I know the event isn’t over, but it is for me. I have to go to sleep now and work tomorrow and by the time I get home the patch will have hit and I’ll have lost my chance.
I’ve spent a lot of gold and a lot of time over the last few weeks trying to beat Liadri. Originally because I wanted the mini, then just because I wanted to do it. I came close – I got her down to about 1/3 health on my best attempt, but I didn’t do it.
And now I have nothing to show for all that time and effort, right? Except I don’t see it that way. I have nothing tangible. I don’t have the mini or the achievement. But I feel like I’ve gotten a lot from this fight, and the Gauntlet in general.
Mainly I know it’s made me a much better player. A couple of months ago I re-mapped my keyboard to put all my skills on the number pad and part of the reason I did it was because (being left-handed) I could use my thumb on the arrow keys to kite. Except I never did. It was only when I started doing the Gauntlet, when I had to attack and kite and move the camera all at once that I finally learned to do this.
Now I do it all the time. I was fighting a Champion solo during one of the Invasion events and I was kiting around it, dodging at the right times, switching between my longbow and short bow effectively and although I couldn’t quite solo it I did decent damage and managed to hold my own until help arrived. That would never have happened without the Gauntlet. When I started I didn’t think I could even reach Liadri (I’ve never considered myself a good player) so it’s been a huge boost to my confidence to know I could even get that far.
I also thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to test myself against something truly challenging. I can’t remember the last time I did something this hard in a game, with this many different aspects to keep track of. I don’t think I’ve ever done it in a game without a pause function or turn based combat. Honestly although I’ve never considered myself the type of gamer who wants virtually impossible challenges it’s been hugely fun and I look forward to the fact that by comparison pretty much anything else won’t seem so bad*. It’s a bit like when I moved on to other jumping puzzles after finally doing Dark Reverie but on a much broader scale.
And like Dark Reverie I also look forward to going back to the Gauntlet when it returns and finding that I’ve continued to get better and now I can do it relatively easily.
*I’ll get back to you on this one after I’ve seen SAB Tribulation Mode.
“Life’s a journey, not a destination.”
I did manage to beat Liadri, but I passed on the Light Up the Darkness achievement this time around, since I barely scraped past Liadri with my sub-par gear. I’ll wait till the Gauntlet returns before attempting it again, but yeah, it’s a very satisfying feeling seeing your skills gradually improve each time you challenge Liadri.