Raid Quest Survey from a Raid Guild.

[Gimpster]

explain to me how 2 ppl can make it through the water area (red) in TF?

Basically you don't. Just get the medallion, and run someone as a ghost through the other halls while the other guy rezzes.

[Tavok]

After all the chatter and opinions on raids I did a remedial survey among the most prolific raiders in the game.

In Merlask's recent survey Aundair ranked far and away the most prolific raiding server.

Of that server The Twilight Avengers are the most prolific raiding guild.
I happen to be a part of that guild.

As a guild we raid the 3 majors on average 20 times a week. (not counting Tempest Spine)

This gives us a lot experience with the quests, the bugs, the flagging, and reflagging like no other collective guild in the game.

Since we know about raid discussion in Turbine, both past and present, we're offering our views from the most raid active guild in the game.

================================================

1 ) Day timers are fine. Extending day timers past what they are now is probably not a good idea. The issue with quick repetition is not in the timers, but it's within the raid itself.

2 ) Difficulty needs to be ramped up. We understand that familiarity lowers the difficulty rating. And leveling likewise does this in straight up fights. More HP, More AC, More attack, higher level gear make a difference.

Difficulty can be ramped up several ways. Mostly though smarter mobs, or the addition of more mobs. And the removal of bugs. (ie: cleric safe spot in VoN 6)

3 ) Reflagging via quests is bad. Annoying, redundant, and basically boring/lame.

I ran a survey of the most hated quests in the game among our guild members.
The tops were' DQ reflagging, and VoN reflagging. (offered as collective choices)
After that came the Pit.

Bottom line is we want Raids to require Raiding. Let Quests require Questing.

First let me say we are ALL in agreement, that we do not want the elimination of reflagging simply to benefit the ease or quickness of the actual quest.

Quite the Contrary in fact.
Were in agreement, that the original access to the raid Via Questing is a FINE IDEA!!! ALA The Twilight Forge...

A set of quests which must be completed once in order to access the Raid content is ideal. Then a RAID which carries the group toward a final encounter is another great idea. What we don't like is the mindless repetition of questing to reflag for the raid. It's boring, and it's old, and it will drive players away from raiding, and from the game.

This is where StormReaver Fails..... It's far to easy to repeat, and is thus an operation in milking a cow. And this does not carry the spirit of raiding at all. This is farming. This needs a PreRaid quest badly. The ideal one woulda involved the Dragons at the end of Gianthold Tor.
Why this wasn't done is very surprising.

The Demon Queen also fails in this regard, with the exception of the Reflagging. In our perfect world the DQ raid would be alot more difficult to begin with and Against the Demon Queen/Circle of Eternity would be re modified to a Raid encounter Prequel to the Demon Queen raid.

4 ) Expand upon your raid content and build upon what you have.
Let Raids allow you to Flag for Another Raid. So there is a sense of progression to Raiding. And not just singular story arcs.

I hate to bring up EQ but raid progression they had a handle on, despite some very valid mistakes. Their progression path made sense and allowed those who enjoyed raiding to progress in that manner.

5 ) Loot system, honestly we're fine with that. Chest loot for Preraids, with the Glyph Chest for the Major Bosses/Finales. it's working fine for us. We have an internal system for rewarding those and it's working good.

6 ) Puzzles Vs. Combat.Toss up, we like both.

We feel The Twilgiht Forge and the Titan are about the best combo. However, we woulda like a more smash Mouth fight with the Titan than the small percentage we do get to fight him. If we had to fight him for 50% of his life then it would be ideal.

Reaver is pretty good, Puzzle is very easy though. Probably should checked to see if there wasn't a sure fire way to beat it every time though. But we like having to tolerate his attacks for a long time. This was done well.

VoN is a toss up. Part 5 was fine, puzzles and fighting. VoN 6 was done poorly. The puzzle/problem of the pillars plays agains the climax of the fight.

And with the "Safe Spot" ont he VoN 6 platform, the Velah fight is WAY anticlimactic. And the Dragon should moved/flown during the fight as well.

7 ) Randomness should be considered.

Something not really seen too often. The mastermind game sorta hints to this in that the end isn't always the same. So you can't just pick the same colors.

You've installed randomness into DQ part 4 however and Chamber of Raiyum.
Working that sorta randomness into a Final encounter would ramp up difficulty especially if the raid is under duress. They'd better pay attention.

8 ) Raid quests without Glyph chests are fine. (ala Temepst Spine) Let risk = reward though. I remember when Irestone Inlet was a Raid. It was a lot of fun.

=================================================

Basically in review,

We don't mind the initial quest flagging.

We dislike the constant reflagging.

We like Raid quests Prior to End Raid encoutners.

