LET'S TALK: Introduction

[umeannothing]

Thank you MadF, this is a great way to head into the new year. And was a great thing to see when I got on the computer.


My 2 single biggest concerns in this game is:

1) The inability for in game GM's to be able to CONSISTENTLY help players, and most importantly, restore lost items, or at least be able to tell players if they sold/destroyed the items when they open a ticket, and their inability to help a player that opens a ticket for an issue, that is not an issue, i.e. a player opens a ticket saying a chest didn't spawn, but the player doesn't realize the chest doesn't spawn because they didn't complete an objective in the quest. The GM should be able to explain this to the player, rather than just say "we cannot spawn a chest for you".

2) The power creep and reworking of older content to compensate. Constantly reworking older content for high level/power players is effectively shutting out the new players/casual players from enjoying the content. When something like the shroud has been working fine to be what it was made to be, a level 17-20 raid for those p[layers to get geared up, and you tweak all levels of the raid to effectively be level 20+, then alot of people, myself included, feel like they will never get a chance to enjoy the content.

If you are going to make gear for players to become more powerful than the content they are playing to get the gear, you need to make new content to reflect this. I mean content that the is hard for these players, not take content that those have outleveled/outgeared harder for those that have yet to play the content.

Oh, one more gripe. Challenges. Really? you took what was a special thing we got to play once or twice a year (Crystal Cove) something that was a nice change from the normal grind, and ruined it in my opinion by making it a normal grind and removing the special aspect of it. I predict a bit less participation in CC over this, even I am looking forward to it less already. If you have plans for a new content pack mimicking Mabar, PLEASE shelve it, let Mabar be special one of a kind, the way I really feel Crystal Cove should have been.

It is nice to get a change from the normal grind with the special events, those are special for a reason, because they are unique and fun. Turning them into a grind/task a player HAS to complete just ruins the uniqueness of them.

[Hafeal]

MadFloyd -

Starting a conversation is the right thing to do. Make no mistake, it should be a conversation - not a dev peep in. Acknowledging the player base - even if they do not get what they want - will go a long way with obtaining respect and support. I think it will also prevent DDO from making the mistake it made prior to the "vast and mysterious" Eberron launch.

I applaud you on the start and I am curious and pensively optimistic as to how this conversation will develop. I hope we will hear from you, Mr. Paiz, as well as the other devs on all of the subjects you raise.

*hoists mug*

Cheers.

[dkyle]

First of all, let me say that DnD classes are NOT supposed to be balanced. The whole idea (as you know already) was to have a party of various classes overcome obsticles and challenges by using the strengths of all of the party.

Various classes being better than others at various things, working together to play to those strengths, is balance, and exactly what I want to see. That's not what we have. Casters can do almost everything melee can do, but better. The one thing that Melee are better at (tanking) is only truly relevant against the absolute nastiest Raid bosses, on the highest difficulties.

[fco-karatekid]

...
Some of the topics on my mind are:
- class balance
- overall difficulty of content
- bugs
- AC
- Ranged combat
- Challenges
- True Reincarnation
- Strengths & weaknesses of the game
- where we're headed
...

I look forward to it, and thanks for this. With the exception of Challenges, all of these are of interest to me (highest being bugs and ranged combat - in that order).

[rdasca]

While I understand that you are not asking for feedback in this thread per se, none the less I will chime in with a few thoughts; and thank you for this, I hope it becomes the norm and not just a flash in the pan type of thing.

See below in red

Hi all,

For those of you who don't know me, I'm the Design Director for DDO. I manage the 'content' team and the 'systems' team. I don't get to make all the decisions of what we do, but I participate in and influence those decisions to the best of my abilities. :-)

I'd like to get your feedback on a number of topics and to that end I will be starting separate threads on each of them. The idea here is to make sure we're hearing your wishes, get constructive feedback on past updates as well as some future plans, and being able to drill down and ask some specific, but important questions.

Our update cycles require us to be developing/implementing and planning simultaneously. We're deep into both for 2012 updates but I want to be sure that we're targeting the right things and not overlooking the obvious. In short, I want as much overlap between your expectations and ours.

This is going to be somewhat tricky for a number of reasons. I'm not at liberty to divulge all our plans. There's always a high risk for misinterpretation. I expect some degree of controversy. I expect some cynicism and anger and I expect to be humbled at times.

One thing that is exceptional about the DDO community compared to many other MMOs is the level of maturity. Most of you are highly passionate about the game and can articulate your thoughts and ideas extremely well. I hope to see these attributes shine through in your responses and that we avoid non-constructive behavior, rudeness, etc. As usual, if you don't feel comfortable sharing your thoughts in these threads, feel free to PM me.

