So U51 is rubbish

[MacDubh]

What can we do?

Lets face facts - this abortion of an update is going to happen.

So can any improvement be made?

The power reduction for epic levelling is going to happen, it's obviously a strategic decision.
They may tweak the level gating, but doubtful.
Lets hope they have the tools to tweak the quest difficulties, especially the lower epics.

The loss of key feats like Dire Charge and Mass Frog is also gonna happen. Their heads were above the parapet and are just too good for us to have so easily.

The sickeningly bland and unfun set of new EDs can be improved, many folks have given good ideas and thoughts, keep at it. A bit more sparkle in the mantles would be nice. Give a few woohoos whenever they actually listen.

Our main target must be the rancid charge/builder system. This is just so anti-DDO, anti-fun, and anti a large section of the playerbase. They ain't gonna dump, but our aim should be to only have it in 2 EDs out of the 12 maybe, one martial and one arcane, so folk have reasonable options if they don't like clicking buttons every few seconds whenever in a dungeon. It's a stretch target, but this is the main killer of fun imo for the whole update. Obviously the good designers got outvoted by the shallow people on this one.

I expect the following concessions in any case (could be wrong):-

STR/DEX/CON on physical checks will be extended to any stat. This is a fairly easy one for them to give, and seeing as how they've been encouraging everyone to use INT, WIS and CHA for stuff as well, the restriction is senseless and against many other design aspects, including PDK race and all the lovely Universal Trees

The cost of reset will be radically reduced. They probably set it high just so they had something to give that doesn't matter strategically.

Other things? Maybe we can band together and send a few bottles of whisky to the devs, some nice magazines, special hair gels, whatever sort of thing we think they like. Any folks local can schmooze and seduce them. Remember, you're doing it for the team.
On the forums, keep on pointing out improvements needed, rage against the putrid charge builder aspects, all the usual good stuff.
Some folk go on DDO Discord, suck up to them a bit and give them a nudge or push whenever you can.
Those folks with special access (i.e. who play around with theory crafting) you gotta put it out there for everyone's benefit and push in improvements. Do whatever you have to do (we're relying on you).
And lets keep it nice folks.

[Lonnbeimnech]

What can we do?

cap in sharn,
run lvl 18-19 heroics at level 20
turn in sagas, should get us to 22 or so

run slayers in thunderholm, necro 4, ravenloft, cogs and feywild, should get us to 26 maybe 27

then run von 3,4 wizking, two toed tobias, spies in the house,on R1EH for first time bonuses

before you know it you will have your lvl 29 gear back on and you've only touched one quest over lvl 22

[kmoustakas]

We could find a new game and hope the blowback gets all the people responsible for this 'horizontaly promoted'

[TFerguson]

We could find a new game and hope the blowback gets all the people responsible for this 'horizontaly promoted'

All the other games in this genre suck worse that DDO.

[Memnir]

All the other games in this genre suck worse that DDO.

This is true. Thus, I have been expanding genres. My DDO time is dwindling. I don't know if U51 is going to be my "straw" or not. But my DDO time is dwindling.

[Bacon_Burger]

This is true. Thus, I have been expanding genres. My DDO time is dwindling. I don't know if U51 is going to be my "straw" or not. But my DDO time is dwindling.

DDO time is on a knives' edge.

The rubbish UT called HW is the final straw.

U50 or 51 it doesn't matter. SSG has managed to ****s off most of the old player base. But in thier pugness, they won't admit it, or own up to it.

So be it. When payers won't throw money at DDO due to *all of the issues posted by many recently* maybe then when EG7 drops the hammer on them, they will see how they alienated the majority of players with bad development choices and the massive PAY WALL then maybe, just maybe *some* players will come back. But I doubt it.


ZERO faith with SSG, and won't drop a dime on a garbage UT that steelstar defends as the next greatest thing in DDO. It's RANGER subclass being pawned off on us a some kind of "fix" for bow users. It's garbage, and WotC should stop the release of said garbage.

[Hashrabal]

All the other games in this genre suck worse that DDO.

Give the Burning Crusade Patch for World of Warcraft Classic a go. Honestly.

I though the same thing as you before I gave it a shot. But I've switched and am not looking back - hell I am so glad I made the switch.

I couldn't stand the though of again having to fight uncaring and disconnected devs on yet another non-issue they've made into a huge problem by their own actions in this game. It's been to many times.

Compared to that, the few issues TBC has are really minor. And the game feels rewarding - unlike DDO where any power you acquire over the course of years of game time is simply stripped away by the devs whenever they feel like it, just so they can sell you a new class/tree/xp potion/otto's box or whatever down the line.

Yes it was a beauty of a game - it really redefined the genre for me and I sincerely hope other games will take inspiration from it. Can you imagine DDO in a new engine, with stable netcode and a team of devs that care? That would be the end of my spare time...

