"(Insert class) IS OP!! NERF!!!" My god, stop it with the nerf bat already...

[GlassCannon]

So a guildmate and I were chatting today and he was lamenting the "Splash 5 Warlock into whatever and skip the life" because Enlightened Spirit is a classic choice of many builds because of the idiot-button Burst AoEs and very high survivability.

Now, things like this have happened in the past and I raised a very valid point: We don't scale powerful abilities with Class level and the Core enhancements for levels 12, 18 and 20 are not nearly powerful enough to deter excessive multiclassing and exploitation.

And in the past we have had extremely excessive nerf bats flung, hurled, dropped on en masse and otherwise used to absolutely pulverize and destroy an entire class. Example: Sorcerer. A first life Sorc cannot be a successful blaster and the CC available doesn't work anymore (and hasn't in a long time) because "solid fog is OP!" and "Cloudkill is OP!" and "Hippie Globe is OP!" etc. etc. etc. A first life Fire Savant Sorc with random loot equipped needs to be able to drop a Maximized Empowered Fireball into a room at-level on Elite (e.g. lvl 7 quest Elite, Sorc is lvl 9) and everything dies, including the Evasion freaks that for some cruel reason have a Reflex that is beyond their level and class by a long shot. The sadism needs to stop. This is a game, not a f*cking competition. Those competing and calling for nerfs need to just stop.

Folks can literally compete about anything. How much they peed, to the milliliter. How much they poo'd. How much they ate. How healthy they are. How much they weigh. How loudly they fart. Stop "rebalancing" the game because they are being fools and competing where competition just isn't right. You don't turn recreation into competition without ruining the recreation. DDO is being hounded by competitive people that want to ruin recreational activities. They try really hard! They do it all the time!

So we need some things changed a bit. Enhancements need to be more powerful for Purist classes. Like at lvl 20 the entire tree gets an overhaul and significantly more powerful for example. This can be done with a scaling % like I keep proposing (just use the concept of the spell point pool for Sorcs/FvS and apply it to the entire enhancement tree of every class) or it can be done differently. Right now there is absolutely no reason to make a pure sorc, pure monk or pure fighter because the disadvantages are just too severe. Other pure classes are also discouraged because their abilities don't make up for the power they could gain by multiclassing 12/6/2 or 6/6/8 or something similar. It's hard to find a straight up 20 anything other than Warlock because Warlock is sustainable AoE magic DPS and has excellent survivability.
Every Savant needs the same kind of survivability and sustainability that Warlock has, respective to their element and Elemental Apostheosis needs to be free and to buff the Savant's abilities, significantly reducing the SP cost of spells of their element while increasing the cost of spells of other elements. The SLAs need to be low to no cost as well and the base DCs of all Damage spells need to be brought back up to reasonable amounts for the non-ultimate-completionist-with-overpowered-gear. Savants need their SLAs to have NO SAVE. In fact, many things are scaling wildly out of control and making things very tough to balance because we have so many sources of buffs on gear and with effects. Some effects are hard to get without Favor or TP but they exist. So, to fix it, just use a cap. That or no save at all. I like caps though. They are nicer than no attempt at balance and work better than no save.

There are some enhancements that are simply too much for a certain class (e.g. Enlightened Spirit, unless that's WAI then use it as the baseline for all other trees as you work on buffing them) and others that are laughably underpowered (e.g. Ninja Spy Poison and basically the whole Ninja Spy tree). The Harper tree only lets us use INT for weapons, why not let Monks use WIS for attack and damage early on (at level 1-3)? Why not have abilities stop working if you don't have enough % levels to keep the Purity, like making Ninja Spy Faster Sneaking stop working if you are a Monk 2 and take a 7th level of Rogue, or take level 17 and are only Warlock 5 and didn't take Warlock so Enlightened Spirit Burst/Blast, Shining Through and Light Spell Power stop working? I really like what was done with Bard Swashbuckler. Nice change there.

I'd like to see the game become more fun and support a lot of wacky play styles without invalidating any of them due to whiners saying things should be nerfed because their competitive nature was offended at someone really rocking a certain play style. It should be fun, not a deathfest or real struggle. We have enough struggle in the real world. It doesn't belong in DDO.

