Campaign discussion

[Max™]

I watched Moo Ouzi DECIMATE a team of Mithras in Sauro, I saw like 6 drop right before my eyes.

[Avé]

Seems they removed the MP from non-casting jobs in Campaign. Normally I'd been able to Aspir or MP-Drainkiss a WAR type mob, but I can't now

WHAT, that's terrible. Now I'm going to have to rest as RDM, and that's crap.

Any info on these new Siege Turret/Belfry/Mantelet things? I haven't had a chance to log in since update yet to check things out. And have any of those trojan horse warmachines shown up yet? I'm guessing it'll be a while before they show up, to give time to the beastmen to develop their technology.

[Sci]

There weren't any of those things in La Vaule last night, but the Orcs were still level 1 then. I was in La Vaule doing campaign for a while, and standing in Sandoria getting the fight status messages for a while. There was a lot of allied losses in La Vaule, which means all the zones are going to suffer. Seems mostly due to allied NPCs having far less HP than they used to, and the generals are less invincible. I used to Cure IV just normal NPCs and barely dent their HP bars, now it's a good 15% maybe?

[Katlan]

what recon lv is it for the beasty's to bring out the new machines? I think its recon 4 but I didnt see any last night when i did campaign (all beasties w/ lv4). And yeah... I am very happy they nerf'd the npc's. Its about time cities start to get atk'd regularly and there was no way that would remotely happen w/the npc's being as powerful as they were. Campaign should be a lot more enjoyable and now there's an incentive to help protect ronfaure/sauru/gusta [S] because if those fall then cities get sieged

[WithinMemoria]

Fortification HP was lowered as well. Before update, they were always close to full but now most areas are halfway depleted.

NPCs are less durable.

Confirmed about the MP removal, couldn't aspir anything I could before. (Only mobs with job classes that normally have MP can be aspired now)

Orcs on Midgard are Lv5 at the moment, going to see if I can find a siege weapon.

[Ivana]

It's shaping up to be a slaughter here on Asura. All areas were under control of the 3 nations prior to the update. However, Orcs and Yags are now at lvl 5, Quadavs lvl 4. Windy is at 0% morale and prosperity. The beastman have major influence over every Windurstian area except Sarutabaruta (they are almost even with Windy though). Sandy is losing Vunkerl, Eldieme and Jugner. Bastok is losing Crawler's Nest and Pashhow.

People are starting to whine that Campaign is too hard now.

[Katlan]

imo thats what it shoulda been like from the beginning. w/ 24 diff zones to defend ppl need to pick and choose the ones to save vs leeching off the npcs. the npc's r still extremely powerful, its just now 3-4 npc's cant destroy everything, and unless the entire army is in a zone then.. well... they cant defend it by themselves.

[Priran]

There's a NPC, Leonoyne, at one of the San d'Orian Campaigns who's using a GSword WS called Spine Chiller, which does around 1000 damage and Terror. Dunno if this is new because I never go to San d'Orian campaigns, but it's kind of cool.

[Ryushii]

Has anyone else noticed stronger enemies also? Pre-update I could blood tank any of the normal mobs as RDM/WHM, and now my attacks and enspells are both doing crappy dmg (my enspells are capping at 50%, as are my spikes, and no it's not the element). I can hardly kill the normal mobs now spamming SS because they're HP is so damn high. Anyone else notice this?

[LD]

While I think I can understand why they weakened NPCs, I think they took it way too far. They should at least be strong enough to squeek by without PC help most of the time, but they seem to get their shit pushed in every fucking time.

Fortifications don't really seem weaker, it's just they're being attacked much more often now, so their actual sturdiness is being shown.

No MP on every mob is unfortunate, but it's not like it ever made sense to begin with, so I understand them taking it out....MP Drainkiss is mostly worthless again. -_-

[blister1]

The NM's just pretty much wreck the shit out of everything now. God knows what the hell that big turret is gonna be doing.

[Muffins]

It seems grossly overtuned. It's like you need the coordination and communication of an HNMLS to survive these waves. I could understand needing to make the mobs harder (100% win rate was /doze), but we've won against 1 DRG wave here in Jugner in the last few hours. It's insane how badly campaign mobs slaughter us. How about 60/40 win rate? Anything that would be a little more reasonable than 1/99. :/

[The Blackrose]

I got to see Muu Buxu the Elusive slaughter the shit out of 50 people and three contingents of NPCs this morning. His ass was running all over the place with wide area Mijin Gakure/teleport spam. It was just utterly rediculous.

