Increasing difficulty in casual content ≠ Savage

[KisaiTenshi]

Agreed. I should have been more clear in my previous response. My intent was for you to identify why you personally think that making 4 man content the hardest content available (instead of their current decision of 8) would be better.



In your example - what is the "failed major mechanic" that spawns the fetter? An example would be helpful to understand your concept.

Why couldn't a tank help free a gaoled/fettered healer?

The current example I'm thinking of is the one with the Minotaur and the "bait" from The Fractal Continuum. One of the other players, eg the healer, would activate this, to interrupt an AOE with heavy damage, where the Minotaur goes after the bait add, and if it successfully eats it, recovers HP.

Re-apply this to a different scenario where the healer is 'gaol'-ed and if the tank goes to free the healer, the boss instead eats the healer if brought close (which is a mechanic like the meteors in T9, combined with the The Lost City of Amdapor when a player is "eaten", and if not freed, immediately ko'd mechanic) and recovers significant HP.

Now either the strategy would be "keep the boss away from the gaol'd healer", by which when the healer sees it coming, moves to the edge of the arena, and the tank keeps the boss on the other side. This buys the most time for the DPS to free the healer. The second "faster" strategy would be to let the healer die before the mechanic comes up, and the mechanic can thus be skipped, but is no fun for the healer, and would require players to self-heal for the entire fight. Hence a properly balanced version of the fight would not allow the second strategy to work even when over geared.

However the other type of fight I was thinking of was one where the healer is simply removed from the fight during phase 2 (eg boss at 60%) and has to do something like "heal a npc (like the magic pot)" to free themselves, that they are otherwise taking AOE damage in a separate room while the weaker DPS is paired with a weaker mini boss in a walled off arena, the stronger DPS is paired with a stronger miniboss in a walled off arena, and the tank keeps the main boss busy (but can do extra damage during this phase by dropping tank stance.) If the DPS fail their mechanics, then they are not available to be raised, as they are not returned to the main arena until the boss's HP is 50%. So the penalty to failing the dps requirement is that the DPS is not available to help speed up the fight. If the healer fails their mechanic (eg if the healable target dies, they're locked in the room until the main boss hits 50%. They can also die by not healing themselves and still not get returned to the main arena until the main boss is 50%.) At 50%, the boss "summons" all the players back into the arena if they're not there, and switches to a "pads!" type of mechanic that requires all 4 players to stand somewhere to toggle a shield, and if players are KO'd from failing their mechanics, then this mechanic fails, and whoever is remaining takes heavy damage going into phase three of the fight, potentially failing it here. If the tank manages to get the boss from 60% to 50% before the DPS kill their mini-bosses, then the mini-bosses are also pulled to the main arena, potentially knocking them off the "pads!" mechanic.

Like what I think needs to happen is that in, say V5.0 they make all the "easy" storyline dungeons 8-player exploratory content, while putting more actual things to do into those dungeons to split the party so they're a bit longer (put role checks in place where only the healer can walk through this door), while some "savage" tier content are 4-player fights with more rigidly defined roles with bosses that you can't eat mechanics on.

[KaldeaSahaline]

Oh, damn it. I typed that on mobile. Yeah, it's a typo on my end. That contradicts my original post badly. But no, I'm not asking for 4mans to have Savage-level difficulty.

****ing Mobile man. Rookie mistake. I kid. We're all good then.

The "latter" referred to the second possible role of a mechanic, to create a point of decision, rather than signalling the start or end of a period enforcing uptime/movement.

Ah ok - I didn't see that in the text. That's why I was confused.

My haste then has a lot to do with the ambiguity, but it would also help if you could pick a few current Savage fight from which you'd like for me to try to create 4-man designs so I could work towards a concrete goal when crafting the example encounter.

How about Alte Roite (O1S) and Guardian (O7S)?

I've no idea what the snatched player will be doing; it didn't seem relevant to the idea of what must be adjusted or permitted to allow a light party to deal with party size reduction when each member accounts for 25% of the party (and potentially the whole of the given role) down from 12.5% (and half of said role).

It's relevant because I'm trying to measure engagement (notably tank/healer since they're isolated in 4 man). If a mechanic removes 25% of the party. It directly impacts what they're during during this mechanic. It then also directly impacts what can happen during this forced downtime.

If something just removes you for x seconds, that's not fun for the player. Sitting there isn't enjoyable or challenging, even if it was punishment for a failed mechanic.

I'd assume surviving some manner of role-adapted mini-encounter, killing... a role-adapted ghost(?), or the like.

In that example, the encounter, mostly as similar. Let's say for instance that TBs, severe raid damage, and DPS checks occur at predictable intervals, as does the chance of getting the player-loss mechanic, such that the light party must decide who they can do without for the upcoming mechanic. If the separation is meant to be purely a punishment, rather than a decision, then that changes things a bit.

