LFR - Looking for raid, or as I like to call it, Looking for retards, is here and with it comes a whole new bucket of drama to go with it.
I was extremely skeptical about the idea of LFR from the moment it was announced. The idea that a random assortment of 25 people could clear a raid instance just sounded ludicrous, especially when I still saw varying degrees of failure in just 5 man dungeons.
The saving grace was that the LFR would be "tuned down" to better accommodate the randomness factor of 25 players. I was still skeptical - so what if they decreased health and damage output? Mechanics are really what kills you. Honestly, how many times do you wipe to enrage timers? It's that ground AoE you didn't interrupt, or that add you didn't kill that blows up your raid.
Anyways, I gave it a try - as much as I hate this fact, there are upgrades in terms of item level. It pisses me off to see people walking around in raid finder gear that equals my hard-earned Firelands gear I got from Ragnaros, but if I can't stop others from getting that gear, then I want it too!
I gave LFR a few runs and understood exactly how it was all possible. You see, they didn't just tune down the HP and damage, they actually completely removed some of the raid-wiping mechanics. Don't get me wrong - the damage nerf is significant, but it's the removal of crucial raid mechanics that make the fights so trivial.
For example on Warlord Zon'ozz, the ball-bouncing mechanic that cost our guild 10+ wipes to learn, is completely negated by the fact that:
1. A tight stack is not required as the explosion radius is very large (hence damage is soaked by everyone whether they are close or not)
2. The ball automatically hits the boss after a certain number of bounces
So basically, a fight that requires high awareness and good positioning on normal raid mode, becomes a downright tank-n-spank fight in LFR.
Another good example is Ultraxion. Most of the mechanics are the same except that there is no requirement for anyone to soak Hour of Twilight. And from what I've seen, even if you're hit by it, it does not kill you. In addition, the fading light debuff only hits the tanks. The complicated taunt rotation and timing required to beat the enrage timer on normal mode is pretty much gone.
On Spine of Deathwing, the kill-stack-roll maneuver to take care of the corruptions is no longer there. I actually got yelled at for killing all the tentacles because apparently on raid finder difficulty, you only need to kill one. I found it kind of ironic that someone would call me a "noob" for this mistake - I was just doing what I'm used to doing on the ACTUAL ENCOUNTER as opposed to a watered-down child level version of it, which apparently makes me a noob.
On the few LFR runs that I've tried, my DPS has been #1 from start to finish. I'm not the best rogue from a hardcore guild nor am I decked out in full heroic T13. I'm an average-geared rogue from an average-progressed raiding guild. The fact that no one even comes within ~3k of my DPS says something about the average damage output of the players in LFR.
I expected a healthy mix of good and bad players - good players who do raid with a guild, but want to fill some gaps in their gear through LFR, and bad players who're looking to the LFR as a quick and easy way to upgrade their gear. What I found was a sadly skewed ratio of more bad than good. In terms of pure DPS, the players I found were not my equals. In terms of raid awareness, I saw at least 2-3 idiots on each fight attacking the wrong targets or not moving out of AoE.
Despite all this, some runs were better than others in the sense that people were relatively polite, did not make a stink about loot, or berate others. Some runs were terrible and made me feel like I was in a Zaldalaris all over again. It's amazing how that one player who is even slightly better (or thinks is better) than his peers wants to vote kick someone who did 0.2% less damage. Or that healer who calls all the DPS garbage and yet doesn't even have a shadow spec to prove he could do any better.
The loot RNG was another big source of grief too. More than once I saw that guy pulling 9k DPS win both the tier tokens and ring I wanted. More than once I saw people ninjaing for their off specs. And once I was even booted (along with 4 other rogues and mages) because someone didn't want competition for their tier tokens.
Overall, I see it as a cheapened experience of actual raiding. The challenge isn't there, the teamwork and fun of downing a hard boss isn't there, and the only thing that is even marginally there are the rewards, which everyone immediately squabbles over.
Will I still run it? Probably, because I need to complete my 4 piece one way or another. But as soon as I don't have to, I won't. It's not satisfying and I find it no less aggravating than running a few 5-mans to get that valor.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
It's my time to shine
The big source of QQing among the general populace has been the introduction of the new legendary. Why the complaints? Unlike any of the previous legendaries, this one is 100% class-specific. You MUST be a rogue to obtain and use this legendary set of daggers.
