I am not sure what the OP means “better gear”. The dungeons grant max stated items….
You can get one for 3 runs min – AND you can run an early one at 35+ essentially pre-buying exotics before you ever get close to 80….
@Ares
I can see both sides. I played a monk in everquest – one of the dedicated pulling classes. In my eye’s pulling itself is a tactic (be it from one side of an entire zone to another for example: King Tormax raids during Velious) and can’t be called as an exploit as devs have complete control of where and how the mobs retains agro. I would never ever say “lets pull a boss + adds” in any MMO ever. It is just easier to kill adds solo and then engage the boss.
But that’s just it. It is an instanced boss encounter. The encounter itself has little to be desired. L-whatever isn’t tough at all by himself. It ends up being a game of whack-a-mole till he drops dead so you can go kill the tree. This is not how the fight should be. A better way to do the fight would simply.
L-Whatever solo at 100%
L-Whatever summons 1 add at 75% (He would do a shout about knights to inform)
L-Whatever summons 1 add at 50% (Same)
L-Whatever summons 2 adds at 25% (Slightly different text to say more will come)
Same amount of adds but it breaks the fight into phases so your not in “tunnel vision” beating on a giant wall. This with better leashing would prevent players from ignoring the mechanic that the knights deliver (Heavy dmg to non prepared players), and players would coordinate to kite L while 4 others deal with the Knight/knights by using CC such as Fear/Stuns (Adds like these should be chain stunnable/feared with some DR attached)/roots/chills/minions/<Insert here>
That ia a much better fight than what we have now and looses the tedium of killing mobs in single file to get to the big baddie.
Edit: Just to point the combat is there, the skills are there, the classes are there to make a really neat synergized fight. To use each class to their best abilities, but it isn’t there quite yet.
(edited by Dead.7385)
I’m totally understanding about the visibility issues. It does get hard to see, but even then it’s possible, especially since 80% of the people fall off early on.
This. I have done it with a charr and an asura. There isn’t that much of a difference.
The problem is that most people fall at certain areas – soon after 2nd “start” – Tiny Square to ramp – Rock to beam jump. Basically if you make it to the tiny square to ramp you will notice about 90% of other players has fallen. When I did it it was usually 3-4 people left at that point. Then the beam jump took some. Then it was left with two.
Literally after the “Leap of faith” (Which is actually the worst design choice as it took me 4 times to give up and look up a guide), it is smooth sailing other than camera – the real issue heh.
I’m also curious how you can link up cross-server to do dungeons. Do they automatically get the message to enter the dungeon instance as long as they are in the right zone (e.g. Plains of Ashford for AC), regardless of their server?
Simply invite the player. Then zone into the area (Ashford) and have one player enter. Just as you would in a regular group. It should prompt the entire party – but if not you should be able to just zone in (if you don’t bug out in separate instances) Friends list/guilds/tells work cross server as well so you can meet up to join that way.
Although I hear it does not work cross region.
Lackluster PVE content devoid of any sort of challenge or skill requirement- FIX PLS
Posted by: Dead.7385
Personally, artificial timers are a horrid mechanic to toss wildly on every boss. It shouldn’t matter if you kill a boss in 4 hours or 3 minutes. The point is you killed it.
I’m a professional level designer myself, so my intent is not to insult the hard work of those that made these dungeons. I know first hand how much work is involved with designing, creating, scripting and decorating a level. And creating a dungeon is no small effort.
I am sorry this really irritates me on forums. Calling yourself “X” job title does not immediately make you someone to go running for advice in design or anything in real life.
Some things to note:
Immunities – Totally agree. Its a real hard balance, but I have never ever liked the “well lets just make them immune”. Want to make people not fear? Make it a long duration fear (With DR hitting as you chain fear like in most MMO’s, including EQ) with mobs nearby – they fear – you get adds. People won’t fear. That imo is smart design
Invulnerability – This totally breaks underwater combat. Anyone who has done HoTW path 2/3 can tell ya – having to fight underwater just to have the mob run inside a wall go immune and leesh is terrible.
