Player Character Balance

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Originally Posted by Starla70

I think after playing in the new content the balance is way off.

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I have trouble remembering an update where this same complaint was not registered. Yet I noticed 2 things: 1) people who had run the quests on Lamannia seemed to get first day completions including raids if that was part of the update and 2) within a few weeks either Turbine had toned down the quests or players had learned them because the complaints went away.

The fact that there are day 1 completions shows the quests are not too hard. The fact that complaints gradually end suggests to me that people are usually learning the quests.

IMO the biggest reason for early failure is that people are actually pretty bad at the game. They have a 1 size fits all strategy and they can't imagine making any adjustments in order to best new content.

Frankly, I say let them struggle.

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Originally Posted by Cardtrick

Eh . . . this one I don't see as unbalanced. It's pretty expensive in terms of APs. A lot of my builds don't even bother with one set of these enhancements, never mind two. Most Shiradi builds are getting most of their procs from either SLAs or un-metaed cheap spells anyway.

I don't really have any problem with abilities that reduce the cost of spells. If they were removed, I think players would just use more pots, which I don't really see as an improvement.



Again, I don't really see the harm in abilities that reduce the cost of spells. It doesn't allow anyone to do anything they couldn't otherwise do -- it just reduces the need for potions and consumable resources. Splashing 2 or 4 levels of Favored Soul on an arcane caster is a significant cost, since you lose caster levels and spell slots (and the ability to splash both monk and paladin).

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Ok, so I'm pure sorc, I want infinite spell point too and no additional spell point cost on maximize as well. No thx, just fix those two.

The priority in term of character balance should be
1) Buff Bards
2) Buff Barbarians
3) Buff Paladin
4) everything else....

Just get the these 3 classes right first please. At the very least, there should be something enticing for us to consider splashing 1 or 2 levels. Once you got that right then move on to make them enticing for full 20 levels.

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Originally Posted by Free2Pay

The priority in term of character balance should be
1) Buff Bards
2) Buff Barbarians
3) Buff Paladin
4) everything else....

Just get the these 3 classes right first please. At the very least, there should be something enticing for us to consider splashing 1 or 2 levels. Once you got that right then move on to make them enticing for full 20 levels.

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nerf monks.

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Originally Posted by Vanhooger

Ok, so I'm pure sorc, I want infinite spell point too and no additional spell point cost on maximize as well. No thx, just fix those two.

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I think you overlooked this:

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Originally Posted by Cardtrick

I think players would just use more pots, which I don't really see as an improvement.

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(color and bolding is mine)

Changing would just mean weakening the players without money (real life money) while those who have ample supplies will just purchase from Turbine the number of mnemonic potions needed to stay filled up on spell points. This is exactly what I did when running casters because I can.

It is a great idea to change this if our goal is to increase cash flow to Turbine but it does nothing to alter the balance -- which is, of course, the point of the thread.

Better would be to create a path by which any blue-bar can achieve comparable results. (And, I'm not sure that they cannot -- rather, I think it might be more a situation of choosing not due to AP cost, destiny choices, etc.)

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Originally Posted by Ivan_Milic

So monks will choose between 25% hamp or 7 wis, 2 ins con and parrying VIII.
I wonder what is better.

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Epic jidz comes with 2 slots (yellow and colorless), plus it has +1 exc Wis too.

I definitely think crit multiplier should move to fire...

Earth right now is pretty much the ONLY stance for melee monks. It has too much.

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Originally Posted by Thrudh

Epic jidz comes with 2 slots (yellow and colorless), plus it has +1 exc Wis too.

I definitely think crit multiplier should move to fire...

Earth right now is pretty much the ONLY stance for melee monks. It has too much.

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I'm on the fence about crit multiplier moving to fire. On the one hand, Earth has more than the others have for now. On the other hand, Earth is also the only stance with a significant drawback. Most of the time when aggro matters, you don't want to have more aggro. That +hate "bonus" on Earth stance is a serious penalty in raids.

