It has happened, Crowd Control is dead. A brief jaunt through numerous heroics over the weekend has confirmed its demise. So young, yet we never knew thee. Good bye to Cataclysm heroics and hello to Wrath once again.
As I dusted of my Druids restoration spec I que for the daily heroic. My only thought was reducing the length of the que by going as a healer, what I got was a re-education in Cataclysm heroics. It was a PUG group with me healing and a Pally Tank leading the charge. I had concerns with the first pull. No marking and no crowd control we dove just head long into the first pack of mobs. As I watched mobs drop, I realized not only were we smashing through them, my mana was holding out as well.
We managed the entire instance with no wipes, no CC and only a random DPS death due to bad threat management. It felt like old times. As I sat therein disbelief at the run we just made I figured it was a fluke. In order to set the world right once more I que’d again. Same song, second verse same as the first. Round two has me fighting side by side with a Death Knight Tank. You got it. No marks, no cc. We just plow into mobs and throw all caution into the wind. To top off this unbelievable turn, each of the runs was less than a half hour in length.
Not one to believe the hand that fate has dealt, I que’d once more. This time however I took Razer along for the ride. I figured my luck was bound to run out so I might as well drag him to PUG hell with me. Unfortunately I was left wanting; the outcome was near identical to the first two runs. It was no fluke; crowd control has gone the way of the Dodo once again.
I can’t say for certain what has changed, all I know is something is different. The instances I ran over the weekend were mere shells of their former selves. I don’t know how I feel about the situation just yet. I am a bit confused by it all. Surely I am not the only one to notice the difference.
The way I figure it, either the instances have been tuned down or I woke up on Saturday with super human healing abilities. As much as I would like to think it is the latter, I am
sure it is the former. What ever the answer, it is very subtle.
I suspect it is the ‘lucky’ buff for queing with a bunch of randoms (+5% dps/hps/health per random toon).