Breakfast Topic: Musing on old-world instances
by Amanda Dean 
Jun 7th 2008 at 8:00AM
When we first heard about heroic level instances in the Burning Crusade, many of us were thrilled at the thought of revisiting our favorite low level instances. We would have them boosted to an end-game level and resurrected into regular play. Then we found out that only the dungeons in Outland were geared up for heroic levels. At least one player was pretty disappointed by this news. One of our readers, Sean, asked to open up a dialog about old-world heroics.
Running the old world dungeons as actual five-man instances seems pretty rare these days. Sometimes we skip past them due to decreased leveling requirements, and an ability to gear our alts with gold earns on our mains. Often when we actually venture into these instances at the appropriate level, we are tailing a capable level 70 character. It's kind of a waste of space and programming effort for Blizzard to leave these instances gathering dust.
The biggest problem with revamping these instances for heroic mode would be the amount of time that it would take to complete them. Blizzard has largely changed the structure of dungeons to make them easier to complete in a reasonable time. At least we shall be seeing Naxxaramas again in Wrath of the Lich King. Well for some of us it will be again. A substantial portion of the current player base opened their accounts after the release of Burning Crusade. My first character hit level 60 in December of 2006, so I haven't seen much of the Pre-BC endgame.
Time and again, Blizzard has assured us that there are no plans to revamp old instances for use by high level players. As I've mentioned before, I love Wailing Caverns. As it is, I find excuses to run through that instance. I would be happy to go into it when it was actually useful to me.
Which old-world instance would be on the top of your heroic wishlist?
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Fan stuff, Breakfast Topics, Instances, The Burning Crusade
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Greg Jun 7th 2008 8:09AM
Heroic Deadmines
Tom Luongo Jun 7th 2008 8:10AM
It would be fantastic to see heroic versions of some of those old instances. The problem, as I see it, though, is that many of them don't fit the current dungeon-building philosophy, i.e. they're too big, too epic.
As much as the Wailing Caverns sucked at level, imagine slogging through that interminable place at 80? Without a substantial change to the size and/or pacing of those old dungeons, they would wind up like most of the Auchindoun dungeons, ignored on heroic, b/c the ROI for the work is just not high enough.
And, after all that work, that would be a shame.
Ta,
schm0 Jun 7th 2008 9:14AM
As a newer player, I really want to experience all the old content before moving on to Outlands and then WotLK stuff, but I'm not sure if that's going to be possible.
Snailking Jun 7th 2008 8:25AM
Shadowfang Keep
Cynra Jun 9th 2008 7:28AM
Seconded! Though I heard/read that the Arugal storyline will be expanded in Wrath of the Lich King. I hope that that's true.
Andrew Jun 7th 2008 8:27AM
I think that the biggest problem with bringing back old-world instances is not just that they are not adjusted to Blizzard's new instance mechanics. More importantly, Blizzard carefully balances the high-end instances that are available, making sure that there is just the right number of them, and an incentive for the different classes to visit each. Blizzard has to make sure that there are enough instances to promote variety, but not so many that it is difficult to find a group for a specific instance. By adding old-world instances back in, they would be subtracting from the number of new instances they can add in the expansion -- something that would cause many players to accuse them of recycling content.
Jmsbrtms Jun 7th 2008 8:28AM
I would like to see Nefarian and Onyxia as 20 heroics. More badges of justice and maybe a class quest hub.
Camaris Jun 7th 2008 8:51AM
Besides, the old world instances are heavily tied into long quest lines, and apparently not with 'farming' in mind. Take Sunken Temple for example. It's the start of the whole Hakkar story, and is quite epic and Indiana Jones-like in its design. But after doing the few major quests to explore the dungeon and move the story along, the design of the instance really is not that friendly for repeat runs. There's an awful long time before you get to the bosses with the more interesting loot.
It seems the original idea of (mid-level) dungeons was that they were really dungeons to 'adventure' in. IE, you save up a few quests, you find a group, and you spend a good time exploring a dungeon and getting some interesting loot as a reward. Scarlet Monastery was probably one of the best farmable instances because they broke it up into parts. Dire Maul also followed the trend of slightly smaller, broken up, instances.
And of course, currently the idea of 5-mans is that they are very much a repeatable experience. Mostly due to the streamlining of layouts and size, but also by adding heroics and more significant rewards.
So therefore, I think, it would be hard to make all old dungeons heroic. But there are maybe a few of the smaller ones that work. Deadmines (quite a 'modern' linear layout) and Scarlet Monastery spring to mind. But things like the Blackrock Depths and Maraudon seem to large to become heroics.
Y'know, the Caverns of Time could also play a role in this. "Future Deadmines", where Van Cleef was never killed, and has actually finished his warship, and is about to launch it? You'd race against time to blow up the ship before it leaves the dock.
