Do you find instant Adventures to be fun and enjoyable?

[tro44]

Do you find instant Adventures to be fun and enjoyable?

[Sariina]

I used to, because you'd almost always have full groups and the defends were awesome. They completely ruined it by taking away the the instant away from teh adventure, now it's run-portal-load again-adventure.

[No_Exit]

tro44 you post too much. I wonder why....

[Simmy]

Possibly nothing else to do but post one line questions with no substance.

[Morvick]

You might not have much to add to tro44's many threads, but at least he's asking the questions. Devs need to keep current on whether or not their content is fun or attractive to play.

Threads like this often expose or reiterate elements of content which fails or isn't working.

For instance, I agree that the Instant Adventures used to be *awesome* and novel and generally great. That was mostly dependent on the large group sizes and rapid-fire pace of working through objectives all around the map (and being properly teleported to them).

Now, however, they've lost that special "something" mostly because group sizes are inconsistent and low-attendance as a general rule. They're scattered far and wide and the experience, honestly, has suffered for it. Still better than doing the same line of quests over and over again, and it's a reprieve from back-to-back dungeon runs... Even so.
They could use a return to the intensity that drew us all to the Adventures.

[Caydin]

This is totally dependent on what you're expecting out of IAs. If you're hoping to get into a massive group of 15 or 20, steamrolling everything in its path, then yes, the more options have probably made things less fun for you.

Most of my experiences usually have left me either by myself, or with a small group of people. In this sense, IAs have never changed. I do them when I feel like running out and grabbing a bunch of mobs to destroy or feel powerful for a little bit. I do them when I'm not quite certain what I want to do.

So to me, IAs are still fun. The lower levels need to encompass a wider area so there aren't so many repeats, and there needs to be more 'epic' quests such as the wardstone invasions. Other than that, I don't have terribly many issues with them.

EDIT: Posts like these are fine, but only when the OP actually adds their own insight and opinions. Otherwise, it seems to be that they're posting just for the sake of posting, not to actually engage in a meaningful discussion.

[Sonoko]

I did actually quite like EI IAs back when I was doing them, but the newer 1.9 IAs not so much.

I've recently cranked out a boatload on Wolfsbane, finishing the 500 IA achievement in both Freemarch and Stonefield. And just overall... I had significantly less fun with them.

Stonefield IAs in particular are quite a mess. Even though there's 11 different bosses, and I believe 2 sourcestone defense locations, it feels like the majority of IAs end with killing just one of three bosses. Abzu, Terramancer Ghaet, or Taulos. It's bad enough that I've seen Terramancer Ghaet 3 chains in a row before, and I'm pretty sure Abzu has done the same. And two of the bosses are so incredibly rare I'm not even sure why they exist, as most people will never see them: The Hungering Maw which I've only seen once ever, and Faulnis which despite shard firsting the 500 Stonefield IA achievement I've still never seen.

The entire way IA chains work with linking to other specific IA quests means most of the IA chains end around the center of the map, regardless of where they start. And having it do something like enter the crypt below The Harrow, and actually stay there for 3 quests straight when every single one has a chance of leaving it is incredibly unlikely. Even ignoring the boss achievements which drive me nuts, this just makes IAs less fun than they could be. Even though there might be something like 100 IAs (I have no idea how many there actually are) in a zone, when you repeat the same 10 over and over and over again for hours on end, it just gets really tedious.

While I haven't done Gloamwood IAs, I'm inclined to believe they suffer a similar issue if the (lack) of discoveries for the Kill every boss achievement is anything to go by.

The bosses on the wardstone defenses in Stonefield seem broken. They all have 200k+ HP, even though the regular bosses have 20-30k depending on the size of the group. It's not difficult, I don't think I've ever seen a group fail to defeat the boss, it's just really boring and takes an eternity to dps down.

A few of the quests, namely the ones requiring you to kill Dreadbone Trolls or Troglodytes in Titan's Rest *still* don't seem to spawn enough mobs to complete the quest, and you end up having to wait for repops or run over to Dreadbone Shelf to find more to kill.

Freemarch's IAs are quite a bit better overall, IMO, as they seem to actually have more variety and take place in different parts of the map and actually end on different bosses a lot more reliably. With that said, however, I find potato planting to be REALLY boring. The similar quests in Shimmersand IAs weren't particularly fun either, so I'm not really sure why they were brought over here as well. The quests where you dig up graves to kill specific NPCs tend to also be quite obnoxious, as the vast majority just give you Fresh Corpse trash mobs instead.

There's also a few bugs with Freemarch IAs that are really silly:
1. Every quest requiring you to destroy stationary objects like crypts, spider nests, or wolf dens is bugged. Every single one counts for 2 quest updates.
2. The quest in Todrin Estate where you plant explosives to blow up shrines has the silliest bug in the game. The barrels can actually be aggroed onto nearby mobs, and as such frequently end up sliding over to them, detonating away from the shrine and requiring you to plant another.
3. The quest requiring you to repair and rearm wolf traps in Kindra's Thicket has a bugged trap. I don't have the loc offhand, but every single time I've done it one is just bugged and can be permanently reused over and over again to finish the quest really fast.

Another annoying thing I've noticed since 1.9, and I'm not sure if it's specific to just the low level IAs or a global change, is that it only attempts to join an IA group with under 15 people. Numerous times I've done IAs, in a group by myself or with one other person (which is significantly less fun than having lots IMO), and end up running across another IA group in the zone with 15 people. Why didn't it put me there? There's nothing stopping me from leaving my group and joining the 15 person one. So WHY are you trying to mislead me and make me have less fun?

