Is AQ40 Actually Hard?

Even if speed run guilds blew through the raid...are there some actually challenging encounters in there??
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[@H4licarnassus]

The difficulty scaling in this raid is super weird. It's piss easy up to and including huhuran and then there's a massive jump in difficulty for both the trash and bosses. The first night we got right through huhu with wb's and 32 people then wiped on the trash after her. Got stuck on twin emps for a couple hours and stopped for the night. The next day came back with full 40 players and finished up all bosses in the raid.

[@DomSchu]

That was exactly my raids experience too. It's way more of a linear difficulty increase than BWL was. But yeah all the bosses up to Emps was super easy. Trash was harder probably.

[@user-fb8qq1fz9q]

Same here

[@kevts]

Same, were we in the same raid? :thonk:

[@CarnifaxMachine]

This. Our first run we steamrolled the first 5 bosses with no world buffs and no issues. Then wiped a few times on Twin Emps trash, maybe 4-5 times on Twin Emps, did about half of C'thun's trash (which also had a few wipes), and called it cause we were past raid time.

[@kixxxo69]

@Silvio Dante blablablabla

[@mike122344]

11:54 Ofc it's going to be buggy. It's AQ.

[@jimbotheimpaler4756]

I like this take on it. Instead of just saying be a super sweaty try hard guild and it’s ez gg it is more realistic about your average guild. On our server AQ opened on Sunday and our normal day for raids is Friday. We managed to put together 1 sweaty 40 man team and they got 9/9 but our second team of misfits only had 32 people and were only mildly moist so we only killed 5 bosses. It was a lot of fun tho and I look forward to doing it on Friday this week with everyone buffed up and ready to roll! Thanks for the video dude.

[@Preacher_.]

Great nuance & context. Ungodly Hard =\= Fun What's fun is PvE Character Progression, which Vanilla did amazingly-and without needing to code in planned obsolescence.

[@dollylynruth]

Super helpful thank you for making this! Shared it with my guild.

[@harryelit]

Short answer no. My guild has no priv server experience and we cleared 9/9 the same day it released

[@ihavenoidea4727]

hardcore guild probably should yea as the strats are out and have been for 15 years. This in no shape of form means that your guild can do that. 99.9% of guilds don't require all to have engineering, and most players don't. That's already 8/9. That plus the tens of twin emps wipes most guilds have according to logs, does not mean an easy raid. There's only 2 guilds on Mograine that cleared full on week 1. Same w most big servers.

[@threatfactor]

Great video once again Sarthe, thanks!

[@mattheww8704]

You're the man. Love the content. Good vibes!

[@Llando]

good vid! Can you tell me what addon you use for the raid icons on the left? Ive been looking for something like this for a long time

[@brianzane905]

Can you please make a video on the Veiled Shadows set? Would love to hear your thoughts on how good it is, whether it’s worth grinding CC rep for, who should go after it, etc. Thanks!

[@JuanRamirez-fx3tf]

Still stuck on the Twin emperors, so for my guild, it is difficult.

[@gunnermac3570]

Same with my guild. Tanks are having issues keep control of the emps.

[@VattenFlaskaCola123]

@@gunnermac3570 Control? As in dying or not hold aggro, some dps standing to close on tp.

[@MidgyEra]

It's not weird at all that we're blasting through content. The fact that we're fully world buffed and consumed on top of knowing the raid inside out, before it's even released makes everything a lot easier. World buffs wasn't intended to be stacked like we're seeing today, but rather grant the players a cool buff once in a while to congratulate them on their efforts. Back in the day the players didn't even use consumables, and here we are today using every consumable imaginable to give us the smallest of adventages towards succes. We're literally doing everything the end game wasn't designed for, and we're still complaining that the raids are to easy. In my opinion i believe we would see the real difficulty and skill of raid groups, if blizzard straight up removed world buffs. I can live with using consumables, but flasks for instance are totally overpowered. In WoTLK the flask gave 130 spell power and the flask similar to the one in Classic gives 150 spell power. There's 2 solutions to this and it's either: A) Blizzard buffing raids since the world buff meta has come to stay B) Remove world buffs or make them unstackable. I believe B would be the best option due to A having one big flaw, which is if they buff the raids, the players who doesn't want to participate in getting world buffs would never be able to kill bosses due to them being overtuned.

[@tska8473]

HaShTaGnOcHaNgEs

[@tska8473]

If only there was a class that could remove buffs off people

[@blech71]

So if a guild doesn’t have everyone decked out yet, does AQ20 offer good upgrades for most classes to jump into 40 without having to go back and keep clearing BWL?

[@SomerHollingsworth]

i would say for most classes aq20 gear is pretty bad. Dont stop your bwl runs!

[@DoubtedPumpkin]

Depends, I’m a feral dps and I need the epic boots from rajaxx

[@tska8473]

For casters there are the bis legs off ossirian, other than that there is some ok gear that can replace a slot if you have a bad item there, but there's better gear from zg, mc, bwl for those slots. I think you would be fine in aq40 with those pieces, but there isn't gear for every item slot so you're gonna have to use gear from other places for those slots.

