BC Raid Progression?

[ShenMolo]

Hello all,

Long time lurker, first time poster, looking to discuss Raid Progression in Burning Crusade.

Currently Blizzard has designed raid instances to be a progression with lockout timers, gear, faction, and resist checks all designed to string out the time it takes to "clear" a raid instance. It can take a new guild, on a new server, 6+ months to even enter Naxx, much less "finish" it. This has the effect of keeping the hardcore raiders subscribed, by giving them content that requires much time & skill and effectively weeds out 90% of the player base, introducing the catass or "elite" factor for those able to complete Naxx.

It appears that the new Raid Instances may be designed differently. There is speculation that Karazhan is designed to be the toughest Raid, and the raid from which many Tier 4 pieces will drop. There is also rumors that Karazhan and other Raids will be doable using the level 70 blues available in the 5 man instances and other raids. If this is true, then it appears that Blizzard is fundamentally changing the raid progression design.

Currently Naxx is only doable by spending months farming items in BWL/AQ40. However, the toughest raids in BC appear to be doable without the same requirements. Karazhan may be hard, it may require extremely well coordinated & skilled groups. But it appears to at least be doable without 4 months of raid farming other instances.

If this is true, it would appear that Blizzard has decided to fundamentally change the end-game by making it accessible to the vast majority of the playerbase, rather than the 10% who currently experience it.

Other factors suggesting this:

-Smaller raid sizes means it is easier to have a raiding guild.
-PvP rewards on par with PVE rewards means raiders will no longer be able to out-gear non-raiders.

Hardcore raiders are already dismayed that their T3 gear is being outclassed quickly in the expansion. Some hardcore guilds are bemoaning the smaller raids sizes and worried about losing members or having to cull their membership. Cries that Blizzard has sold-out to the casual playerbase have been loud and many.


If Blizzard is indeed fundamentally changing the raid progression formula, what effect will this have on the game?

[Ironwood]

Always nice to meet an Enders Game Fan.

For me, the effect will be to reengerise my guild and make 'raiding' much more accessible as a guild function.  We'll be able to do more five/ten/20 man fun as well as energising the 5 man groups again with levelling and new content.

Frankly, this has been a long time coming.  If Blizzard has indeed 'sold out' to the casual players, its more than likely precisely due to the casual player being 90% of their damn market.  Sub stats, I would imagine, would have reflected this reality.

Bear in mind that you will get loud and long complaints from raiders but, for the most part, they won't actually cancel because, let's be frank, they're total and complete idiots.

[jpark]

Smaller raids sizes I certainly support.

Making raids easier?  Hmmm.... the game is easy enough.  That would not be a welcome change.

On par with pvp rewards?  Which - the grind pvp or the ladder pvp Blizzard will break out into two different tracts?  If the former, then this is not a good change.

[Ironwood]

Easier To Raid does not mean Easy Raid.

Cutting down the numbers required and ramping up the levelling loot drops may mean they're more accessible but just as challening and fun.

40 man raids were neither.

[Reg]

I really hope it's true. I left WoW about a year ago and never did much raiding at all with my 60 druid. And at this point it's not likely that any decent guild would want me with my crappy equipment and complete lack of attunements to anything at all. I reactivated over the weekend to refresh my memory of the game before the expansion comes out and I'm really hoping that once it does I can just skip all the awful 4 month grinds and just level normally and get equipment that will be good enough to play in the new dungeons.

[Dren]

Speaking as a casual that can put a lot of hours into the game per week (10-20,) but not a lot of hours into each session (less than 2hours.) :

I've grown tired of the game only from the standpoint that I have built up all the alts I want to build up to 60 (well, ok, I'm close at 4.)

I've grown tired of having nearly no chance at getting anything better than a strong blue piece and a few lower set pieces.  It isn't that I want those pieces to drop for me easily, but I just really have no chance at getting them with my limited RL schedule.  At least give me a chance (faction, smaller raid groups, PvP awards based on honor not ranking, etc.)

