Players skill level gap.

[BillyBlaze]

We are at a breaking point between the huge gap of players skill levels.

I'm glad the bad players have a difficulty level that works for them. I would like a difficulty level that works for the experienced players who want a challenge. Epic elite has become a snooze fest for experienced players and they do not even notice the difference between champions and non champions.

Please make a difficulty that challenges experienced players and doesn't punish the bad players who think they are entitled to epic elite.

[Wh070aa]

Take off all your uber gear, and go do epic elite, you elitist.

Seriously.

If you ignore the power creep, don't get the uberest items, and don't use the uberest epic destiny, the quests are decently challenging.

If that does not help, gimp our con, and make character without evasion.

My opinion is that they should had cut down on the power creep, and HP inflation, but who cares.

[PermaBanned]

Well, you'll probably get a ration of carp for not using some more politically correct term like "inexperienced" or "new" or "casual" instead of "bad" players; but in general yeah - with (X) amount of power available at all levels of play, there should be an appropriate challenge difficulty for that (X) amount of power at all levels of play.

And no, "don't use the lower they let you get" or "gimp yourself" is not the right answer.

[PermaBanned]

Take off all your uber gear, and go do epic elite, you elitist.

Seriously.

If you ignore the power creep, don't get the uberest items, and don't use the uberest epic destiny, the quests are decently challenging.

If that does not help, gimp our con, and make character without evasion.

My opinion is that they should had cut down on the power creep, and HP inflation, but who cares.

On the one hand, I totally agree that power creep has taken a few too many power leaps. That said, you're nucken futs if you think the proper solution is to pop open a chest, see some really cool item say "Oh no! I better not use that or I'll be too powerful!"

[Powskier]

then report back... want a challenge? go make a new character/new server/no big guildship full of crack

[Powskier]

Well, you'll probably get a ration of carp for not using some more politically correct term like "inexperienced" or "new" or "casual" instead of "bad" players; .

true, and not very specific..."bad" could mean alot more than just not good at ddo. Expect people to call out on generalizing terms like that, especially with such negative implications.

[count_spicoli]

I understand where this dude is coming from. The way he put it wasn't very appropriate but jumping into the hardest setting in the game to just have 6 players side by side zerging ahead without a care in the world is a little disheartening.

And NO. Gimping yourself is not the answer cuz nobody around you is going to so it will still be a zerg blast except you will just be getting exercise for your toon in the quest then actually contributing.

It would be nice to have a setting for the toughest out there to jump into and if you run ahead alone it means certain death. Around every corner is something very ominous. Team work is required and if not it means certain wipe. And there should be some cool reward for meeting this challenge.

[Enoach]

I like seeing posts like these because they make me smile...

I always think are they...

Comparing

Actual Skill vs. Cheese?
Accumulation of UBER Gear vs. Random Gear?
Optimal Build Choices (that risk NERF) vs. Not so Optimal Build Choices?
Knowledge of a Quest because it is one of the 10 or so they run because all the rest are XP Lame?

Now I've met people that are bad at playing DDO, it happens. I'm terrible at golf I still enjoy playing.

I've met and played with some really good players too and while their performance made me feel inadequate not once did their personality do so. They even passed down wisdom and gave tips. To this day I also continue to pass down wisdom and tips to those I find struggling or even those that just need a little nudge in the right direction.

Honestly I think the best thing Turbine can do is to come out with new and different quests that push beyond raw DPS and actually makes the player base think "How do I solve this?"

[Seamonkeysix]

Depending on the quest, Epic Elite can be a "snooze fest", but there are some quests that I think most would agree the uberest of ubers don't just go afk and wait for completion. I realize it was a generalization, and I get the basic point...but there are ways to challenge yourself, even if you have experience and the "best" gear.

[boldarblood]

Oh jesus god its not skill that separates people. Its the game and how much you play that truly separates people. Take off all of your twink gear, stop doing ship buffs, having a FULL TR vs a 28 point new player.

Turbine should remove ship buffs, they are ********.

Stop being an elitist snob.

[slarden]

They really just need to combine all servers to 2 servers

1) Hardcore Server
2) Standard Server

The main divide between players is total accumulated playing time which translates into past lifes, knowledge of UI tricks, etc. If they had a hardcore and standard server I would put characters on both.

[Qhualor]

We are at a breaking point between the huge gap of players skill levels.

I'm glad the bad players have a difficulty level that works for them. I would like a difficulty level that works for the experienced players who want a challenge. Epic elite has become a snooze fest for experienced players and they do not even notice the difference between champions and non champions.

Please make a difficulty that challenges experienced players and doesn't punish the bad players who think they are entitled to epic elite.

while I don't agree with the word "bad" players, I know what you are saying. however, ive never agreed with developing a brand new difficulty for players who find elite easy or easyish. ive always said that the difficulties should be adjusted accordingly to match the power creep and level of skill, not counting cheese tactics.

there is absolutely nothing elitist about asking for more challenge when you have achieved a higher level of skill provided to you by the game. I think its absurd and ridiculous when people suggest to nerf yourself after spending time and possibly TP/$ for better gear and more character power just so you can feel challenged. if it got to that point and it seemed the devs had no interest in balancing the difficulties out better, that would make me bored and play less or just leave the game.

[draven1]

The reason that most EE runs became snooze fest is PRR/MRR update.

Do you remember EE runs before PRR/MRR update?
It required some team work and tactical decisions, because mobs can kill you very easily unless the group has those.

Now, you can just collect mobs then push some button for AOE attacks, job's done.
High PRR/MRR, hp, saves makes this game too easy.

Is there any challenges for EE now?

[nibel]

I would like a difficulty level that works for the experienced players who want a challenge.

I'm totally in favor of leaving elite (even HEROIC elite) something hard even for multilife characters. But the point is: Where do you make the cut for "experienced players"?

The top 0.01% who can solo EE raids while on suboptimal EDs?

The top 0.1% who can snoozefest through EE quests?

The top 1% who can reasonably contribute in any EE quest while in a group?

The top 5% who can complete EEs most of the time while in a group?

The top 10% who can snoozefest through EH, but is reasonably challenged by EEs?

Where do you draw the line? (btw, the affirmations above are a complete wild guess)

[zetis]

Sure make a difficulty higher than elite, but do not award more favor, xp and do not increase drop rates. Elitists want more challenge. I say give it to them, but with no extra rewards.

[Such755]

Yeah... No.
Epic Elite ghost of perdition?
Elite Mark of Death?
Elite Fire on Thunder peak? (and the other one)

The epic content is pretty balanced as it is, there's challenge for everyone. And if you're at a point where everything is easy (I find that hard to believe, honestly), then remember that you're the 1% (Or less) and the change should come from YOU (Take off your armor?) and the game developers should be focused on satisfying the rest of the players.

[Chilldude]

Please make a difficulty that challenges experienced players and doesn't punish the bad players who think they are entitled to epic elite.

Come on people, this troll attempt is as transparent as a window cleaned with New! Windex Ultra Clear, for a streak free shine... everytime.

[the_one_dwarfforged]

responses like "stop being an elitist" and "take off your gear/stop using ship buffs" are what is ********.

if you arent going to do the things the game lets you do, why play?

no one is telling noobs or bads that they have to stop being noobs or bads, so why do they feel ***entitled*** to tell "elitists" to stop being elitists? stop being a noob. see what i did there?

if some players desire more challenge from the game, why shouldnt turbine at least make an honest effort to give it to them? champions come out as such an effort but due to outcry that they were butthurting noobs and that "elitists" dont care about them champs got nerfed. so the game should be accessible to both good players and bad, but when anything gets added that is even remotely appealing to the good players it needs to be toned down so it is completely balanced around bad players. it sure seems like one side of the player base is trying to have it both ways.

i tell you what though, for all the people saying "take off your gear/stop using ship buffs", when you get a guild to level 150 ill join it and use the ship buffs and you can ignore them. also give me all your stuff. and i mean all of it, every last ruby, opal, sapphire, masterwork longsword, and stack of non returning throwers. if i ever see you running around wearing any gear at all im gonna report you to the ****ing online ethics committee and tell you to stop being a ****ing elitist.

[janave]

Stop playing 20+ pastlife cheat-builds. Convince your party to do the same. Thats about halfway there.

The late buffs were too much really, but devs dont dare to hurt even the clearly broken builds, so instead they turn DDO into "just any japan mmo" where you fight monsters with 60million hitpoints, but at least you can occasionally crit for 30k :D.


There really arent that many playstyles to challenge.

Mobs that take reduced physical damages, no bypasses this time.
Mobs that take reduced magical damages, no bypasses this time.
Mobs with super high saves and spell pen, no bypasses this time.
Mobs that debuff players in significant ways, both melee and ranged chars, no bypasses this time.
Bosses that arent just big puches of hps, but they have significant abilities, ala Abbot's encase/inferno, high save for lesser effects, no bypasses this time.

I hope you start to get it why the game became too easy... to many bypass mechanisms that players will eventually accumulate, learn and use.

Make iconic monsters iconic. Liches shooting CL40 meteor-swarms with 500 spell power 3 times in rapid succession, give them massive perks, that players can avoid with skill, but no bypasses this time.

[Blackheartox]

People told me to stop playlng my 3x all if i want a challenge. My alt is a shiradi fav soul wiz at lv 26 atm with 30% spellfailure no resist or char or wisdom item, con 5 iconic ring and no striding item. No spellcrit no proper spellpower and no shield wirh shield feats, and no vitality or false life item. I cant gimp her more. And im still completing ee with not much difdiculty. Accept it the game is easy now. It has nothing to do with gear or skill but game mechanics which make it easy.

I played recently other games like rogue legacy and dmc on harder setting.
Honestly i feel like i could have a easier time to box a ee mod solo then last dif in dmc because that game is skill based

[janave]

People told me to stop playlng my 3x all if i want a challenge. My alt is a shiradi fav soul wiz at lv 26 atm with 30% spellfailure no resist or char or wisdom item, con 5 iconic ring and no striding item. No spellcrit no proper spellpower and no shhield wirh shield feats, and no vitality or dalse life item. I cant gimp her more. And im still completing ee with not much difdiculty. Accept it the game is easy now. It has nothing to do with gear or skill but game mechanics which make it easy.

You did admit tho previously that Shirady itself is a major easy-button, and then you deliberately chooste to play that instead of...dunno
a lvl20 rogue with the same amount of gear/preparation?

There are still a lot of skill needed if you dont stick to the cheat-builds, and if anything shirady qualifies. I play one too, because i specifically look for easy buttons (at the moment). I am that lazy to play well.

[Blackheartox]

You did admit tho previously that Shirady itself is a major easy-button, and then you deliberately chooste to play that instead of...dunno
a lvl20 rogue with the same amount of gear/preparation?

There are still a lot of skill needed if you dont stick to the cheat-builds, and if anything shirady qualifies. I play one too, because i specifically look for easy buttons (at the moment). I am that lazy to play well.

Thats why i said game mechanics make it easy and possibly knowledge.
Example i have on her gear like esos proper gear and i could tr her to palie or barb.
Or rogue example i would make even a pure rogue work on her.
Again this is knowledge and ability to read abilities which makes it so easy.

Worst enemy a vet has is the ability to read and knowledge how to approach ee content.
Only way to make the game challenging for such a player is to throw random elements at him where he needs to act fast where actual skill matters.

That is why i was in rage mode after the champ nerf.
It is the direct proof how people do not want ddo to be a skill based game

[mobrien316]

We are at a breaking point between the huge gap of players skill levels.

I'm glad the bad players have a difficulty level that works for them. I would like a difficulty level that works for the experienced players who want a challenge. Epic elite has become a snooze fest for experienced players and they do not even notice the difference between champions and non champions.

Please make a difficulty that challenges experienced players and doesn't punish the bad players who think they are entitled to epic elite.

If you are playing permadeath and you are so good that epic elite is a snooze fest, then I tip my hat to you.

If you aren't playing permadeath, then yes, the "easy" setting of the game is often easy once you accumulate game knowledge, past lives, and gear.

[Tinco]

Turbine needs to grow some balls and finally start to nerf obvious outliers in terms of game features and classes. The "let's not wake the dog"-approach, guarded by fear of having an outcry on the forums is not working.


No new difficulty please, that's just another level of meatbaggery. Casual to Elite easily conveys all types of players as long as the power level of classes is within reason.

