Official Thread - Shadow Dracolich Raid

[Yalinaa]

Now, what raid in the game do YOU think is the absolute best? One where all playstyles, not just your own, have a role?

One of the best raid is LOB. Noone runs it anymore. Awesome raid doesn't equal popular raid.

My problem with the mirror puzzles that a lvl 8 toon with invis can do them, why would you want a lvl 28+ character do something like that?
Boost those puzzle, like throw some mindflyers there with true seeing, dispelling the players, doing disco, eating brains, anything to make the feeling it's a lvl 30-32 raid.

[Pandir]

Nvm

[Shorlong]

One of the best raid is LOB. Noone runs it anymore. Awesome raid doesn't equal popular raid.

My problem with the mirror puzzles that a lvl 8 toon with invis can do them, why would you want a lvl 28+ character do something like that?
Boost those puzzle, like throw some mindflyers there with true seeing, dispelling the players, doing disco, eating brains, anything to make the feeling it's a lvl 30-32 raid.

I'd be perfectly fine with something like that. I giving the mobs a bit of a boost in the danger department and drawing aggro to the mirror turners would make people want to do something aside from just stand around.

[ishr]

Maybe it's because I've only tried it on EN and EH, but this raid is too easy. I really hope that we can up the difficulty a bit so we don't have a FOT repeat where people are crushing this raid from day 1.

One of the best raid is LOB. Noone runs it anymore. Awesome raid doesn't equal popular raid.

My problem with the mirror puzzles that a lvl 8 toon with invis can do them, why would you want a lvl 28+ character do something like that?
Boost those puzzle, like throw some mindflyers there with true seeing, dispelling the players, doing disco, eating brains, anything to make the feeling it's a lvl 30-32 raid.

Totally agree here. LOB was run extremely popularly until MOTU launched and from a relative standpoint LOB loot sucked. LOB loot never got a second look and that is why it's not popular. Popularity is tied directly to loot value/relevancy. A good raid is tied to design, difficulty and novelty.

[Hathorian]

A) Fun is subjective. My favorite quests are ones most people hate. Crucible, The Pit, Study in Sable, Prove Your Worth. I like quests that AREN'T just about how awesome my loot is or how hard I can hit, but focus on other skills...this is D&D after all. That being said, this raid has a fair amount of balance for different playstyles. The DPS types can constantly plow through the respawning mobs, while the puzzle lovers can do the mirrors. There are six challenge rooms in the raid, four of which will be available at random. Have someone with a high intel or a dwarf read the runes that tell you which room is which, if you see the anti-grav room there, skip it. Go to a different room. There are 5 other possibilities. The end fight even has the option for DPS'ers to just wail on a shadow dragon and respawning mobs, while the puzzley-minded people can work the phylactery part out. Then it's just a beat down and good timing after that. Have two people keeping the aggro of the shadows, two people on levers, rest on the dragon.

B) We don't know all the loot so far, as it isn't available. I have only seen one named item from this raid drop, the item with the +4 to assassinate on it. Other than the ingredients, we just don't know what's coming up next.

C) As stated above, there are roles in this quest. DPS can clear trash, someone can do puzzles, tank can hold dragon aggro or draw away from mirror users.

D) Again, subjective. I personally don't think 20 minutes is a reasonable amount of time for a raid. Raids are the upper tier of quests, they should be challenging, engaging and lengthy enough to justify the loot you get at the end. VoN 5+6, Shroud (back in the day), CitW, that's about the sweet spot for a raid, time wise. 45 minutes to an hour, if not a little more. Yes, the first run through of this quest will take sometime, however, after that, it's going to fly by. I assume this will end up being in the 30-45 minute run time.

Now, what raid in the game do YOU think is the absolute best? One where all playstyles, not just your own, have a role?

