Feedback from a new player - New player friendly classes

[Lurien1]

From: https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/514476-Feedback-from-a-new-player-New-player-retention-strategies?p=6318321#post6318321

5 - First lifer player friendly classes:

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Personal opinion/anecdote starts here. Move to the next dotted line area to skip it and go for the actual suggestion.
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Right now, the game is incredibly complicated. And I love it.
My opinion aside, it is too complicated for the average newbie.

There are, usually, two major type of "New Arrivals" to DDO.
1 - Pen and paper players looking for a videogame that plays like it
2 - Other MMO players looking for a new one.

Pen and paper players will find that DDO resembles pen and paper about as much as a chicken resembles a dinosaur.
They are distantly related, and retain some genetics. But that's it.
So they will be lost.

Other MMO players, looking for a new one, will come here being used to "Mash this button for MAX DPS!" WoW playstyle. Where everything is handed to you in an orderly manner and you literally can't screw your build no matter what.

For both of this players, DDO is going to be an uncomfortable experience, as it sits right now, unless they are lucky and somehow build something good.

Here's my initial experience:
Rolled a wizard, because, I like versatilty and mobilty. (Yeah, you read that right).
Rolled a pale master because I don't like school specialization and it was the only other "pure caster" option.
Reached level 3: Invisibility is incredibly useless (on my THIRD life I learned that this is only true if you have no sneaking skills).
Reached lvl 5, no fly spell, couldn't control more than one summoned monster.
Reached lvl 7, no improved invisibilty spell, DDoor works absolutely nothing like pen and paper. My whole build idea was simply useless by now.
Reached level 20: Still didn't know that HEAL makes my pale master SLAs more powerful instead of spellcraft.. And I learned about spellcraft improving my spells at level 12 or so, because a guildie told me, since it's totally unrelated as to how PNP spellcraft works. Got carried into TRing, hated wizard.

Now, this can happen to any class (except maybe barb?)

How could this be fixed?

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Actual suggestion starts here
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Currently, there is a HUGE power disparity between a "well built" character, and a "poorly built" chracter.
So let's crunch the numbers. I will use sorc, even though it's one of the "easy" ones to not screw up, to make the point even clearer.
Just to clarify: The numbers are made up.

A lvl 10 sorc, who casts a fireball, with 0 spell power will do rougly 10d30+30 (avg: 165).
A lvl 10 sorc played by a good player, even at first life, will likely do close to 400-500 dmg avg, asuming a bit less than 200 spell power and a bit of crit.
A terribly bad player is going to have a terrible time. If this player is new, the game will offer no satisfaction, and the player will be more likely to quit.

What I propose is creating a FREE universal enhancement tree, that is newbie friendly, and scales poorly.
How do you make it newbie friendly?
Remove the punishment for erring. If you give that tree a "fireball" (or cone or whatever) spell that does avg 300 dmg with no spell power, and 400 with perfect spell power at level 10 (so it would scale with 30% of spell power instead of 100%), it will become "gear independant" to a degree. A newbie can use this tree to learn and explore, but will never be on par with a good player, and, the closer to level 20 the player gets, the less poweful this build will be.
- "But how do we stop players from exploiting it?!"
Make it extremely action point intensive, and limiting.
Make it have 70 points, and "If you take tier 2 of this tree, you can't take tier 3+ in any other tree" (or something like that). Let the newbies know the game and fall in love with it, instead of having to crunch the math first and play second. If they want to do reapers/epics, they will have to learn.
- "But won't this crowd level 20 with insuferably unknowledgable players?!"
Yes. But it's either that, and teaching them, or having less than Japan's population growth rates.

Additionally, I'd suggest adding one of these for each role:
Ranged DPS (you can use inquisitive if you release it for free)
Caster (warlock covers this role pretty well, so there's something you can base it off)
Melee dps/bouncer (no idea here)
Probably not tank,
Healers are useless at newbie levels due to hirelings.

As always, I am open for suggestions/questions/people challenging this points, since I'm a new player.

[Tobril]

As always, I am open for suggestions/questions/people challenging this points, since I'm a new player.


Everything being documented in-game would be a huge plus.

[Xgya]

To be fair, most of the game IS new-player-friendly.

Your Sorc example will already have met loot that gives them proper spell power along the way.
Probably not to the extent an OP character would like, but it'll matter.

The change of SLAs to accept free metamagic feats also helped give everyone a head start that slowly ebbs out of usefulness.

225 extra spell power on your most used attacks is plenty strong at a level where your best piece of gear hands out 70.
Sure, it won't help with that Fireball (not until two more levels at least :P), but at level 10, you can still dish out a very decent amount using that trusty Scorch, which you should have had available since level 4).

