Trapdoor is getting harder.

*head implodes from logic/anti-logic containment failure*

Okay, if you're going to be in 'my camp', we need to ditch the parts I highlighted in yellow. I have NO PROBLEM with the arc as originally designed. I do NOT think it needs an overhaul. I LIKE it.

My only issue is with the change to Trapdoor as it sounds to me like the devs saying, "Play it OUR way. This is the RIGHT way to do it."

No ones talking about "the hard mission" this thread is about the Trapdoor mission.

Kinda hypocritical statement there, no means mind you an attack on you per-say, But I yet to believe anything that goes on in this game forum is mildly, even possibly, remotely, intelligent. From forumer/gamer, to development, even mods.

Even a possible chance of one even starting, it would be modded and deleted due to the fact it's better business to keep absent minded consumers than smart ones.

Anyhow...


This is what I pretty much posted in the patch notes.

Reichsman was programed to stay put in his area, Trapdoor on the other hand was not and it seems like when players where using a pulling method on Trapdoor, they patched him into not being able to be out of the line of sight of his Biwhositwhatsits when they were intending to multiply more of those guys and was as making them spawn in more random places.

Instead of closing the room off or making his Biwhatchamacallits follow him or spawn around him, they just made the lazy move to just make him stay put so you couldn't pull him.

Why wasn't this explained before? you'd think this was discussed about sometime and a Red Name would at least tell us "Hey, Thanks for pointing that out, Trapdoor was intended to be left in the lava room, so next patch he shouldn't be able to be pulled away from his Biwhozitwhatzit."

I wanted to go into why I feel the lack of professionalism with these arcs, but I will save the devs grace and not type out my opinion about traits in personal health, but rather state what they are doing, and what they have been since I've subbed back since last October, is that I feel they are rushing this too fast where they are half-[Censored]ing work, and placing out poorly designed products and features.

I blame mostly on you forumers, always bored and wanting the devs to constantly give us instant gradification when it takes time and effort to to make a quality product (look at Blizzard rep, point is proven there) and also would aide in the devs so called health problems due to the mass of stress we place on them.

To sum it all up, I'd say yes, the devs did a sloppy work in making the incarnate arc and making Trapdoors situation more difficult than what we are facing now, but I would have to blame the forumers and the dev's business partners into rushing this tripe in order to please the masses before NCSoft loses subscriptions and income from the players that expect the next "Eye Candy" till the next "thing" hits.

The difference between an exploit and a valid strategy is developer intent. It is not whether I or you or the forums as a collective think "this is OK". It is not about having more or less choices.

Please note:
1. While the developers do state their intent sometimes they do not state it all the time, regarding everything. Nor are they required to.
2. The developers can and do change their intent, sometimes after they have stated it.
3. We can make suggestions/arguments to influence their intent regarding some/any part of the game. But the final decision is theirs.

I do wish the developers would explicitly state whether this change to Trapdoor was a case of "we fixed an exploit that was making it too easy" or "at first we thought pulling him was OK, but then we changed our minds".

Seeing as how there was a lengthy closed beta there was plenty of time to make this intent known DURING the beta. To me that's a failure on their part, as they could have had their beta testers TEST this.

I've found communication between the devs and players during betas have gotten considerably WORSE.

Ditto on both counts.

Wormhole ftw, again

Seems like it would've shown up pretty quickly during beta. I mean, three of my four 50s are Blasters, so pulling is one of the key items in my Blaster Toolkit. After getting creamed by Trapdoor over and over on my first Blaster, I pulled him into the hallway with my second one.

That hardly seems possible. Years ago my harshest criticism of the beta process was that beta testers would point out problems, but for the most part the missions would be pushed out as designed. (Every once in a while one would be changed due to tester feedback, but infrequently.) Then you'd see the general population react in pretty much the same way as the testers, which would then get the encounter altered. Seemed to me that's what betas were for, since the proportion of complaints and helpful advice were generally the same in the much smaller beta test group as in the larger general playerbase.

LOL. Now *that's* funny. "Give me the gun, I'll do me myself!"

Didn't you read Ballsock Aztec's replies? HE didn't have a problem and his lucky streak was seven encounters long, which means YOU don't have a problem, either. You gots to get yer head right, boy! Those extra bifurcations you saw were *imaginary* because they never happened to him!

That's an apologist's definition of exploit, and one I categorically dismiss.

An exploit is about undesireable levels of reward per effort or time. I cannot accept that pulling him into the hallway is more time effective than knocking him into the lava or simply DPS-ing him to death with a damage-dealing build. (Did I mention that the lava killed him on its own the one time I knocked him in it? I just had to defeat his bifurcations.)

Closing off innovative solutions to a problem that don't give unreasonable reward comes across as petty, intentions be damned. If it's not giving unreasonable reward, the motivation for doing it is purely conceptual, and it says that their concept for how the encounter should play out trumps player ingenuity.

That's exactly how my encounter went. My Fire x 3 Blaster is a killing machine, so I simply burned Trapdoor down. Who needs lava, I *am* lava! My AR/Dev Blaster, on the other hand, got spanked, hard, and repeatedly. And not in the fun way. I had to get help on her mission. My Energy/Energy Blaster simply pulled him into the hallway and batted him around like a cat smacking a mouse. My Brute just beat him to death.

I actually decided to view this post.

