Dev Discussion Episode 46: Cursed Themyscira Raid

Welcome to gorgeous Themyscira! See the sights with Wonder Woman and Circe! Explore the town! Confront Hecate on her own turf and help release the her Curse once and for all!

This is the feedback forum for Episode 46 Raid, Cursed Themyscira. Please leave any feedback, thoughts, and comments on what you experience. Have a great time!

- Beta and BeanCan

This was enjoyable on elite. Our league really had fun in it and loved the update to Hecate. We struggled and wiped a few times to get the hang of it as a league, but we made it through to the end.

I appreciate the transformations not clearing your pet. Thank you for that.

One of Hecate's attacks in the second fight causes your audio to go crazy low and doesn't come back until you zone.

She also can be knocked out of her shield animation by something. I couldn't remember which, but it stopped her attack that time.

A little feedback on the operation part... Having it end with the shielded bosses felt weird. Like, we expected to fight a big boss after killing them, but when the headline popped, we were like, "that's it". Felt a little anticlimactic. Almost like, really, the second boss would have been nice as the last boss kinda thing.

In the end, our league loved the difficulty and setting. The return to Themyscira was done in a good way. The filter on the Hecate fight was interesting, very dream like. (Like in that Metal duo.) The bosses were using new mechanics that were not really used before, which was refreshing. (Though, the jump over the ring part was a little silly.) Really, just enjoyed this elite raid.

Ran normal on my alt villain. We did the cross faction thing and one of my leaguemates who didn't logout and switch and just dropped so another villain could join got this weird error:

Sryy but wtf is this raid? Elite felt like an event version 15mins 0 deaths on first run isnt elite. 6 months waiting to be bored in less than a week boring raid boring feats next time just giv us the Loot n marks by hitting the dummies for 5mins.

Done the raid on switch for first time yesterday. Hardest part found was the ethereal Hecate part esp for some of the players in my league are a bit visually impaired. It would be nice if the blue speed areas were a bit clearer and brighter maybe to help them. I give raid a 8/10

I would say wonder woman and circe fight was similar to shock raids first boss and nerons underground the 2 big fatsos

I can see that, but I think it would be closer to that Halls of Power raid with Mantis and Kalibak.

I was talking about the last battle of the raid.

For the Dark Side of The Moon feat, does all players have to be in the fight all the time?
I mean...if someone gets KOd from something else but the rest of the group beats Hecate without getting hit by the Moons Fury attack, would the feat pop?

Cte feedback: No, not that Cte, the other.

1st Boss: Interesting. Mechanics don't feel punishing enough but overall interesting and engaging. Boss health seems good and weapon dmg output of the bosses and Bestiamorphs are also well tuned.

2nd Boss: Interesting. Mechanics are very predictable and occur not often enough for my taste. The big bubble-phase mechanic is fun and engaging. Total boss health is a bit too low to make the encouter grow to its full potential with high dmg from the group.

3rd Boss:



I played the elite raid 4x so far. 3x due to my 3 different characters and once to help someone. Times i've reset: 0
I dont see any reason why i should. No instance requires gear progression at all and now that Swe+ has fixed stats and the older instances don't require further gear progression either, there is no reason to "grind".

My feedback for the elite version of this raid so far:

Overall, this raid is a bit too easy, but I do acknowledge some new things were tried here with mechanics and the like.

1st boss:

Nothing really threatens the group to be honest, unless you get hit by Beastimorphs (and their AOEs) and/or Wonder Woman's reflect. The Cursed Pulse isn't a KO nor is the Chain Lightning, so with decent heals these can just be ignored.

2nd boss:

This boss shows some promise for future but it is a small step. Some new things were tried especially the speed zone phase with the big bubbles, which shows promise that the devs who did this are willing to try new things with mechanics going forward.

Try to give the various bubble mechanics different names in the combat log as most of them are called 'Water Spray'. It makes it easier for feedback if each of the bubble mechanics (especially during the speed zone phases) have their own distinct mechanic name.

"Last boss":

This is not a boss encounter. There are a few mechanics sure but this is far too easy, short and ends abruptly for an 'elite' raid fight. You close clouds, break Aspect of Hecate's shield and defeat it (it is basically a larger health add), then repeat 2 more times. This is arguably one of the easiest "elite" boss encounters ever released and is a big step backwards. There is zero difficulty for the group unless players don't want to get transformed to close the clouds I guess?

Overall, this raid is one of the most easy and below par raids we have had in a very long time, with the notable exception of the Ethereal Hecate fight which redeems it slightly. Hopefully going forward the devs for this raid do try more ideas like they did with the second boss to add their own stamp to upcoming content, especially when it concerns elite/elite plus which should be challenging.

Bug wise I haven't found anything thus far, so keep it up with clean releases of content.

Ideas for elite plus:

1st boss:

Circe needs to do more. Her Chain Lightning should KO players (certainly non-tank players) if the player affected with the purple arrow isn't blocking, so the whole group should block in anticipation of this. It could also apply a heal debuff to the group if this isn't blocked.

Give Circe Black Alice's Fateful Contempt ability from Rock of Eternity (Elite Plus). This is the AOE that targets a player and follows that player placing AOEs for a time, becoming deadly if that player doesn't move or if it affects other players nearby.

The red AOEs from Beastimorphs landing should KO any player who gets hit directly, and should do a moderate raidwide attack on all players.

Increased attack/defense buffs for Wonder Woman and Circe if they are too close to each other. They can also heal each other if in close proximity.

