Fractal Random Mistlock Instabilities

[Benjamin Arnold.3457]

@zealex.9410 said:

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Phoebe Ascension.8437 said:Hi Benjamin and team

I have mixed feelings about this.

The bad (will tell more about it)Much harder to random pug fractals. You have to be 'elitist' to safeguard a good safety margin of error to do the fractals with the current random difficulty. I hate being picking about professions/Setup, but fractals requires it now...Some instabilities work 70-95% fine in a fractal, but in ONE VERY place in fractal it creates chaos. Last laugh is such a case.More challenge is nice, but fractals is a daily task, they now take longer most of time. And are more frustrating. With a daily task, you risk, that if you go to far in difficulty you push ppl completely away. I'm going for fractal god, but if it becomes like the cm's to pug, then i will quit very likely.

The good: It requires strategy, adapting. This is quite fun on teamspeak and with ppl that play well. It makes fractals less boring. You must be more aware in most fractals. It promotes changing skills/traits (like get stability more with last laugh).

Now about the 'faults'.

Toxic trail + something other annoying (say afflicted or last laugh or the one that makes you move less fast more damage you take), is very hard in some fractals. Like bloomhunger. The whisp phase sometimes summons army around player. All of those mobs create toxic trail. It's very hard to avoid, and keeps you very likely in combat with afflicted likely putting in cripple, really messy. At boss fight itself, the 'survive bloomhunger mob army' can cover almost full circle with toxic trail It's survivable with good team for short wile (15 sec) but can be pain depending on spread of mobs. And it has to be repeated 3x without mistakes, not easy.

Today i had worst horror so far. Nightmare with last laugh. Generally not much problem and a good instability in this fractal. Except for the last boss, last 15%, it's an absolute knockback 'nightmare' (a real one, pun intended). Not only do the default mechanics knockback and force you in a small save area. All those mobs, become killable, and usually go down in like 3 secs (5+ mobs). If they die spread wide enough, then even double dodge, you will get knocked back, and if then another default mechanic knocks you back, it's painful. 7 pugs quitted after few attempts. The attempt we won with (i got a screenshot from it), we were all downed at 4% hp, two rallied, i gave everything in the world dps wise cause i knew i would fully die next knockback fest. We downed again at 0,7%, spammed downed skills like hell, made it by an inch. This was NOT fun, not skill requiring, nor strategy dependant (we HAD specifically taken all aoe stability we could like well of precognition, stand your ground). My advice, keep instability BUT somehow make the last mobs, not explode (remove the code/block the code on them).

Vindicators still die slowly, you cant 'rally' on them alone, you need your teammates to kill them for you but if they die by same mechanic + vindicator pressure, then you got a real rampage going on. Even if you rally that person but go down to condies it will probably become really chaotic with wipe as result. In most fractals (especially easy ones no prob), but imo in mai trin this has no place, the aoe pressure is huge there already done need an overpowered finisher.

If there would be voting with following options 'keep it, keep it with adjustments, remove it' (the random instabilities) i would choose the second one.

Also friendly reminder Benjamin, I admire that you game so much and know fractals so well. Kudos. However that has a downside. You think like the best player in gw2, the best groups (friend/guild runs, mostly CM runs) that currently play gw2. You know everything in an out, and clearly have often ppl you know well to join you in your team also. But the moment you lfg, the chance of such a crazy good group is low. Usually dps (of everyone) halves, or even less. Wich makes the mechanical pressure double as long, double as much chance to fail the fractal. I'm not saying that you do bad, for instance, amala, Dwayna phase 'checkpoint' is great. I didnt even think that it was possible to have a checkpoint mid boss fight. This is great for pugs. However i still think (not for good groups) but the groups 1 and 2 tiers below the best t4 groups,, that mai trin is overtuned. The moment your dps is low, the adds go down TREMENdously slow, so slow you usually wipe. I'm not saying 3k dps (per person) should make mai trinn doable/easy, but the tresshold should be lower then the current 15-25k per person 'spike during phase' dps requirement. Still i love that you play the game much, it's always better for judgement then not playing it imo. Just keep in mind, you are like a top of the line player if it concerns how good you are at fractals. Like today i was only player in 99 nightmare able to dodge some of the (almost invisible in the 'drunk vision') last laughs at 15% end of boss. This was persistance and long time experience that got me so far, still it didnt help me to prevent knockback rampages, and ultimately a wipe.

It's my hope the instabilities stay random (it's right that it makes then more fun, especially during trash, easier bosses etc), but during some encounters, clearly some insane combo's exist, at the disadvantage of players. Some tuning could be used.

Good feedback ty :) I do want it to be such that one person cannot kill their own vindicator, and I am OK with it being a snowball mechanic in Mai trin as that is what it is designed to do. I think with the new rally and reduced HP as long as the whole group manages to focus it down real quick they can use it to quickly res the downed person.

I am thinking of replacing the blowout with a daze on last laugh since by and large that is the biggest problem right now with random instabilities, at least until we can formulate a full instability balance pass.

The daze would be a fine change. Have you also thought of maybe upping the dmg on the poison trail but slowing down the mov speed of mobs abit? Except in cases where the movement of mobs is importand such as the ice elementals on snowblind or the ouzes on taumanova.

For a short term change I am going to improve the toxic trails messaging so you can actually tell where the damage is. They should be much much easier to deal with without actually tweaking any damage numbers or aoe sizes.

[zealex.9410]

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Phoebe Ascension.8437 said:Hi Benjamin and team

I have mixed feelings about this.

The bad (will tell more about it)Much harder to random pug fractals. You have to be 'elitist' to safeguard a good safety margin of error to do the fractals with the current random difficulty. I hate being picking about professions/Setup, but fractals requires it now...Some instabilities work 70-95% fine in a fractal, but in ONE VERY place in fractal it creates chaos. Last laugh is such a case.More challenge is nice, but fractals is a daily task, they now take longer most of time. And are more frustrating. With a daily task, you risk, that if you go to far in difficulty you push ppl completely away. I'm going for fractal god, but if it becomes like the cm's to pug, then i will quit very likely.

The good: It requires strategy, adapting. This is quite fun on teamspeak and with ppl that play well. It makes fractals less boring. You must be more aware in most fractals. It promotes changing skills/traits (like get stability more with last laugh).

Now about the 'faults'.

Toxic trail + something other annoying (say afflicted or last laugh or the one that makes you move less fast more damage you take), is very hard in some fractals. Like bloomhunger. The whisp phase sometimes summons army around player. All of those mobs create toxic trail. It's very hard to avoid, and keeps you very likely in combat with afflicted likely putting in cripple, really messy. At boss fight itself, the 'survive bloomhunger mob army' can cover almost full circle with toxic trail It's survivable with good team for short wile (15 sec) but can be pain depending on spread of mobs. And it has to be repeated 3x without mistakes, not easy.

Today i had worst horror so far. Nightmare with last laugh. Generally not much problem and a good instability in this fractal. Except for the last boss, last 15%, it's an absolute knockback 'nightmare' (a real one, pun intended). Not only do the default mechanics knockback and force you in a small save area. All those mobs, become killable, and usually go down in like 3 secs (5+ mobs). If they die spread wide enough, then even double dodge, you will get knocked back, and if then another default mechanic knocks you back, it's painful. 7 pugs quitted after few attempts. The attempt we won with (i got a screenshot from it), we were all downed at 4% hp, two rallied, i gave everything in the world dps wise cause i knew i would fully die next knockback fest. We downed again at 0,7%, spammed downed skills like hell, made it by an inch. This was NOT fun, not skill requiring, nor strategy dependant (we HAD specifically taken all aoe stability we could like well of precognition, stand your ground). My advice, keep instability BUT somehow make the last mobs, not explode (remove the code/block the code on them).

