[Suggestion] Bird Instability and Siren's Reef

Originally I was going to cry about how terrible and annoying the birds in fractals are but since I know it'll kind of be pointless and contribute nothing and I know they won't be removed, I came up with something that, at least for me, can help me tolerate them. Right now, I cannot stand them (I despise them) and I think their spawn numbers have been increased since they came out, but I could be wrong on that one.

My suggestion for them is: leave the blind they do - BUT remove the damage - it can be really troublesome in T4s; especially Siren's Reef + birds. It's too much.

As for Siren's Reef, in T4, at the moment, there are just too many adds, which also have a lot of HP - mostly at the last boss fight. So you combine all of those AOEs + Adds + Birds (and in some cases No Pain No Gain as well) and it's just the worst. Like, fractal 99CM is easier than that, at least in my opinion. To top it all off, stability doesn't work on the AOE that pushes you off the ship into the water where you get tons of condis which stack extremely fast and do a lot of damage. I'm fine with the damage, it is T4 after all, but there's no way to counter the pushing away thing given how many things you have to dodge.

My suggestion for Siren's Reef is: either remove 1/3 or half of the mob numbers on the last boss (Captain Crowe) and make the AOE that pushes you off the ship be counter-able with stability.Another idea is, if you still want to have all of those numbers, to at least reduce it to "normal mobs + veterans" instead of the current "veterans + elites".

On the side note, if it's of any importance, I've noticed that FB boon + Revenant seem to work better for this specific fractal than Druid+Chrono, at least with PUGs.

I don't mind the blind debuff and the damage the birds do . You can get rid of them by dodging into enemies too.

But for crying out loud, birds can reappear like 10seconds right after they've de-spawned and It's pretty annoying. Other instabilities like Mists Convergence isn't even close to the rapid respawn rate of the birds instability.

I'm thinking about skipping fractals with Birds. GW2 = active defense. Active defense = dodge. You have to dodge the birds leaving you with no active defense. I normally play DD and even with three dodges I'm running around with Birds on my face.

@Mad As Hell.2168 said:I'm thinking about skipping fractals with Birds. GW2 = active defense. Active defense = dodge. You have to dodge the birds leaving you with no active defense. I normally play DD and even with three dodges I'm running around with Birds on my face.

U can prob dodge ze birds and use blocks or blinds to negate other sources of dmg. Esp in siren's reef its all about that proj hate.

I agree 100% with the OP's suggestions, the birds mistlock in its current state is making me hate any fractal with it. Another option would be to massively increase the pause between group of birds spawning, it currently feels like non-stop birds spawning.I dont mind Siren's Reef that much, it could definitively benefit from fewer adds just so it doesn't get visually ridiculous. But the birds, if they dont retire that mistlock they should at least incorporate these suggestions.

It's not that much that birds are challenging, it's that they're really annoying. It's like going to an awesome picnic in the woods, and having it be FULL of non-stop mosquitoes.

The birds are overtuned and/or buggy I think.

The interaction with other instabilities is also of concern: for example random condi application on top of the blind.

When we have birds on any daily fractal, be it on T4 or rec, we can't really see them during Crowe/Spam-mala or any other fractal with too much visual clutter, so when we think we see it, we used a dodge, but then when we really need the dodge, too bad! It's already wasted on birds and couldn't dodge the AOE and get downed or killed. I also find birds spawn too frequently and what's with the Juvenile that also attack us??

Also another problem I found birds instab is, they're visually similar to the ravens on Warhorn 4. I can certainly tell them apart because I'm the person who casts the warhorn skill, if not, they're visually confusing to others.

@Infusion.7149 said:The birds are overtuned and/or buggy I think.

The interaction with other instabilities is also of concern: for example random condi application on top of the blind.

This.Birds that spawn are affected by the other instabilities. I do think it has been that way since forever like the ones from Mist Convergence, but those were manageable since it only spawns a single enemy, unlike birds.Imagine if you roll Birds + We Bleed Fire + Afflicted. Those birds will burn you and put a bunch of BS condis on you each time they spawn.

