Epic mobs and epic content

[Takora Drakan]

Keep the NEED to fight the mob down. The Sword of Lost Light was a fully ready weapon. With Istaria's method of having item pieces and a crafter to assemble, keep the number of pieces down and then even people with multiple characters on multiple accounts are going to need to visit the mob less. Yes, they may dominate the area for a while, but once they have the items they want, their need to be there will be gone and they'll move on to other areas.

Sorry, but how do you know exactly that they will move away when they have their stuff? When they have all they still can farm the mob to sell the stuff, conidered that? I doubt that "they" will stop doing that when they have nothing else to do.

[Justa Mirage]

Oh, on the topic/issue of having a 10% chance of the main loot when in a group of 10, from experience in other games, I really don't think that is a problem when the respawn is shorter.

In another game, a Guardian drops a sword called the Sword of Lost Light. His respawn was about 15 minutes to 30 minutes (it's been about 7 or 8 years ago). I was there with a group of about 10 people. Some in our group of 10 already had the sword.

With a group of 10 people, if noone had the sword yet and the spawn was 30 minutes, there's a total wait of about 5 hours for everyone to get the sword, but with 10 hectic fights during that time (the Guardian has support mobs).

If you have a smaller group, or less people in the group that needs the item, then the wait will be less.

Keep the NEED to fight the mob down. The Sword of Lost Light was a fully ready weapon. With Istaria's method of having item pieces and a crafter to assemble, keep the number of pieces down and then even people with multiple characters on multiple accounts are going to need to visit the mob less. Yes, they may dominate the area for a while, but once they have the items they want, their need to be there will be gone and they'll move on to other areas.

I know that once I had the Sword of Lost Light, I only went back once more and that was to assist another group with getting the sword.

Now you just need the second part, the Sword of Lost Hope

That was an Asheron's Call quest with the Sword of Lost Light and Hope.

The problem with that in Istaria *cough horizons cough* is that giving a fully working weapon after simply coming out with a team and getting the item, means everyone will have this epic "whatever" with no effort.

Istaria needs more "multi-part" quests like ROP / AROP / Wedding quest / kion militia / etc quests in the "epic areas" of Istaria.

Make the player earn that sword by talking to NPC "X" taking things to NPC "Y" killing mobs for "Loot Drop for quest (like Relkar)" and turning them in, to finally be ready for the fight against BIG BAD MOB GUY, and not just walk up to BIG BAD MOB GUY and kill him for the weapon, quest or not.

The way it is now, the quests don't give instant gratification, only a piece of the pie. Sometimes you get the same piece and try to sell it to others, or give it away to players that are looking for it in the guild.

I would love to see some lower end boss mobs and quests that are protected from 100th level teams coming in, defeating the quest, and then give/sell the award given. Which leads to making quest items bound to you. When you do that... the economy of trading pieces goes down the tube.

[Drevar]

I think a lot of the problems could be handled by making the final boss, if it has to involve one at all, only drop the last required piece. The others could be gained earlier in the quest chain or through distributed camping methods.

Drev

[GalemThawn]

Sorry, but how do you know exactly that they will move away when they have their stuff? When they have all they still can farm the mob to sell the stuff, conidered that? I doubt that "they" will stop doing that when they have nothing else to do.

If I am correct, with the example of the SoLL, you could loot it only once per character. If you went back after two years and tried again, you still couldn't loot the item a second time.

Make the player earn that sword by talking to NPC "X" taking things to NPC "Y" killing mobs for "Loot Drop for quest (like Relkar)" and turning them in, to finally be ready for the fight against BIG BAD MOB GUY, and not just walk up to BIG BAD MOB GUY and kill him for the weapon, quest or not.

As Drevar pointed out that I didn't mention:

Except you forgot the part where you have to go to 7 dungeons--low level, but still 7 dungeons--to get the keys to open the doors along the way to the SoLL

[Justa Mirage]

oh jeez yea, forgot about that part :P the 7 keys

Yea, Istaria has the tech to do that already, just look at the "trials of the gifted." Sorry, but you already did my quest, can't do it again.

