Vizunah Square

mqstout

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: May 2005

Pittsburgh

So my friends and I finally had the displeasure of playing the Vizunah Square mission last night.

Please tell me there are no more missions like this one? Guild Wars was not intended to have a team of 16 people together. There were too many difficulties targeting, moving and monster spikes were disasterous by the huge numbers of them [monsters].

To add insult to injury, the other team was a bunch of people who'd done the mission a bajillion times before and knew exactly where every mob was... and they didn't bother picking up drops. There were plenty of purple drops just laying on the ground assigned to them, uncollected. I wanted to scream! They were rushing along too, my team didn't even get a chance to heal up before they were on to the next mob. They were obviously pissed that they all had hit 'skip' for the cinematic and none of my team did.

There was no pleasure at all in the experience. Please, let there be no more like this.

Ellipson

Ellipson

Academy Page

Join Date: Jun 2005

Hic Sunt Leones [HiC]

Me/

The millions of Assassins still trying to do VS are envious of you right now, though.

I agree that VS was more of a chore than anything. The three times I've beaten it, I had a very slick guild group that need a healer (me!) + other team was henchies, and two groups with minion masters. It was frustrating as hell all three times: not really that fun at all. It's especially painful to see the other team drop before you can even make it to the square.

Chicken Ftw

Chicken Ftw

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: May 2006

I usually pray that the other team is henches in vizunah, and the same for unwaking waters. Yes, there is another mission which involves another team. Unwaking Waters. It's difficult with another team that doesn't listen, drops, dies early, etc. Henches ftw.

aron searle

aron searle

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Aug 2005

Mo/

Welcome to factions

Gargle Blaster

Gargle Blaster

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2005

if a mission takes 16 people to finish it let me choose all of my teammates...

better idea only make the missions for 8 person teams.

i dont have a problem finishing this mission -i have a problem with less than 25 min... every time its slightly over 25.

lyra_song

lyra_song

Hell's Protector

Join Date: Oct 2005

R/Mo

Im so glad my Vizunah Square experience went off without a hitch. Both teams were human, both teams had semi-balanced setups. Our team had a MM and it was pretty much easy sailing. I was a healing monk and i barely did any work. It was very laggy, but we killed everything without much trouble. The only one who died a few times was our ritualist, because he stood still a few times XD.

I dont think its game design, its just people you played with that determines your enjoyment.

Red

Red

Rawr!

Join Date: Mar 2006

Kentucky, USA

Team Love [kiSu]

Mo/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ellipson
It's especially painful to see the other team drop before you can even make it to the square. Quoted for Truth. ><

Suggestion (which would be HECK to code):
1) If one team dies before the cutscene, then they fail the mission and get booted. Their NPC (Mhenlo or Togo) is left behind.
2) At cutscene, the surviving team's NPC resurrects the falled NPC. 8 henchies appear to replace the team that failed the mission.
I can imagine the coding on such a scenario would be obnoxiously evil, though

I think the hugest issue I have here is the inability to interact with the other team. Much like the new Alliance Battles (gentlemen, start your flamewar engines!)... I remember going in from Foreign quarter with a bunch of guildies, and being grouped with an assassin and his henchies. I remember how hard it was to help his team out once we met up--and i was going Life Bonder. I can only imagine the difficulty a true healing monk would face.

>< If they intend for this to be a cool super-group of 16, whee, fun. But let us BE a group of 16, not a madhouse pair of 8man groups who can't coordinate and heal each other. But, we've had this argument before, and we called them Alliance Battles. *sigh*

blood4blood

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Oct 2005

I think Vizunah Square is really easy...as long as the other team doesn't let Togo die right away, which has happened to me about 10 times now (I've also beaten the mission twice - it's easy as long as the other team is even half competent).

Message to Anet: I think it was a horrible mistake to make "cooperative" missions where my success is utterly dependent on another team over which I have absolutely no control or influence. I've wasted a couple hours of playing time waiting to enter the mission, waiting for the mission to start, fighting the first one or two mobs that appear, then seeing Mission Failed because the other team couldn't keep Togo alive = averaging a minute or so of fighting for about 3 minutes of waiting, then doing it over and over again. It's frustrating, annoying, boring, and a huge disappointment. I'd like to highly recommend that any "cooperative" missions in Ch3 be treated like "challenge" missions -- entirely voluntary. If they're required to progress through the game/story, I simply won't buy Ch.3.