I think Shroud is the best raid. Very well designed, a role for everyone (each person gets their individual puzzles although others can help if necessary, requirement for traditional tank/healing roles), good boss fights, challenging (when it came out), great loot system, team-based and fun. My only gripe with Shroud is that it is too long. Take out the mindless portal beat down grind that is phase 1 and it would be near perfect. I've also been running and liking Abbot lately although I think some of the side games (tiles and ice) are a bit overboard. FoT is good. I also like the raid components of ADQ and VON6 (although they should only require doing the pre the first time only for both raids IMO and those raids would be awesome...I'd run them way more often). Chrono is also decent.

Some people have families and careers, so they don't have 1.5 - 2 hours to do 1 raid. Many don't even have 1 consecutive hour (plus the time to form the group, get everyone to the raid, etc). Length of completion and challenge are mainly independent variables IMO. I don't see why nice loot couldn't be rewarded from a 20-30 minute challenging raid.

[Shorlong]

I think Shroud is the best raid. Very well designed, a role for everyone (each person gets their individual puzzles although others can help if necessary, requirement for traditional tank/healing roles), good boss fights, challenging (when it came out), great loot system, team-based and fun. My only gripe with Shroud is that it is too long. Take out the mindless portal beat down grind that is phase 1 and it would be near perfect. I've also been running and liking Abbot lately although I think some of the side games (tiles and ice) are a bit overboard. FoT is good. I also like the raid components of ADQ and VON6 (although they should only require doing the pre the first time only for both raids IMO and those raids would be awesome...I'd run them way more often). Chrono is also decent.

Some people have families and careers, so they don't have 1.5 - 2 hours to do 1 raid. Many don't even have 1 consecutive hour (plus the time to form the group, get everyone to the raid, etc). Length of completion and challenge are mainly independent variables IMO. I don't see why nice loot couldn't be rewarded from a 20-30 minute challenging raid.

I can see that. Nice loot should still be rewarded, even from a shorter raid. But, not ALL raids have to be like that. That was the only point I was trying to make. Right now, you have FoT, ADQ2, ToD, VoD, HoX, Reavers, LoB, MA that are all quick raids (the runs to some of them not counting in that...we really need teleporters for SubT.) Shroud, VoN5+6, CitW, Chrono, Abbott, TS, these are the only raids that are long, and even then VoN5+6 can be done in 30 minutes or less with a great party, CitW can be done in around 30 minutes, and CHrono can be done in 15-20 if you skip most of the optionals. I think they are doing the smart thing with this update...releasing a long, more thoughtful raid that can still be run in under an hour (once people learn it), and a short, arena style raid that can still be challenging (1500 no-save damage ftw!) that can be done in less than 20 minutes. This way, people who like one raid type vs the other get what they want, and everyone is happy!!

[Oxarhamar]

I can see that. Nice loot should still be rewarded, even from a shorter raid. But, not ALL raids have to be like that. That was the only point I was trying to make. Right now, you have FoT, ADQ2, ToD, VoD, HoX, Reavers, LoB, MA that are all quick raids (the runs to some of them not counting in that...we really need teleporters for SubT.) Shroud, VoN5+6, CitW, Chrono, Abbott, TS, these are the only raids that are long, and even then VoN5+6 can be done in 30 minutes or less with a great party, CitW can be done in around 30 minutes, and CHrono can be done in 15-20 if you skip most of the optionals. I think they are doing the smart thing with this update...releasing a long, more thoughtful raid that can still be run in under an hour (once people learn it), and a short, arena style raid that can still be challenging (1500 no-save damage ftw!) that can be done in less than 20 minutes. This way, people who like one raid type vs the other get what they want, and everyone is happy!!

Not a single one of those raids takes more than 30 minutes with a great party.

That being said it likely won't be long before The Shadow raid is crushed in under 30 minutes once it hits live.

[Oxarhamar]

I think Shroud is the best raid. Very well designed, a role for everyone (each person gets their individual puzzles although others can help if necessary, requirement for traditional tank/healing roles), good boss fights, challenging (when it came out), great loot system, team-based and fun. My only gripe with Shroud is that it is too long. Take out the mindless portal beat down grind that is phase 1 and it would be near perfect. I've also been running and liking Abbot lately although I think some of the side games (tiles and ice) are a bit overboard. FoT is good. I also like the raid components of ADQ and VON6 (although they should only require doing the pre the first time only for both raids IMO and those raids would be awesome...I'd run them way more often). Chrono is also decent.

