Challenging Mobs...

[Trust]

I enjoy cherrypicking wind golems out of the storm ogres, It's like fishing. I have no idea why I enjoy it so much but I do. It's challenging.

Easiest mobs, smacks too much of the old 'what do you hunt and why' nerf... pass.

Hardest mob for me is Mhedon; I do crap damage as a Ranger (preach on, Gopher... amen), I can't stun him, and he hits a ton. if I time his attacks right, I'm fine. if he suprises me, I'm sucking sand. Most annoyingly hard mob are WA oracles. I simply do not have enough burst damage to get them down effectively.

[Rawdge]

Easiest mobs, smacks too much of the old 'what do you hunt and why' nerf... pass.

This is what I was afraid of, and what I was trying to avoid. I'll just come out and say it. Right now, I'm not looking to change or adjust any of the existing mobs. Thats a big project, and while it's something on the to-do list at some point in the future, it's not anything I'm looking to tackle right now. There's too many other things that need to get done at the moment.

What I am looking at doing is putting together some collections of high level mobs, with different characteristics. Ones that would have abilities and attributes that compliment each other, rather than making one ubernasty that's immune to the flavor of the week damage type. It's sort of a small side project, and something that I've wanted to do for some time now, and I think I can get it done fairly quickly and sort of squeeze it in. It would add something to do for you higher level folks out there, and it's also something I can put together and release in small stages without squandering time or effort, and without taking away from the other things I'm working on.

The reason I'm interested in finding out what some folks consider to be "easy" is so I can put together a balanced package of mobs and abilities that compliment each other.

I'm sorry you feel that I'm looking to nerf weaker mobs, but thats just not the case. I'm not sure how else to communicate that. Everything has it's place, including the weaker, or easier mobs. One of the things that I think should be clear just from the responses in this thread so far is that different mobs have varying degrees of difficulty for different player race/school combinations. Some mobs will be easier than others to certain players, and thats the way it should be. Establishing a better balance between the varying degrees of difficulty is something that can be done, but like I said, that's a large project for another time.

So again, the more I'm able to find out which mobs are currently difficult, and which ones are easy, and for whom, the better I'll be able to assemble these groups of new mobs I'd like to create. If anyone chooses to remain quiet about what they find to be easy, then the greater the likelihood of these mobs being too difficult for them once they're created. In this case, it truly is a case of the more feedback the better. Keeping quiet doesn't help anyone here.

Hopefully that sheds some light on why I'm asking for this kind of feedback.

---

And as for the lower level players who might be concerned about these new mobs I mentioned not being low enough level for them to participate, yes, that will be the case. These will not be introductory level mobs, or even mid-level mobs. They will be high end content. However there will be trickle down from a development sense. The higher level players are a bit trickier to design for, since there are so many possible combinations. I'd rather take the time to get this sort of thing worked out from the top down, since there are fewer variables on the lower end of things. Those mobs will be quicker to create once a solid foundation is laid down.

I don't think rushing something onto the servers without laying down a solid foundation for it is going to help anyone at this point.

Hence, feedback from you all.

[tramsan]

The things that make a mob be actually hard is, in the end, debuffs, dispells, disproportionately high DPS or armor/evasion. High DPS or armor/eva, but not disproportionately so, can always be countered one way or another. Dodge, block and parry boosting abilities would go under high evasion (and would, for future mobs, be a nice way to vary things and reward grouping.)

For me specifically, when I had my L100 STMD, I really enjoyed fighting the yew outpost event mobs, as well as the Valkor event mobs (not Valkor himself.) They are a good blend between longevity and danger, that you have to be on your toes and use your skills well to come out the victor. The most rewarding fights I've had was soloing the (new) Dark Stalker. (You go try and kill him as a disciple, with only healer to back you, before you say anything.)

As for easy mobs... Well, like I said, I'm a disciple. Nothing is *easy* for me, just less hard.

[Justa Mirage]

I can see the reason for your post, but it varies, as many have said, from class to class.

Even though I am 100th level Ranger and 82nd level healer, named mobs such as Mhedon, Arboreon, and Verdieos will one shot me in a heart beat, or close to it. With only a few healing type spells at my disposal as a ranger, my recovery from their first attacks is either "recalling" or "run-heal-shoot-run-repeat"

Same for Satyr Isle mobs. It is inhabited with level 80-100 mobs but will give even the best multi-classed ped a fit when the mobs there can chain cast things that have 5 minute cool down timers for a regular player. A 100th level Oracle is almost impossible to kill solo, as it gets to use the heal spells at will, and can keep alive for a long time because it does not have "cool down" timers.

