Guild Wars 2

I really wish they had made Ruins of Orr and Southsun Cove more player friendly.

i hate these two maps, why couldnt they create these maps more Solo player friendly ?

In Orr players are perma stressed by perma attacking mobs and in Southsun cove the Mobs hit so hard that a normal equiped player dies in 2-3 hits….

Orr needs a revamp, less mobs more exploration without permanent fleeing from mob crowds. Its no fun there..

not more to say … that was all….

I was thinking exactly the same thing the other day! I just hate being up in those two places because of the overload of mobs. I hope they’ll read this and do something about it asap.

/signed

Its supposed to be hard, the drop tables are better.

The maps are fine the way they are. I hate that once a mildly challenging zone or jp gets released by Anet, a lot of people want it nerfed. This is by no means directed at you specifically. You are entitled to you opinion.

For Southsun Shores, you just need to learn to dodge their attacks. You can’t go mindlessly wandering around and just mashing skills when you fight them. The only difficulty with them is their acid attack which can be dodged. There are also other abilities that can help you as well.

I never had issues in Orr. Cursed Shore was a little rough but manageable. These are high level zones so they should provide a challenge. You can go running everywhere, aggro everything, and hope to survive by mashing keys. There’s more strategy involved and you need to choose the locations that you fight carefully.

I remember Orr being very frustrating for me when I first showed up. Honestly Orr gets much much easier once you develop an Orr strategy, I can run around Orr without dying on any of my 80’s now with a mix of dodging, good routes, and well timed heals.

Edit: Typos

I’m a theif, so I automatically can move around Orr just fine. =D

As with Orr, group up. You’ll find the experience a lot more fun that way.

They are badly designed in the way you cant actually move around solo .. No excuse for that with drop levels as you can still make the drop areas obviously “stay away solo dude” marked..

TBF though I expect most peeps would have at least found a guild by that lvl..

And to be even more fair.. Dont forget one of the beauties of GW2 design is you can hang around and simply join in with the action as an extra and get the same chance of drops.. plus the games way more fun this way anyway.

i can move solo without problems and with all my chars… and only 1 of them is full exo.

Only if you pull 3 or 4 monsters on southsun cove you can say that you are definitely dead, but its your fault.

My Mesmer twink is 80 since this weekend and has no problem in Orr or Southsun Cove. You don’t need special gear or a group to survive, but you should wear reasonable gear and don’t go in there as a full dps glass cannon if you don’t know how to not get hit.

Easiest way to navigate Southsun Cove is to carry projectile reflect abilities.

The main issue with moving around Orr are the amount of mobs with long aggro and equally long pull CC. Sure, you can dodge. But that just means that the third pull rather than the first pull gets you.

Warlord.9074:

Its supposed to be hard, the drop tables are better.

Hard is one thing, impossible is totally another. I am not able to explore either of these two Zones on my character because I am constantly “dead” from being overrun by enemies.

There is a difference.

I like how those zones effectively teach you how to counter cc and bursts.

Bit like kohler in catacombs teaches about dodging and boss attack telegraphs.

lynspottery.6529:

Warlord.9074:

Its supposed to be hard, the drop tables are better.

Hard is one thing, impossible is totally another. I am not able to explore either of these two Zones on my character because I am constantly “dead” from being overrun by enemies.

There is a difference.

Get better at the game then?
I´m not saying you´re a bad player, i´m saying that you can learn to be better. Orr becomes lot easier when you learn it, as does ss cove.

lynspottery.6529:

Warlord.9074:

Its supposed to be hard, the drop tables are better.

Hard is one thing, impossible is totally another. I am not able to explore either of these two Zones on my character because I am constantly “dead” from being overrun by enemies.

There is a difference.

Not impossible when a lot of people have no issues. You just need to rework your strategy.

I went twice so far with my 80. I won’t be back. I absolutely hate those zones.

There is difficult, and then there is annoying. Never mind that when people talk about “skill”, more likely they mean reaction time.

Dont try to solo it.. Why would you, the areas packed at the moment? No ones going to shout at you if you attach along

In all seriousness, I’ve always traveled Orr solo with my level 80 thief, and I used level 70 gear. I never seen much of a difference between orr and other places I’ve been to.

I like the Lost Shores. There’s some parts that are a bit hard to get around, but it’s clear and has a good feeling to it.

The Orr zones, I really don’t care for. They’re gloomy. They feel contrived. I constantly feel like “let’s just leave this horrible place to these risen.” In particular, it feels to me that they made travel in Orr difficult (that it can take you 15 minutes to go 50 yards because of the unclimbable slopes and maze-like structures) as a way to disguise the lack of content, make it feel big and dangerous. After a bit of time there, honestly I only wear MF gear and get along with the mobs ok. I just can’t do it very long or I get so grumpy I could kick kittens.

