Torghast 9.1

[ippollite]

Just watched Tali do a level 8 run. You can go watch the vod on twitch.

Heres my observations:

He constantly chain pulled.
His bar never really breached the cut off line (eye balling it, around 67%).
He didnt fully explore. But he did clear most of the adds, pots and chained souls.
He died 4 times.
On average, i'd put his bar progress at an average of 45-50%.

His final score was zero gems. This isnt a "LOL noob!" point.
If you'd have asked me, based on the fact he genuinely chain pulled, genuinely cleared most of the content and genuinely pushed, i'd have thought (even with the deaths pulling him back), he'd have been given a couple of gems.

I know we dont know any of the answers by the way, but it has my rogue pretty concerned. I like Torghast in general. I even liked the pre nerfed torghast (that period between the healer/tank nerf (~dec 12th) and the full scale nerf of torghast 3 days later (dec 15th) was pretty awesome). But my playstyle is controlled. I like looking about a bit, taking it in, sapping, making careful and controlled pulls at the right moment - you know... rogues).

But dude was chain pulling. He cleared most of the content. But that bar degradation was brutal.
Toward the end he was genuinely pointing out that perhaps the push push aspect of that bar did change up his gameplay at least (even though he acknowledged that wasnt everyones cup of tea).
Perhaps it was the deaths that cost him severely? But then, it kinda suggests that if you die, you need to restart if you require 4 gems to move forward (5 at 9 and above according to preach). But here's my concern:

That talent tree. It has a talent in it that slows the degradation of the bar. Perhaps its slower naturally at lower tiers and at 8 theres a cut off to the 'new content' (ive only seen preach and tali run it so far). But the dude is heroic geared... whats that? 213-225? Level 8 is like rated around 190 to 200? He played the game as you'd assume it was intended (constantly doing stuff, and clearing). And got zero stars?

I think theres gonna be a riot if this goes live?

ETA: It could really just be a tuning issue. Perhaps 9-12 has had more work on it, whilst 1-8 is basically just the 9-12 system crowbarred on to it. But my worry is that its deliberately like 8.3 cloak. And you've gotta spend several weeks (or months if youre kinda slow) failing whilst leveling those talents before you can seriously step into the actual content of the patch.

[huth]

If he got straight up 0 gems, i'm guessing more towards vital parts being NYI, rather than tuning issues. The system may not even be tracking your progress correctly yet, or maybe the score screen isn't actually hooked up.

[Gaidax]

I think theres gonna be a riot if this goes live?

There is going to be a riot either way.

Most likely issue is that like with all these things (obvious tuning aside), it will take a week or two to find that correct recipe for full stars run. Then just like with visions, the extra talent tree and gear will help A LOT.

I bet that deaths hurt your score though and that makes sense.

[Bloodyleech]

Aren't deaths a huge -points/stars?
Either that, talent tree required to level, or not fully implemented.

Edit: the fact that he died 4! times with this gear is quite interesting tho. Has blizz changed anything in layer 8? I rush through it with every character and die never, while I'm gearwise pretty bad (193-205).

[ippollite]

There is going to be a riot either way.

Most likely issue is that like with all these things (obvious tuning aside), it will take a week or two to find that correct recipe for full stars run. Then just like with visions, the extra talent tree and gear will help A LOT.

I bet that deaths hurt your score though and that makes sense.

Aren't deaths a huge -points/stars?
Either that, talent tree required to level, or not fully implemented.

But if they do force you to pay such a price (lets call it half a star) and you need a full completion run (4 stars pre 8 and 5 stars thereafter), thats... well, rationally, one death and you're out, right? Isnt this gonna be the same exact complaint we saw with players hitting the final boss and dying?. We seem to be going in circles in terms of wow GD meltdown issues. Can you even imagine it? "I got to level 4 but your dumb game seems to force me to make huge pulls just to keep that bar and my score up, and then i died... once! And now i have to do this bs again!"

