CS Mission - The Crusaders still too difficult

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Razorfall, Dec 10, 2020.

  1. hiolpe Journeyman

    Putting my thoughts here so a different perspective can be heard. I'm in a large non-raiding guild with a broad degree of game-investment. Some members are just starting out, some players like to dabble with high level content, and some players have max group gear/AA/trophies/augs etc. I would have participated in beta but I'm still working on my character.

    I appreciate some challenge in the group game. I wouldn't want to play a game where I can solo or box "difficult" group content including missions. That's why I'm playing Everquest and not Guild Wars 2, FF XIV, or any other mmo that doesn't have the holy trinity in place. However, when players with raid gear/focii/max AA are finding "group" content difficult that's a sign of an overturned event. I think completing group missions should be more accessible to the larger player base. I'll respond to some comments from a different perspective for a contrast.

    Prior expansion raid gear is still much better than CoV T1/T2 group gear, which is what should be required to successfully complete missions. Players that don't want to dedicate themselves to a raiding schedule should still be able to complete all group content including special achievements.

    CoV group content should indeed be easy with ToV raid gear because ToV raid gear is much better than any group player will ever see. Group content should be tuned for those who cannot commit to a raid schedule.

    I agree that learning mechanisms behind an event and executing is a satisfying feeling. I think the playerbase is a lot more diverse than this forum might have one believe. I still get a rush when I complete ToV group missions even though these were deemed trivial by many on this forum. I get excited when I put a good group together to knock out special achievements. I'm sure a lot of my guild mates feel a similar sense of satisfaction. What may be trivial for one player is challenging for another player. CoV missions being challenging for players who can commit to a raid schedule means trouble ahead for a large portion of the non-raid force playerbase.
  2. Zuul New Member

    After the second crusader is dead, you will start getting green text in your main chat saying "power grows in the (NW, SW, NE or SE)." These locations correspond to the corners where the crusaders are. If you send a toon to the specified location and have them stand in the aura until they get a success message, it will nullify the AoE. After 3rd is dead, the emote will give 2 locations and you will need to send out 2 toons; one to each location. Remember to avoid the cubes. Kill adds first as they spawn; do not try to kill them between crusaders or the event will reset. Don't try to buff recently rezed players between crusaders or you will time out and reset. Run immediately to the next crusader and engage as quickly as possible. Pull the crusaders to the corner to avoid getting banished. Good luck!
    Ironkeg and Slide like this.
  3. Sissruukk Rogue One

    Is the thing with the auras a one time thing per crusader (3rd and 4th) or do you need to keep running back and forth, to and fro? Seems like they are intentionally trying to keep DPS off the crusaders.

    I agree that the adds need to be taken down before taking down the crusader you are currently on, but right now it appears as if the adds have the same amount of HP as the crusader, and if you are peeling off DPS for the auras then you are kind of screwed.
  4. Szilent Augur

    Adds ~50M hp, dragons ~150M hp, both depending on fight time since they have decent regen. A higher dps group will record less total damage.

    The dps variable is not present in The Call mission. Each warder has 136M hp no matter how fast or slow it's killed. That's a kindness, since whichever one you do 4th invariably goes invulnerable a dozen+ times.
    Redsumm and Sissruukk like this.
  5. Xianzu_Monk_Tunare Augur

    To really be fair, the raiders say that they don't test the group stuff in raid gear. They make a betabuff toon and do the group content on those. The people who tend to actually do the group content in raid gear usually tend to be people who are actually group level players from my experiences
  6. Xianzu_Monk_Tunare Augur

    There are far more issues with that old way then there are with the new paradigm. The current way the best group items (excluding the ultra rares) are obtainable by everyone, while the old way typically leads to people not being able to get the best items for their class because of RNG.
  7. Yinla Ye Ol' Dragon

    Beat this tonight for the first time with a guild raid group, Bard, SK, Rogue, Monk, Cleric and Wizzy. Was like a different mission. :)

