Most of the new content being introduced by NCSoft targets 79+ toons.
A few chronicles ago, places like Varkas were made "melee weak" to help melee toons keep pace with nukers / archers for grind.
Most of these new areas introduced not only "weakness" traits, but have also added strong resistances to prevent other classes from grinding that area.
This forces parties to bias against certain categories of classes and has an antisocial effect on the game. We have the Heine areas and Dino isle exclusively for casters. We have Giant's Cave, Forge of the Gods, Den of Evil, and Crypts of Disgrace all off-limits to archers.
Solo areas are one thing, but places for great parties like Giant's Cave excluding people ends up causing friends to be unable to play together as regularly as when people would hit the catas or TOI or similar in semirandom but social groupings.
What is NCSoft's intent in forcing apart parties? How could it be fixed? If the weapon resists were removed from these areas, would they be abused?
Discuss.
Archers had BotSprings for quite a long time... while melees and casters had to survive in stupid places.. slow xp, hard kills.. this in Solo.
Still doesn't change the fact that he/she is entirely correct. leveling area segregation was never going to be a very good idea. Simply adding lots more leveling areas was enough to fix the issues.
Adding harsh resists isn't necesarry at all. Sure make it easier for a specific type of class, but don't completely exclude whole class archetypes.
For example: melee weakness and perhaps some increased archery/magic resistance to favour melee physicals. Not uber magic defense where every spell completely fails or does 10 damage.
This is another example of what I like to call "NCSoft's we've-got-no-plan, development plan".
It looks for all the world like a bunch of clowns sit around a room once a month, make crap up, have quite a few drinks, and then give some notes to programmers--and that ends up being referred to (rather generously) as "the plan".
At this point, I actually don't expect better planning on their part---just a random series of unrelated game changes that follow one another based on total alcohol consumpter/hour in the "planning meeting"....
Being a melee toon for my main, I kind of like not worring about an archer or nuker coming in and taking over my solo spot cause he/she can stand in one spot and hit mobs before I can run up to the mob.
But I do agree that it does suck for party's in those "mob specific" areas.
It definitely was (and to some extent still is) quite problematic for nukers to get a good xp party. Except for fog, which is also hogged by every single dagger/archer/titan/whatever other melee in game, the only option is to solo.
All the melees went to HB and were lvling like crazy, the nukers had to sit in ch and cry until they finally got a pity party invite to come leech a bit.
Being a melee toon for my main, I kind of like not worring about an archer or nuker coming in and taking over my solo spot cause he/she can stand in one spot and hit mobs before I can run up to the mob.
This happens to me constantly....i just move on to the next spot. Unfortunitly some folks actually follow me around....go figure eh!
Actually it's a great idea. It keeps everyone spread out and not all battling for the same areas. I don't expect to see anyone with water elemented weapons in GC, dark elemented weapons in DoE, or earth elemented weapons in Stakato's Nest. With the high volume of Lv79 and Lv80 players in today's game, this is perfect.
ugh, no. and fyi even on mobs that resist an element, 150 of that element on a weapon still does decent damage. anyway people are all still battling for the same areas pretty much, because everyone is back in FOG once they figured out all the other new areas aren't that hot. Only 85 titan is going to be doing AOE in HB or GC. Many of the new areas aren't bad, but only good for melee.
Many servers are low population and DO NOT have a "high" volume of 79-80+ people. So to the OP I agree, I should be able to add an archer or nuker to my party and not have them doing 0% damage and 100% leech because of various mob resists. We should be able to have parties of mixed types of classes and go wherever we want.
I would sure like to spoil in Dino Isle or Fields of Whispers/Silence.
Just wondering.. what does spoil from Dino Isle (the open part) - I have been tempted to take the high level WS in our clan there to spoil while I pew pew the mobs on my StS.
ugh,no.
Sorry to hear that your server don't have many players. We do. I like the change and the way it currently is. Even with it as is we have to battle for higher level areas.
And FYI: if you're killing a monster that's highly resistant to your element, you're not doing decent damage.
Case in point; we are able to have only 2 DD's killing Juniors in Hellbound and keep spawn rate down with the proper element. I'd like to see you do that with dark elemented weapons.
Sorry to hear that your server don't have many players. We do. I like the change and the way it currently is. Even with it as is we have to battle for higher level areas.
And FYI: if you're killing a monster that's highly resistant to your element, you're not doing decent damage.
Case in point; we are able to have only 2 DD's killing Juniors in Hellbound and keep spawn rate down with the proper element. I'd like to see you do that with dark elemented weapons.
