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  1. #121
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    Quote Originally Posted by moorewr View Post
    The Sigil concept was fine.. certainly more interesting than grinding 60 relics...
    I would say that the relic concept was flawed as well and then they made Abbot and the sigil system was worse. At least with relics:

    1. You could trade them in;
    2. You could use them for more than just entry to the raid, there were some useful equipment to be had in exchange;
    3. Of course, the quests, like PoP were hugely popular and made obtaining relics easy;
    4. Perhaps it is just me and lack of the same amount of experience in necro, but the drop rate for relics seems to be higher than sigils; and
    5. DDO is not supposed to be a grind.

    I just look at it from traditional D&D ("old-timer" pnp player) eyes and think - I should really only have to run the quest once to advance my story-line.

    Thus, although I dislike re-running the Vons and DQ to raid - I "get it" from a storyline perspective. I also understand that people run Titan and Reaver because they can farm it instead of re-running pre-reqs. As for giant and necro, to me, it can detract from your story-line / role-playing sense of adventure. All that being said, if they had made the ultimate raid worth the effort, people will suck it up.

    Making something "tolerable" to do in order to advance to the next stage of a quest / raid does not mean that said portion of the game was a success, well thought out, in line with expectations of D&D transalted on-line or something that should replicated.
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  2. #122
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    Quote Originally Posted by Hafeal View Post
    4. Perhaps it is just me and lack of the same amount of experience in necro, but the drop rate for relics seems to be higher than sigils; and
    Well of course the rate was higher: you needed 60 total relics, but 8 total sigils.

  3. #123
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    Is it possible the developers/designers who worked on the original Black Abbot are now gone? Changing/scrutinizing/fixing someone else's code is often way more unpleasant and time consuming than creating your own.

  4. #124
    Founder Bradik_Losdar's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by moorewr View Post
    I still say, fixes or not, the teleport-to-puzzles concept will never feel satisfying.

    why oh why didn't they have you transit the puzzles (once) to get to the end fight? Have mobs as well as the puzzles, and at the end of these three separate paths, levers which have to be pulled at the same time to lower the barrier for the end fight.
    I agree. It never made sense that when you beat down the Abbot enough, he teleported you... to some puzzles?

    If he could do that, why not just teleport you into a giant pool of lava...or acid...or outer space...and be done with you?

    No, no. He needs to rest, so you need to go do - some puzzles. Yeeaaaahhh...riiiighht.

    What have they got to do with anything??? They are a total disconnect (in more ways than one unfortunately )

  5. #125
    Community Member Crazyfruit's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Hafeal
    I just look at it from traditional D&D ("old-timer" pnp player) eyes and think - I should really only have to run the quest once to advance my story-line.
    The most I ever had to do any of the orchard quests was 3 times, and that was only because they were PUGs of newbies to the quests I was leading on LFM without spare parts. They're all nicely done quests worth repeating for the named items as well, loot runs for each are common are Argo. Even the plat farmers do them!

    To counter your points:

    1. You could trade them in;

    You can trade sigil parts at the end of the quest in the chest. Every single group I've been with has done this, or let people roll for the parts they're missing two people want.

    2. You could use them for more than just entry to the raid, there were some useful equipment to be had in exchange;

    The dungeons involved all have named loot & fun optionals so that people can get BOTH the useful equipment and sigil parts without having to choose between one or the other. I don't think I've ever seen anyone using relic equipment, they just sell them on the AH to other people who don't like grinding gianthold for xp 9-14.

    3. Of course, the quests, like PoP were hugely popular and made obtaining relics easy;

    Some of the orchard quests are as well - especially Ghosts. PoP only drops 1 relic usually (sometimes 3) whereas you have a 1/3ish, or more with everyone running that already having theirs, chance of getting your sigil piece you want.

    4. Perhaps it is just me and lack of the same amount of experience in necro, but the drop rate for relics seems to be higher than sigils; and

    Relics is guaranteed but requires much more of them. I'd rather play the odds Orchard-style than run every single Gianthold quest 4 or 5 times for the relics I need.

    5. DDO is not supposed to be a grind.

    Tell that to whoever made the raid loot/completion system.
    Last edited by Crazyfruit; 10-23-2008 at 03:46 PM.
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  6. #126
    Community Member Ringos's Avatar
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    Happy Anniversary Black Abbot!

    I have played this game for about two years and have four capped characters, yet I have never graced your doorstep. Ok, well, maybe your doorstep, but that's only because I run by once in a while.

