Let's Talk: Enhancements!

[MadFloyd]

Some of you might dismiss this as ‘fixing something that isn’t broken’ and that’s fine – it’s totally subjective – but, hey, I’m giving you a heads up just the same.

We hate the Enhancement UI. It’s been 4 years and I still cringe every time I see it, let alone use it. It does a poor job of letting players plan out character goals and you need the patience of a saint to use it. I could go on and on, but I won’t (feel free to use this thread to vent your frustrations with it if you share our opinion).

We’re re-doing it – replacing it with a tree-based design that should make character planning and advancement much better and also have the added benefit of making it easier for us to implement new enhancements (PrE’s anyone?).

It will also be the foundation for some future work.

It does mean that when this goes live, all of you will have your enhancements reset and you will have to re-spend your action points. Some enhancements will remain the same, but many will be new. The changed enhancements will also help balance out many classes (think augmentation here, not nerfs). I appreciate that forced change can be very stressful and realize that this will be major inconvenience for those who don’t enjoy having to make a ton of decisions – especially when there are ‘new’ enhancements to digest, but have no doubt it will be worth it in the end.

I hope that many of you will welcome this sort of change, but either way, feel free to share your thoughts and concerns. Again, I invite PMs for those who prefer to voice their opinions that way.

EDIT: See a mockup/explanation on page 29 of this thread: http://forums.ddo.com/showpost.php?p...&postcount=578

[stainer]

I would do better with a visualization of the new UI. You guys may not have it ready, or have a mock up available though. Doesn't sound outrageous as you presented it.

I think people that still have the "Crit Rage" enhancement line are going to set fire to the forums when they find out about this. Good luck with that Madfloyd.

[Trillea]

Thank you for the heads up sir!

[Zess-wolf]

Well, not sure if the thread is for this but Thanks a lot!

Also, a look at the new UI would be nice

Cheers

Zess

[LeLoric]

Oh no enhancment changes. We don't wanna lose you like we did Hsinclair.

Ok kidding aside. I think having a look at enhancments would be a good thing. Some new/better choices will be nice. More importantly rebalancing the costs of some is probably more important. Monks and pallys are hit especially hard but there's others too that have issues. Racial enhancments need a really good workover and this would be a great way to even out the racial discrepencies a bit. Would be awesome if this change came with a large investment in prestige upgrades also.

Hard to say a lot more without some more specific ideas on what kinds of changes we are looking at..

Curious what kind of time frame are we looking at on a revamp here?

Im sure there's some crit rage barbarians gonna be upset.

[RedDragonScale]

New UI? Fine.

I have no problem with the current one but if it means you're able to finish the PrEs, by all means, DO IT!!!

[Meat-Head]

reduce pally ap costs plox.


Anyway, this all sounds pretty good to me so far..

[ghortagg]

Great news!

I recruited a lot of mewbies in my guild last month and most of them didn't know what a prestige was, inluding some 10+ charcters.

And yes, more option is better

[Vellrad]

Whatever you do, make sure game won't use so much time on resetting and acceping new enhancement setup, and give each enhancement a SEPARATE ICON, WHICH IS NOT USED ANYWHERE IN GAME.

[sacredguyver]

Sounds interesting. I'd also like to request a mock-up of the proposed change, with all the usual "Subject to Change" disclaimers. The resulting input from posting one will probably help refine the design and ease people into the change, so that (at least forum-users) people won't be put off by the sudden change.

[NytCrawlr]

Yeah, trying to see all the available options at once is a pain and a half, add a nice face lift as well as some adjustments sounds good to me.

Can't wait to start seeing some of the changes.

[dkyle]

Cautiously optimistic about this. The current Enhancement UI is certainly not ideal. Hopefully, we'll be seeing some serious love for the primary Melee classes, particularly in terms of DPS.

I do hope we don't see a proliferation of prereqs, to fit things into the tree. Pre-reqs are fine in moderation, but too many reduces build options. I think what we have currently is about right.

[Montrose]

An ehnacement tree would be nice.

I'm not too concerned about the enhancements themselves changing. They've changed a ton since the game started, and this is just one more iteration. As long as the cost to reset them is sufficiently low (plat and 3 days is reasonable) then it should be all goodness.

[Battery]

do it, and the sooner the better

[Enoach]

Resetting enhancements - Those of us that have been around long enough remember doing that when the Enhancement system was first done. I don't see this as a personal problem, but I also don't have a Barbarian with Crit Rage anymore. This change would be a true end of that Era. Also since I will adjust my AP every now and then to try new stuff I don't see having to do them all over again as a bad thing - especially if your giving me more options. Be sad if my current options cost more than they do now, that I would be sad about yep yep.

To (Pre's anyone?) - the answer is a resounding YES. Finish the current ones and give us the other ones we have been waiting for {closes eyes and chants Warpriest, Warpriest, please give us Warpriest}

[Meat-Head]

Hopefully, we'll be seeing some serious love for the primary Melee classes, particularly in terms of DPS.

I do hope we don't see a proliferation of prereqs, to fit things into the tree. Pre-reqs are fine in moderation, but too many reduces build options. I think what we have currently is about right.

This is yes.

[Scraap]

The changed enhancements will also help balance out many classes (think augmentation here, not nerfs).

A bit of a mind-dump, but what they hey, didn't see this one coming:

If balance is the intent, I'd personally advocate for higher, but non-stacking ones.

Say:

Progressing the +stat enhancements beyond level 10 to a full +6 by the end, alongside divorcing them from being locked into a pure class (one of my earliest disappointments when I started was seeing +dex for rogue and ranger, only to find out that they were an either/or. Progressing them to the full 20 would net 2 paths for that (pure, or mixed), and making it so its enhancements or itemization would give a 3rd, and free up an item slot if the game were balanced for that.).

Similarly, the elemental resistance enhancement lines for rogues, barbs, and rangers could progress to being the equivalent of having a permanent resist item/spell, which would yield the options for bring a caster, be in a guild, drink pots, wear items, or buy enhancements.


In a different vein, purely talking augmentation, it would be nice for an across the board enhancement rework for those classes that are inherently a mix of melee and casting, so that the limited SP pool and spell selection were the only real differences, and not the effectiveness of the spells as well (baring of course caster level). Say the cures of a paly, and the cures of a cleric, provided the same aps were spent, as an example. Doesn't give em heals, and surely wont last as long, but every bit helps there in differentiating the melee classes.

[dopey69]

i got a bad feeling about this

[Meat-Head]

to (pre's anyone?) - the answer is a resounding yes. Finish the current ones and give us the other ones we have been waiting for {closes eyes and chants warpriest, warpriest, please give us warpriest}

yes!!

[waterboytkd]

I think a facelift sounds awesome. Tree-style will make it a bit easier on newbs (not to be confused with noobs, who will still screw it up, but there's nothing to be done about that) and people less proficient at that kind of micro-management.

What I'm most excited about, MadFloyd, is the concept of NEW enhancements. For example, did you know that monks have no class enhancements at level 1 (aside from Improved [skill] I)? Did you know that many/most/maybe all light monks are just burning AP on stuff they don't want until they can hit that magic AP spent threshold (dark monks have it a bit easier because of the filler prereqs that Ninja Spy has)?

This could also be an excellent time to revisit some prereqs for enhancements, as some are ludicrous (Assassin PrE, Void 4), and in general, I look forward greatly to a vast "enhancement pass" like spells received in U9.

My big question: are we going to be losing enhancements, as well as gaining new ones? If so, could we get a heads up?

I like these Let's Talk threads, Mad! It's awesome to be notified about changes like this (especially big ones), and be given a chance to weigh in.