[Kabbalah]

It seems grossly overtuned. It's like you need the coordination and communication of an HNMLS to survive these waves. I could understand needing to make the mobs harder (100% win rate was /doze), but we've won against 1 DRG wave here in Jugner in the last few hours. It's insane how badly campaign mobs slaughter us. How about 60/40 win rate? Anything that would be a little more reasonable than 1/99. :/

QFT: if there is a Japanese word for "fine-tune," I would love to know what it is because at this moment, I'm convinced that they have no idea what it means. This is absolutely messed up; it's like there was a small angry Japanese man on the WotG team who got all emo that people seemed to be walking all over his precious campaign battles and decided that the only way that people could have any real fun was to make them work like fucking hell to kill even one mob. Yes, I still get XP and AN after a humiliating beatdown, but that's like being paid to be the cum dump at bukkake: it's money, but it's not fun...for you. I mean, difficult is fine, but a good game designer doesn't try to demoralize the players by constantly throwing overwhelming odds at them, then giving them paltry consolation prize for simply hanging in there.

I could've sworn that campaign battles were supposed to be easy-going events for people who needed to kill an hour or two then log off; what we've got now is the massive sort of rape fest that can only be described as "Hey, remember Legend of the Overfiend?"

[Bakthi]

Battles are a lot shorter now, because the NPCs get mauled and give up so easily. Sometimes we'll be mowing down the opposing forces no problem, and then the NPCs will suddenly retreat and the battle will be a loss.

I can still blood tank mobs just fine as BRD/WHM, but I don't enjoy this nearly as much. I guess the good news is that some of those Offensive ops are going to be available. There's no way Windurst will ever take the battle to Oztroja at this rate, though. We're going to lose everything except Saruta, and that's iffy. I see status messages about 3 groups of NPCs going to defend Saruta and coming back defeated, and that's a bit much.

[Zak]

This so reminds me of how Besieged went. It's like how Lv 5 Besieged that lasted for 15 min went to Lv 8 Besieged that lasted 3h and ended with the AC gone. Campaign HAD to get harder, but standing no chance at all except with 150 people defending a single zone when 5 other zones are attacked at the same time is far from balanced. What's the use of allied NPCs now taking hate, when they die in a minute or just run away?

[Kyreth]

My observations so far as a Windurstian on Ragnarok:

The weakest Federation units now have around 1500 HP. Windurstian commanders are still reasonably tough, but without their units to soak up some of the damage, they're losing hard. You can -not- supertank with an NPC, as cure aggro will get the attention of enemy beastmen.

Morale is in the cellar. Prosperity is getting mangled, and it's very possible at the update that Windurst will lose every single area, all the way down to West Sarutabaruta. At which point, cue the doomsday scenario of directly defending Windurst in city fighting...

Fortifications are weaker. Yagudo are smashing and warping in much less time than before. Further, they're getting Kindred reinforcements at a much greater rate.

Where the heck are the Bulwarks? They're going to need them.

Yagudo NM's have at least in some ways been training- in SC, Pious will now also toss minor cures at least. I discovered this when the first thing I got was a Cure 1 from the Yagudo (!)...before walking over and walloping me with it's staff. Kiting got at least a Cure II out of Pious (on itself) as well. Yagudo won before I could recover from a random Yagudo BLM Sleepgaing me long enough for Pious to obliterate me with a Tornado II. <x.x>

Even Fort K-N, which usually wrecks attackers was getting losses (and some wins). but that and West Saruta are a full beastman bar, and only a partial Federation one.

Bastok's not much better, though North Gustaberg's still in play. San d'Oria is the only one doing decently, though I don't think it'll hold all areas either. I was in a Campaign battle in East Ronfaure heading through on a Windurst mission, and ended up barely keeping the San d'Orian with the greatsword/Blizzaga III/Spine Chiller WS alive through Poisonhand going 100 Fists on him (took two RDM's chain Cure IVing to do it), especially since my first wave of Cure IV's got a Dismemberer to come over and try and faceplant me. Luckily, an unengaged NPC started tearing into him and pulled it off me.

Sandy feels reasonable. Bastok and Windurst are feeling a mite broken.

[Katlan]

There is now a reason to do Co-Ops that influence the army numbers and spirit? Cause on Ramuh, Sandy NPC's own everything. While windy and bastok NPCs get slaughtered. While running around doing tele quests I watched sandy npc's own wave after wave of mobs/NM's in vunklet. Yeah jugner is getting taken over my beasties but that place has so much activity the npc's cant always be there. But sandy npc's > mobs/nm's. Guess the co-op's u do r more important now then they used to be

[Kyreth]

It's the unit types that's giving San d'Oria an edge. Lots of PLD and WAR types, where Windurst is mostly mage/skirmishers and Bastok ranged/RDM/dancer types...neither of which can soak up serious point-blank melee well (though Windy summoners/beastmasters can tank decently with their pets). So they're getting torn to bits and their morale is tattered, while San d'Orian units are taking damage but winning.

[Katlan]

yeah but it now seems as if the co ops u do will have more influence. being highest rank and lazy (having completed all co ops at least once) i typically did aegis scream just to continue and use up my tags. seems more of a reason to do the escort type quests (to bolster unit #s) and w/e the ones r that boost up moral/prosperity.