[Nyazilla]

The exploit has been fixed.
...Not the boss. Well done, sirs.

[jvroig]

I don't think it is bugged at all, just perhaps slightly imbalanced?

The levers are supposed to be for Accalia, it shows in the mechanics. The levers release the prisoners, which give you the buff.

In Drostan's instance, the levers and ballistae are there, but inactive. The levers do nothing (there are no prisoners to release), hence it will look silly for the lever to give you a buff without actually doing anything story-wise in-game.

At any rate, it was a tough fight for my guardian, but I was able to defeat him twice now after several failed (and very frustrating) attempts.

Steps for my guard:
1.) Frenzy stance + Tactic: Attack (we need insane DPS)
2.) Equip polearm, and feated as Tempest (unfortunately, S&S/juggernaut build will not work due to short reach of 1H weapon and lack of AOE-type combo)
3.) Rush into Drostan, hit him hard with everything you have EXCEPT Storm Strike and Reckoning. Save these two for the rats.
4.) Drink a daggamalt right when you first get damaged.
5.) When he moves to summon his rats, don't bother chasing him.
6.) Instead, go further in so that you will be at his right side when he comes back, and you are effectively surrounded by the wall and barrels.
7.) When he comes back, his rats will be there. Activate Stall the Advance (hope you have this AA perk) and Lightning Reflexes so the rats won't chew you up too much.
8.) Do not face Drostan directly, instead face a little bit to your right so Drostan is more or less 10 o'clock from you, and you are more or less facing the horde of rats directly.
9.) Execute Storm Strike then Reckoning. This will end up killing a lot of the rats
10.) Do whatever quick combo you have (Disable, Skewer) on the remaining rats. 100% of them should be gone by then. (make sure!)
11.) Focus back on Drostan. Hit him with everything you've got, DPS him like crazy, as long as you DO NOT USE Storm Strike and Reckoning, to ensure these two crowd-cleaners are available when the rats arrive.
12.) When he summons the second wave of rats (he should be ~40% now), stay your ground, wait for him to return with the rats.
13.) Stall the Advance and Lighting Reflexes will still be in CD, so use The Last Stand. Drink another potion if your earlier potion is already exhausted.
14.) Again, face the rats with Drostan at 10 o'clock, Storm Strike + Reckoning. Follow it up with your quick combo to kill remaining rats.
15.) Back to Drostan again. You'll either kill him now, or he will kill you if he survives long enough to call up a third batch (you have no more StA, Lightning Reflexes, or The Last Stand left, the rats will chew you up like crazy)


That's it. When I first outlined these steps in my head and tried it out on him, it worked like a charm (that's the second time I killed him; the first time was instinctive and lucky, after many many frustrating attempts).

It still relies on some form of AOE (StormStrike+Reckoning, and the long reach of the polearm) to kill the rats. I'm not sure how classes that are truly bereft of crowd-cleaning tactics can do it. However, as long as you can clean out the wave of rats in about 5-10 seconds, I think Drostan can be beaten.

[Civilix]

Originally Posted by jvroig (...) The levers are supposed to be for Accalia, it shows in the mechanics. The levers release the prisoners, which give you the buff. (...)

Not even the softest char needs the mitigation buff during the accalia fight, actually i would say using them will only slow you down in that fight.

[jvroig]

I agree. I never use them myself. I tried but it was hard to release the prisoners before Accalia catches up to you and interrupts you.

However, my point wasn't that you need it for Accalia. My point was that the in-game story shows that the lever (which releases the prisoner from which Accalia seems to be drawing power - she runs to them before starting her power-up which you have to interrupt with the cannon) is really meant for the Accalia encounter, not the Drostan one.

No matter how you slice and dice it, the levers and cannons and barrels (atop, not reachable) are there as normal environment decor for Drostan, but are all non-functional by design.


As of today, I've beaten Drostan several times now using the steps above (minus The Last Stand now, except in cases where I make a mistake), and I'm not fully epic geared at all (only got 3 pieces of epics from Wolf; and only had 2 pieces when I made my previous post) and using the PVP polearm from the shop. A much more veteran guard would surely have no problem doing Drostan. It really boils down to dispatching the rats fast before they mutate and chew you up.

Drostan is certainly a very hard encounter, and it shows with all the people complaining about it, but I'm glad it is the way it is. It's a refreshing change to have a boss fight that you don't just mindlessly tank and spank or do some tedious mechanic (like the Grey Ape God thingy in Isle) to defeat. It's nice to have a challenge you have to just really think about and strategize in order to overcome, not just steamroll over.

[Bibik]

Originally Posted by Civilix Not even the softest char needs the mitigation buff during the accalia fight, actually i would say using them will only slow you down in that fight.

It gives also a welcomed dps buff.

You can use them just after interrupting Accalia's enrage with the ballistas : if she's cast her aoe stun you'll have the time to free prisonner. Ofc you have to interrupt Accalia before she's finishing her cast or you'l loose your buff stacking.

Today i experienced for the first time many trouble to kill Drostan fight with my sin. All i have found is a way to make him not reseting when i died. Not an honorable way to fight him i guess, but who cares about a rat-friend ugly pirate

[Civilix]

Are you suggesting it is by design that there is so big diffrence in the diffuculty between that fight at the two other?

Also forceing people to use bugs or exploits is not good imo.

