U49 Preview 3: 4/13 - 4/15

[Lomizir]

Disclaimer

Everything seen on the preview server, Lamannia, is not final and is subject to change or removal before live release.

Hello, all! Preview 3 of Update 49 is open! It is expected to remain open until sometime in the afternoon (Eastern) of Thursday April 15th.

There will be a dev event on Wednesday April 14th from 8-10 PM Eastern where members of the DDO team will be available to collect feedback and answer questions in real time on Lamannia.

This preview is meant as a last stability check on the update. The total number of changes between preview 2 and preview 3 is limited and so we've opted to make one post that contains all changes since preview 2 instead of concentrated threads for each topic. Everything besides the things listed in here are covered in the notes from preview 2. Those new changes are below:

• New Adventure Pack: Perils of the Planar Eyes
  
  • A deco pass has been completed on the couple of quests that had been missing it.
  • Some of the monster statting has been adjusted
  • Eye Know Whodunnit
    
    • Levers that open secret doors will not be usable if the door is already opened
    • The random chest that was not usable on occasion is now usable.
    • The sparklies on feathers and kobold footprints are closer to their name tags.
• Named Loot
  
  • Gorgon Docent is now updated
  • Armor and jewelry/clothing now has augment slots
  • Force epic sceptre now has force stuff instead of nullification
  • Sora kell un-upgraded items are now level 11, upgraded to be level 13
  • Base items now are 1.5w at level 10
  • Set bonus is now +3 artifact to hit and damage
  • You can upgrade wondrous items again
• Bow Combat Style Revamp
  
  • Bow Strength has been rebuilt to work closer to other Ability-Score-To-Damage abilities in the game; you should now see it on examining bows you have equipped, and we fixed an issue where it would disappear if you had other Ability-Score-To-Damage abilities.
  • Half Elf Dilettante: Ranger's "and can add up to 2 points of your Strength bonus to bow damage" portion now instead grants "+1 to Damage with Longbows and Shortbows". The feat otherwise remains the same, granting the other things that feat currently grants.
  • Half Elf Improved Dilettante Ranger enhancements that granted additional points of strength to bow damage now grant +1 to Damage with Longbows and Shortbows instead; they otherwise remain the same, granting the other things they currently grant.
  • Arcane Archer Final Strike now has its additional AOE damage scale with Ranged Power.
  • The first hit of additional AOE damage from Arcane Archer Final Strike no longer scales with Ranger level, both on the Ranger and Elf versions; it is instead a static number of dice, scaling with Ranged Power, like the others. (It was the only effect on Final Strike using Ranger level to scale).
  • Ranger Arcane Archer Final Strike no longer adds an erroneous extra +250 damage to its bow attack.
  • Elven Arcane Archer Final Strike no longer adds an erroneous +10% Doubleshot.
• Combat Changes Focused on Boosting Game Performance (And Ripple Effects)
  
  • There is a new icon for triple/quadra/penta-hits
  • Sneak attack now doubles properly
  • Ki now doubles properly
  • Adrenaline's damage multiplier has been reduced from 300/300/300/400% to 150/150/150/200%
  • Fury Eternal's 33% chance to regain an Adrenaline charge on vorpal has been increased to 100%
  • Hunt's End damage multiplier has been reduced from 400% to 300%
  • Hunt's End cooldown has been reduced from 24sec to 18sec
  • Aasimar Scourge has lost its 2% Offhand Doublestrike per copy (as that stat no longer exists) and has gained an additional 1% Doublestrike per copy in its place (It now grants a total of 2% per copy, because it gave +1% before)
  • Fury Eternal and Fury Made Placid's tooltips no longer claim that the two abilities are antirequisites of each other; they aren't.
  • Tempest Capstone (Dervish) has lost its 25% Offhand Doublestrike (as that stat no longer exists) and has gained +10% Doublestrike.
  • Reformatted text on Tempest's other Core abilities to be closer to current standards. (No functional changes).
• Miscellaneous Changes
  
  • Fixed an issue that causes bear and wolf form to throw extra attack hooks with many active attacks
  • Fixed an issue that caused Momentum Swing to hit more times than it should. The skill's animation has changed.
  • Fixed an issue that caused Holy Retribution to hit more times than it should. The skill's animation has changed.

