3.0 Hard mode ideas?

[Sinea]

It seems people enjoy Ulduar's style of Hard modes most (Out of Naxx style (Normal mode and normal mode only), Ulduar Style (Triggered), Trial of the Lol (Do i even have to go there), and ICC where you switch it mid-raid if you want).
But it also seems that there are limits to Ulduar's style of hard modes... I could only think of a few hard mode triggering ideas that werent in Uld or the Sartharion Encounter.
Anybody have any ideas as to how Naxx's bosses hard modes would've worked/triggered in ulduar's HM style?
Just curious as to how many ways there would be to trigger a hard mode, instead of just repeating Ulduar's triggering strategies over and over with slight changes.

Yeah i know i worded this terribly and most people will be "wtf"ing right now, I apologize in advance...

[Wupday]

Indded it will become hard to keep finding new ways to "trigger" the hardmodes like in ulduar, but it was way more fun then the sorry excuse they put in ICC.

[Sinea]

tbh i thought that ToC style was MUCH worse then ICC... 4 lockouts in one raid, 6 lockouts in the same building (including 5 mans) is WAY too much.

[Krathdar]

i just think there should be regular modes, and hard modes, with the hard modes having bosses with more hp and a few of them that add elements to the fight that the normal modes don't. Just 1 lockout/

[Undyingchaos]

My only issue with hard modes is the create weird barriers in the raid you are currently in.

As far as im concerned and im sure blizzard is basing it on ICC. Hard modes come after normal....All of normal. But with that in mind if you are working on starter hard modes or a hardmode that comes before a a certain fight, if you become stuck on that fight then you are shit out of luck for the rest of the raid unless ya put it back into normal and keep moving. Which goes against the whole normal before hardmodes.

[Gallador]

Ulduar and ToC both were good ideas on paper (triggered and no thrash) but it got boring after a while.

I kind of like the ICC style, do whatever HC you want, whenever you want, without hassle.

[writhe666]

Blizz already said they were sticking with the ICC way of doing hard-modes, wherein you can switch it per boss provided you have the appropriate attunement or achievement.

Personally, I liked the Ulduar hard-mode strategy, where you had to activate it somehow, but I prefer the ICC way where you kill a certain boss (most likely the final boss in the encounter), and gain the ability to switch any boss to hardmode at will (hopefully they remove the 5 minute cooldown though). Either that, or it'd be nice if they gave you the same ability, but on a per-boss basis instead of a per instance basis, where you kill any given boss in a raid, and you're then allowed to switch that one boss over to hmode if you choose.

[Therastos]

The good thing about Ulduar-style of triggering hardmodes is the fact that the difficulty-increase doesn't feel so "artificial". You don't disable orbital defenses? You don't allow the elders to grant Freya their powers? You turn down Keepers' offer for assistance against Yogg-Saron? Of course it's harder that way.

However, apart from scaled difficulty encounters (Sartharion/Freya/Yogg-Saron/Assembly of Iron), it isn't really any different whether you press a giant red button or activate the hardmode from UI, and the way to activate Heartbreaker, Lose Your Illusion and I Love the Smell of Saronite in the Morning were pretty stupid in my opinion. For instance, ICC-styled General Vezax hardmode could remove the clouds completely and make him spawn animus at 20%. Much better way than holding DPS in order to allow Animus to spawn, with same results.

What I would like to see is radical changes in (some) hardmode encounters. It is fine if some encounters are mainly increased damage and health (works well for bosses like Festergut, Blood Queen and Lord Marrowgar), but for some encounters that doesn't just work (gunship, for instance).

Gunship heroic, for example, could prevent you from using the cannons and make you defeat the opponent by killing all their crew by boarding their ship, and while you are clearing enemy captain's buff stacks, more powerful enemies (sorcerers and Battle Mages) would spawn on your own ship giving you something to do.

Either way, I think Blizzard is aware that many players are displeased (judging forums) how little most of ICC's heroic modes differ from normal modes, and I expect to see more radical changes in hardmodes rather than having Putricide throw malleable goos, already present in another encounter, during Festergut. More like Firefighter, Alone in the Darkness, or Twilight Zone.

[Lightfist]

Ulduar was stupid from a lore prospect.

Why wouldn't our characters ask for help from the Keepers? Why would they leave the towers up? Why would they push a big red button?

And no, "For a challenge" isn't a good answer. Fighting an Old God is a challenge enough. It was basically our characters being retarded.

[MestHoop]

Ulduar was stupid from a lore prospect.

