Guild Wars 2

This post relates to Crucible of Eternity, Path 2.
Almost three hours into this dungeon, we have decided to give up on the LAST BOSS.

80guardian (Guild Member 1)
80elementalist (Me)
80elementalist (My girlfriend)
80thief (Guild Member 2)
80ranger (Random Player)
Everyone appeared to be coherent and not oblivious on how to play their characters

This dungeon is by far the hardest dungeon I have attempted in this game. If anyone is familiar with this dungeon, I’m sure you are familiar with the Alpha. For those who are not familiar with this boss, The Alpha is a reoccurring boss that drops AoE attacks and freezes players with a crazy amount of duration on the freeze.

Doing Path 1, it is pretty chill and kind of difficult. I had no problems with path 1 except for an occasional disconnect here and there. Yes, the Alpha was hard, but it wasn’t anything we couldn’t handle.

Path 2, is intense. TOO intense. We have to fight the alpha a total of 3 times.

-The 1st Alpha was a little difficult, but like normal we were able to respawn at a Waypoint and take him down.

-The 2nd Alpha was kind of far from the previous Waypoint. We had difficulty with this because of his constant Freezing and AoEing. With one member AFK for about 10 minutes, we failed twice and were a bit sad. Convinced we needed 5 to beat the 2nd Alpha, we waited and when our 5th player returned we destroyed the boss while taking a beating and hitting the Waypoints often.

-The 3rd Alpha is absolutely ridiculous. It is a full minute run (with 24/7 Swiftness applied) or longer (for those who don’t have swiftness) from the nearest Waypoint back to THE FINAL BOSS. I’ve included a picture showing where we spawn and where we have to run to fight the boss. If we drag the boss outside of the room he spawns in to help decrease the time it takes when running from the Waypoint, it resets back to 100% HP.

We spent almost 3 hours in this dungeon because of the 2nd alpha being semi-far and this 3rd alpha being ridiculously too far from the Waypoint. There were party members saying that they have “broken all of their equipment” fighting alpha.

Eventually we found that dying and running back from the Waypoints is the only way for us to beat this boss. As long as ONE person was able to stay alive, the others could run back from their death and attack the boss 1vs1. Without this method, I have not seen any other possible method of completing this dungeon. We managed to get last version of the Alpha down to 20% before the last remaining player in the room (me, I spent the entire battle time kiting the boss in circles) died.

Fighting a Dragon for 45 solid minutes with only 3 people on a dead server is not even as hard as this was. We are all very dissuaded from wanting to do this path ever again. At the moment, I am not willing to try again until a closer Waypoint is added.

I’ve played all the other dungeons and almost all the EXP paths for and I have never come across an issue such as this. I asked about it in Map chat after we exited and even in two guilds, and everyone there seemed to have heard the same thing about this dungeon being incredibly difficult.

Sooo… Any tips? Or for real, a developer response on this? This is way too difficult without a closer Waypoint. Even if a Waypoint is 15 seconds closer it would make a considerable difference. If nothing is added, like a waypoint) to help us, I do not see myself every completing path 2. Ever.

I’m assuming you’re having a problem with the double red circles?

When the double red circles are placed (O), look at the ground in the middle of the O. If it looks misty/icey, wait a second and dodge out because an ice spike is coming. If there’s nothing, just stand in the middle because a rock ring is coming inbetween the 2 circles.

All your melee can stand on top of eachother to prevent circles intersecting circles from happening.

If you’re constantly moving, it’s possible to run out of the red circles before the damage happens, allowing you to completely ignore them.

If crystals are a problem, stand closer to the boss so they can be AoE’d. You can also teleport out of them or just wait for them to break themselves – bring a defensive skill though so that you can use it in cases where you’re going to get AoE’d while in a crystal.

Path 2 is actually the fastest path for CoE (it has the most skippable mobs and lesser need for co-ordination than the other 2 paths). I’ve got the full Coe armor set, and this is actually one of my favorite dungeons in the game.

Alpha tips:
His circle attack activates 2 seconds after the circles appear. It takes some getting used to, but its completely possible to dodge all his attacks. Dodging and aegis are really the only ways to avoid this attack if you’re up close.