[slarden]

Yeah... No.
Epic Elite ghost of perdition?
Elite Mark of Death?
Elite Fire on Thunder peak? (and the other one)

The epic content is pretty balanced as it is, there's challenge for everyone. And if you're at a point where everything is easy (I find that hard to believe, honestly), then remember that you're the 1% (Or less) and the change should come from YOU (Take off your armor?) and the game developers should be focused on satisfying the rest of the players.

I've seen some of the same people on Sarlona complaining about challenge (and even saying they always run EE) have alot of problem in EN mark of death and vote NOT to run EH Mark of Death. I've seen them post EH runs in the Orchard.

I think their are alot of people running for efficiency which means easier EEs like motu to bank saga reward for next ETR. The only EE ghost of perdition LFM I've seen since champions is the one I put up with my dwarf occult barbarian I leveled up specifically for that quest to farm the mythic helm. Since I got my helm I haven't seen one other EE LFM for that quest.

PRR/MRR is clearly the biggest easy button in the game. The champion system does nothing to challenge people with PRR/MRR - instead it adds more challenge to builds that spefically lack PRR since high physical damage is the hallmark of champion melees.

There are more EE FOT run than there used to be, but of course MRR made that raid alot easier. I rarely see U21 raids on EE.

There isn't much challenge when you ETR for efficiency, but what do you expect when people are taking the easy road.

[jalont]

Take off all your uber gear, and go do epic elite, you elitist.

Seriously.

If you ignore the power creep, don't get the uberest items, and don't use the uberest epic destiny, the quests are decently challenging.

If that does not help, gimp our con, and make character without evasion.

My opinion is that they should had cut down on the power creep, and HP inflation, but who cares.


This is why most people would make bad game designers.

You just completely eliminated any reason for players to buy into the grind, which is the backbone of DDO. Without actual challenging content, people will realize there's no reason to grind for xp/loot, and they'll just quit the game, as we've been seeing. As the game gets easier, more and more people leave.

[Hendrik]

if some players desire more challenge from the game, why shouldnt turbine at least make an honest effort to give it to them?.

That's easy!

Because someone that is not ready for that challenge might feel entitled to run it and when they are crushed, they call for nerf's.

It's easier to bring everything down to the lowest common denominator instead of rising up to the challenge.

People have been asking for more challenge for over three years and what did we get? Champions. What happened when people that were not ready for that challenge entered that hardest difficulty? They got crushed and then called for nerf's.

[Tesrali]

This is why most people would make bad game designers.

You just completely eliminated any reason for players to buy into the grind, which is the backbone of DDO. Without actual challenging content, people will realize there's no reason to grind for xp/loot, and they'll just quit the game, as we've been seeing. As the game gets easier, more and more people leave.

+1

+1, OP

BTW I have a first life paladin that tanks in EE MoD. This is challenging for that toon. Nothing else is really. (Tanking Nevy just involves watching the buff and making those cheeks move when he's feelin spicy.)

[Hendrik]

This is why most people would make bad game designers.

You just completely eliminated any reason for players to buy into the grind, which is the backbone of DDO. Without actual challenging content, people will realize there's no reason to grind for xp/loot, and they'll just quit the game, as we've been seeing. As the game gets easier, more and more people leave.

Yep.

Play the TR/eTR game they gave us and we get more powerful. We advance to L30, we get more powerful. Just play the **** game and you get more powerful.

Once you play the game given to us, the "End-game gain more power grind", you will soon see that you have all this character power now and not one single place to put it to use.

Once we get all the TR past lives, all the eTR past lives, 4th twist, then what? Do it all over for the next class granting more power and still nothing to do with it.


Go nekkid? No equipment? No ship buffs for a challenge? Are you serious?

Didn't play the game to earn those things only to end up not getting to use them.

[Knobull]

I call it the unemployment gap.

[mobrien316]

I always find it difficult to sympathize with multi-past-life, uber-geared, uber-ship-buffed players with years of experience, who usually run with other multi-past-life, uber-geared, uber-ship-buffed players and then complain the game is too easy.

If you have played for a while, and you have several relevant past lives, and you have good gear, and you are familiar with the quests, and you are sitting level cap thinking, "I'm too good for the game now and everything is too easy," my initial response is, "It's supposed to be."

Think of it this way: If you grinded your way through thirty or forty past heroic and epic lives, and you farmed for all the best gear, and you have run each quest dozens if not hundreds of times, how is the game not supposed to be much easier for you? Paradoxically, if the game was still a tremendous challenge for you that that point, you probably never would have made it to that point to start with.

There is a challenging version of DDO available to everyone already - permadeath. If you are not playing permadeath you are playing the easy version, and it's kind of silly in my opinion to play the easy version and then complain it's easy.

For all the people who are veterans of PnP D&D, how much fun would it have been if every time you went into a dungeon you didn't have to worry at all about dying, because even if you died fifty times during the same quest, you could just touch a shrine and be resurrected with no lasting ill effects? How much more challenging was it when you knew that if your character died, that was probably the end of that character forever. Perhaps there was a chance your party could drag your corpse back to town where a friendly cleric might raise you, if you had the money, and if you were the same alignment as the cleric, and if you agreed to undertake a quest for the church as further payment, and if the cleric was of sufficiently high level and knew the spell.

[Vint]

Stop playing 20+ pastlife cheat-builds. Convince your party to do the same. Thats about halfway there.

I love this idea that people rely on “cheat builds”.

Come to Thelanis and I will show you a pure Rogue, pure Artificer and a pure FS who can solo EE. Not to mention countless splash builds that don’t require “shady” skills to solo.

I wont bicker with you as I know Turbine must cater to the “everyone gets a trophy” crowd, but do not make statements that people have to use “cheat builds” to be solo.

[Vint]

This is why most people would make bad game designers.

You just completely eliminated any reason for players to buy into the grind, which is the backbone of DDO. Without actual challenging content, people will realize there's no reason to grind for xp/loot, and they'll just quit the game, as we've been seeing. As the game gets easier, more and more people leave.

Exactly

Many people in guild and channel said they might be back when the level cap is raised since they have no challenge currently.

[Azarddoze]

I always find it difficult to sympathize with multi-past-life, uber-geared, uber-ship-buffed players with years of experience, who usually run with other multi-past-life, uber-geared, uber-ship-buffed players and then complain the game is too easy.

If you have played for a while, and you have several relevant past lives, and you have good gear, and you are familiar with the quests, and you are sitting level cap thinking, "I'm too good for the game now and everything is too easy," my initial response is, "It's supposed to be."

Think of it this way: If you grinded your way through thirty or forty past heroic and epic lives, and you farmed for all the best gear, and you have run each quest dozens if not hundreds of times, how is the game not supposed to be much easier for you? Paradoxically, if the game was still a tremendous challenge for you that that point, you probably never would have made it to that point to start with.

There is a challenging version of DDO available to everyone already - permadeath. If you are not playing permadeath you are playing the easy version, and it's kind of silly in my opinion to play the easy version and then complain it's easy.

For all the people who are veterans of PnP D&D, how much fun would it have been if every time you went into a dungeon you didn't have to worry at all about dying, because even if you died fifty times during the same quest, you could just touch a shrine and be resurrected with no lasting ill effects? How much more challenging was it when you knew that if your character died, that was probably the end of that character forever. Perhaps there was a chance your party could drag your corpse back to town where a friendly cleric might raise you, if you had the money, and if you were the same alignment as the cleric, and if you agreed to undertake a quest for the church as further payment, and if the cleric was of sufficiently high level and knew the spell.

Permadeath adds nothing to the challenge. It's a self-imposed restriction and not a higher diffficulty challlenge in itself.

What you seem to not have a grasp of is that, maybe i'll give you that, someone that is top geared with everything possible (PLs included) should find the game kinda easy. That does make sense in a way. But the difficulty of the game as it is right now, isn't much of a challenge for many more than "those who have everything" which must represent a tiny %.

Having a system to challenge the ones who are on top of the game's progression takes nothing away from others, it only adds something to those that are actually looking to be challenged and it is healty for a MMO.

A MMO without real (meaningful) progression = a grindfest.

[Knobull]

Has anyone tried running quests above their level? (at least 3 base levels) {In DDO, not that other "Epic" game, not sure what that is, but it sure sounds messed up. Nor that other "Second Life" game either...}

[mobrien316]

Permadeath adds nothing to the challenge.

Have you ever played permadeath?

Is part 4 of the Shroud more challenging, less challenging, or equally challenging as part five, assuming a PUG of 18th-level characters running on elite? If you can't just raise anyone who dies, as many times as you like, the quest or raid is without a doubt more challenging. If you also have the added factor that, if your character dies, you have to delete it and start all over, that is most certainly more challenging.

[Azarddoze]

Have you ever played permadeath?

Is part 4 of the Shroud more challenging, less challenging, or equally challenging as part five, assuming a PUG of 18th-level characters running on elite? If you can't just raise anyone who dies, as many times as you like, the quest or raid is without a doubt more challenging. If you also have the added factor that, if your character dies, you have to delete it and start all over, that is most certainly more challenging.

Not being able to resurect sure adds to the difficulty... if resurect is needed. The fact that you have to delete your char when you die doesn't add anything to the difficulty of X or Y quest though.

I am still not sure that you understand what the OP and mostly everyone mean by challenging content. It's more akin to power available vs diffficulty then "What limitation could I bring upon myself to fix the flaw in the game" imo.

[PermaBanned]

The epic content is pretty balanced as it is, there's challenge for everyone. And if you're at a point where everything is easy (I find that hard to believe, honestly), then remember that you're the 1% (Or less) and the change should come from YOU (Take off your armor?) and the game developers should be focused on satisfying the rest of the players.Or here's a crazy thought: instead of telling players to intentionally gimp themselves with wonky suggestions like "take off your armor" how about we... wait for it...

Make the difficulty descriptions accurate!

• Casual - Needs no change.

• Normal - Should be appropriate for the masses; you know: make it *gasp* the difficulty the game is "Normally" played on.

• Hard - This should be the setting people choose when they don't want the game to be easy. This should be the setting chosen when the setting the game is "Normally played on" is no longer interesting or challenging, and you want to step it up a bit.

• Elite - This is the setting {that should be} even harder than "Hard." This should be the setting for people who want the game to try and squash them, for whome failure is an option because if there's little to no risk of failure, there's little to no challenge. When your game skills are sharp, and your character is well developed & powerful, and you feel "Hard" isn't hard enough - then you should be playing Elite.

Now tell me please, why ^that spread^ would be a bad thing, why the hardest setting aka "Elite" should be "the setting the game is normally played on, (as it currently is)" and why the solution for those of us who want to be challenged should not be having the game challenge us but should instead be "don't ware armor, don't use gear, don't play strong* builds."

*by "strong builds I'm not referring to broken Single+Two Weapon Fighting wolves. I'm not even referring to FotM builds. I'm referring to things like my Melee focused monk (low PRR, less MRR), with only moderate DPS (actually lowish vs non-stunable targets), no instakills (not enough monk levels for Quivering Palm), and an Arti splash for Traps & UMD that many Ox & Cetus type vets would call a gimp if I ever published the build.

[the_one_dwarfforged]

what does permadeath have to do with anything other than permadeath?

if people who complained about how easy the game is thought that permadeath would provide the kind and amount of challenge that they wanted, there would be no complaints on the topic because that option is available to them. same goes for deliberate gimping, ignoring half the game, etc.

permadeath is kind of dumb when one of the core features of this game is character development.

[slarden]

what does permadeath have to do with anything other than permadeath?

if people who complained about how easy the game is thought that permadeath would provide the kind and amount of challenge that they wanted, there would be no complaints on the topic because that option is available to them. same goes for deliberate gimping, ignoring half the game, etc.

permadeath is kind of dumb when one of the core features of this game is character development.

In all the groups I've been in with P&P when I died that was it - I rolled up a new character. I can see why it is appealing, but it doesn't appeal to me in DDO because it's a big loss of progress. In P&P I didn't mind - I just rolled up a new character and played. The roleplaying aspect was more important than progress in P&P.

[the_one_dwarfforged]

In all the groups I've been in with P&P when I died that was it - I rolled up a new character. I can see why it is appealing, but it doesn't appeal to me in DDO because it's a big loss of progress. In P&P I didn't mind - I just rolled up a new character and played. The roleplaying aspect was more important than progress in P&P.

i can see the appeal as well. what im saying is that appeal or no it doesnt have anything to do with ddo, because ddo is not a permadeath game and it (as well as self gimping etc) shouldnt be the only means to create challenge.

unless lvls 1-4 suddenly get wildly more interesting...

which makes me think. if the root cause of elitism in ddo is playing time -> repetition -> metagaming, then you gotta figure permadeathers would know korthos better than anyone, and that it really couldnt provide much challenge for even their gimpy toons. i now will disregard any further comments from those elitist bastards cuz ive got standards and ****.

