13/01/2010

Instance patch notes that I'm afraid we'll see soon

Ahn'kahet: The Old Kingdom
- Elder Nadox will only summon one Ahn'kahar Guardian per fight, so you won't have to waste as much time fighting things that aren't the boss.
- Prince Taldaram won't vanish anymore, so you can keep dpsing him throughout the whole fight.
- Jedoga Shadowseeker will only try to make one initiate ascend per fight, so you won't have to waste as much time fighting things that aren't the boss.
- Herald Volazj will only cast insanity once, even on heroic, so you won't have to waste as much time fighting things that aren't the boss.
- Amanitar, that boss that everyone skips, has moved out of his cave and is now conveniently located in a corner of Volazj' room for easier emblem access.

Azjol-Nerub
- The number of mobs that spawn to attack Hadronox has been greatly reduced and he will move to the surface much more quickly to reduce wait times.
- Anub'arak will only burrow once per fight, so you won't have to waste as much time fighting things that aren't the boss.

Drak'tharon Keep
- Novos the Summoner will now call for all four of his Crystal Handlers at once so you can AoE them down quickly and won't have to waste as much time fighting things that aren't the boss.

Halls of Stone
- The Tribunal of Ages encounter has been sped up significantly to allow players to make better use of their AoE abilities and to make sure nobody has to spend too much time just standing around and listening to RP crap.

The Culling of Stratholme
- The Arthas event will be set in motion as soon as the first person enters the instance and the first wave of undead will spawn right away, so you can start clearing as soon as you reach Stratholme. Once Arthas has finished talking and you've killed Salramm the Fleshcrafter, Arthas will catch up with the party and put himself on /follow on the designated tank for the rest of the instance. Infinite dragonflight mobs will spawn much more quickly and without any dialogue, so you don't have to waste any time standing around and listening to RP crap.

The Nexus
- Anomalus will now only use his charge rift ability once per fight, so you don't have to waste as much time fighting things that aren't the boss.

The Oculus
- The annoying trash at the entrance to the instance has been removed.
- Varos Cloudstrider has dropped his protective bubble and can now be engaged as soon as Drakos the Interrogator has been killed.
- Mage-Lord Urom awaits challengers in the centre ring right from the start.
- The cache of Eregos now also has a chance of dropping a pony.

The Violet Hold
- Ichoron will only pop his bubble once per fight, so you only have to use a crystal activator to one-shot all the adds once.

Trial of the Champion
- Instead of flying down on his skeletal gryphon and making a speech, the Black Knight will now just drop down from the ceiling, yell and immediately initiate combat, so you don't have to waste any time standing around and listening to RP crap.

Utgarde Keep
- Annhylde the Caller will now resurrect Ingvar the Plunderer instantly, so you don't have to waste any time standing around and listening to RP crap.

Utgarde Pinnacle
- Svala Sorrowgrave will await adventurers in her Val'kyr form right away, so people don't feel pressured into skipping her because waiting for her dialogue with the Lich King to finish wastes too much time.
- The device that unfreezes Gortok Palehoof and the other monsters in his room will now activate instantly after clicking. Also, all the mini-bosses will come alive at once so you can just AoE them down instead of tediously having to fight one after the other.
- Skadi the Ruthless can now be shot down with a single harpoon, so you won't have to waste as much time fighting things that aren't the boss.
- King Ymiron's screams of the dead won't stun anymore, but will instead apply a minor damage reduction debuff. We agree that being forced into a whole eight seconds of inactivity repeatedly is no fun at all!

I wish this post was pure satire, but apparently some of the changes mentioned here are already in the works, according to Wild Growth. Why is it so terrible for instances to engage people in other ways than quickly killing a bunch of bosses for their emblems?

18 comments:

  1. Great post! *tries to stop my giggles so my co-workers won't look at me so oddly*

    pure win: "fighting things that aren't the boss."

    Maybe the next stop will be a vendor machine containing all the emblems just inside the instance? :-D

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  2. "Removed bosses, as they seemed to be in the way of players completing their daily badge-runs."

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  3. @Tessy: It does make you wonder. First they nerfed bosses that had mechanics that forced you to stop dpsing for a couple of seconds, now they nerf bosses that force you to do as much as target something other than the boss on occasion. What's next?

    @DDK: Actually, maybe THAT is going to be next.

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  4. I confess that I actually would like to see a few of these implemented. However, they don't all need to be bad!

    Take Anub for example. Let's just make it so he doesn't submerge ever but all the adds that normally come down while he's underground still come down. Now its a harder fight without the annoyance of blowing dps cooldowns only to have them wasted because your incredibly stat-bloated gear rocked a quarter of his lifebar off in two seconds.

