Things we use to do when the game was hard- list

[Lonnbeimnech]

Back when the game was hard.

I remember being declined from a normal shroud because MyDDO said I was a level 7 barbarian, when I was a lvl 20 fvs.

I remember being declined from a normal shroud because I was level 16 dual wielding minII in favor of a first life lvl 20 with lootgen weapons, and less hp.

I remember being declined from groups because 'we already have a caster', so then I went and soloed the same quest.

I remember partly leaders asking everyone to wait for buffs, and them freaking out when I don't, cuz half of that stuff I can handle myself and the other half is unnecessary.

I remember joining a group with a paladin and a bard that were farming pray on the hunter for xp, and then waiting 10 min for a cleric to join before dropping group and soloing it on a first life sorc. I also remember people freaking out when I selected to kill the dragons.


...actually the game was only hard when I first started playing and didn't understand rules about items stacking with equipment, and not being able to find or afford good items, and holding onto pnp rules that don't apply to this game.

[sirgog]

I remember when Vision of Destruction came out, and you were able to reenter after a wipe.

597 minutes, 30+ reentries - SUCCESS.

It got a lot easier when we learned that the trash was triggered by Suulo hitting certain % hp thresholds, and didn't just respawn without limit, so you needed to actually KILL it, not try to kite it.


The thing I miss most was knowing that there'd be times you'd give a quest attempt everything you had, and still fail.

[LightBear]

When things like vorpal, disruption or smiting was totally out of reach.
Having it on the wrong weapon damage type was not in lines with the DnD rules and caused a commotion.
When paralyzing on a weapon actually put a mob in a helpless state.
When instakill spells like Phantasmal Killer or Finger of Death caused arcanes to rule the landscape.
When having zero con caused death, so wounding of puncturing meant something.
When mobs didn't reset them selfs every second and a half so you could actually level drain them.
When Terror wasn't just an ooze beater.
When Terror wasn't just a rusty beater.
When Nightmare of Brilliance was sought after combo on a weapon.
When there where only four classes and races in the game.
When warforged could drown.

Edit:
Things we used to do was come to this forum and spill our guts that the game was to hard.
And then there was this whole group of players that used broken stuff to get around things being to hard.

[Razor_Wit]

I remember reaching level 4 and being forced to locate a sigil of leveling just to be able to level further. At the time i had no idea they were available in store and would be running quests looking for just that to be able to use my enhancement points. It's the main reason I became vip actually. Just a little later they eliminate them completely.

[Erofen]

The church and the cult. When I was new I tried to do this quest and decided I needed to save up for pots to even try.

I finally get to the end fight, it was a long hard fought trek to make it to him. I was low on pots and worried., Then it happened. I ran into this guy http://ddowiki.com/page/Adran_ir%27Karsmore



and what happened, nothing of course, I didn't have a silver weapon. Did he kill me, nope, was it because i was a STRONG, nope.

It is because he is the most evil end boss in the game

He goes Dominate Monster "muah ha ha"

then your free and you do nothing to him, and he goes

Dominate monster "muah ha ha"

I put up an LFM, need help, at boss, bring silver weapon, lol

some awesome paladin that said we was "passing by here anyway" dropped in and saved the day. I was still standing there dominated when he came to save the day.

Just a memeory from when I was just a little newblette

Heh I just ended up dying. This quest I feared from its difficulty back then.

[Red_Knight]

For newbies that's "Boss Beater", not Bravery Bonus.

Ah, I remember getting booted from a forming team running something, can't remember what, while playing my monk. The leader booted me because the DR beater i linked was the Eternal Rest handwraps from Catacombs. Silver at the time was the only material DR my monk couldn't bypass just because she was throwing a punch. Otherwise, I could get by with whatever I had equipped.

These days on the rare occasion someone demands the team I'm on links their boss beaters, I link my Aligned handwraps. You know, cause that's almost the only time i have to switch handwraps. Sure I got a ghostbane handwrap and a banishing handwrap for if the situation requires. But otherwise I normally am using my +5 flaming handwraps of draining.

[der_kluge]

I remember my level 20 cleric - who could solo heal Shroud (back when that was a thing!) was denied Epic Chronoscope (when the cap was still level 20), because she didn't have any ToD sets on her (based on my myDDO profile). wow.

I remember fearing Kobold Assault, and hearing people whisper about how insane it was.

I remember tanks shield-blocking a doorway in Threnal to fight the reaver's - it was the only safe way to kill them - get a caster to draw aggro, and tanks to block the door.

I remember hiding in the rock perch in Redwillows fighting the giants safely from there.

[Micki]

Well, when I started running shroud my friend would post for hard "because we like it hard". Min hp for elite was 400, and my toon was just below it. I also experienced a few wipes.

[Dreppo]

When Terror wasn't just an ooze beater.

It's not even an ooze beater anymore. They changed the material from glass to gem, so it takes damage from oozes now.

[Jiirix]

When the game was “hard” people yelled a lot at new players. I can tell that from firsthand experience as my first toon was a guild less elven scimitar + shield battlecleric when “battlecleric” was still an insult by itself. I was a paria of DDO: “Get more HP!” (lacking greensteel hp item), “Get more SP!” (Lacking bracers of the Glacier), “Get a Minos!” (Had a heavy for item but not the pack for minos yet as everyone recommended sands, giant hold and sands before the necropolis), “Melee cleric is §%&!” (I was busy healing the group most of the time and needed the SP for mass-heal anyway. So why was it such a drama when I swung a weapon in the spare time I was “off-duty”?) and of course I was reasonable for every whipe that ever happened to my groups. That was DDO for me like when it was “hard”.

