Guild Wars 2

It is not fun at all, but I still plan on beating it just to say to myself that I beat it. Definitely don’t plan on making a “I finally beat her!” thread as this really is a cheesy fight. Was expecting something a lot more epic.

Like Frozenpants just said, the concept of the fight, EVEN with having to learn it failure by failure, is fun.

The camera, the floor, the obstruction thing, that’s the bloody frustrating bit that sucks the fun out of the whole shebang. Oh, and the ticket thing and the needing a rez or needing to hike back to stand in line to go again, that’s not the awesome either.

Is it really an ‘achievement’ if it’s handed to you on a silver platter? The entire Liadri fight is about learning the pattern to get to phase 2, then you just have to range her while staying away from her. I’ve beaten her twice now across two accounts. She’s hard, but not impossible.

Tip: Make sure to fight her on the northern most arena.

Only took me 5 or 6 attempts to kill her. I thought it was fun. Not anywhere as hard as i thought it would be or as hard as i heard it was.

Excursion.9752:

I would love to see negative AOE as a solid red circle that way i could quickly tell what side of that one shot AOE that falls from the sky I’m on. This would be a great option to add.

I have trouble seeing the circles too. Maybe it’s the surface, maybe it’s not rendering right, but being able to see those circles clearly would make the fight so much easier for me.

Navzar.2938:

Feralnex.4071:

So why they created something like that ONLY for ppl who enyoj challenging fights? Not everybody like It. I just wanna get achievements, that’s all.

Because a lot of easy content isn’t very enjoyable for people who like challenge. So that content isn’t for them, just like this content isn’t for you.
Honestly, there’s very little hard content like this anyway.

As for achievements- You don’t need them; they’re not necessary at all.

This sums it up! Twice!

I haven’t got to Liadri yet in the gauntlet. All the rumors about her one shot attacks, needing specific builds, etc have actually killed my motivation to get through the rest of the fights. That’s a shame, because I’ve enjoyed working out the rest.

Easy or hard, the Gauntlet is unidimensional. The Bosses spam skills, with no cooldown. They are immune to cc, and take only a percentage of the damage done to them. The entire mechanic probably took 5 minutes or less to setup.

That said, it’s fluff content. It’s better than jumping puzzles but not by much. When gauging how hard they are, remember some people like pain. They revel in defeat and the challenge. They live for the chance to prove themselves in an imaginary world. Me? I pay my rent early, that’s enough of a challenge for me lol. A friend put it best. “GW1 was ridiculed for not being an mmo. It was a co-op. GW2 is trying to sit at the cool kids table. Trouble is the cool kids are still laughing at them.”.

I had always thought of the camera angle as part of the challenge. Like how in the chaos crystal cavern jumping puzzle in iron marches you can get forced into certain camera angles.

Also, I beat liadri as a large char guardian using scepter, and a mix between zerkers/knights/pvt gear with soldiers runes and an altruistic healer trait build/shout (custom engineered to the fight). I had tried thief, warrior, and mesmer beforehand, and for my play style found guardian to be the easiest. I probably tried over 50 times with my other classes, but I wouldn’t change a thing about the fight.

I do agree that if AOE circles are hard to see, that might need fixing, though I never noticed.

My main is a necromancer and certain aspects of this fight are incredibly, incredibly annoying for a class that has no projectile reflection, no invulnerability, no dodge or evasion skills, no real way to disengage and very limited mobility overall.

But my main is a necromancer. I’m going to take this horror down with my main. Somehow.

Ya’ll do realize the gauntlet is a test for new dungeon boss builds right? LOL

I beat her on a full Rabid engineer (No zerker gear whatsoever). I didn’t have any blocks equipped, nor did I have any invincibility equipped. I did have AoE blind, but I didn’t use that nearly as much as I could have. I still finished the boss.

Yes, the fight is hard. Yes, fixing the arena to not screw with your camera would be good. Yes, making the AoE more visible would be nice. Yes, bugfixes would be wonderful.

No, she doesn’t need a nerf. No, the 1-shot skills don’t need to become 2-shot, 3-shot, or 4-shot. No, the orbs don’t need removed.

The fight is fair. You stand in the AoE, and you die. Instant-death mechanics teach you quickly to both plan and react. There’s a pattern for a reason; follow it. You have the capability to learn, so get using it! Saying its cheap is like saying getting hit by a car in real life is cheap: why the hell are you still standing there, looking at the swiftly approaching vehicle?! Get out of the dang way way! Sure, sometimes you don’t see it at first, but that’s why you are supposed to look.

Sylentir.8913:

I beat her on a full Rabid engineer (No zerker gear whatsoever). I didn’t have any blocks equipped, nor did I have any invincibility equipped. I did have AoE blind, but I didn’t use that nearly as much as I could have. I still finished the boss.

Yes, the fight is hard. Yes, fixing the arena to not screw with your camera would be good. Yes, making the AoE more visible would be nice. Yes, bugfixes would be wonderful.

