The xp of some challenges is still unreasonable.

[Munkenmo]

I don't think you bothered to read my post.

I read your post.

You told me how to play, and how my current way of playing negatively effects you.

You told me that character progression is secondary to gameplay.

Then you went on to describe a theoretical quest, and peoples reasons for running it, It's nice that you have your opinions, but you shot them off as facts, and came across as putting down other peoples reasons for playing whilst you were at it.

It's rather clear to me that we have different reasons for playing, and probably wouldn't group well together, but that doesn't change the fact that Challenges have been nerfed to an unreasonable level of xp.

My proposed solution is to re adress all level 18-20 content as a starting point and shift the xp totals up significantly.

[Carkolda]

Wow... Trot, are you nothing but a troll? Seriously? Have you ever played PNP? PBP perhaps? I highly doubt that you have. Otherwise you wouldn't be making brainless comments about how others are allowed to play, because it would ruin your precious perception about the game and what it's supposed to be. I've been a part of TRUE RPG's since I was 8. And it's a time-honored tradition (Dating all the way back to NES and the original Final Fantasy) to grind meaningless quests/monster encounters to get to a level so the rest of the content is easier. Dragon Warrior 1/2/3 had this, too. Swords and Serpents? The list goes on. Get off your high horse and realize that you cannot dictate to others how play style is meant to be done. This game is a group and individual game. If you don't like running a grindy quest, here's a hint: Don't Run It. I know, complicated, neh?

@ Laura: While I understand your point, I would venture a guess that you are giving an extremely isolated example to make your point. You also make an assumption about a few things.

First, how did that player get through level 1-12 (The earliest you can run Buying Time) without running quests, especially on multiple lives. The only way to accomplish this would be to have someone pull them in on a pike and let them sit and farm XP, but even this is limited to a level gap of a few levels. And the argument of "Well, they could go in because they had a 20 in the group" doesn't hold water, mostly because cases like that are so abnormal that it doesn't apply to the whole. Hell, I've run TIM and Epic TIM probably 2-300 times and I still couldn't pull that off. Blame the people who supported someone who piked their way through 60 levels (which I highly doubt they did), not the game system (specifically the challenges). My guess is you ran into someone who bought the account off someone else.

Secondly, I would like you to define the "true player base" of DDO. Getting to level 25 is a slog fest through quests. You HAVE to repeat quests and do slayers to get to 25 on multi-tr (aka grinding). It's inevitable. Don't pretend you don't. So the only difference is the quest I run takes 5 minutes and the one you run takes 50 minutes. Big hairy deal.

Third, you clearly aren't reading one of the most fundamental reasons why people like me are angry about the nerf. It's twofold:
1) Instead of addressing the individual discrepancies with the game's XP balance (i.e. scalpel), they instead did a broad-spectrum nerf that hurt every challenge (i.e. chainsaw). The #1 argument was people getting 200k xp on their first-run for a challenge. Yes, that's too much. Way too much. But making a challenge that previously offered 5,400 xp for 4 stars in 5 minutes now give 1,500 is... well, absurd. Especially when some challenges (the Mansion, in particular) give such horrendous xp you'd rather nail your junk to a board than run them for xp.
2) Probably the most insidious problem is the fact that they took The Most Expensive Pack and made it Worthless. I know that may be hard for you grasp this, but those of us who paid money to purchase the product as it was, only to have it changed after we purchased it... well. I have to say that I'm feeling quite a bit cheated by Turbine. That's why I've been calling for a refund. The Turbine Point cost for challenges was high before, and some argued entirely not worth the 1500 it was. And this was before the XP double-nerf came into play. Now? Now I expect that the pricing would have to be around 250 turbine points for it to be worth our money.

People who are elitist in their mentality (most commonly amongst VIP's) seem to think that we peasants who actually purchase the content should just suck it up and go along with the EULA because ... after all, Turbine gets to make changes to their software whenever they want. The problem is that those of us who AREN'T VIP's are buying a product with the expectation that the product is not going to fundamentally change after we purchase said product. What they did was effectively take Green Steel and delete it from the game. That's how fundamental of a change to the XP they made to the challenges is. Can you get by without GS? Of course you can! But how many people would be screaming on these boards because it? A great number.

Laura, you need to step off that horse you are riding, and realize that people have varied gameplay styles. I've been playing this game for 2-1/2 years, and have been Premium the entire time. I have spent probably 20-30,000 turbine points + $80 for the xpac. So I have just as much vested in this as any VIP, and in many cases, more. The difference? I own all the content in the game, not merely rent it. And I should be allowed to play it in any way, shape, or form I choose, not you. Just like you should be able to play it any way you want to.