But with a bit of work you can just negate that additional hate if it bothers you. But Earth stance has a dedicated Enhancement tree, defense and offense bonuses and that seems wrong.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvZfXipfYcc

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Originally Posted by Ivan_Milic

No, crit should be moved to fire stance, doesnt make sense that its in earth stance.

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Would make more sense if fire gave an expanded crit profile imo.
Earth was always 'bigger numbers' while fire was the more aggressive one.
Is anyone even using air and water anymore?

There are tons of great suggestions and several not so great suggestions. One thing I keep hearing is a return to the way things used to be. Such as toon diversity, viability of pure classes, teamwork etc. I've noticed that when certain toons get nerfed, people, often good players, leave the game, or take an extended break. Nerfing IMO is not the solution. The reason people try to make these high dps, high survivability toons, is because they don't want or can't wait an hour to fill a single quest, which IMO is due to people leaving overall low server population.

At least on Cannith, you can't deny that you've seen people come and go with the wind, but I've known many great players leave, maybe because of boredom, maybe because of nerfing etc. ****ing people off isn't going to help the game. You know how easy it is to roll a monk or sorc and be ok? and live through the quest? Is there something that is preventing other classes from being the same way?

My specific suggestions:

1) DC spellcasting - bring it back. lower trash mobs dcs or up the possibility of more DCs from other sources.
2) Every class such have some way or either healing or mitigating damage effectively.
3) Up the DPS of those less popular classes. I enjoyed cleric all 3 lives of it, but that was when there were always lfms up looking for clerics. Some SLAs are a good start.

I think that enticing people to come play DDO is a good thing. It should not be difficult for a noob to come in and learn the ropes without being instakilled, obviously the high end stuff will still be available to the elite players. I think part of that problem is no one ever does anything less than elite. IDK how to fix that.

All I know is that getting more people to come and play and stay long enough to be good is a part of the answer. Nerfing people/builds that get stuff done, that drag noobs through quests and get them xp is not the way. Changes should be positive. Playing a mmorpg, should be fun not punishing. Given that there are tons of choices of what to play why would anyone want to play a game give their time and money to game that punishes them?

Thunderforged Weapons brings imbalances between classes at CAP. All the amount and strength of extra weapon effects, the lack of a good crit profile... Brings in front of the DPS chain all the TWF builds making all THF worthless except for AoE damage where casters are better.

Give all THF something to wish and Barbarians/Fighter some appeal to build for THF or we'll assist in the near future to the extinction of THF builds.

Also give to Cleave Attacks the benefit of weapon alacrity bonuses and double strike bonus. After all these years they still are considered a "per se" animation that doesn't depend from weapon attack speed.

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Originally Posted by fyrst.grok

Would make more sense if fire gave an expanded crit profile imo.
Earth was always 'bigger numbers' while fire was the more aggressive one.
Is anyone even using air and water anymore?

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Centered kenseis and zeus build are using air for that extra doublestrike, water monkchers when on 10k, or when you need extra saves.

the problem is NOT that mobs hit too hard, it's that many bosses instakill you on melee AND the low chance to get a real healer

my usual party has a semihealer and we do fine on EE content without monkchers, BUT when somebody brings his fury monkcher most boss fights are A LOT easier, if you nerf the monkcher it will still be a lot easier, it will just last a little longer to finish the fight

how do you tank an EE white dragon on tor without ranged?, he freezes you and kills you in melee, same can be said with many other boss mobs

so it's not as much the problem of the monkcher but the lack of people wanting to heal on quests and the useless a tank is for 99% of the time of the quest

of course with the changes to the unyielding sentinel a tank can selfheal really well, so no real need for a healer, but is useless for 99% of the quest, give tanks a means to do good damage and then switch to "turtle" mode, decreasing damage but increasing ac/prr or whatever

Personally I think biggest difference in game is transitioning from heroic content to epic. Some classes have a lot of help with this. Others like artificer has none at all. Same with some enhancements or skills. The iconic rogue chain is a great example of this. Great in heroic but in epic no way your level plus your dex mod is ever going to fail a save on mobs for half damage. Epics CR is just to high for the ability to be feasible at all to use. The classes that can make the transition are those that can get feat or ed to help them with this transaction. Wizzy and sorc would be biggest classes that transition well cause they can get spell pen and dc checks on there spells to help them with mobs high CR in epic content. Some classes though have no chance at all. No one plays a bard or barbarian anymore really.

