The Total Feedback Thread: Nightmare Within

The Total Feedback Thread: Nightmare Within

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Posted by: PopeUrban.2578

PopeUrban.2578

In the interest of easily readable feedback, and the lack of an offical sticky for this, I’ve decided to create one. I’m creating a simple format here, and I request that people use said format!

1. Use the headings
2. Keep feedback to a small paragraph per heading
3. Remain civil and attempt to be constructive
4. Please avoid derailing the thread.
5. Please format your headings in bold buy surrounding them in *s to keep the thread clean and readable.

The heading are:
Achievements
Rewards
Gameplay
Story
Favorite Element
Least Favorite Element

I’ll post my own as an example.

Guild Master – The Papacy [POPE] (Gate of Madness)/Road Scholar for the Durmand Priory
Writer/Director – Quaggan Quest
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ky2TGPmMPeQ

The Total Feedback Thread: Nightmare Within

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Posted by: PopeUrban.2578

PopeUrban.2578

Achievements
Looks like we’re getting fruits of feedback in terms of achievements. I like the inclusion of the “secret goggles” and that the achievements are very natural rewards for playing the content which require a little repetition, but not an inordinate amount of farming. This is a good balance for where to place the achievements in the future, they’re a nice bonus that gives a little direction, but the whole patch does not devolve in to framing for them.

Rewards
Really well done this time! The keys have multiple means of acquisition, and the contents of the chest, even with a bad roll always include a sizable quantity of dragonite and a rare. That puts every opening almost on par with a world boss fight. The drop rate of all the event-related materials seems on par with the rewards, and the unique skins and mini rewards are attractive and unique.

Gameplay
The “open dungeon” feel of the tower, and the way the doors shuffle around, the ever-changing target from person to person for which doors/keys they need all add a much-needed zergbreaking element to this event. This is a great experience as you make your way up the tower the first time, and make your way around the various floors as you hunt for doors for your keys. I especially like the way the roadblock events tend to regroup players and serve as player interaction hotspots. I feel that this is a nice template for future “ultimate base of evil” content, however the mechanics of the doors should be altered so that rerolling overflows or guesting isn’t quite as required to find more content.

Story
The recap cutscene was very nice, but the whole of the story wasn’t served in any way. Lots of cool dialogue, nice callbacks, and a host of other things make this feel like a seminal recap episode, but it lacks that all-important teaser for the final battle that is sure to come. While this reminded us where we have been, it still did nothing to explain why, or where we are going.

Favorite Element
The Nightmare Chambers. I really enjoy hunting down chambers, fighting through floors to get to them, interacting with the various events/mobs in the way, and all of the random elements in the chambers themselves. I like the way the keys are structures to vary my objectives.

Least Favorite Element
Also the Nightmare Chambers. Some are five feet from a travel golem, some require a bit of a trek, and I find myself more often than not rerolling overflows or guesting to find a map with another chamber on my floor. I would suggest in the future for content of this sort increasing the number of doors such that there’s always at least one per required area (floor) avaliable, and that the opening/closing of them be relative to individual characters, and reroll whenever one is completed. In addition, I would suggest removing instance portals that are too easy to get to, as half of the gameplay of these components is the struggle through uncertain parts of the map to reach them.

Guild Master – The Papacy [POPE] (Gate of Madness)/Road Scholar for the Durmand Priory
Writer/Director – Quaggan Quest
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ky2TGPmMPeQ

The Total Feedback Thread: Nightmare Within

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Posted by: Nay of the Ether.8913

Nay of the Ether.8913

Achievements
I think the achievements for the tower itself was pretty reasonable. None of it turned out to be one of those that make me roll my eyes because it’s going to take a whole day of grinding to accomplish.

Rewards
Well, I’ll try not to touch on the horrible design of RNG, but the actual rewards are nice. Assuming I ever get one I think it would be a fair tradeoff of the difficulty and time spent doing the tower. Since I know I won’t get them, I can just enjoy the gameplay of the tower itself and the dragonite I can get from the chests.

