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Feedback - FangBreaker Island difficulty (too easy)
krsbaws
Member Posts: 28 Arc User
I found the new scaling of monsters in Fangbreaker Island too aggressive and the monsters dealt little damage to me, even on a solo run. Especially the thrown boulders by giants, on live server, these are the kiss of death if you don't avoid them or block...however with the difficulty as it is, I didn't even bother with my shield once I got hit in the face with a boulder as it did barely any damage! (the max hit I took pre-mitigated damage from an Ice-giant Warrior was 37k, which with 80% capped defense and 400k HPs is no threat at all)
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- less one-shots, going from full health to dead
- healers and healing becoming more meaningful.
For the lower tier dungeons this effectively means, that the damage from mobs has to be reduced, compared to live.
In fact, it has to be reduced in such a way, that the largest hits taken by the most badly geared player that is eligible to run the dungeon should not be larger than 50% of full health, unless the devs actually want a one-shot mechanic in special circumstances, that is avoidable if one reads the hints how the dungeon can be completed (e.g. certain death avoided in a specific scenario). But then, the specific scenario has to 1-shot all players, independent of their IL, unless they follow the hints. Furthermore, if healers are to be more meaningful, the frequency of the hard-hitting attacks has to be reduced in such a way, that healers can heal the 50% taken until the next 50% hit.
Of course this will mean, that the low tier dungeons will become rather easy for the top IL players, that - despite scaling - have all their stats capped at the maximum. The alternative is to have the low tier dungeons practically unplayable for the IL-levels for which it was designed. This will be a catastrophe, because
- the low tier dungeons in RIQ and RAQ are the dungeons most frequently run. If they are broken for the majority of players that run them and the MAJOR promises of the devs (less one-shots, healers more meaningful) do not apply for the content that is most important for the majority of players (their only source to earn AD), it will be an outcry and the game will be dead, unless the devs happen to fix this really fast. In fact, it is better to fix it before MOD 16 goes live.
- the low IL players, e.g. those that are most likely to pay real money and keep the game profitable, have no other option than to run these dungeons, because their IL is not high enough to run the top tier content. Guess what will happen when they realize, that they do not have the slightest chance to complete these dungeons, unless a couple of near-bis players carry them through. The problem with that is, that near-bis players have no incentive to run these dungeon (rewards are uninteresting) and if they realize that many runs fail or become much longer, because of the pesky low-IL players that need to be carried, it is rather obvious what will happen. They will not run these dungeons at all, or if they need AD from RIQ or RAQ they will do it with a premade group.
It is also rather amusing to hear that "scaling is too aggressive", when I read further in your post that - even after this aggressive scaling - you still have defense of 80%, e.g. defense at the cap. The entry level players that play this dungeon will not have capped defense, in fact it is likely that scaling reduces their already puny defense to near zero .
EDIT: If the top IL players (20k+) have 80% defense and the low IL player for which this dungeon is designed and meant has nearly zero defense (due to low IL plus scaling, fortunately defense can never become negative), the damage the low IL takes will be 5 times as much as yours. Furthermore the low IL player will have roughly half the hitpoints as the top IL player, because the difference between a low IL eligible to run an epic dungeon and a top-IL is roughly a factor of 2. This means, the difference between life and death is a factor of 10. The problem is not skill, not character level, not class, not looks, it is the difference in IL. It is well known that IL is the major factor for the ability to complete a dungeon. It will be even more so, when MOD 16 reduces the large class imbalance and the large difference in player skill. After all, why is it that the entry level of all epic dungeons is based on IL? Why is it that we constantly see LFG 15k+ in chat?
If scaling is to be meaningful, one has to do it in such a way, that all players that run a given dungeon have an effective IL in the range, for which the dungeon was originally designed. In this particular case I would think 11k-15k would be a good design goal. For further information, why meaningful scaling must be based on IL, instead of character level (as it is now), see the following posts in this thread.
