Guild Wars 2

I think the biggest problem with dungeons isn’t that they are too hard, or even that they are too easy, it’s that they are too predictable. There’s no point creating 3 paths in an explorable when one is ultimately going to be found to be the easiest, and then trivialised as a result * CoF *

I think the devs need to take a look back at what they said about dynamic events in dungeons, because that stuff was what really excited me. As it is at the moment, there basically the chance in each route for an extra mob to spawn. Dynamic events need to be the core of the content.

Here’s my proposal:
For future dungeons, remove the choice. Everyone who enters the dungeon should start out on the same path, not knowing exactly what they’re going to be up against in each run. Instead, have the path deviate into one of 3 ways at a certain point. Say for example you’re running down a corridor, and a golem bursts through the wall, revealing a passage through the next section. Or all of a sudden, the floor falls through into an underwater section.

“BUT WAIT!” I hear you cry. “Surely people would just reset the instance if they didn’t get the path they wanted?”

No, because the path only deviates for a small section. After that section, the paths all re-converge, just before the next deviation. After the next event which triggers you onto a new path, you start something else, and so on. The content of the dungeon becomes impossible to predict, and even if there is a bit the group doesn’t like, as long as they persevere, it won’t affect the majority of their route.

What you then have, is a dungeon which you’ve designed 3 paths for split into 3-4 sections. What you end up with though, is a dungeon with 27, or even 81 possible routes through it, all determined by dynamic events.

This ensures that for those who want the armor, or the weapons from a particular dungeon, don’t end up doing the exact same thing 30-40 times to get what they want, but they become more experienced at the whole dungeon overall, and will hopefully enjoy it more too.

While I have not yet had the experience of trying the explorable mode of a dungeon, I feel that the image of what M C expected is similar to what I was. I would have the same “disappointment” (seems like too strong a word for a game I love so much) if the content seemed predictable. What is being requested seems doable, though that is as an outsider looking in.

Well said, M C… well said.

I have personally run CoF over 30 times and no group has run anything but magg. I agree this would make it much more fun. However in reality I don’t see this big a change happening anytime in the near future. It would require a huge overhaul of all current dungeons. Only thing I see happening like this would be when new dungeons start coming out. Anet has done a decent job at stopping the normal min maxing of both stats and how you spend your time in this game however on this account, I don’t know why they didn’t see this coming. In the case of CoF I find the story mode much more challenging and fun than the exp mode. Yet because it is story mode a fair amount of people never do it because it holds little to no reward whatsoever.

Oh no, I don’t think this would be a solution for existing dungeons without a complete rework. This post was intended to influence later development to avoid a repeat of the current situation.