We Don't Need A Challenge Difficulty...We Need People To Use Their Brains

arena25 · January 26

People out here getting hyped over the challenge difficulty coming up...and I'm sitting over here thinking that while getting something you can't faceroll would be nice, what we need more is content that requires people to USE. THEIR. BRAINS.

Just today, Sunday, I encountered:

-Several pugs who could not for the life of them understand the purpose of the siege weapons against the big harvester boss in Writhing Fortress. Even though Walks-In-Ash practically SHOUTS WHAT TO DO AT YOU - I have never seen so many pugs fail to understand basic mechanics. I even tried to show them what to do, and still they couldn't get it.
-Then, just 1 hour later, encountered several players who could not understand a basic world boss mechanic. All you had to do was block or roll dodge. They didn't get it. Required me to come over there and show them that blocking and roll dodging is in fact required.
-And finally, one [snip] player who spent 2 hours whacking at a city guard. Dying, getting up, whacking the guard, rinse and repeat. And then have the audacity to ask in zone chat - anyone want to help me kill this city guard?

ZOS, I truly think we do not deserve a challenge difficulty...at least not yet. No, what we need more is content requiring people to actually USE. THEIR. FETCHING. NOGGINS. [snip]

Apologies if this is not well-written. i'm tired, and i don't write well when i'm tired.

That's all. [snip]
[edited for baiting]

spartaxoxo · January 26

I'm pretty sure there are games where the guards aren't literally invincible but it would take more than 1 person whacking on them to make any dent in their health. Or at least there used to be. Person may have thought they were simply too weak to do anything.

This game could use better tutorials but there's always going to be people who just ain't that great. Some of them are just kids that aren't actually paying much attention.

Erickson9610 · January 26

spartaxoxo wrote: »

I'm pretty sure there are games where the guards aren't literally invincible

You could kill the guards in the singleplayer TES games. If players from those games come to ESO, they'll probably think they can kill the guards in this TES game as well.

Emeratis · January 26

To be absolutely fair on the guard part, they used to be killable early on in eso.

Attorneyatlawl · January 26

Emeratis wrote: »

To be absolutely fair on the guard part, they used to be killable early on in eso.

No, they would go to 0% and never die. I tried when they were first introduced with the justice system. Add-ons would even show their health as "invincible".

mocap · January 26

And how does not knowing certain mechanics relate to the new difficulty mode? Overland difficulty is for vet players, not for those who spend half an hour pommeling Estre - Auridon last story boss, because they don't realize they need to kill atronachs first.

Emeratis · January 26

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Emeratis wrote: »

To be absolutely fair on the guard part, they used to be killable early on in eso.

No, they would go to 0% and never die. I tried when they were first introduced with the justice system. Add-ons would even show their health as "invincible".

I might be misremembering but I am pretty sure there were at least a few ways to kill them on launch though some methods were cheesy like using terrain drops.

ArchangelIsraphel · January 26

-Several pugs who could not for the life of them understand the purpose of the siege weapons against the big harvester boss in Writhing Fortress. Even though Walks-In-Ash practically SHOUTS WHAT TO DO AT YOU - I have never seen so many pugs fail to understand basic mechanics. I even tried to show them what to do, and still they couldn't get it.

To be fair, the mechanic is obtuse and was frequently glitching out for multiple people in the party I ran with when it was first released. Not sure if that's still the case. Walk's audio also wasn't playing for some people in my group, or was drowned out by other noise. I would hope this got fixed since that time.

Either way, PVE who have never been in Cyrodiil won't immediately know what to do with siege or how to aim it, on top of the fact that the extra barrel mechanic they stuck in to use them isn't how actual siege works at all.

As gamers, we all need to remember that not everyone is going to be instantaneously as experienced as ones self. The people you were dealing with might not have seen mechanics like that before, maybe they haven't even played as many games as you so they don't have other points of reference.

You aren't really telling the truth about anything. You're getting upset about your objective interpretation of an experience because you're expecting others to know things that you already know. Could the game use some much better tutorials in order to teach players about mechanics? Yes. But that flaw in the game doesn't make it the players fault, nor does it make the players who needed to be taught stupid, even if they didn't get it. It just means that this is another aspect of the game the developers need to go back and refine.

When you've played a game for a long time, teaching other players things is simply a part of the experience, even when there's tutorials available. It's best to show them patience, make the experience a positive one, and help them learn, instead of coming to the forums to call them names.

