Inquisitive Nerf

[MistaMagic]

Well to all you people screaming for it please note that the powers that be have granted your wish as it will be happening in U45 which should be available next week on Lam

[janave]

Inquisitive is not a class, but a universal tree, nothing should stop Alchemist to train Inquisitive, both excellent being Int based ( so far as I recall). I actually expect Alchy splashes on Inqys to dominate the next few updates. Or maybe AlchyMechs :P. AlchyArties.

Any INT based ranged could conceptually overperform using Alchy and Inqy.

[Garix]

Well to all you people screaming for it please note that the powers that be have granted your wish as it will be happening in U45 which should be available next week on Lam

Source? If it's a video can we just get a quick synopsis.

Thanks

[MistaMagic]

Source? If it's a video can we just get a quick synopsis.

Thanks

Steelstar at end https://www.facebook.com/DDOUnlimited/videos/800384120435512/

[Veltamore]

NOOOOOOOO I just start using inqs let me have some fun for awhile first lol.

[Paladin_of_Power]

So when does sorcerer get nerves.

boom boom boom and the room is empty

[janave]

So when does sorcerer get nerves.

boom boom boom and the room is empty

When it becomes a universal tree and we can use it on top of other classes ? :)

Actually a Sorcerer uni tree sounds fun. Lets call it... "Sorcery"!

[Paladin_of_Power]

When it becomes a universal tree and we can use it on top of other classes ? :)

Actually a Sorcerer uni tree sounds fun. Lets call it... "Sorcery"!

Strange I don't recall warlock being a universal tree

[goldgolem]

SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: oh whats that? the new class is ready?
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP

[Aelonwy]

SSG: Its not OP
SSG: oh whats that? the new class is ready?
SSG: Its OP


Yeah, this was called out months ago... its not like they are subtle about it or anything.

[shores11]

This was a long time coming and many players appreciate this balance adjustment. Inquisitives are just overwhelm to powerful.

[janave]

Inquisitive ( the enhancement tree itself and alone) is not largely over performing, we can use it on any valid MC build and it is just 41 AP, its real power, yet it should not be compared with a class directly because it is not a class .

Inquisitive should be matched against Harper/Falconry/Vistani. Universal tree is a completely separate layer on top of classes, but in DDO's forum pvp this is rarely considered. :P

[Swimms]

whew, glad I got all my racials done, now I just need to bang out my last two primal EPLs in the next week or so, switch to sorc to finish arcane PLs and wait for Alchemist.

[Mindos]

If it's a video can we just get a quick synopsis.


/videos/ (https://www.facebook.com/DDOUnlimited/videos/800384120435512/)

I thought this was funny. Not picking on anyone.

[janave]

INQUISITIVE T5 @ 1AP => Optimistic: +2 Damage Dice with Law on your Side. +10 Ranged Power, +30% Alacrity with non-Repeating Crossbows
HARPER T5 @ 3AP => +6 Ranged Power, MP, USP
FALCONRY T5 @2AP => +10 Melee and Ranged Power.


kthxby!

[Swimms]

INQUISITIVE T5 @ 1AP => , +30% Alacrity with non-Repeating Crossbows


But come on, they are non-repeating crossbows, no one uses those things =)

[TehLexinator]

Steelstar at end https://www.facebook.com/DDOUnlimited/videos/800384120435512/

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

But I just bought it! And it made the game so much more fun! I always wanted to play a Dungeons and Dragons themed shooter.



So when does sorcerer get nerves.

boom boom boom and the room is empty

You misspelled Warlock.


SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: oh whats that? the new class is ready?
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP

This is it exactly. I am starting to see how SSG works. Paid OP class comes out, need to nerf everything else and force people to buy it.

[lyrecono]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

But I just bought it! And it made the game so much more fun! I always wanted to play a Dungeons and Dragons themed shooter.
You misspelled Warlock.
This is it exactly. I am starting to see how SSG works. Paid OP class comes out, need to nerf everything else and force people to buy it.

Doom 2016 is getting a sequel, Doom Eternal, it had loads of undead, demons, devils and a dark atmosphere.
Even Doom's melee mechanics are more viable then ddo's mess
Maybe that wlll fix your shooter needs after the inq nerf.


https://youtu.be/gu3MrNE1TkM

Have fun!!! ;)

[Gniewomir]

Inqui nerf and new class in the same update, coincidence? I don't think so...

[Cernunan]

Another bait and switch by this company surprises who? They have sucked every penny they could from Inqi sales that that could, time to nerf the favorite builds so they can sell the new thing that will be OP as long as it sells. Nothing new here

[Jerevth]

Inqui was alright... I only used it once and the 2020 redesign was predicted. It's like a "Purchase now and receive Super Inqui status for a limited time only."
Alchemist is next.
Purchase [Latest pre-balance Enhancement/ Class Tree] for super phenomenal cosmic power*!

I don't think it's disingenuous, though... so long as we don't end up with 4 ubur smurf** builds a year, all with a half-life of 3 months/ until the next release, in an ongoing series.

*Limited time only.
**Requires an obscure gear item from an old adventure pack (Regular price) to attain Ubur Smurf status.

[Fenrisulven7]

C'mon now. We are supposed to be experienced gamers. If it's too good to be true, expect the nerf bat.

It's why I haven't even bothered to use the Inquis tree. I'm only surprised it lasted this long.

[Gniewomir]

The good thing is: we started with two daggers, got 2 crossbows, but after two greatswords, two spells at the same time, two bows and two guitars we might finally run out of options and one day we'll see new weapons/fighting styles in ddo.

[janave]

The good thing is: we started with two daggers, got 2 crossbows, but after two greatswords, two spells at the same time, two bows and two guitars we might finally run out of options and one day we'll see new weapons/fighting styles in ddo.

Dual halflings, duh, it was asked from day 1.


Combat Style: Halfling.

- You are now an adept at flinging and swiping small races at your targets.

Improved Halfling.

- Your halflings may now wield extra weapons.

Dual-halfling:

- You may now wield two halflings but your 2nd halfling may not doublestrike or wield another weapon or another halfling.

Perfect-halfling:

- Halflings you wield are now hasted and gain +10% alacrity.

[Gniewomir]

Dual halflings, duh, it was asked from day 1.


Combat Style: Halfling.

- You are now an adept at flinging and swiping small races at your targets.

Improved Halfling.

- Your halflings may now wield extra weapons.

Dual-halfling:

- You may now wield two halflings but your 2nd halfling may not doublestrike or wield another weapon or another halfling.

Perfect-halfling:

- Halflings you wield are now hasted and gain +10% alacrity.

You forgot about epic feat:

Gargantuan halfling:

- you look like a human and receive all human traits (in fact YOU ARE human, but shhhh, it's the cheapest solution)

[TehLexinator]

Another bait and switch by this company surprises who? They have sucked every penny they could from Inqi sales that that could, time to nerf the favorite builds so they can sell the new thing that will be OP as long as it sells. Nothing new here

Yep, completely agree. Really ****es me off. They flat out say Inq is fine, I buy it, and now I see it is getting nerfed because a new class is coming out. Pathetic.

I also don't get why these people don't join the Daybreak All Access Membership or have a SSG All Access Membership, where we get access to LOTRO, DDO, and AC2 (if they can bring it back).
I just can't sub to this game for the price they want, compared to what I get with the Daybreak Pass. I still play (and spend money on) Planetside 2, DCUO, and EQ2 just because they are all part of that pass.

[Jerevth]

Dual halflings, duh, it was asked from day 1.


Combat Style: Halfling.

- You are now an adept at flinging and swiping small races at your targets.

Improved Halfling.

- Your halflings may now wield extra weapons.

Dual-halfling:

- You may now wield two halflings but your 2nd halfling may not doublestrike or wield another weapon or another halfling.

Perfect-halfling:

- Halflings you wield are now hasted and gain +10% alacrity.

Pfft.
Dual gnomes will be the meta: you can invest in their gnomehancement tree so, not only are they light (finnesable) blunt objects, they have a 10/20/30% chance of casting colorspray with each hit. Wands of fireballs will be optional, too for taking out those hard to reach kobold shamans.

[droid327]

Well to all you people screaming for it please note that the powers that be have granted your wish as it will be happening in U45 which should be available next week on Lam

I guess now's the time all the current inqui players need to scream and whine as obnoxiously and loudly as possible on the Lama forums to get the nerfs minimized and keep the tree useful across all levels (we dont want to get Monked)....because that's how SSG works, after all.

SSG - Greasing the squeakiest wheel since 2017.

[Kebtid]

https://i.imgur.com/oTeuEA8.png

[TedSandyman]

The good thing is: we started with two daggers, got 2 crossbows, but after two greatswords, two spells at the same time, two bows and two guitars we might finally run out of options and one day we'll see new weapons/fighting styles in ddo.

We could always do three with an extra ski-boxing arm.

[Kebtid]

The good thing is: we started with two daggers, got 2 crossbows, but after two greatswords, two spells at the same time, two bows and two guitars we might finally run out of options and one day we'll see new weapons/fighting styles in ddo.

Cough, https://i.ibb.co/ssNL9d7/wEFQbDN.jpg (https://ibb.co/Yf1vBFg)
After 2 comes 3

[Chai]

SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: oh whats that? the new class is ready?
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP

Actually the post I saw wasnt them saying they spent a ton of hours balancing it, they stated they spent those hours making sure it was where they wanted it to be ---and of course, everyone assumes that means "balanced with everything else."

It doesnt sell like hotcakes when its balanced with everything else. :p

[Chai]

The good thing is: we started with two daggers, got 2 crossbows, but after two greatswords, two spells at the same time, two bows and two guitars we might finally run out of options and one day we'll see new weapons/fighting styles in ddo.

THF

Two Halfling Fighting

If each halfling is TWFing that will effectively give every THFer 4x weapons.

If that sounds absurd, we already dual wield two crossbows with a rune arm also equipped.

[HungarianRhapsody]

Inquisitive is just fine on most builds. It's only a few that seriously overperform. I hope that SSG is going to cut off the top end at cap a bit and leave the leveling goodness (Heroic AND Epic leveling) alone.

Everyone has a few classes that they love and a few classes that they don't enjoy nearly as much. Inquisitive lets you get through those "meh" lives with a lot less pain.

[SlowDM]

Inquisitive is fine. Leave it alone. Many people play solo for reasons as far apart as ADHD to RL to timezone problems. If you want a 'help eachother group'. Post an LFM saying so or just stay anon with your discord mates.
TBH i bought inquis 2 weeks ago and it's made me play more, join groups more and enjoy playing more. For non uber have it all players it's a godsend. BTW I can still trap and umd soul stones. Same as the PM update it's allowing players to enjoy DDO more.
Now just stop with the nerf please. Oh and i still die as other inqs i've played with.

[droid327]

Inquisitive is just fine on most builds. It's only a few that seriously overperform. I hope that SSG is going to cut off the top end at cap a bit and leave the leveling goodness (Heroic AND Epic leveling) alone.

Everyone has a few classes that they love and a few classes that they don't enjoy nearly as much. Inquisitive lets you get through those "meh" lives with a lot less pain.

My thought too - I'm hoping its a very targeted, measured change specific to just the overperforming mechanics at endgame, and they dont just scorched-earth nerf the whole tree like taking the 30% Alacrity off the T5 or something.

My suggestion would be reduce the Law scaling to 100% - that shouldnt affect most builds before L28 since you're not getting huge amounts of RP, but it will help curb the growth of DPS at endgame since both that and Sneak die scale highly on RP. But we'll see next week, I guess. They'll probably do something like make Doubleshot only 33% effective -_-

[Lynnabel]

Players: "Inquis is so OP it's ruining the game"

The Dev Team: Alrighty, we'll be making balance adjustments to it as part of a larger overhaul in which we rework tanks, paladins, adjust stealth mechanics, rework Two-Handed Fighting, and release a new class

Players: "this is clearly a heinous scheme and your ulterior motives are pure evil"

Real talk you'll be able to see all of the above and more on Lamannia shortly, and we'd really appreciate feedback there (as well as anywhere else you can swing it). Even if you're just here to cackle madly and tell everyone you totally saw this coming, definitely use the Lamannia forums when the threads are posted as well to ensure that we get a good spread of feedback :)

[Jerevth]

Players: "Inquis is so OP it's ruining the game"

The Dev Team: Alrighty, we'll be making balance adjustments to it as part of a larger overhaul in which we rework tanks, paladins, adjust stealth mechanics, rework Two-Handed Fighting, and release a new class

Players: "this is clearly a heinous scheme and your ulterior motives are pure evil"

Real talk you'll be able to see all of the above and more on Lamannia shortly, and we'd really appreciate feedback there (as well as anywhere else you can swing it). Even if you're just here to cackle madly and tell everyone you totally saw this coming, definitely use the Lamannia forums when the threads are posted as well to ensure that we get a good spread of feedback :)

You've had that post prepared for a week just waiting, didn't you ;)

[HastyPudding]

Players: "Inquis is so OP it's ruining the game"

The Dev Team: Alrighty, we'll be making balance adjustments to it as part of a larger overhaul in which we rework tanks, paladins, adjust stealth mechanics, rework Two-Handed Fighting, and release a new class

Players: "this is clearly a heinous scheme and your ulterior motives are pure evil"

Real talk you'll be able to see all of the above and more on Lamannia shortly, and we'd really appreciate feedback there (as well as anywhere else you can swing it). Even if you're just here to cackle madly and tell everyone you totally saw this coming, definitely use the Lamannia forums when the threads are posted as well to ensure that we get a good spread of feedback :)

I'm honestly surprised we didn't get a 'this is what we're planning with alchemist' thread in the official discussions forum, but it's going straight to Lammania. Not complaining, just surprised.

Also, I immediately thought of this image, when I read your post.
https://media.giphy.com/media/nxu1WTdW69FQI/giphy.gif

[Lynnabel]

You've had that post prepared for a week just waiting, didn't you ;)

N-no. Of course not. No. Heavens no.

>_>

<_<

>_>


I'm honestly surprised we didn't get a 'this is what we're planning with alchemist' thread in the official discussions forum, but it's going straight to Lammania. Not complaining, just surprised.


Alchemist is so cool and out there that we really wanted people's first impressions to be in the game, trying it out for themselves. We've been working pretty tirelessly on polishing it up for you, and hopefully it sticks the landing :)

[droid327]

Players: "Inquis is so OP it's ruining the game"

The Dev Team: Alrighty, we'll be making balance adjustments to it as part of a larger overhaul in which we rework tanks, paladins, adjust stealth mechanics, rework Two-Handed Fighting, and release a new class

Players: "this is clearly a heinous scheme and your ulterior motives are pure evil"

Real talk you'll be able to see all of the above and more on Lamannia shortly, and we'd really appreciate feedback there (as well as anywhere else you can swing it). Even if you're just here to cackle madly and tell everyone you totally saw this coming, definitely use the Lamannia forums when the threads are posted as well to ensure that we get a good spread of feedback :)

Hey that's not fair - the players were NOT unequivocal in their dislike of Inqui. I'd say its about half and half, for or against the current Inqui model. You had to expect when you appeased the one camp making all the noise about "Inqui is OP", the other would become just as vocal.

Also, I think you did yourself a huge disservice by announcing the nerf without giving ANY kind of details about it. You created a situation where speculation can run rampant at maximum rampancy. Next time, either wait till its actually going live to announce it, or give some framework about what the changes will entail and what the scope of it is - not just "its overperforming, and we're doing something..."

Also - are you actually reworking stealth and THF in this update? :P

[janave]

Pfft.
Dual gnomes will be the meta: you can invest in their gnomehancement tree so, not only are they light (finnesable) blunt objects, they have a 10/20/30% chance of casting colorspray with each hit. Wands of fireballs will be optional, too for taking out those hard to reach kobold shamans.

True, we need a Scion of Halfling and a Halflingry universal tree as well to make sure they are up on par with Gnomes.

[Mindos]

like taking the 30% Alacrity off the T5 or something.


Does this even show up on the character sheet now anywhere? I seem to remember it wasnt at all before. I worrie Devs make changes we can't see/verify easily, then later on we see the text description was never changed and no one knew the ability was different, etc.

[Mandelia]

I don't care one way or the other, but kicking a majority of players who invested a lot of time into this play-style right in the nuts isn't going to work well for your dwindling population.

[Eelpout]

Hey that's not fair - the players were NOT unequivocal in their dislike of Inqui. I'd say its about half and half, for or against the current Inqui model. You had to expect when you appeased the one camp making all the noise about "Inqui is OP", the other would become just as vocal.

Also, I think you did yourself a huge disservice by announcing the nerf without giving ANY kind of details about it. You created a situation where speculation can run rampant at maximum rampancy. Next time, either wait till its actually going live to announce it, or give some framework about what the changes will entail and what the scope of it is - not just "its overperforming, and we're doing something..."


To be fair, there has never, nor will there ever be a universally loved game change. I think you are correct in having information out there so there isn't the "panic! sky is falling" speculation threads, but there will be people upset no matter what the changes are. After the Lamma preview you will see threads that say Inq is still OP and other threads saying you completely ruined a P2W Universal tree, bait and switch.

I think the only time I saw close to a consensus was after the 253rd Monk nerf, even the Monk haters started to say it was ok to stop kicking...

[Clemeit]

Everyone saw this coming. Typical SSG.

They release content that's terribly overpowered, they claim it's perfectly balanced for months, players purchase it.
Months later they "recognize" that it's overperforming, promise nerfs (now that they made money off of it they don't really care) and release new content that's terribly overpowered.

And the cycle continues. Guess it's about time to go play sorcerer again.

[HungarianRhapsody]

Players: "Inquis is so OP it's ruining the game"

The Dev Team: Alrighty, we'll be making balance adjustments to it as part of a larger overhaul in which we rework tanks, paladins, adjust stealth mechanics, rework Two-Handed Fighting, and release a new class

Players: "this is clearly a heinous scheme and your ulterior motives are pure evil"

Real talk you'll be able to see all of the above and more on Lamannia shortly, and we'd really appreciate feedback there (as well as anywhere else you can swing it). Even if you're just here to cackle madly and tell everyone you totally saw this coming, definitely use the Lamannia forums when the threads are posted as well to ensure that we get a good spread of feedback :)

I thought Inquisitive was mostly fine and said so repeatedly. It needs to be dialed back a little, but it doesn't need the level of nerfs that Warlocks and Monks got - that's for sure.

And you have to admit that nerfing Inquisitive just as you're releasing Alchemist does look like a blatant cash grab. That might not be what you were trying to do as a company, but "Inquisitive power level is right where we want it" from SSG followed by a nerf at the exact same time as the new pay-to-use class is coming out looks and smells like "Hey, buy the new power thing because we're going to trash the old power thing that you bought last year".

[Arkat]

I just worry that the nerfs will affect the Ranged play style as a whole instead of just toning down the supposedly over-performing Inquisitive.

[Mandelia]

This game might be pretty good once you finish it. The twelve people left on each server will raid until they die.

[Cernunan]

Hey that's not fair - the players were NOT unequivocal in their dislike of Inqui. I'd say its about half and half, for or against the current Inqui model. You had to expect when you appeased the one camp making all the noise about "Inqui is OP", the other would become just as vocal.

Also, I think you did yourself a huge disservice by announcing the nerf without giving ANY kind of details about it. You created a situation where speculation can run rampant at maximum rampancy. Next time, either wait till its actually going live to announce it, or give some framework about what the changes will entail and what the scope of it is - not just "its overperforming, and we're doing something..."


