U27: The Sudden End of All Endgame DC Casting in DDO?

[Blackheartox]

Indeed.There has been a lot of discussion about difficulty recently. A lot of this seems to boil down to players who have all the gear and past lives thinking that EE is for them and that everyone else can play EN/EH. There's no skill involved in beating a DC or a SR check. It's past lives and, essentially, a gear score.

Not correct, you dont need past lifes nor gear to play in epic elite.
You notice that when you step down from your full geared max plife über toon to a total wuss gimp alt with no gear whatsover, and you make that said alt ee capable by just swaping build and farming for easy to get gear in 1 week.

Currently most if not all epic elite quests can be soloed on a non lifer, non über toon.
That puts 1 question in your head if you put effort to tr, or put money to etr with ottos/xp pots, which is: "What for?"


I will just say to players, that are still on the hunt for maximum past lifes how that is a absolutely terrible waste of time, you dont need anything to be ee capable, and when you have completed the tr hamster train you will find yourself asking the exactly same question i am doing now.
Why tr/etr when they give me über +12 of awesome supreme loots, weapons that can 1 shot stuff and a class called barb that selfheals more reliably and kills then a dedicated healer.

There needs to be some difficulty for the said op classes with op gear, then ballance rest around that.
Either nerf op gear, nerf the overperforming classes, or simply add more immunites for melles/ranged to handle and a bigger difficulty spike.
Yes, even people who find ee atm boring, should have some difficulty in ddo that doesnt consist of playing alts or gimping themselfs to a degree that they end up playing a 8 cleric 3 barb 9 wizzard dc caster (or whatever).
Ddo is not a skill based game currently, its a pick the most broken class and zerg ee game.
This needs to stop, with introduction of smarter ai, better puzzles, fights that consist of coordination, and less meat bags with even more hp then formerly that do nothing but cause instant d alerts.

IF we had korean players, i bet most of us would feel ashamed for posting any kind of speed run or remotely talking about anything being hard

[Tebaco]

• Spell Penetration:
  20: Wizard Levels
  5: Draconic bonus caster levels
  3: Piercing Spellcraft from Draconic
  2: Twist: Echoes of the Ancestor - Arcane
  3: Twist: Piercing Spellcraft from Magister
  3: Archmage Spell Penetration enhancement x3
  8: Spell Penetration, Greater Spell Penetration and Epic Spell Penetration feats
  7: Thunderforged Items
  1: Arcane Sanctum Ship Buff
  Total Spell Penetration: 52
  Destiny: Draconic Incarnation

Nice shiny numbers. Now count DC numbers too. And you will find out that you have to find some compromise.
Its pretty funny listen guys from this discusion with their shinny numbers of 75 or so.. But it cant basicaly work for sorc.
So I would say 1st lifer cant go DC casting.
Aditionaly, running as draconic? Really? I would run as draconic if not set up as DC caster, coz there is nice daunting roar ability that can be used indsted holding spells. Would be nice if someone test that this working in new content or not.

[Blackheartox]

Nice shiny numbers. Now count DC numbers too. And you will find out that you have to find some compromise.
Its pretty funny listen guys from this discusion with their shinny numbers of 75 or so.. But it cant basicaly work for sorc.
So I would say 1st lifer cant go DC casting.
Aditionaly, running as draconic? Really? I would run as draconic if not set up as DC caster, coz there is nice daunting roar ability that can be used indsted holding spells. Would be nice if someone test that this working in new content or not.

Roar is to long cd to be of any use in quests

[Tebaco]

Does EN or EH not even exist anymore for the weaker players?

You cant argue like this thouse days. It was power creep there. Imagine situation that he has a friend that rolled mechanic. As mechanic he is doing everything just fine. And he want play with his 1st life caster and his friend 1st life mechanic. Do they need to play eh coz one toon of tham is op nowdays? They played elite in heroic and havent any problem.. It is pretty logical movement that caster complain about somethin.. Its 1st lifer, now is issue with completionist casters...

Additionaly i agree with you with problem about caster dmg output that is simply very weak.

