Some Positive Thoughts: Levels Beyond 30

[Kinerd]

There is no argument from me that each step is slightly less of an improvement of a character, the biggest improvement for any character is going from 28/32 to a 34 point build, and each step is slightly less of an improvement, however when I take 30 steps and you take 12, the sheer volume of my steps generates more improvement. Plus with each step of improvement I am able to complete the next step slightly faster.

more yes, but how much specifically? suppose we're both aiming to make an arcane, and we each want 3 each of wiz/sorc/fvs past lives. what do the next umpteen heroic lives really get you over me? the only casting relevant things that jump out at me are 1 DC for heroic Completionist and 2 DC for racial completionist (counting the drow and gnome second lives), for 48 heroic lives you can go ahead and have 'em, haha! i'll be happy with my 9 and not having to play melees for a year. sure i wouldn't mind some more PRR fort HP etc. but as a non power gamer i would be much happier getting my 9 much faster than worrying about you getting ancillary bonuses; the gap between where i want to be and where i am is narrowed much more than the real gap between you and me is widened

[SirValentine]

Conversely, TR is the single most unique thing that sets DDO apart and the single most important reason it has so much replayability. I'd be very, very careful about messing with that mechanic.

"an alternative to" is not "messing with".

If you could grind TR without actually TRing, that instantly devalues any content under L26.

Not really.

There are plenty of people (I am not one of them) who seem to love TRing for it's own sake. They will keep TRing.

There are plenty more people (I'm not one of them) who want the most efficient path. If "get-a-life-at-cap" is, say, 2 or 3 times as slow as leveling normally is, they also will keep TRing.

Meanwhile, people who get tired of an eternal TR grind and prefer an endgame raiding (I'm one of them!) wouldn't be coerced into TRing, but would have an alternative approach to (more slowly) gain some of those benefits without the massive drawbacks TR has for certain play-styles.

It would need to be designed as a worst-case alternative offered for people who simply hate the idea of TRing, not merely one for people who might prefer not to TR...

Why? Why do you feel a need to punish those who prefer not to TR? Yes, it should be less efficient, but it doesn't have to be massively so.

[karatemack]

1: Nope - XP in the Heroic Levels is extremely easy to achieve. Lowering the XP from 3.8 to 2.8 will create an even wider gap between the haves and the have nots as the haves will level faster and earning more bonuses to their characters faster allowing them to level even faster. Think of it as a snowball rolling down a mountain.

This has been claimed before... and would be true if the grind were truly endless. But the number of lives is not actually endless.

1. The 3-day TR timer is the universal stop sign. It's an equalizer. If you currently run through heroic/racial PLs in 3 days or less, you will be unaffected by this change. If you take 14 days to run through a heroic life, and this change shortens that time to a week... then you just shortened the gap by 7 days for any future lives that player runs.
2. You don't need all the lives... just enough to make whatever build you find fun to play actually viable. If I suddenly decided to play a DC caster, when I roll that alt I would be able to get to actually playing that character in endgame/raids much faster if the old grinds were reduced. Leaving things as they are creates an incentive for players to focus on 1 main character in new content/grind systems and just accept that most of thier alts are now going to be bank toons/mules.
3. The only other solution to making the old levels of powercreep more accessible is to nerf the levels of powercreep. Otherwise, raising the level cap will only further fracture the playerbase which is already divided across 4 separate TR systems, Reaper and Hardcore League.

[GoldyGopher]

more yes, but how much specifically? suppose we're both aiming to make an arcane, and we each want 3 each of wiz/sorc/fvs past lives. what do the next umpteen heroic lives really get you over me? the only casting relevant things that jump out at me are 1 DC for heroic Completionist and 2 DC for racial completionist (counting the drow and gnome second lives), for 48 heroic lives you can go ahead and have 'em, haha! i'll be happy with my 9 and not having to play melees for a year. sure i wouldn't mind some more PRR fort HP etc. but as a non power gamer i would be much happier getting my 9 much faster than worrying about you getting ancillary bonuses; the gap between where i want to be and where i am is narrowed much more than the real gap between you and me is widened

If you are only going to do 9 heroic past lives what does the extra 7 Million XP matter over the course of seven lives?
Seriously.

That's what an additional 4 maybe 5 hours of actually questing hours per life if you are slow, so 28 to 35 hours total across the 7 lives where the suggestion is top lower the XP is a change.

What about Reaper XP?
How are players grinding out Reaper XP?

[GoldyGopher]

This has been claimed before... and would be true if the grind were truly endless. But the number of lives is not actually endless.

