OG OG New Raid Meh!!

[Thorzian]

i'm all for new content being level 20 but for different reasons..

notice how long and drawn out the last few content packs have been? the xp/minute is laughable. the loot is mid level grinding which nobody out for xp would ever do. they grind it with their high levels for t-r's on the next life. from lordsmarch until present there hasnt been a single quest that a character, especially a t-r, would find desireable to gain xp and hit cap with.

so let's see the level 20 quests! at least at cap grinding long quests for eventual loot is expected..... and turbine can't screw up the xp award when there isnt any.

[xTethx]

I think you missed the fact that he was being sarcastic

I wasnt being sarcastic in the least bit. See im trying this new thing, where the powergamer asks for lowbie ****, hence the devs wont listen and will do the opposite and create high end content! This is soooooo gonna work.

[Rameses]

I can't wait for a Raid Boss that cast's Disjunction. that would up the difficulty factor.

I am, Rameses!

[Shade]

I think Turbine needs to focus a bit more on the 4-6 range for some new content. Then maybe a new raid, but thats just maybe. I mean we had chronoscope out only a year ago, right? I'm all for a new raid, but priorities need to be set more towards the lower lvls.

lol.

well the reverse psycology worked for me on the whole CC item restoration, so maybe this will work.

in this case tho, im pretty sure the new raid is already thru the planning stages, if not already partially complete.

[Shade]

I can't wait for a Raid Boss that cast's Disjunction. that would up the difficulty factor.

I am, Rameses!

like abbot?

Oddly enough when they added that to him, it lowered his difficulty..

Because it's a single target spell.

Most dangerous abilities should always be multi target.

[andbr22]

well guys you talk all about mechanical aspect of game, but what about story. Now we have at least 2 chains that would like some upgards:
- Raver's - we still didn't fought main adversary, maybe something with renegade dragons and lots of dragons with dragons trash.
- Savarath - we got Devil's, next we could get deamons, and after that epics fight while helping archor recive their home back from hands of bad guys. -> The main disadvantage of this is that we have evil outsiders all around endgame.

what we would upgards: some upgard with Subterenian -> it is big explorer area for sure can get like additional raid or few 6 man quests.

[sirgog]

I think Turbine needs to focus a bit more on the 4-6 range for some new content. Then maybe a new raid, but thats just maybe. I mean we had chronoscope out only a year ago, right? I'm all for a new raid, but priorities need to be set more towards the lower lvls.

Epic troll post. You, sir, win the forums.


I want to see the new raid encounters actually change in complexity, not just boss HP and healing requirements, from Normal to Elite. Think how Raiyum is different in at-level Elite compared to running it on Epic - the fight has additional mobs on Epic that cannot be ignored.

Design Elite first (or Epic if that's the highest difficulty) to be a difficult and complex encounter, then remove complexity on the lower settings.


From another thread, here's my suggestion for what a new raid encounter could look like. Notice how much removing one or two spells from the boss' repertoire changes the fight - Normal you can surround the boss and beat him down while healing through his damage, but on Hard individual players will need to run out of the pack from time to time, and on Elite you'll need to frequently move around the room to break line of sight to Trap the Soul traps.


First encounter (trash mobs) players will face on Elite. These monsters cannot be separated (aggroing one of them pulls them all).

1 Hezrou Titan (red named):
Defenses: High SR, 61 AC, medium-high saves (30-36 in each), Epic Ward, DR 20/good, can teleport once per 4 sec. 53500hp. 40% fortification (see below). 'Standard' aggro.
Offense: Unarmed melee (19-20/x4) - 1 attack per 1.2 sec, +77 to-hit, 8d12+30 damage (avg 82, comparable to normal Horoth), Blind-Fight (whenever this mob fails to bypass a concealment bonus, it may reroll once, reducing miss chances to 1% - Dusk, 4% - Blur, 25% - Displacement). Cleaves in a 225 degree frontal arc. Prefers melee but occasionally throws Max-Empped Chaos Hammer, Max-Empped Mass Inflict Moderate and Harm, all with Superior Potency 6. Unlike other Hezrous, this does not throw rocks.
Special: When the Hezrou falls under 50% health, four more Lemures appear (see below). When the Hezrou falls under 40% health, it flies into an epic barbarian rage. In this state it gains +10 Strength and Con, +25% melee alacrity, suffers a -5 AC penalty and loses all Fortification. In this phase it cannot cast spells.

