Officers' Quarters: Patch 3.2 -- An officer's perspective
by Scott Andrews 
Jun 22nd 2009 at 3:00PM
The last time I did an officers' patch perspective, the numbers were reversed (2.3). In that column, I talked about mage tables, spell damage being added to healing gear, and the Horde finally getting Fear Ward. It was October of 2007. Yep, a lot has changed in the past two years of WoW!
Patch 3.2 isn't yet up on the PTRs, but it's never too early to anticipate issues or plan for future success. Here are a few interesting changes to the game that might have an impact on guilds as we head into the late summer.
1 Raid, 4 Lockout Timers: That's right, the Crusaders' Coliseum will have four different versions with four different lockouts. The kneejerk reaction to this bit of news on the official forums (is there any other kind?) was generally not one of celebration. The most common complaint was, "Great. Now I have to farm the same five bosses four times a week."
Many players would balk at the thought of "have to" in this context. After all, just because you can, doesn't mean it's mandatory. But in hardcore guilds, the drive to be competitive (and keep your raid slot) can lead you down some strange roads. In some guilds, it is expected that you attend every scheduled raid you can. Some players are getting burned out just at the idea of running the same content four times in a single week.
I urge all guild leaders to keep this burnout factor in mind when you set up your weekly raiding schedules, particularly if you have strict attendance policies. The first couple of weeks won't be so bad, since all the bosses won't be unlocked yet. But as the new raid gets longer and longer as bosses are unlocked, it will start eating up bigger and bigger chunks of your week.
We don't know much about this raid yet, since it's not available for testing. It could be a very quick run, even with five bosses. If all the encounters happen in the same place (as they would be expected to in a coliseum setting), and with very little or no trash, it could be a 60-minute run when it's on farm. However, the fact that this raid zone will provide a new tier set and a new set of emblems leads me to believe that it will be more involved than most people are imagining it right now.
The New Emblem System: Yes, it's true. As of 3.2, even the most unskilled noob can farm their way to Tier 8 -- and eventually Tier 9 -- gear. Many raiders didn't like the system that allowed players to acquire Tier 6-equivalent gear back in TBC. Those same people certainly don't like that Ulduar-grade emblems are going to flow like purple water from every 5-man dungeon and cobbled-together Naxx PUG in the game. Have no doubt about it: If your guild raids primarily for loot and status, morale is going to suffer.
Times like this will bring to light a player's motivation to raid. Guilds where the officers make sure their raids are not just effective, but fun, will come away from this change without much of a dent in their roster. Guilds where fun comes in second place to loot may run into problems. I would not be surprised to see loot-driven raiders quit the game over this decision. It's definitely a good time to weigh your priorities.
The good news for guilds, and our increasingly tight raiding schedules, is that making these emblems so readily available means that players (and alts) who lag behind your core raiders can gear up at a quicker pace. Moreover, they can do so, if necessary, without raiding at all. Of course, they won't be as effectively geared as they could be, since only so many slots are available. But at least they won't need half a dozen trips through Naxx just so they aren't dead weight in an Ulduar farming run.
It is also good news for guilds who have had to beg, threaten, or trick your members into helping to farm the old Tier 7 raids or a few Heroic dungeons. This new system will give nearly all your members a reason to run Wrath's launch content again. Players at all gear levels will benefit.
Squire Ding: Last week, Blizzard announced that the squire pets obtainable from an Argent Tournament quest line could be upgraded to allow access to your bank, a mailbox, or a vendor once every eight hours.
Encourage your raiders, particularly your absent-minded ones, to upgrade their squires. Doing so should help cut down on those annoying trips back to town for forgotten resist gear, food, etc. Supposedly, the service will only be available to the person who controls the squire, so the more people that have one of these handy pets, the less such errands will cut into your raid time.
In theory, you could also keep a cache of enchanting materials, gems, and other item enhancements on hand to pimp your players' hard-earned upgrades in mid-raid. If you want to get really crazy, you could keep a stash of glyphs and customize an entire raid's worth of toons for individual encounters. Of course, these scenarios assume that your access to the bank or mailbox is limited only by time, and not by the amount of items you can withdraw. We'll know more once the PTR goes live.
Level 80 Epic Gems: Building on the rare-drop, fishing-daily gems from 3.1, a full suite of epic gems will become craftable in 3.2. I'm sure there will be many, many epic gem cuts to learn. Make sure your jewelcrafters coordinate so that all the most useful cuts are available as soon as possible.
/salute
Send Scott your guild-related questions, conundrums, ideas, and suggestions at scott.andrews@weblogsinc.com. You may find your question the subject of next week's Officers' Quarters!Filed under: Officers' Quarters (Guild Leadership)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Chris M Jun 22nd 2009 3:06PM
Solid post, Scott. I intended to blog about this same deal (in a nutshell) as well, and you seem to have hit the nail on the head, of all my points; specifically the emblem change which originally had me irate enough to quit the game; but now I'm just going to step back from hardcore raiding and level alts. :)
Cheers again.
Angus Jun 22nd 2009 5:17PM
I still don't get why people were angry with this.
