Friday, Aertimus and I just woke up and decided to go after three drake ten man OS. After getting in touch with some people, we headed in Saturday afternoon, and three hours later -
Ten "-of the Nightfalls".
3 had not done ten-man with three drakes up, prior.
6 had not done ten-man with any drakes up, prior.
1 had not done ten-man OS before, period.
We went with the following (physical-dps-centric) setup...
1 Feral Druid, tanking Sarth
1 Prot Paladin, tanking Adds
1 Protection Warrior (Moi), tanking Drakes
1 Holy Priest, healing Sarth Tank
1 Resto Druid, healing raid/add/drake-tanks
The twenty-five man experience that we all had hugely beneficial (though the shaman had not done three drake's on 25 man, and the ret paladin had only done 25 man 3 drakes on their main, a mage). Waves and Zones were never an issue - it was mostly just the transitions when drakes landed & loose adds. The strat we used was the exact same as on the twenty-five man.
We went with the two healer setup, to get more DPS in (partly to deal with the reduced number of tank saving cooldowns needed). We had a Guardian Spirit, a HandOfSac+Divine Guardian, and the feral druid's own cooldowns.
One tough point, was that we could only heroism every second or third attempt. We cut it really close with the sarth tank running out of cooldowns when we didn't have it. There also wasn't a dedicated healer in the portals - we used the fury warrior to tank, and the ret paladin off-healed.
As far as the largely talked about
"3D 10-Man is harder then 3D 25-Man"...
I felt they were pretty equal, though different (keeping in mind that we "overgeared" the ten man).
In the 25 Man, you need about 22-25 members that are operating at 100%. In the 10 man, you need 10 that are operating at 100%. Its the opposite way of saying that in a 25 man you can carry people, but in the 10 you can't - and one that I think communicates the 25 man raiders view. In the end, you need more people that are pulling their weight in the online and in the raid for the 25 man.
The 10 Man felt more affected by random type stuffs - but then again, if a random event causes a ten man to wipe twice as much as the 25 man - its still less net person-time spent wiping, and less total repair bills. (One 25 man wipe is 25 repair bills, and 25 runs back. Two ten man wipes are 20 repair bills, and 20 runs back). Also - each person in a ten man is 2.5 times as important as someone in a twenty-five - so their mistakes (and resulting deaths) are 2.5 times as impactful. A 25 man takes as big a hit from 2.5 people dying as one person in a ten man does.
So in general - I feel like ten mans are destined to wipe more from people's mistakes, and have more stringent composition requirements - but the total time and repair cost is the same (if not lower) then a 25 man. So the two paths seem pretty equal to me, in the long run.
4 comments:
Wow, nice work. It was interesting to hear your perspective on 10 vs 25 man. I've not had the chance to try 3D on either 10 or 25. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
I think the 10-man version is likely exponentially more difficult if you are going in in 10-man gear.
As it is, I do not think that is an encounter that my 10-man raiding guild is going to try until we're in T8. Ego over at Egotistical Priest wrote an excellent post about the 10 vs 25 debate, and I like her idea that 10-man achievements should check for item levels (as is going to happen in Ulduar).
In any case, congratulations, Yakra, your guild sounds really impressive, and you'll rock through Ulduar.
I think full best in slot ten man gear would have been do-able. Our play could have been more improved, coordinated, and more tuned to the ten man version - but our 25 man raid gear did let us get away doing/learning this much faster.
I enjoyed your post. I enjoy many of them. This one was a bit more fun.
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