Too many 1-shot mech in NIM ops

[Slowpokeking]

Except rewards aren't even in the equation for why I run ops. HM Revan drops literally nothing that I can use (even the deco). Doesn't even slightly reduce my enjoyment of the boss. (for that matter, basically this entire tier is like that now; I can't get anything useful or any vanity item that I don't already have, but I still raid)

 

You do not equal the majority of the ppl.

[KeyboardNinja]

A large set?

The Drouks got close is not 1-shot.

Even Kephess droids can be taken down even at 8 stacks.

 

The only real one shot mech I remember is the minefield one.

 

Alright, let's try to make an actual list for you here:

 

• Drouks close together isn't technically a one-shot, but since you can't damage them while they're fully stacked and their damage eventually scales to above max HP, I think they qualify.
  
• Taking a second double-destruction is a one-shot in the purest sense: you're stunned… and then auto-killed.
  
• Positioning wrong on the minefield is an auto-kill from the knockback
  
• Taking too long to sprint from the tower on the minefield is an auto-kill
  
• Solving the minefield puzzle wrong is an auto-kill by elimination (in several exciting ways)
  
• The droids were not killable at 8 stacks on tier (pre-2.0 Warstalker here); the DR used to be over 100%. They've been nerfed
  
• I guess being stacked in melee range of the pulsar droids isn't technically an auto-kill. It just did damage exceeding maximum health in under a GCD. So… almost-auto-kill?
  
• Kephess's jump in nightmare mode on tier did more than max health worth of damage to any non-tank.
  
• Gift of the Masters is the definition of an auto-kill. You take damage with it, you die with a zero damage hit.
  
• Kephess's auto-enrage with 2 raid members down also isn't technically an auto-kill, but like the pulsar droids, it exceeded max health almost instantly.
  

 

All of these mechanics are either pure auto-kills, or do so much damage and/or are so constraining that they are functionally auto-kills (like Kephess's "2 down" enrage).

 

You do not equal the majority of the ppl.

 

Ask any serious progression raider (in other words, the target audience for Nightmare Mode). Gear/decos/mounts/titles simply aren't enough reward for what we do. (gear especially; I basically don't care about it at all beyond the ability to do harder content) We do it for the same reason that you climb a mountain: it's there and it looks hard.

Edited September 1, 2015 by KeyboardNinja

[Slowpokeking]

Prefixing… Let's tone down the "didn't do nightmare content when it was relevant" rhetoric. I understand what y'all are trying to say, but I think we can shoot down the points without resorting to an appeal to authority (where by "authority" I mean on-tier NiM experience).

 

There is a limit to what can be solo healed. As I said, I haven't done the Master-Blaster soft enrage, and I honestly don't believe that I can. I've also never solo healed HM Revan's first floor, and I am relatively certain that it is actually numerically impossible (you would need to sustain over 8k effective HPS during the HK phase, which lasts about 90 seconds with good DPS).

 

So it proves that not only 1-shot mech and make the fight tough.

 

One of the things to keep in mind is that there is always a tension, with any mechanic, of where in the group you want to place the burden of that mechanic. Is there some complicated positioning you can use to reduce incoming damage? Great! But can you just heal through that damage and hence increase your DPS uptime? Different groups with different strengths will handle those things in different ways.

 

This is what makes ops interesting, and one of the reason why 1-shot mech shouldn't be overused.

 

One of the primary ways that DPS are challenged in this game is forcing them to deal with mechanics, notably positioning, within a hard time limit. Revan's Core burn is an excellent example of this, where you need to deal with the heartbeat and the aberrations while keeping your DPS high enough to beat the soft enrage. Imagine if, instead of knocking you off the platform, the aberrations just did a crudton of damage to any player who wasn't facing them directly. I can guarantee that the primary strat for dealing with the Core burn would be to just heal through that damage (as long as it didn't exceed ~60 stack HP).

 

Would there be groups that killed it by doing the mechanic? Sure. But the world first clears would have come through just healing the damage. This is partially due to the skill gap between the world's best healers and those who are merely adequate, but it's also due to the difficulty of the other mechanics in the fight when held up in comparison to what you would be asking the healers to do.

How about the aberrations will reduce your damage output? Can it be dealt with heal? Why it has to be always damage for punishment? Be more creative.

