Damage Control

This can serve as a place for us to discuss the raid changes for Cataclysm (rather than the shoutbox).

Basically:
-10 and 25 man instances will share the same lockout and will use a heroic mode similar to ICC.
-Blizzard is going to strive to keep 10 and 25 man content similar in difficulty.
-10 and 25 drop the same item level loot. 25 man drops more of it.

Shoutbox as of 3PM CST:

Selcouth - After reading through the raid changes for Cataclysm I'm torn.

Jbean - Hmm, Couth. That is an interesting link. I hadnt seen it yet. I think I'll join you in: torn.

Xentin - Im not. I wont be raiding 25 in cata if that happens. Whats the point? Same loot. Same difficulty. More scheduling hassle in 25. Also you can build a stronger core 10. Can anyone think of a good reason to raid 25s still?

Cranberry - Because if we only raided 10 mans DC wouldn't exist? I shouldn't say that- I would just be sorely dissapointed if this change went through.


My initial reactions:

@Xentin and Cran - First, I wasn't around but I do believe DC was founded as a 10 man guild.

Speaking purely in terms of efficiency and max loot (reward) per time spent, the only reason I see to do 25 man content is if you have 25 good people who understand mechanics and don't hold the rest of the group back. If you have five people that hold a 25 man raid back, the benefit of the extra loot in 25 is wasted. That group would be better off splitting into two 10 man groups in terms of loot efficiency.

Many people enjoy raiding with 25 people. And I'm sure some will continue to do so despite the rewards being higher if they broke into smaller groups. While I enjoy 10 man raids a lot, the idea of skipping 25 man sounds shocking and makes me claustrophobic at first.

I think Blizzard is making this change to boost the desire for 10 man raids. To make them on the same playing field. I think it's going to shift things too far in the other direction though. Every 25 man guild out there has a ceiling and a floor to their player-base. I would not be surprised if a lot of guilds, focused on loot efficiency, drop their lower performing raiders and opt for 10 man only. "Why take 25 people and wipe over and over on an encounter when we can take 10 and clear it for more rewards?"

Hardcore guilds that can field 25 hardcore, excellent players will probably still run 25 man to gear up as much of the raid as possible (assuming 2.5:1 loot ratio between 25 and 10). But unless the middle class players enjoy the social aspect of 25 man, I don't see that there is much motivation. And obviously a lot of us are in this guild for the social aspect.

The ToC days were tough on me. Raiding every possible variant of ToC/ToGC to get as many Emblems as fast as possible gave me a very sour taste for the game and quickly made me hate that instance. The ICC system was better, yet you still feel like you have to go into 10 man/10 man Heroic for gear, learning, etc. This new system takes it further. I won't have to see the same boss again twice in a week. At first glance, that sounds hot and I imagine content will stay fresh a lot longer.

From a strictly for fun perspective, I sometimes enjoy 10 man more than 25. I like the more intimate setting. There is less to manage and you know your team mates better - you can function more organically. The idea of doing a 10 man and being locked out of 25 doesn't sound cool though.

On the balance issue: hahahahahahahahaha. In order for Blizzard to balance 10 and 25 man fights to within even 90% of each other they are going to have to dumb things down so much. The 10 man has so many fewer people to be creative with.

I personally enjoy 10m much more than 25m.

Ecstatic about the changes.

I don't have a problem with doing 10 mans over the 25- my concern is just losing the guild. I've only been in 2 guilds in this game, Onus, and DC.

Onus died when the BC came out and raids went down to 25 man. Lots of people took off, and it was a real bummer. I'm more disgruntled about the prospect of this happening again.

So really, yall should take it as a compliment

On the balance issue: hahahahahahahahaha. In order for Blizzard to balance 10 and 25 man fights to within even 90% of each other they are going to have to dumb things down so much. The 10 man has so many fewer people to be creative with.

The other concern is just what couth mentioned- are they going to make 10 mans so easy that raiding becomes a joke? This is really my other major concern. I like a little challenge in my gaming and would be bummed to see a further homogenizing of the classes to make 10's better in mechanics. It would also be a bummer to see raid mechanics become incredibly easy.

Reserved for later.

My brain is on extreme burn out from LK25 and H Sindragosa 10. Keep the discussion going. There will be plenty of talk amongst the management team. The best place to discuss it is here so its not too distracting during raid time and everybody's point and concerns and be read.


Have a nice day.

#2531121 Selcouth wrote:

@Xentin and Cran - First, I wasn't around but I do believe DC was founded as a 10 man guild.

This is correct, not so much because the founders wanted 10 man raids, but because there were only around 10 who splintered off from the old guild. So we just did tons of Karazhan and it was a while before enough people were recruited and taken as guests to do Gruul and Mag.

