95+ Quicksand Maze - Sparkie, is it really that bad???

MageMERC - Harshlands · January 2015

So a friend of mine (Psychic r9rr) did WS BH solo pretty fast, giving me a charity run yesterday, and I asked if they'd done the 95+ Maze.

Man, did she have something to say. "I will never step foot in there again. You need a good squad of r9 just to get r8 mats. Totally pointless and near impossible for most squads..." she ranted a bit more about how much she hated it.

Okay so that's one persons reaction, which is a bit depressing tbh, because I was really keen on, just for the novelty really, of getting enough mats to upgrade my morai bow to the 70 attack level ones for pve.

I am a world away from the survivability and dd of my friend, so does that mean 95+ Maze really is that bad and no one will ever do it, and I will never get that upgraded bow????

Sparkie if you've heard more about this, or maybe go do a couple runs yourself because it might be something that needs to be nerfed slightly. I mean I would already need to pay 36mill to upgrade my bow, so requiring 720 mats which are possibly near impossible to get, seems a bit rough.....and from memory I think that amount of mats would require me to successfully complete 20+ runs.

Anyone else have any experience they can share about 95+ Maze?

nbreaking · January 2015

Well, I have been to a half run of the 100+ Mirage sky 10, so, that's the one I'm going to talk about.

Is Quicksand that bad? Yes and no... Here's why:

No because it just requires some thinking and most people apparently are brainless... I mean, the bosses are hard but done easily if you look at your screen and read what they say. In the run I went to we only did 2 bosses and it took us like 1:30h because everyone was afraid of stuff in there when in reality it wasn't that bad.

Yes because it's different and people don't like change. To complete the instance you have to kill 4 bosses while running through a random instance. To make these bosses spawn you have to kill a certain number of "captains" and "minions". Pretty much every few meters there's like a group of mobs with a mini boss (captain) and some little mobs (minions). Now... here's where it gets tricky:
The captain can have a skill written under his name (can actually have multiple skills), here's the hardest one we found.

Hp: Around 2M, level based, not lvl 150 (?)
Damage: Not sure, but to me (r9rr+10 sin) he was dealing around 1.5k per hit
Mob buffs (you know, like normal mobs sometimes have): Increased Defense
NEW buffs/skills: Seal (same as the cleric skill, uses it randomly), Bramble (Same as the veno skill but his bramble reflects a LOT of dmg back) AND 1hit (self explanatory, doesn't actually 1shot you but puts at 1-2% of your hp randomly (if he uses it twice in a row you die or if you're tanking without a healer you die...)

This was the surprising part of the instance, they cast those kinds of skills, there's more like purge and etc...

1st boss:
Physical immune and magic immune, if he says "Do the fire array" you have to kill 3 frost crystals and he loses one of the immunities (been there once, don't really remember which one). If he says "Do the ice (or frost, idk) array" you have to kill 3 fire crystals. You need a caster and a physical DD to do crystals since one of the crystals is physical immune and the other elemental immune. Easy peasy but it was hard because even though me and the barb keep telling them we figured it out they wouldn't listen.

2nd boss:
This boss has 3 pools, you have to stand on the pool he tell you to. Fire pool the boss is immune vs elemental dmg, everyone has to be INSIDE the pool.
Water pool the boss is immune vs physical dmg and stuns you for 3 seconds every 4 seconds (yeah... you're stunned pretty much all the time). Again, everyone has to be inside the pool.
Wood (not sure if it was wood, it was green) pool, the boss is vulnerable to both physical and magic but he will keep casting purple circles on you really fast (like the head spit in FWS but purple and super fast, just keeps creating the circles).
This boss killed everyone except me, I soloed it(he went through 2 of my event gold chamrs, the silver ones) and then decided that it wasn't working out with that squad.

I honestly will not do it again... I wanted to upgrade my r8r weapon but it needs 9999 of one of the mats and sure, i think i could get more if i finished the run but up to the 2nd boss after the split I got 8 LOL

Not worth the time or effort for the 100+ honestly.

