New Western Boss Zero Drop Rate

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Need to mention Baldur's Gate too because, well, it needs to be mentioned when it comes to modding.

Well BG goes back to the Infinity Engine and without some GPL stuff or a scripting engine like Wesley Weimers Weidu it wouldn't be that far.

Or games become OS like Jagged Alliance 2.

PoE should at last give users the possibility to edit tables and the skilltree.

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Captain Arteri was added as a part of our incremental "add more story" plans. As a named NPC, we felt he needed to be Unique. Also, the "Way Forward" quest was far too easy to complete, especially given the nature of the reward. Unfortunately, Arteri's proximity to an area transition raised some issues with how trivial it was to farm/bot him, hence the no drops.

Ok let me use that logic on other bosses:
Hillock->straight forward no drop.
FireFury->straight forward no drop.
Hailrake->straight forward no drop.
Oozeback->straight forward no drop.
The Necromancer->somewhere up right or left no drop.
Kuduku->straight forward no drop.
Chatters->straight forward no drop.
Burning Menace->straight forward no drop.

Gneiss->straight forward no drop.
Calaf->Oh yeah so close to the WP no drop
Black Death->50% of the time next to wp room no drop

Perpetus->Trivial no drop
Banner Triplet->Trivial no drop
Fleshrend->straight forward no drop.
Kole->straight forward no drop.

47 Uniques and according to that logic 18 uniques shouldn't drop anything because they are too trivial

12 of them can be abused just like the gate boss.

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Obviously it's not ideal, because it does feel disappointing to spend so much time and effort on a miniboss for no immediate reward (other than XP, and shortly thereafter a passive skill point). If you have ideas to improve this, we are listening and will consider them, but please bear in mind a few things:
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How about adding a second barrier that's tied to his life? If somebody does an instance reset he faces a 2nd barrier he can't pass because the boss is still alive.

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I think that we're just going to have to learn that GGG does what GGG wants and unless they ask for feedback, there is no reasoning with them.

I highly doubt everybody got the same opinion.
Quarls idea of balancing for example are many complete changes if one way didn't do well enough.
At the current stage potions are terrible and refilling them a pain each difficulty(Still no refilling over time) and mana is broken.
Minions are nothing but meatshields->We get a gem but no summon nodes?

My idea of a challenging game would be to boost the speed instead of life and basedamage.
Defensive Mobs that take forever to kill are no challenge they are annoying.
Damage Mechanics make melee a pain in the ass.
You are surrounded by 8 mobs you can't kill with one hit->600-700 damage each hit on high level->4200-5600 damage+stunlock and on a normal pack you already waste potions if you don't abuse the minion AI and dance around.

Lowering the damage of white, raising the damage or magic and rares and the HP of all 3->White Mobs can be oneshot with good EQ but boost the speed like in Turbo makes it much harder to play ranged.Melees will be overpowered by bigger packs without being stunned that much instead of one pack.
But my guess is that the melee "fix" will be 2 keystones which are "optional" and have an effect that each 5 mobs add 10% reduction/evasion.

He only drops nothing because he's right next to the exit to prisoners gate, right?

So why not make prisoners gate a 1-way exit so you can't instance, kill him, go back, instance etc.

If he drops nothing because you can get to him straight forward from the waypoint... then well, a lot of bosses are gonna have to drop nothing if that's the logic.

Drop suggestion for the captain:

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Rhys написал:

-Giving him the drops of a normal (white) monster doesn't solve the problem of disappointment (and he would still drop nothing quite often).

Having him drop nothing is disappointing, having a chance to receive something is certainly an improvement.

So take it one step further, because he is a captain he has proven himself more skilled than his cohorts, so why not give him an increased chance to drop a non quest reward skill gem together with the drop chance of a white monster. The base chance need not be greater than 10% for less powerful skills and 0.5% for top tier skills.

This will give the averge player half a chance of getting something useful and a little bit special.

Maybe my percentages are a bit high but i am not really considering botting or multiboxing i am just looking at it from the perspective of average dude who does abit of farming to help him along the way. 1 in 10 runs to find a basic non quest reward gem and 1 in 200 runs to find a top tier non quest reward gem seems reasonable within the stingy parameters GGG has established.

Botters and boxers will achieve results better than this where ever they farm, and that is something GGG has to deal with; not inflict the "honest" player with more penalties because it is present in their game.

Make him like Fairgraves, once defeated doesnt respawn (or his guards for that matter).

Why even try, GGG? It's not like you guys have had any success at culling bots, multiboxers and boss farmers so far, so why deteriorate the experience for other people with something that has ZERO effect on these things?

In reality though, i'd rather see a new map for this. Maybe an infiltration of a blackguard camp to assassinate the boss, giving you the quest item. Then you can go back to western forest and unlock that shortcut. Want to farm the boss? gotta go through the blackguard camp.

Simple.


EDIT: Or like the above, you could make him not respawn. I have absolutely no idea why zero loot was chosen over another no-respawn boss.

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Xenthian написал:

Make him like Fairgraves, once defeated doesnt respawn (or his guards for that matter).

+1

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Xenthian написал:

Make him like Fairgraves, once defeated doesnt respawn (or his guards for that matter).

And make his drop chances awesome. As in, so awesome you ponder whether to rush new characters to kill him in Merciless. Also, same with Fairgraves.

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Wooser69 написал:

So why not make prisoners gate a 1-way exit so you can't instance, kill him, go back, instance etc.

This^.

Or not even an entrance/exit at all.
I mean, nobody uses that gate other than race farming, right?
Well wouldn't it just throw a nice little spanner in the works of the very much cookie cutter races? Requiring slight adjustment of race technique/farming method, or reliance on portal scrolls.

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Xenthian написал:

Make him like Fairgraves, once defeated doesnt respawn (or his guards for that matter).

Or this^.

Be required to activate Piety at the other side, which can drop an item (or use a virtual quest activation), engaging new boss then completes the quest. Thereafter the boss can be inactive or just not spawned.

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ScrotieMcB написал:

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Xenthian написал:

Make him like Fairgraves, once defeated doesnt respawn (or his guards for that matter).

And make his drop chances awesome. As in, so awesome you ponder whether to rush new characters to kill him in Merciless. Also, same with Fairgraves.

The bosses should have increased drop chances on first kill like in D2. So simply yet so difficult (for some reasons) for GGG.

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KarraKurri написал:

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ScrotieMcB написал:

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Xenthian написал:

Make him like Fairgraves, once defeated doesnt respawn (or his guards for that matter).

And make his drop chances awesome. As in, so awesome you ponder whether to rush new characters to kill him in Merciless. Also, same with Fairgraves.

The bosses should have increased drop chances on first kill like in D2. So simply yet so difficult (for some reasons) for GGG.

Nope. Make the really awesome ones one-shots. Things like Fairgraves and this Captain -- oh, and the bandits. For the ones you can farm over and over, relative consistency.