[Tebaco]

Not sure I agree that only DC casters have to pay their dues. An under invested barb is gonna have saves that suck badly and spend half his time stunned/held/tripped or whatever; an under invested pally is gonna stand next to those mobs for a while taking a beating; an under invested bard is gonna get zotted in a couple of hits by an antisocial champion.
Now, a GOOD, well built barb, pally or bard won't have those issues and will rock - but that means paying your dues (putting bard lives on my big, tough barbarian just feels WRONG!) just like a DC caster.

And what about pure sorc saves? Isnt it the weakest in game? Aditionaly with weakest hp pool? Should i take force of personality to be semi-fine with one save and sacrifice some SP points or DC points?

[Vanhooger]

I don't get some of you guys. Saying that a caster with working DC will be overpowered, well It's to late complaining about power creep, if you want DC caster to be useful you need to make them on a par with barbarian, paladin, rogue, bard, warlock & mortal fear, otherwise nerf them all and leave caster as it is.

[Tebaco]

Roar is to long cd to be of any use in quests

For 1st lifer it is great option how escape from death..

[slarden]

Like I already said, if the highest achievable MIN/MAX enchantment DC in the game is insufficient to CC the hardest EE mobs, then I agree - either their saves need to be lowered or the highest achievable DC needs to be higher. But not so much that the game becomes trivialized with mass holds everywhere, I think the save dynamics should be such that you need to target different saves with different CC spells to be a master CC'er. A first lifer with mediocre gear should definitely struggle in EE content. Or...maybe they should be ok in EE content and a "reaper" difficulty is in order for the players that transcended the power of an average EE player.

If the hardest mobs in the game mentioned above (whether its EE or "reaper") have will saves as their main stat - then they shouldn't be easily CC'ed by spells that target will saves, pretty much unless you went min/max all the way in those spells - but even then, you should have a backup set of spells to target the weaker save - that would, in my opinion, be a smarter way to build and play a toon. I'm ok with one save in a particular mob-type being sky high - say 80 if your game-max possible enchantment DC is 85 - this way they can roll a 1,2,3 or 4 and still get held - so 20% chance to catch em. That's cool if you're game maxed - those that aren't maxed will be outta luck as far as enchantment spells go, but if this same mob also has a fort save of 55 - then you can twist soundburst and still catch them if you had a decent evo investment. Point is: If they have a really high save that gives min/maxers in that specific spell school a run for their money, they should then have another save that is lower that you should be able to target. This way it's still challenging and approachable at the same time.

Spell resistance is a separate can of worms- mid 40's SR should exist in end-game content. Yes, it's a royal pain in the ass - but maybe you can get a couple melees cleaving with improved shattermantle weapons if it means you can catch them with a hold. Team play is what I'm about - content on its hardest difficulty should not be trivial like it has been thus far.

With DDO's many build possibilities, there's a very impressive amount of incredibly efficient builds out there that work well in EE - but you know what, not every single build concocted should function equally well in the games hardest content. There will be builds that just flat out suck there, and that's ok- it all depends on what each player wants to do, and these in-game goals will inherently set some constraints on what kinds of characters they can do that with.

So yea, you can't waltz in with a group of 10 wizard / 3 warlock / and 7 sorc and expect to plow through the games hardest content, some builds just will be objectively worse in that context - but it doesn't mean it can't be fun to play on EN or EH for those who are into that sorta thing.

For as much as we talk about soloing, etc, etc. It's melees that can solo the game because PRR/MRR/high weapon DPS is all this game is about at the moment.

A cc wizard can't solo their way through difficult EE content - they will run out of sp. When you talk about things being 90% effective, this is where I get confused. The last time I checked PRR is 100% effective. MRR is 100% effective. Mortal Fear is 100% effective against everything but red names.

People are breezing through EE content with melee/ranged toons - not with cc casting.

The game is becoming too much hack and slash lately where you just march through dungeons with high prr/mrr crushing everything in your path with weapon dps.

