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Wilian

Arcane
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Divinity: Original Sin
I wouldn't really know, I played on two servers, one where I was Paladin class leader (ER) and we did MC/AQ20, on other where I was guild leader (rogue, Moonglade) and we did BWL but never stepped to AQ. It was just too hardcore for the people in the guild, even if I wanted. I only became top 100 raider in Wrath really but I didn't have the damn guild leading holding me back, which really, really sucked. Damn kids >.<

Neither of those servers had actually real Naxx guild. 1 Horde did kill 2 bosses in Naxx but not C'thun and Alliance just sucked after collapse of their "HC" guild.
 
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Israfael

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3,580
Raids were less of a cluster fuck but much more unforgiving. A single death often meant a wipe. There were no raid pugs, it was impossible.
Current raids are much more unforgiving as more and more responsibility is shifted to the personal level. We are currently progressing on the Siegecrafter HC and every little positioning mistake (let alone hunters failing on the belt) voids the effort of 9 other people on the 'dance floor'. In olden times, apart from overtuned Sunwell, it was possible to end the encounter with some people dead. Pugs.. pugs never change. There were Kara/T5 pugs, with different amount of success though. Same today - you can easily get into full normal clear pugs, and 3-5 hc bosses pugs with some luck, even 8 hc bosses (at least 2 of my guilides had that experience).
 
Self-Ejected

Excidium

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Bossfights just got a lot more refined over the entire course of wow's history. Raid design as a whole that went on a steep decline after WotLK
 

Avellion

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2elbdc9.jpg

Did you guys see this tweet? Blizzard removed it because it turned out badly for them.

Bossfights just got a lot more refined over the entire course of wow's history. Raid design as a whole that went on a steep decline after WotLK
you mean during WotLK right?
 

Caim

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Alright, I just discovered that a Death Knight can't solo those two bros who guard C'thun, because they keep healing each other faster than you can hurt them.
 

Caim

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Hm, alright. I will also have to find a fix for one of those bosses kicking me away every few seconds so I can in fact keep attacking them. Maybe just standing in the corner will help, and pick off that melee guy first?
 

Wilian

Arcane
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Divinity: Original Sin
..Now I see why you might have issues, yes. :P

Knockback? Back against wall, yes. Very much common sense choice. Excellent!

As for which dude to pick off first, I don't remember as it's ages since I did it but I recommend the one with lower HP unless they share it. Then you just need to hone your rotation until you get them. Those bosses were already doable at around level 80 with good gear.
 

Caim

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Alright, all I need now is the proper rotation. I take it Frost Knight is the way to go?
 

Lerk

Learned
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Alright, all I need now is the proper rotation. I take it Frost Knight is the way to go?
Blood DK in dps gear. you can solo pretty much anything up to and including Dragon Soul, though obviously some bosses have mechanics that require more than one person.

Edit: You're talking about Twin Emperors. In that case I'd say Frost DK would be better, much higher burst. Should be easily doable in the floor-epics from Timeless Isle. Whether you're 2H or DW won't matter, it's basically Diseases>Oblit>FS>HB and spam FS as Runic Power allows, fill up any empty GCDs with Horn, if your runes dry up use Empower Rune Weapoin. Pop Army when the second Twin arrives and drop DnD. I guess you could use Necrotic Strike too if you're having trouble with them healing.
 
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Wilian

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Divinity: Original Sin
Alright, all I need now is the proper rotation. I take it Frost Knight is the way to go?
Blood DK in dps gear. you can solo pretty much anything up to and including Dragon Soul, though obviously some bosses have mechanics that require more than one person.

Edit: You're talking about Twin Emperors. In that case I'd say Frost DK would be better, much higher burst. Should be easily doable in the floor-epics from Timeless Isle. Whether you're 2H or DW won't matter, it's basically Diseases>Oblit>FS>HB and spam FS as Runic Power allows, fill up any empty GCDs with Horn, if your runes dry up use Empower Rune Weapoin. Pop Army when the second Twin arrives and drop DnD.

You might want to explain what all those abbreviations are. I mean, we're talking about someone still figuring out knockbacks :P
 

Lerk

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Alright, all I need now is the proper rotation. I take it Frost Knight is the way to go?
Blood DK in dps gear. you can solo pretty much anything up to and including Dragon Soul, though obviously some bosses have mechanics that require more than one person.

