Monk Capstone: Serenity Preview

[bobbryan2]

you confuse me; this game is designed to reward a lot of multiclasses. there has been *****ing since the day i joined that some classes, seen by pnp purists here as pure classes (the ones that could not return if they multiclassed out, paladin and monk) had no rewards for going pure and were bastardized, etc - lots of paladin forum posts by people who 'just cant multiclass a paladin', lots of requests for some reason at all to stay pure.

and this, is, well, all - and its n ot even that good! its just kind of neat useful good

its not a reason to make a pure monk

multiclassing isnt encouraged? its more a question of 'all 20 is still viable', dude.

No, the serenity capstone is pretty well balanced. It's very powerful, but it's powerful for an ability that usually only pure monks will care about. I actually like serenity.

And I don't really know what your point is? That some people didn't want to multi their paladin, and they expected some sort of bonus to do so? I always thought those people were silly. 3.5 is based around multi-classing.. that's why there are so few classes with a lot of upper tier abilities.

[Aerendil]

Also... despite everyone's 'colorful' examples.. evasion isn't that rare. It's not some ultimate class feature. 3 Base classes gain it, and a SLEW of prestige classes as well. It's not the same as divine grace, or barbarian rage, etc.

Except in DDO, PrCs are quite different, and I have yet to see one grant Evasion.
Which just leaves the 3 classes, one of which doesn't get it until level 9, and the other one requiring you to be Lawful Good.

And in PnP D&D, despite it being a thousand times more prevalent, I never once found myself in a mission where Evasion determined success or failure. But in DDO, sometimes it makes a *huge* difference...

So I can see some of the complaints here regarding Evasion. It really is *that* good, and is a very strong reason for multi-classing. So until it's offered on a magical item, people *will* continue to multi-class for that reason.

[bobbryan2]

Except in DDO, PrCs are quite different, and I have yet to see one grant Evasion.
Which just leaves the 3 classes, one of which doesn't get it until level 9, and the other one requiring you to be Lawful Good.

And in PnP D&D, despite it being a thousand times more prevalent, I never once found myself in a mission where Evasion determined success or failure. But in DDO, sometimes it makes a *huge* difference...

So I can see some of the complaints here regarding Evasion. It really is *that* good, and is a very strong reason for multi-classing. So until it's offered on a magical item, people *will* continue to multi-class for that reason.

Exactly why it should be offered on a magical item.... For all the reasons you posted above.

[Junts]

No, the serenity capstone is pretty well balanced. It's very powerful, but it's powerful for an ability that usually only pure monks will care about. I actually like serenity.

And I don't really know what your point is? That some people didn't want to multi their paladin, and they expected some sort of bonus to do so? I always thought those people were silly. 3.5 is based around multi-classing.. that's why there are so few classes with a lot of upper tier abilities.

it only makes sense for turbine to make all paths have attractions; i don't think this means its clear they want people to play pure classes.

just that its clear they want pure classes to also be a viable option

[Elaril]

Exactly why it should be offered on a magical item.... For all the reasons you posted above.

I have to continue to disagree, not that I don't see your point - especially given your argument for a full character respec. However, you know as well as I do that a full respec is highly unlikely. Given that, I wouldn't mind seeing evasion given to classes via the PRE system as it would still require specific class levels to achieve, balancing it in a similar manner as it currently is.

[Aerendil]

I have to continue to disagree, not that I don't see your point - especially given your argument for a full character respec. However, you know as well as I do that a full respec is highly unlikely. Given that, I wouldn't mind seeing evasion given to classes via the PRE system as it would still require specific class levels to achieve, balancing it in a similar manner as it currently is.

Yep, and that's another viable alternative.

For the sake of argument, let's imagine Kensai was re-worked to grant Evasion at II or III. I know, it won't happen, but bear with me.
Given that each class seems to have (or will have) 3 PrEs to choose from - if you had a system like this, it could work.
The Fighters that want to be dodgy and more evasive would go Kensai. The ones who wanted to be unmovable titans would go with Defender. And so on.

I don't see why it couldn't be worked in as a PrE bonus, especially if placed at level II or III so as to dissuade a 6 level splash to achieve uberness.
Especially if it was worked in so as to change something else. For instance, grant Evasion, but then suddenly take away the ability to use shields or heavy armour or something (again, don't take this literally, I'm just throwing out ideas here).

It *could* work, and provides a better character building dilemma as opposed to making a highly lucrative item put ingame that will just be farmed to death by repeating quests even more than we already do.

[Borror0]

I always thought those people were silly. 3.5 is based around multi-classing.. that's why there are so few classes with a lot of upper tier abilities.

That is actually the biggest flaw of PnP.

While encouraging multiclassing is a good thing, they made pure class way too weak. They should have focused on changing that in 4th Edition rather than the junk they came up with.

[Aerendil]

While encouraging multiclassing is a good thing, they made pure class way too weak. They should have focused on changing that in 4th Edition rather than the junk they came up with.

Don't even get me started on 4th ed., Borr.

What a pile of steaming...

[Borror0]

Don't even get me started on 4th ed., Borr.

What a pile of steaming...

4th Edition is the perfect example of throwing the baby out with the bath water, IMO.