Once upon a time a group of melees would go into epic devil assault and get crushed in 20 seconds without cc. Now they get upset if cc is used because they want all the mobs on them to maximize their cleave and great cleave. This is the problem - not cc wizards getting 95% effective DCs against most enemies.

[slarden]

Roar is to long cd to be of any use in quests

Roar is useful as an escape button not as regular cc. I never had a problem with the cooldown, it was always there for me when I really needed to reduce incoming damage.

[slarden]

Nice shiny numbers. Now count DC numbers too. And you will find out that you have to find some compromise.
Its pretty funny listen guys from this discusion with their shinny numbers of 75 or so.. But it cant basicaly work for sorc.
So I would say 1st lifer cant go DC casting.
Aditionaly, running as draconic? Really? I would run as draconic if not set up as DC caster, coz there is nice daunting roar ability that can be used indsted holding spells. Would be nice if someone test that this working in new content or not.

I showed 52 and didn't even count 2 from the new gloves bringing you to 54. This means you can give up 9 and still have a max spell penetration (some combo of feats, twists, etc.).

Also, if you go sun elf, elf, or helf you can get 3 more spell penetration for a 57 spell penetration on a first lifer. Varg is being very reasonable with spell penetration by not factoring in race options, past lifes and even staying within your own ED sphere to get a no-fail spell penetration.

Sorcs are designed to optimize spell damage and get a solid evocation DC - and they do that. If you want to run a necro, transmutation or enchant sorc the trade-offs to get a workable dc/spell penetration are there of course, but nothing like it used to be. It used to be impossible for a first life sorc to do this just prior to U14. That was always the domain of the wizard that had bonus feats. ED and then enhancement pass made alot more builds viable, including the build you are describing.

[slarden]

Not correct, you dont need past lifes nor gear to play in epic elite.
You notice that when you step down from your full geared max plife über toon to a total wuss gimp alt with no gear whatsover, and you make that said alt ee capable by just swaping build and farming for easy to get gear in 1 week.

Currently most if not all epic elite quests can be soloed on a non lifer, non über toon.
That puts 1 question in your head if you put effort to tr, or put money to etr with ottos/xp pots, which is: "What for?"


I will just say to players, that are still on the hunt for maximum past lifes how that is a absolutely terrible waste of time, you dont need anything to be ee capable, and when you have completed the tr hamster train you will find yourself asking the exactly same question i am doing now.
Why tr/etr when they give me über +12 of awesome supreme loots, weapons that can 1 shot stuff and a class called barb that selfheals more reliably and kills then a dedicated healer.

There needs to be some difficulty for the said op classes with op gear, then ballance rest around that.
Either nerf op gear, nerf the overperforming classes, or simply add more immunites for melles/ranged to handle and a bigger difficulty spike.
Yes, even people who find ee atm boring, should have some difficulty in ddo that doesnt consist of playing alts or gimping themselfs to a degree that they end up playing a 8 cleric 3 barb 9 wizzard dc caster (or whatever).
Ddo is not a skill based game currently, its a pick the most broken class and zerg ee game.
This needs to stop, with introduction of smarter ai, better puzzles, fights that consist of coordination, and less meat bags with even more hp then formerly that do nothing but cause instant d alerts.

IF we had korean players, i bet most of us would feel ashamed for posting any kind of speed run or remotely talking about anything being hard

Sure, roll up a paladin or barbarian and you can run over EE content on a first lifer. This is NOT the case with a palemaster, cleric and most DC casting builds. This thread is about DC casting - not zerging EE on a paladin or barbarian.

[slarden]

That is not what I said at all.


I was talking about DCs of completionists vs first lifers.
and not making judgments on who should be allowed in what.

Every +1 DC is 5% of a D20 save roll. (unless my late at night math is way out of date).

Thing is, I think the min/maxer xp/minute guys currently have way more than a +45% chance to land their spells vs a first lifer without the best gear.

My math may be off.. I haven't actually sat down to figure this out.

But isn't +1 DC 5% of a D20 roll?
Doesn't some past live add +1 dc to some schools?
Can't you stack those 3 times?

