LFR -> Flex -> Normal -> Heroic: Why?

[Squirl]

In a couple of expansions we'll have :

LFR
FLEX
Easy
Normal
Above Average
Harder
Heroic
EXTREME!!!

it's just silly.

Let's put them all on separate lockouts too.

Don't forget the "optional" special NIGHTMARE MODE-only boss. If you wipe, you can never pull the boss again.

[Gondlem]

Why not? If tot was as easy as mogushan palace it'd be pugged coninuously. Difficulty must have something to do with it.

You clearing tot on alts isn't the same as tot being genuinely puggable though, you already know the fights.

I'm not talking about running pugs or anything, I'm just talking about joining other people's pugs that are already being run and just mindlessly DPSing and watching them clear the zone. And no, if your server only has 2000 max level people on it and only 200 of them are 510+ ilvl, probably not that many people are going to pug ToT regardless of its mechanical difficulty.

How is this saying anything other than the raids are overtuned (for their audience)? It doesn't really matter why they are overtuned, only that the discussion starts honestly with the bare facts - recent raids have been and still are overtuned.


You needed 500 ilvl + to clear the first part of tot (getting pat horridon, mostly) on normal and only HC guilds from the previous tier would have that.

but again, all you are saying is that it was overtuned on launch. Why can't we start with that, then talk about the whys and wherefores?

Having a gear requirement is not the same thing as being overtuned. Every fight in the game has a gear requirement. If you go into Stone Guard in greens, you'll have a hard time, doesn't mean the boss is overtuned. ToT normal mode was tuned for around 500 ilvl. That is totally reasonable - normal mode t14 drops 496, gear upgrades allow increases to 504, ToT LFR drops 502 and VP gear is 522. If you were in full BiS normal mode gear from t14 and bought a VP item or two on release you could easily have started ToT at close to 510. Certainly 500 is not unreasonable. But if you haven't cleared t14 of course you won't be at 500, so Blizzard should have made it clearer what gear level the fight was tuned for. I think a huge number of guilds that did not raid t14 in a dedicated way at all expected to walk into ToT and be able to clear it just because it was new and they wanted to. That was not Blizzard's intent, they wanted a sense of tier-to-tier progression and (this is the key part) a challenging experience for dedicated normal mode guilds that had cleared t14 normal but not done t14 heroics. Basically the same experience heroic raiders get - the new tier is tuned to require gear from the previous tier, not tuned to require whatever you want and to be really easy for appropriately geared players who did the last tier.

If you go into ToT normal today, it is easy. The reason for that is not really nerfs, it's just gear.

[Deleted]

Having a gear requirement is not the same thing as being overtuned. Every fight in the game has a gear requirement. If you go into Stone Guard in greens, you'll have a hard time, doesn't mean the boss is overtuned. ToT normal mode was tuned for around 500 ilvl. That is totally reasonable - normal mode t14 drops 496, gear upgrades allow increases to 504, ToT LFR drops 502 and VP gear is 522. If you were in full BiS normal mode gear from t14 and bought a VP item or two on release you could easily have started ToT at close to 510. Certainly 500 is not unreasonable. But if you haven't cleared t14 of course you won't be at 500, so Blizzard should have made it clearer what gear level the fight was tuned for. I think a huge number of guilds that did not raid t14 in a dedicated way at all expected to walk into ToT and be able to clear it just because it was new and they wanted to. That was not Blizzard's intent, they wanted a sense of tier-to-tier progression and (this is the key part) a challenging experience for dedicated normal mode guilds that had cleared t14 normal but not done t14 heroics. Basically the same experience heroic raiders get - the new tier is tuned to require gear from the previous tier, not tuned to require whatever you want and to be really easy for appropriately geared players who did the last tier.

If you go into ToT normal today, it is easy. The reason for that is not really nerfs, it's just gear.

Right. So tot wasn't overtuned if you had gear which most guilds couldn't in fact get because the previous tier was overtuned.

So, it was overtuned.

Hence, flexi. This is why we have so many difficulty levels.

[Nobleshield]

Right. So tot wasn't overtuned if you had gear which most guilds couldn't in fact get because the previous tier was overtuned.

So, it was overtuned.

