Okay, just a heads up this topic discusses the quest chain in The Wandering Isles, also known as the Pandaren starting zone. As such there is very minor spoilers as to specifics on especially two quests, if you’re worried about spoiling this starting zone for Pandas, here’s your warning.
This came out longer than I expected, but I believe all things relevant. If you are a TLDR sort of person and want to understand the full context, load up your WoW and make a new Pandaren. Once you get to [An Ancient Evil] and finish [The Healing of Shen-zin Su] you will hopefully understand without explanation. If you’re a TMEDP (Too Much Effort, Didn’t Play) sort of person, well then the basics are those two quests are practically raids now in terms of their difficulty, which is in a STARTING ZONE for NEW characters. If you feel like this info is not sufficient, well I suggest you read on because I go into detail with what problems I have with these two quests.
With that said let’s get started into this. For a bit of background, Pandaren have become my favourite race. My second character I made ever in WoW was a Panda (joined in WoD fyi). My main is a Panda, and as I’ve recently learned of my love for them I’ve made a few more (recently a hunter and a rogue). This means I have 5 Pandas. This may seem irrelevant, but I assure you it isn’t. This is because I’ve made Pandarens in WoD, Legion and now in BfA.
For those that didn’t know, the levelling is practically similar to other areas. The levelling concerns of taking a practically cyclical journey from the North of an island until all of the island is explored. After which it would allow you to choose Horde or Ally. Most should know this, but it is important to know that levelling used to be easy in here. Yet so did dungeons. Of course, this was before scaling. Most quests are fairly easy even after scaling however. Just what you’d expect from any other starting area.
But here comes the brunt of the topic. Two quests in particular, [An Ancient Evil] and [The Healing of Shen-zin Su]. For those that don’t know, [An Ancient Evil] is a pretty straightforward quest. Here’s this boss, Voldraka, the Deep Sea Nightmare, with a lot of health and your Panda ally, Aysa, will help you defeat him. The boss is limited to two moves, Deep Smash and Deep Sea Rupture. Deep Smash is a cone AOE attack where Voldraka focuses on Aysa and raises his weapon high to slam it against the floor, hitting wherever Aysa is at the end of the cast. Deep Sea Rupture is one where Voldraka focuses on the player and after the cast, calls a shard of earth from the point the player was the start of the cast. Sounds easy, right? Get out of the way of the smash when he raises his weapon and move a bit when he casts Rupture. But there’s just a tad bit more. Randomly more adds will come in, usually two, and will focus on you. As well Aysa will randomly roll around, which will be important later on.
Now I don’t know exactly when this change occurred, I assume with scaling because the two Pandas I’ve made since then, a hunter and a rogue (note neither with self-heals until later levels), have had these new issues. Either way, before the change this encounter was simple. Usually the player would focus on the adds and tbh didn’t have to worry about Voldraka. Once the adds were killed the player could attack the boss, and also tbh didn’t have to worry about the slam or rupture. Now, before we get into the issues I have with the change just note, I do not have trouble with adding a bit of challenge. I liked scaling. However, what I do not like is making content so difficult it’s nearly impossible without perfect action in a starting zone, a place meant to integrate someone into WoW.
The issue now after the change is this: When Voldraka starts casting Deep Smash, Aysa will continue to roll, meaning even if you ran away Aysa could roll into your direction and you’d receive massive damage. As well, the adds come at the worst of times and deal so much damage it’s mental. I was playing as rogue just today and I was likely killed by them more than anything, just because they’d pounce on me when I am at 63 health as a result of Aysa’s fidgeting. The other issue is that these adds will apply a moving debuff to the player, meaning that the player could easily be hurt by Aysa making a roll. Although I don’t consider myself a pro, I’ve done my fair share of raiding. And I can certainly say that I needed more attention and effort to kill this boss than I did any boss in Antorus. Remember, this is a starting zone, not end content.
