Challenging Mobs...

[Creme]

Oastics = sheer evilness

[Creme]

Oh...

Another annoyance of some mobs such as OASTICS.

They follow you way way too far, practically into another zone.

This could be looked at across all mobs. Some stop following too abruptly, even with a DOT on them, others you practically have to recall to get rid of.

[gopher65]

I think that's intended Creme. I seem to remember reading something like "some monsters like Zombies are stupid and will single mindedly follow you until they are unable to do so. Other monsters will quickly tire of the chase."

Mobs also have different types of aggro as well. I think.

[Guaran]

Challenging (melee fighter perspective): T5 and T6 blights, for the stuns and the Atrophy debuff
Blight hounds, constant stuns
Wraith groups, nasty mix of stuns mezzes, dot's, debuff's
Blight anchors and their army's
Fafnir
Daknor
Gruk
Reklar

Easy: mobs one at a time that are unsocial.
Son of Gigaroth
Valkor

[Rawdge]

Wow, a lot of good stuff in here. Too much to comment on individually, and I apologize for not being able to do so. I will say though that this is exactly the kind of information I'm looking for. I really do appreciate you folks taking the time to post in here.

A couple quick things.....

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

Thanks for letting me know. Again, I'm not about to rush out and "fix" those golems. I will reiterate that at some point in the future, we're very likely to revisit mobs and rebalance them somewhat. I don't know yet which ones will be mucked about with, and which ones won't, and even which changes will be made. Those are decisions to be made further on down the line when we finally get to that project. I'll add too though, that even "easy" mobs have their place.

But changes to mobs can't be made in a vacuum. Player Adventure Schools, Monster Loot, (and to certain degrees, Crafting Schools and the Crafting System as well) all need to be considered when making any changes to mobs. All of those things (and more) are tied together, and they all influence one another. This is why it's such a big project, and also why any broad and/or major changes really shouldn't be made ad hoc, or hastily. Besides, if I were to run around trying to nerf all the weak mobs by making them harder, they'd just have to be changed again further down the line anyway, so all that does is add more work for me. Things have been the way they are now for awhile, and for better or worse, it is the current status quo. You all, as players are used to the way things are and there's no reason for us Devs to run around making changes simply for changes sake.

When changes eventually come about, they will be planned, and will be changed to the whatever they end up being for a good reason, and with an eye towards the bigger picture. I'll know more about this in the future, when I finally get to a point when I can review the mobs, their abilities, and see how they fit together with the other systems in the game.

For now though, thanks again for all your cooperation, and giving me the feedback that can help me make a better game for you all. It helps to make my job a bit better, and a bit more rewarding for me to know that I'm helping to create the game you all want to play.

[Rawdge]

Oh, one thing I forgot!

high tier undeads are tough for dragons

I've read why some other dragon players feel that they're tough, but what about you? Do you agree with what's already been said? Do you have different reasons? Any abilities in particular, or is their overall combat behavior?

[Pharcellus]

I've read why some other dragon players feel that they're tough, but what about you? Do you agree with what's already been said? Do you have different reasons? Any abilities in particular, or is their overall combat behavior?

I'm not sure why Amerelium said that; he obviously can elaborate from his point of view. I will say that some of the higher (read Veteran/Elite) undead are very tough, but most of them are about an even challenge for a Dragon. They do cast an inordinate number of debuffs, and debuff-specific classes, like Shamans go a tad crazy.

We can have Cleanse-teched spells now, and from my experience, they do make a huge difference in fighting undead. I haven't tried Blight Ward/Resistance techs much vs undead, but I don't think that it will help too much, as many of their attacks are just normal attacks that go with their WA versions of the normal classes. Wizards still do Energy damage with their Energy spells.

Other than that, the only other complaint I have about Veteran undead is the density of mobs on the smaller Satyr Islands. Elnath feels "about right". You can safely hunt and pull, and you will probably not overaggro. The rest of the Satyr Isles are almost unhuntable. Dahibi especially up near the Inhibition machine structure is so packed with mobs that you can't swing a dead Saris. That's usually where all the Vexators, Zombie Ogres, Abominations, Aegrors, etc end up, too, so if you are hunting the "rares", it is pretty much Elnath or nothing.

[gopher65]

I haven't tried Blight Ward/Resistance techs much vs undead, but I don't think that it will help too much, as many of their attacks are just normal attacks that go with their WA versions of the normal classes. Wizards still do Energy damage with their Energy spells.

