Heart progress is ridiculously slow

[Ashantara.8731]

Every activity should provide Tokens. It's nonsense that only some events do, especially with the weird frequency and type of events in Syntri. Very unfun.

Edited September 7 by Ashantara.8731

[Skub.8240]

1 hour ago, Ashantara.8731 said:

Every activity should provide Tokens. It's nonsense that only some events do, especially with the weird frequency and type of events in Syntri. Very unfun.

You used to get tokens every single time you completed an adventure, but they got rid of it because it made Syntri too bearable.

[Grimegg.1297]

The Renown Hearts in Lowland Shore take 2-3 minutes each, maybe less if you catch an event in-between, therefore I have no issues with them. I think they are all well made and progressing them is well balanced.

In Janthir Syntri however:

1. The first starting heart have no solid progressing method except events. Killing moa birds, wolves, bees and rams give only a measly 0.5% each, they have enough HP to make it slower than it should be and they are quite spread around.
2. The second heart in Janthir Syntri in the middle have "setting up supply crates" for 10% each and "putting out fires" for 5% each, which is better than the first one, but it still feels slow as there are not enough of these.
3. The third one in south have only 2% on disabling relics or killing specific enemies.

My main issues with these 3 hearts are:

• When the meta is on - almost no events spawn. This is obviously to incentivize meta participation, but if you are in a dead map, or playing at a less-active hours, or could not get in any meta group, then you are stuck waiting. The events that do spawn which you can use to progress the hearts during the meta are very few, far in-between and often not soloable for some (depending on your build and skill).
• Even when the meta is not on, it very often happens that 3-4 events spawn almost at the same time, causing you to be able to do only 1-2 of them before a "dead period" happens, with no events spawning for often a good 8-10mins, so you can only sloggishly progress the heart from the abovemenitoned methods while waiting for any event to happen again.
• The Renown Tokens can be obtained only from events outside of heart areas - so while Lowland Shore have 18 different events which can give you a Renown Token, Janthir Syntri have only 5 (2 of which are adventures, the other 2 adventures are in a heart area and don't give Renown Token).

My suggestions:

• Boost the progressing methods from - 0.5% to 2%, 2% to 4%, 5% to 8%, 10% to 14%. The events giving 15%-30% are fair and don't need a change in my opinion, but feel free to check again anyways.
• Add 1-2 more ways to progress the southwest and southeast hearts of Janthir Synthri without the need of events or tokens, equivalent to the "setting up supply crates" and "putting out fires" in the second heart, so you can progress the heart reasonably even when meta is on.
• Allow events in a heart area to drop a Renown Token. Meta can maybe give 3-5 Renown Tokens so people progressing hearts will actively want to participate.

Why do I care?

1. There are 2 achievements for each heart in the two new maps. The first one is to do each heart in 14 different days, and once you do that a repeatable second achievement appears which is to do each heart in 3 different days (every 3rd gives 5 achievement points up to 3 times, so 3x3 = 9 different days to get all achievement points). This is a total of 23 different days of doing every heart in the new zones to finish these achievements.
2. This system feels like it's going to be used again for the next 1 or 2 maps of this expansion, which means more hearts with all the repetition in achievements that might have the same issues.
3. Yes, it is doable as it is right now but it is NOT FUN, and isn't it most important to be fun? Slow and sloggish is not fun. I am not asking to make the hearts like a vanilla zones heart - 1-2 mob kills and heart done. I am only asking to please make it more reasonable.

I hope this will be considered, if not for Janthir Synri then at least for future maps with hearts.

I am otherwise enjoying the new expansion a plenty. 🍀

 

Thank you very much!

 

Edited September 8 by Grimegg.1297
Fixed some wording.

[Hotride.2187]

I need 1 more week of Janthir Syntri hearts, camp and the southwest one. Holy kitten I'm already tired of those 2. It looks like elites pump up heart progression by a lot (why the 3rd heart on the map is so easy), but both locations barely have events with elites. Save the poor flower and kill the ibogas are the only 2 events with an elite.The rest of the events give like 1/5 heart or less and the events spawns are few and far between.

At this point I've started wondering if anyone has play tested this, which is always a great sign. And I see a lot of people waiting with me, for an event, ANY event, to spawn. They complain in chat too. What a trainwreck to ask people to do 14 times (or however many there repeats were). Would have hardly noticed if I had to do them once for map completion...

[Tula.6021]

32 minutes ago, Hotride.2187 said:

I need 1 more week of Janthir Syntri hearts, camp and the southwest one.

