First of I would like to say I appreicate the work you’ve done, especially considering the challenge designing delves must be!
With that said there’s still some pain points that I’d like to give some feedback on, having done delves both solo and in groups and tried all different roles there’s certainly some bits that needs looking at.
1. Unavoidable Damage
One of the main problems I see with Delves right now is that the tuning of difficulty is centered around ramping up damage and health numbers and this becomes quite apparent when there’s plenty of unavoidable attacks. This means either you have to have good gear (and in some cases overgear it) to survive and deal enough damage or play a class with enough self sustain.
With a shift in TWW away from Stops actually interrupting we’re now left in a world where many casts that take well over 20% of your health go from being a big strain on healers in group play to an insane hurdle in solo play where you at Best have one proper interrupt or at worst none at all cough Disc/Holy Priest cough
Which leads us to the next point:
2. Player Agency & Frustration
Delves at the moment gives you very little agency over what kills you and what you can avoid, either the mob got a cast off before you could kill it or it didn’t and usually at higher tiers the mob always gets their casts off. Lack of enough interrupts to handle multiple enemies with casts (like in Ambush events) and other abilities that just chunk you for all your life isn’t very fun and ends up being quite frustrating.
Now there’s a couple of different types of frustration and in general I’d say there’s the frustration at something out of your control and then one at something within your control. The former is where Delves are at the moment, when you die it’s not because you didn’t use the tools at your disposal to handle the challenge but rather a lack of tools. The latter is when you die and didn’t use the tools at your disposal knowing you could’ve lived if you did. And as seen in Souls-games this latter form can lead you to keep trying and going again because you’re aware that you can complete it if you just play right.
Personally I’d prefer if delves was more like the latter form rather than former, which leads us to the next point:
3. Suggestions
So some ideas I had whilst pondering the Delve problem is firstly reducing the raw output of casts and other unavoidable damage and instead shifting it towards attacks that you can counter with your own plays.
Bellow I’ve compiled some concepts for enemy abilities that may help achieve this:
Fire Halo
An attack that takes inspiration from a Priests Halo, after a medium long and uninterruptable cast a halo extends from the enemy and deals big damage to anyone grounded that’s caught in the wave.
The key word being Grounded, meaning anyone that’s jumping as it’s about to pass takes no damage. The idea is every class can jump and while some maybe have an easier time it’s at least an ability that can be overcome by everyone.
Poison Cloud
After a short uninterruptable cast a poison cloud emenates from the enemy, dealing ramping damage to anyone standing in it and lasts for a set duration before fading. This attack will make players have to step out of melee for a bit before the mob catches up with them or if they feel tanky enough stand their ground and fight in the poison.
Mud Screen
This ability kicks up a smoke bomb-like effect around the enemy, giving anyone (including players) inside it increased dodge chance and makes them untargetable by anyone outside the smoke area.
Pretty much an ability taken from the Dawn of the Infinite mobs (just before the Tyr fight) this one lets you choose to either stand in and take less damage but also deal less damage or hurry out. This dynamic also changes how you react to it both in group play and solo play.
These are just some ideas that will challenge different roles in different ways whilst still giving you agency of how to tackle them but not relying on interrupts for that agency. I also tried to stick to concepts we’ve already seen in wow but ofc there’s an infinite amount of ways to tackle this problem.
The above are ways to change the enemies we face but another direction is giving the players more tools to use, which you already do in some dungeons but perhaps these can be used to a greater extent.
One such tool is the flamethrower which you use to burn away web and free webbed ppl quickly, perhaps another way to use this could be to add a blind effect when you use it on a casting enemy. Succesfully interruping them but also disabling them for a short time, thus giving every class means to interact with enemy casts.
Another idea could be to overload your candle in the Kobold delves, giving you a temporary shield that can block a number of casts or perhaps a Fire Halo wave to give players more options to tackle that one.
Same could idea be applied for the underwater ones, you could give the player an extra action button that gives them a temporary bubble of air that also blocks an attack. Either you can use to to maximize your air and reduce time you spend searching for air bubbles or you can use it defensivly.
These are just some ideas that might improve the feel of delves but by no means do I claim to be an expert or have the means to test them out and prove my theories. That said I would be happy if any of these ideas make it to the devs and maybe even that delves might become more of a challenge in skill that can be overcome rather than one of just gear and hoping you chose the right class.