Blizzard's post-mortem on Cataclysm dungeons and raids
by Michael Sacco 
Mar 5th 2012 at 10:00PM
Read the full interview after the break.
Cataclysm Post Mortem -- Dungeons and Raids with Scott "Daelo" Mercer
As a part of our post mortem series on Cataclysm, we sat down with World of Warcraft Lead Encounter Designer Scott "Daelo" Mercer to hear his thoughts on Cataclysm dungeons and raids.
Q. What were your main goals going into Cataclysm?
We really wanted to make sure we were creating new challenges, strong mechanics, and cool creatures while staying true to the expansion and the themes we wanted to carry out. The three raid dungeons came out well and we had a lot of fun bringing the story of Nefarian and the Twilight's Hammer to life. We were also able to add some dynamic mechanics in Throne of the Four Winds, which featured players moving across multiple platforms.
Q. How did this evolve over the various content patches?
Zul'Gurub and Zul'Aman were entertaining raids with diverse mechanics, and they translated well when we converted them into Heroic dungeons for patch 4.1. Interesting mechanics and features that once were restricted to raids are now finding their way into our five-player dungeons.
Adding the Dungeon Journal in patch 4.2 was also a major step forward. We wanted to be able to share more information in the game so that players wouldn't feel the need to go look everything up on external websites. While those sites are great at what they do, we felt like we needed to try to alleviate the need to go out of the game to find the information players wanted to see.
The addition of Raid Finder in patch 4.3 also opened up more opportunities for players to be able to experience our raid content. The feature has proven to be extremely popular, and not just with people who had given up on raiding. Many players use Raid Finder to gear up their secondary characters, gain Valor for the week, or just because it's fun.
Q. What do you think worked best?
We've been reasonably successful with our tuning across all four raid difficulty modes. There were a few warts here and there, but we delivered on the idea that 10-player and 25-player raids could exist at a similar difficulty. We also had some memorable dungeons and cinematic moments in Cataclysm. I'm particularly fond of the interactive bombing run in Grim Batol involving the red drakes. Players really got a sense of the epic scale of Grim Batol, and how well they performed in the event could make clearing the rest of the dungeon much easier.
With our improved tools and the experience we've gained over the years, we've become better at finding ways to explain the mechanics of our encounters. Our bosses do a better job of warning players of incoming threats. In Dragon Soul we also began to better inform players of mechanics that caused them to die. Providing a better understanding of the encounters to players is an important goal. We feel that losing to a boss and not understanding why is frustrating, just as beating a boss and not understanding why you won is not as satisfying.
Q. What didn't work out as planned or expected?
Initially, we started off the Heroic dungeons at too high of a difficulty. The difficulty level rather abruptly changed when compared to the Heroics players experienced at the end of Wrath of the Lich King. This major change caught many players off guard, and frustrated some of them. The difficulty also increased the effective amount of time required to complete a dungeon to a longer experience than we wanted. With the release of patch 4.3 we're now in a much better place. We've always talked about being able to complete a dungeon over lunch, and the Hour of Twilight dungeons get us back to that goal. End Time, Well of Eternity, and Hour of Twilight all provide epic play experiences to our players, but at the real sweet spot of difficulty, complexity, and time commitment.
Q. Was there anything that surprised you about how players reacted to a particular encounter?
Not particularly. Something we've learned over the years is to expect the unexpected. The community is very creative and intelligent. The most important thing for us is that players are having fun. They often find interesting ways of approaching things that maybe we didn't expect, but as long the creative solution is still fun for everyone, we usually don't have a problem with it.
Q. What have you learned from Cataclysm and what are some of your top goals for Mists of Pandaria?
We learned we could create a crazy encounter like the Spine of Deathwing. It took a lot of hard work from the whole team and it was a difficult design challenge to tackle. How do you orchestrate a fight on the back of a gigantic flying dragon without inducing nausea? How do we make sure you feel like you're on Deathwing? Delivering that experience was really important and everyone wanted the opportunity to work on it. What was really great was that we launched the story of Cataclysm with the cinematic that showed Deathwing having his elementium plates being put on, then we end the expansion with those very same plates being torn off. It gives some real closure to storyline.
