lol chemjeff we do egwd in under 10 min without tank i dont know where this is nearly a challenge
Congratulations! I'd say you are probably in the top 5%-10% of the players. I would reckon most players can't finish this dungeon at all, let alone finish it in 10 minutes.
Now, be honest. How many times have you done eGWD, as compared to, say, eTOS or CN?
Furthermore, suppose there was a new, harder dungeon, that was optional, that gave rewards that were the same or only marginally better than eGWD. Would you do this new dungeon, which might be very long and take hours, even for a good player such as yourself? Or would you do eGWD, which you know you can finish in 10 minutes? Sure you might do the new dungeon a few times, just for the sake of accomplishment. But when it comes to the effort/reward ratio, your time would be better spent in eGWD, collecting the rewards that are almost as good as the ones in the new dungeon.
The history of this game has demonstrated that players tend to be motivated by the rewards, rather than the challenge of the dungeon; and that players will tend to take the path of least resistance.
I don't want the devs to devote huge resources to content that only maybe 5% of the players can possibly take advantage of. If they are going to make super-hard dungeons, I would like them to be necessary for progression. The top 5% would be able to beat them right away, average players like myself would have to really struggle and work at it to be successful at it, but everyone eventually would have to go there and then beat the dungeon in order to make progress.
Your attitude is straight up what's wrong with this game. Why do you hate so much on the top players? What happens when you eventually rise to their level? Do you really want to have NOTHING to do after the hard work and effort getting there?!
And no, I really don't want to see progression gated behind passing the toughest content. It's far too limiting for the developers to accommodate for everyone and far too frustrating for the average player.
I don't hate top players. I just don't think dev resources should be devoted *disproportionately* to catering to a relatively small audience, when the patterns of the past have indicated that players, even top players, will tend to take the path of least resistance.
I don't hate top players. I just don't think dev resources should be devoted *disproportionately* to catering to a relatively small audience, when the patterns of the past have indicated that players, even top players, will tend to take the path of least resistance.
You just don't realise how much you hate them with the attitude you adopt. ATM 0.00% of dev resources are spent catering to top PVE-ers. That's also disproportionate.
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tripsofthrymrMember, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,624Community Moderator
I don't hate top players. I just don't think dev resources should be devoted *disproportionately* to catering to a relatively small audience, when the patterns of the past have indicated that players, even top players, will tend to take the path of least resistance.
Every MMO has power creep. The current top content should be challenging for the current best players. As we have seen "best" can be a combination of gear and skill. More skill, you can win with less gear.
When the next module comes out, there will be power creep. The former top content becomes more accessible to players with less gear and/or skill. No effort was "disproportionately" wasted, but rather some players will need to wait longer before they can best that content.
Having said all that, any member of my alliance or any member of NW_Legit_Community with the item level to queue for given content will find a group they can complete it with. I suppose the same is true for many other alliances (and NW_Legit_Community is open to everyone).
Believe it or not, not for rewards, just for the fun because for me it has a nice design, and it could be still challenging if we were not running with our mainchars. We don't use shortcuts in eTOS for example, we like to full clear a dungeon, we are not interested in speedruns,back when the skillnotes could have even Rank 5 enchant, we took them, we looted every chest in an dungeon. We have our little running gags in dungeons aswell. A DC from us activate every mimic he could find, saying "Oooops i did a little mistake, hehehehe" Another mate is planting a pinata every time in ECC at the same place saying "I really don't know how this could happen." Yeah there are still people out there having a good time together, running a dungeon.
And again and again and again:
We know how hard it could be for "casuals", for random groups to finish Kessels Return, finish an T1 not to mention T2, demo or edemo, Tiamat and so on. WE F***** KNOW IT.
I can't count how often we failed in eLOL, VT, eTOS at the beginning from Mod 6, but we are more or less long time players ( I have for example the "Caturday Survivor" Title on my Mainchar), i could easily remember back the days in old dungeons like Spellplague wich costs us more than 3 or 4 hours! only to reach the Endboss without having a success at the end. So we are wipe resistant, we don't gave up, we changed our "group tactic", we tried to do as much crowd control a group could afford, so our TR's were always a little bit ahead, bc they could do a safe initial stun to an add group, and so all of us could more or less easily kill add group for add group. Then these "dr bug" was fixed, so it was a little bit easier and then we noticed that we are able to test some things, DC had overheal, so they could change from the virtous to the righteous path, most of our CW changed from spell Thaum to spell Ren or Mof Ren and we noticed that these buff/debuff thing could be very interesting, more successfull than a pure dps group.
At the time active companios/Bondings becomes more and more useful we were not only using fast procc Companions, we were trying out Companios with buff/debuff potential aswell.
And here we are actually a small guild with more or less 20 active players with allies that share our opinions aswell but able to do every content, because we worked for it and we have still fun to do that. And this is something noone could take us away and we are dammed proud of it to be like we are period
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lantern22Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,111Arc User
I don't hate top players. I just don't think dev resources should be devoted *disproportionately* to catering to a relatively small audience, when the patterns of the past have indicated that players, even top players, will tend to take the path of least resistance.
You just don't realise how much you hate them with the attitude you adopt. ATM 0.00% of dev resources are spent catering to top PVE-ers. That's also disproportionate.