4 Infernal Blackguard:
Defenses: High SR, 66 AC, high saves (all 36+), Epic Ward, 3500hp. DR 6/-. Can cast Freedom of Movement and Mass Protection from Elements (absorbing 500, not 120, to make up for players doing more damage than monsters do). Can use Whirlwind Attack (as the feat) on a 6 second cooldown.
Offense: Khopesh and board melee (17-20/x3) - 1 attack per 0.7 sec, +45 to-hit, 4d6+20 damage plus Flaming and Evil Burst (41 average, 55 on a crit that is negated by fortification). The Khopeshs used by these foes are Supreme Tyrant Greensteel Khopeshes of Ash (Flaming, Evil Burst, Insight +4, 5% chance of Enervation proc on melee hit)

5 Lemure Grunts:
Defenses: No SR, 54 AC, low-medium saves (all 25-30), Evasion, DR 20/good OR cold iron, very fast movement. 580hp each.
Offense: Unarmed melee (19-20/x2) - 3 attacks per 1.3 sec (claw/claw/bite), +66 to-hit, 4d12+20 claw, 6d12+30 bite, vorpal attack from the bite inflicts a debuff reducing movement speed by 35%, Fortification by 50% and incoming divine/arcane healing by 50% for 12 seconds. Nothing short of Unyielding Sovereignty will cure this debuff before it expires.
Special: Four more of these spawn upon the Hezrou hitting 50% hp (the Hezrou has had a Glabrezu ally cast a Wish to emulate a Contingency spell to trigger a Summon Monster spell).

3 Infernal Fire Elementals:
Defenses: No SR, Evasion, extreme (40+) Reflex save, other saves poor (25 or lower), low AC, permanent Fire Shield: Warm, DR 15/-, fast healing: 50hp/sec. 2400hp. 29HD (so susceptable to Trap the Soul, both the spell and the procs)
Offense: Maximized DBF, Meteor Swarm, poor melee attacks.


The Hezrou will put up a bit of a fight and may take time (~20 seconds) to kill once the party focuses on it, but the fight is always changing and the healing requirements are somewhat intense, so you avoid some of the dull Crateos-style combats. Achievable and sustainable player ACs provide some defense against it, but are not the 'god mode' that an AC of 80 is in Normal VoD. Furthermore, the AC requirements change when old Hezzy goes berserk at 40%.

For comparison HP wise: The Hezrou's 53.5k HP is about 50% of what Harry has in Part 4 of the Shroud on Normal. 580hp on the Lemures is close to mob HP in Amrath Normal with single-player dungeon scaling in effect. 3500hp on the Blackguards is similar to IQ elite Quori trash (although the toughest ones have >5k). The Hezrou hits almost as hard as the melee attacks of Normal Horoth, but attacks slower.


... and the final encounter...

This encounter takes place in a room similar in size and shape to the final room of A New Invasion - a hexagonal room with six enormous pillars that block line of sight.

Players that die in here have their soulstones teleported to a room above the ceiling. However, whenever Nythkatos summons additional mobs (at 75%, 50% and 25% hp), those stones will fall back into the main room, allowing these players to be raised once each.

Nythkatos, Glabrezu (an image of a Glabrezu can be found here: http://www.vesivus.com/eBay/dndminis/GoL_Glabrezu.jpg, they are Huge size so ~20ft=6.1 metres tall).

Defenses:
Purple-named immunities
SR 44
Very high saves (35+)
68 AC (see below)
DR 10/cold iron AND good AND epic
DR 25/cold iron OR good (so a Good-slotted Epic Hellstroke Greataxe deals full damage; a Good-slotted eSOS deals 10 less than full damage, and a +5 Scimitar deals 25 less than full damage).
276k HP
Very fast movement (200% of player base speed)
Teleport on a 20 sec cooldown
20% fortification
20% concealment (as Blur)
30 resist fire/acid/cold
Immunity to Lightning.
Also, at 20% health, many of these change - see 'Berserk' below.

Melee attacks:
4 attacks per attack chain, attack chain duration 2.4 seconds.
+82 To-Hit (can be debuffed easily to 76 with a combination of Waves of Exhaustion and Strength-Sapping)
10d12+25 (90 average damage).
Blind-fight.
Overall, he hits harder than Elite Horoth, doing 150 damage per second in melee, but Displacement provides a 25% reduction in incoming damage, bringing him close to eHoroth's damage output.

Unique spells (all max-empped and extended, all save DCs are 45):
All of these except the first require one or more of the players to stop auto-attacking the Glabrezu and do something specific, keeping the encounter changing. These spells (like the Abbot's Inferno, Conjure Phase Wraith, Encasement and Disjunction) all share a 20 second cooldown, and the Glabrezu casts one at random each time the cooldown expires.
Unlike the Abbot, there is no warning as to which one he might be casting.

Hellball:
Conjures a deadly ball of elemental chaos. Deals 10d8 (loaded, so 50-80) base fire damage, plus an equal amount of electric, acid and cold damage, to each foe within a 40ft radius of the target. Reflex half for each component of the spell. (Max-Empped, this spell deals ~530 damage to someone that has all four 30-point elemental resists and fails all four saves. Treated as a level 11 spell for save DC purposes). This spell is always cast centered upon the Glabrezu's primary aggro target. Like other Fireball-type spells, this spell will detonate early if it hits a target before its chosen one.

