I'll never defend Turbine again.

[theblaz]

Aerniel, sometimes the posts come out of order. People call it "ninja-ing" a post, where you post a reply to something but it pops up above the original.

I have no idea why it happens.

To the OP:


No, I don't agree with you.

YOu had a bad group, rather an group with well intentioned but bad mix. I dunno wasn't there. Maybe you had too many 1's being rolled.

HOWEVER-

It is a public forum, and you can have your say.


However, being nasty doesn't help the situation at all.

Nor does it make any friends, though you are leaving, I suppose you don't care. That is your choice. But I have very little sympathy for you. But I will not be rude to you.

As for the rest--See above statment. It applies to EVERYONE. It's called civil.

I suspect that the Cube will have breakfast in the AM.

Let the Cube eat, you're right. I don't care anymore.

My nastiness was towards the situation and vaguely towards Turbine. The first personal attack came towards ME, not FROM me.

I know it's easy for people to say "You had a bad group, move on."

But you're wrong. You were not there, you didn't know who we had.

We had a group that would have rocked the Shroud last week, no problem.

In the Reaver, we had a group that would have destroyed it with ease.

The problem was not that we had a bad group, it was not that we had a group that didn't mesh.

If you want to make that argument, feel free.

But know that you were NOT there, and I was.

And that I have ALWAYS defended Turbine and this game. I don't complain for the fun of it.

[Aerniel]

ok this is wierding me out... arent my posts supposed to g at the bottom!?!!?

[Valzoric]

As do I.

The type of salute I have in mind would not be welcomed in most public instances.

[Valzoric]

I heard this was the place for the penitent rogues ball? Is this it?

I brought carrots for all the penitent rogues.



I salute you, Rameses!

Ah, the typical split. Elitists on one side Casual gamers on the other. We know where Turbine's allegiance lies.

[Valzoric]

ok this is wierding me out... arent my posts supposed to g at the bottom!?!!?

This thread is so screwed up right now, I wouldn't be surprised to see the OP's post be the last post.

[Kistilan]

Ah, the typical split. Elitists on one side Casual gamers on the other. We know where Turbine's allegiance lies.

It did seem appropriate... at the time.

I salute you, Rameses!

[Leyoni]

way to not take casual players into account,

IMO this is a valid complaint.

I spent some time prior to mod 8 arguing that it is in Turbine's economic interest to scale quests so that normal is doable by casual players, hard by casual but good players and elite by top quality players. That was countered by a couple of very active posters who insisted that Turbine's focus is the high end, top flight player group.

I had argued that their estimates indicated only 10% of the population was in this top group so catering to them did not make good sense. I even pointed to the revamped introduction section in the NPE as proof that Turbine's focus was on the estimated 65% of us who are casual gamers.

Then came the posts about how much more difficult it is to get a completion on various content and on how often uber loot is dropping in new locations. And my initial reaction is just what I've quoted from the OP -- way to not take casual players into account.

The biggest downside for me atm is that all the groups seem to be on one of two ends of the spectrum -- either they are all low levels running the new NPE (I've soloed it all on 3 characters, can't figure out why there is any need to group at all as it is really beautiful but also very easy) or they are all high levels in a "don't come unless you are uber" groups going after the new high end content.

Meanwhile the level 8-12 crowd is left out again with nothing to do. I logged in yesterday and couldn't even find groups for my 3 L4-5 characters as everything was L1-3 or L15-16.

Now, I expect things to settle down in a week or two as all the newness wears off. And, in honesty, Reaver was way too easy on elite. VoN I haven't run in months because I wind up passing the levels far too easily and never seeing groups to join (although I would like to get some completions there with Cratesmasher).

All in all I am disappointed in the approach Turbine has taken and in what looks to me like disregard for the bulk of the players. So I echo the OP's frustration and understand it.

OP is right. Quests should be doable by PuGs because that is the core of the game. Something like the Shroud should be doable on normal by most PuGs. Reaver normal should be about what Reaver elite used to be. Maybe these things are in fact how it now is. I don't know because I can't find groups running the quests atm.

So I feel that Turbine has not done a good job of considering the casual players either.

[Aerniel]

I salute you, Rameses!

As do I.

