What is Reaper difficulty?

[Lemdog]

Don't confuse the prepared player with those that aren't.
Prior to those changes every one forgot once to have the correct potion, now players be like I'll be blind for 90 seconds so what, big deal I'm cursed it will be gone in 2 minutes.

90 seconds on blindness can be a big hit to a dungeons progress. Slows you down like crazy, and that curse you just got reduced your saves so now your saves are actually low enough to be effected by blindness. It's always a good idea to have those potions around.

[Silverleafeon]

Also available on Twitch.

Of note around these minutes are:

9:20ish ~ Reaper Difficulty mentioned in a semi serious manner.

41:45ish ~ No eta, but looking at Gnome race Heads

48:00ish ~ Level 30 still coming this year (little bit of smokescreen there to ponder)

48:00ish ~ Epic Vale still coming this year. Will have all new epic quests (not revamped heroics) as well as an Epic Version of the Shroud (with more damage). Heroic Quests and Heroic Greensteel will not be changed.

50:00ish ~ Sentient Weapons is being rethought and redone to be more what players would like. No ETA.

Raid dramatically increased in difficulty.

Artwork on quests, raid, and new items is very impressive.

New creature type ~ Fallen Angel (Greek word which mean Furies)

New monster manual coming (with bonus Remanent and new pet as prizes)

Pack will be 495ish

New Tomes of Fate upcoming

New Tomes of PPR/MMR? from Remanent collector permanently added.

[Thrudh]

Hopefully zero xp and zero additional favour would help solve that.

So EN-EE is for building the toons.

"Reaper" for playing 'built' toons and gaining hard to get gear.

Just like the old epic system!!

I like it!

[Powerhungry]

Same difficulty as elite but...
To enter/qualify for reaper difficulty, your character must have no equipment and inventory must be empty.
or
you are permanently affected by binding chains and the shadow/purple haze blindness we all love so much (and cannot be turned off in post-video effects like it currently can be).
snarky sarcasm off/
Balance clerics first please.
Even my poorly equipped first life fighter has better dps than my well geared completionist cleric
and fighters are not high on the dps list as it is (which shows how poor clerics really are)

[Drakos]

One of the best things we could do right now is get a server merger and a revitalized endgame. I am in an endgame guild and we have been losing logins since the Madness pack. There is a dirth of low-level content. Fixing the LFM panel population bug would help new players. Let's do that among other things.

And theses are just your opinions. There are those of us who do not want a server merger, and would like more attention paid to early and mid-games.

[Ape_Man]

And theses are just your opinions. There are those of us who do not want a server merger, and would like more attention paid to early and mid-games.

Please tell me what is lacking int he mid and early game?

[Grosbeak07]

Please tell me what is lacking int he mid and early game?

Players.

[Ape_Man]

Players.

The whole game is hosed by the lack of people playing it.

[Uska]

And theses are just your opinions. There are those of us who do not want a server merger, and would like more attention paid to early and mid-games.

yup

[Merlocke]

Which is exactly the same as saying.. "Hey, we are working on a harder difficulty, even though EVERY TIME PLAYERS SUGGEST IT ON THE FORUMS ABOUT 10X AS MANY PLAYERS POINT OUT ITS A BAD IDEA.. because, we don't care".

Thanks for the reminder of why I don't come to these forums but twice a year.

An endgame challenge is welcome and long overdue. Just put unique loot in there so there's an incentive.

[The_Human_Cypher]

I've been thinking about how the new Reaper mode would be implemented in game and how it may differ from the Elite difficulty. We have discussed not offering more favor or even XP for Reaper completions but instead better loot and perhaps other tangible in game rewards. However, I think that using a server-wide scoring system for Reaper mode may be the best way to approach the new setting.

Players and Guilds would have their Reaper quest and raid completions tallied on the server and then displayed for everyone to access, from the Social panel for example. Players and Guilds could then compete against each other for number of completions on Reaper, fastest completions, and so on. The only rewards, other than bragging rights, might be Mysterious Remnants for players and Guild Renown for Guilds. As we do not have a genuine PvP system in DDO, the Reaper mode may be a way to offer a similar feature.

[Silverleafeon]

However, I think that using a server-wide scoring system for Reaper mode may be the best way to approach the new setting.....

I heartily approved the guild levels above 150 just be for greater glory and bragging rights for the Guild system, and any extension that mind set would be very favorable to me.

[Goratoar]

I haven't heard anyone bring this up, but the best way to make something difficult in this game is to force a max level to enter the quest or make it so that if someone in the group is above max level for the quest no gear/xp/favor/etc. is gained. This is so people cannot farm gear for subsequent lives.