Where the hell did you even get the last half of the post? Glad to see you're still putting words in my mouth. I KILLED the bifurcations AS they spawned and never saw them spawn faster than one every 30 seconds. On seven characters. That IS NOT LUCK.

I never said they didn't exist. I never said the mechanic wasn't there. I said they spawned at a regular pace, not rapidly, and I KILLED them rather than try to whittle him down through his regen.

You keep posting what you want to hear though, it seems to be working for you. And I appreciate the name-calling. You're just pissy because I called you on your bull@#$% and you have no other comebacks other than making crap up and insulting people.

Hey, don't blame me, you started it.

I'm specifically referring to the post you made where you all but called people talking about the fast respawns of the bifurcations liars. As proof, you held up the fact that you went seven encounters without experiencing that. (As you just now did.) Well, here's the thing: sometimes the bifurcations spawn at an increased rate. I experienced that in two of my four encounters and others experienced it, as well. Yet you essentially dismissed those statements as being untrue. Because if it didn't happen TO YOU, then obviously it NEVER HAPPENS AT ALL. It *was* luck for you. A coin coming up tails seven times in a row isn't evidence of design, it's just luck. The rest of us who've seen it come up heads aren't lying about that, we're just reporting what we saw.

This is why I can't respect you. Also the fact that you cried and put me on ignore. This is your thread. Man up and stay in the fight that you started, dude.

In the "realism" department, knocking him in the lava makes less sense than pulling him into the hallway. I did it once and he just stayed there. I can see taunting him into chasing you -- "Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!" -- but getting the holy mother of all hotfoots and just standing there seems silly.

Alright. Fine. Let's take a little stroll through this thread and see why I put you on ignore before I 'man up', shall we?


I listed them, and all I got from you was "you got lucky". No, it still doesn't work out that way. I helped a friend run through that arc on 4 of her 5 50's last night and you know what happened? Same damn thing! Same respawn rate, same bifurcations, and the same strategy. Just kill the bifurcations and then hammer on Trapdoor. So 4 more runs, totaling 11 times I've watched and experienced this mission, and the same thing happened. Still sound like luck to you?

And again, not once did I say that. I do not have a 'purpled out DPS monster'. I have a versatile and tough-to-kill assortment of characters with the exception of my 50 'Troller and my '50 Corr, who both tend to die if you breathe on them funny. But no, that can't possibly be right because you can't possibly be wrong with your inference of my so-called luck.

Then there was this little gem, aimed at another poster:


Which you rapidly followed with another insult after he pointed out he was just offering advice. I'm sorry, champ, but I don't like to associate myself with people who act that way. You handled that poorly and quite honestly, I think I'd be better off not reading your posts for my own blood pressure's sake as well as my standing on this forum (now usually I don't care about that, as this entire thread points out, but I do like to know what I'm talking about when I talk about it and having a tarnished credibility doesn't help one's case).

Since that post you've resorted to nothing but insults and making things up to boost your own argument instead of providing concrete evidence that my information is false. Here, let's look at those instances:



Here's my favorite:


And this is why it's my favorite:


What's that about pots and kettles, bud? Who's backing up their arguments with just insults?

ME?

Jeez, I thought all these Trapdoor missions I've run were actual experience, not just calling you names. Boy, I was wrong!

You've been contradicting yourself and acting like a first-rate fool since you insulted the gent from Belgium and got called on it. The only reason you're still taking this up with me (and following my posts around the other forums, I might add) is because you can't bear the thought of someone saying anything against what you believe and refuse to accept that you might be maybe just the least bit incorrect in your assumptions.

You want me to man up? I'll man up when you man up and we call this a draw. No one's right, no one's wrong. Crap happens one way and crap happens another way and it's on YOUR shoulders to understand that NOT EVERYONE experiences the same thing. Does it sound like I'm contradicting myself? Yes it does. But you've made the same mistake I have: You assumed, like I did, that the only way you've seen it is the way it must be.

We're both wrong. I will admit that what I said has a great chance of being inaccurate. Will you 'man up' and join me in doing so, or will you keep throwing mud at my expense?

Well, if you ever make an MMO and you actually implement a system where the definition of "exploit" (or even game mechanics themselves?) is defined by popular (player) vote...
I would like to see how that works out. It would certainly be something new in the MMO space.

As defined by whom ?

Right now, the developers get to make the rules. This is reality. They may have talked about some things, received feedback from players. But there has never been a case in the 6 year history of this game where player(s) forced the developers to make a change against their will.
And I agree with this system to the point that I play this game and pay money for my access to it. There are some parts I would like changed, and I have made suggestions regarding them. But the lack of those changes has not made the game unplayable to me - if/when that happens I will leave.

Not that it helps much, but more anecdotal evidence:

elec/elec/elec blaster.. not too difficult,
energy/energy/force blaster .. ditto,
AR/dev/weapon mastery blaster .. ditto,
2 MMs, robot/traps, merc/traps .. really easy;

bifurcation spawn rate wasn't fast, and each time it came up I defeated the spectre within a couple of seconds,

all were at -1 difficulty except for the 3x elec which was at 0 (and is the only one with any purple IOs: a stun set at the time). They all have numerous IO sets and nary a single SO among them.

I never pulled him out of the room but did knock him into the lava almost every time. It's not my fault he's too stupid to get out quickly.

Dunno what all the hubbub is about.