Guest passes for Sunnyside Korthos

[biggin]

Had a RL friend who was interested in DDO or LOTRO, so he downloaded both to give them a try. He rolled up a toon on DDO, but of course didn't know exactly what to play. It would have been nice to pull out some of my higher level characters to run through the Korthos explorer area just to give him an idea on what each might be capable of, but I'm going to have to wait and hope that he doesn't get too bored before running those starter quests.

I know there was reasoning behind separating the new folk from the old, but I think it would be to everyones interest if there were cheap guest passes so that RL friends, family, etc could get a 'tour' without having to run hours worth of quests. They would still have to go back and complete the quests so it wouldn't change anything, just something that would enable me to show what characters are capable of at higher levels.

[Memnir]

/signed

Getting a friend to play and wanting to help them as they start out shouldn't be the uber-pain that it is.

[Theodores]

but, doing a level 1 character and going trough the snowy side isnt a pain either. You just help him make his way to misery's peak and then start the real deal in harbor with a veteran made char

Just my opinion.

[MartinusWyllt]

After the grotto a brand-new account can talk to the woman on the dock...V..something and skip the storyline to the sunny side. (I recently did this for my wife's account.)

Edit: You still have to run collaborator to get to the wilderness, but you're on the sunny side at least and can go with them through those first quests.

[Cairo]

but, doing a level 1 character and going trough the snowy side isnt a pain either. You just help him make his way to misery's peak and then start the real deal in harbor with a veteran made char

Just my opinion.

Seriously. Just roll up a Cleric to keep him alive so he can play whatever class he wants. Then explain to him that this is the training area, and how it works. This will introduce him to:

1) The flagging system
2) The instanced zone system
3) Wilderness zones
4) Quest chains and how they work,
5) Set items, and
6) Character development.

Then, when you both get through to sunny-side, THEN you can log in your awesome high-level characters and show him what that's like.

[kaleid0star]

After the grotto a brand-new account can talk to the woman on the dock...V..something and skip the storyline to the sunny side. (I recently did this for my wife's account.)

^ this ^ you don't have to run korthos at all, just get your friend to talk to the firstmate and be sunny side

[biggin]

I did wind up rolling a FVS to walk him through. But it would have been 10 times easier to pay 20 TP and show him what a high level cleric, bard, barb, etc would be capable of rather than trying to coordinate over the phone where he was, why he couldn't see me, and a whole host of other problems. You have to remember we all didn't start with Korthos, I've only been there a handful of times myself.

It just seems to me it would be a nice little low cost add in to get friends and family to enjoy the game without having to go through the hassle of having to talk them through everything, just so you can put on a little display. It's been a while for many of us, but after the 3-6 hour download the last thing anyone wants is a lengthy explanation of classes, races, etc. They want to see something go boom.

[MartinusWyllt]

I did wind up rolling a FVS to walk him through. But it would have been 10 times easier to pay 20 TP and show him what a high level cleric, bard, barb, etc would be capable of....

Grotto->first mate->skip Korthos storyline-> profit.

[Phemt81]

Grotto->first mate->skip Korthos storyline-> profit.

If you read the above post you know why it looks like you are complaining without any real reason, in my honest opinion.

D&D never been a game to go boom, always needed hours of reading to be enjoyed.

[biggin]

If you read the above post you know why it looks like you are complaining without any real reason, in my honest opinion.

D&D never been a game to go boom, always needed hours of reading to be enjoyed.

This isn't D&D. It's DDO. And while some may enjoy the crawl, the scenery, etc, others want to see some action. I get your point. But how is what I'm suggesting going to harm anything? Most new to the game aren't used to 'story arcs'. They don't know what a chalice above someone's head means. You may enjoy reading for hours. Others do not. I can go on about how casual hurt the game, it's been made too easy, or a list of other things that honestly have no bearing whatsoever on my playtime.

This....

Grotto->first mate->skip Korthos storyline-> profit

...seems easy to you and I. Try typing someone through that who has never played an MMO before. Or had the game lock up 4 times during character creation and almost got the whole of DDO deleted (thereby taking away a possibly paying customer) and was frustrated from the start. How is what I'm asking for detrimental to the game? I just want to spend my own TP on things that I may want. Turbine has an outlet for me to ask for these things. I'm not trying to sound ******, I just don't think gamers realize the headaches non-MMO people face when they first start or they forget how confused they were when they started.

And +1's to all with rep bars. At least the discussion is civil.

