SUGGESTION: Proving Grounds

[ComradeVodka]

Quick backstory: Recently helped a friend complete the final MSQ (not spoiling the story but those of you who did it, you know how hellish it can be) and it reminded me of something this game desperately needs, even more so with the addition of the paid boosts.

I saw people failing basic mechanics: Stacking what should be spread, not moving to safe zones or zones of least damage taken, not prioritizing the correct targets, I can go on and on. I would love to see SE take inspirition from what World of Warcraft has done: Make a proving grounds with bronze/silver/gold medals or similar.

You can read on WoW's proving grounds here: http://wow.gamepedia.com/Proving_Grounds

TL;DR: Every role has its own tiered proving grounds, progressively getting more difficult, progressively introducing more mechanics and progressively requiring more efficient dps rotation and cooldown/ability usage. Along the way mechanics and potential methods of dealing with everything is explained.

If this were to be introduced and you add an additional restriction to level cap content (dungeons requiring bronze, trials requiring silver, omega requiring gold for example) it would, in my opinion, VASTLY improve the experience for players that are actually trying to play the game as well as they can as they will not be stuck with players that are ignorant of what to do, single-handedly wiping parties.

Another thing you could do with the introduction of this system is up the difficulty of all content that requires proving grounds. Since you can't pass proving grounds if you're not good enough, you can expect a certain amount of competence from players that have completed it, allowing for more complex dungeons/bosses and an added challenge, maybe even an extra tier of content (extreme dungeons maybe?).

TL;DR for post if you're not interested in wanting a better game:
- Make proving grounds to improve player skill
- Add proving ground completion as a requirement to queue level cap content
- Make level cap content more difficult as player skill grows up for healthy added challenge

Sidenote: Make boss auto attacks hit harder so cure1 and 2 are actually useful ;3

[Sylvina]

We call this "Hall of the Novice" and it's fine being optional.

[ComradeVodka]

I played HotN and hardly found it decent preparation

[NolLacnala]

We call this "Hall of the Novice" and it's fine being optional.

Hall of the Novice may be fine as optional, but a Hall of the Professional (Not optional) could do wonders towards raising the skill bar and decreasing the complaining about Royal Menagerie

[Paladinleeds]

decreasing the complaining about Royal Menagerie

We'd just get complaints about "Hall of the Professional" instead.

[KisaiTenshi]

We call this "Hall of the Novice" and it's fine being optional.

There is also this thing called "Guildhests". I did all of them waaaay back at release, and then when I was looking through the Wiki it turns out, no I didn't do the last one, the 8-man one. Good luck waiting for 8 people to do them. Thus it remains not done.

What SE should do is expand Guildhests all the way to level 70 with everything from level 40+ as 8-man non-Trials versions of mechanics.

The Guildhests generally prompt you to do things (eg kill or target something) , it's not a stretch to get some AOE dodging, stacking, pillar stacking and such into some of these.

If you pass all of them, then you're good to go for the game. If you can't do all of them, then Trials and Dungeons with those AOE's should be locked off.

[Core1019]

We call this "Hall of the Novice" and it's fine being optional.

No it really isn't. It's not even close to difficult enough and the type of people who would see that they need improving most are also probably the least likely to do it if it's optional.

[Driavna]

Your current proving ground is the last MSQ boss of SB, he alone covers all the typical mechanics you encounter in any other place.

[ComradeVodka]

Your current proving ground is the last MSQ boss of SB, he alone covers all the typical mechanics you encounter in any other place.

Issue with this is though people should know what to do BEFORE you do that. He is literally impossible if you can't grasp basic mechanics which a lot of people can't.

[Driavna]

Issue with this is though people should know what to do BEFORE you do that. He is literally impossible if you can't grasp basic mechanics which a lot of people can't.

All SB dungeons/trials add one or two mechanics, we even have a dungeon showing most, if not all, AOE telegraphs.