Vindicators still die slowly, you cant 'rally' on them alone, you need your teammates to kill them for you but if they die by same mechanic + vindicator pressure, then you got a real rampage going on. Even if you rally that person but go down to condies it will probably become really chaotic with wipe as result. In most fractals (especially easy ones no prob), but imo in mai trin this has no place, the aoe pressure is huge there already done need an overpowered finisher.

If there would be voting with following options 'keep it, keep it with adjustments, remove it' (the random instabilities) i would choose the second one.

Also friendly reminder Benjamin, I admire that you game so much and know fractals so well. Kudos. However that has a downside. You think like the best player in gw2, the best groups (friend/guild runs, mostly CM runs) that currently play gw2. You know everything in an out, and clearly have often ppl you know well to join you in your team also. But the moment you lfg, the chance of such a crazy good group is low. Usually dps (of everyone) halves, or even less. Wich makes the mechanical pressure double as long, double as much chance to fail the fractal. I'm not saying that you do bad, for instance, amala, Dwayna phase 'checkpoint' is great. I didnt even think that it was possible to have a checkpoint mid boss fight. This is great for pugs. However i still think (not for good groups) but the groups 1 and 2 tiers below the best t4 groups,, that mai trin is overtuned. The moment your dps is low, the adds go down TREMENdously slow, so slow you usually wipe. I'm not saying 3k dps (per person) should make mai trinn doable/easy, but the tresshold should be lower then the current 15-25k per person 'spike during phase' dps requirement. Still i love that you play the game much, it's always better for judgement then not playing it imo. Just keep in mind, you are like a top of the line player if it concerns how good you are at fractals. Like today i was only player in 99 nightmare able to dodge some of the (almost invisible in the 'drunk vision') last laughs at 15% end of boss. This was persistance and long time experience that got me so far, still it didnt help me to prevent knockback rampages, and ultimately a wipe.

It's my hope the instabilities stay random (it's right that it makes then more fun, especially during trash, easier bosses etc), but during some encounters, clearly some insane combo's exist, at the disadvantage of players. Some tuning could be used.

Good feedback ty :) I do want it to be such that one person cannot kill their own vindicator, and I am OK with it being a snowball mechanic in Mai trin as that is what it is designed to do. I think with the new rally and reduced HP as long as the whole group manages to focus it down real quick they can use it to quickly res the downed person.

I am thinking of replacing the blowout with a daze on last laugh since by and large that is the biggest problem right now with random instabilities, at least until we can formulate a full instability balance pass.

The daze would be a fine change. Have you also thought of maybe upping the dmg on the poison trail but slowing down the mov speed of mobs abit? Except in cases where the movement of mobs is importand such as the ice elementals on snowblind or the ouzes on taumanova.

For a short term change I am going to improve the toxic trails messaging so you can actually tell where the damage is. They should be much much easier to deal with without actually tweaking any damage numbers or aoe sizes.

Imho the visual effect could use some polish but its like that with most effects in gw2. It should be easier to tell that the ground is covered in poison and also how much of it is covered.

[Eramonster.2718]

@"zealex.9410" said:Mfw half the population doesnt know what fb or stability is...

In their defence, "Stability" isn't listed under any dps meta builds :lol: . Vindicators is like a free rally tbh, they get obliterated the moment they spawn.

[Trae.2384]

I really hope some much more careful thought goes into the next whitelist update. Theres some that should never be paired on encounters. The above poster has a great point, the devs of this game actually play it so if theyre using their own gameplay experience to tune stuff, that is not going to pertain to 90% of the playerbase who hasnt either created the game or played it for many hours a day every day since launch. My gameplay involves pugging almost exclusively when it comes to pve, maybe 1 in 10 of the groups Ive joined since this release have been unphased by this in a negative way. Ive heard almost exclusively how bad it is and negative comments of the sort.

I absolutely love fractals, it's one of my favorite parts of the game since coming back from a long break, and this change was a very unpleasant experience for me personally but I have adapted just fine for the most part. I do wish you would consider who you're tuning the game for when you make massive changes like this. Most ppl dont know mechanics like developers and just get frustrated and leave after a wipe or 2. I saw 3 groups completely disband yesterday at the Ensolyss 15% phase of nightmare cm. Before the irony there is once you made it to that 15% phase, unless you all DC, you won and now its a rage quit phase so close to the end. Will a daze to LL help that, sure but what about the next unforseen ridiculous combo. If it aint broke dont fix it, but if it is broke please fix it......like now...like yesterday.

[Talindra.4958]

@zealex.9410 said:

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Phoebe Ascension.8437 said:Hi Benjamin and team

I have mixed feelings about this.

The bad (will tell more about it)Much harder to random pug fractals. You have to be 'elitist' to safeguard a good safety margin of error to do the fractals with the current random difficulty. I hate being picking about professions/Setup, but fractals requires it now...Some instabilities work 70-95% fine in a fractal, but in ONE VERY place in fractal it creates chaos. Last laugh is such a case.More challenge is nice, but fractals is a daily task, they now take longer most of time. And are more frustrating. With a daily task, you risk, that if you go to far in difficulty you push ppl completely away. I'm going for fractal god, but if it becomes like the cm's to pug, then i will quit very likely.

The good: It requires strategy, adapting. This is quite fun on teamspeak and with ppl that play well. It makes fractals less boring. You must be more aware in most fractals. It promotes changing skills/traits (like get stability more with last laugh).

Now about the 'faults'.

Toxic trail + something other annoying (say afflicted or last laugh or the one that makes you move less fast more damage you take), is very hard in some fractals. Like bloomhunger. The whisp phase sometimes summons army around player. All of those mobs create toxic trail. It's very hard to avoid, and keeps you very likely in combat with afflicted likely putting in cripple, really messy. At boss fight itself, the 'survive bloomhunger mob army' can cover almost full circle with toxic trail It's survivable with good team for short wile (15 sec) but can be pain depending on spread of mobs. And it has to be repeated 3x without mistakes, not easy.

Today i had worst horror so far. Nightmare with last laugh. Generally not much problem and a good instability in this fractal. Except for the last boss, last 15%, it's an absolute knockback 'nightmare' (a real one, pun intended). Not only do the default mechanics knockback and force you in a small save area. All those mobs, become killable, and usually go down in like 3 secs (5+ mobs). If they die spread wide enough, then even double dodge, you will get knocked back, and if then another default mechanic knocks you back, it's painful. 7 pugs quitted after few attempts. The attempt we won with (i got a screenshot from it), we were all downed at 4% hp, two rallied, i gave everything in the world dps wise cause i knew i would fully die next knockback fest. We downed again at 0,7%, spammed downed skills like hell, made it by an inch. This was NOT fun, not skill requiring, nor strategy dependant (we HAD specifically taken all aoe stability we could like well of precognition, stand your ground). My advice, keep instability BUT somehow make the last mobs, not explode (remove the code/block the code on them).

Vindicators still die slowly, you cant 'rally' on them alone, you need your teammates to kill them for you but if they die by same mechanic + vindicator pressure, then you got a real rampage going on. Even if you rally that person but go down to condies it will probably become really chaotic with wipe as result. In most fractals (especially easy ones no prob), but imo in mai trin this has no place, the aoe pressure is huge there already done need an overpowered finisher.

