The xp of some challenges is still unreasonable.

[Tiamas]

The two best House C farm challenges were buying time and time is money (the short ones). Trying to get good xp from these involved five minutes of frantic effort (which I found fun).

**** critical part removed ****

The only good thing about this nerf is that it as people provide numbers, it is getting to be more and more fun illustrating how ridiculous the nerf was in the first place!

I know you didnt want to, but you called for a nerf here, plz remove it. I am too lazy to check my quote later so i removed it here already .

[Ancient]

Because you asked nicely... I'll do it. But there are 10 or more quests in the expansion that can produce about 10k xp per minute. The very first farm house quest, impossible demands, can match that xp rate.... solo. Nerfing the "stand in place" quest wouldn't even amount to a speed bump for those serious about grinding epic destiny xp. I'm not the first to point this out, I'm not even in the first 10 to point this out.

There are DOZENS of epic quests where even very ungeared average players can and do regularly attain 5-10k/xp a min on EASY NORMAL quests.. Challenges originally offered 3-7k/min - depending on your star performance, attaining hte full 7k was VERY DIFFICULT. And challenges now give 1-2. It makes zero sense.

Is turbine going to nerf every quest where you can manage that xp? No they aren't. They just dont understand game balance.

Here's an example tho for those in search of epic xp, and for turbine to nerf next:
Impossible Demands, el very first quest in the eveningstar chain (the global obj recommends you to eitehr that or the challenges, not a tough choice anymore:
plus - once your 25 there is no rep penalty.
Thus you can run it with a cpl lvl25 at an alamingly fast rate, on normal without any xp penatly due to the new mecahnics of p2:
Grants 18k xp in 1-2mins tops.
Thats 9k+ a min.
Does not require uber chars. Does not require much dps. Just a very trivial quest, that gives a lot of xp.

And getting to 25 in the first place without incurring a single rep penalty is not at all difficult sans challenges: Run each new quest once hard, once norm - youll be there.

Will turbine nerf that one next? Perhaps. But I know another 10 quests that give roughly the same xp/min, so I have no idea what there goal is here. Epic Xp goes fast, its just the fact of the matter. Challenges were not the problem.

[Dolphious]

As others have noted for epic xp, those challenges were never anything special. They are a great way to get tokens though, and that would be true even if they didn't give epic xp at all.

The thing that changed is they used to be a good way to get over the 18-20 hump on a TR, particularly if you primarily solo. That hump is a problem IMO. I used to get TRs to 17 then raid and gear grind for the last few levels (on top of some xp grinding in IQ and RR). I've only done one TR since u14, and that last level was painful.

[Tiamas]

I wasnt 100% serious about removing it *g*. Though you know, as soon as more people give advice of how to do something effectively (like farming XP) some devs remember that is not WAI and nerf it. At least it somehow feels a bit like that lately. (Thats just my very own subjective opinion based on nothing but a feeling, try to beat that with numbers!)

[Vormaerin]

The fact we cannot pin the completion time down to an exact microsecond is once again... missing the point.

Fourth, there isn't a magic lever at the start of a House C challenge you can pull to get an automatic five star completion in the minimum amount of time.

2 minutes vs 15 minutes or 25 minutes vs 45 minutes is not worrying about "exact microseconds." That's major shifts. Its the "holy 1kxp/min" for group A and half or less for the second group.

Second, are you saying that the 1kxp should be for 5 star completions only? Because no one else is saying anything so specific. They just say that running the challenges should be over the 1kxp/minute. How much should a 1 star completion be worth? Seriously, that's my whole point. People are just throwing numbers around without any tie in to anything except some holy writ that 1kxp is good and anything else is bad.

I don't know what quest you are piking and I really couldn't care less. If you want to be bored like that, more power to you. Its certainly not a factor in the discussion of what's a reasonable reward, nor does it address the point you used it in reference to. If a player gets 5kxp each run of Time is Money, for most players that will be far more xp than they'll get anywhere else. Barring an invite to some piking opportunity.

[Kinerd]

I think we disagree about whether its "slightly" different results, at least with regards to quests. The average group, from my experience, seems to take easily 5 to 10x as long as the "how long it should take" times given by zergers. Someone told a poster earlier today that Kobold's New Ringleader is great xp because you can finish it in 2 minutes. I'm sure that's true for a lot of people. But a lot more people won't finish it in less than 15-20 minutes (unless there's a zerger rushing through it for everyone).