So, to answer your thread, Challenging mobs can almost be any mob in the game based on your character's abilities and class. And... it's that challenge that keeps you striving to achieve more levels so you can say "Finally, I can beat <mob> and not suck!"

(I won't even try to take on any of the WA mobs in ED, those mobs there are just like the Satyr isle mobs, only worse.)

[Takora Drakan]

I always hated those lvl 120 shamans in the eastblight, they debuffed the hell out of you and then nuked you. BAHHHHHHH!!! And they also healed themselves!

[Aamer Khan]

I am a lvl 100 scout/cleric/ranger/druid/guardian.

For me, the most fun I have had, were the lvl 120 blighted festival treants last year, the cenotaph mobs, and Daknor hunts back when folks hunted him.

The lvl 120 treants I felt were challenging, took everything I had to win the fight and I HAD to kite them the whole time. This was in ranger form.

I was one day helping another player reach the wood cenothaph, and got into a battle with just me and one other lvl 100 druid. It was a total blast! Seemed that for those mobs the druid and ranger complemented each other very well. We battled 2 healer types and a bone golem and although it took like 5 mins, we succeeded in killing all three.

Daknor took planning and the exact right set of skills to kill. I always fought in cleric mode, buffed to 4700 HP and often was the puller since I could JUST avoid dying by pulling from extreme distance.

The things I do NOT enjoy, are mobs that seem to have no timers on their debuffs like the current festival treants and even some of the elite blights. I think it very odd that they can cast enfeeblement 6-8 times during a 1.5 min fight when I sure cannot even if I have the spell made with recycle. Seeping blight or other bleeds don't bother me much as I have many ways to detox of cleanse.

Bottom line is I want to fight mobs that take my attention to kill, are not artificially buffed with HP just to prevent me from soloing them. We all want mobs that take effort and with SKILL on our part, to just squeek through and win with maybe 10 HP left.

P.S. Almost forgot... As ranger I have a bit of trouble with the yew treants of today, guardian eats them for lunch. Druid form even easier. As cleric they cannot kill me but I can just bearly kill them... diff skills and diff abilities ftw/ftl

[Pharcellus]

I have fought quite a few things since my return, so here is my 2cp.

As an Ancient Helian spellcaster (most TPs in primal/power/etc) Dragon, I find the toughest mobs for me right now are Veteran Blights. If I get more then 2-3 of them at once, I spend the whole battle stunned into oblivion, waiting for anything to go off. Forget spells; I am lucky if I get off *a* melee attack. Depending on Spiked Scales to kill them is dicey and if I run low on health, I can't depend on being able to escape, let alone use my instant heal. Spiked Scales and Refreshing Breeze is it. This makes Energized Kwellen groups especially dangerous for me, as they usually come with anywhere from 2-8 Veteran Blights (except for that effin' Mauler group, which has 10-12 ELITE Blights bodyguarding a T5 Kwellen).

Vexators seem to have recently been buffed, as they usually get off their Synaptic Spasm x 12 stun attack at least twice in one battle now. They are still fairly easy to kill, but there's no way to take more than 2-3 at a time (assuming you can *find* 2-3 in the same area, let alone 1). So, yeah, they seem to be a good, balanced challenge, at least for me.

Zombie Ogres are still pretty rare, but they go down without much effort at all. The only challenge with them is finding them.

Veteran Undead seem to be pretty balanced. I tend to avoid certain ones like the plague, though. Diviners (healers) and Shamans I avoid. The first because It is almost impossible to out-damage their heals. I can hardly hit them to begin with, and what damage I do is pretty much healed as fast as I can deal it. About the only way I can kill them is to wait until my main damage abilities are recycled, remove all debuffs from myself, cast my 3 debuffs on them, then try to spike them with Gold Rage, Breath of Flame Burst, Silver Strike, Ravage, etc, usually trying to lead off with Tail Whip to try to take advantage of the stun. Shamans I avoid because I get all my biped buffs blown off of me, and since I spend a lot of time hunting solo, getting Alacrity and other biped gifts before going out, which can take a bit of time to find someone able and willing to cast them, I don't want to go through the rest of the hunt gimped. Yes, Alacrity makes a LOT of difference. About the only time I bother with Shamans is if all I am running on are self-buffs.