Necrotic Field:
Will negates. This spell is targeted upon a foe and lasts 8 seconds (16 extended). Upon a failed Will save, the target becomes a powerful conduit for negative energy. The target and all of its allies within 20ft suffer 100 negative energy damage per 2 seconds (Deathward negates, this heals Pale Masters instead of harming them) and all incoming arcane and divine healing is reduced by 75%. This spell is never cast on the Glabrezu's primary aggro target but is instead cast on a random other player. (The affected player is intended to run away from the party and be healed through it).

Conjure Elemental Servant:
This spell conjures two powerful elemental servants (earth, fire, water or air, not necessarily the same as each other) with rednamed immunities and 7000hp each. These elementals fight as standard for their type(s). In addition, they grant all of their allies a 400% buff to damage dealt by spells of their element (acid damage for the earth elemental, cold for water). These need to be killed immediately by the players - if one is still alive and Hellball is cast, Hellball will probably wipe the party.

Soullock:
Upon casting this spell, the Glabrezu creates a crystal on the ground. Five seconds later, the crystal shatters. All foes with line of sight to the crystal when it shatters are struck by a Trap the Soul spell (Will DC 45 negates). Players must hide behind any of the (quite large) pillars in the room when this is cast.

Additional mobs:
When the Glabrezu falls under 75% hp, he summons four Infernal Blackguards to join the fray. These come in via the trapdoor in the roof (where player soulstones are stored), causing the soulstones to drop into the middle of the room.
At 50%, he summons a further eight Infernal Blackguards the same way.
At 25%, he summons two Hezrou Titans. These Titans have no ability to summon further mobs.

Berserk:
When reduced to 30% HP, the Glabrezu starts conserving energy and stops casting its unique spells (this lets players mob up any elementals or Hezrous that may be active). At 20%, it goes berserk, and starts casting Hellball on a random party member every six seconds, and his attack chain speeds up to take 1.6 seconds.
While he is berserk, his AC drops by 20 and he loses his Fortification.
You'd better kill him fast.

For comparisons: 276k HP is in the same ballpark as Hard Horoth (250k). 68 AC is very high, the same as Epic Malicia. This fight is intended to take a raid party 4-5 minutes, or much longer with multiple deaths.

Scaling down for Normal and Hard:
On Hard, the Glabrezu loses Empower Spell (which makes Hellball much easier to survive - a fresh Mass Protection from Energy may not be needed each time), his AC is 60 and DR is 20/cold iron OR good only, his attacks do 25% less damage, and he loses the ability to cast Soul Lock. Elemental Servant HP falls to 4000. His SR falls to 40 and HP to 200k (same as Normal Horoth).
On Normal, the Glabrezu has only Empower Spell (no Maximize). His AC falls to 55, his attacks do 60% of Elite damage, and he loses the ability to cast Necrotic Field and Soul Lock. Elemental Servant HP remains 4000 (as per Hard), but only one is summoned at a time.
Instead of summoning 4 blackguards, 8 blackguards and 2 Hezrous, he summons 3/6/1 (on Hard) and 2/3/1 (on Normal). His SR falls to 36 and his HP to 150k (same as Normal Suulomades).

[Rameses]

like abbot?

Oddly enough when they added that to him, it lowered his difficulty..

Because it's a single target spell.

Most dangerous abilities should always be multi target.

ODDly enuff I was thinking more like the Disjunction traps in the Sunken Sewer by with a higher DC.

[Ganak]

I'm dreaming about the new raid loot.

We've seen awesome discourse during the epic item overpass discussions and I am optimistic we'll see non-epic yet quality end game raid items that will cause people to run the raid like mad.

For the first year or so after the shroud release, we'd run 5-6 shrouds a night and have a blast. Looking for that type of raid and the raid loot will be a significant factor.

[DragonTroy]

Epic troll post. You, sir, win the forums.


I want to see the new raid encounters actually change in complexity, not just boss HP and healing requirements, from Normal to Elite. Think how Raiyum is different in at-level Elite compared to running it on Epic - the fight has additional mobs on Epic that cannot be ignored.

Design Elite first (or Epic if that's the highest difficulty) to be a difficult and complex encounter, then remove complexity on the lower settings.


From another thread, here's my suggestion for what a new raid encounter could look like. Notice how much removing one or two spells from the boss' repertoire changes the fight - Normal you can surround the boss and beat him down while healing through his damage, but on Hard individual players will need to run out of the pack from time to time, and on Elite you'll need to frequently move around the room to break line of sight to Trap the Soul traps.


First encounter (trash mobs) players will face on Elite. These monsters cannot be separated (aggroing one of them pulls them all).