cR4zY-n^

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Jul 2005

Zadar - Croatia

We Work As A [Team]

Mo/E

If you fail the mission 'cos they kill Togo or smtn, do you lose Survivor chance, I mean when you fail mision you suddenly drop dead, does it count in deaths?

floplag

floplag

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Feb 2006

SoCal

Gamerz United

Me/N

try doing it with a team of all hench on the otehr side !

we actually managed to get through it like that last night

Aerian_Skybane

Aerian_Skybane

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Apr 2006

House of Caeruleous [HoC]

R/E

I still don't understand how there is much hate for this mission tbh. I could understand it when the glitch in it made it almost impossible every other time, but ive done this mission four times now, havent gotten masters, but have gotten expert twice. I actually enjoy it. I think its a blast to have two teams of eight fighting back to back against the giant hordes of afflicted. Add an MM, and its pure chaotic fun. And although I do get frustrated with the whole 3*4 vs 3*4 misscomunication, the inability to communicate here not that much of a problem, as the entire mission is fighting off giant hordes, so if you ahve one team of 8 fighting off one side calling there targets, and the other fighting off targets on the other front, youll do pretty well. Its called All Chat to coordinate things while running to the square inbetween fights. Theres no human enemy to read that now is there? Unless Anet plays cruel trucks on us.

It is frustrating to get a henchie team, at which point id tell my team to /resign and start over. If you get only a part henchie team, tell them right off the bat what to do (mostly on local side). One of the times I was able to baet it with the opposite team only bein two sins, a rit, and henchies. Last time i did it, was full 8 man human, even balanced, and it was actually tougher. Like someone (too lazy to actually read above now) said, it about the skill of the general team. Even then just take controll of the situation and start barking orders over All Chat in all caps if things start going wrong. The battle is supposed to represent chaos, and I think it does it very well.

Lonesamurai

Lonesamurai

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Apr 2006

Cheltenham, Glos, UK

Wolf Pack Samurai [WPS]

R/A

Oh my god...

last night, tried it 3 times... I was on Foriegn Quarter with henchies and a a guild had a full 8man team on the local quarter...

We get down to the first lot of Am Fah no worries, then the second group, Mhenlo and I get left by all the henchies as they try and run down to the fighting in the middle with the other group...

As you can imagine, I was not best impressed... Why the F*ck do the henchies try and run down to the other group? They aren't our team, they don't come up on the chat window when they target etc... and why do i have no hench control over the henchies I have in my party when i'm the only player?

rezabm

rezabm

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Jan 2006

Nightshift Resurrection

R/

We did it (playing the foreign side with pug) with all human players in both teams...truth is that we had to restart maybe 5 times because the other teams didn't last even few minutes before we reached them. But eventually we got a fine local team and it was a breeze and great fun. I really liked huge battles in this mission.

Kakumei

Kakumei

Forge Runner

Join Date: Jul 2005

Grind is subjective

learn this please

Vizunah Square is by far the most fun mission in Factions.

Twenty minutes of chaos? Hell yeah.

cR4zY-n^

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Jul 2005

Zadar - Croatia

We Work As A [Team]

Mo/E

Quote:
Originally Posted by cR4zY-n^
If you fail the mission 'cos they kill Togo or smtn, do you lose Survivor chance, I mean when you fail mision you suddenly drop dead, does it count in deaths? Anyone? :S

Esprit

Esprit

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Jun 2005

Dvd Forums [DVDF]

E/

I was looking to get items for the high level collector armor and needed Plague Idols and Putrid Cysts... rather than chance my drops on henchies, I went to Vizunah to claim the uncollected drops.

I disliked Vizunah at first, but I enjoy it now.

Lowly Peasant

Lowly Peasant

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Dec 2005

For the life of me I cannot get my assassin past this mission. I have done all 5 of my other chars but there are simply too many assassins to get a group w/o standing around doing LFG for 2 hours. Every time I try with Hench the enemy AI suddenly kicks into overdrive and spikes me and the healer/spirit hench, if they haven't already begun to follow the other group.

Snograt

Snograt

rattus rattus

Join Date: Jan 2006

London, UK GMT??0 ??1hr DST

[GURU]GW [wiki]GW2

R/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Lonesamurai
Oh my god...

last night, tried it 3 times... I was on Foriegn Quarter with henchies and a a guild had a full 8man team on the local quarter...