[PermaBanned]

In all the groups I've been in with P&P when I died that was it - I rolled up a new character. I can see why it is appealing, but it doesn't appeal to me in DDO because it's a big loss of progress. In P&P I didn't mind - I just rolled up a new character and played. The roleplaying aspect was more important than progress in P&P.

In PnP that works, but I've never understood permadeath in DDO - especially in guild/static groups - because you can't just role up a level 9, or 11 or 17 when your character dies but the rest of the group did not; I mean how do permadeath groups resolve that? Is it either "we all start over now so we can still play together" or "sucks to be you Charly, catch ya on the next set of characters!"

Rather than derailing the thread, answers via PM would be fine as I really am curious on that point ;)

[Knobull]

Has anyone tried running quests above their level? (at least 3 base levels) {In DDO, not that other "Epic" game, not sure what that is, but it sure sounds messed up. Nor that other "Second Life" game either...}

So I guess the answer is no? I think we might have found the problem.

[slarden]

Or here's a crazy thought: instead of telling players to intentionally gimp themselves with wonky suggestions like "take off your armor" how about we... wait for it...

Make the difficulty descriptions accurate!

• Casual - Needs no change.

• Normal - Should be appropriate for the masses; you know: make it the difficulty the game is "Normally" played on *gasp*

• Hard - This should be the setting people choose when they don't want the game to be easy. This should be the setting chosen when the setting the game is "Normally played on" is no longer interesting or challenging, and you want to step it up a bit.

• Elite - This is the setting {that should be} even harder than "Hard." This should be the setting for people who want the game to try and squash them, for whome failure is an option because if there's little to no risk of failure, there's little to no challenge. When your game skills are sharp, and your character is well developed & powerful, and you feel "Hard" isn't hard enough - then you should be playing Elite."

Now tell me please, why ^that spread^ would be a bad thing, why the hardest setting aka "Elite" should be "the setting the game is normally played on," and why the solution for those of us who want to be challenged should not be having the game challenge us but should instead be "don't ware armor, don't use gear, don't play strong* builds."

*by "strong builds I'm not referring to broken Single+Two Weapon Fighting wolves. I'm not even referring to FotM builds. I'm referring to things like my Melee focused monk (low PRR, less MRR), with only moderate DPS (actually lowish vs non-stunable targets), no instakills (not enough monk levels for Quivering Palm), and an Arti splash for Traps & UMD that many Ox & Cetus type vets would call a gimp if I ever published the build.

There are a few independent issues at the moment.

- most people view the existing quests as leveling quests while other view those quests as "end game" quests. For those us effectively done with etr we had the benefit of running those quests as leveling quests and by upping the difficulty we are making it harder for others to level than we had it.
- Most mmos have diminishing returns for more difficult end game content. In DDO the rewards for running on Elite vs. Normal are so much better that everyone wants to do it. Upping the difficulty won't stop people from joining my EE party and simply dying alot more. If the reward structure for hard and elite were better but marginal (slightly better odds not better gear) the majority player base would not mind.

However, the demand for higher difficulty and a greater disparity in rewards results is a rift that will never go away. Compare the original implementation of shroud reward and pre-BB to now.

The game needs more rewards for grouping (which is really healthy for the game) rather than difficulty setting. So I am fine with challenge going up and my main 2 character can surely handle it. I just want to make sure my guildies aren't shafted in the process.

Honestly I would rather just see a hardcore server and would put my main 2 characters there and leave the rest on a standard server since they don't have the past lifes and gear. Even then there will be people saying the standard server is too easy and the hard core server too hard which gets to the bottom of the problem - people want difficulty tailored to them.

[PermaBanned]

Has anyone tried running quests above their level? (at least 3 base levels) {In DDO, not that other "Epic" game, not sure what that is, but it sure sounds messed up. Nor that other "Second Life" game either...}
So I guess the answer is no? I think we might have found the problem.Maybe if everything after the first parenthesis made sense, you'd get more of a response?

[Knobull]

Fair enough, allow me to clarify:

Epic: is not DDO but some other game that is completely different from DDO.
Reincarnation: is also not DDO but is some other game that is completely different from DDO.

(bear in mind the "unemployment gap")

Does that help?

[PermaBanned]

However, the demand for higher difficulty and a greater disparity in rewards results in a rift that will never go away. Compare the original implementation of reward and pre-BB to now.Yeah, I can only hope & assume the Devs didn't actually intend Elite to be the standard difficulty for every one from new players on first life characters to multicompletionists played by vets and simply got bit by the law of unintended consequences. But since it has become exactly that, and they've simultaniouy raised power and lowered difficulty to accommodate that arrangement - they've really just painted themselves into a corner of the only place the populace at large will allow them to create any real difficulty is in the yet-to-be-developed "end game" because anything else would simply be taking the candy from the - players.

Just for the record: I'm not one those that profess to want a challenge, but require a "proper carrot" to actually face it. If Normal, Hard & Elite gave the same XP & loot odds it would change nothing of how I play (although it would seem that I'd likely have far more IP Elite LFMs that get ignored than I currently do due to a lack of "proper carrots." ;))

[slarden]

Yeah, I can only hope & assume the Devs didn't actually intend Elite to be the standard difficulty for every one from new players on first life characters to multicompletionists played by vets and simply got bit by the law of unintended consequences. But since it has become exactly that, and they've simultaniouy raised power and lowered difficulty to accommodate that arrangement - they've really just painted themselves into a corner of the only place the populace at large will allow them to creat any real difficulty is in the yet-to-be-developed "end game" because anything else would simply be taking the candy from the - players.

Just for the record: I'm not one those that profess to want a challenge, but require a "proper carrot" to actually face it. If Normal, Hard & Elite gave the same XP & loot odds it would change nothing of how I play (although it would seem that I'd likely have far more IP Elite LFMs that get ignored than I currently do due to a lack of "proper carrots." ;))

Same I would be fine with 10% and 20% increases in drop EH and EE and make both much harder. Sometimes I want a challenge and run something really tough EE MOD and other times I just want a quick completion.

I would also be fine if they get rid of BB and replace it with a grouping bonus to account for the extra time it takes to form a party.

[gaffneyks]

I agree, skill is such an important thing in a 8 year old video game that is plagued with lag.


Geez....

[PermaBanned]

Fair enough, allow me to clarify:

Epic: is not DDO but some other game that is completely different from DDO.
Reincarnation: is also not DDO but is some other game that is completely different from DDO.

(bear in mind the "unemployment gap")

Does that help?

So - if I understand you correctly - you're asking a question, but ruling out {what I suspect to be} most of the population (TRs and/or players in ~1/3 of the available character levels) from answering... and somehow drawing a conclusion from a lack of responses?

[the_one_dwarfforged]

So I guess the answer is no? I think we might have found the problem.


Fair enough, allow me to clarify:

Epic: is not DDO but some other game that is completely different from DDO.
Reincarnation: is also not DDO but is some other game that is completely different from DDO.

(bear in mind the "unemployment gap")

Does that help?

if people bothered to post here that they play quests 3 levels higher than their characters sometimes, would anything be accomplished? is the fact that no one besides you posted in this thread that they do this proof that no one else does it?

so you are telling me that game functions in ddo actually arent ddo? well, what the **** do you figure they are?

i can haz ur koolade?

[Knobull]

Just pointing out that the challenge is there is you look for it (without gimping your character). I'm currently playing level 16 quests with a level 12 character, and sometimes it is a tough go of it.

Ya, Epic & Reincarnation is not DDO. (I work full time+, and will never have the time for such grinds, nor would I if I did have the time, it sure doesn't sound like much fun, unlike DDO which I enjoy quite a bit.) We really are talking about two different games here.

[mobrien316]

The issue is that people don't want a challenge, they want to crush content with their min-maxed, uger=geared, multi-past life, uber ship-buffed character. There is plenty of challenge available for anyone in the game if they want it. One very easy solution, as mentioned, is to run content above your character level. If you are at level 28, swap out some of your uber gear or epic TR and roll a character that isn't min-maxed.

Complaining that your triple completionist with his God-mode gear on isn't getting enough of a challenge is rather silly.

The purpose of mentioning permadeath is that if someone is saying "I want to play DDO, but I want it to be challenging", then they can play permadeath. It is challenging and sometimes stressful to go on dungeon crawls knowing that if you roll a couple of 1's you might wind up deleting your character.

If you don't want to play permadeath, then there are many other things you can do. If you are stubbornly fixated on saying, "I don't want to do anything different at all, to any degree whatsoever, OTHER THAN play my min-maxed, fortieth-life character, with fully-upgraded Superman gear, with all my overpowered ship buffs, in a group with other min-maxed fortieth life characters with all of their fully-upgraded Superman gear and all of their overpowered ship buffs, but when I do it's too easy", then you can probably say you've now "won" DDO with that character. You are among the 1% of top players in DDO. Take a bow, buy yourself a drink, and consider starting a new character.

[PermaBanned]

The issue is that people don't want a challenge, they want to crush content with their min-maxed, uger=geared, multi-past life, uber ship-buffed character.While this is likely true for some people, it's certainly not true for all. Some of us video game players pick the "Hard" or "Insane" difficulties because we didn't want the "Easy" rofl stomp one - and we would like it if DDO had a similar option (again).


There is plenty of challenge available for anyone in the game if they want it. One very easy solution, as mentioned, is to run content above your character level. If you are at level 28, swap out some of your uber gear or epic TR and roll a character that isn't min-maxed.

Complaining that your triple completionist with his God-mode gear on isn't getting enough of a challenge is rather silly.Perspective: Having the hardest game setting as the standard game setting is rather silly. Instead of "Casual, Normal, Hard & Elite" we effectively have: "Rediculously stupidly Easy, Really Easy, Not too tough & Normal" because Elite is what the game is normally played on.


The purpose of mentioning permadeath is that if someone is saying "I want to play DDO, but I want it to be challenging", then they can play permadeath. It is challenging and sometimes stressful to go on dungeon crawls knowing that if you roll a couple of 1's you might wind up deleting your character.

If you don't want to play permadeath, then there are many other things you can do. If you are stubbornly fixated on saying, "I don't want to do anything different at all, to any degree whatsoever, OTHER THAN play my min-maxed, fortieth-life character, with fully-upgraded Superman gear, with all my overpowered ship buffs, in a group with other min-maxed fortieth life characters with all of their fully-upgraded Superman gear and all of their overpowered ship buffs, but when I do it's too easy", then you can probably say you've now "won" DDO with that character. You are among the 1% of top players in DDO. Take a bow, buy yourself a drink, and consider starting a new character.I would just like it if they gave me a place to use the power they've put in the game for me to aquire - why is that so bad? Would you tell a marathon runner that if they want a "real challenge" they should tie their shoe laces together?

[Sehenry03]

I acquired all my gear and TR's grinding in the game and I had fun doing it. I have some pretty darn good gear.

Now I should stop using the gear I put the tim in to get to make it a challenge? I should stop using the ED's I put the time in to get so its harder?

No I got all those things because I want my character to be able to use all those things for the fun of the game. I don't want to play a quest simply because its insanely hard. I personally find enjoyment in the xp and the items I can possibly get to drop.

I really don't think its unfair for me to ask for Elite difficulty to be for the Elite character who put time in to get. I never farmed Elite quests before TRing as I didn't have the gear...I did hard or got a group or even played normal if it was beyond me. now I can solo Elite without issues the way it stands and I should not be able to. I don't care if players who have just started feel entitled to run elite as the new normal that's NOT how it is suppose to be or how the description says it should be. I want to run Elite dungeons to get elite xp and elite gear better then what I have. if I have to run hard a few times first then so be it I did it years ago and I would do it again if they gave me a reason...meaning if they made Elite truly Elite.

people don't want to run normal or hard because they won't get as much favor. Really? They want the same loot to drop on Normal that drops on Elite. They want to be able to solo Elite on a first life toon with no tomes. Sorry this all sounds like the typical "Give it to me because they have it and I want it"

If they have to do a sudden overnight change and we all have to adapt then by all means. If they make Elite so hard that I can't solo anymore I will do on hard. There are only a few favor rewards I care about and all are easy to get even running on hard.

So vets only put up for Elite LFM's? Who cares join them and milk the xp then go back to normal when soloing or even hard. I ALWAYS put up an LFm saying doing these quests on Elite and I accept whoever clicks to join and I don't care if they die I will take the time to rez and explain why it happened and I don't care if they do it again.