2011 has been an interesting year, but definitely bumpy in many respects. We need to do better in 2012.

Some of the topics on my mind are:
- class balance class balance in D&D (and DDO) is one of the hardest things to achieve, simply by the nature of the game casters are going to be more powerful at level 20. A level 20 wizard vs. a level 20 fighter the wizard is going to win 999 times out of 1000, that is the way the game is suppose to work; however, taking away dps from melees was a bad idea as was taking away the auto crit for held mobs. The answer is not more immunities to mobs or bosses, but to make the quest themselves require teamwork. Once you actually start a thread about this I will go more in-depth on the subject.

- overall difficulty of content The content now for the most part is fine, though please no more new challenge type content it gets real boring real fast. But the biggest difference I would like to see is a real difference between the difficult settings; casual should be a cake walk for an at level toon even solo; normal should be a challenge for a short manned party but not too hard for a full group; hard should be next to impossible for all but the best players to solo and a challenge for a full group; elite should be a major challenge for even the best geared toons at level; and of course elite should make level 20 toon be on their best game. A couple of ways to do this would be to drop the dungeon scaling, want to short man a quest, no problem but you still have to fight the same number of bad guys, also randomize the locations of traps and secret doors even the number of bad guys that are home when your group comes a calling.

- bugs Well bugs are bad of course, I would like to see a real known issue list and the dates they are fixed as well as a coordinated effort on Turbines part to fix bugs that hinder game play with the same urgency that exploits are fixed.

- AC AC is a hard one, I have never understood how a guy in a loincloth can have a higher AC than a guy in full plate. Maybe it is time for a “house” rule or two and release some +15 or +20 armor in the game, but make it half plate or better.

- Ranged combat Yes please …. Oh wait you meant the arrow shooters we have now; well I understand the problem with making ranged combat over powered, I would suggest that ranged have the same damage potential as melee, slightly slower, but give mobs shields or cover bonus and the like.

- Challenges Ok the way they are, just no new ones.

- True Reincarnation It is a grind, but honestly it should be somewhat of one; however, keeping your past life tomes would be the one major thing I would like to see changed.

- Strengths & weaknesses of the game Strengths; the quest, the loot (some of it is OP but that happens) the combat system, the sheer number of toon combinations, the Pres (the ones that are done anyway), the story lines, many, many others as well. Weaknesses; some things being overly grindy for outdated reasons (dragontouched, abbot flagging, ect…), the epic loot grind, in game support (the GMs) and a lack of any clear cut enforcement of the rules.

- where we're headed I cannot wait until you guys tell us. I am known for expressing my displeasure of things in this game and of certain Turbine decisions, but this is IMO still the best MMO and it is the only game I pay money for every month, and I want to see it grow and get better, I want it to be around for a long time, and I think / know that post like yours are a major step it seeing that it will be.

I'm sure I'm forgetting some at the moment. These threads won't all happen at once, but I hope to get them going as soon as possible.

Thanks in advance for your constructive participation!

[Drwaz99]

First of all, I appreciate the effort you are putting forth here but something sinking in me says this is a PR move to calm to risin' uproar. I could be wrong, but there hasn't been a thing to prove is anything but PR nonsense. I hope I am worng.

Hi all,

For those of you who don't know me, I'm the Design Director for DDO. I manage the 'content' team and the 'systems' team. I don't get to make all the decisions of what we do, but I participate in and influence those decisions to the best of my abilities. :-)

I'd like to get your feedback on a number of topics and to that end I will be starting separate threads on each of them. The idea here is to make sure we're hearing your wishes, get constructive feedback on past updates as well as some future plans, and being able to drill down and ask some specific, but important questions.

Our update cycles require us to be developing/implementing and planning simultaneously. We're deep into both for 2012 updates but I want to be sure that we're targeting the right things and not overlooking the obvious. In short, I want as much overlap between your expectations and ours.

In red because, this seems to be the bottom of the todo list. If you are so far into dev'ing for 2012, our/needs/wants ideas now may not be seen until 2013+, and many smart people don't bet on games being around that long (but nothing suggests to the contrary.

This is going to be somewhat tricky for a number of reasons. I'm not at liberty to divulge all our plans. There's always a high risk for misinterpretation. I expect some degree of controversy. I expect some cynicism and anger and I expect to be humbled at times.

