the concept of nerfing

[waterboytkd]

This viewpoint comes from my many many years of DMing PnP D&D, from 2nd edition to 4th edition.

In my fairly short time playing DDO (a bit over a year, now), I've seen a number of nerfs come through in the updates, which I find a little wrong. As a DM (granted, there's a huge difference between PnP RPGs and an MMO), one of the core tenets was to never take away from the players, especially something awesome that you gave them. Instead, find ways to challenge them with what they have. And if there was an inbalance between characters, you certainly didn't find ways to make a character worse, you found ways to make the other characters better.

Again, I'll grant an MMO is different. There's more at stake, and if one thing is overpowered, amping EVERYTHING in the game up would be a tremendous, possibly impossible, task. That said, I still think it's a bit of bad business to nerf resources on the player's end (classes, races, etc) because they seem a bit better than the other resources available. Why not make the other resources better, so they're as desirable, or at least close, to the "best"?

I'm going to use the latest issues with monks to highlight this (please keep in mind, I'm not trying to argue anything one way or the other for monks, I'm just using it as an example). With update 5, the community was more or less in agreement that the changes and additions to monk made the dark monk almost always better than the light monk. Keep in mind that this is a class that is first and foremost a dps build (though it has other minor roles, as well, which is why it wasn't the best dps build). The dark monk, by virtue of its PrE, was granted a +3d6 sneak attack, as well as the ability to deal 500-1500 untyped damage with a single clicky (Touch of Death, and a bug actually made that 500-2500, but that's a bug), plus the ability to gain 50% incorporeal for a minute unlimited times per rest for a moderate ki cost.

Meanwhile, the light monk was granted a smite ability that would have been useful, but it was given a refresh timer that was double the Touch of Death timer, as well as a static ability to bypass Byeshk and Cold Iron DRs (useful in the middle to middle-high levels, but not that great at end game), plus a slew of abilities that really weren't useful (only the Dismissal strike had any use, and that was banishing regular mobs of elementals and other low will save outsiders--again, useful in mid to mid-high levels, but not at end game).

This was unbalanced. The dark monk actually got good abilities for being dps, while the light monk got mediocre to bad abilities for being dps, with no actual bump to its support abilities (the reasoning given for making dark monks better dps is that light monk has a stronger support role). Now, with update 7, Turbine is addressing this, which is good.

The first step they revealed to fixing this problem was that they were amping up light monk's PrE. This was a smart move. They gave the smite a fair cool-down timer; gave the monks a static bonus to saves and AC vs their favored enemies (though it won't probably matter until level 12, gear-depending, and even then maybe not till 18) which was far better than the clicky they had that really did nothing; tacked on silver to the fists at level 18 (which is great for raid bosses at end game); and gave it a couple other neat abilities (ranged stunning, which seems sweet, and the jade stuff, which could be cool--though I'm a little concerned about the 60 sec refresh on Tomb of Jade as that seems like it could be the same mistake they made with Shintao's original smite evil). All in all, they were good changes. They made people reconsider being dark, but didn't necessarily force a mass-exodus from the dark path.

Then the nerfs for dark monk got revealed. Really, it was just one nerf, but it was pretty major. They decided to reduce the quality of the major dark monk ability, an ability that really costs 12 AP (the 8 AP of prerequisites are terrible abilities that never get used). Not only did they make it so that damage could be reduced by half with a Fortitude save from the bad guy (and at end game, the Fort saves are the highest ones that bad guys have, especially raid bosses), but they made it a negative energy effect, which means there's a host of bad guys it won't work on (the undead, which are actually a pretty major enemy type in the game). Now, it seems that monk players are abandoning the dark path for the light path, because with that nerf to the Touch of Death, the light monk path just seems strictly better.