Get people out of crystals ASAP. Alpha will heal if someone is trapped in a crystal, which is why the stacking technique works well.

If you have a guardian in your group, have them spec the shouts “Retreat” and “Hold the Line.” Have them pop “Retreat” right before Alpha does his many circle attack, and that will block it if any member can’t dodge out of the way. If someone does get hit (and isn’t instantly down) use “Hold the Line” for group regen and protection.

Ele’s shouldn’t use any of the big AOE attacks, as this will kill off all the tendrils that he spawns. If anyone goes down, rallying off the tendrils is the fastest/most effective way to get back into the fight.

Everyone should have some form of stun break for this fight for dealing with the crystals. I main a guardian, and sadly none of our skills work on getting us out of the crystals, so spec skills that give boons or can block attacks or give regen. (As a guardian, and switching to scepter/focus while trapped in a crystal is a lifesaver as the block skill for focus still works while you’re trapped).

Also, try searching the dungeon forum on Coe. I remember seeing quite a few good posts on Alpha’s attack patterns and more in depth tips there.

CoE is definitely the most balanced and easy dungeon, not easiest, but easy enough have have – never – wiped in that dungeon with getting my whole set with PUGs, meaning I did about 25ish runs…
You must either really new to the game/dungeon which then can be understandable I guess…

Destroy the crystals asap (should go down in about 2 seconds max) and dont run 5k hp builds is my advice.

I still believe its bugged why on earth after you kill Alpha does the way point spawn near him?

You kill Alpha, ended the dungeon and then the waypoint spawns, useless to anyone…gotta be a bug..

And i concur running half way across a dungeon hoping your teammates don’t all die before you get back is far from fun.

Plus i posted this same issue months ago saying the exact same things and zero has been changed, i gave up doing the dungeon its not worth the hassle involved.

Most of Alpha’s attacks are avoidable. By most I mean all of the attacks that actually do damage to you can be avoided provided you aren’t within melee range of him and get out of the red circles in time. He does an AOE fire attack so you would have an incredibly hard time trying to melee him.

Many of his red circles give you enough time to actually walk out of them. Only use dodge if absolutely necessary so that you have the endurance for when you actually need it.

If you find yourself in a crystal you should try to use a skill that would allow you to get out of it. Thieves can use steal to escape but I don’t know about other professions. Otherwise, you want to get people in your party to switch to crystals immediately. They don’t take long to destroy.

Path 2 is easy, path 3 is much harder when he gets the high damage earth cone AoE. Path 2 dragon tooth is easy to avoid, you just strafe the whole fight and only dodge the big red circles.

Your mentalists should use blink (gets you out of crystals)
Guardian should use the meditation that teleports you/burns foes (target boss and teleport if you get crystalized.
Thief can shadowstep (maybe even with bow) aswell as steal.
Ranger I’m not sure about.

That would leave you with one memeber you need to break out.

I find P2 to be pretty easy – much easier than P3.
His ring-circle attack – if you’re spread out, finding a safe spot is pretty easy. Clustered, wait till you hear a “frost” noise, then dodge. I almost never get hit by his big attacks.
It helps to call target on crystals (target, then Ctrl + T) if you’re stuck in one; they need to be broken ASAP.
On the third fight, look out for Essences – they tend to spawn fairly close to Alpha. Killing one gives him a hefty stun.

All you really need to do in path 2 is to facetank Alpha and avoid the occasional ice spike since most circles you can simply stand in the middle of. The faster you get rid of him the less chance you have of messing it up, because the boss is fairly unforgiving. Once it starts going wrong it goes way wrong.

This boss is mainly about timing and keeping a calm head under the AoE fire, making sure that you have your defensive maneuvers at hand all the time and knowing which circles you can stand in the middle of.

i always find it funny when people call coe as a hard dungeon lol arah is hard but nothing in coe is.

Kelayda.8359:

Everyone should have some form of stun break for this fight for dealing with the crystals. I main a guardian, and sadly none of our skills work on getting us out of the crystals, so spec skills that give boons or can block attacks or give regen. (As a guardian, and switching to scepter/focus while trapped in a crystal is a lifesaver as the block skill for focus still works while you’re trapped).

Both teleport utility skills will get you out of the crystals.