Blizzard CEO: "WoW subscriptions have stopped growing"

[Sinewmire]

Heh, well, I remembering the difference between, say, Heroic Magister's Terrace and any heroic nowaday. Much easier. That's a good and a bad thing combined.

I'm personally not at all sad about being able to heal heroics for my friends (3 hunters and a DK) rather than having to say "sorry guys, I can take one of you, but we need better CC than frost trap. Who is coming?"

[Civil War Man]

I personally like how CC will make some pulls in Pit of Saron (the trash after Ick) and the waves in Halls of Reflection go more smoothly, but not to the point where they are required to get past those areas.

It's a good thing, too, because both of those examples are undead, so only Priests and Retribution Paladins (and Hunters if they are good at Frost Arrowing) are really suited for it.

If they do decide to bring back CC as a necessity in heroics, I hope they at least give other classes some form of it so you don't get "LFM rogues or mages only". And make some specs less dependent on mashing AoE abilities for their single-target damage (cough cough Fury Warriors cough Retribution Paladins cough)

[Minischoles]

It's both a good and a bad thing

Good:
It opens up heroics to many more specs, you simply wouldn't go to Magister's Terrace as a Fury Warrior unless you had a pally tank or 2 mages in the group.
Makes heroics less dependent on the CC specs (mage/rogue)

Bad:
It made heroics faceroll - even in early WOTLK, heroics were being pounded away like crazy, aoeing them down even when you were in Naxx gear.
Heroics were a complete joke, and are now in WOTLK, the hardest heroic now is HoR - and even that is piss easy with a tank that's even half awake.

[Darmalus]

The problem with HHoR is that you need to be half awake for it, but after leveling my hunter in Northrend post 3.3, I realized I never actually targeted anything but the boss. It was just endless Volley spam until we got to the boss. If you don't have Vanilla/TBC experience, you could have gone your entire WoW life doing that.

I don't even know how to use my traps, I just chase the tank and spam volley. :\

[Civil War Man]

The problem with HHoR is that you need to be half awake for it, but after leveling my hunter in Northrend post 3.3, I realized I never actually targeted anything but the boss. It was just endless Volley spam until we got to the boss. If you don't have Vanilla/TBC experience, you could have gone your entire WoW life doing that.

I don't even know how to use my traps, I just chase the tank and spam volley. :\

Unfortunately there's no real way of learning those skills in the current environment unless you have friends who are willing to spend a night going slowly through heroics to allow time for people to practice CC skills.

And even people with Vanilla and Burning Crusade experience may have had those skills atrophy due to lack of use.

Not too long ago, several members of my guild took one of our new members, who just hit 80 on her first character (a Hunter) to teach her things like Freezing Arrow and Misdirect. I brought along my Rogue, who also had just hit 80, though I did feel a little insulted when the group leader asked if I knew how to Sap. I levelled that character with the express goal of killing as few extraneous mobs as possible (if the quest said 10 naga, I'd do my best to only kill 10). Of course I knew how to Sap.

[Rahvin]

Yeah, EH is insane for Druids. Pallies and DKs are a lower but Pallies have shittons of mitigation. DKs could use some love, but warriors are essentially gimped in both.

Since there's been so much talk about everyone else...what's your opinion on DK tanks right now? Particularly in light of Will of the Necropolis being slightly un-nerfed (the 15% damage mitigation will now affect 100% of every attack that will take you below 35% health, with no more internal cooldown)?

I have a little experience, but not much - my tank spec is an off-spec, so I don't have end-game gear or experience with DK tanking. All I can really say is that I don't seem to have too much trouble in general - I can easily out-threat bears with equivalent gear, I feel like I have some decent mitigation (8% from Frost presence, 5% from Blade Barrier, and 15% when under 35% total health from WotN), and I seem to have enough health to get the job done. How do you think DKs compare to the others? Given a choice, would you ever actively choose a DK tank as at least equivalent?

[CaptainChewbacca]

I actually had to sap when we did ulduar, but it doesn't really come up much. I do like that they hve me disarm traps in ICC though.

[Ghost Rider]

Yeah, EH is insane for Druids. Pallies and DKs are a lower but Pallies have shittons of mitigation. DKs could use some love, but warriors are essentially gimped in both.

