The years of discussion, argument, accusation and recriminations are over. As of Update 2, Radiance is no more. Casual players are likely heartened by this news, this will allow them to partake in end games raids without having to collect a stockpile of other gear. Even raiders are happy about this as the thought of taking a bevy of alts through the process was disheartening, and gaining new recruits from casual players will be easier. I myself cheered at news of its demise.
But the idea of Radiance was a good one. A stat that represents a characters unrelenting hope that our efforts are improving the Free Peoples chances of winning the war, that the shadow can be turned back and defeated, that our very acts make us into more heroic characters. As the dev diary said, it was the implementation which was lacking. How could Radiance have been implemented in a better fashion? I should mention that this article is adapted from my own post on the subject more than a year ago. I have been aware of this problem for some time, and am not just piling on. I truly think Radiance could, and should, have been salvaged.
Deed Based
Radiance should never have been tied to gear. It should have been conceived as an indivisible aspect of the character. Like Glorfindel or Elrond, as our characters grow in virtue and deeds they should innately emanate radiance and hope. The best system to incorporate radiance was then the Deed system. Each powerful enemy overcome should have had a deed attached to it which would reward the character with Radiance. This would then galvanize the character against further challenges from evil in the form of new raid bosses.
So defeating Igash in the Grand Stair would reward the player with a deed which provided 10 Radiance. No matter what armor you wear you would have this innate statistic. This would be rewarded for the first kill, maybe only in hard mode, or maybe any victory. This then frees players to decide if they want to continue to run the instance for the armor and jewelry drops. Those who just want to move on to prepare for raiding could simple go to the next instance having only run Grand Stair one time. If they greatly valued an armor piece or a jewelry item they could run it ad-infinitum.
By killing the other bosses in 16th Hall, Fil Gashan, Forges, Dark Delving, and Skumfil you would gain the other 50 radiance to have the same radiance as those armors provided. Killing the Turtle and the Watcher could have been worth 10 additional Radiance each. This would give you the same 80 radiance as the actual system did with the Moria armor.
Currently, you must run each instance 6 times, and the watcher 12 times, on average, to get the radiance for the next raid. With a Deed based system you would have all the radiance required by running each instance or raid, successfully, one time. No doubt, many would continue to run most, or all, of these instances many more times to get the armor or jewelry, but the burden that they were required to run it more than once would have been lifted.
This also provides more of a sense of character growth and story. Your character is defeating each great evil in turn and slowly rolling back the shadow. It is much more palatable as a narrative than killing the same beast a dozen times.
On-Ramp
When new content is released it can be untenable for players to run through now obsolete instances. It is difficult to gather up a group for a special run when many others don’t need anything from the instance. An option for this would be to use the “catch up” or “on-ramp” instances to quickly ramp up a character’s radiance.
As an example, when Lothlorien was released the instances Hall of Crafting, Water Wheels, and Nala Dum were added along with the Dar Narbugud Raid. The instances allowed one to collect tokens to barter for radiance pieces so that you could build up to 75 radiance by gaining 3 25 radiance pieces. This would be enough to allow you to function in DN.
So a possibility would be to add a tech for either-or Deeds. You can complete this or that to complete the Deed. Using this new tech, players who had already gained the 80 radiance form Moria would gain no more from the new instances. But players who had not completed these instances would get 10 Radiance from the bosses in WW and ND, and 20 Radiance from each of the three bosses in HOC. This would allow them to catch up to the Moria players 80 radiance by running current instances instead of old content.
So now everyone has the 80 radiance needed for DN. In DN each boss would fulfill a deed which would provide additional radiance. The total radiance from killing all the bosses would be 40, bringing the total radiance up to 120, matching up with the old system.
For the new Dol Guldur cluster much the same thing would occur. Killing the bosses from Sword Halls, Warg Pens, and Sammath Gul would ramp you up to 120 Radiance if you had not completed the Moria or Lothlorien deeds. This 120 radiance allows you to function in the raid: Barad Guldur.
