Patch 5.4 patch notes
Virtual Realms feature revealed
The Proving Grounds are coming
The latest patch 5.4 newsRandom raid factors and the high cost of failure
by Allison Robert 
Jan 30th 2012 at 2:00PM
Compare this to encounters where the primary difficulty is role-specific or even player-specific. Good DPSers pushed their output to the limit on Patchwerk, healers learned to anticipate damage during Malygos' Vortex while one or two people got good at yanking sparks into the raid, and tanks grew experienced with fast pick-ups on Kael'thas. But the average raid group, even when experienced, probably tripped over and over again on encounters like Teron Gorefiend or Anub'arak. When you can't control who gets targeted by Shadow of Death or Anub'arak's spikes and when the randomness limits the experience that any one player can get ... Well, it's easy to see how certain fights acquire the nightmare moniker.
When you think about it, most of the truly difficult boss fights in the game from classic through present have all incorporated that Tag! You're it! element, and the inability to control for that randomness keeps these fights unpredictable and uncertain until players outlevel the content. As Klepsakovic observes, it's not fun for the raid group as a whole to die to one person's mistake, but it's an unfortunate method of making an encounter challenging -- raising the cost of failure.
The Raid Finder version of Dragon Soul seems like an oblique confirmation of what Klepsakovic's saying here, I think, and it's going to be interesting to see what Blizzard yanks or preserves in future encounters to keep the content accessible to as many players as possible. The true distinction between the average, the good, and the great won't be high DPS, careful gearing, or longevity -- it'll be the ability to cope with random elements that will never be present in the Raid Finder version of an encounter.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 2)
Evelinda Jan 30th 2012 11:28PM
Totally with DFK on this one. These sort of mechanics have been in raiding from the start, and raids have always been hesitant to bring people they weren't sure we're up to snuff. I only started raiding in bc, and didn't get past t4, but those mechanics were there; you put trustworthy people on cubes in magtheridon's lair, because if they screwed up, you wiped. Same deal with beam soakers on netherspite. I can't even begin to count the number of times a new raider would come in on shade of aran, and move during flame wreath.
Maybe it's elitist to expect people to be able to do this sort of thing, but i don't think that's a bad thing. It's the pinnacle of the game, it's SUPPOSED to be hard. Play any other game since pong, and it gets harder as the game goes on.
And I'm saying this as someone who has only done ds rf in this expansion, so hardly the upper echelons of wow.
zEagleEye` Feb 2nd 2012 4:48PM
@DFK
I don't care what you take fault with Gevlon - it's between you and Gevlon.
Instead of ranting about Gevlon please READ what you answer to (what I wrote).
I wrote that there is another opinion somehwere in the field - oh my god what a sin, but I refuse to apologize for that.
Instead of answering the issues you tried to show that Gevlon is not entitled to opinions since he requires "being carried". I don't give a flying you-know-what about Gevlon's history and ability.
If you read the posting that I answered to AND the posting it referenced to (Allison's and Klepsacovic's) you see consistency that happens to disagree with you.
Are you saying that those posts are also out of the blue and the posters have no idea what they are talking about?
Is everybody who disagrees with you a moron (or a Moron?) or is that "title" reserved to people you feel you can offend?
I don't care what you think of me or what I say, but if you insist on telling me how wrong I am please at least READ what I actually say first and acknowledge that not all the opinions in the world that you disagree with are wrong.
For some reason I thought I was living in "the land of the free" with "free speech".
Please note that I am not telling you what you cannot say (you try to tell me not to reference a blog) - I am trying to tell other people that there are different points of view.
As you note - I stated by stating I am not a raider.
As a non-raider I can read what you write and what others write and decide what I like and what I don't and it makes no difference to me since I am not a raider.
Am I stepping on your (un)holy turf by voicing ANYTHYING other than quoting you?
hmmm I'm starting to get that feeling.
Bottom line - if you disagree with the view that the cost of raider's mistakes went up, why don't you take it up with Aliison and others? Because you cannot bully her or because you know she'll cut you down to size? You may even be right and the price of mistakes has NOT gone up, but the way you come across is not really condusive to a discussion (and the difference between a discussion and an argument is that in a discussion people actually LISTEN to the other people).
Please answer to issues, not to a person's background.
To everybosy else - sorry about the rant, but I feel it had to be said.
/getting off the soapbox
DragonFireKai Feb 3rd 2012 4:53AM
Wow, that's a garish amount of caps you used there, I guess you feel very strongly about this. Let's make this clear, I'm not trying to bully you, or anyone else on this site. I'm simply pointing out flaws in people's reasoning.
I did read your comment. You said:
"If in the past a "weaker" player died but the raid killed the boss, the main punishment was the "weaker" player (and the extra load for the ones who carried him/her).
If now a "weaker" player can cause a wipe then the "better" players would logically oppose bringing the "weaker" player in."
Which is something that is not true, and I cited examples of encounters dating back to the first raid instance in WoW that illustrated the same design elements as the current tier.
As for the reason why I brought up Gevlon's raiding history, is because it's relevant to the discussion. He was arguing from a fundamentally flawed position because he didn't account for the impact that his own social experiments were having upon his raiding experience. It's like forgetting to tare your scale, and then using the flawed reading as proof that something's heavier than it used to be.
I think you need a refresher on the difference between a fact and an opinion. "I think raiding should be easier." is an opinion. It is an opinion that people are free to disagree with. "raids didn't use to wipe to mechanics like this." is a false statement, one that can be disproved with a cursory analysis of previous raid encounters. If you think raids should be tuned easier, that's an opinion that I don't agree with, but it's a valid opinion to hold. If you truly think what I quoted from your earlier post, then you're wrong. There is a difference between the two stances. You can reference whatever you want, but if the facts are wrong, then they're wrong, no matter who's saying them.
As for calling people Morons? I didn't. That's more Gevlon's style. You know, the M&S that he's always denigrating.
And a quick heads up. It takes more than one person to down vote a post into oblivion. If your posts are getting blacked out, it's not just me who's disagreeing with you. I might be the one who's most vocal, but I get one vote, just like everyone else.
Robert Jan 30th 2012 8:20PM
So that's why Madness of Deathwing sucks... because the fight doesn't start to get difficult until ten minutes in, when your entire attempt can go belly up when a healer happens to get smashed by the tentacle moments after the elementium bolt lands.
DragonFireKai Jan 30th 2012 8:26PM
Or Thrall decides to drop one of your tanks on the jump to Kalecgos' platform...
Screw you Green Jesus.
mlvarden Jan 31st 2012 9:09AM
The apex of random raid punishment goes back to EQ: I'm sure many players still remember with little fondness getting death-touched by Cazic Thule in Plane of Fear. Not much deflates your enjoyment faster than rocking a boss fight, doing everything right, then "BAROK!" *boom* instant death. Happily, the days of randomly death-touching bosses are long behind us. I think.