I dropped completing Syntri hearts achievements.

Did lowlands' though.

Will wait for the next map to be released- Maybe Syntri will benefit from that and get improved.
Why the pain now when it may be joy later.

[GeraldBC.4927]

The heart token issue is one of many aspects that follow the same trend: I love what Janthir Syntri COULD be, I get the ideas behind those design choices, but I don't like what it is. I love the theory, but not the execution. 

The idea is obvious. The focus is supposed to be shifted towards the events, you're supposed to fill the hearts by completing events, either by completing events within the territory of a heart or by farming heart tokens. But there are two problems here

• A huge chunk of non-heart events do not give heart tokens, which ones feels kind of random
• There aren't enough events within/around the hearts. Either they are not placed in sufficient abundance, or they are not frequent enough. I think it's both. 

[Ashantara.8731]

21 minutes ago, Tula.6021 said:

Will wait for the next map to be released- Maybe Syntri will benefit from that and get improved.
Why the pain now when it may be joy later.

That's very optimistic. If SotO has taught us one thing, it's that already existing content in a mini-expac barely gets touched after release, because new content has priority.

If they haven't fixed the Token drop rate in Syntri almost three weeks after release, they won't be doing it two months from now.

Syntri is a half-baked map in that regard, events and activities are copied&pasted and mind-numbingly boring (defuse White Mantle mines, run back and forth like a lackey to deliver plants/vegetables/meat or food/water/gear, stand by a flower for 7 minutes to protect it from slowly spawning enemies [and try not to fall asleep while doing so], kill the same corrupted mobs over and over, press a button to "paint", kill the same leviathan over and over, and so on).

It is clear that they didn't have the time to make Syntri as good as the Shore map. They likely had the choice between good map design+story+achievements (which are very good indeed) and creating compelling events that players would enjoy.

P.S. If only adventures would provide significant progress (or progress at all) and could be done instead, that would already be an improvement... Only the warclaw-sniff adventure is in range of a heart and gives progress.

Edited September 8 by Ashantara.8731

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

2 hours ago, Grimegg.1297 said:

In Janthir Syntri however:

1. The first starting heart have no solid progressing method except events. Killing moa birds, wolves, bees and rams give only a measly 0.5% each, they have enough HP to make it slower than it should be and they are quite spread around

Events spawn post Meta start that all give 15% base participation to the task as they finish.  Before the meta, there are the gathering e vents that do the same.  Throughout the map there are two adventures that regularly give the task tokens.  You can use these to get 50% participation off the bat with teh camp one and it's what I recommend.

2 hours ago, Grimegg.1297 said:

In Janthir Syntri however:

1. The second heart in Janthir Syntri in the middle have "setting up supply crates" for 10% each and "putting out fires" for 5% each, which is better than the first one, but it still feels slow as there are not enough of these.

There's never been an instance where no elemental event hasn't been active.  The elite alone is about 25% participation and, given how many you have to kill, you'll be getting roughly 50% from one event and finish in an average of 2 to 3 events.

2 hours ago, Grimegg.1297 said:

In Janthir Syntri however:

1. The third one in south have only 2% on disabling relics or killing specific enemies.

The adventure at this heart task  gives you 15% per completion + 3% from all t he animals you have to dig up and takes about a minute to finish.

[GeraldBC.4927]

Also I want to add to my previous post that someone at Anet clearly knows about this issue, and for evidence I cite the northeastern heart in Janthir Syntri, the "Help the kodan study and settle in the Janthir Syntri region " one. In terms of practicality, that heart is perfect. Several very simple 'kill some elementals' events very close to the heart vendor, they spawn so frequently that you ALWAYS find one, sometimes two at once. It looks like someone internally stumbled on the issue and rushed to fix it by slapping some straightforward events right around the vendor. 

[Grimegg.1297]

38 minutes ago, Epsilon Indi.2031 said:

Events spawn post Meta start that all give 15% base participation to the task as they finish.  Before the meta, there are the gathering e vents that do the same.  Throughout the map there are two adventures that regularly give the task tokens.  You can use these to get 50% participation off the bat with teh camp one and it's what I recommend.