The game needs more (i.e. new) end game content that is hard. At the moment there is none, so Hav0clol is 100% correct, for the last 4 Mods or so there has been 0% of Dev resources going toward this. Actually at the moment it seems that most of the Dev resources are focused on bringing in new Power Creep to make everything easy and resulting in a need to nerf certain classes.
Having said that, I don't think chemjeff is hating on the top players, rather the title of this thread seems to imply that all dungeons need to be made harder, which will affect the "not so well geared" players and chem is probably reacting to that. We don't need old stuff made harder, we need new stuff blah blah blah
so Hav0clol is 100% correct, for the last 4 Mods or so there has been 0% of Dev resources going toward this. Actually at the moment it seems that most of the Dev resources are focused on bringing in new Power Creep to make everything easy and resulting in a need to nerf certain classes.
Having said that, I don't think chemjeff is hating on the top players, rather the title of this thread seems to imply that all dungeons need to be made harder, which will affect the "not so well geared" players and chem is probably reacting to that. We don't need old stuff made harder, we need new stuff blah blah blah
That's not it exactly. What I don't want to see is scarce dev resources devoted to constructing this awesome new dungeon, that sits empty because nobody runs it, because it's too hard for the rewards that it gives.
Look at what happened at Mod 6. When there were three T2 dungeons which gave equivalent rewards, what did most players end up doing? They did the easiest one (eTOS), or they glitched eCC. Almost no one did eGWD. Why? Because it wasn't worth the effort based on the rewards that it offered. Why struggle with eGWD, when you can have a comparatively easier time with eTOS and get the same rewards in the end? That is what will happen if there is some *optional* super-hard dungeon. It will sit empty most of the time.
Now I don't object to harder dungeons. I just think they should be tied to progression, so that the devs' work doesn't get wasted.
They should make a dungeon that is so hard that you need a fully coordiated 4k party to do it, just to prevent free rides. Then they should put a 100% chance to win a 100% cool fashion item from defeating it, or a good looking title. Then it would be a lot easier to choose who to bring in our speed runs if we are missing one person.
With dreams to be a king, first one should be a man.
so Hav0clol is 100% correct, for the last 4 Mods or so there has been 0% of Dev resources going toward this. Actually at the moment it seems that most of the Dev resources are focused on bringing in new Power Creep to make everything easy and resulting in a need to nerf certain classes.
Having said that, I don't think chemjeff is hating on the top players, rather the title of this thread seems to imply that all dungeons need to be made harder, which will affect the "not so well geared" players and chem is probably reacting to that. We don't need old stuff made harder, we need new stuff blah blah blah
That's not it exactly. What I don't want to see is scarce dev resources devoted to constructing this awesome new dungeon, that sits empty because nobody runs it, because it's too hard for the rewards that it gives.
Look at what happened at Mod 6. When there were three T2 dungeons which gave equivalent rewards, what did most players end up doing? They did the easiest one (eTOS), or they glitched eCC. Almost no one did eGWD. Why? Because it wasn't worth the effort based on the rewards that it offered. Why struggle with eGWD, when you can have a comparatively easier time with eTOS and get the same rewards in the end? That is what will happen if there is some *optional* super-hard dungeon. It will sit empty most of the time.
Now I don't object to harder dungeons. I just think they should be tied to progression, so that the devs' work doesn't get wasted.
Well I agree that if the reward per time spent running the dungeon isn't better than say CN, most people (who are still gearing up anyway) will run the dungeon that gives the greatest reward.
But does that mean there shouldn't be something challenging for 3K, 3.5K or even 4K parties? Shouldn't we all have something more to aim for?
There is heaps of stuff for ppl under 3K (forgive me the generalisation).
I think there are plenty of people who would say, based on the progression and power creep, that we are overdue for some harder content. CN came out and within one week, there was a video of someone soloing it.
Anyway, I think I agree with a fair bit of what you've been saying, just not the bit about the need for harder stuff.
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lantern22Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,111Arc User
They should make a dungeon that is so hard that you need a fully coordiated 4k party to do it, just to prevent free rides. Then they should put a 100% chance to win a 100% cool fashion item from defeating it, or a good looking title. Then it would be a lot easier to choose who to bring in our speed runs if we are missing one person.
I bet that regardless of how hard the new content is, within 1 month there will be a GWF soloing it
Not if they made it so that it would require a full 4k party to complete it.
There is absolutely no pride in doing the dungeons we have today. You can solo q in with a bot and do nothing but to walk to the chest. It is easy for two or three players to clean the mobs, even from solo q.
The hardest dungeon we have today is elol, and that is only because some people have problems jumping across the lava.
The only way we can make them challenging is by trying to do them in the shortest time, or like we just saw in the video.
Post edited by voidgift on
With dreams to be a king, first one should be a man.
I don't hate top players. I just don't think dev resources should be devoted *disproportionately* to catering to a relatively small audience, when the patterns of the past have indicated that players, even top players, will tend to take the path of least resistance.
You just don't realise how much you hate them with the attitude you adopt. ATM 0.00% of dev resources are spent catering to top PVE-ers. That's also disproportionate.
But relatively normal for many MMOs. The percentage is actually much less than 5%. I don't remember the exact figures, but a dev from a game I used to play was asked some questions about why there was very little challenging for top PVEers to do.
