Trifle

Uh, no. ZA was meant to be roughly T5 equivalent difficulty from memory, most people that got the Amani Warbear vastly outgeared the zone. Heck, they left the bear in until well after people had cleared sunwell, which was basically 2 tiers of gear over ZA.

 

gia

Amani Warbear was doable in Karazhan/ZA + the later badge gear and some decent raid stacking, You Don't Have An Eternity and Twilight Zone requirements are much higher than that. It is an issue that pure 10 man guilds don't really have a decent shot at this. I like the suggestion of adding an item level (213 max) check to the achievement. The Hundred Club proves a similar check can be done.

 

glowacks

I think people are missing my main point. Forget about the Amani War Bear; consider it a completely separate incident and look at what's actually been stated.

Emphasis added. Link to the MMO-C blue tracker.

The achievements themselves aren't being removed, just the mount rewards. No 10-man content is being removed, just the ability to get a different skin on your proto-drake. There are plenty of others out there, and there will be 310 mounts available through (perhaps easier?) sources in Ulduar.

If you're going to argue that you should be able to have access to every skin of proto-drake even though you're not doing all the content, we'll agree to disagree. If you want to argue that all the content is available in 10man version, it is my opinion (and I definitely know it is purely an opinion) is that 25 man raids are fundamentally different than 10 mans to that point that doing only the latter does not mean "doing all the content". Blizzard guaranteed there would be 10-man raid progression, not that 10-man groups would have access to absolutely everything.

I will admit it is a bit disingenuous for Blizzard to state the 10-man progression will be there, offer a bunch of achievements with rewards for doing only 10-man, call the 25-man "heroic", and then take the rewards away before you have a legitimate chance. Ok, perhaps your uproar is merited. But it's only a different proto-drake skin, it's not even a unique model!

 

Contego

From my own persepctive and the view of many of my guild mates, its not really the different skin on it that is the attraction. I personally couldn't care what colour it was, it could be pink with yellow spots for all I care (well maybe a bit of an exaggeration). Its the fact its 310% speed that is the attraction.

Yes we know that there are other sources for these - New Ulduar ones, the holiday events etc. However, as is so common with many things in warcraft, people want it now. They want that fast mount

 

Darkwind

I just think there wasn't enough time to get either of those mounts. You would have had to be in a raiding guild that stepped right into Naxx when it opened to have had any kind of shot at getting them, and even then, some of those achievements are quite difficult (And, let's face it, a little unfair with the undermanning achievements. It may make the content harder, but leaving two to five people out is a stupid way of doing it). I mean, it's only been three months since WotLK shipped.

With the Amani War Bear, you had nearly a year to get it. With the Ulduar mounts, we now know they'll likely be taken out when 3.2's raid comes out, so we know we need to push hard ahead of time. Plus, I'd wager there's a lot more people that will be ready to step into Ulduar then were ready to step into Naxx right from the get-go.

Personally, I'd rather see them use the item level restriction than completely remove them. Until we see a level cap increase, of course.

 

Bullshot

Personally, I welcome this. Should get rid of the "let's do the achievement next week while we collect easy-mode loot this week" mentality which prevails every week. It'll let the guild itself decide when they're ready to tackle the hard-modes and make them push themselves harder.

I also view these proto-drakes as the PvE-equivalent of the Gladiator mounts. Black and Plagued may be removed, but Ironbound and Rusted are being added. New "season," new mounts.

 

Cirocco

I think the one thing that everyone can agree on is that there should be no further achievements that require you to ask your friends and fellow raid members to have to sit out. i'd hope that the legitmate concerns about this have been noted and that there aren't any further examples of this less than x number in the raid achievement, or if there are that they are quitely taken out before they're even seen.

 

Buka

I really do not understand why is so big issue for many. You can do "under manning" achievements twice with different people sitting out. And it's true for every other raiding achievement too -- almost no one have strictly 10 or 25 people in their raiding core…

 

rbbrdckybk

... that flies at 310% speed.

