TOO impression

rikitaki

Day 1: Chatraxis

Too hard, too long and in fact tedious. If it was just 3 phases (lets say 1,3,5), that would be much better.

The problem with being hard is reflected in PE group making - dps having only il 26k is simply no go. And that you are scaled down to 20k anyway? Does not matter - not in the eyes of players.

It is doable, but not exactly fun to run hard dungeon over and over again just to risk ending with no reward. And this year the risk is too big.

The last thing is my fear: Most dps classes want the envenomed journal, because as an active artefact it boosts your performance tremendously. There is nothing in the game that would be anywhere near for your personal damage - the other choices would be Wyvern-Venom Coated Knives and Staff of Flowers, if you prefer team performance to your own.
So, many dps want it. Many have problem to find somehow capable healer to be able to complete round 3... that means many people unhappy. And as I know you, the artefact will probably be nerfed after the event as performance of the masses suddenly and mysteriously rise.

So my summary: the rewards of this event target those, who need a boost, while is technically not accessible for such people. (this is player-base stuff, not commenting your design atm!) Even if you manage to form a group, it is a really hardcore game-play. With knife of the Damocles over your head.
To top that: With prospects that if people accidentally succeed too often, I would bet you will nerf the hard-earned reward right away.

lorax

For me, the biggest problem with ToO is that it is absolutely ruined by one dc. Turns out, if you dc, you cannot rejoin, and you do not get coins. The party also suffers as it limits how far they can get. If they abandon, they get no coins. And of course, if you play on pc, dc is all too common (I have no idea about xbox). I enjoyed the runs I made, as far as I got at least. But I won't be going back unless this changes. I feel awful when I dc and it reams the party.

nooneatza

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rikitaki

@lorax I did not know how they solved this problem. (my run was without an issue, for me only once lag caused party mass extinction due to impossibility to heal.)
- It turned up they did not touch the DC issue at all. This, coupled with the difficulty, is bad.

btw: I peaked into the Zen store and finally was enlightened. 90 coins and 1 fabled chapter for 1500 Zen. Which through ZAX equals 1.125M AD for so little currency - that you actually cannot buy even a single FULLY FUNCTIONAL piece of the main event items. This is by far the most expensive equipment you can put on your characters.

rikitaki

@nooneatza Could you, please, read my first post a bit more thoroughly? You digged up things I did not write and it feels awful as you put them as MY words.

I said the event is not fun. It is not. It is hard and tedious.
The chase item is there, sure. What I said is that it will make many players frustrated.
Being BIS for scaled content is not about IL. Trust me - I can boost my IL past 27k... and it will lower my damage roughly by 1/4, survivability a bit less. That is about being BIS that people somehow connect to IL, which - in this state of the game - is stupid.

And, you see - I planned to run the event on a few chars to gear them up. I tried - and sincerely found it not worth the effort. It does not pain me, but I know some people that find an event that is plain PITA as a stupid move.

Even having some reward guaranteed after finishing each run would boost the morale of the crowds a lot. But the design is based on being PITA. In an event right before next mod - which will most probably render your effort... ridiculous.

BTW: I have the full set on my barbarian. It is a year already and it still suffers by the same bugs. Actually, the bugs (HP and Power boost) is the only thing making it worthy to wear. Then there is the journal - which strangely over-performs...

This event is by design ridiculous. And - I do not require free stuff. Quite the contrary, I am one of the fools that would prefer to play the game instead of seeking buyouts... And THERE lies my problem: Designing an event to make most of the player-base feel frustrated is a wrong move.

mord

rikitaki said:

@nooneatza Could you, please, read my first post a bit more thoroughly? You digged up things I did not write and it feels awful as you put them as MY words.

I said the event is not fun. It is not. It is hard and tedious.
The chase item is there, sure. What I said is that it will make many players frustrated.
Being BIS for scaled content is not about IL. Trust me - I can boost my IL past 27k... and it will lower my damage roughly by 1/4, survivability a bit less. That is about being BIS that people somehow connect to IL, which - in this state of the game - is stupid.

And, you see - I planned to run the event on a few chars to gear them up. I tried - and sincerely found it not worth the effort. It does not pain me, but I know some people that find an event that is plain PITA as a stupid move.

Even having some reward guaranteed after finishing each run would boost the morale of the crowds a lot. But the design is based on being PITA. In an event right before next mod - which will most probably render your effort... ridiculous.

BTW: I have the full set on my barbarian. It is a year already and it still suffers by the same bugs. Actually, the bugs (HP and Power boost) is the only thing making it worthy to wear. Then there is the journal - which strangely over-performs...

