Keyes Trial Adjustment

So I'm sitting here reading through some threads and see the complaints about the Keyes Trial. And I had a thought regarding the pulse damage.

What about adding a temporary shield power similar to what we can get in the Terra Volta trials?

It wouldn't necessarily have to protect against all the Pulse damage but help mitigate it. Maybe some protection and a minor - moderate regen buff?

If something like that were considered, I'd even propose that using the shields would disqualify from attaining the Anti-Anti-Matter badge for that run.

And also, for the last phase, they would automatically dissipate as the Pulse is no longer an issue.

Anyways, just another random thought.

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Personally, I'd rather they just made the pulse damage not autohit and unresistable. Too many things are getting that lately. Sure, give it a massive accuracy bonus and maybe increase the damage to compensate, but I'm sick of things just arbitrarily murdering me no matter how much defense or resistance I have.

That and it'd make buffs a little more useful in the Keyes trial, right now you basically have to stack the league with people who can heal rather than people with buffs, which kind of flies in the face of everything before it in which you could bring just about any team makeup and be fine. And I liked that. I liked not having to tell people I can't invite them because the league has too many tankers already and I need something else. I liked being able to tell people to bring whatever character they feel like playing, rather than what the league needs. It was one of the best things about this game to me.

To be honest that seems kinda pointless to me. Adding a zone-wide effect and then adding something that counters it is pretty much pointless unless getting the counter is the point of the challenge. I could see it if there was a significant effort required to get the shield (i.e. a full size squad of warworks that respawns every minute guarding the shield thing) but I think in that case most people wouldn't even bother.

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Originally Posted by Rebel_Scum Personally, I'd rather they just made the pulse damage not autohit and unresistable. Too many things are getting that lately. Sure, give it a massive accuracy bonus and maybe increase the damage to compensate, but I'm sick of things just arbitrarily murdering me no matter how much defense or resistance I have.

The problem there is that if they do that and make it strong enough to be a risk to melee characters it will obliterate squishes. Making the damage independent of defense/resistance and a fraction of the character's max hit points means that it is equally damaging to all characters.

Groups are already starting to pick up the 'impossible' MoKeyes Accolade and learning how to speed it in the process (nearly getting all terminals unlocked even before AM shows up).

It's not hard. It's just new tactics to get used to. There is no need to reduce the difficulty.

Why? It's not like Keyes is actually difficult. I can scrounge up groups in the dead of the AM and still easily win it. The only time it goes wrong is if you have at least eight idiots, nobody who knows how to play it, nobody who knows how to call things, or at least four griefers. The fact that people are complaining about the difficulty is just evidence of how sad some people are in this game. Just because it's a really easy game almost all the time doesn't mean the few precious moments that actually give some challenge and require basic thought should be dropped down to stupid mode.

The only thing I would see changed about Keyes, and to a lesser extent Lambda, is the rewards. Keyes ought to offer much better rewards considering the much higher time investment in starting it and running it, and so should Lambda. I would think it fair if Keyes always gave at least a Rare drop, and Lambda always gave at least an Uncommon drop. That way you're not upsetting the legions who will complain when their precious Astral farm BAFs are taken away, but still providing some reason for peopel to want the others save the novelty and the Empyreans.

Well, fun is like taste... non disputande.

But as far as difficulty, if it seems that by I21 there aren't speed Keyes and people still haven't achieved the MoKeyes Accolade in the same rate as previous iTrials and TFs, then I will encourage the Devs to datamine that, and if it is indeed the case, I personally, will be lobbying for the Keyes mechanics to lighten up a bit.

I like the autohit damage. It's different, difficult, and ACTUALLY REQUIRES YOU TO PAY ATTENTION, unlike almost all of the rest of the game. Plus, it strongly encourages teamwork and preparedness.

Don't listen to the whiners who can't handle a few deaths here n there...i play on my brute..and love it. so i die..it's the only thing in game that i have to watch my health over.

This basically:

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Originally Posted by uberschveinen I like the autohit damage. It's different, difficult, and ACTUALLY REQUIRES YOU TO PAY ATTENTION, unlike almost all of the rest of the game. Plus, it strongly encourages teamwork and preparedness.

i pretty much agree with snow globe on this, i dont think the keyes trial is all that difficult, but it is EXTREMELY tedious and annoying

3/5 of the phases in the trial are 99% the same, you run to reactor grab temps activate terminals (possibly having to drag an AV around) rinse and repeat till you fight him, the thing that adds to the annoyance is the massive dmg autohit pulse

even fighting AM is pretty tedious with the god awful time freeze in which you have no control to do ANYTHING

it never really made sense why freeze time applied a hold on us, it would make more sense that he was phase shifting us (if it was phasing instead of holding the dmg beam would still be able to hit us but we would still be able to move)

Keyes is fine the way it is.

The iTrials will be getting harder and harder - they're not designed to be handouts to stroke the ego; they're designed to test your mettle.

I can empathize with those who feel there is tedium in the Keyes with the same Reactor mechanic three times over because in the same day, I had two drastically different experiences of it:

In the first instance, it was a team of MoBadge hunters who knew exactly what they were doing. By the time AM appeared each time, two thirds of the reactor was already done. And in the last battle, no one was dying or getting hit with the Obliteration beam (well, not on the successful runs). So, this was speedy and fun.

In the second instance, I was pulling together a PuG of shall we say, varying degrees of skill level. We pulled through and there was no danger of failure, but it took three times as long. And there was a lot of figuring out where is AM and how can I pull him when my toon has no taunt or damage-free anchor because the Tanker on the team is lost. So, yes, that was a bit tedious.

Give Keyes time for everyone to get on board with a Standard Operating Procedure so that it can zipped through in half and hour and I'm sure you doubters will find the fun in it.


In related news, I was at a Virtue Hami Raid last night that after clearing the first bloom, everyone stayed and killed Hami ignoring the two blooms. Remember how long Hami Raids used to be?

Sorry, no. Nothing that reduces the difficulty of Keyes.

If some people can't do it, too bad. There is no need for the game to be balanced around the lowest common denominator. If people are missing out on badges, merits and incarnate components, too bad. There should never be a guarantee, implied or not, that every reward should be obtainable by every player.

If you want to make it less about spamming heals while maintaining the difficulty, one change I could get behind would be stronger pulses at longer intervals e.g. instead of 50% every 30s, make it start off with 80-85% every 60s. You take less damage per unit time and have a longer window where you don't need to worry about it, but the pulse is deadlier.