No, she doesn’t need a nerf. No, the 1-shot skills don’t need to become 2-shot, 3-shot, or 4-shot. No, the orbs don’t need removed.

The fight is fair. You stand in the AoE, and you die. Instant-death mechanics teach you quickly to both plan and react. There’s a pattern for a reason; follow it. You have the capability to learn, so get using it! Saying its cheap is like saying getting hit by a car in real life is cheap: why the hell are you still standing there, looking at the swiftly approaching vehicle?! Get out of the dang way way! Sure, sometimes you don’t see it at first, but that’s why you are supposed to look.

Um, several times the range-immune orbs pulled me into the shadows while I was attempting her. So yeah, when the car PULLS you to it in real life your analogy would be a VERY very good example. But our vehicles atm lack magic suction.

EDIT: Also, unless you turn post processing off, her blind makes every bit of watching and learning the pattern defunct. If you can barely see the zones as is.

Also, I did beat her, after 15 tries fighting through the bugs she brings with her to the plate.

Edit 2: This is an amazing fight with some half decent mechanic attempts. The bugs and poor sight issues simply send the difficulty through the roof.

Frozenpants.5491:

The fight is fun i enjoy the challenge… what i don’t enjoy is :

One shot mechanics in a fight that’s put above the most laggy zone in the game.

Buggy camera which makes it very annoying.

Semi transparent floor that makes the Aoe harder to see.

Bugged Rifts that get the obstruction bug.

Poorly balanced and favors certain professions/builds.

Resource cost+long corpse run to try again.

But yea.. other then all that it’s “fun” i guess.

Yeah, take Liadri and remove all of the little annoyances and it’d be fun… but then everybody would be able to do it and some people couldn’t have that at all.

Feralnex.4071:

Last night after 50 deaths I throw my keyboard on the ground, seriously, I was REALLY kitten ed of…

Now it all makes sense.

ANET wants people to buy the new GW2 keyboard!

Sylentir.8913:

Instant-death mechanics teach you quickly to both plan and react. There’s a pattern for a reason; follow it. You have the capability to learn, so get using it! Saying its cheap is like saying getting hit by a car in real life is cheap: why the hell are you still standing there, looking at the swiftly approaching vehicle?! Get out of the dang way way! Sure, sometimes you don’t see it at first, but that’s why you are supposed to look.

By your logic, there should be no mor car crashes because everyone can see all cars coming.

Lag and invalidating non-berserker gear are the primary reasons why 1-hit kill mechanics should be removed from the game yesterday.

I say, give easy mode and hard mode.

Easy mode: Liadri has 75% less HP, does 75% less damage, and does not have a cripple skill. No rifts spawn and once phase 2 starts, the aoe 1shot kills stop. Remove all 1 shot kills.

Hard mode: The way it is now.

Rewards for easy mode: both achievements and the miniature
Rewards for hard mode: botch achievements, the miniature and 10gold

EDIT: oh, and people don’t spawn DEAD outside the dome on the catwalk. We spawn alive and well.

Evon Skyfyre.9673:

The Bosses spam skills, with no cooldown.

• The bosses have an arsenol of skills like the players. Most have recharges, but some skills do not like auto-attack.

They are immune to cc,

• The bosses are not immune to any CC except Immobilize. You can do everything else to the bosses including Daze, Cripple, Chill, Stun, Launch, etc.

and take only a percentage of the damage done to them.

• This is simply not true.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but you should probably be more honest about your experience with the fights since you have obviously not participated in them.

Oh, and I forgot to mention: The timer needs to go.

There should be no timer on liadri…

This is why Diablo III developers decided not to add achievements for monster power.

“Going an extra mile” should give its own rewards without putting anything out of reach from the rest.

In the case of Diablo III, if you can manage to do stuff in monster power 10, then you get better drops and level up faster.

But if you can’t, you can just tone it down and take things easier and slower.

Nobody doing monster power 10 feels unrewarded because there’s no achievements for it since they get other rewards.
And nobody who can’t manage monster power 10 is feeling alienated and frustrated about something they may never get because of things like poor Internet connection, a crappy system or not having two hands; because nothng drops in MP10 that won’t drop in lower difficulty settings. It just may take longer.

MithranArkanere.8957:

This is why Diablo III developers decided not to add achievements for monster power.

“Going an extra mile” should give its own rewards without putting anything out of reach from the rest.

In the case of Diablo III, if you can manage to do stuff in monster power 10, then you get better drops and level up faster.

But if you can’t, you can just tone it down and take things easier and slower.

Nobody doing monster power 10 feels unrewarded because there’s no achievements for it since they get other rewards.
And nobody who can’t manage monster power 10 is feeling alienated and frustrated about something they may never get because of things like poor Internet connection, a crappy system or not having two hands; because nothng drops in MP10 that won’t drop in lower difficulty settings. It just may take longer.

Are you suggesting people on GW2 feel left out because they can’t do optional content that is geared towards more skilled players?