For Mists of Pandaria, we will continue to provide new dungeons and raids while also presenting interesting new types of content in the form of challenge modes and scenarios. Players will also be introduced to new enemies in the Sha, Mogu, and Mantids. Making those creatures come to life will be a lot of fun.
Q. Do you have a favorite dungeon or encounter from Cataclysm?
There are so many. The Conclave of Wind was a great one. Working out interesting mechanics that allowed players to go from platform to platform was a lot of fun and the environment felt really epic. A fight like that was a goal of the encounter team for a very long time.
Blackwing Descent was another favorite and working out the mechanics for the Atramedes fight gave us a lot to think about. How do you create an encounter with a blind dragon that fights? So we gave him sonar and showed the interaction with a sound meter on the player's UI.
In Bastion of Twilight, we really got to sell the corruption angle on Cho'gall which made for another really interesting fight.
Q. Is there a certain mechanic that you always wanted to do but couldn't do prior to Cataclysm?
Not really. There are so many cool ideas to work with that I never feel held back. It's easy to be creatively inspired by the people around you and their energy. It's never a problem of coming up with ideas. It's usually deciding which ones we want to go with next, but the possibilities are endless.
Q. Do you have a "dream" dungeon or encounter that you'd like to create if you had the opportunity?
I've never felt that I haven't been able to do the things I want to do. Everyone on the team is completely dedicated to giving us unlimited opportunities to make epic and awesome experiences. But, if I have to mention something, it would be huge giant death robots. We had Mimiron in Ulduar, but you just can't have too many death robots.
Q. Thank you for your time, Scott.
You're welcome.
Q. What were your main goals going into Cataclysm?
We really wanted to make sure we were creating new challenges, strong mechanics, and cool creatures while staying true to the expansion and the themes we wanted to carry out. The three raid dungeons came out well and we had a lot of fun bringing the story of Nefarian and the Twilight's Hammer to life. We were also able to add some dynamic mechanics in Throne of the Four Winds, which featured players moving across multiple platforms.
Q. How did this evolve over the various content patches?
Zul'Gurub and Zul'Aman were entertaining raids with diverse mechanics, and they translated well when we converted them into Heroic dungeons for patch 4.1. Interesting mechanics and features that once were restricted to raids are now finding their way into our five-player dungeons.
Adding the Dungeon Journal in patch 4.2 was also a major step forward. We wanted to be able to share more information in the game so that players wouldn't feel the need to go look everything up on external websites. While those sites are great at what they do, we felt like we needed to try to alleviate the need to go out of the game to find the information players wanted to see.
The addition of Raid Finder in patch 4.3 also opened up more opportunities for players to be able to experience our raid content. The feature has proven to be extremely popular, and not just with people who had given up on raiding. Many players use Raid Finder to gear up their secondary characters, gain Valor for the week, or just because it's fun.
Q. What do you think worked best?
We've been reasonably successful with our tuning across all four raid difficulty modes. There were a few warts here and there, but we delivered on the idea that 10-player and 25-player raids could exist at a similar difficulty. We also had some memorable dungeons and cinematic moments in Cataclysm. I'm particularly fond of the interactive bombing run in Grim Batol involving the red drakes. Players really got a sense of the epic scale of Grim Batol, and how well they performed in the event could make clearing the rest of the dungeon much easier.
With our improved tools and the experience we've gained over the years, we've become better at finding ways to explain the mechanics of our encounters. Our bosses do a better job of warning players of incoming threats. In Dragon Soul we also began to better inform players of mechanics that caused them to die. Providing a better understanding of the encounters to players is an important goal. We feel that losing to a boss and not understanding why is frustrating, just as beating a boss and not understanding why you won is not as satisfying.
