So far, being disintegrated seems to be as lame as it sounded on paper
By
Aggelakis,
Posted on: 2011-06-28 14:48 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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Originally Posted by Crazy_Larry
Oh no, NO, I'll have to use strategy?
This sounds far too difficult. |
There IS no strategy for 'Auto-hit giant pulses, insanely high accuracy mobs and a two-shot AV trolling your backside'
Nice try
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Originally Posted by Zwillinger
GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.
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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon
NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.
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Sadly, it seems they took the +4 Boss Con, Monster and AV part of the Sewer Trial, and left out the 'clever, team based mechanics' part...
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Originally Posted by Zamuel
...Abandoned Sewer Trial? Also, (the post I12 version) is one of the few truly non soloable TFs in the game.
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Originally Posted by Zwillinger
GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.
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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon
NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.
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Originally Posted by CactusBrawler
Boss with a fight reset? Nah, don't think I'll bother.
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I know what you mean. Finding out that a boss has a fight-reset mechanic automatically generates a collective "not again" groan from every gamer I know, regardless of what game you're dealing with. One lag spike and you have to start over? No thank you.
On the other hand, it could be worse. When this mechanic gets combined with something that weakens your group or strengthens the boss as the fight runs longer, you generally end up with the most hated boss in the content bracket, if not the entire game. Fortunately the devs had the brains to not add the second half of this one-two suckerpunch to Antimatter.
I'm actually not entirely against boss fights that restart if you lose (read: wipe), but bosses that can reset the fight with what I feel is a "cheap" mechanic? No, thank you.
Generally, I kind of don't like the approach where you can just keep flinging warm bodies at a boos and no matter how many times you die, all that matters is you keep dealing damage. But unless we can define a losing condition - which I don't think Keyes Island has - then resetting the fight is just a dick move.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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This is the only viable tactic for PuGs and newbies to the trial. Just forget all the wacky stuff going on with the huge green AoE, disintegration, red/blue orbs and terminals healing him - all you have to do is KILL HIM WITH FIRE.|
Originally Posted by Arilou
Heck, last time we managed to beat AM simply by DPS-ing him to death. Yeah, he healed (about 4-5 times) but not enough to recover from the pummeling he recieved.
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It has worked on my successful runs. The downside is it puts smaller leagues at a disadvantage since they just don't have the total DPS to pull it off.
24 muppets with no clue what's going on can still pummel AM into submission, regardless of his silly games
Sadly, this still leaves the problem that after one or two runs, most players just cannot be bothered with Keyes when they can run a BAF or Lambda instead.
If I was in charge I'd remove the blue/red entanglement and add 5 minutes to the timer in the last phase. A lot of new leagues were juuuuust barely failing becuase the timer ran out, then everyone swore to never do the thing again. To go through all the effort of the three reactors, then lose at the end due to the time limit is too much for some people.
The Widow's Dark Hand - leader of Faux Pas
Champion Server
Tee Hee!
Ok. I have many thoughts when I tried it on my Grav/FF controller.
1) The normal mission sucked for me. Pulses killed half my HP, as it did all types other than the melee set. I was dead (As was my team) and in the hospital more than I was actually playing the damned thing.
The ranged, lower HP crowed suffered...A lot. Enough where entire groups in the TF rage quitted.
2) Finally we did all of the silly tasks to stop the pulses and pushed through to Antimatter. Then the ranged AT's and support AT's were a bright beacon of hope. That was about 10 minutes of the entire trial, and while the Melee set were sure upset they could not dogpile Antimatter, the ranged and support sets/At's finally could actually participate in the trial...mind you for only 10 minutes. But still...it was a bone thrown to us and we took it.
Conclusion
a) this Trial is built for the melee/HP heavy set. For all but 10 minutes
b) this Trial hates ranged players and support for pretty much all of the trial
c) Empaths***Shine Brilliantly***, Therms and Pain finally have a place on a TF, where as in Bafs and Lamda had lesser roles to play making them low damage dealers, or in Empathy's case nill, seeing as it has no debuffs and generally low damage.
So each of the trials favor something, but all have one thing in common, which is that it favors the melee damage/or AOE Damage/Debuffing sets over the support/healing/buffing sets.
So for 10 minutes of an entire trial, trying to kill a boss, a healing or support set finally gets to shine more than what I usually see on trials, which is melee tanks, and a ton of scrappers, brutes etc...mind you, for about 10 minutes.
