Cloakshire

I like the new voice acting heard in the Merc Lounge. It's a nice change and it does give the characters some personality. Miri seems to have some audio issues though. In some of her dialogue, you can hear minor audio peaks, very slight chirps, on her S's. But that can be fixed by re-balancing the audio file. It's a super easy fix.

However, the battle grunts are very hit and miss. Like @ikevi posted, and how I posted in the Vindi discord, Lann's battle grunts do not work. He only has two grunts that play when executing a smash attack, both of which are ~2 seconds in length. This causes extreme audio overlap issues when spinning, moonsplitting, gliding. His normal attack grunts and Fury infusion grunt are fine imo. What they could do to fix this would be to:

• Remove the two smash grunts and just make it so his normal attack grunts carry over to his smashes.
• Keep the current grunts but make it so they don't repeat constantly during a spin/moonsplit. One grunt at the start of a spin/MS, and silence after while the attack continues.
• Give an option to revert to the original Grunts.
• Re-dub the smash grunts again and this time, make them shorter and less pronounced.

Two other character's that need battle grunt adjustments from what I've seen/heard are Hurk and Evie. Hurk's voice just feels too high pitched and the original lower toned grunts fit the character much better. Evie's voice is good and her grunts are okay for the most part except on staffie. She has only two grunts that play when she hops, and one of them makes her sound constipated. While it is quite comical, it needs to be addressed and fixed.

EviLorY wrote: »

Oh.. forgot to mention, there is a new female character joining on Feb 2020 in kr server. There are concept arts available already. But ceebs to upload them here. Feel free to Google it.

"The second winter update in January will bring you a [new hero] using special type of weapon, that is completely different from the existing heroes."


I don't see anything stating that the new character will be female nor do they mention Feb. They state January and the gender is left unkown. This is the only pic in the 2019/2020 preview post that mentions a new character. If there's something confirming that the new character is female & the Feb release time, can you post it?

FlameSama1 wrote: »

Vlad summed it up very beautifully in their post. We do these raids dozens of times generally speaking and 'only 30 seconds of cutscenes' adds up very quickly. Agares is the worst because I can't even Cast Save during his bullshit. At least in something like Lugh I can save attacks or throw out regen or something.

Look, I don't wanna try and have to correct you again. First you say that Cromm's waves are unavoidable as Evie which I proved to be incorrect. You say that Agares is the worst offender b/c you can't cast save during his BS. Wrong again I'm afraid.

Looks like during the first ~10 second scene where he goes immune at the start of pillar phase, you can fit in some quick cast saving.


It also looks like the ~6 second window he's immune at the end of pillar phase is a good opportunity to charge up a Rage Conductor.


But for all I know, you could be referring to the down time during Agares's execution move. I already established that complaining about it is moot because whether or not it happens is the fault of your party members. But just for you, I'll show that you can still do stuff during an execution.

Even though you can't move or use your hotkeys during an execution, you can still click skills/items on your hotbar. You could pop pots or repair your armor, but this Evie chose to not only prep her Continual Focus for when Agares becomes vulnerable, but also casts regen. Good stuff.



So tell me again how Agares is the worst offender because you apparently can't "save attacks or throw out a regen." I thought you were supposed to be a veteran Evie from S1 Glas days. I don't even play Evie and I've already had to correct you twice now.

FlameSama1 wrote: »

I like proactive aspects of raids. Have a new version of Liono where we can bomb him off for stuns and damage or Kraken where you have to attack the tents. Those are things involving players attacking the boss in a way. Wandering around dodging AOE spam for two minutes is like playing an especially shitty rhythm game where you press the spacebar to win. I'm not actively participating in anything at that point except some contrived endurance test.

I didn't know that trying to preserve your life during a boss's last attempt to take you with him wasn't proactive. I guess you could perceive pro-activeness purely in terms of dealing damage to the boss. But one could equally perceive that the act of surviving Cromm's final phase as dealing damage to him b/c thematically, he is giving his life to take you down. If you survive, you're responsible for the damage he did to himself on the last bar. However, this just boils down to a matter of perception and opinion. You don't like Cromm's last phase b/c you can't attack and are forced to wait. I enjoy it b/c it fits the tone of the battle and I have fun getting absorbed in the fight and trying to survive.

FlameSama1 wrote: »

You don't see me complaining the same way about Redeemers, far and away harder than Cromm and something I'm also far and away worse at, because the rules don't just change arbitrarily at the end to screw with the player. From the get go, Neam gates kill if you don't dodge them (usually) and if your party wipes at any point you lose, bam. I respect that because it's constant. It doesn't introduce those mechanics right at the end to artificially pad the raid's difficulty.

