Alright, guys grab a coffee this one is a doozy!
Before anything, this post isn’t a plea for ToA to be installed on the Phoenix Server, rather a post stating what I think would be a proper installation if it were, based on fixing the mistakes of old, and keeping and moderating the good of what ToA potentially could have had.
Trials of Atlantis is by and large a taboo word among the Daoc community, although, I always saw it as a project with great potential, although, improperly implemented/executed.
ToA:
Original Launch Problems
- The amount of PvE that was necessary to make a player viable in RVR was too steep
- too many extra abilities e.g. ML abilities and charges from having 3-5 artifacts on your template.
- There are more underlying problems, but in my opinion, these were the heavy hitters.
New ToA Goals
- Give players new reusable PvE content for groups and raids alike.
- Make templates more interesting to build and adding a little player customization
- Make all content easily accessible to the casual player.
- Not make all old content and zones irrelevant
Let’s get down to brass tacks, and how I would change some things about ToA personally.
I’ve broken down this monster of a post into 4 parts to make quoting easier if you’d like to reply to a specific section:
A: Master Level Abilities
B: Artifacts
C: New Instanced full group raids
D: ToA Raid Dungeons
A: Master Level Abilities
First and foremost, These should NOT work in RvR at all. The current state of the RvR battlefield is “relatively” balanced, adding these in would make for a big headache.
I’m tempted to say that these abilities shouldn’t exist at all. However, I like to believe that everything has a place. That being said, let’s brainstorm. I suggest that these abilities exist in a way that helps in ToA raid encounters or possible 8 man group encounters similar to ‘Darkspire’. While having a back door exception to offer a secondary solution to these encounters (see below)
For example, there is a boss who goes stealth and regens HP while in stealth, and the only way to find him is with a Presence Node. (maybe a back door to this boss would be to have a stealther in the party)
Or maybe another boss that summons very fast-moving adds that can only be slowed by a Speedwarp in order to kite them easier. ( a secondary option is to strategically place TWFs in the kite path)
To get out of just using Convoker examples: maybe there is a room full of runes and somebody has to use Reveal Crystalseed to guide the zerg/group through a certain area. Or possibly a boss that randomly drops runes in the room. (can’t really think of a back door to this, but if only 1 person needs it, is it necessary?)
What would be your ML ability specific encounter? Can you think of a secondary solution to the encounter?
Adding to this, ML raids could even be set up in a way that makes it so that previous dungeons have to be done in order to succeed in the next.
That exception being less exclusivity, maybe it can still be possible if only a portion of the people in the group/raid have these ML abilities from previous raids, as to not exclude large portions of the population. Just as you would only need a few people to Main tank, you would only need a few people in the raid to have certain ML abilities from the previous Master level raid. Leaving the rest of the players to need nothing at all from previous raids.
B: Artifacts
Artifacts were an interesting concept originally, they took a lot of the passive RA’s and put them into “ToA Stats” gained through these artifacts. Although, by doing this the original developers created some big problems.
First, and probably the biggest problem, is the amount of time necessary to: get the artifacts on drop/roll, farm the scrolls, level these artifacts, etc. This creates a huge power imbalance between those who have time to build templates including multiple artifacts and those who don’t. Thus, forcing new/returning players to go through a lot of PvE before ever actually being able to compete in any non-zerg faucet of RvR.
Next, having so many new ToA items/artifacts made all the older PvE content completely not worth doing. Many players including myself missed the old Legion and SI raids. But the gear from those areas was just not worth it. Because ToA stats were the thing to get now, and all of that came solely from ToA.
My solution:
Artifacts in this alternate ToA should exist, but with a limitation. One Artifact per equipment/inventory.
I suggest this limitation for a few reasons,
First, is the balance between casual and hardcore players. Hardcore players have the time/resources to get decked out in Artifacts while the casual doesn’t. We shouldn’t create a huge wall to climb in PvE if it isn’t necessary. Obtaining 1 Artifact per player is not too challenging of a feat for everyone to do.
Second, avoiding the cardinal sin of MMORPGs, making old content irrelevant. Allowing just one Artifact per player means that players will still have to go after SI raids, Legion, etc to get credit for good gear to help create their templates.
Third, keeping player-crafted armor/weps still very relevant.
Finally, having only one Artifact adds just the right amount of customization to that player’s play-style be it through extra ability / passive stats, without going overboard.
Obtaining Artifacts:
1. I believe that all artifact credits should be purchasable with feathers as to not force every single player to PvE if they don’t want to. Similar to how items are purchased currently from the main cities.
