Guild Wars 2

This is actually funny. I play games for pvp exclusively. I did play wow and similar and i can’t deny the fact that majority of players do prefer pve/raids in particular.

I do think this game needs raids. Actual raids, not open world bosses, dungeons or guild spawns. I am talking about at least 10 man instances with boss mechanics, timers, modes (normal/hard mode) and certain rewards obtainable only via those raids.

Why would i say that? Here is the thing: this game would do better in all aspects (including wvw and pvp) if it had more population. What keeps a lot of players away from this game is lack of end game content and raids. LS is nice and all. But they are finished fast and are for casuals. I had quite few friends that tried GW2 and went back to wow because of this very fact: gw2 is really fun BUT doesn’t have raids. WoW is not great nowdays, imo. I do think gw2 could win a lot of wow players for example if it had raids.

Holy trinity is not needed either. You could use certain buffs that force boss attack you and thus designate someone to tank (banner wars, bunker guards etc.) Eles could be healing those tanks, other classes dps. Could add some adds (mobs), porting mechanics etc. that would give moblity classes some job to do.

And most of the things for raids are already there.
- buffs that force NPCs attack only you
- debuffs that reduce healing (to make rezzing harder)
- fun mechanics (see fractals, LS bosses like Marionette, aetherblades path etc.)
- instance mechanics (see dungeons)

The only thing that is lacking is capability to create 10 man group and i doubt it would be THAT hard to implement compared to all other things that are already in game.

@Anet: i know it is a lot of investment, but in long run you could indeed win a lot of players from older MMOs who love to raid (and there are a lot of them).

Raid title : The Rise of Lazarus 10-man

Story what appears in your news mail : we found the last remaining force of the White Mantle in the maguuma jungle worshipping but appears to be pure air. Are they crazy? and what are they doing here? we better find out…..

during the instance we find trails of the crew that disapeared after going after the White mantle along with warnings to warn the queen. Along the raid you will need to or talk with a seer or somehow ascend in order to see the mursaat. The instance culminates with a epic fight with Lazarus empowered by a neaby bloodstone

Bosses

1 – Justiciar Abbot ( warrior type boss surrounded by enemy forces)

specials
None Shall Pass Upon reaching 30 stacks of None shall pass (gw1 skill name) Justiciar Abbot will call ranged reinforcements and minor melee reinforcements.
If Justiciar Abbot is more than 5 seconds without at least 20 stacks of None shall pass Justiciar Abbot will call melee reinforcements and minor ranged reinforcements.

Coward Whenever a an ally doges away from Justiciar Abbot they will receive 2 stacks of Torments ( dogde still avoids dmg )

Tiger stance Justiciar Abbot attacks 100% faster . ENDS if justiciar misses an attack ( recharges in 30sec)

Zealot Dhumbala ( Necromancer/ranger , battle divided in two rooms 1 up and one down) ( bodies of frog people whose name i forget scaterred kinda like he studied them and their toxins)

specials

attacks apply poison but he has slow attack speed

Knowledge of the Jungle POISON deals 300% more damage
in the up room there is a closed vent if one person activates it this debuff dissapears for 2 mins however doing so spawns assassins on the top room.

Expert Focus you can NOT enter stealth while fighting Dhumbala …. up room is cool though….

<50% HP

• Aura of the Lich * Dhumbala will call upon his power to summon twisted bone golems from the frog corpses, these apply bleeding and poison with its attacks.
  Whenever a minion dies it apllies a stack of insidious parasite to the other golems.

Insidious parasite Golem hits heal dhumbala for X.

<25%HP
Jagged Bones Dhumbala as last resort uses necromancy on his own body. Jagged bones causes 5 stacks of bleeding whenever dhumbala is attacked at melee.

Putrid Bile Dhumbala uses it knowledge of poison and necromancy to create a virulent plague that if given enough time will burst causing 20 stacks of poison to entire party. can only be bursted by being attacked in melee range….. and it is growing in dhumbala body.

golems still exist and respawn like every 3 min or 2 min

puzzle involving the mists and what u can or cannot see…… mursaat stuff XD people will ned to really coordinate on this one

THE SEER you free a seer emprisoned in the instance. but he is heavily hurt.

• The Jade Emperor a huge jade construct made to protect Lazrus at all costs

• Jade armor* reduces melee damage received by 20%. and crits deal 50% less dmg

Empowered Smash the Jade Emperor uses his magically infused power to deal heavy damage to surrounding foes and apply 5 stacks of confusion (10s)

• Jade Bombs* the jade emperor throws jade shards to ranged enemies and they deal damage to foes they hit entraping anyone they hitted for 4 seconds. After 4 seconds the bombs will Explode dealing HEAVY damage.

<50%

Summon the empire summon 3 Jade constuct with bows and 3 Jade constructs with Hammer . Bows deal heavy ranged damage and hammer are CC heavy. they have jade armor aswell.