With all this self entitlement going on where people think they deserve to be able to run Elite because they want favor faster or because they want better xp I am starting to understand WoW putting a minimum gear lvl in place. yeah it sucks in my opinion but at least there was no whining about not getting into the super tough dungeons people would just run easier dungeons til they got the better gear level and then move on. Horrible system in general but at least half the population doesn't think they deserve to run the hardest content right from the start.

[jalont]

Just pointing out that the challenge is there is you look for it (without gimping your character). I'm currently playing level 16 quests with a level 12 character, and sometimes it is a tough go of it.

Ya, Epic & Reincarnation is not DDO. (I work full time+, and will never have the time for such grinds, nor would I if I did have the time, it sure doesn't sound like much fun, unlike DDO which I enjoy quite a bit.) We really are talking about two different games here.

Good thing you have content then created just for you! It's called casual/normal difficulty. If you find those too hard, we can talk about nerfing them.


Now back to the real discussion.

[Knobull]

Good thing you have content then created just for you! It's called casual/normal difficulty. If you find those too hard, we can talk about nerfing them.


Now back to the real discussion.

Lol. Reading comprehension fail.

Have you tried playing a higher level quest?

I guess you missed the part where I said I'm playing base level 16 quests with a level 12 character. Give it a try!

[jalont]

Lol. Reading comprehension fail.

Have you tried playing a higher level quest?

I guess you missed the part where I said I'm playing level 16 quests with a level 12 character. Give it a try!

I'm just not sure what your point is. You admittedly take advantage of like 2 percent of the game, and you're trying to discuss something that admittedly has nothing to do with you. The funny thing is that it's not clicking with you. You barely play the game and it's already easy for you. That doesn't seem to throw off alarms in your head that things are really bad for people that actually play the game at 50 percent, or the trainwreck it is for people that play it at 100 percent.

[deuxanes]

We are at a breaking point between the huge gap of players skill levels.

I'm glad the bad players have a difficulty level that works for them. I would like a difficulty level that works for the experienced players who want a challenge. Epic elite has become a snooze fest for experienced players and they do not even notice the difference between champions and non champions.

Please make a difficulty that challenges experienced players and doesn't punish the bad players who think they are entitled to epic elite.

No matter how many resources Turbine puts into such a feature/idea, the result will always be just a temporary fix.

Introduce a new difficulty level? Players will expect and want rewards (e.g. item rewards, experience rewards, etc.) for running at that difficulty level. Once the players will be decked out? The new difficulty level will no longer be as difficult as before.


Challenge means: facing a situation which requires all your skills and efforts (e.g. playing chess vs someone who has the same skill as you or is better than you). No matter the result (i.e. success/failure or winning/loosing) you'll be forced to improve yourself.


You can have challenge in DDO. You don't need to reach the level cap. You don't need to play "DDO meets farmville". You don't need past lifes. You don't need new difficulty levels.

Even a level 4 quest can be challenging. I can remember a time when elite quests were run with parties that were below the quest level. Back then there was an underlevel bonus. If you want a challenge then try it. Today you will miss out XP for sure. Give it a try.

But if one just chases after the bravery bonus, optimal leveling schedule or farming for crafting then the challenge goes somewhere else. It's up to the players to make up their minds. Contradicting requirements/expectations will make it only harder for developers.


Why chasing the far end of the rainbow when the other end is right beside you?

[deuxanes]

I acquired all my gear and TR's grinding in the game and I had fun doing it. I have some pretty darn good gear.

Now I should stop using the gear I put the tim in to get to make it a challenge? I should stop using the ED's I put the time in to get so its harder?

No I got all those things because I want my character to be able to use all those things for the fun of the game. I don't want to play a quest simply because its insanely hard. I personally find enjoyment in the xp and the items I can possibly get to drop.

...


To make a game equally challenging for everyone is a very difficult task.


DDO is based off a P&P roleplaying game system. In theory there is unlimited advancement (provided the DM allows so).

The more interesting question is rather: at which point will the players loose interest?

What do people do when they lose interest?

They take a break.
They play something else.
They start a new game in the same campaign setting (but different character and different stories).
They start a new game in a new campaign setting.


Regarding an MMO only options 1 & 2 are realistic. If this were not DDO but Neverwinter Nights (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neverwinter_Nights) then option 3 & 4 could be realised by the players themselves.

[Knobull]

I'm just not sure what your point is. You admittedly take advantage of like 2 percent of the game, and you're trying to discuss something that admittedly has nothing to do with you. The funny thing is that it's not clicking with you. You barely play the game and it's already easy for you. That doesn't seem to throw off alarms in your head that things are really bad for people that actually play the game at 50 percent, or the trainwreck it is for people that play it at 100 percent.

My point is that if you are finding the game too easy, then try playing higher level quests, that is all. Pretty simple, and it works.

It is easy for me because I have been playing the game for over six years and I know these quests like the back of my hand. Actually better than the back of my hand, I never look at the back of my hand. This is why I play quests higher than my level.

Now if there were new quests under level 20 available to those of us who work full time (+overtime), then that would add some challenge, and I would probably not play new content under level.

But we have not seen any new content for the non-epic game for quite some time now and I suspect we never will, because of the squeaky wheel principle.

If the idea of running higher level quests is unacceptable to you as a means of adding challenge, I have no explanation for that. I guess you are talking about something else, so I will stay out of it. Carry on. My point is made and some will understand it and obviously some will not.

[Qhualor]

My point is that if you are finding the game too easy, then try playing higher level quests, that is all. Pretty simple, and it works.

It is easy for me because I have been playing the game for over six years and I know these quests like the back of my hand. Actually better than the back of my hand, I never look at the back of my hand. This is why I play quests higher than my level.

Now if there were new quests under level 20 available to those of us who work full time (+overtime), then that would add some challenge, and I would probably not play new content under level.

But we have not seen any new content for the non-epic game for quite some time now and I suspect we never will, because of the squeaky wheel principle.

If the idea of running higher level quests is unacceptable to you as a means of adding challenge, I have no explanation for that. I guess you are talking about something else, so I will stay out of it. Carry on. My point is made and some will understand it and obviously some will not.

I get what you are saying, but it just goes to show that in order for you to find challenge you have to be under level. it falls under taking off your gear category because the intended level range on the highest difficulty is not enough of a challenge.

[Azarddoze]

My point is that if you are finding the game too easy, then try playing higher level quests, that is all. Pretty simple, and it works.

It is easy for me because I have been playing the game for over six years and I know these quests like the back of my hand. Actually better than the back of my hand, I never look at the back of my hand. This is why I play quests higher than my level.

Now if there were new quests under level 20 available to those of us who work full time (+overtime), then that would add some challenge, and I would probably not play new content under level.

But we have not seen any new content for the non-epic game for quite some time now and I suspect we never will, because of the squeaky wheel principle.

If the idea of running higher level quests is unacceptable to you as a means of adding challenge, I have no explanation for that. I guess you are talking about something else, so I will stay out of it. Carry on. My point is made and some will understand it and obviously some will not.

I do believe we all understand the point you are trying to make. Still it feels like you are not speaking as a player when you say that things are fine only if you don't follow the trail that the game is offering you. Exemple, when I TR, I do every single quests on elite until I have to skip some because I over leveled. See, your workaround doesn't work for me, at all. It's not even a question of difficullty at this point, it's about not giving up on long term fun (repeating quests) for some short term pleasure. Pretty sure that would have lead me to taking a break if I had to stop playing because of xp penalties or simply a lack of quests at higher levels.

Maybe i'm wrong about the lack of exp... I obviously never tried your way for a whole life. Would like to know the results though.

It's just a thing that you found out that suits you and your playstyle... and since it's fine for you, you think that it would be so for everyone else but nope. All those limitations and workarouds that people have to find are due to the game system being flawed.

Experience, challenge (+ end game / loot) and the grouping system are all flaws which I believe have made alot of people leave the game. And if not, people have found ways around how the game is "supposed" to be played. It's all good, creativity and being able to enjoy ourselves with what is given is cute and all but not everything will work for everyone, granted they have different gaming habits.

Edit: Imma say that I should have tried doing that here and there once in a while before. Did 3 levels above often but never more than that in heroics. Might try it out for the heck of it with a couple quests.

[Sir_Noob]

Perspective: Having the hardest game setting as the standard game setting is rather silly. Instead of "Casual, Normal, Hard & Elite" we effectively have: "Ridiculously stupidly Easy, Really Easy, Not too tough & Normal" because Elite is what the game is normally played on.


Judging your join date of 2013, unless you had changed accounts etc, and have played for a longer time. You really do not have the perspective.

Power creep inside the game, is crazy on several levels.
It has changed greatly what N/H/E is to the players base.

Back in the day, people were dieing to own end rewards from STK, Tangleroot etc.
These items were usually the most powerful stuff you could find in the game at that level.
For the most part it is vendor trash now.
Nowadays the weapons that drop in chests in harbor quests can be insanely powerful.
I remember when I first joined you would never see anything like that unless you were running level 6 or 7 content.
The same can be said about all the other equipment you pick up in the course of a toons adventuring life.

Now do a TR. If you run a life that has anything in common with the first life then things are somewhat sweet.
Not only do you have decent equipment you picked up the first time around, you now get a second chance to pick up equipment to improve upon your holdings.
Not to mention to stock away things you plan on using for future lives you may find.
The obvious benefits you gain from adding more lives to a character, improved stats to the build and bonuses from past lives.
You can see how this is going to lead to a much tougher character each time you do a TR.
Not to mention for the most part running content you now know like the back of your hand.
If you cannot be surprised by the content and are now wearing multiple lives accumulated wealth how in the heck can you expect a challenge?

At the same time there has been minor tweeks here and there of adding toughness to the adventures but it is no where comparable to the power creep available to the players base.
The settings of Normal / Hard /Elite just do not stand up to what it once was.

If anything, the call for easy buttons over the years by the players base on the forums have made things easier as well.
Mind you not in every case. There has been many wonderful things the players have clamored for that has been beneficial to the game.

I can understand how someone who has invested the time to TR multiple times even to the point of Completionist would be partial to being able to use all of their equipment.
Good god, the hours they have poured into the game says they deserve the right to be able to wear it.
I can understand how upon reaching this god like status that the game all of the sudden would lose some of its glamour.

To be honest, I do not see any problem with them adding another level of difficulty to the game.
They could easily do it. A few adjustments would be all that is needed.
The Heroic content of the new difficulty should be more of a glass cannon type of approach as no one wants to spend 45 minutes fighting trying to defend the Cannith Crystal on Korthos because the mobs have had their hp inflated beyond belief.
The Glass cannon approach would make people think about their tactics etc.
Bring more enjoyment to the game for the uber collectors.

The game has sort of a broken mechanic now spreading out the players base to cover 28 levels of content.
4 levels of difficulty and now soon possibly a 5th.
I can see it getting harder and harder to fill parties.

Sorry for the ramble.
Just felt like I needed to interject 2 cents worth.

Also please do not add favor to the new difficulty setting.

[Sehenry03]

To make a game equally challenging for everyone is a very difficult task.


DDO is based off a P&P roleplaying game system. In theory there is unlimited advancement (provided the DM allows so).

The more interesting question is rather: at which point will the players loose interest?

What do people do when they lose interest?

They take a break.
They play something else.
They start a new game in the same campaign setting (but different character and different stories).
They start a new game in a new campaign setting.


Regarding an MMO only options 1 & 2 are realistic. If this were not DDO but Neverwinter Nights (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neverwinter_Nights) then option 3 & 4 could be realised by the players themselves.

I completely agree it is a very tough thing to do with an MMO to make things hard for vets and easier for new players. The problem is that a lot (not all) of the player base feel elite should be for everyone. Elite should be soloable even by newer players so they can get favor. I'm sorry but this reasoning is what will destroy the end game we are all hoping for. How will it be end game if everyone wants everything to be achieved by any level of player? Elite at ANY level should mean a very tough challenge. I would love a slight increase to Elite every update just to help balance any power creep by players. The problem is it would take a lot of time to do but it is something they should do. Elite should always be a tough task. I don't what lives/gear you have Elite should always be a nasty quest to complete. It needs to be the same for everyone though. Elite should only be fore those that have taken the time to get the best gear or get the best TR's and build the best life to beat. Otherwise it should take a group of strong players to beat it.

Elite should be for the best geared players...period. Or a group of well geared players.

Hard should be for a group of new players working together or a single well geared player.

Normal should be for new players soloing or duoing and they can think of moving to Hard if it is a bit easy.

Casual should be for my 3 year old son.

