Planar Tomb content/bug/glitch report - (not DC related)
I ran the planar tombs today for the first time. I was pleased to see the run difficulty on par with the other end-game-level elites (nordr, shuyal, tinderin). There were only a couple of times I died while fighting mobs without seeing what hit me, but this also happens when I go visit Grimnr, so it was nothing unusual, and happened no more here than on the elites we already have.
I was also lucky and in 4 1/2 runs (an hour or two total) only disconnected once, and the rest of the time my party members and I all stayed connected. Therefore, these are real reports and not related in any way to lag, latency or disconnects.
Bugs Noticed:
Map 2
General: the shielded mobs do not lose their shields when you pull them to the tower. They take ages to kill. I am going on the theory that these towers mimic the ones in Undim, and should remove those shields when the mobs get within range.
Boss: The curse, when I actually got the cloud above my head while alive, was far too strong. I was on rogue in maxed gear and had to stop everything and chug about 10 healing pots as fast as possible to stay alive. Ravager managed to survive it most of the time, but he's also one of the top elite warriors in game. Most players would have died almost right away.
Aside from this (and the following big glitch) he would be a very difficult, but good elite boss.
Big Boss Glitch: One of this boss's attacks is severely glitched, almost exactly like the old bloodhammer glitch in the Arena. This is also a curse attack, but not the one I managed to pot through and survive.
Details: Even if well outside any red zones, I would instantly die, and only AFTER I was dead, I would see a cloud over my character's body, raining on it. This happened multiple times in one fight, and in none of these instances did the curse cloud appear over my character before it died. It was death on impact, and then the curse cloud showed up over the corpse behind the resurrect selection screen. There was also absolutely no warning of this attack, and it happened both if I kept moving or tried standing still.
Map 3
Boss: This guy is tough, and rightfully so. However, he has both stun and panic abilities, of which the stun can last several seconds. This really needs to be shortened to be fair to the players, as they frequently have no chance to avoid his one-hits. The panic is not quite as long, but considering he has both abilities, it's a bit much,
For the most part I really enjoyed this boss, but I did find that when he was pulled off the platform (which most players would do to avoid excess vine spawns) he did a helluva lot more one-hitting, to the point where a party any less experienced and geared than the one I tested with would find it next to impossible.
I am all for difficult, but the red zones must actually reflect the danger-of-death area, and the stun/panics should also be sequenced so that players can get away soon enough to survive, if they have enough skill to run to safety as soon as released. Right now there is no chance to escape too much of the time, and it is just unfair to the players. Especially since the map is so long that free ressing is unfair to everyone in the zone.
Glitch Just like with Ashral heart, the vines continue to spawn forever after the boss dies.
Summary
Basically, if the maps are going to be this large (and I do love large maps), the game designers must account for that and design the bosses so that, with skill and strategy, it is possible to complete the fight without being autokilled. I don't mind paying to res when it's my own mistake that killed me, and neither does anyone else I know. However, if there is no way to avoid dying even with skill, experience, gear, strategy, and a stellar team....that's where people start to riot.
I think these maps were very well laid out, and the bosses interesting. With a few adjustments they could be totally awesome. But they do need these things modified before they are a benefit to the game.