    Someday we shall meet. Someday...

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  7. #127
    Community Member vtecfiend99's Avatar
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    must not... let.. this thread die!

  8. #128
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    Quote Originally Posted by dwooley1981 View Post
    must not... let.. this thread die!
    Ok, sure. I'll try to think of a slightly-helpful comment that hasn't been covered yet. How about this:

    Some players and designers make the mistake of confusing "beatable" with "playable". They see the factual evidence that people beat this or that portion of the Abbot raid challenges at X% rate, and decide that since people are winning they must be having fun, and the raid project was a success. That's a fallacy: beatable and playable are distinct concepts with only a rough influence on each other. Across all kinds of games, you can find things that are beatable but unfun (homework), or fun but unbeatable (tetris). Within an MMORPG context, something with low beatability is going to be unfun, unless it's a side area irrelevant to the macro gameplay (XP/loot acquisition).

    For example, I could make a game about factoring prime numbers with a pencil. After some practice people would learn to beat it reliably (as long as the numbers aren't too big), but they probably wouldn't find it fun.

    Aspects of the Abbot raid are approaching that condition, and not reaching their potential to be an entertaining gameplay experience. Simply making something easier and easier until players are consistently winning is not the same as making it fun.

    Ice Wand: This could be fun, because the idea of dynamically growing a bridge to cross over a dangerous area is amusing. But in practice it's only a little fun, because the situation is so straightforward and players have so little opportunity to make choices that aren't the same on every single run. Ideally, you'd do this challenge with macro playback that puts prerecorded inputs on both characters.

    Phase Chasm: Similar to Ice Wand, crossing a dangerous area by using an unreliable bridge can be fun. Likewise, one person verbally guiding a blindfolded man around is a traditionally fun party game, and moving it to the internet is a novelty. However, Phase Chasm fails to exploit the potential because it is neither forgiving enough nor complex enough for someone to really experience much of the "You tell me and I'll go there" gameplay. It's accomplished as a single run where any one mistake probably means total failure, so there's little chance for interactive communication between the two players aside from a pre-planned route at the start, and then mirror-sync movement for about 25 seconds worth of running.

    If the chasm was larger and more complicated (less tiles active at one time), but the tiles changed slower so that you had more time to view and react, then players would have a more engaging experience.

    Asteroid Pillar: Most obviously of all, the idea of FPS-like shooting at incoming threats is fun in thousands of games. But it's not fun in the Abbot raid, because the way you win this challenge does not involve throwing any rocks.

  9. #129
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    Quote Originally Posted by Angelus_dead View Post
    Ok, sure. I'll try to think of a slightly-helpful comment that hasn't been covered yet. How about this:

    Some players and designers make the mistake of confusing "beatable" with "playable".

    Agreed

    Simply making something easier and easier until players are consistently winning is not the same as making it fun.

    This is a mistake made all the time in "evolving" games where player feedback is taken into account. Most often a knee jerk reaction to cries of an unfair aspect. I think we can all agree that making some changed to the abott at this point could in no way be considered knee jerk no?


    Phase Chasm: Similar to Ice Wand, crossing a dangerous area by using an unreliable bridge can be fun. Likewise, one person verbally guiding a blindfolded man around is a traditionally fun party game, and moving it to the internet is a novelty. However, Phase Chasm fails to exploit the potential because it is neither forgiving enough nor complex enough for someone to really experience much of the "You tell me and I'll go there" gameplay. It's accomplished as a single run where any one mistake probably means total failure, so there's little chance for interactive communication between the two players aside from a pre-planned route at the start, and then mirror-sync movement for about 25 seconds worth of running.

    If the chasm was larger and more complicated (less tiles active at one time), but the tiles changed slower so that you had more time to view and react, then players would have a more engaging experience.

    I only diasagree in that I dont believe there is anything that can be done to make this FUN. that is only my opinion however. some people might love it if it was a little easier
    Asteroid Pillar: Most obviously of all, the idea of FPS-like shooting at incoming threats is fun in thousands of games. But it's not fun in the Abbot raid, because the way you win this challenge does not involve throwing any rocks.


    This area is a total failure in my mind. Most of the complaints i hear in game are about this area. Also, and this is probably over the top nitpicking but I hate the flavor of an asteriods game in Dnd.

    My responses in red. Hope this thread keeps going till a dev comes in and shares with us.

    lets all keep this thing from degenerating like so many other threads.