Throw in all the variables like access to ship shrines, tomes, bravery, optionals, etc and it becomes a rather big dimension.

Let's take either extreme:

-Balanced around the most casual Time: now the quests that are most zergable are even better to run, rewarding those quests that are most susceptible to skill/knowledge. Great! That is a good thing to reward.
-Balanced around the most zerger Time: now the people with the most skill/knowledge have the widest palette of "good" quests; which is to say all of them. People are rewarded the more skill/knowledge they have. Again: great! That is a good thing to reward.

Anywhere in between is a balance between two great things, by definition! Behold! Considering time at all nets us a great situation instead of "you want to run Taming the Flames? pfft, let's run Delera's for the millionth time instead", and what is frankly a debacle of XP/time for quests from 18-20, the levels that require by far the most XP.

.

Consider each issue you raise in this light, and you will see that it is equally irrelevant in the overall sense. Considering a variable at all will always net an improvement. The variables you already describe are already ignored, we can't get a worse situation by continuing to ignore them. This is lucky, because of course every variable is going to be continuously ignored by the decision makers at Turbine and this discussion is 100% meaningless.

[Vormaerin]

Not that that has anything to do with my point, which is that xp/minute by itself is a vague and useless term. Or, rather, your point expands on why I've said its a vague and useless term.

The Devs could say "Look, Mr.Cow (or whomever is particularly fast even by zerg standards) is getting 1kxp/minute in this quest. Its all good." And 99% of the player base doesn't. Would that address the concerns of the posters in this thread?

Or do they think 1kxp/minute is a god given right of anyone who bothers to play?

As far as challenges go, no one in this thread has bothered to say whether they think the 1kxp/minute is for a 1 star effort or only for those who 6 star it. Are they arguing that the lvl 10 Time is Money should give the same xp reward as the lvl 20 version, since the time is the same?

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

[Kinerd]

Not that that has anything to do with my point, which is that xp/minute by itself is a vague and useless term. Or, rather, your point expands on why I've said its a vague and useless term.

The Devs could say "Look, Mr.Cow (or whomever is particularly fast even by zerg standards) is getting 1kxp/minute in this quest. Its all good." And 99% of the player base doesn't. Would that address the concerns of the posters in this thread?

Or do they think 1kxp/minute is a god given right of anyone who bothers to play?

As far as challenges go, no one in this thread has bothered to say whether they think the 1kxp/minute is for a 1 star effort or only for those who 6 star it. Are they arguing that the lvl 10 Time is Money should give the same xp reward as the lvl 20 version, since the time is the same?

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

Well, I think everyone has been pretty clear that we're primarily concerned about quest vs. quest. Mr. Cow doesn't get 1k xp/min in every quest; in fact, I would very strongly urge a dev to go over the lists Mr. Cow has very helpfully provided demonstrating the staggering variety of xp/min values throughout DDO. Picking his Sorcerer Diaries since, well, they came up first in google for me, we see everything from 4890 (Shadow Crypt) to 156 (Hold for Reinforcements). We also see that the three House C quests come in at 575, 555, and 474. This is what I mean: a dev would hold time constant by holding Mr. Cow constant (for a certain value of cow, you could say), and compare quests that way. Or a dev could hold time constant by surveying people who had only been playing for a month. So long as they don't mix methodologies, we would see improvement.

The central point is that while the devs claim to have changed challenges to "a more reasonable amount of XP/minute", they very clearly have no grasp of the term. Of course we would prefer that the absolute number is higher rather than lower, but that's a quantitative issue. We're still grappling with the qualitative issue of division at all.

(Ideally they would also notice that 18-20 has a tiny number of quests relative to XP required compared to, for instance, 5-8. Baby steps.)

[Ancient]

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

That is hilarious... being that the dev's just acted on them.

[Ancient]

2 minutes vs 15 minutes or 25 minutes vs 45 minutes is not worrying about "exact microseconds." That's major shifts. Its the "holy 1kxp/min" for group A and half or less for the second group.

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

Second, are you saying that the 1kxp should be for 5 star completions only?
Because no one else is saying anything so specific. They just say that running the challenges should be over the 1kxp/minute. How much should a 1 star completion be worth? Seriously, that's my whole point. People are just throwing numbers around without any tie in to anything except some holy writ that 1kxp is good and anything else is bad.

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.

