Dragonstar Arena Pacing

Goldtistic

Been trying to get puncturing remedy for my tank, but every single DSA run takes like 30-40 minutes just waiting for mobs to spawn. I really, REALLY wish they'd go back and tune this activity for the amount of damage we hit, or just introduce a speed mode where all of the mobs spawn at once. Anyone else feel this way, or is it just me who thinks the pacing is stupidly slow and inflates the grind?

Etherea1

Agree.

M0ntie

The mobs could spawn a little faster, but the worst thing with DSA is the 30 seconds at the start of each round. For goodness sake ZoS reduce the time from when you enter the next arena to 5 or at the most 10 secs!!! We do not need to hear the commentator blabbering on for so long especially after clearing it once. If the group needs more time, they can just not enter until they are ready.

Molydeus

There are 9 bosses so the additional dialogue adds maybe 5-6 minutes to the arena, at most.

Necrotech_Master

M0ntie wrote: »

The mobs could spawn a little faster, but the worst thing with DSA is the 30 seconds at the start of each round. For goodness sake ZoS reduce the time from when you enter the next arena to 5 or at the most 10 secs!!! We do not need to hear the commentator blabbering on for so long especially after clearing it once. If the group needs more time, they can just not enter until they are ready.

the dialog has nothing to do with the timer, the intention of the timer is to allow all the group members time to get into the arena if anyone was using the little merchant imp to sell/repair prior to the fight

i would hate if they got rid of the dialog, i find it the most entertaining thing in the arena

i do agree that they definitely need to shorten some of the spawn timers and reduce the waiting, i dont think 30 sec wait for each arena is really necessary and could be reduced to 10 sec without messing with the dialog

sharquez

More stuff like Vateshran and Blackrose would be delicious the pacing of those was way better. DSA is a colossal waste of time. They have been getting really good about making the group content digestible but challenging. last 3 dungeon DLCs have been home runs.

El_Borracho

sharquez wrote: »

More stuff like Vateshran and Blackrose would be delicious the pacing of those was way better. DSA is a colossal waste of time. They have been getting really good about making the group content digestible but challenging. last 3 dungeon DLCs have been home runs.

Completely with you. Going into VDSA you know its going to take 45 minutes to an hour, even with a good group. I know you can say the same for trials, but the weapons and set drops in VDSA have severely declined in usefulness. Its just not worth it

Amottica

Pretty sure each wave has a specific NPC that when killed the next wave spawns. Someone I run with has been running vDSA for years and said they hit certain NPCs to bring out the next wave when they used to push to bet the fastest time. Apparently scoring used to be a time score.

endorphinsplox

Amottica wrote: »

Pretty sure each wave has a specific NPC that when killed the next wave spawns. Someone I run with has been running vDSA for years and said they hit certain NPCs to bring out the next wave when they used to push to bet the fastest time. Apparently scoring used to be a time score.

This appears to be true, but the amount of standing around and waiting in DSA is egregious still. Pushing through waves efficiently is fine, but the individual rounds have long pauses between them. Then there's the dialogue from Hiath and Boethiah which, while awesome to listen to, takes way too long and is unnecessary on subsequent runs.

It appears to me that they put long pauses between rounds to give players time to heal and recupe their resources. The long dialogue segments were also par for the course as far as game design was in ESO at the time of DSA's release. Another major offender in that regard would be Vaults of Madness. Blackrose Prison is obviously a much shorter arena having only five arenas with five rounds each as opposed to 10 arenas, 9 of those having 5 rounds. Aside from being shorter, BRP also just feels a lot faster than DSA. I think its because instead of putting long pauses between rounds, the game just refunds a portion of your resources and health so the next round can start way sooner. There also isn't a pre-amble dialogue for each new arena like in DSA.

I think there should be a QoL pass on a lot of older content, which thankfully ZOS has really delivered on with many things, but DSA is one of the biggest offenders now that there are more reasons to go back there. I'm fairly certain when a new round starts, players that aren't in the arena get transported in automatically already so there's no need for the long dialogue stuff beforehand. Each arena should start immediately on entering and passing the trigger volume that is already present, instead of the 30 second wait before the first round. The dialogue can still play but should just play during the fighting instead of making people wait. After each completed round, the players' resources should be restored like they are in BRP so the next round can start almost immediately instead of the long wait between. The Hiath fight also shouldn't have such a long wait before he spawns in.

Hope ZOS is listening.

Elrond87

A lot complain about this issue, its time for it to be tweaked to reduce spawn times, it was ok years ago but now as stuff dies faster as they nerf stuff the older it gets, they need to adjust the spawn time

M0ntie

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

M0ntie wrote: »

The mobs could spawn a little faster, but the worst thing with DSA is the 30 seconds at the start of each round. For goodness sake ZoS reduce the time from when you enter the next arena to 5 or at the most 10 secs!!! We do not need to hear the commentator blabbering on for so long especially after clearing it once. If the group needs more time, they can just not enter until they are ready.

the dialog has nothing to do with the timer, the intention of the timer is to allow all the group members time to get into the arena if anyone was using the little merchant imp to sell/repair prior to the fight

i would hate if they got rid of the dialog, i find it the most entertaining thing in the arena

i do agree that they definitely need to shorten some of the spawn timers and reduce the waiting, i dont think 30 sec wait for each arena is really necessary and could be reduced to 10 sec without messing with the dialog

Just ask your group members to wait if you're going to take a long time repairing/selling.
After you've done it several times, you don't need to hear the same dialog over and over and over.

Necrotech_Master

M0ntie wrote: »

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

M0ntie wrote: »

The mobs could spawn a little faster, but the worst thing with DSA is the 30 seconds at the start of each round. For goodness sake ZoS reduce the time from when you enter the next arena to 5 or at the most 10 secs!!! We do not need to hear the commentator blabbering on for so long especially after clearing it once. If the group needs more time, they can just not enter until they are ready.

the dialog has nothing to do with the timer, the intention of the timer is to allow all the group members time to get into the arena if anyone was using the little merchant imp to sell/repair prior to the fight

i would hate if they got rid of the dialog, i find it the most entertaining thing in the arena

i do agree that they definitely need to shorten some of the spawn timers and reduce the waiting, i dont think 30 sec wait for each arena is really necessary and could be reduced to 10 sec without messing with the dialog

Just ask your group members to wait if you're going to take a long time repairing/selling.
After you've done it several times, you don't need to hear the same dialog over and over and over.

i personally use an addon to auto-repair when i visit the merchant, so it takes me seconds to actually interact with the merchant

the original 30 second timer im pretty sure was added to make sure everyone was ported into the next arena, but in all honesty they should just reduce the timer to 5-10 sec since unless you need to fully change out gear for some reason you shouldnt need that long once someone enters the next arena