Once inside BG, each boss defeated would provide an additional 20 Radiance. So after killing Durchest everyone in the raid would then jump to 140 Radiance. After killing the twins you would be at 160, and after defeating the Lieutenant you would be at 180. Of course for the armor, you would have to run the raid many times, but the story part, your characters growth, would be complete after the first defeat.
I see the Annuminas and Helegrod clusters as another on ramp for Radiance. A newly minted level 65 character might chose to run level 65 versions of these instead of the DG instance cluster and some of BG. For Helegrod, keep the 150 radiance total, but break it up to give 30 radiance for each of the 3 sub bosses (assuming you have not already done the DG cluster) and 60 Radiance from Thorog. Or they could choose to do Annuminas and be rewarded with 50 Radiance from each of the three instances.
An alternate Deed tech might be more useful. It would track the Radiance as it is earned, but only allow the Radiance to be applied from the source which has been progressed the farthest. So if I have done the three sub bosses from Helegrod, I would have 90 Radiance. But then if I completed the DG cluster I would jump to 120. And then if I completed the Annuminas cluster I would move up to 150. I could then run BG and complete that raid for the 180 radiance. It would basically track my highest radiance cluster and apply that stat to my character.
Conclusion
Basically, this is an alternate schedule for accumulating radiance through deeds rather than through armor drops. It has the benefit of allowing characters to quickly progress through the plot so they can move on to the next raid if they desire, or linger to gain the gear if that is their fancy. The idea of Radiance as an integral part of the character, gained through exceptional deeds, is also very appealing.
Another perk of this idea is that players can then use any armor they see fit. It would drastically increase the armor available to a raider. Rather than being forced to wear whatever happened to have the most radiance, players could pick and choose what to wear based on desirable stats or set bonuses.
This has the additional advantage of forcing the Devs to put good loot in the instances to encourage players to run them more than once. But it could also be used to reduce the need for the Devs to create as many new armor sets in the attempt to keep a few available at end game radiance requirements. There are an awful lot of sets now available to the level 65 raider, probably more than would ever be needed if radiance were not a concern.
A final benefit is that alts and new players could more quickly get into the end game raid by running current end game instances one time through. These instances are generally being run anyway by end game raiders and pugs, even if earlier instances and raids are not. The Deed based system also removes the need to run a few weeks of those end game instances (like Helegrod) before you can gain the radiance armor and take part in the end game raid. Run the 4 Helegrod wings one time and you have 150 Radiance and could come to BG.
You will not be as effective without the nice stats from the armor and jewelry, but can at least come along. This is more like the situation from Shadows of Angmar where any level 50 could come on a Rift raid. This radiance deed system would provide more encouragement for people to at least try the raids, which is good for casual players and raiding kinships.
Of course the wholesale removal of Radiance will now also allow anyone to try raiding. But it is sad to see such a good idea thrown away. Maybe someday Turbine could attempt to re-introduce a radiance type mechanic which is better implemented. It certainly does sound like a Tolkienesque concept.
February 28, 2011 at 9:02 am
That’s one thong they should have thought…
If the gear is good enough, ppl still continues to do the raids…
I do dozens of times the GB instances to keep GB marks and to barter the GB armor set…
February 28, 2011 at 9:49 am
I like this idea. It should of course work retroactively so that all dungeons already visited are acknowledged by the new system after a patch.
February 28, 2011 at 11:59 am
Unrelated question, but what the hell is this ugly thing?
February 28, 2011 at 2:15 pm
That’s the end boss for DN.
February 28, 2011 at 2:24 pm
The Mistress of DN, she is a sexy mama if I do say so. Half the time she is spewing some ungodly filth from her orafices. That photo is one of her better ones
March 5, 2011 at 10:57 pm
Yep, that’s the mistress
I helped down her the other night on Imladris :p
or, as I like to call her, my Mother-in-Law, and that’s still complimenting Karen far more than I would like to . . . :p
February 28, 2011 at 1:00 pm
I totally agree with the deed based system. I’m not 100% on board with the Ramp Up part though.
