the real question ultimately is whether their tuning is good enough to offer a compelling experience to groups with granular sizes and compositions, or if it'll just be LFR that you have to pre-form a group for. The world mobs were a nice enough testbed I guess, but all they really do is scale their health up so that they don't die in seconds.
There's a lot of options, really. Maybe in the future the flex system could replace all normal modes, and heroics could still be tuned to 10/25. Or maybe there coud be 10, 15, 20 and 25 man settings or something, since tuning seems like it'd be easier with increments like that.
Replacing normal with flex would probably kill raiding. You would either have to be Heroic Guild™ or you'd end up with nothing to do most of the time because you killed all the normal mode bosses and you don't want to cut 1/3 to 1/2 your raid out to get to 10. I'm 1/13 (H) and have no illusions about getting Ra-den pre-6.0, what does that leave me with?
The Flex Raid system is a test bed for next expansion. It it goes well, I will bet it will become the standard next expansion.
Think about it, how have we seen raiding trends change?
20 man raid at Zul'Gurub in Vanilla was a test for smaller raid groups which led to 25 man raiding in BC
10 man raid at Karazhan in BC was a test which led to 10 man raiding in WOTLK
"Hardmode" activation in early WOTLK led to specific Heroic/Normal Toggles in late WOTLK
LFR raid at Dragon Soul in Cata which led to LFR for every raid in MOP
With the new tech, elite scaling, gear scaling, personal loot, and now a scaling raid? The deck has been stacked.
the real question ultimately is whether their tuning is good enough to offer a compelling experience to groups with granular sizes and compositions, or if it'll just be LFR that you have to pre-form a group for. The world mobs were a nice enough testbed I guess, but all they really do is scale their health up so that they don't die in seconds.
There's a lot of options, really. Maybe in the future the flex system could replace all normal modes, and heroics could still be tuned to 10/25. Or maybe there coud be 10, 15, 20 and 25 man settings or something, since tuning seems like it'd be easier with increments like that.
Replacing normal with flex would probably kill raiding. You would either have to be Heroic Guild™ or you'd end up with nothing to do most of the time because you killed all the normal mode bosses and you don't want to cut 1/3 to 1/2 your raid out to get to 10. I'm 1/13 (H) and have no illusions about getting Ra-den pre-6.0, what does that leave me with?
It leaves you exactly where you are right now? It's not as though you couldn't keep running 10s under my extremely hypothetical 'flex replaces normal' paradigm.
hold your head high soldier, it ain't over yet
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
the real question ultimately is whether their tuning is good enough to offer a compelling experience to groups with granular sizes and compositions, or if it'll just be LFR that you have to pre-form a group for. The world mobs were a nice enough testbed I guess, but all they really do is scale their health up so that they don't die in seconds.
There's a lot of options, really. Maybe in the future the flex system could replace all normal modes, and heroics could still be tuned to 10/25. Or maybe there coud be 10, 15, 20 and 25 man settings or something, since tuning seems like it'd be easier with increments like that.
Replacing normal with flex would probably kill raiding. You would either have to be Heroic Guild™ or you'd end up with nothing to do most of the time because you killed all the normal mode bosses and you don't want to cut 1/3 to 1/2 your raid out to get to 10. I'm 1/13 (H) and have no illusions about getting Ra-den pre-6.0, what does that leave me with?
It leaves you exactly where you are right now? It's not as though you couldn't keep running 10s under my extremely hypothetical 'flex replaces normal' paradigm.
We wouldn't have been running 10's, though. We would have been taking 11-13 people, possibly more, since it's hard to distinguish between "doesn't want to raid" and "doesn't show up because there's no spot anyways". And then we get our (easier) Lei Shen kill and next week, 3 people get booted for H Jin'rokh attempts. Yeah, nothing like going from guaranteed spot to gtfo to sour people on it.
the real question ultimately is whether their tuning is good enough to offer a compelling experience to groups with granular sizes and compositions, or if it'll just be LFR that you have to pre-form a group for. The world mobs were a nice enough testbed I guess, but all they really do is scale their health up so that they don't die in seconds.
