Unrealistic Expectations

I would believe that to some extent we all suffer from having unrealistic expectations but the question is, are they really always unrealistic?

I am going to share some of the examples of my own unrealistic expectations and some others I see thrown around a lot, maybe you could share some of your own, or tell us what you consider to be unrealistic expectations.

Being Raid Ready at Release:

I remember when the expansion started I expected my guild members that wanted to raid to be raid ready within a week of release.  In all honesty I don't see how anyone that actually wants to raid would not be ready to raid after a week.  That is a week to level, a week to grind gear, a week to get gemmed, enchanted, reforged.  Sure, if you play once or twice a week that is extremely unrealistic but if you are someone that wants to raid, desires to raid, and is an active player, is it really all that unrealistic to be ready to roll after a week.  I don't think so.

As it would have it, this expansion was like every expansion before it, we sat around waiting on our healers to take their sweet ass time to get raid ready and even when we did first enter MV for the first time well more than a month after it came out most of the raid was still woefully under geared.  At least under geared when thinking these people had a month to get ready.  A month to grind the reputation needed to buy valor gear, a month to buy valor gear, a month to get the crafted gear, a month to grind dungeons to get drops, and still more than half the raid had done none of the above.

Some people still tell me that it was a lot to ask of a casual group and I had unrealistic expectations of my raiders but I do not believe so.  I believe even a casual player who desires to raid should have been ready after one week and even if not one week most definitely have been ready after one month.

What it really boils down to is the perspective of where you are looking at it from.  Perspective is everything, always will be.

Warlords:

So lets look at the wait for warlords.  I was expecting it to be out in march, or may at the absolute latest and here we are still without even a beta for something that should have been released already as is.  But those were just expectation and some might even call them unrealistic expectations.

But were they really unrealistic expectations?  Mists quickly became the best expansion in terms of content and kept up with the pace of it.  We had the staggered raid releases at the beginning to make it feel as if we kept getting stuff added, even if all that stuff was there already and just not activated.  Once again, perspective, it felt like stuff kept rolling out and how things feel are always more important than how they really are because people will remember how things felt, not how they really were.   That is where "rose tinted glasses syndrome" comes from, people remembering how things felt, not how they really are.

They released content patches and raid patches quicker than ever before.  So was it really an unrealistic expectation to believe that the next expansion would be sooner than later?  Was it really an unrealistic expectation to believe we would not go through such a prolonged time with no new content after we were treated to the best schedule of content release in the history of the game?  I don't believe so.

It makes me laugh when people say "warlords is not late, they never gave us a date so you can't say that" and things along those lines.  Yes, warlords is late, extremely late.  You can say we had unrealistic expectations because we believed that blizzard would keep to their word of quicker releases.  You can say we had unrealistic expectations because we were lead to believe they meant it by the excellent release schedule of this expansion.  But you can not say it is not late because they did not give us a date.  It is late, very late, because they led us to believe they were sticking to their word of faster content releases and using those standards to judge, it is late.

Was it unrealistic to expect warlords to be out already?  Absolutely not.  The only thing that was unrealistic was that we believed blizzard would not leave us in limbo for over a year once again.  But we were tricked into that by them doing such a good idea at the start of the expansion.

Item Level Requirements:

I must say I will be the first to admit I hate seeing people ask for 550+ for a flex run.  It really defeats the purpose of the run.  I want to bring my 510, 520, 530 characters in there, characters that need a lot of gear because that is what flex is for, gearing up without having to do LFR.  But is it an unrealistic expectation to expect people to have a number like that and still want to do flex?

I often hear people say, why would someone 550+ want to do flex.  These people believe that it is an unrealistic expectation to fill a group with 550+ players because no one at that level would want to do flex.  Not true, not even remotely close to true.  My main hunter is 570 and I would still jump at a flex 2 or flex 4 in a heartbeat.  I would not think twice if I got an invite to either.

I would do flex two because I am still trying to get the shaman trinket, any version will do.  And now with 2 additional upgrades any grade is even more desirable for me being I am still wearing a trinket I got from ToT heroic and that one can not be upgraded 4 times, it is still stuck at 2 upgrades only.  I've been wearing that trinket so long I am starting to see some rust on the edges and I think there is a layer of dust building up on it in some places.  The last time I wore a trinket that long was my greatness that I got at the beginning of wrath and wore until it was replaced by deathbringers will.  But it was still a great trinket even then and all inscription trinkets should last that long, but that is another unrealistic expectation all on its own, that gear will actually be worthwhile for an extended period.

I would do flex four because of the heirlooms.  Don't matter which character, which spec, I would still jump in one because I can use every single heirloom that drops because I play all 11 classes.  So yes, even at a 570 item level and all my other characters that happen to be over 550, I would still do flex.

And lets not forget the people that just want to run it for valor because with a decent group it is a nice quick run with decent valor generation.  And with everyone, even the best of the best, wanting to valor cap again, at least for the next 8 weeks, seeing people 570+ in flex just for the sake of doing it even if they need nothing is not unrealistic at all.

So how exactly can people say that someone asking for 550+ has unrealistic expectations for who would want to do flex?

Numbers:

When looking to pug for a normal run I would often ask for 150K from people if I know we are only going to do the first 10 bosses but if I know we are going for the last 4 I seek people that can pull at least 200K.  Personally I think that is a fairly reasonable requirement but I have been told that those are "heroic numbers" and I can't expect people to be pulling over 200K to get into a normal.

I personally do not believe it is an unrealistic expectation to get someone that can pull 200K for the later normal bosses and even more so garrosh.  On that fight more than any other, the higher the numbers the easier the fight.  Some fights stay the same, same dance, even with bigger numbers, that fight the dance card changes immensely with higher numbers.

The key however is, how is asking that people do what they should be capable of doing an unreasonable expectation?  Perhaps I am out of touch, perhaps I am asking too much, but I do not believe so.  I believe that any person in mostly normal gear, mostly upgraded at least 2 times gear, completely gemmed, enchanted and reforged gear, should be 100% capable of pulling over 200K with ease if you know how to play the character. 

That is why when I pug I do not ask for item level.  I never say looking for 550+ DPS, I say looking for 150K DPS, or 200K DPS.  I might ask what item level they have, but I would prefer someone in 540 gear that can pull 200K over someone in 560 gear that can't because that means one knows how to play their class (540) and one doesn't (560).  I need people to perform and that is all that matters.  So asking for 200K from people in mostly normal gear to pug in is not really an unrealistic expectation is it?  I don't care what that person said, he was just probably upset because he could not meet my requirements.  I do not believe 200K is an unrealistic expectation.  But of course, I could be wrong, but I do honestly believe 200K is not a lot to ask of a pug for normal if I want the last bosses to be easier.

So I have had my own unrealistic expectations I admit in expecting casual players to be raid ready a week into a new expansion.  I have been the victim of believing in blizzard and their hype to give me an unreasonable expectation of faster patch releases.  I can understand how asking for what might seem like high item level numbers isn't always really an unrealistic expectation.  And last but not least I have been accused of having unrealistic expectations by asking for a certain performance level that is, in fact, not unrealistic at all.

What are some of your unrealistic expectations, unrealistic expectations you were led to believe, things you believe are unrealistic expectations or times you might have been accused of having unrealistic expectations?