Obstructed – As you said a bug, but sometimes can be annoying. Nothing game breaking on my runs though.
Armor repairs – This is a dual edged sword. ACex is some of the best money you can get and it is a level 35 dungeon. You can easily run path 1/2 in 15-20 mins and earn a chunk of change. Armor repairs are the sink. Every Modern game has them from EQ2 to WoW, and both have you wipe and wipe and wipe (Especially on raids).
Now if you were to lets say – have Story Mode with free repairs (As story mode is supposed to be built casuals and not hardcore dungeon runners), I would definitely say that is fine. But for explorable? It is fine as is. Also 9 silver in repairs is all fixed in the end (80 reward is roughly 26 silver iirc).
Using Giganticus would be the equal to say comparing a non nerfed heroic dungeon in WoW or EQ2 and can’t be used to “Most pugs”. Especially since he is one of the harder bosses in the game and is located in the “end” dungeon.
Gimmicky obstacles – I totally agree with you. This isn’t even a “GW2” problem it is a genre problem. Back in Everquest they didn’t really restrict you (It got worse as times went on), but way back you can do as you please. Want to kill that mob? Kite it – then they added summoning to stop that. Ok. Lets pull this boss far out so we can ignore adds – Nope he just “looses interest” when you walk past that door. – Ok. Green pet pull! Such a incredible hard tactic to pull off but so worth it – Nope, gotta fix that. You MUST use “X” class to pull. Ok. Ohh man if you keep “X” mob alive it doesn’t respawn so you don’t deal with adds – Nope gotta kill it because we said so. And so the list goes on. The more scripted fights get the more restricted you are. It is why they mock raids and modern dungeon design as “dancing”, because your just following steps made from someone else (Dev) and be kitten if you trip once.
Waypoints – I agree. If you have to WP zerg, your not doing it right and your punishment is armor repair. A good player just doesn’t die in this game (usually).
Bosses (Hp issue) – It varies. Certain mobs/zones are HP battles (Dog/HoTW all paths), but most I have found really aren’t. A lot of the problem is that we can’t see group DPS, because it can vary HUGE from group to group. Were no longer looking for X3 DPS that we know will at least do a min of “X” dmg. Were going LF2M AC explorable path “X”. That changes the dynamics of groups – you can have lets say 5 warriors all be DPS,Tank,Support (I am just using this as simple example) and barely know it till you start killing.
Still the dungeons beat out most I played before – And it is because it is fun to play. I no longer have a healer pumping me with numbers or preventing numbers. Sure I use my brothers healing spring and my banners to provide AE heals, but that is more fun to work with than “Heal/boon me”.
Your really backwards if you think HoTW is fine but TA/AC (Which are speed cleared daily for Easy Cash aren’t) – Butchers is the one people do, and underwater combat is so wonky they have mobs go Superman through the roof.
Butchers path is one of those “bad bosses” that you ignore all totems to DEEPZ the boss because they respawn too fast anyway. That is bad design. Another example is AC path 2 with the turrets that nobody uses.
:EDit – Also anyone else irritated by the amount of boss encounters with no loot (Looking at you CoE)? Nobody seems to bring this up. Mini bosses (Mr. Robot/CM dog) that take 5 mins to kill NEED a chest.
First of all:
Raising the level cap has nothing to do with gear stats. They can make it so that level 1000 armor is equal to level 80 exotic quality. It is just numbers. Similar to how we have dungeons vs crafted vs Karma gear. Stats are the same (only thing that might change is what stat is on what).
For me though I couldn’t care less either way. They will have to raise the crafting cap if they want to do it right though. Either way has pros/cons such as:
Gated progression is easier to know “where to go” – This was a VERY big problem in the start of GW2. Any player that played and watched the forums remembers the “I don’t know where to go” posts.