If there would be voting with following options 'keep it, keep it with adjustments, remove it' (the random instabilities) i would choose the second one.

Also friendly reminder Benjamin, I admire that you game so much and know fractals so well. Kudos. However that has a downside. You think like the best player in gw2, the best groups (friend/guild runs, mostly CM runs) that currently play gw2. You know everything in an out, and clearly have often ppl you know well to join you in your team also. But the moment you lfg, the chance of such a crazy good group is low. Usually dps (of everyone) halves, or even less. Wich makes the mechanical pressure double as long, double as much chance to fail the fractal. I'm not saying that you do bad, for instance, amala, Dwayna phase 'checkpoint' is great. I didnt even think that it was possible to have a checkpoint mid boss fight. This is great for pugs. However i still think (not for good groups) but the groups 1 and 2 tiers below the best t4 groups,, that mai trin is overtuned. The moment your dps is low, the adds go down TREMENdously slow, so slow you usually wipe. I'm not saying 3k dps (per person) should make mai trinn doable/easy, but the tresshold should be lower then the current 15-25k per person 'spike during phase' dps requirement. Still i love that you play the game much, it's always better for judgement then not playing it imo. Just keep in mind, you are like a top of the line player if it concerns how good you are at fractals. Like today i was only player in 99 nightmare able to dodge some of the (almost invisible in the 'drunk vision') last laughs at 15% end of boss. This was persistance and long time experience that got me so far, still it didnt help me to prevent knockback rampages, and ultimately a wipe.

It's my hope the instabilities stay random (it's right that it makes then more fun, especially during trash, easier bosses etc), but during some encounters, clearly some insane combo's exist, at the disadvantage of players. Some tuning could be used.

Good feedback ty :) I do want it to be such that one person cannot kill their own vindicator, and I am OK with it being a snowball mechanic in Mai trin as that is what it is designed to do. I think with the new rally and reduced HP as long as the whole group manages to focus it down real quick they can use it to quickly res the downed person.

I am thinking of replacing the blowout with a daze on last laugh since by and large that is the biggest problem right now with random instabilities, at least until we can formulate a full instability balance pass.

The daze would be a fine change. Have you also thought of maybe upping the dmg on the poison trail but slowing down the mov speed of mobs abit? Except in cases where the movement of mobs is importand such as the ice elementals on snowblind or the ouzes on taumanova.

I like to daze mobs :p don't like to be dazedWell.. hope there's still ground aoe indicator or easy ways for us to react and avoid being daze xD my character's reaction/reflects are very slow and she is very lazy to be on alert all time too :p xD

[Zlater.6789]

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Phoebe Ascension.8437 said:Hi Benjamin and team

I have mixed feelings about this.

The bad (will tell more about it)Much harder to random pug fractals. You have to be 'elitist' to safeguard a good safety margin of error to do the fractals with the current random difficulty. I hate being picking about professions/Setup, but fractals requires it now...Some instabilities work 70-95% fine in a fractal, but in ONE VERY place in fractal it creates chaos. Last laugh is such a case.More challenge is nice, but fractals is a daily task, they now take longer most of time. And are more frustrating. With a daily task, you risk, that if you go to far in difficulty you push ppl completely away. I'm going for fractal god, but if it becomes like the cm's to pug, then i will quit very likely.

The good: It requires strategy, adapting. This is quite fun on teamspeak and with ppl that play well. It makes fractals less boring. You must be more aware in most fractals. It promotes changing skills/traits (like get stability more with last laugh).

Now about the 'faults'.

Toxic trail + something other annoying (say afflicted or last laugh or the one that makes you move less fast more damage you take), is very hard in some fractals. Like bloomhunger. The whisp phase sometimes summons army around player. All of those mobs create toxic trail. It's very hard to avoid, and keeps you very likely in combat with afflicted likely putting in cripple, really messy. At boss fight itself, the 'survive bloomhunger mob army' can cover almost full circle with toxic trail It's survivable with good team for short wile (15 sec) but can be pain depending on spread of mobs. And it has to be repeated 3x without mistakes, not easy.

Today i had worst horror so far. Nightmare with last laugh. Generally not much problem and a good instability in this fractal. Except for the last boss, last 15%, it's an absolute knockback 'nightmare' (a real one, pun intended). Not only do the default mechanics knockback and force you in a small save area. All those mobs, become killable, and usually go down in like 3 secs (5+ mobs). If they die spread wide enough, then even double dodge, you will get knocked back, and if then another default mechanic knocks you back, it's painful. 7 pugs quitted after few attempts. The attempt we won with (i got a screenshot from it), we were all downed at 4% hp, two rallied, i gave everything in the world dps wise cause i knew i would fully die next knockback fest. We downed again at 0,7%, spammed downed skills like hell, made it by an inch. This was NOT fun, not skill requiring, nor strategy dependant (we HAD specifically taken all aoe stability we could like well of precognition, stand your ground). My advice, keep instability BUT somehow make the last mobs, not explode (remove the code/block the code on them).

Vindicators still die slowly, you cant 'rally' on them alone, you need your teammates to kill them for you but if they die by same mechanic + vindicator pressure, then you got a real rampage going on. Even if you rally that person but go down to condies it will probably become really chaotic with wipe as result. In most fractals (especially easy ones no prob), but imo in mai trin this has no place, the aoe pressure is huge there already done need an overpowered finisher.

If there would be voting with following options 'keep it, keep it with adjustments, remove it' (the random instabilities) i would choose the second one.

Also friendly reminder Benjamin, I admire that you game so much and know fractals so well. Kudos. However that has a downside. You think like the best player in gw2, the best groups (friend/guild runs, mostly CM runs) that currently play gw2. You know everything in an out, and clearly have often ppl you know well to join you in your team also. But the moment you lfg, the chance of such a crazy good group is low. Usually dps (of everyone) halves, or even less. Wich makes the mechanical pressure double as long, double as much chance to fail the fractal. I'm not saying that you do bad, for instance, amala, Dwayna phase 'checkpoint' is great. I didnt even think that it was possible to have a checkpoint mid boss fight. This is great for pugs. However i still think (not for good groups) but the groups 1 and 2 tiers below the best t4 groups,, that mai trin is overtuned. The moment your dps is low, the adds go down TREMENdously slow, so slow you usually wipe. I'm not saying 3k dps (per person) should make mai trinn doable/easy, but the tresshold should be lower then the current 15-25k per person 'spike during phase' dps requirement. Still i love that you play the game much, it's always better for judgement then not playing it imo. Just keep in mind, you are like a top of the line player if it concerns how good you are at fractals. Like today i was only player in 99 nightmare able to dodge some of the (almost invisible in the 'drunk vision') last laughs at 15% end of boss. This was persistance and long time experience that got me so far, still it didnt help me to prevent knockback rampages, and ultimately a wipe.

It's my hope the instabilities stay random (it's right that it makes then more fun, especially during trash, easier bosses etc), but during some encounters, clearly some insane combo's exist, at the disadvantage of players. Some tuning could be used.

Good feedback ty :) I do want it to be such that one person cannot kill their own vindicator, and I am OK with it being a snowball mechanic in Mai trin as that is what it is designed to do. I think with the new rally and reduced HP as long as the whole group manages to focus it down real quick they can use it to quickly res the downed person.

I am thinking of replacing the blowout with a daze on last laugh since by and large that is the biggest problem right now with random instabilities, at least until we can formulate a full instability balance pass.

