Skipping raid content again?

[wayne62682]

Not sure if this is the right place to ask, so forgive me if it's not. Has there been any indication if future Cataclysm patches will follow the WOTLK model, where the older raids are made obsolete and serve no purpose as you can get equal or better gear from running heroics (or normal dungeons e.g. current ICC 5-mans)? In other words, when we're at Patch 4.1.0 will people be able to skip past Bastion of Twilight (barring a thing like the weekly raid now or for achieves) and get T11-equivalent gear in heroic dungeons?

IMO if they continue this model it really screws anyone not coming into the game at the start of the expansion as they'll be told, just like now, to farm Heroics for badges instead of getting upgrades in raids.

[skyesfury]

Skipping raid content actually started in vanilla. An AQ40 raid guild could carry someone in AQ40 and that person be a brand new 60. Skipping raid content is just part of over gearing content. It's not a new thing.

[Ihnasir]

Well, the fact that I'll have at least 10 lvl 85s a bit into te expansion, I would welcome the fact to get them up to par because I feel wrong bringing a pure dps class to a raid when I'm so much more useful otherwise

[Cernunnos]

Tier 11 is released, certain non tier slots and 3 pieces of tier are bought with Valor Points.

Tier 12 is released, certain non tier slots and 3 pieces of tier are bought with Valor Points. The tier 11 pieces that used to cost Valor points, now cost Justice Points, and can be farmed by running the tier 11 heroics, as well as the new 5 man instance that comes with the tier 12 patch that drops epics eqivalent to tier 11.

Tier 13 is released, certain non tier slots and 3 pieces of tier are bought with Valor Points. The tier 12 pieces that used to cost Valor points, now cost Justice Points, and can be farmed by running the tier 12/11 heroics, as well as the new 5 man instance that comes with the tier 13 patch that drops epics eqivalent to tier 12.

Tier 14 is released, certain non tier slots and 3 pieces of tier are bought with Valor Points. The tier 13 pieces that used to cost Valor points, now cost Justice Points, and can be farmed by running the tier 1312/11 heroics, as well as the new 5 man instance that comes with the tier 14 patch that drops epics eqivalent to tier 13.

Blizzard have stated this. Not in so many words but it's the pattern they will follow.

3.2 was released, toc 5 man had gear equivalent to Ulduar to help you get into toc.
3.3 was released, icc 5 man had gear equivalent to trial of the crusader to help you get into icc.

We will be skipping tier on alts, and newbies will skip stuff.

4.1 will release a 5 man that has gear equivalent to tier 11 to help you do tier 12.
4.2 will release a 5 man that has gear equivalent to tier 12 to help you do tier 13.
4.3 will release a 5 man that has gear equivalent to tier 13 to help you do tier 14.

And repeat for as many huge content patches as cata has. Also any further expansions will follow this pattern.



The days of running kara (tier 4) to get gear to do SSC/TK (tier 5) to do Hyjal/BT (tier 6) and that was the only way to do it (until they patched in some badge vendors with tier 5/6 equivalent and Zul'Aman) are gone.

WOW will never return to a TBC style progression.



Oh and I forgot to mention Tol Barad (VOA 2.0) You can bet your ass once tier 13/14 is out no one will kill the tier 11/12 boss in Tol Barad.

[Deleted]

I think it's okay and hope it'll be the same in cata. Now most of you will think, that i'm someone who hasn't raided everything in Wotlk and doesn't earn the items, but i raided every raid since wotlk came out. And i got my gear there. But it's a good option for players who took a break or want to play another class. So they'll be rdy to raid soon after becoming 80/85 in Cata. That is good for the guild and for every single player.

So plz Blizzard, let the System like it is i like it and every casual player or working person who hasn't as much time as me or others likes it too i bet ^^

[CrunkJuice5]

and every casual player or working person who hasn't as much time as me or others likes it too i bet ^^

cry me a river

[wayne62682]

Hmm.. I do see your point. My issue is that I came to WoW just as ICC was released (3.3.1 I think?) so I never got to experience any of the older content as content, just as weekly facerolling filler that gets done in 10 minutes. When I hit 80 there was no "entry-level raid" it was farm heroics until my eyes bled and hope I could get into a TOC/ICC group with zero raiding experience - I got lucky and was in a casual guild that did raid once in a while so I got at least some bit of experience.

That's my concern with their approach. A new player has no way to get experience since the entry-level stuff won't be run as soon as a new raid comes out. For those of us with many alts I could see how it benefits us to not have to go through older content again.