Impact changes only by nature of what's coming up; it's on the party to mitigate that impact by choice or through perfect mechanical execution (again, depending on if it's a decision or punishment).

You then mention that the party must decide which of the 4 it can do without. I.e. if big raidwide damage is incoming -> need healer, can lose someone else. If TB is upcoming, need tank, can lose DPS, if DPS check is incoming, can lose healer/tank.

That's extremely binary, more so than existing design. Which is my exact fear and why I don't think 4 man savage level is a good idea (without sweeping changes).

If the player snatch mechanic occurs predictably alongside other mechanics, doesn't it stand to reason that it's likely to either be too punishing (i.e. unable to survive/complete follow up mechanics) due to lack of bodies, or it's trivial. How do you handle it within the existing design constraints?

For example - if healer gets grabbed - how much eHP does the tank take while the healer is trapped? 20%? 50%? 120%? How about the rest of the party?

What ends up happening (I think) is that the healer failed the mechanic and people weren't healed enough to survive while they're gone -> wipe. If the healer did, comes out, they have x amount of seconds to top the party up. Easy.

DPS don't have defensives so you can't do more than 100% eHP. That's what I mean it's usually either trivial, or too punishing. There's not much room for dynamic design with existing toolkits, especially with only 4 players.

I'm struggling with that piece with respect to 4 man savage level content.

[*]Which is why it's important that the boss damage be modified to split-damage (e.g. with minor flat defense and max HP down or the like), at which point positioning is enough to make up for a lack of tools.

Again, if its split damage, that's far from a matter of "low enough that..." The initial or maximum eHP of two melee (or two melee and a Surecast healer at that) on average is higher than a tank outside of popped CDs. The issue is their sustainability -- especially if, say, naturally more affected by a given debuff than a tank would be. It needn't change the damage dealt from the strong initial levels at all, only HOW it is dealt.

I need practical examples of this 'split damage' idea you keep mentioning. I don't understand it. If tank is eaten, how does it deal split damage? Current design handles that with stack markers. How are you proposing it happen?

Do you simply mean that a boss's auto attacks are all passive cleaves in that anyone in front splits the damage (a la Rav EX Blinding Blade TB?). If so - then are you proposing this as a shared design element across all content forms, or strictly this '4 man savage' iteration? Speaking plainly - I think undermechanics like that are bad design UNLESS they're consistent. I am not opposed to the concept at all though.

The current example I'm thinking of is the one with the Minotaur and the "bait" from The Fractal Continuum. One of the other players, eg the healer, would activate this, to interrupt an AOE with heavy damage, where the Minotaur goes after the bait add, and if it successfully eats it, recovers HP.

Re-apply this to a different scenario where the healer is 'gaol'-ed and if the tank goes to free the healer, the boss instead eats the healer if brought close (which is a mechanic like the meteors in T9, combined with the The Lost City of Amdapor when a player is "eaten", and if not freed, immediately ko'd mechanic) and recovers significant HP.

Good examples. I think I understand your POV. However, these examples are very binary, which is what I am afraid savage 4 man content will look like. There's no choice. It's simply do the mechanic this one way or else. This isn't an issue with your ideas, but the core design of the game, which is only managed moderately well in larger party sizes due to mechanical overlap/dynamic gameplay.

However the other type of fight I was thinking of was one where the healer is simply removed from the fight during phase 2 (eg boss at 60%) and has to do something like "heal a npc (like the magic pot)" to free themselves, that they are otherwise taking AOE damage in a separate room while the weaker DPS is paired with a weaker mini boss in a walled off arena, the stronger DPS is paired with a stronger miniboss in a walled off arena, and the tank keeps the main boss busy (but can do extra damage during this phase by dropping tank stance.)

Looking at this in a vacuum - this sounds ridiculously boring and how would the game identify which dps is weaker/stronger? Killing a random mob with no real mechanics or effects or simply dodging telegraphs while executing your ST rotation isn't engaging on its own, CERTAINLY not for a tank

If the DPS fail their mechanics, then they are not available to be raised, as they are not returned to the main arena until the boss's HP is 50%. So the penalty to failing the dps requirement is that the DPS is not available to help speed up the fight. If the healer fails their mechanic (eg if the healable target dies, they're locked in the room until the main boss hits 50%. They can also die by not healing themselves and still not get returned to the main arena until the main boss is 50%.) At 50%, the boss "summons" all the players back into the arena if they're not there, and switches to a "pads!" type of mechanic that requires all 4 players to stand somewhere to toggle a shield, and if players are KO'd from failing their mechanics, then this mechanic fails, and whoever is remaining takes heavy damage going into phase three of the fight, potentially failing it here. If the tank manages to get the boss from 60% to 50% before the DPS kill their mini-bosses, then the mini-bosses are also pulled to the main arena, potentially knocking them off the "pads!" mechanic.

