Which Boss Fight would you play the most if it had New Rewards?

kamokami

The goal of this poll is to see if there is a zone or lair that would be played a lot more if there was a concerted effort to update ONLY its rewards. I am attempting to make this poll very specific so only mentioning the area and the boss for that area. But if you want something else please hit "Other" and specify in your comments.

I have purposefully avoided MC and Alerts as there is already plenty of reasons to be there relative to anything else. I have also avoided the Adventure Packs as those will likely require a lot more than new rewards to make them worthwhile, but feel free to disagree.

Note that I know many would want to play more than one of these boss fights haha. But the question is written purposefully in a way as to force 1 choice. Which one would you play the most? Hopefully this could evolve to guide the devs towards changes that would fit the qualification of being both easy for them to implement and result in lots of engagement from us

morigosa

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

Necrull's Lair in Canada. Always liked that place. Don't have any good reason why.

championshewolf

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

I think all of them should have new rewards, the dungeons themselves redesigned and have new mechanics to encourage teaming and mechanics that prevent soloing so the team aspects of the game can be emphasized, and of course a queuing system that allows players to queue for the normal and a heroic version of said dungeons. Maybe some rewards can be specific powers from the bosses, costume pieces of course, and special mods and such that can make for comparables to things people use now. Maybe even mods that act like power replacers, but of course fixed so they don't shift the power balance.

I also think some of the dungeons that were not made dungeons but soloable should be made official dungeons now;

Purple Gang Hideout
Ghost Town Mine (with Witchcraft's sister)
Project: Awakening
Stronghold Prison

and a few others to name a few.​​

nepht

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

Mega D. Its the fight most people know and arguably the most fun ( though the mish just before him is rubbish -_- ) .

pantagruel01

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

I'm oddly fond of the Viper's Nest final battle, though it's notoriously buggy. The Destroyer's Factory final battle has interesting ideas that don't actually work.

kamokami

Therakiel's Temple - Therakiel

championshewolf said:

I think all of them should have new rewards, the dungeons themselves redesigned and have new mechanics to encourage teaming and mechanics that prevent soloing so the team aspects of the game can be emphasized, and of course a queuing system that allows players to queue for the normal and a heroic version of said dungeons. Maybe some rewards can be specific powers from the bosses, costume pieces of course, and special mods and such that can make for comparables to things people use now. Maybe even mods that act like power replacers, but of course fixed so they don't shift the power balance.



I also think some of the dungeons that were not made dungeons but soloable should be made official dungeons now;



Purple Gang Hideout

Ghost Town Mine (with Witchcraft's sister)

Project: Awakening

Stronghold Prison



and a few others to name a few.​​

If you had to pick just one of those, as a thought exercise, which one would you pick?

championshewolf

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

kamokami wrote: »

If you had to pick just one of those, as a thought exercise, which one would you pick?

If I had to do one of them, only, I would say Stronghold Prison should be completely redone from the ground up, multiple bosses and turning Menton into a credible threat with mechanics that emphasize that it's you versus the power of the most powerful mentalist in Champions.​​

kamokami

Therakiel's Temple - Therakiel

I should clarify that I'm just asking about content where the only thing they change is the rewards as a way to make the results here immediately actionable.

Goal being to say: "All you have to do is update rewards for thing X, and a bunch more people would play" with the only variable being what "thing X" is.

It's also a valid choice to just say, "there's nothing like that and everything would require more of an overhaul to be made compelling enough"...but I don't think that's the case.

If I had to pick one that I would play the most, if all they did was change the rewards, it would be Therakiel's Temple (and I've already played it a loooooot). It's gorgeous, epic, on the highest difficulty it can be challenging for some teams, and just in general feels good to complete.....so to me that's one where everything is pretty close to perfect expect for the rewards.

championshewolf

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

Well, then there's nothing I would suggest as none of the content is really deserving of an updated reward since most everyone can solo the current content in this game.​​

itsbrou

I have serious doubts that sprinkling rewards into 5 year old lairs is going to make people come back or suddenly be possessed with the spirit of teaming.

kamokami

Therakiel's Temple - Therakiel

someguywhoplaysgames said:

I have serious doubts that sprinkling rewards into 5 year old lairs is going to make people come back or suddenly be possessed with the spirit of teaming.