But the game in it's current shape, heading towards where we all can clearly see it going? It is time to let it go. It won't ever become again, what we all crave and that is the cold hard truth of it. At this point the best chance for a playable edition of DDO would be "classic" servers, but I wouldn't get my hopes up.

[Lotoc]

Give the Burning Crusade Patch for World of Warcraft Classic a go.

as someone who played burning crusade when it was current content rather than classic, dear god you could not be more wrong.
they won't be fixing any of the issues TBC had during its run to maintain it being "classic" and the design philosophy of the devs at the time was far worse than anything I've seen of DDO, and the design philosophy of blizzard on current WoW is still miles worse, I get you're jaded by disliking change or whatever, but you're drastically misinformed if you think WoW classic: TBC is by any means an improvement when it is not even a game in development, its an already outdated game that has already finished its entire lifespan just being redone.
You think SSG don't listen to feedback or anything? Everything about classic wow's "development" is set in stone, it's a no effort stagnant themepark - there won't be changes, there won't be improvements, hell there won't even be bugfixes unless those bugs deviate from what was originally in TBC.
You may dislike and disagree what ssg are trying to do or their vision of what constitutes an improvement
but at least they are trying.

[gringofoot]

Can you imagine DDO in a new engine, with stable netcode and a team of devs that care? That would be the end of my spare time...

That's the dream.

[Shadospawn]

All the other games in this genre suck worse that DDO.

Have you actually tried any? LOL wow so the one game that doesn’t suck is the one with more lag issues, worse graphics, and where “content” equals rinse/repeating character lives over and over and over again?

Hey I play ddo too but to say all others suck I think sounds to me like those toddlers who will only eat hot dogs. Hot dogs are good but there’s better food out there.

[Oxarhamar]

All the other games in this genre suck worse that DDO.

Not for long since DDO is now adding outdated cookie cutter MMO mechanics what made DDO better outside of the DND setting was the gameplay & combat was different not for long

[Hashrabal]

cap in sharn,
run lvl 18-19 heroics at level 20
turn in sagas, should get us to 22 or so

run slayers in thunderholm, necro 4, ravenloft, cogs and feywild, should get us to 26 maybe 27

then run von 3,4 wizking, two toed tobias, spies in the house,on R1EH for first time bonuses

before you know it you will have your lvl 29 gear back on and you've only touched one quest over lvl 22

Or in short: skip the content. If the recommendation for how to deal with a new system is to skip it, maybe just maybe there is something terribly wrong with the system?

Don't get me wrong - I fully agree that it is good advice to skip that <censored> content - it probably is going to be the only way to stomach it.

It's just that better advice is to find a game where devs don't actively make the game worse and worse each patch.

[JOTMON]

cap in sharn,
run lvl 18-19 heroics at level 20
turn in sagas, should get us to 22 or so

run slayers in thunderholm, necro 4, ravenloft, cogs and feywild, should get us to 26 maybe 27

then run von 3,4 wizking, two toed tobias, spies in the house,on R1EH for first time bonuses

before you know it you will have your lvl 29 gear back on and you've only touched one quest over lvl 22

Easy to fix.

Remove XP from Slayers
Remove XP stones from Sagas

Keep the xp focus to questing.

[Aelonwy]

Easy to fix.

Remove XP from Slayers
Remove XP stones from Sagas

Keep the xp focus to questing.

I don't understand why anyone would ever propose this^. Can we NOT try to force everyone to play just one approved way? Can people just have fun, in a leisure activity/hobby however its fun for them? I happen to enjoy slayers but what would the point be of spending any time at all in them if they didn't give any xp? And sagas? Stop removing fun. Stop adding grind.

Sometimes I wish MMOs had never been invented. I'd like to go back to multiplayer PC games without microtransaction BS. With DDOs population it barely counts as an MMO anyway. This game doesn't need one iota more of "grind this almost fun time-sink and pay $x$ for widget to make it go faster/better so it actually becomes fun".

You propose they remove XP from slayers/sagas and focus XP on quests but I got news for you if they removed XP from slayers/sagas it wouldn't be redistributed anywhere. Much like their XP adjustment to repeating dailies with the tease that they would then be able to make more rewarding optionals. Ha! XP is their #1 product, hence XP potions, Ottos boxes, past life grinds requiring what? over 500 million XP now right? I'm getting sick of all of it and suggestions like the above make me long for the days when games were made to be fun not sabotaged from the inside out to maximize profits on every aspect. Not sabotaged by players suggesting ways to force everyone to play their preferred way. You don't enjoy or approve of slayers/sagas? Fine don't use them. No one is forcing you. Don't advocate to remove them from people that do enjoy using them to level.

