Guild Wars 2

I think that every cave, every forest, every building and so on in the open game world could potentially be a location for a challenging boss fight using the same instance technology as that used for the Personal Story. For example, imagine you come across a cave while out and about, and at the entrance a green star appears to let you know that there’s a boss fight inside. Anyone not interested in the fight could pass through the cave as they normally would, while those who wanted the challenge could enter the boss’s instance via the star icon.

There could be different types of bosses based on the location (ie. bosses specific to caves, others specific to forests, and still others specific to buildings), and the spawn could be randomly determined upon entering the instance. There would be no need to create any kind of lore or backstory for these fights, because their sole purpose would be hopefully to provide the challenge that some people crave, and as such, hopefully no one would feel ‘forced’ to do them.

So basically making the game less open world and more instanced?
I don’t think many people would agree with that.

lordkrall.7241:

So basically making the game less open world and more instanced?
I don’t think many people would agree with that.

Disagreements are perfectly acceptable. Is it possible, do you think, to implement challenging fights in the open world, taking into consideration that anyone and everyone could come along to take part in them, or would they need to be drastically toned down to account for the diversity of player types that might show up?

I would say it is fully possible to have challenging fights out in the open world. There are already several that already exists (the Karka Queen, Temple of Grenth, Temple of Balthazar and such).

lordkrall.7241:

I would say it is fully possible to have challenging fights out in the open world. There are already several that already exists (the Karka Queen, Temple of Grenth, Temple of Balthazar and such).

Would those kinds of encounters work as well in sub-80 zones, do you think?

They might. The main issue is that if they give good enough rewards lvl 80 players will simply swarm them and take some of the challenge away due to higher overall stats.

Hanayatori.3764:

There would be no need to create any kind of lore or back-story for these fights…

I can’t say I agree with that.

Just plonking fights in that don’t fit with any sort of lore, or have any story whatsoever makes them a separate part of the GW universe.

Just look at Legendaries. Flameseeker Prophecies is the only legendary that has any correlation with the world.

If anything, the most challenging fights would present the most danger to the world, thus would require a back-story as to why they pose a threat.

As for making challenging, open-world fights, it’s possible if two criteria are met:

• Devs work on mechanics that discourage zerg encounters, and encourage co-operation and organisation within the limits of the current communication system (which would mean some kind of prior warning / respite period for people to communicate).
• Players understand that it’s OK to fail, and that these fights are meant to provide a challenge and compelling group content, and not simply as loot pinatas for them to repeatedly farm.

lordkrall.7241:

They might. The main issue is that if they give good enough rewards lvl 80 players will simply swarm them and take some of the challenge away due to higher overall stats.

What if the fights were intended for level 80s, perhaps as a means of counteracting the ’there’s nothing to do at level 80’ issues that some people have?

TheDaiBish.9735:

Hanayatori.3764:

There would be no need to create any kind of lore or back-story for these fights…

I can’t say I agree with that.

Just plonking fights in that don’t fit with any sort of lore, or have any story whatsoever makes them a separate part of the GW universe.

Just look at Legendaries. Flameseeker Prophecies is the only legendary that has any correlation with the world.

If anything, the most challenging fights would present the most danger to the world, thus would require a back-story as to why they pose a threat.

I was thinking that, because these bosses would be based on location, and as such would be of the same type of mob that would already be found in that location, there’d be no need to explain lorewise why they are there, just as there’s no need to explain where there are veteran or champion mobs sometimes lurking in the far reaches of some of these open world locations.

Hanayatori.3764:

lordkrall.7241:

They might. The main issue is that if they give good enough rewards lvl 80 players will simply swarm them and take some of the challenge away due to higher overall stats.

What if the fights were intended for level 80s, perhaps as a means of counteracting the ’there’s nothing to do at level 80’ issues that some people have?

You can’t have fights that are intended for level 80’s in pre-80 zones.

I mean, what if these fights spawn, and there’s no level 80’s around to do them?

Personally, I think they need to:

• tie how the mechanics scale, and not simply health and damage. For example, the Shatterer’s healing crystals. There’s the same amount no matter how many people turn up, meaning the majority of these players can ignore the mechanic. Scaling the amount that spawn with the amount of players would mean these idle players would have to take note of the mechanic.
• introduce anti-zerg and spam mechanics (AoE that does [base damage x the amount of people it hits], multiple little events within the main objective event that are important to success = the zerg will be split, and each little group will have its own responsibility)

TheDaiBish.9735:

Hanayatori.3764:

lordkrall.7241:

They might. The main issue is that if they give good enough rewards lvl 80 players will simply swarm them and take some of the challenge away due to higher overall stats.

What if the fights were intended for level 80s, perhaps as a means of counteracting the ’there’s nothing to do at level 80’ issues that some people have?

You can’t have fights that are intended for level 80’s in pre-80 zones.

I mean, what if these fights spawn, and there’s no level 80’s around to do them?

That’s why I suggested that they use the Personal Story instance method. They could be located in any zone, regardless of the zone’s level range, and because the fights would be accessible by way of the in game Personal Story star marker (or some other similar marker), they wouldn’t be a disruption to the normal workings of the zone.