This still suffers from binary gameplay though. Which sure, works, but it wouldn't be engaging (especially for a tank), which is where I think most of the problems lie. It's that tanks and healers by themselves aren't robust enough without the overlap of mechanics that a larger party size adds.

[KisaiTenshi]

Looking at this in a vacuum - this sounds ridiculously boring and how would the game identify which dps is weaker/stronger? Killing a random mob with no real mechanics or effects or simply dodging telegraphs while executing your ST rotation isn't engaging on its own, CERTAINLY not for a tank

The game can track this from how much collective damage was done by the players up to that point on the trash mobs.

Like, yes, in a vacuum, it's probably boring, but you have to consider the difference between doing this one-at-a-time, versus how it's done in existing dungeons like "The Sunken Temple of Qarn", or WoD, where ignoring the mechanic is catastrophic. Like in Qarn, you don't want the healer to get walled off. In Void Ark, Cetus pulls one team away and walls them off. In other games, these kinds of mechanics tend to be done one-at-a-time, thus allowing those outside the arena unable to do anything except maybe use a player-centered casted aoe (eg holy) against the wall of the arena for splash damage. Though there's other ways of finding emergent game play with a wall, if the wall can be used to chain a lightning-like cast, or set the wall on fire that creates a burning field AOE.

The issue with the 4-player content is that the roles are not rigidly defined, so the tank and healer's roles are diminished with gear creep. You can't split the party up into 4 combat situations because the role of the tank and healer is not to cause damage. In 8-player content, it's harder to balance since you can sideline one tank and one healer once gear creep lets them. Like one way of making "8-player" content harder without becoming savage tier content is by splitting the arena (See Hullbreaker Isle) or Hraesvelgr's fight in Sohr Khai and making it so that the tanks have to fight bosses on either side of the arena (eg a reverse "pads" mechanic), but the healers have to stay in the center of the arena to be able to heal both of them and keep the land the tank is on from collapsing.

[Shurrikhan]

snip; from easiest to answer to hardest

I need practical examples of this 'split damage' idea you keep mentioning. I don't understand it. If tank is eaten, how does it deal split damage? Current design handles that with stack markers. How are you proposing it happen?

Do you simply mean that a boss's auto attacks are all passive cleaves in that anyone in front splits the damage (a la Rav EX Blinding Blade TB?). If so - then are you proposing this as a shared design element across all content forms, or strictly this '4 man savage' iteration? Speaking plainly - I think undermechanics like that are bad design UNLESS they're consistent. I am not opposed to the concept at all though.

Consistent across the fight. I don't think it needs to be across all content forms for now, but ultimately I would prefer such flexibility increases were added to anything and everything, in a sense. (You may recall my opinion on cleaves, and all things that look like they ought to be cleaves, in general.)

In short, I'm saying that any fight which may remove the tank without intending to make that an auto-wipe must have damage-splitting from the get-go. That said, it should simply be tailored in such as way as to make any more than just the tank being hit a last resort (see *).

Think Hydra back at ARR launch. An MT could only hold it solo with serious cooldowns and/or very dedicated healing, which tended not to be available with people lagging in fireball initial hits (each with vastly early snapshots), so it tended to be OTed for every Triumvircate. If the OT died, we'd normally swap in and rotate BLMs, since Mana Wall was originally on a 30s CD, same as Aetherial Manipulation, or the Monks and Dragoons, swapping out instantly upon any cleave damage taken as not to lose said DPS. If the MT bottomed out, then it was time to toss in 3 people and use Cure III and likely wipe eventually to the lack of Bards.

* Now, imagine if there was a damn good reason not to go in that cleave unless you absolutely have to. Maybe it's a longish overriding DoT. Maybe it's flat Defense or Maximum HP reduction. Maybe it's a knockback proportionate to -- flatly or probably quadratic -- from %HP damage taken. Whatever. But without it, you just end up with the remaining 3 people being one-shot in enmity order if the tank dies or is temporarily removed from the fight. The only way to deal with that is to offer a option that is sustainable long enough to return the tank, given good coordination, but still not viable in the long-term (or therefore allowing a group to forgo the tank).

As far as that "good coordination" goes, Hydra can provide yet another example. Triumvercate, the originally some 80%+ (through ShO) tankbuster split damage over the number of targets hit, but Hydra's unnamed cleave did not; it just cleaved, for enough to make sure whichever DPS subbed for the OT would be killed by Triumverate in the next duo-split if without Fists of Earth, Mana Wall, etc. Think of each as semi-periodic (occurring per a given range of seconds such as per 4 to 8 and per 10 to 20, at greater effect the longer the skill has been held, with a smaller internal cooldown shared between each); there'd be an element of both the gamble and tracking involved as to when the DPS can afford to stack.