Gameplay
I have some issues with a few of the mob skills, mainly the fact that buffs can’t be stripped on them, and any projectiles they fire cannot be reflected. Idk if that was intended or a bug (this happens to the ones outside the instance too). A few of the krait skills that spam the chaos storm-like skills are a bit over the top sometimes. It’s impossible to dodge that much spam. Other than that I loved the enemies and the fights. They weren’t faceroll easy, nor were they so hard I wanted to punch my monitor. There are a few bugs or issues with the spider queen boss, especially with her eating the NPC’s and regaining full health (her heals are way over the top, or maybe my poison is just not affecting them; big surprise there, poison has been broken for a while). I know people said shes not supposed to be able to eat the npcs but I saw it multiple times with my own eyes, she also cocoons downed players, which is a BS move because there’s no way out of it and it’s a guaranteed full heal for her. The rest of the fights were amazing. The hybrid fight was spot-on! Beautiful work on it in both aesthetics and mechanics. I loved all the chamber fights (except spider queen, and even then I didn’t hate her, just those things I pointed out).

Story
Loved the kickback cutscene, but other than that, there really was no story to speak of. The ambient voiceovers were awesome while fighting, but the story itself was MIA. I know there are amazing writers on the GW2 team, and I am in no way bashing their writing ability. Something just got gummed up here. Hopefully it will help clarify the directions they need to head in the future. I can’t really offer any constructive criticism besides that.

Favorite Element
The chambers as well as the fights leading up to them and the fact that even though you might run through everything to get there, eventually you’ll be stopped and forced to do an event to go further. I love that, and I’m not even trolling. Few small issues with them (read spider queen comment above) but otherwise it was awesome. the end fight was a blast too and I plan on doing it lots more times.

Least Favorite Element
Spider Queen. While I’m sure a cookie cutter zerker group can burn her right down, I was actually enjoying joining up with random pugs for once and helping them through this stuff, so for an average non-zerker group, it needs tweaking. Something PopeUrban mentioned too, was the chambers being right next to golems. not sure why they did that to some of them. I enjoyed the scavenger hunt for them.

http://almunns.wix.com/elitedeathsociety
~Surrender fiend and you will get an easy death
~I could promise you the same…but it would be a lie…

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Posted by: Romo.3709

Romo.3709

Achievements
Interesting variety of achievements, but not enough of them. The whole meta can be completed in under 3 hours of playing the content, which keeps the achievement hunters away after they’ve completed their task.

Rewards
Gas Mask was a nice little thing to have. It’s something other than a backpiece. I’m not much of a mini collector, but I have to say, the Mini Toxic Krait is one of my favorite ones of all time

Gameplay
Challenging gameplay although it brings the worst in people when not moving with the zerg. The reason for that is that if you try ressing someone on the way up, there’s 80% chance you will die as well, hence creating an environment in which people run past the corpses. Aside from that, quite fun and challenging.

Story
Barely any of it. We don’t know how it all connected into the whole thing. Why Scarlett did what she did. The story was simply: Tower, Krait, Toxic Alliance, Hybridborn, Hybrid slain, Scarlett Escapes after a cool looking cutscene. And that was it. Nothing was explained, nothing moved forward.

Favorite Element
Instance that’s actually an open world. Awesome!

Least Favorite Element
Lack of actual story…
And forced to fight against your mentors…

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Posted by: SSGroguey.5841

SSGroguey.5841

Achievements
I think there’s a nice variety of achievements, with nothing being too grindy. You should get a fair chunk of them done by the time you reach the top of the tower for the first time. Theere’s achievements for exploring, just clearing events on the various floors, doing nightmare chambers, reaching the top. However, there may have been too few achievements. I had guildmates who were already almost done after only a few hours.

Rewards
I think the Gas Mask is cool and this is probably one of coolest minis I’ve gotten so far. In terms of the Tri-key chest, I think the key fragments have a good drop rate, the best chance seems to be 50% from nightmare chambers, but I have had a fair share of keys from floor mobs. I can’t really say if it’s because my magic find or not, but I’m getting 1 yellow, ore, seed pouch, and something else each time. I think the chest is worth it (but I’ve been hearing people say they’re only getting blues/greens.) I think the backpack, other mini, and waterbreather skin as rng from the chest is fine, there’s plenty of rewards to find both from easy achievement acquisition and being random drops.

Gameplay
I’m finding most of the gameplay to be pretty solid. You have a mix of small scale fights, in terms of nightmare chambers/final boss counter, and more zerg-like fights in the tower. As it stands, zergs are spread out pretty evenly across floors, so the groups are maybe around 20 people. The bosses aren’t mindless zerg loot pinatas and have decent mechanics to keep people on their toes (spider was really obnoxious first go before people knew the mechanics).
Running solo to the top is also possible, but it can be challenging.

