Saving DDO, The New Forgotten Realms Era.

[Ungood]

Ok.

I know, I know, there have been a million and one ideas on how to "save" DDO, and they often look like a spiral into depravity from bad to worse to things that really should not have been thunked up, but, before you all get the torches and pitch forks, just hear me out on this.

I present:

"The New Forgotten Realms Era"

The idea is simple, Turbine makes it so that any character can start at level 1 in either FR or Ebberon, and I am not talking that Hall of Heros stuff, I am talking, you make either a FR Character OR an Ebberon Character.

No, what I am proposing is a whole separate environment for Forgotten Realms, away from the Monty Haul and other problems of Ebberon.

Ok, So now you might be wondering: How does it work?

I works like this. The story for players that enter into the Forgotten Realms setting, is that it is 100 years in the future from when the Ebberon Heros defeated Lolth. Ana is passed away as an old woman, or moved off to be with Elimister, and things have gone by, life has returned to normal in the village of Eveningstar, and all that remains of Ebberon in the small village is the stories of these other world hero that have long since gone back to their home world, now that the threat has been averted.

The Drow, now defeated (Mostly), their power broken (Mostly) and their Goddess banished (Mostly) are not causing any current problems, and have been naught but a bad memory for most, and the stories that children get told to scare them.

Lo and Behold, an Orc Uprising has begin in Kings Forest, and there are reports of Undead in the Prison of Weloon, now, is the time for you, now if your moment to show the world what you are made of, clinging to the heroics of the stories of the Ebberon Heros, people from the village rise up to fight these problems, (You) among them, and now is your chance to carve your name in the history books.

So, here is how it works.

The setting is Low Magic, Almost Zero Loot.

There would be no Vendors for Potions, no buying stacks of scrolls and all kinds of stuff. None of that.

Loot Gen, would rare drop only, and be defaulted back to the old style of Loot gen, no deadly, no Ghost Bane, no Tiers I - X, just the normal stuff we all recall from the books.

No Slots, No Augments, just, good old school style DnD type loot.

Most chests being nothing but potions, scrolls, and coinage, with some sprinkling of 'collectibles' because we gotta have red and green bag usage. There would be vendors that would trade in collectibles for potions and scrolls and such.

This, players would have to put in some real effort to build their toons, to get decent gear.

All named items from the FR "packs" would be BtC, and exclusive.

Ok, now, this we set the stage, a real feeling of FR, low magic, low gear drops, a real challenge to get what you are looking for, and it would function like Snowy Side Krothos, you can leave, but you can't come back.

So how would you leave?

Simple enough, you could take the Hall of Hero's to Ebbron, that would port you 100 years in the past, back to the Ebberon Era, Or you could Level to 20th, and then take the "Epic Level Walk the Rift" back to the Ebberon Time to face Lolth. (Think "Beyond the Rift" in reverse)

But this would be required if a player wanted to progress past level 20, as epic levels would not exist in this old style Forgotten Realms, that would be reserved to the world of Ebberon.

Now, there would only be 2 ways to get into the Forgotten Realms Era, that would start a New Toon, or TR.

But, if you TR'ed, you would not have access to your TR bank, as that would be 100 years in the past, and in Ebberon, and the rift to FR had been closed, so they could move your stuff to the New FR Era. Only once you return to Ebberon do you get access to your TR bank. (Just like Snowy Side)

This way, some people really could enjoy FR without the taint of Ebberon all over it, the stupid powerful loot gen, the insane amount of magic and abundance thrown all over the place.

This would be old School, This would be Forgotten Realms as players remembered it, when a Flaming sword was cherished, and +1 Full Plate was rocking the scene.

I think this would really revitalize the game for a lot of new players, players who want to give it a go, but don't want to have to try and keep up with the several year vet who is by this point is insanely powerful and has enough raid gear and epic items to bury a small town.

Such is my idea to fix that, to return to the basics, without hurting anyone else's game.

Nothing changes for the existing game, all that is, would be as it is, more content could be added, Ebberon packs, and FR packs, each in their own time.

It would make for a great "expansion" that would feel like an Expansion.

[Trillea]

Ok.

I know, I know, there have been a million and one ideas on how to "save" DDO, and they often look like a spiral into depravity from bad to worse to things that really should not have been thunked up, but, before you all get the torches and pitch forks, just hear me out on this.

I present:

"The New Forgotten Realms Era"

The idea is simple, Turbine makes it so that any character can start at level 1 in either FR or Ebberon, and I am not talking that Hall of Heros stuff, I am talking, you make either a FR Character OR an Ebberon Character.

