Why the constant tinkering, Devs?

[Borror0]

But you still have spells they are changing that the babysitter can't protect you from.

I know but none of those really make the game easier.

How does tinkering make a game not go stale?

Buy A Theory of Fun for Game Design and read p. 44. Koster explains itfar better than I could dream of. Basically, by always changing patterns, you prevent players from groking how the game works fully and thus prevent them from getting bored.

Another way of looking at the question is asking yourself why new content keeps the game "fresh".

And this...this is only true if you play the game exactly as Turbine designed it to be played.

Turbine are designing under some assumptions, yes, because they cannot develop the game while covering all possible scenarios. It would just be unrealistic. So, yes, some changes might have different effects outside of expected gameplay but that's just how life is.

[Ghoste]

I know but none of those really make the game easier.

So being paralyzed in a multitude of ways by beholders, who will strip away your silly FoM with the wink of an eye, isn't a challenge? Being feebleminded in a party with no dedicated healer, that's also not a challenge? For those players not as uber as Borroro, who eats beholder rays and anti magic for breakfast, they will be less of a challenge than they currently are in game.

Basically, by always changing patterns, you prevent players from groking how the game works fully and thus prevent them from getting bored.

If you were talking about throwing in some surprises that will force players to re-think their current patterns, this makes sense. But the specific changes being discussed in this thread are changes that only go one way: they will require LESS thinking from players, not more.

[quickgrif]

And this...this is only true if you play the game exactly as Turbine designed it to be played. This logic fails as soon as you're talking about soloing, short manning, or just plain grabbing whoever's available.

And speaking of odds, you seriously think that the odds are pretty high of not only having someone in the group that has this as a class spell, but that they will also have it prepared, and that they will also always cast it on the party ahead of time?

The reality of that is just a teensey bit different than theory. Very different if you PuG. Ever.

I pug a lot at times and at higher levels freedom of movement is usually around. It makes things ten times easier and the fact it can do this is the whole point Borr was driving at I think.

I see the changes as a two edged sword:
1) better for us that we do not get spammed on by stupid high abilities like worgs trip or elementals throwing you around like a rag doll.Tell me you get caught up in such a situation where is the skill in being completely unable to do anything to break the chain of events resulting from this?
2) worse because now some of our cc will not be as effective on mobs or hold them as long (stoneskin is a big one.).

[Ghoste]

Turbine are designing under some assumptions, yes, because they cannot develop the game while covering all possible scenarios. It would just be unrealistic. So, yes, some changes might have different effects outside of expected gameplay but that's just how life is.

Lol, you talk about grouping without a dedicated healer as if that were a rare thing. Very cute.

[Ghoste]

I pug a lot at times and at higher levels freedom of movement is usually around. It makes things ten times easier and the fact it can do this is the whole point Borr was driving at I think.

Oh, i got that point. Over and over and over and over. What I seem to be missing is how he connects that to the claim that it will have no impact on the game at all, be it easier or harder.

...and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and...

[Angelus_dead]

I have to wonder why all the tinkering with game mechanics and dynamics since the release of Mod9. The game was mostly ok

That's hilarious. The game is not OK, and needs a lot more tinkering to get up to speed.

Their priorities are different then I would have selected, and for example I wouldn't have tried fixing Air Elementals with a global rule change (because the problem IS a local one), but tinkering is needed. After they get done with this stuff they should proceed to tinker with ranged combat, shield defense, metamagic UI, 5+ capstones, 10+ spells, and 15+ feats, because all of those things need work.

Oh and things like Dungeon Scaling and Epic mode? A lot more tinkering please! That'd be better than leaving them bad.

[Ghoste]

That's hilarious. The game is not OK, and needs a lot more tinkering to get up to speed.

Their priorities are different then I would have selected, and for example I wouldn't have tried fixing Air Elementals with a global rule change (because the problem IS a local one), but tinkering is needed. After they get done with this stuff they should proceed to tinker with ranged combat, shield defense, metamagic UI, 5+ capstones, 10+ spells, and 15+ feats, because all of those things need work.

Oh and things like Dungeon Scaling and Epic mode? A lot more tinkering please! That'd be better than leaving them bad.

Agree. Tinkering obviously can sometimes help. What they have done on this particular occasion, I don't like.

