Would you like to see an end to Invulnerable phases on Bosses?

DreamyLu

No

For me it's "yes" and "no" simultaneously (Schrödinger, my best friend lol). See below.

My understanding is that invulnerability phase are linked to one - or more - mechanisms, that the player shall understand and manage to break the invulnerability.
From there:
1) If my understanding is correct, then invulnerability phases are part of bosses mechanisms to be managed by the player: My vote is "no".
2) If my understanding is wrong and that invulnerability phases are purely "waiting times" during which the player can't interact and go have a coffee until it's over: My vote is "yes".

SilverBride

Yes

disky wrote: »

SilverBride wrote: »

Why can't other things go on without the Boss becoming invulnerable for over half of the fight? These phases are way too frequent and last way too long.

Why can't it be something like the player has to kite the Boss to a certain object on the ground to damage them, and this object glows when it's active, and there are several of these scattered around the room and each does a different type of damage to the Boss and the player can only damage them when they are near one of these, and they are only active for so long then they stop glowing and another becomes active?

The Boss wouldn't be invulnerable for a predictable set amount of time but rather the player has some control over how fast they can kite them to the right spots and do more damage. That would take some thinking and would be way more fun than what we have now.

They can, it's just that the health pool and/or defensive abilities of a boss which normally has an immunity phase would need to be increased so that the fight is roughly as long as it was when the immunity phases were part of the fight.

Then increase their health pool and give us something more than just close portals and kill adds now, over and over and over.

Soarora

Yes

I understand the purpose of immunity phases but they aren't fun because when you do have that high level of damage to burn through, you get stuck with immunity phases back-to-back. I'd be more okay with immunity phases if, say, you burn past an immunity phase it doesn't trigger that phase. Like in Frostvault with the one boss with the lasers. You literally can have him stand up and sit back down back-to-back for half the fight. It's not fun.

SilverBride

Yes

DreamyLu wrote: »

For me it's "yes" and "no" simultaneously (Schrödinger, my best friend lol). See below.

Great reference!

disky

No

DreamyLu wrote: »

1) If my understanding is correct, then invulnerability phases are part of bosses mechanisms to be managed by the player: My vote is "no".

In my experience, it's always this. The problem players seem to have is that they thing they do during the phase is generally not compelling enough, or that a mechanic which forces them to stop attacking the main target is frustrating for them.

Soarora

Yes

DreamyLu wrote: »

For me it's "yes" and "no" simultaneously (Schrödinger, my best friend lol). See below.

My understanding is that invulnerability phase are linked to one - or more - mechanisms, that the player shall understand and manage to break the invulnerability.
From there:
1) If my understanding is correct, then invulnerability phases are part of bosses mechanisms to be managed by the player: My vote is "no".
2) If my understanding is wrong and that invulnerability phases are purely "waiting times" during which the player can't interact and go have a coffee until it's over: My vote is "yes".

Sometimes it is something like "go kill this other thing" (ex. one of the Apocrypha world bosses) and in those instances I'd agree. Usually, though, it's "you hit this % health now go fight these adds except there's so much damage they die instantly so you're waiting doing nothing for more to spawn or just stand there waiting for the boss to become vulnerable again" (ex. end of Oblivion Portals, Frostvault laser boss). In Gold Road's incursions, you do have to kill waves of enemies but there's less waiting time. But it does make them feel obscenely long for an incursion.

UntilValhalla13

Yes

[snip] It's just unnecessarily padding out a fight time.

[edited for bashing]

Renato90085

Don't care

i not care
I feel that Invulnerable phases wait boss so boring
but most boss can solo within 1 minute...for me
Atoll of Immolation last boss have 3time(4?) Invulnerable phases
because he only 1.2m health and my stam nb solo dps is 50-62k...
it mean if he cant Invulnerable phases i can solo in 20s...
with my brother do it ,like a other trash combat...(3~5s? because i can early spam killer blade
Invulnerable phases and fast kill both boring
just you hate whitch more
if they delete Invulnerable phases
they need buff boss health > 6m(6m dummy

spartaxoxo

Yes

disky wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

disky wrote: »

They could certainly also do more interesting things instead of "go fight this other guy for a second" while the immunity phases are in-effect, but again, we arrive at the problem of not wanting to actually do anything other than attack the big bad.

