Producer's Letter

[legendkilleroll]

Problems on multiple fronts here.

1. Even if casuals demand that EE is easier so they can get the EE loot. You respond with either "no" or "get better at the game, then you can get it". That's the point of making high hanging fruit. If you can reach it, then you can have it.

2. And actually, what you are proposing is precisely the situation right now. No high hanging fruit, and everyone is bored out of their mind.

3. Old epics wasn't just masochism, it also provided loot incentive. People have ran the content bare and dry searching for their seals and shards, that's what made people run the stuff so much - it had both challenge and loot incentive. I'm arguing that you need both for successful content. EEGH is another pristine example of this.

I would like to see more reasons to run EE but not everyone is bored out of their mind as you say, not everyone grinds everything out on day 1 so they can post a video showing how uber they are then post in the achievements section how they shaved a second off their PB

[Postumus]

Especially when we decided to run EADQ1 (before EN/EH/EE) - those first few runs were amazingly fun and ridiculously hard to do.

Yes the first few runs were fun, just like the first few runs of anything in DDO are, in general, fun. But the next 500 runs to get loot that had ridiculously low drop rates that were mind-numbingly awful.


Old epics were awful and boring.

[Postumus]

I would like to see more reasons to run EE but not everyone is bored out of their mind as you say, not everyone grinds everything out on day 1 so they can post a video showing how uber they are then post in the achievements section how they shaved a second off their PB

This. I don't think most players get burned out on the new content in less than a week.

[Qhualor]

Yes the first few runs were fun, just like the first few runs of anything in DDO are, in general, fun. But the next 500 runs to get loot that had ridiculously low drop rates that were mind-numbingly awful.


Old epics were awful and boring.

I'll take old epics that actually entertained you and made it so you had to stay awake the entire quest rather than the face rolling done in 10-15 min on elite rinse and repeat until ransack or got what you wanted in a day to a week.

[Cetus]

Yes the first few runs were fun, just like the first few runs of anything in DDO are, in general, fun. But the next 500 runs to get loot that had ridiculously low drop rates that were mind-numbingly awful.


Old epics were awful and boring.

The first few runs of anything is not fun. I don't know about you, but the first runs of 3bc, this xoriat garbage, and the new evenignstar quest were not fun (with exception of terminal dilirium, if I'm to be honest in my remarks, I have to mention that I did have a bit of fun in there the first run).

Look, my point is this: any system that has a system on one extreme - there will be people on the other end who are (rightly so) unhappy. This is why I keep proposing a happy medium by actually making use of the tiered difficulties we already have in place. The old epics had a bit of an extreme in the sense that, like you said, it took "the next 500 runs" to get loot that was very rare. I don't support a system like that either. But what we currently have is the opposite of that extreme, we get the games most difficult loot quite quickly if we put our minds to it. Days, not years. Both are quite deterring - and this includes our current situation.

The proposal is to make use of our already-in-place tiered difficulty system. We have EN, EH, and EE - instead of just having a generalized "EPIC" setting. The benefit of the old "EPIC" system - is that there was no cheesy way to get the loot within. You had to run "EPIC". A lot.

Now, we have deviated away from "EPIC" - and adopted tiers of EN/EH/EE. I like this change, but the baggage that it carries is the possibility of "cheesing" the reward risk. You can just run the easier version of what used to be "EPIC" and still get gear of the same power that only the old "EPIC" could provide.

If we have tiered difficulty, then it should necessarily follow that the rewards be tiered as well. I mean, it is mind boggling to think that people just cruise through on norm to get the same stuff that drops on elite. Those people who want the most powerful loot but aren't able to complete higher difficulty should keep practicing and getting better at the game. Not be appeased and just say "oh, ok - here you go".

[MadCookieQueen]

I'll take old epics that actually entertained you and made it so you had to stay awake the entire quest rather than the face rolling done in 10-15 min on elite rinse and repeat until ransack or got what you wanted in a day to a week.

Maybe bring back the 16 hour wait time in between Epic runs with no bypass timers for it?

[SirValentine]

TU is kicking ass in deleras if you bothered with getting it high enough, but around lvl 12-14 pretty much anything is getting immune to your turns, even with the proper gear (that stuff, that made you turning a few levels earlier EVERYTHING) especially on elite

I found TU useful all the way up through heroics on Elite, but then I have Clr PLx3.

But as soon as you hit Epic levels, the mob hit dice bloat renders TU useless.