Pretty much this.
When you overreact to the people complaining the loudest but ignore the people who vehemently are opposed to such changes, it is bad form to ridicule the people who actually spend large amounts of money to support your product.
It makes them less inclined to continue supporting your product

[Kinerd]

Players: "Inquis is so OP it's ruining the game"

The Dev Team: Alrighty, we'll be making balance adjustments to it as part of a larger overhaul in which we rework tanks, paladins, adjust stealth mechanics, rework Two-Handed Fighting, and release a new class

Players: "this is clearly a heinous scheme and your ulterior motives are pure evil"

Real talk you'll be able to see all of the above and more on Lamannia shortly, and we'd really appreciate feedback there (as well as anywhere else you can swing it). Even if you're just here to cackle madly and tell everyone you totally saw this coming, definitely use the Lamannia forums when the threads are posted as well to ensure that we get a good spread of feedback :)

why not delay the inquisitive nerf until the next update?

[Pyed-Pyper]

Actually the post I saw wasnt them saying they spent a ton of hours balancing it, they stated they spent those hours making sure it was where they wanted it to be ---and of course, everyone assumes that means "balanced with everything else."

It doesnt sell like hotcakes when its balanced with everything else. :p


Yes, I caught that too. What everyone should learn from that vaguely imprecise sort of statement is to never, NEVER, assume that SSG's interests align with their own.


-----


Also, I'm shocked SHOCKED! I say to find that INQ is getting nerf'd just as Alchemist is introduced.

Hmm. Wait. No, no I'm not.

[0ldschool]

The Dev Team: Alrighty, we'll be making balance adjustments to it as part of a larger overhaul in which we rework tanks, paladins, adjust stealth mechanics, rework Two-Handed Fighting, and release a new class


Whoa! If this was mentioned previously, I totally missed it. Do I dare ask what adjustments are planned? Do I dare dream of a more stealth friendly DDO? My assassin waits with bated breath.

[cdbd3rd]

Hey that's not fair - the players were NOT unequivocal in their dislike of Inqui. I'd say its about half and half, for or against the current Inqui model. You had to expect when you appeased the one camp making all the noise about "Inqui is OP", the other would become just as vocal.

Also, I think you did yourself a huge disservice by announcing the nerf without giving ANY kind of details about it. You created a situation where speculation can run rampant at maximum rampancy. Next time, either wait till its actually going live to announce it, or give some framework about what the changes will entail and what the scope of it is - not just "its overperforming, and we're doing something..."

Also - are you actually reworking stealth and THF in this update? :P


I thought Inquisitive was mostly fine and said so repeatedly. It needs to be dialed back a little, but it doesn't need the level of nerfs that Warlocks and Monks got - that's for sure.

And you have to admit that nerfing Inquisitive just as you're releasing Alchemist does look like a blatant cash grab. That might not be what you were trying to do as a company, but "Inquisitive power level is right where we want it" from SSG followed by a nerf at the exact same time as the new pay-to-use class is coming out looks and smells like "Hey, buy the new power thing because we're going to trash the old power thing that you bought last year".


Droid makes a fair point. When something good is hinted at mysteriously, the folks here will enthusiastically take the hint and run it through every conceivable scenario while waiting for the 'new thing' to be turned loose upon us. Unfortunately, the same holds true for hints at things that are less positive, like nerfs, tho the term "enthusiastically" becomes something less... kind.

Luckily, I guess, I hadn't really gotten deep into Inqui on any characters so I won't get bruised or shorn by whatever is coming. However - just as an observer on the topic, the optics on the timing really do look bad.

[Cordovan]

It would surprise me if we explicitly said "Inq is fine" as we typically keep ourselves open to making whatever balance adjustments are necessary, so those kind of binary statements usually don't come from us.

[lyrecono]

Another bait and switch by this company surprises who? They have sucked every penny they could from Inqi sales that that could, time to nerf the favorite builds so they can sell the new thing that will be OP as long as it sells. Nothing new here

A good reason not to spend another dime!


Yeah, this was called out months ago... its not like they are subtle about it or anything.

Same here, just vote with your wallet. Don"t reward them for screwing over the game


SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: oh whats that? the new class is ready?
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP

Hahahahaha, so true.
I said the same when they nerfed double boosting from racial and class boosts, they deemed it op.....
Then introduced reaper trees that do allow you to double boost.....


C'mon now. We are supposed to be experienced gamers. If it's too good to be true, expect the nerf bat.

It's why I haven't even bothered to use the Inquis tree. I'm only surprised it lasted this long.

Other stuff had been op for years, prior to this.
It's surprising that now people are waking up to this.
They sold liquid crack in the form of mana potions, now they try their hands classes and trees.


The good thing is: we started with two daggers, got 2 crossbows, but after two greatswords, two spells at the same time, two bows and two guitars we might finally run out of options and one day we'll see new weapons/fighting styles in ddo.

What about a universal Hecatoncheires tree?

All joking asside, i would love a universal 2hf tree that was as bonkers as the inq in the current meta XD

[rabidfox]

The Dev Team: Alrighty, we'll be making balance adjustments to it as part of a larger overhaul...adjust stealth mechanics...
oooo, stealth mechanics adjustment. I wonder if that's rogue stealth dice or sneaky sneaky don't see me adjustments. I'd love me some better sneaky sneaky stuff.

[nevergiveup356]

Players: "melee is a support play style now"

The Dev Team: Ignore because they dont play melee and dont know anyone that could have fun playing it

Players: "bye"

Ranged Players: "server merge please!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Why give feedback if you ignore it?

[lyrecono]

Players: "Inquis is so OP it's ruining the game"

The Dev Team: Alrighty, we'll be making balance adjustments to it as part of a larger overhaul in which we rework Two-Handed Fighting,

Real talk you'll be able to see all of the above and more on Lamannia shortly, and we'd really appreciate feedback there (as well as anywhere else you can swing it). Even if you're just here to cackle madly and tell everyone you totally saw this coming, definitely use the Lamannia forums when the threads are posted as well to ensure that we get a good spread of feedback :)

Since ignoring feedback led to a lot of melee&2hf players to walk out a long time ago, how will you filter out all the static noice that blurs the feedback of the few 2hf fans that are still out there (and know what they are talking about). Just an example, feedback on the barbarian enh pass led it to be weak for the meta, especially compared to all all the other enh passes that followd it. Feedback from a lot of people that aren't or shouldn't be on the frontline led to nerfing Epic Defensive Fighting before it made it to the live servers.
Or what about nerfing double action boosting (and putting it right back in with reaper trees?)

2hf has been broken 3 ways from sunday, it needs help, however, what good is it if a 2hf melee has a glass jaw in high reaper and grouping is dead in some hours of the game? Reaper has a distinct set of rules that are easier to navigate around when ranged, what good is a 2hf weapon there?

I will keep an eye on lam, i hope this time the dev in charge of 2hf will bother to process the feedback and understands the issues.

[nevergiveup356]

Since ignoring feedback led to a lot of melee&2hf players to walk out a long time ago, how will you filter out all the static noice that blurs the feedback of the few 2hf fans that are still out there (and know what they are talking about). Just an example, feedback on the barbarian enh pass led it to be weak for the meta, especially compared to all all the other enh passes that followd it. Feedback from a lot of people that aren't or shouldn't be on the frontline led to nerfing Epic Defensive Fighting before it made it to the live servers.
Or what about nerfing double action boosting (and putting it right back in with reaper trees?)

2hf has been broken 3 ways from sunday, it needs help, however, what good is it if a 2hf melee has a glass jaw in high reaper and grouping is dead in some hours of the game? Reaper has a distinct set of rules that are easier to navigate around when ranged, what good is a 2hf weapon there?

I will keep an eye on lam, i hope this time the dev in charge of 2hf will bother to process the feedback and understands the issues.

Let me save you time and explain what is going to happen.

They are going to boost damage because it is the only way they know to "improve" things.

Caster and ranged players are going to whine a river about the pointless boost.

Every change that can benefit caster and ranged builds will be boosted, everything melee only will be nuked from orbit.

THF will be even worst than before.

Your welcome.

[Lynnabel]

Does this even show up on the character sheet now anywhere? I seem to remember it wasnt at all before. I worrie Devs make changes we can't see/verify easily, then later on we see the text description was never changed and no one knew the ability was different, etc.

Be sure to check the new + tab, it should be in there somewhere. You also shouldn't worry about us not letting you all know about changes, we do public previews and release notes just to keep everyone in the loop. If we miss stuff in release notes, please do let us know so we can correct them ASAP.

[HungarianRhapsody]

It would surprise me if we explicitly said "Inq is fine" as we typically keep ourselves open to making whatever balance adjustments are necessary, so those kind of binary statements usually don't come from us.

https://i.postimg.cc/7ZRBztLR/inquis-gxb.jpg

SteelStar didn't say it was fine, but he did say it was right where SSG wanted it to be. So if it was overpowered, then SSG wanted it to be overpowered (presumably to help sell the pack or to give people something to use for class lives where they didn't particularly enjoy the class as designed).

Edit: For clarity - that was from Discord back in mid-September.
Edit number 2: SteelStar mentioning (Spetember or October) the fact that SSG believes that the game's balance is better than it every has been before:
https://i.postimg.cc/CKkfGgbv/class-and-role-balance-kotc.jpg

[janave]

I got this. xd

1.) Adjust some mchampions to resist law damage and chaos damage ( cough Mark of...), and me gonna hate this but some probably needs deflect missiles..., one of the reaper variant should probably get deflect as well, the % one.

2.) Decide what the AP/value is for a tier-nth in universal trees, tune upwards Harper and Falconry numbers, or meet in the middle (then two more choices are viable, Falconer may need some cooldown shifts as well): Eg: Ranged Power 10 or 2 for 1 action point is a major gap, so how about 5 for 1 ap in a T5 uni tree?

[Lynnabel]

SteelStar didn't say it was fine, but he did say it was right where SSG wanted it to be.

The words "at the moment we believe" add some pretty necessary context to that interpretation.


So if it was overpowered, then SSG wanted it to be overpowered (presumably to help sell the pack or to give people something to use for class lives where they didn't particularly enjoy the class as designed).

If we release something that's overpowered, that's on us. We can make mistakes, and when we make mistakes, we should correct them. We have a lot more play data now than we did months ago, and infinitely more play data than we did before it was released.

[HungarianRhapsody]

If we release something that's overpowered, that's on us. We can make mistakes, and when we make mistakes, we should correct them. We have a lot more play data now than we did months ago, and infinitely more play data than we did before it was released.

The constant stream of SSG statements saying that you didn't believe us when we told you it was overperforming and that you wanted information showing how it compared to crossbow Rogues and then the incredible silence from SSG after that makes this seem like a surprise nerf that a lot of people weren't expecting... EXCEPT

this is also coming at the same time that you're releasing the new class (Alchemist) for people to buy. Which is exactly what a lot of cynical people predicted. I'm not going to say that you are breaking the old toy to get people to buy the new toy, but please at least recognize that the timing on this is suspect.

[Lynnabel]

The constant stream of SSG statements saying that you didn't believe us when we told you it was overperforming and that you wanted information showing how it compared to crossbow Rogues and then the incredible silence from SSG after that makes this seem like a surprise nerf that a lot of people weren't expecting... EXCEPT

I don't really understand how "hey we think this is balanced but if you think this is OP please let us know, oh ok you all are saying and showing us it's OP we should fix it" is the wrong way to go about things. How would you prefer we handle balance feedback in the future?


this is also coming at the same time that you're releasing the new class (Alchemist) for people to buy. Which is exactly what a lot of cynical people predicted. I'm not going to say that you are breaking the old toy to get people to buy the new toy, but please at least recognize that the timing on this is suspect.

We release new stuff all the time. It's a virtual, literal impossibility to land a rebalance when we aren't releasing or revamping something else. I don't think you all really want us to have a patch of just nerfs, and even if we did, what time period between a nerf and a new feature would be enough to appease the "you're just doing this to sell the new thing" theory? 1 month? 3 months? How long should we wait between rebalancing things and releasing new stuff? How long should we let overpowered things be in the game before it's been long enough to correct our mistakes?

If you're going to reply with "you shouldn't release OP things in the first place," well, you'd be very right, but sometimes we make mistakes, and when we do, we need to correct them.

[Roberdt]

I miss the days of "Paladin Op plz nerf" threads, update 45 lets go.

[Qwikkish]

I just worry that the nerfs will affect the Ranged play style as a whole instead of just toning down the supposedly over-performing Inquisitive.

As far as I am aware, it's mainly damage that's being nerfed. From me experience this will mean mobs will get closer to you before they're dropped. Since I was killing them at extreme ranges before a nerf, I imagine I'll be killing at medium ranges. Seems a pointless move unless SSG has something else planned.

[droid327]

1.) Adjust some mchampions to resist law damage and chaos damage ( cough Mark of...), and me gonna hate this but some probably needs deflect missiles..., one of the reaper variant should probably get deflect as well, the % one.


This is a facet of a bigger systemic problem that I've been talking about lately a lot - the game favors ranged combat mechanically too much, and doesnt reward you enough for melee.

Kiting is an effective universal defense, which lets glass-cannon builds offset their lower numerical defense while maintaining their high DPS. However, melee builds (which have higher innate numerical defense but lower DPS) cant increase their DPS through player skill in the same way.

There needs to be a lot more emphasis on mechanics that challenge ranged players in future quest design:

- Ambush type encounters where you cant alpha strike from range
- Quest layouts that are too tight for effective kiting
- Mobs that can "charge" or otherwise immediately close to melee range...right now only some Devils can do this AFAIK
- More prevalence of slow/root CC...but not full CC like stun/trip/hold
- Mobs with heightened defense to ranged attacks, like suggested here with a % deflect arrows, but easier to kill in melee
- Conversely, mobs with powerful ranged attacks of their own but more manageable melee, to encourage you to fight close up. Fear Reapers are kinda like this, but I think that's the only instance of such a design
- Mechanics that encouraged close-range fighting in general: Improved Point Blank Shot in some form, or a melee version of Archer's Focus. Changing mob AI to not constantly try to flank you, forcing you to backpedal constantly.
- Restore damage multipliers for melee tactic conditions, so that melee players can boost their DPS by playing skillfully.

If ranged players' defense were challenged more effectively, then it would restore that TTK/TTL balance that should keep rolespace for both ranged and melee.

[thedip]

Please note that these are my own views and do not invalidate yours if you take an opposite position.

Please guys 'n gals play nice.

This thread is starting to resemble forumites against the devs. It is nice to see devs responding in threads and whilst you may disagree with what has been said, do not take the comments personally.

[droid327]

I don't really understand how "hey we think this is balanced but if you think this is OP please let us know, oh ok you all are saying and showing us it's OP we should fix it" is the wrong way to go about things. How would you prefer we handle balance feedback in the future?

Emphasis mine.

Please realize that the majority of feedback is going to come from whatever side is demanding a change. There will always be a "silent majority" who is satisfied with the status quo, because one is much less motivated to speak up when one already has what one wants, and just ignore the complainers. Please dont make a correlation between volume of feedback and prevalence of opinion.

Dont fall back on saying "this is what you asked for, so we're giving it to you". That's a cop out. Make a case why you think its something that needs to be done, why you agree with the people making that argument. Show us what you're seeing that suggests a change is needed now, what you didnt see before when you put in hundreds of hours testing it internally before release, or on Lammania when it was being playtested. Try to convince the players who disagree why its needed, with specific examples.

Even if we still dont agree with the logic, at least there IS some logic then. If you just cop out to saying "its what players asked for", then that just makes us blame the other players for demanding it. That's what Frontier did in E: D with their reversal on instant ship transfers - its a cowardly tactic to deflect criticism, and all it accomplishes is enshrining permanent toxicity within the community.

[lyrecono]

The words "at the moment we believe" add some pretty necessary context to that interpretation.



If we release something that's overpowered, that's on us. We can make mistakes, and when we make mistakes, we should correct them. We have a lot more play data now than we did months ago, and infinitely more play data than we did before it was released.


I don't really understand how "hey we think this is balanced but if you think this is OP please let us know, oh ok you all are saying and showing us it's OP we should fix it" is the wrong way to go about things. How would you prefer we handle balance feedback in the future?



We release new stuff all the time. It's a virtual, literal impossibility to land a rebalance when we aren't releasing or revamping something else. I don't think you all really want us to have a patch of just nerfs, and even if we did, what time period between a nerf and a new feature would be enough to appease the "you're just doing this to sell the new thing" theory? 1 month? 3 months? How long should we wait between rebalancing things and releasing new stuff? How long should we let overpowered things be in the game before it's been long enough to correct our mistakes?

If you're going to reply with "you shouldn't release OP things in the first place," well, you'd be very right, but sometimes we make mistakes, and when we do, we need to correct them.

How about doing extended playtesting instead of asking us for money?
And publish ballanced material, half the playerbase shouldn't be tr-ing into a caster or ranged build to navigate around more difficult content, because it's currently far easier then trading blows in melee

[Lynnabel]

If you just cop out to saying "its what players asked for", then that just makes us blame the other players for demanding it.

That's entirely fair. That being said, the operative words here are both saying and showing - hence why Steelstar specifically went out of his way to ask for hard data.

[janave]

I miss the days of "Paladin Op plz nerf" threads, update 45 lets go.

Paladin (as I remember) was second in row, and players had no idea what is coming, the attention Pallies got was legit vs content at that time and balance saturation. Right now, they fell behind mostly because they werent prepared to scale into the next stage of content stat bump (leg raids and reaper mostly).


That's entirely fair. That being said, the operative words here are both saying and showing - hence why Steelstar specifically went out of his way to ask for hard data.

I think mistake was balancing it against a premier class build, rather than seeing it as a fully stacking universal tree, where none of them before loaded that much dps along a semi combat style. It has a ton of scaling added into it as well largely available during heroics.

[capsela]

Nerf IPS not INQ.

Inquisitive wouldn't be OP if it didn't clear entire rooms at once.

AOE should be reserved for casters.

It's mana limited.

Pew pew has no limit.

[Thar]

I don't really understand how "hey we think this is balanced but if you think this is OP please let us know, oh ok you all are saying and showing us it's OP we should fix it" is the wrong way to go about things. How would you prefer we handle balance feedback in the future?

.

In my opinion, the devs need to take player feedback with a grain of salt. Players don't know the overall plan and what your building the game towards.

And the player base advising the devs might not be the best sampling of if the thing is broken or not. Inquisitor made it easy to build a character comparable to some of the top builds on the server with little knowledge of how to min/max and multiclass a character. There are builds that blow past the inquisitor today, but most people on the server don't know how to put those characters together to get that level of power or have the in depth knowledge of the game systematically or mathematically. Ie a typical pally build comparing to inquisitor is probably underpowered, but a well built full sorc is probably like nothing is wrong with it as they surpass it in kills and dps.

[Thar]

Nerf IPS not INQ.

Inquisitive wouldn't be OP if it didn't clear entire rooms at once.

AOE should be reserved for casters.

only aoe they have is ips which requires time to have mobs line up. A caster should clear the room faster.

[capsela]

only aoe they have is ips which requires time to have mobs line up. A caster should clear the room faster.

Sweet summer child...

[HungarianRhapsody]

We release new stuff all the time. It's a virtual, literal impossibility to land a rebalance when we aren't releasing or revamping something else. I don't think you all really want us to have a patch of just nerfs, and even if we did, what time period between a nerf and a new feature would be enough to appease the "you're just doing this to sell the new thing" theory? 1 month? 3 months? How long should we wait between rebalancing things and releasing new stuff? How long should we let overpowered things be in the game before it's been long enough to correct our mistakes?