This seems bad. The nerf wasn't necessary, as by amping up the light monk stuff, people were tempted to switch, not seemingly forced to. But with the nerf, people don't even feel the dark monk is worth it. Now, consider this: what if Turbine hadn't amped up light monk at all, but just nerfed dark monk? What you'd end up with is both sides of monk being less-than-desirable, and you wouldn't have people switching monk sides, they'd probably just be abandoning monk all-together. I mean, if your options were Shintao of old or dark of new, which would you take? I have a feeling that most people out there would give a flippant answer, like "I'd take barbarian," or "I'd take a good class."

I understand that there is a concern for power-creep (for those that don't know that term, it means that as new player resources are introduced to the game, the power of the players keeps increasing because, in order to make new stuff interesting to players, it has to be good; this causes an imbalance between the players and the environment they fight against, which isn't good for the game as it becomes too easy), but the opposite can happen when nerfs are used to correct balance-issues: power wanes, and players find that their choices rarely matter because they're going to be weak anyways. Even worse that that possibility, though, is that players feel ripped-off when something good is taken away from them when they've done nothing wrong.

The true reason I made this post was not because of the monk situation (that was just useful to highlight my point), but because of the overwhelming response that half-orc is overpowered, and the equally prevalent prediction that Turbine will nerf it in a coming update. When it hits live, we'll see how OP it truly is, but even if it does turn out to be the "best" choice for any melee character, does that mean it needs to be nerfed? I don't think so. What should be done is that the other races should gain some more resources (read: good enhancements) to make them acceptable choices over half-orc. I'm not saying better than half-orc. I'm not even saying as good as half-orc. I'm just saying not so much worse that it's always the wrong choice.

This kind of re-balancing would, in turn, create more positive play experiences, for both old and new players alike. New players because, by amping rather than nerfing, everything gets better, and it's harder to make "gimped" toons. It hurts when the guy you've been leveling for two months gets close to the end game, and everyone starts telling you that you're not good enough. Old players because old toons don't suddenly become obsolete by new race/class additions, and in fact, old toons can become new and fresh again when new resources are added to its race/class.

And, from Turbines stand point, this is awesome. The more positive play experiences in their game, the more new players come and the longer old players stay, all of which means more money. Also, the more "good" races and classes that are out there (and here, I'm referring more to races as there's really only one class that people are on the fence of calling good, and not suprisingly, it's monk), the more toons people will want to have on their accounts, which means more VIP accounts, as well as more spending in the DDO store, for both character slots and pay-to-play races and classes.

This is only good for Turbine. I've never heard of a person who quite a game because cool, new, powerful stuff was introduced to it, but I have heard many people claim they are quitting a game because cool, powerful, fun stuff was taken away because of balance concerns. No one likes to lose what they earn, what they pay for, and even what they're given for free. Nerfing is itself a negative play experience, and Turbine should truly reconsider their policy on its use.

[jwdaniels]

I'm going to assume that you are very new to MMOs, because nerfing is something that happens all the time and, quite honestly, is very necessary.

In a tabletop RPG, you're looking at the DM and odds are that person is a friend. You want a powerful character, but you don't want to totally ruin the game for them and the rest of your mutual friends sitting around the table. In an MMO, it's completely anonymous and the DM is a machine - this triggers people's ability to want to win so they try and break the system.

When a single class reaches a point where it is so overpowered that everyone feels like they have to play one or be totally overshadowed by it then a nerf is needed. The same can be said about a single item that everyone has to have or a single weapon that everyone has to swing. If you don't bring that single thing back into balance then that is all you will see. It's why TWF was nerfed to bring DPS more in line with other melee methods, why Tempest was also nerfed, and (in my opinion) why the khopesh needs to be nerfed.

If I wanted to play a game where every party was made of the same six classes using the same equipment as every other party, I'd pull out the playstation and load up anything made by square.

[Phidius]

...
If I wanted to play a game where every party was made of the same six classes using the same equipment as every other party, I'd pull out the playstation and load up anything made by square.

Or you could just nerf anything that has an advantage so that everything is the same.

If you want things to be different, you have to accept that some will be better than others. And in an environment where people feel competitive, you're gonna see a lot of people using the best options. Especially in a game where DPS rules all.