Tuccos.8592:

I really wish they had made Ruins of Orr and Southsun Cove more player friendly.

i hate these two maps, why couldnt they create these maps more Solo player friendly ?

In Orr players are perma stressed by perma attacking mobs and in Southsun cove the Mobs hit so hard that a normal equiped player dies in 2-3 hits….

Orr needs a revamp, less mobs more exploration without permanent fleeing from mob crowds. Its no fun there..

not more to say … that was all….

To do that is to change the lore of Orr…..that’s not happening. Orr was a great nation that sunk to the bottom of the sea, killing all it’s inhabitants during the Charr invasion.

lynspottery.6529:

Warlord.9074:

Its supposed to be hard, the drop tables are better.

Hard is one thing, impossible is totally another. I am not able to explore either of these two Zones on my character because I am constantly “dead” from being overrun by enemies.

There is a difference.

Neither zone is “impossible”. I don’t mean this to sound rude (so please don’t take it as such), you may need to examine your playstyle or build. Every class can work fine in these zones it just takes looking at what you are doing, they are “endgame” zones and as such what works there may not be the same that worked everywhere else previous to them. I have seen others suggest this as well, until you get used to the zone buy some cheap masterwork defensive gear and test out different builds until you find what works. So little about the pve in this game is actually very challenging once you become familiar with all the capabilities of whatever class you are using. This can be as simple as using a different weapon set to completely changing your build, to just switching out to different utilities. In the end though there are certainly plenty of players who do perfectly fine in these zones on every class so you should perhaps rethink the “impossible” stance.

The lost shore mob have attacks that need to be avoided. The krabkas have a string of attacks with that loud sound, each doing a lot of damage.

Every profession has some method to do it. My ranger has to send the pet first and then attack, so the pet eats the big attacks, or dodge roll out of em. My guardian has to dodge and block and blind. The good thing is it’s just the special attacks that hurt – the normal ones you can absorb.

It’s an MMO. Middle M stands for multiplayer. Why does everybody want to play MMOs solo? It’s nice they designed some solo content, but really, what’s the point of playing an MMO without the community aspect. Just play dragon age or some single player RPG.

Neither of these areas is by any means “impossible” to navigate solo.

Every class has the tools avaliable to comfortably navigate these zones. If you’re bringing bad gear, or full glass cannon gear with no escape or mitigation strategy it’s your fault that you’re getting killed repeatedly.

In orr, dodge hooks, in southsun, bait pulls and dodge acid sprays. You don’t need any special gear setup to do either, you can literally bait and completely avoid pulls and acid spray simply by strafing intelligently. Now should you walk up and say hi to a veteran karka, risen giant, or other large monstrosity in these zones without a build designed to do so, yes, you may find that fight impossible.

Luckily, all of those large monstrosities are spaced pretty far apart, enough so that as long as you’re paying attention you can avoid their aggro completely.

If you haven’t figured out before getting to the L80 zones that GW2 combat is much more about avoiding large spike damage and mitigating smaller packets with boons, heals, I recommend taking a refresher course. AC story is a good “GW2 PvE boot camp” for all players, as completing it requires a firm understanding of aoe avoidance, attack telegraph recognition, use of environmental weapons, and dodge timing.

That said, if you really and truly can’t be bothered to step up to the challenge of these zones, loot scaling has recently been adjusted so that you can have a shot at decent L80 loot in zones as low as 50 now, so I’d recommend just playing somewhere else that you find fun.

I kind of agree with this.

On my first visit, I went sight-seeing, took few photos, kill few mobs, do phase 3 and took the ship back. I didn’t visit it back because that place is not meant for you to go alone. It doesn’t feel like an end-game place. It’s a waste of a good scenary.

If the purpose is to “group up”, we might as well do fractals.

digiowl.9620:

There is difficult, and then there is annoying. Never mind that when people talk about “skill”, more likely they mean reaction time.

While there is truth to this in part, it is not entirely accurate. A person with a faster reaction time may be able to handle dicey situations a touch easier, if a person has a slower reaction time however it does not mean it becomes impossible. All classes can be built pretty tough through gear and traits, will you kill as fast? Nope but the tradeoff is if a person does not have a super fast reaction time and does not deal with the twitch mechanics they can still survive quite easily building more defensively and learning more about their class abilities. I know many players experiment a little with their builds but once they find something that works for them they stick with it and as such they are hesitant to explore new possibilities. In Orr and ss cove, there is enough difference in the mobs ai and abilities to make them unfamiliar from what players have seen previously, as such it should require new strategies for each type of player to be successful.

digiowl.9620:

There is difficult, and then there is annoying. Never mind that when people talk about “skill”, more likely they mean reaction time.

