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6/26/2015 3:33:09 PM
223
The Definition of Insanity...
Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. It's a cliche and not even really true, but it is an apt description of the Skolas fight. After banging my head against the wall for 3 hours last night, I just couldn't take it anymore. I'm not the type to normally come to the forums to complain, but I feel it's warranted this time.
For the record, I have beaten Skolas twice: once on the Arc burn week, and once last week (with a Warlock and Titan respectively). So I've beaten him both pre and post patch. Not to mention many hours of trying to do it both pre and post patch and failing. I know the strategy, I know the mechanics, I have all the right weapons, and I don't suck. I'm no MLG pro or anything, but I'm far from casual. I have no trouble completing any endgame content in Destiny.
My issue isn't that the fight is hard, it is and it should be. My issue is that it isn't fun, it's frustrating. As an MMO veteran, I welcome the use of mechanics instead of bullet sponge bosses. I love that you have to communicate and work as a team to complete it. However, I feel that there is just too much for most teams to handle. Consider all the things to worry about: Skolas, the adds, the Devouring Essence, the Mines, the modifiers, and level disadvantage. None of these is any more concerning than any other, my opinion (and I stress MY OPINION) is that there are simply too many things to worry about for the majority of players, especially on teams with inconsistent rosters.
The factor that annoys me the most is the level disadvantage. We had to deal with this during hard Crota as well, and even though that wasn't terribly difficult, I still feel it was a cop out. It's an artificial difficulty multiplier, and completely uncreative on Bungie's part. With such drastic penalties for being "underleveled" for a fight, like those that exist in Destiny as a whole, there really is no reason for any endgame encounter to be at a higher level that we are. I think even at level 34 it would still require teamwork and communication to defeat Sokolas and deal with all the other mechanics, but it would remove a lot of the frustration of being two-shotted by a random add. I think this would allow many more teams to complete the activity while not making it so easy that it's a joke.
There is also the issue with the rewards. For such a grueling fight, there is really very little reward. You are not guaranteed any gear or weapons, and the treasure chests are no different than those in any other PoE encounter. For going 9-0 in Trials you are guaranteed an elemental primary, an exotic, and whatever other goodies you get out of the Lighthouse chest. It is very hard to go 9-0, so those rewards are appropriate. Defeating Skolas is also very hard, but the rewards are lackluster at best. Considering the way the rewards are currently in PoE, there really is no reason for the fight to be that difficult.
There will be those that say the fight is fine as is, that the level disadvantage is just a part of the fight and we should just deal with it. I also expect a fair amount of "git gud scrub" and "filthy casual" remarks from the uncomfortably high percentage of immature people on the forums. My counter to the former is that Vault of Glass was hard, and fun, and rewarding, and there was no level disadvantage. The raid was level 30, and as long as you were level 30 you were on an even playing field. To the latter I will simply ignore you as I ignore the opinions of anyone not able to hold an adult conversation.
I know Bungie will not change the Skolas encounter any further, and this is not some ultimatum that if they do not concede to my wishes I will quit the game.. I love this game, and I will keep playing it. My only goals in writing this are to vent my own frustration and hopefully find some other Guardians that feel similarly. If Bungie, by some random act of the universe, did read this, I would only ask that you consider those not it the upper echelon of gaming prowess when designing endgame activities. I am an MMO veteran so I understand that those types of activities should be challenging, but they should also be attainable by more than a small percentage of the player base.
If you have no trouble beating Skolas three times every week, good for you. I truly am glad you have the skill and consistent team needed to do that. This post is not for you, and I hope you understand that in the end this is a game, and it should be fun. Right now, in my opinion, Skolas is not fun, it is a hot mess of frustration. I have a feeling I'm not alone in that opinion.
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2 Replieshmm, its strange, the definition of insanity is exactly what people do to get better at something for example lets say your trying to get good at sniping in destiny you snipe over and over again expecting to get better results
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1 ReplyHe's meant to be challenging. Skolas is to weed out the OK from the good. Better rewards, better perks, etc. The thing that you need to consider, is it's the same as a Hard Mode raid. The raid itself is fun, but hard mode is simply the same thing, just with an added difficulty. You can't blame Bungie for making it challenging. There are four additional levels you can run Prison of Elders on. Skolas isn't necessary, but it certainly speeds up the leveling process, and leads to greater rewards. What REALLY isn't fun, is Trials of Osiris. I am not the best a Crucible to begin with, and that is VERY hard. There is no recipe to victory. Skolas has a recipe. Stop using substitutes
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i beat skolas the first time i did 35 and ended up getting a elder cifer so either i am really lucky to have a good team or you guys probably give up and not practice enough
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2 RepliesI had fun on the skolas fight last night. Anyone who doesn't is looking at it like a chore they have to do and that's why you aren't enjoying it.
