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Interlude: Raiding
🕑 Added 2021-07-14 16:00:08 +0000 UTCOfficial Road to Purgatory-Beta Forum
- Kerrin, confirmed Beta-Account-
Raiding - Or how not to do it.
A word of advice, for all those who want to challenge the open-world dungeons and raids in Mundus: Don’t.
Well, maybe that’s too harsh, but if you do, be careful, those things are deadly. Part of the problem is limited information, which is why we, internally, decided to share our experience here, so that others can learn from it, maybe contribute their own stories with this or other dungeons. Ultimately, we all want to enjoy the game and not get booted out, due to the death-penalty.
So, what was our experience, you ask?
It all started when we heard about a dangerous area, filled with spiders and monsters, that the locals generally avoided. As we have been quite effective in gathering a whole bunch of people and working together to quickly level up, we thought, hey, that might be the raid for us. We pretty much all outlevel the area anyway and need to move on, for greener pastures and more powerful monsters, different quests and all that, so, why not check that area out.
We managed to gather a set of five groups, nicely balanced, with everyone between level fifty and one-hundred and set out to challenge the area. We thought that it would, at most, be a raid, maybe some twenty levels above the average for the area, which would make it around level fifty. As mentioned above, that should be easy with a group like the one we had assembled, but even if things didn’t work as planned, we thought we had enough margin of error to assure our retreat.
When our scouting party arrived in the area, they prepared a camp-site, took a look around and easily found the area in question. They especially paid attention to prepare and mark escape-paths, back to the Imperial Road, with somewhat convenient rally-points set out beforehand. You know, to make sure that if things go wrong we can fall back onto known terrain and fight there.
Anyway, back to the area in question. The locals had given us a map, making finding it trivial. What they found was an area filled with spider-webs and crawling with countless spiders, enough to send any arachnophobe running for the hills. Hell, enough to make anyone run for the hills or try to kill it with fire. Which is what we did. Take a look.
raid.avi
A large group of people is carefully making their way through a sparse forest. They all move in formation, centered around a group of comfortably dressed and not obviously armed people. The rest of the group is the opposite, each of them carrying some sort of weapon, readied for immediate, lethal use and they are all armoured, some of them wearing heavy, sturdy metal armour, others only reinforced leather or light chain-armour. But what they all have in common is the look of vigilance on their faces as they make their way through the forest.
“We are in range.” one of the lightly dressed people states, her voice not carrying for, but clearly audible. With that signal, three similarly dressed people gather around her, while she pulls out a piece of parchment, covered in dense, arcane runes. After a moment of checking with the three clustered around her, and the leader standing a little apart from them, her voice sounds out again, not more than a whisper, but echoing in a strange way.
“Thunderous Wrath!”
For a few moments nothing seems to happen, until the parchment in her hands starts to glow, a glow expanding to her and mirrored on the other three, who stand around her in a triangle. After the glow intensifies for a bit, a strange structure appears in the air in front of her, countless, tiny symbols forming a greater whole. The glow surrounding them flashes for a moment, before winking out, leaving only the glowing structure behind.
With a gesture from the leading caster, the structure flashes once more, and another structure, identical in form, though much larger, appears in the air, hovering above a valley deeper in the forest. Now, with the glow illuminating it, the valley truly comes into focus.
And what is there to see, would be enough to drive any arachnophobe into a panic attack. Countless black forms, skittering around, while the trees and even the slopes of the valley are covered in complex spider-webs.
As the glowing structure flashes once more, a single bolt of lightning strikes down from it, grounding into the earth accompanied by a thunderous crack. The bright flash makes it impossible to see the effect, especially as that bolt is only the first of countless bolts, all raining down into that valley. The thunder caused by all those bolts turns into a singular roar, strong enough to shake the earth and cause the wind to blow away from the valley, as enough air is displaced from the continuous explosions.
Then, as sudden as it started, the air is still once more, the glowing structure blinking out of existence once more. Ahead, in the bombarded valley, the air is stirred by the explosive force, small fires making things hazy and difficult to see as the dim light of the forest returns after the magical bombardement.
end raid.avi
So far, so good, right? We used a rather expensive spell-focus, crafted by a native but powered by our own spellcasters, for the initial attack, to break whatever ambush might have been set-up, as our scouts spotted one of their magical scouts the day before, so they knew we were coming. We didn’t think it would be bad, not with firepower like that for what we thought was a lower-level area.
Anyway, after the spellcasters, our artillery, had softened up the target, we thought to send in the infantry, to sweep what remained of our enemies, secure the area and maybe find some good loot. At least that was the plan. But I guess everyone knows what is said about plans, and how well they survive contact with the enemy.
wipe.avi
“Charge!” one of the others, a dwarf in heavy armour, commands and most of the frontline starts to move, quickly crossing the distance with their weapons raised and ready. Before the effects of their charge can truly become obvious, they are swallowed by the haze that lingers in the area, their forms turning vague and unclear.