Other game mechanics face the same mob-hit-die problem, though not quite in the extreme that TU does.
- Your d20 roll for TU doesn't directly add to your turning level...it only adds up to +4, not +20.
- There is not a single Epic Destiny that adds to your turning level, the way some add to your caster level for various classes.
- Dispel against mob spells is as bad as TU; the cap on caster level versus Epic mob caster levels equal to their hit dice makes it useless.
- Dismissal and Banishment are also as bad off in practice as TU, and also go from great in heroics to useless in epics.
- Spell Penetration has enough feats/PLs/gear/enhancements/EDs to make it possible to get EE-viable values, but just barely, and not typically on a first-life build.

[Qhualor]

Maybe bring back the 16 hour wait time in between Epic runs with no bypass timers for it?

sure, as long as the drop rates were fair. that was a big discussion back then.

[Oxarhamar]

Maybe bring back the 16 hour wait time in between Epic runs with no bypass timers for it?

/not signed

[Xoham]

Warlock
We are looking into adding a new class during the year, and we are considering the Warlock class. The Warlock creates powerful eldritch blasts to destroy enemies in addition to a variety of spells to aid them in their adventures.

“Warlock Class? Wait isn't that basically Pale Master?”


We envision the Warlock class concentrating mostly on its Eldritch Blast ability and ways to manipulate that arcane blast in various ways. While the Warlock does have spell abilities they are closer to a ranged character than a traditional caster.

I thought I would add another voice saying this is very exciting: I am very much looking forward to the warlock class! I have even kept my character "Charisma-based" for some time hoping that warlock would one day arrive.

Near the end of last year I started playing Neverwinter instead, and with a warlock character, because I heard they had added warlock. It is quite fun, and the D&D monsters and settings and the like look very good, but it is a lot simpler in its gameplay (for example, rather than having twenty hot-bars with ten buttons each as I have in DDO, there are less than twenty buttons total). Correspondingly, eldritch blast doesn't really have blast shapes or eldritch essences; certainly not the diversity of say Neverwinter Nights 2. I think DDO has an excellent opportunity to have this more-complex-gameplay warlock, and I would certainly purchase the class!

Should you want more ideas/opinions, I posted my initial thoughts on how warlock would be implemented last year at:
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...37#post5418737
And a couple of follow up posts:
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...57#post5452157
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...06#post5453006
Having just looked, that thread is still active with many other players' ideas and opinions too.

[Mahatu]

I thought I would add another voice saying this is very exciting: I am very much looking forward to the warlock class! I have even kept my character "Charisma-based" for some time hoping that warlock would one day arrive.

Near the end of last year I started playing Neverwinter instead, and with a warlock character, because I heard they had added warlock. It is quite fun, and the D&D monsters and settings and the like look very good, but it is a lot simpler in its gameplay (for example, rather than having twenty hot-bars with ten buttons each as I have in DDO, there are less than twenty buttons total). Correspondingly, eldritch blast doesn't really have blast shapes or eldritch essences; certainly not the diversity of say Neverwinter Nights 2. I think DDO has an excellent opportunity to have this more-complex-gameplay warlock, and I would certainly purchase the class!

Should you want more ideas/opinions, I posted my initial thoughts on how warlock would be implemented last year at:
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...37#post5418737
And a couple of follow up posts:
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...57#post5452157
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...06#post5453006
Having just looked, that thread is still active with many other players' ideas and opinions too.

I like much of what you posted here. I do have a couple of comments though. On the matter of whether or not max and empower should be usable on eldritch blasts/invocations, I think we will have to wait and see how their damage compaires without them to that of other characters based on more sustainable sources of damage (melee and some types of ranged). I am currently on the side of wanting to allow them, but we won't know until we see some more concrete numbers and mechanics.

I am currently on the fence about whether or not warlocks should work on a form of spellpoints. I certainly don't want them to use a standard spell point pool, but some sort of small, rapidly regenerating spell point pool would better integrate with existing mechanics. I am sure that totally going without spellpoints could work too, but it would require more of a rework to make many of the epic destines and feats compatible. As it stands I am somewhat concerned on how warlock are going to work with existing destines. New gear options may also be a concern, particularly in relation to invocation DCs and keeping them relevant through epics.

I do think your suggestion for some sort of a charge mode could be very interesting, but I would worry that at higher levels you would have to spend most of your time waiting for the high levels of charge to attack so as to compete with the very high saves of epic level content. Sort of like playing an arty with just a rune arm. Maybe something more like a gauge that charges based on eldritch blast usage that can be expended to gain a short duration buff based on the essence or shape you are using.