Q. What didn't work out as planned or expected?
Initially, we started off the Heroic dungeons at too high of a difficulty. The difficulty level rather abruptly changed when compared to the Heroics players experienced at the end of Wrath of the Lich King. This major change caught many players off guard, and frustrated some of them. The difficulty also increased the effective amount of time required to complete a dungeon to a longer experience than we wanted. With the release of patch 4.3 we're now in a much better place. We've always talked about being able to complete a dungeon over lunch, and the Hour of Twilight dungeons get us back to that goal. End Time, Well of Eternity, and Hour of Twilight all provide epic play experiences to our players, but at the real sweet spot of difficulty, complexity, and time commitment.
Q. Was there anything that surprised you about how players reacted to a particular encounter?
Not particularly. Something we've learned over the years is to expect the unexpected. The community is very creative and intelligent. The most important thing for us is that players are having fun. They often find interesting ways of approaching things that maybe we didn't expect, but as long the creative solution is still fun for everyone, we usually don't have a problem with it.
Q. What have you learned from Cataclysm and what are some of your top goals for Mists of Pandaria?
We learned we could create a crazy encounter like the Spine of Deathwing. It took a lot of hard work from the whole team and it was a difficult design challenge to tackle. How do you orchestrate a fight on the back of a gigantic flying dragon without inducing nausea? How do we make sure you feel like you're on Deathwing? Delivering that experience was really important and everyone wanted the opportunity to work on it. What was really great was that we launched the story of Cataclysm with the cinematic that showed Deathwing having his elementium plates being put on, then we end the expansion with those very same plates being torn off. It gives some real closure to storyline.
For Mists of Pandaria, we will continue to provide new dungeons and raids while also presenting interesting new types of content in the form of challenge modes and scenarios. Players will also be introduced to new enemies in the Sha, Mogu, and Mantids. Making those creatures come to life will be a lot of fun.
Q. Do you have a favorite dungeon or encounter from Cataclysm?
There are so many. The Conclave of Wind was a great one. Working out interesting mechanics that allowed players to go from platform to platform was a lot of fun and the environment felt really epic. A fight like that was a goal of the encounter team for a very long time.
Blackwing Descent was another favorite and working out the mechanics for the Atramedes fight gave us a lot to think about. How do you create an encounter with a blind dragon that fights? So we gave him sonar and showed the interaction with a sound meter on the player's UI.
In Bastion of Twilight, we really got to sell the corruption angle on Cho'gall which made for another really interesting fight.
Q. Is there a certain mechanic that you always wanted to do but couldn't do prior to Cataclysm?
Not really. There are so many cool ideas to work with that I never feel held back. It's easy to be creatively inspired by the people around you and their energy. It's never a problem of coming up with ideas. It's usually deciding which ones we want to go with next, but the possibilities are endless.
Q. Do you have a "dream" dungeon or encounter that you'd like to create if you had the opportunity?
I've never felt that I haven't been able to do the things I want to do. Everyone on the team is completely dedicated to giving us unlimited opportunities to make epic and awesome experiences. But, if I have to mention something, it would be huge giant death robots. We had Mimiron in Ulduar, but you just can't have too many death robots.
Q. Thank you for your time, Scott.
You're welcome.
Brace yourselves for what could be some of most exciting updates to the game recently with patch 4.3. Review the official patch notes, and then dig into what's ahead: new item storage options, cross-realm raiding, cosmetic armor skinning and your chance to battle the mighty Deathwing -- from astride his back!
Filed under: Blizzard, Cataclysm, Mists of Pandaria
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
Thorie Mar 5th 2012 10:20PM
I like that Blizzard stays optimistic about things. I, however, think the least of Cataclysm's raid/dungeon problems was entry-level Heroics. In my opinion, Heroics and raids felt too fast-paced and sloppy, especially Dragon Soul. While I understand not everyone likes to wait and feel like a part of the world. I hated how Dragon Soul's use of phasing was done instantaneously (we dont see the Alliance ship drifting in or Twilight's Hammer reatreating even though Afrasiabi says they are).