Unless your reaction time is somewhere around 2 seconds, it´s not the issue.

Simple matter of learning that mob A does a high damage ranged attack usualy right after engaging, and also does certain animation beforedoing it. Two simple things and reaction time is not an issue.

Protip: Mobs are stupid, they act the same way nearly everytime.

Honestly, discounting any concept of skill, I’m personally in Knights gear on my mesmer head to toe, not zerks, and can tank a full young karka projectile nuke while typing, then win the fight effortlessly.

The place seems custom built to encourage people to add a little durability to their builds, as glass cannons can’t survive the damage, but anyone with at least some tank stats does fine for themself. The confusion inflicted by the drakes is a bit of a pain, but a single condition removal skill seemed to keep me set against four drakes at once, as they didn’t seem to do much damage outside of that.

If anything, it kinda feels like GW1, where you needed specific skills readied to deal with specific mobs effectively.

I know that mobs have the same behavior pattern. But i do not have the mental capacity to memorize 1001 different mob patterns. And While armoring up helps a bit, the game strongly favors player action vs character stats on the defensive side of the equation. Meaning that if you trade DPS for armor you will only take longer to eventually die, because your reaction time is still the same and but now your damage output, the one thing that will end the fight (except running away) is considerably lower.

The thing is that armor, vitality and healing ability scales linearly, while DPS, thanks to the crit mechanic, scales exponentially. With high crit damage you can nearly triple the output of in relation to the input. And fury allows you to guarantee crits for its duration.

In essence the game favors quick reaction players with glass cannon builds when dealing with mobs.

Group up. The contents designed that way, and all the events are for groups anyway. That said I just finished Orr on my Engineer without any issue soloing through about 80% of it, but I did join in for Shrine events and the Gates of Arah.

digiowl.9620:

I know that mobs have the same behavior pattern. But i do not have the mental capacity to memorize 1001 different mob patterns. And While armoring up helps a bit, the game strongly favors player action vs character stats on the defensive side of the equation. Meaning that if you trade DPS for armor you will only take longer to eventually die, because your reaction time is still the same and but now your damage output, the one thing that will end the fight (except running away) is considerably lower.

The thing is that armor, vitality and healing ability scales linearly, while DPS, thanks to the crit mechanic, scales exponentially. With high crit damage you can nearly triple the output of in relation to the input. And fury allows you to guarantee crits for its duration.

In essence the game favors quick reaction players with glass cannon builds when dealing with mobs.

Trust me, you’re severely underestimating durability. Severely.

For one, you can’t do damage when you’re dead. For another, armor reduction is % based, not flat, so effectively the more you have, the less each point of power/crit damage means on your opponents stats. And to top it off, getting completely stacked in toughness only drops your crit damage. Your non-crit damage is still the same, and try as you might, you do not crit every hit.

Trust me, armor and a condition removal skill or two makes Southsun easy. If, on a mesmer, I can get the durability I need to literally shrug when a young karka hits with every projectile, I fail to see why even more durable classes like warriors/guardians can’t simply stack on even a little extra durability, and get a similar effect.

digiowl.9620:

I know that mobs have the same behavior pattern. But i do not have the mental capacity to memorize 1001 different mob patterns. And While armoring up helps a bit, the game strongly favors player action vs character stats on the defensive side of the equation. Meaning that if you trade DPS for armor you will only take longer to eventually die, because your reaction time is still the same and but now your damage output, the one thing that will end the fight (except running away) is considerably lower.

The thing is that armor, vitality and healing ability scales linearly, while DPS, thanks to the crit mechanic, scales exponentially. With high crit damage you can nearly triple the output of in relation to the input. And fury allows you to guarantee crits for its duration.

In essence the game favors quick reaction players with glass cannon builds when dealing with mobs.

There´s a handful of patterns you need to know…many have the universal “dusting” effect and really long activation, rest can be just soaked with defense stats

digiowl.9620:

I know that mobs have the same behavior pattern. But i do not have the mental capacity to memorize 1001 different mob patterns. And While armoring up helps a bit, the game strongly favors player action vs character stats on the defensive side of the equation. Meaning that if you trade DPS for armor you will only take longer to eventually die, because your reaction time is still the same and but now your damage output, the one thing that will end the fight (except running away) is considerably lower.

