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Cronus...no, Hades...no, Aphrodite. no, wait...

AuthorMessage
Geographer
Mar 12, 2013
923
It's been roughly a year since Darkmoor came to live, and roughly a geologic age since Aquila went live. Nevertheless, let's talk about Cronus, Bunferatu, and Aphrodite - those farmable bosses that are trapped inside larger dungeons.

Even today at the sigil for Tartarus, you can still hear the competing chorus of "Cronus anyone?" and "Full dungeon team up" as two very different groups try to get enough players for their target. Ah, but here's the rub. You can team up for full Tartarus, and get full Tartarus, but you can't likely team up for "just Cronus" and get a group who agree they will all do "just Cronus".

You could maybe ask them to do cronus before heading down the hillside to the death satyr, but most will just want to skip it and get to Hades as fast as humanly possible. Even bringing it up may cause some folks to abandon the dungeon in fear of unforeseen delays because someone wanted to do Cronus.

The same is true at the sigil for Graveyard. If you want to run Graveyard with team-up, you can easily find a team that way (no guarantees they will all stay). But if you want "just the plant boss, thanks" you're very much out of luck.

Teaming up to do just the plant boss, will go absolutely nowhere you want to go - but the same is true of standing around near the sigil asking random folks if they want to JUST do the key boss. For a little while, you could actually scrounge together a group to go in for plant boss, but this late after the release, interest has dropped off, and the few are scattered across the various realms, standing around sigils, unable to find each other because it railroads them into full-dungeon teams.

I would have expected the lesson of "Cronus only" would have spurred some sort of workaround for those who just want to do $Key Boss inside of $Larger Dungeon. But to this day, you're still left at the sigil, keening and wailing your endless lament "Cronus only"..."Plant boss anyone?"..."bunferatu?" without even your own special team-up.

For key bosses there's the additional problem of "if I team up, whose key gets used?"

So far so bad. Lots of complaining. Where's the solution?

I propose 1) internal bosses like Bunferatu, cronus, Aphrodite Two get a checkbox option in the team-up interface for their respective larger dungeon.

and 2) for keys, you MUST have the correct type of skeleton key in your inventory when you use the team-up or the checkbox option won't appear; and when the dungeon "kicks off", it will use a key from one person on the team AT RANDOM. That person will be notified a key has been removed from their backpack and used to unlock the door.

That last is to give the first guy to start the "team up" session a break, so it's not always his key that gets eaten.

Thoughts?

Astrologist
Dec 26, 2013
1124
crunkatog on Nov 6, 2015 wrote:
It's been roughly a year since Darkmoor came to live, and roughly a geologic age since Aquila went live. Nevertheless, let's talk about Cronus, Bunferatu, and Aphrodite - those farmable bosses that are trapped inside larger dungeons.

Even today at the sigil for Tartarus, you can still hear the competing chorus of "Cronus anyone?" and "Full dungeon team up" as two very different groups try to get enough players for their target. Ah, but here's the rub. You can team up for full Tartarus, and get full Tartarus, but you can't likely team up for "just Cronus" and get a group who agree they will all do "just Cronus".

You could maybe ask them to do cronus before heading down the hillside to the death satyr, but most will just want to skip it and get to Hades as fast as humanly possible. Even bringing it up may cause some folks to abandon the dungeon in fear of unforeseen delays because someone wanted to do Cronus.

The same is true at the sigil for Graveyard. If you want to run Graveyard with team-up, you can easily find a team that way (no guarantees they will all stay). But if you want "just the plant boss, thanks" you're very much out of luck.

Teaming up to do just the plant boss, will go absolutely nowhere you want to go - but the same is true of standing around near the sigil asking random folks if they want to JUST do the key boss. For a little while, you could actually scrounge together a group to go in for plant boss, but this late after the release, interest has dropped off, and the few are scattered across the various realms, standing around sigils, unable to find each other because it railroads them into full-dungeon teams.

I would have expected the lesson of "Cronus only" would have spurred some sort of workaround for those who just want to do $Key Boss inside of $Larger Dungeon. But to this day, you're still left at the sigil, keening and wailing your endless lament "Cronus only"..."Plant boss anyone?"..."bunferatu?" without even your own special team-up.