Edit: You're talking about Twin Emperors. In that case I'd say Frost DK would be better, much higher burst. Should be easily doable in the floor-epics from Timeless Isle. Whether you're 2H or DW won't matter, it's basically Diseases>Oblit>FS>HB and spam FS as Runic Power allows, fill up any empty GCDs with Horn, if your runes dry up use Empower Rune Weapoin. Pop Army when the second Twin arrives and drop DnD.

You might want to explain what all those abbreviations are. I mean, we're talking about someone still figuring out knockbacks :P
Lol sure sorry :oops::

2H Two Handed
DW Dual Wield
Diseases Frost Fever, Blood Plague
Oblit Obliterate
FS Frost Strike
HB Howling Blast
Horn Horn of Winter
GCD Global Cooldown
Army Army of the Dead
DnD Death and Decay

Caim I would spend an hour or two running around Timeless isle hunting chests and killing rares if I were you, you can get a full set of 496 itemlevel random drop epics there that will make soloing anything pre-Pandaria a breeze. You can also buy 476 itemlevel weapons from the vendors for Timeless Coins (of which you'll get a lot)
 
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Zed

Codex Staff
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Codex USB, 2014
Well there's the raid myth. They really weren't that hard. MC was literally tank and spank, BWL first boss was more involved but most of the later ones were tank and spank. No one did AQ/Naxx anyhow (unless you claim to be that 0.01% who did, then lol.). They were more involving and probably actually hard but majority of raids people actually did were not. They were just fucking hell to organize and I happen to know this as someone who led 40 apes through them.

Majority of content was dungeons and leveling for about everyone (Or RP if that was your thing) unless you were part of the hardcore stuff and as such I think that's over-promoted. And dungeons are actually kinda difficult in vanilla compared to raids.
Early raids were very dependent on good tanks who could position, stance-dance and rotate well. Tanks were critical from the first boss of MC (Lucifron) to the last boss of BWL (Nefarian). For the rest of the raid, it was mostly just positioning and reacting to things like Living Bomb and spawned adds (which, again, relied on tanks).
A good raid leader and a couple of decent tanks could have led any 40-man team though all the content.

TBC introduced more raid-wide challenges. From positioning on Gruul and managing Magtheridon rage, to passing balls on Vashj and the clusterfuck fights in Tempest Keep.
I suppose WotLK did this too, but was generally more forgiving. The itemization and rewards made most base content trivial. The new Naxx was a joke compared to the old Naxx.

The later part of Dire Maul and LBRS/UBRS were the only really challenging dungeons of vanilla, but BRS could be raided anyway. Stratholme was pretty easy if you just took the time and didn't rush because there were a ton of potential miss-pulls and adds.
 

Lerk

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Well there's the raid myth. They really weren't that hard. MC was literally tank and spank, BWL first boss was more involved but most of the later ones were tank and spank. No one did AQ/Naxx anyhow (unless you claim to be that 0.01% who did, then lol.). They were more involving and probably actually hard but majority of raids people actually did were not. They were just fucking hell to organize and I happen to know this as someone who led 40 apes through them.

Majority of content was dungeons and leveling for about everyone (Or RP if that was your thing) unless you were part of the hardcore stuff and as such I think that's over-promoted. And dungeons are actually kinda difficult in vanilla compared to raids.
Early raids were very dependent on good tanks who could position, stance-dance and rotate well. Tanks were critical from the first boss of MC (Lucifron) to the last boss of BWL (Nefarian). For the rest of the raid, it was mostly just positioning and reacting to things like Living Bomb and spawned adds (which, again, relied on tanks).
A good raid leader and a couple of decent tanks could have led any 40-man team though all the content.

TBC introduced more raid-wide challenges. From positioning on Gruul and managing Magtheridon rage, to passing balls on Vashj and the clusterfuck fights in Tempest Keep.
I suppose WotLK did this too, but was generally more forgiving. The itemization and rewards made most base content trivial. The new Naxx was a joke compared to the old Naxx.

The later part of Dire Maul and LBRS/UBRS were the only really challenging dungeons of vanilla, but BRS could be raided anyway. Stratholme was pretty easy if you just took the time and didn't rush because there were a ton of potential miss-pulls and adds.
Scholomance could be pretty hairy too. As for tanks ... honestly in my experience tanks were more valued for their dependability than their "skill". They had no rotation as such, spamming sunder gave insane threat, shield block and mortal strike on cooldown and spam heroic strike. No decent tank took more than 15 points in the prot tree anyway (just enough to get Defiance), the rest was spent in Arms for Mortal Strike (few points in Fury for Cruelty)

Stance Dancing on a boss? Suicide because you lost your damage reduction and you typically weren't crit immune unless you had full tier 2 with Styleen's Scarab. Tanks had to up their game in AQ and Naxx, but then so did everyone.

