Initial thoughts on the new patch:
Void gauntlet is awesome! Love the weapon, but kind of wish the melee ability was a toggle rather than a duration. Either way, great work! Hope to see more weapons in the future.
I would like to point out something that may have been overlooked (or maybe not, who knows) but whenever a new weapon comes out, players will have to re-farm watermark to catch up the new weapon to the rest of their items. I’m personally not affected by that because I haven’t done any hardcore watermark farming, but if that is going to be a “thing” every time a new weapon comes out, it might be best to look into a solution now. I think a lot of players would agree the watermark system could use some improvements in general.
The new areas are awesome too. I love revisiting the older areas and seeing the new stuff. The new enemies were a nice addition and I explored some of the areas and enjoyed the new lore. Love this part of the game and I hope it continues to expand! It would be awesome to have new areas like that in level 60+ zones to explore.
The changes to elites are questionable, if I’m being honest. Especially in lower level (pre-60) zones or elites linked to quests (ie Skysong Crypt), it makes them impossible to solo and extremely difficult to take on even with a full party of 5. I love a challenge, but these enemies have become a lot more tedious than challenging. Giant health bars aren’t enjoyable. In my opinion, I find it more fun to be overwhelmed by a million enemies that die in one or two hits than to be overwhelmed by only a single, giant hp bar enemy.
Some solutions for the elite issue (and these are just ideas): If you don’t want people to zerg through content, make the elite areas instance based! Treat them like dungeons that you don’t need keys for. You only go in with your immediate party and resources nodes are instance based as well. I see why this might not be a desirable solution, but in my opinion it’s WAY better than 10x elite hp mobs that take 10 minutes to kill with a full party. Instance based > Enemies don’t respawn until you reset the instance > chests reset daily. Even better, let these dungeons grant unique pieces of gear that people can farm, like exotics from Destiny. Even add secret, unmarked dungeons that take a sequence to open! This is an easy formula to build off of.
Another, indirect solution for people zerging elite zones would be to give them more desirable options to farm watermark. Make keys to expeditions easier to obtain or even remove keys entirely so people can spam expeditions. If you want people to do it at a slower pace, give them dailies specifically to help increase their watermarks over time. There are tons of solutions to this issue rather than “make hp bar bigger” and slapping flextape on it. The current solutions hurts solo players and casual players more than anyone, and it discourages players like me from continuing the hunt for better gear. Instead of hurting the community, use this opportunity to expand your game and help it grow. There’s so much that can be done that would make this fantastic game even better, but increasing hp bars isn’t one of them…
As a crafter, the new crafting rules make me sad. I’ve put 325+ hours into the game and don’t have a single crafting skill 200. Now the grind is worse, and the need for refinement material is greater. I will power through, but this patch hurts the people that took too long to up their skills, and punishes new players that wanted to give the game time before diving into crafting. I hope this will be remedied in some way. Maybe by crafting quests? This is another opportunity to expand on the game to make it more interesting. Once I’m over the shock of this update, I will probably continue to craft, if I don’t lose heart on the game completely in the meantime.
…That being said, the potion update is fantastic. THANK YOU!!
I absolutely love this game and it breaks my heart to see it in this state. If elite areas aren’t meant to be soloable, I understand the need for change. But this is just too much. I hope you will be more open to us about future updates. If this kind of thing was on the PTR, I’m sure the feedback would have told you it was a bad idea. Currently, I’m taking a break from the game. I was super excited for the update, but now that it’s here, the “bad” changes (crafting exp and elite mobs, mostly) make it feel like I’ve hit a dead end in my progression. I plan on returning soon, especially if there is positive change!
I’m sorry so much of the community is so toxic. I love your game and just want to see it thrive. Thank you for the 325+ hours of entertainment it brought me, and if this stuff is fixed and the game improves, I hope for thousands more.
(Also, if you add mounts, make sure to add a ridable ostrich!)
