Halloween: Digging Their Graves Task

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Ishtass, Oct 31, 2015.

  1. Ishtass Augur

    I'm sure it's been mentioned before, but would like to voice my opinion that the "Digging Their Graves" task should have its lockout timer reduced significantly. You must complete this task 5 times for the parent task: "The Hunt for Tattooed Flesh". Because of the long lockout (18 hours), it will take 5 days to complete the whole thing. The entire Halloween event cycle is only live for 12 days total, making it difficult for some players to be able to complete the task before it's over.

    Also, the Digging Their Graves task has a pretty annoying mechanic, in that you can only use the required clickie once every 17 minutes. That's a huge waiting period, and seems pointlessly / arbitrarily long.

    Both of these points just force players to sit around instead of being able to work on content, and I think lifting those restrictions would make it more enjoyable. Thanks for reading.
    Silv, Motherlee, JacklSK and 2 others like this.
  2. Motherlee Augur

    Thanks for putting numbers to it.
  3. Raccoo Augur

    Tried solo a night ago for 3 hours and didn't get any tattooed zombies to spawn.
  4. Ishtass Augur

    I've thankfully had better luck on the tattooed zombies, getting the first one on my first try, and my second one on my second try. But I agree that a lot of people have had bad luck and spent hours if not days to get one. I just now completed my second run of this in 24 minutes. Now I get to wait a week because I'm leaving town tomorrow for a business trip. Hopefully I can finish the last 3 runs before the event is over.
    Motherlee and Silv like this.
  5. Silv Augur


    Agree.

    I know a guildy who had to click ~10 times just to get the update once... that would fall a bit under 3 hours of sitting around and clicking once every 17 minutes provided you did it immediately every refresh. I've even heard a horror story of it taking so long to get the zombie pop that they actually had to re-get the task [thus starting over the 18 hr lockout].

    Workaround: Log in some boxxes, bring some other friends, or log in and out on your account with the task on each person. It doesn't matter who pops the zombie, the character you care about can loot it and get the update. Is this annoying and stupid? Yes. Does it increase the chances of finishing? Absolutely. Obviously the downside is if multiple friends/boxes are trying to finish as well.

    I doubt this will ever be changed though. Even if they considered it I wouldn't see it happening this year given past experience with limited time events.

    Edit: Just to reinforce the ridiculousness, I did this with 4 characters earlier all clicking as soon as they were able and it still took an hour.
    Ishtass likes this.
  6. Ishtass Augur

    Yeah, and it still doesn't help with the long 18 hours between each of the 5 tasks ;p
    Silv likes this.
  7. Silv Augur

    True... but at least you won't be wasting multiple hours of your life clicking! It's mind boggling how someone thought an 18 hour lockout was a good idea on an event that lasts 2 weeks. Sure, you could start the Halloween tasks right when they launch but after 8 days you're more or less screwed if you couldn't start before then. So... anyone wanting to finish all your achievements, start this quest line before/on Saturday and don't miss a day. :)
    Motherlee and Ishtass like this.
  8. Silv Augur

    Additional workaround a friend told me about: Bind at quest giver. Request, attempt to spawn zombie, if fail - gate, drop task, destroy shovel, re-get, and repeat.

    Like Ish said, this doesn't alleviate the issue of having an 18 hour lockout but if you have limited playtime or don't enjoy spending hours on something trivial there are some options.
  9. Motherlee Augur

    And people wonder why we make alts, go read email, Facebook, make dinner, etc. while 'playing.'
    Silv likes this.
  10. howitz Journeyman

    Has anyone tried this quest at a lower level?, other than Field of Scale?

    I'm at 4 turn in's but it's taking some time.
    Maybe reduce the shovel recast time...
  11. Gundolin Augur

    It would be great if they eliminated or at least greatly reduced the shovel recast timer. Not sure why this type of time sink is in the game. It isn't strategy or skill to complete the quest, just patience to push your shovel every 17 minutes.
    Ishtass and Mayfaire like this.
  12. Motherlee Augur

    IIRC, you run over the grave, clicking, while interrupting the shovel, you can sometimes pop zombies without using up its timer.
  13. Silv Augur

    FYI I could not get this to work after multiple attempts this past week. I didn't try for more than a few minutes tho so maybe it's one of those completely random get lucky moments.
  14. Motherlee Augur

    Prob. nerfed. They have lots of energy to nerf things.
  15. SpamFactory Augur

    I notice that every year there's a thread about the recast timer on this shovel.
  16. Gundolin Augur

    I think that's because it was poorly designed. Well that and I'm moronic enough to have gone through 7 cycles and have yet to get the first drop. Really it is a stupid quest and a stupid thing to try. No skill, no strategy, just random luck.
  17. Motherlee Augur

    Someone with a good memory, not like me, needs to post this before the Sept. patch 2016.
    Ishtass likes this.
  18. Ishtass Augur

    Back from my trip, and round 3 was severely less lucky than my first 2 rounds. I had 7 characters up all spamming shovels every 17 minutes and it still took 5 hours. See you in 18 hours.
    Silv likes this.
  19. Ishtass Augur

    Few more hours and another 18 hour wait, cya tomorrow.
    Silv likes this.
  20. Silv Augur

    As a reminder to anyone wanting to do this... if you haven't started at this point you might be screwed to finish it before the NOTD quests are removed. Soooo...
    Ishtass likes this.