Blizzard is making heroics harder than MoP : Good or Bad?

[Self Inflicted Wounds]

Dunno which "back then" you had in mind but lets assume you mean TBC.
1) only few dps specs had reliable CC
2) you could do heroic 5mans with no CC (the more CC the groupe "needed" the worse players they were) - yup, Balance Druid here who were not allowed in pugs cause of no CC yet did all of the heroic 5man pre nerf with no mage in group!

Thats fine, still leaves plenty of CC.

And thats fine, dungeons were still harder back then. You haven't dis-proven anything.

STILL doesn't mean the game doesn't teach you, or clearly explain spells.

Tank here, rarely wiped on the Cata Heroics pre-nerf. Guess they weren't that bad.

[Lilija]

Thats fine, still leaves plenty of CC.

And thats fine, dungeons were still harder back then. You haven't dis-proven anything.

STILL doesn't mean the game doesn't teach you, or clearly explain spells.

Thank here, rarely wiped on the Cata Heroics pre-nerf. Guess they weren't that bad.

For an experienced player NOTHING in WoW will ever be hard. And Vanilla was pretty easy on its own. The fact is, Vanilla and TBC were doable without much experience. With Cata it was whole different story as it is a fact that many people who started playing at that point stopped (hence the drastic drop in subs). So for a new player Cata heroics was a much worse experience than TBC heroics for a new player. In TBC there was far less to learn about your class and nothing horrible happened if you didn't learn those things. In Cata those horrible things started happening for those who didn't know how to play their class.

Vanilla and TBC were easy enough to not require people being tought how to play their classes. But with time and game has become more complex and the most challenging things even more challenging so for any new player there is a huge gap and that's why the game needs to start teaching new players so they aren't discouraged the moment they reach max level. People of all skill and experience level should have content suitable for them and the means to move towards harder content.

[Self Inflicted Wounds]

For an experienced player NOTHING in WoW will ever be hard. And Vanilla was pretty easy on its own. The fact is, Vanilla and TBC were doable without much experience. With Cata it was whole different story as it is a fact that many people who started playing at that point stopped (hence the drastic drop in subs). So for a new player Cata heroics was a much worse experience than TBC heroics for a new player. In TBC there was far less to learn about your class and nothing horrible happened if you didn't learn those things. In Cata those horrible things started happening for those who didn't know how to play their class.

Vanilla and TBC were easy enough to not require people being tought how to play their classes. But with time and game has become more complex and the most challenging things even more challenging so for any new player there is a huge gap and that's why the game needs to start teaching new players so they aren't discouraged the moment they reach max level. People of all skill and experience level should have content suitable for them and the means to move towards harder content.

Its not factually the cause of sub drops. Unless Blizzard posts stats on all the people who canceled, which have a majority stating because "heroics are too hard" ... then no, not a fact.

You're also being dishonest, there is WAY MORE INFORMATION inside and outside of the game than in TBC. WAY MORE. Dungeon journal, too tips are better, they have a "basics of your class" screen, they have training.

The real problem was new players hitting max level and jumping into HEROIC content. If anything, Heroics should have been gated better. In Cata, I believe all the dungeons at launch had a Normal and Heroic setting as well. Its easy, Normals are suitable for bads or new players. Especially with the changes Blizzard is making.

You're also being dishonest in the human ability to learn things. It unlikely that Cata heroics were so insanely hard, its more likely that lazy people were used to storming through heroics with ease, getting easy loot, badges and gear, and were upset.

[Lilija]

Its not factually the cause of sub drops. Unless Blizzard posts stats on all the people who canceled, which have a majority stating because "heroics are too hard" ... then no, not a fact.

The biggest drop is subs started with early Cata: check
The big "come back to hard heroics" + LFD happened in early Cata: check
Logic.

You're also being dishonest, there is WAY MORE INFORMATION inside and outside of the game than in TBC. WAY MORE. Dungeon journal, too tips are better, they have a "basics of your class" screen, they have training.

I think you completly missed the concept of "game teaching people how to play it". If people HAVE to look for info outside of game to play it then then something is not right. And that info that is in game isn't displayed well enough for a new player who is hit by tons of new information when they join the game.

Also, given nowadays there is information and people fail at the game while back then there was hardly any information and people still killed stuff, it shows a lot about the comparission of difficulty.

The real problem was new players hitting max level and jumping into HEROIC content. If anything, Heroics should have been gated better. In Cata, I believe all the dungeons at launch had a Normal and Heroic setting as well. Its easy, Normals are suitable for bads or new players. Especially with the changes Blizzard is making.

The problem is not gating but Normal having too little incentive. Plus they did not teach anything about what will hit you as a new player in heroics :P

You're also being dishonest in the human ability to learn things. It unlikely that Cata heroics were so insanely hard, its more likely that lazy people were used to storming through heroics with ease, getting easy loot, badges and gear, and were upset.

What you described might have been the case with some % of people who already were playing the game. It doesn't apply to new players for quite obvious reasons :>

[Deleted]

Willing to be they'll still be easy.

[nekobaka]

The biggest drop is subs started with early Cata: check
The big "come back to hard heroics" + LFD happened in early Cata: check
Logic.

Along with no alternatives.
https://twitter.com/OccupyGStreet/st...76849881726977

Q: didn't they[heroics] work in BC?
A: Right. That was the problem with Cata -- matchmaking and no alternatives.
A: But hard+organized = loot efficient with easier+matchmaking = less loot efficient could work.

https://twitter.com/OccupyGStreet/st...15585040408576

I say this frequently, but players vastly overestimate the degree to which design changes cause sub loss. Vastly.
Pretty sure I've never said that specific changes cause a lot of players to quit. Too much change overall can and does.

