Re: Scaling Past Level 80

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@mcsupersport wrote:

I have never understood, WHY, people are so upset that a Hardcore or Insanity level of difficulty isn't easy to play on.....if you want easy, then turn the difficulty down...simple ......

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There's no trophy for completing the game on Insanity if you play on easy 😉

Jokes aside...I did in fact lower the difficulty because of the tedious bullet sponginess of the baddies. That's artificial difficulty.

I don't want the fights to last longer. I want them to be harder and there is a big difference.

Easy=One shot to kill bad guy

Casual=Two shots

Hard =Four shots

Hardcore=Eight shots

Insanity=Sixteen shots

^^^That is not what I want to see.

Then HOW would you raise the difficulty??

Make them more aggressive??  Make them shielded or Armored??(That is just health by another color)....Make them use powers???  More of them???  Make them kill you in one shot???  How do you raise the difficulty and make a balanced game and people happy??

If they aren't high HP, then Biotic/Tech casters will mow through them.....If you put armor/shields on them, then you decrease Caster ability and are basically just adding health and powers resistance.....If you make more, but lower health, then a few tech/biotic explosions will finish it and make it easy, no matter how many...more waves of fighters(Dragon Age 2 did that, people hated it)  More aggressive how??  More shooting, less cover??  Maybe,but again about casters unless you tweak HP......so what would you like to see, and how do you see your changes being put into the game??

All I know is Destiny got this part right - you weren't shooting trash mobs in the head 16x to drop them (just sayin).

Ghost Recon Wildlands a headshot drops anything really.

And in both of those games, it gets real when things go down.

The Division, however, was just a bullet sponge slogfest to the point everybody quit playing for 6 months (cept fanboys).

My suggestion? Take notes from games that got it right and make difficulty hard in interesting ways instead of just bullet-sponging it up. More elite enemies on higher difficulties and less trash mobs..? Or more of everything? Or have enemies rush you in waves but they actually die when you shoot them?

Or you fans can just enjoy your bland bullet sponge soup... alone.

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@mcsupersport wrote:

Then HOW would you raise the difficulty??

Make them more aggressive??  Make them shielded or Armored??(That is just health by another color)....Make them use powers???  More of them???  Make them kill you in one shot???  How do you raise the difficulty and make a balanced game and people happy??

If they aren't high HP, then Biotic/Tech casters will mow through them.....If you put armor/shields on them, then you decrease Caster ability and are basically just adding health and powers resistance.....If you make more, but lower health, then a few tech/biotic explosions will finish it and make it easy, no matter how many...more waves of fighters(Dragon Age 2 did that, people hated it)  More aggressive how??  More shooting, less cover??  Maybe,but again about casters unless you tweak HP......so what would you like to see, and how do you see your changes being put into the game??

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How you make them harder is scaling up the dmg their attacks do. All of their attacks.Not to the point where trash mobs one shot you but totally to the point where you need to use cover and tactics, skill, to get through the battles. Also more of them. A swarm of slightly higher damage trash mobs is going to hurt more and be more actual challenge then simply having to unload more bullets into an individual.

@mcsupersport Have you ever played Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning? I guess not - otherwise you'd know of how KoA:R fixed that particular power creep issue.

And while an fast-paced shooter like ME:A needs an additional tweak compared to that, this seems all like DA2 all over again - where Bioware only increased the health of enemies to such insane amounts that it was just T&S (tank&spank) instead of challenging fights where you need to pay attention.

   As best I can tell the Op is right, the Mob's scale in such a way that they become almost UN-kill able at higher levels you become less, and less able to kill them.  The scaling is messed up because all the player really gets is Skill point, and you can only use 3 skill's at a time, and only step up your shields, and physical stats to a point, and then thing's stop for the player. However the mob's keep going, and going.

also you have to travel to Tim-buck-too to change to another set of 3 skills. Yes you can fast travel, but not in the bottom of one of those dungeon. Unless you want to redo the Whole dungeon again.