Those birds are so untested rush, placeholder instab added just for number that juveniles count as enemies in Urban and you can't capture the point for shaman to get to mid if even a single trash juvenile is alive.

Siren's reef would be so much better with just a few QoL changes.

Mobs should despawn after every treasure you return and after the canon phase. Maybe buff the champs a bit, because now they are faceroll easy.

No add spawns when fighting Crow, but every 25% champions could spawn(1 at 75%, 2 at 50% and 3 at 25%). This allows for either ignoring the champs and burn the boss, always kill the champs or just ignore the last 3. Imo, this would fix a lot of the problems with Siren's Reef.

All I gotta say is, I have not played Fractals since the new instabilities. Not worth the time and frustration anymore, when Raids might be more work but all the factors are known, OR even playing a different game that doesn't mess with me as much.

Had the birds attack me in Twilight Oasis while I was mid-air using Enhanced Reflexes. Couldn't dodge for at least 1.5-2 seconds. Well designed and balanced instability, of course. But hey, the 2-3 elite players who post on this forum like it, so obv it's good.

@Turkeyspit.3965 said:Had the birds attack me in Twilight Oasis while I was mid-air using Enhanced Reflexes. Couldn't dodge for at least 1.5-2 seconds. Well designed and balanced instability, of course. But hey, the 2-3 elite players who post on this forum like it, so obv it's good.

Same here. I also had the birds attack me underwater when I got knocked off the boat at the end of Siren's Reef! At least they could have changed the animation to penguins or something...

Final boss of siren's reef needs some nerfing. Reduce HP of the adds and force the caster adds to come onto the ship rather than standing outside on the ramps.

@Doombringer BG.3740 said:Originally I was going to cry about how terrible and annoying the birds in fractals are but since I know it'll kind of be pointless and contribute nothing and I know they won't be removed, I came up with something that, at least for me, can help me tolerate them. Right now, I cannot stand them (I despise them) and I think their spawn numbers have been increased since they came out, but I could be wrong on that one.

My suggestion for them is: leave the blind they do - BUT remove the damage - it can be really troublesome in T4s; especially Siren's Reef + birds. It's too much.

Or vice versa, leave the damage and remove the blind. Or better yet, remove the bird spawns which are probably the biggest issue since they cause additional targets which soak massive amounts of damage and skills. The target birds are the main issue of the instability and the biggest annoyance.

@Doombringer BG.3740 said:As for Siren's Reef, in T4, at the moment, there are just too many adds, which also have a lot of HP - mostly at the last boss fight. So you combine all of those AOEs + Adds + Birds (and in some cases No Pain No Gain as well) and it's just the worst. Like, fractal 99CM is easier than that, at least in my opinion. To top it all off, stability doesn't work on the AOE that pushes you off the ship into the water where you get tons of condis which stack extremely fast and do a lot of damage. I'm fine with the damage, it is T4 after all, but there's no way to counter the pushing away thing given how many things you have to dodge.

My suggestion for Siren's Reef is: either remove 1/3 or half of the mob numbers on the last boss (Captain Crowe) and make the AOE that pushes you off the ship be counter-able with stability.Another idea is, if you still want to have all of those numbers, to at least reduce it to "normal mobs + veterans" instead of the current "veterans + elites".

On the side note, if it's of any importance, I've noticed that FB boon + Revenant seem to work better for this specific fractal than Druid+Chrono, at least with PUGs.

Agreed, the add re-spawn in Siren's Reef is an issue. It forces near perfect play or bringing classes which have innate cleave (scourge and reaper). I think a reduction by 1/2 would be in order. Also have adds despawn between boss phases. When /gg is faster than doing the mechanic, something needs adjusting.

The synergy between a lot of adds AND birds is what causes the most issues for non necromancer compositions. People do not realize this, but this many targets basically reduces damage on important targets (boss and adds) a lot. It's almost the same thing as the necomancer minion builds in the past where bosses like the Legendary Archdiviner in Cliffside could not hit players because 15-20 pets where around, until it got fixed (did it, not even sure). Just that in this case, the roles are reversed. The game is simply not designed with more than 10 enemies around.

