Proposal: Implementing Ability Cooldown Reset After Boss Kill/Wipe in TBC Raids

[Szopachnik]

Here's your problem. Why don't we introduce mass resurrection here? Why not create raid wide food and flasks? Why not have reforging? Why not have bonus perks? Why not have heirlooms for ease of leveling? Why not create a one button mass summon for the whole raid? Why not have portals to raid entrances? Why not have spirit resurrection closer to raid entrances? Why not have boss teleports up to bosses you've cleared? Why not have free repair bots like a hearthstone in everyone's bags?

I could go for days on conveniences that could make things less "annoying" in this game. Many of which are present in future expansions. And I can argue all day the same things that have been said in this thread for this particular change for any one of these other things. What you can't argue though is any one of these changes modifies the original game. That's why it's very unlikely to happen.

I play on Onyxia. A change like this hasn't even remotely crossed my mind. Haven't had that downtime. The cooldowns were never even close to required to beat the content and most every cooldown was available by time the raid was ready to pull again anyway. Which makes me believe the people arguing for this are part of the almost non existent speed killing/parse community which continually plague these forums for game modifications to suit their own gameplay. I don't know why anyone would care at all otherwise on Onyxia unless they were incredibly bad at the game.

You're right - many changes do alter the original gameplay. However, resetting cooldowns after a wipe isn't some radical 'convenience', but rather a reasonable reduction of pointless downtime. In Wrath Classic, this works perfectly fine without reducing content difficulty - top guilds still spend hundreds of attempts on challenging bosses.

You personally haven't encountered this issue on Onyxia? Great! But that doesn't mean other players don't experience it. If you don't need this feature - no one is forcing you to use it. Yet why deny others the opportunity to save time without compromising gameplay? Blizzard themselves implemented this in Wrath Classic - did they 'ruin classic' too?

[Szopachnik]

In essence, yes. This is TBC, not something else. If you want drastic changes, might as well call it something. Might as well call it easy-mode classic if CD's are reset after each attempt/kill. CD reset on attempts I might be persuaded to support, kills never. This would provide the QoL with reset if you're bad at the game. But you'd need to choose which CD's you as a raid want to use. This way it's not easy-mode whenever. Even then, only some bosses should offer CD reset and certainly not last bosses. I opposed it from the start. Now that I had to think how/when/if it should be implemented, even if only after wipes, I find it appalling.



Most of those were implemented by Warmane. There were no questions or polls to query players if these should be implemented. Not saying that there should've been, just stating that these were thought out and implemented from the get-go. Would you prefer playing 2,5 years with no RDF, and 2 years without a dual spec being possible? Would you like to take the time and effort to level two Paladins, and professions for both, so that you can play Holy and Protection. You could always do the endless amount of talent change, not exactly something cheap if you have to do it on repeat.
Only thing that got polled was if some more or less random items should be released on phases where they actually matter bit more. No big game changing items on that list.
Onyxia got some QoL updates, doesn't mean it should get everything.



It does, and you don't seem to get it. With CD reset, every boss is effectively easier as you get to use big spells each fight instead of every other or even more rare occasion. Every boss Blood lust/Heroism, LoH, Rebirth, Reincarnation, to only name a few from a rather lengthy list, drastically changes boss difficulties. Onyxia is already post-nerf. How trivial you want the boss fights (the biggest think in progression) to be?

Let's examine who will benefit from this change and how. For top-tier guilds - speedrunners or kill-focused raids - cooldown resets will simply eliminate artificial pauses. The former will be able to use all abilities on every boss, while the latter can focus on practicing mechanics instead of waiting. All this without creating any unfair advantages - just more efficient use of time.

Mid-tier and casual raids rarely encounter issues with cooldowns anyway due to longer transitions between bosses. This change will simply remove those rare cases of pointless downtime at corpses, allowing players to immediately analyze mistakes.

Important note: the system won't be active during the first ID - keeping the initial progression "pure". It only activates from the second ID onward, when most guilds have already learned basic mechanics.

