So,what do you think about the new raid?

[Felixon]

In this post i'm not going to discuss the mechanics,but the feature - the raid is built in a similar manner the mercenary mode is - you take the side of the opposing faction,thus,many Horde guilds will have a reason to whine (or even reroll),that they lose their precious racial abilities on some bosses and the Alliance gets the overpowered racial abilities (especially, on the last boss,which matters the most,who is Jaina),thus giving a chance for them to get the world first.

So,here are two questions:
1)Is this new mechanic implemented to give the Alliance raiding guilds a chance to participate in the world first race,and by doing that,does the Blizzard admit,that the Horde racials are superior?
2)How do you feel about the idea of Blizzard forcing you to fight your allies - members of your faction?


Share your thoughts!

[Lochton]

In this post i'm not going to discuss the mechanics,but the feature - the raid is built in a similar manner the mercenary mode is - you take the side of the opposing faction,thus,many Horde guilds will have a reason to whine (or even reroll),that they lose their precious racial abilities on some bosses and the Alliance gets the overpowered racial abilities (especially, on the last boss,which matters the most,who is Jaina),thus giving a chance for them to get the world first.

So,here are two questions:
1)Is this new mechanic implemented to give the Alliance raiding guilds a chance to participate in the world first race,and by doing that,does the Blizzard admit,that the Horde racials are superior?
2)How do you feel about the idea of Blizzard forcing you to fight your allies - members of your faction?


Share your thoughts!

1.: This switching side thing is more likely because the number of iconic bosses there's going to be.
2.: It is a raid in the end.
3.: The High Tinker fight looks like a brilliant mess of insanity, can't wait to try it!

[MoanaLisa]

1)Is this new mechanic implemented to give the Alliance raiding guilds a chance to participate in the world first race,and by doing that,does the Blizzard admit,that the Horde racials are superior?

Helping an Alliance guild to world first is a trivial reason to design the entire raid in this way. I doubt if that ever entered their minds when designing the raid however long ago that was (during Legion and perhaps before that). It's a potentially interesting way to switch things up for players a little bit.

[Ophenia]

The first point has to be a troll.

[Exquis]

In this post i'm not going to discuss the mechanics,but the feature - the raid is built in a similar manner the mercenary mode is - you take the side of the opposing faction,thus,many Horde guilds will have a reason to whine (or even reroll),that they lose their precious racial abilities on some bosses and the Alliance gets the overpowered racial abilities (especially, on the last boss,which matters the most,who is Jaina),thus giving a chance for them to get the world first.

So,here are two questions:
1)Is this new mechanic implemented to give the Alliance raiding guilds a chance to participate in the world first race,and by doing that,does the Blizzard admit,that the Horde racials are superior?
2)How do you feel about the idea of Blizzard forcing you to fight your allies - members of your faction?


Share your thoughts!

If you're an alliance player and you think that racials with 0.3% variation is going to net an alliance guild the world first i have bad news for you lol

EDIT: Actually, for many specs the alliance races outperform the hordes. So yeah, even worse news.

[Volardelis]

If you're an alliance player and you think that racials with 0.3% variation is going to net an alliance guild the world first i have bad news for you lol

EDIT: Actually, for many specs the alliance races outperform the hordes. So yeah, even worse news.

Method doing a full clear of Uldir before more G'huun prog was ultimately what scored them world first over Limit, who went straight to G'huun by extending the lockout. Sometimes a small % means winning or losing. For world first, every bit of extra damage / healing / damage reduction has a big impact.

And horde has had a history of better racials. Hence why there was a snowball effect of top guilds switching to Horde, which then led to the tier below them to move over too.

[Soulwind]

The raid is probably fine, Blizzard is still fairly consistent in that aspect. But I really dislike the switching sides idea.

If this is the "faction conflict" expansion, I'd understand having two different raids, even if they were to be a bit smaller because of it.

Or have the same boss mechanics with different characters, so that you are both doing the same encounters, but still fighting different bosses.

But suddenly becoming an enemy and fighting one of your leaders is a very stupid way to promote faction pride.

It will also be the first time they've forced us to be disguised in a raid. People are fairly attached to their characters, and looking like someone else for some five minute quest or a ten minute dungeon is bad enough, let alone raiding as one, where you can be stuck for many hours in higher difficulties.

I just don't know how this idea got past the first dev meeting.

[Reubane]

Wait, I thought the race changes were cosmetic only just like in timewalking or using orb of deception.

[Exquis]

Method doing a full clear of Uldir before more G'huun prog was ultimately what scored them world first over Limit, who went straight to G'huun by extending the lockout. Sometimes a small % means winning or losing. For world first, every bit of extra damage / healing / damage reduction has a big impact.

And horde has had a history of better racials. Hence why there was a snowball effect of top guilds switching to Horde, which then led to the tier below them to move over too.

Like i edited, there are plenty of specs that favor alliance racials over horde so its a null and void argument to say that horde is favored in this regard.

And also, a full re-clear worth if gear is worth a whole fucking lot more than a 50 dps difference in racials (that doesnt even only weigh in the hordes favor)

[Aeula]

Don't like the idea of being forced to kill Rastakhan as Horde.

Don't like that only one out of the three Horde-exclusive bosses dies. It's not like the Alliance is strapped for characters, whereas the Horde very much is.

I don't care why they added this weird faction change feature mid-raid. I don't care about the world first race and I never have. Imo I shouldn't have to kill the Horde bosses as a Horde player.

[Chonar]

Wait, I thought the race changes were cosmetic only just like in timewalking or using orb of deception.

This. Isn't this the case?

