05-28-2008, 04:46 AM
Here's a wild theory on my part:
When Blizzard initially launched the game, they thought raid content would appeal to a small, devoted, "hardcore" gamer crowd, while the so-called "casual" players would be happy with 5-15 player instances and everything else.
Then the game became more popular than they probably ever dreamed, and they discovered that a lot of those "casual" players wanted to see all the content as well.
This has led to a bit of a dilemma for Blizzard: how do you make as much of your content as accessible to as many people as possible, while still maintaining challenging content for even the most cutting edge guilds?
The Burning Crusade is pretty much a case study of Blizzard zig-zagging between these goals. Capping the maximum raid size at 25 people made content *more* accessible (by reducing the logistical barriers to raiding); devising long and complicated attunement quest chains made content *less* accessible - until the point where they decided to remove them, and then suddenly boatloads more guilds were in SSC/TK/Hyjal/Black Temple.
The Sunwell Plateau requires no attunements. Its just flat out hard - hard enough to satisfy even the most bleeding edge of guilds. However I do expect a larger proportion of guilds to complete Sunwell than say Naxxramas because they will have longer to work on it before the expansion (best guess for release date - November or December).
I think Blizzard has made enough statements to the effect that they want people to see the content they create, they want players to feel part of the world. They've said they made a mistake by keeping Illidan pretty much locked up in Black Temple so the only players who to see him were raiders that made it that far.
When viewed through the prism of trying to cater to a very diverse player base, the two dungeon system makes a lot of sense as an extension of a lot of the initiatives begun in the Burning Crusade. Heroic dungeons showed they could extend the life of old content by creating an additional difficulty level. Karazhan showed they could design a 10 person dungeon which contained most of the complexity of a 25 person raid. Zul'Aman showed they could make a 10 person dungeon that was more challenging.
Re-using the same dungeon for two different raid sizes generates more bang for their development buck. It caters to groups that can put together 10 person raids but for one reason or another don't want to participate in 25 person content (and lets face it - its easier to get a group of 10 friends to group with than 25). It increases the options that 25 person raid guilds have for "off-nights", and also gives you more options for gearing up alts.
I'm okay with different difficulty levels and different rewards for the 10 and 25 person dungeons. Some encounters might be exactly the same, some might be wildly different but I think Blizzard will attempt to retain the essence of each fight (the Kael'Thas re-purposing in Magister's Terrace as one example - fights are completely different but many of the game play elements are the same). And I'm pretty confident that 10 person Arthas will be a lot harder than say, 25 person Naxxramas.
Chris
When Blizzard initially launched the game, they thought raid content would appeal to a small, devoted, "hardcore" gamer crowd, while the so-called "casual" players would be happy with 5-15 player instances and everything else.
Then the game became more popular than they probably ever dreamed, and they discovered that a lot of those "casual" players wanted to see all the content as well.
This has led to a bit of a dilemma for Blizzard: how do you make as much of your content as accessible to as many people as possible, while still maintaining challenging content for even the most cutting edge guilds?
The Burning Crusade is pretty much a case study of Blizzard zig-zagging between these goals. Capping the maximum raid size at 25 people made content *more* accessible (by reducing the logistical barriers to raiding); devising long and complicated attunement quest chains made content *less* accessible - until the point where they decided to remove them, and then suddenly boatloads more guilds were in SSC/TK/Hyjal/Black Temple.
The Sunwell Plateau requires no attunements. Its just flat out hard - hard enough to satisfy even the most bleeding edge of guilds. However I do expect a larger proportion of guilds to complete Sunwell than say Naxxramas because they will have longer to work on it before the expansion (best guess for release date - November or December).
I think Blizzard has made enough statements to the effect that they want people to see the content they create, they want players to feel part of the world. They've said they made a mistake by keeping Illidan pretty much locked up in Black Temple so the only players who to see him were raiders that made it that far.
When viewed through the prism of trying to cater to a very diverse player base, the two dungeon system makes a lot of sense as an extension of a lot of the initiatives begun in the Burning Crusade. Heroic dungeons showed they could extend the life of old content by creating an additional difficulty level. Karazhan showed they could design a 10 person dungeon which contained most of the complexity of a 25 person raid. Zul'Aman showed they could make a 10 person dungeon that was more challenging.
Re-using the same dungeon for two different raid sizes generates more bang for their development buck. It caters to groups that can put together 10 person raids but for one reason or another don't want to participate in 25 person content (and lets face it - its easier to get a group of 10 friends to group with than 25). It increases the options that 25 person raid guilds have for "off-nights", and also gives you more options for gearing up alts.
I'm okay with different difficulty levels and different rewards for the 10 and 25 person dungeons. Some encounters might be exactly the same, some might be wildly different but I think Blizzard will attempt to retain the essence of each fight (the Kael'Thas re-purposing in Magister's Terrace as one example - fights are completely different but many of the game play elements are the same). And I'm pretty confident that 10 person Arthas will be a lot harder than say, 25 person Naxxramas.
Chris