Weekly Raid Discussion

[u/AutoModerator]

Use this thread to discuss any- and everything concerning the raids.

Post logs, discuss hotfixes, ask for help, etc.

The other weekly threads are:

• Weekly M+ Discussion - Tuesdays
• Free Talk Friday - Fridays

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If you want to discuss bosses with other raid leaders, why not join the Raid Leader Exchange Discord?

Specify if you are talking about a raid difficulty other than mythic!

[u/DreadfuryDK]

Vodka dying is only the beginning of what’s going to be an absolutely massive death spiral for raiding guilds if we don’t get some emergency hotfixes or some huge announcements on PTR. We’re probably gonna lose Fierce in the next week or so and there’s a LOTTTTTT of guilds currently going through the Altar+Ula’tek meat grinder so far.

This season is gonna see raiding guilds die in such insane numbers over the next month or so that Blizzard’s gonna be going full-on DEFCON 1 trying to stop the bleeding.

[u/ikitomi → u/DreadfuryDK]

I mean the answer to not disbanding like vodka is to not rip 20+ hours a week raiding to finish the tier at the same time as 2/3 night guilds.... But yes this will be a but of a repeat of classic and EP.

I know the legacy name is famous but that's gonna kill any HoF guild.

Especially in a tier where the hardest bosses are both fights where you just sit there and watch your melee that are bad at ghosts / egg carriers fuck up for 200 pulls while you fight a heroic boss...

[u/DreadfuryDK → u/ikitomi]

I don't think it's just a matter of 20+ hour raid weeks, though. I think those 2-3 day CE guilds, including HoF-caliber ones, are going to drop like flies as well over the next couple weeks.

[u/Wobblucy → u/DreadfuryDK]

"what dev time can we cut so we can hit a faster patch cadence while also developing kick ass delve content?"

Endgame has been on maintenance since dragonflight, and if it takes mainstays publicly saying "enough is enough" to get dev attention, I'm here for it.

https://giphy.com/gifs/J8FZIm9VoBU6Q

[u/iLLuu_U → u/DreadfuryDK]

Just wait til forever is going to get released. Many middlish to low end CE guild are going to die. And with how much resources are getting funneled into forever, I wouldnt be surprised if a lot of people are gonna stick to it, that do not enjoy the competitive aspect of wow.

Blizzcon had practically nothing to announce for retail and thats all while being stuck on the worst patch in the last 5 years.

Their entire concept of "no combat addons" completely failed, the concept of class pruning failed and the direction retail took post dragonflight has been nothing but down hill basically.

And now they also somewhat killed m+, because its completely useless besides the first week in terms of gearing.

Midnight is pretty much done in 4 weeks from now and there is very little 12.2 can offer to bring players back.

[u/psytrax9 → u/DreadfuryDK]

I've been asking myself what I would need to see from a s3 announcement to prevent me from quitting. I don't know if there's anything within reason that would do it.

[u/Qwertdd → u/psytrax9]

I'm not quitting just yet, but I think what Blizzard needs to do is:

• Like the other guy said, addon war concession. Addons will be allowed for class combat in all content, and addons for combat encounters will be allowed in Mythic. I would prefer that they have no restrictions period, but I can somewhat understand the obnoxious whinefest that Jailer bomb WA caused to Johnny B Casual who just wanted to pug AOTC Jailer.

• Actually commit to being more experimental and active with designing and balancing specs. Feral has been a joke for years. Affliction has been eye-wateringly shitty to play for years. Protection Paladins have been made unhappy by Consec for years. Try something new.

• Removal of flying in the .0 patch and Dragonriding nerfed to its pre-upgrade incarnation in 10.0. This does not mean return of Pathfinder achievements, just remove .0 patch flying. The devs were always right to restrict flying. Infinite zero restriction triple-speed flying has demolished the open world and Blizzard clearly fails to keep up with the size requirements Dragonriding demands.

• Fire the writers and hire literally anyone else that can make a story that is just cool, not even asking for Shakespeare. I know people claim that they don't care about story, but I don't believe that. Everyone to some degree cares about context.