It leaves newer players farther and farther behind. The biggest problem with increase cap over and over is that say each expansion added 10 levels – 5 years 1 year per xpansion:
We would be level 130. That both is and sounds daunting to new players. I just rejoined WoW because it was 5 bucks and the amount of leveling I realized I had to chug through again for my character was disheartening.
^ Is the real problem. Lets leave “gear stats” out of this as those can be controlled by the developers the level feeling can’t.
@Mad Queen
Are you talking TA story or TA explore? TA story reward is really just a toss away hat so it doesn’t give armor, just “attunement” making you able to enter explorable mode without someone else. Even that is optional.
As far as difficulty – TA story IS more difficult than explore mostly since you are going to get newer less skilled players (obviously less now, but back when I did them almost everyone was leveling their main not an alt). That is where the problem lies for SM. The story dungeons aren’t inviting enough to new players. It just smacks them with layers of combat and says “die and figure it out”, such as the lovers fight or TA SM final boss (which order to kill the mobs in). They should have balanced SM around 3 players to allow it to be more akin to Dynamic Event difficulty.
Edit: And before anyone say’s SM isn’t “harder” – You have done Up path right? Compare that nightmare tree to the SM final hero bosses.
EM is fine as it unless your in a bugged dungeon/underwater combat/ or anywhere near the mind numbing bore fest that is HoTW.
(edited by Dead.7385)
You got a precursor from a dungeon chest? who/what/where? Was unaware they dropped from dungeon chests. Which did you get?
It is all RNG. I personally have never seen an exotic drop from a chest in all my game time, but it can happen.
Most parents are probably not going to want to mindlessly upload their child even in virtual avatars to the world.
Best Arah bosses
1. Double Dragon.
2. Single Dragon
3. Mouth of Zhaitan
I think if they removed phase 1 (Gathering/3 bosses)/dragon fight and had you start with the Mouth of Zhaitan as the first warm up boss then rip the dragon phase out and replace it with more Zhaitan specific stuff it would have been better. I would have liked to actually fight against him personally more.
Full set of P/V/T with HoTW upgrades.
I have a mix match of different armors:
Head = CoF
Shoulders = CoE
Chest = Se
Legs = CM
- Still need
Feet – HoTW (Two runs left)
Gloves – Arah (Two runs left)
Weapons:
Mace – AC
Shield – TA
Greatsword – AC
SwordX2 – TA
-
All others will most likely be AC/Zerker (axe)
Dungeons are on the Ok level. Not super amazing, but not super horrible (unless they are bugged like SE path 1 is now).
For example AC path 2-3 is just fine. Boss has a 1 hit downs, and it better be a one hit down. It isn’t that hard to dodge with two rolls + shield block if you are a class that can use. One hit downs are not a bad thing, in fact it is the only thing that makes Path 1/3 AC boss anywhere near scary.
The actual bad path in AC and bad designed boss is in fact path 2. His entire mechanic is 100% ignorable. You can easily just DPSDPSDPSDPS the boss and never ever go down. In fact it is BETTER to ignore the turrets and just DPS the boss as fast as possible as it makes the run faster.
I do agree that dungeons do a trait switch because certain builds can become 100% useless in certain situations. Hey condition damage need to do damage vs environmental objects? Fat chance. Hey you like your build? Go underwater where it becomes useless! That sort of thing.
Certain bosses need tuning and others people state don’t. DPS varies HUGE in this game as you can have a good glass cannon and a bad glass cannon. A good one is such a huge difference in DPS it is almost mind boggling, but they are quite rare as it takes a good amount of skill especially for melee’s.
It would be nice if we could swap inside the dungeon to meet demands of certain fights. And no saying “don’t specc too deeply” isn’t a good response for bad design.
(edited by Dead.7385)
“The end game (and ultimate point) is still PvP. You just don’t have as much flexibility as in GW1 and have to invest in a larger time sink to get to it.”
