Your thoughts on the Titan Hard Mode quests

Then you must be lucky. Most of the time when I got there with fall back, he is already half dead.

Overall, the quest can be done with a good spawn and determination, just masochistic.

Took me a full hour in mineral springs to do DDF.

I wouldn't have made it thru without DP removal, but then again, my team wasn't optimal. No prot or any kind, I would definitely recommend an ST rit if you are a melee player, without damage mitigation, multiple Frost Titan groups are impossible to clear without wiping.

I think you must have gotten that good spawn.

I ended up taking more than a dozen whacks at this (as compared to no more than 2 for any of the others), so I had plenty of time to observe the opening run. You've got two potential problems, and they both come down to luck. First, the third group of char between you and the king might (a) not spawn, (b) spawn close enough to bow pull, or (c) spawn to far too bow pull. If (c) happens (and it usually does), and you try to ignore them and run straight for the king, they will either bodyblock/kill heroes or follow you over to the king, adding pressure at the worse possible moment. (Sticking around to kill them results in the king dying 100% of the time.) Second, the king's priest has a ~40% of dying before you get into casting range -- Fall Back or no Fall Back. In my experience, the king almost always lived long enough to reach casting range, even with no Fall Back. (Though sometimes so low on hp and so heavily attacked that he died anyway.) Once you finally get a spawn without that third group and with a live priest, the quest goes pretty smoothly... assuming you're cowering behind a spirit wall...

Yes the spawn luck factor affects the difficulty a lot. I have had terrible luck when it comes to spawns. With good enough luck, you can even get all your Armageddon groups without sparks.

The level 38 sparks come with Rodgort's Invocation, Searing Heat, and Tenai's Heat and to make this even more evil, they also have mantra of resolve so they are interrupt-resistant.

I was finally able to complete it with 3 heroes after many attempts but this quest is INSANE. It is worse than the pre-nerf BLA. I completed BLA on all my pve characters pre-nerf and I never needed BLA to be nerfed in the first place but LDD HM is ridiculous. Some people would think LDD HM is ok if they have nice spawns, while others would call LDD HM almost impossible. They really ought to fix this but then again, maybe they wont fix this because, unlike BLA, this quest is more optional even though it is more difficult.

P.S.: It is also easier to do this with a human party than with 3 heroes because they don't clump that much. Even though you can flag your heroes, you need to adjust because the groups come from different directions. Furthermore, the right PvE skills make a lot of difference here.

I find it hard to believe that I got the good spawn on my very first attempt, sufficiently so that I don't remember how the early part of the mission played out. I vaguely remember two of the King's guards dying early, and then the other two dying soon after I got there, but no more than that.

I need another attempt at this quest. Someone 2-man this with me or something (or make the quest repeatable, even if it gives no reward) ...

About to try it for 1st time in HM. Sounds like fun. Guess I'll use my ranger and roj team.

I agree with Jeydra on this; I had multiple attempts at it and the first charr spawns could never kill the King.

No, but if all the other NPCs die its considerably harder. And the king does die when you get 2 flamekeepers in that setup.

Even IF the king survives, the spawn depends on whether you can get through that encounter when the titan group reaches ya. As i said, 2 flamekeepers is annoying because of how the heroes like to bunch up and 2x meteor shower.

It is true that firedmg is easy to mitigate through prots and all but a single titan smash followed by a meteor and/or SF on your backline ==> someone is gonna die.

I would much rather have 2x avengers pop up

I kinda wish King spawned right outside Frontier Gate outpost and "Ruriked" towards location of his current spawn point.

If the King does not die before I get there there is almost no danger of my failing the mission. Heroes bunch up -> flag apart. Meteor Shower is by no means the deadliest of the spells the AI can use, simply because you have 3s before the first damage hits. SF does no damage until people are actually burning, can be interrupted, don't come in many copies (>2) and you ought to be able to cope with one hit of SF. Meteor is also less threatening because you should be split up already anyway.