Misadventures In Raiding: We Got This

Yesterday while doing our standard valor cap thing, now that it is worth doing again, myself and the two people I was spamming heroic scenarios with to cap our characters got an invite from a friend of one of us to join in on an SoO pug.

Normally we would not do something like that, it is valor cap time but figured what the heck.  We all jumped on alts, me a druid tank, one of the others a druid tank and the third a damage dealer on a hunter and we joined the group.

It was a pure pug, all people from different guilds except for us three of course.  I am sure a few of them knew each other because that is how pugs usually go.  A friend invites a friend invites a friend.

It was a slow moving run because after the first boss someone dropped and we ended up waiting near 30 minutes to get going again.  We had a few more delays along the way, but otherwise everything was running smooth.  Bosses were falling over despite the raid leader using strategies that at least the three of us had never used, but he is the raid leader so we followed his lead and did as he said.

Like I said, with the exception of a lot of wasted time, which no one complained about, things were going nicely.  It seemed as if the group worked well together.  At least until Galakras.  It was where we hit our first bump in the road.

Side note:  To anyone that is not a raider, please be advised, this is not the right way to do things.  This is a misadventure and pure luck.

Towers went fine but when the protodrake landed all hell broke lose and the entire raid died near instantly.  Don't ask me how because I have no clue but you do not need death note to tell you it probably had something to do with standing in the fire.  Okay, bad joke.

It was just me, my co tank and one damage dealer still up.  The raid leader said it was a wipe to which I responded the way any person that has tanked a lot would admit they have responded at least a hundred times by saying, don't worry, we got this.

I was not trying to over rule the raid leader, it was not my raid.  It was his decision, but I figured it would not hurt to try and go for it.  At that point it was, in my mind at least, we are either going to manage to pull this off, or we are going to finish it off and die quickly, so lets have a little fun and I must admit, there is nothing more fun than saying "I got this" and somehow managing to get it.  This seemed like one of those times it could be pulled off.  Even if those chances were really slim.

Galakras was around 78% with the raid went poof up in flames.  Did I really believe we had this?  Yeah, I guess so, I did believe it was possible.  While me and my co tank were on alts we were on very well geared alts.  For normals anyway.  So it came down to, do we think we can heal ourselves enough to survive because his breath was going to start getting really brutal really fast with only the three of us alive and us using all our rage for healing instead of damage.

I said to the other tank, who do you think I should bring up.  He said our other guild mate.  So I battle revived our guild mate and we kept at it.  How he, on a hunter, survived so long without any heals is was amazing and the other damage dealer, the one person beside the tanks that managed to not go up in smoke instantly was a priest, managed to at least keep themselves alive.

At around 50% the shaman healer, who apparently did not want to waste their pop decided, what the hell and popped up.

We said, don't worry about us, keep you guys up, and myself and the other tank kept pounding away, rotating cooldowns, and keeping ourselves alive and low and behold, we got it.  You could hear the excitement on vent and the see the dead people typing in raid things like "I can't believe what I am seeing", "how is that even possible", and the funniest line you ever hear in a pug "this is the best group ever, I love you guys".

It wasn't the greatest thing to ever happen in a raid but it sure was fun to have something like that happen.  It was not pressing content, it was not something that was out of the realm of possibility, but it was definitely one of those raid stories you will go on to tell for a long time.

I often complain about pugs but sometimes fun things like this can only happen in a pug.  It was a good group and really you could tell that from the get go when no one complained at all about the long wait between the first and second boss.  I guess their patience was rewarded with a story they can tell their friends.

Side note: Both myself and my friend were on druid tanks.  If you do not play a druid I'll just explain how we did it nice and easy.  Druids rocks.  It reminded me of our first kill of Al'Akir at the beginning of cataclysm.  Somehow the entire raid got blown away at the beginning of phase three except me tanking on my druid, a feral druid DPS, and a restoration druid.  So the three druids did the third phase all alone for out first kill.

We got this.  Yes, we did.  Sometimes misadventures are the best adventures to have.  Misadventures indeed.

Patches, Pets and People Oh My

I had a few things on my mind so I figured I would make a post with a few things in it.  I'll try to keep each mini topic short but you know me so don't hold your breath on that one.

Patch 5.4.8

I was, read that as past tense because it is, very excited for patch 5.4.8.  There is not a great deal of meat to this patch, it is just really there as filler to try and ease the pain of us still having to play the same content.  There were two main points, at least as I see it, that we were expecting in this patch.

One was allowing us to upgrade our gear another 8 item levels which I have touched on.  It is a great thing for the people that don't need it but not really such a great thing for those just playing catch up or not valor capped or having nothing worth spending it on or those that do not even know about upgrading, which those things combined are basically most of the people that play the game.

The other part of the patch, as we were expecting it, was that they were adding a speed up option for the legendary quest line.  I gave up on getting cloaks because I was fed up with the LFR experience but I was thinking of dabbling back into it if they were going to speed up the process substantially because it would in effect greatly limit the time I needed to spend in that hell hole we affectionately refer to as the LFR.

Then I read over at wow insider that our fine feathered friend Rygarius was the bearer of bad news.  The legendary quest catch up would not be part of this patch.  This upset me of course because I was looking forward to finishing off the quest on my monk and mage who are both close to done and starting up another hunter on the line.  Now, blah, who cares.

But there is a second reason to be upset with this not being in the patch.  It means it will be even longer before we get 6.0 and warlords.  What makes me say that?  Well, all just guess work of course, but blizzard would not create a catch up mechanic unless we had more than ample time to finish it with that mechanic in place.

If they did release the catch up then, in theory, the possibility of the next expansion coming was sooner than later.  If they release the catch up mechanic later, that means they are doing it to keep us active.  So the later they release it the more we need to realize that we will be able to finish it and that means we need to wait longer for 6.0 and warlords to follow.  You can read this not being in the patch as 6.0 being even further away now and warlords being even further away now which is a sad turn of events.  This catch up system was supposed to be the last catch up system to hold us over until the expansion.

BTW, my insider, the one that often tips me off to things which I speculate on here before it comes out, so I know his information is solid, told me to expect warlords 16 weeks after the catch up mechanic comes out.  So thinking it was coming out today made me think that in 16 weeks we will get warlords.  So to me, based on the information I know, it not being part of this patch is basically a delay in warlords.

So this patch means nothing for me.  If anything it means warlords is being pushed even further back.  Sure item upgrades are nice, but not needed.  A catch up mechanic is also nice and it is needed.  At least needed for me, if they want to keep me interesting in playing for those 16 weeks after it comes out while we wait an unprecedented time for new content.

The Pet That Keeps Getting Away

In preparation of maybe starting to run LFR again I decided to give ToT part 3 a run again for the first time in months.  I had run this one a lot.  A hell of a lot.  My mage, my monk, my priest and my rogue basically did the majority of their legendary quest line in this one.  It drops secrets and runes and more importantly it drops a pet I want off of primordius.  The quivering blob which teaches you Living Fuild, a pet I want and need for my collection.

