Likely issues with Skyscale fireballs and in-combat mounting.

[GeraldBC.4927]

Now I see a lot of uses for the upcoming masteries for the skyscale and griffon, but I and many others already see problems caused by it on the horizon. 

Primarily, this issue lies intrinsically with mounted combat and was already creeping up in gyala delve with siege turtles before. A lot of random tagalongs misunderstand the functionality of the siege turtle and end up spending the entire final boss mounted, trying to kill scaled-up champion mobs and haze hearts using turtle skills only and thus of course, dragging out the meta way more than need be. To extremes where it almost fails at times. 

With skyscale fireballs, this problem is coming to every meta in the game. Unless something is done to clearly curb that, people will mistake the skyscale's ability to inflict small amounts of damage while remaining mounted as license to spend entire overworld bossfights floating in place, spamming fireballs. Clogging up everyone's vision with the giant flapping wings of their mount. Imagine trying to complete Dragon's End but 25 out of 50 people spend the entire fight floating 3 meters above ground spamming their fireball. And not just with Soo-Won, but with every fight, the area you're trying to overlook is going to be filled with skyscales. Death-Branded Shatterer? Maw of Mordremoth? Chak Gerent? Whatever the new maps offer? So many metas the completion of which we take for granted are going to start failing for lack of anyone affecting the fight in a tangible way. 

There needs to be some kind of solution. Something that clearly, visibly and viscerally tips players towards realizing that they are not supposed to sit on their mount all the time. It has to be conveyed to them in a way that they can't ignore, even if they try to. I can think of a few quick fix solutions which I will list, but I will leave coming up with a more elegant solution to the professionals. 

-place an anti-skyscale aura on old meta bosses that forcibly dismounts them and keeps them from mounting back up, similarly to how jumping puzzles work

-create an additional mastery for the heart of the obscure that allows players to charge and fire a lightning strike at another player IF they are mounted on a skyscale. The lightning damages the skyscale by more than a third of it's max health and the cooldown is short enough that it can be reused before the mounted player starts regenerating health.

The main problem with any forced dismounting is that with the in-combat mounting mastery, people can just immediately mount back up. It always has to be coupled with something that prevents them from doing so afterwards. 

 

No matter what one may argue against the above, the fact of the matter is that I don't want to spend every overworld meta with 20 skyscales flying around in my face and neither do you.

[Jianyu.7065]

I dont think anyone wants what you're talking about. I haven't seen any players express enthusiasm about dozens of other players bombing metas from their skyscales. I'd hope ANet knows what kind of traffic jam this can be and puts limitations on it that keeps things moving and fun without being overwhelmingly ridiculous.

[Trejgon.9367]

42 minutes ago, Jianyu.7065 said:

I dont think anyone wants what you're talking about. I haven't seen any players express enthusiasm about dozens of other players bombing metas from their skyscales. I'd hope ANet knows what kind of traffic jam this can be and puts limitations on it that keeps things moving and fun without being overwhelmingly ridiculous.

I can imagine MightyTeapot trying to clear Dragon's End meta with just skyscales on stream for more memes (he already did a number of meme DE's runs, including all minionmancer run, that kinda broke it....)

[Nate.8146]

1 hour ago, GeraldBC.4927 said:

There needs to be some kind of solution. Something that clearly, visibly and viscerally tips players towards realizing that they are not supposed to sit on their mount all the time.

Try hovering around enemies in PoF and subsequent LS zones (White Mantle; Bloodstone Fen) and let me know how that works out for you 🙂. The fact that the new maps are in the clouds with death gaps makes it even all the more sinister for the devs to introduce those threats and collect all those juicy player tears.

Edited August 18, 2023 by Nate.8146

[Trejgon.9367]

19 minutes ago, Nate.8146 said:

Try hovering around enemies in PoF and subsequent LS zones (White Mantle; Bloodstone Fen) and let me know how that works out for you 🙂. The fact that the new maps are in the clouds with death gaps makes it even all the more sinister for the devs to introduce those threats and collect all those juicy player tears.

