Boss fights.

[Joote.4081]

GW2 must be the only mmo that I don't like boss fights. I mean I see one and I shoot stuff off into the big ball of flashing lights just to get a reward. I don't know what I'm shooting at or why. I don't know if I'm hitting the boss or a passing duck.In raids and such how can you use any sort of tactics on these bosses, how do you see any telegraphs through all the flashy lights and laser beams?I was fighting the dragon in the personal story and the story was to watch out for its breath, you will get a warning when it's about to breath on you. Impossible to see. The only warning or idea it had snorted on me was when I ran of a cliff.Does anyone think boss fights in GW2 are fun?

[lare.5129]

@Joote.4081 said:GW2 must be the only mmo that I don't like boss fights.so you can fight boss in other mmo, and skip that in gw2. This is will get help you to get fun.This is not hard.I start check raid after 36k AP earn only, before that what raid content was absolutely skipped.

[Randulf.7614]

I think some of them are excellent.

• Shadow of the Dragon
• Hounds of Balthazar
• Caduceus
• Kralkatorrik
• Joko

Those are amongst my favourite instanced boss fights and flashing effects don’t really interfere and the mechanics are interesting and fun to me

In terms of open world

• Marionette/Vinewrath
• Gerent
• Tequatl

Because the mechanics are all undisturbed by flashing effects by spreading players about

Some bosses are just ruined by the excess of effects.

• The final boss of S4 E2 is a ridiculous amount of fireworks. *edited due to wrong ep mentioned
• Death Branded Shatterer is shrouded in too many effects. Which is a shame because Shatterer is well animated like most bosses
• I don’t think I’ve even seen the in game model of the hydra queen pirate boss because Taidra is so covered in players and effects

I can’t comment on raids

[moony.5780]

I only enjoy boss fights with small groups(2-4). So everyone support everyone and the effects r not that flashy. With more than 5 player the effects are too crazy and its far too difficult to even see something....with 20+ player i cant even see myself anymore but only a big ball of light and effects. Thats the reason why i do a meta maybe 1 time per month only....

In raids i completly rely on the comander tag and the yellow edge...otherwise i would not see whats going on and constantly kill myself and the group. I even tried every possible grafic setting...but nothing helps :<

[AliamRationem.5172]

I'm not a big fan of world bosses. They are visually impressive, but 50 people stacked in a pile beating on a dragon's toenails just doesn't do it for me. The sounds and animations in this game are pretty terrible, too, aside from the voicework and music. You definitely can't see anything once you get a group above about 10 people and the seamless cooperation between players often makes it so that you don't even need to because any damage you take is instantly healed and you're covered in boons to handle everything else. Just hack away and win!

I prefer solo and small scale play in everything I do here.

[kharmin.7683]

@AliamRationem.5172 said:The sounds and animations in this game are pretty terrible, too....Like the grunts that were recently added to the Svarnir boss at Frozen Maw. Egad. Sometimes it sounds like he's having too good of a time, if you know what I mean.

[AliamRationem.5172]

@kharmin.7683 said:

@AliamRationem.5172 said:The sounds and animations in this game are pretty terrible, too....Like the grunts that were recently added to the Svarnir boss at Frozen Maw. Egad. Sometimes it sounds like he's having too good of a time, if you know what I mean.

It's weird. I feel like the voice work and music sound fine, silly grunts aside. But things like explosions and other sound effects are just a cacophony of noise. And it actually matches the visual mess of combat in this game quite well! Not a good thing...

[LuRkEr.9462]

@Joote.4081 said:In raids and such how can you use any sort of tactics on these bosses, how do you see any telegraphs through all the flashy lights and laser beams?

Guessing you haven't raided before. You should try them out, they are alot of fun. Raids don't really have the issue of flashy skills since its only 10 people. Many bosses have mechanics that require people being in different areas doing different things which also spreads it out a little. You should give raids a try though if you like bosses. Any game with 50+ people in one area casting skills will have a light show.

