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For those cying NERF!! due to difficulty
prierin
Member Posts: 7 Arc User
Ill tell you what I was tempted to rage out several times playing the new expansion on elite. The ships are tougher
not smarter, not better fighters, just on steroids. Their shield/hull strength is like 2.5x normal and your DPS suddenly feels noobish. However, I came to a realization when I had an epiphany.
You dont have to play the game on elite!
As simple as that sounds, here is what I have discovered while playing solo:
1: Episodes drops are no greater than on Advanced. I have yet to see many MK XIII gear drop or many purple drops on elite than on advanced while solo. In a team on elite with a minimum level of 57 there are a few decent purple drops, but not many.
2: XP gain. Again, solo, the difference is not what one would expect. We automatically assume that on a harder level you get more xp and level faster. This is logical. However, with the tweaks they have made to the elite NPC ships you actually are doing yourself a disservice. The ships are much harder to kill and award only a moderately higher amount of xp, meaning you actually waste a lot of time going after that meagre xp bonus when, playing on advanced, although you get slightly lower xp you kill faster, meaning your overall xp gain is actually higher.
3: The game isnt meant to be played on elite. I am convinced this is a fact. Theres just no real reward for doing so other than bragging rights, so why put yourself through the grief? STFs are another story; for decent rewards they are meant to be played on elite, but as far as the game itself goes, there is no need to set your level any higher than advanced.
So, in conclusion, the ONLY advantage to playing in elite mode is either: xp farming with a team or running STFs and these should only be run if you are already lvl 60 with a minimum of MK XIII gear and have practiced the run in advanced mode to ensure you know what the objectives are. Dont be the guy/girl who rushes in and fails the STF for everyone.
No, my rage has more to do with the random desktop crashes, severe lag and other bugs that, in my mind, should have been ironed out before launch.
But hey, the above is merely my opinion. Play your game the way you want to. I just prefer to enjoy it rather than pound my forehead into my keyboard over and over again.
You dont have to play the game on elite!
As simple as that sounds, here is what I have discovered while playing solo:
1: Episodes drops are no greater than on Advanced. I have yet to see many MK XIII gear drop or many purple drops on elite than on advanced while solo. In a team on elite with a minimum level of 57 there are a few decent purple drops, but not many.
2: XP gain. Again, solo, the difference is not what one would expect. We automatically assume that on a harder level you get more xp and level faster. This is logical. However, with the tweaks they have made to the elite NPC ships you actually are doing yourself a disservice. The ships are much harder to kill and award only a moderately higher amount of xp, meaning you actually waste a lot of time going after that meagre xp bonus when, playing on advanced, although you get slightly lower xp you kill faster, meaning your overall xp gain is actually higher.
3: The game isnt meant to be played on elite. I am convinced this is a fact. Theres just no real reward for doing so other than bragging rights, so why put yourself through the grief? STFs are another story; for decent rewards they are meant to be played on elite, but as far as the game itself goes, there is no need to set your level any higher than advanced.
So, in conclusion, the ONLY advantage to playing in elite mode is either: xp farming with a team or running STFs and these should only be run if you are already lvl 60 with a minimum of MK XIII gear and have practiced the run in advanced mode to ensure you know what the objectives are. Dont be the guy/girl who rushes in and fails the STF for everyone.
No, my rage has more to do with the random desktop crashes, severe lag and other bugs that, in my mind, should have been ironed out before launch.
But hey, the above is merely my opinion. Play your game the way you want to. I just prefer to enjoy it rather than pound my forehead into my keyboard over and over again.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
You will forever be missed and never forgotten.
Post edited by prierin on
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Comments
Time will only tell!
I'm actually glad to see cryptic nerfing normal and advanced but buffing elite. It means people like me get 2 training grounds to really practice hard on so we don't ruin someones day by blowing an elite.
....wait. Can you link the threads where people were complaining about elite difficulty?
people talk about advanced, not elite.
There is your first mistake. All the current whining is about the insane hp levels that advance give.
Increase at 60 is like 4.x and not 2.5 times.
You also neglect the fact that you need to play advance to get the needed parts for the reputation system.
I am a casual player with MK XII gear, some elite fleet gear, in a Galaxy X T5U (hardly a DPS monster) and advanced is fine for regular gameplay. The mobs are stornger (or healthier), yes, but nowhere near the almost immortal levels of elite.
Again, I am talking about regular gameplay - epsiidoes, patrols, etc. not STFs. Advanced STFs may be, as I have heard, s;lightly harder than the previous 'elite' setting and also give the insta-fail on objectives, which is bogus. No argument here on that.