I don't know what quest you are piking and I really couldn't care less. If you want to be bored like that, more power to you. Its certainly not a factor in the discussion of what's a reasonable reward, nor does it address the point you used it in reference to. If a player gets 5kxp each run of Time is Money, for most players that will be far more xp than they'll get anywhere else. Barring an invite to some piking opportunity.

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.

[Hilltrot]

1) The lion's share of my 2nd and 3rd life xp came from Time is Money. This nerf completely nukes that option from high orbit.

This is a good reason to nerf XP in a quest. Running a quest repeatedly without playing other quests.

Is Time is Money that much fun for you? Or was it just a way to jump ahead in level quickly.

I wouldn't play a game if leveling were not fun. I've paid for and played SWTOR. Made it to level 25ish. (I forget). Stopped because the gameplay was boring. Played Diablo 3. Stopped at level 18. Boring. Everquest - I paid $50 for it and stopped at level 3. Everquest 2 - Didn't make it past the free tutorial. Age of Conan, level 40. LOTRO with a system much like challenges, lifetime membership. Made it to 38 before I was freaking tired of doing the same stupid set of challenges day in and day out. Of course WoW to 60, then another to 70(for my brother. . .), skipped the next one, then two to 85.

Personally, I don't understand how you can stand playing the same challenge again and again through multiple lives. . .

I usually like adventures based on how much I enjoy them, not how much xp/min. Some people bring their work ethic to their game. Personally, I think people should leave their work ethic at work.

[Isolani]

This is a good reason to nerf XP in a quest. Running a quest repeatedly without playing other quests.

Is Time is Money that much fun for you? Or was it just a way to jump ahead in level quickly.

I wouldn't play a game if leveling were not fun. I've paid for and played SWTOR. Made it to level 25ish. (I forget). Stopped because the gameplay was boring. Played Diablo 3. Stopped at level 18. Boring. Everquest - I paid $50 for it and stopped at level 3. Everquest 2 - Didn't make it past the free tutorial. Age of Conan, level 40. LOTRO with a system much like challenges, lifetime membership. Made it to 38 before I was freaking tired of doing the same stupid set of challenges day in and day out. Of course WoW to 60, then another to 70(for my brother. . .), skipped the next one, then two to 85.

Personally, I don't understand how you can stand playing the same challenge again and again through multiple lives. . .

I usually like adventures based on how much I enjoy them, not how much xp/min. Some people bring their work ethic to their game. Personally, I think people should leave their work ethic at work.

I wouldn't level on challenges like that either, but seriously, what do you care how other people like to level? You level how you like and let other people do what they like.

[Ancient]

The Devs could say "Look, Mr.Cow (or whomever is particularly fast even by zerg standards) is getting 1kxp/minute in this quest. Its all good." And 99% of the player base doesn't. Would that address the concerns of the posters in this thread?

At the epic level 1k/min isn't high enough to be balanced with other exp options.

As far as the non-epic levels, not even Mr. Cow can complete a House C challenge in less than 5 minutes... So yes, if he could get 1k/min in each and every one of the House C quests at the non-epic level... I'd be happy. Like the rest of your objections, this one really doesn't apply to the issue.

[Carkolda]

I wouldn't level on challenges like that either, but seriously, what do you care how other people like to level? You level how you like and let other people do what they like.

I like this post. Who do people think they are that they can dictate to others what is the best way to level their characters? Who are they to define what "fun" is.

Hilltrot, to answer your question: I ran it over and over because of three reasons.
- First, it was a low-committment deal. If I wiped, it was only 5 minutes lost. If my wife called for me to do something, I was able to pause what I was doing. Some of the longer quests take an hour or more, and as a healer I can't just bail on people like that.

- Second, it's steady xp and I know it well. I knew what to look for, where to go, and how to get 4 stars in 5 minutes every time. And the challenges, while not great xp each time, the per-minute reward turned out to be pretty decent... anywhere between 800-1,000 xp on average for heroic levels. It also allowed me to guestimate how long I would need to do something; it gave me a benchmark. I measured levels in TIM runs. And then by 5 minute increments.

- Third, and most importantly, the quests were easy enough and mind-numbingly boring enough, where my guildies and I could just hang out and chat and have a grand old time. Talk about our GF's/BF's/Wives/Husbands/Kids/ and all that stuff. It enabled us to sit around the table with a bag of cheetos and some mountain dew and just BS. We didn't have to focus on the game at hand so much, and so we enjoyed each others company more than the game itself. And last I checked, that's what D&D is about.

