test content
What is the Arc Client?
Install Arc

halloween nightmare?

sheldonlcoopersheldonlcooper Member Posts: 4,042 Arc User
Surprised no one started this discussion - so I will.

Halloween seasonal event. What do you think? Nightmare or sweet dream?

They put so much effort into this. Sadly for me it was a nightmare. Not sure I can drag myself through 13 more times.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."

"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."

Post edited by baddmoonrizin on
«134

Comments

  • sysil84sysil84 Member Posts: 207 Arc User
    I love it, but I will never pug it again. Fortunately, I know people who understand the game mechanics, and it will make it a fun event.
  • vetteguy904vetteguy904 Member Posts: 3,843 Arc User
    I didn't play it but I watched it. I could not make heads or tails of what you were suppose to do for most of it
    Spock.jpg

  • warmasterxdk#9668 warmasterxdk Member Posts: 66 Arc User
    I think its fine, the grand prize is a joke. The first run-through with a pug was a challenge, mostly because everyone ignored the candle mechanics and kept trying to overpower the adds with brute strength. If you have more than 6 brain cells the final boss is not that hard, but I don't think the 4 other players had a combined total of 5.

    All in all, nice repurpose of the Boreth temple, its definitely Halloweenie, but the prize is just a goof and this COULD have helped some players that are going to fall just short of the 3500 event campaign point mark. That would be the only reason I'd see myself playing this event daily, let alone buy it out, IF it granted 700 progress points (I'm falling about 300 point short of the grand prize, lucky me); but it doesn't, so I won't.
    Fingers crossed for the return of the Section 31 Heavy Rifle <3
  • protoneousprotoneous Member Posts: 2,950 Arc User
    Groups seem to be getting better. It's brand new after all. It might take some time before people notice the immune floaters, dialogue tips, and that lighting more candles makes things easier.

    Threatening stance works well. Having a lot of pets or spam stuff out seems to be counter productive. It doesn't do threat any good and obscures things. One of the best groups I ran this with pretty much just walked through the entire thing with a minimum of fuss.

    After that last event on ESD that seemed to involve little more than killing ever spawning streams of enemies until a timer ran out this may take some time to adjust to.

    A few tips in team chat were really appreciated. Completion time seemed to be around 20 minutes. Didn't notice if there was an advanced version of the event available.
  • paradox#7391 paradox Member Posts: 1,774 Arc User
    edited October 2021
    It was mostly a dream, figured it out skeletons can only be killed when near candlelight, spiders were a nightmare, I can't deal with 8 legged arachnids, they creep me out virtual or not, witches target their cauldron to lower their defenses and for devidian lord look for switches when the tesla coils spark purple lightning, plus I even dressed up my toon for the event, Count Romula fitted in pretty well amongst the cast of monsters, besides what's a Halloween event without a Vampire.
    86cd125716d1922d19a1df1a117061fd.jpg

    9348d39db2d0181517336a919f75e658.jpg
  • rattler2rattler2 Member Posts: 57,969 Community Moderator
    I had fun for my first run. Might have to dress up for the next one though. Just went in my normal uniform.
    db80k0m-89201ed8-eadb-45d3-830f-bb2f0d4c0fe7.png?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOjdlMGQxODg5ODIyNjQzNzNhNWYwZDQxNWVhMGQyNmUwIiwiaXNzIjoidXJuOmFwcDo3ZTBkMTg4OTgyMjY0MzczYTVmMGQ0MTVlYTBkMjZlMCIsIm9iaiI6W1t7InBhdGgiOiJcL2ZcL2ExOGQ4ZWM2LTUyZjQtNDdiMS05YTI1LTVlYmZkYmJkOGM3N1wvZGI4MGswbS04OTIwMWVkOC1lYWRiLTQ1ZDMtODMwZi1iYjJmMGQ0YzBmZTcucG5nIn1dXSwiYXVkIjpbInVybjpzZXJ2aWNlOmZpbGUuZG93bmxvYWQiXX0.8G-Pg35Qi8qxiKLjAofaKRH6fmNH3qAAEI628gW0eXc
    I can't take it anymore! Could everyone just chill out for two seconds before something CRAZY happens again?!
    The nut who actually ground out many packs. The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
  • tigerariestigeraries Member Posts: 3,492 Arc User
    is the boss fight time gated... seems we need to keep clearing trash and just wait for invis timer to click down...
  • dacia#9992 dacia Member Posts: 68 Arc User
    I personally liked it alot.

    One of the things I had been curious about from the onset is whether or not control effects would work on skeletons. It turns out they do. The ramifications of this is that things like Paradox Bomb can be used to pull skeletons into the light. Likewise, it can be used to drag them out of the light too.