I feel alienated by all the easy contents in the past. It was all grind grind grind.

I really feel welcomed/invited by the challenge Liadri provides. TY Anet

Shpongle.6025:

Oh, and I forgot to mention: The timer needs to go.

There should be no timer on liadri…

The timer is part of the challenge. You need to multi task while fighting her to be able to actually beat her. You’re asking for an easy way out. everyone would just go in as a tank.

If they remove the timer, at least reward the people that can beat her with a timer with some sort of a title

Shpongle.6025:

I say, give easy mode and hard mode.

Easy mode: Liadri has 75% less HP, does 75% less damage, and does not have a cripple skill. No rifts spawn and once phase 2 starts, the aoe 1shot kills stop. Remove all 1 shot kills.

Hard mode: The way it is now.

Rewards for easy mode: both achievements and the miniature
Rewards for hard mode: botch achievements, the miniature and 10gold

EDIT: oh, and people don’t spawn DEAD outside the dome on the catwalk. We spawn alive and well.

Hardmode: both achievements, miniature and an exclusive TITLE. Don’t care about the gold.

People who finished her, especially the 8 orbs deserve something special that you can’t obtain. If you’re asking for a nerf, then you should be prepared to lose something exclusive like a Title. Not on some cheap 10 gold that you can farm in less than an hour.

Lots of whiners on the forums. If you can’t kill liadri, do something else. Once you get the pattern down, she’s easy. I think i used 5 or 6 tickets to kill her and most of those were to figure out the first part.

Frozenpants.5491:

The fight is fun i enjoy the challenge… what i don’t enjoy is :

One shot mechanics in a fight that’s put above the most laggy zone in the game.

Buggy camera which makes it very annoying.

Semi transparent floor that makes the Aoe harder to see.

Bugged Rifts that get the obstruction bug.

Poorly balanced and favors certain professions/builds.

Resource cost+long corpse run to try again.

But yea.. other then all that it’s “fun” i guess.

All of this. The lag is the worst, I’ve hammered ‘F’ before trying to pick up crystals when I’m well within range, and dodged out of shadowfall to a clear spot only to die anyway. I have seen my character appear to move forward and “snap” back a few steps, just enough to die again in another shadowfall, and visions that should be too far away exploding and killing my character again. Last night, I dodged and got “Invulnerable” messages on my screen and still died.

So then I get to WP, repair armor, run back, and wait in a line to do it all over again 5-10 minutes later or whatever. What part of this was fun again? It’s like the gauntlet was designed for an offline console game—and if it was, I could hit a restart key or load a save game and be right back in the fight again. But this? No. It’s as if its entire design is intended to be an aggravating and contrived way to extend the life of the gauntlet.

They said fight with Liadri will be about skill and tactic, but it is purely about luck. Will the aoe shows right above you if you had to dodge it already twice in 6 sec or not? If not you win.
There is no skill required. It is super easy to get to phase 2 and phase two is only about luck. I quit after around 20 tries. I have no reason to waste my time and gold for WP just to kill something that can kill everyone who is patient enough to try it 100 times. Some of my friends are patient enough and after 100 times they did it, but i am not and Anet did not even gave any reason why to try to be patient enough. Some mini?….Keep it. I cant even use it properly becouse every time i push deposit all collectibles it will be in my bank. So why should i waste so much effort for something that is only about luck and awards me with something that will be in my bank for rest of its existence?
No thanks anet..I am experiencing enough RNG out of combat in this game. I dont want to experience it in combat now..

Shpongle.6025:

I say, give easy mode and hard mode.

Easy mode: Liadri has 75% less HP, does 75% less damage, and does not have a cripple skill. No rifts spawn and once phase 2 starts, the aoe 1shot kills stop. Remove all 1 shot kills.

Hard mode: The way it is now.

Rewards for easy mode: both achievements and the miniature
Rewards for hard mode: botch achievements, the miniature and 10gold

EDIT: oh, and people don’t spawn DEAD outside the dome on the catwalk. We spawn alive and well.

Translation:

“Give me a free mini.”

Sawnic.6795:

[…]

Are you suggesting people on GW2 feel left out because they can’t do optional content that is geared towards more skilled players?

I’m not suggesting anything in this case.

I’m stating a fact.

In a game, the very moment you strap some achievement or unique reward to a piece of content, it’s no longer “optional”. It becomes and objective. Games are all about rules and objectives.

Everything can be considered optional if you want, including living. So “it’s optional” doesn’t work as an excuse here, once you strap an objective to it.

You need to draw a line somewhere between what people will fell is an “objective” and what’s actually “optional”.

Since it’s an online multiplayer game, the line is drawn where enough players will stop having fun, because games must be fun above all else.
That that is most often where they will feel forced to do something they may not really enjoy to get something unique they won’t be able to get in any other way, because they will enjoy using or having that thing.

That doesn’t mean you can’t have higher difficulties.