Hence, flexi. This is why we have so many difficulty levels.

Injin, I normally agree with near everything you say but sometimes it has to be asked if the issue is that things are "overtuned" or if you, me and others just play with subpar folks? Honest question, which raids in recent history do you think were tuned right? Dragon Soul? Firelands? T11? I only ask because the more I think about it, most of us who think the current stuff is overtuned probably enjoyed Wrath, and in Wrath ICC had the stacking buff come out fairly fast that I recall, so could it just be that we felt it was tuned right because it was buffed? Same with Firelands, for instance. How many people did Firelands after it was nerfed and thought it was fine, but struggled with it pre-nerf (and whose fault is that?). Dragon Soul was easy at launch even without the nerfs.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that it can't always be "the raid is overtuned", because when were the raids NOT overtuned? Naxx? OS? EoE? Ulduar? ToC? I recall people having issues in ToC even during ICC (Beasts and Faction Champs in particular), so was ToC overtuned or was I just raiding with scrubs? I don't recall ToC ever receiving an actual nerf, just the usual gear inflation. A lot of guilds broke up in T11 when they could do ICC... but those guilds were running ICC with a 30% buff, some guilds didn't START running ICC until it was deep into the buff. Was T11 really that hard, or were these guilds just deluding themselves into thinking they're good because they were used to +30% everything, and then all of a sudden they didn't have that anymore (also look at Ruby Sanctum. how many guilds could get deep into ICC but couldn't even get close to killing Halion, because RS didn't have a 30% buff)? Same with DS and T14; were they really good and T14 was overtuned, or were they just thinking they were good because they were doing 30% nerfed content in an already pretty simplistic raid (as far as raids go), and then went into 0% nerfed content?

I guess the main question here is where do you draw the line? If you run nerfed and/or easier content, then is the unnerfed content "overtuned" or were you never ready for it in the first place, and were "tricked" into thinking you were by the nerfed content you were able to run/clear before?

[clevin]

Having a gear requirement is not the same thing as being overtuned. Every fight in the game has a gear requirement. If you go into Stone Guard in greens, you'll have a hard time, doesn't mean the boss is overtuned. ToT normal mode was tuned for around 500 ilvl. That is totally reasonable - normal mode t14 drops 496, gear upgrades allow increases to 504, ToT LFR drops 502 and VP gear is 522. If you were in full BiS normal mode gear from t14 and bought a VP item or two on release you could easily have started ToT at close to 510. Certainly 500 is not unreasonable. But if you haven't cleared t14 of course you won't be at 500, so Blizzard should have made it clearer what gear level the fight was tuned for. ....

A huge part of the issue was that Horridon was both tuned for 500+ AND mechanically hard for a second boss. My raid was in the 480s when ToT dropped since we'd started late and hadn't quite cleared T14 when that happened. Jin... we went in the first week, took a few pulls and he died. Horridon? Nope. Was ToT overtuned? Well... yes and no.

The issue was that they tuned the initial bosses at a level that *presumed* you'd been farming T14 for a bit and if you hadn't it was a bit tough. Ideally, the first 2-3 bosses in a tier should assume a gear level that means you've done a good chunk of the previous tier but it shouldn't assume you've been farming it for months. In ToT's case that would mean the first bosses should have assumed 490 or so with the 4th and later bosses being a significant jump up.

[Gondlem]

I don't disagree that Horridon was too hard for a second boss. But I don't think there's anything wrong with requiring normal mode gear from the last tier to do normal mode. That's totally reasonable - you have content you can do to get the gear you need that should be well within your capabilities as a guild. It's no different from requiring LFR gear from the last tier to do the new LFR.

[MoanaLisa]

Because Raiding is the Bread and butter of PVE in wow, always has been and by the looks of it nothing is going to change.

If anything is the bread and butter of PVE, it's Questing (leveling, questing, otherwise), Dungeons next, and Raiding coming in a ways behind that.

That said, raiding is a signature piece of World of Warcraft as far as Blizzard is concerned. It's a tradition in the game and traditions are important. But given the participation levels in raiding prior to LFR's availability it's difficult to argue that it was little more than a niche. Which is why it was important to Blizzard to more prominently feature their signature game element leading to LFR which increased participation in designed raids by many multiples.