That game encouraged alting more than this one so is not directly comparable, but he said that a much smaller fraction of players than I expected even had a maximum level character and a small fraction of those were fully tricked out. I can't remember how many zeroes there were after the decimal point in the 0.0...%. Thus they spent their limited resources where they'd be most used.
What the top players often fail to appreciate is that their ability to essentially beat the game, ruins it for people struggling with their first 70 with blue gear and no guild boons, who finds that the nerfs brought on to keep the top players in check make the game borderline unplayable for them.
I decided to try to make several nice characters rather than one supreme one so top out at about 3.6K but I have several at 3.2-3.6 rather than going for the one 4.2, but I was levelling/gearing a new one and at 2K without guild boons I was unable to solo quite a lot of trash. Now 3K+ with an extra 5K power and def from guild, he's a monster, but getting there would have been horrible without stuff from my other 70s.
The hardest dungeon we have today is elol, and that is only because some people have problems jumping across the lava.
You really think eLoL is harder than eCC? Considering I've waltzed through eLoL then with the same team wiped repeated on eCC, I'd have to disagree with you on this one. Not saying eCC is particularly hard - if you have a team of 3k+ it's not - but with a team with a less than 2.5k average, eCC can be a real challenge, much more so than eLoL - which is why eCC is a T2 dungeon and eLoL is a T1.
They should make a dungeon that is so hard that you need a fully coordinated 4k party to do it, just to prevent free rides. Then they should put a 100% chance to win a 100% cool fashion item from defeating it, or a good looking title. Then it would be a lot easier to choose who to bring in our speed runs if we are missing one person.
I was lmao when I first read this post, but then after reading your next post I sobered up a bit because it looks like you are serious.
Man I must be a horrible player--I actually feel challenged by the end game dungeons. I do find the lava path a 'challenge', but personally I find eTOS a bit more challenging than eLOL.
I understand though, that those dungeons represent a degree of difficulty to top tier players as a normal TOS does to me--and that is boring. After a while, even the promise of 4K+ RAD is not a reason to run a dungeon. In the real D&D, no GM would keep throwing dungeons populated with kobolds at 20th level characters--they would hang up their armor and burn their spellbooks after a dozen of those 'adventures'.
I really want the devs to work on some nice, tough endgame dungeons (crawls, not HE style) for the top tier players for several reasons--it keeps the best players interested in the game, and their techniques/styles/etc. flow down to lower tier players and help us learn how to play more effectively. It mitigates some of the power creep, giving those with insane toon powers a place that challenges their skills, and it provides a goal for lower tier players to strive to achieve.
I hope the new content has that type of dungeon. I also hope they don't do a 'MOD 6' to create it. Leave the current dungeons alone--create the next level that challenges the top tier. Make rooms that cause your pet to 'disappear' behind walls, cutting off their benefits. Create traps that separate parties, not just injure a player. Use dopplegangers to mimic party members. Have giants or large creatures move faster with less telegraphing moves. You know--typical, good GM practices that create challenges for players and make them think rather than button mash.
I hope the new content has that type of dungeon. I also hope they don't do a 'MOD 6' to create it. Leave the current dungeons alone--create the next level that challenges the top tier. Make rooms that cause your pet to 'disappear' behind walls, cutting off their benefits. Create traps that separate parties, not just injure a player. Use dopplegangers to mimic party members. Have giants or large creatures move faster with less telegraphing moves. You know--typical, good GM practices that create challenges for players and make them think rather than button mash.
+1 to this.
And, to ensure a certain GWF doesn't post a video showing how to solo the new DD within a week - make these dungeons actually require active participation from start to finish of a whole team. Tiamat for example.... 5 spots that need to be defended at the same time in areas far enough apart that you can't do it solo. I realize there's a spot in the new CN sort of like that, but it's not required that they be done at the same time - it should be or the run should simple FAIL. boom. Start Over.
The most important factor is randomization. Not a few canned things that might happen, but actual randomization. I know the tech doesn't exist for this - but dang it Cryptic ( @asterdahl ) , invent it! You know, just pull it out of your magic hat of infinite time and resources... chop chop! Such hats exist, my lead developer keeps one on his desk, it looks like this ---->
The ability to add TRUE randomization to instance-based content would be the single most important advancement you could possible make. Once that tech is in place, you can start rolling it into things all over the game. True randomized content has the capacity to obviate bot activity in DDs/Lairs completely - if the lair cannot be mapped because it's truly unpredictable, not only does that represent the notion of replayable (which last mod you said was a big part of M9, but nothing in M9 was anything but simply repeatable despite the bold words) it also means every run represents a new/different challenge. Over will be the days of running a DD with your eyes closed because there just may be an insta-kill pit trap where last time was a treasure chest, or this time, the DD is infested with wererats down a tunnel that wasn't even there before...... etc etc etc....
When I think Cryptic, I simply cant think hardcore games. I can say right now that mod 10 will be easy to the elites. It wont require more then 3000il. It wont provide the challenge they dream of.
How many more times can people willingly set themselves up for disappointment? According to the elites Tiamat isnt hard. Yet Cryptic proudly touted it as thier most difficult content, at the time. Castle Never and Epic Demogorgon also disappointed and also have been proudly proclaimed by Cryptic as most difficult content.
There is a clear pattern here. The increase in item level between new top end content and old is minor. Tiny incremental increases rather then 'go for broke' leaps.
