The Algalon Hour

[Xombo]

I'm not normally one to be qorried about an impleted change into the raiding system, but this hour-long period you're allowed to fight Algalon seems a little broken.

As we all know, sometimes in life, shit happens. This was shown sometimes when trying to achieve the "Immortal" Naxx title. Someone d/c's randomly, someone forgets reagents, the server shuts down...etc etc. This stuff *shoudln't* happen, but we all know it does. But I'm thinking this has been taken to a whole new level with this boss encounter. It seems as though Blizz didn't have ideas to really make him all that much harder so they decided to give a silly time-frame as to promote the "You think Ulduar is Easy? Link your Algalon achievement" threads that will undoubtedly spread like wildfire in a few weeks/months when people begin to get bored of Ulduar.

I'm not too sure what will really define this hour, whether it's actual fight time, or whether it's counting while you rez/corpse-run after a wipe, but it seems like a little bit of a scam to try and make the fight harder.

Your thoughts?

[Herecius]

To be honest, it's fine. Everybody clamored for a way to get EXCLUSIVE loot, that no scrub could ever have, and now they have it. A guild cannot just roflpunch their way through wipes on Algalon until they finally beat him, they have to make sure they're totally ace on the first go. If shit happens, shit happens, try again next week.

Blizz could have made it far worse by taking a cue from say, Ragnarok Online, and having a boss despawn for an entire week (or longer) whenever you wipe on him.

[Paper]

Total cop-out. I want a genuinely difficult encounter that combines more challenging mechanics with gear and skill requirements. Not a time limit.

[Spl4sh3r]

I like the idea with a time-limit, these means it will take weeks before Guilds will down him, since they might not even get all the info for tactics on the first 1 hour. Instead of just plowing through after hours of wiping. And actually why even start to QQ about it before you even met him? Tell us more about this when you have tried to kill him or when you have killed him.

[Ares42]

I enjoy playing a game that I have a monthly subscription to, but I can only access the new and exciting content for 4 hours/month.... In a month or so when everything else in Ulduar have been farmed to death, it won't be worth keeping the subscription just so you can play the game 1 hour/week.

[Herecius]

I enjoy playing a game that I have a monthly subscription to, but I can only access the new and exciting content for 4 hours/month.... In a month or so when everything else in Ulduar have been farmed to death, it won't be worth keeping the subscription just so you can play the game 1 hour/week.

Because the only thing worth doing in the ENTIRE game is wiping on Algalon.

And nothing of value was lost.

[Ghul]

how far i understood it, hes only despawning after one hour of fighting time? not uptime? so regging buffing etc can take as long as you want it to?

[Thellais]

Seems like a good idea, may actually help to increase the competition for world firsts on this guy, instead of seeing who can stay up the longest.

[Herecius]

I'm going to quote myself from about a week ago, talking in a thread about Ensidia blasting through bosses.

I'm going to laugh when they manage to finally get to Alagalon a couple weeks down the line, and all we can hear on the internets are theirs screams as they're sucked into black holes.

[Nezoia]

Sunwell Gates over again.

.....

And face it, 999/1000 people who's going to write "it sucks" comment on this forum, the official forums, and any other forum, is to casual for Algalon, and won't reach him the next 4 months.

And in 4 months time they'll remove the limit, have nerfed him 5-6 times, and it'll take the average guild under a hour to kill him.

WoW in a nutshell.

[loopy]

I'm fine with it, it'll certainly make for an interesting race for world first.

[Ares42]

Because the only thing worth doing in the ENTIRE game is wiping on Algalon.

And nothing of value was lost.

I had 6 months to exhaust all the other content released in WotLK before 3.1. This patch brought Ulduar and Argent Tournamet, how long do you think those will last except for Algalon? I promise you within a few months Algalon is the only thing that hasn't gotten stale.

[Xombo]

I like the idea with a time-limit, these means it will take weeks before Guilds will down him, since they might not even get all the info for tactics on the first 1 hour. Instead of just plowing through after hours of wiping. And actually why even start to QQ about it before you even met him? Tell us more about this when you have tried to kill him or when you have killed him.

I really hope I'm not coming across is OMG QQQQQQQQQQQ, because that wasn't the point of the thread, I'm just curious to hear the opinions of everyone outside myself. I'm a realist, I know what I think really doesn't matter at all in this. Just thought it might be an interesting topic to discuss. Also, Ulduar will keep me happy for quite some time, and I've never been one to find WoW boring, there's always something to do (albeit maybe not *everyone* finds this to be true...) and I'm happy with the game so I'm really not worried if ONE boss doesn't fit my liking.

[Neichus]

I like the idea of the despawn. At first I was a little wary, but as others have pointed out I think that this is consistent with Blizzard's attitude toward content in WotLK: skill counts more than time. You may question that, saying that content takes no skill either, but by comparison to Classic I think it's taken a big step up. Originally the ability to actually raid 40-man content wasn't really a demonstration of skill; it just showed that you had enough time in your life to farm up the different elixirs, potions, Felwood tubers, dark runes, and food for raid. That with no dailies to help you had to farm enough every day to pay for the extensive repairs you'd suffer on new content. And let's not forget just how much trash populated many zones (/hate post-Emp AQ40) that just sucked up yet more time.

