Curse

Kamatsu · Sep 09, 2005, 12:59 AM // 00:59

Well, I have to say I strongly feel that when you create a character the game decides whether or not to make things easy or hard for you... or ANet is just making the game harder and harder all the time..

I'm just thinking about how easy and/or hard some parts of the game were for some of my characters and how seemingly bloody hard it is for others.. Some characters have had easy draw's when it comes to quest's.. while others have been screwed over royally by huge dish's of bad luck..

To illustrate..

1. Althea's Ghost placement.

W/Mo - this character had the easiest time getting to the ghost. The Ghost was very close to the Noloni exit - when you exit the academy and go around the curve you can go straight by some stairs or head down the hill which heads to the east and then does a loop around a crystal formation.. thats where the ghost was for my w/mo.

R/Mo & E/Mo - different placement but still easy to get to, although no as easy as my W/Mo. Just NW of where Garfuzz is .. is some ruined buildings. It's sorta halfway between noloni and the courthouse. Easy to get to - only have to go through a feww charrr or some gargoyles.

N/Mo - had the ghost placed in the absolute hardest place in the map. Just south of where Garfuzz is.. there is a place with 3 "pyramids" with the middle one connecting a back plateau via a bridge.. there are about 30 or so charr in that region, with most of them being on the back plateau.. now the ghost was placed right at the back.. so to get to them I had to go through ALL the charr.

Now I've cleaned that plateau out before with my W/Mo. So I know it can be done.. however, my W/mo had it easy in that I was able to pull small groups out as they were spread out.. which let me kill them all. Now when my N/mo went to do it (and tried re-entering the area a few times.. no change).. it was rediculiously pathetically hard as all but like 3 of the charr were stuck at the bridge connection point. This meant that when I aggro'ed any of them I had like 20 charr atatcking me.. and try and pull 1 group? pfft.. you atack or aggro one and they all attack.

I ended up doing it very, very slowly and painfully. I only died once surprisingly. I had to go in aggro them, run away and then let the henchies die (well I tried to keep them alivce, but it was hopeless) and then just run and run till I only had a few still with me and then kkill them slowly. it took ages to drag 2-4 of them each time and I had to run halfway back to noloni to get them into manageble groups..

But I did it. However it was bloody harder than any of my other characters.

2. Shiverpeak Straggler's.

Yet aother quest where my N/Mo had it way, way harder than any other character of mine.

W/Mo - the npc's were halfway between yak's & borlis. They were in a "sfe" part. Was fairly easy to get them.. just had to kill the patrolling stone summit and then a few of the critters by where they were. - they were sortof near where the road turns up the hill to borlis where the centaurs are - they were down the hill off the path, but away from the critters in that area.

R/Mo & E/Mo - this was dead easy. Follow the path to borliss over the 1st hill and past where the ice golems stand by stairs down... just past that you can go right and follow the path or left.. the npv's were to the left and well away from any monsters. very, very easy.

N/Mo - talk about extremely hard... the npc's were way out close to the centaus. they were on yak's side of that hill where the centaurs are bu further back close to the patrolling critters up there. But not only that.. there were a whole bunch of new critters between yaks bend and them.. like 20 of them.

I eventually killed them.. by using close to the same tactics I used on the charr to get to Althea's Ghost. The henchies all died very fast since they insist on attacking when they have empathy cast on them... and fact is you just couldn't pull any of them at all. well not far.. when you attacked one and then ran away.. it would follow for about like 1 cm on the mini-map then then run back.. and trying to attack-run-atatck didn't work.. In the end I was running in casting Life Syphon on as many as I could combined with Shadow Strike and Vamp Gaze and then running off to let my health get back up.. once health was upo run back in to LS, SS & VG some more.. rinse and repeat till they are dead.

It was a hellava lot harder to do this quest than it ever was for my other characters.

3. Borliss Pass

W/Mo & E/Mo did this mission with no problems at all.

N/Mo - This character has uber bad luck. Every place in that mission where patrolling groups could get stuck on each other.. they did.