I am very well aware what events are there before and during the meta. I have written it in my post my issues with it, please read the whole thing.
I will quote it for you again. The second point is specifically for the first heart:

2 hours ago, Grimegg.1297 said:

• When the meta is on - almost no events spawn. This is obviously to incentivize meta participation, but if you are in a dead map, or playing at a less-active hours, or could not get in any meta group, then you are stuck waiting. The events that do spawn which you can use to progress the hearts during the meta are very few, far in-between and often not soloable for some (depending on your build and skill).
• Even when the meta is not on, it very often happens that 3-4 events spawn almost at the same time, causing you to be able to do only 1-2 of them before a "dead period" happens, with no events spawning for often a good 8-10mins, so you can only sloggishly progress the heart from the abovemenitoned methods while waiting for any event to happen again.

~~

38 minutes ago, Epsilon Indi.2031 said:

There's never been an instance where no elemental event hasn't been active.  The elite alone is about 25% participation and, given how many you have to kill, you'll be getting roughly 50% from one event and finish in an average of 2 to 3 events.

There are no elemental events spawning at all during the meta for this heart. Either you will have to wait out the meta or participate if you can join a group. And as I previously mentioned:

2 hours ago, Grimegg.1297 said:

This is obviously to incentivize meta participation, but if you are in a dead map, or playing at a less-active hours, or could not get in any meta group, then you are stuck waiting.

For the second heart specifically you can still go for supply crates or putting out fires, but it's still slower than it should be. If they just leave some of the elementals events to remain able to spawn during the meta I'd have no issue with this heart.

~~

38 minutes ago, Epsilon Indi.2031 said:

The adventure at this heart task  gives you 15% per completion + 3% from all t he animals you have to dig up and takes about a minute to finish.

Yes, I am aware of this adventure. I have not seen anyone do it in 1 minute even if it's possible, so it usually takes 2-3 minutes on average. Also - it's not enough. Knocking out ~20% with this is good, but it's a single thing to do and the rest is much slower than it should be (I already mentioned how every heart in Lowland Shore takes 2-3 minutes, here this adventure by itself takes 2-3 minutes).

Edited September 8 by Grimegg.1297
Corrected a sentence.

[Pifil.5193]

2 hours ago, Ashantara.8731 said:

That's very optimistic. If SotO has taught us one thing, it's that already existing content in a mini-expac barely gets touched after release, because new content has priority.

I think it's unlikely too, but I do have some hope that they plan to add more to Janthir Syntri in the November release as they won't have a new map then. Hopefully they expand on and polish the content here but I really hope this isn't a sign of the quality we can expect from maps three and four.

Janthir Syntri does feel very unpolished compared to other maps. It's especially noticeable after coming from Lowland Shore. A pity really.

[Randulf.7614]

2 hours ago, Ashantara.8731 said:

If they haven't fixed the Token drop rate in Syntri almost three weeks after release, they won't be doing it two months from now.

3 weeks is next to no time for post-launch changes. They generally only do hot fixes for game breaking bugs in this period and save any changes for the first main patch. That could be Tuesday, it could be a few more weeks. It's far, far too early to say that 3 weeks has gone and expect no changes. It's takes time to collate feedback, discuss what and how changes to be made and then code them in.

We're still in the launch period right now. CHanges are likely to many things - even if it's going to be with the quarterly update (I don't think we will have that long a wait though)

Edited September 8 by Randulf.7614

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

9 hours ago, Grimegg.1297 said:

I am very well aware what events are there before and during the meta. I have written it in my post my issues with it, please read the whole thing.
I will quote it for you again. The second point is specifically for the first heart:

I did read it all and I'm stating there is no huge issue here.  You can get participation in all the gathering events by jumping from one to another and handing in 5-8 meats.  If there are no events, move on.  Don't linger, don't wait.  Go to another task (And on your warclaw too, to sniff.  If the meta is going to be on soon, look for a map doing the meta. 

9 hours ago, Grimegg.1297 said:

There are no elemental events spawning at all during the meta for this heart. Either you will have to wait out the meta or participate if you can join a group. And as I previously mentioned:

For the second heart specifically you can still go for supply crates or putting out fires, but it's still slower than it should be. If they just leave some of the elementals events to remain able to spawn during the meta I'd have no issue with this heart.

 

Okay, so you saw the 10 minute timer, yes?  Why didn't you open the LFG and join a map doing the meta? Participating in Decima generally gives lots of progression in the NE heart task as it's within range and events post meta spawn rather quickly so you could easily finish it up with a few elemental tasks and move on to the speedy skiffs adventure for a heart token on your way back down south.

