Why is Naj-Caldeesh so grossly overtuned in normal?

prof-dracko · April 25

I've noticed the general trend with newer content that the bosses are massively overpowering in all areas, clearly with expectations that older, more experienced players are the ones doing most of them. Just take a look at the World bosses in Solstice. 10mil for one. That's almost trial level when some others barely hit 4mil in the past. It adds nothing to the experience, just drags it out. That's what the bosses in N-C are. On Normal they aren't adding anything by being so tough, they're just padding. There is literally no harm to the player base with toning them down. Literally just halve the HP totals for normal and the problem is basically solved.

xylena · April 25

DenverRalphy wrote: »

It's not overtuned.

If casuals are struggling with Normal, then yes it is overtuned and an abject failure at its intended purpose. You wanna sweat, you queue for Vet.

NxJoeyD · April 25

I don’t think NC is overturned, per se. I think that over time power creep has gotten so high that the Devs have tried to throw out content that challenges those higher scale builds as well as the cooperative aspect of these instances.

IMO Vet NC wasn’t bad at all. .. doing those musical stomps was a pain but not essential anyway.

Both mechanically & power wise I think Vet Black Gem is significantly harder than Vet NC, by some margin.

Vet NC has some mechanics but they never felt as unforgiving as, say, Vet Graven Deep.

As for the experience factor, I’m pretty sure these dungeons are locked behind a CP300 floor. It’s somewhat hard to gauge “experience” versus just time played in the game so it’s really a roll of the dice.

I do notice that when it comes to content like Vet NC, Vet Graven, or Vet Black Gem, a lot of players don’t want to run them outside of a group they know they can communicate and coordinate with; regardless of level. The mechs require a certain amount of precision that’s hard to get from a rando group and I think that’s more of why people jump from the group.

Maybe ZoS could add another dungeon category, this way we’d have: Random Normal Dungeon, Random Veteran Dungeon, & Random Advanced Dungeon; where the Advanced would see the more mech-intricate dungeons. That way players could queue without having to wonder if they’re going to get a brutal pick.

ivaylo.krumoveb17_ESO · April 25

NxJoeyD wrote: »

Both mechanically & power wise I think Vet Black Gem is significantly harder than Vet NC, by some margin.

Yes but PUGs roflstomp nBGF. It is only nNC where the curve bends. Today it is the pledge and i already collided 3 times with it trying to do my RNDs

AvalonRanger · April 25

"Why is Naj-Caldeesh so grossly overtuned in normal? Bookmark"

Normal Naj-Caldeesh is not so hell.

(Vet is pretty hell though...LoL

)
Just mindless players keep doing nonsense always like other dungeon running.
(fake tank, fake healer, fake DPS, mindless speed running...etc)

It's a failure of "education".

AvalonRanger · April 25

AvalonRanger wrote: »

"Why is Naj-Caldeesh so grossly overtuned in normal? Bookmark"

Normal Naj-Caldeesh is not so hell. (Vet is pretty hell though...LoL )
Just mindless players keep doing nonsense always like other dungeon running.
(fake tank, fake healer, fake DPS, mindless speed running...etc)

It's a failure of "education".

Plus, I've seen much of almost fake healer in random running.
Not Naj-Caldeesh only problem anyway.

DenverRalphy · April 25

xylena wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

It's not overtuned.

If casuals are struggling with Normal, then yes it is overtuned and an abject failure at its intended purpose. You wanna sweat, you queue for Vet.

Normal Naj Caldeesh is not sweaty at all. It's just not a tank-n-spank dungeon. The hardest part on normal is probably the bonus Rockband style rythm puzzle.

It just requires the players pay attention to mechs. Nuthin sweaty about it.

spartaxoxo · April 25

Normal Naj is definitely sweaty if it requires far more attention than other content in the same category of content.

The question of sweatyness isn't if any one person finds it easy enough to do. I can do it alone. The question is if it's an outlier to everything else in the same category.

All of these comments about you "Just have to pay attention," and "you should just bring a tank," or "it's just not good for activity finder groups," convinces me of the exact opposite of the claims. That it is in an outlier that should be nerfed. Normal is precisely for those activity finder groups and people who don't know mechs yet. Needing pay close attention because the content is a real challenge, group comp, build concerns...those things are for vet.

If normal Naj requires the same type of gameplay as vet, even if it's to a lesser degree, then it needs to be toned down. Normal is meant to be able to be completed by a level 35 just starting to get into group content. They don't even have CP yet.