And FYI, you need to watch the generalizations. I've run all the different quests in the game, with the exception of the last chain in the demonweb and the raid. Why? Because I don't feel like investing an hour into a quest and finding it bugged out. I'm waiting for them to iron out the kinks before investing that kind of time.

[Vormaerin]

Which is why asking for exact rates is silly in the first place. You can however tell when things are drastically out of balance.

I didn't ask for rates. I objected to arbitrarily inserting numbers into the discussion as if they actually had all the relevant parameters to mean something.

I think an epic five star completion should be worth more than 1k xp/minute... but I don't think a 1 star should. I don't think anyone on this thread has stated such.

Actually, no one said anything about what level of success should be required. They just tossed out xp/minute figures from quests without saying if they are talking about first time, repeats, what number of stars, or anything else. Its not actionable feedback.

Thankfully, the devs have paid better attention to the numerous lists of quests that provide better xp... especially at the epic level. The devs have spoken on this issue, and they have stated they will be raising the challenge xp. Not to the original levels, but it will be going back up.

I'm not sure that causal link actually exists. The devs have made statements that imply they have some standard of measurement, but at no point have they said anything to indicate what that standard is, much less that its some comparison to the quest xp rates being tossed about.

I'm glad that the xp is being increased. It was too low. But the devs' comments so far don't lead me to believe that this change will satisfy most of the number tossers in these threads.

[Carkolda]

Actually, no one said anything about what level of success should be required. They just tossed out xp/minute figures from quests without saying if they are talking about first time, repeats, what number of stars, or anything else. Its not actionable feedback.

Snipped

Then perhaps we go with the average accomplishment of stars per challenge as a benchmark. Some quests (like Short Cuts) are virtually impossible to clear 5-6 stars, but TIM and Buying Time are readily available to get 4, with a little bit of luck to get 5-6. This is the kind of attention to detail they should have been using the first time. They have data logs which track completions, I'm sure. So the benchmark would be the average completion rate per challenge, and then permute the xp at 1k/min on heroic challenges, and perhaps 2k/min on epics, base level for both based on what the average completion time is for each challenge. That's what most people expect as the "acceptable standard." Will it take some more work? Yeah. But, it'll provide XP so ALL the challenges can be run instead of a few being run with the rest being avoided.

[LightBear]

They have data logs which track completions, I'm sure.

They check if you completed, not the failures.
They check if you gained some more favor.
They give out xp based on the both of them (stars and completion).
I doubt that they log all 3 of these tied together.

[Carkolda]

They check if you completed, not the failures.
They check if you gained some more favor.
They give out xp based on the both of them (stars and completion).
I doubt that they log all 3 of these tied together.

I'm curious... If they don't, how did they know to lower the xp to make it more "reasonable?"

[Vormaerin]

That's what most people expect as the "acceptable standard."

I really wish that posters would stop pretending that the forum based zerg style is actually normative for the player base as whole. 1k xp/minute standard is only usual for a specific playstyle.

Regardless, that's a side point. The rest of the post is a start at addressing the concerns that I was getting at. At least there is some idea of what the player is expected to be able to do to get the specified rewards.

[Hilltrot]

Wow... Trot, are you nothing but a troll? Seriously? Have you ever played PNP? PBP perhaps? I highly doubt that you have. Otherwise you wouldn't be making brainless comments about how others are allowed to play, because it would ruin your precious perception about the game and what it's supposed to be. I've been a part of TRUE RPG's since I was 8. And it's a time-honored tradition (Dating all the way back to NES and the original Final Fantasy) to grind meaningless quests/monster encounters to get to a level so the rest of the content is easier. Dragon Warrior 1/2/3 had this, too. Swords and Serpents? The list goes on. Get off your high horse and realize that you cannot dictate to others how play style is meant to be done. This game is a group and individual game. If you don't like running a grindy quest, here's a hint: Don't Run It. I know, complicated, neh?

First, you start with name-calling. . .

ROFL

get up. . . . TRUE RPG

ROFL

Try to get up. . .. TRUE RPG

ROFL

Get up . . . Dating back to the NES . . .

ROFL

Ok, get up time to be serious, Dragon Quest TRUE RPG

ROFL

Grinding, time honored in PnP . . .

. . . . .

. . . . .

