Guild Wars 2

Our guild team finally managed to complete CoF path 3 after many failed attempts in the past. And after we completed it, these were our party leader’s exact words:

• “Now I know what it is like giving birth”

Other delightful quotes that he shared with us were:

• “I might have actually gotten (insert deadly disease of choice here) from this”
• “I think I will go and grate my eyeballs now”

Truth be told, now that the torches bit no longer requires 5 torches to be lit but 3, it is some what doable, but still not a whole lot of fun.

The bit where we have to hold off several waves of Flame legion, was something we only managed to complete due to a stealthed thief hiding in a corner, keeping the zone occupied (so we could respawn without the mobs resetting). It took us ages, and it really was a grind. We were so close to throwing in the towel, but finally managed to do it. And no, we did not feel proud making it. Our only comfort was that once we completed it, we never had to do it again. This would have been a lot less frustrating if the waves didn’t reset every time you wiped. It is so frustrating to have all your progress reset, and do it all again.

The next bit was a riot. Long lines of exploding bombs. A challenge which will surely blow your armor apart the first few attempts, until you realize you’re better off doing it naked. And thus the underwear parade was on its way, until at long last everyone made it to the top. Seriously, if an obstacle course causes players to strip naked, you may want to revise your concept. This is one of those obstacles that is probably really easy once you’ve done it a few times. How ever, the process of learning it is aggravating, because it blows your armor apart with each attempt. It is like the game is kicking you after you’re already down. It was not much fun, and you couldn’t even shut the annoying thing off. Oh, and fire turrets at the top… yeah, thanks for that. Not even a safe spot after that gauntlet?

And then the final boss, who was a joke. Seriously, if the final boss to a dungeon is this much easier than the dungeon itself, maybe there’s a mistake in the design somewhere. All we had to do is stand on the bridge while he charged for us, and then he went back to his platform. He kept repeating this over and over, and was no threat what so ever. The fight thankfully was easy after all the things the dungeon had put us through. But did it have to be this boring?

The loot was terrible too.

Why am I posting this? Well perhaps the design team can draw some conclusions from our experiences regarding the design of the current dungeons.

Did it with 5 torches, did it with 3, all the same to me. If you can’t pull this up as a team, then you sure can’t do swamp fractal either or the laser part in CoE or any other content that requires a bit of coordination.

As for the bomb tunnel, simply double dodge at the end, easy peasy.

The end boss is annoying tho, becoming invulnerable so often only prolongs the fight, doesn’t make it any harder or fun.

codpin.6542:

Did it with 5 torches, did it with 3, all the same to me. If you can’t pull this up as a team, then you sure can’t do swamp fractal either or the laser part in CoE or any other content that requires a bit of coordination.

I didn’t have any trouble with the lasers, and the swamp Fractal took a few tries, but we eventually got it. But the 5 torches thing, that was a nightmare! Even with everyone on TS, people still would be unable to light them all at the same time without dying due to the constant respawning enemies. Glad they reduced it to three now. Now it was pretty straight forward. If only they had made the rest less painful.

Our party leader was right. The whole dungeon does feel like giving birth, but without the joyful surprise at the end. Surprise! You have rubbish loot for your troubles!

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Our party leader was right. The whole dungeon does feel like giving birth, but without the joyful surprise at the end. Surprise! You have rubbish loot for your troubles!

You’re assuming that a baby is a “joyous” surprise.

Ursan.7846:

You’re assuming that a baby is a “joyous” surprise.

Haha, point taken.

So..is this path now harder or easier than from when I last did it last year…? You make it sound like it’s really hard. I vaguely remember the torch part being a pain to do but…otherwise I think it’s alright…?

Little tip for the bomb part; if you have a thief in your group, simply use shadow refuge. The bombs wont blow up if you’re stealthed.

LyzeUH.1398:

So..is this path now harder or easier than from when I last did it last year…? You make it sound like it’s really hard. I vaguely remember the torch part being a pain to do but…otherwise I think it’s alright…?