We like more difficulty in the form of tougher fights, and puzzles under duress.
(lailat would be IDEAL if she didn't have Overrun)
(Velah would be ideal if she could move/fly)
(Titan Would be ideal if we had to fight him for a greater precentage of his life)
(Reaver is good)

We are fine with reset timers and the Glyph system of loot.

We'd like to see raids build upon each other via flags/requirements.


Anyway, hope this gives you devs some insight to what we like.
And what we feel is hindering the fun.
As usual feel free to contact us/me with any questions.

We'd really like to help you guys make raiding more fun and challenging.

And for the record, the Titan raid was seen as the closest Raid to ideal amongst our guild members. Good length, good challenge, good finale, with good rewards. And NO reflagging.

I'm gonna agree with Yaga here. While the survey is really nicely done, and I agree with 100% of it, don't let the "we are the biggest, best raiding guild EVA" kinda thing get in the way that, other people, on other servers, do raid (unbelieve as that is). Obviously Merlask didn't level a toon to 14 on every server and do raids with every guild within that server, she has no way of knowing with the exception of tells. I raid probably just as much as you guys, and while I am not in TA, or Aundair, I raid. And to have someone else proclaiming "people sent tells about us, we are the best raiding guild" is kinda spitting in my (and other people's I would assume) face. Claiming that you have experience like no other guild in the game is blantantly wrong, you have no clue how much others raid. Just because someone didn't get some forum acknowledgements about their guild doesn't mean they don't raid just as much or even more than you.

[Vox]

I'm gonna agree with Yaga here. While the survey is really nicely done, and I agree with 100% of it, don't let the "we are the biggest, best raiding guild EVA" kinda thing get in the way that, other people, on other servers, do raid (unbelieve as that is). Obviously Merlask didn't level a toon to 14 on every server and do raids with every guild within that server, she has no way of knowing with the exception of tells. I raid probably just as much as you guys, and while I am not in TA, or Aundair, I raid. And to have someone else proclaiming "people sent tells about us, we are the best raiding guild" is kinda spitting in my (and other people's I would assume) face. Claiming that you have experience like no other guild in the game is blantantly wrong, you have no clue how much others raid. Just because someone didn't get some forum acknowledgements about their guild doesn't mean they don't raid just as much or even more than you.

Any chance after that terrible overquote you could discuss the actual content of the post instead of one sidenote? Or possibly read the entire thread and note that this issue has already been addressed by several TA members.

Vox

[Tavok]

Any chance after that terrible overquote you could discuss the actual content of the post instead of one sidenote? Or possibly read the entire thread and note that this issue has already been addressed by several TA members.

Vox

Overquote? Yea I'm sure that took a lot of effort to move the screen down a bit so you could see my writing.

The TA members in question addressed the fact that it was self-proclaiming, which I know it was not. But the fact that someone else proclaimed it, doesn't make it true either. There, short and sweet, no tedious scrolling.

Back to the issue, I did state I agree with this post. The only thing I might change is the raid system, I don't mind the little things that allow you to pick up the loot. But isn't there some way to tell which loot to absolutely exclude? Such as, theres obviously no WF in this group, but lets go ahead and give them 2 docents anyways.

[Vox]

I think I misread your post as agreeing with merlask's survey. I sit corrected.

That being said, it's just polite to edit out portions of an exceptionally long quote to get at the parts you are really talking about. It also makes it much easier to understand when you can see the conversation as A, B, C, etc. vs. Ahfgjhgalhgasgashsf, Bjkasgskjsgsuwrw, C.

Vox

[Tavok]

I think I misread your post as agreeing with merlask's survey. I sit corrected.

That being said, it's just polite to edit out portions of an exceptionally long quote to get at the parts you are really talking about. It also makes it much easier to understand when you can see the conversation as A, B, C, etc. vs. Ahfgjhgalhgasgashsf, Bjkasgskjsgsuwrw, C.

Vox

Yea. But its late

[AEschyl]

i'm not really one for ****ing matches.. just simply clarification.

there is no "best" or "most prolific" raiding guild.

it's all about how long your characters have to wait after re-setting on a raid until you raid it again (the ability to do so, not saying you HAVE to run every raid once every 3 days, just be able to).

if i were given the choice of:

being in a guild that raided 100 times in a month, but due to needed-class restrictions, guild-makeup or whatever...

or

being in a guild that enable me to raid the moment my raid timer expired, every time?

i choose option 2.

(and to the OP: there are guilds on other servers (servers that are thought of as "Care Bear" servers) that raid more than 20 times per week as a guild-total, i was the guild leader of one not too long ago.)

[Frodo_Lives]

Bottom line is raids should not be based around or built for the players or guilds that raid 20 times or 100 times a week.

Most players do not raid that often, do not have access to a group that raids that often, and unless that is what they want to dedicate their DDO time towards that goal it won't happen.