I think that it would get more of the existing players playing more of the content that they've never seen.

championshewolf

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

kamokami wrote: »

I think that it would get more of the existing players playing more of the content that they've never seen.

I will have to express my doubts on that to. They've tried to entice us into old content like that before and people only did it long enough to get the new rewards, if it was even worth it. Most people saw it as not worth it.​​

squirrelloid

Therakiel's Temple - Therakiel

I'd have voted for Qwyjibo, but the respawn timers on cosmics are way too long, and certain people have them permanently camped so no one else really ever gets a shot at the drops anyway. They need more than new drops - they need their respawn timers looked at too.

kamokami

Therakiel's Temple - Therakiel

championshewolf said:

I will have to express my doubts on that to. They've tried to entice us into old content like that before and people only did it long enough to get the new rewards, if it was even worth it. Most people saw it as not worth it.​​

I agree that we're pretty jaded. But I think that if the newer players who, as an example, have never been to VB had an explicit reason to go there it's worth looking into.

roughbearmattach

Mandragalore - Bronze King

If every lair had rewards as good as events, like an aura, a guaranteed costume drop (like end of Resistance), a significant amount of G, a lot of SCR (like 10), then they would get some play.

Yes, plenty of players would play each one once. . . and that would be amazing. That would actually get players moving around the game world.

championshewolf

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

kamokami wrote: »

I agree that we're pretty jaded. But I think that if the newer players who, as an example, have never been to VB had an explicit reason to go there it's worth looking into.

Jaded is not the word (or words) I would actually use. Spoiled, entitled, inconsiderate, demanding and other such words I would probably use to describe this player base as a whole.​​

beezeeze

Vibora Bay - does not have a cosmic, but it should!

It's only the vocal minority that is like that I suspect.

I vote for more stuff in Vibora Bay!

Yeah yeah, I like VB Ok? I like it enough to have it unlocked on all my charaters lvl 34 and over.

championshewolf

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

gradii wrote: »

All things I'd use to describe you.

Those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. But then again you probably haven't a window left in that house. But then again, your ego is so big as you probably thought I wasn't including myself in that mess despite I said this player base. But, monkey's and typewriters I guess.​​

sterga

OK. We get it. You two hate each other with the fury of a 1000 exploding suns. Grats. Have a cookie.

Don't some of those bosses have rewards that people would want but the drop rate is so abysmal that no one bothers? Therakiel's blades come to mind. Plus, he's not as easily farmable as Kiga. He also has a garbage drop rate.

I would farm the one that meets this criteria:
1. Easy to run solo
2. Rewards that are appealing to me -or- guarantee token drops so I can pick my reward.
3. Decent drop rates.

hasukurobi

Desert - Grond

It is slightly depressing that despite having loooots of 40's and such I have never taken down any of these (aside from the first version of Therakiel which is not the same.) or even seen any besides Grond.

jaazaniah1

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

I'm kind of fond of Lava Disorder: Kriminal Intent with Phoenix on Monster Island. One of those you really have to look for.

As others have noted doing anything to improve drops for Kigatilik and Qwyjibo is pretty pointless due to timer issues and spawn campers.​​

pantagruel01

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

hasukurobi said:

It is slightly depressing that despite having loooots of 40's and such I have never taken down any of these (aside from the first version of Therakiel which is not the same.) or even seen any besides Grond.

Teleios tower should be easily soloed at level 40; Andrith and Mandragalore are soloable enough.

crypticarkayne

Good info! Thanks!

magpieuk2014

It's nice to get a drop at the end of a mission, although I understand the issues with item farming. The Witchcraft/Talisman story arc still has a specific item drop - it's not particularly desirable one to most builds, but always good to see something new appear on the items list.