Jade Barrage same as jade bombs but alot more shards spited out

Infused Existence gain 1 stack whenever he is attacked at melee , Upon reaching 10 he activates Infused existence REFLECTING all projectiles… these reflected projectiles cant be reflected back and deal 300% damage. stacks go away at a rate of 0.5 per second.

<25%

Jade eruption emperor strikes ground, ajde spikes rise form gound from him to the end of the room increasing in size kinda like subject alpha mordremoth thing.

Final Directive The jade emperor senses defeat and utilizes its final resort dealing MASSIVE damage to foes he hits. The emperor implodes his armor targeting ranged or melee ( huge area) very little reaction time ( people need to be very aware) but he shatters his armor increasing damage he takes by 20%. and losing the crit penalty. crits now deal more 50% than what they should

• Lazarus the Dire The final boss the surviving mursaat. he is a necromancer

Taste of Death Lazarus stealths himself, his next attack deals 200% damage. if revealed the buff will be lost. people can dodge this.

Protect me he summons jade constructs

<50% now empowered by bloodstone

Defile Corruption Lazarus applies ALL his stacks and conditions to a random foe ( 1min CD)

Edge of Extinction Defeated enemies CANNOT be revived. Downed people can PASSIVE

Atrophy Might has no effect for a period and puts weakness on everybody

Awaken the Blood Lazarus creates wells of blood targeting players that heal lazarus and apply 5 stacks of bleeding with each pulse

Cacophony deals X damage and applies Daze whenever a player uses a spell(skill 1 doesnt count) or uses a shout. (10sec) (medium CD)

<25%

Consume Corpse Lazarus consumes the corpse of one fallen ally of yours to create a golem minion ( or a diferent really cool minion) that attacks you. its attacks are vampiric towards Lazarus and its attacks apply cripple and torment. IF a golem dies it casts death nova.

<10%

Spectral Agony Lazarus uses all his power to create a vast massive damage dealing area that will also stun oponents. stun breakers work. Applies 10 stacks of torment and 5 stacks of confusion

tell me what u think just for the kick of it…. i would detail it more but have no time right now to write about scenery, terrain etc….

4 bosses in raid instance. I won’t even mention how many Naxxramas had. This is one of things which instanced PvE suffers.
Raids are k, though

i was thinking of like 10 but i really didnt have more time… maybe tomorrow ill put more
wanted at least 1 boss fight centering on conquering the courtyard of a white mantle base in order to advance and it would have siege weapons. also wanted extra bosses unlocked trough masteries, like master lore. a dual boss thing 2 bosses at the same time and finally wanted a boss that somehow involved the eye of janthir.

I posted this in an old thread, hope you like it

Selina the Chaosweaver

Selina, former member of the Shining Blade, were suctioned by an Asuran experiment to the mist. After many efforts to bring her to Tyria, she was back… but she was never the same. Something changed on her, she came back from the mist with only one objective in her mind: Destroy the head of the Shining Blade.

Countess Anise knowing about the thread, decided to gather a group of heroes to face her and know more about what happened to her in The Mist.

Encounter

Selina The Chaosweaver

Weapons:
Fan/Off-hand Fan

Fan

• Ether Shot: Hit her main target with an Ether Shot. Placing 10 stacks of torment for 6 seconds and knocking-back the target 1025 distance. 1 sec cast time.
• Chaos Confluence: Create a ball of chaos with 600 radius. After 3 seconds it will pull all players inside the ball causing 3k damage and 500 each seconds for the duration of the spell. Players absorbed by the ball are unable to cast any spell and can’t leave it. Duration: 20 sec. Cooldown: 15 sec.
• Chaos Leap: Leap to the farthest target in an attempt to do a killing blow. On her way to that target she leave a trail of Chaos Fire that apply Burning(10s), Bleed(10 stack, 10s) or Poison(25s). Leave a clone that use Ether Shot with 10k hp per player on the instance. Cooldown: 8 sec.

Off-Hand Fan

• Phantasmal Mime: Summon a Phantasmal Mime with 5k hp per player on the instance. Cooldown: 10 sec. Phantasmal Mime will do the same action as his target with 800% more effectiveness.
• Unstable Chaos Armor: Gain Unstable Chaos Armor for 6s. Unstable Chaos Armor have the same effect as Chaos Armor, but each time she is hit, the attacker is pulled to her if is farther than 600 of knocked back for 1200 if the attacker is closer than 600.

Fight Mechanics

• Countess Anise will help in the fight, as well as – 5 members of the shining blade.

Countess Anise: She will use Sword/Sword on this fight. She places Time Warp every time Selina lost 25% of her health. Also places Null Fields and summon Phantasmal Defender.
Shining Blade Member: They will use Staff. Also place Null Fields and summon Phantasmal Disenchanter.