[xanvar]

I also agree with the OP in theory. Maybe the tone was a bit harsh but I think the game is starting to favor the top 10% way more than it used to. Is that a bad idea? I don't know but I can see this trend leading to a large decline in subscriptions. Maybe as bad as the super lag monster that struck around mod 3 or so.

[Valzoric]

IMO this is a valid complaint.

I spent some time prior to mod 8 arguing that it is in Turbine's economic interest to scale quests so that normal is doable by casual players, hard by casual but good players and elite by top quality players. That was countered by a couple of very active posters who insisted that Turbine's focus is the high end, top flight player group.

I had argued that their estimates indicated only 10% of the population was in this top group so catering to them did not make good sense. I even pointed to the revamped introduction section in the NPE as proof that Turbine's focus was on the estimated 65% of us who are casual gamers.

Then came the posts about how much more difficult it is to get a completion on various content and on how often uber loot is dropping in new locations. And my initial reaction is just what I've quoted from the OP -- way to not take casual players into account.

The biggest downside for me atm is that all the groups seem to be on one of two ends of the spectrum -- either they are all low levels running the new NPE (I've soloed it all on 3 characters, can't figure out why there is any need to group at all as it is really beautiful but also very easy) or they are all high levels in a "don't come unless you are uber" groups going after the new high end content.

Meanwhile the level 8-12 crowd is left out again with nothing to do. I logged in yesterday and couldn't even find groups for my 3 L4-5 characters as everything was L1-3 or L15-16.

Now, I expect things to settle down in a week or two as all the newness wears off. And, in honesty, Reaver was way too easy on elite. VoN I haven't run in months because I wind up passing the levels far too easily and never seeing groups to join (although I would like to get some completions there with Cratesmasher).

All in all I am disappointed in the approach Turbine has taken and in what looks to me like disregard for the bulk of the players. So I echo the OP's frustration and understand it.

OP is right. Quests should be doable by PuGs because that is the core of the game. Something like the Shroud should be doable on normal by most PuGs. Reaver normal should be about what Reaver elite used to be. Maybe these things are in fact how it now is. I don't know because I can't find groups running the quests atm.

So I feel that Turbine has not done a good job of considering the casual players either.

I applaud you for taking the time to read the complaints...not troll. And to lend your opinion to what I feel is not just the problem for this MMO, but all MMO's. Eventually the DEV's focus all their time on the UBER and ELITE groups/people/guilds, and eventually, that's all that is left playing. So, in their quest to lure new gamers...they just end up chasing them away.

[manfredshw]

You contradicted yourself in the same post. You use the word CAUSAL and GRIND in the same sentence. Grinding indicates the ability to be logged on for hours, looting the same thing over and over again. Casual indicates the ability to log on, run something and log off. So which would you prefer?

Tactics? We knew the reaver was changed. We tried 3 times, with 3 different tactics. Again, I'm sure if I had hours to GRIND and try every tactic in the game we could hammer it down and have a specific group of x casters/x clerics/etc with x items and the sort. But how does this benefit the CASUAL gamer?

well, you may not know how to play a game efficient.
If I was a casual player, that only means I don't have enough time to grind, but do not mean I can't grind.
Give me one hour, I can do a lots of things in this game.

And the most important, RAID is a matter of 12 people there, if you failed, only means you guys lack of teamwork.
And don;t know how to do next. Adjust is needed, and overcome the changes. Reaver is still a piece of cake. As well as other quests. For my guildies, when we run reaver after mod8, we fail in the first time, but second time, we won. That's not because how uber we are, is only because we know how to adjust and overcome.

Some people think mario64 is hard, but others may think it is way too easy.
That is the world.

[cdemeritt]

Hmm... This has been an interesting thread to read. Myself, I don't consider myself to be an elite powergamer, but I'm not a pure causal gamer either. however, The base complaints in this thread were the same ones that actually drove me from the game. It has been almost 1 month since I last logged in to play, but I thought I'd check out mod 8 over the weekend. I didn't get a chance to really play, but I have to say, I haven't seen/heard anything that will change my mind about not renewing my subscription after 1 year. I prefer the dungeon crawl over the speed runs I've seen, and those who like the speed runs seem to have the Devs ears. I no longer see a game of infinate choices, I see a fancy game of DOOM. The balance is gone (ok very difficult to maintain, at best), and so is the fun.