Aegrors are nasty fat bastards. While they aren't super hard to kill, they do a LOT of damage really fast, and if I aggro one without realizing it and taking it out ASAP, I'll end up taking a dirt nap.

Abominations are pansies; pale imitations of the Avatar of Pain. They aren't even remotely a challenge, except maybe to find, like Zombie Ogres.

Spiders, Tarantulas, and Fyakki. Spiders and Tarantulas are not difficult to kill, but they take a while, because they have high levels of evasion. I don't know if it is via skill, like a Dryad Dazzle, but it seems to get easier to hit them after you've been fighting them for a minute. Fyakki and their Harden Shell gets annoying, and they do quite a bit of damage; much more than the spiders and tarantulas. It almost seems like they were buffed quite a bit from before I left two years ago. There also seem to be "Evolved" versions which are especially nasty. Can't take on too many of those and live. It seems like they were introduced to put an end to the mass XP farming by rounding up the whole field and nuking them into oblivion, a la Purple Flies.

Nahguks (both ogres and pygmies) are pretty easy; just have to watch out for the stun if you pull multiples.

Wind Golems are a pain, because they are rare, and often found inside of HUGE spawns of Lightning, Storm, and Thunder Ogres, which, like T5 Blights, are not something I can handle more than 1 or 2 at a time. Wind Golems themselves are no piece of cake. They have a Refreshing Breeze-like ability, and seem to have a lot of evasion, plus they hit fairly hard. Just makes for a protracted fight.

Wolves. Unless I just pull too many (or get Ravager in the mix), they are a good challenge. They seem to fit my conception of what I "should" be able to fight. I can take 4-6 of them without too much worry. Dire wolves in Selen Forest have a really bad habit of clustering their spawns in the middle, near the little mushroom house and down that hill. I saw like 10 of them in that area initially, and decided to do a mass pull. I ran through there, and more must have appeared/spawned, as I ended up pulling like 40 of them. Needless to say, the server was so lagged updating me that I was dead at least 10 seconds before all the attack messages stopped. I thought it was particularly hilarious, seeing that sea of wolves milling around my corpse, but it isn't very practical as a mob spawn, as there was almost nothing in the rest of the forest.

Giant Beetles. Not much of a challenge, even with Harden Shell. I regularly round up 10 or more Ice Beetles and nuke them into oblivion; spiked scales tends to do most of the damage, and they don't really do much damage to me that Refreshing Breeze can't handle. Fire and Flame Beetles are a little more challenging, so I can't take on so many, but they still are a very predictable battle, and I don't feel particularly threatened by them. They do make a rather satisfying squish, though.

Yew Treants and Forest Oastics. Treants seem to be a little easy. They do heal some, but they seem to have little armor or evasion, and they don't seem to do a tremendous amount of damage. Oastics, on the other paw, are just like Aegrors. If I pull or aggro one, I have to kill it immediately; they do a tremendous amount of armor-penetrating damage. Taking on 2-3 is dicey, and I often have to retreat if I get more than one in a pull of treants.

Gruoks. Nasty little piggies. They are a pretty decent challenge. Just have to finish them quick once they get low on health because they start using Boar's Rage, which hurts.. a lot.

I've only tried a few of the Harro invasion event mobs. The "smaller" ones, like the Blight Hounds, and the Kwellen seem to be a good challenge, about like Valkor's bone golem minions. I don't think I want to try fighting more than 1 at a time, though.

As for Elites, most times it is pretty much 1-on-1. Once in a while, I can do two Elite undead at a time, but they are just more challenging versions of the Veterans and I avoid the same ones for the same reasons as above.

Purple Necroflies. Gads. Those things were seriously buffed. I pull one swarm, the whole spawn is on me, and they are mostly the Evolved kind, which are hard to hit, and do a lot of damage. Needless to say, they are almost unhuntable, probably even with a group now. I'm glad I don't have a need for purple necrofly wings...

I can't speak really for the lower-tiered mobs, because there's really not any that are challenging since I am a maxed-out Ancient Dragon. I guess it is satisfying to a point to know that I am powerful enough to not have to worry about anything a tier or more below me if I have to go into the field, but I don't think I really can weigh in on the level of challenge-vs-fun factor since it has been ages where they would be a challenge for me. I will say that I think I still have to be careful, even in the Western Deadlands, as the Mighty undead can still dish out the damage, especially the Wraith groups, but that's about the only place I really worry about as lower-tier than myself.