There's a lot of options, really. Maybe in the future the flex system could replace all normal modes, and heroics could still be tuned to 10/25. Or maybe there coud be 10, 15, 20 and 25 man settings or something, since tuning seems like it'd be easier with increments like that.
Replacing normal with flex would probably kill raiding. You would either have to be Heroic Guild™ or you'd end up with nothing to do most of the time because you killed all the normal mode bosses and you don't want to cut 1/3 to 1/2 your raid out to get to 10. I'm 1/13 (H) and have no illusions about getting Ra-den pre-6.0, what does that leave me with?
It leaves you exactly where you are right now? It's not as though you couldn't keep running 10s under my extremely hypothetical 'flex replaces normal' paradigm.
We wouldn't have been running 10's, though. We would have been taking 11-13 people, possibly more, since it's hard to distinguish between "doesn't want to raid" and "doesn't show up because there's no spot anyways". And then we get our (easier) Lei Shen kill and next week, 3 people get booted for H Jin'rokh attempts. Yeah, nothing like going from guaranteed spot to gtfo to sour people on it.
Wait, we always had a bigger pool of raiders than spots, it was understood that people would have to rotate for class balance and buffs and crap for progression. 11-13 seems perfect for a team trying to clear heroic.
At minimum we had a roster of 30 for 25's, there were always a couple people that would be away any given night. Back in Sunwell days we had to have 35+, since you had nonsense like 10 healers for twins, 5 healers for Muru, 97 Priests on whatshisface for Mass Dispel, stack ALL the Shamans for Brutallus, etc. At least they knocked that off, ugh.
Actually, let me put that in somewhat sharper context: Sorry, you can't come heal because we won't have enough dps to beat the enrage timer.
That's been the case for every DPS race encounter I can remember since vanilla; Sit healers until you win. I do have to say, I did feel like a beast the first time I soloed healed HHodir10, I think we brought 3 for 25. Muru was 5, original Patchwork was like 5,
You really should never be running exactly 10 people in a raid team, since it only takes one person's net to drop out, or have a prior engagement and the whole raid is bust. 11-13 is always what you should be running.
the real question ultimately is whether their tuning is good enough to offer a compelling experience to groups with granular sizes and compositions, or if it'll just be LFR that you have to pre-form a group for. The world mobs were a nice enough testbed I guess, but all they really do is scale their health up so that they don't die in seconds.
There's a lot of options, really. Maybe in the future the flex system could replace all normal modes, and heroics could still be tuned to 10/25. Or maybe there coud be 10, 15, 20 and 25 man settings or something, since tuning seems like it'd be easier with increments like that.
Replacing normal with flex would probably kill raiding. You would either have to be Heroic Guild™ or you'd end up with nothing to do most of the time because you killed all the normal mode bosses and you don't want to cut 1/3 to 1/2 your raid out to get to 10. I'm 1/13 (H) and have no illusions about getting Ra-den pre-6.0, what does that leave me with?
It leaves you exactly where you are right now? It's not as though you couldn't keep running 10s under my extremely hypothetical 'flex replaces normal' paradigm.
No, but flex is supposed to be easier than normal. Normals as tuned in Cata/MoP are pretty fucking hard. There used to be the 10m difficulty that was easy in ICC, but having 10m turn into a legit raid size removed that easier organized difficulty. Flex seems designed to bring that back.
in fairness only like five people took damage on the original patchwerk, and not usually at the same time
anyway, I ultimately just don't have a problem with the idea that heroic groups are going to make concessions to group composition, have bench time, etc. The whole reason those encounters are fun is that a lot of thought goes into how to beat them, not just 'bring whatever 11-13 people are available.'
there are limits to that attitude obviously (nobody who raided in sunwell really wants to go back to that model), but buffs and such are proliferated enough (aside from warlock stuff) that it isn't much of an issue
hold your head high soldier, it ain't over yet
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
We wouldn't have been running 10's, though. We would have been taking 11-13 people, possibly more, since it's hard to distinguish between "doesn't want to raid" and "doesn't show up because there's no spot anyways". And then we get our (easier) Lei Shen kill and next week, 3 people get booted for H Jin'rokh attempts. Yeah, nothing like going from guaranteed spot to gtfo to sour people on it.
