Burning Crusade

There are a lot of things that can be said about the expansion for World of Warcraft. Overall the lore for a lot of the end-game is interesting and entertaining, so at least Blizzard has that going for them.

It's been months now since the release of Burning Crusade and Blizzard has already introduced patch after patch of extended content, existent content fixes, and 'nerfs'.

The latest patch dismissed the attunement steps for SSC and Tempest Keep: The Eye. Both instances have been out the whole time and numerous guilds worked hard to get attuned so that they could complete more content together. This has always been the case with end-game content. MC, BWL, Naxx... AQ was a server-wide effort. They never removed the steps necessary to access any of those, so why did they change their minds with BC instances?

It's annoying, to say the least. Not that many guilds who weren't doing these instances prior to the change will accomplish much now, but the problem is that they've made these places easier to access for the casual gamer, thus in a few weeks I can definitely foresee a nerf to the trash and bosses within them so that the casual gamers can yet again easymode their way through things by having Blizzard cater to them.

I realize that expecting people to play hardcore is a bit stupid, because well... people have lives, but when you begin dumbing down the things that guilds have and are working hard to tackle in their current state, you leave a lot of the people who are putting the effort into the content as it currently, wondering why they even bothered in the first place.

Karazhan for example was the first step in BC raiding when BC was released. Why? Because you had to kill Nightbane and other bosses and trash in order to eventually obtain an item that allowed you to be halfway attuned to SSC. Since BC they've first nerfed the shit out of Karazhan, buffed the gear that drops in Karazhan, and now... have altogether eliminated it's necessity from the equation, ultimately. The only thing it offers now, essentially, is gear for a new to 70 raider. Even then, the gear released with the new Arena season surpasses that of the stuff from Kara... so guilds could basically drop Karazhan from their plate and take up arena for a few weeks, gain good gear, and work on 25 man content.

That kind of nerfing and crap is what gets to me. It's like when they nerfed Gruul. Lots of guilds went in and downed him right afterwards that couldn't even come close pre-nerf. I do understand and agree that some content does need a nerf... either the bosses health or the amount his spells and attacks hit for, or the the adds that spawn... yes, some of that stuff is much harder than it should be. It isn't impossible, by any means, but it's rough. Karazhan before they nerfed it and buffed the gear was annoying as shit. Some of the encounters in there such as Shade of Aran were seriously very luck reliant. No matter what you did, it was a matter of whether or not you got lucky with which spells he cast, who resisted them, and whether or not you could take care of the elementals without dying to blizzard... which you could barely see unless you wanted to lag the hell out. Yes, nerfing is needed at times. Lol.

But... entirely dismissing something such as an attunment... isn't it a bit much?

Blizzard has ruined their own game. Yes I am enjoying leveling at the moment, and ultimately I'll appreciate having it easymode to get into raids... but that doesn't mean I agree with it. I think there was something regarding scrolls that Vashj would be dropping for guilds so that they could get members attuned without all of the prior steps. Why do away with that? I think that would have made more sense... and made it worth it for all of the people who put the work into getting attuned in the first place.

All in all, nerfing content has always existed. Not to the level we've seen in BC, but it patches have always offered changes to content and additions as well. The issue I'm seeing now is that WoW is being rushed, per say. New content is being thrown out before many guilds can even come close to being ready for it. Attunments to existing instances are being dismissed so that people can 'catch up.' It's all a joke now. I mean where do you draw the line? Why cater to the top guilds by forcing new encounters so quickly (that are usually buggy as hell upon release and often get nerfed to hell shortly after one or two guilds can confirm that they are, in fact, buggy as hell), why cater to the casuals who complain about things being too hard or too time consuming? What happened to appealing to the crowd that seems to dominate the game all along... the people who want to play it? Did WoW really lose that many of it's hardcore player base?