For the last several years we’ve seen many minor improvements to the feature but many pain points still exist in varying relevance from player to player.
1. Depletion/Timer/Why is there no +0?
As far as I know your key used to start the dungeon gets reduced by 1 once the run starts. It stays that way when you go overtime. You get an upgraded (+1,2,3) version depending on your “in time” finish. Or in other words: 1 millisecond decides if it’s a +1 or -1 but a ±0 does not exist.
Why is there no “over time” time span (+20% or +25%?) that is reserved for a ±0 finish? At the same time given this option your key should not be depleted the moment the run starts, it just stays at ±0. If you go severely over time you should still get a depletion but as long as you abort before you reach that point your key should still stay on it’s level. You already invested the entire time until then for no reward so far, that is enough trade-off for still being able to have another attempt.
I don’t think you need rating adjustments here since people kinda know who clears in time and better.
2.Seasonal affixes: compounding on mechanical overload?
These extra affixes have been all over the place in terms of visuals, added mechanics, short & long-term impact on your performance and therefor enjoyment or displeasure.
- Infested in the way it played out was a precursor to Inspiring, isolating a mob because it’s consequences are annoying. Inspiring is gone and nobody misses Infested.
- Reaping was an AoE padding fest with some extra work for tank positioning but if you had a more exact mob counter/percentage overview you could deal with those extra mobs outside of a current pull or within if you wanted.
- Beguiling felt like a roadblock simulator with 1 of the 3 possible mob versions literally being the Inspiring affix. Nobody misses this one either.
- Awakened is probably GOATed at this point. The extra mobs did not interfere with your standard gameplay if you wanted to. You opted into these fights specifically. Using them well got you clear advantages for instance pathing. And if you wanted your run or especially the endboss to be hard that was up to your group’s choice.
- Prideful was similar to Reaping. An extra addon for better trash overview was helping to optimise it. In general narrow corridors or rooms don’t work well with many affixes such as this one. It also was a trade-off for clearing the mob faster preventing high aura ticks or compounding all your CDs with this buff on the next pull.
- Tormented turned out as a lesser version of Awakened. Extra mobs that would not interfere. You could ignore all the mobs (and time spend) to deal with extra effects on the last boss (for the entire fight this time). The anima buffs were permanent for the rest of the run so they were rather weak modifiers. Rather underwhelming and more of a spreadsheet decision.
- Encrypted feels like a mix of Awakened and Prideful but the effects are weaker versions. The Awakened portals were permanent, the invisibility sprint was a one time skip for example.
- Shrouded: Better than Tormented since you had more fitting choices. No extra mobs on top and in 1 or 2 spots you’d actually want to dodge/skip the elite spawn.
Thundering:
- An extra Swirlie effect on top of other Swirlie effects given by other affixes or general dungeon design.
- An audio queue that mutes other audio queues that could be helpful at the moment
- A kiss curse that also increases mob HP in the run in general. The extra damage can be seen as an overall positive for this, but: that would require to plan ahead for this and use the 30% damage bonus combined with CDs most of the time. Given it’s randomness it doesn’t overlap well everytime.
- Can happen out of combat/when running around/during mana reg before bosses and you get 0 use out of it.
- Having to run into other players can overlap with other area of denial effects etc.
- It is way too much random to be a cohesive experience and outcome on paper
As a summed up comparison:
Every other seasonal affix gave you some kind of control of how and when you going to deal with it and you could mostly separate it completely from dealing with bosses and/or trash. In this season it just happens and you have to deal with it.
Since we are talking about Swirlies:
Why do they still have no outline?! The percentage of their area that is visually in between their jagged edges but still has the effect is not too big. BUT: Once they get scaled up that area also increases while it becomes harder to gauge were it actually ends. This is not a lot of fun when you (for example) fight the Bird Boss in Algethar Academy with 2 fire swirlies spawning in melee range and Thundering is also spawning. You can have a really hard time telling how much or even if there is a safe spot in these situations.
As a different effect of this: Bosses with large models (wings etc) often obscure the view on these visuals. Not a problem exclusively with swirlies but making sure that effects like these don’t clutter up space around such bosses would help.
And the cherry on top for this mechanic: Swirlies on ground textures of similar color or on steep inclines.
