Dungeons we need to talk dungeons

[Illmaeran]

Call me the minority, but I enjoy dungeons the way they are. They're good for leveling, getting tomes and other sundry items, glamour farming, generally derping around with friends, and *practicing mechanics*. I think this last one is most important. Dungeons give us the opportunity to practice mechanics on various classes before going into the 8 and 24 player content where they actually matter.


I agree that the two-packs and a boss recipe gets boring, but anything will be boring after a while. Larger dungeons with more varied pathways will not only get boring, they'll get *tedious* after a while, leading to the old Aurum Vale syndrome. Roulette dungeons are pretty much the best of a bad situation so the best we can do is put our heads down and get them done with as little fuss as possible for those weekly tomestones.

[ReynTime]

Mt. Gulg is the best dungeon with the largest pull possible in the entire game and it's awesome to do it with WAR. That is a quality upgrade for me.

Having different paths like in The Thousand Maws of Toto-Rak is awful. You just run across 1-2 mobs and some random chests. That's not creativity, it is waste of time.

The mechanics of the Shb dungeon bosses are far more interesting than those of the dungeons from previous expansions.

Boss mechanics have no connection with the design of the dungeons themselves.
ShB dungeons have NOTHING that sets them apart aside from setpieces.

[FoxyAreku]

Mt. Gulg is the best dungeon with the largest pull possible in the entire game and it's awesome to do it with WAR. That is a quality upgrade for me.

Having different paths like in The Thousand Maws of Toto-Rak is awful. You just run across 1-2 mobs and some random chests. That's not creativity, it is waste of time.

The mechanics of the Shb dungeon bosses are far more interesting than those of the dungeons from previous expansions.

Totorak is a very poor example. "More enemies to pull at once" is not variation either, it's still the same boring formula with enemies that hit like wet noodles.

There's so many ways you can spice up dungeons so they are a different experience between runs without just having hallways with nothing in any of them like totorak. Don't know why you even brought that place up, it's entirely an example of how *not* to do it.

I really struggle to call any dungeon boss 'interesting', either...different strokes on that point.

[Steelbreaker25]

Totorak is a very poor example. "More enemies to pull at once" is not variation either, it's still the same boring formula with enemies that hit like wet noodles.

There's so many ways you can spice up dungeons so they are a different experience between runs without just having hallways with nothing in any of them like totorak. Don't know why you even brought that place up, it's entirely an example of how *not* to do it.

I really struggle to call any dungeon boss 'interesting', either...different strokes on that point.

You got any examples?

[Melorie]

I agree that, given that now you can do it with trusts, at least post-expansion-launch dungeons, such as the ones that you do in the between patches and composes the expert roulette should be a bit more challenging. I came back from a break, and I've been running expert and honestly? The only thing that changes from a low lvl dungeon run is the fact that I at least have my full skill kit, which I suppose doesn't mean much as a healer, but aside from that both dungeons are way too easy. I kinda miss the level of Baelsar's Wall and The Burn. I'm not even asking for some mind-blowing design here, I'm literally throwing examples already in-game.

Matoya's specially was a huge disappointment, even though I love the aesthetic and the final boss. Palgth'an was a bit better because it's always fun to see the storytelling involved, but still, mechanic-wise is... blergh.

As always, suggesting anything more than a snooze-fest is seen as a waste of time. God forbid, feeling engaged by this video-game.

[SamsaraTrickstar]

i love how dungeons look and they can be a great way to deepen the Lore. but there are other ways to get that. other than always the same corridor.


that being said, i would love a harder optional dungeon every other patch. with more mechanics, more dmg, stricter lvl synch and with a LOT more adds... like a room full with it where players have to be careful what to pull. with adds walking around and some adds with high dmg which have to be focused.

not every dungeon has to be like that. and it doesnt need to be in the msq. but it would be awesome if we get such a dungeon now and then. maybe with a small story and a bit more Lore.

Ye this be great this way.

[Steelbreaker25]

I would like to see some source on there being even fewer dungeons in 6.x, because I haven't seen anything similar and it doesn't fit into how dungeons are used.

Otherwise, while I definitely understand the appeal of complex dungeons, especially as a long-time Zelda fan, I simply don't think the game is designed with them as the "main content." They are primarily story content, and their use in the end game for expert roulette is mostly used to cap out tomestones each week, and that's not even a necessity to do every day. You can easily cap weekly tomestones if you can catch 1-2 hunt trains. The gear isn't really valuable for progression outside of fringe cases or glamour.

I think the issue with trying to make them more complex stems from the game being mostly tuned for 8-man battle content. There's no real exploration or puzzling mechanic in the game that wouldn't either be solved immediately thus removing any complexity, or insanely tedious to do. Imagine how awful dungeons would be if they relied on treasure maps' RNG or the platforming mechanics from Gold Saucer to progress.

[CaptainLagbeard]

Well, for the amount of dungeons... I think partially at least for 5.x the amount was kind of hindered because of a certain virus going around for most of it's time... And also making them work with Trusts takes longer.

[Caurcas]

Dungeon are fluff content and will remain as such.