[AwM] of Jade Quarry.
Punishing Content
How is the Boss Blitz punishing content? You get a reward even if you’re on a map that doesn’t pull it together enough to get Gold or Silver rewards.
Time for a small WS break, mainly to defend the smart people of Extra Credits from being used for the wrong reasons: linking doesn´t equal understanding it seems. Did you actually watch that video to the end? The “aha” moment is: do not mass zerg single bosses, but split and time killing – and GW2 is the first MMORPG I have ever seen where people do not get “kill healer first”, even after explanations. GW2´s majority of player base being abysmally bad and unskilled at gaming (or noticing things in general) is not unfairness in the sense presented by Extra Credits.
Punishing content? You mean anything that doesn’t require you to spam 1 while watching TV?
Seriously, if anything this game needs a heck of a lot more difficult content.
You should pay more attention to the Extra Credits videos, BossBlitz isn’t an example for punishing content.
In BossBlitz you have an example of rewarding strategic play, but if you fail to play strategic, guess what, you still get rewarded, just not the full reward, but for the achievement, is counts the same way, you are not required to get gold reward at all.
Charter Vanguard [CV] – HoD
Bardy Belzebuson – Ranger Sir Belzebu – Herald
(and the other 8 elite specs maxed too)
(and the other 8 elite specs maxed too)
Boss Blitz is not punishing content. It might seem punishing after playing WvW for any length of time, especially as a staff Guardian.
Even if I play it right, I have to rely on 70 other people to play the strategy right. How is that not punishing, please?
“Be angry about legendary weapons, sure, but what about the recent drought of content?”
-Mike O’Brien
Because we can’t be angry about both?
-Mike O’Brien
Because we can’t be angry about both?
Even if I play it right, I have to rely on 70 other people to play the strategy right. How is that not punishing, please?
You are mixing punishment with not getting bonus reward.
Punishment Content would be: You didn’t kill the 6 Bosses in 8 minutes? Well … no rewards for you, please donate and try again.
Current state: You didn’t kill the bosses in 8 minutes? Ok, I’ll give 8 more minutes to get 2nd place reward. You didn’t kill in 16 minutes? Ok, take as long as you need, and you will get the 3rd prize anyway.
Charter Vanguard [CV] – HoD
Bardy Belzebuson – Ranger Sir Belzebu – Herald
(and the other 8 elite specs maxed too)
(and the other 8 elite specs maxed too)
Even if I play it right, I have to rely on 70 other people to play the strategy right. How is that not punishing, please?
Even if you zerg you are relying on 70 other people. Do you really think you can solo a bosses in this event without support?
You can solo Kuraii tho.
You could solo the others as well if it wouldnt be for the veteran mob spam.
Well, maybe not Pyroxis
Ranger – Drakkar Lake[DE]
Full melee Ranger since August 2012
Full melee Ranger since August 2012
Punishing content? You mean anything that doesn’t require you to spam 1 while watching TV?
Seriously, if anything this game needs a heck of a lot more difficult content.
+10,000
At least I would if I could. * sigh *
I think you all need to pay more attention to that video. Look at existing and preexisting content, then look at the differences to Boss Blitz. Hence, why the video is a perfect fit for this. I don’t care what you want or if you like Boss Blitz or not, that’s irrelevant to the discussion.
[AwM] of Jade Quarry.
If you actually watch the Extra Credits link, the author postulates things that differentiate challenging from punishing. These are:
1) Consistency of rules: To my knowledge, while the Boss Blitz boss mechanics are novel, they do not violate any of the game’s base assumptions. They do violate the status quo of bosses that can be trivialized by hitting them with more players than they can scale to, but status quo does not equate to rules. Even if one were to say that status quo equates to a “rule,” this may not be an issue. The author takes pains to note that the more difficult the game, the closer the game must adhere to rules (i.e., expected mob behavior). Bosses that can be zerged present little to no difficulty, hence sticking to the status quo is not really required.
2) Outlet to approach problems in new ways: or, if at first you don’t succeed, try again. This option seems eminently available for Boss Blitz. What isn’t available if one is unlucky is “show up and win.”
3) Telegraphing: I’m not prepared to say whether the game adequately informs players that zerging these bosses is not the best option. However, the correct tactic does seem to be widely known. Thus, easily discernible and not an issue.
4) Iteration time: In some ways, one could argue that the “everyone wins” philosophy — in this case, bronze reward for boss kills no matter how long it takes — equates to increased iteration time. It takes longer to try again, because the initial attempt takes longer. However, if the mechanic were simply “kill them within the gold time limit or they reset and you start over,” — which would mean shorter iteration time — this would probably be perceived as more punishing. This point may be a Kobayashi Maru issue for ANet.
5) Usability: the tools to defeat Boss Blitz for gold reward are eminently available. All it takes is convincing random people to cooperate. However, this is a different level of challenge than players are used to. This is likely going to be harder on EU servers with language differences than in NA. Also, like with Teq/Wurm, the greatest difficulty is coordination, which is to some degree outside of a player’s control. Arguably, this is the best argument for this content as punishing rather than difficult. At its core, it is a fundamental problem with presenting “more difficult” content in a random access setting.
6) Difficulty curve: “Huge spikes” in difficulty? I’m not seeing it. The non-zerg aspect of this content is not a huge spike in difficulty, it’s a tiny spike, from very easy with no requirement beyond showing up to a requirement that involves awareness of a mechanic that is well known and easily communicated (barring language issues) and little else. Where I might kvetch is whether the Boss Blitz mechanics are really sufficiently engaging to constitute real challenge, or whether they are just one step in the right direction.
The author’s last point is a telling one. “Developers should be aiming for a difficulty curve that encourages players to try again.” If there’s one failure to GW2 difficulty curve, it’s been too much “everyone wins with no effort beyond showing up.” This has created the impression by contrast that simple mechanics, easily discerned are punishing.
Even if I play it right, I have to rely on 70 other people to play the strategy right. How is that not punishing, please?
No, that’s still playing it wrong. The correct way is to use the LFG tool to find a server where people are doing it right, and join them. It takes 5 minutes tops.
Not that it matters anyway, since the festival is over tomorrow.
EDIT: I just realized it said July 1 not June 1 and I’m legitimately devastated Q.Q
“You’ll PAY to know what you really think.” ~ J. R. “Bob” Dobbs
(edited by Andred.1087)
Punishing? They made it a little bit more difficult to organise because they can’t actually make difficult encounters.