I'm trying to get people geared up enough to do ulduar 25. It means going into naxx25 with people that are already geared enough for it and boring them. It means spending a month getting up to speed and if new recruits show up gearing them too.
Change the badges to actually be about as good as Ulduar stuff and you have Naxx10 entry level gear in 3.0 situation. No longer having to go backwards if a raider leaves or if 2 people are just not geared enough to survive is a good thing.
Having an alt able to step in if needed for a different role is nice.
If the new system allows the tanks to get that upgrade they desperately need while a healer or DPS can get the same piece with badges (or vice versa) it is a good thing.
Eisengel Jun 22nd 2009 5:58PM
At first I was annoyed at the badge change too. I wondered why I should play at all if all the gear will just get reset in a few months... then it hit me... the game isn't supposed to be about the gear. There's that whole plotline/story thing. i don't mean this sarcastically at all... I had actually pretty much entirely forgotten about the story and flavor of the game in the quest to obtain the next tier of gear.
I agree that these changes are pretty heavily shaking up the way WoW works, but if they're going to focus the game on having fun and experiencing the story rather than grinding X for N days a week... I'll all for it.
virtualgigi Jun 22nd 2009 3:07PM
I wonder how the easy or hard the bosses will be. Hopefully the First couple of bosses will be pretty easy to take down so my casual raiding guild can clear them. I love mounted combat so this should be fun :D
Lokasenna Jun 22nd 2009 3:40PM
Mounted combat?
Unless I missed an important detail, I think someone is going to be very disappointed on patch day.
virtualgigi Jun 22nd 2009 11:53PM
Yes, aren't the argent tournament raids mounted combat raids?
jfofla Jun 22nd 2009 3:10PM
"The New Emblem System: Yes, it's true. As of 3.2, even the most unskilled noob can farm their way to Tier 8 -- and eventually Tier 9 -- gear. "
I am disappointed you included this in an otherwise excellent article. When you say things like this, you seem no better than the forums posters.
Neodarkmatter Jun 22nd 2009 3:19PM
Even though it is true? It is a factual statement even though it is being repeated 10,000 times on the forums. I myself is disappointed in this since it will allow those level 80 noobs to hop straight into Ulduar when they can't even understand the mechanics of the Naxx bosses.
Great article and good points!
jfofla Jun 22nd 2009 3:24PM
How is it true? This is the war cry of the Epeen, but I cannot see how terrible players are suddenly going to be able to do Heroics all day long.
If they have not done them before, they are not going to be able to do them now.
Clevins Jun 22nd 2009 3:35PM
I think the article overstates it a bit, but it's a little disheartening to see people who've never set foot in a raid able to grab 2pc T8. If these were Valor emblems I'd not have any issue, but 1) you don't need T8 to do heroics if that's all you're going to do and 2) These are the emblems that have dropped in 25 man Ulduar, the current cutting edge. To drop those all the way to 5 mans seems drastic.
It's not epeen, it's kind of "why did I run Naxx all those times to try to grab one more piece of loot to make my toon better?" Oh and I love how when raiders talk about gear it's all epeen, but when more causal players can get gear then it's not about the loot. /sigh.
However, this is a great way to get alts geared as well as players who were just slower to 80. The guild I'm in is mid-way through Ulduar and depending on where we are in gearing and progress we might take a week or so to run heroics and grab T8 for the entire raid. So, on balance, it's a good thing... but it means I'm not bothering to run Naxx on my main for those last couple of minor upgrades now.
smcn Jun 22nd 2009 3:56PM
Before they add Conquest Badges for heroics, they should remove the feature that causes a piece of gear to become less useful the more people are wearing it.
Er, wait a second...
rudemented2 Jun 22nd 2009 4:38PM
@Neodarkmatter
"I myself is disappointed in this since it will allow those level 80 noobs to hop straight into Ulduar when they can't even understand the mechanics of the Naxx bosses."
Seriously...if they still can't get past the Naxx bosses yet who cares if they can now jump straight into Ulduar? They will just sit there endlessly wiping on Flame Leviathan anyhow since they won't be able to even understand that mechanic of that fight either. How does that have any effect on you?
Everyone who complains about this are all talking out both sides of their mouths. Because any real hardcore player knows that its about skill not gear that makes them successful yet when Blizz makes gear easier to get for casual players all those hard core players start screaming that now the noobs can do everything they can do. Well ya know what? They can't. Even with the gear they are just gonna sit there stuck at the beginning of the Uld just like are they are now in NAX and will not even come close to a hardcore players progression. So stop crying about it.
rudemented2 Jun 22nd 2009 4:53PM
@Clevins
"why did I run Naxx all those times to try to grab one more piece of loot to make my toon better?"
You just defined epeen man? Like...why did I spend that extra $10k on the sports car when the sedan still gets me to work? And I'm not saying that running Naxx over and over to grab that one more piece of loot to make your toon better is wrong. I'm just saying you didn't do it because if you didn't your raid would constantly wipe in Uld. You did it because like the rest of us...you enjoy playing the game and want to see that IMBA score go up and naturally strive for perfection. Just because someone else is wearing your same gear but got it differently does not take what you did away from you. You guys are all looking at the finish line but constantly seem to forget how much you enjoyed the ride.