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The level disadvantage is the big thing they need to think of a better way to make something difficult other just plopping a level disadvantage and calling it a day
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1 ReplyI think the Skolas fight is one of the few challenging things in destiny. After they removed elemental burn I posted a very similar post, but have since beaten him 6 times without too much trouble. Get a good team with leveled weapons... Pay attention to the adds first... Learn the mechanics well... Enjoy! He's not that hard to bring down once you have done this. Lightswitch does kinds suck with the blade captains, but fatebringer and a good shotgun takes care of them. Also, if you notice the armor this week does have a fallen perk for PoE. Have not tried it yet, but this likely will help. I have 1 run left this week... If you need help then friend me on PSN and let's get it done!
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Honestly, I thought Skolas - with a good team - was way more fun prior to the patch. All it is now is rotating while killing captains and sometimes bombarding Skolas. Also, I don't even do Prison of Elders anymore. I can't stand it. It's so boring and the rewards are garbage. I get better rewards from Crota's End and Vault of Glass and they're actually fun to me. Yes, even Crota's End. The raids in this game are fun. It sucks that our "new and refreshing" PvE endgame activity is just a pointless 5 hour event that nobody seems to enjoy. I think Bungie crapped the bed, personally. However, like you, I love this game. I simply refuse to play Prison of Elders.
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Skolas is a chore, but can be fun. My biggest gripe about the whole thing are the garbage rewards. If you are lucky enough to get one of the elemental primaries, you only get 2/3rds of a weapon and the weapons are just plain bad. The rest of the rewards can be had on the 32 (armor core) and 34 (weapon core, etheric light, possible elder cipher). There is not much motivation to do Skolas. VoG is actually fun, so I would rather do that for no rewards at all than Skolas.
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Good assessment and reasoning. I would add that I'm okay with the level 35 opponents, as long as POE exhibited more strategy and less grind. Checkpoints at each stage of the encounter would be good along with better reward for time invested. Add a unique bragging perk specific to Skola, such as a bond, sparrow and shader, and there would be more incentive to run it. As it is, I'd rather just do a 32 and 34 and skip the limited chance at getting a mediocre primary with burn from 35.
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1 ReplyI agree. They need interesting and challenging mechanics, not higher levels. As a level 34, Vault of Glass hard mode, lvl 30, is both more fun and more challenging than Crota's End hard mode, lvl 33. That's because Vault of Glass requires a full team, coordination, stealth, timing, strategy, and many other elements besides just good guns. Crota, on the other hand, takes a Ghallarhorn, and that isn't even required. The only thing that involves anything besides waking, running, shooting, and punching is the bridge. At least, that's how it's supposed to be. The only part of Crota that required strategy and coordination was ruined because it had more cheeses than one thousand Wisconsins. I only did the bridge legit once, and it was really fun. Too bad now you just die and snipe. OP is 100% right.
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Edited by Matsudaira: 6/26/2015 10:01:49 PMI've run Skolas twice and haven't beat it. By the time we get to him I'm starting to get over the stupid thing. Like you said, it's not [i]fun[/i] and I've heard nothing but horror stories about the rewards (especially the exotics), which makes it even less appealing to run the Skolas round for a 7th time. I'm no longer going to even give Skolas a try. I would rather just run 32 and 34 three times each and get the rewards that way. Even then though, I'm running out of reasons to even do [i]that[/i] because I've upgraded everything I need to with EL and the weapons and armor sold through HoJ is garbage. Seriously, there isn't a single weapons in this expansion that makes me rub my hands together in delight. There is no Gally or Vex desire-level weapon. I [b]really[/b] hope TTK has better return on investment for my time (and money).