WoW has always bleed subs, what changed was the number that countered it.
https://twitter.com/OccupyGStreet/st...16208553062400

Number of players coming and going has always been fairly high. Fewer new players are trying the game these days.

It was even talked about by one of the developers after the first quarter of Cata launch saying that new subs already started declining in WotLK and crossed paths with losses. A point which many Cata doomsayers ignored despite it also being the reason why Blizzard spent development resources on an old world revamp and focus on quick catch ups for new and returning players. The over focus on that goal caused problems for existing players that only cared about endgame.

The problem is not gating but Normal having too little incentive. Plus they did not teach anything about what will hit you as a new player in heroics :P

Which was on purpose as the developers saw no need for normal modes at max level at the time.

[Osmeric]

I wonder if this is why Ghostcrawler bailed out. Get off the train before it wrecks.

[Aleksej89]

It always felt lame that the only challenging thing for PvE players, outside of Raids, was PvP...

With the addition of challenge mode 5man that is a bit better, but having even tougher 5man dungeons will greatly help!

[Karnige]

Wrath heroics were the hardest imo

[Aleksej89]

It always felt lame that the only challenging thing for PvE players, outside of Raids, was PvP...
With the addition of challenge mode 5man that is a bit better, but having even tougher 5man dungeons will greatly help!

Just to add that Cata/WotLK heroics were hard because people refused to learn to use all the spells their classes had - while in TBC most of the classes actually did not have proper CC/threat drop/Defense tools.

You just can't take a class and learn 10% of that class's spell repertoire and then expect to win against difficult opponents (pvp and pve).

[Deleted]

Wrath heroics were the hardest imo

This is a joke, right?

[Razorice]

I like my face-roll dungeons. Just go in, 5 minutes later, go out. Fast Valor farm

[Ferrair]

I'm a 90 mage.

I farmed Heroics with a 550+ tank and a 550+ warrior.

My dps at the end of each dungeon was about 25k. Things were dying so fast, I could only get 1 cast off, so I just ended up watching a tv show on my 2nd monitor while i followed them in wow.

If they were to make it harder, that'd be nice.

--

While i was levelling my warrior, we were in Magister's Terrace and Setthek Halls?, a BC dungeon I believe, i remember that last boss in Setthek Halls or whatever had this huge Arcane damage explosion that required us to hide behind the walls to LOS it.

I was the tank, i was getting ready to run but everyone just stood there dps'ing. So i figured... Heirlooms > Boss mechanic.

Then I went into Magister's Terrace, one of the bosses was a group of 4 or 5, we needed CC but nope, everyone just ran in, that one we wiped.

So i guess what i'm trying to say is.. BC dungeons are harder?

And what's with all these dps'ers thinking they're tanks, so annoying.

[Xargoth6634]

I don't really understand the purpose of making them harder. As they stand now, heroics serve their purpose: a relatively short time commitment for daily valor, or justice if you need it. We already have challenge modes for people who want to push the bleeding edge of competitive content, and in the next xpac those will be back as well as Mythics. Do we really need levels of relatively challenging 5 man difficulty? I see the majority of people who do 5 mans as people who see them as the means to an end, not as progression content like the minority do with challenge modes now, and I'm not sure how 3 levels of medium hard-super hard difficulty and one set of normal mode dungeons really gives their audience what they need.

If the new heroics are particularly challenging then I probably just won't spend much time in them, myself. I don't have the time that I used to to game, and after the first couple of times seeing a new dungeon I just don't have the interest in doing it anymore unless it's a speed run. Other people can have the challenge, I'll farm old raids for mounts or go knock out a few games off my Steam backlog.

[Deleted]

Heroics should be hard, normal and lfr are there for people to see the content and heroics and mythical are for people who want a challenge not for all the pricks that think they are entitled to everything.

[Darmalus]

I'm a 90 mage.

I farmed Heroics with a 550+ tank and a 550+ warrior.

My dps at the end of each dungeon was about 25k. Things were dying so fast, I could only get 1 cast off, so I just ended up watching a tv show on my 2nd monitor while i followed them in wow.

If they were to make it harder, that'd be nice.

You realize that those dungeons were design for people in 435 gear, right?

That would be like a level 70 complaining that Wailing Caverns is easy.

They should just remove the whole Normal/Heroic part of a dungeon name and replace it with the ilvl it's designed for.

That way people stop going "Derp, it's a HEROIC it should be hard (when it was design for players in 435 gear and I'm in 550 gear)." Instead they should be going "It's a 435 dungeon, of course this will be easy!"

[Synstir]

I must say that I can't see the whole picture, as they are adding normal dungeons for max-level.

BUT: after the cata-disaster I think they should really be careful.
Going back to something they had to change drastically in that same xpac, could be stupid (and that is what I voted).

[kamuimac]

I wonder if this is why Ghostcrawler bailed out. Get off the train before it wrecks.

he saw how they are dumbing down game to the ground and run away he could already forsee all this bashing about the new gearing up system playerbase would blame him for :P:P

[Giscoicus]

I must say that I can't see the whole picture, as they are adding normal dungeons for max-level.

BUT: after the cata-disaster I think they should really be careful.
Going back to something they had to change drastically in that same xpac, could be stupid (and that is what I voted).

And clearly their current trajectory isnt working.

[Raiju]

he saw how they are dumbing down game to the ground and run away he could already forsee all this bashing about the new gearing up system playerbase would blame him for :P:P

Yes, the guy who oversaw LFD, LFR, repeatedly simplified talents, cutting of class spells, etc. is running away from dumbing down. That makes sense