Also the problem pajamas / heavy armor need to be resolved. Pajamas can obtain higher AC and PRR and dodge (like 20% more miss chance) than heavy armor user - how is that fair.
Solution is:
Step 1: Move the +1 crit multiplier from earth stance to fire stance - so they have to choose dps vs defense
Step 2: Give armors DR/everything (or DR/magic or epic) base.
Like: Outfit/robe: 0 DR
Light armor: 5 DR
Medium armor: 10 DR
Heavy armor: 20 DR
And this should stack with items like shadowscale.
Itd still be evasion vs 20 DR (+30 obtainable through shadowscale) - but its better than evasion vs nothing and maybe some people will prefer DR. On EE 20 base DR is not really that much when all spells hit you for full power.

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Originally Posted by Kayla93

Also the problem pajamas / heavy armor need to be resolved. Pajamas can obtain higher AC and PRR and dodge (like 20% more miss chance) than heavy armor user - how is that fair.
Solution is:
Step 1: Move the +1 crit multiplier from earth stance to fire stance - so they have to choose dps vs defense
Step 2: Give armors DR/everything (or DR/magic or epic) base.
Like: Outfit/robe: 0 DR
Light armor: 5 DR
Medium armor: 10 DR
Heavy armor: 20 DR
And this should stack with items like shadowscale.
Itd still be evasion vs 20 DR (+30 obtainable through shadowscale) - but its better than evasion vs nothing and maybe some people will prefer DR. On EE 20 base DR is not really that much when all spells hit you for full power.

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It would just be enough to give Armor back the edge in PRR, actually. But I would second the DR as well.

And give that goddammned Evasion on Monk into lv. 6, like all decent folk should have. Then all the now so funny 2 monk grandmster earth stance builds would vanish over night.

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Originally Posted by Ivan_Milic

Centered kenseis and zeus build are using air for that extra doublestrike

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This makes no sense to me. They use cleaves for 70% of their attacks, cleaves don't doublestrike. (With the exception of Alpha Strike in Nature's Warrior tree)

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Originally Posted by Uska

If you start making balance changes to classes to please the whiners please count on me canceling my sub renewel and quitting the game we need less changes from pnp not more I am on the border already but that kind of **** will do it.

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In pnp Monks and Paladins cant multiclass have to be human and can only carry ten magic items. Rangers cant be Lawful Good in pnp. The closer the game gets to pnp the better I'll like it. I think everyone should wake up in starter rags and drop rates should be cut to 10% of what they are. I kid. I play first edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons on paper still.

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Originally Posted by garlor

the problem is NOT that mobs hit too hard, it's that many bosses instakill you on melee AND the low chance to get a real healer

my usual party has a semihealer and we do fine on EE content without monkchers, BUT when somebody brings his fury monkcher most boss fights are A LOT easier, if you nerf the monkcher it will still be a lot easier, it will just last a little longer to finish the fight

how do you tank an EE white dragon on tor without ranged?, he freezes you and kills you in melee, same can be said with many other boss mobs

so it's not as much the problem of the monkcher but the lack of people wanting to heal on quests and the useless a tank is for 99% of the time of the quest

of course with the changes to the unyielding sentinel a tank can selfheal really well, so no real need for a healer, but is useless for 99% of the quest, give tanks a means to do good damage and then switch to "turtle" mode, decreasing damage but increasing ac/prr or whatever

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Four lives raid healer. Sixteen lives total were out there just waiting for the call.