Here is what I experienced as a typical, casual, solo player.
- Find the quest giver. It says the suggested number of players is 5. OK.
- Post in Local Defense asking if anyone wants to do the quest
- One person arrives, I invite them and start the quest.
- Second person arrives so I invite them as well, just in time for the mob to show up
- We kill him pretty easily
- Its not immediate clear whats next, I guess I have to go talk to the two guys, turn-in the quest, start a new quest, and interact again (3rd time) and say “Ready”.
- The second mob shows up. We kill him pretty easily as well.
- Repeat 6.
- Mob shows, we start the fight, another player shows up. “Oh, well, the quest said the number of suggested players is 5, let me add him/her to the group as well”. Oops, the mob disappears mid way through the fight. What the hell.
- Go back to the quest givers, interact, blah blah blah, start the fight. The quest giver says its the final fight. Oh cool! The mob shows up.
- I am not adding anyone to the group again. Kill the mob. This one takes a while so it must be the final fight. Try to complete the quest and I can’t, there is another fight. Except everyone else left…I am guessing they were able to turn in the quest???
Sure the quest works great, when you have 5 people who play with each other all the time and who all grouped up somewhere before the quest. But thats not how must people play WoW and so this particular quest design absolutely does not work.
1 Like
It’s a world quest so people are typically around for it each week.
This “ring of blood” questline has been in most (every?) expansion since BC. It’s fun and popular but here some reasons why it can be cumbersome.
Here’s how it works if you’re doing the regular questline:
- Pick up the quest and talk to the NPC who will call the weakest fighter. Defeat the fighter and turn in the quest.
- Pick up the new quest and talk to the NPC who will call the next fighter.
- Repeat until you defeat all the fighters.
Sometimes there are other people working on the same questline who have already defeated some of the fighters. So when they talk to the NPC, he will call the next fighter in the list for that player.
You’ll end up fighting the same combatant several times as everyone works their way through the lineup. Eventually the fights can sync up but that’s why it seems random.
Also, if you’re in a group, everyone has to turn in their quest before you call the next fighter, otherwise they will be 1 fight behind everyone else and you’ll have to let that person start the next fight and beat the fighter again.
Now to add additional complexity, there is a World Quest available for players to go back and defeat a specific fighter.
When these players talk to the NPC, the fighter for the World Quest will be summoned, no matter where in the lineup that fighter is.
So the end result is your lineup getting interrupted many times when trying to complete the original questline. Hope that helps!
Blizzard understands perfectly well how players play the game. This quest is a relic of past expansions that had a similar gauntlet style of quests. The only really dumb thing about them is the fact the NPC has to be talked to and quest turned in by all and then follow up quests picked up by all and then someone triggering the fight. The quest should just be a single objective to kill all of them and the NPC cycle through automatically (similar to maldraxxus and how the theater of pain did it).
Also who the heck uses local defense? Good grief just list it in LFG and invite anyone who signs up or just solo the dumb thing. I’ve solo’d it easily while leveling on multiple characters. Unlike past expansion comparable enemies, these are minimally more than punching bag tank and spanks. Like FFS, go and activate chromie time on a low level alt and go try the Wrath one in Icecrown. Heck even the one in Zul’Drak is probably too much to solo.
Actually Blizzard understands the players very well. The problem with the Ring of Blood style quests is that they become almost impossible to do after the 1st/2nd month of launch because everyone’s at end game and not leveling.
By adding in a WQ with typically pretty good rewards, Blizzard is providing relief for those later players or people leveling alts that still want to do the quest by creating a cobweb system where those high level players wanting to do the WQ might have to help out another player that’s just trying to get through the quest line.
Where in all the history of WoW does anyone post anything in local defense? Just use the group finder that’s been in the game for over 10 years now.
3 Likes
I had a couple of alts that wanted to do the quests to unlock the world quest. Using group finder doesn’t end in much success now - usually no-one looking. But generally at week start or when the new world quests spawn it’s easy to get players doing the world quest to help you or there are others there in the same position as you. As people finish with world quests this will get more difficult.
1 Like
I’m mostly a solo player too, but seriously? Just use the cross-realm group finder. There’s a nice little green button to press beside the quest. Everyone get’s it, nobody waits. No need to even talk. Just kill the mob.
Lol youre spare parts bud.
i am actually shocked people use local defense. not being sarcastic or anything, I honestly never knew it was used. and yes this quest is awful.
Field of Ferocity is a 62 level quest.
This quest design also is in the Ring of Blood quests, among others. Also, there are a number of short questlines that were merged into others in the conversion to “storylines” during level scaling, where everybody must be at the same place in the questline in order to be able to see party members. Sometimes it is impossible to tell where a storyline starts, or it may depend on having completed all storylines prior to this one in the zone.
Keep in mind when you are recommending that players “just use the group finder”, that no one under level 50 can use it. The premade tab is greyed out. Generally, in these zones you will find no one who is on that quest, or maybe not another player at all. Zul’drak. Seriously? Nobody should do that zone unless they’re working on Loremaster.
Planned obsolescence, aka parasitic game design intended to make the content impossible to do for late starters or in later expansions.
uhg. There is a thing next to the quest on the screen you can click on to find other players. I didn’t mean open it and type in a custom group.
It’s a shortcut to the group finder. Again, sub 50’s do not have access to that in their content.
I feel like they thought having this sort of quest and restrictions (for low levels) would somehow support a thriving community, when actually there is usually no one on your server that can help you with leveling quests like these.
1 Like
Maybe I misunderstood then, I don’t know. So is there no way for a low level player to get into a group for a group quest aside from totally randomly or by accident?
This is the part people don’t realise, it’s the person who speaks to the NPC that spawns the next enemy they need, so someone can sit there spawning what they want and screw everyone else over.
Well, what’s your solution?
I definitely soloed some of the bosses in that questline doing it while leveling and I am not that great at the game. Every once in awhile someone would fly in and help so they could kill it and do the world quest, but I also had to do some of them by myself and I am pretty sure they scale to your level/gear.
1 Like
a lot of user error involved in that - why would you invite someone else to your group after you started and killed a few of them.
almost every alt I do that on now. I find a group in group finder or make a group and usually between 2 people we kill them all.
I do that because I am not waiting for 5 bosses to be killed before I get mine.
1 Like
Yeh but do you do it just to screw people over? Some do.