The reason I stay?  I've tried the other games out right now and prefer WoW.  It really comes down to that.  I'm not going to get all dramatic on everyone and say I'm quitting, because I'm not.  I'll always be playing one MMOG.  The question is, which one?

There are other games on the horizon and Blizzard knows that.  I know that.  Once a game that has the "finish" of WoW comes out and is more casual friendly, I'm gone.  If Blizz can keep WoW the most casual friendly game, and continue to put out content at a rate that the market accepts, I'll be a long time player.

I like the direction they are taking and am very ready for BC to be released.  I've backed out of playing much already to 5-7 hours a week.  Single player games can bridge the gap for awhile, but I'll need my MMORPG fix soon damn it!

Sell out to the casuals?  That's really funny.  You have to believe with 6+ million subs, they have a group of people that have the sole purpose of figuring out how to maintain that level or even make it better.  They will do what it takes to make as much money as they can.  If the raiders think Blizzard has some kind of special love for them that would make them ignore growing their revenue, I have some swamp land to sell them.

[Ironwood]

If the raiders think Blizzard has some kind of special love for them that would make them ignore growing their revenue, I have some swamp land to sell them.

Well, possibly, but you have to bear in mind that evidence suggests this did, in fact, use to be the case.

[ShenMolo]

The new PvP Rewards purchased with points gained via the Arena system are all level 70 and are on par with high end dungeon loot.

(According to Drysc http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=32277664&pageNo=1&sid=1#3)

While the current pre-BC raid progression design does restrict content to the vast majority of players, it also functions to keep people subscribed. If everything is now basically accessible to everyone, how long will it be until everything is finished by everyone?

I like to think that my guild exists because we enjoy each other's company and the game. I also know that people become distracted & bored if they aren't working towards concrete, in-game goals (a boss killed, and instance mastered, a shiney obtained).

Perhaps it is too early to wonder about the end-game in BC. Maybe it will still take months of wiping to learn the tougher instances.

My guild is also very ready for the expansion. I'm personally very happy with the potential changes. Philosophically speaking though, if it's easy to finish, will we get bored?

Perhaps we need that next, nearly unobtainable level of progression to keep us interested?

[Modern Angel]

There are a few things at work here.

One thing is that the Tier 4 stuff is going to be spread over multiple dungeons. A little Karazhan, a little Black Temple, some in those Onyxia style kill and run raids... I think that might mitigate the pain for the larger guilds a bit; not tough to run a 25 man and a 10 man in the same night so long as people pay attention to raid lockouts. I also fully expect them to tweak that mechanic some. So you're not going to have this linear progression to the instances and you'll actually have meaningful choice on raid nights. I love that. Being forced to run MC months longer than you otherwise would because some of your geared people split sucked and sucked hard.

The MAIN thing is that the tank and spank gear checks are largely a thing of the past and have been for awhile. Watching the adjustment of my guild as we've moved from BWL to AQ40 has been interesting. Sudden;y just pressing buttons in the right order isn't good enough. People have to move and think on the fly. Alot of folks aren't used to that. I fully expect one of the main cockblocks to raid content in TBC isn't going to be time spent so much as actual honest to goodness player skill. Not twitch, mind you, but as close as you'll get to it in a Diku game.

The last thing to bear in mind is that there will be a Tier 5. Tier 5 (if it releases prior to the expansion; I could see them offering raiding sidegrades and do one tier an expansion if they stick to the yearly plan) is going to be the real indicator. Are they going to release five more raid zones with Tier 5 spread throughout a la TBC's raid game or will they only have the time/resources to do one instance with the next tier of gear like now?

[pants]

As a member of a not particularly hardcore raiding guild (ie we only raid twice a week, but that is for a 4-5 hour sitting) - I'm kinda torn.  I personally have trouble with a 4-5 hour sitting, so I tend to be the turn-up-halfway-through guy.  And when I do raid, being DPS #27 means I just press my Aimed Shot and FD buttons, drink beer, and shoot the breeze with my guildies.  While that is an enjoyable pasttime, its not a particularly fun game mechanic.

