wolfie1.0. wrote: »

Honestly, I would prefer a more curated approach to IA. I feel that between IA and event zones like the NM you yous should be able to have curated access to every non craftable set peice in the game if you are willing to farm enough.

with the rotating gear drops in the archive you basically do unless its from dungeons, trials, arenas, or cyro

something that could be interesting and make some bosses more tolerable, is have a chance to get a gear drop from the bosses source (so if its say a dungeon boss, then you would have a chance to get a piece of gear from the dungeon that the boss shows up in)

could even work the same way for trial sets too (and yes it would only be non-perfected)

at least this would add some extra value to the drops in a way for those who have everything

for me personally the primary point of the archive is the archival fortunes because theres a lot you can get with those, and you get those from every boss anyway

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

wolfie1.0. wrote: »

Honestly, I would prefer a more curated approach to IA. I feel that between IA and event zones like the NM you yous should be able to have curated access to every non craftable set peice in the game if you are willing to farm enough.

with the rotating gear drops in the archive you basically do unless its from dungeons, trials, arenas, or cyro

something that could be interesting and make some bosses more tolerable, is have a chance to get a gear drop from the bosses source (so if its say a dungeon boss, then you would have a chance to get a piece of gear from the dungeon that the boss shows up in)

could even work the same way for trial sets too (and yes it would only be non-perfected)

at least this would add some extra value to the drops in a way for those who have everything

for me personally the primary point of the archive is the archival fortunes because theres a lot you can get with those, and you get those from every boss anyway

Ya. IA is like working a 12 hour day and getting paid $4 for the day. Only a slave would be OK with these wages.

AScarlato wrote: »

tomofhyrule wrote: »

A lot of the “omg this is such a grind!!!1!1!” complaints are also stemming from the conflict of ZOS’s view versus the players.

Remember: the news articles they posted for each of the features they’ve done imply that they intend a lot of these grinds to be long-term projects - they directly said so in reference to things like levelling the Subclass skill lines or collecting Scripts and Ink for Scribing.
The players, on the other hand, see a progress bar and need it filled that afternoon.

With 36 gear pieces per set and two sets per class (and likely with another set per class to come, not to mention another crop of three sets every time we get a new Class), it’s absolutely not intended that we finish immediately. The fact that it’s a long grind to get everything is not a bug - it’s a feature of the system. ZOS wants you to play it long-term, because once you complete it, there’s not much drawing you back… and live-service games live and die by interaction.

I am going to call it an instance because even after just 1 week of consistent play there, it isn't *THAT* varied to justify the extremely slow process of unlocking these sets - sets which in most regards are RP-tier sets that are outperformed by easier to obtain options. At least this is what I have gathered in all of the threads about them that I could find.

The reason threads like this are popping up lately is because all classes are seeing a buff to one of their class sets making them strong contenders (if not outright meta in a couple cases) with U50. Especially so if used in conjunction with the Class Masteries also arriving in the same update.

So now many players are flocking to IA hoping to get a jump on having those sets ready when U50 lands. It can be a long grind too, since regardless which class, a player newish to IA will have to grind through two sets containing all 3 weights. I'm sure over the next couple of months we will all be regaled with a significant amount of IA looting mechanics feedback.

DenverRalphy wrote: »

AScarlato wrote: »

tomofhyrule wrote: »

A lot of the “omg this is such a grind!!!1!1!” complaints are also stemming from the conflict of ZOS’s view versus the players.

Remember: the news articles they posted for each of the features they’ve done imply that they intend a lot of these grinds to be long-term projects - they directly said so in reference to things like levelling the Subclass skill lines or collecting Scripts and Ink for Scribing.
The players, on the other hand, see a progress bar and need it filled that afternoon.

With 36 gear pieces per set and two sets per class (and likely with another set per class to come, not to mention another crop of three sets every time we get a new Class), it’s absolutely not intended that we finish immediately. The fact that it’s a long grind to get everything is not a bug - it’s a feature of the system. ZOS wants you to play it long-term, because once you complete it, there’s not much drawing you back… and live-service games live and die by interaction.

I am going to call it an instance because even after just 1 week of consistent play there, it isn't *THAT* varied to justify the extremely slow process of unlocking these sets - sets which in most regards are RP-tier sets that are outperformed by easier to obtain options. At least this is what I have gathered in all of the threads about them that I could find.

The reason threads like this are popping up lately is because all classes are seeing a buff to one of their class sets making them strong contenders (if not outright meta in a couple cases) with U50. Especially so if used in conjunction with the Class Masteries also arriving in the same update.

So now many players are flocking to IA hoping to get a jump on having those sets ready when U50 lands. It can be a long grind too, since regardless which class, a player newish to IA will have to grind through two sets containing all 3 weights. I'm sure over the next couple of months we will all be regaled with a significant amount of IA looting mechanics feedback.

That is nice to hear, and makes the effort seem more worth it.

I really only wanted my set for RP and it being themeactic, but hearing they may be buffed is a bonus.

It was starting to feel like a slog, especially with my RNG. I got 4 bows out of 5 RNG boxes, and that was just starting out with nothing unlocked where it seemingly would have made sense to buy the uncurated boxes.