A lot of that depends on just how overpowered the new toy is and how heavy the inquisitive nerf is.

It probably would have been good to dial back Inquisitive in U44, but if U45 is when you can make the changes that you think are appropriate because you didn't believe what players were telling you since April until after U44, that's fine. But just recognize that making the newest thing you're selling be on the top of the META heap every single time is going to raise eyebrows. ESPECIALLY if you pull back the power level of the most recently sold thing that was the top of the META heap at the same time.

SSG has a bad habit of doing that.

Changes that help balance are good. Introducing new things that significantly outperform old things is not good. Why not introduce a new thing with an aim of trying to place it in the middle of the pack? Better than Paladin, but not as good as Sorcerer? Not everything that gets added to the game has to be META - as long as it's fun, that's good. People will still buy it to make sure they keep their Completionist.


And when you have the nerf of the last thing at the same time as you want to sell us the new overpowered thing, just acknowledge the timing. "Hey, we know it looks wonky to have the Inquisitive nerf at the same time that we're trying to sell you Alchemists. Sorry about that. This is just when we were able to make the changes that were appropriate because we didn't want to over-nerf the Inquisitives and wanted to make sure we had good data before making the changes. Sorry that the timing looks suspicious."

[Quikster]

Nerf IPS not INQ.

Inquisitive wouldn't be OP if it didn't clear entire rooms at once.

AOE should be reserved for casters.

It's mana limited.

Pew pew has no limit.

I disagree. IPS has been in the game for a very long time and has not been overpowered.

[Thar]

Sweet summer child...

A good DC wizard can pk a room just as fast as inquis and a sorc can clear a room in the same time or slightly faster. The problem for most players is this is past life and gear intensive and most people don't put in that work. Even a DC cleric can clear a room quickly in some cases.

most people don't play in those types of groups and don't realize. case in point.

[bracelet]

Nerf IPS not INQ.

I hope they realize what an egregious mistake this would be. This would annihilate all ranged builds. Then again, this is SSG we are talking about. Remember how Manyshot was so good?

[0ldschool]

Whoa! If this was mentioned previously, I totally missed it. Do I dare ask what adjustments are planned? Do I dare dream of a more stealth friendly DDO? My assassin waits with bated breath.

I'm replying to my own post now since I can't stop thinking about this 'update to stealth mechanics' statement, and have found nothing else on the forum to expand upon it. If anyone can provide some information on what is planned, I would love to hear more. This brought to my mind nokowi's thread of a few months ago, in which the current problems with stealth play were very well summarized.

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/507597-Stealth-Used-to-be-for-Skilled-Play/page3

The link is to page 3 since nokowi's summary near the bottom of that page was excellent. I very much hope that the concerns mentioned there were taken into account. Even a small move in that direction would be a very welcome change.

[MistaMagic]

Fighter:- Ok ill charge in as usual and you Mr. Inquisitor can kill as much trash as possible to make my life easier
Mr. Inquisitor:- Ok Mr fighter will do
Mr. Fighter: Hey why are you not helping me with the trash?
Mr. Inquisitor: I am, the just do not die anymore


Enough said

[Lynnabel]

Why not introduce a new thing with an aim of trying to place it in the middle of the pack?

We do. Sometimes we do it right, sometimes we don't and need to correct our mistakes.


And when you have the nerf of the last thing at the same time as you want to sell us the new overpowered thing, just acknowledge the timing. "Hey, we know it looks wonky to have the Inquisitive nerf at the same time that we're trying to sell you Alchemists. Sorry about that. This is just when we were able to make the changes that were appropriate because we didn't want to over-nerf the Inquisitives and wanted to make sure we had good data before making the changes. Sorry that the timing looks suspicious."

Wow, what a mistake that would be. Acknowledging that idea at all gives a certain legitimacy to it, even if our acknowledgement is to repeatedly step in and say "this conspiracy theory is both completely false and drives an unneeded wedge in-between the players and developers which is ultimately harmful to DDO as a project, please stop." That being said, here I am, asking players politely to avoid escalating the situation, so oh well, guess I walked into that one, didn't I.

There is literally no way to time any nerf without stepping on a different feature - in fact, if we had nerfed Inq in U44, players would still be sitting here telling us that this is all a ploy to avoid overshadowing Alchemist. In fact, if we wait a few months and nerf it in U46, surprise, it's still all a big ploy to get people to play Alchemist. Even if Alchemist were just cancelled - like, whoops, sorry, no new class, turns out DDO explodes if more than 14 are implemented, our bad - nerfing Inq would magically become a sinister plot to avoid overshadowing Paladin. Or Two-Handed Fighting. Or Stealth. Or Mounts. Or anything - everything - doesn't matter what it is, all that matters is that it came out in the same update, or the next update, or two updates later, or two years later, and therefore must be a cold and calculated marketing decision.

How should we release and rebalance things, if putting any release of any new feature and any rebalance of any old feature in the same calendar year becomes a sinister conspiracy to defraud people? Is there a way to win this situation?

[Hobgoblin]

It would surprise me if we explicitly said "Inq is fine" as we typically keep ourselves open to making whatever balance adjustments are necessary, so those kind of binary statements usually don't come from us.

it was discord with steel

[Kinerd]

I don't really understand how "hey we think this is balanced but if you think this is OP please let us know, oh ok you all are saying and showing us it's OP we should fix it" is the wrong way to go about things. How would you prefer we handle balance feedback in the future?



We release new stuff all the time. It's a virtual, literal impossibility to land a rebalance when we aren't releasing or revamping something else. I don't think you all really want us to have a patch of just nerfs, and even if we did, what time period between a nerf and a new feature would be enough to appease the "you're just doing this to sell the new thing" theory? 1 month? 3 months? How long should we wait between rebalancing things and releasing new stuff? How long should we let overpowered things be in the game before it's been long enough to correct our mistakes?

If you're going to reply with "you shouldn't release OP things in the first place," well, you'd be very right, but sometimes we make mistakes, and when we do, we need to correct them.

no one would have been skeptical in this way if the inquisitive nerf came at the same time as just a THF buff

an inquisitive nerf combined with just a new adventure pack would also not have been met with skepticism

it's the specific combination of a nerf to a p2p universal enhancement tree and a new p2p class that causes this

no one expects a company to never release something OP. here's Cordovan in September (https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/508648-Here-is-(one-important-reason)-why-melee-isn-t-META-in-the-Sharn-era?p=6251683&viewfull=1#post6251683): "Clearly the DPS output of Inquisitive combined with its overall survivability is a hot topic on the forums. If we need to scale things back, we can." inquisitive had been out for six months and it wasn't OP then. what new data specifically makes it OP now?

[Lynnabel]

no one would have been skeptical in this way if the inquisitive nerf came at the same time as just a THF buff

an inquisitive nerf combined with just a new adventure pack would also not have been met with skepticism

it's the specific combination of a nerf to a p2p universal enhancement tree and a new p2p class that causes this

To be pretty real with you, a patch of just systems nerfs would be impressively, horrendously unpopular and a pretty egregious mistake from a PR perspective. We balance out nerfs with new features and revamps of old features so that when players look at patch notes the systems changes aren't just us taking away your favorite toys. The downside is that some players have latched onto this as justification that we've carefully concocted some sinister plan.

That being said, do you think we should do that instead? Would splitting out negative systems changes from major releases instead of putting them in with the other stuff help make things better? We can certainly hold back positive features from certain updates to get the nerfs out away from anything else, would that be something that you'd like us to do?

[WhateverDisplay]

The words "at the moment we believe" add some pretty necessary context to that interpretation.

Honestly, this sounds too much like trying to justify that announcment by grapsing for straws. Im a programmer myself an i know, that our kind is hard to pin down to a yes or no instead of a probably, maybe or likely.

But honestly, if you [whoever you is @ SSG] were wrong, why not just admit it.
I have spent 13 years on this game, listening to explanations, why yet another character build i inversted heavily into got nerfed to hell. I had my months of hiatus for exactly this kind of arguing and I have less and less incentive every time I come back to stay here.

Looks like a good thing, my VIP expired last week and I chose not to renew it, cause it seems learning from mistakes is something we wont see here.

[Rauven]

adjust stealth mechanics

This is the part I'm most excited about. Maybe this is a good time to ask why crabs are spiders. Or, if they're not why is there stealth detection so ridiculously high? Or is this just a symptom of something about stealth that needs to be adjusted?

[SpartanKiller13]

The good thing is: we started with two daggers, got 2 crossbows, but after two greatswords, two spells at the same time, two bows and two guitars we might finally run out of options and one day we'll see new weapons/fighting styles in ddo.

I'm waiting for the dual maul days. Silvanus + Tempest incoming!


Cough, after 2 comes 3

Three heavy crossbows =/= one repeating crossbow? :rolleyes::rolleyes:


There is literally no way to time any nerf without stepping on a different feature...

How should we release and rebalance things, if putting any release of any new feature and any rebalance of any old feature in the same calendar year becomes a sinister conspiracy to defraud people? Is there a way to win this situation?

Yeah, just do it and ignore the naysayers :) Alchemist should be released, Inq needs to be nerfed, THF needs to be buffed - all of these are necessary, so just go for it. Timing will always look weird, but the meta will shift as it does.

At least there's plenty of time for people to finish their Inquisitor lives before the next update :)


no one would have been skeptical in this way if the inquisitive nerf came at the same time as just a THF buff

I guarantee there would be plenty of threads about the devs shifting meta from range to melee. Less because Paladin (and a lot of THF) is F2P, but they'd definitely still be there.

[Lynnabel]

But honestly, if you [whoever you is @ SSG] were wrong, why not just admit it.

Us rebalancing Inqusitive is us admitting it. Sometimes we're wrong, and when we realize that we were wrong, we fix our mistakes. What else would you like us to do?

[Kinerd]

To be pretty real with you, a patch of just systems nerfs would be impressively, horrendously unpopular and a pretty egregious mistake from a PR perspective. We balance out nerfs with new features and revamps of old features so that when players look at patch notes the systems changes aren't just us taking away your favorite toys. The downside is that some players have latched onto this as justification that we've carefully concocted some sinister plan.

That being said, do you think we should do that instead? Would splitting out negative systems changes from major releases instead of putting them in with the other stuff help make things better? We can certainly hold back positive features from certain updates to get the nerfs out away from anything else, would that be something that you'd like us to do?

i think you may have misquoted, i didn't advocate nerfs only patches.

just to reiterate though, i advocate only nerfing a p2p option when buffing an f2p option, such as thf or stealth.

i also think it's instructive that nobody in this thread is pointing at those particular buffs as having ulterior motives.

[Arkat]

As far as I am aware, it's mainly damage that's being nerfed.

Yes, that's what I meant.

Will they (the changes) nerf the damage of throwers? How about the damage of bow users? What about the damage of repeaters? How about the damage that Mechanics do? Will these changes nerf them as well?

Are they going to use a sledgehammer (yet again) to "fix" something when they should have used a scalpel?

[ahpook]

https://i.postimg.cc/7ZRBztLR/inquis-gxb.jpg

Contrarian view on this comment and the nerf:

SSG: we think it is balanced but if you disagree show us with examples.
(later)
SSG: You have shown that requires some rebalancing.

Some players: How dare you change it when you thought it was fine months ago just because some players did what you asked and showed that it required toning down???


Complaints by players about a nerf seem childish in absence of seeing what exactly is changing.

[Kinerd]

I guarantee there would be plenty of threads about the devs shifting meta from range to melee. Less because Paladin (and a lot of THF) is F2P, but they'd definitely still be there.

of course there would, and the concomitant complaints. i didn't say there was a way to get 0 pushback from customers, that's impossible.

i said they wouldn't be "skeptical in this way" in response to Lynnabel's question of "what time period between a nerf and a new feature would be enough to appease the 'you're just doing this to sell the new thing' theory?", and i stand by that.

[Chai]

To be pretty real with you, a patch of just systems nerfs would be impressively, horrendously unpopular and a pretty egregious mistake from a PR perspective. We balance out nerfs with new features and revamps of old features so that when players look at patch notes the systems changes aren't just us taking away your favorite toys. The downside is that some players have latched onto this as justification that we've carefully concocted some sinister plan.

That being said, do you think we should do that instead? Would splitting out negative systems changes from major releases instead of putting them in with the other stuff help make things better? We can certainly hold back positive features from certain updates to get the nerfs out away from anything else, would that be something that you'd like us to do?

This goes back much further, all the way back to the melee class revamps, where forumites demanded nerfs of each revamp after they came out, and each was nerfed shortly before or shortly after the next one released.

The "conspiracy" doesnt even need to go into why items get nerfed. All one has to do is observe the pattern that the new thing getting released is overpowered (most premium class releases) or be considered a "must have" (such as know the angles in Harper, even though going to capstone in that tree wouldnt be OP.

What would help dispel the "conspiracy" would be to talk about what the specific benchmarks for balance are. Players can then provide their feedback in comparison to those benchmarks to show something is OP or not. Since we dont have those, what you receive as feedback is videos of people lazering their way through specific handpicked quests set to R10 on whatever the new thing is, then demanding nerfs. Monk was particularly egregious as it was nerfed twice, and the same video of a pre-first-nerf monk clearing outdated content was posted repeatedly while demanding a second nerf - and right on time, right before a brand new overpowered thing was released.

[janave]

This is a matter of perspective, a patch full of dialing back could be a positive change if it creates a scene when:

Hmmm lets pick a ranged build

Pre patch
A) Inq flavor
B) Inq flavor
...

Post patch
A) Inq
B) Mech
C) Archer
...

Then the patch was a positive change, and should be welcomed, ...altho `there are more than one ways to get a ticket :P. Seems like you did not like my idea to buff content vs inq damage and buff its actual competitors, the other uni trees.

:)

[Steelstar]

no one would have been skeptical in this way if the inquisitive nerf came at the same time as just a THF buff


Worth noting: this is coming at the same time as a THF buff

[droid327]

That's entirely fair. That being said, the operative words here are both saying and showing - hence why Steelstar specifically went out of his way to ask for hard data.

If they showed you, though, then you could show us. Right now you're just saying it, and that's the problem.

You asked how to handle announcements of necessary downtuning...I'm saying the best way is to say "we were able to recreate player reports of Inquis doing [some specific thing that's obviously out of tune]. We only intended for and so we're trying to [general sense of what's going to be corrected, even if it lacks specific numbers]."

Give us the same [I]hard data you had that led you to make the decision. If it convinced you, then it will convince a lot of us.

[Lynnabel]

i think you may have misquoted, i didn't advocate nerfs only patches.

just to reiterate though, i advocate only nerfing a p2p option when buffing an f2p option, such as thf or stealth.

i also think it's instructive that nobody in this thread is pointing at those particular buffs as having ulterior motives.

Let's play a quick hypothetical game - say you're working on DDO in the year 2035, and over the last 6 months, you've been working with art to make a new race - let's say, Tabaxi or something. They look great, they have cool tails, they can run really fast - good stuff. It's coming out next update and you're really excited.

But oh no! Turns out a different race - like, uhhh... Thri-Kreen. Oh god, they're so OP. Turns out their one-man-band Bard synergies are just tearing up the meta. Almost all r10 completions are just 100% Thri-Kreen, people on the forums have caught wind of this and are very upset. You've gotta tone em down. It's hurting endgame - in fact, it's hurting the whole game. Everyone's got four arms and there's no way to just buff the other 32 player-races, it's clearly Thri-Kreen that are the outlier.

What do you do? Do you hold back Tabaxi to safely nerf Thri-Kreen? How long does Tabaxi wait, implemented fully but disabled, before you feel safe enough to release it? Do you release Tabaxi first and then wait on the nerf? How long would you be able to wait before being able to "safely" nerf Thri-Kreen? What timing would make the players the least angry? If there's a right answer here, let me know.

[Andoir]

Nerf IPS not INQ.

Inquisitive wouldn't be OP if it didn't clear entire rooms at once.

AOE should be reserved for casters.

It's mana limited.

Pew pew has no limit.


Improved Precise Shot in and of itself is not the issue here. It's Improved Precise Shot coupled with "No Holds Barred" & "Endless fusillade".
Making NHB or EF an action boost capable of being up 60% of the time is the underlying factor. (18 seconds out of every 30 seconds)

There are enough sources of extra action boosts that it's quite easy to not run out of charges between shrines in most quests.

Manyshot can only be up 16% of the time (20 seconds out of every 120 seconds)
Bow users are basically getting half as many projectiles down range normally and then their burst is only up 25% of the time as often compared to Inquisitive/Battle Engineer.
I wonder why they're screaming.

[ChadB123]

I don't care about the conspiracy theories. Inquisitive needed adjustments, and I don't care about the timing.

I will refrain from passing judgement on the changess, but I will say I hope they don't nerf ranged as a playstyle. Shuricannons and Great Xbow builds perform well at end game, both from EE-R10. Inquisitive alone should be changed.

[nokowi]

Us rebalancing Inqusitive is us admitting it. Sometimes we're wrong, and when we realize that we were wrong, we fix our mistakes. What else would you like us to do?

I'm curious when you will realize stopping support of an entire play style without comment was wrong, regardless of your ultimate decision.

More generally, I'm also curious when you will realize competitive play decisions are extremely important to game experience, and that it is something you have repeatedly ignored in your class passes. Your current DPS balance will just be thrown away with the next build/tree you implement, and this is not really a wise way to try and make a balanced game.

Had you set better limits on your cross class abilities, you could actually balance things in a way that stays balanced, and allows much more diverse play options.

You spend way too much time telling us the game is balanced, and then showing us you were wrong. Please think about more intelligent design choices so that so much of your time is not consumed in this process.

We want you to do better.

[nevergiveup356]

When epic ward is coming since the real cancer in this game are instakills?

[Kinerd]

Let's play a quick hypothetical game - say you're working on DDO in the year 2035, and over the last 6 months, you've been working with art to make a new race - let's say, Tabaxi or something. They look great, they have cool tails, they can run really fast - good stuff. It's coming out next update and you're really excited.

But oh no! Turns out a different race - like, uhhh... Thri-Kreen. Oh god, they're so OP. Turns out their one-man-band Bard synergies are just tearing up the meta. Almost all r10 completions are just 100% Thri-Kreen, people on the forums have caught wind of this and are very upset. You've gotta tone em down. It's hurting endgame - in fact, it's hurting the whole game. Everyone's got four arms and there's no way to just buff the other 32 player-races, it's clearly Thri-Kreen that are the outlier.

What do you do? Do you hold back Tabaxi to safely nerf Thri-Kreen? How long does Tabaxi wait, implemented fully but disabled, before you feel safe enough to release it? Do you release Tabaxi first and then wait on the nerf? How long would you be able to wait before being able to "safely" nerf Thri-Kreen? What timing would make the players the least angry? If there's a right answer here, let me know.the right answer is if they're both p2p don't nerf one at the same time you buff another IF you don't want people to accuse you of doing so for the money

if you absolutely must release both at the same time, then give concrete information about why you're nerfing right then as opposed to months earlier when players were saying the exact same things

[Kinerd]

Worth noting: this is coming at the same time as a THF buff

and nobody is mad about that! that's my whole point, there are ways to release buffs and nerfs at the same time without making it look like what people are calling a bait and switch (which i don't think is technically accurate but that's not the point)

[Kinerd]

Contrarian view on this comment and the nerf:

SSG: we think it is balanced but if you disagree show us with examples.
(later)
SSG: You have shown that requires some rebalancing.