Throw favor/rewards/whatever out the window this should be the normal. Elite should creep up as the player base gets more powerful meaning every update they buff classes then throw an increase into Elite. Yes the favor should still only go to the highest difficuilty also. Elite SHOULD get the best favor and a new player should never have as much favor as a vet. You can get both inventory bags and both bank slots by running normal/hard quests if you actually run enough quests. There are plenty of favor quests available now. If they need a little more favor they put up an LFM for it. When I wanted the bag from vale favor I put up an LFM hoping some good players would join and help me through a few elite runs and I always got help.

The point is it just needs to happen overnight and become the norm...like the champs. Turbine looks like they are taking a stand on the champs (kinda they are way weaker now then before) and they plan on keeping them. Sev stated Elite should not be ran by newer or weaker players so lets get this done. Make it Elite again.

[PermaBanned]

My point is that if you are finding the game too easy, then try playing higher level quests, that is all. Pretty simple, and it works.Your point also seems to be that if I'm playing a TR and/or in Epic levels then I'm not playing DDO and therefore you're not offering me any advice, so...

<snip>

Now if there were new quests under level 20 available to those of us who work full time (+overtime), then that would add some challenge, and I would probably not play new content under level.

But we have not seen any new content for the non-epic game for quite some time now and I suspect we never will, because of the squeaky wheel principle.How do you define "quite a while?" Stormhorns, Wheeloon Prison, Druids Deep, High Road, (maybe others im missing?) and most recently the Heart of Madness all have Heroic versions for your non-epic enjoyment.


If the idea of running higher level quests is unacceptable to you as a means of adding challenge, I have no explanation for that. I guess you are talking about something else, so I will stay out of it. Carry on. My point is made and some will understand it and obviously some will not.That's because you've intentionally restricted your point to only apply to "DDO" which - according to you - is only played by Heroic 1st life characters. /chuckles

[mobrien316]

While this is likely true for some people, it's certainly not true for all. Some of us video game players pick the "Hard" or "Insane" difficulties because we didn't want the "Easy" rofl stomp one - and we would like it if DDO had a similar option (again).

Perspective: Having the hardest game setting as the standard game setting is rather silly. Instead of "Casual, Normal, Hard & Elite" we effectively have: "Rediculously stupidly Easy, Really Easy, Not too tough & Normal" because Elite is what the game is normally played on.

I would just like it if they gave me a place to use the power they've put in the game for me to aquire - why is that so bad? Would you tell a marathon runner that if they want a "real challenge" they should tie their shoe laces together?

Elite is only normal for you because you have been playing for a while. Game knowledge is a big factor in how "easy" a quest is. It's likely safe to say that when you first started playing you were not crushing content on elite, two or three levels over your character level.

If that marathon runner was 25 years old and at the peak of his career, and he was continually running marathons against middle school kids and complaining how stupidly easy it was, I wouldn't tell him to tie his shoelaces together. I'd tell him to get tougher competition. In DDO, if you want tougher competition and you are on your fortieth life with fully upgraded Superman gear and detailed knowledge of each and every quest, it seems reasonable that you would have to adjust your play a bit.

If you were a chess player, and you were on an island with a thousand other chess players, and you could beat all of them, would it make sense to just keep beating them all while complaining how easy it was? Or would it make sense to find some challenge by handicapping yourself a knight or a rook or a queen? It would be up to you; if you want challenge, you could get it. If you just wanted to complain how easy the game was, you could do that, too.

[PermaBanned]

Judging your join date of 2013, unless you had changed accounts etc, and have played for a longer time. You really do not have the perspective.Mr.Noob, do you remember the great forum downgrade when many of us initially lost access to our account's posting privileges unless we changed the posting name? Funny story: you can actually select a name that - as it turns out - you can get permanently banned just for having as a Forum Name (send a PM if you want to know what mine was); anyway, because my Juduss (<- also name of my main character) name could no longer post I changed it to "something else" that was quickly deemed offensive. When my origonal account was permanently banned in 2013 PermaBanned was born ;)


Power creep inside the game, is crazy on several levels.
It has changed greatly what N/H/E is to the players base.And not just power creep, Bravery Bonus had a huge hand in taking Elite from something many people would just eventually come back to for Favor purposes to the becoming "the difficulty the game is normally played on."

<snip>

The settings of Normal / Hard /Elite just do not stand up to what it once was.Exactly! Power creep by itemization + Power creep by Systems changes (Scaling, P/MRR, etc...) has larelgly turned Elite into Standard, with Hard & Normal becoming "those things you do for a little more XP w/1st time bonuses."

[PermaBanned]

Elite is only normal for you because you have been playing for a while. Game knowledge is a big factor in how "easy" a quest is.So is power creep exceeding difficulty increases. I call Elite "the difficulty the game is normally played on" because when I open the LFM panel, I see *three things: Heroic Elite, Epic Elite, and Epic Normal XP/min speed runs - that's it. Epic Hard is quite rare, and Heroic Hard - honestly can't remember the last time I saw a Heroic non-Elite anything.


It's likely safe to say that when you first started playing you were not crushing content on elite, two or three levels over your character level.When I first started playing, this was a vastly different game - one where you are correct and I couldn't run new stuff on Elite. Now? When I first bought Stormhorns & Wheeloon I hit it on EE. When I got a guest pass for Druids Deep it was EE all the way. Heart of Madness? Don't own it, but when I do it'll be EE. When ToEE comes out I'll hit it EE just like I did Haunted Halls. Am I squashing quests with ease on my first run-through? No, but neither am I thinking "Oh ****! I better step out and try this again on Hard or Normal first..." It should be more like it was when Elite needed to be worked up to and not the defacto standard.


If that marathon runner was 25 years old and at the peak of his career, and he was continually running marathons against middle school kids and complaining how stupidly easy it was, I wouldn't tell him to tie his shoelaces together. I'd tell him to get tougher competition. In DDO, if you want tougher competition and you are on your fortieth life with fully upgraded Superman gear and detailed knowledge of each and every quest, it seems reasonable that you would have to adjust your play a bit.

If you were a chess player, and you were on an island with a thousand other chess players, and you could beat all of them, would it make sense to just keep beating them all while complaining how easy it was? Or would it make sense to find some challenge by handicapping yourself a knight or a rook or a queen? It would be up to you; if you want challenge, you could get it. If you just wanted to complain how easy the game was, you could do that, too.Do you equate 25 year olds running marathons against kids to playing a game on it's hardest setting? Because I'm talking about playing a game on it's hardest setting...

As for the Chess on the Island bit - we're not on an island, and this ain't about a PvP scenario where I'm better than everyone else - this is about a PvE scenario where I want a challenging environment appropriate to the power level placed at my disposal.

[Samones]

Before I put in my 2 cents to this heated debate, I want to clarify where I'm at. I'm a free-to-play account, and have been playing solo characters for a decent while. Also have played with a few static groups, mostly just my wife and I, and enjoying each. At this point, we've been finding normal to be pretty manageable, only every so often having difficulty (Tempest's Spine with 2 people is kinda fun and you tend to need tactics your first time around). So there. I have no personal knowledge of epic elite soloing and whatnot. That being said, there are some things which I think those who can breeze through ee are not quite understanding from a game developer's point of view:

1. From what I can understand, there's a very different power level, even among experienced players, depending on how long the player has been farming and whether or not he's paid for the right adventure packs and whatnot. A player (like myself, when I eventually get there) could have great knowledge of the quest, have spent many hours developing the right character build, and good equipment for his level and be just fine doing hard or even elite as it is now, though it may be a bit difficult. This is very different from the power even of someone who has paid for more quests and is in a decent (say level 75) guild and TR'd a couple times. However, they appear to both be miles behind someone who is in the highest tier of characters, in a very powerful guild, TR'd many times, and has the best gear possible for his level. Here's the main difficulty that I see from a developer's point of view: all three are pretty equal in player skill. The main difference between the three is the level of time devoted to TR'ing and farming for gear and whatnot. How do you determine which should be playing Elite and which shouldn't? Do you make Elite so insanely difficult that players who haven't devoted many many hours can't hope to do it? You could create a new difficulty (as some are saying), but then you still have the same problem with Elite, just without the top 5% or so of characters. You have to draw the line somewhere, and Turbine has done so. Maybe it's too low, maybe not (seems to be fine from where I'm sitting, but then I realize that I've already handicapped myself in a few ways, so that's not relevant for most players).

2. As far as the wanting challenges for those people who are legitimately extremely powerful, I feel it's a matter of perspective. If my solo toons get to the point where they can solo EE very easily, I'll be very proud of that fact. I would have invested a great deal of time in making the game easier, I'd have farmed the best gear I could, and I'd have spent a lot of time perfecting the build I'm using (shout out to EllisDee37 for inspiring me to make an evasion pally. My build's a bit different than yours, but I'm crediting the idea to you and am very thankful. 2 Rogue, 18 Pally, it's my favorite solo character yet.). On other games (particularly KOTOR), when I got to the point where I could kill the boss in 3 hits, it wasn't fun anymore. Until that is, my friend gave me challenges of various types. Complete the game without going above level 3. Only solo it. No weapons or armor. That sort of thing. It was a ton of fun and forced me to think differently about the game and try new builds. Sure, it's not quite the same, but it makes the game still fun when you know it so well.

So Congratulations to all of you who have mastered the game to that extent. You guys are awesome and I hope to join you at some point. Maybe Turbine will eventually come up with some way to deal with the power creep across all levels of play, but until that time, I'm just going to enjoy the content, and if it gets too easy, I'll ask my friend to give me a challenge and start all over again. Sorry this turned into an essay. Good luck to you all and have fun!

[bls904c2]

Sure make a difficulty higher than elite, but do not award more favor, xp and do not increase drop rates. Elitists want more challenge. I say give it to them, but with no extra rewards.

no i disagree they need a trophy to brag on so give them some cool looking cosmetic gear for trophy, or a token that after so many tokens they get their choice of cosmetic gear

[Gremmlynn]

responses like "stop being an elitist" and "take off your gear/stop using ship buffs" are what is ********.

if you arent going to do the things the game lets you do, why play?The problem is, the game lets you do to many things. The difference between an average build by someone who is making choices intuitively and a maxed out build by someone who is studying every detail of the game is to large. What should be giving the latter an edge of a few percentages is giving them several times the ability of the former. That's before we even add gear and meta-knowledge, both of which also create to big a gap.

[Blackheartox]

The problem is, the game lets you do to many things. The difference between an average build by someone who is making choices intuitively and a maxed out build by someone who is studying every detail of the game is to large. What should be giving the latter an edge of a few percentages is giving them several times the ability of the former. That's before we even add gear and meta-knowledge, both of which also create to big a gap.

Sadly you do not need meta knowledge or build knowledge to build a pure 2hander barb or palie to reach imortallity in game. Example, to make my main over work out as pure sorc ineed to combine many spells, know saves od mob i engage and what his weakness is. Also i need to use positioning clickies know how to use sp properly. Ineed to keep track of many things to be in top form. When i tr over to a palie or barb i dont need 12 bars i actively use but only 9 buttons. And i would complete content faster. Ddo has nothing to do with player metagaming ability or skill, but with simple capability ti read how strong they buff classes.

You dont need to be a scientist or magister to figure out how broken prr harmor palies and barbs are atm.

They change game mechanics so much in favor of wonabe good players with lack of skill that the skilled vet doesnt see a rwason to play ddo. I for example do not unterstand why such a huge biff to melles. I never had issues as melle in ee formerly. Now its just braindead autorun spam 3 cleaves 3 heals 3 boosts playstyle.

Apsolute non skill based garbage, unfun and gives no reason to improve yourself whatsoever.
I mean people can contribute kill and outperform you on such brokene builds on firstlifers easily.
And not due to skill but abuse of over the top brokemechanics.

Im pretty sure i would do better on 6 life alt as palie then on 3x alla over who is a sorc

I fat fingerd alot letters on phone so sorry bout typos, hard to edit

[PermaBanned]

The problem is, the game lets you do to many things.No, the problem is that for some reason Elite needs to be appropriate @ level to the group you first describe, leaving nothing to be worked up to. Instead, I think it should be targeted as follows:


...an average build by someone who is making choices intuitively...
Normal


...a maxed out build...
Hard


...{then we} add gear and meta-knowledge...
Elite

See how that would work? A multi-difficulty system, with different difficulties targeted to different character power & player skill demographics. Wouldn't that work better than our current system where nearly everyone plays Elite, Normal/Hard serve next to no purpose, and people who want a difficult challenge are told to gimp themselves to find it?