Wait, we always had a bigger pool of raiders than spots, it was understood that people would have to rotate for class balance and buffs and crap for progression. 11-13 seems perfect for a team trying to clear heroic.
At minimum we had a roster of 30 for 25's, there were always a couple people that would be away any given night. Back in Sunwell days we had to have 35+, since you had nonsense like 10 healers for twins, 5 healers for Muru, 97 Priests on whatshisface for Mass Dispel, stack ALL the Shamans for Brutallus, etc. At least they knocked that off, ugh.
Actually, let me put that in somewhat sharper context: Sorry, you can't come heal because we won't have enough dps to beat the enrage timer.
That's been the case for every DPS race encounter I can remember since vanilla; Sit healers until you win. I do have to say, I did feel like a beast the first time I soloed healed HHodir10, I think we brought 3 for 25. Muru was 5, original Patchwork was like 5,
And that works great if you're in the Heroic Guild™ that did Sunwell when it was current content. I'm not in one of those anymore and I suppose I haven't been since the Icecrown buff got to 20, 25% or so and it became increasingly inexplicable why we weren't making progress on H LK 25. My point is:
1) Heroic guilds will still be relatively small in number. Even a server like Mal'Ganis with hundreds of guilds that raided stuff in T14 can't get two dozen that finished it.
2a) Tuning all fights to support 16 different raid sizes, while still ensuring that players don't turn into defective agents - this is going to be critical for the success of flex raids anyways - is going to be too hard to keep the overall difficulty the same as normal raiding is now, so...
2b) Normal guilds will be facing easier content they'll burn through more quickly, resulting in the same kind of LFR fatigue you get from steamrolling easy fights week after week, after which...
2c) People who were used to getting a spot every week thanks to Flex Raids now have to sit out for heroics, which is a pain and a disincentive to do them in the first place.
in fairness only like five people took damage on the original patchwerk, and not usually at the same time
anyway, I ultimately just don't have a problem with the idea that heroic groups are going to make concessions to group composition, have bench time, etc. The whole reason those encounters are fun is that a lot of thought goes into how to beat them, not just 'bring whatever 11-13 people are available.'
there are limits to that attitude obviously (nobody who raided in sunwell really wants to go back to that model), but buffs and such are proliferated enough (aside from warlock stuff) that it isn't much of an issue
There's a difference between Heroic Guild™ that has two people per spot and Normal Guild that killed the last guy and would like to try a few heroic bosses before the next patch comes out. For every guild that kills all the heroic bosses there's 10 that drop a few of them because it's either that or farming.
Our heroic guild has some 35 or so active raiders (including some apps). Swaps happen after every encounter (or every few pulls on progression) based on fight requirements, strategy we are trying, performance, and who needs loot from boss (people swap out on farm if they don't need loot and aren't needed for the composition).
Yeah, my 10m heroic guild has 13-14 members on our roster. We switch people in and out depending on loot needs, or if we need a certain comp for a certain boss, etc. Everyone's super cool with switching in and out as needed, especially as people are filling in most of their normal mode slots. We did have one dude leave cause he wasn't okay with sitting, but yknow, to each their own I guess.
I mean, I'm a tank, so I pretty much never sit. But, if I ever needed to be sat for some reason (1-tank fight or w/e) I'd totally do it. It's something that just happens in raiding, especially heroic raiding. But yeah, extended roster is totally the way to go. I've been in guilds where we only had 10 people, and it'd only take one person to not show up to mess up our night.
The more I think about it, the more perplexed I am. It sounds more chiefly for people who have more than 10, but less than 25. Yet the difficulty and loot is lower than Normal. I guess I'm just picturing these people being assholes and running with 10, and telling the other 4 to fuck off and run a scenario.
"The sausage of Green Earth explodes with flavor like the cannon of culinary delight."
LFR hurt the community, but flex raiding seems to be a step in the right direction towards making a stronger community IMO.
It's slightly easier than normal with better rewards than LFR. People already do LFR as a guild, this just further incentivizes people to form as a community.
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
Allows you to create your own IF THEN statements that will dynamically change the function of a button.
This addon is intended for people that have a basic understanding of programming. Specifically conditional If-Then statements.
