The Story...

You land on the Island of Trials wondering what awaits you.

As you jump down into the pit, Lady Luck calls out to you: "Let's see what you've got, Slayer... and don't forget to watch the skies."

A Shrike slams down in front of you and releases an ear-piercing screech. No problem, you've killed plenty of it's kind before.

You haven't even broken a sweat as Shrike feathers litter the trial arena floor, the behemoth slain.

"Well done! Let's get you your prize..." Lady Luck teases, then breaks into laughter. *"You really didn't think that was all there was, did you?"

A Gnasher enters the trial arena, snapping it's teeth at you and thumping it's tail in anticipation of the fight.

Once again you are victorious. Next you find yourself up a Quillshot, then a Skarn.

"So you've made it this far... let's heat things up a bit," Lady Luck says, her voice starting to hint at a genuine interest in your battles.

An Embermane appears, and you recognize a pattern. You've fought these behemoths before. They are familiar foes for you, but never one after another like this. As the Embermane charges you wonder how long this will keep up, and how long you will be able to last. After all, you have fought plenty of behemoths, but if you must fight them all you have barely scratched the surface.

A badly timed dodge and you take damage. It was barely a tap, but suddenly you are getting worried. Those taps will add up...

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The Gauntlets

Imagine if when you queue up for a trial, what you are stepping into would be a gauntlet of foes. Every behemoth in the game will be thrown at you one at a time from the weakest, all the way up through Dire, Heroic, then Heroic+. You don't get to refresh your consumables. You don't get to swap out your equipment. Whatever you enter the trial arena with is what you will have at your disposal all the way to the end, and the danger meter will only decrease by 50% when a behemoth is defeated.

How far do you think you can get? How will you and your teammates equip yourselves to be able to survive?

If you are strapped for time, or are still struggling to learn the ropes, try your hand at the elemental gauntlets. In these you will only have to go up against the behemoths of a single element type.

Leaderboard

A new leaderboard exists, this time ranking you by how far down the gauntlet you have made it, and how long it took you to get there. You will want to fight fast, but any careless mistakes made will cost you down the road as you start facing the more difficult behemoths.

And what do leaderboard rankings give you, you ask? Bragging rights and a reward of stars at the end of the trial week.

Solo and Group leaderboards would remain, but newly introduced would be a Guild leaderboard. If you enter the Gauntlet with a team of 2 or more, all of you belonging to the same guild, your attempt will count as both a group and guild run. Finally it allows guilds to earn some honor.

Stars

Rather than being time-based, you now earn stars based upon how far you make it through the Gauntlet. Each behemoth defeated will grant you either silver or gold stars, but only once a week. If you hit a wall you will either need to get further through the Gauntlet, or wait for the next week.

Rewards

If you make it through the entire Gauntlet you will wind up with a full 500/500 silver/gold stars to spend. Additionally, you earn yourself a special title, and you unlock some champion items in Lady Luck's shop: a Gauntlet champion flare, emblem, flag, and flag staff. On top of this, there is a 50 platinum reward awaiting you every week that you beat the Gauntlet.

As time goes by, perhaps items could be added to Lady Luck's shop. Maybe a selection of cosmetics from the regular shop can appear there for the week, their platinum costs halved but requiring a number of gold stars to make up the difference.

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Conclusion

If it were up to me, that is would be how I would change the trials.

It makes trials more accessible for those who are not yet at the endgame state, while for those who are there, they get a good challenge by having to put their skills to the test. Many veteran players can kill any behemoth thrown at them, but all of them in a row? That would take something extra.

By changing the way stars are earned, the difficulty slope does not reward too easily, but also does not punish those who struggle by denying them any participation. Additionally, by including platinum as a reward for defeating it you create that incentive to keep pushing, and by introducing the cycling 50%platinum/50%goldstar cosmetics you introduce a new platinum sink with some urgency to buy before the end of the week.

That translates to a more fair challenge for new players, a more reasonable challenge for veterans, and more platinum being spent on purchases beyond the hunt pass. Someone may not be willing to drop $10 on platinum for an outfit, but if they see that outfit for $5 worth and 500 gold stars I think they may be more inclined to make the purchase.

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