Some players: How dare you change it when you thought it was fine months ago just because some players did what you asked and showed that it required toning down???


Complaints by players about a nerf seem childish in absence of seeing what exactly is changing.

what examples came up between September and now that didn't come up between release and September, though?

here's a thread from August (https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/507469-Inquisitive-is-the-most-broken-thing-you-ve-ever-released-on-purpose) detailing everything that made Inquisitive OP. everything that was said there was NOT enough for Inquisitive to be OP, because the devs said exactly that a month later. therefore there must be something about Inquisitive NOT said in that thread that makes it OP.

what is that something?

[Steelstar]

if you absolutely must release both at the same time, then give concrete information about why you're nerfing right then as opposed to months earlier when players were saying the exact same things

Here's that explanation in a nutshell:

Gathering data takes time.
Verifying that that data is accurate for the reasons you think it is takes time.
Analyzing meaning within that data takes time.
Coming to conclusions about why issues are the way that they are takes time.
Discussing potential solutions takes time.
Prototyping potential solutions takes time.
Gathering new data based on solution prototypes takes time.
Iterating on changes by repeating the six steps above this one takes time.
Qualitative testing on implemented solutions takes time.
We just went through the holidays where the humans behind these accounts were with their families.
We spent a lot of time on a large ecosystem of changes for this update, a lot of which haven't been shown yet.
This is the first update window since Inquisitive issues became apparent where a change that we feel is going to make the impact it needs to make is ready.


We could've slapped out a harsh change much earlier on this one, but took the time to figure out what our earlier work missed and why. And then, looking at the bigger picture, we started constructing solutions.

U45 is a big update with a lot more new things, cool things, and buffs in it than nerfs. We're looking forward to showing the whole thing soon.

[HungarianRhapsody]

Worth noting: this is coming at the same time as a THF buff

Yes, we like that part.

[rabidfox]

Let's play a quick hypothetical game - say you're working on DDO in the year 2035, and over the last 6 months, you've been working with art to make a new race - let's say, Tabaxi or something. They look great, they have cool tails, they can run really fast - good stuff. It's coming out next update and you're really excited.

But oh no! Turns out a different race - like, uhhh... Thri-Kreen. Oh god, they're so OP. Turns out their one-man-band Bard synergies are just tearing up the meta. Almost all r10 completions are just 100% Thri-Kreen, people on the forums have caught wind of this and are very upset. You've gotta tone em down. It's hurting endgame - in fact, it's hurting the whole game. Everyone's got four arms and there's no way to just buff the other 32 player-races, it's clearly Thri-Kreen that are the outlier.

What do you do? Do you hold back Tabaxi to safely nerf Thri-Kreen? How long does Tabaxi wait, implemented fully but disabled, before you feel safe enough to release it? Do you release Tabaxi first and then wait on the nerf? How long would you be able to wait before being able to "safely" nerf Thri-Kreen? What timing would make the players the least angry? If there's a right answer here, let me know.

All I heard was I want it to be 2035 already so I can be a kitty.

[nokowi]

Let's play a quick hypothetical game - say you're working on DDO in the year 2035, and over the last 6 months, you've been working with art to make a new race - let's say, Tabaxi or something. They look great, they have cool tails, they can run really fast - good stuff. It's coming out next update and you're really excited.

But oh no! Turns out a different race - like, uhhh... Thri-Kreen. Oh god, they're so OP. Turns out their one-man-band Bard synergies are just tearing up the meta. Almost all r10 completions are just 100% Thri-Kreen, people on the forums have caught wind of this and are very upset. You've gotta tone em down. It's hurting endgame - in fact, it's hurting the whole game. Everyone's got four arms and there's no way to just buff the other 32 player-races, it's clearly Thri-Kreen that are the outlier.

What do you do? Do you hold back Tabaxi to safely nerf Thri-Kreen? How long does Tabaxi wait, implemented fully but disabled, before you feel safe enough to release it? Do you release Tabaxi first and then wait on the nerf? How long would you be able to wait before being able to "safely" nerf Thri-Kreen? What timing would make the players the least angry? If there's a right answer here, let me know.

What you don't do is give everyone four arms, which has been the SSG solution - sharing abilities to make more poor combinations, while ensuring there is only one way to play the game.

You give four arm play advantages and disadvantages instead of trying to match DPS. This allows a game where people have a wider spread of DPS to be important and useful.

Please stop matching DPS and focus on unique play experience with unique advantages and disadvantages. Stop making everyone too similar. This would dramatically reduce your balance issues for you.

Barriers to the most powerful abilities help prevent the type of situation you describe above, and make the fixes much easier.

[Son_of_the_South]

Dual halflings, duh, it was asked from day 1.


Combat Style: Halfling.

- You are now an adept at flinging and swiping small races at your targets.

Improved Halfling.

- Your halflings may now wield extra weapons.

Dual-halfling:

- You may now wield two halflings but your 2nd halfling may not doublestrike or wield another weapon or another halfling.

Perfect-halfling:

- Halflings you wield are now hasted and gain +10% alacrity.

Here's another:

Cost: all credibility: Jealous, inept player may now post insensible nonsense all over selected forum, with particular emphasis on ensuring repeatedly posting so as to appear to have the loudest, yet least meaningful, 'voice'.

[nokowi]

Here's that explanation in a nutshell:

Gathering data takes time.
Verifying that that data is accurate for the reasons you think it is takes time.
Analyzing meaning within that data takes time.
Coming to conclusions about why issues are the way that they are takes time.
Discussing potential solutions takes time.
Prototyping potential solutions takes time.
Gathering new data based on solution prototypes takes time.
Iterating on changes by repeating the six steps above this one takes time.
Qualitative testing on implemented solutions takes time.
We just went through the holidays where the humans behind these accounts were with their families.
We spent a lot of time on a large ecosystem of changes for this update, a lot of which haven't been shown yet.
This is the first update window since Inquisitive issues became apparent where a change that we feel is going to make the impact it needs to make is ready.


We could've slapped out a harsh change much earlier on this one, but took the time to figure out what our earlier work missed and why. And then, looking at the bigger picture, we started constructing solutions.

U45 is a big update with a lot more new things, cool things, and buffs in it than nerfs. We're looking forward to showing the whole thing soon.

If you want some constructive feedback, just avoid telling us that everything is great, as the appearance is that you have your ears closed.

We watched you tell us stealth was great, and then we found out it actually wasn't being supported. (the opposite of great, I guess)
We watched you tell us "inquisitive was balanced, with the 100 hours to prove it" when we gave you feedback, and now those statements look a little tone deaf, as the player base was correct.

Something to the order of "We are scheduling a discussion based on forum feedback" would go a lot further, and doesn't obligate you to take any particular action.

Every time we give you this type of constructive feedback about communication, it gets ignored.

Telling us you could not have done any better has that same appearance of not really being open to listening.

Of course you could have done better. There are constructive comments throughout this thread, if you are willing to listen.

Your effort is 100%, but the implementation is not always at that same level as the effort.

[janave]

Here's another:

Cost: all credibility: Jealous, inept player may now post insensible nonsense all over selected forum, with particular emphasis on ensuring repeatedly posting so as to appear to have the loudest, yet least meaningful, 'voice'.

Ah I see, insulting and attacking a person who tried to insert a little relaxed humor is now the baseline for meaningful & credible voice!

Cheers & Congrats! Never seen that one coming ;)


//Scratches head trying to define "loud" voice in forum posts..:)



Worth noting: this is coming at the same time as a THF buff

Nice! good news ;)

[Alcides]

There exist a set of builds based on inquisitive that can solo R10 which needs to be addressed...

[Alrik_Fassbauer]

Well, I'll have to adapt anyway. I have only 1 char which is an Inquisitive fun build at currently level 2 artificer + level 2 druid. As this is an very experimental build, I'm not playing it that much, because I want to try out other classes first.


What I notice is that people write that Inquisitive is overpowered - but they never seem to stop playing it. Peoiple don't even try to gimp it.

What shocks me a bit is that ... mindset of minmaxing is SO MUCH set into stone - as if the player's minds were consisting of rock - that players NEVER have the idea to get away from this mindset.

It's like eating nothing but vitamine C filled fruit. Because it is so healthy. Nothing but that. People wouldn't even think of eating spaghetti, because there is no vitamine C in it.

So, everybody's playing Inquisitive, because Inquisitive = Vitamine C. People don't even tinker with gimping it so that it wouldn't be overpowered. It HAS to be played bECAUSE it is so powerful ! And the same peoiple do NOT play anything else BECAUSE it is NOT as powerful as Inquisitive.

It is quite difficult for me to explain what I mean, because English isn't my first language. But people continie eating sweets called "Inquisitive Sweets", even although they DO know that too much sugar isn't good for their teeth !


I just wish people were playing more fun builds, and not so much extremely maximized builds.



There exist a set of builds based on inquisitive that can solo R10 which needs to be addressed...

Thank you very much for proving my point !

The older I become, the more I hate this extreme profit-oriented approach of people to maximize everything !

[HungarianRhapsody]

Here's that explanation in a nutshell:

Gathering data takes time.
Verifying that that data is accurate for the reasons you think it is takes time.
Analyzing meaning within that data takes time.
Coming to conclusions about why issues are the way that they are takes time.
Discussing potential solutions takes time.
Prototyping potential solutions takes time.
Gathering new data based on solution prototypes takes time.
Iterating on changes by repeating the six steps above this one takes time.
Qualitative testing on implemented solutions takes time.
We just went through the holidays where the humans behind these accounts were with their families.
We spent a lot of time on a large ecosystem of changes for this update, a lot of which haven't been shown yet.
This is the first update window since Inquisitive issues became apparent where a change that we feel is going to make the impact it needs to make is ready.


We could've slapped out a harsh change much earlier on this one, but took the time to figure out what our earlier work missed and why. And then, looking at the bigger picture, we started constructing solutions.

U45 is a big update with a lot more new things, cool things, and buffs in it than nerfs. We're looking forward to showing the whole thing soon.

A post of "hey, we hear you and Inquisitive is going to be dialed back a bit" sometime in November or December would have been helpful.

I'm positive that at least part of the blowback comes from having the Inquisitive nerf thrown in as a "by the way, we're nerfing Inquisitive" at the tail end of a podcast instead of a post listing exactly what you have here.

[Kinerd]

Here's that explanation in a nutshell:

Gathering data takes time.
Verifying that that data is accurate for the reasons you think it is takes time.
Analyzing meaning within that data takes time.
Coming to conclusions about why issues are the way that they are takes time.
Discussing potential solutions takes time.
Prototyping potential solutions takes time.
Gathering new data based on solution prototypes takes time.
Iterating on changes by repeating the six steps above this one takes time.
Qualitative testing on implemented solutions takes time.
We just went through the holidays where the humans behind these accounts were with their families.
We spent a lot of time on a large ecosystem of changes for this update, a lot of which haven't been shown yet.
This is the first update window since Inquisitive issues became apparent where a change that we feel is going to make the impact it needs to make is ready.


We could've slapped out a harsh change much earlier on this one, but took the time to figure out what our earlier work missed and why. And then, looking at the bigger picture, we started constructing solutions.

U45 is a big update with a lot more new things, cool things, and buffs in it than nerfs. We're looking forward to showing the whole thing soon.

granted, all of that

what i mean by concrete is more like "X is what made Inquisitive issues become apparent, and we started looking into it on Y date". this lets us verify that X wasn't brought to the developers' attention way before Y date, which goes a long way to "appeas[ing] the 'you're just doing this to sell the new thing' theory". as a bonus it also helps us understand what the developers consider OP and evidence of OP, which goes a LONG way to streamlining both the customer-customer and customer-developer discussion process.

imagine how differently this thread would have gone if there had been posts like
October: "fyi we're looking into whether Inquisitive is OP"
November: "yep, it's definitely OP"
December: "the fix we had in mind didn't pan out, but Inquisitive is still OP and we're still working on it"
January: "okay, nerf time"

of course some people will still be suspicious when p2p nerf is simultaneous with new p2p thing, but from our perspective the devs went from "Inquisitive is perfectly balanced" to "okay, nerf time" overnight. that abruptness would be suspicious even in a vacuum.

and of course you don't have to do any of this. my understanding from this thread is the devs want to alleviate this suspicion, and i feel this would be a very potent way of doing so.

[nokowi]

I just wish people were playing more fun builds, and not so much extremely maximized builds.



They haven't supported the builds that people said were fun, and their design choices actively discourage players from choosing fun over rewards.

If they were going to put in huge rewards, SSG would have had to match fun with rewards, letting people progress at similar rates when they play whatever they enjoy. They chose not to do this, continually pushing players to play one way. Even their dungeon design choices support this mentality.

[droid327]

What I notice is that people write that Inquisitive is overpowered - but they never seem to stop playing it.

I just wish people were playing more fun builds, and not so much extremely maximized builds.



The people complaining about Inqui, generally, are not the ones who are playing it. They're complaining because other players are suddenly better than them...even though their builds havent changed at all themselves.

A lot of people find it fun to be powerful. Its not a dichotomy. People like being as strong as possible, so they're going to gravitate to whatever offers the most power, and they're not going to have fun if they're playing something less powerful.

[Nickodeamous]

Well, I have to say that I am actually sad about this. As a pure build monk, I have really actually enjoyed plowing through heroics with my IQS buddies. It has made leveling so much easier.

I do feel the IQS pain though as a professionally Nerfed class (monk). The only thing I wonder is how much of a nerf is it, and will this be the end? Or is this a test, and then later you get whacked again (again captain nerf monk here). I continued to play and optimize my monk. I am sure this is not the end of road for IQS by any means.

Good luck! (and to think I was about to roll and IQS build)

[Nickodeamous]

The people complaining about Inqui, generally, are not the ones who are playing it. They're complaining because other players are suddenly better than them...even though their builds havent changed at all themselves.

A lot of people find it fun to be powerful. Its not a dichotomy. People like being as strong as possible, so they're going to gravitate to whatever offers the most power, and they're not going to have fun if they're playing something less powerful.

^^^^^This!!

I don't play one, but I love running in a Pug with them! It does make leveling so much easier. A bit sad!!

[Thar]

There exist a set of builds based on inquisitive that can solo R10 which needs to be addressed...

I group with a good number of 1% and excellent high reaper players. no one is solo'ing R10 on an inquis anymore so than other classes are.

[Fenrisulven7]

This thread so much reminds me of another game, when the devs finally fixed everyone's pet exploit. OMG you would have thought their dog was killed.

[bracelet]

I group with a good number of 1% and excellent high reaper players. no one is solo'ing R10 on an inquis anymore so than other classes are.

My experience is the same. I am running R10s with generally well-balanced groups. My inq often leads the kill count by a small to medium margin, but if I were on my own I wouldn't last one room. Teamwork is what brings success, not raw firepower. Interestingly enough, I have run into two or three other builds that outperform inq pretty healthily. Depending on how far they swing the bat, I may switch to one of those.

[capsela]

A good DC wizard can pk a room just as fast as inquis and a sorc can clear a room in the same time or slightly faster. The problem for most players is this is past life and gear intensive and most people don't put in that work. Even a DC cleric can clear a room quickly in some cases.

most people don't play in those types of groups and don't realize. case in point.

I am a DC wizard. One of the best. And I think inquisitive is MUCH stronger than DC wizards. Maybe 4 times stronger but with no mana limit. And about 100 times more solo capable especially in high reaper.

A DC wiz can PK one mob at a time. With IPS trash can be cleared much faster and safer. Always up NHB. What more needs to be said?

Trying to wail in R10 is almost 100% suicide.

[HungarianRhapsody]

This thread so much reminds me of another game, when the devs finally fixed everyone's pet exploit. OMG you would have thought their dog was killed.

I'll do just fine on whatever the META is, but I like the fact that Inquisitive can run just fine on any class, so I'm not just limited to [insert class here].

I finally got off my ass and finished my completionist, so that doesn't matter quite as much, but Inquisitive is mostly fine. There are some situations where it overperforms in Epic, but it isn't an outlier in Heroic lives at all (*everything* is overpowered in Heroic - even Paladin is amazeballs in Heroic content) and it's merely "good" on most classes.

[nokowi]

My experience is the same. I am running R10s with generally well-balanced groups. My inq often leads the kill count by a small to medium margin, but if I were on my own I wouldn't last one room. Teamwork is what brings success, not raw firepower. Interestingly enough, I have run into two or three other builds that outperform inq pretty healthily. Depending on how far they swing the bat, I may switch to one of those.

Let's all hope SSG doesn't balance 100% of the game around 1% of players.

That's not a formula for success.

I think your statement is representative that the top 1% largely plays whatever is most powerful, which leaves little reason to balance the rest of the game around them.

[jhypsyshah]

NOOOOOOOO I just start using inqs let me have some fun for awhile first lol.

Same here. I just bought Inqui and rebuilt to tinker with it. It is the first purchase I have made in years but I guess I should have known better.

There are no lemon laws in Ebberon. Buyer beware.

[Chai]

The people complaining about Inqui, generally, are not the ones who are playing it. They're complaining because other players are suddenly better than them...even though their builds havent changed at all themselves.

A lot of people find it fun to be powerful. Its not a dichotomy. People like being as strong as possible, so they're going to gravitate to whatever offers the most power, and they're not going to have fun if they're playing something less powerful.

I'd be fine if it stopped there. The issue is instead of joining the new META people go to the forums and claim someone else playing the new thing ruins their fun. A dichotomy does exist in that a real meta gamer would simply join the new meta, and those complaining about having their fun supposedly ruined by someone else playing the new thing werent meta gamers in the first place. The design flaw here is not in how powerful the new thing is, but in having an actual dichotomy where meta gamers and non meta-gamers are in the same game space. Non meta players are not willing to forgo the reaper progression system even when the vast majority of it only functions in reaper. So they force their way into a game space designed for meta gamers then complain the meta build, meta ap line, meta (insert new thing here) ruins their fun.

Its kind of an odd mentality, because I run into them from time to time and many refuse to raid, due to newer raids even on normal being far more difficult than normal quests. This means forgoing BiS gear in many cases, which can bring as much if not more progression to the character than running reaper would. Is it the extra XP earned that causes them to force themselves into the metagamer game space? How big is the overlap between non meta gamers and xp/min crowd? Typically the meta gaming crowd is the most concerned with xp/min/farming/etc...not non meta gamers.

[Fivetigers33]

They haven't supported the builds that people said were fun, and their design choices actively discourage players from choosing fun over rewards.

If they were going to put in huge rewards, SSG would have had to match fun with rewards, letting people progress at similar rates when they play whatever they enjoy. They chose not to do this, continually pushing players to play one way. Even their dungeon design choices support this mentality.

This is a serious problem with DDO, but we are probably beyond the point of actually doing anything about it.

DDO was supposed to be a party based game where several different roles were needed for success. They gave everyone heals and healers became optional. 99% of traps can be safely bypassed so trappers are optional. Stealth has been virtually removed from the game. Clickies and power creep let any variety of builds effectively "tank" if even only for short bursts of time such as boss battles, so dedicated tanks/aggro management became optional. All that's left is DPS, and that's the game DDO has become.

When the goal of the game is to get through a dungeon and all the other necessary roles have been removed, the higher DPS builds are going to naturally end up carrying lower DPS builds through the quest. And at that point, the game that was supposed to be built on diversity (endless build possibilities!) has been turned into a game of uniformity.

Inquisitive is the icing on this cake. Any class can have good DPS!!!! Just be Inquisitive. IE give us money and you'll be good at DDO! If DDO hadn't removed the necessity of a balanced party over the years, I think you'd see a lot less complaints about Inquisitive now.