The addon allows you to write your own if-then statements that will be evaluated and run whenever you press a button, or they can trigger on certain events ingame.
It provides a simple text editor, a fully documented API and some simple If-Then syntax so that you can string together almost anything you want to react to.
Examples:
IF HasOpenQuest("My daily fishing quest") AND InZone("Stormwind")
THEN Cast("Fishing");
OnEvent("GroupInvite") AND InLFGQueue()
THEN DeclineInvite() AND Reply("Sorry, I am already in the LFG queue");
Mods aren't allowed to use anything besides the macro system to cast spells so that mod won't do anything extra. You can do conditionals in macros all you want for doing things that aren't gated on being in combat, such as chatting and whatnot.
0
Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
Wow, I actually beat Hexos. That was crazy. I must have been lagging last time because the maze was much easier (or maybe I wasn't looking at the right focal point). Also, /castsequence macros are FTW. Inefficient, but I can't consentrate on proper rotation while I am spinning my camera like a madman
Stance 0 is non-stealth.
Stance 1 is stealth.
Stance 2 is vanish.
Stance 3 is Shadowdance.
So when I'm not stealthed, vanished, or shadowdancing, my rogue will use backstab when I hold shift and hemorrhage when I don't.
If I am stealthed, vanished, or shadowdancing, my rogue will use cheap shot when I push shift, he'll also cast pick pocket and premeditation. If I don't push shift, he'll just use ambush.
Pickpocket and premeditation do not use the global cooldown, so I can toss them in anywhere, but I like to have them on shift, so I can better control when I use them. Since I have the subterfuge talent, I stay in stealth for 3 seconds after it's broken, so I can open with cheap shot (or garrote if I change it), then ambush. Once stealth is over, I immediately switch to hemorrhaging unless I hold shift and get behind the target. If I want to preemptively use premed to get a 2 point slice and dice before breaking stealth, I just stay out of melee range, hold shift, push the hotkey, then cast SnD, then open.
So it's a very useful macro and I can do six different abilities with one keybind, plus a modifier. Saves a lot of space. Pretty much everything I have is on a modifier, especially buttons I don't want to waste or accidentally hit.
I'm not sure how in date this is, but it's a start for what other classes have stances/forms: http://www.wowwiki.com/Stance
I think, other classes may have a stance or two they can macro into modifiers, but I'm really not sure. I don't play too many classes, so you'd have to look that up.
From what I know, only a few things work for one button macros. The first two are the button and stance modifiers. Then there are target mods. Another is a cast sequence macro, which works great for things you want to cast in order.
Here is a great way to use cloak, then vanish before your are hit with something that could pull you out, like a bleed:
/castsequence reset=60 Cloak of Shadows, Vanish
This will always cloak on the first press, then vanish on the second. After 60 seconds, it will reset. I put in 60, because cloak's cooldown is 60 seconds and vanish is 120 seconds. So if I only want to cloak, I just hit it once, then leave it alone. If I want to vanish, say 30 seconds later, I push it again. Or, I can press it twice fast and remove all dots and reenter stealth.
This is what I use for stealth:
#showtooltip
/cast [nocombat] Stealth; Vanish
It uses combat as a modifier. If I'm not in combat, it will stealth, if I am, it will vanish. If I am stealthed and hit it, it will remove stealth. Great macro. You could even add a button modifier to it.
Here is another macro with a few modifiers in it that I use a lot:
This one will blind my focus target, if I have one. If there is no focus target, or my focus is dead, it will just blind my current target. If I do have a focus, but want to blind my current target, I hold shift to blind my current target. I could also add a mouse over modifier, so that I will blind what my mouse is over when I hold shift, like this:
Mouseover macros are great for ranged abilities. I use it a lot for things like Strangulate and blind or other ranged CC's.
You can also toss is harm and help modifiers. Like if you want to have shadow word pain and renew on the same button, but I'm not very good with caster and healer macros, but I did find this one while searching for ya and what it does:
This macro casts either Renew (friendly) or Shadow Word: Pain (hostile) on whoever is hovering under your mouse that exists and is not dead. If you're not hovering, it does either Renew (friendly) or Shadow Word: Pain (hostile) on your selected target that is not dead. If all of the above are false, you will Renew yourself.
