The problem with Kingsroad (our least visited hunting area)

Looks great, plays like driving a car from Bakersfield to Barstow to kill a scorpion and back again ~TL~

 

Those party spots are only popular because they produce the most xp. If you took kingsroad and made it possible to gain 15 mil xp in a short amount of time then everyone would go there instead. The layouts and design are essentially meaningless. If something produces the most xp, most people will do it, no matter how boring it is.

 

This is the core of the problem. Enjoyable experience and rewarding gameplay aren't the same thing in SotA.

There are many ways to mix these two together. The closest the game comes to it is The Breach, I think. Alas, it's not all that popular in LFG.

 

I agree, yet those high grinding spots have little below them which would offer the same, yet in a lesser, scalled down amount of exp offered for the lower characters to transition from. Airship, The Breach and Vertas Pass, those grinding spots are not going away "because they are popular". They all have the same problem though, and that problem is new-mid range characters showing up because they have no place to grind. That endagers everyone who hunts with those who join these popular public hunts.

"Never kill a good thing", and those mid-range characters showing up to those hunts do just that, but they have no other place to go which is similar.

We may not agree with the style of these areas, but they are here to stay.

The Breach was done VERY well.

Alphaine Nine made a comment to two mid-range characters who wanted to hunt there in his public offered party, yet there were no other greater characters hunting with A9. Sp A9 asked them "what are you doing here?" There's no way these characters were going to live past even a scratch from any of the creatures there, and A9 can't keep them alive on his own, so it was useless for everyone, A9 and those two mid-range characters to hunt the breach together.

The reason they were there, was that there is no mid-range similar grinding hunting instance which compares.

/askadev @Elgarion .

I think this subject rises to be a needed scene, and if Kingsroad is not being used, then what better place could there be?

It's something to think on, and that's what I've been doing alot of, while hunting those top grinding scenes.
~TL~

 

I ran both my characters there when they were low level. It lost that appeal when the Outskirts were introduced. I did train some innate defensive skills there. I let the small spiders nibble on me and cast heals as necessary. I have ducked in there when I teleported to the 'Vale and left all my Ash at home (happened twice so far).

Scalable scenes were discussed on a dev stream a year or so ago. I posted "Epic level Kingsroad" in the chat. We'll see.

 

The newly improved, "Kingsroad"...

"Very Nice!" ~TL~

 

When I try to open up parties to hunt in DRW, which is fairly good for mid-lower characters, I get no uptake on it. I don't do it super often, but fighting there by my self... I'd rather do something else if noone's coming along.