Please Stop Trivializing Content

Sakiri

LonePirate wrote: »

There is no way people one-shot Manninarco in the level 40 quest or Molag Bal in the level 50 quest. Both have far too much HP and there is not a weapon or skill in the game that does enough damage to kill them with a single shot, not even using a maximized Vampire Sorceror with VR 10 gear and Magicka stats. What is with the desire to post such fabrications? Surely nobody believes this nonsense.

I one shot both of them as melee.

I died once on the way up to Molag Bal, and that was simply because my dog was being an idiot and I looked away from my screen for two seconds and got swamped. Before the whole "ordeal" that powers you up.

LonePirate wrote: »

South_of_Heaven wrote: »

They obviously mean "beat on the first try", not in one hit...

This is much more believable. Word choice is important, people!

"One shot" has been used for "Doing it on the first try" since before RPG games or even games in general in the sense that we play them today.

kirnmalidus wrote: »

Sakiri wrote: »

Bal was one shot and I have four fully maxed crafting skills on a dw dk.

Doesnt mean Im special.

I think you missed my point. Because it was that I'm not special, and it wasn't that hard.

Your post came across as a braggart posting.

wastelanderer

Kendaric wrote: »

wastelanderer wrote: »

I think defense system is broken/bugged, because it don't work, it's a same thing if you wear armor or not, making a tank is not possible if defense don't work.
Because of this it's hard to play.

It's not really broken in the literal sense, it seems related to lag as blocking and dodging often doesn't register. This, of course, adds to the frustration.

Armor defense should always work as passive not as active when you block, blocking is working fine, but armor as passive don't do a thing, it has no difference if you have light armor on or heavy, that's what is broken, armor has no effect at all, you could wear robes and still be as effective as someone wear full metal gear with armor shield activated.

kirnmalidus

Sakiri wrote: »

Your post came across as a braggart posting.

And you stating that you one shotted Molag Bal didn't?

All I said was that I beat him and enjoyed the challenge. I'm guessing thousands – if not millions – of people have also beaten him at this point, so it's not something I consider exceptional or worth bragging about per se.

On a lighter (less flamey) note, after having participated in this discussion the last couple of days I saw a commercial for a pizza place with a kid that kept spilling tacos. The commercial advocated that tacos were to difficult to eat and you should eat taco pizzas instead.

My first thought was "Oh, great, they're nerfing tacos. Can't the kid just learn to eat tacos?"

Sakiri

kirnmalidus wrote: »

Sakiri wrote: »

Your post came across as a braggart posting.

And you stating that you one shotted Molag Bal didn't?

All I said was that I beat him and enjoyed the challenge. I'm guessing thousands – if not millions – of people have also beaten him at this point, so it's not something I consider exceptional or worth bragging about per se.

On a lighter (less flamey) note, after having participated in this discussion the last couple of days I saw a commercial for a pizza place with a kid that kept spilling tacos. The commercial advocated that tacos were to difficult to eat and you should eat taco pizzas instead.

My first thought was "Oh, great, they're nerfing tacos. Can't the kid just learn to eat tacos?"

Ok that was amusinh.

And whats sad was I *didnt* find Molag Bal to be a challenge. I mostly circle strafed, avoiding all of his crap, spamming light attacks the entire time.

The challenge was getting there. My main problem is that this is a required questline. Mandatory to pass level 50. They expect everyone to beat it. Not everyone will.

The bad players with friends that help with everything else are going to quit, the elitist jerks will say good riddance, when in fact if you want a challenge in MMOs, its always been either group content or trying to solo group content.

Even in old school EQ. There was no solo content. You wanted a challenge you solod group content, including those rats outside town.

Baraz

Must be added/said : the current game build easily allows cooperation on the spot and hard fights would encourage people to play as a group.

Currently, everyone I know plays solo as otherwise it is too easy.

Lanatireb17_ESO

The players that are now so adamantly against allowing a group in storyline missions will be very very surprised soon. The small casual guild i am in started with 25 players....and of those 25 players most are usually less skilled...and three are currently left playing.

Elember

ZOS_JasonL wrote: »

Hey there, everyone. Just a reminder to please keep the conservation on this thread constructive and on-topic. While we allow users to disagree, we require all posts to be respectful and constructive, per our Code of Conduct. Thank you for your understanding.