Now for those that love a challenge, and I do admit that at times I just craved one but only for a short while... I do recommend the Devs work on Hardcore Mode. Someone called it "Reaper Mode" but that's just pretentiousness and narcissism paired with sadism and sadomasochism talking. It's Hardcore Mode. Respect the folks that set it up in the first place and use the proper name. In previous games, Hardcore Mode was not a "Well, we have Normal, Hard, Elite and Hardcore." It was more than that, it was "Well, you can play a Normal game or we can put it on Hardcore. Once we set it, we can't change it. It's either Normal or Hardcore. Pick one." There has been for some time a Mortal Voyage Permadeath Guild to simulate Hardcore but their measures step out of the bounds of DDO's design and go for the maximum danger to characters, as DDO is designed to arbitrarily murder folks' characters just because the Devs love to inflict -10% XP out of the blue.

In regards to Hardcore there need to be check boxes in the Hardcore Settings (part of the Options page): You cannot open dungeons on your difficulty if there are members who are not Hardcore or do not share your settings without them clicking Yes in a dialog box. You can enter someone else's Hardcore Dungeon no matter if you are Hardcore or not but it's not an added checks and balances headache for the Devs. It's just Hardcore. Don't like it? Go back to regular Casual/Normal/Hard/Elite.

Hardcore Characters that have elected for Permanent settings can enter all dungeons on all difficulties as non-hardcore characters are able. They just have penalties they have opted for.

Proposed settings:
Enable Hardcore Mode for Opening Dungeons
(Note: Each setting increases XP and Loot Quality by x%) - ***Loot Quality is not Loot Level, it is the chance of a third or fourth enchantment being on an item and the percent likelihood that those enchantments are similar***

Temporary on/off as wanted toggles:
Damage - Resistances to all damage, be it melee, ranged or spell/effect based
Saves Ward - Better saves
HP Ward - More HP
Dangerous Traps - Traps will kill you. Now all Traps completely ignore Saves and are DC10 and now deal a random 50% to 95% damage instead of a fixed number. Certain traps, designed to hit you more than once or twice in less than a second, are omitted from this. (e.g. the Spike lever in Haywire Foundry Right Wing near the Flame Vent levers)
Difficult Traps - Rogues not challenged enough? Traps ignore Skills and are DC10 for a true 50% no matter what your skills are! Wait, did we mention that the traps are random and can at some times be horribly broken in their randomness? Well, we did now. Have fun!
Crazy Monsters - Hasted, Raged and Spell Fury'd and they prefer AoE damage spells and AoE attacks
Fast Monsters - Stacks with Crazy, makes them stupidly fast
Heavy Hitters - Before we put this one in, casters need to hit like casters. That means a Sorc on EE/LE melee or ranged hits a Player for 16 damage, not 430. After that change is made, we go for the gusto and everything gets Quad Damage.
Champions Everywhere - More stacking! Everything is a Champion, complete with 1 random Champ buff. This cannot be enabled without 2 other settings enabled first. This is the official Mysterious Remnant Farming Setting. Enjoy!
"Everyone Is The Boss" Day - Everyone is a red named boss, with respective wards.
Office Party! - "Everyone Is The Boss Day" just got more interesting as other offices were invited to the party! Now random Raid and Quest Bosses from all over DDO will appear in your dungeon in addition to the non-named Bosses!

Permanent toggle:
Permadeath - This one needs to be a permanent toggle with a dialog "Are you sure?" and "Are you really sure?" and "Are you sure that you're sure that you're really really sure?" that pops up before you enable it that changes drops for you to be just for you and never randomly assigned to another and are significantly increased in quality and power, never over your level (but they may have the power of whatever level they would have been, so your level 10 axe is now reassigned Level 7 because you are level 7, for example) and bound-to-you with no option for auction and such. You can still buy stuff on the AH or bring it to your Permadeath from the Shared Bank but you cannot use Bound to Account items. This character cannot Reincarnate.
G.I.M.P. - You are randomly assigned a class each time you level up. Make the best of it! You are able to reroll loot for free twice on every chest (every chest, even raid chests, though if you reroll on raid chests you cannot assign it to someone else) because you cannot predict your class next level. G.I.M.P. allows the character to have levels of any and all classes and can potentially make you a 1/1/1/1/1/1/1/1/1/1/1. Be aware of this. Your dominant class will appear to other players in the UI.


Now that I've covered the excessive and rather despair-inducing use of the Nerf Bat over the years and some ways to fix it, let's get to talking. Like many other threads I start I may just never look at this one again, fair warning. I tend to do that. Sorry.

