Domain Of Anguish

thats some bad spirit placement then

DoA is not my idea of fun either, what I class as fun would be FoW and maybe to a limited extent UW, but I hardly go to either place anymore I've no need for Obsidian Armor and no need for the materials for extra gold either, but this isn't my point, my point is that ArenaNet have known (and if not why not?) that not many people actually do all the quests in either of those areas, because most people just don't have the time for that sort of thing.

I entertained going to DoA for all of 2mins, noted the graphical nature of place was poor, the underhanded cop out tactics that is just endless drivel of environmental effects and left, I have absolutely no desire to play these areas, just as I didn't have any to play the likes of Urgos or The Deep, I would rather PvP which is less of a challenge than these areas, in fact I would rather take on 8v1 with the top 10 guilds than play these areas, sure I'd get rolled and pancaked but at least that would be fun.

I wonder if this area is supposed to force people out of PvE and make them go find other things to do for an end game, like PvP for example or just go back to FoW.

It's not an elite mission, it's a pandering to the elitism that will always exist in the minority in this game, and will continue under ANet quit spoon feeding them with entertainment that only the very few can take part in, and when I shelled out my money I expected to be able play all that my money paid for, rest assured that in future I will not be so foolish.

Except you forgot one thing... melee is easy to avoid. Spells are not. You can easily get ready to protect a monk or ele when an aatxe gets by and is going to hit for hundreds of points of damage. You can't always know who a caster is going after. It's not easy to prepare for a 300+ damage spell without preparing the WHOLE team for it, hence the MoF build. And the melee in DoA still hit for 150-200 damage, so it really isn't "a lot less" than the aatxe.

So DoA = UW Difficulty? Not even close.

Edited to add:

And don't forget about the rangers. 150+ damage from an aggro bubble and a half away? No thanks. Not my idea of fun. The terrain of the place is designed to give you the disadvantage. Even UW and FoW are not like that.

/clap

That my friends,is a perfect analysis of what is wrong with DoA.

There is no point in making it this over powered. You need 100 gems to get a gold as it is.. so it would still take a long time even if it was as difficult as UW or FoW (which you can say is not difficult) BUT for people who like a challenge.. you can create you own with less people.. certain build.. playing while drunk..

And frankly even if it was slightly easier I don't think people would be complaining that it was too easy... you'd still be busy collecting gems, getting hero armor, greens, ect... I think without it being as hard as it is there is still enough content to keep one busy before the next expansion or holiday event ect.

The ones who say it's a fun challenge because you have to find the right build.. that wont last long. So then those people will be bored again.. and the people who don't like the over powered mobs are going to give up.

It just makes more sense to me to do a little adjusting to the area. ~

It should also be obvious to people that if too many find this place too hard, the place will end up like "The Deep" or "Urgo" void of people, and since there are no henchmen down there, no one will play it.

Give it time, right now it's new when it gets old people will realize the obviousness of the truth, the same thing the whole of guild wars falls foul of, max effort for 0 reward, and the ones that do gain rewards will stay the rest will leave miffed, and disheartened.

The only conclusion I can come to is that ArenaNet are trying to kill there game off, to prepare for the next incarnation of rubbish.

So what some people have finished part 1 of a 4 part quest. How long did it take? Was it really worth it. At this rate it will take about a week before someone has finished the quest. Wow 30k xp and a load of crap drops for a weeks playing. Sorry not my idea of fun. But if thats what you like that good for you.

Very well said FrogDevourer A very good posts on whats wrong with the DOA.

Btw when I said that the doa might be worth if there was NEW never before seen weapons. I did'nt mean new skins for old weapons or even new versions of the old weapons. But new weapons TYPES.

It just shows that if someone was bored after geting just 6 gems why would any one bother to get 100.

It's not really an expansion, it was by all appearances supposed to be there since release, so I wouldn't go down the path of oh ANet are so good to us giving us something free, because there was no end game content what so ever until this unholy pile of garbage was dumped on us, if that add something from this point however I'd consider that something free.

What concerns me is that, someone picking up just nightfall and having never played Guild Wars at all, wouldn't just find this a challenge at all, to be honest I don't know what they'd be thinking, but I'd say it wasn't a positive one.

BTW: Districts from release was 14, this has dropped to 4.

Heh I'll have to give it a go with my new sin build (damn my guildies for one of them not having a sin there too :S) Seems to me though that there are successful builds out there. Just figure out what works and run it.

Speaking of "run", anyone know how long it takes a quick sort to sort a list of 5000 numbers? I've been waiting for nearly 15 minutes... and I still have a 10000, 50000, and 100000 trial to run. May end up just finding a curve that fits what I have so far and guess from there :S

They could start by giving the monsters 8 skills.

