Discussion - Has 'Elite' content become too easy, and should 'Elite Plus' content still continue?

With all the recent staff changes and a roadmap of content on the horizon for DCUO going further into 2024, I think it is time for this discussion.

While I have been a supporter of keeping 'Elite Plus' content releases in DCUO, we now have a mostly new team of content designers and developers from previous recent years who have yet to really show their creative side in terms of mechanics in content going forward, while previous content designers are either more behind the scenes or in most cases no longer working on DCUO. Additionally, many recent 'Elite Plus' raids have become more mitigated in difficulty, adding a few extra mechanics but otherwise feeling more like how 'Elite' raids used to be up until Wonderverse. With the exception of Source Wall raid's Elite Plus version, elite plus hasn't really felt like elite plus for many endgame players.

Which then leads onto the discussion of 'Elite' content, which is often a slightly more difficult 'Normal' for endgame players with occasional exceptions.

So the BIG question/s is/are, is it time to make current 'Elite' content as difficult as current 'Elite Plus' content, while in turn retiring Elite Plus going forward? (The devs could then use the resources for 'Elite Plus' to either make a second raid or another content release)

I would like to hear this discussion from all sides if possible, and please be respectful to others.

Elite+ is just content made for groups who are art swapping and endgame geared thats why its not solving the underlaying issue of the community requests that are mostly based on the core design of a raid that would be more engaging content,as someone who wants longterm engaging/challenging/skill based content its a waste of ressource and dev time to catter to such groups by doing E+ they are also unknowingly telling the community if you want to complete such content you gotta play by the fixxed rules of such groups,art swap,buff trolling etc theres little variety and its always the same whatever deals more damage use it the mechanical background of raids become secondary and less important because it all comes down to nuking it all done so fast that you dont get to experience the raid itself by much,its even easyier to play in such a group then playing normal elite with a random group.

Swe+ was different then the usual E+ because they heavily restricted the number of DPS you could use by forcing us to use more tanks allthough i believe elite should always be designed in a 2 tank setup and be heavily focused around support rolls it shouldnt be more then 2 tanks in a 8 man group it does take away the impact of DPS if we go down from 5 to 4 DPS in a group and leaves more room for bosses and mechanics that you cant bypass with dealing damage but it still doesnt fix the issue of balance problems,swe was a improvment because that lead designer understood what to do after each episode feedback unfortunatly after the lead designer left all the episodes raids released afterwards were completly different and very underwhelming.

Elite would be enough if they went ahead and did balance changes and designed content differently back in the days they did it right and content was amazing because the content wasnt impacted at all much by the dps output of the group but nowadays its flipped the support rolls like tank lost their once great impact (trollers just became the dps buffer)

(i would like to know a devs perspective on this topic).

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You can run Elite+ without art swapping, more so as DPS, Heal or Tank. Art swapping can be advantageous but certainly not a requirement.

Agreed, mechanics should be more engaging. I would like to see more heal focused mechanics to encourage pure healing or even better force 2 heals in a group (a heal swap mechanic for example). A boss fight with both a heal swap mechanic and a tank swap mechanic in an elite raid would be interesting.

More tanks doesn't equal better content. While I enjoyed the mechanics of SWE+ and to a degree the difficulty, I didn't like that it was so over reliant on tanks to make it challenging (it was challenging for all roles but more because of positioning/timing of mechanics). 2 Tanks is a good amount for an elite raid, *maybe* 3 tanks for a specific feat (like the one from Flashtastic Voyage Elite).

The dev who did Source Wall Elite also did the raids from Sins of Black Adam and The Terrorium. The Terrorium was held back because of the background art design of the raid.

Elite needs mechanics that focus more on particular roles to encourage having more than 1 tank or more than 1 heal, with only the most competent groups in endgame being able to solo support and manage multiple mechanics and perform their roles effectively once they had max gear and had become very familiar to the mechanics.

FGSe last boss needed 2 healers last boss because of the Cage breakouts and having 1 healer caged while the other heals/shields the group as necessary. In certain groups a very well co-ordinated group and a competent solo heal could finish this boss when the raid came out, but this was generally rare even among the top top players and required more skill from the group.

