Update 28: Devil's Gambit Review

[The_Human_Cypher]

Ran the 4 new quests on Lammania with KookieKobold last night. Full party on EE difficulty.

1) Tavern Brawl. Short but very fun, the idea of putting a quest in The Portable Hole is great. This quest was actually my favorite even though it is really just a fight. Collecting the pages was not difficult at all so hiding them somewhere would make this option more worthwhile.

2) Grim and Barrett. Added a new Harbor location called the Druid's Hostel. This quest is interesting in its concept but the game play didn't really grab me. Run through, fight The Jailer, go to boss fight, the end. Probably needs to be fleshed out more before it goes to the live servers.

3) Name? Added a new location in House C that is part of the House Cannith Manufactury. This quest looked the best of the four quests, making good use of existing art resources to create a dungeon. Traps, puzzles, some challenging fights, and a new type of boss that can copy himself and have the party fight a half dozen of his images at the same time. I enjoyed this one along with Tavern Brawl.

4) Subversion. This quest in the Tower of the Twelve adds a new monster, the Slaad! Kookie confirmed that the Slaad is an entirely new monster with its own animations, so thank you for that. I liked this quest and its sets, but the end fight with the Green and Red Slaadi probably needs more work. The fight was a breeze on Epic Hard - Kookie had to go to sleep at 10 pm EST, so I finished it with one other player. We were able to complete the boss fight without too much trouble and with 1/3 of the party. There is a bug where an Orthon can get stuck in the translucent crates hiding the two crests. I would also hide the crests in separate locations to make the players work more, making them placed randomly if possible.

Final Thoughts This is the first quest chain that makes players travel around the game world, which is a something new in DDO. Chasing Harry all over Eberron (he appears at the beginning of each quest but you can't fight him) is a winning plot device. New quests in The Hall of Heroes (The Portable Hole), the Harbor, House Cannith, and The Tower of the Twelve add variety to the chain. Age of Conan, for example, features this design convention in many of its quest chains (players have to travel from Stygia to Tarantia and then to Cimmeria and perhaps back to Stygia to finish a story arc) so I hope that it is used again in DDO. Good effort leading up to the new Vale quests, I look forward to the finished product on the live servers.

[Hafeal]

Sounds very interesting and fun. Thank for you the not too spoilery review.

A new Monster!?! Whoa! Didn't see that coming. Maybe we can ask for more along with spears etc.

I hope this is a good sign the dev & co. are getting a a handle on the code a bit.

[Krelar]

Final Thoughts This is the first quest chain that makes players travel around the game world, which is a something new in DDO. Chasing Harry all over Eberron (he appears at the beginning of each quest but you can't fight him) is a winning plot device. New quests in The Hall of Heroes (The Portable Hole), the Harbor, House Cannith, and The Tower of the Twelve add variety to the chain. Age of Conan, for example, features this design convention in many of its quest chains (players have to travel from Stygia to Tarantia and then to Cimmeria and perhaps back to Stygia to finish a story arc) so I hope that it is used again in DDO. Good effort leading up to the new Vale quests, I look forward to the finished product on the live servers.

In theory that sounds appropriate. In practice I suspect that running all over the place to complete this chain is going to get old really fast.

[DANTEIL]

In theory that sounds appropriate. In practice I suspect that running all over the place to complete this chain is going to get old really fast.

The thing that I appreciated, though, was that each of the quest givers (in Harbor, House C, Twelve) gives you the option of transporting you directly back to the Hall of Heroes after you finish the quest, where the Planescaller there can then transport you to the next quest. so really, you don't have to run around at all.

[The_Human_Cypher]

Something to note is that there is no reason to complete the four Update 28 quests before Update 29 except for the story, other than the usual reasons such as loot. I would make the Update 28 quests flagging quests for the first new Vale quest in Update 29 - at least for the Epics.

The four Update 28 quests can be done in any order even though Tavern Brawl appears to be the beginning of the story. Please consider revising this so that the quests need to be completed in a logical progression as Harry is chased around Eberron and reveals more of the back story to Update 29.