Orbital78 · April 25

xylena wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

It's not overtuned.

If casuals are struggling with Normal, then yes it is overtuned and an abject failure at its intended purpose. You wanna sweat, you queue for Vet.

Vet isn't that hard for a decent group. It is just that it has mechanics and DPS are used to ignoring them. Some of the bosses do require more healing too, some groups are used to 3 DPS.

Normals should be quite different though. Power creep and challenge creep should scale somewhat, but normal level power isn't going up so much to merit the challenge creep.

DenverRalphy · April 25

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Normal Naj is definitely sweaty if it requires far more attention than other content in the same category of content.

The question of sweatyness isn't if any one person finds it easy enough to do. I can do it alone. The question is if it's an outlier to everything else in the same category.

All of these comments about you "Just have to pay attention," and "you should just bring a tank," or "it's just not good for activity finder groups," convinces me of the exact opposite of the claims. That it is in an outlier that should be nerfed. Normal is precisely for those activity finder groups and people who don't know mechs yet. Challenges, group comp, build concerns...those things are for vet.

When did the inability to be able to speed run with 4dps become the bar?

spartaxoxo · April 25

DenverRalphy wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Normal Naj is definitely sweaty if it requires far more attention than other content in the same category of content.

The question of sweatyness isn't if any one person finds it easy enough to do. I can do it alone. The question is if it's an outlier to everything else in the same category.

All of these comments about you "Just have to pay attention," and "you should just bring a tank," or "it's just not good for activity finder groups," convinces me of the exact opposite of the claims. That it is in an outlier that should be nerfed. Normal is precisely for those activity finder groups and people who don't know mechs yet. Challenges, group comp, build concerns...those things are for vet.

When did the inability to be able to speed run with 4dps become the bar?

Normal is for level 35s. Obviously a group of high level DDs should be able to speed run it. That's the norm for activity finder and it's the power level of every other dungeon in the group.

Orbital78 · April 25

If people drop from the dungeon the second they load in, there must be some bad experiences with it. If the dungeon requires a higher cp, require it to queue.

DenverRalphy · April 25

spartaxoxo wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Normal Naj is definitely sweaty if it requires far more attention than other content in the same category of content.

The question of sweatyness isn't if any one person finds it easy enough to do. I can do it alone. The question is if it's an outlier to everything else in the same category.

All of these comments about you "Just have to pay attention," and "you should just bring a tank," or "it's just not good for activity finder groups," convinces me of the exact opposite of the claims. That it is in an outlier that should be nerfed. Normal is precisely for those activity finder groups and people who don't know mechs yet. Challenges, group comp, build concerns...those things are for vet.

When did the inability to be able to speed run with 4dps become the bar?

Normal is for level 35s. Obviously a group of high level DDs should be able to speed run it. That's the norm for activity finder and it's the power level of every other dungeon in the group.

It's not the power level that makes naj caldeesh different. It's designed to promote group compositions containing all 3 roles, and players working together. That's it. Something sorely lacking in ESO after years of power creep.

There's nothing sweaty about nNC. It's just not a trivial walk in the park.

When did sweaty come to simply mean one step up from beginner casual? Sweaty players are those looking to complete HM's, Trifectas, etc.. Heck, non-hm vet difficulty used to not be considered sweaty.

SirBanana1992 · April 25

spartaxoxo wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Normal Naj is definitely sweaty if it requires far more attention than other content in the same category of content.

The question of sweatyness isn't if any one person finds it easy enough to do. I can do it alone. The question is if it's an outlier to everything else in the same category.

All of these comments about you "Just have to pay attention," and "you should just bring a tank," or "it's just not good for activity finder groups," convinces me of the exact opposite of the claims. That it is in an outlier that should be nerfed. Normal is precisely for those activity finder groups and people who don't know mechs yet. Challenges, group comp, build concerns...those things are for vet.

When did the inability to be able to speed run with 4dps become the bar?

Normal is for level 35s. Obviously a group of high level DDs should be able to speed run it. That's the norm for activity finder and it's the power level of every other dungeon in the group.

To add a 2 cent to this with a personal experience from years ago, I was once a new player tanking for Moon Hunter Keep that never experienced DLC dungeons after just unlocking them, no CP lvls. My first experience there was absolutely abysmal as it just led to me getting screamed at by an entitled DPS that was mad I did not know mechanics yet. And back then that dungeon was more punishing with what it dished out, pretty sure it was nerfed in many aspects for normal difficulty.

