Challenging Mobs...

[Rawdge]

Just out of curiosity.....

Which mob(s), including named ones, do you all find the most challenging, and why do you find them challenging?

Alternatively, which ones do you all find unchallenging, and again, what makes them so easy?

Feel free to discuss any mobs in particular, and anything about their characteristics, abilities, spells, etc.. However, please refrain from discussing their loot (including drop rates, etc), as that is a whole other topic, and beyond..... let's just say beyond my immediately curiosity at this particular moment. We'll discuss those things in another thread.

And before anyone gets anxious, no, don't worry about about mentioning weaker ones. I'm not on a nerf-quest here. I'm strictly curious as to what you folks consider to be a challenge, and what you don't.

Okay... discuss!

[Shian]

For the challenged:
I remeber being afraid of adult dragons in Draak while doing my ROP. Thier debuffs were very strong.

For the unchallanged:
At low levels I loved doing giant chickens and fall harvest zombies. Not a bad thing though It made me feel strong when I could take 15-20 of them at once ^_^

[Dracana]

I have my off days with some t5 and t6 mobs but the consistently challenging ones for me is any of the event mobs around Harro and Old Oaks since they come with a lot of HP, debuffs and some of them, like the abomination taskmasters come with insta kill attacks. Usually I will tend to avoid them rather than get into a fight with them when I'm in the area. T6 green and purple vexators fall into the category of challenging mobs too

[gopher65]

Preramble:

My primary class is Ranger. Because of the odd way this game is (un)balanced, all short delay, low damage weapons do less DPS against most mobs than long delay, high damage weapons. Personally I am of the opinion that this happens largely as a result of the designers putting too much emphasis on the Armour and Evasion stat of mobs, and not enough emphasis on wards and, especially, resistances.

I want to occasionally have to remove lightning arrows (50% Chance of 3 second stun, plus converts damage to nature damage) because I'm facing a mob with 5000 nature ward which makes it impossible for me to hit with that ability on (oh and you'd have to fix the double/triple/quadruple damage changing buffs on at once bug).

Anyway though, as a consequence of all of this, I find any mob with excessive armour to be very difficult to kill. Hitting a golem for 100 damage at 30 delay makes for a tough kill when it is hitting you for 300 at 45 delay:P. I think originally we were suppose to kite mobs and pinprick them to death (as you'd expect an archer to do if they only had their bow as a weapon), but that was deemed unbalanced and removed from the game early on without rebalancing the other side of the equation (our sub-par weapon damage).

However, the few mobs with little or no armour (Oastics, Skulks) are very easy for me to kill. I notice that when I am in any other school Skulks become almost impossible to kill because of their debuffs, but for a Ranger, Scout, or ELAR they are one of the easier mobs in the game (which is cool and as it should be. I still think that every mob should be virtually immune to at least 1 damage type. Force people to either change schools on occasion or use damage changing crystals and spells. And to freaking stop auto-casting the same spell continuously).

Main point:

This brings up a point that I think you will hear over and over again: For most people (well, me anyway, but I matter more to me than most other people) the hardest mobs in the game are normally those that use multiple debuff abilities with short recycles on those abilities (ie, skulks, WA shamans). Without debuffs it becomes a simple matter to subconsciously calculate the average "Damage Given vs Damage Taken". If ADG>ADT then you will win most of your fights against that mob. When you add debuffs into the mix it changes the whole game and makes you sweat. You start to worry whether or not specific individual hits land or not, rather than just the average DPS of a fight.

Interesting little tidbit that I find neat: my dragon and my ranger have almost opposite likes and dislikes for killing mobs. My ranger/druid/healer/spiritist has trouble with mobs like golems (cause she has no high damage classes, lower power and low strength), but finds spiders easy even with their high evasion and magic evasion (high focus, high magic skill, high dex, moderately high weapon skill). My dragon can't easily kill anything that casts debuffs, cause he can't cleanse himself yet. He also has trouble with spiders, cause he has low stats and skills, and therefore can't get past their evasion check. But golems are a cinch.

[Kala]

I want to occasionally have to remove lightning arrows (50% Chance of 3 second stun, plus converts damage to nature damage) because I'm facing a mob with 5000 nature ward which makes it impossible for me to hit with that ability on (oh and you'd have to fix the double/triple/quadruple damage changing buffs on at once bug).

I can't hit anything evolved with lightning arrows. Not even level 20 necroflies as a level 100 ranger. This is very irritating for me, especially when hunting the satyr isles, where I turn on lightning arrows, turn it off, turn it back on again, etc. I'd like for more things to be immune to stuff and less things to be immune to nature damage. I'd also like to be able to hit something 80 levels below me.