[The_Human_Cypher]

The thing that I appreciated, though, was that each of the quest givers (in Harbor, House C, Twelve) gives you the option of transporting you directly back to the Hall of Heroes after you finish the quest, where the Planescaller there can then transport you to the next quest. so really, you don't have to run around at all.

Yes, you are teleported directly to the next quest. This takes barely more time than usual. Age of Conan makes you ride all over the game world until you can teleport to each hub area.

[PsychoBlonde]

3) Name? Added a new location in House C that is part of the House Cannith Manufactury. This quest looked the best of the four quests, making good use of existing art resources to create a dungeon. Traps, puzzles, some challenging fights, and a new type of boss that can copy himself and have the party fight a half dozen of his images at the same time. I enjoyed this one along with Tavern Brawl.

Nerezza?

[PsychoBlonde]

Something to note is that there is no reason to complete the four Update 28 quests before Update 29 except for the story, other than the usual reasons such as loot. I would make the Update 28 quests flagging quests for the first new Vale quest in Update 29 - at least for the Epics.

The four Update 28 quests can be done in any order even though Tavern Brawl appears to be the beginning of the story. Please consider revising this so that the quests need to be completed in a logical progression as Harry is chased around Eberron and reveals more of the back story to Update 29.

Ugh, no. Required order for quests borks grouping up. People leave, someone joins, they're not on the right part of the chain . . . no. Tired of that ****.

[The_Human_Cypher]

Ugh, no. Required order for quests borks grouping up. People leave, someone joins, they're not on the right part of the chain . . . no. Tired of that ****.

True. I thought about this as well. I'm not sure if the Update 28 story makes sense if it is not done in order, however.

[The_Human_Cypher]

For the Tower of the Twelve quest, Subversion, I would make locating the two crests more difficult. Adding a secret door behind crates in the room that currently contains the two crests, which then leads to a large warehouse of boxes some of which are illusionary would do this. The crests could be placed randomly with some traps in the way, maybe locking one or both crests behind trap doors or paintings. Presently, obtaining the crests will only be entertaining the first time so making them hard to get every run would add significantly to Subversion's longevity.

[JOTMON]

For the Tower of the Twelve quest, Subversion, I would make locating the two crests more difficult. Adding a secret door behind crates in the room that currently contains the two crests, which then leads to a large warehouse of boxes some of which are illusionary would do this. The crests could be placed randomly with some traps in the way, maybe locking one or both crests behind trap doors or paintings. Presently, obtaining the crests will only be entertaining the first time so making them hard to get every run would add significantly to Subversion's longevity.

If they want longevity, they need to fix the loot.

[The_Human_Cypher]

Nerezza?

Multitude of Menace. I just logged into Lamannia and checked the quest Journal.

[IronClan]

Ugh, no. Required order for quests borks grouping up. People leave, someone joins, they're not on the right part of the chain . . . no. Tired of that ****.

^this never ever do this again, also never require turning in all the quests to do the final quest that is miles away from a teleport (I'm looking at the "100% red door it every life" What goes Up) quest chains that have strict progression. This totally goes against DDO's grouping/flexibility inclined player base. Good luck doing the CitW flags all the way every life... unless you're leading the groups you're going to lose people, people are going to join and they are going to "need the first quest" or they end up red dooring the whole thing and then because they can't turn in the quests they can't participate (not even red door) in the last quest (Portal, or Battle for eveningstar for example). This is terrible for grouping and always has been. Arbitrarily forcing people to drop group when they don't want to is one of DDO's dumber mechanics.

No one reads the story after the first run through anyway. and we play quests dozens sometimes hundreds of repetitions so the progression and turn in requirements is perhaps nice (for people who like their hand held) ONCE, and then a pain in the ass forever after.

[Svartelric]

Sounds pretty cool - new monsters, travelling around to chase Harry, quick quests... Thanks for the review, I'm looking forward to trying the new pack!