So, I recently made an islander and I am really enjoying the style however the one thing I really miss from off the island is bosses. I was wondering if it would be possible, if the community was interested, to make a boss on the island that would not offset the nostalgia of the island with exp, or off island drops, but would reward the killers with either items that are already found on the island, but at a higher drop rate(equips and scrolls), or possibly some nx equips or small nx coupons. I am not looking to upset or change the islander gameplay. I suggest that it have a good amount of hp that it would take a party to kill it in a normal amount of time, and would also do a fair amount of damage making it difficult and exciting. I don't really have any suggestion of which specific boss. I think the boss should be killed similar to other big bosses, where the party will be warped into a room by an npc and the boss will have to be spawned with an etc item, which could be acquired through an exchange quest for etc items found on the island similar to pet food. The boss should only be able to be spawned by a character over lvl 30, and only once every 24 hours. The boss should spawned and everyone hacks away at it until it dies. It could have a few forms, each stronger than the previous, or is just one strong boss with an unhealthy amount of hp. Would love to hear what the community and staff think, understand that I am a new islander and I never played an islander before so I do not know exactly where we draw the line in private servers as to what makes something more fun or just takes away the nostalgia, But this seemed like a good idea to me so I figured I might as well post it and see what people think.
A rare Snail boss that's like a palette swap of a regular Snail would be pretty cool. Have it drop some untradable NX equips would be an incentive to fight it.
I think Mano would be a good idea, and it would be even better if it spawned at the bottom of Snail Field of Flowers. For drops, in addition to NX equips, may I suggest an untradeable ETC drop? Islanders could able to trade some high amount (TBD) of it to an NPC for an untradeable chair (or medal, new source permitting). I need some motivation to keep islanding here...
The most important question I have in this thread to those who have posted so far, are any of you Islanders? If you aren't an Islander, frankly, you shouldn't be involved in the conversation as it doesn't affect you in the least. The Islanders I know would have zero interest in this idea because as meakss is saying, there is absolutely no nostalgia involved with this idea.
But it would. Anything of this description necessarily favours strength islanders, which means that there would be an objectively better build for islanders, and so the islander experience is turned on its head. (Unless, of course, everyone inflicts the same damage, but then it doesn't incentivise training as much as getting your hands on a Pumpkin Basket, because of its faster speed.)
Frankly, I got over the nostalgia before I even hit level 30, let alone my current level 46. I supported this because I thought it would be a cool and fun addition to hitting mushrooms and pigs all day. I could be in the minority though (I wouldn't know since a lot of the replies here are people thinking they're funny). I would argue that if the boss' avoidability was enough so that strength islanders miss a few times here and there, it would level out the playing field.
In which case some kind of hybrid build with some dexterity and lots of strength is the objectively superior build, and I reiterate my argument from above. (Though I suppose it would make Pumpkin Spears very attractive.)
As I stated it should be a 30+ boss, where dex islanders already have 80+ damage and you are adding into strength already. Also, you are not required to participate, there should not be any exp advantage. It should purely be for fun for those that feel they miss bossing, or they want to feel like their ap points are going to something after they hit 80 min damage. Making a character without getting it to enough dex to hit 80 min damage, making it harder for you to train, just to be able to kill a boss that drops random nx equips wouldn't be very smart, and I definitely wouldn't consider it superior. I would still consider dex until min 80 damage the superior build which would keep the islander play the same. This is an idea for what to do after we reach that goal. Giving us another goal that isn't just more levels, because I can imagine it gets old after a while.
I understand that this isn't exactly like gms of course. But if it would not give anyone any advantage, as in exp or off-island drops, then what harm can it do. No one is required to participate, and they don't lose out by not participating, but for those that would like to be able to have a goal, and work at it with their friends, and possibly strengthen the islander community, whats the harm? Obviously if there isn't enough interest the staff shouldn't go through the trouble to code it, but I don't see what nostalgia is taken away by including this any more than multiplying the exp rate by 4. When you are able to reach higher levels on the island due to higher exp rates, then it would be nice to be able to do something with those levels.
I'm pretty sure all islanders put at least one point into Three Snails, so what if that was the only attack that registered on this hypothetical boss? Magelanders would have an advantage MP-wise, but things would be equitable in terms of damage. I think it could be quite cute if there was a high HP Bob the Snail hidden in some of the maps-- like a little surprise. :3
Nah its just that we want to be islanders if there are these interesting goods. But that defeats the purpose of islanding. I think the island should stay gms like as possible with no flexibility. And i learnt that the hard way lol
I've expressed support for an island boss for awhile now, it has to be done in the most respectful way though. The boss needs to be hittable by anyone regardless of build, so no avoid. It needs to have high enough HP that it takes the same amount of time to kill with a party of 6+ islanders as an off island boss would. It needs to stay true to the nostalgia and drop only scrolls which exist on island or equipment ORIGINAL islanders had but we don't: fruit knife, green skullcap, red headband. All stuff original islanders had access too but we don't for various reasons.
^^^^ This, for sure! There are definitely a few equips I am missing from my GMS islander that cannot currently be found on this version of the island. I personally would love to see something like a boss. I've seen this idea partially implemented on "islander only" private servers but nothing really refined. For me, I have already spent countless hours on the official server with the versions older than v62 and a couple of months with v62 itself, so I definitely ready for change. Who is to say that the Maple Island of early 2010 was the definitive, best version of the island and that Nexon's decision making at that time should be worshiped? I think that adding little additions to the island (i.e. the Halloween NPC, Christmas event, pet food merchant etc.) are not going to destroy the integrity of the game. It would be nice to see some creativity branch off from what is mostly a carbon copy of what we had already played for many years. Honestly, I fail to see how something like this could be a bad thing.