At 75% health, Selina summon 1 Phantasm for each player in the raid and dissapear.
Warrior, Guardian: Summon a Phantasmal Defender with 2k HP per player on the instance.
Mage, Mesmer, Elementalist: Summon a Phantasmal Warlock with 2k HP per player on the instance.
Ranger, Engineer, Thief: Summon a Phantasmal Duelist with 2k HP per player on the instance.

After 20 seconds, all the phantasm will shatter and Selina appear.
Causing 500 damage, placing 1 stack of confusion, place distortion on Selina for 1 second and 1 stack of Might for 15 seconds for each successful shatter.

at 50% health Selina will disappear and summon a Phantasmal Destroyer.
Phantasmal Destroyer:Summon a Phantasmal Destroyer with 20k hp per player on the instance and place Chaos Storm in the entire instance with 200% more effectiveness. After the Phantasmal Destroyer is destroyed, it will explode causing 15 stack of bleed for 15 seconds to half of the raid.

At 25% Selina gets angry and gain Quickness. All of her cooldowns are reduced in half.

(sorry for any typo, english is not my first language.)

Just a question of why not raid frames for WvW for squad commanders to see who/what/how many ppl they have with them without counting sheep.

Raid frames for pve trains to see how many ppl are following you? This seems like a game that needs some kind of large party frames with the huge amount of ppl. With Heart coming out seems like something to toss in no?

Alot of mega older games have had some kinds of frames. Maybe up to 40 ppl something like that?

This is something that has been asked for many many times especially with the large group content in both WvW and PvE but they won’t do anything about it. Its ludicrous.

_i hope to see 10-12 ppl raids
_i hope the reward will be better than fotm, i hope will be not for guilds only
_i hope inside this istance we can do direct dps, condi dps, tank and healer, so we should play something different than just dps everything with dodge/reflections stacks, i’m pretty bored to play “quake arena 2”
_mechanics who allow players to split for different purpose, so every class should find his spot, for example a tank or some like that who wil taunt boss away from teamfight, the “dps team” do their job, and crowd controll players who manage other kind of foe, and the healer who will help everyone who need
_i hope also it will be done once per week, for feel it important and not farmable

Do you really think Anet will ever make raids? I mean, I would love to see them. Raids in WoW were the only fun I had in that game, but I don’t think Anet likes instanced content

Mortifer.2946:

Do you really think Anet will ever make raids? I mean, I would love to see them. Raids in WoW were the only fun I had in that game, but I don’t think Anet likes instanced content

but they like money

alot of ppl are crying for the tequatl buff, imho if the ppl know what to do, is super easy
there are casual player and “pro” player, if anet wanna put all together in the same room nothing good will come, maps like silverwaste and livingstory are for casual/farmer player, hard istanced content are for “pro/hardcore” gamers… if they think to make openworld content harder it will make casual/farmer angry for the difficult, and the “pro/hard” gamer will still be bored for have no real challenging content….
imho there is no still good game around, and this is a real luck for anet, but i saw different good game will be released in the next months so if gw2 will bring something MORE for everyone could be one of the best game around also if new games are comming, otherwise i thing other games will be steal player from this game, and also if i’ve bought the expensive HOT i should go away for something i will enjoy more…

anyway it was a raid CDI and also a job for raid designer, i hope they got a good one who will be able to make something different and challenging, who “force” player to go deeper inside his profession, because atm, all profession are just a different way to make dps

My idea for a raid in GW2:

-An open explorable, instanced, accessible by many players at the same time.
-Multiple quest goals, which all need to be completed in order to unlock the end.
-Quests and encounters that aren’t trivialized by stacking, zerking or simply by overwhelming numbers.
-Monsters that require careful planning, teamwork, and clever builds, and are quite deadly otherwise.
-Dynamic event chains inside the raid
-Harvesting nodes inside the raid
-Vistas inside the raid
-Skill challenges inside the raid, that unlock a specific special skill that is needed for progression inside the raid.
-Unique drops (crafting materials miniatures, and weapon skins) that can drop from any enemy
-Randomized bonus chests
-Multiple floors, jumping sections and swimming sections
-After all quests are completed, any player can enter a multi-stage boss battle if they meet the requirements for doing so. This means completing certain quests first on a personal level, and completing the end-battle requirements for the instance itself.

If they do choose to go the instanced raid path, which now seems feasible with the way they describe how guilds will be starting some mission types (unique instances), I hope they take a much different path than those found in other MMOs.

Specifically, I would like to see large scale organized encounters that mesh seamlessly with the dynamic events in the open world. Instead of a shambling raid that takes many hours to complete, let the dynamic events in a zone serve the role that trash mobs do in other games.

When certain events are done, a flag appears that allows organized groups (guilds first and foremost) to enter an instance and fight a single raid boss. Once that is done, the group comes out of the instance and fights their way (in the open world) to the next flag, where they do the same.

