Power Balance correction / New Epic destinies / fun of the game

[Tarinia]

Hi Guys, Dear Devs,

note that I like the process of asking the community before you do such a great change and that you made a good job in the past- I am with DDO since the beta and liked all kinds of changes including HC Seasons.
But I want to point out, what (for me and many players I know) is fun and what is not- that should help to make decisions if you do the changes from lamania or will develope them further in another direction- not all are of my opinion, but
I will try:

Fun is:
1. To level in heroic levels from 1-20, in HC and also in live doing quests, gaining RXPs and achieving reincarnation of race or class.

No fun is:

2. To level in epic levels from 21-28 using the fastest way like wilderness slayers till I get to 28/29 grinding for epic reincarnations

Fun is:
3. then doing the legendary expansion quests/raids from lvl 28-30

sometimes fun is:

4. Doing the legendary raids from lvl28-32- main reason is, that they are not enough and diverse in my opinion and the progress is only through items farming, which is sometimes fun, but not always- many raids give no progress because they have sub standard loot or I already own all interesting items.

5. No fun is:
doing lower epic quests on elite or reaper, because
a.the reward (loot) is substandard and you will have much better loot near lvl 30 then on lvl27 and below
b. and RXPs are not balanced vs. doing it on lvl29/30, where you get double RXPS and need much less time to farm them,
c. have more people to choose and play with in endgame
d. the normal xps you can get trough easy wilderness farming is much faster (and so you need less time to get the next epic reincarnation) then doing quests
e. the epic quests differ wildly in xps/minute, so most will do their boring epic daily quests instead doing amore interesting aproach.
f. doing epic quests on solo is so much more difficult then doing them in heroic, that you choose to farm wilderness areas instead of seeing only slow progress (in relation through other players and to your own time invest)

6. fun is:
taking level 20 and feeling the power rush of all the epic destinies you know have of your fingertips that I have earned under sweat and great time effort and have paid seperately for

7. No fun was:
grinding the epic destinies in the past BUT now after I have done it, I of course want my rewards and not feeling I have done it for nothing
Why was it no fun to grind the epic destinies- I have to grind heroic past life, too?
There are different reasons for that:
a. You can more freely choose your class and race doing the heroic grind and pay for not wanting to play a class/race if you don´t want to but need the reincarnations
b. leveling through epics is much more boring and hard to solo in relation to heroics
c. the epic reincarnation system gives lesser rewards and you feel slower progress then the heroic system

8. fun is:
to feel the might of the endgame gear or lvl29+ gear

9. no fun is:
to loose all that is fun (see above 6+8) only because new players will have an easier entry and need not so much time to get similar results in game or because DEVS want to increase lvl cap

I don´t have feelings against giving new players better fun or raising the lvl cap, but not if I loose all what was fun before (see above point 6+8))


10. fun is:
having a goal (reincarnation, loot, level, fun) and reaching it with not to slow progress

11. No fun is:
loosing all end game gear because of mistakes of the devs in the past and having to grind 5 Millions xps more (to lvl 33 or 35) to get a lesser bonus item for a new endgame which is less powerfull then we had before

12. fun is:
feeling powerfull, special and successfull in relation to the mobs and other players- so taking away special abilities (current epic destinies and epic moments at lvl20) or powerfull items (lvl28/29 legendary gear) and making it convenient is exactly the wrong decision imo.

13. no fun is
the grindingly long and complicated reincarnation process with clearing the super slow reincarnation bank- why you not concentrate on making this more smoothly instead of taking other fun away?

So what is is all about- why I perhaps like to raise the lvl cap in spite of all no fun points- why I like an overhaul of the destiny system in spite of losses?

I like it only if the DEVS will give something in return for players which is more then just a cloak for paying for old epic destinies and taking them now away- give us an ap system in addition to epic destinies
I like it if the Devs make epic leveling more fun, a feel of faster progress and rewards
I like it if the wilderness exps is more balanced vs. quests xps.
I like it if RXPS can be gained in a similar rate solo in epics then in heroics and NOT so much faster in endgame
I like it not, if I only have to grind 5 Mio xps more to get the same loot again I has already now, I have to pay for that and the above points are not changed that makes epic leveling boring

For me ( I am a pen&paper player) I like the idea of going back to the roots and bonis of pen&paper with the new system, but it is no fun and seems not fit to loose all you have hoarded in the last 20 years for a compromise
I would rather change the things which are no fun and hold on the points wich are fun.
I already felt a bitter taste in this HC season and don´t farmed RL any more, because you nerved the belts for casters- how much it will felt if you nerf all items and make them the same as normal stuff around since ages and also similar to random loot? No fun I can tell you- so I decided to leave epic and legendary be and only do heroic as in the the past 2 years, so I will not feel the bitter taste of loss again.

