"best" whatever

[Fromthelog]

Yes there's that word best again. Problem I'm having is that so many responders are elitists. They for some reason can't understand that when a noob asks about "best" they want to know what does the most damage against a blank slate. They don't want to hear about your adventure on the third level of whereever with a +6 almighty toothpick.
They don't want to hear that yellowfang flipeye takes more damage from an upswing backhand than from a left jab with just the correct twitch at the end.
They don't understand the math yet and may appreciate a light reference but certainly don't want to be burdened with it.
They understand that you have experiences and in good time will hear about them eagerly.
At this very moment though all they want is to be told that this race in this class with these feats and these enhancements kicks @$$.
They'll learn everything else they need to in time.

Tone doesn't translate to text well with me often and I seriously, seriously want to be clear that this is meant to be in no way insulting.

[KingOfCheese]

I've struggled with this exact issue.

The problem resides in the complexity of the game, D&D, and rules. There simply isn't a "best" under the definition you are asking for in many instances. There are tons of "good enoughs" but "bests" are so very dependent on so many factors.

Compounding this complexity is the fact that people have a very difficult time discussing "good enough" because everyone sets their boundaries at a different levels. So trying to discuss them usually ends up in fights.

One of the greatest things about this game is the complexity--it keeps it interesting and allows one to dig deeper and deeper into the fine details. A consequence of this benefit is that the complexity creates a knowledge barrier that makes "easy answers" hard to come by. And creates a gap between new players and elites (both real and perceived).

[Adrian99]

Yes there's that word best again. Problem I'm having is that so many responders are elitists. They for some reason can't understand that when a noob asks about "best" they want to know what does the most damage against a blank slate.
...
At this very moment though all they want is to be told that this race in this class with these feats and these enhancements kicks @$$.
They'll learn everything else they need to in time.

Well, here's the problem with asking about what is "best": It's an ignorant question to ask. If you know DDO, then you know that everything boils down to a trade-off, where toon configuration A performs better in situation X and configuration B performs better in situation Y. You'll also know how much of what you can accomplish is gear-dependent, and how much is skill-dependent, those things having nothing to do with race/class/feat/enhancement options. As far as the "elitists" you're referring to, they're actually being nice by not directly and immediately pointing out the ignorance of your query and instead giving you information that may be helpful once you reach an adequate level of understanding. Well, unless they're trolling you, that's another possibility.

[Fromthelog]

That's a thoughtful answer KingofCheese, thank you for the feedback.

[gerardIII]

Yes there's that word best again. Problem I'm having is that so many responders are elitists. They for some reason can't understand that when a noob asks about "best" they want to know what does the most damage against a blank slate. They don't want to hear about your adventure on the third level of whereever with a +6 almighty toothpick.
They don't want to hear that yellowfang flipeye takes more damage from an upswing backhand than from a left jab with just the correct twitch at the end.
They don't understand the math yet and may appreciate a light reference but certainly don't want to be burdened with it.
They understand that you have experiences and in good time will hear about them eagerly.
At this very moment though all they want is to be told that this race in this class with these feats and these enhancements kicks @$$.
They'll learn everything else they need to in time.

Tone doesn't translate to text well with me often and I seriously, seriously want to be clear that this is meant to be in no way insulting.

What do you know about what "they" think?
Each "noob" is a very different person from the other "noobs", with different expectations.

Are you the "Noob representative" ...

... or something?

Who are you to put them in the same bag?
I'm gonna call the Noob Union and we will go to trial.

[Fromthelog]

I've been slapped down twice now and I must say that I appreciate how you did it Gerard. I was indeed doing as you described. A self appointed rep. Your reply was well taken.

As for other feed back, yes the ignorant seek knowledge. To be called ignorant when you're already confessing as much often rubs wrong.

In any case valid points have been made against my post. I learn best from experience, in this case playing. The mechs come to me with use and chat fills in more. As a complete noob to the game I know I would have liked to have stumbled across more replies telling me that I have a lot to learn but so as not make my ears bleed take this build and run with it. It's designed to damage or what ever and it does it well.
I've been a pro at other games and I know how it is to forget how completely lost I was at the outset.

BUT
That's me and I ought not try to speak for everyone. Thank you guys for your time. You've given me a broader perspective.

[CanuckWisdom]

If the question is 'whats a good X build', then I dont think the best answer is what you seem to suggest the best answer would be.

The best answer (IMO) is not, do this, this and this and you will do this well, but rather, this is what this does and why that can be useful (then you can decide if it fits the desired end of your play).

