F#¢& CoH Keyes Island Reactor Trial

If it sounds like I am unduly critical to the Keyes Island Reactor trial, it’s only because I despise it.  I am actually really hesitant to suggest ways to fix it, because when I try to pinpoint what’s wrong I come up with everything.

The biggest problem with Keyes is that the developers confused frustrating with challenging.  People die a lot on Keyes, but very rarely does that make a difference on the success of the trial.  There really is no skill required, just a morbid stubbornness that allows you to get kicked in the balls again and again.

The next biggest problem with Keyes is too many gadgets.  I have said in game that the people that like Keyes also like the Star Wars prequels, and to stretch the metaphor...the Star Wars prequels to me ran like every single brain storming idea that George Lucas had, needed to go into the films.  And the script then had to accommodate a bunch of “Neato!  Gee Whiz!” shots.  Keyes is exactly like that if you substitute game play for script.

~~~Original Trial~~~

The villain is Antimatter, and the trial starts with a long cut scene of megalomaniac ranting and pining for some arch-villainess.  That’s interesting maybe once.  Then the trial begins.

The opening phase of the trial has the team collecting glowie temp powers to use on the reactor.  The spots need to be cleared of mobs, and Antimatter needs to be close to them.  There are 10 of these f@*&ers on different elevations so you need a tank to drag Antimatter from spot to spot.   Oh yeah you have to do this 3 times.  More oh yeah, there’s  a “Antimatter Pulse” that damages the entire team periodically, and it gets worse if you damage Antimatter.

The final showdown with Antimatter is equally annoying.  The pulse is gone, but there’s a lot more you have to contend with.  AM can “Disintegrate” a target, which means that the victim simply dies unless he gets a heal power triggered on him within 10 seconds (or so).   There’s an “Obliteration ray” which is a devastating wide area AoE attack that also puts all sorts of status conditions and debuffs onto the team.  At 80%, 50% and 20% health AM regenerates.  You can limit his heal by destroying nearby objectives.  Now I have only done this trial twice, but at no times was I actually concerned that we wouldn’t defeat AM before the time limit expired.  So basically all the damage and death that happened wasn’t actually challenging, just painful.

~~~Current Trial~~~

A funny thing happened.  You put in a trial that’s not very fun to play and offer the same generic rewards as other trials, and NO ONE PLAYS IT.  NC-Soft’s reaction was awful, and I am embarrassed for them.  Look most of the time the player base squawks about a change, they are usually full of sh!t.   In CoX, a lot of players hated the global defense nerf, enhancement diversification, and the merit system.  All of those were necessary changes for play balance, and anyone who rage quit from these changes simply does not understand how a successful MMO actually works.   

The knee jerk solution NC-Soft came up with was to encourage Keyes play they would drastically reduce the rewards available from Lambda and BAF.

Ok, Lambda and BAF’s are farmed for the end game rewards.  That’s what happens when you make gear generic, everything becomes a grind.  So many trials unlock this, so many more unlock that.   And I don’t have a problem with this because currently in game, there are ONLY 4 incarnate trials available.  Given those restrictions, what would any sane player base do except grind the ones that are easier and at least a little entertaining?

After some pretty severe customer backlash, instead of removing Empyrean Merits from the Lambda and BAF, they added a bonus one to Keyes and the Underground trials.  They also nerfed the opening phase for Keyes.

The pulse has been scaled back, and the conditions for using glowies on the reactors were adjusted.   You still have to do all 3 reactors, but you have to drag AM from station to station a lot less.

Unfortunately, the final, frustrating showdown hasn’t really changed.  You still wind up face down in the dirt lots, and you still have plenty of time to defeat Antimatter.

I still hate this trial.