Casual thoughts on New Sharandar

lightnintramp

I'm a casual player who is a guild master in a very small guild. I took my characters through the New Sharandar intro yesterday and played around a bit in the zone. Here are my thoughts:

- Not worth the grind. As a casual, I don't have hours to grind through quests to get 5 iron trinkets each. The zone is heavily populated with mobs that have knockdown and is just frustrating to navigate. And the rewards? Items with level that is 50 above what you can get in "easier" and more interesting zones.
- Small guild strongholds are at risk. With the removal of Fey Trinket voucher creation from the campaign tree, you might think the only way to get vouchers is to grind this new, frustrating zone. But, remember, you can always build the Jubilee Trader in your stronghold! While that's frustrating for casuals to tend that, it's better than getting beat down by Redcap Giantsouls who constantly pound your poor character into the ground.

Look, I know the devs are trying to make the game more challenging. And dedicated players who have hours and hours to play or who like to spend tons of money on the game are going to enjoy a zone that in a few weeks is going to be even harder when the scaling goes away, we casuals are going to have to make decisions on what we spend time on. And I rather enjoy Vallenhas, daily queues, skirmishes and zones with much more interesting stories.

So casuals, take heart! The game still have plenty to offer besides a mindless grind in a zone that is frustrating!

plasticbat

It seems you are having a different Sharandar experience. The common experience of the new Sharanadar is there is not much to grind unless you want to do the optional HE to grind for diamond. Typically, a character can finish the weekly haul per character in less than 20 minutes. And, that is all for the week for one character.

johnnystranger

20 minutes ? Nah , maybe an hour for normal players . Don’t forget you lose 10 minutes teleporting every quest for the first two . Than every 2 quests , port in , port out etc etc
At least on PS4 it’s about 20 secs each teleport or so each way .
Even my best toons took an hour . You also need to find the right troll or area and hopefully no ones cleared em out .
Plus heroics take 5m to 7m and you 3 . No idea how you can get 100 weekly haul in 20 minutes . Maybe way better player .
Place is glitchy as well on PS4.

lightnintramp

My definition of grind is probably different than others. Grind=quest to "kill 10 specific enemies in a specific area on the other side of the map and run the gauntlet of all other mobs proc'ing on you, just for 5 iron trinkets...and you have to do that 75 times to get the 375 iron trinkets needed to finish the reward tree".

Remember, I said I was a casual. My main toon is IL 35,000 and still has trouble quickly killing mobs. And before a troll says it, I know I need to "git gud". I'm not spending tons of money to buy stuff just so I can kill a freakin redcap. I am perfectly content to play in zones that I have fun in and enjoy, at least until the developers get rid of those too (like Old Sharandar). And you know it is true....it's coming.

plasticbat

lightnintramp said:

My definition of grind is probably different than others. Grind=quest to "kill 10 specific enemies in a specific area on the other side of the map and run the gauntlet of all other mobs proc'ing on you, just for 5 iron trinkets...and you have to do that 75 times to get the 375 iron trinkets needed to finish the reward tree".

Remember, I said I was a casual. My main toon is IL 35,000 and still has trouble quickly killing mobs. And before a troll says it, I know I need to "git gud". I'm not spending tons of money to buy stuff just so I can kill a freakin redcap. I am perfectly content to play in zones that I have fun in and enjoy, at least until the developers get rid of those too (like Old Sharandar). And you know it is true....it's coming.

Sorry, I am on PC and I didn't do that on the first few days.

Assuming console has the same scaling like PC, lower IL (less than 40K) does better than those above 40k. My 6 toons are from 33K to 40k.

I don't remember how long my first toon did in the first week. It was pretty short. Lets say an hour. Since I obtained 'experience' and knew what to do, my 2nd to 6th took about 20 minutes each. Doing HE helps to get 25 points fast and killing mob within HE also help fulfilling other 5 point quests.

By the way, don't forget to take reward from the campaign which opens up extra quests.

Iron trinkets can be picked up from ground and table. Sometimes, you can just pick them up without doing any fighting (if other players cleaned the area already).

johnnystranger

Oh yea , pc is scaled up already . Console not yet , 2 weeks .
@ op yea I only have 1 dps at 44k , paladin just at 41k . Rest are mid 30k and yes , it is a bit of a grind , but compared to other campaigns , I prefer this style campaign! Session 2 will bring different quests I’m assuming.

plasticbat

johnnystranger#5900 said:

Oh yea , pc is scaled up already . Console not yet , 2 weeks .

@ op yea I only have 1 dps at 44k , paladin just at 41k . Rest are mid 30k and yes , it is a bit of a grind , but compared to other campaigns , I prefer this style campaign! Session 2 will bring different quests I’m assuming.