Attorneyatlawl · January 26

Emeratis wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Emeratis wrote: »

To be absolutely fair on the guard part, they used to be killable early on in eso.

No, they would go to 0% and never die. I tried when they were first introduced with the justice system. Add-ons would even show their health as "invincible".

I might be misremembering but I am pretty sure there were at least a few ways to kill them on launch though some methods were cheesy like using terrain drops.

Ah, I only ever tried legitimate combat

. I never heard of them being killed by any method, but I could have missed that easily.

Paramedicus · January 26

I never understood why ZOS does not force players to do mechanics in overland/story mode. I know that many players are very casual and the mechanics could be potentially too difficult for them, but this could be remedied by introducing very long reaction times (e.g., you have 15 seconds to interrupt the boss's spell or you die), an accompanying NPC could shout out what you need to do; after the first death a pop-up could appear on the screen with instructions, and after a few deaths an option to skip the fight/mechanics could appear. Not forcing players to learn and use basic mechanics results in you seeing 1000 CP players who don't use block or roll dodge.

frogthroat · January 26

arena25 wrote: »

I truly think we do not deserve a challenge difficulty...at least not yet.

It's fine if you feel that you and the pugs you mentioned do not deserve a challenge difficulty, but this is an MMO. There are more players than just you guys. Some of us can handle and indeed, enjoy a bit of a challenge. And assuming ZOS has more than one developer, I'm sure they can develop more than one specific thing at a time.

GloatingSwine · January 26

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Emeratis wrote: »

To be absolutely fair on the guard part, they used to be killable early on in eso.

No, they would go to 0% and never die. I tried when they were first introduced with the justice system. Add-ons would even show their health as "invincible".

People would still gang up to fight them though, which tanked performance in cities. Which is why they changed them to fully invincible.

PoveusRonin · January 26

arena25 wrote: »

People out here getting hyped over the challenge difficulty coming up...and I'm sitting over here thinking that while getting something you can't faceroll would be nice, what we need more is content that requires people to USE. THEIR. BRAINS.

Just today, Sunday, I encountered:

-Several pugs who could not for the life of them understand the purpose of the siege weapons against the big harvester boss in Writhing Fortress. Even though Walks-In-Ash practically SHOUTS WHAT TO DO AT YOU - I have never seen so many pugs fail to understand basic mechanics. I even tried to show them what to do, and still they couldn't get it.
-Then, just 1 hour later, encountered several players who could not understand a basic world boss mechanic. All you had to do was block or roll dodge. They didn't get it. Required me to come over there and show them that blocking and roll dodging is in fact required.
-And finally, one [snip] player who spent 2 hours whacking at a city guard. Dying, getting up, whacking the guard, rinse and repeat. And then have the audacity to ask in zone chat - anyone want to help me kill this city guard?

ZOS, I truly think we do not deserve a challenge difficulty...at least not yet. No, what we need more is content requiring people to actually USE. THEIR. FETCHING. NOGGINS. [snip]

Apologies if this is not well-written. i'm tired, and i don't write well when i'm tired.

That's all. [snip]

So people are having difficulty following mechanics and understanding them. Your answer is to ask them to add more?

Am I understanding this right? MORE? When they have issues with the current, you think adding more is the solution?

Think about that for a little bit.
[edited to remove quote]

scrappy1342 · January 26

i think your example with the guard proves that this likely would not change much XD

Paramedicus · January 26

PoveusRonin wrote: »

So people are having difficulty following mechanics and understanding them. Your answer is to ask them to add more?

Am I understanding this right? MORE? When they have issues with the current, you think adding more is the solution?

Think about that for a little bit.

It is more a matter of habit than complexity of mechanics. Really, if you are capable of turning on your computer/console and logging into ESO, then you probably have sufficient mental capacity to understand that you should block when you see yellow sparks and interrupt when you see red ones. But if you're not in the habit of paying attention to what's happening on the screen, because ESO doesn't require you to do so in the Overland, then you'll hit a wall when any mechanics appear.