I never made it further than the torches back when it was just 5 torches, so I would say the start is now easier. The rest… I doubt it. Probably still just as hard… and certainly not alright, nor fun.

We just finished CoF path 3 as well, and it was a heck of a grind. We had to do the torch event 3-4 times, but we finished it without too much of a headache. However, during the “Protect the Hall” event, we weren’t so lucky. Nevertheless, we kept at it and I have never felt as much satisfaction in clearing the event. After having to tough it out with my fellow party members, it was amazing in a “Not Quitting” sort of way!

Yeah, it wasn’t a speed run, but we were so happy

everyone’s good at somethnig, and perhaps not so good at other things. grats on geting it done. now never revisit the same path. i accidentally did so the other day since it’s been so long (CoF is easily my least favorite dungeon, on par with CM) and when i saw it i was like “nooo, not this again!” lol.

I did it with 5 torches and a really terrible MF ranger. We still got through OK. Never wiped during the zone defense, we all just got a bit angry at the MF ranger not being able to fight off a few mobs during the torch bit.

even with 5 torches, that part was easy.
after reading about it, I went in alone, killed mobs and stop-watched respawn timers until I knew how the groups were hanging together. after that I just got a group and told them how to do it (also explicitly stated the strategy in my lfg). we failed a few times because 1 warri thought he’d better us ash legion kit, and a thief thought stealth is easier.. until the warri ran out of kits and the thief finally gave in into doing it the same way as us. just kill 2 out of 3 mobs. go away, lose aggro. once everybody is in the clear, go back, kill the mobs. people with less dmg should go after the tar elementals. once everybody killed his mob, they write something in the chat. when the last one wrote his part, everybody go to the torches and activate. you have ~30 seconds for this, so even if you need 3 tries, you still have enough time.

the only thing making this part hard is bad players who think they can time their stealth exactly right (but can’t of course).. killing the mobs is really easy and gives you abundant time.

haven’t tried it since they made it easy, but to be sure I’d go in alone again before grouping up to see if anything changed.
maybe people should expect to do at least a TINY amount of homework figuring out stuff instead of being carried by a group without ever having to do anything themselves?

Oranisagu.3706:

maybe people should expect to do at least a TINY amount of homework figuring out stuff instead of being carried by a group without ever having to do anything themselves?

Yes, after doing a bit of homework CoF P3 is easy. It’s one of those dungeons that looks hard at first but once you undestand how it works it gets very easy (that’s good dungeon design)

A good Thief can still time his stealth right and use the torch properly
An Elementalist can use a Staff and pop Magnetic Aura while using the torch, or Mist Form, just keep in mind with Mist Form you have to activate it after you start using the torch, you can’t manipulate objects while in Mist Form
A Guardian can simply pop Sanctuary before activating a torch
A Ranger can simply send a durable pet (Bear) to aggro the last mob while using the torch

Of course if you are not good at timing your skills, doing it the safe way is always an option, go as a team and kill all but one mob near each torch, then go back, kill “your” mob and use the torch.

For the exploding bombs part, a usual trick is to bypass the first bomb, so you are just a tiny bit closer to the exit. There is a safe spot between the first and the second bomb, avoid the first and wait in the safespot, then once the bombs start disappearing use Swiftness and run through, might need to dodge once though. There are more safe spots later in but I never have to use them, a few seconds of swiftness are enough to get to the other side safely once you do the first bomb trick.

maddoctor.2738:

For the exploding bombs part, a usual trick is to bypass the first bomb, so you are just a tiny bit closer to the exit. There is a safe spot between the first and the second bomb, avoid the first and wait in the safespot, then once the bombs start disappearing use Swiftness and run through, might need to dodge once though. There are more safe spots later in but I never have to use them, a few seconds of swiftness are enough to get to the other side safely once you do the first bomb trick.