I've made more than a few macros. The best way to test them, that I've found, is to go to the arenas that exist in the world. Like Nagrand or the Gurabashi arena or any of the other open world areas that allow full pvp, even between the same faction. Usually, you invite two people and they group up against you and you test them out in different scenarios. Target dummies also work, and duels, but not as well. Easier though.
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
Wow, I actually beat Hexos. That was crazy. I must have been lagging last time because the maze was much easier (or maybe I wasn't looking at the right focal point). Also, /castsequence macros are FTW. Inefficient, but I can't consentrate on proper rotation while I am spinning my camera like a madman
See, I'd try doing that, but I'm not entirely sure how it'd work out with Energy. I mean, I guess I could monitor my Energy/Chi instead of mashing the button, though.
Either way, I think I might give that a go and see what happens. Thanks for the tip!
Battle.net Tag: Dibby#1582
0
Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
edited June 2013
So I am now rank 9. The other three guys are a complete joke compared to Hexos. Wiped a few times on the last fire guy because the hit detection on that stupid water robot is really, really poor. But once I got it right I got him no problem.
Edit: And I don't know what the monk rotation is exactly, but it was fine for my Rogue with energy. If my energy was too low I couldn't hit the button. But it was basically no different than hitting mutilate over and over - once I get enough energy back it uses the ability and continues the cast sequence.
I almost hit the enrage but my gear is pretty decent and I popped some cooldowns right at the end.
Oh yeah, if any of you folks with hordies that moved to Zul'jin recently want an invite to a level 25 guild to just get the perks for while you look for a 'real' guild, hit up me or @bigity with a PM or something and we can get you invited into my personal bank guild.
Bank tabs are all locked up though, since it's also my own personal bank, that I share a bit. :P
Just keep in mind the "not a 'real' guild" part; we just use it for perks and since the few of us don't have any real need for an actual guild atm.
Destro also gets the largest benefit from Soul Leech. Some warlock (forget who) actually soloed Heroic25 LK because of Soul Leech. The absorb never fell off of their Voidlord. Kinda nuts.
I think Twinbraid/Bloodhilt got nerfed, last time I went to help somebody kill them they were at 20 mil or so health. Still, not exactly quick if you're soloing.
Mage question: Looking at going from frost to fire on my mage. From what I've been reading, I want to be at least 35% (buffed) crit before I even try, correct? So that pretty much cuts out swapping while stuck in LFR gear it seems.
Allows you to create your own IF THEN statements that will dynamically change the function of a button.
This addon is intended for people that have a basic understanding of programming. Specifically conditional If-Then statements.
The addon allows you to write your own if-then statements that will be evaluated and run whenever you press a button, or they can trigger on certain events ingame.
It provides a simple text editor, a fully documented API and some simple If-Then syntax so that you can string together almost anything you want to react to.
Examples:
IF HasOpenQuest("My daily fishing quest") AND InZone("Stormwind")
THEN Cast("Fishing");
OnEvent("GroupInvite") AND InLFGQueue()
THEN DeclineInvite() AND Reply("Sorry, I am already in the LFG queue");
the API blocks multiple user-initiated events in macros; that's why /castsequence needs to exist, rather than the macro structure just being '/cast x, /cast y, etc.' Macros also cannot be rewritten in combat.
hold your head high soldier, it ain't over yet
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
I wonder if they'll ever do something different with having to gem and enchant again every time you get a slightly better version of the same item. When I last raided I was on a low-pop server so admittedly everything was insanely overpriced, and the guild helped out to some degree, but ugh. And the GC party line saying that heroic raiders don't NEED to do everything/run every possible lockout available to them is silly. If the opportunity is there, and you can upgrade your gear even if it's not BiS, you're going to do it. So now not only is there LFR, normal, heroic and thunderforged or whatever, but yet another tier wedged in between there? Please. That confusion of gear is another thing that made me super-frustrated with the whole process and not want to deal with any of it anymore. Instead of getting simpler, they make it increasingly complicated?
Oh also the fact that it's using the LFR loot system. A lot of the fun of those old "let's run some alts through Kara" after-hours drunk-on-Vent type guild runs was getting someone ALL THE GEAR. Not here though.
