PTR Testing, Blue posts, Comics

[Lehane]

Isnt this like saying "Me and my team would love to win the World Cup in Soccer, but we can not be asked to train mutiple days a week, every week for it".

To me atleast it seems like it.

Your point would be valid if you are talking about World Cup Soccer on the playstation or X-box. I imagine quite a few professional Soccer players would feel insulted to have a WOW raid instance being compared to the ultimate tourney in their sport as an equal achievement.

Also you can make quite a good living as a professional soccer player if you are good enough, just ask Beckham. Do point me toward the professional WOW player getting paid millions to join a raid guild.

[Balbaroy]

There's nothing more satisfying than the tears of rogues.

[Ikkatsu]

Your point would be valid if you are talking about World Cup Soccer on the playstation or X-box. I imagine quite a few professional Soccer players would feel insulted to have a WOW raid instance being compared to the ultimate tourney in their sport as an equal achievement.

Also you can make quite a good living as a professional soccer player if you are good enough, just ask Beckham. Do point me toward the professional WOW player getting paid millions to join a raid guild.

Maybe not millions, but Ensidia?

Isn't their rumours of them being financed by a Saudi Prince?

[Herecius]

Maybe not millions, but Ensidia?

Isn't their rumours of them being financed by a Saudi Prince?

Protip: WoW obsession + tons of money = holyshizwtfbbq

[ds___swoosh]

Quote from Blizzard staff
Raids & Dungeons - Hard Mode
Ulduar has a ton of bosses. While I'm sure some players would love for us to deliver an instance with that level of content every month or so (and throw in a 5-player run to boot!), it's not in the cards, at least not for the next couple of years.

Instead, what we tried to do with Ulduar is offer a lot of different ways to play the encounters. While the progress-oriented guilds may clear it quickly, we hope that some of the hard modes will offer them a lot to chew on. All of the players who are somewhere between barely being able to clear the instance and the "world first" crowd should be able to find a comfortable difficulty level as well.

Your old model towards end game was a success, it brought you eleven million players.
Most of whom never had a chance to finish a raid. They didn't get to see some of the best art in the game, hear the unique music or voice over, or in many cases even see the villian at the end of their quest line. From a production POV, instances are very expensive. It seems an odd choice to lavish all that attention on such a tiny percent of the player base.

At the same time, we know there are players who love a challenge and are willing to do almost anything to beat a raid-destroying boss provided they also have a shot at the best loot. They don't want the instances to be over too soon. They like banging their head against the wall.

And so hard modes were born. We tested the water a little with Obsidian Sanctum. We're going full bore with Ulduar.

And there we have it folks, the end and death of Wow.

Blizzard have it so wrong.

They had an awesome model, when raids were first released they were imba hard and many people couldn't even clear trash. This brought such an epic and legendary feeling to loot that many people were intrieged and drove them harder to play better.

When the first 10-50 guilds managed to complete the instance Blizzard would generally stealth nerf them and more guilds would trickle through to see end game content.

More stealth nerfs would happen, until eventually pugs could farm them. As the level cap is raised with expansions, the last of the people would get to see content.

Now blizzard has made everything wide open and accessable to everybody.
Nothing is sacred, nothing is epic, nothing is legendary.

They have shot themselves right in the foot.

All making content easy to do is accelerate the process of which the game is dieing. People willl complete Ulduar and not bother playing again.

What a load of croc this is.

Give back sunwell difficulty and nerf the instance when the first few guilds start to complete it. Its miles better than this bullcrap "lets pretend to make content last longer by giving it hard modes" structure.

[Ikkatsu]

And there we have it folks, the end and death of Wow.

Blizzard have it so wrong.

They had an awesome model, when raids were first released they were imba hard and many people couldn't even clear trash. This brought such an epic and legendary feeling to loot that many people were intrieged and drove them harder to play better.

When the first 10-50 guilds managed to complete the instance Blizzard would generally stealth nerf them and more guilds would trickle through to see end game content.

More stealth nerfs would happen, until eventually pugs could farm them. As the level cap is raised with expansions, the last of the people would get to see content.

Now blizzard has made everything wide open and accessable to everybody.
Nothing is sacred, nothing is epic, nothing is legendary.

They have shot themselves right in the foot.