[Nevid]

In
When a single class reaches a point where it is so overpowered that everyone feels like they have to play one or be totally overshadowed by it then a nerf is needed. The same can be said about a single item that everyone has to have or a single weapon that everyone has to swing. If you don't bring that single thing back into balance then that is all you will see. It's why TWF was nerfed to bring DPS more in line with other melee methods, why Tempest was also nerfed, and (in my opinion) why the khopesh needs to be nerfed.

I would buy this argument excpet for the fact that there is nothing currently more overpowered in game right now than WF arcanes. The immunities plus their own healing line, and con bonuses makes puts them over the top of anything else caster-wise. It also negates the downside of playing WF...the healing. Every update arcanes get new and more powerful spells, yet bards and clerics - eh, not so much. Why no nerf? I suspect, because casters are sexy, and WF casters are extra sexy and sell more accounts, more pots, more WF classes.

In fact, having played this game for a long time, it seems like the nerfs now seem to be not about evening out a character build, but closing the equipment gap between new player vs. old player. I mean, seriously, nerfing wop? Why? In four years I pulled three wop items, two bows and a rapier. Were they over the top powerful? Sure. Was there a plethora of players running around dual weilding wop rapiers? No, not really.

The exploiter tempest builds that became very popular put out some nice dps, most were geared (my own included) with two mineral II kopeshes or Dwarven Axes. Now, some will not even accept a tempest ranger in a group (although I think that is a little extreme and some fairly uniformed raid leaders). The most powerful melee in the game now is frenzied bersker. 800 hit points, sustainable rages with huge str bonuses, and really, all you need is one triple positive great axe and you too can be right up there in kill count. In fact, if you do not want to make a triple positive or min II great axe, the ice games can let you turn a +5 shocking burst of maiming into a +5 shocking burst icy burst of maiming. Add the force critical and you have a very comparable weapon to min II on everything except bosses with multiple DR's.

I hate to be a pessimist, but to pretend that there is not a monetary driving force behind a lot of this is perhaps a bit naive in my opinion, and Turbine wants to keep the new players feeling at least somewhat on par with the guys who have grinded the gear for years.

[waterboytkd]

I'm going to assume that you are very new to MMOs, because nerfing is something that happens all the time and, quite honestly, is very necessary.

In a tabletop RPG, you're looking at the DM and odds are that person is a friend. You want a powerful character, but you don't want to totally ruin the game for them and the rest of your mutual friends sitting around the table. In an MMO, it's completely anonymous and the DM is a machine - this triggers people's ability to want to win so they try and break the system.

When a single class reaches a point where it is so overpowered that everyone feels like they have to play one or be totally overshadowed by it then a nerf is needed. The same can be said about a single item that everyone has to have or a single weapon that everyone has to swing. If you don't bring that single thing back into balance then that is all you will see. It's why TWF was nerfed to bring DPS more in line with other melee methods, why Tempest was also nerfed, and (in my opinion) why the khopesh needs to be nerfed.

If I wanted to play a game where every party was made of the same six classes using the same equipment as every other party, I'd pull out the playstation and load up anything made by square.

Why can't they just make everything else stronger? Why does it HAVE to be a nerf? I don't think it has to be a nerf. If something is really powerful to the point of overshadowing other classes/races, why don't they just start boosting those other classes/races?

[Ashiel_Dragmire]

Why can't they just make everything else stronger? Why does it HAVE to be a nerf? I don't think it has to be a nerf. If something is really powerful to the point of overshadowing other classes/races, why don't they just start boosting those other classes/races?

That would result in a power creep, where eventually every player is a demigod and every mob is a god. We already have issues with inflated Hit Points for PCs and NPCs alike, as well as insane to-hits for most mobs (which renders AC useless on most builds past Lv 12). That and the fact that it would be far too difficult to make everything good when the same result can be had by making one thing worse.

No one really likes nerfs, but they are a necessary evil.

[Sinni]

That would result in a power creep, where eventually every player is a demigod and every mob is a god. We already have issues with inflated Hit Points for PCs and NPCs alike, as well as insane to-hits for most mobs (which renders AC useless on most builds past Lv 12). That and the fact that it would be far too difficult to make everything good when the same result can be had by making one thing worse.

