Earning Hearts of Wood - post U20

[LrdSlvrhnd]

There's active discussion here at Turbine about the binding status of Commendations of Valor.

We're of course happy to hear feedback on all aspects of Reincarnation or other upcoming changes, but if you have specific thoughts on whether you'd prefer BtA Commendations or a cheaper price for Heroic True Hearts of Wood, please let us know here in this thread!

BtA. Always BtA. If BtC is ever suggested for *anything*, the person should be slapped with a wet noodle. BtC needs to Go Away. Period, end of discussion. If I get something on character A, I should be able to give it to character B who can actually use it. They're both MY characters. They're both ME. There is no reason why just because I got lucky on character A, character B should suffer.

Additionally, Comms of Valor should drop in chests, like Tokens. Ideally, you'd rename Tokens of the Twelve back to Epic Dungeon Tokens and rename the Comms Epic Dungeon Tokens and combine the two, or rename Tokens of the Twelve to Comms of Valor and combine the two, or have some way to convert between the two. But Comms should drop in the end chests. You should not be required to run Sagas to get them. That makes Sagas no longer a "bonus", that makes Sagas a requirement. Keep them in the Saga rewards, sure. But have them drop in the chests as well. Let me have the actual *choice* of end rewards. Let me take the renown for my, basically, two-person guild. Let me take the Upgrade Tome of Actually Useful Skill if I want. Let me take the XP to give an off-ED a booster shot. Let me have the choice.

[PNellesen]

What does Turbine believe are legitimate reasons for BtC Commendations of Valor?

I think it's blindingly obvious what the driving reason for this is, especially given the fact that the only quests (that I have seen mentioned, at least) that will no longer drop tokens after U20 goes live also just happen to be the only F2P way to get them.

[SisAmethyst]

A dozen more sagas would be a bit much in my opinion. Some people have suggested making each house chain into a saga, but since they are already chains that would seem a bit redundant to me.

Necro 1-4 is the most obvious candidate, except that they don't have epic content. I'm thinking that they don't want to make sagas that are heroic only.

How about a saga that encompassed all of the house quest packs? That's 4 relatively short chains. Carnival, sentinels, fens, and von. If people say they are not connected, well i don't really see that much connection between some of the quests in the Sagas they have now.

Well, as far as I understand the saga overspan an global story arc, like as at the end of Waterwork you get a hint to look for STK and so on, or the Droam quest chains from the Plaza...
Before the Devs even consider to making Saga the main source to earn commendations/tokens or whatever to buy a heart, then they should create a lot more of those Sagas, which on the other hand make it a lot more confusing with all those NPCs. So the second thing they should think of is a system to be able to track progress independent of thousand of NPCs where you may even not know where they all hide.

Independently of that currently the Sagas are optional enough to skip entire Sagas if not needed but still make the reward interesting enough to at least check if one can finish them one or a second time.

...

I can't tell you how long twelve tokens will be the "preferred method".
I would like to see it cleaned it up as a system, consolidate the items, get the right balance, etc. But not at the detriment of people enjoying the game. ...or excluding content.

Thank you for continuing to give us opinions, examples of how you play are also useful feedback tools. We'll keep working on the communication flow.

I guess the majority of the players not really have an issue if you start to create one single way to earn those. However you can't switch to a half ready system, with which I mean there are just not enough sagas to turn the wheel around. Also I wouldn't create this the single way to retrieve them because that would kill it for all casual players that just can't finish those sagas, especially when most of them are in the higher level content. Also it invalidates the other reward of the Saga as the only chance is to farm the hell out of them and take always the comms instead.

Also having to run the Sagas too often mean you most likely have outleveld most Sagas faster then you can say Amen, even thou your goal may have just been to get to level 20 and TR nearly right away...

[Gwyxxx]

There's active discussion here at Turbine about the binding status of Commendations of Valor.

