Is anybody who isnt 12 and under still playing Neverwinter Online?

[jskinner937]

I am glad I never dumped money into that game...it is a horrible interpretation of D&D. Terrible character development, terrible in-game economy, terrible game support.

[somethinggoeshere]

My entire guild (from argo) switched to Neverwinter when it came out and no one has come back to DDO. It goes without saying we're all much more excited about the upcoming NW expansion than the DDO expansion. The playstyle definitely took some getting used to but it's very rewarding that the bulk of your character's power comes from your ability to control him than by decisions made while leveling up or your gear that's going to be outdated with the next content release.

That's not to say that there aren't a good variety of builds even from the limited selection of classes at the moment (tho 3 classes are slated for release currently). I have 2 level capped tanks, both very different, and another class built as a tank. My friend has a rogue tank - very cool. It's also nice that the classes are actually balanced - there aren't any insta-kill wizards who can solo epic dungeons without need of assistance. Every class has its role in a dungeon. The dungeons are hard enough to require balance and team coordination but easy enough that talented, well geared and well coordinated players can complete them even when missing a tank, or a healer, or a controller.

It's awesome that all the content is free. We never have that problem of buying guest passes. The entire upcoming expansion is free. There's always other people to play with, in guild or in a pug, without any artificial monetary barriers keeping you from grouping with anyone else.

It's way less P2W. No money barriers between gear, no buying XP, no sorcs paying for infinite SP, no timer bypasses, nothing like that. I've spent about 200 bucks on the game so far - mostly because I'm a sucker for mounts and companions - my buddy has spent zero. We run the same dungeons together.

It's way less grindy. Level cap comes fast, and I never have to take the same path twice - you literally never have to do the same mission more than once while leveling if you don't want to.

I thoroughly enjoy making my own missions. There's a few people in my guild who do so, including myself, and we all trade missions around, continue campaigns together, etc. Even made a guild hall for us all to hang out in.

There's constantly new events (not recycled old events without even new gear). There's a new event coming up this Friday, actually.

I'm sure there's a lot of people still enjoying DDO, and I'm not here to spread doom or anything. It's cheap to keep an MMO running - hell, even Everquest is still going.

But with DDO gutting their endgame, constantly releasing content that even VIPs have to pay for, exceedingly and increasingly P2W stuff like the Epic Destinies, the inane grind for TPs, the bypass timers... Neverwinter is clearly the game of choice for my group of friends.

I think the thing I like most about Neverwinter, tho, is actually seeing other people playing it. There's other people running around in the world while you're questing, zone chat is always buzzing, and it's easy to find groups.

I played DDO for years and enjoyed it thoroughly, altho my join date won't reflect that - I haven't been able to log into my old forum account since they switched.

[AZgreentea]

I played up to level 20 something in the beta. Then I played Up to level 2 when it went open beta. I haven't played since then.

I should probably uninstall it from my HD, its taking up space. Plus I accidentally open it sometimes when I am aiming for my browser because I placed the shortcut to close.

[jskinner937]

My entire guild (from argo) switched to Neverwinter when it came out and no one has come back to DDO. It goes without saying we're all much more excited about the upcoming NW expansion than the DDO expansion. The playstyle definitely took some getting used to but it's very rewarding that the bulk of your character's power comes from your ability to control him than by decisions made while leveling up or your gear that's going to be outdated with the next content release.

That's not to say that there aren't a good variety of builds even from the limited selection of classes at the moment (tho 3 classes are slated for release currently). I have 2 level capped tanks, both very different, and another class built as a tank. My friend has a rogue tank - very cool. It's also nice that the classes are actually balanced - there aren't any insta-kill wizards who can solo epic dungeons without need of assistance. Every class has its role in a dungeon. The dungeons are hard enough to require balance and team coordination but easy enough that talented, well geared and well coordinated players can complete them even when missing a tank, or a healer, or a controller.

It's awesome that all the content is free. We never have that problem of buying guest passes. The entire upcoming expansion is free. There's always other people to play with, in guild or in a pug, without any artificial monetary barriers keeping you from grouping with anyone else.

It's way less P2W. No money barriers between gear, no buying XP, no sorcs paying for infinite SP, no timer bypasses, nothing like that. I've spent about 200 bucks on the game so far - mostly because I'm a sucker for mounts and companions - my buddy has spent zero. We run the same dungeons together.

