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[Entropia]

BC's heroics had hard trash, bosses weren't terribly hard.
Wrath's heroics were just straight up easy. Oculus was an annoyance though.
Cata's heroics were difficult for trash and bosses. Though I could attribute some of the difficulty to the way they changed the healing game.
MoP's weren't Wrath easy, but they're easier than BC and Cata. I think they were the optimal difficulty.

 

[cartoon_soldier]

BC's heroics had hard trash, bosses weren't terribly hard.
Wrath's heroics were just straight up easy. Oculus was an annoyance though.
Cata's heroics were difficult for trash and bosses. Though I could attribute some of the difficulty to the way they changed the healing game.
MoP's weren't Wrath easy, but they're easier than BC and Cata. I think they were the optimal difficulty.

Agreed, Cata felt harder due to two issues:
1. Healing changes
2. LFD ilvl requirement was probably not optimal for heroics

Healers and tanks got blamed a lot in LFD groups from what I remember.

But then I quit Cata 4 weeks into reaching level 85.

I think the jump in difficulty was jarring from Wrath to Cata, not just for heroics but I felt also for raiding. Loved Ulduar and ICC, hated Cata raids.

 

[Tremas]

That timed heroic shattered halls run as part of the tempest key quest chain represented the pinnacle of heroics for me. Every pull had to be premeditated and CC'ing needed to be perfect.

 

[cartoon_soldier]

103 mounts! yay

Not sure how I can get to 150 without spending shitload of money

 

[Bisnic]

103 mounts! yay

Not sure how I can get to 150 without spending shitload of money

I got 158 mounts and i don't have any Trading card mounts, or those being sold for over 30k, or any raiding ones for that matter. My rarest ones being Raven Lord, Blue/Green/Violet Proto Drake, the one that drop in Stratholme, the bug mount from archaeology and the Hallow End/Brewfest ones. My most expensive ones being a Jade Panther from JC and the Mammoth with vendors.

Don't forget about PVP mounts sold for honor points, or even the ones that drop in AQ. That's 3-4 easily obtainable free mounts.

 

[Peachpies]

But it's LFR. That's the whole point of it - it's essentially 25-man instances.

Since when have you needed to do any sort of work in a 5-man instance? Even day 1, you could completely ignore mechanics (except on very specific fights, but even then those mechanics are guided).

That is already the case with lfr though. If you aren't able to beat a game (or raid in this case) you can either lower the difficulty or play better. The difficulty level of lfr is already so low that if you lower it more you end up with something like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7f3HDsgLV68 where you can't lose. Is asking people to do 1 or 2 things to defeat a boss really too much? And if it is then why even ask them to stand there dpsing a boss for 8 minutes if the outcome is the same every time? The problem with lfr is player attitude not the difficulty. If you consider a 2+ hour lfr run if people had taken 15 minutes to look up the fights before joining and spent a little time on learning how to play their class you would probably be spending a lot less time total and it would be much more enjoyable. And that 15 minutes spent learning applies to future runs of the same wing and that knowledge can be used for running flex or normal. Lowering the difficulty might make lfr runs a bit shorter in the short term but it is not a long term solution and it will not improve the attitude of players and might even make it worse as increasingly poor play is being rewarded.

 

[TimeKillr]

That is already the case with lfr though. If you aren't able to beat a game (or raid in this case) you can either lower the difficulty or play better. The difficulty level of lfr is already so low that if you lower it more you end up with something like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7f3HDsgLV68 where you can't lose. Is asking people to do 1 or 2 things to defeat a boss really too much? And if it is then why even ask them to stand there dpsing a boss for 8 minutes if the outcome is the same every time? The problem with lfr is player attitude not the difficulty. If you consider a 2+ hour lfr run if people had taken 15 minutes to look up the fights before joining and spent a little time on learning how to play their class you would probably be spending a lot less time total and it would be much more enjoyable. And that 15 minutes spent learning applies to future runs of the same wing and that knowledge can be used for running flex or normal. Lowering the difficulty might make lfr runs a bit shorter in the short term but it is not a long term solution and it will not improve the attitude of players and might even make it worse as increasingly poor play is being rewarded.

