how to make raiding fun and challenging

Malcom · 07-24-2007, 05:51 PM

Im sure there have been past threads addressing this issue, but basically i wanted to stress how time sink trash adds no value to a zone. Instead, it contributes to raider "burn out", which in turn ruins guilds and hurts SoE's pocketbook.

Rather than complain though, id rather this be a thread where we can come up with other ways that we would prefer to raid. For example, proposing an alternate idea to just adding 100 trash mobs that you need to kill before fighting a named.

To start things off i wanted to float an idea that would make trash, and maybe named, a bit more fun. Instead of having named with set scripts, why not have named with ability "chests". The chest would contain stuff like the chance to spawn an add at a certain %, or every "x" %. In addition this same named would have 4 different aoes, but he could only cast 2 of them (its random which 2 they would be each time you engage). Other abilities could have a chance of showing up too. Obviously number of random abilities will correspond with the level of difficulty.

The trash would be in random locations each time, and there would be a set range on the number of trash (i.e. 4-7 groups here, 4-6 groups after the first named, etc). The trash would assist the named so they'd all have to be killed before the fight. The random number and random location would allow SoE to escape with putting less trash in. Instead of spending extra amount of time minlessly killing them, the raid would have to move around and find them. Make 1-2 stealth, 1-2 wandering, and 1-2 that repop, etc.

The basic idea is sort of a dynamic raid zone. The individual parts arn't difficult, but the fact that they are always changing forces the raid to stay on their toes. They may know what aoe's a certain named can have, but they wont know what ones he has this time till they pull him. There will still be guilds that first pull these mobs, and those guilds will have excellent communication and teamwork. I think this would add a little more excitment to the instances and hopefully reduce how quickly people get burned out by the "grind".

Hopefully others will post some ideas, as im sure there are lots of good ones floating around.

Schmoogles · 07-24-2007, 08:09 PM

When I read this my idea would be something like Courts in T6 not a lot of trash mobs. You had to kill x mob before x mob would spawn.

I personally liked how you had to craft something in order to kill a mob in Gates in T6 also.

Snark · 07-24-2007, 08:16 PM

ya sitting around waiting for schoolges to craft was fun zzzzZZZ!!!!!! it gave us time to make fun of your huge gnome nose though!!!

Schmoogles · 07-24-2007, 09:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snark

ya sitting around waiting for schoolges to craft was fun zzzzZZZ!!!!!! it gave us time to make fun of your huge gnome nose though!!!

LOL - I guess it was only fun if you crafted the item. It was just an idea though. Yes you all did have a good time making fun of me and most of the time it almost screwed me up. ha-ha

Proxo · 07-25-2007, 05:53 AM

when a mob attack it decays gear, on every attack, it affect everyone in the raid. every attack is a zonewide ae. and the ae is an uncureable and unresistable nox dot wich gives 2k dmg per tick for 10 minutes and the dots stack
and the dot ticks 1 sec apart, and the mob has 2sec delay on his attacks

and the mob has 20 mill hps
:P

(this was a joke btw)

Ishbu · 07-25-2007, 08:37 AM

You want to add challenge to raiding? Well given everything we've seen in game there needs to be a success lockout set for killing even 1 trash mob in a raid instance so guilds cant go in day after day. As an example, that alone could change an encounter that was challenging for 4 days and turn it into an encounter that was challenging for a month.

Step 2: Remove repair kits and spawnable menders from the game. Nobody uses back up gear anymore. Sure people have other pieces for various reasons, but not back up gear, and there is no need to. You suck and just wiped to whatever mob 20x? No big deal, here's 100% gear!

Step 3: Do NOT add in instance holding like they are doing. Everything in this game has either been broken or beaten relatively quickly once it wasnt broken. The only way for instance holding to work for this game without trivilizing anything that is actually killable is if beating certain raid content actually allows your character to be flagged to do something along the lines of level higher, get higher level upgrades to your spells/abilities, or get more aa points. Anything less than something GAME CHANGING wont work because of how easy it is to stupefy all caps and make most gear upgrades within an expansion all but meaningless. Flagging basically is going to be necessary, so if that your not good enough to kill Mob A, sorry, but you are not even allowed to attempt Mob B or ever go into instance number 2 until you do.