I know, the typical rebuttal is "Well they still should try, the top percent needs content." I have to then wonder how they expect that to ever happen. Cryptic has never shown the ability or desire to do so. They have never been able to satisfy the top level players. The few times they have come somewhat close has been accidental, mostly due to glitches and bugs. Even when players asked or begged to keep the bugged difficulty, Cryptic has always refused and fixed it anyhow. I dont know of a more profound, if unspoken, statement a company can offer.
They should make a dungeon that is so hard that you need a fully coordinated 4k party to do it, just to prevent free rides. Then they should put a 100% chance to win a 100% cool fashion item from defeating it, or a good looking title. Then it would be a lot easier to choose who to bring in our speed runs if we are missing one person.
I was lmao when I first read this post, but then after reading your next post I sobered up a bit because it looks like you are serious.
Man I must be a horrible player--I actually feel challenged by the end game dungeons. I do find the lava path a 'challenge', but personally I find eTOS a bit more challenging than eLOL.
I understand though, that those dungeons represent a degree of difficulty to top tier players as a normal TOS does to me--and that is boring. After a while, even the promise of 4K+ RAD is not a reason to run a dungeon. In the real D&D, no GM would keep throwing dungeons populated with kobolds at 20th level characters--they would hang up their armor and burn their spellbooks after a dozen of those 'adventures'.
I really want the devs to work on some nice, tough endgame dungeons (crawls, not HE style) for the top tier players for several reasons--it keeps the best players interested in the game, and their techniques/styles/etc. flow down to lower tier players and help us learn how to play more effectively. It mitigates some of the power creep, giving those with insane toon powers a place that challenges their skills, and it provides a goal for lower tier players to strive to achieve.
I hope the new content has that type of dungeon. I also hope they don't do a 'MOD 6' to create it. Leave the current dungeons alone--create the next level that challenges the top tier. Make rooms that cause your pet to 'disappear' behind walls, cutting off their benefits. Create traps that separate parties, not just injure a player. Use dopplegangers to mimic party members. Have giants or large creatures move faster with less telegraphing moves. You know--typical, good GM practices that create challenges for players and make them think rather than button mash.
OK, I was a bit harsh on that last post. I'll admit it. The first one was made to be fun, so you got them both right.
Still, anyone can get a free ride through any of the dungeons. Only one you can't carry 3-4 people is through the lava, so that remains the only one you can't do 1/3 of the time with no skill.
With dreams to be a king, first one should be a man.
When I think Cryptic, I simply cant think hardcore games. I can say right now that mod 10 will be easy to the elites. It wont require more then 3000il. It wont provide the challenge they dream of.
How many more times can people willingly set themselves up for disappointment? According to the elites Tiamat isnt hard. Yet Cryptic proudly touted it as thier most difficult content, at the time. Castle Never and Epic Demogorgon also disappointed and also have been proudly proclaimed by Cryptic as most difficult content.
There is a clear pattern here. The increase in item level between new top end content and old is minor. Tiny incremental increases rather then 'go for broke' leaps.
I know, the typical rebuttal is "Well they still should try, the top percent needs content." I have to then wonder how they expect that to ever happen. Cryptic has never shown the ability or desire to do so. They have never been able to satisfy the top level players. The few times they have come somewhat close has been accidental, mostly due to glitches and bugs. Even when players asked or begged to keep the bugged difficulty, Cryptic has always refused and fixed it anyhow. I dont know of a more profound, if unspoken, statement a company can offer.
They already tried to make dungeons difficult where it required a trinity. It failed as people whined that everyone was getting 1-2 shotted. The player base here is mainly casual so they will cater to that.
greywyndMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 7,150Arc User
Tank in Orcus' face is all well and good until he has to drop his shield and run. Oh, wait, GFs CAN'T run...
I'm not looking for forgiveness, and I'm way past asking permission. Earth just lost her best defender, so we're here to fight. And if you want to stand in our way, we'll fight you too.
Still, anyone can get a free ride through any of the dungeons. Only one you can't carry 3-4 people is through the lava, so that remains the only one you can't do 1/3 of the time with no skill.
Now I understand why you said eLOL is harder--that makes sense. Dodging the green balls of death in CN might be the same if you are thinking of one high tier player carrying some low skill players. Although you can talk/lead them through CN and kill the mobs for them if you really want to carry them in that dungeon.
Well i will introduce you, and espacially for people like @aslan3775 and old eTOS run from us, back in Mod 6 with dr bug. You will see one shots, no good movement, no overpowert companions/bondings, wipes, just things many groups (guilds/premade/pug) still see, try for try every day. But what i try to explain is, if those people not giving up after 2-3 (more) trys, they will be succesful.
And @aslan3775 i mean that serious, you said you are in a small guild, i would say good for you, try to get some members more, or try to make allies with other small guilds, so that you have always a group you can run with. Don't join a big guild to become a small number or be just a donate slave for SH or just a filler if they can't get enough people for the 5th, 6th or 7th group farming CN, eLOL whatever at the same time. Believe me SH boons are NOT that necessary for the actual content, they are just a "nice to have" thing. Be brave, have the guts to try things out, stand with your guild and i am sure in a few weeks/months you could be in the same postion as some people are actually, excellent gear, good knowledge of classes, but nothing to do to prove it. I trust in you.