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People like you just need to learn self-control. No one is forcing you or anyone else to play at all. Nothing is mandatory. Nothing. If you *choose* to run everything you can so you can get more gear faster, that's your *choice*. Choice is a voluntary action and the flip side of it is that if you're the least bit adult you'll realize that you're responsible for your choices, not anyone else. So, if you just want to raid Flex and not LFR, do that. Want to raid LFR for a little while so you can see all of SoO and get a leg up on gear? Great, do that and then stop. Want to maximize your chances at gear so you run LFR and Flex every week? Awesome... do that. But please quit complaining about how an action that you do voluntarily is somehow mandatory.

Most conversations revolving around many aspects of the game could advance miles in a very short time if this simple paragraph were accepted as common sense.

[Karnige]

If anything is the bread and butter of PVE, it's Questing (leveling, questing, otherwise), Dungeons next, and Raiding coming in a ways behind that.

hell no raiding is the bread and butter of wow. why do you think there are so many options now. people want to raid and a lot of people just don't have the time and patience to. so there are options now. if there wasn't raiding in wow I wouldn't have played all these years. seriously rethink what you said

[Nobleshield]

hell no raiding is the bread and butter of wow. why do you think there are so many options now. people want to raid and a lot of people just don't have the time and patience to. so there are options now. if there wasn't raiding in wow I wouldn't have played all these years. seriously rethink what you said

I think that's part of the issue.. WoW has the Everquest mentality where raiding is what everyone should strive for, whether they want it or not. The trend with more modern MMOs is to focus on SMALL group content, not big raids. WoW has never been abou that, and I think that's where the disconnect is that it's a game where the ideal perfect world goal is EVERYONE raiding, when a fraction of the people WANT to raid.

[clevin]

I don't disagree that Horridon was too hard for a second boss. But I don't think there's anything wrong with requiring normal mode gear from the last tier to do normal mode. That's totally reasonable - you have content you can do to get the gear you need that should be well within your capabilities as a guild. It's no different from requiring LFR gear from the last tier to do the new LFR.

The question is, should you be expected to be in all the best gear from the previous tier to have any success in the next one? REmember, 496 wasn't the T14 average... much of T14 was 489. So getting to an average of 496 required farming T14 gear in most slots, upgrading some of the 489 stuff and getting some SPA stuff (or some mix like that). That feels a bit high to me to just *start* T15.

[arcaneshot]

My current plan is to run Normal/Heroic like normal and use Flex for an alt/achievement run. There's no reason to send a main into LFR next patch; that gear is so much worse than what you get in Heroic ToT that there's no point.

[Glorious Leader]

If anything is the bread and butter of PVE, it's Questing (leveling, questing, otherwise), Dungeons next, and Raiding coming in a ways behind that.

That said, raiding is a signature piece of World of Warcraft as far as Blizzard is concerned. It's a tradition in the game and traditions are important. But given the participation levels in raiding prior to LFR's availability it's difficult to argue that it was little more than a niche. Which is why it was important to Blizzard to more prominently feature their signature game element leading to LFR which increased participation in designed raids by many multiples.

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Most conversations revolving around many aspects of the game could advance miles in a very short time if this simple paragraph were accepted as common sense.

First of all I don't think it was an important tradition for Blizzard to carry through. I mean I can name lots of things that they did in the past that carried through and were eventually eliminated. Should they have kept loot lag? Or how bout dungeons? dungeons were important to but they abandoned that at the drop of a hat in mists and shoved everybody into lfr instead. It increased the participation by bribing the player base into that content, it says nothing about it's actual popularity.

As for the second part well yea people could not do things but the minute people stop doing things is the minute they stop doing things. Who in their right minds designs software to not be used? They spend all that time on this and resources and money for you to say fuck it I"m going to play solitaire? That's backwards development. I mean do we honestly live in an age where the developers and their defenders are telling peopel STOP PLAYING THE GAME because well that's what they'll do. They'll not do what you tell them not to do, figure out how little they have to do (because you told them not do whatever it was) then leave the game.

[Cocobutters]

Cry More.
10 chars

Infracted; Post constructively.

