I don't presume to be able to speak for Scheddonardus, but I think his point is that since there are not really any new mechanics to hard mode, it's not really any different. The difference betwee normal and hard is really not much more than the deiffence between the normal level Phogoth strike and the Weekly Heroic version of the Phogoth strike. It's not that they should have waited until now to release even the normal mode raid - it's that they could've released the hard mode back then with the normal mode. They obviously weren't working on any new mechanics that needed to be implemented, so it kind of feels like the normal mode version we've been playing was no more than a beta version for what we have now.

I was personally hoping for weight of darkness during the Crota encounter. You'd have lamps by the stairs on either side. Your sword bearer couldn't jump, so he'd have to run the gauntlet so to speak to get to Crota, get his hits in, then immediately walk off the side so as not to die to Crota. Your team would then have to clear the way for them to walk back to the lamp, and keep them alive.

But did you really expect new mechanics? Vault of glass hard and normal are virtually identical.

Crota
- No chalice

Great, now I have to level up Red Death again. (either that or level up my other 2 hunter's blade dancer tree and use hungering blade).

I spec'd into hungering blade for the Crota fight tonight but actually didn't use it at all. I relied completely on Infusion (the first perk on Mask of the Third Man) for regenerating health.

I would too, but I have the old version, so I can;t get to 32 with it.

Crota
- No chalice

Great, now I have to level up Red Death again. (either that or level up my other 2 hunter's blade dancer tree and use hungering blade).

I spec'd into hungering blade for the Crota fight tonight but actually didn't use it at all. I relied completely on Infusion (the first perk on Mask of the Third Man) for regenerating health.

Crota
- No chalice

Great, now I have to level up Red Death again. (either that or level up my other 2 hunter's blade dancer tree and use hungering blade).

- How does Luke Smith and the rest of the raid team feel about - what should be the hardest content in the game - being downed in less than half an hour?

'Hard' doesn't mean 'long.'

TWSS

'Hard' doesn't mean 'long.'

Yes, I'm a child :)

Im not sure about the Boomers spawning a Wizard on death. Depending on the timing (is it straight away, or on a delay like the sword Knights that jump down?) that could hurt.

I think that wizard takes the place of the sword knight that jumped on the bridge from the boomer tower.

You definitely have a point. It's just kind of shocking that it took the world's first VoG hard mode Invigorate 15 hours - compared to less than half an hour here. Even if this group cheesed as much as possible, TripleWreck's team beat Crota Hard in about 40 minutes with no cheese. And I think the main reason this went so much quicker is because Bungie didn't really introduce new mechanics/puzzles to figure out - they just leveled up the enemies.

There's another major difference between the first VoG hard mode runs and today's Crota runs. The first teams to attempt VoG on hard did so pretty much right after completing it on normal mode for the first time. Since Bungie separated the release of the hard mode raid from the release of the normal raid this time, the teams that are running Crota today have had a couple of extra months to find their rhythm. The only real difference they'll face today is having to put a couple of extra rounds into most of the enemies.

Just out of curiosity, how fast were people running hard mode VoG a month after it was released?

-Disciple

does killing the gatekeeper give you a damage buff? if he is there just to make the encounter harder, than boo to Bungie.

I can't wait to play, but i kinda feel cheated. None of these changes are drastic, the basically waited until all the major flaws were found. we basically paid them to beta test the raid for 6 weeks.

Eh, I don't mind their approach. That is, I don't mind them getting rid of the low-hanging cheese before releasing the hard mode. The cheesers have to get more creative to get hard-mode rewards.

I'm with you there. I'm glad they got rid of the cheese, i just wish they had added new mechanics to work through in addition to just cleaning up cheese (and pushing the "up" arrow on the keyboard to make the enemies "harder").

Yeah, but they didn't do much different in VoG either, did they? More detain shields, yes, but what else? I agree with you. I was one of those who wished that the random teleporting had been reserved for hard mode.