So I'm guessing if the normal difficulty can generate such tension for new players that are still learning it might not be ideal and dissuade some players from group content later down the line. Thankfully I myself saw this as an outliar and I've been casually tanking vet trials for a pretty long while now in my social casual guild.

Soarora · April 25

DenverRalphy wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Normal Naj is definitely sweaty if it requires far more attention than other content in the same category of content.

The question of sweatyness isn't if any one person finds it easy enough to do. I can do it alone. The question is if it's an outlier to everything else in the same category.

All of these comments about you "Just have to pay attention," and "you should just bring a tank," or "it's just not good for activity finder groups," convinces me of the exact opposite of the claims. That it is in an outlier that should be nerfed. Normal is precisely for those activity finder groups and people who don't know mechs yet. Challenges, group comp, build concerns...those things are for vet.

When did the inability to be able to speed run with 4dps become the bar?

Normal is for level 35s. Obviously a group of high level DDs should be able to speed run it. That's the norm for activity finder and it's the power level of every other dungeon in the group.

It's not the power level that makes naj caldeesh different. It's designed to promote group compositions containing all 3 roles, and players working together. That's it. Something sorely lacking in ESO after years of power creep.

There's nothing sweaty about nNC. It's just not a trivial walk in the park.

When did sweaty come to simply mean one step up from beginner casual? Sweaty players are those looking to complete HM's, Trifectas, etc.. Heck, non-hm vet difficulty used to not be considered sweaty.

I wouldn’t even consider trifectas sweaty. Imo, sweaty is a state of being where you’re intending to hit the maximum damage possible to full burn through as much as possible, sweating your global cooldowns and preDoTting. This is applicable to any level of content, it’s the person that makes the difference. You can do dungeon trifectas in off-meta builds just having a chill time.

If you take me and take an actual sweaty player and try to make us do a dungeon together, you’ll see the difference pretty clearly because we’ll butt heads over what we consider fun.

code65536 · April 25

DenverRalphy wrote: »

It's designed to promote group compositions containing all 3 roles, and players working together.

That's nice... for vet.

DenverRalphy wrote: »

It's not the power level that makes naj caldeesh different.

No, it's that it's different from the experience that people have come to expect from normal that makes it different. It's different from even its sibling dungeon from the same DLC.

The thing here is that you're arguing about where the line should be drawn, when there is already a line, in the form of precedence and established expectations, that had already been drawn.

Soarora wrote: »

I wouldn’t even consider trifectas sweaty.

Nitpicker's Corner:

Sweaty is not a binary thing that's either on or off. It's a continuous spectrum, and what counts as "sweaty" depends on the context of what you're comparing it against.

It's the same reason I get annoyed when people pompously talk in a way that implies "endgame" is for people who have multiple post-KA trial trifectas, since I'm sure there are players out there where the border between normal and vet is where that "endgame" line is drawn. Labels like this are too imprecise and can mean too many things to different people.

spartaxoxo · April 26

DenverRalphy wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Normal Naj is definitely sweaty if it requires far more attention than other content in the same category of content.

The question of sweatyness isn't if any one person finds it easy enough to do. I can do it alone. The question is if it's an outlier to everything else in the same category.

All of these comments about you "Just have to pay attention," and "you should just bring a tank," or "it's just not good for activity finder groups," convinces me of the exact opposite of the claims. That it is in an outlier that should be nerfed. Normal is precisely for those activity finder groups and people who don't know mechs yet. Challenges, group comp, build concerns...those things are for vet.

When did the inability to be able to speed run with 4dps become the bar?

Normal is for level 35s. Obviously a group of high level DDs should be able to speed run it. That's the norm for activity finder and it's the power level of every other dungeon in the group.

It's not the power level that makes naj caldeesh different. It's designed to promote group compositions containing all 3 roles, and players working together. That's it. Something sorely lacking in ESO after years of power creep.

There's nothing sweaty about nNC. It's just not a trivial walk in the park.

When did sweaty come to simply mean one step up from beginner casual? Sweaty players are those looking to complete HM's, Trifectas, etc.. Heck, non-hm vet difficulty used to not be considered sweaty.

And it's doing those things with power level. All they'd need to do is nerf some numbers with no other mechanical tweaks and it would just as in line with everything else.

It already almost is. I didn't even notice it until someone made this thread and I realized that I had to switch up my bills to finish fights by myself a couple of times now.

Orbital78 · April 26

I just did Black Gems on normal random and it was comically easy. You don't have to do any of them mechs really, which probably isn't a good thing. I need to do a normal Naj again to see how bad it is, I usually stick to vets for better rewards.