It just means higher difficulties must be really optional, having no rewards unique to it.
There must still be rewards, and they can be more than in lower difficulties, but not unique.

For example, let’s take the Trials. For most players they were horribly badly designed content. For a very few, it was “Way too easy”.
Even once you remove the usual “It’s too easy, make it harder” trolls that didn’t actually do it, but say that just to kitten off people, there was still people who found it easy.

So, how should have it been?

It should have been more like GW1’s Factions and Nightfall challenges.

1.- Virtually endless. Getting harder and harder wave after wave.
2.- Any unlocks and unique rewards (achievements, titles, etc) would require only getting to the point a little bit after it got hard, but not too hard. Like the faction cap increase from challenges in GWFactions, you only need 100 points, but there are players who are able to go past 1000 points in several challenges.
3.- Past that point, there’s still more reward, but they are no longer unique or unlocks. Those who can’t get past that, will have to take it easy in lower difficulties.
4.- There should be a leaderboard for the challenges, so those who are better get to show off, but only for as long as they are good. They don’t get to get some title and show it off forever. If someone gets better, they go up the challenge laderboard, if someone gets worse, they go down. Real skill is dynamic it’s in the present. Not something you did back in the 90’s. That’s in the past. Skill is now. Achievements are not really to show skill, they are merely to record achieved feats.
5.- And it should not have been temporary. It should have been a fixed challenge that is there permanently, so people willing to train and get better are able to do so. When you make it temporary, you are no longer really rewarding skill, but other factors like having a better connection or innate talent. Imagine if all athletes were not allowed to train. It’ll be all about genes, without dedication, learning or skill development involved. Give time and talent is still a factor, but the untalented can still develop the skill with training.

We already have a bit of that in GW2, in fractals, although the rewards are not very well balanced, if you manage to do the higher fractals, you still get more chances for rare stuff more often. But you won’t lose any unique rewards for sticking to just to the easy level 10-30 fractals.

MithranArkanere.8957:

Sawnic.6795:

[...]

Are you suggesting people on GW2 feel left out because they can’t do optional content that is geared towards more skilled players?

I’m not suggesting anything in this case.

I’m stating a fact.

In a game, the very moment you strap some achievement or unique reward to a piece of content, it’s no longer "optional". It becomes and objective. Games are all about rules and objectives.

Everything can be considered optional if you want, including living. So "it’s optional" doesn’t work as an excuse here, once you strap an objective to it.

You need to draw a line somewhere between what people will fell is an "objective" and what’s actually "optional".

Since it’s an online multiplayer game, the line is drawn where enough players will stop having fun, because games must be fun above all else.
That that is most often where they will feel forced to do something they may not really enjoy to get something unique they won’t be able to get in any other way, because they will enjoy using or having that thing.

That doesn’t mean you can’t have higher difficulties.

It just means higher difficulties must be *really* optional, having no rewards unique to it.
There must still be rewards, and they can be more than in lower difficulties, but not unique.

For example, let’s take the Trials. For most players they were horribly badly designed content. For a very few, it was "Way too easy".
Even once you remove the usual "It’s too easy, make it harder" trolls that didn’t actually do it, but say that just to kitten off people, there was still people who found it easy.

So, how should have it been?

It should have been more like GW1’s Factions and Nightfall challenges.

1.- Virtually endless. Getting harder and harder wave after wave.
2.- Any unlocks and unique rewards (achievements, titles, etc) would require only getting to the point a little bit after it got hard, but not too hard. Like the faction cap increase from challenges in GWFactions, you only need 100 points, but there are players who are able to go past 1000 points in several challenges.
3.- Past that point, there’s still more reward, but they are no longer unique or unlocks. Those who can’t get past that, will have to take it easy in lower difficulties.
4.- There should be a leaderboard for the challenges, so those who are better get to show off, but only for as long as they are good. They don’t get to get some title and show it off forever. If someone gets better, they go up the challenge laderboard, if someone gets worse, they go down. Real skill is dynamic it’s in the present. Not something you did back in the 90’s. That’s in the past. Skill is now. Achievements are not really to show skill, they are merely to record achieved feats.
5.- And it should not have been temporary. It should have been a fixed challenge that is there permanently, so people willing to train and get better are able to do so. When you make it temporary, you are no longer really rewarding skill, but other factors like having a better connection or innate talent. Imagine if all athletes were not allowed to train. It’ll be all about genes, without dedication, learning or skill development involved. Give time and talent is still a factor, but the untalented can still develop the skill with training.

We already have a bit of that in GW2, in fractals, although the rewards are not very well balanced, if you manage to do the higher fractals, you still get more chances for rare stuff more often. But you won’t lose any unique rewards for sticking to just to the easy level 10-30 fractals.

So yes, you are suggesting optional content is alienating players. That "objective" is an "optional objective." It has absolutely no play on the game itself if you haven’t killed Liadri.

Sawnic.6795:

MithranArkanere.8957:

This is why Diablo III developers decided not to add achievements for monster power.

