U51 Preview 3: Epic Destiny Overview

[shores11]

I have three concerns about the U51 changes in general, aside from how the trees themselves are turning out.

The first is the lack of value being given to old fate point tomes. They were not easy to find in game nor were they cheap to buy. Yet SSG seems to think that because they are the old thing they should only be worth at most about a third as much as the new thing they want to sell us.

>> After reading the update notes I thought it was made clear that old fate point times would be made into permanent epic points. This means you get the base value at level 20 plus the permanent ones. How are you losing?

The devaluation of the old tomes is just not acceptable. It sends a very bad message to customers, ie, be careful about spending money on our products because we might pull some completely arbitrary rules change in the future that makes what we're offering you now much less valuable then. It is an act of bad faith and may have consequences for customers' spending patterns. Don't cross that line.

>> Again, this is simply NOT TRUE. Better reading comprehension is all that is needed.

My second concern relates to the additional value of epic completionist in the destiny point calculation. I'm curious if a character will simply be granted an additional point per any 12 epic past lives or there is additional requirement that you need three lives per sphere for each one of these additional destiny points. There will be people whose efforts have been mainly focused in two or three spheres with 12 or more past lives who technically aren't epic single, double or triple completionists and I would like to know how that will be handled.

>> Yes, as stated in the dialog in the OP you can get up to an additional 4 epic completionists points that are permanent.

The third issue is how respeccing our characters will be handled with the update. My advice is just do the right thing and give everyone a BTC +20 LR heart for each character they have at the time the update goes live. That will do a lot to alleviate the concerns of people who find the characters they have at cap or are in progress are severely affected by the update.

>> Isn't the fact that you are re-acquiring your ED points per the system a complete epic respec; and it's free without requiring a tome.

I thought this addressed in the opening comments.

[DRoark]

I never thought that a private company in the USA (capitalist's nation) would want to make money (profit). How dare they!

You're right, it's all business, but some of it's shadier than others. U51 will shoehorn the need for dozens of ERs for EDPs,
a huge jump in XP potions, hearts for ER/TR cycles to reduce token farming time, and EDP Upgrade Tomes (obviously).

We get it, DDO's the "old man", but stop kicking out it's walker, and spend a year or so working on ACTUAL fixes
people ask for. You still haven't gotten Filigrees to work right, I mean, seriously people, it's been 4 years already. )

[Certon]

I never thought that a private company in the USA (capitalist's nation) would want to make money (profit). How dare they!

How DARE they SELL us epic abilities and feats then take them away.

That's EXACTLY what they are doing. Your sarcasm BLEEDS truth.

[majster67]

Feat Tie-Ins
We're going to try to reclaim as many of the old and sub-optimal feats as we can - for example, an ED ability that grants a significant bonus if you have the Luck of Heroes Feat trained - in ways that would reward you for having them in your build without making them mandatory. Some feats might need additional help, but with this we're going to make an effort to tie a lot of those loose ends up.

You'll also see a lot of abilities that tie into Destiny and Epic feats that are underused or overlooked, such as Embodiment of Chaos/Law and the Bulwark of Defense feat. When these appear, rather than being requirements to train, they will instead apply an additional bonus if you have the feat to reward players who decide to shift their own meta.

I don't really understand why you are pushing these feats under players' noses. It won't make them want to take them. Most of these feats are useless and of little value, and they only take up important space which is limited in number. Also, most of the bonuses they give are like "if you have type usless feat you also gain +1you won't feel it anyway". Grants a significant... what? Rather it's more like Loses a significant(feat space). If you need an absurd reason to give something more in a passive or active skill, you've actually found it. But it would be simpler to just add the same thing without supporting it with a feat especially heroic eg. Nimble Fingers, Improved Turning, Discipline etc even Tactician as epic giving +2 anyway... There are others that are more worth taking instead. I guess only having Bulwark of Defense will give some tangible benefit in corresponding ED but it can still be added without conditioning it with a weak feat. The only exception I can remember is in Fatesinger where some additions are based on a feat the bard gets automatically like Fascinate, Bardic Ballad. The rest... Either fix these feats (though some of them could be removed) or remove the bonus-requirement for a weak bonus to a weak SLOT-SHOTING feat and double the bonus to these skills regardless of both. It looks like you want to show the players that old feats can be useful. But players really know what is good for their characters and they don't need such suggestions. And for every such suggestion you make, they will find 20 ways around it to do it better, that you didn't anticipate.
In general, I suggest that you allow more flexibility in character design, especially with major changes such as these, and don't do everything the way you think it should be done in your sometimes narrow vision. Because the only thing you can impose on players with this is the desire to leave the game.

