Quicker Dungeons

So I've heard from quite a few anonymous sources that their dungeon runs haven't been all that enjoyable towards the end. Specifically starting from the Necropolis onward, they feel bored with the dungeon either from all the waiting or all the enemies they've had to fight.

Therefore I suggest getting rid of the Midway in the next dungeons. At one point, the "Midway" was actually the middle of a dungeon before the latest system was put in place. I'm not suggesting to bring back the old system, just shorten the dungeon as a whole.

By the time a group gets tired or bored of a dungeon, they will only have to deal with the Chamber, the final room. With 1 less room to go through, maybe things will go quicker and people will enjoy their prolonged stay in the same scenery without getting tired or bored with the dungeon to the point that they didn't enjoy their stay.

The best reason I could dig up for shortening a dungeon is the reason we are all here; to have fun. If one of the biggest aspects of this site (the dungeon) is not fun, then the only reason to go in is for riches, power, and a tad bit of glory.

Well, maybe it might be good to have 2 versions of dungeons.

1. Short, with either stronger foes, or weaker prizes. 
2. As they are, but prizes go up.

Personally i have never entered a dungeon but i feel being long is somewhat important. You battled all this way, and finally made it.

Personally, I have been in five dungeons. Two of those experiences were under the old system. I can't say the length of the dungeon was ever an issue for me. I have always enjoyed dungeon diving. Perhaps there are other factors involved for these "anonymous few."

My concern with adjusting the dungeon system is that a dungeon is supposed to test someone for the MOST powerful possesion one is able to obtain on this forum. Reducing the length quite possibly would make it easier to obtain an "army killer". Even if you increased the battle difficulty, that could make it just as long. In my experience, the battles get drawn out is because people are too scared to use more than one ability per post most of the time. That goes for both events and dungeons.

Well, i guess their isn't allot of pvp experience going around, and in a sense dungeons are pvp. Maybe  we should increase the amount of OOC battles, or maybe an option for Npcs to be controled by players not just staff for maybe [The coli, B  teir and below].

I have no problem with the dungeons as they are, as long as I'm given enough to work with and the writing doesn't bore me half to death or whatever reason. Dantalion was/is my first dungeon, and regrettably, Merrze controlled it despite having little to no experience in controlling something as large, or perhaps important, as a dungeon and didn't recognize sooner that other staff could proofread his posts before putting them up until recently. But all of that is beside the point I suppose since it is basically fixed now and has nothing to do with the proposal made.

Azix has a very valid point, so my answer is the same as his, or would be if I could word anything properly.

As for players controlling the NPCs, I'm not sure I personally understand what you are suggesting there, Kabutop.

I change my mind. This was a dumb idea :P

Adrastos Thanatos wrote:I have no problem with the dungeons as they are, as long as I'm given enough to work with and the writing doesn't bore me half to death or whatever reason. Dantalion was/is my first dungeon, and regrettably, Merrze controlled it despite having little to no experience in controlling something as large, or perhaps important, as a dungeon and didn't recognize sooner that other staff could proofread his posts before putting them up until recently. But all of that is beside the point I suppose since it is basically fixed now and has nothing to do with the proposal made.

Azix has a very valid point, so my answer is the same as his, or would be if I could word anything properly.

As for players controlling the NPCs, I'm not sure I personally understand what you are suggesting there, Kabutop.

Well, the idea for the player controlling NPCs.  Normally in important situations staff control NPCs, Like Dungeon posting, leaders of a faction or events. Good nothing wrong here.

Though there isn't I say a lot of people actually PVP related things. For example, let's say I went to em do a B teir job or equivalent or lower. [Which normally I would, just control myself].  But if say I wanted a bit of a challenge, I could give said enemy to Lagi to control, or even someone in the Coli. 

This gives me the opportunity to to practice a bit of PVP, and test out combos in a somewhat real situation. If I did this multiple times, facing different Npcs controlled by different people. By the time I try it with a major event or dungeon. I will be more confident in my abilities and combat style.

Possibly a dice system, Say i want a real player controlling a bandit, I roll a dice of people who have put themselves forward for such positions.

staff has said more than once that if you wish to have a more "real" PVP experience in the coliseum, they are happy to NPC for players, to give them that practice. Plus, there is always the option of battling an actual PLAYER in the coliseum, and as long as both players agree on the rules, then you could simply ask someone like Lagi if they would be willing to battle you in the Coliseum, but limit him to B or A-tier abilities and lower.

As for the dungeon length, I agree with Azix... it is supposed to be a test of the strength and determination of the Contender, shortening things simply makes it easier. If that were the goal, then obtaining a djinn would lose all its pride and value.

I don't think dungeon lengths are an issue, however Zadi did bring up a point I would agree with. Let's ditch the "Midway" section.

I can hear the comments now, "But Yaku, isn't that the same as shortening the dungeons?" and to anyone who had that thought, I'd have to say that it's a fair assessment.

However, what I'd like to see in place of the midway being removed is more emphasis and content in the remaining rooms to make up for it.

Combat might make a room take more than a few posts, but generally each room is, "You arrive. You get told where to go with very clear context clues. You bump up against some kind of obstacle. You move on to the next room." That pattern has been pretty consistent throughout most dungeons. Not all, but most of the ones I've read.

The process is almost too straightforward. I'd prefer to see more organic and open ended approaches/paths through dungeons such as the one Azix got his djinn from. If I remember right, it had multiple paths and interesting surprises based on which path you chose. I don't want to be told, "Go this way" and instead I want to be given a setting and free reign to bumble around it till I find the path forward.