I know the most from you could not understand a single word in the vid, what we are talkink about, except you had German lessons at school or has German roots and your parents, grandparents teached you a little bit. So deactivate the sound, search for your favorite music and enjoy a "normal" run.
I know that most of you could not understand a single word in the vid, what we are talking about, except if you had German lessons at school or have German roots and your parents or grandparents taught you a little bit. So deactivate the sound, search for your favorite music and enjoy a "normal" run.
Thank you for saving the video all this time and posting it. It is refreshing to see parties have to pause before each group in this dungeon, gather their spells, and attack as a group to survive.
And yes--your English is much better than my German.
I agree with with wurmschwanz....and thanks for sharing:) I also agree with lots of good ideas for better dungeon experiences - like Kvet´s and others... Also agree with Hav0clol on his objections concerning making higher tier dungeon rewards necessary for toon progression and I have even more concerns about that. Why on earth would one want to introduce even more power creep unless one is on a mission with a goal to find out whether it is possible to turn both pve and pvp into even more of a farce? Why more boons and more powerful equipment? Why-.-? It is possible -theoretically- to introduce new items (and boons of a different kind...titles...special rewards with fun or convenience factor etc.) that offer variety...specialization...and not just MOAR power... It´s already bad enough....just one grossly overpowered toon in a dungeoneering group can stomp down and ignore any mechanics of a dungeon even in a pug-run...it´s only ever going to get worse if the power differential between new Lvl. 70 toons and older ones is increased. I´m not an "elite" player in any way (highest IL is on my lil cw with 2.7k). But still I´ve complained ever since my three little toons reached 2.5k IL that:
a. from that point on toon progression becomes absolutely tedious - the latest nonsense being the "bot fight", the one before that was taking coal. wards out of the tamarlune shop. I don´t really see any indication (yet) that there was some serious effort to alleviate the consequences of that... b. nothing in PVE made me feel like this progression was necessary in any way (and PVP is nonsense anyways due to the huge power differentials unless they at least introduce some dynamic bracketing (no fixed brackets - just (adjustable) max IL difference of toons in any match)
Not a very clever combination, that.
So yes, more challenging dungeons are needed (also in terms of mechanics as wurmschwanz´ video has shown) but if those dungeons are accessible to 3k and then 3.5k and 4k IL toons (and why not? If toons are allowed to become so powerful then the game should offer them something to do, plus then they´d haunt content that is to easy for them less frequently) then new players have to be given a -realistic- chance to get there...not overnight...but within a more reasonable timeframe than right now.
And why wouldn´t players do them - IF they can do, for example, either 4 elols or one more challenging dungeon on average within the same time (after the first fun pains of mastering it) and for the same rewards? (the latter one giving 4x more ad and an increased (though still infinitesimal...:P) chance at winning a very valuable item? Because reasons? Because players are all braindead zombie-bots who hate fun? Hardly.
And since I almost exclusively pug everything (I need to stop doing that and get to know my guildmates at some point who I´m sure are very nice people :P)I of course have seen the chicken tank in cn. Hilarious. One show in particular almost made me fall off the chair laughing. But I had a feeling that that´s over now since tanks have learned how to muster up the courage to do this...;) And the lava-hopping left path definitely makes elol the most challenging dungeon. The fun rage-quits, players with evil intentions using the power to speed up other toons with the worst timing - not to help them but to see them miscalculate the jump and get deep-fried...it´s probably why you sometimes log in to a party at the scorpions...;)
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vinceent1Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,264Arc User
ye, elol is best dung by far. you can see amazing things there. lowbies deaths and resulting heroic gameplay of experienced players to finish the boss. every boss is different and has his challenge, jumping is challenging when you have higher ping. I wish to see more like that. maybe even transcendent version of it.
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silverkeltMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,235Arc User
if it wasnt for the fact Ive run like o.. thousands of elols, I would agree with you, it actually was well made when it was released.. However.. that was mod 4..
The sad truth of this game, is A. they dont release nearly enough dungeon content and B. when they do its only one at a time, so we all get tired of it rather quickly.
Because they only release 1 at a time, they also want you to run it 1000+ times a mod.. which again.. you know gets boring.
They need to dedicate themselves to doing 3-4 new dungeons at a time and have valid reasons to run them. It doesnt always have to be about power creep, but if a hard dungeon gave you like 10 r6s to finish ? well darn, that is a good way to get alts thier artifacts rp.. 10 runs = a stack.. sign me up!
If its hard enough bots cant do it.. dungeons that are hard, that give you stuff that bots cant do.. is good.
This way there is a great reason to run the dungeon, but its not just about more stats.
But just making us run 1000 krs.. or 10000 heralds or whatever.. jeebus creepers its hard to not close your eyes while your doing something for the 1000x time, and still not get what you need out of it.
They need to spend an entire mod's worth of effort making QoL and underlying systems improvements, and included an entire epic for a randomization system and roll-out to existing instance content.