Sorry about the wait. I past out from laughing.

Grinding is a tradition in MMORPGs, and really, Really, REALLY bad CRPG's. (Sorry, if I shattered your belief that Dragon Quest was a good game . . .)

Grinding has never been a time honored tradition in PnP. Ever. If you go to Gen Con, believe me, you don't sign up to play the same adventure 20 times for 80 hours straight.

Grinding does occur in a lot of MMOs, but that is either because the game is based on really bad Japanese CRPG's like Everquest was; the MMO just sucks; or that people are playing the game a lot more than people normally ever played PnP.

Now, I never mentioned ftdOmen's original post, my original reply was about Carkolda's. But I'm sure that Turbine will eventually even out the XP for the new 21-25 adventures and challenges. Just hope that you don't have to wait as long as a Deepwood Sniper. (4 years now?)

But back to Carkolda. I still believe Turbine had good reason to nerf the XP. The argument could be made that the nerf was too much. Usually buffing other parts of the game instead of nerfing one aspect, is more diplomatic. However, Turbine chose this method likely because they didn't want to increase the leveling speed.

Before 2-point conversions, NFL teams would always kick the ball on conversion. (I guess some teams might have had an injured kicker and would run it.) Every conversion a kick. Unless it was an important one, it really was boring and wasn't even worth watching. I think the networks started to use them as commercial breaks. So, the NFL adopted 2-point conversions. It really makes the conversion far more interesting to watch.

Now did the NFL demand that every team run the ball and play a certain way as you claim that I am doing? No. They simply changed the rewards. That is what Turbine has done and I am supporting.

Turbine isn't preventing you from doing anything. You can play challenges all day, every day, if you like to. ftdOmen can play challenges all he wants to as well. Despite the words you two have put in my mouth, I haven't once said that people shouldn't be able to play challenges as many times as they want. Go. Play them a million more times for all I care.

[Carkolda]

Ok, get up time to be serious, Dragon Quest TRUE RPG

Proof, ladies and gentlemen, that trot doesn't read my post and is only trying to stir up a fight.

Dragon Warrior 1/2/3 had this

Grinding, time honored in PnP . . .

Again, proof you don't read my post.

And it's a time-honored tradition (Dating all the way back to NES and the original Final Fantasy) to grind meaningless quests/monster encounters to get to a level so the rest of the content is easier

And that makes this comment:

Grinding has never been a time honored tradition in PnP. Ever. If you go to Gen Con, believe me, you don't sign up to play the same adventure 20 times for 80 hours straight.

without value. I have never, or will I ever, suggest that PNP should have a grinding aspect to it. My reference above (which you clearly didn't read) indicated that electronic games have a grinding aspect to them. And if you are comparing DDO to an actual true TT group of PNP, you are sadly mistaken.

rest of your post

Your NFL reference was an interesting illustration of my argument, because what they did was increase the reward for doing something harder, not penalize something for doing it easier. They didn't turn the kick conversion into a 1/2-point value. They made the harder one 2 points. Thanks for proving my point. Any more evidence you would like to provide that supports my position?

@ Vormaerin: 1k xp per minute is a far cry from zerging. I accomplish 1k per minute in many quests, and a zerger am I not. How much of a zerger can a cleric/monk be, when I'm only dishing out maybe 30-40 points of damage a swing? So no, I don't agree with you that 1k/minute is zerging, especially when you can run quests like impossible demands and net yourself 12-14k inside of 5-10 minutes. 1k/minute is a pretty reasonable standard I should be shooting for when I TR'd for the first time.

[Cyr]

The "Reference" points being used so far are completely vague, arbitrary, and utterly useless for furthering the discussion. They are not actionable suggestions.

It is actually very simple.

It is called an average. You set up what you want the average xp/min to be and base that upon the average completion time including average run time to the quest.

It is just a matter of data mining to get this information. We are not talking about rocket science here.

Then slow players will get less xp/min (as always) and zergers will get more xp/min (as always) then the average player, but all content will be much much closer in it's rewards so that players will not be skipping as much stuff and grinding as much specific things as they do now.

[ferrite]

/signed

Challenges, as they are implemented are a complete screw-up.

First, the developers don't listen to what players want here. Second, the devs don't listen to complaints and concerns. Third, they don't LISTEN. And here we are today.

Let's face it, they've changed it dozens of times and still can't get it right. So what makes you think they ever will?

[laurawilder]

Carkolda,

While I sympathize with Turbine altering the pack after you bought said pack I do not agree and I am not elitist in my viewpoints.