But there is a lot of attitude, I find especially with regards to gearing, that people have about how hard or easy it is to get certain things, or assuming everyone is VIP from day one. I often find myself thinking 'How could you possibly think its easy to get that item,' or, 'you think that THAT is the minimum required HP to survive that raid? What have you given up on your character to achieve that much HP!?'.

People make it sound like its so easy to get certain skills for example above 23, but then 3 of the 4 items they list that stack for boosting that skill come from packs I dont have etc etc etc... yes it can be frustrating reading here. Its not the listing of the items thats frustrating, but the attitude that may or may not be correctly perceived, where its as if everyone for sure has this and that and can easily do this, when in fact its not that way for all players.

[sigtrent]

I try to avoid best unless you can truly measure it with a number that doesn't change constantly.

I like to kind of have ranks when I am asked how good a build or the like is.

Elite would be your top 10%
Strong would be the next 30% or so
Decent is a good 50% more
Iffy is anything else you might honestly want to try
Crappy is the more or less worthless or intentionally bad

Thing of it is, some folks take an Elite or **** stand with nothing in between. I just can't hold to that when the game has such a wide range of challenges.

I tend to play between decent and strong characters. Some of them start iffy but I make them work. Elite just isn't my thing, takes too much attention with not enough marginal reward for me.

I think when someone asks for "the best" just give them your recommendation and stick to fairly conventional choices. Anyone asking is probably kind of new and giving them some exotic crazy choices is likely not to work well for them without a ton of instructions.

[Faent]

Elite would be your top 10% Strong would be the next 30% or so . Decent is a good 50% more..

So when a certain someone posts LFMs for "strongs like me" he's only looking for the the 60-90% crowd? =)

[Doomcrew]

Mongol General: Wrong! Conan! What is best in life?
Conan: To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women.


If you ask, " What is Best?" people will try to respond.
If what you mean to ask is, "what is good/solid?" the answer may
be different. Your problem isn't the answer you're getting, it is the
question that you are asking.

[jeremyt]

All boils down to communication IMO

In your original post, where you reflecting on asking that exact question? If someone posed that question to me I can see responding in exactly the way you where lamenting. You asked for the best and as someone who considers himself pretty polished in creating/gearing/playing DDO characters I would give my best effort to show you "best" given such broad parameters. If you narrow it a bit, I would refine my answer to match, refine more, again I would try to match. You can even specify you have no packs and are just striving to have a toon that has a set of +2 tomes someday. (well honestly at some point it gets so restrictive it becomes a pretty dry answer and I probably wouldn't bother posting). But please expect if you ask for best..and you give no details on specific restraints on time/content access/play skill/class or race preference, you will probably get an answer that is very unobtainable/frustrating/laden with too much gear or play info/instructions.

P.S. and sig, i dont know what your personal view of gains/losses on character performance are but Ive seen the returns for pushing for a completely performance driven build with cohesive gear planning to be HUGE. Like decide to pug elite running w/ devils and 3 people wipe on first 4 mobs before i step in, and on my rogue life (with monk levels and 1 fighter level mind you) come in and kill everything, raise everybody and end up leading onward to get 95% of the kills and raise all but the late arriving sorc a few times. The pugger bard bit the dust many many times...the PM wiz went down too many times to count. three of them had wings by their names...I think that last 10% is huge. (and yes i know how DDOrky/conceited that story sounds but just giving a stark example honestly)

[Zyerz]

I remember when I got my friends to play DDO. (Unfortunately they hated the combat system and went back to WoW .)

They used to ask me what is the best weapon for X class and X level. I explained to them that DDO isnt like other mmorpgs that just give you better weapons as you progress no matter what class you are. (one good example is DC universe online. You simply get better gear as you level and aspire to aquire it).

I told them in DDO gear is an important thing, but not the only thing you need. Again, unlike other mmorpgs, DDO requires intensive build consideration, and one wrong step could throw your build off a bridge. Personally, that's what I love about DDO... Your gear doesnt mean anything if you didnt build a good toon. You could have the best weapons and armor out there, but miss every single time and be practically useless on elite. (I remember that when I started playing years ago, but thankfully I had an understanding of D&D pen and paper, so that helped me to build a toon, since in those days, its was customize only)
I guess thats what annoys a lot of new players, they have the idea that in most mmorpgs, you level up, choose a thing or two, and the game does the rest. But all of us who have been playing a while know that the predetermined character build paths are for learning the game, not actually building an endgame toon. I always encourage new players to test out one of those preset builds and once they understand how the game functions, look up some builds in the forums and customize one themselves. I sometimes join low level pugs to help out new players, and they have absolutely no idea how DDO works. They hit a path option, but if they hit the customize, they mostly end up with hopeful builds that unfortunately are really hard to pull off.

