Robin's post about
fun with kiting yesterday immediately reminded me about the old days of 40 man raiding. Don't worry, this isn't a nostalgia trip per se... in many ways raiding is better now than it's ever been... but one of the things I enjoyed back in classic WoW were the world bosses. Bosses like Azuregos, the
Emerald Dragons and Kazzak (as well as summoned bosses like
Maws and Eranikus) added a feeling of competition that simply couldn't be had by being the first to clear a raid. If Blizzard wants to bring the antagonism between Alliance and Horde back to the forefront, well, even on a PvE server back in the day one could watch Horde and Alliance guilds jostle over
Azuregos. Heck, we were griefed pretty hard doing the green dragons, especially
Emeriss, as Horde players would come running up to die under our tank and become mushrooms.
Burning Crusade had a couple of world raid bosses (a recycled
Kazzak and
Doomwalker) but for the most part they weren't terribly compelling: the gear they dropped was comparable with Karazhan (eventually it was made BoE to try and drive raiders towards it to harvest them for sales, which happened to some degree but is hardly what you'd call a sign of an exciting time, scavenging bosses for BoE's) and it seems like the practice has fallen out of favor since those days. While there are wandering big elites in Howling Fjord and Zul'Drak, they're either just there with no real rhyme or reason, or they're involved in quests.
So I ask you: would you like to see big world bosses return in
Cataclysm? Or do you think they're an artifact of an older time, and we're better off without them?
Tags: Azuregos, cataclysm-guide, cataclysm-news, Doomwalker, dragons-of-nightmare, Emeriss, expanion, expansion-three, game-discussion, gamer-discussion, Kazzak, Lethon, Maws, next-xpac, Taerar, third-expansion, third-xpac, world-of-warcraft-cataclysm, world-of-warcraft-discussion, world-of-warcraft-hot-topics, world-of-warcraft-topics, wow-4.0, wow-4.0.2, wow-cataclysm, wow-discussion, wow-expansion, wow-guide, wow-hot-topics, wow-issues, wow-third-expansion, wow-topics
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Jan 15th 2010 at 8:00AM 
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 5)
Tridus Jan 15th 2010 9:04AM
What you're describing is effectively an instance, only outdoors. But it nicely shows the problem with world bosses.
They're bad because Blizzard's direction these days is to make content accessable. World bosses are the definition of not accessable content. Only one group gets to do it per week. Back in vanilla, we had a guild that farmed them to the point where they had the schedules down and knew when they were coming back up. Everybody was already waiting, no matter what time of day it was. For anybody outside the uber hardcore, the bosses for all practical purposes didn't exist.
It was a bad model then, and its a bad model now.
Puntable Jan 15th 2010 10:06AM
Why couldn't they be phased? If didn't kill it this week you can see it. If you did you kill it you can't see it.
Deathknighty Jan 15th 2010 11:38AM
I agree with Puntable. They could do it like this: you kill it, and everyone in the group has the boss phased out till the end of the next lockout.
The actual mob respawns in 5 mins, which should be enough time for everyone to get a shot at the fight each week, assuming they wanted to.
Or, there could be tons of the boss, just phased, so if you're not in a group, you get the same mobs as anyone else w/o a group would, but if you're in a group, you get the solo one phased out and the group one phased in. They could probably even change the phase to give you a 10 man, 25 man, or possibly, if they felt like making an optional use for those last 15 available slots in your raid, a 40 man version (but without any extra benefits, to make sure it doesn't get farmed for "extra phat lewts").
The possibilities are endless!
BlackTiger Jan 18th 2010 3:36AM
Wrong model?
But socialistic concept "everything for everyone" is much worse! It's even worse than blizzard's worship to Mr. Random.
It for lemmings and sheeps.
It makes everything "grey" and worthless.
Rotties67 Jan 15th 2010 8:16AM
I am one of those that actually enjoyed 40 mans. No, it isn't rose colored glasses. I had fun working with 39 other people toward a common goal. We had a great guild (Requiem on Eitrigg), and we had FUN. We attempted the world dragons, and /saluted the other guilds when they got them down.
I am all for Blizz putting a few of them in, and perhaps put various degrees in of what size raid you need for them. Make one a 10, another 25, and just for old times sake, make another a 40 man. Do I see the 40 man getting taken down very often? No, but it sure would be fun to try.
mihai_thats_me Jan 15th 2010 10:39AM
40-man raids weren't hated. They weren't bad. They weren't unfunny. Just roam around the three QQ threads open at any time of day and night around the General Forum filled with people moaning for Classic Servers and you'll know that those people liked 40-mans a lot. Everyone liked them, you're not rare by any means by liking them.
The problem was that they were unpractical. While of course, those few who could find 39 other people who had a similar schedule to theirs and who knew how to play the game well had a blast during Vanilla WoW, probably experiencing the best era of WoW raiding ever, they forgot (to say it mildly, to say it harsh - didn't care) about the biggest part of the community, who were paying just as they were yet got to see half the content.
The problem was that the other 97% of the population, those who had busy schedules and couldn't synchronise their play time with the times of 39 other people, were just paying Blizzard the same amount of money as those people who were having loads of fun, yet all they did was to enjoy a mediocre game, being practically locked away from the very essence of this game.
While 40-man raids sound epic and alluring, they really won't happen anymore. They were a good idea, but not a profitable one.
What's exacly the difference between 25-man and 40-man people? 15 more names on the screen. I think that Blizzard would rather live with you missing those extra 15 blue names floating above PCs heads than having to double (again) the amount of work they need for each content patch and design dungeons for 40 people too.
Dracula Jones Jan 15th 2010 8:18AM
Not until they balance H:A population better. Literally never holding Wintergrasp because it's max Horde vs 20 Alliance (or vice versa on other realms, I'm sure) is bad enough.
