If there was a classic version of each xpac. Which one would actually be hard ?

[Azerate]

It really depends at which aspect of the game you're looking, and at which part of the player base. Over the years, the game has been becoming increasingly easier for casual players, and increasingly harder for hardcore players, with some exceptions (such as Cataclysm dungeons).

So, for casuals it would probably be cataclysm or tbc due to insane difficulty of 5 man dungeons, which are usually considered the basic content, that should be easy.

For people usually doing the most difficult content in the game it would be BfA/Legion. These two expansions not only have objectively hardest mythic bosses released to date, but also have massive open-ended grinds that min-maxers feel the need to max out despite it being impossible to do so.

[Orby]

I wish every expansion was its own game.

[Sinaa]

When they release BC servers, every raid boss will die inside a week

Sure they will, how is that relevant to difficulty though? Folks that deeply know the tactics for everything will naturally kill everything, but that doesn't apply for average raiding guilds.

[kranur]

The ones with the most rng

[Fistfighter]

we already have a mythic mode that's pretty hard for most players

But the hardest would be probly Legion with all of them soaky overpowered boring raids

[Lord Pebbleton]

I would say Cataclysm because I can't remember killing even one single raid boss during the first patch. Heroics were also often off-limits, Shadowfang Keep was impossible to pug for a time because of the asphyxiating boss and the coordination it needed

[TJ]

TBC onwards will still be hard for a lot of players, I'm guessing even Naxx in Classic will be. Hard for the top majority and hardcore? That's a different question. A handful of Bosses from Wrath onwards I guess, they are still unforgiving and require a lot of skill/execution.

- - - Updated - - -

I would say Cataclysm because I can't remember killing even one single raid boss during the first patch. Heroics were also often off-limits, Shadowfang Keep was impossible to pug for a time because of the asphyxiating boss and the coordination it needed

Good times, the new Deadmines was sooo fun to do for the first time. I think it's the most I've ever enjoyed doing a heroic dungeon.

[WowIsDead64]

After seeing how easily classic was cleared, if blizz decided to re-release each xpac, which one would you consider would offer some challenge ? Where would you draw the line at where we might need a few hundred pull for an average guild to clean ?

Personaly, i'd feel that appart from some very secific fight (yogg 0, maybe arthas, kt , kj ?), it was cataclysm that really brought the game in a new level of complexity. I dont see guilds getting rid of sinestra, chogall, nefa, ragnaros, etc as easily as they would dispose of the hardest challenge from previous xpansion.

Thoughts ?

Patch 4.0. Imagine Vanilla mechanics and WotLK level of difficulty. This is "raw" difficulty.

Legion/BFA are hard too, but their difficulty comes from bad game design and incompetent devs - uneven content, i.e. when Blizzard constantly mix solo content with group one and prevent players from skipping group parts. Like putting elites on every corner and removing flying/ground mounts, so players can't fly over/ride through them. Plus way too steep borrowed power growth curve, that causes way too big difference between new players/alts and players, who play in a long term and keep up with progression. Blizzard need to balance content for both, but "compromise" just isn't good enough.

[Terongor]

TBC was quite hard on it's time. But, people now know how to "exploit" everything. Addons are more common now than then, WA's exist where they didn't back then.

That means that every expansion before the popularity of these addons will be trivialized. That will include Wrath, i'm sorry to say. Wrath was significantly easier than TBC, though this is relative. I remember the Sunwell being a very hard raid until the pre-patch. But with all the preparation and addons of today, i am sure it will also fall over.
So, i'd say maybe Pandaria? I remember Garrosh taking quite some effort to down.

well wotlk had atleast algalon and yogg+0

[Krothar]

None of them.
We have every resource, every tactic a few clicks away.

Whats happened in Classic can't seriously be a surprise to anyone. People have had years to test and and refine builds and tactics for these games.

And lets not forget a game is never as hard as your first playthrough, hence why challenge runs become so popular.

[deenman]

Are you basing this on actually raiding in TBC? Have you killed Archimonde, Lady Vash'j, Kaelthas in the TK, or even Magtheridon early on? Have you cleared the Sunwell? Black Temple was a lot harder than the timewalking version..
I mean sure top1000 Mythic raiding guilds won't have a hard time, but others who knows.

vashj and kt were bugged,comicaly so....maghteridon early on was way to demnanding by expecting EVERYONE to not fuck up in 2007 lol,bosses today like star augur,maiden or xanesh are nightmares for many people,sunwell was not hard just overruned numbers wise,and yeah ofc bt was harder than now...classes were much weaker and had less tools,now everyone has interupts,heals,defensives,better overall burst etc

[SoundOfGuns]

After seeing how easily classic was cleared, if blizz decided to re-release each xpac, which one would you consider would offer some challenge ? Where would you draw the line at where we might need a few hundred pull for an average guild to clean ?

Personaly, i'd feel that appart from some very secific fight (yogg 0, maybe arthas, kt , kj ?), it was cataclysm that really brought the game in a new level of complexity. I dont see guilds getting rid of sinestra, chogall, nefa, ragnaros, etc as easily as they would dispose of the hardest challenge from previous xpansion.

Thoughts ?

Cataclysm was an absolute piece of shit in both raid- and dungeon-difficulty in my perception. It was challenging, yes, but only by using the cheapest ways to force it. They cut on survival abilities, strangled healer mana management. Dungeons took more CC than people had left and i still get a disgusting feeling on my neck when i remember heroic Grimbatol early on, because half of the dungeons were horribly overtuned and spammed Mobs like it was a competition. The Raids were the same, Bossfights in part took up to 15 Minutes if i remember correctly? This evened out a bit with the Firelands, the later added Dungeons and Spine was... not as bad... but still.

