Patch 2.4 Notes

[oldmandennis]

I really don't see what all the badge whining is about. Did the world end when they released "tier behind" badge gear before?

Also, even though T6 is more complete then T5 from the standpoint of covering all specs, it still has some holes that could be filled. Fist weapons, shadow priest weapons, and feral weapons are the ones that leap to mind (don't mention the pillar of ferocity please).

Plus, a full set of T5 is would be about 800ish badges (guessing that a 2h T5 would be 100 badges... probably on the low side). T6 could be even more. That's a hell of a lot of badges. If you figure 5 badges/hr (probably about right - Kara is faster, but you can't do that everynight. Also, if you are really grinding hard on badges, you are forced to do less popular heroics after you are locked out of the good ones or the ones with daily quests, meaning it takes longer to find a group) and 60 badges on average for a piece of gear, you get .083 epics per person per hour. My guild are not world beaters, but we can form up and clear Hyjal in less then 4hr - thats .15 epics per person per hour. Raiding is a hell of a lot faster of a way to gear up then just counting on badges.

All the elitists will change their tune very quickly if it turns out that T5 or T6 bosses drop the Essence of the Immortals (used to unlock bosses 4-6). "Here, semicasual guild member, let me bring my warglaves to Shattered Halls so you can finish on time. You are going to use that badge to buy gear to take Kael down with, right?"

[Skandranon]

I really don't see what all the badge whining is about. Did the world end when they released "tier behind" badge gear before?

The world didn't end. Gruul and Mag did.

Too many people are misinterpreting my line of argument in this thread. Once again, I'm not arguing this from an elitist perspective. The thing is, encouraging people to gear up through heroics and Kara again is just forcing them through old and done content, over and over. It's not fun or good design.

If they implemented the badge vendor to take 3 TK badges and a Kael badge for an epic, I'd be happier. Yes, that means a TK clear earns an epic for 25 people, a much faster rate of gearing than the badges are likely to be. That's fine by me. What's important is that people should explore new (to them) content and get gear for it, instead of being forced to run Kara. Less hardcore guilds should be free to drop Kara and Heroics now; they should be moving on to bigger and better things, instead of seeing Kara week-in, week-out.

Keeping people in old content is bad design, any way you slice it.

[oldmandennis]

Gruul + Mag are like maybe 2hr total, counting formup time and travel between the two. The T5 badge gear didn't make people drop G+M and go back to Kara. Nerfs to T5 making it possible for casual guilds to progress there are what killed G+M.

I strongly doubt that many guilds are going to drop the raids they were spending trying to progress in T5, and start doing Kara for badges. I find it much more likely that many guilds will stop banging on Kael/Vashj, and start doing Rage and Naj'entus. On off days, or after raids they will get some badges to help them do it.

[Mavfin]

if they implemented the badge vendor to take 3 TK badges and a Kael badge for an epic, I'd be happier.

But that *forces* people into 25-man content, even if they don't have the time for it. That's just as bad in my book.

[Jester]

But that *forces* people into 25-man content, even if they don't have the time for it. That's just as bad in my book.

It forces them into it if they want the loot.

Hasn't that always been true?

-Jester

[Mavfin]

It forces them into it if they want the loot.

Hasn't that always been true?

-Jester

Why make a 10-man progression path, then force people into 25-mans? No, Blizz is avoiding doing that by using the same badges. If they make them drop more places, that's a better solution

[Warlock]

A better solution still is to have a progression path for each of 25-man, 10-man, 5-man and PVP players, make following several worthwhile but not essential and allow players to move between the streams reasonably easily as their tastes and/or schecule change. In particular, I'd like to see 'absolute best 5-man gear' be enough to begin the latest & greatest raid instance - mostly because I prefer 5-man play and still want a good character but also so that bleeding edge guilds can recruit without ripping key players from intermediate guilds. A friend of mine that still plays had his guild fall apart in SSC this way and he's no happier stuck in Kara than I was with nothing but 25's for further growth.

[Taelas]

If they have to implement 5-man loot that's equivalent to one step below current bleeding edge gear, they'd better do it in the same way they did arena, where you can put in long hours on your own schedule, and still get your epics.

I honestly doubt they will do it, though. It would make so much content obsolete.

[Warlock]

If they have to implement 5-man loot that's equivalent to one step below current bleeding edge gear, they'd better do it in the same way they did arena, where you can put in long hours on your own schedule, and still get your epics.

I honestly doubt they will do it, though. It would make so much content obsolete.

*shrugs* Content becomes obsolete, they'll make more. Seems to me Bliz will satisfy more players by allowing them to work for upgrades now by continuing to play instead of by killing 13 troggs at the start of WOTLK.

[Taelas]

There's quite a difference from making some content obsolete after more than a year and to continuously make previous raid instances obsolete with every content patch. It won't happen.

