Favourite Boss Mechanics

[Nightmanis]

What is everyone's favourite boss mechanic?

Include even bosses from other games.

Personally, I haven't played all that many games. But I've always liked the traditional Tank and Spank setups such as ToD and LoB, but I always liked having multiple different things you had to do while someone was tanking as well. So basically the whole of LoB is my personal favourite. ToD comes in second because of the constant waves that have to be dealt with, and the second boss that has to be killed requiring the party to split up.

[Chai]

Old school EQ, plane of fear. Cazic Thule

[Thalone]

My favourite mechanic is when Turbine makes unannounced changes to raids during updates and patches. The sweet, sweet tears on the forums keep me entertained for days.

A runner-up is stuff like Abbot or Titan or Shroud, which depend on personal ability or knowledge rather than a character's build (e.g., the old intim-tank days of ToD/VoD). I would rather take the first 11 and go instead of waiting for someone who has a build that needs to run the raid and is also off timer.

[Qhualor]

Sorjek in Tempest Spine. getting thrown off, puzzle, tank.

Sorjek in Stealer of Souls. boosted abilities with mephitis and variety of spells.

Suulomadaes in Vision of Destruction. tank, waves of mobs, chain, curses.

Suulomades and Horoth in Tower of Despair. tanks, waves of mobs, many damaging spells, stun, banish

Lord of Blades in Lord of Blades. tank, twister, rain of blades, death and resurrection penalty. didn't like dog kiting though.

Arraetrikos in part 5 Shroud. poison damage although the 1000 con damage is too much, Flock of Blades, teleport, random agro

these bosses were more fun when cap was 20 and on elite with a pug group. heroes could have been anyone that were able to keep the group alive or save the group from wipe. I haven't had that thrill of the rush feeling like I used to have since the cap was raised, level 28s now join for completions sake and more power creep. that's what I miss most about raids.

[Nightmanis]

A runner-up is stuff like Abbot or Titan or Shroud, which depend on personal ability or knowledge rather than a character's build (e.g., the old intim-tank days of ToD/VoD). I would rather take the first 11 and go instead of waiting for someone who has a build that needs to run the raid and is also off timer.

See, I always liked the idea of a dedicated build for a certain kind of raid (old aggro intimitanks). It would be cool to me to have only 1 needed slot, then just have 10 other puggers (or 11, if you're said build) that are off doing other different things. Shroud will always be the #1 raid in the game, simply because you can do exactly that: Take the first 11 that hit. As long as they're flagged, it's fair game.

[sephiroth1084]

I like the fight against the Abbot, having to adjust to his actions, either helping allies out of CC (encased), or using terrain to avoid his special nuking attack (ice wands during inferno), although I'd like it more if one player screwing up, or the game lagging a tiny bit didn't wipe the whole group.

Basically, I'd like a fight similar to this, where players are equipped with an in-quest resource that is needed to help their allies and forced to seek shelter occasionally, but in a more interesting fashion than simply hiding behind rocks when Velah belches forth her flames.


I also like tankable boss fights, especially ones that require every to pay attention, a varying strategy, and something for the whole party to do. Lord of Blades did this pretty well, by making his attacks dangerous enough that the tank sometimes wants to block instead of swing, and with enough of a warning to actually accomplish that, plus resetting and sometimes-fluid aggro mechanics that force people to pay attention when they're damaging the boss. The boss also moves around a lot, and has a variety of actions it can take. Then we have some trash added occasionally, as well as the pillars that need addressing. My biggest problem with the raid is that of the dogs, which seriously encouraging kiting, which I find to be incredibly dull. I like VoD as well, and think that it does a better job with giving the non-tanking characters something to do when not pounding on the boss' hide, but falls short of LoB's tactical variety.

The Titan could have been cool, if instead of having the Titan's aggro be random, it could be influenced by players, and if we then had some mechanic in place that would require members of the group to lead the Titan around. Add respawns that make life difficult for whoever is working the laser or dealing with the Titan and pillars, and this would be a more enjoyable raid.

Oh, or maybe replace the "ovens" where the crystal to power the laser is acquired with a fight...perhaps a certain number of WF need to be slain, their parts collected, to fuse together and power the laser.

[redoubt]

I liked the titan. (I heard its broke now, so back when it wasn't.)

I would have like it more with less ladder hugging, but I liked the overall premise.
-- mob is too tough to hurt, so break giant pillars to knock it down
-- need a construction laser to hit it while down.
-- need to power up the laser.