Story
It’s just not there… We got a recap, which might help new players, but it adds nothing to people who have been playing from the start. I still have questions, nothing has really been answered for me in terms of anything Toxic Alliance (both these patches)

Favorite Element
Nightmare Chambers, probably the only thing where there’s some interesting NPC interaction. I can talk to Rox, Braham, Kasmeer, and Marjory. Sometimes the two teams find themselves mixed together (Rox and Marjory, Kasmeer solo, etc.) and I enjoy the way they react. (Marjory: Charr hallucination, try harder Scarlet. and then Rox gets mad) It’s exciting to see what you face. I’ve fought Trahearne, Tybalt, Sieran, Logan, and Caithe. If I had higher level alts of the other races, I’ve loved to see the Rytlock, Zojja, and Eir hallucination.

Least Favorite Element
Pretty much the anticlimatic cut scene at the end. Here’s how it went for me, I fought the final boss with guildies and didn’t see a cutscene. I went back in solo because I missed the diving goggles. Then I heard rumors of there being a cutscene and had to run a third time, only to be greeted with nothing new. I went back in expecting answers, but got a recap instead. :|

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Posted by: Ram Banson.4081

Ram Banson.4081

Achievements
I dont really care much about them, but i have fun sometimes with getting a few, so there are achievments and i can get them if i want, thats cool :>

Rewards
Its ok, i dont have much interesst in those, but the minis are cool

Gameplay
I have to say, its pretty awesome. Its a good and fun solo challenge, there are enough places where you can fight without zerg. The instances are fun, the art-style is awesome as usual, simply the whole design of that thing is just great. Sadly it will be gone soon( i have much fun just fighting there.
Story
Well…scarlet again.. but i dont have direct interests in the story, and dont read the ones on the homepage. But i like the texts of the NPCs while hallucinating hallucinating is fun
Favorite Element
Definitely to fight the Molten Alliance mobs, and the brawler _, so awesome, i love them! just perfect for that combat system!

Least Favorite Element
Endboss isnt that dangerous as it should be, should be deadly and powerful, its not much

Personal comment
I wrote quite few whiners in the forums, i feel sorry now… this one….its very cool, except the usual living story issue that it will be gone soon.
Hope to see more such stuff, and elite areas, etc. (yes it kinda felt like a elite are, the pollum debuff is hardmode stuff as a squishy ele :d)
SPLITTING THE ZERG! is a good thing.
I will spend some real money in the gem store for the dagger, to thank you :P, sadly the dagger is pretty small on asura o.o

Blùb [LuPi]

(edited by Ram Banson.4081)

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Posted by: Peregrine Falcon.5496

Peregrine Falcon.5496

Achievements
I like that the meta achievement took some effort, but wasn’t too difficult to get. And that the repeat achievements were 3 times instead of the usual 10 or 20 times. There’s only so many times that I want to repeat content, no matter how cool it is.

Rewards
Meh. The same old account bound bit of ascended crafting material that I don’t care about and can’t sell and a couple of level 80 greens. Not bad, but definitely not a motivator.

Gameplay
It’s challenging and fun, as long as you roll with a zerg. Just like the last dozen or so updates. It’d be nice to get some non-soloable content that didn’t also require the presence of 30+ other players.

Story
The final cut-scene was very entertaining, and I like that it can be watched again from the console, but it’s bascially just a recap. Worse, nothing is actually explained. We still have no idea what Scarlett’s doing, or why or how. Yeah I know, the story’s not over yet. Problem is that it’s dragged on for so long I’m starting to not really care anymore.

Favorite Element
The randomness of the chamber instances. Well, except for the fact that Spider Queen is currently bugged to be unkillable.

Least Favorite Element
People and zergs griefing others by dragging groups of enemies to them. I think that most of this is accidental, but I’ve seen several instances of it happening on purpose. I don’t think this would be a problem if the mobs’ leash range weren’t quite so long.

Paragon City refugee – “We’re heroes, it’s what we do.”

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Posted by: Tommyknocker.6089

Tommyknocker.6089

Achievements: Easy to get and that is a good thing for those that don’t want to grind the tower forever, the 9 chambers is the only one I will never get.

Rewards: Not to bad it seems most things do drop more than just porous bones, which to me is a huge improvement.

Gameplay: Floors one and two are a nice romp, with or without a zerg and are indeed fun for the whole family. Third floor however is just a freaking nightmare. Even with it’s insane leash length it would not be so bad if the mobs were not so closely packed together making it a chore for even small parties to not agro the entire floor. Here’s a hint, make the purifiers a safe zone (mobs retreat) at least, for those that need the shelter.

