Strategy vs Slaughter

[FURYous]

When I first started playing this game, they had some quests that could be done without the monotonous room to room slaughter that seems to be the only allowed “strategy” now.
Why is [slaughter, move ten feet, slaughter, move ten feet, slaughter] the only option for 99% of quests?
I remember being able to sneak through quests, to CC through quests, having different options based on your team’s classes.

Now it seems even the traps and puzzles are a side note that can be ignored most of the time and people only build for DPS.
Kills things fast enough and ignore everything else. Seems like a FPS more the D&D.

The Dryad and the Demigod had so much potential to break us out of the rut, they added doors to that shield on purpose and they made undead immune to the mass port at the end on purpose. It takes a lot of extra programming and work to add doors and be selective on who gets ported. This allowed options on how to fight that last fight and gave legitimate strategy to the fight. Do you think it is coincidence that the black unicorns have negative damage?
Now it is just another speed slaughter fest, bring all DPS and kill anything that moves for the win ?

So much time and planning and programming wasted to appease the brain dead bullies that only want DPS.
I am so tired of the whiners that think killing is the only viable solution to questing. Let us have options again, why is moving from room to room slaughtering things the only PC option? Why not put everything to sleep or sneak past to open a short cut passageway or any of the other imaginative and cool things you can do in D&D?
Still allow for the wholesale slaughter for those that want it but allow the rest of us options.

P.S. I still think it is the biggest insult to our intelligence that when you pretend to get away from the slaughter like the Age of Rage quests and Make Believe, you still only allow the wholesale slaughter of the people you are “saving” but pretend you are just putting them to sleep by hitting them over and over with your weapons and spells the EXACT same way you slaughter everything else in the game.

Isn’t D&D based on imagination????

[FURYous]

Oh, I forgot to mention Quid Pro Quo!

Great example of what I am talking about. So much fun to sneak behind the werewolves and negotiate with the Griffins and Forians. One of my favorite quests now. Best of all, the sneaking is slower than just running through slaughtering things but every time I show people how to sneak it, they loved that solution.

[Kessaran]

Oh, I forgot to mention Quid Pro Quo!

Great example of what I am talking about. So much fun to sneak behind the werewolves and negotiate with the Griffins and Forians. One of my favorite quests now. Best of all, the sneaking is slower than just running through slaughtering things but every time I show people how to sneak it, they loved that solution.

While I agree with your post, I want to point out something that SSG did that completely ruined the ability to do this, and made it so the only "viable" way to complete the very vast majority of quests is to actually kill every monster instead of incapacitate them. It's called Dungeon Threat. If you pull too many monsters, dungeon threat increases. Getting to Red is something most everyone avoids, as even yellow/orange can cause wipes on Elite without proper tanks. Rogues/Arti's and probably some very unique builds could take advantage of sneaking past everything so as not to actually agro mobs, but there is no longer the option to "cc and run" because even CC'd mobs still count towards the dungeon threat level. For solo players, sneaking classes or invisibility paired with a good hide/move silently check could still work but in a group setting it's all about the slaughter as you put it. Back in the original game (long before even Shroud was released) you actually would CC groups of very dangerous mobs and move past them into an area they couldn't follow, or sneak past mobs to grab keys/levers/runes etc. Was a very viable part of the game, and most of the successful groups utilized that option. SSG made the game into a kill fest.

[Abilbo]

While I agree with your post, I want to point out something that SSG did that completely ruined the ability to do this, and made it so the only "viable" way to complete the very vast majority of quests is to actually kill every monster instead of incapacitate them. It's called Dungeon Threat. If you pull too many monsters, dungeon threat increases. Getting to Red is something most everyone avoids, as even yellow/orange can cause wipes on Elite without proper tanks. Rogues/Arti's and probably some very unique builds could take advantage of sneaking past everything so as not to actually agro mobs, but there is no longer the option to "cc and run" because even CC'd mobs still count towards the dungeon threat level. For solo players, sneaking classes or invisibility paired with a good hide/move silently check could still work but in a group setting it's all about the slaughter as you put it. Back in the original game (long before even Shroud was released) you actually would CC groups of very dangerous mobs and move past them into an area they couldn't follow, or sneak past mobs to grab keys/levers/runes etc. Was a very viable part of the game, and most of the successful groups utilized that option. SSG made the game into a kill fest.

