Ive been following a lot of the talk going on about the proposed raid lockout change and how it is a blessing or the doom of the world. One thing that has consistently been bothering me is the tendency of the "anti-change" faction to base all many of their arguments on comparisons of the current 10 and 25 man raids. I cannot stress enough that 10s as we know them will cease to exist. Right now, 10s are tuned to be accessible yet difficult for players who cleared the previous tier of 10 man content. Since almost every tier (even Ulduar in some senses) was being pugged on the 25 man level, most players exceeded the tuning gear level. No longer will that be the case.

Progression Pathway

Here's what I see happening. Cataclysm will hit and we will all level to 85. The first tier of content will be tuned to the 25 man ICC gear level. Gear of this ilevel will be accessible during the end of the leveling process. Yes, I know, all your hard earned work might get replaced by some epic quest chain reward at 84. Swallow it down. I predict there will be two instances in this first tier of content. Lets call them instance A and instance B. Instance A will be tuned for the new 85s. It will drop the next ilevel of gear. Most guilds will need to clear instance A before having success in instance B. Instance B will be tuned for the completion of instance A. This will be the first true raid instance in Cataclysm and will be our first real example of content that is tuned to the same difficulty in 10 and 25 man for our current gear.

I sincerely hope that the second 10 man smacks the ever-loving crap out of peoples faces. I think the first instance has to be a little under-tuned to propel people into the new expansion. And when that second 10 man reaches out its mighty hand, drawing back for the biggest of b!+ch slaps, a lot of people will realize that maybe they miss having the shelter of 24 other people. The 10 man raider will shoulder a larger chunk of responsibility. The average 10 man player will likely have to make prolific use of an offspec in order to increase raid viability and configuration. I'm blessed with the ability to have two Balance specs. I really hope that changes and I am forced to adopt a feral tank spec to improve raid viability.

Personal Stakes in a Raiding Environment

I want to be pushed. I want to have a larger investment in the outcome of a raid. I work my butt off in 25 man, doing my best to pump out great numbers while minimizing damage taken and playing "pro" in general. I want to work with other people that do exactly that. Now I'm not implying that there are people who don't care, but let's face it. Some people slack in the 25 man. Nobody would notice if I came in 10th or 11th on the charts instead of 2nd or 3rd. At least they wouldn't say "Rel! Do your damn job man. We know you're slackin!" But in a 10 man, where my effort has a greater impact on the outcome, I might hear just that. "Well, without a collective DPS of X, we won't be able to do this before enrage. That averages out to Y DPS per person and I look at this list. . . Rel, you're not pulling your weight, you fatkin. Step it up." And step it up I would. Because in the 10 man, I'm not buffered by 24 other people doing their job.

Stratification & Homogenization

Here's where stratification comes in. Currently the raids are stratified, with a 10 man raid building into a 25 man raid as a viable progression pathway. Part of me likes this system. It would be nice if the instances scaled with average ilevel or some such nonsense, but I don't see that happening. So the progression pathway becomes a loot and badge pinata that you have to run in order to stay at the forefront of progression. If you're not running it, then you're falling behind or letting your team down.

Homogenizing the raids into a single choice reduces the required time to stay "on the curve". Like it or not, WoW is designed to be a time sink and it is slowly losing some of its older playerbase to the fact that it takes many many hours to stay competitive (the entire point of the game for some people, myself included to a degree). This relieves that problem a little, as does capping the number of badges you can receive. It also allows a player to spend more time on alts. Personally, I'm not an altoholic. I abhor the leveling process. I really don't like grinding for things either. I like raids because its tantamount to overcoming a challenge with a collective group effort (of which I like to imagine I am an integral part).

The only downside to homogenizing raids is that 25 mans don't feel as epic because they drop the same loot. Even more of the same loot doesn't really make the "epic" feel return. So why run a 25 man? Well you might actually have 24 friends. Maybe. More likely, you're in a 25 man raiding guild and want to continue in that 25 man raiding guild because chances are you aren't the raid leader. That and forming your own 10 man guild would require a lot of work. Also, I will guess that folks running 25-mans will potentially gear up quicker. With all content being equal (however this is achieved), losing one DPS on 10 man will be much more significant than 1 DPS on 25 man. I'm not even looking at it from a scrub/star perspective. In a 10 man, there are on average 5.5 DPS, 2 tanks, 2.5 healers. Sometimes that off-tank is a really good DPS, other times not. If 1 DPS dies then you've lost somewhere between 17% to 20% of your DPS. In a 25 man, there are 16.5 DPS, 6 healers, and 2.5 tanks. One DPS lost is ~6%. That's a pretty significant difference. Even your best DPS isn't putting out 15% of your DPS (or you're doing some serious carrying) in the 25 man setting.

I know I'm ranting, and I do apologize, but it really irks me that so many people are getting angry about this change. Like it would be utterly impossible to make the 10 and 25 man raids close enough in difficulty to make the choice based on personal desire, not loot. I say, hold on to your knickers, dry those cryin eyes, and wait for some beta information to trickle through. I bet people will be surprised at just how different the 10 mans feel. I know I'm excited!