There are also plenty of buffs they could give the monsters that are a lot more strategy inducing and a lot less frustrating. For example, give each monster type an immunity to a certain damage type. Maybe the monks can't be damaged by slashing, the eles not by fire, the necros not by piercing, the mesmers not by holy, etc. Or have monster skills that give them more armor the closer they are to allies, so you want to spread them out (when was the last time you wanted to do anything but get them closer together for easy nukes?) Or give them a skill that lets them copy your skills, so you have to be prepared to counter yourself. Or they could introduce variance. I could go on. Obviously some of them might be tested and determined to still be too easy, frustrating, annoying, etc. I'm just working off the top of my head, after all. But I'm sure there's at least some reasonably implementable ideas that are very challenging in a lot more fun way than "all monsters do so much more damage you have to exploit the AI to keep them from killing you".

The worst case scenerio for quicksort is n^2 comparisons, so 25,000,000 comparisons. The worse case scenerio for mergesort is n log n. So your quicksort should take around 1351 times longer (worst case scenerio for base quicksort and mergesort). Now, if your mergesort took 1 minute or something, then yeah...you're screwed.

Giving monsters more skills to work with and still be effective would also entail giving them better AI to use it. Heroes have okay AI, but often times you have to manually disable their skills because they use them when they're not supposed to. I think immunity is a good idea, and I wouldn't mind them adding it to parts of DoA. More armor while grouping together doesn't really change much, as you'd still want to nuke them when theyr'e grouped together for energy cost reasons, and if they can't hurt you, you can just stand there and nuke them to death anyways. Now, if you made them invincible if they're not moving, that could be interesting. Giving monsters your skills doesn't make any difference, since they won't know how to use it correctly without major AI buffs. A lot of these suggestions definately add more twists to the gameplay, but I think they'll either end up being not hard enough to overcome, can't be implemented without major AI overhauls, or end up similar to what's happening in DoA right now.

oh God....I think my merge sort for sorting 5000 items 1000 times (don't ask part of the assignment I know its lame) took around 20,000 ms which I guess is about 20 seconds so only a 450 minute wait for this to get done.... which I guess is 7.5 hours....*sleep* Well thanks for answering my question. I'll just end it now and find a curve for my data.

EDIT: So right when I was going to stop it, it finally ended. I must of not of recalled exactly how long the merge sort took at that rate, cause this one only took 6,500,662 ms or about 1.8 hours.... well thanks again

While I really don't want to see it happen, I can see all of these things happening. With the thousands of players ArenaNet claims this one has, we really should be seeing some more signs of progress here. While I do think people will eventually succeed here, I have a premonition that very few are going to find these places worth the trouble. I think we have a ghost town in the making.

Actually, on average quicksort should have the same performance as mergesort. They're both n log n sort algorithms. Are you using a random list of numbers?

How is this a problem?

We have six month till the next chapter, there's no rush.
And once it HAS been beaten by someone, the strategies will come around so others can follow, and everything will be fine.

Are you telling me, that I'm writing walkthroughs and strategy guides for absolutely nothing? Have you even bothered to READ my reply to you earlier, and checked out the Elonian Explorer's League section?

Or are you gonna continue to sit there whining, crying, and complaining like a very vocal peddler in middle of a toy store?

Oh, btw, it's 2 of the 4 part that's finished.
You would have learned that, if you actually bothered to read what I replied to you in earlier page.

If you don't have the time, dedication, and fun trying to figure it out yourself, and be the first ones to finish the quest, that's PERFECTLY FINE. Just wait till we, the ones with lots of time on our hands, figure it out, so guys like YOU can use the strategy to do the quest easier. So I would appreciate it if you don't spit at our face, like you are right now.

Well, the amount of districts in GoA is not 3, much lower than the 16 at the initial release. Even when you factor the times...it's evident that the majority of the playerbase is quite frustrated.

I'm surprised no one has alerted the Waaambulance to this thread's existence yet. <(*-_-)>

I'm dialing...

I think I've seen a screenshot of someone with 3 parts of the quest finished, all except Foundry I think.

Or it could be that a long of people that play this game are teenagers that have to go to school. During school hours, it was at 2 districts. After school hours it briefly went up to 5 districts and then settled at 4 for several hours. Now that it's getting on to be later in the evening, I'm sure a lot of teenagers are getting offline to do things like eat supper, do homework, have family time, and go to bed.

When it was released it was a friday evening and a lot of people were excited and had nothing better to do.

Wow, nice. They must have figured out something about Ravenheart Gloom that we don't know about.
I'm sure fighting 50 incoming torments simunlateously isn't the only way to get past the first part of that quest. Been trying diffrent things to see if there's any event triggers with that glowing item, whispers nearby fighting torments, etc. Haven't had any luck yet, but are trying.

