Guild Wars 2

[NOTE: I’m cross posting this in both the Dungeons and Personal Story boards since it effects both aspects of the game.]

So I just ran some people through Arah storymode to help them finish their personal stories. I had read in the patch notes about Zhaitan’s poison bombs being nerfed and the airship battle being nerfed, so I expected that. Here’s what I didn’t see coming:
During phase 1 Zhaitan’s adds are now non-veteran and spawn in ridiculously reduced numbers (2 per spawn instead of 4). They also have next to no HP, so the NPCs killed them before we could even get there. We literally sat on our rears and let the game play itself.

Then it got even better. The three Eyes of Zhaitan during phase 2 had their HP cut in half and their damaged nerfed so hard we took none at all. They died so quick we had over a minute to wait as the ship pulled up next to the tower and we could start the cannon phase. When that started it too less than thirty seconds to kill Zhaitan. Thirty seconds. He didn’t even have time to spawn his tentacle adds you guys put in there to make the phase more “engaging.”

How is this acceptable, Arenanet? How can you justify this second rate game design? This is a FINAL BOSS, something that’s supposed to be difficult to kill. Sure the fight was crap before but at least you had to involve yourself. After the patch this isn’t even a boss fight. It’s comparable to the quicktime event bullcrap that permeates FPS games nowadays. I wouldn’t even call this casual. To call it such would insult the intelligence and skill of casual gamers.

Arenanet you better have some amazing fixes planned for boss fights, especially this one, when you reveal your “phase 2” of the dungeon changes. If this is a sign of things to come then dungeon content in this game is doomed.

I didnt try arah story after patch yet, but if its true what you said, its horrible. Not like the battle was any good before. The only interesting part of the fight before war artwork of Zhaitan. The rest was boring and easy.

Because casuals + required dungeon path to complete your personal story = easy mode.

Personally who cares, there’s plenty of explorable dungeons that are much harder, originally story mode was suppose to be super easy anyways and was more for casuals to experience the story.

Stack on top of that your personal story which is super easy, and now you get super duper easy dungeon path so no one can ever complain about things being too hard to complete their story.

Strifey.7215:

Because casuals + required dungeon path to complete your personal story = easy mode.

Personally who cares, there’s plenty of explorable dungeons that are much harder, originally story mode was suppose to be super easy anyways and was more for casuals to experience the story.

Stack on top of that your personal story which is super easy, and now you get super duper easy dungeon path so no one can ever complain about things being too hard to complete their story.

The fact it’s story mode does not excuse this insulting level of nerfs. World of Fraking Warcraft doesn’t make it’s easy mode dungeons this easy. This was literally Guild Wars 2 playing itself. If we hadn’t caught the adds being killed by the NPCs before despawning we could have sworn that the phase was bugged and no adds were spawning at all. You cannot justify this kind of kitten poor game design.

As for why should we care? This reflects on the path Arenanet is willing to take to appease it’s playerbase. Ultra-casual nerfs may not effect explorable mode…yet. What happens when they do? If they’re willing to literally destroy this encounter rather than fix it then it’s an ill omen for all dungeon content.

Strifey.7215:

Because casuals + required dungeon path to complete your personal story = easy mode.

Personally who cares, there’s plenty of explorable dungeons that are much harder, originally story mode was suppose to be super easy anyways and was more for casuals to experience the story.

Stack on top of that your personal story which is super easy, and now you get super duper easy dungeon path so no one can ever complain about things being too hard to complete their story.

Speaking as someone who would self-describe as casual, I find the lack of overall engagement in this fight to actually be insulting so, yeah I’m going to care even if every bodies precious explorables aren’t affected. Casual doesn’t need to mean spoonfeeding and I find it insulting that people think that it does, just to support their own narcissistic elitism.

Thysoliai.2859:

Strifey.7215:

Because casuals + required dungeon path to complete your personal story = easy mode.

Personally who cares, there’s plenty of explorable dungeons that are much harder, originally story mode was suppose to be super easy anyways and was more for casuals to experience the story.

