Forked Tower: Blood Needs A Normal Mode

[0blivion]

I mean, how are you gonna make the trap aspect matter on normal mode considering they can already be cheesed as-is, and making them not even instakill would defeat the point of having them in the first place? Like sure, I think the skills could have alternate effects for outside FTB, but in general, much like DRN, all the unique parts of field exploration content become entirely inconsequential the second they don't actually kill you.

[Supersnow845]

I mean, how are you gonna make the trap aspect matter on normal mode considering they can already be cheesed as-is, and making them not even instakill would defeat the point of having them in the first place? Like sure, I think the skills could have alternate effects for outside FTB, but in general, much like DRN, all the unique parts of field exploration content become entirely inconsequential the second they don't actually kill you.

Basically do to Forked what DRN did to DRS

DRN’s traps still killed you, you could still precept them. All the skills still worked the same (other than arguably pure essence of the divine) it’s just the fights themselves were easier (and they removed very problematic aspects like minotaur and slimes/golems)

Just take forked, make the bosses easier, remove hard checks like using stop to stop the idols from casting raidwides, possible either delete bridges or make it much more simple and make the support puzzle a small extra thing one party can do like Lyon in the final boss of CLL

[0blivion]

Help the "delete bridges" made me cackle because, yeah, they'd need to.

[Khryseis_Astra]

Basically do to Forked what DRN did to DRS

DRN’s traps still killed you, you could still precept them. All the skills still worked the same (other than arguably pure essence of the divine) it’s just the fights themselves were easier (and they removed very problematic aspects like minotaur and slimes/golems)

Just take forked, make the bosses easier, remove hard checks like using stop to stop the idols from casting raidwides, possible either delete bridges or make it much more simple and make the support puzzle a small extra thing one party can do like Lyon in the final boss of CLL

*Nods* There’s people on the other thread about the PF fix saying how this isn’t really Savage difficulty, more like Extreme. But I’d say the rez restrictions and the wipe mechs themselves are what puts it on Savage difficulty. Someone on a discord I belong to listed out 23 specific things that have to be done by people using a specific phantom job, that can cause a wipe if not done correctly. To me, that’s enough to be considered Savage. And it’s also enough room for error for me to put it off even further, if not altogether, if we don’t get a Normal mode added.

A Normal mode would be something I’d want to do over and over again. This version? Endure it once and never touch it again, assuming I’m lucky enough to clear before I get sick of trying.

[Avoidy]

Their explanation, that they ran out of time or that there was a "cost" issue or whatever, is comical to me. It's like they did triage but in reverse. Instead of focusing their limited development time on something that could provide the maximum enjoyment for the largest amount of people, they hyperfocused on something turbo-niche that ultimately wound up being gatekept behind a discord and enjoyed by mostly raidslop enjoyers and amassed a whopping 400 clears after several weeks. Again. This is like the third time this has happened, lmao. They keep prioritizing this endgame sweaty poopsock crowd that makes up a minority, while most of the game's population which is casual just waits patiently for something that doesn't require prefight knowledge and markers and synchronized coordination and bodychecks for days so that one guy screwing up can anchor your progress all night.
But hey, I mean -- at least twitch raidstreamers are happy. Subcount's falling off a cliff and the game is visibly emptier outside of roleplay gooner areas, but at least twitch raidstreamers are giving the game a thumbs up on stream. Thank god, too. Where would we be without praise from out of touch players who never leave the comfort of their static?

[TaleraRistain]

I have one very simple question for people asking for a 'Normal Mode' of Forked Tower.

Baldesion Arsenal is so popular to this day that many players will go out of their way to join Discord groups for clears.

Delubrum Reginae is PF-able, and yet there's practically zero listings for it most of the time.

If Delubrum Reginae is this super-amazing, flawless, example that the devs should follow to the letter for ALL content relating to Occult Crescent, why is it comparatively dead from a player interest standpoint?

You're comparing FT to the wrong thing. You shouldn't be comparing it to DR. You should be comparing it to CLL and Dalriada. Those are both accessed inside the instance the way BA and FT are. And they are both still popular. I just took friends through Dalriada right before OC dropped so they could finally finish Bozja. You don't see the maximum numbers of people like when it was current, but there is still plenty of interest from those inside the instance and it's very easy to clear. I did CLL not too far back as well and it also wasn't an issue. Bozja is not hugely populated and can be hard to get people interested in FATEs but the instanced CEs still get plenty of participation from those inside the instances.

[TaleraRistain]

*Nods* There’s people on the other thread about the PF fix saying how this isn’t really Savage difficulty, more like Extreme. But I’d say the rez restrictions and the wipe mechs themselves are what puts it on Savage difficulty. Someone on a discord I belong to listed out 23 specific things that have to be done by people using a specific phantom job, that can cause a wipe if not done correctly. To me, that’s enough to be considered Savage. And it’s also enough room for error for me to put it off even further, if not altogether, if we don’t get a Normal mode added.

A Normal mode would be something I’d want to do over and over again. This version? Endure it once and never touch it again, assuming I’m lucky enough to clear before I get sick of trying.

The crazy this is that even Savage lets you try again immediately. And we complained about body checks in Savage not because we want things easy but because it's artificial difficulty. Panda was body check after body check after body check. You had very little options to recover so you had mechanics you couldn't even see until you could run the body check gauntlet perfectly. These past two tiers have been praised because there are still body checks but they're used tactically and allow room to recover and see mechanics. We all complain about add phase in m6s but we also praise it because it's real difficulty in needing to prioritize targets and refine dps to get past that wall. So it's kind of even more head-scratching that they go back to this artificial difficulty when they had a lot of feedback from even the raiding community that we didn't like it either.

[SeriousPan]

The crazy this is that even Savage lets you try again immediately. And we complained about body checks in Savage not because we want things easy but because it's artificial difficulty. Panda was body check after body check after body check. You had very little options to recover so you had mechanics you couldn't even see until you could run the body check gauntlet perfectly.

Bodychecks are the teams favourite form of padding for the combat design in this game. Don't know what mechanic to add to make it harder? Bodycheck time! I concur with your point completely.

[Khryseis_Astra]

The crazy this is that even Savage lets you try again immediately.

Exactly. Having content difficult enough to have to prog, but not being able to repeat it at will until you get the hang of it is just not fun for me. Even with the PF fix, it’s still going to be finding a run that works with your schedule with a Discord group, and hope you can eek out a clear without hitting your rez limit or wiping the raid, or you’re going to be repeating the process all over again.

[Kisshu]

Looking at the first boss, they could easily make a normal version out of it without having to remake the fight.

1: Show telegraph at casting start.
2: Rotate gets the rotating marker and pre-mark the danger zone
3: Meteors as normal, instead of four updraft markers on people, they have two fixed locations on the meteor side
4: Adds, two options, either use dispel on the red add, or kill the smaller adds to remove the defense buff (if the group lacks time mages)
5: No floating towers

With these changes, even a complete random group with no communication should be able to beat it. And you don't need to remake the entire fight. It's still mostly like the current fight, but makes it easier to see what's going to happen so people can adjust earlier for it.