I think cataclysm wasn't difficult - it was tedious.

[WingsofLiberty]

BfA but I honestly think blizzard is doing difficulty wrong. I think the healthiest difficulty is around Wotlk-MoP level. Where a dedicated but mediocre guild ~1000 can clear hardest difficulty in 3-4 months. Add any more to that and it leads to severe burnouts.

If they continue to keep up the pace with turning up difficulty it will be hard to find raiders.

I also believe Wotlk and MOP was the time when they got the difficulty right (Cata was trash).

Furthermore, I think that was the charm of wotlk. The normal raids were easier than the current heroic, but boss kills still held some meaning in the community (as they weren't LFR-level of loleasy). Then you had heroic raids (and before them the hardmodes) with the same role as mythic today (which got gradually nerfed by the applied debuffs). It was the perfect recipe for the raiding scene imo. Also, I might be in the minority, but what I appreciated back then was the somewhat loose tuning of some fights.

[TEHPALLYTANK]

Cataclysm was an absolute piece of shit in both raid- and dungeon-difficulty in my perception. It was challenging, yes, but only by using the cheapest ways to force it. They cut on survival abilities, strangled healer mana management. Dungeons took more CC than people had left and i still get a disgusting feeling on my neck when i remember heroic Grimbatol early on, because half of the dungeons were horribly overtuned and spammed Mobs like it was a competition. The Raids were the same, Bossfights in part took up to 15 Minutes if i remember correctly? This evened out a bit with the Firelands, the later added Dungeons and Spine was... not as bad... but still.

I think cataclysm wasn't difficult - it was tedious.

People had plenty of CC, the issue was that randoms didn't have a clue how to use it and you'd regularly get idiots who would just outright break it. Grim Batol was a bit of an exception, it remained painful even after they nerfed the heroic dungeons. I don't remember any boss taking more than 2-3 minutes early on in Cata heroic dungeons, unless you were doing them with 1 or more dps dead because they didn't move out of a really obvious ground effect.

[SoundOfGuns]

People had plenty of CC, the issue was that randoms didn't have a clue how to use it and you'd regularly get idiots who would just outright break it. Grim Batol was a bit of an exception, it remained painful even after they nerfed the heroic dungeons. I don't remember any boss taking more than 2-3 minutes early on in Cata heroic dungeons, unless you were doing them with 1 or more dps dead because they didn't move out of a really obvious ground effect.

Probably a fair point with the pugs. They did nerf the CCs available tho i... believe to remember, and that made it more of a clusterfuck than it had to be.

And of course i meant heroic Raidbosses. 15 Minutes for a Dungeon Boss would be kinda sad.

[TEHPALLYTANK]

Probably a fair point with the pugs. They did nerf the CCs available tho i... believe to remember, and that made it more of a clusterfuck than it had to be.

And of course i meant heroic Raidbosses. 15 Minutes for a Dungeon Boss would be kinda sad.

There weren't many heroic raid bosses over 10 minutes long, most were 4-7 minutes iirc. A bunch of them had hard enrages at 6/8/10 minutes, the only thing that comes to mind when you mention a 15 minute fight is Heroic Madness of Deathwing, because it was actually a 12-15 minute fight (hard to really call it a raid boss, since it just felt like one really long trash pull...man did I hate doing progression on such a boring fight).

[SirBeef]

After seeing how easily classic was cleared, if blizz decided to re-release each xpac, which one would you consider would offer some challenge ? Where would you draw the line at where we might need a few hundred pull for an average guild to clean ?

Personaly, i'd feel that appart from some very secific fight (yogg 0, maybe arthas, kt , kj ?), it was cataclysm that really brought the game in a new level of complexity. I dont see guilds getting rid of sinestra, chogall, nefa, ragnaros, etc as easily as they would dispose of the hardest challenge from previous xpansion.

Thoughts ?

None.

1) players are far more knowledgeable about the game now than they were about any iteration in the past.
2) players have more skill now than before.
3) all the best and most efficient strats are out in the ether for everyone to use.

In terms of how long to clear, probably the most recent retail version when it hits a classic server would be the most difficult just due to the least amount of time those encounters have been around. But in all seriousness, not a single expansion, if they all get "classic" servers will ever be hard.

[SoundOfGuns]

There weren't many heroic raid bosses over 10 minutes long, most were 4-7 minutes iirc. A bunch of them had hard enrages at 6/8/10 minutes, the only thing that comes to mind when you mention a 15 minute fight is Heroic Madness of Deathwing, because it was actually a 12-15 minute fight (hard to really call it a raid boss, since it just felt like one really long trash pull...man did I hate doing progression on such a boring fight).

Maybe it was just such a harrowing experience to me, that i conflated the other bosses with Madness. But i did not like many of the earlier bosses that much to begin with. I somehow remember - especially the bosses in twilight bastion - as overloaded with a barrage of needless mechanics which were not hard to play, but just... euugh. I think of the first tier i did like 1 or 2 in the blackwing descent, the four-winds-thing bosses and Sindragosa but its also not in any relation to how much i hated TwB. And i don't hate Bosses just because i didnt enjoy them. But those are... high on my shitlist somehow.

[Lazuli]

If we're talking for general playerbase, easily cataclysm pre-nerf. That was a shit show for pugs in heroics and 10mans after everyone was used to training wheels.

Otherwise.. I guess TBC?

[MrFawlty]

When they release BC servers, every raid boss will die inside a week

Obviously, they will probably be released nerfed and in any case, they have been on farm for years on private servers which often have the difficulty set higher. It is simply not a fair comparison.