I think the problem lies in the fact that there's a TON of player who simply don't give a shit.

They don't want to learn fights. They're not there to master mechanics, they're not there to be challenged or to learn. They're there to play. To have dumb fun, and to not feel left out by not seeing content.

THAT is who LFR is for. Dumbing down the mechanics for these people, where the most they have to do is get out of the fire after being warned for a good second. It's okay to still have some stuff, but it can't be punishing. And that's only for DPS - what if you're a tank? You'd think tanks would want to know more about fights, right? Nope. And that's why tank switching mechanics are sometimes weird in LFR, and they're also typically a lot less punishing.

If a fight like the Shaman didn't have a tank swap, you'd still have 2 active tanks, and you'd just demand less from them, like LFR should. The Shaman tank swap is complex because you need to be somewhat timed, which demands coordination from 2 people who aren't necessarily able to communicate at all.

Galakras demands that people know the fight and go into the towers. If you don't know it, you're screwed. The amount of times I've wiped on LFR Galakras because either a healer didn't go up to heal an undergeared tank, or no tank went up, etc. are IMMENSE. That mechanic demands coordination and understanding of mechanics that can't really be learned on the fly.

Nazgrim demands that you know what adds to DPS and what adds to interrupt, which is something nobody really had to do during all of MoP, so why is it still so punishing if it isn't performed correctly?

That's what I'm getting at. I'm all in agreement that people SHOULD take the time to learn fights, to understand them, to learn to play better, because that's what playing a game is to us. But to a lot of these players, it's just time spent off relaxing and wanting to see the content without needing the time commitment for normal raiding, or even flex raiding.

Flex uses the exact same mechanics as normal, they're just less punishing. The fights on flex require coordination. Fights in LFR shouldn't require coordination, they should just require personal awareness. That's my opinion anyway.

 

[Kraftwerk]

Shit, I might have to buy a lottery ticket tonight.

Had glaive drop from Illidan and a my final binding from Baron. So happy :0

 

[CassSept]

Heroic Underbog .. never forget.

Those mobs near the end that would one shot you .

So gud

Shattered Halls.


.

 

[Entropia]

Tanking Garrosh on LFR has been fun... :3

 

[Touch]

that feel when you see someone get the horseman reins in your group

 

[LAUGHTREY]

I got 158 mounts and i don't have any Trading card mounts, or those being sold for over 30k, or any raiding ones for that matter. My rarest ones being Raven Lord, Blue/Green/Violet Proto Drake, the one that drop in Stratholme, the bug mount from archaeology and the Hallow End/Brewfest ones. My most expensive ones being a Jade Panther from JC and the Mammoth with vendors.

Don't forget about PVP mounts sold for honor points, or even the ones that drop in AQ. That's 3-4 easily obtainable free mounts.

The BC rep ones as well. Skyguard can take a few hours, and Netherwing is easy.

All the reps in Pandaria give a good amount of mounts as well.

 

[Gentleman Jack]

Tanking Garrosh on LFR has been fun... :3

Garrosh is a fun encounter but it gets really stressful learning it with a new group. We managed to stick together like a normal 25 man by and large but by the end of the 4th wing we did not have any of the tanks we started with. Our first pull was so short we didn't even get a stack of Determination for our trouble. That's what we get for not telling people to dps down the engineer I guess.

 

[JCizzle]

Shit, I might have to buy a lottery ticket tonight.

Had glaive drop from Illidan and a my final binding from Baron. So happy :0

Wowow. Crazy lucky. Major congrats!

 

[Ultratech]

Wing 4 LFR report!
(Note: I did this in a premade, so obviously, expect worse or whatever with randoms.)

Trash: Fuck trash. So yeah, you have to do the same trash as going to Spoils again.
Fun times.

Siegecrafter: Wasn't too bad. I think part of that had to do with the fact that we had really good DPS.
Conveyor Belts are still around, but I didn't mess with 'em.
Should be good with sending one or two guys down to deal with that.

Trash: Eh. Nothing too terrible.

Spoiler

Poor Kovok. ;_;

Paragons: One-shotted it without really knowing what we had gotten ourselves into.
So it went better than what I've heard/read about in Flex and above.
Kill 'em one at a time, pay attention, and it's not bad.