[Arkat]

• Hunt's End damage multiplier has been reduced from 400% to 300%

:sigh:

• Hunt's End cooldown has been reduced from 24sec to 18sec

Thanks for this, at least.

[thunir]

Do we now receive further benefit from a double strike greater than 100%

[Arkat]

Do we now receive further benefit from a double strike greater than 100%

Numbers higher than 100% in Doublestrike will only result in a higher chance for an Off-hand Doublestrike, according to my understanding.

Example: Your toon has 120% Doublestrike listed on its character sheet. The main weapon's chance to DS will still only be 100%. Your Off-hand weapon's chance to DS will be 50% of that, so 60% chance to it's DS chance.

I'm not sure of the meaning of over 100% DS as it relates to Two-Handed Fighting, however.

[Taxidiotis]

And perfect TWF?

[Madja]

Numbers higher than 100% in Doublestrike will only result in a higher chance for an Off-hand Doublestrike, according to my understanding.

Example: Your toon has 120% Doublestrike listed on its character sheet. The main weapon's chance to DS will still only be 100%. Your Off-hand weapon's chance to DS will be 50% of that, so 60% chance to it's DS chance.

I'm not sure of the meaning of over 100% DS as it relates to Two-Handed Fighting, however.

I feel like I read one of the Devs say this as well, but then what is a triple/quadra/penta-hit?

[Epicsoul]

I feel like I read one of the Devs say this as well, but then what is a triple/quadra/penta-hit?

Throwers can throw up to five projectiles.

[LrdSlvrhnd]

I feel like I read one of the Devs say this as well, but then what is a triple/quadra/penta-hit?

Ranged

[ShinuzukaRakam]

I feel like I read one of the Devs say this as well, but then what is a triple/quadra/penta-hit?

Doubleshot still works above 100%, and so this would imply that when you score additional hit(s) with 200+% Doubleshot, a new icon is shown.

[Arkat]

I feel like I read one of the Devs say this as well, but then what is a triple/quadra/penta-hit?

For throwers, perhaps? There's no cap on Doubleshot.

[unbongwah]

• Adrenaline's damage multiplier has been reduced from 300/300/300/400% to 150/150/150/200%
• Fury Eternal's 33% chance to regain an Adrenaline charge on vorpal has been increased to 100%
• Hunt's End damage multiplier has been reduced from 400% to 300%
• Hunt's End cooldown has been reduced from 24sec to 18sec

Seems like the intent is to make the spike damage boost from FotW and Shiradi smaller but more frequent. It'll be interesting to see how that pans out with the changes to multihit attacks and the "improved" Manyshot.

Do we now receive further benefit from a double strike greater than 100%

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...me-Performance

• A player's 100% effective Doublestrike cap still applies in this system.
• Offhand strikes will still be a separate "hit" and will roll their own damage from their own weapon and can still Doublestrike. However, we have removed the stat Offhand Doublestrike from the game. Your offhand now Doublestrikes at 50% of the Doublestrike of your mainhand. This means that if you have a 50% chance to produce an offhand strike, and 100% Doublestrike, your offhand will hit 50% of the time for 50% Doublestrike (so a 50% chance to deal double damage). Abilities and enhancements that used to provide Offhand Doublestrike no longer do so.
• Shields still cannot Doublestrike.

Since your offhand doublestrike is now 1/2 of your mainhand doublestrike, TWF builds will see some benefit from >100% Doublestrike. Non-TWF melees get nothing from >100% DS, AFAICT.