Furthermore, we could make this feature optional - toggleable for those few players who want absolute authenticity, similar to how experience rates work. And let's be honest: just like 99.9% of players didn't level at x1 rates but used x3/x5 instead, most would likely keep this QoL improvement enabled.

By the way, in original TBC phases lasted for months and gearing up was much slower. Yet nobody demands we return to these "classic" conditions. Apparently some conveniences have become normalized while others inexplicably cause controversy.

In reality, this simply removes archaic downtime without affecting:
Boss difficulty
DPS/healing requirements
Threat balance
It doesn't inconvenience anyone while saving time that would otherwise be wasted.

[OhieMitzen]

AI slob

If you, or the AI, can't see how every CD being available every boss fight would make the raid overall easier, I don't see the point trying to talk about something that even a brick wall would understand.

Just like 99.9% of the players who wanted something and didn't get, you too can live without getting what you wanted.

What's next, elixirs that lasts for the day so you don't have to use more than 1 per raid?
Mounts at level 1 as everybody would benefit from faster movement speed?
Remove ICD's from trinkets? It too would surely benefit everybody.
Everybody could train every profession on their favorite main character —eliminating the archaic method of relogging alts.
Why settle for Dual Talent Specialization when you could have Triple Talent Specialization —because 3 is bigger number than 2!

[devyni9]

If you, or the AI, can't see how every CD being available every boss fight would make the raid overall easier, I don't see the point trying to talk about something that even a brick wall would understand.

Just like 99.9% of the players who wanted something and didn't get, you too can live without getting what you wanted.

What's next, elixirs that lasts for the day so you don't have to use more than 1 per raid?
Mounts at level 1 as everybody would benefit from faster movement speed?
Remove ICD's from trinkets? It too would surely benefit everybody.
Everybody could train every profession on their favorite main character —eliminating the archaic method of relogging alts.
Why settle for Dual Talent Specialization when you could have Triple Talent Specialization —because 3 is bigger number than 2!

Your argument against this suggestion is "nah man, you want too much" lol

[Morvion]

so if the purpose is to eliminate the "time wasting". why stop at boss fight?. why not implementing it straight after kill/death against anything including players in pvp? that way with the same reasoning, the implementation of this will cut the "time wasting" between fights and forget waiting cds is part of the game entirely.

[Szopachnik]

so if the purpose is to eliminate the "time wasting". why stop at boss fight?. why not implementing it straight after kill/death against anything including players in pvp? that way with the same reasoning, the implementation of this will cut the "time wasting" between fights and forget waiting cds is part of the game entirely.

PvP and PvE are balanced fundamentally differently. In raids, cooldown resets simply eliminate artificial downtime after wipes without affecting boss difficulty. In PvP however, cooldowns are the foundation of strategy - resetting them would break the entire gameplay.

The difference between PvE "back then" and "now" is colossal: today top guilds clear raids in 2-4 hours, while it used to take weeks. Meanwhile, PvP has remained nearly unchanged for 20 years - the core mechanics are the same. Such superficial comparisons only demonstrate a lack of understanding of WoW's fundamental game design.

[Morvion]

PvP and PvE are balanced fundamentally differently. In raids, cooldown resets simply eliminate artificial downtime after wipes without affecting boss difficulty. In PvP however, cooldowns are the foundation of strategy - resetting them would break the entire gameplay.

The difference between PvE "back then" and "now" is colossal: today top guilds clear raids in 2-4 hours, while it used to take weeks. Meanwhile, PvP has remained nearly unchanged for 20 years - the core mechanics are the same. Such superficial comparisons only demonstrate a lack of understanding of WoW's fundamental game design.

wasnt my point to compare pve and pvp tho, but fair. forget the pvp part, why only apply the QoL to raid boss killing/wipe? why not on every other mobs aswell? like between trashmobs, or like the elites on nagrand, or even everyday normal questing mobs?
i mean with the same reasoning, those are pretty fair, right?
that way we dont have to "waste" our time waiting on cds doing nothing just like the original argument.
or is that gonna change the gameplay and make the game easier? but somehow if its applied only on boss killing/wipe will not change the gameplay or make the game easier?

