What 4 things would you do to improve DDO

[Bakalakadaka]

1. Cosmetics - ..... but I'd rather they give us a secondary slot for cosmetic purposes only allowing us to keep the item with the stats we want in the main slot and what we want it to look like in the secondary slot both ddostore cosmetic items and any item (of the same type of course) can be put in here. Of course this would take some work so it would make sense that these slots would be locked behind a TP gate...a cheap one at least...say 100TP per slot per character. This would in turn incentivize the Devs to create more visual option such as gloves, cape, boots,etc.

What you are talking about here is basically the LOTRO (Turbine's other game) style of cosmetics which is what they should have done in the first place. LOTRO's system is without doubt the best approach to cosmetic appearance of any game. You can have up to 8 appearances defined - 1 based on what you are wearing and 7 cosmetic ones which can be configured using any combination of either looted gear, social items (from events etc) or cosmetic only items from the store. You start with 3 free cosmetic slots and can buy the others for 495tp each - these are purchased per account but can be configured independently per character. The cosmetic appearance has no impact on your stats and once it is defined you can sell/dispose/bank/whatever the piece used to create the appearance. You also have a wardrobe which acts like a shared bank but only for appearance items (again any combination of loot or purchased/social items) and again once an item is in the wardrobe you can get rid of the original but still use the appearance on any character.

This is the way that they should have gone instead of the blatant money grab of armor kits and there was no real excuse for doing it that way instead of learning from the LOTRO team. Having to buy a new armor kit every time you change gear just to keep an appearance you like is just silly. Putting one on a BTA set isn't too bad as you can reuse it on another character but otherwise they are just a waste of TP. Some allowances would need to be made for the fact that DDO bases your whole look on just the chest & helm/goggles pieces (LOTRO has seven pieces making up your look so you can mix and match) but otherwise the system should have been brought across as is instead of the useless one they gave us.

3b. Archer's Focus - Good in concept but frankly wholly against the ranged combat playstyle which is all about out maneuvering your enemy (ie. My Wizard AA loves throwing down an AOE or 2 and jumping around forcing the enemies to walk through it while launching a barrage of arrows...works especially well with a bunch of Melee allies) as opposed to focusing on being heavily armored,etc. and Archer's focus forces us to not move to gets it affect

Personally disagree as I play my AA very differently. I stand as far back as possible and plant as many arrows as I can into my foe from a distance, preferably when they are in a position where they cannot get to me but even if they can they will normally be dead long before they get near. This one is a matter of play style so rather than changing focus perhaps make it work differently if you have the Shot-on-the-Run Feat allowing you to also gain focus when moving as well as while standing still.

3c. Quivers - This ones simple...quivers in the hotbar should be equipped when clicked not opened...would nice to be able to name them and other containers as well

So totally /signed. This is something that is long overdue

4. Expand the weapon set function - I honestly only use the function for S&B (don't have a TWF) and I'd like to see the function expanded to full sets of equipment...

Champions Online has a similar feature (or it did have - not sure if it changed when it went FtP) where you could define three builds each of which had a different equipment set, appearance and (potentialy) power set. You could thus quickly swap between offence, defence, healing, support etc as needed based on your defined build. Best thing was that the equipment could actually be left in your bank and when you swapped your current gear was placed in the bank and the new gear appeared on your body - saved on time and backpack storage.

[Entelech]

(1) Better management. Specifically, we've seen a lot of things in recent months that boil down to poor communication, poor project management (i.e. the latest wedge of incomplete content, bugs, lag / crashing getting released to live) and carelessness (forgetting to renew Domain registration).

(2) Cosmetics. Especially regarding shields.

(3) MITHRAL AND ADAMANTINE IN THE NEW RANDOM LOOT.

(4) Get rid of Elminster. Forgotten Realms would be almost tolerable without that bearded, pipe-smoking old creep. There's not ACTUALLY a law saying that he needs to show up in every single AD&D adventure, despite what Ed Greenwood seems to think, you know.

(5) PLEASE GOD, I know what's going to happen. Elminster had his greasy fingerprints all over this expansion, and next update it's going to be Drizz't do'Urden. The music for Otto's Sphere of Dancing is going to change to Bauhaus. The only named loot from the raids will be magic scimitars with Brooding +15 or Sulking +15 (determined randomly). And "Has Mommy Issues" will become a new Drow Prestige Enhancement. Just...don't. Iconic NPC's are no fun, since to be iconic, they have to take the focus away from the PC's.

[Alrik_Fassbauer]

The "create group" dialog is imho in dire need of a serious overhaul.