This!!! This i agree with. The Red Alert dungeon threat that was implemented years ago, changed the way dungeons are run. Because of this threat generating system, it is much easier to build a mass murder toon, and be successful, than it is to build a CC/Sneaky toon, and try and complete dungeons.

The threat system not only affects Elite, it also effects Reaper. Groups of mobs where you "might" have thought about skipping, become more important to kill, because if you move past them, and then accidentally back into them, you are now fighting two groups. Its much easier to murder each pack of mobs as you go, and you build your characters to do such.

[droid327]

Isn’t D&D based on imagination????

D&D is based on imagination, yes. If you want that, then find a PnP group, though.

DDO is an MMO, and MMOs are based, fundamentally, on risk/time/skill:reward. Invisi-zerging and CC zerging were bad for the game because they circumvented the risk:reward balance, and also the time:reward balance.

The only real metric for risk in the game is dying. So the only way to justify worthwhile rewards is to challenge you not to die. And the only real good way to do that is through combat. Being able to sneak/CC past fights entirely essentially removes that challenge. Traps are another way to do it, but relying too much on that can create a situation where trappers becomes obligatory, and that's bad for the game. Combat is the one thing that everyone can reasonably expect to be able to do. There are only two trapping classes, but there are no non-combat classes in the game.

Likewise for time...their options to slow us down are either combat, or just making us waste time running around, or waiting for scripted events. The latter two are never fun for any build, so that's not really a good alternative to combat. Plus, with combat there's an element of player skill and character progression: the better you get, the stronger you get, the quicker you can get through the combat. You wont see that with non-combat elements; they take as long as they take.

Puzzles are probably the one exception - though they're entirely player skill based, not character based at all, which itself is kinda divorced from the concept of D&D as a character-based RPG. You cant take points in Puzzle Solving, i.e., and solve them better or faster. But you do still see plenty of puzzles incorporated into quest design, so that's still an aspect of gameplay.

All that being said, there are still many examples of recent quests where, if you know what you're doing, you can safely skip the grand majority of fights. At the risk of pointing out an example: Safety in Numbers. You can basically zerg the entire quest to the end fight.

[SpartanKiller13]

Puzzles are probably the one exception - though they're entirely player skill based, not character based at all, which itself is kinda divorced from the concept of D&D as a character-based RPG. You cant take points in Puzzle Solving, i.e., and solve them better or faster. But you do still see plenty of puzzles incorporated into quest design, so that's still an aspect of gameplay.

THTH puzzles you can skip 1/3 solves by trapping? PN puzzles you can reduce your solving by killing constructs faster (technically)? Toxic Treatment allows you to kill enemies to perma-light puzzle tiles? Crucible test of instinct gives hints based on your Wisdom (high or low)? There's also all the puzzles with red tiles that evasion/tough characters can speedrun

I'd agree it's pretty separate, but there are definitely some character influences on some puzzles, which I really appreciate.

I'd like to see more though! I like stats giving hints

[KoobTheProud]

When all you have is a hammer every problem looks like a nail.

Why does DDO look like a nonstop slaughterfest now?

Because the devs and management let the power creep get out of control and gave everybody the pathway to building a fully self-healing AoE killing death machine.

It's a superhero game not a D&D game at this point. SSG's biggest fear has to be that somebody at Hasbro winds up playing and realizes this is no longer a D&D franchise in spirit.

[myliftkk_v2]

Invisi-zerging and CC zerging

Both of those fails were because of bad AI development. And instead of doing good development they doubled down on the bad by nerfing the options of the player, rather than increasing/improving the AI options.

Invisi-zerging =/= sneaking - Invisibility can be dispelled at any time. SSG was just too un-imaginative to have mobs with true-seeing and that cast dispel to counter the invisible scrolling when they had tremor-sense go off.

Complete CC zerging would have been trivial to defeat in most quests if mobs didn't rubber band (an arguably they shouldn't at all without a barrier).

The reason why everything is a DPS fest is because of the limited skills of the dev crew to be able to code anything that is not. It has nothing to do with player choices or risk/reward.

[Chai]

Both of those fails were because of bad AI development. And instead of doing good development they doubled down on the bad by nerfing the options of the player, rather than increasing/improving the AI options.

Invisi-zerging =/= sneaking - Invisibility can be dispelled at any time. SSG was just too un-imaginative to have mobs with true-seeing and that cast dispel to counter the invisible scrolling when they had tremor-sense go off.