All making content easy to do is accelerate the process of which the game is dieing. People willl complete Ulduar and not bother playing again.

What a load of croc this is.

Give back sunwell difficulty and nerf the instance when the first few guilds start to complete it. Its miles better than this bullcrap "lets pretend to make content last longer by giving it hard modes" structure.

I honestly feel that if my guild has Ulduar cleared within a month, i may have to quit.

[Nowyn]

Isnt this like saying "Me and my team would love to win the World Cup in Soccer, but we can not be asked to train mutiple days a week, every week for it".

To me atleast it seems like it.

This is apples and oranges.

Your attempt at an example is pitiful. Trying to compare an actual sport to a video game is so far outside each other its not even worth mentioning.

Hard modes are exactly what hardcore raiders want isnt it? A challenge? I mean you're not just around to show off your l33t armor and brag about how big your epeen is right?

I say kudos to people who can do the hard modes, because they are hard. 3 Drake Sartharion may not be hard to people who have been doing it over and over (I remember this same argument back on old school Naxx, my server had the first atiesh as well as 3 guilds at the end actually farming the place. They had a druid in full T3 running around - I mean full T3, ring everything.) but 10 man maly has only been downed by 46 percent of the populus and 25 man maly has only been downed by 30 percent, if those numbers are anything indicative you'll seen even less who have seen 3 Drake Sartharion down.

(numbers from www.wowjutsu.com )

All the screams of "WoW is dying" is just stupid to me. Their numbers keep going up, how do you explain that? Personally I get really tired of WoW, wait let me rephrase that, personally I get tired of the morons I have to put with when I play WoW. Morons who think that they are entitled something, morons who whimper about the old days when they were screaming about how boring MC was and how they wanted to claw their eyes out. I wish you people could hear/read what you say/post sometimes.

[Lehane]

Maybe not millions, but Ensidia?

Isn't their rumours of them being financed by a Saudi Prince?

But it is just rumors. Until the 'Prince' officially speaks up I will discount those as internet rumors meant to enchance their 'prestige' among their fanboys. Even if true they are likely still far from the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, or Major Soccer leagues in pay scale. And still not a valid career option for most people to devote hours of training and pratice in hopes of landing a paying job later on.

This is a service that people pay for to entertain themselves not a job that will support you and a family and it should be viewed as such.

[Herecius]

This is apples and oranges.

Your attempt at an example is pitiful. Trying to compare an actual sport to a video game is so far outside each other its not even worth mentioning.

Hard modes are exactly what hardcore raiders want isnt it? A challenge? I mean you're not just around to show off your l33t armor and brag about how big your epeen is right?

I say kudos to people who can do the hard modes, because they are hard. 3 Drake Sartharion may not be hard to people who have been doing it over and over (I remember this same argument back on old school Naxx, my server had the first atiesh as well as 3 guilds at the end actually farming the place. They had a druid in full T3 running around - I mean full T3, ring everything.) but 10 man maly has only been downed by 46 percent of the populus and 25 man maly has only been downed by 30 percent, if those numbers are anything indicative you'll seen even less who have seen 3 Drake Sartharion down.

(numbers from www.wowjutsu.com )

All the screams of "WoW is dying" is just stupid to me. Their numbers keep going up, how do you explain that? Personally I get really tired of WoW, wait let me rephrase that, personally I get tired of the morons I have to put with when I play WoW. Morons who think that they are entitled something, morons who whimper about the old days when they were screaming about how boring MC was and how they wanted to claw their eyes out. I wish you people could hear/read what you say/post sometimes.

This, this, this, a thousand times this.
There's nothing I can add to this post to make it more awesome.

[Qwios]

I think the hard modes have been a success, problem being there is only one hard mode currently; then after that we only have Glory of the Raider which you have to make some dumb accommodations to complete for everyone. I think having many hard modes to complete will feel more like raiding in the past, where there's hopefully a progression and not just steamroll everything then work on Sarth3D.

[Steady]

Vezax's health on 10-man seems to have increased to 7.67m. I can only assume 25-man has had a health increase too.