As for the poll - the only one I've done in the three years I've played this game is Telios's Tower; occasionally you can get some teams to do that which aren't marred by item farmers/speed runners, and that's quite fun. The rest are either unknown (does anyone do Lemuria anymore?) redundant, or aggravating (people zooming through so fast it gives no flavour of the content).

If I could suggest a location it would be Fallout's Dome in the Desert, because that is just such a cool steampunk styled area which gets very little use. It's ideal for converting into an open mission/PVP match (heroes v Onslaught villain arena, maybe?)

Another suggestion would be a "Vigilance" style mission involving completion of a selection of high-level lairs. The rewards would have to be new, top-notch and highly limited in scope, similar to rampages; but it might form a good extension to the Alert system of regular "to do" content.

kamokami

Therakiel's Temple - Therakiel

magpieuk2014 said:

As for the poll - the only one I've done in the three years I've played this game is Telios's Tower; occasionally you can get some teams to do that which aren't marred by item farmers/speed runners, and that's quite fun. The rest are either unknown (does anyone do Lemuria anymore?) redundant, or aggravating (people zooming through so fast it gives no flavour of the content).

hasukurobi said:

It is slightly depressing that despite having loooots of 40's and such I have never taken down any of these (aside from the first version of Therakiel which is not the same.) or even seen any besides Grond.

I hear this sort of thing all the time. And it's crazy to me that we are in that situation.

We'll always want more content. I want it too. But there's already a lot of great content that players have not experienced and I think that's because there's no reason to go out and do it.

kamokami

Therakiel's Temple - Therakiel

crypticarkayne said:

Good info! Thanks!

Hooray!!

morigosa

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

kamokami said:

magpieuk2014 said:

As for the poll - the only one I've done in the three years I've played this game is Telios's Tower; occasionally you can get some teams to do that which aren't marred by item farmers/speed runners, and that's quite fun. The rest are either unknown (does anyone do Lemuria anymore?) redundant, or aggravating (people zooming through so fast it gives no flavour of the content).

hasukurobi said:

It is slightly depressing that despite having loooots of 40's and such I have never taken down any of these (aside from the first version of Therakiel which is not the same.) or even seen any besides Grond.

I hear this sort of thing all the time. And it's crazy to me that we are in that situation.

We'll always want more content. I want it too. But there's already a lot of great content that players have not experienced and I think that's because there's no reason to go out and do it.

It is crazy! I know! And it's one of the reasons I made my main into a super-tank - so I can go and solo these sorts of things that I'd otherwise never see. I mean, at least Therakiel's Temple and Andrithal still have some drops that are worth having, and places like Necrull's Lair can be rewarding if you're at-level and have the missions, but consider the poor Monster Island VIPER lair - it has no rewards at all, anymore (I think there might be a q-box or something, but there are much faster and easier ways to get those) - even the missions for it don't give you anything that matters.

Make its main mission - the one with all the staged time limits - repeatable on a daily basis & reward 2000Q, and I'd happily run the lair instead of subjecting myself to yet more boring alerts. For bonus points, give it back its original unique drops that got lost with On Alert, too.

nacito

Monster Island - Teleiosaurus and Qwyjibo

Fighting giant Dino yay

roughbearmattach

Mandragalore - Bronze King

magpieuk2014 said:

Another suggestion would be a "Vigilance" style mission involving completion of a selection of high-level lairs. The rewards would have to be new, top-notch and highly limited in scope, similar to rampages; but it might form a good extension to the Alert system of regular "to do" content.

This ^^^ is an excellent idea.

jaazaniah1

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

I always thought that throwing direct personal insults around on the forums was a TOS violation. Guess not.​​

spinnytop

Teleios Tower - Ultimate Mind

kamokami said:

I should clarify that I'm just asking about content where the only thing they change is the rewards as a way to make the results here immediately actionable.

