When Karazhan was first introduced at the start of TBC, WoW fans and fan sites immediatly began questioning Blizzards approach in implementing this instance as a tiered instance. Making up the first 1/3rd of the tier 4 instances, Karazhan was supposed to provide an easy step up to 25-man by allowing casual guilds access to tiered instances without having to worry about the logistical implications of 40-man. However, it didn't quite go so smoothly and despite Blizzard saying that they were intending to implement another 10-man instance, players began to question the decision.
Previously on World of Warcraft...
Back in the olden days when UBRS and LBRS were still used to gear up players for MC, it was cut and dry mechanics from a logistical stand point. 4 groups ran UBRS and LBRS to get gear and then those 4 groups merged to form one 40-man raid to attend to MC. When Blizzard implemented Zul'Gurub, it became even more cut and dry as the gear was better and it was specifically tuned to help in Molten Core so the majority of players only visited UBRS for their BWL attunement quest. Again, cut and dry means that 2 seperate groups could attend to ZG and then merge to form one 40-man group to take on MC. This made ZG not only a fun instance suitable for guilds that weren't in a position logistically to raid MC but also a viable and easy way of gearing up for MC and the fact that this raid dungeon wasn't tiered meant that nobody felt compelled to pay it a visit if they didn't want to - it was considered a complimentary instance with bonuses but not an all important one. Everyone loved it and everyone thanked Blizzard for such an instance and when 10-mans and 25-mans were announced for TBC, initially people began to rejoice at the lower logistical requirements and at the casual nature of the 10-mans. The complications came when Kara was placed in the tier 4 league...
Now, The Conclusion...
So what we had was raid numbers that fit with the maps. UBRS = 10-man x2 - ZG = 20-man x2 - MC = 40-man and so on and so forth. Now however we seem to be at a wierd place in World of Warcraft logistics. Granted, the logistical requirements of end game raiding have gone down, thus making it easier to create a raid group but at the same time, things have become a little more complex.
Karazhan is a 10-man dungeon designed as an entry level instance to train basic coordination and introduce newer players to raiding without subjecting them to hardcore situations. It's a relatively easy instance that provides average challenges on later bosses. It was designed as a ZG for level 70 (sort of) and whilst that is all well and good, a clear mistake was made with the instance - it was tiered. Players had to visit it to attain pieces of the tier 4 set and thus, greater importance was placed on it than ZG. Now, this immediatly seperates it from ZG and either the player base were mistaken and it was never intended to be a ZG for 70 or Blizzard got something else wrong. Even if Kara was not intended to take the place as the ZG of 70 (as the addition of ZA would suggest) and more the place of the UBRS and LBRS of 70, there is still an issue that a lot of players are concerned about and that is in the logistical area of the game.
Every instance past Karazhan (excluding Zul'Aman) requires 25 players. This is two and a half kara teams. Therefore, you either run 3 kara teams and have 5 players that are cycled in depending on their performance, you run 5 kara teams and have two 25-man teams running or you don't run karazhan and gear your raid group up in heroic dungeons. The latter is a little ridiculous as you need kara to attain pieces of the tier 4 set. The 5 kara teams idea is a logistical nightmare, as 40 mans were. The only actual option is to run kara with 3 groups in order to gear up enough players to see 25-man and as such, you always have 5 players left out. This is ok if you want benches that take raid spots based on who is and who is not available for certain runs but if you are intending on have a closed guild that only has 25 players that run as a closed group, you still have a logisitcal nightmare.
In short, it is harder to step from kara to 25-mans than it was to step from UBRS/ZG to 40-mans and the hardcore raids are penalised by what is a lengthy reset timer (7 days) which, in my opinion, should be lowered.
The Late Addition
Zul'Aman would suggest that Blizzard did not intend Kara to be the ZG of 70 and as such, presents a few concepts that could work out for the better. For a start, the casual guilds who do not want to run 25-mans now have a form of progression to make from kara to ZA and as such, have something to keep them occupied until WotLK comes out. Another is that the gear in ZA is none-tiered whihc means it can be used as a complimentary instance like heroics to gear up for G25-mans without feeling compelled to pay it a visit, like you are with Kara.
A Solution?
There is no solution to this issue. Blizzard have said they intend to stick with this format and Naxxaramas is being retuned as a 25-man dungeon for the first tier of WotLK and they have no plans to change this.
What about 25-mans then? Surely they could change the logisitcs so that 25-mans became 20-mans or 30-man and this would make the complexities of progress from the 10-man entry level dungeons up to the full on end game dungeons far easier on the numbers and far more cut and dry... like the old system?
