NPCs instantly casting spells

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Uxtalzon, Nov 12, 2014.

  1. Uxtalzon Augur

    Got to love all mobs in TDS having instant-cast spells. Most of them we couldn't care less due to resistances or just weak, ignorable spell damage (I prefer if a wizard mob is trying to cast a nuke, because he isn't trying to triple punch me for 12k).

    But enchanters and cleric mobs are just ridiculous. AAs and resistances be damned, I resist mez maybe 10% of the time and there's no stopping these instant-casts. Then when I'm stuck, they turn and obliterate my merc in two shots due to their lovely decrease in survivability post-100.

    Then after mez wears off, I am face-to-face alone with an enchanter that I could swear gave me a smile before I get a nice quad-punch for 60k.

    [IMG]

    I hope this isn't going to be the new "standard" for mobs.
    Ebonylight-Xegony and Fenudir like this.
  2. Cerris Augur

    Mez was a serious issue in Neriak 4th gate as well. It's particularly notable with the sirens on Brother's Isle and in Caverns of Endless Song, though, because you didn't NEED to go into the parts of 4th gate that were lousy with enchanters and you don't have that freedom with the linear quest progression in TDS.

    What's really odd is that they seem to land Chaotic Confounding (a spell with only a -10 resist check) nearly every time. Something seems really off with resist checks.

    I haven't seen as much of a problem with cleric mobs. They do lead a stun from the Awe* line an awful lot of the time, but I seem to resist it more often and it's only an 8 second stun when it does land. Still, control effects like these are maybe a little too powerful for NPCs to be busting out on a regular basis.
  3. Narye Augur

    As an enchanter - I want the insta cast spells the NPC's have!
  4. Corwyhn Lionheart Guild Leader, Lions of the Heart

    SOE devs how about a reduction in the number of mezzing mobs? Puh-lease and thank you :)
  5. Axxius Augur

    But she just wants to be alone with you! Don't you want to be alone with her? ;)
    [IMG]
  6. segap Augur

    I don't mind the mezing so much. I do mind that it lasts 42 seconds. In the group game where you have at most 6 people and most likely not more than one is capable of tanking and not more than one healer, getting a key group member mezed for 42 seconds can wipe you. On raids you have redundancy and people that can cure. It's a workable mechanic in those situations. In groups, odds are you have no way to counter it.

    I did enjoy having to find a way to pull without getting insta mezed. I do think a short duration mez can add some challenge. I just think it is currently overboard for what a typical group can recover from.
    Garshok, Marton and Fanra like this.
  7. Kelandi Elder

    I can't remember the last time resists actually made a difference, but I believe we were raiding the Halls of Testing around that time.
  8. Fanra https://everquest.fanra.info

    Instant cast should be extremely rare. It takes away from the tactic of stunning to interrupt casting. That tactic helps make the game more interesting and offers more options for gameplay.

    Back when I was fighting mobs that would gate when they got low hit points (they would gate back to spawn point, and bring friends back), I had an audio trigger that they were casting gate so I could cast my stun. Of course, the druid stun is worthless these days, as every mob is too high level or just plain immune, but it was a nice part of gameplay to have that ability.

    It used to be you had the option of using skill and different playing styles to figure out how to be all you could be. Sure beats modern cookie cutter mobs that only have high hit points and hit like a freight train (one rounding casters), and you just spam heal the tank and dps forever to kill.

    Things change. But I wonder what is the plan behind what is going on. Is all this intentional or is there a lack of memory of how it used to be and how things have changed, and whether the change is for the better.

    I don't know, really. But whenever mobs cheat (which they often have to, to be any kind of challenge) you need to be very careful that you don't remove player options.
    Garshok likes this.
  9. Eaiana Augur

    It is doubly frustrating that for the most parts pets are not mezzed, charmed, feared, etc. They make the best tanks for these sorts of mobs.
  10. segap Augur

    That was part of the fun having mobs with higher hitpoints. You had time to react to different actions and utilize skills. For gating mobs, you needed to react and time your stuns or bashes. For healers, you would chose to kill them first, potentially stun or even mana sieve them. Different people brought different skills to a group and you'd build your group synergy around those skills to counter mob behaviors. With the move to mobs that could be thrashed in seconds, all those demands on player skill went away. It probably also meant that devs forgot about how to integrate mob abilities with player reactions when they added hp to mobs in tds.
  11. Axxius Augur

    Thankfully, there are no enchanter mobs with 3x hitpoints in TDS, are there? That would be extremely annoying. :D
  12. segap Augur


    They'd never die. By the time you had them down 10%, your whole group would be mezed.
  13. Cerris Augur

    This kind of reminds me of the static zones in DoN, which had a ton of enchanter and necromancer mobs. They used to LOVE to cast Fear, which often meant that your tank would tear off through the zone for a good 30+ seconds until fear broke and they got splutted by whatever room full of mobs they'd wound up in.

    Enough people complained that this wasn't exactly happy fun times, and Fear got taken out of the spell set for generic non-named mobs. Dispel, likewise, has largely been removed because, again, not fun to constantly rebuff.

    Long-duration mezes could stand to be looked at from the same perspective.
  14. Koryu Professional Roadkill

    The Fear Fruit helps with being mezzed, but has several problems:
    Because of the cooldown, you can only fight 1-3 sirens/enchanters, depending on DPS, before you have to wait on the timer or fight something else to pass the time.
    You have to click off any Druid/Shaman regen and Necro recourse, or else the damage won't wake you.
    Even if you wake yourself, all previous aggro is lost and must be recovered.
    While you are waiting for the damage tick to wake you, your poor squishy groupmates are being slammed by mobs.
    Not every tank has a Fear Fruit to deal with being mezzed.

    Why don't Enchanter debuffs have counters, by the way? Mercs can't cure Demolished Consciousness and it lasts ~10 minutes, so you need a class with Radiant Cure to deal with it.
  15. Random_Enchanter Augur

    sure you can exchange them for charm insted of mez :rolleyes:

    Be happy they dont rune themselfs

    can always get an enchanter in your group to help deal with these mobs. the majority of the mobs that I've seen (outside of dino island) can be stunned. As a result your common enchanter can stun lock them
  16. Kaliblessed New Member

    Nothing like this happening to your tank. Mezzed for 50+ seconds while the mob destroys everyone in your group. lol. This has happened to me couple of times already in tds.
  17. Sirene_Fippy Okayest Bard

    It seems enchanter mobs always cast mez on the first person to get on the hatelist (like rampage). So ideally have someone other than the tank pull and it will cause less of a problem.
  18. Axxius Augur

    The first person to get on the hatelist other than the most hated. Yes, a puller always gets the first mez.
  19. Cerris Augur

    I'd MUCH rather have charm than mez; charm has a resist check every tick while mez lasts to full duration. There's a reason groups ground on the fire side of Riftseeker's rather than the ice side :)