Ulduar
 

I was feeling nostalgic so I dug up some conversations about the best raids that Blizz ever put together. Ulduar was far and away the top choice. Several people made the insight that this was the pinnacle as far as creativity, scale, story and above all, fun; the finale of the "Vanilla" raid formula before the game transitioned into the a more linear, flex/"universal grab bag style". I found myself agreeing with this thinking (I wasn't around for the "other golden days" of the logistical nightmares that were 40Naxx, Twin Emps and the like) and found it fitting that it was Algalon that finally did us in. I don't think I would have lasted much longer than that anyway. The best part for me was always the time that went into making Fuse work. Some of the best friends I had were the ones that would shoot the shit in the downtime, the ones you had to be around because the community was so local. I've tried a few times since then and haven't really found that same magic again.

Anywho, thanks for an awesome couple of years fellas and thanks for not voting me down when I know I was probably not the most ideal recruit! Probably lame but I still watch our videos from time to time and play the Fuse Greatest Hits. I don't think I'll forget anytime soon!

Ulduar was the last hoorah for many players...Loads of nostalgia there. We had a world first, the Leviathan encounter was the first of its kind, and also raided 10 man in addition to 25.

MC40, BWL, and eventually Naxx 40 (Where Fuse members essentially met) goes without saying. There were plenty of uniquely designed encounters, and defeating Rag/Nef/KT were so rewarding in pride alone.

I personally think of M'uru (spelling) as the pinnacle of encounters. SWP wasn't all that great as whole, but Blizzard nailed it with that design (pre-nerf of course). I've never, nor will I ever, heal so hard in my life!

Great thread Cruci, glad to have raided with you!

Yea, M'uru was by far my favorite encounter as well. Those were five intense weeks, still remember all of the turnover with members over the course of learning and almost every second of that kill (south side backing up Luro!). SW seemed like an afterthought as far as story and implementation though, maybe it was just to bridge the BT to WotLK gap. Fuse at its best.

Ulduar though...Mimiron, Freya, and XT hardmodes were so damn fun and so damn rewarding. The whole place was a work of art too. Tops for me.

And I'm glad your vacation wasn't permanent Grupp!

yup ulduar was good times even though the guild blew up at the end of it. very good raids. and tbh i liked a lot of encounters in TBC i thought Illidan was a great encounter. there were a lot of unique ones to TBC loved it. muru and KJ were both great. vashj was good even lurker was fun (needing someone with max fishing to even do it.)

I don't know if Ulduar was my personal favorite raid instance (hard to beat the nostalgia of MC/BWL), but I do think it was the best one Blizz made. The approach to the hard modes was just so novel and fun. Most of the fights were really well designed and unique. Naxx and Karazhan (even if it was 10man) are probably a close 2nd imo.

Like KZ, I really enjoyed some of the fights in TBC too though. Mulgar (omg mage tanks!), Gruul, Vashj, Kael'Thas were all great imo.

Icecrown Citadel was a pretty good instance too. Certainly the Arthas fight was one of the best in the game.

M'uru broke me. That fight was ridiculously intense. Simply no room for even a single error. I was thrilled when you guys downed it, and a little sad I didn't finish that fight, but it (and probably SWP as a whole) just burned me out. It was fun competing against Afterlife for a while there though.

Lots of good memories from Eventide/Fuse. I think we're some of the rare lucky ones that had a group of people stick together for so long.

Haha, I didn't call anybody out specifically but you were the first Sunwell casualty I thought of! SW was intense through and through; it did in just about the entire mage team! All of the Shamans too...I think we had at least 3 shaman songs over the course of M'uru + KJ.

I think my most hated fight to date still remains Maloriak 10-man hard-mode in Blackwing Descent during Cataclysm. Super tight dps check with a fast-casted ability that effectively wiped the raid if it wasn't interrupted every 6 seconds (but don't interrupt the wrong ability, or else that'll wipe the raid too!). The fight itself was relatively fun -- assuming you weren't the one that had to do the interrupt, in which case it was a nightmarish hell I wouldn't wish on anybody. I played a shaman at that point, and iirc, was the only one with a 6s interrupt. ::shudder:: That was the other fight that broke my will to live.

Sunwell will forever be my most remembered raid instance. That was by far my favorite time playing for many reasons. The people in the guild at that time were my favorite and I felt like it went continually downhill for me after that point.

The competition for taking server first over Afterlife was incredible. That was an amazing time and I felt like it was a huge driving force for the guild as a whole that really solidified us. We had a strong recruitment pool along with some great returning players to round off the roster. Even having Rathore around provided some great memories!

I still think that the Sunwell encounters were the best balance of boss mechanics, difficulty, and creativity. I did like some of the Ulduar content, but I was never really that impressed honestly. The only encounters in there that were truly great were Freya hard, no light Yogg, and Agalon. That's a small percentage of the number of encounters whereas I thought every single Sunwell encounter was fantastic.

I can remember many many nights where we would just sit around and theorize on how to do a boss. What changes to the raid composition were necessary, how to better position, our timings and transitions, and just plain ingenuity and creativity. It truly felt like a team effort that paid off.

And while Sunwell was incredibly difficult and challenging, our guild's morale was (almost) always fantastic. People wanted to play. They wanted to be there and wanted to push. M'uru was the pinnacle. We watched countless guilds give up at that point and I have always admired the perseverance and dedication we were able to put forth. I think a great deal of that was due to the officer core we had at the point, though. However, I think it caused a lot of them to burn out and was a contributing factor to our decline in Wrath of the Lich King (along with the shit hole of Naxx take 2).

Good times!

i was tired of dealing with loot at that point. my god it was annoying having everyone wanting to roll on shit they didn't need for their main spec.

I feel like your personal going down hill mirrored the group move for move. In fact, I hold you personally responsible for any collective angst...

Kidding!

I think it stayed in tact as long as it did because everybody was committed to each other more than they were to crushing pixel demons. It takes some serious reflection to ask yourself why exactly you're still in it and it takes some massive balls to do something about it. Seemed like more than a few were ready to trade in the pads for pom-poms. I'm sure you guys saw that a mile away. But hey...I was 19 and (more) dumb, I'm just now hitting my stride!