I think what Blizzard is doing is the best way to go. They need to make it more accessible to casual players, they need to increase the speed of leveling and remove some of the grind. There are far more casual players than there are hard core raiding guilds/players (at least I would think that's the case). If this is what it takes to increase the number of subscribers then it's in their best interest to do so.

No matter what sector of the gaming community they cater too its going to cause the others to whine. The game can't be all things to all people.

nothing to add realy.

i will not renew my account till wotlk, i have seen some sunwell bosses and that is it for me. WoW is turning ino some medicore, watered down shadow of what it used to be.

i have nothing against faster leveling and 10 man versions of all instances. these are good ways to make stuff more accessable. I dont like wellfare epics and removed attunements though. And most of all i dont like that with EVERY patch since BC release they made instances easier. Mobs hitting less hard. less mobs in general. Mobs like the ice block casting skeletons in karazhan which can be shackled all of a sudden. And lets not even start about boss fights. Poor solarian is nothing but the weaker daughter of the original boss. nerfs left, right and in the middle. And added on top of this new items with every other patch which make life even easier.

best example would be the nerf to heroics which must be 7 months ago. we tried to complete the timed run trough heroic shattered halls at that time. it was HARD AS HELL. on tuesday evening, we didnt get past the first boss. no thinking about completing the timed run anytime soon. the next day came a patch. we waned to try again, and lo and behold, we finished the entire instance in 35 minutes whibout a single person dieing. same group, same equip. And that was just one nerf. And it went on and on like this with every patch.

all in all they made it too easy. we ran trough BT and killed 4 bosses in the first evening we set foot into the instance. The ONLY two boses that were about right in difficulty trough BC before sunwell were lady vash and kael. Even Illidan is a pushover. How sad is that...

Blizzard is not alienating hardcore raiders. blizzard just shows that they care alot more about the huge base of casuals than about the few that put way too much effort into raiding :) That is their decision, and the business numbers seem to prove them right. But i hope one of the other MMORPG's that are coming out this year will keep a harder line :)

All I have to say is QQ more. It's a game. Get over it. I think Blizzard is doing the right thing. It's better to make the game more player friendly because hey we all can't be Professional Nerds or play WoW all of the time. It's better to make things easier so the new people will be given a chance and then will pay Blizzard to play. I don't think because of one "popular" guild disbanded that Blizzard will be crying because there are millions of other players playing.

omg registering here to post "QQ more". what a constructive first post. keep it up.

Obviously only top end players (like Twoflowers) can answer that. Blizzard needs to decide if it is worth it to pour resources into creating an area of the game, that only a small percentage will experience. And that this percentage will either be adored by the "lesser" populace, or envied, or hated, because you can ofc claim that by paying your monthly fee you have a right to see all of the game.

Wether this is true or not, I do not want to comment on. But by bringing Naxx and T3 armor models back to the game, Blizzard seems to admit that catering to a small minority (are there big minorites?) was not the best move in Vanilla WoW.

We now see BT with our guild (Illidan at 50%), but it is clear that we need at least 6 more weeks with pretty much full clears to attain a level that makes us comfortable to enter SWP.

In the end, Blizzard may have decided that losing 10 000 players from guilds that now do SWP is the leasser evil, compared to alienating 3 million player who want to see all of the game too.

Blizzard are, in general, doing a good job in pleasing most of the people most of the time. They are catering to the casuals because that is what makes economic sense to do. Casuals make up the vast majority of the player base. If you cater almost exclusively to the raiders, as was the case prior to TBC, then you alienate the majority. That being said, I do disagree with a few of the things that Blizz have done.

Moving heroic attunement from revered to honoured was a bad idea, especially as it is possible to reach honoured with most of the factions without stepping foot inside one of their associated instances. The attunement for heroic MgT is a far better idea but needs to be a bit trickier. The attunement for heroic mode should require a quest item from the last boss of each dungeon associated with that faction, perhaps with an additional summoned boss to fight for the key. That way you know that every single toon in a heroic instance has completed that instance on normal.

Nerfing heroics - heroics should be HARD. I want to know I've been in a fight when I pick up my badge and loot from a boss.

Badge rewards need to be toned down a little. The new rewards from QD are so ridiculously powerful that raiders who have cleared MH and BT are still forking out badges for them.