[Szopachnik]

wasnt my point to compare pve and pvp tho, but fair. forget the pvp part, why only apply the QoL to raid boss killing/wipe? why not on every other mobs aswell? like between trashmobs, or like the elites on nagrand, or even everyday normal questing mobs?
i mean with the same reasoning, those are pretty fair, right?
that way we dont have to "waste" our time waiting on cds doing nothing just like the original argument.
or is that gonna change the gameplay and make the game easier? but somehow if its applied only on boss killing/wipe will not change the gameplay or make the game easier?

The core distinction lies in the fundamental gameplay design differences between raids and open world content. Raids are isolated dungeon instances where 25 players are essentially locked together and forced to remain inactive while waiting for cooldowns. The open world operates completely differently - you always have alternative activities available when abilities are on cooldown.

Your suggestions about applying this to every mob are frankly absurd - proposals for the sake of proposals without considering actual game design. Regular mobs aren't balanced around cooldown resets, and implementing this would turn combat into mindless button spamming. If you genuinely want to propose additional changes, the forum is open for you to create your own suggestion thread.

Boss encounters are specifically balanced around cooldown management - their mechanics anticipate ability usage at particular moments. Resetting after wipes doesn't make them easier but merely eliminates artificial downtime. Applying this universally would destroy game balance, allowing infinite ability spam against regular mobs. There's a reason such systems have never been implemented in any version of WoW - because they're fundamentally flawed

[Morvion]

The core distinction lies in the fundamental gameplay design differences between raids and open world content. Raids are isolated dungeon instances where 25 players are essentially locked together and forced to remain inactive while waiting for cooldowns. The open world operates completely differently - you always have alternative activities available when abilities are on cooldown.

Your suggestions about applying this to every mob are frankly absurd - proposals for the sake of proposals without considering actual game design. Regular mobs aren't balanced around cooldown resets, and implementing this would turn combat into mindless button spamming. If you genuinely want to propose additional changes, the forum is open for you to create your own suggestion thread.

Boss encounters are specifically balanced around cooldown management - their mechanics anticipate ability usage at particular moments. Resetting after wipes doesn't make them easier but merely eliminates artificial downtime. Applying this universally would destroy game balance, allowing infinite ability spam against regular mobs. There's a reason such systems have never been implemented in any version of WoW - because they're fundamentally flawed

not suggesting anything, just wanted to point out that the suggestion maybe wont change the "difficulty" but definitely will change the gameplay cz people cant wait few minutes for the sake of "QoL improvement", but i guess its too much.
i hope when someone suggesting any other classic proven changes with the same argument in the future, u'll think the same.

[OhieMitzen]

proposals for the sake of proposals without considering actual game design.

Just like your suggestion. All you want is to kill bosses with little to no downtime. Raids weren't designed to be like that. Raids were designed to test players and their resources, including, but not limited to time and long CD's.

Boss encounters are specifically balanced around cooldown management - their mechanics anticipate ability usage at particular moments.

Boss encounters & raids weren't designed around where every player would have every ability ready every fight. If they were designed so, those long cooldowns would also be altered and the abilities' impact/power to be lowered as a balancing factor, so that they can be used every boss encounter without impacting encounter difficulty. Blizzard did that with some abilities. Long CD's became shorter, but they also became weaker, take a guess why they got weaker.

Ignore tactics, just pop a CD.

[Obnoxious]

take a guess why they got weaker

Because they were too strong and people would just wait for the cooldowns instead of playing, which isn't what the game aimed for.

[Szopachnik]

Just like your suggestion. All you want is to kill bosses with little to no downtime. Raids weren't designed to be like that. Raids were designed to test players and their resources, including, but not limited to time and long CD's.



