Level 90+ maps

[kharmin.7683]

@Teratus.2859 said:I don't disagree that it's a lot easier to stick to instanced content like CM's etc but they just don't give that same Hard Mode experience that people had and loved in Gw1.I think there will always be a some kind of demand for Hard Mode in the open world because of that, Gw1's hard mode was just too much fun I guess :)GW2 game design is too dissimilar to GW1. GW1 was instanced content which could more easily allow for variable difficulty levels.

[Raknar.4735]

Don‘t really see the point in this. If the enemies purely get stronger by having more stats, you can already do that by lowering your own ones.Make the monsters too strong/scale too hard and you get the same result as the eastern vabbi meta with no one doing it.

Turning the monsters into hp sponges will also just result in some players only participating in the last % hp of a boss, trying to min-max reward/time-spent playing. You can already see that in most open world bosses like Drakkar, Tequatl etc., where you still see high-mastery players wait outside the boss arenas, just to swoop in for the reward, contributing even less than bad players.

[MarkoGold.7126]

@"sevenDEADLY.5281" said:I'm not a prophet, but I can guess as to what would happen. The maps themselves would have to have SOME beneficial reward. If there was absolutely zero benefit to playing in a leveled up map, I'm guessing the "excitement of a new thing" would dwindle fast and it would be a "why am I doing more work for less reward" thing and become dead content quickly. So now IF they did give it some kind of bonus or reward, the more casual playerbase that can barely keep up with current leveled content would immediately jump on the forums demanding it be changed because they can't do it.

This is basically why we can't have nice things. There's little reason to work harder for no reward, and there will always be those that want the same rewards for no effort.

true anet cant have it both ways they should decide what type of player base they want and stick with it, if its hardcore they should go full that, if its casual the same.

[Teratus.2859]

@kharmin.7683 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:I don't disagree that it's a lot easier to stick to instanced content like CM's etc but they just don't give that same Hard Mode experience that people had and loved in Gw1.I think there will always be a some kind of demand for Hard Mode in the open world because of that, Gw1's hard mode was just too much fun I guess :)GW2 game design is too dissimilar to GW1. GW1 was instanced content which could more easily allow for variable difficulty levels.

True.I don't think it would be easy to introduce a hard mode experience like Gw1 had but I do think it would be possible.

The differences do have to be factored in.. buffing enemies and raising levels like in Gw1 is completely out of the question unless you're willing to split players between map instances, normal and hard mode but I really don't like that idea, goes against what Gw2 is supposed to be as a game.

Putting some handicaps on the individual player as a trade off for boosted account bonus's though.. that seems far more realistic to me as a method of providing that open world HM experience.But as I said in my past posts there would have to be some precautions in place to prevent abuse and cheesing etc.. it wouldn't work without those.

[Dayra.7405]

@Game of Bones.8975 said:

@Dayra.7405 said:The more general and less effort way would be to give you an option of directing the downscalling algo to scale you down a bit more.Currently it's you are 2 level higher than the mobs after downscaling, why not an option to scale you 1-10 level lower than mobs, i.e. you can choose to be downscaled to 70 on lvl 80 maps. And maybe it can boost your MF and cash drops a bit if scaled down.

Sorry to say, but that would be a pain in the kitten.It's one thing to change a character's level, but now you have to think about the equipment, trinkets, armor, and weapons that are all Lvl 80.

Try it out, it's already there. Go to an area with lvl 68 mobs and look how all your stats are when you are downscaled to lvl 70. The only difference to today, is that you can influence to which level you are downscaled against which mob-levels.

[Ashen.2907]

@"Sirius.4510" said:Kind of like GW1's "Hard Mode"?There might be some interest in this, but I'm a bit concerned about the "damage sponge" trend making it more tedious than challenging...

I like the idea, but the tendency to interpret increased mob health as increased difficulty would concern me as well.

[Game of Bones.8975]

@Dayra.7405 said:

Try it out, it's already there. Go to an area with lvl 68 mobs and look how all your stats are when you are downscaled to lvl 70. The only difference to today, is that you can influence to which level you are downscaled against which mob-levels.

You're right. I don't know what I was thinking. Of course everything is downscaled now when you are playing in a lower level map, so the algorithm is already in place.