We get down to the first lot of Am Fah no worries, then the second group, Mhenlo and I get left by all the henchies as they try and run down to the fighting in the middle with the other group...

As you can imagine, I was not best impressed... Why the F*ck do the henchies try and run down to the other group? They aren't our team, they don't come up on the chat window when they target etc... and why do i have no hench control over the henchies I have in my party when i'm the only player? I was the guildie on other team, so I feel his pain!

For what it's worth, Lone, there was no bad feeling on my team. They weren't blaming your sole human input (MM FTW!), but when Mhenlo fell, after a few wtf??s, it was 'damn, they need to fix them henchies'

When I did the mission first time, it was me and 15 henchmen. I didn't even realise it was 2 team co-op until I noticed there were more henchmen than usual...

felinette

felinette

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Mar 2006

Girl Power [GP]

Me/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Snograt
For what it's worth, Lone, there was no bad feeling on my team. They weren't blaming your sole human input (MM FTW!), but when Mhenlo fell, after a few wtf??s, it was 'damn, they need to fix them henchies' That's what I hate about the mission, though--that another team's success depends on you. I prefer to hench, but I've never henched Vezunah because I know another team's success is riding on what I do, and sometimes things can tank quickly with henchies. So I've always grouped, out of courtesy for whatever suckers are on the other side. I don't like the mission because all it does is throw mobs at you, and your success depends on another team but there's no way to work together. That's the stupid part--two teams who should cooperate, but can't. It's not a cooperative mission when the two teams can't coordinate targets, healing, etc.

When I heard that Unwaking Waters was another one of these two team bores, I figured I'd group for that one, too, but there are so few players at the later missions that I henched it and ended up with a full team of hench on the luxon side. That happened to me once with Vizunah, too--our full human team ended up with a full team of hench, and we beat the mission. Too bad you can't ask for that all the time.

KamikazeChicken

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Aug 2005

Mo/

The only other 16 player mission is Unwaking Waters, from what I can remember. Unwaking is only 10-15 minutes long though. :P

demon dantes

demon dantes

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Feb 2006

ny

Iyanden Wraithguard

Mo/Me

vs is a very fun mission i still do the mission with my mm and hench just so i can help whoever is on the other side. if i happen to find another mm to go with me it is much much faster. i always like to help canthon char in that mission cause took me about 10 try s with my assasin to finish it. something i wish you could do though is have it like the deep when you combine you could heal the other team as well.

Burton2000

Burton2000

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Oct 2005

A cardboard box in England

Men Of Substance [YMCA]

Mo/Me

I didn't actually know Unwakening waters was a 16 player mission untill a guildie pointed it out.Was fairly easy with 8 hench on the other side though.

JR

JR

Re:tired

Join Date: Nov 2005

W/

Quote:
Originally Posted by mqstout
So my friends and I finally had the displeasure of playing the Vizunah Square mission last night.

Please tell me there are no more missions like this one? Guild Wars was not intended to have a team of 16 people together. There were too many difficulties targeting, moving and monster spikes were disasterous by the huge numbers of them [monsters].

To add insult to injury, the other team was a bunch of people who'd done the mission a bajillion times before and knew exactly where every mob was... and they didn't bother picking up drops. There were plenty of purple drops just laying on the ground assigned to them, uncollected. I wanted to scream! They were rushing along too, my team didn't even get a chance to heal up before they were on to the next mob. They were obviously pissed that they all had hit 'skip' for the cinematic and none of my team did.

There was no pleasure at all in the experience. Please, let there be no more like this. Sounds like our team. Sorry that we don't need to wait half an hour for monks to get energy back; it's a little thing called energy management.

If it was our group you were paired with, thanks for full wiping and making our job much harder. <3

PVEHOW2BEET.

azuresun

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Feb 2006

WV, USA

Spirit of Elisha [SOE]

Me/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Kakumei
Vizunah Square is by far the most fun mission in Factions.

Twenty minutes of chaos? Hell yeah. QFT!

We got through it on the first try. Most fun I have had in GW actually, but we had awesome groups.

EDIT: Although I must say, some way to see your allies health in the party screen would be great (i.e something like they do for pets and npc's a la Ghostly Hero's etc.)