Most raiders in other games hate fighting through 45 minutes of trash mobs to take on the boss fights (which is what raiding should be about). Anet has the chance and systems in place to alleviate that pain – letting raiders focus on the thing they most enjoy – the actual boss fights – while using the open world to implement interesting champion and trash mob fights.

I agree Blaeys. It would be great to see a new type of Raid that is consistent with GW2’s overall design, and that includes stuff like dynamic events. I would also love to see commanders take a central role during raids, and organize various battles in the zone.

I’d love to see a balance between challenging boss encounters and challenging mob encounters. A type of encounter-design that turn common trash into meaningful and challenging encounters.

Perhaps a Raid in GW2 should work some what similar to The Deep or The Twisted Marionette, where you break up the huge groups into smaller ones, for multiple battles.

Mortifer.2946:

Do you really think Anet will ever make raids? I mean, I would love to see them. Raids in WoW were the only fun I had in that game, but I don’t think Anet likes instanced content

Well Anet has hired a Raid designer a while ago. And Colin said that the Open World Content in HoT is not what they mean with Challenging Group Content. So yes, Raids could be possible in HoT

Open air dungeon for 10 players that involves hunting some giant beast down in the jungle, trap it at multiple points and fight it to hp% points before it rampages and 1-shots several people before taking off again. Make it summon champions and the such to defend it and make it appear at random places for surprise attacks. Also have a part where there are like 50 normal mobs that just charge you all at once. I think having to use some mechanic other than our own weapons to bring the boss down would be good, but it would have to be better than press 2 until Zhaitan is dead.
Can use gliders during some parts.

Then let’s keep our fingers crossed

Bear bow ranger fight will cast rapid fire every 8 sec with pierce if 10% of max health is done within 20 sec will activate signet of stone 20 sec cd also jumps on top of any wall ledge etc.. within the area and spam rapid fire for 15 sec straight.

My idea would be to go play a game that can implement and already has implemented enjoyable raids that aren’t full of zerk dps as fast as u can with the occasional dodge roll.

Random.4691:

My idea would be to go play a game that can implement and already has implemented enjoyable raids that aren’t full of zerk dps as fast as u can with the occasional dodge roll.

Possible Raid Bosses would need high enough Toughness so normal Damage doesn’t melt them and high enoug Vitality so Condition Damage doesn’t melt them, but they should be killable in a decent amount of Time. Bosses with absurd amount of HP should have different Phases to make the fight more interesting.
Also we need to look at the Dodge Roll, the Encounters need Mechanics to deal with the Dodge Roll, like having fields that only make little damage initially but do massive Damage if you try to dodge out of them.
Raid Bosses should be complicated enough to be called a Raid Boss. Things like the SW Bosses would only fit as early Raid Bosses but the later ones need more and better mechanics.
And then there is the stacking. Certain Mechanics should help stacking, like shared Damage from an AOE and certain Mechanics should be there to make the Raid spread out, like Splash Damage or exploding Players.

Oh, oh! We could do it like WoW and have fights where you get mind control debuffs that make you exploded dead after a minute of staring at the screen. Those were always fun. Guaranteed never-solo!

Snark aside, there’s an issue of grouping that could make the concept of raids very difficult. There’s parties, maps, and squads. Squads require a commander, which means paying for an expensive luxury item. Parties are limited to 5, unless they manage some special classification. 10-man maps would probably be ideal, but it’s prone to similar party size complications, needing taxis, and that doesn’t prevent strays from strolling in.

So, unfortunately, it’s 5-man raids or zerg, at the moment. Factor that into these grand designs as recommendations. And, yeah, lore appropriate. They’ll be zero traction if there’s nothing to connect it to the story at large.

One thing that I would like to see, is boss fights that don’t revolve around a timer.

I personally love the “enemy gain control” mechanic I have seen in STO fleet combats, where you get hit with a debuff that essentially flips the team your on. All your buffs go tot he enemy, all your enemies turn into your former allies. This is not a “debuff” by normal senses and as such cannot be cleansed. It does not last long (manner of seconds, I think about 5-6) but the enemies sure enjoy your spamming heals suddenly giving them health.

I think introducing that mechanic alone could be interesting, as it will do one of two things:

1. Force the player away from the area to avoid AoE Condis from team mates
2. If not paying attention they will begin hitting their former allies

If these are AoE attacks, then it also forces groups to keep moving, and dodging.

Another idea would be condition reversal. A White Mantle Justicar may channel the flames to take all burning damage as healing instead, a poison drake could drink poison stacks for health from both enemies and allies. An enemy revenant could gain bonuses to damage and still attack freely while under the effects of blind.

Anet just needs to think out of the box with its current system, there is a lot of interesting opportunities without adding new mechanics, simply changing how the current ones work.