Don't you think the guy who grinds the best gear has at least 2 DC on the guy who doesn't?

Seems to me those guys have +45% minimum on the have-nots.

Turbine has made a lot of mistakes with power creep IMO.
It makes it very difficult to make a dungeon where first lifers can play along side those who have been grinding for years now.

But I wouldn't exclude anyone.
First lifers can use debuffs.
Or target the low save monsters.
Or use a non-dc spell or even a weapon.

No reason to exclude people from EE just because they can't one-shot kill every single monster in the dungeon.
They just have to adapt.

Past lifes are a huge benefit - and none are more beneficial in this game than PDK/Divine past lifes granting 36 PRR.

There is confusion about spell penetration and DC. The benefits of a maxed out character vs. a first lifer are definitely significant for casters. Benefits are:

Spell penetration: 45% extra success chance (3x past life wizard + 3x past life fvs)
Evocation DC: 25% extra success chance (3x past life sorc + completionist + active past life wizard feat)
Conjuration DC: 25% extra success chance (3x past life cleric + completionist + active past life wizard feat)
Enchantment DC: 15% extra success chance (active past life bard feat + completionist + active past life wizard feat)
All other school DC: 10% extra success chance (completionist + active past life wizard feat)

Realistically though you can't fit all the feats on some builds. For example an enchantment warlock can't take advantage of all the past life feats without giving up dps so the past lifes end up being no real benefit.

Edited to correct error Huneymunster noted

[HuneyMunster]

Spell penetration: 45% extra success chance (3x past life wizard + 3x past life sorc)

FvS rather than Sorc.

[moo_cow]

I don't get some of you guys. Saying that a caster with working DC will be overpowered, well It's to late complaining about power creep, if you want DC caster to be useful you need to make them on a par with barbarian, paladin, rogue, bard, warlock & mortal fear, otherwise nerf them all and leave caster as it is.

I don't think the goal should be to make casters on par with barbs. Then this game just becomes a bigger walk in the park. Only seems acceptable if reaper difficulty is actually what people are hoping for.

[fmalfeas]

I honestly never understood people throwing fits about DC cast CC spells/Instakills anyway.

Seriously? People throwing fits about the trashmobs? Because if it's not trash...it's immune. Utterly, completely, 100% immune. Can't debuff it to remove the immunity. Can't do anything to make those spells work in any way on the non-trash. And it's the non-trash that really matter in the quests.

If grouped, and a PM runs through instakilling all the trash, they're basically being the absolute best group member they possibly can. Why? Because that means that everyone who has abilities that are actually effective against the reds (or in some quests, purple) will be able to keep themselves in full fighting trim, ready to engage the real enemy at max power, rather than being worn down and weakened when they get there.

Instead, though, when a PM does that people scream that they're OP and should be nerfed.

[valarmorghuliis]

I've been lurking this thread and the other doom threads for a few days now just getting steadily more and more frustrated and since it's daytime and I'm sober I figured I'd actually let myself respond now.

All of the success percentages that keep getting thrown around have a really big caveat attached to them that no one is mentioning. When you are talking about increases to the percentage of success it is important to remember that those increases only occur so long as a maxed dc / spell pen first lifer and the completionist's success rates fall within certain ranges.

Every character succeeds when the target rolls a 1 and fails with a 20 so they start off with a 5% minimum and 95% maximum success rate (except for spell pen). This means that in order for there to be a 25% increase in conjuration success from past lives the first lifer must have spell focus greater and epic spell focus conjuration and still have a success rate of less than 70% while the same setup on the completionist has the completionist succeeding at least 30% of the time.

For spell pen the increase of effectiveness is only there so long as the first lifer with all 3 spell pen feats in the correct sphere with optimal gear and echoes: arcane and all of the piercing spell crafts and is failing on an 11 or less and a completionist in the same setup fails on a 2.

This just isn't the case in almost all content in the game.

The real benefits from past lives is the versatility they offer. You can't squeeze in every spell focus and greater spell focus but you can fit in 2 feats for completionist and pl wiz. If you are running content where a fully maxed out spell pen specced first lifer is just barely passing the check on a 1 you just freed up three twists and a destiny point that you can use elsewhere.