All in all, I felt rushed through the raid I was looking forward to the most and ended with a confused look on my face wondering just what all happened.
Tyrrax Mar 5th 2012 10:23PM
I think that the difficulty point was understated. There was a trend that was started in raiding that intensified in WOTLK. I call this phenomenon the "hokie pokie dance". Succeeding at a raid has become doing a special little dance. You move here when this DBM alert goes off, you do that when this other DBM alarm goes off. This trend intensified throughout the previous expansion. You do this and that when you're told. There's no strategy here....you just do what you're told.
Then we get to Cataclysm. The Hokie Pokie dance got even worse. In many cases before if you didn't do the dance right you would suffer some negative result: it might slow you down or damage you to the point that healers have to waste mana to save you. Now if you don't do the hokie pokie and turn yourself around you typically die now...instantly with little or no margin for error.
To make it worse at the start of Cataclysm this even trickled down to the instance level. You now have bosses in 5 man heroic dungeons that are more mechanically complex in some of the bosses in say....Naxxramas.
Blizzard has been trying so hard to one up themselves after every expansion that the complexity of everything is beginning to overwhelm everything else they do. They need to stop listening to the people complaining about EZMODE encounters and "welfare epics". Casuals are the ones paying their salary. If they can't understand that then they deserve to fail.
Sqtsquish Mar 5th 2012 10:32PM
Naxx was one of the Raids in original wow that had a great deal of its difficulty and mechanics gutted of flat out nerfed into oblivion before we even saw it in Wrath. So are you to say that a 5 man's boss mechanic cannot be of comparable, if not slightly more difficult than one of the simplest raids in recent history?
The playerbase needs to step up, if only a little. They tried too hard all at once, but you can't have bosses with only 2 abilities that they use once or twice a fight anymore, it just isn't comparable. The biggest difference in cata 5 mans from Wrath ones is you were much less likely to be able to manage to carry anyone, not that you can't, but it is harder.
Arbolamante Mar 5th 2012 11:02PM
"Dance" is definitely the right word. While there are bosses that allow for variations in strategy, it still boils down to do your dance steps, fire off you interrupts and cooldowns at the right time, and pump out the numbers.
I don't have any bright ideas for improving on it, but I do get a little tired with all the dancing sometimes.
Revynn Mar 5th 2012 11:30PM
- "I don't have any bright ideas for improving on it, but I do get a little tired with all the dancing sometimes."
Dancing is far more entertaining than standing in one spot and pew-pewing for 5 minutes straight. A DPS race with a tight enrage timer can be a white-knuckle experience the first time you down it, but as your gear builds and the enrage timer becomes less and less of an issue, the fight just gets boring.
And if you're going to be doing something every week for the next 6 months, boring is certainly what you -don't- want.
Twill Mar 5th 2012 11:41PM
There just needs to be a slightly bigger margin of error. If one of my DPS fucks up, I as a healer want to be able to fix the problem, not feel useless because I can't do anything about it. I want to be able to down the boss because we as a team beat it, not because everyone is a good dancer. When one person fails, have others pick up the slack. I think that's perfectly fair.
Revnah Mar 6th 2012 12:06AM
Revynn, I hear what you are saying. But I do think we've taken the "make encounters interesting" philosophy a little too far. I raid Dragon Soul on my kitty, and there isn't a single fight which is suited to feral dps's playstyle. I don't mind movement, or target switching, but practically every fight with the possible exception of Zon'ozz normal, has absolute tons of both, negating any advantage my spec could otherwise have. I'm tired of running back and forth to get to the next, and next, and next target while ranged simply tab-target or at most, run a few steps (while doing damage).
There's not *one* Patchwerk. Ultraxion is often hailed as such, but the Fading Light/Hour of Twilight mechanic makes it impossible for several classes to do optimum damage (DoT classes...). And to return to my kitty example, we can't use our bread-and-butter ability, Shred, and even with glyphed Mangle it's a substantial dps loss.