 

 

One shot mechanics not only serve as a level of difficult in and of themselves, but they magnify the difficulty of every other mechanic! This is their purpose. The reaches in NiM Dread Masters aren't really that hard… unless you're pushing hard to beat the second phase DPS check. Doom in NiM Dread Guard isn't really that problematic unless you're coming up tight against that third phase enrage. Dropping to the floor in NiM Raptus barely even qualifies as "trivial"… except for the extra damage you take as a consequence (pushing load to the healers) and the fact that it can take a healer out of the fight for a time. Heave isn't difficult to heal in HM Revan (even during the Core burn)… until you have to heal it while simultaneously managing the aberration facing.

 

And other mechanics can serve the same purpose(Raptus' curse), why only rely 1 on shot?

 

All mechanics accentuate each other, but one-shot mechanics provide an absolute baseline floor to a fight. They provide a mechanic that you can't "shift" to another area of your raid group. You're forced to deal with it, and thus they provide the literal structure that the rest of the difficulty builds upon.

At the same time, it reduced variety of the mechanic isn't it?

 

With 204 main hands, 10/10 can be three DPSed. Even pre-nerf and pre-204, Zorz came very close to 7 manning 10/10 (as in, they needed about 25k more damage total on the Core… they cleared 9/10 with no problem). Is that a problem of class design too?

 

A good assassin tank can reduce their damage on almost any fight relative to a poor assassin tank (assuming both are baseline executing all mechanics) by 40-50%. Is that bad class design? Or is it just skill ceiling?

 

Clearly there is a balance here. You don't want the best players in the world to be untouchable gods who can solo any content. But at the same time, you need every class and role to have room to improve and grow. Things to strive for. Challenges to achieve. This is very complex to achieve, and I think Bioware has struck a good balance. One-shot mechanics are an important part of that balance.

So you are talking about ovegearing it, which means most of the drop means nothing. I don't think the raid content's difficulty should be based on such players.

 

 

You're talking about Nightmare Mode. This is already less than 1% of the playerbase. Most of the one-shot mechanics are confined to the hardest bosses of each tier, which shrink down to the 1% of the 1%. If you're going to talk about content which is definitionally restricted to that kind of world-leading subset (at least on tier), then you absolutely need to consider their skill ceiling.

Many ppl are willing to try it. Just very few had cleared them all. Should we let more ppl willing to try it and have challenge or think about "only 1% will do it, let's make it very hard for them so nobody else will do it"?

[Khevar]

Ask any serious progression raider. Gear/decos/mounts/titles simply aren't enough reward for what we do. (gear especially; I basically don't care about it at all beyond the ability to do harder content) We do it for the same reason that you climb a mountain: it's there and it looks hard.

I concur. I personally am this way, as are the people that I personally know in-game that run operations.

 

The actual activity of fighting a boss, with a group of people, which could result in a success or failure, is fun.

[shyroman]

You do not equal the majority of the ppl.

 

Almost every hardcore raider (the ones nightmare is designed for) that I know is exactly like KBN

[Slowpokeking]

Alright, let's try to make an actual list for you here:

 

• Drouks close together isn't technically a one-shot, but since you can't damage them while they're fully stacked and their damage eventually scales to above max HP, I think they qualify
  
• Taking a second double-destruction is a one-shot in the purest sense: you're stunned… and then auto-killed.
  
• Positioning wrong on the minefield is an auto-kill from the knockback
  
• Taking too long to sprint from the tower on the minefield is an auto-kill
  
• Solving the minefield puzzle wrong is an auto-kill by elimination (in several exciting ways)
  
• The droids were not killable at 8 stacks on tier (pre-2.0 Warstalker here); the DR used to be over 100%. They've been nerfed
  
• I guess being stacked in melee range of the pulsar droids isn't technically an auto-kill. It just did damage exceeding maximum health in under a GCD. So… almost-auto-kill?
  
• Kephess's jump in nightmare mode on tier did more than max health worth of damage to any non-tank.
  
• Gift of the Masters is the definition of an auto-kill. You take damage with it, you die with a zero damage hit.
  
• Kephess's auto-enrage with 2 raid members down also isn't technically an auto-kill, but like the pulsar droids, it exceeded max health almost instantly.
  

 

All of these mechanics are either pure auto-kills, or do so much damage and/or are so constraining that they are functionally auto-kills (like Kephess's "2 down" enrage).

 

Ask any serious progression raider. Gear/decos/mounts/titles simply aren't enough reward for what we do. (gear especially; I basically don't care about it at all beyond the ability to do harder content) We do it for the same reason that you climb a mountain: it's there and it looks hard.

