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BOSSES what do they look like to you (help the devs out on what we want bosses to be)
apocrs1980
Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Silverstars Posts: 0 Arc User
Going to re-post this so answers are not lost in the shuffle.
Lets get our ideas up there to the Dev's they are asking for our feedback
Dev Badbotlimit asks:
Here is my vision of a Boss
A tough HP bucket that is larger than normal mobs (in most cases) and has a drop down menu of unique abilities what we can assign, weather that be at 75% /50%/25% life summon adds or gain a new ability or change ability... something that only 5 players can take on.
It should be a separate challenge all on it's own.
Nothing is better than having a Big baddie that has it's own unique mechanics for people to figure out how to bring them down and celebrate when they do.
Also since this is a 5 man encounter and only a 5 man group can bring it down... you could limit the fight to 1 per map on the budget and then have it drop blue loot since the fight would not be a walk in the park.
This thing does not need to be scripted to the environment it can behave in the exact same way the normal mobs do, basically we can take Any costume/actor and create a boss encounter out of them. I submit the broodmother costume for example.
It's a big costume and a large collision box but still navigates fine in the environment I built for her.
( you gotta admit Robobo we wasted that spider in milliseconds it's anti-climatic lol)
I would just like to take the Broodmother a step further and hit a tool tip check box that says BOSS and when I check it...BAM!! She now has a large HP bucket and a drop down that has all the telegraphed abilities in game, now I can assign a few of those abilities to my new boss creation similar in the way I assign backdrops to a map.
In addition, there is a "When HP" tool tip that I can assign to those abilities.
I want that broodmother to ROAR and the entire area quake... should scare the adventurers out of their boots.
Lets get our ideas up there to the Dev's they are asking for our feedback
Dev Badbotlimit asks:
badbotlimit wrote: »Let's keep this discussion about bosses going...
What does bosses, bosses and bosses bosses mean to you?
Depending on what it means has a huge bearing on what it means to be implemented.
Does Bosses mean tough mobs, HP buckets, things only 5+ players can take on?
Does it mean something scary like, full scripting and custom everything?
Let me say that I like the idea of bosses but i like the defined version of bosses a lot more!
Here is my vision of a Boss
A tough HP bucket that is larger than normal mobs (in most cases) and has a drop down menu of unique abilities what we can assign, weather that be at 75% /50%/25% life summon adds or gain a new ability or change ability... something that only 5 players can take on.
It should be a separate challenge all on it's own.
Nothing is better than having a Big baddie that has it's own unique mechanics for people to figure out how to bring them down and celebrate when they do.
Also since this is a 5 man encounter and only a 5 man group can bring it down... you could limit the fight to 1 per map on the budget and then have it drop blue loot since the fight would not be a walk in the park.
This thing does not need to be scripted to the environment it can behave in the exact same way the normal mobs do, basically we can take Any costume/actor and create a boss encounter out of them. I submit the broodmother costume for example.
It's a big costume and a large collision box but still navigates fine in the environment I built for her.
( you gotta admit Robobo we wasted that spider in milliseconds it's anti-climatic lol)
I would just like to take the Broodmother a step further and hit a tool tip check box that says BOSS and when I check it...BAM!! She now has a large HP bucket and a drop down that has all the telegraphed abilities in game, now I can assign a few of those abilities to my new boss creation similar in the way I assign backdrops to a map.
In addition, there is a "When HP" tool tip that I can assign to those abilities.
I want that broodmother to ROAR and the entire area quake... should scare the adventurers out of their boots.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Post edited by apocrs1980 on
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Boss hits 90% hp? Activate all traps in the room.
Fight has been going on for 30 seconds? Summon a bunch of reinforcements.
Boss hits 50% hp? Retreat to another room (teleport to place marker while staying in combat) and have the players get through a gauntlet of traps and jumping puzzle elements to get to the boss again.
Boss hits 25% hp? Half of the floor tiles on the room (that are clearly marked) disappear and open up a fall into an endless pit (kill volume).
Add sound effects at boss %hp (or time) triggers as well as enemytalk or 'raid warning' style text to make the fight memorable, as well. The usual "tis just a flesh wound!" comments could work here, or maybe some metallic clangs when the iron golem is heavily damaged. Music could also change as the fight goes on.
Getting good content to players in the Foundry - challenges and solutions
Handle: @zaphtastic
A boss is a single encounter entity that has full "Contact" controls as well as full "Encounter" controls.
The boss should have the ability to call minions based upon author defined criteria.
A boss has at least one, potentially more, special attacks that engages based upon author defined factors with a reasonable cool down timer between engagement taken into account.
Base difficulty should be able to be set in a factor of times the hard difficulty mobs.
