Greetings friends! I'm here to layout my version of Heroic Raids that would help add new content and prevent an older server from becoming stale in regards to PvE.
PLEASE read through before you start hitting me with #NOCHANGES!!! This does not change the game we know and love, but help continue the game we know without adding new expansions.
HEROIC RAIDS
I think adding a Heroic Difficulty for raids could be pretty neat if it's implemented properly. However, there would have to be some changes to the Heroic Systems we have known in the past. A guild cannot simply enter a heroic version of a raid just because the beat the normal version of it. Heroic Raids would be exclusive to 40 man raids, not 20 mans.
HEROIC ATTUNMENT
In order for Heroic Raids to work within the authentic nature of Vanilla Wow, there would have to be a "Guild Attunement" and an individual "Character Attunements".
CHARACTER ATTUNMENTS
I think a character attunement would involve some sort of quest for each heroic raid attunement. I think the quest should be slightly different based on your race/class, this way the entire guild can't complete the character portions of the attunements in one go. Think of these quests in the same matter as the Scarab Lord quest in terms of length and difficulty. Nobody will be completing this quest in a day, a week, or even a month. At the end of the quest, you would gain a Class Specific Epic Weapon, Neckpiece, ring, whatever etc. and attunement to the Raid you are attuning for. You would be able to start this quest when you kill the final boss in the previous raid. i.e. Kel'Thuzad would drop the starting quest item (lootable by everyone that night) to start the Heroic Molten Core attunement chain. Heroic Ragnaros would drop the starting quest for Heroic BWL, HC'Thun->HNaxx.
GUILD ATTUNEMENTS
As for the Guild Attunement to a Heroic Raid, you can't just beat the final boss from the original raid. You would have to complete the entire raid in a single night on a timer without changing the makeup of your raid and having zero wipes. If you manage to do this, your guild earns the attunement. The Guild itself (guild ID) would now be eligible to start a Heroic Raid, however only attuned characters could enter. In addition, the difficulty of the raid and the itemization of the loot would need to be slightly better than the previous raid. So Heroic Molten Core would be a .5 upgrade in terms of itemization to Naxx gear. HMC -> HBWL ->HAQ40 - >HNaxx. lastly, the boss encounter abilities and strategies would change to give the players something new to look forward to. This could also introduce heroic versions of the raids tier sets that will help you stand apart from a standard raider.
NEW CONTENT
Only after a guild completes all standard Vanilla WoW 40 man raids on Heroic do they unlock a brand new unreleased raid based in the old world. i.e. Grim Batol, Hyjal, Uldum, whatever, etc. These raids themselves would be considered Tier 2 Raids and once the final raid is completed, they too would unlock Heroic Versions of themselves.
Alternatively, you could say each new raid is opened up by completing a tied Heroic Raid. For example, when you kill Herioc Ragnaros, you are eligible for the Uldum raid. When you defeat the Uldum raid, you are eligible for Heroic BWL, when you defeat HBWL, you are eligible for Grim Batol, etc. etc. Just an alternative.
I think this system will stop guilds from getting bored and would really add an "elite" mode to the game that Vanilla used to have. You know if you see people in Grim Batol+ gear, they're truly the best of the best.
I appreciate the enthusiasm here but I'm not personally a fan. It will be a challenge enough for like 90% of people to complete all the 40 mans.
Classic should be timeless. It should have a ceiling. Classic should never make you feel like you have just achieved something great and then hit you with more stuff you have to do.
I appreciate the enthusiasm here but I'm not personally a fan. It will be a challenge enough for like 90% of people to complete all the 40 mans.
Classic should be timeless.
I appreciate your opinion on the subject. However, I will have to disagree with you as well. I don't personally feel that Classic needs to have a ceiling. It's an MMORPG and you aren't supposed to be able to "beat" an MMO; at least not permanently. Perhaps for a while, you and your guild will be #1, but there is always new content in EVERY MMO. Guilds rise, guilds fall. Nothing is forever.
