So, how is Pagos?

[Deceptus]

A weekly challenge log that I bust out in an afternoon, other than that, no thanks.

Currently am 25.

[Jxnibbles]

A theory running around right now is if you are fighting Dragons as a 34 you get more light. What can go wrong with a bunch of 35s doing more damage, and then seeing level 34s leeching and getting more light.

If this is true get ready for more toxicity during dragon light parties. I wonder if light parties will start refusing 34s if they have a mount. Great design.

[Lunafreya]

Okay, I've been on a 5 week break from the game and just got back very recently. I heard that Eureka Pagos was fixed and that it would be similar to Anemos so I stepped foot in it. I was wrong! While the train is somewhat there, it's still incredibly boring. Nobody wants to help a fresh level 20, nobody even cares about you if you dont have access to aetherytes, nobody does your fates around your level, etc. I thought that with the train somewhat back that people would start helping out again but I'm clearly wrong or had a bad instance. Either way, this content is dull, dry, and just a reskin of Anemos with a new snow coat of paint. I mean, they didnt even try to make this engaging did they? It's boring, it's tedious, and it's dull as all hell. I dont even know if I care about the relic anymore. I did Anemos because I figured out the train and afk exp thing but now there are monsters literally everywhere in Pagos and if I'm one shot, it's likely I am left behind by my party at level 20. I didnt want to play pagos at launch cause I heard it was worse but trust me it doesnt look like this experience is any better.

[ChameleonMS]

The most notable difference in the player base I have seen between Anemos and Pagos, now that NM spawn rates are better and XP values have been adjusted; there is a near complete lack of chauffeuring happening in Pagos when compared to Anemos.
In Anemos, it was commonplace to the point of expected that players with mounts would chauffeur players without mounts around the map.
In Pagos, it is pretty common to have 3 or 4 lv35 players in a party, and less than 1 of those players would pull out a two person mount.

Why has this happened? My thoughts are layout of Pagos is the reason for this. The narrow dragon guarded dividers of map areas are just too annoying to deal with. In Anemos you could pretty easily avoid the mobs and keep your low level passenger safe. In Pagos, the passenger death is so much more likely, that the drivers just do not want to bother.

[Zsolen]

Okay, I've been on a 5 week break from the game and just got back very recently. I heard that Eureka Pagos was fixed and that it would be similar to Anemos so I stepped foot in it. I was wrong! While the train is somewhat there, it's still incredibly boring. Nobody wants to help a fresh level 20, nobody even cares about you if you dont have access to aetherytes, nobody does your fates around your level, etc. I thought that with the train somewhat back that people would start helping out again but I'm clearly wrong or had a bad instance. Either way, this content is dull, dry, and just a reskin of Anemos with a new snow coat of paint. I mean, they didnt even try to make this engaging did they? It's boring, it's tedious, and it's dull as all hell. I dont even know if I care about the relic anymore. I did Anemos because I figured out the train and afk exp thing but now there are monsters literally everywhere in Pagos and if I'm one shot, it's likely I am left behind by my party at level 20. I didnt want to play pagos at launch cause I heard it was worse but trust me it doesnt look like this experience is any better.

If you PF a party, whether you are doing challenge logs, chain, or even train, they are more likely to be loyal and you can easily get exp. If they are around your level, it will increase your chances. Challenge log is serious exp for people at level 20. If you are looking to AFK throughout, some parties will tolerate it, but not everyone would. It will take a very long time to get light, if you AFK with the train.

[MsKirsten]

I don’t mind the light farming. It’s the LACK of farming options/locations that is lacking causing toxic environments. Dragons light locations are only 1 good spot and the other dragon location isn’t as ideal thus people are fighting for that ONE good spot. Pagos is a 144 people instance with only that 2 spots for ideal light dragon farming. Do the maths and imagine the chaos as more and more people get to ilv 35 fighting for that dragon light farming. This isn’t the case in the past whereby people have other options to do light farming (doing 24-man;Savage A1 spamming etc). Now our options are in a 144 people instance and if those are taken, good luck going out and coming back again to a fresh instance (while waiting for that previous 144 instance to be filled up) just so you could get that dragon light farming spot.