Undodgeble pulses which can take half a squishies HP...are much more annoying then having to have a heal placed on you for ten minutes or yelling "Disintigrate" to gain such heals...for 10 minutes.
10 minutes! As opposed to (Insert minutes not related to the ten minutes mentioned previously) minutes for the main trial being in the hospital!
I think Melee wins again!
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The incidental damage is what worries me about this. If that last hit really is 99% damage, then not only do you need to heal up after the second hit, you need to heal basically to full, AND not take 1% incidental damage in the meantime before the last one comes in. Unless timing (and lag) are really tightened up, then that's just roulette. I already have Progress Quest for those times I want pure randomness to determine success.
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Originally Posted by reiella
There are two effects you're mixing I think.
Disintegration and Obliteration. Obliteration is the one with the big visual queue. And not so much the one being discussed. Moving away is still helpful so you don't get pinged as much with incidental damage while under disintegrate. |
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This actually reminds me of previous times when this has come into play, such as Romulus Augustulus. I've learned, in time, that there are perfectly valid tactics to defeating Romulus when you can't outdamage his healing Nictus, but when you can just dogpile him and beat him that way... Who cares?
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Originally Posted by Dollymistress
This is the only viable tactic for PuGs and newbies to the trial. Just forget all the wacky stuff going on with the huge green AoE, disintegration, red/blue orbs and terminals healing him - all you have to do is KILL HIM WITH FIRE.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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Winning the Trial = a winning strategy |
Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha
There IS no strategy for 'Auto-hit giant pulses, insanely high accuracy mobs and a two-shot AV trolling your backside'
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@Golden Girl
City of Heroes comics and artwork
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DPS is a strategy now?
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Originally Posted by Golden Girl
Winning the Trial = a winning strategy
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The entanglement components aren't that important. I think more damage is done by folks trying to mess with those than not. They do 8 damage every tick per person. Not a whole lot when the most overlap you'll get is 12 [so it would really suck for stalkers :/]. I personally think it's more relevant for the person getting hit with disintegrate so they can get out of the death pit if you have it light on auto-heals. Even though, I think they're better off with the group with stuff like Rebirth and whatnot going off. Long as people are able to heal them.|
Originally Posted by Dollymistress
This is the only viable tactic for PuGs and newbies to the trial. Just forget all the wacky stuff going on with the huge green AoE, disintegration, red/blue orbs and terminals healing him - all you have to do is KILL HIM WITH FIRE.
It has worked on my successful runs. The downside is it puts smaller leagues at a disadvantage since they just don't have the total DPS to pull it off. 24 muppets with no clue what's going on can still pummel AM into submission, regardless of his silly games Sadly, this still leaves the problem that after one or two runs, most players just cannot be bothered with Keyes when they can run a BAF or Lambda instead. If I was in charge I'd remove the blue/red entanglement and add 5 minutes to the timer in the last phase. A lot of new leagues were juuuuust barely failing becuase the timer ran out, then everyone swore to never do the thing again. To go through all the effort of the three reactors, then lose at the end due to the time limit is too much for some people. |
Personally, given that entanglement is the only mechanic that attempts to move it from dogpile, and it's not that big of a deal. I see that dogpiling is a perfectly valid tactic for AM. The parts that matter are Oblit and Disintegrate and his AE nuke [although I'll be honest, I don't even know how badly that one hits].
With smaller leagues, it's easier to avoid the trivial Entanglement, but you are far more vulnerable to having targets die to Disintegration, which is Very Bad. My small league attempts so far have both failed with Antimatter getting stuck in the Reactors though, so don't have a fair grasp of those dynamics yet.
5 minute timer would be way too short imo, that lends itself to the failing if you aren't steamrolling it. I like the 15-20 minute that the other trials use for their AV step. It allows for mistakes to happen, and suboptimal teams to be resolved and progressed. Still ends up taking less time than a STF when you only have 1 ranged dps and ghost widow feels mean
.KIR is longer than LAM though, and I really don't see much way to speed it up, you can get some better speed by clearing some terminals before Am shows up, but that doesn't really add up to much, the reactors take time :x.
Let's Dance!
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Yes - it's selecting an option from a choice of several, and then using it at the right time |
Originally Posted by Clouded
DPS is a strategy now?
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@Golden Girl
City of Heroes comics and artwork
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"You're going to DPS very, very slowly. Now - and by slowly I mean <bleep!> slow."|
Originally Posted by Golden Girl
Yes - it's selecting an option from a choice of several, and then using it at the right time
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"Until then you will throw more dots. Throw more dots. More dots, more dots. Come on, more dots. K, stop dots."
