Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Epic Expectations


I have developed a little pre-raid ritual since joining Vigilant. If I am invited to go, it goes along the lines of panicking until the encounter starts, doing fine on the encounter, feeling better, and then starting all over again for the next one. I can't help it; I just get nervous about screwing up or not doing well. Managing to focus through the encounter despite being jittery is apparently a strong point of mine.

So, as I logged on and got a surprise invite into the raid forming for Trial of the Crusdar (25), I was definitely feeling a few butterflies. Brand new content, not a ton known about it, and here we were about to jump in headfirst. The raid had been formed early to give as much time as necessary to completing the bosses. We were stocked up on items and had our repair allowances increased in preparation for those learning wipes.

...And then we completed it in two or three tries, and went back to OS drake selling and Ulduar hardmodes. XT was more difficult than this with his massive (bugged) spawn packs. What's up with that? In ten man, it took maybe 20 minutes with only one wipe while we tweaked poison mechanics for a smaller group.

I understand it's going to be released week by week with new and more bosses. I also know the guild I'm in is top on Alliance side. I know, too, that this was normal 25 man, and heroic will be tougher. Still, it seemed rather lackluster. The yeti's mechanics, while interesting, were incredibly simple. The toughest part about the fight could be poison management, yet even that only took one wipe to coordinate into something workable.

On the other hand, I agree with Bellezza, one of my guildmates. She stated she preferred doing one boss (with only one loot drop, we tend to refer to the beasts as "one boss") without lag or crashes to having a whole instance that froze and died on top of us. In truth, that is really nice.

I suppose I will just have to wait for more bosses and heroic mode before passing final judgment. But so far, I am finding it to be a little disappointing. I can only hope when I venture into the new five man and vault, it perks up a bit.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

At your gear levels, it's supposed to be super easy. Many good guilds have 1 or 2-shot it, then gone back to Ulduar. My heart sank after we killed the boss in 1 attempt, then went back to Ulduar. I'm rather sick of ulduar now, but I guess we'll do both instances each week for the next few weeks at least.

Heroics, and that whole #-attempts thing, is where the hardness of raiding is at these days.