JeroenB · January 26

Paramedicus wrote: »

I never understood why ZOS does not force players to do mechanics in overland/story mode. I know that many players are very casual and the mechanics could be potentially too difficult for them, but this could be remedied by introducing very long reaction times (e.g., you have 15 seconds to interrupt the boss's spell or you die), an accompanying NPC could shout out what you need to do; after the first death a pop-up could appear on the screen with instructions, and after a few deaths an option to skip the fight/mechanics could appear. Not forcing players to learn and use basic mechanics results in you seeing 1000 CP players who don't use block or roll dodge.

ESO's combat isn't interesting (to my subjective taste). There is no ESO content that I play for the combat experience. Some environments and stories inherently need some level of combat activity. As soon as that combat starts feeling repetitive, scripted, artificial, and sloggy, for me it devolves into immersion breaking, frustrating, and simply 'un-fun'.

The source seems to be when the designers start introducing "interesting mechanics" into encounter design, when "encounters" become their own design objective rather than a natural consequence of environment or story. These sloggy frustrating combat encounters appear to be much more prevalent in recent years' content, with West Weald standing out for its ability to generate irritation and quitting-to-play-something-else because I'm just not having fun exploring the setting.

I have developed a minimal ability to do outgoing damage and avoid incoming damage with my various characters, allowing me to engage with combat naturally by applying those (limited) skills to whatever situation my character is confronted with. (Note I do consider basic blocking and dodging part of that skill set.) Whenever the game forces me to stop playing naturally in the middle of combat to engage with some new non-standard mechanic that cannot be handled with natural character combat, it does not trigger excitement and interest in me; it triggers a sense of artificiality (immersion breaking), and forewarns of likely repetition, frustration, and boredom.

"after a few deaths" -- in Overland content? This isn't 'PvE endgame' content, where repeating combat encounters to overcome them is the goal of the experience. PvE endgame content naturally has this type of 'encounter mechanics combat' as a primary design objective. But that is a different type of content that a player engages with for a different experience than Overland (excepting world bosses).

Part of this feels like attempts by the designers to forcibly prevent 'PvE endgame' players from melting every boss with two hits. The problem is that non-PvE endgame players (those who cannot take down a normal boss with two hits) are then confronted with these frustrating repetitive slogs.

In short, it's great that there is going to be a more difficult version of Overland for those who want it (clearly not me) and please do not introduce more frustrating "encounter mechanics" into the normal difficulty.

robwolf666 · January 26

Erickson9610 wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

I'm pretty sure there are games where the guards aren't literally invincible

You could kill the guards in the singleplayer TES games. If players from those games come to ESO, they'll probably think they can kill the guards in this TES game as well.

One look at their health bar should tell players there's something different about them in ESO.

INM · January 26

Lack of difficulty is the primary reason why people don't use their brains. The more forgiving the difficulty is, the less people care about paying attention or interacting with the systems.

That's precisely why you can see people in ancient veteran Direfrost that can't break free from the last boss' grab. Because the punishment for not doing it in the open world is 10% of your health. The same is with interruption. The same is with staying in stupid. The same with people that only spam light attacks. And these 200+ of brainless gameplay only reinforces bad habits.

JeroenB · January 26

INM wrote: »

Lack of difficulty is the primary reason why people don't use their brains. The more forgiving the difficulty is, the less people care about paying attention or interacting with the systems.

That's precisely why you can see people in ancient veteran Direfrost that can't break free from the last boss' grab. Because the punishment for not doing it in the open world is 10% of your health. The same is with interruption. The same is with staying in stupid. The same with people that only spam light attacks. And these 200+ of brainless gameplay only reinforces bad habits.

I would argue that this is inverted for Overland. The less a combat mechanic is likely to interfere with my non-combat experience, the more likely I am to engage with it. The less forgiving the difficulty is, the more likely I am to simply not engage with it. Combat isn't the objective of Overland (for me); artificial-feeling combat gets in the way of experiencing Overland (for me).

Veteran Direfrost obviously isn't Overland. When there, the player presumably is looking for that mechanics-heavy combat experience. Edit to clarify: by which I mean that I agree that if you choose to play PvE endgame content, you should over time put an appropriate level of effort into being competent at that content.

Paramedicus · January 26

JeroenB wrote: »

(...)

I agree that ESO combat in Overland isn't very enjoyable, and introducing some mechs wouldn't make it any more interesting, but I think they should be added to make the game more healthy. Just go as a tank to the veteran pugs and you'll see clueless players constantly dying from elite's heavy attacks. I don't think ZOS needs to overdo it: adding oneshot mechanics to elite units, or even to every boss, would be crazy. But if few main bosses per story forced players to use mechs (simplified, but still challenging, as I described), it would simply teach players that mechs EXIST.

