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The Foundry Hard Mode Reviewed


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Below you will find my thoughts on doing a Hard Mode Flashpoint (HMFP). The Hard Mode in question is The Foundry. There will be criticisms and kudos. My intention is to help folks who are approaching HMFPs for the first time and to hopefully provide good feedback. For the instant gratification crowd there is a TL;DR before each section.

 

 

TL;DR: I have a fair amount of end game experience in other games and feel I can provide appropriate information from the three main rolls of SWTOR.

 

Ok as a brief introduction. I’ve done endgame content in FFXI and WOW. I’ve done all three rolls in end game content. My experience is mostly as a tank and healer so whenever I do instances I try to look at an encounter from both of those perspectives. I don’t consider myself a hardcore gamer but I make it a point to be good at what I do when I chose to play in a party environment in an MMO.

 

 

TL;DR: I’ve been 50 for a few days and this was my first Hard Mode but I am fairly geared.

 

I also have tried to practice my healing as I’ve leveled.

I took my time leveling once I got my ride skill as I was in two beta weekends. I’m a Cyber crafter and have made it a point to make enough money or create my own items to have at least blue quality mods in all my orange items. I’ve made some good money so I’ve bought a few purple accessories and the like. I’ve practiced healing in FP and leveling so that I could be ready for it endgame.

 

 

TL;DR: The Foundry Hard Mode does add a bit of excitement and difficulty to the game, however, it seem to have too great a curve right now making it impossible.

 

As stated at first this was my first Hard Mode. It started innocent enough saw a tank seeking and whispered him and then we had a full party shortly after. The party was two Juggs (one DPS), one Marauder, and me as a Sorc healer. Yes we were melee heavy and that didn’t help make the instance fairer that wasn’t the reason there were so many troubles. The group mentality was such that we knew we’d probably wipe (and wipe we did) but would keep coming back at it. We made a few dumb mistakes, the DPS attacking a different target before the tank or CC was up, however, this was the exception rather than the rule. Each of my other party members said that they’d done some other Hard Modes except me and each had a few artifact level items equipped.

 

We got to the first boss (the big robot) and wiped twice on the big AOE he does (melee heavy hurt here) but eventually we got him down due to good defensive cool downs, shields, and getting the F out of there. I thought this boss was fair, if you were stupid you died. However, if you handled the encounter properly you could beat it. This is the type of encounter I like to see at end game for MMOs.

 

The second boss, HK, however was a different story. I’m sure many of you have run into the bug where the shield core will crush you in a much larger area than the shield core actually is. So that was frustrating. It took us a few times to get our groove down and for the tank to listen to the rest of us but he did fall. The one issue I have is that when try to attack the pads to make the core go back up sometimes you’d still get the action from your toon, but you’d actually interrupt yourself by moving too fast.

 

The Broodmother is where the start of all the problems began. The group was able to get the mechanics of the fight down on our first try. Running when she turns to you to stay out of the bad is one that I quickly learned after she owned me. This boss has a hard enrage timer that is VERY short. On our second and subsequent tries we were able to not die until she enraged and then started one shotting people. We’d get her to less than 15k and then she start trashing us. We were able to defeat this boss because I DPSed almost as much as healed to push us over the edge. I got a nice belt out of it too, but that timer was VERY short and nearly impossible.

 

Then we get to Revan. We all knew this fight and had interrupt priority and yes I was on most of it. We couldn’t get him below 1/3 health before he’d enrage and one shot us. The first two times I thought I’d just missed an interrupt and he got his buff but the third time. I was actually had him targeted when he started one shotting and he never received the Force in Balance (or whatever it is called). The reason I know he gets the buff is I did this fight solo on regular to see the instance and didn’t bother to interrupt because I out leveled the FP. We couldn’t get Revan past 1/3 of his health after 6 tries and at that point we’d been there for over 3 hours and I couldn’t stay awake so we called it.

 

I don’t have a problem with unforgiving mechanics but if you can control what you can control and can’t beat a NON raid encounter that hardly seems fair or productive. I don’t mind dying when I can make some progress. However, it seems that Revan is tuned such that you HAVE to be in mostly raid gear to make the timer. This seems like it needs to be examined.

 

 

TL;DR: There may be some issues with the game but I genuinely enjoy it.