So I like the fact of smaller, more focussed raids where you have to pay attention and do stuff.  I also LOVE the idea of wings etc, coz you can do something in 1-2 hour chunks.  But why did Blizzard have to chnage the goalposts 2 years into the game?  We've had several recruting drives as people quit and we need to keep ~40 raiders to do BWL/AQ40 and now Naxx.  If they had've started with 25-person raids, we could have set up that way from the start.  I'm lucky that my guild has a good solid leadership, and a core of us have been playing since early EQ days, so we tend to be pretty grown up and realise its only a game.  But I can see a lot of angst coming - and while part of me enjoys a trainwreck as much as the next guy, still gonna be a lot of cranky noisy people out there.

[Xanthippe]

I don't understand why people think that guild size needs to change.  If you have a guild capable of running 40-mans, then you clearly have more than just 40 people in guild.  So now you need a guild capable of running 25-mans.  The game has been out long enough that a lot of people have alts that they play as capably as they play mains.  If  you need more people to run two groups, recruit more.  If you don't want to recruit (and any guild that stops recruiting eventually withers and dies), then wait for attrition to trim the numbers.

[Scadente]

It's because most guilds are built up of: three-four _capable_ raidleaders. My guild fell apart once I (the "main" tank), the GM and another very social person went on a break or quit raiding. I used to be the guy that kept pushing the raid, the GM kept us in check and the social guy ranted endlessly on Vent. It just crumbled, and raids were really lacking if one of the key persons wasn't there. It's a full-time job leading a 40man raid in MC/BWL (can't even imagine AQ40), people not paying attention/afk'ing/having to leave. And you're trying to make it a nice experience for every one, and being effective. I didn't hate leading a raid, but most of my raids were just crazy zergs and ninjapulls. It worked out once we got used to each-others playingstyles. But once a key member was out, the raid really suffered.

I hope BC really changes that, I've always been an immense fan of the 5man groups, and the most funny experience I had was clearing Blackrock Depths with a 5man MC geared party. Some insane pulls, and zergs. Clearing the whole of the instance when we were overpowered, but we pulled 3 pats at once, to make it challenging, multimobbing became essential, aggro-management was much more fickle. And it was actually... intense, challenging and fun.

[Modern Angel]

I think the problem is less filling two raids as dealing with A/B team mentality and the raid lockout timers. If you have, say, a really great 25 man team and then an average to less than average 25 others who gets what? Do you split the 25 great players? Make an A team and B team? What if you clear something over two days but some people don't log on, thereby messing up who's in what raid (impossible to handle because of the timers)?

[Merusk]

Anything is hard the first time to do it, or if you're the first ones to learn it.

UBRS, Scholo, Strath, BRD.  These were HARD instances when people first encountered them, and did them at the appropriate gear and level step in progression.  I still recall a LARGE amount of bitching about the torch room in BRD from groups of 10 60s who'd go in with nearly full blue sets.

Plenty of 5-man groups still wipe frequently in Scholo. Plenty of 10-mans still wipe frequently in UBRS, or simply can't kill Drak.  Plenty of 10-mans CAN NOT kill the last boss for the .5 tier equipment.

Molten Core is a 40-man raid.  Does this mean it's harder for people to get it done?  Not at all.  I have a harder time staying awake than fighting things, and I'm the puller.  There's more challenge to a 45-min Baron run than a 4 1/2 hour clear of MC.

BWL is challenging, but only until you learn the fights.  In less than a Month of doing BWL ONE NIGHT a week for only 4 hours my guild is already at Broodlord, learning him.  Does that mean we're hardcore uber players? Not at all.  Does this mean we're more deserving of eqiupment? Not at all.