Ahhh, you just hit upon a major pet peeve of mine. Nature mobs do crush damage. WA do crush damage. Boss mobs do crush damage. Golems do crush damage. Magic users do Energy or Fire...unless they physically attack you, and then they do crush damage. With the exception of Elemental mobs (Flame Beetles, Ice Beetles, etc) everything does crush damage, or in a few cases slash (wolves I think). So what exactly is the point of Blight Resistance and Blight Ward? (Don't come back with 2 examples of mobs that use Blight or don't use crush. I'm aware that there are a few mobs that use pierce (like 2) and have blight attacks:P. There just aren't nearly as many as there should be.)

WA mobs should do Blight damage and Spirit damage. That's their whole deal right? They come from the realm of "Blight"? And they're soul suckers and reanimators? I guess I'm just peeved that I only very rarely have to use Blight Resistance and Blight Ward. Even Nature Resistance gets more use than those two spells, and the Blight is suppose to be our main enemy.

[Steele]

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.

Edit: I just realized how derailed from the original topic my post is, and wanted to apologize. If a mod wants to move it to a new thread or something, feel free. Since I took the time to write it, I didn't want to simply delete it. Thanks.

Yeah... this is REALLY something that needs to be looked at, especially for small group play (husband/wife duos, for example). I honestly believe there is something awry with monster AI. I'll explain as best I can:

I play a 97 Dwarf CHSW with L30ish Mage/Sorc/Wiz sub-classes.
She plays a 97 Dwarf Healer/ 65ish Spiritist.

Since coming back to the game, we've largely adopted a simple tactic:

She's going to end up tanking anyway, so she just spends most of our battles self-healing (spirit bolting when she can afford to), and I pick off mobs one by one. It's boring, uninspired, and a rather significant pet peeve even though she's learned to accept the role.

The really strange thing, however, is this:
I can see her becoming a mob-magnet when she's in SPRT school, since her rating would be lower than mine; that makes sense. What doesn't make sense however, is when she's in healer school. A typical pull is as follows:

1. She positions herself behind me, I move within 41' of the pull target and cast an extended range bolt spell - usually doing 100ish damage.
2. The mob ignores me completely, makes a beeline for her and unleashes every timered attack it can on her.
3. I take a few seconds to spin around, engage the mob and gain aggro by blowing most of my specials. She is now hovering between 30-50% health, depending on the type and number of mobs pulled.
4. She heals herself, ripping any mobs off me through legitimate 'heal aggro", and cementing her aggro with any still beating on her.

Step 4 is relatively normal behavior... Steps 1, 2, and 3 are EXTREMELY frustrating, and occur (I think she'll back me up on this) on nine of every ten pulls. We've tried varying iterations of positioning, who initiates the pull, the schools we're in, types and number of buffs on us, etc. and nothing seems to matter. If she's in my group, any mob aggroed beelines to her.

I figured it might have been some sort of pulsing aura effect, but even stripping completely "buff-naked" and relogging (which would also clear residual chain aggro on out-of-range mobs), pulled mob behavior remains unchanged.

Saw the same thing happen when the two of us were in a larger group... I want to say 7 or 8 of us, including Menkure and I want to say Andaras and maybe Pickel, too. We were beating up on Elite & Veteran Blights in EDL, and noted the same behavior - we all died a few times, but even with all sorts of wholesome AE goodness exploding about, she died several more times than anyone else, and for no obvious, explicable reason.

With the Death Point changes on the horizon, and possibly more significant penalties as well, I sincerely hope these phenomina will be fully investigated and not rubber stamped (as perhaps they were long, long ago) with "everything seems to be working normally."

[pevil2000]

I think I've found virtually everything challenging on my way to adult! I remember the first time I tried to take out the grass beetles, ouch! And the leafy oastics, they would sting a lot. Running to Draak and bumping into Blight Hounds... hmmmm...

However I think a lot of those were simply coz of being too low level (i.e. as a hatchie they were the same level as me), once an adult the equivalents in my current tiers were never as bad. Though oastics are still disliked by me, they go down easily but give out the damage as well. I think for my dragon any magic user is challenging really, that seems to damage me quite nicely, whereas being maxed out on Dex for my level, most melee attacks miss me.