Trash: OH GOD. So yeah, if you actually use CC, and pull one at a time, it's really easy.
If you don't CC...welp, you better get busy dying

Garrosh: So funny story: Our first attempt ended with our ranged not knowing where the engineers were. Ended so quick, we didn't even get a stack of Determination.
After that though, we managed to beat it. Seems like a lot of crap going on, though I was pretty much stuck on the boss most of the time.
Hilariously enough, we got the Strike! achievement after beating the fight, so that'll probably get fixed quickly.

Then I finally got to finish the Legendary questline (finally!) and that quest at the end of SoO.
Good times.

 

[profit]

I've not kept up with LFR releases, but EU still has to wait another week? That cant be right...

Edit: apparently it'll unlock later in the morning. Was confused because the realms were already available.

 

[mclem]

Yeah tanking was a different game in TBC.

If you didn't have a Prot Pally for that place you were screwed.

I miss the more hybridization that existed back then. Like, one of the BIS weapons for a Prot Pally was a caster mace because it gave more threat and such. Wish Blizz didn't move away from that.

It was kinda fundamentally broken, though, in that the entirety of our threat at the time was down to the weapon, since none of the rest of our gear would be itemised with spell power - and conversely, it meant that one of our slots was wasted when it came to actual tanking stats - It effectively meant we had to plan around having one fewer tanking item than any other tank.

That and I don't think the mages/shadow priests/warlocks were overjoyed about me stealing 'their' spell power weaponry

 

[mclem]

BC's heroics had hard trash, bosses weren't terribly hard.

Worth bearing in mind that BC's heroics were gated behind a rep grind; you weren't getting fresh 70's diving into them.

Is asking people to do 1 or 2 things to defeat a boss really too much?

I'm going to guess that you've never raided with a group where a signfiicant proportion don't speak your language

 

[strafer]

Man, Blizzcon is so close. I can taste it.

 

[Entropia]

Worth bearing in mind that BC's heroics were gated behind a rep grind; you weren't getting fresh 70's diving into them.

I'm going to guess that you've never raided with a group where a signfiicant proportion don't speak your language

This is true. Though the gear you got from heroics were the same as what you got from the normal mode in some cases (i.e. the level 70 ones), and the only upgrades were from the end bosses.

I actually liked how for the heroics for the lower level normal ones, they had entirely different items rather than just "Heroic" added to it and the appropriate ilvl.

Garrosh: So funny story: Our first attempt ended with our ranged not knowing where the engineers were. Ended so quick, we didn't even get a stack of Determination.
After that though, we managed to beat it. Seems like a lot of crap going on, though I was pretty much stuck on the boss most of the time.
Hilariously enough, we got the Strike! achievement after beating the fight, so that'll probably get fixed quickly.

Sounds like the run I was in as well. I think we had 5 stacks of determination on us before we got it, and same thing we got the Strike! achievement.

That had to be one of the more satisfying kills I've had in LFR since it came out.

It was kinda fundamentally broken, though, in that the entirety of our threat at the time was down to the weapon, since none of the rest of our gear would be itemised with spell power - and conversely, it meant that one of our slots was wasted when it came to actual tanking stats - It effectively meant we had to plan around having one fewer tanking item than any other tank.

That and I don't think the mages/shadow priests/warlocks were overjoyed about me stealing 'their' spell power weaponry

In a way, it is. However, I think given the current state of the game I don't see why Blizzard doesn't try for this type of hybridization again. I'm actually surprised too that they didn't go back to having leather with tanking stats on them like they did in BC now that there are two leather classes that can tank.

 

[zulfate]

Man, Blizzcon is so close. I can taste it.

Especially how big this blizzcon will be. I cant wait to see what blizz will do with wow this time around.

 

[strafer]

Especially how big this blizzcon will be. I cant wait to see what blizz will do with wow this time around.

Yeah, so much stuff.

The movie.
The future
new exp

and maybe some pics of the new player models

 

[Entropia]

I'm really looking forward to:

1) The next/new WoW Expansion

- Depending what's new and everything they generally have a computer booth area setup where you can play some of the new content.​

2) Playing Heroes of the Storm
3) Meeting/getting drunk with TheYanger
4) The WoW Movie details
5) Partying
6) The other Blizzard games.

