Monster Champion Feedback

[Impaqt]

No actually the turning off of champions in Elite has nothing to do with bravery bonus, proof is below;

Running straight elites, by the time you hit level 9 running every quest on elite, you will be running level 6 quests on elite and will no longer be earning BB xp, so literally BB has no effect on xp for those that are enjoying every quest in the game.

SO WHAT DOES IT EFFECT?

It effects non TR'd non uber regular players, especially new players and non-vip players from earning DDO Sotre points thru favor!

WHY DO ALL THE UBER MULTI LIFERS LIKE THIS?

Because all the new non vip players will be paying money into DDO to pay for all the new high level content designed for ubers

WHY SHOULD YOU BELIEVE ME?

why else would super uber players give a rats A$$ about what regular , new, non vip players are doing at low level content

IT's simple economics folks, just stop paying for the ubers, if that is the respect they are going to give you.

um.. what about all the people who arent "uber" but still like this new system?

[kafrielveddicus]

People its simple...give those that want it their little button to disable champions. Just reduce the quest xp and chest levels for wanting/using an easy button.

/Signed

Sounds good, I dont do elites for the xp or the loot, its for the favor and the "DDO Store points" <- remember non-vips, its the DDO store points they are making you work harder for with the champions system.

[phillymiket]

i say this...

Epic Champions and Heroic Elite Champions are enough, leave the new folks exploring Korthos the Hard setting at least.

I mean, do any of you who want Champions to stay as is even play on Heroic Hard?

Normal was good for your first trek around the village because you were just learning the controls, but now it's a joke.

You try Hard and there is some crazy high HP....

you come back with this...

Okay, let me shift it to the heart of the matter:

You are arguing to make ELITE an entry level difficult for brand new players who do not know anything about builds, tactics or gear.

I am arguing that your position is deeply flawed, and would be extremely harmful to the game. In a perfect world, the new player you describe should absolutely get destroyed in elite content. No question. Elite should be so hard that they don't even think about trying it until they learn something -- anything! -- about the game.

Otherwise, once they do learn the game and get good, elite for them will be the same boring snoozefest the anti-champion crowd are citing as the reason that they simply cannot play normal. Playing normal, they argue, is so boring that they'd rather find a different game.

That's what you're arguing for the game to be. Once you get good at it, it should be so boring that you'd rather play a different game.



Regarding the specifics of our little debate about whether or not level 2 sorcerers are more powerful now than they were three years ago, I find your position unreasonable and wholly without merit.

Try again to read what I said.

You want Epic to be Champion City? Fine. I like Champions. Epic is Epic. Deal

You want Elite to be Champion City? Fine. i like Champions. Elite is Elite. Deal.

BUT NORMAL IS BEYOND A JOKE!

Don't tell me anyone stuck on NORMAL will stay around.

How long does a school that gets no new students continue to teach?
How long does a restaurant that gets no new customers continue to serve?
How long does a business that hires no new staff stay open?

Not very long!

Leave Heroic Hard alone, and if you ask me, crowns should not show up until after Korthos and the Harbor minimum.

And lastly, I didn't say a level two Sorc was more powerful. I said this...

I take you up on your offer and ask for more ways a brand new player is better off these days then they were when there was a vibrant, helpful player base running low-difficulty content on a regular basis to show them the ropes and group with.

A level two Sorc may have a few more SP to spare with SLAs and may have a few better gear choices but they are infinitely worse off as far as the grouping situation, party dynamics, and general attitude of the vets they will group with compared to the past.

I'm pretty sure the "No-one to teach because i can't find a party I can hang with" situation will trump the +10 Spell Power. ;-)

[Mendelsohn]

A Champion Gulf
So I am not a great player, but I am also not new to the game.

My son and I ran Outbreak on Hard. He has a level 18 WF PM/Monk (second life) and I am running a 18th level PDK Fighter/Rogue to support him (doing fairly respectable damage for low gear and a first life). Not elite, we know our limitations, but not shabby. We know this quest, we know the first room.