[Vengeance]

One of the biggest problems, in my opinion with the current Epic 3: Valk, Sog, and Rek, is they are no longer epic in scale compared to some of the players and devised techniques for killing them. All 3 of those mobs are going on two to two and half years in age. They are some of most enjoyable mobs in the game to combat. Hands down there is not enough opportunity to fight them. Multiple people have suggested ways to change the way they spawn or are quested. Though these are good ideas you have to look at the potential investment time the Devs are going to have to make to get a workable solution compared to other needed changes such as new content. I would really like to see them, The Epic Three, added in mass to some part of the ED. I know many people are concerned about the whole idea of everyone running around with epics. The thing is the Epic loot isn't very epic. It was designed that way to not interfere with crafter market.

I think a 24 hour trial run of it would be cool. Lets see how well having Rek, Valk, and Sog swarming around in an area killing players and being killed would look. Players are saying the epics need more support in battle against players. Like I said earlier imagine Valk agroing while your trying to kill SoG. How would that be for help.

[GalemThawn]

Players are saying the epics need more support in battle against players. Like I said earlier imagine Valk agroing while your trying to kill SoG. How would that be for help.

Thanks Impaler Dude! Those 'gifted' are getting to be bothersome.

SoG being social with Valkor and Reklar would be pretty funny.

[Theolaerynn]

Keep the NEED to fight the mob down.

This is why I like the Epic Formula or Epic Tech drop idea. If an epic critter always dropped one (and only one) of a random list of Epic Formulas and Epic Techs then it would reduce the need to camp it because eventually the ones who want the formula and can afford it will have it and the demand will drop off, while still keeping them moderately uncommon.

It would, of course, be important to place a key component of the tech on other encounters. Otherwise you would just be back in the same situation, where Epic mobs would be camped for the components as well as the formulas. This would also give folks incentive to camp something other than the epics, for two reasons:

- The techs and forms would be useless without the components.
- Those camping to generate funds would be better served by camping the components because there would be a larger market and thus higher returns.

Perhaps this would be on a balanced group, similar to that eluded to by the quote from Rawdge. Especially if these groups exist in plentiful enough numbers to entertain our end-gamers. They wouldn't have to be Epic encounters, exactly, but could certainly be close enough to make them very challenging.

A system like that might satisfy both the hunters and the crafters. Uncommon formulas and techniques, and challenging combat that is both plentiful and useful.

It would also be a great way to trickle in new weapon and armor model techniques, so crafters can vary the look of them. It would be nice to see some of the variety that was talked about back in beta, like the weapon tassels and such. I would *love* to see a Yari spear or Lion Sword in game, complete with tassels :-) Not that Dragons use such things, but it would still be fun to see :-)

[rizo/nawkia]

the social idea doesnt sound to bad but might wanna just make it to where they are in the area such as when sog goes near reklars spawn area, makem social?

[Katscratch]

An immense Thank You! to VI for listening once again.

On the particular part that I've quoted, here's an idea:
Techniques that can be applied to Player crafted armor (Flaming Weapon, Withered Bane style armor techs). Make it something that is completely different from presents techs, or a superior version of normal techs.

Super Thanks again!

Lets extend that idea the spell book has a list of all scibed techniques change it so that dbl-clicking on a tech in spell book brings up a form for creating a drop on tech and asks for the required components for that tech ie. Armor socketing requires 4 bronze bars and 2 dim orbs for each socket tech you make.

Since there is no requirement to scribe techniques you could set it up so that there is no requirement to make them or you could make Ingenuity a requirement to scribe and create drop on techs. There should be no need to change existing method of adding techs to items or it could be phased out. The new drop techs should have descriptions of which items they can be dropped on.

Using this method might stimulate more consignors sales for unteched items and drop on techniques that would allow crafters and their customers to benefit

Thank You

[lightning claw]

Epic bosses like sog, Umarry, Valcor, Dankor, Faf, should drop the old techs that have been taken out like Primal Vengeance, Eminence, Flash, Repopulate the best armor in the game. Many players that have throws Uber rare techs, do not drop any more. They have left the game. I say Yes to use full Drops where every gets something for there trouble but Keep it real Epic means Epic hard to get but worth the wile .
I do not ask (For example )
Killed sog,
Loot table Produced Demon weapon’s , Primal vengeance Tec ,9 Ambrosia and 1 mith coin. I ask that the old techs be given one more go so the newer generation has a chance to get this armor … Perhaps having a 4% Drop rate of these techs From Epic monsters or Reinsert the Quest to get them. I know I would love the challenge of attempting to get these. from what I hear, it was very difficult and worth the trubbel once you got it .

I really don’t know how the Epic armor would work with out these techs Re implemented to the game.