I would love to be able to have more than one per quest, but understand that the overhead may prevent that.
When I envision a UI for boss encounters, I see something like the story tab defining the actions of the boss as a base encounter. You might have a dialog item that you drop, then a minion call, that you would define, then the boss attack, under the boss attack your actions occur at predetermined percentages of health loss, at 25% health loss, you drop another minion call or you drop a special attack, at 75% a different special or you can setup specials based upon other criteria, you can even at say 5% of health have the boss stop fighting and present a dialog, with an option to finish the final battle or run away.
That's what pops into mind immediately. I think that if you have this degree of control over a boss encounter that you could scale it to 3-5 man content pretty easily, but you also could create a very engaging solo boss encounter with lots of options. I am sure that others more talented than me could flesh something like that better.
hmm, seems I need /10char.
It seems everyone wants some kind of scripted event when certain conditions (usually hp) are met. That is only the beginning! I want mobs to give auras to their allies and foes, I want speech checks to change the difficulty or quicken the run, I want unique abilities, I want scripted events! Flexibility to the maximum!
Boss::
1; unique npc that has the life and damage abilities that would take a 5-man team with average or better gear, average or better tactic,a solid 3+ full mins of combat to defeat with a 90% chance of success.( Yes there should always be the thrill of a chance to lose)
2: unique npc that has the life and damage abilities that would take a 3-man team with average or better gear, average or better tactic,a solid 5+ full mins of combat to defeat with a 50% chance of success.( to give example of what difficulty is on average)
3: Gear drops should NOT be better then same level official dungeons.
4; 1-2 players NO matter the gear. NO matter the tactics should have 0% chance to win a Boss.
ELITE;; 1 NPC that is about 20-25% of the strength of a Boss npc in all ways.
As I understand it right now foundrys strongest encounter is about 15% of a "boss" npc at its best.( this of course is a guess in general but ive seen near every video made on it and ive done a dozen+ foundry runs.)
Ravenloft
Look for@Apocrs1980 or visit the main page here or Ravenloft here
Let's say you have a boss where you need to move from the tile that will drop and will make you fall to your death (as mentioned), if the cleric or the guardian/gwf drops into that kind of hole it should be a teamwipe. If that happens with a mob-pack you should still be able to win.
Also, i like bosses that change tactics through the fight; one phase using aoe, another using spike damage, third is adds, last stretch is all of them combined.
1) has a boss hitpoint bar
2) can trigger things at 30% health.
3) is a singleton encounter somewhat harder than a "hard" encounter
a boss to me can have several stages, or maybe a teleport. those are good ideas.. the ability to crank up the hp is also not bad, but could be downright impossible to manage. The easiest route i see to a true boss in the foundry would be like using "fight to submission" on steroids, and make that a multiple stage, with a break, to heal if they can lol. You could add in some ability to transform it, (replace costume) just for effect.. Without being able to replace costume, continuing the same encounter with a new mob...
I can create a pretty decent boss scenario with the solo mobs, but being able to connect them, sort of. or use one, and have it refresh when it hit its "fight to submission", with the ability to replace its costume. yea. lol. i can make that into something pretty amazing.
So it would have to be a combination of an increase in hp, combined with the ability to trigger stuff at certain percentages... that seems like the best idea, from all of them.
Good luck programming that.. .lol. i dont envy you.
Himmelville - Are you easily frightened?
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On one side of the mountain, there were bones...
Website Dedicated to Foundry Tutorials: www.NWUGC.com Twitter: @NWUGC
Gold or Bones!!
Yes yes and YES!
I would love to see compelling boss mechanics and fights. . One of my biggest fears is that after we have all used the same bosses over and over how engaged we can keep the players when they start to see it as a face roll.
The ability to maybe chose some custom attacks or defense systems for a boss to make up a scripted or fun boss fight would be awesome. . but I know that could be a TON of work. .
So. .for me bosses need lots of health.. and need to be challenging. .
This is probably the most important thing for me. While I understand that a boss should be a tough SOB to deal with, making it group only will kill quests that have them from being played by a lot of people. Some people like to solo things, either because they do not have (choice or otherwise) many friends or they do their solo playing when their friends are not online. Also a lot of players duo or trio content together, so scaling would make bosses still a challenge without being impossible.
I want my quests accessible to everyone, not just groups of players. So this must be implemented for bosses.
Also like mentioned, bosses should have drop down accessible triggers based on % of HP to either use a big hard hitting large area AOE, multiple direction ability (don't stand in the red!) cause a room wide event to happen (area wide gas/fire/cold/eletrical based attack for example that ticks off player HP slowly over X (3-5 optimal) seconds) or summon minions (also scales with player #). This option should be dynamic and adjustable by the author.
