3.1 = No more Glory of the Raider Mounts

[Horacio]

There are going to be alot of yelling angry raid leaders/GM's/officers over the course of the next few weeks lol.

The most true and incontrovertable statement in this thread.

The fact that there are always going to be things I cannot attain unless I devote more time to Wow is fine by me because when I do, when I am able to track those things down, they will be more special, more worthwhile.

I probably won't get a drake from the achievement. I'm going to push like hell to get it but I don't see it happening. /shrug, its not the only drake in the game....I got a bronze right when I first heard about them, when it was tough in blues and a few crappy epics. I have a red one and the ugly ass Albino one and a nether drake too. All things I worked for and am happy to have.

Frankly, the line has moved significantly between what is attainable and what is not and heavily in the favor of a broader, more casual audience. All that's left is fancy titles, vanity items and time.

[Lexxaa]

i think its a good idea personally, the mounts are representative of an achievement achieved at the appropriate gear level. as with the za bear mount, they have learnt from past experiences. id imagine the people that had bear mounts before sunwell came out would be few and far between.

although its frustrating having immortal as the last heroic raid achievement - very... frustrating...

[kolben]

I think it's kind of silly, but I don't think it has anything to do with patting raiders on the back for being good. It's a lot more likely in my jaded opinion that they don't want geared Ulduar25 guilds taking terrible casual horribads like myself through the achievement for say, 25K gold in payment. Which is what was happening with ZA mounts for many months prior to it getting yanked out in 3.0.

[Kerchunk]

With the exception that if you were in Ulduar 25 gear you'd probably breeze throught he naxx achievements with much issue.

That logic is backwards. If you're in Ulduar 25, you probably ALREADY breezed through Naxx meaning you more than likely already have the achievements in question.

This change seems... pointless and silly.

[Petninja]

I think it's kind of silly, but I don't think it has anything to do with patting raiders on the back for being good. It's a lot more likely in my jaded opinion that they don't want geared Ulduar25 guilds taking terrible casual horribads like myself through the achievement for say, 25K gold in payment. Which is what was happening with ZA mounts for many months prior to it getting yanked out in 3.0.

Aye, Forgotten Heroes (#1 on server) was charging people 10k every reset, starting the week they announced it was going away in 3.0, and I think they ran a couple groups at a time. It's beyond me why people would pay so much for such an ugly mount.

Anyway, they said they are putting a similar thing in Ulduar, so even the people who missed this time around have a chance next time . I think at this point the only two epeens that are worth flashing are Zerglings and Scarab Lord anyway.

[Darksend]

Aye, Forgotten Heroes (#1 on server) was charging people 10k every reset, starting the week they announced it was going away in 3.0, and I think they ran a couple groups at a time. It's beyond me why people would pay so much for such an ugly mount.

dam right we did

we made me like 20k gold in a month off bears

[Caulle]

You need to look at it more as a parallel to the Arena 310 Drakes.

They are awarded to those that complete the top of the top in PVE during a particular "Season" to those that have the coordination, skills, willing to put the time and practice in and obtain the gear to obtain them. Likely w After the "Season" ends and the new PVE content is released, a new set of drakes become available for those that do it in the next season.

This. It's the best thing to compare it to right now. I never got an arena drake because I never spent enough time in arenas. I did my 10 games each week casually, and that was it. I've got my 10 and 25 man proto drakes however because I worked my butt off to get all the achievements needed.

[Rowland]

The Arena drake comparison makes the most sense to me also. However if Blizzards reasoning behind it is they don't want us to blow through earlier content with better gear to obtain novelty items, such as the Amani War Bear change and now this, then to be truly fair they need to remove all mount rewards prior also correct? Goodbye Skadi's mount, Malys, Sarth's, Culling timed runs etc.
Also is the mount from ZG still available? Tiger or Raptor or whatever it was, wouldn't make sense to have removed that along time ago? Who knows what Blizzard thinks half the time with their spur of the moment decisions /shrug

-Rowland

[Ciderhelm]

The Arena drake comparison makes the most sense to me also. However if Blizzards reasoning behind it is they don't want us to blow through earlier content with better gear to obtain novelty items, such as the Amani War Bear change and now this, then to be truly fair they need to remove all mount rewards prior also correct? Goodbye Skadi's mount, Malys, Sarth's, Culling timed runs etc.
Also is the mount from ZG still available? Tiger or Raptor or whatever it was, wouldn't make sense to have removed that along time ago? Who knows what Blizzard thinks half the time with their spur of the moment decisions /shrug

-Rowland

There is an order of magnitude difference between the effort involved for these mounts. You can also bet that the decision for this (though not the Amani bear) was made specifically bceause they don't want easily obtainable 310% mounts.

[Rowland]

And thats exactly how close I'll ever be to an achievement drake, I didn't realize they are 310% increases. I thought the only 310's were the Arena season rewards, and that was to encourage and promote arena with something other than a reward reskin that could be obtained in PvE.

Hopefully they keep some kind of reward with completing the achievement although not as powerful, maybe each "season" they should phase out the previous item rewards and include a gradually lower item reward. It woudl still give the slower guilds something to shoot for, "well guys we didn't get it this time, lets shoot for next season".

-Rowland

[kolben]

There really is no point in removing the old mounts, since they required no e-peen to get really even when the places they dropped from were current content. Baron Rivendare's, Tiger Boss, Bloodlord, flight form boss, Al'ar, 5-man Kael'thas, those are all a factor of pure luck with tiny drop rates.

The 310% speed may be something they want to guard. I see it as more being something they want to make unfarmable for those who did not complete the achievement on current gear. If it is the PVE equivalent of a Gladiator mount, then this is the only way to do it that would not be easily exploited and have the achievement carry any meaning at all.