Not sure I get this. SPvP is = to a PvP created char in GW1. The PvP chars in GW1 did not start with all skills unlocked nor upgrade components for newer players so it was a much higher curve to “get things” compared to SPvP where you make a character – go to mists – boom all skills/traits/gear.
rgrwng if you want someone a tad bit more friendly to new players and has a bit of ability of lead them add me to your list. I usually do a lot of TA/AC explore with PuGs and do others with static groups. (Deadwarrior is my main)
@Roz – they don’t even need to be on Yaks bend/(Insert your home server here). Dungeons work cross server.
By now you might as well just grind for the weapons again. I don’t see it on their “Top to do list” anymore.
You guys just don’t understand the writing of Traehern and his voice over. He is a physical representation of the player. He doesn’t care and we don’t care? See? Were a perfect match together. He is destined for greatness and you are destined for greatness. A match made I suppose.
When he reacted to the death of his friends in a motionless and definite nonchalant way I too acted in the same manner.
See were not all that different! We can get along with him.
If Level scaling was gone would you feel motivated to visit lower level areas again?
Posted by: Dead.7385
Then I wouldn’t be able to group with my lower level friends.
Wanna know the only reason to go back aside from 100%? To group with lower level friends.
Who had this idea? You guys should have kept the guild wars1 formula if your party get wiped you are thrown out of the dungeon and start again, instead you guys opted for the diablo3 respawn formula this is pretty weak.
Yeah! In prophecies if the NPC died the mission was over too! THAT was a great idea as well!
Ohh wait…
As a general rule, avoid asking for traditional MMO features in GW2.
The playerbase does not want them, Anet does not want them.If you suggest something make sure it is reasonable within the manifesto of GW2, aka no treadmills, inspect, world pvp or other traditional MMO garbage we don’t want.
But then the entire forums will be left void and empty. The poor trolls need something to do to keep from the sun.
I think we all know what we want: A real alternative to Orr with the same idea’s just implemented better. For me a HUGE mini-dungeon with mobs that push back players and take waypoints in a linear fashion would work. Give chest loot throughout the zone (with actual good loot). Give us something like this + new dungeons w/armor and really that will appease the playerbase.
Welcome to MMO’s.
We hate everyone and everything here.
No game of this specific genre will ever meet WoW numbers again. Ever. The fantasy RPG Themepark genre has hit its heights during WoTLK and is on a slow decline to a plateau. So bringing in WoW numbers (which is losing numbers and is on its own slow decline/plateau) is irrelevant. Once you realize this and the thought of “10 MILLION subs = win” is gone, the entire genre opens up for you. I just easily see the patterns and it follows just like Everquest did back in the day before WoW took MMO’s Mainstream (and now there is nowhere else to go for these games).
Making the game like WoW just won’t work. The mechanics don’t support raids, and barely support massive PvE elements.
For instance: Combo effects – Combo’s only work on a two layer element. For instance if my warrior tosses down a fire circle all projectiles get fire damage.
Awesome.
Now toss that same fire circle and toss a poison circle on top. The game seems to only recognize one of those two elements. You not doing Fire + Poison damage (which is what should happen) you are doing fire or poison damage. Having 25 people running around tossing fields down just doesn’t work atm. Maybe if they added that they could implement some sort of good raid system that could take advantage of the combat system we have, but not right now.
LFG finder. Yup I agree, been asking since day 1 (Before anyone harps on me I do multiple dungeons a day so I know what I am talking about).
This is one fudged up path now. I can see the asura buff, but the ability to run back?
You fixed NOTHING about keeping one nade mob. NADA Anet. You just made it so people can’t run back.
Worse dungeon patch I have ever seen.
Even better the “Dungeon rewards revamp” are taking so long and to come out, they then make runs take longer with the reward system we have now. Dumb ideas or what =/
Agreed that chests inside dungeons should have some exotic drops with RNG.