Sure, Thunderfury was unavailable to some folks (Actually I think besides druids, shamans and priests everyone was able to at least meet the weapon proficiency) - even if it was useless for a mage or something, he could at least use it just for bragging rights. There was no specific flavor text excluding folks like that.
Then came along other legendaries such as Atiesh and Warglaives of Azzinoth which specifically limited the legendary to certain classes. But the point is that it's always been more than one class - Atiesh was open to druids, mages, priests and warlocks, for example. Thori'dal, the legendary bow, clearly was intended for Hunters, but rogues and warriors COULD technically get it (despite the criticism some guilds received for doing so).
Well, the Fangs of the Father is rogue-specific. I don't care if warriors and hunters and shamans can use it too. You're not a rogue, you can't even get the quest.
There was a tense couple of weeks (at least for me) after the announcement of the rogue legendary where I wondered if I was going to get it or not. Legendaries are almost impossible to complete without the backing of an entire guild, as it requires multiple raid clears to collect the quest items. My status in the guild at this time was a little uncertain, as I had recently come back from a 6-month absence during which time I raided with a different guild. There were extenuating circumstances to be sure, but let's just say that there were certainly more loyal guild members than myself who did not jump ship.
Anyways, I was welcomed back with open arms and I filled a gap in the roster (namely melee DPS). I also made it clear that I was totally fine with sitting out on raids - I came back for the friendships, not to be a loot whore. I was also so overcome with gratitude for being allowed back that I damn near flooded the gbank with herbs and fish to help out with the raid supplies, and continue to do so on a regular basis.
Despite my best efforts to show the guild that I was loyal and willing to contribute, whether the guild would back me up on getting the legendary was another story. I think the deciding factor, really, was that there was simply no other rogue to give it to. I was the only main rogue, and while people had alt rogues and such, not one of the were even on the backup raid roster. I think even the veterans in the guild would've agreed that giving the legendary to an alt rogue would have been somewhat unfair.
So about a month before the new patch dropping, I did get a pesudo-confirmation that I was to receive the guild's help in getting the legendary. Woohoo! Step 1 complete.
I scoured information from the PTR related to the legendary questline and it looked pretty fun, and thankfully required minimal participation from the whole guild other than just downing bosses. Apparently there was some real roguish quests involved, requiring you to pickpocket, sap, stealth, and sneak your way into the heart of enemy territory.
As soon as the patch hit we ventured into the new raid, where I was to pickpocket the 4th boss to start off the legendary questline. The first 4 bosses were a breeze and I pickpocketed, turned it in, paid 10,000g for the next step in the quest, and waited 12 hours (also part of quest).
The next part had be stealth my way into Ravenholdt manor, which was very easy. I simply sapped and sprinted my way through the whole thing. After a pretty cool little cutscene where Deathwing's son propositions me, I made my way to the ruins of Gilneas city where I was to repeat the whole sneaking process.
Oh boy, was this one hard. I had read on the PTR forums that it was easy, but apparently they tripled the number of guards or something. The entire city was crawling with mobs, with every corner thickly covered with patrols and idle guards.
I tried my best, but after about 10 attempts where I got no further than halfway in, I gave up! I'm ashamed to admit that I used a trick where you fly in part-way, jump down, and re-stealth to get credit. I guess you can say that a rogue uses all the tricks up her sleeve to get the job done, so in a way it's ok? Whatever, I still don't feel good about it, and if I had another chance I'd like to go back and try to do it without exploits. But the thing was, I only had one night to get this done before the raid went back into Dragon Soul and I didn't want to miss any chances of getting the gem clusters (of which I need 333 for the next part of the quest).
After that, I had to solo an elite-level boss. I was checking my bags to make sure I had enough potions, bandages and whatnot, when I see an alliance rogue come up an engage the boss! It was the same rogue who I had seen wiping over and over to this guy (as evidenced by how many times he had to rez at the questgiver each time). I knew it wasn't quite fair, but I ran in and helped out, and we ended up 2-manning it pretty easily. I normally don't help ally scum, but hey you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours.
We both emoted /thank to each other, turned in our quests, and now I'm the proud owner of the stage 1 dagger set of Fangs of the Father, the Jaws of Retribution: Fear and Vengeance. Wow, that is a very long title.