[marionetas]

[marionetas]

Disclaimer[/LIST][*]Combat Changes Focused on Boosting Game Performance (And Ripple Effects)

• There is a new icon for triple/quadra/penta-hits
• Sneak attack now doubles properly
• Ki now doubles properly
• Adrenaline's damage multiplier has been reduced from 300/300/300/400% to 150/150/150/200%
• Fury Eternal's 33% chance to regain an Adrenaline charge on vorpal has been increased to 100%
• Hunt's End damage multiplier has been reduced from 400% to 300%
• Hunt's End cooldown has been reduced from 24sec to 18sec
• Aasimar Scourge has lost its 2% Offhand Doublestrike per copy (as that stat no longer exists) and has gained an additional 1% Doublestrike per copy in its place (It now grants a total of 2% per copy, because it gave +1% before)
• Fury Eternal and Fury Made Placid's tooltips no longer claim that the two abilities are antirequisites of each other; they aren't.
• Tempest Capstone (Dervish) has lost its 25% Offhand Doublestrike (as that stat no longer exists) and has gained +10% Doublestrike.
• Reformatted text on Tempest's other Core abilities to be closer to current standards. (No functional changes).

[*]Miscellaneous Changes

• Fixed an issue that causes bear and wolf form to throw extra attack hooks with many active attacks
• Fixed an issue that caused Momentum Swing to hit more times than it should. The skill's animation has changed.
• Fixed an issue that caused Holy Retribution to hit more times than it should. The skill's animation has changed.

[/LIST]

PLZ increase the chance of excutioner shot from SD so the users from this destiny, and assassins not get a nasty big nerf due to the changes on double hit/shot

[rabidfox]

[*]Bow Combat Style Revamp

• Elven Arcane Archer Final Strike no longer adds an erroneous +10% Doubleshot.

As long as your doing stuff to the Elven Arcane Archer tree, can you normalize the level requirements for the cores(levels 1,3,6,12,18,20 instead of the current 1,4,8,15,22,25)? Needing level 22 & 25 (beyond the other cores being delayed) is just annoying and a dated system given the existence of universal trees that flow normally and aren't leaving one with AP unspent after hitting heroic level cap & progressing to epics.

[TPICKRELL]

First data point. I took my level 30 THF barb over to lammania III and due to Adrenaline Nerfs its about 10% less DPS than live. My best Bruntsmash out of 3 on live was 20 (no debuffs) and my best of 3 on Lammania III was 22 Seconds.

Not as bad as I thought, but still a significant overall DPS nerf.

[Triaxx2]

Perfect TWF is still listing a +10% offhand Doublestrike.

[DjangoKeys]

Perfect TWF is still listing a +10% offhand Doublestrike.

^^^ Like I just said, half-assed.

[Monkey_Archer]

Perfect TWF is still listing a +10% offhand Doublestrike.

I'm guessing they just don't know what to do with this feat yet. Its in a somewhat rough place atm...

Could just make it 10% doublestrike, but then its not really a TWF feat and will be taken by THF and SWF even more often than now...
Could convert the 10% offhand DS to 10% offhand strike chance (or replace the whole feat with +20% offhand strike chance) but then tempest would need compensation...
Could remake it as full stat mod to offhand, but yet again another proxy tempest nerf...
Could just add 10 combat style melee power, but that seems lacking...

[Pandjed]

1. Half-Elf Dilettante: Ranger now seems kinda decent, as the capped STR-bonus for bows was much more of a reason to respec to another ability modifier and . Not that HElves are anywhere close to other premium races with this change, but if you have racial AP going on, it's actually one of the things you can spend on... may be now the best archer race as it adds much more helpful stuff to rangers and other archer builds outside of their box.

2. AA Final Strike: Sounds interesting, will definitely try it out more. Usually just saved the AP, because of the scaling ranger level issue, and that for ranger, I think DWS is a better T5 tree for archers for overall performance (Slaying Arrow is nice, but tends to make the build rather gimicky).
Won't miss the unintended stuff, because it wasn't really that obvious and I rather have its actual ability (AoE on a bow) work better.