Why wouldn't our characters ask for help from the Keepers? Why would they leave the towers up? Why would they push a big red button?

And no, "For a challenge" isn't a good answer. Fighting an Old God is a challenge enough. It was basically our characters being retarded.

It goes back to the whole roleplaying aspect of a RPG.
When you enter a dungeon you don't know you need to kill those drakes before attacking the dragon. They might not even see it!
When you face off against 3 iron dudes and one throws lightning, I'd take him out first ("go for the caster, not the tank" kind of mentality).

When people play D&D they often make decisions that make it harder for them in the end than it should be :P
Regarding the red button... Well I guess it's meant to attract the little kid inside of us It even said don't push ^^

[Lightfist]

It goes back to the whole roleplaying aspect of a RPG.
When you enter a dungeon you don't know you need to kill those drakes before attacking the dragon. They might not even see it!
When you face off against 3 iron dudes and one throws lightning, I'd take him out first ("go for the caster, not the tank" kind of mentality).

When people play D&D they often make decisions that make it harder for them in the end than it should be :P
Regarding the red button... Well I guess it's meant to attract the little kid inside of us It even said don't push ^^

The Keepers offer their help as soon as we free them. We have to kill the Trash before doing Sartharion, it's almost impossible to not see the drakes...and I'd like to think my character is mature enough to NOT press a big button.

[Weriik]

Maybe a hardmode for the final boss in spider wing would be that the web would slow rip apart causing holes you could fall through killing you or something

[ledbythereaper]

tbh i thought that ToC style was MUCH worse then ICC... 4 lockouts in one raid, 6 lockouts in the same building (including 5 mans) is WAY too much.

5 lockouts as you can't get saved to ToTC5 normal ;p

[jcj64200031]

Gunship heroic, for example, could prevent you from using the cannons and make you defeat the opponent by killing all their crew by boarding their ship, and while you are clearing enemy captain's buff stacks, more powerful enemies (sorcerers and Battle Mages) would spawn on your own ship giving you something to do.

I always thought that blizzard should have had frost wyrms fly in at set times in the fight that freeze the jetpacks of anyone who uses one for 1 minute, and continue to do so until it is killed. They're flying around the outside of the tower, why not actually send them in to defend it?

as for what would trigger naxx hardmodes... I can't see a whole lot with their current mechanics, they'd have to add new mechanics to most if not all the fights in order to get it added in.

[Deleted]

I did enjoy Ulduar's hardmode style. As said before, you felt that it became harder. Of course it'll get harder if Freya gets assistance from three keepers, and that Flame Levi gets backup with the towers up. I would like to see more of those, rather than pressing the UI.

[Durandro]

tbh i thought that ToC style was MUCH worse then ICC... 4 lockouts in one raid, 6 lockouts in the same building (including 5 mans) is WAY too much.

Technically 5 lockouts, since you could do 5 man normal as many times as you liked. But I'm being pedantic :P

[Reinhard von Lohengramm]

The thing with ulduar hardmodes, even though seeing Big red button with giant "NO" signs is that.....

http://www.wowwiki.com/Archivum_Console

read its text

in order to get to algalon and save the world, you need the 4 watcher sigils

yes, it would be easy to go up and say "lol can i hax teh sigil plz?".....but Mr. Yoggy is Mc'ing them.

"the sigils are tied to their mental and physical integrity"

I honestly dont know why not beating a guy in 3min or pushing or not pressing a button changes the state of mind/body of a keeper (freya and thorims make a bit of sense.)

[MestHoop]

The Keepers offer their help as soon as we free them. We have to kill the Trash before doing Sartharion, it's almost impossible to not see the drakes...and I'd like to think my character is mature enough to NOT press a big button.

Well, the keepers were MC'd before. How do we know if we engage the dude he won't do it again?
Also who says we have to kill the trash before we kill sartharion? We know this now because someone obviously tried and told us :P If you went in there to beat a big dragon and you saw some menacing drakes (of a different kind) and all you want is to kill the dragon then dodging these drakes might be best. Hell, the fight even tells us the drakes don't like sartharion.

As for Mimiron, consider this: You and your friends are fighting your way though his chambers and you see him tinkering on a tank. There's a button that said "Do not press" and there were bombs all over the place before you... Obviously HE doesn't want you to press the button, so maybe you DO want to press it.

All in all though these are open minded things in a fairly close minded game. You are told many things before you go in and many people have done it before you and told about it on the internet so you know what to expect, but if you look at it from your character's perspective then all this can make sense. It's just not really represented in the right way because everything is pre-scripted unlike a DM in D&D.