[Borror0]

However, you know as well as I do that a full respec is highly unlikely.

We have to stop saying that kind of sentence. It gives the impression that a full respec is a bad idea.

It is not.

In a MMO, especially one so focused on character customization as DDO, you simply cannot go on without respec options. Feat and enhancement respec are nice, but they are not all. Skills are the most messed up field by many. Even I made mistakes on my skills and I know this game better than most people. The game changes. What was viable a year ago might not be the following. Players get attached to their character, or they simply don't want to grind again to get that character all the gear it'll need. Awesome improvements to the game are ignored because of the lack of character respec, etc.

If anything, we should be here underlining the importance of respec options. Not acting as if it's unlikely.

[Aerendil]

If anything, we should be here underlining the importance of respec options. Not acting as if it's unlikely.

Yep, exactly. And there are plenty of methods in PnP of "respeccing". Wish spells; psychic mindwipes (chirurgy (sp?) I think it was called); etc.

Technically speaking, using psionics, you should be able to re-align *everything* in your character, since it's effectively mind-wiping you. So you would be able to re-allocate feats, skill points, enhancements, and, IMO, even levels you've taken could be a possibility, or your starting stats, or alignment.

Plenty of ways to do it. An NPC Kalashtar psion could require some extortionate fee; or some rare item that only drops in high-level raids and is untradeable; or it could even permanently reduce your CON stat by 1 per mindwipe. Or all of the above, who knows.

But I do agree. There are 1001 reasons *to* have a full respec available, and none that I can think of to *not* have one.

[Borror0]

There are 1001 reasons *to* have a full respec available, and none that I can think of to *not* have one.

Exactly. The tricky part is to balance the cost.

For skill points, it shouldn't be too costy. Something similar to feat respec should do it. It's for ability and class levels that it gets more complicated. If there would be a way to reroll your character without loosing bound items, I think that would be the way to go. How that would have to be done though, will probably be a nightmare for the dudes at Turbine...

[maddmatt70]

But I do agree. There are 1001 reasons *to* have a full respec available, and none that I can think of to *not* have one.

It is all about priorities. Everybody wants druids, everybody wants half ors, everybody wants more high level dungeons, everybody wants the level cap expanded, everybody wants epic levels, everybody wants more spells and at some point there is just some things that got to go because Turbine isn't some multi-billion dollar corporation where ddo has an unlimited budget..

[Elaril]

If there would be a way to reroll your character without loosing bound items, I think that would be the way to go. How that would have to be done though, will probably be a nightmare for the dudes at Turbine...

Which is the reason that it is very unlikely that a character respect will become an option. Would you rather develpmental time be put into somethign as resource intensive is a full respec is bound to be? Or would you rather they come up with more than four/five new quests that are relevent to the majority of the playerbase per mod?

Don't get me wrong, if there are major changes to the mechanics of the game, then I think a respec might be required, and might be a worthwhile place for the developers to spend their time. Short of that, it is simply not a practical use of resources.

[EightyFour]

Thanks for punishing creativity.

[Borror0]

Would you rather develpmental time be put into somethign as resource intensive is a full respec is bound to be? Or would you rather they come up with more than four/five new quests that are relevent to the majority of the playerbase per mod?

Thre are different teams in charge of different projects. Those in charge of quest are most likely not the ones who would take care of that.

We just have to wait for it to become the pet project of whoever is in charge of that team.

[SableShadow]

Which is the reason that it is very unlikely that a character respect will become an option. Would you rather develpmental time be put into somethign as resource intensive is a full respec is bound to be? Or would you rather they come up with more than four/five new quests that are relevent to the majority of the playerbase per mod?

Depends how they do it. "Reset me to level 0 with all my gear/favor/experience" isn't of itself that difficult...the issues come when you look at balancing that option against the rest of the game.

Don't get me wrong, if there are major changes to the mechanics of the game, then I think a respec might be required, and might be a worthwhile place for the developers to spend their time. Short of that, it is simply not a practical use of resources.

I don't mean to be obnoxious about it, but there have been several changes over the game's life to racial abilities, class abilities, feats, and skills. Feats we have covered (to an extent...trying to respec a three-level feat chain is very painful). Skills, in particular, could use a respec option.

[Borror0]

What game have you been playing for the past few years?

LOL, coming from you makes it even more credible.

[Elaril]

I don't mean to be obnoxious about it, but there have been several changes over the game's life to racial abilities, class abilities, feats, and skills. Feats we have covered (to an extent...trying to respec a three-level feat chain is very painful). Skills, in particular, could use a respec option.

Yes, there have been changes to the game, but nothing that constitutes a major change in the game's mechanics. Additionally, the only non recoverable changes that I can immediately recall were the changes to fascinate and evasion in non light armor, and neither one was a game breaker.

Again I emphasize that I'm not against a respec, only against any developmental time being spent anywhere, unless it's absolutely necessary, other than quest/character level progression.

[Borror0]

Yes, there have been changes to the game, but nothing that constitutes a major change in the game's mechanics.

The skills have been changed in drastic ways. Just take a look at Intimidate pre-Module 4.0 compared to now. Huge difference.

As for a lack of drastic changes, my intimitank disagrees with you.