Does the Rise of the Zandalari dungeon tier serve a purpose?
by Matthew Rossi 
Aug 22nd 2011 at 1:00PM
Patch 4.1 shook things up, and although patch 4.2 introduced a new raid, the same basic system that debuted in 4.1 is still with us. The Zandalari heroics not only dropped epic gear, they allowed non-raiders to collect twice as many valor points, a grand total of 980 valor points. It also allowed players to run heroics in a less limited fashion; you had up to seven in a week and you could run them once a day, all seven at once, or at any other rate you liked until you'd run your seven in a week's time. This was, overall, a positive change and one that allowed non-raiders to collect the tier gear available on vendors faster. Patch 4.2's change to the valor cap (reducing it to 980 in a week) meant that the Zandalari heroics could supply non-raiders with as many VPs as raiders got from raiding.
Now here we are, a couple of months into patch 4.2, and for the most part everyone's run the Zandalari heroics enough to be as fully geared as valor points make possible. Any pieces not available to non-raiders will have been picked up from the ZG/ZA loot table. I'd hazard a guess that a significant fraction of people go from leveling up straight to the Zandalari heroics, carried by justice point tier 11 epics that put them over the ilevel cap as soon as they hit 85, especially when they can also bank honor points and trade those for JPs or spend them on PVP weapons as good or better than the Zandalari items.
At this point, the Zandalari heroics are used to grind out valor points, then grind out justice points for supplemental items or heirlooms for alts. Yet the Zandalari heroics still give twice as many VPs, and when you're capped on VPs, reward twice as many JPs as the launch heroics. With the recent announcement of patch 4.3 coming with three new 5-man dungeons, we're moved to ask: Why not open up the heroics we have to more people?
Opening up the other eight heroics to the 140 VP/JP reward for completing them would basically be saying, "At this point, it's not the gear, it's the points" -- and frankly, that's exactly the case. With ilevel 365 gear available through dailies and crafting and ilevel 378 gear in the AH from Firelands farming, most players are farming up the valor pieces and items they can get and filling the holes they can't with JP purchases. With this as the case, it's simply not necessary to bestow special status on the Zandalari heroics at this point.
ZG and ZA are fine dungeons, well designed, a half-step harder than most of the heroics that came in with launch, but the gear curve is catching up to them, as it must to all things, and as a result, groups that are purely running dungeons to gear up an alt or two are subjected to a level of monotony that simply isn't in anyone's best interest. It would be far better if people whose main emphasis was running five mans could run them and get one out of 10 possible dungeons instead of one out of two.
Another difficulty here is one not everyone will agree with, but here it is: When the Cataclysm dungeons launched, their heroics were often very hard to pug. Months later, that's not the case -- so why not let groups that can finally stop and look at all that gorgeous scenery go in and do so? Dungeons like Halls of Origination, Throne of the Tides, Lost City of the Tol'vir and Vortex Pinnacle are magnificent dungeons in terms of art and layout. Their inclusion in the Rise of the Zandalari tier of reward would greatly break up what potential art and music we were going to be exposed to while farming for points.
With 4.3 a few months away, this is a change that could be made immediately and that would immediately relieve some of the tedium that is unavoidable when grinding points in the same two places over and over again. It would be as if the only BG worth running was Alterac Valley. No matter how much you like AV, you'd get sick of it eventually.
In the end, there simply appears to be no compelling reason to maintain the tier of reward difference between ZG/ZA and the rest of Cataclysm's heroics. For the benefit of everyone involved, for more reason to run these well designed, beautiful instances, and for a break from killing trolls over and over again, I can't see a downside to moving this particular content wall.
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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Raiding
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 6)
Alex Aug 22nd 2011 1:10PM
I agree completely. This would be awesome and many people will agree with me i'm sure. The same 2 dungeons over and over get quite old especially when you're running your alts thru there as well.