    Huge difference between group geared chars and raid geared chars, tanking was close with a raid geared SK, DPS was a lot faster so less healing was needed anyway, rank 3 spells and raid level foci for spell/discs helped get the dragons deaded faster. CoV spells/discs won't make much difference as so few were upgraded and were also ones not usually used.
    Corwyhn Lionheart likes this.
  8. Vaeeldar Augur

    Raid gear tanking being close is always a concern. I have a war in tow t2 raid, a pal and and a sk in in high end group gear. The sk can semi/sort of compete with passive healing but even then not really. There is a massive difference between a raid and even top end group geared tank.
    Corwyhn Lionheart likes this.
  9. Szilent Augur

    That part of the anecdote is suspect. And is, notably, not told from the perspective of either the tank or the healer. I 2h through that mission as a warrior (so no LichSting/taps). I don't doubt that a warrior with less gear than I might want to dual wield instead for safety, or would put off the mission until filling defensive AA (I had nothing new defensively until this morning), but… yeah, "tanking being close" is not how I'd describe the potential concerns of The Crusaders
  10. Szilent Augur

    Emote is timed, you won't get any during the 3rd dragon if you're going fast.

    Also, there is no consequence to failing the emote. At least the first 1-2 times. There is an additional (pretty serious) dot that expands from Yelinak's room to encompass the fight area if several emotes are failed.

    Unless you're seeking the achievement, stay on your dragon.
  11. ArtremasEQ Augur


    No it dosn't reset, can kill dragon/adds in any order. Do this all the time.
    Also Adds despawn when you open the chest.
  12. ArtremasEQ Augur

    Avoiding the cube is so trivial. If 'stuff happens', do better positioning. This is not the concern for this mission.

    The AE's on the other hand.. in all the CoV missions, the AE's are brutal for group geared players. Both HP ones, and mana drains. Never mind what happens when you start on some of the achieves.

    When a full, optimal grp of top raid geared players have to 'work fairly hard' to complete many of the Hero mission achieves, (with mana issues for chars that don't have mana issues on raids), then I humbly suggest they are 'overtuned' for group geared players who may have no chance at completing them.

    PS: To be clear, I personally liked that they are hard, and have enjoyed doing them all over last 5 days many times, for all the achieves (except the bugged ones). BUT I worry about the ability for the general population to do them.. I wonder if DPG's intent was 'start hard, tune down later' or something.
    FawnTemplar, Yinla and Sissruukk like this.
  13. ArtremasEQ Augur


    Easiest to Hardest, my estimate.
    1. Zlandicar
    2. CS - Crusaders
    3. ST - Vulak
    4. ToV - Arryonar

    This changes depending on straight mission vs Achieves.
    Arryonar has by far the hardest achieve.
    Axxius likes this.
  14. Yinla Ye Ol' Dragon

    From my log
    Was too far a way from the bodyguard for the kill message, but that was just as it died. Looks like a reset to me as the dragons reappeared.
  15. Sissruukk Rogue One

    Yes, you can kill them in any order. What you fail to mention, though, is whether or not you drag the add to the next Crusader or not. If you don't and focus on killing an add after you kill the current Crusader, the event will reset because you didn't engage the next one in time.
  16. Vumad Cape Wearer

    So last night I had a chance to do all 4 missions, and at present, these missions are not over tuned. Sorry, they are not. The Cliff Golum in TBL, yes, these, no.

    Some people are going to stop reading or try to invalidate my post as soon as I say we had 6 raid geared toons, but if you take that stance, then your view point is invalid by your bias.

    CoV launched on Wednesday. We beat all 4 missions on Sunday. 2 of the players had completed 2-3 of the events and had attempted but failed the last event.

    Yes, we are raid geared, but raid armor has about 8.9k HP. The new T2 visible in this expansion are about 8k HP.

    The problem with the group vs raider argument, is that the content does needs to be tuned to the group. Thing is, it IS tuned to the group. The actual problem is that Raiders have PRE-PAID while groupers have not. I am not saying that groupers are wanting something for free, but there is no credit in EverQuest. You pay in advance, or you pay after launch.