My idea for a raid revolves around the premise that you are in either a circular or cross shaped room with 4 corners. Each corner can support a 5-player group. Each group has to tackle objectives and make it to the center of the zone. The more groups that make it to the center the easier the boss becomes (but without all 4 groups being there it will be super hard but not impossible to kill).

Each of the 4 corners will require different mechanics to beat like 1 will be high dps to kill mobs before they overcharge there elite skills which 1-shot you (hence zerk groups). Another will have really high physical damage reduce but can be hit with condi damage (condi groups). Another requires survivability as mobs will die on their own and you just have to outlive their damage output by healing/supporting. The final corner can be a mix of all 3.

This type of setup makes use of all types of gear and builds and is a 20-man raid.

Thats my thought…

Rauderi.8706:

Oh, oh! We could do it like WoW and have fights where you get mind control debuffs that make you exploded dead after a minute of staring at the screen. Those were always fun. Guaranteed never-solo!

Snark aside, there’s an issue of grouping that could make the concept of raids very difficult. There’s parties, maps, and squads. Squads require a commander, which means paying for an expensive luxury item. Parties are limited to 5, unless they manage some special classification. 10-man maps would probably be ideal, but it’s prone to similar party size complications, needing taxis, and that doesn’t prevent strays from strolling in.

So, unfortunately, it’s 5-man raids or zerg, at the moment. Factor that into these grand designs as recommendations. And, yeah, lore appropriate. They’ll be zero traction if there’s nothing to connect it to the story at large.

As opposed to what we have now, I guess if you find running though a dungeon in 5 min with no risk, no challenge, no imagination, no need for range, no need for 99% of the utilities & weapons in the game all while getting no real rewards fun.

Have at it.

Random.4691:

…

Yeah, no. The dungeons are.. mediocre and they don’t really make use of the freedom of 5 independent agents as a group. Those aren’t ever going to get better, because ANet has no will to redesign them or fix their numbers. Whatev.

I was pointing out two things:

1. Some raid mechanics can go die in a fire. Seriously. The prevalence of WoW raids (and probably many other games) using control-loss mechanics and allegiance-swapping is irritating. It’s not the majority, but it’s enough to notice.
2. Logistics are going to determine the size and scope of potential raids, as outlined above.

What I’m hoping from the potential for raids are suitably clear tasks that split up the zerg (if there is one). Fight designs that present more challenge than stack-and-smack, so that survival is a real issue. I recall one of the old Living Story fights, actually. Boss would chuck toxic puddles that did unavoidable damage to the room. The party member with the heart on his head would attract a blob that would eat them. He didn’t do his job, party wiped. It was irritating on my squishy thief when other people ignored it, so I wouldn’t say have random assignment like that, but the idea is there.

Beyond that, I can never get a straight answer about what is both ‘challenging’ and ‘balanced’ for content. Anything that has one-hit KOs isn’t balanced, nor does it really present an opportunity to actually learn an encounter. Requiring a specific mechanic shuts out other classes and excludes them from content. And so on.

Rauderi.8706:

Random.4691:

…

Yeah, no. The dungeons are.. mediocre and they don’t really make use of the freedom of 5 independent agents as a group. Those aren’t ever going to get better, because ANet has no will to redesign them or fix their numbers. Whatev.

I was pointing out two things:

1. Some raid mechanics can go die in a fire. Seriously. The prevalence of WoW raids (and probably many other games) using control-loss mechanics and allegiance-swapping is irritating. It’s not the majority, but it’s enough to notice.
2. Logistics are going to determine the size and scope of potential raids, as outlined above.

What I’m hoping from the potential for raids are suitably clear tasks that split up the zerg (if there is one). Fight designs that present more challenge than stack-and-smack, so that survival is a real issue. I recall one of the old Living Story fights, actually. Boss would chuck toxic puddles that did unavoidable damage to the room. The party member with the heart on his head would attract a blob that would eat them. He didn’t do his job, party wiped. It was irritating on my squishy thief when other people ignored it, so I wouldn’t say have random assignment like that, but the idea is there.

Beyond that, I can never get a straight answer about what is both ‘challenging’ and ‘balanced’ for content. Anything that has one-hit KOs isn’t balanced, nor does it really present an opportunity to actually learn an encounter. Requiring a specific mechanic shuts out other classes and excludes them from content. And so on.

I think my idea a few posts up answers all your questions. You have 4 seperate 5-man groups tackling different mechanics therefore allowing all types of builds to participate and in the end require a 20-man raid to finish.

Achrisos.1360:

I think my idea a few posts up answers all your questions. You have 4 seperate 5-man groups tackling different mechanics therefore allowing all types of builds to participate and in the end require a 20-man raid to finish.

Oh, wasn’t calling you out specifically, just a thing to keep in mind for people tossing ideas out.

What you suggested recalls Marionette, which was generally well received.