It was awesome with a good team and coordination.

Frighteningly horrible without out.

[FranOhmsford]

Having never fought a "Boss" in any of the other MMO's I've tried I'm gonna have to simply pick my favourite from DDO....


And that is....


Sinvala!

[Nightmanis]

Would be interesting if LoB could be rewritten into something like Titan.

Think Traditional Tank/Spank, but he inevitably gains the power of the forge. Only now, it empowers him far too much, and he becomes seemingly indestructible so you have to break the pillars and smash them down upon him, eventually the forge itself comes crashing down on it.

Also when thinking about Velah, one thing I always wanted was for the fire to not just hit once, but to hit more like a dozen times a second. Do like 20-50 damage each tick, but hits so many times with a reflex save each time. If the game engine could handle a load like that, it would be awesome. That would feel more realistic for dragon breath than the once and done we have now.

[HatsuharuZ]

I'm not sure if this is a mechanic or not, but I like having rocks to hide behind when Velah unleashes her breath weapon.

[earl_of_pain]

I like end bosses that you have to hit and keep hitting. If you stop then they heal up. Thinking of the Troll Boss in Trial By Fire. First time through I simply couldn't hurt him faster than he could regenerate. I get a smile on my face now that he goes splat without difficulty now.

[Spoonwelder]

What is everyone's favourite boss mechanic?

Include even bosses from other games.

Personally, I haven't played all that many games. But I've always liked the traditional Tank and Spank setups such as ToD and LoB, but I always liked having multiple different things you had to do while someone was tanking as well. So basically the whole of LoB is my personal favourite. ToD comes in second because of the constant waves that have to be dealt with, and the second boss that has to be killed requiring the party to split up.

I think I got the wrong idea when I read the thread title....

[Vellrad]

Draigoch and Saruman from lotro.

[Nightmanis]

I think I got the wrong idea when I read the thread title....

I thought it was pretty simple and easy to understand o_o

[Nightmanis]

I like end bosses that you have to hit and keep hitting. If you stop then they heal up. Thinking of the Troll Boss in Trial By Fire. First time through I simply couldn't hurt him faster than he could regenerate. I get a smile on my face now that he goes splat without difficulty now.

Oh yeah that's always fun. Depending on difficulty it can really show just how much dps the party is capable of. Would be cool to have an end boss that on EE has about 500khp and heals fast enough to make some of the top top tier melee max themselves out.

[Nightmanis]

Draigoch and Saruman from lotro.

Please elaborate. I've not played that, and I actually would like to know how Turbine made something decent in another game :P

[Vellrad]

Please elaborate. I've not played that, and I actually would like to know how Turbine made something decent in another game :P

Draigoch:

Huge red dragon with evil looking goatie.
3 or 5 times bigger than Velah or any puny little DDO dragon.

First, your raid enters its lair. You must navigate through tunnels avoiding instakilling fire breath by hiding behind pillars and running when he's looking elsewhere.
Then the real fun begins.
There is about million gold coins scattered everywhere, they make great sounds when you fight on them, his lair looks like what dragon lair should look in D&D.
Draigoch talks a lot, unlike elnoobstrel its actually well written monologue. Players are running in tunnel with lots of holes. When fight starts, he lands each of its legs attached to one hole. Tank with healer stays up, they're keeping head occupied when rest of group attacks legs. After last let loses its HP, dragon falls on the huge gold pile and party can beat on him. He got lots of hit points, so team must use fellowship coordinated attack system, to launch series of special attacks in specific order to apply debuffs to body and legs. This repeats few times. If players take too much time with legs, dragon flies and puts instakilling flames in part of tunnels, tank must observe where will he attack and warn party to run away in good direction (you usually can't just DPS legs as fast as possible, because attacks enabling fellowship maneuvers must be off cooldown). He also puts instakilling fires for slowpokes who didn't run away when he was waking up from legs recovery. After you beat legs few times, dragon stays on centre, where tank must keep head away from people beating on legs. You drop him on his belly few more times, and after launching 12th coordinated attack correctly finish off body.
This is a well designed encounter, because it requires coordination from party members and shows how dragons are supposed to be. DDO dragons ssucks when compared to draigoch.
Unfortunately, this raid is broken by bugs more often than Abbot, and, last time I was playing lotro, was broken, and it looks like turbine is never going to fix it.

