Toypocalypse Is Too Long

So, the Toypocalypse mini-game is trivially easy - the only time I've ever seen the doylaks be threatened is in the first 30 seconds or so, when not all the players have necessarily even spawned in - which is probably not a bad thing; I imagine an activity requiring actual strategic base-building with 5 random players would be a recipe for frustration and anger and I'll go out on a limb and say they're not the intended emotions for Wintersday. I do, however, think that 10 rounds is about twice as many as is necessary; not only do the toys have absolutely no chance but it doesn't take long for building more defenses to become essentially pointless as all the enemies already die within moments of spawning to a barrage of catapult shots. The back half of every game just becomes an exercise in waiting for it be over, which is not exactly a thrilling experience.

It's just the process of gathering scrap, building and killing on a map that is way too large imo that makes it feel so drawn out and lame.

If it was fast paced that would be cool. Make waves ramp up, maybe make the weapons better for actually killing them without risking your life half the time.

It does feel excruciatingly slow. The strange thing is that I have participated in it since the first year and it is only starting this year that it feels that way. Did they make some changes to it?

@Khisanth.2948 said:It does feel excruciatingly slow. The strange thing is that I have participated in it since the first year and it is only starting this year that it feels that way. Did they make some changes to it?

Nah, it has always been that way. Probably even in the first year it was introduced, but it was still fresh then so it was harder to notice.

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Khisanth.2948 said:It does feel excruciatingly slow. The strange thing is that I have participated in it since the first year and it is only starting this year that it feels that way. Did they make some changes to it?

The first year people found it a lot harder. The achievement required all 5 dolyaks to survive and it was changed to just 1 because it was so hard to keep them all alive through the first few rounds, so your options were pretty much entering a map where some had already died or entering first and being blamed when everyone else came in and they were dead.

I don't know if there were any changes made to address that or if players just got better at it but that definitely seems to have changed. The only time I've entered a map where a dolyak was dead the first two people in hadn't read the instructions and were trying to fight all the toys themselves.

I think it would be nice if they could either make it shorter or do something to make the later rounds more exciting.

Players just got better. In the first year many people still didn't understand that building defences was the key, nor did they understand which defences were worth using and which weren't. Which is why you've had people trying to wall the whole central area off, and building only ballistas but no catapults. As well as people just running around and happily shooting at toys with their toy rifles.

@Blocki.4931 said:It's just the process of gathering scrap, building and killing on a map that is way too large imo that makes it feel so drawn out and lame.

If it was fast paced that would be cool. Make waves ramp up, maybe make the weapons better for actually killing them without risking your life half the time.

Well, a true 'horde' mode would have unlimited waves - basically they keep coming until eventually you die. That's certainly an idea, but does it fit with ANETs vision for the event?

I also suspect the OPs post has at least something to do with how long it takes to get the daily done if toypocalypse is on the list (which it currently is)

I would love to see a "challenge mode" of some kind added for pre-organized groups.

@Turkeyspit.3965 said:I also suspect the OPs post has at least something to do with how long it takes to get the daily done if toypocalypse is on the list (which it currently is)

Well, that's definitely why I was playing it today, which got me to thinking about why it always ended up feeling so boring, but I certainly don't value my own time so highly that I just want to be able to complete the daily in a couple of minutes.

@Turkeyspit.3965 said:

@Blocki.4931 said:It's just the process of gathering scrap, building and killing on a map that is way too large imo that makes it feel so drawn out and lame.

If it was fast paced that would be cool. Make waves ramp up, maybe make the weapons better for actually killing them without risking your life half the time.

Nah not necessarily horde mode or unlimited waves, but starting out a bit easier to allow your team to get some defenses going then it gets a bit harder until it maybe peaks with a boss that can actually threaten you.

tl;dr concentrate siege in 4-5 locations (near where foes spawn), so that the NPCs converge on the siege and get taken out more quickly

Each wave ends when all the NPCs die, so the trick is to make sure that your siege is setup to engage them as soon as they spawn. For funsies last night, I tried to put some siege in odd places, with the idea that it would last longer and therefore be more useful (also because I was bored). Bad idea. The foes made a bee line for the siege and couldn't reach it easily, but it also meant they were out of range of the concentrated deployment zones, so the foes lasted longer too.

The best thing seems to be to build siege in narrow areas: the hill near where the unstable presents spawn, the maze, etc. The NPCs move towards the siege quickly and concentrated siege disposes of them even more quickly. That ends the phase sooner. Similarly for Toxx, who will also run towards siege (or the center). With two people using hammer [2] & [3] to CC (plus [1] turned into autoattack) and the rest on rifles (using [1] for autoattack, also), he's eliminated quickly.

It still won't be "fast;" it will just be oodles faster than the usual.

PS there are similar tricks to speed up Infininininininirarium.

edit: added tl;dr

I agree that it is too long. For people who do know what to do it is easy and long, and for people who have no clue it is hard and even longer (unless they are so bad that all dolyaks die). 10 rounds should be changed to 5. Even then it will not be done a lot because the rewards/time ratio is simply very bad, but at least it wouldn't feel like a chore in the second half anymore.

It does get a bit tedious when you can't really lose it and it's that long. I'd prefer they actually made a difficulty curve through the waves

It is absurdly long and boring, but you don't really have to do it if you don't want to and I do know ppl who love it. So meh, it's nice to have a variety of events I suppose. I'll be in the jp if anyone needs me . . .