My mind turns toward logistics again, and maybe the hiring of the raid designer goes more in hand with guild halls. They’re a controlled space, and raid content is usually more appropriate for coordinated guilds anyway. So maybe the new guild challenges are …raids? Could be interesting.

Ok im back, so in my opinion cutting short raids should focus primarily on Bosses and not trash mobs but trash mobs should feel revelant lorewise and not out of place.

one of u guys gave me an really cool idea:

Xhtolos the Mystic

specials

Spectral sight kinda like lysa boss fight… A player can only look directly at Xhotolos for X time, if player exceeds X time he dies. Looking away will slowly erase the debuff so u can fight again u will be dazed however while turned back

Accumulated Pain long CD . Xhotolos raises a chaos armor that causes all damage and conditions caused ON xhotolos to go to a random ally of yours ( anti-bersekr FOR SURE XD)

<50% HP

Backfire Any ground targeted ability u cast becomes a enemy ground targeted ability. ( a ele casting meter shower is like a enemy ele casting meteor shower in that area) but it will target one of your allies

Confusing images Xhotolos conjures 2 identical clons of him and he teleports to one…… whenever u kill the wrong Xhotolos… chaos storm apllies on its corpse dealing X damage and applying 15 stack of confusion to you

<25%

Ether Lord medium CD. Spectral sight is lost but Xhtolos drives his ultimate power. Xhtolos divides all 10 members into private arenas. Each member of the group will be alone in a arena against 10 Xhtolos. Only 1 is real…. little tips will be given etc… if 2 player fail… Xhtolos causes u to lose yourself in the dream and die.

Blaeys.3102:

Most raiders in other games hate fighting through 45 minutes of trash mobs to take on the boss fights (which is what raiding should be about).

raiding is about trying to kill a boss for MANY MANY hours, learning the mechanics to solve the giant puzzle that a raid boss should be and improving as a player and as a group to eventually kill the boss.
fighting meaningless trash mobs isnt the interesting part.

Walhalla.5473:

Possible Raid Bosses would need high enough Toughness so normal Damage doesn’t melt them and high enoug Vitality so Condition Damage doesn’t melt them, but they should be killable in a decent amount of Time.

nothing would ever be melted by any type of damage, IF the mob hp would be tuned according to the possible dps output of good players, but that is not the case in gw2 atm.

My raid idea is not having a raid. Would be better for the game not to cater it to reward-hungry content locusts.

After all, if the gear from it won’t be superior, the raiders will cry as they always do, and bam, we have the gear threadmill. GW2 is better off without that nonsense.

And what if the raid simply includes cool weapon and armor skins? Or an achievement?

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

And what if the raid simply includes cool weapon and armor skins? Or an achievement?

then he/she will be mad because not good enough to acquire the skins.

NoTrigger.8396:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

And what if the raid simply includes cool weapon and armor skins? Or an achievement?

then he/she will be mad because not good guild enough to acquire the skins.

Remember, it’s a group effort.

-

Meanwhile, I’m trying to remember the last dungeon/raid mechanic that was actually interesting. There’s a lot of ways it can go wrong, or at least be unfun. Mechanics should make use of all three soft roles in some fashion. Monolithic bosses are bad.

Damage is obvious. Death is the best status effect. But a decent raid boss is going to find ways to stall burst phases and force damage dealers to contend with damage. Cone attacks threaten range, radial attacks threaten melee, retaliation, reflects, etc. Survival phases like Mai Trin’s cannons make sure that everyone is paying attention.

Support is mostly ingrained. Boons will flow like water, so enemies should be finding occasional ways to deal with them. Boon removal, stealing, and corruption will keep things in line, so it’s possible to have a phase where something has to be done to negate the mechanic.
Boss stealing your boons? Necro, lol. (Though that’s a bit specific.)
Maybe there’s an item in the room that enables the boss’s boon removal. Send a DPS squad to mangle it when it spawns.
So long as a boss is countering the team’s 25-Might-Stacks-LOL-Win strategy, it keeps the boss’s total HP down anyway.
…I almost passed this section without using the word “healing.” Nifty. But yes, damage is going to be prevalent in a good raid. Hard to balance, but self-heals should be sufficient, with actual healers giving the team much needed breathing room. I’ve come to find that knowing when to disengage is critical in some situations, balancing damage with survival if things go to kitten.

Control is a kittene, and it’s why I say monolithic bosses don’t work. Maybe that will be different with the Defiance Bar, but I’m not referring to just hard CC. If the boss just sits in the middle doing nothing, cripple/immobilize and traps are made irrelevant. On the one hand, most monoliths also tend to drop weakness/blind/vulnerability durations by a significant amount. Hardest on the blind, as it’s easy to spam but can shut down an encounter completely. Weak/Vuln at least have a dozen or so people who can pump it out constantly, so that actually keeps them engaged. Ish.
A good raid fight is going to find ways to split up the zerg in some fashion, keeping members busy on small objectives while the rest burn the boss. Or avoid the boss until it’s exposed. The slime boss from Thaumanova is a sort of rudimentarily decent example.