[Narzok]

This. Isn't this the case?

nope, was even on the fron page a few days back.

there are charts showing what race turns to what other race, with certain classes being different (DH and Pally mostly)

about OP: i don't know the exact order, but if a alliance-version boss turns out to be a gatekeeper, your argument loses a lot of value.
we had quite a few tiers lately where at least 1 boss before the end stopped progress for a couple of days.

[FuxieDK]

Share your thoughts!

I hate being mutated into an ugly Night Elf...
But I hate even more that Blizzard force us to attack our host, after he let us stay in his great city; Yes I talk of King Rastakhan..

[eduwneso]

I hate being mutated into an ugly Night Elf...
But I hate even more that Blizzard force us to attack our host, after he let us stay in his great city; Yes I talk of King Rastakhan..

Forcing attack your host? your character, the real one doesn't, it's just a recap of what happened. Why is it so hard to see it as another interesting boss? are you all really raiders?

I'm "die horde dogs!!" kind of guy but as a raider I find interesting to see how hard is jaina as a boss and pretty exited about the bloodlust mechanic. Imagine that the last boss for the horde is meh compared to the boss alliance face and you couldn't do it you are stuck with a shitty boss while the other faction has an amazing one, or the other way around. The shitshow would be amazing.

What blizzard is doing is covering their asses so people dont go with "OMG THIS IS UNFAIR HORDE/ALLIANCE BIAS WAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH" and actually making a raid where both factions have a different story and at the same time have the same bosses, it is so hard to see how amazing that is? nah, why?, it's better to whine.

[Felixon]

If you're an alliance player and you think that racials with 0.3% variation is going to net an alliance guild the world first i have bad news for you lol

EDIT: Actually, for many specs the alliance races outperform the hordes. So yeah, even worse news.

Aye,I'm glad you never experienced a wipe at 1%. That 1%,which most likely wouldn't be left,if you would have racial such as haste increase.

[Louz]

This. Isn't this the case?

"Horde characters will transform into soldiers of the opposite faction (including their associated racials) based on their race:"

Yeah, it sucks. Can't wait to make use of those amazing racials that the fugly cows have, really gonna be a gamechanger for me... I mean yeah, but the other way around.

Hope this is the last instance where they put this shit. I'm okay-ish with visual swaps, like in CoT, but to swap racials too - into pre-defined races, is just bad.

Don't like the rest of the raid design choices, like the armor being "bwonsambdi" themed, or the mount that drops off Mekkatorque is an actual gobo shredder with Gallywix's portrait.

Also, playing Alliance, fighting your own gets a bit old. First Darkshore warfront, now this. What is even purpose of this faction swap? A "fun twist"? Lazyness?

[Soulwind]

What is even purpose of this faction swap? A "fun twist"? Lazyness?

I'm going to go with laziness.

Had they made two separate raids with different bosses, it would have been a hell to balance, and even if they didn't care about balance (which they kind of didn't for this iteration either, as they said there will be two world firsts), they would have had to design double the amount of encounters.

Had they made a single set of encounters, but as different characters for each faction, they would have had to make sure they fit those abilities. Gallywix could share the same encounter as Mekkatorque, but who would realistically do the same things as Jaina or Rastakhan? Either they would have had to know they were going to make this raid from the beginning, and introduce such characters in 8.0, or not use such powerful/specific characters at all.

If both options were too difficult or expensive to develop, they should have just scrapped the idea, and accepted that faction specific raids aren't feasible. This half measure looks like a last minute decision they made to save the concept: If we can't change the bosses, we'll change the players!

[Avengerx]

"Horde characters will transform into soldiers of the opposite faction (including their associated racials) based on their race:"

Yeah, it sucks. Can't wait to make use of those amazing racials that the fugly cows have, really gonna be a gamechanger for me... I mean yeah, but the other way around.

Hope this is the last instance where they put this shit. I'm okay-ish with visual swaps, like in CoT, but to swap racials too - into pre-defined races, is just bad.

Don't like the rest of the raid design choices, like the armor being "bwonsambdi" themed, or the mount that drops off Mekkatorque is an actual gobo shredder with Gallywix's portrait.

Also, playing Alliance, fighting your own gets a bit old. First Darkshore warfront, now this. What is even purpose of this faction swap? A "fun twist"? Lazyness?

Purpose of the faction swap is so that players can experience both sides of the story. Uldir for example, alliance has technically no idea why we are even there besides the loot. Also imagine the shitshow if horde would get to fight 2 alliance faction leaders, whereas ally gets a few nameless mooks + Rastakhan.

[Ophenia]

Should have been two entirely different experiences.

That's a shame but the Broken Shore scenario for Legion's introduction made a better job at "showing two points of view" than BfA will ever do. There were two cinematics where not everything was shown, so you couldn't 100% know what happened there.

Horde players should wonder why Rastakhan died. Did he surrender but Anduin still killed him ? Did Jaina teabag him ? Did Bwonsamdi help him or did he let him die without intervening ? Same for all Alliance bosses, Alliance players should never know what actually happened.
We should be left with the interrogation (that worked approximately for Saurfang's fate, where Horde PC had supposedly no clue he didn't die protecting Lordaeron). Instead, we will be fed with the full story with all its details.

You can't fuel faction pride / faction defiance by doing things like that.

Gallywix could share the same encounter as Mekkatorque, but who would realistically do the same things as Jaina or Rastakhan?

Thalyssra for Jaina could have worked I guess, Rastakhan is a lot more specific for sure

[AwkwardSquirtle]

I like the idea. I think it's a really elegant solution, given that making different bosses balanced is literally impossible. It's not like we're responsible for the deaths of Horde forces, given that we're just being shown what happened. If they'd separated it out, Rastakhan would be just as dead. This way we get to experience all the interesting encounters regardless of faction.