Reason is :

- too much information crammed up in too little space
- no separation of fields
- edit fields being just too short (read : cannot take up enough words) - a string length of at least 100 or so characters should be there
- doesn't look nice at all, from a design perspective

[Failedlegend]

What you are talking about here is basically the LOTRO (Turbine's other game) style of cosmetics which is what they should have done in the first place. LOTRO's system is without doubt the best approach to cosmetic appearance of any game. You can have up to 8 appearances defined - 1 based on what you are wearing and 7 cosmetic ones which can be configured using any combination of either looted gear, social items (from events etc) or cosmetic only items from the store. You start with 3 free cosmetic slots and can buy the others for 495tp each - these are purchased per account but can be configured independently per character. The cosmetic appearance has no impact on your stats and once it is defined you can sell/dispose/bank/whatever the piece used to create the appearance. You also have a wardrobe which acts like a shared bank but only for appearance items (again any combination of loot or purchased/social items) and again once an item is in the wardrobe you can get rid of the original but still use the appearance on any character.

This is the way that they should have gone instead of the blatant money grab of armor kits and there was no real excuse for doing it that way instead of learning from the LOTRO team. Having to buy a new armor kit every time you change gear just to keep an appearance you like is just silly. Putting one on a BTA set isn't too bad as you can reuse it on another character but otherwise they are just a waste of TP. Some allowances would need to be made for the fact that DDO bases your whole look on just the chest & helm/goggles pieces (LOTRO has seven pieces making up your look so you can mix and match) but otherwise the system should have been brought across as is instead of the useless one they gave us.

Unfortunately the Devs here seem wholly against using anything even remotely close to anything from LOTRO. Which is unfortunate because while I don't like LOTRO much it has alot of good ideas hidden within it...namely character creation, cosmetic system, the crafting and the weird quests (ie. One quest you become a chicken and have to warn the other coops in the area about a wolf attack)

I'm sure there's more but I never made it past noob-hood in LOTRO

Personally disagree as I play my AA very differently. I stand as far back as possible and plant as many arrows as I can into my foe from a distance, preferably when they are in a position where they cannot get to me but even if they can they will normally be dead long before they get near. This one is a matter of play style so rather than changing focus perhaps make it work differently if you have the Shot-on-the-Run Feat allowing you to also gain focus when moving as well as while standing still.

Yeah if they did that I'd be fine that way both playstyles can remain and whilst the active style has an advantage it takes a heavy feat investment.

[Tshober]

[COLOR=paleturquoise]What you are talking about here is basically the LOTRO (Turbine's other game) style of cosmetics which is what they should have done in the first place. LOTRO's system is without doubt the best approach to cosmetic appearance of any game.

You have obviously never played City of Heroes. Their cosmetic customizations make LOTRO look really weak by comparison. And make DDO's look laughable. It is an entirely different game setting though, so some of what they allow would not be appropriate in DDO or LOTRO. CoH spoiled me forever when it comes to appearance customizaion. Nothing else I have played even comes close. And I have played a lot of MMO's.

[janave]

Heres mine:

• 1. Finish all prestige classes -- IP .
• 2. Make Druid a top tier caster choice, its lackluster at the moment. Melee focused forms need major buffs as well. -- Lots of people shelfed or TRd their Druids after reaching 20.
• 3. Drop the PDK vendor Favor to 250pts. -- have been discussed.
• 4. Commendations, and Eveningstar challenge mats to BtA, Challenge items to BtCoE.

Bonus: Add an Eveningstar Challenge Vendor option for a *special turn in* gamble:
* Providing a special list that may contain several items of:

• Accessories: Trinkets, Rings, Necklaces Etc (+8stat possible on lvl24 turn ins)
• Rare Drops: 5% Loot Boost, Exp Pots, ...
• Rarer Drops: 0.67% for tomes: lvl16/+2 -- lvl20/+3 -- lvl24/+4

[Alrik_Fassbauer]

You have obviously never played City of Heroes. Their cosmetic customizations make LOTRO look really weak by comparison. And make DDO's look laughable. It is an entirely different game setting though, so some of what they allow would not be appropriate in DDO or LOTRO. CoH spoiled me forever when it comes to appearance customizaion. Nothing else I have played even comes close. And I have played a lot of MMO's.

Play SIMs Medieval (RPG-ish) or The SIMs altogether.

Look here, for example : http://sims.wikia.com/wiki/Create_a_Sim

[Xynot2]

So in short...Make XP per minute the same across all quests (of the same level) with the better named loot showing up in raids and the harder/more complex quests?

Exactly- of course they would have to get actual difficulty balanced out to do this but yeah. It would cure a lot of the complaints of *no one runs my favorite quest any more* by giving TRs a single set of quests that give top XP. They would all give the same.

[Failedlegend]

Exactly- of course they would have to get actual difficulty balanced out to do this but yeah. It would cure a lot of the complaints of *no one runs my favorite quest any more* by giving TRs a single set of quests that give top XP. They would all give the same.

Would be nice if they fixed the length estimates I've played PLENTY of "verÿ long" quests that lasted like 20mins and "Short" quests that lasted at least 30

[Jay203]

1) nerf the **** out of everything so the game is back to being builds matter more than equipments
2) plan the stacking of bonuses better so the stats doing inflate out of control
3)fk' off with the enemy blanket immunities
4)upgrade enemy AI... like... A LOT...