Favorite Element: First and second floor with a decent party or even solo is just plain old fashion fun.

Least Favorite Element: Third floor, there is fun and then there is tedious chores, this is the latter.

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Posted by: EdgarMTanaka.7291

EdgarMTanaka.7291

Achievements
They are perfect, not too hard, not too easy and quite a good amount of them and the reward was a good reward, not everyone can like a cosmetic though.

Rewards
This is fine, I like the amount of loot form killing enemies from bottom to top though they could have skipped the keys and just have a open once a day per character chest, I don’t want more keys to take space in my bag. And well I don’t care about a mini but nice move making it sell-able instead of BoA since it is RNG in chest only.

Gameplay
Realy nice, I enjoyed the tower the first day and it could still be enjoyed if not for farmers and stupid idiotic run and rush players that is the majority of MMO’s.
It would have been nice if the tower had more “doors” to stop players from rushing through the tower and stay and fight instead. I Supported the “the tower is easy if you just stay and fight” before but now when less players actually stay and fight you will die becouse other players will pull millions of enemies at those who stay and fight, no good mechanic imo.

Story
I realy like the story so far, I will await next LS to see what happens next

Favorite Element
Good amout of enemies and difficulty and a good way to make players group up without actually group up.

Least Favorite Element
Rushing players pull enemies that will agro on players who stays and fight.
Rather the possibility to actually run through the whole tower is bad.

Member of Alpha Swedish Gaming Community – http://www.alphas.se/
Guild Leader of Alpha Sgc [ASGC]

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Posted by: ChyldeMyst.5098

ChyldeMyst.5098

Am I the only person who likes Scarlet as a villain? I see a LOT of potential in the whole Sylvari story and the mystery of their background , and can totally understand how the creepy hive-mind-cult culture creates a higher-than-average percentage of psychotics and sociopaths.

Achievements

Not too painful. I’m more of a casual player, owing to the fact that I’m a stay-at-home mother and a full-time college student. I was able to knock out Tower of Nightmares in 3 days flat and still turn in my assignments on time. ^.^

Rewards

Eh. Honestly, I wasn’t impressed. The gas mask helmet skin is unique, but a lot of the reward sets lately have been very steam-punk and sci-fi, and I’m kind of missing the classic fantasy flavour. The mini Krait for running the final dungeon was adorable, but even it wasn’t worth the cost, both figurative and literal, of scaling that tower multiple times.

Gameplay

Excruciating. As I said, I’m more of a casual player, because I don’t have hours upon hours to devote every week. And for a casual player in a small, casual guild, the gameplay was HORRIBLE. I started this Living Story release with 20 gold and 9 repair canisters in the bank. Even with rewards, loot drops, and selling rares I couldn’t use, I finished the achievement with 12 gold and NO repair canisters in the bank. The respawn rates and percentage of elites make this impossible to complete without a group or zerg, and pugging is a crapshoot. There’s no telling if the bunch of people mowing along behind the current commander tag will bother to help you, or if they’ll just kite their aggro onto you and keep going. I appreciate that you’re trying to make content that encourages players to work together, but content that requires a large cooperative group becomes a very expensive proposition for any but the most hardcore players.

Story

I seem to be in the minority that’s enjoying the Scarlet story arc. I can’t for the life of me figure out how ONE Sylvari can orchestrate the kinds of alliances and schemes she’s been throwing at us, and she makes the Nightmare Court look like the Cleavers. I love not knowing what she’s doing next, or how she’s doing it, or why she’s doing it. I just hope that, when we finally reach the end of this arc, there’s a good solid explanation that totally blows my mind. Don’t let me down, writers!

Favorite Element

The story. As I said before, I love the whole Sylvari racial background, and I’m really enjoying the Scarlet arc. I just hope the actual content that goes with the story is less frustrating next time.

Least Favorite Element

The rewards. Honestly, there was absolutely NOTHING to get excited about in the rewards for this release. The mini’s cute, but I don’t have the inventory slots to spare to tote it around with me. The gas mask is something that I’ll never use; I went with a classic fantasy theme for all my toons, and a steampunk gas mask doesn’t fit that. The composite key idea for the final chest is neat, and I hope we see it elsewhere, but getting to the chest is so expensive for me that nothing I get out of it is worth the effort. In the future I’d like to see more variety available in final rewards, maybe a choice among several themed items. I completed this release because I’m enjoying the story arc, but I wish I had something better to show for it than an ugly skin I’ll never use and a hole in my bank account.