I can't speak for others but I find that type of thing more enjoyable than just immunity for add phases. I really enjoyed the Hollowjack fight. I also like the fight in one of the dungeons where you gotta eat sweet rolls near you're a goat. It's the lack of creativity and time wasting that makes these fights so unpleasant imo.

If all the boss is going to do is trash talk and shoot stuff at me, then just let me kill him.

So then the real problem, for some people at least, is just that the immunity phases need to be more fun.

Well, I also like the occasional tank and spank fights too. Variety is the spice of life. But yes, you're correct. I don't want to see an end to immunity phases. I just want them to be used a little less often and when they are used, make it something actually fun and creative.

TheMajority

No

no because it is the vision of the dev and the vision of the dev for how they want their game to be comes first and i support dev vision. it is part of the Identity of the boss to have immunity phases and we can not change who they are just because a player wants a easier fight

we need more important and good changes please do not change this Very Important Part of a bosses Identity

Arunei

Yes

disky wrote: »

SilverBride wrote: »

disky wrote: »

Then would you be okay with ZOS increasing the health of the boss to compensate, so that you can attack it while other players have to destroy the adds? That sounds fine to me, but I gather you wouldn't like it.

No I wouldn't be ok with an increase in difficulty because it ruins the experience for those that can no longer defeat these Bosses then. But that is a completely different debate and not what this poll is asking.

Removing tedium is one thing, but I think we're failing to consider the real reason those phases exist, and by getting rid of them entirely we're missing an opportunity to ask for something better.

But the fact is a vast majority of people find invulnerable phases TEDIOUS. They absolutely do NOT add anything to a fight. 99% of the time it's "this boss is invulnerable until you kill X mobs or interact with Y things" and that, plain and simple, is tedium. If there were actual neat mechanics and things you had to do while a boss is invulnerable, that'd be one thing. But it is literally almost always the same boring thing to drag fights out. How is it engaging or fun or interesting to have to mow down packs of trash mobs a dozen times during a boss fight, just for it to be drawn out by a few extra minutes?

People aren't saying anything about wanting stuff to be easier and it's kind of bad faith to claim that's what anyone who wants less of this stuff is after. People don't want easy, we want engaging and not the same boring, [snip] mechanic over and over and over. It's the same with OHKOs, they aren't fun or interesting most of the time, they're annoying and [snip]

[edited for bashing]

disky

No

Arunei wrote: »

People aren't saying anything about wanting stuff to be easier and it's kind of bad faith to claim that's what anyone who wants less of this stuff is after. People don't want easy, we want engaging and not the same boring, [snip] mechanic over and over and over. It's the same with OHKOs, they aren't fun or interesting most of the time, they're annoying and [snip]

This:

SilverBride wrote: »

disky wrote: »

Then would you be okay with ZOS increasing the health of the boss to compensate, so that you can attack it while other players have to destroy the adds? That sounds fine to me, but I gather you wouldn't like it.

No I wouldn't be ok with an increase in difficulty because it ruins the experience for those that can no longer defeat these Bosses then. But that is a completely different debate and not what this poll is asking.

Not expecting a challenge compensation for removing immunity phases is effectively making the boss significantly easier. And I don't think most of the people asking for them to be removed are necessarily expecting compensation of that kind. I agree that things could be different and more interesting in a lot of cases but I would also like to point out that there will always be a portion of players who dislike something, no matter what it is, and the developers are going to try to make a game as engaging for as many people as possible while trying to avoid as much criticism as possible. It's the reason a lot of mass-market games are so frequently banal.

*cough*Veilguard*cough*

[edited to remove quote]

SilverBride

Yes

disky wrote: »

SilverBride wrote: »

disky wrote: »

Then would you be okay with ZOS increasing the health of the boss to compensate, so that you can attack it while other players have to destroy the adds? That sounds fine to me, but I gather you wouldn't like it.