1 Hezrou Titan (red named):
Defenses: High SR, 61 AC, medium-high saves (30-36 in each), Epic Ward, DR 20/good, can teleport once per 4 sec. 53500hp. 40% fortification (see below). 'Standard' aggro.
Offense: Unarmed melee (19-20/x4) - 1 attack per 1.2 sec, +77 to-hit, 8d12+30 damage (avg 82, comparable to normal Horoth), Blind-Fight (whenever this mob fails to bypass a concealment bonus, it may reroll once, reducing miss chances to 1% - Dusk, 4% - Blur, 25% - Displacement). Cleaves in a 225 degree frontal arc. Prefers melee but occasionally throws Max-Empped Chaos Hammer, Max-Empped Mass Inflict Moderate and Harm, all with Superior Potency 6. Unlike other Hezrous, this does not throw rocks.
Special: When the Hezrou falls under 50% health, four more Lemures appear (see below). When the Hezrou falls under 40% health, it flies into an epic barbarian rage. In this state it gains +10 Strength and Con, +25% melee alacrity, suffers a -5 AC penalty and loses all Fortification. In this phase it cannot cast spells.

4 Infernal Blackguard:
Defenses: High SR, 66 AC, high saves (all 36+), Epic Ward, 3500hp. DR 6/-. Can cast Freedom of Movement and Mass Protection from Elements (absorbing 500, not 120, to make up for players doing more damage than monsters do). Can use Whirlwind Attack (as the feat) on a 6 second cooldown.
Offense: Khopesh and board melee (17-20/x3) - 1 attack per 0.7 sec, +45 to-hit, 4d6+20 damage plus Flaming and Evil Burst (41 average, 55 on a crit that is negated by fortification). The Khopeshs used by these foes are Supreme Tyrant Greensteel Khopeshes of Ash (Flaming, Evil Burst, Insight +4, 5% chance of Enervation proc on melee hit)

5 Lemure Grunts:
Defenses: No SR, 54 AC, low-medium saves (all 25-30), Evasion, DR 20/good OR cold iron, very fast movement. 580hp each.
Offense: Unarmed melee (19-20/x2) - 3 attacks per 1.3 sec (claw/claw/bite), +66 to-hit, 4d12+20 claw, 6d12+30 bite, vorpal attack from the bite inflicts a debuff reducing movement speed by 35%, Fortification by 50% and incoming divine/arcane healing by 50% for 12 seconds. Nothing short of Unyielding Sovereignty will cure this debuff before it expires.
Special: Four more of these spawn upon the Hezrou hitting 50% hp (the Hezrou has had a Glabrezu ally cast a Wish to emulate a Contingency spell to trigger a Summon Monster spell).

3 Infernal Fire Elementals:
Defenses: No SR, Evasion, extreme (40+) Reflex save, other saves poor (25 or lower), low AC, permanent Fire Shield: Warm, DR 15/-, fast healing: 50hp/sec. 2400hp. 29HD (so susceptable to Trap the Soul, both the spell and the procs)
Offense: Maximized DBF, Meteor Swarm, poor melee attacks.


The Hezrou will put up a bit of a fight and may take time (~20 seconds) to kill once the party focuses on it, but the fight is always changing and the healing requirements are somewhat intense, so you avoid some of the dull Crateos-style combats. Achievable and sustainable player ACs provide some defense against it, but are not the 'god mode' that an AC of 80 is in Normal VoD. Furthermore, the AC requirements change when old Hezzy goes berserk at 40%.

For comparison HP wise: The Hezrou's 53.5k HP is about 50% of what Harry has in Part 4 of the Shroud on Normal. 580hp on the Lemures is close to mob HP in Amrath Normal with single-player dungeon scaling in effect. 3500hp on the Blackguards is similar to IQ elite Quori trash (although the toughest ones have >5k). The Hezrou hits almost as hard as the melee attacks of Normal Horoth, but attacks slower.


... and the final encounter...

This encounter takes place in a room similar in size and shape to the final room of A New Invasion - a hexagonal room with six enormous pillars that block line of sight.

Players that die in here have their soulstones teleported to a room above the ceiling. However, whenever Nythkatos summons additional mobs (at 75%, 50% and 25% hp), those stones will fall back into the main room, allowing these players to be raised once each.

Nythkatos, Glabrezu (an image of a Glabrezu can be found here: http://www.vesivus.com/eBay/dndminis/GoL_Glabrezu.jpg, they are Huge size so ~20ft=6.1 metres tall).

Defenses:
Purple-named immunities
SR 44
Very high saves (35+)
68 AC (see below)
DR 10/cold iron AND good AND epic
DR 25/cold iron OR good (so a Good-slotted Epic Hellstroke Greataxe deals full damage; a Good-slotted eSOS deals 10 less than full damage, and a +5 Scimitar deals 25 less than full damage).
276k HP
Very fast movement (200% of player base speed)
Teleport on a 20 sec cooldown
20% fortification
20% concealment (as Blur)
30 resist fire/acid/cold
Immunity to Lightning.
Also, at 20% health, many of these change - see 'Berserk' below.

