I will continue my wall of text here with another matter that interests me and originally was considered as main mechanic.
The maelstrom and the siege mechanic.
Together with the Surge system this was and SHOULD have stayed the main feature on Siptah.
With:
- Addition of terrain to the original map(players request)
- Players asking to be let to have builds inside the maelstrom
- Highly exploited mechanic(boss farm, poison arrow farm or boss kite)
- High performance usage
I understand why it was put on stand. Additional land had to be filled up with content, players have been listened to, you can now live inside the maelstrom, maelstrom has also been reduced to a “not so threatening look”, so IT IS THE PARADISE of what majority wanted.
BUT.
How about the minority, which made the entire maelstrom concept their main goal, to reach perfection, to get the most fun i had in this game after such a long time. To be productive + Lots of adrenaline and FUN, this is what Maelstrom and Siege mechanic was for me. And try to do it LEGIT(i failed though).
I try to explain what made maelstrom hunting/building the main attraction for me. I also advise PvPers to stop reading here. This has nothing to do with PvP.
I start exploring the map, gather some exp, make some weapons,tools,healing. While doing this i come across these Lacertha lizzards, very easy to kill and high exp back then. So i reached lvl 35 very fast, stone daggers ftw! As you all know the first taste of this game grind is at lvl 30 when u start needing steel. I have gathered some coal, visited some skeletons, got 60 on coal/black ice, but i was only having my steel tools and mace, royal armor and the old stone daggers. Again, as you all know crafting stuff takes time in Conan Exiles, especially when you need everything from anything :)).
So while i was waiting, i went and tried my first Vault. I somehow have choose to spawn on west side of the map and ended up building above the Demense of Spiders vault, well not really above, but i have ended up with having a really cool Apex base surrouding the vault. Anyways, i had no thrall, so it took me a while to finish, my stone daggers really helped at the last boss 
. When i come out, the storm was active so i decide to go in for the first time and see whats all about.
There are a few paths in the middle area of the map that are free from Mountain Lions,Tigers,Rocknoses,Spiders. I had the “bad luck” and went directly into one. From the Demon Leyshrine if u go directly east, there is a small ridge…if u keep on it you end up right before the center area, without being troubled by any creatures. I reach the leyshrine without seeing any storm creatures popping out, fill up my water skin and i hear this LOUD THUNDER, almost had a heart attack and had my first encounter with a Yakith…sadly dodging their attacks and stacking bleed with my lovely stone daggers made the Yakith be a easy prey, at the same time FALSE SELF CONFIDENCE started building. MAYBE you know this too, but early Siptah maelstrom was starting slow, very slow i may add, so i killed a couple more storm creatures, noticed that i get Black Ice, Brimstone , Demon Blood, Hide as resources from them…i already was forming my plan on farming these creatures…i was like 15 minutes into the storm and about to reach the end of the ridge, healing was not a problem so confidence was very high…and then i hear, BAM BAM BAM 
. Double Yakith, Red Spider and 2 of the white creatures…Confidence suddenly removed bracelet and i was left there alone trying to have enough stamina to out run them…I hoped on a small stone formation and i noticed that they just stand there, spider was slower so it took him some time to reach my spot…when he did, he also got me to 15 health 
knocked me of the stone…i rolled out of the knocked down animation and climbed higher on the stone formation, saving my ■■■ with 15 health. I’m like 20 minutes into the storm and the worse is still to come, i healed myself a couple times and tried to apply some bleeds but with so many around the stone formation i was stucked there. You do not want to know how i felt like…i never had such a horror experience in any game…hearing the sounds of all those creatures(i could have turned it off, i do not know why i have not done it) for 10 minutes felt like an eternity 
but was also an eye opener.
There are plenty of puffball mushrooms on the nearby river, i already had a low level alchemist on the wheel (because…), i also had the levels so getting poison arrows was the first thing that passed my mind. Crafted a storm mask, loaded myself with arrows,went to the same stone formation…You know how it ends. I exploited, but why not. I was alone on the server when i was doing it, never crashed the server while doing it and it did not lasted long, once i got 500 of the unstable essence i went and did my first Surge, got my first Berserker from the North Surge…again by exploiting…being undergeared makes you do silly stuff.
