In which I rant.
This is an actual response from the blogosphere to Bornakk’s announcement that Emblems of Triumph will soon replace Emblems of Conquest as the “base” emblem:
I am annoyed that I’ll once again have to grind heroics come 3.3 for enough Triumph for full Tier 9!
Complaining about grinding heroics for full Tier 9? Really?
I have three words for you:
BOO.
FREAKING.
HOO.
Seriously. How much more "accessible" can this game get? Short of lowering the level cap to 5 and installing an Emblem of Triumph vendor in the Valley of Trials to exchange T10 pieces for twisted boar’s tails, NOT VERY.
Ugh.
Just ugh.
My alt — who has never set foot in a 25-man raid harder than Naxxramas — is just three Emblems of Triumph shy of 4pt9. I've missed more heroic dailies than not and attended a few alt runs of ToC 10 ... and by "alt," I mean "tanked, healed and DPS'd by newly ding'd 80's in quest blues and a smattering of the already widely accessible welfare Emblem of Conquest epics."
Trial of the Crusader isn't hard.
And T9? IS ALREADY FREE.
But, lo! Soon™, instead of collecting Emblems of Triumph from daily heroics and the occasional ToC loot-go-round, casual players and up-and-coming 80's will be able to farm heroics for full T9.
/golfclap
I know, I know. Blizzard is striving to make raid content accessible to the majority of the playerbase while throwing the more serious raiders a bone in the form of hard-modes. (Unfortunately for us, hard-modes are recycled challenges, not new ones, and there are only so many times you can clear Trial of the Crusader in any one of its four incarnations before it starts to feel claustrophobic anyway.)
So, no, I'm not happy about it — but I do understand that it is ultimately a business decision.
That's fine. Really.
It's reading this kind of inane QQ that inspires me to /rage.
... and then the rage subsides, and I'm just sad. I miss my linear raid progression. 
Edited to add: What he said.
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October 7th, 2009 - 14:54
I actually thought this might be the case ever since I finally got to see the details of the Frozen Emblems coming from the new Weekly Raid Quests.
But honestly? It doesn’t bother me too much. I /like/ that there is a progression path available outside of raids, and I like that even those that DO raid, if they are willing to put in the effort – or more to the point, have the free time
– that they can get themselves up to speed without relying on the rather fickle loot RNG system to drop what they want. (Let alone then also getting in line to be entitled to it or otherwise winning it at the time it drops).
All that said though, T9 is a slightly different story. Simply due to the fact that until now, only 2 pieces of the current tier were ever purchasable from a single token type. I will grant you that if you were doing 25m Naxx at that time, it was possible to completely buy your 4 pc (2 from valour, 2 from heroism), but still. Now, everyone will be able buy a full set of T9 from running heroics.
Of course, it will be the lowest of the low version though. Unless they can ALSO either do 10m heroic ToC or 25m ToC for the trophies. So yeah, overall, I still like the changes in philosophies of loot access in Wrath, which we saw the beginnings of in BC.
People on the cutting edge of raiding are always going to be better geared than everyone who is not. And that is how it should be. I don’t however think it should follow that those on the outside should be relegated to being stuck with instance blues forever as it was in the ol’ days.
Of course, I understand as well that your main problem was all the QQ surrounding it. And I completely agree. I have been tired of the ‘elite raider’ side of the QQ forever, but I hadn’t yet ever encountered anyone complaining from the other side, of simply having to do more easy content to get their ubar’d up gear.
Both are equally rediculous to me, though!
Naithin´s last blog ..DC Boss One Shot this Week
October 7th, 2009 - 15:22
Since my self-worth isn’t /actually/ tied up in the quality of my purple pixels, I don’t care if someone who hasn’t experienced the content I have has the same ilevel of gear.
Like I said, I’m fine with Blizzard’s “new” business model. It just irks me to read such asinine QQ from someone who doesn’t raid end-game content (and therefore doesn’t need ilevel 245 gear to begin with!). That would be like me crying about about having to grind honor for Relentless gear when I don’t PvP.
To be fair, a large part of my frustration stems from the fact that I really, really miss linear raid progression — both as a raider (no raid dungeon will /ever/ feel as epic to me as Black Temple did, and I’m sure that has to do with the sheer number of barriers to entry that we had to overcome in order to see it) and as a guild leader (who still struggles to fill raids for “progression” fights in Ulduar 25 that have been rendered obsolete by those snoozefest farm bosses in ToC 10).