By the entrance of the fort.. you have a boss monster and patrolling stone summit's & ice golems.. except the patroller's weren't patrolling as they were stuck on each other.. only way was through a fight with 2 beastmasters, 2 ice golems, a boss and 2 scouts. I managed somehoew to do it..

And I did wait to see if they would seperate.. they never did...

Later on when your outside the second gate with a lever.. between you and the "bonus" section is another group with a patrol of beastmasters... and yep, the beastmasters had got caught on the fixed boss group. I usualy wipe them out.. but I left them this time as I didn't feel like I could wipe out 3 beatsmasters, 1 doylak rider, 1 boss & an assortment of other stone summit... although I know I can take them all down assuming I can take the 2 group's seperately.

Further on in that mission where your carrying the enchanted torch.. fight the 1st group then go down the hill.. there's 2 patrolling group's each with a doylak rider in it... except yet again both group's had got stuck on each other.. and couldn't be pulled apart. And they were positions in such a fashion that you couldn't really run past them...

Again I managed somehoe to kill them all. It was slow and gruelling and painfull and a few of the henchies did die doing it.. but I got there. but yet again the mission was way, way harder for my N/Mo than any other character due to bad luck.

4. Frost Gate.

I admit, I hate this mission with a passion. but I did it easily with all my characters apart from my N/mo. Ok ok, I had to redo it with my W/Mo as I was silly.. and I was silly with my N/Mo too.. but thats irrelevant really.

first of all targeting with henchies wasn't working very well and I seemed to draw in every critter. First fight was the minotaurs.. 2 minotaurs close by with none comming.. target closest and send in Thom 7 Stefan.. fine and dandy.. until that aggro's about 6 minotaurs who weren't even on my min-map.. they all come charging in and attack alesa.. who of course dies.. then Claude dies nexyt.. then Renya.. then minotaurs. Rez everyone and move on..

Now mind you.. thats never happened to any of my other characters. Yes they did aggro other minotaurs.. but they were on the mini-map and patrolling.. they never aggro'ed once not even on the mini-map..

Further on get a fight of some ice golems and stone summit.. between 2 other groupos... don't know why but both other groups decided to attack even though they were well out of aggro range of any of my group... had a few henchie deaths but managed to somehow beat all 3 groups.

Final straw was the last section.. every charactr up to my N/Mo had gotten 2 groups in the last area - one by the gates and 1 by the furthest lever. However my N/mo must be special as she got 3 groups - 1 by the gate and 2 by lever's.. and I was silly and attacked the closest group 1st.. which meant by the time I got to the 2nd group a 3rd group was arriving.. and got wiped.

Now the thing is.. my W/Mo & E/Mo did that and only ever faced 2 groups, eyt my N/Mo goes there and gets 3 groups.. and the 4th group comes in faster than it had for my other characters. Making the end part of the mission to be much harder than it had been for my other characters.

...

So makes me wonder whats going on. Either ANet is making things harder, or I'm having an extremely long run of bad luck with my N/Mo. I say an extremely long run because generally anything that can go wrong is going wrong - patroling critters getting stuck on themselves, extra spwned groups, harder placement of quest targets, etc.

Now I don't mind a challange when I play.. but to be constently pitted against rediculiously hard situations.. I don't find fun. In fact I found trying to do the Shiverpeak Stragglers quest to be a real PITA and not fun at all. Yes I was happy with myself that I managed to do it, but the way I was forced to do it.. pfft! Getting to althea's ghost was an achievement.. and I like that I did.. but when compared to how easy it was for my other characters.. makes me pretty peeved off really.

Just wondering if anyone else has experienced this? Where they have characters that seem to have every thing much harder for them? Or has continuious bad luck in monster spawns, placement, quest placement, etc.. because my N/mo is having the worst of everything.. makes me want to re-start thecharacter and hope to get better luck.

As I said, I don't mind challanges.. and I'm proud of the challanges I've faced.. but I'm a bit peeved that my 1 character has everything so darned hard yet my other characters who did the same quests found it way, way easier to do...