Last, Dark One's Own Luck only grants your Cha bonus to a single save chosen when you invoke the power, though you may invoke it again to change the save it is attributed to. Leaps and Bounds gives +6 to jump, tumble and balance. These are from the PnP rules, though, rather then Neverwinter Nights 2.

[Voorvan]

Will DDO consider including Gnomes as a new (old) Player Character race? Also, will we ever see the world of Krynn and the Dragonlance setting? Just wondering.

[DrWily]

Warlock
We are looking into adding a new class during the year, and we are considering the Warlock class. The Warlock creates powerful eldritch blasts to destroy enemies in addition to a variety of spells to aid them in their adventures.

/signed

I would love to test the Warlock class.

[Uska]

Will DDO consider including Gnomes as a new (old) Player Character race? Also, will we ever see the world of Krynn and the Dragonlance setting? Just wondering.

I wouldn't mind seeing gnomes but they only add flavor really

Krynn wont work it would take special rules for wizards and clerics and it wouldn't be worth the trouble and if they didn't do the special rules than it wouldn't be Dragon Lance.

[winsom]

I like, no LOVE, The Vale explorer area. I could easily do without the adventures though as long as I have a way to get into Shroud Raid.

What will the upcoming plans do to my beloved Vale explorer area at play levels 13 to 17 ? I do not want that experience to go away.

I have a group of friends still playing pre-epic and will be for quite some time. Two of them want to buy Vale of Twilight, but one of them might not get there (to 14th) for some months yet.

Is the Vale a good buy still or will the revamp "Take it away" from the Heroic Level play ?

[Marupal]

I like, no LOVE, The Vale explorer area. I could easily do without the adventures though as long as I have a way to get into Shroud Raid.

What will the upcoming plans do to my beloved Vale explorer area at play levels 13 to 17 ? I do not want that experience to go away.

I have a group of friends still playing pre-epic and will be for quite some time. Two of them want to buy Vale of Twilight, but one of them might not get there (to 14th) for some months yet.

Is the Vale a good buy still or will the revamp "Take it away" from the Heroic Level play ?

That's a pretty good question.

...
“Epic vale quests again...”


Our current plan is to redo the Vale quests, and keep the raid mechanics mostly intact with a new encounter at the end. Some of the Vale quests really need to be revamped.
...


Sev~

They didn't mess with wilderness areas for heroic Three Barrel Cove, Gianthold, or Orchard but the quests weren't really revamped either.

Devs, anything you can say about this?

[Severlin]

That's a pretty good question.



They didn't mess with wilderness areas for heroic Three Barrel Cove, Gianthold, or Orchard but the quests weren't really revamped either.

Devs, anything you can say about this?

We don't plan on changing the explorer area or revamping it for a new difficulty. It will still be there for lower level characters.

Sev~

[dunklezhan]

If we have tiered difficulty, then it should necessarily follow that the rewards be tiered as well. I mean, it is mind boggling to think that people just cruise through on norm to get the same stuff that drops on elite. Those people who want the most powerful loot but aren't able to complete higher difficulty should keep practicing and getting better at the game. Not be appeased and just say "oh, ok - here you go".

I still don't understand what people didn't like about norm/hard/elite loot.

Speaking as someone who has just completely given up on Elite because of champions (I am not complaining - it is a good thing that elite now requires more skill than I have), I should feel like I am missing out.

[DemonMage]

I still don't understand what people didn't like about norm/hard/elite loot.

Speaking as someone who has just completely given up on Elite because of champions (I am not complaining - it is a good thing that elite now requires more skill than I have), I should feel like I am missing out.

My biggest complaints were with the level requirements going up with difficulty instead of being set based on the Normal item (and to be fair I have issues with level requirements of loot in general lately), and the absolutely terrible drop rates. Also on an item-by-item basis, some of the hard->elite upgrades were great, some were terrible, most were just eh.

[Systern]

I still don't understand what people didn't like about norm/hard/elite loot.

Speaking as someone who has just completely given up on Elite because of champions (I am not complaining - it is a good thing that elite now requires more skill than I have), I should feel like I am missing out.

I'd figure that Devs didn't like it because it tripled their workload. Players didn't like the "punish success" model of increasing ML, eliminating that does truly make the Normal and Hard versions wasted effort, coding time, and design however.