Mercenaries tasks/unlocks are unclear, I am so over it

Singleplayer Discussion
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I thought I would try and have some fun in mercenaries today instead of scrambling to do as many tasks as possible in the small amount of time i have to play . . . So I decided to do the heroic alterac valley bounties, I had not gotten around to attempting them yet.

I completed the first and second one, and thought I would go see who I unlocked artifacts for. I quickly realized I had not unlocked any artifacts. This is almost certainly because I did not have the new characters in my team. I totally would have put them in my team if i knew I had to.

Now I know this is not a new problem, and that it is not limited to unlocking these artifacts. I am so intimately aware of this problem with how unclear the tasks and unlocks are because I make this same mistake of not knowing I need the mercenary in my party repeatedly and regularly. I am so over it.

TLDR: PLEASE make the tasks and unlocks and overall language used in Mercenaries better. Please do it quickly. Please do it comprehensively. Please do it to existing content, not just “changing how we word things going forward”.

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While they are at it, they should drop the Heroic requirement for the 3rd piece of equipment.

I mean, really, they went from “grind away to Task 7 and it’s all yours” to “blow your brains out trying to beat Heroics” for the same, at times questionable, reward.

But Blizzard has always been blind to its casual audience, fixating rather on developing the game so the devs can have fun.

Normal = Play, Heroics = Work

That’s not why I’m logging on.

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The frustrating part is the inconsistency. Take these two tasks for instance:

  • Defeat four heroic bosses
  • Deal 150 damage

The first one requires the merc who has the task to be on the team. The second one doesn’t. How do I know? Experience. There is no indicator in the text that one requires the merc and the other one doesn’t. Even more frustrating? Some of the text is clear:

  • Deal 150 holy damage with a team that includes this mercenary

Why can’t they append the words, “with a team that includes this mercenary,” to the “Defeat four heroic bosses” quest text? Including the condition on some of the text while omitting it on the other falsely implies that the condition isn’t required for the other. It doesn’t even take an experienced coder or a seasoned technical writer to figure this out. A college intern could easily do a better job than the current team is doing.

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I came her specifically to get some idea on the Rexxar one.
Task 8: Is the Horde Righteous - Use the Boon: Fighter coin 2 times.
I have absolutely no idea what to do. If anyone can please advise I would appreciate it.

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There is a whole class of these. You don’t even need Rexxar in the group to complete this one. Just look for the fighter buff icon on the map (i.e. the Boon: Fighter coin) and plan your route through it. The Boon: Fighter coin has a sword on it, the Boon: Caster coin has an up arrow, and the Boon: Protector coin has a shield on it. I was initially confused with the wording, too. I don’t normally think of a map space as a “coin,” especially when they have nothing to do with the coins that we collect at the end of each map to upgrade our heroes.

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Thank you so much for this. I googled it and had no luck either.

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Tasks that require the merc in your party for credit.

  • complete a bounty at level 30, (that’s a given)
  • complete 2 / 4 / 6 Heroic bounties (not known until you don’t get credit the first time you do one sans merc)
  • deal X damage with a party including this mercenary

Takes that don’t require the merc in your party for credit.

  • deal damage
  • deal damage to protector / fighter / Caster
  • use boon coins
  • use spirit healers
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I have got another point to add to this. Today I failed to do the Event task 2 because I had the “celestial alignment” treasure. This increased my damage so it did more then 100 to Ivus. The problem is my skill did not include this damage, so I looked at my skill, 23 damage, skill that repeats, color double, x2 x2 double double boom boom 92 damage. But no!! - it actually did 33 damage because of the increase for celestial alignment, and I did more than 100 damage, and now I have to slog through the whole dang bounty one more time. Looking right at my skill though it said 23, not 33. Ivus was the only character on the board when this happened, it is not like he was not in front of my character and then people died and he moved so the ‘allignment’ changed, no no that def did not happen. My skill should have told me the actual damage it would do.

TLDR: A skill should tell you exactly what it will do that turn modified by all variables assuming states do not change as actions are executed. Full stop. Every skill, every variable, every time, mid combat changes as actions unfold being the only exception.