Jhyphi · Sep 09, 2005, 01:18 AM // 01:18

Have you tried Frost Gate bonus? You can't really pull with that stupid dwarf being Leeroy. There's also 4 dolyaks right there who all join in. I swear there weren't 4 dolyaks there before on my first character. Now my Mo/E is struggling massively.

jasondragon · Sep 09, 2005, 01:21 AM // 01:21

Tip for frostgate if you bring hench. Don't bring warriors.

Mavrik · Sep 09, 2005, 01:28 AM // 01:28

Frost Gate bonus, clear the way and then get the dwarf...

Kamatsu · Sep 09, 2005, 01:47 AM // 01:47

I'm not trying to do the bonus. I'll go back and get the bnuses later when I'm level 20 and want xp to get skill points :P My N/mo is having enough trouble with just the main missions as it stands... don't need anymore troubles by trying for the bonuses as well

Don't bring warrior's? wtf are you smoking.. DumbHam is useless... and Orion loves to do celebratory firestorms or dance with death.. The 2 henchie warrior's are fine.. and good for trying to get aggro on them and not on me/alesia/claude. They have a better chance of surviving a few minotaurs pounding on them.. where as me/alesia/claude don't

Jhyphi · Sep 09, 2005, 02:13 AM // 02:13

Mavrik - yea, I thought of that right after I posted. But I don't recall having to do that on my previous character. Oh well, no biggy.

jasondragon · Oct 07, 2005, 10:38 AM // 10:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by kamatsu

Don't bring warrior's? wtf are you smoking.. DumbHam is useless... and Orion loves to do celebratory firestorms or dance with death.. The 2 henchie warrior's are fine.. and good for trying to get aggro on them and not on me/alesia/claude. They have a better chance of surviving a few minotaurs pounding on them.. where as me/alesia/claude don't

I don't bring warriors because they usually rush off and draw all kinds of unnecessary aggro when you call a target. They don't know what that white circle means. And no thank you, I don't smoke.

Kamatsu · Oct 07, 2005, 10:53 AM // 10:53

OMG! I completely forgot I'd created this thread! hehehehe

I was going to make a reply to it to add a recent story.. just to see that I'm the OP! hehehe

Jasondragon - I was talking about Warrior henchies - ie Stefen or Thom. I wasn't talking about idiot W/x players who do tend to go running off on their own...

And to further add to my "Luck / Bad Luck decided at creation" thoery.. I'll share something else..

I recently decided to recreate both my Ranger and my 4th character. I went through Pre-searing doing all the missions with both characters. However, there was a definate marked difference between them..

Ranger - This character got a *lot* of "Precious" drops. I'd say 9 out of 10 blue drops were "precious". Because of this she left pre-searing with close to 3K gold and I didn't even bother to farm or map or anything, I just went through all the quest's.. and because I got so many blue's and so many of them werre "precious".. I was rolling in money

4th Character - This character did the exact same thing, did all the quest's but didn't farm or anything special. She got hardly any blue drops and of those that did drop 1 out of 30 was "Precious".. I ended up not buying ID kit's simply because I wasn't getting enough "precious" drops to warrant it. At the conclusion of the quest's I was sitting on 1.2K gold... less than half of my Ranger, and they had both spent approx the same time in pre-searing...

jasondragon · Oct 07, 2005, 01:27 PM // 13:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by kamatsu

Jasondragon - I was talking about Warrior henchies - ie Stefen or Thom. I wasn't talking about idiot W/x players who do tend to go running off on their own...

Henchie are often just as bad unfortunately

. Unless they've changed. I too was referring to Thom and Stefan.

Align · Oct 07, 2005, 01:35 PM // 13:35

Well, there's definitely some sort of luck involved. I've got a total of 8 black dyes since I first played GW in E34E, without farming or anything(I used 6 of these on my armors, the 7th I dunno, the 8th I sold), kinda neat but not useful.
But... yesterday, my guildmate was talking about how black was the most expensive dye because you needed one of each color mixed to get it - meaning he didn't think it dropped on its own.
Also, I have 10 silver dyes in storage; less than that for all the other colors(except black which I dont have in storage).