The rest of your post I agree with.
 

Cyberarmy

Love fool
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Divinity: Original Sin 2
I was massively dissapointed when saw the nerfed Strat-Scholo where we can pull without thinking... I miss good'ol class runs.

Edit: Some bosses required stance dancing to resist fear effects. I even had a timer add-on which had good guesses/knows when certain bosses gonna use fear.
 

Caim

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Alright, I can work with that. I did see that you can upgrade your stuff with Valor points, which you can grind on the Timeless Isle as well with dailies. Or is that not really feasible?
 

Lerk

Learned
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Alright, I can work with that. I did see that you can upgrade your stuff with Valor points, which you can grind on the Timeless Isle as well with dailies. Or is that not really feasible?
Dont' upgrade the TI stuff, it's a waste of VP. It's good to get if you've nothing else, but it's shit for its item level (no sockets except on chest and helm, only one secondary stat).

Run some Throne of Thunder LFR for tier and weapons when you're kitted out with Timeless, no one cares what your gear is like in there as it's usually being steamrollered by fairly geared alts doing their legendary cloak. You *could* try hitting up Siege of Orgrimmar too but people can get sniffy about gear there (even in LFR) and you might get kicked on that basis alone:M
 

Lerk

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I was massively dissapointed when saw the nerfed Strat-Scholo where we can pull without thinking... I miss good'ol class runs.
Ah man, Classruns! I'd forgotten they existed :love:

Edit: Some bosses required stance dancing to resist fear effects. I even had a timer add-on which had good guesses/knows when certain bosses gonna use fear.

Aaaah...that makes sense, then. I was Horde back then and we abused the shit out of Tremor Totem :)
 

Wilian

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Divinity: Original Sin
The difficuly of vanilla didn't really come from mechanically difficult mobs or bosses. It really came down to invidual groups and how they played together

Say, if you had entry level group fresh from leveling and some questing, there were several key-things to watch

Patrols: Patrol at wrong moment could pull in extra group that could kill you, unless you had particulary skilled group utilizing their class to the fullest to pull it through. Had to remain attentive of surroundings all the time

Threat: Threat was a real thing in vanilla, and unlike cloudy memories of Lerk, it was actually far more involving with dance stancing, interrupts, stuns and even trying to AoE tank which was not easy as Sunder did cost quite the rage. On top of that, thanks to entry level gear, tanks had no hit so a lot of abilities could miss, making the choices you do a more hectic and threat you generate far less. One wrong miss sunder? Mob runs there, what now? Taunt miss? What now? Hope group is up to it. Or you know how to use rest of your tools which you had if you were good.

CC: Pulls were big and the mobs hit hard, one-two shotting clothies if taken unawares and leather not much better. You had to CC and keep eye on CC as they could often run out since mobs didn't tend to die in just couple of hits. Many mobs only were suspectible of certain CCs so either you had to play clever with short-term ones (stuns/incapatiates) or fit unconventional groups

Mana: Mana, especially on mentioned entry gear was very limited resource and the healer had to be really careful when to dispel and heal and especially whom, else having the threat of running OOM. Oftentimes players had to bandage because the mana just wasn't enough to go around. Healer also might've had alternative CC duties on top of that to keep track of

Trash abilities: Yes, these existed and they were nasty. Not in terms of "there's fire, don't stand in it" but "Fucker I just stunned you and I'm about to go and rape your healer". This created whole dynamic where players had to apply their class abilities to stop the mob, taunt the mob or anything. They ranged from stuns to fears that could devastate the group, mindcontrols, to summoning extra mobs to simple lifedrain/boneshield combination that if not broken could up the mob entirely. Mobs also healed each others, those idiots. They didn't even need to be complex. A mob critting could gain enrage and then suddenly if healer wasn't awake proceed to take 80% of tank HP in couple sweeps. Tank was low? Ooops, too bad. Dead.

Bosses: Bosses weren't mechanically difficult but more so punishing in every little thing they did, especially dungeon end bosses. Good example being last boss of Strath UD. Does AoE damage to anyone within 30 yards, casts Shadowbolt taking 40% of tank's health, hits like truck, summons skeletons that if nto killed fast, heals the boss. Very, very hectic fight in itself to pull through even if not complex. Required stuns, AoE, offheals, interrupts and all nice stuff. Surprising amount of bosses were like that at end-game

It's combination of all these things that made the runs challenging, interesting and requiring attention.

