Do people actually not understand that they abusing every possible buff advantage in order to make the raid content trivial? If so, then why do they then complain that the game is too easy and the content must be nerfed?
How about we see a guild with normal items (not BIS blue dungeon items on all the players) and ZERO world buffs go into MC. Better yet, let’s see a guild that had never used world buffs in a raid clear through BWL and AQ40.
Show me this. No gimmicks, no over-gearing, no B.S.
Then tell me the game is EASY mode.
IF you played back in vanilla, people did not optimize to the point of tedium in order to make the content trivial. That is why the game seemed harder. Maybe, instead of complaining about nerfed bosses or raids, play the game as we did back then.
These top guilds are neck beard sweaty 80 hour per week gamers that spent the last 14 years playing private servers, optimizing the fun out of vanilla. Of course they will smash the content. For some reason, they think it is fun. Give it a rest already.
Even without world buffs or every bis pre-raid item or even flasks the earlier content would still be significantly easier than it was on release because by patch 1.12.1 the game had a lot of inherent “damage inflation.”
This can be seen with a number of class and talent reworks, particularly the mage rework where mages had their damage significantly boosted, and it made them able to skip a lot of itemization options they used to need because they now inherently got it for free through talents.
It’s no wonder why people are able to burn through bosses like Ragnaros on patch 1.12.1 when every patch since 1.6 only added large amounts of damage to the game either directly to classes or indirectly through items and consumables when even the best guilds had to deal with at least a couple submerges during actual early vanilla. It has nothing to do with “oh we’re so skilled now” but rather the sheer numbers that became possible by 1.12.1 that were previously impossible.
Though everyone seems to be ignoring the elephant in the room. You are correct, but what about world buffs and over-gearing to a ridiculous level? Stacking 10 fury warriors in one raid? These types of things… They are play controlled and have nothing to do with Blizzard.
They are going out of there way to make them happen and to make the game immensely easier than it was.
i don’t think you can blame the players really. there is something satisfying about min/maxing and being prepared.
the problem with classic’s difficulty is that it was entirely based on a lack of knowledge, rather than mechanical execution. games that require mechanical execution tend to maintain their difficulty throughout time. games that are only difficult because of a lack of understanding, are easily beaten once they have been “solved”.
it’s why games like pokemon, which seemed so hard when we were younger, are now easy with our understanding of type matchups. meanwhile, games like dark souls, even despite the years of knowledge, are still considered hard, as it requires a certain level of mechanical skill and execution.
“i don’t think you can blame the players really. there is something satisfying about min/maxing and being prepared.”
Yeah, a lot of people enjoy trying to max out their character through available means yet still have a challenge. Sadly that rarely works out well especially in older RPGs where you tend to become a God and the game becomes boring.
I actually never finished Skyrim for this reason. I wasn’t even trying to max - just leveling skills and professions I thought were useful - and the game on very hard difficulty ended up being very easy to the point I saw o reason to keep playing. I do intend to revisit the game again from the start and avoid some of the OP pitfalls. Random info lol
Easy to say. Doesn’t match reality, though, if you just observe human behavior.
People could also walk or bicycle everywhere they go instead of driving. It would be great for their health, and it’s entirely in their control. But they don’t. Because they can’t. They are too weak, and they don’t have the willpower to do it.
There are also social factors. If one person drives. The others in the group can’t walk or bicycle because they’d arrive where they are going at different times. There are social factors involved in MMO’s, too. If one DPS gets all the buffs, the tanks also have to get the buffs if they want to hold aggro. And the other DPS need to get the buffs if they want to compete on the logs and not look lazy.
People will usually take the easiest path to achieve their goals and they will conform to social pressure, and most don’t have the awareness or the willpower to not do that. So it’s up to game developers to tune games to the appropriate difficulty. Most people simply can’t do it themselves.
Go back and watch world first videos and tell me, based on the look of their toons that they weren’t optimizing gear, especially with what was available on their first/third/fifth week of clearing.
Don’t make assumptions when you’re wrong about it.
Private servers are different from both classic and vanilla.
This is what is lost in all of this Classic vs Vanilla. It isn’t about good or bad, easy or difficult. Vanilla was inherently a different game. It was every changing with people not knowing what was around the corner. Guilds and players made due with the hands they were dealt at the time. You don’t get any “redo’s” in a progressive game like Vanilla. “Well, now that we know that fury warriors scale ridiculously well, we’ll tell Blizzard to stop progression, and tell all other guilds to stop the progression race, so we can all re-roll.” It doesn’t work like that.
This is compared to Classic where everything is gated, and everyone knows what’s coming next.
People abuse every possible advantage in plenty of games and still find challenge, in fact many games expect players to do so and tune the content accordingly.
People assumed Classic would be as hard as they remember, or more than likely, as hard as they were told it would be
People meta game much better now in WoW than they ever did 15yrs ago
Vanilla was never tuned with BiS everything and optimum raids, because WoW was new and 40m raids were considered deliberately unwieldy to manage so slush and bad play was factored in
The reality is the game isn’t tuned for it. It isn’t the players’ fault they learned to play better and the game failed to challenge.