   I mean I may be wrong, but I have one character very high, and it is like shooting the mobs with a Bean flip now, I do so little damage.   So if they are scaling according to level, that may be a pretty stupid Idea for this game.

@dragonofnrvnqsr  I played it a long time ago....all the way up with mage class until all the powers I was killing stuff with got weaker and weaker....same kind of thing you see here with Biotics.  I played pure Biotics for about 30 or so levels in normal....then found I was having to double or triple biotic combo basic enemies...sorta what I ran into with KoA:R....in this game I moved to a hybrid Vanguard/Infiltrator with many points into Sniper and shotgun, and pull/throw charge for close combat...

I don't really like the bullet sponge mentality...but I also know that you can call them "bosses"  "elites" or "commanders" and it all breaks down to the same thing, enemies that are harder to kill, either by resistances or more HP.   When you punt a guy so high in the air you can't see him, and he lands gets up and comes back to fight you, you kinda know there is an issue........I miss the holding ability of Singularity...Barrier as a active skill....I miss warp to explode instead of throw(more fun for me seeing them fly than a explosion that may or may not kill them) and generally harder enemies that don't take 2 mags of ammo to kill....but saying to balance it and make changes is easy to say, and harder to do in a way that works.

To me, ME2 was the best in how powers worked and how enemies were increased in difficulty.  Protections, with multiple ways to strip them off, plus when you blew someone up with biotics they were usually dead...or if you punted them into the air a mile, they died...BUT in ME2 you also had better control of your allies, something sorely missed here, as well as more active powers to use, which I sorely miss too.

@taglag45  What do you mean travel back to timbucktoo to change skills???

You just set your favorites up and you can have four combinations of 3 skills with any combo of "class" bonus skill modifier for them..

You want to be an infiltrator with Cloak, shield drain, and incinerate, load that to favorites one for PC it is F1

You want Vanguard with Charge, pull and throw, load that into favorites two and it is F2.

then you can do two others, all you have to do in a fight is hit F1 and change to your sniper rifle...then F2 and pull out your shotgun and wait for charge to reset and off you go...easy peasy...

You put pts in to soldier and your weapons and you can carry all four weapons and change profiles very easy....my level 62 character does it all the time...need heavy armor taken out, sniper infiltrator, ready to clean the trash mobs, and Vanguard and shotgun....

I'd introduce whole new enemy types that were much rarer or even nonexistent on lower difficulties,  such as a caster type enemy that will use biotic effects on you if your shields break for example.   Enjoy a piece of your own (If you play that way) medicine and experience a Pull-Throw toss off either the nearest high surface or into the nearest wall with the most enemies around it.     

Enemies start coordinating attacks against you,  comboing you,   drawing you out of cover more,  pinning you with fire more,  flanking more.    Fights intended to be more difficult may have scripted events and situations rather than relying purely on the AI trying something,   in addition to having more enemies,  rather than more health. 

Bosses should behave more like bosses and not glorified elites.   Only one seems to even be unique/named,  and even that's a generic name,  and doesn't play any differently.    Even the end game boss fight is just a "Fight everything you've fought before" shtick.  There's no actual boss fights in this game,  when with the mobility and slight parkour element to it there was room for so many cool boss fights.   

Increased aggression,  accuracy,  and damage,  but never increased health.   Bullet Sponges are not ever significantly more difficult,  they're just more tedious. 

But that'd require putting some actual work into AI so I doubt Bioware will ever make the game that engaging.    Their current AI motto seems to be 'Always target the player"  "Always know where the player is"  "Always hit with laser accuracy even when dodging".   And "Be aggressive a/f".

@mckrackin5324 I agree with you 100%.  Games need to get more creative with making enemies difficult in my opinion rather than just giving them more health.

Longer doesn't equal more difficult... it equals things being more tedious.

Take the Architects for example.  Once you know their pattern, they're actually fairly easy to kill.  The only question is how long am I going to have to be doing the same *.

To me, they were a missed opportunity.  Facing the same exact thing several times instead of facing different versions with different methods of fighting.