What I find fun is a challenge, one that I can scale based on available mobs to match my ability. I find most mobs in my tier a challenge to some extent or another, with exceptions noted above. What I find even more fun, though is getting something tangible for the effort. XP has no meaning to me anymore, as I am capped out. Hoard drops are good, but the main thing I am after are tech components. Most of them are worthwhile for the effort, a few are ridiculously plentiful, and quite a few are very scarce. While I know loot is another subject, I do consider hunting "fun" as a package deal. It's a combination of scalable challenge, and reward for effort, or at least affirmation of purpose.

[Pharcellus]

Oh, I forgot to mention golems.

With Marble and T5 Gem golems, the only challenge is in numbers.. LARGE numbers. Then again, they are walking piles of rocks and ore, I wouldn't expect too complicated a challenge.

Mithril golems are a little bit more challenging, because they can do a bit more damage, esp with Avalanche of Ore. I think it is more due to them being a higher-level version of Marble golems than anything, though.

Bosses. Of all the bosses, I find Mhedon, Mouf, and Galestorm the most challenging. I think Mouf and I have an even score now. Galestorm I cannot kill solo. Period. The rest of the bosses I can take 1-on-1, or even in a small group with other mobs. Just a matter of who and how many. I'm not including Umyarr, as he is a unique and special quest boss, and I put him in the category of "SuperBoss", like Gigaroth, Valkor, Reklar, etc. Basically only killable with a large, powerful, and well-coordinated group.

[Kulamata]

Very nice explanation Rawdge, thank you. The original "happy hunting ground" nerf was so ill-conceived, and the bitterness it engendered was so long-lasting, that the disavowal was a good idea.

One consideration is that these additions should not broadly require "forced grouping". On Order particularly, I suspect that because of the smaller population, and perhaps a higher percentage of crafter/builders, that an emphasis on forced grouping would be misplaced. So enough for spice, but not enough to cause a major shift in the game's orientation.

Another consideration would be the need for "balanced groups". It sounds great in theory, but how likely is it to be able to form up balanced groups? (It'll be better as the population grows, but now...) A standing group, that hunted this way is nice (like the Marrow Population Control Corps I was privileged to hunt with) but ad hoc pickup groups with unbalanced skills should be able to participate effectively also. With a requirement for keenly balanced groups, you start edging into the raid group approach to the end game, which, I think, does not fit the Horizons model or players well.

I believe that the idea of strongly specialized mobs making up the group (which is what you're exploring?) is a very good idea. A mob with very high armor and evasion, 3 millisecond timers, strong self-heal, and a gazillion hp is not fun, let alone imaginative. But a mob with strong standard abilities, and weak typical vulnerabilities (strong cast, lousy armor/evasion to pick an obvious example) as a member of a group that contains complementary mobs is an opportunity to move the game back towards more reasonably balanced mobs. A simplistic example would be a group composed of single-classed sorcerors and warriors which seems to be the direction you're heading.

I'd like to see one of the new groups be a revival of the old myloc groups; for nostalgia's sake.

And once again, thank you for the transparency and the opportunity for all to participate in the conception. ****{edit: My goodness gracious}, what a breath of fresh air!

[gopher65]

Part you should ignore cause it is a random ramble:

I largely agree with Pharcellus, except to say that I can't take on any of the normal boss mobs solo unless I stun them to death, and the same is true of the event mobs. But that's due to the class I picked, which is a stunner/support class not a direct damage class. And oastics are wicked easy (rain of arrows), but treants are kinda hard (that nature HoT they have is a killer for me).

The thing is though, I like my role in a group, but I never end up having to fill it with normal mobs, and when there are ubermobs to take on I am superseded by Druids as healers/stunners/minorCC, Healers/Clerics as damage control, and shaman/sorcerer as mezzer(rooter too)/majorCC/debuffer. So even if you ignore multiclassing, which you can't, the lack of well defined class rolls in HZ means that you can't design mobs that are good for specific groups. And, as Kulamata says, I'm not sure you'd want to.

If you are trying to create mobs that are good for general groups, look at what was done long ago with the Crimson Scrouge, but bump up the difficulty level a little bit (cause now many are higher level or ancient dragon or multiclassed). That was a great area for midsized groups at the time. It also had some interesting loot with neat unintended consequences (which were great consequences btw. It would have been neat if that break-mez thing had been planned).

