Difference between Maelstrom normal / veteran?

nihirisutou

So I just completed the arena for the first time, I am CP 240 - 45 something.

I didn't know you have to complete it once before you start veteran, or maybe I picked up the quest prior to level 50.

Either way since I completed the apparent normal mode at CP level, is there any major change in difficulty if I attempt once again now?

SirDopey

Massive.

Vet is probably equivalent to doing normal naked with no passives or cp.......

VaranisArano

There's a big difficulty spike. Normal Maelstrom is good for learning the spawn points and the mechanics but it in no way prepares you for the difficulty of Veteran Maelstrom.

Enemies have more health and do more damage but all the mechanics stay the same.

"That's not so bad..."

VMA is kicking my butt. Enemies do lots more damage so you have to mitigate a lot more damage plus you have to really pay attention to priority targets that will mess up your day plus you have to do more damage to kill everything. There is very little margin for error so you really have to pay attention to what kills you and do it right the next time.

I highly recommend Joy_Division's guide: https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/381682/joys-new-and-improved-guide-to-beating-maelstrom-arena

Vapirko

Normal is pretty much like any overland content, with the last boss being like a decently challenging world boss but with power sigils which is to say, not challenging. vMA is going to be some of the hardest game conentent you’ve ever played, on your first run through. It’s gets exponentially easier, but that first time is can feel like it’s totally impossible. Your experience will also vary depending on what class you play and gear available. For stam classes vicious ophidian makes a world of difference. For magicka it’s suposoed to be overall easier because shields and Destro ult, but I really prefer stamina sorc. With VO gear, crit surge and hurricane there’s just no stopping. Also keep in mind that even vMA was designed with CP300 in mind so you’re going to have a tough time. Not impossible just extra hard. Might want to try and get to cp500 at least just to save yourself the trouble unless you consider yourself extra good at this game.

Taleof2Cities

It's the hardest solo content in the game.

It does get better after the first complete.

DoctorESO

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Ciovala

I never finished normal (tried once at CP150, died on stage 3 and abandoned the quest). Came back at CP500 and went straight to the veteran version. The first clear took me a week (off and on), but the very next attempt just took me like 2 hours. You just need to get used to the mechanics, when the perfect time is to use your ultimate, which targets will pwn you, etc. Joy's guide (linked above) is ace.

Qbiken

TL:DR

In vet maelstrom mechanics kills you.

VaranisArano

Qbiken wrote: »

TL:DR

In vet maelstrom mechanics kills you.

Pretty much. In Normal, you can learn the mechanics and make mistakes without dying.

In Veteran, death is your teacher.

Asardes

Normal can be done "flawlessly" with random gear and random skills on your bar, just doing light and heavy attacks. Veteran is almost as hard as beating a veteran dungeon solo, with mobs having about the same health as normal dungeon ones, but with plenty of attacks and mechanics that will do 20K+ damage (one shot) if not blocked, dodged, or played properly. IMO there's really no point in doing normal unless you are leveling a character to 50 since it gives decent experience, but you'll learn nothing about veteran. For example on normal most characters can simply heal trough the poison in Vault of Umbrage that comes from ground spores and the archers, but on veteran it will kill you in 3s unless you are a sorcerer with a huge shield that can sprint to the pool until it drops him.

greylox

Its the largest jump in difficulty in the game.

DocFrost72

Ever seen a chuck E cheese next to a strip club? About that level of difference.

Vet punishes you if you don't know the mechanics where normal doesn't.

DoctorESO

.

VaranisArano

Vet is the single most punishing thing I've tried in the game. Arena 4 is kicking my butt.

And every round I beat is the sweetest victory I've ever earned in this game.

Truly no reward worth having comes without great effort.

driosketch

VaranisArano wrote: »

Qbiken wrote: »

TL:DR

In vet maelstrom mechanics kills you.

Pretty much. In Normal, you can learn the mechanics and make mistakes without dying.

In Veteran, death is your teacher.

I'm a poor student, because 4 was also kicking my butt for the longest time. Video guides from other players are a godsend.

beetleklee

The first run on vet is always the hardest.
For me, the first run through, the hardest were 4, 5, and 9. I used a pet MagSorc.
6 and 7 were pretty difficult but mostly due to RNG, the mechanics were easy to deal with.
1, 2, 3 and 8 are easy peasy.
Stage 4 is supposed to be easy according to people, but I found it pretty tough the first run through. I knew to focus the little turret guys before they shielded up but sometimes on the phase where the boss has the green circle and you move with him, I didn't see some of the turrets spawn on the other side despite looking out for them.
Stage 5 took me a few hours over 2 days. The archer and ice mage adds were the worst. They do so much damage!
Stage 9 final boss took me a few hours over 3 days and was the most frustrating. Mostly due to Crem Guards. The mechanics weren't hard. But man I hate the Crem Guards. I had no idea having a Negate ult would cause them to not breath fire, next time I'll keep that in mind. I mostly saved my destro ults for those ****s lol.
It was worth it, got the vMA bow.

