Curse

Witchblade · Aug 17, 2007, 10:32 AM // 10:32

Worst One: Unwaking Waters

Most Boring: Surmia (soooooooooo long)

Fire Childe · Aug 17, 2007, 11:05 AM // 11:05

Gate of Madness is one of the best missions in the game :O

And Shiro is actually something of a rush. Its also great fun to come up with anti Shiro builds after he pawns you the first time around and half the fun in Guild Wars is build design.

This is a step towards the kind of pve I'd like to see more of - crazy hard bosses and mixed mobs. Shiro is a bit of a culture shock when you first get to him and no nothing about how hes going to bang your butthole everywhich way. But its an opponent in pve that you actually have to think about how to beat. You have to look at his skills and work out a counter build. I appreciate that its somewhat demoralising to spend half an hour getting to the boss only to have him wipe you out in seconds when the victory line is in sight.

But after the first demoralising defeat, I helped guildies to beat this mission a further 4 times. And over that time you can refine a build which covers all the angles (we ran with a crip slash/conjure frost/wild blow warrior, a crip shot/poison arrow ranger hero, curses necro/mesmer hero (with spiteful spirit, enfeeble and empathy), RC prot hero (with glyph of lesser energy, aegis, guardian), LoD heal hero, and a water ele loaded up with slow hexes. Then we basically pulled him up to the doorway, hit him with hexes and crippling and beat him down to 50% health when he starts using Impossible Odds. After that we started sniping him by flagging our heroes back and running in for 1 hit, then running back out (you can do this fairly quickly so that you can hit him , he misses his attack, then you swing back in and hit him again. rinse, repeat). Its easy when hes slowed. Heroes piled on the degen. Warrior kept up the bleeding.

Shiro goes down like a sack of potatoes and I have to say - he caned us the first time, was a tough nut to crack the second time, but by the third he was a real satisfying boss to conquer.

I'd like to see more mini bosses as hard as (if not harder than) Shiro. Gate of Madness is a mission you can take to Guild Chat and teamtalk over what build to run and in the absense of certain key skills, how you can improvise around them. Not enough pve in my humble opinion kicks the player up the butt like Gate of Madness does and encourages you (the hard way) to think about builds and counters. Great stuff.

Worst mission for me? Ring of Fire probably. Although my past experiences of it made it worse than it is now. Back when I had to play Ring of Fire for completion of prophecies you only had henchmen. No heros. Pubbies were as good as you could get in the absense of guild mates and that was like lucky dip. No build pinging had been implemented so that you truly didn't know what that wammo was running until to your utter horror you get in game and he charges up to the mursaat at the start, clearly uninfused (because his health is spiraling down like a stock market crash). And whats this? Hes casting healing breeze and contemplation of purity on himself!

Building for RoF was a pain at that time because to change builds you had to spend refund points. 1 refund point = 250 exp so if you ran out of refund points (if I remember correctly the max you could have was 25), you had to go grind some exp to get them back. This is one reason why everyone used to play Underworld regularly (because of the 10,000exp quests in the Labyrinth). Respeccing say, from sword to axe, and changing secondary could cost you all your refund points.

And to make matters worse. Capping skills in RoF was a nightmare. No faction. You had to cap elites using a signet and you had to keep the boss alive and cap the elite after he had used his elite skill.

Now...why I hated RoF:

1) henchman/pubbie aggro used to wipe so many parties. It was scary. I remember wiping this mission so many times and almost all of them were preventable.
2) Having to return to the wipefest several times to cap elites which were horribly fiddly and annoying to cap.
3) Wiping and wanting to change build but having to go play an hour of Underworld first (and a further hour to get a team together to do it).
4) Mission is full of annoying Mursaat towers that drain all your energy, homogenous mobs of boring enemies, uninspired Diablo II Hell-esque terrain.

All told it was just the worst mission back in the day for exposing the flaws of the refund point system, the signet of capture system, henchmen and random pubbies.

So ANET made good and got rid of refunds, allowed you to cap elites off dead bosses and gave us heroes (ooooooh thank yooouuu). But there are still an unprivelidged few that remember the nightmare that was RoF before ANET waved its magic wand and made everything ok. The nightmares still haunt me in my sleep.

