The Patched City

Just an idea that I had, kinda similar to the unbeatable instance. In that scenario, the instance would just be retuned so that it could not be beaten by current gear levels.

However part of Blizzards plan for both Wrath and Cataclysm have sparked a new idea in me. See, when Wrath was announced they planned on having Azjol Nerub be an entire underground zone. In Cata, there will be zones (Deep Holme(I think)) that will be nearly entirely enemy occupied. This is a long one, so I put in a nice break for you. Clicky-clicky!


What I would like to see is something like the invasion of Azjol Nerub. This speculation will be based along the WotLK timeline.

Patch 3.0: The Underground Empire Raid is released. There are three bosses, Krik'thir, Hadronox and Anub'arak. There would be more trash than is currently in AN. The gear from 10 man would be iLv 200 and from 25 man, iLv 213.

Patch 3.1: The Underground Empire Raid gets its first expansion. The first three bosses hit about 10% harder and have 10% more health. The loot is now 213/219. No hard mode. While the gear isn't as good as the gear that drops in Ulduar, it is still better than what was previously dropping and your raiders don't need to learn a new fight- just do the same old fights as before. Additionally, five new bosses are released. They drop 219/226 and have hard modes. They are in three different parts of the city, and each fight has specific strengths and weaknesses. There would be an option to ask the assault leaders (from the Alliance/Horde) to help with your advance. Once you have killed each of the (first three) bosses five times, they will be able to build defenses up to that point so that you do not have to fight that boss again. Therefore, once you have gotten all the loot you needed from Krik'thir, and everyone in the raid has killled him five times, you can quickly move past that area.

Patch 3.2: The Underground Empire Raid is delved into more. The first three bosses again hit for about 20% more and have about 20% more health (than originally). The loot is now 226/232. No hard mode. The next five bosses have triggered hard modes and hit for 10% more and have 10% more hp. The loot is now 226/232 here. Now the NPCs can build barriers up through all 8 bosses. However, it is only required that a player has beaten the first three bosses three times, down from five. It still requires five victories over the next five bosses however. After clearing the second section, players can access a third area. However, they are entering the Old Kingdom (exiting upper kingdom) and can choose either Heroic or Normal. This affects all the mobs in the instance. It is part of the same raid ID, but the bosses that had triggered fights are already down. Loot dropped from these six bosses is 232/245 with hard mode gear scaling as appropriate.

Patch 3.3: The Underground Empire Raid is completely open. Gear scales up for all the bosses, damage and health are also scaled accordingly. Barrier can be constructed up past the first fourteen fights. The first three bosses only need to be beaten once, the next five three times and the first six in the Old Kingdom five times. The hard mode style is changed yet again and goes back to affect the third area as well. Now hard modes can be selected on a fight by fight basis.

The first area is still relevant- it drops 245 gear, an improvement for strict 10 man raiders (who previously only had access to 232 (245 H-modes)) Now, they can get slightly better than that but they would have to learn new fights in ICC. Additionally, with the blockade system, you can't just leave the end boss (Anub'arak (again)) on farm, you would have to run fresh 80's through the entire system. Additionally, the number of bosses may be larger or smaller (this is just a general idea). If it were to be implemented, Blizzard would probably only have one type of Hard Mode implementation- they were experimenting in Wrath. Also, the scaling percentages are rough numbers- I have no idea how much they should actually be to scale up appropriately.

Anyways, just an idea.