I just finished my 2nd run last night, this time with MagDK. It was much faster this time around, and easier (but by no means easy)
This time stage 5 took 20 minutes. Having wings on MagDK helped even better deal with the ranged archers and mages when I didn't have defensive sigil. The boss burn took much quicker because my MagDK has strong DoTs and quicker ult gen.
I did stages 1-8 in one night. I got to the final boss on stage 9 but due to having bad lag, I died a lot and decided to call it quits for the night. Went back the next day, it was still the hardest stage but I beat it and this time the RNG gods were not with me, got the vMA axe and sword...

Not sure if I should continue farming it with MagDK/MagSorc or try with my StamDK. I'm a little scared not having a shield, haha. My StamDK has the best deeps though.

Definitely push through it. It will make you a better player and maybe give you that rockin bow or destro staff.

DoctorESO

.

Partomax

I've done delves harder than normal maelstrom arena. vMA is hell the first few runs but if you have decent damage and survivability it gets easier and easier with experience

Valrien

DoctorESO wrote: »

driosketch wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

Qbiken wrote: »

TL:DR

In vet maelstrom mechanics kills you.

Pretty much. In Normal, you can learn the mechanics and make mistakes without dying.

In Veteran, death is your teacher.

I'm a poor student, because 4 was also kicking my butt for the longest time. Video guides from other players are a godsend.

Everyone has a unique play style just like everyone has a unique fingerprint. So everyone has a unique Achille's heel. There is no shame in having difficulty on a particular stage. Something else that's easy for you is difficult for someone else. I guarantee it.

Fingerprints aren't unique though. It's highly unlikely that two people share the same fingerprints yes, but there's actually no scientific basis for fingerprints being 100% unique like, say, DNA.


Also before something is said about snowflakes it was disproven that no two snowflakes are alike in 1988

VaranisArano

That was a really odd thing to necro this thread from January for, just saying.

Anyway, good luck to anyone attempting VMA for the first time during the Orsinium event! And good luck to everyone when it comes to RNG on the weapons you want!

tcrite

DocFrost72 wrote: »

Ever seen a chuck E cheese next to a strip club? About that level of difference.

Vet punishes you if you don't know the mechanics where normal doesn't.

I know this is old, but this made my day. Lmao🤣😂🤣😂🤣

Inklings

When I get asked this in stream I always answer. Normal isn't so much of a learning curve as it is a false hope.

SHADOW2KK

Normal you could play naked and watching Netflix, vet is a entirely different kettle of fish.

Aideian

If you have the right sets and decent cp and know the mechanics its a walk in the park, the mechanics are the hardest part of vet maelstrom, normal maelstrom is basically for you to learn them and once you get them down you'll be fine you won't even need gold gear but gold weapons would definitely help. But yeah to answer your question its not even close the same difficulty.

yodased

All these posts are correct, but are lacking in small details.

stage 1 basically the same but the split happens much faster and the adds heal boss
stage 2 blades themselves can murk you
stage 5 ice breaks much faster, archers can 1 bang you
stage 6 if you don't cleanse the big spider thing she enrages and murks you
stage 7 you can't bash the scream and have to sit in the bubble of the mage, sometimes the mushrooms pop in that bubble and its ggwp
stage 8 crystals take a lot more damage and fix themselves much faster
stage 9 crematorium bosses will murk you, if you let a npc get the gold ghosts you are murked, touching a white ghost is basically a death.

Along with the difficulty of enemies ramped up about 10x and their health and resistances by like 100%, there are mechanics that you may not have even seen on normal depending on your dps output

Royaji

Oh, just something like the difference between a gentle warm shower and a water canon on an anti-riot truck.

Colecovision

Chuck e actually makes it rain tickets fwiw.

I found normal to be useless for clearing vma. I didn't know a single mechanic that can be passed with damage. In normal, I beat the engine guardian without getting in the green circle. I never got under the shield in round 6 and I just killed the spiderlings on round 7.

Hopefully I'm not the norm on this one, but I wish they would have really locked up progression on all the rounds, the way they did on 8. You have to take down the pillars to move on, there's no just plowing through it.

It's not perfect but there's not a lot like vma in rpgs in my experience. It's pretty awesome. I wish we'd see a new solo arena in the next chapter, but I doubt we'll ever have another piece if endgame gear available to solo players.

tcrite

Been stuck on stage 5 for about 2 mos....haven't played in about a month for fear of breaking my PC...once got close to defeating the boss but took too long and last platform was destroyed, and so was I🤬🤬🤬🤬

nihirisutou

I was struggling with this a lot too.

It's a L2P issue.

Start the boss fight on the first platform (the one where you spawn into the arena) , calmly kill the adds and the troll and after burn the boss down a bit.

Repeat with the second platform.

Third platform, grab the damage sigil and throw your ultimate on the boss whilst burning it down. (it's useful to end on the platform with the damage sigil.)

This made it very doable for me.