[Varkie]

Wonder with the announcement of Season 5 ending we can get a sneak pic of the Deadly Gladiator's Frost Wyrm ;D

Or something

[Efedorus]

All the screams of "WoW is dying" is just stupid to me. Their numbers keep going up, how do you explain that? Personally I get really tired of WoW, wait let me rephrase that, personally I get tired of the morons I have to put with when I play WoW. Morons who think that they are entitled something, morons who whimper about the old days when they were screaming about how boring MC was and how they wanted to claw their eyes out. I wish you people could hear/read what you say/post sometimes.

You sir win.. I haz a new sig 8)

[AoBman05]

This is apples and oranges.

Your attempt at an example is pitiful. Trying to compare an actual sport to a video game is so far outside each other its not even worth mentioning.

Hard modes are exactly what hardcore raiders want isnt it? A challenge? I mean you're not just around to show off your l33t armor and brag about how big your epeen is right?

I say kudos to people who can do the hard modes, because they are hard. 3 Drake Sartharion may not be hard to people who have been doing it over and over (I remember this same argument back on old school Naxx, my server had the first atiesh as well as 3 guilds at the end actually farming the place. They had a druid in full T3 running around - I mean full T3, ring everything.) but 10 man maly has only been downed by 46 percent of the populus and 25 man maly has only been downed by 30 percent, if those numbers are anything indicative you'll seen even less who have seen 3 Drake Sartharion down.

(numbers from www.wowjutsu.com )

All the screams of "WoW is dying" is just stupid to me. Their numbers keep going up, how do you explain that? Personally I get really tired of WoW, wait let me rephrase that, personally I get tired of the morons I have to put with when I play WoW. Morons who think that they are entitled something, morons who whimper about the old days when they were screaming about how boring MC was and how they wanted to claw their eyes out. I wish you people could hear/read what you say/post sometimes.

WIN.

WINWINWIN.

WIN.

[remanis]

This is apples and oranges.

Your attempt at an example is pitiful. Trying to compare an actual sport to a video game is so far outside each other its not even worth mentioning.

Clearly you are to narrow minded to understand it was a metafor. However, I will not try to change ur opinion nor do I care todo so. You are ofcourse entitled to it and I will not call you a "moron" for that reason. I am a little more mature than that.

Now to my point. I do understand, and agree, with the "normal" mode and "hard mode" structure. That is totaly fine with me. However, the hard mode should REEEEAALLY be hard mode, like muru pre nerf. It is not! Blizzard have stated that they will never make another "sunwell" again. If they are going all out on hard modes Blizzard, why not make it REAAAALY hard? I would even go further and offer a completely new tier set in hard mode, not only some slight upgrades here and there.

[Mahtamori]

Is it just or... 46% of the WoW community has killed Malygos 10 man. I didn't even know that many cared for raiding enough to actually bother getting into that instance to begin with.

[Amgyn]

Now to my point. I do understand, and agree, with the "normal" mode and "hard mode" structure. That is totaly fine with me. However, the hard mode should REEEEAALLY be hard mode, like muru pre nerf. It is not! Blizzard have stated that they will never make another "sunwell" again. If they are going all out on hard modes Blizzard, why not make it REAAAALY hard? I would even go further and offer a completely new tier set in hard mode, not only some slight upgrades here and there.

There is a difference between REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEALLLLY hard and impossible.
Sunwell wasn't cleared in a week because it was IMPOSSIBLE to do so. (gate system)

Sartharion is easy. Sartharion 2drakes is hard. Sartharion 3drakes 10-man is REEEEEEEALLY hard.

I have a feeling people are comparing WoW to other MMORPG's out there for some reason..

with every WoW expansion content level is reset back to leveling -> "entry level" -> "raid" -> "mid-raid" -> "end game"

other MMO's expansions are just more end game content... their expansions = wow's content patches.

[Herecius]

I have a feeling people are comparing WoW to other MMORPG's out there for some reason..

with every WoW expansion content level is reset back to leveling -> "entry level" -> "raid" -> "mid-raid" -> "end game"

other MMO's expansions are just more end game content... their expansions = wow's content patches.

I get that feeling too, about the over-comparison of WoW to other MMOs. If you want a brutally hard MMO, play FFXI, for example. Or Everquest. Or any other number of brutal MMOs out there, Ragnarok is another. When you die, you lose experience. In some games, your epic equipment can break when you die. FOREVER. In Everquest, the enemies scale in power at LEAST twice as fast as your character - by the time you are level 20, if you aren't leveling with a partner, or two, then you will die, constantly. Raid bosses destroy guilds, rip them apart because nobody can touch them, and it often has little to do with strategy, and a lot more to do with luck and overpowered melee attacks, or special attacks.