One thing that is exceptional about the DDO community compared to many other MMOs is the level of maturity. Most of you are highly passionate about the game and can articulate your thoughts and ideas extremely well. I hope to see these attributes shine through in your responses and that we avoid non-constructive behavior, rudeness, etc. As usual, if you don't feel comfortable sharing your thoughts in these threads, feel free to PM me.

2011 has been an interesting year, but definitely bumpy in many respects. We need to do better in 2012.

Some of the topics on my mind are:
- class balance (how long has this been an issue? Years. Is it really that complicated?)
- overall difficulty of content (as a person who sometimes can play a ton, then has to sit out months due to a disability, catching up is impossible. I have some good guildies that help out when they can, but I was out classed of Elite Cannith (LOB, etc) and most other epic raids. I just don't have the time to physically grind it out.)
- bugs (The known issue list is now longer than the relesae notes for major udates..Something extremely wrong)
- AC (Doesn't effect mew much, but I know some people go crazy over this...monster AC, there's another issue all to it's self.)
- Ranged combat (not big on my list.)
- Challenges (To me, worthless. I can't solo them, as I am no where near the level of the best in the game, and even they have a hard time at times. Waste of resources IMHO)
- True Reincarnation (For a person who doesn't play 10hr a day 6 days a week. 1 TR is all I will ever get to. PERIOD)
- Strengths & weaknesses of the game
1. Strengths. At least you do updates. Overall good MMO model. Wow, can't think of much more....
2. Weakness: wish I could get my 100 dollar sub back after the last 2 updates and patches, game is unplayable at times for me. Absolutely the worst communication from a DEV to a player base. For example, BF3 just came out and DICE (the dev) responds to almost every tweet on twitter. Sure they are bigger, but what do we get? They even have a "Dev Diary" type thing where they explain where they want to go. Whoa, Deja Vu....

- where we're headed (like your going to say anything here, ROFL)

I'm sure I'm forgetting some at the moment. These threads won't all happen at once, but I hope to get them going as soon as possible.

Thanks in advance for your constructive participation!

All in all, I'm disappointed in all of you. You promised many changes after SOON, and Vast & Mysterious, and then after we won that MMO contest for you. We got nothing except a lot of NOTHING. Fernando's last State of the Game has been proved to be the biggest lie you've told us so far. 97% of what he said became irrelevant. Oh, and how about an apology for screwing things up to the degree you have. We are a forgiving community, I think it's the least we as a paying group deserve.

[jejeba86]

Very nice.
As always, MadFloyd.
Can't wait to write my opinions too, but I'll do it in the right threads.
But the things I would like the most are great armored AC tanks working on epics and characters beyond 20! hehe

[AmatsukaIncarnate]

This is gonna be awesome. The more communication, the better....
Some quick thoughts about the things you want to have addressed.

- class balance
- overall difficulty of content
- bugs
- AC
- Ranged combat
- Challenges
- True Reincarnation
- Strengths & weaknesses of the game
- where we're headed

CLASS BALANCE:
First thing that comes to most people's minds is the balance between casters and melee. In most content, casters, especially well geared casters, are much more useful. This is because, IMO, as it stands right now, casters are not truly limited by SP. By the time a caster has run out of SP, every mob in the instance has already been obliterated. The main problem I see, however, by making casters less efficient, is that it hurts healers who have similar limitations as arcanes. We saw this with the HP bumps made to raid bosses. Thus, a very fine balance must be made to equalize melee and casters.
One thing that could be done is to nerf certain spells that make arcanes so powerful. However, I believe that is the wrong approach to take. I think a better approach is to improve melee with more options in PREs, more diverse choices in end game weaponry, and to improve the abilities of the mobs in regards to spell defense.

OVERALL DIFFICULTY:
For general quests, I find that elite is still a challenge for many players and normal is quite accessible to newer players which is fantastic. Raids, however, are a little skewed. The fact of the matter is many raids are run only by level 20s which trivializes most raids. I think a new system for raiding should be considered to make raiding accessible to "at-level" characters and still challenging for end game characters. I posted this idea in the following link: http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=351364

BUGS:
First things first, exploits. I've heard that many times that exploits have been discovered prior to the release of the updates and weren't fixed which has caused problems for many players. Since unforeseeable things happen and exploits do occasionally find their way through, Turbine really needs to step up to the plate and be able to find those who used the exploit and delete the work of the exploit. This means that the game should be able to detect items and their disappearances and appearances (disappearance corresponds to the famous lag-bank loss and appearances corresponds to exploits).