I will take oportunity in here to point out that pocket raptors present in HoT and LWS3 zones are ground-to-air missiles (and are silly profitient at shooting down skyscales that made an error of going altitude crossing their leap range (especially annoying in Draconis Mons tbh)

[Omega.6801]

The solutions are bad, but the problem will be real. If Gyala delves have showedus anything it's that people don't understand when to use mounts and when not if they have the option to do either.

[Manpag.6421]

It’s unlikely to be a problem, since the skyscale has less armour and significantly less health than the turtle. The turtle hover also uses endurance so gets evasion while using the jets with Adroit Evasion, while the skyscale hovering in place does not.

 People might be able to pull off flying around and dive-bombing, but the skyscale has neither the bulk nor the evasion to “float above spamming fireball”.

[HnRkLnXqZ.1870]

I've seen that problem as well. Glad someone else brought it up. I see the main risk with those special players we are not allowed to talk about here, because the AoE is a very effective tag- and damage source compared to an auto-attack. In addition I can see a lot of players spamming it in events with high number-scaling as a cheap alternative to an actual tag-build. 

The solution ANet is more likely to apply however is cooldowns. The engage-skills already have a cooldown, which prevents excessive use. But they may just increase the duration of that cooldown or add a cooldown for the in-combat-mounting.

[idpersona.3810]

10 minutes ago, HnRkLnXqZ.1870 said:

The solution ANet is more likely to apply however is cooldowns. The engage-skills already have a cooldown, which prevents excessive use. But they may just increase the duration of that cooldown or add a cooldown for the in-combat-mounting.

If the fireballs use endurance and/or flight meter energy, that could also solve the issue. Or a cumulative cooldown for each subsequent fireball. I'm assuming this issue has been taken into account already though (hopefully). We'll see in a couple of days.

[Kalavier.1097]

6 hours ago, GeraldBC.4927 said:

-create an additional mastery for the heart of the obscure that allows players to charge and fire a lightning strike at another player IF they are mounted on a skyscale. The lightning damages the skyscale by more than a third of it's max health and the cooldown is short enough that it can be reused before the mounted player starts regenerating health.

 

So you want to weaponize trolling?

 

Also we have no idea the damage of the fireball, or how combat mounting works at all. 

Edited August 18, 2023 by Kalavier.1097

[GeraldBC.4927]

1 hour ago, Kalavier.1097 said:

So you want to weaponize trolling?

Yes. I wouldn't be opposed if people had a tool that lets them go "You there. Get off your kitten skyscale and help us!" and force them to dismount. 

I'd even suggest making it so if someone gets dismounted by the heart, their in-combat mounting is on cooldown for a minute. 

[Pifil.5193]

3 hours ago, Manpag.6421 said:

It’s unlikely to be a problem, since the skyscale has less armour and significantly less health than the turtle. The turtle hover also uses endurance so gets evasion while using the jets with Adroit Evasion, while the skyscale hovering in place does not.

 People might be able to pull off flying around and dive-bombing, but the skyscale has neither the bulk nor the evasion to “float above spamming fireball”.

Why would it need to evade anything? Most of the metas don't have a whole lot of ranged mobs and none of the pre-SotO zones have flying mobs at all. Therefore the event mobs will target the players on the ground not those in the air. Someone hovering above fireballing won't need to do anything to avoid them. That's unless the fireball has very short range, has low damage or a very long cooldown if any of those is the case then why bother introducing it at all?

[idpersona.3810]

18 minutes ago, Pifil.5193 said:

Why would it need to evade anything? Most of the metas don't have a whole lot of ranged mobs and none of the pre-SotO zones have flying mobs at all. Therefore the event mobs will target the players on the ground not those in the air. Someone hovering above fireballing won't need to do anything to avoid them. That's unless the fireball has very short range, has low damage or a very long cooldown if any of those is the case then why bother introducing it at all?

Maybe it does little damage to ground targets, but more damage to aerial ones? Or extra damage to objects.

[Killthehealersffs.8940]

Whover can maneuver it midair+ hit the fireball , i will give them a kiss .

Most likely every1 will be on ground-level (where the boss can hit them) and spamm the 1 , just like a siege tank , with the ability to evade danger .