Stack on top of that your personal story which is super easy, and now you get super duper easy dungeon path so no one can ever complain about things being too hard to complete their story.

Speaking as someone who would self-describe as casual, I find the lack of overall engagement in this fight to actually be insulting so, yeah I’m going to care even if every bodies precious explorables aren’t affected. Casual doesn’t need to mean spoonfeeding and I find it insulting that people think that it does, just to support their own narcissistic elitism.

Completely agree. There’s a difference between making content accessible to casuals and treating them like idiots. This nerf is the latter.

let’s all go kitten on reddit! let’s also forget we were kittening the other way around on reddit before the nerf!

I actually think that ALL story mode dungeons should be easy. They do not even give a reward for those armors. So you cannot farm armors in the story mode anyways. And they are required before exploration mode. So it make sense for them to be easy, so casuals can read up the story.

Most missions in the personal story are very easy for the same reason.

But then again, maybe not THIS easy…

CHIPS.6018:

I actually think that ALL story mode dungeons should be easy. They do not even give a reward for those armors. So you cannot farm armors in the story mode anyways. And they are required before exploration mode. So it make sense for them to be easy, so casuals can read up the story.

Most missions in the personal story are very easy for the same reason.

I will restate my point: The fact this is story mode does not justify poor game design.

I agree with the OP’s sentiments wholeheartedly. The thing you have to understand is that Zhaitan was never a hard fight to begin with. Originally it was bugged and Zhaitan had no attacks. After, Zhaitan had some attacks and the fight could get by at least with its spectacle. Now Zhaitan goes down in about 30 seconds in its final phase. That is, in my opinion, completely awful. The fight was over way too fast! Just like the OP’s experience, he doesn’t even spawn the adds any more! The fight didn’t need nerfing – people were already complaining that it was too easy.

Please, ArenaNet. This isn’t a nerf. This is just crippling the fight. I’d implore you to please revert the changes that the latest patch made to Zhaitan or, preferably, make significant improvements to the fight itself during your massive ‘dungeon overhaul’. This is just putting a bandage on a gaping wound. A bandage laced with virulent poison.

It’s a part of personal story and those missions are really easy.

haviz.1340:

It’s a part of personal story and those missions are really easy.

I’ll restate the obvious: the fact it’s story mode does not excuse poor game design.

Let me explain how does it feel…To do arah story is like soloing lvl 15 map with fully geared lvl 80 character…

I finally got around to finishing Arah Story a few weeks ago (so pre-nerf) and even that was mindnumbingly boring. The entire zone was pretty much a cakewalk and the final fight was just sleep-inducing. I don’t even remember what I had to do during the final fight with Zhaitan because I just recall standing around or something, there was so thrill, no danger, no sense of impending death. I just had to try not to fall off the airship until the final cutscene.

Now, if they nerfed it even more, I can’t even imagine how kitten this fight is. If I were a “casual”, I’d be insulted at how little ANET thinks of me.

Vasham.2408:

[NOTE: I’m cross posting this in both the Dungeons and Personal Story boards since it effects both aspects of the game.]

So I just ran some people through Arah storymode to help them finish their personal stories. I had read in the patch notes about Zhaitan’s poison bombs being nerfed and the airship battle being nerfed, so I expected that. Here’s what I didn’t see coming:
During phase 1 Zhaitan’s adds are now non-veteran and spawn in ridiculously reduced numbers (2 per spawn instead of 4). They also have next to no HP, so the NPCs killed them before we could even get there. We literally sat on our rears and let the game play itself.

Then it got even better. The three Eyes of Zhaitan during phase 2 had their HP cut in half and their damaged nerfed so hard we took none at all. They died so quick we had over a minute to wait as the ship pulled up next to the tower and we could start the cannon phase. When that started it too less than thirty seconds to kill Zhaitan. Thirty seconds. He didn’t even have time to spawn his tentacle adds you guys put in there to make the phase more “engaging.”