I just want to make DDO more fun. I want to see it live for a very, very long time and be known as "The best MMO that also happened to be the only MMO that never died because folks took good care of it." If I helped to make it better in any way, that's cause for celebration. I really love this game.

[JOTMON]

/half read the wall of text..

/no thanks.
Multi-classing has heavy roots in DDO, not interested in a game that caters to purists.. lots of other games have those..

Low level Warlock is powerful and could use some tweaking, but needs the power when transitioning into high/endgame levels.
Also, It is a pay to play class... not a pay to be mediocre... so it should be a good class... you are buying a Ferrari not a Fiero...
I would look at ....
~change the 1d6/2levels Eldritch to 1d4 at level 1 and upgrade to d6 at higher level.. somewhere around level 12
~change the progression of Utterdark Blast in the TS tree to Faltering>Penetrating>utterdark..
Utterdark blast is low hanging fruit and easy access for every Warlock to consolidate spell power, pushing it to Tier 4 keeps it accessible for all Warlocks, but not easily accessible at low levels.

[Qhualor]

Eh, the only disadvantages I feel on my pures are my fighters need an sp bar for Cocoon and my melees swing at enemy soulstones because the ranged killed them before I could get there. I could care less if my pures are better or worse than multiclass on paper. I care more about the balance. I think abilities need to scale more based on class levels.

To understand how and why multiclassing jumped in popularity, you have to go back to the enhancement revamp and the introduction of EDs. We went from choosing 1 prestige, requiring minimum 6 levels of a class and stricter requirements to being able to dip into multiple trees, needing 5 levels of a class for T5 enhancements, looser restrictions, changes to feats, adding more power to enhancements/cores/feats to be worth taking and taking advantage of front loaded class abilities that resulted in having to back load cores to be be worth taking for pures. Low tier self sufficiency and power in EDs easy to twist.

[FranOhmsford]

and power in EDs easy to twist.

How about simply removing Twists then?

[Lemdog]

So a guildmate and I were chatting today and he was lamenting the "Splash 5 Warlock into whatever and skip the life" because Enlightened Spirit is a classic choice of many builds because of the idiot-button Burst AoEs and very high survivability.

Now, things like this have happened in the past and I raised a very valid point: We don't scale powerful abilities with Class level and the Core enhancements for levels 12, 18 and 20 are not nearly powerful enough to deter excessive multiclassing and exploitation.

And in the past we have had extremely excessive nerf bats flung, hurled, dropped on en masse and otherwise used to absolutely pulverize and destroy an entire class. Example: Sorcerer. A first life Sorc cannot be a successful blaster and the CC available doesn't work anymore (and hasn't in a long time) because "solid fog is OP!" and "Cloudkill is OP!" and "Hippie Globe is OP!" etc. etc. etc. A first life Fire Savant Sorc with random loot equipped needs to be able to drop a Maximized Empowered Fireball into a room at-level on Elite (e.g. lvl 7 quest Elite, Sorc is lvl 9) and everything dies, including the Evasion freaks that for some cruel reason have a Reflex that is beyond their level and class by a long shot. The sadism needs to stop. This is a game, not a f*cking competition. Those competing and calling for nerfs need to just stop.

Folks can literally compete about anything. How much they peed, to the milliliter. How much they poo'd. How much they ate. How healthy they are. How much they weigh. How loudly they fart. Stop "rebalancing" the game because they are being fools and competing where competition just isn't right. You don't turn recreation into competition without ruining the recreation. DDO is being hounded by competitive people that want to ruin recreational activities. They try really hard! They do it all the time!

So we need some things changed a bit. Enhancements need to be more powerful for Purist classes. Like at lvl 20 the entire tree gets an overhaul and significantly more powerful for example. This can be done with a scaling % like I keep proposing (just use the concept of the spell point pool for Sorcs/FvS and apply it to the entire enhancement tree of every class) or it can be done differently. Right now there is absolutely no reason to make a pure sorc, pure monk or pure fighter because the disadvantages are just too severe. Other pure classes are also discouraged because their abilities don't make up for the power they could gain by multiclassing 12/6/2 or 6/6/8 or something similar. It's hard to find a straight up 20 anything other than Warlock because Warlock is sustainable AoE magic DPS and has excellent survivability.
Every Savant needs the same kind of survivability and sustainability that Warlock has, respective to their element and Elemental Apostheosis needs to be free and to buff the Savant's abilities, significantly reducing the SP cost of spells of their element while increasing the cost of spells of other elements. The SLAs need to be low to no cost as well and the base DCs of all Damage spells need to be brought back up to reasonable amounts for the non-ultimate-completionist-with-overpowered-gear. Savants need their SLAs to have NO SAVE. In fact, many things are scaling wildly out of control and making things very tough to balance because we have so many sources of buffs on gear and with effects. Some effects are hard to get without Favor or TP but they exist. So, to fix it, just use a cap. That or no save at all. I like caps though. They are nicer than no attempt at balance and work better than no save.