[gopher65]

I don't like single mobs as an epic fight. I remember Kaa back in the day. At the level my group and I were at back then, he was an epic fight for us. One biggish mob, a few lesser big mobs, and a bunch of cronies running around. That's how you get everyone to participate. If it is just one big mob then all that matters is how much damage you can deal. Crowd control, DoTs, and multitarget (but smaller) damage become irrelevant.

So here's how I'd set up an Epic Fight:

• 1 Biggish Commander - high DPS and high hit points
  
  • 3 Lieutenants - lesser on both counts
    
    • Each of the lieutenants acts as a spawn group, and has limited res capability. They'll res the big boss and their grunts, but not each other (otherwise it turns into a res fest. If they are the only ressing mobs, and they can't res each other, then it won't have the potential to turn into an unwinable battle).
    • Each of the 3 groups commanded by the Lieutenants consists of:
      
      • Mezzers (Sorcerers)
      • Healers (cannot res)
      • Damage Dealers (Berserker type mobs)
      • Debuffers/DoT
      • Crowd Control (Druid)
      • General multipurpose mobs with a few stuns/debuffs/AoEs, and moderate DPS (Ranger, Reaver, Wizard, Bloodmage)
      • Each grunt has just coin on them.
    • Each Lieutenant has good items (like the aforementioned Ambrosia XI), and a small chance to drop an epic.
  • Biggish Commander has 100% chance to drop epic, and a higher probability to drop good items. No matter how many times he is ressed, he can only be looted once.
    
    • As I mentioned before, I like set pieces as epic loot instead of individual items or pieces of individual items.
  
  

[Vlisson]

Epic bosses like sog, Umarry, Valcor, Dankor, Faf, should drop the old techs that have been taken out like Primal Vengeance, Eminence, Flash, Repopulate the best armor in the game. Many players that have throws Uber rare techs, do not drop any more. They have left the game. I say Yes to use full Drops where every gets something for there trouble but Keep it real Epic means Epic hard to get but worth the wile .
I do not ask (For example )
Killed sog,
Loot table Produced Demon weapon’s , Primal vengeance Tec ,9 Ambrosia and 1 mith coin. I ask that the old techs be given one more go so the newer generation has a chance to get this armor … Perhaps having a 4% Drop rate of these techs From Epic monsters or Reinsert the Quest to get them. I know I would love the challenge of attempting to get these. from what I hear, it was very difficult and worth the trubbel once you got it .

I really don’t know how the Epic armor would work with out these techs Re implemented to the game.

yes great idea !!!

[GalemThawn]

I really don’t know how the Epic armor would work with out these techs Re implemented to the game.

Epic armor would be completely new and have varying stats or abilities different from player crafted armor. It would not need any old techs.

[Vengeance]

I don't like single mobs as an epic fight. I remember Kaa back in the day. At the level my group and I were at back then, he was an epic fight for us. One biggish mob, a few lesser big mobs, and a bunch of cronies running around. That's how you get everyone to participate. If it is just one big mob then all that matters is how much damage you can deal. Crowd control, DoTs, and multitarget (but smaller) damage become irrelevant.

So here's how I'd set up an Epic Fight:

• 1 Biggish Commander - high DPS and high hit points
  • 3 Lieutenants - lesser on both counts
    • Each of the lieutenants acts as a spawn group, and has limited res capability. They'll res the big boss and their grunts, but not each other (otherwise it turns into a res fest. If they are the only ressing mobs, and they can't res each other, then it won't have the potential to turn into an unwinable battle).
    • Each of the 3 groups commanded by the Lieutenants consists of:
      • Mezzers (Sorcerers)
      • Healers (cannot res)
      • Damage Dealers (Berserker type mobs)
      • Debuffers/DoT
      • Crowd Control (Druid)
      • General multipurpose mobs with a few stuns/debuffs/AoEs, and moderate DPS (Ranger, Reaver, Wizard, Bloodmage)
      • Each grunt has just coin on them.
    • Each Lieutenant has good items (like the aforementioned Ambrosia XI), and a small chance to drop an epic.
  • Biggish Commander has 100% chance to drop epic, and a higher probability to drop good items. No matter how many times he is ressed, he can only be looted once.
    
    • As I mentioned before, I like set pieces as epic loot instead of individual items or pieces of individual items.

I like these ideas, however I am scared the Lag monster would be horrific.

[Vahrokh]

Epic is something that:

- requires epic effort due i.e. to death risk.

- is completely rare.


