Quote Originally Posted by FallenArisen0990 View Post
I don't see how releasing SM first and NM later makes any difference. This sounds like an excuse because even if NM wasn't released, you would've had to fight SM in i170/i180 gear with weekly i200 gear. NM is not to blame because many chose the casual route and not the hardcore route.
The problem here was that people who wanted to do savage, had to also do normal to get gear. They had to do normal an obnoxious number of times to get gear.
Removing normal from the itemization to start Savage would alleviate the fatigue that a lot of savage raiders complained about. Releasing Normal after savage, and adjusting the iLevel design accordingly, would have helped.
As it was, Savage was released after Normal, and the only reason I had to complain was that I had to do normal a bunch before even attempting savage.