Well you have 4 weeks to do it (~1 per day) so it really isn’t too terrible. Though if you do it all on the same day (like you did) it probably is pretty bad.
LOL . Its just the 2nd day of the event. So… you yet have more 26 days ahead to it >_> .
And by the way, I’m pretty sure that will have dailys based on baloons events. Don’t do all of it in first day. Play around, and do baloons when you are going to kill world bosses.
I’ll agree, it’s better than pinatas or sonic devices. But it’s still hide-n-seek. The only reason I’m doing it is because there’s a chest at each one, a balloon prize, and a few champions to kill on the way. I figure do 2-5 per day I play and I’ll have the achievement before time’s up.
Do the balloons reset? I know there was a dev post about not getting the chest anymore after the 30, but haven’t seen anything about being able to use the same balloon chest, or even using the tower on different characters (which I’ve tried, and I think the balloons are account bound).
You and I in a little toy shop
Buy a bag of balloons with the money we’ve got
Set them free at the break of dawn
Til one by one, they were gone
Back at base bugs in the software
Flash the message, something’s out there
Floating in the summer sky
99 red balloons go by…
LOL . Its just the 2nd day of the event. So… you yet have more 26 days ahead to it >_> .
I don’t think the point is that it’s too hard or overwhelming in volume, but that it’s just repetitive and boring. It’s just more busy work, menial tasks designed to light content updates feel more substantive.
It seems that the balloons do NOT reset. You need to find 30 unique balloons across the entire world map. This could make it problematic for players with only low level characters.
Why is 30 to long? Don’t do them all at once?
[location]Veteran slayer, [location] Kills and [location] event completer are almost always in the dailies.
So pick some maps when those are up, and do the balloons then.
Yes it’s a grind if you try to do it in a single day, but I guess that’s why the event is there for a full month.
I’ll agree, it’s better than pinatas or sonic devices. But it’s still hide-n-seek. The only reason I’m doing it is because there’s a chest at each one, a balloon prize, and a few champions to kill on the way. I figure do 2-5 per day I play and I’ll have the achievement before time’s up.
Hide and seek? They’re marked on the map, and if the gates are closed the pilot gives you a quest marker of where to go to clear it. Did it with a guildie in a couple hours. What do you want, GPS and a field guide too?
With the Queen’s Champions guarding entry to some of the balloons, yes…30 is way to many. With all the perma-KD, perma-stun, etc, etc that these champions have, it becomes boring, annoying, and time consuming to do even a few balloons, especially if you’re forced to solo the champion. I’m not surprised at this though….if there is one thing Anet is consistent with, it’s that they don’t know how to make a good fight strategy….it’s just chain CC you till you die and call it a day. They really need some new ideas, cuz this same ol’ kitten day in and day out is getting old fast.
LOL . Its just the 2nd day of the event. So… you yet have more 26 days ahead to it >_> .
I don’t think the point is that it’s too hard or overwhelming in volume, but that it’s just repetitive and boring. It’s just more busy work, menial tasks designed to light content updates feel more substantive.
It seems that the balloons do NOT reset. You need to find 30 unique balloons across the entire world map. This could make it problematic for players with only low level characters.
What percentage of players do you think fit that category?
It seems that the balloons do NOT reset. You need to find 30 unique balloons across the entire world map. This could make it problematic for players with only low level characters.
What percentage of players do you think fit that category?
o/
The game has grown since launch, you know. There are new players.
It was tedious, and when I finally got the last one I was happy for about 3 minutes, walked around with my balloon, then promptly put it in the bank and thought “WTF is wrong with me?!?!”.
It seems that the balloons do NOT reset. You need to find 30 unique balloons across the entire world map. This could make it problematic for players with only low level characters.
What percentage of players do you think fit that category?
o/
The game has grown since launch, you know. There are new players.
So what percentage of players only have characters of level 10 or less? You didn’t answer the question, you avoided it. I believe you avoided it because you know that the number of people that fit that category are not enough to be concerned with.
