Explain Red Skull Enemies To Me?

[Chippy]

My brain refuses to comprehend what I'm dealing with. Apparently:
"HOW DOES IT WORK?:
it seems that the game has 4 types of enemies: Low, normal, High and Deadly."
Source: https://forums.cdprojektred.com/ind...emies-harder-removes-buffs-and-debuffs.52708/

While this mod explains that:
"Changed high level (red nameplate) enemies health increase from 350% to 50% and attack power increase from 500% to 50%."
Source: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/501

So my understanding of this is that an enemy is considered "deadly" if over 10 levels higher than Geralt. They kill you (typically) in 1, possibly 2 shots. So you get to within 10 levels of them, and maybe 2-3 shots. But get within "normal" level range: and the HP sponge and 500% (or less for "high" enemies) magically dissapears.

So: I can kick the shit out of some "high" enemies that do minimal damage to Geralt, while others do 1/3 HP per hit. And I'm wearing armor that has the same resistance per enemy. So what's that all about, other than to gotcha! the player?.

This is the second time I've tried to play this game, after rage quitting a few days ago. I played it about a year ago, and did the right thing by avoiding all red skull enemies.

And it took months just to play Novigrad.

Why have CDProjekt placed such a tax on player's time with this mechanic?. It's like playing BG1 and having the developer ramp up enemies on a certain map (who are the same creature type as every other enemy in the game) by putting them behind 'Heart of Fury' difficulty. And then when you clear the map at higher levels, the treasure is really not much different.

So...why? Other than to put a 4th wall breaking, rule breaking mechanic in the game that packs it out unnecessarily, provokes my autism greatly, and taxes my time.

This is worse than level scaling in Oblivion. What's the point? How does it improve the game? What was the thinking behind it?.

Edit: "Deadly" enemies get buffed +800% HP and +500% power.

 

[Delterius]

they belong to a terrorist organization with corny branding

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Strange Fellow]

Shit mechanic in a shit game designed for shit players that need to be nannied at every step. Hope this helps.

 

[Terenty]

Prepare to ragequit Cyberpunk then, the same skull enemies apparently roam the streets of Night City

 

[Chippy]

red skull means that this is some serious player killer and should either be avoided or attacked on sight.

Long long time ago it used to be better. There were no skulls and players were expected to gossip and remember names of problematic enemies... sort of like famous outlaws. Then they added skulls and life became meh

But were they buffed? It's one thing to go against Firkraag in BG2 at level 7, it's another to go against him at level 7 with +800%HP & +500% dam to all spells and physical attacks.

But go against him at level 10, and those buffs are removed. For no other reason than...just because.

This game isn't holding my hand, it's giving me autism. I'll probably just play it for the "Fuck you, I beat your game without dying once!" factor. But I should be more mature, and not have the time for this shit. If I replay in the future (graphic update) I'll just install the above mod.

CDProjekt make some retarded decisions. Make a game rationally hard, and I'll respect your decision. Make a game irrationally hard just for the sake of it being irrationally hard, and the player soon loses respect for the game.

Because ultimately it's not that hard: I can still kill these 'high' enemies, but it takes ages: so I'm just experimenting between the time tax for killing them, and the time tax for avoiding them.

 

[Gerrard]

You already have autism, you realize you could just walk away, right?

Shit mechanic in a shit game designed for shit players that need to be nannied at every step. Hope this helps.

Considering that OP made this thread, clearly not.

 

[thesecret1]

I think it's just a shitty design decision. Basically "We need to space around the content so that no matter the player's current level, he will always have something challenging to fight. But we do not want to only unlock those quests later – player must be able to pick those quests up at any time, even if he's much lower level, because we don't want to force him to backtrack. Also our combat is shit and the player could easily finish all the monster hunting quests long before we want him to, so give them massive buffs to stop that from happening."

 

[mondblut]

Reverse level scaling, that's a new one.

Interesting, I've heard of that obscure game genre called "RPGs" where player characters grow in power over time, making enemies who were invincible at one point increasingly easier to kill without having to change their parameters. Perhaps this game could borrow some elements from those RPGs instead of doing these dumb shenanigans.

 

[Ol' Willy]

Why do you play this shit in the first place?

