Weekend (10 Oct) - The End of ICC 25?

Weekend (10 Oct) - The End of ICC 25?

Most guildies I've talked to believe that Patch 4.01 will arrive this coming Tuesday. There are major changes in that patch that affect raiding. The biggest, and most personal changes are to player talents and gear stats. Both undergo a massive overall which the patch will implement. The word from the players in the PTR (the test server realm) is that DPS (and by extension healing) is insanely higher than before, but that the mechanics have changed so much it will take time to figure out how to achieve those numbers. One shaman friend said that his healing per second in the PTR fell to half of what he was getting in Live WoW at first, and it was a lot of work figuring out how to use his altered spells and adjust to the changed stats. Wild has not attempted the PTR, in part because copying Wild's character over to the PTR can be a painful and time consuming process, but mostly because I don't have the time.

Our Wed/Thurs G2 ICC10 group plans to raid Naxx10 instead ICC10 next week if the patch goes live. Going to Naxxramas will give us a chance test out these changes in a more forgiving environment. If we all are comfortable with our specs, gear, etc, then we might switch over to ICC. The MM guild intends to continue fielding two ICC10 raids. I think.

After last night's ICC25 raid (which I'll get to in a minute) there was a discussion on what would happen with the ICC25 co-op post patch. Once the patch hits we can only kill a raid boss in ICC once per week, either in ICC10 or ICC25, but not both. If the ICC10 raids continue to run, none of those raiders will be able to join the ICC25 co-op. That's most if not all of the raiders currently going to the co-op raid. The ICC25 co-op would die. The possibility of turning the co-op into an "alts" run was discussed. "Alts" almost by definition are not the equal of their mains so such a run would not be nearly as successful as our current group, and the run would only be for farming reputation and justice points and collecting what few i264 pieces of gear we could get from whatever bosses we were able to kill. Philly would probably be interested in that, but I think it will be difficult to get enough folks to attend.

From Wild's perspective, the G2 ICC10 should continue, assuming that the changes don't make ICC10 a lot harder than it already is. We still have a ghost of a chance to reach the Lich King, but ... the Blood Queen encounter and the dragon Sindragosa are both very tough battles that we have almost no experience at. And the Lich King battle itself? Most raids took weeks to finally beat it. It's pretty long odds. And of course, by going to the ICC10 raid, Wild will not be able to be in the ICC25 co-op.

For PUGs the patch is going to turn raiding into the Wild Wild West. With the ability to move from raid to raid, and with PUG raiders trying to match up raids with the bosses they've killed or not killed, it's possible that actually forming a coherent raid long enough to kill more than a boss or two might become a nightmare. The new raid feature that is supposed to manage all that and tell us whether we can join a raid and what bosses we have access to (and might lose access to if we joined the raid) is going to make or break this, I think.

On Friday night we had a successful evening. We swept through the first wing of ICC25. We did have a bit of a bump right at the start, when we were not able to kill Marrowgar in Heroic mode. After two failed attempts, we switched to normal mode so that we didn't lose any more time. Our only Heroic kill was the Gunship. Festergut and Rotface in the second wing also went down easily, and we got the weekly ICC raid quest done as well. Putricide stymied us, though. We only had time for two attempts, neither of which went particularly well.

Wild was pressed into service as a main tank healer since three of our six healers were druids. Wild and a priest (who always tank heals) took care of the tanks. Wild got the job because I wasn't fast enough when the raid leader asked who wanted to tank heal. Everybody, even the priest, said No Way! micro-seconds after the question was asked. Wild just shrugged and said, well, I guess that leaves me. My shaman friend from FS, Bf, was also in the raid as a healer and we chatted a bit. My other talkative friend, Cr, doesn't come to the ICC25 and in fact hasn't been coming to the G2 ICC10, either. Not sure what is up with her. Anyway, Bf is the shaman that used to run as an alt with the FS ICC10 raids, but was later told that he wasn't good enough and was no longer going to be invited. So Bf was pretty happy with his play in ICC25, coming in first in healing. You go, dude! Wild wanted to protest that his healing was down a bit because he was tank healing and not raid healing, but then I'd have to excuse the other raiders who had to tank heal on nights Wild was raid healing. Overall, though, Wild was happy because he kept his tanks alive. And that's what counts.