[Steele]

WA mobs should do Blight damage and Spirit damage. That's their whole deal right? They come from the realm of "Blight"? And they're soul suckers and reanimators? I guess I'm just peeved that I only very rarely have to use Blight Resistance and Blight Ward. Even Nature Resistance gets more use than those two spells, and the Blight is suppose to be our main enemy.

Agreed.

If a mob is a non-blighted beast/humanoid or non-magical undead like skeletons/zombies, it should deal pierce/slash/crush according to attach method.

If they attack with spells, then according to spell type.

If they're holding an unenchanted weapon, or multiple weapons in the case of abominations, they should deal damage appropriate to the weapon type.

Otherwise, truly blighted mobs should deal blight or spirit damage - even when using bare fists... they're oozing with necrotic magics and rotting auras, aren't they? Simply touching us should cause our flesh to shrivel. The WA should be scary, and difficult, provide challenge and inspire imagination. Right now, they're just kinda ho-hum easy or hard.

Except for swarming purple necroflies. They're just kinda silly-impossible at the moment.

[Pharcellus]

Ahhh, you just hit upon a major pet peeve of mine. Nature mobs do crush damage. WA do crush damage. Boss mobs do crush damage. Golems do crush damage. Magic users do Energy or Fire...unless they physically attack you, and then they do crush damage. With the exception of Elemental mobs (Flame Beetles, Ice Beetles, etc) everything does crush damage, or in a few cases slash (wolves I think). So what exactly is the point of Blight Resistance and Blight Ward? (Don't come back with 2 examples of mobs that use Blight or don't use crush. I'm aware that there are a few mobs that use pierce (like 2) and have blight attacks:P. There just aren't nearly as many as there should be.)

Well, actually, they DO use a lot of blight attacks. Seeping Blight, Soul Anchor X, Emanation of Discord, Enervating Morbidae, etc. The problem is that they aren't usually the real sources of damage. Most of them are debuffs, or DoTs coupled with debuffs (ugh), so only Blight Ward would affect them. Everything else is weapon/spell-specific. Blight Ward/Resist would work well against Shamans, but they aren't terribly difficult, just annoying.

But, yeah, most things do crush, because crush is the most common damage type by far in fantasy anyway. H2H, staves, hammers, clubs, mauls, maces, etc all should do crush. Most monster attacks also seem to be crush because they are H2H. Gem golems do some slash; spiders, grouks, and wolves do pierce.

It does seem kind of excessive, but hey, I am all for wearing a set of crush-resist scales and taking less damage from most sources.

[Pharcellus]

The really strange thing, however, is this:
I can see her becoming a mob-magnet when she's in SPRT school, since her rating would be lower than mine; that makes sense. What doesn't make sense however, is when she's in healer school. A typical pull is as follows:

1. She positions herself behind me, I move within 41' of the pull target and cast an extended range bolt spell - usually doing 100ish damage.
2. The mob ignores me completely, makes a beeline for her and unleashes every timered attack it can on her.
3. I take a few seconds to spin around, engage the mob and gain aggro by blowing most of my specials. She is now hovering between 30-50% health, depending on the type and number of mobs pulled.
4. She heals herself, ripping any mobs off me through legitimate 'heal aggro", and cementing her aggro with any still beating on her.

I have found that, if I am far enough back, the mob will change aggro 2-3 times before settling on the tank, once he starts doing serious damage. However, you are right. When someone else pulls, the mobs IMMEDIATELY head straight to me, if I am in the group, and visible to the mob. They then change back to the tank, and sometimes back to me again. It's like the mob is confused. I remember doing a bit of ping-pong mob aggro for fun back when we were building the outpost north of Harro. However, usually, once the tank does enough damage, they focus back on the tank, but I do have to stay out of range.

[Ssilmath]

Giving tank classes abilities that draw and help cement aggro would go a long ways towards making grouping a much more enjoyable experience. I'd think that grouping mechanics should be fixed before making groups of enemies that take cohesive groups to drop. As it is, for me to draw aggro from a ranger, I have to spam heals. That seems a little conter productive to me.

[Silverblaze]

I very much agree with this tanking idea...I designed my dragon to tank he does it well, but sadly cant make things keep hitting him otehr than menacing presence. It help, but not quite enough.

Now as for me... some of this is gonna sound arrogant so please forgive me.

1:1 both of my mains 1 dragon, 1 multi classed biped) have soloed just about every event mob in the game. With the exception of valkor,fafnir,sog,reklar,daknor, and gruk.

Some of those keep in mind *can* be solo'd.