Turbine while adjusting it has taken nothing away from you. Just as before you can run the challenges until your face turn blue with no loss of xp as quests get after having been redone.

Also you do not get the most insidious problem as you like to call it. Challenges are just another excuse people have to not run in a lfm. So rather than joining a pug lfm someone will run a challenge.

That is the worst aspect of these challenges and easy xp. Add in the bravery bonuses and all Turbine is doing to oil the non mmo style players to just power level fast and easy at the expense of the story arcs would ruin the game.

Why create more quests and adventures when no one is willing to make the effort to run them as they would give less xp than the challenges. Why be the person trying to learn his character when the idiot next to him has all the shiny things in game from maxing out challenges with guildies in 5 minutes instead of doing a raid that takes 40 minutes.

So believe me I get the big picture it is you that do not. I do not believe in rewarding those that like to cut corners and get something for nothing.

There are more that power level in challenges than you will admit since you are addicted to the xp per minute yourself. The previous person I cited was real and while it was an extreme example it was also a common one. I can take you on any server and in any of the large guild find within moments many that would have been elevated by others, more so than in the past. Piking and power leveling has always been around and some is ok. But not when you actually can do it by avoiding content.

Had Turbine taken something truely away from you I would see your point but alas all they did was make you actually have to work and grind more in the challenges. The truth is it irks you that now they just are no longer more appealing than running the quests.

So remember do not post on the forum that some are noobs and do not know endgame, are not raid ready, or you cannot find enough people to run all the old raids at level. Because that is what you are creating by advocating a higher xp per minute from running challenges with no penalty.

[Vormaerin]

It is just a matter of data mining to get this information. We are not talking about rocket science here.

That's kind of my point. The posters early on were getting all enraged that they weren't getting what they consider reasonable xp. And they were tossing out numbers like 1k xp/minute. But they weren't qualifying it in anyway. They weren't saying what they think you need to accomplish for that. Is that what they expect the 1 star players to get? The five star players? The average player (who I doubt gets 1k xp in quests generally) or just the 'elite'?

I know the devs can determine that stuff. They obviously have if MadFloyd's "get 15 min xp for 5 minutes' work" comment wasn't just a throwaway.

But that doesn't change the fact that the player comments were vague and unhelpful. Do I need to five star The Disruptor to get that 15k xp? The posters seemed to think they were providing information about their expectations, but they weren't providing enough information to be worth reading.

[Isolani]

Carkolda,

While I sympathize with Turbine altering the pack after you bought said pack I do not agree and I am not elitist in my viewpoints.

Turbine while adjusting it has taken nothing away from you. Just as before you can run the challenges until your face turn blue with no loss of xp as quests get after having been redone.

Also you do not get the most insidious problem as you like to call it. Challenges are just another excuse people have to not run in a lfm. So rather than joining a pug lfm someone will run a challenge.

That is the worst aspect of these challenges and easy xp. Add in the bravery bonuses and all Turbine is doing to oil the non mmo style players to just power level fast and easy at the expense of the story arcs would ruin the game.

Why create more quests and adventures when no one is willing to make the effort to run them as they would give less xp than the challenges. Why be the person trying to learn his character when the idiot next to him has all the shiny things in game from maxing out challenges with guildies in 5 minutes instead of doing a raid that takes 40 minutes.

So believe me I get the big picture it is you that do not. I do not believe in rewarding those that like to cut corners and get something for nothing.

There are more that power level in challenges than you will admit since you are addicted to the xp per minute yourself. The previous person I cited was real and while it was an extreme example it was also a common one. I can take you on any server and in any of the large guild find within moments many that would have been elevated by others, more so than in the past. Piking and power leveling has always been around and some is ok. But not when you actually can do it by avoiding content.

Had Turbine taken something truely away from you I would see your point but alas all they did was make you actually have to work and grind more in the challenges. The truth is it irks you that now they just are no longer more appealing than running the quests.

So remember do not post on the forum that some are noobs and do not know endgame, are not raid ready, or you cannot find enough people to run all the old raids at level. Because that is what you are creating by advocating a higher xp per minute from running challenges with no penalty.

So basically you want Turbine to force people to group with you? Not sure that's going to be a good business model since they have said that soloers are a significant percentage of the population.

[LordPiglet]

I don't particularily understand the hard part about normallizing xp on challenges.