Melee attacks:
4 attacks per attack chain, attack chain duration 2.4 seconds.
+82 To-Hit (can be debuffed easily to 76 with a combination of Waves of Exhaustion and Strength-Sapping)
10d12+25 (90 average damage).
Blind-fight.
Overall, he hits harder than Elite Horoth, doing 150 damage per second in melee, but Displacement provides a 25% reduction in incoming damage, bringing him close to eHoroth's damage output.

Unique spells (all max-empped and extended, all save DCs are 45):
All of these except the first require one or more of the players to stop auto-attacking the Glabrezu and do something specific, keeping the encounter changing. These spells (like the Abbot's Inferno, Conjure Phase Wraith, Encasement and Disjunction) all share a 20 second cooldown, and the Glabrezu casts one at random each time the cooldown expires.
Unlike the Abbot, there is no warning as to which one he might be casting.

Hellball:
Conjures a deadly ball of elemental chaos. Deals 10d8 (loaded, so 50-80) base fire damage, plus an equal amount of electric, acid and cold damage, to each foe within a 40ft radius of the target. Reflex half for each component of the spell. (Max-Empped, this spell deals ~530 damage to someone that has all four 30-point elemental resists and fails all four saves. Treated as a level 11 spell for save DC purposes). This spell is always cast centered upon the Glabrezu's primary aggro target. Like other Fireball-type spells, this spell will detonate early if it hits a target before its chosen one.

Necrotic Field:
Will negates. This spell is targeted upon a foe and lasts 8 seconds (16 extended). Upon a failed Will save, the target becomes a powerful conduit for negative energy. The target and all of its allies within 20ft suffer 100 negative energy damage per 2 seconds (Deathward negates, this heals Pale Masters instead of harming them) and all incoming arcane and divine healing is reduced by 75%. This spell is never cast on the Glabrezu's primary aggro target but is instead cast on a random other player. (The affected player is intended to run away from the party and be healed through it).

Conjure Elemental Servant:
This spell conjures two powerful elemental servants (earth, fire, water or air, not necessarily the same as each other) with rednamed immunities and 7000hp each. These elementals fight as standard for their type(s). In addition, they grant all of their allies a 400% buff to damage dealt by spells of their element (acid damage for the earth elemental, cold for water). These need to be killed immediately by the players - if one is still alive and Hellball is cast, Hellball will probably wipe the party.

Soullock:
Upon casting this spell, the Glabrezu creates a crystal on the ground. Five seconds later, the crystal shatters. All foes with line of sight to the crystal when it shatters are struck by a Trap the Soul spell (Will DC 45 negates). Players must hide behind any of the (quite large) pillars in the room when this is cast.

Additional mobs:
When the Glabrezu falls under 75% hp, he summons four Infernal Blackguards to join the fray. These come in via the trapdoor in the roof (where player soulstones are stored), causing the soulstones to drop into the middle of the room.
At 50%, he summons a further eight Infernal Blackguards the same way.
At 25%, he summons two Hezrou Titans. These Titans have no ability to summon further mobs.

Berserk:
When reduced to 30% HP, the Glabrezu starts conserving energy and stops casting its unique spells (this lets players mob up any elementals or Hezrous that may be active). At 20%, it goes berserk, and starts casting Hellball on a random party member every six seconds, and his attack chain speeds up to take 1.6 seconds.
While he is berserk, his AC drops by 20 and he loses his Fortification.
You'd better kill him fast.

For comparisons: 276k HP is in the same ballpark as Hard Horoth (250k). 68 AC is very high, the same as Epic Malicia. This fight is intended to take a raid party 4-5 minutes, or much longer with multiple deaths.

Scaling down for Normal and Hard:
On Hard, the Glabrezu loses Empower Spell (which makes Hellball much easier to survive - a fresh Mass Protection from Energy may not be needed each time), his AC is 60 and DR is 20/cold iron OR good only, his attacks do 25% less damage, and he loses the ability to cast Soul Lock. Elemental Servant HP falls to 4000. His SR falls to 40 and HP to 200k (same as Normal Horoth).
On Normal, the Glabrezu has only Empower Spell (no Maximize). His AC falls to 55, his attacks do 60% of Elite damage, and he loses the ability to cast Necrotic Field and Soul Lock. Elemental Servant HP remains 4000 (as per Hard), but only one is summoned at a time.
Instead of summoning 4 blackguards, 8 blackguards and 2 Hezrous, he summons 3/6/1 (on Hard) and 2/3/1 (on Normal). His SR falls to 36 and his HP to 150k (same as Normal Suulomades).

i personally feel this is one of the coolest things ive read here on the forums. and i think if this isnt the new raid, then this should be added soon afterward, because it sounds like that elite fight could the the most epic in all of ddo

[ladypummel]

i wanna see a raid where i just get chests lots and lots of chest little chests big chests filled with awesome stuff dont really need anything in there but loot cause it justs waste time we are not there to watch little monkeys dance we want loot just loot it thanks ---Sgt law CO-leader OF For Loot And GLory

[twix]

nvm i actually read the whole thread this time

[stoerm]

Here's hoping we get one it in Three Barrel Cove. That pack has polish but needs a bit more meat. A pirate themed raid ... Yum. Also waiting for the difficulty scaling mechanism from the Cove, could we maybe see it in a raid?