It's way less grindy. Level cap comes fast, and I never have to take the same path twice - you literally never have to do the same mission more than once while leveling if you don't want to.

I thoroughly enjoy making my own missions. There's a few people in my guild who do so, including myself, and we all trade missions around, continue campaigns together, etc. Even made a guild hall for us all to hang out in.

There's constantly new events (not recycled old events without even new gear). There's a new event coming up this Friday, actually.

I'm sure there's a lot of people still enjoying DDO, and I'm not here to spread doom or anything. It's cheap to keep an MMO running - hell, even Everquest is still going.

But with DDO gutting their endgame, constantly releasing content that even VIPs have to pay for, exceedingly and increasingly P2W stuff like the Epic Destinies, the inane grind for TPs, the bypass timers... Neverwinter is clearly the game of choice for my group of friends.

I think the thing I like most about Neverwinter, tho, is actually seeing other people playing it. There's other people running around in the world while you're questing, zone chat is always buzzing, and it's easy to find groups.

I played DDO for years and enjoyed it thoroughly, altho my join date won't reflect that - I haven't been able to log into my old forum account since they switched.

I'm glad you like it. I played it enough in beta to cap 2 toons (TR and CW). Then the exploits came where CW and GWF were soloing dungeons and the economy turned to **** and no server role back was made to fix it. Maybe it stabilized by now, but you could definitely p2w more than any MMO I have ever seen.

As for the f2p model they are using....don't expect that to stay. As a company you can't continue to invest money into developing a product that is already paid for without some return on that investment.

Again I am glad you enjoy it, for me I grew old of it after a month or so and really thought it to be lame and a terrible interpretation of the game it was based off of. I am sure after you become tired of NWO or they close the servers you will be back. Hopefully you won't be too far behind in your toons on DDO athough.

[waryJerry]

You and, frankly, I may not be interested in Neverwinter (at least in its present incarnation) but to assume that because we're not the game must not be a going concern seems unintelligent. I have no idea how the game is doing in terms of how many players it has but they sure seem to putting out new content like mad--which suggests money flow.

[AZgreentea]

You and, frankly, I may not be interested in Neverwinter (at least in its present incarnation) but to assume that because we're not the game must not be a going concern seems unintelligent. I have no idea how the game is doing in terms of how many players it has but they sure seem to putting out new content like mad--which suggests money flow.

DDO had an ambitious development program after it went F2P. I think it was a new content update every 2 months for almost 18 months.I want to say it finally slowed down around U9. Usually after an initial release, a game rides the wave for a while before things settle down. I'm sure NWO will do something similar for at least its first full year. Then the game will settle down into a "maintenance" phase for a while.

[waryJerry]

It's quite possible that the rate of updates for Neverwinter will slow. However, I still play and enjoy Star Trek Online and they also update frequently. From everything I read about Cryptic online suggests it's doing well as a company, hiring new people where many studios are laying off their talent. Like them or hate them, they seem to be doing something right.

[Satyriasys]

Anyone over 12 playing it? I highly doubt it. I dont see how they could.

[Arnhelm]

I know of many people who are still playing NWO and enjoying it. It's a game well-suited to their play style and available time to play.

Those of us who spend hours playing any online game, such as DDO, often forget there are people who don't max out chars in weeks, have families and friends and other commitments in life, and prefer to play a few hours a week rather than constantly every day. NWO is a good game for people like that, imo.

[LeslieWest_GuitarGod]

For me personally, it was very close to the perfect D&D online experience, but completely missed the boat in just a few key areas. Overly simplistic character creation/leveling, hyper inflated XP rewards (at least 400% faster than DDO progression - rushing you to the end game where there really is not much to do), quest gating (running major quests -delves- when Cryptic wants you to by giving away extra top flight gear by running during a somewhat randomly generated hour -- the rotation, skirmishes/pvp all have spots on the rotation), and rooting (stop swing, stop move, stop... the UI/combat can be harder to defeat than the mobs, game was created with NO rooting in mind, they added rooting to add an artificial difficulty to the game).

Even with those issues I mention above, I found the game fun, and many HAVE called it their main game. It's good light-hearted fun. The D&D lore and graphics are amazing. The engine allows for really cool looking spells. The artwork is creative. And the devs actually talk to and listen to their playerbase. I just prefer more complexity and depth in my D&D online game.

Neverwinter is not just for the meNOW generation though. They will come and go after a few weeks/months like they do in all games. Our guild has proven the game DOES have staying power, and can entertain older folks. Our guildies over there range from 19-70+, and believe it or not some are highly experienced, long time PnPers who KNOW D&D.

