Get rid of scaling on elite

[Rawel_San]

Ok this is the first time I've actually posted a suggestion thread on the forums but the new scaling method
in Weapon Shipment prompted me to.

Before you dismiss the suggestion as elitist and stupid please read the post (as if. ).

In my opinion there are 2 main reasons to have elite not scale:

1) Such huge scaling goes completely against the grouping idea. It's bad enough that on normal most amrath
quests will be 2-manned before being 6 manned. The fact this might now start happening for elite is just plain
wrong in my opinion. Elite is supposed to be about overcoming a challenge and having more people to help
you should be a boon not a hindrance. I can see the argument for normal scaling (let people who don't have time
or interest in grouping get the completion) but elite should be the place where as the disclaimer says
"You want experienced players and a well balanced party."

2) It makes short manning a quest an actual achievement. Something to work on and think about as opposed
to the easy way out.

You might ask why I only come with this so late when dungeon scaling has been around for 2 years or so.
The reason is the new type of scaling present in WS. The dungeon scaling on elite before U11 weapon shipment
was noticeable but not large enough that it would usually alter the decision if you want to run the dungeon with
1 person or 6. I (and many of my guildmates) would regularly do elite amrath flagging for new chars or just
general people in channels lfm's to get yugo pots and while you can tell when the dungeon occupancy goes from
1 to 4 or 6 it doesn't really change much. The extra damage taken is about 40-50% at most and if you play smart
it doesn't even faze you. This means that putting up an lfm and having people jump in did very little.
The scaling in WS doesn't do this. Going from 8 archers to 30 (don't have exact numbers but that's about what it
feels like) is not a slight change it's a huge change, and it means that the dungeon will take longer even if you
are well geared and ready for it.

This type of scaling also means it will become harder to find good players to run those quests on elite with.
Most of the vets/elites/hardcores (whatever other derogatory or laudatory term you want to use) will prefer
soloing it since it will be much easier faster and they won't have to worry about 5 other people messing things
up. Particularly self sufficient classes (fvs/cleric/ac builds/casters) which are extremely beneficial (almost
necessary) for elite content will have it so much easier to solo that they will rarely want to go in a group.

Now before people say I'm calling for a nerf I want to say I loved running weapon shipment with 5 people piking
at the beginning. It was awesome fun quite a thrill and while it never got to the point where I'd be thinking "I'll
die now", I did end up with half my gear broken and had to adjust my tactics on the fly to not end up finishing
in my underwear. I want that to be the case without having to get 5 people in to be bored at the beginning.

[Jubbers]

/signed

Elite should have 1 difficulty having more people should be better on elite. No scaling on elite would be great.

[Phidius]

Don't stop with Elite - remove Dungeon Scaling completely.

When it was implemented, we didn't have Casual - now we do.

Reduce complexity - let us decide how hard we want to run the quest, versus modifying the difficulty on the fly.

[ArkoHighStar]

I say remove it on hard and elite, leave it for normal and casual

[morticianjohn]

I agree that elite should not scale.

[BlackSteel]

There is no dungeon scaling present on elite. Mob hp n damage on elite is the same whether u r solo or in a group of 6. Are u saying that weapons shipment is spawning more mobs on elite based on party makeup?

[joaofalcao]

Since when does Elite scale? As far as I know, it doesnt.

[Rawel_San]

Elite has scaled since forever. The scaling is much smaller then on normal or hard but it does scale. Jump into
elite gen point or elite sins solo and get an orthon to start shooting at you. Then have 5 more people come in.
The damage goes from 12-16 (pre dr) per hit to about 16-20. The ranges might be slightly off but the difference
in incoming damage is a little under 50% from my testing.

The scaling in WS is a different beast alltogether though. Solo run finished with about 80 odd kills 6 people in
finishes with 310 odd kills. (the first hallway doesn't scale in numbers) the end fight is almost 6x as many mobs.

[muffinlad]

Elite has scaled since forever.

Elite has scaled since it was implemented. Not quite forever, but....ok, good enough for Forum, da!

muffinrussian

[Rawel_San]

Elite has scaled since it was implemented. Not quite forever, but....ok, good enough for Forum, da!

muffinrussian

Good point. +1
In my mind forever was the longest possible reasonable timeframe (i.e. since scaling was first implemented in
ddo). Arguably "about 2 years" isn't quite the same as forever.

[merentha]

I like this idea. Take off scaling but leave it as it was for a full party. If you solo it that way, then that's saying something!