As for challenging mobs, at lower levels the named on LA are quite deadly to hatchlings. Well...pretty much anything is, but those especially...partly because they wander and so you're never quite certain where you'll be safe.

[gopher65]

I can't hit anything evolved with lightning arrows. Not even level 20 necroflies as a level 100 ranger. This is very irritating for me, especially when hunting the satyr isles, where I turn on lightning arrows, turn it off, turn it back on again, etc. I'd like for more things to be immune to stuff and less things to be immune to nature damage. I'd also like to be able to hit something 80 levels below me.

As for challenging mobs, at lower levels the named on LA are quite deadly to hatchlings. Well...pretty much anything is, but those especially...partly because they wander and so you're never quite certain where you'll be safe.

Yeah, that's cause they have nature resistance on those mobs. You can still hit them and stun them, but you just do 0 damage to them. I like those mobs, but the problem with them is that the level 20 mobs (on that island just off LA) are just as resistant to my nature spells as the level 120 mobs:P. *That* is annoying. This means that nature stuns and roots still work, which isn't the case if Wards are used instead of resistances.

I accidentally flipped those in my other post: "wards and, especially, resistances" should have been "resistances and, especially, wards".

Anyway though, I realize (being a nature user) that nature uses already have to deal with resistances on higher tier mobs because of the whole unfortunate chain stunning thing that use to happen due to unlinked spells. But I rarely run into a mob with spirit resistance (automations are the only one I can think of offhand, and they are oldschool mobs), and AFAIK there are no mobs that are completely immune to a physical damage type. Oh Faykkis and Beetles have Hardened Shell, and Dwarves do their thing, but those aren't school specific. That would be like having a Magic immune mob rather than a Nature immune mob.

Kinda offtopic though.

[Vaz]

Redbacked Spiders, their hatchlings, and their breeders are among the more challenging things I've encountered.

Their spawns are sparse and far apart, and although I like doing some proper hunting rather than non-stop slaughter, needing to hunt for them 99% of the time and be killing them 1% of the time, mostly due to the wonky spawn system making it impossible to tell if I'm moving through areas too fast to trigger spawning or if there just aren't any spiders in the areas, can be frustrating.

Then, once they are found, the spiders can both stun and bleed. This, for me, is generally a fun sort of challenge though.

The Blighted Festival Treants are probably the toughest things I've fought. "Ow, ow, OW, OW!" They have about four hard-hitting abilities, they have more HP than their equivalent treants making it take a while to kill them, and in general they hit a draconic attacker 10+ levels higher than them a bit hard. For me, this is also an acceptable challenge.

[tjl]

with no healing or cleansing ability... any of the undead can be tricky if they get close enough to melee. Seeping Blight ad infinitum, plus all the STACKING debuffs can put a caster down really fast. just one application of the t6 seeping blight can take away close to 1/2 of my health.

vexators are also next to impossible because of the aura they have.

[Kala]

I accidentally flipped those in my other post: "wards and, especially, resistances" should have been "resistances and, especially, wards".

It was the "I want to occasionally have to remove lightning arrows" that threw me there, since I already have to do that.

[Kulamata]

Nice analysis Gopher. I'll go in another direction, and simply add "mobs that spawn too freely" as an example of inappropriately or irritatingly challenging. One example was the Spiral Down to Kaa; a lot of fun in the early days, much less so later.

(It's been a while since I played much, so the late Tulga-era spawn reduction may have helped with this issue.)

As a side note, given the nature of the WA, I'd think that Nature spells should be particularly effective.

[Fratricide]

I personally liked the Avatar of Pain. His ability to collect cronies and let them wreak havoc amongst the meak and weak hearted individuals that feebly attempted to smash their way through his territory was quite enjoyable to watch and be party to.

Someone mentioned the current blighted Treants that are within the realms... I have my own personal issues with them, as I am working on that there blighted Yew treant quest. Problem being, I can solo that named Yew treant.. lvl 110 I think.. don't remember his name off the top of my head.. but I can't even get near killing a low lvl 90's Blighted treant... that makes no sense whatsoever... The named should be well more powerful then even a blighted version of itself, what 15-20 lvls below itself...

Anyway... them are my Cents... spend them as you will.

[gopher65]

That's interesting Fratricide. What class/classes are you? I can't kill the named Yew (not even close), but I can kill any of the blighted treants, though it is a close battle at times. This is probably due to the fact that I cast Detoxify Self, 2 cleanse teched heals, and Purify V on a regular basis. Those debuffs are just a killer if you can't get rid of them.

<snip>
"mobs that spawn too freely" as an example of inappropriately or irritatingly challenging.
<snip>
As a side note, given the nature of the WA, I'd think that Nature spells should be particularly effective.

