The culture shock of 5-man heroics.

[Omedon]

This thread deserves mass approval. I give it mine. Thank you for such a well written and well reasoned post, and I hope your thread on the beta forums can get enough notice

Actually, I'm not in beta, so I'm pretty sure I can't post to the beta forums. I did, however, post this to my realm forums, because I plan to abandon the DF for awhile in favour of server side community group forming... so I'd like them to be as informed and ready as I am.

[ComputerNerd]

tl;dr

Thank you for your contribution.

Back on topic, that was a very detailed and well thought out post, and I thank you for your time putting it together.
It does highlight a lot of issues with the pug mentality, which I fear is not going away anytime soon.
Not least because of the raid ID changes, allowing raid hopping.
And the concern that some of those idiots will even prevent the good players from hopping to another raid due to the current obsession with gunship heroic, since a heroic encounter will lock you to that raid, without the option of moving to another.

[Deleted]

(I want to apologise in advance for my bad spelling, grammar etc)
Very well writen Omedon, and I would like to add a few more things.

Deadmines HC as I watched on a vid yesterday It didn't seemed too hard (as explained from the player as well). It was hard enought to be a HC.

5-man heroics should be the learning curve of your class capabilities and for the raid bosses you will encounter after.
Not all the bosses on 5-man hc should be hard but at least one per heroic should be imo. And by saying hard I don't mean imposible or 2 hits on tank and his dead. Hard should be knowing combat mechanics and knowing your class.

I wached another vid for a boss encounter where they showing only wipes. And the point was to explain the mechanics and how well it was implemented for such a fight. The debuffs could be dispeled the adds needed to be gathered correctly, you need to move when the time is right and if you stand on the "dust" isn't it your fault?

At the end all have to take in concideration that playing a 5-man encounters on beta is nore dificult than live since no Deadly boss Mods are there. So all the encounters are played solidly by knowing the tacs and watch the visuals instead of timers of what you will need to to next.

And another thing is why will you pug a 5-man? There are many types of guilds. Why not be in one and when you need a group for a 5-man normal or heroic then your group is there.

And finaly I realy can't understand why many like to see heroics as a brain dead concept of game? And don't forget that at one point many encounters will be outgeared. Can't recall any game that doesn't have challenges in there. A game you start from the begining towords the end and never die (ok prince of persia with your dagger doesnt count :P ). Or a game where you start it you put it on easy or very easy. When you reach bosses and without any thought or sweat or at least the doubt that you might not be able to win. And if you fail then you are more pissed off on that boss and take things personal... you hate it more and you definetly you want him dead. What you do? you try again and focusing harder and when thats it is done you get excited.
Imposible? No. You just have to try harder!

... and thats the beauty of games.

[emidas]

I loved many of the points you made in this topic. I remember doing heroics in bc with guildmates to gear them up and get them experience in a group setting before taking them to kara (oh, how i miss kara!). I think my biggest problem with Wrath was not just that heroics were lolez, it was that once a new tier of raiding came out, all others were obsolete. In BC, you had to experience Kara and get some experience before you went into Gruul's and Mag's, at which point there was a huge step in difficulty to SSC and TK (Kael and Vashj were the REAL noob checkers). In Wrath, you went from 5-man's to whatever the latest raid was. Granted, after Sunwell came out you could get gear that put you into T5 content, but most guilds still made you run the smaller stuff first to prove yourself to the guild. Now, it's faceroll 1-80, faceroll heroics, then die in a fire during raids and blame it on the guy with the lowest gearscore.

I'm really hoping Cata brings back the proper raid progression, and not this "skip everything but the latest content" crap.

[Omedon]

You guys have given me the courage to post to the "Cataclysm" WoW forums. May mercy be had upon my soul...

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...26395524&sid=1

[Baz]

I was expecting a troll or some shit but that was nice. Thanks.

[Thundertom]

Well done sir. A nice explanation and I agree with you!