Thanks - if I ranted too long, its because I love this game and don´t want to loose the grip...

Tarinia

[Evean]

Anything to do with balance, EDs, new loot, all moot.

Until SSG gets their lag (AKA lack of quality control) in check, it’s not even fair to say “they have a bad product” because in reality, they don’t have any product at all. A car with no tires and no engine isn’t a car, and it certainly doesn’t matter what colour it is.

[SheIsMiiiiiiinnnne]

Thx OP, a well balanced response putting the reasons U50 and U51 are wrong for the game, from the perspective of an experienced players, and emphasising how FUN is important to a game.

We can but hope the ongoing chorus of disapproval from many long term and serious players, even those that rarely post, will be heard in the deep dark design catacombs of SSG.

Just say no. No. No. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

[Tarinia]

Thx OP, a well balanced response putting the reasons U50 and U51 are wrong for the game, from the perspective of an experienced players, and emphasising how FUN is important to a game.

We can but hope the ongoing chorus of disapproval from many long term and serious players, even those that rarely post, will be heard in the deep dark design catacombs of SSG.

Just say no. No. No. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

thanks for the response- It is tough to make a constructive offer what can be done whitout loosing all the fun, but I will try:

1. no fun: loosing all the power of epic destinies at lvl20
compromise: giving players immediatly at lvl 20 one epic moment from the old system in addition to all other things proposed- they can choose from all destinies they capped- for newer players they can choose between the epic moments if they have epic completionist with new system. They can change the choosing every time they reincarnate epic.

2. no fun: loosing the feeling of Lvl28/29 you get from your legendary equipment
compromise: letting players choose one item from every expansion or raid lvl28+ (Ravenloft, Sharn, Feywald max. of 3 items) once bound to account to take into the future even if the item is unbalanced in the future systems.

3. no fun: leveling in epic:
compromise: do a smoother curve from heroic to epic, reducing monster might, so that soloing on R1 is possible for well equiped toons.
compromise: reducing RXPS gain at end game and increasing them in epics depending on quest lenght
compromise: rebalance quests xps to wilderness xps
compromise: give us an AP systems similar to heroics with Tier 5 in Lvl 32 (as lvl12 in heroics)

4. no fun: to complicated and long slow reincarnation process
compromise: before giving us legendary reincarnation, let us speed up epic reincarnation:
- one button to do epic and heroic reincarnation together without need to level to 20 again for epic reincarnation and then deleting it immediatly because you want to go to 1 and not to 20.
- very fast reincarnation cache with marks, what item you want in inventory and what item you want selling or deleting

5. no fun: loosing the feeling of power you have getting epic feats/specials near Lvl29
compromise: don´t delete epic feats/or specials near lvl28/29 because they are part of feeling special near lvl30
compromise: add more of these special feats/abilities for lvls above 30

Thanks for your interest in my opinion

Tarinia

[Eme]

it's turning a tune into a tone

[Kebtid]

I also play the game for a long time, since 2008.
And by going trough all the ups and downs in ddo, promising and swearing never to play again, all i can say is...
Fix inventory management, and do whatever else you want to do with the game, i would care less.



It does not matter, progression will be smoothened out, the gear power is to spikey and needs to be nerfed, we lose nothing if the mobs are adjusted.
We lack the information to understand how the new endgame will shape up to talk about it officially.
We only know what they plan to do and that they are working to adjust it.
Points:
- We do not know all the gear that will and how it will change for update 50
- We do not know all the destinies that we will get and how the previewed ones will look in their final form
- We do not know what the endgoals are for level cap raise, what and how the game is planned to be coded at that time


What i can personally tell, i hate the current epic system.
It consists of me reaching 20, doing slayers and a elite saga or 2 and high value xp quests to get to 30 in 4-5 hours of gameplay to get my gear on to start having fun in r10 with guidlies.
r10 with same minded players in efficient builds is to frigginn easy and only the rng of spawning multiple vengences plagues dooms and despairs in a cleaving party makes it a bit interesting, to avoid worst case scenarios of total chaos.

Game as it is, feels like, get to 20, then get to 30, path between 20 and 30 is irrelevant, pointless, a hassle, unfun and not necessary.


IF they smoothen out the curve, make the progression feel like a progression and if the content at level, same with gear, gets more interesting and fun, i will call it the best quality update that ddo has ever had.