[PermaBanned]

Double post

[mobrien316]

It seems to me that it is a very negative way of viewing a great game, to say "When my fortieth-life, uber-geared level 28 character with massively overpowered ship buffs runs EE content for the hundredth time, I find it too easy and therefore, DDO lacks challenge."

There are many, many ways to get a challenge in this game. If you want to narrow them all down to one very specific scenario, without any deviation or adjustment, and then complain that, within those very specific parameters, DDO is lacking challenge, you are certainly free to do so. You might find there is still lots of fun and challenge to be had in the game if you looked at other ways to challenge yourself.

[BillyBlaze]

The reason I posted this thread is I'm happy that the "new players' "casual players" "permadeath players" "self imposed gimp yourself players" etc... All have a difficulty that works for you, and I do not want Turbine to ruin your fun.

But for some reason you are all extremely selfish and only care about your play style. LET ME SAY THIS AGAIN I'M HAPPY YOU ARE HAVING FUN AND THE GAME SETTING IS PERFECT FOR YOUR PLAY STYLE.

However for some reason you think that the .1 percent can only solo epic elites this couldn't be father from the truth. There is a lot of players that are really good and can easily solo epic elite that are still here. The number would go way higher if we included all the players that have left the game because it was to easy. I would say that 20 percent or more of the player base would enjoy a harder difficulty.

Please quite thinking about only yourself and understand that there is a play style by a lot of players that are really good and want a play style that works for them.

We are not elitist we just want to have fun like you.

[Vint]

It seems to me that it is a very negative way of viewing a great game, to say "When my fortieth-life, uber-geared level 28 character with massively overpowered ship buffs runs EE content for the hundredth time, I find it too easy and therefore, DDO lacks challenge."

I don’t have a dog in the fight, but I find it very negative when people refuse to run normal or hard and quit complaining because elite is not catered to them.

It is irrelevant as many of these people just like to complain.

[FestusHood]

You can frequently see people complaining that the classes which haven't yet had their pass are underperforming. If the game really is too easy, why do people worry so much about this? Wouldn't it be better to leave those classes as underperforming and then people who want more challenge can play them?

There is never going to be any amazing A.I. upgrade, so let's realize that the only way they can really make the existing content more difficult is to bump up the damage and hit points of mobs.

When they add new, higher level content, the monsters have higher cr ratings. This not only bumps up their hit points and damage, but also their saving throws and the dc's of abilities they use. Remember people complaining about the high cr ratings of monsters when epic Gianthold came out? I can't land my spells, i can't make the saves, i can't take the hits, mobs have too many hit points. Are people actually going to be happy if the game is made like that again?

Although i agree that the prr/mrr changes were probably too strong, there is no doubt that a large majority of players agreed that prior to the change, heavy armored melees were in a bad way in epic elite play.

Personally, if they are going to add difficulty, i would rather they added a new difficulty level, rather than mess around too much with the ones that already exist. People will say that, eventually, the new difficulty will end up being in the same position that elite is now. So what? It's an mmo, nothing will ever be permanent about it. You put in something that works now, and when that doesn't work anymore, you put in something else.

[FestusHood]

I don’t have a dog in the fight, but I find it very negative when people refuse to run normal or hard and quit complaining because elite is not catered to them.

It is irrelevant as many of these people just like to complain.

Weren't you one of the folks who were quite disturbed about them fixing the stat to damage aspect of single weapon fighting? How can they hope to make any challenge in the game when even fixing things that are actually broken causes distress?

[Blackheartox]

The reason I posted this thread is I'm happy that the "new players' "casual players" "permadeath players" "self imposed gimp yourself players" etc... All have a difficulty that works for you, and I do not want Turbine to ruin your fun.

But for some reason you are all extremely selfish and only care about your play style. LET ME SAY THIS AGAIN I'M HAPPY YOU ARE HAVING FUN AND THE GAME SETTING IS PERFECT FOR YOUR PLAY STYLE.

However for some reason you think that the .1 percent can only solo epic elites this couldn't be father from the truth. There is a lot of players that are really good and can easily solo epic elite that are still here. The number would go way higher if we included all the players that have left the game because it was to easy. I would say that 20 percent or more of the player base would enjoy a harder difficulty.

Please quite thinking about only yourself and understand that there is a play style by a lot of players that are really good and want a play style that works for them.

We are not elitist we just want to have fun like you.



Let me give you a advice, you are wasting your time.
Find a better game, chill and hope that they make something this year.


When those players that think ddo should be easy braindead ee zergfest realize that all the good players moved on and there is not enoigh funding left to keep ddo alive. They will know how much wrong they did with their selfishnes.
I never got their way of thinking.
We dont want to get in their way of playing, we just want ee to be truth to its name, but they dont want us to have fun.
Why? You are a victim if you are good at this game, and their solution is pay less play less gimp yourself.

I have done that and only thing that came out of that is that even alts get strong.
I cannot gimp my intelligence and skills forever and punish myself by playing idioticaly to have fun i this game.

Champs the firsrt few days were good. But they got the supernerfbat in speedrecord

[FestusHood]

Let me give you a advice, you are wasting your time.
Find a better game, chill and hope that they make something this year.


When those players that think ddo should be easy braindead ee zergfest realize that all the good players moved on and there is not enoigh funding left to keep ddo alive. They will know how much wrong they did with their selfishnes.
I never got their way of thinking.
We dont want to get in their way of playing, we just want ee to be truth to its name, but they dont want us to have fun.
Why? You are a victim if you are good at this game, and their solution is pay less play less gimp yourself.

I have done that and only thing that came out of that is that even alts get strong.
I cannot gimp my intelligence and skills forever and punish myself by playing idioticaly to have fun i this game.

Champs the firsrt few days were good. But they got the supernerfbat in speedrecord

One thing needs to be diagnosed, and i don't know the answer.

For whatever reason, the release of MOTU caused an accelerated decline in the game population. What was it exactly that caused this? One thing it definitely was NOT, is the overall game difficulty. When the tiered epic system was introduced, i don't remember very many people complaining that epic elite at the time was too easy. Many people still left the game, so it was something else.

My feeling is that many old timers couldn't deal with the game going off the d20 system for combat. Never mind that the d20 system at the time wasn't even close to working, they viewed it as too big a change that went too far afield from core pen and paper.

[Azarddoze]

One thing needs to be diagnosed, and i don't know the answer.

For whatever reason, the release of MOTU caused an accelerated decline in the game population. What was it exactly that caused this? One thing it definitely was NOT, is the overall game difficulty. When the tiered epic system was introduced, i don't remember very many people complaining that epic elite at the time was too easy. Many people still left the game, so it was something else.

My feeling is that many old timers couldn't deal with the game going off the d20 system for combat. Never mind that the d20 system at the time wasn't even close to working, they viewed it as too big a change that went too far afield from core pen and paper.

Money wall
Group breaker
Horrible grind that were the EDs
EDs = re-learning process - another wall
How much the "feel" of the game / gameplay changes in epic levels
Items being invalidated quickly
Forgotten Realms
etc...

Could even just be "a reason to move on".

At that precise moment, I don't think that difficulty factored much.

[moo_cow]

The reason that most EE runs became snooze fest is PRR/MRR update.

Do you remember EE runs before PRR/MRR update?
It required some team work and tactical decisions, because mobs can kill you very easily unless the group has those.

Now, you can just collect mobs then push some button for AOE attacks, job's done.
High PRR/MRR, hp, saves makes this game too easy.

Is there any challenges for EE now?

No it was still easy.

[Blackheartox]

One thing needs to be diagnosed, and i don't know the answer.

For whatever reason, the release of MOTU caused an accelerated decline in the game population. What was it exactly that caused this? One thing it definitely was NOT, is the overall game difficulty. When the tiered epic system was introduced, i don't remember very many people complaining that epic elite at the time was too easy. Many people still left the game, so it was something else.

My feeling is that many old timers couldn't deal with the game going off the d20 system for combat. Never mind that the d20 system at the time wasn't even close to working, they viewed it as too big a change that went too far afield from core pen and paper.

As a old time player /join date wrong/ il say thar it was prolly the total overhaul of the whole mechanics, the countless bugs that came with motu and total and utter destruction of most build concepts. For a vet the game literally fell apart.

Also we can include a moneywashing horrible ammount of drow content followed with one of worst raids ever created in existence of ddo til thar point. I was on break for rl then but if i was playing during that mess i doubt i would had played myself

[Gremmlynn]

The reason I posted this thread is I'm happy that the "new players' "casual players" "permadeath players" "self imposed gimp yourself players" etc... All have a difficulty that works for you, and I do not want Turbine to ruin your fun.

But for some reason you are all extremely selfish and only care about your play style. LET ME SAY THIS AGAIN I'M HAPPY YOU ARE HAVING FUN AND THE GAME SETTING IS PERFECT FOR YOUR PLAY STYLE.

However for some reason you think that the .1 percent can only solo epic elites this couldn't be father from the truth. There is a lot of players that are really good and can easily solo epic elite that are still here. The number would go way higher if we included all the players that have left the game because it was to easy. I would say that 20 percent or more of the player base would enjoy a harder difficulty.

Please quite thinking about only yourself and understand that there is a play style by a lot of players that are really good and want a play style that works for them.

We are not elitist we just want to have fun like you.If they add that new difficulty and this group masters it though meta-gaming and the rewards that many insist it would need to have to make it even worth playing, what then? Add another new more difficult difficulty?

It's not about people being selfish, it's about them being realistic. The closest the game could come to what you want is to make a difficulty that forces "gimping" by not rewarding players with more power by playing it and even then, once they figure out how to beat it reliably, it loses a lot of that difficulty.

[Azarddoze]

If they add that new difficulty and this group masters it though meta-gaming and the rewards that many insist it would need to have to make it even worth playing, what then? Add another new more difficult difficulty?

It's not about people being selfish, it's about them being realistic. The closest the game could come to what you want is to make a difficulty that forces "gimping" by not rewarding players with more power by playing it and even then, once they figure out how to beat it reliably, it loses a lot of that difficulty.

It is also realistic to observe a trend that has been going on for months. I'm pretty sure it's safe to say that we understand what kind of challenge the game can offer and what could be "acceptable" difficulty wise vs what is not a.k.a. the current state.

[Qhualor]

One thing needs to be diagnosed, and i don't know the answer.

For whatever reason, the release of MOTU caused an accelerated decline in the game population. What was it exactly that caused this? One thing it definitely was NOT, is the overall game difficulty. When the tiered epic system was introduced, i don't remember very many people complaining that epic elite at the time was too easy. Many people still left the game, so it was something else.

My feeling is that many old timers couldn't deal with the game going off the d20 system for combat. Never mind that the d20 system at the time wasn't even close to working, they viewed it as too big a change that went too far afield from core pen and paper.

what started it was the big todo that VIPs had to pay for an expansion. for the most part MOTU was received well when announced talking about what we were to expect to see and I knew many people who months before were preparing for a bigger challenge by grinding for past lives. that was the whole reason why I started my TR train. after the first few weeks getting my ass handed to me I thought more relevant past lives and making my characters all 36 point builds would help.

than came the off destiny grinding that make no sense even today. I still consider it the worst grind in the game.

some of the quests were considered short and sweet and MOTU didn't feel like an actual expansion. some people felt they over paid even if they pre-paid for a discount price with goodies.

I think those were the biggest reasons for the start of the decline.

[Vint]

Weren't you one of the folks who were quite disturbed about them fixing the stat to damage aspect of single weapon fighting? How can they hope to make any challenge in the game when even fixing things that are actually broken causes distress?

Was note me mate. You don’t need that or druids or other “cheat builds” or “shady” tactics to compete in EE. I can give you a list of many builds that either I or channel/friends use to solo EE.

In general I am sick of people complaining to nerf this and nerf that. IMHO there are many things that are driving players away from this game that turbine should focus their attention on. Being butt hurt because someone else leads the kill count is hardly a game breaking issue. I am convinced that the people who complain about this simply enjoy to complain.

[PermaBanned]

One thing needs to be diagnosed, and i don't know the answer.

For whatever reason, the release of MOTU caused an accelerated decline in the game population. What was it exactly that caused this? One thing it definitely was NOT, is the overall game difficulty. When the tiered epic system was introduced, i don't remember very many people complaining that epic elite at the time was too easy. Many people still left the game, so it was something else.

My feeling is that many old timers couldn't deal with the game going off the d20 system for combat. Never mind that the d20 system at the time wasn't even close to working, they viewed it as too big a change that went too far afield from core pen and paper.

