Into The Burning Crusade

Entry into The Burning Crusade (quickly known as BC) was quite spectacular.  Walking through The Dark Portal the first time I remember seeing all those Fel Legionnaires battling on the steps ahead, a gigantic Demon Lord in the back bellowing out commands.  Just incredible.  The landscape beyond looked barren and alien, the sky above darkened and foreboding.  Welcome to Outland!

Holy Item Level Batman!

Not having raided much in Vanilla, and when I did raid those few times, I hadn't been fortunate enough to get any gear drops for my toons.  I entered into this new zone with quest greens and instance blues -- but that turned out to be not a problem at all.

After landing at Honor Hold and picking up the first few quests, I headed off to do battle with the demonic inhabitants of Hellfire Penninsula.  My Warlock Gronrad with his trusty Voidwalker ready to take the beating.  The mobs hit fairly hard, harder than the mobs in Silithus.  Fortunately I'd made a good choice in the class, and was able to finish off my first quests and headed back to turn in.  I remember some talk in Guild chat about the quest rewards, but it didn't really sink in.  Here were people who'd raided into AQ-40, and had their hard-won gear to show for it.  The shock of seeing the item level of the quest rewards were blowing people away, as they were replacing raid epics with quest greens!   Of course, this was an absolute bonanza for an Altoholic.  I looked forward to jumping up in gear while leveling my alts, once again.

At its release, The Burning Crusade had 10 new character levels, upping the maximum to Level 70.  There would be a whole ton of new 5-Man Instances, new Raids, and for the first time, Heroic versions of the 5-Mans, available at Level 70.  There were also new races introduced during this expansion, Draenai for the Alliance, and Blood Elves for the Horde.  Until this time, I'd stayed mainly on Alliance, with only a small venture onto a Horde PvP server at the suggestion of a real life friend.  My experiences with World PvP consisted of getting a toon to level 25, entering into the contested areas, and getting stomped by any random high level Alliance that felt like making my life miserable.  I quickly went back to my PvE server on Elune.

5-Man Instances And Crowd Control

The first 5-man available to newcomers in Hellfire Pennisula was Hellfire Ramparts.  A fairly linear instance, it was quite a bit different than the meandering runs such as Mauraudon, Wailing Caverns and Blackrock Spire.  There was something that really came into play during this time -- the usage of CC, or Crowd Control.

Up to that point, most of my Instance experiences had consisted of a Tank pulling mobs, the DPS killing the mobs the Tank held aggro on, and Healers in the back keeping us all alive.  A good Tank could hold 3 or 4 mobs beating on them, a great Tank could hold 5 or 6.  Luckily, I hadn't seen that many poor tanks, as I'd been running with the Guild TWC for long enough that we'd had very good Tanks.  Up until then, I hadn't seen much CC, but the new mobs in Hellfire Ramparts were a lot more difficult to handle.  Today, in the era of Heirlooms and facerolling through instance after instance, it's hard to imagine.  Back at the beginnings of BC, however, it was an entirely different game.  Tanks were quickly made aware of Blizzard's change in tactics, as they faced mobs that not only hit harder and had more health, but had things like armor debuffs that would quickly lower a Tank's main defense.  Blizzard already had Crowd Control in place, but it wasn't used very often.  CC truly came into the mainstream of Instances during the BC era.

Hunters used Ice Trap, Mages could Polymorph mobs into Sheep, Priests could Shackle Undead, Rogues could Sap, Druids could Hibernate, and Warlocks could use their Succubus Minion's Seduction to freeze mobs in place.  For me, it was a whole new adventure, using skills I'd used to survive while solo levelling out in the world, and bringing them into a 5-man run.  DPS that could actually keep mobs CC'd until the Tank was ready to engage them became worth their weight in gold.  DPS that couldn't... well, they were more of an annoyance than anything.  The use of Crowd Control seemed to lessen as you progressed in levels, as Tanks and Healers got better gear, and were able to withstand the attacks of multiple mobs.

That is, until we hit Level 70 and proceeded into the Heroic modes of the 5-man Instances we'd been running.  Tanks back then had a Defensive Rating, I can't remember what that value had to be in order to Tank Heroic modes of 5-man Instances, something like 450.  This was a combination of factors such as block, parry, armor, etc. that added up to the Tank being able to survive the massive damage that Heroic Bosses would inflict.  Tanks who didn't stack up in terms of gear would suddenly be faced with more incoming damage than their gear and skills could mitigate, and more than their Healers could overcome.  Heroic Instances were the place where new Tanks would be tested to their utmost, even prior to them setting foot in a Raid.

When a new Tank arrived in these Heroics, they were faced with the choice of pulling and handling groups that would not only have three to eight mobs, but also would have to deal with mobs that would aggro but stay at range... archers, casters and the like.  Back in The Burning Crusade, a Tank had very few options in dealing with those ranged mobs.  They may have had a ranged interrupt, such as a Paladin throwing their shield, but that would only work to draw a caster to them.  Archers would take the damage from the shield and maintain their fire.  Another option would be for the Tank to drag the melee to the ranged.  The problem in that tactic was that the Tank would open themselves up to melee attacks from the rear, which would inevitably turn out to be fatal.

The other way for a Tank to start his pull would be to mark CC targets... usually Moon for Sheep, Square for Trap, Circle for Sap, Triangle for Shackle, and so on.  The Tank would initiate the pull and the DPS would immediately begin to CC their marked mobs.  Focus macros really helped a DPS to maintain a long CC, if it was taking a long time to down the mobs that were aggro'd onto the Tank.  Sure, it would take a little bit longer to set up each pull, but that time was insignificant compared to all hell breaking loose when a Tank died.  CC also helped lessen a Tank's stress in trying to keep aggro off of their healer, as a Healer's natural inclination to fire off a heal right at the start of a pull, in order to mitigate the incoming damage spike on the Tank.

The accountability this placed on DPS was large, but for me it made the game a lot more exciting and challenging.  Remember, the real key to this was that there was no LFD system, you'd have to put together your own 5-man group before entering an instance.  This meant that people who could not only output damage well, but could CC upon request were worth their weight in gold when choosing a group.

I loved this time of the game, where we didn't just rely on a Tank aggroing everything in sight and DPS launching their firepower for all they were worth as soon as the pull happened.  Damage meters like Recount weren't stressed as a measure of how good you were, it was only part of the equation.

Sure, it may seem like Rose Coloured Glasses, but this was a time of personal responsibility in an instance.  Those days are pretty much over, much to some old timer's chagrin....