Then I found my guild and with the help of some vets my cleric became an “extended, maximized blade barrier” wielding killer machine. I remember well what a DPS push those “superior impact VI” clickies were. Since then hardly anything in DDO was “hard” for me anymore, there was always a new “overpowered and imbalanced” build I could copy from my guildies. First my cleric got radiant servant and the aura made him even more unkillable when zerging with blade barriers. Then eSoS wielding warforged souls with extra damage from the archon and divine punishment were the thing. Followed by pale masters, nuking savant sorcs and the rise of the monks/monkchers. The artificer class brought us the Juggernaut and everything without manyshot was a lame duck. Funny how there always has been a way to build a new toon that crushed the content.

I short: When DDO was "hard":

- new players where yelled at
- clickies where "the thing" for bluebars
- the group needed a "healer" but the "healer" not a group
- everything stays the same, there are just new flavor of the month builds

[axel15810]

I remember being denied a spot in a normal shroud raid group because I didn't have a DR breaker.

[Eth]

I remember being denied a spot in a normal shroud raid group because I didn't have a DR breaker.

You need a MinII to run the shroud.

[PNellesen]

Setting my status to "Anonymous" when on my Clerics to avoid constant "Come heal my Shroud/VoD/ToD/HoX" requests...

Harassing random strangers with (supposedly respectfully worded) unwanted intrusions because
1) you make unwarranted assumptions about their character on very little information,
2) you want them in your group based solely on those (often inaccurate) assumptions, and
3) meanwhile you must also think they're too stupid to be able to hit your LFM if they had been the least bit interested in joining your group for whatever raid/quest you're running.

Right, got it, the "good" old days. Good riddance.

[Chai]

~2008 running shroud, after running part one, we would enter part 2, and if we got the devil and the fire elemental in the same pull, everyone would recall out and reform the group to run part one again.

Mana potion buy ins to get a spot in a VOD group.

[axel15810]

You need a MinII to run the shroud.

Well no you don't. I was poor back in the day and remember saving up for a silver outsider bane weapon that I bought off the AH, but just pointing out that in a pug the raid was hard enough on normal back in the day for a group to justify not accepting people because they didn't have a DR breaker.

[Eth]

Well no you don't. I was poor back in the day and remember saving up for a silver outsider bane weapon that I bought off the AH, but just pointing out that in a pug the raid was hard enough on normal back in the day for a group to justify not accepting people because they didn't have a DR breaker.

Well, yes...that's the joke.

[Knight_slayer]

The content is the same difficulty now as it was 4 years ago, thats the problem. Content difficulty needs to scale with character power increase.

[SiliconScout]

Three main things that I can think of that we did when the game was hard would be

#1: Use tactics for most fights.

• Running in Rambo style in a party usually got people killed
• Shield blocking in a door way with a wall of fire in front of you while the caster pulled in mobs with magic missile or a thrower.
• Worrying about doing that raid with just one dedicated healer and stepping it down to normal because of that.
• We did a lot less raw damage so having a golf bag of weapons to beat Damage Resistance was normal (hell now we don't even care if the weapon is healing, even in a VON 5 end fight!)
• Three manned a quest at level on elite and felt like GODS!
• Worked like dogs to try and get a toon that could manage an EPIC (when there was only 1 epic) quest to try and farm fragments for a heart to TR. Most of us bought one or if we were really luck we won one on the lottery.

#2: Buy the expansions.

• I personally dropped over $300 on MOTU (my two accounts and my wife's) as did my friends, we all pre-ordered the super ultra deluxe model.
• MOTU while cool as hell also pretty much ruined the game we (my family and firends) loved with the massive easy buttons.
• Each "AP" in an epic destiny is basically as powerful if not more than a full feat for Heroics.
• With the loss of challenge we lost a LOT of players, and a lot of good ones. Pre-MOTU I had 7 friends playing this game and paying for 11 Vip Subs between us. Withing 4 or 5 months of MOTU there are two of us left and 1 sub which was a yearly one that he will let die off when it's over. We each used to play an average of 4+ hours a day, now I would be surprised if we played 4 hours a week combined.

#3: Have Fun and be helpful

• When the game was hard we needed each other, there was a reason for just about everyone to help the new guy get better.
• We felt a sense of accomplishment when we finally beat that quest or managed to shortman it. Hell the first time we completed an Epic Bargain of Blood without a single death it was a miraculous feeling, WEEKS of playing our toons to get to that point and it was fantastic. And that was widely considered one of the easier EPIC quests!

Was it perfect, no it's never been perfect but overall I think it was a lot better than where we are now.

Man I miss those days so much.

[Loromir]

Dont know if anyone mentioned this, but in eDQ1 we would pull all mobs (a few at a time) to the scorpion pit and range them down.

In e wiz king...we would pull all mobs (a few at a time ) down to the door neat the entrance and for a shield wall. I'm not sure why we didn't do that up at either the east or west door near the corridors.

In eDQ2....everyone standing together in one spot while healers spamming mass heal and everyone else spamming DPS. Anyone who moved off that spot died and was thoroughly ridiculed for not following instructions.

One if my favorites....bringing a whole stable of hirelings with Divine Vitality and calling them one at a time to recharge SP then dismiss and call the next one.

[Tyrande]

I remember being declined for shroud on normal
Because they said they already had a caster.

I remember being declined for VOD because I refused to carry reconstruct on a sorcerer.
I remember using up 15 major mana pots as the same caster running VOD elite.

I remember TOD being hard where an acrobat with an epic soul eater staff just went shrooming by
While that same caster almost got the bar in 1/3 just to kill one elite devil.

I remember being one shotted by Devils in Chronoscope elite; and 42DC being very good for epics.

I remember when the cap was level 10 and a vorpal anything sold for like 2 million plat; and the thermal giant caves were loot runs; while waiting for a healer to join to group hug Coyle to go through Eastern part 3.