Additionally, make items from reaper difficulty similar to elite level gear, except when in a reaper difficulty quest.

Make quests hard enough that you will have to build characters just so that they can handle a single quest or series of quests of a certain level on reaper mode. If you include dungeon scaling, make it so that it is auto-scaled to at least 3 for most quests and make hirelings worth the same as PCs (to discourage adding walking hp pools at low levels). This will encourage grouping and building synergistic groups of 3-6 players to handle the difficulty.

As for rewards, as I mentioned before making gear only unlock its true potential while in reaper mode is key to avoiding the inevitable mudflation aspect of introducing a new difficulty. Also, another interesting thing that could be added is medals for completion.

Medals: Come in bronze (basic quests), silver (hard quests/end of quest lines), and gold (raids). You can only receive one medal per mission per true heroic reincarnation. These items can be used to buy small, but permanent upgrades (eg: copper buys +3 upgrade tomes of spell/range/melee power, silver buys +4, etc.) or powerful consumables or clickies with a long global cooldown. In addition, the first time completing a mission on any life will give you a permanent version of that medal, which could either be used similarly for permanent build related things (possibly only affecting characters in reaper mode) or simply as a trophy.

In terms of implementation, please only add this difficulty to a few quests at a time, figure out the balance and move from there. If you implement it all at once, people will find certain quests are easy compared to others or even just broken or exploitable. Not every quest has to be reaper-able. The idea is to make 28/30 no longer the definitive endgame and to create endgame content at all levels.

Okay, so you have all that as a guideline, but what's in it for Turbine? With somewhat minimal coding effort (but a lot of time spent balancing, which the community will likely be happy to help with) you've made the game fun and challenging for many people that are starting to drift away from a game they don't find engaging anymore. Mid-range players will spread the word that there is a super-difficult MMO still around and people will be more drawn towards the more p2w consumables and permanent boosts in the store to put together certain builds in order to complete the quests.

I really hope someone reads this and at least takes some aspects of my argument into account, or it at least adds to the conversation of what a new difficulty could or should entail.

Thank you for your time,
Goratoar (Thesebeats)

[Axeyu]

I really hope they don't repeat the mistake of making endgame content without difficulty settings.

[Silverleafeon]

I really hope they don't repeat the mistake of making endgame content without difficulty settings.

Should Designer X in future Y years decided that D&D version six has 40 levels therefore DDO ought to have 40 levels, then we end up in the same hole as pre MotU?

I can see what you are saying there...

[Darkmits]

Being a new, inexperienced player compared to all of you, I'd like to start with a "Hello everyone". I play for about 2 years. I have only one character, currently in his 3rd life with only one Epic Destiny maximised and no ETR done. With that aside, I'd like to explain my opinion as a casual player that plays once or twice per week for a couple hours at best:

DDO suffers immensely from power-creep. While numbers may not reach the hundred of thousands per hit and hit points of raid bosses the order of billions, the relative difference in power between different characters is higher compared to other games. DDO's "end-game" is actually getting triple completionist, that's the carrot on the stick. That isn't a bad thing on itself; it becomes bad however because the bonuses of TRing are evident throughout the new life. Essentially a character becomes more and more powerful with each life (which is to be expected). This causes the issue that content which would require carefulness and/or a group, it can be bypassed and just outheal the damage while soloing. Players have argued that almost the entire game is soloable at first life on Elite at level, and mathematically it is, however, how many of you actually managed that on your first run through the game, where you were still learning the combat system, the map layouts, the different builds etc? Anyway, it means that TR'ed characters solo most Elite content. This means that grouping isn't required except for some few quests where it makes questing a lot faster and/or removes the bad chance of losing the 10% no-death bonus. Which is one reason why, despite the (I guess) high number of TRs happening and therefore the number of low level characters, there are too few groups available for low level quests.

Power-creep comes from quite a few sources. Past Lives is one. Gear is another. The fact that every time there are balancing passes, they have almost always been buffs is the third. We've reached the point where, before L20, enhancements are a more important factor in how powerful a character is than feats + skillpoints + class level choices (after L20, EDs take care of that).

Next up is Bravery Bonus. In my opinion, it has caused more issues than it has solved. It's a carrot-on-a-stick that heavily punishes breaking it, it actively punishes running a quest with someone else on a lower difficulty just for fun, and maybe the entire experience curve is designed around maintaining it. The only it helps is going through the life quicker so that the player can TR again faster. Imagine if there was no BB bonus and first TR required just ~25% less exp, and 2+ TR required ~40% less. The actual result would be that n-th lives would be completed at the same rate, but the players wouldn't be limited in playing Elite or not playing at all. Favor could remain as is, since without BB, a player would be running quests at the difficulty they like, then come back at a lot higher levels to get that extra favor.

