Current State of End-Game Contents - A Blog Post from A Japanese Player

[Doki]

I do not have a problem with mechanics in fights. It was extremely rewarding the first time I cleared T7 after several nights worth of frustration. It's still sort of weird 1-shotting T6 now after having so much trouble the first few weeks. That being said, I do feel that the mechanics are a bit too unforgiving now. Between lag issues, and just "highway hypnosis" levels of repetition it's easy to mess up once or twice in a 11 minute fight. Messing up once shouldn't immediate make 7 other players annoyed at you.

Honestly the thing that is starting to bother me more, is that everything is immune to nearly all status ailments now. Can't stun, blind, silence, or skill lock bosses at all. Immediate 100% immunity is lame. Especially when a boss uses a skill with a name like voice or shriek.

It's just going to get worse. Just a few days ago I watched a raids preview for Wildstar, and thought to myself "That does not look like fun. It looks like hours upon hours of wipes."

[Nero]

It's not just one man's opinion. It's a feeling many in the community share.

Source to those "many"? Sorry, but like in this thread, not everyone does agree with it. And even if some do, there is no way in telling if many do or not do. Personally the OP is a good read, but reading between the lines he basically wants to being carried by Gear > Skill and no punishment at all, if doing mistakes. So Easy Mode in all cases, while you can faceroll every single Content of the Game. I am not sure how people can agree to that.

He also realises that this is not the most effective way to handle challenging content in a 'fun' way, and at least he is trying to offer an alternative, adaptive style solution to the dev team aimed at keeping players from leaving the game for the reasons stated.

Indeed, he did a great job on writing it down and that is why he got my like, even if i disagree with his opinion.

[Songi]

I had to deal with enough insta kill mechanics in EQ2 to last me a lifetime. This game's itemization isn't really great either. The better your gear is the more painful the fight becomes (T6 - Honey Glaze/Bee, T7 - Cursed Voice/Renaud spawns) Honestly I hope the equipment system becomes more interesting later on because right now gear choices have no affect on any role except DPS.

Now, I don't want gear to totally trivialize the encounter but I'd definitely to see a significant increase in my character's performance from having said rewards from constantly crushing the top tier content. Right now as it stands the only way I'm able to tell my character is getting stronger is when I'm spamming Holy bombs in Mythflox.

[ZReport]

That's kinda the trick though, isn't it? There's no mechanics you Absolutely Must deal with, so the mechanics that do exist can be increasingly ignored as gear and general power continue to increase, and slowly the fight will lose identity, and ultimately challenge.

Indeed. But we both knew this would happen as a by-product of an advancing MMO regardless of the current scenario. Fights will always become outdated in time, due to increasing iLvl and echo-like buffs, which is fine. In the case of T4, the challenge for those who did it in the 5-7 month time span before 2.2 had run it's course, and in most cases throughly (which is why I enjoyed it when I did). In time even T5 which has been thrice nerfed (including Echo buff) will simply be outdated by iLevel as well.

I can fully agree with anyone's sentiments who rushed content before it was nerfed, because the true challenge laid in beating that content within the confines on the current system in play. However, it's refreshing to know that Yoshi-P will continue to deliver more challenges in the future with increasing difficulty. There will always be something new over the horizon that puts your previous hard earned gear to work.

[Garlyle]

Indeed. But we both knew this would happen as a by-product of an advancing MMO regardless of the current scenario. Fights will always become outdated in time, due to increasing iLvl and echo-like buffs, which is fine. In the case of T4, the challenge for those who did it in the 5-7 month time span before 2.2 had run it's course, and in most cases throughly (which is why I enjoyed it when I did). In time even T5 which has been thrice nerfed (including Echo buff) will simply be outdated by iLevel as well.

Yes, but there's a drastic difference between how long it's going to take T4 to be little more than high powered mobs, and how long it's going to take T5 to be little more than that.

To side-example, as gear increases, more during Titan EX will be ignorable - you can eat more plumes in a bad dodge, you can eat bombs without fear of being KO'd; eventually you may even be able to survive superbombs -> geocrush. More DPS will push phases faster, reducing the amount of time you have to screw it up. That's inevitable, although they're still severe enough that it'll be a while before that happens. And there will always be parts of Titan EX you have to deal with - gaols and landslides. And that will retain Titan EX as a challenge to many people when that happens. And it will retain Titan's identity as a unique piece of content at that time, instead of just fading into mountains of identical trials.

[AeirTalies]

I agree with everything in this post.

[ZReport]

Yes, but there's a drastic difference between how long it's going to take T4 to be little more than high powered mobs, and how long it's going to take T5 to be little more than that.

To side-example, as gear increases, more during Titan EX will be ignorable - you can eat more plumes in a bad dodge, you can eat bombs without fear of being KO'd; eventually you may even be able to survive superbombs -> geocrush. More DPS will push phases faster, reducing the amount of time you have to screw it up. That's inevitable, although they're still severe enough that it'll be a while before that happens. And there will always be parts of Titan EX you have to deal with - gaols and landslides. And that will retain Titan EX as a challenge to many people when that happens. And it will retain Titan's identity as a unique piece of content at that time, instead of just fading into mountains of identical trials.

I agree wholeheartly to your sentiments, so much so that I posted a very similar response to you on page 4, lol. To that end, it's fine as well; the "challenge" is still preserved for a while longer for certain fights (Titan EX, T5) -- the win will be justified for anyone involved who is relatively new to said fight. More gear does trivalize the fight somewhat, but as you mentioned, it only trvializes the portions that players should have otherwise been able to dodge regardless. The real challenges will still be around, completely ignoring your iLvl/Echo.

However, I do believe it will get to a point where even these fights can be carried, or at least in the case of T5 recoveries mid-battle recovery from partial wipes will become possible. It will then become fights based on actions of a few who are super geared and can dodge everything, therefore carrying the rest of the party who was otherwise knocked out for a time. Biggest example being Titan HM, even before the Echo addition. A very geared tank, healer and two DPS can carry four others in that fight now. Of course the scenario would change in Titan EX, two over geared tanks, healer, 2-3 DPS, effectively limiting the carry to about 2-3 people.

[zeroumus]

i think summed up, the game relies too heavily on instanta death mechanics that can not be recovered from. ( knocked off the edge in titan ). The game is really doing a "perfection" check, you have to find 8 people that can avoid getting killed and it has to be perfect. the challenge its not that you need to be a super skilled player, the real challenge is finding 7 other people how are reasonably skilled at any given moment in time. Great if you role with a good static, not so good if do not.

as pointed out, this kinda of content does need to be in the game, there needs to be things for well tuned staitics to do

[Jyan91]

excellent post, was thinking something along these lines

[Hyrist]

I don't agree with all of it, especially the portions where he assumes to speak for the community on multiple levels, but it is well written and there are points that can be gleaned from this that I do agree with.

The parts I really agree with is the overuse of unforgiving mechanics, and the further discussion down the line of the auto-immunity to stats afflictions we give.

While I don't necessarily want it so players can simply power through or around the mechanics (like tier 2 enrage method) systems that are incredibly frustrating that instantly spell the dealth of the group can be toned down on the whole. Or at the very least, expand the endgame paths so that the difficulties are varied enough that we can more or less pick our poison.