This is what we are tentatively moving to for the next Lamannia preview (which is decided days ahead of time, so the conversation is likely to keep moving and Lamannia will be out of date by then):

Heroic True Heart of Wood: Costs 250 Commendations of Valor
Binds to Character on Acquire

This is not what we intend to ship with. However, we need to decide on whether to lower the cost should or change the Commendations to be Bind to Account instead of Character. (Or potentially both, as the exact cost is still under discussion, but for simplicity I'm pretending it's one or the other right now.)

If the Commendations are BtA, we expect that most Commendations will be farmed by level-cap characters and passed to other characters, and that they will be earned much faster than if the Commendations are BtC and earned by lower level characters. We also believe there are legitimate reasons for both choices and why one or the other is better for gameplay or fun, many of which have been expressed by various players recently.

We're of course happy to hear feedback on all aspects of Reincarnation or other upcoming changes, but if you have specific thoughts on whether you'd prefer BtA Commendations or a cheaper price for Heroic True Hearts of Wood, please let us know here in this thread!

Know the prices of other hearts would be nice.
Anyway is not really fair if now we can have 2000/40* = 1/50 part of heart in a quest and now 250/3 = 1/83 part of a heart.
* medium quantity of fragment in a quest

We can borrow this, I imagine, but is not fair.
BTA is important because it gives more space to sperimentation.
If i want to prove a strange build, a build for fun, or whatever i want, i know that in the worst case, i must go up to twenty and then go to TR and forget the pain of that wrong build. Now... i go to twenty and i cant farm with an high and good character the Heart for the Bad One?
How many Character will be abandoned just for this?
I'm a paranoic person so i will have ALLWAYSS the second heart for escape plan, but... I don't like it. Really.

[patang01]

There's active discussion here at Turbine about the binding status of Commendations of Valor.

This is what we are tentatively moving to for the next Lamannia preview (which is decided days ahead of time, so the conversation is likely to keep moving and Lamannia will be out of date by then):

Heroic True Heart of Wood: Costs 250 Commendations of Valor
Binds to Character on Acquire

This is not what we intend to ship with. However, we need to decide on whether to lower the cost should or change the Commendations to be Bind to Account instead of Character. (Or potentially both, as the exact cost is still under discussion, but for simplicity I'm pretending it's one or the other right now.)

If the Commendations are BtA, we expect that most Commendations will be farmed by level-cap characters and passed to other characters, and that they will be earned much faster than if the Commendations are BtC and earned by lower level characters. We also believe there are legitimate reasons for both choices and why one or the other is better for gameplay or fun, many of which have been expressed by various players recently.

We're of course happy to hear feedback on all aspects of Reincarnation or other upcoming changes, but if you have specific thoughts on whether you'd prefer BtA Commendations or a cheaper price for Heroic True Hearts of Wood, please let us know here in this thread!

And who cares? I mean seriously. You want us to jump on this silly hamster wheel of forcing us to run quests we absolutely don't want to run, leveling karma in off destinies and there's an actual worry that we might do it too fast? And you say that with straight face about to sell Otto's boxes that just level you with timer resets in there so anyone dumb enough to swipe the CC can get to maximum TR as quick as they can click.

It's like you're missing the entire point here. How fast is not the issue. To punish people to run EN content because they're in a off destiny or not multi-TR or whatever misses the entire big picture about what BTC means overall to a player willing to pay for the entertainment.

This is not a philosophical question of 'time balance'. This is a question about treating customers as if you're selling them a product they want. If you're willing to lose customer over this 'concern' so be it, but don't pretend a month or two down the road that we didn't warn you.

What 'we' want is a system where we have the freedom to do whatever we want with our time. And you forcing us to feed that time and energy over artificial constrictions limits that freedom. BTA, off destiny leveling and absurd Valor turn in are things that lose you money.

If you don't think so then look at the Eveningstar challenge system and how few that played it when the mats were BTC and the turn in requirements artificially high. I mean if you don't learn over the years from your mistakes you will never do it.