[Bloodyleech]

But if they do force you to pay such a price (lets call it half a star) and you need a full completion run (4 stars pre 8 and 5 stars thereafter), thats... well, rationally, one death and you're out, right? Isnt this gonna be the same exact complaint we saw with players hitting the final boss and dying?. We seem to be going in circles in terms of wow GD meltdown issues.

The easiest solution would be to not die, at all. There is no reason dying to anything up to L8 - I do not know the scaling of 9-12, so can't say anything to those.
You can even kill L8 endbosses without any anima powers if you are heroic/mythic geared. No person that knows his character should be failing to kill the bosses of L8 of regular Torghast (TC is something different)

Yes, I can imagine this. If you failed in Mage Tower or Visions you had to rerun, too! Except that you had only a limited amount of runs per week. I'm absolutely fine with this.
Luckily, a L8 run takes about 20 minutes, so nothing to bad at all.

Edit: Imho dying the worst that can happen - I wouldn't even be pissed if dying would kick me out of a run, but that's just me.

[huth]

Aren't deaths a huge -points/stars?
Either that, talent tree required to level, or not fully implemented.

Edit: the fact that he died 4! times with this gear is quite interesting tho. Has blizz changed anything in layer 8? I rush through it with every character and die never, while I'm gearwise pretty bad (193-205).

They actually did mention ramping the difficulty back up now that you getting your Ash isn't dependent on you getting through well.

Still, they also said that 4 gems should be reachable if you're either fast or methodical, only 5 should require both, so i'm still leaning more to the system not actually being fully implemented yet.

[Bloodyleech]

They actually did mention ramping the difficulty back up now that you getting your Ash isn't dependent on you getting through well.

Still, they also said that 4 gems should be reachable if you're either fast or methodical, only 5 should require both, so i'm still leaning more to the system not actually being fully implemented yet.

My guess is that dying is really killing the score, although it could simply not be finished. As you said - dying will still give you your ash.
If you die on L8, you can't expect to be able to clear L9, which in relation means that you simply do not unlock L9 till you are doing L8 deathless (something many roguelite doing - only unlocking stuff/content if you do "this and that" without dying).

[Bloodyleech]

i tried it on the ptr... i stealthed to everything... only got 3 gems and couldn't advance to next layer lol...

My guess is that you get only 3 or 4 stars if you "just" rush through or kill everything slowly and 5 stars is for people who do both, rushing the whole floor (only 4 stars is needed to advance).

[cuafpr]

I have no faith in this system and don't see why they are doing it this way.... the current way works, you clear the floor you go up to the next, why add "gems" to it, its just stupid. Speed should not even be a factor into your gem level either, there is M+ in the game already for timed content.

[Bloodyleech]

I have no faith in this system and don't see why they are doing it this way.... the current way works, you clear the floor you go up to the next, why add "gems" to it, its just stupid. Speed should not even be a factor into your gem level either, there is M+ in the game already for timed content.

But this way you are road blocked by a simple "you can't beat this in a good amount of time without deaths? why do you want to go into the next layer?". Better than just saying "hey, buddy, this should need around 210 ilvl".

[FelPlague]

From what I've played of it I've pretty much always gotten 4 or 5 gems. Knowing tali he likely paused alot to talk to chat. Cause if your legit chain pulling you should easily be constant.

[cuafpr]

But this way you are road blocked by a simple "you can't beat this in a good amount of time without deaths? why do you want to go into the next layer?". Better than just saying "hey, buddy, this should need around 210 ilvl".

I figure most are smart enough that they keep dying over and over eventually they figure it out, that they need gear or practice

[Bloodyleech]

I figure most are smart enough that they keep dying over and over eventually they figure it out, that they need gear or practice

Na, you expect to much.
There are people that instantly blame the game and not their own skill.
Like.. there are mages (obviously other classes too, like hunters thinking that soulforges is impossible, because they have no build-in healing - spoiler: they do! Leech + Mend pet ) that think that soloing Torghast is impossible - and no proof is enough for them.

