Troll’s End Jumping puzzle is not for large characters.
My norn can’t do this puzzle at all (not the old version). The cave is too small, my head hits the top of the cave thus making the camera freak out and partially break free from the environment. It also means that there is absolutely no room for me to make the first platform jump as I can’t jump let alone figure out where it actually is thanks to the camera.
Attached screenshot(1) shows what happens to the camera – that platform should be level not angled. It also jiggles – and not in the fun way…
screenshot(2) again the camera doesn’t work in here – he’s actually laying flat on the ground, not on a wall.
screenshot(3) note that my character isn’t as tall as can be – I think I chose the default height for Norn females. But it is extremely difficult to jump to the platform – there’s only a couple inches of room to move and the camera only has a few inches of movement as well.
— moments after I put the third screenshot I made the first jump and got out of that cave. These camera problems need to be fixed. It glitches through the environment, causes long hitches in camera movement, prevents you from seeing your character. In close quarters we absolutely need first person view (which would solve all of those problems).
also, what server are you on? i’m a Norn male and slightly above default height if not exactly. it took a LOT of getting used to. if you’re on SoR, i can try to show you a run maybe. i know a few shortcuts so it helps a little bit. but i feel at certain points in that puzzle, because we’re so tall when we jump, our head hits the ceilign so we fall immediately. lol not sure if truly environmental or me just bad at jumping then :PPP
Akaimon | Jolly Good Guardian
Akaigi | Warrior Made of Wood
[CDS] – Sanctum of Rall
The old camera system would put the camera behind your head (blocking the screen). The only good part was that you could rotate the camera to see where you are standing and a bit ahead.
The new camera system puts you into a pseudo-first person view, and it’s harder to tell exactly where you are standing. The “jiggling” is also way worse with this camera system than the original. I can only do Troll’s End by “muscle memory” on my norn (and my female norn is medium height).
Josh Foreman who created this puzzle said that he uses a Norn on the tallest setting to test these puzzles, and he specifically mentioned this one too. Unfortunately he also stated that this was probably his worst puzzle of all.
One of the themes I tried to explore in a couple places was claustrophobia. (Specifically in Troll End, which I consider to be my worst JP) I always play as the largest male Norn in these areas while I’m building and testing them. One of the reasons for pushing the limits like this is that our engine is malleable because we are an MMO, so we are always tinkering, and it’s possible to push the direction of the engine in new and interesting ways, but only if there are compelling mechanics to justify those changes. I’m one of the guys always pushing and pushing to try to discover new compelling mechanics. That means a lot of experiments. And the nature of experiments is that some fail. But I assure you, at no point have I, or anyone here, built something that totally sucks for one of the races and said, “Well, screw THOSE guys! I don’t care about Norn!”
I did it with a tall Norn, but you’re right, it’s a nightmare. My arms ached from retrying and my head hurt from the spinning, freaked out camera. And the jump between two stalactites is impossible to judge because you can’t see your character at all. You just have to keep getting to it and learn from painful experience where the sweet spot is to not clip a stalactite and fall down.
I got really lucky with my Charr and managed to fly through this puzzle in under 5 minutes, jumping blind more often than not. You’re right: it’s a pretty awful puzzle and a perfect example of how this game’s camera becomes an absolute disaster in tighter spaces, especially for the larger races.
There used to be a small quick shortcut close to the dead adventurer body, but it looks like after the patch they brought the cave down a bit more at the beginning of the puzzle so that the shortcut “jump” was no longer available.
I agree — doing Troll’s End on my max-height charr once for the achievement was more than enough for me and I haven’t done it since. Which is a shame since I would find the puzzle fun if not for the camera issues that plague larger models. But due to the camera issues, it took me nearly an hour to finish because I could not see where I was going for the part where you walk along wooden beams and jump from platform to platform and parts of the environment (one stalactite in particular) would go invisible. And the jittery camera didn’t help at all and actually made me start feeling sick.
I know the camera has issues and bugs of its own — which probably doesn’t help matters — but it would be nice if enclosed jumping puzzles such as Troll’s End were more friendly to larger players. They’re doable, but, at least for me, they lose much of their fun and challenge because of how the camera acts on larger characters. I don’t know if it’s possible, but even setting specific camera behaviours within certain puzzles so that the camera stays further back instead of zooming into a psuedo-first person view would lessen many of the problems I would think.
