I’ve literally, and not even joking, only been playing boss maps lately on a quickmatch queue. The past two days the only time I encountered a different map is when I ended up with people farming grain map which I left because I want the quickplay bonus.
Aside from that the AI director seems totally bent over backwards currently and spawns are even more horrid than on launch in the groups I’ve been in. It feels like something was missed in the scaling since it happens more when I’m with people in Champion that aren’t yet at level 30/max power level.
As a result my groups have been getting totally wrecked with me ending up having to dance circles around a half-hp boss and being chased to death by the variety of elites that seem to be all that crowds these maps nowadays, only getting to tickle the boss if I kill them before fresh ones spawn.
I’m a fervent fan of this genre and really want to support this game and have done so since the start, I’ve played your beta and keep giving feedback but it feels like your AI director is completely disheveled at times. Mind - this has been happening since the HOTFIX and before that the 1.5.0 patch and the 1.5.0 BETA felt amazing for me and enjoyable.
Furthermore I’m really liking Unchained at the moment but I almost feel like I have to use beam over bolt simply due to the massive difference in heat usage and the fact that Beam seems to stagger with everything it does where Bolt is very unreliable in it’s stagger mechanics. I also wouldn’t mind if the Unchained ability staggered more reliably with the long cooldown and semi-tactical use-cases that it seems to have. Aside from that it seems fairly balanced however, it’s just painful how much of a crutch the beam staff is at the moment with it’s low skill and mastery cap - using it was basically allowing me to breeze through every map almost alone which just turned the entire game bland for me.
As for her other weapons, I really like the mace, the dagger is great too and has a lot of utility but Chaos Warriors and Stormvermin can be really awkward to headshot at times and at certain angles which feels strange for such a high precision weapon. (Even when the frames match up perfectly you often have to overshoot it very awkwardly.) A lot of this could be host-latency however, but still.
As for Shade elf, I’ve finally started seeing them more, and thank god they fall over less than your average waystalker, the cooldown reduction on the ult seems to have done them well. Also seeing a lot more slayers which is great for variety! Consider making it easier for slayers to deal with shielded foes however, especially with their DW-Axes, it’ll increase their niche and make them a lot more attractive to group with for the elitist folk too I think.