No one really likes nerfs, but they are a necessary evil.

this

and after some time you'd need to adapt all monsters too so they still pose a little challenge, which is also a ton of work

the only way to avoid nerfs and a inflation of power would be to balance everything out and stop changeing anything else or adding anything new.
that wouldn't be very desireable.

[Phidius]

Nerfing is the only reason that anyone I know of has ever quit an online game. Ultima Online was my first experience with this, and I'm sure it won't be the last.

Turbine made the decision to focus on the new players coming to the game. The expected behavior is that they come in, spend some money, then leave.

Retention of players in this environment is a no-win situation. You just need to attact as many (or more) as you are losing.

[Renvar]

This viewpoint comes from my many many years of DMing PnP D&D, from 2nd edition to 4th edition.

In my fairly short time playing DDO (a bit over a year, now), I've seen a number of nerfs come through in the updates, which I find a little wrong. As a DM (granted, there's a huge difference between PnP RPGs and an MMO), one of the core tenets was to never take away from the players, especially something awesome that you gave them. Instead, find ways to challenge them with what they have. And if there was an inbalance between characters, you certainly didn't find ways to make a character worse, you found ways to make the other characters better.

Again, I'll grant an MMO is different. There's more at stake, and if one thing is overpowered, amping EVERYTHING in the game up would be a tremendous, possibly impossible, task. That said, I still think it's a bit of bad business to nerf resources on the player's end (classes, races, etc) because they seem a bit better than the other resources available. Why not make the other resources better, so they're as desirable, or at least close, to the "best"?

I'm going to use the latest issues with monks to highlight this (please keep in mind, I'm not trying to argue anything one way or the other for monks, I'm just using it as an example). With update 5, the community was more or less in agreement that the changes and additions to monk made the dark monk almost always better than the light monk. Keep in mind that this is a class that is first and foremost a dps build (though it has other minor roles, as well, which is why it wasn't the best dps build). The dark monk, by virtue of its PrE, was granted a +3d6 sneak attack, as well as the ability to deal 500-1500 untyped damage with a single clicky (Touch of Death, and a bug actually made that 500-2500, but that's a bug), plus the ability to gain 50% incorporeal for a minute unlimited times per rest for a moderate ki cost.

Meanwhile, the light monk was granted a smite ability that would have been useful, but it was given a refresh timer that was double the Touch of Death timer, as well as a static ability to bypass Byeshk and Cold Iron DRs (useful in the middle to middle-high levels, but not that great at end game), plus a slew of abilities that really weren't useful (only the Dismissal strike had any use, and that was banishing regular mobs of elementals and other low will save outsiders--again, useful in mid to mid-high levels, but not at end game).

This was unbalanced. The dark monk actually got good abilities for being dps, while the light monk got mediocre to bad abilities for being dps, with no actual bump to its support abilities (the reasoning given for making dark monks better dps is that light monk has a stronger support role). Now, with update 7, Turbine is addressing this, which is good.

The first step they revealed to fixing this problem was that they were amping up light monk's PrE. This was a smart move. They gave the smite a fair cool-down timer; gave the monks a static bonus to saves and AC vs their favored enemies (though it won't probably matter until level 12, gear-depending, and even then maybe not till 18) which was far better than the clicky they had that really did nothing; tacked on silver to the fists at level 18 (which is great for raid bosses at end game); and gave it a couple other neat abilities (ranged stunning, which seems sweet, and the jade stuff, which could be cool--though I'm a little concerned about the 60 sec refresh on Tomb of Jade as that seems like it could be the same mistake they made with Shintao's original smite evil). All in all, they were good changes. They made people reconsider being dark, but didn't necessarily force a mass-exodus from the dark path.