I totally agree with you on the gear thing. Here's my basic checklist if I get gloves or something:
I have to cut gems and socket them.
I have to enchant the item.
I have to put my engineering tinker on it.
I have to reforge it.
Add a belt buckle if it's a belt.
I have to spend valor to upgrade it.
I choose to transmogrify it.
All of that requires at least two of my characters, and like 10-15 minutes of logging in/out, getting the mats, running around, etc. I mean, it's still satisfying to get the item ready to go, but I can see the point.
The flex raid is really a bad ideaif they want people to learn the raid fights they should make the lfr have them. SO like 25 people fighting the boss built for 20 people
The flex raid is really a bad ideaif they want people to learn the raid fights they should make the lfr have them. SO like 25 people fighting the boss built for 20 people
somebody doesn't remember will, elegon, or garalon LFRs.
I totally agree with you on the gear thing. Here's my basic checklist if I get gloves or something:
I have to cut gems and socket them.
I have to enchant the item.
I have to put my engineering tinker on it.
I have to reforge it.
Add a belt buckle if it's a belt.
I have to spend valor to upgrade it.
I choose to transmogrify it.
All of that requires at least two of my characters, and like 10-15 minutes of logging in/out, getting the mats, running around, etc. I mean, it's still satisfying to get the item ready to go, but I can see the point.
you forgot about reforging/gemming some other items if the upgrade puts you over a cap or breakpoint
The flex raid is really a bad ideaif they want people to learn the raid fights they should make the lfr have them. SO like 25 people fighting the boss built for 20 people
somebody doesn't remember will, elegon, or garalon LFRs.
Someone has not seen before it was faction tagged a 40 man Sha kill
Posts
Replacing normal with flex would probably kill raiding. You would either have to be Heroic Guild™ or you'd end up with nothing to do most of the time because you killed all the normal mode bosses and you don't want to cut 1/3 to 1/2 your raid out to get to 10. I'm 1/13 (H) and have no illusions about getting Ra-den pre-6.0, what does that leave me with?
Think about it, how have we seen raiding trends change?
20 man raid at Zul'Gurub in Vanilla was a test for smaller raid groups which led to 25 man raiding in BC
10 man raid at Karazhan in BC was a test which led to 10 man raiding in WOTLK
"Hardmode" activation in early WOTLK led to specific Heroic/Normal Toggles in late WOTLK
LFR raid at Dragon Soul in Cata which led to LFR for every raid in MOP
With the new tech, elite scaling, gear scaling, personal loot, and now a scaling raid? The deck has been stacked.
It leaves you exactly where you are right now? It's not as though you couldn't keep running 10s under my extremely hypothetical 'flex replaces normal' paradigm.
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
We wouldn't have been running 10's, though. We would have been taking 11-13 people, possibly more, since it's hard to distinguish between "doesn't want to raid" and "doesn't show up because there's no spot anyways". And then we get our (easier) Lei Shen kill and next week, 3 people get booted for H Jin'rokh attempts. Yeah, nothing like going from guaranteed spot to gtfo to sour people on it.
Wait, we always had a bigger pool of raiders than spots, it was understood that people would have to rotate for class balance and buffs and crap for progression. 11-13 seems perfect for a team trying to clear heroic.
At minimum we had a roster of 30 for 25's, there were always a couple people that would be away any given night. Back in Sunwell days we had to have 35+, since you had nonsense like 10 healers for twins, 5 healers for Muru, 97 Priests on whatshisface for Mass Dispel, stack ALL the Shamans for Brutallus, etc. At least they knocked that off, ugh.