I'm in a small (10-man) guild that did the ZA bear run in a group where all 10 members were only wearing KZ/ZA gear. It was a legitimate challenge for us, but it was doable. We are not superstar players by any stretch, but with practice we were able to work toward the reward and eventually win - wearing nothing but gear you obtain in ZA and the zones that came before it.

Sarth+3D (10-man) is simply not realistically doable in 10-man gear. It doesn't make sense to me to have achievements that can only be completed once you outgear the zone, especially if the rewards are going to be removed before the intended audience (10-man guilds) will have access to a zone where they can even obtain gear to make it possible.

 

Cosa

I didn't want to just quote words regarding rewarding undermanned content. While doing Naxx, EoE and OS with less than maximum number of participants shall be noted and rewarded with single achievement - those achievements shall not count toward Meta achievements.

I am guild master of community/non hardcore raiding guild on Xavius and we basically rebuilt our community from characters not actively played endgame content in TBC. We got our raiding force to the level where we farm Nax25, EoE and Sartharion +2D, working hard on 3D and Malygos under 6minutes, in all this efforts we can do, but cannot afford undermanning instances both because not everyone accomplished their gearing goals - but because you cannot tell your friends "Excuse us but we want meta achievement, thanks for everything you have done with us but only this 20 out of 25 will get drake first".

I am pretty sure Blizzard is reading this lines and that is why I am posting this here. Maybe it is too late, maybe it is overlooked at the start, but excluding undermanned achievements from meta ones will help a lot in future content.

 

Gumibear

I don't want to see another Gonna Go When the Volcano Blows achievement that's most easily completed by dying as fast as possible. That's 1 of 2 that I'm missing right now for Glory of the Raider and it's near impossible to complete when I'm relied upon for 3 drake Sartharion (so I can't just go die in a pug). The DPS requirement for 10 man 3 drakes is way too high for me to worry about dodging an attack that's not even high damage until after the burn phase is nearly finished.

 

Kissmyaxe

I really don't get the problem with undermanning achievements. You ask people to sit out of the raid every week since I doubt there is a guild with exactly 10/25 people.
With that in mind, you will do every achievement at least 2 times.
So what is the problem in running Naxx with 20 people 2 weeks in a row? Optimize your group so drops don't get sharded and there is absolutely no reason to not do it...

As for the removal of the drakes it makes sense and I applaud it. Those that complain that they didn't have enough time to do it in Naxx can mobilize themselves and do it in Ulduar.

 

Ninfea

1)Something i noticed immediately in the Player vs Player panel is that the Arena Master achievement (2200 personal rating in all the brackets, hot streak, hot hot streak etc etc)is again* required for the Battlemaster title/achievement.

*Again, because if i recall correctly it was already needed when the achievements came out in the beta, Tigole then posted that they would remove the Arena Master achievement as requirement for the Battlemaster title.

2)Hot Hot Hot Streak(win ten ranked match in a row at 2000+ personal rating/reward:flawless victor title) isn't here anymore, it is like if they removed it from the game.

3)There is a new panel under "World Events" called Darkmoon Faire. What should we expect?

4)There is a new panel under "World Events" called Argent Tournament, the achievements are already here but they aren't working.

Ot: About "The insane", the only way to farm Raventhold reputation is to kill the syndicate npcs in Hillsbrad Foothills if you aren't a rogue, right?

 

Gumibear

I only have the Dedicated Few because one night we had 45 people log on, so we arranged an achievement raid and a gearing raid. We don't like leaving people out of our weekly scheduled raids. No one logging on expecting to raid is going to feel good about sitting when there is room for them to be in.

The removal of the drakes is not fair to purely 10 man guilds, and won't be in the future unless Ulduar 10 man achievements are easier than normal The Twilight Zone and You Don't Have an Eternity. They won't make up for missing their opportunity if Ulduar 10 achievements require Ulduar 25 gear.