Also, at level 10, that Sorcerer should at the very least have the 3 Cores for their element, which is yet another 30 spell power every player will already have.

I'm going out on a limb here saying the second Sorc will have about 100 more spell power than the first for their better equipment (should be in the right ballpark. That's a Barovian Scepter and a Ravenloft caster belt vs a perfectly normal random gen fire scepter a few levels lower)

Fireball's caster level should be 11 by now for both of them.
One caster has 100 spell power, the other, 200.
198 max damage vs 297

The second one does 50% more damage more than the first.

Now compare their Scorch SLAs.
One has 325 spell power, the other, 425
The difference now drops to a fifth of their respective damage, to the point where the first caster's Scorch does more damage than the second one's Fireball.

The main difference here isn't the damage. What'll stop the newbie and make them weep is the fact their enemies save against their best attack a lot more often than they do the veteran. It won't happen until they reach about level 10, so you were in the right area.

Spells having saves is what balances them out in the end, forces more itemization and choices out of casters.
Giving access to a no-save AoE that does about the same damage as one with a save is probably a big no-no.

[Lurien1]

The change of SLAs to accept free metamagic feats also helped give everyone a head start that slowly ebbs out of usefulness.

225 extra spell power on your most used attacks is plenty strong at a level where your best piece of gear hands out 70.
Sure, it won't help with that Fireball (not until two more levels at least :P), but at level 10, you can still dish out a very decent amount using that trusty Scorch, which you should have had available since level 4).

Also, at level 10, that Sorcerer should at the very least have the 3 Cores for their element, which is yet another 30 spell power every player will already have.

I'm going out on a limb here saying the second Sorc will have about 100 more spell power than the first for their better equipment (should be in the right ballpark. That's a Barovian Scepter and a Ravenloft caster belt vs a perfectly normal random gen fire scepter a few levels lower)

All of this assumes that the newbie players understands the game mechanics and knows what to put on each slot/skill/feat, and only has low tier items.
The focus is not on "gear is op", the focus is on "new players will run around with 14 'combustion' items, because they think they stack", and the same applies to every class.
From this point of view (ignorance, instead of gear), do you still consider the game to be friendly? (Honest question, no rethoric there)

[Xgya]

All of this assumes that the newbie players understands the game mechanics and knows what to put on each slot/skill/feat, and only has low tier items.
The focus is not on "gear is op", the focus is on "new players will run around with 14 'combustion' items, because they think they stack", and the same applies to every class.
From this point of view (ignorance, instead of gear), do you still consider the game to be friendly? (Honest question, no rethoric there)

Oh, most definitely not, there needs to be a rather big update to in-game guides and how they work.
The game explains traps in the very first quest, despite trapping being exclusive to 2 classes, but never tries to explain how magic works, while there's a huge total of 3 classes totally bereft of it.

I was demonstrating that the power available, at least in pure number form, is close enough for an unprepared caster to matter, at least at lower levels.
I jjust wanted to show the problem isn't power. The power available is close enough for both characters to do meaningful work.

As you just hinted at, the biggest difference is mostly knowledge-based. Any solution that doesn't start with fixing this isn't one.

Lessening the gap between new and old players starts with handing those new players knowledge. Force feed them knowledge where possible.
The hints and tips people in Korthos isn't doing that. Most people entirely ignore them anyways.

There was a mentoring system in many games I've played, where older more knowledgeable players would help out new ones.
DDO's older community does that for free when given the chance. You'll find we're VERY friendly compared to many other games, and it shows.
Other games gave out incentives in order for the mentoring to happen, but most DDO oldies just need someone to tell them they need help.

Have an actual person be responsible for teaching that knowledge.
Walls of text are nice, but they sure don't replace that.

Instead of a new power-related tree/class/weapon, I'd rather see a system allowing me to instantly clone a hireling's stats and spells and join up another player to help them out.
My character's stats no longer change, but now that newbie has another character the same level as they are in their party that doesn't take up a valuable character slot for me while they benefit from my own knowledge base.

[Alrik_Fassbauer]

Personally, I'd never do a Pale Master, because it just feels uncomfortable to me playing an undead one (or near undead one).
Personally, I would never play a class only because it provides me with max power. Maybe that's the favourite play style of newer generations, but not mine.

So, there might always be a few players who are attracted by the setting and its look, not by its max powah.

[zooble]

Your complaint is about DDO not being like PNP.

Your solution is about a new enhancement tree that doesn't rectify the above.

Quite frankly nothing will solve it except a giant sign saying "Warning: not like PNP".

The new player class options are already in the game and they are the class 'paths'.