If that's somebody's definition of fun... then maybe they should go play those other 'fun' games. WoW has millions upon millions of subscribers, if it were all that hard, I doubt it would be so successful.

[fantomspower]

I think it is really hard to balance Hardcore vs. Casual. Personally, they could have done this with 10 vs. 25 man; 25 man being the harder. I do think that needing more people makes it harder, and requiring each of those 25 people to be skilled is important to raising the difficulty (rather than it was in the 40 man).

I also think there is a misconception of what casual is/should be. Right now the time complete a boss/raid isn't/shouldn't be considered an issue (very minimal time commitment needed), however most raiding guilds raid 4-5 day a week which probably isn't considered casual. What I don't think casual should be is "I pay to play so give me epic loot"; Time commitment/skill should be reflected in the gear received/earned. Casual players should still have to have a certain skill level to earn loot. What some 'hardcore' players are saying (maybe poorly) is that Blizzard went from catering to them primarily to handing out 'free' loot to the 'noob' masses, while not providing them the same challenge. The hard-mode has yet to be a real challenge, and 30-40% is still quite high considering the 'old days'. This Hardcore group may just be griping/QQing, but there is a lack of challenging end-game content that in the past was always there.

Yes, casual players should have a system to earn good loot, but don't you think time-commitment/skill should still play a role? Just because people are casual do they not want the challenge of a higher difficulty raid? I would like to see the difficulty of Sunwell (or something a bit less) for the casual player; having the ability to not reset instances based on Blizzard schedule would help. Doing the same instance, having the same skill, getting the same loot, but over a time schedule that is possible for me/my causal Guild to do. Why isn't this an option? Why is causal associated with easy? That isn't casual that is just lazy. I think Blizzard is guilty of equating casual with easy and in-turn has catered this game to the lazy.

My little Rant:

From some of the post up here I find that you like the level of difficulty of Naxx the way it is. However, there is little else out there to challenge those who want one. Blizzard has stated that Uld will not be much harder, besides the hard-mode; and this may still not add enough to end-game.

I don't care if you identify as Hardcore or Casual, this game like any game should be challenging, that is what makes a game fun - the challenge of achieving a goal/receiving a reward. Getting the same reward without the challenge seems empty to me. I like learning the fights and taking time to progress. That is what is fun, and much funner than the eventual farming needed to get the rewards (gear). If I am not around for the learning process going into a farmed run is nowhere near as rewarding to me. I want there to be a good balance between content for Casual and Hardcore, yet with Blizzard it always seems to be one or the other.

[Herecius]

From some of the post up here I find that you like the level of difficulty of Naxx the way it is. However, there is little else out there to challenge those who want one. Blizzard has stated that Uld will not be much harder, besides the hard-mode; and this may still not add enough to end-game.

I don't care if you identify as Hardcore or Casual, this game like any game should be challenging, that is what makes a game fun - the challenge of achieving a goal/receiving a reward. Getting the same reward without the challenge seems empty to me. I like learning the fights and taking time to progress. That is what is fun, and much funner than the eventual farming needed to get the rewards (gear). If I am not around for the learning process going into a farmed run is nowhere near as rewarding to me. I want there to be a good balance between content for Casual and Hardcore, yet with Blizzard it always seems to be one or the other.

It needs to be restated that there's a pretty obvious reason for this problem that you put forth. Blizz has their progression model, if not for the sake of simplicity, then for the sake of the sanity of the developers. They cannot insert both UBER EPIC HARD WITH HYPER LOOTZ in the exact same patch as early-progression-entry-level-raid. It doesn't make sense. Naxx is the entry-level-raid in WotLK. Ulduar is the next step. 3.2 is the next, Icecrown is the last. Blizz has attempted to placate the 'hardcore' with hard modes, because they can't actually insert hyper-difficulty raids yet, because of the progression model.

Is it possible there is a better model than this progression? Other than releasing everything all at the same time, which just isn't feasible, I can't think of one.