As critical as I am of many dev decisions and the direction of DDO in general, I actually applaud both of the Sharn raids. They require team work and strategies that had been removed from most of the game over the years. Though I will admit THTH is definitely a DPS race, as a whole it still takes a lot of coordination and more than 2 people in the raid knowing what's going on. If you can harness more of "teamwork required" content, I think you'll see less complaint threads like this in the future.

[psykopeta]

i got good news for you, following the most recent (or all?) trends, new class will be OP for around 2 years, however universal trees you all know 1 year is max duration in the opness, which doesn't make em directly ****, cause they will touch the lower part, not the overperforming one, so you feel all enticed to buy new class (it's like playing new packs/expansions during 1st week after release, makes no sense denying the facts lol)

[AbyssalMage]

So...

A) Thank you developers for communicating with the community. This thread is dovetailing quickly so wanted to get that in before its locked.

B) It was predicted by the community Inquisitive would be nerfed prior to the release of Alchemist. Honestly I was surprised you waited this long, but they were right. If you are still reading the thread, focus on Alchemist immediately if you don't want a repeat. Look to your players who you have a good rapport with and act on there feedback. I would hazard a guess some of your employees have their personal numbers and you can call them in "off hours" if you asked them if that was ok.

C) Anyway (i.e. off topic), hopefully it doesn't take 3 months and 5 days before my computer gets out of the shop once again. Stupid repair departments!

[nokowi]

As critical as I am of many dev decisions and the direction of DDO in general, I actually applaud both of the Sharn raids. They require team work and strategies that had been removed from most of the game over the years. Though I will admit THTH is definitely a DPS race, as a whole it still takes a lot of coordination and more than 2 people in the raid knowing what's going on. If you can harness more of "teamwork required" content, I think you'll see less complaint threads like this in the future.

I'm glad you like this content!

The core issue (for the reasons you mentioned above) is that a solo player also needs to be rewarded for tactical play, and game design really pushes players into whatever is easiest (hi Inquisitve!). I was happy soloing at 1/3 the speed of everyone else, using tactics, but devs decided that this type of play was simply not important. With current design, you are stuck trying to find a group that matched your preferences to run the content, and while this might exist on release, it usually disappears in short order once players have the rewards and move on to easier (faster rewards) content.

The game design needs to support this same type of skilled tactical play in solo mode, and this is best done through game mechanics and class abilities rather than content. This means giving a player competitive options that are meaningful, rather than gated and monotonous choices that encourage you to watch Netfilx while playing.

There needs to be a challenge setting (not rewards setting) that is solo-friendly, requiring tactics, if on average people are spending ~70% of their time soloing. They actually removed this from the game (stealth) when they introduced reaper, which leaves an arms race for the easiest play.

[Chai]

This is a serious problem with DDO, but we are probably beyond the point of actually doing anything about it.

DDO was supposed to be a party based game where several different roles were needed for success. They gave everyone heals and healers became optional. 99% of traps can be safely bypassed so trappers are optional. Stealth has been virtually removed from the game. Clickies and power creep let any variety of builds effectively "tank" if even only for short bursts of time such as boss battles, so dedicated tanks/aggro management became optional. All that's left is DPS, and that's the game DDO has become.

When the goal of the game is to get through a dungeon and all the other necessary roles have been removed, the higher DPS builds are going to naturally end up carrying lower DPS builds through the quest. And at that point, the game that was supposed to be built on diversity (endless build possibilities!) has been turned into a game of uniformity.

Inquisitive is the icing on this cake. Any class can have good DPS!!!! Just be Inquisitive. IE give us money and you'll be good at DDO! If DDO hadn't removed the necessity of a balanced party over the years, I think you'd see a lot less complaints about Inquisitive now.

As critical as I am of many dev decisions and the direction of DDO in general, I actually applaud both of the Sharn raids. They require team work and strategies that had been removed from most of the game over the years. Though I will admit THTH is definitely a DPS race, as a whole it still takes a lot of coordination and more than 2 people in the raid knowing what's going on. If you can harness more of "teamwork required" content, I think you'll see less complaint threads like this in the future.

"Teamwork required" content got shouted down quite some time ago. There was a statement on the forums that elite was not designed to scale down due to #party members, and a bug caused it to actually scale, and when players began posting about it, there was heavy advocacy to RetCon the "bug" as WAI so people could solo elite for max favor. The same "not fair" and "ruins my fun" arguments were trotted out when this occurred.

This is part of the issue we continue to bring up. Multiple groups of different kinds of players forcing their way into each others game spaces, then demanding the game space with the highest progression potential be tailored for their playstyle. Refuse to run normal or hard. Demand elite be RetCon to scale - then when the original elite players complained the game was too easy, the response was eventually Reaper 1-10.

[TheMaxpower]

I expect the new class will be very OP and the nerf will come after everyone buys it. Don’t make it too OP and perhaps you can avoid another bait and switch and making people upset. ????

[LOOON375]

Thank you devs for continuing to try to make this game the best role playing game out there.
Because it still is.

[Graskitch]

.. a new race - let's say, Tabaxi or something. They look great, they have cool tails, they can run really fast - good stuff. It's coming out next update and you're really excited.

this is great but unexpected news.. I can see tabaxi fitting into the isle of dread release. It is not my ideal player race (I still would have preferred kobold) but I do like the idea that we might get some kind of ball of string ranged missile/lasso weapon. You have tail technology in ddo so it makes sense to use it. This would be a great opportunity to show off fur textures and patterns.



.. a different race - like, uhhh... Thri-Kreen. Oh god, they're so OP....

wow. This really caught me by surprise and makes me think you are going for a Dark Sun campaign expansion release which is more than I had hoped for. I am assuming that thri-kreen are granted the choice of four-weapon OR four-handed weapon fighting as an exclusive racial feat and that the paperdoll inventory will accommodate four weapon slots AND that there will be an option to dual wield quarterstaves...

I am not sure why but I feel like saying thri-kreen sounds very grievous in a good way.
I am just wondering what the armor/carapace options will be.

How many ring slots will thri-kreen get?

[Lynnabel]

this is great but unexpected news..

I feel obligated to point out that this was a hypothetical scenario that hopefully made a few players realize that what they are asking for is impossible, and not an actual announcement that, in the year 2035, we'll be releasing Tabaxi and Thri-Kreen.

[GordolGreydon]

I feel obligated to point out that this was a hypothetical scenario that hopefully made a few players realize that what they are asking for is impossible, and not an actual announcement that, in the year 2035, we'll be releasing Tabaxi and Thri-Kreen.


RIP tabaxi dreams </3

[Thar]

I am a DC wizard. One of the best. And I think inquisitive is MUCH stronger than DC wizards. Maybe 4 times stronger but with no mana limit. And about 100 times more solo capable especially in high reaper.

A DC wiz can PK one mob at a time. With IPS trash can be cleared much faster and safer. Always up NHB. What more needs to be said?

Trying to wail in R10 is almost 100% suicide.

I play a DC caster with dc's that work in mid-high reapers post nerf and I can remove 4 mobs before the inquis can finish one with the exceptions of a few specific player's inquis. and spell timers are usually done by that time to start over, not to mention aoe instakills or AOE dps damage. by that time the mobs have lined up for ips but often the environment limits getting them all in a straight line. That caster is multiple lives and not a build a new player can jump into. If your using wail and blowing up, you may want to rethink your approach. perhaps mass hold and then wail. perhaps heightened circle of death and stay far away is better. but as one of the best you probably don't need that tip.

is that the best way to play a dc wizard - no. you should be mass holding mobs first in reaper. but if I do instakills can keep up or surpass inquis builds from many good players.

As for mana, reaper has a benefit called spell balls that give you spell points back or you conserve spell points by limited use of high cost spells. PK is not high cost. You can't run a caster doing lvl 9 spells all day with full metamagics and make it through a dungeon. both myself and the inquis need to shrine so that is equal. me for spell points, inquis for no holds barred charges.

I do agree inquis needs a slight adjustment but it's not op the way the forums make it out to be. What I see is that inquis is an easier path to a good build for pugs with little room to mess it up unlike most multiclassing in ddo. if the attack speed in tier 5 is reduced form 30% to 20% that should be enough.

[Thar]

I feel obligated to point out that this was a hypothetical scenario that hopefully made a few players realize that what they are asking for is impossible, and not an actual announcement that, in the year 2035, we'll be releasing Tabaxi and Thri-Kreen.

no it's in writing it's official!!! lol Hope the game is still going this strong in 2035...

[Lynnabel]

no it's in writing it's official!!! lol Hope the game is still going this strong in 2035...

It will be. DDO is actually doing really, really well. I'm extremely confident in our ability to continue to improve. Maybe I'll even get around to reworking the monk class by then, who knows.

[Pyed-Pyper]

Ho oh boy oh boy this thread has been a helluva ride. I'm going to read it again from the start.


----


Before going, I'll leave this for ponder fodder.


“Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action”

Ian Fleming

[rabidfox]

It will be. DDO is actually doing really, really well. I'm extremely confident in our ability to continue to improve. Maybe I'll even get around to reworking the monk class by then, who knows.

The four fisted Thri-Kreen handwrap monk will make the wait worth it. =)

[Fauxknight]

The four fisted Thri-Kreen handwrap monk will make the wait worth it. =)


Was about to say something regarding Thri-Kreen monks.

[nokowi]

It will be. DDO is actually doing really, really well. I'm extremely confident in our ability to continue to improve. Maybe I'll even get around to reworking the monk class by then, who knows.

Can you share any metrics with us?

Many of us gage our (in)activity on your ability to do some of the things you have not done, whether that is better grouping, more playstyles, etc, and the appearance to a player in game can be quite a bit different than the revenue model.

Knowing you have the capacity and desire for improvement goes a long way to those heavily invested in the game.

[Chai]

Let's play a quick hypothetical game - say you're working on DDO in the year 2035, and over the last 6 months, you've been working with art to make a new race - let's say, Tabaxi or something. They look great, they have cool tails, they can run really fast - good stuff. It's coming out next update and you're really excited.

But oh no! Turns out a different race - like, uhhh... Thri-Kreen. Oh god, they're so OP. Turns out their one-man-band Bard synergies are just tearing up the meta. Almost all r10 completions are just 100% Thri-Kreen, people on the forums have caught wind of this and are very upset. You've gotta tone em down. It's hurting endgame - in fact, it's hurting the whole game. Everyone's got four arms and there's no way to just buff the other 32 player-races, it's clearly Thri-Kreen that are the outlier.

What do you do? Do you hold back Tabaxi to safely nerf Thri-Kreen? How long does Tabaxi wait, implemented fully but disabled, before you feel safe enough to release it? Do you release Tabaxi first and then wait on the nerf? How long would you be able to wait before being able to "safely" nerf Thri-Kreen? What timing would make the players the least angry? If there's a right answer here, let me know.

This depends.

Is Tabaxi also OP to the point where the same forumites will demand nerfs claiming it ruins their fun?

If its not, release it. If it is, then you run into a similar issue there is now, with a pattern of releasing new things at the top of the meta, then nerfing it before releasing the next thing that is top of the meta.

Of course, theres the catch 22 that if its not released as powerful then that same group of forumites feedback to anyone asking will be to buy Thri-Kreen and not Tabaxi because of the OP nature.

The real marketing question would be: Is there enough non meta players who buy races for flavor reasons, to "collect them all" or for any other reason than "when it comes out its OP?" In most games this crowd dwarfs the power gamers, and people buy it just like they buy fashion skins, mount skins, weapon skins, etc.

Your answer to any negative feedback would be that we cater to multiple types of players and every new release doesnt hit like a truck on purpose in order to sell it to the same people.

[redoubt]

SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: oh whats that? the new class is ready?
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP
SSG: Its OP

this...

[Kinerd]

I feel obligated to point out that this was a hypothetical scenario that hopefully made a few players realize that what they are asking for is impossible, and not an actual announcement that, in the year 2035, we'll be releasing Tabaxi and Thri-Kreen.

i feel like there's a serious disconnect between what we're asking and what you feel we're asking

i've suggested an {Inq nerf THF buff} release wouldn't have made people suspicious - the racial analogy to this would be nerfing Thri-Keen and buffing Halflings

i and others have also suggested that should a simultaneous {nerf p2p new p2p} release such as Good-Bye Thri-Keen Hello Tabaxi be deemed unavoidable, you could still blunt the suspicion considerably with a more detailed design and release process. for example in this case the devs have said in this thread that new data made them re-evaluate Inquisitive as OP, but when asked point blank and repeatedly to detail that data the devs have not done so

it's not clear to me how either of those suggestions is "impossible", but especially the latter one since you've already looked at that data, you must have it somewhere. why not just post what specifically about Inquisitives made you declare it OP?

[Graskitch]

I feel obligated to point out that this was a hypothetical scenario that hopefully made a few players realize that what they are asking for is impossible, and not an actual announcement that, in the year 2035, we'll be releasing Tabaxi and Thri-Kreen.

NOOO!!! Lynnabel! NO!!

come on, you know that we know that you always have major teases and spills about upcoming features in your posts that are "accidental". we always take your hypotheticals and sly slip-ups as early spoilers for things to come; we feed off your hiccups and reading between the lines that are not there.

if not tabaxi, then please confirm that ssg might or "might not" be releasing thri-kreen and a dark sun campaign expansion in 2020 and probably not in 2035. I really am looking forward (or not) to dual wielding quarterstaves again.

[nokowi]

NOOO!!! Lynnabel! NO!!

come on, you know that we know that you always have major teases and spills about upcoming features in your posts that are "accidental". we always take your hypotheticals and sly slip-ups as early spoilers for things to come; we feed off your hiccups and reading between the lines that are not there.

if not tabaxi, then please confirm that ssg might or "might not" be releasing thri-kreen and a dark sun campaign expansion in 2020 and probably not in 2035. I really am looking forward (or not) to dual wielding quarterstaves again.

More importantly we can now see why they created dual crossbows.

Steelstars signature is finally making a lot of sense.

We just have to wait for 2035 to see their brilliance.

[Anuulified]

Well to all you people screaming for it please note that the powers that be have granted your wish as it will be happening in U45 which should be available next week on Lam

Ozz, you knew it wouldnt last. I see caster damage lasting though. But only because they have a limited resourse that can be further limited in the future, aka lack of rest shrines.

[myliftkk_v2]

I feel obligated to point out that this was a hypothetical scenario that hopefully made a few players realize that what they are asking for is impossible, and not an actual announcement that, in the year 2035, we'll be releasing Tabaxi and Thri-Kreen.
What players are asking for isn't impossible, you're just not interpreting their actual need correctly.

The problem with releasing on nearly zero hard playtesting data is natural bias is always going point towards to making something OP. No one goes to buy a new car thinking, oh I want one slightly mediocre to my existing car, you always want better. Same for the designers making a car, and same for the designers making software. The fact that SSG/Turbine/etc has consistently released the new OP thing, while trying to fix the last OP thing, doesn't even have to be a commercial tactic to be true. It can be true strictly on the basis of everyone having a natural bias to make the next thing better than the last thing.

To first acknowledge that implicit bias exists and then identify how to place controls on that is how you eliminate the constant cycle of introduction of OP problems which has never, ever stopped to this day. When you finally stop that cycle, then the conspiracies will dissipate, but that's not even core reason to end that cycle. It should be ended because it makes the game better not to constantly be trapped in that cycle and the follow-on implications of nerf/buff/re-nerf/re-buff/etc.

[Graskitch]

More importantly we can now see why they created dual crossbows.

Steelstars signature is finally making a lot of sense.

We just have to wait for 2035 to see their brilliance.


omg you are right, with thri-kreen we will be able to quadruple crossbow. I suspect the whole point of this 'inquisitive nerf' is to pave the way and balance for the upcoming quadruple crossbowing, aka "quad shooter".

[SpartanKiller13]

We could've slapped out a harsh change much earlier on this one, but took the time to figure out what our earlier work missed and why. And then, looking at the bigger picture, we started constructing solutions.

U45 is a big update with a lot more new things, cool things, and buffs in it than nerfs. We're looking forward to showing the whole thing soon.

I guess I'd prefer if you start with smaller nerfs to overperforming things in the short term after release, and adjusting as needed - as opposed to releasing strong stuff and waiting a while before heavier nerfs. I don't want the nerf maul of smashing +7, I want the nerf bat to tap things around.

ES Warlock nerfs seemed fairly well done (if again spread out), like Shining Through got hit a few times before the Blasts did, and that seemed to work out well. It's a little niche now, but it didn't go from Stronk to Weak in one pass, which I worry about Inquisitive doing (even if I think it's quite OP currently).


I feel obligated to point out that this was a hypothetical scenario that hopefully made a few players realize that what they are asking for is impossible, and not an actual announcement that, in the year 2035, we'll be releasing Tabaxi and Thri-Kreen.

I'm just sad that you expect us to be struggling with R10 in 2035. I expect to be in W40 difficulty by then!

[myliftkk_v2]

Us rebalancing Inqusitive is us admitting it. Sometimes we're wrong, and when we realize that we were wrong, we fix our mistakes. What else would you like us to do?
Does SSG realize that part of "fixing a mistake" is ensuring it won't happen again and actually taking ownership of the mistake, correct? Just twiddling some bits in a file is not what any layperson would describe as "taking ownership".

When SSG starts taking ownership of mistakes, before and after they "fix" them, forumites will get off their back.

When SSG starts taking ensuring the same mistakes don't happen again seriously, before and after they "fix" them, forumites will get off their back.

Btw, I've never met a software developer who ever believed they were wrong when telling them exactly that. Confirmation bias on users always being wrong as a Pavlovian response is a universal perk granted to the software developer class upon selection.

[Oliphant]

The real culprit here is fun. First thing I do when I perfect my OP DC caster, which is far beyond any INQ I make, quick TR cache grab and back to something fun. INQ was fun though and and therein lies the problem. A big problem.

p.s. I hope they curb extreme DPSy stuff, maybe along the mechanical lines, but leave decent folks that heal people alone, you know builds like that are fine right? We all favor healing right? Right? Very favorable! *hinty, puppy eyes, tries to look sympathetic*

[nokowi]

When SSG starts taking ensuring the same mistakes don't happen again seriously, before and after they "fix" them, forumites will get off their back.


I personally would love to be making more positive posts about SSG, and bringing some of my friends here.

I'm surprisingly actually enjoying a phone game, Shadow Legends with 3 of my friends. They have figured out how to create trade-offs in what rewards you go for, while letting the whales go crazy with spending. You can achieve any one thing as a FTP player, but not everything.

I'm running my own guild, learning for others, and helping people learn.

While it's a model for enticing addictive behavior, it has some really good design elements.

[Lynnabel]

Does SSG realize that part of "fixing a mistake" is ensuring it won't happen again and actually taking ownership of the mistake, correct? Just twiddling some bits in a file is not what any layperson would describe as "taking ownership".

What is "taking ownership" if not saying "we were wrong" and fixing the problem? Is there more we can do here?

[capsela]

I play a DC caster with dc's that work in mid-high reapers post nerf and I can remove 4 mobs before the inquis can finish one with the exceptions of a few specific player's inquis. and spell timers are usually done by that time to start over, not to mention aoe instakills or AOE dps damage. by that time the mobs have lined up for ips but often the environment limits getting them all in a straight line. That caster is multiple lives and not a build a new player can jump into. If your using wail and blowing up, you may want to rethink your approach. perhaps mass hold and then wail. perhaps heightened circle of death and stay far away is better. but as one of the best you probably don't need that tip.

is that the best way to play a dc wizard - no. you should be mass holding mobs first in reaper. but if I do instakills can keep up or surpass inquis builds from many good players.