If every1 takes off and no meele nearby , the boss/npc resets  . He can also  have a ranged currupt ability that will dismount players after 6-10 sec and some upwards ariflow for people to get out of combat and resumon it after 30 sec

 

We shall call them Dragonkinghts or Dragoons.

 

Hopefully with 0.2 opacity + blue flame ,if the system detects more dragoons nearby .

Edit:Or they do max damage based on how far they are from the aura that he boss emit (they dont get damage reduction debuff)

 

But we will get an uproar from the "usual people" , because dragon dont allow the casuals to learn rotations but what matter is fun " semi-new-classes 😛

 

Edited August 18, 2023 by Killthehealersffs.8940

[Mangoyami.2418]

9 hours ago, GeraldBC.4927 said:

No matter what one may argue against the above, the fact of the matter is that I don't want to spend every overworld meta with 20 skyscales flying around in my face and neither do you.

I absolutely want to spend my dragonstorm meta with 50 fools on skyscales spamming fireballs at ryland and braham

[Manpag.6421]

1 hour ago, Pifil.5193 said:

Why would it need to evade anything? Most of the metas don't have a whole lot of ranged mobs and none of the pre-SotO zones have flying mobs at all. Therefore the event mobs will target the players on the ground not those in the air. Someone hovering above fireballing won't need to do anything to avoid them.

Lots of bosses throughout the game have AoE wave/blast attacks that would hit you in the air. And for a long time, red circle fields on the ground have in fact been tall cylinders that can hit you a surprising distance above them, something which isn’t limited to old content because of things like the world boss refresh. People who think they’re going to be able to just cruise overhead chucking fireballs are likely in for a shock. Doubtless there are some it will work on, ones with really old mechanics, but not all and possibly not for long if they continue refreshing content.

[Astralporing.1957]

11 hours ago, GeraldBC.4927 said:

Primarily, this issue lies intrinsically with mounted combat and was already creeping up in gyala delve with siege turtles before. A lot of random tagalongs misunderstand the functionality of the siege turtle and end up spending the entire final boss mounted, trying to kill scaled-up champion mobs and haze hearts using turtle skills only and thus of course, dragging out the meta way more than need be. To extremes where it almost fails at times.

Problem with turtles was that you need them to push some of the Gyala events along, but you could not mount them in combat. So, you had to choose between staying mounted and being next to useless for most of the time, but having turtle when it counted, or trying to disengage in panic (which wasn't exactly easy in target-rich environment that Gyala events are) when you ended up lacking a turtle when it was necessary to have.

Hopefully, with Skyscale in-combat mounting ability coming with SotO this issue will not happen this time around.

[Gehenna.3625]

It all really depends on how long the cooldowns are for mounting during combat and using the fireball skill but also where you can use these skills and then there's the point that you have to be in range of mobs to hit them as well, so chances are you can be shot down when using the fireball. It's going to be interesting at least 😂

[GeraldBC.4927]

21 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

Problem with turtles was that you need them to push some of the Gyala events along, but you could not mount them in combat. So, you had to choose between staying mounted and being next to useless for most of the time, but having turtle when it counted, or trying to disengage in panic (which wasn't exactly easy in target-rich environment that Gyala events are) when you ended up lacking a turtle when it was necessary to have.

This is plain and simply not true.

You do not need the turtles for anything other than collecting energy. Once you've collected the energy, you don't even need to be mounted to charge the stations. And you can't charge the stations until the mobs have been killed. So if you stay mounted, you're just standing there waiting for someone else to kill the mobs. All of which are scaled up assuming that both you and them would fight them. You are slowing everyone involved down for no reason.

If you dismount, you can help kill the mobs so people can get to charging the station. Again: You don't need to be mounted to charge it. The moment the circles are blue, the beam connects. Not only that but the mobs are set up to go for the stations specifically, so if you just run maybe 10 meters away from the stations, you already get out of combat and can mount back up to collect more energy. You lose nothing by dismounting. 

