Darkhold really "easy" or merely what we were warned about by Matsui?

[Murugan]

I had posted this in this the "tough content" thread but it was buried by a cavalcade of casual whining. I think though maybe this deserves its own thread. I want to ask whether Darkhold's "easy" problem is the result of poor design, or merely a player created problem resulting from them implementing such high end encounters prior to the battle changes being finalized.

Most of the "difficulty" of the batraal 5th chest run is just getting through the dungeon. The fight itself is easy and does not pose a challenge in itself. Tank it in the corner, drop the circles, kill the skeletons.

I know many people will say that getting the speed run accomplished is "hard" but I can say that compared to even most normal HNM in FFXI, speed run is nowhere near the same difficulty. Thats like saying getting to ROC was tough because you had to run through Garlaige Citadel...... Hardly....

I played XI endgame to the bone, and I take exception and some offense to this post.

Now I haven't watched Mog's videos, but if I had to guess they are using the pretty standard pick up group method of stationary tanking/soaking. For those who are unaware what this means I'll break it down for you:

• Ogre is tanked against the upper wall the entire fight, and when the ghosts are up the tank simply takes the hits.
• Batraal is tanked in the corner (or other spots) and the tank either avoids the ghosts (by standing between Batraal's legs), or soaks their damage.

Doing it this way I can see how it could be said that darkhold is easy, but is that how the encounter was designed? Let's look at the situation, both encounters center around ghosts which disappear and reappear at a static (Ogre) or dynamic (batraal) location. These ghosts are capable of all types of drains, and heavy AOE damage if they use their dmg ability in unison. Darkhold was intended to be completed in under 30 minutes in order to get the 5th chest, and it was balanced to allow a setup of all classes in the same group (which means 4 melee).

• The stationary tactic is not melee friendly, melee either have to back off and throw weapon during a large portion of the fight, or they like the tank have to soak (or in the case of batraal I suppose they could mimic/stand on top of the tank).
• Was the tank meant to soak this damage/debuff? How well does a pure r50 gla or any tank soak this damage/debuff and can said tank hold enmity enough with those to beat the instance in <30 minutes?

I'm not saying it is wrong or exploitative to employ different strategies and workarounds for mob mechanics, heck that is what endgame is all about (half the fun). Matsui said he was worried about implementing these high end encounters before battle changes were finalized. What I believe he meant by that was that currently players, especially those with multiple (or all) classes to 50, are overpowered. This allows them to employ such soaking strategies and is why the fight appears to be so easy to execute. These same strategies might not have been possible/preferable if the changes had come first.

At the same time I'm not going to sit here and pretend like jousting is this end-all-be-all raid tactic or that Darkhold is the most difficult raid encounter design ever. It's a beginner dungeon no matter how you look at it, I'd be wholly disappointed if things never got more interesting, but are the fight really that dumbed down, or do we simply overpower them due to our being overpowered.

Nerf players, nerf the armory, bring class specialization and uniqueness and suddenly I think darkhold's encounters are not that bad at all. If people would do them more as they were designed (and I'd love to get some confirmation on how that was) and they've got a pretty decent finesse check factored in.

• Tanks manually dodging Batraal's laser frontal of death while jousting so that melee are unhindered, and keeping everyone out of range.

I think that takes a certain finesse, is it impossible or "elite" maybe not, but it's a far cry from how simple the standard pick up strategy is.

I want to know is anyone doing the fight this way and still thinks it is overly easy for a beginning dungeon? Is anyone claiming it is overly easy that doesn't have at least a core selection of players running with them with all or most currently useful cross-class abilities for their class? Does anyone doing so not feel the problem might reasonably be tied to them being a tad overpowered under the current system?

You know a major balance change is coming, and if you believe that doesn't mean a nerf I seriously hope you are expecting a giant boost in mob strength as well because one day of any activity killing mobs @ or above the maximum level (10+) in XIV should show you that we have outgrown our britches. Since they have stated due to "balance concerns" they are not raising that limit the logical development step to address this problem is to Honey, I shrunk the kids! us.

>.> (fear for the children of video game developers)

tl;dr learn to read better, it's good for you.

[Xenor]

Everything is easy once you figure out how to do it consistently. The difficulty is figuring out how to do it.

[Murugan]

Everything is easy once you figure out how to do it consistently. The difficulty is figuring out how to do it.

Yes, and no. The difficulty of executing a strategy differs. This is why you have a disagreements between people who want to claim that WoW's raids are the hardest endgame ever, and you have lots of old school MMO players who beg to differ. WoW has all sorts of little environmental obstacles, and once you learn these yes it is easy, but old school MMO raid encounters were more punishing in their finesse requirements which meant that players had to maintain a high level of focus/attention throughout the fight. This changed though later on as expansions in both old school (PvE) MMO's FFXI and EQ made players overpowered in my opinion.

[DoctorMog]

Everything is easy once you figure out how to do it consistently. The difficulty is figuring out how to do it.

I disagree.

The purpose of my previous thread was to illustrate that a good encounter in a video game should be one that challenges players even after doing it a thousand times.

Learning a fight takes very little time and provides very little content if the fight itself proposes no challenge.

Batraal is a good example. It took us a few tries to learn the fight, and now we kill it regularly with no degree of difficulty.

Batraal however could have been a very challenging fight had he been reworked to provide a bit of randomness to the fight. Maybe he should have run into the eyes on a whim, that would have made it interesting. Or something, ANYTHING that would give the fight something to make a player who had done it fifty times go "oh crap"

[Murugan]

I disagree.