[ippollite]

The easiest solution would be to not die, at all. There is no reason dying to anything up to L8 - I do not know the scaling of 9-12, so can't say anything to those.
You can even kill L8 endbosses without any anima powers if you are heroic/mythic geared. No person that knows his character should be failing to kill the bosses of L8 of regular Torghast (TC is something different)

Yes, I can imagine this. If you failed in Mage Tower or Visions you had to rerun, too! Except that you had only a limited amount of runs per week. I'm absolutely fine with this.
Luckily, a L8 run takes about 20 minutes, so nothing to bad at all.

Edit: Imho dying the worst that can happen - I wouldn't even be pissed if dying would kick me out of a run, but that's just me.

It might just be you. It might not. To be honest one of the big reasons the content got nerfed was the people in the first few weeks screaming "this is so easy! I cant believe you think its a challenge?!?" with absolutely no concern about class or playstyle. PS, we also found out pretty quickly on that you couldnt just use prep or planning (ie. skill) in pulling to progress. There was also a gear check (and all gear checks always favored hybrid classes in particular - ironically - when undergeared). I know that sounds mad, but my hybrid feral druid in vanilla could always solo 5 man group quests far easier than my rogue even with all its stuns and mitigation. Which is why it was heals and tanks that got hit with the nerf bat initially (remember the near riot of people crying about how 'last week we could solo layer 8 and now im struggling with layer 5s!". Thats where the nerf to the content came from... not rogues. Not casuals. People who could do something a week before that were suddenly and (un)expectedly equalised with the rest of the playerbase and feeling like they were being cheated out of progression.)

Point is... telling everyone how easy torghast is (without accounting for said intended gear check and spec/class variance) leads to resentment. Resentment that tali's shadowpriest chain pulling mobs (id mark his downtime at around 5%... 10-15% including corpse runs) was rewarded with zero stars. I mean... my rogue (sin) is a ramp class. It cant pull 15 mobs at once. It HAS to pull cautiously. Am i gonna be expected to spec outlaw for bf/ar because i cant be strategic and play to my strengths, i need to be constantly pulling? Also, keep in mind, though please correct me if im wrong, but sub has more frequent burst windows and control over widespread damage. Outlaw has more aoe output (with moderate survivability). I have more power in 2-3 mob cleave and single target. To maximise my throughput i should control and limit the number of mobs on me.

I may be wrong. I dont even want this to be about me. I want this to be about tali getting zero stars chain pulling, clearing the floor and clearing the tier whilst also never really breaching the 4 star cut off point, let alone average it.ion literally said "speed clearing isnt the only means to successs". Tali didnt speed clear in the sense of a tier 8 dk speed clear. But that degradation really hurt him even with chain pulling...

[Bloodyleech]

Snip

The current Torghast IS easy if the player behind the character is just remotely good with 200+ gear. I do not know the new scaling, that's why I asked if there is something different in 9.1. You could me give any class/spec with 200 and I'd clear you (the current) L8 deathless, it doesn't matter for me(!) - I know almost everything about every spec in this game, but this is not the case for most people. Regarding this, I agree with you, that one can't simply say "lol torghast ez". There are some specs that got a harder time, that's a fact, but it's still doable with any of them.

Tali died. 4 times (this is almost the current allowed death-cap). I do expect that blizz is hitting the "no, you can't pass" button when you died - 1 death is fine imo, but more than 1 death in an easier layer than the following would be.. No, I completely agree if this is blizzard intend to block people out of higher layers for dying. We still do not know if this is really the case, we will see in the following days/weeks.

As far as blizzard gave us informations, you can either do it slowly and clear everything, or go ham and run through it. You rogue should(!) be fine going for 4 stars.

All we can do right now is guessing, and I guess that:
5 Stars: clear everything/most of a floor fast, no deaths
4 Stars: clear everything slowly OR do a fast run, no deaths/maybe 1 death if going fast fullclear
3 Stars: not clearing everything, not thaat fast, 1 death
less stars aren't interesting enough for me to think about them - I think you know what I want to say.