They have stated a re-revamp to dungeon rewards will be going on, but as far as what they will do nobody knows. They wanted to do it for this update, but it wasn’t ready for launch.
Things I want:
Chest specific loot with a RNG twist – dungeon chests shouldn’t be something you want to skip. Adding a RNG element will have the random factor to it.
Better looking dungeon armor. I like shiniez and currently my choice is basically Fire and Fire (CoF/SE) for particle effects. Why does my AC mace glow at night, but the armor set just look like plain old bland armor? The weapons should match the set, just compare HoTW weapons to the armor and notice the difference, it looks like it is from a completely different dungeon.
Things I don’t want:
PURE rng loot. Leave the tokens (aside from fixing the various bugs/exploits) as they are. I want a RNG chance as well knowledge that my dungeon run will go for my next piece of gear.
Stat based “tiered” gear carrot – Exotics are fine as the “best” endgame items. Although more variety in stats might be nice.
Should be more to spend Karma on. It is odd that the Temple events in orr spawn NPC’s with exotic quality gear, yet no other Meta even NPC does.
I would personally add “exotic” line from 1-80 (in the end it wouldn’t be too bad), but sprinkle vendors at end of Meta events. Such as the Shadow behemoth. Have him killed and spawn a level appropriate Karma vendor with exotic quality gear (stated for that level of course) and unique skin to the mob. Would add more inventive to spend rather than hoard Karma to 80.
But you’re the one arguing against me, so please explain to me what is there to do at level 80..? Stop talking if you can’t say anything.
I stated I do dungeons. BTW just a note – yes I am level 80. So what I do at level 80 is dungeons as I stated previously. What you do at 80 is up to you. I unlike you don’t need my hand held to tell me where is a nice place to play and where it isn’t. Fun isn’t dictated to me by levels scales or numbering on pieces of pixels. I do dungeons for the multiplayer aspect and social aspect. That to me is endgame enough.
No I do not do SPVP so talking as this is a “PVP” MMO is rather laughable. I do not do WvW so that applies yet again.
You can state the same thing over and over as “what is there to do at 80”, and I will repeat. What do you want to do at <Insert Max Level Here>, as in the instances of gaming that is more important. If it is gear progression/raiding there are games out there. If it is open world PvP there are games out there.
For example: Your last MMO, what did you do at max level?
So what is there to do at level 80..?
What do you want to do at level 80 is the correct wording. Why ask me – I don’t dictate your play. I do dungeons – you don’t like them? It doesn’t bother me a bit.
mmopvp is dead on though.
Barely.
Is everquest MMOPVP because it has a specific server with a Free For All ruleset in place? It would be like labeling most games with instanced based dungeon MMOCORPG (Massively Multiplayer Cooperative Online Role Playing Game) just because the instances are squashed into 5 man dungeons. The PvP is a part of the game just like the dungeons are.
Fluff requires gems <See Mad King costume>.
The actual content requires no gems – See scavenger hunt/candy corn/costume brawl.
However the costumes DO give you uses in costume brawl (Customized Mad King skills from what it stated), but in reality it will be for like? What a week? So in the end it doesn’t really matter. If it really bothers you. Log in on after the holiday is over and all this mess will be over.
Edit: As for the permanent looks for weapons etc, can’t those be crafted? I haven’t looked as I don’t care too much.
Oh wait, you can’t triump more easily in GW2 if you’re hardworking and dedicated.
So it’s not a mmorpg. GW2 should have it’s genre labelled as mmopvp or fps.
You have no clue as to what an FPS is do you? Guild wars has literally nothing in common with it. It doesn’t even use reticule based combat….
I enjoyed 1 shotting with Ambush, or immortal tanking on a disc priest. fluff is cute and all but it will hardly keep any “hardcore” players. You dont feel more superior with a fluffier weapon.
I hardly call hitting one button and killing a player/monster “hardcore”.
Two things:
Tons of groups allow people under 80.