No, what I am proposing is a whole separate environment for Forgotten Realms, away from the Monty Haul and other problems of Ebberon.

Ok, So now you might be wondering: How does it work?

I works like this. The story for players that enter into the Forgotten Realms setting, is that it is 100 years in the future from when the Ebberon Heros defeated Lolth. Ana is passed away as an old woman, or moved off to be with Elimister, and things have gone by, life has returned to normal in the village of Eveningstar, and all that remains of Ebberon in the small village is the stories of these other world hero that have long since gone back to their home world, now that the threat has been averted.

The Drow, now defeated (Mostly), their power broken (Mostly) and their Goddess banished (Mostly) are not causing any current problems, and have been naught but a bad memory for most, and the stories that children get told to scare them.

Lo and Behold, an Orc Uprising has begin in Kings Forest, and there are reports of Undead in the Prison of Weloon, now, is the time for you, now if your moment to show the world what you are made of, clinging to the heroics of the stories of the Ebberon Heros, people from the village rise up to fight these problems, (You) among them, and now is your chance to carve your name in the history books.

So, here is how it works.

The setting is Low Magic, Almost Zero Loot.

There would be no Vendors for Potions, no buying stacks of scrolls and all kinds of stuff. None of that.

Loot Gen, would rare drop only, and be defaulted back to the old style of Loot gen, no deadly, no Ghost Bane, no Tiers I - X, just the normal stuff we all recall from the books.

No Slots, No Augments, just, good old school style DnD type loot.

Most chests being nothing but potions, scrolls, and coinage, with some sprinkling of 'collectibles' because we gotta have red and green bag usage. There would be vendors that would trade in collectibles for potions and scrolls and such.

This, players would have to put in some real effort to build their toons, to get decent gear.

All named items from the FR "packs" would be BtC, and exclusive.

Ok, now, this we set the stage, a real feeling of FR, low magic, low gear drops, a real challenge to get what you are looking for, and it would function like Snowy Side Krothos, you can leave, but you can't come back.

So how would you leave?

Simple enough, you could take the Hall of Hero's to Ebbron, that would port you 100 years in the past, back to the Ebberon Era, Or you could Level to 20th, and then take the "Epic Level Walk the Rift" back to the Ebberon Time to face Lolth. (Think "Beyond the Rift" in reverse)

But this would be required if a player wanted to progress past level 20, as epic levels would not exist in this old style Forgotten Realms, that would be reserved to the world of Ebberon.

Now, there would only be 2 ways to get into the Forgotten Realms Era, that would start a New Toon, or TR.

But, if you TR'ed, you would not have access to your TR bank, as that would be 100 years in the past, and in Ebberon, and the rift to FR had been closed, so they could move your stuff to the New FR Era. Only once you return to Ebberon do you get access to your TR bank. (Just like Snowy Side)

This way, some people really could enjoy FR without the taint of Ebberon all over it, the stupid powerful loot gen, the insane amount of magic and abundance thrown all over the place.

This would be old School, This would be Forgotten Realms as players remembered it, when a Flaming sword was cherished, and +1 Full Plate was rocking the scene.

I think this would really revitalize the game for a lot of new players, players who want to give it a go, but don't want to have to try and keep up with the several year vet who is by this point is insanely powerful and has enough raid gear and epic items to bury a small town.

Such is my idea to fix that, to return to the basics, without hurting anyone else's game.

Nothing changes for the existing game, all that is, would be as it is, more content could be added, Ebberon packs, and FR packs, each in their own time.

It would make for a great "expansion" that would feel like an Expansion.

I understand this, I really do. Unfortunately I don't think it would work. For one, FR is just as Monty Hall as Ebberon per canon - you never know when that farmer over the hill is a retired adventurer with a magic ring of 2 wishes (he used 1 wish to retire). If you want a low-magic, low-loot setting I think that Darksun would be a more proper setting, and good luck getting that IP.

As for wanting a low-magic campaign it doesn't work too well in a MMO setting. The characters HAVE to be powerful to be able to overcome a dungeon with a halfway decent mob density, unless you want to spend hours in empty corridors (which I would understand but it puts you in a severe minority of the playerbase). I know and understand the "wanting to get back the feel of D&D" but that ship sailed its last when they took away the XP debt for death.

I wish that I was on the dev team now or back then, but especially back then. They made some significant fundamental mistakes when they started this game which have ended up snowballing to the overwhelmingly-inflated monster stats that we see today. But the past is the past, and nothing short of a brand new game would be enough to do it.

