It may be too late to point this out, but I think you totally misread that statement, and it seems like it’s driving your anger a bit. He said “character power” as in “the power of your WoW character”, not “character” as in “good sportsman.”
Yeah, I can eat several Paralyzes most likely. I tend to routinely eat at least one because I’m goofing around in ventrilo.
I’ve healed all the 5-man heroics, and I’ve been through some nasty content prior to this expansion. So it’s doable.
I’m very sympathetic to the folks that think the heroic 5-man too much, and I think the minimum gear requirement is indeed a bit too low.
The LFD tool’s whole purpose is to throw strangers together who most likely will never be together again. I think the unforgiving nature of some of those mechanics is just asking for too much coordination from a group of strangers. Guild groups? If they raided Ulduar then it’s probably just fine.
My experience is quite the opposite. I try to explain fights, but pugs are most likely will take 30-45 minutes longer. I’m a good leader in a pug, but spending that time explaining fights to a constant stream of pugs is a beating.
Having a good DPS shaman (enhance or elemental) is absolutely huge. If I had to choose between a good tank or a good shaman, I’d pick the shaman.
Even if the rest of the group is total garbage, that one hex makes life for the healer just infinitely easier. Most fights don’t have more than one absolutely critical ability that needs to be interrupted, and wind shock is on a short cooldown.
So, a good shaman can salvage a bad group in a way that I don’t think a boomkin druid or warlock can. Mages and Hunters in theory I suppose could pull off the same tricks, or close, but I have a tough time finding a pug mage that will give water much less sheep a target reliably. And Hunters, don’t get me started.
Most of them were pretty easy compared to TBC heroics though. I started doing them the day after hitting level 80 and don’t remember them, with a few exceptions, being all that difficult.
You’re probably using too many words to explain the fight. Use small words, and very few of them, and make it targeted explanations.
I just did H-Stonecore with a healer who’d never done the fights. I explained them thusly:
“This fight, get out of the dust when he burrows, get out of crystal spew, collect JPs.”
“Dodge spikes, don’t stand in fire, LOS him with spikes when he does storm.”
“Judgement him when he uses Elementium Shield Spike, cleanse the Hunter after Paralyze, collect JPs.”
“Don’t stand in void zones, don’t stand in dust on the ground, collect VPs.”
Admittedly, he did get hit by a rock on the last boss, but I was able to keep the tank up until we killed her.
Occasionally I’ll get someone who won’t put in the effort required to not stand in fire. This is what votekick is for, or if there are too many such incompetents, it’s one of the 15% and I just leave and requeue.
Athryn
4206
Here’s also a very good mod called Bossnotes that will paste text of boss strategy to the group, it helps a lot.
I’ll just throw in my two cents to say that yes, heroics are hard, but not impossible hard, more like the kind of hard that makes it gratifying to beat the bosses. For instance, there’s the second boss in SFK who I’d never been able to beat (Springvale?). PUG group I was in had a hunter pull him waaaay out to the courtyard, where we burned him down. It was a lot of fun to down him that way.
I think as people gear up, get better at playing their classes, and get more familiar with the fights, they will get “easier” to do.
I actually like how the mechanics used for boss fights mirror much of what’s been used in raid encounters. Makes things more interesting (in fact they’re doing that throughout the entire world - see the Maw of Madness in Twilight Highlands for instance).
Complaining that heroics are hard is sort of missing the point. If you’re spending, as sinnick says, 3-4 hours in one, then your party is either undergeared, not completely understanding the strategies or just not playing well. And to repeat Athryn’s earlier question, why aren’t you running the normal instances instead? If you’re just into it for the experience of the dungeons themselves, the normal versions accomplish that nicely. If you’re in it for the better gear the heroics offer, I have to question exactly why you’re after that gear in the first place if difficult content frustrates you.
I don’t read the Blizzard post about heroics as condescending at all. He quite plainly states what heroic instances in Cataclysm are about: more difficult content for players who enjoy more difficult content.
There’s also rep for the Cataclysm factions to consider - the easiest way in the universe to farm that in Lich King was wearing the right shirt to the heroic dungeons. Additionally, heroic dungeon gear isn’t supposed to be that great by Lich King standards. The difficulty ladder that we’re used to is Dungeons -> Heroic Dungeons -> Raids -> Bigger Raids. Heroic Dungeon gear would have been a touch lacking for any of the raids I actually ventured into. I don’t know how many ways there are to get Justice Points now to get whatever tier we’re on gear, but for a while there the currency that you traded for the pieces that you’d actually wear were also pretty much exclusive to heroic dungeons, outside of raids. If you even wanted to have the option to go see ICC, you needed to get at least enough advanced gear that you wouldn’t explode into a wet spot on the floor at the first BONESTORRRRRRRRM. That was particularly important then because ICC was kind of where the story ended, and judging from the rolling buff Blizzard put on the whole raid instance, they wanted as many people as possible to get in and see how the plot for the past decade or so wrapped up.
Now those expectations are completely reset. If heroic dungeons are too hard to do without considerable effort with a random group of people, the dungeon finder tool is basically worthless for anything beyond teleporting preassembled groups into the instances, topping out rep for shirtable factions will involve grinding daily quests again (assuming that hasn’t been changed; I think maybe you could run the three 85 dungeons with those shirts on over and over and over and over and over and over and over again too, right?), and even securing the option to step into a raid where maybe you’re not under quite as much pressure and it’s a little bit easier to learn what you’re supposed to be doing is out of reach for a considerable subset of their player base.
