of honor nowadays?

Tl;dr: Raiding was hard then, Raiding is hard now. They are hard in different ways, the game really isn't even close to what it was in BC, to compare a current raid to a raid previous to or during the Burning Crusade is an unfair and inaccurate comparison, please do not do this. Number of Attempts is a better way (Far from perfect) to gauge difficulty than "Number of days before world first." Difficulty is subjective. It is a little early in the world first race to be giving Garrosh a title such as "Most difficult raid boss in history".

[Dazzy]

What everyone else said. Plus, gearcheck =/= hard

[Akylios]

What everyone else said. Plus, gearcheck =/= hard

But posters are claiming different things.

• You have classic raiders coming in here telling everyone raiding is about as hard now as it was back in classic and that on average, raiders are about as good now as they were back in the day.
  
• You have modern day raiders coming in here telling us that modern day raiders are the best raiders ever and everyone prior to their time was much worse.

You can't possibly agree with everyone. Pick your side!