Complete CC zerging would have been trivial to defeat in most quests if mobs didn't rubber band (an arguably they shouldn't at all without a barrier).

The reason why everything is a DPS fest is because of the limited skills of the dev crew to be able to code anything that is not. It has nothing to do with player choices or risk/reward.

This.

They began using a scaling template to create quests some years ago. Some still get designed with some level of immersion, but its still 1. kill mobs, 2. move forward, 3. repeat. The original DDO had an XP bonus for killing few-zero mobs. This playstyle went away because posters on the forum complained about how other players not even in the same group or quest, were doing things differently. The vast majority of the options we used to have are now condensed down to which stat are you going to consolidate everything to, and what skin you want to put on your damage generator. Nowdays the gear is also a template, as set bonus leaves little room for variance.

[boredGamer]

The original DDO had an XP bonus for killing few-zero mobs.

The CURRENT DDO has an XP bonus for killing few mobs.

[arminius]

The CURRENT DDO has an XP bonus for killing few mobs.

Yes, but I think the point though is that there is a lot of counter-design to that at play as well, with having to kill X mobs to advance to the next plot point, or kill everything in the room to open the door, etc. There isn't as much room for clever workarounds like existed in the Harbor and Marketplace quests. A lot of that has to do with the fight against lag, having too many active mobs at once and bringing the server performance down.

[Carpone]

So much time and planning and programming wasted to appease the brain dead bullies that only want DPS.

Insulting people about their playstyle is akin to telling them their fun is wrong. Play the game however you like but without bullying other players based on their choices.

DDO is a compliment to, not a replacement for, PnP D&D. Imagination has no bounds. DDO is bound by pixels and programming.

[FURYous]

Insulting people about their playstyle is akin to telling them their fun is wrong. Play the game however you like but without bullying other players based on their choices.

DDO is a compliment to, not a replacement for, PnP D&D. Imagination has no bounds. DDO is bound by pixels and programming.

Sorry but if your "playstyle" is nothing more than to beat things with a stick, then you are a brain dead bully. Monkeys can beat things with sticks, it doesn't require thought to find something moving and hit it with a stick until it stops moving.

There are a very few examples of quests that are better then that (Thanks SpartanKiller13) but the vast majority of them are beat things with a stick for the win.

[Carpone]

Sorry but if your "playstyle" is nothing more than to beat things with a stick, then you are a brain dead bully.

Once you resort to ad hominem attacks then your argument has no merit.

[Epicsoul]

Sorry but if your "playstyle" is nothing more than to beat things with a stick, then you are a brain dead bully. Monkeys can beat things with sticks, it doesn't require thought to find something moving and hit it with a stick until it stops moving.

There are a very few examples of quests that are better then that (Thanks SpartanKiller13) but the vast majority of them are beat things with a stick for the win.

Any monkey can beat things with sticks, sure, but not every monkey can do it well. Also, you're a terrible communicator and will convince no one by resulting to name calling.

[boredGamer]

Also, didn't you quit?

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...-in-one-attack

People tend to hate quests you have to figure out. I wouldn't worry about it too much. Play the quests you like, and if there are no quests you like, well ... you know what to do.

It sounds *more* like you want to tell people you are doing it *better* than they are. People don't really like that. Especially when "better" and "fun" are very subjective.

[Tsutti]

When I first started playing this game, they had some quests that could be done without the monotonous room to room slaughter that seems to be the only allowed “strategy” now.
Why is [slaughter, move ten feet, slaughter, move ten feet, slaughter] the only option for 99% of quests?
I remember being able to sneak through quests, to CC through quests, having different options based on your team’s classes.

Now it seems even the traps and puzzles are a side note that can be ignored most of the time and people only build for DPS.

I am so tired of the whiners that think killing is the only viable solution to questing. Let us have options again, why is moving from room to room slaughtering things the only PC option? Why not put everything to sleep or sneak past to open a short cut passageway or any of the other imaginative and cool things you can do in D&D?
Still allow for the wholesale slaughter for those that want it but allow the rest of us options.


Oh, I forgot to mention Quid Pro Quo!

Great example of what I am talking about. So much fun to sneak behind the werewolves and negotiate with the Griffins and Forians. One of my favorite quests now. Best of all, the sneaking is slower than just running through slaughtering things but every time I show people how to sneak it, they loved that solution.