The thing is that armor, vitality and healing ability scales linearly, while DPS, thanks to the crit mechanic, scales exponentially. With high crit damage you can nearly triple the output of in relation to the input. And fury allows you to guarantee crits for its duration.

In essence the game favors quick reaction players with glass cannon builds when dealing with mobs.

Again this is partially true, I agree that you have an advantage with faster reaction time. It should be that way to be honest because of the way the combat is designed in this game, relying on active defenses more than stat defense rng. Seriously though if you build “tanky” and can not still survive, it almost has to be a case of just simply not wanting to learn the game mechanics. I am certainly no super sayain speed key presser, and I survive just fine even built in a dps build. Sure there are some times when I bite off more than I can chew, and I simply chalk it up to a learning experience like well dummy don’t try to run through 10 mobs when half my skills are on cd again. I actually enjoy the little challenge there is to the general pve in these zones…the rest of them are far far too easy in my opinion. One shot mechanics and insane health pools aside this is why I enjoy running dungeons as well, it’s one of the few places in the game where you are forced to learn the mechanics or simply keep payin the high repair cost, but they are not impossible even for someone with less than optimal reaction time.

..sigh, well judging by the commentary, it appears I am not a very good player then. I am not one to complain though, I was just commenting based upon my own experiences.

I prefer ranged type play style so play a Ranger. I like the guardian but not the in-your-face portion of it with the broadsword.

Strang.8170, Ayrilana.1396 and ShadowPuppet.3746 all have very valid points, I do need to learn better strategy but I am not a hard core player preferring instead to amble through a game for fun.

I usually run with guild mates and they are all very accommodating in helping me. But this old timer is just not that fast on the uptake any more so my reactions are a bit slow.

But, they like my jokes and use me as bait a lot. lol I am fairly good natured so enjoy the banter. I keep telling them I’ll change the sandwich I seem to have attached to my back if I can find a better one than PB&J.

You’ll find that trying to fight at a distance to be very difficult in this game unless you have something (pet, summon, etc) to distract it. Otherwise you’re just using ranged attacks at point blank.

You could kite them but I fond it to be more of a hassle than it was worth. In fact, it seemed to take much longer than if I just tanked it.

If you’re having problems then I suggest speaking on map chat and seeing if anyone wants to group with you. If you’re trying to do a particular skill point then I’m sure you can also get someone there to help you.

Difficult = Annoying, to me. At least in those zones.

Queensdale is so much more friendly! Soloting Centaurs, 2shoting mobs, I really feel like a hero. In Orr, I just feel like a dumb guy with an arrow in the knee 90% of the time…

Strange i found the new zone a lot easier than Orr

“everybody come” now ranks up there with “do i look fat in this” and “trust me im a professional”

New zone mobs may hit hard but atlest thay are spaced far enough appart that you get one not him and three friends that have started respawning by the time you kill them.

I actually like Cursed Shore, but you should be 80 when you get there. The previous two maps are just crap when it comes to doing anything pre-80. They need to be reconsidered and content perhaps changed quite a bit, a difficulty curve added so the further along you go while getting to Cursed Shore the more like Cursed Shore they become.

Ayrilana.1396:

You’ll find that trying to fight at a distance to be very difficult in this game unless you have something (pet, summon, etc) to distract it. Otherwise you’re just using ranged attacks at point blank.

You could kite them but I fond it to be more of a hassle than it was worth. In fact, it seemed to take much longer than if I just tanked it.

If you’re having problems then I suggest speaking on map chat and seeing if anyone wants to group with you. If you’re trying to do a particular skill point then I’m sure you can also get someone there to help you.

I actually do use a pet a lot …and I actually was able to pick up my new Ranger pet, but only after 6 or 7 of us finally took down the boss guarding them. I died but was told to wait that someone would rez me. It would have been too difficult to return through all that terrain and beasties alone. That worked.

Usually, I run with guildies and rarely venture anywhere I would have issues soloing by myself. I have a lot of the map to uncover yet and so I have a lot of options there.

Oh, and I have finally learned how to kite. heheheh that is fun. I just make sure my guildies aren’t in the line of fire and run the heck out of the enemy while they kill it. Works for me.

I can count the number of places where the risen kingdom of Orr was truly horrible on one hand. Southsun Cove is a lot more hostile.

I only do these maps when I group with someone. I found them frustrating as a solo player. Frost place is a nice area solo.

lynspottery.6529:

..sigh, well judging by the commentary, it appears I am not a very good player then. I am not one to complain though, I was just commenting based upon my own experiences.

I prefer ranged type play style so play a Ranger. I like the guardian but not the in-your-face portion of it with the broadsword.

