Mod 9 plea

[ArkoHighStar]

If you haven't seen the latest interview withour fearless leader check it out here

http://www.gamebanshee.com/interviews/dndonline6-1.php

One of the new pieces of info dribbled out to us was that there woudl be no new crafting of any kind in mod 9, so no more greensteel crafting being added. This is very disappointing. However I would like to make a plea to Turbine to al least do the following.


Please add shroud ingredients as random drops in the new content,
please let essences of cleansing drop as well
maybe even complete greensteel blanks
also put a copy of the altars from the shroud in the new safe area
Consider greensteel deconstruction
Ingredient trade in


While it would be nice to see fairly regular drops, the shroud should still be the place for the most regular drops etc. maybe having one or 2 quest where the reg chests drop small and medium stuff, and the optionals that drop larges

But at least give us a shot to continue getting ingredients so we can craft without necessarily having to grind the shroud as much, especially since we would hopefully be doing the new content

[Beherit_Baphomar]

But at least give us a shot to continue getting ingredients so we can craft without necessarily having to grind the shroud as much, especially since we would hopefully be doing the new content

This is something that I asked about MOD8. In fact Arko your fearless leader's, DfC, answer was spot on.

We all wanna craft greensteel items/weapons and the only place to do that is in the Shroud. So....grind the Shroud over and over. Which, in turn, leads to me not even wanting to log on to do yet another Shroud run.

We actually have a nice lil setup with greensteel crafting, but it just comes to a grinding halt after the Shroud...just seems so...half-arsed, y'know?

[moorewr]

It seems this is all the content we get until February.

Uh.. man, I thought I'd never say it, but if that's true we're Doooooooooooooooooooooooooooooomed.

[Lorien_the_First_One]

Consider greensteel deconstruction

This would be nice... Even if the blank was lost and you only got back the ingredients from the shroud itself it would be nice... Heck even randomly destroy one of the ingredients and give me the rest back lol...

[Gol]

Think about it this way...

How uber is the mob 9 raid loot (talking about weapons here) going to have to be to be better than shroud crafted gear? We're talking absurdly uber. Can you imagine something better than Mineral 2 dropping already assembled? I can't.

So, I'm going to be running the shroud anyway, as will most of the rest of us. I'd just assume they leave it as is just to allow us to emphasize how much we want real crafting. Mod 9 raid weapons will be 1 of 2 things:
1) Less than Mineral 2, and therefore Shroud will still be a more important raid for melee types.
2) Better than Mineral 2 (aka unbalancing), effectively permanently retiring the Shroud
I'm betting heavily on #1.

So my vote is, no, leave Shroud ingreds in the Shroud. Let us keep farming it, continuing to neglect the content from mods 7-9 for all things weapons (notice, they didn't even try to make better weapons in mods 7 or 8). Besides, without Shroud crafting, we're back to having no economy aside from Wounding/Puncturing weapons.

[DelScorcho]

/signed for ingredients dropping in Mod 9. It will be the same storyline.

/not signed for essences of clensing. I see that more as a longevity award for shroud grinding. The effect of these is too powerful to have as a random drop. However, it doesn't seem too overpowered when the alternative is +3 tomes.

[ArkoHighStar]

/signed for ingredients dropping in Mod 9. It will be the same storyline.

/not signed for essences of clensing. I see that more as a longevity award for shroud grinding. The effect of these is too powerful to have as a random drop. However, it doesn't seem too overpowered when the alternative is +3 tomes.

+4 tomes in mod 9.

[DelScorcho]

+4 tomes in mod 9.

/drools with anticipation. Probably not unbound.

[suitepotato]

I can't see this game continuing as-is much beyond mod 9. I'm a die-hard, and have all my old hardcover books and dice, but the trend is towards half-assed results which inevitably come down to a lack of manpower, which is due to a lack of allocated money for their salaries and benefits. Hire more coders and graphics people, you can have more content faster. They cost serious money, and benefits usually cost close to the salary itself, so it is the biggest stumbling block.

I don't see this changing for Turbine any time soon since so much of game development funding comes from venture capital people, many of whom took shellacking in the recent economic upset. Also, venture capital often is used as a vehicle for creatively LOSING money for various reasons. If the company you're trying to lose money on is successful, you're kind of at cross purposes and can't have that. This is very common in the telecom and Internet world.

Maybe someone could weld the Turbine people to another development company and do a DDO2, but I don't see the money for that being easy to nail down either. Meanwhile, on what we do have, there's no way you're securing more money from the existing players in increased monthly fees.

The trend is clearly towards decline right now.

(If you ever wondered why ads for system admin positions seem to be looking for mutant crossbreed coders/Cisco freaks/voip mavens/SQL geniuses, it's because you start with one person for each, cut a person at a time forcing the rest to adapt, then the last person leaves, and you don't have the money to pay for more than one person to wear six hats. That is where Turbine is clearly headed. It's extremely common in tech jobs.)

[ArkoHighStar]

I can't see this game continuing as-is much beyond mod 9. I'm a die-hard, and have all my old hardcover books and dice, but the trend is towards half-assed results which inevitably come down to a lack of manpower, which is due to a lack of allocated money for their salaries and benefits. Hire more coders and graphics people, you can have more content faster. They cost serious money, and benefits usually cost close to the salary itself, so it is the biggest stumbling block.

