Guild Wars 2

Spent my weekend waiting for nightfall, go up to the boss and no one is there. The one time there were about 5 people, it was a joke. 4 different times on Friday/Saturday.

The instance death is stupid, the lack of interest in the boss makes it stupid. I like tying up loose ends.

This game has population problems. scaling problems. Megaserver problems.

Problems…

Usually Axemaster Gwyllion is dieing first. You must go on the wrong maps

Step 1. Open lfg
Step 2. Find org VB and taxi
Step3. Play until nightfall and do axemaster
Step 4. Profit

As with any other game, GW2 has its flaws, but the very common mistake that ppl don’t use the tools available can’t really be called a game issue

you think I didn’t do that?

If you rally people for it and tell them the mechanics maybe that would help. I’ve always gone to this boss first.

Mechanic- Stealth detection (Nuhoch mastery) when he stealths and repositions you need to break his breakbar to interrupt instant death. Some skills can mitigate this, Revenant Glint heal and Ele “Rebound” for example.

Do we need him for a leg collection, or just mastery pt?

On EU took me a while to do it also. I basically kept looking for a VB with lots of commander tags (usually means better organized and more ppl willing to do stuff).

It’s important to tell people where to go (to take chopper up that hell there, with wp below). It’s also important to tell ppl what to do on boss.

But even more so, open lfg. And say ‘Org Axemaster lfg, come fast’. After third attempt, that did a the trick for me. Then I spammed in chat ’boss axemaster 60%, 50% etc. The whole map at some point was there I think (50+ people), and we got him down eventually.

I did the same for the triboss up the canopy. But I admit this was frustrating for me like OP.

I think you stand a better chance AFTER wintersday. People will retain HoT business more then.

There’s two ways to beat Axemaster Gwyllion:

1. You have a small group of people (5 – 10 is best), all or most of whom have Nuhoch Stealth Mastery and hard-hitting CC. At this scale, your individual CC is enough to easily break his bar, and your numbers are sufficient that if someone goes down, you can power res them quickly enough that it won’t be a problem. It’s now just a matter of following Gwyllion around and dumping all your CC onto his stop spots.

2. You bring a MASSIVE zerg of at least 30+ players. His insta-down attack caps out at about 10 or so targets, and against so many players, you can easily res everyone everytime they go down. At this scale it’s unlikely that you’ll be able to break his bar anyway; just focus on dumping AoE and cleave damage onto the Commander/Mentor tag. Inform the zerg that even though they can’t see his bar decreasing, he IS getting damaged.

One main problem is idiots zerg-circling the bosses instead of splitting up… So annoying.

From my experience most maps only do 1 boss since it seems that’s all the know about tell map there is what ? 5 boss’s they will probably be surprised

Part of the problem is Matriarch is easiest to get to, being at the center of the map. She’s also fairly easysauce for the zerg.

Frog brothers or any of the other bosses? “Too hard” or to get to them, you have to wiggle to one of the map corners to get in range.

party buddy.4956:

you think I didn’t do that?

Is hard to believe you joined a T4 attempt and nobody was at Axemaster.
Only case is that the attempt just “failed” and people left but that’s rare.
Usually the attemp doesnt reach t4 in night (because people don’t defend before bosses and dont get the map at halfway to T2 at least).

Just try another taxi maybe? And be there before actual bosses phase?

Here’s the problem. For most people, getting to this boss is almost an accident, since that was the chopper they were near. They get up there and then…boom…dead via an invisible enemy. No where, in game, does it say that you probably shouldn’t try this boss if you don’t have the Stealth Detection mastery. At first, I thought it was a bug (the boss being invisible to me, I mean). I then never bothered to go to it again. I only found out about the mastery requirement when I accidentally read something about it in these forums. That isn’t good game design. Nope.

After you kill him once, why bother?

And don’t chime in ‘the chestpiece’, some of us care what we put on.

It was my third time trying him last night. First win. The fight was not really very fun. This could be due to the fact that he was not visible for 90% of the fight (presumably a bug). It could also be due to the fact that being unable to personally counter the 1m damage hit via block, dodge, etc. is frustrating. I get the whole, “CC needed” thing, but was unable to contribute because my CCskill requires a target. The fight basically consisted of running after the other players, dropping AoE fields and swinging a melee weapon in the hopes they’d hit.