[Sinsyxx]

All Raids should offer ulterior motives for completing them rather then just gear since Blizz has said they will not be changing the pattern. Many old raids have vanity pets or mounts from different bosses or have rep factions inside the raid which can only be earned by doing the raid. This would create a more driven desire for a larger % of the population to still be doing old content once the next tier comes out. Whats sad is that 50% of the ICC raiders we see now havent done ulduar or naxx for more then a couple of weekly bosses and those are still 80 content which new 80s should want to run.

[Huntdanoobs]

People are missing the idea here.

I am pretty sure he means would a new guild be able to jump into lets say ( using wotlk patches) ToC or would they have to progress from t7 to t8 to t9 and so on

[Chickensoup23]

People are missing the idea here.

I am pretty sure he means would a new guild be able to jump into lets say ( using wotlk patches) ToC or would they have to progress from t7 to t8 to t9 and so on

Thats WotLK's problem. Heck, ToC25 is a walk in the park even with heroics gear (assuming you are decently skilled). When it was prog, my guild 1-shotted all of ToC, except for Anub (2-shot) - and that was in Ulduar 226 gear. Heroics are now 232. My point?

I personally have my 25 uld drake and my Alg kill, and so does most of my guild. In a pug, NOBODY ever heard of what's "after" XT-002, since that's as far as weekly quests go.

/sigh. I miss BC, even if I couldn't clear anything past BT because it was too hard for my guild. Look now.


**EDIT: Epics don't feel as "epic" as they used to. I got my tier, and I feel like everybody has it. Remember T4? Was eaz, but it did still feet special.

[sicness]

Yes they've confirmed that once tier 12 is released you will be able to purchase tier 11 with justice points (points you gain by doing heroics).

---------- Post added 2010-11-13 at 01:33 PM ----------

**EDIT: Epics don't feel as "epic" as they used to. I got my tier, and I feel like everybody has it. Remember T4? Was eaz, but it did still feet special.

Get over it, gear is no longer a status symbol, if you want a status symbol it's titles and mounts.

[wayne62682]

That wasn't even what I was asking, it was basically if someone who started playing at, say, Patch 4.1.0 would be told to "just grind heroics" and not bother with Bastion of Twilight, Blackwing Descent, etc like you're now told in regards to Naxx and Ulduar.

Sadly it looks like the answer is yes.

[Deleted]

cry me a river

Get a job and a social life.

[akille]

I think that the primary pieces should be the same as it is now. Vendor gear to suppliment the gear you get in the raids.
However, I think that each raid instance should have a set of trinkets/librams(etc) that are useful all the way through to the final raid. Situational things, like a dodge trinket for a tank in one raid, a stam trinket in another, an armor trink in the 3rd and so on.
This way, someone who is dedicated to excelling will want to run the lower tier raids for that one or 2 drops.
I know that the majority of pieces will become obsolete as new content is released, that's just how it is now and that is fine with me. But, trinket and libram slots tend to offer more flavor to your character as well as situational uses. these are the ones that people keep in the bank "just in case" they need it down the road. I know on my pally tank, I have about 7-8 trinkets and all the different librams in my bank, just in case one of them is useful in a fight.

I think this might make older content more viable for a new raider to run then just skip it and farm heroics for the welfare epics.

[FattGuy]

Hmm.. I do see your point. My issue is that I came to WoW just as ICC was released (3.3.1 I think?) so I never got to experience any of the older content as content, just as weekly facerolling filler that gets done in 10 minutes. When I hit 80 there was no "entry-level raid" it was farm heroics until my eyes bled and hope I could get into a TOC/ICC group with zero raiding experience - I got lucky and was in a casual guild that did raid once in a while so I got at least some bit of experience.

That's my concern with their approach. A new player has no way to get experience since the entry-level stuff won't be run as soon as a new raid comes out. For those of us with many alts I could see how it benefits us to not have to go through older content again.

Things have changed bro. Cataclysm will teach players mechanics. Regardless of the fact that there will be tier skips each patch release, and players will be introduced raid gear equal to the level last patch, the heroics in the game have become so much harder. They will teach you how to play your class.

Don't listen to these dip shit ass holes that say, oh casuals will just get easy stuff again. In order to get into heroics and raids, you are going to have to do lv. 333 blue gear from Normals, Reputation, et cetera, than get your rares (depends if your in patch 4.03 (Tier11)) or Epics from heroics (If your in patch 4.1), then you can experience current raid content.

