Quel Shardfall - Hoping for more....

When I heard was a new PvP zone coming I thought cool, maybe theyve learnt some lessons....
apparently not

First the positives, nice zone visual design, love the lightning strikes etc, cool ruins with nice puzzles.

And now the downside - yet another pvp zone with the same mobs, (rubbish except the obsidian golems)
which arnt unique to a pvp zone and are easier farmed elsewhere (hilt). The only decent mob I found -1 elder obsidian golem, I kept getting hit by lightning and knocked back so hed leash, and dunno if bug or what but I never found the lich.

Also with the added danger of the lightning seems to be an overly dangerous area with little upside beyond the initial exploration.

Conclusion - for the PvP zones to have a purpose they need mobs or atleast drops that are unique to them,
recipes, mats, much greater loot, something to make it worthwhile.

 

I agree it seems there isn't much here. I play a mage and, the stupid "magic shutdown" nonsense that obsidian golems do has made shardfalls all but offlimits unless I put my wands away and bring a melee weapon, (which was just one more reason to avoid them completely, sadly). I ran around the ruins and opened all the boxes but some of them had nothing at all, one had a chest with 18 gold in it, and the other 2 had chests that had the same stuff most chests have in - handful of fragments/scrolls. When we talk about risk vs. reward I can see no reason whatsoever to come to an open pvp gank area to get such rewards.

I disagree with your conclusion, however.
You start putting pvp-unique only items in, items which help further the PvE game, then you create a forced-to-pvp-to-further-your-pve game situation which this game is toeing the line with (with the main questline dragging you through pvp unless you take extremely time consuming detours).

While the zone is visually appealing, I have to admit with the meteor and the big buildup, I'm pretty disappointed - we didn't need one more empty pvp zone. And if there's something more in this ruins I'm not finding when I'm here on QA - completely unmolested by other players - I'm not likely to find it on live either. And if there is a unique/reward/item/etc. then it will be a matter of (pve) people trying to find low population times to come in and get it and then likely never come back.

 

I had really hoped the Lich crypt would be a separate scene from the Shardfall, accessible from the Underworld. Its interesting to explore on QA, but I can't see trying to navigate its tight confines while dealing with PVP.

The only really interesting thing I see is that this is a "New Shardfall", yet almost immediately we see signs of obsidian corruption. Not only is the Lich "infected", but the strange plants are beginning to grow where the obsidian pieces the earth. That is an incredibly fast rate of change. It would be interesting to hear @Scottie talk about what actually happens to life in areas where a Shardfall is, and how the corruption spreads.

 

Other than on the QA server, I don't visit the Shardfalls. Period.

The risk is so out of wack with the rewards. Plus the love taps from Evil Avatars!

Gah!

Not worth it at this time.

 

I wonder if there could be something in a future Episode where Avatars have the option to "cleanse" the Shardfalls and restore balance to them.

 

Hmm, maybe a quest that turns it into a control point while players protect it (fighting off obsidian golems or whatever), but once they die or leave the scene reverts back. That could be fun.

 

I see where your coming from , I was just born in felucca and it was a harsh world, and it was that harshness that gave the game the extra fun for me. That and the pvp systems that you could just step into on 1 side or another.
Just looking for ways to incentivise players to go into them. If there was stuff to farm that was more worthwhile somehow, or gave certain drops that were unique but in no means essential so not some ore type but a higher loot rate than it is
currently and maybe higher tier mobs, maybe control point like stuff . Remember when they added champions to uo , many pve-ers came to farm them on mass and fought off the pks, or lost to them sometimes, either way both sides had fun.

Or doing it another way they could have a guild Renown system (just a pvp rankings so wouldnt affect non pvp) and guilds could hold points within area for renown, and the longer its held for the more renown is gained by the victor who captures the point off them, so many possibilities they could look at tbh to make them more interesting.

 

Yeah, I'm totally with you on pvp needing to be more meaningful; and think pvp rewards that benefit pvp in some way would be great.

Putting PvE incentives in there doesn't make meaningful pvp, it just creates victims as people with no interest in fighting players feel compelled to go into that zone for the pve benefit.

The shardfalls remain the best place to farm obsidian chips, but since those are of limited use (chaos magic, or, the obsidian gear which isn't worth the ingots anymore due to crafting rng/break rates) it is both a)not sufficient incentive but also b) nothing the pve/crafter community is going to rage about.

I've long supported the idea of adding say, a unique slottable gem that ups dmg vs players, or something along those lines, to the shardfalls so there's something unique to get, but the unique thing has to be of no interest to people for whom pvp has no interest.

 

Looking forward to exploring this!

I think the pvp zones just need some more action and places with higher mob density. Not to make it better than 5 skull pve zones, just more on par. Maybe the added wave battles will solve this if I understood correctly.

I like the pvp zones because of the visuals and the added excitement. But usually I'm alone in them, and exp is very low compared to other places. I don't want to force pve players to go there, just want to have it a bit more productive for times when there's no pvp to be had.

 

Heh! It would be interesting for me to hear about that too! In all honesty, though I'm somewhat well-versed in the more ancient lore of the world, I'm not actually as knowledgeable concerning recent goings-on, or as well-versed in the alien way that the obsidian shards found in the Shardfalls corrupt the work around them... I do know that they penetrate the crust of the world in a way that creates veins of corrupted and powerfully-enchanted lava that spread out and away into the deep underground, leaving behind formations of their own obsidian here are there in various locations (as can be seen dripping down from the ceiling of the chamber containing what is left of the Pool of Destiny beneath the Epitaph, and even the ceiling of the chamber containing the Obsidian Forge deep below Hilt)... I also know that the corruption kills or transforms most natural life around it... Beyond that, the specifics of the arcane science involved eludes me, and I'm not sure if it has been fully quantified yet...