Deflated

I just got EotN for xmas and up to now have been love'n it. The upgrades, the graphics/artwork, the whole thing....really awesome. What an enhancement to an already great game.

But now I'm at Heart of the Shiverpeaks quest and I need to kill Cyndr *sigh*. I know that there are some really long threads on this subject but I need to put in my two bits.
I've played this quest thru (up to Cyndr that is) 3 times and it all comes to a grinding halt at that point. So far Cyndr is nearly invincible against me. I am also trying really hard to do this with H/H. I've done my research on here and Wiki, I tried to equip my W/M with the right skills, heroes and henchies and I still come up with same result...Cyndr kicks my freak'n ass. The last time I tried to grind him with 60%dp for a half hour and his health didn't budge one pixel. And I thought Abaddon was hard...

Ok, now I can understand having bosses that are really really hard in any game. It's like someone posted on the Wiki discussion on Cyndr..."this is what separates the casual players from the hardcore ones". I don't mind that part. In fact it's good to have challenges like this. It's what makes us better players, right? It's the rest of the quest that gets me. I spend 15 to 20 min. just getting to Cyndr! And then it's also a primary quest that has to be accomplished to continue the game! (unless I'm missing something).

I need to feel like there's light at the end of the tunnel when a game get's really hard. I know my eyes are bad but I'm have'n a hard time see'n the light here. I'm not asking for help. The help is already out there...I've read it and it's good and plentiful. I'm just ranting. I guess my frustration is overflowing on to this forum so I apologize if this offends anyone but I needed to express my thoughts.

I'll keep grinding this quest for a while and will party up or try to find friends or even join a guild if I have to. I'm not done yet. But I'm having to do things that are taking too much extra time (capping elites and such) and are too difficult to accomplish just to finish this quest. *sigh*

So for now my excitement with this game is a little deflated...that's all,
OFG

You don't need to grind the dungeon or Cyndr, you need to complete it and kill that boss.

I think the thing about Cyndar is that he is particularly difficult with only Heros and Henchmen, more so than any other boss. If you're the only person running powder kegs to get him to the point where you can attack him, that makes for a very difficult and long time, throughout which he is mercilessly nuking your party.

If you leave with a PUG from the Eye, and they are relatively easy to find there since it's a pretty nice little dungeon in it's own right, it makes things a lot easier considering you can get several powder kegs on him at once. Or at least less time than it takes to run back and forth with only one character.

This last time I went through EotN, I was able to H/H everything, including the rather difficult mission after HoS, but I still had to find a PUG for Cyndar just becuase of those kegs.

And if you have a build that works, I don't think you need to cap any specific skills or spend any more time on it than you would normally if you just go with a PUG.

Good luck to you.

killing the boss is actually quite hard, because you need to drop 3 explosives on him before he becomes vulnerable to your attacks. even then, you'll have a 20 second window of opportunity before the sucker just regenerates. without at least another player, he is quite difficult to kill.

there are shortcut methods though. one of the most effective is to bring touch rangers, since cyndr is always vulnerable to lifesteal and degeneration. another way would be to use necros and mesmers and just degen him to death.

vvvvvvvvvvvv

Broadhead Arrow, read the wind and distracting shot are your friend on ranger hero.

As stated bevore, there is an absolute no brain way to afk kill him:

Use Livia with some or all of those: Ravenous Gaze, Vampiric Gaze, Angorodon's Gaze, Barbed Signet.

Run to the opposite side of the entrie, wait till cyndir appears, run back to the entire, flag livia in attack range and shelter your other h/h behind the wall, but close enought to run out and heal livia if needed.

gg

I heard life stealing goes through him.

A friend of mine had the same problem you had. I helped him through it, we both 3 touchers, 1 necro life stealer/ss, 2 monk heroes, me as a dslash spammer, he was a mesmer.

We rolled through him at 45% dp or something....

Just flag heroes around, so that they don't ball up for aoe, and run kegs yourself.
Another person with heroes is not required, but advised, because henchies are rather weak and cannot be flagged separately from eachother...
Overall it is pretty easy even in HM, just make sure to flag heroes and run kegs like mad.

As stated before.. no matter what class you are, either you or hero should have life stealing skills (so be a necro primary or secondary with as many points into blood as you can) flag your heroes and henchies a little away from each other, bringing an interrupter can help too. He goes down easy like that, and you don't even need to worry about the kegs.