That's been the case for every DPS race encounter I can remember since vanilla; Sit healers until you win. I do have to say, I did feel like a beast the first time I soloed healed HHodir10, I think we brought 3 for 25. Muru was 5, original Patchwork was like 5,
No, but flex is supposed to be easier than normal. Normals as tuned in Cata/MoP are pretty fucking hard. There used to be the 10m difficulty that was easy in ICC, but having 10m turn into a legit raid size removed that easier organized difficulty. Flex seems designed to bring that back.
anyway, I ultimately just don't have a problem with the idea that heroic groups are going to make concessions to group composition, have bench time, etc. The whole reason those encounters are fun is that a lot of thought goes into how to beat them, not just 'bring whatever 11-13 people are available.'
there are limits to that attitude obviously (nobody who raided in sunwell really wants to go back to that model), but buffs and such are proliferated enough (aside from warlock stuff) that it isn't much of an issue
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
And that works great if you're in the Heroic Guild™ that did Sunwell when it was current content. I'm not in one of those anymore and I suppose I haven't been since the Icecrown buff got to 20, 25% or so and it became increasingly inexplicable why we weren't making progress on H LK 25. My point is:
1) Heroic guilds will still be relatively small in number. Even a server like Mal'Ganis with hundreds of guilds that raided stuff in T14 can't get two dozen that finished it.
2a) Tuning all fights to support 16 different raid sizes, while still ensuring that players don't turn into defective agents - this is going to be critical for the success of flex raids anyways - is going to be too hard to keep the overall difficulty the same as normal raiding is now, so...
2b) Normal guilds will be facing easier content they'll burn through more quickly, resulting in the same kind of LFR fatigue you get from steamrolling easy fights week after week, after which...
2c) People who were used to getting a spot every week thanks to Flex Raids now have to sit out for heroics, which is a pain and a disincentive to do them in the first place.
There's a difference between Heroic Guild™ that has two people per spot and Normal Guild that killed the last guy and would like to try a few heroic bosses before the next patch comes out. For every guild that kills all the heroic bosses there's 10 that drop a few of them because it's either that or farming.
I mean, I'm a tank, so I pretty much never sit. But, if I ever needed to be sat for some reason (1-tank fight or w/e) I'd totally do it. It's something that just happens in raiding, especially heroic raiding. But yeah, extended roster is totally the way to go. I've been in guilds where we only had 10 people, and it'd only take one person to not show up to mess up our night.
Battle.net Tag: Dibby#1582
LFR hurt the community, but flex raiding seems to be a step in the right direction towards making a stronger community IMO.
It's slightly easier than normal with better rewards than LFR. People already do LFR as a guild, this just further incentivizes people to form as a community.
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
Pretty much limited to warriors, rogues, Druids, I think DK's and a couple other classes can benefit from it.
It's one button that can do about six different things. I'm on my phone, so I'll share it later.
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
Stance 0 is non-stealth.
Stance 1 is stealth.
Stance 2 is vanish.
Stance 3 is Shadowdance.
So when I'm not stealthed, vanished, or shadowdancing, my rogue will use backstab when I hold shift and hemorrhage when I don't.
If I am stealthed, vanished, or shadowdancing, my rogue will use cheap shot when I push shift, he'll also cast pick pocket and premeditation. If I don't push shift, he'll just use ambush.
Pickpocket and premeditation do not use the global cooldown, so I can toss them in anywhere, but I like to have them on shift, so I can better control when I use them. Since I have the subterfuge talent, I stay in stealth for 3 seconds after it's broken, so I can open with cheap shot (or garrote if I change it), then ambush. Once stealth is over, I immediately switch to hemorrhaging unless I hold shift and get behind the target. If I want to preemptively use premed to get a 2 point slice and dice before breaking stealth, I just stay out of melee range, hold shift, push the hotkey, then cast SnD, then open.
So it's a very useful macro and I can do six different abilities with one keybind, plus a modifier. Saves a lot of space. Pretty much everything I have is on a modifier, especially buttons I don't want to waste or accidentally hit.
I'm not sure how in date this is, but it's a start for what other classes have stances/forms: http://www.wowwiki.com/Stance
I think, other classes may have a stance or two they can macro into modifiers, but I'm really not sure. I don't play too many classes, so you'd have to look that up.
From what I know, only a few things work for one button macros. The first two are the button and stance modifiers. Then there are target mods. Another is a cast sequence macro, which works great for things you want to cast in order.
Here is a great way to use cloak, then vanish before your are hit with something that could pull you out, like a bleed:
This will always cloak on the first press, then vanish on the second. After 60 seconds, it will reset. I put in 60, because cloak's cooldown is 60 seconds and vanish is 120 seconds. So if I only want to cloak, I just hit it once, then leave it alone. If I want to vanish, say 30 seconds later, I push it again. Or, I can press it twice fast and remove all dots and reenter stealth.