Sorry but if your "playstyle" is nothing more than to beat things with a stick, then you are a brain dead bully. Monkeys can beat things with sticks, it doesn't require thought to find something moving and hit it with a stick until it stops moving.

First off, while traps can sometimes be ignored, nearly all puzzles cannot be unless they are for optionals. They are often requirements to have access to quest completion.

From what I've seen on the forums, people used to be able to zerg invis/sneak past entire quests. This right here is probably why they made slaughter the only option in most cases, because it slows people down the most. I do still use sneaking for some things sometimes, but the reason we can't just put things to sleep or sneak past to open shortcuts is that it would just increase the zerginess from what it is to even more zergy. Although, it would be kinda nice if there were some situations where you could open a door/pull a lever without sneak dropping, but that's likely in place for the same reason.


Quid Pro Quo: idk how sneaking past the wolves compares with just fighting everything on like EE or R4, but it's actually faster most of the time to sneak on higher difficulties because it's incredibly easy to get instant red dungeon alert if you don't and then even the most OP parties can very easily wipe with things coming at you from all sides. I've never been in a party that intentionally aggroed everything in there because it can be rather difficult to get to the chalice and get out of there otherwise. I imagine the people you've showed may like it partly because it is so much easier solo.

As for the fomorians and griffins, I think I've been in one group that didn't negotiate with the fomorian and griffins. It's simply faster and easier to do so.

There is also the fourth quest in the Mines of Tethyamar chain, Strike Back, where you can skip a ton of enemies that can also be quite hard to deal with by using a skill check, or if you have a high str member you can fight a couple dretches to go below in the tar as a sort of shortcut and fight less drow. Rarely been in a party that goes the dretch route, but nearly every party I've ever been in has at least attempted to bypass that fighting by negotiating, with the few I've been in that didn't do so either failing the check (I now have some cha skills items so I can't fail) or they didn't realize that not fighting was an option. It's vastly easier and faster.


A monkey can hit things with a stick, but a monkey cannot figure out how to make a character in DDO that functions at any reasonable level except possibly by memorizing and copying exactly what someone else did. The complexity of the game largely comes from the enormous number of possible characters. There are combat choices, and when solo/in a difficulty that's really pushing it for the group, there is strategizing, but that is generally not a big contributor to the game's complexity afaik. A monkey cannot grasp any of it.

The reason everyone usually chooses to be murder hoboes is because that's the only option we've been presented, and that's to slow the game pace down. Everyone does it because it's the fastest and most efficient way through a quest, by virtue of being the only way through a quest on a difficulty appropriate for the group. Sometimes in gear farms, people just ignore everything and stack red dungeon alert while literally just sprint boosting to the end, looting, and leaving, but that's also usually a much lower difficulty than they can handle. If sneaking past everything were an option, you would rarely see people murdering everything because it would be fastest and most efficient to ignore the quest. Actually, it's possible another reason sneaking/invising past everything has become largely not viable is that then people look even less at the dungeons and mobs the devs have created, so why even have mobs? May as well just let people grab 'x' amount of xp every 'y' minutes from some NPC, then call their character done when it gets to level 30 and not even have quests or a game, if people never have to fight stuff (I realize you didn't say you never want to have to fight things, but allowing sneak mechanics largely made this how the game functioned from what I can tell on the forums).

People don't necessarily want specifically to go around killing everything (although seeing big numbers is fun and seeing things instantly die at the press of a button without any damage is also fun), they mostly just want to get through the quest and get their xp as fast as possible. This isn't 100% of the time or 100% of players, but it is how the general population's tendencies lean. Since killing everything is the option we have, everyone focuses their builds either on allowing a party to most efficiently murder everything or on some specific specialization (soloing, attempting a specific style of play, w/e).

[superevbully]

[QUOTE=boredGamer;6430112]Also, didn't you quit?

LOLOLOLOLOL awesome

[Hawkwier]

Sorry but if your "playstyle" is nothing more than to beat things with a stick, then you are a brain dead bully. Monkeys can beat things with sticks, it doesn't require thought to find something moving and hit it with a stick until it stops moving.

There are a very few examples of quests that are better then that (Thanks SpartanKiller13) but the vast majority of them are beat things with a stick for the win.

Shutup and give me that banana, and your lunch money, or else...