[manfredshw]

edit: re-post due to internet lag

[Valzoric]

well, you may not know how to play a game efficient.
If I was a casual player, that only means I don't have enough time to grind, but do not mean I can't grind.
Give me one hour, I can do a lots of things in this game.

And the most important, RAID is a matter of 12 people there, if you failed, only means you guys lack of teamwork.
And don;t know how to do next. Adjust is needed, and overcome the changes. Reaver is still a piece of cake. As well as other quests. For my guildies, when we run reaver after mod8, we fail in the first time, but second time, we won. That's not because how uber we are, is only because we know how to adjust and overcome.

Some people think mario64 is hard, but others may think it is way too easy.
That is the world.

Right...lack teamwork with the same people that could do shroud last week with no problems. Lack teamwork with people that I have grouped with many times before. It was obviously the lack of teamwork...when in a NORMAL quest, maxed characters cannot land CC or any of the usual array of spells that would work prior to mod 8.

I'm glad you and your guildies can go in on the second time and win. Congrats...here's a cookie. How many of them have run it...10 times? 20 times? 40 times? I'm talking about people that as a whole have run this as a group...once, twice.

As far as adjusting? We had listened to what people were saying as for what did and didn't work...we were adjusting...and on NORMAL...nothing worked. So yeah, maybe if you were casual...you could still grind...but obviously your NOT casual...so don't try to put yourself in my shoes.

Sure, I don't have to do this quest either...but you know...after spending so much time working to get a lot of people ready for it, and to walk in on NORMAL and be completely overwhelmed, I would say...its a tiny bit out of balance.

Not everyone has Tier 3, every raid reward, complete sets, dragon this..etc. There are some people who don't max out their character 12 hours after a mod comes out. This is called...the casual gamer.

[DoctorWhofan]

Aerniel, sometimes the posts come out of order. People call it "ninja-ing" a post, where you post a reply to something but it pops up above the original.

I have no idea why it happens.



Let the Cube eat, you're right. I don't care anymore.

My nastiness was towards the situation and vaguely towards Turbine. The first personal attack came towards ME, not FROM me.

I know it's easy for people to say "You had a bad group, move on."

But you're wrong. You were not there, you didn't know who we had.

We had a group that would have rocked the Shroud last week, no problem.

In the Reaver, we had a group that would have destroyed it with ease.

The problem was not that we had a bad group, it was not that we had a group that didn't mesh.

If you want to make that argument, feel free.

But know that you were NOT there, and I was.

And that I have ALWAYS defended Turbine and this game. I don't complain for the fun of it.

Agreed, I wasn't there. There have been times I wanted to chuck the computer out the window in fustration. Trust me, PuG all the time. I am saying just ggive it up because of one very bad run. Ok 3 in a row. Walk away for a few days and come back.

I was referring to your tone not the content. Because of all the yelling and swearing, by the time I got to the end of the post, I didn't really care if you were offering sainthood to Tolero, you made me angry at you.

As for the personal attack, yes you were attack, and that was very wrong of the poster. I am certainally don't defend him, even though I may agree with him. Again, the tone was wrong. I am sure he will get his present from Tolero in the AM.

His posts did not help the situation at all. I agree. But my reply was to the both of you, not just you. But don't let him set the tone of your final decision. Again, take a few days off and think it through.

[GeneralDiomedes]

Bottom line .. D&D rules were not meant for MMOs .. bottom is a lot farther from the top that other MMOs, and unfortuntaly those at the top make it hard for those at the bottom. Any content can be done, the difference is how fast.

[manfredshw]

Right...lack teamwork with the same people that could do shroud last week with no problems. Lack teamwork with people that I have grouped with many times before. It was obviously the lack of teamwork...when in a NORMAL quest, maxed characters cannot land CC or any of the usual array of spells that would work prior to mod 8.

I'm glad you and your guildies can go in on the second time and win. Congrats...here's a cookie. How many of them have run it...10 times? 20 times? 40 times? I'm talking about people that as a whole have run this as a group...once, twice.

