I’m going to try to edit a few blue posts into this when I’m not posting from my phone. =P

Recently Bluzzard has posted about Ulduar, specifically 10 man server first achievements. The essence of what was said is that it is not Blizzard’s intentions for guilds to raid 10 and 25 man raid concurrently. Seperate progression paths is what is intended.

I agree with this in theory, however I feel it’s implementation is extremely difficult. As the leader of a new guild, I am busy recruiting, trying to keep my guild happy, and give us something to do. By that, I mean that we’ve completely smashe most of the current raid content out there. Most every raider has all the gear they can obtain from our raids, so they look for where the next upgrade comes from: 25 man raids.

This leaves me with a problem. I’ve got a bunch of bored raiders on my hands, itching to get into raids we just don’t have the numbers to fill. Way to go Blizzard, this definately seems like a seperate progression path.

I blame this partially on the ease of content at the moment. Guilds have blown through the content so fast that it’s been farmed to death. Hopefully Ulduar will bring a new challenge, and maybe a few more recruits.

Although I still think that Blizzard’s idea that heroic raids are somehow harder to complete (maybe on the raid leader), and deserve better loot is a complete failure (at least with Naxxaramas). The two fights where this is true are Thaddius and Kel’thuzad, and this is only the case because they are proximity/coordination fights. Most of the fights, and achievements are vastly easier with 25 man. Sarth+drakes and Four Horsemen are examples of this.

In my opinion Blizzard shouldn’t award better loot, just more of it, to fit the raid size. This will keep them truely seperate progression paths, as there is no benefit to either path.

Blizz has states they don’t want any mandatory classes in a raid. They have supported this with overlapping buffs from different classes as well as reworks of a few mechanics.

Tanking was the “sort of” focal point of the mechanics changes in WotLK. Crushing blows were removed, Deathknights were added, (protection) Paladins were completely reworked, among other things. Any time there are drastic changes, habits and patterns often get opened up to change. However, peoples choices are not always 100% pure and unbiased. Many people still hold what was true in The Burning Crusade, and even back to Original content as true today. Paladins and Druids have gained huge buffs since those days, and some people are beginning to accept some of what new information is out there, while others cling to old concepts and refuse to open an eye to see what’s out there.

In Wrath of the Lich King there are four tanking classes, Warriors, Paladins, Druids, and Deathknights. Now that crushing blows have been removed, the line between the classes has been blurred to a certain degree. Paladins and Warriors can use shields, while the other two tanks cannot. In WotLK Block Value has shot through the roof. At the peak of my (boss) gear, I might have been a bit over 300 BV in TBC. Now in Wrath I am just shy of 1,400 BV completely unbuffed, and in a raid setting I can reach up to 2,000 BV. Additionally, WotLK did not bring with it a “huge” stamina jump like we saw in The Burning Crusade. Therefore boss damage numbers haven’t scaled quite as fast, and blocking a hit can significantly up your overall damage mitigation.

Druids compensate for this with very large health pools, and larger than normal armor ratings. Bringing their mitigation almost up to a Warrior or Paladin. However their high HP pool is there simply because they take much less consistent damage. They have dodge, miss, or full-hit on their incoming combat table. Deathknights have a similar situation, however they add parry to the list.

Paladins and Warriors can shave off another 1-2.5k from those hits. Warriors can also get a “critical block” for two times their block value (albeit not very frequently). Paladis are the only class that can (with a little raid gear) consistently block every I coming hit (that isn’t avoided). This brings their (physical) mitigation to the smoothest of all tanks.

People that raided pre-BC still have it stuck in their minds that Warriors are the end-all tank. However I feel the playing field is much more even, if not slightly leaning towards paladin MT’ing. I’ve gotten into several raids and been designated to OT duty (damn pugs), until the warrior (who has less health and avoidance) gets smashed by the boss.

Wrapping up, anybody reading this, please try to educate people that the scene has changed and sometimes there is a better choice than what worked in the past.

PS – maybe “Bring the player, not the class” is true, and I am just that leet. LOL!