These babies are very, VERY nice. It gives you a stacking agility buff which is amazing (basically +100 agility for any fight longer than a minute). I'm pretty sure they're the sole reason why I suddenly skyrocketed to the top of the DPS meters during last night's raid. Let's just say there's a certain warlock whom I've never outDPSed up till now...and last night he was a good ~3000 DPS behind me!
One rather unfortunate thing about this legendary questline is that any rogue, and I mean ANY old scrub rogue, can get the stage 1 daggers. Since it doesn't actually require a raid boss kill (just pickpocket, which resets after a wipe anyways), a rogue can simply pay another guild to just come in for a few minutes at the 4th boss and get the item. The rest of the sneaking, etc, can be soloed.
This has led to a lot of people either asking in trade chat to come pickpocket, or raid leaders advertising that they're willing to let rogues come pickpocket for a fee. This has not been banned or anything yet, so it looks like pretty soon you'll see rogues everyone run around with the Jaws of Retribution.
At least with Dragonwrath, the previous tier legendary, you had to clear ~30 bosses in firelands before you could even get the stage 1 item. With this, however, all you need is some cash and maybe a friend who's in a raiding guild. Sigh.
Oh well, at least the stage 2 doesn't look like a terribly long grind. I'm already up to 51/333 shadowy gems. Looks like the drop rate is about 4-7 per boss, so at this rate I should have the stage 2 daggers, Maws of Oblivion, in about 6 weeks or so.
Legendary, here I come!
Sure, Thunderfury was unavailable to some folks (Actually I think besides druids, shamans and priests everyone was able to at least meet the weapon proficiency) - even if it was useless for a mage or something, he could at least use it just for bragging rights. There was no specific flavor text excluding folks like that.
Then came along other legendaries such as Atiesh and Warglaives of Azzinoth which specifically limited the legendary to certain classes. But the point is that it's always been more than one class - Atiesh was open to druids, mages, priests and warlocks, for example. Thori'dal, the legendary bow, clearly was intended for Hunters, but rogues and warriors COULD technically get it (despite the criticism some guilds received for doing so).
Well, the Fangs of the Father is rogue-specific. I don't care if warriors and hunters and shamans can use it too. You're not a rogue, you can't even get the quest.
There was a tense couple of weeks (at least for me) after the announcement of the rogue legendary where I wondered if I was going to get it or not. Legendaries are almost impossible to complete without the backing of an entire guild, as it requires multiple raid clears to collect the quest items. My status in the guild at this time was a little uncertain, as I had recently come back from a 6-month absence during which time I raided with a different guild. There were extenuating circumstances to be sure, but let's just say that there were certainly more loyal guild members than myself who did not jump ship.
Anyways, I was welcomed back with open arms and I filled a gap in the roster (namely melee DPS). I also made it clear that I was totally fine with sitting out on raids - I came back for the friendships, not to be a loot whore. I was also so overcome with gratitude for being allowed back that I damn near flooded the gbank with herbs and fish to help out with the raid supplies, and continue to do so on a regular basis.
Despite my best efforts to show the guild that I was loyal and willing to contribute, whether the guild would back me up on getting the legendary was another story. I think the deciding factor, really, was that there was simply no other rogue to give it to. I was the only main rogue, and while people had alt rogues and such, not one of the were even on the backup raid roster. I think even the veterans in the guild would've agreed that giving the legendary to an alt rogue would have been somewhat unfair.
So about a month before the new patch dropping, I did get a pesudo-confirmation that I was to receive the guild's help in getting the legendary. Woohoo! Step 1 complete.
I scoured information from the PTR related to the legendary questline and it looked pretty fun, and thankfully required minimal participation from the whole guild other than just downing bosses. Apparently there was some real roguish quests involved, requiring you to pickpocket, sap, stealth, and sneak your way into the heart of enemy territory.
As soon as the patch hit we ventured into the new raid, where I was to pickpocket the 4th boss to start off the legendary questline. The first 4 bosses were a breeze and I pickpocketed, turned it in, paid 10,000g for the next step in the quest, and waited 12 hours (also part of quest).
The next part had be stealth my way into Ravenholdt manor, which was very easy. I simply sapped and sprinted my way through the whole thing. After a pretty cool little cutscene where Deathwing's son propositions me, I made my way to the ruins of Gilneas city where I was to repeat the whole sneaking process.
Oh boy, was this one hard. I had read on the PTR forums that it was easy, but apparently they tripled the number of guards or something. The entire city was crawling with mobs, with every corner thickly covered with patrols and idle guards.