BECAUSE KNOWLEDGE IS POWER!

Ok I'm gonna start my reply out by saying its still way early and I'm sure things can change. Also we have probably 5+ months away from Cataclysm so I wouldn't let it affect us in anyway.

I've been with the guild for almost a year now so I feel like I have a vested interest in the guild. I'm just stating the facts below. So don't get your panties in a bunch with anything I say. Obviously when the time is right I'm going to listen to guild management, just based off the information at present its hard to see how a 25man can be successful in Cata.

What benefits does 10 man have over 25 in Cataclysm?

• Loot - 10 man loot is now the same as 25 man.
• Loot Availabitly - While more loot does drop in 25 man, you will still have less competition in 10 man. E.g. 6 casters wanting a piece in 25 man, where maybe 2 casters wanting it in 10 man.
• Skill - Lets be honest, its easier to get 10 great players together, than 25 equally great players.
• Balance - No matter what they try to balance the 10 vs. 25 man instance, 10 man will always be easier on many fights. Think about Defile for LK. No matter what you balance, it will always be easier for 10 people to move out of Defile vs. 25.
• Rewards - Our guild has never been a 25 man hardcore guild. Lets be honest we are never going to get the ICC25 310% drakes (we never got ulduar either), because thats not the type of guild we are. However, several groups have gotten it in 10 man in Ulduar and are real close in ICC10. If you do only 25, you lose that benefit from those rewards in 10.
• Friends - As in any guild there are cliques of friends. I would like to think many of us are friends with most people in the guild, but there are some closer than other. 10 mans are generally more fun because you get to raid with your 9 other closest friends.
• Scheduling - Just a numbers game. 25 people are harder to get together than 10.
• Loot Distribution - No loot council/DKP/etc in 10 man. Everyone knows everyone else and loot is generally easier to distribute.

The only downside I see to 10s is reliability of raiders. If 1 or more people do not show up to a 10, you are done for the night unless you pug someone. Even with raiders who float, it still can be difficult. Whereas 25 man, you usually have a bigger pool of raiders to choose from so if some go on vacation you have replacements readily available.

I would be excited to see these new changes in place... but as Xentin and others have said, due to the enormous amount of "QQ" that will happen because these ideas have been announced, the people in charge at Blizzard may decide to not even do it. No sense in worrying about something that may or may not happen for several months out.

Also, I have been in a guild that ran two 10 mans concurrently when kara came out. It is not without its own set of challenges but it can be done without a /gdisband.

Also, I love the grumpy bear award.

But on a serious note, if anyone is truly upset by me being grumpy, please talk to me because I would appreciate it. I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings.
I've only been grumpy because of the LK25 + H Sindragosa10 much like Ridah.

#2532071 Xentin wrote:

Also, I love the grumpy bear award.

But on a serious note, if anyone is truly upset by me being grumpy, please talk to me because I would appreciate it. I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings.
I've only been grumpy because of the LK25 + H Sindragosa10 much like Ridah.

i'm upset with it, you used "let's be honest" like 100 times in this thread. FFS


Ultimately I don't think Blizz is going to follow through with these changes, lets be honest.......runnings 10's and 25's is a way of prolonging the the experience and usefulness of a tiers content. ( if you can't see this i'll explain it to you later however it is very simple)

If they follow through with this plan they will be forced to produce dungeons/gear at a faster rate than before.
1. That costs development money (cuts into the bottom line)
2. When has Blizz ever been expedient with content....wha'ts that you say? never!?!?

#2532170 Shiroshima wrote:

Ultimately I don't think Blizz is going to follow through with these changes, lets be honest.......runnings 10's and 25's is a way of prolonging the the experience and usefulness of a tiers content. ( if you can't see this i'll explain it to you later however it is very simple)

If they follow through with this plan they will be forced to produce dungeons/gear at a faster rate than before.

1) That's what people said about 40 man to 25/10 man for BC. If they're announcing it, they've already thought it through pretty thoroughly. If they do go back on it, I'd still expect the first tier in Cataclsym to be designed this way. I could see them switching after much QQ of people actually experiencing it.

2) I disagree with you on the need to produce dungeons and gear at faster rate. I think you have this backwards. Being forced to only do 10 or 25 man means the content stays fresh longer. You aren't spending as much time in it so they can spend more time between releases. They also have less design to do because there are now 2 sets of gear (10/25 and 10H/25H) vs 4 sets (10/10H, 25/25H).

We ultimately have to see what Blizz does. They may rethink this and scrap it as they have done many other things before the last 2 expansions.

