Guild Wars 2

So I’ve just finished my first big dragon fight… it was from the personal story once you have to defeat the undead who had taken over part of Lions Arch. I did not have big expectations because I’ve seen some videos of dragon fights already.

Visually, it looks amazing. Gameplay-wise and looking at it logically, it ceases to make a lot of sense…

So here we have a huge epic dragon with immense power and a huge army – yet it just stands in one single place throughout the whole fight. The way the dragon looks does not match the way it acts. The dragon is slim, has hands, moves pretty quickly and seems rather agile, yet it is just standing in the same place doing the occassional ground slam with one hand, and a few roars here and there… meanwhile its’ main attack was throwing grubs from its wings…?

Surely a big strong dragon would be moving around, doing pile drivers and choke slams to everything in its path? Would it not be eating people alive, charging into large clusters of people, and unleashing complete chaos upon its’ foes?

I know if I was a big dragon, I’d be charging at people, smashing everything, singling out targets who are dealing lots of damage, using AoE where people are clustered, and making a few sudden random movements in order to actually win the fight.

These dragons do not look as if they want to win the fight, yes they are obviously scripted to be downed, yet they just remain static, replaying the same animations over and over. Surely the player should feel the need to be caution to the dragon, and not know that he is completely safe at a certain distance since the dragon will never move?

Personally, I’d like to see these big bosses actually chase players and move around a bit, without acting as if they are anchored to the ground, or simply too lazy to just destroy stuff. Like, we understand that there is a big threatening dragon sieging a location, we really do… but we all know a big dragon is not gonna sit in the same spot while it roars at the ground and doesn’t even look at it’s enemies…

Yea, all the epic fights don’t seem very epic when you actually play them because they have a small range of mechanics and the scripting is very predictable

It gets worse as you progress namely the final boss who is a joke. Namely what he does when he attacks a certain ship makes no sense. I won’t go into much detail cause I don’t want to spoil it

i have not really seen any epic fights in this game and i’ve done almost every encounter.

to be honest they’re all rather boring with the same way to beat them all. press 1 and double tap move on red circles. that’s it.

I think ANet is working on matching health pools with varied content. Hopefully this means the dragons as well (and the opportunity to do them as well).

ANet should look into the mechanics for the Monster Hunter series. The way it enrages after a certain % of hp is destroyed, the idea that you can damage certain elements (cut the tail, break the claws etc.), and how it slowly tires once its about to die.

When i began the fight I was so excited. The fight was pretty bad though. I died to the poison everytime I went for the hands, so I just stayed back and rifle. I did some otherstuff while i just let my char AA him to death. Not fun.

I can’t shake the feeling that the last fight with the big guy is bugged.

DusK.3849:

I can’t shake the feeling that the last fight with the big guy is bugged.

this ^^
the whole dungeon group i was with was just like “seriously this cant be right”. the whole end fight just seemed like a joke +my sound cut-out(the music) making it seem even more lame.

I think that fight is supposed to be over a lot more quickly than it is.

When I did it only about 1/4 of the npcs in the area actually helped, and it took forever to die.

i would throw it out there that the game was somewhat rushed out.

it’s an epic game but some parts are clearly unfinished.

Just want to voice support for the thread.

If Anet reads this, the description where the OP delves into how a dragon fight should be, implementing something like that would make this game the new industry standard. No other MMO has enemies where their attacks are continually calculated based on the player’s movement, amount of DPS, etc. I think it’s definitely worth looking into, it would make the game much better.

My one and only disappointment with this game has been the big boss fights. Why are these dragons standing still? When they stand still, they feel less alive and more like robots. I wanted to see the Shatterer not just fly up into the air, breathe fire, and land again, but instead fly up into the air, forcing players to go into siege weaponry and shoot the kitten down! Then, while he’s on the ground, dazed hurt and confused, melee’ers can run up the side of his body and attack weak points on him for extra damage. Ranged could target specific and small, hard to hit areas that would also be considered as weak points.

I really, really hope ANet learns to make these fights less static. Because nothing says buzz kill like a stationary boss.

Wish the dragons were more like the ones you fight in Vindictus battle wise.

I know what your saying and I agree with your sentiment on what a dragon battle should be. However if you want to give it that kind of capability how long do you think you would last? No amount of rolling out the way or pricking at his hands with your puny little weapon is going to win. I think they did a pretty good job within the boundaries of the games “coding?” epic moments like tequatl busting out of the sea, Jormag losing his wings.. Shatterer landing, the thing in the queensdale swamp and maybe more I havnt yet seen. Its not often I just smile at my screen and cast a quiet expletive of awe and so far this game delivers.

If you want Ninja Gaiden, God of War (add whatever combat game you like) physics based combat you probably wont find it here.

I love these games (MMO’s in general) because of their sheer size and complexity. I like that I can play the game until my eyes bleed and my brain cant take it anymore. (The buzz wears off) I’ve played too many games in my time to get any joy out of playing for 8 hrs of roller coaster and it all being done when its over.

Maybe I’m showing my age but games have come a looooong way since the ones i first started playing as a kid, perhaps I appreciate it more because of this? Dunno

Arena Net talk about being dynamic all the time, but the fact is the major boss fights are simply not dynamic. They are rather static, predictable and zergable. They don’t really require the maximum focus of the player because they do not do anything radical. Take certain bosses in WoW for example, if you do not handle a certain situation appropriotly it will endanger the entire group, enhance the difficulty due to the player’s error, and possible cause failure. In GW2, you just stay alive and throw deeps at the targets. They lack subtlty of mechanics and this in my opinion greatly takes away from the real enjoyment of an ‘epic boss fight’.

I my self am a PvP player because PvP is naturally dynamic since players will do random, unpredictable, calculated things. This is one of the sole reasons I do not enjoy the PvE realm of most games because everything is predictable and static.

Now, I’m not saying to just add lots of random conditions and variables which instantly snipe people or suddenly destroy a player with no warning (cough AC), as that only results in frustration when it becomes a game of chance. I’d simply like for the ‘epic boss fights’ at least to be more human-like and for them to be programmed in a way which players feel they have to survive and seriously perform well in order to save/earn/defeat something. These bosses don’t do that, simply because you can just walk away and not be harmed.