It seems that the balloons do NOT reset. You need to find 30 unique balloons across the entire world map. This could make it problematic for players with only low level characters.
What percentage of players do you think fit that category?
o/
The game has grown since launch, you know. There are new players.
So what percentage of players only have characters of level 10 or less? You didn’t answer the question, you avoided it. I believe you avoided it because you know that the number of people that fit that category are not enough to be concerned with.
Wow, yeah, they should completely ignore new players. Only the ones who signed up on the exact day of launch should matter. Brilliant. You truly have a bright future in game development. -facepalm-
Huh? I hardly noticed the 30-ness. Granted I had to take a breather around 20, but the whole process was so much fun, visiting some areas I’d never been before, and enjoying the Aetherblade stuff, the escorts, the Champion challenges, that it didn’t feel like a chore to me at all.
And I am now the proud owner of a beautifully-animated balloon
Just to put it into perspective, I’ve never done any of the temp content up until I did a bit of the Zephyr stuff, and now the Balloon Tourist. None of it ever quite grabbed me (although I did enjoy some of the Fire and Frost stuff when I happened to chance upon it in the course of my travels). This is the very first thing I’ve been “completionist” about in the game at all.
It seems that the balloons do NOT reset. You need to find 30 unique balloons across the entire world map. This could make it problematic for players with only low level characters.
What percentage of players do you think fit that category?
o/
The game has grown since launch, you know. There are new players.
So what percentage of players only have characters of level 10 or less? You didn’t answer the question, you avoided it. I believe you avoided it because you know that the number of people that fit that category are not enough to be concerned with.
Wow, yeah, they should completely ignore new players. Only the ones who signed up on the exact day of launch should matter. Brilliant. You truly have a bright future in game development. -facepalm-
So your saying that Anet is doomed to failure because of the balloons? BTW I’ll compare my game design chops to yours any day.
Also, no one ever said to completely ignore new players. So the facepalm( how droll an expression) goes to you for your reading comprehension.
If it was 1 balloon per area, then I would agree. However it’s 2 per map. And I was able to finish it (with a high lvl char) within 24 hours of the update.
Sure you might experience the bug where you’re unable to loot the chests, but go to the higher lvl areas and you’ll seldom have to worry about someone coming by and messing you up. I started low to get an idea of what I was supposed to do, when I got it, it was a matter of time – not too long. (Started @ Queensdale, went from Kryta area, Hoelbrak area, Ascalon area, Caledon area and finished @ Sparkfly Fen)
Hopefully by now Anet’s already addressed and fixed the loot problem.
It seems that the balloons do NOT reset. You need to find 30 unique balloons across the entire world map. This could make it problematic for players with only low level characters.
What percentage of players do you think fit that category?
o/
The game has grown since launch, you know. There are new players.
So what percentage of players only have characters of level 10 or less? You didn’t answer the question, you avoided it. I believe you avoided it because you know that the number of people that fit that category are not enough to be concerned with.
Wow, yeah, they should completely ignore new players. Only the ones who signed up on the exact day of launch should matter. Brilliant. You truly have a bright future in game development. -facepalm-
So your saying that Anet is doomed to failure because of the balloons? BTW I’ll compare my game design chops to yours any day.
Also, no one ever said to completely ignore new players. So the facepalm( how droll an expression) goes to you for your reading comprehension.
So saying that a small (but probably larger than you think) minority is “not enough to be concerned with” isn’t the same as saying to ignore said small minority? You said that it’s not important that new users can’t complete the achievement because they’re too far outnumbered by those who can. If that’s not what you think you said, then I can’t help you.
As for your other points: no, I don’t think ANet is “doomed to failure”, but I do agree that events should be fully accessible to everyone. And I may not be a game designer, but half of running a game is knowing how to treat the players, so I think I’ve got a 50% lead on you right now.
It takes a few hours to complete, its a pain I know. You spend maybe 50-75s on waypoints (need to go to a zone to see the ballons), do the event, visit the tower, repeat.
You know exactly how to complete it and you can see steady progress.