[Bernkastelx]

Been calling the fighting over dragon spots turf wars. Also not all of us 35's have two seater mounts? Proper reports have been made of people getting brilliant lights and I can recall a few times were lights felt like they were dropping way more than they usually do. SE should just give us something to go off of at this point cause the more people reaching el 35 the more toxic fighting over dragon camps. Which most likely aren't even the best way to get light.

[Solarra]

I thought that with the train somewhat back that people would start helping out again...

I had the same expectation, however what we failed to take into consideration was when people get their mount. In Anemos you got your mount while you were still levelling, in Pagos you get it at 35 when probably the only fate you care about is Louhi. That change is so significant.

Since the content isn't very engaging, I've been entertaining myself by noticing the differences in people's behaviour in Anemos and Pagos and trying to work out how the design has led to it. Changes like this have had a surprisingly large impact. The problem is, I'm not sure the devs realise just how important a good atmosphere in the game is.
The more co-operative and social atmosphere we developed in Anemos left me feeling positive about our community and the game in general. Pagos really tests your character and not surprisingly, most people are not altruistic when there is a good chance their own game-play may be hurt if they try to help others. I've met some really lovely people in Pagos, but they do stand out as exceptions to the general rule.

If I'd had any say in designing Pagos I'd have given players the mount and Aetheryte access earlier and put a two-seater mount in the lockboxes (because not all players have one). Just think how different the atmosphere would have been. If they'd actively encouraged co-operation instead of going down the path they have, the whole experience would feel much more positive.

I'm grinding through Pagos on my main; I've promised myself I'll finish levelling her but I'm not sure I'll bother finishing the light farm. I certainly don't intend to do this on my alt.

[Vaer]

The most notable difference in the player base I have seen between Anemos and Pagos, now that NM spawn rates are better and XP values have been adjusted; there is a near complete lack of chauffeuring happening in Pagos when compared to Anemos.
In Anemos, it was commonplace to the point of expected that players with mounts would chauffeur players without mounts around the map.
In Pagos, it is pretty common to have 3 or 4 lv35 players in a party, and less than 1 of those players would pull out a two person mount.

Why has this happened? My thoughts are layout of Pagos is the reason for this. The narrow dragon guarded dividers of map areas are just too annoying to deal with. In Anemos you could pretty easily avoid the mobs and keep your low level passenger safe. In Pagos, the passenger death is so much more likely, that the drivers just do not want to bother.

The reason is the design of Pagos. The mount is level 35. When you are 35 you do light, you don't really follow the train around and if you do the low level stuff gives such bad rewards sometimes people don't bother if they want to keep their chain. Think of it like Sabo, after a while no one bothered since the rewards were junk even to people leveling. It's mostly on SE how this turned out.

In Anemos everyone benefited from doing the train, since it dropped crystals that are used for relic (anemos crystals, which could be converted to protean) That was about 90% of the required stuff for each relic (the other being the feathers but now you can get those too from just training) so everyone had a common goal.

In Pagos, people are split between Louhi, Cassie, bunnies, cold warped lockboxes, high level train (people who have access to top area crystals) and the low level train (people who have to walk still). NMs don't pop frequently enough, and you need a lot of light, which means max level players are either doing stuff that leveling players wouldn't bother going to due to the level gap, or level 35 players are farming light in their own group and not on the train or they've been stuck at cassie for like 2 hours or farming cold warped lockboxes since the NM ones are the low quality ones.

Basically, in Anemos everyone had a reason to do the train, in Pagos it might just be a bunch of people who need pagos crystals, everyone who doesn't that's 35 might be off doing their own thing.

[Tint]

I would say another reason is that the Aetheryt placement is better and the walk on foot is more restricted by the small passage in the middle of the map. In Anemos people were walking more and only used the teleports sometimes, while you use the teleports more often in Pagos. Also the two Aetheryts in Anemos unlock earlier than the two in the upper half of the map in Pagos.

This means that any high level player is gutting himself when he walks with the 2 seater to carry a low level player (through the passage in the middle), instead of just teleporting off. On the 2-seater they both will likely miss the NM anyway.