I did manage to kill him with a bear shaman using some creative play here the other day: http://youtu.be/ScS4HNxkAIo

But i dont want to do it that way

[jvroig]

Originally Posted by Civilix Are you suggesting it is by design that there is so big diffrence in the diffuculty between that fight at the two other? Also forceing people to use bugs or exploits is not good imo. I did manage to kill him with a bear shaman using some creative play here the other day: http://youtu.be/ScS4HNxkAIo But i dont want to do it that way

Yes, by design. This is self-evident in the in-game mechanics (barrels of water to cool down the dummy, ballistae to stun Accalia, and levers to release the prisoners from which she draws strength) and has been confirmed multiple times by many GM according to earlier posts here.

The only reason people keep insisting it is bugged is because they refuse to believe there is a boss fight that is actually hard for a change, that requires critical thinking instead of tank&spank or following a tedious boss mechanic.

I personally like it. Mundane boss fights are all over the AOC universe - old world, khitai, turan - and it is nice to have a boss fight that you don't just breeze through without any excitement or having to actually strategize instead of relying on pre-built mechanics. Most boss fights are so utterly boring because you are not afraid of losing at all - even before the fight starts, you know there is no way for you to lose, and the "boss" nametag he has barely has more bite than a [minion] tag - you'll just steamroll through both without fear of death anyway, boss or no boss.

Bosses in the Villas, Slaughterhouse, Forgotten City, The Breach, and practically all world bosses - they are all a joke. The best they get is fighting them once (and losing that fight) to learn the mechanic, then the fight is formulaic. Everything is pretty much formulaic - "This boss casts super AOE, just move back", "This boss becomes immune for a few seconds, just move away" - or a mechanic using world objects which, once figured out, completely makes the encounter non-lethal and not challenging, such as the Grey Ape in Isle (it looks menacing, and certainly lethal at first, but once you figure out to use the knockback pad only to disrupt Unleash Fury, the Grey Ape encounter loses its bite - it's simply a time-consuming tedious encounter, no excitement, no fear of death anymore).


So I like the Drostan encounter. With no obvious mechanic in place, it is deceptively like tank&spank, but forces players to think and strategize. One guildmate of mine, also a guardian, tried several times (even tried my own steps) but couldn't do it. When he finally managed to do it, he figured out his own way of doing it.



Also, no one is forcing people to use bugs or exploit. I died several times (probably over 20) before figuring out the right way (for me) to kill him. Resorting to using bugs or exploits says more about the players than the developers.

[Civilix]

If they intended it to be a hard fight i would say they failed hard, let me give an example: http://youtu.be/4FgUsPVmDDY

[jvroig]

People are complaining it's bugged because it is harder than usual, and now you are saying they failed because it's too easy (after claiming it was bugged and "forced" people to use bugs and exploits).

Which is it?

There are many issues here, and if you conflate them, then you'll end up making things more convoluted. From my point of view, you are convoluting the issue with Drostan (which is, simply, it is harder for melee classes, or, alternatively, requires a certain level of DPS in order to overcome the mechanic of the rats getting bigger and badder the longer they live), with the much more difficult and complicated issue of class balance.

What you linked to has nothing to do with the issue of the Drostan boss fight being supposedly bugged and some people complaining about it. If anything at all, what you linked to is an example of how different the strengths of different classes are - to put it plainly: some classes are just astoundingly more suited for some scenarios than others.

It's a different issue altogether. If someone also posted a video of their demonologist destroying Drostan and his pet rats without much fuss and says "I thought this was hard, what's up with the QQ at the forums?", it would also be in the same category of class balance - Drostan is much easier for AoE classes, and if that AoE caster meets the required DPS level (to kill all rats before they mutate or do significant damage), then they'll find the fight very underwhelming.

There's nothing wrong with that, and, IMO, not a fault of Funcom at all. It is the nature of different classes and playstyles. Some scenarios are more suited for some classes than others. They (Funcom) couldn't possibly make it so that every single scenario is "the same" for each and every class, because if they did, then every class would just be a superficial rehash of every other class, and that would be boring and people here would be crying about a whole different thing: "Funcom, be creative and actually make different playstyles, don't just give us different class names that play exactly the same, lol".


Anyway, this is silly. At the end of the day, neither of us needs to convince the other. In my opinion, I believe the GMs that this instance is in fact not bugged. Furthermore, I like what they did here. Do-able, but for melee classes like mine and my friend's, it forced us to approach the problem in a totally different way than most other bosses which we simply steamroll over, or just use a tedious cut-and-dried pre-built game mechanic like activating levers or pads. It's a nice change that makes the game actually challenging and exciting.

If in your opinion it is wrong and the GMs are lying and that it is bugged but don't want to fix it, or if you think they aren't lying but they failed to make it a proper boss fight, then so be it. You are entitled to your own. I disagree, but I respect your opinion. It's just a game, after all.

[Civilix]

I disagree, but I respect your right to be wrong.

People are not complaining that it is hard, the complaints is that it is bugged.

I have ran that instance since it was in beta, i know it once worked with the levers only showing up in drostan fight. I experienced and did deal with the bugs that came with the patches, but when unchained mode came it was in such a bad state that the work needed to do it with something like a S&S guard or bear shaman made the instance not worth it at all. Reward for those classes is tiny and makes the instance not worth it to do at all.

In my opinion the requirement of AOE in the fight comes in the same category as having a boss with a sizable healthpool do a special attack that hit for 10k hp every minute, many classes can easy handle that, all classes _can_ do it, but ie. no sin would ever do that fight for a few rares.