To open, no, I have not killed Tequatl. My home server is Divinity`s Reach, and as far as I can tell its pretty much been a ghost town in Sparkfly Fen once people got their wings. Those of us still showing up appear to be a mix of those waiting for their wings and a few die hard hopefuls, wishing, praying that we might eventually have the bodies to succeed. Otherwise, I am a level 80 War with maxed exotic gear. This is not intended as a complaint or whine, but as honest feedback on the event, what I feel was done well, what was done poorly, and what could be improved for next time.
TEQUATL: The big man himself, the star of the show and…he was perfect! He had a good mix of abilities to test a player`s skills and builds. The wave mechanic especially stands out, as it meant players had to pay attention to more than just timing their skills, but also be aware of other game mechanics in order to fully participate. There does appear to be a bit of a hardware issue with the graphics on it, but that is in a consequence of another problem with the event and is at least partially remedied by the NPCs calling the time on those attacks.
FINGERS: The Fingers are another positive in my book. They are good method for keeping the battlefield mobile, were not too difficult to remove by savvy players, and the use of poison was a good choice. The said, there was one problem with them. The fact that they flung their poison field meant that it often became difficult to track the dangerous spots when other environmental factors, such as water, came into play, as well as making it difficult to determine exactly which Finger was causing problems for the individual player. For the next time I suggest centering the poison field on the Fingers themselves, and either increasing their spawn rate, the radius of the field, or both to compensate.
TURRETS: The Turrets were another positive, creating a symbiotic battlefield that required players to work together. My experience with them is that their abilities are well balanced, and do not quite require perfect play in order to be used. That said, there were far too few of them for this event. It is my understanding that the event was designed for 80 people, and yet there are turrets for less than 10% of the players. That makes them an easy source of failure before the event either begins, either through deliberate trolls or players forced AFK. Trolls/AFKers should automatically be factored into any design, as they are a simple reality of the community. You cannot prevent griefers any more than you can prevent the hazards of real life from interfering with the game. In my opinion there should have been at least 8 – 16 turrets, based on the math of 5 man squads, with the ideal number being around ten. (For those wondering, assume the minimum of 80 players for the event. Split them in half, forty going for the dragon and forty sticking by the turrets. Forty broken down into 5 man squads is 8, +2 to compensate for trolls/afk.)