[Hawkwier]

I don't understand why anyone would ever propose this^. Can we NOT try to force everyone to play just one approved way? Can people just have fun, in a leisure activity/hobby however its fun for them? I happen to enjoy slayers but what would the point be of spending any time at all in them if they didn't give any xp? And sagas? Stop removing fun. Stop adding grind.

Sometimes I wish MMOs had never been invented. I'd like to go back to multiplayer PC games without microtransaction BS. With DDOs population it barely counts as an MMO anyway. This game doesn't need one iota more of "grind this almost fun time-sink and pay $x$ for widget to make it go faster/better so it actually becomes fun".

You propose they remove XP from slayers/sagas and focus XP on quests but I got news for you if they removed XP from slayers/sagas it wouldn't be redistributed anywhere. Much like their XP adjustment to repeating dailies with the tease that they would then be able to make more rewarding optionals. Ha! XP is their #1 product, hence XP potions, Ottos boxes, past life grinds requiring what? over 500 million XP now right? I'm getting sick of all of it and suggestions like the above make me long for the days when games were made to be fun not sabotaged from the inside out to maximize profits on every aspect. Not sabotaged by players suggesting ways to force everyone to play their preferred way. You don't enjoy or approve of slayers/sagas? Fine don't use them. No one is forcing you. Don't advocate to remove them from people that do enjoy using them to level.

Yes. In general, IMO there are far too many folks on here with an absolutist attitude to a game that can, and should, be played in a whole variety of ways. "You do it this way (i.e. my way) or you're doing it wrong" - In large part I think hubris drives such myopic thinking. That and a natural tendency to simplify the complex - this worked for me, so it is therefore the only solution - no, it's only a solution, among many.

If there truly was only one way to succeed at this game, or only one measure of success even, how boring it would be!

[superevbully]

I don't understand why anyone would ever propose this^. Can we NOT try to force everyone to play just one approved way? Can people just have fun, in a leisure activity/hobby however its fun for them? I happen to enjoy slayers but what would the point be of spending any time at all in them if they didn't give any xp? And sagas? Stop removing fun. Stop adding grind.

Sometimes I wish MMOs had never been invented. I'd like to go back to multiplayer PC games without microtransaction BS. With DDOs population it barely counts as an MMO anyway. This game doesn't need one iota more of "grind this almost fun time-sink and pay $x$ for widget to make it go faster/better so it actually becomes fun".

You propose they remove XP from slayers/sagas and focus XP on quests but I got news for you if they removed XP from slayers/sagas it wouldn't be redistributed anywhere. Much like their XP adjustment to repeating dailies with the tease that they would then be able to make more rewarding optionals. Ha! XP is their #1 product, hence XP potions, Ottos boxes, past life grinds requiring what? over 500 million XP now right? I'm getting sick of all of it and suggestions like the above make me long for the days when games were made to be fun not sabotaged from the inside out to maximize profits on every aspect. Not sabotaged by players suggesting ways to force everyone to play their preferred way. You don't enjoy or approve of slayers/sagas? Fine don't use them. No one is forcing you. Don't advocate to remove them from people that do enjoy using them to level.

Ty just so well thought out and said again ty

[Certon]

Easy to fix.

Remove XP from Slayers
Remove XP stones from Sagas

Keep the xp focus to questing.

I'm all for completely removing slayer areas and sagas, if xp for quests is improved. i have always hated the grind that they represent. remove repeat penalties from dungeons if you are in a full group and allow all levels to group together (with high level players abilities' scaled down.) But these easy solutions aren't in the playbook for them. Instead, they will mess with gameplay--this AFTER including Reaper difficulty and alienating some of the eldest playerbase originally. they just can't seem to make a good decision.

[pSINNa]

I'm afraid U51 has cut the last thread tying me to this game. Is it the systems being implemented? No, not really.

It's rebuilding my characters again, and again, and again. The goal posts moved one too many times.
It takes me a year or two to get every character just right, just the way i like it so i can log on and enjoy myself without having to chase this or that. Then Boom... they change it all again and this time, well, I've run out of love.

Coit has gone to another place, where the story and the game are one (reckon you can all figure it out with all the gaming chatter in the news lately).

I may drop in from time to time as my GF is still playing, but the 12 years of devotion have ended.

Peace out all, Coit out.

[donblas]

I love where DDO is going with U50 and 51. I suspect the game will keep going longer than I will be alive!

[merlinfire1]

I'm all for completely removing slayer areas and sagas, if xp for quests is improved. i have always hated the grind that they represent. remove repeat penalties from dungeons if you are in a full group and allow all levels to group together (with high level players abilities' scaled down.) But these easy solutions aren't in the playbook for them. Instead, they will mess with gameplay--this AFTER including Reaper difficulty and alienating some of the eldest playerbase originally. they just can't seem to make a good decision.

Didn't you just assert a couple posts earlier an admonition against "taking things away"?

Or are you admitting that sometimes, balance for the sake of game quality is necessary?