There are some enhancements that are simply too much for a certain class (e.g. Enlightened Spirit, unless that's WAI then use it as the baseline for all other trees as you work on buffing them) and others that are laughably underpowered (e.g. Ninja Spy Poison and basically the whole Ninja Spy tree). The Harper tree only lets us use INT for weapons, why not let Monks use WIS for attack and damage early on (at level 1-3)? Why not have abilities stop working if you don't have enough % levels to keep the Purity, like making Ninja Spy Faster Sneaking stop working if you are a Monk 2 and take a 7th level of Rogue, or take level 17 and are only Warlock 5 and didn't take Warlock so Enlightened Spirit Burst/Blast, Shining Through and Light Spell Power stop working? I really like what was done with Bard Swashbuckler. Nice change there.

I'd like to see the game become more fun and support a lot of wacky play styles without invalidating any of them due to whiners saying things should be nerfed because their competitive nature was offended at someone really rocking a certain play style. It should be fun, not a deathfest or real struggle. We have enough struggle in the real world. It doesn't belong in DDO.

Now for those that love a challenge, and I do admit that at times I just craved one but only for a short while... I do recommend the Devs work on Hardcore Mode. Someone called it "Reaper Mode" but that's just pretentiousness and narcissism paired with sadism and sadomasochism talking. It's Hardcore Mode. Respect the folks that set it up in the first place and use the proper name. In previous games, Hardcore Mode was not a "Well, we have Normal, Hard, Elite and Hardcore." It was more than that, it was "Well, you can play a Normal game or we can put it on Hardcore. Once we set it, we can't change it. It's either Normal or Hardcore. Pick one." There has been for some time a Mortal Voyage Permadeath Guild to simulate Hardcore but their measures step out of the bounds of DDO's design and go for the maximum danger to characters, as DDO is designed to arbitrarily murder folks' characters just because the Devs love to inflict -10% XP out of the blue.

In regards to Hardcore there need to be check boxes in the Hardcore Settings (part of the Options page): You cannot open dungeons on your difficulty if there are members who are not Hardcore or do not share your settings without them clicking Yes in a dialog box. You can enter someone else's Hardcore Dungeon no matter if you are Hardcore or not but it's not an added checks and balances headache for the Devs. It's just Hardcore. Don't like it? Go back to regular Casual/Normal/Hard/Elite.

Hardcore Characters that have elected for Permanent settings can enter all dungeons on all difficulties as non-hardcore characters are able. They just have penalties they have opted for.

Proposed settings:
Enable Hardcore Mode for Opening Dungeons
(Note: Each setting increases XP and Loot Quality by x%) - ***Loot Quality is not Loot Level, it is the chance of a third or fourth enchantment being on an item and the percent likelihood that those enchantments are similar***

Temporary on/off as wanted toggles:
Damage - Resistances to all damage, be it melee, ranged or spell/effect based
Saves Ward - Better saves
HP Ward - More HP
Dangerous Traps - Traps will kill you. Now all Traps completely ignore Saves and are DC10 and now deal a random 50% to 95% damage instead of a fixed number. Certain traps, designed to hit you more than once or twice in less than a second, are omitted from this. (e.g. the Spike lever in Haywire Foundry Right Wing near the Flame Vent levers)
Difficult Traps - Rogues not challenged enough? Traps ignore Skills and are DC10 for a true 50% no matter what your skills are! Wait, did we mention that the traps are random and can at some times be horribly broken in their randomness? Well, we did now. Have fun!
Crazy Monsters - Hasted, Raged and Spell Fury'd and they prefer AoE damage spells and AoE attacks
Fast Monsters - Stacks with Crazy, makes them stupidly fast
Heavy Hitters - Before we put this one in, casters need to hit like casters. That means a Sorc on EE/LE melee or ranged hits a Player for 16 damage, not 430. After that change is made, we go for the gusto and everything gets Quad Damage.
Champions Everywhere - More stacking! Everything is a Champion, complete with 1 random Champ buff. This cannot be enabled without 2 other settings enabled first. This is the official Mysterious Remnant Farming Setting. Enjoy!
"Everyone Is The Boss" Day - Everyone is a red named boss, with respective wards.
Office Party! - "Everyone Is The Boss Day" just got more interesting as other offices were invited to the party! Now random Raid and Quest Bosses from all over DDO will appear in your dungeon in addition to the non-named Bosses!