The gear is there for the progression through PvE content.  If you don't progress, you don't need the gear.  Tossing uber equipment out for folks who just want to farm Level-cap mobs for selling mats or clear low level dungeons to twink alts doesn't make sense, since it can be done in inferior equipment. 

 But if the majority of your playerbase isn't progressing, then your game is broken.  Obviously folks want to progress and do the tough fights, but they don't want to be forced to do so in a huge raiding guild. There's nothing wrong or bad or horrible about that.

[stray]

The gear is there for the progression through PvE content.  If you don't progress, you don't need the gear.

Not all of the gear found in a raid is for the sole purpose of progressing through PvE content -- There are plenty of stand alone items (be it individual armor pieces or weapons) that are good for PvP'ers.

In some cases, this equipment is even better than the "official" PvP gear (which is harder to get than raiding gear at that!). And in some cases, they're the only way certain players can even make viable builds (Balance Druids have no real options other than AQ atm, for example).

[Morfiend]

I dont think Blizzard is changing the model at all. Except for the raid size, think of it like this.

Karazhan is the level 70 raid dungeon, and it will be doable in all level 70 blues. Now think back. At release MC was the level 60 raid dungeon and it was doable in all level 60 blues. You didnt have progression really until they released BWL at a later date. I think you can put money on the fact that Blizz will release another raid instance that will need Karazhan loot.

I see no real change.

[Threash]

The gear is there for the progression through PvE content.  If you don't progress, you don't need the gear.  Tossing uber equipment out for folks who just want to farm Level-cap mobs for selling mats or clear low level dungeons to twink alts doesn't make sense, since it can be done in inferior equipment. 
 

Actually there seems to be a much bigger focus in pvp than before.  The gear might have been there for further pve progression but it didn't change the fact that it made the raider/non raider gap in pvp too big for most people to surpass.

[Modern Angel]

I dont think Blizzard is changing the model at all. Except for the raid size, think of it like this.

Karazhan is the level 70 raid dungeon, and it will be doable in all level 70 blues. Now think back. At release MC was the level 60 raid dungeon and it was doable in all level 60 blues. You didnt have progression really until they released BWL at a later date. I think you can put money on the fact that Blizz will release another raid instance that will need Karazhan loot.

I see no real change.

Except that's not how it's working at all. All of the planned raid instances drop Tier 4 via (presumably) a token system a la ZG/Naxx. Meaning all can be done off the bat.

[jpark]

There's more challenge to a 45-min Baron run than a 4 1/2 hour clear of MC.

BWL is challenging, but only until you learn the fights. 

Quite true.

[Paelos]

Personally, I'm happy with the changes. What I've never understood is why the raiding guilds care at all about "casuals" getting shots at stuff in the game. I'm not stupid, I know the actual reasoning, but no matter what the excuse is it typically just boils down to insecure bullshit. I want to lord my success over someone, I want people to stare at me as a I walk by, I want to know that I can do things these plebians can't do. There's no sense of internal accomplishment, no recognition that the success of others doesn't actually downplay your successes at all, and no realization that defining a game by the feats of others instead of your own is incredibly hollow. I mean if I beat a single player game, I don't jump all over the internet to see how hasn't beaten it yet and trash them up and down the internet. That's stupid.

My alliance of guilds has done well in MC, we are at Nef in BWL, and we're fucking around in AQ40. Each success has been fun for me, and fun for us. We're not the first to do anything or kill anything on our server, nor would we notice. We're operating in a relative vacuum and don't give a shit about who conquered before us or who will later. This is the kind of attitude that keeps us successful in our terms. There's small drama as usual, but there's not going to be an upheaval when the expansion comes because of numbers. We fight, we respond, we adjust, and we move on to the next challenge. We are borg  . We simply like having goals and conquering those goals, other people be damned. If everyone conquers the same goals at some point, that's fine and dandy as long as there are new goals for us in the near future.

What I am pleased about with the changes is that they are putting a lot of things in the game at once, and they are making raids more accessible to the playerbase. I want the standard uber-guild attitude to go the way of the dodo. I want everyone to get together and talk about how great it is to raid for fun instead of getting together to jump all over how much it sucks to have to group with 39 other hairless yard apes.