So, moving from “oh, nifty concept” boss idea to actually engaging the players is going to take some careful thought.

NoTrigger.8396:

nothing would ever be melted by any type of damage, IF the mob hp would be tuned according to the possible dps output of good players, but that is not the case in gw2 atm.

Well to be Fair. The Bosses were not tuned for the Situation we have now. With Players knowing them in and out and having set up Build with such high Damage that they die in Seconds.
They were created to be a challenge at Release, were no one even knew how to play this game. ( Remembering the “Dungeons are too hard” whine ), but now almost 3 Years later, they are like: kittening Easy and Faceroll.

Not calling them RAIDs would be my first suggestion (sorry, but many find that term “tainted”).

The fissure of woe.
The domain of anguish.
The underworld.

30min time limit

Invade other guild’s guild hall, find super champ boss (random spawn and the other guild can either select the type of champ or its skills). Defeat the champ while killing other players to be able to claim a trophy from the opposing guild.

Keep trophy in your guild hall for visitors to admire or cry if it was theirs :P

I’m not good at detailing things meticulously so here it goes.

• Need to be map wide yet still instanced. (guild hall guild portal maybe)
• Need to keep the organizational aspect of it, just like evolved wurm.
• Kill coordination has to remain a thing, think about evolved wurm.
• Need to make sure all three major types of builds are required, damage, support, control.
  - Support attrition fights, where a certain amount of healing/condi cleanse spec players are needed.
  - Damage attrition fights, where a certain amount of both direct dmg and condi dmg is required.
  - Control attrition fights, where a certain amount of control spec players are needed to ensure success.

• Bosses need less one hit kill shots, faster attack speed at lower dmg levels.
• Bosses should never be alone, dangerous wave spawning should be a thing, to keep players from just blobbing onto the boss. Ignoring these waves should be lethal !
• Completion time for the whole raid from start to finish 2.5 hours, with phase reward point bosses at around every 30 minutes or so.
• Each phase is more difficult and challenging than the previous one.
• Proper death penalty should be a thing in raids.
• Reviving in Raids should be limited and require “raid shards” each player can only carry X amount of “raid shards” with him, once those are used up you cannot revive anyone.

EDIT: Thanks to Seera.5916

• Raid shards: Upon entering you receive X amount of raid shards, this is how many times you can be revived, once depleted you cannot be revived again, the only way for you to comeback to live would be a full wipe, but your shards would not be replenished, meaning if you die that is it till the next wipe.

EDIT2:

• Full wipes: Full wipe counter, you are permited X amount of full team wipes per raid session, after this limit is reached catastrophic failure occurs, all players die and are booted from the instance.

• Raid attunement, is instant upon reaching the entrance of the raid but…. only one of your characters can be attuned for a certain raid at a time, once attuned this ability has a 1 hour cooldown, this attunement is require to enter the raid instance, this prevents class and character swapping !

I cannot stress this point enough ! This is why dungeons are a joke now, no one monitors them.

• Raids need to be monitored constantly by a.net Raid team, if something is being cleared to easily or certain exploit style tactics are being used things need to be adjusted in order to keep it challenging.
• Phase reward structure similar to teq 2.0 tiers, you clear phase one you get phase one reward at the end. Not the actual rewards those suck big time.

I’m divided on the reward structure myself since I believe failure should NOT be rewarded.

Ewwww. No raids please. Hours and hours of grind, to maybe get a chance at a piece of loot, that takes years to get a full set. Yuck. Other games exist if you want that. I really hope they never, ever add raiding.

MashMash.1645:

Ewwww. No raids please. Hours and hours of grind, to maybe get a chance at a piece of loot, that takes years to get a full set. Yuck. Other games exist if you want that. I really hope they never, ever add raiding.

You seem to be confusing the content system with the reward system.

I disagree with:

• Raid Shards – there’s already a death penalty system in place where someone who downs too often will end up dead. This coupled with a well-designed encounter mechanics negates the need to artificially limit rezzing.
• Raid attunement – I don’t see the harm in letting players switch characters. A well-designed encounter should be the obstacle, not an artificial barrier.

MashMash.1645:

Ewwww. No raids please. Hours and hours of grind, to maybe get a chance at a piece of loot, that takes years to get a full set. Yuck. Other games exist if you want that. I really hope they never, ever add raiding.

Your notion of what Raiding is makes me sick !
Where did I write any of what you said ?

And if you haven’t noticed gw2 does have it’s own kind of raiding already, it just needs to be expanded, namely evolved wurm and teq 2.0 are raids get with the program !

look at my part about reward structure before answering and looking like a [censored]

MashMash.1645:

Ewwww. No raids please. Hours and hours of grind, to maybe get a chance at a piece of loot, that takes years to get a full set. Yuck. Other games exist if you want that. I really hope they never, ever add raiding.