1.9 changed it where IAs now have a quest to "Do this zone event". Every time I've seen this happen, at least half the group just instantly leaves and does IAs in another zone. And honestly? I do too. If I'm doing IAs, it's because I want to do IAs, not a zone event. I thought "integration" with them would just maybe have you do things like close death rifts if the zone event requires it, or defend a wardstone for a bit if its related to the zone event, and so on. "Do this zone event" just feels really lame, tbh.

I also strongly dislike the Random IA option and having to run to an individual zone to do IAs. With the nature of achievements, and the fact that I'm PA capped and have no use for Inscribed Sourcestones, I really have no desire to do IAs in the majority of the zones. From what I can tell, most people don't even realize you can port to a specific zone and do IAs there, so a lot of people just stopped doing IAs entirely. Ember Isle IAs, which I find to be the most fun IAs in-game, are effectively dead now and hardly anybody does them, when you used to be able to have at least 2-3 groups going at nearly any hour of the day.

And while I've complained about this in another topic, I feel it needs to be reinforced. 1.9 added 4 new artifact sets for Instant Adventures, one set in each of the four lowbie zones. These are the absolute worst and most frustrating sets to get in the entire game. I have seen the rare mobs that drop them twice in each zone, meaning they spawn about once in 250 IAs. The moment the corresponding quest that can spawn it starts, I quickly run all over spamming a target macro, hope to find it and kill it ASAP away from anybody else in my group to get it for myself. So if other people actually really knew about these and competed against me, the actual artifact rate here would be significantly lower than 1 per 250 IAs.

The real kicker here is that all four gave me the white artifacts, so through my own means, I'm effectively 1/4 in two out of the four zones. 1000 IAs for 2/16 artifacts... the most common ones. I'm actually quite a bit further than that from buying them, the most recent of which I paid 200p for, but what the hell? These are low-level artifacts, and they're the hardest sets in the entire game to get, being only somewhat less expensive than ID artifacts, but worse overall because they almost never show up on the AH. And due to faction restrictions, you can't even do IAs in the other two zones, making these the only sets in the game that force you to either buy them off the AH or play an alt of the opposite faction.

All of this combined places the actual fun-level of IAs I have with them only slightly higher than waterboarding. I'm only doing them because I'm ridiculously OCD with achievements/artifacts.

[Questoften]

Yeah, short, sweet, and productive. Allows me to have the time to love and level as many characters as I want. Time enough at last. *Fey breaks glasses* Noooooo! There was time now.

[AtomicUniverse]

Do you find instant Adventures to be fun and enjoyable?

I find them fun and enjoyable for about 20 minutes once a play session and then I go do something else.

It is a pity the EI ones don't attract the same numbers of people they used to....would prob play more if they did.

(p.s. I like Tro's posts and he's easy on the eye too.. )

[Morvick]

Yeah, short, sweet, and productive. Allows me to have the time to love and level as many characters as I want. Time enough at last. *Fey breaks glasses* Noooooo! There was time now.

It's... It's just not fair. It's not fair at all. I had time. All the time in the world...

Edit: Carefil, tro44. You've got an admirer -- competition for the Missus?

[Aphrodite Rising]

I am not sure it is fun for those seeking achievements of 500 in each new zone added, so I would propose:

1. Make it 10, 100, 500 for any of those zones you do IAs for. So for example, you can have a mixture of them for each zone and add up to 500 total and maybe raise the amount you get for that achievement. So its not like 10 points to get 500 in Silverwood and 10 to get 500 in Stonefield, but rather you would get like 30 points or 50 points to get 500 in aggregate.

I do like the achievement though of defeating all the bosses in each zone.. That should remain.

[Randeth]

For the niche they are meant to fill I think IA are great. They aren't deep story lore like quests. They aren't strategy-fests like Raids. They are just pure action fun to burn some extra time.

[EnochianCub]

I very much enjoy them, for what they are.

A little more variety in the quests would be nice though. As it stands, for pure mindless xp gathering fun, they work.

[leaa]

No i actually don't, not at all. The reason for this is heal aggro, which is ridiculously high on any healer in those groups.

What usually happens is that a boss spawn, i heal, and people riding to this boss bringing mobs they pull on the way, and in the end, even though i am not even touching those mobs, i will have them all hitting me (which at points can be more then 20 mobs), all whilst the rest of the group teleport to next location.

And this happen anywhere were the group pull and don't kill. A healer close to that, and their buffs or their heal to other people around who is actually hitting the right things, will instantly pull heal aggro.

And even more fun is when there is actually people in the group who is tanks, and they can not even peel them off me, and a fast kill is not even always possible when i have 20 rangers standing eveywere on the map with me in target. It happens that i die at those situations, especially if i can not los to collect them.

This is only a problem in IA, i do not have this issues in a ordinary event group, nor anywere else. And this is actually even worse at lower levels regions.

The effect of this is that people don't like to heal in IA´s, so TRION should really have a look at it.

[Not Listing It Here]

The XP and PA - yes. The rest...not so much.

I have been running my guardian rogue a lot recently and leveled from 20 to 50 using IA's.
Silverwood IA's are 3 to 15 people...one of whom is just leeching and if anyone tries to vote kick them they leave the second the notice comes up so they don't get the lock out timer.
The adventures used to run 3 or 4 to an area, than move back to one of the other areas for another short chain, rinse and repeat. Now it is literally: 1 in the swamp, 1 or 2 on the beach, 1 or 2 on the hill, 2 in the swamp, 1 on the beach, etc. I've had quests that were just 1 in each spot (for an hour straight) so you have a choice of just endlessly riding across the map, or leaving and rejoining group hoping it ports you (which 9/10 times it doesn't).

Not sure I'd call it fun and enjoyable. But, when you are near the quest - it's a good way to level quickly.