[Crimson Spears]

The idea behind the change seems to be to add a grinding component to it like chromie's quest and visions. You are not really expected to be able to beat the new torghast without doing the mindless grind.

People rejected the systems where people mindlessly won because it was boring as all hell. So now they are trying to make it feel like you earned the boring as all hell can't lose grind in a effort to make it feel like you earned it.

- - - Updated - - -

It might just be you. It might not. To be honest one of the big reasons the content got nerfed was the people in the first few weeks screaming "this is so easy! I cant believe you think its a challenge?!?" with absolutely no concern about class or playstyle. PS, we also found out pretty quickly on that you couldnt just use prep or planning (ie. skill) in pulling to progress. There was also a gear check (and all gear checks always favored hybrid classes in particular - ironically - when undergeared). I know that sounds mad, but my hybrid feral druid in vanilla could always solo 5 man group quests far easier than my rogue even with all its stuns and mitigation. Which is why it was heals and tanks that got hit with the nerf bat initially (remember the near riot of people crying about how 'last week we could solo layer 8 and now im struggling with layer 5s!". Thats where the nerf to the content came from... not rogues. Not casuals. People who could do something a week before that were suddenly and (un)expectedly equalised with the rest of the playerbase and feeling like they were being cheated out of progression.)

Point is... telling everyone how easy torghast is (without accounting for said intended gear check and spec/class variance) leads to resentment. Resentment that tali's shadowpriest chain pulling mobs (id mark his downtime at around 5%... 10-15% including corpse runs) was rewarded with zero stars. I mean... my rogue (sin) is a ramp class. It cant pull 15 mobs at once. It HAS to pull cautiously. Am i gonna be expected to spec outlaw for bf/ar because i cant be strategic and play to my strengths, i need to be constantly pulling? Also, keep in mind, though please correct me if im wrong, but sub has more frequent burst windows and control over widespread damage. Outlaw has more aoe output (with moderate survivability). I have more power in 2-3 mob cleave and single target. To maximise my throughput i should control and limit the number of mobs on me.

I may be wrong. I dont even want this to be about me. I want this to be about tali getting zero stars chain pulling, clearing the floor and clearing the tier whilst also never really breaching the 4 star cut off point, let alone average it.ion literally said "speed clearing isnt the only means to successs". Tali didnt speed clear in the sense of a tier 8 dk speed clear. But that degradation really hurt him even with chain pulling...

It was mindlessly easy... certain groups in wow never learn how to play and got crushed but I weary of caring about the mage that only casts fireball or the sub rogue that uses swords.

I think blizzard has to man up and tell them GIT GUD.

[Bloodyleech]

It was mindlessly easy... certain groups in wow never learn how to play and got crushed but I weary of caring about the mage that only casts fireball or the sub rogue that uses swords.

I think blizzard has to man up and tell them GIT GUD.

Or those balance druids with agi weapon, warrior with int, retri with int.. Yeah, those people exist, sadly.

Imo Ion gave a hard slap towards those people in the last interview - which I really liked.

[Crimson Spears]

Or those balance druids with agi weapon, warrior with int, retri with int.. Yeah, those people exist, sadly.

Imo Ion gave a hard slap towards those people in the last interview - which I really liked.

In what way? By telling us all future content will be gutted so they can accomplish it and that we are going to have to grind boring things like the torghast streak system so they feel less useless?

Wish he would slap around the mythic raiders like that.

[Bloodyleech]

In what way? By telling us all future content will be gutted so they can accomplish it and that we are going to have to grind boring things like the torghast streak system so they feel less useless?

Wish he would slap around the mythic raiders like that.

Na, he said that people are just playing bad if the dps difference is to big. (which I'd agree - a 203 bm hunter out dpsing a 220 enhancer IS bad gameplay from the enhancer, nothing to do with balancing)
Imo it was a cute little slap to bad players, but I could totally misunderstand what he wanted to say with this.