New Dice notation. Do not like.

[Zenako]

Just out of curiosity I wonder if the Devs are still reading this post. They have kinda maintained radio silence about this over the past 4 days or so.

Its been the weekend and most of the developers are allowed out of their cubes to go home once in a while I suspect. I personally never expect a Developer comment over a weekend.

[Missing_Minds]

I so missed the wording of this my first few trips past the front page.

"...is pretty much not acceptable..."

Pretty much not, eh?

Correct, as play ground owners, they are allowed to do as they please. We are trying to encourage them not to do this.

[Sylvurdragon]

Its been the weekend and most of the developers are allowed out of their cubes to go home once in a while I suspect. I personally never expect a Developer comment over a weekend.

hahah of course. I never expect any comments over the weekend. but the last update on this from a Dev was on Tuesday or Wednesday I think This is a MAJOR deal for many of DDO's playerbase. Since Turbine is "Powered by our fans" it would be great to see something done on this.

There has been an open outrage about this particular change. Moreso than the 2WF nerf, from what I've noticed.

We have done what Tolero has asked...we have provided actionable feedback on this situation. We are simply waiting on a response from someone now. It would be great to know that this has been taken into account so we don't feel like we are talking to a wall

[Sarria22]

The fact is, its not like dice notation is limited to D&D, plenty of games across many genre (although mostly roleplaying and wargaming) use the same notation, it isn't a hard concept to grasp, and could easily be explained by RTFM (or in this case a pop up tip like all the others that explain the game)

*edit* Ahhh! thread merge of pure evil!

[Spellmaster]

To the Developers at Turbine

I am all for making the game easier to understand for new players, I just don't think this is the way to go.
This game is based on Dungeons & Dragons, and growing up playing Baldur's Gate, that is one of the reasons I picked this game.
So making the dice a secondary part of the descriptions takes away some of the DnD feel of the game. Tolero asked that feedback be more specific so here it goes.

* Aspects of the current changes that you like the most: the addition of color to spell damage text.
It makes it easy to pull the description up find the damage out put and be on your way.

* Aspects of the current changes that you like the least: Moving the DnD dice to be an after thought.
Instead of making two description for damage and adding unnecessary text, try putting it in this format.

Example:1d6(1-6) per caster level for a max of 10d6(10-60)

A lot of people have also suggested this and it would keep the dice while adding more detail for those who need it.
Another way to do it would be leave the descriptions alone and add a part explaining the dice in the tutorial and/or in hint.

* Your own suggestions for how to make description text numbers more clear: If the new change is the route you decide to go, make how little the spell can do at maximum power more clear.
Right now its 1 to 6 damage per caster level (max 60). To make it more clear you could change it to 1 to 6 damage per caster level( max 10 to 60).
This is the only thing I can think of to make it more clear.


To summarize I am against this change as it is now, but I do think it is a good idea to make the descriptions more clear for players not familiar with the dice system.

[Crann]

The actionable suggestions have been spelled out numerous times, I think the Dev's understand the will of the forum dwelling playerbase. Dice are a core part of DnD.

The only reason I feel compelled to add anything here is that along with other changes occuring in the game, the slide down the slippery slope away from it's DnD core is gaining momentum.

I came to this game because it was Dungeons and Dragons. I played other MMOS...they didn't feel like DnD, I stopped playing them and started playing DDO.

I stayed because it is Dungeons and Dragons. I knew the rules, knew what a Ranger was, what a feat was, and what 1d6 meant. It is extremely different from other MMO's in that regard....it is DnD on my computer.

I will leave when it is not Dungeons and Dragons anymore. The more you deviate from the Core DnD philosophies...not just specific rule sets...in order to appease new players, the more you are going to alienate your established client base.

They will be replaced by ex-wow, non paying, I wanna be level 80 now, types who will be alot happier with an easier to learn system and an easier game to "win" at. If that is the direction your taking this train, then the next stop is where I get off, and wish you a pleasant journey.

[Sir_Noob]

1d3+3 /= 1 to 6

/signed

not to be a nit pick, but shouldn't 1d3+3 /= 1 to 6 actually be 1d3+3 /= 4 to 6?

Don't take this game from its roots!

[spyder7723]

for every DnD fan out there who takes away their money, there are about 5 non DnD fans out there who will gladly take your place. In the grand scheme of things, I don't really think pouting will get the dev's attention. Sorry to be the one to tell ya.

Its not pouting you twit. Its telling a company exactly why I (and most likely others) purchase their product, and that reason is because its dnd. When it stops being dnd there is nothing to differentiate it from any of the other games out there. It becomes just another game like wow or eq, games that never interested me enough to even try them let alone stay with them. Some might actually call that feedback. Crazy idea huh?

[Crann]

not to be a nit pick, but shouldn't 1d3+3 /= 1 to 6 actually be 1d3+3 /= 4 to 6?!

"/=" means "does not equal."

[theb]

Just out of curiosity I wonder if the Devs are still reading this post. They have kinda maintained radio silence about this over the past 4 days or so.

I'll be very blunt when I say telling players "you're too stupid to learn D&D" is pretty much not acceptable on these forums in any way shape or form.

Is it possible they've all been banned, as instead of teaching new players D&D notation, the game descriptions attempt to dumb it down? This is pretty condescending; the notation change is similar to telling new players "you're too stupid to learn D&D."

By the way, this is a sentiment that I *do not* share, I am a very new player (joined in 2010) and think very highly of new players, apparently more so than some game developers do.

[Tilliak]

for every DnD fan out there who takes away their money, there are about 5 non DnD fans out there who will gladly take your place. In the grand scheme of things, I don't really think pouting will get the dev's attention. Sorry to be the one to tell ya.