I just took at look at my main characters that have ran the LFR the most, and of course ran that wing the most, and combined they have 63 kills of primordius in LFR.  It is also safe to believe that they used a coin most of the time in attempts to get the pet.  As my most played characters I often would use that one as something I always did when capping valor and there have been no real use for those coins for a long time.  So lets say that means 100 attempts on those characters alone.  I have 18 level 90s that can get into, and have done, ToT wing 3.  Even if all of them only did it a few times that adds up.  I know some, like my mage, monk, priest and rogue are at least in the 10 range because they often did that wing while collecting drops, and all the others have to be at least 3 a piece, maybe more.  We are talking I have to be well past 200 attempts when including coin rolls at getting that pet and still no pet.

I was looking forward to the legendary catch up thing, as I just previously mentioned, because I was going to start doing this one wing again on every single character each week, effectively increasing my chances to get the pet and moving along slowly in the legendary quest line.  Now that is not going to happen, and I am still waiting on what can only be considered amazingly horrible luck.

Helping Out For Fun

My alt hunter needed a tiny bit to cap valor at 3K so I figured I would do the epoch stone thing on the island but changed my mind.  Might as well run a couple of dungeons.  It can help some people get through them faster and they can be downright fun.  There is something to be said about going in and mindlessly blowing things up in a complete and total mindless slaughter.  The game needs more group content like that.  For new characters it might be a way to gear up, but for geared characters it is a way to just have some fun.  The game needs a hell of a lot more fun group content.

The first run I get in apparently is headed by a DK tank that has never tanked before, or at least never tanked the one we got into.  It was shado pan monastery.  He pulls that first guy and looks surprised when adds spawn but that is not want gives his newness away, it was the fact that after he kills that one he goes forward to those guys up on the steps that do not need to be killed instead of making a left like everyone does.

No big deal, I slaughter them, we move on.  On each boss we kill someone rolls need on the item that drops.  Freaking awesome, I love it.  Not only am I having some fun killing stuff but I am doing so in a group of people that actually need some things from here.  Not exactly sure why they are not getting whatever they can from the timeless island, but who am I to judge.  Maybe they did and they did not get the right drops and are still missing a few slots.  Either way, it was fun helping them and even more fun knowing they got some gear they needed.

I do another one and get the same instance.  This one has a mildly decent geared lock as well.  Between the lock and I nothing lives for more than a few seconds.  We both seem to come from the same school of thought.   Even with a tank that was barely scratching the surface of 450K life, something we both greatly surpassed as damage dealers, we still let him pull the mobs, we still let him wrap them up, and then we killed them super fast.

It is nice to see there was another damage dealer in a group that thinks like I do.  I am able to solo all these things, have been for a very long time, but when I am in a group the tank pulls.  I am just a tool of destruction and I kill what the tank points at but I always let the tank point because that is his job and this is mine.  It was a fun run and guess what?  Every boss dropped something either the other damage dealer, the tank or the healer needed.  Freaking awesome.  I got to help people out and have fun at the same time.

I like that there is content like that in the game.  Something I could do solo but I can help others out with and they actually get something they need out of it.  I get a feeling of satisfaction for helping and get to have a little fun just killing stuff for a while, what is there not to like about that?

Monday Random Thoughts

- Moving around stuff on characters it made me think of an idea for an app and/or addition to the game I would love to see.

- Like those commercials "there's an app for that?"

- I wish there was one for this.

- What am I babbling about?

- Inventory control for us pack rats.

- A way to access the bags of every character we have and move stuff back and forth between them.

- Sure I understand there would need to be restrictions like stuff that is character bound or server bound, but it would be an awesome utility.

- Just killed a rare and got a big bag of herb.

- Woot, go me.

- Damn, accidentally opened it and now I only have three bag slots left.

- Open my app, move it all to my mages bag, because he is my herb catch all character, and tada, I have my bag space back and did not need to find a mail box to do it.

- Or while you are at work, do some cleaning up.

- Priest is holding on to all the cloth timeless pieces and I have a few in my bags around all my other characters.

- Move them over, no need to log into each, mail each, and then go fetch each mail.

- Who would not love something like that, in game and as an app?

- Okay, you got me, many people would not have a need for it.

- But that doesn't means I can't dream about how awesome having something like that as an ability in game would be.

- I am sure some people would use it, maybe even quite a few.

- Either way, I will willing to play the role of selfish elf and ask for it anyway.

- Just for me.

- Please. :)

- I asked nicely.

- My arena team is over 1300 now.

- Moving slowly doing 10 matches here and there, but getting there.

- And I got my weapon.

- Only 2 more non PvP peices and 5 low PvP pieces to replace.

- And I can calling anything under 522 low.

- All will get to 550, sooner or later.

- I had a dreadful outing last time we played.

- Funny as it might sound, the more I PvP the worse I seem to be getting at it.

- We are talking someone that could kite world bosses to main cities without even thinking about it and now I keep making mistakes kiting warriors.

- Maybe it is just as I do it more I am meeting harder opponents and I am making "nervous" rookie mistakes.

- They say sometimes to move forward you need to take a step back.

- Maybe this is a small step back for me.

- I just miss the days of being able to kite two melee at the same time all day long while I laugh at them never being able to catch me.

- Either I was better back then, or they were not as good back then.

- Or maybe a little of both.

- Seems everyone has so many catch up abilities now.

- Except retribution paladins.

- I could still kite them with my eyes closed and one hand tied behind my back.

- Now that is how all melee should be.

- Yes, evil, I know.

- I went cruising around the timeless island on three low geared 90s this weekend.

- My fresh 90 DK I mentioned last week, a 490 hunter I had not done anything with, and a 494 mage I had gotten to 90 and timeless geared up and never touched.

- For as much as I love hunters and will always remain a hunter, nothing can compare to a DK.

- Even a freshly dinged DK in timeless gear only with no gems and no enchants and no effort to fix them up could pull endless amounts of mobs, to some extent.

- Not frogs, oh hell no not frogs.

- My hunter could handle anything, as long as my pet could live.

- Some took more pet management than others, like stuff over the bridge.

- At that item level I could do chanters but the charge from the other guys one shot my pet.

- Unless I hit the shield shell before I pulled of course.

- But it took forever.

- My DK took forever too, but at least my DK was never really in danger of dying.

- My mage, I could not even try most stuff.

- Heading up the road I could get the elites but that was more about skill of positioning than skill of playing.

- Wait for them to do their herbing, then walk up on them to attack.

- No charge that way, because it would kill me.

- And then just stay far enough away not to get meleed and close enough not to get charged.

- Trust me, that is a skill all in its own.

- But that was too much work.

- It was interesting running the same route on three different characters with similar gear on the same day and seeing how they all fair.

- I had no trouble on anything with them at that item level but needed to play it differently on all of them as well.

- I decided to try and start gearing up my hunter, like I really need another one.

- Yes, I do, I do.

- But I find the gearing part fun.

- Did a few LFRs for the first time in months and now I remember why I stopped doing them.

- I did manage to get a fair deal of sigils in the ones I did do however.

- I was on voice chat with a few people when doing them when I made the innocent comment that had two very different responses.

- I said that all raids should be like they were in vanilla.

- One person said, if raids were that simplified they would quit.

- The other said, that it was a great idea.

- I think one thought I mean all raids as in "all" raids.

- I meant all raids in terms of what I was doing at that moment, LFR.

- Once I pointed that out, they agreed 100% as well.

