Having farmed this guy around 40 times on HC Ultimate until I got the Eldritch Gaze blueprint, I find that his drops are very weak.
The fact that he has the unique blueprint drops is good because it gives you a reason to farm him (their drop rate is another story), but the boss’s actual drops are clearly no different from a random boss spawn.
Considering how long it takes to reach him (Burwitch Village -> East Marsh -> wait for door to open -> hidden area -> load -> Temple of the Three) and how hard the boss is, I think his drops should be better to give the player an incentive to farm him if you have no use (or already have) his blueprints.
Otherwise the boss is pretty much “kill him once per difficulty for the skill point and be done with it,” which would be a shame considering the effort was put into making the new content.
I farmed him for the Eldritch gaze as well and it also took about 40 tries. His loot seemed to be on par with Cronley or other bosses. Given his static location, I feel that is sufficient. The increased difficulty compared to other bosses is a decent point to make the loot a little better…still not on par with nemesis though.
Most bosses (at end game and doesn’t include nemesis) aren’t typically farmed (outside of log) for loot, but for their unique drops. Some bosses are farmed more then other (AU/royal hive) but that is because of the other heroes typically found on the way. I think crate did a good job with the sentinel and mad queen loot tables by keeping the seeming on par with other bosses.
If frustrating having to kill him 40 times to get the BP and not much other loot along the way…but that is just the way it goes… I feel that is a solid trade off for a specific item when other drops are found randomly.
Dunno man, I farm Cronley a lot actually, probably the run I do the most.
There are many benefits to farming him:
-Mass amounts of Dynamite
-2 extra guaranteed bosses along the way, 3 with Romanov bounty
-Chance of Fabius along the way (I actually find that doing straight Cronley runs is more profitable than hunting Fabius, especially since his nerf)
-Tainted Brain drops
-The MI is excellent and can be unbeatable with good affixes
And I don’t agree that Cronley has the same drops as Sentinel. I know I only did 40ish runs which isn’t a large sample size, but in all those runs I only got 1 Legendary and a handful of blues and Ancient Hearts.
Cronley OTOH seems to regularly drop Legendaries for me, 1 out of 8 runs or so isn’t unusual. That’s why I find him the most lucrative to farm.
And compare the difference in difficulty between them.
Cronley’s lair is almost always harmless, while the machine gun poison spitters, the red bats and the Sentinel himself are deadly.
Given all the above, there’s virtually no reason why anyone would ever want to farm Sentinel over Cronley from a gameplay aspect, outside of the blueprints.
That’s really the reason why he should get a decent bump in drops.
I was comparing Cronley vs sentinel, not all the stuff along the way. A full Cronley run will definitely yield more loot, specially if Fab is there. But, you can’t get and specific legendary item. It is all random. Because this game is mainly focused on random loot, the fact that you can get a specific legendary item balances the same loot for increased difficulty.
I understand the frustration of not getting much out of all those runs. Like I’ve said, I did 40 runs myself. But can you think of a way to get any other specific legendary item faster? (same as outcast’s secret and mad queen claw). I’ve farmed bosses and turned in soooo many rare matts trying to get some Ulto’s set pieces and I’ve gotten only two so far… I got both BP’s from the sentinel in 40 runs…
You’re missing the point, the boss having exclusive drops is a good thing, but it’s also a niche item.
His overall drops are just disproportionally bad compared to his difficulty and the effort to reach him.
I think they should be closer to the nerfed Nemesis tier drops, maybe slightly below them.
There are some other creatures like this that take a lot of effort to kill but don’t really reward the player, such as the largest Flesh Hulk type monster, the non-unique Herald Aetherials, those huge Aether golems creatures.
Does anyone kill the latter instead of just running past them? They have a humongous amount of HP but they don’t drop anything and don’t even give good XP AFAIK.
The Heralds are similar, and they even have a second phase so you need to wait for them to transform. I always felt these should drop several crystals or a guaranteed cluster.
I always thought that many of those big creatures were unsatisfying to kill because of it and better off skipped as there is no incentive to do them from a powergamer’s perspective. Or even a normal gamer’s.
I get your point, I just have a different opinion. Crate has done a pretty good job (helps now that Fab’s loots been nerfed) of balancing the loot drops so that there isn’t just one “best way” to farm gear. Having many options for farming is what makes this game great! I’ve gotten so bored with other games having to farm the same monster for a chance of one item and then moving on to the next monster for the next piece and so on… But have a couple like that isn’t bad…as RNG can be a bitch sometimes…
Have you farmed the outcast’s secret? Anastasia isn’t farmed for anything besides the Secret either… And if you’re talking about rewarding difficulty, what about the avatar? Talk about a niche item… Or the clone of John Bourbon?