  10. #130
    Community Member Torosar's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by dwooley1981 View Post
    My responses in red. Hope this thread keeps going till a dev comes in and shares with us.

    lets all keep this thing from degenerating like so many other threads.
    Well it's not so much that they degenerate, it is more so the fact there it has been over a year now that nothing has been done.. and in that year everyone has expressed their ideas/comments/problems on the matter and without any changes, or developer discussion there is fairly little new information to spur discussion.

    Well actually, there have been some. There was a post about dispelling the Abbot's mantle and anyone who has followed this thread knows that turned out to be incorrect. There was also a post saying it was possible to beat the raid without cheese and anyone who has put effort into the raid knows that this is just simply untrue.

    The original Black Abbot feedback thread is one of the single largest threads in this forum's history with more than 900 replies and over 32,000 views. There's just not all that much more fuel in the tank. Although, just because people do not have much to say it does not mean for many it is not always going to be a sour topic.

    A_D's commitment to the issue is truly commendable. I just hope it doesn't go unrecognised to those who can actually make a difference, because the raid is NOT okay as it is.
    Last edited by Torosar; 10-27-2008 at 12:53 AM.

  11. #131

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    You know what... we ran this RAID again for about 2 hours last night with no luck. We had a full party and several first timers/inexperienced folk in there, nevertheless we had several who can complete all three puzzles (cheese and all). I know this is not novel or anything like that, but I have come to the following conclusion...

    THERE ARE JUST TOO MANY WAYS TO MESS UP IN THERE AND MAKE IT INCOMPLETABLE!

    Seriously, we have no room to make a mistake in there. One mistake by one person and your attempt is done, you have to start over. It doesn't matter how good the crew is. One person misses a cue and all bets are off.

    DEVS ... can we please review this quest and give us a patch with a solid rebuild of it. Please take some of these good suggestions posted in this thread and go with them.

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  12. #132
    Community Member Lorien_the_First_One's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bradik Losdar View Post
    I agree. It never made sense that when you beat down the Abbot enough, he teleported you... to some puzzles?

    If he could do that, why not just teleport you into a giant pool of lava...or acid...or outer space...and be done with you?

    No, no. He needs to rest, so you need to go do - some puzzles. Yeeaaaahhh...riiiighht.

    What have they got to do with anything??? They are a total disconnect (in more ways than one unfortunately )
    And lets add that if he didn't teleport you there you couldn't defeat him...yup makes no sense at all from a story perspective.

  13. #133
    Community Member gfunk's Avatar
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    I've raided a bit in this game.. I've completed each raid between 10 to 100+ times... except the Abbot.. big goose egg there. I would estimate that my failed attempts at Abbot are probably similar to all the combined fails of all other raids I've run.

    Clearly, the raid stands out as an anomoly.. but everyone here knows that. The question is, does Turbine expect it to stand out that much? I do actually think its beatable.. but it's a question of odds to beat it.. If you were to complete any one puzzle 20% of the time, you would only have a 0.8% chance of solving all 3. In order to get to a 50% chance of solving all 3, you need to sit at a roughly 80% success rate on each individual puzzle. Currently, it seems that very little of the player population is willing to practice enough to get their odds of completing that high.

    I can see getting to that point with a static group of players on the ice and the tile puzzles. I am not so sure about the asteroids. Tellingly, I've seen videos posted on the net of both tile and ice being completed properly, but I can't find an asteroid video like that.

    Removing the neccessity to complete any 1 puzzle would dramatically increase chances of success. I believe that it is possible to equip a party to survive the flame attack without jumping onto an ice island.. it would just take fully upgraded fire absorption/resist/healing amp, and some clerics with good concentration skills. That kind of equipment just isn't available to the typical player though. I have only met 1 player with the equipment neccesary to do it, so even if this method consistantly worked to bypass the need to do the ice puzzle, it would still exclude most of the player population.

    I don't have anything to add about the tile puzzle or goggles. As for the Asteroids, I don't see any way around the neccesity of completing that one... other than just being lucky enough that too many people don't get encased.
    <Sarlona>Leafy - ranger , Ingvild - fighter, Backk - rogue, Dahgnabbit - warlock , Reinheits - cleric, <Lost Legion>


  14. #134
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    Quote Originally Posted by moorewr View Post
    If they devs still want to force you to take a random puzzle.. they still could, and you'd still need six+ to get sent to all three puzzles...
    Well, that brings up a separate change needed.

