i simply went to inner perimiter you don’t need to destroy door,
i did event more than 40 time.
condition is official pvp server and no nobidy killed the hand of war, because i killed him after.
and that was also confirmed at my first attempt where i tried an assault at front door with 20+ thralls, once i broke the second double door and my chracter was able to enter inner perimiter castle, spawn of npc has stopped outside at first front gate, but still inner perimiter thalls were spawning (but i would recommend to nobody to try to assault by front door) as my conclusion after first attempt was i need to find a other way that give less losses to my army.
it stop spawn of outer perimiter, it do not kill npc that have not been already killed outside. but it will not stop spawn of inner perimiter npc (for that you need kill the boss)
Okay, after some more testing, I can confirm azaroth’s findings.
To clarify and summarize what he and I found so far:
Entering the inner courtyard stops the respawn outside the castle. By inner courtyard I mean the area behind the first two gates, just before entering the inner castle.
Entering the inner courtyard does NOT stop the respawn inside the courtyard or between the two outer walls, i. e. between gates 1 and 2.
Killing the Hand of War stops the respawn inside the inner courtyard as well as the castle.
Killing the General does NOT kill all guards as it did in beta.
Destroying any gates does NOT influence respawn.
Caveats:
I did encounter the occasional guard in supposedly cleared areas and saw one guard pop up from nowhere. So maybe the respawning is only slowed, or guards teleport around a little, or I had too much coffeein.
Tested on single player PC.
The spawn stopping mechanics help little with the problem discussed here, though.
Stopping the outer spawn allows to destroy the main gate. However… that requires to climb into the castle (to stop the spawn), then outisde again, to then destroy the gate and enter again.
Doing it this way does also help in destroying the second gate, as you only have to deal with respawn from inside the outer wall, but still, that seems nonsensical.
The gate to the castle is still guarded by the same number of guards.
It would be possible to climb into the castle, kill the boss, then the Hand of War, then enter the inner courtyard and slaughter all guards with no respawn. However… Don’t see a reason to do that.
After this, I wonder if we’re dealing with a bug instead of questionable design. Maybe the spawn stopper in the inner courtyard was supposed to work after passing the first gate, and another spawn stopping mechanic is missing or not working? The problem at the innermost gate would remain, but that would at least make the whole affair a bit more consistent.
Or there’s another trigger we haven’t found yet.
Or it’s just… questionable design.
Kudos anyhow to azaroth for finding the second mechanic!
thank you so much i was a little bit desesperate in trying help the community, and yes a game need to be explored, and a raid need observation and try and defeat is part of a raid. it why victory is so precious.
honestly the siege is one of the few good elements of this chapter 3, and they did a real try to balance it (which mean will be piece of cake for pvp players used to raid, and hard for pve players that will need to explore the raid mechanism (but in doing that they will discover some aspects of the game they probably never explored and do progress on raiding )
guards can walk a lot (long distance) so they can come from other spawn points not locked yet.
there is two hand of war, one in the upper room (this one is the final boss), but there is also one hand of war at first floor, may be this one stop the inner courtyard spawn when killed (i never tried as i simply climb to final boss)
And that’s the problem I see with the content: The best way is to skip most of it. Siege engines, breaking down gates, killing guards - all of that is neither necessary nor the optimal way to get the rewards.
a raider will never loss his time and ressources for secondary worthless objective, we go directly to the main loot and use the weaker point
but still i kill nearly all guard as i loot fully this castle with what interest me (except the first floor where there is nothing i am interested by), but in inner courtyard there is a legendary weapons, 4 bombs, and 2 battering ram, and I kill inner guard for that each time.
and well they gave the choice, eirther you do the ninja guy, either you do the barbarian going to the strongest defense point. and well if bored with this two gamplay you can also do a god that will simply nuke the whole castle.
the challenge for me in this event, is to make survive my thrall untill i kill the final boss, which is not guaranted and easy.
and defeat is part of a raid. it why victory is so precious.