Clearly, they strive for new content every 3 months, and I can see why, but at some point you MUST innovate your platform or the game simply wears itself out. If your foundation is crumbling away, a new paint job will not keep a house standing.
wurmschwanzMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 35Arc User
What I don't understand: They know how to do nice dungeons. They have the data of the old dungeons. FH or PK are mostly the same as they were before Mod 6. They could rearrange the hp, dmg etc. in a normal patch when everyone was whining in Mod 6 because it was too hard. So they could easily take the old dungeons, make them for level 70 and we would get our beloved old dungeons back. I don't get why they won't do this because they said they don't have the ressources. I think this way they would save up ressources.
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revan06100Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 205Arc User
What I don't understand: They know how to do nice dungeons. They have the data of the old dungeons. FH or PK are mostly the same as they were before Mod 6. They could rearrange the hp, dmg etc. in a normal patch when everyone was whining in Mod 6 because it was too hard. So they could easily take the old dungeons, make them for level 70 and we would get our beloved old dungeons back. I don't get why they won't do this because they said they don't have the ressources. I think this way they would save up ressources.
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And no, I really don't want to see progression gated behind passing the toughest content. It's far too limiting for the developers to accommodate for everyone and far too frustrating for the average player.
When the next module comes out, there will be power creep. The former top content becomes more accessible to players with less gear and/or skill. No effort was "disproportionately" wasted, but rather some players will need to wait longer before they can best that content.
Having said all that, any member of my alliance or any member of NW_Legit_Community with the item level to queue for given content will find a group they can complete it with. I suppose the same is true for many other alliances (and NW_Legit_Community is open to everyone).
Sci-fi author: The Gods We Make, The Gods We Seek, and Ji-min
Believe it or not, not for rewards, just for the fun because for me it has a nice design, and it could be still challenging if we were not running with our mainchars.
We don't use shortcuts in eTOS for example, we like to full clear a dungeon, we are not interested in speedruns,back when the skillnotes could have even Rank 5 enchant, we took them, we looted every chest in an dungeon.
We have our little running gags in dungeons aswell.
A DC from us activate every mimic he could find, saying "Oooops i did a little mistake, hehehehe"
Another mate is planting a pinata every time in ECC at the same place saying "I really don't know how this could happen."
Yeah there are still people out there having a good time together, running a dungeon.
And again and again and again:
We know how hard it could be for "casuals", for random groups to finish Kessels Return, finish an T1 not to mention T2, demo or edemo, Tiamat and so on.
WE F***** KNOW IT.
I can't count how often we failed in eLOL, VT, eTOS at the beginning from Mod 6, but we are more or less long time players ( I have for example the "Caturday Survivor" Title on my Mainchar), i could easily remember back the days in old dungeons like Spellplague wich costs us more than 3 or 4 hours! only to reach the Endboss without having a success at the end.
So we are wipe resistant, we don't gave up, we changed our "group tactic", we tried to do as much crowd control a group could afford, so our TR's were always a little bit ahead, bc they could do a safe initial stun to an add group, and so all of us could more or less easily kill add group for add group.
Then these "dr bug" was fixed, so it was a little bit easier and then we noticed that we are able to test some things, DC had overheal, so they could change from the virtous to the righteous path, most of our CW changed from spell Thaum to spell Ren or Mof Ren and we noticed that these buff/debuff thing could be very interesting, more successfull than a pure dps group.
At the time active companios/Bondings becomes more and more useful we were not only using fast procc Companions, we were trying out Companios with buff/debuff potential aswell.
And here we are actually a small guild with more or less 20 active players with allies that share our opinions aswell but able to do every content, because we worked for it and we have still fun to do that.
And this is something noone could take us away and we are dammed proud of it to be like we are period
The game needs more (i.e. new) end game content that is hard. At the moment there is none, so Hav0clol is 100% correct, for the last 4 Mods or so there has been 0% of Dev resources going toward this. Actually at the moment it seems that most of the Dev resources are focused on bringing in new Power Creep to make everything easy and resulting in a need to nerf certain classes.
Having said that, I don't think chemjeff is hating on the top players, rather the title of this thread seems to imply that all dungeons need to be made harder, which will affect the "not so well geared" players and chem is probably reacting to that. We don't need old stuff made harder, we need new stuff blah blah blah
Look at what happened at Mod 6. When there were three T2 dungeons which gave equivalent rewards, what did most players end up doing? They did the easiest one (eTOS), or they glitched eCC. Almost no one did eGWD. Why? Because it wasn't worth the effort based on the rewards that it offered. Why struggle with eGWD, when you can have a comparatively easier time with eTOS and get the same rewards in the end? That is what will happen if there is some *optional* super-hard dungeon. It will sit empty most of the time.
Now I don't object to harder dungeons. I just think they should be tied to progression, so that the devs' work doesn't get wasted.
Rise to POWER with <House of Power>.
The Exterminator - (NW-DLNXF3BGG)
But does that mean there shouldn't be something challenging for 3K, 3.5K or even 4K parties? Shouldn't we all have something more to aim for?
There is heaps of stuff for ppl under 3K (forgive me the generalisation).
I think there are plenty of people who would say, based on the progression and power creep, that we are overdue for some harder content. CN came out and within one week, there was a video of someone soloing it.
Anyway, I think I agree with a fair bit of what you've been saying, just not the bit about the need for harder stuff.
There is absolutely no pride in doing the dungeons we have today. You can solo q in with a bot and do nothing but to walk to the chest. It is easy for two or three players to clean the mobs, even from solo q.
The hardest dungeon we have today is elol, and that is only because some people have problems jumping across the lava.