It would be nice if you actually said something about the subject rather then just telling us to behave....but I guess that is asking for to much on your part...

NordJitsu

For anyone saying that the content is too hard, please see this and this.

My guild mate @MichaelCra‌ recently beat Molag Bal at level 45 while completely naked.

So much for wearing bad gear to make the fights challenging. Fighting with no gear and 5 levels too low wasn't enough.

Lanatireb17_ESO

go ahead and try the same thing with Mannimarco. I dare you

Kendaric

NordJitsu wrote: »

For anyone saying that the content is too hard, please see this and this.

My guild mate @MichaelCra‌ recently beat Molag Bal at level 45 while completely naked.

So much for wearing bad gear to make the fights challenging. Fighting with no gear and 5 levels too low wasn't enough.

So what? Not everyone is god's greatest gift to gaming and can pull off stuff like that. In fact, I'd say most players can't.

Sorry, but that doesn't prove that content is too easy in any way. Some people are simply more skilled, have better reactions/reflexes, etc.
You simply can't base things like the main story around those players without alienating a majority of players.
Stuff like the upcoming trials? Sure, make them hard as hell as they are completely optional and you guys deserve some content you find challenging.
Group dungeons? Sure, make them challenging. Again, they are optional and aren't needed for anything at all.
But the main quest and normal quests? No, they don't need that kind of difficulty.

NordJitsu

Lanatireb17_ESO wrote: »

go ahead and try the same thing with Mannimarco. I dare you

@Lanatireb17_ESO‌

You can ask @MichaelCra‌ himself, because I'm not 100% positive, but I believe he beat Mannimarco way below level as well. I know for a fact he was naked. He made a point to do the entire leveling experience naked and underleveled.

I know he beat the Gian Sinmur wayyy below level and naked.

Mannimarco is incredibly easy at this point the though so I don't care if Cra has proof of that one. Its just such an easy fight that it wouldn't even be impressive.

Lanatireb17_ESO

NordJitsu wrote: »

For anyone saying that the content is too hard, please see this and this.

My guild mate @MichaelCra‌ recently beat Molag Bal at level 45 while completely naked.

So much for wearing bad gear to make the fights challenging. Fighting with no gear and 5 levels too low wasn't enough.

I have this friend who can solve abstract mathematical problems concerning quantum physics without a calculator. That totally proves that quantum physics is easy and everyone that doesnt understand it needs to get a grip, seriously.

LonePirate

NordJitsu wrote: »

Mannimarco is incredibly easy at this point the though so I don't care if Cra has proof of that one. Its just such an easy fight that it wouldn't even be impressive.

Would you care to explain why you think an enemy with tens of thousands of HP who is capable of hitting you like a truck is easy to defeat? He is not an enemy you take down in a minute or two with a couple of click attacks and button spells. For many people, there is a lot of death and successful battle can sometimes last 15-20 minutes or more. That's not easy at all for some people so I am genuinely curious why you think he is easy when many people consider him to be tougher than Molag Bal.

Lanatireb17_ESO

He is just talking out of the wrong end of his body.

NordJitsu

@LonePirate‌

Mannimarco has 3 keys to deafeating him.

1. Dodge roll out of his AoE (at least the inner circle)
2. Interrupt his life suck channel
3. Have some form of self healing

There used to be a 4th which was:

4. Kill adds

But they no longer hit hard enough to matter so that step has become optional.

Other than that you just use base attacks on him and watch him melt.

Those steps are so easy to perform that the fight has become trivial. He used to be much harder hitting and have much more health (like doubly so.)

LonePirate

NordJitsu wrote: »

@LonePirate‌

Mannimarco has 3 keys to deafeating him.

1. Dodge roll out of his AoE (at least the inner circle)
2. Interrupt his life suck channel
3. Have some form of self healing

There used to be a 4th which was:

4. Kill adds

But they no longer hit hard enough to matter so that step has become optional.

Other than that you just use base attacks on him and watch him melt.

Those steps are so easy to perform that the fight has become trivial. He used to be much harder hitting and have much more health (like doubly so.)