For key bosses there's the additional problem of "if I team up, whose key gets used?"

So far so bad. Lots of complaining. Where's the solution?

I propose 1) internal bosses like Bunferatu, cronus, Aphrodite Two get a checkbox option in the team-up interface for their respective larger dungeon.

and 2) for keys, you MUST have the correct type of skeleton key in your inventory when you use the team-up or the checkbox option won't appear; and when the dungeon "kicks off", it will use a key from one person on the team AT RANDOM. That person will be notified a key has been removed from their backpack and used to unlock the door.

That last is to give the first guy to start the "team up" session a break, so it's not always his key that gets eaten.

Thoughts?
I like it. Countless hours have been wasted loitering around the sigils of these instances waiting for takers. My cries of "Gladiator anyone?" and Tentacles only?" still go unanswered. And then, if you do manage to get a full team there always seems to be one person who didn't understand that the group was for the "side" boss... so he splits. As far as key bosses, I really don't mind using my keys. I normally have so many I could use them for railroad ties. And I don't even try for the key bosses unless I have the correct key. I've learned not to depend on others having one. But I like your idea regarding "key-in-inventory" eligibility.
Similar suggestions have been made a number of times in the past and it seems like they should be relatively easy modifications for KI to implement, but for one reason or another they've never been addressed.

Delver
Mar 31, 2015
203
TucsonWizard on Nov 6, 2015 wrote:
I like it. Countless hours have been wasted loitering around the sigils of these instances waiting for takers. My cries of "Gladiator anyone?" and Tentacles only?" still go unanswered. And then, if you do manage to get a full team there always seems to be one person who didn't understand that the group was for the "side" boss... so he splits. As far as key bosses, I really don't mind using my keys. I normally have so many I could use them for railroad ties. And I don't even try for the key bosses unless I have the correct key. I've learned not to depend on others having one. But I like your idea regarding "key-in-inventory" eligibility.
Similar suggestions have been made a number of times in the past and it seems like they should be relatively easy modifications for KI to implement, but for one reason or another they've never been addressed.
Like PVP, for instance...

Historian
Nov 28, 2010
614
crunkatog on Nov 6, 2015 wrote:
It's been roughly a year since Darkmoor came to live, and roughly a geologic age since Aquila went live. Nevertheless, let's talk about Cronus, Bunferatu, and Aphrodite - those farmable bosses that are trapped inside larger dungeons.

Even today at the sigil for Tartarus, you can still hear the competing chorus of "Cronus anyone?" and "Full dungeon team up" as two very different groups try to get enough players for their target. Ah, but here's the rub. You can team up for full Tartarus, and get full Tartarus, but you can't likely team up for "just Cronus" and get a group who agree they will all do "just Cronus".

You could maybe ask them to do cronus before heading down the hillside to the death satyr, but most will just want to skip it and get to Hades as fast as humanly possible. Even bringing it up may cause some folks to abandon the dungeon in fear of unforeseen delays because someone wanted to do Cronus.

The same is true at the sigil for Graveyard. If you want to run Graveyard with team-up, you can easily find a team that way (no guarantees they will all stay). But if you want "just the plant boss, thanks" you're very much out of luck.

Teaming up to do just the plant boss, will go absolutely nowhere you want to go - but the same is true of standing around near the sigil asking random folks if they want to JUST do the key boss. For a little while, you could actually scrounge together a group to go in for plant boss, but this late after the release, interest has dropped off, and the few are scattered across the various realms, standing around sigils, unable to find each other because it railroads them into full-dungeon teams.

I would have expected the lesson of "Cronus only" would have spurred some sort of workaround for those who just want to do $Key Boss inside of $Larger Dungeon. But to this day, you're still left at the sigil, keening and wailing your endless lament "Cronus only"..."Plant boss anyone?"..."bunferatu?" without even your own special team-up.

For key bosses there's the additional problem of "if I team up, whose key gets used?"

So far so bad. Lots of complaining. Where's the solution?