Oh, and two days ago was the first time said guildmate got a rare drop.

KvanCetre · Oct 07, 2005, 01:39 PM // 13:39

I figured they were changing quests slightly in updates... for me, shiverpeak stragglers was at its easiest this latest time because they weren't under attack when I got to them.

jegner · Oct 09, 2005, 07:20 PM // 19:20

I have to be honest, I didn't bother reading all of your recaps on how you finished every mission. If it's anything, it sounds like "luck," not "pre-generated luck." You're using examples like "zomg I had a hard time pulling," and then if something doesn't fit into your scheme, you arbitrate it. "Ok ok, I had to redo it with my W/Mo as I was silly." You obviously enjoy the game, but your premise for story telling is weak.

Mister Overhill · Oct 10, 2005, 03:25 AM // 03:25

Playing with henches only, there are an infinate number of combos, considering your classes/skills/levels/weapons plus whatever "helpers" you choose for a given mission. My r/mo got her butt handed to her 20+ times at Elona (it was pitiful) until I left the two tanks at home, then took the mission easily. But that's just one example, with one build.

KvanCetre · Oct 10, 2005, 05:50 AM // 05:50

Honestly, the enemies are randomly placed at the begining and class has nothing to do with it. I remember exiting out of Lion's Arch a few times trying to get to Ascalon Settlement... and each time I exited, I fought enemies in different spots.

Kamatsu · Oct 10, 2005, 06:49 AM // 06:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by KvanCetre

I figured they were changing quests slightly in updates... for me, shiverpeak stragglers was at its easiest this latest time because they weren't under attack when I got to them.

I will admit that's definately a big improvement. I can't tell you how many times I got to the stragglers just as the named NPC died.. grr! At least now they are safe from harm (90% of the time).. even if it's a lot harder to get to them.. My next character to do this quest is going to try a completely different tactic and see how it goes..

Quote:

Originally Posted by jegner

I have to be honest, I didn't bother reading all of your recaps on how you finished every mission. If it's anything, it sounds like "luck," not "pre-generated luck." You're using examples like "zomg I had a hard time pulling," and then if something doesn't fit into your scheme, you arbitrate it. "Ok ok, I had to redo it with my W/Mo as I was silly." You obviously enjoy the game, but your premise for story telling is weak.

No offense mate, but if your not going to even bother to read my post - why bother making a response which shows you have no idea what I was even talking about?

If you bother to read my post(s) you'll see I'm talking about "pre-generated" luck - are things detirmined when you create a character? Or when you pick up a quest? Or is it just co-incidence that 1 character has extremely bad luck in everything they do while another character consistently has it very, very easy?

Iere · Oct 10, 2005, 02:32 PM // 14:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by KvanCetre

Honestly, the enemies are randomly placed at the begining and class has nothing to do with it. I remember exiting out of Lion's Arch a few times trying to get to Ascalon Settlement... and each time I exited, I fought enemies in different spots.

I noticed that Althea's ghost's position changed.

I was about to get her, but then something came up and I had to leave. When I went there again, she was located in a different place.

I even noticed, a while ago, that she was located in two different places for me and my teammate (We had different directional arrows on our maps). I don't know if they fixed that or not.

jegner · Oct 11, 2005, 01:39 AM // 01:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by kamatsu

No offense mate, but if your not going to even bother to read my post - why bother making a response which shows you have no idea what I was even talking about?

If you bother to read my post(s) you'll see I'm talking about "pre-generated" luck - are things detirmined when you create a character? Or when you pick up a quest? Or is it just co-incidence that 1 character has extremely bad luck in everything they do while another character consistently has it very, very easy?

I skimmed your post because it was long-winded, and I didn't need to know how each XXX character did XXX mission. I don't even know how you came to the conclusion that I have no idea what you're talking about when you quoted ME in explaining what you were talking about. I could just quote my first post to answer your questions where I said (I will summarize it for you): I believe it is luck and not pre-generated luck. Your evidence is not convincing because it is a) silly and b) arbitrary.

