Hello,
For some reason developers in MMORPG's still find it necessary to put in 1 shotting mechanics from bosses. Cazic Thule's death touch is the classic example that every single game dev has copied since then.
I want to bring this open for discussion here, with Pantheon ITS GREAT to have tough mob bosses that hit hard, but 1 shotting a player is cheap and makes you feel pretty worthless in the end. Do you all feel being 1 shot is something that needs to go? I think its something from the past that needs to stay there.
I feel that things like death touch should be in place, and should vary when they are used so somebody can't just eat the death touch. I want the main tank to croak from an unexpected death touch. Also: Are black screen blinds going to be implemented?
I dont mind death touch. It can be a wonderful tool to increase the challenge of an encounter. However I would like to see it be improved to have no randomness... Instead, have the mob selectively death touch people.
In my opinion, These AI behaviors for Death Touch should be used in conjunction with other mechanics in a fight. A raid should be further complicated by adding other elements to it.
Each time a boss is engaged, it selects from each of these "AI Settings" for DEATH TOUCH ONLY.
Death Touch + Tank Swap = Emergency Tank Swap
The monster will death touch at 80%, 60%, 40%, or 20% HP. The percentage which it is triggered is random... It could be one of these percentages, or every 20%.
Your offtanks should be off "doing stuff" like offtanking baby mobs and not just DPSing. This would trivialize the risk of the main tank suddenly getting death touched.
Death Touch + DPS = DPS Check.
The monster will start death touching DPS classes. This can cause a soft or hard DPS check for a fight. This also causes the remaining DPS to perform --- And perform well!
To prevent abuse of this AI, have the monster stop Death Touching when there are, for example, 6 or fewer DPS classes on its hate list. Then it starts Death Touching tanks/healers because the raid is taking too long. This is also to prevent groups from bringing all tanks and healers to nullify this AI setting.
Death Touch + Healers = Support Classes Time to Shine or Minimize Damage Taken
Similar to "Death Touch + DPS", but this is for healers. This will put more pressure on your primary healers and give your support classes a chance to step in to help assist heal.
Alternatively, this can allow you to bring more DPS to the raid.
Classes with shielding (Think of the Rune line for Enchanters in EQ1 or Skin spells for wizards) that may not even be healers can asssist here also, providing a different play style for them.
I personally like the fact CT DT. It was cool because it was so brutal. Now I don’t know if it was over used in the future but I can’t really think of many other Raids that have a similar power. Cazic was a GOD and he literally points at you and you die. It makes sense to me. Now if the Lord of Orcs DT you that seem dumb.
Wipe mechanics are different beast all together. Killing ever member of the raid because you failed finish a mechanic in time is very lazy content.
Not sure if anyone plays / had played SMITE but Khepri's Ult is a great example of an ability that I would love to see in the game, for Clerics maybe. This ability could help against the one-shot bosses, but also could prevent a death period.
For those who are not familiar, Khepri could cast an ability on a target, and for a very short duration if that target would die, they would instantly revive with a percentage of health back at Khepri's location. This could be fun little 'death save' ability.
halflingwarrior said:I feel that things like death touch should be in place, and should vary when they are used so somebody can't just eat the death touch. I want the main tank to croak from an unexpected death touch. Also: Are black screen blinds going to be implemented?
LOL, I hated the black screen blinds....Always felt like it was cheap, at the least I should still have my UI. Some people say, "But you're blinded, if you have your UI you could have your group warning instructing you?" Pretty much like RL, if something is blinding me or I'm in the dark I can still hear, I can semll, I can feel, I can talk, I can tell if I'm running into a wall, etc. In game a completely blacked out screen, is essentially knocking out all your senses.
The only spot that Death Touch makes sense is when you are facing the raid target and it cannot reach you because of pathing abuse or other intentionally abusive mechanic. You can leverage it as a wipe mechanic because the fight has taken too long (enrage timers) if needed as well.
Outside of those situations, I believe the tool needs to be limited and used sparingly. If you are actually facing a deity that embodies Death then it might make sense, but just because you are a diety this does not make sense for everyone to have. With descension being used by Deities this would be a logical ability that they would lose.
starchildren3317 said:Not sure if anyone plays / had played SMITE but Khepri's Ult is a great example of an ability that I would love to see in the game, for Clerics maybe. This ability could help against the one-shot bosses, but also could prevent a death period.
For those who are not familiar, Khepri could cast an ability on a target, and for a very short duration if that target would die, they would instantly revive with a percentage of health back at Khepri's location. This could be fun little 'death save' ability.
Tanks could join the "purple club" in EQ: If your health bottomed out the instant a heal landed, your health bar would hit the purple range, then it'd go back up. Man, those were exciting heals! :P
Sorry but one shots make it so several tanks are needed which means you need less DPS or less healers which make the mob a little harder. If your Offtank is doing his job he should either have an intercept o0r some emgerncy aggro pull and eat the oneshot leaving the MT alive. Its a stratagy thats what raiding is. If you couldn t figure out a way to fight three oneshot mobs then dont raid.
I want to echo some posts above that there should be a DT mechanic to boss fights. Death Touches should be just a small part of the fight to add challenge, something like taking out top DPS or healer, it makes no sense that a boss mob wouldn't do his best to get rid of whoever was hurting him the most. Or if it is a main mechanic make it avoidable, like you can see it is charging so everyone has to go hide except for the main tank or something where a specific ward type ability will keep him alive during the deaths.
To borrow Liav's point about hell levels "why not just spread that out across the normal level range", that can be analogous here. Why not spread out the overall difficulty of the encounter without having to use a DT. An encounter could be effectively the same, or even harder, without DTing.
Krixus said:To borrow Liav's point about hell levels "why not just spread that out across the normal level range", that can be analogous here. Why not spread out the overall difficulty of the encounter without having to use a DT. An encounter could be effectively the same, or even harder, without DTing.
Basically this. I can name a million and one ways to make a raid encounter challenging without having to result to "hey, let's make it so one unlucky person has to get sacrificed to the mob for no particular reason". I'm vehemently of the opinion that deaths during an encounter should be a result of player mistakes, not bad luck or stupid inevitabilities.
1-shot mechanics are not bad. There are a few places where they are useful.
Were you 1-shot because a raid mechanic was failed? Well you will certainly learn not to fail mechanics again.
Were you 1-shot becuase it is an actual raid mechanic (aka CT DT)? Then it is part of the raid and be prepaired accordingley.
Were you 1-shot because you were a low level running through a high level area? Well learn to fear and respect the environment.
Were you 1-shot because a level apropriate mob got a critical hit on you? This one I am not a fan of. It adds realism and imersion but also adds to frustration.
