61 réponses à ce sujet

[deatharmonic]

Ok, so I’ve been thinking about the boss fights which occur in DA2 (specifically the Arishok and Meredith) and how bosses are constructed, which seems to dictate how these fights pan out. To elaborate, bosses in DA2 seemed to be unique character designs with not much more than an excessive health boost and lots of immunities. This leads to one merely needing to ‘out heal’ the boss in order to prevail. In other words, the basic formula for
winning boss fights is as follows:


1) Fight occurs
2) Hack at boss
3) Kite & heal
4) Repeat from step 2

Obviously this high-health boss construct has an impact on the tactics available to the player. By simply buffing out the health of bosses it narrows the player’s tactics to attrition warfare, gradually wearing down your opponent until the moment of capitulation. Quite frankly I find that boring.

What I propose: I would like to see bosses constructed in a more imaginative way, as opposed to just giving them a huge health hike and a ton of immunities. I would like to see bosses given unique strengths and also weaknesses for the players to find themselves which promote the use of actual tactics. Furthermore, I think it would be good to be given the ability to utilise elements in the environment to your advantage. Maybe you’re in a
warehouse and there are a bunch of barrels with oil in them, lure the boss towards them and fire away! Small things like that which I wouldn’t want to be necessary to win but would add some variation.

Anyone else got any ideas on how boss fights can be made more dynamic and not just a war of attrition?

Modifié par deatharmonic, 10 octobre 2012 - 09:30 .

[scootermcgaffin]

I never got the kiting complaint. I never had to kite. Set up your tactics.

[AlexJK]

The Rock Wraith was more interesting.

Can't disagree that most of them (Arishok and High Dragon being the most obvious two) are pretty much just hitpoint endurance though.

[FINE HERE]

Cthulhu42 wrote...

Get rid of all boss fights. Too video-gamey.

Or instead of fighting the boss, you have to beat him in a game of DDR, where the screen shows arrows and you have to hit them in the right order more than the boss does.

On a serious note, I agree with the Arishok battle being... bad. I found myself doing figure eights around the pillars, waiting for my spells/abilities to re-fill. It was boring.

Modifié par FINE HERE, 10 octobre 2012 - 09:34 .

[ObserverStatus]

I'd prefer something like metroid prime style boss battles, bigger than houses with multiple tagetable body parts

[deatharmonic]

AlexJK wrote...

The Rock Wraith was more interesting.

Can't disagree that most of them (Arishok and High Dragon being the most obvious two) are pretty much just hitpoint endurance though.

Yeah, that made for a nice change of pace. It would have been nice if each boss fight had a unique feel to it.

[scootermcgaffin]

FINE HERE wrote...

Cthulhu42 wrote...

Get rid of all boss fights. Too video-gamey.

Or instead of fighting the boss, you have to beat him in a game of DDR, where the screen shows arrows and you have to hit them in the right order more than the boss does.

On a serious note, I agree with the Arishok battle being... bad. I found myself doing figure eights around the pillars, waiting for my spells/abilities to re-fill. It was boring.

Okay, yes, I will definitely agree with this one. The Arishock solo fight was very poorly done and does require some kiting. I always forget about that one. 

[deuce985]

Legacy DLC...bai god. It's nice Bioware wanted to try something different but if you're going to design a boss fight like that, please make positioning easier to do...

That was easily the hardest fight in the game on nightmare...and it wasn't because he's difficult. Poor gameplay mechanics contributed to him being so hard. That's bad design, IMO.

And they need to do a better job at allowing us to change the proper companions for the fights. You're pretty much screwed on Legacy if you didn't get the proper setup right before the boss...you can't change companions.

Arishok is easy on a mage. He's hard on a warrior. Overall, Bioware's boss design is very poor in DA2...

Every fight felt like it was about endurance. Each boss had about 50 gazillion HP and sometimes I'd fight a boss over a hour..

Modifié par deuce985, 10 octobre 2012 - 10:39 .

[hexaligned]

Rip off Dragons Dogma. Seriously.....rip off Dragons Dogma. No, shut up. Listen to me. Rip off Dragons Dogma.

I stopped playing the game after that battle with the Arishock actually, it highlights a lot of things I just did not like about DA2 combat.

[rapscallioness]

relhart wrote...

Rip off Dragons Dogma. Seriously.....rip off Dragons Dogma. No, shut up. Listen to me. Rip off Dragons Dogma.

I stopped playing the game after that battle with the Arishock actually, it highlights a lot of things I just did not like about DA2 combat.

lmao. how funny. but yes, dragons dogma had some amazing battles

[rapscallioness]

And yes, the Arishok battle was disappointing.....and felt kinda silly. I thought it was gonna be an epic battle...but it was......idk..cartoony? Then the part where he gets you and sticks that sword in your gut. You're just wiggling your legs all silly. Blood spurting out in a cartoony way.

meh.

[deatharmonic]

relhart wrote...

Rip off Dragons Dogma. Seriously.....rip off Dragons Dogma. No, shut up. Listen to me. Rip off Dragons Dogma.

I stopped playing the game after that battle with the Arishock actually, it highlights a lot of things I just did not like about DA2 combat.