9 hours ago, Grimegg.1297 said:

Yes, I am aware of this adventure. I have not seen anyone do it in 1 minute even if it's possible, so it usually takes 2-3 minutes on average. Also - it's not enough. Knocking out ~20% with this is good, but it's a single thing to do and the rest is much slower than it should be (I already mentioned how every heart in Lowland Shore takes 2-3 minutes, here this adventure by itself takes 2-3 minutes).

Literally have done it in 1min 10sec and I'm 12th place lifetime (Which means it can be done faster).  I average 1min 30s on it and that's 9 minutes from 0% to 100% task completion if you do just that.  Each completion also rewards a little map currency and a green, so doing it 6 times is actually pretty rewarding.  Generally in that time another event spawns and I can do that and then the adventure and finish it in about 6 minutes.

[Vavume.8065]

11 hours ago, Ashantara.8731 said:

P.S. If only adventures would provide significant progress (or progress at all) and could be done instead, that would already be an improvement... Only the warclaw-sniff adventure is in range of a heart and gives progress.

The flying adventure in the north west gives a heart token.

[Mungrul.9358]

On 9/7/2024 at 9:30 AM, Maria Murtor.7253 said:

I just did two of the gathering events in gold. And this is what I got. You probably need five of these events to fill that heart. It's insane.

https://imgur.com/a/fQNV4ui

Yeah, that's like another part where they've skewed progress bars: disarming a Mursaat mine gives about a third as much progress as building a supply thingy.

I also did the Warclaw race this morning and got gold, and it didn't progress the associated heart at all.

[Gaiawolf.8261]

15 hours ago, Epsilon Indi.2031 said:

Literally have done it in 1min 10sec and I'm 12th place lifetime (Which means it can be done faster). 

Oh kitten, it's that easy that a whole 11 people in the whole world have done it? Sure.... no problemo for the average gamer. Just like how everyone gets really close to dps benchmarks, right?😆

[Grimegg.1297]

19 hours ago, Epsilon Indi.2031 said:

I did read it all and I'm stating there is no huge issue here.  You can get participation in all the gathering events by jumping from one to another and handing in 5-8 meats.  If there are no events, move on.  Don't linger, don't wait.  Go to another task (And on your warclaw too, to sniff.  If the meta is going to be on soon, look for a map doing the meta. 

No, you did not read it all.
Here's what I wrote:

On 9/8/2024 at 1:19 PM, Grimegg.1297 said:

This is obviously to incentivize meta participation, but if you are in a dead map, or playing at a less-active hours, or could not get in any meta group, then you are stuck waiting

Keep in mind, some people like me sometimes can only play at less active hours and for short amount of time per day, so often when I play there are no meta group going at all.

~~

19 hours ago, Epsilon Indi.2031 said:

Okay, so you saw the 10 minute timer, yes?  Why didn't you open the LFG and join a map doing the meta? Participating in Decima generally gives lots of progression in the NE heart task as it's within range and events post meta spawn rather quickly so you could easily finish it up with a few elemental tasks and move on to the speedy skiffs adventure for a heart token on your way back down south.

Read my quote above again. I also already mentioned the issues with heart tokens. Shall I quote that too?
~~

20 hours ago, Epsilon Indi.2031 said:

Literally have done it in 1min 10sec and I'm 12th place lifetime (Which means it can be done faster).  I average 1min 30s on it and that's 9 minutes from 0% to 100% task completion if you do just that.  Each completion also rewards a little map currency and a green, so doing it 6 times is actually pretty rewarding.  Generally in that time another event spawns and I can do that and then the adventure and finish it in about 6 minutes.

Let's assume that I am able to rush the adventure like you can for 1min10s. You are telling me to do it 6 times. That's approximately ~7min of non-stop adventure spam. A "little map currency and a green" is not a motivator here. For me it's going to take double that time since I cannot rush the adventure like you do nor do I want to.

There are no other hearts in the game that are as slow as the ones from Janthir Syntri and with as few options to progress them quickly.
If there are slow hearts - they have relatively quick progression options and are not highly dependent on events/adventures.
If there are hearts highly dependent on events/adventures - they fill really quick.
Even more so, Janthir Syntri hearts have achievements require you to do them just like dailies in other MMORPGs and are the slowest currently.

Do you understand what you are defending?

[Will.9785]

The best way to do the southeast heart, IMO, is to wait for the pomegranate-type of events to spawn but DONT turn anything in.  Just milk the mobs for kills.  Granted, each kill only gives you 0.5% of progress, but completing the event only gives you 15% so you are better of just killing the mobs and filling the bar that way than waiting forever for another event to spawn.