Maybe someday CoH/V will have cool raid wipe videos like that...
Few things that make this not as bad as people think:
1. Anti-Matter is very squishy compared to Siege/NS/Marauder, and I'm pretty sure the disintegration has a respectable recharge on it. The first time I did the trial, Keyes was at exactly 1% HP in the last fight, and disintegrated someone to get back to 24%. And, literally before I could finish my thoughts of "Aw, ****, and I thought we were about to finish this on the first try, I wonder what kind of **** he's about to pull now", he was already back down to 1%, then dead.
2. The entanglement (red/blue orbs) is practically unnoticeable, in terms of damage.
3. The orbital cannon (whatever its actual name is) is just like the WarWalker Orbital Lance: an obvious target reticle appears on the ground, and you have plenty of time to get out of it before it fires. It also doesn't do too much damage, particularly compared to disintegration (about half a corruptor's HP) -- the main thing is that you get held for a bit before it actually fires off if you stay in the reticle too long.
4. As far as I can tell, Anti-Matter uses ZA WARUDO each time he first hits 75%, 50%, and 25% HP -- like Hamidon's blooms. It appears he doesn't actually have his natural regeneration while he's healing -- just the visible healing tics of ~1300 HP every one or two seconds. This is actually less than it sounds, when you consider point number one. He healed to full from the first one, but the second and third time he did it, the amount he healed was barely even noticeable (perhaps this was due to the team realizing what exactly to do).
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Your character does recieve something akin to the 'I HAVE A METEOR FRAGMENT' aura from Bloody Bay, and in addition, you receive a warning that Anti-Matter is disintigrating you that other people can see if they're paying attention. In the heat of the battle, though, it might be hard for other people to see either after the initial message if you don't tell them you're melting, like a guy I saw last night not do.|
Originally Posted by Lazarillo
Does it have some sort of ultra obvious visual cue? Like some giant pillar of light screaming "ALL HEALERS DOGPILE ME RIGHT NOW", at least?
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One of the most important things people need for this trial is good communication.
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I just don't run it.
No big deal. Kudos to those that do enjoy it though.
I don't see the big deal as there are alternatives here.
When something good happens to me, I can never enjoy it....
I am always too busy looking for the inevitable punchline...
BEHOLD THE POWER OF CHEESE!
*le Sigh* did this last night on my illusion/emp controller. When it came down to it, I had no time to do anything but heal. The ideal strategy seemed to be: healer heal, tankers be taunters. (no attacking!)
It seems to cater to some of the worse habits in the game for standardized MMO strategy with no adaption needed.
Worse yet, the disintegration ray was invisible amongst auras, shields, and destiny buffs. I had to be told directly by the target they were being disintegrated, even then I could only tell by their rapidly emptying health.
Suggestions: have an unmistakably brilliant aura that makes the disintegration target visible. Have pressure release valves that redirect the reactor pulses skyward, if they are clicked just before the pulse. This is interruptable, and guarded. This makes avoiding the disintegration death/heal more manageable, and gives different options than "HEAL EVERYONE!"
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An oversized, bright glowing green version of Golden Rings or Soul Storm might do the trick.
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Originally Posted by Seldom
*le Sigh* did this last night on my illusion/emp controller. When it came down to it, I had no time to do anything but heal. The ideal strategy seemed to be: healer heal, tankers be taunters. (no attacking!)
It seems to cater to some of the worse habits in the game for standardized MMO strategy with no adaption needed. Worse yet, the disintegration ray was invisible amongst auras, shields, and destiny buffs. I had to be told directly by the target they were being disintegrated, even then I could only tell by their rapidly emptying health. Suggestions: have an unmistakably brilliant aura that makes the disintegration target visible. Have pressure release valves that redirect the reactor pulses skyward, if they are clicked just before the pulse. This is interruptable, and guarded. This makes avoiding the disintegration death/heal more manageable, and gives different options than "HEAL EVERYONE!" |
The Widow's Dark Hand - leader of Faux Pas
Champion Server
Tee Hee!
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One of the things I love about CoH is the variety you can have for teaming and succeed in most tasks. That being said, it is in NO WAY one of the worst habits to have a tank/healer combo. It is one of many viable choices.|
Originally Posted by Seldom
*le Sigh* did this last night on my illusion/emp controller. When it came down to it, I had no time to do anything but heal. The ideal strategy seemed to be: healer heal, tankers be taunters. (no attacking!)