I tried my best, but after about 10 attempts where I got no further than halfway in, I gave up! I'm ashamed to admit that I used a trick where you fly in part-way, jump down, and re-stealth to get credit. I guess you can say that a rogue uses all the tricks up her sleeve to get the job done, so in a way it's ok? Whatever, I still don't feel good about it, and if I had another chance I'd like to go back and try to do it without exploits. But the thing was, I only had one night to get this done before the raid went back into Dragon Soul and I didn't want to miss any chances of getting the gem clusters (of which I need 333 for the next part of the quest).
After that, I had to solo an elite-level boss. I was checking my bags to make sure I had enough potions, bandages and whatnot, when I see an alliance rogue come up an engage the boss! It was the same rogue who I had seen wiping over and over to this guy (as evidenced by how many times he had to rez at the questgiver each time). I knew it wasn't quite fair, but I ran in and helped out, and we ended up 2-manning it pretty easily. I normally don't help ally scum, but hey you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours.
We both emoted /thank to each other, turned in our quests, and now I'm the proud owner of the stage 1 dagger set of Fangs of the Father, the Jaws of Retribution: Fear and Vengeance. Wow, that is a very long title.
These babies are very, VERY nice. It gives you a stacking agility buff which is amazing (basically +100 agility for any fight longer than a minute). I'm pretty sure they're the sole reason why I suddenly skyrocketed to the top of the DPS meters during last night's raid. Let's just say there's a certain warlock whom I've never outDPSed up till now...and last night he was a good ~3000 DPS behind me!
One rather unfortunate thing about this legendary questline is that any rogue, and I mean ANY old scrub rogue, can get the stage 1 daggers. Since it doesn't actually require a raid boss kill (just pickpocket, which resets after a wipe anyways), a rogue can simply pay another guild to just come in for a few minutes at the 4th boss and get the item. The rest of the sneaking, etc, can be soloed.
This has led to a lot of people either asking in trade chat to come pickpocket, or raid leaders advertising that they're willing to let rogues come pickpocket for a fee. This has not been banned or anything yet, so it looks like pretty soon you'll see rogues everyone run around with the Jaws of Retribution.
At least with Dragonwrath, the previous tier legendary, you had to clear ~30 bosses in firelands before you could even get the stage 1 item. With this, however, all you need is some cash and maybe a friend who's in a raiding guild. Sigh.
Oh well, at least the stage 2 doesn't look like a terribly long grind. I'm already up to 51/333 shadowy gems. Looks like the drop rate is about 4-7 per boss, so at this rate I should have the stage 2 daggers, Maws of Oblivion, in about 6 weeks or so.
Legendary, here I come!
Monday, December 5, 2011
Patch 4.3: Hour of Twilight
The title of the patch is apt, since an hour is about all it takes to see the new major content.
Mind you, I'm not complaining. I love the three new heroics they added in. Each take no more than 20-30 min to run (my record is 15 min in an all-guild run), the mechanics are interesting (yet not so punishing as the Zul's), and the rewards are very nice.
Are they a little too easy? For sure. On my rogue the content is almost trivial. Mobs die so quickly that I can actually just stunlock them for 8-10 seconds and they die silently without ever getting to hit the tank. On my priest it's less trivial, but still quiet easy - let's just say that I've yet to go oom on a pull.
End Time is probably my favorite, since you can literally finish the whole instance in under 20 minutes with a good group and the right combination of bosses. Baine, Sylvannas and Jaina can be killed with no more than 2 trash pulls each. The only one that forces you to pull multiple trash packs is Tyrande, and already that one is becoming everyone's most hated boss.
Murozond is, I think, one of the funnest fights in the expansion. It's a DPS race on speed where you get 5 bloodlusts and burn all your cooldowns with the comforting knowledge that you'll be brought back to full health and full CDs in just a few seconds. I've yet to wipe on Muro, even with the most inexperienced and craptacular DPS.
With everyone getting new gear, DPS in general seems to be improving too. I've only seen one guy pull sub-10k. Despite 10k being the benchmark for the Zandalari dungeons, 10k seems to be adequate to clear these new dungeons. It surprised me a little, as I would've thought blizzard would set the bar a little higher than this. One would expect a ilvl 370-ish player to pull at least 15k but perhaps that is unfair to the 80% of the community who have never heard of elitistjerks.com.