Arcanes used to be the hardest to start with, especially without 'hand me downs' but with all the low cost Spell Like Abilities now they should be much easier to play.

It will be worth hitting up Anniversary Party, if and while it's still on, if you don't have a caster stick from there already (or Barovian as other guy said).

Yes, in-game documentation is lacking and the wiki is basically required reading.


FWIW I use invisibility a lot, like a lot lot. But I can see why you'd think it's weak.

[MacDubh]

The problem for a lot of newbies from anywhere is they are coming into a game where players have overcome many things and devlopers have had to keep inventing more, in 14 years of neverending development and counters.

It's like a game of Rock-Paper-Scissors with 99 variants, where everything has a counter but newbies are just dropped into and get massacred. Tho painful, lessons can be learned ...

They get taught a bit about slashing/bludgeoning/piercing, underwater breathing and just thrown in ...

a list of things it would be good to know would be fairly extensive


oozes - everbright/muckbane/ranged/fists
curses - curse pots, be a wf
disease - disease pots
poison - poison pots, be a wf
good - evil
fire - ice (etc.)
stat drain - resto pots/heal scrolls/be pale master
shadow STR drain - spawn screen
incorp - ghost touch/ghostbane/ethereal ...
https://ddowiki.com/page/Monster_DR_and_weaknesses - endless variations ....
level drain - deathward, pale master
death effects - deathblock
rust monster - wf
fear - gh/be a pallie, ...
traps - reflex, tame rogue
damage - blocking
knocked down - blocking
stuff - fom
other stuff - true seeing
sneak attack - deception/otherwise engaged/bluff
blue circles - run away
....

etc.

and things that have been done in the past but now negated by counter-effects
WoP weapons
sneaking
imp deception turn around

lol, how many times they have to die to learn all that

[C-Dog]

I could point to several locations where "DDO is not identical to tabletop D&D" is emphasized - but how could that not be intuitive?

Admonitions re "Don't try to design your own character!" are equally abundant, but not as intuitive. It may not help, but you're not alone - we've all been there.



Reached level 3: Invisibility is incredibly useless (on my THIRD life I learned that this is only true if you have no sneaking skills).
How is this different from Pen-n-paper? Any GM worth his salt will say "Move Silently roll, pls!" - and the average lead-footed wizard is in deep yoghurt if they're anywhere near a bad guy.

In DDO, Invis is great - you can run past many mobs, and they may activate, but not until you're past them. (There is a limit to this, as it creates Dungeon Alert - but, again, that's not much diff from tabletop once the "dungeon" gets the word that there's an invisible threat.)


As for "New Player Friendly" classes, I'd say blast'em Sorcerers, crossbow wielding Rogues, and smashmouth Barbarians would be toward the top of the list as "intuitively the same" - or as close as can be when porting the concepts from tabletop to a computer game.

[droid327]

This seems like an overly complicated fix that's likely to cause as many problems as it solves

Honestly, the easiest solution would be to simply remove Paths and replace them with premade builds that are useful and relevant to the game - newbie-friendly builds that are well-established and time-tested. Even if they're multiclass builds, as long as they're 28 pt and F2P.

[Requiro]

I'm sorry that will disappoint you, but we don't need new friendly class or universal tree. Barbarian, Rouge and Ranger are quite newbie friendly right now and are free. Unfortunately the is no Spell caster friendly class that is free. Wizard and Sorcerer require some game knowledge and Warlock is paid only.

What we really need, that will encourage new players them to stay longer, is:

New, updated Path system, for all new players that don’t know yet if they like this game. New design should give players additional tips what items your class need (at some point in game, for example new tips after 5/10/15/20/25/30 levels)
New quest in Khortos, that will explain how to use map in town! (this is a huge problem for new players - so many icons, with colors that they don't understand, and they feel lost when they go to Harbor)
New unique end rewards in Khortos quest (right now they are very outdated, and new players made wrong assumption, that there is no reward for doing quests!)


What should be done:

Some NPC (active, following you) in Harbor, that will explain everything for new players from Khortos. Should be activated only for first toon that will came to Harbor. Right now, new players that have great experience after Khortos, when they land in Harbor, they lose interest in game, because they don’t know what to do next.
New animated Intro, that is up-to-date. Because we can’t improve graphic in DDO anymore, animated intros and short videos will made this game, more new young players games friendly.
Updated Favor turn in DDO point system – only for first time bonuses. Bigger first time bonuses and additional threshold. For example 50 DDO points after you reach 5,15,25,50,75,100 and 25 points with 150,250,500,750 total Favor. That will give new players, some DDO to bought additional quests. And there is plenty on additional quest in game, and will be more each year.
And maybe some adjustment to reward system from NPC, after you complete quest. IMO that reward list should have chance for Named items.
Any information that DDOWiki exist

[C-Dog]

What we really need, that will encourage new players them to stay longer, is:
[LIST]
New, updated Path system, for all new players that don’t know yet if they like this game. New design should give players additional tips what items your class need (at some point in game, for example new tips after 5/10/15/20/25/30 levels)
Since "gear" is so critical to any decent build, having some pop-up tips every time a "Path build" visits a Trainer seems at least as important as the design itself.