I don't see this changing for Turbine any time soon since so much of game development funding comes from venture capital people, many of whom took shellacking in the recent economic upset. Also, venture capital often is used as a vehicle for creatively LOSING money for various reasons. If the company you're trying to lose money on is successful, you're kind of at cross purposes and can't have that. This is very common in the telecom and Internet world.

Maybe someone could weld the Turbine people to another development company and do a DDO2, but I don't see the money for that being easy to nail down either. Meanwhile, on what we do have, there's no way you're securing more money from the existing players in increased monthly fees.

The trend is clearly towards decline right now.

(If you ever wondered why ads for system admin positions seem to be looking for mutant crossbreed coders/Cisco freaks/voip mavens/SQL geniuses, it's because you start with one person for each, cut a person at a time forcing the rest to adapt, then the last person leaves, and you don't have the money to pay for more than one person to wear six hats. That is where Turbine is clearly headed. It's extremely common in tech jobs.)

Actually Turbine has tons of venture capital, they raised over $80 million dollars and just opened a new west coast studio for their new as yet named project for consoles, plus Warners Bros gave them $40 million of that money, and is now their partner on LOTRO. DDO's problems come from the fact that they keep changing priorities mid stream. Crafting is a great example, they spend all this dev time promoting and developing greensteel crafting as a prototype, then hype that mod 8 is going to be the big full crafting mod, and then quietly dump it for hirelings, because someone looked at exit surveys and said OMG people are leaving because they can't solo or need to fill up groups, we need something to stop that. So given that they do have a limited staff and budget they cut and replace.

[VirieSquichie]

I can't see this game continuing as-is much beyond mod 9. I'm a die-hard, and have all my old hardcover books and dice, but the trend is towards half-assed results which inevitably come down to a lack of manpower, which is due to a lack of allocated money for their salaries and benefits. Hire more coders and graphics people, you can have more content faster. They cost serious money, and benefits usually cost close to the salary itself, so it is the biggest stumbling block.

I don't see this changing for Turbine any time soon since so much of game development funding comes from venture capital people, many of whom took shellacking in the recent economic upset. Also, venture capital often is used as a vehicle for creatively LOSING money for various reasons. If the company you're trying to lose money on is successful, you're kind of at cross purposes and can't have that. This is very common in the telecom and Internet world.

Maybe someone could weld the Turbine people to another development company and do a DDO2, but I don't see the money for that being easy to nail down either. Meanwhile, on what we do have, there's no way you're securing more money from the existing players in increased monthly fees.

The trend is clearly towards decline right now.

(If you ever wondered why ads for system admin positions seem to be looking for mutant crossbreed coders/Cisco freaks/voip mavens/SQL geniuses, it's because you start with one person for each, cut a person at a time forcing the rest to adapt, then the last person leaves, and you don't have the money to pay for more than one person to wear six hats. That is where Turbine is clearly headed. It's extremely common in tech jobs.)

You could date your post a year ago and it would still be valid.

Being violently opposed to the grind in general, I would welcome the ability to do "shroud" crafting in other places than the shroud, using ingredients that can be obtained other places than the shroud. I have yet to have any one character hit 20 Reaver runs, for instance - that's how anti-grind I am.

[Krago]

I think they should keep going with crafting with the collectables. That seemed to be a good way to incorporate existing items.

Maybe you can upgrade arrows/bolts to pure good, holy, etc.

Or

Allow casters to create scrolls with lvl 9 spells until the cap increase.

[ArkoHighStar]

You could date your post a year ago and it would still be valid.

Being violently opposed to the grind in general, I would welcome the ability to do "shroud" crafting in other places than the shroud, using ingredients that can be obtained other places than the shroud. I have yet to have any one character hit 20 Reaver runs, for instance - that's how anti-grind I am.

the thing is the ingredients can be used for more than just grinding to make greensteel. I know many who use them to barter for goods, sell on the AH and make cash, and while some prices may be inflated now, having them drop in multiple quest would bring the value down to a more reasonable level, like we see for tapestries now.

[Cold_Stele]

/signed

Having ingredients dropping in more quests will stop us all grinding the Shroud to death and getting bored and irritable.

I also hope the devs are at least considering a 4th tier on greensteel items and maybe even a 5th when we get to epic levels. If we have to bank our greensteel after months and months of grinding for ingredients it'll be a little... frustrating to say the very least.

[Ranmaru2]

So mod 9 is towards April now? WHAT THE HELL!? KATE PAIZ FIRE YOURSELF ALREADY! or am I interpreting what she's saying wrong....?

[ArkoHighStar]

So mod 9 is towards April now? WHAT THE HELL!? KATE PAIZ FIRE YOURSELF ALREADY! or am I interpreting what she's saying wrong....?

