Temple of Elemental Evil Part One Strangeness or Bug

[IJudar]

Hello, I am reaching out here as I have never received any replies from customer service for submitted issues. First, I am a classic D&D player who wanted to come back to the game in the online format during the COVID-19 craziness. There are many things that I am still learning so please forgive any foolishness on my part. Here I want to report a situation that did not seem 'normal'. I was running this quest on Normal difficulty with my Level 10 Artificer Myryndael, Cleric hireling, and Iron Defender. I like to take the quests slow and explore all the nooks that the developers have spent time working on and also enjoying the art and design of the dungeons. All was proceeding as expected, Orcs and bandits could be killed by one shot from a Vorpal repeating xbow with lots of enchantments, and the earth elementals went down with 3 shots. But, when the encounter with Kelno the Prefect occurred, everything went crazy: First, we were all buffed and loaded with enchantments like Protection from Fire, for armor and weapons, and Rune arm charged to tier III... Well, Kelno started to attack and we returned the favor. Strangely, I noticed that after about 100 shots from xbow and rune arm, plus what the cleric and Defender were doing, the red hit point bar was still completely full!!! He had taken no damage in 3 minutes of full out combat... Well, it became very clear that Kelno was NOT going to take any damage at all. In fact, he destroyed the entire party without loosing one hit-point.
So what gives???
This is NOT consistent with this Monster Manual entry or the expectation of the quest:

Kelno the Prefect
Type: Humanoid (List)
Race: Human (List)
Monster Manual classification: Human
Alignment: Unknown
Boss: Red Named - Quest Boss
CR: ?12 ?*15 ??37 ??42 ??*74
Attack: Spells: Firestorm
Special Qualities: Permanent Blur, Arcane Encumbrance, Brittleskin

This situation was very annoying, and not fun at all, so I am hoping that someone can make sense of this.
I have reported this as a bug because it seems that way to me. Please let me know if I got it wrong.
Once before I saw similar dungeon behavior:

• When encountering Whisperdoom, you are told to destroy the offspring but do not attack her... if you do, she takes no damage.

Grateful for some replies and feeling a bit disenchanted that every issue that I submitted to In Game Customer Service has gone unanswered.
I maintain a premium account because I feel that if I derive enjoyment from the work of others, then I should support their efforts.
Never getting a reply makes me feel like my experiences with the game are not important... and that is not a good feeling.

Cheers,

Charles

[cru121]

that's... strange.
I do recall that Kelno had some DR (or PRR perhaps). But no damage seems weird. Did you check the combat log perhaps?

[IJudar]

Thanks for the suggestion cru121... How exactly do I access the Combat Log? Is this a text file that is saved/parse-able?

I did not see any setting under Game Play options for combat log...


Cheers,

[Hobgoblin]

Thanks for the suggestion cru121... How exactly do I access the Combat Log? Is this a text file that is saved/parse-able?

I did not see any setting under Game Play options for combat log...


Cheers,

default tab in your chat box called combat

[IJudar]

default tab in your chat box called combat

Great, got it. So only accessible during the fight... would be good to be able to review in this case...

So, how is it that the the hit point gauge never really decreased? He took 100s if not 1000s of points of damage, and his bar never dipped more than 1mm...

Remember, this is Level 7 NORMAL, so what is going on? Is it the same bug as with Whisperdoom???

Thanks!

[SlowDM]

Whisperdoom isn't a bug. You must complete the quest objective before you can kill her. Even then she hits hard and she can kill players easily.

I've looked for posts and checked ddowiki.com ( spoiler alert this website has detailed info and maps, be careful using it if you don't want your fun spoilt ) about Kelno. I couldn't find anything.

Check the quest objective box to make sure you've completed them . Optionals aren't required to complete a quest.

Very rarely there are Strangeness's (an error not a bug) when doing quests. I think your were just terribly unlucky. No one knows why or when they will happen. If players report the same 'bug' often they get fixed. .

Temple of elemental evil is an extremely long and difficult quest. many many players have complained and asked for it to be split in more parts. part 2 is even more difficult and you can fail/die at the end fight easily if you don't understand the 'mechanics' of the end fight.