Permanent toggle:
Permadeath - This one needs to be a permanent toggle with a dialog "Are you sure?" and "Are you really sure?" and "Are you sure that you're sure that you're really really sure?" that pops up before you enable it that changes drops for you to be just for you and never randomly assigned to another and are significantly increased in quality and power, never over your level (but they may have the power of whatever level they would have been, so your level 10 axe is now reassigned Level 7 because you are level 7, for example) and bound-to-you with no option for auction and such. You can still buy stuff on the AH or bring it to your Permadeath from the Shared Bank but you cannot use Bound to Account items. This character cannot Reincarnate.
G.I.M.P. - You are randomly assigned a class each time you level up. Make the best of it! You are able to reroll loot for free twice on every chest (every chest, even raid chests, though if you reroll on raid chests you cannot assign it to someone else) because you cannot predict your class next level. G.I.M.P. allows the character to have levels of any and all classes and can potentially make you a 1/1/1/1/1/1/1/1/1/1/1. Be aware of this. Your dominant class will appear to other players in the UI.


Now that I've covered the excessive and rather despair-inducing use of the Nerf Bat over the years and some ways to fix it, let's get to talking. Like many other threads I start I may just never look at this one again, fair warning. I tend to do that. Sorry.

I just want to make DDO more fun. I want to see it live for a very, very long time and be known as "The best MMO that also happened to be the only MMO that never died because folks took good care of it." If I helped to make it better in any way, that's cause for celebration. I really love this game.

Couldn't agree more - /signed and +1

[Qhualor]

How about simply removing Twists then?

I don't have a problem with twists. I think the problem is that the power is too low tier. It's one of the many things that has led to players being able to be better at self sufficiency and stacking more power on top of existing power. That kind of power should come at a greater cost as any other power should.

[changelingamuck]

*snip*

If "the nerf bat" was actually being used enough, there wouldn't be so much clamoring for "Reaper" or "Hardcore" or whatever difficulties. If it was being used enough, the majority of heroic levels wouldn't have been invalidated into a condition of being face-rolling content. Extra, tacked-on difficulties are demanded in MMO's when power creep has been inadequately controlled. Extra, tacked-on difficulties in MMO's also further spread apart player populations which is especially problematic with thinning player populations.

Inadequately controlled power creep --> tacked-on difficulties --> players spread apart across more difficulties --> players finding it harder to find others to group with at their level/difficulty --> more problems with player retention, especially new players --> shortened lifespan of DDO

That's the big picture. Most people aren't concerned about the power levels of characters because they're competitive, petty, jealous, etc. like you've suggested here. We are concerned about how unbridled power creep affects the longevity of the game, class homogenization, the 'everyone solo-ing while in a group' phenomenon, the lack of developer resources to go back and retroactively rebalance heroic level content, and so on. Whether or not you agree with us; we have, like, y'know *reasons* other than being y'know all self-centered, dumb and whiny and stuff. It's conceivable that we could be wrong based on things like poor logic or faulty evidence; but we're still really, genuinely, actually using logic and evidence, not just the mental vomit that spews forth from our loathsome personalities.