[Catteras]

Remember Turbine laid off devs. They don't have the manpower to code an entirely new game with tons of entirely new quests as you seem to be suggesting. (Not that Turbine ever had that manpower anytime recently)

Low magic. Low loot. Count me out. That reminds me of a tabletop session where the DM made us roleplay crossing a river. It took us 30 minutes to work out the details of how to cross it. Most boring 30 minutes of my life...

[Impaqt]

o.O

um.. no.

cant imagine that scenario holding my attention for muych more than 10 or 15 minutes.

[Memnir]

This would not save DDO.

[Teh_Troll]

LOLz . . . low loot.

[Ungood]

This would not save DDO.

I will respectfully disagree.

From what I have been reading, this is exactly what DDO needs, as it provides key functions and features:

1. a Place for new players to learn the game without needing to compete against vets.

• many of the reports and reviews on DDO, the largest problems with the game that get mentioned time and time again, are the veteran players, typically presented to downright hostile to new players or players that may not know what they are doing. This is a core problem that DDO is struggling with on many levels, as they really can't afford to alienate their core vet players but at the same time they can't afford to keep their vets at the cost of new players, thus I would wager is strong motive behind why the game seems to be continually moving in a Solo-Friendly manner.
  
  • But solo-friendly is not the solution, because people play MMO's to be social to start with.
  • So lets be real, they are not making the solo-friendly for the vets, unless we are to assume that we are all such deplorable people that we can't even get along with each other.
  • So, the improvements in making the game "accessible" are most likely focused on getting new people to enjoy the game, the signs are pretty painfully obvious really from:
    
    • Iconics (Hey start at 15th and get into the Epic Game faster where Gear is not the have all end all)
    • Look at this Powerful Loot Gen, it screams, "hey look, new people! You don't need to run raids, put up with jerks, or be in the right guild of power gamers to have good stuff".
    
    
  • Menace of the Under Dark petty much leveled the gear score of DDO, with very easy to get Epic Level gear and items, so much so that new players, and casuals could rival and match the years that vets spent getting gear, in a matter of days if not hours.
  
  
• The writing on the wall is pretty obvious when you look at it, what they are trying to do, what their problems are, and how can they go about fixing them. But like most game companies, they are going in the wrong direction.
  
  • They are throwing out easy to get loot for everyone. The goal of course with this is to level the playing field, to allow the new player and the vet to be equally geared, however this always a bad idea for any older game, as this often tends to **** off vets, because it makes the years they spent getting gear worthless. But the fact they are doing it, sends a clear message as how desperate they are, and how big the problem is.
  • Ghostbane. Come on, they openly admitted this was to make the game more accessible to new players.
  
  
• The problem is, these solutions never worked for older games and they are not going to work for DDO either. All that will happen is:
  
  • vets get jaded (Oh look, that is exactly what happened)
  • vets feel as if they are not appreciated (again, check to this too)
  • vets get annoyed and opt to move on (Well, attrition is going to happen, right?)
  • New players still don't flock to the game (We are not seeing surges in new players)
  
  
• So what solves the Problem?
• Letting new players, play the game at their own speed, solves the problem.
  
  • less gear, that way it's easy for them to look at it, because it's infrequent, they take the time to study it, see how it stacks up to what they are currently using.
  • Less "junk" this means, less things to distract a player, the game is simpler, the loot is easy to keep track of, and up grades are few and far between, so players can pay attention to what they have.
  • Less Power, slow power curve, As odd as this may sound, but power jumps only help the people who already have the know-how to handle them.
    
    • For those that have taken breaks in the game, when I come back in 6 months, I TR, because I don't remember what I was doing with that toon, what my build was, or why it worked, I TR, to re-learn the game, from level 1, and start a new build. It helps to smooth the transition back into playing again, and after a few weeks, I can jump on my other epic toons with an idea of what I am doing again.
    
    
  • Less competition. Nothing discourages someone faster then realizing how bad their toon is, except perhaps how much time and effort it may take to un-suck their toon. For vets who have been playing for years, we don't see 100 quests runs as a big deal, but I remember my first Shroud, I was like, Wow, I have to do this.. HOW MANY TIMES? I recall getting my first signet stone, and thinking, I am never making more then one of these. Thankfully, when I joined, it was during the F2P migration, and there were a lot of other new players, people who were in the same boat as me, people who I could lean on for support, who understood and banded together and we pulled on.
    
    • That time is past us now, it's random new player, there is not a great network of support, because often times a new player runs into some jerk vet and BAM, they are made to feel as if they do not belong here at all.