The problem with scaling is, that it is done totally wrong in MOD 16. In MOD 16 the scaling is based on character level, not on IL-level. Low tier content is not "too easy" to run, because a character has high character level (80 or close to 80). Character level is nearly irrelevant for the difficulty, on live and in MOD 16. Low tier content, in fact any content, is "too easy" if toons have high IL. This means, if one really intends to make low tier content "more challenging" for the top IL levels, if one really intends to have meaningful scaling, SCALING MUST BE BASED ON IL, not on character level.
If a dungeon has an entry IL of say 11k, a player with 11k IL should not be scaled at all. If a player with 20k IL queues for a 11k dungeon, his effective IL should be reduced, so that it is close to the maximum IL intended for the dungeon. This would be meaningful scaling, but the way scaling is currently implemented (based on character level), produces far more problems than it actually solves.
@krsbaws this report belongs in the Difficulty and Unexpected deaths thread.
Obsidian Oath - Warlock
A whole lot of other Obsidian toons as well.
For this, scaling must be based on the factors, that actually affect the efficiency of a player, to handle the given content.
For level 70-80 content, character level is nearly irrelevant as a factor. It will become even more irrelevant, when all characters are at the new max level (80). In fact, if it takes ~1 week to go from 70 -> 80, practically all players that run lvl 70-80 content will be at level 80, any <1% in the range between 70 and 80.
If you base scaling on something that is irrelevant for the issue you want to solve, it is rather obvious that scaling will not work as intended and will produce problems of its own, for instance that level 70 content becomes easier for a level 70 character than a level 80.
I understand that some playtesters (not you) would like to remain to be GOD-like in the low tier content due to your high IL (not character level). For these it is understandable, that they will find any argument against meaningful scaling based on IL. But if you are serious about the issue, that low tier content is "no challenge" for a the high IL players, scaling must be based on the most relevant factor that makes it "no challenge", which is - rather obviously - your IL.
Example:
Without scaling a 11k IL, level 80 player might have 300k HP and 20% defense in a level 70 dungeon.
Level scaling reduces this to 200k HP and zero defense.
In contrast, the 20k+ IL has 400k HP and 80% defense AFTER SCALING, because - despite scaling - his IL is still high enough to have defense (and most other stats) at their maximum (capped) value. Scaling will have reduced his HP by the same percentage as for the 11k IL, but with 400k it is largely irrelevant what his non-scaled HP have been, in particular if one takes the 80% defense into account. His effective HP (including defense) are 2000k, a factor of 10 higher than the 11k IL player.
Similar arguments can be made for the other stats (offensive, defensive).
This means, scaling has not contributed at all to equalizing the difficulty.
The effect is rather insignificant for the high IL, but it is huge for the low IL.
Scaling - in its current implementation - punishes the low ILs, and has nearly no relevance on the near-bis ILs.
This means, scaling - in its current implementation - actually contributes to imbalance, it does not reduce it.
To make scaling meaningful, we must reduce the effective IL of the near-bis player, without reducing the IL of an entry level player! It is quite simple to do this:
If the entry level of the dungeon is 10k, the maximum IL should be around 50% higher, e.g. 15k.
To bring all players in the range 10k-15k, you need to know the highest (currently) possible IL for the given MOD, e.g. the bis-IL of MOD 16. Lets assume it is 20k.
So a 20k needs to be reduced to 15k, whereas a 10k should stay at 10k.
This means every IL point above the minimum requirement of 10k must be scaled down by 1/2.
If an 18k queues for the dungeon, he is +8k above the minimum, which should become +4k scaled.
His effective IL should be 14k. This means, all of his stats should be reduced by a factor x = 14/18.
It is a rather simple (linear) calculation.
Scaled_IL = Min_IL + (Player_IL - Min-IL) / (Bis_IL - Min-IL) * (Max_IL - Min_IL)
x = Scaled_IL / Player_IL
This will be meaningful scaling, very easy to implement with a few lines of code.
Easy to tune (if a dungeon is "too easy", lower the Max_IL, if "too difficult" either increase the Min_IL, or the Max-IL, or both)
EDIT: corrected error in formula