Quote Originally Posted by Vandril View Post
Quote Originally Posted by Dogempire View Post
Later tonight I'll probably host a PF for the last two dungeons.
That would probably be your best bet if you want to experience them as intended.
It certainly improves your chances, though unfortunately, it doesn't guarantee them. When I first ran Praetorium, I listed it in PF with the "no cutscene skipping" option as well as saying in the comment it's for a full story run. I then asked in /shout for people to join me, again saying it was was for a full story with cutscenes run so that I (and anyone else who wanted) could see the whole thing. Once we finally got a group together, we discussed in party chat that it was my (and one other player's) first time and we wanted to see everything.

And of the other 7 players in the group besides myself, the number who either watched or waited for the first cutscene: 0

I came out of the scene alone in a room filled with non-solo-able mobs with no idea where the exit from the room is (since the others had just raced past everything to the exit, leaving all the mobs behind for me to face by myself). As I was typing the message asking everyone where they were, they finished off the first boss without me, so the portal to their last location came up at the entrance, which was the only way I could continue with the run — by skipping past the first section entirely. Even that put me well behind where the rest of the group was, since they'd taken off running while I was porting to their previous location. The whole run consisted mainly of chasing after them, just trying to keep them (or at least the pack of mobs chasing after them) in sight often enough that I could figure out which direction they were going.

And when I asked why they hadn't waited, everyone acted surprised. It apparently hadn't occurred to any of them that anyone might not want to speedrun. I really have no idea what they thought all that discussion before the run and the settings in the PF were about, since nobody seemed to think that no cutscene skipping meant no cutscene skipping or that wanting to see the dungeon meant wanting to see the dungeon.

The only consideration towards having new players in that run was that they did finally wait before the final boss fight for everyone to get there. So I did get to take part in at least the first part of the final boss fight (the only piece I actually got to do out of the whole run). I never got to see the final part of the final boss fight, though, since that one has a cutscene in the middle and again, they didn't wait for it.

I was so pissed off about how that run destroyed the climax of a story I'd been on for so long, I nearly quit the game entirely. As it is, six months later I've still never worked up the fortitude to try again, so I still don't know how the ARR story ends. (My Castrum run was also spoiled by speedrunning, but I'd done that through DF, so it was kind of expected. It was Praetorium, where I'd set up a PF run explicitly to avoid speedrunning, that it bothered me so much. I've repeated Castrum a few times since, but never Praetorium. Nor have I continued with the next part of the story.)


p.s. Sorry that turned into such a long rant. Guess I'm still not over it. Hope you got more luck with it than I did, Dogempire.