U42.2 Feedback: Moria Balance Revamp

[Neinda]

The difference now is that bleeds/DoTs have been added to so much since that fight was created.

Now on top of that, he has 13 million morale. And you can only DPS 80% of the time at most. To be safe, you'd really have to throttle DPS on pretty much all classes at the 30 second mark after the bubble, so really you get 30 seconds of DPS for 45 seconds of downtime. Turns into a 25-minute fight in which the boss gains a progressively stronger damage buff. If you're perfect.

If not, it gets a lot longer. Every tiny mistake is a 130,000 heal.

There's not a chance in hell this fight gets done without the entire raid performing flawlessly and all being in voice chat. It was a pug-killer even on Anor. I can see why they wouldn't want to gate the raid to only raiding kins, considering this is a nostalgia server.

Making bleeds not heal him is probably a good enough change. You'll still have the Hunter auto attacks to vex the group, and it's still a stupidly long fight.

Though that depends on how his damage it tuned. He gets a 25% damage buff every 30 seconds (which made sense back when this was a 7 or 8-minute fight) starting at 50% morale. With 13 million morale, it's pretty much guaranteed he'd get to the max 10 stacks of that buff well before the end of the fight.

If they allow the bleeds/dots to keep working, then groups will just use bleeds/dots and skip mechanics. The dots would have to turn off when his bubble turns on.

 

[auximenes]

Ahhh, is gidhur an undercover account?

If he's a Dev then he's been hiding it since like 2007.

 

[Electrolyte]

If they allow the bleeds/dots to keep working, then groups will just use bleeds/dots and skip mechanics. The dots would have to turn off when his bubble turns on.

All the dots possible wouldn't let us skip the mechanics here, really. It wouldn't make much of a difference unless you had a ton of Wardens in the group. You still have to stop hitting the boss, it's just that classes which rely on dots or apply dots passively won't be at a prohibitive disadvantage. You still have to pay attention and get out of the room when he calls your name. He still gets all of his buffs and debuffs.

Absorbing dots during the bubble is fine, but it'd only noticeably affect Warden DPS, which stinks for them because theirs relies almost entirely on them. It's funny that they introduced this mechanic in the same expansion where they added Wardens, because that's who it messes with the most.

 

[Ecrinhael]

In a real raid group, keep in mind there are also significant player buffs. In an organized raid group with 1 or 2 offensive support classes (redCap, blueMariner, blueLM) average DPS for a straight DPS spec is often more than 2x your solo/dummy DPS. On top of that, your non-DPS players will certainly be dealing non-zero damage over the course of the encounter, and the last consideration to keep in mind is that when Moria was originally released, player revive skills had significantly longer cooldowns than they currently do (in many cases 5-10x the cooldown). That's significant in the Filikul encounter because a death+revive is effectively a hard reset on a single player's 'timer' since your DoT starts over at tier 1.

Keep in mind that these player buffs only provide burst DPS. bMariner buffs, while great, have a long cooldown, and only buff the group/raid for a short amount of time. As a mariner, I'd rather go rMariner to keep a sustained DPS rather than go bMariner, halving my DPS and only providing burst damage increase, especially on a 3/6 person team.

 

[Gibby]

Er... yes we could.

Apart from 3-man instancves which were almost all soloable, even many of the 6mans could be done solo.
Urugarth was an easy solo on nearly all classes.
Grand Stairs was soloable on several classes, as was the Sixteenth Hall.
I solo'd Turtle raid when Lv60 was still the cap.
Sammath Gul could be done solo apart from the optional challenge boss.
Now at Lv75 there was only 2 6mans and I'll admit those were both tough, but the 3mans were still doable.

you cannot solo urugarth on the 2007 client

 

[Ribald]

Specific and targeted adjustments are being made to level 60 equipment to incentivize running various instances. We have not changes the Medallions of Moria paradigm, so you can still get 4/6 Moria set pieces even if you never enter (or can't complete) a specific instance, but you will still need to best the Watcher to get the helm and shoulders, as well as various DN bosses for the Lothlorien raid sets. Beyond those armour sets though, there are various pieces of jewelry, off-hands, shields, etc that you may want for a given class/spec and which will only be found in specific instances.

That said, none of these should be prerequisites. As I said earlier in this thread, none of these instances have difficulty tiers, so they have been adjusted generally with a goal of still being entirely completable with PuGs. The only possible outlier that comes to mind and which has long been a 'pug-killer' in lvl 60 content is Flagit, who punishes DoTs so much that the fight can easily be impossible without tight coordination. I'd like for his heal to ignore DoTs, but that's not a change I can make myself and I can't give an ETA at this time about when it might be changed.