Thank you for responding. I think we will both agree that item #2 on your list is the critical one. That's the ability that wipes out most HP on everyone and it is probably the least known defensive tactic in the game. It doesn't help matters, at least for me anyway, that Interrupt does not always work, either due to the specific timing of it or some mobs' immunity to it. I know I have tried to interrupt attacks from other mobs and my efforts have been unsuccessful. It also doesn't people when this game does an incredibly poor job at educating them on these defensive mechanisms like interruptions. The occasional and unpredictable screen pop-up that only randomly appears when fighting enemies - and almost never appear when they would do the most good. This game desperately needs to require players to master the interrupt tactic before leaving the prison. Mastery of that skill would certainly help against Manninarco and other enemies like Harvesters which can decimate your HP very quickly.

Even with interrupting him, I still think Mannimarco is anything but easy to defeat. We can agree to disagree on that I suppose.

NordJitsu

@LonePirate‌

For this fight Force Shock and Venom Arrow are amazing. Both are ranged interrupts with DoTs. So you can mostly save your resources in this fight for two things (maybe 3.)

The only thing you need to spend resources on are the ranged interrupt w/ dot, self healing, and optionally AoE to take out the adds.

The rest is all about light attacking and moving around. I kid you not when I say I didn't get bellow 90-95% health in this fight and was done with it in minutes.

Its just about learning his mechanics. By making this fight easier, ZoS has removed a learning experience from the game.

Morgha_Kul

Lanatireb17_ESO wrote: »

NordJitsu wrote: »

For anyone saying that the content is too hard, please see this and this.

My guild mate @MichaelCra‌ recently beat Molag Bal at level 45 while completely naked.

So much for wearing bad gear to make the fights challenging. Fighting with no gear and 5 levels too low wasn't enough.

I have this friend who can solve abstract mathematical problems concerning quantum physics without a calculator. That totally proves that quantum physics is easy and everyone that doesnt understand it needs to get a grip, seriously.

Full of win because I really wish I could do that too.

MichaelCra

On the Mannimarco fight I wasn't actually under leveled cause I had finished the planemeld think I was lvl 43, still had my lvl 34 Greatsword though. Also I must say I don't range at all the only range attack I have is stampede which is a gap closer. I was always with in melee range of manni but then again since I had no armor I did have to kill the adds which took 2-4 hits and if he started his life drain while I was killing them I'd just charge him and interrupt but that could be contributed to knowing to interrupt that.

Other than the life drain his attacks are really weak compared to before, that little projectile used to do more damage and that was while I was in armor and those adds hit way harder they used to be way more of a priority to kill. Also the life drain is much weaker too I think there was one point I was out of stam so I couldn't charge him and I walked to him through it and it only did like 15% of my health.

@Lanatireb17_ESO I am a good player but by no means could be compared to your friend in that comparison you made, I'd say at most Mannimarco could be compared to some fractions like 9/8+16/21.

Xaei

aRealClassAct wrote: »

Where to begin....


Maybe ZOS should take a page out of The Secret World's book. For those of you who never played TSW, it had end game elite and hardcore versions of the normal dungeons, but the only way you could unlock this content was to solo a boss called "the Gatekeeper". There were even three different versions of the boss that you would fight depending on your role (healer, dps, tank). It required you to perform your role very well in order to clear the content and it did a pretty good job of making sure that people in the Veteran content actually knew what they were doing.

I doubt Zenimax will read half of the great ideas that get thrown around on this forum, but I have faith that they will get everything right eventually. Right now I think they are running around with their hair on fire trying to resolve the botting, spamming, and duping issues, which I hope is top priority.

I'm not really sure if that's really good here. Roles in TSW are very very strict and everything apart from 1 particular dungeon (Hell Fallen NM mode, with its need for DPSs to interrupt bosses in an organised fashion) all obey the same set of rules, with relatively (and I note, relatively, you won't see anyone tank like I do in that game in most MMOs) scripted ways to tackle them.

Also, the normal and elite dungeons are cakewalk in that game.

I'm not yet on veteran content but from what I've seen, there aren't really a fixed particular ruleset you follow for every role and you don't even necessarily need a traditional tank, or in some cases, healers if your party is built to not need one (not saying its like GW2, because there's still advantages to having a trinity), so I'm not sure if a boss-fight which forces you to fight in a certain way is a good idea.