ARMOR CLASS:
Some balance needs to be made in particular from levels 14 and onwards where AC becomes more and more useless for the majority of characters despite having put in some work towards a higher AC.

RANGED COMBAT:
I haven't had too much to talk about here since I've played with people with quality characters who used ranged tactics.

CHALLENGES:
N/A Again, I don't have too much of a stance on this one besides the fact that I wished that there were more varied challenges instead of Crystal Cove clones.

TRUE REINCARNATION:
With the amount of XP that is in the game now, I like everything about TRing except for one thing: TOME RETENTION.

STRENGTHS/WEAKNESSES OF THE GAME:
The active combat of the game is truly awesome. I love it. However, I find that the active combat isn't particularly used effectively, especially in raids. In particular, Hound of Xoriat, Vision of Destruction, the Shroud, Zawabi's Revenge, and to a lesser extent Vault of Night all have boss fights that are simply "auto attack" for the most part but a lot of these raids could be tweaked to better use the active combat.
For example, in the Shroud, the blades should be avoidable by jumping over the blades or perhaps rolling underneath them. In Vault of Night, if Velah's cometfalls could be avoided by avoiding the shadows of the comets or something that would be very very cool.
Long story short, I'd like to be able to utilize my skill as a player to achieve success rather than "I have the best equipment in the game"

The last thing I want to address is the need for the core classes and races to be in DDO. DDO feels incomplete without them....
and please finish all the PREs

[Phemt81]

First of all, let me say that DnD classes are NOT supposed to be balanced.

Playing a caster?

[Krumm]

There are issues with classes, balance, epics, level 20 and beyond content or lack there of, etc, etc, etc...
but in general, I like the game.


The issue I have is with some fundamental bugs with the game.

Ladder issue has been around for a very long time.
Lag has been a constant issue... worse these days but it's been there always.
inability to target mobs that are close by (espacially for spells)
to hit value on the inventory screen doesn't display correct value after few swings (we shouldn't have to relog to see our true to-hit value)
logging in and out multiple character (more 1 will do it) within same client session will make the client run slower.
etc, etc, etc...

Can these be fixed?
When will they be fixed?


Just the general lack of polish and bugs makes this game less enjoyable to many of us. Also Turbines inability to fix these known bugs are giving us players no confidence.

I like DDO.
It would be better if we can play it with little or no lag and no glaring bugs thats been around for years.

[GeneralDiomedes]

Weaknesses:

I think what is emerging to be one of the largest weakness of the game is that it is starting to show its age graphically, especially in light of a few recent high profile releases. Sure, the combat is fun, quests are well done, etc. but all else being equal (and a lot of other games have fun gameplay), I'll choose to spend my time with a game that tickles my rods and cones as will many players evaluating it for the first time. Even the last couple of updates introduced some new textures, but they weren't particularly professional looking. I think Turbine needs to step up big time in this regard.

Bugs:

The biggest problem historically has been lag .. hire a genius, whatever it takes .. this really sucks the fun out of it for me and makes me want to do something, anything else.

[Rawel_San]

Just popping in to say Kudos on talking to the player base even if it's just 5-10% of it or so. Hope this becomes
a standard rather then just a sprinkling.

I realize that you have lots of other things to do, then read the forums and respond, but I'm sure you must
have noticed that even a short post saying "we know about this" or "this is not working as intended" or
"this is WAI" goes a long way. People like knowing you listen and are in touch even if not everything or
even hardly anything ends up making it in game.

So great job on opening talks and hope it all works well.
Happy holidays,
Rawel

Ps.: justifications for nerfs even if not the best ones would also be great (hint hint: abbot loot).

[bhgiant]

Some of the topics on my mind are:

- class balance
Arcanes and Ranged combat. To echo others, there’s almost no reason to run as a melee with Arcanes as OP as they are, and even less reason to run a ranged. Yes, SP might run out eventually, but it only happens as you’re learning how to play as one, then you are invincible. Ranged has absolutely no reason to exist as it is right now. The only way to get meaning dps out of ranged is to hit manyshot and that’s only for 20 seconds and then it’s on a 2 minute timer. Melees have damage and haste boost, both lasting 20 seconds, on a 30 second timer. Doesn’t seem right somehow.

- overall difficulty of content
I think DDO shines here. My only suggestion would be to introduce more content that is soloable on the higher levels. When I first hit about level 8 with my first toon, I almost stopped playing because I couldn’t run the content anymore. Luckily I found a good guild and started grouping more, but I don’t think people should be required to group in order to play the game.