Anniversary is end of February, but many are saying well that means April, we won't know until probably early Feb

[cdbd3rd]

I can't see this game continuing as-is much beyond mod 9. I'm a die-hard, and have all my old hardcover books and dice, but the trend is towards half-assed results which inevitably come down to a lack of manpower, which is due to a lack of allocated money for their salaries and benefits. Hire more coders and graphics people, you can have more content faster. They cost serious money, and benefits usually cost close to the salary itself, so it is the biggest stumbling block.

Heck, I'd code for em for a place to live, some eats, free sub, and a little gas money. :D


...'course, they'd have to learn to deal with an AOSCP who types two-fingered. :o:rolleyes:

[MacFionn]

I...benefits usually cost close to the salary itself...

If you don't mind me asking, where do you work... and what benefits do you get working there? Unless the devs are making less than $24,000 in salary, I don't know how this statement can be true. Classically, benefits are considered to be health, dental, and vision. You might have accidental death and disability coverage. Any executive that is building a budget multiplies base salary times 1.2 to get a loaded salary + taxes and benefits number that is predictable 99% of the time. I've never, in all my years of budgeting, found an instance where the companies contribution to benefits is equal to the base salary.

Sorry if I brought the hammer down too hard, but these types of generalizations are one of my pet peeves...

[Uska]

/drools with anticipation. Probably not unbound.


No but with bound +4 tomes maybe we will see unbound +3

[Uska]

Disagree with all your wants except maybe this


also put a copy of the altars from the shroud in the new safe area
Consider greensteel deconstruction
Ingredient trade in


My perfect choice would have been for greensteel never to have been its way to much.

[Timjc86]

(notice, they didn't even try to make better weapons in mods 7 or 8).

Dude... are you joking!?

We got Masterwork Toothpicks!!

[Tin_Dragon]

Please add shroud ingredients as random drops in the new content, No thanks, leaving Shroud stuff, in the Shroud, is fine. Its not a terrible quest, although a weee boost to large drop rate couldnt hurt
please let essences of cleansing drop as well again, leave it to Shroud, every 20th for this isnt terrible, we all dont need to have a complete set of GS items THAT fast.
maybe even complete greensteel blanks Really? thats a bit much, thats like saying " I dont want to run any quests to earn my loot, gimme gimme"
also put a copy of the altars from the shroud in the new safe area Again, those alters are safer, after you kill all the baddies, and you can even go BACK at the end.
Consider greensteel deconstruction I ALMOST agree with this, I have messed up 1 item that would love to do this on, but its part of the learning curve, was made early, while still figuring it all out,
Ingredient trade in Like the GH Relic trade in? hmm I could go for that, say at a 3 to one ratio of the same size, or 20 to one of one size higher, of course, all the same for the same of higher size.





in red

[Rog]

the reality is mod 9 is a 4 level cap increase with +4 tomes. turbine has never done a 4 level increase before i hope they get it right they always do but they take there sweet *** time to do it. I like everyone else worry about the state of the game i was very much more happy when i could find out what the devs was doing every week to better the game not to see what they are improving but to prove they are working on the game every week and not on a when the feel like taking a break from somthing more important.as for noted decline in player base you go over 2 years without any major marketing to the mass media and you depend on a static player base that is going to happen. we must what was turbine thinkng with the new player experience why would a static player base give a rats *** about it anser that and the furture of the game will be fortold.

[ArkoHighStar]

in red

Again while this makes sense now that we are stuck with Shroud, VOD and the Hound as our main raids, but hopefully by mod 9 we will be long out of those areas, and lets hope there are more interesting things to do than grind the shroud at lvl 20, because if not then this game is in bad shape

[swooshrp]

Again while this makes sense now that we are stuck with Shroud, VOD and the Hound as our main raids, but hopefully by mod 9 we will be long out of those areas, and lets hope there are more interesting things to do than grind the shroud at lvl 20, because if not then this game is in bad shape

I agree with your loot suggestion...I think it should be tied anything related to the Shavarath stroyline though, meaning only those quests and explorer areas. Ingredients, essences, etc that was first introduced into the shroud should have a random chance to drop in the future mod9 loot areas.

Ultimately the reason I agree is that players need a reason to loot run again. Adding a chance that these items drop would give people a reason to loot run again. Look how popular loot running is/was when the subterraen Garamol was dropping named loot. It was the thing to do on Khyber even before running the new mod 8 stuff. Any other weapon outside a W/P or shroud tier II weapon is not worth anything these days...adding a chance to continue that process outside a shroud run would put back life into the what will be old content by then.

[ArkoHighStar]

I agree with your loot suggestion...I think it should be tied anything related to the Shavarath stroyline though, meaning only those quests and explorer areas. Ingredients, essences, etc that was first introduced into the shroud should have a random chance to drop in the future mod9 loot areas.

Ultimately the reason I agree is that players need a reason to loot run again. Adding a chance that these items drop would give people a reason to loot run again. Look how popular loot running is/was when the subterraen Garamol was dropping named loot. It was the thing to do on Khyber even before running the new mod 8 stuff. Any other weapon outside a W/P or shroud tier II weapon is not worth anything these days...adding a chance to continue that process outside a shroud run would put back life into the what will be old content by then.

My intention was that they drop in the mod 9 quests, since we are on the plane of battle where these ingredients originated from in the first place