Well we used to. 3 Champions are there and both of us and our hirelings are dead in seconds. An argument ensues, we discuss tactics, we reenter and try again. 2 Champions, dead again. One last time, 3 Champions. Same result. Due the high numbers of mobs in the first room, I am guessing that the drop-rate for Champions is naturally high, which means we are never going to get very far in this quest. Sure, we could do it with a group, but I shouldn't have to. Hard is a fine post-school challenge before making dinner.

So we back out and try it on Normal, and it's the cake-walk we expected, almost boring. I took two work calls while dropping a Wood Woad. I heard my son yawning. It wasn't the challenge we wanted, but it wasn't the Eternal Circle of Death either.

Is this the gulf that we have to play now? Too Easy Normal and Unplayably Hard? Where's the middle ground?

Is this what new and nearly new players have to deal with? If so, then watch them run from this game faster than you can say ''I died again''.


The following are not my ideas, but surely:

A Champion means there can only be one, right?
And s/he is probably not more powerful than the Boss, or s/he would be the Boss, right?
And if the Champion is harder to fight than the occasional random orange-named mob, s/he would be worth XP, right?
Right?

[kafrielveddicus]

um.. what about all the people who arent "uber" but still like this new system?

As I and others have suggested let them have an optional button to turn champions on in heroics, give them a choice.

This is the point missed, i am not saying people shouldnt have a an option to increase their challenge just dont force it upon people.

[Aletys]

Is it?

Is the difference literally double the XP? I actually havent doe th emath on that myself, but I find that hard to believe.

And even if it is.... Did it really take you exactly the same amount of time to run Elite as it did Hard?

Don't know if it's actually double (though on some quests I think it may be close to that), but it's significantly higher, especially when you do all the optionals, which we usually do. And, if it keeps me from having to do some rather odious quests more than once, I'll happily take some extra time to do it on elite.

And if it did. Doesnt that sound incredibly broken to you?

Considering the difficulty increase between normal & elite, no.

So, do you think they're going to take the time to increase the XP on the lower difficulties for every quest in the game? Or would you prefer they nerf the elite XP for every quest in the game? That would probably be easier for them.

thats exactly why I'm asking. People are complaining about the wrong thing here imo. Turbine does indeed strongly encourage the "Elite is Normal" attitude.
For this to work, Things like Bank and backpack space based favor rewards might need a look.

No, they are not complaining about the wrong things. The champion introduction is a major change to the game, so much so that it makes it a completely different game than what we had before U24. If I wanted to play a Diablo-style game, I'd play Diablo. I'm not, I'm playing DDO, and before this change it was a game I enjoyed. Now I'm not enjoying it very much.

And do you actually believe they'd completely revamp the favor system? They haven't fixed serious bugs that have been there for several updates, some have been there since before I started playing. They apparently don't have either the staff or the desire to do so. So if they're not fixing major bugs, what makes you think they're going to take the time & resources to do such a major revamp?

They took the easy way out on the champion system, simply throwing in a few formulas & applying it across the board to all quests. If they'd implemented it in a more intelligent fashion, it wouldn't be such a disaster. Of course, that would have required resources they may not have, and they might not have done champions at all.

Besides, then we'd have the "it's too easy" crowd complaining that they're making things even easier.

400 Coin Lord favor is hardly exciting. Its a flavor reward. which I find appropriate. the lower tiers might need an adjustment still though. and PKD? bah. hardly a necessary reward. I literally have NEVER used my 375 PDK favor.

You may have not used your pdk favor, but a lot of us have. Just because you don't find it worthwhile doesn't mean that others don't. And while Coin Lord may not be the best example, a lot of folks really like the Silver Flame pots (I noticed you didn't say anything about Silver Flame favor). I personally don't use them, but that doesn't mean I devalue them because I don't. Besides, want to earn a 32 point build? On normal? Good luck. There aren't enough quests in the entire game to accomplish that.

huh? come on. first time open on elite is NOT the only reason to subscribe.