Start your own group.
That will fix the problem.
For example: I have never seen you problem and run with anyone of Min level+ of the specific explore (I am 80). The difference is I am always starting a group rather than looking for a group.
@Lacrim – Only people new to MMO’s think of Longevity in such terms. For example not even the developers of Everquest 1 thought their game would last 3-4 years. Even Smedly stated he thought it would die out in those years, yet here they are announcing their 19th expansion. With a whole mess of new things. Guild wars works a little different as they can later in 6-7 years swap GW2 for GW3 and get those MMO hoppers drooling before they leave again.
Just because you want to play “the popular” game to feel good about yourself, doesn’t mean the world has too. MMO’s can live on with smaller player bases than most think. “Game dies” is rather laughable as most of the ones that “die” are in the IP form (SWG / MxO for instance). The others are extremly niche (Auto assault anyone?) Or bugged with little room to do anything w/o huge hype (Tabula Rasa anyone?) Others still live on.
The new mini-dungeon seems bugged.
Me and my brother zoned into the room with candles + darkness/mobs (light the candles and they go away). Several traps and a Veteran.
The Dynamic event popped up as we entered. The Veteran was immune to all forms of damage. We light EVERYTHING that could be light in the room to see if that removed it, yet it still was immune.
Then we noticed the NPC AI was in a corner dead. Running to him we had no “rez” ability for him. Lucky my brother was a ranger so he swapped to rez spirit and got him back up. The NPC just seemed to stand there and do nothing.
Went to the next area and couldn’t find anything to do (tons of chains that did nothing).
Wow…..
So to fix a problem for people that have done the personal story mode, they gave us a token that requires you to have not completed the personal story mode to turn in.
Who exactly was testing this one?
@Reevac
It has been awhile since I did Arah, but I think the OP means he can’t get to Giganticus, not that he can’t drag him to a WP.
I think anyways.
@Krulz – that hasn’t been implemented yet, saw a dev post where they wanted to push it for Halloween update, but it isn’t ready yet.
So…..one-three more weeks I guess=/
:Edit:
Here is the quote.
Robert Hrouda:
Content Designer
2 and III) We are currently re-working and changing our loot for dungeons. I had previously hoped that it would be in for the next patch, but it requires a lot of tuning and testing, so it might take another patch.
(edited by Dead.7385)
There should be an event there to “free” the dungeon.
Involves going around that big building doing “X”. Then you have to fight the commander who Teleports between platforms. Have someone at a certain platforms to tag him or else he drops agro – regens to full hp and shouts:
“Your failure is only amusing if you try…” – this can be heard from far away to tell others that he is up as well.
No, no, no!!!!
Very few people pug it, but there is always someone who wants to do it. Try starting a group and see how it goes.
Not really:
TA Story – 1
TA ex up – 2
TA Ex F/Up -3
Most groups don’t go beyond this as the other path is a tad longer and more difficult. Most players now if they do TA are looking for Explore Up – F/Up as it can be done relatively fast and 120 tokens isn’t bad.
So:
Dungeons will give karma – Finally I can actually gain Karma again
New mini dungeons – Was hoping for something good. Hope it turns out good enough.
New events sound really interesting. Modus Sceleris from what they sounds are completely random. Which is a definite improvement over “ETA on jormag spawn?” we get now. Now lets see if they can really scale it. I am still WAY iffy on it as they have so many variables to take into account.
New rewards for jumping puzzles/Mini-dungeons – doesn’t state what they are, so can only wait and see. I would like more people to go LFG for Mini-Dungeons as well as instanced dungeons personally so I can only hope.
Burgaler – Meh either way.
The laser is far more forgiving than the bee’s largely because they have a nice WP right there. Sure 3 people need to get over, but it isn’t that bad.
Doing TA F/Up with all new players and nobody good at bee’s? Prepare to run and pray someone can disarm.
AC/TA are easy dungeons. They just suck the first time and that goes for most any dungeon to be honest.