The entire roadmap for the past few years has included:

*the introduction of easily acquired named loot that outclassed long-grind items of the past (MotU loot)

*the introduction of epic destinies that have all of their power kick-in instantly at level 20 rather than be evenly distributed across levels

*pay-to-win tomes of fate and the constant escalation of bonuses available on store-bought ability tomes

*item augments that provided much more flexible slotting of many enchantments and were permanent unlike the previous 'guild augments'

*epic past lives adding things like +9% doublestrike and +9 PRR that were actually allowed to function during heroic levels--levels which already lacked challenge for run-of-the-mill characters

*enhancement passes that have all increased the power of every class affected by them (many of them dramatically)

*the introduction of new guild ships that greatly increased the power available from ship buffs, which also became persistent through deaths

*the recent reworking of random loot with extra, third enchantments, higher bonuses than those available on most named loot, and the addition of enchantment properties on them that were previously, exclusively available on named loot (e.g. light resistance, + assassinate, negative/repair healing amplification)

*soon, a crafting system revision that I have to assume will need to inflate the power of crafted loot dramatically in order to be even somewhat comparable to the new random-gen loot

The nerfs that have occurred are miniscule compared to that ever-growing tsunami of power. I don't think that this world where an ever-present nerf bat has been pulverizing our characters into non-viability actually exists. Almost every nerf that has occurred in the past few years has been to something that was an increase in power (e.g. holy sword) and was partially scaled back in power, which still leaves a net increase in character power.

Low level Warlock is powerful and could use some tweaking, but needs the power when transitioning into high/endgame levels.
Also, It is a pay to play class... not a pay to be mediocre... so it should be a good class... you are buying a Ferrari not a Fiero...

When spending money on DDO in general, many people are spending that money with a desire to add something new to a game they enjoy because it has many classes that the devs generally try to keep balanced. To them, buying a class like warlock that is very poorly balanced in heroics compared to the other classes in general is actually a worse purchase. I don't think you can assume that people spending money on a different class want that class to be 'better', so much as wanting it to be 'different'. I like a lot of things about warlocks. But I really don't like feeling like I shouldn't group with people in heroic levels because I'd end up turning the other party members into pikers by preventing them from actually fighting by killing everything instantly while barely trying.

[jalont]

If "the nerf bat" was actually being used enough, there wouldn't be so much clamoring for "Reaper" or "Hardcore" or whatever difficulties. If it was being used enough, the majority of heroic levels wouldn't have been invalidated into a condition of being face-rolling content. Extra, tacked-on difficulties are demanded in MMO's when power creep has been inadequately controlled. Extra, tacked-on difficulties in MMO's also further spread apart player populations which is especially problematic with thinning player populations.

Inadequately controlled power creep --> tacked-on difficulties --> players spread apart across more difficulties --> players finding it harder to find others to group with at their level/difficulty --> more problems with player retention, especially new players --> shortened lifespan of DDO

That's the big picture. Most people aren't concerned about the power levels of characters because they're competitive, petty, jealous, etc. like you've suggested here. We are concerned about how unbridled power creep affects the longevity of the game, class homogenization, the 'everyone solo-ing while in a group' phenomenon, the lack of developer resources to go back and retroactively rebalance heroic level content, and so on. Whether or not you agree with us; we have, like, y'know *reasons* other than being y'know all self-centered, dumb and whiny and stuff. It's conceivable that we could be wrong based on things like poor logic or faulty evidence; but we're still really, genuinely, actually using logic and evidence, not just the mental vomit that spews forth from our loathsome personalities.

The entire roadmap for the past few years has included:

*the introduction of easily acquired named loot that outclassed long-grind items of the past (MotU loot)

*the introduction of epic destinies that have all of their power kick-in instantly at level 20 rather than be evenly distributed across levels

*pay-to-win tomes of fate and the constant escalation of bonuses available on store-bought ability tomes

*item augments that provided much more flexible slotting of many enchantments and were permanent unlike the previous 'guild augments'

*epic past lives adding things like +9% doublestrike and +9 PRR that were actually allowed to function during heroic levels--levels which already lacked challenge for run-of-the-mill characters

*enhancement passes that have all increased the power of every class affected by them (many of them dramatically)

*the introduction of new guild ships that greatly increased the power available from ship buffs, which also became persistent through deaths

*the recent reworking of random loot with extra, third enchantments, higher bonuses than those available on most named loot, and the addition of enchantment properties on them that were previously, exclusively available on named loot (e.g. light resistance, + assassinate, negative/repair healing amplification)

*soon, a crafting system revision that I have to assume will need to inflate the power of crafted loot dramatically in order to be even somewhat comparable to the new random-gen loot

The nerfs that have occurred are miniscule compared to that ever-growing tsunami of power. I don't think that this world where an ever-present nerf bat has been pulverizing our characters into non-viability actually exists. Almost every nerf that has occurred in the past few years has been to something that was an increase in power (e.g. holy sword) and was partially scaled back in power, which still leaves a net increase in character power.



