Monday, October 20, 2008

Successful night – and yet I’m disappointed

We did it. The night after the patch last week we went to Black Temple for our ordinary Thursday raid. And that was quite an achievement when you think about the amount of broken addons and the problems some people had to download the patch and make everything work decently.

Looking at the number of bosses killed the raid was a success. We killed 7/9 bosses in a few hours. Previously the same bosses have taken us three nights. They were nerfed until stupidity, that’s all I can say. I hardly used any potion at all during the night. I never once looked at my mana gem. We didn’t have any warlock stone and I never missed it either. And of course I never thought about using evocation, even though I had got the glyph for it. There was no need.

“This is like Deadmines heroic” someone said. Every single boss was oneshotted. And the trash went down so quickly that you had to be pretty quick if you wanted to take part in the killing at all.

Considering how easy it went I’d be surprised if we didn’t kill Illidan pretty soon. Which of course is fun and nice in one way, but still I can’t help feeling slightly disappointed. Will we get any more epic raiding experience at all before the expansion? Maybe in Sunwell. That’s my hope. Because if Sunwell isn’t better, this patch was the end to raiding in TBC the way that we knew it. Now it’s not the real stuff. It’s badge and gear farming. That’s the sad truth.
I miss the wipe nights already.

10 comments:

krizzlybear said...

I'm feeling almost the exact same thing. I've always wanted to progress on new content, but one-shotting Gruul and 2-shotting mags in one weekend really raises an eyebrow...

Anonymous said...

One of my mates keeps saying things like:
"Let's do Kara, we will knock it over in 2 hours",
"Let's do ZA, anyone can do it now"

I have also had a couple of 25 man invites.

But the thing is, I am not interested... in part because it is nerfed. I have done enough OP clears to know that you don't really enjoy the experience, you don't take the time saved to check out the scenery etc.

So I am running a silly spec and just taking my time checking out all the sights I have missed in the past.

Funeral said...

Blizzard is just giving everyone who never got to see the content a chance to, along with giving you the feeling of being oh so powerful before knocking you back down again with the expansion.

It's safe to say that they won't continue to make things that easy. It just has to do with opening it up and the fact that their dungeon design ideas have shifted, I mean no 40 mans, the changes to the classes. These are pretty much free-bee's now.

Gevlon said...

The TBC raiding is officially over. The bosses were nerfed in order to let very casual players see raids they never imagined (and have the archivement for it).

The only reason for a serious raider to raid is to check talents, test raid support abilities.

Don't worry, the day when Larísa step into Naxxramas is closing.

Dragon's Den said...

The problem is that the likes of Kara will become the new BRD after the expansion - an empty cobweb filled place that hardly anyone runs now.

We took some new level 70s (there are still people levelling to 70 for the first time) in a Kara team and although it was something of a pushover they got to at least experience it in some measure and get some gear.

They'd never seen fights like it, loved the gear and their joy made for a rewarding and fun evening.

Anonymous said...

We had the same experience on our Wednesday night raid. Seven bosses in a little less than three hours, all one-shots, no wipes — not even the silly little deaths on trash that remind us to laugh at ourselves.

On Saturday we one-shot Council and downed Illidan for the first time after a handful of attempts. It wasn't exactly easy — there were still new tanking mechanics to learn — but it certainly wasn't the challenge it would have been pre-3.0.

I know that several of my guild members were disappointed; one even remarked on Vent that it felt anti-climactic. (On the other hand, we had a new enhancement shaman in the raid who had never seen T5, let alone T6 and Illidan. He subbed into our final attempt and was absolutely beside himself to have experienced our first kill. "Wait. Did we ... did we just kill Illidan?!")

What I reminded the rest of them, and what I sincerely believe, is that defeating Illidan wasn't just about defeating Illidan. This is how I phrased it in the obligatory forum post:

Sure, it may have taken us a little longer to down Illidan with our pre-3.0 talents, or if he weren't suffering from the mysterious malady that has afflicted all of our Outland foes with 30% less health (I'm not 100% sure about this, but I suspect it's the 'expansionitis' I've heard so much about...), but we all know his days were numbered either way.

What we're celebrating today isn't just Illidan's defeat at our hands (or paws, as the case may be!). It's the long road that we've taken to get here, the commitment we made to each other to kick off the journey and the friendships we've built along the way.


I hope this rings at least a little true for you, as well. Congratulations on your progression thus far, and on your future Illidan kill. Whether it feels like it at this moment in time or not ... you've earned it!

Fish said...

I am kind of glad the content got nerfed. I am not really a raider by any stretch. I would like to see as much of the current content as possible and not have to run back through it with an 80 just to do so. I have an outside shot of actually getting to run Kara before the expansion. I know it's dissappointing to players who have been using it as a benchmark, but in under a month, there will be new content to measure oneself against.

Anonymous said...

@Krizzlybear: yes. Even if you can progress now it isn't the same kind of progress. It's slightly better than going back to see Onyxia and such old lvl 60 raiding content.

@Gnomeaggedon: well, one reason to go could be that you'd get more used to raiding in 25 man party, if you're heading to do that in WotLK. After all it's a bit different and maybe it could be an idea to get the picture of it, if you haven't done it before.
But I do understand your choice. It's been long since I did a Kara run now, even before the patch.

@Funeral, yes, I know it's temporary and I basically understand and respect the reasons for it. It's great that more players can gear up a bit too to get the early levels in Northrend smoother. And they'll have some fun and enjoy seeing new content. They're worth it I guess. Still I can't help mourning a bit, even though I know it's selfish of me to do so.

@Gevlon: yeah, in my heart I know you're right. About the reasons for raiding I can add a few more: the social reason - I love hanging around with 25 other geeks like me - the content reason - I'd like to see mr Stormrage with my own eyes - and gear reason - OK gear will be replaced but I'd sure feel pretty cool if I could get at least one piece of T6 before TBC is ended forever.

@Dragon's Den: thats not a bad reason for raiding either: to give some joy to newbie raiders and see the enthusiastic sparkles in their eyes.

@Poorhesva: you're so right about everything you write. We too did manage to take Mother S down before the patch and I'm very proud how far we did. The last few weeks we had finally managed to get the recruits we needed and all the work started to pay off. You should have seen how frenetically we farmed for shadowres gear just a week before the patch. That was a guild achievement, really! If we only could have been given a couple of more weeks I'm convinced we would have downed Illidan the non-nerfed version. Now we won't be able to proof it, sad enough.

@Fish: that's great to hear. I hope you'll be able not only to run Kara, but ZA as well and maybe 25 man instances. There are quite a few pug runs if nothing else these days, at least on my server.

Anonymous said...

A few of my Horde my guildies told me that the raids were a lot easier. I am disappointed. I don't have a level 70 toon but I do have two level level 60+ toons.

Finding the class that I wanted to level to 70 was challenging. I've finally found the class (Holy priest) and although I'm disappointed that I won't be able to experience what my buddies have however I'm happy that I'll get some nice drops by the time my priest reaches that level and I'll be able to tackle the tough content of Northrend with my buddies who've ben patiently waiting for me to level to 70 so we can explore the new continent together. :-)

David said...

I got Gruul and Mags on my first time on each, and in a pug. And, I got T4 chest and leg tokens for my (non?)efforts! They will make for some nice feral gear for wotlk leveling.

It was easy and fun, especially for someone like me who never seriously raided TBC content.