Here's how I see it: if we (players) are grouped you have two choices:

1) uberpowerful single boss: I hate these so I won't speak on them further
2) grouped regular mobs: I think this is what you are asking about, but I'm not sure.

Main Point:

Grouped regular mobs have to be broken down into basic categories similar to those that are used in RTS games. In those games you have the Foot, Ranged, and Mounted triangle of classes as the base for everything else. Defensively each of the three is weak to one type of damage, but strong against the other 2 (more or less). The same is true of attack.

In HZ none of the mob classes, or player classes for that matter, corresponds exactly the that triangle, but I think we can nonetheless group players and mobs into four general categories:

1) Damage Control Team - Healers, Clerics (hull breech, deck 12, section 14!)
2) Physical Damage - Warriors, Lunus, Monk (heh)
3) Magical Damage - Helian, Mage
4) Crowd Control (mezz, root, stun, debuff) - Shaman, Spiritist, Sorcerer

Some classes are of course a mix (Ranger, Reaver, Guardian, Shaman, Battlemage, Wizard), and others just suck at their intended roles (*cough*Helian*cough*), but that's how I break them down, more or less.

1) Damage Control is pretty obvious, just make sure there are no groups of mobs are made up entirely of Healers. That is unfortunate when it happens. Wanna know what players do when we see such a group? We avoid it and wait for the next server reset to kill them for us. Sad but true.

I don't know if you have the ability to change when mobs cast spells/abilities or not, but these mobs should not immediately cast Instant Heal unless they are in deep trouble. I hate that. I don't do it and neither should they. Have them cast intermediate short recycle heals at a higher priority than their long recycle heals. When they waste their IH right away they lose a vital self-defence tool. Also, they should only cast Instant Heal on themselves. I try and save that ability for myself as often as I can in real fights. Obviously the AI can't be expected to make complex judgement calls, so it has to have a cut a dry rule like this.

One last really important thing: could you take away their Res and give them a long recycle Superior Res (even 5 minutes would be good)? Infinite resurrecting is BRUTAL on these mobs. If you see more than 3 healers in a group you either hope you have 3 archers to RoA them to death or you walk the other way.

2) Physical Damage dealers are the backbone of many ah player group and the same should be true of mobs. These are pretty general mobs. They should do a fair amount of damage, have quite a bit of armour, but have no special abilities and should thus easy to kill if they are on their own. But if you are forced to ignore them while you go after a Cleric, well, they can do a lot of quickly if there are 2 or more of them on you.

3) Every group of mobs should include at least one Magical Damage dealer. A medium level nuker that should be brought down with a couple of well placed Crits or a SS/GR combo. Sure they are easy to kill, but if you try and take out that annoying healer first your entire group is going to start the fight at half health. These mobs should open with their biggest attack, preferably multicast. But they *should not* stun you, mez you, cast HoTs on their group, or cast DoTs on your group. At least, not very often. They also shouldn't be able to 1 hit your group. That sucks. Maybe 3 or 4 of them together could do this, but not one lone nuker.

4) Crowd Control have only slightly more armour than Magical Damage classes, and they can't nuke. But they should cast a large number of AoE debuffs LIKE CRAZY, large numbers of roots/overburdens, and occasionally stuns and mezzes. Too many stuns and mezzes gets annoying quickly, so don't let them go crazy on those abilities.

The reason I spelt them all out like this is because the mobs need to be generalized. You can't create 4 finely tuned group-mobs and say to yourself "alright, these 4 mobs complement each other great! I'm going to set up a spawn of them." These mobs all need to have a place in the random (not hand picked) groups of mobs that will undoubtedly form on the live servers. So if you create 4 types of mobs, their abilities need to be general enough to be able to complement other mobs in any situation, whether it is a group of 3 random mobs or a group of 10 magical damage dealers (hah. Nuke, nuke, nuke, nuke, nuke, nuke, nuke, nuke, nuke, and nuke aaaaaaand dead.).

