In the latest raid of World of Warcraft, one boss provides a lot of joy. Communication is especially important at a new level.
I want to be honest – I am also one of those people who no longer have the time to dedicate two to three evenings each week to a fixed raid group. That’s why I only sporadically participate in raids when a random group is formed or a friendly guild needs a priest.
But goodness – the newest raid is so much fun! It has been a long time since I laughed so much in World of Warcraft as I did in the Battle of Dazar’alor.
Especially the seventh boss fight against Gelbin Mekkadrill brings more joy than ever, as the fight features several funny mechanics.
- Endless bots spawn. These bots create AoE effects around them that will eventually overwhelm the raid if enough of them aren’t removed.
- Some players get shrunk. Shrunk players can be trampled by “normal” players, taking massive damage in the process.
The catch is that the shrunk players can climb into the bots. There, they have to provide the correct color code to disable the bot. The problem: The player in the bot cannot see the color order; only the players outside can, as the color is displayed above each respective bot.
I admit without shame: The first attempt was pure chaos. Three people tried simultaneously in Discord to call out the colors for the bots. Since the bots were also marked with “Raid Marks”, funny calls like this resulted:
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“Bot blue – green – yellow – purple!”
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“The bot with the red mark, red! RED! RED! Man, press red! Yellow! Blue – uh, I meant purple! Damn!
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“Green bot – yellow – red – uh, is that yellow? Yellow!”
Just imagine that all these calls happened at the same time. It was hard for me to hold back the laughter when none of the three bots was disabled.
While players call out the colors of the bots, some raid members are also assigned bombs. These bombs must be carried far away from the raid. Some forget this when they are currently calling out the colors for a colleague.
Sure, for such an experience, you also have to have the right people. Many would probably have been frustrated or angry about the chaos, but in the relaxed atmosphere of the raid, it was wonderful. We needed more tries for the boss than necessary, but we had a hell of a lot of fun.
Other players apparently also enjoyed the fight. One raid group learned during the fight that one of their teammates is “a bit colorblind” and he “probably should have mentioned that” – after he bravely made the first calls. The reaction was amused and relaxed, as the video shows:
Such experiences ran throughout the entire raid, even with Jaina, Rastakhan, or the treasure boss. And this is where I see the big difference to Uldir, the previous raid.
I found Uldir terribly boring. Not “boring” in the sense of “the bosses are too easy” but I didn’t like either the setting or the bosses. In my opinion, they lacked personality and significance, except for Zul. However, in the Siege of Dazar’alor, there are so many cool bosses with funny mechanics or great quotes that I look forward to each one of them.
No matter how much criticism one may have for World of Warcraft right now, the Battle of Dazar’alor is pretty cool and is already one of the best raids WoW has ever had.
What do you think of the raid “Battle of Dazar’alor”? Are you having fun in the raid, or are you bored? Or are you still waiting for the LFR version?
In the same raid, there is also an annoying bug right now – it involves a mount!