- bugs
Do you really need to ask? I personally have never been affected by one, but the amount of known issues and number of bugs that are introduced in EACH UPDATE is very very very discouraging. I can understand new bugs with new content. That’s expected, but not as many as come out, especially this last update. Also, bugs that persist from several months ago (handwraps anyone) are not acceptable, especially when new content is coming out? I expect bugs to be fixed in a timely manner if I am going to pay for a game. This is actually one of the main reasons I have refused to buy TP lately.

- AC
Wouldn’t know.

- Ranged combat
See “Class Balance”

- Challenges
They are fun, but incredibly frustrating at times. The Distruptor needs to not be random, but appear at set times. Rushmore’s mansion is too random for me to be fun. I always end up 1 crest short of an entrance that is vital to completion and I’ve run it over 10 times now. I agree with others though. Don't spend a whole of resources on them, not worth it.

- True Reincarnation
No idea. But looking forward to doing it .

- Strengths & weaknesses of the game
It’s fun. Somehow, somewhere, you hit the fun factor with this one. Even after I hit level 20, it’s still fun (which surprised me). I hope to be here for a while, I hope (see below).

- where we're headed
I don’t like the direction. There seems to be a lot of money grabbing, and when I see money grabbing I usually run the other way. It means the company is either failing or too greedy for me to trust them anymore. This is the other reason why I haven’t bought TP. We may have more content to run, but there are more bugs than we can count. And honestly, 1500TP for the challenges? To quote an anonymous Kobold on the matter, “Really? REALLY?!” I really really was looking forward to buying TP for Christmas, but I just can’t bring myself to it.

Extra: Your customer service sucks. Fix lag.

Thanks for this. The fact that you are asking for honest feedback that I feel you will strongly consider and may even implement does a lot to take that sour taste out of my mouth. I am starting to see light.

[Pwesiela]

#1 - PrE's. All of them. Or at least 2 full lines per class.

#2 - Ranged Combat. Glad that's on the list, cause it needs a big update.

[gloopygloop]

I'd like to get your feedback on a number of topics and to that end I will be starting separate threads on each of them. The idea here is to make sure we're hearing your wishes, get constructive feedback on past updates as well as some future plans, and being able to drill down and ask some specific, but important questions.

Looking forward to this.

I have lots of thoughts, but I'll save them for the individual threads.

[Jandric]

Playing a caster?

The funny thing is that casters that read the threads about the "good old days" when all casters were good for in Epic was to cast haste and mass hold think the exact same thing.- "This guy must play melee toons. My DDOing the posters in question usually backs up that assertion, as well.

Cool picture though

[MadDruid]

The day a raid could be solo'ed the game lost something and upping raids to make them nigh on impossible to first timers with non twink gear is not an answer that is good for the long term survival of the game.

Something needs to be done to the high lvl of the game to make it interesting to the maxed toons but not cut out less experienced players, I personally would say higher lvl quests but rather than do a overall lvl cap raise then add quests in that bracket later on I would think adding lvl 21+ quests first and follow them up with a level raise later. Also instead of more uber gear to grind out how about making the final reward for completing a quest series a bonus feat slot or additional enhancement points or other once only bonus.

Also knowledge is making a lot a quests too easy when players have done it once or twice, If it was possible to maybe introduce some random elements to quests say traps at random locations or additional groups of monsters that spawn at random. This might also help encourage group play which is becoming less and less important sadly in what originally was based on a social roleplay system.

[dkyle]

The funny thing is that casters that read the threads about the "good old days" when all casters were good for in Epic was to cast haste and mass hold

I've not seen these threads.

I do, however, think that pre-U9 balance was at least less-bad than what we have now. Casters played an important role, melee played an important role. It wasn't ideal, since there was a problem with not needing more than one or two casters, but it was obviously better balance than "casters can do everything better".

[Terebinthia]

Good to see this form of reaching out. I'll be on the lookout for the threads.

[waterboytkd]

Well, I know there won't be thread for this topic posted, so I will ask it here: How can we inhabit a world with three moons, yet it has no tides?

Three moons? My dear sir (or madam), Eberron has 13 moons. Turns out, 13 is a special number for Eberron. It's the number of planes connected to Eberron, it's the number of Dragonmarks (one of them is now 'extinct', but could resurface), it's, um, the number of moons...I think there's some more 13s out there...

The moons are also somehow tied to the planes. When the giants severed the tie to Dal Quor, one of the moons disappeared (but it's still supposed to be there, I think...). When the Gatekeepers sealed the routes to and from Xoriat, one of the moons' orbit moved far far out of whack, so now that moon is super far away.