Now here's the thing.

People that run EE will still do so, usually in TR or guild groups. If they're in a so so guy or a super guy that won't change it. Most lfms are going to be EN or EH with so so toons or great toons. And most quests takes x amount of minutes to do - the only difference is the amount of Valor a saga provides. Just figure out something like 20 quests worth to do a HR (EH) and maybe double that for Iconic and Epic. That's a reasonable target. Skip worrying about BTC since the amount of time I spend on X guy turns out to be about the same on Y (guess what - most people are about set habits in our play then anything else).

[rayworks]

You realize what you highlighted is actually how it works in game already.
When you turn in your tokens for wood it DOES bind to that character. It is the tokens that are not BTC.

As for on lama, when you understand how builds work you realize that it isn't stupid, just the nature of the beast.

Yes, I highlighted poorly. Excuse me. And I understand how builds work. They work badly because the devs make it that way.

[patang01]

roughly 3 Commendations per quest

You know that the real issue is having to complete sagas, not the new currency? See if this was your plan you could've easily rolled it out for all epic quests. With maybe something like an average of 17 as a bonus for finishing a Saga. That way we could still just do things like we've always done. Now you removed the incentive to take anything but Valor in the end of a saga and you're forcing us to run stuff we don't want.

Had this been the actual end goal - that all epic quests drop some valor the occupation and all the grief would more or less never happened.

This was entirely self inflicted and about as customer oriented as a sharp stick in the eye for most players.

[SisAmethyst]

BtA. Always BtA. If BtC is ever suggested for *anything*, the person should be slapped with a wet noodle. BtC needs to Go Away. Period, end of discussion. If I get something on character A, I should be able to give it to character B who can actually use it. They're both MY characters. They're both ME. There is no reason why just because I got lucky on character A, character B should suffer.

Additionally, Comms of Valor should drop in chests, like Tokens. Ideally, you'd rename Tokens of the Twelve back to Epic Dungeon Tokens and rename the Comms Epic Dungeon Tokens and combine the two, or rename Tokens of the Twelve to Comms of Valor and combine the two, or have some way to convert between the two. But Comms should drop in the end chests. You should not be required to run Sagas to get them. That makes Sagas no longer a "bonus", that makes Sagas a requirement. Keep them in the Saga rewards, sure. But have them drop in the chests as well. Let me have the actual *choice* of end rewards. Let me take the renown for my, basically, two-person guild. Let me take the Upgrade Tome of Actually Useful Skill if I want. Let me take the XP to give an off-ED a booster shot. Let me have the choice.

I second this, especially the players that do TR and ask for more bank space is due to too much BtC items.

Also I agree that Epic Dungeon Tokens have a huge advantage over Comms as we can get also Token Fragments while we surely will not be able to get Comm fragments. Also why creating another new thing when there is already a mechanic in place, which just has to be enabled for all the other epic Quests. Then just give the option to earn more Tokens at the end of the Saga, so we have the choice to farm them inside the Quest, or get them faster together by taking them on the Saga reward.

[Cyr]

This is not the number we are expecting at all, despite how often this is quoted, and feel this has misinformed some player's expectations. This is partially why we tried to clarify earning progress in multiple sagas at the same time. Our estimates are for roughly 3 Commendations per quest after looking at the overlapping quests in Forgotten Realms, played on Epic Hard.


This is also why we're actively looking at different ways to earn Commendations of Valor, though we can't promise specifics for U20 at this time. That is part of why we aren't touching Tokens of the Twelve for U20, either.

So at 3 comms per EH quest you would need to run ~83 quests on EH in sagas to get a heart...just a normal run of the mill heart. I will presume you still think that epic hearts should require ~2 times more comms so those would require ~166 quests on Eh in sagas. You would also be forgoing the XP rewards/tomes/renown from those sagas lets call it 8-9 saga completions or 16-17 for the epic heart of xp rewards...so a couple million xp or so...