HIVE Elite last boss needed more support roles because of the gas damage over time mechanic, the damage check and mechanic for the adds during the Terra boss fight. That fight in general was very well structured and punished the group if they slacked on doing mechanics or DPSing adds in time by increasing the gas DOT. *

*Similarly the second boss in False Idols Elite also required sufficient heals, shielding, damage and adherence to mechanics to pass the forge/lava phase.

Agreed, although with many of the current dev team being very recent additions (including Lead Producer/Creative Director) I would like the devs to play and experience the game fully before weighing in on this subject. It would give this thread some optimism if the new hires play this game through to endgame and are playing the content that the endgame players are experiencing to really get all sides of the discussion from their own personal experiences playing the game.

This may be controversial, but I don't think they should have bothered with Elite + at all. Because a group of players has played together for months or potentially even years and have a lot of experience with the game and one another, they are not going to have too much trouble beating any content.

And that is also because even if they do have trouble, they all know each other, they are willing to fail, willing to teach and they will do so until they succeed and it becomes 'easy' for them. Sure sometimes they beat content day one, first try, etc. And yeah, maybe it should not be THAT easy, but it's only that easy because those that beat it are likely very experienced with the game.

If the same could be said with random queued group, then sure, elite has become too easy. But we all know that sure as heck is not the case, as often random groups have trouble in regular content.

Take arts and augs off. Run it how content was ran originally. That’ll definitely sort the issue out.

Most within this game now max their renown using the solo or alert, then pretend they cleared the raid(s) on day one. I still think they should remove all elite gear, and go back to the very random OP drops. “Elite” gear isn’t “Elite” it’s purchased now with replays ffs.

But like I said… take your arts etc off, and go run the content for more of a challenge.

They should be more focused on fixing the s***show that is this game now, than worrying about harder content, that caters to a very, very small %

When the developers made stats revamp they showed the content can be beat with an experienced group no matter the gear or skill points only that it would take them many hours to accomplish. Unfortunately Elite and Elite Plus is an extreme waste of development time. because if done with an experienced group with gear and skill points the content becomes cheesed even more so with artifacts and allies and if you add swapping in there. What would the game be like if they dropped an episode with a lot more regular content instead of wasting development time on Elite and Elite Plus. Would there be a massive increase in player base because there's more regular content?? Hmm I think so given the fact that only 3% of the player base are experienced enough to handle Elite mechanics and rotations at the sametime

I second this. The random gear drops back in the day gave the raids a lot more replayability. Especially the cosmetic styles. Thinking back to when everyone from all tiers used to run Ace Chemicals just to try and roll on the Kick Me back piece.

Remove Elite and maybe set a note under raids/alerts that says what level they suggest your arts should be at when running the raid. Similar to the "suggested cr" note and the minimum domincance requirement.

Make the game feel rewarding to play again!

Personally, Elite+ should be in the game but only drop cosmetic items like previous survival modes.
Supply drops, orbitals, henchmen, outfits, pets

E+ should not have feats. They can have feats but make them 0 stars and titles only.
That way if you wanna get all the rare cool stuff, you push and test yourself, if you dont care for it, no reason to do it

Elite is not a waste of development time.

The reason people do not go into elites is because the bar is already set high for wanting Certain artifacts, good dps and so on. Elites are simple if people would learn, however high end players who only care about high damage input or looking good in front of other will not be willing to teach people elite.

I have taken my League members through elites, taught them mechanics and now its a common thing we do weekly. Sure the damage is not the greatest as most have 120 artifacts, it could be a lot higher, but we get it done because people learn.
Elites are not a waste of development time. Most elites are the normal raid but just scaled up and the enemies special attacks are 1 hit mechanics. Think of the new raid CT. CT you have spinning wonder woman, Circe chain lightning, Hecate soul absorbing, final bosses you have the whip, swamp things poison field, Zatannas special attack and Deadman's trapeze. In elite, all of those still appear but they are now mostly 1 shot mechanics whereas normal they are used and the team is hit for 50% hp

Elite + is a waste of time in the regards of what you are thinking of. New mechanics are added. That's about it, which those could be added in a few days by a small team. The only thing that needs balancing is the enemies stats.
but in the grand scheme of things, development time on elites and more is not an issue because they go from the base raid and change the stats/modify the damage of mechanics.