There are many pros and cons of the 10/25 man on the same lockout. Which people will bring up in this thread and people will have to pay attention to.

my personal thoughts:

I have also thought about finally throwing in the towel and retire from playing because coming this summer I can't commit much time at all to the game anymore due to work and school coming up. However if a 10 man raid thing turned up that only had me raiding 2 or 3 days at max then I might be able to hang out and stay. But at the moment with helping manage +25 people, 25 person raids, 10 person raids and logging on 5-6 nights a week to raid I'm pretty much done when they release the new expansion.

Again anything can change so its good to think about things and keep them on your/our minds. But acting on it too early will be for nothing if they scrap it any only cause people to get pissed off.

#2535116 Slridah wrote:

I have also thought about finally throwing in the towel and retire from playing because coming this summer I can't commit much time at all to the game anymore due to work and school coming up. off.

Gimme your stuff.

So 10 and 25 share the lockout? Meaning if I kill a boss in 10, he's already dead in the 25? Or no switching allowed?

I'm still composing my thoughts about how to respond in this thread. But to answer Dien... That's not how I read it, and I can't imagine blizz allowing us to switch back and forth btwn 10/25.

#2535328 Diendovalis wrote:

So 10 and 25 share the lockout? Meaning if I kill a boss in 10, he's already dead in the 25? Or no switching allowed?

Dien, as I read it: You go into 25 man and kill a boss thus gaining a raid ID and being saved. When you leave 25 man, form a 10 man group and then try to enter on 10 man you enter your 25 man raid ID.

Interesting comments added recently.

-There should be no circumstances under which you kill a boss more than once per week on the same character. However, in the same way that you can decide on a per-boss basis whether to try normal vs. hard mode, we might allow you to change between 10 and 25 on a per-encounter basis for additional flexibility. If you started a raid in 25-player mode and then found that you couldn’t get everyone together later in the week, you might be able to downsize the next few bosses to 10-player.

-Will legendary items be available through 10 player dungeons? How about special mounts like Invincible? ...we just don’t know yet.

-There will just be raid achievements, not 10- vs. 25-player versions in most cases. The achievement won’t care if you complete it in 10s or 25s. If we do meta-achievement mounts, it’s possible we’d still have different colors of mounts, or maybe even different mounts; but for some players that might mean that 25s feels mandatory again, which would be a potential problem.

We’re also not sure about realm first achievements or titles. We don’t want to encourage, say, 25-player focused guilds to run a 10-player raid instead because they think that will get them the ream first title faster. One potential solution is you can earn a realm first title in 10 or 25, but not both. These types of achievements also serve as great content for guild achievements.

The larger raids can feel more epic, yet the smaller ones tend to have less loot drama because there is less competition per item that drops. The smaller raids in some sense are more hardcore, because there are fewer opportunities to include novice raiders or folks who just aren’t carrying their weight.

10s, the new 25.

As a casual player - the demographic Blizzard is trying to cater to the most lately. This change frustrates me. It is nice to be able to hop into a guild 25 if I'm needed early in the week and still be able to hop into a 10 man that I might actually kill something in and perhaps even get some loot. It's crap.

For example the other night when I came to fill a slot for LK attempts. I had no problem doing that, I had fun seeing a fight I probably wont see again and trying to learn the mechanics quickly. (Side note: thats why I used to raid... the challenge of new content) However I could only come along because the 10-man I did earlier in the week didn't conflict with the lock out.

It's bad enough as a casual just to find a competent raid when you actually have time to do so... to be forced to turn down a competent raid just because you've done a seperate VERSION 6 days earlier is harsh.

Here would be my suggestion - loot lock-outs. We all know the only reason theyre putting in the lockouts is to avoid the top teir guilds getting super geared out by running 3 10-mans, and a 25-man each week. Make it so each character can only get loot from 1 raid a week. If you get an item from the 25 man you can no longer get it from another ID of a 10 man. Or hell even a 25 man. Eliminate the restriction from zoning in, but replace it with a restriciton on loot.

#2567737 Algrububblur wrote:

Here would be my suggestion - loot lock-outs. We all know the only reason theyre putting in the lockouts is to avoid the top teir guilds getting super geared out by running 3 10-mans, and a 25-man each week. Make it so each character can only get loot from 1 raid a week. If you get an item from the 25 man you can no longer get it from another ID of a 10 man. Or hell even a 25 man. Eliminate the restriction from zoning in, but replace it with a restriciton on loot.

I like it!

i don't especially when certain classes get roger fucked with tolken and specific loot, if rng was anywhere near to accurate on the micro level i would agree but it simply isn't.