By enacting the XP nerfs, I've been back inside TIM twice. I've found that the xp is so atrocious it isn't even worth our time. I now own a pack (Yes, I paid 1,250 tp on it, got it on sale) and I don't play it any more. Thanks, Turbine, for ruining content because you apparently felt your definition of "fun" superseded your player base's. If you aren't going to fix the XP, I want my TP back.

[laurawilder]

I like this post. Who do people think they are that they can dictate to others what is the best way to level their characters? Who are they to define what "fun" is.

- Third, and most importantly, the quests were easy enough and mind-numbingly boring enough, where my guildies and I could just hang out and chat and have a grand old time. Talk about our GF's/BF's/Wives/Husbands/Kids/ and all that stuff. It enabled us to sit around the table with a bag of cheetos and some mountain dew and just BS. We didn't have to focus on the game at hand so much, and so we enjoyed each others company more than the game itself. And last I checked, that's what D&D is about.

By enacting the XP nerfs, I've been back inside TIM twice. I've found that the xp is so atrocious it isn't even worth our time. I now own a pack (Yes, I paid 1,250 tp on it, got it on sale) and I don't play it any more. Thanks, Turbine, for ruining content because you apparently felt your definition of "fun" superseded your player base's. If you aren't going to fix the XP, I want my TP back.

This is a perfect example as to why Turbine needed to nerf the xp as was mentioned previously. They did not lower the xp to ruin the fun but to offer balance. The challenges were made to add to the game and offer alternative options to farm items, gear and exp. It was not meant to supplant the game and make a mockery of working to be a completionist.

This is why I met someone the other day on his 4th life that knew nothing about the game and I mean nothing. This person did not know at what lvl a ranger got spells and they had been a ranger in a past life. They did not know where the waterworks was and did not know that bard could raise the dead by a scroll.

If you want to play the DDO version of Mario Brothers fine, but DDO does not need to insult its true player base and all those that made the game what it is today by having challenged abused to the point that someone levels lives only in them.

[Hilltrot]

I wouldn't level on challenges like that either, but seriously, what do you care how other people like to level? You level how you like and let other people do what they like.

In a way, it does affect me. Laurawilder mentions good points but I would like to add more myself.

There was a day when certain adventures in DDO gave way, way, way too much experience. So everyone played those adventures and those adventures only. Like 6-7 adventures to hit max. This kills the game because the game has "no content." Just a few adventures. This is how people will see the game. Boring. In the end, this kills the game. Most people play games to have fun, not just level. If people come to this game and find out that it's only a couple of adventures repeated endlessly, they won't keep playing. Welcome to Everquest 2.

It only takes a certain amount of advancement to keep people "interested" in an RPG. This should not be the primary concern of an RPG company. The primary thing you need is a compelling story and more importantly to an MMO, gameplay.

Let me repeat this.

Gameplay is the most important aspect.

Imagine for a moment for all those people who believe people only play for the XP number at the end of the quest.

Turbine comes up with a new adventure. You enter into a square room. First you run to all four corners 30 times. Then you jump 100 times. After this you hold the left mouse button for one minute. This takes 5 minutes.

You get a chest filled with wonderful possibly epic stuff and you get 20,000 experience.

"Everyone" would be sitting around playing this "wonderful" adventure ad-nauseum.

This one adventure would kill DDO. DDO would become a running gag. People might try to defend the game, but by simply listing this one adventure would destroy all defense of this game.

Yes, some nuts would play this adventure. To help alleviate the pain of working this adventure, they would invite friends to come along to chit-chat. They may even drink a bit or pull out a bong to dull the pain.

You aren't playing a game. You are working a meaningless job!

Wait! This is exactly what Carkolda was saying! I just wrote the perfect adventure for him!

[Munkenmo]

Wait! This is exactly what Carkolda was saying! I just wrote the perfect adventure for him!

No this isn't, most people who grind xp / minute don't want to group with whiny break every barrel look at every corner person anyway. This has been proven to me time and time again when "adventure types" ignore the text in my lfm and join zerg groups.

A far more reasonable method would be for turbine to admit their content from level 18 onwards has been abysmal exp for a very long time, and boost this.

Given how few quests there are in the 18-20 range it wouldn't actually take long.

[Hilltrot]

No this isn't, most people who grind xp / minute don't want to group with whiny break every barrel look at every corner person anyway. This has been proven to me time and time again when "adventure types" ignore the text in my lfm and join zerg groups.

