Curse

Alleji · Feb 19, 2007, 05:58 PM // 17:58

Some people say PvE is too easy. Others find certain missions nearly impossible. Basically, the variance in skill level across the population of this forum is pretty high. I imagine it would be just as high across the whole game, although the average skill level itself would probably be lower. After all, forums = information = skill.

So, how difficult would you like PvE to be? Would you like it being mostly easy areas, like shing-jea/istan/kryta? Or would you like realm of torment to be bigger and have more than just 3 difficult missions per campaign? Another DoA, perhaps?

Personally, I'd want more of the game to be like the harder areas in realm of torment, but not downright crazy like DoA.

Why? Because I actually found them fun. I mostly PvP, but a couple days ago the guild and friend list were pretty dry, so I decided to do some PvE. I took a couple quests that I didn't bother with when I was going through the game for the first time and went out into Domain of Fear with my usual frontloaded build that's designed to streamroll everything before it can say "ow" (SS, MM, 2x barrage/gfte, sandstorm hench, paragon hench, 2x monk hench) ...and I got my ass handed to me by two packs of lvl 28 water eles in about 3 minutes.

Getting owned like that in PvE actually made me rethink my build instead of just aggroing slightly less. :P Even then the areas were fairly difficult and I had to be careful about not fighting in patrol paths and doing a lot of micro with the heroes. I even felt like I accomplished something when I got to the end of the quest. Although, why is the final encounter in a master's difficulty quest (The Fortune Teller) easier than what I had to kill in order to get there? Can anyone explain the design behind that?

But I digress... what I meant to say with this little story is that challenging PvE = fun. The other 95% of PvE = boring.

Zinger314 · Feb 19, 2007, 06:02 PM // 18:02

I'd love a Realm of Torment difficulty...except without the prejudicial enviromental effects.

ArenaNet's last hope is the Hard Mode...

Pynne · Feb 19, 2007, 06:20 PM // 18:20

Personally I can't stand the more difficult areas. I play video games to escape the challenges of real life. After a hard day at work, then spending some time with the wife and kid, and helping to maintain the household, I get a few hours in the middle of the night to kill stuff. The last thing I want is that stuff to kill me first.

I prefer to do brainless easy tasks. If I can sit staring slack-jawed and drooling at the screen, then I'm happy. Every game I play that has a difficulty adjustment slider of some sort on it, is usually on the easiest setting.

I do get a nice sense of accomplishment from completing a difficult task, and I understand why so many love the tough stuff, but for the most part easy is what does it for me.

Phaern Majes · Feb 19, 2007, 06:24 PM // 18:24

I think Hard Mode will help appease both sides. It will leave things to be easy for those who like it easy, and for those who want more of a challenge can partake in the Hard Mode.

tomcruisejr · Feb 19, 2007, 06:46 PM // 18:46

So difficult that even afking in PvE outpost will require uber skills.

Warmaster Patton · Feb 19, 2007, 06:52 PM // 18:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by tomcruisejr

So difficult that even afking in PvE outpost will require uber skills.

Perfect!

Seriously though, I like Real of Torment sometimes, sometimes I just like kikcin the cap out of some beats on the newbie island/ascalon. It all depends on my mood. After a rough day, I like easy things, after an easy, fun day, I like harder things.

Fender · Feb 19, 2007, 06:56 PM // 18:56

I'd like something in between the c-space easiness* of nearly all of PvE and the ridiculous monster only skills and environmental effects of the elite missions (and RoT to a lesser extent). Those encourage cookie cutter builds. Unfortunately, there is no in between. Everything in NF is SUPER easy up until RoT. Then it gets a little difficult, but still quite possible. Go back and do chapter 1 missions now. THK w/ bonus is boringly easy. Even "hard" Factions missions are easy now w/ NF skills. You can masters every mission quite easily w/ heroes, except maybe killing Shiro.

For hard mode I'd like to see all mobs have boss like buffs: half casting times, half recharges, double energy pips, half condition lengths, half hex lengths, +2 to +4 health regen, better AI, better skill bars and a slight boost to their levels. Throw in all the god's blessings for good measure. Buff the monsters, but not with silly monster only skills. Don't cripple the players through environmental effects.

* Hit c, hit space, go get a drink and your heroes/henchies have killed everything by the time you get back.

darktyco · Feb 19, 2007, 07:45 PM // 19:45

I agree, I would like PvE difficulty to be around the Realm of Torment level minus the environmental effects. The effects are just frustrating.

The idea of having AI with efficient skill bars sounds interesting too, although I wouldn't like having each and every PvE battle take as long as a RA match. Could be avoided by having only certain groups of monsters have the upgraded skillbars (i.e. only humanoid groups or just harder groups mixed in with all the trash groups.)

Rhedd · Feb 19, 2007, 08:09 PM // 20:09

I bet I officially fall into the "easy" crowd.

The fact is, I find nothing fun at all about having to do something (anything) over and over and over. Therefore, my PERFECT game is one that is challenging enough to make you feel a sense of accomplishment when you succeed, but in which you never fail.

Since player skill levels vary so dramatically, and nowhere more than in this game, this ideal is simply impossible for a developer to achieve.

Still, that's what I want. ^_^

XvArchonvX · Feb 19, 2007, 08:10 PM // 20:10

I think most people miss the point when they start branding PvE as 'easy'. Basically, PvE is about the journey, PvP is about the struggle. While it's definately good to have parts of PvE that are hard (especially later on in the game), diversity in experience as well as an immersible environment is the most important aspect to an enjoyable experience imo.