[Important bit]
I'm not sure if I outright said it anywhere up there or not, but the fun bit about these types of groups is having to make choices. There are many combinations of 4 mobs in groups of 2-10, and each combination requires the use of slightly different tactics. Should you hit the 2 Clerics and the Healer first, or should you take care of those 3 nukers? If you go after the nukers and don't manage to 1 hit them, the DCT will have them healed back up instantly and you will have wasted all of your most powerful specials. But on the other hand if you go after those clerics the nukers might be able to take your entire group down to sub-100 health in one go, and then those 4 Tanks are going to dirt the lot of you before you can even think of healing.... maybe we could stun the healers? No wait, the nukers. No wait, the tanks, then go after the clerics, while the nukers do their thing... choices choices.
[/Important bit]

That's fun. Spending 4 hours setting up and coordinating a group of players to make a dungeon run against an UberBoss isn't fun. It isn't fun to have to tell each person exactly when to use their specials in a certain order or else lose those four hours in bloody death with nothing to show for it. It especially isn't fun if you have an idiot in your group named Leroy Jenkins (as an old example that I'm sure everyone is familiar with).

[Casyle]

Fo Casius...

At the moment, Kwellen Berserkers. *Event Monsters I think* Why? Simple, freaking insta-kill attack.

For normal monsters, Elite Whithered Aegis. They've always been really powerful for their levels.

Honerable mention... Oastics. They're mean for their level. They hit hard and have a CoT ability. Not to mention they're so small that when Casius is engaged with something he frequently misses them coming in.

Easiest... Not to be a jerk, but I'm not sayin' Already enough competition at the little spawn as it is.

For Casyle....

Elite Withered Aegis Healers and Archers. I think everyone can sympathize and understands with the Healers ;p I just have a special hate for Archers...

Easiest.. Same as Casius.

[Casyle]

D'oh, named monster...

That's easy.

Fafnir. 'Course, that's not because he's hard but because he's cheap as **** with his group insta kill attack.

Oh, and Fratricide, that Yew Treant's name is Arboreon.

Oh, and Casyle is a mostly-mage character right now. All the Arcane schools, 'cept Chaos Warrior, and Healer.

[Casyle]

Hell with it.

The easiest monster in the game, in my opinion, are the Sand Scarabs. They're lvl 70 - 75, though the Harvester is 80. Like most beetles they don't deal a lot of damage and their defense isn't that good, BUT, unlike most beetles Scarabs have no, um... That armor enhancing ability that makes you do squat damage for awhile haha. Scarabs are quite underpowered.

Of course, their spawn is SMALL too. It's only in a small area and, maybe, 6 are spawned at any one time.

Oh, and what's fun to hunt? Son of Gigaroth. He's powerful, and has a powerful AoE, but it's not an insta kill. He's challening without going into the lame insta-kill territory.

[Trust]

I'm sorry you feel that I'm looking to nerf weaker mobs, but thats just not the case. I'm not sure how else to communicate that. Everything has it's place, including the weaker, or easier mobs.

OK, Rawdge, easiest mobs for me are gem golems. They rarely dodge and have weak specials.

[Aamer Khan]

One more comment I forgot...

The elite blight anchor. A most stupid and irritating mob if there ever was one.

What could be a very cool thing, is basically a how may death points you want to rack up with no real reason.

If these mobs dropped something worth going after I would change my tune.

If this mob would roam around but could actually be killed by an accomplished group of defenders I would change my tune.

IF it dropped something worth trying to figure out workable tactics I would change my tune.

However, as it is currently, This mob does nothing to make t6 resources hard to get nor does it provide fun and excitement... it is just a mind numbing excercise in frustration.

PLEASE fix this mob or do away with it completely.

[Drevar]

Another Ranger here. Are we all Rangers or something? I am built for bow through and through. All the other schools I've taken are to augment ranged combat. 100 Ranger/ELAR/Healer/Druid, 36 Mage/Scout. Working on Spiritist and Conjurer.

I find treants, oddly, to be quite easy. With flame attack overriding the nature damage on lightning arrows but retaining the stun ability, they rarely get near me. It's the oastics and thier ethereal damage that sneak up on me in 2s and 3s that get me in trouble. One big help with those two monster types is that thier thorns don't trigger with missle weapons, even at point blank range. The named treants pose little problem for me, I can even solo Thistleface (killed him once and he never got closer than 20m). *hint: I use Demon Flurry + flame attack on flame vulnerable creatures*

Stone and gem golems are rediculously easy. Metal golems are a bit tougher since they seem to have much more armor.

The undead seriously need to be toned down in the number of debuffs they use. Any attack at all seems to have a chance of landing one of the multitude of morbidea effects, even when they do no damage (sevaral player abilites work the same way). Challenging yes, but way more annoying and tedious than fun. Some of the T6 undead need to be looked at. T6 Diviners have dex/evasion set too high by a factor of 10. Fully buffed (1800+ bow skill) and in flurry I am lucky to hit 1/5 of the shots.