October 8th, 2009 - 07:41
“…as a guild leader (who still struggles to fill raids for “progression” fights in Ulduar 25 that have been rendered obsolete by those snoozefest farm bosses in ToC 10).”
Can I get an “AMEN!” from the congregation?!? Too much to say here – maybe I have material to get the blog kickstarted =)
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October 8th, 2009 - 08:33
Do it!
The world /needs/ more Surreality bloggers.
October 8th, 2009 - 12:32
Wall of text posted, waiting to crit you all. See handy link below…
Forreststump´s last blog ..Goodbye, Yellow Brick Road
October 7th, 2009 - 15:43
I agree that the QQer should be drawn and quartered but personally I am not that disappointed by this, however the reasons for me not being disappointed are entirely self serving. This new system that blizzard seems to have adopted means that when your long lost fury warrior decides to stop learning how to save puppies and kittens and has time to go back to bludgeoning dragons and deities to death, that procuring gear required to be on a similar page with my long lost friends will actually be possible.
-Bob2
October 7th, 2009 - 17:07
I’m not sure I’d go quite so far as drawing and quartering.
Like I said, I’m fine with the change itself. I’ll probably even love it when it comes to gearing my growing stable of alts! And if it helps us catch some of our newer (or long-lost) raiders up to the rest of the guild in terms of gear, then it could prove to be a blessing in the long run.
No; I’m upset because even after Blizzard obliterated linear raid progression and replaced actual content with these gimmicky and repetitious “hard-modes,” the end-game is /still/ deemed inaccessible by much of the casual playerbase.
The best analogy I can come up with is the one I shared with Naithin. I don’t complain because the best PvP gear in the game comes from high-level arenas, nor do I feel I “have to” grind battlegrounds or heroics for a full Brutal set (or whatever comes below the current season’s gear) just because it happens to be available for purchase with honor or emblems.
/shrug
October 7th, 2009 - 18:39
Here’s my QQ (I’m a Mage by main, so it’s perfectly acceptable).
I’m a casual player… as in generally one night a week.
Pre-Triumph badge events, I was relatively well geared. Not Ulduar, but with a Mix of Naxx 10 & Naxx 25 gear I could be reasonably sure I would get a gig in a raid and definitely in a Heroic.
Now.. my gear hasn’t changed.. in fact I got so frustrated by the increasing gear-gap that I rerolled…
Well, my reroll just entered Northrend, so it looks like I will soon have 2 80s that will be undergeared and pushing it to get into a Heroic in the 1st place.
Yes, if you have the time, you can become over-geared for all content…
If you don’t, then you will not only warm guild benches, but PuG benches.
Don’t get me wrong… good fortune to all… it’s just not my good fortune.
New Alt coming up I think
Gnomeaggedon´s last blog ..What if: Single Character Slot
October 7th, 2009 - 20:37
As much as I complain about my server, I have to give Black Dragonflight some credit: I haven’t seen PuG’s using “gear scores” as a benchmark. (I honestly didn’t even know gear scores existed until I started reading about them in other blogs!)
If you’re in Naxx 10/25 level gear, then you already over-gear heroics and are certainly sufficiently geared for Ulduar and even Trial of the Crusader. I can only /boggle the PuG raid leader who would refuse to invite you to the heroic daily because you don’t out-gear ToC 25. =\
October 8th, 2009 - 01:59
I wonder when Blizzard will realise that it doesn’t matter how much they lower the bar, there will always be someone who wants it easier. All it does is turn people into even more spoiled brats with senses of entitlement. Throw them something, they’ll just want more, or want it easier.
I’m really growing tired of this game, for the same reasons as you really. The emblem change and bastardisation of linear progression doesn’t bother me too much (although it’s nice to see that all the raiding we did for the last year was essentially for nothing as someone could come back to the game now and gear up to the same level in a few weeks), it’s the lack of anything imaginative or challenging at the moment.
Ulduar was good but has now been overshadowed by a boring lootfest instance which takes all of an hour to clear. I think lots of guilds have the same problem even running normal Ulduar these days, because people go for the loot, not the challenge (You can thank Blizzard for encouraging this attitude).
I’m sure Icecrow will be amazing, but I have this little voice in the back of my head telling me that we’ve waited a year for “proper” raiding and everything up until now has been a waste of time really. More fool us I guess.
October 8th, 2009 - 13:32
Yes, I want my TBC raids baaack
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