Speaking mostly on TA.
TA flowers provide something no other dungeon has – easy super fast repsawning instant rally tools. Couple that with CC removal and you have tons of “lives” during the wurm fight. TBH I don’t even slot CC removal anymore aside from my trait that will auto do it if I have 2 conditions on me (unless I am doing F/F that is).
I do agree that the Bee’s need a waypoint though – for anyone that disagrees go do CoE explorable (Lvl 80 dungeon) which has a trap similar (instant death) has a nice WP set up RIGHT there. That’s how all traps should be handled. Also remove the armor penalty as any sane dungeon runner just strips themselves before doing these.
:Edit -
There is no strategy to them. I’ve aquired over a thousand TA tokens, and they are a needless hassle. The only people who can clear them reasonably are staff guardians and shortbow thieves.
Thats really the only thing about the flowers that suck – certain classes are better at clearing. BTW you missed Axe ranger as it bounces between blooms like crazy making it tons easier to run though (I PuG with my brothers ranger all the time).
(edited by Dead.7385)
TA is still one of the “intro” to EM dungeons. Its really only problematic on path F/F due to facing knights over and over again.
Want an easy run? Do Up path.
Hints:
You can melee the wurms rather safely. If you any class with a parry ability you don’t even need to dodge – just parry the wurms slam attack. Also blooms = insta rally.
Pull spiders into the cave and AE them one pack at a time.
The spider boss always alternates the same two attack (Unless interrupted). It will go Breath-AE-Breath-AE once you realize this it is easy to predict when to dodge and when to side step.
Kill next 4 spiders and run across to next boss.
Pull her into tunnel and beat on her to death. Mostly cheeze, but it isn’t like it is an amazing fight you would be missing anyway. And a WAY better tactic than the good old 2/3 “tactic” anyday.
If you killing – Auto target the knight. Knights are your BIGGEST threat and everything else is so so. Use forms of CC/Stuns to prevent him from crushing your team. The pack of 4 will sometimes stop and sometimes follow, it seems based on the NPC AI Ally. If they stop have a nearby pulling class single them out one at a time.
Archers are easily cleared/skipped.
The two pull (Gold + Silver) can be split by any decent pet pull to make it tons easier.
The boss is melee friendly despite what some groups think, but if your not melee just range and dodge. It is seriously easier than anything you did in AC.
@ Makube
SM or EM? Which pack and which path? There is quite a bit of differences.
I do agree though. I played DDO up till about 12 or 14 as a Cleric healer. I loved the difficulty settings and though Story Mode was the same idea (SM = something similar to Easy/casual in DDO) while EM would be something like Elite mode in DDO (Which is btw harder than most dungeons in any game I have played due to Mana System).
Path 3 is quite insane but path 1 has a pattern
Assign two people to defend hodgins and 3 on offense. Have the 3 on Offense stand at first burrow to the Left of hodgins. DO NOT KILL the one in front of his table, save that one for later. Kill that burrow, hit corner ASAP. Burn it. Head to one on the forward right of hodgins. Burn it then burn one in front of hodgins. One will pop in a corner move team there and kill. Clean up a bit and you have one left over.
There’s a huge flaw with the current gameplay mechanic in this game. The lack of the “trinity” system ruins the group mechanic for things like dungeons.
This will seriously hamper the long term success of Guild Wars 2.
Lets be honest here. Tossing the trinity in has nothing to do with long term success, you can even use SW:ToR as an example that Trinity + star Wars IP (which is huge) /=/ long term.
Every instance/dungeon in this game turns into a chaotic mess with no aggro system and everyone spamming dps. Full party wipes are frequent because there is no aggro system or roles such as healer, tank etc.
All dungeons have been completed and specific ones that used to be stated as “worse dungeon experience ever” are now turned into speed clears. Some got nerfed (CoF path 1 for instance) and some still need to be revamped (HoTW all paths), but it is far from a utter failure as people run them every single day. Party wipes aren’t frequent anymore unless you run story mode which usually is a rougher ride than the EM counterpart (excluding Arah and maybe one or two others).