[oldmandennis]

In particular, I'd like to see 'absolute best 5-man gear' be enough to begin the latest & greatest raid instance - mostly because I prefer 5-man play and still want a good character but also so that bleeding edge guilds can recruit without ripping key players from intermediate guilds. A friend of mine that still plays had his guild fall apart in SSC this way and he's no happier stuck in Kara than I was with nothing but 25's for further growth.

Badges drop in 5-mans, and are 1 tier behind T6 right now. Although it would take a special sort of dedication to get a whole set of T5 badge gear from heroics, and there are a couple of slots missing. But purely from a gear standpoint, I think most classes could get a gearset acceptable for starting T6 from a mix of Badge gear, a couple of high quality blues, some rep items, and maybe pvp weapons.

If I was a raid leader, I would probably strongly prefer somebody wearing raid gear because it's more likely they have raid skills.... things like showing up on time, bringing consumables, taking direction, sitting in one place for 4hr at a time - if you have 3-4 pieces of tier gear its a higher probability that you can do those things then if you have the mish mash, even if the gear is an imperceptible difference in actual performance.

[Taelas]

Badges of Justice are dropping in Sunwell Plateau now. Assuming this means that they're going to drop in all 25-mans, your concerns seem to have been addressed, Skan.

[oldmandennis]

A bunch of news: new epic JC only trinkets. Primal nethers and nether votexes are BOE (wow). Nether vortexes are purchasable with badges. Resil affects mana drain, with 450 resil knocking off 23%. Druids heavily nerfed by changing the 4pc bonus to a -cast time to healing touch.

That last one stings. A lot. While druids need some sort of 2's and 3's nerf, it's a pretty heavy one, and the new bonus is trash. No druid at any sort of competitve level is going to just stand around in caster and get off a bunch of 2.75 second casts. It's a big nerf to 5's, where druids already need help.

15 badges for a nether vortex seems low. I don't disagree with the idea though. Unboping them (and the primal nethers) I'm less sure about. I think having them be bop was a way for crafters to earn a nice bit of cash - if the change goes through they will be forced to just accept 5-10g for the combine.

And 20$ gets you entry to a pvp only server, where you can choose 3 fully geared toons. Tournament prize package is 200k. This is for 3v3.\

Vashj, but not the other bosses in SSC dropped essence of immortals. Still unknown are T6 bosses such as Rage, etc. Probably safe to assume that Illadin and Archi drop them. Also, 3 badges from her.

[Skandranon]

Badges of Justice are dropping in Sunwell Plateau now. Assuming this means that they're going to drop in all 25-mans, your concerns seem to have been addressed, Skan.

Not quite. This is better, no doubt about it, since it doesn't completely split the loot incentive away from the progression incentive. As I said, that's very important.

But there's still a tremendous incentive to run Kara. As I pointed out in post #21, just putting badges on 25-man bosses is not a fix, because you still have to organize more people, do learning runs, farm consumables, read strat, and incur major repair costs in 25-mans, and you don't in Kara. Guilds on the margin will still stop running 25-mans to do straight Kara. Other guilds will still waste part of their time in there.

If they've gone so far as to put badges on the 25-man raid bosses, why not take the last step? Make 25-man badges a different kind, let them buy T6 loot, and require significantly less of them than of Badges of Justice.

If there's any reason to do Kara at all, people will go in there. And these people who haven't been much into raid content at all so far are the people who deserve to leave old content behind at last.

[oldmandennis]

I'm not following Skan. What is your hypothetical guild that is hurt by this gear doing right now? At pretty much any gear level, if you have an organized group, once the attunements are lifted, you can zone into T6 and start making progress. Anybody who can field any sort of raid group should be able to make good progress at least to 3-4/5 MH and 3/9 BT. You can probably throw 1/6 SP in there.

You would have to be mentally defective to throw away that ability to progress for more Kara clearing **during your primetime raids**. If you can't knock out Kara in a couple of hours on an off night by this point, you probably aren't ever going to get Kael or Vashj, and you certainly will not get Archi or Gorefiend.

I'm just failing to imagine a group that has any hope of long term 25man progress, that would cast aside the early T6 pinatas in favor of more Kara.

Also, I think most of the people who just want lewtz have already pretty much abandoned raiding in favor of 1450ish rated arena teams.

[Taelas]

If they've gone so far as to put badges on the 25-man raid bosses, why not take the last step? Make 25-man badges a different kind, let them buy T6 loot, and require significantly less of them than of Badges of Justice.

Obviously because they want players who do not want to raid to progress in gear as well.

With this move, players who still want to raid SSC/TK can keep doing so, and the players who want to progress their toons without raiding can do so as well. I would put more badges on the 25-bosses than 2, though. If they made SSC/TK better time spent than Karazhan, they'd emphasize the 25-mans over the 10-mans. Many people would still prefer raiding Karazhan, as the 25-mans require learning and Karazhan doesn't, but the players who want to raid SSC/TK can keep doing so while earning more BoJ/hour than running Karazhan over and over again.