The Charr and Titans come with no healers except for the last wave. That means individual Charr are easily spiked out and another EBVAS / YMLAD on the battlefield. There is almost no chance of failure.

Unless this has something to do with primary profession advantage, I do not get the problem at all.

The king does not usually die during the first charr spawns. He can be half dead which is a big difference from being fully dead. The king is the most resilient but the rest of his NPCs have such bad AI (i.e. the monk always stood his ground and wand the melee ranged titan no matter how low his life is), that they would probably die by the end of the quest wasting your energy to keep them alive in the process.

I agree that Meteor Shower is not the deadlist of the spells the AI can use. The deadliest AoE spells are probably the RI and Searing/Tenai from the sparks with mantra of resolve, whose chance to spawn with the Armaggedon depends on luck.

Sure you can flag your heroes apart, but you have to attack, watch the king, and watch your heroes all at the same time because you need to re-flag them to avoid AoE if you don't want them to die.

Like I have said, with luck (or multiple attempts), it is possible to get all your Armaggedon groups spark-less, making it a lot easier. It is also a lot easier with humans because you can bring multiple copies of PI to kill them faster and lesser impact from summoning sickness, if you use a summoning stone.

Flagging and reflagging has become routine for me to be honest. I will flag when I'm defending and unflag when I'm diving in for spike (or moving spirits closer, etc). All this is close to second nature to me. Rodgort's is painful, but again a single Rodgort's should not score kills, Sparks can and should be KDed with YMLAD and EBVAS, and besides there's but a small chance it hits a party member.

The King should not die even if he is at half health. He's a level 30 NPC with Defy Pain. I remember facing Sparks, but they neither wiped me nor scored kills. No, if I get to the King and he's at half health I can essentially consider the mission complete.

If only I had a second Elementalist decked out with max titles and heroes, I'd record myself doing the quest and upload it somewhere ...

They've got 2 kinds of rits, both of which some pack healing. Getting two of them together can be a problem, especially if you're not using a spike-capable class and spirits decide to go after the wrong target(s).

Also, the distribution seems to be totally random. I did not get a healer in my final wave, but I did get single and double (rit) healers in earlier waves.

Sure, but what are you going to do if there are 2 of them. Even if you managed to interrupt 1 spell with YMLAD, the level 38 spark is not going down with 1 EVAS especially with a healer in his team. Besides the charr shaman, the 2 different kinds of charr rits also pack heals.

Not everyone has maxed titles and all decked out heroes either, I have to spread my limited wealth across 16 characters. But I don't think those factors make as much of a difference as having the best spawn versus the worst spawn for that quest.

The only thing I can say is, we're evidently facing the same foes (I DID face Sparks and healers) and yet I'm not having trouble, so ...

What are you trying to say? You know you can always claim the worst spawn and still finished it with ease, nobody would dispute you right?

As far as the rest of us mortals are concerned, we do not call it an easy quest during the worst spawns. If you claim that it was easy for you then great.

Um ...

My point is that I didn't find the quest too difficult, and it was simple enough that I got it on my first try with unaltered builds. All the threats posed by the Titans can be mitigated, and the King should not die if you safely get to him. I would say therefore that a difficulty rating of 15/10 is overhyped. Read that how you will.

I would prefer the mission not to be nerfed because so much of the game is already so easy, but then again I've already completed the quest and can't redo it, so any change won't affect me.

The 15/10 difficulty rating is in there because of the many random elements which can screw it up. In addition the way that the NPCs run ahead of you don't give you enough time to prepare. If the priest survives until you can reach em, its considerably easier than when he gets 2 shot with the rest of the guards.

You prolly got lucky on your first time with the spawn and all.