It is supposed to scale up in the first 2 weeks. At least, in PC, it was. When you are in Sharanadar and if your item level (in character screen) is in blue color, you are scaled.

thefiresidecat

you can't "always" build the jubilee trader. it's only available during the jubilee. imo they really ought to make another one that is available year round or make it available during every event they do

pitshade

The scaling is permanent. Only the intro quest changes, in that after 2 weeks, you will need 40k IL to be offered the quest to go there. If you bump your IL over 40k after that point, you can complete the quest and then go below 40k again and get scaled back up.

penybont

Thanks to the new rubbish combat system doing the new add on is pointless died on second battle thanks to the enemies constant aoe attack that you can’t dodge because the lazy developers still won’t fix the issue on still getting hit when your outside the red circle on the ground that and you can only the dodge a few times before waiting for it to re charge.

milehighxr

I personally much preferred the EE/Undermountain style campaign with no weekly hauls, and especially Undermoutain with no campaign currency required to progress. That experience is much more what I am looking for in a RPG. You know much more reminiscent of the original Baldurs Gate.

I did take all my toons through the intro, I only have 2 of 5 that were over 40k when collars are equipped. My 50k pally is not nearly as fun as he was at the beginning of Undermountian. I blame the combat rework for that, and I'm quite perturbed about that, as he has the most effort and resources put into of all my toons. I figure it's gonna take 10mil ad min to make my pally great again, and I ain't fallin for it again.

My rogue at 43k is much more fun to play in the new area(actually even the older ones too). Same goes for my 39k cleric. My warlock, and my wizard, 37 and 34k respectively, are just about as much fun as my pally, maybe marginally better. And yes, I do know how to play my toons. This combat rework as really screwed me over.

The rewards are abject trash IMHO. Oh boy another worthless transmute, and after the first toon goes thru, it gold at milestone 2. At least in Undermountain every toon gets ad when the time comes. And the gating is goofy as heck. Why on earth did the devs set it up so that it take 4 weeks to get thru the last milestone? It should've been 3 weeks max, especially with all the repeat-repeat-repeat. Due to the rash rewards, and the fact the boon points are mostly worthless, I'm only gonna taking one, maybe 2 toons all the way thru the campaign. Redeemed citadel was way too much of a grind, and the rewards were only marginally better. And I only did that on 3 toons...

johnnystranger

I ran all 9 toons thru week 1 . Yea , I’ll agree , 5 gold for reaching milestone 2 on alts is very underwhelming. Hope part 2 and 3 have better rewards .
I hadn’t checked my IL to see if I was scaled , I’ll take your guys word .
Also , might swap my paladin justicar to palaheal for soloing this , 10% more damage etc according to a friend

froger

Yeah, the content isn't exactly exciting and the quests are "empty". Go kill a few of these, collect a few of those, etc. doesn't provide any immersion to the content. I've run two characters through it so far and 20 minutes isn't happening for me, and not for a lack of killing power, traveling simply takes too long. Though the great /insulting thing about the upscaling is you shouldn't have problem if your percentages are good.

jojo

i was looking forward to the New Sharandar and I have to say it was a huge let down. Most of my guildmates who had taken a break before Sharandar because they were bored, came back and are already back on a break. The area is too cramp, involves too much travelling between gates and trying to find the right enemies to kill is really annoying. I'm not sure what to expect from episode 2.

thefiresidecat

there is not much about it I like. the new campaign is a wtfbbq?? I mean, the campaign.. where are the new unlocks for weekly quests? it's really just a battlepass styled thing. oh boy 100k diamonds? I'd much rather have another weekly quest. doing a kill five witherers over and over and over and over is a hard pass for me. I did enough he's to get 100 broken diamonds... and for that you basically get (From what I can tell) a single use potion? hard pass from me. it's really really work to even log in these days. only reason I am is because trying to help build an alliance. it's rough going though.

thefiresidecat

jojo#4167 said:

i was looking forward to the New Sharandar and I have to say it was a huge let down. Most of my guildmates who had taken a break before Sharandar because they were bored, came back and are already back on a break. The area is too cramp, involves too much travelling between gates and trying to find the right enemies to kill is really annoying. I'm not sure what to expect from episode 2.

Ikr the level design is also bizarre. it's basically a reskin of helms hold it seems like with some greenery added in. hardly what i'd expect of sharandar. the old sharandar was prettier.

armadeonx

I've got 4 characters in the zone (not bothering with the other 5) and it really isn't interesting - I'm just doing the weekly cap as fast as possible then working on my other characters campaigns, doing a dungeon & skirmish and legacy quests for companion tokens. There's nothing engaging in Sharandar. I don't like the Avernus/Redeemed Citadel style progression bar - as someone said above, the Undermountain method was much better - work at your own speed without having to repeat everything a thousand times over.

johnnystranger

After doing this more and more . The aggro you draw and the distance the enemies chase you is absurd . If you’re fighting one group , soon enough it will be two and possibly 3 groups .,The knockdowns care getting ridiculous . I think because everything is crammed into this small map that too many enemies aggro all at once.

sumplkrum

With the time-gating, I keep forgetting this mod even exists.
Unless you're doing the HE grind there's no reason to be there.

plasticbat

sumplkrum#5169 said:

With the time-gating, I keep forgetting this mod even exists.
Unless you're doing the HE grind there's no reason to be there.