3. Positive instead of negative affixes
Currently we have 2x5 affixes and players have learned to deal with them. And this is where it starts. Why is it always:
“Deal with it or get punished” instead of “Use this to your benefit or get nothing”
The moment you turn negative affixes into positive ones you move the time spend/effort required to deal with this into time gained by performing better having interacted with the affix. So scaling/balancing key levels would of course be acceptable if such a change would be made. The difference between doing nothing and using the affix effects to your benefit could be somewhere around 1-2 key levels therefor they should not lead to potential one-shots or completely sidelinding certain boss/trash mechanics. In general the versions that we get should never be even remotely close to what the current factors are for affixes. -40% HP on quaking or 100s of % from bolstering would be nonsense or make the gaps betweens using and not using it too big.
Given the current affixes and suggestions I’ve seen and heard here and there or came up with by myself it could look something like this:
+4
-
Bolstering
Mobs don’t get buffed, you get buffed. Maybe also with the rolling buffs of the current iteration instead of one singular buff. That way a coordinated trash group wipe-out at once would be rewarding. Important factor here would be: Distances between packs, how long does the buff last, RP before bosses. Kiting meta etc. The stacks should not be too powerful though. Minions excluded I guess. -
Bursting
Mobs “explode” on death, bursting with orbs that return HP or ressources (color/symbol coded) when running through them. Despawn at some point. Risk-Reward interaction. -
Raging
Mobs enrage randomly at certain percentage points, turning red, making them receive more damage. That way swapping targets or kinda holding smaller CDs for it is rewarded. -
Sanguine
Mobs standing in these puddles will not drop HP but soak up the puddle when receiving damage. Players can do this too. Should it still happen on death or spawn randomly? How high are the values? Might make for some weird tank gameplay synergy if it is too strong. -
Spiteful
Spirits spawn in a small area around the place (not aggroing other mobs). They are wandering towards individual players. If it takes too long they despawn. Run into them early to receive a buff (+damage, +healing, - damage taken). Join them too late and you get nothing/they despawn (HP ticking down). Maybe the naming has to be changed. Who would be spiteful? For what?
+7
-
Explosive
Orbs still spawn and despawn after maybe a longer than current time. Two options for their effect: Explode when being hit or running into them they bump away from you into other mobs and explode, dealing damage or leaving a modifier debuff (only on enemies). -
Grievous
The lower the player HP drops the more mana the healer receives when healing them. But this effect also diminishes over time. That is also a discussion had by healer players/designers though, idk how well each spec can adjust to these benefits. Also: What about shields? Does applying them count? What about spreading HOTs? The ultimate cheesing strat? -
Quaking:
No more cast interrupt, no more damage to other players. Overlap your ring with those of other players. Few seconds after that (circle animation) anything in those intersections is receiving decent damage (no 1 shots) or a small debuff that is a short term reward for risking cast-time for movement etc. Should it also interrupt caster mobs? Depends on uptime. If it’s too common those weeks are too desired since it’s more about utility than raw damage. If it is tied to triggering on overlap caster/healer might also have a decent chance to time their overlap when standing on ranged in general.
Bonus point: No stress on elevators or mid-air in Algethar Academy (yes I’ve seen players die mid-air).
Regarding the theme: If it triggers on overlap it’s also a lot more like you having control over that continental drift creating a quake instead of a random time bomb every once in a while. -
Storming
Storms are spawning and circling around (also near players/not just mobs). Catch them and get a short-term buff. Not as boring as a +X modifier though. Maybe melee specs get an AoE storm around them, caster spells proc effects like that onto their targets damaging enemies around them. That way positioning or swapping targets is prefered. -
Volcanic
Those always spawn around a players current position. Don’t trip into them when they burst? Nope: Run over all 3 of them and gain a fire proc damage buff.
These are all just suggestions. Maybe the devs come up with new stuff instead that doesn’t need a re-fitting of the theme for these affixes.
4. Tyrannical vs Fortified
Why does the damage dealt also have to increase? The core difference between those weeks is time spend on boss vs. time spend on trash. Just due to the HP increase. If the damage also increases we get two different outcomes.
-
Tyrannical:
Bosses deal more damage especially when it comes to larger special attacks. What I remember the most where Legion bosses that would at some key-level one-shot you no matter what. Having immmunities for that one moment during the entire run made a clear difference (Blackrook endboss). If you die in a bossfight it’s BR or mostly a wipe. The boss resets to full HP and without a Soulstone it’s a full runback (see that topic below). -
Fortified:
You might die more often during trash but that mostly matters in terms of running back to the group (no CR, tank death & kiting spam aside). If a group wipe happens some trash mobs from a pull/pack will most likely be dead. That progress is not being reset.
The increased damage modifier though puts way more emphasis on interrupts. Those seem to have become a lot more relevant in DF. Certain trash packs have up to 10 casts go off within the first 15 seconds and interrupts alone need heavy assistance from AoE stun and other forms of CC.