    If the devs want to force you to beat all 3 challenges before you can kill the Abbot (and the evidence is that they DO want that), then when it's teleport-time each pair of character slots 1-2, 3-4, and 5-6 should be sent to a challenge room, even if you only have 2 or 4 party members.

    That way the magic minimum to theoretically win the raid is 2, instead of 6.

  15. #135
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    Quote Originally Posted by gfunk View Post
    In order to get to a 50% chance of solving all 3, you need to sit at a roughly 80% success rate on each individual puzzle. Currently, it seems that very little of the player population is willing to practice enough to get their odds of completing that high.
    Unless you're disabled by slow internet, a weak PC, or genuinely crippled hands, then anyone who puts in 60 minutes of true practice can get 95% ice successful. (Of course, it'll take a lot longer to rack up that time in-puzzle because of the randomness of where you get sent). That challenge isn't a lot of fun, but its consistently winnable.

    However, for a lot of players it's not worth it to learn that challenge, because there is NO way they can do the other two, which are just as obligatory.

    Quote Originally Posted by gfunk View Post
    I believe that it is possible to equip a party to survive the flame attack without jumping onto an ice island.. it would just take fully upgraded fire absorption/resist/healing amp, and some clerics with good concentration skills.
    Surely by "concentration skill" you mean "Quicken Feat". Even the original Inferno, which is about half the damage of the current one, was impossible without Quicken. Also, you seem to have forgotten the huge mana drain from Inferno, which would also force those clerics to drink major pots almost constantly.

    Oh, and don't skip Fire Shield Cold either. You can get 3x clickies of that, but it's Exclusive...

    Quote Originally Posted by gfunk View Post
    I don't have anything to add about the tile puzzle or goggles. As for the Asteroids, I don't see any way around the neccesity of completing that one... other than just being lucky enough that too many people don't get encased.
    Well, Encase "only" freezes you until you die. Dying is a reversible condition, except that it deletes any phase goggle / ice wand / power boulder you might have.
    Last edited by Angelus_dead; 10-28-2008 at 05:02 PM.

  16. #136
    Community Member gfunk's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Angelus_dead View Post
    Surely by "concentration skill" you mean "Quicken Feat". Even the original Inferno, which is about half the damage of the current one, was impossible without Quicken. Also, you seem to have forgotten the huge mana drain from Inferno, which would also force those clerics to drink major pots almost constantly.
    .
    agreed.. I had been in a run where a halfling healing mark cleric with high fire absorption was last one standing and stayed alive for a significant amount of time (He wasnt optimally prepared to face the inferno). I don't recall how many mana pots he drank, but obviously he would have been helped a great deal by the healing marks. Still, a rare build, and a very niche stratey if you could get it to work. Just thought I would mention it as I hadn't seen anyone else mention trying it
    <Sarlona>Leafy - ranger , Ingvild - fighter, Backk - rogue, Dahgnabbit - warlock , Reinheits - cleric, <Lost Legion>


  17. #137
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    Quote Originally Posted by jperz View Post
    Seriously, we have no room to make a mistake in there. One mistake by one person and your attempt is done, you have to start over. It doesn't matter how good the crew is. One person misses a cue and all bets are off.
    Actually, it is acceptable for the raid to be so unforgiving that one failure means you lose. It's not optimal for the purposes of fun, but it's acceptable.

    The real problem comes from the drastically uneven difficulty of the challenges. You have the ice wand, which as I just mentioned is beatable with a 90%+ success rate for nearly anyone who has practiced it 30-90 minutes... and moreover, it's beatable by doing the naturally obvious thing the devs intended you to do.

    The other challenges are not nearly so reasonable. Attempting them "as intended" means a 99.5% failure rate, and using a cheesy semi-exploit (which not all chars are equipped to do) still usually means 75%+ failure.

    If all three were as reasonable as ice wand, then a combined 90% success each would give you a total 73% chance to get them all and be positioned to win the raid. That's a tolerable success rate- most groups would win in 1 run, but sometimes they'd need two.

    Note:
    The "natural and obviously intended" way to beat the other challenges is as follows:
    Asteroid Pillar: Each of two players picks up one energy boulder and equips it as a weapon. Then they watch opposite directions and throw rocks at incoming asteroids.

    Phase Chasm: The guide player equips goggles and watches the tiles for about a minute, then tells the runner player which of 1 starting positions to go to, and begins saying things like "go", "up", "up", "left", "wait", "up", "up", "up", "wait", "run run to the end". If there was no lag, then with the 10-second lifetime of tiles it would be fine to tell the runner a direction on each individual tile. Instead, there is 3+ seconds of lag between each direction being needed and responded to.

