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Dragon Response Missions [Feedback] Spoilers?


hugo.4705

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So, I was nicely surprised by those. Sure they are strikes, but I prefer those compared to boss only ones. But I don't say they are perfect and some details itches me:

Firstly the pros:-The event chain is interesting. Some tasks to do like an heart quests, a boss to kill at the end.BUT please add aditionnal morale boost tiers for each task, they fill very fast and beyond when 5.

-Abundance of Npcs, allies or foes. It is more realistic than usual. Npcs aren't just generic ones with generic names. (Example, I can save professors, genius, or assistant in metrica)Through, can the escorts npcs be made veterrans and be more resistant? They die every two seconds.

-Use a good chunck of the corresponding map. Respecting their out of story versions.

-A system of tokens, that can be exchanged with various things in eye of the north (Hope that the volcanic stormcaller weapons and recipes can be obtained that way)

-Good length when compared with steel warband as example.

-Nice little "story" behind it and dialogues between the allies.

-Cool factions support mechanics during escort. Well apart the firemen hazmat suits for asura. Better putting a veteran classic golem per player (like you did with fern hounds with kennelmaster for sylvaris) cause even taimi sais when arriving "I brought golems with me" and nope she hasn't brought any.


Now the cons:Before I start, it is mostly about the mechanics, not really the environments or the look of the instance. It is just detailed.

It is said, suitable for 1 to 5 players. BUT excuse me, but have you tested it? Nah, it can's be done, solo: It's a pain, see follwoing points:

-If you are solo, you don't have the time to do all the tasks before escort. Either you multiply by 2 or 3 the timer, or make the pre-escort tasks trigger the escort when they are all finished.I simply can't fix 10 golems, save 10 researchers, and kill 25 destroyers solo, in what, 5 mins?

-The final boss of each mission is a fricking HP SPONGE. I'm just fed up of that, I go solo and it took me 40 mins with my holosmith! For bad rewards! Divide at least the final boss HP bar by 20 if you are alone! The private insctance should really scale to the number of players in, in term of timer, but also in term of foes healths. This is the case for solo, but also in group, the other day did brisban one, we were 5, it took an eternity to kill the destroyer crab queen at the end. Just stop already with the Horrid HP sponge foes!!!It just feels quite bland because no unique foe 3D model, nor big signature move. (edit: APPARENTLY HEALTH WAS A BUG, but to me, even after that fix, you still need to divide by 2 the health in public, 10 at least in alone

-Each time we finish a public mission, splash screen displays: '0/3 challenges, bronze chest" What the kitten frick is that? There is no hint there is any challenge motes or factions npcs in the instances, and most public instance I join have already started and without motes! HAVE YOU SIMPLY FORGOT TO PUT THOSE NPCS IN PUBLIC VERSION?1-> Make it so the INSTANCE DOESN'T START IF THERE ISN'T 5 PLAYERS IN THE INSTANCE AND AGREEING TO START (you can use that rectangle where you bring the npc saved)2-> ADD A BIG CHUNKY VISIBLE ICON ON THE MAP WHERE THE MOTES NPC IS.3-> DISPLAY A SPLASH SCREEN INDICATING THAT THERE IS A CHALLENGE MOTES NPC4-> ADD A HOUSE EXIT BUTTONThey are present in private version.

-The rewards.... I only got bronze, can't judge the others but only 1-2 faction tribute crystal per mission, and very bad loot of some useless low mats... After spending so much time on the final bosses? It is the sixth time I did a mission (2x each) I'm already fed up. Not rewarding, and fighting foes that are basically just a large Health bar, using foes models from 2012, doing basic attacks from 2012 ( well apart boss who have interesting fighting mechanics, but can be better using bounty ones base on ley lines).

-Make the volcanic stormcaller weapons less rare as a loot. Tune down the smoke. Make the hue red and not pink like they are currently.

-The challenge motes themselves (tried in solo private): In addition of having useless water asuran power suits instead of real help, destroyer buffed to the extreme and stupid timer not giving enough time. A big pain to do. https://imgur.com/a/S3AC3T4 The fun of dying again and again. Again, someone tested it or? "SUITABLE FOR 1 PLAYER" recked as dps holosmith. Cannot even complete with challenges, had enough, closed the game. Nice design Anet, really. And welp the boss with ton of life for a solo player... so basically, challenge equal group but group don't have npcs to toggle challenges on, does that make sense to you?

