Producer's Letter - 5/21/15

[lyrecono]

intriguing......

The letter refreshingly short and grounded in reality.
Shockingly it seems to be lacking grand ideas that don't ever seem to make it...

i really hope you guys(dev's) learned from the past and don't bring half finished content in order to reach a deadline, separating warlock from the content seems to suggest this... fingers crossed.....

So transferring your hardware....
are you considering merging servers?
In it's better years we had multiple(4) instances of the marketplace due to it's population being so big (lv 20 was cap)
But i don't see multiple instances of evening star either (just an example though).
either everyone put his status on anonymous or the game is bleeding people badly since U14

New content& Storyline:

+++
Continuing some real endgame/epic story instead of emo drow, epic rats, cheap conversions of heroic material.
Kudo's!

Updating shroud, although this was said before i'm happy to see this confirmed.
Please don't make this as meager and rigid as Canith raid crafting or ToEE, the biggest strenghts of Shroud gear are the many crafting options (4 elements and 2 alignments coupled with weapon and clothing& jewelry slots) and the low level you could equip it, making it amazing tr gear.

Greetings!

It’s been extremely busy and fun for us here on the DDO team this year and we feel the time is right to provide an update on some of our plans over the next few months.

We’ve made some excellent strides to reduce lag and improve stability, and we are continuing to work towards these goals. One of the larger projects that we are working on is a transfer of our game servers and other hardware to a new data center. The new facility will provide both Dungeons and Dragons Online and our friends over at The Lord of the Rings Online with more stability, greater CPU power, and a better networking capability. This will complement our ongoing efforts to reduce lag. It’s a big project and as the year progresses we will be working toward a date where we will migrate to the new datacenter.

Update 26 is coming in June, and it will focus mainly on a new class; the Warlock! Warlocks make pacts with powerful otherworldly patrons and channel that eldritch power into powerful blasts and arcane spells. The Warlock can choose a pact with Fiends, Archfey, or even a Great Old One. The Warlock will also have three enhancement trees; the Tainted Scholar, the Souleater, and the Enlightened Spirit.

Update 27 will follow in July. It includes an all-new adventure pack that returns to Shavarath, showcasing the Archons’ side of its endless war. With your help the Gatekeepers have gathered enough Mysterious Remnants to continue their research. They’ve tracked the Remnants back to Shavarath, the Plane of Battle. You need to travel there to recruit the help of the Archons in unravelling this mystery. The Archons, however, will only aid those who are worthy, and you find yourself embroiled not only in their tests, but in their eternal struggle with the Devils and the Demons. This adventure pack will include three new dungeons and a new raid, and as usual will be free to VIPs.

We've also been hearing your feedback that you'd like an improved experience when using the DDO Store, and we're happy to say that we'll be introducing a new store in the near future! We expect the updated DDO Store to offer a streamlined experience when making purchases and many other improvements. We're planning to start rolling out the new DDO Store to players later this summer. You will still be able to purchase Turbine Points with a credit/debit card, PayPal, and a wide selection of alternate payment methods. We'll have more to say about the DDO Store as we get closer to its launch.

We'll have more updates this year as well, of course. Players will be able to increase their character level to 30. We’ll have more adventure packs for you. We’ll have an Epic and extended version of our popular Shroud raid and a new adventure pack that relates to the Vale of Twilight. Players will be able to use an updated and epic version of Greensteel to craft more powerful gear. We are excited to bring this content to you!

Thank you for being a part of the Dungeons & Dragons Online community, and we love hearing your feedback. It's been a pleasure to talk to everyone here, and we hope to see you in-game for a long time to come.

Robert “Severlin” Ciccolini

[The_Human_Cypher]

Looking forward to the year's plans.

Hopefully this new DDOstore will give us the ability to gift store purchases or points straight to someone's account. You're missing out on a pretty big cash cow and we're missing out on the fun of it.