If I ever see a patch note that says they’ve fixed the bug, I might try him again. As of now, I see little reason to do so.

IndigoSundown.5419:

It was my third time trying him last night. First win. The fight was not really very fun. This could be due to the fact that he was not visible for 90% of the fight (presumably a bug). It could also be due to the fact that being unable to personally counter the 1m damage hit via block, dodge, etc. is frustrating. I get the whole, “CC needed” thing, but was unable to contribute because my CCskill requires a target. The fight basically consisted of running after the other players, dropping AoE fields and swinging a melee weapon in the hopes they’d hit.

If I ever see a patch note that says they’ve fixed the bug, I might try him again. As of now, I see little reason to do so.

It’s not a bug. You need Nuhoch Stealth Detection to see him for most of the fight.

As to the rest of the complaints…. for me, HoT maps and event required a LOT of timer watching and LFG lurking. A large portion of my time in HoT was spent trying to find maps with enough people or in the right stages of the metas to accomplish all of the goals.

That’s really not a positive thing, it’s not a great design overall. In theory the timers and meta maps are great but in practice, not so great.

IndigoSundown.5419:

This could be due to the fact that he was not visible for 90% of the fight (presumably a bug).

You need the Nuhoch Stealth Detection mastery to see him when he’s in that mode. Hitting him with CC reveals him and if he’s revealed in time no one will get insta-downed.

Doesn’t really get explained unfortunately unless you ask a fellow player…

IndigoSundown.5419:

It was my third time trying him last night. First win. The fight was not really very fun. This could be due to the fact that he was not visible for 90% of the fight (presumably a bug). It could also be due to the fact that being unable to personally counter the 1m damage hit via block, dodge, etc. is frustrating. I get the whole, “CC needed” thing, but was unable to contribute because my CCskill requires a target. The fight basically consisted of running after the other players, dropping AoE fields and swinging a melee weapon in the hopes they’d hit.

If I ever see a patch note that says they’ve fixed the bug, I might try him again. As of now, I see little reason to do so.

You need, as others have said, Nuhoch Stealth detection to see him. That needs to be communicated better. But aside from that, The entire fight after that point is the break bar. Assuming you have enough people with stealth detection, which will be more and more as time goes on, all you really have to do is break the break bar each time it comes it. That prevents him from doing his big killing attack.

It’s actually quite an easy boss for that reason, and not particularly exciting. I do him on my ranger with my eletric wyvern pet, because by itself that skill pretty much takes down his break bar. If you have a mesmer, the moa skill pretty much completely takes down a break bar too.

When people think in terms of speccing for break bars, bosses like this are dead easy.

Thanks for the FYI’s. I didn’t realize that I’d have to go to Tangled Depths to unlock a mastery that would help with a boss in VB. Oh, well.

I had done my kill when most people were still in the teens for mastery points, and it was rare to see someone in the 50+ range, let alone 150. It CAN be done with an entire group without stealth detection. His massive damage cannot be dodged/blocked (it can only be canceled by defeating the break bar), however I believe it only targets up to 5 people. It will also only DOWN the target, and there is enough time between phases that downed-penalties get cleansed. So 8 or 9 people can kill him, as long as they rez each other and focus on not being dropped between stealth phases.
Also to note, the boss has a descriptor which says you should get Stealth Detection if you read by his health bar.

Teleniel.1809:

Also to note, the boss has a descriptor which says you should get Stealth Detection if you read by his health bar.

Funny, I though this was a game where we were encouraged not to look at the UI. Not really helping, especially if 90% of the fight his health bar is not available for viewing and the other 10% you’re scrambling to figure out what’s going on.

Well description help you learn the mob :/. He have obvious move that tell you when he gonna one shot.

If you don’t have stealth detect and people stop his one shot. He won’t show up again until he successfully use one shot attack at some point. I think it’s bug that I don’t know they’re fixed yet. Because I already have that mastery.

This boss I pretty much need just some people to deal with his smokescales .

IndigoSundown.5419:

Thanks for the FYI’s. I didn’t realize that I’d have to go to Tangled Depths to unlock a mastery that would help with a boss in VB. Oh, well.

I didn’t realise you have to go to TD to train Nuhoch Stealth Detection. Oh wait, you don’t.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Thanks for the FYI’s. I didn’t realize that I’d have to go to Tangled Depths to unlock a mastery that would help with a boss in VB. Oh, well.