As for the second quest, [The Healing of Shen-zin Su], this is where the airship has been blown out and there’s a gaping wound in the island. The player is meant to gather healers, from a choice of Alliance Priests and Horde Druids, and bring them to the wound. Before the scaling, this was not as easy as the aforementioned boss but it wasn’t difficult. Rescue the healers, bring about 4-6 over and protect them, simple just a bit of time and a tad more effort needed.
But now, the only healers that are viable to save are those under debris. This is because by the time the player kills an add to rescue a healer, the healer will begin to heal themself. By the time they’ve finished this, most times even before they’ve even finished, another add comes and either kills you or the healer, and then all the effort is for nothing. It’s worse for the Horde Druids, for they are further in the jungle which means if you kill one add, it’s most likely 3 will take their place easy before the healer has healed themself. As for the ones under debris, they still need to heal themself, meaning a stray add could surely come around and kill the healer as they are healing themself. Not only this, but the adds who attack the healers at the wound need to be aggroed no matter what. For me, a sub Rogue, this was made easier by a Shuriken. It seems this is the best thing to do for those without self-heals, as there’s no way to have sustained survival, put oneself near the Huojin Panda nearby who will spawn monk healing spheres occasionally and just range attack the adds to get the aggro. Yet, even with this, the player is relying on luck that the Panda will spawn a healing orb before they’re dead on top of worrying about the healers at the wound. And that’s with a ranged attack. Without a ranged attack, you have to attack them from where they land, these adds still apply moving debuffs occasionally which means if you attack three who are attacking the healers and try to bring them to the Huojin, they could kill you before you can even get to a sphere. The only way I’ve been able to do this with both my hunter and my rogue, even after all of this organisation and everything, is to find some random player who is also struggling on this mission and organise for one to get the healers and the other to protect the healers at the wound. Even after this, there’s a ton of effort and precise focus to be put on the instance. Again, this is a starting zone! And just think about what happens if there’s not a player around doing it at the exact same time as you!
This anecdote may seem irrelevant yet I think it important. When I tried to do this on my hunter (which by the way was much easier on Voldarak because of reliance on range attacks) I came across another Pandaren rogue. Although it took time, eventually they realised what I was whispering them suggested for them to get the healers and for me to protect them (I figured this was best because I have range to attract the aggro from the wound). It took so much time and the rogue died multiple times. I tried to tell them about the healing spheres but they didn’t understand. After about I’d say 10 minutes of working on this instance we finally did it. I whispered them afterwards and it turns out they were a new player simply struggling with this instance.
And so I just think to myself, why is this starting zone so difficult and sadistic on any player, both experienced but especially new, who make Pandaren? You don’t see this sort of effort, work or challenge in Elwynn Forest or Durotar. Scaling was beneficial to those areas. But now The Wandering Isle is a new raid, they just released it for MoP starting zone content. That is why I call it the New Broken Shore, because this isle is broken as f***. If Blizzard has seen this issue, which I sincerely hope they haven’t because it is absolutely absurd, don’t they want new players? This is just punishment on those who are new and think “Those Pandaren are nice I want to play as them.” just like that rogue was trying to. The fact is, if I hadn’t have come along that rogue would have likely left the game for good or at the least chosen another race, which nobody should be forced to do! If you’ve read this far, I just want to say thank you for reading. I want to hear your comments. Have you been in The Wandering Isle since this change? Have you noticed the difference? Do you think it’s not that bad? Do you think it should be changed? And as for Blizz, does Aysa really have to roll constantly around Voldarak causing the player to be in danger of such an attack? Do these adds around Voldarak really need to do that much damage and have that much health? Do these adds at the wounds really need to spawn this quick, in this large of an amount, when one tries to save a healer? Do the healers really need to take such long of a time to heal themselves after one saves them? Do these adds at the wound attacking the healers already healing it really need to be this difficult for melee players without a range ability or a self-heal? Would you expect new players to go through this hell? And most of all, why is this starting zone, of all starting zones, so difficult and near to impossible?