For example - if healer gets grabbed - how much eHP does the tank take while the healer is trapped? 20%? 50%? 120%? How about the rest of the party?

Given the CDs forced prior or assuming that one would remain flexible for such an issue (at cost of a further shield and split later), let's say around 140%, requiring top-off, and any two of (1) at least a split stack or two, (2) all-the-self-heals, or (3) extra defensive CD. Something of that sort. You can get through it if you continue with a level head and draw from resources meant from later in the fight (which then forces further caution and adjustment down the line, increasingly).

DPS don't have defensives so you can't do more than 100% eHP.

Depends on what you mean by eHP. If you consider moving away from proximity-based explosion damage you'd normally stand in for the uptime, or seeking cover (from, idk, Acid Rain) at uptime cost as allowing for a greater amount of would-be damage, then they do, and you can allow for damage in excess of what would have normally been 100% eHP (insofar as self-heals, external mitigation buffs, and the relevant Defense/mDefense stats).

But generally, I'd agree. Raid damage shouldn't be prominent during a period where one may lose their healer, though it can certainly be prominent just before and just after.

You then mention that the party must decide which of the 4 it can do without. I.e. if big raidwide damage is incoming -> need healer, can lose someone else. If TB is upcoming, need tank, can lose DPS, if DPS check is incoming, can lose healer/tank.

That's extremely binary, more so than existing design. Which is my exact fear and why I don't think 4 man savage level is a good idea (without sweeping changes).

I gave two very distinct possibilities, member loss with decision (e.g. A4S) and member loss by punishment (e.g. O5S). Their only commonality is that a maximum of one player can be taken.

Technically such a mechanic can also be a blend of the two, such as someone jumping in the way of a grab mechanic when the player it is aimed at will almost certainly be caught (due to failure on their part or those responsible for saving the target), when that player is of greater incoming importance. Do you risk no one being grabbed, or risk not having a healer/tank/both DPS?

Were the mechanic to be a punishment (one which cannot be sacrificed for), the phase to follow should not favor any particular role to "go in". For that to be possible at all, however, I suspect that you will need a way to increase both tank and DPS eHP without adjusting the actual damage being dealt by the boss or raid AoEs. That is why I included as necessary both a way to sacrifice uptime for survivability and a way to split damage away from the tank.

If there is an element of decision available, and especially if the mechanic is unavoidable (is not a punishment), however, then the phase to follow can situationally favor a particular role to "go in". That becomes part of the memory of the fight, like any other. "Double Acid Rain next; DPS in." "Frigid Coals next; pop Divine Veil/SiO/TBN and then healer goes in." "We've overaccelerated the train; mile marker 13 coming up fast. Blow the stack to accelerate the TB, then tank jumps." I don't see how that's any more binary than current prepositioning, etc. (Though, that's not to say I think highly of the current mostly-scripted fights either...)

It's relevant because I'm trying to measure engagement (notably tank/healer since they're isolated in 4 man). If a mechanic removes 25% of the party. It directly impacts what they're during during this mechanic. It then also directly impacts what can happen during this forced downtime.

If something just removes you for x seconds, that's not fun for the player. Sitting there isn't enjoyable or challenging, even if it was punishment for a failed mechanic.

I understand that, but the only reason for what's being done over there to influence what's being done beforehand would be if CDs needed to be saved based on the encounter on the far side. I didn't picture that being necessary except perhaps to push up the time one returns, but I imagined that, too, as only necessary following a past failure or indecision.

Doubtless, something happens over there, but my concern was simply on what is necessary to leave the same flexibility and permit the same intensity of tuning to a party far more penalized by the loss of a given member than an 8-man party would be. I'm not suggesting such a mechanic, but the question was posed, down the line of, "what if" such a situation were to occur, given a size of 4, down from 8. Honestly, I'd prefer a bit of interdependence between what goes on over there vs. the main fight, but not so great that it needs to be planned around, as I like having that degree of flexibility and recoverability.

How about Alte Roite (O1S) and Guardian (O7S)?

Aight. Those seem simple enough; substitutions, increased space usage, slightly tighter debuff rotation, and probably a bit of additional applied randomness (though with indicators) to maintain the same positional intensity. Will probably be forced to require at least one non-melee DPS, is all, especially in 7S for Chakra and depending on how much I'm willing to adjust airplanes. Damn, there's a lot I'd like to make more interesting even in the 8-man version that I'm going to have to avoid for a pure translation...

Btw, found some old notes from trying to create a nonlinear Phantom Train boss-dungeon (the dungeon is the boss, and every second counts after passing the threshold) a while back. I may also toss that up at some point when I get a chance.