Icecrown Citadel gated progression update
by Alex Ziebart 
Dec 9th 2009 at 6:20PM
Luckily, Daelo has hit the forums to tell us that it's not going to be that way between every wing. The first wing has an extra long delay because of the holidays, and each of them afterwards will be faster.
He also adds some details about an increased number of attempts on the end bosses:
In other news, the initial number of attempts to defeat the major bosses at the end of each wing of Icecrown Citadel has been increased by 5. This means you'll have 10 attempts for Professor Putricide, 15 attempts when The Crimson Halls are available, then 20 when the Frostwing Halls becomes attackable.Overall, it's good news. I know all of my raiders will be relieved to hear things will speed up again after the holidays.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Eliminate Dec 9th 2009 6:25PM
Yay for common sense. If they keep this gating trend, they are going to lose alot of high-end players.
Scott Dec 9th 2009 6:31PM
Good news about not waiting until April, but any artificial extension of content is still filed under "meh".
CrimsonEyedDeath Dec 9th 2009 6:45PM
If the 'high-end players' left everytime someone like you said 'X will cause them to lose high end players', there'd be none left in WoW.
Good thing, then, that you don't have the first clue what you're talking about, as do most of the Chicken Littles forecasting the Death of WoW or a mass exodus of players, high or low end, at EVERY decision.
Dave Dec 9th 2009 7:04PM
Funny, the entire point is to keep the high end raiders in the game longer artificially past the point they're able to progress on their own.
Gonna work great too. the lesser guilds won't notice a difference, the elite guilds will have to slow down and learn to take it easy. Or eat all their candy the day after haloween and have nothing left for the rest of the month.
vinniedcleaner Dec 9th 2009 7:20PM
boo hoo...
so all the 'hardcore' players might have had to wait until April to start waving their epeens around...
JokerFace Dec 9th 2009 8:00PM
Why does everyone keep saying this only affects highend hardcore raiders?
We are talking about gating the 5 man non-heroic wings right; or I'm missing something?
Obviously the raids will come after all the 5mans are unlocked, but, I can't imagine anyone thought you could stick it to the Lich King on day one anyways...
I also can't begin to imagine these (haven't had a crack at it myself) instances on normal mode would be an incredible strain on anyone who didn't just ding 80 this week.
Xmas is still over 2 weeks away...we really can't get one more 5man in before then?
Blizz needs to hire some atheists to keep things runnin' while everyone else is celebrating.
Lokasenna Dec 9th 2009 8:24PM
No, gating is the wings of the ten-man. It's like giving us Naxx with just the Spider Wing to start with.
JokerFace Dec 9th 2009 9:07PM
Thank you Loka, that makes a whole lot more sense.
I wonder why I got down voted... that's typically only a result of stating one's own personal opinion or people not understanding sarcasm.
Pemberton Dec 10th 2009 2:13AM
Low end players outnumber and pay the same amount as high end. :P
CrimsonEyedDeath Dec 9th 2009 9:54PM
Moreover, saying that the Icecrown gating is going to make the hardcore players quit is rubbish. The REAL hardcore guilds, the ones who get or are in competition for the world first, Ensidia and the like, are probably looking at this and thinking: 'this lets us get more people Icecrown geared by the time Arthas is up, that means better tanks, more dps, and more healing, which gives us better chances of dropping Arthas the first time, or at least earlier'.
Now, for the elitist hardcores, the ones who complain about how casuals don't deserve epic gear and threaten to leave at every decision that doesn't cater to them, they're not going anywhere. Aside from the fact that they threaten this every two days, they NEED WoW. WoW has the largest playerbase, and thus, the most people for them to lord their purple gear over, thus distracting them from the probable facts that a good number of them don't have friends, lovers, or a quality job. If they quit, then what? They'll go to Aion, where they have to start as a dreaded n00b, then apply to a guild and hope it's as full of people as 'hardcore' as them? Why risk all that when they're already at WoW's endgame, already probably in a guild of like minded people, and have a large crowd of people they can look down on?
Not even touching the fact that WoW's proven it's got some pretty solid legs, and isn't going anywhere.
Viper007Bond Dec 9th 2009 6:29PM
Makes perfect sense if you ask me.
A big delay makes people not feel rushed in the middle of the holidays and gating ensures that the content doesn't get old as fast as it would otherwise.
johnthediver Dec 9th 2009 6:36PM
And here i thought the ploy to keep dollars flowing was the creation of a good product, with fun content. Who knew?
Falcon6 Dec 9th 2009 6:39PM
During the holiday season?
I doubt they needed an artificial extension for that. They would be netting in the money anyway.
telltalehart Dec 9th 2009 6:40PM
While I also think the 28 days is kind of crazy, in a way it kind of makes sense. Remember all the craziness with 2.4 being used as a buffer because Wrath took longer than planned? I think have people wait a bit of time between gates allows the patch to remain on the fresh side a bit longer (for those of us who don't burn through it so fast, although props to those who do!) and we would be less likely to be stuck with a 3.4 filler if something goes wrong with Cataclysm. This is actually something I've discussed with someone of my friends and its our own little conclusion.
(cutaia) Dec 9th 2009 6:40PM
I know it doesn't matter now, but why do they keep saying we wouldn't see him till April if the gating stayed at 4 weeks? There are only 2 gates after the first one, right? If so, that would put Arthas opening in early March.
Alex Ziebart Dec 9th 2009 6:44PM
You are most likely correct, and we at WoW.com utterly fail at months of the year.
Daniel Dec 9th 2009 6:50PM
I don't understand where the April date is coming from, even if each gate were 4 weeks apart.
If you look at the gating post (http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=911), it says that everything unlocks in 4 steps. The first step was yesterday's patch. The next step is the Plagueworks on 5 January. Then Crimson Hall opens, then there is a single final unlock that makes Dreamwalker, Sindragosa, and the Lich King available.
So even if it were 4 weeks between each gate, we'd be looking at 2 February for Crimson Hall and 2 March for the Lich King.
Right?
Tyr Dec 9th 2009 6:45PM
I don't really understand the limited attempts stuff. Can anyone make sense of it for me?
t0xic Dec 9th 2009 6:54PM
Your raid ID has a counter. Every time your raid wipes the counter goes down. If the counter reaches zero before the boss is dead you come back next week and try again.
CDave Dec 9th 2009 7:04PM
It's probably just a way for them to push partially-finished content to allow more time to develop and test the later encounters. This will sate the impatient, and also give them a longer time frame until Cataclysm is released.
Otherwise the alternatives would have been a bug-filled half-assed IC this month, or the whole thing in March, with us waiting more than 5 months for new content.