JeroenB · January 26

Paramedicus wrote: »

JeroenB wrote: »

(...)

I agree that ESO combat in Overland isn't very enjoyable, and introducing some mechs wouldn't make it any more interesting, but I think they should be added to make the game more healthy. Just go as a tank to the veteran pugs and you'll see clueless players constantly dying from elite's heavy attacks. I don't think ZOS needs to overdo it: adding oneshot mechanics to elite units, or even to every boss, would be crazy. But if few main bosses per story forced players to use mechs (simplified, but still challenging, as I described), it would simply teach players that mechs EXIST.

Shouldn't early group dungeons have that teaching role, rather than Overland? (I recognise that the game does not effectively force players to engage with the base game dungeons before the DLC ones though, so that might be practically infeasible.)

If Overland, I'd argue for world bosses and public dungeon bosses rather than zone quest bosses. Particularly public dungeons; presumably players typically aren't diving into group dungeons seriously without whetting themselves on public dungeons first.

I'm also not sure that not being aware of mechanisms is the entirety of the problem. I'm currently trying to remain motivated to complete the West Weald zone, and when engaging World Bosses I've often found myself repeatedly one-shot or nearly so for no specifically identifiable reason. There is typically simply so much stuff going on that I find it impossible to keep track. There's the boss and there are multiple different types of adds (often hard to distinguish from the boss), all constantly doing all sorts of special actions; there are multiple players, there are ability visual effects from both sides all over the place; the floor is typically filled with multiple moving red zones from multiple different mobs you have to keep out of; oh and you musn't forget to actually keep attacking too. Reliably noticing yellow or red sparkles from one of all those mobs (possibly behind you) is unlikely, and I might not even be able to reach them from across the room even if I do notice red sparkles.

Note I'm not complaining about dying to World Bosses -- those are fundamentally intended as a challenging combat encounter. (Though I do question their design.) I don't play this game for the combat. When I fail at soloing a group dungeon, I have no desire to invest effort in improving my combat skills or learning about gear; I just jot down a reminder to not enter that particular group dungeon again.

Edited to reminisce: I'm reminded of that 5-man boss in Wrath of the Lich King that occasionally used a mechanic where everybody had to stop applying damage or Something Bad would happen. Despite numerous runs, discussing with other players, and reading guides (did we have YouTube already then?), I never did figure out what the supposedly-obvious-to-everybody-else tell was amongst all the other visual overload on screen.

Muizer · January 26

Interesting take by the OP. Personally I always found the need for 'mechanics' to make content harder a crutch. Something that's apparently necessary because the AI of mobs and bosses is too stupid to meet the player on remotely equal terms. A symptom of failure for the game if you ask me. The reason I want veteran overland is because I hope it will make Overland somewhat difficult without resorting to these silly, contrived crutches.

CalamityCat · January 26

I say bring on the difficulty levels. After enough failures and deaths, players will either try and figure out what to do or stick at the old easy level

It's been argued here, that the easy overland content is why players struggle to understand mechanics when they get into DLC dungeons and trials. I'm inclined to agree. When I've solo'd world bosses and couldn't understand why I was dying - I looked it up online! Or asked guild mates/friends. Before I join a group for a vet DLC I don't know, I look at guides and sometimes make notes for myself so I'm not the healer dead on the floor lol.

Cooperharley · January 26

We need both lol

Just because some people struggle with the game doesn't mean we shouldn't get overland difficulty increases? What is this logic you're using??

Paramedicus · January 26

JeroenB wrote: »

[Shouldn't early group dungeons have that teaching role, rather than Overland?

Unfortunately, they do not. Inexperienced players just get carried there. Why normal dungs and trials fail to teach anything is a topic for a long discussion...

JeroenB wrote: »

I'm also not sure that not being aware of mechanisms is the entirety of the problem. I'm currently trying to remain motivated to complete the West Weald zone, and when engaging World Bosses I've often found myself repeatedly one-shot or nearly so for no specifically identifiable reason. There is typically simply so much stuff going on that I find it impossible to keep track. There's the boss and there are multiple different types of adds (often hard to distinguish from the boss), all constantly doing all sorts of special actions; there are multiple players, there are ability visual effects from both sides all over the place; the floor is typically filled with multiple moving red zones from multiple different mobs you have to keep out of; oh and you musn't forget to actually keep attacking too. Reliably noticing yellow or red sparkles from one of all those mobs (possibly behind you) is unlikely, and I might not even be able to reach them from across the room even if I do notice red sparkles.

