Interested in opinions...AQ40 vs Naxx, where...

Calim · 06/22/06, 10:34 AM

I'm interested in gathering different peoples opinions on whether they are going to be focusing on AQ40 or Naxx now that Naxx is available.

I'm in a guild that has been working on huhu for about 2 weeks, and came fairly close to downing her the night before the patch. We've seen guilds on our server and others have high turnover even after c'thun was patched due to AQ frustrations.

These are my opinions on pros and cons for going forth in each instance, correct any that are incorrect and I'd like to hear yours as well.

Pro Naxx:
- T3 loot.
- Potenially better gold from boss drops.

Con Naxx:
- Usually buggy first release of an instance.
- Attunement costs as price inflation is at its peak.
- Shifting our gears could take some time.

Pro AQ:
- T2.5 loot (happy rogues)
- Learning the fights here may help our coordination for naxx.
- C'thun is rumored to be one of the 'funnest' fights in the game.
- Less instance lag, since everyone else is in Naxx?

Con AQ:
- Low gold drops on bosses
- None of the gear in here is 'required' for advancement in naxx?
- Gear is perhaps questionable after this.

thanks.

♦ Praetorian · 06/22/06, 10:39 AM

You forgot the major "con": The easiest fight in Naxx is harder than Huhuran, which you're stuck on.

That said, hey, what's the harm? If you can get 40+ people attuned and willing to go, then check it out for a week or so and see if you get anywhere. If so, then great. If not, then maybe further work in AQ40 will seem more appealing.

Kytrarewn · 06/22/06, 10:40 AM

Do both: Happy Rogues = Happy Warriors whent the Rogues either don't have the DKP, or are unwilling to buy, things like Desecrated Pauldrons, to use in place of the Deathdealer's Spaulders they have now.

Honestly, I'd just throw MC, and maybe Ony, out of the "official raid" loop and work on speed-clears in BWL (No reason to not get a red scepter shard every week). That will leave you, assuming that you raid 5 days/week, 4 days to work on AQ and Naxx, two days on each.

Phon · 06/22/06, 10:51 AM

I've been wondering the same thing.

My guild is on a relatively new server. The AQ gates are currently still closed, but we've been farming Nef for 3 weeks on a three month old server. We got our Brood rep guy to 35/42k when he quit the game... Do you guys think it's worth the effort to rush the rep farming/AQ questline, or start working on Naxx?

Also, with just tier 2/BWL gear, is it even possible to do Naxx? Will we just get owned from lack of gear?

Thanks for the help!

Brilliance · 06/22/06, 10:54 AM

Originally Posted by Phon

I've been wondering the same thing.

My guild is on a relatively new server. The AQ gates are currently still closed, but we've been farming Nef for 3 weeks on a three month old server. We got our Brood rep guy to 35/42k when he quit the game... Do you guys think it's worth the effort to rush the rep farming/AQ questline, or start working on Naxx?

Also, with just tier 2/BWL gear, is it even possible to do Naxx? Will we just get owned from lack of gear?

Thanks for the help!

I would say stay away from Nax for a few more BWL clears. You dont need to go to AQ to kill things in Nax per say, but you do need the BWL gear to do it.

MongoJerry · 06/22/06, 11:02 AM

My advice is to at least down the Twin Emperors. That encounter teaches a raid a lot of coordination and just general "how to keep everyone on their toes." If your guild is able to down the Twin Emps, then you should be able to handle some of the first bosses in Naxx. If not, well, you still have some work to do. And, of course, the loot in AQ40 will help you progress farther in Naxx.

My guild is effectively dropping BWL now, since we've been farming it for eight or nine months, and we're turning half the loot from there into nexus shards and even a good portion of the loot that isn't sharded often goes to alts. Sure, there are some items in BWL we would still like to have (our guild has had *awful* luck getting Rejuvenating Gems, for example), but with Naxx out, it's not worth spending an evening running BWL on the faint hope that a few of the prime pieces of loot drop. We might occasionally pick it up again on an off night, and another Horde guild on Tichondrius is talking about organizing joint BWL runs on off-nights with us. But basically, we're done with BWL.

For AQ40, we're trying to get to the point where we can clear it consistently in two weekday evenings and then have two days over the weekend ("weekend" here means Saturday-Monday) to start making progress in Naxx. It's a decent schedule that we think can avoid raid burnout and allow guild members to keep their wife/girlfriend/job factions intact. Unfortunately, due to server instability and the unexpected changes to the AQ40 encounters, we'll have to spend three days on AQ40 this week.