It seems to cater to some of the worse habits in the game for standardized MMO strategy with no adaption needed. |
Healing is not evil. Designing an encounter here and there where healing is very useful is not evil. Not every game encounter should become trivial because we brought a bubbler, a cold, and a sonic. Sometimes, even healing should be desired.
If every encounter was designed to have the tanker/healer combo and only that there would be a problem. But the KIR is cool because of that gameplay mechanic and because we so very rarely need it. It is novel in CoH. Of course, I also like the STF, which features that mechanic once at the end as well.
Why Blasters? Empathy Sucks.
So, you want to be Mental?
What the hell? Let's buff defenders.
Tactics are for those who do not have a big enough hammer. Wisdom is knowing how big your hammer is.
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Deleting the rest to make a smaller post. I'll just add that I have noticed a lesser number of support characters doing the trials compared to what happens on team outside of the trials. Controllers and doms are even lesser played on BAFs for one obvious reason(escapee phase). I've only felt the desire to really use my Kat/sr scrapper for the trials. All of my other 50s outside of my Claws/regen are support.
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Originally Posted by Nyx
Ok. I have many thoughts when I tried it on my Grav/FF controller.
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Originally Posted by TheDeepBlue
Your character does recieve something akin to the 'I HAVE A METEOR FRAGMENT' aura from Bloody Bay, and in addition, you receive a warning that Anti-Matter is disintigrating you that other people can see if they're paying attention. In the heat of the battle, though, it might be hard for other people to see either after the initial message if you don't tell them you're melting, like a guy I saw last night not do.
One of the most important things people need for this trial is good communication. |
So much this....
On the trial I led last night, on the AM fight, I was calling out the person's name that was being targetted by the disintegrating ray....they moved out of the location AoE and we went on...
Granted I could have stated what I was doing (one of the people I named said, "what?")...it was hectic and now that I know/remember the KIR a bit better I can be a better leader.
This one just requires more communication. Somehow even though I really didn't do too much as far as fighting/getting temps/etc, I still got a very rare component.
Leader of The LEGION/Fallen LEGION on the Liberty server!
SSBB FC: 2062-8881-3944
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*le Sigh* did this last night on my illusion/emp controller. When it came down to it, I had no time to do anything but heal. The ideal strategy seemed to be: healer heal, tankers be taunters. (no attacking!) It seems to cater to some of the worse habits in the game for standardized MMO strategy with no adaption needed. |
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Originally Posted by StratoNexus
One of the things I love about CoH is the variety you can have for teaming and succeed in most tasks. That being said, it is in NO WAY one of the worst habits to have a tank/healer combo. It is one of many viable choices.
Healing is not evil. Designing an encounter here and there where healing is very useful is not evil. Not every game encounter should become trivial because we brought a bubbler, a cold, and a sonic. Sometimes, even healing should be desired. |
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It does have a losing condition: Running out of time. (and earlier on, killing anti-matter before disabling the reactors)
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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
I'm actually not entirely against boss fights that restart if you lose (read: wipe), but bosses that can reset the fight with what I feel is a "cheap" mechanic? No, thank you.
Generally, I kind of don't like the approach where you can just keep flinging warm bodies at a boos and no matter how many times you die, all that matters is you keep dealing damage. But unless we can define a losing condition - which I don't think Keyes Island has - then resetting the fight is just a dick move. |
"Men strunt �r strunt och snus �r snus
om ock i gyllne dosor.
Och rosor i ett sprucket krus
�r st�ndigt alltid rosor."
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If they weren't 3 for 3 in designing trials I hate, I might be more excited about those alternatives.
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Originally Posted by Test_Rat
I just don't run it.
No big deal. Kudos to those that do enjoy it though. I don't see the big deal as there are alternatives here. |
Overcomplicated gimmicks do not an interesting encounter make. Time after time, game designers have proven that some of the most successful games, tasks and encounters are made of some of the simplest mechanics which simply interact in complex and unpredictable ways.
We've reduced our gameplay to quick time events. You see this cue, you press that button. You see a green thingy, you move to that place. You get hit with this, you use that power. It's a series of prompts that do nothing more than test your attention span. This is far removed from having people actually be aware of their characters and use simpler systems in complex ways. The developers have done all the "hard" work in scripting these events. You just need learn to respond to them.
In the very simplest of terms, calling a system where you know ahead of time what you have to do in every single instance of every single in-game event "hard" or "complex" is absurd. Any system which does not require the players to actually think and decide on their actions in real time is neither.