So, what you're saying is that he should continue to pay for a product that is now advertised as D&D and is clearly not D&D, when the only reason he was paying for the product to begin with was because it was D&D.

Yeah. You make a ton of sense.

[Antheal]

not to be a nit pick, but shouldn't 1d3+3 /= 1 to 6 actually be 1d3+3 /= 4 to 6?

It should, but the spell descriptions of (1 to 6) that were written by the developers of the game aren't even wrong, they're false, and that's much worse than a simple mistake.

[Ethias]

Dice Notation Is Not Learning D&D.

FFS.

It's learning dice notation!!

There is a huge freaking difference. Asking someone to learn what a 1d6 means does not mean you need to ask someone who has never touched D&D to know how to calculate anything. 1d6 is a super-simple concept.

This change is really a major issue. Look, I am all about making the game easier to get into. But you can incorporate the helping tools int othe newbie zone. You do not need to change game-wide notation!

Hell, it seems to me teaching these people what 1d6 means is better, because what if they have to look in their combat log sometimes? Gah. Just leave the notation in; if it's a major issue that new players are super confused by, just incorporate it into newbie items.

[theb]

There is something everyone must learn in addition to dice notation (which they must learn no matter how developers try to coddle them): how to roll on loot. In fact, knowing how to roll on loot *requires* understanding dice notation.

My suggestion is to add a crappy piece of loot, perhaps a +1 con trinket, to the chest in the grotto and have every new character roll against Jeets for it with /roll 1d100, highest number wins. If you want to get really fancy, have the trinket add +1 to a stat based on class, and have the character roll against the other member of the party who could use it based on primary stat, and teach how to swap loot within a chest.

Jeets could say "I'll roll you for the trinket. 100 sided dice, highest number wins." A popup could say "roll one 100 sided die by typing /roll 1d100. This will generate a random number from 1 to 100. The number before 'd' indicates how many dice are being rolled, and the number after 'd' indicates how many sides those dice have. For example, /roll 2d6 rolls two six sided dice and generates a number from 2 to 12."

If his roll is higher, Jeets can say "Better luck next time, mate!"

If the PC's roll is higher, Jeets can say "Congratulations! Coming so close to winning the treasure and falling short stabs me in the heart like a stingray's barb, but I'm happy for you!"

For people who are graduating to DDO directly from games such as "count to ten without using your fingers" you could spell it out even more, as apparently that's what you either enjoy doing or think is necessary, but keep it confined to the lower level areas and away from higher level item descriptions!

[Knippers]

O.k., I haven't yet been on the test server to look at this, so maybe I'm not understanding whats being discussed here. But, are you adding more data to pipe down to my client during the combat events in the shroud & TOD raids? And will this change play a part in that lag?

[Turial]

Does it encourage me to quit in any fashion? No.

Does it irrationally irritate me to no end? HECK YES!
Does it also rationally irritate me knowing that Turbine made the decision to pay one of their developers to go through and chance every single dice comment which adds NOTHING to the game? YES.

Even worse...while they did this they spent 0 time updating poorly worded feat descriptions.

Granted the switch was likely a find and replace type of transaction.

[Sweetsoul86]

I can't comment on how you feel, except to say I don't share these feelings.



Have a look at the new tooltip you get when clicking on Extend etc (on Lama).

It contains a list of the 9 classes that can get the feat, then a 3 line description of Extend's effects (so is now 12 lines long, 8 red, 1 green and 3 white).

I think we should be pointing out that those 9 extra lines are not helpful.

I understand that you don't share these feelings, your posts have made that clear already, you asked if you were missing something and I was telling you what you were missing. I never said that you shared these feelings or that you needed to I'm just answering your question.

Based on the posts made in this thread I was telling you how many of us feel. I wasn't just speaking for everyone with no idea how they feel, a LOT of people have made it clear that the feel of d&d/putting d&d as an afterthought is their biggest issue with this change along with the fact that it's misleading and completely wrong in most cases.

A lot of people have also commented on how long some of these changes make descriptions and that it will cause item descriptions like epic items to go right off the screen and therefore be useless so we have already been pointing out that these extra lines aren't helpful but rather a space waster.

[Quarterling]

The developers will be straining themselves over a most unwelcome change. Here is what I propose.

* Keep it how it is.
* In the Korthos Tutorial, have a little segment explaining all the different notations of the dice and how they operate. That way, D&D players will be happy, and newcomers will be educated without having to use the advice channel.

[Narmolanya]

Jesus saves all others take 4d6 damage

Jesus saves all others take 4-24 points of damage

Not the same. One is obviously a D&D referance the other is just lame. Why do you have to go and do things like this Turbine. This is a D&D based game keep it that way please.

[OldAquarian]

I would imagine that the translation from die to range notation doesn't seem like as hard a leap as either one to average damage.

If I'm new and I can choose between 3d6+1 and 2d10
I'd want to know which is higher, and 4-19 sounds worse than 2-20. Since 19 is lower than 20.
While 3d4 could seem higher than d20 since its more dice, 3-12 doesn't compare well in my head with 1-20

I don't think anyone would object to putting the average after the xDy notation
3d6+1 (11.5 Avg) vs 2d10 (11 Avg) is pretty clear and probably means more to the unintiated.
Same way 3d4 (7.5 Avg) is clearly worse than d20 (10.5 Avg)

And this way the distribution id clear to those who want to see it, and a meaningful number is included for those that don't.

I'd even wager that quite a few people who like the dice would benefit from the Average being listed.

(Bonus points for an option to show weighted average instead of honest statistical average since thats really what you want to compare. A d6 would reflect 1d3+3 as 5 instead of 3.5, in fact this should always be shown, but an option would be nice)