No it's not, and for you and for me it's certainly not the only reason we took it. But, for a lot of folks it's the main reason they became VIP. Especially for those long time players who had already purchased most or all of the packs before they became VIP. I have several guildies in that situation. They'll simply cancel their VIP. They don't need it if they're only running on normal.

no. Lots of people may make grand claims that they will quit... be we all know the actually perentage of people that will leave is significantly lower.

That is very true. But, I'm afraid that in this case, folks are already starting to quit. I'm seeing it. I personally will wait and see. But when the game is no longer fun, why bother to play. That's really the bottom line. With champions as they are currently implemented, the game is not very much fun to play for a lot of us. It's just frustrating.

For me, playing on elite was fun. Normal had become boring most of the time. But if I can't play on the higher difficulties where it's challenging, why bother? This is the only MMO I've ever had any interest in playing. I'll just go back to single player games or do other things entirely. It's not the end of the world, though I will certainly miss the social part of the game, and getting together with the friends I've made.

Regardless...... actual FEEDBACK on the changes rather than rage quitting is what the devs need. anyone who just called it quits already, was just looking for an excuse to leave the game anyway.

Folks are giving real feedback. They're providing statistics, suggestions for changes, etc. I'm carefully recording what I encounter, down to the buffs I see on the champions (when we're not completely overwhelmed & have no time to check buffs), and keeping a log with the statistics. I have already reported on some of it. The 10% no. is simply incorrect. It is often much, much higher. One champion per encounter is not typical. On lower heroics I'm often seeing three (and sometimes more). On epics I've seen whole mobs of them, not always, but enough to feel that it's not that unusual.

But, if the feedback doesn't cause the devs to change anything, why bother? That's the general feeling out there, I think.

All we're getting from the devs is "we're looking at it". It's nasty enough that I think it should be rolled back until they come up with something better. Right now it's a just a miserable mess for most of us. We feel that we're being forced to be alpha testers (not beta, this was not ready for beta), and that is simply not right. We're paying to play a game, not to be their QA department.

[zorander6]

A Champion Gulf
So I am not a great player, but I am also not new to the game.

My son and I ran Outbreak on Hard. He has a level 18 WF PM/Monk (second life) and I am running a 18th level PDK Fighter/Rogue to support him (doing fairly respectable damage for low gear and a first life). Not elite, we know our limitations, but not shabby. We know this quest, we know the first room.

Well we used to. 3 Champions are there and both of us and our hirelings are dead in seconds. An argument ensues, we discuss tactics, we reenter and try again. 2 Champions, dead again. One last time, 3 Champions. Same result. Due the high numbers of mobs in the first room, I am guessing that the drop-rate for Champions is naturally high, which means we are never going to get very far in this quest. Sure, we could do it with a group, but I shouldn't have to. Hard is a fine post-school challenge before making dinner.

So we back out and try it on Normal, and it's the cake-walk we expected, almost boring. I took two work calls while dropping a Wood Woad. I heard my son yawning. It wasn't the challenge we wanted, but it wasn't the Eternal Circle of Death either.

Is this the gulf that we have to play now? Too Easy Normal and Unplayably Hard? Where's the middle ground?

Is this what new and nearly new players have to deal with? If so, then watch them run from this game faster than you can say ''I died again''.


The following are not my ideas, but surely:

A Champion means there can only be one, right?
And s/he is probably not more powerful than the Boss, or s/he would be the Boss, right?
And if the Champion is harder to fight than the occasional random orange-named mob, s/he would be worth XP, right?
Right?

<bad spanish accent>You keep using that logic, I don't think it means what you think it means.</bad spanish accent> I used to play 1-2 hours per week assuming I didn't get killed by the lag monster. Frankly if monsters are killing me with 1 shot while lagging I'll get frustrated and annoyed. I admit I don't have an uber top of the line gaming system with tons of memory but when the game came out originally it ran relatively fine. Now I can't go more than two steps without rubber-banding. I don't see the point in being that frustrated. I'd rather do something else.