Dougal Kronik · Feb 19, 2007, 08:14 PM // 20:14

I think the difficulty tiered system Anet is adopting with Hard Mode is correct way to go.

Once you have completed the game through the normal storyline and difficulty, you can have the choice to try it again in a more difficult setting.

Increase in difficulty by randomly generating mob configurations with the monsters having full skill bars and secondary professions. Not just adding levels and monster only skills.

Avarfang · Feb 19, 2007, 08:31 PM // 20:31

Well i've been playing gw for around 3 months(nf), and found the missions and quests interesting and challenging at first, but it got more and more boring...
the hardest mission for me was rilohn refuge

the reason being, i had no knowledge of available skills whatsoever, and even if i knew about them(still don't know many

), you can't get most of them until you get to RoT...

the mission i liked was madness gate(for being hard and actually making me get new skills

) but after that it was ridiculously easy

I was very dissapointed with the last mission.... did masters in first try, without any real preparation...

... boring... and i did it with henchies and heros(my heros haven't been modified at all, koss had 7-12 sword or sth like that most of the storyline

)

I can see why this chapter is very easy for "pros" and almost impossible for people new to game... i learned about the skills through wiki and guru, while i could've easily learned about them ingame. I think anet should make the learning curve for new players more gradual(i read it is so in prophecies?) while making enemies, esp. bosses more versatile(more skills, not so much overpowered monster skills)
I hope the "hard mode" will be done right(although can't really tell now what that would be

) and bring some more fun

I think i wrote enough for now...

Chuba · Feb 19, 2007, 09:07 PM // 21:07

One aspect that makes the game harder to some is the limited skill selection when starting a new account/new profession that came with the new expansion, and also the lack of skillpoints and gold to even buy the skills at start. I myself think that the RoT difficulty level is the absolute maximum for me to continue enjoying the game... Of course we'll be doing the Hard mode as a guild event, but I wouldn't want the standard game to be that hard. The DoA "difficulty" is just too extreme for a casual gamer like me.

Skuld · Feb 19, 2007, 09:33 PM // 21:33

I like it easy, because I am lazy and like to semi-afk the campaigns.

FoxBat · Feb 19, 2007, 09:41 PM // 21:41

I don't like when PvE gets hard enough that it becomes "slow."

The usual grind of carfully aggro one mob, get them to pile on the tank, nuke them all standing close together etc. just bores me to tears, whether I'm playing the tank, monk, or nuker. In areas like FoW, UW, Deep this kind of playstyle is prevalent even though it's unnecessary. DoA is the one area where you really do have to play like this.

By comparison, I did monk for a massive B/P alliance team once in Urgoz, and that was fun. There were no tanks, so aggro piled on pretty fast to the pets/minions, who themselves sometimes aggroed things. This mitigated a lot of damage, but people were still dropping fast under loose thorn wolves and as a monk I had to stay alert. Especially thrilling was when our other monk dropped and I had to keep everyone up together with a defensive spirit spammer vs urgoz.

But the standard "iron wall" build from The Deep to take care of the oni, and pulling to circumvent environmental effects, I find pretty dull. Unnecessary too when you could just have a team of paragons blitz the area. Even though it's currently not the most efficient way to do most areas, people still like it mostly because a) kiting is rare and b) good monks are rarer. The melee AI needs something like actual positional awareness to avoid getting stuck at chokepoints and such (or, just build new maps so they don't have chokepoints.)

Also, pulling. It's unnecessarily slow. I would rather have mob groups be more carefully designed. If you want the party to face 12+ mobs at once, put them all into one group. If you would rather them pick off 6 at a time, stick those two far enough away that I don't risk aggroing two groups at once. Reduce the size of patrol paths as well while you're at it, so I don't have to sit around waiting to engage. Also teach mobs to actually kite instead of simply running away, so A) healers are still around to heal and B) they don't drag you into another mob group.

Rakeman · Feb 19, 2007, 09:46 PM // 21:46

I want it hard enough so that it presents a challenge and you have to think, but easy enough so that you don't get discouraged from continuing.

icedragon981 · Feb 19, 2007, 09:48 PM // 21:48

Honestly I'd love more areas such as the Realm of Torment but without the environmental effects. Even though it's easily hero/henchable to me, I like the challenge it provides compared to most other PvE areas. But I feel that DoA was a bit too much. DoA styles should stay as challenging PvE areas, don't get me wrong, but I wouldn't exactly want the entire game to be scaled to DoA difficulty.

Seef II · Feb 19, 2007, 09:58 PM // 21:58

Realm of Torment without the environmental effects would be about the right level. (See Nightfallen Garden.)
Hard enough to separate the boys from the men, but not hair-pullingly so.

The Ernada · Feb 19, 2007, 10:02 PM // 22:02

I'd like to have PVE with more challenging monsters but with less of them rather than the way GW is set up where you're fighting swarm after swarm of easy monsters. That way it requires some thinking and some fun rather than mindlessly grinding through areas. Quality over quantity.

But unfortunately, it seems that the mindset of too many PVE players is being able to mindlessly click buttons to kill a dozen monsters at once.

Bryant Again · Feb 19, 2007, 10:04 PM // 22:04

I'd like it to be difficult to the point where I need to come up with a different build for each area.

But, to be actually fun while difficult, I'd want different AI. I don't want to have to have a normal DoAish party with a tank, bonders, nukers, etc. I would just want a good and skilled team to go against smart and harder AI and skillbars.

This forum is only a very tiny fraction of the community, however. I wouldn't judge Guild Wars players' skill level based upon these forums.