I propose 1) internal bosses like Bunferatu, cronus, Aphrodite Two get a checkbox option in the team-up interface for their respective larger dungeon.

and 2) for keys, you MUST have the correct type of skeleton key in your inventory when you use the team-up or the checkbox option won't appear; and when the dungeon "kicks off", it will use a key from one person on the team AT RANDOM. That person will be notified a key has been removed from their backpack and used to unlock the door.

That last is to give the first guy to start the "team up" session a break, so it's not always his key that gets eaten.

Thoughts?
The only thing I could see being a problem for requiring a key to join is that the main point of this is to assemble a full team for a specific cause. What if the thing that's preventing you from quickly assembling a full team is that someone doesn't have a key?

I'll use myself as an example because currently all I have are Stone and Wooden keys, but if I could, I would join a team to do the bosses that require Gold keys if someone else could get us in. If I had a key, I would gladly sacrifice it, but right now I don't have one.

I do understand the intention behind restricting it to key holders only, and understand it's not meant to be petty. I just think if you're looking to build a team faster, it would be best to have holding a key optional as long as participants joining that have keys are willing to accept you into their party knowing one of them is going to have to use their key.

But I do like the check box idea. There are probably different ways to go about it. Maybe 3 choices? Full Dungeon, Side Boss Only, and and Full Dungeon + Side Boss? I'm not sure, but I definitely think it's something worth considering.

Champion
Sep 01, 2009
491
Yes, yes, and more yes. I have 4 gold keys, and would love to farm Aphrodite, but I can never find anyone to join. As for Cronus, I haven't even attempted it yet, because I know the trouble I will have getting a team together.

Great original post, great ideas, hope KI reads it.

Explorer
May 25, 2013
69
I like the first idea, the only problem I could see with that is a cramped team up board if you decide to browse like that. A simple story about why I like this idea: I had a friend who wanted to do gladiator d, but since he plays at awkward times, he had to use team up because nobody was at Aquila. If I recall, EVERY TIME he got into a dungeon, it was a bunch of magus wizards trying to cash in on Zeus gear. Plus, since most of them didn't know about the gladiator and the alpha and omega ring, he couldn't leave without looking like a jerk. He spent an entire night helping out level 30's because he couldn't specify what he was doing.
The second idea seems unneeded in my opinion though. My policy I run with the keys is if I'm asking for help, I use the key as a small thank you. But if I'm helping you out, the least you could do is use a key of your own. That seems to be how it goes with most everybody in Mooshu and Avalon, but don't take my opinion of this too seriously because I haven't experienced the Darkmoor struggle yet.
Great ideas none the less.

Geographer
Mar 12, 2013
923
Thinking on this some more, I can see where ThatOneFizzler's key idea makes more sense.

You start the team-up, you bring the key.

That might encourage more people to pick up your help request in the kiosk, because a free chance at a key is added motivation.

The point of the checkbox is so that you don't have to run the full dungeon.

I want the beguiled gargoyle pet from Bunferatu, but I don't want to have to slog through Howling Chaney and Sir Blackwater to get there. By then, my patience and tc have been used up, I need a wisp, and oh wait it's time to get back to work, and the dog just tore open a paper wasp nest in the garage oh my--

When I was running with my group we would actually stop and do Bunferatu as part of the dungeon, no questions asked. But we were a well-organized team of friends who had our strategies developed and honed for maximal teamwork. It took 4 rounds.

Explorer
Jun 27, 2014
82
Another idea would just be to place bosses like Gladiator,Cronus,Aphrodite etc have there own little dungeon with sigil and not be a part of another dungeon in the first place. I have had the opposite problem from yourself When my magus wizards want to farm zeus, or trying to find people who dont want to just fight cronus and actually want the full dungeon etc. If these side bosses had their own area it would make things allot simpler. There are already some skeleton key bosses out with other dungeons like in Avalon for example, where it is clear what everyone is there for. For both groups having these side bosses included in other dungeons is frustrating unless you actually wish to do both at the same time, which isnt as likely. For the likes of cronus and aphrodite it would be easy to add another sigil next to the main dungeon just for the side bosses. I do realise with gladiator sand squid and cronus they are supposed to be secret bosses, but I dont see any problem having them in their own areas either.