This is why I rolled a few new characters. The early content still feels like it follows Lich King difficulty rules and practices, it’s all new anyway, and hopefully by the time I roll around to doing the new heroics they’ll be tuned back to drooling idiot level so that it at least won’t always feel like it’s my fault when we crash and burn.
idrisz
4210
I’ll just throw in my two cents to say that yes, heroics are hard, but not impossible hard, more like the kind of hard that makes it gratifying to beat the bosses. For instance, there’s the second boss in SFK who I’d never been able to beat (Springvale?). PUG group I was in had a hunter pull him waaaay out to the courtyard, where we burned him down. It was a lot of fun to down him that way.
so you feel happy because you downed a boss using glitch?
Managed to get the achivment for the first boss in Halls of Origination yesterday. Kept having the snakes kill whomever hit the switches, so the tank pulled both sets of snakes before pulling the boss, and we didn’t attack them at all.
The fight was a breeze then.
Ranulf
4212
Why not? They’ve brought back kiting into the game. Given that he’s likely unbeatable by most LFD/pug groups, they should use whatever advantage they can. I know of one group of guildies who killed him “legit” the other day so I know its doable but it requires skill, gear and luck. The i329 gear requirement is a joke. It should be 333 at least.
That CM post from the blizzard boards was most amusing. Further proof that the devs really are clueless at times. The post does tell me one thing though, they’re in it for the long haul of QQ till folks relearn mechanics. The question is, will people stick around that long and put up with all the other annoyances/new gameplay issues. Devs are already working on new class changes due to PVP issues (ferals getting bleeds nerfed and their 1 fear break).
Again, there are better ways to get challenges and CC back into the game without making the game a brickwall of frustration. LFD is pretty uselesss at this point and as I’ve predicted won’t be for 3-6 months if at all without nerfs. One of my guild’s best dps still cannot understand he needs to effing interrupt spells all the time. I thank the devs daily for giving bears skullbash.
I went into a normal random on x-mas eve to get that last 1k of rep I needed for wildhammer. Worth the risk for 3 epic upgrades. I started as the tank (bear) and after the first boss, the healer and 1 mage left. Guildmates who I guess didnt like the loot drops. It was a shame because the group was perfect. 1 mage, a shammy healer, ele shammy, bear tank and a hunter IIRC. CC out the yazhoo. New DK tank and dps war show up, I’m now the healer. While the tank wasn’t horrible, he still subscribed to LK tanking design and the only reason we died just once was I outgeared the instance (i346, healing a bit better than tanking). The tank at least did listen though I got admonished for not telling him in the 10s before he charged a group of 4 to at least CC one of those mobs.
Long story short, heroics aren’t impossible but they are often not worth the time investment to me. Most of my guild appears to share that sentiment. Few if any want to pug anything more than 1-2 dps spots to avoid wasting time.
JM1
4213
They fixed the Springvale bug. He leashes now and can’t be kited to the courtyard (the bug was that his adds wouldn’t spawn). He’s still a pain in the arse but he is doable. One of the hardest though, for sure.
TheJare
4214
Bah crash destroyed my long reply. To cut it short, yeah a player who is obsessive enough to want to max all reps just to get a dozen more INT or somesuch is not a typical casual player so he’s not worth discussing. Your gear gets into the comfort zone for normal instances WAY before maxing all reps.
See, I’m not complaining about the heroic difficulty itself (hell I personally love wiping while learning new content). The real issue is that this difficulty interacts with the rest of the game systems and dynamics in a way that makes a pugger’s life absolute hell and in many cases outright not worth the abuse.
I may be happy to cancel now and come back in a few months, when all the bad players and asshole basement dwellers outgear their own stupidity. Maybe then I will be able to log in for an hour, get something reasonably significant done, and not have to endure a stream of achievement whines, nerdrages, votekicks, etc. Since right now you can’t outgear stupid, Bliz will have to nerf the heroics before that happens. Hence my conclusion that heroics are too difficult. Even in faceroll heroics, I can easily find ways to challenge myself just like I did in WotLK (equip my fishing pole, shoot for single-digit overheals, etc).
idrisz
4215
Why not? They’ve brought back kiting into the game. Given that he’s likely unbeatable by most LFD/pug groups, they should use whatever advantage they can. I know of one group of guildies who killed him “legit” the other day so I know its doable but it requires skill, gear and luck. The i329 gear requirement is a joke. It should be 333 at least.
it’s not kiting, it’s a bug/glitch that he doesn’t spawn add if dragged too far, kiting would be having someone kite all 3 puppy adds during the beauty fight, not dragging the springvale to the fountain.
Mordrak
4216
There’s innate differences between players that go beyond gear. Someone who’s already done that, is not necessarily someone who has the necessary situational awareness, reaction time, and skill to pull off heroic encounters. Gear will help (and if they are exalted with all the factions they are sitting on some early epic gear), but gear isn’t everything.
And the people who may have trouble with it, but gear up relatively quickly, I don’t think should be written off. I’m not saying the people who are complaining are entirely right or that heroics shouldn’t be hard at all… but hard is relative between players and I can at least understand and sympathize with people who are geared for heroics, but are still having trouble due to encounter design.
idrisz
4217
I think if you are a casual player, you should just stick with non heroics, if you really want to do heroic, and don’t plan to be in a guild, then play healer or tank, because that’s one of the spot that can actually carry a pug group.
currently I just run heroic with 2 of my friends, we got dk tank, shammy/priest healer/dps, it’s smooth sailing even if we get horribly bad dps that pulls like 5k on boss fight we can still easily beat most of the fights.
Daagar
4218
If you’re a casual player, I’d say playing tank/healer is worth it just for the queue times in LFG - I suppose this is even more true with the increase in difficultly. Pity of course for those groups that get me as a tank :)
Athryn
4219
This sentence doesn’t make sense. How can you gear up quickly if you’re having trouble with the content?
rei
4220
I got all my reps to exalted today except for the pvp one.