Oh, I thought there was the caveat that they would also make a level 40 version of the lair. Well then my vote is invalid.

spinnytop

Teleios Tower - Ultimate Mind

bluegrassbeast said:

And then we have the Rakshasa problem only worse.

How many people line up for Rakshasa alerts, again?

I dunno, how many people who play this game aren't big crying babies? Figure that out and you'll have your answer.

HINT: I've never had to wait long to get into an alert when it was Raksasha, so probably more than you'd think.

kamokami

Therakiel's Temple - Therakiel

spinnytop said:

Oh, I thought there was the caveat that they would also make a level 40 version of the lair. Well then my vote is invalid.

Ah didn't think through that bit when I listed the Tower.

pantagruel01

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

I'd sort of like to see most lairs have their critters tagged with Scary Monster, so teams of mixed levels going through it would be more coherent and "hey, everyone SK to 40 so we can turbo this level 28 lair" less of a thing.

hasukurobi

Desert - Grond

pantagruel01 said:

hasukurobi said:

It is slightly depressing that despite having loooots of 40's and such I have never taken down any of these (aside from the first version of Therakiel which is not the same.) or even seen any besides Grond.

Teleios tower should be easily soloed at level 40; Andrith and Mandragalore are soloable enough.

I thiiiiink I know where Teleios is but I have no idea who or what Andrith is and while I have seen the thing that I assume is the Mandragalore I have never really seen any sort of quest or boss there.

kamokami said:

I hear this sort of thing all the time. And it's crazy to me that we are in that situation.

We'll always want more content. I want it too. But there's already a lot of great content that players have not experienced and I think that's because there's no reason to go out and do it.

You know... I am not sure it is even rewards either. When I think about these things it is not the lack of a reward, considering I have no idea what rewards may be there as it is, it is a mix of other things for me anyway.

One: I do not really know about most of these things, where they are, how to get the mission for them. I also do not really want to go through a huge story-line to get to them considering all the rewards for those tedious and boring missions tend to be junk.

Two: Most zones outside of MC are pretty much empty. Not really all that fun doing things alone and it really lowers the motivation to really want to spend any time exploring these places that are dead.

Three: Much of the big end content like story packs takes too darned long to do and you have to do it in one shot.

Four: Too many deadly bugs. I have been told numerous times that many of these things have big bugs that can come up and ruin all your hard work. I am not really motivated to put in the work to get shafted by some bug.

A nice spotlight on these places and what you can get there and what you can do and where would be nice. Also being able to just GO to VB would be nice.


I also want to say that I am not one of the people who asks for Endgame Content or whatever because I know I have not actually done most of the content so there is no point in asking for new stuff in my case.

magpieuk2014

One: I do not really know about most of these things, where they are, how to get the mission for them. I also do not really want to go through a huge story-line to get to them considering all the rewards for those tedious and boring missions tend to be junk

This is one of the post-Alert problems with the game. The Zones and mission arcs are still set up for linear playthrough. Most people play Westside and then get lost, because they've played alerts along the way and have out-levelled the game content; the Canadian/Desert crisis seem long and easy, rather than worthwhile. The ideal solution to this is more skull level content - that works nicely in Steel Crusade to make content challenging at most levels - but more practical might be a system of e-mail alerts on levelling, summoning your character to an emergency in another zone (which just happens to be a mission arc of appropriate level). Beef up the XP rewards for completing the missions (a 1hr XP boost or similar on taking on the mission) and add an arc completion reward of choice - XP, Q, tradeable items like backups, devices and costume drops - and we might get people playing out of MC.

What also might help - while I'm at it - is a pan-Zone chat channel. Zone chat in MC may be a mixed bag but it's like a game radio station; nice to have that background chat to tune in and out of. Going into one of the other zones feels a bit dead without that background hum.

chaelk

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

bluegrassbeast said:

And then we have the Rakshasa problem only worse.