There will ALWAYS be a hardcore group of players no matter what game there is and the end game.
DCUO - E+ for the 1%
Destiny 2 - Raids for the 16%. Hard raids for the 6%. Speedrunning for the >1%
Black Desert Online - PvP sieges, Dungeons, group content, The newest of spots to play that only the top 1% can do because they are maxed out already.

A game needs a way to allow players to push themselves, no matter the game. If you remove elite content, the game will die out quick because what are people to do? Speed run the normal version that can be done by a basic random group in less than 10mins anyways? Open world bounties (WV/31st/dakota) that will only give marks for the DLC they are in so they can eventually buy a crappy aura for a feat after 50+ bosses?

If there is no end game, the game is as good as dead unless they bring survivals, hoard modes and other ways to cater for an end game.

With the current state of the game, the lack of feat runs, lack of old content playing, the people hating stat clamp, the people who cant find old content to do for feats because no one wants to help. What are players supposed to do after they log in for 20 mins a day to do dailies, alert, solo/duo and then leave. There would be no point staying around unless you need to farm SM or nth lol

Elite and Elite plus are the reason we only get a few reg content per episode. Elite and Elite plus are where only 3% of the player base is. That means tge rest of the player base is doing regular content? Don't you think they should invest more time into making way more regular content since that's where 90% of the player base is at. What if elite and Elite plus were pit together and that development time was put into pvp wouldn't that make more sense

But you also have to see that those 3% are probably putting more money into the game than the 90%.
Im not saying you are wrong in wanting more regular content, but if there is no higher end content that the community has been asking for a while then there is nothing people are gonna do. They are gonna play the raid, weekly and then daiilies for 20mins a day and then leave the game again because whats the point in putting in so much effort into the game when you are just gonna be the same as any other DPS/Tank/Troll/Healer.

As soon as DB takes away the elite content and does not find a viable solution to catering to the 3%, then they will lose a lot of people AND a lot of money.

The elite content only contributed to making people more arrogant towards each other, making judgements before even knowing the possible difficulties encountered by certain players. The different modes of movement have contributed to this, as have the game's different gameplay elements, some of which have been forgotten for too long by the devs.

The elite content is just one more factor to encourage criticism among players who haven't made the best choices, here and there...

Elite+ content is already heavily dependent on people using cheesy elements of the game to overcome it, I wouldn't like to see normal elite content turned in to that, because it's bad enough in elite+, so my answer is no.

The developers need to fix the broken elements of the game players are relying on to beat elite+ content easily in the first place like heavy artifact swapping, stacking gadgets precision players or nature gorillas and then acting like it's all too easy.

Once those things are fixed we could then perhaps have a proper discussion about difficulty settings.

The higher end content has always been the pvp mode. why they are making elite content and elite plus is beyond me. The problem with this game is pve is washed up it's extremely repetitive and boring it doesn't hold player retention like it use to when they dropped pve and pvp content together sametime

I think the issue is that in order to make the content for 'everyone' you need to have too wide a swing in difficulty from top to bottom for 1 raid version...even 2 now I suppose.

When Elite was invented back in ToTD, the swing consisted of a minimum CR to 'max' at the time(10 or 12 CR as I recall)...then SP where a reasonable minimum was probably 100 or 120 less than 'max' SP available.....maybe less. So reg started to get 'too easy' if your group was on the 'max' side of things, even though it could be a struggle in a minimum group. So along came elite to give those players the same challenge that a lower player would find in reg. Now the swing has not only artifacts and allies, but the ability to swap artis or SP where the range can be 500+....easy. So we need E+ to add challenge for the players near the top.

There is really no 'fix' for this, other than setting some kind of minimum outside of a 20-30 CR gap...and that would be met with rage from anyone NOT at that mark. So E+ does serve a purpose for those that wish to be challenged, and 'Elite'....although it seems easier than it used to be...is easier mainly because of those E+ players who just don't feel like going for that challenge.

Personally I don't want or 'need' E+....but I know it's not for me. What I'd like to see is a removal of the SP that are jammed in there, replacing those with titles, styles or shiny items like in SM, where the mode becomes more 'optional' for those who want the option. Leave the challenge there for the try hards and competitive types...they play the game too.

Well said post, I also don't really like progression being put behind difficulty settings, I feel like we should all be able to progress on an even playing field then when you play elite and elite+ you're going to extra shiny cosmetics and other things that give you bragging rights, not things that make you statistically better.