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Quillon]

fucking cdpr man they ruin games with these shit mechanics lmao

most every game with levelled enemies does this, they have their normal stats and level multiplier, player controlled characters also has it in most games, implementations may vary

 

[purupuru]

I think it's a fairly common thing in JRPGs, it serves the purpose of gatekeeping contents and rewards just "leveling" in itself and not what comes with it.
I don't like it, but it's a problem you can easily get around by doing those contents later.

 

[moraes]

Why have CDProjekt placed such a tax on player's time with this mechanic?

Conflicting design goals: open world and the need to give the story a structure that takes the player along a determined path.

Yes, it's a terrible solution.

No, it isn't an easy problem to solve.

 

[Chippy]

Why do you play this shit in the first place?

Autism. Third in series. Must find out what happened story-wise. Keep pretending it's Witcher 1.

 

[Reinhardt]

I think it's a fairly common thing in JRPGs, it serves the purpose of gatekeeping contents and rewards just "leveling" in itself and not what comes with it.

Nah, japanese like to put op enemies to gatekeep things but they don't give them buffs to damage and hp depending on level difference between them and player. They are just stronger than you at this point of the game, not stronger+buffed until you gain some levels.

 

[Chippy]

So just come across one of the holes that dot marshes. Bilge hag nearby, and can't jump out of the hole because A: in water up to Geralt's knees, and B: in combat. Apparently moders fixed these two issues easily, so it leads me to believe it was done deliberate.

You know, if there was a cemetary in this game like there was in BG1, with a list of tombstone descriptions for character fails - my one for this playthrough would read: 'Here lies Geralt of Rivia: we only buried him a few foot in the ground, 'cause we knew if'n he got pissed off and tried to come back for us, he wouldn't be able to jump outta his grave!'.

Fuggin game. Only good thing is these retarded decisions can be modded out.

 

[purupuru]

I think it's a fairly common thing in JRPGs, it serves the purpose of gatekeeping contents and rewards just "leveling" in itself and not what comes with it.

Nah, japanese like to put op enemies to gatekeep things but they don't give them buffs to damage and hp depending on level difference between them and player. They are just stronger than you at this point of the game, not stronger+buffed until you gain some levels.

Nope, レベル差補正 is definitely a thing. It's most notorious in Xenoblade Chronicles ,where it debuffs your chance to hit by as much as 200% iirc.

 

[Flying Dutchman]

Autism. Third in series. Must find out what happened story-wise. Keep pretending it's Witcher 1.

This is the best answer.

Points for conciseness.

 

[Chippy]

Just rage quit again. Think this is my third time now. I was doing the Tower of Mice quest at level 11 (think it was recommended at level 6) and fighting x2 level 6 rotfiends. So just cast igni at one of them, and instantly died.

I know they explode and do damage at low health - it wasn't that. And I went back there to see if there was any explosive swamp gas there. There wasn't.

So as much as I want to finish this game...I'm gonna take an extended break. Maybe several years. Come back to it after I've upgraded the PC with the new graphics version, and maybe if they've patched out the dumbfuckery. And if I don't...well, no great loss.

Because when you're playing one game and constantly thinking about another game, then the one you're spending time on can only be called an ordeal.

Edit: And my autism for finding out what happened as far as the story goes just doesn't surpass the irritation this game creates.

 

[DraQ]

Fixing self inflicted problems by piling more self inflicted problems on top of them.
Game design, game design never changes.

 

[laclongquan]

It's a mechanic of a game, boyo. If you cant accept that others have arbitrary power to change things in your game without logic (as you know it)... you wont enjoy games. Or novels. Or movies.

 

[Chippy]

It's a mechanic of a game, boyo. If you cant accept that others have arbitrary power to change things in your game without logic (as you know it)... you wont enjoy games. Or novels. Or movies.

If I didn't think the mods here would just find it funny, I'd report you for autistic rage harvesting.

For the record: what is more autistic - the fool who engages in autism, or he who creates autism and expects others to follow in its footsteps?.

And I'm not referring to yourself, I'm referring to myself having continued to bang my head aginst the brick wall of retardation that are some of the choices made in this game.

 

[DraQ]

If you cant accept that others have arbitrary power to change things in your game without logic (as you know it)... you wont enjoy shit games. Or shit novels. Or shit movies.

Fixed.

Spoiler

Your terms are... Acceptable.

 

[Carrion]

I'm assuming DraQ still hasn't played TW3 since he's still here with us and not lying at the bottom of some Polish ditch after having facepalmed himself to death due to all the creative mechanics the game has to offer. I'd pay for an analytical Let's Play.