 

It's not 1-kill unless you them for too long. The rest are mostly minefield.

 

I'm asking you, how many people will still run the ops if it doesn't drop anything/no achievement? Will you do it again it you beat it once?

Edited September 1, 2015 by Slowpokeking

[Slowpokeking]

Almost every hardcore raider (the ones nightmare is designed for) that I know is exactly like KBN

 

How many of such hardcore raider are there, among the majority of the population?

 

So you run it over and over everyweek without and rewards?

[KeyboardNinja]

So it proves that not only 1-shot mech and make the fight tough.

 

Sure, but the HK phase would be a heck of a lot easier to solo heal if we didn't have to worry about killshot (auto-kill) or stacking grenades (effective auto-kill due to max HP). It would basically be like a slightly more single-target oriented malaphar, which is easy to solo heal and you can achieve well over the requisite 8k eHPS.

 

This is what makes ops interesting, and one of the reason why 1-shot mech shouldn't be overused.

 

Yes, but at some point, you still need to keep all roles engaged in the content, otherwise the DPS turn into dummy parsers, or the tanks AFK with a penny on their taunt button. One-shot mechanics, much like the edge of a fight platform or (more simply) a wall, provide the structure which enforce an upper bound on how easy things can be for any given role.

 

How about the aberrations will reduce your damage output? Can it be dealt with heal? Why it has to be always damage for punishment? Be more creative.

 

You should probably think a little more deeply before you accuse me of lack of creativity. It would need to be one HECK of a damage debuff to outweigh the positional penalties of having to face the aberrations. Also, again, there are ways to shift that responsibility.

 

And other mechanics can serve the same purpose(Raptus' curse), why only rely 1 on shot?

 

I actually have no idea what you're saying here regarding Raptus's curse.

 

At the same time, it reduced variety of the mechanic isn't it?

 

Not at all. The variety of mechanics comes from what you must do to handle them. Both Deathmark in Hateful Entity and the heartbeat in HM Revan are auto-kill mechanics, but you need to manage them in 100% different ways.

 

So you are talking about ovegearing it, which means most of the drop means nothing. I don't think the raid content's difficulty should be based on such players.

 

I believe I explicitly specified pre-nerf, pre-204 MH for the Zorz 7 manning stuff. No overgearing there.

 

How many of such hardcore raider are there, among the majority of the population?

 

So you run it over and over everyweek without and rewards?

 

Several times a week, actually. We do it because it's fun, not only to fight the boss but also to spend time with friends.

 

And the number of hardcore raiders that are still around is irrelevant. You're talking about specifically and only that subset of the population whenever you're talking about Nightmare Mode anything. Unless you are advocating to straight-up nerf all the content, Nightmare Mode (or ideally Hard Mode going forward) is going to remain a very exclusive purview.

Edited September 1, 2015 by KeyboardNinja

[Khevar]

I'm asking you, how many people will still run the ops if it doesn't drop anything/no achievement? Will you do it again it you beat it once?

Many raiders continue to run the same operations even after they've geared up their mains and their alts as well.

 

It depends on if there's new operations to run instead. If not, it's back the ones we already have.

 

Do you follow? Many people LIKE running operations. The ACTIVITY of running operations is, in and of itself, a fun activity. It gets less fun when it gets boring. This may be because you've run it too many times, it may be because it got too easy, or many other reasons.

 

Once you have it on farm, you try stuff like underman it, or weird group compositions, or things like KBN's group did one time of killing all the Cartel Warlords at exactly the same time.

Edited September 1, 2015 by Khevar

[Slowpokeking]

Sure, but the HK phase would be a heck of a lot easier to solo heal if we didn't have to worry about killshot or stacking grenades. It would basically be like a slightly more single-target oriented malaphar, which is easy to solo heal and you can achieve well over the requisite 8k eHPS.

 

Then how about other kind of mechanic, not about damage?

 

 

Yes, but at some point, you still need to keep all roles engaged in the content, otherwise the DPS turn into dummy parsers, or the tanks AFK with a penny on their taunt button. One-shot mechanics, much like the edge of a fight platform or (more simply) a wall, provide the structure which enforce an upper bound on how easy things can be for any given role.

I don't see how it can't be done with non-1shot mech. If classes turn into dummy without 1-shot mech, then again it's a big failure on the whole PVE system.

 

 

You should probably think a little more deeply before you accuse me of lack of creativity. It would need to be one HECK of a damage debuff to outweigh the positional penalties of having to face the aberrations. Also, again, there are ways to shift that responsibility.

