I would like to start out by stating that I think the larger bonuses for completing the different dungeon paths is nice for trying to get people to stick it out explore modes. Chain running 2 bosses in Arah and hopping up secret paths to get 8 tokens at a time wasn’t exciting but at-least you got credit for the little bit you completed. I had taken a break from speed running for a couple weeks and came back to the new system of keeping tokens for the end. At first I was impartial to the change but… my two horrible experiences from last night have opened my eyes that something needs to done to the current status quo.
I spent from 9pm-3am (6hrs) trying to finish 2 different Arah pugs. The first one broke up rather quickly on the way to the second boss with people being lazy and fighting over whether or not they should run back or get rezzed in the middle of a trash pack while they sold items on the trading post. Since it ended fairly quickly I decided to test my luck again and joined another pug for the night. In hindsight I wish I would of gone WvW with the rest of my guild or finished some zones for 100% map completion because that second group was by far the worst experience I’ve had playing this game to date. That includes frequently getting ported into the environment from mesmer spells (which is still not fixed despite the patch notes) or doing some relatively long dynamic event only to find it bugged out before the end. Anyways it may just be the 4th path of Arah is too long and too complicated for sleepy individuals to comprehend but the group had to replace people on 2 occasions before frustrations were at peak levels and everyone had come to the conclusion that 60 tokens was not worth the time investment nor constant bickering from certain individuals.
It has been my experience that completing an explore mode takes a good deal of time anywhere from an hour or more(usually much more). That’s fine for people who have nothing better to do than spend long hrs grinding tokens for one piece of gear at a time but there should be something for people who may not be able to spend as much time continually playing or as in my case spent way too long playing and ended up with nothing to show for it. Yes you get greens and 55 copper but lets face it at lvl 80 if its not exotic its basically trash. I understand the theory behind removing tokens off bosses but in doing so it punishes players and groups that end up dissolving before the finish. Adding tokens back to boss chests(perhaps 1/2 the original amount) or having them randomly drop off trash and bosses would help cut back on feeling you were shafted after investing your time and not getting a single step closer to the item you originally came in there for. Another thing that may help would be to split up some of the longer explorer paths and breaking up the reward from 60 tokens at the end to maybe 30 for the 1st half and 30 for the finish.
Im sure there are those who have dungeon clearing groups and able to whiz through without any problems but I know I cannot be the only one who has experienced some disaster runs. Anyways feel free to input additional opinions on the current dungeon reward system.