Getting Lost in Progression
Progression is a funny thing. Funnel players into too strict a progression path of gear, of levels, of dungeons, and you take away player choice and limit options. Provide too many options or no clear path, and you have player confusion about what they’re supposed to do next in the line of progression.
The Shadow Odyssey had a straightforward (if restricting for developers) progression, with 3 and later 4 tiers of armor from Heroic through to x4 Raiding. This is not to mention the open-to-all Shard of Hate raid zone which had internal progression from a named encounter that almost any pickup could kill, to arguably the hardest raid mob in the game (Byzola). Sentinel’s Fate broke from the set bonuses of The Shadow Odyssey and scattered itemization throughout the zones. It also gradually increased the reliance on the Critical Mitigation survivability stat, at least in raid zones.
If Sentinel’s Fate had an overabundance of options, Destiny of Velious went the opposite way. The Velious group zones and even the overland solo zones all went on Progression lockdown, each requiring copious amounts of the Critical Mitigation survivability stat. Everything was put on a straight path with few diversions. Access quests also made a return to group dungeons, something unheard of since EQ2’s third expansion. Every Destiny of Velious raid zone has been offered in a Normal or “easy” (EM) and Challenge or “hard” (HM) mode. The reduced buff packages and easier scripts in the normal zones have allowed many guilds to participate in these raid encounters that would not normally have the gear, coordination, or skill to do so.
EM raiding has not been universally appreciated, especially as the rewards are often only a minor downgrade over HM gear. A look at RaidProgress.com shows that only 3 of the 15 Hard Mode raid targets in the Sullon, Tallon, and Vallon Strongholds within Drunder have been felled since they were opened with this May’s Game Update 60. A major contributing cause is the rigid requirement of Critical Mitigation for each zone or mob. In TSO and SF, it was possible to fudge the numbers a little with exceptional healing, buffs, debuffs, etc. Now, just one member of the raid not passing a Critical Mitigation test equals instant raid wipe. So every member in every raid force wanting to attempt these fights must first farm existing zones until they have their entire raid set first. Add to this the razor thin differences in quality between EM raid and HM raid gear, often just a 5% increase in stats and it’s no wonder most guilds are just running EM raids and calling it a day. Many of the most dedicated raid guilds have expressed a complete lack of interest in putting in the hours to progress.
These problems came to a head on the EQ2 Forums in the Game Update 61 General Feedback thread, where SmokeJumper was surprisingly candid in over 2 dozen responses regarding Progression, EM/HM raiding, Itemization, and Critical Mitigation. We couldn’t possibly quote everything of value that was said, but when Game Update 61 went live, a few things happened:
- The Plane of War EM x4 raid and HM x4 raids were “closed for at least a week”. In actual practice, as nobody has cleared Drunder, it’s not like there was any chance anyone would succeed in Plane of War HM anyway.
- The Echoes of War EM group mobs were missing key “buff packages” on the mobs, making them exceptionally easy.
- The Echoes of War EM group zone was dropping loot that was obviously from the Echoes of War HM group loot table, as the items were huge upgrades over Drunder HM group gear.
Changes
The Plane of War EM raid has been cancelled. It won’t happen. There just isn’t room in itemization between Drunder EM, Drunder HM, and Plane of War HM.
From SmokeJumper on the EQ2 Forums:
We agree with many of you that the bandwidth of item progression is too compressed between the heroic PoW options and the intended normal and challenge modes of the PoW raid. Therefore, we’re not going to release the “normal” mode of the PoW raid and instead release only the challenge mode. The logical progression of content within PoW then becomes normal mode Heroic, challenge mode Heroic, and then challenge mode Raid, however raiders that have been plundering challenge mode Drunder x4 will be well-equipped and can move directly to challenge mode raid of PoW, if desired.
That last line got a few laughs as not one single guild has cleared Drunder x4 challenge or even come close to it.
If you are wondering if this means the end of EM raiding, the intention seems to be that newer EM Group/Heroic zones will have better gear than the Velious launch HM raid zones. That’s kinda confusing to say the least but it seems to be where we’re going.
The 8 easiest dungeons in Velious are losing their Critical Mitigation requirements.
This last change seems a bit puzzling as with Game Update 61’s Reitemization Revamp, level 70 and 80 gear is now positively dripping with Critical Mitigation. It seems unlikely that anyone at this stage would be unable to scrounge up 80-100 crit mit.
Anyway, here’s the Test Update Notes:
- Tower of Frozen Shadow: Umbral Halls
- Tower of Frozen Shadow: Haunt of Syl’Tor
- Forgotten Pools
- Iceshard Keep (heroic)
- Hold of Rime: The Ascent
- Hold of Rime: The Fortress Spire
- Crystal Caverns: Collapse
Why so slow?
SmokeJumper seemed taken aback that a 3 month release schedule for raid zones might be seen as too fast, and concluded that maybe players didn’t have enough time to clear the content?
In fact, the reasons why Velious raid progression have gone so slowly have already been discussed. Raid encounters have launched broken, or with buffs that make them virtually unbeatable except by luck. Bugs have been a major roadblock as well. It took over a month for the doors in one Velious raid zone to be completely bugfixed, and the Tower of Frozen Shadow access quest was in various states of brokenness for the first 2 months of the expansion. On top of all this, the punishing Critical Mitigation requirements have been demoralizing for guilds that must endlessly farm past zones to increase this one crucial stat.
From SmokeJumper:
And raiders never want to hear this, but our current raids are too hard (IMO) and should be toned down so more people could have success, but raiders get really, really annoyed if they don’t get serious challenges in challenge mode (duh), so we leave them extremely difficult intentionally.