“What?” one of the lightly armoured guards who have remained with the rest asks, looking into the haze comprehensively. Turning to the others around him, he pauses, eyes staring in disbelief when he sees something he shouldn’t see. Behind his friends, hovering between the trees, he sees a monster, only vaguely humanoid, a grotesque mix between avian and human, covered in black feathers, wicked talons and a sharp beak overwhelming anything that might be seen as human. And the two wings, sitting on the beings lower back, lazily beating the air, far too slow to actually provide lift but somehow, the being seems to ignore such boring things as gravity.
Just as he wants to scream out a warning, he realises that he is no longer in the forest. That nothing is around him but a vague, cloying darkness. Screaming in horror, he turns, his mind overcome by the single desire, to flee. To get away from the monster, to get out of the dark. Somewhere, there has to be light.
end wipe.avi
We used that last point-of-view as he’s the only one to even see what killed us. For the others of that group, things were even worse. They were just suddenly thrust into darkness, knowing that something was behind them, instilling them with an overwhelming urge to flee. Or rather, to run away, or would you call it a flight if the only thing you achieve is to run into a trap, getting knocked unconscious without even knowing what happened? Because that’s what happened to each and every one of us, the first wave ran into that accursed valley and was knocked unconscious, the second wave was subject to what I think is almost certainly a fear-effect and ran into the valley, only to be knocked unconscious as well.
Oh, and then we died. For a few of us, it happened after a couple seconds, others were alive for almost half-an-hour. But none of us have even the slightest idea what happened.
Personally, my best guess is that what we thought was an out-door dungeon appropriate for the level-region is actually a high-level raid or something like that. Really, I got no idea, other than that it is lethal as hell. Maybe, in the future, we can all work together to get a better idea and more information to keep shit like that from happening. Or at least keep others from blundering into situations like that. No need to pile up Death-Penalties on everyone.
- Do’rodra, confirmed Beta-Account
Okay, gotta admit, the magic looks insane. Other than that, wasn’t there a similarly winged creature in one of the early highlight-reels?
- Danilli of the Raging Storm, confirmed Beta-Account
You were not prepared…
But then, how can you prepare without knowing what to prepare for?
- Tarrin, confirmed Beta-Account
So far, I’ve only played two instanced dungeons, nothing open world. Those two were quite fair, one was a cave filled with murderous ant-like monsters that spit acid, the other was a cave as well, only filled with ice-monsters that had far too many teeth for comfort.
They were hard, requiring constant focus to not get murderized to death, but felt fair and were definitely rewarding. Curiously, when I did the first, I got a title for being the first Traveller to go in there, when I got into the second, there was no such reward.
- Tobiuno, confirmed Beta-Account
Tarrin, that’s because someone else got there first. No idea who, but I can confirm that you get a larger bonus for getting a title multiple times. I have no idea how big that bonus ultimately will be, or if there will be some sort of balance but dungeons will be difficult in that aspect anyway. Instanced Dungeons at least.
Because the natives are wise to them, if you haven’t noticed. As I have stated in other threads, I was recruited by the human empire early on and given special training. That special training was within an instanced dungeon, which we ran multiple times within a few days, essentially funnelling the experience points to me as much as possible.
That only works if a faction has control over the area, to the point that they can let the dungeon build up power, or however that works. I hope Pantheon has some sort of system in mind, or at least some ideas how to prevent larger guilds from monopolizing dungeons and such, or Road to Purgatory will be in serious trouble. And that’s from me, the leader of one of the larger, if not the largest, guild currently in existence.
- Dargira, confirmed Beta-Account
Haven’t been in an instanced dungeon yet, but I was in a dwarven patrol that stumbled into an open world dungeon. At least that was what everyone said it was. For me, it was mostly zombies, lots of them, stinking of mud and rotting flesh. That part wasn’t really fun, to be honest, but I was told that there’s an insane amount of experience to be had, if you manage to clear such a place. Right, @Morgana?
- Morgana, confirmed Beta-Account
Can confirm, outdoor-dungeons give a ton of experience. But come with significant danger. You know, that old joke about opportunity and danger going hand in hand? Yeah, that’s dungeons in general and the outdoor-version in particular.
About the video posted here, and the hightlight-reel someone mentioned, yeah can confirm that one, too. A few months back, I stumbled over a being called Samodiva, looked similar to that thing, just a lot more on fire, tried to mesmerize my party and me, making us dance with her first and wanted to eat us later. Not in the fun way, I should add. At least I think she didn’t mean the fun way, we didn’t stick around to find out.
What you ran into might be a similar being, or maybe a darkness?-version of her, going by colour, or some sort of harpy? Those might look like that but so far, I havn’t seen one on Mundus, so I can only go by myths and my guesses.
Care to share where you ran into that area, just so we have an idea where not to go? I mean, it’s a forest, but so far, forests are the terrain that is the most plentiful on Mundus, at least in the areas where I’ve been running around.
