With the release of the new phantom forest, it has become clear that farming ebosses is going to be a priority for anyone who wants the new ring. To this effect I would like to suggest a few improvements to how the bosses spawn in this area specifically:
First, if we could lower the amount of elite mobs needed before a boss spawns, that would be great. I can do these quests at reset, and usually find enough players to coordinate an efficient hunting schedule, but doing it alone is like 2 hours of grinding from a fresh map. 2 hours of gameplay for a single daily seems like a bit much.
Secondly, if we could have a mob like messenger of darkness, or better yet some way to outright know exactly how many emobs away from a boss any given map is, that would really help. It takes some coordination on part of players but with how low the population is in some of the servers (namely elysium) it can be really time consuming to get this quest done alone. And I know we have the dark/grim messages but never before has there been such a strong focus on specifically killing emobs and ebosses, I think some tools to help in this regard would be well received.
Thirdly, some kind of exp scaling would be great. I understand daddy nexon korea wants everyone funneled into arcane river as if black mage is a realistic goal for 99.99% of the player base, but it would be REALLY REALLY NICE to have some grinding options other than the shiny river of time gating. For example, most players will spend 225-240 at cavern lower path. The mobs there give something like 400k exp each? Can players level 230+ maybe get like 300k exp per forest mob? The rewards from the bosses definitely make up for the lack of exp, I'm LOVING the cubes, but it's not to say it couldn't be even better
Fourth, can we make Dead Man's Gorge a town map? Having to teleport back to NLC just to use the auction house is a bit tedious. Additionally, adding a storage NPC in this map would be nice. At this time I am unsure if the NLC Taxi triggers the insanity to increase when you use it to get into the forest. If it does, this kinda sucks, cause that means I need to go a bit insane every time I want to leave the forest and come back just to store or sell something in AH. Either remove the sanity trigger on the taxi, if it exists, or add a storage NPC in Dead Man's Gorge. In the event the Taxi doesn't trigger insanity, then all is good in that regard.
Finally, some things that I think are very good:
The rewards from the ebosses are fantastic, PLEASE don't nerf this. We love the rp and cubes, and the blackgate gear is extremely helpful for mules.
The ebosses themselves are really nice. I like the 20 seconds of invulnerability. It gives players time to come to my map to get the dailies done.
The aesthetic of the area in general is beautiful, devs outdid themselves. Mobs and maps looking AMAZING. I want familiars ASAP lol.
To conclude, great work with the new area, but it definitely needs some tuning.
Side note, a lot of people have a problem with the sanity thing. Can we make it optional? I love it but I can clearly see why people don't.
Edit: Just saw the coin requirements for enhancing.
Why would you add an entire new equipment set and make it worse than all the stuff we already have? What is it that nexon doesn't understand? YES we like equipment diversity. But diversity means you have multiple options. This equipment set is unrealistic to obtain, it is a non-option. I am extremely disappointed now. Why can't the items just be enhanced normally? This is terrible.