That sounds like an incredible grind oriented system which funnels people into a limited amount of content.

It is also MUCH longer then the current way of earning hearts with the epic hearts being that much worse if the 2:1 ratio continues to be the case.

Worst system design ever.

[oradafu]

I guess the majority of the players not really have an issue if you start to create one single way to earn those. However you can't switch to a half ready system, with which I mean there are just not enough sagas to turn the wheel around. Also I wouldn't create this the single way to retrieve them because that would kill it for all casual players that just can't finish those sagas, especially when most of them are in the higher level content. Also it invalidates the other reward of the Saga as the only chance is to farm the hell out of them and take always the comms instead.

Also having to run the Sagas too often mean you most likely have outleveld most Sagas faster then you can say Amen, even thou your goal may have just been to get to level 20 and TR nearly right away...

You are partially wrong.

I think the majority of players don't want Sagas to be the SOLE source of HoV. Many of us don't want to run a chain of quests that contain a quest or quests that we loathe running (which every chain has so far, and I foresee every chain in the future). If Sagas were an additional source for HoV that provide more than usual amount of HoV and didn't make players choose between HoV and other end rewards, then it would be fine. But that's not what we are getting. In fact, the Devs have turned Sagas into a force mechanic for players, instead of what it was originally pitched as, a source for additional goodies for running a chain of quests. What the Devs have decided to do with Sagas is not to make it an additional source to get goodies, but the ONLY source to get certain goodies.

[relenttless]

There's active discussion here at Turbine about the binding status of Commendations of Valor.

This is what we are tentatively moving to for the next Lamannia preview (which is decided days ahead of time, so the conversation is likely to keep moving and Lamannia will be out of date by then):

Heroic True Heart of Wood: Costs 250 Commendations of Valor
Binds to Character on Acquire

This is not what we intend to ship with. However, we need to decide on whether to lower the cost should or change the Commendations to be Bind to Account instead of Character. (Or potentially both, as the exact cost is still under discussion, but for simplicity I'm pretending it's one or the other right now.)

If the Commendations are BtA, we expect that most Commendations will be farmed by level-cap characters and passed to other characters, and that they will be earned much faster than if the Commendations are BtC and earned by lower level characters. We also believe there are legitimate reasons for both choices and why one or the other is better for gameplay or fun, many of which have been expressed by various players recently.

We're of course happy to hear feedback on all aspects of Reincarnation or other upcoming changes, but if you have specific thoughts on whether you'd prefer BtA Commendations or a cheaper price for Heroic True Hearts of Wood, please let us know here in this thread!

Why are you bothering having ANY debate over whether Comms are BtA or BtC?

There is only one viable solution which will keep a large quantities of your best, long-standing, revenue-providing, expansion-buying, PAYING customers playing this game, and that is making comms BtA.

If you have any genuine intentions to make them BtC then I suggest you tell us now, and stop wasting everyone's time, so we can all go and find another game/hobby, and you guys can start looking for new jobs.

By the way, it is not my intention here to be flippant, I am deadly serious.

[Zibowskij]

There's active discussion here at Turbine about the binding status of Commendations of Valor.

This is what we are tentatively moving to for the next Lamannia preview (which is decided days ahead of time, so the conversation is likely to keep moving and Lamannia will be out of date by then):

Heroic True Heart of Wood: Costs 250 Commendations of Valor
Binds to Character on Acquire

This is not what we intend to ship with. However, we need to decide on whether to lower the cost should or change the Commendations to be Bind to Account instead of Character. (Or potentially both, as the exact cost is still under discussion, but for simplicity I'm pretending it's one or the other right now.)

If the Commendations are BtA, we expect that most Commendations will be farmed by level-cap characters and passed to other characters, and that they will be earned much faster than if the Commendations are BtC and earned by lower level characters. We also believe there are legitimate reasons for both choices and why one or the other is better for gameplay or fun, many of which have been expressed by various players recently.