I went as a standard Discord Caller with Livia/Olias/MoW. It was basically call your target, hex and use YMLaD, and Vanguard Sniper to inflict conditions and force heros to use Discord. Cynder died about 20 seconds later before he could burrow and let his carapace regen.

Alot of people ( me included ) use touch rangers. Flag your heros close enough to offer support but not close to each other so they don't all get taken out with a couple blasts. Bring [protective spirit] and cast it on the rangers as they go in. I used Jin and Margrid. Jin died but Margrid finished him
fairly quickly. When I went with my Necro I also used [insidious parasite] and some degen skills along with [breath of the great dwarf].

also..read this:http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...php?t=10198024

Good Luck

Ant

I had trouble with this quest my 1st time through, but when I read his skill's descriptions and "quirks", it wasn't that difficult. If you're doing this H/H make sure you equip your heroes with life steal and/or a mesmer with good interrupts. Having a 2nd person with his heroes helps alot! especially with running the barrels. So if you want to give it another go, just give me a PM here 1st so we can arrange the time to meet ingame.

Sadly it's another case of being at a disadvantage because you like to play with Heroes and Henchies. Best thing to do is take 3 monks in your party to help with the damage you suffer and flag them all out at separate locations (use all 4 flags). You have to run the kegs yourself and drop 3 before you can damage him, hopefully when you have ran and dropped the 3 kegs your party will still be alive to damage the boss because you have spread them all out!

With all the changes they've been doing to 'level' the playing field, I'm ***STILL*** surprised they haven't addressed the OP-ness of this boss (in NM, no less). There's also that OP end-boss in sepulchre, that casts at you from 5+ aggro bubbles away.,.,.,

The 3 keg thing should be 1 keg, and it should last 30 seconds - problem (mostly) solved. The burning doesn't seem to sync up exactly with what you see on the ground either (same w/ Sacnoth - pls fix already) - extinguish was my friend, I believe. Just go in with necro life drain skills and you're golden...

Cyndr took me about three tries with H/H, just wanted to reassure you that it is possible ^^ I was on max DP at the end but I did it XD

Flagging your heroes and henchies to spread out is essential, and a speed boost for running the explosives is useful too. A lot of the times Cyndr would nuke me JUST as I was about to reach him, and I'd drop the explosive just a few inches short of the target DX It's a frustrating fight, absolutely, and probably a lot of luck involved. But rather satisfying when you finish it.

On my most recent run, I hero/henched Cyndr and came out of it with no DP at all... (It probably helped that he popped close to Blackpowder, however.)

Tricks are as people have said. Lots of lifestealing (I personally like bringing Livia with Order of the Vampire), protection and a decent amount of healing on top of the lifestealing, and a few interrupts. Revealing the Dwarf Ghosts to help can also be beneficial in providing ablative armour (there are two or three of them near the entrance to the level). Run the three barrels, and if the lifesteal is doing it's job, he may well be half down by the time you have, then hit him with everything you've got.

One of the saving graces is that he actually doesn't have that many hit points under the carapace, so he goes down reasonably quickly to lifesteal, and goes down fast when the carapace is broken as long as you do have the firepower to exploit it.

Welp, thank you for your great advise but I think everyone missed my point. I don't mind the difficulty of Cyndr, it's that PLUS everything else.

Take Abaddon for example. That mission was really hard for me but I didn't mind it because the boss was all that there was to that mission. You pop in, run a short distance and get to business. I could have failed that mission 20 times and I would have kept trying because "spamming" it was so easy. Just pop in and get to business... With HotS you have to 'waste' 20 min. just to try again, wtf?!

All this advise is great because it gives me a reason to want to try and beat Cyndr. But the work and time it takes to get there..... It's the whole quest that I was complaining about, not just the boss. Cyndr I can deal with, that's just a matter of time. But the time........ugh *sigh*

Anyway, thank you all for your support. I'm going to party up from here on. Maybe after some success with live characters I can go back and try again with H/H.

Thanx again,
OFG

There's a lot of really smart gamers out there so if you see me please say hello. I could use some of this expertise on my friends list .
IGN - Magnus Gorr (W/M)
American District

I ran it with a guildie the other day, she brought 3 RoJ monks and I brought 3 touch rangers. I don't think out builds really mattered, I was running SY warrior and I don't even know what she had, we ran a couple kegs, Cyndr was dead in less than a minute, I think it was my touch rangers, she thinks it was her RoJ monks, either way it worked great.