Boss encounters & raids weren't designed around where every player would have every ability ready every fight. If they were designed so, those long cooldowns would also be altered and the abilities' impact/power to be lowered as a balancing factor, so that they can be used every boss encounter without impacting encounter difficulty. Blizzard did that with some abilities. Long CD's became shorter, but they also became weaker, take a guess why they got weaker.

Ignore tactics, just pop a CD.

Finally, a glimmer of thought in your response. You keep repeating these dramatic phrases about ignoring tactics and spamming cooldowns. If your guild actually plays this way, I can't help that. Perhaps you and your guildmates should learn proper boss mechanics instead of waiting for full cooldown resets just to fail again. Though I'm certain most guilds actually study tactics for these 20-year-old encounters.

Let me remind you - the game is over two decades old. Travel time between bosses now takes 3-5 minutes (often less), whereas originally it took 2-3 times longer - that's why cooldowns naturally reset by the next pull. Player skill and class knowledge have improved exponentially since then.

I'm 99.9% certain you didn't level at x1 rates, and I'll bet you use dual spec and other non-original features (assuming you actually play on Onyxia) - though of course, nobody's forcing you to use them. Ironically, dual spec impacts gameplay far more significantly (gold savings on respecs) than cooldown resets ever could.

We're living in 2025 playing a 2000s game with accelerated rates, dual spec, and compressed phases - yet you oppose this simple QoL change purely on principle of "it wasn't like this before." How curiously selective your nostalgia is

[OhieMitzen]

Because they were too strong and people would just wait for the cooldowns instead of playing, which isn't what the game aimed for.

Thus if they are strong, and their CD's were to be reset on wipe/kill, it would make people use strong abilities each fight -> more strong abilities being used -> much easier fights. Which isn't something the game is aimed for.

Perhaps you and your guildmates should learn proper boss mechanics instead of waiting for full cooldown resets just to fail again. Though I'm certain most guilds actually study tactics for these 20-year-old encounters.

Assumptions and assumptions. The suggestion isn't weighed by one's personal achievements.
I could also assume you need the CD reset so that you don't waste 5 hours just to get 1 boss down, and want to get 2 bosses down in 4 hours instead, because you keep on failing these post-nerf archaic bosses that everybody knows tactics of by the time they stop wearing diapers.

Let me remind you - the game is over two decades old. Travel time between bosses now takes 3-5 minutes (often less), whereas originally it took 2-3 times longer - that's why cooldowns naturally reset by the next pull. Player skill and class knowledge have improved exponentially since then.

So people are so much better in video games than they were before, where would such skilled players need a CD resets for? Are you not as skilled as you think you are? Or are these post-nerf archaic bosses of early 2000's still hard for you? Maybe read a guide, or study these ancient bosses that were considered hard at some point.

I'm 99.9% certain you didn't level at x1 rates, and I'll bet you use dual spec and other non-original features (assuming you actually play on Onyxia) - though of course, nobody's forcing you to use them. Ironically, dual spec impacts gameplay far more significantly (gold savings on respecs) than cooldown resets ever could.

Dual spec, level rates are topics of their own, unrelated to your own suggestion, but you keep bringing them up? One thing was changed, so 100 things should change too? I did level x1 rates on other high rate realm though. Have you ever done that? Tell me how this is relevant to your suggestion? Or is this just epeen measuring contest now?

We're living in 2025 playing a 2000s game with accelerated rates, dual spec, and compressed phases - yet you oppose this simple QoL change purely on principle of "it wasn't like this before." How curiously selective your nostalgia is

It's good that you know what year it is. I'm so proud of you. You keep repeating that so much. Why?
I oppose the QoL change because it inherently would make all raids not only faster (not opposing this) but also easier (this is what I oppose).
You don't seem to comprehend what the QoL change would affect overall in raid environment.

Here's an interesting and simple counterargument: Remove those long CD abilities. This way you don't have to wait after wipe/kill to get them out of CD. Ofc, it wouldn't make the fights any harder. If you think this would make fights harder, you should, just maybe, understand that CD reset would make fights easier.