No I wouldn't be ok with an increase in difficulty because it ruins the experience for those that can no longer defeat these Bosses then. But that is a completely different debate and not what this poll is asking.

Not expecting a challenge compensation for removing immunity phases is effectively making the boss significantly easier.

Challenge and difficulty are not the same thing. And I already stated that I am fine with giving the Bosses more health so the fights aren't over in a matter of seconds. But they do not need to do more damage and have more defenses which would be a problem for some players.

If all they want are longer fights, tedious repetition isn't the way to do it. Interesting fights and mechanics are what will keep players engaged.

notyuu

Don't care

SilverBride wrote: »

I feel that Invulnerable phases add nothing of interest to Boss fights and only serve to artificially prolong the fight.

Well yeah, that's the entire reason they were added, to prolong the fight long enough for scripting things to be done, lines to be said, ect, ect.

Without invul phases the boss fight would be over before they could finish their opening monologue.

Ph1p

The problem isn’t invulnerability per se, but the lack of an interesting and challenging mechanic to end or survive that immunity. There are tons of better immunity examples in other content - Sunspire dragons, HoF spider and triplets, DSR Reef Guardians, Moongrave Fan stone atro, and the list goes on.

What they all have in common is that the invulnerability phase isn’t the easiest and thus most boring part of the fight.

Nihilr

No

Anyone mentioning West Weald should know that it's mainly for how many players can take down the bosses so quickly while this zone is still busy. In a year this zone will be half the population and maybe then they can remove the immortal phases.

But until then, parsing bosses as quickly as possible to skip mechanics is boring. If you want boring, go fight your target dummies.

Taril

Yes

Overall, invulnerable phases are a rather cheap and annoying mechanic.

They're rarely the best way to handle things.

Like, simply having high damage resistance to promote players to interact with mechanics is better, since then you still leave open the option for people to brute force their way through things (Alternatively you can have things like continual shield generation whereby players can assist in brute forcing it by applying Defile)

In regards to addressing the issue of well geared players blowing up a boss, you can implement DPS caps so a player's damage to the boss cannot go above a certain threshold per second. Which would provide the same artificial prolonging of the fight, without necessarily being a boring "You cannot harm the boss for X seconds" mechanic.

The tricky part would be addressing the "We have an entire zone full of people zerging the boss" thing... But then again, wouldn't an entire army of players blowing up a boss be appropriate? (This particular thing also self addresses when content becomes less "New" and so fewer people are actually doing it)

colossalvoids

Yes

TheMajority wrote: »

no because it is the vision of the dev and the vision of the dev for how they want their game to be comes first and i support dev vision. it is part of the Identity of the boss to have immunity phases and we can not change who they are just because a player wants a easier fight

we need more important and good changes please do not change this Very Important Part of a bosses Identity

That's kinda cute response. The Vision is probably nowhere to be seen for the last five years or so.

Major_Mangle

Yes

Invulnerable phases are fine if they can be shortened by executing certain mechanics, but the way zos did in with literally every single npc encounter in the Goldroad chapter was absolutely awful.

AlienSlof

Yes

If it was just the odd boss here and there, and there were interesting mechanics to do in the meantime, then I'd be fine with that. However, it's LOTS of the bosses that have this same boring, tedious 'god mode' thing, [snip] Boring, BORING, BOOOOOOOORING!

[edited for bashing]

DexterMorg4n

Yes

[snip] poor game design.

[edited for bashing]

Elsonso

Yes

I doubt they will change anything.

However, all characters should get a free 15 second invulnerability phase that automatically triggers at 75%-50%-25% or 66%-33% health.

TybaltKaine

No

It's a boss fight, and there needs to be some challenge. DPS has gotten so outta control that most players turn the majority of bosses into parse dummies and the fight ends in seconds. Either bring the DPS down across the board by reducing the number of proc sets and swinging the nerf hammer (which no one wants) or add invuln phases, mechanics and adds to prolong what is supposed a challenging fight.