If you are bored with raids cause they are too easy then run them with just your starter equipment then. Find ways to make them harder because if you have run the dragon 200 times then of course it's going to be easy and it won't matter if you are the best player in the world or a lousy one that has gotten good at the raid simply by repitition.

If the raids are made to "challange" those that run it over and over and over again then they will be made down right impossible for those that don't.

I don't mind that the good raid loot is still pretty hard to get, I just hate the human decision making that goes into deciding who gets what. Some guilds are great to run with, others will screw you out of raid loot (or even a shot at raid loot) with a second thought.

[Daze]

Bottom line is raids should not be based around or built for the players or guilds that raid 20 times or 100 times a week.

Most players do not raid that often, do not have access to a group that raids that often, and unless that is what they want to dedicate their DDO time towards that goal it won't happen.

If you are bored with raids cause they are too easy then run them with just your starter equipment then. Find ways to make them harder because if you have run the dragon 200 times then of course it's going to be easy and it won't matter if you are the best player in the world or a lousy one that has gotten good at the raid simply by repitition.

If the raids are made to "challange" those that run it over and over and over again then they will be made down right impossible for those that don't.

I don't mind that the good raid loot is still pretty hard to get, I just hate the human decision making that goes into deciding who gets what. Some guilds are great to run with, others will screw you out of raid loot (or even a shot at raid loot) with a second thought.

Valid point, however, I have never played an MMO that is more geared toward the casual player then DDO .... which makes it difficult to stay interested for some ppl.

The baseline non uber player being able to raid has already been addressed in other posts. Now with that in mind making the quest more random and not using single arc story lines for every raid wouldnt change the difficulty (except in repitition) or exclude the casual gamer.

As far as entertaining ourselves by doing the titan 6 man and using starter gear etc. We do that already and honestly we shouldnt have to do that to keep ourselves entertained.

My favorite raid was the titan when it was unknown whether we would beat it or not. The strat where we'd beat it about 5/6 times.

Back to the issue, I did state I agree with this post. The only thing I might change is the raid system, I don't mind the little things that allow you to pick up the loot. But isn't there some way to tell which loot to absolutely exclude? Such as, theres obviously no WF in this group, but lets go ahead and give them 2 docents anyways.

no kidding ..... 2 docent giveaways to the cleric are kinda lame. At least in TA we always get a PLS point (provided we're successful). I would be really bitter if I were in a random roll guild.

[Dragonhyde]

my fave raid is still Tempest for the ease of running it at the drop of a hat. I feel the timers are right for every raid but the reaver...this one actually should have a wait timer longer than the others because of the lack of having to reprep the raid. i am thinking once a week instead of 2 and a half days...but that is just my opinion.

[Morgoth_the_Enemy]

(and to the OP: there are guilds on other servers (servers that are thought of as "Care Bear" servers) that raid more than 20 times per week as a guild-total, i was the guild leader of one not too long ago.)

lol Aesch. I thought about posting how I mostly agreed with his thoughts, but because I was from a server that Merlask ranked as a low raid server, I clearly had no idea what I was talking about.

[Conejo]

We like more difficulty in the form of tougher fights, and puzzles under duress.
(lailat would be IDEAL if she didn't have Overrun)
(Velah would be ideal if she could move/fly)
(Titan Would be ideal if we had to fight him for a greater precentage of his life)
(Reaver is good)

Velah would be ideal if the whole setup around her wasn't such a piece of ****.

raids don't need to be tougher when they already have absurd arbitrary goals and conditions within.

[Tavok]

The baseline non uber player being able to raid has already been addressed in other posts. Now with that in mind making the quest more random and not using single arc story lines for every raid wouldnt change the difficulty (except in repitition) or exclude the casual gamer.

Just because that points have already been address does not mean that someone should not include their opinion because someone has already stated their own opinion, otherwise, what is hte point of the forums in the first place?

[Riorik]

Just out of curiosity, how many players do you have in your guild that allows you to manage 20 raids per week?

<begin bragging>
In the final few months before the Lucky Knights disbanded on Fernia, we had a steady membership of 20-30 active members between December and April of 2007 (more towards the end). With a player count of 22-25, we hit an end of month total of 78 raids completed in February. Our individual top raiders were in the 30's and 40's. Please keep in mind these were only the official raids that counted for our DKP system (50% Marilith, 40% Titan, 10% Dragon). All raids were always complete raids...if we killed Velah, we ALWAYS started from the beginning of VON5). We had a few individuals that although they were members, tended to run with a dedicated (unofficial) group - and they'd do 6-7 raids a week. Unofficially, this would have put us a bit over 100.

