Thread: [Suggestion] Savage Dungeons

Here's an idea that I brought up not long ago in a thread about dungeon difficulty: Savage Dungeons. This would be a form of mid-core endgame. These dungeons are designed to be significantly harder to complete at-level than their Normal/Hard counterparts, but not necessarily take significantly longer (assuming the players know how to handle mechanics properly).

Here's the short version of my idea:

Savage dungeons should:

• Have trash that hits significantly harder at-level than Normal/Hard dungeons.
• Have bosses that hit somewhat harder at-level than normal dungeons, and have mechanics which, if ignored, will make the fight significantly harder or even wipe the party.
• Drop current (at time of release) tomestone items from the final boss, on a weekly lockout (excluding weapons).
• Drop items 10 ilvls below current tomestone items from other bosses (this can include weapons).

Savage dungeons should not:

• Have monsters with significantly more HP/Defense relative to the ilvl required to enter.
• Have rewards that are less powerful than current tomestone items from the final boss, or the current normal raid tier from other bosses, or more powerful than current tomestone items from any boss.
• Be a significant source of Tomestones of any kind (that's what Expert-level dungeons and roulettes are for)
• Be in any roulette, unless said roulette is only for savage dungeons.

Now for some more detail on the above:

Trash in savage dungeons should hit harder, but not have significantly more HP/Defense than what would be considered "normal" for the given ilvl: This makes trash matter, and makes doing full pulls at-level less feasible (but not necessarily impossible with good gear and/or strategies), without making the dungeon take significantly longer and/or become a "Slog".

Bosses should hit harder (but not as much harder necessarily as trash), and have mechanics that matter, but not significantly more HP/Defense: The idea here is that boss fights should be harder, yet not necessarily take longer than is usual for a dungeon.

Loot should be relevant for the content tier in which the dungeon is released: This means current limited-tomestone gear (or gear of the same ilvl, excluding weapons in either case) from the final boss, on a weekly lockout when released (which can be removed later), and gear equivalent to the current "normal" raid tier from other bosses, possibly also limited at first (each tier of gear should be on a separate lockout, tho). For balance purposes, this could also exclude body/leg pieces if needed.

Savage Dungeons should not be a significant source of Tomestones: This is so that they don't completely replace normal dungeons as a source of Tomestones for people who can run them.

Savage Dungeons should not be in a roulette, unless it's a "Savage Dungeon Roulette": This is because what SQEX calls Expert roulette really isn't for experts - it's for people wanting to farm limited tomestones, and includes Normal dungeons. It's also related to the above: Savage Dungeons should not be a significant source for Tomestones.

In short, Savage Dungeons should be harder, more rewarding versions of current normal/hard dungeons, without necessarily taking significantly longer to complete with a good group.

--Erim Nelhah

Make dungeon rewards depnd on clear rate time. Since there are multiple bosses and trash mobs.
The faster the clear the better the reward at the end.

Efit: I am talking about savage dungeons.

An 8 man dungeon in 1.x style would be nice as a Savage dungeon (including multiple chests from the final boss if specific conditions got fulfilled).

Originally Posted by Yeol

Make dungeon rewards depnd on clear rate time. Since there are multiple bosses and trash mobs.
The faster the clear the better the reward at the end.

That was also part of the 1.x dungeons (chest #5 for speedrun)

Originally Posted by Kosmos992k

Alternately, and more importantly (because affects all content), strengthen the impact of level and Ilevel sync (...)

Tightening existing level/ilvl sync doesn't accomplish the goal of making a sort of mid-core endgame the way savage dungeons (or extreme dungeons, if you prefer) would, and could end up alienating casual players if the tunings are too tight, which is something SQEX definitely does not want.

As for why the new dungeon tier: Currently, for casual players, we have expert-level dungeons, normal raids, and 24-man semi-casual raids. For hard-core players, we have Savage raids. Mid-core players only get Extreme Primals (and possibly the early floors of the current savage raid) currently, and those are very limited (1-2 per raid tier these days) and only last until players get the weapons and/or mount from them. In other words, they don't last very long. Having an extra tier of dungeons the way we have primals and raids would add more content that mid-core players could handle.

Originally Posted by Yeol

Make dungeon rewards depnd on clear rate time. Since there are multiple bosses and trash mobs.
The faster the clear the better the reward at the end.

While I like this idea for Savage Dungeons (see below), applying this to normal dungeons would make the community more toxic towards bad and/or undergeared players. Sometimes such a player would get silently kicked, and others they'd be yelled at (and then maybe kicked afterward). This, once again, could lead to players feeling alienated, and leaving for other games.

Originally Posted by Felis

An 8 man dungeon in 1.x style would be nice as a Savage dungeon (including multiple chests from the final boss if specific conditions got fulfilled).

That was also part of the 1.x dungeons (chest #5 for speedrun)
(image snipped)

I like the idea of extra chests for optional objectives and/or fast clears, but creating completely new dungeons for Savage may not be feasible due to resource constraints. Having an extra chest at the final boss for beating certain time thresholds (say, 25m and 20m), and another for completing with no deaths, would probably work.

--Erim Nelhah

Originally Posted by Airget

(post about giving trash mobs mechanics instead of just making them stronger)

I like this idea, in a way, but it should be limited to a single mob in a pack. Things like a mook maker (generates extra monsters so needs to be killed fast), or a mob with an ability like "chirp" from PotD that needs to be interrupted would be great. Having 2 mobs with such abilities in the same pull, however, would not be the greatest idea (what happens if your party consists of tank/ast/blm/smn, which is very possible with DF?).

--Erim Nelhah