    There is NO WAY that the casual players have camped enough named in the last 3 days to be fully CoV T2/3 group geared with appropriate augs. I'm sorry, but if you haven't raided to pre-pay for your armor, you need to go get it and then complain. The CoV group armor from non-missions is a significant upgrade from ToV group armor. Non-raiders need to go get it. (Sidebar; Augs don't drop in raids, so raiders have the same augs as everyone else).

    We raid 3 nights a week. In that time I could complete all 4 missions. That means I have, only counting 50 weeks of the year, 300 opportunity to do missions (4*3*25, it was said above it takes 200 missions). So if a non-raider followed our raid schedule, of only raiding, not including any of our grouping time, of 9-10 hours of gameplay per week, they could spend 6 months gearing up in CoV and then still have 6 months to finish getting their CoV mission augs before the expansion ends. And since not all of the missions are that hard, they can start on the ones they can beat now and work their way into the content.

    I am sorry to tell the people complaining that farming armor, grinding AA and dying in the development of a strat is part of EQ, but it is.

    Maybe these events could use a slight slide back from where they are at some point, but for 3 days after the expansion launched, no, they are not over tuned. People need to go farm the CoV group armor. This is a year worth of content.
    Yendar likes this.
  17. Sissruukk Rogue One

    Therein lies the problem. Because you are a raider, you already have the gear. The most efficient way for group geared people to get gear/augs/weapons of T2+ value is by doing the missions, not going out and hoping some named mob camp is open for you to camp it.
  18. Ironkeg New Member


    I can't speak to group gear. But these missions are very doable in raid gear. I ran through all four missions last night in a raid geared group. It took us an hour and 27 minutes from first kill to last kill. We had one death and that's on me (shaman healer). It helps that some spent five hours plus dying in a particular mission figuring out the mechanics during beta.

    I'd like to try the mission with a group geared up in the best ToV and/or CoV gear. To my mind, the right tuning is if a group in the best ToV gear who knows the mechanics can complete all four missions. If you're in the best CoV gear and know the mechanics, a properly tuned mission should be farmable.
    Yendar and Vumad like this.
  19. Syylke_EMarr Augur


    The problem is that, for groupers, the purpose of these missions is as a way to obtain this gear. So tuning the missions for max geared groupers is wrong. They should be tuned for groupers in T2/3 ToV and some CoV gear.

    I have not personally attempted most of the missions yet, so I cannot speak to their current level of tuning.
  20. Velisaris_MS Augur

    I have yet to see people post strategies for toons in a mix of T3 ToV group/T1 CoV group gear, especially people boxing without using 3rd party software. I've seen some posts about using a fully raid geard tank with other characters in a mix of gear, but if people are beating missions with tanks in ToV group gear, I want to see that information (it's possible some have and I just missed it).

    The moment I see any post start out with "six fully raid geared toons", I stop reading because absolutely NOTHING in that post is going to be relevant to group geared players.

    If these missions can't be beat by players (with some boxing) in full T3 ToV group gear, then they're overtuned. I'm not talking about steamrolling a mission via dps (like Velk's) or making it easy enough to be on "farm status." I'm talking about just being able to beat the mission, after learning the strats...so it is possible to START gearing up. Expecting people to only be able to gear up via named is nonsense.

    I'll give an example of what I mean:
    After a few tries at the Kael mission, my guildmates and I learned the strats/emotes and were able to beat it. Some of us boxed at least 2 toons during these missions. We were in a mix of TBL T2/T3 and ToV T1 group gear. We died a lot. And we had to use Staunch Recovery for the first couple of wins, until we started to gear up in ToV stuff...*VIA THE MISSIONS*. We don't raid, so no raid gear for any of us. We were not in the best gear available, but we were able to learn the strategy and beat the missions so that we COULD gear up, and eventually put everything on farm status.

    If the scenario I've described isn't viable for the CoV missions, then they're overtuned. And I don't want to hear another story about raid geared toons, with 6 actual players who don't have to worry about boxing, come in and start spouting their "git gud" nonsense.