“Going an extra mile” should give its own rewards without putting anything out of reach from the rest.

In the case of Diablo III, if you can manage to do stuff in monster power 10, then you get better drops and level up faster.

But if you can’t, you can just tone it down and take things easier and slower.

Nobody doing monster power 10 feels unrewarded because there’s no achievements for it since they get other rewards.
And nobody who can’t manage monster power 10 is feeling alienated and frustrated about something they may never get because of things like poor Internet connection, a crappy system or not having two hands; because nothng drops in MP10 that won’t drop in lower difficulty settings. It just may take longer.

Are you suggesting people on GW2 feel left out because they can’t do optional content that is geared towards more skilled players?

All I feel left out of is the gold farming train. I’d love 150g in a week from less than a minute of work per shot.

Interesting that as time goes by, there’s fewer and fewer “omg Liadri is impossible” posts. =D

It’s really not THAT bad. Everyone can do it.

How ableist of you.

Everyone cannot do it and that’s the point. Not everyone can beat this content and that’s FINE. I don’t think it should be nerfed at all.

And before you scream “LEARN 2 PLAY SCRUB”, I’m disabled. The fight mechanics are beyond my physical ability and my tolerance for hair pulling stress and frustration. And I’m 100% cool with this – I don’t need the mini. Optional content is optional.

But don’t say everyone can do it. Everyone can’t.

ArenaNet screwed up huge this time, not because it was unforeseen
but simply because they didn’t care
their inability to create varied difficulties and award accordingly is simply appalling

voice of reason “hey, if we’re considerate toward our customers, then we can release content that everyone can appreciate”
Anet “No, Everyone is getting hard content this time and they’ll learn to like it. if they can’t adjust then they aren’t getting the mini”

cheshirefox.7026:

ArenaNet screwed up huge this time, not because it was unforeseen
but simply because they didn’t care
their inability to create varied difficulties and award accordingly is simply appalling

*voice of reason* "hey, if we’re considerate toward our customers, then we can release content that everyone can appreciate"
*Anet* "No, Everyone is getting hard content this time and they’ll learn to like it. if they can’t adjust then they aren’t getting the mini"

ANet said before the patch dropped that only 8% of their testers could complete it, and not everyone will be able to.

It’s not that they didn’t care, it’s that you’re not the targeted demographic if you can’t complete it. And yes, what you mentioned is their logic. The hard content is targeted towards PvE players who /want/ challenging content.

that’s funny because not Every game publisher gets returning customers….

Frozenpants.5491:

The fight is fun i enjoy the challenge… what i don’t enjoy is :

One shot mechanics in a fight that’s put above the most laggy zone in the game.

Buggy camera which makes it very annoying.

Semi transparent floor that makes the Aoe harder to see.

Bugged Rifts that get the obstruction bug.

Poorly balanced and favors certain professions/builds.

Resource cost+long corpse run to try again.

But yea.. other then all that it’s “fun” i guess.

This I can agree with the. I can forgive them for the profession balancing a bit because it would very difficult to balance this to all profession. I think someone of every profession has done it now so it is at least doable.

One shots mechanics are fine in a game like this but how the idea of putting dodge dependent bosses in the same area as zerg farming got past anyone without someone realizing this was a terrible idea due to the lag it would cause is astounding. I don’t know, maybe having this much of a lag issue is rare? still it seems like it could have been easily avoided. I have it on the lowest settings and still getting under 10 fps. I gave up trying to fight liadri because everything looks like is doing short teleports around the arena rather than running whenever I fight her.
I don’t mind too much because its not like you have to do this to progress in other areas of the game and the mini pet is nice to have but not a game changer but I would like to be able to try this fight without the issues. I’ts probably too much to hope for that they put the gauntlet in a instance in a later update this time around but I hope they do next time or at least just more it out of zergland.

Making you appear dead outside the arena and run back is just a frustrating inconvenience that adds nothing.

The bugged rifts aren’t the only issue. This update just seem to have a lot of bug this time around. I’ve had the floor not close after dumping someone out twice.

First, everyone can take part in the content so it doesn’t alienate anyone. It frustrates, but that is different. Liadri is what an achievement should be something not everyone has and they had to work to get. If some people got it on their first try, congratulate them they are awesome. If some got it on the 100th, congratulate them because they don’t give up. If you haven’t gotten it, don’t ask for a nerf. Step up your game or go the plethora of other content in the game.

(Yes, the camera angles stink, but I thought of it as part of the challenge.)

Sawnic.6795:

Shpongle.6025:

I say, give easy mode and hard mode.

Easy mode: Liadri has 75% less HP, does 75% less damage, and does not have a cripple skill. No rifts spawn and once phase 2 starts, the aoe 1shot kills stop. Remove all 1 shot kills.

Hard mode: The way it is now.

Rewards for easy mode: both achievements and the miniature
Rewards for hard mode: botch achievements, the miniature and 10gold

EDIT: oh, and people don’t spawn DEAD outside the dome on the catwalk. We spawn alive and well.

