A hugely popular topic on WoW blogs this week has been the continual nerfing of Ulduar, in particular this last round that made changes like extending XT’s enrage timer from 7 to 10 minutes. I have to say that I’m pretty proud of my fellow bloggers from what I’ve read so far — very few are in a cutting edge hardcore guild, and yet every single post has been in favor of keeping the challenge in Ulduar. No one wants another sleepwalk like Naxx, even if it does come with easy achievements and a rain of epics.
Machiavellis Cat is not hardcore. We’ve killed six bosses in Uldar so far, and while I am very proud of every kill it hardly puts us on the map of uberness. We weren’t on the PTR trying out fights, and we didn’t increase the number of hours we raid each week. Sometimes people stand in bad things, or I bork up a strategy and everyone dies (Dear Hoppy Giants before IC: You suck.), or someone falls off the Kologarn balcony. It’s not that we’re those infamous “bads” — I actually think we’re pretty good. But we’re also not a honed, unified killing machine.
Given all that, my guild, and apparently many other guilds, love a good challenge. Ulduar has made the Cats come alive again in ways that only satisfying content can. We’re theorycrafting strategies on the forum, working hard to fill in gear gaps that could slide by in Naxx, and honing specs and class techniques. And nothing speaks more to a happy and excited team than having everyone in the instance ready to go 10 minutes before raid time.
So it’s not really surprising that nerfs make me nervous, even if they would enable us to cruise through Ulduar easier. And it’s even more unsettling when they happen beneath our feet. Last week we killed Leviathan and Razorscale in one night, with a bit of work. This week we stomped those two AND XT AND got a first kill off on Ignis, all on Tuesday, with no more than 3 attempts per boss at the most. It was slightly underwhelming, to be honest. How much of it was us being more experienced, and how much of it was nerfs? It’s hard to say.
It was with some trepidation that I stepped into Ulduar on our second raid night this week for Iron Council (2nd kill!), Kologarn (1st kill!), and Auriyaya (her cats ate our faces!). And, I have to give it to Blizz: for our guild, the fights were still pretty challenging, or at least not Naxx facerolling. Will they stand up over time as we improve our skill and strategy? I don’t know. And honestly for both kills we were sloppy and I admit to lamenting a bit that some of the bite was lacking in the bosses. But for last night, at least, they still presented a satisfying challenge.. although not as satisfying a one as last week.
Now to get in and start killing some of the Watchers before they get their dose of the nerf bat!
