Tuesday, January 5, 2010

I lol'd

To encourage players not to shy away from the many invigorating adventures to be had in The Oculus, we have applied a change to enhance the rewards players are provided when selected for this dungeon via the Random Heroic option in the Dungeon Finder. Once Ley-Guardian Eregos is defeated, one loot bag per character will be provided in his chest in addition to the current rewards. Each loot bag will offer players rare gems, two additional Emblems of Triumph, and a chance of being rewarded the Reins of the Blue Drake. These fine treasures could be yours should you honor your fellow party members by besting the challenges contained within The Oculus! Keep in mind, however, that these extra loot bags will only be awarded to each party member if Oculus is selected by the Dungeon Finder when players choose the Random Heroic option.

In light of this change, the Reins of the Azure Drake will now have a chance of dropping in both 10- and 25-player versions of The Eye of Eternity.

I never bailed on an Oculus before, but now I won't groan as much if the loading screen pops up. It is rather sad now much the instance has been nerfed along with all the other incentives they have to add to it in order to make it appealing. Really, it's a fun encounter, it just needs some design tweaks.

I asked our code quru what the logarithm looked like for determining the "random" dungeon, and he said that the instance you get depends on your gear level. Now, without delving further in (which is bad, but I'm in a rush today), I'd guess that the system looks at your gear and determined from the iLevel where you will get upgrades/be a little challenged. That's all well and good, but I have a sneaking suspicion that it plateaus around i200, which would explain that the only three instances I ever get are H:Halls of Stone, H:Oculus, and H:Halls of Lightning. Wouldn't a considerable improvement on this system have a next level of iLevel, where if your gear is above, say, i232, the dungeon you get is truly random? Or is this hypothesis completely wrong?

Anyway, good luck with the next wing of Icecrown! Hopefully our GDKP runs will be able to venture past Saurfang within a reasonable amount of time!

5 comments:

Christopher Schmidt said...

My gear is significantly higher than ilevel 200s (typically 232/245 pieces), and I have never gotten Occulus on random out of something like 3 dozen runs.

In general, once you can join a dungeon via the random option at all, I have not seen any indication that it keeps you out of that dungeon for random selection. However, you will be limited based on what other people you get grouped with have for gear, so if you have a mage in blues in the run, you're not going to be able to have HoR.

You can tell if you're locked from a specific dungeon by your gear by opening up the "Specific Dungeon" interface and looking for dungeons with locks next to them.

The large number of people 'seeming' to get Occulus may simply be because you're filling holes: This change indicates that there is still a large number of people dropping group on Occulus when they get it on Random (otherwise they wouldn't buff the loot), and that means that you're likely to be filling in a spot for someone who left more often.

But yeah. I get HoR all the time, but I never get Occulus. I'd definitely prefer Occ over HoR with most of the groups I get assigned to.

Anonymous said...

I'd appreciate it most if the random dungeon were completely random. As long as you can't get into a dungeon that will kick your ass, it's all good. Most folks are doing the random for badgers anyway so getting HUK will make them happy (fast easy badgers).

Kheldul said...

I got Occulus last night on random. I had lead. The first group 3 bailed at the start. The second group two bailed. It is sad how easy it is. There are three things you do need that are unusual.

1) Somebody who doesn't get lost. It feels very freeform unlike other dungeons.
2) Someone who knows how to heal on the green drake.
3) A decent red drake tank with decent iLvl gear.

Everything else is optional. You could three man it.

Criven said...

they added 2 more nerfs to it as well this morning.

Ayonel said...

I admit that I have never liked Occulus, not only because it used to be pretty hard, but because it requires a level of coordination lacking in most pugs(even pre-3.3, if that makes a difference.)

I have enjoyed it somewhat as the challenge it presents to a group of good players who know each other and are willing to work through the learning curve, but still wouldn't want to run it with someone who is unwilling to listen to the leader on how to approach the Eregos fight.

I also agree with you on the random dungeon logic. I am mostly TOTC/ICC geared, and I only ever see HoS, UP, and sometimes HoL. I have gotten FoS twice, and UK or Gundrak once. Over the Christmas break, I got HoS and UP as random at least 5 times each.