So yes, memnir, I think this is exactly what DDO needs, a place for new players to be new players, to meet up, and build each other up, before venturing into the "Big Boy" game, as opposed to being thrown into the deep end of the pool like they are now.

[MyraScott]

This would not save DDO.

+1

[Ungood]

+1

Not to be rude, but, you must be easily impressed. he offers no explanation, no ideas of his own, adds nothing to the discussion but curt negativity and you think that's worth a +1.

So, do you have a better idea?

I don't think you do, because, you know I have read quite a few ideas on this forums, but I'll give you a +1 if you can lay down one I have not heard before, that makes some kind of reasonable sense.

[Uska]

FR is more monty haul and overpowered than eberron ever dreamed of being not to mention completely and utterly boring and unoriginal. That said a separate game world wont save ddo and could likely speed its demise.

[redspecter23]

In my opinion, I think you have a great starting point for an idea, but you're really dead set on adding a low magic feel to it. That's your choice. I don't really see it gaining any steam that way, but I get that's what you want. Bending the game around a set of low magic rules like that appeals to such a small portion of the player base overall. This is already a niche game with a smallish, diminishing player base. Making content that many will have little interest in (not because the content is bad, but because the rules of the game are altered) is probably not a great money making move. Loot drives this game for many players.

The time travel/low level in the past concept is pure gold. They could reuse all the current dungeons in FR but lower the levels and populate them with lower level mobs if necessary to provide quests for low level players. Small amounts of tweaking to existing content opens up a world of new low level content. It's not really needed, but if there came a time they wanted to make FR a real 1-20 environment, it would be a good way to start it up.

[Ungood]

In my opinion, I think you have a great starting point for an idea, but you're really dead set on adding a low magic feel to it. That's your choice. I don't really see it gaining any steam that way, but I get that's what you want. Bending the game around a set of low magic rules like that appeals to such a small portion of the player base overall. This is already a niche game with a smallish, diminishing player base. Making content that many will have little interest in (not because the content is bad, but because the rules of the game are altered) is probably not a great money making move. Loot drives this game for many players.

As off the wall crazy as this is going to sound, the intention behind that is to make it less enticing to existing vets that enjoy the Ebberon setting, so they won't bring their 27th life, twinked out the crazy TR junkie toon into this setting, and new players (as well as perhaps some casuals or even players who want less convenience in their setting) can gather, and play a game.

I feel that this would be a good starting point for DDO to try and bring in more fresh blood, or a good introduction point, as a player who is starting the game, can at their choice, opt how they want to approach the game. Do they want to try and run against the 4+ year vets, who are running near god mode builds and gear, or do they want to perahps do level the playing field.

Most games make the mistake of trying to level the playing field by giving the new players a ton of easy to acquire powerful stuff so they can instantly be on par to the existing vets in the game as far as gear goes, this is a horrible mistake, and every game that does it, it never ends well... Never.

But sadly, it seems, that every game can't think to say "Well, what if we level the playing field, but giving them both nothing to start out with?"

DDO has the perfect set up to make this division too, with instance based gaming and dungeons, no one has to deal with anyone else, for anything. So making a setting that is designed around letting the new players learn the game, slow paced gear advancements, I would wager slow paced leveling, as there is no power house builds available, due to limited gear and items, a minimally coherence grouping set up as well.

Think about it, how many times have you thought to get a fiend into playing, but your character was so far more powerful then anything they could make, it made the whole thing be nothing more then them watching you kill everything while they sat on the sidelines, pretty much being bored out of their minds.

This fixes that.

The power gamers would never come to this setting, so you won't have zergers, and super players jumping into some newbs LFM, blitzing their quest, calling them names, and then dropping group telling them to learn to play noob.

Equally so, as a power gamer could tell some newb "Go spend some time playing the FR pre-game before trying to run with the big boys.. noob" you know, before the traditional kicking from the group and squelching them.

The best part is, the FR world would not need to be expanded, it's supposed to be for first life toons, if someone wants to TR there, well they can run the same dozen quests a hundred times to level, that might teach them to stay out.

The time travel/low level in the past concept is pure gold. They could reuse all the current dungeons in FR but lower the levels and populate them with lower level mobs if necessary to provide quests for low level players. Small amounts of tweaking to existing content opens up a world of new low level content. It's not really needed, but if there came a time they wanted to make FR a real 1-20 environment, it would be a good way to start it up.

Exactly!

Most of the content is there already, the forest, the maps, the quest hubs, all of it, built, so, mainly just a change in the monsters and flavor text, remove all the 20+ level gear (Like the PDK, War Wizards, Village Idoits, etc, etc,) stuff from the setting, and just have standard collectible turn in like how Goldskuttle would trade prayer beads for reptilian bane arrows and junk like that.