Don't call "epic" what in World Of Warcraft is a recolored (in purple) version of something everyone uses, because that's just e-peen garbage for making every "random" happy of their eliteness.


Epic is the Boar Mask, epic are the old scale techs. Farmable mobs are not epic, in due time everyone on the server could be full of their "epics" devaluing the value of those items into "commoneer stuff".
At a certain point, the epic becomes so devalued that you either have it "like everyone else" or "you suck" and are seen as lesser player, forcing everyone into farm frenzy even if they would be fine without it.

Again, it's a WoW term to call "epic" something trivial but you took 1 year to get it by perma-farming. It's not epic, it's just perma-farming for no lifers, don't let the worst WoW concepts taint Horizons please.

Epic is something that someone happens to get hold of, sometimes in a completely unexpected way. Life is random but random does not mean fair. Some, few, will have something called "epic", it's made epic by being something that it's extremely hard to happen again.

Example: a guy happened to "be there" and got a recipe that never became available again and now few still exist that have it. That recipe is not a flaming King Arthur sword but it's still something epic, one of the FEW things able to make you feel UNIQUE in a game that by definition is for "the masses" and where losing identity is a big letdown, but a very probable letdown.

So I am quite against recycling long gone items (and I miss so many), lucky who got them, they are unique, all will tell random people to ask for you for it, you are the holder of the "relic". Like in the fantasy books, ONE has the mega-sword-of-justice not every commoneer, and eventually wars will be fought for that sword.

Now, putting all of the above into a "massive players game" requires a reality check.
Players come and go, epic items may completely disappear seemingly forever.

While a reader may be fine that a Ring would drop in a river and never be found for generations to no end till "the day", online game players might want to always have a way to get hold of at least one ring in the whole player base.

In this case I'd suggest to perform a cron / timer based scan during servers maintenance: if no player having one of the X epic items is not playing any more since i.e. > 3 months then add _1_ of X into one of the epic mobs. So the "epic" will stay epic and rare (even if the old owner comes back i.e. after 5 months, you still have 2 recipe holders in game) while still being relatively available.

[Silverblaze]

I'm sure my post will be removed or edited thats fine, but please edit e-peen and the like, its offensive and clearly aimed at people who like to hunt the mobs.

thankyou

if youd like me to send messages like these as PM's I'll do so in the future.

sorry in advance

[rizo/nawkia]

so pretty much anything that was a temporary item event and could do a lot were epics ie boars hide mask, the scale techs, maybe the bitter pickle weapons(id consider them epics of their tiers>.>)

[Theolaerynn]

Epic is something that:

- requires epic effort due i.e. to death risk.

- is completely rare.


Don't call "epic" what in World Of Warcraft is a recolored (in purple) version of something everyone uses, because that's just e-peen garbage for making every "random" happy of their eliteness.


Epic is the Boar Mask, epic are the old scale techs. Farmable mobs are not epic, in due time everyone on the server could be full of their "epics" devaluing the value of those items into "commoneer stuff".
At a certain point, the epic becomes so devalued that you either have it "like everyone else" or "you suck" and are seen as lesser player, forcing everyone into farm frenzy even if they would be fine without it.

By your own definition, then, nothing in Horizons would ever be epic *including* the Boars Hide Mask and old scale techs because, and I know this is a HUGE secret, they were farmed!

I also know a number of people that were essentially given BHMs, and I certainly hired crafters to make my old scale tech chest scale.

You cannot apply such a specific set of qualifiers for an item being 'epic', because it just doesn't work that way. Eventually everything will be farmed, and if you do not allow the components to be farmed then what is the use in having epic formulas?

Now, just because the components, techs, and items can be farmed doesn't mean they should drop like candy from a pinata. I agree they should be rare, and that real effort should be required by hunters and/or questers to obtain them. But they should also be able to be traded, because face it, not all crafters care for the adventure side of things in the least. A crafter of Epics should not have to be an elite adventurer too.

I personally feel that the components required by epic formulas and techs should not be as hard as the forms themselves, because it was already such a long shot to have obtained the form or tech in the first place. We want them to be realistically usable too, otherwise, again, what is the point?

I know that there are those among us that feel the need to be 733t, and would prefer it if there were only three BHM's and that they had all three so they could be able to brag about how Uber they were to anyone unfortunate enough to have to listen to them. Speaking for myself, it is enough that the items are uncommon but available to all who are willing to put forth the effort to obtain the items, or who can pay the prices the Epic crafters are asking.