Phased access to bosses in raids - I'm not a hardcore raider but I know many of them are pissed off that their progress through the new raid instance is artificially stalled by the progress of the server in opening the gates. I think they would be much happier to have access to all bosses and be able to proceed at their own pace.

There are two separate things under discussion here.

1. That encounters have become easier throughout the life of TBC. This has obviously been policy, and it makes a certain amount of sense. Life of a typical bit of content:

a. Patched into the game. Very hard. The top "hardcore" guilds race each other to be the first to struggle through it, and get a sense of accomplishment out of it. Other players mostly struggle.

b. Nerfed. Other players can now complete it with effort, and it's very easy for the hardcore "elite". Most of the "other players" like the change, a few are upset because they will never be able to experience the challenge of the hard version. Some of the "hardcore elite" are also upset as they feel that they are not so special any more.

Repeat step b a number of times, each time allowing more and more players to beat the challenge and get that sense of personal accomplishment.

This has fairly clearly been policy for a while, as a means of giving one group the full-on challenge while allowing the not-so-capable to experience the content. It works, to some extent, but it annoys a lot of people.

2. Blizzard have obviously recognised that this system is not perfect. They've proposed another method of accomplishing something similar in WOLK, by having the 10- and 25-man versions of dungeons. Now everybody who can do a 10-man raid can see the end storyline elements, and experience at least a version of the boss encounters. Of course they may well choose to nerf this over time as well.

they released 3 raid instances in the two years before BC. BWL, AQ and Naxx. i dont see how this is cathering to the raiders "almost exclusively".

They also released lbrs, ubrs, dire maul, zul'gurub and AQ20 in that time, which are all more casual friendly 5, 10 and 20 man instances ( i think scholomance wasnt in the release either ? or was it strat ? ). They changed the Pvp system to be more casual friendly. They made reputation grinding easier etc etc.

blizzard always was more orientated towards the major mass of their clients, the more "casual" players. it is just going into new extremes since TBC.

I don't agree here. It actually helps raiders to get items that they may have been missing out on in the raids. Myself, I got a badge robe and trousers although we are deep in BT. (and gems that the raidbank was short on) Personally I don't care if somebody who has been clearing Kara for 52 weeks now and has 1000 badges can buy items and epic gems of T6 quality that rival my own. If it makes him happy, who am I to judge? Maybe he can only ever find 10 people to raid with once a week.
I have seen many great other bossfights, he earned his badges in a different way.

For all I care, he could be buying a full Malefic set with his badges. I raid for the fun and challenge..and the loot is a nice by product. And my badges would allow me to buy the pieces that I didn't win...

Dire Maul was the last 5-man instance to be patched into the game before Magisters Terrace. That was patch 1.3 and then there's a gap of nearly 2 years in the 3 year life of the game to-date before the next one in 2.4. Between DM and MgT they patched in BWL, ZG, the world dragons, AQ, Naxx, Black Temple, ZA and SWP. The only instance to be patched in that was not 20-man or above was Zul'Aman. I'd say that was catering to the raiders.

I don't see a problem - surely it's a good thing to allow more folks to see end-game ? Afterall, they pay the same each month ...

As for the nerfs - to me Swaldman hit the nail on the head; the encounters start difficult to allow the hardcore mob a chance at them, then get eased to allow more folks to try. Let's not forget - no-one's going to be running Outland raids this take next year - everyone'll be in Northrend.

Isn't it a good thing that someone who can't put in the same hours as a hardcore raider should get to see end-game ? The hardcore mob will have already cleared them (and probably have those instances on farm), so why should it matter to them that a non-hardcore player should get to experience the content ?

you were talking pre - TBC.

Of course they didnt need to patch in new 5 man content after TBC launch because there were 15 5 or 10 man instances allready coming with TBC iself, compared to 4 raid instances. of which 2 are onyxia style with only one or two bosses and very very little trash. the only real raid instances that came with TBC on release were TK and SSC.

yes, they patch in alot raid stuf, but that is mainly because in the expansion itself they concentrated 95% of their work on the non-raiding stuff. I would love to hear your complaining if it would be the other way around :) imagine 15 big raid instances and only 2 5man instances on TBC release. would be ok for me. you could even have some patches with new 5man instances. I probably would be too busy working my way trough 15 new raid instances to even notice.