Digo · 06/22/06, 11:20 AM

Nevermind the fact that the raid experience you'll receive from AQ is invaluable when you start Naxxramas.

Brissa · 06/22/06, 11:35 AM

I dont really buy all this "you need to do AQ to get experience stuff"
If you have come up to huhura/twins in AQ (that the easiest Naxx bosses are supposedly as hard as) why not go work on a Naxx boss that will teach your raid just as much coordination and be just as hard and drop better loot?

Now personally I want my guild to stay in AQ but thats because I want to kill the bosses we have left.

Brilliance · 06/22/06, 11:54 AM

Originally Posted by Brissa

I dont really buy all this "you need to do AQ to get experience stuff"
If you have come up to huhura/twins in AQ (that the easiest Naxx bosses are supposedly as hard as) why not go work on a Naxx boss that will teach your raid just as much coordination and be just as hard and drop better loot?

AQ is far more forgiving to a mistake then Nax.

Kytrarewn · 06/22/06, 12:00 PM

Originally Posted by Brilliance

Originally Posted by Brissa

I dont really buy all this "you need to do AQ to get experience stuff"
If you have come up to huhura/twins in AQ (that the easiest Naxx bosses are supposedly as hard as) why not go work on a Naxx boss that will teach your raid just as much coordination and be just as hard and drop better loot?

AQ is far more forgiving to a mistake then Nax.

Here's another question for you: Have you had any arguments/regalia drop? If so, you owe it to the people who spent their DKP on them to kill the Twin Emperors so that they can complete their hammers/staves/daggers/whatever.

Kalman · 06/22/06, 12:16 PM

Originally Posted by Kytrarewn

Originally Posted by Brilliance

Originally Posted by Brissa

I dont really buy all this "you need to do AQ to get experience stuff"
If you have come up to huhura/twins in AQ (that the easiest Naxx bosses are supposedly as hard as) why not go work on a Naxx boss that will teach your raid just as much coordination and be just as hard and drop better loot?

AQ is far more forgiving to a mistake then Nax.

Here's another question for you: Have you had any arguments/regalia drop? If so, you owe it to the people who spent their DKP on them to kill the Twin Emperors so that they can complete their hammers/staves/daggers/whatever.

Or, if you're *not* running AQ40, make a deal with another guild that is to let you use their instance lock once they've dropped the Emps.

Bocheezu · 06/22/06, 12:22 PM

Originally Posted by Calim

I'm in a guild that has been working on huhu for about 2 weeks, and came fairly close to downing her the night before the patch. We've seen guilds on our server and others have high turnover even after c'thun was patched due to AQ frustrations.

One of the big frustrations was taken out this patch, with the teleporting after you kill Twin Emps and Ouro. C'Thun wipes used to be just completely demoralizing after a couple hours -- the number of people AFK following on the run back just kept getting higher and higher as raids went on and people in our raid just didn't want to be there anymore. It became difficult to remain focused when it was actually time to fight again.

Right now Naxx feels like some kind of dream, where you can just zone in after a wipe and run to a boss in under a minute. This will get worse with the run back to wing bosses, and I'll get AQ flashbacks, but for the time being, it sure feels nice.

So I guess the point is that learning the back of AQ isn't as bad as it used to be and you can get a lot more attempts in per raid.

EDIT: Grammar

• frmorrison · 06/22/06, 12:37 PM

Originally Posted by Bocheezu

One of the big frustrations was taken out this patch, with the teleporting after you kill Twin Emps and Ouro.

How does this teleport work? I assume it was just added.

On topic, the raid tactics learned in AQ (and the decent ring ppl can get at honored rep), makes it worthwhile to go there for a few runs before messing with Nax.

Kalman · 06/22/06, 12:43 PM

Talk to the post-Skeram dudes, and they will teleport you deeper into the instance based on whether you've killed Emps and Ouro. I believe an Emps kill gets you access to a port to the dragons, and an Ouro kill gets you access to a port to Ouro's chamber, but I'm sure I'll be corrected if I've misremembered, since I'm entirely too lazy to look it up.

Elendril · 06/22/06, 12:46 PM

we stopped doing BWL ourselves. if you're not far enough along in bwl that you can drop it from your schedule (and i'm already assuming you stopped doing molten core), you should keep working on AQ40. you won't make any meaningful progress in Naxx if you can't beat the tail end of AQ, and if you can - well, you might as well just drop BWL and do AQ/Naxx, since that's where the best loot is.