This event is by design ridiculous. And - I do not require free stuff. Quite the contrary, I am one of the fools that would prefer to play the game instead of seeking buyouts... And THERE lies my problem: Designing an event to make most of the player-base feel frustrated is a wrong move.

If memory serves (and I might be wrong as memory is seldom perfect), when Tales of Old was originally released it was intended to be a difficult event, for players who have very little left to do in game (aka endgame players). The frustration is part of any sort of progression... You struggle to do something, get frustrated, persevere and overcome = progression and satisfaction at overcoming something that was difficult. This is what keeps the game interesting (at least for me). If i were to breeze through everything with no form of challenge (which there is already very little of) I would have no interest in playing anymore.

When the event was first released i remember it getting a lot of support from the playerbase, saying how fun it is. It still is fun. Perhaps you may have run it over and over, but there are many new people in the game who have never experienced this event and are having fun running it.

The design of the event is based around Risk Vs Reward (which i think it accomplishes very well), not being a PITA. People just need to be honest with themselves about what they can expect to achieve. They have increased the amount of Coins of Tales Told you receive for the Grand Retelling so capping is far easier than it was when the event was first released. At release the coins were much more time consuming to obtain, you would need to complete a 5x run and a 4x run to reach the cap (1, 3, 7, 15, 31 being the original sequence). Where as now you can obtain all 45 in one 5x difficulty run. So be honest with yourself, do the lower difficulty runs, get the coins and still at a faster rate than the original release. I state this simply to show the positive side, not to insult you or others.

The journal doesn't over perform, it's bonuses were actually reduced in Mod16 (again if memory serves). There are other, competitive artifacts that can and do get used (Soul Sight Crystal and Decanter of Atropal Essence being two very good alternatives depending on class).

As for it being too hard, well, as @nooneatza stated, the rewards are BiS or close to it. If they were to be more easily obtainable it would devalue them and the effort people put into obtaining them. They SHOULD be hard to obtain (again, feeling of progression and accomplishment). It's like giving medals to everyone in a race, it devalues the medals of those who came in 1st, 2nd and 3rd, so what is the point in even trying to achieve such goals?

Unknown

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durugudesu

I would like to think of this event as something you'd want to do with your friends, guilds/ alliances. Running the same dungeon 5 times who can commit their time would be the best possible approach, because as mentioned, one disconnect from game just stops the group progression.

In my opinion this lair of the mad dragon is the easiest, and you can take your time to go from mob to mob if needed.

It is another issue if you decide to play with people who have alts that are classified as heal/tank but have not really fully "experienced" how to properly do it. These groups will most likely struggle at frozen heart and dread vault.

So yes i agree this is "hardcore gameplay" which requires players to really focus a little more and there lies the frustration upon failing whether it was from disconnecting from the game or failing the dungeon due to being overwhelmed.

Still, i would recommend people to try this with their guild/alliances/friends. Getting people from PE or channels can work, but stress levels from there can go up really fast.

Also please don't join groups asking for item level or requiring power and whatever as they clearly can't carry themselves.

rikitaki

@durugudesu While I agree that this event is better to run in alliance, the catch is the overwhelming majority of DPS wanting to run this event. I have both tank and healer classes that managed beat this dragon at 5x difficulty, but... I do not benefit running with those chars much. (...the tank obtained more than he needed the last year already, and I don't like to heal)

When all rewards are char bound and benefit DPS, you have to run on DPS. Running a tank or healer is mostly for fun - and running a hard dungeon 5x in row without any reward is annoying, not fun.

If we could obtain the reward account bound, I believe more tanks and healers would join the effort, because it would make sense to hoard rewards for your alts. This way, it is meh.

Anyway, last year there was disparity between dung difficulty over each day, so I expect there might be at least one easier than those jumping fiends.

zimxero

IMO, the only hard element is the dragon, which may be dealing a little too much damage. A team effort is needed for round 3-5 because if your top DPS goes single target, you may not have enough firepower to destroy all the adds. Without a balanced approach, the DPS will be dodging & running as often as fighting... which will prolong the fight further.

hustin1

It would be really nice if they would let us loot the boss in Frozen Heart, etc. instead of immediately booting us out. There's a lot of legacy loot that is unobtainable that we're missing out on. It would be even better if they restored the original loot chest.

micheal1979

The event is not intended for every player. Some talk about item level as a status for player ability, it is not. Inspect people make sure they have stat caps and a decent amount of power or outgoing heals before forming groups. Yes people can be carried but it does put a much larger responsibility on the rest of the party. The only tricky part to this event, and yes it is still being done by some groups of payers, is Dreadvault x5 due to the small amount of bonus items or power ups as some call them. The other 3 dungeons are pretty darn easy with a little teamwork.