The more rooms there are, the harder making a dungeon like this would be. So I say drop the midway and instead give more focus on making the remaining rooms full of content to equal out with current dungeon lengths.

As a final note, I'd like to say that the more recent dungeons have all been better than the earlier ones and staff has done a great job of improving upon the formula so far.

I defiently agree with Yaku. I am still pretty new compared to all of you, however I have watched the Magi anime. In the dungeons, they are very complex and not always clear. They were also very different. I am not saying that the dungeons are not different or unique because I have read some of the dungeons and they are very different, however lets compare 2 anime dungeons, Zagan and Amon. Amon was a dungeon that was very surprising in the sense that there were many traps, and that they were different riddles. Zagan was very similar but these dungeons both had something they were specialized. Zagan's dungeon is actually a village of dungeon monsters while Amon was supposed to hurt with fire like traps. Zagan was more of emotional and confusing dungeon while Amon was a more bravery and deadly like dungeon.

Yeah I want open ended exploration inside a dungeon too, well maybe not open ended but at least non linear. But I think dungeons are more like races rather than something to just go adventuring in and explore. So yeah naturally if they want to get the prize at the end players are gonna beeline to the goal ignoring the scenery and other opportunity to just look around. XD

Hohotaro wrote:Yeah I want open ended exploration inside a dungeon too, well maybe not open ended but at least non linear. But I think dungeons are more like races rather than something to just go adventuring in and explore. So yeah naturally if they want to get the prize at the end players are gonna beeline to the goal ignoring the scenery and other opportunity to just look around. XD

From a player perspective it's a race. But from the djinn's perspective, it's a test. Since the djinn makes the dungeon with the test in mind, I think it's fair to say the dungeons shouldn't be built with the race aspect being considered very heavily. If it is considered, I would personally like to see efforts made to minimize the ability to race forward. For example, keeping the goal hidden and obscured so it is hard to beeline for it since you won't know where to beeline it to.

Or at least, that's my opinion on the matter.

Zadi wrote:I change my mind. This was a dumb idea :P

It wasn't my intention to make you feel like your idea was stupid. If there is an issue with enjoy-ability, I feel it is smart to explore the idea and see what the community can come up with. That being said, I wanted to point out that I felt it was less the amount of rooms that was the issue, and more that other factors could be at fault. Just because I didn't completely agree with you, doesn't mean you should completely disregard your opinion.

Well, I don't think Dungeons are really races. Generally in the anime it's more about survivability and proving one self, I don't remember any person really in the anime treating it like a race, wouldn't that somewhat disrespect the Djinn considering it a race.

I'm really liking the way Yakuroro is thinking with this.

In future dungeons, whether the midway is scrapped or no, make the "race" dependent more on the Djinn and Contenders. Keep everything obscure, unless the contender is starting to please the djinn. If the djinn/staff doesn't think that the contender is passing these smaller tests, keep throwing more at them. Instead of kill this many things and reach the next door, maybe have it more "what would you do" type of thing? I dunno. Just throwin stuff out there. Kinda brain stormin. #gratata

Of course, I haven't really read dungeons or participated. So it may be that way now and I"m just ramblin

I like that idea a lot. In the manga Belial's dungeon is basically one room and its based on trials as opposed to a linear beat an enemy then move on kind of thing like Amon's was or what was essentially a race to the finish like Valefor's . I think having variation between the dungeons is a good thing. Mind you, I haven't experienced a dungeon yet so I may be off base, but I've been keeping up with Dantalion and I read the other ones as well and personally I would get a bit bored of a very linear sort of dungeon especially if they are, for the most part very similar.

I have no complaints about the dungeon I recently went through that was perfect for me, coodo's to Garet. Thanks man for a great story

SolomonxKing wrote:I have no complaints about the dungeon I recently went through that was perfect for me, coodo's to Garet. Thanks man for a great story

LOL cause we fooled around too much inside our dungeon it was so much fun.

Well that's the point that right?  The more we react to wats given to us the more the dm can supply it's a give and take situation,  if he throws something out and someone just gives like a sentence that's not much to work with.

The same can be said vice versa too, Solo. The dungeon competitors can't write a decent response if what the DM gives is weak and uninformative.

I actually have been planning the next dungeon for a bit now, and since this matter came up, I would like to get an idea of what people would be looking for...

A lot of you seem to enjoy the idea of being given more choices/options in the dungeon with more depth and explorability (similar to Cimeies). If this is what you would like to see from the next dungeon, pipe in with that.

Several members have also been interested in seeing more PVP both inside and outside of dungeons. If this is something you guys are more interested in, holler back! (okay, Ari should stop trying to be cool now)

I would love it if the next dungeon were to be more open. Cyrus would totally be in a dungeon like that!

This may seem like an pbvious question, but how would more PvP be implemented inside and outside the dungeons?

I'm indifferent about PVP in regards to the dungeons. I think that is something that is more or less up to the dungeon challengers and shouldn't be built into the dungeon's design unless the Djinn in question specifically values something revolving around that type of conflict.

As for the more open dungeons, I think I already made my vote on that apparent, but I'd like to clarify that what I don't want as a result of that is an endless horde of enemies if I keep choosing the "wrong path" or something like that. It would be fine in a dungeon designed around the premise of endless mass weak foes, but not as the general approach to all dungeons. Using the library in Dantilion as an example, instead of just being a detour that eventually led to the same gate, I'd like a dungeon were wandering into the library might just open up a completely different route with a different challenge than the one you'd face if you just followed the main road.

Long story short, more content that isn't just more enemies. Puzzles, moral choice events, traps, and other dungeon-like scenarios beyond simple combat.