    This is exactly the kind of content I like. Ones that force you to use your abilities with finesse rather than take your abilities away. More of this please.

    A few small points of criticism: I noticed that there is a voiceover throughout the TFO giving instructions on the mechanics, however the FX on the voice makes it so garbled that it's easy to tune out as background noise.

    Many times when lighting a candle, another player would try to light it at the same time. The result would be that the candle would flick on and off again. This led to a moment or two where (comically) we couldn't get the thing lit because when one would light it, the other would keep putting it out again.

    Upon finishing a section, the appropriate door to open doesn't always glow making it appear you have to back track rather than move forward in another direction. This happened in the Spider Room.

  • saurializardsaurializard Member Posts: 4,385 Arc User
    tigeraries wrote: »
    is the boss fight time gated... seems we need to keep clearing trash and just wait for invis timer to click down...
    No, when one is targeted and phased, they have to go to a switch to zap the boss and make it vulnerable for a while.

    For me, this is where this can get tedious because despite the GOO telling you what to do, players tend to ignore that.
    figured it out skeletons can only be killed when near candlelight
    Like here. Before you encounter your first skeletons, the GOO tells you candles get rid of their invulnerability. :P
    #TASforSTO
    Iconian_Trio_sign.jpg?raw=1
  • dacia#9992 dacia Member Posts: 68 Arc User
    For me, this is where this can get tedious because despite the GOO telling you what to do, players tend to ignore that.

    Like here. Before you encounter your first skeletons, the GOO tells you candles get rid of their invulnerability. :P

    Like I mentioned in the post just above yours, the FX on that voice is very overdone. It's easy to tune it out as background noise. Something I think they should consider fixing.

  • protoneousprotoneous Member Posts: 2,950 Arc User
    dacia#9992 wrote: »
    This is exactly the kind of content I like. Ones that force you to use your abilities with finesse rather than take your abilities away. More of this please.

    I'd have to agree. Just pugged it twice. A little finesse can go a long way.

    The first group was a spectacular flail by those very strong in the belief that just spamming everything must eventually result in a win.

    The second group was amazing. No pets, minimal abilities or spam that obscures views. Everybody worked as a team with controlled AoE's and threat to pull critters into the light. Folks did things with care. Outstanding!

    That has to be the most rewarding and immersive 20 minutes I've had in game for a long time.

    Cat's Tale seems to reward thoughtful gameplay and I find that refreshing.
  • davefenestratordavefenestrator Member Posts: 10,501 Arc User
    dacia#9992 wrote: »
    For me, this is where this can get tedious because despite the GOO telling you what to do, players tend to ignore that.

    Like here. Before you encounter your first skeletons, the GOO tells you candles get rid of their invulnerability. :P

    Like I mentioned in the post just above yours, the FX on that voice is very overdone. It's easy to tune it out as background noise. Something I think they should consider fixing.

    Yes, combine the spooky voice with a bunch of weapons fire and ability spam and you get something like "You've been phased, you need to Klaatu Verata N...mumble mumble ...." Necktie? Nickel?

    I said the words. Well, most of them.
  • protoneousprotoneous Member Posts: 2,950 Arc User
    edited October 2021
    On PC those same words are also in the chat box and a blurb just underneath where team mates are shown. Makes all that mumbling easy to understand. I heard if you play the dialogue backwards evil things are being spoken.

    Who's gotten to pay a visit to the ghostly fortune teller? Seems there's a few creepy surprises hiding in this TFO.
  • captainkoltarcaptainkoltar Member Posts: 895 Arc User
    I liked it. I've only played it once, so my experience is limited.

    It seemed that even though the group struggled with the mechanics, we got there eventually. I appreciated the fact that it wasn't just run and shoot, and the map was definitely atmospheric. Thumbs up for me!

    I've got a Ghostbusters costume ready to go with my next run. I also reran Spin The Wheel, so I've got a proton pack ready to go too!
  • dacia#9992 dacia Member Posts: 68 Arc User
    edited October 2021
    Hardly anyone reads that, man.

    The first time I came to the book shelving part, I had the worst time of it because while I was trying to match the book with the proper shelf the rest of my group was just running around randomly hitting the closest interactable they could find, instantly resetting the entire thing. If people aren't going to read the part of the mission that actually requires them to read, they certainly aren't going to do it in the middle of a boss battle.

    Be reasonable.
  • cirran1cirran1 Member Posts: 230 Arc User
    Interesting scenario, I love the fact that face rolling on the keyboard with DPS is not the answer in this TFO. A couple of us in the group I did it with figured out that the enemy had to be in the circle of light to be damaged. Trying to convey that info to the rest of the folks who were scratching their heads trying to figure out why their awesome DPS wasn't making the TFO be done in 3 minutes or less was lets just say "comical".
    We need more TFO's like this.