 

I’ve experienced a few bugs but in general I haven’t had the issues many of these forums complain about, however, I hope as more of us get to 50 and provide good feedback that we see some encounters be more fair instead of impossible. I hope my experience helps a few folks and wouldn’t mind hearing a few others but if you’re a troll please go find another bridge.

 

My character is Nary’a on the Shadow Hand server so if you need a healer who is dogged in beating an instance send me a whisper.

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I have just finished foundry heroic with the exact same issue, getting revan to appox 20% on average and then just getting one shot by him.

 

We had 3 people that can interrupt and we know we did not miss one. Even when tanking all CDs popped and bubbled I was still getting one shot.

 

If anyone else has had the same issue then please say so, or if you have killed him and if there is a way to get around the bug ?

 

Many thanks

 

Defence, Luka Sene

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"Ages" ? Some people really love to dramatize things...

 

Anyway, Revan is not the only bugged boss on HM.

 

HK-47 pt.2 on The False Emperor has a few bad days too where you can't interrupt/avoid/counter his stab, he casts it in <1 second and insta-gibs a player.

 

I've heard reports but haven't yet tested it out that the last boss of Boarding Party drops no loot.

 

I'm just wondering how come no one checked this or no one bothered fixing it. I've seen my share of bugs in games, and as a programmer I can understand some of these.

 

But bugs that render HM FPs unbeatable, FPS issues etc. are unjustifiable.

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But bugs that render HM FPs unbeatable, FPS issues etc. are unjustifiable.

 

There are no unbeatable flashpoints. They've all be beaten - many, many times.

 

@op: You just made a post critiquing content that is horrendously bugged; This serves no purpose. HK and Revan are clearly not intended to work the way they currently do. Once they fix the multitude of bugs, you will be able to steamroll the entire flashpoint in fresh 50 blues, because it's fundamentally easy.

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There are no unbeatable flashpoints. They've all be beaten - many, many times.

 

Ok then, let me rephrase :

 

Flaspoints that are unbeatable on SOME days, when they BUG.

 

That better ?

 

Because there was no way to avoid/break HK-47's stab last night short of jumping into the reactor.

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Im a Bh with 8/10 epics pvp/hm gear i had trouble with hk with me being pyrotech dps and maurder however u spell it after few trys i replaced the dps with a another bh downed him 1st try ignored turrets as they do 330 or so dmg and when hk start to go stealth and hits you with his stab all of our party member even without epics like me was hit down to 30% or in that range from there are healer shielded us and healed us that simple. Last boss was a bit harder as u have to hit him off the edge at 5% health but all said and done
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There is only one way to beat revan, and its a strat that my guild has mastered.

 

 

First you need an assassin tank, if you don't have one, this won't work.

 

Get reven to 50%. He will gain a buff (force something). Your DPS needs to be amazing this fight, and non-stop. When he casts his AOE force lightning, stand and take it, and do as much damage as you can.

 

After 5 seconds, everyone but the tank run out. At the 7th second, have the tank pop his evasion, and he should be able to take the full duration of the lightning blast.

 

Revan will then jump to one other person and kill them. Battle rez, DPS him until about 5% to which he will become immune, and you are done.

 

 

-This strat has been brought to you by the wonderful people here at OPW.

Edited by Artacks
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To say that all the bosses have been beaten many times is fairly rhetorical. Most of the evidence we have of this are videos where they were in beta or other simulated scenarios, not in production.

 

Reports I'm seeing are that this fight is, in essence, a controlled wipe scenario where the main tank is destined to die, and the only way through is simply burning him down as quickly as possible and hope that enough people don't die before you manage to dps him to oblivion.

 

Whether it's possible or not, the fight's mechanics are generally .. silly. Without predictable hokey pokey to "figure out", it is simply a combination crap-shoot and gear check, with far more significance weighted on the crap-shoot side of things rather than the gear check side of things. Skill beyond maximizing your dps spec and mashing cooldowns exactly when they're supposed to be is.. irrelevant in this fight.

 

My guild group is exceptionally geared, and cleared the instance without significant resistance until Revan, where we basically hit a brick wall.

 

Without tactical options available to us other than "dps faster" the fight is ludicrous. The fight makes the instance a waste of time and resources, and until it is reviewed we will be focusing on more well-crafted content.

Edited by Bavin
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