  18. #138
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    Very interesting thread.
    I am mainly playing in the Japanese server, and would like to clarify several issues related to the Japanese server.

    I witnessed the first hanging from the pillar. A friend of mine was blown off by the asteroid, but he accidentally succeeded to grab the edge, which led to our first success of the Asteroid puzzle in December 2007. We all tried to reproduce it, but we soon realized that it was too difficult to use it in a reliable manner. Then, I "invented" the ghoul-method for the asteroid room. (Thank you for introducing my YouTube video in this thread and others) This new method soon populated in the Japanese server, Abbot was first beat down Abbot on Jan 17. This success was officially announced in the official DDO home page in Japan with a message from Kate.
    http://support.ddo-japan.com/files/k...turbinecom.jpg

    I would also like to stress here that all the details of our methods are published in the official blog space of the Japanese DDO server. Not a few players also produced movie how-to's in YouTube or Zoome.

    Quote Originally Posted by Angelus_dead View Post
    The "natural and obviously intended" way to beat the other challenges is as follows:
    Asteroid Pillar: Each of two players picks up one energy boulder and equips it as a weapon. Then they watch opposite directions and throw rocks at incoming asteroids.
    Like this?
    http://zoome.jp/premiere/diary/31/
    (This movie was taken in August, MOD6.1)

    Finally, I just want to ask Dev one issue. I have beaten Abbot more than 100 times, and statistics tells that raid loot rate is close to 1/4 in normal and around 1/6 in elite. Is this intended?

  19. #139
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    Quote Originally Posted by chibi View Post
    I would also like to stress here that all the details of our methods are published in the official blog space of the Japanese DDO server. Not a few players also produced movie how-to's in YouTube or Zoome.


    Like this?
    http://zoome.jp/premiere/diary/31/
    (This movie was taken in August, MOD6.1)
    Wow, the asteroid part actually looks doable by a pug from this video. The asteroid speed is reasonable (at least to start), targeting doesn't seem to mess up (at first), and the character shown can actually take a number of hits from the asteroids before being knocked off.

    Was this set up different on the Japanese servers? Did the player in the video have a super high speed, super reliable connection close to the game server?

    The last 15 times I have tried on the US servers, the asteroids are coming in in much larger, much faster groups right off the bat, the targeting is nearly impossible to get right (rocks go right through the asteroids most of the time - hinting at server/client latency problems), and one hit knocks a person right off the platform (as was shown with the companion in the video).

    If the puzzle could be "fixed" to be more like this video, this puzzle might, just might, be doable with a pug.

    It sure would be one huge step forward.

  20. #140
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bradik Losdar View Post
    Wow, the asteroid part actually looks doable by a pug from this video. The asteroid speed is reasonable (at least to start), targeting doesn't seem to mess up (at first), and the character shown can actually take a number of hits from the asteroids before being knocked off.

    Was this set up different on the Japanese servers? Did the player in the video have a super high speed, super reliable connection close to the game server?

    The last 15 times I have tried on the US servers, the asteroids are coming in in much larger, much faster groups right off the bat, the targeting is nearly impossible to get right (rocks go right through the asteroids most of the time - hinting at server/client latency problems), and one hit knocks a person right off the platform (as was shown with the companion in the video).

    If the puzzle could be "fixed" to be more like this video, this puzzle might, just might, be doable with a pug.

    It sure would be one huge step forward.
    The movie was taken in August, before MOD7 update. Asteroid puzzle has significantly changed in MOD7. The chasm puzzle has become significantly easier to clear, but I feel that the Asteroid puzzle is now very difficult. The number of asteroids are reduced, but their origins are now much closer to the pillar. So, you need faster response.

    An important trick here is do not try to shoot down all the asteroids. It is impossible. You have to choose which asteroids to shoot down. Not all asteroids are dangerous. The distance of the knock-off effect depends on the incident angle. Horizontal ones are fatal, you will be knocked off from the pillar by one shot. Vertical or close to vertical ones are okay, unless you are close to the edge. Thus, the further the origin, the more interval for decision and targeting.

    Please do not misunderstand that I am saying the Asteroid puzzle is easy. It was difficult before MOD7, and now it is nearly impossible. I totally agree with most of you that this puzzle needs some fix, if Devs want to make the shooting option viable. For example, make the number of asteroids scale to the difficulty; same number in elite, and half in normal. Their origins are much more important. They should be more distant.

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