That being said. The abominations with their "look at me I can critical strike twice at a time" are hard. ( t6 mainly)

Stuns mess me up, need high resists to live through it. Ethereal damage makes my dragon cry, but shield of gold helps.

So as far as challenge goes... (t5/6)blights, t6 fyakki, evolved flies ( non evolved not so much). I hate Shaman undead, but they break easy

I myself dont think every fight should leave me going "omfg how'd i live?". I'm not one who likes a normal non event t6 mob to leave me breathles in a 1:1 fight.

People who want that, need to go play EQ etc where if you dont group you are up a creek without a canoe. not my style.

I like grouping, I like soloing. Taking either away is a bad idea.

So while yeah, I like a challenge. I', not looking for nerfs to make my life h*ll out there. Want a challenge pull more mobs? bask in your uber glory for taking out a field of icy dires. muahahaha

As for fun factor. Dracanaa was dead on. I like mobs to drop a goody I want. Icy dires are perfect even after the nerf. (coin bags, trophies, forms, comps, hides[not so good],snowballs{not good, but fun!})

Undead are a balst for challenge AND they drop goodies...as they should. The Withered Aegis is our main foe no?

Yes class is very important for challenge...those who dont multi or dont multi school effectively will have more toruble than others. Comes down to tactics at that point...same with dragons.

Play style has a large effect too, while none are wrong, some are certainly more effective no?

All comes down to fun.

I just hope those who play casual, dont beg for nerfs to make the game harder, thereby messing with those who play hardcore. Vice versa btw would suck...cuts both ways.

I'm half and half, when I play a game I wanna be insanely good at it, but I dont really get very competitive per say.

[Valados]

Undead mobs are far too strong for their own good. They are fine on their own, maybe one by one, but all you have to do is take a look at Elnath or one of the other isles. I may have fought just about everything under lots of different names and succeeded at all of them but the one thing that persists are undead mobs.

If I can go to fire isle and pull the entire mountainside of mobs, fiery dire wolves, fire opals, and all, and then smash them with there be so many that it makes the very game chug framerate wise and destroy them all but yet I can land in the western deadlands and get pounded by two mobs with over 2.5k armor and a 380 crush resistance and they are doing crush damage to me then I know something is wrong.

I have a strategy to every thing in the game. Even the bosses get easy after awhile to a point where you just need one good healer with you. But undead mobs persist. It drives me nuts. They are so packed together and some of them have insta-kill abilities too. Two shots from an abomination taskmaster with a 2.5k armor and 380 slash resistance setup. The reason being because the crit strike hits me four times. Argh.. the pain.. You can kill one of them and it instantly spawns about ten feet away from you, fresh recycle timers, fresh buffs, everything..

Undead mobs can be difficult. Not impossible. Just difficult. I know they are supposed to be the equivalent of biped classes but evil versions, but they still seem awfully strong.

The only other thing I have found is mobs lack ethereal armor or spirit wards of any kind. Spiritist class was a wee bit annoying to level for me for the low damage output so maybe it was ment to be that way, or maybe there is a secret I'm missing. Beyond that in other classes it seems like I use spirit bolt more then anything else over anything else. Does even better then flame bolt on most occasions.. Mix up damage resistances on mobs maybe? I know treants are nice and resistant to nature, or something. *Cringes from the memories of getting mobbed*

I'm the Shadowdawn, so biped classes still elude me at times. But anything dragon and I have figured something out to it. Except undead mobs..

Oh, oastics too. The math does not add up vs the armor and resistances when I fight one and then fight something else 20 levels higher then it and take less..if any..damage from the thing 20 levels higher. 2.5k armor, 380 or so pierce resistance and the big forest ones out near the old outpost can still tear through that doing roughly 200+ damage a hit for some reason. Maybe it was ment to be this way? I dunno, but that kind of stack is almost like having half of some kind of t6 armor. Just seems odd.

I'm sure I could think of other things but I'm too sleepy right now to go into too much detail. Though I would love to break down every combat element on paper like I've done in the game. Thats alot to type though... Hmm.. Oh well, maybe if I was asked.

[Steelclaw]

*learns from last time and types this up in notepad*

Fun mobs?

Depends on my mood.

There are times when I don't mind a little work. Work can be one or both of the following:
1) "Tricks" -- defeating these mobs is depdendent on some trick, such as the Primal Boon spell for Reklar, or getting out of range of Fafnir's Scorch when his (her?) arms glow. Finding these tricks is part of the fun, so is developing a strategy.