[Kataztrophe]

I agree with Blizz's decision to drop the mounts in 3.1.

I also think they should take out the ability to gain the Twilight Vanq and Nightfall titles in 3.1 as well.

[Krete]

My only beef with this is that someone like me never had a shot at this to begin with. We were super excited that there was going to be a 10man path for all the content in Wrath. Our core 10man has been together for over a year and none of us had any interest in adding new people into what we had just to see the same fights with more people at a time. We even lost a few (my own sister lol) to more "hardcore" guilds on the 25 man path. We have a few of the achievements left, but the one that we're not too hopeful about is "You don't have an eternity" and Sarth3D. Aside from KT drops and some BoE gear, we're solely geared in ilvl 200 gear.

Its mainly principle to me. It comes down to 2 points, Blizz had stated that Sarth3d 10 was not tuned to be done by groups decked out in gear available on the 10 man path currently. Some will say that its not impossible to do with current 10man gear only, but it is very improbable for most guilds my size with limited group comps. We're not "bads" or whatever, quite the opposite, so it is frustrating that through poor planning on Blizzard's part we will not be able to fully complete our progression path. For some reason it is not ok for us to go into Ulduar, gear up in ilvl 213-226 gear, and come back and finish that tier of content (which is what Blizz said you'd have to do in a 10man only guild), but it is ok for 25 man guilds to gear up in ilvl 213-226 gear and complete the 10man tier. I realize that stat allocation will probably be better in T8, but I think my point is still valid.

I'm sure if we wanted to, we could PUG Naxx25 instead of doing our own runs, but that's not what we enjoy. We should be able to progress through the content AND accomplish the achievements tied to that difficulty level completely independent of the 25man path. I'm not going to quit playing over it, but I do feel shafted a bit and I hope that 3.1 brings a more true separation of the paths.

[bludwork]

I don't even know why glory of the raider gives a 310% speed mount. Achievements just suck in general. What I really want is a mini patchwerk when I do his achievement.. and a mini 4 horsemen when I do that too; pretty much a mini everything for every dumb achievement they put in the game.

[demoniclizard]

i really think blizzard hit the nail on the head with the sartharion encounter, the same fight that can be approached in ways for added difficulty

casual raiders can still experience the content, but harcores can step it up to get the titles and wave their epeen or whatever, casuals qqing about not being able to get the most hardcore achievements...seriously...there has to be something for the more dedicated players to bang their head against in this game, you have an entire raid instance, as well as all the other single boss instances that have easy modes, and we got this ONE encounter to wipe on every night

and i am fully confident that a group of skilled, capable players, can do the fight with 10 man gear. The difference between tiers is really not that large, sarth 3d is all about each players personal responsibility and strategy execution, gear or not, you must have 10 people do everything they are supposed to do perfectly, or you will wipe. The dps check is only on tenebron, and believe me it is not a hard goal to meet

the difficulty most guilds have is in the transition between shadron and vesperon, and dealing with adds + twilight torment. 25s is a test of coordination of cooldown abilities on the MT, but is not so much in 10

[Darksend]

I don't even know why glory of the raider gives a 310% speed mount. Achievements just suck in general. What I really want is a mini patchwerk when I do his achievement.. and a mini 4 horsemen when I do that too; pretty much a mini everything for every dumb achievement they put in the game.

because there was a grand total of ONE 310 mount available to raiders, the TK mount

pvpers had 4 seasons of them

[Armstrong]

On a semi-related note, I'm very surprised they haven't removed the ability to acquire both Thunderfury and Hand of Rag from the game yet as well as the War Glaives and the Bow.

Probably because those items rely on very rare, random drops from instances that are on a 7-day reset timer (i.e. can't be farmed repeatedly). This is also the case for the mounts from ZG / Kara / TK, although Baron Rivendare's mount makes for an interesting exception.

Comparatively, the ZA bear and the Glory of the Raider mount are 100% guaranteed to "drop" so there's no time investment obstacle for an over-geared group who walks in and overpowers the encounter.

One interesting question is whether they will eventually remove the 100% drop mount that drops from Sartharion +3. The fact that it's on a 7-day timer makes it less farmable than the ZA bear would have been so that may be enough for Blizzard to leave it in. We'll see.

[Alent]

I'd still like to see a gearcheck added so that they could just leave it in and slow groups could have a shot at it.

Hell, I'd be happy with them downgrading the mount speed in 3.1. People who already got theirs could keep the 310%. the rest of us could get the normal epic flier speed versions.

[Krete]

Just because we're on a 10man only raid path doesn't make us casual. I know why that stereotype is there, but it doesn't apply to us. The mounts (to me) were symbols of completing a tier of content. If it was never meant to be done with the gear available in 10 man raids then there should've never been a 10 man version of Glory of the Raider, or the mount should've been 280 and all requirements of the meta should've been doable with appropriate gear. Like I said in my other post, I just hope they don't do this with the Ulduar achievement.

We shouldn't be forced to play the game in a manner we don't enjoy (25man raiding) to complete content AND achievements tied to that content. They fixed the content portion in WotLK for us, but the 10 man acheivements for maly and sarth3d really frustrate me. Sure, they're mathematically possible with 10man gear only, but to a small guild with limited group comp it might as well be impossible.

[Nicki]

Im a bit concerned this must be annoying to people who lack 'the immortal' or the dedicated few.

Because those are time constraints. My new guild canceled their wednesday immortal attempt because of lag only to come back on thursday and have 3 people DC in one encounter.

Thats not a test of skill thats a test of luck...

How many other guilds won't get glory of the raider because blizzard's stability is low?