MotU brought with it a lot of straws that individually may not have been too bad but collectively they broke a lot of backs. The game took a sharp left turn, where many players would've preferred to continue forward - and as the game's new direction became clearer more and more folks either didn't like the destination they saw ahead, or what they'd have to do to get there, or both. Some of us have been content to chill here until the next cool D&Dish game arrives, many couldn't stomach the ever growing divide between what this game was (Pre-MotU) and what it was becoming (post-MotU).

If you really want to know why so many folks were chased off, look up posts from players you remember but haven't seen in ages and look at what they didn't review favorably, what they warned would drive away existing players, and what updates ~coincided with their disappearances. The patterns are there for those wanting to find & willing to see them.

[Sir_Noob]

Mr.Noob, do you remember the great forum downgrade when many of us initially lost access to our account's posting privileges unless we changed the posting name? Funny story: you can actually select a name that - as it turns out - you can get permanently banned just for having as a Forum Name (send a PM if you want to know what mine was); anyway, because my Juduss (<- also name of my main character) name could no longer post I changed it to "something else" that was quickly deemed offensive. When my origonal account was permanently banned in 2013 PermaBanned was born ;)
And not just power creep, Bravery Bonus had a huge hand in taking Elite from something many people would just eventually come back to for Favor purposes to the becoming "the difficulty the game is normally played on."
<snip>
Exactly! Power creep by itemization + Power creep by Systems changes (Scaling, P/MRR, etc...) has largely turned Elite into Standard, with Hard & Normal becoming "those things you do for a little more XP w/1st time bonuses."

Hey PermaBanned. Hope you did not take offense, I tried to make sure I worded things so no offense would be taken. None was meant.

I have seen some arguments by a number of recent joining dates that makes me wonder all the time if they truly know how the game has changed over the years.
Heck, I have some friends who are now only occasional players who regale me in tales often of what it was like in the level 10 was the top level days etc.
Unfortunately decisions made about the game usually are not worried about the historic perspective.
It is more of what happens if we tweak the current format and will it improve what we have as a game now.

Anyway, discussion is good. Hopefully these threads provide the devs with the seeds of good ideas that can improve the game for most of the players base if not all.

Cheers!

[FestusHood]

Also we can include a moneywashing horrible ammount of drow content followed with one of worst raids ever created in existence of ddo til thar point. I was on break for rl then but if i was playing during that mess i doubt i would had played myself

I really like the drow stuff. I personally think the MOTU stuff is pretty good content.

About the raid. I asked my guild leader a while back about the possibility of running the Abbot raid with our group. I have never personally run this raid. His response was that Abbott, along with the Titan raid, are absolutely horrible raids mechanically. I have heard many other people say the same thing. I have not run them myself.

I actually enjoy Caught in the Web. Once people know what they are doing. From what i have heard, the Abbott raid is easy to fail even after you know what you are doing. Failing is not as popular as some people think it is.

One of the arguments people make about overall game difficulty is that there is no realistic chance to fail. The reason people make their characters stronger is so that they won't fail. If they actually make the game so hard that even players that have literally done everything they can to not fail are still failing, i don't think that would go over well for most of the population.

Now if they added some sort of extreme difficulty setting to the game where the description of the difficulty was "you will fail this almost every time", then that would be fine.

As far as self gimping to find challenge, i find it ironic that some of the people who say this is an inane idea would be perfectly ok with the devs doing it for them (i.e. nerfing).

[Gremmlynn]

It is also realistic to observe a trend that has been going on for months. I'm pretty sure it's safe to say that we understand what kind of challenge the game can offer and what could be "acceptable" difficulty wise vs what is not a.k.a. the current state.Okay, I'll bite. What would make it acceptable?

[PermaBanned]

Hey PermaBanned. Hope you did not take offense, I tried to make sure I worded things so no offense would be taken. None was meant.

I have seen some arguments by a number of recent joining dates that makes me wonder all the time if they truly know how the game has changed over the years.
Heck, I have some friends who are now only occasional players who regale me in tales often of what it was like in the level 10 was the top level days etc.
Unfortunately decisions made about the game usually are not worried about the historic perspective.
It is more of what happens if we tweak the current format and will it improve what we have as a game now.

Anyway, discussion is good. Hopefully these threads provide the devs with the seeds of good ideas that can improve the game for most of the players base if not all.

Cheers!
Nope, no offense taken :D I just never judge anything by join date because of 1) folks like me, 2) folks that have sock-puppets, and 3) I've seen some '06ers that are... um... yeah, best left unsaid what I was about to say there...

[FestusHood]

Was note me mate. You don’t need that or druids or other “cheat builds” or “shady” tactics to compete in EE. I can give you a list of many builds that either I or channel/friends use to solo EE.

In general I am sick of people complaining to nerf this and nerf that. IMHO there are many things that are driving players away from this game that turbine should focus their attention on. Being butt hurt because someone else leads the kill count is hardly a game breaking issue. I am convinced that the people who complain about this simply enjoy to complain.

So what is the solution? People doing too much dps is part of the reason they are saying the game is too easy. If you are against nerfing of any kind, then yes, the only answer is to give the mobs even more hit points, and there are plenty of people who hate that.

The defensive stuff is another part. The problem is balancing this for a game where some character types get hit all the time and others rarely get hit at all. Not easy to do.

[PermaBanned]

So what is the solution? People doing too much dps is part of the reason they are saying the game is too easy. If you are against nerfing of any kind, then yes, the only answer is to give the mobs even more hit points, and there are plenty of people who hate that.

The defensive stuff is another part. The problem is balancing this for a game where some character types get hit all the time and others rarely get hit at all. Not easy to do.

Especially when the multiple difficulty selections aren't an acceptable part of the balancing mechanism ^^

[FestusHood]

MotU brought with it a lot of straws that individually may not have been too bad but collectively they broke a lot of backs. The game took a sharp left turn, where many players would've preferred to continue forward - and as the game's new direction became clearer more and more folks either didn't like the destination they saw ahead, or what they'd have to do to get there, or both. Some of us have been content to chill here until the next cool D&Dish game arrives, many couldn't stomach the ever growing divide between what this game was (Pre-MotU) and what it was becoming (post-MotU).

If you really want to know why so many folks were chased off, look up posts from players you remember but haven't seen in ages and look at what they didn't review favorably, what they warned would drive away existing players, and what updates ~coincided with their disappearances. The patterns are there for those wanting to find & willing to see them.

You mention chilling here until the next cool D&Dish game comes. That would be a difference between you and me. If an argument comes down to what system makes THIS game works better vs. what is more faithful to the pnp source material, i will take the former every time.

If i was really hung up on the similarity to pen and paper thing, i really could never have played this game. I played second edition, and 3.5 was already too far removed for me to consider it the same game. Fortunately, i don't sweat all that lore stuff, i'm just looking for a fun game to play.

[Vint]

So what is the solution? People doing too much dps is part of the reason they are saying the game is too easy. If you are against nerfing of any kind, then yes, the only answer is to give the mobs even more hit points, and there are plenty of people who hate that.

The defensive stuff is another part. The problem is balancing this for a game where some character types get hit all the time and others rarely get hit at all. Not easy to do.

Balance is gone in this game and has been since Motu. If you want to achieve balance in this game then you will need to get rid of:

The easy ability to self-heal.
Get rid of Multi classing. People can splash the best of everything to making an uber build.
Get rid of ED’s. People will have an unfair advantage with maxed destinies compared to someone without a point spent anywhere.

There are a few other things, but I highly doubt we will see these things removed. There will always be someone else out there that has more hp, more sp, better saves, PRR, game knowledge, twitch skill and anything else.

Sadly I don’t believe people will come back to the game who have been run off and people complaining that they want balance will never see it so they should just accept the game for what it is before the crybabies have their way and drive away even more players.

[Azarddoze]

Okay, I'll bite. What would make it acceptable?

Something in between old epics which had complete immunities (I understand this can be not so fun) and what we have today. I would would prefer closer to the former but whatever would be better than now.

We all know what kind of mechanics the game can deliver: mobs with huge HP pool, high saves and damage, the design of the encounter (kind of mobs, the location, etc) and perhaps some puzzle-ish stuff. That on top of some unique mecanics when it comes to raids. Can't they just make a good mix up that ends up being challenging according to the items and buffs THEY DECIDED to put in the game.

They added so much power available from so many different sources without rebalancing the difficulty that I don't see how someone cannot see how much it has changed and why it could be not so fun and unacceptable for others. It's like basic maths + understanding that some people like a higher challenge than we perhaps do.

[FestusHood]

Especially when the multiple difficulty selections aren't an acceptable part of the balancing mechanism ^^

For the most part, the difference isn't in the quests, it's in the power of the characters. Going back now and altering all the existing game difficulties to match this is essentially the same thing as going back and nerfing all the character power back down to what it was five years ago, or whatever people have decided was the time when the game was hard. It's totally relative.

Rather than do either of those, just put in a new difficulty setting to match the new power that characters have.

If you were to take a static game that people have beaten, and try to make it hard enough so that those players are challenged by it, how are new players supposed to play it?

[PermaBanned]

You mention chilling here until the next cool D&Dish game comes. That would be a difference between you and me. If an argument comes down to what system makes THIS game works better vs. what is more faithful to the pnp source material, i will take the former every time.

If i was really hung up on the similarity to pen and paper thing, i really could never have played this game. I played second edition, and 3.5 was already too far removed for me to consider it the same game. Fortunately, i don't sweat all that lore stuff, i'm just looking for a fun game to play.
We come from ~the same PnP background it sounds like :)

I came in expecting a level of divergence from PnP. I mean, going from turn-based to live action pretty much necessitates some allowances to be made. That said, the treatment Epic levels received with Epic Destinies, the Enhancement revamp, the constantly fluctuating loot philosophies, the constant introduction of {what I consider to be} "compensatory" systems like PRR then the reworked PRR + MRR, Melee + soon Ranged power... D&D is way back their barely recognizable in the rear view mirror.

Also, the post you replied to was mostly about the folks {I know} that have left, and not the folks like you who've {happily?} stayed...

[FestusHood]

Balance is gone in this game and has been since Motu. If you want to achieve balance in this game then you will need to get rid of:

The easy ability to self-heal.
Get rid of Multi classing. People can splash the best of everything to making an uber build.
Get rid of ED’s. People will have an unfair advantage with maxed destinies compared to someone without a point spent anywhere.

There are a few other things, but I highly doubt we will see these things removed. There will always be someone else out there that has more hp, more sp, better saves, PRR, game knowledge, twitch skill and anything else.

Sadly I don’t believe people will come back to the game who have been run off and people complaining that they want balance will never see it so they should just accept the game for what it is before the crybabies have their way and drive away even more players.

Every one of those things that you mention there can be done voluntarily by players. Again, i find it hard to have sympathy for people who aren't willing to do things themselves, but are perfectly happy to have the game force it on them. The first way affects only them, the second affects everybody, even those who don't want it.

[PermaBanned]

If you were to take a static game that people have beaten, and try to make it hard enough so that those players are challenged by it, how are new players supposed to play it?By not starting out on the Hard or Even Harder (<- aka Elite) difficulties?

[Vint]

Every one of those things that you mention there can be done voluntarily by players. Again, i find it hard to have sympathy for people who aren't willing to do things themselves, but are perfectly happy to have the game force it on them. The first way affects only them, the second affects everybody, even those who don't want it.

Well I will not argue with you, but it is a two way street. People who claim this game is too hard can easily run normal or hard.

Time for the Super bowl, have a good night.

[Gremmlynn]

Something in between old epics which had complete immunities (I understand this can be not so fun) and what we have today. I would would prefer closer to the former but whatever would be better than now.

We all know what kind of mechanics the game can deliver: mobs with huge HP pool, high saves and damage, the design of the encounter (kind of mobs, the location, etc) and perhaps some puzzle-ish stuff. That on top of some unique mecanics when it comes to raids. Can't they just make a good mix up that ends up being challenging according to the items and buffs THEY DECIDED to put in the game.

They added so much power available from so many different sources without rebalancing the difficulty that I don't see how someone cannot see how much it has changed and why it could be not so fun and unacceptable for others. It's like basic maths + understanding that some people like a higher challenge than we perhaps do.One problem with that is old epics were end game and new epics are mid game, or developmental content. The game really doesn't currently have an end game. A better comparison would be between what heroic elite, then just "elite", was and what epic elite now is as they both serve the same purpose in the game. Frankly, I find EE much more challenging at level than pre-MOTU elite was.

Better to ask them to actually develop some sort of end game than to treat the content we play to get end game ready to be end game IMO.