[@presleynguyen3047]

wrong info about the back of cthun, the back of cthun is the southeast corner from the entrance of the room.

[@Ewhit-je3os]

Yes there are guilds that can power through this content in like 30-45min. However there are people who spent hours on a private server to practice. Your average guild will struggle. My guild down cthun on our 2nd day in the dungeon, we downed every boss except visc because we ran out of time and consumables on a lot of people. This is the first raid that require people to do stuff other than tank and spank. My guild is no where near a hardcore raid guild. We are more casual, but we are the 5th team to clear it on our server :)

[@lfgubrs]

Cleared AQ40 today (our second run) in 1h and 28 min. 10th place on our server (4th horde).

[@davidzhao1729]

Fair comments. Good stuff.

[@cibinomin6540]

Brother can you copy that icy chill works and frostwands dont? the community seems split about that and id like to know beforehand. Great vid anyhow

[@orangeslice316]

Twin emps and trash before it wiped us. Why'd you change guilds?

[@franciscokln]

Nice vid. U got my sub 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

[@noscorpv2]

What happened to ?

[@DarkKniteZ]

Another great video

[@celoot33]

Man I lost my buffs on first pull from insane WF triple crit + Stormstrike crit... Wish made it as far as you with all buffs lol...

[@frankthetank520]

dont know we didnt have enough time to clear bwl then aq. (we still need gear from previous raid) so I will tell you on monday when we actually have the 3 hours to bash faces

[@TheZackzable]

normal guild here - no ptr training- did aq40 with 36-38 man because not enough online (yes we did cthun with 38) most ppl with world buffs and flasks. we lost 2 ppl on thorns first trashpack and another 3 on first boss through aoe. bug trio - easy. Hururan - good fight, not much leeway - lost maybe 2 few died on trash fankriss - free loot. twin emp. 2 wipes - one stupid because of pull. trash before cthun - oh hell it never stops... so so many packs. cthun - quite easy actually if u have the groups/tactic down. I honestly don't think random groups can down twins/cthun. I hope it stays that way...I hate it how random bwl raids let u have a higher chance to get the item u want (dft) then doing guild runs and waiting for your turn

[@Daiei808]

Icy chill working confirmed? I thought it needs to be an attack/damage...not debuff.

[@yazzyyazyaz]

Lol did I see a warrior with TS shoulders in your AQ run Sarthe...

[@CarnifaxMachine]

They probably run 20 fury wars in their sweaty main raid... lotta competition for lewt.

[@martjjn1]

For a guild where every member is prepared, this raid is a joke. Like viscidus was actually our easiest fight, took no damage and blew him up in one go because everyone had sappers. Just cthun was a bit tricky cause we are heavely melee stacked and the positioning for the first time was a bit odd.

[@SaarimaaSauli]

Imagine having to cheese fights with sappers. Learn to play.

[@XenomorphsWrath]

Dear casual orientated players, please take note that they are running 15 warriors. Their damage output is far superior to what your guild can manage, therefor some of the damage centric advice is not applicable to you.

[@wilshore]

The plague did not kill your world buffs. Explode did.

[@HavocParadox]

we had a few wipes on twin emps on the first night but since then we got it down easy... pre and post twin emps trash though is brutal lol.

[@adambrophy1344]

Our first clear we wiped early on trash and lost our world buffs making it much harder. Second clear with full buffs was a cake walk, no wipes, one shot everything. Easy mode.

[@ryanvance1767]

World buffs is the chest code of classic

[@Nahojism]

Nothing is hard if you know everything in advance. AQ40 does pose some challenge in a handful of fights and if you do things wrong you will get punished for it. If you do it right it will be easy, if you do it wrong it will be hard.

[@moraqt]

Love ur vids

[@ReggieVSSolace]

It looks like if we are prepared then its not hard. If folks half ass it then i think it will be hard, especially viscidus

[@JangXa]

Did you change guilds?

[@IamTheRealCmen]

Ya he sold his John Deere tractor

[@JangXa]

@@IamTheRealCmen Uff leaving the guild where you got thunderfury as rogue

[@duquette1792]

@@JangXa his guild folded during the AQ opening, scarab lords and whatnot cause a lot of drama in the community

[@dior966]

my guild 1 shotted visc/ but wiped alot on ouro

[@flowmastaflam]

I'm going to find out who made the decision to de-tune AQ40, find out where they live, get a job at their local starbucks, and slightly screw up their drink once or twice

[@LewReviews]

enjoyfull new word :P

[@LegionInfanterie]

actualy my casual shity guild kill cthun but cant manage kill ouro and viscdi and we disband :-)

[@paulswabek173]

Try doing huhu and twin emps with 34 people

[@gbolt111]

We killed huhu with 33 people. No world buffs. But used NR gear and gnpp.