[Shorlong]

I played for quite some time, taking a break from DDO while I was unemployed and my VIP was gone. I capped a CW, my wife capped a TR....we duo'ed two fo the dungeons at level while we were leveling. It was overall a fun game, but I did not liken it to D&D at all.

I LOVED the Foundry, and was a part of the biggest Foundry guild, and we had the largest twitch.tv show called The Forge, were we played through Foundry quests, offering critiques, giving praise were needed, and overall just having fun.

Then, a quest that I had spent two months perfecting up and vanished into thin air. Just disappeared. Devs have no answer for me, and I still don't have it back. 200+ hours worth of work, all gone. I haven't been back since, but I do drop in on the guild Vent to see what's up. A lot of them have left already as well.

[Uska]

I know of several that are even though it really has nothing to do with dnd other than the name and some setting stuff. But then ddo has less and less to do with dnd all the time somebody I really respect here loves the game over all and I tried it out of respect for them but it just didn't do it for me to many issues

1. Cryptic
2. PW
3. forgotten realms
4. 4E even though its not really 4E it draws on it some.

That said even though I think its a terrible game and mind-numbingly boring that's just how I see it others enjoy it and we should let htem

[S.MCCARGO]

After many years of playing DDO I find turbine are just turning DDO into nothing but a money machine. I have tried Neverwinter, I find its more simplistic then DDO, but quite good, makes for a change.

[Dagolar]

My entire guild (from argo) switched to Neverwinter when it came out and no one has come back to DDO. It goes without saying we're all much more excited about the upcoming NW expansion than the DDO expansion. The playstyle definitely took some getting used to but it's very rewarding that the bulk of your character's power comes from your ability to control him than by decisions made while leveling up or your gear that's going to be outdated with the next content release.

That's not to say that there aren't a good variety of builds even from the limited selection of classes at the moment (tho 3 classes are slated for release currently). I have 2 level capped tanks, both very different, and another class built as a tank. My friend has a rogue tank - very cool. It's also nice that the classes are actually balanced - there aren't any insta-kill wizards who can solo epic dungeons without need of assistance. Every class has its role in a dungeon. The dungeons are hard enough to require balance and team coordination but easy enough that talented, well geared and well coordinated players can complete them even when missing a tank, or a healer, or a controller.

It's awesome that all the content is free. We never have that problem of buying guest passes. The entire upcoming expansion is free. There's always other people to play with, in guild or in a pug, without any artificial monetary barriers keeping you from grouping with anyone else.

It's way less P2W. No money barriers between gear, no buying XP, no sorcs paying for infinite SP, no timer bypasses, nothing like that. I've spent about 200 bucks on the game so far - mostly because I'm a sucker for mounts and companions - my buddy has spent zero. We run the same dungeons together.

It's way less grindy. Level cap comes fast, and I never have to take the same path twice - you literally never have to do the same mission more than once while leveling if you don't want to.

I thoroughly enjoy making my own missions. There's a few people in my guild who do so, including myself, and we all trade missions around, continue campaigns together, etc. Even made a guild hall for us all to hang out in.

There's constantly new events (not recycled old events without even new gear). There's a new event coming up this Friday, actually.

I'm sure there's a lot of people still enjoying DDO, and I'm not here to spread doom or anything. It's cheap to keep an MMO running - hell, even Everquest is still going.

But with DDO gutting their endgame, constantly releasing content that even VIPs have to pay for, exceedingly and increasingly P2W stuff like the Epic Destinies, the inane grind for TPs, the bypass timers... Neverwinter is clearly the game of choice for my group of friends.

I think the thing I like most about Neverwinter, tho, is actually seeing other people playing it. There's other people running around in the world while you're questing, zone chat is always buzzing, and it's easy to find groups.

I played DDO for years and enjoyed it thoroughly, altho my join date won't reflect that - I haven't been able to log into my old forum account since they switched.

I found Neverwinter to be clunky in presentation; ridiculously awkward, counterintuitive, and broken in movement/attack mechanics; more p2w in basic design; very unattractive; simplistic in nearly every regard, from character design to story to quest design to environment design, etc; boring on storyline; and uninspired in many design aspects. I never deleted a game off my computer as fast as when I had reached the point where I determined I couldn't stand any more of the game.

Some of my issues with NWN are subjective ones, and some are objective ones.

