Serpents Ire - Needs Tweaks + Suggestions on how to tweak it

[Turtleman.5416]

Dear Arenanet,

 

As many people have pointed out, Serpent's Ire's meta event, mainly the 2nd phase is unbelievably hard for a public meta. This is due to the very short bomb timer and the lack of real explaining on how to do the CC challenge. Stage 2 is the issue here, stage 1 and 3 are great events.

 

It's a great concept to test CC like that, really unique so you get points for creativity however in practice, I have never seen the meta event get past stage 2 and I believe if you looked at your statistics for this meta event, you would notice it has a next to zero completion rate vs other pof meta events.

 

The issues:

 

* When the 2nd phase starts, players are given a very small amount of time to get to the court. This is way to short of time to have any conversation about how or what is going to happen next. It's currently 2mins however the branded area is MASSIVE. After killing the Zelots it's quite normal to be at the very other side of the map.

* The 2nd phases "bomb bar" is very short, most groups do not kill event one priest before it blows up.

* It's not explained well. There is no clue from the meta event that you should spit into groups or you should bring heavy CC. This leads to people zerging one priest at a time which normally fails the event.

* People now don't want to try it anymore, I've been told it's impossible by many players. They think it's currently impossible! While it is actually possible, with the little information your given about the meta on how to beat it, it seems like it is actually impossible.

 

Suggestions:

 

Make an NPC to guide players during the meta. The NPC can split people into groups for the CC challenge, explain that you need lots of CC to break the priests and generally provide the information that's currently lacking about the meta.

 

You can do this subtlety, for example having an npc give out weapons that have CC moves and having the NPC ride in on a Springer

 

Mark on the map the different priests, have a circle on the ground that has a count from say 0-20 so people know when there are too many people on one priest to break them together.

 

Get more people into the map. If you want this to be super hard, that's fine but currently people don't want to play the meta as they prefer to run champ trains for rewards. Either up the rewards for the meta or come up with a way for more people to join in.

 

Anyone have anything else to add? Lots of other posts here about this problematic meta however we need solutions. It should be a fun and enjoyable meta like the other maps released in POF.

[Ayumi Spender.1082]

I agree at least the bomb bar should be toned down a bit. Just a bit.

[Silmar Alech.4305]

I read that using Springer skill #1 is great CC for the break bar. Perhaps the event was designed to use this skill, but to mount the Springer you have to get out of fight, and trying to get out of fight in the middle of a tightly timed fight, with other enemies around and this in the branded area where you are hit by lightning every few seconds that pulls you back into fight, is absolutely counterintuitive.

 

Having an NPC or item nearby that gives out a special CC weapon would be great.

[Joraan Adenard.2061]

I must disagree on that. This meta can be challenging buy with the proper strategy, it can be cleared without trouble and with substantial time left on the bomb timer (around 30%, I've even done some maps that had 50% left).

 

The problem is that commanders keep splitting the whole squad in 5 equal subgroups, which results in a very tight success if and only if everyone is on point with their CC skills. Splitting the squad in 4 small groups and one substantialy bigger one (15-20 people on the same zealot) makes it much smoother.

 

The reason is simple: each downed zealot makes the remaining ones faster to kill and slowd the bomb timer. Having a larger group one one zealot kills it fast enough so that same group can rotate or split on the other zealots, killing them all hassle-free.

 

Making it easier is okay but definitely not necessary, considering the very few events in open-world that actually need some coordination and strategy instead of dumb zerging.

[Lexi.1398]

If people went into the HoT metas without looking it up or getting an explanation, they'd fail them too. Infact, all of the HoT metas need a large coordinated group to complete while following specific tactics, including t4 verdant brink. I don't see why this is so different- if people listen to their comms when they ask to spam cc then it'd be completed more often. The only difference, really, is that the room for error on serpents ire is a LOT tighter. If everybody isn't spamming cc as hard as they can it WILL fail, whereas for most HoT events you can chill on the cc and other tactics a little more - it'll be harder if people do, but not impossible.