Not complaining about Redeemers? .....really?
http://forums.vindictus.nexon.net/discussion/comment/58550/#Comment_58550
http://forums.vindictus.nexon.net/discussion/comment/13946/#Comment_13946
http://forums.vindictus.nexon.net/discussion/comment/15424/#Comment_15424
http://forums.vindictus.nexon.net/discussion/comment/15702/#Comment_15702

I'll acknowledge that these complaints don't run along the exact same lines as your take on Cromm. However, I have a question. What do you think of Balor's last phase? The phase where the rules "change arbitrarily at the end to screw with the player."

FlameSama1 wrote: »

I misspoke with the Dulla thing. I meant to phrase it like, people don't take the slow route in that. They want to facetank the start of it and keep him out of the middle at the end. If 3/4s of my party doesn't want to do it the slow way, I'm not gonna single-handedly convince them to take the extra time out to do it, especially not in the era of 2000 ATT Cap Removal whale-types who average 40% damage a run-they don't wanna take an extra minute or three to let the phase happen.

Let me make myself as clear as I can here. No one is telling you that you have to convince other party members. Your three party members can facetank the last 3 bars all they want. You could always walk away from the boss while your party members handle the facetanking at the end. However, the moment you decide to join them, you revoke your ability to have a legitimate complaint about facetanking him. You made the choice.

FlameSama1 wrote: »

Dunno how you draw the conclusion that I don't like additional complexity when you start that post off by recognizing that I like Abom chains and Macha spearing (which I do like). If you're gonna take control of the pacing from the party, at least add something to do like Arcana's kicking phase. It changes the mechanics, presents a way to fail, while also giving the player something to do by letting you kick her to end the phase quicker. Zec raising his power, the latest Elchy and his flying phase, hell every dragon and its flying phase gives the player something to do.

Then let me rephrase myself. I think that you do not like additional complexity IF it's something you cannot quickly grasp and get good at. Abom's chains and Macha's sword tossing are both easy mechanics. Cromm's last phase apparently wasn't easy for you therefore you gave up on it back in S2.

Cromm's last phase also changes the mechanics, presents a way to fail, and gives you something to do. The mechanic 2:10 AoE survival gauntlet where the way to fail is by everyone dying. As for what there is to do, it's paying attention to your position as well as your party member's positions; dodging accordingly to ensure your survival. If you pay super close attention, you'll notice a predictable and slightly manipulatable pattern to waves.

FlameSama1 wrote: »

What's the first thing you do when you get into a raid, actually jump into the fight after campfire and everything? Mash the ESC key to skip the cutscene asap. Because all it does is just drag the fight out. These AOE dodge sessions are like that. Overly long segments that slow the pace of the game down to a halt and highlight your frustrations if you happen to have a bad run or some reason.

Intro cinematics, as well as those annoying cutscenes after certain raid bosses are annoying and I'm in favor of skipping them. Even the scene between Macha's first and second phase should be skippable imo. But those scenes take place outside of the fight itself. Small cinematic scenes that take place during a fight such as Claire's bar 3 scene, Agares's pillar scenes, Balor's phase transition scenes, etc don't really bother me. I don't think a 2:10 second gauntlet of dodging AoE's is that bad and while it does slow the fight down, you still gotta try and survive which technically gives the player something to do.

If you don't want your frustrations to be highlighted in Cromm's last phase, go into the lvl 80 version on hero mode and practice it. It may seem pointless b/c you're practicing something that doesn't directly damage the boss, but getting good at that last phase lets you potentially be the deciding factor on if a raid clears or fails. You can turn that highlighted frustration into a feeling of accomplishment. I know you can

Vladino wrote: »

@Cloakshire you said that you skip mechanics and play braindead. No it requires teamplay and brain to skip mechanics. Because after 50-100 times those mechanics become braindead. Devs are just lazy to implement good and imersive mechanics. It's easy to just set boss invulnerable and "ok nao go do something".

@Valdino
Yes, the act of skipping a mechanic is not braindead as it requires coordination with your party. However, what I'm trying to say is that skipping mechanics often reduces most bosses to a braindead experience. Yeah, let's lock-chain Macha's last 2 bars and reduce the experience into everyone mindlessly wailing on her until it's your turn to lock her. The only non-braindead part of this is act of using your lockdown at the right time. Compare that to letting her fly up, dodging some swords/waves, fighting her naturally for another bar, then dealing with the waves again while still fighting her to the death. I'd much rather the latter of these two choices as it's much more involved and fun for me personally.

