I recently posted this on the offical WoW Forums but it was quickly buried by new posts so I figured I would post it here and see what kind of response I get.

First let me start by saying if this has been brought up before I apologize in advance for a duplicate thread.

In a recent post put out by GhostCrawler (http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/2053469) he made mention to Blizzard having given thought to the idea of tiered dungeons beyond the standard Normal/Heroic difficulties currently present in the game.

"Second, there are only a few level-85 normal dungeons. For a level-85 player who isn’t ready for Heroics but wants to run dungeons, these can get old pretty quickly. Perhaps another way to handle it would have been to have introductory Heroics and harder Heroics. We’ve also flirted with having three difficulty levels before, but that does add an extra level of content to develop and complexity to explain."

The issue stated above is the concern for (I assume) the cost of development and complexity involved with implementing such a system. After giving it a little thought I feel I might have come up with a potential solution which could alleviate some of those concerns.

In the current system the difference between a normal and heroic dungeon is two fold. The first and most obvious is the increase in both mob hit points and damage output. The second and probably the one which creates the true difference in difficulty are the new mechanics introduced during boss encounters. In my experience the latter more often than not is the difference between a wipe and a clear. I personally find the new mechanics provided to be a breath of fresh air because in a way they allow Blizzard to (almost) double the available dungeon/raid content by providing a different experience for the player. And this is where I find the pontential to introduce a more layered dungeon/raid experience as stated by GC.

What if both Normal and Heroic dungeon were available in a standard and hard-mode version. In a standard version all dungeons and raids would be exactly as they are today, which the major difference between the two being the more difficult mechanics of a Heroic. However the hard-mode versions would simply up the anty by increasing the HP pools and damage output of the mobs and in return provide an increased drop rate of loot (albiet of the same quality available in the standard version) along with appropriately scaled reputation gains per kill.

I feel with a system like that which I present above it would gradually along players to get accustomed to the content while offering greater reward (or rather increased reward) for greater risk involed, in this case players would have to be able outlast the HP and damage output of the mobs rather than new mechanics with appropriate gear. This would also not require much investment from a development stand point as it does not require new content but rather adjustments to current content.

Ok I think I have gone on for long enough. Tell me what you think and would you be behind a system such as this or something like it. Thank you.

 

it's...not WoW. the change would be too dramatic for the game. it'd simply stop being WoW.

it'd probably be easier to create a WoW2 from ground up with a dynamic PvE content of this magnitude.

balancing would be unreachable, making the 'easiest' number per boss to be the most commonly done. it wont provide flexibility, it'll provide inbalance. which will quickly turn into rigidity.

Selfish bump to hopefully stir some more opinions on this topic.

they already changed it a while ago by adding heroic content apart from normal.

I dont see use atm for another mode so that you can run that content once again!

Rehashing content is something Blizzard are getting into the habit of doing and i find it pretty pathetic that they cant just create new content.

With that said i think the majority of the WoW dev team have a bigger project to be working on currently named as "Titan" rather than making new heroic content for a 6 year old game.

The Ulduar model was the pinnacle of raiding in WOW. 10m were for the casuals and 25m were for the hardcores allowing completely new content hardmodes for either if they chose.

Originally posted by miguksaram

I recently posted this on the offical WoW Forums but it was quickly buried by new posts so I figured I would post it here and see what kind of response I get.

First let me start by saying if this has been brought up before I apologize in advance for a duplicate thread.

In a recent post put out by GhostCrawler (http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/2053469) he made mention to Blizzard having given thought to the idea of tiered dungeons beyond the standard Normal/Heroic difficulties currently present in the game.

"Second, there are only a few level-85 normal dungeons. For a level-85 player who isn’t ready for Heroics but wants to run dungeons, these can get old pretty quickly. Perhaps another way to handle it would have been to have introductory Heroics and harder Heroics. We’ve also flirted with having three difficulty levels before, but that does add an extra level of content to develop and complexity to explain."

The issue stated above is the concern for (I assume) the cost of development and complexity involved with implementing such a system. After giving it a little thought I feel I might have come up with a potential solution which could alleviate some of those concerns.

In the current system the difference between a normal and heroic dungeon is two fold. The first and most obvious is the increase in both mob hit points and damage output. The second and probably the one which creates the true difference in difficulty are the new mechanics introduced during boss encounters. In my experience the latter more often than not is the difference between a wipe and a clear. I personally find the new mechanics provided to be a breath of fresh air because in a way they allow Blizzard to (almost) double the available dungeon/raid content by providing a different experience for the player. And this is where I find the pontential to introduce a more layered dungeon/raid experience as stated by GC.

What if both Normal and Heroic dungeon were available in a standard and hard-mode version. In a standard version all dungeons and raids would be exactly as they are today, which the major difference between the two being the more difficult mechanics of a Heroic. However the hard-mode versions would simply up the anty by increasing the HP pools and damage output of the mobs and in return provide an increased drop rate of loot (albiet of the same quality available in the standard version) along with appropriately scaled reputation gains per kill.

I feel with a system like that which I present above it would gradually along players to get accustomed to the content while offering greater reward (or rather increased reward) for greater risk involed, in this case players would have to be able outlast the HP and damage output of the mobs rather than new mechanics with appropriate gear. This would also not require much investment from a development stand point as it does not require new content but rather adjustments to current content.

Ok I think I have gone on for long enough. Tell me what you think and would you be behind a system such as this or something like it. Thank you.

 

This idea is well thought out but still, think about the big picture. Many players would be dissapointed with this change and they would lose alot of subs. Although blizzard these days is still playing it safe putting out new content with harder mobs, same loot buffed stats and same mounts with a different color tint which isn't so good anymore. But simply doing this would make WoW "WoW"