To Hot To Handle Difficulty

[Odysseus2011]

I wonder if the missing mechanic is related to the cooling tanks. We've completed it with completing the cooling tank puzzles in part 3 and with not completing the puzzles.

what bugs i've seen... lag... and trash pops continually and boom done.

My understanding of that is that to get the boss back in phase 3-1 you only need to solve the coolent tanks, not solving the furnaces will result in the DoT still affecting the group. We've had this happen a few times where we solve the coolent tanks before the furnaces; however we then finished the furnaces before beating the boss down. I'm curious though if you kill the boss before solving the furnaces what happens? Do you still need to do the furnaces after or is it over at that point?

[Torc]

Minor corrections: Reapers spawn in all reaper raids, not just Killing Time. All non-boss, non-raid-boss mobs in Killing Time can be champions; it's not limited to any particular sections of the raid. Unless there's been a change to those two that hasn't been announced yet. Should I be submitting bug reports with screenshots for these if they aren't WAI?

Nope! My head has been in the oven to long. You are correct. Reapers spawn in most raids.

-T

[Sebastrd]

So … that raid… Too Hot to Handle.... kinda living up to its name.

After watching you fight the good fight for a couple of weeks, and going over the data, we’ve concluded that the raid is over-performing modestly for our goals.

As a result we are currently a testing a few changes that will affect all difficulty levels, although the adjustment to Elite will be much smaller. None of these changes affect core mechanics of the raid, and instead will target pacing. The fixes should be live within a few weeks, but we’ll have an exact date soon.

A few notes:

This is one of the most difficult raids we’ve seen in while. There have been no Elite completions, and very few Hard completions, across all servers. A fair number of Normal. The guides we see posted have become more accurate (yet not perfect), indicating knowledge of the raid mechanics is mostly out there. There are a few wrinkles though that if you guys don’t understand yet, it will cost you. Giving no spoilers though.

This raid was designed to push our raiding community harder, and to shake up things. To see what life would be like if Elite first completion was something that might not happen day one of release. We’ve actually gotten a lot of positive feedback on this count. Even if the raid seems crazy, there is always the question for some, can you find a way?

We opted for putting the gauntlet in Elite rather than Reaper because the Reaper tree power doesn’t match up well with the first skull, and skull ten is just….bonkers.

Our minor nerf to Elite was after some consideration of not touching it at all, but the thinking is since it hasn’t been beaten yet moving the goal post slightly closer will just mean more people will be in the race.


-T

P.S. - So we almost called this raid “Go die in a fire”, but we thought that might have been to on the nose…

I'm really disappointed about this. After all of the complaining that the game isn't hard enough - especially for endgame elite raiders - you finally gave us a challenge. Now the complaints are that it's too hard? Stick to your guns. It's okay for endgame raids to be unbeatable until we figure out all of the mechanics. If normal difficulty is PUG-able, that's good enough.

[Domince]

Will we maybe get a reduction of evil damage? Since it is unavoidable currently to my knowledge. Also, Will you guys be reducing spawns or increasing the amount of time it takes for wraiths to upgrade?

[Ladywolf]

Is the lag in the raid being examined? We’ve had runs where we’ve lagged out even before the shrine. It gets frustrating when the lag happens run after run after run where you can’t move for a long while

[Noircere]

Will we maybe get a reduction of evil damage? Since it is unavoidable currently to my knowledge.

Per my understanding, all of the evil damage is subject to either PRR or MRR [edit note: this is not expressing uncertainty about which one matters for evil damage. Rather, different attacks use PRR or MRR depending on which attack it is.]. I think the Evil Absorption tower shield might apply to all of it, or perhaps only the magical portion. Most of the magical evil damage offers a will save for half damage. Most of the physical evil damage is stopped by concealment, dodge, and/or deflect arrows.

[Webfoot337]

In the 25 or so completions we have finished on Normal, 90% were completed with massive lag spikes at the end. In numerous cases we reset the raid on the first fights because it is unplayable. We have now lost interest in pursuing it on harder difficulties because of the constant lag wipes. When you fix that we will be back.