2. I am a huge believer in the best items coming from the player base, meaning that the person who ultimately puts your artifact together would be a player crafter. The mats would include an Artifact credit item, + purchasable mats + ToA item (maybe a farmable scroll?).
3. Should leveling up Artifacts even be a thing? I’m on the fence about this one. Thoughts?
4. Artifact credits should come from various places, meaning Raid content and group content. It should drop as an item similar to any other item that drops in a raid and /rolled for at the end of the raid, while at the same time giving credit so players can buy them from merchants later.
Final thoughts on Artifacts:
- Artifact charge uses should be on a separate timer from the timer of normal item uses. Maybe on a 7-minute reuse timer.
- There are some artifacts that may need tweaking or removed completely, as to not benefit 1 realm more than the other, or maybe the charges/stats of some could be considered overpowered and would need tweaking or removal.
- Lastly, consider making hard caps on ToA stat + RA combinations. For example, 5% cast speed on an item + Mastery of art 9 shouldn’t give 20% casting speed, the cap should remain 15%. Following along with other ToA stats cap increases e.g. 5 to dex stat cap shouldn’t stack on top of aug dex 9, the value of aug dex 9 should be the cap regardless of how you get there.
C: New Instanced full group raids ( similar to Darkspire)
Bosses in these dungeons would drop RoGs, Feathers, and some would give certain Artifact credit + item
There is a ton of ideas that can be put together to make these dungeons a possibility, I’d like to hear your guy’s thoughts on what would be your ToA Group instanced Dungeon. Keep in mind it may be hard to instance some of these areas. I’ll give one thought for a dungeon.
My dungeon would be sort of a rehash of the group challenge steps from ML 7
Your group must finish the 4 challenges in any order to progress to fight the final boss
Apophian's Challenge, Volurgon's Challenge, Shaitan's Challenge, Hephaestian's Challenge
After defeating the 4 challenges you could be able to teleport to a new instanced fight with “Chimera”
(The ML 6 boss)
Basically, instead of going through a big dungeon, you have 4 teleport pads that take you to 4 different challenges that vary in different ways. And then a final teleporter that sends you to Chimera
D: ToA Raid Dungeons
In a spirit of holding true to the progression of the ML steps, I think that each ToA dungeon should be done in progression to the next. Meaning to do Dungeon 2, Dungeon 1 must be completed first and the boss of that zone drops one or two, tradeable, single-use keys to open the door to dungeon 2, So on and so forth. Nowadays every realm has its raid leaders, they would most likely end up with the key(s) regardless.
Progression through the dungeons should remain relatively the same, e.g. you still need to make the glove in Deep Volcanus to stop the lava waterfall for the raid to cross the bridge. Although the dungeons should be streamlined as to not take longer than 1.5 hours to complete with a good-sized BG.
At least half of the Artifact credits would be obtainable in the raids as well.
Due to the immense level of resources that would have to go into this project. I would imagine the ML raid zones would be implemented in phases.
I would break down the Raids into 4 separate dungeons and 1 final area.
ML Raid 1 : Sobekite Eternal
Dungeon progression remains the same, Final boss: Runihara
Have fun jumping off at the end.
ML Raid 2: Halls of Ma’ati
Dungeon progression remains the same, Final boss: Medusa
Don’t get turned to stone now.
ML Raid 3: Deep Volcanus
Dungeon progression remains the same, Final boss: Typhon
Cold damage anyone?
ML Raid 4: Aerus City
Dungeon progression remains the same, Final boss: Phoenix
Would love to see what the devs would change about this fight.
ML Raid 5: EV keep
Final boss: Phoenix Reborn
This final raid would be a mix of RvR defense and PVE raid completion. Upon defeating Phoenix in ML Raid 4 a single key will drop which opens the door to the EV keep and the final encounter.
This last raid will have to be coordinated between the RvR BG leaders and the PvE BG leaders. Once the door opens a message will be sent out across the realms, chaos will soon ensue.
Upon opening the door the raid has to wait 10 minutes before the encounter begins allowing some time. The encounter itself should last anywhere from 10-15 minutes. Half the realm is defending from the other two, while the other half of the realm is trying to finish off the PvE encounter.
Upon defeating the boss there will be a flag that must be taken (similar to task zone flags) After capping the flag a Djinn (or whatever NPC you want) will appear for 24 hours, giving out only one reward should you choose to accept it.
I have yet to think about what that rewards should be, but it should prevent realm swapping. What do you guys think that reward should be?
Thank you for taking the time to read such a long post, I've wanted to write something about ToA for a while just never got around to it.