EDIT: ZOMG right after I posted this, I see a new thread on Gloom in EEL.
See, this is what I'm talking about... we butt our heads together, we WILL come up with solution.
Do not whine because you can't find the solution... just wait till others do.

I find it funny that people say the average players can't complete this... the average players aren't done with the game yet. Sorry but if you think the majority people who frequent this forum are average players, you have it all wrong. The average players are those that bought the game and play once in a while to have fun even if they are (most likely) no good at the game, not those that rushed through the game in a week to get rare skins.

The average players might of heard about it and will discover this place in a while when they complete the game and will never get past the first mob (probably) because they will take a random PuG when they gets there of other average players.

My point is, it's going to be the same as the Deep & Urgoz's... a lot of people will never even learn they exist (since they don't frequent forums & GW websites) and if they do get there, they won't get picked up by a PuG because their class isn't in the cookie-cutter build (soon to be finalized I assume) or get picked up by a group, get decimated, and never come back. That's basicly GW-endgame right there, accessible to a minority, cleared by a minority of the minority. Seriously, I consider myself to play more than the average player (will maybe not for NF since I barely played it yet) and I never was able to clear The Deep, Urgoz, UW, FoW, ToPK, SF(althought I never tried this one), etc

ANet would be much smarter to try and add areas that are advertised (IE in-game NPCs would tell you lots of hints to where they are) that aren't too difficult but with great scenary & some fun mini-games or something that the average players could enjoy for a long time instead of trying to please the 5-10% of people that desperatly want elite areas that is "challenging" for a few weeks before builds are finalized and that only those with access to those builds or with a lot of time on their hands will ever enjoy, only to whine after they get it because its a)too challenging, b)the rewards aren't what they had in mind (believe it or not some people assume they are going to get some special items that make them better than other players for completing elite missions, like in WoW for example)

I had kind of hope ANet would of added creative content (SF was pretty good, at least I was able to do the start with henchies) instead of just making these type of elite missions that really, aren't enjoyable (for the large majority of people)

If that is the case then ArenaNet don't have the players they think they do, a large chunk of players I would guess, would people that just pick up a chapter play it too the end, then drop it again while initially giving the appearance of more people playing that is actually the case, people still buying multi-pal copies for them selfs early on and perhaps still today, put those numbers they think they have in serious question, also as more chapters get added as we've seen the population gets speared too thin, giving the illusion of less people playing to the player, which is never a good thing.

At any rate we've moving closer and closer to the lift time limit of any computer game, while people still play a game that is old, they don't play it as much putting the game further in decline of people, the saying "Never Fight Alone?" won't be an option after too long.

Too this I can only say the following, if it was the minority saying that DoA is too hard or very few, then I'd agree with your trollish statement, but in this case it is not, majority rules and the majority it would appear have dictated this is too long/hard or boring for a casual game.

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Last edited by Avarre : Today at 04:26 PM. Reason: personal attacks dont make you right

Oh and what would you call his comment then? I consider that a personal attack, so you get what you deserve,

You know, let's wait until we get the rest of our christmas presents from A-net first (from what Gaile said, there's probably more stuff). Maybe they will add more content based around what casual players want. If they do that, everyone should be pleased right? Just keep DoA as it is right now, except maybe make the ritualist hero part of the easier end-game stuff, and give us a super cool albeit functionally redundant hero (like maybe a giant dragon, and you have to pick its class when you choose him! That'd be awesome and well worth it, and it'd still give easy access of a ritualist to everyone else).

Its a problem as even though I DO have the time and the dedication IT JUST NOT FUN. Maybe its for YOU but its not for me and I belive many others. I don't see the point in spending a week on a quest. Its not like I'm going to get anything good from it. If you do then good for you. Even if there was a complete walk though and guide. I doubt I would bother. An area where the smallest mistake will ruin many hours of play is NO fun for me.

Yes I was. The problem though I believe lies in the fact that quicksort create 3 new sublists every recursive call and merge sort only does two. And considering the size of my list (5000 entries in that case) and the fact for the assignment I had to run it 1000 times (ridiculous for 1000+ sized lists but not bad for anything under) I think thats where the huge time was coming from. Its also possible I messed up while coding it so it probably is running longer than n log n. My merge sort was fast though all things considered.

Anyways I did well enough on previous assignments that my quicksort problem shouldn't lower my grade too much. Thanks for the input though.

What is your profession?

I am sure the poster you responded to didn't include burger flippers as a professional.

(PS: I am surprised with that kind of spelling you can even read burger order slips!)