Ben instead of making it a daze, could you perhaps consider just putting last laugh on a global cool down. I for one think it's a good idea and a really cool mechanic that makes you think on your feet and catches you off guard if you don't avoid it. But it becomes a serious problem when there are a lot of adds dying at the same time more so when you also have to be aware of personal placement. That would really alleviate the silliness of it without having to nerf encounters or give up any of its flavor.

[Benjamin Arnold.3457]

@Zlater.6789 said:

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Phoebe Ascension.8437 said:Hi Benjamin and team

I have mixed feelings about this.

The bad (will tell more about it)Much harder to random pug fractals. You have to be 'elitist' to safeguard a good safety margin of error to do the fractals with the current random difficulty. I hate being picking about professions/Setup, but fractals requires it now...Some instabilities work 70-95% fine in a fractal, but in ONE VERY place in fractal it creates chaos. Last laugh is such a case.More challenge is nice, but fractals is a daily task, they now take longer most of time. And are more frustrating. With a daily task, you risk, that if you go to far in difficulty you push ppl completely away. I'm going for fractal god, but if it becomes like the cm's to pug, then i will quit very likely.

The good: It requires strategy, adapting. This is quite fun on teamspeak and with ppl that play well. It makes fractals less boring. You must be more aware in most fractals. It promotes changing skills/traits (like get stability more with last laugh).

Now about the 'faults'.

Toxic trail + something other annoying (say afflicted or last laugh or the one that makes you move less fast more damage you take), is very hard in some fractals. Like bloomhunger. The whisp phase sometimes summons army around player. All of those mobs create toxic trail. It's very hard to avoid, and keeps you very likely in combat with afflicted likely putting in cripple, really messy. At boss fight itself, the 'survive bloomhunger mob army' can cover almost full circle with toxic trail It's survivable with good team for short wile (15 sec) but can be pain depending on spread of mobs. And it has to be repeated 3x without mistakes, not easy.

Today i had worst horror so far. Nightmare with last laugh. Generally not much problem and a good instability in this fractal. Except for the last boss, last 15%, it's an absolute knockback 'nightmare' (a real one, pun intended). Not only do the default mechanics knockback and force you in a small save area. All those mobs, become killable, and usually go down in like 3 secs (5+ mobs). If they die spread wide enough, then even double dodge, you will get knocked back, and if then another default mechanic knocks you back, it's painful. 7 pugs quitted after few attempts. The attempt we won with (i got a screenshot from it), we were all downed at 4% hp, two rallied, i gave everything in the world dps wise cause i knew i would fully die next knockback fest. We downed again at 0,7%, spammed downed skills like hell, made it by an inch. This was NOT fun, not skill requiring, nor strategy dependant (we HAD specifically taken all aoe stability we could like well of precognition, stand your ground). My advice, keep instability BUT somehow make the last mobs, not explode (remove the code/block the code on them).

Vindicators still die slowly, you cant 'rally' on them alone, you need your teammates to kill them for you but if they die by same mechanic + vindicator pressure, then you got a real rampage going on. Even if you rally that person but go down to condies it will probably become really chaotic with wipe as result. In most fractals (especially easy ones no prob), but imo in mai trin this has no place, the aoe pressure is huge there already done need an overpowered finisher.

If there would be voting with following options 'keep it, keep it with adjustments, remove it' (the random instabilities) i would choose the second one.

Also friendly reminder Benjamin, I admire that you game so much and know fractals so well. Kudos. However that has a downside. You think like the best player in gw2, the best groups (friend/guild runs, mostly CM runs) that currently play gw2. You know everything in an out, and clearly have often ppl you know well to join you in your team also. But the moment you lfg, the chance of such a crazy good group is low. Usually dps (of everyone) halves, or even less. Wich makes the mechanical pressure double as long, double as much chance to fail the fractal. I'm not saying that you do bad, for instance, amala, Dwayna phase 'checkpoint' is great. I didnt even think that it was possible to have a checkpoint mid boss fight. This is great for pugs. However i still think (not for good groups) but the groups 1 and 2 tiers below the best t4 groups,, that mai trin is overtuned. The moment your dps is low, the adds go down TREMENdously slow, so slow you usually wipe. I'm not saying 3k dps (per person) should make mai trinn doable/easy, but the tresshold should be lower then the current 15-25k per person 'spike during phase' dps requirement. Still i love that you play the game much, it's always better for judgement then not playing it imo. Just keep in mind, you are like a top of the line player if it concerns how good you are at fractals. Like today i was only player in 99 nightmare able to dodge some of the (almost invisible in the 'drunk vision') last laughs at 15% end of boss. This was persistance and long time experience that got me so far, still it didnt help me to prevent knockback rampages, and ultimately a wipe.

It's my hope the instabilities stay random (it's right that it makes then more fun, especially during trash, easier bosses etc), but during some encounters, clearly some insane combo's exist, at the disadvantage of players. Some tuning could be used.

Good feedback ty :) I do want it to be such that one person cannot kill their own vindicator, and I am OK with it being a snowball mechanic in Mai trin as that is what it is designed to do. I think with the new rally and reduced HP as long as the whole group manages to focus it down real quick they can use it to quickly res the downed person.

I am thinking of replacing the blowout with a daze on last laugh since by and large that is the biggest problem right now with random instabilities, at least until we can formulate a full instability balance pass.

Ben instead of making it a daze, could you perhaps consider just putting last laugh on a global cool down. I for one think it's a good idea and a really cool mechanic that makes you think on your feet and catches you off guard if you don't avoid it. But it becomes a serious problem when there are a lot of adds dying at the same time more so when you also have to be aware of personal placement. That would really alleviate the silliness of it without having to nerf encounters or give up any of its flavor.

Potentially in the balance patch but I don't want to overnerf it with this short term change.

[zealex.9410]

@Talindra.4958 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Phoebe Ascension.8437 said:Hi Benjamin and team

I have mixed feelings about this.

The bad (will tell more about it)Much harder to random pug fractals. You have to be 'elitist' to safeguard a good safety margin of error to do the fractals with the current random difficulty. I hate being picking about professions/Setup, but fractals requires it now...Some instabilities work 70-95% fine in a fractal, but in ONE VERY place in fractal it creates chaos. Last laugh is such a case.More challenge is nice, but fractals is a daily task, they now take longer most of time. And are more frustrating. With a daily task, you risk, that if you go to far in difficulty you push ppl completely away. I'm going for fractal god, but if it becomes like the cm's to pug, then i will quit very likely.

The good: It requires strategy, adapting. This is quite fun on teamspeak and with ppl that play well. It makes fractals less boring. You must be more aware in most fractals. It promotes changing skills/traits (like get stability more with last laugh).

Now about the 'faults'.

Toxic trail + something other annoying (say afflicted or last laugh or the one that makes you move less fast more damage you take), is very hard in some fractals. Like bloomhunger. The whisp phase sometimes summons army around player. All of those mobs create toxic trail. It's very hard to avoid, and keeps you very likely in combat with afflicted likely putting in cripple, really messy. At boss fight itself, the 'survive bloomhunger mob army' can cover almost full circle with toxic trail It's survivable with good team for short wile (15 sec) but can be pain depending on spread of mobs. And it has to be repeated 3x without mistakes, not easy.