Then the nerfs for dark monk got revealed. Really, it was just one nerf, but it was pretty major. They decided to reduce the quality of the major dark monk ability, an ability that really costs 12 AP (the 8 AP of prerequisites are terrible abilities that never get used). Not only did they make it so that damage could be reduced by half with a Fortitude save from the bad guy (and at end game, the Fort saves are the highest ones that bad guys have, especially raid bosses), but they made it a negative energy effect, which means there's a host of bad guys it won't work on (the undead, which are actually a pretty major enemy type in the game). Now, it seems that monk players are abandoning the dark path for the light path, because with that nerf to the Touch of Death, the light monk path just seems strictly better.

This seems bad. The nerf wasn't necessary, as by amping up the light monk stuff, people were tempted to switch, not seemingly forced to. But with the nerf, people don't even feel the dark monk is worth it. Now, consider this: what if Turbine hadn't amped up light monk at all, but just nerfed dark monk? What you'd end up with is both sides of monk being less-than-desirable, and you wouldn't have people switching monk sides, they'd probably just be abandoning monk all-together. I mean, if your options were Shintao of old or dark of new, which would you take? I have a feeling that most people out there would give a flippant answer, like "I'd take barbarian," or "I'd take a good class."

I understand that there is a concern for power-creep (for those that don't know that term, it means that as new player resources are introduced to the game, the power of the players keeps increasing because, in order to make new stuff interesting to players, it has to be good; this causes an imbalance between the players and the environment they fight against, which isn't good for the game as it becomes too easy), but the opposite can happen when nerfs are used to correct balance-issues: power wanes, and players find that their choices rarely matter because they're going to be weak anyways. Even worse that that possibility, though, is that players feel ripped-off when something good is taken away from them when they've done nothing wrong.

The true reason I made this post was not because of the monk situation (that was just useful to highlight my point), but because of the overwhelming response that half-orc is overpowered, and the equally prevalent prediction that Turbine will nerf it in a coming update. When it hits live, we'll see how OP it truly is, but even if it does turn out to be the "best" choice for any melee character, does that mean it needs to be nerfed? I don't think so. What should be done is that the other races should gain some more resources (read: good enhancements) to make them acceptable choices over half-orc. I'm not saying better than half-orc. I'm not even saying as good as half-orc. I'm just saying not so much worse that it's always the wrong choice.

This kind of re-balancing would, in turn, create more positive play experiences, for both old and new players alike. New players because, by amping rather than nerfing, everything gets better, and it's harder to make "gimped" toons. It hurts when the guy you've been leveling for two months gets close to the end game, and everyone starts telling you that you're not good enough. Old players because old toons don't suddenly become obsolete by new race/class additions, and in fact, old toons can become new and fresh again when new resources are added to its race/class.

And, from Turbines stand point, this is awesome. The more positive play experiences in their game, the more new players come and the longer old players stay, all of which means more money. Also, the more "good" races and classes that are out there (and here, I'm referring more to races as there's really only one class that people are on the fence of calling good, and not suprisingly, it's monk), the more toons people will want to have on their accounts, which means more VIP accounts, as well as more spending in the DDO store, for both character slots and pay-to-play races and classes.

This is only good for Turbine. I've never heard of a person who quite a game because cool, new, powerful stuff was introduced to it, but I have heard many people claim they are quitting a game because cool, powerful, fun stuff was taken away because of balance concerns. No one likes to lose what they earn, what they pay for, and even what they're given for free. Nerfing is itself a negative play experience, and Turbine should truly reconsider their policy on its use.

You really can't compare PnP to MMO. In PnP flavor, RP, and non-combat abilities actually matter. Here, they matter only a little to not at all. In PnP the half-orc negatives (low int, low charisma, social stigma in certain societies and settings) would impact player choices. Here it's all DPS, HP, and DPS.

So the problem Turbine has is that the negatives of a half Orc only affect you if you are trying to play a Wiz, Bard, Sorc, Rogue, Pally or FvS. Even some of thsoe classes won't care. DPS rogues don't use int or charisma anyways. Many FvS and bards and bards treat charisma (Their primary class ability stat) As a dump stat. This is all part of the min/max mentality of the MMO where DPS is king.