You want kittenty achievements? How about the champion kill acheivement (balloon events)? It doesnt list what champions you need to kill and its completely random. I’ve done all balloons yet still have 4/5 and no bloody clue which champion is left (think its the hammer one but not sure). So I will have to run around for DAYS and repeat worthless events that I no longer get a chest for just for the random hope of getting the correct champion.
I open my map and stare at the 100% exploration bar in the upper left-hand corner and then at all the regions to which we don’t have access (Crystal Desert, Maguuma Wastes, the Fire Islands, etc.) and I lament that the developers have chosen to spend resources on balloons and pinatas and kites instead of working on releasing these regions with as much depth and attention to detail as the those in the game at release.
If it was 1 balloon per area, then I would agree. However it’s 2 per map. And I was able to finish it (with a high lvl char) within 24 hours of the update.
But did you enjoy it? Was getting the 30th balloon as fun and engaging as getting the first? And more importantly, what enjoyment does it provide you the remaining 13 days in this chapter of the Living Story? Are they going to provide you any lasting enjoyment? Or are they going to be forgotten the moment they’re removed from the game?
If it was 1 balloon per area, then I would agree. However it’s 2 per map. And I was able to finish it (with a high lvl char) within 24 hours of the update.
But did you enjoy it? Was getting the 30th balloon as fun and engaging as getting the first? And more importantly, what enjoyment does it provide you the remaining 13 days in this chapter of the Living Story? Are they going to provide you any lasting enjoyment? Or are they going to be forgotten the moment they’re removed from the game?
The part I enjoyed was actually being led out and exploring the map a bit more. A couple places I never knew existed were Ruined Fields and Blaze area (east of Ascalon).
However, it also freed up lots of time for me to engage in the gauntlet after finishing and getting the Watchknight mini + mini balloon. I’m also occupied trying to get more of the achievement kills, so finding more/new places that’ll speed that up is always a plus.
The best quality of this particular task (imo) was to encourage exploration for the most part. So yea, I’d say it was a bit of a thrill going on somewhat of a world tour aside from farming and doing monthly/daily events on a regular basis.
I think 30 were too much. Not because it was too much to visit 30 balloons but because of running into bugs so much that it was more like 40 balloons and having to do the exact same things at each balloon. 10 would have been plenty. It was busy work.
I would have preferred a story that took the same amount of time and effort but wasn’t doing the same thing …. waypoint to balloon, do I of 3 things, waypoint, repeat. Bit boring. A quest series would have been more interesting. For example, I really enjoyed the ones we did to get the book back item at Mad King festival. That was more interesting to me.
It’s a kitten conspiracy. Kittens gonna be kittens. All is vain!
30 balloons was a bit much. i couldn’t help but remember what Colin said in the Manifesto regarding combat when i was doing this challenge. (paraphrasing) “look, i swung a sword, i swung it again. hey, look! i swung the sword yet again. we just don’t think that’s ok”. i kept thinking “look, i visited a balloon tower, i visited one again. hey look! i visited one yet again!”. after awhile it didn’t feel ok. i felt like i was going through the same motions over and over again.
but what’s more frustrating for me is that after visiting 30 towers, i still haven’t defeated all the Queen’s Champions. so, i guess i’ll have to go visit some more! at least i have my cute red balloon now.
Repeating one simple task multiple times is very very bad.
Unless that task was to man the ‘Asuran Chain Destruction Cannon – Model B – SDE1990’ to call thunder and lightning down upon 30 Aetherblade ships during the real-time balloon flight to Divinity’s Reach.
This achievement was easy compared to some of the monthly ones we have had. Plus you could get the Queen’s Champions out of the way at the same time as well as Party Crasher Crusher if the Aetherblades were up and present. So all in all it was a win-win to cover what you needed to do. No complaints here.
To be honest, 30 was easy. The hardest part is finding that one last missing Queen’s Champion type.
The monastary above where Behemoth spawns has a champ there, not always active but you can always find one there. You can guest to other servers to see if one is there you have not done yet. Then wait for it to be triggered from the balloon or run back from the balloon after triggering it.