Compare this to now, where the trash mobs in Ulduar are more like mini-bosses. There's not a lot of it, but handling it wrong will kill you just as surely as a boss would. However once you get the trick there isn't very much of it and you stop wasting time. Zones are expansive, but they have teleports, trams, etc to keep it from being a long and pointless run back (again, see AQ40). And so I think this is yet another tactic for this approach: it's not going to be guilds that can throw themselves at a boss for 8 hours straight that will get him, but those that really make the most out of their time with quality players.

That said I do admit there are downsides, but I think Blizzard is testing this approach out fairly enough. If it's successful then we'll probably see it more in the future.

[Xombo]

I'm fine with it, it'll certainly make for an interesting race for world first.

I'm still pretty sure Ensidia is gonna have this guy down this week on 25-man haha. We all have to accept though, that eventually, this "hour" won't have any affect because he'll be farmable in a no longer than 30 mins I would suspect. An hour just makes *learning* the fight difficult.

However, it will certainly be interesting if this hour combines with a boss that's just as hard as pre-nerf M'uru...Algalon will most likely leave Ulduar and head to the Official WoW Forums because the feedin' grounds fer tearz will b guud.

[Calamari]

Its ok I think, the best guilds will be geared in hard mode drops that the majority will never get their hands on, the very best will be geting Algalon drops. Time frame or not me as a casual raider and the majority of all wow players will likely never even see Algalon in person so meh.

[Khalkaroth]

I'm not normally one to be qorried about an impleted change into the raiding system, but this hour-long period you're allowed to fight Algalon seems a little broken.

As we all know, sometimes in life, shit happens. This was shown sometimes when trying to achieve the "Immortal" Naxx title. Someone d/c's randomly, someone forgets reagents, the server shuts down...etc etc. This stuff *shoudln't* happen, but we all know it does. But I'm thinking this has been taken to a whole new level with this boss encounter. It seems as though Blizz didn't have ideas to really make him all that much harder so they decided to give a silly time-frame as to promote the "You think Ulduar is Easy? Link your Algalon achievement" threads that will undoubtedly spread like wildfire in a few weeks/months when people begin to get bored of Ulduar.

I'm not too sure what will really define this hour, whether it's actual fight time, or whether it's counting while you rez/corpse-run after a wipe, but it seems like a little bit of a scam to try and make the fight harder.

Your thoughts?

My thoughts? I'll tell you my thoughts... this post seems more like an attempt to belittle blizzard for whatever reason than a reasonable interrogation.

You're saying that blizzard have put that 1-hour limit on Algalon just because he isn't really difficult? Did you even tried him to proclaim such illogical and blasphemous things like that?

I may overexagerating a little bit here but I really hate when people belittle blizzard on every little nerf/buff/ideas they do... but hell, I guess that "curse" came with the birth of this overpopular game.

And that's maybe the reason why at this moment only 3 people voted "I dunno"...

[Nezoia]

Thus why there is a achievement and title for just killing Algalon. (And a extra realm first).

He feeds of your tears!

[Ares42]

I like the idea of the despawn. At first I was a little wary, but as others have pointed out I think that this is consistent with Blizzard's attitude toward content in WotLK: skill counts more than time. You may question that, saying that content takes no skill either, but by comparison to Classic I think it's taken a big step up. Originally the ability to actually raid 40-man content wasn't really a demonstration of skill; it just showed that you had enough time in your life to farm up the different elixirs, potions, Felwood tubers, dark runes, and food for raid. That with no dailies to help you had to farm enough every day to pay for the extensive repairs you'd suffer on new content. And let's not forget just how much trash populated many zones (/hate post-Emp AQ40) that just sucked up yet more time.

Compare this to now, where the trash mobs in Ulduar are more like mini-bosses. There's not a lot of it, but handling it wrong will kill you just as surely as a boss would. However once you get the trick there isn't very much of it and you stop wasting time. Zones are expansive, but they have teleports, trams, etc to keep it from being a long and pointless run back (again, see AQ40). And so I think this is yet another tactic for this approach: it's not going to be guilds that can throw themselves at a boss for 8 hours straight that will get him, but those that really make the most out of their time with quality players.

That said I do admit there are downsides, but I think Blizzard is testing this approach out fairly enough. If it's successful then we'll probably see it more in the future.

You do realize they already tested this out back in BWL with Vaelastrasz, and eventually decided to scrap it because it doesn't add any sort of fun to the game. Adding a time-limit to content only reduces the potential for people to enjoy the game.

[Herecius]

I'm still pretty sure Ensidia is gonna have this guy down this week on 25-man haha. We all have to accept though, that eventually, this "hour" won't have any affect because he'll be farmable in a no longer than 30 mins I would suspect. An hour just makes *learning* the fight difficult.

However, it will certainly be interesting if this hour combines with a boss that's just as hard as pre-nerf M'uru...Algalon will most likely leave Ulduar and head to the Official WoW Forums because the feedin' grounds fer tearz will b guud.

As it took Ensidia... what? 9 hours? More? Of wiping on Yogg to finally down him, I would be seriously amazed if they managed to down him next week. No, I take that back, I will eat my pants if they manage to do it, with oyster sauce.