Keep in mind, the very term Epic refers to tremendous effort, not rarity. The RoP and ARoP are Epic quests, but available to all Dragons who put forth the effort (including the effort required to meet the minimum requirements of each).

Other games have Epic Quests that lead to class-level epics, but are again available to all within that class. Essentially all characters have the potential to be equipped with Epic weapons.

I do agree that WoW has a very odd notion of the purple epics, in that they can drop off of the oddest critters. But most of the good ones required a great deal of effort. I had the dagger from the Romeo and Juliette even in Kara, for instance. I first had to get keyed for Kara, which was a considerably involved quest in and of itself, and then I had to go on a fair number of raids just to get TO that event. Consider then that the event was one random event out of four, and that the dagger was a random drop from that event, and that I was usually one of seven or eight people rolling on it.

In short, it was a *tremendous* amount of effort to get that dagger. Enough so that I would certainly consider it an epic effort.

All of that being said, though, I am far prouder of my Chest Scale of Eminence, and I purchased it. True, it cost me an arm and a leg, and I got it from one of the three people on our server who had all three techs, and I did have to farm the comps for it. But I didn't actually put forth the effort to get the formula itself, although I did try. I simply wasn't lucky enough to get into a good enough group. Even so, the scale feels epic to me, even though everyone had them at the time.

So much for black and white definitions of an epic. Go figure.

[Guaran]

Some interesting ideas. I have my own suggestions which I want to add to those who suggest the epic mobs having lieutenants:

My only change to that suggestion is remove the epic bosses' ability to be ressed. What point would this serve? Once dead he would be insta looted (assuming some form of loot becomes the reward). Then he could be left alive and the next group would get nothing for the effort. So once the lieutenants or boss were downed, they stay down. Ressing may not need to factor in at all.

My additional thoughts on this: Have a quest for killing this mob, which is needed to get the quest counter to advance (in the case of the NPC handing out a chance at a form/tech/item/ or item piece or component), and/or the NPC(quest) grants you a 2 hour buff which offers protection against the mobs' AOE mega death spell. If you are not on the quest, the boss can cast a mega bomb aoe on you and your group, kills everyone without the quest, and also prevents them from being ressed. Recall only. (want to ensure no one works around the quest requirement). The quest is repeatable, but only once every 24 to 48 hours. (Or maybe every 12 hours, but applies to all toons on the account. So only once every 12 hours on a per-account basis. This matches current respawn timers). This timer is not reset by server maintenance or reboots. The mob himself respawns every hour.

In this way multiple groups can get the chance at the epic battle. Which will be far more fun than "epic 14 hour camping trip" we currently deal with. Without the quest you can still be killed by the mob so you know to stay away.


As far as the loot itself? Why shouldn't it be as good or better than crafted? Especially the current items which in fact ARE crafted from all the appropriate pieces? Bloodsword has +100 health, demon axe has +15 dexterity? I mean why bother putting stats on at all.... These should have +75 or more if a stat or skill is on them. More when it comes to health. (+150). As far as reklars tail scale, it has tier 5 armor scales' armor value. Why shouldn't this be higher? Tier 6 values seem more appropriate (+90) or even +100 armor. [All the items with lvl 100 requirement should have T6+ damage ranges and stats.] And the + to incoming spell damage almost assures NO ONE ever uses it... For all the work the dev's put into creating Reklar and that form/items, and then all the work we have to do to get one, it is a serious letdown. Unusable against anything where it may possibly help... If it had +100 ward for Reklars blight dots or Reklars Mezz immunity or something interesting like that (wisp immnuity!), then I might use mine. But as it is I haven't used it more than once or twice. (sad)

To maintain crafter involvement on the non-crafted epics (SoG's demon weapon drops) allow them to take one extra drop-on tech. The tech would be a form purchasable by anyone with say the certain skill and some imperial lore tokens, or cash. This maintains a crafters place on the demon weapons. The form (Master Formula: Demon Weapon Tech) then has 1 tech slot, and all existing, applicable techs can be chosen from (Armor V, Health V, Weapon Skill V, Parry V, Spell Skill V, Weapon Socket, etc) and is crafted using the normal comps plus maybe some blighted or tainted Shining or Radiant orbs. This would allow a fair number of variations, so these items would have a semblance of uniqueness about them. And having only 1 or 2 forms needing created would greatly simply the implementation.

Thats all I can think of for now.