The ease of the new heroics has created a rather interesting conundrum actually. I've found that healing the new heroics is much, much easier than trying to heal an "oldschool" heroic dungeon.
I tried to heal a Stonecore a couple days ago, expecting it to be a breeze, and boy was I wrong. We wiped on Corborus after two DPS ate it on the dust flail. I'd also like the point out that the rogue had the audacity to say "man this game has gone downhill"...as if the game is to blame for your failure.
Whereas with all of the Hour of Twilight dungeons, I've yet to wipe because everyone seems to just be better - better at DPS, better at interrupts, better at not standing in shit...just doing better. I've only seen a handful of truly clueless people but usually the other 4 people make up for the slack. It's so easy to just chain-run 4-5 dungeons in under a couple of hours and cap out on valor, maybe pick up a couple pieces of gear and maelstrom crystals. And if the satchel is up, hey maybe I'll even get a pet or two!
As far as the other content goes, I have not experienced enough of it to say. Our guild did clear 4/8 bosses on one raid night, and we're tackling the rest of it tonight. I didn't think a full clear the first week would be doable, but it might just actually happen, we'll see. Darkmoon Faire just started yesterday and already I have a new pet. The mini games are entertaining, but nothing that I'd actually be doing if it didn't award DMF tickets.
And as for the rogue legendary...I think that deserves a post all on its own. It is, after all, legendary.
Overall a good patch! It's almost like back in wrath when heroics were a joke!
Mind you, I'm not complaining. I love the three new heroics they added in. Each take no more than 20-30 min to run (my record is 15 min in an all-guild run), the mechanics are interesting (yet not so punishing as the Zul's), and the rewards are very nice.
Are they a little too easy? For sure. On my rogue the content is almost trivial. Mobs die so quickly that I can actually just stunlock them for 8-10 seconds and they die silently without ever getting to hit the tank. On my priest it's less trivial, but still quiet easy - let's just say that I've yet to go oom on a pull.
End Time is probably my favorite, since you can literally finish the whole instance in under 20 minutes with a good group and the right combination of bosses. Baine, Sylvannas and Jaina can be killed with no more than 2 trash pulls each. The only one that forces you to pull multiple trash packs is Tyrande, and already that one is becoming everyone's most hated boss.
Murozond is, I think, one of the funnest fights in the expansion. It's a DPS race on speed where you get 5 bloodlusts and burn all your cooldowns with the comforting knowledge that you'll be brought back to full health and full CDs in just a few seconds. I've yet to wipe on Muro, even with the most inexperienced and craptacular DPS.
With everyone getting new gear, DPS in general seems to be improving too. I've only seen one guy pull sub-10k. Despite 10k being the benchmark for the Zandalari dungeons, 10k seems to be adequate to clear these new dungeons. It surprised me a little, as I would've thought blizzard would set the bar a little higher than this. One would expect a ilvl 370-ish player to pull at least 15k but perhaps that is unfair to the 80% of the community who have never heard of elitistjerks.com.
The ease of the new heroics has created a rather interesting conundrum actually. I've found that healing the new heroics is much, much easier than trying to heal an "oldschool" heroic dungeon.
I tried to heal a Stonecore a couple days ago, expecting it to be a breeze, and boy was I wrong. We wiped on Corborus after two DPS ate it on the dust flail. I'd also like the point out that the rogue had the audacity to say "man this game has gone downhill"...as if the game is to blame for your failure.
Whereas with all of the Hour of Twilight dungeons, I've yet to wipe because everyone seems to just be better - better at DPS, better at interrupts, better at not standing in shit...just doing better. I've only seen a handful of truly clueless people but usually the other 4 people make up for the slack. It's so easy to just chain-run 4-5 dungeons in under a couple of hours and cap out on valor, maybe pick up a couple pieces of gear and maelstrom crystals. And if the satchel is up, hey maybe I'll even get a pet or two!
As far as the other content goes, I have not experienced enough of it to say. Our guild did clear 4/8 bosses on one raid night, and we're tackling the rest of it tonight. I didn't think a full clear the first week would be doable, but it might just actually happen, we'll see. Darkmoon Faire just started yesterday and already I have a new pet. The mini games are entertaining, but nothing that I'd actually be doing if it didn't award DMF tickets.
And as for the rogue legendary...I think that deserves a post all on its own. It is, after all, legendary.
Overall a good patch! It's almost like back in wrath when heroics were a joke!
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