The great thing about vanilla wow is that not everyone COULD do everything, which is what gave it so much magic and character. You see, this is the issue with retail, they've adapted to the players instead of making the players adapt to the game. Not every player has to achieve everything, but if they want to, the opportunity is there.
Classic should never make you feel like you have just achieved something great and then hit you with more stuff you have to do.
I 100% disagree with this. A true MMORPG should not have a ceiling and a player should never feel as if they have "beat the game". I don't look at this as "more stuff you have to do", but rather a way to further your adventure on your character.
Again, thanks for the input and this is really just a suggestion in the event that they do add heroics. That's all.
Raids or Dungeons should not have different difficulty tiers. It automatically devalues every tier that is not the highest. It also accelerates gear inflation.
I also disagree with your stance on indefinite content. You cant add new content without either
a) spreading the people between different content
b) devaluing existing content
c) replacing previous content
For all of these 3 it would be easy to find numerous examples from retail, if requested.
The only logical conclusion, at least from my perspective, is that eventually you reach a point when adding new content is not adding to the games health. I dont think Classic/Vanilla reached that point, but I just wanted to address this sentiment. At the end of the day its up to the players to keep the game interesting.
You either do or do not. There should never be tiers. Difficulty modes are (a part) what got us all to this point in WoW. The raids are hard for a reason and the gear you get from them separates you from the casual players for a reason. It's a system that rewards those who chose to make raiding a priority in game and, for some, in life.
The opportunity is there for all players to take but it's up to the player to make the effort to be prepared for such a raid. Folks often confuse an opportunity with a handout.
While you had a well thought out argument; I'm going to have to disagree.
Vanilla raiding was a challenge, just getting attuned was a task in and of itself. The task of getting 40 people in tune to tackle the raids was nothing short of heroic. (The term herding cats...comes to mind.)
We have too much catering to all of the different "social classes" in wow as it is. Its fragmented the community and made itemization a nightmare.
Vanilla was great, it was binary. You raided or you didn't. You PVP'd or you didn't. The do or do-not aspect of the game really drove it and kept it going.
Dont really know how else to put it. I'm not a #NoChanges purist, but I think we should leave some major changes out of Classic.
I can understand the case for heroic versions of dungeons, because running only Blackrock Depths and Blackrock Spire over and over and over again for gear to enter Molten Core is REAAAALLLY tedious. But no on heroic raids. In classic, raiding IS the heroic difficulty setting.
Oh well, I tried. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Oh well, I tried. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Interesting idea, but #NOCHANGES runs too deep. I am really curious how they handle the game once Naxx has been on farm status for a long time. I doubt Blizzard will just leave it alone.
TBC servers are my guess. Classic+ is also an option, but less likely.
Or maybe they wait for the playerbase to shrink enough to proclaim "interest isnt high enough, we told ya".
TBC servers are my guess. Classic+ is also an option, but less likely.
Or maybe they wait for the playerbase to shrink enough to proclaim "interest isnt high enough, we told ya".
They will go the route of private servers and build #FRESH
In the end the biggest problem will always be the loot. Is it to weak guilds would not do it. If it is to strong you will break the game.
Oh well, I tried. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
You put up a valid argument, don't beat yourself up.
I think biggest problem is having 40+ awake and prepared people at same time is big challenge those days. Back in vanilla most of players were very new to the MMOs they wanted to explore this kind of games. Most of active people interested in Classic are adults now and have much less time than back then (familly, job, social life). For international guilds or groups pugging a raid group could be more or less trivial but if you want to play with people from your nation (like myself) having a raider roster will be difficoult. We have to keep in mind this whole HC Raid concept is not original part of Vanilla and have downsides like somebody have said here. From Mythic raider in retail I have to say that having too much copies of same content with only higher difficoulty devalue accoplishment in first place.
If there had to be another tier it should be something new, maybe a prestige difficulty where you get the same loot but it's way harder.
Question: why would you do this? Because it's prestigious. People love being the best, and sometimes it's not about the material rewards but the reputation behind completing something hard that matters. And if there had to drop anything it should be the same rewards (maybe recolor?) But I'm personally not sure, just woke up so don't know where this idea is going right now.