[Ironwood]

The Dancing Monkey is exactly right.  I have never understood why my having a nice sharp blade should lessen the Raiders story of having a nice sharp blade.

To be honest, his story is more likely to be more exciting than mine, up until now.

[Fabricated]

Paelos put it in a more elegant manner than I ever could.

With the smaller raids and I guess decidedly higher difficulty factor of the new ones, will PUGs for anything greater than 5-mans go poof? There are going to be times you can't hash together a proper mix of classes for even 10-mans unless your guild is decently large and has lots and lots of people who're reliably on...will the really small guilds or guilds without attendance requirements PUG fill-ins, or will you need such a well-oiled vent-sporting unit that you may as well just "stay home" and tradeskill/harvest/quest?

[Modern Angel]

I'm wondering who the fuck subjects themselves to talking with the PUG gaming base (ie everyone else) enough to even give a shit. I try to find a guild of like minded people so I don't have to talk to all the subliterate mouthbreathers, not get better gear and then flaunt it.

[Paelos]

Paelos put it in a more elegant manner than I ever could.

With the smaller raids and I guess decidedly higher difficulty factor of the new ones, will PUGs for anything greater than 5-mans go poof? There are going to be times you can't hash together a proper mix of classes for even 10-mans unless your guild is decently large and has lots and lots of people who're reliably on...will the really small guilds or guilds without attendance requirements PUG fill-ins, or will you need such a well-oiled vent-sporting unit that you may as well just "stay home" and tradeskill/harvest/quest?

Having been in a guild alliance, I can honestly say that I think they will be the wave of the future when BC hits. Two to Three moderate sized guilds should be able to put together two successful raids without having to worry about fighting over recruits or jumping ship to bigger guilds. My alliance is about ten guilds large, but that was to cover the class requirements we'd need to support 2 MC raids, 1 BWL raid, 4 ZG raids, 2 AQ20 raid, 2 Onyxias, and 1 AQ40 raid. I think we have roughly 100 very active raiders out of those 10 guilds.

Really, when you have an alliance it helps you weed out most of the PUG crap. Good guilds weed out bad entries, and the ones that do get in are quickly exposed. Depending on who is running the raids, it's very easy to set up bad attitude members as persona non grata, and in my experience the guilds themselves usually boot them because they didn't realize how big of a dipshit they initiated.

[Calantus]

Personally, I'm happy with the changes. What I've never understood is why the raiding guilds care at all about "casuals" getting shots at stuff in the game. I'm not stupid, I know the actual reasoning, but no matter what the excuse is it typically just boils down to insecure bullshit. I want to lord my success over someone, I want people to stare at me as a I walk by, I want to know that I can do things these plebians can't do. There's no sense of internal accomplishment, no recognition that the success of others doesn't actually downplay your successes at all, and no realization that defining a game by the feats of others instead of your own is incredibly hollow. I mean if I beat a single player game, I don't jump all over the internet to see how hasn't beaten it yet and trash them up and down the internet. That's stupid.

This is me being a bit disappointed and annoyed right now. Over and over and over again (some of) you guys like to paint all raiders with the elitist asshole brush and spout some psycho-babble about "how raiders really think". Frankly it's getting old. Almost as old as the chart/trammel wars that spout everytime we get into the topic of pvp and/or ultima online.

Basically at the heart of it is that the most difficult task should be the most rewarding. If the hardest thing is 5mans then fine bring it on. If it's challenging or just plain fun enough for me to enjoy it I'll partake. Or if it gets me the stuff I need to compete in some other way that I DO enjoy, hey I'll tolerate it. To be perfectly honest I'd never seen myself as a raider before WoW, but when I hit 60 for the first time the thing I wanted to do most was to get into Molten Core. Before I knew about Molten Core I wanted to get into UBRS because as far as I knew that was the shit and was where you got the biggest shinies. THAT is why I raid. If 5man content was the biggest content and gave the best shinies then I'd be fine with doing 5mans too. But while 40mans are the biggest and bestest thing they should give the biggest reward because of that virtue.