Example: Every 20, Every 25, Every 33 or Every 50% of boss HP the boss does a "super special", the power of the special is based on how often it is used (HP%) so if it is every 20%, the super special should hit just a bit harder than a normal special and at 50% should be a player killer unless they effectively avoid it. In the event the author chooses minion spawns, the number of minions would be determined by how often the spawn occurs as well.
I think this would add so much diversity to the UGC alone but I also know this is asking a lot and a more simplified version (predefined HP% for specials @ 25% intervals for example) is perfectly acceptable for me.
I also know that getting into "fight and flee" mechanics are probably too much as well, but it would be a very nice thing to have for a quest to progressively fight a boss at certain points until the final showdown at the end.
Lastly, we should have a whole encounter group of boss types, with different number of bosses available (1-3) with ranged and melee variations in any combination the author wants, but again, I am willing to accept just having bosses.
I hope, nay I say pray to the D&D gods that you guys find an acceptable encounter set up for bosses and allow us to create even more memorable adventures, whether they be putty that we can shape and mold to our desire or preformed to at least add bosses and boss mechanics to our UGC.
Single player elite bosses are still tough as they are right now. They turn into potion guzzling contests at times... but I would like to see more options for adding abilities to the boss, etc. instead of being stuck with abilities of the mob we just skinned over.
I picture the following:
- One single encounter, all by itself.
- Choose a skin, then customize the skin.
- If it is a single player boss, then allow two decent pull-down abilities.
- If it is a 2-5 man encounter, then allow abilities equal to the encounter.
- I am not too worried about loot, since it is likely the chest is pretty close to being after the kill. At least allow a loot table where there is a higher chance for a blue-quality item.
Hmmm... more ideas to come...
@kmhknight
My campaign: The Madness Plague.
My quest: Blacklake Gold
My guild: "The Older" Age 30+, Casual
1) Allow scaling of existing "costumes"
2) Choose a hit point range, the game can then scale based on level/group size.
3) Set triggers based on %health of boss.
4) Assign abilities from a power pool.
Wow, did you play my quest? That's exactly how I handle the boss in my last fight. He starts off as an elite, then graduates to a wight commander, then finally a solo encounter mob. Variations to the costume of course.
Great minds think alike lol.:cool:
Every time they idiot-proof something...they make better idiots.
Ravenloft
Look for@Apocrs1980 or visit the main page here or Ravenloft here
2. Dragon
3. Like to see some small bosses, Like a sneaky little evil gnome!
My favorite is mechanics of a boss fight. If it means we have to use a certain room just to use that special mechanic I could live with that. As long as we can customize look of boss, and anything else that would not mess up the encounter.
I don't care if we are limited to one Main boss a quest either.
It must feel unique.
This can mean a lot of things, from the costume to the attack patterns. The important thing is that the players don't get a "been there, done that" feeling when fighting a boss.
Himmelville - Are you easily frightened?
Click Here
On one side of the mountain, there were bones...
This.
Give us a few triggers tied to the health of the boss, health of the player(s), physical position, and time elapsed since engaged, and I'm sure we can come up with an infinite amount of crazy and challenging boss encounters. The triggers should be accessible to the boss itself to have them do certain things (use an ability, move to a certain position, etc) as well as available to other placeable objects (trigger an encounter of adds, make floor sections disappear, make a level (!) interactable, etc.)
Maybe if I have some free time I'll write up a full design doc. :P
The Crystal Relics - NWS-DMXNCNAVJ
Tower District Contest Entry: Undercover Brother - NW-DCD6OI9JE
This.
Give us a few triggers tied to the health of the boss, health of the player(s), physical position, and time elapsed since engaged, and I'm sure we can come up with an infinite amount of crazy and challenging boss encounters. The triggers should be accessible to the boss itself to have them do certain things (use an ability, move to a certain position, etc) as well as available to other placeable objects (trigger an encounter of adds, make floor sections disappear, make a level (!) interactable, etc.)
Maybe if I have some free time I'll write up a full design doc. :P
The Crystal Relics - NWS-DMXNCNAVJ
Tower District Contest Entry: Undercover Brother - NW-DCD6OI9JE
Ravenloft
Look for@Apocrs1980 or visit the main page here or Ravenloft here
^^^ In the immortal words of Dave Hester "YUUUUPPP"
"Perfecting the art of being a meatshield since 1998"
Banners of the Light
I also like Zaps idea! Would be nice to have triggers on health.