Ianmis Aug 22nd 2011 1:44PM
Ok, now that we all agree that the heroics should all be open for the 140 valor points in the random finder and that getting into the Zs should be like when you are trying to get into the top of the leveling dungeons, based on actual item level, lets take it to the actual WoW forums so that the people responsible for making said change will see that we want it. ;)
Vorken Aug 22nd 2011 2:04PM
I find it more likely the trolls get tuned down to the t11 heroics and the new three get the current troll only perks.
Sorry about the optimism.
Chmmr Aug 22nd 2011 2:28PM
It would be nice to see the price of Heavenly Shards to return to something more reasonable as well, as a result.
Donhorn Aug 22nd 2011 2:52PM
I would love so much for either one or the other, buff up the other dungeons or nerf back the Zs, anything to get them in the same rotation. I loved the dungeons that came with launch, like the article said they have so much awesome artwork and music to them that right now isn't really being experienced anymore. I really liked how in Wrath there were newe dungeons added but it was still all in the same rotation, you still had to get geared enogh to get the new dungeons to be added, but once you got there you just had to get it to come up in the rotation or specific queue up for it. Nice and easy.
kreighund Aug 22nd 2011 7:05PM
The basic premise of the troll instances (as Magister's Terrace and Trial of the Champion before) is to aid in accessing gear to fill gaps... This need won't go away just because something newer and flashier is on the way. I find it highly likely that the valor point reward will be reverted to justice points and that the new instances will award the extra valor points. Remember that with 4.3 the JP vendor should be selling T12.
As far as instances getting "old" is concerned... at least there are two as opposed to the singular instances mentioned!
Necromann Aug 22nd 2011 1:10PM
I see Blizz merging the Troll Heroics into tier one and have tier two be the 4.3 heroics. If someone is geared enough for 4.0 heroics but not 4.2, then the trolls aren't in their random, like in Wrath. Personally, I would like all the heroics to in a "base random" queue and still be able to queue for each tier seperately also.
Necromann Aug 22nd 2011 1:12PM
4.1* not 4.2
Mike Aug 22nd 2011 1:17PM
I would like the heroics 5 mans to be in the same tier, but the difference in difficulty is still very much noticeable. I think Blizzard should revert all the nerfs to the original heroics as that would put them closer to the Zandalar difficulty
Amanda A. Aug 22nd 2011 3:10PM
Some of the 'nerfs' were very much needed, though. For example, making the Shatter radius more clearly visible was a good change--yeah, you learned eventually, but it was very unfriendly to new players.
Grak Aug 23rd 2011 5:00AM
Making the shatter radius visible wasnt a nerf, it was an update, as the mechanic was still the same.
Making Karsh Steelbender's adds not dropping lava pools when they die was a nerf.
Zankoku Aug 22nd 2011 1:18PM
The part I dislike is that you run 2 dungeons for max VP. With a larger Heroic Pool, there is some variety and the content does stale as fast.
Eirik Aug 22nd 2011 3:43PM
I do not understand this.
ZG/ZA take considerably more time (in my experience) than "basic" heroics. Given the time I have available, I typically tank "basic" heroics by preference.
Doing "basic" heroics DOES reduce the number of Zandalari heroics you can do for the 140 VP reward, but at a 2-for-1 basis. If I want, I can do 6 "basic" heroics, then 4 Zandalari, were I so inclined.
So where does this "I can't do normal heroics if I do Zandalri heroics" attitude come from?
Maymer Aug 22nd 2011 6:02PM
@Erik
The main point isn't that you CAN'T do normal heroics for VP, it's just that many players (including me) will rush through, get enough gear for the item lvl requirement for trolls, and just do those for the reasons listed.
I can get much better gear from farming ZA/ZG than I can from farming normal heroics. It's true. Not only that, but since it's only two dungeons, instead of 7 initial release dungeons, players have a higher chance of the gear they need from a certain instance dropping by simply having only two dungeons that could appear than a 1 out of 7 chance for the dungeon they need to appear randomly so they can also get their VP.