[artcreator.4859]

I would be down for them adding one map to be harder than the others, maybe level 90.

Just so the players who want challenge can go their and we wont be as let down when a new map is released and it's brain dead easy.

[blp.3489]

@Ledha.9640 said:Level scaling can always have some bad repercussions.The best way ? Have a HM version of maps, with all monsters being lvl 80, all normal monsters being veterans, all veterans being elite, with rewards being scaled up for lvl 80 players. Every day, a different HM map of all area (krytia, ascalon, shiverpeaks, etc) can be played by peoples, so you'll always find players doing the events, and changing the map every day will break the monotony.

I like this idea the most, I think it would be worth trying for one map, you reuse the map itself and reuse creatures from other maps. The south end of the Sylvari starter zone is being invaded by the undead, just replace all those wimpy undead with ones from Orr. Populate the nightmare court areas with the high level characters from the personal story and the level 80 maps. Etc.

I think it would be much more fun to use more powerful/sophisticated creatures rather than the same creatures with scaled health and damage. The loot should be appropriate for the level of creature, and the some of the hearts should be kept but with decent loot instead of coppers and karma.

Actually the south part of Drizzlewood is quite decent, if you just upgraded some of the mobs to use another skill or two from the classes they are modeled on it could be a fun challenge.

Although I never experienced the original version of HoT, an alternate version of Verdant Brink with the original higher difficulty would also be great to try.

[blp.3489]

I would take it for granted that the reward for killing a higher level creature would be higher, isn't this already the case? The rewards from killing Champions are definitely more than for plebes and I haven't heard casual players complaining that they need to be able to easily kill champions.

[Tyncale.1629]

@"sevenDEADLY.5281" said:I'm not a prophet, but I can guess as to what would happen. The maps themselves would have to have SOME beneficial reward. If there was absolutely zero benefit to playing in a leveled up map, I'm guessing the "excitement of a new thing" would dwindle fast and it would be a "why am I doing more work for less reward" thing and become dead content quickly. So now IF they did give it some kind of bonus or reward, the more casual playerbase that can barely keep up with current leveled content would immediately jump on the forums demanding it be changed because they can't do it.

This is basically why we can't have nice things. There's little reason to work harder for no reward, and there will always be those that want the same rewards for no effort.

That text should be hanging on the wall in a nice frame in every office where they make MMO's.

[Xanadrine.4352]

@blp.3489 said:

@Zuldari.3940 said:Are you telling me we are going to 90? GG wow made me go to 100 that was a slug of a run across 24 characters, at least they squished every one down to 50, going 120 would have killed the game. Why do they have to raise the level cap? 5 levels maybe okay but 10 more.

No, the original idea was to raise the map level without raising the character level to provide more challenge.

Oh I see, well in that case I have to say no ty. I dont think people understand the power a mob 10 levels above them has. When wow released the expansions that raised level cap by 10 it was impossible to solo just regular mobs that were 10 levels above. you got wrecked and they saw you coming from a mile away. You had to go through the zones to raise your level before hitting those areas, so just making expansion mobs 10 levels higher without raising our level cap would be ridiculous. I think raid bosses should be skull level or higher and zone bosses, but not everyday mobs. No one wants to have to get groups together just to be able to do a heart.

[Mungo Zen.9364]

I wonder if there is much correlation here but, I was messing around on a lvl 25 Elementalist (in level 17-22 gear) vs lvl 32 mobs in Gendarren Hills. While 1v1 it is doable, it gets harder and harder to constantly land hits and getting 1 shot is a real issue. If I invested into the build specifically for going after higher level mobs I feel it would be possible but incredibly challenging especially at +10 levels. I recognize that at lvl 80 with full specs (I had no Elite Utility for example at lvl 25) it could be easier and make for some interesting and advanced gameplay.

I might try more under level play on different toons as this is an interesting challenge. Perhaps the simplest way to get a hardmode would be to have an option to turn off XP gain on a character to freeze them at a specific level. Sure you miss out on elites but, this is meant to be a hardmode....yeah?

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

Here is some information to consider:

The game discourages players from bringing characters into areas that are more than 10 levels above the current character level.