Note I'm not complaining about dying to World Bosses -- those are fundamentally intended as a challenging combat encounter. (Though I do question their design.) I don't play this game for the combat. When I fail at soloing a group dungeon, I have no desire to invest effort in improving my combat skills or learning about gear; I just jot down a reminder to not enter that particular group dungeon again.

As you've noticed, WB are designed for groups, so the mechanic overload is intentional there (do you have the “Show additional ally effects” option turned off btw?). Maybe ZOS could design them better, but it is easy way to increase difficulty.
I suggest adding the mechanic to (some) story bosses so that players can get familiar with it (without the mechanic overload). In my case, it would definitely work, because I learned that you have to interrupt in the hard way: after many wipes/team rage quits in group dungeons in my VR levels. Of course, I realize that this won't suddenly make all players ready to play more difficult content (e.g., some of them will never be able to do so due to health limitations), but ESO's refusal to teach is simply surprising. It's (too) normal to see players not to do basic mechanics, and it's difficult to imagine that they all have serious health problems.

WaywardArgonian · January 26

A lot of this has to do with the fact that ESO has pretty bad in-game information. The tutorial does not really teach you how to play, and the build guide does not really teach you how to make a build. A lot of information is unavailable without the use of addons, and other information is impossible to grasp for newer players. There are things in this game that are almost impossible to figure out without third party guides because they are simply never explained.

You could say that, being an MMO, part of the responsibility falls upon experienced players to teach new ones. But since ESO is heavily oriented towards solo play and is referred to in marketing copy as an 'Online RPG', this does not really happen at a big enough scale.

However, all of this is a separate topic from Challenge difficulty as, once you do figure out the basics, the questing in this game is some of the easiest content in all of gaming, and it takes the sting out of the entire experience.

JeroenB · January 26

Paramedicus wrote: »

JeroenB wrote: »

[...]

As you've noticed, WB are designed for groups, so the mechanic overload is intentional there (do you have the “Show additional ally effects” option turned off btw?). Maybe ZOS could design them better, but it is easy way to increase difficulty.
I suggest adding the mechanic to (some) story bosses so that players can get familiar with it (without the mechanic overload). In my case, it would definitely work, because I learned that you have to interrupt in the hard way: after many wipes/team rage quits in group dungeons in my VR levels. Of course, I realize that this won't suddenly make all players ready to play more difficult content (e.g., some of them will never be able to do so due to health limitations), but ESO's refusal to teach is simply surprising. It's (too) normal to see players not to do basic mechanics, and it's difficult to imagine that they all have serious health problems.

Ah yes, I think we can all agree that ZOS seems allergic to explaining necessary information to players. I am reminded of the long developer post on how understanding light attack weaving was, in their opinion, important for players' enjoyment of the game, but they noticed most players didn't understand it. Unsurprisingly, as it wasn't mentioned in the in-game tutorial, the in-game help files, or any informative article on the official website... Of course the conclusion the developers drew was that instead of doing their job and actually explaining the feature to players somehow, they should redesign the combat mechanics instead... (En passant revealing that they were unaware of the 'official' purpose for the two skill bars according to the in-game explanation, and had been designing combat mechanics contrary to how the game explicitly described it to players.)

In Necrom and West Weald I definitely noticed some zone quest combat encounters with non-standard mechanics (other than WB and those tedious West Weald incursions), so ZOS may be thinking along those lines too. I don't think these current implementations were effective at teaching anything though, because the unexpected new feature in the middle of an unexpectedly and atypically challenging combat encounter leaves little mental overhead for analysing and remembering the new feature.

Normally we learn best by repetition, as in your own experience that you mentioned. I'm not sure that would work in Overland though, as atypically challenging combat and repeated deaths in normal Overland zone quests would just lead to my type of player doing something else instead.

Essentially the mechanic has to be presented in a situation where the majority of available focus can be on the mechanic, with minimal other threat. Your thoughts on reaction times or NPC guidance might work, though they could quickly become artificial and thereby off-putting, depending on the point in a story.