[Fluorescent0]

The question is, should you be expected to be in all the best gear from the previous tier to have any success in the next one? REmember, 496 wasn't the T14 average... much of T14 was 489. So getting to an average of 496 required farming T14 gear in most slots, upgrading some of the 489 stuff and getting some SPA stuff (or some mix like that). That feels a bit high to me to just *start* T15.

That's for the average normal guild. If you were good enough you could probably go in with less and still succeed. And I'm pretty sure Blizzard itself agreed that Horridon was pretty steep for a second boss.

[Deleted]

More enchant mats!

[Deleted]

Right. So tot wasn't overtuned if you had gear which most guilds couldn't in fact get because the previous tier was overtuned.

So, it was overtuned.

Hence, flexi. This is why we have so many difficulty levels.

I am fairly convinced that you would also consider Pong to be overtuned.

[Normie]

There is no "average" in this game.

I've been in an average guild wiping on Protectors because the average people couldn't find their average dispel buttons or walk averagely out of a Lightning Storm, and in an average guild (well, bunch of them were 10/13 HC with an average weekly 4 hours of raiding) where we ROFLstomped through ToT like nobody's business. Guess which one I think is average? Right, the ones who could averagely act according to boss mechanics. This might upset a lot of people who think not standing in fire is hard. Our "averages" differ greatly.

I repeat, there is no average.

You don't know what "average" means.

Nor do you understand what "difference in skill" means or how easy it is to underestimate it.

Nor, most likely, do you understand a variety of things pertaining to how you play the game vs how other people play it, and when it is that you are the exception, not everybody else.

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hell no raiding is the bread and butter of wow. why do you think there are so many options now. people want to raid and a lot of people just don't have the time and patience to. so there are options now. if there wasn't raiding in wow I wouldn't have played all these years. seriously rethink what you said

There is the LFR and soon Flex option because raiding was a niche activity that consumed a disproportionate share of resources given that few players ever saw more than one or two bosses in a current raid. If it weren't for LFR, Blizzard would have dialed way back on raid development.

Personally I'd like something other than LFR to do, but there's always next expansion.

[MoanaLisa]

As for the second part well yea people could not do things but the minute people stop doing things is the minute they stop doing things. Who in their right minds designs software to not be used? They spend all that time on this and resources and money for you to say fuck it I"m going to play solitaire? That's backwards development. I mean do we honestly live in an age where the developers and their defenders are telling peopel STOP PLAYING THE GAME because well that's what they'll do. They'll not do what you tell them not to do, figure out how little they have to do (because you told them not do whatever it was) then leave the game.

When given options A-B-C-D I'm perfectly comfortable just choosing one or two of them. That's why they are called options. It applies to nearly everything in the game including dailies (early on) and raid difficulties now. All that's required is to exert some self-control and not allow one's self to be lulled into "I must have everything on the buffet right now" mentality.

[Grimble]

Dude, just stick to your single player console games, it's not world's fault that you don't have any friends.

Have you ever been part of a normal IRL social group where someone had a friend/husband/brother that couldn't make it because they had a WoW raid? First off, about 90% of the human population doesn't even know what that means, and when it's sheepishly explained to them, it goes over about as well as saying the missing person had to stay home because they were reorganizing their Star Wars toys. It's halfway between that and finding out that they have a harmful drug habit.

hell no raiding is the bread and butter of wow. why do you think there are so many options now

Because having a bunch of raid options spares them the expense of having to make a bunch of additional five-mans the way they did back in WOTLK. The problem is, casuals are leaving because they don't like raids very much, even easy LFR raids. Period. If Blizzard wants to keep them, they're going to have to give them something to do besides stab a dragon in the ankles for an hour. Pet Battles was a good start. A housing system would be an excellent additional step. Anything that runs outside of the usual "new patch, time to either get more gear or maybe quit" cycle.

[FLANOFETT]

6.0 changes

LFR loot: heroic blues versions but same model as epic loot drops. maybe no set bonuses on gear drops. As tiers progress ilvl will go up to prior tier epic levels but the gear will still be blue.
Flex: Regular epic loot, no more 10man at all.
25man: epic loot slightly higher ilvl from flex.
Heroic 25man: heroic epics etc.