The Raiding Timeline (and other things)

[Dreadnought101]

So I got on to this server a few weeks ago, and I have had a blast while leveling up, and the mix between Wotlk yet capping at vanilla is a very interesting concept. However the end game (raiding) is very confusing and after talking with my Guild and some of their concerns we have come up with ideas how to better the end scene.

What I want to focus on is the spacing of the large scale raid tiers, the small scale raids and world boss releases in between, and the mechanic of starting with raids highly buff and nerfing them over time, and how to integrate it with the overall timeline so that it will make sense (and fun!).
Keep in mind I did not play retail vanilla (I joined in BC) and so some specific details may be lost on me on how it was done, however this is a private server and the devs make their own rules! and we as a community can hopefully get them to do what we want ~_~

The first part will be about having tier raids every 6 months, and lesser raids in between, while the second part is about raid scaling and keeping it buffed for 3 months, then scaling it down for the next 3 months. Then the third or optional part will explore additional options like an NPC that reinstates the buff for those that want to experience the raid at its buffed sate, and possibly giving them rewards for it.

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First Part: Tier raids and lesser raids scheduling ideas and rules.

Tier Raids ~ ~ I recommend each raid tier be released every 6 months. Right now we are in the Vanilla phase, which would be 1) Molten Core 2) Blackwing Lair 3) Ahn'Qiraj 4) !!NAXXRAMAS!!

Lesser Raids - - The schedule for releasing the lesser raids should either be 3 months in between Tier raid releases or coincide directly with tier raids, like Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj (20). These raids are either something extra for raiders to do if they get bored 3 months down the line of a tier raid or catchup raids for guilds that are behind in the current raid tier.

I propose this most bodacious schedule for the Vanilla Phase
~ Each raid tier is 6 months apart
- Each lesser raid is 3 months after a raid tier

(Already out) ~ (Tier 1) Molten Core and World Boss Azuregos
- Zul'gurub (20) and World Boss Doom Lord Kazzak
~ (Tier 2) Blackwing Lair (Tier 2) and Onyxia's Lair (40)
- Dragons of Nightmare World Bosses
~ (Tier 3) Temple of Ahn'Qiraj and Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj (20)
~ (Tier 4) !!NAXXRAMAS!!

(Notes)
- If its possible...The release dates for raids and world bosses should appear on the calendar, if not, the next raid release date should appear in an auto-broadcast "Zul'Gurub and Lord Kazzak will be released on Augest 25, 2015" (Date is just an example, not actual recommendation)
- Yes im aware zul'gurub came out after black wing lair but the loot and the 'apparent' general boredom of the server has me place it in between Tier 1 and Tier 2
- I know Onyxia's Lair was added before Blackwing Lair, but her loot is directly comparable and she drops the head-pieces for the tier 2 sets. 'Like brother Like Sister as the lore goes...'
- Lord Kazzak and the dragons of nightmare were hard to place, I took reference to their release dates and loot tables, Kazzak seems to have a mix of strong and weak items while the world bosses have generally stronger items, also theres 4 of them, while kazzak is solo, so puting him with Zul'gurub seemed reasonable while the world bosses will make things very interesting between tier 2 and 3.
- I know there is nothing between Tier 3 and 4, but by Tier 3 there are 7 world bosses and 5 raids, so I think we can get away with it ;D
- I know Ahn'Qiraj was technicly 2.5, but it just doesnt make sense to me, and its easier to follow along, so hence...Tier 3

(Random Notes)
-I like Naxxramas
-Have no idea if they will actually do Kazzak, they said that they were doing naxxramas, so kazzak should be easier to move and scale down (should be, but I dont know, im not a dev o.o )
-Bugs are scary, Ahn'Qiraj will be cruel

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Second Part: Raid Scaling.

So the current raid Scaling is like this... "Raid difficulty will then gradually decrease each week during the first 3 months, after which it will stay at a default buff to make up for the damage difference due to WotLK mechanics."
Essentially, that raid will be buffed for just 1 week before we see it dropping, and with the current schedule that I want in, that raid will be completely nerfed for 3 months before we see the next raid.
I just joined a few weeks ago, and molten core is already being nerfed, I feel like im missing out on a fun challenging molten core raid and im given a significantly nerfed raid that is easy to blow through.

This needs to change.

