Are wotlk fights shorter?

[Kelaan]

Well, I can't say that it was any "epic bosses" in Karazhan. The epicness for me started with A'lar, it was very cool to see this bird fly around, and then ultimatly getting reborned from the ashes and jihad bomb the raid with me picking up the adds.

For a tank, maybe not so epic. For a DPS player, or a healer, different fights might be. Netherspite, Malchezzar, Maulgar, and Magtheridon -- these all were faily epic-seeming to me when I was a DPS. Heck, Gruul did as well, when we were struggling on staying alive during what was (for us) a DPS check encounter.

Just because tanks don't get gibbed doesn't mean it can't be epic for someone. Vashj was certainly hectic for me as DPS -- keep up on killing adds, while also making sure to play tainted-core-rugby? Fun times. About the only 25-man fights in T5 (or below) which didn't seem "epic" were Lurker, Hydross, Void Reaver, and Tidewalker.

[Vioarr]

When progressing every boss has felt "epic enough" in length except for Shade of Akama. I'm plenty happy with WoW's timeframe, coming from 4 years of FFXI when the "epic" fights are 2-4 hours long and even on farm content from before NA's were at the highest level you have a 15-min wait between fights (sky).

Sup holding Tiamat for 6 hours from RMT while waiting for people to login and get to Attowah Chasm.

[Norfolk]

Maybe I'm just old school, but I'll always think of EQ when it comes to epic raid encounters.

[PsiVen]

WoW's raid encounters are rather intense, that wouldn't be fun to sustain for really long fights. I think it strikes a good balance, important fights tend to be epic in scope and length while others are all about racing the clock or consistent execution.

Sometimes we get fights that are really interesting and require it all, but the result is that they tend to be very hard. Sunwell's final two bosses did a good job of making fights epic and complex without being very long at all (M'uru is 5-7 mins, while KJ is ~9). The current incarnations of Sapph and KT are epic but relatively straightforward, which ends up being boring at times. 20 minutes is too long for any fight that doesn't involve a badass lore character like Illidan or Arthas.

[Splug]

WoW's raid encounters are rather intense, that wouldn't be fun to sustain for really long fights. I think it strikes a good balance, important fights tend to be epic in scope and length while others are all about racing the clock or consistent execution.

Sometimes we get fights that are really interesting and require it all, but the result is that they tend to be very hard. Sunwell's final two bosses did a good job of making fights epic and complex without being very long at all (M'uru is 5-7 mins, while KJ is ~9). The current incarnations of Sapph and KT are epic but relatively straightforward, which ends up being boring at times. 20 minutes is too long for any fight that doesn't involve a badass lore character like Illidan or Arthas.

I fully agree. M'uru's a fucking rush, with Entropius always being a nailbiter. Kil'Jaeden feels a bit slower paced, though not by much. Maybe that's just because I spend half of each attempt floating around mashing jump while waiting for breaths to come off cooldown, though...

[Kathane]

Hmph. I thought you said FLIGHTS. To answer that question, they are NOT shorter, and they are NOT cheaper. They are quite expensive and long.

I read it the same way.

[Cakes]

Most of the long fights in TBC had a decent amount of downtime to them (Kael, Illidan) where other things are happening that the players may or may not be in control of. Shorter, more complex fights aren't really any better on mana management due to fairly high damage intake on the raid (see Twins, Muru and KJ). It's probably a wash overall.

[fafhrd]

I'm wondering how much the DPS increase and hp reduction is going to make up for the downranking nerf and heroism/drum/mana pot chaining in 3.0.

Twins/KJ/Muru with no downranking of heals and no reduction of raidwide magical damage sounds like it'll be rough on healers :o (and mages and maybe hunters). Will the HP nerf be enough to cut the fight lengths down by 40-50%?

[Mithos]

[quote=Fafhrd]I'm wondering how much the DPS increase and hp reduction is going to make up for the downranking nerf and heroism/drum/mana pot chaining in 3.0. [/quote]

Me too, my initial reaction was "FFS -30% HP!" etc but then I remembered no chaining pots, no insane amount of heroisms, no drums, no downranks. I think a lot of people that really complain, like REALLY complain don't look at the overall picture, I complained of trivialisation initially but then realised it's probably not gonna be like that at all.

It's gonna be a lot tougher on healers I think and the DPS (and even tanks going DPS) will have to push it in order to get them down before eveyrone runs oom and dies. Will be very interesting to see how this works when the patch hits.

[trellian]

I prefer the way raiding is in WoW but would like to have a few 15-20 minute fights.

Try solo-ing panther boss
Piss easy as a pala with Figurine of colossus, but it'll take you at least half an hour

[Jikozani]

I prefer that the long, complex multi-phase epic encounters are few and far between. Less is more They 're epic when you 're attempting and kill for the first time, but quickly become boring and a good part of raiding is farming. Vashj and Kael were ideally placed in progression imo, very nice fights but I 'm glad I only had to do them a handful of times each.

[fiorina]

Longest fight in Wrath by far, see raid chat boss mode message. Last 2 minutes you fight on drakes, so its maybe not the best example of endurance fight.



Other fights are 5 minutes max, mostly 2-4 for 10 men version.
For 25 man, its about 4 minutes average and 6+ minutes for bosses with tons of HP or multiple phases(KZ, Thaddius...)

Depends on your DPS too. Patchwerk can be killed in 2 minutes as well as in 5.

[Slaav]

A cool way I think to make fights seem both epic but seem short and not get unecessary boring and long as some bosses (vashj) would be to gear the instance around fighting a single boss. There would be say 5 "bosses" in the instance but each fight you would be going up against the same epic character. After each of the first 4 the boss "retreats" leaving behind loot. This would feel a lot more engaging and epic than the traditional instance structure and allow the raid to feel like they are really wearing down a powerful character without the need for outside help (eg Kil'jaeden and the blue dragons, Malygos and Alexestra).

It would also make a lot more sense than a boss waiting at the end of the instance for you to kill all his henchmen.

For an example lets aim high Arthas. I personally don't think icecrown should work this way but this is an example.

Fight 1- Arthas attacks almost as soon as you enter the instance. Summons a bunch of mini bosses and fights himself. Defeat the mini bosses and he retreats.
Fight 2- Fight Arthas alone. Lots of epic moves blah blah. Raid finally breaks through his shield and starts damaging him. Arthas realizing you are perhaps a threat retreats again.
Fight 3- The raid sees Arthas casting a giant spell that would anialate them. Guantlet with arthas putting up barries ect to stop you. Raid manages to interrupt the spell and arthas retreats to reconsider.
Fight 4- Arthas attacks again. Fight focuses on separating him from frostmourn. After the raid succeds Arthas teleports them all into his mind.
Fight 5- Raid fights and defeats the lich king's spirit. World is saved ect.

Now this isn't how i'm saying the fight should go but wouldn't the instance feel a lot more engaging with only a single boss. Also it wouldn't feel like the boss is holding back like some bosses do when they get to the enrage and just destroy you. The suggested fight really feels like Arthas is trying his hardest to win.

PS- in fairness the concept wasn't mine. I read it somewhere beta forums i think.