I did try to list IA in party finder to try to make it more interesting as I was getting very bored with my companion doing this over and over again but didn't get any bites.

katanagirl1 wrote: »

tomofhyrule wrote: »

A lot of the “omg this is such a grind!!!1!1!” complaints are also stemming from the conflict of ZOS’s view versus the players.

Remember: the news articles they posted for each of the features they’ve done imply that they intend a lot of these grinds to be long-term projects - they directly said so in reference to things like levelling the Subclass skill lines or collecting Scripts and Ink for Scribing.
The players, on the other hand, see a progress bar and need it filled that afternoon.

With 36 gear pieces per set and two sets per class (and likely with another set per class to come, not to mention another crop of three sets every time we get a new Class), it’s absolutely not intended that we finish immediately. The fact that it’s a long grind to get everything is not a bug - it’s a feature of the system. ZOS wants you to play it long-term, because once you complete it, there’s not much drawing you back… and live-service games live and die by interaction.

No, it’s because doing this solo I did 2 arcs when the second daily came out but when I was done with that I did only one arc each run. You get piddling fortunes for that. I just finally started getting something other than arcanist drops before I stopped doing it. I had enough fortunes to buy a few leads, and buy the bonuses except the one for Theater of War, which I never got. I don’t have many fortunes left.

If you have someone to run with or an OP boring tank build then you’re set. Otherwise, it is a long haul and some of us just can’t take that tedium. I am happy they have forgotten about it and have abandoned it and have not added more stuff to it.

When I farmed it out, I found it faster to solo with Azandar as a tank companion. Pretty much any class with a HA build with sergeants mail, noble duelist, oskensoul, and lightning staff can run to Arc 2 Tho'at in about 30 mins with minimal effort. (though I do recommend striving for Arc 3 Marauder for that additional armor piece)

And if it's an Oakensorc, you'll just own Theater of War.

I agree with Katanagirl that the content simply isn't fun enough to justify how much time they want us to be in there. I'm not saying there was no fun - it was fun to me for a little while. But then that is replaced with tedium and finally resentment.

While I didn't like being portrayed as someone who expects everything I want in an MMO to be handed to me immediately and with no effort, I understood Tom's point that they want repeatable content because we consume content faster than they can develop it. But there has to be a balance between rewards and the time investment they want out of players. And some consideration as to how interesting/exciting the content is to actually do over, and over, and over, and over again.

I had more fun seeking rare dungeon pieces from even before the stickerbook/curating with friends, because at least that was a more social experience. I haven't been able to get people to run this with me since most will just do it with a companion if at all. Most people are in the "I don't want to do this at all" category that I know personally.

I appreciate Denver's tip that it can be very easy to do two arcs by just using Oakensoul / HA, but even if that were only to take a half hour - it's quite a tax on my free time when you consider the number of total runs I'd need to be doing. And without the social aspect that made dungeon runs for loot and loot sharing fun. Adding in HA / Oakensoul would probably make me even more bored.

I probably will try to do one run a day until I can't stand it anymore, since I am interested in saving up currency for companion gear boxes and other things I can get there outside the sets. But I still wish they were more generous with the set drops. It's odd they added curating/stickerbook to look player-friendly and then designed this to limit how many pieces we can get per hour of time played.

katanagirl1 wrote: »

I can’t run Oakensorc anymore due to problems with my right index finger and not being able to hold down the right trigger on the controller.

Oh my apologies, I had forgotten (or just didn't pick up on) that you had a physical concern limiting your gameplay/endurance. Have you considered possibly using a competitive gaming controller with button paddles, and remapping the R2 trigger to one of them? That would allow you to perform the same action but with your middle or ring finger instead.

[edit] Sorry, went off topic. Just an honest and curious question.

DenverRalphy wrote: »

katanagirl1 wrote: »

I can’t run Oakensorc anymore due to problems with my right index finger and not being able to hold down the right trigger on the controller.

Oh my apologies, I had forgotten (or just didn't pick up on) that you had a physical concern limiting your gameplay/endurance. Have you considered possibly using a competitive gaming controller with button paddles, and remapping the R2 trigger to one of them? That would allow you to perform the same action but with your middle or ring finger instead.

[edit] Sorry, went off topic. Just an honest and curious question.

There is a PS5 controller called Elite or something that lets you assign back buttons to do stuff. It has a much smaller battery because the sticks can be removed and changed easily. I considered it but passed because of that. I really do okay with a non-subclassed arcanist because I can slot Camo Hunter on both R1 buttons and just not light attack most of the time.

My main complaint about IA is not that I can’t get everything with this amount of effort, I just want to clarify that. I’m really there for the furnishing leads, and I only have one codex entry for all of them at this point. There is too much other stuff getting in the way of leads and you can’t buy the furnishing leads in the IA with fortunes.

I'm done with IA. Already spent too much time there and no way in **** am I going to put in the absurd amount of grinding it would take to get anything noteworthy from IA.

I'm discovering the night market is essentially the same thing too. Just get the few basic rewards then move to activities that are actually fun and not just a forever grind.