I’ve got nothing against a different focus on heavy AoE vs. sustained or single target focus changing from week to week. But the effect the extra “damage dealt” modifier has is a bit much.
5. Respawn points and run-back time
I could go through each dungeon but I’ll just use a few examples:
Halls of Valor:
You respawn at the start for boss #1,2,3 (and more? idk, haven’t wiped on the others in a long time). Start to #1, a few seconds on mount. Start to #2, distance wise more than double while also being dismounted for a large part. Same goes for #3. The sprint buff after defeating #2 or #3 is nice but why is there no respawn once the plateau before the inner hall is cleared for example. That one has a similar distance to most spots.
In general with these examples: It is not that much more or less common to wipe on a boss in general but why is one wipe more punishing in terms of running back than the other?
Shadowmoon Burial Grounds:
Respawn at the start until you get to boss #2. That run is just awful. Afterwarts each respawn is a lot closer to anywhere you want to get after a wipe. Why? Why is there no safe spot before the 1st boss once you cleared one of the two patrol packs before.
Jade Serpent:
Wipe at #1? Rather quick.
Wipe at #2? Basically run an entire circle around the room.
Wipe at #3? Basically run an entire circle around the #2 room and a similar distance to get back to it.
Wipe at #4? Straight forward for a few secs!
Why does the door for the 3rd one not open once #1 and #2 are defeated?
Algethar Academy
Slightly varying distance no matter where you wipe while also being able to mount up. This should be the minimum standard.
In general:
There once was a statement made in an interview that after a wipe 90 seconds should be the max amount of time to re-engage with the boss. I don’t think that works so well these days, especially in mythic+. 90 seconds is up to 5% or even more (sub 30 min runs) of an entire run. You can argue about the time being used to reflect on the mistakes and communicate, but: It is still weighed against a ticking timer.
For additional feedback/improvement on this topic (timer induced stress) see:
Similar statements have been made multiple times - also by influencers - about the size of raids and lack of safe/spawn spots within. Why do I have to run through the labyrinth that is Castle Nathria to get back to the Kael’Thas encounter when there could be a simple safe spot right before the encounter area that is active for anyone dying during the fight once the last trash pack has been cleared?
If I wiped on The Jailer I just run in a straight line for a few seconds.
6. Energy Bars, Irrelevant Mana Bars and the Lack of Timers/Information
These days most 5man bosses have an energy bar that is at least a signifier for when the next big special attack/spawn will happen. You’ve added older dungeons to the Mythic+ pool that are 10+ years old where bosses have similar design but still display a standard mana bar that is absolutely irrelevant for their design.
Now this is not just an argument for current day re-implementation. You are on a certain QOL level when bosses can give you that information. If that would be standardised from the first dungeon ever (sure BFA is basic newcomer leveling) or rather for every dungeon boss ever (Timewalking has bosses up to 16 years old by now) it would be an established pattern that helps any kind of player to learn a bit in this game.
Now you could also add extra blocks in said energy bar that might display different events coming up that are more frequent and less impactful. And once said bar is a separate Interface part and could be modified and moved around it would be quite similar to the most basic Boss Mod feature.
A feature like this does not have to be immersion breaking to be the most basic & useful interface addition that helps players.
7. Applying until the heat death of the universe: the Pugging experience
This is more of an interface QOL point.
Why do I have to click so much?
- Clicking on the listed run.
- Clicking on sign up.
- Confirming your role (people rarely write a text).
Wandering in a triangle over the screen each time.
Why does applying not look like this?:
Click on the role (greyed out if not filled) for the roster of said group. Done.
That is 1 instead of 3 clicks. If you want to give info for the lead, have a text icon on the listed run element.
How desired is that group?
The person listing their key can see if 1 or 20 people are interested in that run. People applying can’t. Adding a number showing this to applicants would help. If you just want to jump into a run it might be more tempting to fill in groups that are less frequented. This does not remove the time effort to get a spot but it would improve it. Will people be discouraged to queue up for highly frequented keys? Maybe.
But this and long waiting times for DPS in general are the essence of 2 much broader topics:
-
Tank/Healer shortage or “should vengeance return in some form?”
-
Perceived Dungeon Difficulty: SBG vs NO/AV
I’ll leave those topics for specific discussions since they are related to class & dungeon design and it’s consequences.
Conclusion:
Many individual aspects make up and can improve the Mythic+ experience. Dragonflight is seen as a time of looking at the basics of the game and improving them.
I hope I’ve gone over the most relevant ones for the M+ topic in this post.