I want it to be buffed for 3 months! Then after that, it will scale down for 3 months to the original vanilla levels.

Here is why:
- A raid should become easier as the players get more gear, you start seeing bosses get taken down and raiders progressing through a raid because their loot becomes better overall as time goes on. A week is not enough for players to get to an appropriate gear level to really start progressing through bosses.
- People may think bosses are really hard at first and that they will never progress through it for the next three months, this is not true, they simply do not have the gear yet to down the boss.
- It will give hardcore raiders and newcomers plenty of time to experience the raid at its hardest
- It is ok if raiders continuously wipe on bosses, killing the boss is all the more gratifying (I raided sunwell platue, the easiest boss took 50 wipes, and Muru took us about 200! but thats not the point, each boss has its own adventure!)

Rules on the Over-tuned bosses:
If no guild is able to down a boss, and have wiped hundreds of times even with the best available gear from previous tiers of raiding, then the boss will be considered "Over-tuned" and should be toned down a little in health and damage.
-First Boss - 25+ wipes
-Standard Bosses - 50+ wipes
-Wing Bosses or Gate-Keeper Bosses - 100+ wipes
-Final Boss - Nothing, wait for the nerf (I just want to note that the lich king and heroic ragnaros took 500+ wipes from top guilds to kill them, I doubt our guilds will have that kind of persistence to get 500 wipes, if it DOES get to that point, and there's barely a dent in a final boss (as in they are never getting below 5%, some tuning might be applied)

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Optional Part:
(this is just extra 'fun' stuff that I dont think needs to be in the game like the first and second part, but would be beneficial!)
An NPC at the front of the instance that you can ask to reinstate the buff once content gets nerfed.
At 4 weeks (33% nerf) the NPC will ask you if you want to reinstate a 33% buff and when the raid has been completely nerfed, the NPC will ask if you want a 100% buff!

I want to see what it was like when Molten Core was at its strongest, like how hard the bosses hit and how much health they had, but ive missed out This NPC will function like some NPCs did in future raids where it will reinstate the buff (technicly blizzard did a 5% decrease on raids, and that NPC would get rid of the nerf, this is similar, but doing it in the opposite way)

Quick Rule: You can turn it on and off, that way if someone unknowingly (or a troll) turns it on to wipe a raid, you can turn it back off.
I think you can do this after killing the first boss, some bosses are simply harder for some guilds then others, and they need a nerf to progress,

I know that the devs want to keep the server as "Blizz-like" as possible and I am for it, however...when your adding wotlk to vanilla content, there will certainly be changes to the world itself.
"But your ruining my immersion by adding that NPC! It was never there before!" If you want true immersion, go play Nostalrious or another Vanilla Blizz-like server, that ship has sailed with this one as soon as they decided to directly change values on bosses, let us also access if we want to change those values as well! I really dont think that this will ruin anyones experience, if it does, I will be quite suprised and I really want to hear the reasoning behind this.

Optional Optional Stuff! (yes I said that twice)
Other things to add to the NPC buff (we can have 1 or all of them added, but these were fun little ideas me and the guildies toyed around with)
1) Instead of the nerf coming every week, it will come once a month, so it will be easier to track and calculate (33%, 66%, 100% instead of 12 nerfs)
2) The NPC will grant the raid a chance at getting more gear from bosses if you ask for a buff. (at a 33% nerf, it will give you a 33% chance that a boss will 1-2 extra items. At 100% it will give you a 100% chance to drop an extra piece of loot and a 50% chance at a second piece of loot)
- This way it will reward those that keep it challenging (and give new comers a legitimate reason to see the raid at its hardest) and make farming old raids better, because lets admit it, there is not alot of loot in vanilla raids lol, you get less loot from a boss, and you have to spread it among MORE people!
- It will make it easier for gearing up for the next tier raid, because more loot over the course of 6 months has dropped.
-This will not increase the chance for legendary items.
3) I have no idea how this will work for world bosses, should we make this happen? or just make it specifically for raids, in fact, do we scale down world bosses at all? (or buff them, as half the difficulty comes from competing with other guilds, PvP...yay, alliance pulls the boss and suddenly the horde turns on the buff, wiping the alliance lol)
- Maybe the bosses ALWAYS stay buffed, or they are NEVER buffed to begin with


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So all in all, I hope you read my post (it turned out WAY longer then expected) and i TRIED to make it easier to ready, but probably failed lol.