As for mana, reaper has a benefit called spell balls that give you spell points back or you conserve spell points by limited use of high cost spells. PK is not high cost. You can't run a caster doing lvl 9 spells all day with full metamagics and make it through a dungeon. both myself and the inquis need to shrine so that is equal. me for spell points, inquis for no holds barred charges.

I do agree inquis needs a slight adjustment but it's not op the way the forums make it out to be. What I see is that inquis is an easier path to a good build for pugs with little room to mess it up unlike most multiclassing in ddo. if the attack speed in tier 5 is reduced form 30% to 20% that should be enough.

Not sure what the point of this. This is the dictionary definition of patronizing. apparently kind or helpful but betraying a feeling of superiority; condescending
Spare me.

You must play with some terrible inquisitives then.

[GordolGreydon]

Not sure what the point of this. This is the dictionary definition of patronizing. apparently kind or helpful but betraying a feeling of superiority; condescending
Spare me.

You must play with some terrible inquisitives then.


I think he's partially right though. wizards are in a good place for questiing right now. After the inquis nerf, there really is no reason for sorc not to be flavor of the month though. Nearly the same cc/instakill kit as wizard with nearly as much dps as Inquis.

[JonD]

I feel obligated to point out that this was a hypothetical scenario that hopefully made a few players realize that what they are asking for is impossible, and not an actual announcement that, in the year 2035, we'll be releasing Tabaxi and Thri-Kreen.
..and here I was hoping that, in this case, forewarned really *is* four-armed.

(sorry)

[nokowi]

What is "taking ownership" if not saying "we were wrong" and fixing the problem? Is there more we can do here?

Already listed.

1. Notify the player base you are actually discussing inquisitive power levels
2. Don't tell the player base they ae wrong, when you might have to eat your own words
3. Show that you are listening by acknowledging what was said instead of pretending you were not given suggestions
4. Take actions to prevent this from happening repeatedly

The experience people receive is not optimal with this Op/nerf cycle. It feels like your design is jerking us around. People get caught in the middle of TR's, and in builds they would not have chosen without the nerf. You seem to be designing for the people that will play whatever is most OP with raw power levels, which needs zero of your time and resources, instead of what is unique that makes a particular game play fun.

Now please show us you can you do #3.

[HungarianRhapsody]

Not sure what the point of this. This is the dictionary definition of patronizing. apparently kind or helpful but betraying a feeling of superiority; condescending
Spare me.

You must play with some terrible inquisitives then.

Do you play an Inquisitive yourself?

You called yourself one of the very best DC casting Wizards. Someone else said that their experience didn't match how you described your experience. That isn't condescending. That's pointing out that your experience didn't match their experience (even though you called yourself one of the best DC casting Wizards).

Wizards and Sorcerers are both doing REALLY well right now. They each have different strengths, but they're both in a REALLY good place compared to 6/6/8 Inquisitives that are all the rage right now. Inquisitives can do some things that offensive casters can't. Offensive things can do some things that Inquisitives aren't as good at. That's okay.

An even better option is a DC offensive caster alongside a DPS character like an Inquisitive or any of the dozen other options that are still viable even if they aren't the same level of cake-walk-through-R1-solo that Inquisitives AND Sorcerers AND Wizards currently are.

[HungarianRhapsody]

I think he's partially right though. wizards are in a good place for questiing right now. After the inquis nerf, there really is no reason for sorc not to be flavor of the month though. Nearly the same cc/instakill kit as wizard with nearly as much dps as Inquis.

The biggest reason why Sorc won't be absolutely dominating parties the way that Inquisitives do now is that you have to play a Sorcerer to play a Sorcerer. If you want to play an Inquisitive, you can be any class, so you can knock out your Class lives with Inquisitives. You'll want to knock out your Racial lives with Sorcerer or Wizard. It's obviously going to be harder to get your Cleric life with a Sorcerer unless you want to eat a +20 Lesser Heart.

[Kinerd]

What is "taking ownership" if not saying "we were wrong" and fixing the problem? Is there more we can do here?

you can say what changed your mind

you don't have to, but i can't imagine devs looking at this community interaction and seeing it as a success. may as well give it a shot, right?

[Arkat]

What is "taking ownership" if not saying "we were wrong" and fixing the problem? Is there more we can do here?

You can't win this, you know.

[Quikster]

Not sure what the point of this. This is the dictionary definition of patronizing. apparently kind or helpful but betraying a feeling of superiority; condescending
Spare me.

You must play with some terrible inquisitives then.
He does. Some of the worst.

[nokowi]

You can't win this, you know.

She can win me over with one sentence, by acknowledging that she was given actionable suggestions, and that she heard them.

Turning detractors into supporters is a process.

[Nickodeamous]

It will be. DDO is actually doing really, really well. I'm extremely confident in our ability to continue to improve. Maybe I'll even get around to reworking the monk class by then, who knows.

By rework, you mean, un-nerf? haha, just busting your chops:) Thanks for everything!

Nico

[Valiance]

What is "taking ownership" if not saying "we were wrong" and fixing the problem? Is there more we can do here?

I have read this entire thread and honestly can't believe the response. You just gotta shrug it off and know people are going to complain no matter what. Honestly the only thing I can think of that would ameliorate a reasonable concern would be to offer "30% point refund" for anyone who bought inquisitive in the past 3 months or something. Even that is not necessary.

On the substance of the matter inquisitive needs to be nerfed and I can't even believe there is a debate.

I like to find the "hidden" op in this game. Cool build combinations, trying new stuff out, trying to see what works and what works best. With inquisitive in the state it is in I literally feel compelled to play it since I know it is by far the most effective build in the game...yet I'm bored of playing ranged right now. Thus the current state of Inq has literally lead to me barely playing anymore. This nerf is great news as I'll feel excited to play new things, in addition to the Alchemist that is coming soon.

People gotta realize games are adjusted and you need to roll with it for the good of the game.

[nevergiveup356]

Calm down ppl, it is going to be like warlocks.

Just after the 5th nerf that inqs are going to be horrible.

It is funnier to read the forums than play the game lately.

[Pyed-Pyper]

Whew! What a ride. I laughed, I cried, I kissed five bucks good-bye!



We do. Sometimes we do it right, sometimes we don't and need to correct our mistakes.



Wow, what a mistake that would be. Acknowledging that idea at all gives a certain legitimacy to it, even if our acknowledgement is to repeatedly step in and say "this conspiracy theory is both completely false and drives an unneeded wedge in-between the players and developers which is ultimately harmful to DDO as a project, please stop." That being said, here I am, asking players politely to avoid escalating the situation, so oh well, guess I walked into that one, didn't I.

There is literally no way to time any nerf without stepping on a different feature - in fact, if we had nerfed Inq in U44, players would still be sitting here telling us that this is all a ploy to avoid overshadowing Alchemist. In fact, if we wait a few months and nerf it in U46, surprise, it's still all a big ploy to get people to play Alchemist. Even if Alchemist were just cancelled - like, whoops, sorry, no new class, turns out DDO explodes if more than 14 are implemented, our bad - nerfing Inq would magically become a sinister plot to avoid overshadowing Paladin. Or Two-Handed Fighting. Or Stealth. Or Mounts. Or anything - everything - doesn't matter what it is, all that matters is that it came out in the same update, or the next update, or two updates later, or two years later, and therefore must be a cold and calculated marketing decision.

How should we release and rebalance things, if putting any release of any new feature and any rebalance of any old feature in the same calendar year becomes a sinister conspiracy to defraud people? Is there a way to win this situation?

Warning: please note I used this particular post to use as a reply but what follows is not a personal criticism of any one person. I'm not even sure who at SSG should be getting their ear twisted over bad decisions. Also, I don't really know why I'm bothering to take the time to do this, but here goes.


Remember when people would sell stacks of 22 kobold prayer beads in AH? There will be players that chase every last quantum of power, no matter how small. There is no reason to Monty Haul the power rewards.

Likewise, there will always be some people that want more POWAH. It is the job of SSG to basically ignore that eternal insistence.

Did SSG see how popular the Hardcore server was? Does SSG have any idea why it was as popular as it was? Here's a hint - grouping and challenge. People playing together with under-powered characters.

Did SSG really truly believe that Inq wasn't OP? Really? Really really? I didn't need to play Inq to know it was OP. I didn't need to see videos of Inq players pwning content to know it was OP. I didn't need to read the tree specs to know it was OP but I did even though I'm terrible at doing that and it still was painfully obvious that it would be OP. All I needed to know that it would be OP was to know it was the newest new. And that I knew it would be OP because it was the newest new says more about what I know about DDO's history than anything else. And that is sad.

When introducing something new, say a new class, the first and last questions SSG should ask is, "What does this add to the game? Why would players be interested?" If the answer is "It is more powerful," then you, SSG, have not done your jobs.

Additionally, and this is just my opinion, a universal tree should accent a class or build, not define it.

Now the reason I chose this particular post to use as a reply:


Is there a way to win this situation?

Yes, absolutely yes there is a way to win this situation. More than one, even. The easiest way is to avoid it. Don't release stupidly OP things then nerf them. If that requires testing then open a test server. There are plenty of devoted players, though sadly much fewer now, willing to do just that, TEST. If you won't open a test server, then use the preview server to solicit feedback BEFORE releasing the next stupidly OP thing so you can make adjustments.

But lets assume for the moment that releasing stupidly OP things is simply unavoidable. In that case, there should be a place and a procedure for players to make the case and be reviewed in a timely manner. And yes, this requires informed engagement on the part of SSG.

Lastly, you really didn't think Inq was OP? Really?



Master Inquisitive: +2 to all Ability Scores. +10 Ranged Power. While wielding a Light or Heavy (non-repeating) Crossbow, your Vorpal hits will knock down targets hit on a natural 20 + confirmation for 6 seconds without a saving throw, as a Great Crossbow. In addition, you gain +4 Damage dice with Law on your Side.

Sounds like a typical capstone to me.:rolleyes:

[myliftkk_v2]

What is "taking ownership" if not saying "we were wrong" and fixing the problem? Is there more we can do here?
If we distill the public communications to their core essence, isn't this essentially what we have?



SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: Its not OP
SSG: oh whats that? It's OP? prove it?
SSG: Crickets
SSG: ...
SSG: ...
SSG: ...
SSG: ...
SSG: ...
SSG: ...
SSG: ***Nerf Bat*** (oh yeah, we were wrong)


Now in the non-gaming professional software world, many of us don't get to deploy radio silence to our core users as a tactic while we fix things that affect them. And, while all the reasons for the time it takes to fix a software issue are true and valid (as communicated by Steelstar), how one communicates publicly to their users during that time is integral to how one takes "ownership" of the problem (even if one thinks that the problem might be in the user's heads).

It could have been handled far more elegantly as such:



SSG: If you believe it to be OP please provide case data we can review.
SSG: If you believe it to be OP please provide case data we can review.
SSG: If you believe it to be OP please provide case data we can review.
SSG: If you believe it to be OP please provide case data we can review.
SSG: If you believe it to be OP please provide case data we can review.
SSG: If you believe it to be OP please provide case data we can review.
SSG: If you believe it to be OP please provide case data we can review.
SSG: We have received enough data to begin targeting the problem with potential solutions
SSG: We are working on crafting viable solutions.
SSG: We are working on crafting viable solutions.
SSG: We are working on crafting viable solutions.
SSG: We are working on crafting viable solutions.
SSG: We are working on crafting viable solutions.
SSG: We are working on crafting viable solutions.
SSG: We have a viable solutions coming
SSG: ***Nerf Bat***


And the best communication is "we are looking at addressing the cycle of nerfing and how that can be eliminated on an ongoing basis".

None of this is particular rocket science (although asking dev staff to communicate effectively to end users sometimes is to them like asking to undergo a root canal sans anesthetic - and some I'd never let in front of users at all). If you want to build a trusted rapport with your users though, it greatly helps to meet them on their layman's terms when it comes to the frankly social interactions of software problem management.

If one can't figure out how to hack together some decent social strategies for these things, that other option is to create a window into a problem ticket framework like Bugzilla and just ask staff to update that. And be thankful you're not in an SLA with key users where you have to provide bridge calls and status updates every 30 min, so I don't think Chai and everyone else are really asking for a lot.

[Lynnabel]

By rework, you mean, un-nerf? haha, just busting your chops:) Thanks for everything!

Nico

Good gracious, derail aside, I have so many pages and pages of what I want to do to the Monk class. Good lord. In my mind, I'd love to see Henshin Mystic take all of the tanky stuff out of Shintao and become the Quarterstaff and Ki Flame tank tree, where Cauldron of Flame becomes an AoE "enemies that are within the flames will consider you at the top of their hate list" kind of thing, and their ranged Ki flame attacks carry significant threat bonuses. I would absolutely rework the huge amount of active attacks present in Shintao that carry slight bonuses, put all of the saucy fun CC in more accessible and less bizarre places, and make it less of a semi-bruiser defensive-y tree and into a more streamlined CC-and-Melee-DPS tree. Finally, Ninja Spy needs way better Tier 5s and has a lot of holes that need to be filled with a better range of thrower and melee boosts. I think Shortsword Monks are such a cool and unique way to play and I wish the tree had more melee support. Oh, and I'd make Ninja Poison and all of the Poison attacks be way easier to use. I like that Ninja Spy is all in on Dark Monk stuff but it feels like there's no real reason to fully invest in the tree compared to a monk/ranger multiclass. Gosh. The class gets so many cool feats, and they have access to so many cool things, but I feel there's just sooooo much fluff inbetween the major hits. I really feel like Monk is strong despite their trees, not because of them.

What I'm really saying is we're going to keep buffing bard :P

[capsela]

Do you play an Inquisitive yourself?

You called yourself one of the very best DC casting Wizards. Someone else said that their experience didn't match how you described your experience. That isn't condescending. That's pointing out that your experience didn't match their experience (even though you called yourself one of the best DC casting Wizards).

Wizards and Sorcerers are both doing REALLY well right now. They each have different strengths, but they're both in a REALLY good place compared to 6/6/8 Inquisitives that are all the rage right now. Inquisitives can do some things that offensive casters can't. Offensive things can do some things that Inquisitives aren't as good at. That's okay.

An even better option is a DC offensive caster alongside a DPS character like an Inquisitive or any of the dozen other options that are still viable even if they aren't the same level of cake-walk-through-R1-solo that Inquisitives AND Sorcerers AND Wizards currently are.

Giving advice like hold a mob is absurdly patronizing.

Nobody is talking about r1.

Archmage hasn't been changed since October 20, 2010.

[capsela]

The biggest reason why Sorc won't be absolutely dominating parties the way that Inquisitives do now is that you have to play a Sorcerer to play a Sorcerer. If you want to play an Inquisitive, you can be any class, so you can knock out your Class lives with Inquisitives. You'll want to knock out your Racial lives with Sorcerer or Wizard. It's obviously going to be harder to get your Cleric life with a Sorcerer unless you want to eat a +20 Lesser Heart.

Playing a sorc actually takes skill. You don't just hold the left mouse button down til the end chest.

[Rauven]

What is "taking ownership" if not saying "we were wrong" and fixing the problem? Is there more we can do here?

No, there isn't. There is nothing you can do or say that will please those who will not accept reasonably explanations. You can't win at their game. The only way to win is to not play. Your and Steel's explanations are enough.

[AbyssalMage]

Calm down ppl, it is going to be like warlocks.

Just after the 5th nerf that inqs are going to be horrible.

It is funnier to read the forums than play the game lately.
Usually takes them 3 to 5 nefs, so yeah your target number is there.

I just find it amusing that Paladin is already getting a round 2 update before some got their first. Not saying they don't need it after the 4 (?, I think that was the total) nerfs they received.

[nokowi]

No, there isn't. There is nothing you can do or say that will please those who will not accept reasonably explanations. You can't win at their game. The only way to win is to not play. Your and Steel's explanations are enough.

Not listening to those asking for them to listen is a losing game.

When the solution is as easy as "I acknowledge and heard you", it's pretty darn easy to win.

I dare you to point out what such an action is impossible. You can say it's not necessary, but the idea that it can't be done is false.


The question is whether winning is improving customer happiness or maintaining ones own pride at the expense of the player base.

Those are the two options, and they are difficult, and at the expense of each other.

[nevergiveup356]

Usually takes them 3 to 5 nefs, so yeah your target number is there.

I just find it amusing that Paladin is already getting a round 2 update before some got their first. Not saying they don't need it after the 4 (?, I think that was the total) nerfs they received.

Dont worry, every mele buff comes with 3 nerfs.

[Rauven]

Not listening to those asking for them to listen is a losing game.

When the solution is as easy as "I acknowledge and heard you", it's pretty darn easy to win.

I dare you to point out what such an action is impossible. You can say it's not necessary, but the idea that it can't be done is false.


The question is whether winning is improving customer happiness or maintaining ones own pride at the expense of the player base.

Those are the two options, and they are difficult, and at the expense of each other.


Listening to those who do nothing but complain is a losing game. They've said they heard and are bring about changes, but that's not good enough for those who want them to come on these forums with a mea culpak in one hand and seppuku in the other.

[SirValentine]

And I think inquisitive is MUCH stronger than DC wizards.


I agree!



I am a DC wizard. One of the best.



Trying to wail in R10 is almost 100% suicide.


I think you're doing something wrong.

[myliftkk_v2]

The question is whether winning is improving customer happiness or maintaining ones own pride at the expense of the player base.

Those are the two options, and they are difficult, and at the expense of each other.
If "winning" is defined at the trendline of player population per server, I'd hate to see "losing". :p

[capsela]

I agree!

I think you're doing something wrong.

Wow, you are clever. I can see why you're on the council.

My point on how wizards are required to slow dance within arms reach of mobs in r10 to kill them with wail is entirely missed by the mental giants in this thread.

Whilst inquisitives can murder mobs while in a different timezone comfortably sipping a latte.

[nokowi]

If "winning" is defined at the trendline of player population per server, I'd hate to see "losing". :p

One of the biggest misconceptions on these forums is that there is only two possible design choices.

SSG has executed fantastically on being able to create great new content and introducing cosmetics and mounts.

The effort is 100% there.

When people talk about implementation issues, these can always be improved. A simple example is the sheer amount of time SSG spends on DPS balancing. When I argue that better design choices allow a wider range of DPS to exist, I can make this point without the world having only 2 options.

Those that ask for better communication are not making the argument that SSG is bad, or that all, many, or the majority of their decisions are wrong.

Try listening to what is being said and please avoid such misstatements as your post.

[ahpook]

...

We want you to do better.

I want you to speak for yourself.

I will also wait to see what the extent of the changes are before I think of calling the devs incompetent.

[Discpsycho]

What I'm really saying is we're going to keep buffing bard :P

This is all I needed from the past 9 (?!) pages of forumite hate.

If you're looking for suggestions, I'm down for a more immersive playstyle (https://wow.gamepedia.com/Bard_(April_Fools)) for Spellsingers

Edit: Wow, it jumped to 10 during the time it took to find that link

[nokowi]

Listening to those who do nothing but complain is a losing game. They've said they heard and are bring about changes, but that's not good enough for those who want them to come on these forums with a mea culpak in one hand and seppuku in the other.

What they have actually done is listen to the nerf change, but ignore how they can communicate about changes, and how they can make future changes to prevent this from happening. The response was literally "we made the change, we can't do more".

Labeling other people is a very important step in not listening. "Those who do nothing but complain".