[Albinosaurus]

Actually, they got rid of tiered N/H/E loot a few updates ago and they have no intention of bringing it back.
Random loot hasnt been of significant value in a very long time.

I'm not talking about lootgen. I'm talking about unique/named loot. Either way, you're still missing the point (probably intentionally).

And "I like it that way because thats the way its always been" doesn't hold up IMO.

That's fine if you don't think so, but don't be surprised when people leave because it isn't the game they signed up for.

[Sehenry03]

Please do NOT implement a check box on whether you want champs or not. Everyone should be playing the same game. You should NOT get as much favor as I do if I am running an elite quest with champs and you are to busy complaining about it so you want to click an "I win" button so you can get your easy free favor.

Sorry peeps but I have no issues with Turbine upping the difficulty of getting favor. It doesn't matter if they are doing it strictly for the money. If you want the BEST favor then win on the HARDEST setting. If champions are in the game then that includes them.

1) I have no issues with maybe not putting in champions until lvl 8 or something so early levels are easier. Fine.
2) If they are suppose to be 10% of the total mob count then fine...reduce the current 10-40% to straight 10%.
3) If you don't want to be 1 hit by a champ fine...reduce that ONE mobs high DPS number and increase EVERY other mob. It is ONE mob...I have been 1 shot a couple times and I come back ****ed to kill him. I have no issues with a mob being able to 1 shot me. I 1 shot them ALL the time so its a little pay back.
4) Do NOT increase rewards for champions or add more xp. They should just be part of Elite quests
5) If people hate them in Hard difficulties so much...fine make them Elite only. Newer players can run hard quests and I think we established that the difference between HH and HE is about 26% xp with HH being much quicker to complete so it averages out.
6) You don't want to have to run a quest twice so you can get Elite favor? Fine grow a pair and beat it on Elite or get help.
7) You are a permadeath player and don't want the champions to be so tough because you die to easy? Then play the game as it was made. You CHOOSE to play by your own rules then you have to live with the consequences.

Some quick points I am sure a lot of people will be offended by...

[Vulkoorex]

As I and others have suggested let them have an optional button to turn champions on in heroics, give them a choice.

This is the point missed, i am not saying people shouldnt have a an option to increase their challenge just dont force it upon people.

But you have some posters that don't want the optional button because they DO want it harder for everyone else.

[Impaqt]

As I and others have suggested let them have an optional button to turn champions on in heroics, give them a choice.

This is the point missed, i am not saying people shouldnt have a an option to increase their challenge just dont force it upon people.

you do realize that a checkbox to turn the system on and off is never going to happen?

[BigJobbs]

Put me in the 'so uninterested in champions I've cancelled my subscription' camp.

I've got a completionist toon - wears light armor, uses blur/displace/ghostly/dodge as a significant portion of damage mitigation, some PRR(~75) and this toon was EE capable in U23. She is now EH capable if she gets lucky with the champion spawns. Perfectly capable of getting effortlessly wiped by champions in EH now, if I get unlucky with the spawns. In an EE Spinner, a crowned Jarilith was hitting for around 500-600 damage (after ~40% mitigation via PRR) with almost automatic knockdown.

I've got a swashbuckler build - he was a blast to play in U23, but he's on the shelf now. As is my tempest (U23 didn't help him much) who just gets taken out too easily due to insufficient PRR/MRR and average saves.

That's 3 of my 4 mains that I don't really want to play now due to this stupid mechanic. Only my light-nuker build will be even vaguely viable against this new system, particularly on EE.
I could HTR them and start again - but that raises the issue of getting back through heroic levels with this random **** all the way through them.


Here's my 2c worth:
- a monster buff system which completely invalidates entire build philosophies overnight (most champs I encountered seemed to have true seeing and damage boost, meaning that light melees turn into a light snack) is a good way to get people to leave the game.

