This week, Blizzard announced some pretty shocking news, they plan on “staggering” the releases of the raids in the first tier of Mists of Pandaria. In fact, they plan on not even having the first raid, Mogu’shan Vaults available until a second week of the expansion, and then the other two, Heart of Fear and Terrace of Endless Spring will be released about a month after. As normal when change comes to World of Warcraft, players have been voicing their opinions, both in support and against this change. So, this week I decided to talk about what this change can bring both positively and negatively to the game.
First of all, I love the idea of releasing the raids at different times. Doing so helps players stay more interested in the content for longer. Sure players will still be sick of running Mogu’shan Vaults by the time patch 5.1 comes, but Heart of Fear and Terrace of Endless Spring will still be somewhat entertaining. Having these two raids release will keep people logging in for current content for a little bit of a longer period.
I also like staggering the release of raids is, if done correctly, it can make the story of all the raids seem connected. Similar to how some dungeons work, players will kill the last boss in Mogu’shan Vaults, and something will happen that will tell them that there work is not done and they are needed in Heart of Fear. Personally, I just think having raids lead up to each other like that is an awesome idea.
Finally, having the raids released later means that Blizzard can tune these encounters to be a bit more difficult, since they can assume that players have been running the other raid for a month. This means that Blizzard can hopefully have the encounters get a little more difficult after each fight, making the sense of progression through this tier feel better the most others have.
Having the second two raids release a month after the first doesn’t seem to be the issue with most people. Many people have been complaining about the fact that Mogu’shan Vaults will not be available the first week of Mists of Pandaria. I can seen how some people are upset with this. One of the most exciting times of a tier is having players race in and strive for the worlds first kills. Having people wait a week makes the race feel a little less exciting. On the other hand, there are a lot more players that often feel rushed into raiding, even by guilds that are not going for the worlds first. If raids were available first week many players would not be able to experience all the new features of Mists of Pandaria. Though some of the top end players are upset by this, I feel that it is the right choice, as it will probably make the game more enjoyable for a much larger number of people.
Mists of Pandaria is an expansion that is changing so much of World of Warcraft. The idea of staggering raids between tiers is just the newest change that Blizzard has decided to make to the game. Whether you agree with this change or not, it will still be interesting to see how this change actually affects the game once Mists of Pandaria goes live.
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