[Shade]

. Also waiting for the difficulty scaling mechanism from the Cove, could we maybe see it in a raid?

1. Crystal cover had absolutely no difficulty scalign options - one of its major failures in design, it was a joke - casual only no matter what lvl selected. Lvl scaling != difficulty.
2. Why would you want that? do you regularly run chronoscope at lvl6? dragon at 10? abbot where the max is 17? Raids are far more often ran at cap, as was always the original design.

Raids should be for the endgame. Low lvl raids are pointless and so infrequently ran that they are a waste of developement time. Let alone one for EVERY low lvl.

[Cetus]

I personally wish we had raid loot that would augment our existing gear, not create further competition and global rearrangement and re-gearing of how our characters are currently outftted. How about introduce some quivers with stats that are applicable to things like UMD, exceptional stat +2's, guards, Greater arcane lore, or foci, etc. It would be like a whole new slot addition to our already incredibly tight and limiting gear slots.

Just a thought, ever since I saw that quiver linked by a European (I think?) player with seeker +10 and +5 UMD on it, I grew fond of the idea of how a quiver can become another gear slot that we can use.

[Bladedge]

1. Crystal cover had absolutely no difficulty scalign options - one of its major failures in design, it was a joke - casual only no matter what lvl selected. Lvl scaling != difficulty.

Probably just bad memory but, I found the lv 16-20 name mobs more challenging then those in those in the lv 21-25 range which just had tons of hps for my lv 20s. So I agree CC Lvl scaling != difficulty.

[Cetus]

Epic troll post. You, sir, win the forums.


I want to see the new raid encounters actually change in complexity, not just boss HP and healing requirements, from Normal to Elite. Think how Raiyum is different in at-level Elite compared to running it on Epic - the fight has additional mobs on Epic that cannot be ignored.

Design Elite first (or Epic if that's the highest difficulty) to be a difficult and complex encounter, then remove complexity on the lower settings.


From another thread, here's my suggestion for what a new raid encounter could look like. Notice how much removing one or two spells from the boss' repertoire changes the fight - Normal you can surround the boss and beat him down while healing through his damage, but on Hard individual players will need to run out of the pack from time to time, and on Elite you'll need to frequently move around the room to break line of sight to Trap the Soul traps.


First encounter (trash mobs) players will face on Elite. These monsters cannot be separated (aggroing one of them pulls them all).

1 Hezrou Titan (red named):
Defenses: High SR, 61 AC, medium-high saves (30-36 in each), Epic Ward, DR 20/good, can teleport once per 4 sec. 53500hp. 40% fortification (see below). 'Standard' aggro.
Offense: Unarmed melee (19-20/x4) - 1 attack per 1.2 sec, +77 to-hit, 8d12+30 damage (avg 82, comparable to normal Horoth), Blind-Fight (whenever this mob fails to bypass a concealment bonus, it may reroll once, reducing miss chances to 1% - Dusk, 4% - Blur, 25% - Displacement). Cleaves in a 225 degree frontal arc. Prefers melee but occasionally throws Max-Empped Chaos Hammer, Max-Empped Mass Inflict Moderate and Harm, all with Superior Potency 6. Unlike other Hezrous, this does not throw rocks.
Special: When the Hezrou falls under 50% health, four more Lemures appear (see below). When the Hezrou falls under 40% health, it flies into an epic barbarian rage. In this state it gains +10 Strength and Con, +25% melee alacrity, suffers a -5 AC penalty and loses all Fortification. In this phase it cannot cast spells.

4 Infernal Blackguard:
Defenses: High SR, 66 AC, high saves (all 36+), Epic Ward, 3500hp. DR 6/-. Can cast Freedom of Movement and Mass Protection from Elements (absorbing 500, not 120, to make up for players doing more damage than monsters do). Can use Whirlwind Attack (as the feat) on a 6 second cooldown.
Offense: Khopesh and board melee (17-20/x3) - 1 attack per 0.7 sec, +45 to-hit, 4d6+20 damage plus Flaming and Evil Burst (41 average, 55 on a crit that is negated by fortification). The Khopeshs used by these foes are Supreme Tyrant Greensteel Khopeshes of Ash (Flaming, Evil Burst, Insight +4, 5% chance of Enervation proc on melee hit)

5 Lemure Grunts:
Defenses: No SR, 54 AC, low-medium saves (all 25-30), Evasion, DR 20/good OR cold iron, very fast movement. 580hp each.
Offense: Unarmed melee (19-20/x2) - 3 attacks per 1.3 sec (claw/claw/bite), +66 to-hit, 4d12+20 claw, 6d12+30 bite, vorpal attack from the bite inflicts a debuff reducing movement speed by 35%, Fortification by 50% and incoming divine/arcane healing by 50% for 12 seconds. Nothing short of Unyielding Sovereignty will cure this debuff before it expires.
Special: Four more of these spawn upon the Hezrou hitting 50% hp (the Hezrou has had a Glabrezu ally cast a Wish to emulate a Contingency spell to trigger a Summon Monster spell).