- if you think mobs need 10x the hp they usually have and the ability to wipe characters (particularly melee toons) with massive damage spikes, you may have forgotten the TWO BIGGEST COMPLAINTS THAT LED TO U23 IN THE FIRST PLACE. U23 allowed us a lot more build freedom and the chance to play light melees again - and you've just snatched most of it away with a big fat dose of random.

- ridiculously overpowered uber-mobs that wipe my group because of random = the worst game mechanic ever. If I pulled this **** on my P&P group they would be pulling out a copy of mechwarrior and starting to roll characters, because my game would be dead and buried right there and then. This is NOT how a good RPG plays.

- people saying that 10% of mobs being champions is a good number to aim for - I suggest otherwise. A normal coal chamber has 450 kills - so around 50 champions. That quest takes long enough as it is and there is only 1 res shrine - bring extra raise scrolls, and hope you don't get too unlucky with the champs. Random! Our group didn't especially look forward to running coal chamber before - this will just make it so we don't want to at all. You know it's a great, well thought out mechanic where vet players start not wanting to run their favourite content because it may have turned into a frustrating grind because... RANDOM!


So to those who embrace champions, good luck. I'll check back in a few weeks and if the system has been adjusted to the point where it might be the slightest fun to play most of my toons, I may pick up where I left off.

For those of you in this thread that keep saying 'there is always normal' - I respond with this: why should I be reduced to playing this game that I've been playing on hard and elite for 4 years on the beginner level just because I'm adverse to wasting my gameplay time either wiping to trashmobs with good random abilities or constantly raising other toons or ferrying them between res shrines? How does that make my gameplay experience more fun or rewarding? Fun is what I'm here for, long-term goals notwithstanding. I run in a small group, at Asia-Pacific time. When I log in, there are often 3-4 LFMs up in total. Finding anyone to group with at that time can be difficult - moreso if you're not running a difficulty people actually want to play.

If you're not finding the game challenging enough, try building a non-twink non-min/max toon and not gearing him to the absolute limit. I was enjoying doing just that - my toons were fun to play and found EE a moderate challenge. Now, they might well not make it past the first set of mobs in a quest on either EE or EH, just based on getting unlucky with the champion spawns. But hey, I can always release, repair, rebuff, reset, re-enter, and hope I get luckier next time. Woo Random!

That level of variation in a globally applied mechanic is just awful and makes the game one I will probably not waste my leisure time playing - certainly not one that I will pay money for.

[Albinosaurus]

But you have some posters that don't want the optional button because they DO want it harder for everyone else.

And that is why my previous posts include the notion that this is at the cost of everyone else.

[FestusHood]

Shouldn't you let people are new decide what it is they would enjoy instead of you deciding it for them based on your perception of how things were when you were new (and hint hint - it wasn't nearly as tough as you make it out to be - it just seemed so at the time becuase well.... you were new).

For all the vets that are saying that this reminds them of the fun they had when they were new, this is a very important point. When you were new, you still had lots of room to grow, you could increase the power of you character a ton, and there was still a lot you could learn about the game itself.

People mention remembering being one shot by mobs when they were new. How long did that go on before you took steps to prevent it. Remember when the advise was to get more hit points, get false life item, don't dump con? Once you did that, you stopped getting one shotted right?

The problem with this new system is, that now the mobs are one shotting people who HAVE all that stuff. What is the point of even trying to get more hit points, more prr, more of anything really, if it won't make a tangible difference in the game?

The game has now changed to one where it's basically you get hit, you die. There is almost nobody with the skill level to play at that level in this game. So the result will be that yes, people will resort to cheesy "tactics" because there will be no other option. Then once people have learned to do that, what next? There will be no reason to progress your character, because only the "tactics' will matter. That's fine in a game that is designed that way, but it's a terrible mechanic for a game whose main appeal is character development.