How is this acceptable, Arenanet? How can you justify this second rate game design? This is a FINAL BOSS, something that’s supposed to be difficult to kill. Sure the fight was crap before but at least you had to involve yourself. After the patch this isn’t even a boss fight. It’s comparable to the quicktime event bullcrap that permeates FPS games nowadays. I wouldn’t even call this casual. To call it such would insult the intelligence and skill of casual gamers.

Arenanet you better have some amazing fixes planned for boss fights, especially this one, when you reveal your “phase 2” of the dungeon changes. If this is a sign of things to come then dungeon content in this game is doomed.

This is a story mode dungeon that’s part of the personal story. It takes well over a hour to do and with the removal of wp rez it would simply be more tedious and frustrating to finish.

Alot of players including myself believe this is a decent change to compensate for the removal of wp rez in dungeons.

Vasham.2408:

haviz.1340:

It’s a part of personal story and those missions are really easy.

I’ll restate the obvious: the fact it’s story mode does not excuse poor game design.

That’s your opinion.

So far you haven’t shown any real evidence that this is poor game design. All you’ve demonstrated is that you personally think it’s too easy.

Easy is not the same as bad design. There are certain things that should be easy, like personal story missions.

By all rights the final story mission should be soloable rather than requiring a group if they were going for consistency in design, since the personal story is the single player aspect of the game.

There are plenty of difficult if not over the top dungeon paths you can run if difficulty is your thing, but just realize that not everyone shares your opinions.

Vasham.2408:

I’ll restate the obvious: the fact it’s story mode does not excuse poor game design.

What poor design? I’m all for reducing difficulty of story mode which was suppose to be for average player while explorables should be made harder.

You can thank the horde of “casuals” that habit this forum that rant and rave about anything that involves going into an instance.

I had 10x as much fun during the part with two dragons than I had at zhaitan. Arah story is amazing, atmospheric, and fun, right up until that point.

I honestly feel they should have just renamed one of those two dragons “zhaitan” and I would have been far more impressed. Taking down something giant as an “underdog” gives a much better feeling than “HAR WE HAVE BEIG SHIP OUT OF NOWHERE WE HAVE BIGGER LASER BYE”

haviz.1340:

Vasham.2408:

I’ll restate the obvious: the fact it’s story mode does not excuse poor game design.

What poor design? I’m all for reducing difficulty of story mode which was suppose to be for average player while explorables should be made harder.

What poor design?

• Mobs that die the moment they spawn to nearby NPCs
• An epic, climactic battle that is not epic and anticlimactic
• The complete inability to die from any ability the boss can throw at you
• 30 seconds of spamming #2 being the only part of the fight you need to participate in

It’s also worth repeating that just because it’s story mode doesn’t mean it should be a complete faceroll. When you start to settle for less the end result is the dungeon content in WoW.

If it were up to me, the current Arah story path would be a solo story mission instead, ending with Zhaitan falling down into Arah, but not dead.

Then replace the Arah story path with a 5th explorable mode path (make it the hardest, most epic dungeon path in the game) that involves going back into Arah to finish off Zhaitan.

voidwater.2064:

If it were up to me, the current Arah story path would be a solo story mission instead, ending with Zhaitan falling down into Arah, but not dead.

Then replace the Arah story path with a 5th explorable mode path (make it the hardest, most epic dungeon path in the game) that involves going back into Arah to finish off Zhaitan.

Agree with this.

I have 3 level 80s i still need to finish my personal story on, but can’t be bothered getting a group together given the small size of our guild (5 people) and how rarely they all play.

Would be nice to be able to complete it in my own time.

Then again, i wish all dungeons had a solo option.

I have 6 level 80’s. Story mode should be just that – an interesting story you enjoy as it fills in the backdrop of the world. Not some crazy hella thing you don’t want to do more than once ever. I was kitten when I had to do Arah twice as it glitched at the end the first run through, it was long, annoying and the ending was so anti-climactic for the time the kitten thing took it was pointless anyway. Having the storymode easy is a great decision. Less time wasted doing a quest you’re only doing to get rid of the annoying green popup in the top right of your screen.