Don't get me wrong, I still love and enjoy DS. I'm only wondering whether they've taken certain mechanics too far, and whether there might be different ways of making an encounter "interesting" (how about, for example, having to move following the boss around and dodging stuff, without also switching targets three million times? Just thinking out loud).
Arbolamante Mar 6th 2012 12:37AM
@Revynn Agreed, certainly. It's fine to have a gear check fight from time to time -- I guess Ultraxion fits that role in Dragon Soul, though there are some minimal mechanics there. I'd like to see a great plausible range of successful strats for most fights though-- but I'm not a game designer, so I'm not sure how to achieve that.
Plainswander Mar 6th 2012 8:45AM
The main problem with cataclysm can be summed up as "one mistake and you're dead". Difficulty should increase on a slop relate to player skill and/or attentiveness, it should not be a binary proposition where any deviation from form results in total party death.
One-hit-wipe mechanics in anything but max-level heroic raiding are the bane of enjoyable gaming.
Jyotai Mar 6th 2012 2:52PM
Yeah...
Pretty much every new boss raid or 5-er that I've seen since naxx, I find myself joking in chat "oh, this is just Heigan's dance, but with more shiny things on the left of my screen instead of right like that last guy."
I feel like we all need to be wearing cowboy boots and hats that are frilly for actual cows, but just right for the C&W clubs downtown... :)
Line dancing meets MMOs.
Raids for me have been getting less interesting since I started them - having started in Kara. I joined near the end of Classic, and didn't hit 60 i time to experience any of those raids. But I've gone back to many of them on high level toons.
- A look around and I can tell you had to think, and change up a lot. But that they were also designed with the understanding that 20 or so folks would screw up leaving the encounter to be done by the remaining 20 not yet face-planting.
...
Some things have improved and others have not.
What I miss most about older raids was tolerance among players for wipes. Back in Kara people just assumed you'd wipe on a boss for a few weeks until you all got it down. Now, 5 minutes into LFR, we haven't even wiped yet - and folks start giving up because one of the DPS is only pulling 20.7k DPS on a fight where he should have 20.71k...
When you had to form groups, and you had to unlock things to even get in the door...
- People felt more committed once there.
Yes it was way too much of a pain to form a group most of the time, but once you had one, you all felt a commitment to work together for the goal.
Now people give up way too easily on the whole thing or each other.
Ata Mar 5th 2012 11:37PM
Is it just me, or does this interview give the impression that they really are dissapointed with dungeons, and know that most of the playerbase hated them, and the HoT dungeons are only a slight apology?
Whenever asked about his favorites, or what he liked, Mercer will happily point to something in a raid. The only time dungeons are mentioned is when former raids were turned into dungeons, and then when the interviewer flat out asks what was bad, because he can't avoid the answer everyone knows, addresses the white elephant, and then 'whee, but we fixed it with HoT!' ignoring that you're still trapped in the older, shitty heroics until you get the right ilevel or cheat with pvp gear.
I hate that I feel myself becoming an unhappy, jaded WoW player. My only enjoyment in the game now comes from playing solo, and that's sad to me. I love the game, and I was just...so disappointed in Cata when I had been so excited about the fact they were finally changing the 1-60 experience. That turned out to be the only part I liked. *Sigh* I still play, and still do get enjoyment, just not as varied in what brings me enjoyment as what I used to get, and that's the sad part to me, I think.
Sqtsquish Mar 5th 2012 11:59PM
the mechanics in the heroics are anything but "shitty", it is the fact that one person screwing up ruins it for everyone. That is where raid difficulty is supposed to have the line drawn. The fights themselves are VERY entertaining, it is the bad attitude of the players about them, the fact that not everyone is always on their A game, that is the reason the can be a drudgery. I am not saying people should need to always be on their A game for heroics, but it is definitely difficult to create a feeling of suspense or desperation in a dungeon without that requirement. Halls of Reflection was my favorite heroic in Wrath, not because it could randomly screw you, but because when it wouldn't RNG screw over eating a squishy, you had everyone, regardless of skill level, get serious, and when you did manage, you totally felt like you rocked!