If we want to teach PvE endgame mechanics through an Overland context also unavoidable by players with no interest in PvE endgame content, it must be carefully designed to not inadvertently put those players off from the Overland content itself. Design it well, and it might encourage players to try PvE endgame content who would not otherwise have done so; design it badly, and it might discourage players
from continuing ESO at all (e.g. West Weald).

WaywardArgonian wrote: »

You could say that, being an MMO, part of the responsibility falls upon experienced players to teach new ones. But since ESO is heavily oriented towards solo play and is referred to in marketing copy as an 'Online RPG', this does not really happen at a big enough scale.

I agree with your post, though I'd argue that while theorycrafting, builds, and strategies should be up to the community, correct and comprehensive documentation of fundamental player-facing mechanics should absolutely be the developers' job, even in an MMO.

Paramedicus · January 26

WaywardArgonian wrote: »

A lot of this has to do with the fact that ESO has pretty bad in-game information. The tutorial does not really teach you how to play, and the build guide does not really teach you how to make a build. A lot of information is unavailable without the use of addons, and other information is impossible to grasp for newer players. There are things in this game that are almost impossible to figure out without third party guides because they are simply never explained.

Oh yes, it's much more than yellow and red sparks.

When it comes to builds, the difference in damage dealt between inexperienced and experienced players is so great that, in my opinion, ZOS should just add some kind of in-game system with ready-to-try builds, because the tutorial alone would not be enough. And even then, they would probably have to increase the damage dealt by inexperienced players.

JeroenB wrote: »

In Necrom and West Weald I definitely noticed some zone quest combat encounters with non-standard mechanics (other than WB and those tedious West Weald incursions), so ZOS may be thinking along those lines too. I don't think these current implementations were effective at teaching anything though, because the unexpected new feature in the middle of an unexpectedly and atypically challenging combat encounter leaves little mental overhead for analysing and remembering the new feature.

Normally we learn best by repetition, as in your own experience that you mentioned. I'm not sure that would work in Overland though, as atypically challenging combat and repeated deaths in normal Overland zone quests would just lead to my type of player doing something else instead.

Essentially the mechanic has to be presented in a situation where the majority of available focus can be on the mechanic, with minimal other threat. Your thoughts on reaction times or NPC guidance might work, though they could quickly become artificial and thereby off-putting, depending on the point in a story.

If we want to teach PvE endgame mechanics through an Overland context also unavoidable by players with no interest in PvE endgame content, it must be carefully designed to not inadvertently put those players off from the Overland content itself. Design it well, and it might encourage players to try PvE endgame content who would not otherwise have done so; design it badly, and it might discourage players
from continuing ESO at all (e.g. West Weald).

That's true, I can see that introducing punishing mechanics out of nowhere can be very frustrating. That's why I think they should add mechanics to story bosses in solo-instances. it would be safer enviroment, without additional distractions (other players or mobs) and players could easily get used to the mechanics (I see no reason to imitate world bosses and add overlapping mechanics there). This would also fit the storyline: if you're fighting a boss who wants to destroy the world, it would be good to make the fight against him more challenging in any way.

AlexanderDeLarge · January 26

We need challenge difficulty and people to use their brains. These things are not mutually exclusive.
I don't know how you can look at footage of a completely naked, statless character AFKing in front of a bear attacking them for a minute and a half and not think there's a problem:

https://youtu.be/CLYwxXFqEZk

Soarora · January 26

Theoretically, challenge modes will force people into learning basic combat as right now you can brute force overland with no spammable, no set bonuses, just light attacks and a dream.

I still want combat tutorials for tank (line of sight & outranging tests, mitigation test, taunt uptime test, etc.), dps (weaving, stand in front of healer, dot/direct/aoe/channeled/st damage types, what a proc is, et.), healer (buff & debuff selection mostly), pvp (resist test, penetration test, break free practice, etc.), and maybe solo (resist/roll dodge test, etc.).

Tariq9898 · January 26

AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »

We need challenge difficulty and people to use their brains. These things are not mutually exclusive.
I don't know how you can look at footage of a completely naked, statless character AFKing in front of a bear attacking them for a minute and a half and not think there's a problem: https://youtu.be/CLYwxXFqEZk

This. Of course no one needs to use their brains if majority of the content is brainless. It’s part of the reason why Overland Difficulty needs to happen, so players can use their brains and learn the actual mechanics.