Took some pulls on this tier 4 mob last night and noticed the de-level mechanic. Only one ascension skill I found does this and it has to be grandmastered. I have faith that the devs would not implement any kind of enticing pay to win scheme on this mob (I really do). But I am curious....
They got my munee munee!They know their player base better than i do,I swore never again after Ethereal Assasin!Forever and never are neither for men.
I meant to type I don't think they would implement the strat this way... but I was wondering. Regardless of who can kill it or not.. that wasn't my question - but thanks!
So yeah this is standard I guess among the tier 4 mobs. Some people have brought it up but I'm suprised it hasn't been mentioned more. It's basically pay to win raid mobs (not that it only takes that). If money is that desperate I guess you gotta do what you gotta do.
Glacial Freeze upgrades can be acquired by multiple in game means not just insta-research. I understand your frustration but there are other ways of getting what you need to raid top end content.
While I do agree its available its pretty bad considering the drop rate is so low on the lower teir versions that if you want to get it done within the timeframe of this expac then you are going to have to pay to get there. The upgrade drops need to change so they reflect what they were even 5 years ago. Journeyman was common, Adept was uncommon, Expert was crafted with a rare (although in this case I'd settle for multiple harvested rares say 10), Master was dropped in raid and was rare. In the new game I guess we would say Master still drops in raid as a rare drop, GM should be a rare drop with a ultra rare harvest. Ancient is an ultra rare drop from T4. At the moment even journeyman is ultra rare and this is a pretty poor situation to be in considering all tiers need to be upgraded in order (Which I don't have a problem with just the rate of the different levels). TL;DR Its Pay to win at the moment. Make the drop rates tiered again rather than all ultra rare.
Getting to top end game content because of the challenge is fine.. getting there because of months of research assistant or in incredibly rare drop rate is not really the same. All in the concept of heavily encouraging people to use cash - it's a clear cut thing here. Thanks for the response however... but it still needs to be changed.
Before yesterday, 2 of the 5 ways to obtain the spell weren't working, forcing people to research or insta-unlock the upgrades. Until yesterday's patch, the recipe to make adept and master were dropping before-hand but none of the mats were dropping to make them (which are no-trade). So previous to yesterday, in order to progress on time, at least 2 ranks would need to be researched (probably still do unless a single person gets lucky with 10 page scrolls). That would only leave the journeyman, expert, and grandmaster to drop as far as ready to be crafted. After that, it is praising rngesus to give you the journeyman, expert, or grandmaster, at the least, in order to obtain the delevel since it is not on any other previous ranks. The drop rate for grandmasters are rather low and more than likely to not be sold on the server, as every guild who would raid and want to progress would need to keep the grandmaster; only leaving journeyman and expert (which are just as rare) to be traded on the broker/auctioned. Basically, people would need to undergo p2w in order to progress in a timely manner, which is why people are frustrated.
Have you ever worked out the chances of actually getting these upgrades through gameplay? Numbers for our whole guild; Journeymans for Glacial freeze found - 1 Adept recipes - 0 Adept pages - 0 Experts - 0 Masters - 0 GM - 1 This is a guild with 30+ people who have been playing all expac. Personally I have seen 2 experts in total this expac, across all the spells/classes. Claiming this requirement is obtainable through gameplay is just a joke. If you want suggestions for improvements - Add Masters as a drop (the actual spell, not a recipe) to Raid mobs. Add Experts as a trash drop. This way at least there is a possibility to get 3 tiers of the 6 during raiding.
It all boils down to being a cash grab folks. Once they get the cash, then they nerf the crap out of it. Bait-and-switch. I hate that it has come down to this, it has caused me to cancel my sub and say good bye.
Yes it is - however I don't necessarily blame Gninja or the other developers. This looks like a decision made by guys wearing suits. Still doesn't change how wrong it is.
On a brighter note, at least it's less P2W than most newer mmo's out there. Hell, it's less than most the stupid phone/tablet apps and Facebook games.
Introducing paywalls to competitive end game raiding crosses an ethical boundary. Trying to fallback on the excuse of "can be acquired by multiple in game means" is insulting to the intelligence of your customers.
All I was saying was that there were ways around it as it currently stands. That does not mean we aren't taking a close look at it. There was no insulting of intelligence intended. Just trying to communicate
I just hope you take this information into your next meeting and bring to light (if they don't already know about it) that people are leaving the game at alarming rates due to the P2W feel. My suggestion would be to remove ascension from insta upgrade DBC and increase the drop rate 10 fold. At this point, there should be many many more people with grand master spells on the server by drop rate. I think I have a few adept going the full research way, without spending a single dollar and without getting a single scroll to drop. I think our guild has gotten about 12-13 total grand master scrolls to drop since the beginning of the expansion. That's almost 5 months of raiding with an average drop of 2-3 per month? We've had zero Glacial Freeze grandmasters. If it's going to be part of a raid strat, there should be a way to get it to drop 100% of the time, kind of like the control wand for the Xalgoz fight.
We don't need to massively increase Ascension drop rate. It's ok to have them enter the game slowly and thus control player's progression through the tiers. If people want to pay to increase their parse a bit, that's fine... it's not game-breaking, and with this one exception discussed here, it's not stopping guilds from killing things. However, gating raid progression behind a huge wall (having at least 4x players with a specific ability Grandmastered) is NOT ok. The realistic chances of getting to that point through natural gameplay means, even including aggressive broker scanning, are just too farfetched. This is essentially a "pay $$ or you won't progress" situation. To be clear: I don't want Ascension drops made less rare. I want this one specific ability changed so the de-level component is granted at a tier lower than Grandmaster... something more reasonable like Expert perhaps.