Today i had worst horror so far. Nightmare with last laugh. Generally not much problem and a good instability in this fractal. Except for the last boss, last 15%, it's an absolute knockback 'nightmare' (a real one, pun intended). Not only do the default mechanics knockback and force you in a small save area. All those mobs, become killable, and usually go down in like 3 secs (5+ mobs). If they die spread wide enough, then even double dodge, you will get knocked back, and if then another default mechanic knocks you back, it's painful. 7 pugs quitted after few attempts. The attempt we won with (i got a screenshot from it), we were all downed at 4% hp, two rallied, i gave everything in the world dps wise cause i knew i would fully die next knockback fest. We downed again at 0,7%, spammed downed skills like hell, made it by an inch. This was NOT fun, not skill requiring, nor strategy dependant (we HAD specifically taken all aoe stability we could like well of precognition, stand your ground). My advice, keep instability BUT somehow make the last mobs, not explode (remove the code/block the code on them).

Vindicators still die slowly, you cant 'rally' on them alone, you need your teammates to kill them for you but if they die by same mechanic + vindicator pressure, then you got a real rampage going on. Even if you rally that person but go down to condies it will probably become really chaotic with wipe as result. In most fractals (especially easy ones no prob), but imo in mai trin this has no place, the aoe pressure is huge there already done need an overpowered finisher.

If there would be voting with following options 'keep it, keep it with adjustments, remove it' (the random instabilities) i would choose the second one.

Also friendly reminder Benjamin, I admire that you game so much and know fractals so well. Kudos. However that has a downside. You think like the best player in gw2, the best groups (friend/guild runs, mostly CM runs) that currently play gw2. You know everything in an out, and clearly have often ppl you know well to join you in your team also. But the moment you lfg, the chance of such a crazy good group is low. Usually dps (of everyone) halves, or even less. Wich makes the mechanical pressure double as long, double as much chance to fail the fractal. I'm not saying that you do bad, for instance, amala, Dwayna phase 'checkpoint' is great. I didnt even think that it was possible to have a checkpoint mid boss fight. This is great for pugs. However i still think (not for good groups) but the groups 1 and 2 tiers below the best t4 groups,, that mai trin is overtuned. The moment your dps is low, the adds go down TREMENdously slow, so slow you usually wipe. I'm not saying 3k dps (per person) should make mai trinn doable/easy, but the tresshold should be lower then the current 15-25k per person 'spike during phase' dps requirement. Still i love that you play the game much, it's always better for judgement then not playing it imo. Just keep in mind, you are like a top of the line player if it concerns how good you are at fractals. Like today i was only player in 99 nightmare able to dodge some of the (almost invisible in the 'drunk vision') last laughs at 15% end of boss. This was persistance and long time experience that got me so far, still it didnt help me to prevent knockback rampages, and ultimately a wipe.

It's my hope the instabilities stay random (it's right that it makes then more fun, especially during trash, easier bosses etc), but during some encounters, clearly some insane combo's exist, at the disadvantage of players. Some tuning could be used.

Good feedback ty :) I do want it to be such that one person cannot kill their own vindicator, and I am OK with it being a snowball mechanic in Mai trin as that is what it is designed to do. I think with the new rally and reduced HP as long as the whole group manages to focus it down real quick they can use it to quickly res the downed person.

I am thinking of replacing the blowout with a daze on last laugh since by and large that is the biggest problem right now with random instabilities, at least until we can formulate a full instability balance pass.

The daze would be a fine change. Have you also thought of maybe upping the dmg on the poison trail but slowing down the mov speed of mobs abit? Except in cases where the movement of mobs is importand such as the ice elementals on snowblind or the ouzes on taumanova.

I like to daze mobs :p don't like to be dazedWell.. hope there's still ground aoe indicator or easy ways for us to react and avoid being daze xD my character's reaction/reflects are very slow and she is very lazy to be on alert all time too :p xD

Do you like to be knocked around the place more? It will prob be the same thing but instead of knocking u around the olaces instead it dazes you.

[Talindra.4958]

@zealex.9410 said:

@Talindra.4958 said:

@zealex.9410 said:

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Phoebe Ascension.8437 said:Hi Benjamin and team

I have mixed feelings about this.

The bad (will tell more about it)Much harder to random pug fractals. You have to be 'elitist' to safeguard a good safety margin of error to do the fractals with the current random difficulty. I hate being picking about professions/Setup, but fractals requires it now...Some instabilities work 70-95% fine in a fractal, but in ONE VERY place in fractal it creates chaos. Last laugh is such a case.More challenge is nice, but fractals is a daily task, they now take longer most of time. And are more frustrating. With a daily task, you risk, that if you go to far in difficulty you push ppl completely away. I'm going for fractal god, but if it becomes like the cm's to pug, then i will quit very likely.

The good: It requires strategy, adapting. This is quite fun on teamspeak and with ppl that play well. It makes fractals less boring. You must be more aware in most fractals. It promotes changing skills/traits (like get stability more with last laugh).

Now about the 'faults'.

Toxic trail + something other annoying (say afflicted or last laugh or the one that makes you move less fast more damage you take), is very hard in some fractals. Like bloomhunger. The whisp phase sometimes summons army around player. All of those mobs create toxic trail. It's very hard to avoid, and keeps you very likely in combat with afflicted likely putting in cripple, really messy. At boss fight itself, the 'survive bloomhunger mob army' can cover almost full circle with toxic trail It's survivable with good team for short wile (15 sec) but can be pain depending on spread of mobs. And it has to be repeated 3x without mistakes, not easy.

Today i had worst horror so far. Nightmare with last laugh. Generally not much problem and a good instability in this fractal. Except for the last boss, last 15%, it's an absolute knockback 'nightmare' (a real one, pun intended). Not only do the default mechanics knockback and force you in a small save area. All those mobs, become killable, and usually go down in like 3 secs (5+ mobs). If they die spread wide enough, then even double dodge, you will get knocked back, and if then another default mechanic knocks you back, it's painful. 7 pugs quitted after few attempts. The attempt we won with (i got a screenshot from it), we were all downed at 4% hp, two rallied, i gave everything in the world dps wise cause i knew i would fully die next knockback fest. We downed again at 0,7%, spammed downed skills like hell, made it by an inch. This was NOT fun, not skill requiring, nor strategy dependant (we HAD specifically taken all aoe stability we could like well of precognition, stand your ground). My advice, keep instability BUT somehow make the last mobs, not explode (remove the code/block the code on them).

Vindicators still die slowly, you cant 'rally' on them alone, you need your teammates to kill them for you but if they die by same mechanic + vindicator pressure, then you got a real rampage going on. Even if you rally that person but go down to condies it will probably become really chaotic with wipe as result. In most fractals (especially easy ones no prob), but imo in mai trin this has no place, the aoe pressure is huge there already done need an overpowered finisher.

If there would be voting with following options 'keep it, keep it with adjustments, remove it' (the random instabilities) i would choose the second one.

Also friendly reminder Benjamin, I admire that you game so much and know fractals so well. Kudos. However that has a downside. You think like the best player in gw2, the best groups (friend/guild runs, mostly CM runs) that currently play gw2. You know everything in an out, and clearly have often ppl you know well to join you in your team also. But the moment you lfg, the chance of such a crazy good group is low. Usually dps (of everyone) halves, or even less. Wich makes the mechanical pressure double as long, double as much chance to fail the fractal. I'm not saying that you do bad, for instance, amala, Dwayna phase 'checkpoint' is great. I didnt even think that it was possible to have a checkpoint mid boss fight. This is great for pugs. However i still think (not for good groups) but the groups 1 and 2 tiers below the best t4 groups,, that mai trin is overtuned. The moment your dps is low, the adds go down TREMENdously slow, so slow you usually wipe. I'm not saying 3k dps (per person) should make mai trinn doable/easy, but the tresshold should be lower then the current 15-25k per person 'spike during phase' dps requirement. Still i love that you play the game much, it's always better for judgement then not playing it imo. Just keep in mind, you are like a top of the line player if it concerns how good you are at fractals. Like today i was only player in 99 nightmare able to dodge some of the (almost invisible in the 'drunk vision') last laughs at 15% end of boss. This was persistance and long time experience that got me so far, still it didnt help me to prevent knockback rampages, and ultimately a wipe.