3 Infernal Fire Elementals:
Defenses: No SR, Evasion, extreme (40+) Reflex save, other saves poor (25 or lower), low AC, permanent Fire Shield: Warm, DR 15/-, fast healing: 50hp/sec. 2400hp. 29HD (so susceptable to Trap the Soul, both the spell and the procs)
Offense: Maximized DBF, Meteor Swarm, poor melee attacks.


The Hezrou will put up a bit of a fight and may take time (~20 seconds) to kill once the party focuses on it, but the fight is always changing and the healing requirements are somewhat intense, so you avoid some of the dull Crateos-style combats. Achievable and sustainable player ACs provide some defense against it, but are not the 'god mode' that an AC of 80 is in Normal VoD. Furthermore, the AC requirements change when old Hezzy goes berserk at 40%.

For comparison HP wise: The Hezrou's 53.5k HP is about 50% of what Harry has in Part 4 of the Shroud on Normal. 580hp on the Lemures is close to mob HP in Amrath Normal with single-player dungeon scaling in effect. 3500hp on the Blackguards is similar to IQ elite Quori trash (although the toughest ones have >5k). The Hezrou hits almost as hard as the melee attacks of Normal Horoth, but attacks slower.


... and the final encounter...

This encounter takes place in a room similar in size and shape to the final room of A New Invasion - a hexagonal room with six enormous pillars that block line of sight.

Players that die in here have their soulstones teleported to a room above the ceiling. However, whenever Nythkatos summons additional mobs (at 75%, 50% and 25% hp), those stones will fall back into the main room, allowing these players to be raised once each.

Nythkatos, Glabrezu (an image of a Glabrezu can be found here: http://www.vesivus.com/eBay/dndminis/GoL_Glabrezu.jpg, they are Huge size so ~20ft=6.1 metres tall).

Defenses:
Purple-named immunities
SR 44
Very high saves (35+)
68 AC (see below)
DR 10/cold iron AND good AND epic
DR 25/cold iron OR good (so a Good-slotted Epic Hellstroke Greataxe deals full damage; a Good-slotted eSOS deals 10 less than full damage, and a +5 Scimitar deals 25 less than full damage).
276k HP
Very fast movement (200% of player base speed)
Teleport on a 20 sec cooldown
20% fortification
20% concealment (as Blur)
30 resist fire/acid/cold
Immunity to Lightning.
Also, at 20% health, many of these change - see 'Berserk' below.

Melee attacks:
4 attacks per attack chain, attack chain duration 2.4 seconds.
+82 To-Hit (can be debuffed easily to 76 with a combination of Waves of Exhaustion and Strength-Sapping)
10d12+25 (90 average damage).
Blind-fight.
Overall, he hits harder than Elite Horoth, doing 150 damage per second in melee, but Displacement provides a 25% reduction in incoming damage, bringing him close to eHoroth's damage output.

Unique spells (all max-empped and extended, all save DCs are 45):
All of these except the first require one or more of the players to stop auto-attacking the Glabrezu and do something specific, keeping the encounter changing. These spells (like the Abbot's Inferno, Conjure Phase Wraith, Encasement and Disjunction) all share a 20 second cooldown, and the Glabrezu casts one at random each time the cooldown expires.
Unlike the Abbot, there is no warning as to which one he might be casting.

Hellball:
Conjures a deadly ball of elemental chaos. Deals 10d8 (loaded, so 50-80) base fire damage, plus an equal amount of electric, acid and cold damage, to each foe within a 40ft radius of the target. Reflex half for each component of the spell. (Max-Empped, this spell deals ~530 damage to someone that has all four 30-point elemental resists and fails all four saves. Treated as a level 11 spell for save DC purposes). This spell is always cast centered upon the Glabrezu's primary aggro target. Like other Fireball-type spells, this spell will detonate early if it hits a target before its chosen one.

Necrotic Field:
Will negates. This spell is targeted upon a foe and lasts 8 seconds (16 extended). Upon a failed Will save, the target becomes a powerful conduit for negative energy. The target and all of its allies within 20ft suffer 100 negative energy damage per 2 seconds (Deathward negates, this heals Pale Masters instead of harming them) and all incoming arcane and divine healing is reduced by 75%. This spell is never cast on the Glabrezu's primary aggro target but is instead cast on a random other player. (The affected player is intended to run away from the party and be healed through it).