Ok, pre-tbc only then. Last 5-man instance was patch 1.3.
1.6 - BWL (40-man)
1.7 - ZG (20-man)
1.8 - World Dragons (40-man)
1.9 - AQ (20 & 40-man)
1.11 - Naxx (40-man)

So anyone who reached level 60 at or around patch 1.3 (which is roughly when I did it) and didn't raid had no new instances to look forward to until the release of TBC whereas the raiders had new content virtually on a monthly basis.

I repeat, pre-tbc Blizzard catered almost exclusively to raiders. Now they are swinging the other way although they are making efforts to try to keep some balance - which is not easy. I think they are doing okay and it is certainly a vast improvement for the majority of the player base.

I concur with the "hard at first, make easier over time". I am a casual myself and I have NO problem with the hardcore raiders seeing and finishing Sunwell. Unfortunately I myself will probably only have a chance at seeing them with a 10-man group of L80s. Helping me get adequate gear to get there long after the raiders did seems only normal to me.

Personally I agree, but I think a proportion of the "top" players then feel that if others can do the same as they have done, they are no longer "special" or "better than the rest".

Re badge rewards... By making T6-quality loot available to everybody (though with some omissions - you won't get a full set of that quality from badges), Blizzard are saying "it's not about the loot, it's about the content". I think most of us here play, and raid,in order to experience the content. In this case there's no reason that we should care that people can get nice gear without doing BT.

1.6 - BWL (40-man)
1.7 - ZG (20-man)
1.8 - World Dragons (40-man)
1.9 - AQ (20 & 40-man)
1.11 - Naxx (40-man)

Yes, these were all patched in, but look at the amount of 5-mans available vs. raids in Vanilla WoW.

Ragefire Chasm
Deadmines
Wailing Caverns
Stockades
Scarlet Monastery
Razorfen Kraul
Razorfen Downs
Maraudon
Uldaman
Zul'Farrak
Blackrock Depths
Sunken Temple
Lower Blackrock Spire
Scholomance
Stratholme (Started as a 10-Man)

Now, also look at BC:

5-Mans:
Hellfire Citadel (3)
Coilfang Resevoir (3)
Auchindoun (4)
Tempest Keep (3)
Caverns of Time (2)
Magister's Terrace
Raids:
Karazhan (10-Man)
Zul'Aman (10-Man)
Gruul's Lair (Onyxia Style)
Magtheridon's Lair (Onyxia Style)
Serpentshrine Cavern (25-Man)
TK - The Eye (25-Man)
CoT - Mt. Hyjal (25-Man)
Black Temple (25-Man)
Sunwell Plateau (25-Man)

Now, I believe I may be missing some pre-BC 5 mans, but I think the total that I've added up leads to much more 5-man content than raiding content.

I dont mind the gradual nerfing of raids as the Kudos is always on when you completed it for the first time not if you have. My gripe for BC is welfare epics, lack of clear blue between the tiers(I mean when you downed a new boss in vanilla the loot you got was better, now it may have 2 more stat points and actually be worse overall) and lack of gear progression overall (sure the loot from tier 4 to tier 6 has a huge diffrence but along the way the rate of improvement is at a snails pace, you might have 6 diffrent items in the same slot during that time just between two tiered instances).

Finally ultimatley I ABSOLOUTLEY HATE PVP, blizzard are turning this game bit by bit into guildwars, the Game was created to be about the PVE with PVP as a minor element, now huge development and balancing is dedicated to it and it hurts pve immensley.

I can't really speak from personal experience about high-end raiding in WoW, as I avoid it like the plague personally. I'm also not going to sit here and criticize people's opinions on the subject, since as I said before, I really have no room to speak on that subject, in that manner -- I personally don't care for raiding, but that doesn't mean I think nobody should enjoy it or get to do it.

That said, I am thinking that Blizzard has been restructuring the raiding concept a bit -- changing from the old pre-TBC era of huge raids, very little loot, and large population requirements to field them, to something where the competitiveness for advancing to the most relevant & recent content/raids exists, while the older content becomes more accessable for more people to be able to experience it. I think they are still working on the concept, but I believe it is an effort to try to please both the hardcore raider -- with the upper-tier, most-recent dungeons requiring a lot more challenge and difficulty to master, while at the same time, the things that aren't the "cutting-edge" dungeons, become more open, more accessible, more available to a wider player base... if anything, to potentially get more people to see the content, and maybe even attract larger numbers to potentially want to see the most recent content.

