Dev Discussion Starro: The Threat Below Raid Feedback

One question for the devs since the new changes to the raid. Is it your intention for the majority of members (at the recommended CR) to be able to finish this raid, or are you wanting it to be more like a SM event? Cause the majority of groups I've been in haven't been able to get past the second boss. The starfish spawning heal Aquaman way too fast, even with troll heal debuff.

1. I understand you want to make it more difficult to get the feats.
2. I think there might be an error where people think this is supposed to be an elite raid. Is that what you want this to be?

I hesitate to ask for nerfs, but I want my spores on all 3 of my alts which are recommended CR level. But I can't get into a group because people only want 190 or 191 now because of the burn needed. Perhaps this is why people are hesitant to even form groups for this raid now, just like it was on test server. I personally like the mechanics, but I don't want to have to look for 2 tanks, 2 heals and pray that everyone knows how to communicate, just to pass a quick raid. Sigh.

I ran the raid twice(clamped version) - in my first run I got loot from final boss and treasure box only. So I ran it again to confirm and this time I got the loot from First Boss. My league mates faced the same issue before. Is it intended? Like we gotta run it twice to get all the bosses and treasure box locked. Keep in mind I am talking about the clamped version only. Thanks.

Hello! I just wanted to chime in and address a few bugs.

- I don't know how or why but loot on the first boss in the clamped version is somehow linked with the member raid. So say for example you reset the clamped and are also unlocked for the member. Sometimes (it doesn't always occur) you will receive loot, but you look after the raid and notice you are now locked from the first boss in the member version and not clamped. Another example is if you are locked from member but unlocked from clamped, you will not receive loot because the game thinks you are locked due to member raid being locked. It's really annoying.

- The add "Mature Starro" splits off into 2 smaller versions I think they are called "Young Starro" can sometimes spawn outside the walls of the raid and can stop progression indefinitely. The way to produce this bug I found was very simple, kill the Mature Starro next to a wall or ceiling and when the 2 Young Starro spawn, they will spawn outside the walls/ceiling preventing going any further in the raid.

- Final Boss attack know as "Flatten" in both versions of the raid are one-shotting everyone including tanks. This is most definitely bugged because even if you have a Shield + Consecrated Ground + while blocking, you still die.Yes you can avoid it if you are out of range but that doesn't justify the broken attack.

Edit:
- It hasn't happened to me, but a league mate told me he was once labeled as the opposite faction (in this case, a villain) and was unable to heal, or pick people up because he was a villain. I don't know how to reproduce this I'm afraid.

possibly add a red skull when he is about to hit someone with his beam

So why is it broken? Because it's a one shot no matter what? A lot of other MMOs have one-shots that need to be avoided and not taken, and I can't see why this game can't. Maybe the addition of a skull or a longer animation before he does Flatten would make it more manageable and easier, but one-shots for the Tanks and other roles make it more engaging and require more than just the ability to block and be able to live through it.

Personally I don't think that's needed. The laser goes to the furthest group member away. We position ourselves so we have a second tank taking the laser at all times and if for some reason it doesn't go on him (Starro spins towards him and makes him not the furthest one away for example), we have our highest CR dd, troll or heal stand behind the rest of the group and he/she can live through it at 192 as long as he/she gets healed through the DoT.

If anything needs a skull, it's definitely the move Flatten but I'm not for or against it getting a skull.

Hey Light FX, appreciate the detailed feedback.

We made the Starro's spawn faster because we felt they weren't threatening enough. We got some early reports suggesting that Aquaman's member version was trivial. But after looking at the data from the weekend I'm going to tune it back the way it was.

As for adding the knockdown, that was done because some people were tanking Aquaman into a corner and KO'd him rather quickly. This either reduced the amount of times he went to the center or prevented it all together.

One shot no matter what and based on the following quote, I can only assume it's broken.

Without an obvious tell that messages "Hey, this thing is going to hurt" we don't want attacks to 1 shot. The Double Beam and Flatten attacks were meant to hit a little bit harder than normal, but not to the extent of 1 shots.

Is it possible to leave Flatten as a one shot with an easier and longer tell? Have him move into position and stay motionless (as in no spinning) with a skull attack for a two or three seconds. This tells the group that he's about to do it and they have time to get out. If nothing one shots, there's no reason to actually care about working around and avoiding the damage of mechanics no? You can just sit there and take it.

Thanks for the response. We did the feat this weekend after the hotfix and it was certainly a pain lol but we got it done after about 30 mins or so of trying different approaches. I hope its not being changed back because of what i said about it. I was only questioning the why of it. Im guessing some would struggle w/it the way it is now tho. As for the knockdown i can say we didnt even notice it. It was hectic so maybe we just missed it.