Then again, I'm probably one of the few players that raids purely for the sake of enjoying a good fight and to push myself as a player. Since loot is nothing more than an afterthought bonus to me, I'm not in any hurry to clear like most people are. I like taking my time and enjoying the experience of battle no matter how many times I've done it. This is probably why I dislike it when people skip mechanics as it robs me of the full battle experience.

FlameSama1 wrote: »

Gonna give it another shot now, but anytime you have to overqualify the argument, you're already starting from a losing position. "Oh you *only* have to perfectly time it and have a good connection" doesn't really convince me it isn't bullshit.

Over-qualifying my argument doesn't mean I started from a losing position. The reason I went so far is because I was taught that if ever you make an argumentative claim, you're supposed to back it up and thoroughly explain so that the opposing person can understand your point of view.

Regarding the perfect timing with a good connection not convincing you it isn't BS, bad connections mess with nearly every character in one way or another. Next you're gonna tell me that Vella's CC mechanic is BS because it has a chance to fail if the connection is bad, or that Lann's glides are BS b/c they're not consistent if the connection is poor. I ran with you yesterday and if I recall, you were the host and it was fairly good. If you want to take the connection variable out of the equation, just host it yourself. Do that and the only variable at play is your skill as a Staff Evie; problem solved.

FlameSama1 wrote: »

Back now. Hopped through the final section, dodged a handful of the big AOEs but got hit by others so I'll concede they aren't undodgable. They ARE, however, a hell of a lot easier to dodge for every other character I'd say. People replying to my mega post the other day said that they understood why I personally had an issue with it. It's an annoying stressful time kill that rewrites the rules of the entire raid so my points mostly still stand.

Glad to hear that you've retracted your claim about the AoE's being unavoidable as Staffie. I applaud and respect you for admitting your mistake there. That takes guts. I will agree that Cromm's waves are easier to dodge for other characters, and I too was one of the people that replied to your mega post yesterday commenting about Evie's dodge vs Cromm's waves.

However, you just have to accept that not every raid boss is going to favor every character's strengths. You don't see SS Arisha's, GS Hurks, or TS vella's complaining about how they get gimped in Braha. You also don't see Bow Kai's complaining about smaller bosses like Arcana/Macha/Neam being harder to hit than bigger bosses.

The point is that not every character is a perfect matchup for every boss. Some bosses will favor characters while putting others at a disadvantage. Your disadvantage just happens to fall on Cromm's last phase, but yet you wanna call it BS just because your the one at a disadvantage this time around. That's not a valid reason in my eyes.

FlameSama1 wrote: »

As far as 'endless pool of GGs', if you don't understand why having cash shop items act as a crutch in a raid is an issue, there's not really anything I can tell you. Yes you can earn some during events and the AP shop but that's besides the point. Just like adding arbitrary timers to normal pots (but not on mercs, almost like they wanna encourage you to spend money huh...)

I don't really get what you're saying here based on the phrasing. Are you trying to say that having people rely on GG's as a crutch is an issue? If so, I agree and was personally hoping they'd be disabled during Cromm's last phase. Being able to easily erase death lessens the time people have to reflect on their mistakes and thus their skill development is slowed.

I don't really see how they're encouraging people to spend money on GG's though. If you take the time to practice a raid and learn from your mistakes, both of which don't cost you anything but time, there's no reason to ever need GG's.

Also, the "arbitrary timer" on regular potions was needed to balance out the removal of the potion drinking animation when RISE hit. Merc pots were always instant with no cooldown from the very beginning. So the topic of comparing reg pots vs merc pots here is moot.

FlameSama1 wrote: »

As far as Dulla, "YOu dOn't HAvE tO faCetAnK HIs LAst 3 BaRs" I want you to find me a Dulla lobby that doesn't just facetank him. It's been months, if not years since I saw people actually try to bomb him. Hey in that respect I'm on your side - I'd rather bomb him and just deal with the phase if it was a one time thing. But if you let him do it once and don't finish him off very quickly, he'll just do it again. The running around avoiding ghosts phase leading me seemlessly to...

I think you're conflating two of Dulla's mechanics. Years ago, people would do the whole bombing mechanic but that's because it was necessary. After the devs nerfed the damage reduction on Dulla's shield, there was no longer a need to do the bombing mechanic.

^But that's not the mechanic I'm referring to.