This is a good idea. I would like to be able to gift Guildies, new players, and friends in game directly from the Store.

[The_Human_Cypher]

Progress? Sev - if what we have been experiencing on Ghallanda for the last two months is progress - I really am going to be giving up my VIP subscription. I am actually a little angry that there was no apology (or recognition at all) of the problems our server has experienced over the last two months. It would have been nice to see a little statement that our concerns have been heard by you, that there was some feigning of interest, at least.

They apologized on DDO's Facebook page for the G-Land downtime today.

[Blackheartox]

Greetings!

Robert “Severlin” Ciccolini

Wonder why noone asked you this yet in the past, but can we call you Robie?

Polish classes and releases and revamps before you present it to live servers to make it with least ammount of bugs possibly, good call is to check lammanina live servers, not forums but servers since many people point out bugs there but dont write on forums, is my biggest wish

[mezzorco]

Hi
I remember in 2014 a couple devs / PC members talking about a new class coming, a heavy armor user, quite different from current heavy armor classes (I suspect it was Duskblade).
Has it been discarded?

[patang01]

Please put in place a moratorium on raid bypasses for at least 5-6 months. Or make them 1 days permanently. That using a bypass cuts it down to 24 hours. Not zero seconds until you can raid with that toon again.

We need this, or it'll be like all raid over again - a group of people will do it 24x7 until no one runs it and people that can't dedicate to that schedule gets screwed.

[Xerio]

two weapon fighting could use a review, it feels very weak when compared to thf and swf.

[laurawilder]

We've gotten quite a bit of "end game content" in the last few updates including Update 25 with ToEE. The Devs can't just put out end game content, that really does not serve the entire user base. Many players don't care for end-game and would prefer more attention be put into broadening the player options, including Races and Classes.Me I've always saw end-game-content as a bit of an oxymoron, as in End-Game denoted the end, which is time to start another character and play them through. But I understand that some players only want to continue playing their uber-loot bedecked character forever rather than playing a new character, who stands on their own without inheriting twink gear which makes content at the lower levels trivial.Personally, I like to find new ways to approach the game such as, solo new character from 1 to 20 without teink gear, or level to 20 with only using explorer areas. Too each their own. Me I prefer that we get the new class first and the new quests later, but I like to play a lot of alts and very diverse builds, specifically avoiding the FotM or most elite builds,. It seems much more challenging to take an average, or even purposefully gimped, character to high levels than to play a character with the most uber loot and elite build to the same level.

Exactly the way more should approach the game. Keeps it challenging and fresh each time.

[moo_cow]

As we've mentioned previously, the biggest weakness of casters currently is putting out good boss DPS without completely draining spell points. We will be addressing that with some kind of new high level damage over time spell. I have no time frame to announce at this time, but unlikely it will be 3 years out.

Sev~

Hopefully this isn't another epic feat that cost 100 spell points.

[moo_cow]

Are we at least getting a few quests with the warlock update. I was lead to believe that we were getting warlock and shavarath in u26.

[Saekee]

The stuff about the archons got me really excited. LOVE the devil battlefield, with arrows peppering the ground as the trace of the conflict.

I guess the archons are unlike kobolds--they will forget about that little incident in the vale?

[Saekee]

Please put in place a moratorium on raid bypasses for at least 5-6 months. Or make them 1 days permanently. That using a bypass cuts it down to 24 hours. Not zero seconds until you can raid with that toon again.

We need this, or it'll be like all raid over again - a group of people will do it 24x7 until no one runs it and people that can't dedicate to that schedule gets screwed.

they should do this on new content every time it is released.

[mikarddo]

Please put in place a moratorium on raid bypasses for at least 5-6 months. Or make them 1 days permanently. That using a bypass cuts it down to 24 hours. Not zero seconds until you can raid with that toon again.

We need this, or it'll be like all raid over again - a group of people will do it 24x7 until no one runs it and people that can't dedicate to that schedule gets screwed.