Hey now. I was there doing Stigma, that should count for something!
Mob resistance isn't that high. All you need are a few crystals and you should still meet the damage break point just below 150 (which most people are at simply because you need to go 'over' 150 to achieve 150 rate damage on mobs).
HB, is fine tbh, but maybe I'm just biased as I'm running around with 350+ dark attribute all the time.
My point is you're not going to have the same output as someone with 150 - 300+ holy element. Of course you're going to do inferior damage with an opposite element. Why would anybody waste time on a monster and deal less damage when you could be capitalizing on other monsters in which you would be doing 70% more damage to. Hellbound was only an example. I'm mainly refering to the other areas like GC, DoE, CoD, Stakato's Nest and Mithril Mines.
For the person that wanted to see spoils on Dino; I would suggest taking a Fortune Seeker rather than a War Smith. Dang people forget which dorf is which. Don't take those gimp WS that need a bucket of bolts to help them...
My point is you're not going to have the same output as someone with 150 - 300+ holy element. Of course you're going to do inferior damage with an opposite element. Why would anybody waste time on a monster and deal less damage when you could be capitalizing on other monsters in which you would be doing 70% more damage to. Hellbound was only an example. I'm mainly refering to the other areas like GC, DoE, CoD, Stakato's Nest and Mithril Mines.
The thing is I'm not sure there would be a damage increase. I've had my attribute all the way to 380 (+ Power enchanted surrender) and there is simply no damage increase.
When you're nuking things for 400 attribute, and using skills for about 390+ (depending on attribute enchant level) you'd expect a significant increase over 300 if the mob has subtantial attribute defense (like 100 against dark, nothing against holy etc.).
Even though we'll never know for sure if every mob is the same, I don't think mobs have more than 20 base resist, with 0 to attributes they are weak to and double the 'base' resist to what they're strong against. That's what I've observed so far.
Of course not every mob is the same and some may indeed have really skewed resists, and also most classes can't really get that high over 150/300, so you're right.
The thing is I'm not sure there would be a damage increase. I've had my attribute all the way to 380 (+ Power enchanted surrender) and there is simply no damage increase.
You don't need to cast surrender if you have 300 elemented weapon (and then +20 extra as an innate attribute of your nuke) and the mob doesn't have special resistance to your element.
You don't need to cast surrender if you have 300 elemented weapon (and then +20 extra as an innate attribute of your nuke) and the mob doesn't have special resistance to your element.
I was just pointing out that I don't see an increase going from 300-400 on the various mobs I've tested. Heavy dark resist or otherwise. The point was basically that at 300+, mob resistance seems completely inadequate regardless of elemental favouritism.
Most of the new content being introduced by NCSoft targets 79+ toons.
A few chronicles ago, places like Varkas were made "melee weak" to help melee toons keep pace with nukers / archers for grind.
Most of these new areas introduced not only "weakness" traits, but have also added strong resistances to prevent other classes from grinding that area.
This forces parties to bias against certain categories of classes and has an antisocial effect on the game. We have the Heine areas and Dino isle exclusively for casters. We have Giant's Cave, Forge of the Gods, Den of Evil, and Crypts of Disgrace all off-limits to archers.
Solo areas are one thing, but places for great parties like Giant's Cave excluding people ends up causing friends to be unable to play together as regularly as when people would hit the catas or TOI or similar in semirandom but social groupings.
What is NCSoft's intent in forcing apart parties? How could it be fixed? If the weapon resists were removed from these areas, would they be abused?
Discuss.
I agree the way Nc is forcing certain classes out of partys is a really bad idea from there part. It is really the death of mixed partys.
I dont like the new solo clased based hunting zones..
One they arent that great on exp..
Two they do keep certain classes from hunting together..
Three they basically direct you in where you can hunt.. so a nuker seeing and experiencing the hunt in some strong nuker resist areas is non existant and promotes boaring grind in one or two areas. This goes for other classes like archers not hunting in Silent Valley..
Basically an archer at lvl 79 has one choice for solo play varkas or ketras..
Overall in my opinion the classed based hunting zones are an epic failure..
Whats needed is 80+ catacomb for ancient adena... party play needed.. and give us something to spend blank scrolls on again.. Merchant has nothing worth getting with them..
they kinda screwed things up bad when they implemented the 3 lvl difference dmg output deal.... that's rediculious
You need to re read that , you actually have to be within 1 lvl of the mob not to get any penalty , thought it was 2 lvl's myself until it was pointed out to me. And yeah , it is kinda dumb , mean's the new "Seed of Annihilation" you are actually going to have to be 84 to farm those crystal's effectively.