I agree with MashMash.

No yucky raids.

TheDaiBish.9735:

MashMash.1645:

Ewwww. No raids please. Hours and hours of grind, to maybe get a chance at a piece of loot, that takes years to get a full set. Yuck. Other games exist if you want that. I really hope they never, ever add raiding.

You seem to be confusing the content system with the reward system.

---

I disagree with:

• Raid Shards – there’s already a death penalty system in place where someone who downs too often will end up dead. This coupled with a well-designed encounter mechanics negates the need to artificially limit rezzing.
• Raid attunement – I don’t see the harm in letting players switch characters. A well-designed encounter should be the obstacle, not an artificial barrier.

You make good points, let me explain my reasoning as to why these are needed.

• Raid shards: reviving someone over and over is not skillful play, in the current system even if someone is fully dead they can be revived by burst revival (many players at the same time) in a raid environment of say 150 players this is easily accomplished regardless or mechanics. raid shards would put an unbreakable barrier and would stress keeping yourself alive, promoting more skillful play and knowing the encounters better. The decision to revive someone would be an intense one, do I revive this mediocre player or do I save my last shard for someone that truly deserves it ?

• Raid attunement: This is to prevent what happens already in fractals where some of the mechanics at certain places are negated by simply swapping to the class that is better equipped to deal with whatever mechanic is in place, than swapping back to whatever you were playing. To me this is something that should be thought of before entering "hey we gonna need X class at X point to deal with X mechanic we better bring some of them along, instead of the usual " crap, X class would get us through here in seconds, ok let me swap to it brb"

Guild Wars 2 raiding should be like guild jumping puzzles but on steroids, and even more stuff, and new mechanics, and fights that require more than berserker – puzzle solving, coordination, and set rewards for that dungeon only that drops from chests or bosses themselves.

What would be the point of raids if not to get a chance at something valuable like gear? Achievement points? Some other kind of massive reward that is actually worth it and won’t be worthless like wow armor that goes obsolete every 6 months? because that’s what raids mean to most people; eternal grind to get temporary armor. There needs to be some kind of epic reward for it that isn’t gear. Otherwise it’s just not fun to spend hours doing a clearthrough that could end up in failure.

Farzo.8410:

Guild Wars 2 raiding should be like guild jumping puzzles but on steroids, and even more stuff, and new mechanics, and fights that require more than berserker – puzzle solving, coordination, and set rewards for that dungeon only that drops from chests or bosses themselves.

OMFG !!!

I hope you’re not serious about this [censored] idea !
Also, you people really do not read, see the part about requiring damage, control, support !!!

This generation is doomed if all you do is skip read !

If Raid Shards are what players use to revive others then the same person can still die over and over again. They just have to be near someone who hasn’t used up their shards. People aren’t going to be keeping track of who has been going down a lot.

Raid Shards should be how many times a player can be revived.

Raid attunement. Give each raid instance 5 character swap items (maybe have them be given to the instance starter, and they become destroyed upon leaving the instance but aren’t account bound). That way, everyone and their mother can’t swap, but it allows instances where someone disconnects and doesn’t get back on in a reasonable time or has to leave suddenly the ability to replace any necessary functionality the leaving player brought to the table.

latinkuro.7304:

Farzo.8410:

Guild Wars 2 raiding should be like guild jumping puzzles but on steroids, and even more stuff, and new mechanics, and fights that require more than berserker – puzzle solving, coordination, and set rewards for that dungeon only that drops from chests or bosses themselves.

OMFG !!!

I hope you’re not serious about this [censored] idea !
Also, you people really do not read, see the part about requiring damage, control, support !!!

This generation is doomed if all you do is skip read !

And maybe he was offering a counter idea to yours? That instead of raids like you’re suggesting, ANet should do raids like he suggests.

I don’t see why ANet can’t do both types. Combat oriented raids and Guild Puzzle type raids.

Seera.5916:

latinkuro.7304:

Farzo.8410:

Guild Wars 2 raiding should be like guild jumping puzzles but on steroids, and even more stuff, and new mechanics, and fights that require more than berserker – puzzle solving, coordination, and set rewards for that dungeon only that drops from chests or bosses themselves.

OMFG !!!

I hope you’re not serious about this [censored] idea !
Also, you people really do not read, see the part about requiring damage, control, support !!!

This generation is doomed if all you do is skip read !

And maybe he was offering a counter idea to yours? That instead of raids like you’re suggesting, ANet should do raids like he suggests.

I don’t see why ANet can’t do both types. Combat oriented raids and Guild Puzzle type raids.

I was talking about the ludicrous idea of raid style jumping puzzles !

Combat oriented raid guild puzzles is a good idea, that other thing not so much :S