[2021] Elders should have been Primals.

I've been playing around the test server for a bit. The game crashes every time you kill a behemoth. Every. time. I think it has something to do with the title card for an Elder Appearing on an island (like the title card for Primals that shows up on screen) Well, I won't complain much on that since it is a test server after all. So here's my point.

Elders should have been Primals

As I said in the title, I think Elders should have been the ones introduced first. The mechanics of their fight are pretty straightforward, and are much more early-game friendly even. Let me explain.

Elder Mechanics

As of now, I don't see anything new with Elder Behemoths aside from their shields. They're not faster, they're not stronger, nothing. They're just behemoths with shields. The shields are like those shock explosions from shock events. The way their hitboxes work is that you get shocked when you attack them, though you can walk through them. They also detonate at intervals and shock you if you're close. The number of shields from what I observe are based on the number of behemoth parts intact and they're not static. They move around at times, so it's like a mini game where you find the right opening to get to the behemoth to deal damage. (though I might be mistaken since sometimes the shields phase into each other and appear like one shield.) Basically, when fighting an elder, it's like you're playing a shock event, but the lightning always strikes close to the behemoth.

Elders VS Primals

1. Do slayers have a debuff imposed on them when fighting Elders? No. When fighting Primals? Yes.
2. Do slayers have to engage in the mechanics of the fight to beat an Elder? yes. With Primals? No. Well, a slayer will inevitably engage with the Shield when fighting an Elder, whereas the Pillars could be avoided entirely when fighting a Primal. Yes, the shield shocks, but the player doesn't have debuffs in all relevant damages and lifesteal, whereas not engaging with the Pillars makes a Primal more tedious to fight. For the newer player, would they rather keep all their damages and lifesteal at the cost of dodging a few more shock explosions with an Elder, or endure a cucked damage fight with a Primal unless they break a Pillar which makes the fight harder for them? I'll leave them to think about that.
3. Do the Elders get faster or stronger when the shields are broken? No (Since you can't break the shields). For Primals, when the Pillar is broken? Yes.
4. Let's talk about the Past and Future Slayer's Path. We can boil the Past and Future Slayer's Path to this. The Future (Elder) Slayers Path assists slayers the more they progress, while the Past (Primal) Slayer's Path rewards slayers the more they progress. What's the difference? Let me explain.

The Future Slayer's path gives nodes to unlock faster attack speeds, resistance to the shield shocks, and dealing damage through the shields or Shield-Bypassing as I call it. For veterans, it's all meh, but for newer players it might be a give-and-take thing where they actually get to think about the nodes they're unlocking. Do I want to upgrade my drone or deal damage through their shields so I don't have to tactically maneuver around them?

Well what about the Past Slayer's Path? Doesn't it also help with the fight against Primals? The Primal's Path helps with debuff resistance, and these stacks of perfection and whatever, but the debuff resistance don't do sh*t for newer players. Debuff resistance nodes basically just undo the debuff imposed on the player, its adds nothing new other than that. It's a waste of time to grind 5000+ time fragments grinding behemoths on steroids just to max out your debuff resistance when you're powersurging your sh*t. Perfect strike helps with killing the behemoth faster, but that's just icing on the top for players who know the behemoth so well that it's second nature to read the cues and dodge their attacks. Veterans. At most, newer players might be able to dodge a couple of attacks and get hit by two or more, but if those hits one shot them then what's the point?

Let's compare two similar nodes from both paths that negate the mechanic of the Elder and Primal. The Future's Shield-Bypassing node and the Past's Debuff Resistance Node. One could argue that the Shield-Bypassing node also just undo's the mechanic of shields, but here's the thing. Players can maneuver through the shields and attack the behemoth directly WITHOUT DEBUFFS, so they don't have to attack the shields in the first place. Whereas the debuff node from the Past Slayers Path universally applies.

• If you don't want to engage in the mechanic of the Debuff Pillar, you have two options; One, unlock the Debuff Resistance node and MAX it, which gives you up to 50% resistance against all debuffs - that itself requiring you to KILL PRIMALS, OR break the pillars and make the fight harder and near impossible. What would a new player choose in this case? Either way, they're screwed. Oh, what's that? Invest in Perfect Strike? Yeah, those explosions will definitely help grind 5000+ fragments when their armor set is like +4 in perks and sh*t.
• Compare that to the mechanic of the shield. You have two options. One, you avoid the shield and try to dodge the shocks, OR you unlock the Shield-Bypassing node to not have to hassle yourself into repositioning with each attack. That's it. As a plus, if you don't want to invest in the Shield-Bypassing, spend all those fragments on getting a Drone Buddy. Hell yeah!! DRONE BUDDY.