Toodles

Banned

Join Date: May 2006

Quote:
Originally Posted by Redly
I think the hugest issue I have here is the inability to interact with the other team. Much like the new Alliance Battles (gentlemen, start your flamewar engines!)... I remember going in from Foreign quarter with a bunch of guildies, and being grouped with an assassin and his henchies. I remember how hard it was to help his team out once we met up--and i was going Life Bonder. I can only imagine the difficulty a true healing monk would face. Actually, playing a healing monk in Vizunah was actually quite enjoyable. You let the other team's healer/s deal with their own team while you deal with yours. This ensures that if your allied team has a competent healer then you shall not only disrupt their healing, but also not fail and be blamed as the sole cause of the group's demise.

With the energy management issue, that's always something I've put a priority on. Playing a monk, be it protection or healing is deathly boring if you have a team that sits there for half an hour after each battle to catch their breath, then pull a select mob of 3-4 before repeating the half hour break.

Sometimes I've found myself forcing the team to get on with things by aggroing everything in sight then keeping the team alive. It's not that I can't, it's not that I'm sabotaging anything, but it gives the team a whole lot more confidence when their healer draws as much as possible enemies onto the group, then keeps them alive to kill everything off.

Of course they think you're insane when you ping your energy at the end to be something like 43 of 47 and are ready for the next radar of mobs to come flying at you.

Francis Demeules

Francis Demeules

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Jan 2006

Canada, Qc

[Holy]

Me/Mo

Quote:
Originally Posted by KamikazeChicken
The only other 16 player mission is Unwaking Waters, from what I can remember. Unwaking is only 10-15 minutes long though. :P 10-15 minutes getting Zapped over 200 dmg by Kuunavang at the same time and -10 degen to everyone (Which I finished under 9:30 minutes with henchies but its another thing), hell yeah for how long it last.

Back to topic.

For Vizunah Square, I finished 3 times now with my ranger (full henchies), ritualist (full henchies) and mesmer (1 player in each team). The problem you can encounter is the lack of communication between the 2 teams if you do a full players teams. Local Channel is useful in these missions.

Another advice: Stay together and protect each others. You split, you get screwed.

Hookecho

Academy Page

Join Date: Jun 2005

The Red States

The Runners Academy

W/Mo

Last wekend I was helping a alliance member out in Viz Square (foregin) and I had my MM. He decided to join us into a pug and lo an behold there was 2nd and 3rd MM. So here we go into the mish, the other team is live not henchies and they keep Togaman standing and we get to the 1st big battle. OMG there wer minions EVERWHERE! Had to be at least 60 because the other team...shocker....had a MM!

It turned the mish into a breeze and sort of a race to reap a corpse in time

wilebill

wilebill

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Dec 2005

Mt Vernon, Ohio

Band of the Hawk

W/Mo

Cooperative mission? Where's the cooperation? First you need players who can cooperate and who want to cooperate. Most players are just casual logons. I've done this mission three times. Much groaning and complaining; nobody saying it was fun.

xBakox

xBakox

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Oct 2005

[JF] Just Friends, [NOT] Nomads of Turmoil

I find this mission amazing fun...Having 2 teams each with a MM is very cool to look at. Plus its just chaos. It repliactes a feel of a real battle as well, though there is plenty to work out.

For the next chapter Anet, maybe have these missions be optional, like Challenge ones, and maybe even allow you to pick your teammates.


Another note: getting hench here=not fun .

Zayren

Zayren

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: May 2006

Wherever I feel like.

Rt/

I was able to beat Vizunah Square with a team of 15 henchies on my blood spikin' necro, of course it was very difficult, but also very fun at the same time. Also, on my Rt, I was able to beat Unwaking Waters, which many people consider the hardest mish in the game, with a team of 14 henchies, the only other human player was on MY team and he was a ranger, not even an interrupt ranger as most people prefer. This was near the release of Faction's though, so it might have been made harder.

Cymmina

Cymmina

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Apr 2005

Me/N

Quote:
Originally Posted by cR4zY-n^
If you fail the mission 'cos they kill Togo or smtn, do you lose Survivor chance, I mean when you fail mision you suddenly drop dead, does it count in deaths? No, key ally deaths within missions do not cause you to lose your title.

I had the displeasure of doing this mission for 6 different characters and then some to help friends through. My first time through was on foreign... at that time, there were not enough players on local to be the other team and henchmen only teams would not do any resing (this was patched later).

This mission was just poorly designed. I hope to never see a mission like this that is required for storyline advancement. It would be different if I could pick my "sister" team.