Some people have families and careers, so they don't have 1.5 - 2 hours to do 1 raid. Many don't even have 1 consecutive hour (plus the time to form the group, get everyone to the raid, etc). Length of completion and challenge are mainly independent variables IMO. I don't see why nice loot couldn't be rewarded from a 20-30 minute challenging raid.

agreed

[Flavilandile]

One of the best raid is LOB. Noone runs it anymore.

Easy reason : The annoying explorer area before. Since what can be called end-game moved to 25 nobody want's to bother with the annoying explorer area.

I think Shroud is the best raid. Very well designed, a role for everyone (each person gets their individual puzzles although others can help if necessary, requirement for traditional tank/healing roles), good boss fights, challenging (when it came out), great loot system, team-based and fun.

Yes.
That's also why a lot of people wants to see an Epic Shroud, it is one of the most loved raid, for it's loot and for it's mechanics.
It's something the current generation of developer should take into account, I can understand that you want to make something new, but at least look at what previous people in your position created that was well received by the players.
It should give you hints at what we ( the players ) want and like.

Now for obvious reasons ( re-hashing : no char copy ) I couldn't test the new raids, ( I don't have the time to waste 3 hours+ to generate a raid worthy character, and then actually run the raid ) so I won't comment on hte actual topic.

[JOTMON]

Still a few issues with the raid overall I enjoy it, but some parts are unbalanced.
My point of view is from the EE and EH versions that we have sucessfully completed, haven't even tried EN..

Would like to see 1 or 2 more shrine stops spread out within the raid... Personally I don't like not having shrines at regular intervals.

Red light Green Light has too many mobs and un-named red horrors wiht massive HP relative to the other challenges.
Will have to verify... it appeared the beholder was disintigrating through walls and floors.

Mirrors are sometimes buggy, have to keep turning them until they work. - on known issues list

Dragon gets stuck sometimes near the ledge, GM's have been helpful moving stuck dragon.

ghostly is not bypassing incorpreal of mobs. - already on known issues list

Endfight there is still some party crippling Lag aggro mechanic that occurs and stops lagging right after the last person in the raid dies that had any mob aggro... I suspect some programming error here.
Only people not affected were ones that had no aggro, hav ecome across this multiple times after philactory is destroyed beating dragon down to prep for finish.

Loot on EH and EE appers to be broken, may need more testing to confirm.

on the EE run before the reroll mechanic was changed to not work 3x on raid chests, I re-rolled every chest 3x along with several other raid members.
~no decent random loot drop for anyone
~no named items
~ only 0 or 1 shadow Phlogiston's on end chest for all raid players ( even with 3x roll)

edit: ps.. thanks for removing the 3x roll option from raids. now I will not ddo store purchase any shards or use shards to roll chests anymore. period. my wallet thanks you.

3 EH runs
~no decent random loot drop for anyone
~no named items
~ only 0 or 1 shadow Phlogiston's on end chest for all raid players


if only 0 or 1 shadow Phlogiston are dropping at all difficulties it makes no sense to run the raid on EH or EE, just rinse repeat EN.
I am assuming this is bugged, wiki says 0-3 for EE and 0-2 for EH, no one in our groups has seen more than 1.


after 3 EH and 1 EE completion and have not seen a named item drop for anyone in the group.
Either the named loot is extremely rare on all difficulties or we have a very unlucky raiding group.
update:..on our 4th run last night..one person got a diamond of something, and I got a unbound pure +5 STR tome instead of a Phlogiston

[Atremus]

More Shrines are needed for sure. only 1 shrine after all that trash is not nice. There should be a Shrine in each Shadowfell section of the Mirror Puzzles, 1 after the Bone Guardian and 1 prior to the end fight.

The Redlight / Greenlight room is killing people even when they don't move. Please make the death effect only hit the person who can't stay still....