Redbacked Spiders, their hatchlings, and their breeders are among the more challenging things I've encountered.

Their spawns are sparse and far apart, and although I like doing some proper hunting rather than non-stop slaughter, needing to hunt for them 99% of the time and be killing them 1% of the time, mostly due to the wonky spawn system making it impossible to tell if I'm moving through areas too fast to trigger spawning or if there just aren't any spiders in the areas, can be frustrating.

Agreed with both Xoshara and Kulamata. Many mob spawns are either two dense or two sparse. Both cause frustration to me. I like to track and hunt individual mobs (unless they are really easy), but that is hard when the spawns are loopily placed at filled.

I think Nature does affect Undead more than normal Kulamata. But because nature is mostly crowd control and not pure damage, you don't really notice it. I mean, and I'm just pulling these numbers out of thin air, if my Stone Fist normally does 150 damage against a non-WA mob, and it does 10% more damage against a WA mob of similar level, armour, and resistance, then it will only do 165 damage against a WA mob. Whereas if you are using a flame spell (the pure damage spell line) and you saw a 10% increase, you'd definitely notice +50 extra damage.

[Ssilmath]

One group of mobs I find way too easy are golems, gem golems in particular. For all that they are huge mounds of mineral, they go down way to quickly to me, no matter what I'm chucking at them. I'm a 100 Paladin/75 Druid/Working on Shaman, and use a Blade of Rending for the lower levels. However, when working on Druid, I could easily run through two or three level 80 Golems with nothing but spells by the time I hit 50.

[Rawdge]

Hmm, some good and interesting feedback here. This is helpful.

Some good points in here, especially regarding the different schools and the mobs they're able to handle or not. It's also good to know things like Shian mentioned. Having mobs that are easy for your particular school (or race) to defeat and make you feel powerful is a good thing, and that needs to be there, to some degree or another, for everyone. Of course, there also needs to be some mobs that are somewhat above the difficulty curve for your particular race or school. So feel free to include that kind of info as well.

Of special note, which mobs are fun to fight, and why? Ultimately, that's what this is about. Which mobs, which is to say, essentially, which combinations of abilities, resistances, wards, etc., are fun to engage with? Since that's what mobs really are, at their core. The more we can hear from you all which mobs are fun to fight (whether that fun is found due to a good challenge or a good stomping is your call), the more we can build upon that, and alter or shape current or future mobs to be fun to fight.

All in all, this is Good Stuff. I appreciate you all answering so far, and I'm taking all of this into account. So the more feedback you all can present, the better.

Thanks again folks!

*checks the time*

... and have a happy holiday too!

[Kala]

Of special note, which mobs are fun to fight, and why?

I like fighting vexes simply because they look really neat. Of course, the fact that they tend to go down pretty quickly when I'm on the cat helps too. And the blue ones are such a pretty shade of blue...

[Dracana]

Of special note, which mobs are fun to fight, and why?

I tend to like fighting mobs which I can kill a lor actually get something out of it worthwhile. Icy dires, firey dires, golems, vexators (they are challenging but I like to fight them), blight hounds, etc. Makes me feel like I am getting something out of the game. I also like killing arbotus just for their death animation. Evil I know.

[rizo/nawkia]

(yall gota lengthen the log in time....this my 3rd time typing it)
The challenging-
-treants are chalenging when ya are a nature class since ya do lil damage an they heal(less ya know what ya are doin:P

-all the undead except the ones that take after the races are pretty challenging with the hp an attack they have(task masters wraiths meats etc)

-giants are both defiantely challenging an fun nice attacks with nice dorps

-evolved stuff is defiantely challenging seein as how they are immune to nature spells so i have to resort to crush(my spirit an everyhtin else kinda sucks atm:P)

the easy!
-beetles an wolves are kinda easy cause they are easily killed with spirit

-golems are pretty cool if ya have enough armor otherwise they are kinda challenging cause they do so much damage in so lil time 1500+armor recommended:P

-blighted hounds are easy cause of the spirit spells hehe pygmys are pretty easy to w/o the ogres roundem

-really anything easy if ya are prepared for it

THE FUN!!!!*types slowly or dramatic effect*
-ever since i started playin horizons ive always love mass killin(aoeing to me
its realy fun to ape cause its a cool spell effect, many die at same time so its a lota loot,plus you can test some of your skills...back when the spells were linked i would pull about half of fire isle just to see what i could do, an ofcourse they all died *looks at the steaming pile of beetles shocked an electrified by countless thunders an lightning storms>.>*....wasnt me:P

-other things that are fun is grouping just to hunt an to see what a mixture of classes can do when hunting together (2 druids,nature and a mage type are good combos, especialy a row of archers..ima have to try that one day stand on a hill an kill everything in sight with some friends:P

-killin event mobs is also fun in its own way, monsters have the nice attacks an our rewad is a nice lump of loot:P











well theres my 2 cents/ will add more later if i remember

[Fratricide]

That's interesting Fratricide. What class/classes are you? I can't kill the named Yew (not even close), but I can kill any of the blighted treants, though it is a close battle at times. This is probably due to the fact that I cast Detoxify Self, 2 cleanse teched heals, and Purify V on a regular basis. Those debuffs are just a killer if you can't get rid of them.