    Cirran
  • saurializardsaurializard Member Posts: 4,385 Arc User
    edited October 2021
    cirran1 wrote: »
    We need more TFO's like this.
    This, but also, for another reason: so players hopefully stop having the instinct to just try to atomize anything that moves as fast as possible.
    Right now, most TFO can be solved by being fast and smashing the spacebar. So of course, unless you're used to more "intellectual" (as in, thinking for more than 2 seconds, not Myst levels) gameplays, many PUG for this TFO are gonna be disasters many times for the first week(s).

    For me, it doesn't bother me at all as I love games that reward basic patience, analysis of the surroundings and exploration. And I play when I have time so I can afford watching DPSers getting confused for a while before I tell them what to do.

    But what this game should try to do is keep progress "separated" between players. For this TFO, for example, the library part is close enough but it could be better by saying which player is right and which player is wrong (one time I thought I got the book category wrong, but that was because the teammate interacted a wrong one at the same time as me), so whoever is wrong could at least try to stop embarrassing themselves and wasting everyone's time (the tech is here since the dialogue whether you're phase-shifted or not is different, at the same time during the final boss fight).
    #TASforSTO
    Iconian_Trio_sign.jpg?raw=1
  • xarynn2058xarynn2058 Member Posts: 158 Arc User
    Players have been so conditioned to just blast whatever's in the way, this TF is quite refreshing. More mechanics like these should be present in TFs, the ground ones at least.
    S1J6m8B.jpg
  • paradox#7391 paradox Member Posts: 1,774 Arc User
    edited October 2021
    dacia#9992 wrote: »
    Hardly anyone reads that, man.

    The first time I came to the book shelving part, I had the worst time of it because while I was trying to match the book with the proper shelf the rest of my group was just running around randomly hitting the closest interactable they could find, instantly resetting the entire thing. If people aren't going to read the part of the mission that actually requires them to read, they certainly aren't going to do it in the middle of a boss battle.

    Be reasonable.

    I like reading the dialogue, it helps and it adds character,

    cirran1 wrote: »
    Interesting scenario, I love the fact that face rolling on the keyboard with DPS is not the answer in this TFO. A couple of us in the group I did it with figured out that the enemy had to be in the circle of light to be damaged. Trying to convey that info to the rest of the folks who were scratching their heads trying to figure out why their awesome DPS wasn't making the TFO be done in 3 minutes or less was lets just say "comical".
    We need more TFO's like this.

    Cirran

    Forget TFOs, we need more missions like this, this TFO actually makes you think about how to complete the objective rather than blasting it, it made me feel like a Starfleet Officer again, Starfleet was more about outsmarting your enemies rather than killing everything insight, if you just want to mindlessly kill stuff go play a Klingon.

    BTW I loved watching Skeletons get assimilated what kit module was that?
  • diocletian#7546 diocletian Member Posts: 131 Arc User
    I would have liked if it was released as a ground patrol versus TFO. That way I could go at my own pace and appreciate the environment much more. I had to race through everything and other players were constantly shooting. I think the setting, visuals, and graphics were great. The problem I had is there was so much visual spam from other people’s weapons and abilities,I had trouble seeing things, plus the sound spam drowned out what the npc’s were saying. So many bright flashes and exploding sounds made me feel like I was missing out on all the visual work and story the creators put into it.
  • ashstorm1ashstorm1 Member Posts: 679 Arc User
    edited October 2021
    I enjoyed it, the spooky ambience is decent, and it's overall a nice tribute to one of TOS' most unusual episodes.

    A couple gripes, though :

    The book puzzle section lacks clarity... While I did try to follow the clues, the lack of a clear explanation as to the game mechanics at play here made things a bit tedious, especially with other team members randomly and carelessly clicking stuff.

    Reward-wise : a magic wand? Well, why not, but please, devs, can you stop flooding us with Kit Modules, and instead give us items that qualify as "Devices" ? I mean, half of my 130+ slots inventory is filled with Kit Modules that only my Captain can use. Devices, on the contrary can be equipped on Bridge Officers, and they'll regularly make use of it.
    Post edited by ashstorm1 on
  • captainwellscaptainwells Member Posts: 718 Arc User
    ashstorm1 wrote: »
    I enjoyed it, the spooky ambience is decent, and it's overall a nice tribute to one of TOS' most unusual episodes.