When I play singleplayer RPGs I play the death out of them. I go to every hidden dungeon and kill every optional boss. Including in games like Disgaea where you have to do some crazy (read: boring) shit in order to kill everything. I don't post about what leet shit I've done and I have no idea how many people have also done it and generally some of the things you do become redundant (like the reward at the end of via infinito in FFX-2, if you can kill the endboss there you can kill anything, so why do you need a strong item?). But at the end of the day I still expect something extra for having done the extra hard "we don't care how balanced this is because you can finish the game without it lol" optional stuff. If not then why bother? It can be an extra cutscene or a drop that I may not need but if I do something extra and get nothing then I'm going to be disappointed. It also has to be something thats appealing to enough other people for them to come along if they are required. I know I'm a little masocistic when it comes to gaming so I'll go through more to get less, but not so many other people are like that.

(on a side note I'll play an action game on harder difficulties or go to extra areas for the thrill of the challenge alone, but rpg's generally are not worth doing too many activities for their own sake as they take less user input and thus lessen the pure good feeling reward from success)

That's why raiders kick up a stink about "casuals" wanting loot as good as raiding gear without raiding. If you want to make the smaller instances so brutally hard that the raw difficulty meets the extra overhead and dramas caused by raids then so be it. If you want to lower the bar so more people can participate then so be it. But you can't just leave raids as the hardest thing to do while not giving enough reward to make it worth it over and above the easier activities.

And yes I'm sure there are a lot of people who like to lord their purples over others and that's their sole reason, but to ascribe that attitude to all raiders who objected to "casual" rewards as good as raider rewards is asanine.


As for the greater subject at hand I prefer the endgame be more accessable to the wider customer base. For one it makes for a better recruiting pool, but it also means more work can be pooled into improving the activity I'm engaged in. I also don't think it will have an adverse affect in the long-term in and of itself. So long as the encounters are engaging and the shiny is flowing people will play. So I don't think there's any reason for anyone to worry. Unless of course you're going to have to deal directly with the dramas and logistics of regearing a raiding guild for the changing expansion raiding environment of course, but I figure that pain will be short-lived.

[Ironwood]

That argument breaks down if you're of the opinion that MC isn't hard.

It just needs more people.


To expand :  Make the 5 man instances as hard as you like.  Just don't make it so that I have to spend a week getting a group together to give it a try.

[tazelbain]

GW tried the hard thing in Factions and it caused much nashing of teeth.  Some people suck, some refuse to group.  But all felt they were "entitled" to get to the end.  People really hate to find out that they are the bottom of barrel in playerskill.

[Xanthippe]

After reading Calentus's post above, I still don't quite get why some people are upset about the changes.

It seems to me that there are people who enjoy punishing play, and think that everyone ought to earn rewards in games through punishing play.

I play games that I enjoy playing, and I play them the way I want.  I don't enjoy raiding per se although I do enjoy the potential of what raiding has to offer.  I enjoy playing with a group of people who don't fuck around and who know how to play, provided that the content is interesting and people are not being assholes.  I don't enjoy going to the same dungeon over and over and over again doing the same encounters over and over and over again with 40 people no matter how well they play and how much they don't fuck around.  To me, that's punishing.

I'd be playing EQ (or Vanguard, I guess) if I liked that sort of thing.

With regard to the raiding game - I assume there are people who actually enjoy raiding for the sake of raiding.  Figuring out the fight, etc.  The high end raiding guilds working on new instances spend hours every day doing exactly that.  It's not really all for loot, is it?  Or is it?  So they can have what no one else has before anyone else has it?