[@yazzyyazyaz]

huhu is easy af when prepared, it's Viscidus you need to worry about

[@akshithvijaykumar3779]

Wiped at twin emperors 7times

[@soundninja0]

Tony Ferguson the type of guy to make weight for his child's birth

[@videk9269]

wrong video

[@ARi-ht7su]

I love your vids but I do not need to see this one to give the answer - which is "it is very easy". We (a bunch of 40yo dads) cleared it the first day (NR gear and NR prot pots, but no world buffs (...pvp^^)). Everything down except that optional slime boss (mages fucked up the aoe timing) with two wipes at the twins and one wipe at Cthun. This is not because we are good (we are not), but because everyone who is prepared in Classic wins. Mechanics/movement are not a thing until wotlk (tbc arguably).

[@MethadonLTD]

Our guild was overprepping for Huhuran, with all the Nature Resistance gear. We oneshotted Huhuran but found the trash before Twins and Twins itself incredibly hard compared to the rest of the raid. The jump in difficulty is massive. We finally got Twins down to ~25% on our first raid night.

[@hibye2166]

no its not

[@thomasreed3640]

Bro I got a death sting in game thollis rogue😂

[@JSalonsky]

We wiped 22 times in twin emps, nothing easy about it

[@tska8473]

Yea its pretty ruff for dps u gotta move a few feet and wait a second to dps again every half min

[@mingliesokisoki]

15 warriors. LoL

[@cjf3957]

"pleg"

[@CapusHospitii]

Like every content on KZbin with a « ? » the answer is no

[@santinousw5010]

SORRY but Onslaught is running PTR no other guild! its just a joke guild

[@MYRNNN]

If you think only ONSLAUGHT does that, you are gravely mistaken

[@delorne2776]

I don't understand this talking point of "Well, how buffed were you for the raid?". It's a raid. It's THE end-game PVE content. Full buffs or close to it should already be a given, it shouldn't even be discussed. When a new raid would come out in retail and it gets blown out, people aren't asking these kinds of questions. There is none of this "we were over buffed". If there is a worthwhile buff to get, you SHOULD be getting it for a raid. Not having them only means you are under buffed. The ONLY thing worth discussing when gauging difficulty is what are the individual fight mechanics, how challenging are they to play around, and how punishing are they for any individual player that makes a mistake vs the impact it can have on the raid. The only challenging encounter in AQ40 is Twin Emps, and that's only if you've never done the fight before. Every other fight either has exceedingly simple mechanics to play around and or are typically only individually punishing. My guild cleared AQ40 a week and a half ago, and 2 shot C'thun with 0 world buffs. More than half of us had never done/seen the content before and we are far from hardcore players. It's easy if you are trying/paying attention at all. The only way this raid, or any raid, is going to present any kind of challenge where a guild finds itself actually "progressing" and not just clearing the raid; is if you have a full guild of 0 experience players who is too lazy to buff, and refuses to use online resources to educate themselves of mechanics. All of this said, it's still a good time. Have fun with it, get your loot. I have lots of fun raiding with my guild. Just don't dilute yourself into thinking this content is notably challenging, it's just not.

[@jalolejroffael9693]

because getting a few cons and Collection multiple buffs in a 1-2hour effoort and enter the raid while the other faction trys to kill you or dispell your buffs is the same. if world buffs would exist in retail and encounters are tunned for world buffed characters. your retail top guild would need like 6 months of pure play time preparing for thier 400 attempts needed in progression for a singe raid tier. atleast it would be enough raid content per expension to keep players bussy for a decade or two. World buffs do not help any bad guild or pugs clearing raids in classic, only people knowing what to do are able to keep them...and those would be able to kill the boss wihtout worldbuffs aswell.. just slower.

[@delorne2776]

I'm not saying i'm in favor of world buffs being in the game, but they are, so it shouldn't be a question of whether people have them or not. And wtf are you talking about 1-2 hours to get buffs? My guild has theirs in 40 minutes maximum each week. And regardless, if you don't want to get world buffs because you/your guild can't be bothered you don't absolutely have to, obviously. All of the content so far even without buffs is a literal cake walk. Buffs just make it faster.

[@jalolejroffael9693]

@@delorne2776Its not about the guild.. sometimes it may be 40min but ususally buffs are popped late or even not at all like they are anounced ( on server buff discord), having to deal with massive server lags on popular raid days, once the delay between the ligthning animation on neff turnin an the buff being applied was 20minues. this and.not talking about getting DMF when its not on your faction side xD

[@delorne2776]

@@jalolejroffael9693 This is all besides the point. My point is the content is easy with or without buffs.

[@jalolejroffael9693]

@@delorne2776 Its easy but still takes more effort, to clear the raid every reset im comparrison to retai raid on farm..espacially when naxx comes out with 15bosses

[@ondrejgotz3414]

Actually first Poggers