Well since none of that is ever going to happen, challenging just isnt going to be a part of this game, sorry.

Oh and by the way, simply making it so the best raiders actually were several times better than the people who dont raid like it was in eq1 would make the game more fun simply because people would have something to work towards. As it is we are all just cookie cutter images for the most part.

LFG · 07-25-2007, 10:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ishbu

Step 2: Remove repair kits and spawnable menders from the game. Nobody uses back up gear anymore. Sure people have other pieces for various reasons, but not back up gear, and there is no need to. You suck and just wiped to whatever mob 20x? No big deal, here's 100% gear!

I very much agree with this. Nothing has accelerated the premature consumption of content in this game more than mender bots.

MeridianR · 07-25-2007, 10:36 AM

They will get rid of Repair kits, and mender bots....but that is because everything will be a Persistent Instance...that is SoE's logic.

Kisy · 07-25-2007, 04:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ishbu

You want to add challenge to raiding? Well given everything we've seen in game there needs to be a success lockout set for killing even 1 trash mob in a raid instance so guilds cant go in day after day. As an example, that alone could change an encounter that was challenging for 4 days and turn it into an encounter that was challenging for a month.

Step 2: Remove repair kits and spawnable menders from the game. Nobody uses back up gear anymore. Sure people have other pieces for various reasons, but not back up gear, and there is no need to. You suck and just wiped to whatever mob 20x? No big deal, here's 100% gear!

I know that patch kits and repair bots have made the time we can stay in a raid zone longer. Yes you may not like it, and I'm sorry. We are trying these zones just like you were back when the expansions just came out. Are we, can we, will we ever be as good and efficent as you and the rest of the large raid guilds? No. I will not debate that with you. You are a better raider than I. Period end of story. ( ouch that hurt. I think I actually gave someone I hate a complement. OUCH IT BURNS IT BURNS! ) ANYWAYS. I think repair kits should stay - but the repair bots if they stay should have a much longer recast on them. Say 5 hours for example. Other than EH what zone could you possibly still be in after 5 hours?

Step 3: Do NOT add in instance holding like they are doing. Everything in this game has either been broken or beaten relatively quickly once it wasnt broken. The only way for instance holding to work for this game without trivilizing anything that is actually killable is if beating certain raid content actually allows your character to be flagged to do something along the lines of level higher, get higher level upgrades to your spells/abilities, or get more aa points. Anything less than something GAME CHANGING wont work because of how easy it is to stupefy all caps and make most gear upgrades within an expansion all but meaningless. Flagging basically is going to be necessary, so if that your not good enough to kill Mob A, sorry, but you are not even allowed to attempt Mob B or ever go into instance number 2 until you do.

I agree that a named progression should be in a zone. If you cant kill A then you cant go to B or C or D, etc. As for having the re-entry system. I have to agree with this only for zones such as EH. I dont see any other zone in the game that could possibly be an argument for this system.

Well since none of that is ever going to happen, challenging just isnt going to be a part of this game, sorry.

Oh and by the way, simply making it so the best raiders actually were several times better than the people who dont raid like it was in eq1 would make the game more fun simply because people would have something to work towards. As it is we are all just cookie cutter images for the most part.

I dont see how you are all just cookie cutter images for the most part. Not every raiding guild has accomplished what the Second Dawn, Disso, etc. guilds have. Let alone the casual raiders ( myself included ) could ever hope for.

I never played EQ1 so I can't address the raiding system there.

/2cp I know I am the minority on this site. I am the casual raider who simply looks at things through different eyes.

Raina · 07-25-2007, 04:47 PM

thats why this game needs solid zone progression. There should be zones that only the hardcore people can get into for awhile as well as other zones that the casuals can cut their teeth on and work towards getting into the harder zones.