2nd boss:

Honestly not sure about this one, perhaps less reaction time between the Speed Zones appearing and Ethereal Hecate doing her big bubble phase. (again distinct mechanic names for each bubble mechanic would help a lot as I don't want to sound too vague when addressing feedback).

I would like to see some kind of heal focused mechanic applied. Maybe give the group a Madness style mechanic (Shattered Gotham) that gets more powerful later the longer the fight continues with a continual dot on the group (this doesn't interrupt reviving a fallen teammate however). Or a heal swap or tank swap mechanic similar to One Who Laughs' Callous Anger in Source Wall (Elite Plus) or Neron's Underworld Rebuke mechanic from Neron's Underworld.

And of course, most mechanics should do heavier damage or perhaps KO affected non-tank players, such as her smaller bubbles and whirlpools. The Maelstrom should also have a heavier DOT.

The blue donut AOE followed by the red AOE in the middle, these mechanics should KO any player directly impacted by these.

3rd boss:

Unless we start fighting Hecate directly and there is an entire boss fight after defeating the three aspects, nothing will save this boss encounter from being anything but easy in elite plus.

Make the orbital strikes a KO (the purple columns).

Pretty much any mechanic with projectiles flying out, those should KO a non-tank player on impact.

The red things you interact with, make them like the Nightmare Void orbs from The Terrorium (Elite/Elite Plus) where if you don't interact with them in time they explode and wipe the group. Or at least give a raidwide heavy dot and heal debuff to the group.

The group will need to defeat 5 Aspects of Hecate to finish the fight, with each Aspect having much more health. These should be like a mini-boss fight rather than an add with a few extra mechanics. Do not underestimate how strong DPS are in the DCUO community at the moment.

Have the timer to revive Wonder Woman be much less. If Wonder Woman isn't revived, Hecate will do her big bubble attack like in second boss except there are no speed zones. This will in all probability cause a group wipe (enrage mechanic)

That is all for now.

Regarding the second boss fight feat: Hardcore Parkour (Elite); does feat fail when:

1. pets take damage?
2. what if a player is hit by a water spray attack but all the damage of the water spray attack is absorbed by a shield? I think any type of Water Spray attack logged on combat log (even if a shield absorbed all of its damage) fail the feat. Am I right?

What exactly counts as a water spray attack? Some say it is all of Hecate's attacks (i.e. 360 splash attack before the ghost phase). I personally dont believe that.

I believe its only the spinning water bubbles and water bubbles which she shoots after ghost phase. The latter one has a red circle and a red cone tell before she shoots.

Lastly does the water bubbles from the water golems also count as water spray attack? I believe they are but just making sure because feat says "Hecate's water spray".

My team did everything crystal clear for the feat but feat just not popping. Something is off or pets are the issue.

I respect your time and effort you put in these suggestions but you should have written just make KO every single attack instead. We enter the fight then KOed. Lol
I don't feel that elite plus should be KOs everywhere.

Please buff the raid. It's way too easy

I like the mechanics of this raid (normal) but you have the mechanically challenged players in here. It makes it fun having to jump a ring of doom or run circles on water and etc, but expecting 7 other ppl to do the same is not always likely. I just queue it up so I get what I get, but still, oh nvm.

My feedback is too many ads in the first few sets of hallways. Last boss I feel doesn’t really tell you what to do. Abrupt ending.

Everyone has more and more pets out and it really makes each boss a hassle to play as you can’t move sometimes and can’t see anything important.

Hardcore Parkour is bugged, follow link to bug report here:
https://forums.daybreakgames.com/dc...n-cursed-themyscire-raid-elite-bugged.329510/

And what should elite plus be in ur opinion? Just another spam fest? The elite Version is already terrible and u can nearly ignore all mechs. If thats fun for u thn I should see u every Day for a longer time at the dummies glued to a Spot spamming ur Bar and having the time of ur life which u dnt need plus for or an elite ths ez

There is a glitch with the walls in the second and third boss fight where people get caught in the walls, link to bug post here:
https://forums.daybreakgames.com/dc...orcefield-walls-in-cursed-themy-raids.329511/

I actually liked the raid. Not super great but gives players a bit more to do than the last Episode's 'box arena' room.

What I see as an increasingly annoying problem, though, is sound design. NPC spoken text first and foremost needs to be 100% added to the chatbox. Important dialogue is not being recorded there for players with hearing impairments, such as Etrigan's sword puzzle hint/Batman's hint in the alert. These voiced lines of dialogue need absolute priority over any other sound effect, including music, which should be lowered while the NPCs speak (also including warnings in battle, such as when a boss mechanic is being alerted to the player by Oracle/Calculator/etc). There should also be an option to separately reduce all other player sound effects so your SFX and any NPC sfx have higher priority.

Lastly is the actual font style used for the warning/in battle messaging text. It's never been very good and is more difficult to speed read in the middle of a hectic battle. A more clear, less blocky/chunkified angle font would be much more helpful.

Well, I think not only the oneshot mechanics can make a raid harder. It's annoying af. Just make roles matter again. Eg. if you fail a mech, group gets dot that forces healers to work harder to survive. Same for other roles. Opportunities are endless. It's all about creativity but you know only ko punishment. It's getting boring that you need to avoid something in every second or you die. There can be oneshot moves, it's ok, just pls don't build a whole raid around them.

The feat should pop even if one group member got KO'd as long as no one (including the KO'd group member) got hit by Moon's Fury.