Essentially it came down to this...

Part One: A proper Schedule for raids - 6 months on a raid tier, and when to release the lesser raids and world bosses, either during a major tier raid release or 3 months in between raids
Part Two: Redoing the Raid nerfs - The old way is it starts out buffed for a week, then is nerfed over the next 3 months. The way it should be done is start out buffed for 3 months, then nerf it over the next 3 months.
Optional Part: An NPC to reinstate the Buff, and possibly adding rewards if you take the buff! Other optional ideas include how it would work with world bosses (if they should even be buffed) and seperating nerf times from weeks to months.

I would like to hear your comments, what you hate, what you like, what you think should be tweaked, and any new ideas regarding raiding.
Answering with a one word post "Yes" shall make you burn in the fires of Sulfuron!

[Zanmato]

Tried to read everything.

For the first part, i think we're already having problems with the current content being cleared and raiders getting bored mostly because they have no more preraid stuff to farm, pvp still doesnt happen so often because there's a large chunk of the population leveling and MC gets cleared in a night. Waiting 3 months to release the next content might not be ideal. The problem here was that MC was/is too easy. If it would be tonned up, maybe we would still be progressing through it and probably motivated in beating it. This brings us to your part two;

For the second part, i agree with your suggestion. Content shouldn't start being tonned down so fast. Coming from the same era of wow raiding as you do, i actually enjoy wiping a ton of times to overcome a boss. Wiping dozens or hundreds of times and then finally beating it - that was a nice feeling of accomplishment. Personally i don't mind if the end bosses are overtonned to the point of being extremelly dificult during those first 3 months as you suggested. At least people will still be motivated in overcoming that challenge.

[Roel]

That was a long post indeed, you really spent a lot of effort on this.

For raid scheduling we will indeed use the general idea of one big (tier) raid every 6 months and then a smaller content release 3 months into it (where possible). As for the exact plan and announcements, that will be done once most of it is ready and tested. Though it won't follow your plan exactly, Onyxia and Kazzak would be released as soon as ready. For the latter, we're not yet even sure if it will be released.

Redesigning the raid scaling/buffing is something I am working on and would like to finish before any new content is released. It's hard to judge the right difficulty so it will indeed end up overtuned on release day, that's also to make sure that any bugs don't make an encounter overly easy like what we have seen in Molten Core. Adjusting it based on wipes would be a pain so I still think nerfing it each week is a good option to make sure a certain boss becomes doable at some point. But I was also thinking about extending it to 6 month which makes the week-to-week difference negligible.

As for an NPC to reinstate the buff, I don't think that will really be used especially for the 40 man raids. You can add difficulty in the same way by reducing your raid size. Later on in Vanilla, Molten Core was often raided with 20 man which means you basically have half the damage and healing. This automatically makes sure that you get more drops because you only need to distribute it among half the amount of people (even less if a lot of them are already geared). And I am sure people would rather save their potions and flasks for the raids that really need them.

Most importantly, a plan should be adjustable if it's not working optimally. We're doing things that have never been done before (as far as we're aware) so we might discover that certain things should be changed at a later point. (like changes we're discussing right now)

[chasedavor]

6 months for big raids? That's just wrong. Nobody wants to play mc/bwl for two years to see aq40, people quit other projects cos of huge gap between content.....

Just no, please. No.

[Roel]

6 months for big raids? That's just wrong. Nobody wants to play mc/bwl for two years to see aq40, people quit other projects cos of huge gap between content.....

Just no, please. No.

2 years for aq40? I am not sure where you read that but in 2 years from now we will have TBC. With those 6 months we can have aq40 in less than a year from now.

[chasedavor]

Less then a year for aq, 6 months to nax and from nax to tbc another 6 months? Or you don't plan to release nax for 60?
Otherwise that looks like a two year plan to me, ~12 months aq40, 6nax and 6tbc = 12+6+6=24

[Roel]

Less then a year for aq, 6 months to nax and from nax to tbc another 6 months? Or you don't plan to release nax for 60?
Otherwise that looks like a two year plan to me, ~12 months aq40, 6nax and 6tbc = 12+6+6=24

Yes on retail it also took 2 years for TBC to be released, actually every expansion lasted about 2 years. We already announced this plan for the longevity of the server instead of grow fast die fast. We will also make sure that guilds will struggle to clear raids for quite a while after the release.