The idea of the helms being a “niche item”, like most legendary drops… Is you only need to farm him if you need it. If you don’t need them, then don’t farm him. Kill him for the quest and move on. The fact that you can actually farm a BiS piece (eldritch gaze for bleed warder builds) is rewarding enough in my book… Course you can still get other legendary and epics from him and I’ve even gotten a few epics from those chests behind him… I usually ran into 3-6 heroes on the way too. So he isn’t completely devoid of other rewards. Just his complete run is not as efficient as other farming routes like Cronley.
Yeah, your opinion definitely differs from mine, nothing wrong with that though.
I think that high effort bosses like Log should drop better than Cronley and other easy ones, otherwise there’s just no real reason to farm him except for the quest.
There’s just no reason to go there if you want to maximize your drops per hour, since you’re often much better off running past everything except heroes (which is another issue) and killing Cronley, or running straight to the boss in BoC 1 and checking for a trove, and repeat.
So personally I’d like to see those fights made a bit more profitable.
I personally would prefer if “Monster Infrequent” Legendary items had a better drop rate.
With Rashalga and Sentinel the entire run is pretty unrewarding, the low drop rates doesn’t help. Whilst i have no qualms with the drop rate of other legendaries, even if it takes 30-40+ runs to get an item. But it’s fine, on the other hand legendaries dropped by specific monsters should have better drop rates otherwise atleast add some chest to make the run worthwhile
Sentinel and The Mad Queen loot drop rate is really unrewarding. It takes a while to reach the Sentinel, it makes farming him more time consuming. I think upping his loot drop rate would fix this.
Around 60 Mad Queen kills and i only got two Mad Queen’s Claws. Seriously? I’m not saying for her to drop it in every kill, but an higher drop rate would be better.
I can see where people are coming from as who doesn’t like more loot? However, balancing farming routes so there isn’t a “best one” is going to be next to impossible… There are a number of decent ones now that aren’t that significantly different (although still some difference…). Not everything needs to be created equal… Pros and cons to different runs is a good thing…
Log is more rewarding then Cronley. I’ve gotten three legendries from one Log kill (not counting what I got on the way). It was only once, but I have gotten two several times. Never more than one from Cronley.
“Monster Infrequent” drops should have a high drop rate as they come with affixes and most of those don’t work out so you need to get multiple drops. But with the legendary drops from specific monsters, the drop rate should be lower as a form balance. yeah, you might not get a lot of other loot like you would from a Cronley run, but see how many Cronley runs it takes to get a warpfire (or any other specific legendary item). You need to get extremely lucky with RNG to get that any time soon… Being able to get that specific legendary piece, even if it takes 30-60 runs, is your reward! Who farms Anna after getting an Outcast’s secret? Or even farms her at all if you don’t need the hood? Why make the sentinel/mad queen special?
Honestly, you’ve made the same point in your every post in this topic and I have no interest in a circular argument.
What I’ll say one last time is that this has, from the beginning, neverbeen about his unique drop but specifically about his random drops.
I accede that bosses having unique drops is a good idea as mentioned before, and if you’re comparing unique drops you should compare Cronley’s Ring with the Sentinel’s helm blueprints— they have varying amounts of power which is reflected in their drop rate and difficulty of getting a good one in the case of the MIs.
Nor is this thread about making everything balanced, it’s about rebalancing certain fights in the game in order to make them attractive as another option to run for the player.
This isn’t whining about bad drops, it’s about giving the players more alternatives in the end game, which I dare say hardly anyone can think is a bad thing.
There is a reason why almost no one runs Log or this new boss simply for their drops because the skewed difficulty/reward ratio makes that unappealing for gameplay reasons.
Sorry, I’m not trying to argue, just have a discussion with different point of views on a topic. “tone” in text is difficult to pick up and I do see how some discussions can definitely seem like arguments… Sorry, no ill will intended.
Well, I keep going back to the same point as you keep ignoring it! I know you say this as never been about his unique drop but his random drops. I understand that. If he ONLY had random drops, I would completely agree with you! But he doesn’t. He DOES have a unique drop and it is a very strong non-random affix LEGENDARY drop! Ignoring that fact he has a unique drop and arguing that his run should be more reward is missing the point. Yeah the helms can’t be used by everyone, but there are builds that can use both helms which in the end, makes the run rewarding (if you want to keep running after the quest)… I don’t feel you can just ignore the helms because they don’t work for YOUR build…or that you only need them to drop once…
and if you’re comparing unique drops you should compare Cronley’s Ring with the Sentinel’s helm blueprints— they have varying amounts of power which is reflected in their drop rate and difficulty of getting a good one in the case of the MIs.