Yeah, it’s kind of a questionable bit of game design. The fact that the game doesn’t actually tell you how to stop his insta-kill move doesn’t help either. I had to look it up on the wiki. I mean, it’s just “break his break bar” like pretty much all HoT bosses, but it leaves a bad impression when you show up to a fight and then just die mysteriously.

Haleydawn.3764:

I didn’t realise you have to go to TD to train Nuhoch Stealth Detection. Oh wait, you don’t.

You have to visit Tangled Depths to unlock the nuhoch mastery track.

Gaaroth.2567:

party buddy.4956:

you think I didn’t do that?

Is hard to believe you joined a T4 attempt and nobody was at Axemaster.
Only case is that the attempt just “failed” and people left but that’s rare.
Usually the attemp doesnt reach t4 in night (because people don’t defend before bosses and dont get the map at halfway to T2 at least).

Just try another taxi maybe? And be there before actual bosses phase?

I can’t get it done too.

But, it’s pretty stupid to spend a whole weekend trying to do something that can’t be done, because you didn’t find a good map.

Just be patient, and check the map time to time, and eventually you’ll find a good map.

Hyper Cutter.9376:

IndigoSundown.5419:

Thanks for the FYI’s. I didn’t realize that I’d have to go to Tangled Depths to unlock a mastery that would help with a boss in VB. Oh, well.

Yeah, it’s kind of a questionable bit of game design. The fact that the game doesn’t actually tell you how to stop his insta-kill move doesn’t help either. I had to look it up on the wiki. I mean, it’s just “break his break bar” like pretty much all HoT bosses, but it leaves a bad impression when you show up to a fight and then just die mysteriously.

Haleydawn.3764:

I didn’t realise you have to go to TD to train Nuhoch Stealth Detection. Oh wait, you don’t.

You have to visit Tangled Depths to unlock the nuhoch mastery track.

You can start training the Nuhoch line instantly in HoT as long as you at least visit the relevant map, you don’t need to do anything else to unlock/train it so it’s hardly an issue.

Haleydawn.3764:

I didn’t realise you have to go to TD to train Nuhoch Stealth Detection. Oh wait, you don’t.

…

You can start training the Nuhoch line instantly in HoT as long as you at least visit the relevant map, you don’t need to do anything else to unlock/train it so it’s hardly an issue.

My earlier post said “unlock,” not train. If anything in the game had told me that before I did this boss, I should go to TD, unlock the Nuhoch line, then train the line up to the stealth mastery, I would have not bothered trying the boss until I’d done so. Maybe you find that fight fun when you cannot see the target, or maybe you raced through the zones and were able to train any line you wanted to as soon as HoT dropped. How would I know your situation — or you mine? Is it a big deal? No, but you’re wrong about it not being an issue.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Thanks for the FYI’s. I didn’t realize that I’d have to go to Tangled Depths to unlock a mastery that would help with a boss in VB. Oh, well.

HoT progression isn’t strictly linear, just like the rest of the game. Earlier maps hold a few surprises that you can find once you come back from later parts. This is one of them.

Personally, I very much enjoy that the map-design isn’t linear, and that there’ll always be bits and pieces to discover in all maps all through the progression path. There’s enough games out there where you go to one map, finish it up, and then it’s no longer relevant to your gaming. I like that GW2 does this differently.

That said, I’ve been in a successful kill of this boss before I had stealth detection. I downed a few times until I noticed the debuff on my buff bar and found the right timing to evade the attack (mesmer mainhand sword skill 2 did the trick for me). Yes, the game does encourage you not to spend all your time looking at bars, but never did they say you’re not supposed to check them every once in a while. Due to the timing, this fight is one of the more difficult ones to figure out, especially without stealth detection, but all the hints are still there.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Teleniel.1809:

Also to note, the boss has a descriptor which says you should get Stealth Detection if you read by his health bar.

Funny, I though this was a game where we were encouraged not to look at the UI. Not really helping, especially if 90% of the fight his health bar is not available for viewing and the other 10% you’re scrambling to figure out what’s going on.

Okay, I often agree with you, and I understand you’re frustration, but the not looking at the UI comment is really bad. Not play the UI means not staring at bars going up and down like healers do in other games, not reading a description under a bosses name that tells you what’s going on.