The longer you stay, the less damage it takes, if it's too much, why shouldn't they move?

 

 

I actually have no idea what you're saying here regarding Raptus's curse.

It magnify the fight if you fail challenge.

 

 

Not at all. The variety of mechanics comes from what you must do to handle them. Both Deathmark in Hateful Entity and the heartbeat in HM Revan are auto-kill mechanics, but you need to manage them in 100% different ways.

if it's not 1-shot there will be more ways to deal with it.

 

Several times a week, actually. We do it because it's fun, not only to fight the boss but also to spend time with friends.

"We" include more than 5% of the players?

[Slowpokeking]

Many raiders continue to run the same operations even after they've geared up their mains and their alts as well.

 

It depends on if there's new operations to run instead. If not, it's back the ones we already have.

 

Do you follow? Many people LIKE running operations. The ACTIVITY of running operations is, in and of itself, a fun activity. It gets less fun when it gets boring. This may be because you've run it too many times, it may be because it got too easy, or many other reasons.

 

Once you have it on farm, you try stuff like underman it, or weird group compositions, or things like KBN's group did one time of killing all the Cartel Warlords at exactly the same time.

How many if there is no mount/decor/comm drop?

 

You like it, sure, but you are mostly a small percent of the playerbase, the majority come for rewards.

Edited September 1, 2015 by Slowpokeking

[Slowpokeking]

As for low level ops, like I said in the other thread, it's not designed for outleveled/outgeared players thus it's dumb to blame it for not challenging when you are 5-10 levels higher. if you want challenge it doesn't take long to build a new char.

[FerkWork]

A large set?

The Drouks got close is not 1-shot.

Even Kephess droids can be taken down even at 8 stacks.

 

The only real one shot mech I remember is the minefield one.

 

Not at level. I would like to see a video of a group at level downing a droid with 8 stacks (and why you you anyways with interrupts. Your again making an argument based on what the content is now.

[Khevar]

How many if there is no mount/decor/comm drop?

 

You like it, sure, but you are mostly a small percent of the playerbase, the majority come for rewards.

Relative to the entire playerbase? Or those that run endgame?

 

I do know that every single player that I've personally talked to (that does raiding) actually likes the ACTIVITY of raiding. Those in my guild, those outside of my guild. They like the rewards, of course, but when you run out of rewards, and there are no new operations, you keep running the ones you have -- in new and more interesting ways.

 

Now pug operations players, I have no idea -- usually the chat channel is more occupied with explanations of fight mechanics, the occasional joke (or RP), or whatnot. No much time for philosophy: "Tell me random guy #1, what motivates YOU?"

Edited September 1, 2015 by Khevar

[FerkWork]

How many if there is no mount/decor/comm drop?

 

You like it, sure, but you are mostly a small percent of the playerbase, the majority come for rewards.

 

Lol you know nothing of raiding. And that's coming from someone who was a filthy casual SM warrior till 3.0. Gear is there to gear up for harder content. Comms same. Credits help pay for repairs. Vanity items? They are like nice trophies of congrats you downed this content. Just because you play only for rewards doesn't mean all of us do.

[FerkWork]

Many raiders continue to run the same operations even after they've geared up their mains and their alts as well.

 

It depends on if there's new operations to run instead. If not, it's back the ones we already have.

 

Do you follow? Many people LIKE running operations. The ACTIVITY of running operations is, in and of itself, a fun activity. It gets less fun when it gets boring. This may be because you've run it too many times, it may be because it got too easy, or many other reasons.

 

Once you have it on farm, you try stuff like underman it, or weird group compositions, or things like KBN's group did one time of killing all the Cartel Warlords at exactly the same time.

 

Off topic: Did it work with the CW? I feel like a challenge is leave Horic for last

[DrMeth]

Off topic: Did it work with the CW? I feel like a challenge is leave Horic for last

We have done Horic last going left to right, its quite a lot of fun.

 

Running in circles killing lieutenants while avoiding his cleave is awesome.

[Slowpokeking]

Relative to the entire playerbase? Or those that run endgame?

 

I do know that every single player that I've personally talked to (that does raiding) actually likes the ACTIVITY of raiding. Those in my guild, those outside of my guild. They like the rewards, of course, but when you run out of rewards, and there are no new operations, you keep running the ones you have -- in new and more interesting ways.

