Trail of Treachery⁠—A Middling Experience

[Vara]

Garden of Morr, Convocation of Decay, and now Trail of Treachery, these maps all have in common one singular issue which makes all of them the least most popular maps in the community; they're nearly impossible without large amounts of teamwork and or second-hand knowledge of the map. The problem with pubs, playing with randoms, is that teamwork is often in short supply. more so with people who know the ins and outs of the map itself. Trail of Treachery demands high amounts of cooperation between all four players or else the entire mission is a bust. Out of nearly 20+ matches on legendary with randoms, only 2 were successful. No, I'm not bad at the game either. I've played for well over 500 hours and have completely finished the game on every difficulty, including Cataclysm, and have earned every achievement (Besides Winds of Magic and handful of Chaos Waste achievements). However, this being said, when partnering up with my friends, we were able to, after a few rough tries, do a complete run on Cataclysm with 2 grims and 3 books with only 1 death.

The map needs a nerf, a big one. Requiring the complete and utter focus on four total strangers is impossible. There are exceptions to the rule, but I've found that Trail of Treachery is too difficult and worse yet, a map I won't go out of my way to play.

And this also doesn't take into account the map's many bugs and flaws such as specials spawning around corners or directly in the player's LoS. Or how stormvermin, along side specials, will spawn directly on top of the player, example being the cogwork event as I was entirely unable to see where plague monks and stormvermin were streaming in from. Or how there are simply too many angles of attack.

Other things I did not enjoy about Trail of Treachery⁠ is how often Lohner's disembodied voice interrupts the flow of gameplay. This was also an issue in Back to Ubersreik where Olesya would constantly interrupt the players and tell them what to do despite there be several times previously where the heroes would find the way forward by their lonesome.

TL;DR I think the map needs some work.

[Hithlir]

You're ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ right.

[Hithlir]

apparently " g o d d a m n " is too much of a naughty word.

[Vara]

Originally posted by Hithlir:

apparently " g o d d a m n " is too much of a naughty word.

Goshdarn.

[Ghoul Hunter]

It's actually one of the easiest maps in the game.

1. The cog event has limited enemies, so if you kill all of them, nothing else spawns. Hunker down until they stop coming. Another wave appears with the sled part, but you can do the same strat.

2. The end event is front loaded. If you kill the initial waves and boss, very few things spawn after that. A significant wave spawns with each urn lit. Take this event slow, by going to the underground crypt immediately, and surviving the initial burst. Don't leave that crypt until the boss is dead and everything has slowed down. Bombs and potions are good.

3. Many segments of the map have no horde spawns, so you can take your time.

This map is designed for slow play and really rewards you for it.

Fun fact: Against the Grain and Garden of Morr are also this way. The end events can be slow played, because they are not infinite.

[Vara]

Originally posted by Ghoul Hunter:

It's actually one of the easiest maps in the game.

Out of nearly 20+ matches on legendary with randoms, only 2 were successful.
Unless you're getting top of the line players who work masterfully well together, I highly doubt the validity of your statement.

[Frostbeule]

but hes right, if you rush you doom yourself, slow down your playstyle and big pro tip talk about it before the event starts.

[RaNdOmKiLs666]

Yeah the finale is pretty hard with randoms, I hope they nerf it. Way too many enemies are thrown at you in tight corridor type areas. Not to mention coordination with randoms usually isn't great.

[Frostbeule]

okay that may be your point of view, but you should ask yourself if it realy needs a nerf or just a simple adaption of your gamestyle. Also try to read the whole post and you might learn how this event work, that will give you a simple understanding why so many people fail on their attempts. no more nerf-clubs please...

[azamba89]

I'm a veteran cata player, so I get it that it's not for everyone, but I did "solo" it on Legend on first try, so not THAT difficult. And I'm pretty sure most Cata players did it too, nothing to brag about, that's not the point, don't misunderstand me. BUT, that last part (I assume that is the main issue here) really needs a Nerf, like they did in Convocation of Decay. It was way more complicated than it should have been and I completely understand why people are having a hard time to do it. And on Cata, its INSANE, doable, but with pugs its like 1% chance to complete it. That being said, I'm pretty sure they will nerf it, eventually. The rest of the map, however, is just fine the way it is, I liked it.

[capybaras are cool]

Originally posted by Ghoul Hunter:

It's actually one of the easiest maps in the game.

1. The cog event has limited enemies, so if you kill all of them, nothing else spawns. Hunker down until they stop coming. Another wave appears with the sled part, but you can do the same strat.

2. The end event is front loaded. If you kill the initial waves and boss, very few things spawn after that. A significant wave spawns with each urn lit. Take this event slow, by going to the underground crypt immediately, and surviving the initial burst. Don't leave that crypt until the boss is dead and everything has slowed down. Bombs and potions are good.

3. Many segments of the map have no horde spawns, so you can take your time.

This map is designed for slow play and really rewards you for it.

Fun fact: Against the Grain and Garden of Morr are also this way. The end events can be slow played, because they are not infinite.

this is exactly what op is talking about though. you need extensive pre knowledge of the map and way more teamwork than other maps require.

[capybaras are cool]

the maps super easy if you just know exactly how every single encounter works mechanically and everyone in your team knows that too. theres no way for you the player to know this without either someone telling them or extensive experience with the map itself. but its really easy once youve done it 50 times.

[Moschusbock]

did it first try on cata. my only complaint is that snowed in enemies look stoopit.

[But Chuddha...]

Indeed. I couldnt play the map yesterday, so now I did multiples tries of this map today. The map design-wise is amazing, but its full of flaws:
-Third tome location forces you to fall and loose health. This makes Empires of Flames or Horn of Magnus platforming to get second grim look easy.
-Once you reach the area in which you need to get Gears...the games overwhelms you in an unjust way with hundreds of Specials and armored Elites, in a constant horde.
-The Finale is even worse: Old Haunts finale 2.0...but made worse by having to wear a torch while overwhelm in three far away areas. And said torch is barely visible, shown with a marker, and bugged.
-Lots of bugs. keys and buttons not responding, second grimm not respawning somehow, enemies appearing instantly in front of you, etc...

[Phantom Limb]

I'm still dumb or clueless probably but can someone explain to me how to get inside the catacombs on the final arena?
I know you need to go to the crypt with one of the urns but the next step is unknown to me. Is there some hidden switch or something?

[Rebel]

It's relatively difficult, nothing too crazy. Did it on Cataclysm with bots.