My own impression is, that Fernia has a medium (or smaller) sized player population and the guilds here tend to be smaller. I'm curious how our player counts vs raid counts compare.
</end bragging>

While we have not done any such survey as yourself, my own opinion is that the availability of the Reaver Raid has altered opinions. While I still enjoy zerging through the Marilith prep, it is a bit routine and monotonous. I think it's a great raid, however, compared to how little prep (none) it takes to do the Reaver once you've done it all...well, it changes your opinion a bit. I think the only saving grace of VON1-4, Chains/Raiyum/Offering is that I'm running it with people that really know the quests well, and even with substandard/suboptimal parties (2-3 players), we zerg through it all effortlessly in minimum time...thus minimizing the pain of re-running it yet again.

As much as I'd hate to deprive other players of the pleasure (the success) of learning to do something well, and being rewarded for doing it well - perhaps you're right. Perhaps it's time for success in other raids & quests to affect how much prep you have to do?

What if, for example, if Character XXXX slew the Titan, they no longer need to run VON4 (I have no idea why, I'm just picking a quest) - so when they complete VON3, they're now ready for VON5. If Character YYYY slew the Reaver, that particular character no longer ever needs to run VON1, etc.

I do think the random raid quest idea could be rather awesome - and I do think Turbine is moving towards that as we write. Things are being tested, techniques developed, etc.

[Tavok]

As I recall, our guild (~25 players) ran 78 raids in February 2007. While I no longer have access to the precise official count, I recall approximately 50% Marilith, 40% Titan and 10% Dragon. Also keep in mind that as a rule, we were exploit free - every Dragon run was ALWAYS from the very beginning of VON5 thru to Killing Velah. Further, these were only the sanctioned guild runs that applied to our DKP system.

These days with the Reaver raid, the numbers mean a bit less when they're aggregated. Currently, for example, I've slacked off and only have 3 Reaver ready characters. I could hit 30 raids per month just doing this one raid.

Nax

This is what I mean when I say theres obviously other raiding guilds out there. I totally disagree with Merlask's decision to name TA as "the most prolific raiding guild". I do not even think there should be a title such as this one. I would even go so far as to say that they were only named this because of their forum presence and rep. No other guild in the game has their kind of forum presense, I will give them that, but in no way are they the only raiding guild in the game. (for the record, I don't care if this is beating the dead horse, I really believe this was a totally wrong decision on merlask's part. The rest of her servey was ok though.)

[Conejo]

This is what I mean when I say theres obviously other raiding guilds out there. I totally disagree with Merlask's decision to name TA as "the most prolific raiding guild".

Merlask didn't name TA anything.

Merlask decided (i don't know why) that Aundair was the most raid-focused of all servers.

Riott is pointing out that TA's primary focus is raiding.

[Cowdenicus]

Fernia > all other servers.

Learn it, live it, love it.

Its like we are on FIRE BABY!!!!!

[Merlask]

*ears perk up*

Now now, no spatting... remember

1. I have not named ANY guilds for ANYTHING. Namely because there are countless ones out there and to name one guild means I have to start getting an inbox filled with 'but my guild such-n-such...' etc.

2. The high portion of raiding content concerning said server is based directly off feedback from them and from observations of them... and what it means is, they showed more positive mention for raiding than other things they could be doing... it does not mean that they DO more raiding than anyone else, it means that of their population, a heavy portion of them were interested in raiding specifically, and not as much in things like:
events, roleplaying, pugs, auction house activities, character builds, etc.

3. I have stated it before time and time again, I will restate it here: You are able to find ANYTHING on ANY server in terms of what you are looking for out of DDO. The trick is what is the concentration of the players in the given locations to doing the same things as you. I for one could care less about raiding - I've seen the dragon twice in my entire DDO existance, never even flagged for the Titan, have no intention of seeing the Reaver any time soon, and the only time I saw a Maralith was in POP or +Sir's spawning... so... obviously it must be something else holding my interest in the game, and other players interested in the things I am, that is keeping me here.

[Torroth]

Very nice post as a matter of fact, couldn't agree more with the points made. And I would like to say that while I have not done any formal survey, a good portion of my raiding guildmates on Riedra (The Trinity Guild's Holy Warriors) would agree as well. We are more casual raiders, taking plenty of joy in running only 2 "official" guild raids a month and allowing our members to fill in the gaps, but we do enjoy the time we spend in the raids and these suggestions would are so spot on.

[Daze]

Just because that points have already been address does not mean that someone should not include their opinion because someone has already stated their own opinion, otherwise, what is hte point of the forums in the first place?

mainly because I dont care to waste my time addressing issues that I dont have an opinion differing from those already posted ..... it was my post. I didnt feel the need to go on that topic any further then I did and felt the need to explain that.

By all means voice your opinion ... but what exactly is the point if there's 1 post and 99 saying the same thing all over again?

Do you have something constructive to say? or shall we continue with the hijacking of the thread toward all of Dazes posts suck?