[Dematto]

What's the best?
You. *Cue Karate Kid Sountrack*

There is no 1 "Best," it's actually a ton of niche-bests.

Example: Self-Sufficiency is GREAT. If you can heal or reconstruct yourself in the middle of a fight, then you're on the right path. To that end, a high constitution and umd are extremely useful almost regardless of what toon you're actually playing. This means that -- while you might not be able to replace a full, devoted healer -- you might be able to substitute, or contribute to the group in a different way during an emergency. That kind of adaptability is an EXTREMELY useful tool to have. It can grease the wheels of a rough quest, it can salvage an almost-wipe.

The Catch? Well, if you exclusively run with guildies or have an otherwise pre-determined group, then maybe it's more important for you to focus on boosting your survivability and damage output.

If the catch doesn't apply to you the majority of the time you play, then look for that self-sufficiency. It makes you less of a drain on party resources.

Beyond that, things get sticky. Are you looking to do Solo, Tank, DPS or Heal? What class are you looking to run?
You HAVE to be able to answer at least 1 of those 2 questions -- role or class -- before people will be able to help you start addressing "best". It'll still be a finite, niche, path that they take you in. Maybe you'll hate their suggestions and disregard them. That's totally fine. What's important is that those suggestions they offered caused you to redefine your goal of "best ____" and that gets you closer to attaining it. The more narrowly defined you can make the question, the more people will be able to suggest things to you.

They'll still fight over minutia. "No, THIS is best" "No, THAT is lame. THIS is best" But here's the real secret, and what I feel is the answer to your question:
by the time you get to that point -- when people are arguing over minutia like +1 damage or +3 Crit Damage with a 17-20/x2 threat range -- by that point, you'll have already passed the point you set in your initial post "this class, this race, these enhancements ROCK."

[HungarianRhapsody]

They for some reason can't understand that when a noob asks about "best" they want to know what does the most damage against a blank slate.

One of the things that I like best about DDO is that there is no "best" class at doing damage against a blank slate.

Some classes can do more damage against certain enemies in certain scenarios. Other classes can do more damage against other enemies in other scenarios.

DDO is more rock-paper-scissors than many people give it credit for.

[DeafeningWhisper]

It often gets asked what is the best build for "insert clas here" in harbor and market place on Khyber, the general answer is "it depends, what do you want to do and do you plan to group alot or not?".

It usually moves to which Pre is better then? At which point someone points the newb to DDO wiki (which really, you should have link to when you make your DDO account) and to weight the pros and cons himslef.

[zwiebelring]

Yes there's that word best again. Problem I'm having is that so many responders are elitists. They for some reason can't understand that when a noob asks about "best" they want to know what does the most damage against a blank slate. They don't want to hear about your adventure on the third level of whereever with a +6 almighty toothpick.
They don't want to hear that yellowfang flipeye takes more damage from an upswing backhand than from a left jab with just the correct twitch at the end.
They don't understand the math yet and may appreciate a light reference but certainly don't want to be burdened with it.
They understand that you have experiences and in good time will hear about them eagerly.
At this very moment though all they want is to be told that this race in this class with these feats and these enhancements kicks @$$.
They'll learn everything else they need to in time.

Tone doesn't translate to text well with me often and I seriously, seriously want to be clear that this is meant to be in no way insulting.

Noobs think, if they had the *best* of whatever they rule the game. DDO does not work that way. You can ask for the best gear for your particular character you can compare similar builds and decide what is the best in some aspects.

But the *best* is not seperated from the context of your role. Without input on what you are planning to do nobody can give you an answer or worse, everybody can give you an answer. The best character is the one you have fun with. And the best character is the one, you can handle to its extend. It is the one of which you know the advantages and most important the limits and how to handle them.

Asking for the best can be very similar to being lazy and not willing to make your own thoughts for something. You ask what is the best, somebody points at a build, then you play that build.

But you never had any idea of what is possible, you never struggled to get to the final build by reaching limits several times and pushing them with every new start. Stop asking for the best instead ask reasonable questions for your beforehand made up idea!

Nothing is sexier than your own toon. Over and out.