[rrusse.7058]

I've been wanting a topic that touches on something like this. If you want an example of a level and boss battle that teaches the player what to look out for, while being both challenging and fair. Then look no further than the Nightmare Fractal. Honestly I can't sing praise for it quite enough.

For the sake of simplicity lets just consider the regular version as oppose to the Challenge one. The first fight you start out against the Mobile Artillery. This boss teaches the player about a handful of mechanics. We have:

• Projectiles
• fire spin attack
• shockwaves
• poison fields
• large quarter circle attacks and the room-wide explosion that is blocked with the bubble.

Now admittedly that is a lot on paper but for the most part these attacks are isolated and come one at a time with clear tells.

Then we have the Altar section where players need to

• capture points while avoiding projectiles.
• shockwaves and mobs.This is also the section that players learn blue projectiles are good and heal you.

Siax the Unclean is next. This boss teaches players to

• interrupt or break the breakbar.
• powerful tail swipe
• poison bubble/seed attack that bounces outwards and teaches players to watch where projectiles go as well as not to stand in the area they touch.

Finally Siax teaches players about the vomit mechanic.

Now mind you each of these challenges are not a big deal when they are isolated and come at you one at a time more or less. However when rolled together, they pose a more serious threat to you and your group. That is why the final boss is great and works as a sort of final exam of all you have learned.

Ensolyss employs all of the previous mechanics, but to the greatest degree and often many of them are rolled into one or two attacks. Look at the point when he spawns his mobs and they try to stab your teammates while he casts a shockwave attack. This requires players to mind their positioning, while also considering where or how to dodge the shockwave as getting hit by both can result in a KO in higher fractal levels.

If you are a new player, regarless of game mode. Consider what gear you are running and what utilities you have. What options, if any do you have to save yourself when things get dicey? It's sometimes better to sacrifice a little DPS for more survivability because a downed player contributes nothing. Heck even a little more knowledge and familiarity will go a long way in keeping you in fights and understanding what to look for through all the visual noise.

[Svarty.8019]

@AliamRationem.5172 said:I'm not a big fan of world bosses. They are visually impressive, but 50 people stacked in a pile beating on a dragon's toenails just doesn't do it for me.

I agree. That stuff looks ridiculous. It's 2021. Arenanet, please do your part in making the future look right!

@AliamRationem.5172 said:The sounds and animations in this game are pretty terrible, too, aside from the voicework and music. I'm a fan of the GW2 audio people. I think some of the weapons could do with a refresh, though.I think the mount animations were "

", but I'm not so sure about what else we've seen - imagine if players could clap! OMG! Emotes? It's 2021, we had games with far more animated emotes ... FIFTEEN years ago!

@AliamRationem.5172 said:You definitely can't see anything once you get a group above about 10 people and the seamless cooperation between players often makes it so that you don't even need to because any damage you take is instantly healed and you're covered in boons to handle everything else. Just hack away and win!I don't see this resolving itself without a gigantic balance patch on every class and ability to nerf boons.Unless they just make boons just plain worse across the board. So each boon does less of whatever it does, or gets changed to do something else. I bet they do that in EoD.I also expect new enemies that do rapid multi-strikes to make aegis spam ineffective.It's the age old story of nerfing what currently exists to add new things that are way more powerful - buy the expac or remain weak. "Weak? I was strong just before..." ... ye.. that.

[Westenev.5289]

I don't enjoy boss combat in general in gw2. I generally enjoy bosses based on story tension and atmosphere, but fighting bosses is kinda boring because I generally spend more time looking at my characters feet than the boss. If I die, I don't really feel that burning regret knowing I could have played better. If I win, I regret I didn't use my dragonhunter to win faster...

[Veprovina.4876]

Idk, for me it varies...Some bosses are great, especially in LS4 story.But some of them are such effect spamfests that i just 11111 at the boss from range and hope i hit something lol. Warden Amala comes to mind...