Anyway, that's just my case, I think you should try to experience it for yourself but squads are hard to come by since most people did it the first day it came out and hated it.

Have fun b:cute

Desdi - Sanctuary · January 2015

MageMERC - Harshlands wrote: »

You need a good squad of r9 just to get r8 mats.

That's what people say whenever we get a new instance.
Remember when people said AEU can only be done by R9 people?

When a new instance is out, It takes some time to figure out its mechanics, tricks and secrets and people are quick to label it with "It's impossible!" "It's for R9 people!" "Waste of time!".

But the thing about Quicksand Maze itself, is that it's randomly generated. Bosses aren't always the same, and I don't even know if we (the playerbase) have met all the bosses in there yet to make a thorough guide.

The other thing is that the map is always different and coupled with the random bosses you can't plan ahead of time. You can't predict how fast it will be. One of my faction's squads did it in about an hour. The next day I went with faction mates on another run and it took us 2 hours or so.

Chances are that you might not find people wanting to run it on a regular basis. It takes time to get all the materials and whatnot, but who knows? I'm sure there might be people out there that are interested in getting R8rr.

DEMHEALSMAN - Dreamweaver · January 2015

If people here with R9rr can't get it done, I really wonder what the state of it is in the chinese servers, they are pretty much running around with a whole lot less R9 than our version if I remember right.

It takes time to learn how to properly do and coordinate it, which is good.
But it will mean people don't like it because CHANGE IS BAD and MUH EASY MODO NO WORK HERE.

pick your poison.

Mosz - Heavens Tear · January 2015

DEMHEALSMAN - Dreamweaver wrote: »

If people here with R9rr can't get it done, I really wonder what the state of it is in the chinese servers, they are pretty much running around with a whole lot less R9 than our version if I remember right.

It takes time to learn how to properly do and coordinate it, which is good.
But it will mean people don't like it because CHANGE IS BAD and MUH EASY MODO NO WORK HERE.

pick your poison.

its actually not hard at all, the boss with colored pools is most annoying as the spawns can be very unlucky (can get a unlucky captain combo too here and there which is annoying, but overall meh easy), its just time and effort for low amount of mats...and rerolling sucks..4 stat slots but reduced %s for the rarest stats ./le sigh for APSing

there r8rr is endgame grade due to insane r9 cost, here it isint so its cheaper/faster to make r9s3 really than a good set of still inferior r8rr...lame

Alice_Nyan - Dreamweaver · January 2015

I did once with a r9 squad, was hard, but most because its new. Once we figured out what to do, wasn't that bad, was actually fun. Pretty sure when all know what to do it will become easier. Problem is, i don't see many people forming runs, so I think will take while until people knows what to do there in all paths and bosses.

I wouldn't go again, at least for now, because took too much time for just some R8 mats that i don't need.

Chrisalys - Dreamweaver · January 2015

Not worth the effort.

Peccable - Raging Tide · January 2015

this instance is utterly pointless, indeed.
you could do this instance and spend a lot of time and effort to get r8rr set or just weapon, but with much much less time and much much less effort you could farm the coins to get the much more superior r9rr.

running it a few times for fun to see all bosses, sure. anything beyond that makes 0 sense. wich makes sense, since this IS pwi.

the economy in china must be from another dimension if rewardrate of this instance makes sense there. in pwi it sure as hell does not - juding from the experience we all have with the staff here there and the devs, i wouldnt be surprised it if wouldnt make sense in china either. b:laugh

demansfairy · January 2015

I did the run with a squad full of 3r9 players, it took us 2 hours to finish. Even taking into account the extra time it took to learn the bosses, still looking at about 1.5h per run, and the kicker? From that run i made about 1/900th of the mats i need just for the weapon...it's not worth the time, which is a shame since it is kinda fun.

ballenato · January 2015

The instance it's not hard itself but, the amoutn of time/work u have to put on it, just to farm a VERY FEW MATS (Considering the amount needed for first recast and rerolls), it is now worth it...