[razmattaz]

amazing analysis and a lot of depth, I will need to get to 60 first to offer my ten penith, but looks like a lot of good ideas, as we all like a challenge

In regards to the moaning about the 2 yr plan before TBC, I have to say, if you had bothered reading the article on the news page, you would have known about the timeline. End of the day Prime and the gang have decided to use a schedule close to blizzlike to have a server that will last 6 yrs so we can all enjoy the best 6yrs of warcraft again, and I think its a good idea, means a majority of the current and future population can have a lot of content spread out and not wear it out too fast.

[simmelma]

6 months for each good instance?

Is this a joke?

Plz dont go more than 3 months between instance releases, I would recommend no more than 2.

Lots of other private servers have died because of slow content release, don't ignore the trends.

[Analya]

I am not concerned about content being released every 3-6 months as long as it's playable. Only thing that is important is that you try to keep your promises when it comes to release, aka don't give ETA unless you are at least 80% sure that you are able to release it in given timeframe.

[Dreadnought101]

Right...so just woke up, thanks for all the feedback and comments.

About the 6 month thing...Blizzard had for a long time released raids every 6 months, and that mold was only broken recently with mists. With PrimalWoW I think people are anticipating that it will be boring in between raid releases. I dont think so, as long as the tier raids are buffed at a high level, raiders will take a while to progress through raids. I want to point out that blizzard released Black Temple when nobody killed Kael'thas at Tempest Keep, the previous raid tier! this could happen with raids now.

That was a long post indeed, you really spent a lot of effort on this.

For raid scheduling we will indeed use the general idea of one big (tier) raid every 6 months and then a smaller content release 3 months into it (where possible). As for the exact plan and announcements, that will be done once most of it is ready and tested. Though it won't follow your plan exactly, Onyxia and Kazzak would be released as soon as ready. For the latter, we're not yet even sure if it will be released.

Thank you for replying to my post, it was quite interesting and informative.
I knew that raid tiers would be released every 6 months, and lesser raids in between, and that you guys would be releasing zul'gurub soon and Blackwing Lair after that.

So with the first part: The Raiding Timeline I wanted to do 3 things
1) Convince the community that releasing raid tiers every 6 months is a good thing. With lesser raids and world bosses in between.
2) Confirm that the devs would do lord Kazzak, I had no idea if they were doing it. Mission Accomplished
3) Convince Prime that my Time-Line is the way to go, and when to release Onyxia and the world bosse. Im pretty sure AQ(20) will be released with AQ(40), and that releasing a raid tier every 6 months was going to happen in the order I set. This was mostly to get Prime to go with my time-line

I want to mop up with concerns about specific release dates, I think that you guys should set a soft date exactly 3 or 6 months away from any previous raid release. If you have trouble meeting that day... Tell the community the issues you are having, and why you are pushing the date back. The private server community is very forgiving (besides a few trolls) and will understand and cope with why raid releases are pushed back. Dont be afraid of setting dates, just make sure you get the message across why you are pushing a date back!

[.btbyrne]

Tangential, but are Ruins and Temple going to be gated by the war effort?

[Roel]

AQ20 is more like a lesser raid with lower drops like ZG. It can be released between BWL and AQ40 to keep people busy.

Anyway I wouldn't like pushing releases back, more likely pushing them forward. Like mentioned above, if we give an ETA, we will release it by that time. You don't need to worry that 3 months are suddenly going to turn into 5 months or 6 months into 8 months.

Also no promises regarding the war effort yet.

[Dreadnought101]

Right, now lets go on to the big part...Raid Scaling and the NPC. At first I was thinking of a purely optional idea with the NPC (Lets call it the Buffinator, thats more fun) but now im really starting to see the Buffinator could be very useful, ill explain why later.

Redesigning the raid scaling/buffing is something I am working on and would like to finish before any new content is released. It's hard to judge the right difficulty so it will indeed end up overtuned on release day, that's also to make sure that any bugs don't make an encounter overly easy like what we have seen in Molten Core. Adjusting it based on wipes would be a pain so I still think nerfing it each week is a good option to make sure a certain boss becomes doable at some point. But I was also thinking about extending it to 6 month which makes the week-to-week difference negligible.