Conjure Elemental Servant:
This spell conjures two powerful elemental servants (earth, fire, water or air, not necessarily the same as each other) with rednamed immunities and 7000hp each. These elementals fight as standard for their type(s). In addition, they grant all of their allies a 400% buff to damage dealt by spells of their element (acid damage for the earth elemental, cold for water). These need to be killed immediately by the players - if one is still alive and Hellball is cast, Hellball will probably wipe the party.

Soullock:
Upon casting this spell, the Glabrezu creates a crystal on the ground. Five seconds later, the crystal shatters. All foes with line of sight to the crystal when it shatters are struck by a Trap the Soul spell (Will DC 45 negates). Players must hide behind any of the (quite large) pillars in the room when this is cast.

Additional mobs:
When the Glabrezu falls under 75% hp, he summons four Infernal Blackguards to join the fray. These come in via the trapdoor in the roof (where player soulstones are stored), causing the soulstones to drop into the middle of the room.
At 50%, he summons a further eight Infernal Blackguards the same way.
At 25%, he summons two Hezrou Titans. These Titans have no ability to summon further mobs.

Berserk:
When reduced to 30% HP, the Glabrezu starts conserving energy and stops casting its unique spells (this lets players mob up any elementals or Hezrous that may be active). At 20%, it goes berserk, and starts casting Hellball on a random party member every six seconds, and his attack chain speeds up to take 1.6 seconds.
While he is berserk, his AC drops by 20 and he loses his Fortification.
You'd better kill him fast.

For comparisons: 276k HP is in the same ballpark as Hard Horoth (250k). 68 AC is very high, the same as Epic Malicia. This fight is intended to take a raid party 4-5 minutes, or much longer with multiple deaths.

Scaling down for Normal and Hard:
On Hard, the Glabrezu loses Empower Spell (which makes Hellball much easier to survive - a fresh Mass Protection from Energy may not be needed each time), his AC is 60 and DR is 20/cold iron OR good only, his attacks do 25% less damage, and he loses the ability to cast Soul Lock. Elemental Servant HP falls to 4000. His SR falls to 40 and HP to 200k (same as Normal Horoth).
On Normal, the Glabrezu has only Empower Spell (no Maximize). His AC falls to 55, his attacks do 60% of Elite damage, and he loses the ability to cast Necrotic Field and Soul Lock. Elemental Servant HP remains 4000 (as per Hard), but only one is summoned at a time.
Instead of summoning 4 blackguards, 8 blackguards and 2 Hezrous, he summons 3/6/1 (on Hard) and 2/3/1 (on Normal). His SR falls to 36 and his HP to 150k (same as Normal Suulomades).

This is an AMAZING suggestion. If the developers truly think they are capable of pleasing us with a new end game raid, then they should take some notes on this one. Very creative and thought out suggestion.

[sirgog]

ODDly enuff I was thinking more like the Disjunction traps in the Sunken Sewer by with a higher DC.

Go run epic ADQ1 if you want to see Disjunction traps in action... They are pretty harmless in Sunken Parish, you can just wait them out without penalty. They are a lot nastier when you have an epic Marilith swinging at you.

I'm dreaming about the new raid loot.

We've seen awesome discourse during the epic item overpass discussions and I am optimistic we'll see non-epic yet quality end game raid items that will cause people to run the raid like mad.

For the first year or so after the shroud release, we'd run 5-6 shrouds a night and have a blast. Looking for that type of raid and the raid loot will be a significant factor.

I hope we see the loot on Lamannia, so that any really off the planet items can be squashed there.

[Vengeance777]

Go run epic ADQ1 if you want to see Disjunction traps in action... They are pretty harmless in Sunken Parish, you can just wait them out without penalty. They are a lot nastier when you have an epic Marilith swinging at you.

The Lag Monster they spawn when hit can easily wipe a party too. Sux when your hit by one and you get frozen in place while everything in your inventory rolls a save. Many a time I've seen a party member hit by one and unable to move for 10 secs while a dozen buff animations flicker on and off on them. I'd rather they be instant death effects no save, then disjunction. At least then it wouldn't lag the group for 10 -20 secs while the game engine rolls dice for an entire backpack worth of stuff.

[TheDoctor]

If we had a high level raid that had RANDOMIZED content it would keep us amused for months. Change the map, change the monsters, change the loot. It could be accessed through a Chaos Planar Gate. How exciting !!! Ohh what are we in for this time.

Or have a randomized out door area to traverse to get to the raid with the possability of large encounters with lots of mobs. Making the dash to the quest would be an adventure in its self.

I like Serge's suggestion too, He has put a lot of thought into it. Nice post.

I truley believe Randomization is the key.