Now Siren's Reef with current instabilities is absolutely doable, but requires either unique compositions (heavy necro focus) or perfect play and the vast amount of enemies heavily discourages certain classes when under certain instabilities (try playing an elementalist while 300% bonus damage from behind is active).

@Cyninja.2954 said:The synergy between a lot of adds AND birds is what causes the most issues for non necromancer compositions. People do not realize this, but this many targets basically reduces damage on important targets (boss and adds) a lot. It's almost the same thing as the necomancer minion builds in the past where bosses like the Legendary Archdiviner in Cliffside could not hit players because 15-20 pets where around, until it got fixed (did it, not even sure). Just that in this case, the roles are reversed. The game is simply not designed with more than 10 enemies around.

Now Siren's Reef with current instabilities is absolutely doable, but requires either unique compositions (heavy necro focus) or perfect play and the vast amount of enemies heavily discourages certain classes when under certain instabilities (try playing an elementalist while 300% bonus damage from behind is active).

Not sure what you want to achieve with a heavy necro focus. Necro is not even close to be the best cleaving profession. Condi FB and Holo are. Tickle them down with bleeds? Epidemic has a cooldown. Holo hits 5 targets with every ability without any cd on cleave.Condi FB is just broken with adds. Scourge dps is garbage even with a lot of life force to spend.

@Nephalem.8921 said:

@Cyninja.2954 said:The synergy between a lot of adds AND birds is what causes the most issues for non necromancer compositions. People do not realize this, but this many targets basically reduces damage on important targets (boss and adds) a lot. It's almost the same thing as the necomancer minion builds in the past where bosses like the Legendary Archdiviner in Cliffside could not hit players because 15-20 pets where around, until it got fixed (did it, not even sure). Just that in this case, the roles are reversed. The game is simply not designed with more than 10 enemies around.

Now Siren's Reef with current instabilities is absolutely doable, but requires either unique compositions (heavy necro focus) or perfect play and the vast amount of enemies heavily discourages certain classes when under certain instabilities (try playing an elementalist while 300% bonus damage from behind is active).

and yet, any 1-5 Scourge party rushes through Siren's Reef with no concern which instabilities are present with absolutely no issues. No matter how good the players. Scourge also doesn't have to aim skills and can focus 100% on movement, something which causes issues for a lot of players on the final Boss.

Epidemic remains the strongest 1-button damage skill in the game. Scourge has permanent full life force in this fractal and will hit maximum targets just about all the time, especially with birds.

Condi FB sits on 11k life, Scourge on 20k with support Scourge going as far as 28k, meaning you need not have any concern about getting hit in the back during 300% bonus damage (or getting unlucky focused).

Is there faster options? Sure, there is always a most effective setup. Is there any easier class with no knowledge or experience required available than Scourge which is heavily benefited? No.

Not sure what you want to achieve with a heavy necro focus. Necro is not even close to be the best cleaving profession. Condi FB and Holo are. Tickle them down with bleeds? Epidemic has a cooldown. Holo hits 5 targets with every ability without any cd on cleave.Condi FB is just broken with adds. Scourge dps is garbage even with a lot of life force to spend.

It's mostly about survivability (barriers when in Scg and shroud life force when in Rea, while still doing a lot of cleave). I've tried fbd, scg, and rea and I definitively prefer scg on that fight on t4. Yeah, the continuous reset of tome 1 is great on fbd, but still safer on scg imo

5scg. Full viper. Parasitic contagion. Epidemic. Ez.

Sirens Reef Is perfect fór birds, as you said. Lot of adds. So you can send birds easy to them. We dont have issues with this. I Think birds then dmg multiple foes And Blind them too(not that sure about this). My biggest pain instabilities Was T4 deepstone with sliperly slope And hamstrung And sumthng. IT was pain but doable.