Hurode Jun 7th 2008 2:42PM
SFK would be a fantastic dungeon to do this too, in my opinion. It's very linear, quite fun, and it already introduces new players to concepts like silence, the anti-magic shields some mobs have, the curses in the last half, etc. It's also not too long and overall a greatly fun experience. A level 82 Arugal would be fun to take out - I can only imagine what loot he'd drop *drool*
Xetanx Jun 7th 2008 8:55AM
Would like to see heroic Blackrock spire, As it is now its still a ten man but a 5 man heroic would be epic and very fun.
Damon Jun 7th 2008 9:54AM
Yeah, some of the old world instances are quite simply painfull overall (Gnomeregan, anyone?) because you have to slog through hordes of trash mobs before getting to a tank-and-spank boss so he can drop an interesting green.
I am a big supporter of an oldworld revamp: Yes, leveling is easier ever since patch 2.3 but that doesn't mean parts of good ol' azeroth aren't still boring as hell. There's a reason people quest in hillsbrad foothills but not silverpine forest.
Something as simple as giving a Mob a new attack can go a long way in making the experience of fighting it more interesting.
As for old world dungeons, it's simple what has to be done. Just make one or two heroic-ish an expansion. That way you aren't spreading out the players and still giving them the nostalgia trip they want. Not to mention some of the old dungeons are freaking awesome. Wailing caverns in particular.
And i definatly see why blizz has stopped making dungeons mazelike, but it's still disconcerting to see that "Shadow labyrinth" is essentially a straight line.
Elyx Jun 7th 2008 10:00AM
Shadowfang Keep...
I'm a big fan of the Gothic feel, the 'exploring the ruins' that became popular with the original pen and paper RPG, D&D...shadowfang keep IMO has the best feel in relation to that, with its only competition Kara.
Even the music there had a 'edge of your seat' suspense feel. Add to it the haunting idea, with the curse thign on top of it, seep me in fantasy ftw. I love the instance, and take every single alt i have through there, even if its with one of my 70's, to revisit the feeling. Good stuff.
Dieirdra Jun 7th 2008 6:04PM
My favourite is BRD, closely followed by Scholo. Having said that I love the feel of Wailing Caverns and Blackfathom Depths too which both look devastatingly pretty. All my alts go through all of those. I just like running through the scenery even if it is on follow to a capable lvl 70 friend.
BRD feels like you should be marching through with an army not just 5, the architecture in there is amazing. It has the added advantage that if you fuck up you can still die in there which adds flavour. Gief heroic BRD on 10 man as the old world Kara!!!
Really tho, I like most old world instances, with the exception of Stockades which feels utterly pointless.
D
Ruva Jun 7th 2008 1:52PM
Agreed, SFK is one of my all time favourites right next to the SM instances. Both instances were very well done and both of them easily farmable for nice blue items.
Eternalpayn Jun 7th 2008 10:20AM
I know many will disagree, but Uldaman. I loved it, personally. Everyone's issues seemed to be with the balance in difficulty from the beginning to end, but they'd rebalance it with a heroic mode. And who can say that the final boss wasn't epic as hell?
Also, another one I'd love to see heroic is Sunken Temple. We need a good 5 man dragon in Wrath. :P
lordlight Jun 7th 2008 10:25AM
Heroic Tribute runs. Full of epic
Dan Jun 7th 2008 10:33AM
Am I the only one who realises that you can do the old-world instances HC, although only up to a certain point. All you have to do is get 5 people, pull the entire instance (you're not allowed to kill any mobs until everything is pulled), then have fun! XD
Alchemistmerlin Jun 7th 2008 10:47AM
Number 1 way to freak the hell out of newbie guildies. "Sure I'll run you through ____________"
Then pull EVERYTHING.
Just make sure they're not a healy class...they'll try to heal you, things will go horribly wrong from there.
Nick S Jun 7th 2008 4:10PM
we do this regularly....
all you need is reasonably good gear on any tanking class.
before the athene trick was nerfed, we'd pull all of SM Cath with a paladin 5 times an hour, drag them all back to a waiting mage at the entrance, and blow em all up at once.
Illirien Jun 7th 2008 11:01AM
I think a lot of the division over whether people like the pre-bc instances comes from the players' gaming background. Some, like myself, come from tabletop roleplaying games. Others come exclusively from a background of video games. One group enjoys the epic feel of a mazelike dungeon with goals and a real story. The other group basically just wants to 'beat' it as quickly as possible.
Personally, I find nearly all of the 'dungeons' in Burning Crusade to be really lame. It's just a single bent line of killing things. I got to their end bosses the first time through and thought "that's it?" After about the second or third time I was so bored with them I never wanted to go back. Heroic version? It's just the same monsters beefed up with better loot. I mean.. jeez, I have the dvd of Star Wars, but I don't watch it twice every day.. know what I mean?