DDO is an old game and sorry to say in game and out of game support is nearly non existent. You can post a ticket in game if you have a 'bug' but from forum posts getting a GM reply is just plain luck even in usa working hours.

Just enjoy the game . There are many great quests with a roleplay feel. as you continue to play you'll be delighted to meet an old adversary or npc you helped appear again.

[SlowDM]

Not every quest is the same difficulty even at level. Newer quests are often more difficult at level because of this games age , more powerful magic items, changes in enhancements, changes in character power. Power creep is often complained about.

Like me when i first started playing I just enjoyed exploring all the nooks and crannies , even now when new quests are added I play hard or normal just to enjoy all the FUN. Stop and read everything, look in and 'search' all the dead ends.

Temple of elemental is an awesome quest. sadly not many people play it. It needs some TLC to make it as good as it should be.

[Alrik_Fassbauer]

Once before I saw similar dungeon behavior:

• When encountering Whisperdoom, you are told to destroy the offspring but do not attack her... if you do, she takes no damage.

If you mean Tangleroot/Splinterskull : This is there for ages, and I assume that it is meant to save her for the next quest (or quest chain), see here : https://ddowiki.com/page/Whisperdoom there you can see her DRs.

[IJudar]

If you mean Tangleroot/Splinterskull : This is there for ages, and I assume that it is meant to save her for the next quest (or quest chain), see here : https://ddowiki.com/page/Whisperdoom there you can see her DRs.

First, thanks for the replies... really appreciated, especially the sentiment shared by SlowDM.

And yes, the behavior of Whisperdoom BEFORE you complete the quest objectives is what I was trying to highlight:
You can not kill her and the system makes sure of that by "topping up" her hit points - no matter how much damage you do.

This is exactly what I was seeing with Kelno: No matter how much damage he was dealt, the red bar just kept "topping up" to full.

So, maybe what happened was the system decided that it was not time for him to die, and engaged the same behavior as it does for Whisperdoom if you try to kill her too early... That's why I thought it was a bug, because clearly you need to kill him to progress the quest.

Anyway, I will try this quest again when I can round up some willing accomplices and have a larger, more balanced party for support :-)

This is tricky as I am in New Zealand and the time difference is substantial: -18 hours from Eastern Standard Time: Wednesday 5pm here = Tuesday 1am there...

And no, I do not know the winning lottery numbers earlier than you... LOL

Finally, it is disappointing that it is so difficult to get a CS reply.
I do feel that the folks who love this game and are supporting it with their hard earned money should rate at least a reply for filling out the contact form.
To not do this is both bad etiquette and bad business practice, IMO.

Cheers,

Charles

[cru121]

Here's a theory. Did you actually enter his room? Or did you try to range him from outside? There might be some scripting going on where he's invulnerable unless you step in and approach him?

[IJudar]

Here's a theory. Did you actually enter his room? Or did you try to range him from outside? There might be some scripting going on where he's invulnerable unless you step in and approach him?

As I recall, I entered the room, but I never talked to him. His bar turned red and he attacked. The attack was like something level 12+ with one fireball doing 100s of points of damage. Again, he took no damage and chased the party all over the map and killed everyone. No way to run away, no escape, and every attack would kill an at level character. THIS IS NOT NORMAL BEHAVIOR of Heroic level 7 quest. Definitely a bug or very bad programming.

Cheers,

Charles

[Mindos]

As I recall, I entered the room, but I never talked to him. His bar turned red and he attacked. The attack was like something level 12+ with one fireball doing 100s of points of damage. Again, he took no damage and chased the party all over the map and killed everyone. No way to run away, no escape, and every attack would kill an at level character. THIS IS NOT NORMAL BEHAVIOR of Heroic level 7 quest. Definitely a bug or very bad programming.

Cheers,

Charles

Did you have a wolf or iron defender? A hireling? I wonder if he triggered on them instead and got messed up. What about confusion? Sometimes confused targets can get into "stuck" state where they are hostile but can't be damaged. Was there a battle going on near him? Did you drag mobs into the room with him? Was he attacked by a confused mob? Did you have the falconry bird out? Theres sometimes a bug with the bird and mob interactions/scripts.