Desync, Maps, and More

Let me first start off by saying that I am lvl79 Witch who has enough 64+ maps that I do not need to go back. In fact, I even vendor 63s.

I say this, because I want you, the reader, to know that map mods are quite powerful. And costly.

MAPS:

I believe that I have found a solution, which will not affect your personal IIQ. What if, the +maze and +area mods were automatic? Indoor maps always had the +maze mod, and outdoor maps could roll the +area mod in the background (never be seen)? This would allow players to focus on running hard maps with as much +quantity as they wished.

Currently, it is always, always better to have a mod which increases size. Why? Let me put it like this. Lets say an underground map is 2-3x larger with +maze. Even though that mod gives 0 +quantity on its own, your own IIQ affects every single monster you kill that a non +maze map wouldn't have received. Being able to kill 2-3x more monsters is far, far superior. Same can be said for +area maps as well.

Further, this not only affects low lvl map players who with alt maps to get this mod, but it also affects high lvl map players who feel forced to chaos or alch/scour maps to get said mod. It's that important, and personally, I would never, ever play a 66+ map without said mod. It's not worth it.

The benefits of this are that players can focus on other mods which they WANT to play. Whether they be +magic/+rare for higher lvl drops and more xp, or higher quantity rolls. By freeing these orbs up, players will then be able to change more alts->jewelers->(or)fusings. This will make fusing price fall, and with chaos orbs freed up, better items can be rolled for everyone.

This will, IMHO, "fix" the issue of those complaining (somewhat understandably) about how hard a 6L is to get. Which I think it should be. BUT when a player is spending their alts to change maps, they have none to use themselves or any to sell.

I also feel that temporal chains mod should get a boost in its +quant %. Currently, too many people will roll again, just to ditch this mod. Quite honestly, it's not worth it. Now, if it was, say, +50%, might make it more interesting and not so quickly rerolled.

So by changing the +area/maze mod to be automatic, it will allow players the ability to kill more monsters, spend more time in maps, which should allow players to progress more reasonably without feeling stuck, or forced to reroll for specific mods.

Desync:

I have died to this 2x in 2 days now. On the same map, and so the same general theme. Packs of fast moving monsters, which when running for a distance, desync, server (freezes) as it rubberbands back into place (instadeath).

This map was the Strands map (lvl65). The first occasion it occured with about 7-8+ snakes quickly moving down the beach, blinking in and out, until I felt I had "outrun" them, felt great, than BAM!!, brought back into the pack and death soon followed.

The next day, same map, but with monkeys this time. Same 7-8+ in the pack. Exact same thing happened.

Personally, I have come to the conclusion that fast moving packs are simply too "hard" for the server keep track of. So, to the other players and devs, "Would it be too much to ask to please turn down the movement speed of said monsters"? At least until the desync problem is more under control. The fact that I have been able to repeat this, seems to me, that it's a bad enough issue. By adjusting their movement speed, I would personally believe that this would work as a temporary band aid. Once the desync issue has been "resolved" in a more proper way, turn their speed back up!! I like the thrill of running away and feeling my heart race as I know death is right behind me. But the feeling of getting away, elation, than being brought back into that pack, frustration, in mere milliseconds, is well, a *****.

Vendor:

Can we figure out a compromise for vendoring 6 modded rares? Currently getting one Augmented orb, when it takes 4 Augment orbs to get a Alteration orb from vendor means a 6 mod rare = .25 alts I've gotten 11 alt shards before from vendoring one less than 6 mod item. Seems strange. Would like to see something changed about this.

TLDR: +area/maze mod should be automatic. Thus allowing players of both low and high lvl maps more freedom in getting what they personally deem "good rolls". Fast packs of monsters should be slowed down to prevent desync (or diminish it) temporarily. 6 Mod rare vendor recipe needs a boost of some sort.

Comments/Suggestions are always welcome

P.S. If this thread needs to be moved to the Suggestions thread I understand, I just thought these ideas were both comments & suggestions. Further, I wanted as much feedback as possible. Move if need be :)

Edited for Spelling

I think I have to agree about the desyncing part. No experiences with maps yet.

Anytime I had an issue with desyncing I was kiting a bunch of monsters, and my movement speed was really fast. I feel like its either your character moving too fast for the server to pickup or something.

That was long :)

About the map mods, I completely agree. It looks like you can choose stronger mods over larger maps but it is not true in the end, playing larger easier map even if you get the very same amount of loot in the end is superior to playing a really hard small one. Not to mention you actually get more loot from larger map.

Back when both maze and area size mods were possible, it was quite fun and I was really sad when they took it away but it was a good decision, it helped the balance.

About vendoring 6mod rares, it seems like you should get the alt shards AND the augmentation orb (maybe substract 5 alt shards from the result to compensate the aug. orb).

I agree completely. Desync happens 99% of the time when you or the mobs moves too fast. This is simply bad coding and could be prevented by temporaly slowing down fast monsters and making them harder otherwise.

I have gone even so far that I changed my 30% MS boots that I absolutely LOVED to these ones: simply because they DONT have the movement speed increase. I will move very slowly but atleast I wont desync myself.

I think this is simply the biggest problem in the end-game. People with good builds VERY rarely dies without desync problems, and this just makes them very angry.

I know the devs know about the problem, but why not do something about it? Or even tell us what they are planning to do?

Maybe the devs dont think this as big of an problem it in reality is. The people who run maps all day are usually the "best" players whos opinion should matter the most. They have gone through the game completely and know all the quirks and little bugs, yet this is simply the biggest problem they see. I think that should tell the devs how major the problem is.

About Maps and mods overall, I think it's too hard to get high level maps, but I wont whine about this since we don't have act 3 and don't know how it changes the end-game and map drops. I can only wait and hope it will be better than it is now.

And yes, there is problem with vendor recipes too. I could have started with 20 stash tabs and play the chaos/alch tetris with chrome but it's not what I want from a game, so I rely on drops and thus am much poorer than the guys who abuse this to the end.

I don't see anyything wrong about making all rares giving you different amount of different shards and making it easy and balanced for everyone to get the easy alch/chaos/regal/whatever without hoarding useless items for random tetris.

Yeah, about area and maze together. Those were fun, but incredibly OP combo. Once had a 68% area and maze in a dungeon type map. Took 3 hours.

I just think that the +area/maze combo is too good. So instead of taking out, why not give it to everyone so the more fun mods can be chosen.

The desync issue, I still believe would be nice no have "fixed" as much as possible before OB. It truly does become a big problem in end-game ladder specifically.

I also like the vendor recipe suggested as Aug orb + alt scraps that would have been give otherwise. Seems more in line with current ratios. Nice suggestion.

P.S. If all maps were larger, and people could focus on getting high quantity maps w/ rolls that suit their needs, I would believe more people would find higher lvl maps.

agree +1