The crazy thing is, I felt like they got this right (or came closer to it) in Dragon Age Inquisition when it came to dragon fights.  Fighting one high dragon was not like facing another.  At least not for me as they used different tactics and abilities.

Also, trash mobs need to stay trash.  Sure there can be enemies that will stay a threat, but I need to see the fruits of my labor sometimes in the form of enemies that once gave me a hard time getting easily owned.

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@PretzleMe wrote:

@mckrackin5324 I agree with you 100%.  Games need to get more creative with making enemies difficult in my opinion rather than just giving them more health.

Longer doesn't equal more difficult... it equals things being more tedious.

Take the Architects for example.  Once you know their pattern, they're actually fairly easy to kill.  The only question is how long am I going to have to be doing the same *.

To me, they were a missed opportunity.  Facing the same exact thing several times instead of facing different versions with different methods of fighting.

The crazy thing is, I felt like they got this right (or came closer to it) in Dragon Age Inquisition when it came to dragon fights.  Fighting one high dragon was not like facing another.  At least not for me as they used different tactics and abilities.

Also, trash mobs need to stay trash.  Sure there can be enemies that will stay a threat, but I need to see the fruits of my labor sometimes in the form of enemies that once gave me a hard time getting easily owned.

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Inquisition dragons were the best bosses in a game for a long time for me. Smarter not harder.

The only problem was maybe that the first one was too easy to find too soon...maybe? I got to it at level 4 and it was ridiculously hard. lol

Like with any game I spend 500+ hours in though,I figured them out.

I don't care if I get so powerful that I bulldoze all the content,as long as I had to work to get there.

By the way...I figured out some of the dragons better than others. lol

Letting me play as one of my team mates made the world of difference. The whole teams powers mattered.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZEEyHpQS-E

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@mckrackin5324 wrote:

The only problem was maybe that the first one was too easy to find too soon...maybe? I got to it at level 4 and it was ridiculously hard. lol

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LOL!  Yeah yeah, lol.  Me too.  It was... an experience... a short lived one.  Very short lived experience haha.

But yes, smarter not harder.  And yes, you figure them out, but at least they felt different.  Like you pointed out, depending upon your play style aand or powers/abilities some dragons would be easier to drop than others.

I just loathe the whole "let's just make this basic guy take 15 shots from a fully upgraded augmented modded weapon to keep things challenging" mentality,

You all LIKE dragons??  Some of the biggest bullet sponges in Dragon Age...geeze...hit hit hit, strip guard, strip guard, strip guard, hit hit hit, dodge...or get out of stagger, strip guard, strip guard, strip guard, hit hit hit...strip guard strip guard, strip guard, hit hit hit, strip guard strip guard, strip guard.....geez, you call that good enemy design....they are cool to see, fun maybe for one fight, but all in all, pretty boring when it comes down to it after you have fought them all once.....just huge HP wells to drain before you get some stuff...

I HATE ENEMIES THAT JUST EAT DAMAGE, THEN PUT FREAKIN "PROTECTION" AKA HITPOINTS BACK ON, JUST SO YOU CAN STRIP IT AGAIN...

Yeah, not much thought really, other than make them have about a million HP and go for it.....

And yeah, I hate the Kett with the shield and orb in this one too....

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@mcsupersport wrote:

You all LIKE dragons??  Some of the biggest bullet sponges in Dragon Age...geeze...

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Yes I did.  I didn't say they were perfect, I said in my opinion they were the closest thing to what I was looking for and while for you (and likely others) all you had to do was the same thing for all of them, the fights were quite different for me.

I had to switch equipment, plan team members, adjust them, control them, and the dragons seemed to have different behaviors to/for me.

Dragon Age: Inquisition: High Dragons... Experiences May Vary, lol.

Either way, they were far more interesting and varied in my opinion than facing Spongebob the giant armored remnant several times over.  Again, my opinion.