Before anything, this post isn’t a plea for ToA to be installed on the Phoenix Server, rather a post stating what I think would be a proper installation if it were, based on fixing the mistakes of old, and keeping and moderating the good of what ToA potentially could have had.
Trials of Atlantis is by and large a taboo word among the Daoc community, although, I always saw it as a project with great potential, although, improperly implemented/executed.
ToA:
Original Launch Problems
- The amount of PvE that was necessary to make a player viable in RVR was too steep
- too many extra abilities e.g. ML abilities and charges from having 3-5 artifacts on your template.
- There are more underlying problems, but in my opinion, these were the heavy hitters.
New ToA Goals
- Give players new reusable PvE content for groups and raids alike.
- Make templates more interesting to build and adding a little player customization
- Make all content easily accessible to the casual player.
- Not make all old content and zones irrelevant
Let’s get down to brass tacks, and how I would change some things about ToA personally.
I’ve broken down this monster of a post into 4 parts to make quoting easier if you’d like to reply to a specific section:
A: Master Level Abilities
B: Artifacts
C: New Instanced full group raids
D: ToA Raid Dungeons
A: Master Level Abilities
First and foremost, These should NOT work in RvR at all. The current state of the RvR battlefield is “relatively” balanced, adding these in would make for a big headache.
I’m tempted to say that these abilities shouldn’t exist at all. However, I like to believe that everything has a place. That being said, let’s brainstorm. I suggest that these abilities exist in a way that helps in ToA raid encounters or possible 8 man group encounters similar to ‘Darkspire’. While having a back door exception to offer a secondary solution to these encounters (see below)
For example, there is a boss who goes stealth and regens HP while in stealth, and the only way to find him is with a Presence Node. (maybe a back door to this boss would be to have a stealther in the party)
Or maybe another boss that summons very fast-moving adds that can only be slowed by a Speedwarp in order to kite them easier. ( a secondary option is to strategically place TWFs in the kite path)
To get out of just using Convoker examples: maybe there is a room full of runes and somebody has to use Reveal Crystalseed to guide the zerg/group through a certain area. Or possibly a boss that randomly drops runes in the room. (can’t really think of a back door to this, but if only 1 person needs it, is it necessary?)
What would be your ML ability specific encounter? Can you think of a secondary solution to the encounter?
Adding to this, ML raids could even be set up in a way that makes it so that previous dungeons have to be done in order to succeed in the next.
That exception being less exclusivity, maybe it can still be possible if only a portion of the people in the group/raid have these ML abilities from previous raids, as to not exclude large portions of the population. Just as you would only need a few people to Main tank, you would only need a few people in the raid to have certain ML abilities from the previous Master level raid. Leaving the rest of the players to need nothing at all from previous raids.
B: Artifacts
Artifacts were an interesting concept originally, they took a lot of the passive RA’s and put them into “ToA Stats” gained through these artifacts. Although, by doing this the original developers created some big problems.
First, and probably the biggest problem, is the amount of time necessary to: get the artifacts on drop/roll, farm the scrolls, level these artifacts, etc. This creates a huge power imbalance between those who have time to build templates including multiple artifacts and those who don’t. Thus, forcing new/returning players to go through a lot of PvE before ever actually being able to compete in any non-zerg faucet of RvR.
Next, having so many new ToA items/artifacts made all the older PvE content completely not worth doing. Many players including myself missed the old Legion and SI raids. But the gear from those areas was just not worth it. Because ToA stats were the thing to get now, and all of that came solely from ToA.
My solution:
Artifacts in this alternate ToA should exist, but with a limitation. One Artifact per equipment/inventory.
I suggest this limitation for a few reasons,
First, is the balance between casual and hardcore players. Hardcore players have the time/resources to get decked out in Artifacts while the casual doesn’t. We shouldn’t create a huge wall to climb in PvE if it isn’t necessary. Obtaining 1 Artifact per player is not too challenging of a feat for everyone to do.
Second, avoiding the cardinal sin of MMORPGs, making old content irrelevant. Allowing just one Artifact per player means that players will still have to go after SI raids, Legion, etc to get credit for good gear to help create their templates.
Third, keeping player-crafted armor/weps still very relevant.
Finally, having only one Artifact adds just the right amount of customization to that player’s play-style be it through extra ability / passive stats, without going overboard.
Obtaining Artifacts:
1. I believe that all artifact credits should be purchasable with feathers as to not force every single player to PvE if they don’t want to. Similar to how items are purchased currently from the main cities.