I do agree, however, that we’re releasing raid content too often for the difficulty level that we’re setting them at. If they were a bit easier to accomplish, this would have been just fine in regards to timing. But that’s not the case, so I agree that the situation is not the way we want it now. We’re adjusting.
Tags: game update 61
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Comments (15)
Dharvane
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Smokehuffer needs to adjust faster, imo.
Excellent article btw, Feldon. 🙂
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Silzin
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At the beginning of this expansion during Beta the devs said that the gear is going to be bland but left open for customization using adornments. then they turn around and make requirements on progression that require a player to adorn for all Crit chance and Crit Mit in order to meet the entry requirements. this action eliminates the ability for any customization.
This has been my biggest problem and pet peeve with this expansion. If the gear for one stage of progression gives all of the CM and CC needed for the next stage + about 5-10% then it would allow guilds to be able to gear most of their people. The people in these guilds that are lacking a piece or 2 would be able to use a few adorns for CC/CM and be good.
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Striinger
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I’m no HM raider, but for the rest of us it seems nearly impossible to clear harder zones (e.g. Drunder) with gear equivalent to what drops there or lower. This is especially true for roles like tanks.
I question if they can fix the problem of too many difficulty tiers by nerfing dungeons without putting a bigger gap between gear tiers.
So, what IS the difficulty and gear progression, now.
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Kalako
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Sadly I think it’s up to us to decide raid progression. Usually (prevoiously) it’s been clear. Everything that’s happened since gu61 and the aftermath since has confused us all.
Here’s hoping EQ2Wire can shed some light for us all.
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Viperwolf
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@striinger – I strongly disagree! Until lately I couldn’t raid with my guild. I did mainly PUG heroic zones on Nagafen. With fully adorned Rygorr armor and TOSx2 jewelry my Fury and similarly geared Allies ground Drunder 1,2,3 daily with success. We all Disco’ed the crafted armour And upgraded without x4 raid loot to help us (including several pieces before the requirements were halfed).
These zones were clearable WITHOUT easymode raid loots and that included the Tank ( a paladin called Deepred who Disco’ed every piece of the crafted Paladin armour).
We then went on to tackle and upgrade in the Drunderx2 with similar success. The Drunder zones were pitched just right to provide a meaningful challenge to those who had ground the living daylights out of Kael and the TOSx2.
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Viperwolf
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I will concede we initially needed help from one high raiding DPS to get the last kill in Drunder 2 – but have also killed it without his (kyri) significant help 🙂
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Einina
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“There just isn’t room in itemization between Drunder EM, Drunder HM, and Plane of War HM.”
Why does there have to be “room”? Make it drop original DoV HM level stuff and be done with it – at least casual guilds can do new scripts rather than the same old but more annoying.
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starfeesh
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“Access quests also made a return to group dungeons, something unheard of since EQ2’s third expansion”
While it was far easier to accomplish in one run of each (heroic) zone, the Vigilant x2 raid in SF also had an access questline.
I’m fairly certain SOE is just waiting for *US* to fix the game because it really doesn’t seem like they take the initiative to fix a damn thing unless they have 50 threads on the official forums clearly stating what NEEDS to get fixed.
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Saev
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Just implement smart loot. I do not mind having to get one tier of gear to advance through the next, just don’t make us go back 100 times for random pieces when the HM is technically recycled EM. BORING seriously. EM drunder drops only 1 armor piece per boss. With out smart loot imagine how many times it would take to equip your guild for tier3….
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Rasaraja
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@Saev
Yes. What ever happened to smart loot?
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James
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@Viperwolf
That is the problem with Drunder. That you had a complete set of TOFS X2 jewlery speaks volumes. They said that all three zones would be clearable with a full set of heroic jewelry and a full set of ry’gorr.
I doubt that is possible. You simply don’t have the crit chance without the X2 gear.
All three Drunder zones are a complete waste of dev time. The entire crafting mechanic is the absolute worst idea for obtaining gear. I would rather farm ToRZ every single night getting 5th alts a BP then go into those zones and waste everyones time.
The crafting mechanic should have been implemented in one of two ways:
1. They should have had harvestable nodes spawn through the zone after you kill each boss. The more you kill, the more spawn. The nodes should be respective to the player and not to the group.
2. Or they should have just used, yet another, new currency.
Going in an explaining to my guild “don’t equip the items, even if it’s an upgrade, because we are going to melt it down for armor” is a total waste of everyones time.
We finally had some success in Drunder X2. But I still think the zone is out of tune compared to where TOFS X2 and the EM X4’s are at.
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Daalilama
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Gear progression in DOV is so screwed its not even funny…..since the itemization updates turned previous raid gear (minus DOV) into usuable options again and with the gear dropping out of elementa of war its really a sad state
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Viperwolf
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@ James – really not that hard to get the crafted stuffTBH – I now have enough raws for sets on 2 alts. Also – not sure why are u are commenting about TOSx2 gear being an issue. We now 4 man that zone for plat/ alt gear and none of us are x4 geared ( 7 nameds anyway). Current heroic zone farm cycle I suggest is Iceshard& thrones up to rare named spawn, then Drunder 2&3 then EoW. Nets highest reward for time spent. Not sure why Drunder is seen as a problem!!
You can get gear that’s only marginally worse than x4 raid gear if you work hard on endgame heroic zones – just don’t expect it to be easy or fast……. and why should it be???
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Viperwolf
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Also you can break down attuned Drunder items into ore….. So not sure why you would give that advice to your guildmates?
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Kharn
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Some of us can’t even get into those zones because we don’t fit into anyone’s raid. We have a billion and one Brigs out there and only needed 8 per server to do anything. Leaving some other players that are hungry for more, ready and willing, up the proverbial creek without a paddle.
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