Ah that sounds good then if the other gear besides the armour has been getting tweaked to be a bit more relevant/desirable, anything along those lines is most welcome! And I'm glad to hear that about still needing to run Watcher to get the final 2 coins, the wiki was suggesting they could be bartered for 15 Medallions of Moria each.

One cherry on top would be making sure the set bonuses for the Beorning (both Watcher and DN sets) and Brawler (DN set) had the same kind of TLC as was shown to the Mariner ones. Even older classes like Warden, Burglar and Champion came out with generic bonuses on their DN sets. But I understand it's probably a time-consuming process to go through and tweak them all.

You gave me a nice flashback there mentioning Flagit though. I can still hear my old raid leader's exasperated sighs after he had sat there explaining the fight for a while to our newest joiners, only for one of our most established players to just happily let rip on his hunter and heal Flagit right back up again.

 

[Brinuw]

I understand support classes exist but turtle also has mitigations. Support classes as far as i know only make you do 2x dmg in the buff window given, not the full 8 minute window we need. Support classes also dont do as much damage as dps classes. If the best theoretical comp is 4-6 red LM's and 2-4 support classes, 2 tank/2healers, I'm failing to understand how this clears turtle.

the strongest mitigation debuffing doesnt come purely from support classes, its from diversifying group compositions as each class (excluding a few traitlines) bring a 3-5.5% mitigation debuff with typically a 100% uptime. So stacking a group of only rLMs means you're only getting -3% phys/tact mits whereas a group with that isnt stacking all of the same classes would be in the realm of 18-25% just from the dps, and 3% for all 12 raid members is 36%. Assuming Turtle has the same base mits as most enemies on landscape, since its effectively a t1 instance, then it'd have around 40% mits, so mitigations are likely a none factor. Maybe Turtle is considered a t5 raid boss, in which its mits would likely be around 50%, which is where you'd need Defensive Support classes to fill the gap.
Major Rents give -15% for the first part of the duration, and then -12.5% for the remainder of the duration, and Minor Rents give -8% Phys/-10% Tact for their durations, and burgs alone can manage around 95% uptime with major and 100% with Minor; so again mitigations even if they are on the highest end should be at or around 0% with planning/coordination.
That just leaves damage buffs, which are alot harder to quantify.

So, high ball the health at 19million as I dont know the exact amount, as assume 7.5 'dpsers' (5 dps, 2 offensive supports as .75 dps each, and defenseive supports at .5 dps each, ignoring dps of healers/tanks) that means that each 'dpser' needs to do 2.53million over the course of the fight; an 8min fight length puts that dps value at only 5277 dps, and thats not even taking into damage increasing buffs/debuffs like Oathies, Reveal Weakness, ect.

 

[Hermi]

I took a 6 man through Skumfil on BR the other day and with the left side, we had zero issues and enjoyed what we were doing. On the right side, Grimreaver defeated us. Multiple times. We changed strats and just couldn't get him down past half health before losing people. We had Brawler tanking Grim, Warden tanking cave claw adds, 2 Red LMs, Red Mariner and Blue Minstrel. 5 of us were in full DN sets and all 6 with maxed LIs.

Mirror hall and water wheels with a 3 man was fantastic. We had a brand new LoTRO player with us and after readjusting our strat for the final boss in water wheels, got both instances completed easily. Was it quick? No. But we enjoyed what we were doing and actually had to think about things. Group composition: Blue Brawler, Red Mariner, Blue Minstrel. All with DN 6 piece (thank you Omelette and Pistachio) and maxed LIs.

 

[OnnMacMahal]

First of all thank you to all the players and groups who jumped into instance testing for us on Bullroarer! Your feedback is much appreciated. The vast majority of the feedback I've seen has been very positive, and I'm glad that most people seem to agree that we've struck a pretty good balance: instances can challenge you and boss fights are long enough that you have time to engage with their core mechanics, but none of these instances are very punishing overall. (One notable exception: I haven't seen a group yet attempt Dar Narbugud on level after these changes. DN is designed to be the most difficult of the level 60 endgame instances, but is still not supposed to be on par with the difficulty of a modern T3/T5 instance).

While the following list is not entirely comprehensive, this is a list of the more significant changes made in response to feedback we received from players this week:

Nornuan's health has been reduced slightly.
Nornuan had an erroneous mitigation buff which has been removed.
Caerlug's heal while resting is now much more potent.
Gazathrug Bruiser health has been increased to be closer to other elite monsters in the Grand Stair.
Igash's health has been increased.
The Beast's health has been reduced.
Dorozg the Beast Tamer's health has been increased slightly.
The Dorozg buff granted when the Beast is awake, called 'Protect the Master' now reduces the Uruk's incoming damage.
The Beast's Ground and Pound damage increased slightly.
Krankluk's health has been increased.
Halls of Crafting non-boss mobs (goblins especially as well as some orcs) have increased damage and/or health. This does not include the goblins summoned during the first boss encounter.
Gothgaash's Strength of Fire buff is now more potent.
Gothgaash's Fire Shield now reflects all types of incoming damage rather than only melee, but only reflects 15% (down from 50%).
Moria Fighters and Skirmishers in Fil Gashan have increased damage and/or health.
Chief Guards in Fil Gashan have dramatically reduced health.
Hwandrin's health has been reduced significantly.
Most non-boss nameless creatures in the Dark Delvings have had their damage increased.
Flagit's health has been reduced ~45%.
Blind One's health has been increased slightly.