How many people line up for Rakshasa alerts, again?

me, I also line up for Ao.
I don't have a problem with it and I warn people with pets in Rakshasa exactly what will happen.

The problem with this and other threads similar to it are people being too used to alert rewards.
"For a few easy minutes we can get this. So to get us to play anything else, it needs to have better rewards"

Any increase in Q or Recognition rewards would also require a MAJOR update to the store for them.

IN 4 and a bit years of play.
I've done Teleios tower once.
Viper nest several times including after on alert, someone asked for a team so several people on MI went with them .

White rhino before and after On alert. again someone asked in MI zone.

Necrulls cave- recently, to do the mission. Didn't manage to kill him on that AT but it is certainly an interesting lair. Not enough damage between heals.

Therakiels temple- I have a character with the misison but have never done it. People stopped queuing for it when the drops were removed.

Megaladon- I have the mission(I think on Smudge and the bucket of chum. Hybrid- melee ranged character.

Andrithal- been in there several times, never found the room he was in but found pretty much every other and the side missions. Did notice the recent video of defeating him, requires several legacy device for healing and dodge.

The three unpronounceables-(well for me) on MI and Canada- yes, since I happened to be there when they turned up. That blasted lizard, likes turning up when I'm trying to level a character there. Usually just up the path I'm running down.
I find yelling in Trade gets volunteers there fast.

Mandragalore- I don't think I've managed to get the mission for that, despite several characters who have been through Lemuria from end to end.


Bloodhound in VB is quite a good fight but could be harder and more involved, no idea what the rewards are but it's a fun fight.
I also vote for Pheonix- that guy seriously needs an update from the wimpy Inferno he is. The lair is a good start but needs expanding.

crypticbuxom

I'd like all pre on alert rewards reinstated into these bosses and lairs. Perhaps updated so they aren't their old gear which is likely necessary. Just make sure things drop off of bosses, aren't BoP, and is useful to have multiple of and is trade friendly.​​

cyrone

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

championshewolf said:

Well, then there's nothing I would suggest as none of the content is really deserving of an updated reward since most everyone can solo the current content in this game.​​

This. So much this.

gradii said:

championshewolf said:

Jaded is not the word (or words) I would actually use. Spoiled, entitled, inconsiderate, demanding and other such words I would probably use to describe this player base as a whole.​​

All things I'd use to describe you.

And this was absolutely unnecessary, gradii. Quit picking fights.

morigosa

Other - please elaborate....the more specific the better.

chaelk said:

Andrithal- been in there several times, never found the room he was in but found pretty much every other and the side missions. Did notice the recent video of defeating him, requires several legacy device for healing and dodge.

Just wanted to comment on this one because I've kindof made a habit of soloing Andrithal every now and then and it absolutely does not require legacy devices, high end gear, or anything more than a moderately tank-y build. (My main, Razula - build link here - was quite able to solo the place in the blue gear I'd picked up while leveling to 40.)

What it does require is a solid understanding of how the last fight works and what in that fight will kill you. (Also, make sure your difficulty is set to Normal! Turning it up is very bad, for reasons I'll discuss later.)

First up is the fight trigger - Vikorin will engage when all four pillars are destroyed*. His protective golems will activate in sets of four as soon as each pillar is damaged. If you try to fight the golems and Vikorin at the same time, you will almost certainly die. So destroy a pillar, kill golems, repeat for pillars 2 & 3, tap the fourth pillar with a single hit from your energy builder, kill the last set of golems, and then go back to destroy the last pillar and start the fight.

Phase One: Vikorin stands there and throws some shadow attacks at you. He'll also - if you're out of melee range - try to pull you to him. Nothing particularly dangerous, and he doesn't heal, so take your time. The one kinda nasty thing here is his disable: an AoE move that looks like a stun, hits through block, applies nailed to the ground, and locks out even active defenses and offenses! But there's an important note: it doesn't prevent you from moving. Of course, in phase one, there's no real need to move - but you can, and that'll be important later in the fight.