When spending money on DDO in general, many people are spending that money with a desire to add something new to a game they enjoy because it has many classes that the devs generally try to keep balanced. To them, buying a class like warlock that is very poorly balanced in heroics compared to the other classes in general is actually a worse purchase. I don't think you can assume that people spending money on a different class want that class to be 'better', so much as wanting it to be 'different'. I like a lot of things about warlocks. But I really don't like feeling like I shouldn't group with people in heroic levels because I'd end up turning the other party members into pikers by preventing them from actually fighting by killing everything instantly while barely trying.

Best.Post.Ever.

[Wulverine]

If "the nerf bat" was actually being used enough, there wouldn't be so much clamoring for "Reaper" or "Hardcore" or whatever difficulties. If it was being used enough, the majority of heroic levels wouldn't have been invalidated into a condition of being face-rolling content. Extra, tacked-on difficulties are demanded in MMO's when power creep has been inadequately controlled. Extra, tacked-on difficulties in MMO's also further spread apart player populations which is especially problematic with thinning player populations.

Inadequately controlled power creep --> tacked-on difficulties --> players spread apart across more difficulties --> players finding it harder to find others to group with at their level/difficulty --> more problems with player retention, especially new players --> shortened lifespan of DDO

That's the big picture. Most people aren't concerned about the power levels of characters because they're competitive, petty, jealous, etc. like you've suggested here. We are concerned about how unbridled power creep affects the longevity of the game, class homogenization, the 'everyone solo-ing while in a group' phenomenon, the lack of developer resources to go back and retroactively rebalance heroic level content, and so on. Whether or not you agree with us; we have, like, y'know *reasons* other than being y'know all self-centered, dumb and whiny and stuff. It's conceivable that we could be wrong based on things like poor logic or faulty evidence; but we're still really, genuinely, actually using logic and evidence, not just the mental vomit that spews forth from our loathsome personalities.

The entire roadmap for the past few years has included:

*the introduction of easily acquired named loot that outclassed long-grind items of the past (MotU loot)

*the introduction of epic destinies that have all of their power kick-in instantly at level 20 rather than be evenly distributed across levels

*pay-to-win tomes of fate and the constant escalation of bonuses available on store-bought ability tomes

*item augments that provided much more flexible slotting of many enchantments and were permanent unlike the previous 'guild augments'

*epic past lives adding things like +9% doublestrike and +9 PRR that were actually allowed to function during heroic levels--levels which already lacked challenge for run-of-the-mill characters

*enhancement passes that have all increased the power of every class affected by them (many of them dramatically)

*the introduction of new guild ships that greatly increased the power available from ship buffs, which also became persistent through deaths

*the recent reworking of random loot with extra, third enchantments, higher bonuses than those available on most named loot, and the addition of enchantment properties on them that were previously, exclusively available on named loot (e.g. light resistance, + assassinate, negative/repair healing amplification)

*soon, a crafting system revision that I have to assume will need to inflate the power of crafted loot dramatically in order to be even somewhat comparable to the new random-gen loot

The nerfs that have occurred are miniscule compared to that ever-growing tsunami of power. I don't think that this world where an ever-present nerf bat has been pulverizing our characters into non-viability actually exists. Almost every nerf that has occurred in the past few years has been to something that was an increase in power (e.g. holy sword) and was partially scaled back in power, which still leaves a net increase in character power.



When spending money on DDO in general, many people are spending that money with a desire to add something new to a game they enjoy because it has many classes that the devs generally try to keep balanced. To them, buying a class like warlock that is very poorly balanced in heroics compared to the other classes in general is actually a worse purchase. I don't think you can assume that people spending money on a different class want that class to be 'better', so much as wanting it to be 'different'. I like a lot of things about warlocks. But I really don't like feeling like I shouldn't group with people in heroic levels because I'd end up turning the other party members into pikers by preventing them from actually fighting by killing everything instantly while barely trying.

Great post. And you're on the 2016 council as well. Hope you continue these quality posts there as well

[Gremmlynn]

OP, if walking through a quest and tossing a fireball into each room and everything dies is what you are looking for. Have you tried casual difficulty? Because that is pretty much what it offers, so the option is there.

[Gljosh]

Lets just be honest here.