For the most part I disagree, and would agree with some previous posters that experienced players who know how to go about certain mechanics can do so regardless of artifact swap. Prime example being that Neron's Underworld, The Terrorium and Cursed Themyscira all share very similar first boss encounters. All 2 bosses, at least one boss having a reflect mechanic, and both have to be defeated at similar time. Once you are familiar with that then it is just more about being comfortable avoiding AOE attacks, blocking at the right moments, and being familiar if not competent at your own role.

The reason I say for the most part is that there is one particular artifact that has made certain situations in certain boss fights cheesy: Lasso of Truth. While it is smart it is very situational even during specific boss encounters and only used to pull adds that have some mechanic or objective during the boss encounter away from the boss or away from using an ability that will cause issues to the group. This is the case during Source Wall Elite Plus with the Destroyer adds during the Dark Knights fight, and again with the Thought adds during the Ethereal Hecate fight in the Elite plus version of Cursed Themyscira. Outside of highly endgame players this is a very niche artifact that the majority of players (certainly not main tanks) wouldn't consider, and normally in these situations Lasso of Truth will be used by a DPS or a Controller.

Again there is a misconception that artifact swapping is paramount to success for elite plus content, and while it can be advantageous it is not a must.

Mechanics I feel are a much bigger factor regarding elite/e+ content.

Valid point.

There are so many levels of difficulty in DCUO now subjective to what artifacts/allies the player has and at what level.

Someone in an earlier post did make a point about elite renown being rewarded from elite solos/duos and elite alerts. Leave those at the difficulty they are already at and make the elite raids as elite plus raids are currently? That is one possible idea.

The issue with the idea of removing SP from elite/elite plus is incentive. Will endgame players still want to run that content if there are no feats with SP to farm for? Good example: Fractured God Sphere (Elite). I ran this raid weekly (if not more) for the duration of Wonderverse until Long Live the Legion came out - because it had plenty of feats to farm for, like the bug feat and other great feats like the no die feats and the damage check.

Even things like henchmen/supply drop. SWE+ (while still remaining the hardest raid in the game despite being 2 years old) has the Source Shard Supply Drop on last boss with the 25pt feat. CTE+ will likely still be run after next episode comes out because of the henchmen and 50 point feat. Without those you lose incentive to run these raids later.

This kinda ties into another point I have (the other side of the coin). Few if any players run the following content nowadays:

- FFE (Stages 2-5)
- SDE (Stages 2-5)
- ROEE+
- NUE+
- TTE+

Once elite plus is no longer in the current episode, very few players will revisit it later after the episode is no longer the most recent. (Unless there are farm feats or rare drop feats that have SP attached). Elite plus is only relevant for the duration of that episode.

It could be that the next episode (Brainiac Returns) has 2 raids that both have elite and elite plus versions. But it could also be true that when the following episode releases, barely anyone will run the elite plus raids from Brainiac Returns or most of the elite plus raids preceding that.

Which begs the question: If Elite Plus raids were to cease having feats with SP attached, should Elite Plus become a timed event similar to the event version of the raid, that expires when the next episode releases?

Apologies for the lengthy reply, but hopefully this will add some nuance to the ongoing discussion

That's nice.

The real problem is the players who are abusing exploits like swapping in DKS to evade the cool down on orbital support, then they're also swapping out Ebon to avoid losing their stacks. Poison Ivy is incredibly over powered in the way it has buffed nature and then the issues with DKS and Ebon are fueling that even further.

You talk about Lasso of truth, which is limited in the way it provides benefit and really only helps with certain very few mechanics like Hecate's spectres' or the adds in TSW, I don't actually think this is a problem because that artifact even when used like that isn't working in a way that contravenes its design.

On the other hand, the abuse of Ebon and DKS and numerous other artifacts being exploited, like MERCY and in a sense P-Stone are impacting all boss battles, especially those that then suddenly intend to have burn checks that start to get balanced around damage obtained through this abuse, because players keep giving difficulty feedback while exploiting and this is naively not being picked up at the development level.

I won't even start on gadgets.

Yes.. but pvp is dead. You are saying remove the only content that is a challenge. Pvp is full of imbalance just as much as pve. You are saying "Get rid of endgame, there is a forgotten, un-updated for 5 years content that is to be played"