Tell me, which of these mechanics seems more friendly to introduce to the new player? The one you have to grind off your ass off to even get the chance to fight, or the one that gives you more things to dodge without cucking your damage output into oblivion? Oh, which also gives you a DRONE BUDDY.

Like I said. The Past Slayer's Path is more rewarding for veterans who can make do with the debuffs and time their dodges and attacks perfectly to achieve the perfect strike, while the Future Slayer's Path actively assists the player into progressing the path!!

The mechanics of the fight against elders all boil down to: Avoid the shields and shock detonations while building your slayer's path, and as you progress you get more options there. There's a path that gives you a DRONE BUDDY that helps deal damage and give buffs. I got a little bit more invested in this tiny upside-down pyramid hovering close to me all the time, more invested than I thought I would be. It explodes, It drops molten cells and random Cascade Buffs, It's the best friend of newer players who need all the help they could get! Again, the Elders don't get faster or stronger the more parts you break or the less shields there are, they're just normal behemoths with shields. That's waaaay better for newer players to deal with than the Primals that get more and more impossible to beat without optimized builds with powersurged gear! Why didn't they introduce this first if they considered bringing in more players?

Unless of course, these Elders are subject to more changes, like getting faster and stronger the more shields are broken or something. Yikes.

Conclusion

If the Elders are as they are at the moment, then they should have been the Primals while the Primals should have been the Elders. In conclusion with my main point in the title, The Pillar Mechanic works better for the experienced player, while the Shield mechanic is more early-game friendly.

Or what would've been infinitely better is to leave these Primal/Elder Behemoths is to put them on another island and let the willing slayers fight them, and not force them in the hunting grounds since they really are a hassle for the core reforge loop especially for newer players.

Here's some of my feedback for other minor things.

Portals and the Accessibility of Legendary Behemoths

There are now portals in the hunting grounds of the last three islands that lead to the Legendary Behemoths. You need portal keys to unlock them which you get from Hard Escalations.

Visually, I think they're too white and stick out like a sore thumb in the hunting grounds. Sure, it makes it easier to spot, but they don't blend well with the terrain. This is just aesthetics though.

In terms of meta, It's a good way for legendary weapons to be more accessible, but perhaps it might be go down the path of '"If everyone has legendaries, then no one has." I wouldn't be so pessimistic, but in my opinion, what made legendary weapons hold value was the climb to grind them. That's just my opinion though. Perhaps the Heroic Escalations in the future could give legendaries more value than they have now, heck why not make exotics the rewards for Heroic Escalations? I'm getting off topic.

My opinions aside, I do have a question for the portal key mechanic. How many keys does one get per Hard Esca? Since Portal Keys are obtained from Hard Escas, the core loop from grinding legendaries might turn into something like this:

1. Beat Hard Esca to get Key
2. Use key on Poral to fight Legendary
3. Repeat Step 1 when out of keys.

Because, depending on the number of keys you get per esca, grinding for legendaries might become a perpetual switch between Hard Esca and hunting grounds, or Hard Esca once then a couple of Hunting Grounds. It's just a question on my mind, I don't have much opinions about it since everyone is free to do as they wish. The Portals gives more options is the point, and that's okay.

Other Thoughts on Elders

I've tried a couple of weapons against Elders. Some of them work, some of them a bit more annoying to work around with.

Sword, Striker, Chainblade

Best against Elders. Avoid shield and get up close and personal. Chainblades of course, always the best for dodging, especially during the shock detonations. Although, the spinning attack on chainblades does connect with the shields more often than you would want.

Hammer, Axe, Warpike

Wide and sweeping attacks might hit shield when attacking behemoth, even when you're up close and personal. Hammer spinning move and pike spinning move gets you shocked cause you'll almost always hit a shield, especially when dealing with smaller Elder Behemoths like Riftstalker.

Repeaters

Always a pain.

Shield Mechanic Thoughts

For behemoths that run around all the time, like Embermane, shields are... they're annoying if you're not in the mood for a challenge. Stormclaw and Winter SKraev? Haven't encountered an Elder of those yet. But I can already feel the pain. Less painful than all-pillars-broken versions though.

Wait. Shock Shields and Detonations... DOES INSULATED WORK ON-

No. It doesn't. Those sneaky devs!!

Final Thoughts

My whole point with this post is basically moot since what's done is done. I just hope the Chronovore isn't a deranged Rezakiri-Valomyr hybrid on steroids.

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