They said they should give atleast 1 k per minute

So set them at 1 k per minute, base XP on a 5 minute challenge is 5k, 10 minute challenge 10k, stars at 10% of base as they have now. Heck, they could even tier the stars so that 1 is 10%, 2 stars is 20% . Even then the XP wouldn't be out of control.

They did add the new time component, so just kick that in once you hit base time, so that for every extra minute you'd get another 1k xp.

I don't see why a 17 minute Picture portals returns less xp and less ingredients then the 3 5 minute runs I could have done of buying time. This is especially true of picture portals or moving targets where there are automatic time extenders, when you don't always actually want the time extended and you can get absolutely screwed on then crests (and not know it until you're 5-10 minute in).

[Carkolda]

Snip

First, I thank you for reading my posts and responding in the manner you are.

I think the disagreement in our two mindsets is a very fundamental one.

You believe that in order to make the primary appealing, you should make the alternative less appealing. In application, you believe quests should be left alone, and dissuade others from playing challenges by lowering the rewards for running said challenge. I would call this Adverse Avoidance.

I believe that in order to make the primary appealing, you should make it more appealing. In application, I believe that you should leave challenges alone as a whole (obviously, the 200k example was ludicrous), and tweak the quests to make them more appealing, thus encouraging people to run them. I would call this Reward Appeal.

If Turbine established a benchmark for xp gain per time invested, and then applied that to EVERYTHING, then you'd see that people would run quests equally or more than challenges. I know that they have their hands full with churning out U15, and they've probably been coding like fiends since before they announced MotU. But this I believe is something they need to resolve, because I don't see this issue going away.

How can they possibly resolve a 15 minute challenge giving as much xp (or less) as a 5-minute challenge? How can they have a 45 minute quest on BB and first-time give as much xp as a first-time 10-minute challenge? There are too many weird and varied quests, and just saying "eh, this sounds good" is not giving this problem the attention it deserves.

You want people to run/purchase premium content, then make that premium content hold true to a different (higher) benchmark. And you can benchmark the xp based on how many people are in the party (not counting hirelings) when you run it. If you increase the XP gained when you run with a party, it will encourage people to run in parties. Here's an example that you would apply as a GM in a PNP game.

You have a group of 6 PC's in a dungeon on a quest. You would throw an encounter at those 6 PC's that was consummate with their power level. But, because that encounter CR was higher than if it was 2 PC's, there would be more xp to go around.

Same principle. You want people to run as a group, and you want people to run quests. So instead of ****ing everyone and their uncle off because you "nerf" something, why not encourage them to play the original by making it more appealing? Give them a benefit for working in a party. Give them a benefit for buying and running paid content. Encourage them to work together to run quests, not dissuade them from running a quest because it's considered OP by certain people.

Here's my suggested layout with a couple assumptions first.
- First, I would have the dev team go back and review (or start tracking) average completions given the number of players in a party per quest. Yes, this is a BIG task and requires a lot of data points. But once you establish these data points, the law of large numbers applies and you will see the average completion time given any quest, given whatever number of players there are in the quest.

Given that data, here's how I would place an example (and I stress just an example) benchmark:
- Base XP per heroic quests/challenges is 500 xp per minute, and 1,000 for epics. Hard-baseline. So if you are running Durk's got a Secret, and the average completion time is 10 minutes, the base XP given is 5,000 xp. If you're running Epic Partycrashers and the average completion time is 25 minutes, you just got yourself 25,000 xp base.
- For every additional player, you add 75 xp per minute to the baseline. The argument would be "well, that's too much xp." But you're also missing out the fact that larger parties complete quests faster, thus the average completion time would drop to maybe 7 minutes? So a group of 6 players would net 500 (base) + 375 (extra players) = 875 per minute x 7 minutes = 6,125 xp base.
- Hard would give +10% xp, and Elite would give 20% (additively, like it's already done for all your other boosts).
- If you are running premium, paid content that you own or are VIP, you get an additional 25 xp per minute to the baseline. On a guest-pass, that'd be 15 xp per minute to the baseline. So if you were running Come Out and Slay with a group of 6 and assume the average completion time is 10 minutes for that group of 6, you'd be looking at 500 (base) + 375 (extra players) + 25 (for those VIP's or owners of the content) = 900 per minute x 10 minutes = 9,000 xp base. Those on GP would receive 8900 xp.
- This formula would apply to timed events like Challenges, as well. Stars would add maybe a 10% boost to the base XP per star, and if you get 6 stars you get an additional 15% (for total of 75%). So the math would be: 500 (base) + 25 (VIP/Owner) = 525 per minute x 5 minutes (For TIM) = 2,625 xp x 1.4 (40% boost for 4 stars) = 3,675. It's not as good as it was, and it's not as bad as it is. And if you want to add in a group of 5 other PC's, then it changes to 500 (base) + 375 (extra PC's) + 25 (VIP/Owner) = 900 per minute x 5 minutes = 4,500 xp x 1.4 (40% boost for 4 stars) = 6,300. This boost would encourage people to bring friends along.
- If you don't take any meaningful action towards the completion of the quest or challenge, you don't add to the "friend boost." This would prevent pikers from just zoning in and doing nothing. In addition, if you are idle for more than half the time that the quest takes to complete, everyone takes a 75 xp penalty per minute per player idle 1/2 the time.