Even if you have friends to help you out, or factionmates. You can't trade the purple/golden mats. only the common one. That sucks

b:angry

Desdi - Sanctuary · January 2015

Peccable - Raging Tide wrote: »

the economy in china must be from another dimension if rewardrate of this instance makes sense there. in pwi it sure as hell does not - juding from the experience we all have with the staff here there and the devs, i wouldnt be surprised it if wouldnt make sense in china either. b:laugh

In PWCN, and just about every other official PW server as far as I've seen, R8r is the norm and most popular gear. R9 on other servers is harder to get.

It wouldn't surprise me if farming R8rr is actually easier/faster than getting R9 there.

Eoria - Harshlands · January 2015

So basically even worse than trials mat rate was and probably nowhere near as alt abusable as trials was originally. 'kay, so we just wait for them to put the mats in NW forges. Cool.

Sirkura - Raging Tide · January 2015

Desdi - Sanctuary wrote: »

In PWCN, and just about every other official PW server as far as I've seen, R8r is the norm and most popular gear. R9 on other servers is harder to get.

It wouldn't surprise me if farming R8rr is actually easier/faster than getting R9 there.

You hit the nail on the head. our versions are so different. tho we are also missing things from that forge. For instance the t3 warsoul weapons, now the only major difference is a perfect 65 attack lvls. but most people don't realize the attack bonus from refines on r8rr and warsoul also go up drastically. the warsoul was actually on par with r9rr in china. it isn't the first time PWI robbed us of them either:

http://www.pwdatabase.com/pwi/items/36528 this is t2 warsoul stats btw, pwi capped them off.

Colum - Raging Tide · January 2015

I've been to 100+ QSM once and ran the lower level versions few times, including 95+ almost solo.

It is not that bad. 95+ QSM is perfectly soloable for averagely geared 100+ toons (g16 or such) and the captains are easier than in the 100+ version, bosses don't hit as hard either.

The biggest difficulty is the captains, in my opinion. Bosses are bearable as long as you pay attention and even have someone in squad chat telling instructions (or in voice chat if possible) and make sure your squad will be listening. Players who do not listen are useless here. ¨

Anyway, the captains. I'd recommend having a puller that'll keep an eye on the captains' stats while pulling them and being smart about it - it may not be wise to pull a group of 5 captains where one of them has HF, other is sacri assault, third one SOG... Be smart about the pulls. I recommend a barb, BM or very well geared g16/r9rr toon for this. Once puller stops everyone will start AOEing the captains rapidly and a cleric should BB if possible. It's important to keep dangerous captains stunlocked (unless they have movement debuffs - then you cannot stun them).

You should be very vary of the SOG captains, also the ones with bramble/sov, HF (really depends what other captains are around), purge and 1-shot captains. 1-shot captains should be dealt with separately.

I also heavily recommend having both cleric and mystic in 100+ QSM, both assigned to HEALING. In fact, it's best to have as much variety in the squad as possible.

Eoria - Harshlands · January 2015

Sirkura - Raging Tide wrote: »

You hit the nail on the head. our versions are so different. tho we are also missing things from that forge. For instance the t3 warsoul weapons, now the only major difference is a perfect 65 attack lvls. but most people don't realize the attack bonus from refines on r8rr and warsoul also go up drastically. the warsoul was actually on par with r9rr in china. it isn't the first time PWI robbed us of them either:

http://www.pwdatabase.com/pwi/items/36528 this is t2 warsoul stats btw, pwi capped them off.

You realize CN doesn't have those extra attack levels either, right?

sailormoon4ever · January 2015

Colum - Raging Tide wrote: »

It is not that bad. 95+ QSM is perfectly soloable for averagely geared 100+ toons (g16 or such) and the captains are easier than in the 100+ version, bosses don't hit as hard either.

I thought it was 50-64, 65-79, 80-94, and 95-105. I figured by 95+, people meant 95-105. Or maybe I misunderstood something.