 

[Fjordson]

Can't wait to find out about the next expansion. MoP has gotten me back into the game in a big way.

 

[aesop]

I really hate the loot system in flex and LFR. While it's miles better than begging someone for a trade like in DS, the fact that I can go weeks without a decent drop is frustrating as fuck.

Plus I've got nothing but gold with my coin rolls. That's frustrating as hell on two levels:
1. Fuck! Gold again!
2. Fuck! Why did I waste the coin in a non-normal run?!

/rant

 

[profit]

Just finished the last LFR part, we one shot everything. Garrosh was a fun fight though; can't wait to do it in Flex.

 

[Rösti]

Still haven't found a solution to this. If anyone here can check if it's possible to get WoW running in 640 × 480 screen resolution. It worked up until the most recent patch, but now when I set gxResolution to "640x480" the game just reverts back to 1280x1024 (highest my monitor can go in full screen) for some reason.

I've tried changing gxMaximize and gxWindow in various ways, does nothing. It'd be nice to find out if this is due to changes in WoW or has something to do with my computer. I never got an answer from Blizzard so it's hard to know.

Also, got first tier piece today (from Niuzao):

 

[Gentleman Jack]

Trash: OH GOD. So yeah, if you actually use CC, and pull one at a time, it's really easy.
If you don't CC...welp, you better get busy dying

Our tanks pulled the last 3 packs together. We died so fast that all the manifestations hadn't reset yet and we were swarmed by double the unkillable mobs on the runback. We must have wiped four times to Garrosh trash.

Then I finally got to finish the Legendary questline (finally!) and that quest at the end of SoO.
Good times.

Feels good having an empty questlog. Well I have one quest but fuck pet battles.

 

[Orochinagis]

So mmmm anyone wants to play the heartstone beta? I got a spare code.

 

[Adzin]

So mmmm anyone wants to play the heartstone beta? I got a spare code.

I would love a Hearthstone beta code if it's still available!

 

[sqwarlock]

Just watched this video (it's in two parts) over the course of yesterday and today. Probably the best compilation of pre-WoW in-game lore I've seen. Very high quality, nice edits, and nobody talking over the top of it.

The History of Warcraft (Pre-WoW) Part 1 & Part 2

 

[Orochinagis]

I would love a Hearthstone beta code if it's still available!

Sure thing PM'ed you.

 

[Anbokr]

so made 20k gold today and got my 540 trinket off thok, what a great day

 

[Entropia]

Got a belt off Ordos and tier gloves from Yu'lon, yay!

 

[zulfate]

Yeah, so much stuff.

The movie.
The future
new exp

and maybe some pics of the new player models

I'm really looking forward to:

1) The next/new WoW Expansion

- Depending what's new and everything they generally have a computer booth area setup where you can play some of the new content.​

2) Playing Heroes of the Storm
3) Meeting/getting drunk with TheYanger
4) The WoW Movie details
5) Partying
6) The other Blizzard games.

Can't wait to find out about the next expansion. MoP has gotten me back into the game in a big way.

fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu excitement time! too bad i am not buying a virtual ticket because i hate that its on a Friday and i have work i refuse to pay for something if i dont get the whole package! i know i can watch it later but it wont feel the same :/ GAF better have some good impressions lol.

i only pray that blizz does something a bit more with the professions they're something else, fuck lol.

Get ready for that free 2 play announcement i am calling it lol.

 

[Neki]

Just did Garrosh on LFR, that final cutscene with Varian, such a bad ass. Why am I not Alliance anymore?

 

[Dot50Cal]

Our guild runs have finally stabilized and we one shot every boss up to Iron Juggernaut in less than 2 hours. On our last lockout we got to Malkorok, so I'm hoping we down him at the least and move onto spoils.

I swapped to Destruction as well and got my 4pc with some 540 gear from flex raids, loving the 4pc proc! Sha of Pride was especially ridiculous with launching tons of chaos bolts onto the boss when the adds spawned, I ended up doing around 260,000 DPS. I notice the spec suffers a bit compared to affliction in some fights (Protectors), but its not by such a huge margin. On most others, Destruction is higher in DPS.

