The second week of Mythic+ this season is over, and Nightstalker314 is taking a look at the weekly data from Raider.IO. With a 25.26% drop-off from last week, we saw a pattern similar to the early weeks of last season. But the shift towards high-level keys was even faster this season. In addition, the focus on the few BiS items from the M+ loot pool became as clear as it hadn’t been in quite a while. So, let’s look at the details.
Weekly Total Run Performance Compared To Other Seasons
The 25.26% decline had the usual regional split. EU (-30.10%) and the US (-28.96%) sat on the lower end. The farm effort for loot drops was probably a lot higher in the first week, and the rebound turned out stronger. In addition, the chance of getting a normal mode tier piece or heroic Ulduar loot from both timewalking quests also drove interest away from M+ in week 2. Meanwhile, TW (-22.13%), CN (-19.10%), and TW (-18.05%) saw much more sustained activity.
When comparing the four regular regions across the previous seasons, MN S2 showed almost the same total numbers as TWW S2. The trajectory was once again much stronger than in all of TWW. Within the next few weeks, this pattern will be constantly shaken up by a dungeon week event, more Timewalking, and a new solo raid boss. And the regular bonus rolls, outside of the vault option, will see more use within the raid for now.
Total Runs Across All Dungeons
The spread across all dungeons hasn’t been this wide since the first week of TWW S3, when everyone farmed Operation: Floodgate (17.56%) for a BiS trinket. And back then, the 2nd most favored dungeon only got to 13.34%. The top two dungeons this time, though, added up to 31.89%. A value that only Mists of Tirna Scithe and The Necrotic Wake (33.36%) in TWW S1 could top recently. The order only slightly shifted in week 2. Temple and King’s Rest swapped places, with very little difference in general.
Murder Row (91.45%) continued as the easiest dungeon, only adding to its popularity. King’s Rest (90.98%) and Temple of Sethraliss (90.20%) benefitted from the recent nerfs. Voidscar Arena (89.29%), with next to no major changes, might just benefit from Tyrannical first IDs, since major trash pulls are really punishing for PUGs. Altar of Fangs (87.91%) managed to get up to 5th from last place in week 1. The massive nerfs throughout the dungeon clearly helped. At the low end, with quite the gap, Ruby Life Pools (86.11%), Blinding Vale (85.40%), and Den of Nalorakk (85.30%) are overdue for more nerfs or have really hard boss tuning.
Split Across All Key Levels
77.78% of all keys were completed at key level 10 or higher. This value is once again higher than in week 2 of MN S1 (71.48%). CN metrics are once again at the extreme end with 84.49%, while the other four regions got to “just” 73.03%. One might expect that the 38.41% for key level 10 alone also falls into such a split, but CN (38.32%) and the rest (38.47%) are quite close. The big difference starts with key levels 11 and 12. In CN, those had a share of 17.53% and 14.27%, respectively, compared to 10.82% and 11.54%. Players over there are already setting their focus much higher. Their activity is outpacing the other 4 regions in absolute numbers above level 15 and above their global share above level 10. The ceiling was higher in week 2 of S1, but due to a single depleted +21.
The overall success rate increased by 1.57 percentage points to 88.58%. It grew for any key level above 6. The decrease in these lower levels could be due to high-end players no longer flooding these levels after week 1. And the influx of freshly leveled and geared characters from Timewalking. The drop-off from key level 6 to 7 remains a harsh step, with almost -7.93 percentage points in difference. Meanwhile, the gap between 9 and 10 (+4.43) has not grown too much in the opposite direction. With 91.54%, +10s are easier than in week 2 of MN S1 (89.28%). In general, the step-up from week 1 to week 2 has been better in this season. From 87.01% to 88.58% instead of 87.66% to 88.14%.
Conclusion and Week 3 Forecast
So far, MN S2 follows the basic pattern of the previous season for the most part. It is only offset by the general decline in activity and a faster shift towards higher-end keys. The dungeons are tuned a bit closer early on, but there is still room for improvement. A new solo-raid boss much earlier into the season and the changes to bonus rolls might be to its detriment in the near future.
As of this writing, 144 hours after the US reset, the hourly numbers for all major regions have only slightly decreased. -7.21% for the US, -5.28% for the EU, and -4.86% for CN. This could partially be due to the heavier focus on Timewalking in week 2. We’ll examine this further in next week’s breakdown.