Wolves are extremely soft, as are beetles when not in hardened shell mode. Wolves are only dangerous when they attack as a pack and all lead off with thier multistrike.

The most balanced mobs to me seem to be, believe it or not, spiders and gruoks. They have a mix of weaknesses and strengths, use debuffing effects that hurt but don't spam them and have decent hp and armor.

I don't mind having creatures that I simply can't fight due to my skill set or weapon choice, as long as there are enough other choices that provide similar reward opportunities. The totally resistant to X love needs to be spread around more, though. I'm tired of Nature being the step-child beaten with the nerf bat when it comes to new monsters and bosses, particularly event mobs.

One aspect of combat that needs serious looking at is agro control. Healing draws way to much agro and there is little to no way to pull agro back on to those who are actually doing damage. A single group heal can pull an entire group of mobs to the healer and in order to survive has to chain heal himself, perpetuating the agro. The melee schools need more options to regain agro and keep it. The guarding abilities are laughable.

Drev

[gopher65]

I think Wolves are suppose to be viewed as a group, not as individuals. As individuals, yes, they are probably the single weakest mobs in the game. But with the exception of Icy Dires (who only sometimes group due to their wide spawn range) I always find wolves in a pack. From the level 25 ones near Dalimond to the Dires and Fire Dires.

Drevar, I use a crossbow on Oastics. I find killing them much harder with a bow. With a Xbow I Multishot/powershot one dead instantly, and the other 2 are down to 3/4 health due to CoT by that time. I heal myself, then kill one using normal attacks. I then either PS again, or headshot the last one. No problem as long as I don't have a treant on me.

I only have something like 900 bow skill (989 current or something like that) so bows are really only for pulling in my case. When fighting lower tier mobs that I can actually hit with my bow, I find that bows and Xbows are useful in different situations. I want to bring my bow skill up to 1000 base so I can actually use the darned thing on Tier V/VI mobs on a regular basis to test out exactly what mobs should have what used against them.

I think every Scout and Ranger should carry around one of each.

Here's a thought: My character is a human and has no racial traits of interest. How many Archers out there are either Elves, Gnomes, Dryads, or Dwarves? Gnomes in particular would have a very easy time killing many bosses due to their Racial Ability. Also I don't have any special weapons like a Demon Flurry (there are no special tier IV or V crossbows). I've also not brought any crafting schools up to level 100. So I still only have that base 600 strength (I'm levelling up warrior right now cause I hate crafting:P). When looking at your damage output, if you only have the regular amount of Archer strength you do about 70% of the damage you'd do otherwise (in my experience). 10/7 =~1.43. It'll be nice when I'm doing 143% of my current damage. Actually more, because raising strength will also raise my skill level, which will raise my damage even more.

Even if you ignore tweaked characters (and everyone has pumped their character up in some way, either through teched items or special drops or multiclassing), some of these are apples to oranges comparisons, if only since some Racials are so overwhelmingly powerful.

[Pharcellus]

Oh yeah, the Healer Hate is rather excessive, I have to agree there.

Nothing breaks a good aggro and pull from the tank like a big Heal spell. It has gotten to the point where I offer to tank, because the mobs WILL eventually be beating on me anyway. I'm even working on better armor which will allow me to tank more effectively. Sometimes a real tank and I can switch off; he does the pulls and takes the big specials, then I take over as tank when the mobs all run to me after I heal him, and then I just chain heal myself until the mobs are dead. Can even hotkey the sequence and just stand there, ready to hit the Big Heal when I get too low.

Guild Wars (just as an example) has Healer Hate as well, but it isn't nearly as bad and the tank can easily manage the aggro and keep it on him.

[Amerelium]

high tier undeads are tough for dragons

[Braun]

Plenty of T6 Undead in the Eastern Deadlands are fun and challenging. Level 120 Shaman are so hard to kill, especially when other undead come in to heal them. Elite Striders teamed up with the T6 Warriors or Reavers can be quite a dealy combo. A 120 CONJ took me out before I even saw him... MCIV on a flame spear as I was stalking another mob... just looked up and I was dead LOL.
Were you thinking of just creating some multiclassed mobs, or perhaps adding more to the WA group AI?