    A couple gripes, though :

    The book puzzle section lacks clarity... While I did try to follow the clues, the lack of a clear explanation as to the game mechanics at play here made things a bit tedious, especially with other team members randomly and carelessly clicking stuff.

    Reward-wise : a magic wand? Well, why not, but please, devs, can you stop flooding us with Kit Modules, and instead give us items that qualify as "Devices" ? I mean, half of my 100+ slot inventory is filled with Kit Modules that only my Captain can use. Devices, on the contrary can be equipped on Bridge Officers, and they'll regularly make use of it.

    This, so much!
  • jonsillsjonsills Member Posts: 10,354 Arc User
    I don't recall a book section - is it possible the rest of the team cleared it while I was trying to figure out where to go? (I and another team member got separated from the others for a bit, and found our way back to the team after a few moments.)

    Overall, while it was interesting, I'm not entirely convinced I want to grind this for two weeks straight just to get a magic wand that will turn one enemy into a cat briefly. Not nearly enough bang for the credit, IMO.
    Lorna-Wing-sig.png
  • saurializardsaurializard Member Posts: 4,385 Arc User
    ashstorm1 wrote: »
    The book puzzle section lacks clarity... While I did try to follow the clues, the lack of a clear explanation as to the game mechanics at play here made things a bit tedious, especially with other team members randomly and carelessly clicking stuff.
    It's not that it lacks clarity, it's that people aren't used to this kind of puzzles in this game.
    Because overall, it's a pretty straightforward puzzle:
    -it's a library
    -the librarian needs your help with book-sorting
    -there is a "interact here" light appearing every time the librarian asks about a book
    -the categories are visible above the shelves
    -the titles of the books flat-out says which category it's from
    -from there, it's simple to guess what you're supposed to do

    The only thing that is annoying is that it can be hard to see where the book you need to pick up is, especially if there are candles nearby as it's orange-ish yellow lights covering an orange-ish yellow interaction FX.
    #TASforSTO
    Iconian_Trio_sign.jpg?raw=1
  • gonaliusgonalius Member Posts: 893 Arc User
    Good fun, but the mechanics do not lend themselves to group-play. Hopefully people will learn how to do it properly over the next couple of days which should make it more bearable to repeat. Though if people don't, I certainly won't be running it for 13 more days.
  • paradox#7391 paradox Member Posts: 1,774 Arc User
    ashstorm1 wrote: »
    The book puzzle section lacks clarity... While I did try to follow the clues, the lack of a clear explanation as to the game mechanics at play here made things a bit tedious, especially with other team members randomly and carelessly clicking stuff.
    It's not that it lacks clarity, it's that people aren't used to this kind of puzzles in this game.
    Because overall, it's a pretty straightforward puzzle:
    -it's a library
    -the librarian needs your help with book-sorting
    -there is a "interact here" light appearing every time the librarian asks about a book
    -the categories are visible above the shelves
    -the titles of the books flat-out says which category it's from
    -from there, it's simple to guess what you're supposed to do

    The only thing that is annoying is that it can be hard to see where the book you need to pick up is, especially if there are candles nearby as it's orange-ish yellow lights covering an orange-ish yellow interaction FX.

    Done it twice, never ended up in a Library in either one, Today one of teammates ditched so I had to fight Shar'let the spider and her hoards of evil Spiders minions alone, as an arachnophoebe it was not a good time, BTW where is the Library anyways?
  • saurializardsaurializard Member Posts: 4,385 Arc User
    edited October 2021
    Done it twice, never ended up in a Library in either one, Today one of teammates ditched so I had to fight Shar'let the spider and her hoards of evil Spiders minions alone, as an arachnophoebe it was not a good time, BTW where is the Library anyways?
    It's random.

    That said, as a Fed, I kept getting the library, while I got the other rooms each as a different faction, but I also got the spider room only as a JH, but I had a human teammate.

    So I dunno if it's "bad" luck on my side or if there is a specific algorithm on how players are affected to a different part of the castle with the puzzles.

    Also, once everyone has finished their own puzzle, you can enter their part of the castle (I did this to try and get all cats that the rest of the team may have missed to spawn. It succeeded, but lighting all candles and finding all cats doesn't give you any accolade)
    #TASforSTO
    Iconian_Trio_sign.jpg?raw=1
  • mikewallace#2209 mikewallace Member Posts: 106 Arc User
    Hard pass for me.

    Like others said it is a foreign tradition and IMO irrelevant to STO. Just because they found a dark TV airing for TOS of a similar episode does not mean to create a 14 day event. Perhaps 1 day might have sufficed. Then again we already have Dinos with freaking lasers shooting from their heads. Just hoping they will have the EASTER bunny event next :)
This discussion has been closed.