What i want to happen, r10 need to be harder, way harder at 30 with max gear, leveling reaper should be harder, way harder, i should not be capable to do most of heroic content solo at r10, that should not be possible, soloing r10 should also not be possible.

Reaper content was meant to be a challenge and as it stands right now, we have to many super powers with dumbed down gameplay (the most complicated builds i can think off are fsoul dc caster and sorc caster that utilize the use of 30ish-40ish buttons in combat, dps utilize maybe 10, excluding monks at high top end from best players yada yada bla bla due to use of macros for boosts)

I want ddo to be harder at top end game, easier for low entry, and the xp boost to be removed from reaper with just reaper experience being granted in reaper content, no regular xp at all whatsoever.
That would keep the reaper community together and would not force tr or new players community to bother with it and feel forced into it.


And again, fix the Inventory management in this game, it is the only thing i consider unfun.

TLDR.
Fix inventory, update could be good if done right, make reaper harder.

[Strider1963]

I agree with the Op on many of his/her points. Mainly, "FUN" . Games are supposed to be fun, and it seems to me that lately the devs keep trying to take fun out of the game. Now we get to re-level and epic tree(s) after we already did it in heroic? Thats not fun. No epic moment anymore?, thats not fun either. I would think that epic leveling from 20-30 will take longer than before, and thats not fun either. Of course, I'd like to be proven wrong on that point but we'll see. When they finally manage to take all of the fun out of the game, the game will be no more.

[Enderoc]

If you are just playing to level and reincarnate you got blinders on. The game lasted over a decade. You got time. No need to rush to start over to rush to start over. You are missing out in immersing yourself into your character and storyline. Each life should be unique.

SOME lives are rushed through if you are excited about a specific build that would be greatly affected by having specific past life feats but every life shoukdnt be a zerg. Those that are should be built for more than slayers lol usually multi class do everything to survive HC builds.

[GoldyGopher]

Everyone has a different view of what fun is. You view on fun my align mostly with the next player but there will always be another player whose view of what is fun is the polar opposite of yours.

Changing the difficulty of the game does not by itself change the level of fun players can have in while playing the game. Making the game easier does not make the game more fun nor does making the game harder make the game less fun.

The Development Team is challenged to make the game as fun as possible for the widest number of both current and potential players. If you don't improve the game for potential players than as attrition eats away at your current player base you end up with diminished player base and the game ceases to exist. In the past the development team gave the existing player base some huge changes/systems that were to the detriment of the potential or new players. The game stagnated.

The current development team is working at adjusting the game to allow continued development and improve the experience for a wider number of players and potential players. Some of those changes are going to be painful for us as existing players. Some will quit, some will complaining on the forums, some give it the good old college try.

The stat squish or alignment or right sizing, or what ever you want to call it only presents only a few minor concerns as a player. It hits defensive stats a lot harder across the board than offensive stats.

I am not a fan or supporter of the Epic Destiny change. I like the current sphere system and wish the development team would have gone fully monty with it rather than give us a few pieces. It would have been very interesting and supported a much wider number of build archetypes. Instead we got just enough for them to say they did it and pretend they gave it a good old college try. Made worse by the fact they let it languish over the past half-a-dozen years. Six months after the change more players than now will be clamoring to get the old spheres back.

I understand why the development team wants to reuse enhancement trees and shove their crappy trees down our throats. To them it makes total sense. To us as players looking at it from our perspective it is stupid. We all have different reasons why we think it is stupid. To me the problem isn't the level gating rather it is the idea they need to frontload the trees to stop players from complaining about losing power at level 20 and the counter is to give us lots of filler abilities in the tree.
The other problem with the new trees is I cannot see how their is a future for the trees as we level up past 30. It might work to 32 or 34, it will have problems at 36 or 38 and will be disaster at 40. There is no way around it with the current design.

[Tarinia]

Everyone has a different view of what fun is. You view on fun my align mostly with the next player but there will always be another player whose view of what is fun is the polar opposite of yours.

Changing the difficulty of the game does not by itself change the level of fun players can have in while playing the game. Making the game easier does not make the game more fun nor does making the game harder make the game less fun.

The Development Team is challenged to make the game as fun as possible for the widest number of both current and potential players. If you don't improve the game for potential players than as attrition eats away at your current player base you end up with diminished player base and the game ceases to exist. In the past the development team gave the existing player base some huge changes/systems that were to the detriment of the potential or new players. The game stagnated.

The current development team is working at adjusting the game to allow continued development and improve the experience for a wider number of players and potential players. Some of those changes are going to be painful for us as existing players. Some will quit, some will complaining on the forums, some give it the good old college try.