We're of course happy to hear feedback on all aspects of Reincarnation or other upcoming changes, but if you have specific thoughts on whether you'd prefer BtA Commendations or a cheaper price for Heroic True Hearts of Wood, please let us know here in this thread!

commendations should be BTA
At the same time, either increase comm drops by A LOT or decrease the cost for the hearts by a lot.
the costs and drops u see on the forums were posted as a screenshot, so it's not like we made them up.
Sorry for being blunt but this has been going on for too long IMO. One peice of advice: next time you want to change something this big let us know first. We'll have a chance to discuss it before and you won't have to read all these angry posts

[Vargouille]

Thank you for taking the time to converse with us, and listening to our feedback.

Thanks to everyone for their feedback!

I understand the big message is that "the grind isn't so bad - you can get the same credit for multiple sagas!" Let us imagine someone owns all of the FR content. A player can begin with the Lords of Dust arc, getting credit for "The End of Eberron" saga, and upon reaching the Rift, start progress toward "The Chosen of Mystra" as well. Then begins your travel in FR - you start getting credit for "Perils of Cormyr" and "Menace of the Underdark" sagas as you battle your way to protect eveningstar. You complete both "Menace" and "The End" sagas, but since you already have "Perils" and "Chosen" progress, you do other quests to finish them out - and in doing so, pick up progress for "Honor of the Huntsilver." You battle your way through all of the quests, and turn in for your rewards. You have done 36 quests without repeating a single one, but now you have credit for those different sagas, granting:

- The End of Eberron - 11 Quests, 33 CoV
- Menace of the Underdark - 13 Quests, 39 CoV
- Perils of Cormyr - 25 Quests, 75 CoV
- The Chosen of Mystra - 11 Quests, 33 CoV
- Honor of the Huntsilver - 16 Quests, 48 CoV

Total - 228 CoV in just one run, with all the favors and without having to repeat a single quests.

Thanks for showing this math. We do understand there are still concerns here.

The problem is, players do not want to do this. There are several issues with this plan.
- First off, not everyone has all of the content.

- Second, some of those who have it, do not enjoy it.

- Third, from what I have seen, most people want to perform heroic TR ASAP, without having to delve into Epic levels; the latter sagas are Lv 24 range on heroic I believe, which forces people to perform a significant dedication to Epic levels.

- Fourth, it narrows what you can play, rather then encourages a variety. You can only get credit from saga quests, and only once per saga; if there is a quest you want to play repeatedly, you have to slog through other quests before you can get credit for the one you like again.

- Fifth, it removes an existing, functional system in order to replace it with a longer grind time unless you have "optimal" content. There are plenty of partial or half-functioning systems that players would absolutely love see improved upon, rather then distressing an existing, working one.

Thank you for this well written and enumerated feedback, amongst many others. We are continuing to follow along and consider different changes.

[SisAmethyst]

...
If the Commendations are BtA, we expect that most Commendations will be farmed by level-cap characters and passed to other characters, and that they will be earned much faster than if the Commendations are BtC and earned by lower level characters. We also believe there are legitimate reasons for both choices and why one or the other is better for gameplay or fun, many of which have been expressed by various players recently...

And what is the issue if I pass the heart down to an other character? Maybe my gimp character just made it to level 20 and has a hard time in the epic content. So instead to destroy it I decide to reincarnate the character to make it better which I just manage by completing the phiarlan chain over and over again. Also despite the fact that I want to have the option, how many players really pass down the heart from one to an other? Also if someone doesn't like sushi but prefer ham pizza you can throw him as much sushi at him as you want he will still prefer his ham pizza. The same goes for how players tend to run quests and which quest they choose.

[Vargouille]

Your previous question about binding status was clearly missing the point. We don't care a whit if the hearts are bound or not; they're BTC on live fer cryin out loud. We care about the ingredient used to purchase hearts. THAT is what needs to be BTA, not the heart.

