The Pulse: Definitions of an Epic Encounter

Did I mention how much I love this web app yet? Several days ago, I posted my thoughts on the new information released about Wrath of the Lich King. The night after, I went to a birthday party with a few friends. Some of them were former WoW players and they asked me if there was anything in the expansion worth coming back for.

I told them Arthas is now 10 mannable. They were stunned. Immediately, I could tell they didn’t believe that the fight would be "epic" enough with only 10 players. This lead me to ask a quick question on Twitter to my WoW playing colleagues:

Question: What makes an encounter, raid or otherwise, considered "epic"?

As you can see, no one player or blogger mentioned anything about player limits. The "epicness" of an encounter falls solely on Blizzard and how their design team is going to set up the bosses in raids. I’m willing to bet Arthas and Malygos will truly be memorable fights on their own whether they’re fought in 10 or 25 mans.

10 thoughts on “The Pulse: Definitions of an Epic Encounter”

  1. It depends on the encounter, at one time Wailing Caverns was epic…

    It’s all in how hard you have to strive for sucess, how narrow the margin is.

    Seeing Netherspite go down in Kara, first kill, 9 people down, last one standing is the OOM holy priest Got him with Shadow word: death with the last of his mana. that was an epic fight.

    Many moons ago in Blackwing Lair, the group is buffing up for another shot at Vael. Raid leader decides to have hunters use their pets this try (this particular fight the RL wanted them put away normaly) so I pull mine out, oops never changed out of aggessive from earlier pvp… that was an epic wipe I still hear about, lol.

    I guess it depends on the where you are in the game. Things I farm are epic for others, and things others farm are epic to me.

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  2. Once you beat the event, it changes the way you play from that point on. Ka’el was epic, Archimonde was epic IMO.

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  3. Nothing available to more than 5% of the WoW population can be called epic – it might be rare,
    but it’s ordinary…
    These days purples are the new blue – they deserve to be called ‘epic’ just as the ‘epic’ mounts (i.e. not at all).

    “Epic encounters” are epic at some point of the WoW (overall, not personal) progression – Illidan was epic back in June 2007. He is not anymore (when you are the 10th guild on your server to reach Illidan – you can’t call him epic, can you?).
    Right now, I’d say M’uru is EPIC (after all – only 9 guilds in the world have downed him so far). Serverwide (on any particular server) – Eredar twins are epic (although chances are more than one guild is already killing them per server), Felmyst is borderline, but I wouldn’t call her epic anymore.

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