[Hercanic]

Only slightly relevant, but at one point while favor-grinding, I joined a TR's group. He was in sunny-side, I and others were in snowy-side, and yet somehow, through some glitch, we bypassed the grouping restriction and were able to quest together out in Korthos island. When going back to town, though, it was as if he was in a parallel dimension. Pretty funny, but I can attest to just how annoying the whole snowy/sunny division is, particularly in the LFM window that doesn't distinguish it for you (so many times have I tried to join, or had people try to join my party, unknowingly from one side while I was on the other, only to get an error message when accepted). Turbine, please lift this grouping restriction. It causes more headaches than it solves.

[biggin]

Only slightly relevant, but at one point while favor-grinding, I joined a TR's group. He was in sunny-side, I and others were in snowy-side, and yet somehow, through some glitch, we bypassed the grouping restriction and were able to quest together out in Korthos island. When going back to town, though, it was as if he was in a parallel dimension. Pretty funny, but I can attest to just how annoying the whole snowy/sunny division is, particularly in the LFM window that doesn't distinguish it for you (so many times have I tried to join, or had people try to join my party, unknowingly from one side while I was on the other, only to get an error message when accepted). Turbine, please lift this grouping restriction. It causes more headaches than it solves.

We also ran into that problem. I logged off to make my lvl 1 to run him through and when I came back he was in the Harbor, so I switched back to my 20. He could run around the Harbor but I still kept getting that error messsage you get when trying to group with someone who hasn't completed snowy side yet. I don't know if it was because I was camped inside the tavern on Korthos (figured it would be the easiest way for him to find me) and it had us in some buggy loop.

[Krelar]

Your suggestion still wouldn't fix anything though.
In order to use a quest pass on your friend you would still have to be in the same instance.
Unless I am totally mistaken on how guest passes work (I haven't used them much)

If talking them through the process mentioned above is too difficult you can still make a new character. Type "follow me" and lead them right to the person they need to talk with. Then switch to whatever character you want to show them around.

[biggin]

Your suggestion still wouldn't fix anything though.
In order to use a quest pass on your friend you would still have to be in the same instance.
Unless I am totally mistaken on how guest passes work (I haven't used them much)

If talking them through the process mentioned above is too difficult you can still make a new character. Type "follow me" and lead them right to the person they need to talk with. Then switch to whatever character you want to show them around.

That's the problem. Even when the person talks to the right NPC, it can still be buggy. I guess I should have been more specific, in that this guest pass would be a guest pass/bracelet of friends or whatever it's called. When you come to the game on your own, it's fun to run around and explore. But say for example, like what happened to me, you talk a RL friend into the game, which repeatedly crashes during character gen, only to have the game bug and keep us from grouping together. People who aren't familiar with MMO's don't know about lag, bugged quest chains or any of the other problems we get so used to that are now white noise.

I just want a cheap way to market DDO for Turbine. Yes, I am willing to pay to make DDO look better to new customers. I could ask that Turbine fix bugged NPC/quest chains but I think they would be more receptive to charging me to do it for them.

[Phemt81]

I can attest to just how annoying the whole snowy/sunny division is, particularly in the LFM window that doesn't distinguish it for you (so many times have I tried to join, or had people try to join my party, unknowingly from one side while I was on the other, only to get an error message when accepted). Turbine, please lift this grouping restriction. It causes more headaches than it solves.

Good point.
Mark groups or toons from sun or snow side, or just eliminate this division for accounts who have already passed snow storyarc.

+1

[biggin]

Good point.
Mark groups or toons from sun or snow side, or just eliminate this division for accounts who have already passed snow storyarc.

+1

Never thought of that but that's an even better idea. Saves dev time and TP.

Maybe making it selectable like instances in public areas would be the easiest way (until one of you smarter guys comes up with something better ),

[MartinusWyllt]

Never thought of that but that's an even better idea. Saves dev time and TP.

Maybe making it selectable like instances in public areas would be the easiest way (until one of you smarter guys comes up with something better ),

Selectable sounds like a great idea.

I think that even if you skip the storyline to the Harbor and do not talk to Mari you're in a quasi-sunny state that can prevent you from grouping with either...at least I've had this experience before. Ran back for MP and opened an LFM, I couldn't accept anyone on either the sunny or snowy side. (Didn't try to repeat it, so could have had been a one-off bug.)

[Phemt81]

quasi

[Ungood]

How about a guess pass to snowy side, as opposed to them coming to sunny.

That way, they can enjoy the whole story line and all that jazz and you can show them how amazing your 20th is.

But, just making a 1st level toon can be fun too. Nothing like putting on the noob gear to gain a whole new appreciation for the first time though.

[FlyingTurtle]

Even if you're out of character slots, pick an unused server and roll up a couple dudes there together.

A newbie should expect to reroll his first 10 characters anyway. I didn't plan to, but I had to retry a lot before I could roll up something that wasn't totally gimped.