-About those challenges it say that there are vigil, whispers and priory forces fighting against them to help us, asking us if we want to call them back to strenghten the foes. EXCUSE ME? THERE IS NO ORDERS NPCS IN ANY INSTANCE FIGHTING OR HELPING WITH THE ESCORT. Another thing forgotten?

-BONUS NITPICK. So, it happens in respectively, soren draa, skrittburgh and ascalon settlement. BUT, no veteran classic golems (should I say that they are here to defend against awakened invasions, but they aren't here against primordius invasion? GOD ANET the continuity... if they are all around metrica defending against awakened, why not here....We are in a skritt town, skrittburg, with a skritt king, but none of them help us fight them? Putting dead corpses is an easy, bad solution.Haha. Somehow, you've put watchknights in brisban, but forgot rata novan golem in soren draa and skritts in brisban, you can't be serious.Ultra nitpick: You pass through a nightmare court camp for brisban response mission, but you don't see any nightmare courtier???No pirates profiting in gandarran and stealing goods in town while the others are occupied?

-Who are those unfamiliar allies? Ryland? Crystal bloom? If those it's your biggest 1st april joke. Because they were expected.


TLDR, it's still good, don't really be afraid of the big cons paragraph. It is really just a major issue of tuning. Make it so it is doable in solo-private instance by increasing start tasks timer, that the final boss isn't a big hp sponge and more interesting. And make the challenge motes existences perfectly indicated and prevent the mission from starting without being full of players and all of them agreeing to start. (No more bonus challenge reward missed), seeing those vigils crusader , whispers agents and priory arcanists. And make that reward/time invested ratio better. Those are the issues decreasing the replayability to 0 and increasing the boredom.

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Thank for your insight @"Linken.6345" : I did some tests. The npc is a red flag icon.-> It doesn't require to be 5. In private mode, alone, you have acccess to that challenge npc during the whole pre escot phase. So any number of players work in private.-> All the game I did in Public mode, nobody ever found that challenge NPC (nor the faction one btw). (every time, bronze rank, 0/3 challenges? we are 5)

oMQy52T.jpgThat screen have been taken in public mode of the gandarran dragon reponse mission. On the view, no npcs with special icons.On the minimap, no icons indicating their possible presence. Or making understand to players how to activate the challenges.

So my conclusion is that, if it is intentional, it is very disgusting. New players finish the instance to discover they aren't receiving max rewards because, somehow they missed something to activate the challenges, something, that isn't even present in the instance!

Second exploration: I tried to spot the difference between the private and public mode. Anddddd.... there is no differences!!! So I don't see why the faction and challenges npcs aren't there in public. Also, I noticed a thing I haven't spotted before: The challenge npcs speak about "removing vigil forces, priory forces and whispers forces with a consequence of making foes strongers" and guess what, there aren't any whispers, priory or vigil npcs at all in the instance, during the pre escort tasks or during the escort!

So I take that as a spit in the faces of players and make it feels like another rushed and unfinished content (Con added in main post). And hope to see that fixed: Having whispers,priory and vigil npcs added, and the faction npc and challenges npc added in al instances if they aren't there.Also btw, they should add more morale boosts tiers, the pre-escort tasks fill very fast when we are 5. Like 3 x the required objective sometimes.


Also, Anet, there isn't another issue that confused my private group the other day, the LFG of the dragon response missions make SQUAD. But the instance, to work properly, is capped to 5 so GROUP whereas a squad can have 10 players. YOU MUST REPROGRAM THE LFG TO MAKE GROUPS FOR YOUR MISSIONS.

Sadly, more issues than I originally saw.

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  • 2 months later...

At first I liked the Dragon Response missions, the first one or two really got me excited.They felt urgent and important. You were responding to a emergency and that felt good.

The more I progress through these Dragon Response only stories, the more boring they become. They turned from important to tedious in a matter of moments.They feel like they are a really good way to include new story onto old maps which is good. They also can be a useful tool to break up a story section with some really tough action if the bosses are built right with some more engaging mechanics WITHOUT making them overly tanky. (Looking at you Thunderhead)

The other issue is that I have very little motivation to get through the story with this DRM only stories, let alone having any desire to repeat that content for the currency and such it provides.