 

Only thing I agree with is bomb bar should last longer, and something should be around to cause more cc for those classes which get next to no cc abilties. I don't think it should be a weapon, but something the preists toss out during the fight and you pick em up and throw - like the bloodstone shards in LW3.

[Turtleman.5416]

> @"Lexi.1398" said:

> If people went into the HoT metas without looking it up or getting an explanation, they'd fail them too. Infact, all of the HoT metas need a large coordinated group to complete while following specific tactics, including t4 verdant brink. I don't see why this is so different- if people listen to their comms when they ask to spam cc then it'd be completed more often. The only difference, really, is that the room for error on serpents ire is a LOT tighter. If everybody isn't spamming cc as hard as they can it WILL fail, whereas for most HoT events you can chill on the cc and other tactics a little more - it'll be harder if people do, but not impossible.

>

> Only thing I agree with is bomb bar should last longer, and something should be around to cause more cc for those classes which get next to no cc abilties. I don't think it should be a weapon, but something the preists toss out during the fight and you pick em up and throw - like the bloodstone shards in LW3.

 

Oh the bloodstone is a great ideal, you could make them look like branded shards too! Then everyone would feel like they are helping no matter what build they are playing.

 

I've never seen a comm try this event. I'm normally the one to encourge people to come but without enough time to explain the cc thing its a fail.

 

Most of the issues with the event is to due with lack of good information from the game. Its bad game design for people to have to go and consult a wiki for information.

[Glacial.9516]

I'd like to see the breakbars for each of the Zealots in Phase2 displayed on the quest info like Octovine HP bars. This would help immensely in coordinating CC, which should make that phase **significantly** easier even if CC coordination is kind of wonky because of the way soft CC works. I worry that it could lead to toxicity the way Octovine occasionally does when one group is slow or kills early, but I think it would help more than it would hurt.

[cyndelaq.7148]

I think two things need to happen.

 

1 - The amount of CC needed/the impact that CC has needs to be tuned down a bit.

 

2 - The zealots have a buff that makes them take 33% less damage when shielded. Make it so they take 33% more damage when unshielded (bar is broken).

[Pridedemon.3041]

I totally agree with you but as it has been pointed out time and game, this only has to do with rewards. I have been playing PoF for a month now and almost forgotten that open world rewards can be great.

 

I just put a lfg for a verdant brink night event and in less then 10 minutes got a full 50 squad and before bosses the map was full. After finishing a t4 night my bags were almost full with loot (200 bag space). 10s of rare's, 3 exotics (i have lots of MF), botload of currency, an amalgamated gemstone and i did all that with simple relaxing play (game muted, songs running background).

 

Compare this against serpents ire (effort needed vs rewards) and you need to have a crowbar stuck inside your skull to even consider doing that if you have already completed your funerary collection. No one is ever gonna run it again after finishing their collection and this is the problem.

 

I am also stuck on that event to finish my collection but as i said its practically impossible. Some day i might get lucky and find an highly organized guild or map doing it but until then its simply not possible. ANET seriously need to tweak the rewards. Make the rewards equivalent to something like triple trouble wurms event and ppl will flock to it no matter the difficulty.

[mercury ranique.2170]

I disagree with adjusting the event. But I do think reward and difficulti are not on par. I rather see the rewards improved so it is on par with tequatl. I have been doing it in an organized way and then it is a fun event. When the reward is on par, it will attract enough people to do it organized and the people needing it for achievements and collections can do it more easily as well.

[Nilkemia.8507]

Tweaks? That whole meta might as well be removed and the Funerary Gloves collection placed behind something more reasonably achieved.

[Khisanth.2948]

> It's a great concept to test CC like that, really unique so you get points for creativity

 

I had the complete opposite reaction to that. "Oh great, another breakbar gimmick. "