It's simply looking at the straight line for gear progression. I can get on the Troll Highway Dungeon and get to Epic Loot City quicker and with more traffic (which is actually a good thing in this analogy) than I could going through the alternate route of Slow and Easy Old Dungeon That Doesn't Ever Drop That Damn Weapon You Need, And Even If It Does, You KNOW A Hunter Is Going To Get It, Cause Everything Is A Hunter Weapon Street. It intersects with PvP Boulevard, and the rush hour traffic can be horrendous.
winterhawk Aug 22nd 2011 1:19PM
I am sick to death of the Zandalari dungeons. Even when running them with a geared guild group they're just too long--aside from the stupid cap that means I can't just run normal heroics until my eyes bleed to get to the weekly cap on my non-raiding alts, for the most part it takes less than half the time to run a normal heroic (especially ones with optional bosses) than it does to run a troll. And (fill in favorite deity here) forbid you try to pug the Zandalaris! My pugs (which I always run with at least one other friend) are hit or miss--sometimes we get a really good group and just blast through, but wiping over and over because your pug lock can't manage 5K DPS on the last boss of ZG is just demoralizing.
Aside from that, they're just *boring*. I mean, yeah, they were cool when they were new, and I kind of got my fill of ZA back when it was a raid. But being forced to alternate between ZG and ZA to cap points is...ugh. I've gotten to where I don't even bother running them anymore--I just take longer to get upgrades for my non-raiding alts because I just can't stand the thought of looking at those two dungeons anymore.
Straz Aug 22nd 2011 2:33PM
I was sick of them fast. I ran ZA quite a bit the first time around, plus farming Zandalar rep and mounts before the 60 version disappear, so the locales became engrained in my mind.
While the revamped versions are very well done, they still look the same. On the other hand, most of the other dungeons are extremely well done artistically speaking, and I haven't tired of looking at them. But WoW is a very reward-oriented game, so of course I've skipped over the lower tier as the time spent vs. reward is much lower than doing the Zul'Agains.
vocenoctum Aug 22nd 2011 3:26PM
I still run "old" heroics fine, queue times are less and it's faster and generally easier. You still get people new to them occasionally, but no biggie. There's also of course a wider variety of gear to help out. For those farming VP, I'd say even just removing the stupid weekly cap would help. You could easily run twice as many old heroics as troll heroics for a more enjoyable time usually...
Oh well.
Helm Aug 22nd 2011 1:21PM
Completely agree with the article. Here's hoping Blizz listens to the community and realizes that instances can and should be fun rather than the monotonous chore they have been for months.
I fear that like Necromann mentioned they will simply make the new 5 mans their own tier and in a few months we'll be in the same boat, except we'll be running those dungeons until our eyes bleed instead of the trolls.
loop_not_defined Aug 22nd 2011 5:21PM
I'm not sure how many people remember this, but for a long time after the ICC 5-mans were introduced, it was common to see half or even all of your random PUG members drop group within seconds of zoning in.
Basically, they were harder than 3.0 dungeons. Why risk wasting time on wipes when you could drop/requeue into a faceroll dungeon for easy points?
There were all types of shady activities during that time. Some PUGers would act like complete asshats, trying to get vote-kicked out so they wouldn't get the Deserter debuff. Others would hold their spot for ransom until they've been booted, simply sitting still in the mean time.
I'm not necessarily against combining Current Tier dungeons with Previous Tier dungeons, but we've been here before, and it would be helpful if the past was taken into consideration.
Sinthar Aug 23rd 2011 9:24AM
My suggestion would to be drop the points earnt difference. Make the troll dungeons 1.5x the points a 'normal' heroic dungeon would give. With the added length of the troll dungeons, this seems a fair time to points investment. Then when new dungeons are added, they can change the differential again - say 2x for the new ones, 1.5 troll ones, 1 for 'normal' ones.