Yea, being stuck with a poorly designed dungeon for months at a time has taken its toll on me. Because let's face it. As a caster we have one of the easiest jobs in the world. To sum it up here's a guide to being a succesful casting raider in Trial of the (G)Crusader:
1. Learn your rotation
2. Dont stand in x/stand in x
3. Know your kill priority.
Granted, some casters are easier off than others. Arcane Mages have one of the most mindless rotations I've ever laid my eyes upon while affliction warlocks do require a bit of timing and practice if you want to squeeze everything out of your abilities. But my point is that even a tunnelvisioning idiot can be a somewhat succesful player in this place, hell he might even do pretty good.
Ulduar stands as a shining example of what I expect from Blizzard. Fights varying massively in
difficulty, the choice to turn it up a notch by going with a keeper less or pressing that shiny red button all adds up to an instance where both the idiots and the great players will find themselves
amused for countless hours.
Oh, how I loved Ulduar. 2 fights in particular stand out as far as me being a caster goes. Yogg+1 and Firefighter. Both fights required for me to constantly think on my feet - Controlling the fire, managing your distance to the rest of the raid all the while maintaining your maxDPS. And Yogg Saron simply has enough special abilities for it to remain one of the 2 greatest fights in wotlk history.
If there's one thing I believe should be a main concern of the developing team it's the fact that in
pretty much every single encounter, healers are the ones that are "worst" off.
To show you guys what I mean I chose to use my legendary paint skills to visualize the process from the first time you meet a boss 'till the attempt where it falls to the ground!
As clearly shown on the graph to the left, tanks
and DPS reach the point where they're "ready" to kill the boss way sooner than our beloved healers.
It shows my estimate of the progress of each team on average while fighting a boss of x difficulty.
The perfect encounter in my eyes is when f(x) = g(x) = q(x). When each of the roles are - more or less - equal in difficulty to each other.
Every once in a blue moon Blizzard really manages to hit the spot and create an encounter that, in my eyes, is perfect. And it's the moments where my team mate and I overcome these challenges that keeps me from deleting this game.
Ok, finally gonna post my reply (Been trying for 2 times now, and always closed the window before posting, cause I am that cool.
SvarSletI think that the perfect encounter would be an encounter where every class, and roll should all have a way to improve themselves untill the ultimate. During our guild runs we had a few problems with heroic Anub, even though the boss isnt hard at all. We were wiping for it for a good 3 days, every time we faced him, going a little bit harder, dps improving by small margins, tanks picking up adds faster, healers dividing CD's better. After all the fail we had, we all got better at the encounter. I would not mind having the healers too actually catch up with the dps or the tanks, I dont care if they progress slower then the other roles, I only care if they have to push it to the limits.
Ulduar was one of the most epic experiences in WoW for me so far. I am a nubcake in WoW raiding, only raided a bit in TBC doing Kara, but getting more pro during wotlk, and now being part of Finding Emo, one of the most succesfull 10 man 'strict' guilds that is around right now. During the first week of Ulduar I never had that much fun, cause it was the first hard thing we ever had to face before. We were doing 10mans only with a dieing guild, only with the most epic core left.
During all the wiping we did on all the bugged bosses and trash, I found that Mimiron was the most epic experience. I mean, the trash took a good 1 hour to clear. Mimiron itself was heavily bugged, did twice the damage it is doing now on normal mode, mines oneshotting everyone, mines spawning more often, mines not despawning, mines not visibly, bomb bots doing loads more damage.. (Can go on if you want too), so basicly, it was hard.
Really, really hard. And after progressing during this encounter, getting faster kills, fewer deaths, I noticed that it did not matter who had the hardest job during this encounter. The fact that you are dedicated a role in a raid, does not mean that you are not part of the raid anymore. Making sure you feel that group feeling during your kill is very important. This made Mimiron the most epic fight for me so far, also due to the fact that we were doing this with the core that was left, the fun core, from a guild that was sick, and was about to die.
Yes, togc10 was hard without any 25man gear and without wiping once. But the 'immortal' raids are just not as epic, cause it only is based on luck, and the people you got around you that moment. It gives a boost of adrenaline if you try for this achievment, but it just isnt fun enough.
Give me a hard encounter in ICC. Preferably the first fraeking boss, make him impossible to kill. Arthas saying: "HIGUYS, GL!". I know this wont happen though. Just hope the lich king will be a epic experience, on normal and heroic version.
I hope they will, I dont think they have. It is clear to me, that the moment ICC is not a succes like Ulduar, then the game ends for me. I basicly raided a year for only 2-3 weeks of really fun raids. If this is the way WoW will be for hardcore raiders, then, nvm, and logoff.
(I hope I made some sense, I am a lil drunk :D)
-Kanro
If you have good healers (very rare as they have to work as a team) it is probably the easiest role to learn.
SvarSletI do agree with Ulduar. It actually managed to make players think about encounters. This makes it nunfortunately not a good place to test out new/trial people.
Quiddle
Oh messed up there. Ment ToGC is awful place to test new people.
SvarSletYou can actually see if people arent total fucking retards in ToGC, but that is basicly it. Really testing is nearly impossible, although you can offcourse check out response time, group play, numbers on recount, or other stuff like getting ice down on Anub, or kiting Anub during submerge like a freaking pro.
SvarSlet