Guild Wars 2

So, my guild and I (small, 5 person guild) Have been running a fair amount of dungeons. We’ve done most of the story dungeons, Done a couple of runs of CoE, SE, and A LOT of AC. (Don’t ask why it’s such an odd combination.)

The other day I decided I want the CM Medium Gloves for my thief, so we geared up, ate our food, drank our potions, and went back to the mansion to try our hands at Exploreable.

We picked Path 3 (Because “The Butler Did It!”) The first boss killed a few of us during our fight with him, but wasn’t too big of a deal. We’d probably be able to handle him with no casualties at this point. Then there was a corridor full of turret ambushes (annoying, but doable) Then the corridor full of missile turrets (We wiped once before we figured out what to do. My personal favorite encounter in the whole place.) There was another bandit boss who hit really hard, but we dealt with it. Then a trap filled corridor (a lot of those here) With 2 snipers at the end.

This was the start of our serious problems. That encounter was increadibly painful. We eventually made our way down there and dealt with it, but we had a pretty hard time. The traps couldn’t be dodged, we couldn’t discern a pattern, and the bandits kept on shooting/killing us, because we were moving. We basically ran down the hallway at 1 second intervals and managed to get an off-hand pistol thief to blindtank while the rest of us healed up or walked back. Horrible. If there’s a better way to do that segment, I’d like to know.

Then the Nightmare started.

Room full of mobs. 6 normal, 6 Silver Veteran per group. Practically impossible to pull one group without pulling the other. Even when we do, 6 silver bandits were able to wipe our entire party without us being able to focus down a single one. We sneak past them using Shadow Refuge, and get to another room with 2 guys guarding a door. We manage to kill them, but then 4 sharpshooters appear behind us standing on the catwalks, and kill us. We tried chaining Shadow Refuges to get past THAT mess, only to walk into Another room FULL of more bandits.

We tried pulling them slowly and working our way through it. Nope, Dead.
We tried rushing through it throwing caution to the wind. Nope, Dead (Well, 1 thief made it through. But Shadow Refuge OP and everyone else died for it)
We tried carefully avoiding the groups one by one, waiting for cooldowns before sneaking/assassinating key groups. Not even close.

I have no idea what the proper tactic for dealing with this room is. I don’t know what We’re supposed to do.

Our later digging found some posts suggesting that CM was bugged and that bandits had no cooldowns. Not sure if that’s true or not, but it would partially explain why we all got our kitten kicked so hard.

It was incredibly demoralizing, and I was hoping someone might have insight into how to approach this dungeon in a reasonable fashion. Maybe we just picked a bad path, I dunno. It looked like other routes would also go through that room, and I can only imagine it would be just as bad.

Our group has not been so upset/angry/sad by anything. Even non-nerfed AC Lovers caused us this much frustration. (And we rage quit that and vowed never to do it ever again twice.)

TL;DR: CM kicked our kitten and was really demoralizing. It was not fun, and sparked arguments in our normally happy group. It should probably be looked at. Also: Halp!? How do I deal with the giant room full of Bandits?

Traps: If one person gets through he should move forward so they get disabled. If you want easy way go wait at door while others kill boss (or at 25%).
Big room: Hugging right allows you to pass them without aggro. Also even if you aggro I think you can keep going and jump down and they won’t follow. I also suggest keep hugging right and fight riflemen inside room (4 more will spawn and you will get sniped).

CM path 2 doesn’t go through that room. Anyways just whisper me if I’m on and I will help. Or you can check out my guides on http://guildwars.incgamers.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?244 (HotW is missing)

I had exactly the same issues. This dungeon may need a revision by Anet, as it is more frustrating than difficult.

crazy mobs = CM, the boss is very easy yet the mobs are really annoying,
have any problems with a bandit room?
1.get 2 guardians either 1 max toughness and 1 max boon duration
2.spam retaliation, AoE, rinse and repeat (even if means u only killed several of em)

CM really isnt that hard. You just need to know what mobs you can skip and what mobs you pull to a secure location.

First the corridor with traps:
When you look down the corridor towards the mobs, there is a small spot where the whole group can stand on the left side, where the traps doesnt hit. Its around 1 dodge roll down the corridor and on the left side. From there you can run along the left wall to the 2 mobs. Easy killing them.

Cave/Room full of mobs:
Its actually 2 group of mobs with a combo of silver and normal mobs. You can
a) Hug the right side of the wall and pass them without pulling aggro, then run along the scaffold on the right side, bypassing the mobs in the big cave/room.
b) get a really aoe heavy group with a guardian that know how to control mobs. Pull a group to a bottleneck and lock down the mobs while you aoe like mad. The best i ahve had was guardian, 2 warriors, ele and mesmer. Me (the guardian) and mesmer(time warp) did maxed control and the rest just went balls to the wall with aoe.
c) pull the first group, then kite backwards while dpsing like mad. Keep pulling and kiting backwards until all mobs are dead.
I have done options and a) is by far the easiest.

CM can be done really fast. but it’s by far the least favourite dungeon of mine. wait, i don’t even like it. pretty annoying mechanics, but if you practice enough, you will be slightly better off. : ))

reflect abilities help a LOT. wall of reflection on Guard, feedback on mesmer i think (don’t play one) and other abilities that absorb projectiles too.

you can check out strifey’s videos as well. iirc, he has a guide on CM Path 3 and you can pick up his strategies where you need ‘em. just search strife and gw2 or dungeon on youtube. pretty good fast runs with commentary! : ))) sorry at work now so can’t access youtube. :PPP (glad i can access the forums!)

For the corridor full of trap have one person run to the door before the boss dies. When the door open all that person has to do is run towards the ramp (without aggroing anything) and it will disable the traps.

For the group near the ramp, the easiest tactic is to jump on the rock next to it and then jump on the rail, it’s pretty easy to do and allows you to entirely skip that group.
Or if you have a thief you could use mass stealth and simply run up the ramp.

Once you are up the ramp, run straight for cover, that way the bandits that spawn will have to come to where you are and you can melee them.

CM is one of the most nonsensical dungeons in GW2. It’s all about memorizing the exact ways in which you must move and pull mobs. There’s very little room for creativity or variation. Do it “the right way” and you’ll get through with no issues, deviate a bit and everybody dies.

For the traps: You can avoid them completey by being near the door when the boss dies. Failing that, move forward, then diagonally left, then along the left wall with the wooden beams (no traps there). Mesmers are great here (portal entrance, blink across the first traps, decoy stealth to close in on enemies, feedback to suck up the next shots, and portal exit, allowing the entire team to pop up on the enemies).

Alternatively, kill the riflemen with long-range attacks (there are rifles lying around the floor, I think their range is big enough) and then take your time across the traps.

In the next room, you can avoid most enemies. Just jump on the rock on the right side, then from the rock onto the wooden railing, and go up the ramp (BTW, going up the ramp turns the traps off, so you can also have a single player do this while the others wait). Alternatively, have the entire group run together up the ramp (pulling the enemies) and use a group stealth ability at the top to lose aggro.

You can find plenty of videos on YouTube.

Account.9832:

CM is one of the most nonsensical dungeons in GW2. It’s all about memorizing the exact ways in which you must move and pull mobs.

To be honest nearly all dungeons in any game is about memorizing the “right/easy” way of doing things :-P

But you are 100% right Al Zheimer, CM might be the dungeon with least wiggle room, i still like it (might be the setting and difficulty – you just cant faceroll the trash there).