1. The 3-day TR timer is the universal stop sign. It's an equalizer. If you currently run through heroic/racial PLs in 3 days or less, you will be unaffected by this change. If you take 14 days to run through a heroic life, and this change shortens that time to a week... then you just shortened the gap by 7 days for any future lives that player runs.
2. You don't need all the lives... just enough to make whatever build you find fun to play actually viable. If I suddenly decided to play a DC caster, when I roll that alt I would be able to get to actually playing that character in endgame/raids much faster if the old grinds were reduced. Leaving things as they are creates an incentive for players to focus on 1 main character in new content/grind systems and just accept that most of thier alts are now going to be bank toons/mules.
3. The only other solution to making the old levels of powercreep more accessible is to nerf the levels of powercreep. Otherwise, raising the level cap will only further fracture the playerbase which is already divided across 4 separate TR systems, Reaper and Hardcore League.

1) This change isn't going to save you 50% of your questing time, it is going to save you 4 to 5 hours per life. So 14 days is going to drop to 12 days. 30 days to 27.

2) You need enough lives so the build you want to play is viable at the difficulty you want to play at. If you want to play Reaper 5 at End Game or Repaer 10 or Elite or even just Hard all have different levels of past lives. Not everyone is going to be successful at R10 end-game.

3) The current systems of character progression all need to be adapted or adjusted to if you want to make it more accessible, simply lower the XP on heroic lives is nothing. Considering so much of the power comes from other sources.

[Kinerd]

If you are only going to do 9 heroic past lives what does the extra 7 Million XP matter over the course of seven lives?
Seriously.

That's what an additional 4 maybe 5 hours of actually questing hours per life if you are slow, so 28 to 35 hours total across the 7 lives where the suggestion is top lower the XP is a change.

What about Reaper XP?
How are players grinding out Reaper XP?

it would appear i am very slow because i don't get anywhere near 200k XP per hour, but even if i did i would very much like those 35 hours, especially since no matter what arcane build i aim to end on MOST of those past lives would be in a class that wasn't that

i also am not sure from this post if we agree now that gap-widening is not a concern, would it be fair to say we are?

i can't speak to how players are grinding reaper XP but i imagine people would be very happy to reduce the grind there too. indeed, as the OP said "If we're getting another layer of grind, old layers of grind should be more easily/quickly obtained." and we can certainly agree reaper would qualify as an old layer of grind, right?

[Chai]

The more alternatives there are the more spread out the populaces is, with less people in each game space. This is a concern in a game with a declining populace.

This however, is not a symptom of todays changes, this is a symptom of having previously polarized the community of ~6-8 years ago and having run the majority of those end gamers off in favor monetizing the TR game. Had they made moves to keep the end gamers in those eras instead of adding grind system after grind system, there would be multiplicitively more players in that game space who would enjoy a cap raise. Its not like there was any shortage of things to do for the grinders in any era after TR was introduced.

[GoldyGopher]

it would appear i am very slow because i don't get anywhere near 200k XP per hour, but even if i did i would very much like those 35 hours, especially since no matter what arcane build i aim to end on MOST of those past lives would be in a class that wasn't that

i also am not sure from this post if we agree now that gap-widening is not a concern, would it be fair to say we are?

i can't speak to how players are grinding reaper XP but i imagine people would be very happy to reduce the grind there too. indeed, as the OP said "If we're getting another layer of grind, old layers of grind should be more easily/quickly obtained." and we can certainly agree reaper would qualify as an old layer of grind, right?

The gap-widening exists but as it provides benefits you consider negligible it is not worth discussing. I see a couple hundred hit points, 2/4/6 Racial Enhancement Points, a couple hundred spell points, +2 to an off stat all as bonuses to any character. The big one you are skipping is Reaper Points.

In the past six hours I earned an average of 142,000 XP an hour running Wilderness Adventure Areas. Not a single quest from 16/17ish to one dot from 20. I am a VIP, have a Greater Tome of Learning, using a +150 slayer pot and a +30 XP pot. Both of which I have huge stacks of from daily rolls, so I use them. I could have easily made that number go higher even just running the Wilderness Adventure Areas, let alone questing. Wilderness Adventure Areas are brain dead simple and yet I spent too much time chasing out of the way rares, haven't equipped at level gear as I am still using Korthos loot, but I am lazy and not a power gamer. Heck i am currently on have +5% striders on. I should go get my +30 out of the bank. Power Gamers can earn easily 240,000 XP an hour easily, throw in 15,000 Reaper XP and hour. I had one power gamer tell me they can earn 320,000 XP an hour over the course of heroic life, that's about 12 hours of questing time to get to Korthos to 20. I can not fathom it as I am in the 24 to 30 hour range.

That in a nut shell is my problem with this solution. Lowering the XP to level on 3rd and subsequent lives may make it easier on the casual player, a difference many may not even really notice, it allows the power gamer to even more quickly achieve character power. With many games currently increasing the time spent leveling characters (they don't have TR so it is not a true comparison between DDO and World of Slowcraft) this solution does nothing for me.

[Kinerd]

The gap-widening exists but as it provides benefits you consider negligible it is not worth discussing. I see a couple hundred hit points, 2/4/6 Racial Enhancement Points, a couple hundred spell points, +2 to an off stat all as bonuses to any character. The big one you are skipping is Reaper Points.