[-D_Rock-]

So … that raid… Too Hot to Handle.... kinda living up to its name.

After watching you fight the good fight for a couple of weeks, and going over the data, we’ve concluded that the raid is over-performing modestly for our goals.

As a result we are currently a testing a few changes that will affect all difficulty levels, although the adjustment to Elite will be much smaller. None of these changes affect core mechanics of the raid, and instead will target pacing. The fixes should be live within a few weeks, but we’ll have an exact date soon.

A few notes:

This is one of the most difficult raids we’ve seen in while. There have been no Elite completions, and very few Hard completions, across all servers. A fair number of Normal. The guides we see posted have become more accurate (yet not perfect), indicating knowledge of the raid mechanics is mostly out there. There are a few wrinkles though that if you guys don’t understand yet, it will cost you. Giving no spoilers though.

This raid was designed to push our raiding community harder, and to shake up things. To see what life would be like if Elite first completion was something that might not happen day one of release. We’ve actually gotten a lot of positive feedback on this count. Even if the raid seems crazy, there is always the question for some, can you find a way?

We opted for putting the gauntlet in Elite rather than Reaper because the Reaper tree power doesn’t match up well with the first skull, and skull ten is just….bonkers.

Our minor nerf to Elite was after some consideration of not touching it at all, but the thinking is since it hasn’t been beaten yet moving the goal post slightly closer will just mean more people will be in the race.


-T

P.S. - So we almost called this raid “Go die in a fire”, but we thought that might have been to on the nose…

for a 'Normal' this raid is a bit ridiculous to say the least. it felt like an r4 quest at minimum and I do r10's daily. For a normal raid this is not acceptable to anyone for a NORMAL difficulty. I can totally understand hard and elite and reaper as well but NORMAL, just no.

You almost called it "Go die in a fire". more like you almost called it "DDO dies in a Fire". Not the best way to get your players to play your poor humor Raid content on normal. Do you even play test your own content? I almost forgot, we ARE your playtesters as you barely play your own game obviously. At least you woke up to feedback. Going in some sort of direction here I guess perhaps.

[HungarianRhapsody]

for a 'Normal' this raid is a bit ridiculous to say the least. it felt like an r4 quest at minimum and I do r10's daily. For a normal raid this is not acceptable to anyone for a NORMAL difficulty. I can totally understand hard and elite and reaper as well but NORMAL, just no.

You almost called it "Go die in a fire". more like you almost called it "DDO dies in a Fire". Not the best way to get your players to play your poor humor Raid content on normal. Do you even play test your own content? I almost forgot, we ARE your playtesters as you barely play your own game obviously. At least you woke up to feedback. Going in some sort of direction here I guess perhaps.

DDO is not going to die because of one bad Reed. We already have a dozen reads that we don't run. One more raid that we don't run is not going to make a difference.

[Grace_ana]

I'm really disappointed about this. After all of the complaining that the game isn't hard enough - especially for endgame elite raiders - you finally gave us a challenge. Now the complaints are that it's too hard? Stick to your guns. It's okay for endgame raids to be unbeatable until we figure out all of the mechanics. If normal difficulty is PUG-able, that's good enough.

Bearing in mind that I have not yet run this raid...

My understanding was that people were asking for normal to be toned down, so as to be accessible even for people that might not have access to raid guilds and need to do pug raids. If that is indeed the case, then it would make sense to tone down normal, either adjust or leave hard the way it is, and leave elite alone.

But again, I haven't had time to devote to running it and figuring it out lately, so take that with a grain of salt.

[Shadow_Jumper]

Bearing in mind that I have not yet run this raid...

My understanding was that people were asking for normal to be toned down, so as to be accessible even for people that might not have access to raid guilds and need to do pug raids. If that is indeed the case, then it would make sense to tone down normal, either adjust or leave hard the way it is, and leave elite alone.

But again, I haven't had time to devote to running it and figuring it out lately, so take that with a grain of salt.

The big issue is that if you don't DPS the boss and trash fast enough, you get swamped by trash mobs. If you don't solve the puzzles fast enough, you can't advance the raid all the while spawning more mobs. And if you don't bring the proper Absorb, things hurt.

