The guild group was intending to run 8-man ops, with the possibility of upgrading to 16-man if enough people showed up. When 12 people from the guild were in the group, the ops leaders decided it was time to call on friends to fill up the balance, which was quickly accomplished.
It wasn't the ideal composition. We ended up with 4 or 5 healers, 4 or 5 tanks, and the balance dps. But, undaunted, we headed to the Eternity Vault to kill some things.
The trouble started when we discovered one of the group was already locked. After he apologized and left group, the raid leader invited someone to fill the slot, reset the instance, and zoned in. When some of us found ourselves stuck at the entrance, we discovered the operation was set to 8-man.
"Everyone zone out; we need to set it to 16-man!"
The ops leader changed the settings, and we started zoning in again, only to find it was still actually set to 8-man.
This was a little puzzling to the ops leader, who decided to try something different. This time, we all zoned out and left group. Once the ops leader adjusted the setting to 16-man, the group was reformed.
At last, we could all zone in! We landed, gathered together, and prepared to face the first trash.
Quinndarius and I had watched videos of the boss encounters in the Eternity Vault, so we were somewhat familiar with the basic idea of the place. Even so, we were excited to be able to see it all in person and test the skills we had honed through all those Heroic quests we'd 2-manned.
The trash fell quickly--very quickly--and the group stepped back to await the spawning of the first boss. The fight was explained, the tank rotation was set, and finally, the boss was pulled.
Before we knew it, the boss was dead.
The veterans of the group expressed surprise. It had been too fast. What was going on? Someone commented that the developers had intended to make 16-man a little easier, as "getting together 16 people was a challenge, in itself," but even so, it seemed a little odd. There had been almost no healing required.
We moved through the instance, chain-pulling trash packs, and before we knew it, the second and third bosses were dead.
This was too easy. Someone wondered aloud if, in all the machinations we'd had to do to get the op set to 16-man, somehow the op had remained 8-man difficulty, while allowing 16 players inside the instance. It would make more sense than having the developers make 16-man instances so mind-numbingly simple.
Entering into the room for the fourth boss encounter, it became obvious the guess was correct. Instead of seeing 16 bosses to be killed, only 8 bosses awaited on 8 platforms. With a laugh, the ops leader encouraged those who had not seen the fight to take up their spots by the appropriate bosses, while the others stood on the far platform and watched the fun. It didn't take long, and we were on our way again.
We completed the instance in only about an hour, so we decided to continue on to Karagga's Palace. Quinndarius and I had not expected to be heading there the same evening, so we had not watched the boss fights, but with a good deal of WoW raiding under our belts, we figured we could manage.
The big question on everyone's minds was this: would this one really be set at 16-man difficulty?
After wiping on the first boss, we realized it was.
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| See all those names on Mumble? Sixteen of 'em . . . |
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