Lol, I did quite enjoy the combat mechanics for DD, especially for bosses, being able to jump on them added another dynamic to fights. Though I doubt Bioware would overhaul combat to that extent.

[daaaav]

Completely agree.

Giving bosses high resistances and HP boosts as the only mechanisms of increased challange only fosters the same old tank spank and heal tactics we've (well, I've) all grown so tired of..

[Conniving_Eagle]

Bloody Arishok, dueling him as a two-handed warrior was a major pain.

Bioware needs to take from some other games.

[syllogi]

I think that the last two boss fights could have easily been an either/or situation, and had more impact.

And there was no good reason for Super Saiyan Meredith. Nobody would have said "you know what was missing from DA2? Meredith jumping REALLY HIGH and animating statues!!!"

[deuce985]

I'd argue that DAO had boss encounters but they were over so quick, most people didn't really see them as bosses.

Mark of the Assassin is the only boss fight I really enjoyed. Legacy would've been awesome if positioning wasn't such a major problem with companions. But still, even those two boss fights fall into the old endurance fight tank'n'spank with endless HP. DAO fights are over too quick and DA2 boss fights are too long with handicaps against the player. Arishok is a ******* nightmare on a warrior but a joke on a mage. You can kite him all day on a mage and blast him.

Boss fights not having save points is also a bad design decision, IMO. Especially if you design fights built on endurance+phases(Legacy/MOTA). Legacy made me want to pull my hair out getting to the last phase and my silly companion wanted to stand around as the fire destroyed her...

Somebody mentioned Dragon's Dogma as a good example of boss fights. I agree. That game has really good boss design. They also end up with multiple weaknesses that they allow you to find and exploit. I liked that mechanic too. Boss fights are fluid and fast in that game. You don't grind them out for a hour. It beats that tank'n'spank formula they used in DA2 because you could approach bosses in different ways. I'm not sure DD's boss fights would work in DA3 though. DD is far more action oriented than DA2.

Ideally, I'd like to see fights over quicker than DA2. That's too long. Unless you put a checkpoint system in the boss fights...

Modifié par deuce985, 11 octobre 2012 - 03:16 .

[Rawgrim]

Bossfights are ok, if done right. I liked the broodmotherfight in DAO, for instance. But the Branka fight got ridicilous. She cloned herself, even though dwarves can`t use magic? Same goes for the Arishok fight. Button mashing for 10 minutes was just...well. He managed to impale Hawke about 18 times during the fight as well. There went the immersion right out the window. The Rock Wraith fight was pretty good, though. So i am guessing its a case of balance.

[deuce985]

Rawgrim wrote...

Bossfights are ok, if done right. I liked the broodmotherfight in DAO, for instance. But the Branka fight got ridicilous. She cloned herself, even though dwarves can`t use magic? Same goes for the Arishok fight. Button mashing for 10 minutes was just...well. He managed to impale Hawke about 18 times during the fight as well. There went the immersion right out the window. The Rock Wraith fight was pretty good, though. So i am guessing its a case of balance.

Thinking back to the boss fights in DAO, they were actually very simple and over fast. I liked that. It seemed they tried to get too cute with them in DA2 and it came off as completely unbalanced to me, IMO.

I do like what they tried with Legacy/MOTA but they need to do a better job at balancing fights like that. Easy solution is put checkpoints in each phase. If they put that simple feature in those fights, I probably wouldn't be talking about them as being flawed at all...even with the poor positioning mechanics in DA2...

Modifié par deuce985, 11 octobre 2012 - 03:23 .

[TEWR]

Rawgrim wrote...

She cloned herself, even though dwarves can`t use magic?

Wait... what? Do you happen to have a video of this, because I can't say I saw it happen when I destroyed the Anvil.

[Rawgrim]

The Ethereal Writer Redux wrote...

Rawgrim wrote...

She cloned herself, even though dwarves can`t use magic?

Wait... what? Do you happen to have a video of this, because I can't say I saw it happen when I destroyed the Anvil.

It happens during the fight. she activates the golems, and once you kill them and attack her, she "clones" herself. Several of her running around. The clones only needs to be hit once before they disapear, though.

[Night Dreams]

Rawgrim wrote...

Bossfights are ok, if done right. I liked the broodmotherfight in DAO, for instance. But the Branka fight got ridicilous. She cloned herself, even though dwarves can`t use magic? Same goes for the Arishok fight. Button mashing for 10 minutes was just...well. He managed to impale Hawke about 18 times during the fight as well. There went the immersion right out the window. The Rock Wraith fight was pretty good, though. So i am guessing its a case of balance.

I really liked the broodmother battle, and with Branka I found myself sending Leliana or someone else ranged to all of the lyrium before she could get to it. Actually worked very effectively. 

Overall, and especially in DA2 I totally agree that boss battles need to be based on more than simply fighting a different type of enemy with majorly increased HP. Something interesting that challenges us in a different way to what we are use to, but with strategies that are still suited to an RPG. The rock wraith and the end boss of Legacy were both enjoyable imo. I also didn't mind the final boss battle of Mark of the Assassin. But yeah, the Arishock boss battle was ridiculous. It would have been a little better if he could have been stunned temporarily whenever he did that random run of his or something.