Your other comment, about it not being visible all the time is fair enough, but not playing the UI is not really appropriate in this case. Whenever I get into trouble with any foe, the first thing I attempt to do is read what it says about them.

Frankly I’d prefer a system where I could learn it myself, but the information is being provided for a reason.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Thanks for the FYI’s. I didn’t realize that I’d have to go to Tangled Depths to unlock a mastery that would help with a boss in VB. Oh, well.

More of ANet’s highly questionable design flaws. :\

They tried to be very Metroidvania about how the masteries work. Explore, find inaccessible area, get new mastery, go back to area and move forward.

Works for Metroidvanias. Not so much for MMOs.

Vayne.8563:

Your other comment, about it not being visible all the time is fair enough, but not playing the UI is not really appropriate in this case. Whenever I get into trouble with any foe, the first thing I attempt to do is read what it says about them.

Fair enough about the UI comment. That was frustration with the encounter. That said, ANet’s info blurbs under mob name bars are not usually very different from what the game itself is telling me. “Applies Vulnerability (or Weakness)” == sure enough, there’s the debuff. “Knocks” — bingo. And so forth. So, I tend no longer to look at them or even think about them because I usually just figure it out. That’s my reaction to mobs. I try different things to see what works. The results in this case were underwhelming. Nothing worked, and believe me, I tried.

I normally find that discovery process to be a large part of the fun in MMO combats. However, that usually means an eventual success. The frustration with this encounter was that nothing I could do was going to work except: a) leave the encounter and go do something else; or b) get lucky and be there when there were enough players doing it that could see him, and hope that I got lucky in placing my ground targets — which is what eventually happened. Neither option seems like the result of good game design to me.

Anyway, I’m over it. I know not to attempt that fight until and unless I get that Mastery trained. There are other bosses, and now that I’ve got the AP for killing him, incentive to return even with the mastery is not very high. It seems like this boss design exists primarily to justify the Stealth Detection mastery. Now, if instead there were enough player abilities to reveal the unseen, and they built the boss so those worked instead, I think that would have been a better encounter — but it would not have justified the Mastery.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Vayne.8563:

Your other comment, about it not being visible all the time is fair enough, but not playing the UI is not really appropriate in this case. Whenever I get into trouble with any foe, the first thing I attempt to do is read what it says about them.

Fair enough about the UI comment. That was frustration with the encounter. That said, ANet’s info blurbs under mob name bars are not usually very different from what the game itself is telling me. “Applies Vulnerability (or Weakness)” == sure enough, there’s the debuff. “Knocks” — bingo. And so forth. So, I tend no longer to look at them or even think about them because I usually just figure it out. That’s my reaction to mobs. I try different things to see what works. The results in this case were underwhelming. Nothing worked, and believe me, I tried.

I normally find that discovery process to be a large part of the fun in MMO combats. However, that usually means an eventual success. The frustration with this encounter was that nothing I could do was going to work except: a) leave the encounter and go do something else; or b) get lucky and be there when there were enough players doing it that could see him, and hope that I got lucky in placing my ground targets — which is what eventually happened. Neither option seems like the result of good game design to me.

Anyway, I’m over it. I know not to attempt that fight until and unless I get that Mastery trained. There are other bosses, and now that I’ve got the AP for killing him, incentive to return even with the mastery is not very high. It seems like this boss design exists primarily to justify the Stealth Detection mastery. Now, if instead there were enough player abilities to reveal the unseen, and they built the boss so those worked instead, I think that would have been a better encounter — but it would not have justified the Mastery.

Two ways to look at it. The boss exists just to justify stealth detection or people would try the boss, read the text and look forward to getting stealth detection. Obviously some people read the text under the boss, or they’re told that, and without the frustration of failing, people think, oh cool I can come back when I have stealth detection. Without the frustration it’s something to look forward to. I know this because though I beat the boss with a zerg, he was invisible most of the time and I looked forward to trying him again when I had stealth detection.

The thing is, if you want a T4 map to succeed, people have to do it, so once I have stealth detection that’s the natural boss to go to. The upside is, with stealth detection and people who know what’s going on, he’s the easiest of the bosses. That’s another incentive for me to do him when we’re doing T4. lol