Vasham.2408:

What poor design?

• Mobs that die the moment they spawn to nearby NPCs
• An epic, climactic battle that is not epic and anticlimactic
• The complete inability to die from any ability the boss can throw at you
• 30 seconds of spamming #2 being the only part of the fight you need to participate in

It’s also worth repeating that just because it’s story mode doesn’t mean it should be a complete faceroll. When you start to settle for less the end result is the dungeon content in WoW.

Wasn’t it like before?

I did Arah story before the patch with myself and 2 others having never done it before. I actually really enjoyed the battle leading up to him and we died a bit getting to zhitan (which is a good thing as challenge is welcome). Then as we fought the dragon itself just severe dissapointment crept into my soul. The boss was the easiest part of the dungeon when presumeably it should be at least somewhere in the middle. I’m not for the end boss being the most difficult but it was disgraceful. Now that I hear it’s easier I have given up on the personal story entirely.

WonderfulCT.6278:

I did Arah story before the patch with myself and 2 others having never done it before. I actually really enjoyed the battle leading up to him and we died a bit getting to zhitan (which is a good thing as challenge is welcome). Then as we fought the dragon itself just severe dissapointment crept into my soul. The boss was the easiest part of the dungeon when presumeably it should be at least somewhere in the middle. I’m not for the end boss being the most difficult but it was disgraceful. Now that I hear it’s easier I have given up on the personal story entirely.

Yes it’s really easy to give up a free alpha siege golem and pact rare weapon that sells for over 1 gold.

/Sarcasm off

haviz.1340:

Vasham.2408:

What poor design?

• Mobs that die the moment they spawn to nearby NPCs
• An epic, climactic battle that is not epic and anticlimactic
• The complete inability to die from any ability the boss can throw at you
• 30 seconds of spamming #2 being the only part of the fight you need to participate in

It’s also worth repeating that just because it’s story mode doesn’t mean it should be a complete faceroll. When you start to settle for less the end result is the dungeon content in WoW.

Wasn’t it like before?

Before the fight was terrible (kill trash waves, kill eyes of zhaitan, spam cannons) but at least you had to put forth effort. With the nerfs to the mobs it’s so easy the NPCs that are on the airship can kill the mobs without you intervening. The only part you need to involve yourself with is the cannons, which now kill the boss in under thirty seconds so he can’t even spawn his adds.

yesterday, i ran Arah, and one of my party member said “this is just like watching movie”.
i think it’ll be more challenging if they continuously spawn adds during last canon phase.

Just a question, how was the fight before Zhaitan?

The kill stuff for airship parts and kill the dragons?

Was it too easy as well?

I hope so, this way it will be balanced around one player. Players will then be encouraged to play Story mode by themselves so they can finish their personal storyline.

since it sucked so hard as a difficulty when you reached 80 and wanted to finish the story, now it is more easy. go explorable if you want a challenge.

the whole main story and especially last boss is such a joke they should delete it. I want fun co-op missions like in gw1

DanH.5879:

since it sucked so hard as a difficulty when you reached 80 and wanted to finish the story, now it is more easy. go explorable if you want a challenge.

Ever stop to think some people like running story mode dungeons, or others (like me) would prefer to see what’s supposed to be this game’s final boss be an actual challenge and not a glorified quicktime event?

I love the change so now i am able to complete my personal story. Yes i am bad at dungeons and i’ll probably never step foot inside one but this one i know that i can complete. You may not find challenge in them whereas i do….each one of us sees things different.

So at first I thought the OP must be overreacting but I just finished my second character’s personal story yesterday and had to LOL at how incredibly nerfed this mission was. I was with a PUG, done in less than an hour.

Once we got onto the big airship and had to fight the mobs before shooting at Zhaitan, the NPCs were taking them down for us. You know it’s bad when Logan Thackeray stayed alive. I just stood there and danced, didn’t even have to do anything!

All that aside though I understand why they would nerf it, however making this probably the easiest mission in the game went a little too far. I can see this being made more challenging again soon.