After several tries we figured this out too. But I highly doubt anyone ever got it right on their first attempt. Which means everyone gets blown to bits the first couple of times, and has to repair their armor. Which means you’ll end up either paying a lot of money for every retry, or you do the whole thing in your underwear. That, is bad design.

The only problem I have with CoF3 is the endboss.

10 times as much HP as he should have and knockbacks into lava are never fun.

Iehova.9518:

The only problem I have with CoF3 is the endboss.

10 times as much HP as he should have and knockbacks into lava are never fun.

We didn’t have any issues with that. Camping on the bridge as we did, the only thing he could do is knock us back further along the bridge (and not into the lava). Or, we would simply back away from him, and the boss would head back. But I agree, as boring as the fight was, his vast hp pool made it much longer than it needed to be.

If I would change this fight, I would make sure that players had to fight him on the little island, and would not be able to camp on the bridge. I would lower his health, and make the boss itself a bit slower. I would also give his big knockback attack a much longer and obvious preparation time, and players that fell into the lava would be teleported back into the arena, and simply downed (like in Fractals). Add a few more interesting attacks and I think you might have a much better boss battle.

don’t kill me for that,
but imho after the 3 torches change this dungeon is very enjoyable.
with the right party ofc!!
thief is always nice to have here, specially for the bomb part, but also for the flame legion waves.
this imho the hardest part of the dungeon, without a good party you gonna get wiped a lot and eventually fail.
We failed a lot, like 3-4 times and the bat is that the waves take long to do from scratch, but when you pass the 3rd wave is almost done, if i recall well 3rd is hardest.
ele and thief with bow can do diffeence here, keep spamming aoe around while kiting, till few enemies left then focus and kil before respawn of next wave.
worst thing is if you cannot manage to clean the area b4 next wave spawn.
once you did this is too sraight forward lol.
bomb part hard? that’s a joke lol almost any profession can get swiftness somehow and if you really cannot, just manage to get one from your team!
when you get to other side just manage not to get wiped by turrets, may be tricky for glass cannons tho.
fo the rest of the dungon i don’t really see any problem!! final boss may be anoying, i admit, but, well, only bcause the only thing you have to do it time “v” or double tap.
but c’m on what else is this game about if not dodge?

imean, 5 torches were kitten hard, really “pro” oriented, and even for extremely coordinated team was a lucky shot to get throug, waves is still really a hard fight, maybe too much but i did anjoy immensely when we did it, rest may be anoying but only beacuse lacks interesting mechanics..

if i could i’d bet we’ll see a “revamp” of cof soon, so be ready guys, we can make ourself an idea with ac.. and if they do the smae good job, well BRAVO!!!

The best team I have ever had we ran it with was a thief,2 guardians,1 warrior,and a mesmer. We ran the whole of P3 fairly easily without exploits and only whiped once on the final boss and it was from 3 party members getting knocked into the lava. We didn’t have enough dps to finish it without the whole party so we decided to reset and we got it on the very next try. Now that being said that was the best team I have ever had and all other teams I have been in have struggled or unable to get past the Flame legion waves which could be counted down to everyone running glass cannons and no survivability. You should make a lil more tanky class before attempting p3 or be willing to switch armour for the endurance fest which is that wave part.

The torches are easy peasy now, glad they changed it. The bomb hallway…well, even as many times as I’ve done it I never enjoy it. We can usually make it ok, but there’s always a few times where we miss a dodge, or are just slightly too close in the so-called “safe” spots and get blown up anyway, not to mention the gaggle of stupid waiting for you at the top. Other than that the rest of the dungeon is easy, the boss is about the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen. His inappropriately high hp pool makes me nod off at the keyboard when I do it. Yeah sometimes it gets interesting and you get knocked off into the lava, that’s about the extent of it. So my suggestion: clean up that bomb path some and rework that boss from the ground up. That would pretty much make this dungeon path obee kaybee