I really want to like late game

Borderlands 3 Borderlands 3 General Discussion
#1

I didn’t spend thousands of hours playing the game, so I might be wrong in some cases but I want to like the game and there are many things that don’t let me do it. That’s the main reason I’m writing this post.

What I like already is playing the story(and DLCs) and shooting. It’s actually good in all Borderlands games. But when it gets to the late-game I lose all the motivation to play it and here is why:

  1. Vendor machine farming. Why is this even a thing? No one is forcing me to do it but it looks like a bad design if you can spend an hour or two by just reloading the game and checking a vendor machine for that legendary(with right stats obviously) you need.

  2. Boss farming. Feels exactly like previous when you already have good gear and the boss does not die in 1 second(like Graveward) only because he has an invincibility stage.

  3. M10 vehicles. Damage is too low. Some quests require you to ram into enemies and on M10 it’s not hard, it’s just boring.

  4. M10 grenades. Same as vehicles - damage too low. Grenades actually turn into mods that give you 50% elemental damage bonus(other anointments seem useless) and some utility like healing by % of damage dealt or incapacitating enemies, which actually is not that bad.

  5. Slam. Seems useless since the beginning. Never saw someone using it. Deals no significant damage.

  6. Slide. Works with some anointments but I don’t think anyone uses it that way. Snowdrift relic seems to be the only case when slide is cool and fun and I think this effect should be always on without a relic.

  7. Lack of competition. I often compare this game with Diablo where each season you have an ultimate goal - reach LVL 150. But in Borderlands you have to high five to yourself (or at least you teammates). No one will even know that you cleared that “Maliwan takedown” in less than X minutes.

  8. Bugs. The game is still full of bugs. Frequent crashes when farming vendor machines and closing windows too fast, bugs in rendering etc.

  9. Map rotation. Just let me lock it. So annoying.

  10. Inventory. Scrolls to the very bottom when you open it and press “Down”. Less annoying than map though.

  11. Inability to switch between menus using hotkeys. Can’t press “I” to switch from Map to Inventory. Either use Z/C or ESC+I.

  12. Late game money. Useless

  13. Late game eridium. Useless. At least you can now buy legendaries but the gain is very insignificant.

  14. Matchmaking. No way you can find a group for arenas/takedowns. Fortunately, we have a discord community. But it’s still hard to find a group even there.

  15. Rolling mayhem affixes. Just hit that ‘Reroll’ button 100500 times until you get what you want. I think everyone should have the same set of affixes which rotates every week or something.

  16. No description of special effects on legendaries. I know it was like this in previous games but I’m pretty sure many people just google for those effects instead of trying it. Why can’t I just read it ingame?

  17. No ability to switch between builds. It’s so annoying when in order to reallocate 1 skillpoint you need to reset and allocate all of them.

Don’t get me wrong, I can’t wait to play the next DLC but as for late-game… Don’t really see why someone would play it.

6 Likes
#2

I feel the same way. The Gameplay in borderlands 3 feels is awesome, all vault hunters are unique and fun to play.
As soon as you’re done with the Campaign and the dlc’s, what is left to do?

  • 6 Trials
  • 3 Slaughters
  • 2 Takedowns.

Beeing generous that “endgame” will take a couple Hours. Is that it?

Oh and farming guns, lots of guns.
But why? I can already beat all activities with just 1 good gun euqipped…

8 Likes
#3

If you Google “borderlands 3 Map rotation”, you can find out many people been talking about this many many times.

This is driving me absolutely insane. Trying to orient myself with the map, and it’s constantly spinning around. THIS IS REALLY STUPID if you ask me.

Allow us the option to disable large map rotation relative to the player.
Also, disabling the Resetting of map ZOOM when closing the map.

How in the world did Gearbox design something like this? Do they have any common sense?
It has existed since the game launched.
Now, Gearbox still don’t fix it. WHY?

2 Likes
#4

How is giving players an alternative means to farm for 10% of desired gear bad design? Why should you care at all if you’re not using it. And I think you mean weeks, not one or two hours.

So you’re solution to the horrible reroll mechanic is to take away even that tiny amount of player choice in favor of making this non-MMO even more like a MMO than Gearbox has already done by locking content behind timed events?

Strongly agree

#5

Also the Catch-a-ride machine remembers your car choise about 5 % of the time. I’ve 300+ hours in the game and I’ve managed to get the loadout I chose last time instead of a default one 2 times when using the quick spawn.
Also why is the DLC3 catch-a-ride not a separate thing? Why do I have to choose my parts again when I hop into DLC3 and then I have to choose my parts for base game / dlc2 again if I ever adventure into Jetbeast land? This is made 1000 % worse by the fact that the game has serious amnesia about remembering what car parts you prefer.

Slide… decent, I think. Slide into melee is ok thing if you build for melee but that’s mostly just if you go melee Amara from the get go. It does seem to avoid some hits if you ever feel like skipping mobs and just chain slides while running away instead of sprinting but it’s definitely not a game changer.

Speaking of completion the completion percentages on base game maps are almost always beyond 100 % if you’ve done everything. Seems like one of the crew challenges was added afterwards or something? Then in DLC3 I’ve had stuff below 100 even though every challenge, location and chest had been found and done.
Also I’ve found every Eridian tablet in the game according to the challenge page but never got the achievement for doing that.
Kinda beside the point you were making there but it felt relevant to mention. I don’t want the game to be Diablo though. Absolutely not.