Also, the mission involves everything which is wrong with the game right now.
- Abnormally high attribute points
- Requirement for PvE Skill
- Abuse of game mechanics (shelter, etc)

War in Kryta was more enjoyable tbh (pre 7H update). Some of those quests really made you work for it in hard mode, and none of the NPCs were lvl 40

honestly, when i first heard of them, i just loaded up a standard 7 hero bar, turned on a movie, and just cspaced like i usually do in hm, thinking that the quest would be as easy as villany of garlath.

oh how wrong could i be...

i actually smiled when i realized my usual approach was worthless here. i am strictly against cons (except merchant stones sometimes) so i actually had to think in order to droknars forge. a few things i noticed were:
--the mesmer ai is better, for some reason. they now almost exclusively used diversion on me (the monk) or my n/rt healer.
--however, the warrior ai is woefully inadequate. i generally left them and the necros alive last because they did the least damage as the warriors focused on minions and spirits.
--those monks are some of the most annoying mobs you will fight. if you get 2+ alive at a time, with some other enemies still up, that fight gets significantly harder as the monks never seem to run out of energy.
--the frost titans were priority targets. they did craploads of aoe damage, and raped my shelter spirit, and when they died they spawned icy brutes and titans malice. the next priority were the mesmers, and then the monks.
--i know this sounds simple, but flagging is super important here. i havent had to flag my heroes at all since like kathandrax hm, so at first i found it annoying, but soon it became a second nature. heroes are idiots, and panic destroys them.
--my party wiped twice during the entire run, and both times were due to overaggro. the mobs can get pretty close together, and the titan hearts in particular have a large wander range. so be sure to pull farther than you usually do. i learned that one the hard way


in the end, droknars forge was a great challenge, and i liked the rewards, so i cant wait to do the rest




UPDATE: The Denravi one was easy, did it on my first try, but then i got to north kryta province...

i really dont want to use cons or a eight man party, because they make me feel like im cheating , but i think i might have to. the second wave at the ascalon settlement ruins me. at that point i flag razah back and just make him focus on using st and shelter, and i kicked my mm because the minions waste mah precious uses of shelter, but poor razah cant keep up with all the damage, even with soul twisting. after 1.5 hours of trying, i finally got to the end, but captain greywind leeroyed into a bunch of traps, and died before i could react.

ive decided i am going to bring back my mm, and put winter on razah and mantra of frost on everyone else for a quasi frostway. any tips? that quest is killing me.

I'm kinda weird, tried to do these quests on my main going for survivorsl.

Defending very doable with heroes, I just came back to GW after picking it up only for a few months after EoTN release. Please don't nerf these yet a-net,really enjoyed them ^_^.

For Defend Droknars, Bring Hex Eater Sig and Mantra of Concentration on multiple heroes (I did it on my panic/inept mezzes and a smite monk) , and luck shouldn't be an issue at all.

I ferried cuz I was scurred I would die for Kryta and Titan Source :P.

I agree with Hunter's sentiment on LDD, lost a few times though I eventually beat it getting double flame casters...Just run in and heal the king and spike the flame casters, I don't get the problem lol...If its that hard just throw in an ST rit, though I personally didn't take one. (Still had 2 spirit spammers and a prot monk tho)

I 8 manned it out of caution, but I definitely wouldn't recommend frostway and the ST, esp with 6 people, you're losing a lot of flexibility by doing that.
For these missions you definitely need a lot of hybrid roles.

Since you're a monk I'd suggest just going smite with a team with hybrids (SoS with heals, MM with heals, Curse Nec with heals), and shutdown mezzes, along with your ST.

Yeah Defend Droknars HM is easy. No need to nerf that one.

Today I did The Last Day Dawns. I had some free time so I decided to go from Temple of the Ages. The run took two or three hours (I wasn't hurrying actually) and the quest itself was extremely easy - I was really surprised. I read some of your posts about the spawns and how Adelbern rushes into the mobs, so I thought that all of my time might be wasted if he dies before I even reach him (I had no Fall Back or any movement speed increase whatsoever), but in fact he was standing still almost until I got to him. Noboby died in the first battle, and in the other ones pretty much one NPC per battle until King was left alone. Of my heroes only Ogden died once, everyone else was fine. I used no cons, no discords or sabways and only one summoning stone (which was a Merchant, so, yeah). So that's it - party size of 8 for the win. Although I don't know, maybe I was extremely lucky when it comes to spawns - for example there was only one Spark in the entire quest and as a Mesmer I was able to shut it down while the heroes took care of the Armageddon Lord.
Now Titan Source is left and I consider starting from TotA as well - I kind of enjoy this run.

