Let's talk about Hunts - a detailed rundown of their assumed mechanics

[Dimagasa]

I wouldn't expect SE to change hunts in any form, and they obviously aren't going after the maphack software even when they state upfront it scans the game processes and pulls coordinates out from memory rather than the game's text logs. But I certainly DO expect them to be banning the bots who are disrupting the game for other players/hunters, especially when it's blatant in the open world.

Seems that the majority of the arguing in the last page is over idiosyncrasies of specific servers (i.e. "well they mark stuff here so they're a part of the community" doesn't hold up for the next 4 servers where they don't). If your server works together and isn't awful, great. There's a lot that aren't so community oriented and I'm sure that people who are considering server transfers would like to hear about it to know which places have toxic environments to avoid.

[Sarteck]

But I certainly DO expect them to be banning the bots who are disrupting the game for other players/hunters, especially when it's blatant in the open world.

Completely agreed.

Seems that the majority of the arguing in the last page is over idiosyncrasies of specific servers (i.e. "well they mark stuff here so they're a part of the community" doesn't hold up for the next 4 servers where they don't). If your server works together and isn't awful, great. There's a lot that aren't so community oriented and I'm sure that people who are considering server transfers would like to hear about it to know which places have toxic environments to avoid.

Fair enough. Exodus has it's own fair share of issues, but it really does seem to be different from what Gilgamesh and Behemoth are claiming. If anyone really is considering a server transfer just for that, I'd advise you to consider Exodus. Although I've had issues with them (particularly the cheating), for the most part they really are very community-oriented and try to give most people a fair shake at Hunts.

[NosamKin]

Guess I'll jump in with a some random comments.
On my server the 'A' hunts are ok. People will wait, sometimes too long in my opinion, but usually whoever found it pulls it. Ariyala is often not up to date - with many monsters "missing".
For ARR and SB 'A' ranks I can't always get anyone to show up! Hinterlands is especially bad.
The 'S' ranks, on the other hand, "seem" to pulled right away. But then it doesn't take many lvl 70 players to kill a lvl 50 even if its S.
My main point though, is many people don't see the call out and then complain. I'm on several hunt link shells and often see something like:
[00:00] Hunt X found...
[00:01] relink1 - hunt X found...
[00:02] relink2 - hunt X found...
....
[00:04] pulling if no one one the way.
[00:06] hunt dead.
[00:07] inv? why you pull so early...

arrg... I see this more often than not. 5, 10 minutes after the first call out some people finally show up and then complain...

[Luna_Li]

I'd be happy with just one, simple fix/change. Give S Ranks a 5 minutes invulnerability buff when they spawn.

[BillyKaplan]

I'd be happy with just one, simple fix/change. Give S Ranks a 5 minutes invulnerability buff when they spawn.

And if it's a server where people don't set alarms for themselves to check, say, the Garlok whenever the weather conditions are met, those five minutes will pass without anyone being there, then we'll be back where we are right now.

[Dimagasa]

And if it's a server where people don't set alarms for themselves to check, say, the Garlok whenever the weather conditions are met, those five minutes will pass without anyone being there, then we'll be back where we are right now.

We're not trying to cure player issues like disinterest or laziness, so that wouldn't be back at the same spot. But even a change like that might still encourage players to look around more than they are now if they know they have a better chance at getting credit.

For other games that have camps with RNG rare spawns and issues with kill stealing there's always been discussion around about only letting the previous clearers see or engage the enemy for a short grace period before it phases in for everyone. In this case the suggestion is that the S rank wouldn't be engageable by anyone for a short period but they could still tell it was up or would be soon.

[BillyKaplan]

But even a change like that might still encourage players to look around more than they are now if they know they have a better chance at getting credit.

For certain hunts yes. But hunts like Garlok, or Okina, or Mindflayer can spawn without any player being there or actively spawning them, which means they can easily spawn and be alive for five minutes, then only be found after their vulnerability has long since fallen off. You can't even say 'start it off as soon as they're found' either because there's too many complications with that suggestion. It'll be a partial solution at best (because it won't cover those particular hunts) that might yet actually discourage people because a lot of people would see the five minute wait time as too much of a bother.
Then there'll be the people who find it and only relay after the vulnerability has fallen off so what was the point of it in the first place? etc etc

[InkstainedGwyn]

We already have non-map-marked FATES that still require level sync to participate. While I'm sure a lot of people would hate that (especially the ones who want to be able to solo A and S ranks), wouldn't it at least work towards solving the problem for S ranks in particular? You can apply it to A ranks too, although I'm not sure that wouldn't be overkill given how many there are and how often they spawn. But for S ranks, it would mean that people would have to wait, at least for a handful of folks. And that would give other people a chance to arrive. Anybody can bring out a story, sure, about how 'they saw a level 50 paladin who could easily solo [x] S rank' but I have seen the crowd sometimes work together; the early-puller pulls an SB S rank, everybody stays back, the early puller eats dirt. We can't rely on that, though, so if they're at least forced to sync, they can't just faceroll it.

[alimdia]

Is Udumbara still mostly guesswork? Anything solid on the exact conditions? So far this is the only hunt that most of the time makes me feel like I'm wasting my time

[KageTokage]

A JP wiki lists it as being 50 kills each of Diakka, Leshy, and Sapria.

I've seen it successfully spawned off of kills of all three at this point, so I'm inclined to believe it's the truth.