Saethos - Raging Tide · January 2015

Remember when AEU first came out? Everyone raged it required full r9 squads to do, but I tanked it with a t2 barb. Remember when Flowsilver came out? There were threads about how stupidly hard it was to do, now you can get in based on class instead of gear.

Quicksand maze is an instance with real thought poured into it, it's one of the most unique and best developed instances we have that requires actual thought to execute properly. I have full r8r+10 much like some people on china. Granted I don't use this anymore because of my r9, but I am fully confident using this r8r I can easily take on quicksand maze with a squad of other r8r people. If there were more I'd make a video of a r8r exclusive squad, but really the only other two I know of that have r8r on my server don't play anymore so I can't do that.

People are going to complain about this instance because up until this point every single instance we're given has been a typical tank and spank instance, FS and UCH gave a small twist on it but still too small to change it from any strategy to beat other than tank and spank. Now that we have a new instance where tank and spank won't cut it. The dungeon is amazing, I love it, and if I can do this full A card and a r9rr+7/10 BM then a t3 A card +5/7 Barb can easily take on this instance if they have a competent healer, from there you need DPS that doesn't suck at this game, but good luck finding any.

Sthenith - Dreamweaver · January 2015

With every new instance, it takes time to get to know the layout and what bosses there are. Players need some time to get used to it and develop some way to make it "easier" to finish.

That being said : you have to consider the cost/benefit from running an instance. For players who do not go for R9RR and whatnot, it would be pointless going into an instance that drops reforging mats for that kind of gear.

Same deal for other instances that you don't run if you don't really need the drops. Sure, it might be "fun" to do it, but no one is going to run it if the benefit(s) is not worth the trouble.

Most players that i know do not go for R9 simply because it's to costly for them. They either go for G16 or a combo with R8RR. Now why would those players for example run an instance for mats designed for R9 ? Having your charm(s) tick away for what comes down to a pointless endeavor is, honestly, stupid.

Why would i do the celestial tigers event if i don't need it or if it has no real benefits for me ? It's the same thing with quicksand maze. If you like it cause it's fun, then by all means do it. But if you go in there for mats that have no purpose for you, then it's indeed pointless. As are so many things in pwi.

SerenityCNB - Dreamweaver · January 2015

Sthenith - Dreamweaver wrote: »

With every new instance, it takes time to get to know the layout and what bosses there are. Players need some time to get used to it and develop some way to make it "easier" to finish.

That being said : you have to consider the cost/benefit from running an instance. For players who do not go for R9RR and whatnot, it would be pointless going into an instance that drops reforging mats for that kind of gear.

Same deal for other instances that you don't run if you don't really need the drops. Sure, it might be "fun" to do it, but no one is going to run it if the benefit(s) is not worth the trouble.

Most players that i know do not go for R9 simply because it's to costly for them. They either go for G16 or a combo with R8RR. Now why would those players for example run an instance for mats designed for R9 ? Having your charm(s) tick away for what comes down to a pointless endeavor is, honestly, stupid.

Why would i do the celestial tigers event if i don't need it or if it has no real benefits for me ? It's the same thing with quicksand maze. If you like it cause it's fun, then by all means do it. But if you go in there for mats that have no purpose for you, then it's indeed pointless. As are so many things in pwi.

The instance isn't for R9rr drops, it's for R8rrr drops.

Though I do agree that this instance doesn't have a lot of perks to joining it, if you're not aiming for them...aside from maybe just testing it out for the first few times....

Skippy - Dreamweaver · January 2015

I dont see the problem,,i farmed my nirvana armor when nirvana first came out.

Seems r8rr seems easyer to get then to farm nirvana gear the old way

opkossy · January 2015

The short answer is this.

It's not that bad at all. It's actually fairly easy in a group of people that pay attention and know how to play well.