As far as adjusting? We had listened to what people were saying as for what did and didn't work...we were adjusting...and on NORMAL...nothing worked. So yeah, maybe if you were casual...you could still grind...but obviously your NOT casual...so don't try to put yourself in my shoes.

Sure, I don't have to do this quest either...but you know...after spending so much time working to get a lot of people ready for it, and to walk in on NORMAL and be completely overwhelmed, I would say...its a tiny bit out of balance.

Not everyone has Tier 3, every raid reward, complete sets, dragon this..etc. There are some people who don't max out their character 12 hours after a mod comes out. This is called...the casual gamer.

I need to work, I only play ddo afterwork and before go to bed.
I only have one t3 gs weapon, and it is useless in reaver.

Enough said, if you want to be stronger, some items are needed, but not difficuilt to obtain, such as t1+t2 dps weapon, nightwork, very easy. And I got my IR just the day before yesterday, after mod8, you know the giantskeleton chest? IR is very easy to obtain.

Well, I feel sorry for you, you are not in sarlona, can't help you.

[Leyoni]

You contradicted yourself in the same post. You use the word CAUSAL and GRIND in the same sentence. Grinding indicates the ability to be logged on for hours, looting the same thing over and over again. Casual indicates the ability to log on, run something and log off. So which would you prefer?

I don't know that I agree with your definitions. Casual, IMO, is an attitude more than a reflection of how much time a person has available. I have lots of time available and some days am logged in 6-8 hours. But I don't try to get thru as much content as possible or raid every high level chest or exclude new/less capable players because they slow me down or interfere with completion. I play that way because it is what I want to do.

I do not mind running a quest 3 or 4 times in a row looking for an item. I also don't mind not running the quest 3 or 4 times in a row (even when I really need the item to help my character). I want the good loot, but I don't worry that life ends because I don't have it.

IMO it is possible to be both casual and to grind. To some degree you have to grind given the way DDO is going because you have to qualify for quests -- we call it flagging. I need 10 each of 3 different tokens to open a quest and I won't get them by running all the content thru on normal. I have to run each quest 2 or 3 times. Personally I don't like that. It is how video games work, PC games -- but not Dungeons and Dragons.

Maybe you never played D&D/AD&D in any other form. But, in PnP how often would you go back and run a dungeon over again? Even with the first AD&D modules we never ran them twice. There just isn't any joy in doing that. We'd design our own quests and build our own story lines. We would never go back and repeat a quest.

It doesn't seem appropriate to do that in DDO. Yet the game is focused more and more on that aspect of things.

Turbine's developers continually miss opportunities because they do not think in big enough terms. Hard should not be normal with ramped up monsters. Hard should be a new experience where the entire dungeon has been revamped -- where monsters are in different locations, new rooms and traps have been added, objectives have been changed. And elite.... Elite should be all of that and more -- a genuine, top-rate, OMG experience.

To top it all off, once completed on elite that should be it. If the villians are dead or banished or whatever then they shouldn't be there for us to fight again the 20th time.

"Foul," I hear some of you crying. "That would mean more content and people would have nothing to do while we wait the interminable months for develpment," you are saying. Well, the solution would be for elements of the elite version to change so that it is highly unlikely that a player will have the same, predictable experience in any of 30 or 40 attempts.

But, that isn't how things are. So casual players are stuck with also pursuing the grind because that is all that is left to us. So, your definitions don't hold and it is not only possible to be both casual and grinding -- it is a requirement given DDO's current state.

[Taojeff]

First, let me start by apologizing to anyone who has criticized this game only to see me defending it and arguing with you.

Honestly, I'm sorry.

I've defended this game because my old PnP group was playing it, and because we met some cool people in the game. We all had fun doing our thing. We were so not uber, it was almost crazy. I'm done only 3 raids ever (VoN, Shroud, Reaver). Two capped characters, my main is still my first 28 pt build. Less than 2000 favor.

Our loot runs are From beyond the grave, sleeping dust, vale rares. Nothing special. A month ago I went ape**** when I won the Reaver Napkin on my main.

I say all that to give you an idea of how I play the game and how I'm not burned out, how I'm not at the very very end waiting for new content. I'm not a hardcore raider, I'm very casual.

Tonight, I've almost certainly made up my mind to leave the game.