Noctune Jan 20th 2010 1:49AM
WG problems they could have solved by adding a immune to stunn/silence etc chance equal to
Tenacity*7% meaning if you got 10xTenacity then you get 70% immunity with
with 15xTenacity then you whould be immune. that way you can blow them down
right now 20x Tenacity means your stunnlocked to death longer then with 0xTenacity it doesn't matter if your 120x vs 20x then your bound to lose with current implementation.
still i love to go bearform and charge in with 20x Tenacity its so fun to have that amount of HP...
I still think Blizzard should make a 40x man version of the instances to
a 10x a 25x and a 40x that way everyone is happy
and please don't put all bosses up on PTR to test before release boss fights should be
right now bosses are downed as they come online. the dificulty of figuring out new bosses have disaperared to the PTR and thats a shame esp. since some bosses is tested in EU servers and some in US servers.
industria Jan 15th 2010 8:19AM
AMGYES.
This is one aspect of WoW I am deeply sad to have missed. By the time I hit World of Warcraft no one ever bothered running world bosses anymore. With bigger and brighter things to do in Outlands / Northrend, it just wasn't worth it for them. I'm still determined to take down one of those dragons, but have yet to find someone to help. :b
For those that don't want to have to deal with griefing or the top end guilds just running the bosses every respawn Blizzard could use their new phasing technology to grant access to the boss. Not sure how it would work, but I'm sure it could be possible.
andy Jan 15th 2010 8:23AM
no, i really dont think they should.
i remember how evil it was to bekilling a world dragon just to have some allis come and wipe us,
and having to have somone logged on to se if they had spawned was annoying
and then getting everyone together when it did spawn just to find annother guild had got there first was annoying.
basically it was fun and interesting to have around but far too annoying to kill
Okya Jan 15th 2010 8:23AM
I personally would enjoy seeing them back again as I felt it brought and interesting aspect to the game, in my opinion. It wasn't something you could plan ahead of time like a normal raid, you had to see the yelling and scavenge people together. I always liked that idea a bit more than just mindlessly leveling through zones, it added another dimension to the game.
WoWie Zowie Jan 15th 2010 8:24AM
they at least add flavor if nothing else.
the gear from kazzak and stuff wasn't really worth the effort because the strategy was harder than those in kara. plus you had interference from the opposite faction all the time, so it was like umm ya i'll pass and i just gear up in kara
jjtwalton Jan 15th 2010 8:25AM
I remember running into Emeriss by mistake as a level 24 mage....
I SHAT MYSELF...
Seriously.. not only are world bosses great for guilds, but they're incredible to run into as a low-ish level or a new player. I think that if they had ZERO aggro radius and only attacked when damaged/threatened, then you could have them anywhere..
I'm looking forward to Cataclysm.. will be nice to have a break until then, but even so.. there's so much potential... and my Druid will love having fangs...
Still excited about Worgen forms... :D
paul Jan 15th 2010 9:05AM
One of the world dragons, Azuregos, I think has this kind of thing. He is yellow (not literally, the name I mean :P ) And you can speak to him, When you do, there is an option that says:
"Hey, I usually beg in SW, but as Im here, can I haz your gold?" (Or something similar)
When you do, he turns red and you kill him (Hopefully...)
Apart from that, though, I dont think they would need to be nuetral, Because as they are they are quite out of the way. The twilight grove in duskwood is empty completely apart from one of the dragons, so it is easily spottable. In feralas or ashenvale they are surrounded by other high level elites, and anyone who wont be able to do the boss probably cant get past them anyway.
Also, with flying mounts in azeroth, why not just put them somewhere thats hard to reach unless you have a flyer? (like kazzak, reachable but easier to get to with a flyer)
For the size of their modals, they seem to have a smaller agro radius than you'd exect anyway.
Vagrant Jan 15th 2010 10:05AM
Aye, as a newbie I never ran into much , a group of bears here, some druid cultists die, slash slash, good bye gorilla....so why are these elite dragon things standing here .....eeep what the hell ..eep ...huge dragon ...wow.. and this was after i decided to clear out this one missing piece of ashenvale on my map, run run run swoop passed the elites .....WOW ...hit the brakes, 180 and flee. I just love these surprises, these offsets to your status as absolute lord and master of some zone due to being able to just bash in anything without too much effort, it was pretty great to run into the and I would not mind seeing them once more!
Nex Jan 20th 2010 1:32PM
Yes please, but no more dragons ffs.
Kragragh Jan 15th 2010 8:28AM
I'd love to see some unkillable world bosses. Things that are too strong to be killed currently but will be at maybe 90. Just like the idea of it. Also would love to see people think they could kill it...
Sicadastra Jan 15th 2010 8:33AM
Absolutely. There should be places you simply don't go because "there be dragons". I've always loved "discovering" an area of a game that simply kills me right away because I'm too weak, the excitement and anticipation of trying again in a few levels is great. WoW does that a little hear and there, but world bosses are a great way to add a sense of scale and epicness (yep, epicness, deal with it) to a zone.
matiaid Jan 20th 2010 3:13PM
NO
adyuaa Jan 15th 2010 8:36AM
Some of the comments have me thinking about a combination world boss/Wintergrasp. Every 2 hours or so, it would spawn. Horde and Alliance would kill it together, but whichever side did the most damage got to loot it - and damage done to the other side counts. So you don't have to try to kill the other faction if you don't want to, but the other faction will probably be trying to kill you.
Or each of us has a boss we're trying to protect. You can heal your faction's boss. Whichever dies first, etc.
Varian and Garrosh get in an battleground together. Whoever kills their own leader first ...