/sarcasm on: Oh, but what am I talking about...obviously all those spells never affected any players anyways. We're all immune to those spells all the time. So what I should really be saying is that all this tinkering was a waste of time because it didn't actually do anything. At all.

[Borror0]

So being paralyzed in a multitude of ways by beholders, who will strip away your silly FoM with the wink of an eye, isn't a challenge?

True. It is one instance where it makes the game easier. Beholders got easier unless Turbine went back and readjusted them for the new rules.

The overall effect on the game though? Minimal.

Being feebleminded in a party with no dedicated healer, that's also not a challenge?

*mana pot* *moves on*

Lol, you talk about grouping with a dedicated healer as if that were a rare thing. Very cute.

I talk about a dedicated healer as if Turbine assume it is not a rare thing.

[quickgrif]

Oh, i got that point. Over and over and over and over. What I seem to be missing is how he connects that to the claim that it will have no impact on the game at all, be it easier or harder.

...and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and...

Oh it will effect the game there is no doubt. How much however remains to be seen on many factors. We do not know to what degree the mobs get this advantage nor how effective it will be for us (How long till it helps us break vs old system and if it will be enough to save us regardless.).

To be honest if they just applied to to air elementals and worgs I would be happy lol. I remember running some of the Amarath quest with you and watching all of us get tossed like rag dolls the whole time. The poor caster could of killed them if the air eles gave him one second but yeah right.

[Ghoste]

True. It is one instance where it makes the game easier. Beholders got easier.

The overall effect on the game though? Minimal.

*mana pot* *moves on*

I talk about a dedicated healer as if Turbine assume it is not a rare thing.

Edited post about rare healer.

Also, I am not trying to make a point about how big a step this is towards dumbing it down. Big step, small step, whatever. Dumbing it down is still dumbing it down. That's all I was ever saying. Perhaps I shouldn't have made the WoW reference. I'm not trying to say they're going that far, just pointing out the actual direction.

"*mana pot* *moves on*" ya, because everyone has plenty of those to waste. For those who actually hold any value at all for these, that is a potential price to pay to get over feeblemind.

[Shassa]

Again, I have to agree on Borror0 on this one. Let's call it whatever we want, but taking out some of the more frustrating elements isn't a bad thing.

I remember going through The Enemy Within for the first (and what has been the only) time. An hour-long tedious grindfest only to get zapped by the Mind Flayer at the very end and sit there helpless while he eats my brain. Remember the early Hero/Space Quest games and the "haha you're dead" syndrome that wasn't particularly fun then either? Why make people go through that? Because you have a need to puff out your chest by overcoming it? Well, kudos to you, but I think I'll pass.

The same goes for the Lammania room in Prison of the Planes. Even if you can overcome the air elementals, how fun was that exactly? I didn't feel "challenged" or "accomplished" after surviving it, no I needed a break from DDO for a bit. You play the game for fun. Challenging can be fun, look at the Crucible. Challenging can be tedious and not fun at all, look at Tomb of the Tormented. The difference is in the implementation. And laying there on your back helpless until the worgs finish you is in my opinion not a fun implementation. It's that kind of stuff that turns people off from the game.

Of course, we will get the nth reply to this along the lines of, "Well why don't we just have a button next to Recall that says Win and give them the rewards outright." Yep, original material there. I keep hearing a desire to weed out the weak, by whatever definition they arbitrarily apply as weak. Which never seems to include them, just everyone else.

[Ghoste]

Again, I have to agree on Borror0 on this one. Let's call it whatever we want, but taking out some of the more frustrating elements isn't a bad thing.

Borroro and I are not discussing whether or not it is good or bad. It is a discussion about whether this is moving at all in a hard to easy direction. That is all I have been trying to discuss with him.

I personally think it is a bad thing. He may or may not think it's a good thing. Who cares. Not what we've been discussing.

[Borror0]

Dumbing it down is still dumbing it down.

Obviously. Making the game easier is making the game easier but that is not always bad. Often, they are changing things in a way that makes it easier but not solely to make it easier. In this case, the goal is to avoid situation where players cannot make any action for an extended period of time. That's a good thing: it makes skills matter more and bad luck cost you loss.

You argue that the change is bad because it makes things easier. Thus, magnitude matters here and the effect is barely noticeable in most cases.

"*mana pot* *moves on*" ya, because everyone has plenty of those to waste.

I have a stack of crappy low levels ones on my caster just for that.