And yes, tier 5 should be moved to 29lvl, your strange silence will not make players change their minds

[elvesunited]

And yes, tier 5 should be moved to 29lvl, your strange silence will not make players change their minds

Tier 5 should be level 26. Give players a chance to use these abilities.

[DRoark]

I don't really understand why you are pushing these feats under players' noses

Pretty much. I think they're just changing/breaking stuff to troll us at this point.

[Blerk]

I thought this addressed in the opening comments.

No, it wasn't.

>> After reading the update notes I thought it was made clear that old fate point times would be made into permanent epic points. This means you get the base value at level 20 plus the permanent ones. How are you losing?

There are no "epic points". There will be fate points and destiny points. The bonus fate points we get for tomes become part of the fate point total which is then divided by three and used to calculate bonus destiny points. So a Tome of Fate +3 will give one destiny point under U51.

That bonus destiny point from a Tome of Fate +3 will become a smaller number in a larger pool and is therefore worth less. The tomes that only provide +1 or +2 fate points may not actually make any difference under some scenarios to the amount of destiny points awarded. Do you see what I mean by devaluation now?

>> Again, this is simply NOT TRUE. Better reading comprehension is all that is needed.

As shown above, the fact that a devaluation is occurring is true. This is despite what you are claiming. You are welcome to apologise for your cheap and inaccurate ad hominem attack about my reading comprehension either here or the next time we group together. I will keep my opinion about your own level of reading comprehension to myself.

>> Yes, as stated in the dialog in the OP you can get up to an additional 4 epic completionists points that are permanent.

This is a non sequitur so it seems like you missing the point here once again. Your answer refers to what happens with epic completionists. But my question was specifically about characters that have 12 or more epic past lives who may not technically meet the current requirements for epic completionist. However, this question has now been answered by a developer in another thread.

>> Isn't the fact that you are re-acquiring your ED points per the system a complete epic respec; and it's free without requiring a tome.

No, it's not a "complete epic respec". For example, it doesn't allow feat or class split changes. The revision to EDs will have all sorts of consequences for how effective different builds are and how much people enjoy playing them.

The developers have recognised this and will be issuing some +5 LR hearts, but that will not be enough to solve every problem created by these changes. They have the option of giving our characters as close to a full respec as this game has in the form of a +20 LR heart but are choosing not to do so.

I get that some of you insist upon supporting the company and its decisions, no matter how poor those decisions seem to the rest of us. But if you're going to call people out for their criticism you might want to check your facts more carefully first.

[o2t4f]

No, it wasn't.



There are no "epic points". There will be fate points and destiny points. The bonus fate points we get for tomes become part of the fate point total which is then divided by three and used to calculate bonus destiny points. So a Tome of Fate +3 will give one destiny point under U51.

That bonus destiny point from a Tome of Fate +3 will become a smaller number in a larger pool and is therefore worth less. The tomes that only provide +1 or +2 fate points may not actually make any difference under some scenarios to the amount of destiny points awarded. Do you see what I mean by devaluation now?



As shown above, the fact that a devaluation is occurring is true. This is despite what you are claiming. You are welcome to apologise for your cheap and inaccurate ad hominem attack about my reading comprehension either here or the next time we group together. I will keep my opinion about your own level of reading comprehension to myself.



This is a non sequitur so it seems like you missing the point here once again. Your answer refers to what happens with epic completionists. But my question was specifically about characters that have 12 or more epic past lives who may not technically meet the current requirements for epic completionist. However, this question has now been answered by a developer in another thread.



No, it's not a "complete epic respec". For example, it doesn't allow feat or class split changes. The revision to EDs will have all sorts of consequences for how effective different builds are and how much people enjoy playing them.

The developers have recognised this and will be issuing some +5 LR hearts, but that will not be enough to solve every problem created by these changes. They have the option of giving our characters as close to a full respec as this game has in the form of a +20 LR heart but are choosing not to do so.

I get that some of you insist upon supporting the company and its decisions, no matter how poor those decisions seem to the rest of us. But if you're going to call people out for their criticism you might want to check your facts more carefully first.