A boss must look awesome, they need to be big and bad! I want it to feel epic and to accomplish that the boss needs to look the part as well as act the part. I really like the idea of having model changes, in my mind I see a human that turns into a werewolf or some similar transformation. The first time you see that you are going to <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> your pants if it is done well. I also really like the idea of having a bunch of triggers like time, health %, player actions etc, that will allow the boss to react to what we are doing. If we do a lot of damage really fast maybe it has a defense buff or healing action. Maybe if we are not doing much damage it can taunt us. The idea of having environmental scripting during a boss fight is cool as well, the "red circle" that reminds us to get out of the fire as well as all area encompassing effects like constant damage over time. I always felt a little more immersed in a dungeon that required me to come prepared, for example going into a volcano and bringing fire resistance potions or something similar, perhaps that can play a part as well. For example there could be a secret room with some quest item that is not related to the main quest at all, but if you get it then the quest NPC detects you have the item and triggers a new line of script that ends with you getting some kind of buff which makes the boss fight much more tolerable. And of course loot, nothing better than an awesome reward after surviving such an ordeal. If the loot doesn't match up it kinda makes your efforts feel a little cheap, still fun of course but it needs to equal out. If I die multiple times and burn through countless potions and finally win I would like to think that it will all be well worth the effort :-)
I dunno, just my 2 cents.
So for the Foundry:
1. Being able to assign 1 or mini bosses to help the main boss.
2. Have the ability to script "Enrage" at x% which raises defence and attack y%
3. Have the ability to Start adds and stop adds from appearing every x amount of hit point the boss drops.
4. Give us hit boxes that we can assign certain bosses.
5. Give us more control on size of the creatures.
I would like to see More flying creatures that could be potential bosses[Gargoyle, Drake, Sphinx, Wyvern, and Bats]
Also Bring Giants, Cyclops, Trolls,
Last tid bit. Give us some control over ambient sounds; When they trigger, loop and stop. Sound plays a big part of a boss encounter. It would be great to have control there.
Thank's for all the great work you've done so far.
Stripped of will and soul. Only their thirst for freedom gives them hunger for
Vengeance...
~Neil Peart
And a boss can be weak than rest of the mobs, but should be hard to reach or hard to kill (by it being tricky, intellegent etc.).
I think it might be nice to give a pool of powers authors could choose from.
Like "Summon Mobs"
A few Boss Special Attack Moves
Regeneration
Combat Phases (such as getting tougher at weaker health)
Basically bosses should have some sort of mechanics that the rest of the mobs don't have.
If it was possible to select from a decent size list of abilities (yet be limited to say, 4 on any boss) to be added into the boss AI it could go a long way into allowing players to make dynamic boss fights of their own.
If you give me the power to script I would love you forever robobo!
But in lieu of that unlikelyhood (please please please let me script/program certain things) I'd love to see some NWN Variable Style selection bosses to flush out behind the scenes AI presets
If you set it up so that the Boss has 5 different mechanics that could be attached to the boss or 5 different bosses in the same skin but different abilities/mechanics that can get spawned based off a random trigger. So every time you run that dungeon you never know what mechanic you will run into. Could be a melee, magic, control, area affect, or player focus style of mechanic. You can't pre-plan for a specific group makeup because you don't know what you are going to get. No more rinse and repeat or I know he will smash the ground at 30% health... Eventually you will learn all the mechanics but I think it will extend the end game content.
As far as Foundry Boss..
Movement: Teleport (Instant Relocation), Planeshift(Vanish 2-3 seconds and reappear behind a random player then bop him on the head like Homey the Clown), Time Shift (Run speed increased n% and attacks multiple targets)
Health: Large Bucket of Hit Points, Self Heal nTimes, Self heal at 25% back to 50% if you can't reach 25% health in nSeconds from the time he hits 50% health.
Target: Class Target Random, Class Target Specific, Player Target Health Level, Player Target DPS Output. Each one of these the Boss could charge and special attack or multiple regular attack the target and then return back to who ever had aggro.
Control: Take control of a player and make them attack other players until spell broke(time or damage taken/given), Dead zone (Immobilize / incapacitate a player), Fear (Make player run away from battle for nSeconds)
Area: Damage(Traps, Acid Rain, Fireballs, Lava, Ice...), Battlegrounds(Floors turns yellow then falls or crumbles away), five separate floor spaces break apart and float around close to one another (You have to jump as the floors pass each other to get back to your party or get close to boss to attack).
Damage: Enrages at different times or health to increase DPS output from hitting harder or faster. Switches from a Melee style to a range or magic style. Activates reactive armor or some mirroring effect that returns n% of damage to player.
Transformation: Changes into a werewolf and takes on the characteristics of it. As a Devil it could transform into one of the many souls it has taken and then take on the characteristics of the new image.
I like that guy's ideas. Just do what he says and everybody should be happy, happy!