@Community I have seen improvement on this. I am reffering to the water pools around the Demon Leyshrine, these are still causing server/client crashes. Players still use those pools to knock down thralls or kill with blunted/snake arrows. Recently, i think with 2.3, i have noticed that the enemy AI goes into those waters, but instead to continue attacking you they just want to get out of the water asap :)))
Back to my wall of text.
Having a good thrall, delved weapons/armor and high healing my Confidence was back on target! So i went and connected my base to the maelstrom for the first time. I have build near the maelstrom by mistake, mainly only because it was looking so evil! But anyways, i connected my base, killed 2 bosses, the Mushroom boss was the 3rd spawn i had, killed my thrall, killed me a couple of times until i gave up. So yes, i farmed 3 greater bears, 2 greater sabers and tried again after having the bears eat the dmg like PRO . I eventually got to use 10 Karthok of the Great Beast for boss farm. Again, some say this was an exploit aswell, some say it was just a commodity.
Well you see, what i have said above Funcom adressed and fixed promptly. Maybe a bit drastic and i’ll tell a small story in regards to this also. Removing the siege mechanic was maybe need it for different reasons. But as for a PvE end game mechanic nothing else compares to it.
You all know that deeper you go into the maelstrom the more often the lesser creatures spawn,right? Now add around 20 Bosses to those 150+ lesser creatures(i never reached 200 in one 30 minutes storm, not even with poison arrows). I was building back then 1 and half foundation high(stairs, fences, pillars) 12 thralls(8 fighters and 4 archers) and let me tell you, when you reach boss number 10(if you are lucky and get only one Mushroom boss) things already heat up, ofc you can go and use more thralls, but this is how i felt i was having the most fun with. Towards the end of the maelstrom it was chaos, i was mainly rolling, blocking and poking the lesser creatures with my spear while watching my thralls getting the beating of their life…Very high adrenaline and fun feature which sadly was been put on stop. I do not want to go on PRIVATE SERVERS in order to play with this feature @community .
This is how i see it …
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Creatures in the storm spawn rate and numbers were reduced. Change was done right, if you choose to go inside the storm for lesser creatures without AN ARMY…you can still have fun.
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Effects on storm creatures were fixed/removed. Good fix. I cannot roll and poke anymore to stack different effects on the creatures. I adapted though, not for long though(feature disabled).
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Storm Creatures could not leave the storm “perimeter” anymore. Good fix! With this fix i stopped thinking while i was offline, if another player will kite a storm boss into my base or not :)))) .
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Maelstrom Duration, reducing it’s duration to 15 minutes was/is bad. I sincerely feel like the Maelstrom is just a splint in my finger. And only because of how short it is.
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I played a lot with custom maelstrom settings and i think i have seen a lot of this mechanic potential.
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Disabling this mechanic on PvE servers is wrong. Is it “sacrificed” for “the greater good”?
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I have one suggestion here. Have some official PvE servers where you enable the siege mechanic? It could even work on PvE-C servers with some ganking potential…
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The new Boss summoning is something i urged for a long time ago. It is AWSOME! But it does not compare to the siege mechanic, 2 different things. And i really hope devs have not just left siege mechanic on the side for good.
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I am good no matter if this mechanic will ever be used again on official servers. Eventually, when i feel again strong enough mentally to do maelstrom farms, private servers or hire my own will always be an option.
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Thank you for this mechanic, i really had some memorable experiences while playing.
About time to end this post? Most likely.
As i mentioned in another post… i will be saying bye bye to you guys here on forums. I have confidence that the game is in good hands and going in the right direction. In all this Siptah experience i had, i have learned to be more realistic, not to lower expectations but just be real.
For the entire Conan Exiles team i wish all the best, stay healthy and please accept my apologies for different things i have said and i was wrong about.
Do not loose vision and make this game good! I respect you all!
Radio out…
) what Do you feel in regards to Early Access 2.0 which Siptah had to be, in order to allow them this kind of drastic rework/balance. Call it how you feel like 
).
) i cannot stop from praising Dennis and his “Our aim is to go to a boat and travel, we will see.” short and hopefull, now if they will manage to do it like this ( o m g sake?), if not…Truth is, Character Travel is coming, in one way or another.
mentioned White Sands Isle(for the ones that Do not know what that is, Starting area in Age of Conan in which you are using a boat to get there). Now keep it steady and Do not think of this as a Slipper, for me was the moment when i felt that my time and money spend in this game tilted, well done!
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