My apologies for being unclear. I was only meaning to discuss the binding of the commendations at all points in my post.

[Ayseifn]

Can we get a vendor to trade these CoVs to for say level 28 augments or maybe even something not in the store? Right now the long term opportunity cost of them is XP while leveling, if people sit a cap to get raid completions or to farm up some other gear then taking those CoVs is a no brainer. Tokens of the Twelve were nice back in the day because I could buy a heart to TR or slot a nice item.

[Qhualor]

sagas were well received as an option for bonus rewards with the option to skip 1 or 2 or more quests we don't like. now its being forced on us as the only way in game to reincarnate, when token trade in phases out. as a result, this is how the players react. now players are actually going to hate sagas. well done.

[SisAmethyst]

You are partially wrong.

I think the majority of players don't want Sagas to be the SOLE source of HoV. Many of us don't want to run a chain of quests that contain a quest or quests that we loathe running (which every chain has so far, and I foresee every chain in the future). If Sagas were an additional source for HoV that provide more than usual amount of HoV and didn't make players choose between HoV and other end rewards, then it would be fine. But that's not what we are getting. In fact, the Devs have turned Sagas into a force mechanic for players, instead of what it was originally pitched as, a source for additional goodies for running a chain of quests. What the Devs have decided to do with Sagas is not to make it an additional source to get goodies, but the ONLY source to get certain goodies.

You understood me wrong! I don't mean Sagas to be the SOLE source but having ONE System to turn in, no matter if it is named 'epic token' or 'commendation'.

[Violith]

hmm, So while on the topic of saga's, we're able to donate shards to bypass a quest in a saga. I havent really checked the saga's since they went down, and did it once before then. yet it is preventing me from skipping the last quest I need. keeps saying Ive already skipped the maximum number of quests allowed, yet I havent skipped any quests in the current saga, I did skip the quest the first time I ran it, but it went down before I could skip the quest again to finsih it a second time. is this supposed to be done once ever? or did it just bug for me somehow?

[FranOhmsford]

What.. on...earth..

If you aren't expecting that number, why has it persisted on the test server for *days* despite this outrage against it? :/
You pulled a number out of somewhere, and it's wrong. The player-base calls for it to be changed. Show us a new number please?

If you want 3 Commendations per quest - AWARD US 3 COMMENDATIONS AT THE END OF EACH QUEST >.> The answer is right there.
Now how many quests per Heart? Let's say 25.
And Boom.
75 Comms for a Heart. I've done the math for you? Tweak as needed

Just award the Comms only once per day per quest (Say, tie it into the 20% daily exp bonus?) - and there you have the quest diversity that you claim is the key part of this..?

The Perfect Reply - Turbine this is what we want!


And again I will say btw that - You make me choose between TRing and Guild Renown and I will take the Renown every single time!
I will therefore NOT TR and will put far less money into this game!
Once I hit a point where I no longer need to worry about Guild Renown i.e. Lvl 66 I will play less as there will be nothing left for me to do.
Soon after that I will become one of those people who logs in from time to time {maybe once a month if you're lucky!} but at that point I will have dropped my VIP too!

The ONLY reason I run Elite at Level is Because that is the ONLY way to Earn Guild Renown - Once I have My guild to Lvl 66 I will be able to go back to how I actually ENJOYED playing this game!

STOP Pandering to the 1%!
STOP with the "Only Elite Uber Builds get anywhere" Mentality!
REMEMBER THE CASUALS!

And yes I am a Casual Player despite the fact that Until Saturday just gone I'd played virtually every single day for an average of 6-8hrs per day for 3 YEARS!
I've Been VIP for Over TWO!
I have TWO More Accounts for which I've spent Real Money!
I put on average £20 per Fortnight into DDO on TOP of my VIP! {Much more when you factor in Expansions etc.}
And you want to Drive me away?
REALLY?