Update Discussion: August 25, 2019

[ErDrick]

Just a question I wanna ask everyone here, but how do you guys feel about the elite's damage in the new zone?

The same way I feel about all Elite mob damage ( and it's actually bleeding into non-elites in some places) in all zones atm, It is extremely high for a tab target game, you can literally be killed faster then you can react, in a lot of cases even reacting instantly won't save you. ( obviously being a tank gives you some buffer buuut). Example that has literally happened vs a non-elite in fae realm: I get hit twice and see that I need to heal, click heal, heal goes on cooldown and gets activated, die before it actually heals me... so 3 hits from a non-elite in this case, that's about 4-5 seconds vs approximately 700 health and 800 armor ( and thickskin with 7 modifiers on top of that), which is much higher then the average person is going to have. Other random things have killed me in 2 hits, but it might as well be one hit because the same thing happens, I get chunked, hit heal, die before the heal actually takes effect. The elites are fully capable of 1 shotting me and so is general prask still.

No instant kills are acceptable at any level unless it's some special mechanic like a face of death simply because there is no way to actively dodge or block such mechanics, and to be honest those are way too prolific.

A level 45 troll+ level 45 worg can combo instantkill ( and even if it isn't actually "instant" that's pretty irrelevant since you can't do anything the entire time you are prone) just about anyone in level 70 gear.

The wolves in kur cave or the ratkins in rahu sewars can stun you once and chain that into a 8 second stun, so that might as well also be an instant kill since all you can do is watch yourself die.

The guys on rahu plateau will stack movement speed reduction on you to about 90% reduced in approximately 2 seconds if you accidentally aggro more then one and he chain aggroes more... this is essentially also an instant kill because you are just plain fucked, and you know it. ( Prask also has this ability btw and can still rage 100% you!)

Some random skeleton swordsman on the ground aggroes you as you fly 30m over his head in birdform, your power drains to zero in about 6 seconds and you sit there and die, because you cant run or fly away even though you never initiated a fight and this guy basically said "BIIIIIIRD!".. same basic situation. ( for added fun you are not allowed to transform out of bird form in-combat because...well I don't know, maybe they find it amusing! )

Multiple respawns happening at once.... you are dead, go directly to the afterlife of your choosing, do not pass go or collect $200.

Mobs being packed in like sardines so pulling one really = pulling 10...same thing, instant kill with a different graphic.

I love Citan, I love this community.. the new content and level caps don't have me very excited though ( though the zone is beautiful), because combat is still in a fairly fucked place atm, at least that's my opinion. I don't mind an excessive grind if the combat is good, but this grind really is EXCESSIVE and the combat ( in my opinion, you are welcome to have a different one!) just Is more frustrating then it is fun, by a wide margin. It has been getting more and more frustrating since you implemented the multi-respawn mechanic right after dark chapel came out.

Increasing mob damage in any way shape or form is the opposite direction to go, you wanted to extend fights so you lowered our damage but left the mobs exactly the same, knowing that we were already forced into pure damage builds because you can die so quickly if you give anything a chance to actually hit you a few times. Since then we have lamias mixed in with packs of deadly mobs, ae disables, ae stuns, ratkins that are as annoying with chain stuns as wolves already were, faster respawns, multiple mobs respawning at once, mobs critical hit capabilities, more mobs, stronger mobs, mobs that summon reinforcements.

I know some people won't like this but it's true regardless, you people speccing as healers are mostly wasting your time because no self-respecting tank is going to trust you to heal them in the 2 second time window in which they can die, all of them have set up's for self-sustain. Even if they do trust your competence when you add channeling times into the mix it's still pretty much a random dice roll to see if your heal lands before 1 more hit does. I say mostly, because it does still have some uses ( group resurrects are tits, so is unfetter and the bard version of both ), and if you enjoy it you aren't wasting your time either way. I mean this as another example of just how out of control incoming damage is.

Another possible solution to this btw could be in messing with player health and armor bars, can keep damage down but just extend survivability past 5 seconds. But by that I mean by a large margin, like at least double what we have currently.

We have always in this game as players, built around as much damage and cc in as short a timeframe as possible ( or as a tanky self-sustaining type for the trailblazers ) because getting hit has always been too penalizing compared to our tiny health bars, speaking of... I can survive just fine in fae realm with archery/battlechem, just crowd controlling stuff to death ( which is the same thing as building for pure raw damage from a solo standpoint, same basic concept: kill them before they can 3 shot you, in this case you're just delaying the 3 shot for long enough to kill them first.)

EDIT: Just wanted to add a P.S.
Grouping does not solve any of these issues since resurrects are limited due to timers ( and materials or special restrictions ) and any one party member is capable of being dead within 1-4 seconds in level appropriate content. That is just ludicrously fast for a game where you cannot hold up a shield and block it for as long as you need to ( presumably waiting for a 2 second channeled heal to actually fire and land), or roll out of the way. A 4 second death in level appropriate content would be bad even in an action combat game like rift, tera, dcuo, wildstar..etc etc etc... for a tab-target game it's just completely insane mechanically.