The issue is that it's a new instance (aka everyone whines about it being impossible without whatever endgame gear is because they don't know it well) and it requires people to actually think and pay attention instead of having super easy ways to cheese it while half AFK. Combine that with the fact that people are gonna want to ignore it in favor of getting R9 stuff since ours is much easier to obtain than on any other official server and you'll find people avoiding this place like the plague.

ovenusarmanio · January 2015

guys. BH69 is too hard. It requires tt90 to beat or a barb. Do you have ANY idea how hard it is to find a barb. GOD!

GUYS! Nirvana requires APS +10 to beat. Anything less than that is just too hard.

GUYSS! EU is just too hard. It requires r9 to beat. I mean ****ing relay races, how do they work?

GUYSSS! AEU is even harder. It requires reading prompts. OMFG, nerf it please.

GUYSSSS! The new SOT and ABA are so difficult that it gave me super ultra mega death. It requires R9 just to get inside.

GUYSSSSSS! FC is too hard to beat without RB, taking non-rb players literally nerfs the difficulty. Which you would think would mean the opposite, BUT IT DOESN'T!

What is this FSP nonsense! WHY MAKE AN INSTANCE JUST FOR R9. I'm never gonna get new skills now! That's it! I quit. I'm tired of all this content just for cash shoppers.

GUYSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!111

unrefuted · January 2015

lol @ OP asking for GM for this when there are so many more pressing issues that they have to deal with.

bloodedone87 · January 2015

oVenusArmanio wrote: »

guys. BH69 is too hard. It requires tt90 to beat or a barb. Do you have ANY idea how hard it is to find a barb. GOD!

GUYS! Nirvana requires APS +10 to beat. Anything less than that is just too hard.

GUYSS! EU is just too hard. It requires r9 to beat. I mean ****ing relay races, how do they work?

GUYSSS! AEU is even harder. It requires reading prompts. OMFG, nerf it please.

GUYSSSS! The new SOT and ABA are so difficult that it gave me super ultra mega death. It requires R9 just to get inside.

GUYSSSSSS! FC is too hard to beat without RB, taking non-rb players literally nerfs the difficulty. Which you would think would mean the opposite, BUT IT DOESN'T!

What is this FSP nonsense! WHY MAKE AN INSTANCE JUST FOR R9. I'm never gonna get new skills now! That's it! I quit. I'm tired of all this content just for cash shoppers.

GUYSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!111

Because ppl are lazy. They dont want to play the game actually. They always complain an instance is to hard. Funny that the same ppl complain about PVE being so boring, that bosses and mobs are doing the same thing. But when PW makes the instances a litlle more harder they start complaing its so hard and it only needs r9rr ppl to do it.
These kind of ppl want to go inside an instance and the bosses die just by an heart attack .
If things arent a litlle harder in 100+ DUNGEONS it will be like playing FF13 Lighting Returns and Bhunivelze having just 1 stage and not being resistant to all kind of dmg for an amount of time during the battle, not somonning monads, not summoning 2 Eden minions that can reduce Lighting HP to 1. It will be so boring to play.

opkossy · January 2015

oVenusArmanio wrote: »

guys. BH69 is too hard. It requires tt90 to beat or a barb. Do you have ANY idea how hard it is to find a barb. GOD!

GUYS! Nirvana requires APS +10 to beat. Anything less than that is just too hard.

GUYSS! EU is just too hard. It requires r9 to beat. I mean ****ing relay races, how do they work?

GUYSSS! AEU is even harder. It requires reading prompts. OMFG, nerf it please.

GUYSSSS! The new SOT and ABA are so difficult that it gave me super ultra mega death. It requires R9 just to get inside.

GUYSSSSSS! FC is too hard to beat without RB, taking non-rb players literally nerfs the difficulty. Which you would think would mean the opposite, BUT IT DOESN'T!

What is this FSP nonsense! WHY MAKE AN INSTANCE JUST FOR R9. I'm never gonna get new skills now! That's it! I quit. I'm tired of all this content just for cash shoppers.

GUYSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!111

It's sad just how accurate this is. b:laugh

HideYoHubby - Archosaur · January 2015

Main issue with the instance is that its simply not worth the effort. It takes long, is difficult and reward is more or less a joke.