Also happy cause I finally crossed the 550ilvl mark, at 551 equipped now. Yay!

Did a normal scenario too, the one where you reclaim the horde camp in Krasarang. At the end part where you have four waves of enemies coming out..just for shits and giggles I pulled everything and ended up doing around 1.5million DPS, barely lived but we did it in just a couple seconds. Destruction AOE is so retardedly OP with the 2 and 4pc procs. Crits Galore!

 

[LAUGHTREY]

Just watched this video (it's in two parts) over the course of yesterday and today. Probably the best compilation of pre-WoW in-game lore I've seen. Very high quality, nice edits, and nobody talking over the top of it.

The History of Warcraft (Pre-WoW) Part 1 & Part 2

It's also longer than all 3 LotR movies.

 

[Fjordson]

Just watched this video (it's in two parts) over the course of yesterday and today. Probably the best compilation of pre-WoW in-game lore I've seen. Very high quality, nice edits, and nobody talking over the top of it.

The History of Warcraft (Pre-WoW) Part 1 & Part 2

Oh wow, totally gonna watch this. Thanks mate.

 

[TimeKillr]

So I hit 1mil HP last night, raid buffed but not flasked... Felt so nice

We're gonna hit Malkorok tonight on normal. We did him on Flex last night just to get used to the mechanics, and our raid team is getting better at it, but I still have to instruct them to get behind me for Heart of Y'Shaarj.

It's a very straightforward fight, really. Nothing much to do about it! Spoils looks... weird. Like my challenge is going to be to open crates quickly enough, I think.

 

[mclem]

So I hit 1mil HP last night, raid buffed but not flasked... Felt so nice

We're gonna hit Malkorok tonight on normal. We did him on Flex last night just to get used to the mechanics, and our raid team is getting better at it, but I still have to instruct them to get behind me for Heart of Y'Shaarj.

It's a very straightforward fight, really. Nothing much to do about it! Spoils looks... weird. Like my challenge is going to be to open crates quickly enough, I think.

I've fallen into a pattern of crate-opening that fits the fight from Flex, I'm assuming that the same pattern should - on paper - work fine in Normal. We'll see how it goes.

...not that I'm there yet. Cleared seven SoO bosses yesterday, on par with our previous best single-day run, but we've never had a proper raid day on Nazgrim yet, so we'll see how it pans out.

(In fact, for good measure, I've *never* killed Nazgrim on any difficulty. Admittedly I've only had one night of attempts on Flex before our focus moved more towards Normals, but still...)

 

[Bisnic]

So what exactly NEEDS to be done on the Spoils fight? My LFR group wiped like 4 times on that fight because for some reason the whole group died suddenly every time. And on the 5th attempt, everything seemed to be fine for some reason.

 

[mclem]

So what exactly NEEDS to be done on the Spoils fight? My LFR group wiped like 4 times on that fight because for some reason the whole group died suddenly every time. And on the 5th attempt, everything seemed to be fine for some reason.

Kill sufficient enemies to release the lever, then hit the lever, twice each, for two independent groups, within a time limit.

 

[Entropia]

So what exactly NEEDS to be done on the Spoils fight? My LFR group wiped like 4 times on that fight because for some reason the whole group died suddenly every time. And on the 5th attempt, everything seemed to be fine for some reason.

On each side, you need to get 50 energy by killing the mobs in the crates. How much you get depends on the size crate's mob. So you need to kill the 2 big guys, most of the mediums and most of the small ones. Then you hit the lever and go through the gate and repeat.

 

[TimeKillr]

I've fallen into a pattern of crate-opening that fits the fight from Flex, I'm assuming that the same pattern should - on paper - work fine in Normal. We'll see how it goes.

...not that I'm there yet. Cleared seven SoO bosses yesterday, on par with our previous best single-day run, but we've never had a proper raid day on Nazgrim yet, so we'll see how it pans out.

(In fact, for good measure, I've *never* killed Nazgrim on any difficulty. Admittedly I've only had one night of attempts on Flex before our focus moved more towards Normals, but still...)