[Ghoste]

You argue that the change is bad because it makes things easier. Thus, magnitude matters here and the effect is barely noticeable in most cases.

And finally we are on the same page. All this time you've been arguing points that I made about direction, not magnitude. You want to have a discussion about magnitude? Fine, let's change the topic to magnitude.

You say it is barely noticeable. I agree, for the most part. As we've both already said, that magnitude increases in a few situations - beholders.

Got another point to make? Something new, perhaps?

[Shassa]

Borroro and I are not discussing whether or not it is good or bad. It is a discussion about whether this is moving at all in a hard to easy direction. That is all I have been trying to discuss with him.

I personally think it is a bad thing. He may or may not think it's a good thing. Who cares. Not what we've been discussing.

Sorry if I was not as clear as I could have been. I am also saying that this is not a dumbing down. It's game balancing, and a good one if I may interject that part as well.

I don't believe this is a discussion on semantics. There is a real difference between the two, and I don't see DDO turning into Hello Kitty Online anytime soon. Even if the air elementals now allow me to stand for a couple of seconds in between playing human pinball.

[Ghoste]

Sorry if I was not as clear as I could have been. I am also saying that this is not a dumbing down. It's game balancing, and a good one if I may interject that part as well.

I don't believe this is a discussion on semantics. There is a real difference between the two, and I don't see DDO turning into Hello Kitty Online anytime soon. Even if the air elementals now allow me to stand for a couple of seconds now.

So you're saying the changes don't make it any easier in any situations for anybody? That's fine, say it. But I've grown tired of talking to people who are incapable of separating in their minds the definitions of magnitude and direction. So go find somebody else to talk to.

[eonfreon]

To me saying it's "dumbing it down" is making a comment on both direction and magnitude.
It seems to not only say it's "easier" but that it's so "easy that now even a caveman- er- I mean dummy can do it".

[ahpook]

Of course. Though, they have not done that so that is not applicable either.

Kind of lost the context in this quote but you were referring to the idea that they have made every difficulty setting easier. Normally I agree with you but in this case you are wrong. Shrugging off the CC changes as simple balancing doesn't change the fact that they made a host of enemy effect easier to deal with on every difficulty level. And before update 3 they made changes to make it easier to handle stat dmg and negative levels by having them disappear over time.

You can argue that these are good or necessary changes and that they make the game more fun or profitable. But you cannot say that they have not made every difficulty setting easier because that is factually false.

I think it is even valid to call this easier style "dumbed down" because you no longer have to worry about dealing with a host of problems that were previously requiring you to be prepared. It will no longer be a big deal to be unprepared to deal with Curse, Feeblemind, Mummy Rot, or Fear (I am surprised that Blindness wasn't on the list, was that an oversight??). Forgetting to be properly equipped (or what was previously determined to be properly equipped) is now just an opportunity for a bio break. And this change will be evident in every difficulty setting.

I, for one, liked that mistake would cause the party to lose resources (potions or sp) and not just time. And that problems that could not be solved (eg: no remove curse) would haunt you until you made it to the shrine (or the inn back in the day). Removing these issues may good for the game overall, but they DO make it simpler.

No. I still have Freedom of Movements, do I?

A lot of the changes reduce tedium (like waiting several minutes after the right is over for someone to get out of Flesh to Stone) but does not really make the game much easier.

But it does remove the value of Stone to Flesh. Another marginally useless spell that has shifted to totally useless. I am pretty certain that this game had too many spells anyway.

[Borror0]

All this time you've been arguing points that I made about direction, not magnitude.

I was discussing magnitude from the beginning. For example, it would be ridiculous to complain that Turbine made the game "grindier" if all that did was lengthen the duration of one unique grind by 5 minutes. While you might dislike the idea that the game becomes grindier, you have no grounds to oppose the change if it has beneficial effects and only this meaningless "negative effect".

Got another point to make?

Maybe. I think it's most likely a good change.

[Ghoste]

To me saying it's "dumbing it down" is making a comment on both direction and magnitude.
It seems to not only say it's "easier" but that it's so "easy that now even a caveman- er- I mean dummy can do it".

Hey eonfreon. They're dumbing it down just a teensey little bit. Have I dumbed that statement down enough for you?

Don't put words in my mouth. If you can't separate definition from vague implications, then I've got some colorful words to put in your mouth as well.