[Khisanth.2948]

Culling some of the overlapping effects would probably help with performance as well ...

[IndigoSundown.5419]

The decision to base any rewarding game play in both PvE and WvW around group content while simultaneously providing huge visual effects and no means to significantly reduce those effects goes down as one of the more unfortunate design decisions in MMO's.

[HnRkLnXqZ.1870]

Some bossfights are a bit weird. The following things really grind my gears. Mostly when the developers decided to ignore the rules:

• They throw you across the field, no matter how many stability stacks you have. Some of them throw you out of bounds. If you are in an instance, joke is on you.
• Block unblockable attacks
• Reflect melee-damage like they are projectiles. True reflection, not Retaliation :S. Something we are not allowed to have, because it would be overpowered.
• We once learned Nuhoch Stealth detection, to see stealthed NPCs, but this mastery is 100 % useless on any other NPCs. Everything enters an leaves stealth as they want.
• Some can even block reveal-skills.
• The current DRM bosses have a few special tricks on their own. Even if they do a ground-based AoE, it will still oneshot you even when you are 20 m above the ground.
• One NPC was able to ignore CC completely, breakbar for visuals only (got fixed by now).
• Some Most bosses can land lethal strikes through invincibility. It almost feels like the effect does not exist at all.
• Some can even blast through true invincibility, which is extremely annoying. True invincibility means you die, but a trait/rune effect heals you at 0 HP. It can break some of the unblockable lethal strikes, but not all.
• Stuns that cannot be broken with a stun-breaker which lasts 5-15 seconds.

On the other hand, I do feel sorry for most of the Fractal bosses. The instant a break-bar appears, they can pretty much say bye-bye to all of their cool moves, which would normally be used after that phase. Some of these attacks are very well designed and would require the players to be a lot more than just a rotation-bot. My absolute favorite is the MAMA in the Nightmare Fractal. I totally understand why the farmers want to prevent those attack-patterns at all costs. But it cuts a lot of fun (imo).

[Joote.4081]

Instanced and low numbers are the key words here, then you have smaller bosses so your not looking at the bosses toe throughout the fight.There is no dungeon training in GW2 like there is in FFXIV. Having training starts new players off on the right foot.Open world bosses for the most part are a disaster in GW2. I don't think I have ever had the opportunity to watch the animations of these bosses because all you see is a ball of lights, dust, smoke, s***, and blood, and the lag, oh the lad.

I don't suppose there is some setting to reduce or kill all of these flashing lights.

[mindcircus.1506]

@"Randulf.7614" said:

• The final boss of S4 E1 is a ridiculous amount of fireworks.The intended mechanic in this fight is to jump off the platform when the "fireworks" start and glide to the stairs then re-engage after they have eased off.There is no reason to stay on the platform and attempt to mitigate/dodge this.It's a very simple fight as long as you do this and work the other mechanics.

[Randulf.7614]

@mindcircus.1506 said:

@"Randulf.7614" said:

• The final boss of S4 E1 is a ridiculous amount of fireworks.The intended mechanic in this fight is to jump off the platform when the "fireworks" start and glide to the stairs then re-engage after they have eased off.There is no reason to stay on the platform and attempt to mitigate/dodge this.It's a very simple fight as long as you do this and work the other mechanics.

I do apologise, wrong boss. I mean Amala Lonai - she's Ep 2 right?

The Golem fight is not one I have an issue with

[mindcircus.1506]

@Randulf.7614 said:

@mindcircus.1506 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:

• The final boss of S4 E1 is a ridiculous amount of fireworks.The intended mechanic in this fight is to jump off the platform when the "fireworks" start and glide to the stairs then re-engage after they have eased off.There is no reason to stay on the platform and attempt to mitigate/dodge this.It's a very simple fight as long as you do this and work the other mechanics.