[Calantus]

It isn't all for loot no, but the loot suppliments the sense of achievement. Besides, like you said raiding is not fun in and of itself once you've raided the instance since forever and I don't care who you are, that holds true. The only reason you go back is for the loot. Take the loot away and... what do we do with all the time we used to raid for loot? It's not that I enjoy punishing play so much, but I'm willing to go through it if the payoff is worth it (sense of achievement, shiny, etc). The 50 billionth time I did BWL was most definately not an achievement or fun by itself and the messing about on vent could have been done over any activity, but the rejuv gem I got from it was pretty sweet.


Also, MC isn't hard no, but I also wouldn't say that MC is not the shit anymore either. And Naxx is hard. Now personally I can do my job just fine after a couple looks at the boss and so can my brother and so can this person and that person and a whole lot of other people. But it's hard to get everybody to a point where they know what to do and do it (or even show up sometimes). That's the difficulty in raiding and like it or not that means it's got to pay out if they expect us to do it day after day. And like I said I have no problem with something else being the shit and don't care how many other people can do it, so long as it pays out well (because no matter what it is, we will have to do it long after it loses its appeal for its own sake).

[Xanthippe]

I'm unclear on what the bone of contention is, then, between raiders and non-raiders.

Raiders do it for the loot, not because they enjoy it particularly but because they get loot.

Non-raiders want the loot but for whatever reason - not enough social capital or not enough contiguous time chunks - can't raid. 

If raiding is un-fun enough that people wouldn't do it if there was an alternative way to get the loot, then what would the objection be to the system being reworked in such a way that was more satisfying? Are battleground grinders unhappy with the changes to the BG honor rank rewards system?

Or am I still missing the point?

[Zane0]

Killin' stuff over and over again was never limited to 40-man raids.

I think the changes are largely great.  Accessibility and pacing has always been problematic for people who couldn't raid for whatever reason, and this expansion does a lot for them.  My main concern now is quite simply content longevity.  Removing 15 people removes a ton of variables.  Organization will be easier, there will be fewer factors (people) at play; things will generally get done faster.

We all know how glacial Blizzard's content cycle is.  If their speed is unchanged come expansion, there will be a heavy onus on their new PvP systems and the hard difficulty setting to keep people distracted once they finish everything else, I think.

EDIT: To answer your question, the main issue is giving attention to one "playstyle" without compromising the other, and vice versa.  As I see it!

[Modern Angel]

I'm unclear on what the bone of contention is, then, between raiders and non-raiders.

Raiders do it for the loot, not because they enjoy it particularly but because they get loot.

Non-raiders want the loot but for whatever reason - not enough social capital or not enough contiguous time chunks - can't raid. 

If raiding is un-fun enough that people wouldn't do it if there was an alternative way to get the loot, then what would the objection be to the system being reworked in such a way that was more satisfying? Are battleground grinders unhappy with the changes to the BG honor rank rewards system?

Or am I still missing the point?

Because not all raiders do it for the same reasons. It's sort of the same thing (and this may be a shock) with non-raiders playing the game in different ways; some like to craft, some like to gank, some like to RP, etc, etc.

You've got a very vocal minority who have alot of their self-worth tied up in their dope loots. Alot more enjoy the dope loots and see it as a byproduct of doing the raiding. I love raiding because I get to see complex encounters (though I'll freely admit I like the idea of 25 and 10 mans better); the loot makes me go "Ooooo! Neat!" and then I quickly forget as I move on to the next foozle. It's a means to an end.

The payoff as described is just there because it HAS to be there. There's nothing strange about this. From the moment you log on to WoW it's a loot driven game. Just because someone might be camping the AH for their dope blue item while muttering profanities about raiders doesn't mean that the exact same thing isn't going on. It's no better or worse, just different.

[Ironwood]

I disagree that it's a loot driven game - until you hit 60.

[Modern Angel]

So with 100 gold in your pocket you can't slam every other level 19 in the battlegrounds? So the blue sword that drops off of Van Cleef isn't half again as good as an equivilant AH green?