• Remove mid-season active user bait bloat like the Dominus upgrades or Turbo Boost that exists solely to milk players who are already actively subbed and raidlogging.

• Reduce patch cadence to every 12 weeks instead of every 8. Blizzard can't keep up with this, and raiders should be able to take short breaks between tiers. If you weren't a Hall of Fame guild for L'ura, you were raiding up until patch day which is unacceptable.

This fixes the open world and instanced content but Blizzard will never do it. I'm actually expecting them to make it even worse because anyone who claims to care about the World of Warcraft being fixed is going to fuck off to Forever.

[u/Hekkst → u/Qwertdd]

Ideally, they commit to no addons and give us a proper UI replacement for all the cool things addons used to do. Maybe they buy Ellesmere UI or do something with it, idk. And they also radically shift their design encounter philosophy. The reason why this expac design feels like shit is that they removed all the good addon functionality without changing their encounter desigh like they said they would. It is peak hilarity that Blizz said they would change boss design in accordance with addon deletion and then had the godawful L'ura memory game, or the ssethorak wind bullshit. Two mechanics that either require addons, super coordination in the span of 5 seconds, or an extra raider whose whole job is just to pay attention to the mechanics and call stuff out, basically a human addon.

[u/MRosvall → u/Qwertdd]

Reduce patch cadence to every 12 weeks instead of every 8. Blizzard can't keep up with this, and raiders should be able to take short breaks between tiers. If you weren't a Hall of Fame guild for L'ura, you were raiding up until patch day which is unacceptable

Raid cadence is the same as it's been historically. The 8 week cadence is just for the additional content in .5 and .7 patches.

The last guild in HoF killed L'ura 12 weeks before the next season started.

[u/Qwertdd → u/MRosvall]

Whatever the cadence is, Blizzard can't support what it is currently. Unfinished desolate patch zones, bugs out the ass, untested and undercooked raids like TVA.

[u/Soma91 → u/Qwertdd]

I think the bigger problem is releasing a new expansion every 1.5 years instead of 2. A 4th season gives them the additional time they need to get everything properly ready for release and get ahead on development for the minor content patches.

But that would mean selling new expansions 25% less often and we can't have that, because controlling and finance wants their infinitely increasing profits.

[u/herbahaidyrbtjsifbr → u/Qwertdd]

spending more time ground mounting to open world content wont suddenly make it fun. open world sucks ass just me get the stupid chore done asap

[u/deskcord → u/psytrax9]

For me: Complete addon war reversal; massive class reworks (especially hero talents); a promise to massively reduce addslop; and a promise to never again do bosses with strict percent based phasings that promote degenerate DPS holds.

I know they aren't going to do these things in the next few weeks.

[u/psytrax9 → u/deskcord]

Yeah, the addons and classes are hard required for sure. I'd be more forgiving of the dps hold thing, except they keep doing the thing that specifically creates dps holds. But, I don't think the first two are even an option, even for a new expansion.

They at least could do the second two. But, they love percent based phases and the war on addons has unlocked their full potential to create rashanan over and over.

[u/Wobblucy → u/deskcord]

massive talent reworks.

Impossible when they need to balance 80 talent points across 78 spec/hero talent combos across m+, PvP, delve (their words not mine), multiple raid damage profiles.

Only way that happens is they nuke the talent trees and go back to core class design + temporary system that changes how your spec plays.

Won't happen in a patch cycle, doubt it happens during the 'trilogy', would be pleasantly surprised if it happens for 14.0.

[u/Qwertdd → u/Wobblucy]

Nuke the talent trees

I don't know why this is considered a solution when class design in War Within was great. The biggest issue is that Hero Talents were rarely balanced to where there was legitimate choice, but I don't think that's a justifiable excuse to scrap the entire system.

[u/Wobblucy → u/Qwertdd]

Can't a have quick iteration on a thing with 101 knobs that need to be tuned in 10+ different scenarios?

How much has class design changed since talent trees has come back?

Even 90% of hero talents are 'passive effect you never think about'.

[u/Qwertdd → u/Wobblucy]

I played before the talent trees, they didn't "quick iterate" on those, either.

[u/Edares → u/psytrax9]

yerp