I dont know if the moratorium needs to be that long but at the very least 3 months where raid timers cannot be used when a new raid comes out would be most welcome (read absolutely mandatory).

A 1 per day per raid per character would also be alright as that lets you run with friends even if you are on a timer - but not farm instantly and endlessly which is very detrimental to the game.

[Elytia]

I should not tell players that Ranger will be next once we finish up Warlock in case something causes us to change our plans. Nor can I say that fighter will be some time after that, probably after we work on a new Favored Soul tree. Sadly I cannot confirm any of this information.

Sev~

At this rate we'll all be long dead before arties get a 3rd tree or ED!

[Grosbeak07]

I can't believe the negativity... A new class, new servers, Shavarath and epic Vale/Shroud and people are complaining... Not even a little excited?

I think even the negative people (like me) are excited. The problem is we are bored now (after only 9 years!) and there is just not enough content to keep satisfied. And I know the Devs can't possibly produce enough content to keep people like me happy between updates anymore. So this means check back in 2 months for new quests. 2 months that I'm playing other games, doing other things, spending money elsewhere. I know I"m not alone in feeling this and it can't be good for the game as the less engaged players become, the less likely they are to come back between these breaks and the less money DDO takes in, which leads to further cuts in staff and content and we are looking at a dead game, sooner rather than later if the devs don't plan carefully.

[Sephenis]

As we've mentioned previously, the biggest weakness of casters currently is putting out good boss DPS without completely draining spell points. We will be addressing that with some kind of new high level damage over time spell. I have no time frame to announce at this time, but unlikely it will be 3 years out.

Sev~

Actually, the biggest weakness of ARCANE casters is after you reach epic levels, you're become more and more weak, compared to melee chars, and to enemy mobs. The only way to be a useful wizard for example is to use CC spells, and death spells. However the original advantage of the wizard is the variety of spells can be used, despite of this, nearly all of the heroic spells become useless (except high level CC). One extra spell does not solve the problem. For years, arcane classes does not have any updates, while melees became overpowered (mrr was the most "interesting" buff for them).

[Qhualor]

As we've mentioned previously, the biggest weakness of casters currently is putting out good boss DPS without completely draining spell points. We will be addressing that with some kind of new high level damage over time spell. I have no time frame to announce at this time, but unlikely it will be 3 years out.

Sev~

I still don't think a new DOT is the way to go. They already have existing DOTS and I remember when they first came out they were so powerful that a dedicated tank had trouble holding agro against a triple stack. I still see powerful casters all the time against trash mobs, so maybe just need to improve existing spells. Casters that I have seen don't usually have sp problems from shrine to shrine and usually are dumping mana blasting away. I just think there is more of an underlying problem that should be looked into rather than just giving casters a boss DOT.

[FifthTime]

I should not tell players that Ranger will be next once we finish up Warlock in case something causes us to change our plans. Nor can I say that fighter will be some time after that, probably after we work on a new Favored Soul tree. Sadly I cannot confirm any of this information.

Sev~

Seriously? More melee buffing?

Wow...

Who is making these decisions? Please tell me it's not based on that moronic survey in which all the people who play melee characters said casters were over powered.

That would be just sad.

[Severlin]

two weapon fighting could use a review, it feels very weak when compared to thf and swf.

Two weapon fighting tests show it doing a lot more damage than comparible THF and SWF at the top end for Paladin, Barbarian and (of course) Rogue builds.

Tempest specifically is behind the curve though if that's what you are running.

Sev~

[FifthTime]

As we've mentioned previously, the biggest weakness of casters currently is putting out good boss DPS without completely draining spell points. We will be addressing that with some kind of new high level damage over time spell. I have no time frame to announce at this time, but unlikely it will be 3 years out.

Sev~

When you stuff say this like this it makes me wonder if anyone on the Dev team actual plays the game.