You need to re read that , you actually have to be within 1 lvl of the mob not to get any penalty , thought it was 2 lvl's myself until it was pointed out to me. And yeah , it is kinda dumb , mean's the new "Seed of Annihilation" you are actually going to have to be 84 to farm those crystal's effectively.
I really wish they would remove this function in game.
if i wanna kill light red/yellow mobs i should be able to do that w/o getting a penalty
i think this should work in PvP too then, just the other way, players 1+ lvl higer than u, will do less dmg against you
so a lvl 85 will do 50% less dmg against a lvl 80, while the lvl 80 will have no penalty
3 lvls is way to small margin
i think this should work in PvP too then, just the other way, players 1+ lvl higer than u, will do less dmg against you
so a lvl 85 will do 50% less dmg against a lvl 80, while the lvl 80 will have no penalty
That would be more like a punishment for levling up.
Mixed Parties are gone a long time, because we as Players didnt use them. it was and is far better to group specialists together, get them the Buffs they need and let them XP together.
So NCSoft is just continuing what we started.
An Optition would be to make two parts of the level Area. one for solo People, and one for Groups of the targeted speciality. So the Archers for example find together naturally, because they are in the same area, and have an incencitive to form an Archer Group, to hunt the Groupmonsters.
You need to re read that , you actually have to be within 1 lvl of the mob not to get any penalty , thought it was 2 lvl's myself until it was pointed out to me. And yeah , it is kinda dumb , mean's the new "Seed of Annihilation" you are actually going to have to be 84 to farm those crystal's effectively.
100% agree.
The rediculas notion that you 'should do less damage if youre lower than the mob' totally ignores the fact that some people, including me, sometimes wish to fight red mobs, or yellow mobs. Why stop people trying to fight a hard mob? It makes no sence.
Den of evil should be fine for a 79+melee duo or solo.
Catakombes are working fine untill 80lvl on solo,varka/ketra too.
4 Sepulcers are very nice for small 79+group.
After 80 Stakato is very nice for mele group.It's not that you dont have options,the bad thing is the mobs resists which make all areas class specifics,so you have to find people with that weapon's element,or cant mix classes like meeles and nukers.
What is no good at all is nukers areas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!Only Dino available from 80-85.
For the rest of options,(like the new heine places)
unless we have 300 weapons killing rate is so slow its not worthing.
I've read about Freya update and it seems new xp grounds will be even worst.
All new areas are for polearm skilled classes(which noone play in this game) and TOTALLY unfriendly to all other classes!All good rewarding quests are on these polearm's areas too!
And in the top of all,these new areas are for 82+polearm classes!!!!!!!
Do designers take any sample of which classes based is the l2 population?
If they introduced good rewarding areas for lets say,78+polearms,i could think they want people to see more class variety in game and lvl a polearm sub,or new players to make polearms.But 82+????we will get an update and no people to be able to play in it.
the best pole area in game ATM for anyone but a destro is FOG and it's 78+
from what i read of the developers they seem to assume that a clan consists of a bunch of w/e class and a couple polers and the only way ppl lvl is by leeching off the pole classes.... and it's pretty much true for most end game clans
people are all still battling for the same areas pretty much, because everyone is back in FOG once they figured out all the other new areas aren't that hot. Only 85 titan is going to be doing AOE in HB or GC. Many of the new areas aren't bad, but only good for melee.
Many servers are low population and DO NOT have a "high" volume of 79-80+ people. So to the OP I agree, I should be able to add an archer or nuker to my party and not have them doing 0% damage and 100% leech because of various mob resists. We should be able to have parties of mixed types of classes and go wherever we want.
totall agree with this
people (any DD class) takes pole and go xp in fog, pagan or other "pole area", they manage it good as only DD with boxes, solo areas for nukers, archers are the same and even drop herbs... other areas where 80+ party of 9 people could xp are mostly for meele or archer classes. Mostly in those areas you cant take a nuker or archer in party coz mobs resist too much of theyr skills, attacks.
Take fog as example, it was good place for all to xp in before the change. Now they did sepate the rooms to "pole weak mobs but strong resist vs magic" and "mobs for all". So basically they made the xp area for nuker partys in fog smaller coz mobs with low magic deff people can still pole easy, but mobs with low pole or blunt deff mages cant kill easy.
and guess what NC do, they add more pole areas and more pole areas and more areas where different classes cant xp together coz of restricted mobs. So lets tell to all our friends that dont fit in our partys coz they will "leach" in them to reroll to class that will make dmg becouse NC makes the game that way...