CapnK - Sanctuary · January 2015

For the most part it isn't bad. Usually problems occur from people pulling too many groups of mobs. Captains by themselves aren't bad, but multiple types together can easily cause a squad wipe.

There is, however, one final boss that is complete BS. Naga Basara requires a barb. It's like toad in FSP but much worse - you can't get by tanking it with a sin or whatever. If you get this as your final boss and don't have a barb in squad, you just wasted your run.

MageMERC - Harshlands · January 2015

unrefuted wrote: »

lol @ OP asking for GM for this when there are so many more pressing issues that they have to deal with.

Nice post. Cant ask a simple honest question now, and promote reasonable discussion??

And apparently my post was completely legitimate since it has resulted in reasonable useful responses (not yours of course) and the result is that maybe the instance SHOULD be changed since its VERY obvious no one will ever do it, which is something the GM's could add to their list of issues.

Thanks to all who gave useful responses.

bloodedone87 · January 2015

MageMERC - Harshlands wrote: »

Nice post. Cant ask a simple honest question now, and promote reasonable discussion??

And apparently my post was completely legitimate since it has resulted in reasonable useful responses (not yours of course) and the result is that maybe the instance SHOULD be changed since its VERY obvious no one will ever do it, which is something the GM's could add to their list of issues.

Thanks to all who gave useful responses.

You know that in this case GMs cant do nothing about the instance, no? They cant make the instance easier or harder. Those able to do that live in China and work on wanmei.
To farm mats for lvl70 and lvl80 gear is a good instance to put time and effort in it.
But to upgrade r8r gear not worth it.need over 1000 mats for each piece and tens of milions coins fee just to upgrade to something that its not better than T3.
Better to work on farmiing r9 gear with that time and effort.

Fail_BM - Raging Tide · January 2015

I can name another MMORPG where strategy and team comperation is a must to kill a boss, even a group of mobs can be wipe your squad if you don't pay attention to the environment.

PWE is now trying to introduce this kind of instances where you need to take your time and analyze, instead of the lolrush, mygearcantankitall, aoetheworld, that we are all used to. This is something that had to be done since the being of the game [maybe it was one of the things left behind when PWE(?) bought this game] so our players could get used to it.

However, this instance as a waste of time. The amount of time you have to put into it to upgrade a single piece of gear is away too much, making note that our version is trying to match china's version, a version where their players somehow have enought time and patience to farm everything they want, even if it is 1 piece out of 999 per run; not because they want to, but because they are addicted or can produce money of it out of the game [not generalizing].

Maybe if they make it a bit more rewarding, like after 20 runs you can upgrade one piece of armor, more people would be up to go through it.

I speculate r8rr mats will be added to NW forges someday.

MageMERC - Harshlands · January 2015

bloodedone87 wrote: »

You know that in this case GMs cant do nothing about the instance, no? They cant make the instance easier or harder. Those able to do that live in China and work on wanmei.

Yep, I do know this. I assume there are backchannels between GM's and Wanmei. The DEV's must get ideas about change/nerfs/balances from somewhere.

Personally with all this discussion, idk how hard or easy an instance is, just that the rewards must be commensurate with the effort. Take normal quests, no one did them before the expansion, now if you want you can and you might feel its worth it because you get vastly more xp killing a tenth of the mobs in many cases.

Keep the maze as it is, sure. But the rewards need to be greatly increased, or as has been widely discussed here, no one will bother. Take the Nirvana instance as another example of extreme imbalance, same deal.

Look however at the lower level maze's. I took alts through the 70+ one. For starters I can use my main, secondly it was reasonably easy, but still ticked my charm a few times, I died a couple other times, so not a total cake walk. It still took 40mins to an hour and I needed to do it 4-5 times. After that my alts got the level 70 weapon and gear. Overall the balance is about right.

95+ Quicksand Maze - Sparkie, is it really that bad???

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