It's my hope the instabilities stay random (it's right that it makes then more fun, especially during trash, easier bosses etc), but during some encounters, clearly some insane combo's exist, at the disadvantage of players. Some tuning could be used.

Good feedback ty :) I do want it to be such that one person cannot kill their own vindicator, and I am OK with it being a snowball mechanic in Mai trin as that is what it is designed to do. I think with the new rally and reduced HP as long as the whole group manages to focus it down real quick they can use it to quickly res the downed person.

I am thinking of replacing the blowout with a daze on last laugh since by and large that is the biggest problem right now with random instabilities, at least until we can formulate a full instability balance pass.

The daze would be a fine change. Have you also thought of maybe upping the dmg on the poison trail but slowing down the mov speed of mobs abit? Except in cases where the movement of mobs is importand such as the ice elementals on snowblind or the ouzes on taumanova.

I like to daze mobs :p don't like to be dazedWell.. hope there's still ground aoe indicator or easy ways for us to react and avoid being daze xD my character's reaction/reflects are very slow and she is very lazy to be on alert all time too :p xD

Do you like to be knocked around the place more? It will prob be the same thing but instead of knocking u around the olaces instead it dazes you.

I happen to be able to time the dodge 8 out of 10 perfectly. If just swapping kd to daze not removing the indicator then that's nothing change to me which is good as I think currently I'm fine with current last laugh no problemo. (I am with 400 average ping)If the mobs are well managed team m8s position well.. good mobs management means last laugh will be easy to manage too.. I think a lot of this is six senses too idk :p just saying last laugh is fine with average group.. but if we are adjusting last laugh as in making it easier then yes yes go ahead xD

[Vinceman.4572]

@"Trae.2384" said:I saw 3 groups completely disband yesterday at the Ensolyss 15% phase of nightmare cm. Before the irony there is once you made it to that 15% phase, unless you all DC, you won and now its a rage quit phase so close to the end.

If chrono and druid are doing their job and stop relaxing after phase shift to enjoy a flawless victory the last phase is no problem at all. Seriously, the 15% mark before was like: "Oh, we did it. Boss only lost 85% of his hp but the fight is over. gg bois!" A deadly and challenging encounter should be harder in the end not easier. Good groups are still making it without wiping once!

[Eramonster.2718]

At this rate, we might end up with everything nerfed and fractals will be linear/stale than ever before (when its a breeze no matter what instability is randomized) :sweat:. Starting to feel the previous system is more enjoyable "balanced".

How 99cm last boss used to start "Can't this guy die any faster?" and ends at 15% "We got this bagged boys and girls, stack close and mash your buttons especially you; healer :wink:"

[TexZero.7910]

@Vinceman.4572 said:A deadly and challenging encounter should be harder in the end not easier. Good groups are still making it without wiping once!

Eh i have a problem with this archaic line of thinking.

If the boss is truly deadly and hard it should be deadly and hard for the entire fight, not just some arbitrary number of health or some attempt to artificially create fight/flight on a boss.

Now im not saying you can't have phase shifts/different attack patterns. What im saying is it shouldn't be limited to oh look im almost dying, best get serious because that cliche gets old.

[Geisterlicht.6083]

@"Eramonster.2718" said:At this rate, we might end up with everything nerfed and fractals will be linear/stale than ever before (when its a breeze no matter what instability is randomized) :sweat:. Starting to feel the previous system is more enjoyable "balanced".

How 99cm last boss used to start "Can't this guy die any faster?" and ends at 15% "We got this bagged boys and girls, stack close and mash your buttons especially you; healer :wink:"

I have to agree with you, I think Last Laugh was the best addition to 99&100CM since their introduction.The exploding mobs at ensolyss could have been baseline and noone would have complained.But now that it comes as an instability, people cry.It is sad that they already removed knockbacks from several mobs in 100CM, now people ask for the same on 99CM? Seriously, I don't know what is wrong with these people...

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Zlater.6789 said:

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Phoebe Ascension.8437 said:Hi Benjamin and team

I have mixed feelings about this.

The bad (will tell more about it)Much harder to random pug fractals. You have to be 'elitist' to safeguard a good safety margin of error to do the fractals with the current random difficulty. I hate being picking about professions/Setup, but fractals requires it now...Some instabilities work 70-95% fine in a fractal, but in ONE VERY place in fractal it creates chaos. Last laugh is such a case.More challenge is nice, but fractals is a daily task, they now take longer most of time. And are more frustrating. With a daily task, you risk, that if you go to far in difficulty you push ppl completely away. I'm going for fractal god, but if it becomes like the cm's to pug, then i will quit very likely.

The good: It requires strategy, adapting. This is quite fun on teamspeak and with ppl that play well. It makes fractals less boring. You must be more aware in most fractals. It promotes changing skills/traits (like get stability more with last laugh).

Now about the 'faults'.

Toxic trail + something other annoying (say afflicted or last laugh or the one that makes you move less fast more damage you take), is very hard in some fractals. Like bloomhunger. The whisp phase sometimes summons army around player. All of those mobs create toxic trail. It's very hard to avoid, and keeps you very likely in combat with afflicted likely putting in cripple, really messy. At boss fight itself, the 'survive bloomhunger mob army' can cover almost full circle with toxic trail It's survivable with good team for short wile (15 sec) but can be pain depending on spread of mobs. And it has to be repeated 3x without mistakes, not easy.

Today i had worst horror so far. Nightmare with last laugh. Generally not much problem and a good instability in this fractal. Except for the last boss, last 15%, it's an absolute knockback 'nightmare' (a real one, pun intended). Not only do the default mechanics knockback and force you in a small save area. All those mobs, become killable, and usually go down in like 3 secs (5+ mobs). If they die spread wide enough, then even double dodge, you will get knocked back, and if then another default mechanic knocks you back, it's painful. 7 pugs quitted after few attempts. The attempt we won with (i got a screenshot from it), we were all downed at 4% hp, two rallied, i gave everything in the world dps wise cause i knew i would fully die next knockback fest. We downed again at 0,7%, spammed downed skills like hell, made it by an inch. This was NOT fun, not skill requiring, nor strategy dependant (we HAD specifically taken all aoe stability we could like well of precognition, stand your ground). My advice, keep instability BUT somehow make the last mobs, not explode (remove the code/block the code on them).

Vindicators still die slowly, you cant 'rally' on them alone, you need your teammates to kill them for you but if they die by same mechanic + vindicator pressure, then you got a real rampage going on. Even if you rally that person but go down to condies it will probably become really chaotic with wipe as result. In most fractals (especially easy ones no prob), but imo in mai trin this has no place, the aoe pressure is huge there already done need an overpowered finisher.

If there would be voting with following options 'keep it, keep it with adjustments, remove it' (the random instabilities) i would choose the second one.