- And the three of us also came to another idea that would be an awesome addition to LFR.

- Or at least we thought so.

- Addition by subtraction.

- LFR should be like ToC, just boss fights, no trash.

- Zone in at a boss, kill the boss and a portal opens, click it to move to the next boss, and so on.

- That would be great.

- And then after wiping not once, not twice, not three times or even four, but five times on the way to magara in ToT I proved exactly why that would be a great idea.

- Trash serves no purpose in random raids like LFR.

- Even more so any type of trash that could wipe you.

- It has just helped to create the hostile environment that leads to the toxic community when one person running in can wipe the entire group that is no where near them by pulling a mob that teleports people to it one at a time to mercilessly execute them.

- We never got magara down, the group gave up without even trying to run back for time #6.

- Sadly, I did not start on the first boss, I started on that one, so never even got a chance at the weapon either.

- It was a waste of time all around for me.

- Speaking of a waste of time, I got a learning lesson this weekend that there is no reason to ever be a nice guy in this game.

- Again.

- Yet I keep forgetting and try to be a nice guy and get screwed.

- I saw a boomkin fighting a rare so I landed and figured I would help him.

- I was not fishing for an invite, just figured I would help.

- Not like he invited me anyway, just pointing that out.

- He died, so I dismissed my pet and feigned death when the mob turned to my tag.

- Could I have killed it?

- Sure, even on a 490 hunter no rare is going to much of a problem for me.

- It was his tag, I was waiting for him to come back and I was going to let him tag it again then I would help him.

- He came back and started at it again and I went to help again.

- Somehow he managed to die even if my pet was tanking and there is no reason a range should die on one of the bug rares, but he managed it.

- I waited again for him.

- He came back and tagged it again and I started in to help him.

- He must have done something that caused him to lose the tag because it switched to my tag half way through the fight.

- I said screw it and invited him to a group.

- First mistake.

- I was in queue for the LFRs, 3 of them, and had been so for 1 hour and 17 minutes.

- As soon as I invited him I lost my space in the LFRs.

- My own fault, I made that mistake, but things get worse of course.

- No good deed goes unpunished they say.

- They are right.

- While waiting in queue I was running around killing rares, had already killed dozens, those baggies that have the goodies were just not dropping.

- But they dropped off this guy.

- I hit greed, because those loot bags are, in my opinion, the prime example of wanting something for greedy purposes.

- It gives you materials, which ones you do not know, but you want to get your greedy little hands on them.

- I hit greed, he hit need, not only on that but he hit need on the 440 cloak too, which he did not need when I hit disenchant.

- So he won both, of course, dropped group and never even said thank you.

- No thank you for dropping my LFR queue to help him, but I would not expect that because he did not know, but being I knew, having no thank you from him made it 100 times worse.

- No thank you for trying to help him kill the rare.

- No thank you for not stealing the tag when he died not once but twice.

- No thank you for waiting for him to come back so I could help him again.

- No thank you for when I did decide to kill it inviting him to the group so he could get a chance at stuff.

- And then the bastard needs on both things, never says thank you, and drops group.

- Not like I needed the stuff, but it is just not a very courteous thing to do.

- Someone goes out of their way for you the least you do is say thank you.

- And this my friends, is why you should NEVER help anyone in wow.

- I keep telling myself that, and I keep helping people.

- Yes, I am a flipping idiot.

- But they are not all bad, sometimes you run across a decent person.

- I saw a level 89 hordie getting his butt handed to him earlier that day and helped him.

- He was by that rare that is just where you enter the dread wastes.

- He was probably leveling, jumped down the rope and he was right there.

- I dismounted and blew it up for him and then mounted right up again.

- It was really quick, but he emoted thank you to me before he even bent over to loot the body.

- Now that is class.

- Reminds me of the tauren death knight I was having some fun with one day much earlier in the expansion.

- We must have both been doing the rare rounds and I stopped to help him and from that point on whenever we see each other fighting we always stop to help each other.

- I have not seen him around in a long time, hope he is doing well.

- See, there are some good people.

- Guess that is why I am an idiot that keeps going to help people.

- Sometimes, rarely, you get rewarded with a simple sign of respect such as a thank you.

- Is that really a lot to ask?

- Apparently it is if it is a boomkin you are hoping to hear it from.

- Next time I see him I am going to stand there and watch him die over and over again and maybe even do the laugh emote each time he dies.

- Then when he asks for help I will kindly tell them to shove it where the sun doesn't shine and steal the kill from him.

- Nah, I am not a jerk like that, but I really should be sometimes.

- Next time I will just not stop and help him.

- And because of him, next time I might not stop and help someone else that would be decent enough to say thank you afterwards.

- Yes people, one jerk can ruin the game for everyone, but one decent person can do nothing to repair the damage one jerk can do.

- My friends group tried gary again with no luck.

- He did not need me so I was not there this time, but he said they were not even getting to that phase they had problems with.

- Reminded him that they can push that phase early to practice it.

- But also mentioned, if they are not even getting to that phase, no reason to practice it now.

- I told him the only thing I could say is that it is a DPS issue for him.

- Without higher numbers his group will not get past it.

- Sad to say, because his team is pretty solid over all otherwise.

- Just not getting the most out of his damage dealers.

- Gear wise they should be able to do it.

- I think gear is a huge issue this expansion.

- More than in any other one.

- Not saying more gear will help them, they just need to get more out of the gear they have, but for the expansion as a whole gear is a problem.

- Too many raid tiers mean too many item level increases means too large of a gap thanks to that massive increase in item level.

- I think I have the solution.

- It is a two prong solution, one I should write a whole post on, but I will sum up an extremely oversimplified version here.

- First, add a new level of gear between green and blue.

- Lets use light blue.

- Was going to say yellow but the greens already look yellow to me and I am confused enough as it is, I do not need more confusion.

- So now we have 4 types of gear.

- Uncommon, Quality, Rare and Epic.

- Now, all the raids should drop the same item level loot.

- Yeap, LFR, normal (flex), heroic (normal) and mythic (heroic) will all drop the same exact item level.

- Lets call it item level 700.

- LFR would drop green 700 gear.  As green gear it would have no gem slots, ever.

- Normal (flex) would drop light blue 700 gear.  A higher stat allotment per item level but still no gem slots.

- Heroic (normal) would drop blue 700 gear.  A higher stat allotment per item level and items can contain gem slots.

- Mythic (heroic) would drop purple 700 gear.  The highest stat allotment per item level and can contain gem slots as well.

- Now that is how you really slow down item inflation.

- Each difficulty would have better gear than the one before, but not by huge margins like now.

- Each difficulty would have a different color to leave people the feeling as if they are getting stronger through gear.

- And it would help balance things over all.

- In theory anyway.

- Much better than the huge gap and huge stat boosts you get from raid to raid within the same tier.

- Sure someone in heroic gear should be stronger than someone in LFR gear but they should not have double the stats.

- 10% more with gem slots between the lowest to the highest is how you slow item inflation.

- Unless they plan to stat squish everything every single expansion, they are just going to back themselves into a corner faster if they keep up with this massive stat increase on gear every raid tier.

- Oh, speaking of stat squish, remember when I said there would be problems with it in reference to doing old content?

- Seems as if I was right.