I ran around with kegs and a speed boosting skill, then had my H/H attack him.

It's not hard.

Yeah if you go with a pug/live human team the Cyrin isn't difficult, since most of them already knows what will happen and the like.

if you don't like to use touch rangers as i didn't :P, then i would suggest bringing a ranger with apply poison and interrupts, apply poison negates his usual regen so he doesn't heal up while you are carrying barrels.

Get also get three monks as others said. Should be dead in about 5 minutes

ZOMG SOMETHING IN PVE IS DIFFICULT AND MADE ME FAIL AND DO IT MULTIPLE TIMES ZOMG!!!!

Good god, enough. People keep saying how easy PvE is, and yet we get people starting threads about how they're unable to kill the second to last boss in the game with a full AI team and they don't even know how to make him vulnerable to damage!

Well I went back and did the HotS quest in a PUG and what a difference!! It wasn't such a grind getting there and Cyndr went down in less than a minute!!!

Unbelievable....

OFG

(now I feel like my complaints were premature )

Not sure how effective this is, but whenever i do this H/Hway, I stand near Blackpowder as soon as you get out into the opening, and Cyndr will spawn near blackpowder, after that click blackpowder, drop keg, click black, drop keg, click black, drop keg. i had problem with it too at frist, when i figure out how to, i get 15 dp when Cyndr is kill, Mhenlo didn't die suprisingly.

PS: call your target even if its only one, since the recent "leash put on h/h" they've become quite lazy, sometime they dance in the middle of a battle... so call your target! *need new keybaord* lol

Third to last. I think the Disc of Chaos counts, even though it's generally not quite as deadly as Cyndr.

Yeah that mission really frustrated me at first with my normal Sabway group of heroes. You really want to prepare. I equipped all my necro heroes and myself as a necro secondary with blood magic and life stealing skills. Cyndr went down with no problem and no keg running.

I heard flagging is pro.

NO Srsly. It is.

5 of the 6 times I've done this in HM, Cyndr popped right next to Blackpowder. Thats like insta-GG right there. If not, you run in the room, flag everything way way spaced out, then just drop the bombs, and just kill him. Shouldn't take more than a minute or two, even if you party has wicked baed dps.

And if you need more help than that, I'm ASSUMING you are taking a prot monk/henchie. Prot spirit versus Cyndr is also win. Spread out, prot monk does there job, and he's then useless.

Well, one thing that might help is that you can join another group doing destruction depths first. Technically that quest comes after HoS so you will have to do it again for the story line, but, it takes you to the central transfer chamber and from there you can go directly to King Jalis by going through the portal there. That way you can retry a lot faster without having to spend 20 mins to get to the right portal since you are almost there then.

Meh the last time I did it I found it to be particularly easy. Used all H/H and an essence but I don't see the essence making that much of a difference. Only had to weaken his carapace with the 3 explosions once.

I suspect the 20 minutes includes time spent within the dungeon as well as getting TOO the dungeon.

Worst case scenario, bomb Cyndr until he pops up next to Blackpowder, then hide in the tunnel (yay for obstruction working WITH us for once) and attack him with lifestealing/have a ranger with [Apply Poison] chip away at him.

I've done it at 60% DP, it does work.

I always found the Great Destroyer much more irritating (mostly because there's no way to fight him that doesn't involve being constantly on fire)

Thats the problem with some dungeons, they are very time consuming and not everyone has the kinda time to play that is required. Always best to do with guildies cause without chances are someone will have to go walk the dog or do the dishes lol and leave you 1 man down, then someone else gets bored, or someone quits cos you die.

This very reason is why all I need is Rragar's dungeon for legendary master of the north but the time it takes to get there and do the dungeon makes watching paint drying more fun, so it's bottom of my to do list

Aye. I really wish PUGgees would, you know, actually set a reasonable time budget before starting on a mission. Part of the reason I don't PUG that much these days (the other parts being the hassle of getting a group, and that if there's a decent chance I'll be disrupted myself, I don't want to disrupt other people in the process).

The worst case I've had was the person who disappeared for about forty minutes... while holding the urn at Cathedral du Heltzer.