'Oh god, MENDING AGGROarogh!df YOU JUST KILLED THE BOSS BEFORE HE USED HIS ELITE.'

Funk ee Monk ee · Aug 17, 2007, 11:13 AM // 11:13

The Facet of Boring Missions
(Dragon's Lair and Glint)

Shakkara · Aug 17, 2007, 11:21 AM // 11:21

Moddok crevice runners on hard mode.

And Eternal Grove on hardmode.

Milennin · Aug 17, 2007, 11:23 AM // 11:23

Dunes of Despair. The bonus is so freaking stupid to get.-.-
Hell's Precipice. Killing Titans takes too long.=\
Eternal Grove. One of the hardest missions in the game.o_o
Dzagonur Bastion. Pure suckyness.=P

Hobbs · Aug 17, 2007, 11:34 AM // 11:34

I thought Dzagonur Bastion was fun.

Abbadon's Mouth is a bad one for me because of the amount of time I had to do it to cap the elites there, which I did with hero/hench. But also because before Heroes and you had to do it with people to get past it in the storyline if you didn't have a good team the monk bosses would be invincible and you had to start all over again with a new team...

WinterSnowblind · Aug 17, 2007, 11:48 AM // 11:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fire Childe

Gate of Madness is one of the best missions in the game :O

And Shiro is actually something of a rush. Its also great fun to come up with anti Shiro builds after he pawns you the first time around and half the fun in Guild Wars is build design.

I actually agree with this, I've never found the Gate of Madness to be that bad. Once you know your way through the mission, and it will likely take you quite a few tries anyway, it's pretty simple. You should have no trouble until you get to the bosses.

And then, yes, as long as you have a decent enough team, neither of them should be any trouble. You can pull the Lich and take him out by himself, and then Mesmers and Necromancers can slaughter Shiro. I've seen a few good Assassin builds go against him too, they can just district him while the rest of the team goes off to get the bonus.

The hardest part is finding a good enough PUG. Just don't rush it, take your time, and make sure your team knows what they're doing. I see far too many people who just want to take whoever they can find and go straight away.

Anyway, for me the worst missions are pretty much any of them in Factions. There are so many points where you can lose because of something out with your control. Having to team up with another group who quits/screws up, or having to defend a certain NPC who has a tendency to run in to mobs and get killed.. It's very irritating when you fail a mission because of that.

The Grand Court of Sebelkeh is always a pain, and I think someone has mentioned it before, but getting the bonus in the Dunes of Despair is just ridiculous. I'm surprised to see so many people complaing about the Gayla Hatchery though.. You guys know you can go round the back and take out all of the enemies first?

Gli · Aug 17, 2007, 11:50 AM // 11:50

Ruins of Morah.

It's boring and silly. Finally you catch up with Varesh, and it's not rewarding at all, just boring and very, very hokey.

"Haha, I'm a dervish but I don't actually use any dervish skills! Ouch, you killed me, but wait, now I'm a paragon but I don't actually use paragon skills!"

Sleeper Service · Aug 17, 2007, 11:55 AM // 11:55

THK. stone Summit call that a seige?

Stormlord Alex · Aug 17, 2007, 11:55 AM // 11:55

Vizunah Square.
Not the actual mission - heck, I adore missions where you gotta defend against waves of attackers - but because it forces a bunch of idiots upon you.

When I see "X Worrior X or Teh Asasssintzor has joined the game", I just leave.
Unwaking Waters isn't half as bad, because no-one plays there. :]

yeah_hi · Aug 17, 2007, 11:55 AM // 11:55

Ruins Of Surmia. Have done that enough times to develop an irrational, raging hatred of it.

"As a boy I spent much time in these lands"...

Grrr.

Komes I · Aug 17, 2007, 11:57 AM // 11:57

Ruins of Morah is such an boring mission that i hate it from deepths of my soul. I also hate some of the missions in Factions in which you have to travel trough carboard city and fight afflicted. Allthough i love the sky at Naphui Quarter.

Goeth Lucien · Aug 17, 2007, 12:00 PM // 12:00

I’ve done every mission and associated masters bonuses on all three campaigns in both normal and hard mode using only heroes/henchmen or just henchmen. I say this not as a boast (for like many, I gratefully stand on the past accomplishments of all the GuildWiki contributors that came before me); rather I mention this to highlight my preferred play style.