I miss getting new maps with stories and I know it is asking a lot to keep creating new maps for what is the stories that occur in between the expansions, but they are what give the players a sense of adventure and exploration. The Dragon Response missions do not give players something to do after they have done it the first time, other than do the same thing again. People stick around for new maps after the story is over because there is new things to see, new events to do with new characters and even if they are just fighting and escorting as most are, they still feel new and relevant to the space.

TLDR:Dragon Response Missions feel bad as the sole story model as they make all these big fights feel less urgent and quickly give the feeling of tedious instead of exciting. The desire to repeat the content decreases rapidly and results in even less people exploring that content, compared to a new map that retains players interest for longer as there is so much to explore by yourself when they story is over, it leaves the player feeling like their adventure is only just beginning.

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@hugo.4705 said:-The final boss of each mission is a fricking HP SPONGE. I'm just fed up of that, I go solo and it took me 40 mins with my holosmith!They arent even close to HP sponges. It's people bringing shit dps.

Even in groups the difference vary wildly. I did 2 ebonhawke missions this morning - the first was a travesty, with people dying and each stage taking like half a minute at least. In the second run, we literally had 2-3 seconds between each stage. Boss AoE done, everyone rushed, snap your fingers and bam invoulnerable again. That's how fast it was.

Anet has done a piss poor job at explaining challenge modes though (the private DRMs and you have to activate each option). I did the jungle one (caithe whatever) with mobs+boss hp solo on my reaper. It was a slog but doable. I think the boss went down faster than some 5 man publics I've ran (the mobs was actually the only ones that managed to kill me once because I was careless).

Some of them also require at least a moderate amount of thought for the specific encounter, its not just regular old champions. Forge is the perfect example. That reaper build I can roflstomp enemies with 15K perma-quickness autoattacks? Burns hurt bruh. That fight can quickly turn into just staying alive with constantly low hp and the threat of dying as soon as something sneeze on you, severly reducing your effectivness. In comparison running in there with my all gyro chronowell scrapper is face-tanking childsplay because I probably cleanse enough conditions for a 50 man zerg with all the combos. Doesnt have quite the same punch as the reaper, but right there far, far more effective for the entire group.

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@Dawdler.8521 said:

@hugo.4705 said:-The final boss of each mission is a fricking HP SPONGE. I'm just fed up of that, I go solo and it took me 40 mins with my holosmith!They arent even close to HP sponges. It's people bringing kitten dps.

Even in groups the difference vary
wildly
. I did 2 ebonhawke missions this morning - the first was a travesty, with people dying and each stage taking like half a minute at least. In the second run, we literally had 2-3 seconds between each stage. Boss AoE done, everyone rushed, snap your fingers and bam invoulnerable again. That's how fast it was.

Anet has done a kitten poor job at explaining challenge modes though (the private DRMs and you have to activate each option). I did the jungle one (caithe whatever) with mobs+boss hp solo on my reaper. It was a slog but doable. I think the boss went down faster than some 5 man publics I've ran (the mobs was actually the only ones that managed to kill me once because I was careless).

Some of them also require at least a moderate amount of thought for the specific encounter, its not just regular old champions. Forge is the perfect example. That reaper build I can roflstomp enemies with 15K perma-quickness autoattacks? Burns hurt bruh. That fight can quickly turn into just staying alive with constantly low hp and the threat of dying as soon as something sneeze on you, severly reducing your effectivness. In comparison running in there with my all gyro chronowell scrapper is face-tanking childsplay because I probably cleanse enough conditions for a 50 man zerg with all the combos. Doesnt have quite the same punch as the reaper, but right there far, far more effective for the entire group.

You are quoting someone from November. I believe the bosses HP took a small reduction since then

Otherwise, yes groups vary wildly. I was in a Thunderhead public mission that somehow took 30-40 mins. The next one was done in about 15-20. Interesting you mention scrapper because my scrapper was able to withstand that boss fairly easily as well.