And here is my point... why shouldn't it. You've ground out an exponentially larger amount of xp to get to 28 than the other guy.

[valarmorghuliis]

We also have threads keep popping up all over the place talking about how turbine always hates dc casters and has been systematically destroying them and making it so that they are not effective at all let alone wanted and that this raid is just a continuation of a theme. Somehow everyone seems to have forgotten that the dc caster was the mvp of the last raid. No build should be better than everyone else in everything.

We are talking about content in Shavarath which historically was a pain to dc cast due to inflated saves, spell resistance and select immunities and environmental buffs to the mobs... the last time we were here dc casters often contributed by casting haste rage displace and tossing some webs. It is now filled with good outsiders which historically are a pain to cast due to inflated saves, spell resistance and selected immunities. With those two factors combined it should be really hard to cast. Like a fully min maxed caster should have mobs save 50% of the time on ee level of hard.

It's a couple quests and a raid that thematically are very hostile for dc casters (just like heroic). It does have an item or 2 that is very want / must have for dc casters (also just like heroic).

The good news for all the wizards finding that they suddenly having a very hard time on ee in there is that we aren't in heroic so with a simple enhancement swap to evocation archmage and a swap of your destiny to shiradi you're about 90% as effective as any other shiradi caster, which is more than enough to farm out the gear you want because aside from the saves the content is super easy.

If you aren't optimized for content fix it instead of hollering over a billion threads.
Or just run a lower difficulty

[Wizza]

I don't think the goal should be to make casters on par with barbs. Then this game just becomes a bigger walk in the park. Only seems acceptable if reaper difficulty is actually what people are hoping for.

We should nerf barbarians/mechs/warlocks etc etc to get on par with Casters, not viceversa. People complain that casters might be Overpowered, I have bad news: we have already 3-4 classes OP that don't even have the problem of Spell points' conservation.

[moo_cow]

We should nerf barbarians/mechs/warlocks etc etc to get on par with Casters, not viceversa. People complain that casters might be Overpowered, I have bad news: we have already 3-4 classes OP that don't even have the problem of Spell points' conservation.

I hope if/when we get reaper mode that those melees need us casters to cc for them. I'm kinda hoping reaper mode makes us have to make balanced parties of heals/cc/ranged/melee. But I doubt it. Wishful thinking I guess.

[Chi_Ryu]

Excuse me but can someone please give us the breakdown on how to get guaranteed 46 Spell Pen on a 1st Life Lvl 28?

I have a slightly different maximum calculation to others:

Wizard 20 (1st life) in Magister
Base levels = 20
Spell Penetration = +3 (Archmage tier 3)
Spell Pen, Greater Spell Pen, Epic Spell Pen Feats = +8
Arcanum (Elf/Half elf Tier 2) = +3
Any arcane destiny = +5
Piercing Spellcraft (Magister Tier 3) = +3
Piercing Spellcraft (Exalted Angel Tier 3, twist) = +3
Echoes of the Ancestors: Arcane (Fatesinger Tier 3, Twist) = +2
Guild bonus = +1
Thunderforged item = +7

That's a Spell Penetration of 55 by level 28 - i.e. will beat DC56 without fail. You could also wear the Shroud of the Abbot for an extra +1 to that (from Lesser Arcane Augmentation IX), but there's better items in that slot, and it's raid loot.

Don't want to spend so much on Spell Penetration? Well, then how about this for 44 (that's 100% on a DC45 roll), using only one feat and no twists (if you are divine, substitute being in Magister for being in Exalted Angel):

Base levels = 20
Spell Penetration = +3 (Archmage tier 3)
Spell Pen Feat = +2
Arcanum (Elf/Half elf Tier 2) = +3
Any arcane destiny = +5
Piercing Spellcraft (Magister Tier 3) = +3
Guild bonus = +1
Thunderforged item = +7

Any less than that and you are compromising, which is fair enough (but shouldn't be 100% successful).