Are you actually arguing that player count didn’t drop significantly in the 7 months of ICC? This is easily verifiable information.
https://ironforge.pro/population/classic/overall/
ICC launch week: 405k characters logged
Last week before Cata pre-patch: 99k characters logged
This is just goofy levels of denial.
Even we called it quits that far into ICC.
Hell we did 1 clear of RS and never went back to that rofl.
Pug raids and new guilds popped up left and right after 30% hit on Whitemane
Population dropped by 75% from ICC launch to Cata pre-patch. You’re just completely, objectively wrong, sorry.
RS did that, not ICC.
I literally just linked it.
If your link contained any Ruby sancum data it’s trash and should be thrown out.
Cope. lmao
No, dishonesty on your part.
Yeah, it’s so dishonest of me to link actual sources showing the steep decline in population over 7 months in ICC. I should just take your word for it.
His link is just the chart of the population over WOTLK.
Youre factually wrong on this 1.
I am only speaking about Phase 4, phase 5 is irrelevant, but hes squeezing that data in for some reason.
I mean you can literally look at when ICC launched which was 10/12/2023?
Then look at when buff was at 30%.
ICC launch week: 405k logged characters
Week before RS launch: 238k logged characters
Can you stop denying facts, now? The chart is right there for you to look at.
Maybe the numbers don’t show the full picture of what I was seeing in my sphere of influence.
None of this changes the fact that this is one of the worst phases ever for player retention, and raid difficulty is playing a large part in that.
Looks like it was at 276k the week of 5% buff and went down weekly.
5% buff started Dec 5th 2023.
Im not saying that people didnt quit because of the difficulty im saying its unlikely all of them did.
I dont have the data.
Its like when people say Cata lost 2 million subs because the game sucked and then thinking back to them losing my sub because im sitting in Navy boot camp.
I didnt quit because the game sucked but you can skew numbers to apparently represent anything you want.
Also don’t let me point out that these guilds that are forming were not the type to even log their stuff, and not counted in these flawed statistics.
When you put something on the internet, it’s there forever. You’re likening his skills to a flag football player and yours to a 2nd string NFL player. Lets not lie now, shall we?
Who cares? In all honestly, you should be using these metrics (WCL) to better yourself, not put others down.
I never mentioned the gear, I’ve been following the thread as if the topic was about the difficulty of the raid and what’s desired by the playerbase. Again, my issue is this
You’re soaked in ego. All you’ve done is mention how great you are, and if anyone disagrees with you, how bad they must be. It’s what you’ve always done from your “main” on these forums as well.
If that was quite “LITERALLY” the reason it was made, and it’s as “optional” as you say it is, then you shouldn’t be rewarded with significantly better gear for doing it then.
Funny how numbers weren’t dropping during Naxx in wotlk with how “easy” it was eh? 
This is the ENTIRE point.
I hope you aren’t serious. This is such a fallacious argument. WoD classic? Total of what, 50 people across all servers playing it? 
It was literally buffed, lmao
End of the day, I feel the best solution is to launch with prenerf to give us a chance to clear it, and then 4-8 weeks later send the nerfs and coast to the next phase.
Unrelated but also related note. Just finished my first night of prenerf ptr.
We did 3/7
Beth’tilac killed within a few pulls.
1 shot Lord Rhyolith, he is still a loot pinata.
Alysrazor we spent quite a bit of time on, but just killed it.
Tomorrow we try for more.
I think most guilds will be able to 2/7. Our main realm first/speedrun raid team is doing much better, at least we get to leech their strats lol.