2. I am a huge believer in the best items coming from the player base, meaning that the person who ultimately puts your artifact together would be a player crafter. The mats would include an Artifact credit item, + purchasable mats + ToA item (maybe a farmable scroll?).
3. Should leveling up Artifacts even be a thing? I’m on the fence about this one. Thoughts?
4. Artifact credits should come from various places, meaning Raid content and group content. It should drop as an item similar to any other item that drops in a raid and /rolled for at the end of the raid, while at the same time giving credit so players can buy them from merchants later.
Final thoughts on Artifacts:
- Artifact charge uses should be on a separate timer from the timer of normal item uses. Maybe on a 7-minute reuse timer.
- There are some artifacts that may need tweaking or removed completely, as to not benefit 1 realm more than the other, or maybe the charges/stats of some could be considered overpowered and would need tweaking or removal.
- Lastly, consider making hard caps on ToA stat + RA combinations. For example, 5% cast speed on an item + Mastery of art 9 shouldn’t give 20% casting speed, the cap should remain 15%. Following along with other ToA stats cap increases e.g. 5 to dex stat cap shouldn’t stack on top of aug dex 9, the value of aug dex 9 should be the cap regardless of how you get there.
C: New Instanced full group raids ( similar to Darkspire)
Bosses in these dungeons would drop RoGs, Feathers, and some would give certain Artifact credit + item
There is a ton of ideas that can be put together to make these dungeons a possibility, I’d like to hear your guy’s thoughts on what would be your ToA Group instanced Dungeon. Keep in mind it may be hard to instance some of these areas. I’ll give one thought for a dungeon.
My dungeon would be sort of a rehash of the group challenge steps from ML 7
Your group must finish the 4 challenges in any order to progress to fight the final boss
Apophian's Challenge, Volurgon's Challenge, Shaitan's Challenge, Hephaestian's Challenge
After defeating the 4 challenges you could be able to teleport to a new instanced fight with “Chimera”
(The ML 6 boss)
Basically, instead of going through a big dungeon, you have 4 teleport pads that take you to 4 different challenges that vary in different ways. And then a final teleporter that sends you to Chimera
D: ToA Raid Dungeons
In a spirit of holding true to the progression of the ML steps, I think that each ToA dungeon should be done in progression to the next. Meaning to do Dungeon 2, Dungeon 1 must be completed first and the boss of that zone drops one or two, tradeable, single-use keys to open the door to dungeon 2, So on and so forth. Nowadays every realm has its raid leaders, they would most likely end up with the key(s) regardless.
Progression through the dungeons should remain relatively the same, e.g. you still need to make the glove in Deep Volcanus to stop the lava waterfall for the raid to cross the bridge. Although the dungeons should be streamlined as to not take longer than 1.5 hours to complete with a good-sized BG.
At least half of the Artifact credits would be obtainable in the raids as well.
Due to the immense level of resources that would have to go into this project. I would imagine the ML raid zones would be implemented in phases.
I would break down the Raids into 4 separate dungeons and 1 final area.
ML Raid 1 : Sobekite Eternal
Dungeon progression remains the same, Final boss: Runihara
Have fun jumping off at the end.
ML Raid 2: Halls of Ma’ati
Dungeon progression remains the same, Final boss: Medusa
Don’t get turned to stone now.
ML Raid 3: Deep Volcanus
Dungeon progression remains the same, Final boss: Typhon
Cold damage anyone?
ML Raid 4: Aerus City
Dungeon progression remains the same, Final boss: Phoenix
Would love to see what the devs would change about this fight.
ML Raid 5: EV keep
Final boss: Phoenix Reborn
This final raid would be a mix of RvR defense and PVE raid completion. Upon defeating Phoenix in ML Raid 4 a single key will drop which opens the door to the EV keep and the final encounter.
This last raid will have to be coordinated between the RvR BG leaders and the PvE BG leaders. Once the door opens a message will be sent out across the realms, chaos will soon ensue.
Upon opening the door the raid has to wait 10 minutes before the encounter begins allowing some time. The encounter itself should last anywhere from 10-15 minutes. Half the realm is defending from the other two, while the other half of the realm is trying to finish off the PvE encounter.
Upon defeating the boss there will be a flag that must be taken (similar to task zone flags) After capping the flag a Djinn (or whatever NPC you want) will appear for 24 hours, giving out only one reward should you choose to accept it.
I have yet to think about what that rewards should be, but it should prevent realm swapping. What do you guys think that reward should be?
Thank you for taking the time to read such a long post, I've wanted to write something about ToA for a while just never got around to it.