To answer your question Gopher.. I am lvl 100 Warrior.. lvl 100 spirtist.. with 50+ lvls of healer.. ~50 lvls of Cleric.. and quite a few others mixed in there as well below 50 lvls of each... Granted... the Yew Named is an extremely long fight, but I am able to best 'im nearly every time I have happened across him.. tis tougher as a spiritist mind you.. cuz of the crappy damage I am able to output with blunt instruments. I have found that he doesn't use many of the Blight spells and such that the newer treants do, and thus as a warrior I cannot remove those blights fast enough with the limited amount of spell casting I have as a warrior... and as a spiritist... I have more then enough detox spells and such available.. but yet I have no armor to speak of.. quite the quandary the blighters place me in.

Anyway.. Maybe if I were to become a Reaver or sommat I might have some better luck with em... but too late in the games for that this year I imagine.

[awdz]

my hunting style, particularly as ranger, tends to be sneak up, pull just one, and take it out as quickly as i can, preferably with little to no damage to me. most things i can take out solo with rain of arrows, gnomian prowess & lightning arrows on at the same time. for those i can't (think non-stunnable), there's kiting or multicast dark cyclone (if i survive the attacks while trying to get it cast).

i find variety fun, because how tough/easy i want the hunt depends very much on my mood. i hate getting stripped of my buffs, because then i focus on reequipping instead of stalking the targets. it's also kind of fun to figure out spawn patterns and work off those, so it'd be interesting for those to change periodically (maybe each quarter of the year or something?).

i'm not very good at the strategies for a group hunt, but there's something special about taking out a really big toughie every so often. i'm not into doing that every night or even several times a week, just once in a while - though i know there are some that would do it continuously if they could, so i guess it takes all kinds. i'm also not into big aoe storms as a hunting style, and i hate the pl hunts at the purple flies or blight bridge. if someone just sits in the background and soaks up xp without even trying to move, why bother playing? i prefer an opponent that forces everyone in the party to participate.

what got me hooked into trying this game (i've never tried other mmorpgs) was seeing over a player's shoulder the battle where that giant werewolf (titus?) invaded dalimond, and the whole shard struggling to take out him & his spawn. not just the battle coordinated at the spur of the moment, but folks saying humorous things in the midst of the chaos like, 'somebody get that maggot!' when it moved past the field of maggot spawn, and 'nice line dance, juggernaut!' when he had attracted the attention of all the healing werewolves and was leading them in a circle around the battlefield so they would not heal the big guy.

i guess i like challenges that encourage folks to work together to win and that has an element of humor mixed in. i don't know if that helps much since it sounds like you're looking for more specific examples. and annoying as they can be to run into, i do like the wandering mega nasties. would be neat if we could beat them back to different spawn zones when we encounter them... like if aop were wandering near last stand, we beat him back past mithril's anvil, then back past yew forest, then into ED and in theory up to reklar's fortress. it always helps to feel like you're making a difference in the world. :-)

[rizo/nawkia]

To answer your question Gopher.. I am lvl 100 Warrior.. lvl 100 spirtist.. with 50+ lvls of healer.. ~50 lvls of Cleric.. and quite a few others mixed in there as well below 50 lvls of each... Granted... the Yew Named is an extremely long fight, but I am able to best 'im nearly every time I have happened across him.. tis tougher as a spiritist mind you.. cuz of the crappy damage I am able to output with blunt instruments. I have found that he doesn't use many of the Blight spells and such that the newer treants do, and thus as a warrior I cannot remove those blights fast enough with the limited amount of spell casting I have as a warrior... and as a spiritist... I have more then enough detox spells and such available.. but yet I have no armor to speak of.. quite the quandary the blighters place me in.

Anyway.. Maybe if I were to become a Reaver or sommat I might have some better luck with em... but too late in the games for that this year I imagine.

Aberon is really easy if ya got flame bolt with an some good heals..i just use the 2 revs an flame bolt an hes dead ina few min, even faster if i melee