Untwinked end game?

[Sir_Noob]

Hello fellow DDO'ers.

I am just curious as I have only ever reached 10th level so far.

Are there any among you who have perhaps ran with a static group where you did not grind quests for equipment and run through all the quests?

Essentially maybe running hard and elite through quests just picking up what equipment drops and still pressing ahead?

Is it possible to complete end game playing that way?

[BlackSteel]

playing the game thru the first time, is far different than say the 2nd, 3rd, or 50th time.

my first real character I took to cap took about two months of casual play back when the cap was 12. I played most of the quests on my way up, and seldom grinded anything back to back unless I happened into a party that was doing so.

I unlocked 32pt builds from that original character, and immediately retired him and rerolled a new barbarian. That one took about two weeks.

Today, with exp pots n other bonuses, I could probably cap a character in 3 days if I had the time off work/family. (600k exp average for a full day of playing). But you throw in the horrible exp curve for a double TR, and the fact that it would be that characters 6th or 7th life on that individual character and you get the situation where smelling the roses isnt my priority.

I did plan for the past life on my main to be his last TR, so I did take more time than I usually do to get elite favor on his way thru the ranks. But it also involved alot of soloing elite at level, or pulling teeth out of guild mates.

[Sir_Noob]

Bump, just looking to see other peoples experiences so far. I am sure (at least hoping) there has been more than one person to do this.

[TheDearLeader]

Sounds similar to me to what every single Perma-Death guild on any server does.

I'm not in one, but a lot of their rules involve rolling a toon, and only getting gear as they come upon it (so no help from alts and such). They normally also run on the Hardest possible difficulties, and I don't think they replay quests often. And their groups are definitely static.

[Malison]

My wizard was my first capped toon. He had been 20 for several weeks before I realized he was still wearing his korthos spearblock bracers. When he TR'd for the first time, he had one piece of raid loot and one tier 2 greensteel. Approaching 20 on his third life now, he has something for almost every equipment slot.

For each of those TR's, I ran every nonraid quest n/h/e except those with excessive traps and kobold assault, usually solo or shortman. It was really cool entering a quest alone and having no idea what you have to do to win.

You don't need massively twinked gear to win quests, but it sure does make it a lot easier. I don't know if the first drow life could have managed solo, but running with usually at least one person I knew in a group he did well enough. That life especially, Amrath was a huge step up from the Vale/Reaver's. Epics were painful but doable.

The biggest thing I carried between lives, though, was the skills/knowledge I'd picked up. You start to take things like aggro management for granted until you run with a low-level pug sorcerer who has no idea how you're killing an entire room with one firewall without taking significant damage. I'm certain if I remade that first wizard now with the same exact build, he'd be far more potent naked than he was geared up.

[voodoogroves]

(1) As was said, this sounds a lot like Permadeath.

(2) My guild recently ran a static group to try to recapture some of that ... no farming quests, run through chains once on hard and/or elite, etc. We did twink them some with gear from our other toons, but not as much as we could have. Was a fun experiment.

(3) I've got a number of capped toons and when I first reached cap months ago (6 now?) I asked from advice from my guild at the time (who I still respect greatly; I left the guild to join up a small one with local friends I've known for years and years) and here and the advice I got was NOT to TR until you had your ducks in order. I've been biding my time and my first TR will have a set of raid and greensteel gear for basically every slot once they hit 12. The only exception may be some tweakage on DT armors and more GS weapons. Dunno, maybe that's overkill.

[morticianjohn]

If you're asking is there enough XP in the game to reach cap without grinding and repeating quests over and over again. Yes there is. If you're asking if you're toon will be too gimp to complete all of those quests without grinding for gear then I would say that you can make it to cap without any fancy gear. In fact I'd say that most (if not all) of the grinding done (for loot) in the early lvls of the game is superflouous as you can just grind at lvl 20 and you'll get better stuff.

[Sir_Noob]

I currently do play in a Permadeath Guild and greatly enjoy the careful playstyle.

The people I have met at Mortal Voyage are great and have always been helpful but even more so, fun to play with.

However, the best success I have had with a toon so far has been a bluelined 9 that bought it in a Red Fens Optional.
I think having played in MV for about 10 months now has actually improved my game play a ton but it is time to get a few friends together now to take a toon through everything to see all the content.

It would be exciting to see all the (new for me) content playing in a Mortal Voyage Style without the penalty.

I stopped doing quests I have not done yet with pugs as often, even if I see advertised "looking for careful team play", they often still run through the adventure with reckless abandon.

I was mostly asking if one could complete all the content without super twinking ones toon.

[morticianjohn]

Like I said before, many people don't start to grind until they reach cap anyway so yeah, you can complete nearly everything without twinking out your toon or grinding for gear especially if you're just wanting to do a normal run and aren't interested in doing everything on elite.

[bryanmeerkat]

Everybody at one stage had to do it untwinked , unless somehow you had a very generous friend who was playing before you started and was happy to help you out with large cash injections .

[katana_one]

Currently in a static group that's doing almost exactly what you're asking about.

Rules for our static group were simply no hand-me-down gear or plat from other characters, and no grinding. We do allow AH and vendors tho, which means we're only slightly twinked. Still, it's a fun experiment, and since most of my crew are relatively new to the game, it's getting more and more interesting as we progress into quests that fewer and fewer of us are familiar with.

[NaturalHazard]

Hello fellow DDO'ers.

I am just curious as I have only ever reached 10th level so far.

Are there any among you who have perhaps ran with a static group where you did not grind quests for equipment and run through all the quests?

Essentially maybe running hard and elite through quests just picking up what equipment drops and still pressing ahead?

Is it possible to complete end game playing that way?

So they knight noobs in canada.....................

Just kidding mate

[Varhann]

OP, I think you'll find that it's not only possible, but sometimes it can give you a greater feeling of accomplishment.

I play in a series of Static groups, with mixed rules about AH usage. My groups that have strict no AH rules tend to run slower on quests on Hard and Elite, but the challenge can make it more fun. I often find that the skill level of players does increase over time when you learn to work together and think things out.

In my RP guild static group, we ran Chronoscope, 11 players between level 5 and 7. All but 1 player had not done it before. Nobody had twink gear, most still wearing Kothos sets and gear, and we did it with very few causalties. We payed attention to directions, focused on completing and did it with style

So, I'm proud to say that it can be done. Gear does make it easier, but no amount of great gear can ever replace the skill of a good player.