- They are now going to give high levels a stat boost when going into old raids.

- It was a great idea, but I knew they could not make it work perfectly.

- At least they are addressing it before releasing it.

- Funny that we are being stat squished but being stat boosted when he go in old raids now.

- They had the best intentions.

- But I knew it would not work as they advertised it.

- Basic math could have told you that.

- I think I went on a little longer than usual today so I think I will end it here.

- Have a great day.

Avoiding Mechanics: Why Are They Even There?

Not so long ago I was in a run that happened to be on garrosh.  Some of the people in the group had been there before but they were having nightmares with it like we all did.  So one of the guys asked me, how did you manage it the first time and I responded, we just avoided getting empowered whirlwinds.

Basically I told him that we avoided mechanics.  Not having to deal with the empowered whirlwinds actually makes the fight much easier.  Same goes for shaman with three tanks.  You get to avoid so many things that "could" bring difficulty but doing whatever you can to avoid the mechanics.

I did a few attempts, 12 I believe, with them before they called it a night, gave some pointers and helped as best one person could but they did not down it.  They managed to get to the third phase once but they where dying, mostly, to empowered whirlwinds.  I felt so bad not being able to help them more.  I've never had to deal with the empowered whirling corruptions.  They have always been completely avoidable in flex and on normal we did not down it until we were capable of avoiding the mechanic.  So while I was able to tell them what needed to be done and how to do it, it came down to the fact that they needed to learn to do it or they would not be getting the fight down.

I've seen many pugs require a certain amount of DPS to push past the empowered whirlwinds or a third tank on shamans, stuff like that.  I don't blame them, I would be the same way too even if my guild never used the three tank method for shaman except for in 25s where we had the people for it.

The thing is, why does the mechanic even exist if it is avoidable?  Why two tank shaman if you can three tank it and make it easier.  Why deal with empowered whirling corruptions when you can push through it and make it easier.

I understand why these things are in game, to give fights some difficulty, but if you are capable of avoiding them, why are they even there to begin with?  All they do is work as a penalty against those that are incapable of avoiding them.  Sure you can do the fight without avoiding them, like I said we never did shaman with three tanks in 10, but it sure as hell would make it easier.

Why are mechanics that can be avoided, and by avoiding them they change the fight in a massive way, in the game at all?

At the end of the run he asked me if I thought the group could do it.  I said I was quite impressed that even with 5 people in there that never even had one attempt on garrosh, for them to get to the third phase once in only a dozen attempts was quite impressive.  So I told him, yes, I think you can do it.  All you need to do is learn how to better handle those empowered whirling corruptions.  As soon as you get that down the fight will be done.  They had the movement down perfect, they were snap fast with mind controls, it was just that one little thing that was keeping them from downing it.

He asked me for advice on how they could get better at it because it was going to get really frustrating having to do the whole fight and wiping late in it just to get a couple of seconds of practice on something that kills them so quick.  I told him, start the fight, go up, do not DPS garrsoh up there.  Let him get some power.  When you come down, he will have the empowered whirling corruption earlier now.  At least this fight had a way to practice it.  They will still wipe, but at least they can draw the mechanic out sooner so they can practice it.

He then asked, do you think my group can avoid the mechanic like you did?  I did not even hesitate, I saw where we were pushing transitions, first phase after 5 axes, second time up at 60 percent, I said no.  Sorry, there is no way your group would be able to avoid it.  You will either need to do the mechanic or wait until people get some more gear and get better.  I suggested he have the DPS practice their rotations on the dummy, because the numbers are not high enough to avoid the mechanic.

Now that is what this post is about.  Why is that mechanic even in the game?  It should be hardwired somehow, something you can not skip, or it should not be in there at all to begin with.

My guild was not any better than his guild when we first downed it.  Heck, his guild getting to the third phase in so few attempts was a lot faster than mine.  Sure, he had some people with experience there like myself, but for a group with half the people there being completely new to the fight without even one attempt under their belt, they did fantastic.  If anything with their performance I would say they are better than my guild.  But we did it because we avoided mechanics and they didn't because they couldn't.  And that is not fair to them.  Not fair to them at all.

So if the mechanics can be avoided, why is it even there to begin with?  His group is getting penalized because they are not over powering it?  All avoidable mechanics do it make things unnecessarily hard on the groups that are not capable of avoiding them.  Can they do it?  Sure.  Should they have to?  No.  If my team did not have to deal with that mechanic his should not have to.

I wish him luck and I know his group will end up getting it down in fewer attempts than mine did if they stick to it, they were doing quite well, but I genuinely feel bad for him.  His guild should have been celebrating downing him that night but a mechanic stopped him from that because he could not avoid it.

It makes me wonder if my guild wasn't as strong in the DPS department as we were, would we have ever downed it?  But if we weren't, we would have kept working until we could avoid it because that was the easiest way to do it.  And that is what I am getting at.  If the easiest way to handle a mechanic is not to deal with it, and it is capable of being avoided, why even add it?  It is a waste of coding time and a waste of player time.

I think that is bad encounter design, that avoiding mechanics becomes the best and easiest strategy to beat the fight.  It is not just skipping the whirlwind on garrosh or three tanking shaman, those are just some examples.  There have been many fights where if you were able to avoid a certain mechanic or bring a certain class it made the fight trivial.  I can name a dozen this expansion alone where if you could push past something with big DPS numbers, or heal through something with some great healing, or have a tank that can do that little extra it completely changes the complexion of the fight.

I am all for being rewarded for doing what you do well and I can see being able to avoid a mechanics because of good DPS might just be considered by some as reward for being better than those incapable of avoiding it.  I just do not see it like that.  I think of it as that group I was in that deserved a win, and knowing if they had the fight I had without the empowered whirling corruption they would have had a kill.

Mechanics like these, ones that can be avoided, have no place in raiding.  Either hard code them that they are not avoidable and everyone needs to do them or remove them.  They add no difficulty what so ever, nothing does really once you figure out how to do it, but they do offer is frustration like the frustration that guy must have felt when I told him my team just avoided the mechanic that is keeping his team form the kill.  As he said, and I now ask, why is it even in there?  Good question Rob, very good question.  So I asked for him. 

What do you think?  Should annoying mechanics that can be avoided by some groups or with certain classes just be removed in favor of more mechanics that everyone needs to deal with?

Why Are People So Mean?

I have an absolutely no evidence to back it up but I have an answer to that question.  To make themselves feel better.

However I would really like to know why people have to be so mean and resort to insults immediately, even when not threatened to begin with.  Perhaps there is more to it that I do not know.  More than just people trying to make themselves feel better.

Why do I ask this you might ask and the answer is simple, and quite obvious as you will see as soon as I mention it.  I was reading the forums.

The thing is that I have been trying to get into PvP more and as per normal for me I make every effort I can to get better.  Not like I will ever really be a good PvPer because my reaction speed is not up to par with top notch reactionary abilties that high level PvP requires but I can be good enough to have some fun with it and enjoy it.  Perhaps that is part of the reason I prefer PvE.  It is scripted so I know what to expect once I see it and I can get ready to respond because I know exactly what is going to happen.

That is the thing however.  Being I might not be the best at reaction or spell selection on the fly in PvP I can learn to be better and handle things better by learning everything I can.  Knowledge is power, to steal a saying.  So not only have I been reading every post I could find and watching every video I find for hunter PvP I have been doing the same for every single class in the game.