At 3 bars of HP, Dulla will repeatedly spam red aoe's in order to push people away from him so that he may walk to the center of the map. After he gets to the middle, he casts a snowstorm to which players must remain in the safe zone while dodging multiple ghosts. He does this again for his final bar of HP. However, people don't like this because the two blizzard phases last ~30 seconds each which is apparently too long. So they opt to facetank his last three bars in order to bypass this last phase. Complaining about having to facetank the red aoe's is worthless because you're the one that made the choice to facetank through it. Don't wanna deal with it? Let him walk at bar 3.

A lot of people nowadays just view raids as a chore and just want to kill the boss ASAP so they can get their loot and go. Gone are the days where the majority of players raided just for the sake of enjoying the thrill of battle with loot being an afterthought.

FlameSama1 wrote: »

This game has a fetish for f---ing the player about with unskippable hands-off sections, see the multiple cutscenes in level 100 raids like Agares (the worst offender) or Claire (at least that one is relatively easy and short). It's a hack and slash RPG, just let me hit some ****, the less interference the better really.

Agares is the worst offender? Really? When he initiates his pillar phase he goes immune for ~10 seconds, and when it ends he's immune for ~6 seconds for a total time of 16 seconds. There are parties that are strong enough to only see one pillar phase, but on average, I usually see two. So let's see.... two pillar phases only wastes 32 seconds of your precious time. If someone gets marked and executed, it wastes ~15 seconds per time this happens. However, this is not the fault of the battle mechanics, but rather the fault of the person that played poorly and got hit while marked.

Now lets look at Claire. You said her cutscene is relatively short when compared to Agares? Her cutscene at bar three is only 12 seconds. A 12 second Claire scene vs 16 seconds from Agares's pillar phase. Wow what a time save, a grand total of 4 seconds! But wait, there's more! Claire's little running phase where you have to dodge arrows lasts ~10 seconds for each of the three times she runs off the stage. A total of ~30 wasted seconds which is double the time of an Agares execution.

So let's assume that in an Agares run, you see two pillar phases and no executions vs a Claire with one running phase plus her bar 3 cutscene. Agares wastes a grand total of 32 seconds while Claire wastes 42 seconds. So it seems like Claire wastes more time even though you said Agares is the worst offender. It's only when Agares starts executing people that he starts wasting more time than Claire, but this can be prevented by playing tactfully. Even if he wastes more time due to executions, it's not the boss mechanic's fault; it's the fault of the player(s) that got killed.

FlameSama1 wrote: »

I like the addons if they actually involve the player. I was good at the Aboma chains (for example) and that's a proactive addition. Passively walking around dodging a constant wave of attacks while watching the bosses health go down on its own is just dumb. Just like the phase of Macha (without the threat of failure though, thankfully), it's just the game's way of saying "hey not so fast, dance around for a minute or two for me". Macha spearing section? Good. Macha AOEs of bullshit while you wait for her to come back down? Bullshit.

Look, I'm probably going to come off as an ass here but I'm going to speak my mind. You say that you enjoyed Abom's chains as well as sword tossing in Macha. You claimed that you were good at chain hooks in Abom and I can only assume that you're good at throwing swords back at Macha too. But you seem to hate Cromm's waves as well as Macha's last phase, both of which you're not good at. I believe the only reason you don't like these is because it's something you couln't quickly grasp and become good at.

Let me tell you what I've gathered from re-reading your first post. You're a veteran player that's been around for a while. When Cromm came out, I'm willing to bet that you tried him a few times, and after being slaughtered repeatedly during his final phase, you gave up. You didn't want to put forth the effort to practice and learn the final phase b/c it wasn't something you could quickly pick up. Had you persevered through Cromm back in the day to the point of mastering his last phase, you probably wouldn't be here complaining about him today, nor would you dislike Macha's last phase.

I'm not trying to insult you, but this is just my impression of you. You strike me as a person that wants to take the simple and easy road. You even insinuated this when you mentioned Claire's phase not being so bad because its "easy and short." You also portrayed a dislike for mechanics, claiming that you "just wanna hit some ****, the less interference, the better." This shows that you're not interested in added complexity, but are rather in favor of easy fights that don't require much thought. This is supported by you saying that you didn't start doing Cromm until after he was nerfed, IE: after the difficulty and need for mechanical thought was removed.

I'm willing to bet that this is the underlying reason as to why you like Colru better. He's a raid that you're already good at, and he doesn't require any thought b/c once the golems are dead, he's just a 3 minute sandbag. All you gotta do is stand at mid range and fling spells while only having to dodge or re-position on rare occasion. Compare that to Cromm where you actually have to try, I can see why you probably don't like him.

Again, I'm not trying to offend or insult you. This is just the type of person you seem like to me, and you have my sincerest apologies if this upsets you in any way.