Levels of zones, enemies, hearts, and events more than 10 levels higher than the character are displayed in purple.

Non-player characters detect lower level player characters from a much greater distance than they would detect a character of equal level, and if they are hostile they will rush the character. Combined with the combat difficulties listed below, this makes even basic exploration of higher level zones extremely dangerous.

Characters more than 10 levels below the area level cannot do any of the following:

Deal full damage. Characters seven or more levels below their target will deal only glancing blows.Inflict conditions. Enemies will display an Immune message instead.Rally off foe deaths. Lower level downed characters have to be healed, or revived after being defeated.

Lower level characters can still technically do the following, but as a rule of thumb it is unlikely and not recommended:

Inflict control effects.Deal enough damage to get loot and to receive credit for events.Complete non-combat renown hearts.Complete non-combat hero challenges, such as communing at a place of power.

Additionally, damage is scaled by the level difference. A low level character will receive much more damage even with the same amount of armor as an appropriately leveled character. On top of this, all hits received will be critical hits. Similar holds true for outgoing damage. In addition to all hits being glancing blows as noted above, damage is further scaled down.

[blp.3489]

I didn't know about those limitations, maybe I should have suggested level 85 maps instead of level 90, although if the limitations are only for greater than 10 levels then level 80 characters would still be okay in a level 90 map.

After all the discussion I've realized that I would prefer a map with more sophisticated opponents rather than merely scaled opponents. From what I understand the HoT maps at launch had opponents with more sophisticated abilities, that would be my preference. Although when I first ventured into the HoT maps, long after they had been nerfed, I got completely clobbered and didn't enjoy it that much. I have not so fond memories of pocket raptors. A lot of that was that my characters with flawed builds and my limited player skills, which had been more than adequate for the easy core content, were overwhelmed. Added to that I have acrophobia (fear of heights) which I was surprised to find was totally triggered by the vertical maps, which was rather unpleasant, and for me the representation of verticality in the minimap and maps was inadequate, it wasn't clear to me which side of a cliff was low and which was high when looking at the maps. Later, when I returned with a "meta" build necromancer, with access to mounts, I breezed through most of the content. There was still some content which challenged me which I enjoyed. I'm not sure but I may have been exposed to wvw by then, where you can encounter a group with superior numbers or a player with far superior skills at any time, where I had learned to just laugh when I got totally trounced. Having mounts also means that you don't have to tediously fight your way through numerous mobs to get back to something like a hero point that is some distance from a waypoint.

The south end of Drizzlewood is still one of my favorite areas due to the mobs made up of various different classes, you use different tactics for different classes, I just wish they could be a little less predictable. The north end is one of my least favorite areas, it is just one big zurgfest, the main challenge is to get in a few hits before the zurg obliterates the opposition, whether you are there fighting or not makes little to no difference. Although I do find it challenging to just keep some of my less robust alts up and fighting in the final Claw of Jormag fight.

[Atomos.7593]

I wouldn't mind something like a sub-area in a map being dedicated to purely difficult enemies to somewhat challenge groups and zergs, perhaps with better drops/rewards from defeating them. In another MMORPG I play, sometimes certain areas of a map where dedicated to things like this while the other areas were still easy and integrated into the story. I found these small open world areas of greater difficulty in some maps to be fun to run with groups for fairly relaxed sessions.

In terms of enemies that challenge zergs in the open world, in GW2 I found the bonus ley infused champions that spawn after the meta event is complete on Dragonfall fun and difficult sometimes with certain groups. In particular, the ley infused hydras can cause chaos sometimes even with large numbers due to high AoE damage and CC, so I find those battles interesting and enjoyable. It's one of the few times I think about maybe playing as support in the open world. More fights like these would be welcome for me in specific areas and situations.

Claw of Jormag at the end of the Drizzlwood meta was fun and challenging until people realized that you can just stand at its feet to avoid the AoE fear from the boss haha. Now, if most of the group does this, it turns out to be a fairly easy fight.