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3 Repliesvery well written. 4.9 out 5
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I agree with a lot of your points. Plenty of them reflect my own thoughts on the Skolas Poe I've also completed it twice. Void week and the final solar week with no primary weapon reward and only 1 elder cipher. Got to Skolas during arc week but our best player had to leave and it was clearly hopeless with a random replacement. Huge bonus points for your arc week completion Got to Skolas this week with 2 randoms and it was going alright after a couple fails. Got as far as clearing both sets of mines but a poor revive attempt by our hunter ended it. Unfortunately forgot about the maintenance Wednesday and got booted he next attempt. Haven't retried it yet. The reward just isn't there for the time commitment. This week I feel it is manageable but you definitely need good players with good team skills. I'd love to know the stats on Crota and VOG hard completions (prior to the DLCs that allowed us to be equal and higher than the enemies) vs Skolas completions. I have a feeling that Skolas completions are significantly less
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I agree on the reward system at least. You'll spend a better part of maybe 3 or 4 hours and all you get is a weapon/armor core, etheric light, and maybe elemental primary (emphasis on the maybe) it's just not worth the time or energy.
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1 ReplyHey what console are you on? I may be able to help you out, I do it every week on all 3 characters no more than a hour each run.
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Putting the sanity in [b]insanity[/b] since '95
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I agree with you on the level disadvantage and Vog is the perfect example the thing with Skolas I see is the level disadvantage is unnecessary since the fight itself has so many awesome mechanics that need teamwork and still keep the encounter tough at level 34
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Did it 3 times this week twice without a wipe, twice lead my fire team. The one thing that bothers me on the skolas fight is when the adds spawn at the middle mine most annoying thing ever. And round 4 for me is the hardest round too many yellows running around! What really sucked is that I did not get a single primary weapon, and if I did it probably would have been the void auto rifle that stuns captains
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1 ReplyAgreed wholeheartedly. I don't even bother doing Skolas anymore, since the last few times were a waste of multiple hours. And yes, I beat him the first week, and no, we didn't just "shoot gjallarhorn, pop heavies, shoot gjallarhorn again". Anyone on PS3 knows this strategy is impossible since loading time to pop a heavy takes up to 30 seconds. New gen, you have it much easier than you know ;) So anyways, yes, we beat it the ol' fashioned way, running around, killing shit, trying desperately to stay alive and revive the best we could. I got a cool ship and shader for my efforts. Sure, a good one time reward. But there's not much incentive for me to repeat these efforts week after week. My solutions: -A Skolas kill is a guaranteed elemental primary. The available guns aren't even that great, so at least give us one of the subpar elemental primaries, guaranteed. -OP's suggestion of making the fight a 34 encounter is good; however, impractical seeing as there is already a 34 encounter. -Take out mines OR essence. Just one or the other. Leave everything else. All of it together is just such a pain in the ass, and not fun to repeat, simply because your hunter ran out of invisibility, or you got overran in your titan bubble, or any of the other things that can happen while diffusing mines. And of course, if the wrong player dies, and your left with an immune guy and a guy about to die from essence, hello Wipe! Having it all together sucks. It would still be a difficult fight without either essence or mines. -CHECKPOINTS. I'd actually play Skolas way more often if I knew I didn't have to risk too much of my time to get to Skolas, fight him a few times and fail, and then have to eat dinner with my girlfriend, or whatever else in life may happen, only to be back at f-ing square one. Could be a fun challenge. Instead, it's a time sink that I don't bother with anymore. I'm not going to get any better guns than what I already have (that is, if I'm even LUCKY enough to get a gun), and who cares about armor and weapon cores once you've got a few? As for etheric light, seeing as I'm sitting on 15 of them, and can get them much easier through level 34 poe and trials, again, what is the point of fighting Skolas? Good post, OP.
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3 RepliesI totally agree with all you said. I say to fix it increase or guarantee a gun drop for completing Skolas. And take out the poison part man I hate that part of it. I think if u remove the poison Skolas would be fun.
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1 ReplyEdited by A Beaten Leaf: 6/26/2015 9:56:23 PMWow. At least you had 500+ words and an essay to you response instead of "Nerf Skolas!!!!" Respect.
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3 RepliesBungie cut corners in every way possible. We aren't going to get good game-play at this point unfortunately. they spent their money on marketing so they don't have to make a good product.
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[b][i]BUMP?[/i][/b]
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hey man, there is a reason this game got 6/10 ratings =/
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Insanity pretty much describes the whole destiny franchise as a whole
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2 RepliesI would like to see the adds rate of fire come down a bit. If your two friends have cover and your the only one they can spot. Good night Irene.