Anacrusa Mar 6th 2012 12:10AM
re: Heroic dungeons, I basically felt that this was a very soft interview, as far as how he answered. It feels like he's saying, "Well, we overtuned the difficulty of heroics and made them too long etc.," but "Hey, we gave you the HoT dungeons, and they fit much better into our re-reevaluated idea of how long/difficult a dungeon should be, so that's a success."
I agree with you, Ata. I found myself so frustrated with the new dungeon mechanics at release, particularly as a melee player (and with people in pugs that insisted on playing like it was a Wrath-style aoe-fest), that I left the game for a while. When I eventually came back, I battled through some of those frustrations, but it's been a weird expansion in that regard.
I'll go ahead and concede that this is Blizzard interviewing Blizzard... but to me it's still disappointing to read some of Scott's answers. I think I was expecting, perhaps unrealistically, some more in-depth commentary (about what have been much-discussed issues for this expansion) from the Lead Encounter Designer.
Jordan Mar 6th 2012 1:00AM
Difficult heroics that require cc and strategy are great, but the way it was delivered this expansion was just bad timing.
First off, we were all fresh from an expansion that exemplified the exact opposite of that playstyle (Wrath AOE fest where CC was actually a hindrance). Months and months of WOTLK ensured that new players never learned these skills, and old players completely lost these habits. Indeed, I remember multiple groups as a healer where after requesting CC to help from going OOM so fast I would get the honest response "what's cc??". Furthermore, the entire 1-80 content only exacerbates this problem, as with the buffs to gearing and nerfs to content, 1-80 dungeons are usually quite trivial and a mindless faceroll. After literally days of content of training new players to just zerg and aoe, they suddenly hit a brick wall of pain in 80-85 dungeons, which demand them to suddenly and flawlessly change to a playstyle they never knew existed, never learned, and don't even know how to execute.
That above was enough to create a disaster. Now throw in some more bad alignment of events: healing redesign. Healing was retooled in a way that was the dramatic opposite of WOTLK style healing. Old habits that were handsomely rewarded and ingrained in wotlk suddenly crashed and burned, resulted in going OOM in seconds. Healer's that were flexible and willing to both relearn their class AND relearn how healing worked hit the second difficulty: many if not most dps players and tanks did not/could not/or would not make the necessary playing adjusgments (TBC style careful pulls with CC) which meant that ALL of the dungeon encounter difficulty got stacked on the healer.
The two of those things certainly is ripe for disaster, but now throw in one more bad alignment of events: uninspiring end-game content. The truth of Cataclysm was that the meat of the expansion was the new 1-60 content, but most players expected it to be the 80-85 content. There were fewer dungeons at-release than the prior two expansions, and due to the aforementioned points players became burned-out of those dungeons even faster. This was exacerbated further by a slower gearing rate compared to WOTLK.
For the above reasons, what was great in principle was a disaster in practice. It's not that players are lazy or stupid and desire mindless content; it's simply that they just want to have fun, and this expansion's end-game content involved changes that were implemented with the subtlety of a train-wreck. Heck, player's like a challenge: WOTLK, despite much wailing, wasn't the eazy-sauce faceroll people make it out to be. The dungeons, when appropriately geared, could be just as challenging at the start of the expansion. The only difference is that one could out-gear WOTLK dungeons much, much faster than Cata dungeons, and hence they got the incorrect perception of being easy.
Players like a challenge, but more than anything they want to have fun. If we can have both, then the more the merrier. But challenge without fun, especially when it's delivered in the form of boring and limited number of dungeons, is no fun at all.
I am one of those players who healed heroics and pugs like you can't believe all through WoTLK. I pined for the days of TBC healing, but the way it was executed in Cata was a disaster, and I dropped my main healer in favor of rolling a rogue. Now I play my rogue and do nothing but pve solo, slowly leveling and savoring the real gem of Cata, old-world content.