2) Focus and Endurance -- some mobs require lots of focus (the player's attention, not the character stat) and patience. Most of the named mobs fall into this description, when fought at an appropriate level. Unlike discovering a trick, this never really gets old.

A few of the mobs I've had fun fighting in this category:

Kaa (before the aggro/social grouping changes) -- Once a strategy for surviving his (its?) attacks was found, it became an endurance fight. Forgetting something like a breeze spell, or ignoring an add too long resulted in failure. A very drawn-out, perma-stunned failure.

Blizzard -- This was mostly endurance. Attack, heal, kite, rinse, wash and repeat. This was the first time I got away with killing something I was considered too weak to take on. Naturally, I was quite excited.

<one of the Rift Guardians (I forget which one)> -- This one required some tricks, such as avoiding its area leech, as well as endurance -- 45 minutes of it.

Surtheim -- I'm not sure this mob is even soloable for a dragon. I try once and awhile. Maybe one day I'll find a winning technique.

Daknor -- With respect to the mob, this is mostly an endurance fight. The real fun here is screwing around with the AI and working with a group. My most entertaining Daknor hunt involved some weird aggro logic -- I earned some 26 death points because the only time his aggro was on someone else was when I was dead.


Then... Then there are times when I feel like beating something up. Lots of somethings. All at once.

Just about any dense-spawning mob will do. Once upon a time, I used to do this out at the gem golems near the Valley of the Moon. Sadly, their spawn rate has been 'adjusted down' some and I can't quite get the satisfaction of 2-3 dozen golems dropping around me in a neat doughnut-shaped pile.

Yeah, there is no challenge there, but sometimes, I'm not playing for a challenge. It has its place (see above), but when I'm in the mood for massive destruction and carnage, the stress (and frustration) of a challenge is generally not welcome.

[Casyle]

@ Valados - As I understand it Oastics do Ethereal Damage, thus the reason they are such nasty little S.O.B.'s.

*Agrees with Steele* Group aggro NEEDS to be looked at.

[Steele]

Just a quick note for the record:

I do NOT think tanks should have fast-recycle "Taunt button" abilities. One of the few shining points of Horizons' battle system, from my point of view as a tank in many MMOs (UO, EQ1/2, DAoC, WOW, Vanguard, LOTRO) is you have to WORK for aggro; that part needs to stay the same.

Reducing tanking to a glorified form of "MASH TONT BUTAN" would, in my opinion, be a huge disservice to Horizons. It would strip its battle system of anything that sets it apart from other MMOs, and be an insult to intelligent tanks who thrive on thinking on their feet and employing strategy. I'm overreacting, perhaps, but I'm so tired of seeing MMO battle systems dumbed down for the lowest denominator that the mere thought of "give us a taunt button!" makes my blood heat.

Now... as a CHSW would I love an AE melee attack with small +dmg boost and solid +aggro modifiers on a 3min recycle? And perhaps an unlinked single-target attack line with similar +dmg and +aggro functionality on a 2min recycle? Bet yer arse I would! Like the Instant Heal and Group Instant Heal lines, they should be reasonable rabbits that I can pull out of my hat every few minutes.

Just don't give me a magical "taunt button". Correct the group aggro issues and give me additional OPTIONS that I can use, if I need to.

[Ssilmath]

I wouldn't go so far as a taunt button. More along the lines of Sunder Armor from WoW. The move doesn't do altogether that much damage, but it does generate a lot of aggro. With the way things are going right now (From what I have seen and heard), a Warrior or Paladin or other tanking type just can't cause enough damage to keep aggro off of healers and nukers. While an out and out taunt is a cheap I win button, being able to rack up a bunch of aggro on numerous monsters rapidly is a must. What's the point of being a tank if half of the mobs you are fighting peel away the moment anybody casts a heal or AoE? Tanks need to get stuck in, get the aggro from all mobs, have a way to generate good aggro on adds, and pretty much stand there and take the pain while the rest of the party does the work. Fixing tanks alone will go a long ways towards making HZ more viable.

On a side note, the only groups I can think of where I never worried about having mobs pulled from me was 2 Paladins and Healer/Spiritist, with the Pally tanking healing himself to keep the aggro. Then again, I never grouped much till I played WoW, so I dunno if things changed. As it is, before you start making mobs better, you have got to give us the tools to fight those mobs. Fix group mechanics first!