@Randulf.7614 said:It does get a bit tedious when you can't really lose it and it's that long. I'd prefer they actually made a difficulty curve through the waves

Shoot i think they need to do that too, and increase the build cap every five waves(over 10), and allow you to go to a maximum of 100 waves, each 10 gives you a completion reward.

@"Illconceived Was Na.9781" said:Each wave ends when all the NPCs die, so the trick is to make sure that your siege is setup to engage them as soon as they spawn. For funsies last night, I tried to put some siege in odd places, with the idea that it would last longer and therefore be more useful (also because I was bored). Bad idea. The foes made a bee line for the siege and couldn't reach it easily, but it also meant they were out of range of the concentrated deployment zones, so the foes lasted longer too.

That might explain why it feels so much slower this year. More of the people I play with this year seems clueless about it than previous years and involves people building stuff in less than useful places.

The best thing seems to be to build siege in narrow areas: the hill near where the unstable presents spawn, the maze, etc. The NPCs move towards the siege quickly and concentrated siege disposes of them even more quickly. That ends the phase sooner. Similarly for Toxx, who will also run towards siege (or the center). With two people using hammer [2] & [3] to CC (plus [1] turned into autoattack) and the rest on rifles (using [1] for autoattack, also), he's eliminated quickly.

It still won't be "fast;" it will just be oodles faster than the usual.

PS there are similar tricks to speed up Infininininininirarium.

@Astralporing.1957 said:Players just got better.

You mean builds got better. ;) Just kidding. I wish one had at least one's utility skills available. The slow running is killing me.

Would be nice if what we build didn't despawn. Makes the length of it feel extra naggy.

@DeWolfe.2174 said:Would be nice if what we build didn't despawn. Makes the length of it feel extra naggy.It's the build cap. Once you get to it, any new siege will despawn the oldest one placed. After reaching a certain point of siege saturation you should stop placing new sieges, and just keep upgrading old ones (and replace any visible defence gaps)

it’s my last task for achievement points thus winters day. but it’s boring and i have to do 13 more runs. and with strangers i had runs that took me 45 minutes or longer. not normal. they must nerf it. i am not sure if i go for the achievement points. wasting holiday with toypocalypse is waste time. but the laugh of the snowman’s are awesome. i want it as wake up alarm ? or other alarm. to hear reactions of non guildwars 2 ppl

@titje.2745 said:it’s my last task for achievement points thus winters day. but it’s boring and i have to do 13 more runs. and with strangers i had runs that took me 45 minutes or longer. not normal. they must nerf it. i am not sure if i go for the achievement points. wasting holiday with toypocalypse is waste time. but the laugh of the snowman’s are awesome. i want it as wake up alarm ? or other alarm. to hear reactions of non guildwars 2 ppl

Your not forced to run with strangers, join a guild or play with friends.. only you choose to join a PUG.There is no need to nerf it, you just need to get better at running it more efficiently... not everyone goes for faceplanting 11111 content.. like Freeezy

Would be nice if what we build didn't despawn. Makes the length of it feel extra naggy.

@Khisanth.2948 said:It does feel excruciatingly slow. The strange thing is that I have participated in it since the first year and it is only starting this year that it feels that way. Did they make some changes to it?

This probably has a lot to do with mounts as well as everything else others have said.. We've gotten very used to running around the world on mounts or with constant speed buffs that it feels very strange and very slow when we are limited to our default running speed XD

Map size and wave frequency too are also drawing this game mode out a lot longer than it needs to be.Not much they can do about the map though.. but giving us a faster default speed (25%) would make the map feel smaller and better allow us to get around and kill waves faster.As for the waves.. they should speed up every round imo, first round remaining the same to give us time to set up our toys but from the second round onwards the waves get bigger per round and spawn quicker forcing us to play some solid but not too overly difficult defense by the time round 5-10 come in.

We can then use the Toxx phase and a small rest period after it to repair, upgrade and replace the toys most in need of it.

Should Anet decide to upgrade this event for next year I'd also like to see the weapons get a bit of an overhaul.Smasher and Popgun are mostly fine but the Repair Pistol is total garbage lolI wouldn't mind seeing that get an upgrade and actually being able to repair damaged siege toys..They should also add in the Princess Wand which has the ability to heal players and snowmen..The Toy Staff which can lay traps/marks and do an AoE chillAnd maybe the Toy Dagger too which deals low damage and adds a small amount of conditions (Bleed, Weakness and maybe Torment) and gives you a few evade attacks.They should be spred out more evenly so there is more weapon diversity but overall less of the same weapons so it would give everyone more of a role option rather than everyone just taking the same weapon.

I think that would be enough to significantly improve this event for next year.

@DeWolfe.2174 said:Would be nice if what we build didn't despawn. Makes the length of it feel extra naggy.

Someone responded to you already, yesterday when you posted the same exact comment.

There's a seige cap, when they start despawning stop building new and start upgrading.

But Anet really needs to add a tell for what the cap is and when people have reached it.

I don't mind it and actually like it. I wouldn't mind a difficulty increase but then people would complain so there is no win/win change they can make really.

The good thing is you dont need to really do it too many times.