The reason I am doing that is because the more in touch I am with the other classes the better I will understand their abilties, how they use them, and more importantly, how they like to handle a hunter.  If I know exactly what they are going to do to take me out I will be in a better position to counter it.  So what I lack in experience and skill I am attempting to make up with in knowledge and hope that the more I play the better I will get at it.  I do believe, in time and with enough practice, my reaction time and skill selection will become faster and as such I will become a better player.

This requires a hell of a lot of reading of course.  If I ever want to get better there is a great deal for me to learn.  I can't just go into PvP saying open with an aimed shot, follow with a chimera and then double kill shot them.  I just do not have the gear to support that being enough to kill anyone and even if I did, there is no half way decent PvPer that would ever let me get that off without screwing me up somewhere along the line.

All this reading however has really turned me off of PvP.  Not only turned me off of it, but has made me want to quit it before I even get any further.  Not that I have thin skin or anything, but do I really want to play with "these" people?

I see people posting asking questions, questions I too would like to see the answers too, and the immediate response is usually something along the lines of "you can not even get 1800 in 2s, you suck", "you are not doing rated battlegrounds, it shouldn't matter to you", "just stick to randoms you noob", "you suck."  Then all those rude remarks are usually followed by rebuttals which are just as rude if not more so like "you have no right to comment you do not even have 10,000 honor kills", "you don't know what you are talking about with your 1500 in threes", and things like that.

Why has no one answered the question?  Really.

For the record, and as anyone that might read here often knows, I am not a PvPer.  I have not really even attempted it seriously since wrath and I wasn't very good back then either but I was bored and looking for something new so I decided to give it a try and learn.  I am not fully PvP geared yet, sill missing a weapon and 2 other pieces and 2 of my PvP pieces are from season 13.  Yes, I am totally a beginner.

Not to mention I am only just rebinding for PvP.  Going back to my wrath PvP roots with over 100 keybinds but I am glad there do not seem to be as many any longer.  To anyone that says that there is more to do now they are wrong, at least in PvP.  I have fewer binds now but more active abilties.

Either way, I am clearly in the learning stage.  Moving binds around as I notice where I would rather it and getting comfortable with them and of course remembering where those rarely used things are bound, like scare beast, come now, who the hell remembers where they bound that or better yet, who the hell remembers that they even have that.  Well, I now remember where it is.  It is just not really in a great place right now because I have not found a better place yet but if I hit - it will cast scare beast now.  Yes, I remember that even when not on the game, and that is what the learning process is all about.  Key binding is only half the battle, remembering where the hell everything is bound is the other.

I am currently 28-23 in 3s with a 1200 rating and I am sure it will get better as me and my team mates start to get some gear.  The other two got their weapons this week, I will next week most likely.  So I am not really what you would call a "good" player but I am most defiantly someone interested in learning and getting better.

And that is where this mean streak seems to start to bother me.  I do not post on forums, never have and never will, because I do not like the people on them, and as you can see there is good reason for that.  But being I read a lot I see how others are answered.

I've seen people in the same boat as me.  Not geared, just having questions and wanting to learn and get better.  And they get blasted because they do not have a PvP history, they do not have a good rating, they do not have all top gear, they do not have the things they should not have yet because they are just beginning.

Why is everyone in the PvP community such an asshole?  Someone comes to them asking for help on how to learn to play better and their first response is to blast the person because they are not good.   Not shit sherlock, that is why he is here asking for help, because he knows he is not good.  Telling him he is not good is like telling someone, hey look, it is day time, while the sun is in the sky.  Thanks for pointing out the obvious.  Now how about trying to help your fellow player?

It is not just the PvP forums mind you, they are just what I was reading lately so they are on the top of my mind and what made me think about it.  The PvE forums are just as bad with the vast number of people that judge someone on their gear and their raid progression.

Let me point out a small fact, you can not judge people on their gear or raid progression because it means nothing.  I could go this weekend and get myself a full 14/14 heroic clear on my rogue this if I wanted to.  I know someone that has been bugging me to trade him a rare S/S pet he has not been able to find but I have and I leveled up to 25. 

He has already offered to bring any character I want through a full clear if I would give it to him.  So if I bought my rogue through there and was 14/14 heroic with heroic gear on my rogue that would mean I am good on my rogue?  Hell no, I suck on my rogue.  Would that mean I am better at my rogue than I am on my hunter?  Hell no, the hunter is the only thing I am even decent at.  You can not judge someone on their raid progressions.  You can only go as far as the 9 or 24 other people you are with and in this case the 24 others I would be with are heroic ready, my rogue is not.

Just like I said of the PvP people I say about the PvE ones.  They are just being mean to make themselves feel better.  Nothing more, at least in my opinion.

I guess the reason it gets more frustrating when reading it on the PvP forums is because I am just starting to learn how to get better at that.  It makes me think that the community as a whole is chasing people away.  I will still do what I am going to do, I will still try to get a little better.  If 1200 is the best I ever do and playing .500 is the best I will ever be, I am content with that, as long as I have fun doing it, but I will try to get better.  If I stop at 1500 or 1800 or even make it higher, so be it.  I will keep going as long as I am enjoying myself.

But what about those poor souls that go to the forums to ask for help?  What if I would go there and say I've been having a horrible time with ferals lately?  Would they just say, well you are only 1200 and do not even have all PvP gear, you suck, just give up now.

How does this help the game, the community, the players?  It doesn't.  Why do people need to be so mean.  Wouldn't it be better for the game over all if people would just give me tips and tricks on how a hunter can get better at dealing with a feral.  Maybe point out I have scare beast, maybe I did not know I had that or even knew what it did.  But no, the community just wants to be mean to those asking questions.

I do not get it, I do not see where this comes from.  I would rather help someone so that means there is now someone else better than to shoot someone down so they might quit and there will be fewer people to play with.  Perhaps it has to do with the fact I am not an ego maniac and I do need to cut others down to make myself feel better.  Actually, I have a different psychological problem all together.  Helping others makes me feel better.  It is one of the reasons I stay in normals trying to help others get their garrosh kill instead of doing heroics, where I should be.

Not saying my actions are any better than theirs but at least I feel I can justify my desire to help others as something that is better for the community and something that makes me feel good about myself in a positive way.    Maybe there is more to them being mean that just having low self esteem and wanting to make themselves feel better and being I do not see it from their angle I don't understand it.  So why are people so mean?

Clueless Blizzard Increases Item Level Upgrades

When 5.4.8 comes out there are some interesting changes coming and the one in the title is the newest one, the older one we heard about concerned the legendary quest line.  They will be adding buffs, not sure how we get them yet, that will increase valor gain, increase black price reputation gain, and increase the drop rate of quest items needed for the legendary quest line.

I will talk about those changes first before I get to the valor upgrade that made me want to write this.  First, it has me thinking I might bring another character through the legendary line or finish off the 3 or 4 I have close but never finished it because I quit doing LFR completely as the reward you get from doing LFR does not equal the hell that LFR is to do.