Nobody wants to nerf regular gameplay, all the rage is about the advanced queues
In every place,
The deeds of men remain the same..."
Youre either really lucky with your PUGs or youre running with FleetMates. The arguement against Advanced currently isnt that the Mobs are too hard. Its that the amount DPS output for the Optionals to be accomplished isnt enough thanks to the uncalled for HP increases.. People are regularly failing the optionals and then in turn failing the Mission itself.
Since most players before DR could jump into an Advanced (Elite) and get the job done. Even with a busted build. The changes are causing a lot of confusion and now more then ever are players with bad builds being exposed for it.
Not quite.
I have heard quite a bit of complaints about elite regular gameplay. Hence this post. I have spoken to several in-game players via zone chat with the same complaints, hence this post.
Advanced STFs are broken as far as I am concerned - that said, pelople who venture into an elite without proper gear or practice runs have nothing to complain about.
If your beef is with the queues then fine. If not, also fine.
On normal difficulty, a Voth Bastion Cruiser had 175k HP. Undine Dreadnought had 954k HP. Plus the way that all NPCs seem to have built-in tac-team rebalancing these days. And I had that goofy little DSD that, according to Cryptic, is apparently representative of what the truly average players fly. The fight took over half an hour. On normal.
Can we please at least agree that the complaints have little to do with difficulty (and so stop using that word), and are mostly to do with how much the HP boosts turn even the most minor encounter into an absolute slog? It has little to do with how skilled a player is, and everything to do with 'oh FFS isn't this guy DEAD yet?"
I'm not convinced that using the One True Build(tm) and pushing people into playing the same way reflects good game design. Games should allow flexibility in the way that an individual wants to play, otherwise you might as well watch a video of someone else playing.
I've said it before, all of this could have been avoided had the difficulty settings been left alone and a fourth difficulty were added above elite. That would have provided something for everyone, from the newest players to the most seasoned vets.
I dont mind advanced being more challenging than the former elite ques, I just think the HP is too high and it drives STF's to last longer to the point where the time vs reward ratio is so bad that its not worth doing. For those people saying "WAIT TILL YOU GET TO LVL 60 GUYZ", i got to lvl 60 and using the same fleet gear i had before DR, it has not made much difference if any at all. Its now the game of how much DPS you can get out of your ship which just drives more people to escorts.
If you want very long hard STF's as a challenge, go play your elite.
I dont know how you are doing well in those STF's, but you must have gotten some really high DPS teams, because I have yet to beat a advanced borg STF que, and even when/if i do in its current state, the reward makes the whole thing not worth it anyway.
And 1mil hp dreadnought ? Well, that's 1m30 with a 10k DPS ship, which used to be a good DPS from a pug. 5K being the average pug player.
I don't think the DSD we use have as much DPS.
And I agree, more CCs, instakill and HP doesn't make the fight more difficult, only more slow and frustrating.
But please point out the threads about people complaing about elite soloing missions being too hard.
That needs to change, I would happily trade like 50% of their HP for 50 to 75% more damage output.
Galor. It heals its shields. It casts FBP, it seems to balance its shields. For a fresh 50 on a stock ship it takes a while to kill one. In packs they might actually wear you down.
I'll concede to this...
Advanced is what needs the most tuning. The reduction in rewards at all levels needs to be re-thought, too. Fortunately it looks like this is going to be addressed reasonably quickly. It all could have been avoided, however.
My highest toon is in a T5U, level 58 but fleet XII and rep XII. I know that doing normal mode at 60 is probably going to still be easy even with the level scaling. As for advanced? since my stats are unchanged from 50-58 and probably will stay unchanged at 60 i expect it to be the same. I've done advanced cure several times at 50-51 on my uber Scim just to see what all they changed. And it wasnt hard really...incoming damage is manageable, even when i am BFAW spamming but of course the hp scaling is way up. Cure adv isnt really a good indicator of incoming damage though. Even in pre DR Elite Cure boss was always a bit of a wuss relative to other bosses like Donatra, Gateways and Tac Cubes.
Personally i'm not crying for nerfs because i'm still at XII gear and still leveling. And i'm not so arrogant as to keep running Adv and Elite in ships, gear or with a character that i know cant handle it. I'm going to wait until i'm in XIII or XIV before i start to make any kind of statements or complaints about Adv and Elite.
On STFs I agree with you entirely, it should be noted at lvl 56 I found advanced to be more manageable so I reckon by the time I hit lvl 60 and have my Mk 14 gear it'll be a walk in the park like Elite used to be.
Unlock "Bug Hunt" and do the advanced version of it. Trust me you will be saving yourself a massive headache.