I disagree with extending the weekly debuffs to 6 months.

Thats not how you make a hard raid easier to clear, what makes it easier is the gear players get over time and those gear and DPS requirements are easier to overcome. Directly nerfing content goes directly against this concept as your making raids easier through 2 methods, not 1, and the bebuffs are out of the raiders control, gear is not. Also I dont think you understand how significant the raid bebuffs are, at the beginning of Molten Core Ragnaros was around 5.3 million, now he is at about 4.2 million i think (and the vanilla health was at 1 million) I dont think you understand how much each debuff every week reduces a bosses capabilities, and cutting it in half IS NOT ENOUGH to make it negligible.

Next lets talk about debuffing raids by weekly or monthly. I dont think weekly debuffs even after the initial 3 months is a good thing, its hard to track how much the debuff is applied, A month is easier to follow, with a 33% debuff, 66%, and then a complete removal of the buff. Having debuffs once a month instead of once a week will also help with my next topic, NPCs and how they can re-apply buffs.

As for an NPC to reinstate the buff, I don't think that will really be used especially for the 40 man raids. You can add difficulty in the same way by reducing your raid size. Later on in Vanilla, Molten Core was often raided with 20 man which means you basically have half the damage and healing. This automatically makes sure that you get more drops because you only need to distribute it among half the amount of people (even less if a lot of them are already geared). And I am sure people would rather save their potions and flasks for the raids that really need them.

20 people could raid Molten Core? Im pretty shocked by this lol, my only comparison was Karazhan with 8 man raids instead of 10 man raids, a 20% decrease, but a full on 50% decrease..?! Insane!! heh heh

Ok, so at first the Buffinator was a bit of a joke in the guild chat, I originally wasnt for it or against it, but added it anyway because alot of players wanted this feature. Now im starting to see why this NPC could be very beneficial to the raiding scene.
I want to talk about how it will increase options for raiders and help devs with adjusting things, Ideas on concepts on what farming can be, and back-raiding (ill explain that one later on)

So keep in mind this is working with the idea that raids will be debuffed 3 times over the course of 3 months (One Debuff every month).
Unlike before where the buffinator changes its buff, it will now simply add another option. Example: After 2 months, it will have 3 options, a 66% buff for 66% chance at more loot, a 33% buff and of course a no buff option.
(technically players will have access to a 100%, 66% and 33% raid, but no 0% raid, and will only get 33% more loot at a 66% raid, they will have to wait a month until their 66% buff will grant 66% more loot, instead of 33% and they have access to a 0% raid....I just wanted to clear that up!)
This is what could happen after 6 months! Raiders will essentially have 4 different levels off difficulty, and not have same the problems with retail with the mythic, heroic, normal and LFR, which can get really messy. This is a much more straightforward and simple option.

Now on the topic of how the buffinator can work with old raids, farming and back-raiding.

Back-raiding is the idea of removing the buff to be the first to down a buff at full strength, The best (and only) example would be that Paragon beat the Lich King at the 5% nerf and got their world first, however no guild after that was every able to beat the Lich King without any nerf, until Paragon went back and killed the Lich King with no nerf, and that gave them TONS of infamy (I was so jelly at the time) because it was thought that the Lich king couldnt be done!
Right now 2 guilds have downed ragnaros as far as im aware, however ragnaros wasnt at his most powerful, I want to see who gets ragnaros at his full power first!

Now on the topic of farming, im still in shock about a 20 man raid taking down a 40 man raid o.o
anyway...this gives more options to farming, maybe you want to split your 40 members into 2 raids so they can get more chances at a legendary loot, or keep them as a 40 man team and have more loot overall to spread around the raid members and avoid loot that cant be used by anyone in that 20 man team because they already have said item.

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Overall Prime, I get things are very strange on how the raids work, im just a random internet guy with these random ideas put together by people. I want to discuss and expand on these concepts before I tack on post for a poll (since i cant edit the original post to include a poll) and the community can vote on the ideas, Will see how it goes o.o

[Dreadnought101]

oh gawd, my next post was also insanity. I come from a small community for a game called Cruiser Command, we get into massive posts over the LITTLE things, so youl just have to deal with it community+Prime