However, blizzard once again shows they are incredibly clueless even with those changes to speed up the legendary quest line.  Drop rates are not so much the problem any longer. Sure they could be more generous of course, but the biggest hang ups on the legendary quest line, and where I have 8 characters sitting, are the valor collection and the PvP wins.  Three thousand valor is huge for a rarely played alt.  If they really wanted to help speed things up they could increase drop rates, sure, but what really needs to be done is to change the valor collection to 1K or even better, just straight out remove it. 

It is a waste of time to wait 3 weeks for no real reason.  When you hit that part you "might" still need stuff from LFR, so it is not so bad running it.  By the time you are done with those three weeks of collecting valor for no reason other than to waste time, you most likely will not need anything else from LFR and even if you do you are most likely about as sick of running that cesspool of content that you just want to never go back there. 

Which now means you have to endure that hell for no reason other than drops.  So even with 100% drop rates, it would still be a waste of time.  You could have been collecting those things during those three weeks instead of just collecting valor.  When the quest was new and it was current that wait was a good thing, it filled up some time where you would not be doing anything else anyway.  Now, it is a complete and total waste of time.  If they really wanted to fix the quest line you would have to do the collect three thousand valor and the next parts of the quest at the exact same time. 

As in, you will still need to collect three thousand valor, but the quest line continues, even if you have not done so yet.  When all is said and done, you will surely have the three thousand valor when done collecting all the pieces and it will just be part of the quest line that is done as you go and not a three week bump in the road that slows you down and makes you lose interest.  The fact they are doing things to speed up the legendary quest line and the valor collection part is even still in there at all shows that blizzard is not only clueless, but that they do not give a crap about playability because waiting three weeks doing nothing isn't exactly fun game play.

The second part is that PvP part.  Sure, I had two characters that went in and one shot both.  I also have 2 characters with many attempts and still no wins.  Druid over 10, warlock over 30.  If blizzard really wanted to speed up the legendary quest line and make it leaps and bounds more enjoyable for the people that do not want to PvP, and the PvPers that hate seeing the PvEers poisoning their content, they should change that part of the quest line to "participate" in each battleground, not "win" each one.  Small change but a huge one for the player base.  It would be a good change too, but blizzard, the clueless ones, will never see that because it is too obvious.  I am so amazed, as in holy crap how did they not even think of that amazed, that the battleground part was not changed to "participate" a long time ago.  Are the people in charge of the brain trust at blizzard really that clueless?  Don't answer that, we already know the answer is yes.

Now that we got the older news of their clueless nature out of the way lets get to the newer news that is the topic title.  I do not even know where to start on this one.  So many rants are going through my mind at the moment.  But I think I know where I will start.  I will start exactly where my mind went the moment I read a response from a blue.

Whats the point? honestly? just put in a SoO zone buff...pretty sure most of us are bored to death of dungeons and scenarios. this is also why it's a good idea to have new dungeons (hint, hint) as well.
Different strokes, I'm sure, but I prefer earning my power, and playing to get stronger. Zonewide buffs/debuffs always feel kind of... like pity. I don't want to be pitied, I just want more paths to success.

What immediately came to my mind when I read this is, who the fuck cares what you prefer.  How about thinking about what is better for the game for one and taking your head out of your ass for just a moment.  For the record, Bashiok was the dimwit that basically said his desires matter more than what would be good for the game.  He is just that important, remember that, he matters, the players don't.

For the record, I do not need the zone wide debuff, I finished normal a long time ago and that is all I do.  I do not do heroic, maybe a few here and there, but I do not work it as progression.   So me supporting a zone wide debuff has absolutely nothing to do with my personal preference.   I don't need it, I don't want it, and I could care less if it were even there.  What it is about is what is good for the game.  And if they are adding things with the intention of making SoO easier for some a zone wide buff can do that and valor upgrades can not, that would be what is best for the game as a whole.  Unlike Bashiok that only cares about what he wants, I, as a player, care about the players.

Lets put it this way.  When we stopped raiding, after finishing it off and many people took breaks or went on to a guild that was still going to push, we had new people that wanted to jump in.  They were lesser skilled and lesser geared and quite honestly, I did not feel like doing the entire raid again over again as progression with a group of new players.  A zone wide buff would mean I could bring them along and not feel like it was progression all over again.  So maybe that is part of the reason I support it.  But it would not be for me, it would be for them, those people that want to raid but are just not really ready to raid normal.  I got my title, I got my mount, the only thing I need from normal is that trinket off shaman.  Quite honestly I would be happy to not raid again until warlords, but warlords is way the hell too far away to just quit.  So if I want to raid, I need to find new people to raid with.  And no, I am not going to do group LFRs or group flex any longer, not this late in the expansion, to gear up and train new people.  No thank you.

A zone wide debuff is a good idea for many reasons.  Many reasons that valor upgrades could never even touch on.  Lets start by looking at valor upgrades and what allowing us to upgrade out gear 4 times instead of the current 2 times means when compared to a what a zone buff would give us.

It makes the powerful more powerful. 

As I said, I already cleared it and I could again with a normal group no problem.  So giving me 4 upgrades instead of 2 means nothing.  Sure, I can down stuff a little faster which is nice and all but it is not exactly needed.  I still can not bring that new lock that never raided before without it feeling like progression.  Or the druid that raided with us two tiers ago that just came back to the game.  Or the paladin that returned for the first time since cataclysm and wants to try his hand at tanking again.  Why?  Because they do not have the gear to upgrade and even if they did have the gear they do not have the valor to upgrade it.  Sure it will come, in time, but that does not help the here and now.  I would still need to raid progression with them and wait for them to catch up.  So as you see, valor upgrades do nothing for people starting or coming back.  It only helps the powerful get more powerful.  So now I can do 400K instead of 350K on bosses that only require 150K to down?  Woo - fucking - hoo.

It does not help with bad luck. 

You could make gear upgradable 10,000 times, it doesn't make a difference.  If you can not get the drops you will not have anything to upgrade.  I am still rocking a ToT heroic trinket I got last tier because the shaman hate me.  Maybe I kicked their ghost wolves in another life or something.  Sure, I do not need it, but that does not change the fact, you can't upgrade what you do not have.  Those players I mentioned, lesser skilled, lesser experienced, returning people, do not have the gear worth wasting valor on upgrading.  So how exactly does changing it to 4 upgrades from 2 help people that do not have any gear that is even worth upgrading two times?  Upgrades work for the people that have gear, they mean nothing for the people that don't be it from lack of winning gear or the fact they are just starting.  Upgrading nothing really does not help you beat a boss, but a zone buff might be able to.

You can't feel the power. 

Okay, I will be the first to admit that upgrading your gear can be huge.  But then again I am the type of guy that got a new pair of boots that were a 300 DPS increase and changed into them even if 300 DPS is not worth a pile of beans when you are doing over 300K normally.  What is that, 0.1%?  Who the hell is going to notice that.  So while I see the valor upgrades, which are more than 0.1%, most people do not feel it.  Feelings matter.  If people do not feel they are getting more powerful, they are not getting more powerful.  Yes, I know that is a falsehood, but perception is everything.  If there is a zone wide buff, or debuff, people, all people well geared and not, get to experience the power it gives you.  It would be a flat 5%, 10% or more.  Everyone gets 5% better, everyone gets 5% more effective, everyone as a team get stronger which makes the you yourself feel even stronger.  Appearances mean a lot and even if valor upgrades give you more power, to the average player, they can not see that power so to them, it is not there.