 

Whistles

It is a delicate balance. With the tiered gear system it will either be really challenging for 10 guilds or fairly easy for 25 guilds. Honestly I don't really see why 10/25 drop different gear. The only reason I've seen given is that 25s represent more of an organizational challenge but it seems that it would be easier to just have the 10/25 bosses have the same drops and tune the 10 to be slightly more difficult to make up for that. Much too late now though and I expect this same situation to arise with the Ulduar achievements. They actually had a chance to avoid that with some of them through the use of vehicles but by making them scale with gear the same balancing problem arises.

 

farlin

If this is true, that is sad. I put in a lot of work doing the battlemaster achievement just for the title, and to have it get removed because I cant get 2200 in every bracket is a little annoying. Getting battlemaster is a huge grind in its self, whats the reason to have arena master tied with it? Battlegrounds != arenas. One is open pvp that anyone can do, one is a skill/class-makeup check.

 

• Falk

A LOT of things are back to how they were on Beta. The DMF pane, Arena Master existing on Battlemaster, Black Dress being required for Valentines, all were things that got changed. This may just be a versioning issue, so it's a little early to jump to conclusions.

(That, and the fact they disabled Achievement transferring "for queue time streamlining" suggests things aren't too smooth at the moment)

 

Luthi

Would you happen to have some quotes for this? I'd be interested to see what they hint at, because as it is, most cloth dps best in slot is absolutely awful.

 

RootBreaker

Here's one.

 

Darkwind

Because it's a week that those people can't continue to gear up. It's a week that those people have to sit with their thumb up their asses. It's a really lame way of making content harder. Take your pick.

 

• typobox

It also means that you may not be able to complete any other achievements during the undermanned run. Not such an issue with existing content, but if the hard modes in Ulduar are tightly tuned, running 5 players short certainly isn't going to help.

 

Tirin

I think the numbers can be deceptive. We've come a long way from MC and the days of 5 people working while 35 /follow and collect loot, but you're still going to have your "first string" group. Success in raid achievements depends on them. If a raid achievement requires 10 members of your A team, that leaves only 15 spots a run for people on the practice squad. A 20-man run cuts that down to 10.

So, 30 people want the achievement for doing Naxx with 8. If you're bringing your 5 best, then it's not 4 runs required. It's 9.
It's an issue with all raid achievements, but especially ones that require undermanning or group-stacking. And of course varies by guild. You might be able to bring just the MT and heal lead and have all the other spots open. You could have only 1 spot available.




The time limit of these achievements makes me wish Blizzard would implement a "requires 9 out of 10" approach to metas. Let the healers take a pass on the brutal dps check achievement. Give the guy with 2 left feet a way that doesn't require dancing. Keep things like Sarth 3d and Immortal mandatory but give a little leeway with the rest.
Without a timer, "one achievement left" is something to strive for. When the clock is running down it's an irritant, as anyone who missed 'Be mine' can probably tell you.

 

Cos-

This is my only real gripe with the stupid achievement. We have to waste the next 3 naxx clears getting everyone dedicated few then hope we get Immortal 1-3 times before patch. Hell yeah.

Everything else comes down to pulling malygos over and over and over and over again wiping in p3 until we're sure he's going to die in the right time.

 

Dancing Wu Li Master

People don't like it because the difficulty is partly (or entirely, for the best geared groups) logistical and not tactical, partly because loot or badges are going to go to waste, and partly because sitting people out is never something you want to do. It's not a bad idea for an achievement though.

EDIT: To clarify, it's a fine idea for an achievement, but a bad one to include in the meta-achievement.

 

Anedris

Save the undermanning achievements until you've got Immortal, by which time it is almost certain that at least half your raiders will no longer need anything from Naxx (unless your guild is really really good and doesn't need a gear buffer to hit Immortal, but if that's the case they're probably not going to gripe about sitting for a week to get everyone their drake). Then there's no need to deny anyone loot and two runs and it's done. Until you have Immortal, the Dedicated Few doesn't matter.

My only major problem with the undermanning achievements is that they're way too easy. Were it 15 people, it would be beginning to get challenging for most of the encounters ('course, that would probably make Thaddius all but impossible due to the multipliers at work there, but he's the exception).