Translation:

“Give me a free mini.”

Swap the rewards and I’ll support it. Easymode and hardmode both get 10g, while hardmode only gives the mini.

The whole point of the mini is for the hardmode players to have some form of representation that they are indeed hardmode. There is currently no other means ingame (Sorry legendary users, I respect you but have no proof of skill).

Sometimes the content itself is the reward. The journey to master it. Not some meaningless pixels you get after. Slapping on everything an optional easy mode (or hard mode) cheapens that dramatically.

I don’t post much, but this thread struck a cord with me and I will say that Liadri was a turnoff. I don’t particularly care about minis or the award, but having tried and failed Liadri ~100 times, it did alienate me from the game because it seemed to crystallize the trend of ANet equating “frustrating” to “challenging”. GW2 has flaws, as all games do, and most of the time, when things are easy, most of the issues can be overlooked. The Liadri fight seems to choose to amplify the aspects of the fight for false difficulty. Going by http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FakeDifficulty:

Bad technical aspects make it difficult:
- Small dome makes camera control awful. ANet also did this for the Aetherblade JP dive goggles where the camera clipped through the ceiling, forcing you to make a blind jump. Please stop making this a “feature”.
- Terrible lag because it’s in a zerg farming map.
- Ranged weapons can’t kill orbs.
- Sometimes uses of the orb don’t count.
- Previous fights in the same arena can affect your Liadri run.

The outcome is not reasonably determined by the player’s actions:
- Orb spawns add an unwelcome random component for a fight largely dependent on memorization and execution. This works in both directions: my best run rallied off 3 orbs, and I’ve died in way too many pulls to AoE then Visage of Mortality.

Denial of information critical to progress:
- Floor texture makes AoE circles difficult to see.

The outcome of the game is influenced by decisions that were uninformed at the time and cannot be undone:
- Not technically undoable, but for cash-strapped or new players, the mechanics definitely favor damage builds. Thankfully not strictly zerker, but the hard two minute cap means there is a gear check, and in general, one-shot kills as a mechanic favors damage heavy builds since the faster you kill, the shorter the duration you have to sustain a perfect performance. Again, this seems to be the meta for all the coming events (Aetherblade dungeon: kill golems before lasers get you, southsun cove dungeon: soft enrage boss).

The game requires the player to use skills or knowledge that are either incorrect or have nothing to do with the genre:
- Blind effect used on the player. Really, if the standard advice for the fight is to turn off post-processing effects, it should not be part of the design.

And this is just coupled with a couple of design decisions that are just annoyances:
- Tickets are soulbound, so switching characters to try requires farming with each character.
- Each failure costs a little less than 3 silver (~1.5 if you don’t need to waypoint) and no reward at all. It doesn’t even teach you about playing the game in general better, it’s just this weirdly specific memorization routine for this one fight.
- Queue or run back to arena on each failure takes about as long as the fight itself.

To look at the parallel with JPs, it’s these kinds of decisions make the difference between Spekk’s Lab (more challenging jumps, checkpoints in between) and Dark Reverie (easier jumps with terrible camera problems and having to do an entire other jumping puzzle and clearing vet mobs to retry). Looking at the Aetherblade JP and Southsun Skipping Stones JP, ANet certainly seems to be leaning in the direction of increasing frustration as a proxy for increasing difficulty.

This isn’t a question of casual vs. hardcore or masses vs. elites for me, it’s simply a question of whether the game makes me feel like I’m wasting time and getting frustrated (GW2) or whether it’s challenging and promoting a sense of mastery (Rayman, Halos on Legendary)

Liadri just seems symptomatic of the direction that ANet wants to take when increasing difficulty, and the lesson for me is that I will not be the target audience for a “more challenging GW2”. That is the aspect I find alienating.

Take out the WP fees/repair costs/corpse runs/queues and I’d be more generously inclined towards the Liadri/gauntlet fights. Those are the really alienating elements to me, especially when coupled with one-hit KO mechanics on top of FPS drops, skill lag, lag spikes, and bugs.

Oh, and since I’m making a wishlist, the devs could return gauntlet admission tickets to account bound too. >_>

Most people haven’t completed Liadri, I challenge anyone to find a statistic that says otherwise.

This forum isn’t for discussing legitimate issues for the game, however, but is a game where you have to bait others into “insulting” you, or making enough people report your post so that it gets deleted.

So I threw 8 orbs onto Liadri for the third time in all my 100+- attempts, and so I got out of time 10 seconds after that as always. I lost about 20g on this. I consider myself hardcore player, but this is just insane, it IS ONLY about luck, nothing more, if you miss 1-2 orbs you dont have enough time to kill her. And if you wear wrong armor, you have spend many gold on another exotic set. GG Anet

Mortifer.2946:

So I threw 8 orbs onto Liadri for the third time in all my 100+- attempts, and so I got out of time 10 seconds after that as always. I lost about 20g on this. I consider myself hardcore player, but this is just insane, it IS ONLY about luck, nothing more, if you miss 1-2 orbs you dont have enough time to kill her. And if you wear wrong armor, you have spend many gold on another exotic set. GG Anet

And yet not missing any orbs requires skill. You can have the most Godly luck and still fail to do that achievement, if you lack the skill or practice. I won’t say it is entirely devoid of luck but it requires more skill than luck. It is extremely tough and I doubt any one out there could complete it two times in a row, but it takes skill to finally beat it. Even if the luck factor plays some kind of a role.