I'm not entirely convinced that Blizzard is sacrificing the high-end raiders in order to make the game accessible... I think it is more a matter of them changing the dynamics and structure of things, to accommodate a wider group of people. The highest-end raiding groups would be hitting the highest-end zone... lower groups would be working on the lower-end zones. Right now, it still seems to be a work in progress, and not 100% perfect, but I'm actually intrigued by how Blizzard is doing it. To the point that the entire concept of raiding is no longer so... distasteful to me.

But you can take what I say here with a grain of salt, like I said before, I don't raid, in fact I intentionally avoid it... for a number of reasons, all of which I've gone over in the past, and would rather not have to rehash. I know there are people who really, truly enjoy raiding, I'm just not one of them. So, I'm hoping my comment doesn't offend anyone here, and if it does, then just disregard my statement as someone who doesn't raid anyway, merely an "outside view" of the situation, as I see it, nothing more.

Honestly though shouldn't you be talking about instances and raids that are "end game"? Saying that wailing caverns caters to the casual and alienates the hardcore is a bit disingenuous.

I think its pretty lame. If your not willing to go the extra mile to beable to get the best of the best then you should be SOL. Just like anything else in life. This is just other case of politcal BS like "Everyones a winnner" which i say is BS your not a winner inless you put forth the effort.

Well, but in this case you forget that it is a game that everybody pays for to play. If we both pay 10 000 Euros for a car, we both expect to get the same out of the car.

People are still not handed freebies. It still needs effort to succeed in SSC, TK and BT...we others are just a bit later. So the heroes had their day. They put in the hours. They have beaten Illidan in July 2007. Now it is 10 months later. Why not give everybody a shot at it. What is it to you?

And those going the extra mile to be the best of the best get recognition as such, get to the newer content sooner, and have competitiveness. Why should it matter what anyone else is doing with the older content? There is a difference between being competitive, and turning it into flat-out elitism. The former I can appreciate, the latter is just unnecessary stepping on other people.

I mean, the top-end guilds right now should have T6, and be working hard on the full Sunwell/T7 gear. Why should they care how people are getting the things they are tossing away and/or already replaced?

Death and Taxes did not disband because of increased content viability, but due to internal discipline issues.

I agree with Xlorep - I am much more interested in doing the the encounters in the 25 man content then I am with what loot I get from there. Yes of course I would love to be outfitted in Tier 6 and hopefully eventually I will get there but again being able to see the encounters is what makes me raid...not whether I get an item or not.

As for the whole 10/25 man deal I think it is awesome. Of course I would take more pride in downing an encounter as its' 25-man version - who wouldn't. But if for some reason we cannot get 25 people together why not do it on a 10-man basis (say like a holiday weekend or something)?

Blizzard trys to make the game available to everyone - I have no problem with that. I think it is great they make the encounters tough for the Nihilums of WoW and then eventually lessen the difficulty...it's about the content, not the gear. Of course all of us would liked to have been SSC, TK, Hyjal, and BT attuned before they removed them but not everyone can. I don't think it is a big deal.

From a purely marketing standpoint, after all, that's what it is all about, Blizzard is doing well with their strategy.

I would like to see multi-tiered instances (beginner/intermediate/hard/advanced) with appropriate gear for each level. My style of play is such that I will likely never be part of a raiding guild, but with a few friends can put together some respectable 5 man groups. Would be fun I think to work your way up the tier as far as your level of expertise would allow.

I think its funny that people think its all about business and catering to the majority to make more money... bull crap... if blizz cared about that then they wouldnt have totally effed people in original wow for endgame 5 mans... and twoflower is a prime example of the elitist pricks who think they own this game and that everything should be hard as hell to make you have some sort of fake sense of accomplishment...

ITS A FREAKING GAME... EVERYONE PAYS THE SAME AMOUNT TO PLAY IT... you have no more right to content than anyone else... i for one dont give a crap about rewards... the only reason people get better gear is so they can experience more content and if that gears easier to get then so be it!

its not about the damn gear! why do you care about gear so much?! isnt it for the ability to do the damn dungeons higher up?! so if blizzard makes it easier than that and you complain about the gear then wtf are you talking about? the priorities are not like that...

the only reason people get gear is to be better at what they do... so what if they make it easier for more people to do?

illidan a push over my ass... maybe for jerks who think its fun to sell their souls to the raid game and make the game into a job... fyi some people still have trouble even getting past kara (heaven forbid) so freaking deal with it!