Gwenhywar · Oct 12, 2005, 12:17 AM // 00:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by kamatsu

Or is it just co-incidence that 1 character has extremely bad luck in everything they do while another character consistently has it very, very easy?

Or it could just be that there is a class or several classes you like to play more, and are better at playing them. That's why everything seems easier with them

.

I am not surprised you found the Ascalon area very easy with your warrior - it IS incredibly easy for warriors; they get almost no damage because of their armor. It will change in the later areas of the game, where it's easier for classes that can dish out more damage than warriors.

I have completed the game with monk, ele and warrior, and currently going through with my necro, so can compare my experiences with each character.

About black dyes etc - well, some people win millions in a lottery, some win something small like a CD from their local radio station, and some never win anything at all. That's how I feel about getting nice drops in games

.

Watmonster · Oct 12, 2005, 01:43 AM // 01:43

my experience with pre-generated luck...

Ive beaten the game and all with my w/mo, but ive never everer gotten a gold drop....
the only 2 purple drops ive gotten modified other proffesions ie. Smiting staff of warding, improves casting speed of blood magic skills: i mean, wtf is with that!?

lately ive picked up farming so i can try to get some 15k glads armor because i dont want to look poor (but i am even though im very conservative). with a surprising twist i found 1 sup vigor, 2 sup absorbtions, 2 major vigors, and many other assortments....in only 4 FREAKIN DAYS!!!!

though im overjoyed by this i still have to wonder why im not getting any expensive dyes, rare crafting materials,or good usefull weapons which im in dire need of? yes the dough is rolling in so i can buy them, but i cant help but wonder why???

now for a new tale, my little ranger/mesmer has been living in royalty since she first stepped out of ascalon city. the 1st creature she killed besides aloe seeds was a bandit firestarter and it dropped a black dye. .....? whoa. After that i started getting more and more and more and more dyes till my inventory was in danger of bursting.
so i sold.
to this day i have 20k on that character( now lvl 13) and i even havnt left the pre-searing!!!!!

the moral to the story: this game is f***ed up

Kamatsu · Oct 12, 2005, 04:14 AM // 04:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gwenhywar

Or it could just be that there is a class or several classes you like to play more, and are better at playing them. That's why everything seems easier with them .

It could be that I am better at playing certain professions. As for liking them more.. I like all my characters, even though I remake them too often

However, when it comes to things like quest placement as well as drop likelyhood.. that does seem to change between characters and seems to be "pre-generated luck". Like comparing the placement of althea's Ghost for all my characters - W/Mo was dead easy, R/mo & E/Mo had is very easy, Me/Mo had it easy while N/Mo had it extremly hard.. also like considering my Me/Mo finished pre-searing with just a measly 1.2K gold while my R/Mo did the exact same quest's and spent around the same time in pre-searing but finished with just over 3K gold! If that isn't "bad luck" on my Me/Mo's behalf... I don't know what is!

Quote:

I am not surprised you found the Ascalon area very easy with your warrior - it IS incredibly easy for warriors; they get almost no damage because of their armor. It will change in the later areas of the game, where it's easier for classes that can dish out more damage than warriors.

Funnily enough my Me/Mo has had the easiest time in Ascalon so far, followed by E/Mo then R/Mo.. W/Mo has it easy because of the armor and such.. but still I must say ability to kill things and control what's going on in the battles.. I do much better playing something else.. heh

BTW.. Warrior's still take a wholeotta pain in ascalon area's.. even with 50 AL armor

But they do take less than the other profession's.. my new W/Mo might have it easier this time... actually bought her a Rune of Absorbtion.. hahaha!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Watmonster

lately ive picked up farming so i can try to get some 15k glads armor because i dont want to look poor (but i am even though im very conservative). with a surprising twist i found 1 sup vigor, 2 sup absorbtions, 2 major vigors, and many other assortments....in only 4 FREAKIN DAYS!!!!

LOL the sheer irony.. you get nothing playing normally but the moment you start farming you get a whole lotta good drops in a short amount of time! LOL