In my opinion, this is good. Teaching players how to play can psychologically help them in real life (since the common stereotype for baddies is that they fail in real life as well. I would know, I was one of them). Players that come to the game late will get their start of rares and epics and experience raid content. The new guild system will also help motivate players to help each other, for everyone will gain benefits for doing so.

So on and so on. I am glad this game is getting better, they learned their mistakes and they are making sure everyone is enjoying the game, even though they said that the majority of hardcore players will enjoy the game more than casuals.

[sicness]

That wasn't even what I was asking, it was basically if someone who started playing at, say, Patch 4.1.0 would be told to "just grind heroics" and not bother with Bastion of Twilight, Blackwing Descent, etc like you're now told in regards to Naxx and Ulduar.

Sadly it looks like the answer is yes.

How didn't my response answer that? Tier 11 gear and it's counter parts that are first sold with valor points will all be made available via justice points once tier 12 is out. This isn't a bad thing either.

[wayne62682]

I think that the primary pieces should be the same as it is now. Vendor gear to suppliment the gear you get in the raids.
However, I think that each raid instance should have a set of trinkets/librams(etc) that are useful all the way through to the final raid. Situational things, like a dodge trinket for a tank in one raid, a stam trinket in another, an armor trink in the 3rd and so on.
This way, someone who is dedicated to excelling will want to run the lower tier raids for that one or 2 drops.
I know that the majority of pieces will become obsolete as new content is released, that's just how it is now and that is fine with me. But, trinket and libram slots tend to offer more flavor to your character as well as situational uses. these are the ones that people keep in the bank "just in case" they need it down the road. I know on my pally tank, I have about 7-8 trinkets and all the different librams in my bank, just in case one of them is useful in a fight.

I think this might make older content more viable for a new raider to run then just skip it and farm heroics for the welfare epics.

I didn't play BC but I heard this was what it was like - like.. unless you were a cutting edge progression guild working on Illidan or Kil'jaeden there was still a reason (besides attunements) to go back to Kara or Gruul or TK because the gear in the next group of raids didn't totally outclass the gear you got, so you could still get some sidegrades or minor upgrades. Compare that to now where each tier of raiding's gear is worlds better than the previous one so the previous one, unless you want a title/achieve or saw it when it was current, are just left to rot.

I could be wrong about that; like I said I did not play BC (unfortunately) but that's what I've heard from people who did.

[Deleted]

I have found that the best people to play the game with are not those that are completely fucking desperate to be the best, and get all the epic purplez first, but those that just enjoy doing content. Sure, people will skip content to be the best and validate their online persona. There will also be folk who like to experience all content, regardless of wether it's level appropriate. Same as ever. The only reasons a player can miss out on content are their own motives for playing. It's not hard to find like-minded people.

[Cernunnos]

That wasn't even what I was asking, it was basically if someone who started playing at, say, Patch 4.1.0 would be told to "just grind heroics" and not bother with Bastion of Twilight, Blackwing Descent, etc like you're now told in regards to Naxx and Ulduar.

Sadly it looks like the answer is yes.

If you are pugging, the answer is probably yes.

If you can field a full guild run, consistently, you can go at your own pace and experience all the raids, gearing up in heroics to do tier 11, gearing up in BOT/BWD (tier 11) to do tier 12, gearing up in tier 12 (firelands/COT:WOA) to do tier 13.

This is made easier by the fact that you no longer have to feel compelled to do both 25 and 10 man, because 25 man has better gear. If you are a smaller guild and can field a full 10 man guild you can get the same gear as the guild runners.

Skipping raid content is only a problem with pugs and people who only view the current highest tier of raiding as being the only thing worth doing. "

Gotta run new raid, new raid, new raid, why run old raid with 25 people who steal my phat lewts once a week when i can run 5 mans and get my phat lewts once a day, new raid, new raid gotta run new raid, what? dont stand in fire? phssh i'm 1337 look at my 200k HP as cloth DPS, new raid"



Certain pieces from Kara (tier 4) served you well into tier 6 (BT/Hyjal) and people were willing to run old content to get those pieces.

[Deleted]

Nax, ulduar and totc are still being run today and have been through the whole expansion.
There is nothing stopping you experiencing the older tiers if you start playing mid-expansion.

Skipping raid content is in place so that it's realistically possible to get gear to get in to the current raids.