The problem is that people later on who joined in got easier runs when they joined up with those already geared up to an extent, taking away a bit from the experience. Mobs dying faster so not being such big of a threat etc. But it was still there to the end at least until getting raid gear.
 

Lerk

Learned
Joined
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Messages
196
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Dunwall
The difficuly of vanilla didn't really come from mechanically difficult mobs or bosses. It really came down to invidual groups and how they played together

Say, if you had entry level group fresh from leveling and some questing, there were several key-things to watch

Patrols: Patrol at wrong moment could pull in extra group that could kill you, unless you had particulary skilled group utilizing their class to the fullest to pull it through. Had to remain attentive of surroundings all the time

Threat: Threat was a real thing in vanilla, and unlike cloudy memories of Lerk, it was actually far more involving with dance stancing, interrupts, stuns and even trying to AoE tank which was not easy as Sunder did cost quite the rage. On top of that, thanks to entry level gear, tanks had no hit so a lot of abilities could miss, making the choices you do a more hectic and threat you generate far less. One wrong miss sunder? Mob runs there, what now? Taunt miss? What now? Hope group is up to it. Or you know how to use rest of your tools which you had if you were good.

CC: Pulls were big and the mobs hit hard, one-two shotting clothies if taken unawares and leather not much better. You had to CC and keep eye on CC as they could often run out since mobs didn't tend to die in just couple of hits. Many mobs only were suspectible of certain CCs so either you had to play clever with short-term ones (stuns/incapatiates) or fit unconventional groups

Mana: Mana, especially on mentioned entry gear was very limited resource and the healer had to be really careful when to dispel and heal and especially whom, else having the threat of running OOM. Oftentimes players had to bandage because the mana just wasn't enough to go around. Healer also might've had alternative CC duties on top of that to keep track of

Trash abilities: Yes, these existed and they were nasty. Not in terms of "there's fire, don't stand in it" but "Fucker I just stunned you and I'm about to go and rape your healer". This created whole dynamic where players had to apply their class abilities to stop the mob, taunt the mob or anything. They ranged from stuns to fears that could devastate the group, to summoning extra mobs to simple lifedrain/boneshield combination that if not broken could up the mob entirely. Mobs also healed each others, those idiots. They didn't even need to be complex. A mob critting could gain enrage and then suddenly if healer wasn't awake proceed to take 80% of tank HP in couple sweeps. Tank was low? Ooops, too bad. Dead.

Bosses: Bosses weren't mechanically difficult but more so punishing in every little thing they did, especially dungeon end bosses. Good example being last boss of Strath UD. Does AoE damage to anyone within 30 yards, casts Shadowbolt taking 40% of tank's health, hits like truck, summons skeletons that if nto killed fast, heals the boss. Very, very hectic fight in itself to pull through even if not complex. Required stuns, AoE, offheals, interrupts and all nice stuff. Surprising amount of bosses were like that at end-game

It's combination of all these things that made the runs challenging, interesting and requiring attention.

The problem is that people later on who joined in got easier runs when they joined up with those already geared up to an extent, taking away a bit from the experience. Mobs dying faster so not being such big of a threat etc. But it was still there to the end at least until getting raid gear.
Great post.

In my opinion, the difficulty in early vanilla raiding was primarily two things:

Logistics (gathering, maintaining, motivating and leading a roster of 40 people required a lot time and dedication)

Bad/Incomplete design (itemisation was spotty, a lot of class abilities were broken, tier drops were limited and non-token (until Naxx), classes were relegated to one role only, and if you lost a geared tank, you had to go back to previous raids and farm up his gear)

Later instances like AQ and Naxx were legitimately difficult, Blackwing Lair less so, but a lot of guilds hit a brick wall after Molten Core because personal responsibility/requirements from the first two bosses in BWL were head and shoulders above anything encountered in MC.
 
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Cyberarmy

Love fool
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Divinity: Original Sin 2
Edit: Some bosses required stance dancing to resist fear effects. I even had a timer add-on which had good guesses/knows when certain bosses gonna use fear.

Aaaah...that makes sense, then. I was Horde back then and we abused the shit out of Tremor Totem :)


Thing is as alliance we have the best thing against it, Fear Ward. but dwarven priest were fucking rare back then...
 

Lerk

Learned
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Ouch. That sucks. Then again, we were very jealous of your paladins ;)
 

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