This.

I can still talk to my casual buddies about raiding endgame bosses, but I still get the gear and the challenging encounters to set me apart.

As long as the hard modes are actually hard (and I imagine blizzard will get it right this time) I have no problems with this.

I dont understand why the best gear in the game only drops in 25 man Raids.

Raids are cute and all, cause theres TWENTY FIVE of us in there. But that hardly warrents the claim of "hard".

Hard for the Raid leader that needs to tell all the idiots how to fight. Sure, he deserves a new drop every time. But for the AOE spamming, cast sequence macro pushing out there, 25 mans are hardly the hardest thing to do in the game.

Give me a hard 5 man any day. Way more statisfying IMO.

Hell, the most fun me and my friends have are runnign 5 mans with bad groups. So much fun knowing you are carrying the load.

In a 25 man, your often lost in the shuffle.

@ jerzz80

25 man mode IS NOT hard mode. Hard mode is when you engage the encounter in a certain way that ramps up the difficulty level. For example: Sarth 25 is not Sarth hard mode, Sart 3D is Sarth hard mode.