Healing:
#1: Bf (shaman) - 4368 hps, 17% of healing
#2: Priest - 4117/16%
#3: Wild - 3786/14.7%
#4: Bd (druid) - 3471/11.9%
#5: druid - 2774/10.1%
#6: shaman - 3325/10%

Saturday Night - Wild joined the ICC25 co-op raid for our Saturday foray with a bit of melancholy that was shared by many in the raid. The raid leaders from BH who host this raid will not be raiding 25 man when the patch comes out, which appears almost certain to be this coming Tuesday. Since Wild's MM guild can't field it's own 25 man raid, this could be Wild's last night ever as part of an organized 25 man raid.

We spent most of the evening battling Professor Putricide. The tenacity of our group despite repeated wipes brought back memories of those old days in places like Molten Core, and even more so, Blackwing Lair, where we spent whole evenings trying to kill one boss. Putricide finally died on our seventh attempt. We then turned to the Princes, and that triplet of bosses went down on our first attempt. We could have taken the easier route and gone after Dreamwalker next, but we decided to tackle the Blood Queen. Blood Queen is truly an original and unique encounter, something that is an almost lost art with the newer dungeons. All those Twilight Saga book/movie lovers should appreciate that the Blood Queen is about vampires, both the good (becoming one and helping the raid) and the bad (becoming one and being mind controlled by the Blood Queen). It was a struggle, but we battled her hard, giving it four attempts before we ran out of time.

Our final tally on the two nights were complete clears of the Lower Spire and the Plagueworks, plus bringing down the Prince and bleeding for the Blood Queen. Eight ICC25 bosses down. This group had the desire and the potential to take on the rest of ICC, but now it's over.

Please excuse Wild for a short retrospective. Back in Vanilla WoW Wild started solo by doing quests. Wild eventually joined a guild and started doing a few five man dungeons. Ten man dungeons followed, including Upper Blackrock Spire (UBRS), which we pounded on every week for months. It was an awesome place to raid, but it was just preparation for the real test. At long last Wild entered the forty man Molten Core. Ten deadly bosses spread across a long, torturous cavern layout and blanketed with trash mobs that could not be taken lightly. The very first end game boss, Ragnaros, was the ultimate goal. Months and months of effort and Wild got his full clear and his full set of Tier 1 gear. I regret destroying that set, now. I kept it for years, but some time ago finally cleaned out my closets and got rid of it.

Twenty man raids followed - Zul'Gurub for one, but the most remembered by Wild was the Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj. Six very unique and challenging boss encounters, including the one Wild always feared, Buru the Gorger. It was also the heyday for the forty man raids. After Molten Core there was Blackwing Lair, which Wild loved even more than Molten Core, and the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj, which we never really conquered. And there were others.

The Burning Crusade killed forty man raids. Instead, we were given a couple of ten man raids, Karazan being the one Wild most remembers for the very tight raid group we had during the months of battling that place. But Burning Crusade wasn't about ten mans, it was about twenty-five man raids. BC spawned SEVEN 25 man raids which culminated with the Black Temple. Wild was engaged in every one of them except the Sunwell Plateau, which was a patch addition not long before the next expansion arrived. Wild never saw the inside of the Sunwell Plateau until long after it had been bypassed for the newer challenges of Wrath of the Lich King.

Now it's time for WotLK to pass into history, yet another chapter finished. Wild faced down the 10/25 man raids of Naxxramas and Ulduar to get to Icecrown Citadel, and in a few weeks time it, too, will be relegated to nothing more than a dusty, historical tombstone visited only by the curious. The last latest addition to the 10/25 man raid, Ruby Sanctum, got barely a look and was ignored by most of players and guilds. Like Sunwell Plateau, Ruby Sanctum will sink into disuse without Wild having ever set foot inside.

Cataclysm is coming. Four new raids, all 10/25 man, are coming. One in particular has Wild's interest, Blackwing Descent. This is a continuation of the conflict within Blackwing Mountain, home of Molten Core and Blackwing Lair. In Cata there are six raid level dungeons in all, in addition to seven new five man dungeons.

Come Tuesday (if the patch rumors hold true) we will have one foot in our existing world and one foot in the next. And the next step after that is Cataclysm itself.