Also friendly reminder Benjamin, I admire that you game so much and know fractals so well. Kudos. However that has a downside. You think like the best player in gw2, the best groups (friend/guild runs, mostly CM runs) that currently play gw2. You know everything in an out, and clearly have often ppl you know well to join you in your team also. But the moment you lfg, the chance of such a crazy good group is low. Usually dps (of everyone) halves, or even less. Wich makes the mechanical pressure double as long, double as much chance to fail the fractal. I'm not saying that you do bad, for instance, amala, Dwayna phase 'checkpoint' is great. I didnt even think that it was possible to have a checkpoint mid boss fight. This is great for pugs. However i still think (not for good groups) but the groups 1 and 2 tiers below the best t4 groups,, that mai trin is overtuned. The moment your dps is low, the adds go down TREMENdously slow, so slow you usually wipe. I'm not saying 3k dps (per person) should make mai trinn doable/easy, but the tresshold should be lower then the current 15-25k per person 'spike during phase' dps requirement. Still i love that you play the game much, it's always better for judgement then not playing it imo. Just keep in mind, you are like a top of the line player if it concerns how good you are at fractals. Like today i was only player in 99 nightmare able to dodge some of the (almost invisible in the 'drunk vision') last laughs at 15% end of boss. This was persistance and long time experience that got me so far, still it didnt help me to prevent knockback rampages, and ultimately a wipe.

It's my hope the instabilities stay random (it's right that it makes then more fun, especially during trash, easier bosses etc), but during some encounters, clearly some insane combo's exist, at the disadvantage of players. Some tuning could be used.

Good feedback ty :) I do want it to be such that one person cannot kill their own vindicator, and I am OK with it being a snowball mechanic in Mai trin as that is what it is designed to do. I think with the new rally and reduced HP as long as the whole group manages to focus it down real quick they can use it to quickly res the downed person.

I am thinking of replacing the blowout with a daze on last laugh since by and large that is the biggest problem right now with random instabilities, at least until we can formulate a full instability balance pass.

Ben instead of making it a daze, could you perhaps consider just putting last laugh on a global cool down. I for one think it's a good idea and a really cool mechanic that makes you think on your feet and catches you off guard if you don't avoid it. But it becomes a serious problem when there are a lot of adds dying at the same time more so when you also have to be aware of personal placement. That would really alleviate the silliness of it without having to nerf encounters or give up any of its flavor.

Potentially in the balance patch but I don't want to overnerf it with this short term change.

I agree, an icd would overnerf it way too hard.

If you change the knockbacks into daze, have you thought of upping the damage the explosions deal?So it remains punishing if somebody decides to brainafk and just facetanks everything?

[zealex.9410]

@TexZero.7910 said:

@Vinceman.4572 said:A deadly and challenging encounter should be harder in the end not easier. Good groups are still making it without wiping once!

Eh i have a problem with this archaic line of thinking.

If the boss is truly deadly and hard it should be deadly and hard for the entire fight, not just some arbitrary number of health or some attempt to artificially create fight/flight on a boss.

Now im not saying you can't have phase shifts/different attack patterns. What im saying is it shouldn't be limited to oh look im almost dying, best get serious because that cliche gets old.

Nah its good to have both. I really disliked how enso at the end just stands there lookimg lile hes casting something but instead of having a dps check we instead get a semi afk phase.

[zealex.9410]

@Geisterlicht.6083 said:

@"Eramonster.2718" said:At this rate, we might end up with everything nerfed and fractals will be linear/stale than ever before (when its a breeze no matter what instability is randomized) :sweat:. Starting to feel the previous system is more enjoyable "balanced".

How 99cm last boss used to start "Can't this guy die any faster?" and ends at 15% "We got this bagged boys and girls, stack close and mash your buttons especially you; healer :wink:"

I have to agree with you, I think Last Laugh was the best addition to 99&100CM since their introduction.The exploding mobs at ensolyss could have been baseline and noone would have complained.But now that it comes as an instability, people cry.It is sad that they already removed knockbacks from several mobs in 100CM, now people ask for the same on 99CM? Seriously, I don't know what is wrong with these people...

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Zlater.6789 said:

@Benjamin Arnold.3457 said:

@Phoebe Ascension.8437 said:Hi Benjamin and team

I have mixed feelings about this.

The bad (will tell more about it)Much harder to random pug fractals. You have to be 'elitist' to safeguard a good safety margin of error to do the fractals with the current random difficulty. I hate being picking about professions/Setup, but fractals requires it now...Some instabilities work 70-95% fine in a fractal, but in ONE VERY place in fractal it creates chaos. Last laugh is such a case.More challenge is nice, but fractals is a daily task, they now take longer most of time. And are more frustrating. With a daily task, you risk, that if you go to far in difficulty you push ppl completely away. I'm going for fractal god, but if it becomes like the cm's to pug, then i will quit very likely.

The good: It requires strategy, adapting. This is quite fun on teamspeak and with ppl that play well. It makes fractals less boring. You must be more aware in most fractals. It promotes changing skills/traits (like get stability more with last laugh).

Now about the 'faults'.

Toxic trail + something other annoying (say afflicted or last laugh or the one that makes you move less fast more damage you take), is very hard in some fractals. Like bloomhunger. The whisp phase sometimes summons army around player. All of those mobs create toxic trail. It's very hard to avoid, and keeps you very likely in combat with afflicted likely putting in cripple, really messy. At boss fight itself, the 'survive bloomhunger mob army' can cover almost full circle with toxic trail It's survivable with good team for short wile (15 sec) but can be pain depending on spread of mobs. And it has to be repeated 3x without mistakes, not easy.

Today i had worst horror so far. Nightmare with last laugh. Generally not much problem and a good instability in this fractal. Except for the last boss, last 15%, it's an absolute knockback 'nightmare' (a real one, pun intended). Not only do the default mechanics knockback and force you in a small save area. All those mobs, become killable, and usually go down in like 3 secs (5+ mobs). If they die spread wide enough, then even double dodge, you will get knocked back, and if then another default mechanic knocks you back, it's painful. 7 pugs quitted after few attempts. The attempt we won with (i got a screenshot from it), we were all downed at 4% hp, two rallied, i gave everything in the world dps wise cause i knew i would fully die next knockback fest. We downed again at 0,7%, spammed downed skills like hell, made it by an inch. This was NOT fun, not skill requiring, nor strategy dependant (we HAD specifically taken all aoe stability we could like well of precognition, stand your ground). My advice, keep instability BUT somehow make the last mobs, not explode (remove the code/block the code on them).

Vindicators still die slowly, you cant 'rally' on them alone, you need your teammates to kill them for you but if they die by same mechanic + vindicator pressure, then you got a real rampage going on. Even if you rally that person but go down to condies it will probably become really chaotic with wipe as result. In most fractals (especially easy ones no prob), but imo in mai trin this has no place, the aoe pressure is huge there already done need an overpowered finisher.

If there would be voting with following options 'keep it, keep it with adjustments, remove it' (the random instabilities) i would choose the second one.

Also friendly reminder Benjamin, I admire that you game so much and know fractals so well. Kudos. However that has a downside. You think like the best player in gw2, the best groups (friend/guild runs, mostly CM runs) that currently play gw2. You know everything in an out, and clearly have often ppl you know well to join you in your team also. But the moment you lfg, the chance of such a crazy good group is low. Usually dps (of everyone) halves, or even less. Wich makes the mechanical pressure double as long, double as much chance to fail the fractal. I'm not saying that you do bad, for instance, amala, Dwayna phase 'checkpoint' is great. I didnt even think that it was possible to have a checkpoint mid boss fight. This is great for pugs. However i still think (not for good groups) but the groups 1 and 2 tiers below the best t4 groups,, that mai trin is overtuned. The moment your dps is low, the adds go down TREMENdously slow, so slow you usually wipe. I'm not saying 3k dps (per person) should make mai trinn doable/easy, but the tresshold should be lower then the current 15-25k per person 'spike during phase' dps requirement. Still i love that you play the game much, it's always better for judgement then not playing it imo. Just keep in mind, you are like a top of the line player if it concerns how good you are at fractals. Like today i was only player in 99 nightmare able to dodge some of the (almost invisible in the 'drunk vision') last laughs at 15% end of boss. This was persistance and long time experience that got me so far, still it didnt help me to prevent knockback rampages, and ultimately a wipe.

