Thursday, June 27, 2013

Last Stand of the Zandalari : A Restospective

As the sun begins to set on Tier 15, most people are getting excited about what's to come with 5.4.  A new raid, tweaks to our toolkit, and new game features have people all a-flutter - and for excellent reason!  It's  hard to not be excited to see changes that will positively impact our game play and give us new challenges to overcome.

Here's a fond farewell to the current progression tier and a Restospective look back at what we have conquered.  There are three categories that I'm putting fights into: Love It, Hate It, or Meh.  Without further ado, here's my Restospective on Last Stand of the Zandalari (Throne of Thunder Part 1).





Jin'rokh the Breaker


I rate Jin'Rokh as Meh.  The first fight of the Throne of Thunder was a loot pinata in my opinion.  The healing wasn't incredibly difficult as long as people were standing in the right place in the right time.  The mechanics weren't complicated and the execution was relatively simple.  The only major downside to Jin'Rokh is how huge his loot table is.  Even now, after 15 or more kills on him, some of our raiders still need drops off this guy.  Seeing as he is a loot pinata, I can see why he'd have such a packed loot table, but it's still depressing to have yet another kill on him and that shiny thing you've been chasing after still hasn't dropped.


Horridon 

Horridon is a fight I love to hate.  The boss hit like a diesel train, the adds love throwing out stuff to dispel, the floor is not your friend...this fight has something for everyone to hate.  It was a serious challenge to heal, especially at the beginning (before all the Nerfs) and before people got the hang of interrupting the Venom Priests and kiting the diseased Drakkari.  Bluntly put, I thought this fight was a nightmare.  It was nearly impossible for us to stack the healing team to deal with all of the different dispels going out, not to mention being SOL if you didn't have someone to cleanse a disease.  Mana conservation was absolutely critical - and again, nearly impossible.  The saving grace of this fight was blasting Walk the Dinosaur by George Clinton.


Council of Elders


I love this fight.  No joke.  I love the Council of Elders.  It was, for me, just a fun fight.  It felt like the healing to be done was nicely paced, where I wasn't panicking the whole time that the tank was going to spontaneously implode while I was in the middle of a spell cast, and I didn't fear the whole team would explode from some nasty burst damage.  It was fun to watch the DPS on the team -- especially our heavy hitters -- throttle back their damage for fear of accidentally committing suicide.  It helps that we gave each of the Elders an endearing nickname - Sparky, Healy, Sandy, and Frosty.  I mean, it's hard not to giggle when you hear the raid leader telling us to beat Sparky down....now Frosty....now Sandy.  I feel like this fight was a great balance of challenge and fun.


The Last Stand of the Zandalari was an interesting start to the Throne of Thunder.  You can't help but feel bad for the Zandalari after you finish the Council and the Thunder King all but thanks you for taking out the trash.  If it weren't for the deeds of the Zandalari, he'd still be a corpse somewhere, and he doesn't even care that they've been wiped out.  It shows that the Zandalari are but a pawn in the Thunder King's chess game, and were only thrown at you to buy some time.

What were your thoughts on the first act of the Throne of Thunder?

Thanks for reading!  Until next time, long days, pleasant nights and happy Raiding!


Credit goes to Dayani over at Healiocentric for the term Restospective 

3 comments:

  1. Now that I have the timing, Horridon is a lot of fun! All-in-all I find something enjoyable about each boss. Throne of THunder has been a fun raid.

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    1. I'm not afraid to admit that I hold grudges against certain boss fights - and Horridon will stay on that list, along with Halion. Maybe it's a prejudice against bosses whose names start with H! Just kidding. But I agree, yes ToT has been a fun raid. :)

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  2. I hate horridon. i hold a grudge against that overgrown rhino that is half the size of Wisconsin. most of the issues we had with horridon was due to personnel changes that really really set us back and killed our morale. once we got in people who were not actively going against everything we were trying to do it has been smooth sailing. now if only he would give up that darn trinket!!!!

    jin'rok and council are both kind of "meh" fights for me. At first they were challenging just because of people not watching their feet. now that we have gone through and are comfortable with these fights i kind of view them as warm up fights. we 2 heal all 3 of these fights and they steadily increase in healing difficulty so its a good ramp up to getting into the deeper content. on council after sul goes down i can almost solo heal teh rest of that fight. most times it ends up that once we get him down our other heal primarily damages the bosses and only heals when someone does something to cause unnecessary damage or we hit a dark power.

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