Villains like the mogu and mantid are so part and parcel of the setting that having them pop up on Kalimdor or the Eastern Kingdoms for a small raid encounter makes no sense.Īnother possibility for the intermediate raid could have been a battleground-style experience highlighting the increasing conflict between the Alliance and Horde. The first difficulty with an intermediate raid for Mists is that there's no suitable thematic preview of Pandaria. But since the event itself will include that content as well, it's understandable that we're not seeing it twice. We're going to see something along those lines in the Theramore event during the pre-expansion event, so possibilities for a raid would have included a Siege of Theramore where Horde players help force their way through the Alliance lines while Alliance players work to evacuate the city. Since our travel to Pandaria is motivated by the expanding war between the Alliance and the Horde, any intermediate raid would have had to be rooted in that conflict. While Mists is similar to Wrath in that we're going to a new continent, this time that new continent isn't ruled by a Lich King-style adversary who would credibly make attacks on both Stormwind and Orgrimmar.
The biggest problem with a Halion-style raid for Mists would have been what it should be. So now I wonder: Did Mists of Pandaria need an intermediate raid? Was it a missed opportunity that we didn't get one? And would it have made sense if we had? A third but related purpose was to give us something to do that wasn't ICC after six months in the place. But second and more importantly, he served as a bridge between the ICC fights, with their Scourge, undeath and plague motifs and the coming expansion's introduction of Deathwing and his Twilight's Hammer cult minions. Both Valiona and Theralion and later Ultraxion used elements of the Halion encounter's mechanics. First, he introduced us to new mechanics we'd bee seeing again in Cataclysm. But now that we've had the same experience in Cataclysm of a long time in our end raid, and this time no intermediate raiding to tide us over until Mists of Pandaria, I'm rethinking my position. What was the point of another small raid when we already had ICC? I remember doing heroic Halion attempts in July and feeling like the whole thing was a complete waste of time and a sidetrack from ICC. No, the Ruby Sanctum and its boss, Halion the Twilight Destroyer, was intended to serve as an introduction of sorts to the Cataclysm that was coming.Īt the time, I was fairly derisive of Halion. It wasn't meant to replace ICC as the end raid of Wrath or the Lich King as the end boss of the expansion.
However, in the lead up to Cataclysm, we got a surprise raid, The Ruby Sanctum. By the end of that time, it got pretty hairy. Anyone who raided back in late Wrath remembers the year we all spent in ICC.
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