The only way we can make them challenging is by trying to do them in the shortest time, or like we just saw in the video.
Rise to POWER with <House of Power>.
The Exterminator - (NW-DLNXF3BGG)
That game encouraged alting more than this one so is not directly comparable, but he said that a much smaller fraction of players than I expected even had a maximum level character and a small fraction of those were fully tricked out. I can't remember how many zeroes there were after the decimal point in the 0.0...%. Thus they spent their limited resources where they'd be most used.
What the top players often fail to appreciate is that their ability to essentially beat the game, ruins it for people struggling with their first 70 with blue gear and no guild boons, who finds that the nerfs brought on to keep the top players in check make the game borderline unplayable for them.
I decided to try to make several nice characters rather than one supreme one so top out at about 3.6K but I have several at 3.2-3.6 rather than going for the one 4.2, but I was levelling/gearing a new one and at 2K without guild boons I was unable to solo quite a lot of trash. Now 3K+ with an extra 5K power and def from guild, he's a monster, but getting there would have been horrible without stuff from my other 70s.
Sekhmet@kvetchus_
Guilds: Greycloaks, Blackcloaks, Whitecloaks, Goldcloaks, Browncloaks, Spiritcloaks, Bluecloaks, Silvercloaks, Black Dawn
Tredecim: The Cloak Alliance
Man I must be a horrible player--I actually feel challenged by the end game dungeons. I do find the lava path a 'challenge', but personally I find eTOS a bit more challenging than eLOL.
I understand though, that those dungeons represent a degree of difficulty to top tier players as a normal TOS does to me--and that is boring. After a while, even the promise of 4K+ RAD is not a reason to run a dungeon. In the real D&D, no GM would keep throwing dungeons populated with kobolds at 20th level characters--they would hang up their armor and burn their spellbooks after a dozen of those 'adventures'.
I really want the devs to work on some nice, tough endgame dungeons (crawls, not HE style) for the top tier players for several reasons--it keeps the best players interested in the game, and their techniques/styles/etc. flow down to lower tier players and help us learn how to play more effectively. It mitigates some of the power creep, giving those with insane toon powers a place that challenges their skills, and it provides a goal for lower tier players to strive to achieve.
I hope the new content has that type of dungeon. I also hope they don't do a 'MOD 6' to create it. Leave the current dungeons alone--create the next level that challenges the top tier. Make rooms that cause your pet to 'disappear' behind walls, cutting off their benefits. Create traps that separate parties, not just injure a player. Use dopplegangers to mimic party members. Have giants or large creatures move faster with less telegraphing moves. You know--typical, good GM practices that create challenges for players and make them think rather than button mash.
And, to ensure a certain GWF doesn't post a video showing how to solo the new DD within a week - make these dungeons actually require active participation from start to finish of a whole team. Tiamat for example.... 5 spots that need to be defended at the same time in areas far enough apart that you can't do it solo. I realize there's a spot in the new CN sort of like that, but it's not required that they be done at the same time - it should be or the run should simple FAIL. boom. Start Over.
The most important factor is randomization. Not a few canned things that might happen, but actual randomization. I know the tech doesn't exist for this - but dang it Cryptic ( @asterdahl ) , invent it! You know, just pull it out of your magic hat of infinite time and resources... chop chop! Such hats exist, my lead developer keeps one on his desk, it looks like this ---->
The ability to add TRUE randomization to instance-based content would be the single most important advancement you could possible make. Once that tech is in place, you can start rolling it into things all over the game. True randomized content has the capacity to obviate bot activity in DDs/Lairs completely - if the lair cannot be mapped because it's truly unpredictable, not only does that represent the notion of replayable (which last mod you said was a big part of M9, but nothing in M9 was anything but simply repeatable despite the bold words) it also means every run represents a new/different challenge. Over will be the days of running a DD with your eyes closed because there just may be an insta-kill pit trap where last time was a treasure chest, or this time, the DD is infested with wererats down a tunnel that wasn't even there before...... etc etc etc....
Sekhmet@kvetchus_
Guilds: Greycloaks, Blackcloaks, Whitecloaks, Goldcloaks, Browncloaks, Spiritcloaks, Bluecloaks, Silvercloaks, Black Dawn
Tredecim: The Cloak Alliance
How many more times can people willingly set themselves up for disappointment? According to the elites Tiamat isnt hard. Yet Cryptic proudly touted it as thier most difficult content, at the time. Castle Never and Epic Demogorgon also disappointed and also have been proudly proclaimed by Cryptic as most difficult content.
There is a clear pattern here. The increase in item level between new top end content and old is minor. Tiny incremental increases rather then 'go for broke' leaps.
I know, the typical rebuttal is "Well they still should try, the top percent needs content." I have to then wonder how they expect that to ever happen. Cryptic has never shown the ability or desire to do so. They have never been able to satisfy the top level players. The few times they have come somewhat close has been accidental, mostly due to glitches and bugs. Even when players asked or begged to keep the bugged difficulty, Cryptic has always refused and fixed it anyhow. I dont know of a more profound, if unspoken, statement a company can offer.
Still, anyone can get a free ride through any of the dungeons. Only one you can't carry 3-4 people is through the lava, so that remains the only one you can't do 1/3 of the time with no skill.
Rise to POWER with <House of Power>.
