Hard Core Thoughts

[KoobTheProud]

Hardcore is about risk mitigation and enduring the consequences of both bad decisions and random bad luck.

People will say that there is a lot of skill involved but really for most people HC is about builds, knowledge of the game and luck.

If people were running at the same levels vs content that they do on Live then the skill element would go up fairly dramatically but at the current HC meta for most people it is just about risk prevention and RNG.

Just like Reaper was about challenge HC is a bait and switch on human nature.

[slarden]

No that is yourn opinion

Hardcore is not hard

You are free to believe what you wish - I am not trying to convince you of anything.

Opinions aside, the #s don't lie. Well over 100 deaths on hardcore season 1 day 1 alone and not even 100 people across all servers earned the cloak in 3 months of season 1. Only a tiny # of people earned the 20 pt reaper pt. Those rewards are meaningful and few people were able to achieve it.

I get it - alot of people want to diminish hardcore that don't participate or failed trying. It doesn't matter - #s are #s and they are very insightful.

[boredGamer]

You have no clue who is grinding for favor and who isn't. There is no statistical way to measure this so your use of "most" is completely inaccurate. Meanwhile, what I stated is absolutely verifiable. These last two days I've logged on I have seen exactly 2 other players in the 20-22 range. There is a handful at L30 running. It's actually unfortunate because I like HC but there is no longer anyone to quest with. Ah well, back to Orien, I guess I "won" HC.

Your observation is verifiable, but the reason behind it is not as verifiable, it is conjecture as much as mine. Yes, I used anecdotal evidence, which is that 90% of groups I run with are running elite, and crossing off all quests at a level. Which means they are favor farming, which is at least 1 clue. Given the number of groups I have run with, I wouldn't say this is inaccurate at all, at least in pugs. My favor toon is at level 13. So I won't be 20 for a bit. I haven't died. You can literally see the surge in players at levels as the season goes on. Day 1 obviously <5. Week 2 <10. Week 3 <15.

So wait a week or two if you want level 20-22's.

[Marshal_Lannes]

Yes, everyone runs elite because even on HC people are addicted to the highest difficulty level (fascinating social experiment in there somewhere). That however doesn't prove people are grinding for 5000 favor. In fact, I would surprise people are going for 1750 favor which is actually attainable. Very few will hit 5000 favor. Finding a way to 5000 favor is itself a mini-game and goes contrary to the theme of this thread because no one can convince me hitting 5000 favor without dying is "easy" especially when you can't go back and redo quests because of the 4 level lockout. I do hope you're right about more groups in the 20s range in a week or so.

[Dark_Lord_Mary]

Here are the my takeaways from HC 2020:

1. HC is fun.
2. HC players are cool.
3. The rewards feel about right.
4. The sashes look more "unique" than the cloaks yet are easier to earn. They should be flipped.
5. One HC season per year would be better.
5a. I would love a supplemental"Ultra-Hard Corps Murder Session! (Survival not expected)."
-One life to live
-R1 minimum difficulty
-Can't run quests overlevel
-Mimic event in effect (maybe with a reduced spawn rate)
-Reward thresholds lowered because of the mortality rate
-Leaderboard list top achievers not just survivors

I agree with 1, 2 absolutely - it is fun and DDO players in general are amazing people - we have a very cool community. Extremely helpful, generous, good humored, good natured, I have had some of my best gaming experiences ever with the people on HCL.

I disagree with 3 - the rewards are the draw - besides the bloody footprints that are now a huge draw there haven't been 'must haves' that would draw all the ddo players - the mounts are nice, the cloaks and pets are ok - I would like more rewards for surviving to lvl 10 and 30 - as well as a way better reward for 5k - its an amazingly challenging grind just for a mount. The cloak are and reward for 1750 i do not like at all, considering all the great art that exists in the game already- example: the archon armor is amazing - why not pick a cosmetic as your reward for 1750 ? cloth, light, med, heavy, docent armor AND a head slot? Make a DRAW to get people to have to play.

If i were to pitch this to SSG I would show them the opening to Scrooged where Frank Cross (Bill Murray) presents his version of a television ad for the Christmas special - 'That isn't good enough! They have got to be so scared to miss it! So terrified!'

DDO players should be terrified to miss out the event - on the must have rewards of the Hardcore League - its not pay to win, not stats or build enhancing things - just cosmetics, mounts, pets, that are so cool you can't pass them up.