[Baybeecakes]

Great post I totally agree. Im taking a break from WoW atm but if anything were to entice me to play again in Cata it would be for the reasons you mentioned. I was so sick of the "WTF VOTE KICK" culture, people that hoarded what little knowledge they had over other people and thought that insulting people somehow made themselves more epic. Ulduar was my favourite raid instance in Wotlk and part of the reason was the difficulty of the encounters and the need for cc even on trash.

loved the matrix quote too

EDIT: spelling

[Grimbold21]

NOTHING makes me rage in heroics more than people that don't respect the runeshaper room! Skipping pulls with no vent to communicate how you're doing it is SUICIDE in that room!

And feel free to steal!

---------- Post added 2010-10-02 at 12:25 PM ----------



From what I've heard (again, not in beta) even nerfing the everloving crap out of NPC damage and such won't change some of the difficulty aspects of these heroics. Some mechanics just hit for "WRONG!", and I'm confident/hopeful that these will remain.

How does it not change the difficulty? If a mob/boss hits for less dmg, the less demanding is the fight. Less dmg , the less the tank has to worry about his CDs, the less the healer has to worry about managing his mana...

[Omedon]

How does it not change the difficulty? If a mob/boss hits for less dmg, the less demanding is the fight. Less dmg , the less the tank has to worry about his CDs, the less the healer has to worry about managing his mana...

This is assuming it's even possible to get to that level of trivializing gear saturation within the confines of this expansion. I think it's a goal that that doesn't happen, if I recall.

I should clarify that you are talking about "a difference", which I acknowledge and is the point of gear. What I am arguing is that that difference will ever resemble what we see now, on live, in WOTLK.

[Deleted]

Absolutely. Fantastic thread!

[Deleted]

OP, do you want this reposted to the EU Cataclysm forums as well?

[BishopXQ]

"What are you trying to tell me, that I can dodge noobs?"

No, Neo. I'm trying to tell you that when Blizzard is ready, you won't have to.

Good I needed a laugh this morning..thank you

To everyone that plays this game for the challenge and enjoys learning about their class,Cataclysm is a god-send.
To the people that need to be carried,won't learn,think everything can be AOE'ed and don't know what CC is...don't let the door hit you on the way out!

[LeGnome]

I thought this community was no longer capable of such a great thread, bravo OP and other posters, when Cataclysm arrives feel free to take your places in the Presidential bunker

[Acidburnz]

first off let me say that this post restores my faith in the unsure future cata will bring us and i thank you for this well written post. In can remember a time when heroics did require a group effort and as a mage i was told to cc certain mobs now the communication of the heroic group has disappeared except for the occasional "u suck" back in tbc i owe alot to those ppl who took the time out to explain things in a calm rational way

[Omedon]

OP, do you want this reposted to the EU Cataclysm forums as well?

That would be awesome, thanks! Be sure to post the link!

[skrump]

Honestly I think the Op started typing before he started thinking because all you would accomplish by making heroics as hard as raids is alienating a larger portion of the playerbase earlier.

Besides even in wrath the 5mans were not insanely easy until blizzard started using them to give away emblems in order to make sure the instances were not neglected by seasoned Veterans.

Of course the Veterans are randomly grouped with the novices thus making the instance trivial content for all involved.

The solution to the problem is simple
#1 lfg finder will only group you with people who have a similar average Ilvl
#2 The health/damage of mobs scales with the groups average Ilvl

[Deleted]

That would be awesome, thanks! Be sure to post the link!

http://forums.wow-europe.com/board.h...11838959&sid=1

Done. I'll probably get forumbanned for reposting, but if so, it's worth it.

[Omedon]

... all you would accomplish by making heroics as hard as raids is alienating a larger portion of the playerbase earlier.

I addressed this in my opening post, but in the interest of discussion (and yes, I'm setting you up :P ), please describe the demographic that will be "alienated".

[Deleted]

I addressed this in my opening post, but in the interest of discussion (and yes, I'm setting you up :P ), please describe the demographic that will be "alienated".

Clearly, the ones unwilling to learn to do hard content. :>