In reality I made very positive posts about their barbarian DR changes, and their <initial> willingness to look into Amber Temple.

So we can see you are making false claims about others to support a decision you agree with, it seems as if you are also not interested in listening to what is being said.

I feel jerked around by their design process, and the suggestions I made are important for those who feel the same way.

[nevergiveup356]

Wow, you are clever.

My point on how wizards are required to slow dance within arms reach of mobs in r10 to kill them with wail is entirely missed by the mental giants in this thread.

Whilst inquisitives can murder mobs while in a different timezone comfortably sipping a latte.

Enlarge

[Theolin]

Good gracious, derail aside, I have so many pages and pages of what I want to do to the Monk class. Good lord. In my mind, I'd love to see Henshin Mystic take all of the tanky stuff out of Shintao and become the Quarterstaff and Ki Flame tank tree, where Cauldron of Flame becomes an AoE "enemies that are within the flames will consider you at the top of their hate list" kind of thing, and their ranged Ki flame attacks carry significant threat bonuses. I would absolutely rework the huge amount of active attacks present in Shintao that carry slight bonuses, put all of the saucy fun CC in more accessible and less bizarre places, and make it less of a semi-bruiser defensive-y tree and into a more streamlined CC-and-Melee-DPS tree. Finally, Ninja Spy needs way better Tier 5s and has a lot of holes that need to be filled with a better range of thrower and melee boosts. I think Shortsword Monks are such a cool and unique way to play and I wish the tree had more melee support. Oh, and I'd make Ninja Poison and all of the Poison attacks be way easier to use. I like that Ninja Spy is all in on Dark Monk stuff but it feels like there's no real reason to fully invest in the tree compared to a monk/ranger multiclass. Gosh. The class gets so many cool feats, and they have access to so many cool things, but I feel there's just sooooo much fluff inbetween the major hits. I really feel like Monk is strong despite their trees, not because of them.

What I'm really saying is we're going to keep buffing bard :P


Why oh why would you make the tank tree ONLY Q-staff ... why not weapon agnostic ???

[nokowi]

I want you to speak for yourself.

I think it is a fair statement that more than one person asked for better communication. Feel free to insert I when I say we if that makes you feel better



I will also wait to see what the extent of the changes are before I think of calling the devs incompetent.

I asked them to improve, without any judgement of competence. I gave CONSTRUCTIVE feedback, which is much different than what you are doing.

If you read (listen) carefully, I even mentioned some things they executed well.

These efforts at tribalism are not helpful.

I'm for SSG as much as you are.

[capsela]

Enlarge

wail

[Nickodeamous]

Good gracious, derail aside, I have so many pages and pages of what I want to do to the Monk class. Good lord. In my mind, I'd love to see Henshin Mystic take all of the tanky stuff out of Shintao and become the Quarterstaff and Ki Flame tank tree, where Cauldron of Flame becomes an AoE "enemies that are within the flames will consider you at the top of their hate list" kind of thing, and their ranged Ki flame attacks carry significant threat bonuses. I would absolutely rework the huge amount of active attacks present in Shintao that carry slight bonuses, put all of the saucy fun CC in more accessible and less bizarre places, and make it less of a semi-bruiser defensive-y tree and into a more streamlined CC-and-Melee-DPS tree. Finally, Ninja Spy needs way better Tier 5s and has a lot of holes that need to be filled with a better range of thrower and melee boosts. I think Shortsword Monks are such a cool and unique way to play and I wish the tree had more melee support. Oh, and I'd make Ninja Poison and all of the Poison attacks be way easier to use. I like that Ninja Spy is all in on Dark Monk stuff but it feels like there's no real reason to fully invest in the tree compared to a monk/ranger multiclass. Gosh. The class gets so many cool feats, and they have access to so many cool things, but I feel there's just sooooo much fluff inbetween the major hits. I really feel like Monk is strong despite their trees, not because of them.

What I'm really saying is we're going to keep buffing bard :P

I love it! ok, back on the IQS thread train. thanks for the response:)
Nico

[SirValentine]

Us rebalancing Inqusitive is us admitting it. Sometimes we're wrong, and when we realize that we were wrong, we fix our mistakes. What else would you like us to do?

Fixing the problem is good. And I fully understand taking the time to iterate through prototype solutions, et cetera before the re-balancing is actually released.

But why did you leave us with the impression that whole time that you thought Inq was balanced just right, right where you wanted it? 100 hours of balancing, blah, blah, blah...

What you should have done is admit it sooner (or least cop out and say "we're investigating it" or something), rather than having the last known dev position be denying there was any problem at all, when you knew there was and were working on fixing it.

[Lynnabel]

Why oh why would you make the tank tree ONLY Q-staff ... why not weapon agnostic ???

I didn't say it would be :P don't worry.


I love it! ok, back on the IQS thread train. thanks for the response:)
Nico

Roger that, derail over.


rather than having the last known dev position be denying there was any problem at all, when you knew there was and were working on fixing it.

Steel's words were "At the moment we believe it's specifically where we intended to put it. If people believe it's too strong, the best way to let us know is to show us specific comparisons." I don't really know how this is a blanket denial of a problem - this is "hey we're pretty sure we're right, but if we're not right, please show us so we can fix it" but with a more formal wording.

[nokowi]

I don't really know how this is a blanket denial of a problem

It's not.

What you need to look at is how you could have done better, instead of assuming everyone else is asking impossible and unreasonable things.

You're still asking the wrong questions if your purpose here is improvement.

[myliftkk_v2]

One of the biggest misconceptions on these forums is that there is only two possible design choices.

SSG has executed fantastically on being able to create great new content and introducing cosmetics and mounts.

The effort is 100% there.

When people talk about implementation issues, these can always be improved. A simple example is the sheer amount of time SSG spends on DPS balancing. When I argue that better design choices allow a wider range of DPS to exist, I can make this point without the world having only 2 options.

Those that ask for better communication are not making the argument that SSG is bad, or that all, many, or the majority of their decisions are wrong.

Try listening to what is being said and please avoid such misstatements as your post.

I thought the emoji provided clarity that the response was a throwaway line riffing on why we would even discuss this subject in terms of "winning" or "losing" (especially since there are bigger fish to fry that they could be applied to).

SSG has, and continues to make, a series of habitually poor choices in communication strategy, which I already laid out. When they stop doing that, then their communication-induced difficulties will relieve themselves. If people want to call it winning, I guess, it could be. It's really just sensible strategic communications.

[nokowi]

I thought the emoji provided clarity that the response was a throwaway line riffing on why we would even discuss this subject in terms of "winning" or "losing" (especially since there are bigger fish to fry that they could be applied to).

SSG has, and continues to make, a series of habitually poor choices in communication strategy, which I already laid out. When they stop doing that, then their communication-induced difficulties will relieve themselves. If people want to call it winning, I guess, it could be. It's really just sensible strategic communications.

I guess I rolled at natty one on my sense motive.

Thanks for clarifying for me.

[SirValentine]

Steel's words were "At the moment we believe it's specifically where we intended to put it. If people believe it's too strong, the best way to let us know is to show us specific comparisons." I don't really know how this is a blanket denial of a problem - this is "hey we're pretty sure we're right, but if we're not right, please show us so we can fix it" but with a more formal wording.

Are you getting concerned about the word "denial"? Fine, I can rephrase to say thing exact same thing in slightly different words, too:

Saying it's "specifically where we intended to put it" sure doesn't read like an acknowledgement of a problem! Or the other wording, "we're pretty sure we're right", still not acknowledging any problem existing. Like I said, so far as we knew, dev team believed everything was A-OK with Inq until this week. But that wasn't your actual belief for all those months, or you wouldn't be spending months on trying to fix a problem you didn't believe existed. At some point, before you started the long, drawn-out prototyping solutions process...you had to admit to yourselves there was a problem, right? The hard feelings are that you never admitted the problem to the community during all that time, and let the deni...non-acknowledgement be the last word.

[HastyPudding]

Good gracious, derail aside, I have so many pages and pages of what I want to do to the Monk class. Good lord. In my mind, I'd love to see Henshin Mystic take all of the tanky stuff out of Shintao and become the Quarterstaff and Ki Flame tank tree, where Cauldron of Flame becomes an AoE "enemies that are within the flames will consider you at the top of their hate list" kind of thing, and their ranged Ki flame attacks carry significant threat bonuses. I would absolutely rework the huge amount of active attacks present in Shintao that carry slight bonuses, put all of the saucy fun CC in more accessible and less bizarre places, and make it less of a semi-bruiser defensive-y tree and into a more streamlined CC-and-Melee-DPS tree. Finally, Ninja Spy needs way better Tier 5s and has a lot of holes that need to be filled with a better range of thrower and melee boosts. I think Shortsword Monks are such a cool and unique way to play and I wish the tree had more melee support. Oh, and I'd make Ninja Poison and all of the Poison attacks be way easier to use. I like that Ninja Spy is all in on Dark Monk stuff but it feels like there's no real reason to fully invest in the tree compared to a monk/ranger multiclass. Gosh. The class gets so many cool feats, and they have access to so many cool things, but I feel there's just sooooo much fluff inbetween the major hits. I really feel like Monk is strong despite their trees, not because of them.

What I'm really saying is we're going to keep buffing bard :P

Dear gods, no, on the Henshin Mystic front. Henshin in PnP is NOTHING like Henshin in DDO. The stereotype for the Henshin Mystic is the zen monk that levitates, breathes fire, speaks in riddles, and meditates for 20 hours a day contemplating the mysteries of the universe. A Henshin monk has nothing to do with tanking and everything to do with manipulating spiritual energy. Henshin Mystic should have been closer to a spellcaster than a DPS tree with a few ki abilities that are next to useless 2 levels after you get them. I give a lot of slack for creative content from you guys but wow, what you did to Henshin when you last redid the monk trees absolutely horrified and disgusted me.

[myliftkk_v2]

I guess I rolled at natty one on my sense motive.

Thanks for clarifying for me.
No worries. I mean I'm all for the inquisitive nerf and all, but can a brother please get some players to quest with around here??? :p

Seriously though, just because developers are bad at communications does not means they're bad developers. I've ridden plenty of development teams to great heights where I'd never send some of them into a meeting with C-suite types. Developers have biases though. They are most naturally biased towards introversion, towards mis-understanding users motivations, and also rejecting users complaints because they are not framed in the proper technical language rather than approaching complaints on a fact-finding mission of seeking out the core issues driving the conflict between the software model and the users.

In addition, if one finds themselves in a DPS break-fix cycle, like SSG has repeatedly, it makes sense to step back and look holistically at the processes and biases that drive decisions that then result in yet another DPS break fix cycle.

[myliftkk_v2]

Dear gods, no, on the Henshin Mystic front. Henshin in PnP is NOTHING like Henshin in DDO. The stereotype for the Henshin Mystic is the zen monk that levitates, breathes fire, speaks in riddles, and meditates for 20 hours a day contemplating the mysteries of the universe. A Henshin monk has nothing to do with tanking and everything to do with manipulating spiritual energy. Henshin Mystic should have been closer to a spellcaster than a DPS tree with a few ki abilities that are next to useless 2 levels after you get them. I give a lot of slack for creative content from you guys but wow, what you did to Henshin when you last redid the monk trees absolutely horrified and disgusted me.
Sounds like Henshin's primary abilities should be a confusion SLA where the mobs set themselves on fire trying to figure out one's riddle.

[Lynnabel]

The hard feelings are that you never admitted the problem to the community during all that time, and let the deni...non-acknowledgement be the last word.

Fair enough.

I am personally skeptical that announcing nerfs several months ahead of time without a concrete plan is a terrible idea - I think the extra time will just encourage players to angrily post about the situation and anxiously catastrophize over what could be. It's also very common in design jobs to reconsider and redesign on paper before we discuss with private preview. There's also the very real possibility that, as with everything we make grand plans of finishing - we either pivot drastically or put a pin in design or rebalances. In a hypothetical where Inquisitive was sort of OP but not really, and we ended up deciding to not adjust anything after all, we'd have kicked a hornet's nest for no benefit and a serious tangible downside.

I also worry that constantly lording what we might possibly nerf in the future over our playerbase will lead to pretty significant ill will. What we don't want is the vague unease of "well this is fun, but Lynn said it was OP 2 months ago, so the rug could be pulled out from me at any time, gah" to permeate the build space. Furthermore, something being OP doesn't mean it's also not fun. If we single out things we may adjust in the future, we'd basically just be pointing at the most fun parts of DDO and warning the players that at some point we're going to take that fun away.

I appreciate you putting your thoughts on paper, you've given me a lot to think about.

[Arkat]

She can win me over with one sentence, by acknowledging that she was given actionable suggestions, and that she heard them.

Turning detractors into supporters is a process.

How's that working out for you?


I'll tell you the same thing I told Lynnabel:


You can't win this, you know.


You're just wasting your time.

[SiliconScout]

::
Steelstar at end https://www.facebook.com/DDOUnlimited/videos/800384120435512/time 29:40 if you want to save a half hour

[nokowi]

How's that working out for you?

Pretty good!






I appreciate you putting your thoughts on paper, you've given me a lot to think about.

She did exactly what I asked, even if her pride prevents her from responding to me directly.

I call that a win for everyone.

Hopefully we will see more of this type of response in the future.

It means a lot to those making suggestions, right or wrong, good or bad, possible or impossible.




You're just wasting your time.

I guess not!

I've always had great hopes in Lynnabel.

Maybe you still have something to learn from this thread.

[Lynnabel]

She did exactly what I asked

Oh, whoops. (kidding :P)

[nokowi]

Oh, whoops. (kidding :P)

:)

I think you are great.

I know it may not sound that way sometimes, especially when I feel my interests have been neglected.

I wish you and SSG the best!

[cave_diver]

YAY! INQUISITIVE nerf....nerf them so hard please

[Kinerd]

Listening to those who do nothing but complain is a losing game. They've said they heard and are bring about changes, but that's not good enough for those who want them to come on these forums with a mea culpak in one hand and seppuku in the other.

Lynnabel directly asked us how "to appease the 'you're just doing this to sell the new thing' theory"

directly answering her direct question with actionable feedback is not complaining

inquiring why those direct answers have not been acted on when the situation is dismissed as "impossible" is still not complaining

there is a fundamental disconnect going on throughout this thread, and i'm really puzzled why it is

[ThomasHunter]

Fair enough.

I am personally skeptical that announcing nerfs several months ahead of time without a concrete plan is a terrible idea - I think the extra time will just encourage players to angrily post about the situation and anxiously catastrophize over what could be. It's also very common in design jobs to reconsider and redesign on paper before we discuss with private preview. There's also the very real possibility that, as with everything we make grand plans of finishing - we either pivot drastically or put a pin in design or rebalances. In a hypothetical where Inquisitive was sort of OP but not really, and we ended up deciding to not adjust anything after all, we'd have kicked a hornet's nest for no benefit and a serious tangible downside.

I also worry that constantly lording what we might possibly nerf in the future over our playerbase will lead to pretty significant ill will. What we don't want is the vague unease of "well this is fun, but Lynn said it was OP 2 months ago, so the rug could be pulled out from me at any time, gah" to permeate the build space. Furthermore, something being OP doesn't mean it's also not fun. If we single out things we may adjust in the future, we'd basically just be pointing at the most fun parts of DDO and warning the players that at some point we're going to take that fun away.

I appreciate you putting your thoughts on paper, you've given me a lot to think about.

Some really good thought here!

For example, years ago when hearing that the "wolf 2-handed fighting wasn't WAI and we're going to make it right" caused me to park my wolf build...for years since it took that long to "make it right". Heh, so that point is definitely valid!

Sadly, I love my Inquisitive so "nerfing" it is a real feel bad. I have a repeater Arti as well. They compare favorably, but the flavor of the Inquisitive is just so cool. It certainly feels powerful, mostly since I am not all that good at kiting and it's a bit easier to do with an Inquisitive (not as many active attacks?). I'm unsure really and not really communicating what I mean all that well. I know that when the ES Warlock was nerfed, I essentially didn't play it anymore (I do however have a new idea to try there). My "pew pew" Warlock is still a fun (GLASS CANON!!!!!) for sure. The ES is just SO terrible against bosses and it lost a lot of HP and power (if my memory serves me right). So, I hope this "nerf" doesn't end up like that. I hope to continue to shoot things dead with an Inquisitive. In fact, I loved it since I had plans to make several flavors of Inquisitive (the latest after seeing a pure Wizard pull it off!).

I know you all have the long term game in mind, but hopefully you still let the casual folks enjoy some fun and powerful stuff like Inquisitive!

Thanks for reading,
Taleisin

[nokowi]

Lynnabel directly asked us how "to appease the 'you're just doing this to sell the new thing' theory"

directly answering her direct question with actionable feedback is not complaining

inquiring why those direct answers have not been acted on when the situation is dismissed as "impossible" is still not complaining

there is a fundamental disconnect going on throughout this thread, and i'm really puzzled why it is

What you see is somewhere around 80% of posters making up falsehoods or making misrepresentations of other people so that they can confirm their own opinions and biases. This can be completely unintentional and does not make one a bad person. We live in a world where people largely try to form their own truths, and really have difficulty with empathy and listening to others.

The best way to deal with it is simply clarify your position or to call it out for what it is. It's pretty easy to spot some of the most blatant falsehoods and mischaracterizations about others.

The solution is complex, and it involves making a community that can accept other opinions other than their own, and trying to rationalize why a reasonable person might come up with that opinion, instead of why the person they disagree with has mental issues. This includes letting people make complaints without character assassination, and abandoning labeling other people as a means to ignore their interests.

[MistaMagic]

Fair enough.

I am personally skeptical that announcing nerfs several months ahead of time without a concrete plan is a terrible idea - I think the extra time will just encourage players to angrily post about the situation and anxiously catastrophize over what could be. It's also very common in design jobs to reconsider and redesign on paper before we discuss with private preview. There's also the very real possibility that, as with everything we make grand plans of finishing - we either pivot drastically or put a pin in design or rebalances. In a hypothetical where Inquisitive was sort of OP but not really, and we ended up deciding to not adjust anything after all, we'd have kicked a hornet's nest for no benefit and a serious tangible downside.

I also worry that constantly lording what we might possibly nerf in the future over our playerbase will lead to pretty significant ill will. What we don't want is the vague unease of "well this is fun, but Lynn said it was OP 2 months ago, so the rug could be pulled out from me at any time, gah" to permeate the build space. Furthermore, something being OP doesn't mean it's also not fun. If we single out things we may adjust in the future, we'd basically just be pointing at the most fun parts of DDO and warning the players that at some point we're going to take that fun away.

I appreciate you putting your thoughts on paper, you've given me a lot to think about.

Whilst I appreciate what you have said you forgot to say :- There is not a cat in hells chance we would announce the nerf when we have only just put Inquisitive in the store. We want our money 1st

[Lynnabel]

Whilst I appreciate what you have said you forgot to say :- There is not a cat in hells chance we would announce the nerf when we have only just put Inquisitive in the store. We want our money 1st

At what point after releasing a paid feature is it considered okay to rebalance it? 1 year? 2 years? More? Never?

[Strider1963]

Another bait and switch by this company surprises who? They have sucked every penny they could from Inqi sales that that could, time to nerf the favorite builds so they can sell the new thing that will be OP as long as it sells. Nothing new here

Yep, sell it then nerf it. I always thought bait and switch was illegal

[MistaMagic]

at what point after releasing a paid feature is it considered okay to rebalance it? 1 year? 2 years? More? Never?

before

[Kinerd]

Fair enough.