Next up are the bonuses in each quest. Bonus exp for optionals, demolition, conquest, traps, hidden doors is amazing, because it encourages exploration. However, having a default +10% to no-deaths and +10% to no-reentries, then losing it if something goes wrong works against the player who goes for exp, and it makes players hesitate to group with others in fear of those others doing a wrong move (therefore promoting soloing even more). If players weren't afraid of losing 20% exp, they would be a lot more open in grouping with others.

How is all that tied to Reaper? Essentially, the discussion about DDO needing a higher difficulty mode wouldn't be taking place if the above issues were solved or didn't exist in the first place. However, I do acknowledge that at this point the devs can't just go back and nerf all the above bonuses; no player likes seeing themselves become less powerful, even if they are nerfed at a lower degree than the player next to them.

TL;DR - Power Creep is the reason we are discussing about Reaper. Solve power-creep, Reaper isn't needed. Don't solve it, Reaper will be a temporary fix until it is cleared.

[wraxzz]

I really like this idea!

ddo becomes game over

[SamaelBael]

I recently stumbled upon the reaper difficulty discussion ingame and would like to deposit my concerns as a 99,99% PUGer.

*) We already spread the groups in the LFM over 4 difficulties (solo/normal/hard for undergeared/casual/farming players and epic for the well geared/favor farmers/experienced players)
Implementing another difficulty will drive an even greater gap between the casual/beginner and the pro. Considering that this game has hardly any new gamers i fear that this will lead to newbies (D&D movie in production, remember?) feeling abandoned in a game that practically bursts with required intel. Abbreviations, item bonuses that don`t stack - which other game has that many defensive mechanics(AC, DR,PRR,Dodge,Incorporeality,Concealment)?

*) I am aware of a lack of challenge for wellgeared experienced players. How could there not be that problem? We are allowed to self-heal/-buff/-tank/etc.
I tanked the Stormreaver in EH FoT with my 670HP assassin without difficulty. No SP, just scrollhealed(Agro has to come from somewhere^^). There will be no permanent solution to a lack of challenge if every wellgeared character can solo most of the content. It is a MMO, get 5 new players and walk them through elite if you want a challenge (5 might be autofail, try 2).
No wonder we are missing the challenge if we 6man a quest with 6 characters all able to solo said quest.
Give Rejuvenating Cocoon a far longer cooldown and a lot less players will demand higher difficulty. Healers would get more attention again.

*)Instead of spreading the playerbase over one more difficulty, why not implement a slider for the champions(0-100%?)?
That way every PUG could decide if they want more challenge in their EE run, the can turn up the spawnrate of champs to 100%.
If they want a challenge but know they will not be able to make it through EE, they could go with EH on 100% champs.
Expand the abilities of champions. They make the game more interesting, but most of us just realise that they hit harder. How about group buffing?(bard style aura/song)
What a surprise it would be to encounter a group of mobs with 2 champs, both instead of attacking grabbing their guitars and buffing the whole group with GH and the healing song.^^
With a champ slider 0-100 champs could be allowed in raids/wilderness areas?

From my experience what registers as challenge is hardly the HP of the mobs. The amount of mobs is just a mild annoyance.
Running elite quests with underlevel cannith crafted gear is a challenge.
Running EE with just Heal scrolls for selfheals that heal for 130 is a challenge.
Running ToEE2 with 670HP, only scrollheals, 50 concentration and stacking aoe dots is a challenge. I really hope you swore off that aoe instakill with wavepattern warning though. 2 are enough in game...

Might have gone a bit off-topic there, hope its useful insight though,
Samael

[bloodnose13]

If there is to be a new difficoulty, at least it should not give any favor so it does not force everyone who want favor to die 100x per run tryign to get through a quest on a highest difficoulty just for favor.

In my opinion favor should be granted for completing of quest on ANY difficoulty, instead of diffrent value per difficoulty, this way one reason of doing elite and possible beyond runs would dissapear.

at this point any additional difficoulty setting would be purely for challenge and nothing else, pure bragging rights should be a reward for it, hell make person glow a gold hue for completing quests on that highest difficoulty for all i care, just dont force everyone to play on them just becouse some want challenge.

[SilkofDrasnia]

ddo becomes game over

Indeed..lol missed check there you did.