I’ve been playing for years and I just now obtained 75 rad. Why? Well back when MoM came out I was in a real causal play style and alt mode. When I finally became high enough level to do some of the instances I wasn’t really interested in them (playing alts too much). I did the occasional GS run, but by the time I started working toward the rad gear I couldn’t find a group. The next set of dungeons came out and as a hunter, most groups wasn’t looking for my class. So I went back to alts.
I then joined a new kin and started looking at the rad gears. But by that time SoM came out and added another level of confusion about what instances I needed to run, what I needed to collect, what I needed to do, what gear I should get….. Basically it was a mess. Also, some of the rad gear wasn’t as good as what I had currently, but to run the end game dungeons I had to have it. Slowly I started getting the medallions I needed, and slowly obtained part of the Moria rad gear.
Long story short, the current rad gating was horrible and when it comes down to an immersion issue, totally wrong. From an immersion, story, point of view, you should only have to run a dungeon once to get what you need to advance to the next one. But if you want that rare loot, then that’s different. I have still not been able to run VM, DN, or any Dol Guldor instances because I don’t have enough rad, or because some people want you to have over 100 for something that you only need say 60 for.
I can’t wait for the update so I can finally do some of the dungeons I have never been to before.
February 28, 2011 at 1:34 pm
I think deed based systems for these things make the most sense. It doesn’t just have to be for Radiance, obviously… but it’s just natural logic in a lot of ways. If you’ve not completed A, why should you get to do B?
I don’t think Radiance itself was ever going to be a good idea, though. It’s integration/non-integration with Hope and Dread was at its best confusing.
February 28, 2011 at 2:25 pm
It seems that you could handle radiance like virtues. You have many different sources of virtues, but they cap out at a certain level. So, perhaps you can gain 60 radiance from Moria instance deeds. Then the next expansion would have a different slot that you could eventually cap out. This way, the new content could be got to in several different ways without the big disconnect between newer players and older players.
–Harperella
February 28, 2011 at 3:48 pm
That’s a good idea.
February 28, 2011 at 9:59 pm
I love this post, it puts into detail what I spent a lot of effort presenting on the Forums a year or more ago when the effects of radiance griding were being discussed and the alternatives to that system. The Deed system (Or Heroic Deeds, as I had coined it) makes so much more sense than some armor you found on your 6th time killing some critter in Moria as to what would inspire inner Radiance in your character. I really like the implementation you outline as to how the different instance clusters would alternatively award radiance.
I’d take it further, and add small increments of radiance for earlier instance bosses such as the Witch King of Angmar in CD, the boss of Barad Gularan, and even Red Maid and final boss of Fornost as examples of heroic deeds one would grow in inner strength after defeating. The barter system for Moria/Whatever Tokens does not appeal at all, except to lessen the distructive nature of the radiance grind.
Prior to the addition of the token system, there was much more universal use of all of the instances, as people needed the items from each of them. Some were more frustrating than others, as any group in which one member let an aoe slip and accidently stomped on a bug in the 16th hall could attest.. the system in either incarnation also encouraged (even guaranteed) the prolification of exploiting to make the endless runs to get armor as short and easy as possible.
If it were somehow encouraged for all the players to experience all of the instances without forcing such painful repetition, rare drops such as the anvil in HoC and the Symbol of Celebrimbor in SG are proof that people would still keep running them after the first go around.
The latest instance revamp system, and particularly the Helegrod instance deed setup really gave me hope that things were changing. Instead, just another slightly useful armor set with radiance and runs where no one ever fights any of the bosses and just speeds through the shortest distance to get a token for that armor is what we got. I’d love to run each wing, encounter the bosses, and gain radaince for that experience. Instead, I’ve seen the first few rooms of each wing, and never even bothered to trade in for any armor, as it is not as good for that piece as the Moria piece i’m using.
In summary, I cheer the removal of radiance, but am sad that the vision Haakon and others have seen did not come to pass.
Gilpharas.
March 1, 2011 at 1:23 am
Great thoughts. Love the idea of the radiance being tied to the deeds in this fashion, still offers players reasons to do dungeons but not a barrier that inhibits you from doing content.