I'll obviously never care for the game.

However, you've done a great job of explaining the subjective and objective reasons the game is working, allowed me a better understanding of those few of my friends playing it, and provided insights into the future potential of the game for those playing it.

For your sake, I can encourage the idea of the game growing to meet your expectations, and lasting for a meaningful duration.

I may even stop trying to Smite Evil on it-
Maybe.

[jskinner937]

I also agree with the above post...although I stopped enjoying the game after about 50 hours of play time, others really like it. To each his own, I suppose and we wish you the best of luck in NWO or DDO whichever you choose. The only thing I enjoyed in NWO, was playing foundry quests. I never bought a p2p subscription, so I could only play quests, however I could see designing your own to be fun too.

[Syllph]

Agreed on thoroughly disliking NWN. Almost a year ago I got highly upset with DDO and left to explore all the other games out there. Sadly, I am still irate with Turbine but the other games just couldn't keep me interested.

When I loaded up DDO for the first time I was instantly drawn in. Everything about it I enjoyed. Over the years things have changed and made me disappointed, but the enjoyment is still mostly there. NWN was the opposite. I had to try to enjoy it. The classes gave me little to no customization. Sure I could choose which spell I upgraded first, but to get some ability I had to upgrade everything eventually. Sure I could choose a paragon path, but the difference wasn't big enough.

I was blocked into what the game let me do - nothing else. DDO I can build a full-plate wearing sorc or a cloth wearing wand-whipping fighter (not the best ideas, but I can!) I can dump one stat and max another. NWN I could do none of this.

I kept trying and trying to like the game, but alas I haven't really played much for months now. The guy who said it wasn't P2W... have you really played the game? From the moment I started, everything about it screamed give me your money!

[LucidLTS]

My entire guild (from argo) switched to Neverwinter when it came out and no one has come back to DDO. It goes without saying we're all much more excited about the upcoming NW expansion than the DDO expansion. The playstyle definitely took some getting used to but it's very rewarding that the bulk of your character's power comes from your ability to control him than by decisions made while leveling up or your gear that's going to be outdated with the next content release.

Mine too! I even had a terrible time trying to get any of them back for a round of Cove, and we all love Cove. I just emptied the guild chest so we don't lose gear when it expires. I'm sure we'll play more DDO in the future (especially if Rowan holds to the course he seems to be charting), but for now it's 95% Neverwinter.

We aren't under 12, most are 35+ and veteran PnP gamers. Several have run games in private and at conventions for years. One I was playing with from before D&D had numbers after the title. Most of us are college educated and a good percentage hold Masters or Doctorate degrees. Neverwinter is definitely not just some flash in the pan pre-teen amusement.

What we are is casual. Most have demanding real world jobs and play under 10 hours a week. We don't have time to grind for gear or past lives. We don't want to re-learn the rules every time some suit has "a great new idea". We don't want to step into a group and be so outclassed that we make a negligible contribution.

Although the 4.0 rules are garbage, Neverwinter has a truer D&D experience because you can just grab a couple of good friends, hop into a Foundry Quest we have never run before without having to read up on it on the Wiki, and have a great heroic romp. In a real D&D game "Know it" and "BYOH" would get you laughed out of the room.

But I don't understand all of the Neverwinter hate here - most hard-cores who try it will be back shortly and complain less, those of us that cost you your 10% XP bonus or show up with too few hit points are more likely to stay there - seems like a win-win. Give us your tired, your poor, your con-dumped masses yearning to play free.

(Wow, these forums are a royal pain, are they ever going to get fixed?)

[jskinner937]

Mine too! I even had a terrible time trying to get any of them back for a round of Cove, and we all love Cove. I just emptied the guild chest so we don't lose gear when it expires. I'm sure we'll play more DDO in the future (especially if Rowan holds to the course he seems to be charting), but for now it's 95% Neverwinter.

We aren't under 12, most are 35+ and veteran PnP gamers. Several have run games in private and at conventions for years. One I was playing with from before D&D had numbers after the title. Most of us are college educated and a good percentage hold Masters or Doctorate degrees. Neverwinter is definitely not just some flash in the pan pre-teen amusement.

What we are is casual. Most have demanding real world jobs and play under 10 hours a week. We don't have time to grind for gear or past lives. We don't want to re-learn the rules every time some suit has "a great new idea". We don't want to step into a group and be so outclassed that we make a negligible contribution.