A far more reasonable method would be for turbine to admit their content from level 18 onwards has been abysmal exp for a very long time, and boost this.

Given how few quests there are in the 18-20 range it wouldn't actually take long.

I don't think you bothered to read my post. I didn't mention any barrels in my adventure. I never mentioned "zerging" either. My adventure didn't require any grouping. And 4k per minute is at least reasonably good by zerging standards in a repeatable adventure.

25 quests in the 18-20 range. Yes, level 20 is rather sparse with only 3 quests. But the game just recently allowed you to go past 20. Levels 14-16, 24 quests. But there were so few quests level 18-20. . . .

The reason why you have said 25 is less than 24 is because you only count quests that give an inordinate amount of xp when worked. You make my point. Adventures need to be balanced on experience to prevent large portions of content from being skipped.

Believe me fTdOmen, if you put "I'm an insulting person who works DDO instead of playing it," I would never join your lfm. I would probably /squelch you just to make sure it didn't happen by accident.

[Artrish]

Personally, I don't understand how you can stand playing the same challenge again and again through multiple lives. . .

The same way we all stand for repeating the same quests over and over and over through multiple lives.

At the moment in game, i am level 18 and have dried up the quest options that i find fun and manageable to run. I repeated running with the devils for the fifth time and got 8k exp for 40 minutes inside the quest. As bad as my math is, i saw this to read 200 exp/min. So, i thought to myself, buying time gives 1300 exp for 5 mins, that cant be too bad as it is about the same exp/min.

Off i went to run challenges to try bump my exp up to help toward my next level up. I ended up running it 4 times. Those 4 times took me about half an hour due to small breaks between or just needing to pause to rest,etc, so the exp gained was the 5200 for a half hour. It felt long just due to it being a quest 4 times, while the one run of devils didnt FEEL as long as those 4 of the challenge.

So the exp from challenges is close to what i earn from quests after doing the initial 2-3 runs of them and hitting repeat penalties, but, quests feel way more fun because i get guild renown and they are a chunk of over 5k in one go.

I will much prefer it when the challenges go back to what i feel is a reasonable amount of exp for them. When needing a million exp points to be able to level into the next life, how many people complete a quest they enjoy to get only 1300 exp points from it?

When those challenges gave enough, while buffing my character out with a stack of exp pots and shrine buffs for exp, to give close to 5k exp a run, they were fun to run. I used to find the balance was that there was no guild renown earnt for the exp gain to be higher.

[Tiamas]

Turbine comes up with a new adventure. You enter into a square room. First you run to all four corners 30 times. Then you jump 100 times. After this you hold the left mouse button for one minute. This takes 5 minutes.

You just described basically almost any task in any computer game. You hit some buttons in order to achieve some action on your screen. (Mind/-motion controlled things just use different kind of "Buttons"). So if you break it down to that point any quest or challenge is the same. And basically it is true. The difference of what we like and what not is just in our minds, and they are different.

It only takes a certain amount of advancement to keep people "interested" in an RPG. This should not be the primary concern of an RPG company. The primary thing you need is a compelling story and more importantly to an MMO, gameplay.

Remember, minds are different. I can tell you that i dont give a **** about the story in DDO or any other RPG. I like character progession and customization stuff (DDO has still the best out there for me), playing skill challenges (very simple example: make the jump at a certain spot and dont fall, etc.), and interesting fights. I dont read any story texts ingame and if i have to answer stuff i do that by remembering the position of the correct answer. So please, don't tell me what a (MMO-)RPG has to have to be interesting for players. I know that there are a lot of people who like a good story (and that is absolutely fine), but there are also a lot of people like me. Others are doing "real" role play within the game, thats another option, and there are plenty of them.

Btw, (this part is for everyone) most ridiculous thing is that challenges and quests have to be different because they are called different. Check out the first part of this post, basically its all the same, so there is no real reason to say that anything should be done for a specific reason. Quests are not for XP only and challenges not for loot only. They are all adventures/tasks/bits&bytes. Different mechanics, ok, but break them down to clicking buttons and they are all the same. If you dont like one mechanic, use another. But dont tell anyone else which mechanic should be used to achieve something.


PS: The only way to play the game right is my way. I defined the "fun of gameplay" by my existance. So shut up you whiners and let everyone have MY fun!

PPS: You might have to roll a sarcasm check once.