    Also, the pony part is the best thing that's been written by a human being today.

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  5. - As soon as the raid enters the Frozen Throne room Arthas will drop Frostmourne to the floor plus all the possible loot table at once, as many times as players are present. In addition he will grant you all achievements for lesser raid bosses (from MC to BT)
    - New social/skill implemented! Just /bang! some mob and your character will simulate shooting a gun with his index and thumb fingers. That mob will drop dead instantly
    - Everytime you use your healthstone you'll be awarded 50 EoTs and 50 EoFs (to be replaced with next emblems on next patch)
    - Quartermasters and Tier vendors will pay you in gold for getting the items instead of you paying them with emblems. If you buy a full Tier set in one go you'll be awarded with a companion pet: Giefloot the Worm, Epicimba the Vulture or Mini-Fat Bastard, a homage to Austin Powers' films. More to come in next patch!
    - Food, drinks, bandages and potions/flasks that affect hitpoints and mana removed. Your life and mana will remain static during the whole fight

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  6. LOL yes! A bit sad really.

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  7. Haha great post !:D

    To be frank though, most changes that are aimed at shortening instances (not downright nerfs like OC, these just soften players) are welcome on my part. There are 5 chars I would have to run my dailies every day to gather badges for saronite for 1 main toon and even if all of them are super fast it still takes over 1:30 if not 2 hours, so it's not a bad thing really to cut a few time consuming scripts that we've been seeing over and over again since WOTLK release, or to save some totally unneccessary 5 minutes from 2 COS runs, or make a fight that always takes 4 minutes no exception 1-2 minutes shorter. These small times add up, and I have only so much time available to do dailies when not raiding.

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  8. I just loved this. And I'm afraid it's not unlikely that we'll see some of those things coming true.

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  9. I have to admit, I wish these were all true. The Anub fight is REALLY annoying, lol.

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  10. Tragically there's a part of me that's with Shayzani on this one. Funny as this is there's not a single thing here that I'm not looking at and saying "actually, that would make things *so much easier*".

    Also I totally want a pony.

    The sad truth is that I no longer run Heroics for anything even *approaching* fun. I run heroics for two Frost Badges per 80 per day, period.

    I know people have joked about this but I actually genuinely think it would improve things if they just sent the damned things to you in the mail. Or perhaps they could put them in the vending machines on the zeppelins.

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  11. What... we still have to fight the bosses?

    I'll leave you my email.. drop me a line when they ship the emblems with the Cataclysm box.

    Pfffft... I pay $15 a month to do stuff?

    Man, TV is free and I don't have to move a muscle!

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  12. Yeah, it's totally ridiculo- Wait? A pony? I like ponies... ;)

    Thanks for the shout-out and for demonstrating just how absurd Blizzard's whole plan is.

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  13. I'm not condemning anyone who finds themselves thinking that they'd actually welcome some of these changes. I moaned when they nerfed Tharon'ja and Ionar, but in all honesty? Whenever I fight them now I can't help thinking, "man, I'm glad they only do their thing once now". I do think there is something wrong though when we start to view boss abilities as something annoying to get over with instead of something that challenges us and requires extra attention.

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  14. I want a pony that breathes shadow-flames and runs at 450% speed and can wipe an instance with one glance from his all-destroying eye.

    And I want it to be pink and pretty and sing Cindy Lauper songs.

    AND...I want a Heroics that are so easy my 7 year old can do them...oh, wait...I actually let my 7 yearl old run one without me supervising him and it was a complete success.

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  15. Let me rejoice for the children because they won't even realise.
    Cataclysm better come out soon because there's not enough good left to balance out the bad. When will they fix the things that actually need fixing? You know the herd in middle and roads getting triple the honor of people playing by BG objectives. It vexes me trying to play WSG with 2 bots, 2 afkers and rest in middle.

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  16. I sincerely hope they shorten the rp in HCoS. I dread having to stand around and see an event I've seen in 2 different games for the 1 millionth time.

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  17. > - Herald Volazj will only cast insanity once,
    > even on heroic, so you won't have to waste as
    > much time fighting things that aren't the boss.

    Stop playing with my head... I was really pissed yesterday when he still did it twice... I can't distinguish between real and your patch notes anymore... :-(

    But, the 3.3 patch notes made me smile when I remembered your post. :-)

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  18. I really only random it up for my frosties these days. If I can get away with it, some fights I just spam incinerate and keep immolate up while reading a book. No chaos bolt, CoE, or conflagrate. It's gotten to the point where I can look like I'm pulling my weight on a boss and it goes down, I'm ok with it. Heroics are a chore required to get geared, when I really wish they were at the least semi-optional once you outgeared them.

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