It's my hope the instabilities stay random (it's right that it makes then more fun, especially during trash, easier bosses etc), but during some encounters, clearly some insane combo's exist, at the disadvantage of players. Some tuning could be used.

Good feedback ty :) I do want it to be such that one person cannot kill their own vindicator, and I am OK with it being a snowball mechanic in Mai trin as that is what it is designed to do. I think with the new rally and reduced HP as long as the whole group manages to focus it down real quick they can use it to quickly res the downed person.

I am thinking of replacing the blowout with a daze on last laugh since by and large that is the biggest problem right now with random instabilities, at least until we can formulate a full instability balance pass.

Ben instead of making it a daze, could you perhaps consider just putting last laugh on a global cool down. I for one think it's a good idea and a really cool mechanic that makes you think on your feet and catches you off guard if you don't avoid it. But it becomes a serious problem when there are a lot of adds dying at the same time more so when you also have to be aware of personal placement. That would really alleviate the silliness of it without having to nerf encounters or give up any of its flavor.

Potentially in the balance patch but I don't want to overnerf it with this short term change.

I agree, an icd would overnerf it way too hard.

If you change the knockbacks into daze, have you thought of upping the damage the explosions deal?So it remains punishing if somebody decides to brainafk and just facetanks everything?

Also while turning it into a daze dont turn it into a tiny bit of daze. If you got knocked by 1 last laugh into multiple exploding u were dead. Dont make it so after u are dazed u can still run out of others that are about to explode.

[Talindra.4958]

@Eramonster.2718 said:At this rate, we might end up with everything nerfed.hahaha!!! not that bad :p just a bit of changes here and there is fine I think.. as long as not nerf to our current build.. >:(

[GrubySzymek.1362]

Imagine if Ben didn't play with random instabilities at all and how much of recent problems would have been avoided.

[Talindra.4958]

@"Kheldorn.5123" said:Imagine if Ben didn't play with random instabilities at all and how much of recent problems would have been avoided.

i guess something has to be done to make the current fractal more interesting, something that will make old maps more alive. players (like myself) is starting to feel weary and impatient esp with the daily run..... -.- so I guess a little change can be refreshing . lets just see how this changes turn out once it is properly readjusted.. :D :cookie:

[AllNightPlayer.1286]

@"Eramonster.2718" said:At this rate, we might end up with everything nerfed and fractals will be linear/stale than ever before (when its a breeze no matter what instability is randomized) :sweat:. Starting to feel the previous system is more enjoyable "balanced".And why is this bad? Factals weren’t meant to be raids for five people. Especially since dungeons aren’t supported anymore, factals are the new dungeons with complex but also easy mechanics.

[Faaris.8013]

@Geisterlicht.6083 said:I have to agree with you, I think Last Laugh was the best addition to 99&100CM since their introduction.

Do you also like being permastunned? Because we could ask Benjamin to add that to the random instabilities. Of course you are allowed to have your opinion, but in this case, you are part of a very tiny minority of masochists :p

There are mechanics that just take away initiative from players, and for most people, they are not considered fun. I believe most players don't find it fun to be stunned by the Jellyfish boss in Aquatic Ruins, and most people don't find it fun when their hits are blocked for 7 seconds by dredge who pull out a shield. These things don't add challenge to encounters, they just prolong the inevitable. They are like adding health to a mob in an attempt to make it harder and the encounter last longer.

Hamstrung, Last Laugh and Poison Trails belong to the same category for me, they are just annoyances. And really, as developer, if you feel like this stuff adds value to your encounter, maybe the encounter itself is lacking and needs some rework. I thought they were on the right track with instabilities to make fractals less tedious, but I was wrong. Instead of having a unique experience in each fractal, with instabilities, they are more similar to each other than ever. If those instabilities are more of a concern for players when it comes to builds and team setup then the actual fractal, something went wrong.

Maybe it's just overdone. What if we had normal fractals and got one or two instabilities once in a while? They would act like natural hazards then and might spice things up. Since they are a given in all fractals, 3 at a time, and very often simply the same, they are not surprising or seen as natural hazards anymore. They lost their ability to spice things up. When I just finished Nightmare and it had Last Laugh, and then do Aetherblade, also with Last Laugh, it's getting old quickly. For me, it feels like making the floor hot like in Volcanic. You have to move constantly (or outheal). It's ok for this single instance in my opinion. Now imagine they added that everywhere, in all fractals. Would it spice things up? Not at all, we would just get used to it and it would become a part of what fractals are.

Another thing I don't like with these instabilities is that they strengthen the meta compositions. I have done 99cm Ensolyss with an average dps group and with a high dps group, and the difference is huge. People will be more concerned about dps than ever, and rightly so. Especially 99 was so focused on mechanics that dps and healing didn't really matter. If your team members could do the mechanics, you beat it. Now that is not enough, you also need really good dps and/or healing to not get exposed to constant knock backs and poison fields.

On a personal note, this stuff makes my thief even less desirable in fractals. Guardian has lots of stability, why would anyone want a thief that gets bounced back and forth like a pinball?

[Eramonster.2718]

@AllNightPlayer.1286 said:

@"Eramonster.2718" said:At this rate, we might end up with everything nerfed and fractals will be linear/stale than ever before (when its a breeze no matter what instability is randomized) :sweat:. Starting to feel the previous system is more enjoyable "balanced".And why is this bad? Factals weren’t meant to be raids for five people. Especially since dungeons aren’t supported anymore, factals are the new dungeons with complex but also easy mechanics.

I don't know what's being compared to with raid in the context (difficulty?). But what I'm trying to say is it's preferable to have contents that's fun by having substance to it. If the result of the change make fractals in this case to be linear/ stale straight out, then there is no different from removing instabilities altogether. Back to the mindless brute force speed-clear for the rewards (not sure how long that will last) no matter what instabilities being active as it doesn't effects/ play any role in the game-play.

[GrubySzymek.1362]

@Talindra.4958 said:

@"Kheldorn.5123" said:Imagine if Ben didn't play with random instabilities at all and how much of recent problems would have been avoided.

i guess something has to be done to make the current fractal more interesting, something that will make old maps more alive. players (like myself) is starting to feel weary and impatient esp with the daily run..... -.- so I guess a little change can be refreshing . lets just see how this changes turn out once it is properly readjusted.. :D :cookie:

How about reworking bosses instead of introducing random gimmicks?

[Talindra.4958]

xDrecorded today t4 particularly for mai trin boss... imo its actually not bad.. quite fun id say.. but it will be nice if we get ... good reward.. because tbh it is the reward that is actually driving these daily runs . these are pugs group. not premade.. typical pug from LFG players not from CM grouphttps://youtu.be/OJS_FfAP51o

[Zaraki.5784]

Random instabilities is maybe the worst thing you added in fractals imo.

[maxwelgm.4315]

I am enjoying the random instabilities because it does justice to its name for the first time ever (i.e introduce actual instability the team has to deal with). With that said, a particular feedback for you guys, Nightmare and last laugh can get very whacky during the last 15% for Ensolyss. The problem is that with post processing effects on there is this purple haze you have to deal with in zoom out, and it's just harder to see enemies blowing up.