I'm not saying my idea is perfect, but it's a start.

[Entelech]

You're really giving Turbine too much benefit of the doubt here. It would be more comforting if they were savvy businesspeople, aggressively changing things to maximize their profits, swaggering around in Gordon Gecko suspenders or Mad Man guy hats... but that is just an illusion. The unpleasant truth is that they just don't care. Changes happen at the whims of casual observation on the part of the highest ups. No reason. Barely any thought. A wise man once said we are being digested in the belly of a cold and indifferent universe, and that is pretty much what's going on here. My advice to you is to enjoy the game for what it is: a dysfunctional excuse to play with people you like.

+1 and QFT.

Need further evidence, just look at the Pax video interview where Fernando Paiz described Half Elves as the "prettiest race in DDO." This comment only makes sense if you assume that he had either (1) never even glanced at the models before the rollout or (2) gets turned on by blow-up dolls with Downs Syndrome.

Further evidence? How many savvy business sharks in an internet-centered corporation "forget" to renew their Domain Registrations?

Given the situation, is it any wonder that Turbine decided to simultaneously implement a new physics engine (which is chock full of bugs), new class (more bugs), new raid (dear sweet lordy, the bugs), epic destinies (almost nothing BUT bugs) and completely redo/break/backtrack on/run around like headless chickens with/freak out over a new enhancement system all at the same time? Clearly whoever's in charge is completely innocent of any clue about programming, QA, or customer service. Either that or the management is brilliant, insane, evil, and wants to commit elaborate suicide.

I love DDO. Please step back from the brink and avoid becoming a case study that will make the next ten generations of MBA students suck their teeth and wince.

[Purkilius]

/signed

Everything else has been said...

[laurawilder]

At least you have proposals for Turbine to use and I commend you for that. But I do not think tweaking quests to compensate for unbalance caused by a new addition (challenges) to the game is a solution.

You do not add inflated xp into the game with challenges and then retoactively go and tweak all xp in the game. That is not a solution. That just makes everyone level even faster, makes the game easier, and in the end many would still grumble then that certain xp is not enough compared to another quest.

Also an MMO as I have always stated is not a Mario Brothers game. It should not be all based on xp per minute. In the end roleplayers and others that are slow while learning would suffer while those just running though will be compensated better.

I do not feel that since I can run through Gwylans Stand on Hard at lvl 7 solo as I have ran it so many time over the last almost 6 years should I get more xp than say a group of 5 new players that formeds a static group and are flower sniffing their way through the quest.

The original content always was appealing but when you give players a legal cheat to cut corners in user challenges to level faster they will and I cannot blame them. But it causes unbalance and what I find funny is you realize it by coming up with a system based more on a challence system and not really based on quest difficulty.

Personally it does not affect me much as I can solo almost everything until vale and even then much. But it does sadden me each year I see less team play and less players and it is all because the game keeps changing to attract a temporary player base.

I know that you have said you have played over 2 years. But do you really think the challenges are what Turbine wants players to be playing and do you really think the are the future of the game? Do you think the players that level in them and avoid the content are the ones that will stay long term in the game or the ones that get help building up there characters.

Face it challenges, guild runs, bravery bonuses, veteran status that can be bought and start at 7, stone of xp all have affected new low level players from learning the game and growing with it.

The game is creating an unfriendly new player world that will bottle neck into mid range content those that have no idea what they are doing and leave a top heavy game with a population that will dwindle.

Elevating xp as you assert will not enhance the game in any manner. I am afraid we shall not agree on this topic.

[Hawkston]

I'm not sure 1k/minute is right. If I'm level 4 and zerg through all of Waterworks in half an hour, I should be up 30k experience? Where does that number come from?