Ordinator199 · April 26

Oh no, a normal dungeon I can't blast through as bow wielding heavy attacking dragonknight, who qued as a healer. Nerffffffff plzzzzzz

frogthroat · April 27

Ordinator199 wrote: »

Oh no, a normal dungeon I can't blast through as bow wielding heavy attacking dragonknight, who qued as a healer. Nerffffffff plzzzzzz

You didn't read any of the comments from experienced players in this thread, did you? Of course we have here some people who think dungeons are easy and surely got Coral Caretaker solo by the way they're talking, but if you pay attention to reasonable experienced players the point is: the dungeons should be on similar level on the same difficulty. This is not the case. I am sure you can solo nN-C just using your toes while simultaneously completing Sekiro no hit run with your hands, but the fact still is that nN-C is closer to earlier veteran dungeons than any dungeon on normal.

cyberjanet · April 27

For starters, I don't PUG. I hate the me-first mentality speedrunners and wonder why they even play. And I really enjoy Naj Caldeesh. I haven't tried it in vet, when it was a pledge the other day I was thinking it would be really hard in vet based on some of the fights. But I absolutely *love* the organs. We look for a full group just to play the organs. One of our guild members bought the dungeon for someone who didn't have it, so he could join us and we could play the organs. And we can only play them twice each. Give us more organ pieces. Give me an organ for my house with lots and lots of pieces to play. Seriously, who cares about the difficulty and the bosses when you have the organs!

CalamityCat · April 27

So having seen this thread, I had my first attempt with Naj last night. Went in with my templar healer after reading a guide so I knew roughly what the mechanics would be like.

My group had reached the second boss but their previous healer and tank had both quit. So after I arrived another tank joined. 2nd boss was definitely a challenge, but we just died once then we got it on the second run. It definitely required what I'd call "proper" healing.

Third boss was the one that got our group though. The tank didn't seem to be actually using a taunt so that didn't help. Annoyingly the tank then quit after we wiped when the boss was on a sliver of health. Usually when I've had a group get that close, they're motivated and we get it the next time, but nope. We couldn't get another tank and had to abort

I'd definitely say those fights felt more like vet DLC than normal. It felt like they absolutely needed a real tank and at least one more fairly strong DD. Mine were absolutely capable DDs and worked hard, but I think we were just a wee bit low on the damage to burn through that last fight. The mechanics didn't even feel complicated, it was just they needed us to all work hard as a team and be aware of what's going on around us. Which I like, but it'd be insane for a group of lower level characters as their daily random.

I'm still looking forward to trying it again

BardokRedSnow · April 27

This thread explains why I couldn’t get a queue for this with my duo on vet or normal lol

code65536 · April 27

cyberjanet wrote: »

I haven't tried it in vet, when it was a pledge the other day I was thinking it would be really hard in vet based on some of the fights.

Naj is not hard on vet or vet HM, and concerns about its difficulty are exclusive only to normal mode. The general consensus is that Naj is easier than average, when compared to other recent DLC dungeons on vet HM.

When a dungeon is designed, the "original" design is what you see in vet HM. And then they make the vet version by nerfing the original vet HM, and they make the normal version by nerfing it some more.

In this case, Naj's difficulty on normal is not the result of the original vet HM design being unusually hard, but rather the result of them being gentle with the nerfing when making the normal version, so that the difficulty gap between normal and vet is smaller than what people have come to expect. And because of this, you can't use normal Naj to extrapolate what the higher difficulties are like.

Edit: If you compare Naj-Caldeesh with its sibling dungeon, Black Gem Foundry, you'll find that BGF is way harder than NC on the original vet HM difficulty. But in the process of nerfing these dungeons to create the lower-difficulty versions, NC only got tweaks to numbers, while BGF also received significant mechanical alterations (no damage ramp for first boss DoT, no damage mit for the second boss adds) and even the outright removal of a mechanic (the most interesting mechanic of the final boss was completely annihilated in regular vet and normal), so that's how you end up with BGF's normal being easier than NC's normal, even though their original relative difficulties were reversed.

Ardriel · April 27

Guys, you do realize that difficulty levels are perceived differently right?
For players experienced with endgame vet hm content, the dungeon is hardly a challenge on normal. But for many other players, it’s obviously different, considering how many people report that groups disband because they fail at the second boss or people quit right at the beginning.