[HAL]

We are at a breaking point between the huge gap of players skill levels.

I'm glad the bad players have a difficulty level that works for them. I would like a difficulty level that works for the experienced players who want a challenge. Epic elite has become a snooze fest for experienced players and they do not even notice the difference between champions and non champions.

Please make a difficulty that challenges experienced players and doesn't punish the bad players who think they are entitled to epic elite.

The problem is that you have made a statement that only talks about extremes. There are a huge range of players between the inexperienced (since I won't follow your example of being insulting) and the uber player and only Turbine knows how many are at any given level of playing ability. My static groups are experienced but since we don't grind we find EE to be plenty of challenge.

And every game ends up being "beaten". Players who still want to play the game make another character.

[Azarddoze]

One problem with that is old epics were end game and new epics are mid game, or developmental content. The game really doesn't currently have an end game. A better comparison would be between what heroic elite, then just "elite", was and what epic elite now is as they both serve the same purpose in the game. Frankly, I find EE much more challenging at level than pre-MOTU elite was.

Better to ask them to actually develop some sort of end game than to treat the content we play to get end game ready to be end game IMO.

End game or not, the difficulty can be challenging according to the difficulty since there are 4 of them. End game is usually harder only because it's new (and mobs have higher CL) and you don't have the new shinies it drops that would make it as easy as the rest (always in relation to the difficulty chosen). End game is usually harder just because it's the current hardest quests and doesn't really have to be separated to the rest when it comes to balance as it will end up easier as we progress.

So elite could be hard from begining to end of your journey. A re-balance of difficulties to a ratio that is close to what we used to have according to the new available power is what I would like to see.

[Connman]

When the loot guys make a bunch of uber loot.

And the content guys don't make quests that factor in people acquiring the new uber loots you get power creep.

And that leads to people being "all dressed up with nowhere to go."

This whole argument that only "triple-completionists" are asking for more challenge, and that everyone else is on their first life is fallacious at best.

If you don't have time to tr, at least twice because of "x" then you don't have time to play the game at all, because honestly it takes just as long to run high level quests as it does to run low level quests.

The whole find your own challenge argument, well you know where I keep looking for challenge, my wallet, and the ddo store. As soon as I can buy some challenge, I.E. content packs suited to the power level that has been handed out, I will quit looking.

As far as the "player gap"

Player skills > good build / good items

I can take one of those Iconic builds, tell that Elminster guy "Hey I have heard enough of your long winded speeches already just make me level 15" and absolutely go crush content, that some "new player" would have no chance in succeeding in by doing the exact same thing with the exact same toon. On that same note, I am sure that at least half of the people that play this game could go crush content that I couldn't, with the same toon. I consider myself average.

Unless of course that "new player" came from a game like "call of duty" where the AI is a guy with a $200 keyboard, a case of Mountain Dew, and a strong desire to "kill all noobs," yeah that guy will be fine.

[mobrien316]

If they add that new difficulty and this group masters it though meta-gaming and the rewards that many insist it would need to have to make it even worth playing, what then? Add another new more difficult difficulty?

It's not about people being selfish, it's about them being realistic. The closest the game could come to what you want is to make a difficulty that forces "gimping" by not rewarding players with more power by playing it and even then, once they figure out how to beat it reliably, it loses a lot of that difficulty.

I tend to agree with this. If a new "mythic" level is created that is truly difficult, even for the uber players, there might very well be a tiny percentage of people who enjoy that. Most people will scream to Turbine that it's too hard and they need to nerf it or boost everyone's power even more so they can cruise through "mythic" on auto-attack while drinking a cup of coffee and hardly paying attention.

And even the people who want challenge, how much challenge do they want? If mythic includes dead magic areas where your melee character's gear all becomes nonmagical, and where your spell casters can't do anything but swing their (now nothing more than masterwork) scepter or staff, while the mobs they face hit hard enough to one-shot your 1800-HP paladin on a crit, are you going to find that truly challenging? Or do you want quests a tick harder that current EE, that you can still crush with minimal effort, but perhaps get a bit more favor or XP or upgraded gear out of?

[PermaBanned]

I tend to agree with this. If a new "mythic" level is created that is truly difficult, even for the uber players, there might very well be a tiny percentage of people who enjoy that. Most people will scream to Turbine that it's too hard and they need to nerf it or boost everyone's power even more so they can cruise through "mythic" on auto-attack while drinking a cup of coffee and hardly paying attention.Assuming this is about a 5th difficulty, Turbine should tell those "nerf it please" folks that they have 80% of the game tailored to them, and the people who want a difficult challenge should be able to have it.


And even the people who want challenge, how much challenge do they want? If mythic includes dead magic areas where your melee character's gear all becomes nonmagical, and where your spell casters can't do anything but swing their (now nothing more than masterwork) scepter or staff, while the mobs they face hit hard enough to one-shot your 1800-HP paladin on a crit, are you going to find that truly challenging? Or do you want quests a tick harder that current EE, that you can still crush with minimal effort, but perhaps get a bit more favor or XP or upgraded gear out of?This is exactly why I think the Favor should be the same, the XP should be the same - or if it must be higher, then only nominally so - the vendor loot should be a little better, but name loot should be the same with perhaps slightly better odds of acquisition, and the only unique loot (if such must exist) is difficulty exclusive cosmetics.

Let the people who want a challenge suited to the full power the game offers have it, and don't let it be a source of yet more power or an efficient source of advancement. Done.

[HAL]

When the loot guys make a bunch of uber loot.

And the content guys don't make quests that factor in people acquiring the new uber loots you get power creep.

And that leads to people being "all dressed up with nowhere to go."

What you are describing is players who grind new content until they acquire all loot they desire for their character(s). Not every player grinds content to acquire the new uber loot. When DDO adds new content, my static groups play it one time. If we get named loot, great. If not, we live with (out) it. If content were constantly made more difficult as though every character was gaining all named loot, that would not reflect character power any more than not increasing difficulty at all.


This whole argument that only "triple-completionists" are asking for more challenge, and that everyone else is on their first life is fallacious at best.

I don't remember even seeing this specific "argument" so I don't know that it is very prevalent. However, it is definitely an uber player that doesn't find any challenge in EE content.


If you don't have time to tr, at least twice because of "x" then you don't have time to play the game at all, because honestly it takes just as long to run high level quests as it does to run low level quests.

Who said they didn't have time to TR? What if people simply don't want to? What if people prefer alts? What if people level slowly because they play with more than one group? Look at my start date: I have only TRd one character who is only level 13. I have played a lot of MMOs and I have grown to like alts - I have 12 characters on one server. Why not TR my character 12 times? Because when I think of a type of character I want to play I make that character. Most of my playing is with a static group so I can't just TR my character(s) whenever I feel like it.


The whole find your own challenge argument, well you know where I keep looking for challenge, my wallet, and the ddo store. As soon as I can buy some challenge, I.E. content packs suited to the power level that has been handed out, I will quit looking.

The reason that people suggest to find your own challenge is because in any game there comes a time that a person "beats" the game. Most games don't increase the difficulty of existing content over time. So once a person beats the game they can either start a new character or find challenge in a different way. I think that Turbine made a mistake by introducing True Reincarnation to DDO. Without it we would have one less level of power creep and DDO players wouldn't expect the content to change with their rising power level.


As far as the "player gap"

Player skills > good build / good items

I can take one of those Iconic builds, tell that Elminster guy "Hey I have heard enough of your long winded speeches already just make me level 15" and absolutely go crush content, that some "new player" would have no chance in succeeding in by doing the exact same thing with the exact same toon. On that same note, I am sure that at least half of the people that play this game could go crush content that I couldn't, with the same toon. I consider myself average.

Its all just tools. Skill, build, gear, knowledge - they're all tools to play the game.

[Connman]

What you are describing is players who grind new content until they acquire all loot they desire for their character(s). Not every player grinds content to acquire the new uber loot. When DDO adds new content, my static groups play it one time. If we get named loot, great. If not, we live with (out) it. If content were constantly made more difficult as though every character was gaining all named loot, that would not reflect character power any more than not increasing difficulty at all.

New content should take into account the gear introduced into the game in the last content update. This new content should entice players to go get at least some of the said gear to accomplish the task set out in the new content.


I don't remember even seeing this specific "argument" so I don't know that it is very prevalent. However, it is definitely an uber player that doesn't find any challenge in EE content.

Read every post in the thread


Who said they didn't have time to TR? What if people simply don't want to? What if people prefer alts? What if people level slowly because they play with more than one group? Look at my start date: I have only TRd one character who is only level 13. I have played a lot of MMOs and I have grown to like alts - I have 12 characters on one server. Why not TR my character 12 times? Because when I think of a type of character I want to play I make that character. Most of my playing is with a static group so I can't just TR my character(s) whenever I feel like it.

Read every post in the thread


The reason that people suggest to find your own challenge is because in any game there comes a time that a person "beats" the game. Most games don't increase the difficulty of existing content over time. So once a person beats the game they can either start a new character or find challenge in a different way. I think that Turbine made a mistake by introducing True Reincarnation to DDO. Without it we would have one less level of power creep and DDO players wouldn't expect the content to change with their rising power level.

Most games are not MMO's, Most games do not increase the character power available all the time. People suggest to find your own challenge because they are deathly afraid they will not be able to collect the absolute best gear while alt tabbing to post on forums (my lumping every single person that says "find your own challenge" into the same arbitrary group is no more valid when you did it, I just assumed every person that said that had there own reasons, respect them for them and hope they can articulate them in a way I can understand.)


Its all just tools. Skill, build, gear, knowledge - they're all tools to play the game.

Well if you are going to go this far with the "tools" so are finger, eyes, ears, top of the line video cards, T-1 Connections, Power outlets...

[Blackheartox]

I really like the drow stuff. I personally think the MOTU stuff is pretty good content.

About the raid. I asked my guild leader a while back about the possibility of running the Abbot raid with our group. I have never personally run this raid. His response was that Abbott, along with the Titan raid, are absolutely horrible raids mechanically. I have heard many other people say the same thing. I have not run them myself.

I actually enjoy Caught in the Web. Once people know what they are doing. From what i have heard, the Abbott raid is easy to fail even after you know what you are doing. Failing is not as popular as some people think it is.

One of the arguments people make about overall game difficulty is that there is no realistic chance to fail. The reason people make their characters stronger is so that they won't fail. If they actually make the game so hard that even players that have literally done everything they can to not fail are still failing, i don't think that would go over well for most of the population.

Now if they added some sort of extreme difficulty setting to the game where the description of the difficulty was "you will fail this almost every time", then that would be fine.

As far as self gimping to find challenge, i find it ironic that some of the people who say this is an inane idea would be perfectly ok with the devs doing it for them (i.e. nerfing).

It is kinda funny.
I for example love titans and abbot and the fail mechanixs in it.
Those raids consist of skill and knowledge and even then there is a fail chance. It is not high nowadays.

Back in the day if you linked 3 items from abbot people would droll over you
And it felt freaking amazin to get named loot.
I can still remember every epic abbot run and the fun i had when i hover over my items.
Same for titans. What about mark or fot or citw?

Nothing beside that i wasted bypaases.

I still remember the rage when i looted my kyoshos.
I literally was all shaking and did a joy dance after it went into my inv.
Content was more fun and simple loot pieces made you happy.
And you still did those raids because they were fun and game wa being managed properlly.


Nowadays nothing feels like a achivment.
There is no reason to bother with anything and game is stoicly boring conpared to old days.

I mean cmon we have freaking dps palies and bards and selfhealing fkn barbs.
If that isnt proof how much went wrong, what is?

And armor up was horri****ind bad idea that gave us blanket immunity and monk splashinf before that wad easy button.
They entirelly kill class roles and are to slow to ballance stuff.
They dont buff nor nerf properlly.

Example what reason is there nowadays to play a melle ranger beaide flavor and fun?
They dont work fast enough and when they do they listen to weekendd players and not vets

Made on phone so many typos cause i fat finger alot

[the_one_dwarfforged]

You can frequently see people complaining that the classes which haven't yet had their pass are underperforming. If the game really is too easy, why do people worry so much about this? Wouldn't it be better to leave those classes as underperforming and then people who want more challenge can play them?

this is why i have made peace with pallies bards and barbs being so obviously broken.

on the other hand, its still annoying as hell to listen to people talk about how high their hp is, what dmg they critted for, how they are so uber when i look at their icon and know its 90% or more the class they are playing.

also there really isnt much to do that provides any challenge to any build at 28. cant play quests 10 levels above my level then, because there arent any...