it freaking disgusts me that all these elitist jerks get to experience the lore events and exclusive storylines when people like me that have been playing warcraft games since the first one (orcs and humans) cant see that content when pricks that dont even care about the story at all do because they have enough time to spend hours upon hours every week and got into a raid guild...

thats the crap that makes this game suck not "wellfare epics" freaking imbeciles... theres no such thing... you still have to spend hours upon hours repetitively farming instances for badge loot dude... just because its 5 man heroics or becuase the gears getting better (gasp! non raiders getting better gear than just the old crap!) doesnt mean it doesnt take lots of effort...

please just stay out of the game because its people like you that ruin it... diaf...

cute how you have to insult raiders. i sence some jealousy, anger problems and a realy unhealthy attitude. It does not help that your points are either wrong or petty.

Scorchy, knock it off with the name calling and personal attacks, lest you want a three day suspension. The rules are clear enough on this issue and you've been here long enough to know better.

Blizzard is also learning things. No game comes out perfectly. If they didn't learn we would still have 40 mans in TBC. Actually I remember the uproar about the end of 40mans. Today I dare say 90% think it is a blessing that we don't have these monstrosities anymore.

Meant as an insult, but rather a compliment. That guild and the website is THE major source for numbercrunching.

For all the rest, go wash your mouth with soap, young man. By default any argument that has to resort to curses, name calling and insulting stops to be an argument and becomes just the impotent rant of a child that had his nookie taken away....

Nookie ?!

Hey, it's my way or the highway.

Nookie!



Had to actually look it up in a german - english dictionary, but pacifier sounded weird, so I chose this of the words on offer

pacifier ? omg ^^ that sounds strange indeed.

Yeah but in England nookie is slang for sex ...

indeed lol

Hrmpppf...at least we had a good laugh. Apparently the word I chose is only regionally used in america ^^

I must admit that I had the same feelings as twoflower when I first heard of all of the nerfs and attunement removals that were going to take place.
I have always enjoyed raiding the hard end-game content right when it comes out and the thought of blizzard making it easier for more people to see it bothered me. But then I actually thought about it and decided that I really was being a prick about it.

The raids were a blast to do and getting the loot and the glory from wearing t6 around when no one else had it was fun but there is really no reason why it has to stay like that forever. I got to have my fun. I killed the bosses and I got the loot and I got to have a lot of fun doing it and thats really what it is all about.

There is no reason why blizzard can't and shouldn't make the instances a bit easier so that more people can see it. Downing Kael for the first time or getting to fight some of the bosses in BT were some of the best times I have had in BC raiding. Blizzard just wants to share the wealth and wants to let more people see some of the awesome encounters that they created.

At this point I am going back with a good friend of mine and his casual raiding guild and helping them through hyjal and BT and I am having a blast again. They didn't have the time or the gear to raid hyjal/BT before the changes but now they get to see it and they are all having a lot of fun. Anyone can enjoy laughing about watching Supremus sprint across the map to one shot a priest that didn't know what to do on their first attempt and I honestly can't think of a valid reason why only those of us that are "hard core raiders" should get to see this stuff. Just take a deep breath, realize it's a game, and the more people that get to have fun and see it the better.

Remember the Limp Bizkit song ten years ago det? That certainly wasn't about pacifiers :D

Uh anyway, I think that 25man dungeons are perfect. But my friend who's doing Sunwell keeps telling me how he misses the old world raids because they were more challenging.. I never did BWL AQ40 or Nax so I can't comment :)

Uhm.. Det.. Nookie. Not so regional as you think.

No, in the dictionary that I checked it said that the word is regionally used as a term for the pacifier...thingy. Plus it did sound close to the german term "Nuckel" (we pronounce our "u" like english "oo")

Oh well..teaches me not to trust dictionaries blindly and reminds me of the Monty Python sketches where this guy sells English-Hungarian dictionaries where the most innocent questions like "How do I get to the station" are translated as "I want to have intercourse with your dog" ...or something like that ^^

Lol, nookie. And that is why we love ze Germans.

I think that the 10/25 man design is a very nice effort to cater both the hardcore and more casual spectre of raiders.

I think it's cool that people with less time to dedicate to raiding also get to see end game content and that people who can/want to spend more time in raiding get the recognition through harder fights and better/more shiny "purplez".

I find it a very clever design and I hope that the guy who came up with it got a bonus this year. And I hope blizz can keep the tuning between the 2 difficulty levels fair.