Thanks again, and I look forward to running these instances alongside you in the near future!

 

[Karac Avalron]

Thanks for working on the moria instances prior to their release on the new legendary servers. This was a major gripe in the past and I am very happy to see SSG address it. Have a great weekend @OnnMacMahal

 

[Uroc]

Ty for update. Please just update some loot so it could be useful for levels 60+ (maybe something nice for legendary weapon? vxp? some weekly?), so people would want to play it even after Moria season is "done". It will keep more alive both legendary servers and normal servers in long term.

 

[Gwenryth]

....5 of us were in full DN sets and all 6 with maxed LIs.

All with DN 6 piece (thank you Omelette and Pistachio) and maxed LIs.

Sorry for the brutal snipping, but this makes me wonder if it ever was considered by the Dev team to lock the best sets in the Tavern, to get more realistic feedback.

 

[Thanatos]

I really wanna hope that these scalings will be switched to the old once once the legendary servers hit the next level caps after Moria, because just the raids now are nearly impossible to solo them even with a lvl150 player. Helping other players on the live servers would now require at last 2 high level chars, which taunt the boss around, or really a whole raid. I dont know yet about the 6 man instances, but also 500k morale of some of the mobs is just a lot for lvl58.
I liked to run Filikul while leveling around lvl80+ from time to time, now its impossible. I dont even know, if players can farm the trolls in the instances now to complete the troll slayer deed, because you can forget to finish them on the landscape. YOu can find just a hand full of trolls there, that would take hours.
And with 18 million morale and 83k dot damage per tick now in FIlikul or the stackable incoming damage debuffs from the other raid boss, I doubt that I would now ever want to run through these with low level players when I have to search some other high level players, because when a lvl150 player cant kill such a raid boss by himself, some lvl58 surely wont push the dps any farer.
I would really wish to keep the stats like before and therefore just add higher tier difficultys or something like a delving stone into the dungeon - make these scalings optional and therefore the loot better. Because now, the loot, the equipment, is just incredibly weak. And most of the time you get only some silver coins from dungeons. IM pretty sure, noone would ever want to farm these dungeons for this loot, while also stucking 1 hour in the dungeon - at least later on the live servers.

 

[Thanatos]

P.s. I just quote a comment from me to another thread about a similar topic and about adding tier difficultys:

That would be the most reasonable solution.

And btw.: The reason why theres a lack of finding players for old dungeons is not that these are too easy, its because you get nothing out of them. Either you get underscaled crap of equipment, which noone would want to use, or you get NOTHING at all except some silver coins. Making the instances overwhelmingly harder would not draw players to them at all. There needs to be more loot, ANYTHING thats usable on this level or also on higher levels. (May it be cosmetics, may it be some buff items, portraits, whatever.)
I tried Filikul with my lvl150 red Captain and beat him very barely. A few more seconds and I had died on the dot. My loremaster died just after the boss had 2/3-1/2 morale left.
NOONE can tell me that this is a supposed scaling for a lvl58 raid.

SSG should just add more tier levels, keep the usual t1 as before and add better loot to the higher tiers.
Since I tell you, half a year after Mordor and ANgmar reached MOria, all the players wont run these anymore once the new expansion is unlocked and all the other players on the live servers, which want to run these instances for their moria quests or deeds - especially slayer deeds - will struggle with them.

Or SSG could just add delving stones to the Moria instnaces.

Well, in my point of view players need motivations to run instances, and these are loot. Sometimes I help players through old instances, but after dozens times im not in the mood anymore.
I mean, check Helegrod now for example, you get nothing, just some lvl105 equipments, which you cant even use. On Mordor I ran it just one time and not again.

Edit: Why would SSG have no time to implement more tier difficultys, when they have time to change the scalings? That makes no sense.

 

[Uroc]

P.s. I just quote a comment from me to another thread about a similar topic and about adding tier difficultys:

Yeah, it would be nice if they do something. Sev once told on some stream that they want us to play new content also but many of us don't want to play just new content or some people just want to play old content and nothing else (old content is what keep them in the game and reason to give money to the game still). I am 99% sure that if they don't create extra motivation for people to keep running these instances that normal servers and later legendary servers will have even more problem with population. Normal servers already suffering with population.