You wanna relax, go pick flowers, fights are supposed to be, ya know, a fight.

colossalvoids

Yes

Imo, if you want a decent fight you should design a decent fight the difficulty included (be it the direct boss difficulty or a mechanical one like puzzle or a sequence of actions). Artificial things like that are an easy way out without upsetting players who lack ability to complete it if designed properly but it still annoys them same as everyone else.

That said there are numerous ways of making immunity phases good, but that still requires a design and not just an "I'm done" card for the dev who on one hand need to make an encounter good and on the other hand to make it easy, approachable and prolonged enough so people would hear all the VO recorded for it.

Turtle_Bot

I'm mixed on this, I like them if there's a mechanic to learn and figure out, but if it's just a delay then it should be changed.

The hollowjack event boss is very close to being good.
It has a mechanic to learn and do (crouch to stay hidden and use synergies on the crow to recover stamina during the drain), but the only issue I take is the second time this happens is just slightly too long (it could seriously only be like 5-10 seconds shorter and would be perfect to drain enough resources to require a potion + crow to survive, but not drain so much that it drains even through a potion + crow).

The hollowjack mechanic is not a big issue, just a small annoyance I've noticed from doing it every day now (although this seems to be made worse by being in a very big group, so maybe just more crows spawned to help larger groups work through that phase could solve it).

Iirc there are some immunity phases that are just pause what you are doing or hope your healers are good enough and those really should be looked at to give them something unique to either shorten them or at least make them more interesting to do, especially those that are just heal checks.

LikiLoki

I'm more worried about some bosses having an ultimatum strike. I'm definitely getting tired of looking for non-obvious tactics that should save a character from death.

Dragonnord

No

SilverBride wrote: »

Why can't it be something like the player has to kite the Boss to a certain object on the ground to damage them, and this object glows when it's active, and there are several of these scattered around the room and each does a different type of damage to the Boss and the player can only damage them when they are near one of these, and they are only active for so long then they stop glowing and another becomes active?

What you describe is a boss invulnerable situation until players do something.

And I can guarantee you that it can take even longer than regular invulnerable phases because 90% of players in this game don't have a clue about what they're doing, don't care about guidance, don't pay attention to their surroundings, to what is happening, to chat, to whispers, to anything.

I don't want to depend on distracted and disinterested random guys to complete Overland content (ie: bosses, Incursions, etc.).
 

LanteanPegasus

Yes

A year ago I might have voted "no".

But the abuse of this idea all through the Gold Road chapter world bosses and the abysmally designed Mirrormoore Incursions annoyed me so much. And it is one of the clearest symptoms for the trend of the last two years of artificially prolonguing content so it looks more substantial than it actually is.

I did the incursions during the chapter event, and I did a few again now, to fill those scribing skill style thingies, but even with quite a few players present this world event is drawn out, boring, and tedious.

I never liked the idea of "boss goes invulnerable until you have killed the arbitrary number of adds that spawn, preferably while red circles appear everywhere". Things like that don't "make me use my head" (except wanting to bash it against the table), or give me pause to admire cool mechanics. ("Kill those three/five/twelve guys before going back to killing the one" isn't an interesting mechanic.)

The only case where I actually like the invulnerability phases are quest bosses. Granted, it doesn't really make the fights more challenging. But it prevents me from accidentally killing the quest boss before I got to hear all his combat comments or his monologue, and it prevents the "great finale" from being over in a few seconds. That's a kind of scripting for dramatic reasons that I can live with. (Because getting the difficulty of these fights right for everyone, so the dramatic funtion can be fulfilled without the challenge becoming too hard, is probably impossible without the scripting.)

ZOS_Icy

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pklemming

Yes

Most of the invuln phases on bosses are utterly pointless and dull.

If you want to extend the fight, then at least make it somewhat interesting. it shouldn't be done as the only counter to high dps. If it does not add to the fight, it should not be there.

Poorly designed mechanics does not make us enjoy fights more, it gives us entirely the opposite impression and thoughts.

Is this fun? If it is no, then don't add it. This should be the mantra to the whole game design.