Basically; its challenging because it requires you to deal with trash quickly, solve puzzles, and have semi-decent dps. Which is the bane of pug groups.

[janave]

The typical RAID PUG:

- most players dont know what to do
- some players dont/cant follow basic directions, like A pls heal B..
- most players are under geared
- most players have just finished a TR quicky suboptimal PL build
- most players are not going to do extra preparation (maxing absorption, mrr, hamp)
- most players simply arent going to try a 2nd time after a wipe
- they are not going to discuss deep strategy, bad exp per minute yo!
...
and more


and yet these peeps still paid the same money for content, unless there ever going to be a casual mode to raids where you can pick random 11 and get thru it, content needs to be adjusted for the realistic assumptions about the PUG, sure sure occasionally you get those 3-4 vets in a group that carries the other 8, i was for a long time one of those 3-4 players, but this time i will pass. In fact if this goes to be a trend, I just pass on DDO, raids are important content for me, this is just silly, like stand behind the archers in MoD silly just worse.

[TitusOvid]

Mechanics are fine. Just tone down normal so that a wider player population has a chance to complete the raid.
Thank you.

[Mindos]

Nope! My head has been in the oven to long. You are correct. Reapers spawn in most raids.

-T

Is the special attack fire vomit death breath evadable? I heard it had dragon buffet attached to it mistakenly, when that is fixed will the raid be easier already?

[S3R3N1T7]

I share the fact that it's a good mechanic and a funny ride.
Unfortunately there is a problem with part 3 even if it is a t4 if we have the Runner in lfm (normal with average player (not completions etc)) I find it really bad I can understand hard or Elite but normal it's a bit limited (that's my point of view).

[Loromir]

I'm really disappointed about this. After all of the complaining that the game isn't hard enough - especially for endgame elite raiders - you finally gave us a challenge. Now the complaints are that it's too hard? Stick to your guns. It's okay for endgame raids to be unbeatable until we figure out all of the mechanics. If normal difficulty is PUG-able, that's good enough.

I agree with this statement. Absolutely tone down norm to give all us casuals a fighting chance to complete it...but keep hard and elite right where they are. The first group to complete Elite...then reaper can actually puff up their chests at a worthy accomplishment.

[Cordovan]

Yes, the intention with these changes is to open the raid to more people on Normal, and probably also open up higher difficulties to a still challenging but doable state. That DDO's raiding community still hasn't completed the raid on Elite says something, after all.

[Shadow_Jumper]

Yes, the intention with these changes is to open the raid to more people on Normal, and probably also open up higher difficulties to a still challenging but doable state. That DDO's raiding community still hasn't completed the raid on Elite says something, after all.

I wouldn't worry too much. Let powercreep take its path.

[Shadow_Jumper]

and yet these peeps still paid the same money for content, unless there ever going to be a casual mode to raids where you can pick random 11 and get thru it, content needs to be adjusted for the realistic assumptions about the PUG, sure sure occasionally you get those 3-4 vets in a group that carries the other 8, i was for a long time one of those 3-4 players, but this time i will pass. In fact if this goes to be a trend, I just pass on DDO, raids are important content for me, this is just silly, like stand behind the archers in MoD silly just worse.

Honestly, a casual mode isn't a terrible idea.

Give raids a LC difficulty, where the players have 100% immunity to all damage and cannot die. Downside is they earn something like 10 runes per completion however.

[janave]

Kinda ironic that We almost always die to the evil portion of the damage (low MRR cap) while the raids' theme is being on fire.

300 fire dmg vs 600-700 evil hmmz, If I was building around this raid (I wont), the fire portion would be the easiest part to manage.

Honestly, a casual mode isn't a terrible idea.

Give raids a LC difficulty, where the players have 100% immunity to all damage and cannot die. Downside is they earn something like 10 runes per completion however.

That would be more like a story tour. I would never suggest full immunity or god mode. The reward could be completely eliminated to be honest, this would serve the purpose to experience the content, rather than getting loot or adrenalin surge.