Just read an excellent post at WorldOfMatticus. Thespius talks about clueless raiders, the lack of challenges in current heroic content and similar issues. Thespius and I share many views, just based on this post alone, because we both seem to believe that there is A Specific Way to Do Things. That is, the Right Way. The way that isn’t AOEing things down as a first strategy, the way that encourages us to use our abilities to counter boss abilities.
It boils down to strategic use of our abilities.
For example, if I’m on Putricide and I’m targetted by the green ooze and DPS isn’t killing it fast enough, I could bubble.
But I don’t bubble.
Why don’t I bubble?
Because I want to make perfectly sure that, around the 7m45s-8m mark of the fight, my bubble is back up, so I can cast Divine Sacrifice as a raid-wide 20% damage mitigator, without incurring any extra damage to myself. I hit it after the other pally does, so roughly when our second tank takes his third mark. Not only does that keep me alive, which is good, because I’m healing the crap out of the tanks, but it also helps reduce the healing needed across the raid.
This is a strategic use of my abilities.
And Thespius seems to be a fan of that sort of method. I can’t stand brute-forcing encounters (like the way we do twins, or the really dumb way we’ve chosen to try to do heroic Anub’arak on 25), so I really liked the post, which detailed a few of the ways I think easier heroics are bad.
That said, as someone with 4 80s and a 78, I am grateful for the shorter length of regular instances and heroics. But I’m sad that the only way I’m challenged is if someone else screws up or decides to pull an entire room. (Yes, Majik, I’m talking to you. ;))
In particular, the following paragraph resonated strongly with me, so I’ll leave you with this to think on (emphasis mine):
Regardless if you’re a completely new player, or just levelling an alt, I fear that we’re starting to lose the building blocks to being a good raider to the ease of too much convenience. (Sidenote: Notice I said “too much”. I’m all for crafting the game so everyone has a shot, but there is a point when it goes too far. I don’t want to go back to the days of needing to run alts through Karazhan to begin the gearing process for Black Temple.)