Since there's been so much talk about everyone else...what's your opinion on DK tanks right now? Particularly in light of Will of the Necropolis being slightly un-nerfed (the 15% damage mitigation will now affect 100% of every attack that will take you below 35% health, with no more internal cooldown)?

I have a little experience, but not much - my tank spec is an off-spec, so I don't have end-game gear or experience with DK tanking. All I can really say is that I don't seem to have too much trouble in general - I can easily out-threat bears with equivalent gear, I feel like I have some decent mitigation (8% from Frost presence, 5% from Blade Barrier, and 15% when under 35% total health from WotN), and I seem to have enough health to get the job done. How do you think DKs compare to the others? Given a choice, would you ever actively choose a DK tank as at least equivalent?

For DKs? It's the lack of a shield, but also not having the sheer durability of the Druid, or the AoE grabbing of the Paladin is the problem...and why the nerfs were too fucking obnoxious. Yes, some had to be done because they overdid the cooldowns, since a DK could essentially tank a enraged boss, let alone a regular one. But after that? They kept slamming the nerf button until DKs weren't even worth as tank and the rebuffing was poor and scattered.

As it stands now? They are slightly ahead of warriors because of some abilities but the health is about par with them and they've muddled what they want to do with them. DKs are okay AoE, okay Single, okay EH. I don't go "Fuck..." when we had a DK tank but they are better DPS and the fact the trees are all muddled with tanking possibilities fucks with how Blizzard designs their raids and raid bosses by extension.

It's both a good and a bad thing

Good:
It opens up heroics to many more specs, you simply wouldn't go to Magister's Terrace as a Fury Warrior unless you had a pally tank or 2 mages in the group.
Makes heroics less dependent on the CC specs (mage/rogue)

Bad:
It made heroics faceroll - even in early WOTLK, heroics were being pounded away like crazy, aoeing them down even when you were in Naxx gear.
Heroics were a complete joke, and are now in WOTLK, the hardest heroic now is HoR - and even that is piss easy with a tank that's even half awake.

Like Chewie and other said...it is sad that essentially the last time of CC I remember was early Ulduar. We had to make somewhat sure they were didn't just AoE because the DPS wasn't beefy enough. Though even then? It was "Bring two pallies...let them faceroll", after a couple weeks of learning the trash packs and what they did.

Though I am in complete agreement that Wrath heroics were on the scale of too fucking easy. Outgearing is fine, I know I will reach it. But when I was in Sunwell gear, my guildies and me were nearly facerolling, let alone Ulduar and going "Sheep wha?". And HoR was hard, the first time, because I ended up telling the tank "Hold aggro dammit! ".

[DudeGuyMan]

I haven't read the whole thread, but I feel compelled to point out that 30% trial retention is huge. HUGE. I guarantee all of their competitors wish they had 30% trial account retention.

[Civil War Man]

In other news, Heroic 25-man Lich King has been downed. Barely. I've heard that Paragon over in the EU servers managed to chip away his final bits of health before a berserking Arthas was able to finish off the last few survivors.

[Minischoles]

In other news, Heroic 25-man Lich King has been downed. Barely. I've heard that Paragon over in the EU servers managed to chip away his final bits of health before a berserking Arthas was able to finish off the last few survivors.

Most first kills of tough bosses end up like that. I still remember my guilds first Mimiron HM kill and Algalon kills, hell even our Anub Heroic kill - nearly every single one involved paladins bubbling for the last 1-2% as the boss went beserk and started destroying people, every class putting up any kind of dot they have just to tick that last little bit of health away.

[GuppyShark]

I evasion-tanked my guild's first Mother Sharaz kill. That was fun.

[Teleros]

In other news, Heroic 25-man Lich King has been downed. Barely. I've heard that Paragon over in the EU servers managed to chip away his final bits of health before a berserking Arthas was able to finish off the last few survivors.

Should go smoother for them next week though. First kills are usually the hardest.

[Sharp-kun]

Yeah, EH is insane for Druids. Pallies and DKs are a lower but Pallies have shittons of mitigation. DKs could use some love, but warriors are essentially gimped in both.

Since there's been so much talk about everyone else...what's your opinion on DK tanks right now? Particularly in light of Will of the Necropolis being slightly un-nerfed (the 15% damage mitigation will now affect 100% of every attack that will take you below 35% health, with no more internal cooldown)?