This one drives me up the walls too, lol :smiley:
I can disable minimap spin but I prefer that one to do so. I can’t prevent the big map from opening every which way depending on where I’m facing and I do want that one to always have north up by default. Why is there an option for one but not the other?

Sometimes when you click a gun, be it equipped or one that you want to equip and then click the one you want to switch into, the game just ignores it. If you don’t pay close attention to something you shouldn’t have to be paying close attention to, you’ll end up going into fights wearing the wrong stuff.

Also why is the skill tree page divided into 3 tabs instead of just showing me everything at once. Whoever designed that made it look real nice but it’s about as far from user friendly as you can possibly get.
Also the keys used to switch between menus or vendor tabs can’t be changed. I really enjoy using E, Q, Z, C etc while I’m playing the rest of the game on completely different keys. Not everyone uses WASD.
Would also prefer to get those emotes out of the arrow keys. Why are they hard locked in there?

I’m in the same spot. In BL2 OP8 was fun and challenging so I could just pop in and have fun and expect a challenge. In BL3 I pop in and the enemies are just weak sauce. M10 is challenging for about an hour or two it takes to farm for something decent, not even top end perfect gear. If you go for that stuff the difficulty just nosedives even further because good passives and annointments just multiply your damage.

Beyond that it’s just trying to dodge modifiers that make enemies immune to the element you are using or dodging the modifier that gives them stacking damage resistance if you’re using high fire rate guns. I run whatever modifiers I get as long as they don’t literally invalidate my whole build and I don’t think any of them are particularly challenging. They’re just annoying.

#6

it’s bad because “load the game - spin the wheel - repeat” is not a gameplay

No, I don’t mind giving choice. I would accept either no choice or an ability to simply select affixes. Because at the end that’s exactly what you are doing when rolling over and over - just selecting “right” affixes. But in the current form, it’s boring and annoying.

1 Like
#7

Amen to that

#8

Thirded. I end up running random maps just for variety’s sake (or like I’ve done for the past few months, walking away from the game).

It would be cool if they incorporated that sort of thing into the design of the end game, and gave us auto-generated missions with worthwhile rewards. It’s a waste of map variety otherwise.

(Also I’d love if they deemphasized boss farming. Sucks that it’s often the most efficient end game activity. Mobbing is what’s best about Borderlands.)

1 Like
#9

Guys what you are looking for is an mmorpg, there you can grind missions or whatever.
borderlands is a looter Shooter or it should be one. Here it’s about farming and RNG.

Oh and the best end Game Content is…

Testing testing testing :nerd_face:

#10

Ideally there would be more variety to the farming. Save quitting bosses over and over is lobotomizing.

E:an MMO is 100% not what I’m looking for. I was relieved when it became clear BL3 was not going to be significantly influenced by Destiny.

#11

the latest mini event 9/3 is a total dud. and i hate the meyhem modifier bs.

1 Like
#12

Well the other BL games don’t have too much in the way of endgame content either (especially BL1.)

BL2 has more raid bosses of course, but in the end they’re really just some more bosses to farm and they can just be plopped in the “Farming Bosses at Endgame” file. But I guess one thing BL2 has going for it is, you have to earn your top tier OP10 gear by running Digistruct Peak a few times to prove your worth whereas in BL3 you just set the slider and boom, instant MM10; BL2 requires a much larger investment in endgame time to get at the absolute top level.

I’ve spent a TON of endgame time in BL2 tubby hunting, always on the treasure hunt for the pearls I’d yet to collect. BL3 has chubbies of course, but they have no special loot pool, they just lootsplode of a bunch of world drops, and thus the incentive for going on hunting trips isn’t there. That’s one thing I sorely miss from BL2. I loved the thrill of hunting them, seeing one spawn, and hoping for a chance to get that one special item I hadn’t gotten yet. :smiley:

Similarly, with loot tinks, thieving jabbers, etc. Loot tinks are cool and all and I frantically try to take them out before they run away, but in the end they just drop a bunch of world drops. LLMs from BL2, again, drop unique gear (artifacts like the Bone of the Ancients) which made them a desired target to hunt. Again, something I miss from BL2. The chance of these special enemies, with their exclusive loot, spawning was some great spice to add to endgame mobbing runs in all kinds of maps. But they’re just not so special in BL3; no unique rare loot is to be had. You’re just going to get some stuff you’ve seen a million times already.

If GBX would add these two thrill-of-the-hunt aspects to BL3 I would be super pleased. Give the chubbies and loot tinks something special only they drop!

2 Likes
#13

Borderlands 3 is tailored to the casual gamer taste.

Ohh… The hours I spent on the caustic caverns and Ellie’s backyard…

… Which already drop like diarrhea or you can spew from the gungun or you can farm from vendors. Oh… Right… Forgot this game is about anointments, not about guns.

#14

Yeah dump some quest exclusive rewards or an M6 weapon into their loot pools. Or give 'em a higher chance of dropping mods or artifacts. Just something for variety’s sake.

#15

I really hope after Mayhem Modifiers get addressed (assuming they do) Gearbox takes a serious look at anointments. I think they could have been a cool addition to the game but they kneecap my enjoyment pretty severely in their current state.