[Jester]

Not quite. This is better, no doubt about it, since it doesn't completely split the loot incentive away from the progression incentive. As I said, that's very important.

But there's still a tremendous incentive to run Kara. As I pointed out in post #21, just putting badges on 25-man bosses is not a fix, because you still have to organize more people, do learning runs, farm consumables, read strat, and incur major repair costs in 25-mans, and you don't in Kara. Guilds on the margin will still stop running 25-mans to do straight Kara. Other guilds will still waste part of their time in there.

If they've gone so far as to put badges on the 25-man raid bosses, why not take the last step? Make 25-man badges a different kind, let them buy T6 loot, and require significantly less of them than of Badges of Justice.

If there's any reason to do Kara at all, people will go in there. And these people who haven't been much into raid content at all so far are the people who deserve to leave old content behind at last.

If you have a guild that can only be taken into 25 man content kicking and screaming, who are just overwhelmingly eager to go back to safe old Karazhan, why exactly is it any kind of benefit to anyone to take away their candy and force them into stuff they don't want to do?

And, if they actually do want to do 25 man raiding, how will this stop them?

-Jester

[Concillian]

If they've gone so far as to put badges on the 25-man raid bosses, why not take the last step? Make 25-man badges a different kind, let them buy T6 loot, and require significantly less of them than of Badges of Justice.

If there's any reason to do Kara at all, people will go in there. And these people who haven't been much into raid content at all so far are the people who deserve to leave old content behind at last.

If they put badges on 25-man content, and make bosses drop ~10-20 badges each and make each piece of gear cost at least 100 badges, then you have effectively done the same thing as requiring a different kind of badges. Lets not foget that the loot they would get in 25 mans would generally be more useful.

We don't know what the items are, how much they'll cost, or how many badges will be dropping in the new content, it's hard to say one way or another if the decision is good or bad.

Not like it really matters anyway...

I really don't know many guilds who are in a situation where they are capable of 25 man content and Kara is taking time from 25 mans. In our case Kara is generally done almost every week, but it happens on nights where we wouldn't be able to field 25 people anyway, so it's not like it's an either / or situation Kara happens and we do 25 mans a couple nights a week. We get gear, we get badges, we have fun, all this despite "all which is wrong with the game".

[Skandranon]

I'm not following Skan. What is your hypothetical guild that is hurt by this gear doing right now? At pretty much any gear level, if you have an organized group, once the attunements are lifted, you can zone into T6 and start making progress. Anybody who can field any sort of raid group should be able to make good progress at least to 3-4/5 MH and 3/9 BT. You can probably throw 1/6 SP in there.

You would have to be mentally defective to throw away that ability to progress for more Kara clearing **during your primetime raids**. If you can't knock out Kara in a couple of hours on an off night by this point, you probably aren't ever going to get Kael or Vashj, and you certainly will not get Archi or Gorefiend.

I'm just failing to imagine a group that has any hope of long term 25man progress, that would cast aside the early T6 pinatas in favor of more Kara.

0/6 SP. Kalecgos is looking right now to be harder than anything in T5 or T6, and Brutallus is a rough gear check that expects full T6 quality in every slot on everyone. (This, in and of itself, is enough to justify a more rapid gearing-up cycle.) And I'm not saying that people are going to throw away 4/5, 3/9 to do Kara. But the point is that doing Kara in addition to this stuff starts becoming rational, and the consequence is less time spent breaking past 4/5, 3/9, especially in groups with limited play time. That holds them back.

[Skandranon]

If you have a guild that can only be taken into 25 man content kicking and screaming, who are just overwhelmingly eager to go back to safe old Karazhan, why exactly is it any kind of benefit to anyone to take away their candy and force them into stuff they don't want to do?

Let me use a WoW analogy to explain the way I'm thinking on this. The flask/elixir change in 2.1 was a serious restriction to a lot of people. It prevented people from doing something that they could previously have done. People didn't enjoy doing it; farming herbs for a flask or two and 4 elixirs for every attempt was incredibly draining. But the incentive was too great to refuse. Blizzard placed a strong disincentive to do this into the game, in the form of a restriction on what players could do. By removing the incentive, players benefited from no longer being incentivized to do something they didn't like to do.

Maybe I'm completely off-base about this. Maybe people really love running Kara. Myself, I tired of the place after eight months running it and haven't been back since, and it just seems like a natural assumption to me that people who've been running Karazhan for six to eight months would also be pretty darned tired of the place. To me, running Karazhan is directly analogous to farming herbs: rewards too great to turn up, but boring. If I were in the situation of an up-and-coming guild, I would greatly value the option to just not go to Kara without harming my progression and my guild's.