Icecrown Citadel - What does Blizzard have planned for us?

Talanik · 08/11/09, 12:12 AM

I don't know that I would say we want tanking niches. I ultimately am agreeing with what you're saying, but once we say "tanking niches" players have visions of the DK who parks outside of Icecrown until boss 4, 17 and 31 (yes, IC is that big).

31+ bosses? That would easily make the largest instance ever. My worry is are they putting quantity over quality? I'm led to believe that half the fights will be generic, recycled fights that we've already done. Either way, its clear as to why they added the raid lockout extension.

Other than Arthas, what are some of the possible boss encounters? I'm sure Sindragosa is one, as well as the Death knights Falric and Marwyn.

As for some speculation and a bit of lore discussion - how about another Kel'Thuzad return (Yes, again). The first time we brought his phylactery to Father Montoya who in turn returned Kel'Thuzad back to life. We didn't get a quest for his phylactery this time.

I would have speculated Anub'arak, however he appears to be the current last boss in ToC, and of course theres always the option of Bolvar Fordragon and Saurfang the Younger.

samualcc · 08/11/09, 12:34 AM

I expect (and hope) for three phases to IceCrown.

Part one is us trudging through Icecrown (the zone area, beating bosses in a similar style to Hyjal). We then face off for the first time with Arthas in front of Icecrown citadel. We win and blast a hole in the basement or something.

Part two has use fighting our way to the inner sanctum. Good time to pull out some lore bosses and maybe recycle some Naxx bosses with new strategies.

Part three is naturally our fight to the top of the citadel where we find a way to separate Arthas and the Lich King. The Lich King escapes and sets up patch 3.4.

Players also get used to extending their raid for weeks on end...

Talanik · 08/11/09, 12:39 AM

Fighting Arthas multiple times seems like an interesting concept, with him getting stronger and having different abilities each time.

It would sure beat having the generic multiple phase fight that you normally get from end bosses.

algo · 08/11/09, 12:43 AM

31 Bosses.. WOW

It explains why they put in the ability to prevent instance id's resetting.

Kyrryth · 08/11/09, 12:58 AM

31

what

Of course, as someone pointed out in the lore thread, BRD apparently has 40 bosses, so this figure could be very misleading and contain lots of multiple boss mobs per boss encounters. But the quote seems to imply that there are (at least!) 31 distinct encounters, which is, well, wow. samualcc might be onto something with a 'phased' Icecrown; would this imply different tiers of gear within the same instance?

As for encounters, it's almost a safe bet we'll see Sindragosa, Bolivar and Saurfang (normal mode: killing them; hard mode: "redeeming" them), and Kel'Thuzad. I also expect to see Mal'Ganis as part of a rival raid.

If the instance is indeed this large then I fully expect some of the encounters to be Horde vs. Alliance. The Big Deal in this expansion is corruption and I would fully expect that to play a heavy part in the instance.

KrinKer · 08/11/09, 1:00 AM

I also see 3 parts to the dongeon but they are different than your samualcc

Part 1 would be the scarlet part of the raid (seems like the scarlet crusade idea hasn,t been fully explored in northrend and I could really see the first part of the dongeon leading up to a figh against Malganys).

Part 2 will more than likely be somewhat like Naxx (winged with the different scourge new creations (val'kyr wing, Plague giants wing, Vrykul wing).

Part 3 would be the tip of Icecrown with Sindragosa, Kel'thuzad, falricand Marwynn and eventually Arthas.

Would be easy to see 4-5 encounters in each wings/parts. Remember they said 31 bosses and not 31 encounters, meaning multiple bosses per encounter (much like northrend beast and 4hm or any "council" type fights.

dustdog · 08/11/09, 1:08 AM

With 31+ bosses, you'd hope/assume that atleast 10 are optional heh.

Cranberry · 08/11/09, 1:34 AM

Still, even assuming multiple Council fights, that's easily as large or larger than Ulduar. In the context of the quote, though, it seems fairly clear that GC is referring to encounters, not individual bosses.