I do apologise, wrong boss. I mean Amala - she's Ep 2 right?Also Ep1, it has two instances with story bosses. The Amala fight and the Scruffy 2.0 fight. Scruffy is the final boss of the ep.

[Randulf.7614]

@mindcircus.1506 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:

@mindcircus.1506 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:

• The final boss of S4 E1 is a ridiculous amount of fireworks.The intended mechanic in this fight is to jump off the platform when the "fireworks" start and glide to the stairs then re-engage after they have eased off.There is no reason to stay on the platform and attempt to mitigate/dodge this.It's a very simple fight as long as you do this and work the other mechanics.

I do apologise, wrong boss. I mean Amala - she's Ep 2 right?Also Ep1, it has two instances with story bosses. The Amala fight and the Scruffy 2.0 fight. Scruffy is the final boss of the ep.

I've looked up the boss now since I keep typing the wrong one. It's Lonai - the end boss from Ep2. Which mechanically is an OK fight through different backgrounds, but is too heavy on the visual noise

[mindcircus.1506]

@Randulf.7614 said:

@mindcircus.1506 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:

@mindcircus.1506 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:

• The final boss of S4 E1 is a ridiculous amount of fireworks.The intended mechanic in this fight is to jump off the platform when the "fireworks" start and glide to the stairs then re-engage after they have eased off.There is no reason to stay on the platform and attempt to mitigate/dodge this.It's a very simple fight as long as you do this and work the other mechanics.

I do apologise, wrong boss. I mean Amala - she's Ep 2 right?Also Ep1, it has two instances with story bosses. The Amala fight and the Scruffy 2.0 fight. Scruffy is the final boss of the ep.

I've looked up the boss now since I keep typing the wrong one. It's Lonai - the end boss from Ep2. Which mechanically is an OK fight through different backgrounds, but is too heavy on the visual noiseI don't even remember this fight. I will have to check it out at some point.

[Randulf.7614]

@mindcircus.1506 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:

@mindcircus.1506 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:

@mindcircus.1506 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:

• The final boss of S4 E1 is a ridiculous amount of fireworks.The intended mechanic in this fight is to jump off the platform when the "fireworks" start and glide to the stairs then re-engage after they have eased off.There is no reason to stay on the platform and attempt to mitigate/dodge this.It's a very simple fight as long as you do this and work the other mechanics.

I do apologise, wrong boss. I mean Amala - she's Ep 2 right?Also Ep1, it has two instances with story bosses. The Amala fight and the Scruffy 2.0 fight. Scruffy is the final boss of the ep.

I've looked up the boss now since I keep typing the wrong one. It's Lonai - the end boss from Ep2. Which mechanically is an OK fight through different backgrounds, but is too heavy on the visual noiseI don't even remember this fight. I will have to check it out at some point.

You start off I think in Divinitys Reach, and there's meteors flying everywhere and awakened whilst the boss attacks. Then you move to Megadestroyer, dodging both her and more meteors from the Megadestroyers and some shades. Then you off to Frostgorge with the Claw of Jormag and Lonai and all sorts of ice attacks, boss attacks and environment stuff going on. Eventually you beat her and end up alone in space on a rock with Braham.

It's a cool fight and I love the background stuff, it's just messy. Very, very, very messy

[Cleopatra.4068]

The boss fights in instances drive me nuts because I always have to google them to find out what the mechanics are supposed to be. Once you know how they work, most of them are not actually hard. I must be missing the bossy sense some people have, though, because I can never, ever, figure out by myself what it is I’m supposed to do. I hate having to google the answers.

[Fueki.4753]

Many bosses in GW2, especially since PoF, just boil down to:bloated HP poolCC spamAoE spam

These things simply make bosses unfun for me.And the disturbing visual effects sometimes make it even worse.

[Joote.4081]

The old vets know every boss tactic in the game, unfortunately they don't want to share.