You may not notice it as much since you level so fast but, yes, WoW is an EXTREMELY loot driven game. Remove loot from the equation and everyone of a given class is exactly the same. Loot's more than A defining characteristic of a character, it's THE defining characteristic. Christ, why do you think non-raiders are bitching right back at the raiders when it comes to loot?

[Paelos]

Just to narrow this down, I'll address your points by number.

1) This is me being a bit disappointed and annoyed right now. Over and over and over again (some of) you guys like to paint all raiders with the elitist asshole brush and spout some psycho-babble about "how raiders really think". Frankly it's getting old. Almost as old as the chart/trammel wars that spout everytime we get into the topic of pvp and/or ultima online.

2) Basically at the heart of it is that the most difficult task should be the most rewarding.

3) That's why raiders kick up a stink about "casuals" wanting loot as good as raiding gear without raiding. If you want to make the smaller instances so brutally hard that the raw difficulty meets the extra overhead and dramas caused by raids then so be it. If you want to lower the bar so more people can participate then so be it. But you can't just leave raids as the hardest thing to do while not giving enough reward to make it worth it over and above the easier activities.

4) And yes I'm sure there are a lot of people who like to lord their purples over others and that's their sole reason, but to ascribe that attitude to all raiders who objected to "casual" rewards as good as raider rewards is asanine.

5) As for the greater subject at hand I prefer the endgame be more accessable to the wider customer base. For one it makes for a better recruiting pool, but it also means more work can be pooled into improving the activity I'm engaged in. I also don't think it will have an adverse affect in the long-term in and of itself. So long as the encounters are engaging and the shiny is flowing people will play. So I don't think there's any reason for anyone to worry. Unless of course you're going to have to deal directly with the dramas and logistics of regearing a raiding guild for the changing expansion raiding environment of course, but I figure that pain will be short-lived.

1) Maybe it's getting old to you, but you say we don't know how they really think, and then you meander around trying to differentiate your points from the same old "raider bullshit" the casuals have been hearing for years. Funny thing is, you sort of walked exactly into what I was talking about when I meant that the rewards of others have nothing to do with your personal success.
 
2) I agree, the higher difficulty/risk should create higher rewards. That's the way things go in games or people simply won't engage in the process. However, there's no reason why you have to remove the access to rewards by forcing people into one form of gameplay. You could give a rare chance of having the epic tier 4 drop in a 5 man, but you'd have to run it around 200 hours to ever see it, or you could run a successful 25 man raid and have the tier 4 pieces be 100% drops every boss. Give the incentive to the raiders to get things faster, but don't cut off the casuals from the chance at seeing high end rewards.

3) Again, if the raids are harder, give them the drops everytime. Let the raiders gear up the fastest. If you organize drop rates correctly, the casuals might get a crack at a full tier 4 set while the raiders are already working on capping off their full Tier 5. It's not going to affect the raiders at all by giving the casuals a shot.

4) I disagree, raiders bitch about casuals getting rewards exactly because they don't want people rewarded for not raiding. They want to feel like putting up with all the raiding guild bullshit was worth it. And that's not ALL raiders. I'm a raider and I don't give a shit what the casuals have on them. I'm beating bosses for the challenge, not for the gear. The raiders that are bitching are totally gear-centric, which is basically horseshit. I have mine, but I don't want you to have yours. Please. I'll even go a step farther, let the raiders earn Master Titles that show next to their names when they conquer instances. That'll appease some of the epeen people without taking loot away from others.

5) Right here, you basically turned around on all the points you just made. You want more people in the raiding game. You want people fighting engaging bosses with great loots. The only thing I think you're missing to be on the "casual" side of the fence is that raids have to be large. That's the essence of the debate, does larger mean more challenging. In micromanging personalities it does, but in terms of the game it doesn't. What I am getting at is that it shouldn't matter. If you like to play diplomat to 25 other people as your way of having fun, that should be rewarded. However, if you don't like that, you shouldn't be tossed out of any chance for greater rewards.