Quicksort is not bound by n log n (thus the n^2). However, there are variations you can make to the algorithm so that your pivot values will never yield worst case results. I remember solving that one for a homework assignment years ago

This is just a thought: Isn't DOA just a balance for the game? By keeping that nth percent of the hardcore players happy, it detracts from them farming/soloing other regions making things like drop levels, etc. level out. I'm not saying they are trying to nerf farming, just giving people who do farm high end areas a worthy challenge.

If high end characters are kept entertained with areas like DOA, Urgoz, etc., then they won't be mass farming greens, etc. from areas which are part of story lines. Thus giving a casual player more of a chance to pick one up while playing through.

Anet balances skills, the economy, etc. By balancing the playerbase, it makes it easier to the other two balanced(as well as making it easier to keep everyone happy). So even if DOA is designed for the hard core farmer types(which I don't think it really is, as people are slowly sticking together builds), isn't it a good thing that such challenging content is here? If you find the area boring, a grind, etc. it simply means that other areas(uw, fow, etc.) are going to be more profitable for you(as less people farm there because of DOA).

But that's just my two cents

The AI we have now for monsters can't even handle proper aggro and the 4 skills they have, let alone 8. I seriously doubt this will be happening anytime soon unless Anet has something awesome up their sleeve.

Uhmm I don't think so, less farmers farming the greens and putting them on the market for sale, means higher prices for items that was worthless, for example a 1k item because it's so over farmed, and abundant in the market will become more expensive, thus driving up the need for more gold to buy such items.

The problem is that the game is geared economically by a need to farm, either it be by players demand for mountain sized piles of gold, or items sold by merchants, 15k armor in Elona for example not just requires farming it demands it, and without it your just not going to get it, period.

But the game offers no incentive to keep playing because the drops for most are terrible.

You are absolutely right, DoA isn't for the casual or even the majority. That's why they called it "elite." If it was designed for the casual players and/or the majority of players, they wouldn't have called it an elite area, they would have called it an expansion or just additional content.

It's called elite for a reason, have you figured that out yet?

You can never please everybody, there will always be somebody feeling left out or who disagrees with whatever is done. That's pretty much a rule of life.

What you have to look at here is the gap in the game that DoA fills. Was NF desperately in need of another easy/moderate area? Were people complaining over a lack of areas that the average player who just completed NF could find a challenge in? I'm a new player so I don't know, but from what I've seen on these forums, a near-impossible absolute-endgame area is what was needed, not another place that could be defeated simply by looking up a build on the net or finding the tactics on guild-wiki.

So, does DoA provide the "most needed"? I personally think so. Feel free to have a different opinion, because mine is based on the information from the forums. I do believe that there are so many displeased players because there's relatively few who can compete in DoA. If the alternative had been an area that most people could beat, and which would become "meh" in three weeks, would it have solved anything? Now there's a goal, proven to be achievable but only by the best. I think that's what benefits NF the most. Remember that beating DoA isn't required to complete the game or anything.

Dear lord people, how can you complain so much? 110,528 views in one week!

*feints*

Is this a new record?

QFT, especially the bolded parts.

I have discovered today that indeed, you do not need a gimmick build to survive, as none of my groups today have been. I have, however, had a lot people err 7ing out of my group, and that's more frustrating than the level of difficulty.

<-------

I might need to get a new ava that has Bleach and supports DoA as well.

Against my better judgment I went to DoA and was quickly pulled into a group.. It just so happened they were great and fun and we cleared the city. I got three gems and three golds (ones from a chest) and a green spear dropped for someone else called the Darkblood? I forget... anyway it was fun.. still think it's a little too much work though especially to get the hero and the fact that you need 100 gems to get a gold is kinda crazy...

Maybe if the made the areas get progressively harder starting with one area that they tone down.. maybe both sides could meet somewhere in the middle @_@

EDIT:: I was also thinking.. aren't the four gems yellow, green, blue, red? I know the city gems are red but has anyone tried salvaging them? If it's possible maybe they could be (or should be?) ruby, sapphire, amber, and jadite. I know Gaile mentioned about the cost of Ruby and Sapphires maybe being higher priced than intended.. perhaps this could be a solution?

I heard gloom only took one group 1.5 hour to complete, maybe the city and stygian are just the longer ones.

Anyways, so far the only thing that needs 100 gems is the weapons, which I guess is like, the ultimate in PvE vanity (although 100 is a bit ridiculous). Assuming prices settle down in a month or so to around 25k a gem (margonite and stygian will probably be less than that, but titan and the gloom one would be much higher?) that'd mean each armbrace of truth would be close to 2.5 mil.

Well, I guess it's something for those people who have FoW and max gold crystalline swords to work towards.

Thank you mods for letting 1500 posts with 'omg/nerf!11!' in and deleting my post with an actual screen-shot showing its not impossible.

Well, here it is again:

Did you get any of the rewards with it yet? Do tell what they are! XD