Phase Two: When he reaches 2/3 health, Vikorin blows up some of the lower level of the platform, summons a bunch of dinky little lemurian minions (that spawn in the lava and then try to run towards you - most of the time they can't actually path up the platform), and conjures four massive lava golems, one in each corner of the room.
The lava golems are deadly. They won't aggro on you while you're in the middle where Vikorin is, but if you do end up out near one of them, you're going to die - they can't be attacked, they do fairly high damage at range, and they endlessly spam knock effects.
And then there's Vikorin's disable... in phase two (and three), he follows this up with an unresistable knockback effect. You can avoid this by running down the stairs - make sure you get all the way to the bottom, and make sure you stay there until Vikorin's tried to pull you to him once. (The disable does have hold health, and it's possible to either button-mash out of it, or get freed by damage from the adds.) If you don't avoid the knockback, Vikorin will fling you into the lava near one of his golems, and then the golem will kill you.

Phase Three: At 1/3 health, Vikorin blows up the rest of the lower level of platform and summons more adds. Any survivors from the first batch will now be able to path to you no problem; AoE them down. This is often a good place for an active defense. These adds can snare you! And if you're snared when Vikorin does his disable, you probably won't get out of the way of the ensuing punt in time. So don't ignore the adds.
On the disable, you're now running down the stairs and standing in the lava for a moment. Yes, it's lava; it does a bit of damage... but it's much less than you'd take from getting punted into a golem. (And this is where you find that things go bad if you turned your difficulty up - increased difficulty = increased aggro range, and you likely won't be able to avoid the punt without aggroing golems just from proximity.)
Other than that, this is the same as phase two; nothing really new. If you happen to have a backup device, feel free to pop it here and watch Vikorin melt.

Advanced Tactics: Vikorin's disable is on a strict timer that gets reset at the start of each phase. If you can do enough DPS, you can actually avoid the disables entirely and trivialize the fight.

If you die: Vikorin's health only resets to 2/3 or 1/3, whatever you've gotten him to. However, his disable and his AoE punt will desynchronize, making the fight nearly impossible; if this happens, your options are 1) die alot, 2) invite friends to try to help (they'll also die a lot, but so be it), or 3) reset the instance and clear back to Vikorin to get a clean attempt.

_____
* Sometimes Vikorin bugs and becomes attackable sooner than this. If this happens immediately upon entering the room - great! You can skip the golems entirely! If it happens while you're in the middle of clearing out golems - clear the golems first, then focus on Vikorin; as long as you don't push him to phase two of the fight, you've still got a chance at getting through it.

beezeeze

Vibora Bay - does not have a cosmic, but it should!

I am pretty sure I've done all the lairs and fought all the cosmics, not solo mind you but with a team of 3-5 people at least ... I made it my goal for awhile to do it and it wasn't that hard to find a team among the sg members of Doomsday Brigade. We cleaned house of course, even the supposedly hard stuff was pretty much a cakewalk, but I had fun doing it...and I would do it again, espicially if the rewards for doing so were updated.(mostly for that fact that it would draw in even more people to participate!)

agentnx5

Therakiel's Temple - Therakiel

Therakiel is my all-time favorite lair, but Therakiel himself isn't as threatening as he once was. He just doesn't hit hard enough, was never updated to match post-OnAlert suvivability levels. Need to have a reason for that "BLOCK FOR DEAR LIFE BLOCK THAT ATTACK!" when he's charging it.

But I will also strongly agree that many MANY lairs need upgrade and better rewards. Sometime I hated that On Alert took away and never gave back with those simple alerts. This is especially true for newer players that have done NOTHING other than Millennium City and alerts, they aren't even aware there's placed outside of that zone and no reason to explore. This isn't an isolated few either, it's a somewhat commonplace mass trend by this point. That's rather sad.