Boon points even though it does little.

milehighxr

johnnystranger#5900 said:

I ran all 9 toons thru week 1 . Yea , I’ll agree , 5 gold for reaching milestone 2 on alts is very underwhelming. Hope part 2 and 3 have better rewards .

I hadn’t checked my IL to see if I was scaled , I’ll take your guys word .

Also , might swap my paladin justicar to palaheal for soloing this , 10% more damage etc according to a friend

I did, and it is still slower to kill things vs before combat rework. I had a really nice pally dps/tank hybrid for soloing, and by the time the combat rework happened, he could one shot most mobs in all the old content(except avernus/vallenhas) with burning light, and then a smite or 2 to finish the job. Now on the healadin load out its banishment, burning light run out of divinty, and wait for recharge...

armadeonx

milehighxr#1299 said:

johnnystranger#5900 said:

I ran all 9 toons thru week 1 . Yea , I’ll agree , 5 gold for reaching milestone 2 on alts is very underwhelming. Hope part 2 and 3 have better rewards .

I hadn’t checked my IL to see if I was scaled , I’ll take your guys word .

Also , might swap my paladin justicar to palaheal for soloing this , 10% more damage etc according to a friend

I did, and it is still slower to kill things vs before combat rework. I had a really nice pally dps/tank hybrid for soloing, and by the time the combat rework happened, he could one shot most mobs in all the old content(except avernus/vallenhas) with burning light, and then a smite or 2 to finish the job. Now on the healadin load out its banishment, burning light run out of divinty, and wait for recharge...

I followed Wilbur's advice and made a full DPS version for soloing - now 2 shots of Bane (charged with Sacred Weapon) kill all adds outside of an HE (Justicar path). I slot SW/Bane/Smite so I still have a more powerful single target skill handy for those bigger wandering solo enemies in the zone.

Yes it is more expensive as you need a bunch of DPS companions at mythic but it's much less stressful, so worth it.

wilbur626

> @armadeonx said:
> I followed Wilbur's advice and made a full DPS version for soloing - now 2 shots of Bane (charged with Sacred Weapon) kill all adds outside of an HE (Justicar path). I slot SW/Bane/Smite so I still have a more powerful single target skill handy for those bigger wandering solo enemies in the zone.
>
> Yes it is more expensive as you need a bunch of DPS companions at mythic but it's much less stressful, so worth it.

I actually scrapped DPSy build and replaced it with what the professionals would call a HDPS tank. Chitters Fangs, max recharge speed increase, max deflect, Greater Everfrost set, Gonds Anvil of Creation and the fabled Mirage set. Can clear all solo content AND tank TOMM/VOS without any issues 👍

Will find a way to fit the new manticore ring in there as soon as I get it from VOS chest.

armadeonx

wilbur626 said:

> @armadeonx said:
> I followed Wilbur's advice and made a full DPS version for soloing - now 2 shots of Bane (charged with Sacred Weapon) kill all adds outside of an HE (Justicar path). I slot SW/Bane/Smite so I still have a more powerful single target skill handy for those bigger wandering solo enemies in the zone.
>
> Yes it is more expensive as you need a bunch of DPS companions at mythic but it's much less stressful, so worth it.

I actually scrapped DPSy build and replaced it with what the professionals would call a HDPS tank. Chitters Fangs, max recharge speed increase, max deflect, Greater Everfrost set, Gonds Anvil of Creation and the fabled Mirage set. Can clear all solo content AND tank TOMM/VOS without any issues 👍

Will find a way to fit the new manticore ring in there as soon as I get it from VOS chest.

ooh nice...

paulpraveen23

I ran all 9 toons thru week 1 . Yea , I’ll agree , 5 gold for reaching milestone 2 on alts is very underwhelming. Hope part 2 and 3 have better rewards .

horizonxael

this game is starting to hold me tight and I repeat they should be playing board games instead of MMO

paulpraveen23

I ran all 9 toons thru week 1 . Yea , I’ll agree , 5 gold for reaching milestone 2 on alts is very underwhelming. Hope part 2 and 3 have better rewards .
https://get-mobdro.com/home

penybont

Load of garbage thanks too the character changes that makes you character weak and enemies over powered. Can’t even get past the first area thanks to the trashy programmers that ruined the game.