I was thinking about this in the past hour in case I had to defend my stance :-)

All I can think of is (a) more detain bubbles, and (b) more gorgons - which is somewhat significant because it means you can't take the same exact path through the labyrinth on hard mode that you can on normal. I guess that's pretty much it though, so I must concede somewhat.

does killing the gatekeeper give you a damage buff? if he is there just to make the encounter harder, than boo to Bungie.

I can't wait to play, but i kinda feel cheated. None of these changes are drastic, the basically waited until all the major flaws were found. we basically paid them to beta test the raid for 6 weeks.

Eh, I don't mind their approach. That is, I don't mind them getting rid of the low-hanging cheese before releasing the hard mode. The cheesers have to get more creative to get hard-mode rewards.

I'm with you there. I'm glad they got rid of the cheese, i just wish they had added new mechanics to work through in addition to just cleaning up cheese (and pushing the "up" arrow on the keyboard to make the enemies "harder").

Yeah, but they didn't do much different in VoG either, did they? More detain shields, yes, but what else? I agree with you. I was one of those who wished that the random teleporting had been reserved for hard mode.

does killing the gatekeeper give you a damage buff? if he is there just to make the encounter harder, than boo to Bungie.

I can't wait to play, but i kinda feel cheated. None of these changes are drastic, the basically waited until all the major flaws were found. we basically paid them to beta test the raid for 6 weeks.

Eh, I don't mind their approach. That is, I don't mind them getting rid of the low-hanging cheese before releasing the hard mode. The cheesers have to get more creative to get hard-mode rewards.

I'm with you there. I'm glad they got rid of the cheese, i just wish they had added new mechanics to work through in addition to just cleaning up cheese (and pushing the "up" arrow on the keyboard to make the enemies "harder").

does killing the gatekeeper give you a damage buff? if he is there just to make the encounter harder, than boo to Bungie.

I can't wait to play, but i kinda feel cheated. None of these changes are drastic, the basically waited until all the major flaws were found. we basically paid them to beta test the raid for 6 weeks.

Eh, I don't mind their approach. That is, I don't mind them getting rid of the low-hanging cheese before releasing the hard mode. The cheesers have to get more creative to get hard-mode rewards.

If normal mode Crota takes about half an hour even when you run through it with ease, how much harder could it have been if it took you about the same amount of time on hard?

Not necessarily. Some parts won't take LONGER on hard mode, when you manage to complete them. It'll just be less likely that you make it in the first place.

Think of the abyss section as an example. The enemies there are now higher level, giving you a higher chance of being killed. However, theoretically if you're doing it as fast as possible, you should be moving the whole time from one lamp to the next. You're not walking slower on hard mode. The jacked-up enemies make it less likely that you'll finish without incident, but assuming you DO finish, it's likely because you went fast and hit all the lamps with the ideal timing. If anything, I expect the average completion speed to be higher (keeping in mind that I'm only counting the runs which DO succeed in that average) because players who fall behind now are much more likely to be killed.

- How does Luke Smith and the rest of the raid team feel about - what should be the hardest content in the game - being downed in less than half an hour?

The fact that it's possible to do it quickly doesn't inherently mean it's not hard. Out of many, many, attempts, only one of them went that fast. It's getting things to fall into place JUST right which is the hard part.

Or, you know, could be cheese too.

You definitely have a point. It's just kind of shocking that it took the world's first VoG hard mode Invigorate 15 hours - compared to less than half an hour here. Even if this group cheesed as much as possible, TripleWreck's team beat Crota Hard in about 40 minutes with no cheese. And I think the main reason this went so much quicker is because Bungie didn't really introduce new mechanics/puzzles to figure out - they just leveled up the enemies.

^that right there

just reading this makes me want to curl up

CC

I went through that list and I was like "That's it?"
I honestly expected worse... Then again, I expect the tiniest mishaps to wipe us over and over... But seriously, it's hardly any different strategy-wise...