The Exterminator - (NW-DLNXF3BGG)
You will see one shots, no good movement, no overpowert companions/bondings, wipes, just things many groups (guilds/premade/pug) still see, try for try every day.
But what i try to explain is, if those people not giving up after 2-3 (more) trys, they will be succesful.
And @aslan3775 i mean that serious, you said you are in a small guild, i would say good for you, try to get some members more, or try to make allies with other small guilds, so that you have always a group you can run with.
Don't join a big guild to become a small number or be just a donate slave for SH or just a filler if they can't get enough people for the 5th, 6th or 7th group farming CN, eLOL whatever at the same time.
Believe me SH boons are NOT that necessary for the actual content, they are just a "nice to have" thing.
Be brave, have the guts to try things out, stand with your guild and i am sure in a few weeks/months you could be in the same postion as some people are actually, excellent gear, good knowledge of classes, but nothing to do to prove it.
I trust in you.
I know the most from you could not understand a single word in the vid, what we are talkink about, except you had German lessons at school or has German roots and your parents, grandparents teached you a little bit.
So deactivate the sound, search for your favorite music and enjoy a "normal" run.
Have fun
And yes--your English is much better than my German.
I also agree with lots of good ideas for better dungeon experiences - like Kvet´s and others...
Also agree with Hav0clol on his objections concerning making higher tier dungeon rewards necessary for toon progression and I have even more concerns about that.
Why on earth would one want to introduce even more power creep unless one is on a mission with a goal to find out whether it is possible to turn both pve and pvp into even more of a farce? Why more boons and more powerful equipment? Why-.-? It is possible -theoretically- to introduce new items (and boons of a different kind...titles...special rewards with fun or convenience factor etc.) that offer variety...specialization...and not just MOAR power...
It´s already bad enough....just one grossly overpowered toon in a dungeoneering group can stomp down and ignore any mechanics of a dungeon even in a pug-run...it´s only ever going to get worse if the power differential between new Lvl. 70 toons and older ones is increased.
I´m not an "elite" player in any way (highest IL is on my lil cw with 2.7k). But still I´ve complained ever since my three little toons reached 2.5k IL that:
a. from that point on toon progression becomes absolutely tedious - the latest nonsense being the "bot fight", the one before that was taking coal. wards out of the tamarlune shop. I don´t really see any indication (yet) that there was some serious effort to alleviate the consequences of that...
b. nothing in PVE made me feel like this progression was necessary in any way (and PVP is nonsense anyways due to the huge power differentials unless they at least introduce some dynamic bracketing (no fixed brackets - just (adjustable) max IL difference of toons in any match)
Not a very clever combination, that.
So yes, more challenging dungeons are needed (also in terms of mechanics as wurmschwanz´ video has shown) but if those dungeons are accessible to 3k and then 3.5k and 4k IL toons (and why not? If toons are allowed to become so powerful then the game should offer them something to do, plus then they´d haunt content that is to easy for them less frequently) then new players have to be given a -realistic- chance to get there...not overnight...but within a more reasonable timeframe than right now.
And why wouldn´t players do them - IF they can do, for example, either 4 elols or one more challenging dungeon on average within the same time (after the first fun pains of mastering it) and for the same rewards? (the latter one giving 4x more ad and an increased (though still infinitesimal...:P) chance at winning a very valuable item? Because reasons? Because players are all braindead zombie-bots who hate fun? Hardly.
And since I almost exclusively pug everything (I need to stop doing that and get to know my guildmates at some point who I´m sure are very nice people :P)I of course have seen the chicken tank in cn. Hilarious. One show in particular almost made me fall off the chair laughing. But I had a feeling that that´s over now since tanks have learned how to muster up the courage to do this...;)
And the lava-hopping left path definitely makes elol the most challenging dungeon. The fun rage-quits, players with evil intentions using the power to speed up other toons with the worst timing - not to help them but to see them miscalculate the jump and get deep-fried...it´s probably why you sometimes log in to a party at the scorpions...;)
The sad truth of this game, is A. they dont release nearly enough dungeon content and B. when they do its only one at a time, so we all get tired of it rather quickly.
Because they only release 1 at a time, they also want you to run it 1000+ times a mod.. which again.. you know gets boring.
They need to dedicate themselves to doing 3-4 new dungeons at a time and have valid reasons to run them. It doesnt always have to be about power creep, but if a hard dungeon gave you like 10 r6s to finish ? well darn, that is a good way to get alts thier artifacts rp.. 10 runs = a stack.. sign me up!
If its hard enough bots cant do it.. dungeons that are hard, that give you stuff that bots cant do.. is good.
This way there is a great reason to run the dungeon, but its not just about more stats.
But just making us run 1000 krs.. or 10000 heralds or whatever.. jeebus creepers its hard to not close your eyes while your doing something for the 1000x time, and still not get what you need out of it.
Clearly, they strive for new content every 3 months, and I can see why, but at some point you MUST innovate your platform or the game simply wears itself out. If your foundation is crumbling away, a new paint job will not keep a house standing.
Sekhmet@kvetchus_
Guilds: Greycloaks, Blackcloaks, Whitecloaks, Goldcloaks, Browncloaks, Spiritcloaks, Bluecloaks, Silvercloaks, Black Dawn
Tredecim: The Cloak Alliance