This is what I use for stealth:
It uses combat as a modifier. If I'm not in combat, it will stealth, if I am, it will vanish. If I am stealthed and hit it, it will remove stealth. Great macro. You could even add a button modifier to it.
Here is another macro with a few modifiers in it that I use a lot:
This one will blind my focus target, if I have one. If there is no focus target, or my focus is dead, it will just blind my current target. If I do have a focus, but want to blind my current target, I hold shift to blind my current target. I could also add a mouse over modifier, so that I will blind what my mouse is over when I hold shift, like this:
Mouseover macros are great for ranged abilities. I use it a lot for things like Strangulate and blind or other ranged CC's.
You can also toss is harm and help modifiers. Like if you want to have shadow word pain and renew on the same button, but I'm not very good with caster and healer macros, but I did find this one while searching for ya and what it does:
This macro casts either Renew (friendly) or Shadow Word: Pain (hostile) on whoever is hovering under your mouse that exists and is not dead. If you're not hovering, it does either Renew (friendly) or Shadow Word: Pain (hostile) on your selected target that is not dead. If all of the above are false, you will Renew yourself.
I've made more than a few macros. The best way to test them, that I've found, is to go to the arenas that exist in the world. Like Nagrand or the Gurabashi arena or any of the other open world areas that allow full pvp, even between the same faction. Usually, you invite two people and they group up against you and you test them out in different scenarios. Target dummies also work, and duels, but not as well. Easier though.
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
See, I'd try doing that, but I'm not entirely sure how it'd work out with Energy. I mean, I guess I could monitor my Energy/Chi instead of mashing the button, though.
Either way, I think I might give that a go and see what happens. Thanks for the tip!
Battle.net Tag: Dibby#1582
Edit: And I don't know what the monk rotation is exactly, but it was fine for my Rogue with energy. If my energy was too low I couldn't hit the button. But it was basically no different than hitting mutilate over and over - once I get enough energy back it uses the ability and continues the cast sequence.
I almost hit the enrage but my gear is pretty decent and I popped some cooldowns right at the end.
I keep seeing warlocks soloing them and I'm just wondering if they're good/well equipped, or if it's not that hard with them?
EDIT: one drawback to a populated server I guess, can't find any of these guys around, scouts or warbringers.
I suppose it is midday saturday though.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
Bank tabs are all locked up though, since it's also my own personal bank, that I share a bit. :P
Just keep in mind the "not a 'real' guild" part; we just use it for perks and since the few of us don't have any real need for an actual guild atm.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
I've been able to solo almost anything on my warlock that I can't on other classes with higher ilevel.
I soloed the one guy in the 5.1 legendary quest line.
Battle.net Tag: Dibby#1582
Mage question: Looking at going from frost to fire on my mage. From what I've been reading, I want to be at least 35% (buffed) crit before I even try, correct? So that pretty much cuts out swapping while stuck in LFR gear it seems.
the API blocks multiple user-initiated events in macros; that's why /castsequence needs to exist, rather than the macro structure just being '/cast x, /cast y, etc.' Macros also cannot be rewritten in combat.
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
I have a couple characters on Alliance Stormrage and I like chatting with PA folks.
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
Oh also the fact that it's using the LFR loot system. A lot of the fun of those old "let's run some alts through Kara" after-hours drunk-on-Vent type guild runs was getting someone ALL THE GEAR. Not here though.
I have to cut gems and socket them.
I have to enchant the item.
I have to put my engineering tinker on it.
I have to reforge it.
Add a belt buckle if it's a belt.
I have to spend valor to upgrade it.
I choose to transmogrify it.
All of that requires at least two of my characters, and like 10-15 minutes of logging in/out, getting the mats, running around, etc. I mean, it's still satisfying to get the item ready to go, but I can see the point.
somebody doesn't remember will, elegon, or garalon LFRs.
you forgot about reforging/gemming some other items if the upgrade puts you over a cap or breakpoint
Someone has not seen before it was faction tagged a 40 man Sha kill
my server!
There is also a grand ritual of 5 horde there