Bring the Player vs. Bring the Class Raiding

I haven’t played World of Warcraft for the past year or so.  It’s been longer than that since I’ve raided or concentrated on doing instanced content.  Even though I’m not playing WOW, I still listen to a couple of shows on WOW Radio.  Specifically, I’m still following TotalBiscuit’s Blue Blz podcast.  I understand that many of the hardcore raiders are not happy with the end-game content released with Wrath of the Lich King (WOTLK).  It’s too easy from what I’ve read and heard.  Many raiding guilds have already beaten the top bosses and have those instances on farm.  It appears that Blizzard is slowly altering the basic requirements of raiding to what TB calls, “bring the player and not the class.”  I hear what he’s saying but until now have only shrugged at the idea.

Even though I completed a lot of levels and content solo in Asheron’s Call 2 (AC2), everyone did the group dungeons.  The dungeons like Lost Company and Boots were repeatable, and provided too much XP to ignore.  The Master Vaults were much the same and equivalent to raid content, minus loot drops.  AC2 was my first experience with large group content.  We didn’t call it “raiding” but it was close.  I found the vaults extremely fun and exciting no matter how many times I’d done them.  After acquiring the items needed to open the vault and gathering the players needed, it was a mad dash.  We raced to clear trash mobs and complete tasks to trigger the appropriate events that would spawn the boss.  You tried your best to get into a party that had a healer before the final encounter where you’d be dead in a couple of hits without heals.

Other than needing healers, the most important requirement was warm bodies.  Some vaults needed particular classes for de-buffs and crowd control.  For example, Eildon Master Vault had to have Enchanters to mesmerize the mini -bosses and adds or it would be a huge wipe which would consume the difficult to get components that opened the vault in the first place.  However, beyond needing one class here and there, it was primarily a focus-fire fight.  It felt more like RVR or large scale PVP combat than the intricately choreographed encounters I learned later in WOW.

The difference between these two types of dungeon encounters, WOW vs. AC2, is that the AC2 version is much easier to PUG - almost always was a PUG because of the amount of players needed.  A guild might group their members together at a pre-determined time to start the vault and form their own parties.  However, they would then need to call for more participants at a binding stone before they could begin.  Typical raid size needed for these master vaults was 60 to 80 players.  It’s less restrictive about the classes and class specs required to complete the content.  This means that someone who plays the game casually, doesn’t know all the minutia of an encounter or is playing an uncommon class build, can still participate and contribute to the “win”.  Whereas the scripted instances in WOW, especially pre WOTLK, were designed with certain classes and class abilities (build) in mind. 

You must have tanks, healers and DPS, in addition to other requirements which change depending on the instance.  Sometimes you MUST HAVE large scale AOE, crowd control for a particular NPC race, certain protective buffs – drop the Mage now and summon in the Hunter for Tranquil shot, drop the Rogue and bring in another Warlock for Banish, drop the Moonkin and bring in another Priest for Shackle, etc.  By designing around very specific sets of circumstances, Blizzard was able to create truly heroic dungeon encounters that are famous the MMO-fantasy world over. 

I hadn’t before and haven’t since, been part of raid encounters as epic as the 40-mans from WOW.  I’ve certainly been in some that are more fun but none as epic.   Unfortunately, there is a price to be paid for this brand of raid content.  Players are pegged into certain roles, which slots them tightly into certain builds, some of which aren’t very effective when you’re not raiding.  Sometimes these raid-specific builds gimp the player for doing other types of content.  This is an old story and not specific to WOW. It’s specific to most highly scripted raid content. I heard of the same issues in EQ2 raiding, where playing certain classes provided a higher probability that you’d be invited into a raid.

Back to “bring the player,” style of instances that TB feels Blizzard is now creating.  Designing instances that are more forgiving on class composition and class builds, severely limits the permutations of complexity that can be involved.   With the exception of tank and healer, most any other class must be acceptable and the class build can’t matter.  Going down the road of fairly vanilla encounters removes aspects of the drama.  If you want to make raiding more friendly and casual, you can’t have class and build requirements.  From what I can tell, Blizzard is trying to get around that by creative use of props – vehicles and other ability changing tools to replace requiring that class.  You don’t have to a Rogue to do “such-n-such” encounter.  There’s some interactive prop that will turn one of the party members into a Rogue.  More lenience in group composition often means a watered down experience.  Not to say that it has to be that way, I’m sure there’s something in the middle and designers are trying to find that sweet spot. 

Having started with vanilla encounters, followed by indoctrination into WOW’s very stringent ones and now back out to vanilla again, has drawn the difference in stark relief.    Neither of these methods is good or bad, they are simply different, each with its own set of advantages and disadvantages.  Almost five years later, WOW is still grappling with this problem of freeing players from class build restrictions in content and incorporating more casuals participants.  They are trying to please everyone – hardcore, casuals and raiders in between.

It’s too early to tell but my impression is that ROM has chosen the vanilla version of raid content.  You need tanks and healers for sure but all other spots are up for grabs.  So far I’ve done the Bloody Gallery which is an instance inside Forsaken Abbey.  I mentioned my healing adventures briefly in another post.  We had designated tanks and healers.  They were attempting to do coordinated pulls – I think our WOW/EQ2 expectations were showing.  However, it seemed like every pull brought packs of additional mobs with no way of effectively establishing off-tanks.  They swarmed everywhere and on everyone.  This was definitely more like what I remembered from AC2.  Bloody Gallery was mass confusion, exhilarating on some level but definitely not a well choreographed dance.  I found myself wondering if all of the instances would be this way.  It was very similar to the Warhammer Online Public Quests Stage III.  Sure you need a tank on the boss and someone healing that character but whatever else was going on was up for grabs.  Even more like keep sieges where you had an idea of which targets to focus on but there are pockets of mini battles all around you and your own survivability often overshadows playing any particular role.  Fight something or heal someone but above all, STAY ALIVE.