I've started doing this and have been able to complete that heart faster.  Of course, the trick is to convince others that this is preferable and that they shouldn't turn anything in either, which can be difficult because the game likes to suppress you after like 2 messages in chat.

Edited September 10 by Will.9785

[Mungrul.9358]

22 hours ago, Mungrul.9358 said:

I also did the Warclaw race this morning and got gold, and it didn't progress the associated heart at all.

Okay, did it again this morning, and technically, this is wrong. But it gives an insultingly small amount of progress.
 

[Maria Murtor.7253]

With today's update:

• "Added additional creatures around Forager's Hunt that grant renown when killed."

Well, this is exactly the situation I described here: 

 

Quote

Which reminds me of an very old radio play cassette about a girl who tried to  organize a scavenger hunt with only one single hint for each station while there were way too many players participating. Didn't turn out so good, when hundreds of people fighting over a piece of paper. Now, we gonna see how 20 Charr pouncing on a poor Moa bird with outstretched claws. And only for a silly reason.

This alleviates the symptoms.

But it doesn't cure the sickness. I gonna do this heart two more times. I will test it out. I wonder …

[Kulvar.1239]

@Maria Murtor.7253 They also made several events drop tokens finally.

[GeraldBC.4927]

Ok I haven't checked forager's hunt yet, but the western heart in Janthir Syntri is a lot better now. There's a new grub killing event right next to the heart and a lot of titan minions that give credit. 

[Cronospere.8143]

40 minutes ago, GeraldBC.4927 said:

Ok I haven't checked forager's hunt yet, but the western heart in Janthir Syntri is a lot better now. There's a new grub killing event right next to the heart and a lot of titan minions that give credit. 

West was already better. Hopefully Foragers hunt is now fixed. 

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

On 9/9/2024 at 12:16 PM, Grimegg.1297 said:

No, you did not read it all.
Here's what I wrote:

Keep in mind, some people like me sometimes can only play at less active hours and for short amount of time per day, so often when I play there are no meta group going at all.

Actually, I did, and I don't particularly enjoy your accusation of me being dishonest.  If this is how you're going to participate in the discussion going forwards, I have no interest in speaking with someone like you..  I've been stricken with bouts of insomnia, so I'm generally online at 2 to 4 AM my time when the maps are basically always dead and having 0 trouble finishing all heart tasks casually in an hour.   If the meta's up on Syntri and there's not enough people organized at the hour I'm on the map for, I hunt Caches until it's over, then go back to doing events.

On 9/9/2024 at 12:16 PM, Grimegg.1297 said:

Read my quote above again. I also already mentioned the issues with heart tokens. Shall I quote that too?
~~

Let's assume that I am able to rush the adventure like you can for 1min10s. You are telling me to do it 6 times. That's approximately ~7min of non-stop adventure spam. A "little map currency and a green" is not a motivator here. For me it's going to take double that time since I cannot rush the adventure like you do nor do I want to.

 

You do the adventure when there are no other events up in the region. It's something you do when the meta is ongoing or if you get there and there aren't any events.  I usually only have to do it not even 3 times to finish the heart task if there's no meta blocking the usual events that spawn there.  The currency it gives is also very useful for buying cache keys.

On 9/9/2024 at 12:16 PM, Grimegg.1297 said:

There are no other hearts in the game that are as slow as the ones from Janthir Syntri and with as few options to progress them quickly.
If there are slow hearts - they have relatively quick progression options and are not highly dependent on events/adventures.
If there are hearts highly dependent on events/adventures - they fill really quick.
Even more so, Janthir Syntri hearts have achievements require you to do them just like dailies in other MMORPGs and are the slowest currently.

Do you understand what you are defending?

Tell me you haven't done core map completion without telling me you haven't done core map completion.  Or you're casually forgetting the heart tasks in PoF, Season 3, and Season 4.  There were a lot of stinkers in there that take FAR longer than several minutes. JS hearts progress at a rate of 20% per adventure + progress made via participation in the event in and of itself. The only difference is there aren't 40 different methods to gain the heart tokens to skip them.

All in all, if I was able to figure out how to get ~20 caches found and complete all 3 heart tasks in ~1h30min, then this is basically a skill issue.

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

On 9/9/2024 at 7:13 AM, Gaiawolf.8261 said:

Oh kitten, it's that easy that a whole 11 people in the whole world have done it? Sure.... no problemo for the average gamer. Just like how everyone gets really close to dps benchmarks, right?😆

Fam,  doing it casually I still get 1min 30s which 3000 people have done faster in the day when I try.