Speaking of which...

@ Devs - Any Path could use an update every time a related Enhancement Tree/Feat/class ability/related aspect gets changed. This, most probably, is a daunting addition to workload for SSG staff.

Would it be possible to set up a group of Player build-design gurus, who do that work for you? Something between the Players' Council and Wiki Editors. They submit new builds to SSG for vetting, SSG updates it, done. Only challenge would be to find designers who are not building "uber" characters, but keep the "new" in "New Player Friendly" in mind.

That group could even submit in the code format desired - if they're going to help, then that'd be part of being helpful.

Mebbe? :confused:



Some NPC (active, following you) in Harbor, that will explain everything for new players from Khortos. Should be activated only for first toon that will came to Harbor. Right now, new players that have great experience after Khortos, when they land in Harbor, they lose interest in game, because they don’t know what to do next.
This idea has a lot of merit.

A sort of Gold Seal hireling (so "regular" hires can still be used), Korthos only - and limited abilities (maybe a very weak Bard?) It would auto-summon in every quest, and in the Wilderness, with "How to's" and comments at/before appropriate moments. Clickable w/ a list of FAQ's would be a bonus.

No illusion here that it would not take a lot of work to set up the triggers for such, but the upside for brand new players would be huge.


Any information that DDOWiki exist
There is a "New Player FAQ (https://ddowiki.com/page/New_Player_FAQs)" on the Wiki, with some (very) few of the basics - but at the moment the chance of a new player reading that before they run into those problems is a long shot. Some internal link, or just an "invitation/reminder to check out the Wiki", could be a plus.

[CritKitteh]

Updating the build paths you could choose from at creation to make them more competitive with hand-crafted characters would be better, too.

[Nebless]

One thing that will help new players is for them NOT to turn off the tutorial pop up's. I made a test character to check something else; now I usually kill those ! pop up's right away, but since I knew this one wouldn't be around long I didn't bother.

Took him to the Harbor and guess what? You get ! pop up's over there also. So some of the information is there, you just have to be willing to let it play out. Also the 'information' NPC's are still in Korthos, it's just without any real indications I doubt too many people make use of them.

I won't say a D&D PnP'er coming here will be totally lost as there is a lot that translate over and if nothing else put's you in the right mind frame to understand what the game's talking about.

For those just jumping onboard cuz it's Free to play ....... oh well.

It is a tough game to learn and I'm sure that fact alone has hurt the population over the years, but if you truely think about it D&D PnP is hard to really learn also.

[Pandjed]

I don't think, a tree would solve the issue. I would first change some of the descriptions of the classes to make it more in-line with the experience. Like "Sorcerer - A master of elemental magic, capable of devastating foes with powerful spells of fire, ice, acid, and lightning." This makes it easier for people to discern what kind of playstyle is recommended (especially important for sorcerer and wizard).

Then have someone take a look at the paths. While I don't think that the paths are bad, there is still room to improve. The descriptions there can be flavorful, but it should also mirror their different playstyles. For that, the archmage should also get a new pass (or be replaced altogether).

What really would improve the performance would be to look at the F2P-content and adapt their end-reward loot. Have new items there, they can act like random items power-wise, but should be thematic and obvious for which build they're supposed to be. Maybe even using old items from Menechtarum (like the elemental robes) and 3bc, lower the min level and spread them at earlier F2P-areas. Put F2P quests in a chain, like "The Marked Houses" that include all the 6s of the F2P Houses. Having 9 quests that way is enough to redo most of your gear.
You could add an exchange for caster items to match your spellpower. So the chain giver may also take your "Magical Robe" (Universal Spell Power and/or spell DCs) and exchange it for a "Fiery Robe", a "Deathly Robe", etc. to allow more experiments and to allow more items than a quest reward would usually give.
If we had these opportunities after Korthos to select viable gear at the levels 6, 12, and 18, I guess most of the problems would be gone. This would also promote buying expansions (like RL for 10s and Sharn for 15s, and updated MotU items for early epics).

The problem as first-lifer/newbie is the lack of direction and the amount of work you have to spend outside of quests to let your build stay viable. And the lack of platin to go to the AH at every level.