It is not inclusive. 

A zone wide buff lets everyone take advantage of it.  It lets everyone feel as if they are moving forward.  Valor upgrades are fine for people like me.  The type that capped every week, that raided all the time, that used their coins to get gear, etc.  We were always doing everything we could to get gear so the valor upgrades work for us.  For someone that is not that dedicated, valor upgrades don't really include them.  Doesn't blizzard understand that the people that get the most out of the valor upgrades are the people that need them the least?  Like myself.  I will upgrade my stuff the second the patch comes out, but I do not need to.  However, the new lock in our raid will not be able to, because he is still gearing up and he has no valor, so what does this patch do for him?  He is not an every day player, he is not a grinder, he is not someone that will go out of his way to get the best he can at all point.  He might be an okay player, he might have potential, but this will do nothing for him. Valor upgrades do not include him.  Hey Bashiok, I'll let you in on a not so secret secret.  He is the average raider.   Valor upgrades do not include him unless he works his ass off and the average player does not work their ass off.

It does not immediately impact the raid. 

Lets use my guild as an example.  We are rolling with at most two people that were part of the raid team on the characters that killed normal.  A couple of us are on alts, which means we know the fights and that makes them easier, but everyone else is new, lesser skilled, or just filling in to help out.  Valor upgrades are not going to impact this raid team, which is the type of raid team you see a lot this late in the expansion.  The mains will upgrade their stuff, but they are already caring the group, so a tiny boost to those two is not really going to make bosses fall over.  Us on alts are still gearing and have most likely not upgraded 2 times yet unless we are approaching valor cap because we are still looking to collect drops that never seem to drop.  So when we have not upgraded two times what does allowing us to upgrade four times matter?  And then there are the others, the average players, the ones we are just bringing in.  Even if they did upgrade their gear 4 times, will it teach them the fight?  If they are new, they are slow and learning.  If they are new they have lesser gear and even upgraded 4 times lesser gear is, well, lesser.  If they do not have the health to move from say a puddle on the first boss before dying upgrading a piece of crappy gear 4 times is not going to give them the split second they need to move, but maybe a 5% or 10% or more reduction to the damage it does might.

Now to sum things up I want to go into a make believe story.  But it is not as fantasy make believe as you might think.  It is exactly what my guild and hundreds if not thousands of guilds are going through at this very moment.  It is something a zone wide buff would help with but valor upgrades do nothing.

Lets say you are a normal mode team with no designs on heroic.  People are getting the gary kills and then taking some time off.  So you are now looking to fill spaces and recruit.  You are getting a fair deal of interest but that interest is coming from people with little or no experience and sometimes no real gear either.  You now need to step back to flex to gear these people but you have been through that already and had people either quit, gear up and leave, or just not show up.  The last thing you want to do is step back to flex again, not this late in the expansion.  You have been clearing normal and you want to continue to clear it.  You do not mind a few wipes here and there as you bring new people in, but you do not want to step all the way back to progression all over again.

Then you talk to your friends in other guilds and they say they are going through the same thing.  The heroic guilds looking to poach the few remaining regulars from normal teams because their raiders are taking breaks too, and the normal raiders not being able to get others to continue on normals.

Recruiting is at a dead stand still because anyone that was a real raider, someone that killing gary mattered to, has already done so and either wants to take a break, continue to clear normals with little fuss, move on to heroics, or just do something different for a while.  The picking are slim and keeping a raid going each week gets harder and harder.  To the point you invite a priest that has not healed since ulduar but she has been in the guild forever and is willing to give it a try again just to help out.  You will take anyone you can get your hands on.  Raid experience becomes so much more important that gear because you keep recruiting these 550+ item level people that could not pull 150K DPS if you set their ass on fire.  I am sure it would not surprise you to hear that I have seen more people at 550 item level doing 80K than doing 150K.  Or at least it would not surprise you if you experienced this scenario I am describing.

So you want raiders, even old raiders, even under geared raiders.  You just want some people to fill the open spots left by a raid that has already run on way to long and might very well run on for another 6 months or more.  It is harder and harder to get people and it is really better to get someone with some raid experience and just a need for gear than someone that you have to start from scratch with.  At least the people with raid experience will do the mechanics right and you can hope that the now over geared other players can compensate a little for their lack of gear.

The valor changes do nothing for filling those empty slot.  That 553 lock that can not pull 120K will not suddenly be pulling 200K because he can upgrade his gear 2 more times.  The 560 tank that you tried one week that had no clue what a cooldown was will not suddenly realize he has them if he upgrades everything and is not a 568 tank.    Sure, we can teach them, but it would be so much easier to teach them with a zone wide buff, or debuff.

See, that is where the game is now.  With a raid that has already ran way to long and worn out its welcome and a raid that has no end in sight, the only people that want to do it are the people that can't, even with another 8 points of upgrade, even if they could afford them, which they most likely can't because the people that can are usually the people that were better players to begin with.  But that zone buff can help. 

A zone wide buff can help a lot.  It can keep those normal groups raiding if they wish to.  It can keep them recruiting.  It can allow them to let more people with little or no raid experience in so they can carry them, so they can teach them, so they can gear them, so they can make these people into raiders.  Something that can not and will not be done with just valor upgrades.

All valor upgrades do is increase your item level (and potential of course).  Sure, it might help with those groups for flex that ask for a 560 item level to do flex one which is a joke, but does blizzard understand that the jerks that ask for a 560 item level for flex one will just say they want 568 for flex one now?

In the end this is basically what it boils down to.

Valor Upgrades:  They help those that help themselves.  The people that are fully upgraded and always remain so are most likely to be the people that do not need the valor upgrades to beat the content.  It will do nothing to extend the life of an already stale raid.  It might help some, very few, raids get past some bumps in the road, but that percentage is extremely small, and a zone wide buff would do the exact same thing for them.

Zone Wide Buff:  Helps those that do not or can not help themselves by allowing them access to something they might have not been able to do otherwise.  It increases the life span of a raid that should have been old content 2 months ago but we will be stuck with for another 6.

In the end, remember that the people at blizzard are clueless and like Bashiok they would rather think about themselves than the life span of the content.

Zone buffs can give life to a raid that should have been replaced by a new expansion or a new raid months ago.  Valor upgrades are like trying to stop the bleeding of having your arm cut off with a bandaid.

The ICC and DS buff and debuff are what kept people raiding and what kept them going for such a long time even if people were bored stiff of them.  Letting people, who don't need to, upgrade their gear 8 more levels is not going to keep them going.  Them getting more powerful, alone, is not going to help the team as a zone buff would.  They'll eventually give up trying to recruit more to keep going because it just is not worth it.

Remove the achievement with the title and the mount if you have to, but adding a buff or debuff will help us deal with 6 more months of this crap.  Just like it did with ICC and DS.

But Bashiok would never understand that because he works for blizzard and they are not allowed to be open minded, they are only allowed to be clueless.  Valor upgrades are nice, I will like them and I thank them for them.  At least for a short time I will have something to spend some valor on.  But over all, it is not going to help my raid team or the hundreds and thousands of other raids teams.  Not in the slightest.  Blizzard is clueless.