Although the 4.0 rules are garbage, Neverwinter has a truer D&D experience because you can just grab a couple of good friends, hop into a Foundry Quest we have never run before without having to read up on it on the Wiki, and have a great heroic romp. In a real D&D game "Know it" and "BYOH" would get you laughed out of the room.

But I don't understand all of the Neverwinter hate here - most hard-cores who try it will be back shortly and complain less, those of us that cost you your 10% XP bonus or show up with too few hit points are more likely to stay there - seems like a win-win. Give us your tired, your poor, your con-dumped masses yearning to play free.

(Wow, these forums are a royal pain, are they ever going to get fixed?)

Another point I can certainly see....casual gamers it certainly caters to. And again many echo the foundry quests being a pretty cool thing. So what about the LFG system? PvP? I found both of those to be terrible and with 3 economies and one completely wasted the first week it was in beta, you again do not see the money grab there? Just asking for input from those that enjoy it.

[LucidLTS]

Another point I can certainly see....casual gamers it certainly caters to. And again many echo the foundry quests being a pretty cool thing. So what about the LFG system? PvP? I found both of those to be terrible and with 3 economies and one completely wasted the first week it was in beta, you again do not see the money grab there? Just asking for input from those that enjoy it.

Well, PvP I can't give any feedback on, I only played PvP on DDO once, and that was after I'd been helping a new player out for a few hours and he (she?) asked about PvP and asked me to demonstrate. The kid had been dinged from 2 groups for having a squeaky voice, I guess, so I felt bad and did a few matches where I was horribly slaughtered. My play time is too precious to squander it in PvP in Neverwinter, though.

The LFG system is a lot like Mabar, you queue up and get assigned a random party. I don't care for that, but I have participated in a few and it's no worse than Mabar. But it's been a long time since I got much use out of DDO's LFG either, mostly I group out of my guild or friends list. What's nice, though, and what is leading me to try grouping a bit more, is that I'm not hopelessly weaker than the average group.

The 3 economies isn't bad, I've made my peace with DDO's TP, AD(/AS), Plat, FRDS, TPCode economy, so Z,AD,G is actually a bit easier. And unlike DDO, the Zen/AD exchange goes both ways which is awesome. It would be nice if you could directly trade AD between players, but you can't trade AS in DDO so I can't really count that against them.

And as for the destroyed economy, it wasn't that bad. I was expecting a disaster too (remember when you could buy dowsing rods for gold doubloons and sell them for 12500 Plat?), but they actually showed some spine and dealt with the exploiters with a firm hand. I was expecting a 3 day ban slap response like Turbine's after the Challange +3 tome generators, or the trade bound in bag exploit(s?), but Neverwinter actually permanently banned accounts, tracked down exploit gains, and did a server rollback. Everything was back to normal in a couple of weeks. They even handed out gift packs and an apology to everybody who was on and didn't exploit. Yeah they got a load of lemons, but they made some decent lemonade!

I do see a money grab, but it's a lot smaller than Turbine's! I can't buy +4 stat tomes, Stones of Experience, or Spell Point Potions from Neverwinter. My gaming experience is subsidized by a bunch of kids buying keys? That's nothing! Neverwinter's money grab isn't nearly as effective as DDO's, either. My guild has spent well over $1000USD on DDO, and $20 on Neverwinter (and that has been spent only on character slots).

I'm not bashing Turbine over the money grab, I only point it out to put the Neverwinter grab in perspective. I'm happy to spend money on a service I'm using, it's how they stay in business.

Asking why people enjoy it is a great question. DDO would be foolish to try to imitate Neverwinter, but there are certainly some lessons to be learned. And getting a better understanding of your customer base, and how to please them, would be a profitable lesson indeed. I truly do like the 3.5 rules better than the 4.0 rules and I'd love to see DDO move in a direction that pleased both hard core and casual gamers. Maybe if more people asked those questions such a path could be found.

[Ausdoerrt]

Asking why people enjoy it is a great question. DDO would be foolish to try to imitate Neverwinter, but there are certainly some lessons to be learned. And getting a better understanding of your customer base, and how to please them, would be a profitable lesson indeed. I truly do like the 3.5 rules better than the 4.0 rules and I'd love to see DDO move in a direction that pleased both hard core and casual gamers. Maybe if more people asked those questions such a path could be found.

Well, except DDO has been anything but 3.5 lately... Moving towards 4.0 at a fast pace with every new update.