[Impaqt]

I'm not talking about lootgen. I'm talking about unique/named loot. Either way, you're still missing the point (probably intentionally).

and Unique/Named loot STILL doesnt have N/H/E tiers anymore.

That's fine if you don't think so, but don't be surprised when people leave because it isn't the game they signed up for.

I'll let ya know if I hear of anyone actually leaving.

[richieelias27]

It brings a refreshing new level of challenge to quests, and (to me) even more importantly a bit of randomness to quests that I end up repeating a lot.

It does need quite a bit more fleshing out though. I'm assuming the current implementation is purposefully bare-bones so that you can test the community reaction. I hope in the future you can give more appropriate rewards and a bit more variety.

Some suggestions:

More buff variety in the champions. As of now it is pretty much just a straight "they have more hp and hit harder". I would like it if champions demanded that I change my tactics beyond "Needs more facepunch faster"

Give spellcaster champions an increased (and relevant) spell selection, and include fully dispellable self cast buffs.

Give ALL champions a small random chance to drop chests. Currently chest dropping favors quests with a large number of orange/red named mobs. Other quests just have increased difficulty for zero reward.

Make the loot from champion chests somehow tied to the buffs they recieved (or at least a chance to get loot tied to said buffs). I.E., a champion with fire immunity buff drops items with fire absorption. I feel like this would make seeing a completely uber champion a good thing, rather than "Well, better recall out and reset"

[kafrielveddicus]

Please do NOT implement a check box on whether you want champs or not. Everyone should be playing the same game. You should NOT get as much favor as I do if I am running an elite quest with champs and you are to busy complaining about it so you want to click an "I win" button so you can get your easy free favor.

Sorry peeps but I have no issues with Turbine upping the difficulty of getting favor. It doesn't matter if they are doing it strictly for the money. If you want the BEST favor then win on the HARDEST setting. If champions are in the game then that includes them.

1) I have no issues with maybe not putting in champions until lvl 8 or something so early levels are easier. Fine.
2) If they are suppose to be 10% of the total mob count then fine...reduce the current 10-40% to straight 10%.
3) If you don't want to be 1 hit by a champ fine...reduce that ONE mobs high DPS number and increase EVERY other mob. It is ONE mob...I have been 1 shot a couple times and I come back ****ed to kill him. I have no issues with a mob being able to 1 shot me. I 1 shot them ALL the time so its a little pay back.
4) Do NOT increase rewards for champions or add more xp. They should just be part of Elite quests
5) If people hate them in Hard difficulties so much...fine make them Elite only. Newer players can run hard quests and I think we established that the difference between HH and HE is about 26% xp with HH being much quicker to complete so it averages out.
6) You don't want to have to run a quest twice so you can get Elite favor? Fine grow a pair and beat it on Elite or get help.
7) You are a permadeath player and don't want the champions to be so tough because you die to easy? Then play the game as it was made. You CHOOSE to play by your own rules then you have to live with the consequences.

Some quick points I am sure a lot of people will be offended by...

LOL you wish!

[EllisDee37]

The option to turn off champion mobs is so you can just keep your Elite streaks right?

When you frame it like this, it occurs to me that a checkbox might actually work:

[ ] Champions and bravery
[ ] No champions and no bravery

The "no bravery" would simply suppress your streak, not break it, similar to how having someone overlevel in the party works.

A level two Sorc may have a few more SP to spare with SLAs and may have a few better gear choices but they are infinitely worse off as far as the grouping situation, party dynamics, and general attitude of the vets they will group with compared to the past.

I'm just quoting this for posterity.

Remember, people: Sorcs are infinitely worse off than they were three years ago!

[DarthCaedus]

I'll let ya know if I hear of anyone actually leaving.

Yeah that never happens. The people that keep saying nobody will leave DDO are right as evidenced by the server populations.

[DarthCaedus]

you do realize that a checkbox to turn the system on and off is never going to happen?

It's not the first time you've made a ridiculous claim like this.