As code already said, the dungeon is too difficult in normal mode compared to other DLC dungeons.
Of course, ZOS could adjust the other normal dungeons and increase the difficulty level accordingly. Maybe that would help with the fake tank and healer problem.

But then I guess at least half the player base would quit ESO. There are a lot of players who queue for random normal because they don’t want to do random vet. For whatever reason. But they still want to do random dungeons.

The only option left is to nerf Naj Caldeesh on normal mode.

Anyone who finds the dungeon too easy on normal mode can always run it on veteran with hard mode.
A higher difficulty level shouldn't be forced on players; it should remain optional. That's what normal and veteran content is for.

lostineternity · April 27

xylena wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

It's not overtuned.

If casuals are struggling with Normal, then yes it is overtuned and an abject failure at its intended purpose. You wanna sweat, you queue for Vet.

1% brain activity = sweat for you?

I mean damn, this is absolutely ridiculous that having a tank with taunt (having not only light armor optional) and a healer with at least 1 heal on bars is considered to be a sweaty.
I wonder if there is even a lower bar to the degradation of the ESO playerbase?

attrielub17_ESO · April 27

I don't chase the meta or anything. I am probably what someone referred to as "fake dps" (which i don't understad as a concept unless you're an all heals and buffs build without a weapon??). I do middling well. I just don't care to chase the latest-and-greatest combos. I didn't even multiclass except to do the initial quest line then figured out how to put it back. I do RND because I know I don't have to worry about being peak performance and hitting the marks.

I like NC because its a cool place.

I dislike getting NC, though, because >50% of the time is a failed run. Lately 20-30% have been failed at the start because someone drops as soon as they figure out where they ended up.

The drop/fail rate for RNDs in NC is much higher than another other. Now, I feel like I get FG/DSC/Spindle/NC disproportionally often compared to any other, and the other three are cakewalks for high CP groups.

The bosses are definitely tuned higher. Harder hitting, more HP. more annoying details (I hesitate to say mechanics, because theres not a lot of "press these buttons together" or the maarselok blood globule thing etc).

With 10 years of growth, i'm not surprised that those early dungeons are speedrunners delights, but I don't think making everythign else harder is the solution.

So yeah, I agree that nNC is tuned too high for an RND group. And as long as that's a play mechanism thats encouraged (RND rewards and 10 group dungeon pursuits etc) it needs to be accounted for. Bring down the damage on the bosses like 10% is probably enough, honestly, just so they're not quite AS deadly

Orbital78 · April 27

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

This thread explains why I couldn’t get a queue for this with my duo on vet or normal lol

More of an issue with preformed duos and zos' matchmaking. It is funky weird, but solo it pops nonstop as a healer or tank.

As for OP difficulty, normal may be overturned relative to other dungeons. However I can heal it on my heavy sorc. It is a DPS/heal check mostly. Tank positioning is important too. If a new tank just leaves adds or boss Immune, it is a bad time. This is one (vet) I normally would not run with players under 1000cp unless I know them to be setup well. I have farmed almost all the motifs now, it isn't bad if you get a decent group.

ivaylo.krumoveb17_ESO · April 27

lostineternity wrote: »

xylena wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

It's not overtuned.

If casuals are struggling with Normal, then yes it is overtuned and an abject failure at its intended purpose. You wanna sweat, you queue for Vet.

1% brain activity = sweat for you?

I mean damn, this is absolutely ridiculous that having a tank with taunt (having not only light armor optional) and a healer with at least 1 heal on bars is considered to be a sweaty.
I wonder if there is even a lower bar to the degradation of the ESO playerbase?

The experience in normal dungeons has degenerated, on that i agree, but not because of the playerbase. We owe this mostly to the RND reward. I for one have nothing else to look for in normals. Nor in vet dungeons for that matter. I only need the 10 transmutes. That's why i want quick and easy clear. *Everyone* wants this for god's sake. Yes, fakes are common. The alternative of waiting forever as a DPS makes this a no brainer. But it's not players' fault. The game design forces this playstyle on us. Do you think it's normal for any sane person tanking a normal to feel obliged to slot vigor or alike to keep the group going because it's 99.9% certain they'll get a fake healer? It is not IMO. But that's what we have in ESO.

Bo0137 · April 27

It is overtuned and unsuitable for pugs.

Most pugs will fail.

One might wonder why that's a problem. Because this dungeon is in the normal random rotation. And because ALL of the other dungeons are tuned way easier than this one.

I agree with OP. If you want some challenge, go for veteran and above. Normal should be normal