Liadri is, at least on a ranger, indeed insanely difficult. I have not encountered anything like it yet in this game thus far. However, even after playing my ranger for almost a year, I must say I’ve learned quite a few new bits about my class skills and traits that I otherwise never would have taken the time to figure out. So as for Liadri, I like the insane difficulty level. It’s rewarding. Ultimately. It’s a frustrating road to get there though.

What I don’t like, is now reading on the forums – which I’ve ignored for a while – that people are exploiting the gambit system, or queueing up together in the same arena, purposefully. It’s creating an enormous amount of inflation.

Kagamiku.9731:

Mortifer.2946:

So I threw 8 orbs onto Liadri for the third time in all my 100+- attempts, and so I got out of time 10 seconds after that as always. I lost about 20g on this. I consider myself hardcore player, but this is just insane, it IS ONLY about luck, nothing more, if you miss 1-2 orbs you dont have enough time to kill her. And if you wear wrong armor, you have spend many gold on another exotic set. GG Anet

And yet not missing any orbs requires skill. You can have the most Godly luck and still fail to do that achievement, if you lack the skill or practice. I won’t say it is entirely devoid of luck but it requires more skill than luck. It is extremely tough and I doubt any one out there could complete it two times in a row, but it takes skill to finally beat it. Even if the luck factor plays some kind of a role.

I press my focus skills which gives me 5 stacks of aegis and come to shadows – they just run around me and don’t blow up so my skill was useless. Other times it works – LUCK
I press my leap of faith (no target, no autotargetting) to leap through shadows to get to crystal – normally they don’t have time to cast their blow up so you can safely leap past them. Sometimes, they blow up with no casting time in the middle of the leap – LUCK

sometimes you exchage 2-3 shadows for crystals, sometimes only one even though they were on the same spot – LUCK

I don’t have any problem with evading Liadri or her ultra big AOEs, but those shadows behave inconsistently, so every risky move like that focus skill, or leap skill to get the area around crystals clear of them, is not always working. And I cannot use dodge all the time to create time to pick up crystals. So yes, it requires luck, at least on guardian. Some other professions have better mobility skills – like warrior’s whirwind attack – they are invulnerably while they doing it, why leap of faith doesn’t work the same way?

Another bug: I used renewed focus to avoid AOEs, but it wouldn’t be enough so almost at the end of that skill I used dodge to avoid last tick of AOE, not worked, though it should.

This boss is totally unfair, tell what you want, it’s more about luck even if you possess the skill.

I love this “then don’t do it” counter-argument. It’s baseless and invalid. People, especially the compulsive mini collectors like me, are going to do it.

Everything I’ve Lost Fighting Liadri:
1: TIME!!! First and foremost. It has been four days now since I first reached her match, without dying on anyone else but Salazan mind you. Him only once because I was not aware leaving the flaming circle was an insta-drop. Anyway, Yeah, four days of doing Liadri, and almost nothing but Liadri.
2: About 18.5 gold overall, just baseline. On tickets, repairs, waypoints, armor/weapons for new build trials, etc.
3: MY sanity. Goes without saying. I haven’t done anything else but lose continuously without gain for four straight days. I have NEVER screamed at a game until now.
4: As of today, $10 actual money buying gems to, guess what… buy more tickets…
5: My account? You read that right, such was my utter despair that at one point I honestly considered loaning my account to a friend for assistance. I’ve known the guy via my guild, which I’ve been a part of for several years, but have never physically met him. The thought of him possibly stealing my account terrified me, but in comparison with the anguish of inadequacy and a prize that’s literally being dangled just out of reach, my fear is honestly the lesser of the two evils.

All for a mini that is just ever so precariously placed out of my grasp. Personally, I think you should automatically get the thing if you put in over 100 attempts, just as consolation. In which case I’d now have two of them. Or at the very least make them trade-able, but not sell-able. It infuriates me to no end that so many likely have them, and either don’t want them, don’t care, or both. When I want one and can’t even have one due to my lack of adequacy in a fight that’s largely determined by luck (which doesn’t even make sense unto itself).

So yes, roll with that whole “so just don’t do it” argument if you find it suiting. It would be a complete non-issue if it was not a mini waiting at that goal line. If it was an achievement, gold, a title, or what-have-you I’d have no trouble at all just not bothering. Good Lord how I wish it were so. I wouldn’t be breaking out in a rash I’m pretty sure is stress related right now. Shall I count my health as #6?