Strang.8170, Ayrilana.1396 and ShadowPuppet.3746 all have very valid points, I do need to learn better strategy but I am not a hard core player preferring instead to amble through a game for fun.

It’s entirely possible to play at range, just have a backup weapon designed for close-quarters combat because Orrian monsters WILL get in your face.

That said, my almost-glass-cannon Ranger has little to no trouble in Orr or Southsun Cove. It boils down to strategy and skill. If you have a plan and you implement it well, generally you don’t have too many problems. If you’re finding a map “impossible”, then you either have a bad strategy or you’re not sticking to your game plan well enough.

If you like playing at range as a Ranger, pick utilities that will help you keep your distance from your targets, or will help you kill them faster so that they don’t have time to get close. I tend to run with Quickening Zephyr for faster damage, and Lightning Reflexes for an extra get-away skill (it also helps you escape from a few types of “lockdown”, like knockdown or stun, which helps IMMENSELY). And most importantly, have a backup plan prepared….mine is 1H sword / warhorn for evasive close-quarters combat + self-buffing.

If you die in a few hits only, I’d advice you to look at your gear and traits.

Orr is great (even trough they should remove the direct damage delt by grubs because it totally makes sense that 2 little worms do more with spit than a freaking giant hitting you with hit foot), Lost Shores… well except that the generic karka have as much hp as the veterans but hit for 1k more (as in 4k total what is between 1/3 to 1/6 of a players hp) in chains instead 1 attack pre few seconds is bloody op for someone who wants to get from point a to point b within a sane amount of time, but managable because of blind… oh wait they have condition consumption.
Still not even close to hard if you actually see them as enemies of your level, but thats not what they are supposed to be (the veterans are, but they are bloody easier to kill than the trash mob, something that is a common feature here in GW2, kill the giant, get eaten by grubs, kill the ghost king who has power to vipe a entire city from the landscape, get killed by 4 little spiders, kill a kittening ascended charr who has powers close to the aspects of the 6 gods, but get slaugtered by jelly).

If someone else kills a young kraka, and I’m standing somewhere that looks safe, I can actually die while opening my inventory because the kraka will respawn behind me, drop me down to 20% health from its first attack (that multi-projectile one), and by the time I close my inventory and spin the camera around, I’m dead.

It’s nice and solo-friendly for guardians, but as an elementalist with a balanced build, these maps aren’t soloable. I feel confined to Frostgorge unless I can find someone who doesn’t mind me following them around.

Clark Skinner.4902:

It’s nice and solo-friendly for guardians, but as an elementalist with a balanced build, these maps aren’t soloable. I feel confined to Frostgorge unless I can find someone who doesn’t mind me following them around.

My staff ele says otherwise, prefectly soloable with right utilities.
*hint Glyph of storms+arcane shield is more than enough defense.

Try Frostgorge Sound.

digiowl.9620:

The main issue with moving around Orr are the amount of mobs with long aggro and equally long pull CC. Sure, you can dodge. But that just means that the third pull rather than the first pull gets you.

So kill them and move on instead of trying to run past them. It doesn’t take that long to kill all the guys along the path of your daily Orichalchum jog.

There are a few little pockets that are really hard to explore solo — places where the mob density is really high and there is some particularly nasty temple effect — but 90% of Orr can be done solo with relative ease. If you’re having trouble just moving around at all, it may be a good sign you need to explore new tactics or refine your build.

I agree with you completely, Tuccos. This game was advertised as being playable by one person. I don’t mind if they have non-required areas be impossible to do alone. But, anything that’s required should be possible without endless dying.

I clicked “Play” on my minion-master necro. 25 enemies. I’m alone, and surrounded by 25 enemies. I lasted less than a second. I was dead before I could even get one skill used.

The problem was that this is NORMAL in Orr. Yes, it was a bit of an aberration since I just spawned in. But, being surrounded by an overwhelmingly powerful group is very typical.

Perhaps I need better gear. (Heck, I’m sure of it — I just don’t know what that means!) But, how am I supposed to get this better gear when I can’t even get to the final mission?

The week I spent trying to get to Arah will go down as the most frustrating game experience of my life, without question. I grew to hate the game at times. Not only is it beyond playable, but they penalize you every time you die.

Don’t put impossible content in areas required for progression in the game. Bring back hard mode if you have to, and let the people who want that kind of challenge get their jollies there.

HOWEVER, those of us who are complaining need to remember how impossible GW Prophecies was before heroes. I would have hoped the designers learned at least a little of what “fun” means in 7 years. And, they definitely have made huge strides in this area. But, they have to divorce themselves from both impossible foes and innumerable foes. That’s not fun. It’s a means to an end; it is nothing more than a grind to get through.