What's even worse is when people stay mounted for the hearts. The defiance bar is broken, the stations are disabled, there is no purpose to being on the mount. The hearts aren't like walls or gates, they take normal on-foot damage.

And people will have the above told to them and they still stay mounted. They know better, they just choose to use the fact that the turtle has any use at all as an excuse to leech. And it will be the same with skyscales unless some feature is included that prevents it. In fact it will be worse because the floating skyscales will be cluttering up everyone's vision on top of it. 

[Astralporing.1957]

You are talking about only the final event. It's not the only event on Gyala, though - the whole meta is just full of turtle requirements. If you missed that, it's only because someone else (someone you are complaining about) was on turtle when it mattered.

[GeraldBC.4927]

5 hours ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

You are talking about only the final event. It's not the only event on Gyala, though - the whole meta is just full of turtle requirements. If you missed that, it's only because someone else (someone you are complaining about) was on turtle when it mattered.

Reading comprehension

17 hours ago, GeraldBC.4927 said:

Primarily, this issue lies intrinsically with mounted combat and was already creeping up in gyala delve with siege turtles before. A lot of random tagalongs misunderstand the functionality of the siege turtle and end up spending the entire final boss mounted, trying to kill scaled-up champion mobs and haze hearts using turtle skills only and thus of course, dragging out the meta way more than need be. To extremes where it almost fails at times. 

And yes, the tunnel events give you plenty of opportunities to mount back up as well.

[Gibson.4036]

21 hours ago, GeraldBC.4927 said:

This is plain and simply not true.

You do not need the turtles for anything other than collecting energy. Once you've collected the energy, you don't even need to be mounted to charge the stations. And you can't charge the stations until the mobs have been killed. So if you stay mounted, you're just standing there waiting for someone else to kill the mobs. All of which are scaled up assuming that both you and them would fight them. You are slowing everyone involved down for no reason.

If you dismount, you can help kill the mobs so people can get to charging the station. Again: You don't need to be mounted to charge it. The moment the circles are blue, the beam connects. Not only that but the mobs are set up to go for the stations specifically, so if you just run maybe 10 meters away from the stations, you already get out of combat and can mount back up to collect more energy. You lose nothing by dismounting. 

What's even worse is when people stay mounted for the hearts. The defiance bar is broken, the stations are disabled, there is no purpose to being on the mount. The hearts aren't like walls or gates, they take normal on-foot damage.

And people will have the above told to them and they still stay mounted. They know better, they just choose to use the fact that the turtle has any use at all as an excuse to leech. And it will be the same with skyscales unless some feature is included that prevents it. In fact it will be worse because the floating skyscales will be cluttering up everyone's vision on top of it. 

Apparently you are the only gw2 player who doesn’t regularly experience being stuck in combat even though you have put far more than 10m between you and enemies.

Do you know one weird trick the rest of us would never guess?

Edited August 19, 2023 by Gibson.4036

[Gibson.4036]

Like a lot of SotO threads, this one is missing the details that will really decide if it’s an issue or not. We’ll find out Tuesday.

[Manpag.6421]

I think there’s bit of a skewed perspective here in the perceived “problem”, anyway. It kind of lumps players who would intentionally mount up to troll people/leech together with people who might mount up simply because they enjoy it. I understand the frustration if you’re in a rush and they’re doing less damage than they could be, but then other people complain about power creep and bosses being melted in seconds.

There are lots of reasons why someone might stay on their turtle during metas; maybe they’re playing with a friend who’s gunning, or they’re helping someone inexperienced learn the mechanics. Maybe they have an extremely glassy build with poor sustain, so it’s better to be tanky and stay alive than constantly dying and running back. Or maybe it’s just a way of making stale metas they’ve done hundreds of times feel different and fun. I suspect the same will be true of skyscales; people will play what feels fun to them.

At the end of the day, in the open world no-one has the right to dictate how anyone else plays, and if your ideal solution to people not participating in the way you’d like is to literally attack them, then you are the problem, not them.

[Knighthonor.4061]

Or simply add some Aerial combat counter defense units for people with skyscales to fight off during land boss fights. Adds multi layer tactics the battle and spreads the field