1. Regarding flatten, something definitely needs to be done about it. What's the point of being a tank if you can't survive no matter what you do? Unless there was a skull, then you'd know it was coming.

2. Regarding the starro spawns, I also agree it needs to be tuned down. But if you guys want to keep the Starro spawn rate the way it is to make it more dangerous, that's fine. With 2 healers (or 1 if they're really fast and have shielding abilities especially) the damage is strong but manageable. The only thing that would need to be nerfed in this case would be the healing out to Aquaman. It just makes him regenerate health too quickly, especially considering the amount of adds/tentacles that need to be dpsed.

I think a lot of people were unhappy with the way it was, just judging from the groups I've been in and how hard it is to form groups outside of your own league.

that's the thing a majority of the player base isn't going to be 192 for quite sometime. the idea of two tanks is one to look into will try in tonights run. the closest we have got was getting him to 10% just but running around playing hit and block lol.

U know how people can be. 1 person speaks about something and if it gets changed they think that person is responsible.

TLantern, found something that might sort out the problem with the Clamped Raid loot locking the Member version for Aquaman. Queued up the Clamped version and noticed that when it popped it said 'You can enter your Starro: The Threat Below (Raid) instance now. Assigned role: Any'. The thing to note there is that when we queued for the Clamped version, it actually told us we were going into the Raid/Member version when we actually weren't. Could that be the problem with the Aquaman loot splitting between Clamped and Member?

It's not just from what you said. It looks like many groups were struggling to even beat Aquaman without attempting the feat. This Raid is unique in that we wanted it to be challenging for high CR players, but still accessible and fun since it is an Event. The fight as a whole isn't fully reverting to the way it was, just the timers are set back to default. Nailing down that difficulty while remaining fun is tough to pull off, but I think we're closer now. And you guys have helped a lot with all the feedback, and I'll continue to listen and take in what everyone is saying.

I was in three different group yesterday, 1 run was tanking 188 cr solo, 2 healers 1 troll rest dps, we did it in 25 minutes was really easy we got three feats out of there, one of the players was 190 the rest in between 187 189 cr, pug group I wasn't even in ins chat. Was so easy.

The other two went bad really bad, not because it's difficulty but mostly because of the quality of the players damn they were bad, even the group was w 190 191 cr but they didn't seems to try any mechanics lol. THE RAID dificulty is NOT the problem, the kind of PLAYERS, the game itself is cattering to IS, Nerfing this is encouraging that. Why don't you guys just give loot away and be done with it, just as the clamped version!!!!!!

Flatten is a multi-hit attack. It shouldn't KO you on the first hit anymore, but if you stand in it without blocking it can still be deadly. It should now be similar to a fire field, if you are in it get out.

I have another tiny protip. Starro will use his Flatten attack when he detects if someone is behind him. Pay close attention to where you're standing!

I for one appreciate this immensely. I think that the feat is tough, but it might be because I just don't have a great fundamental strategy yet. Atm however, I think the feat is too difficult, even if trying to get Aquaman in the corner. I haven't found a tank that can keep him there, lol.

Also, you got a lot of ppl that don't even wanna try the feat anymore. I had a group on Sunday tell me that they are gonna give up (after one try) and will try it again when the devs fix Starro and make Aquaman more reasonable. This is a paraphrase from one of the dudes, but honestly, it's a sentiment I find shared a LOT.

Personally, I would try and try to get the feat for hours/days/weeks. But sadly, that's not everyone, and from my experience most ppl have quit on this feat.

That being said, if there's anyone that's like minded and wants to try the no death fear till we get it, let me know. IGN is MaverickRaven

Our Ice Tank is able to just survive the first hit but it's impossible to heal him up enough to survive the second and there's not enough time to roll away if he's already been hit once. If what you're saying is the way it's meant to be, it's definitely not like that and it'll need tweaking for sure.

Did not know that! We'll watch carefully and see if it's definitely working like that. We always thought it was random or if someone was underneath him which is hard to control when a Tank is tanking him.

EDIT: Just finished a Member version of the Raid with pugs and sadly as you probably know, pug runs are rather messy and uncontrolled, but I tried watching how the Flatten attack worked and it definitely seems like it's activating after he does a dive forward and then checks if someone is behind him. Just want to say that it's a really cool boss mechanic. Good job!

The member raid since that crazy buff they done to it is almost like it's freakin IMPOSSIBLE , literally Aquaman healing back to full even with a dang health debuff on ...smh ... Ya can't not die on that due to how many dang 1 shots he does , My entire group was all 191 + 192 on point with communication & I can say this , round 13 of SM was easier then this dang raid . Not dying the entire raid , well if you didn't luck up & get the feats on the first day , don't expect to get it now since they buffed it .