3. triple/quadra/penta hits: Just a pet peeve and maybe I'm wrong, but I really think it's either "triple/quadruple/quintuple" or "tri/tetra/penta", not this jumbled mess. Anyone who's better in English and Latin can confirm?

4. Adrenaline certainly took a hit after a huge unintended buff, so I guess good going SSG, for finally applying nerfs as soon as possible? I mean, many ppl seemed to ask for them to make their nerfs quicker and what can be quicker than during the Lamannia Preview? :P
I guess, this means adjusting the playstyle a bit and use them more often to make more use of the increased regen. Needs some playing to get it right, but shouldn't be a problem overall. Makes it more worth to spend more resources into DS as a THF.
If it turns out to be too lackluster, I'll just take it as a band-aid until the ED rework, which would have been the next opportunity to nerf Adrenaline if the Devs want to, and I rather have it now reduced to get used to it, rather than living in ignorant bliss while falsely assuming that it's exactly what the devs wanted, just to cry like a child whose toy has been stolen, when the inevitable nerf comes.

5. Hunt's End definitely ends up in a better spot, as it first allows you to use it twice during an action boost if you plan correctly (Hunt's End, AB, High Damage Attack 1, Hunt's End, High Damage Attack 2) and even my AA builds can now combine Slaying Arrow/Hunt's End every 20 seconds.

6. Offhand Strike is a bit outside my expertise, as I never played tempest and as I currently have a strange ranger build, which uses DWS as main, uses THF with a little splash of archery in addition to TWF feats, I can say, that with just the base combat style feats and general combat enhancements, THF overshadows TWF with similar weapons (like 2 Vulkoor's Edge vs. 1 Tail of the Scorpion) by quite a marging over the course of most levels.
Things like Damage Reduction, the numbers of enemy's hit, etc. puts pure THF way ahead of pure TWF in terms of usability and power, imo.

Yet Monkey_Archer made a good point about the missing Perfect THF and its offhand bonus.

I'm guessing they just don't know what to do with this feat yet. Its in a somewhat rough place atm...

Could just make it 10% doublestrike, but then its not really a TWF feat and will be taken by THF and SWF even more often than now...
Could convert the 10% offhand DS to 10% offhand strike chance (or replace the whole feat with +20% offhand strike chance) but then tempest would need compensation...
Could remake it as full stat mod to offhand, but yet again another proxy tempest nerf...
Could just add 10 combat style melee power, but that seems lacking...

Other than the rest of the "Perfect Fighting Style"-feats, PTWF has a rather strange case of being still rather useful for non-TWF builds, as the +5% DS was a general buff. So changing the feat (like +10% Doublestrike), also affect all other fighting styles...

In this case, I actually would support the notion to make the feat stronger, but limit it to TWF to have it fit better in line with all the other "Perfect Fighting Style"-feats. Sucks for some, but having it work outside TWF may have been misguided in the first place and was only doable, because some of its effect was on a pure TWF-mechanic.
I mean, they could add a "When you're TWF"-clause to it, but if they rework the feat anyway, I think limiting its bonuses to TWF only make more sense.

Maybe we could get a higher ability modifier for the main-hand (which wouldn't overlap with Tempest, I think?).


Oh well, ED-pass may also effect destiny feats, so maybe any rework of this feat may be temporary anyway.

[noinfo]

First data point. I took my level 30 THF barb over to lammania III and due to Adrenaline Nerfs its about 10% less DPS than live. My best Bruntsmash out of 3 on live was 20 (no debuffs) and my best of 3 on Lammania III was 22 Seconds.

Not as bad as I thought, but still a significant overall DPS nerf.

This favours classes with higher ss. They simply need to make adren and fury auto ds. This will make melee remain as is