The stat squish or alignment or right sizing, or what ever you want to call it only presents only a few minor concerns as a player. It hits defensive stats a lot harder across the board than offensive stats.

I am not a fan or supporter of the Epic Destiny change. I like the current sphere system and wish the development team would have gone fully monty with it rather than give us a few pieces. It would have been very interesting and supported a much wider number of build archetypes. Instead we got just enough for them to say they did it and pretend they gave it a good old college try. Made worse by the fact they let it languish over the past half-a-dozen years. Six months after the change more players than now will be clamoring to get the old spheres back.

I understand why the development team wants to reuse enhancement trees and shove their crappy trees down our throats. To them it makes total sense. To us as players looking at it from our perspective it is stupid. We all have different reasons why we think it is stupid. To me the problem isn't the level gating rather it is the idea they need to frontload the trees to stop players from complaining about losing power at level 20 and the counter is to give us lots of filler abilities in the tree.
The other problem with the new trees is I cannot see how their is a future for the trees as we level up past 30. It might work to 32 or 34, it will have problems at 36 or 38 and will be disaster at 40. There is no way around it with the current design.

ok, another compromise:

why not changing endgame in letting it be a whole new legendary exp tree, where you can only use legendary gear, that can be crunched out of epic/named loot like sentient items- lots of sentient dungeons, that let only sentient items be with you (or something similar)- that will seperate endgame equipment from normal leveling, because you can only use one sentient item in normal play, and most have not more then one or two sentient items prepared for that new chalenge


instead of leveling normally to 35 or 40, instead start an endgame at lvl30 and let legendary exps go up- then you don´t need to change anything. You can just go along with momentary gear.
You can position older expansions inside this new experience and even allow new reincarnations.

Thanks
Tarinia

[Tarinia]

I also play the game for a long time, since 2008.
And by going trough all the ups and downs in ddo, promising and swearing never to play again, all i can say is...
Fix inventory management, and do whatever else you want to do with the game, i would care less.



It does not matter, progression will be smoothened out, the gear power is to spikey and needs to be nerfed, we lose nothing if the mobs are adjusted.
We lack the information to understand how the new endgame will shape up to talk about it officially.
We only know what they plan to do and that they are working to adjust it.
Points:
- We do not know all the gear that will and how it will change for update 50
- We do not know all the destinies that we will get and how the previewed ones will look in their final form
- We do not know what the endgoals are for level cap raise, what and how the game is planned to be coded at that time


What i can personally tell, i hate the current epic system.
It consists of me reaching 20, doing slayers and a elite saga or 2 and high value xp quests to get to 30 in 4-5 hours of gameplay to get my gear on to start having fun in r10 with guidlies.
r10 with same minded players in efficient builds is to frigginn easy and only the rng of spawning multiple vengences plagues dooms and despairs in a cleaving party makes it a bit interesting, to avoid worst case scenarios of total chaos.

Game as it is, feels like, get to 20, then get to 30, path between 20 and 30 is irrelevant, pointless, a hassle, unfun and not necessary.


IF they smoothen out the curve, make the progression feel like a progression and if the content at level, same with gear, gets more interesting and fun, i will call it the best quality update that ddo has ever had.

What i want to happen, r10 need to be harder, way harder at 30 with max gear, leveling reaper should be harder, way harder, i should not be capable to do most of heroic content solo at r10, that should not be possible, soloing r10 should also not be possible.

Reaper content was meant to be a challenge and as it stands right now, we have to many super powers with dumbed down gameplay (the most complicated builds i can think off are fsoul dc caster and sorc caster that utilize the use of 30ish-40ish buttons in combat, dps utilize maybe 10, excluding monks at high top end from best players yada yada bla bla due to use of macros for boosts)

I want ddo to be harder at top end game, easier for low entry, and the xp boost to be removed from reaper with just reaper experience being granted in reaper content, no regular xp at all whatsoever.
That would keep the reaper community together and would not force tr or new players community to bother with it and feel forced into it.


And again, fix the Inventory management in this game, it is the only thing i consider unfun.

TLDR.
Fix inventory, update could be good if done right, make reaper harder.

Yes you are right, not all have the same fun base- a friend of mine is a high end raider- nothing except new raids and doing them as high reaper as possible is interesting to him.
But In my opinion it is hard to fulfill all fun wishes of people who only like a small part of the game.
But another compromise:

more fun:
using another (more dangereous) set of champions in legendary (like on HC server) quests, reaper quests or raids would be also very interesting and challenging- rotating these sets in unforeseen time intervalls would be more challenging and interesting, too

Best regards
Tarinia