I don't mind 1 or 2 a year - 3 was too much - if they could do a guild pass an make guild management better, and come up with a way (like I suggested with guild XP stones) to take a guild's XP and server transfer with it - I wouldn't mind so much - its an awful lot of resources and money deleted because the guilds are trapped - same as Astral Shards - these should be account wide like DDO points not server only.

I disagree with any tweaking or altering of the rules to 'force R' etc - there are loads and loads of people who play hardcore who love it and play it casually - they do normal and hard; they take their time - this event should be inclusive to the entire community who wish to participate. Having the normal DDO options of difficulty selection ensures this is the case.

I think the leaderboards are fine as is. Most people consider the leaderboards pay to win because you can 50% xp pot your way to lots of Rxp - and you can tome/stat book your toon up for 5k.

[Aelonwy]

Difficulty is going to be subjective, subjective to your skill level and the difficultly level you choose to play and to a certain extent the content you choose to run.
So can't Hardcore be both? Easy for some people and difficult for others?

I get that its mostly great build, risk mitigation, quest knowledge, preparedness and luck, a whole lot of luck. But... no matter how prepared you are or how well you know the quest or how great your build there are times and places when the luck is not with you and every orange name turned into that champion you hate dealing with (so far the orange or green one - OUCH!) or the trap double hit you for some reason (maybe lag, maybe a bug, maybe your timing was off) or your heal didn't go off in time, or you got so many champions you ran out of charges of whatever before the next shrine or you failed a critical save.

I find Hardcore difficult and stressful, particularly at certain level thresholds. I get it some of you are used to running Reaper and playing at that skill level and this is a stroll in the park for you even if your character is naked and you have one hand tied behind your back using your tongue to hit the keyboard. Some of you know down to the millisecond how long it takes a particular mob to get down a hallway or even the mobs casting rotation in certain quests. Your quest knowledge is supreme. (Insert - Wayne's World : We're not worthy!) I get it but that doesn't mean some of us don't still find it difficult.

So to all of you for whom Hardcore just isn't difficult enough, my hat's off to you, you are at a skill level far beyond me.

[Mindos]

I wanted some kind of reward for soloing your way to whatever level. Maybe an ultimate super dooper reward even more difficulty setting to the right of reaper! Have the game track specially favor when solo, and have only the top 25? of the solo favor list get a nice prize.

Idk, just rambling...

[Oxarhamar]

I wanted some kind of reward for soloing your way to whatever level. Maybe an ultimate super dooper reward even more difficulty setting to the right of reaper! Have the game track specially favor when solo, and have only the top 25? of the solo favor list get a nice prize.

Idk, just rambling...

Lone wolf cloak

[slarden]

Difficulty is going to be subjective, subjective to your skill level and the difficultly level you choose to play and to a certain extent the content you choose to run.
So can't Hardcore be both? Easy for some people and difficult for others?

I get that its mostly great build, risk mitigation, quest knowledge, preparedness and luck, a whole lot of luck. But... no matter how prepared you are or how well you know the quest or how great your build there are times and places when the luck is not with you and every orange name turned into that champion you hate dealing with (so far the orange or green one - OUCH!) or the trap double hit you for some reason (maybe lag, maybe a bug, maybe your timing was off) or your heal didn't go off in time, or you got so many champions you ran out of charges of whatever before the next shrine or you failed a critical save.

I find Hardcore difficult and stressful, particularly at certain level thresholds. I get it some of you are used to running Reaper and playing at that skill level and this is a stroll in the park for you even if your character is naked and you have one hand tied behind your back using your tongue to hit the keyboard. Some of you know down to the millisecond how long it takes a particular mob to get down a hallway or even the mobs casting rotation in certain quests. Your quest knowledge is supreme. (Insert - Wayne's World : We're not worthy!) I get it but that doesn't mean some of us don't still find it difficult.

So to all of you for whom Hardcore just isn't difficult enough, my hat's off to you, you are at a skill level far beyond me.

There are maybe 1000 characters in the game with reaper wings There were less than 100 people in season 1 that earned the 10 pt reaper cloak and less than 20 that earned the 20 pt reaper pet.

The people calling for hardcore to be more difficult or claiming it's easy (ignoring the basic facts about numbers) are most likely trolling the hardcore community because they are anti-hardcore anyhow. It's funny to read their ridiculous arguments, but I am guessing SSG sees right through the nonsense because they have the data. if you've been on hardcore you probably have an idea of how many deaths there are compared to how few earn the reaper pet for example. Now it's easier now than in season 1, but still not easy.