Fine survival wise, but they need to fix Icy Touch. Seems to be balanced for Blood and Unholy tanks, but for Frost tanks its far too powerful. We did a test on Marrowgar - I got a 15s head start and the DK off tank outhreated me in 5s or so with just Icy Touch. He then proceeded to single tank Deathwhisper as he could build up massive threat such that it didn't matter if he got zero later on. There was no way myself as a paladin or our warrior in a different raid could even stay near to his TPS if he used Icy Touch repeatedly.

I agree with the reasoning behind the buff, but right now its well out of line and makes threat a non issue for a frost DK.

[Ghost Rider]

In other news, Heroic 25-man Lich King has been downed. Barely. I've heard that Paragon over in the EU servers managed to chip away his final bits of health before a berserking Arthas was able to finish off the last few survivors.

I give them props and congratulations. We saw him and jesus fucking christ. It's 25 regular on steroids and then some. I know a movie won't be out for at least few more kills and what not. The gear is nuts alone and I have gotten a few 277 but not as much as I want.

I am 15 away from Shadowmourne and I got the heroic BP weapon last night.

[Teleros]

Fifteen away? Nice one . 2nd in line for it in my guild here (Unholy DPS DK first), but we're still pissing around on LK25 normal, mostly due to idiots who can't be arsed wiping for a few hours in order to progress .

[GuppyShark]

But Wipe Nights are awesome fun

Keal'thas was great, we were all excited the first time KT activated and started nuking people.

[Minischoles]

In other news, Heroic 25-man Lich King has been downed. Barely. I've heard that Paragon over in the EU servers managed to chip away his final bits of health before a berserking Arthas was able to finish off the last few survivors.

I give them props and congratulations. We saw him and jesus fucking christ. It's 25 regular on steroids and then some. I know a movie won't be out for at least few more kills and what not. The gear is nuts alone and I have gotten a few 277 but not as much as I want.

I am 15 away from Shadowmourne and I got the heroic BP weapon last night.

We're on it currently, best attempt so far has been like 78%, problem is we usually only reach him with a) very few attempts or b) very little time left.

At least it's a good hard mode, i've been thoroughly disappointed in ICC hardmodes so far, they're absolutely terrible except for 2 - Lich King and Putricide. All of the rest are boring and uninteresting shit on a ToC level of being a hard mode - just add damage and HP.
None of them are remotely difficult, none of them add any new and exciting mechanic to the fight, nearly every single one boils down to the same formula of add some more boss hp, add some more damage.

Marrowgar - hp/damage and he can bone spike during the storm
Deathwhisper - hp/damage, and is untauntable
Gunship - lol this fight has a hardmode?
DBS - hp/damage
Rotface - hp/damage and gets given vile gas from Festergut
Festergut - hp/damage and Putricide throws malleable goo in
Putricide - awesome in every single way, this fight is the stand out fight of ICC for me, on normal and hardmode
Princes - shit fight, interesting idea with not being able to move, but in practice you can stack the debuff high and it does nothing
BQL - exactly the same fight, nothing new
Valithria - same fight
Sindragosa - terrible awful shitty fight, even on normal I despise this in every single way, on heroic it's enough to make my blood boil - and that's not even mentioning the awful voice acting
Lich King - awesome, absolutely insane on heroic

I'm not asking for much, but when you look at the differences between normal modes and hardmodes in Ulduar, you can see that Blizzard can actually make interesting encounters, and they can actually make something hard without just adding arbitrary numbers. Just take Mimiron Hardmode, a complete and utter difference to the normal mode, adding layers of complexity and co-ordination needed - or hell even look at Freya+3, or XT HM, Iron Council HM, Thorim, Vezax and Yogg - most of the hardmodes in Ulduar added so much, to see them do such a half assed job in ICC is disappointing.

[Ghost Rider]

I have to agree. Lich King is awesome both regular and heroic. Putricide is the only other heroic to talk of. In fact I was saddened to see they did more with freaking Festergut and Rotface then they did with Queenie and Sindragosa(god, I fucking hate her voice acting. Not the actress but the acting on her is annoying and you are FORCED to listen to it for so long).

As for heroic mode changes, I've of two minds. I like the toggle...but I also wish for more. Putricide is how every single Hard Mode thought of. A fight that blends old and newer nastier evil tactics, not...+25% HP and Damage.

[CaptainChewbacca]

In other news, I now have 101 mounts!

[Teleros]

Heheh, join the club .