Instead of Drow, you have Orc's, goblins, hobgoblins, bugbears, drop some standard undead into a few of the other quests, nothing major, just, a neat little revamp of the level of what you are doing and the loot that drops.

In fact, you could even have double quests, like how Old epic worked, you would get FR Era and Ebberon Era quests in the FR setting, as opposed to Epic (as all the new FR quests would be 20+ in Ebberon Setting)

So yah, a lot of re-used content would be a major part of it all.

[SirValentine]

FR is more monty haul and overpowered than eberron ever dreamed of being...

Yes. I read the original post and wondered if he had some low-magic home-brew campaign that happened to have the same name. Because the official FR is a Monty Haul munchkin paradise.

...not to mention completely and utterly boring and unoriginal.

And that. Eberron, at least, is an interesting & distinct setting.

[Vellrad]

So, in order to save game from sinistrous threat hanging in the air of the forums (most mentioned thing is lack of low lvl pugs) game must be split into two entirely different games.
Brilliant!

[Vanquishedfo]

Yes. I read the original post and wondered if he had some low-magic home-brew campaign that happened to have the same name. Because the official FR is a Monty Haul munchkin paradise.



And that. Eberron, at least, is an interesting & distinct setting.

I believe the term you where looking for was mashed together and illogical. For most PnP D&D players the carefully created Multi verse honed through the decades is not something they enjoy seeing tossed out the window for the sake of trying to push a new magic punk setting on the game with 4E.

Eberoni remains the least interesting and least original setting ever made as all it does is steal creatures and concepts to mash together into an illogical amalgamation that has zero appeal to most dice chuckers.

Now Planescapes would of been a great setting, sigil in place of storm reach, still using doors and instances, but it would actually all make sense to walk through a door and find who knows what.

[Certon]

'Save' DDO? There is no saving it. Of the past three expansions, two have been terrible and one is marginal.

New game and item mechanics are virtually nonexistent. THIS is the bread and butter of an old game. A novel change to combat, or a revolutionary revamp to magic would also do wonders. Adding spells, prestige enhancements, new races, environmental immersion, and finishing the half-fixes to itemization. These would help heal the game.

But it's too late. They've pulled the plug. Now, they are just waiting to see how long it takes for the patient to die--

[die]

The Sundering- R.A Salvatore, and 6 other Authors ? Are as we speak destroying Forgotten Realms, Here soon WOTC will have a new brush in which too paint .

[Talon_Moonshadow]

DDO needs saving?

[Ungood]

The reality is, this was not for me at all.

I have several TR's and I enjoy the feeling of being able to chew though a dungeon with my eyes closed and just destroy stuff, it's why I keep TRing every now and then, as Epic gets stale as it's rather tedium to not be able to chew though it like I can Heroic content.

However, there are a lot of people who enjoy the DnD Setting, more precisely, the Forgotten Realms setting where heros were not wearing +10 Retributive VII Plane Forged Full Plate of Fortification 110%, and are not using +7 Flaming IV Great Axes of Ghostbane IX.

They want to relive the books where the hero has a single named weapon by level 10 while still in mitheral chain, and happy about it.

I would like to say, the fact that some of you are turned off by this setting is exactly what I am looking for, as this is not about fan service to the vets, quite the opposite actually, it's about making the game more appealing to new players that don't want to walk into a world of existing super-players.

[Cardoor]

I would like to say, the fact that some of you are turned off by this setting is exactly what I am looking for, as this is not about fan service to the vets, quite the opposite actually, it's about making the game more appealing to new players that don't want to walk into a world of existing super-players.

I think your suggestions would be better for a new game instead of trying to squeeze them into the current game... it seemed like that much of a leap to me as I read your OP. For example, you suggested that Eberron be the setting for Epic levels, but when nearly every epic level quest is already in the FR, that would be a pretty big change.

Additionally, even though I like the idea of low level FR quests and players having the option of playing either setting, there is currently a somewhat plausible bridge between them. The way you described your idea it sounded more like two seperate games (being able to TR seemed like the only connection).

Ultimately, having the option to self-impose gear limitations or to in contrast use the best items you can slot is better IMHO than imposing one style of gameplay (low magic for example).

DDO already has what it needs to save itself - DnD. When I feel like I am playing DnD, then I am having too much fun to care about my end-game status. I have still never gotten the ingredients to craft the epic Mirror Cloak (which is obviously a very outdated goal), but I love playing the Partycrasher quest because I feel like I am playing DnD.