The problem is evident even in TSW. To elaborate. This particular fight as a DPS to purge buffs from him as a very core part of a phase of the fight and required you to kite mobs around as another. In actual NM dungeons, you don't do the first much at all (and in one particular dungeon, doing so wipes your party), and doing the second often will get your tank very, very annoyed.

There was a serious problem of misinformation in that fight because it tried to fit one-size-fits-all encounter on everything. So I went into NMs at first as a DPS who was basically setting up my build and approaching everything wrong, and actually learnt how to be a DPS and then a tank through actual trial and error in the dungeons themselves.

Bu I do agree that ZOS needs to listen. I don't see any dev presence around the forums at all, and I don't see them addressing a lot of vital concerns. That is very worrying in a game hailed as SWTOR v2.0. If this was GW2 with every reviewer hailing it as as perfect as possible in the hands of mortals, then maybe it would be excusable and the devs can take a passive approach, but with a metacritic score of 74 (same as TSW which blamed its failure on metacritic and 11 points lower than SWTOR) and reviewers bashing it left, right and center, its worrying that they just seem to not care.

Heck, look at what even GW2 did when its popularity fell. A direct dev-to-players initiative about discussions on how to improve the game with devs posting back to players even on weekends.

I like the game, but at this rate, ZOS is on a straight road to failure.

Apricot

NordJitsu wrote: »

For anyone saying that the content is too hard, please see this and this.

My guild mate @MichaelCra‌ recently beat Molag Bal at level 45 while completely naked.

So much for wearing bad gear to make the fights challenging. Fighting with no gear and 5 levels too low wasn't enough.

Wearing a neck piece, rings, a weapon and a helm doesn't make you completely naked. And I think we've established broken armor is.

MichaelCra

Broken Armor doesn't have any benefit or effect and if you wanna look at my rings and neck piece they might as well be nothing since they are soo under level but here you go Accessories And in case you wanted the broken armor proof here is that too Armor

Flynch

Give players the option to buff themselves at a 'well' or whatever before entering the fight. If the player doesn't use a buff, they receive a trophy. If they do use the buff, they don't.

So instead of nerfing the content, you simply buff the player, at a cost to their prowess.

And let's be honest, it has absolute jack to do with other players being less learned in their class in the long run.

(disclaimer: I love a challenge and frankly was annoyed by the nerfs)

GamePlayer7

The "I should be able to play how I want" argument is a common sentiment I've seen across multiple RPGs. This statement will sometimes pop up in various ARPG forum conversations, with certain players claiming that all builds should be equally viable.

Here's a small related thought experiment: In order for there to be "good" builds, doesn't that necessitate that there will also be "bad" builds? This seems fairly axiomatic to me. If all solutions were really equally viable, then I could literally open my skill panel, close my eyes, randomly choose skills, and the result would be just as good as someone who puts careful thought into their build. That doesn't sound like a well designed game to me.

This does not mean that you are necessarily pigeon holed into one or two builds per class. I've done fine solo through vet rank 2 with a resto staff/ bow combo. I don't have pulsar, or deadly bash, or talons, or a lot of the other more powerful skills in the game. Puncturing Strikes would probably be considered one of the more powerful Templar skills, yet it's almost never on my bar. It simply doesn't fit my play style with this particular character.

The build I'm leveling is pretty much the exact build I wanted to play before release, with some minor tweaks. I haven't felt forced into certain skill choices. Skill points are so abundant in this game, everyone should be able to grab skills they really like and have other situational skills too. Swapping skills around per the encounter is part of what the game is about, so don't expect one ability bar to do everything.

Not to be a jerk, but "playing how you want" doesn't mean that you get be successful while playing poorly. If I wear all light armor, yet I choose not to take any of the light armor skills, how strong do you think my character will be? If don't take skills/passives that actually compliment what I'm doing with my character, what should the results be?

Neferath

@‌ GamePlayer7
exactly

nudel

LonePirate wrote: »

NordJitsu wrote: »

@LonePirate‌

Mannimarco has 3 keys to deafeating him.

1. Dodge roll out of his AoE (at least the inner circle)
2. Interrupt his life suck channel
3. Have some form of self healing

There used to be a 4th which was:

4. Kill adds

But they no longer hit hard enough to matter so that step has become optional.