As for Unwaking Waters, that mission was definately changed to be more challenging. I smoked it at ~8 minutes with my mes, a human rit on my team, and the rest henchies within the first week Factions was out. I did it again over this last weekend as my assassin and had a hell of a time with a full player team on both sides. I can't imagine my mesmer being the whole key to that mission's success, since all I did was e-drain and interrupt the only spell she has (the corrupted dragon scales?). We had interrupting rangers on my 2nd time through and it didnt seem to help.

Xeeron

Xeeron

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Feb 2006

Strike Force

Vizunah Square is tons of fun. Maybe you did not like it, but I love seeing 15 teammates, 2 NPCs and 20 minions all rush along at the same time, getting attacked from 3 sides. And tbh, it is a really easy mission, once the first 2 minutes are over: 16 players is just such a huge killing power.

- Xeeron

felinette

felinette

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Mar 2006

Girl Power [GP]

Me/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Cymmina
As for Unwaking Waters, that mission was definately changed to be more challenging. I smoked it at ~8 minutes with my mes, a human rit on my team, and the rest henchies within the first week Factions was out. I did it again over this last weekend as my assassin and had a hell of a time with a full player team on both sides. I can't imagine my mesmer being the whole key to that mission's success, since all I did was e-drain and interrupt the only spell she has (the corrupted dragon scales?). We had interrupting rangers on my 2nd time through and it didnt seem to help. I did it last night with my mesmer and 15 henchies in just under 10 minutes. It seemed easy. I can't imagine that they made it more challenging. Though there does seem to be a problem with interrupts. It's been suggested that two or three interrupts are required to interrupt her spells. My first attempt, I didn't have the domination henchie with me and none of my interrupts worked. The second attempt, I took the domination henchie--both of us interrupting the same spell might have done the trick, because she didn't get off a single dragon scales. I don't know. We're talking about it over in the Canthan Explorers forum.

Spook_Cell

Academy Page

Join Date: Jan 2006

Quote:
Originally Posted by cR4zY-n^
If you fail the mission 'cos they kill Togo or smtn, do you lose Survivor chance, I mean when you fail mision you suddenly drop dead, does it count in deaths? No, Togo or Mhenlo died in Tahnakai once but I didn't get any deaths and my survivor track is still going.

Riceboi

Riceboi

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: May 2005

Minion Master helps so much it's amazing!

DFrost

DFrost

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Jul 2005

Ultima Thule

Legacy of Echovald [Echo]

P/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Xeeron
Vizunah Square is tons of fun. Maybe you did not like it, but I love seeing 15 teammates, 2 NPCs and 20 minions all rush along at the same time, getting attacked from 3 sides. And tbh, it is a really easy mission, once the first 2 minutes are over: 16 players is just such a huge killing power.

- Xeeron I agree. Best mission in Prophecies/Factions combined if you ask me. Everytime both of the teams have made it to the square, we have finished the mission, often with 3 swords. The beginning is the tough part, sometimes it's wise to rush 1-2 foreign quarter guys down to the square immediately to help locals out.

Francis Demeules

Francis Demeules

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Jan 2006

Canada, Qc

[Holy]

Me/Mo

Quote:
Originally Posted by Riceboi
Minion Master helps so much it's amazing! Dual Well Necro too

Zephyr Jackson

Zephyr Jackson

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Oct 2005

Kansas

E/Mo

i did it twice, one with assasin 15 Henches = Masters and once with my warr about 6 humans and 10 henches not quite as good,the monsters are lvl 10 ffs they arent that 'hard

lennymon

lennymon

Forge Runner

Join Date: Nov 2005

Seattle

Odin's Hammer [OH] - Servant's of Fortuna [SoF]

R/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chicken Ftw
I usually pray that the other team is henches in vizunah, and the same for unwaking waters. Yes, there is another mission which involves another team. Unwaking Waters. It's difficult with another team that doesn't listen, drops, dies early, etc. Henches ftw.
unwaking waters last night:
our team (lux) all humans, 2 monks, 2 rangers, MM, ele, assassin, and SS nec. (yes no tanks)
the other team: all henchies

time to completion: 10:16 masters

but I know to bring concussion shot and savage shot, barrage, healing spring and troll ungent because I've done it a few times


henchies can be a problem in viz square due to the fact that they will try to go to the other group, but far less so in unwaking waters as you start together and fight together.

Sayntfuu

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: Apr 2006

I have been through there as a W/Mo, N/Rt, Mo/Rt, but I cannot get my A/E through there at all.

I think I have tried like 25 times now.

Fun mission though.