 

Now pug operations players, I have no idea -- usually the chat channel is more occupied with explanations of fight mechanics, the occasional joke (or RP), or whatnot. No much time for philosophy: "Tell me random guy #1, what motivates YOU?"

What if you have other ways for rewards?

 

I'm not saying everybody run ops purely for rewards, but few would keep run them up if there is none. If we are talking about an ops being "relevant", we are talking about how many people are running it, and surely those with rewards will be run by more ppl. Believe or not, that's how the majority think about.

 

Also how did it start? Yeah old contents, old contents were not targeted at overleveled/overgeared players, it already served its purpose if it's challenging to players at level/gear. I still need to interrupt Malgus' Unlimited Power for safety purpose and don't need to care much about Lorrick, purefaceroll, does it make Malgus FE a better design than Lorrick? Not at all.

[Khevar]

Off topic: Did it work with the CW? I feel like a challenge is leave Horic for last

I believe so -- I saw him post something about it in the forums.

 

As I recall, their group very carefully dps'ed them all down to <1%, gathered them close, and a single AOE killed all of them in the same hit.

 

If KBN pops back in, he could speak to this better.

[Slowpokeking]

Lol you know nothing of raiding. And that's coming from someone who was a filthy casual SM warrior till 3.0. Gear is there to gear up for harder content. Comms same. Credits help pay for repairs. Vanity items? They are like nice trophies of congrats you downed this content. Just because you play only for rewards doesn't mean all of us do.

 

I know what attracts the majority to raid.

[Khevar]

does it make Malgus FE a better design than Lorrick? Not at all.

A bit off topic, but I liked Malgus when you had to knock him down the elevator shaft.

 

When that was changed to remove his invulnerability at <10%, it made that fight less interesting.

 

The Unlimited Power 1-shot? Now THAT was exciting before I had an interrupt on my Commando, that fight was HELLA nailbiting. I remember watching the cast bar grow in one of those "Matrix-like" deja-vu feelings while going "interruuuuuuuuuppppptttttttt" at the poor tank who had missed it.

 

BANG!

Edited September 1, 2015 by Khevar

[Slowpokeking]

A bit off topic, but I liked Malgus when you had to knock him down the elevator shaft.

 

When that was changed to remove his invulnerability at <10%, it made that fight less interesting.

 

The Unlimited Power 1-shot? Now THAT was excuting before I had an interrupt on my Commando, that fight was HELLA nailbiting. I remember watching the cast bar grow in one of those "Matrix-like" deja-vu feelings while going "interruuuuuuuuuppppptttttttt" at the poor tank who had missed it.

 

BANG!

I liked that as well.

[FerkWork]

I know what attracts the majority to raid.

 

You mean SM (like myself was) warriors who have no business being in NiM. If you are doing NiM you are:rak_02: doing it for the fun of it.

[Slowpokeking]

You mean SM (like myself was) warriors who have no business being in NiM. If you are doing NiM you are:rak_02: doing it for the fun of it.

 

I do NIM for fun+achievement first run, but after I beat them once, I do them for reward or helping friend.

Edited September 1, 2015 by Slowpokeking

[KeyboardNinja]

I believe so -- I saw him post something about it in the forums.

 

As I recall, their group very carefully dps'ed them all down to <1%, gathered them close, and a single AOE killed all of them in the same hit.

 

If KBN pops back in, he could speak to this better.

 

Have a video:

I wasn't there for the kill we recorded (we had a couple subs, actually), and I think this may have been the first time we did it (hence some of the discombobulation). We never did it in Nightmare Mode, but this was our Hard Mode strat for quite a long while. Having a Focus Sentinel helped with the whole "hit them all at once" bit. :-)

 

Unfortunately, when Nightmare Mode dropped, this got "nerfed". The reason being that the first week kills of NiM Cartel Warlords were all using a variation of this strat (kill Horic, then kill the remaining three at once) in order to bypass the late-fight mechanics. Bioware implemented a catch which heals all the bosses back up to full if two or more of them are below a threshold, preventing simul-kills.

 

We also tried this with the Dread Guard, but unfortunately they have a very similar mechanic and have had it since launch. We also tried killing the Dread Guard backwards (kel'sara first), but again, the auto-heal mechanic kicked in and we couldn't down them. We theorized that with an absolutely inconceivable amount of burst, we might be able to get them past the trigger point (since, with the Dread Guard anyway, the trigger is at 25% but gets delayed by their rotation), but we were never able to hit that mark.