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@mcsupersport wrote:

Both Biotics and Tech skill points add power to their class skill damage...if you look at your main Biotic skill it even says this, for every point invested in biotics class you game more damage....my level 9 tech has a 9% bonus to tech skills, my level 61 multiclass has over 20 percent, so you do get some scaling, that is in addition to the bonuses you get from armor, and the actual biotic, Vanguard, Infiltrator classes that you can level to level 6 and give bonuses.

As far as being gods at level 100...they make a difficulty that is called EASY...one lower than normal two lower than hardcore, click on that difficulty and you should be back to breezing through.

I have never understood, WHY, people are so upset that a Hardcore or Insanity level of difficulty isn't easy to play on.....if you want easy, then turn the difficulty down...simple ......

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Ummm yeah buddy - did you read my post?  I clearly mentioned the profiles.  You can get them to level 6 by level 80 easily.  Level 6 is the maximum for a profile - so again, you are totally screwed that the game keeps scaling after 80 - you've admitted it in your post, but it's also painfully obvious you don't know what your'e on about, because you haven't reached that high yet.

I'm not upset about difficulty - you can even re-read my post about Habitat 7.  I beat it without dying one time - it just took hours because the enemies absorb clip after clip.  If you consider that difficulty, then I'd hazard to guess you've never played a real game before.  I've platinumed the game Vanquish, I know what a real challenge is in a game - and it's not cheap 1000x HP enemies.  That's just stupidity.  

And once again since you didn't read - this problem extends to every difficulty - not just Insanity.  Even the Narrative level enemies take obscene amounts of damage for Narrative.  The point of leveling up in a game is to gain an advantage - not progressively screw yourself the higher you get.  

Try harder if you're gonna argue with somebody and try to passive aggressively insult them.  

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@mcsupersport wrote:

You all LIKE dragons??  Some of the biggest bullet sponges in Dragon Age...geeze...hit hit hit, strip guard, strip guard, strip guard, hit hit hit, dodge...or get out of stagger, strip guard, strip guard, strip guard, hit hit hit...strip guard strip guard, strip guard, hit hit hit, strip guard strip guard, strip guard.....geez, you call that good enemy design....they are cool to see, fun maybe for one fight, but all in all, pretty boring when it comes down to it after you have fought them all once.....just huge HP wells to drain before you get some stuff...

I HATE ENEMIES THAT JUST EAT DAMAGE, THEN PUT FREAKIN "PROTECTION" AKA HITPOINTS BACK ON, JUST SO YOU CAN STRIP IT AGAIN...

Yeah, not much thought really, other than make them have about a million HP and go for it.....

And yeah, I hate the Kett with the shield and orb in this one too....

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You were defending the bullet sponge method of adding difficulty earlier in this same thread.

The enemies need to be smarter. They should work together and move to flank you.

They should use powers and weapons meant to strip certain defenses. This gives you something to learn about each enemy.

They should use cover and move to avoid taking damage instead of face tanking you. Bullet trading is a stupid method of combat.

They could leave their health pools as they are but make them harder to hit.

Give them disrupting abilities that block lock on skills but give those abilities a reasonable cooldown.

And the enemies should stop scaling once they are 3-4 levels above you since the game stops your progression dead at level 80.

I'm a level 96 now and the power creep of the enemy is starting to get silly. They aren't hitting much harder...or at all. My tactic is "don't get shot". But they are soaking up insane amounts of damage. To the point of actual boredom. I know they won't kill me but it's going to take forever to kill them. The Architect I beat today was ridiculous. About 30 minutes of dumping damage into it.

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@dragonofnrvnqsr wrote:

@mcsupersport Have you ever played Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning? I guess not - otherwise you'd know of how KoA:R fixed that particular power creep issue.

And while an fast-paced shooter like ME:A needs an additional tweak compared to that, this seems all like DA2 all over again - where Bioware only increased the health of enemies to such insane amounts that it was just T&S (tank&spank) instead of challenging fights where you need to pay attention.

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How did they fix it? i want to know since KOA and MEA had the same gameplay designer.