The purpose of my previous thread was to illustrate that a good encounter in a video game should be one that challenges players even after doing it a thousand times.

Learning a fight takes very little time and provides very little content if the fight itself proposes no challenge.

Batraal is a good example. It took us a few tries to learn the fight, and now we kill it regularly with no degree of difficulty.

Batraal however could have been a very challenging fight had he been reworked to provide a bit of randomness to the fight. Maybe he should have run into the eyes on a whim, that would have made it interesting. Or something, ANYTHING that would give the fight something to make a player who had done it fifty times go "oh crap"

Now you say it was merely learning the fight and then now it is easy. But is it? Or are you merely charity running people through it using a few overpowered players? Do you use a stationary method? Do you not see how that might be negating intended important encounter mechanics which would make the fight significantly more difficult to execute?

[Airlea]

Do you not see how that might be negating intended important encounter mechanics which would make the fight significantly more difficult to execute?

That's a flaw in the mechanics if you can negate "intended, important encounter mechanics." It's no different from when AV was zergable for a short period and the devs responded by nerfing BW's effect on him. Hell, that could be said for zerging period in XI.

No, you don't need "overpowered," players to do this btw. Just players that pay attention and can follow instructions.

[Delsus]

That's a flaw in the mechanics if you can negate "intended, important encounter mechanics." It's no different from when AV was zergable for a short period and the devs responded by nerfing BW's effect on him. Hell, that could be said for zerging period in XI.

No, you don't need "overpowered," players to do this btw. Just players that pay attention and can follow instructions.

Or the Modus Veritas zerg where you got an alliance of scholars, one would put a hielix on a mob, then just before the first tick of damage all scholars would hit modus veritas and oneshot any mob in the game, it didnt require you to be overpowered just to beable to listen/read to somone saying 5,4,3,2,1 NOW.

[DoctorMog]

Now you say it was merely learning the fight and then now it is easy. But is it? Or are you merely charity running people through it using a few overpowered players? Do you use a stationary method? Do you not see how that might be negating intended important encounter mechanics which would make the fight significantly more difficult to execute?

To follow my original idea:

If the fight itself was challenging enough, our group would not be able to take other players through with us. This is how I judge the fights difficulty. It is indeed a "somewhat" complex tank and spank.

This is how I personally would have made the Batraal fight:

1) Remove the area to the south. Force players to tank Batraal in the middle.
This should force players to "watch out" for the eyes creating an ever changing positioning of the group. It would also make the circle that stops the eyes from moving more useful.

2) Make Batraal run to a circle to gain the corresponding buff. (weapon buff or damage immunity)
Players then would have to move him out of the circle, and drop it themselves to remove the buff while remaining out of Line of Sight when he starts doing his conal. Again, this creates an ever changing fight and an element of randomness to prevent a tank and spank. Which it is very close to currently.

Now you have a fight that is never identical twice, can still be explained to new players and will challenge players even after having done it 500 times.

[Murugan]

To follow my original idea:

If the fight itself was challenging enough, our group would not be able to take other players through with us. This is how I judge the fights difficulty. It is indeed a "somewhat" complex tank and spank.

This is how I personally would have made the Batraal fight:

1) Remove the area to the south. Force players to tank Batraal in the middle. (this should force players to "watch out" for the eyes creating an ever changing positioning of the group. It would also make the circle that stops the eyes from moving more useful)

2) Make Batraal run to a circle to gain the corresponding buff. (Players then would have to move him out of the circle, and drop it themselves to remove the buff) Again, this creates an ever changing fight and an element of randomness to prevent a tank and spank (which it is very close to currently)

And Tada! Now you have a fight that is never identical twice, can still be explained to new players and will challenge players even after having done it 500 times.

Which would be fine, but couldn't they just fix the ghost blind spot/up ghost damage requiring the tank to move and suddenly the fight becomes more difficult to execute since the tank has to joust between two spots (and a healer with them), while making sure batraal stays pointed away from that healer/group. It wouldn't be quite as random, but I believe that is how batraal was intended to be fought, and it is significantly more difficult to execute.

[Xenor]

I disagree.

The purpose of my previous thread was to illustrate that a good encounter in a video game should be one that challenges players even after doing it a thousand times.

Learning a fight takes very little time and provides very little content if the fight itself proposes no challenge.

Batraal is a good example. It took us a few tries to learn the fight, and now we kill it regularly with no degree of difficulty.

Batraal however could have been a very challenging fight had he been reworked to provide a bit of randomness to the fight. Maybe he should have run into the eyes on a whim, that would have made it interesting. Or something, ANYTHING that would give the fight something to make a player who had done it fifty times go "oh crap"

They definitely could have made better use of the eyes. Why is that light to stop the eyes moving even there? The eyes aren't anywhere near the fight if done right except for an unlucky hit when popping the 0 damage or sword light. If the eyes moved everywhere in the room then you'd have to factor them in and stop them moving when they're away from Batraal.

I think SE tried to cater to both the casual and hardcore crowd by adding the speed factor. It might not be the best way of adding hard mode to a dungeon but it's not bad. What they could have done is had multiple pathways with optional extra bosses that open up more chests at the end but by doing so you make the Batraal fight harder. That way the casuals can still complete the dungeon and get some nice loot, but the hardcore have a challenge for even better loot. They could even make all the drops on the hard run HQs of the normal run.

Problem with this dungeon is they had to design the content to fit in the map rather than design the content and the map together. We'll have that issue for quite a while since there's a dozen or so dungeons still locked off. The raids will have to be tailored to their layouts.