[Cyr]

[quote=BlackSteel;4089700]There is no dungeon scaling present on elite Since the introduction of dungeon scaling it has effected elite. Some rather uniformed developers said early on, incorrectly, that elite did not scale, but it has been proven conclusively and confirmed by development that elite does indeed scale.. Mob hp n damage on elite is the same whether u r solo or in a group of 6. Are u saying that weapons shipment is spawning more mobs on elite based on party makeup? Weapon Shipments new iteration does indeed have a new type of dungeon scaling present. It is in addition to the old dungeon scaling and includes ALOT more mobs when more players are present even on elite. It completely destroys the concept of bringing more people is better. It is all about bringing the best players/toons possible and dumping the rest because they are worse then having no one there to start with (add that onto extra time to form for more people and you have a devastating blow to grouping).

Note, that before Dungeon scaling you were almost universally better off or at least not hurt by the addition of another player no matter how poor their gaming skills were.

In Red

[Chette]

Scaling has never really made much sense to me. Things should be harder for soloists, not easier. Weapon's shipment is certainly a prime example of where it is far easier to solo than run with a group.

[grodon9999]

Remove it completely from Elite, reduce it on hard, and leave it on normal/casual.

[fredericko]

- Not 24 hours have passed since I've run with some people in this thread, who want to remove scaling on elite, that were asking for help to do one of the U11 flagging quests on normal. You know who you are.
- We have people voting against dungeon scaling because, in their own words, that way they find it easier to join PUGs. If we're following that line of thought squelch lists should be immediatly removed.
- How many of the people in this thread can post screenshots of, say, elite Bastion of Power solo completion?
- Why did Shade, for instance, post a video of his barb soloing elite sins? Or should soloing be only for fully twinked out casters?
- If the focus on teamplay is *teamwork*, shouldn't bad players have a significantly bad impact on any party, much more so on elite? Or should I make six accounts, hit Weapons Shipment elite, bring 5 pikers, and loot 18 end chests with the same effort it would take to solo the quest?

[Rawel_San]

- Not 24 hours have passed since I've run with some people in this thread, who want to remove scaling on elite, that were asking for help to do one of the U11 flagging quests on normal. You know who you are. This is an ad hominem attack with moreover no relation to the subject at hand
- We have people voting against dungeon scaling because, in their own words, that way they find it easier to join PUGs. If we're following that line of thought squelch lists should be immediatly removed.
The only person that even hinted at that was me. I have no problems getting into "PUGs" for that
content since I'm in an active end game guild. Moreover I have soloed about 95% of the game content
excluding raids but including a couple of epics(I haven't done elite bastion of power solo but I think it's time i gave it another try). I have also soloed elite sins and gen point with pikers inside (i.e. without scaling).
- How many of the people in this thread can post screenshots of, say, elite Bastion of Power solo completion?
Even though I don't quite see how this is pertinent I see it as a good challenge
- Why did Shade, for instance, post a video of his barb soloing elite sins? Or should soloing be only for fully twinked out casters? No idea how this is pertinent. I would be quite happy if soloing elites was
for essentially noone but yeah twinked out casters sound about right.
- If the focus on teamplay is *teamwork*, shouldn't bad players have a significantly bad impact on any party, much more so on elite? Or should I make six accounts, hit Weapons Shipment elite, bring 5 pikers, and loot 18 end chests with the same effort it would take to solo the quest?

Bad players already have a significantly bad impact on the party. That's why when people let you pike yugo
favor they will very often ask you to stay at the beginning. As more people mean more healing, harder to
manage aggro, and less predictable spawns (as well as less sp regen for your fvs).

As for the last point you can already do that. Moreover you can solo it without the added mobs and then have
your 5 piker accounts come in.

I'm not sure what exactly you're arguing for but just to make it completely plain I want elite to have the
difficulty it now has with 6 people in even when only one person is in.

[Phidius]

- Not 24 hours have passed since I've run with some people in this thread, who want to remove scaling on elite, that were asking for help to do one of the U11 flagging quests on normal. You know who you are.
...

I presume this means that you are not in favor of removing dungeon scaling.

...
- We have people voting against dungeon scaling because, in their own words, that way they find it easier to join PUGs. If we're following that line of thought squelch lists should be immediatly removed.
...

I don't follow your logic here - in my little world, squelch lists are used to avoid people who are unpleasant to run with, or tend towards the abusive. Or in one Reaver's Fate, like to play loud music over their voice chat 'cause they're bored up in the penalty box.