First, we did the Shroud. Pug group, competent people. A couple of whiny people, but I expected nothing less (I know their guilds; bunch of crybabies). It was at least 5 times harder than it was before Mod 8. I had a 22k repair bill. It took us around 2 hours.

Yeah, I know uber people can beat it in 16 minutes, super duper. Don't care, shut up. This isn't about how awesome you are, this is about how a casual player with several good friends in the game is ready to leave when, yesterday, he spent much time defending this game.

So it took forever but we beat the Shroud.

Let's do reaver!

Yeah. Elite, wipe in like 2 minutes.

On normal, we manage to make it to the puzzle.

I'm the solver. I've spent hours practicing. I can solve the online version within 8 moves ALL the time, 6 moves most of the time.

I fail. Not because of the puzzle, but because the ****ing Air Elementals are tossing me around and I can't finish the puzzle.

We try again, can't even get to the puzzle (I think, I'm drinking at this point).

Again, we manage to get to the puzzle, the ****ing air ellies screw us again.

I'm not looking for Icy Rainments, I'm not looking to be crazy uber and 2 man the shroud by slapping my nuts on the keyboard, I'm just looking to have fun with the PnP group I used to spend my Thursday nights with before they all moved away.

Yeah, we can still play. Sleeping dust for the 50th time, what fun.

Running with the devils? Not after the ellie changes.

Ritual Sacrifice? Yeah, 25 runs and still fresh.

Rainbow? Screw that.

Coalescence? Screw that with a rusty railroad spike.

In their zeal to make things more "challenging" Turbine has made the game un-fun.

Even if we failed, I've ALWAYS had fun playing with my friends.

Tonight, we beat the shroud and it ****ing SUCKED.

Tonight, we failed like 4 times on the Reaver, and each one ****ing SUCKED.

So, undoubtedly getting more infraction points, thanks for nothing, Tubrine.

You ****ed up this game to the point where I will never ever defend it again.

And ask around, I defended the **** out of this game.

In closing, I'm almost certainly not re-upping my subscription. If I do, it's because my PnP group convinced me to until the tabletop online game comes out.

Way to go, Turbine. Way to not test anything, way to not take casual players into account, and in summation, way to **** up this game.

No more defenses from me, and no more dollars from me.

Big middle finger to you all.

I would not call myself a hardcore gamer, I take months off at time. But I am more then a casual gamer, I am elite casual gamer. I like stuff to be hard, and I love DDO, it seemed silly for me that reaver was so easy.

However,.... There is a big glaring problem in DDO, basically the casual gamer cannot keep up with the Hardcore and Elite Gamer and it makes it less fun. Reason why alot of Guilds don't run with Pugs is cause they say they are noobs or dont listen, or dont know what they are doing.

Real Reason, this game is tough, its complicated and it gets almost exponentially hard as you go on. This is for a couple of reasons.

1. D&D 3.5 is not a balanced system. It is a good system, but it is not balanced throughout the levels. 4.0 (lover it or hate it) was designed with this in mind and spreads the sweet spot out over the levels for all classes (something 3.5 definitely does not do).

2. DDO does not have the bredth of PnP, the class, enchancement, and prestige systems basically only have as much as the Turbine can crank out at anyone time, so more than likely there will always be at least one class that is gimped and complains. This is ontop of the already unbalanced class roles in 3.5.

3. DDO is based on a D20 system, but unlike many D20 systems, the roll of the dice is weighted down. Basically what I am saying is with all the pluses you can get with the enhancements and items, the roll of the dice has less weight then it does in traditional PnP. This helps to further unbalance the classes.

4. DDO is a monty haul campaign, and will probably always be because most MMOs are and thats what people expect. However, in monty haul systems there will always be the uber hardcore gamer and the casual gamer gap. The goal here however should be to create multiple ways to bridge the gap so that the HARDCORE gamers have an advantage but not signifigantly so. It really all comes down to math, and if you have a D20 system, with some deviations between the casual gamer and the hardcore gamer equal +10 difference your going to have problems. You just cannot scale adventures for that large a deviation. The problem is the system, not Turbine, not the players.

[alchilito]

The OP has some serious need of advice on how to approach new challenges added to the game.

Enervation for the win. Tested that out on air ellys ? works pretty well.