Using only heroes/hunchmen means you’re somewhat constrained in the optimal party build and composition (this is greatly offset however by the AI’s fast reflexes, omniscient awareness, and ability to instantly coordinate focused fire on a called target). The greatest challenge using heroes/henchmen however, is executing tactics that require coordinated efforts between smaller sub-groups.

In normal mode, I can’t say there is any one mission I would single out as being especially difficult (although several that required a few tries before I arrived at a workable approach). Hard mode however had a few hair pullers to offer.

Like Shakkara, the Moddok Crevice runners and Eternal Grove in hard mode gave me the most trouble. The latter in particular, as I can’t say that would be able to consistently achieve masters in HM without a bit of luck.

And, I also agree with Fire Childe’s comments on uber-challenging missions (particularly if they’re relegated to hard mode status, where the onus for achieving them becomes optional). There’s a great deal of satisfaction in coming up with an elegant (or even just workable) solution to a particularly challenging facet of a mission or quest. It’s certainly the PvE aspect of the game I enjoy the most.

Tuesg · Aug 17, 2007, 12:20 PM // 12:20

I'm surprised to see all the talk about Jennur's Horde. I found it to be one of the easier missions in nightfall.

I'm gonna vote for Vizunah Square it took ages to get master in that mission because of the groups I kept getting placed with.

Amorfati87 · Aug 17, 2007, 12:27 PM // 12:27

Divinity Coast is one of my most unfavorite missions. I hate that sometimes the 2 groups of stupid ettins gank the 4th chosen before you can get there. It does not matter how good you are, how good your team is, or how fast you are, sometimes you just ain't making it.

Meh....

infite · Aug 17, 2007, 12:34 PM // 12:34

Every mission, where u have time limit(helloooo?! who invented this?!)If u want masters u need to run ur a*s off to get it, no time to afk for quick break, no time to think what to do. Its just so stupid and boring to run against a clock.

HayesA · Aug 17, 2007, 12:37 PM // 12:37

For me, thus far, any missions in Cantha trumps any lame mission in Elona/Tyria.

I know, i know... but I still hate Cantha. It's taking me like 2, 3 months just to beat it. D:

MithranArkanere · Aug 17, 2007, 12:41 PM // 12:41

Eternal Grove.

So far the only one I can't master with AI.

T. Drake · Aug 17, 2007, 12:54 PM // 12:54

My vote goes to Vizunah Square. It can be a very frustrating mission and is the death to many Survivors...
I hate the fact that I have to rely on another team to:

a) Go through the mission
b) Go through the mission and getting a master reward.
c) Have a Survivor title running. (I would never start this mission until this title is finished. If you have a MM and players won't skip in the last sequence you die. If you quit the game while the last sequence is playing and the other players don't skip it, you die...)

Everytime I must play this mission I hope that I get a henchmen team on the other side. That way I can can be 95% sure that I won't get wiped.

Unwaking Waters is similar, but since not many players try it, I get henchmen team most of the time.
Quite funny to see how you almost beat the mission with henchmen only and the other full human team wipes after the second or third gate.
Yeah and then they leave, so how should you beat Kuunavang now?

Ok just restard the mission ...or should I resign because there are the same people again?

mazey vorstagg · Aug 17, 2007, 01:03 PM // 13:03

Hmm:

I hate Abbadon's mouth: Willa the monk boss is very hard to kill and just plain silly in HM. The most annoying thing is that almost every pug at that stage in the game has at least 1 person uninfused (and I'm normally monking) and they always wipe in the end part with the soul binders. For some reason, it's easier to hench, lol.

In cantha I hate Gwyla hatchery, it's pretty fun if you do it the backwards way but I think they've fixed that now. It's just so annoying when you lose one turtle and see half the team leave (because they're 'masters people').

In NF I'd have to Jennur's horde is the hardest one but at least it's fun and a challenge. Worst in my opinion is Gate of Pain. Simply because I've never managed to get masters on it.

My greatest mission experience/achievment is that fact that I managed to beat the bonus of THK with a team of 7 players, 5 of which were uninfused, and I was the only monk

. It was touch and go for most of it, but it sure was fun.