I find myself more curious now about the Windmill instance.  I was considering passing it by because I already have the Ventis set that most people are trying to get the materials for out of that dungeon.  I believe it has multiple boss encounters and roving patrols.  From what I read about it on the forums it sounds more like a WOW 5-man instance.  If it turns out to be more like Bloody Gallery then it would appear that ROM has selected the more open style of raid content.  That wouldn’t surprise me.  The dual class mechanic, elite skills system and extreme flexibility in building out your class leaves a large variance factor that would be hard to hammer into more flamboyant but restrictive raid encounters.

I’m not sure how I feel about that vanilla-style of raiding.  It’s not going to make or break the experience for me but it may for some.  It does mean that I will easily be able to get into groups to do raids as my preferred role of Monk (melee DPS Priest/Warrior) instead of being forced to just heal or just tank.  If they’re short a healer and I want to heal, I can fill that role.  If they’re short a tank and I have good tanking gear and want to tank, then I can tank.   Otherwise, it appears that this will play out more like Warhammer Online where my class combination, spec and gear will be no one’s business other than my own.  The price I’ll be paying for that freedom is less heroic encounters but that doesn’t mean they have to be boring and I hope they’re not.

Deadmines in WOW is a great instance where all classes and builds are welcomed beyond the tank and healer, and it’s still a lot of fun.  Dire Maul, Scarlet Monastery, Scholomance are other good examples.  Since many elements of ROM feel cloned from WOW, I hope that they’ve also seen how group content that is forgiving in class composition can be achieved without going to the extreme of pure mad dash and warm-bodies raiding of AC2.  I'm enjoying ROM and would like to do the raid content without being forced to abandon the class combo that I selected, my spec and gear enhancements that are suited for how I'm playing my class.

Comments

[Sente]

Too me the "epicness" of an experience is not tied so much to whether specific roles and builds are needed, or the number of people. It is rather the story unfolding as part of the experience.

Of course the experience should not be trivial, but does not necessarily require a very specific strategy.

I think the Guild Wars campaigns are good examples of what I consider more epic experiences - strong storylines, stretching out long over time and with at least pieces that can be quite challenging to deal with.
Guild Wars' skill system makes it also that you may have to consider and try out various tactics that may change, but are not necessarily locked into a specific cookie-cutter pattern.

Bloody Gallery sounds a bit more like City of Heroes/Villains type of encounters, where a full team (8 persons) typically has to deal with groups of enemies that are perhaps 12 different enemies of various types. Pulling may mor may not get the whole group and problems often arises when you get more than one group of mobs.

I am not sure if CoH/CoV style encounters do work as well in RoM though. But that remains to be seen.

[Blacknimbus]

CoV/CoH instances were fun, but repetitive after a while. And they were pretty vanilla and simple.

WoW is going towards less class specific enounters and less consumables. You have 4 tanks to choose from now and several types of healing is now workable. Disc is the most popular build for raiding Priests, if you can believe that.

For a 5 man instance, you need a tank, a healer and 3 other guys. I miss the dynamic of needing CC, but I also enjoy playing classes that don't bring solid CC to the table, so it's not a bad thing imo. Also, they are introducing dual-specs in the near future, so that should change the dynamic even further.

I'm always playing catch-up when it comes to end-game, so the difficulty level is fine with me. I was barely attuned to BWL when TBC dropped and did a few runs of Sunwell when Wrath came out, so I'm pleased that it's likely I'll see more endgame this time around.

[Alysianah aka Saylah]

@Black - I prefer the idea of not being forced out of my combo for raid-level content. I've never been a dedicated healer as I went Shadow Priest, Feral Druid and Shockadin. Having already had the Warlock at max level for a couple of years, I only raided on her.

I have a very usual combination and my gear full represents the combo. If I have to raid as one or the other then I'll have to gather two sets of gear and spend my talent points VERY different than I have so far and it would cost me real money to change back and forth.

[Blacknimbus]

They eliminated spellpower/healpower gear. It's all the same stat now. That eliminated two 'trees' to itemize...no more healing -or- damage gear.

I hardly ever did any raid healing with my priest, but there were times when a healer would drop in Kara and I'd hearth back to grab my crap healing set and respec. Now it looks like you can do the respec on the fly and your gear is your gear...insofar as healing goes.

Tanks will dual spec dps and whatever prot tree their particular class has. They will have to keep two sets of gear, but it's not like anyone else is going to want to roll on stuff like that.

Tank threat is much higher across the board and the current endgame raiding is a lot easier compared to previous early raids from vanilla and TBC.

A little OT, but the Deathknight starter area and the Wrathgate questline in Dragonblight were really amazing. I'm hoping phasing gets used a lot more...it's seriously game changing. I usually dislike cut-scenes, but was very impressed.

[Alysianah aka Saylah]

It's about time! That whole respec issue was annoying especially for a hybrid class and I flat out refused to be bothered gathering multiple sets of gear.

The problem I see is that they are pushing a lot of WOW into a vanilla one-size fits all sleeve. It will be interesting to see how the player base responds overall.

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[mage leveling guide]

There is one thing that gear or specs can't substitute: The skill of a player in his respective raid role.

In my opinion, the needed roles to overcome an encounter should depend on the players ability to actually fill the role with his experience and skill, not the gear+spec alone.

[Warrior Guide]

Well yeah, I kind of love the complexity of the boss encounter. The harder the better. But you are absolutely right - the more Blizzard turns to the "bring the player" concept, the easier encounter will be.

But what is it worth to kill a boss if it's so easy you can even change your spec beforehand? If you don't have to completely *master* your class?