Player Knowledge is OP. Its not the amount of past lives, gear, tomes, etc.

Skilled and Knowledgable Players are OP.

[Whitering]

Lets just be honest here.

Player Knowledge is OP. Its not the amount of past lives, gear, tomes, etc.

Skilled and Knowledgable Players are OP.

Eh, by the time most people meet that criteria they have at least some of the above, it's hard to divorce the past lives, gear, tomes etc. from the skill and knowledge.

[janave]

If "the nerf bat" was actually being used enough, there wouldn't be so much clamoring for "Reaper" or "Hardcore" or whatever difficulties. If it was being used enough, the majority of heroic levels wouldn't have been invalidated into a condition of being face-rolling content. Extra, tacked-on difficulties are demanded in MMO's when power creep has been inadequately controlled. Extra, tacked-on difficulties in MMO's also further spread apart player populations which is especially problematic with thinning player populations.

Inadequately controlled power creep --> tacked-on difficulties --> players spread apart across more difficulties --> players finding it harder to find others to group with at their level/difficulty --> more problems with player retention, especially new players --> shortened lifespan of DDO

That's the big picture. Most people aren't concerned about the power levels of characters because they're competitive, petty, jealous, etc. like you've suggested here. We are concerned about how unbridled power creep affects the longevity of the game, class homogenization, the 'everyone solo-ing while in a group' phenomenon, the lack of developer resources to go back and retroactively rebalance heroic level content, and so on. Whether or not you agree with us; we have, like, y'know *reasons* other than being y'know all self-centered, dumb and whiny and stuff. It's conceivable that we could be wrong based on things like poor logic or faulty evidence; but we're still really, genuinely, actually using logic and evidence, not just the mental vomit that spews forth from our loathsome personalities.

The entire roadmap for the past few years has included:

*the introduction of easily acquired named loot that outclassed long-grind items of the past (MotU loot)

*the introduction of epic destinies that have all of their power kick-in instantly at level 20 rather than be evenly distributed across levels

*pay-to-win tomes of fate and the constant escalation of bonuses available on store-bought ability tomes

*item augments that provided much more flexible slotting of many enchantments and were permanent unlike the previous 'guild augments'

*epic past lives adding things like +9% doublestrike and +9 PRR that were actually allowed to function during heroic levels--levels which already lacked challenge for run-of-the-mill characters

*enhancement passes that have all increased the power of every class affected by them (many of them dramatically)

*the introduction of new guild ships that greatly increased the power available from ship buffs, which also became persistent through deaths

*the recent reworking of random loot with extra, third enchantments, higher bonuses than those available on most named loot, and the addition of enchantment properties on them that were previously, exclusively available on named loot (e.g. light resistance, + assassinate, negative/repair healing amplification)

*soon, a crafting system revision that I have to assume will need to inflate the power of crafted loot dramatically in order to be even somewhat comparable to the new random-gen loot

The nerfs that have occurred are miniscule compared to that ever-growing tsunami of power. I don't think that this world where an ever-present nerf bat has been pulverizing our characters into non-viability actually exists. Almost every nerf that has occurred in the past few years has been to something that was an increase in power (e.g. holy sword) and was partially scaled back in power, which still leaves a net increase in character power.



When spending money on DDO in general, many people are spending that money with a desire to add something new to a game they enjoy because it has many classes that the devs generally try to keep balanced. To them, buying a class like warlock that is very poorly balanced in heroics compared to the other classes in general is actually a worse purchase. I don't think you can assume that people spending money on a different class want that class to be 'better', so much as wanting it to be 'different'. I like a lot of things about warlocks. But I really don't like feeling like I shouldn't group with people in heroic levels because I'd end up turning the other party members into pikers by preventing them from actually fighting by killing everything instantly while barely trying.

For moar highlight,
someone on the PC worth listening to.

[Lorianus]

Was running Legendary Elite quests and raids Sunday night and two veterans were totally rocking on their pure melee monks, including tanking EE Sor'jek Incanni and Xy'zzy while other players struggled on their paladins, warlocks and barbarians. People can demand nerf until the end of days but even if there was only one standard class left some would still feel totally underpowered compared to really good players. I don’t mind very experienced and skilled players and like to stick to them in groups and raids. Class/build/gear is important but won’t make you extraordinary. You can't become awesome just by following builds/advice or grindging the right loot and you can't nerf awseome either. You earn it or you don't.