I am personally skeptical that announcing nerfs several months ahead of time without a concrete plan is a terrible idea - I think the extra time will just encourage players to angrily post about the situation and anxiously catastrophize over what could be. It's also very common in design jobs to reconsider and redesign on paper before we discuss with private preview. There's also the very real possibility that, as with everything we make grand plans of finishing - we either pivot drastically or put a pin in design or rebalances. In a hypothetical where Inquisitive was sort of OP but not really, and we ended up deciding to not adjust anything after all, we'd have kicked a hornet's nest for no benefit and a serious tangible downside.

I also worry that constantly lording what we might possibly nerf in the future over our playerbase will lead to pretty significant ill will. What we don't want is the vague unease of "well this is fun, but Lynn said it was OP 2 months ago, so the rug could be pulled out from me at any time, gah" to permeate the build space. Furthermore, something being OP doesn't mean it's also not fun. If we single out things we may adjust in the future, we'd basically just be pointing at the most fun parts of DDO and warning the players that at some point we're going to take that fun away.

I appreciate you putting your thoughts on paper, you've given me a lot to think about.

the forums already had the concrete unease that you were going to nerf Inquisitive when the next big new thing was released, though. surely we can all agree that thought pattern has only been reinforced by this thread, right? you're worried about a possible future that is already here.

and you don't have to announce just nerfs-in-progress, you could do the same for buffs. look how happy some people were to hear about monks in this very thread, why not make that SOP?

.

you've voluntarily put a lot of time and energy into this thread, but i'm still puzzled why we don't have the fundamental answer to that first question of yours i quoted way back when:

you didn't think Inquisitive was OP
now you do
what changed?

i count versions of this question from me, Chai, droid327, nokowi, Pyed-Pyper, and more of a statement but on the same topic from SirValentine. i can only speak for myself but this isn't a trick question or a trap of some kind. i'm willing to take your word on it, if you can tell me what specifically changed your collective mind then i won't think it was because of Alchemist, and i am reasonably confident others will as well.

[Strider1963]

At what point after releasing a paid feature is it considered okay to rebalance it? 1 year? 2 years? More? Never?

If its going to need "rebalancing", then it should never had been released in that condition to start with. IMHO it was released op just to sell it.

[MistaMagic]

If its going to need "rebalancing", then it should never had been released in that condition to start with. IMHO it was released op just to sell it.

Exactly. Those that got it with sharn or via sharn favor It is ok BUT to know you are going to nerf something and THEN sell it?

[losian2]

Let's play a quick hypothetical game - say you're working on DDO in the year 2035, and over the last 6 months, you've been working with art to make a new race - let's say, Tabaxi or something. They look great, they have cool tails, they can run really fast - good stuff. It's coming out next update and you're really excited.

But oh no! Turns out a different race - like, uhhh... Thri-Kreen. Oh god, they're so OP. Turns out their one-man-band Bard synergies are just tearing up the meta. Almost all r10 completions are just 100% Thri-Kreen, people on the forums have caught wind of this and are very upset. You've gotta tone em down. It's hurting endgame - in fact, it's hurting the whole game. Everyone's got four arms and there's no way to just buff the other 32 player-races, it's clearly Thri-Kreen that are the outlier.

What do you do? Do you hold back Tabaxi to safely nerf Thri-Kreen? How long does Tabaxi wait, implemented fully but disabled, before you feel safe enough to release it? Do you release Tabaxi first and then wait on the nerf? How long would you be able to wait before being able to "safely" nerf Thri-Kreen? What timing would make the players the least angry? If there's a right answer here, let me know.

You heard it here, folks! We'll have Thri-Kreen by 2035!

Not gonna lie, they're my second-favorite not-just-different-shape-and-size-humans race in D&D that's so fun to be playable (behind kobolds, naturally.)

Though, really, Dark Sun would be such a cool setting for DDO.. and with Dark Sun comes.. psionics!

[Fenrisulven7]

I'll do just fine on whatever the META is -

Have you learned that if you chase the Meta you are going to occasionally get hit by the nerf bat? That should be ALWAYS factored in.

It's like people want the chocolate cake but are shocked when they can't fit into their fav jeans anymore.

If you look around the party and 4 of 5 players are running Miniature Giant Space Hamsters, odds are good that Miniature Giant Space Hamsters will be getting a balance pass.



- but I like the fact that Inquisitive can run just fine on any class, so I'm not just limited to [insert class here].

I think you may have inadvertently underscored the greater problem here - an enhancement tree has become more valuable than a class. Not the way it's supposed to work.

[MilleXIV]

At what point after releasing a paid feature is it considered okay to rebalance it? 1 year? 2 years? More? Never?

I mean I’m a fairly new player but whenever it’s clear there’s an issue. Holding back nerfs, or choosing not to nerf content just because it’s paid just leads to a reputation of being “pay to win”.

[Fenrisulven7]

/background

"Giant space hamsters are a species of megafauna bred by spelljamming gnomes. As said gnomes are the notorious tinker gnomes of Krynn, you probably have figured out all the ways that this went wrong. They are normally used as a propulsion source, though they are also raised for meat by terrestrial colonies... Miniature giant space hamsters were bred by gnomes from traditional giant space hamster stock. The gnomes gave up this breeding program when they realised that a miniature giant space hamster was indistinguishable from a regular hamster."

1364

[Lynnabel]

If its going to need "rebalancing", then it should never had been released in that condition to start with.

That puts a pretty tremendous amount of pressure on our shoulders if we're literally never allowed to nerf anything that has ever been released because it shouldn't have ever been released that way in the first place. Sometimes we're going to be wrong, and when we're wrong, what timeline would be acceptable to avoid the complaint that this was some sinister plot? If 1 year was too short, 2 years? 5 years? At what point does it change from "this was a cruel bait and switch and should be illegal" to "ah, they're doing balance adjustments" - if ever?

[nokowi]

At what point after releasing a paid feature is it considered okay to rebalance it? 1 year? 2 years? More? Never?

I think you should set this value based on what makes sense on your end. The goal is for you to communicate your process, so that players understand what is going to happen. I'm okay with a patch day 1, as long as this is a communicated process, as leaving an imbalance always lets the min-maxers get much further ahead, and they don't need the help and it is not good for the health your game to let them get too far ahead.

If you leave every new purchase OP until the next one, it creates a permanent rift between the haves and have nots. Your design goal should be for the big purchasers to get rewards first, but give others chance to catch up - similar to what you did before reaper. People will pay a lot to get something first, especially if it has a cool or unique cosmetic to show off.

If you want to make your new release OP for sales purposes, give a temporary boost with the pack. Be clear it is temporary and for those who make early purchases, and for what period of time. "Core 5 Occult Slayer has been increased from 100 HP to 500 HP for the month of January". This let's players plan around your changes.

Lastly, don't believe the power player that says they will not play a class if it is not powerful enough. Eventually, they will play that class for the past rewards, and they might even purchase their way through it. I played every class even though I really only enjoyed rogue, because I wanted those tasty rewards and I knew (thought?) I could return to what I enjoyed. I purchased my way through the least enjoyable classes, but only because there was somewhere fun to go.

You might need to do something with reaper rewards if they are so big that players are ignoring your sales devices (new class/tree), but I would hope your content sales model prevents that from being a requirement - as I understand the can of worms that would be.

[Fenrisulven7]

If its going to need "rebalancing", then it should never had been released in that condition to start with.

That's unrealistic. I've never been in game where the devs could predict all the tricksy ways players could synergize content in unbalancing ways.

I've even seen exploits sneak past veteran playtesters in Mechwarrior.

Asking that something not be released until it's completely balanced is unreasonable. Druids would still be locked up on Lamannia.

[HungarianRhapsody]

That puts a pretty tremendous amount of pressure on our shoulders if we're literally never allowed to nerf anything that has ever been released because it shouldn't have ever been released that way in the first place. Sometimes we're going to be wrong, and when we're wrong, what timeline would be acceptable to avoid the complaint that this was some sinister plot? If 1 year was too short, 2 years? 5 years? At what point does it change from "this was a cruel bait and switch and should be illegal" to "ah, they're doing balance adjustments" - if ever?

You could release things aiming for the middle of the pack and then adjust them upwards if it's needed instead of aiming for the top tier for everything new you release and then having to nerf it afterwards.

Just a thought.

The fact that this solution hasn't occurred to anyone at Turbine or SSG speaks worlds about your design philosophy. The new shiny thing HAS TO be the most powerful because otherwise, who would buy it, right? And that means you ALWAYS have to have the new shiny thing be powerful enough to cause balance problems that will lead to a nerf (that just *coincidentally* happens as the next new shiny is being released.

But this has never happened before *cough*Warlock*cough*Vistani*cough*

[Dreppo]

ALL content is subject to rebalancing over time as needed. Always has been, always will be.

It would be more productive if players accepted that fact, and instead directed their energies to reviewing/playtesting the proposed balance changes when they appear on Lammania.

And above all, have fun with the game.

[Lynnabel]

You could release things aiming for the middle of the pack and then adjust them upwards if it's needed instead of aiming for the top tier for everything new you release and then having to nerf it afterwards.

Just a thought.

That's what we try to do. Do you really think this is all some sinister plot we've deviously concocted in some meeting somewhere?

[HungarianRhapsody]

Have you learned that if you chase the Meta you are going to occasionally get hit by the nerf bat? That should be ALWAYS factored in.

It's like people want the chocolate cake but are shocked when they can't fit into their fav jeans anymore.

If you look around the party and 4 of 5 players are running Miniature Giant Space Hamsters, odds are good that Miniature Giant Space Hamsters will be getting a balance pass.




I think you may have inadvertently underscored the greater problem here - an enhancement tree has become more valuable than a class. Not the way it's supposed to work.

That's why you don't "chase" the meta. When you TR at least once a month, then your character is never going to get hit with the nerf bat. Your current build might, but that doesn't matter. You just move to the next build. I'm not even playing an Inquisitive right now. I've been sitting in Sorcerer for the last 2 months (and I did finally get that ADQ 20th reward!).

Inquisitive isn't substantially more powerful than other high performing builds (note that I said builds, not classes). It's very good and it should probably be dialed back a little, but it's GOOD that there is an option for people to use if they want a past life in a class that they don't enjoy. I don't have a problem with balance fixes. I do have a problem with the way that SSG went about it (and I hope that they don't swing too hard with their nerf hammer like they did with Monk and arguably Warlock).

[HungarianRhapsody]

That's what we try to do. Do you really think this is all some sinister plot we've deviously concocted in some meeting somewhere?

I don't think it's sinister at all. You make the new thing better so you can sell it. That isn't sinister. It's just shortsighted.

[Thar]

At what point after releasing a paid feature is it considered okay to rebalance it? 1 year? 2 years? More? Never?

rebalancing is fine, but history of rebalancing here has been nerfbatting it into the ground and not worth playing. small adjustments with the open door for more if needed is a better approach. holy sword/pally - nerf'd into the ream of horrible, warlock was nerfbatted how many times and they are now not even that great at trash dps. it was probably one rebalance to make forum trolls happy too many.

[nevergiveup356]

Im pretty sure one of the topics in a meeting to choose a new coffee brand is how you can make melees more frustating to play.

[Lynnabel]

I don't think it's sinister at all. You make the new thing better so you can sell it. That isn't sinister. It's just shortsighted.

But do you actually think that this happens? That we sit down and specifically, deliberately do this? We have meetings about it with marketing, we go over how long we should wait - you really truly think we do this in real life?

[guzzlr]

That puts a pretty tremendous amount of pressure on our shoulders if we're literally never allowed to nerf anything that has ever been released because it shouldn't have ever been released that way in the first place. Sometimes we're going to be wrong, and when we're wrong, what timeline would be acceptable to avoid the complaint that this was some sinister plot? If 1 year was too short, 2 years? 5 years? At what point does it change from "this was a cruel bait and switch and should be illegal" to "ah, they're doing balance adjustments" - if ever?

I've no problem with balancing at all...whenever it needs to happen. I see the problem as another way that people who join the game after <insert nerf> will be further behind the curve when they start playing. Those who got to use/abuse Amber/Impossible Demands/Inq/whatever made very fast gains from their new shiny. Folks starting up after the nerfs progress much slower and will hear vets saying things like, "don't bother with Warlock they suck now."

Anyway maybe a process should be put put in place:

Release to Lama (2-3 times or whatever)
Release to Live
30 day review and announce findings
90 review and nerf/boost
180 day review and nerf/boost
Done and moves into standard DDO lifecycle

In an ideal world this would happen behind the QA wall (and I'm sure it does), but reality is that in a game like DDO you will never catch all the things that could blow balance out of the water and still get new shinys in the game at a pace the players would like. It a dev-player catch 22.

[Kinerd]

But do you actually think that this happens? That we sit down and specifically, deliberately do this? We have meetings about it with marketing, we go over how long we should wait - you really truly think we do this in real life?

i think you have been given multiple opportunities in this thread to give us reasons to believe you, and chosen not to take them

this isn't a value judgment (again, speaking for myself). it's just you asked how you could convince us, people offered you ways to do so, you didn't take any of them up on it

[Thar]

Wow, you are clever. I can see why you're on the council.

My point on how wizards are required to slow dance within arms reach of mobs in r10 to kill them with wail is entirely missed by the mental giants in this thread.

Whilst inquisitives can murder mobs while in a different timezone comfortably sipping a latte.

If you use wail in R10 and are dying in melee range you may want to take enlarge and do what other successful wizards do and use ranged spells so you don't get hit. ie far away like inquis. May not be a reliable source commenting on inquis being op vs a melee wizard. Anything is op vs melee in R10 much less a caster melee.

One of the BEST wizards on sarlona (firegoddess) has everything dead by the time he got to melee range.

[Ulfo]

The four fisted Thri-Kreen handwrap monk will make the wait worth it. =)

Four-chatkcha Thri-Kreen shuri-monk, you mean? 8)

[Thar]

But do you actually think that this happens? That we sit down and specifically, deliberately do this? We have meetings about it with marketing, we go over how long we should wait - you really truly think we do this in real life?

some of us do not believe that. We instead believe that some "loud" forum posters with limited knowledge of the build/class get too much of the dev's ears and influence decisions in negative ways. decisions should (and may actually be) made using data not impressions or # of forum posts.

[Jerevth]

Holy cow...

Last month it was "Inquisitive is to powerful/unrealistic/ruining my gaming experience."
Today, following a video where they said they were implementing a few changes, the forum is all up in arms about how cruel and unfair it was. You knew enough to see the amazing advantage Inqui would give but don't have the sense to know it wasn't going to stay that supreme forever?
You'll likely do the same with Alchies, too. Buy it, divide over something as silly as the Inqui 'plaint of "OMG! Dual crossbows are so unrealistic in this fantasy game!" and then when the dust settles cry because they have to tweak it back a little. Of course a new class/ enhancement should be slightly amazing when it's introduced. If they brought it out erring on the side of caution and keep it fettered, no one would want to try it and then it's an uphill climb to get people to buy and play it.

Twelve+ people ranting for six pages over etymology and carefully selected quotes with two Devs trying to be genuinely polite doesn't speak well for you.
You don't even know what changes will be made to Inquisitive yet for pity's sake. It's like a mob mentality. Be individuals, but foremost, try to be rational.

[Thar]

He does. Some of the worst.

Yes I group with Inquisitives soloing in R10....

but how can i group with someone solo'ing? ahh... i'm a ninja. i'm that good. Maybe it was R1 instead?

[Merrillman]

Well I dont know about this issue but you’re the person to speak with I hear...now about wizards, sorcerers and staves...


I think Spellcasters have a large disincentive (as do monks, or anyone who uses a two handed spell casting implement) to use some items, like The wonderful item from WPM, Wave, as giving up the dual scepters or scepter & orb spellcasting buffs (pen, lore, shielding, etc...) is too great a cost in elite, reaper or endgame. These items need a revamp to incorporate the same powers as two items do together, or something very close. Implement bonuses should be DOUBLE a one handed implement. Incorporate spell pen AND lore AND spell power and DC into the staff. It shouldn’t be unbalancing if it’s the same as wielding two items.

At the very least, let two handed weapons have double the filigrees to make them Somewhat competitive. There should also be sets that incorporate staves (for instance like the 2-piece cursekeeper that only allows an orb — add a staff!! Or combining Morninglord or Barovian with the Ravenloft orb powers or ML & NM into one staff). I love SC classes and have no desire to give up spell pen or insightful SP to use a staff instead of the night mother or other scepters. Even when you craft you can seriously dissuade the use of two handed staves. Lore wise staves are supposed to be amazing. They are a spellcaster’s signature in The S&S genre! Make the dual wield worth giving up! Thanks!!



But do you actually think that this happens? That we sit down and specifically, deliberately do this? We have meetings about it with marketing, we go over how long we should wait - you really truly think we do this in real life?

[applebaby]

Wow, you are clever. I can see why you're on the council.

My point on how wizards are required to slow dance within arms reach of mobs in r10 to kill them with wail is entirely missed by the mental giants in this thread.

Whilst inquisitives can murder mobs while in a different timezone comfortably sipping a latte.


your argument is based on wail lol! i dont even understand. why are you using wail in r10 anyway? why are you getting THAT close to them or wanting to get that close to anything on r10 unless the WIZARDS/sorc have it held lol... and in that case HOLD them run in and wail... problem solved? Ive played with many inquisitives who were constant soul stones lol.... as with other builds as well... im not saying they dont need a minor downgrade.. but this will just push people to play sorc and be OP and im assuming if this happens and its a bad nerf that there will be ANOTHER post on here about how sorcs are to OP and need nerf and are ruining the game because they are dead before the wail goes off!

[applebaby]

Yes I group with Inquisitives soloing in R10....

but how can i group with someone solo'ing? ahh... i'm a ninja. i'm that good. Maybe it was R1 instead?


r1 you can atleast wail the mobs in lala land drinking a cappuccino instead of the lattes

[Kinerd]

Holy cow...

Last month it was "Inquisitive is to powerful/unrealistic/ruining my gaming experience."
Today, following a video where they said they were implementing a few changes, the forum is all up in arms about how cruel and unfair it was. You knew enough to see the amazing advantage it would give but don't have the sense to know it was not going to stay that supreme forever?
You'll likely do the same with Alchies, too. Buy it, divide over something as silly as "OMG! Dual crossbows are so unrealistic in this fantasy game!" and then when the dust settles cry because they have to tweak it back a little. Of course a new class/ enhancement should be slightly amazing when it's introduced. If they brought it out erring on the side of caution and keep it fettered, no one would want to try it and then it's an uphill climb to get people to buy and play it.

Twelve+ people ranting for six pages over etymology and carefully selected quotes with two Devs trying to be genuinely polite doesn't speak well for you.
You don't even know what changes will be made to Inquisitive yet for pity's sake. It's like a mob mentality. Be individuals, but foremost, try to be rational.

the bolded statement and Lynnabel disputing it is why the thread is so long. nobody called it cruel or unfair or even unexpected - the whole point of contention is that it WAS expected, that the general (though not universal) community perception is that Inquisitive is being nerfed now specifically because Alchemist is being released now

Lynnabel has asked in multiple posts in what strikes me as good faith how to frame releases so that they don't engender that perception, and gotten multiple suggestions to that end

from that point the communication has gotten a little murky, for reasons that to me remain unclear

[Quikster]

r1 you can atleast wail the mobs in lala land drinking a cappuccino instead of the lattes

What do you know “miss 2 posts” ;)

[applebaby]

What do you know “miss 2 posts” ;)



Im a baby! :P