What's your pattern for that? I'm curious. When we were trying it on Flex last night the dude who coordinates our raid strategy was saying the order is "Green crates -> One big crate -> All the smalls and mediums", but that just feels a bit weird, because it *feels* like the big crate takes so little time to burn down that you'd be better off killing the 2 big crates first, then doing the mediums and finishing with all the smalls you need...

And Nazgrim on Flex or Normal is pretty easy, really. The *one* thing to make sure you do is space your tanks evenly, kill banners, interrupt warshamans and kill the assassins asap. Other than that, it's a basic awareness fight. You should never get a Ravager, very few war songs, tons of banners and tons of leaps.

Our trick for it was to make sure that me and my co-tank were spaced evenly, at maximum range for taunt, so that we could taunt off on 3 stacks instead of the normal 4 that it should be. The extra range he has to walk takes about 1-2 seconds, and that's always enough to clear the sunders from us, which doesn't lead to us wiping the raid with back to back war songs.

Once you get that down, it's literally just a matter of making sure your raid has awareness and is burning down the correct shit. (and not hitting during defensive stance, which is where you get rid of any extraneous adds).

Lust once he reaches 11% and you're in the clear.

The following bosses are pretty simple, too - Malkorok is incredibly straightforward, Spoils is a trash fight and Thok is just LOL (you barely need awareness for it).

 

[Bisnic]

On each side, you need to get 50 energy by killing the mobs in the crates. How much you get depends on the size crate's mob. So you need to kill the 2 big guys, most of the mediums and most of the small ones. Then you hit the lever and go through the gate and repeat.

So why did everyone die all of the sudden, making us wipe a couple of times? Because some dumbass click on the lever when we didn't have 50 energy? Because the DPS was too low and we hit the time limit?

 

[mclem]

What's your pattern for that? I'm curious. When we were trying it on Flex last night the dude who coordinates our raid strategy was saying the order is "Green crates -> One big crate -> All the smalls and mediums", but that just feels a bit weird, because it *feels* like the big crate takes so little time to burn down that you'd be better off killing the 2 big crates first, then doing the mediums and finishing with all the smalls you need...

That's a lot more movement than I'm comfortable with. I generally take the Mogu quarter first, and I'll run off to start on the green crate near the gate while sending a rogue or hunter off to the other green crate to open it up and MD/tricks the mob over to me. From there I basically work clockwise, opening crates when I'm comfortable. From that position, you'll get two small crates you can start on while finishing off the panda mobs, then you're straight into the first big one. When he's lowish I'll take down the next one near me and so on. When we hit the second large crate we have heroism on our side (we always find Mogu much tougher than Klaxxi).

Doing it this way, when we reach the far wall medium crate, there's only about 4-5 more units of energy needed, which I'll grab selectively from the crates on the other side. Flex isn't particularly representative, but I've been known to get there with a full minute remaining on the clock.

On top of that, going with a regular system allows you to get used to the crate contents - I don't *think* they're randomised - that allows a little bit of preparation for the Anima golems, which can be dangerous unless you work around the healing ability.

Klaxxi side is basically the same; I hit the green crate by the gate while sending a MDer over to the other one, then we work anticlockwise through that.

It sounds to me like your method simply requires far too much running around; you don't need to be that selective, and the time saved by opening crates that are near to one another would probably be beneficial in the long run.

 

[mclem]

So why did everyone die all of the sudden, making us wipe a couple of times? Because some dumbass click on the lever when we didn't have 50 energy? Because the DPS was too low and we hit the time limit?

Presumably the time limit. There's a clock on the top-centre of the screen by default, and various voice emotes about defense systems being fully online just before everything goes boom. Clicking the lever early is simply impossible, wouldn't cause direct issues.

 

[Bisnic]

Presumably the time limit. There's a clock on the top-centre of the screen by default, and various voice emotes about defense systems being fully online just before everything goes boom. Clicking the lever early is simply impossible, wouldn't cause direct issues.

I see... i guess next time i should queue as DPS rather than healer, because wiping 4 times on a fight that simple is stupid. If that means replacing a potential shitty DPS doing 30k DPS to my paladin doing 100k more DPS, then so be it.

 

[strafer]

Holy shit. MEGATON.