[Vellrad]

In orthank raid, Saruman crafter 5 rings of power.
After players defeated owners in 4 preraids they come to face the Saruman. They climb to the peak of Orthank, and battle him atop the tower. He was thinking that PCs want the power and will join him. However, after raid group claims rings, he sees our true intentions- to destroy his own ring of power.

He summons 5 'clones' that players need to defeat. Each clone is based on different element, as rings and wings of raid (shadow, lightning, fire, frost, poison) and posseses different special attacks. There are 5 phases, after each players must run to their positions and use rings in order, otherwise phase needs to be repeated. Each phase got special conditions and events, theese would be hard to describe to someone who never played lotro.

Anyway, each raid got special optional objective called challenge (great idea BTW, I wish DDO had something like that in raids, its comparable only to optional about defeating LoB thrice before destroying forge). Extra challenge in fight with Saruman, is to never fall victim to any of his special attacks. This is quite hard to achieve, as a single mistake from a single player causes objective to fail, but completing it is very satisfacting and rewarding (in form of extra chest and, for 1st timers, extra barter currency and turbine points).

After 5th phase, Saruman's ring is destroyed, and he pushes players from the pinnacle of orthank.
Fortunately, we're saved by great eagles and delivered to the ground when raid loot awaits.

This raid is considered greater lore break than anything Jackson put in his LotR movies, but its intensivity, difficulty and fun it provides makes up for this.

[Nightmanis]

In orthank raid, Saruman crafter 5 rings of power.
After players defeated owners in 4 preraids they come to face the Saruman. They climb to the peak of Orthank, and battle him atop the tower. He was thinking that PCs want the power and will join him. However, after raid group claims rings, he sees our true intentions- to destroy his own ring of power.

He summons 5 'clones' that players need to defeat. Each clone is based on different element, as rings and wings of raid (shadow, lightning, fire, frost, poison) and posseses different special attacks. There are 5 phases, after each players must run to their positions and use rings in order, otherwise phase needs to be repeated. Each phase got special conditions and events, theese would be hard to describe to someone who never played lotro.

Anyway, each raid got special optional objective called challenge (great idea BTW, I wish DDO had something like that in raids, its comparable only to optional about defeating LoB thrice before destroying forge). Extra challenge in fight with Saruman, is to never fall victim to any of his special attacks. This is quite hard to achieve, as a single mistake from a single player causes objective to fail, but completing it is very satisfacting and rewarding (in form of extra chest and, for 1st timers, extra barter currency and turbine points).

After 5th phase, Saruman's ring is destroyed, and he pushes players from the pinnacle of orthank.
Fortunately, we're saved by great eagles and delivered to the ground when raid loot awaits.

This raid is considered greater lore break than anything Jackson put in his LotR movies, but its intensivity, difficulty and fun it provides makes up for this.

O_O Oh. My. God. That just sounds like it could be so incredibly epic.

I will say we do need more mechanics like the marking in LoB. That would add a lot more fun to a raid, especially if they're extremely difficult and are the only way to get some super awesome loot.

[Vellrad]

O_O Oh. My. God. That just sounds like it could be so incredibly epic.

I will say we do need more mechanics like the marking in LoB. That would add a lot more fun to a raid, especially if they're extremely difficult and are the only way to get some super awesome loot.

I love how raid loot was handed in lotro when lvl cap was 75.

Draigoch was easy on gear requirements, you could run it with weak gear, and get 1 or 2 armor pieces and unbound crafting material to make best cloak at the time and decent weapon, or, if everyone in guild had everything, sell for decent coin and split earnings. And most of all, purpose of this raid was to teach you cooperation with people.

Then people ran dungeons for jewelery (very easy to get, as no pugger needed) and barter currency (everyone gets their own so no rolling), and Tower of Orthank at T1 (like normal difficulty) to unlock vendors and get more currency. And at the time, crafting jewellery was extremally potent, so you could have it that way.

After beating raid bosses once, you had acces to vendor giving you best armor. No rolling on loot, just get barter currencies you always get.

When you was ready you entered tier 2 (like hard) and could win unbound crafting currency required to make best weapons and class items. When you had good team, you could attempt challenge mode (like elite in DDO). If you could, you got 2nd chest, and weapon crafting ingredient droprate was 150% (1d2) for raid, so everyone was rolling. Opening chest was really exciting back then. You didn't had to beat highest difficulty for best reward, but it guaranteed at least one person to win raid loot. And everyone else were awarded with barter currencies, first timers got their TPs etc. IMO this way to grant raid rewards the best, second only to greensteel.