Do people use squelch lists to avoid running with people who aren't as good at the game? I love people who aren't very good at the game - they make me look uber by comparison

...
- How many of the people in this thread can post screenshots of, say, elite Bastion of Power solo completion?
...

Not me - I hate Dungeon Alert far more than I hate Dungeon Scaling. While we're at it, remove DA too please.

...
- Why did Shade, for instance, post a video of his barb soloing elite sins? Or should soloing be only for fully twinked out casters?
...

I can't speak for Shade, but I presumed it was to showcase that every class (with sufficient resources and planning) can solo, not just those with blue bars.

Casters don't need to be fully twinked out, but barbarians do

- If the focus on teamplay is *teamwork*, shouldn't bad players have a significantly bad impact on any party, much more so on elite? Or should I make six accounts, hit Weapons Shipment elite, bring 5 pikers, and loot 18 end chests with the same effort it would take to solo the quest?

The idea of Elite is that it's a challenge - one of the "Devs" (believe FlimsyFirewood, but don't quote me) said (paraphrased) don't expect them to hold your hand. Yet that's exactly what the concept of Dungeon Scaling is for.

It's a question of how much penalty should a "bad player" bring with them. Before Dungeon Scaling, the worst thing a "bad player" could do was run ahead and invalidate strategy by rousing the dungeon and bringing them back to overwhelm the party.

With Dungeon Scaling, all they have to do is exist.

[Cyr]

[quote=fredericko;4089877]- Not 24 hours have passed since I've run with some people in this thread, who want to remove scaling on elite, that were asking for help to do one of the U11 flagging quests on normal. You know who you are.
Dunno who you are refering to, but it is irrelvent. Although it is always amusing to see the people who don't have their toons listed in their sigs throwing out personal stuff.
- We have people voting against dungeon scaling because, in their own words, that way they find it easier to join PUGs. If we're following that line of thought squelch lists should be immediatly removed.
The two are completely different concepts. It would also be easier to find a pug if say the death penalty was removed for bad players (and good ones since more pugs would be posted). Squelch lists are for the truly horrible players or annoying ones. This is not about noobs this is about the health of pugs in general.
- How many of the people in this thread can post screenshots of, say, elite Bastion of Power solo completion?
Irrelevent again. I'm not seeing people screaming about nerfing good players or some such nonsense. This is about a mechanic that makes quests easier. Note the easier part...
- Why did Shade, for instance, post a video of his barb soloing elite sins? Or should soloing be only for fully twinked out casters?
It's nice that melee's can solo sometimes. Soloing should never make a quest easier though.
- If the focus on teamplay is *teamwork*, shouldn't bad players have a significantly bad impact on any party, much more so on elite? Or should I make six accounts, hit Weapons Shipment elite, bring 5 pikers, and loot 18 end chests with the same effort it would take to solo the quest?

The entire point is that you soloing the quest does not reward you for doing so more then if those pikers were in the party. Likewise, you could remove those pikers and get real party members who contribute and it's now faster/easier to complete. You can not add an unlimited number of people to a party. You are stuck with either six or twelve. Those can be contributors or not, but clearly the contributors make the quest easier to complete. As in the better your party members the easier the quest is. As opposed to DS and super DS weapon shipment where it actually is more party members probably will just make the quest harder for you unless they are at least as good as you are.

Quests do not automatically become easier if you haveX toons in your party on elite without dungeon scaling. They would be easier based upon the quality of the toons, the players behind them, and their ability to work as a team.

Let's not pretend that dungeon scaling is anything, but a crutch to try and prop up soloers. That is why it was not implemented for epics and raids.

In Red

[Musouka]

/not signed

Sometimes I like to run with 2 friends, and why should we be punished for not filling the party to 6?

I shouldn't get the elite favor the way I choose, because people are complaining on how others can solo?

Seriously, why does anyone care that someone else can solo a quest on elite? Is it directly impacting your play, which prefers a full group?

[Cyr]

/not signed

Sometimes I like to run with 2 friends, and why should we be punished for not filling the party to 6?

I shouldn't get the elite favor the way I choose, because people are complaining on how others can solo?

Seriously, why does anyone care that someone else can solo a quest on elite? Is it directly impacting your play, which prefers a full group?

Ah but you would not be 'punished' for not having a full party.

You would merely be running the same quest as everyone else is. You know just like if you tried to 2 man an epic quest or 2 man a raid.