I did that in my last post… Actually just read a different post where someone did 200 Cronley runs and he was offering up the extra rings (91 total) he got. Someone asked if he had any incorruptible prefixes and he had zero…in 200 runs!!! Most people can get their helm BP in 50 or less… (I got Cot3 in 4 runs and EG on my 42nd run)… RNG will cause results to vary for both of course…
Unless you meant I should NOT compare them… I suppose that is a fair point, but some of those rings with the right affixes are better then legendary rings (which is why they are farmed). Although getting those affixes is difficult as shown above…
Nor is this thread about making everything balanced, it’s about rebalancing certain fights in the game in order to make them attractive as another option to run for the player.
Yeah, sorry didn’t really mean “everything”. Was bit of an exaggeration…
I don’t disagree with making certain runs more attractive…just not ones that reward a unique legendary item considering how hard it is to get other specific legendary items Keeping it on par with the mad queen and Anna seems ok to me… and Anna is probably FAR worse considering all the rep grinding you have to do before you can even get a chance for the helm to drop…Plus that is the actual helm and not a BP so if you want one for a different character too, you’ll have to trade it back and forth or farm another one… She isn’t easy either…
This isn’t whining about bad drops, it’s about giving the players more alternatives in the end game, which I dare say hardly anyone can think is a bad thing.
Never said you’re whining and I agree having more alternatives is definitely a good thing! I think that is why they removed the trove in the shrine of the forgotten god and nerfed Fabius’ loot. They were TOO rewarding for how QUICKLY you could farm them. So I do understand your point that they should INCREASE rewards for LONGER runs. Which to me, seems like they should buff the loot in BoC and SoT as they are much long runs, even compared to the sentinel, and the loot really isn’t that great compared to the length of time it takes to collect it all. PLUS it costs keys to get in and if you die you have to start over… (also there are no unique drops :rolleyes: sorry… just trying to be funny…) I’ve made several runs through both and there were times I received zero legendary items… I don’t mind when I make a run and don’t get any legendary items…when it is a 2-4 minute run…but I can’t clear BoC or SoT that fast and when it takes 15-20 minutes for zero legendries…that sucks… Or I get ganked by a 4 pack of heroes with a reflect I don’t see in the middle then have to start over…
There is a reason why almost no one runs Log or this new boss simply for their drops because the skewed difficulty/reward ratio makes that unappealing for gameplay reasons.
The sentinel definitely has a skewed difficulty based on your build. My AAR sorcerer struggles as he’s so fast with high burst damage. I can kill him, but it is a lot of work and can take several minutes. But my bleeding warder takes him out in about 12 seconds. Only thing hard about the run is the time it takes to get there… So the “difficulty” is really too variable to use that as a reason to up his loot…Time maybe (especially if they nerf others that are “too quick”.)
Actually, I think Log farming has picking up with the release of 1.0.0.4 as he actually can give you some decent loot now. Plus there are two bosses along the way so it really has become a decent run… As I’ve said, I’ve gotten legendary drops from both of his chests in one run (I’ve also gotten nothing higher than a magic item so still pretty random, but bad loot seems a LOT less frequent then good loot), and the entire run isn’t that long (usually around 3-4 minutes maybe? if even that long). His drops were crap for so long, I’m not sure people fully realize his drops got better in the last patch. Too many are used to farming Cronley or Fabius as those are the “premier” routes historical… and probably still are, although 1st floor BoC is making a case (especially if you can’t take out Fabius).
I would actually like them to add more runs like the sentinel where I KNOW I’m going to get the loot piece I want, even if I’m not going to get as much along the loot along the way. Which, honestly, 99% of the time I can’t even use and is why I don’t mind that trade off. I just takes soooooooo long to get the legendary drops randomly from the other farming routes. I do like the fact that there are only few runs like that as I also don’t like having to farm exact monsters to get EVERY piece of gear I’m looking for… Borderlands was a lot like that… That gets really boring too… Balance and options are good!
Shar’zul, Log and Sentinel are all extremely unrewarding. They are a do once and forget them. The only reason to farm Queen more than once is if you are gearing a Witch Hunter and want to dual wield her weapons. Then you make the WH and realize that you wasted your time as the Death marked set will provide you much more damage.
Cronley has been far more rewarding than the others to me that I stopped running them. I used to run SoT a lot and then I happened to have an instance where I did not get a blue from the chest after Alkamos. I stopped running SoT as much.
Keeping it on par with the mad queen and Anna seems ok to me… and Anna is probably FAR worse considering all the rep grinding you have to do before you can even get a chance for the helm to drop…Plus that is the actual helm and not a BP so if you want one for a different character too, you’ll have to trade it back and forth or farm another one… She isn’t easy either…