In the past six hours I earned an average of 142,000 XP an hour running Wilderness Adventure Areas. Not a single quest from 16/17ish to one dot from 20. I am a VIP, have a Greater Tome of Learning, using a +150 slayer pot and a +30 XP pot. Both of which I have huge stacks of from daily rolls, so I use them. I could have easily made that number go higher even just running the Wilderness Adventure Areas, let alone questing. Wilderness Adventure Areas are brain dead simple and yet I spent too much time chasing out of the way rares, haven't equipped at level gear as I am still using Korthos loot, but I am lazy and not a power gamer. Heck i am currently on have +5% striders on. I should go get my +30 out of the bank. Power Gamers can earn easily 240,000 XP an hour easily, throw in 15,000 Reaper XP and hour. I had one power gamer tell me they can earn 320,000 XP an hour over the course of heroic life, that's about 12 hours of questing time to get to Korthos to 20. I can not fathom it as I am in the 24 to 30 hour range.

That in a nut shell is my problem with this solution. Lowering the XP to level on 3rd and subsequent lives may make it easier on the casual player, a difference many may not even really notice, it allows the power gamer to even more quickly achieve character power. With many games currently increasing the time spent leveling characters (they don't have TR so it is not a true comparison between DDO and World of Slowcraft) this solution does nothing for me.

i "skipped" reaper points because we were talking specifically about past lives, but the same question applies - what specifically would you get from those additional reaper points? using your ratio of 15/240 i would have 1.54m reaper XP after my nine past lives under the new system or 39 points, and this is assuming no change to the reaper system (which as stated before isn't a requirement of this proposal). that leaves me 5 points shy of filling out the entire arcane tree, so once again you're really just getting more HP/fort/etc. these are good things! i'm not saying they're bad. i am saying they don't represent a significant power increase in casting, so they don't represent a real widening of the gap between our hypothetical arcane casters

and i promise you i will notice getting to my goal months faster than i would otherwise. i don't play that many hours a day, i don't get near your xp/hour, i am telling you directly that you are not doing me any favors by campaigning for people in my position

[Clemeit]

I agree that it would decimate the Heroic scene, but I don't think that's such a bad thing. It would mean more people at cap and I like the idea of more people at a narrow level range. That seems like a very good thing.

I'm not so sure that killing off heroics is a valid solution to the thinly-spread population. (Even though I hate heroic levels, I know a lot of people love 'em, and I'll respect that.)

What I do think are valid solutions I've discussed extensively elsewhere.

[Zites]

Now that it's confirmed the level cap is raising and that we aren't "pushing beyond level 30" via a lateral progression system... a few of us were chatting about this in Discord tonight and thought of a few ways the dev team could surprise us by adding levels beyond 30 to the game AND the change actually be GOOD for DDO (for everyone... not just the 3 people who like whatever the devs do):

1. Standardize heroic life XP to 2nd life XP when the new levels launch. First life is the easiest... 2nd life on is 2.85 million.
2. Racial PLs and Heroic PLs have a new option with a slightly more expensive heart which allows you to gain a Racial and Heroic life at the same time.
3. Shared past lives
4. Implement a new system which allows players to gain Heroic/Racial/Iconic PLs yet remain at the new level cap (or within the new level range: IE- 30-35/30-40/30-whatever)

TL/DR- If we're getting another layer of grind, old layers of grind should be more easily/quickly obtained.

+1 old layers of grind should be more easily/quickly obtained with new ones being added.

[Deadlock]

1. Standardize heroic life XP to 2nd life XP when the new levels launch. First life is the easiest... 2nd life on is 2.85 million.
2. Racial PLs and Heroic PLs have a new option with a slightly more expensive heart which allows you to gain a Racial and Heroic life at the same time.
3. Shared past lives
4. Implement a new system which allows players to gain Heroic/Racial/Iconic PLs yet remain at the new level cap (or within the new level range: IE- 30-35/30-40/30-whatever)

TL/DR- If we're getting another layer of grind, old layers of grind should be more easily/quickly obtained.

1. Nah, just keep it at 3.8 million, but provide some ways for people to acquire better XP gems and heroic saga xp that doesn't get wiped when you TR so you can bank it for your next life. And add more heroic saga's - I can give you a list of quests for a Xorian Saga
2. Nope, but implement the previously suggested change to Racial TRing (swap Tier 1 and Tier 3 rewards, claimable feat on 1xall, for RTR and HTR, auto-grant feat on 3xall for RTR and HTR)
3. Nada, but maybe allow better XP gems to be BTA as a way to help alts
4. Kinda-ish, allow players at cap to sacrifice levels to acquire BTA XP gems they can pass on (XP gem = 10% of XP sacrificed).
5. Have first-time quest bonusses reset every 2nd ETR so people who want to serial ETR can do if they want to (also helps acquire more RXP)

Just my 2 plat. I used to be dead against ways for characters to acquire XP they could pass to alts, but I've come around to it over the years.