How will become problem for legendary server? Well if someone will want to join that server now, or on for example level cap will be 75 etc... that person will have troubles to find people to help it finish that content so it could create demotivation to proceed with leveling or even start which after some time lead to the point that there is not enough new players or players with alts to maintain activity to keep that server desirable.

 

[Zukbur]

I know this post comes late but still wanted to share my expirience of Fili (again) and DN. Pity Bullroarer tests were not carried also trough the weekend but I understand that time was of the essence. Now I guess true testing will happen on LI servers.

Your feedback is much appreciated. The vast majority of the feedback I've seen has been very positive, and I'm glad that most people seem to agree that we've struck a pretty good balance: instances can challenge you and boss fights are long enough that you have time to engage with their core mechanics, but none of these instances are very punishing overall. (One notable exception: I haven't seen a group yet attempt Dar Narbugud on level after these changes. DN is designed to be the most difficult of the level 60 endgame instances, but is still not supposed to be on par with the difficulty of a modern T3/T5 instance).

Filikul
My mixed lvl group tried today my idea of battle of attrition with Filikul but I guess it is imposible after due to lack of enough hps even if ppl are sturdy and won't die from few ticks from bleed - on prolonged fight we will run out of strong stuff (heals & buffs) and ofc such tactic will rob us of dps (since we used 6 healers ). So Fili as intended will stay as dps race only (in my eyes too).

Dar Narbugud
Just 9 of us today: 4x60, 1x71, 2x75, 1x 83, 1x84. Tanks on lvl and one healer on lvl too... but its irrelevant I guess.
We didn't stand a chance against troll bosses. Raid known very well to us. Few tries. Now indeed it is not your avarage raid. We manage to fight long but after all sooner or later buff on boss make their dmg the same as bleed with Fili. So... again dps race... but this time against buff instead of bleed. Bleed resets on death but buff not so they didn't give us hope... Thus lack of possible testing of rest of bosses ofc

While Fili was mentioned to be nerfed and give us hope to do then on standard servers DN with standard group you can get around lvl looks impossible and will be left for very dedicated pro builded mid lvl groups (classwise) or for overlvl groups. I'm happy for Mordor and Angamr folks since you will have really nice challenge - at last I think so. But after looking at current state of mid raiding on my server, and what I can squeeze of it, I think it won't be easy to find and convice ppl for such stuff. But lets see for myself before I look for others.

an 8min fight length puts that dps value at only 5277 dps, and thats not even taking into damage increasing buffs/debuffs like Oathies, Reveal Weakness, ect.

Altought I tanked today I tested my dps on snow dummy (mit 0). My yellow rk won't be even taken to any of this dps race raids with his 4483 (I keep silent about my red warden possibility ).

*Grand Stairs changes - I'm not sure how strong above mentioned changes will be in there but I hope they will consider the fact that GS is instance lvl 56 and is avaible for ppl with mix of gear 50-55 (so out of 58 sets). Most of feedback (mine too) comes from charcters maxed on lvl 60.

I guess this will be my final post in this thread. I wanted harder Moria and I get. Even harder then I can beat. Pity that major way of changes comes to dps races since they are defintly not suited to me and my friends (we prefer mechanical, coordination challenges) but others who like such stuff now may shine

Cheers all.

 

[gildhur]

If he's a Dev then he's been hiding it since like 2007.

Alpha 2 in mid-2006. If we're talking forums, you'd need to go back to the MEO days. I play the long game.

 

[auximenes]

Alpha 2 in mid-2006.

I don't remember much about that phase but I had a Captain named Braddock and combat with his 2H-sword was slow as molasses.

 

[Hierok]

You're wasting your time, they won't listen to reason,
Buffing the group content to require a group for them is treason.

Imagine being mad that group content requires a group. My guy, are you also mad at stable masters costing money to bring you around?

 

[-CasualGamer-]

Dar Narbugund went easier than I expected though I've done it about 6x and knew the mechanics.
We did have ~5 high levels, 3 mid-levels. It's obvious that a few 150 DPSs pounding at a 10+m morale boss, with decent buffs, kills the boss within 2 mins.

The nice thing is that these instances are still fun for 150s. There is a challenge there and the melee DPS especially die a lot.

Dark Delvings was much harder until we looked up the mechanics. You have to be able to absorb 5k AoE as is common to many of these instances, and spotting the reflect phase is critical. Even so, the reflect doesn't instakill you and you can spot it through your quickly dropping morale alone.

So knowing the mechanics, having 5+k morale and decent Tmits is key to most boss fights.

My guess is both instances are doable with properly-equipped and virtue'd lvl 58s.