If you are participating you are worthy! I completely get that people make a cost/benefit judgment and opt out of hardcore - nothing wrong with it and I get it.

The only people that aren't worthy are the people that don't participate but try to minimize the experience. The sour grapes crowd - I Just have no respect for them because I think it comes from being upset others earn something they either failed at or don't want to do and as as result don't want others to benefit from.

[fatherpirate]

necro thread?

[Aelonwy]

necro thread?

Derp.

Good catch.

[Cordovan]

We have a couple members of the community who get super annoyed when Hardcore-specific threads end up in General rather than the Hardcore server forum, so save me a bit of work and put your Hardcore specific thoughts here if ya would. It has been the most reported kind of post in recent weeks...

[boredGamer]

We have a couple members of the community who get super annoyed when Hardcore-specific threads end up in General rather than the Hardcore server forum, so save me a bit of work and put your Hardcore specific thoughts here if ya would. It has been the most reported kind of post in recent weeks...

It's a little annoying hard-core is singled out from General Discussion when all sorts of sub-forums exist for many topics on there, and they are not singled out.

Just from the current front page: Reaper, Orien, Dev stuff, they all have their sub-forums, but they are not moved into those sub-forums.

Obviously you can run things how you want, and dealing with us isn't always easy - but setting policy based on squeaky wheels is rather annoying.

The whole forum set-up maybe just needs a re-think, people post on General because most sub-forums don't get views or replies, so it feels like by forcing one sub-topic into a sub-forum you are effectively squelching the forum.

[Kebtid]

Done once. Wont do again.

Boring repeat that gets easier as more content is added.

Exclusive rewards for top 5 people on ladder would make me want to do it again.
Exclusive cosmetics

[Oddler]

Done once. Wont do again.

Boring repeat that gets easier as more content is added.

Exclusive rewards for top 5 people on ladder would make me want to do it again.
Exclusive cosmetics

I think hardcore is hardcore enough this seasion. I would like the random 650 one hits to be fixed and a dot that kills in seconds is not fun with play against.

Making hardcore hard will do two things. Make it an eletist experance and pidgen hole builds, as with this seasion 80 percent of builds that make it to 20 are fvs.

If You want a more difficult experance go up on the reaper levels on hardcore, good luck

[Chilldude]

With the limited number of people who would play such a hardcore, what incentive would there be for SSG to run such an event?

The number of players interested in the version I described is only limited by your imagination.

[Bobilar]

In my view if you're not running Hardcore on Reaper 10 exclusively you have no business complaining that it's too easy.

[Jaxtan]

In my view if you're not running Hardcore on Reaper 10 exclusively you have no business complaining that it's too easy.

While running it naked over free wireless from a cheap hotel.

[Cordovan]

It's a little annoying hard-core is singled out from General Discussion when all sorts of sub-forums exist for many topics on there, and they are not singled out.

Just from the current front page: Reaper, Orien, Dev stuff, they all have their sub-forums, but they are not moved into those sub-forums.

Obviously you can run things how you want, and dealing with us isn't always easy - but setting policy based on squeaky wheels is rather annoying.

The whole forum set-up maybe just needs a re-think, people post on General because most sub-forums don't get views or replies, so it feels like by forcing one sub-topic into a sub-forum you are effectively squelching the forum.

The way we've always dealt with "proper forum" reports is based on complaints, so yeah, lots of topics in General that have separate sub forums, but I'll only move them if I get enough complaints. If there is wider interest in us taking a harder line on moving threads I am fine with that, but I'm trying to respond to the wants of the forums here. If enough of you feel we need to keep Hardcore threads posted in General in General rather than move them to the Hardcore server forum I will add it to the decision-making on these reports.

[apocaladle]

The way we've always dealt with "proper forum" reports is based on complaints, so yeah, lots of topics in General that have separate sub forums, but I'll only move them if I get enough complaints. If there is wider interest in us taking a harder line on moving threads I am fine with that, but I'm trying to respond to the wants of the forums here. If enough of you feel we need to keep Hardcore threads posted in General in General rather than move them to the Hardcore server forum I will add it to the decision-making on these reports.

On the topic of the forums as a whole are you able to move to an upvote/downvote system like Reddit as currently the topics that float to the top are the ones that are the most controversial and have players arguing rather than ones the player base as a whole agrees with and as such gives limited feedback to the devs. The current system also rewards people arguing back and forth with toxicity and needs to be cleaned up manually later rather than a semi-self governing system.

In general the ddo subreddit is much less toxic than here and I think the forum systems are why.