Sylentir.8913:

Sawnic.6795:

Shpongle.6025:

I say, give easy mode and hard mode.

Easy mode: Liadri has 75% less HP, does 75% less damage, and does not have a cripple skill. No rifts spawn and once phase 2 starts, the aoe 1shot kills stop. Remove all 1 shot kills.

Hard mode: The way it is now.

Rewards for easy mode: both achievements and the miniature
Rewards for hard mode: botch achievements, the miniature and 10gold

EDIT: oh, and people don’t spawn DEAD outside the dome on the catwalk. We spawn alive and well.

Translation:

“Give me a free mini.”

Swap the rewards and I’ll support it. Easymode and hardmode both get 10g, while hardmode only gives the mini.

The whole point of the mini is for the hardmode players to have some form of representation that they are indeed hardmode. There is currently no other means ingame (Sorry legendary users, I respect you but have no proof of skill).

Not true. Let’s be honest, how many times have you sent your minion to the bank? I’ve sent mine countless times when depositing all simply because you cannot lock them. On the other hand after completing the event I wouldn’t mind if they nerfed the content to make it easier because guess what? It doesn’t make my prize any worse than someone else. I would still know that I acquired my mini the HARD way and overall it did not make me look toward future content since I know the moment they add liandri 2.0 I’m deleting gw2.

Kronus.6048:

Sylentir.8913:

Sawnic.6795:

Shpongle.6025:

I say, give easy mode and hard mode.

Easy mode: Liadri has 75% less HP, does 75% less damage, and does not have a cripple skill. No rifts spawn and once phase 2 starts, the aoe 1shot kills stop. Remove all 1 shot kills.

Hard mode: The way it is now.

Rewards for easy mode: both achievements and the miniature
Rewards for hard mode: botch achievements, the miniature and 10gold

EDIT: oh, and people don’t spawn DEAD outside the dome on the catwalk. We spawn alive and well.

Translation:

“Give me a free mini.”

Swap the rewards and I’ll support it. Easymode and hardmode both get 10g, while hardmode only gives the mini.

The whole point of the mini is for the hardmode players to have some form of representation that they are indeed hardmode. There is currently no other means ingame (Sorry legendary users, I respect you but have no proof of skill).

Not true. Let’s be honest, how many times have you sent your minion to the bank? I’ve sent mine countless times when depositing all simply because you cannot lock them. On the other hand after completing the event I wouldn’t mind if they nerfed the content to make it easier because guess what? It doesn’t make my prize any worse than someone else. I would still know that I acquired my mini the HARD way and overall it did not make me look toward future content since I know the moment they add liandri 2.0 I’m deleting gw2.

Know one thing is for sure. Regardless of whether or not I get this mini, I never want to see the pavilion again. Moreso if I fail. At that point, and indeed as of right now, it’s just a monument to my apparent inadequacy as a player. Queen Jennah, and her bizarre gravity defying dress, can stuff it…

KStudios.2850:

Kronus.6048:

Sylentir.8913:

Sawnic.6795:

Shpongle.6025:

I say, give easy mode and hard mode.

Easy mode: Liadri has 75% less HP, does 75% less damage, and does not have a cripple skill. No rifts spawn and once phase 2 starts, the aoe 1shot kills stop. Remove all 1 shot kills.

Hard mode: The way it is now.

Rewards for easy mode: both achievements and the miniature
Rewards for hard mode: botch achievements, the miniature and 10gold

EDIT: oh, and people don’t spawn DEAD outside the dome on the catwalk. We spawn alive and well.

Translation:

“Give me a free mini.”

Swap the rewards and I’ll support it. Easymode and hardmode both get 10g, while hardmode only gives the mini.

The whole point of the mini is for the hardmode players to have some form of representation that they are indeed hardmode. There is currently no other means ingame (Sorry legendary users, I respect you but have no proof of skill).

Not true. Let’s be honest, how many times have you sent your minion to the bank? I’ve sent mine countless times when depositing all simply because you cannot lock them. On the other hand after completing the event I wouldn’t mind if they nerfed the content to make it easier because guess what? It doesn’t make my prize any worse than someone else. I would still know that I acquired my mini the HARD way and overall it did not make me look toward future content since I know the moment they add liandri 2.0 I’m deleting gw2.

Know one thing is for sure. Regardless of whether or not I get this mini, I never want to see the pavilion again. Moreso if I fail. At that point, and indeed as of right now, it’s just a monument to my apparent inadequacy as a player. Queen Jennah, and her bizarre gravity defying dress, can stuff it…

and that’s my feeling exactly if they continue to add this type of content. I hear bunch of elitists on the forum ‘’liandri was cake, too eazy, need harder stuff’‘. I have the mini, I don’t feel more pro but more disappointed,frustrated and it gives me less patience for future events. Why? because the challenge was plagued with bugs which means that more players asking for harder challenges will make anet add more buggy encounters with cheap tactic relying on dps asap and dodge the 1 hit k.o skill.