[Thorzian]

1. finish pre's.. tier 3 each.. and make any of them good. right now rangers are an absolute joke.

2. more forgotten realms! from eveningstar its a short hop to shadowdale or suzail or auronoch.

3. 3-1 epic scroll trade ins any 3 of a set for 1 from the same set like the current desert system
3b. every player pulls a shard every time bigtop style in every epic quest shards drop in
3c. higher drop rate for seals.
basically, make it a little easier to equip the epic stuff.

4. lose the reflex save spells from raid bosses!! ddo has encouraged time and time again fighter or paladin tanks via pre's, epic destinies, many named gear items/sets. and yet the 80 intimidate/110 ac tank toon gets decimated by a fireball from suolomades on elite or voltron on epic elite. fighters and paladins dont get evasion so why push them as tanks and then make raid bosses evasion nescessary?

[Drekisen]

1. Limit people to only being able to make one character....marriage *GAH!!!* try a new game once in a while.

2. First 20th raid completion is a guaranteed full list...one time only.

3. Increase scroll/seal/shard drop rates at least a little

4. Take more time to release updates so they are less buggy and do what they claim

[Sgt_Hart]

4. Expand the weapon set function - I honestly only use the function for S&B (don't have a TWF) and I'd like to see the function expanded to full sets of equipment...would do alot to expedite changing from so your DPS set to your Tanking set than of course to you UMD Set to raise the cleric...it would work exactly the same...just drag the set of items you want into the box and your golden....alternatively it could be the 3rd tab in the Inventory window (after the two item screens before the cosmetic pet tab) with multiple equipment setups that are exactly the same as the regular equip area ...I'd say make the first two tabs free than more avail through the DDO store (note: leave the current simple weapon sets as is)



As you can see from the shoddily photoshopped image you can use the equipment UI on the left by dragging various pieces of equipment from the handy section on the right which is an extended inventory UI with only equippable items shown. The tabs at the top of the left are the separate sets and can be dragged to the Hotbar..probably look something like this. feel free to comment on others ideas

Might be easier both UI wise and functionality wise.. to just b eable to drag the paper-doll(The humanoid behind the Armor toggle) onto a weapon set and have it save "Presently equipped load-out" if you want to get that into it.

That's just how I'd handle it though.

EDIT: And tack on a "Select Display picture" out of the items in each set. I.E. "Tank" load out can be set to display shield(and only shield), "DPS" set to display weapon(and only weapon) "UMD" set to display Trinket, or cloak, or whatever. would add in tremendous ease-of-use with regards to the guys with 14 different set's.

[Kushiel]

1) Decrease cooldown on: Manyshot (by a significant amount) and True Strike (by around half).

2) Change Manyshot from a decrementing Clock to a decrimenting Count of shots available.

3) Add cooldown timers to: Ogre/Troll triple-smash attack and Scorpian/Ogre Magi/Wraith/BugBear Rogue/Spectre/etc. being able to repeatedly "vanish" - all too often resulting in a waste of too much of Manyshots limited time - and to the Heal spell spam self-cast by certain classes of foes.

4) Really make it so that the spawn of a spawn of a spawn of a mephit can not... spawn another one! (And make them *all* mute - it's as annoying/grating/horrible as the shrieking of the Drudges).

[Chai]

1. I would take dungeon alert out for a nice seafood dinner, and never call it again!!! Arbitrary band aid game mechanic is arbitrary. Each time new content is released theres another quest or two where if DA is set to proc on X number of mobs, at least one enounter spawns X+8 mobs. The optional in Servants of the Overlord is a perfect example. They claim alot of active mobs causes lag. Why create encounters that spawn a crapton of mobs and go straight to yellow/red DA then?

2. Ranged DPS closer to melee DPS. Id also remove all this "standing still = moar DPS" stuff. We play a game that is advertised to the masses as the best motion based combat MMO. Now we have to stand perfectly still to take advantage of a good portion of available archery DPS?

3. Better content balance. More quests where its advantageous to be a melee. None of this "casters tear up 95% of all quests while melee run behind them" stuff. Balance in a video game isnt always this class compared to that class. Content has alot to do with it, and in a balanced game the caster can do the heavy lifting for one encounter while melee comes on strong in the next encounter and contributes more.

4. Cosmetics. In NWN we wrote a script that allowed you to right click on armor and you could change each aspect between 90 different models (for each type), with over 200 different colors and 3 different layers. You could have silver chest with black trim with white chainmail underneath, and then have the shield side shoulder be a different model than the sword side shoulder so one pauldron was huge while the other was small. The sword side could have spikes jutting out of the thigh, shin, and torso, while the shield side was more plain and polished. Each aspect was controlled by the user and not some computer generated "has to be this way" set in stone armor models. End result: No two characters looked remotely close to the same.