Revnah Mar 6th 2012 1:26AM
You all are right. That's because what failed was not the fact that the heroics were long and difficult. It was the fact they're long and difficult *combined with* Dungeon Finder PuGs, groups you have no influence on and that are a complete Russian roulette when it comes to skill, communication, etc. And of course the fact these dungeons were so very long, drawing out the pain. I spent four hours in Grim Batol once without finishing it. We went through I think 6 tanks during that time. Four hours, and no VPs. Certainly not a "fun" gaming experience!
That's when frustration sets in: when people feel they don't have control over their own success and thus often fail without being at fault - with the only alternative being not to participate in end game PvE at all.
Jordan Mar 6th 2012 1:41AM
But dungeon-finder PuGs with even the dread and fearful HoR weren't as grindy and miserable as Cata dungeons. HoR was HARD in the early days before you mindlessly outgeared it, and a blast to do with random people (I purely pugged, never was in a good guild). I never had that consistent experience in Cata.
I think part of the difference is motivation. The series of Icecrown Dungeons were quite simply incredible. Just the sheer dread excitement of HoR, of knowing that THE FRICKING LICH KING is marching towards you was a kick in the butt to play like crazy and take the dungeon seriously that I just don't think was equaled in the Cata dungeons.
mibu.work1 Mar 6th 2012 2:01AM
I dunno, I may just be a grumpy old-timer, but I felt the change to the cataclysm dungeons was a refreshing change of pace. I remember at the beginning of wrath, going into normal-mode Nexus wearing my T5-T6 and my Arena axe, a month or so into the expansion. We went down into the room with the frozen Alliance (or Horde if you are Alliance). I remember panicking when the tank didn't assign raid targets, and being even more alarmed when he pulled. I quickly CC'd the healer, terrified of heals going out or perhaps a fear being used, only to have the tank break it. 'What does he think he's doing!? This room is full of enemies, he's gonna pull more before we're half-done with these guys!' Then, lo-and-behold, the enemies are dead, and CC was rendered obsolete for almost the entire expansion. I mindlessly DPS'd my way through Wrath, jumped gleefully at the opportunity to kite the stoneskin gargoyles in Naxxrammass, and then sat bored until Ulduar.
When Cataclysm hit, I was eager to try these new heroics, and they were HARD! I loved ever minute, from off-tanking the early pulls in Stonecore with my pet to having tanks wait on ME to CC a caster in Skywall, it was amazing and wonderful. We've lost something of that, but now people just recognize when a pull needs CC, needs offtanking, needs an interrupt, and I'm there to provide it.
This wasn't just listening to a vocal minority, this was what the game needed. Cataclysm was hard to begin with, yes, but I think the game, and the players, are better for it at this end.
SamLowry Mar 8th 2012 5:28PM
"HoR was HARD in the early days before you mindlessly outgeared it"
Say what? I have several alts who were covered in purple at the end of Wrath that never completed HoR in either mode because it was such a meat-grinder. 90% of the DF groups I was in fell apart in less than 5 minutes because the first pull almost always ended in a wipe.
Decked out in full 378s, maybe NOW they outgear HoR.
andrew.martin1981 Mar 5th 2012 11:49PM
I really feel disappointed that they feel the dungeons were too difficult in launch Cataclysm. Healing as a fresh 85 is still enjoyable and challenging.
Why is it that the only hard weed out points for terrible players has to be in heroic raids? Why can't the weed out point be much much sooner. Why is it so much to ask that a player learn how to do the fight?
All the dungeons ask you to do is not stand in the bad and use some abilities beyond your basic rotation like interrupts, CC, dispels etc. If you can't manage that why shouldn't you hit a wall?
Ilmyrn Mar 6th 2012 12:32AM
I agree. As a melee player, I felt that the launch heroics were perfectly tuned. Well, mostly. I had a blast whether I was running them with guildies or LFG pugs.