Titan Source is the easiest of the lot, try it with the standard party of 4.

Come to think of it it's July already, shouldn't we have the next HM quest, what could it be ?

Winds of change HM stuff most likely

They have like 1 person doing the coding for it all, so don't expect much dude.

Regarding North Kryta Province: In the old version, if Greywind died, your party died and it said mission failed. BUT if you do not click return to outpost you can still rez, return to the site and kill everything. You would then still recieve credit for the quest.

Does this work for the HM version?

I think it doesn't.

Rise from your grave!

Old trick in NKP doesn't work, it was adjusted so that you die immediately after resurrection at the shrine.

I *finally* got around to completing DDF .... man what an exercise in frustration that was for me (I'm the terrible GW player everyone talks about).

Thanks to this thread though, I brought plenty of hex removal, and made sure I flagged everyone far enough apart that while I generally had Panic on me, it didn't affect the hero's often.

Hero's were 3 mesmers, 2 rits, and 2 monks (one of the rits was a merc). I also used cons. Mesmers were 2x E-surge, and Panic, rits were ST and SoS, monks were the UA build off PvX wiki and a hex removal heavy bar with Spell Breaker. I honestly don't recall seeing Spell Breaker being cast ... ever, no clue how useful it actually was.

As long as I was able to keep aggro inside the "square of death" as I liked to call it, hex's were removed pretty quickly, and I was healed constantly.As a warrior, I took "Feel No Pain" and YMLaD (this helped with HULK SMASH! ... err Smash of the Titans).

If there were 2 Frost Titans, I would darn near always wipe. The brute's fell in love with Gwen, so I would generally try to spike them down into dark titans if they were on her, otherwise I would TRY and go in this order: Frost Titan -> Icy Brutes -> Dark Titans -> and save the Malice and Hearts for last.

Only once did I have to overcome 4 Titan Hearts while trying to kill a Dark Titan. Ended up burning a summoning stone to help with dmg output.

I know everyone says take out the healers first - that usually ended up with a wipe for me until I figured out the above order that worked for ME - 2x e-surge and the SoS was usually enough to overcome the healing, even if I had 2x healers saved for last.

For the final boss, I flagged my hero's out of the canyon, and tried holding aggro near the entrance. I didn't last long (3x smash of the titan's ensured that), but I got lucky they got stuck on a corner so my Panic mesmer took care of them pretty easily. Once the 3 big titans were down, I simply followed my above order of killing stuff and bam quest done.

For anyone who thought this quest was easy, I'd love to see your hero builds as I got 2 more toon's to do this on (Paragon and Mesmer).

I think the hardest part of this quest was me and my playstyle actually. I always tend to just Kilroy mobs, as GW caters to that playstyle if you got a good backline. Once I got myself in check, and proceeded at a much slower pace and brought in the cons (the group DP removal con should be all you need), things went smooth ... er. Yeah, not smooth at all, but definitely smoother then all of my previous attempts (about 100 or so haha).

TLDR; - slow the heck down, bring lots of hex removal, and group DP removal, kill stuff in the proper order, slow down some more ... should be fine. Over aggro is a guaranteed wipe.

You actually can have a 3 mes, 2 rit team without mercs - Gwen, Norgu and Razah as Mesmers and Xandra and Zei Ri as Rits. On the other hand, unlocking Zei Ri requires finishing WoC in HM and the WoC HM quests are around the same difficulty (or even higher) as the Titan HM quests, so...

Anyway, congratulations on completing the quest. I did it as a Mesmer with a human Monk, so it wasn't all that hard (I feel comfortable as a Mesmer and I indeed feel this profession has the biggest damage output plus the rupts, hexes, etc.), but then I tried to complete it as a Ranger (1 Gold Zaishen Coin as a reward is tempting), but, darn, I wasn't able to beat a single group.