ChiperSoft Jun 22nd 2009 4:59PM
Not only was it unnecessary to mention, it was wrong: "Many raiders didn't like the system that allowed players to acquire Tier 6-equivalent gear back in TBC"
The Patch 2.4 badge gear was Tier 5 level, not six. It was done to give the guilds that were still doing kara and gruuls a chance to see new content. It allowed my guild the ability to start progressing through Hyjal and to actually see Black Temple.
There are a couple key differences between that badge change and this one:
1) 2.4 provided new gear for the currency that was already being banked from numerous kara and heroic runs. People came into the patch with 200-300 badges on hand ready to gear up when the patch came out. 3.2 is doing the opposite, increasing the rewards given. players wont go into this with a ton of currency, they'll have to work up to it.
2) Because of this, assuming these people weren't already in ulduar, they will be starting with zero conquest badges when the patch goes live. To get both pieces you'll need over 100 badges. The "casual" player that these complainers are referring to isn't going to have the time to get more then seven or eight badges a day, if that. Most wont even get twenty badges in a week. It is going to take them time to get enough gear that they can buy those pieces, and in that time all these hard-core raiders will have moved on to T9 and can start sneering at the people who are "online in ulduar gear".
The reactions over this change have been grossly over the top. Each badge vendor only sells four pieces of gear relevant to each spec, plus relics & trinkets, and some pvp gear that doesn't come close to as good to what you can get in raids.
Four pieces, out of 14 gear slots. On a fresh 80 that's not even enough to let you do naxx.
This is not a threat to you, people.
Heilig Jun 22nd 2009 5:21PM
"The Patch 2.4 badge gear was Tier 5 level, not six"
2.4 badge gear was ilvl 141, the same ilvl that dropped in BT and Hyjal. Tier 6 was ilvl 128, and the corresponding badge gear was introduced in 2.3 with ZA, which also dropped gear of that ilvl.
M Jun 22nd 2009 5:24PM
"I would not be surprised to see loot-driven raiders quit the game over this decision."
This doesn't sound like a bad thing. Maybe there will be less whining, less show-boating, and less generally rude and immature behaviour.
I love to raid and consider myself decently skilled, and of course shiny new gear is a great thing. However, whatever excitement I had about loot was pretty much destroyed when 3.1 was released. The barely-mediocre upgrade in gear stats over tier 7 loot and the same tired skin style just ruined it for me.
Beating the encounters with a group of skilled people is why I raid. We raid to see the new content. And it's fun to give a hard time to the classes that always seem to get the same type of loot that drops (last night it was dps cloth night).
... For the other comments ...
The "unskilled noobs" can get tier gear, but they're still lacking many of the skills that prevented them from getting it in the first place .. so no real change there. They're also going to have a mix-n-match set of gear, based on what badge items they can buy. The badge-gear players will be easy to spot.
No matter what you do, unless you turn off even the most basic of things (like Sarth's flame walls), there will always be people who lack the coordination and attention span to not stand in the fire. They die in OS, they die in Naxx, they wipe to Flame Leviathan in Ulduar. They may be awesome people, but raiding just doesn't "click" for them. Gear won't change that (just increases their repair bills).
Unless you knew this going in, and are determined to just get through the encounter regardless, those people who just don't get it will be filtered out eventually. Whether the raid leaders stop inviting them, the other raiders refuse to run with them; whether the matter is handled properly and with respect, or with rudeness and name-calling; the situation will work itself out. For my friends/social guild, I just stopped running raids because of it, to avoid hurting peoples feelings and causing unnecessary stress.
Those who are skilled but couldn't find groups will be able to get gear and have a better chance at finding groups .. those are the ones who will receive a great benefit from this change. There are probably more people in this situation than we might expect, and they're not necessarily alts.
Overall, this is a good thing.
The Claw Jun 22nd 2009 6:17PM
"This doesn't sound like a bad thing .. Beating the encounters with a group of skilled people is why I raid."
Well here's hoping that you still have 24 skilled people to raid with after 3.2. You might find that few more of your solid groupmates are actually "loot-driven raiders" than you think.
Volaro Jun 22nd 2009 3:16PM
Ooh, didn't know the squires could be used to access banks, mail or vendors in 3.2. Neat.
Blake Jun 22nd 2009 4:02PM
Yup, once (choose bank, mailbox, or vendor) - with an 8 hour cooldown. For 150 champion's seals.
turkeyspit Jun 22nd 2009 3:17PM
Forget Loot. Forget Achievements. Forget e-peen. All of those are reasons why I Raid, but the single most important reason is to see Epic content.
Naxxramas (being new for me, since I didn't raid it in Vanilla) was cool, and Ulduar is freaking awesome.
This looks.......like...meh. Ring of Champions Raid edition pretty much sums it up.
Outside of Loot, Achievements and E-Peen, WHY ELSE would anyone raid this new instance?