[Nazarick.9653]

@Mungo Zen.9364 said:I wonder if there is much correlation here but, I was messing around on a lvl 25 Elementalist (in level 17-22 gear) vs lvl 32 mobs in Gendarren Hills. While 1v1 it is doable, it gets harder and harder to constantly land hits and getting 1 shot is a real issue. If I invested into the build specifically for going after higher level mobs I feel it would be possible but incredibly challenging especially at +10 levels. I recognize that at lvl 80 with full specs (I had no Elite Utility for example at lvl 25) it could be easier and make for some interesting and advanced gameplay.

I believe I did something similar on my ele...while questing in the Fen I popped next door into Straits and killed a few single mobs that were a lot higher than me. And on my engi I completed the whole of Frostgorge Sound while I was 67-71 (ish). The only quest I had trouble with was the highest one, the others were tough but doable.

And that was the closest I got to replicating my specialisation in vanilla WoW. (killing stuff and doing quests that were several levels higher, or soloing group quests that were same-level)

It would certainly be easier with full specs, just like it was in WoW. (I regularly solo'ed group quests and mobs that were a lot higher, depending on class/gear)

@Mungo Zen.9364 said:

Oh I see, well in that case I have to say no ty. I dont think people understand the power a mob 10 levels above them has. When wow released the expansions that raised level cap by 10 it was impossible to solo just regular mobs that were 10 levels above. you got wrecked and they saw you coming from a mile away. You had to go through the zones to raise your level before hitting those areas, so just making expansion mobs 10 levels higher without raising our level cap would be ridiculous. I think raid bosses should be skull level or higher and zone bosses, but not everyday mobs. No one wants to have to get groups together just to be able to do a heart.

It was actually the expansions that killed levelling challenges like that...zones had small level ranges (4-5 instead of 10-15) and quest hubs you couldn't do without doing the earlier hubs first. (I was very disappointed, since I specialised in doing high-level quests in vanilla WoW)I do agree that soloing mobs that are 10 levels above is almost impossible there - I think I only managed it on a hunter.

[Dark Red Killian.3946]

I love how people offer really cool ideas to implement new features into the game and you get the “I’d rather the devs spend their time elsewhere”, or “use lower level gear. I’m sure you’ll get this no matter what as everyone has their own opinion, but we need new stuff like this to keep the game fresh and exciting. Why can’t people accept what is suggested or say I’m not interested without trying to suggest a way not to do it?

[Astralporing.1957]

@"Dark Red Killian.3946" said:I love how people offer really cool ideas to implement new features into the game and you get the “I’d rather the devs spend their time elsewhere”, or “use lower level gear. I’m sure you’ll get this no matter what as everyone has their own opinion, but we need new stuff like this to keep the game fresh and exciting. Why can’t people accept what is suggested or say I’m not interested without trying to suggest a way not to do it?Have you considered, that perhaps they simply do not consider those ideas to be "really cool" at all, and would rather not see them implemented?

[keenedge.9675]

This is a casual game. There are MANY others with gear grind. Different flavors for every taste. Their audience is not the high adrenaline crowd, it's for people who enjoy exploring and socializing.

There are plenty of inactive nooks and crannies on the existing maps where they could put challenging bosses or groups. They used to have those in the game in low-level areas but they were removed. I think it was because so many people were farming the crap out of them and ignoring other modes of game play that make it more of a social/group game.

We DO have tough stuff in the HoT and PoF zones. I like farming those SOLO when I'm up for a challenge.

I think level 90 zones would take too much developer time from what the majority of players in gw2 want.

[Fueki.4753]

@Dark Red Killian.3946 said:I love how people offer really cool ideas to implement new features into the game and you get the “I’d rather the devs spend their time elsewhere”, or “use lower level gear. I’m sure you’ll get this no matter what as everyone has their own opinion, but we need new stuff like this to keep the game fresh and exciting. Why can’t people accept what is suggested or say I’m not interested without trying to suggest a way not to do it?

Why should Arenanet spend resources on content that would only the smallest part of the player base, when they could use the resources for something that is viable for a way bigger part of the player base?

If top end players want the new content to be more challenging, they already have options to limit their output.But top end players wanting more challenge should be no reason to create content that's virtually impossible for most players.

[Dreamreaver.4908]

Not a fan. Level 82+ mobs annoy me enough as is. Also, anything ten levels over you will not be able to take damage.