Other than that you just use base attacks on him and watch him melt.

Those steps are so easy to perform that the fight has become trivial. He used to be much harder hitting and have much more health (like doubly so.)

Thank you for responding. I think we will both agree that item #2 on your list is the critical one. That's the ability that wipes out most HP on everyone and it is probably the least known defensive tactic in the game. It doesn't help matters, at least for me anyway, that Interrupt does not always work, either due to the specific timing of it or some mobs' immunity to it. I know I have tried to interrupt attacks from other mobs and my efforts have been unsuccessful. It also doesn't people when this game does an incredibly poor job at educating them on these defensive mechanisms like interruptions. The occasional and unpredictable screen pop-up that only randomly appears when fighting enemies - and almost never appear when they would do the most good. This game desperately needs to require players to master the interrupt tactic before leaving the prison. Mastery of that skill would certainly help against Manninarco and other enemies like Harvesters which can decimate your HP very quickly.

Even with interrupting him, I still think Mannimarco is anything but easy to defeat. We can agree to disagree on that I suppose.

Finally something we agree upon. Though really that is what this entire thread was meant to address. It seems to have devolved into a shouting match focused on specific bosses and specific builds.

I completely agree that the game does not reinforce defensive abilities as much as it should. This is why I and the OP and others appreciated some of the more challenging early bosses. Prior to nerfs, Doshia taught me to pay attention to strange visual effects that could be related to boss abilities. The final boss in Spindleclutch taught me that red circles on the ground are bad and dodge roll is my friend. Balreth taught me to use CC effectively. And Aldimion taught me that interrupts are critical. Now none of those lessons are in place.

The problem is not that certain boss fights are too difficult. It's that all the lessons that used to be in place have lost their meaning. As such, the combat ramps up too quickly if a fight requires one of those defensive abilities that should have been learned 40 levels ago. You really don't need to block or avoid AOE or interrupt in just about any of the PVE (save for group dungeons, a few bosses, and VR content).

However, I don't think the answer is to nerf even more content so that defensive abilities are never necessary in this game. Rather as you suggest, some of those lessons need to come back into play. I would be all for drumming home the defensive abilities in the tutorial. However, the only way I can see to really reinforce the need to use these abilities is to have an encounter that is impassable without them. Having that as early as the tutorial will only create more backlash from the very same players complaining about main story bosses in this thread. I too was lazy about using them at first. I knew they were there, but you really don't need them for any of the overworld content. You used to need them for certain bosses. Now even that is no longer required.

EDIT: As a final thought, I don't know how much the participants in this thread paid attention when the PTS Craglorn patch notes were leaked, but they do include a very nice Death Recap system. This should help anyone figure out exactly what contributed to their death so that they can improve. I, for one, am really pleased with this addition.

Death Recap
Death Recap has been added to the game. When your character dies, a Death Recap window will now appear. It includes vital information about what contributed to your character’s death, including the most recent damage inflicted on your character and helpful hints to avoid death in the future based on how your character just perished.

Morgha_Kul

I fought Magestrix Vox the other night. I was a couple of levels above her, but she really posed no threat or challenge. Made me think of this thread.

However, as I was defeating her with ease, secure in the knowledge that I'm not a particularly "leet" player, I was equally aware that I am not a terribly weak player. I recognized that there are probably many players would WOULD find her a serious threat.

You can't assume that everyone plays the way you do, or that you are the "average" player.

Reinmard

I fully agree with the OP...

Pyatra

About the guy soloing Molag Bal naked. The Amulet of kings sets your damage to huge, one shotting everything. Basically MB is just a game of avoidance and your damage is already set to a pumped level, so that scenario is just them choosing the battle to "show off" with, but ultimately means very little. Also I believe the amulet sets your damage reduction too, I was a glass cannon at that point in my build and was getting attacked by 2 Titans at the same time with out any problems... so meh.

Sakiri

The "hard part" of MB is the titans, of which you can block and reflect their crap back at them. I facetanked him otherwise. That fight was unimpressive compared to Mannimarco. Sorry, doing it in broken armor is no more impressive than finishing guild quests at 37 by silver bolts stunlock.