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@Randulf.7614 said:

@hugo.4705 said:-The final boss of each mission is a fricking HP SPONGE. I'm just fed up of that, I go solo and it took me 40 mins with my holosmith!They arent even close to HP sponges. It's people bringing kitten dps.

Even in groups the difference vary
wildly
. I did 2 ebonhawke missions this morning - the first was a travesty, with people dying and each stage taking like half a minute at least. In the second run, we literally had 2-3 seconds between each stage. Boss AoE done, everyone rushed, snap your fingers and bam invoulnerable again. That's how fast it was.

Anet has done a kitten poor job at explaining challenge modes though (the private DRMs and you have to activate each option). I did the jungle one (caithe whatever) with mobs+boss hp solo on my reaper. It was a slog but doable. I think the boss went down faster than some 5 man publics I've ran (the mobs was actually the only ones that managed to kill me once because I was careless).

Some of them also require at least a moderate amount of thought for the specific encounter, its not just regular old champions. Forge is the perfect example. That reaper build I can roflstomp enemies with 15K perma-quickness autoattacks? Burns hurt bruh. That fight can quickly turn into just staying alive with constantly low hp and the threat of dying as soon as something sneeze on you, severly reducing your effectivness. In comparison running in there with my all gyro chronowell scrapper is face-tanking childsplay because I probably cleanse enough conditions for a 50 man zerg with all the combos. Doesnt have quite the same punch as the reaper, but right there far, far more effective for the entire group.

You are quoting someone from November.Haha since the thread had like 3 replies I assumed it was new, looking at the date for this small a thread never even occured to me.
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I enjoyed them up to the boss fights on my first run throughs (haven't repeated any of them yet). The boss fights are just way too overscaled for a single player and it took me >10+ deaths to get through most of them, without dying once before them. Combined with the huge HP pool, each boss alone takes 30-40 minutes, which seems way too long to spend on a single, largely boring fight on normal mode. The one in Brisban got stuck on an environmental obstacle for me and I honestly almost fell asleep spamming it because it took so long. Imo, their HP should be cut to half, or even a third of their current one. Also agree that the start time should be scaled for solo by at least 2-3 minutes more, as I can only finish 1-2 of the three initial objectives each run before the timer runs out. Other than these annoying issues, I think DRMS do have a good place in GW2.

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@Poormany.4507 said:I enjoyed them up to the boss fights on my first run throughs (haven't repeated any of them yet). The boss fights are just way too overscaled for a single player and it took me >10+ deaths to get through most of them, without dying once before them. Combined with the huge HP pool, each boss alone takes 30-40 minutes, which seems way too long to spend on a single, largely boring fight on normal mode. The one in Brisban got stuck on an environmental obstacle for me and I honestly almost fell asleep spamming it because it took so long. Imo, their HP should be cut to half, or even a third of their current one. Also agree that the start time should be scaled for solo by at least 2-3 minutes more, as I can only finish 1-2 of the three initial objectives each run before the timer runs out. Other than these annoying issues, I think DRMS do have a good place in GW2.

L2p issue about the boss mate should not take you 30-40 mins to down that one solo.Pre events solo can be tight on time if you need to repair golems and lead npcs to safety I agree.Should be able to do brisban pre without a problem tho.

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  • 4 weeks later...

There needs to be some mechanism for rejoining your party's instance if you crash out. Two nights in a row now the game has crashed on me in a Lake Doric CM game right at the boss. When this happens you are SOL - there is NO way back into the instance. You don't get a prompt, if you enter through the portal it takes you to a brand new instance, and if you right click a party member there is no "join your friend in..." option.

It wastes your time, and in many cases the party's time if they can't beat the timer down a player.

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I've pretty much given up on DRMs and indeed the wider LW game now I have the /stretch emote.

The devs have completely messed up the balance between input and reward, imo. To get the last two Dragon Slayer weapon achievements, for example, requires an insane number of daily grinds, in an otherwise reward-poor and majorly slow environment. How is that supposed to be enjoyable??

Other companies have made a mint during Covid, because they invested in their games in recognition of the free time so many of us have had. Anet has instead starved us of content over much of the past year - and I suspect their revenues have suffered accordingly (or at least not increased as much as they might have.)

Me? I'm off to find more rewarding content in other games, til Anet remembers that GW2 is supposed to be fun!

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