I could just find a lot of speculation about this matter in old threads and Im a bit interested in this matter.

Now, when most of the raiding guilds, both hardcore and casual, have come to level 70, progressed through karazhan(some complete some on their way) and trying/defeated Gruul and Magtheridon and discovered that SSC is really a pain what do you do then?

My current guild have "just" Nightbane left in Karazhan, killed maulgar and are close to a Gruul kill. We have started to discuss going back to the old raidinstances to both complete and experience what we never did in vanilla wow.

I think that there might be dussins of reasons behind revisiting the old instances. What I really wonder is tho, how big of a challenge is there and what can you benefit from going back?

I went through my old tactics for Naxxramas and gave it a thought what would happen if we went back now, in karazhan gear at lvl 70. Would it be really easy or would some fights still present a challenge?

Here is what I was thinking about the Naxxramas encounters:

Abomination wing:

Patchwerk, Grobbulus and Gluth - Would probably be lootpinatas. Not much to say about them.
Thaddius - I guess you will still need to get a proper strategy for the polarity shifts and have your raid still being awake. I dont know if bringing only 25 people would change the d/cs or not. I still think this fight will be challenging though with more room for error.

Spider Wing - Wasnt really hard in Vanilla WoW and it shouldnt be hard at all now.

Plague Wing

Noth - Might be a problem, I dont know if you resist his curses or not, might be interesting.

Heigan and Loatheb - Death and Taxes showed us that you could 5 man Loatheb at lvl 60 (even if it was prenerf of VT/VE) and heigan wasn't hard at 60 either.

Deathknight wing

Instructor Razuvious - Will probably still be easy

Gothik - I am not sure of this fight. I think the hardest part with it will be to have good communication between melee and caster sides to not overrun the melee side. I am not sure either if 25 people will be equivalent dps to 40 at lvl 60 or less.

Four Horsemen - Will still require a good rotation but there will be a lot more room for taunt resists, and other screwups.

Sapphiron and Kel'thuzad - Ive never experienced those encounters myself more than theorycrafting. I think that they will still need a good and awake raid that can react and listen to instructions.

What do you guys/girls think? Will it still be challenging or just lootpinata all the way?

I think this might be a really good way of spending time if you are waiting for resets and dont really feel like going to SSC already since the massive need of consumables.

Anyone tried going back?

There was a half-PUG Naxxramas run on my server this weekend. Patchwerk dropped in about 3 minutes with ~30 people I believe. Spider Wing was cleared as well. Trash is of course almost soloable :P

Can't see any benefit from going back though. Maybe if you had it cleared or were at least well underway and need to finish one of the legendary staves.

I'm actually putting together a small (like 5-10 people) group of friends to go back to those old raid instances for fun. Admittedly, you're talking Naxx, and I'm talking all the stuff before it, but it's kinda similar.

Basically, I'm planning to redo all the old instances with 1/4 the number of people you'd normally go with. Start with 5-manning ZG, and work from there.

I always found those instances fun, and there's a lot of stuff I just never got the opportunity to do. Besides, with 10 people, you've still got access to Kara and all the heroics.

Fun, challenge, the potential to grab some tier 1/2/2.5 stuff I never had, and a small group you can screw around with. Besides, there's 1 or 2 pieces out there for each class that stood the test of time.

Why not the benefit of just experiencing the best designed raiddungeon in wows history? (At least in my opinion ) As far as I can remember only 2 fixes was applied, one for KT and his despawning and one for taunt and four horsemen.

I also see it as a great way of learning raiding for new players and to make an existing raiding group tighter because its always fun to kill bosses fast, great boost for confidence imo

we did some 20-25men naxx the last few nights.
Spider-Wing is fine, the mt stayed in the locust swarm and he healed through it (missed a hunter). Patchwerk and Grob are easy. Gluth req some good kiting still. Thaddius might be hard with 25 because you wont get that many +dmg buffs.
Razuvious is about the same and Gothik is a joke. 4hm with 20-25 req still a very good execution, with 40m its prolly zergable.

Check this: TBC & Naxx Raids

I actually couldn't find it with the search function either. The only way I was able to provide the link is because I had it linked and quoted on my guild's forums. Searching for specific words used in the thread (such as "obliterated") did not return the thread.

Glad Im not that bad on searching then after all

We currently have three or four atiesh bases in the guild and that is one of the reasons why we will be heading back there starting this coming weekend. I personally want to be apart of finally killing kel after getting to him and having guild member burnout.

Plus I miss the better design of the instance than some of the current content.