Consider · 08/11/09, 1:45 AM

There are a lot of ways to interpret that quote:

Possibility 1) There are actually 31 unique boss encounters. Self explanatory =p.
Possibility 2) There are 31 boss encounters across both the Normal mode and the Hard mode. This seems most realistic to me - something like 15 bosses on Normal than 16 (15 of those simply being the souped up versions of the Normal with new/different/whatever mechanics, plus a brand new boss such as Algalon) on Hard mode.
Possibility 3) There are some encounters with multiple "bosses" such as Iron Council. I kinda doubt this. Blizzard has never before referred to such fights as multiple bosses, so I doubt we would see that here.
Possibility 4) There are certain faction specific encounters, which bumps up the actual count. This may seem a bit outlandish, but it's simply an extension of giving each faction "different" drops in CC. The actual encounters might be the same for each faction, but they have different names/skins/so on.
Possibility 5) There are encounters like the Opera event and like the Animal boss from Karazhan. Rotating bosses. This can be cool, but depending how close Icecrown lands in relation to the next expansion, could potentially be frustrating for seeing all of the bosses with RNG.

Like I said, personally, I think it is something along the lines of number 2, but it could potentially be a combination of multiple ones.

Cosa · 08/11/09, 2:29 AM

We have to take into equation new system of Normal 25 and Heroic 25 which brings 15 bosses normal and 16 bosses Heroic much closer to reality.

Jagiya · 08/11/09, 3:05 AM

Considering the BRD example, 31 isn't that much of a stretch. If you pick apart each encounter in Ulduar, you're left with 23 bosses.

Flame Leviathan
Ignis
Razorscale
Deconstructor
Kologarn
Steelbreaker
Runemaster Molgeim
Stormcaller Brundir
Algalon
Auriaya
Hodir
Thorim
Sif
Freya
Elder Brightleaf
Elder Ironbranch
Elder Stonebark
Leviathan Mk II (Mimiron)
VX-001 (Mimiron)
Aerial Command Unit (Mimiron)
General Vezax
Saronite Animus
Yogg-Saron

Applying the same logic to Naxxramas yields 20 bosses.

Also, with various multi-boss encounters, gate locks, optional bosses and "lucky dip" bosses (ie. Eadric vs Paletress, Edge of Madness) you can fill out 31 very easily.

Leviathon · 08/11/09, 3:23 AM

I doubt there will be 31 bosses in the instance but there still will likely be more than Ulduar.

World of Warcraft - English (NA) Forums -> 31 bosses in icecrown raid.

I was the person who set the original Kill Yogg achievement to 22 minutes too. Just sayin'.

Grimarath · 08/11/09, 4:46 AM

[..] outside of Icecrown until boss 4, 17 and 31 (yes, IC is that big). [..]

Given the way this is said, it indeed strongly points towards 31 (or more) unique encounters. It seems off that Blizzard would actually count Runemaster, Steelbreaker and Stormcaller as being bosses nr. 6+7+8 in the Ulduar instance (numbers obviously can vary as your killing order may be different). It also would have to imply that encounters 4, 17 and 31 would be single boss encounters, else it would have said "on boss 3+4+5+6" f.e. (should atleast one of those bosses be a multi-boss encounter).

On top of that, I also had the feeling Blizzard wasn't just referring to normal mode (15 encounters) and heroic mode (16 encounters). The quoted line hints more towards the direction that the dk tank would have to wait outside the instance for a long time, only to be taken for very specific fights. I have the feeling Blizzard doesn't quite expect us to clear the heroic mode instance quickly after the release of 3.3, especially (given the way the quote was said) to do these 31 encounters back to back.

Blizzard has made a seperate instance for all-hardmode encounters due to the fact that it removes the limitation on the hardmode of 'having to activate it' (think thorim speed-gauntlet, xt heart killing and others). This gives them alot more space to work with hardmode encounters, and they're now able to completely change an encounter. (Note, we haven't seen a single hardmode of the new kind yet, hence we can only speculate what these will actually add now). I guess it'll come down to the fact whether or not Blizzard actually sees hardmode encounters as a completely new and seperate encounter, rather than a difficulty setting, but still the same encounter.

Edit: Just realised another thing to somewhat counter the 15-normal and 16-hardmode theory. If you want to switch out your dk tank on the fourth encounter (which would be normal), why would you want to keep him in on heroic (which would be the 19th encounter)?

♦ Praetorian · 08/11/09, 5:00 AM

There is no content to fuel a thread on this topic yet. Try again in 2 weeks?