Try to stick to the topic, not the "me vs you" you seem to spiral in.

[Szopachnik]

Thus if they are strong, and their CD's were to be reset on wipe/kill, it would make people use strong abilities each fight -> more strong abilities being used -> much easier fights. Which isn't something the game is aimed for.



Assumptions and assumptions. The suggestion isn't weighed by one's personal achievements.
I could also assume you need the CD reset so that you don't waste 5 hours just to get 1 boss down, and want to get 2 bosses down in 4 hours instead, because you keep on failing these post-nerf archaic bosses that everybody knows tactics of by the time they stop wearing diapers.



So people are so much better in video games than they were before, where would such skilled players need a CD resets for? Are you not as skilled as you think you are? Or are these post-nerf archaic bosses of early 2000's still hard for you? Maybe read a guide, or study these ancient bosses that were considered hard at some point.



Dual spec, level rates are topics of their own, unrelated to your own suggestion, but you keep bringing them up? One thing was changed, so 100 things should change too? I did level x1 rates on other high rate realm though. Have you ever done that? Tell me how this is relevant to your suggestion? Or is this just epeen measuring contest now?



It's good that you know what year it is. I'm so proud of you. You keep repeating that so much. Why?
I oppose the QoL change because it inherently would make all raids not only faster (not opposing this) but also easier (this is what I oppose).
You don't seem to comprehend what the QoL change would affect overall in raid environment.

Here's an interesting and simple counterargument: Remove those long CD abilities. This way you don't have to wait after wipe/kill to get them out of CD. Ofc, it wouldn't make the fights any harder. If you think this would make fights harder, you should, just maybe, understand that CD reset would make fights easier.

Try to stick to the topic, not the "me vs you" you seem to spiral in.

Your counterargument misses the mark completely. Long cooldowns exist for in-combat balance (like Bloodlust's 10-minute restriction). Resetting them between attempts doesn't alter this - it simply removes dead time. You're conflating actual content difficulty with artificial between-pull delays that were designed for a different era when raid travel times were longer and player knowledge was lower.

Let me be clear: nobody is proposing to reset cooldowns mid-fight - only after wipes. Wrath Classic has already proven this system works without breaking raids.

As someone who plays for top parses, I know bosses can be defeated whether our long cooldowns are available or not. But currently, we waste 5-7 minutes AFK at bosses after clearing trash - time that could be used for additional pulls to optimize positioning and damage. This isn't about making content easier (the boss mechanics remain unchanged), but about respecting players' time in 2025.

If you view cooldown resets as some unfair advantage rather than what it truly is - quality of life improvement - then you clearly don't understand parse culture or speedrunning. The real challenge lies in executing mechanics perfectly, not in waiting for timers.

[Maslou]

Your counterargument misses the mark completely. Long cooldowns exist for in-combat balance (like Bloodlust's 10-minute restriction). Resetting them between attempts doesn't alter this - it simply removes dead time. You're conflating actual content difficulty with artificial between-pull delays that were designed for a different era when raid travel times were longer and player knowledge was lower.

Let me be clear: nobody is proposing to reset cooldowns mid-fight - only after wipes. Wrath Classic has already proven this system works without breaking raids.

As someone who plays for top parses, I know bosses can be defeated whether our long cooldowns are available or not. But currently, we waste 5-7 minutes AFK at bosses after clearing trash - time that could be used for additional pulls to optimize positioning and damage. This isn't about making content easier (the boss mechanics remain unchanged), but about respecting players' time in 2025.

If you view cooldown resets as some unfair advantage rather than what it truly is - quality of life improvement - then you clearly don't understand parse culture or speedrunning. The real challenge lies in executing mechanics perfectly, not in waiting for timers.

It's useless, he still doesn't see the "wait" phrase after two pages. Although I agree that the shaman's reincarnation, which has an hour of cooldown, will lose its design. And perhaps it makes sense to use a blacklist for such abilities. But he didn't even suggest that as an example, lol.