This is also why dragons are so boring. The dragon essentially just stands there for 10 minutes while every wails dps on him then he dies and a chest is dropped.
Dragons are boring for the same reason Meta Events are boring, because the idea of Dynamic events doesn’t mesh with them.
DE’s do not have “spawn timers” that I can see. If something happens it might trigger off another, but it isn’t “clocked” like Jormag. Go to Frostgorge or even use an out of game App and you can quite literally TIME the dragon spawning. This isn’t what has touted. A few other notes:
The dragon ALWAYS attacks the same spot.
I have never seen the event fail so I can’t say for certain (I don’t even bother with him anymore as his loot vs time sucks), but if it is anything like other Meta Events (Shatterer/Swamp Dragon I forgot name of) it won’t change the zone in much major ways.
Thats why they are boring. Also a trinity system would be AWFUL in an open DE setting. You REALLY want 10 totally random tanks spamming agro abilities on a mob? It would be flip flopping like a fish on land. No healer would have any real target as people will random run up and change his target by hitting their agro button.
Edit: A better fix to these (and all) Meta events is to boost loot up to rare/exotic quality, but drastically increase the difficulty across ALL meta events (Even low level ones to increase players jumping to lower level zones). Reduce their timers so that they are far and few between and if you caught one up you actually go to LA and /map “Shadow Behemoth up need more players”. Right now aside from a couple Temples and Jormag’s there isn’t much you need to recruit for.
Another player posted a long time ago about an idea that Meta Events would get tough the more times he is killed: For example Jormag*** – Jormag difficulty 3 Stars. The event would get tougher and a leaderboard would be added to ALL servers to track who can kill the toughest Meta Event boss for example:
Borlis Pass – Jormag X4
Blackgate – Jormag X3
That would allow guilds and entire servers to compete.
The only way I see of fixing this is by actually making each class capable of being. heals tank or dps by buffing certain weapon choices to suit those roles for each class.
This needs to be changed if this game is ever going to have any longevity.
That would kill any challenge this game has left. Which after you run dungeons in farm mode isn’t that much. For example go fight Kholer for the first time ever. I bet (Unless your good) that you will be pulled, sometime during the fight. Do that fight 5 more times and you will notice you never get pulled because you can see his insanely easy tell. I used to use range all the time in TA up path, now I barely equip a bow. Not even on the tree.
(edited by Dead.7385)
Speaking as someone who does a LOT of dungeons.
Weapons are easily more appealing. Just look at HoTW weapons vs armor.
Armor is quite largely a hit or miss. They went so overboard to please the “I hate particle effects” crowd when you go to look at armor it really doesn’t “wow” you.
For example:
AC weapons – They are normal looking at day but glow a “ghostly” aura at night. Hey thats REALLY neat and unique. You can tell that it is from ac and fits the dungeon.
Go look at the armor and look at it at night. No particle effects. Nothing special. The ones that do have neat effects all seem based around fire (SE/CoF). Boo.
Let us have visual set pieces for dungeons only.
For example at night if you have a FULL set of AC armor you turn into a ghostly version of your race.
If you have HoTW gear you begin to freeze over.
CoE you have tech gadgits or a little robot flying above your shoulders.
CM can be a “base design” w/o particles since it is based on human style nobles attire.
TA can have something “naturey” growing on you.
*edit: and if you really hate particle effects then you can simple Xmute a piece and break the set piece stopping all particle/fun effects.
(edited by Dead.7385)
@Sleave – simple reason why they didn’t make it two entire game modes.
1. SPvP isn’t even fully opened up yet (were JUST getting paid tourneys).
2. They don’t want to split any “competitive” scene. They made WvW for those that wanted something unbalanced.
Thats really all there is too it.