You say tome of fate is being devalued, but it is getting more value compared to a tome of destiny. Tome of destiny will still give you one destiny point. Tome of fate +3 will be 1 DP plus a little hp and sp. As you say, sometimes tomes of fate +1 and 2 won't give you much of anything in u51, but the same could happen with +3 tomes currently. How many times did you have 3 or 4 fate points to spare, but that wouldn't grant any helpful increase in twists? It could happen depending on your build, especially before reaching lv 30. But it was far less likely for the destiny tome additional point not give you anything useful.

Still, I understand your idea that comparing three fate points to the max you currently get to the 1 DP out of the maximum of 67 in u51 makes it feel like a relative decrease of its impact. However, I'm not sure it's a good idea to compare things this way, as this is a major overhaul, and you will go crazy if you overanalyze what you think you might be losing. Rather try to think about how you might start building from now on.

The decay of the relative power of items like tomes has always happened. When +7 ability tomes came out, reaching 100 on some abilities was hard. By the time +8 tomes came, sharn was here, and 100+ on any ability was mostly trivial. So the +8 tomes were relatively less powerful than +7 when they were out the first time. Then came the recent stat squish, and those ability tomes got a relative increase in power. So, of course, we got some people complaining that previously non-mandatory +8 tomes got a relative boost and are now pretty much required. They had a feeling they were forcing people to buy them. Maybe those people will now be happy that they won't be forced into buying tomes of fate +3. Joking, of course. They won't, just as no one was happy about their +8 ability tomes becoming more potent with stat squish. Overall, people don't want major changes at first, even if it later turns out they like it.

So in that sense, I agree that every character, no matter if epic or not, should receive a BTC +20 heart. I'm pretty sure that the unhappiest are the ones that had a build goal they will achieve in a month or so but won't be able to enjoy it and will scrap everything. They might get caught mid heroic life and be too mad to realize not everything is lost. A +20 heart costs SSG nothing but is likely to produce more goodwill towards them. Being stingy during a change like this is never helpful, even if they can scientifically prove that no one needs even a +0 heart. The uproar certainly shows them they could gain a lot by throwing a bone.

[Djjinni]

After some back and forth on this and trying to justify the tiering and unlock levels presented, I think the system overall would function better (and be better received by quite a few of the more dismissive voices) if the T5s were unlocked at level 29.


I'm all for some 'treats' being reserved for at cap play, but currently, this would already be the Scion feats, augment sets, and newer legendary S/S/S, as well as the final Epic feat - this is enough "held back" from the ever-TRing crowd in my opinion, but I'm more interested in what effects this could have on grouping.

With more of the 'endgame' optimized gear being moved to level 30, the performance spikes many saw at 29 which would have filled the gap left in your pattern are reduced already, and for many people, their journey through the game involves minimal time spent at the cap as they continue working on their billion-exp grind. 29-30(and really 20-30 itself) can be achieved in a very short space of time for some people and often these are the people requesting more toys to be held back until cap, while for others this may be a few days of play, and allowing some of the more fun T5s to be used during that is just a win for basically everyone without unbalancing anything.


If this structure goes live as shown, I could see people being more reluctant to take level 29s into raids and even some mid-high reaper questing which further shrinks the pool of players there, another consideration especially for those who aren't moving through epic levels as fast. This could leave people at 29 with fewer available groups, and also hinder how fast the groups for endgame content fills - basically not ideal for anyone and a step back over what we have currently. In static/regular friend groups this distinction doesn't mean much but it'll have potentially negative effects on the LFM crowd and I can't really see it being a positive for anyone currently. I'd be interested in hearing what benefits leaving the T5 to unlock at 30 is supposed to have on the game overall.

Obviously, progression past level 30 is pure speculation at this point, but extrapolating the tier+core/feat/destiny feat pattern out to 40 also really highlights the weird and slightly awkward-looking gap at 29, for what that is worth too.

[Qeistalan]

The game is improving, period. Granted no one likes change, but if you look at the state of the game from its release in 2006 it’s staggering. All of it will buff out in the end.

Another water-carrying drone for the devs.

Epic Destiny overhaul is anything but "epic". Call it what it is: an underwhelming bait-and-switch.

[Blerk]

snip

Good reply, so much more useful than trying to pretend the problems there are with this just don't exist. Thanks.

I think this would be a lot less irritating to the community if just a little more was being done in the areas of recognising money previously spent on the game (ie, give bonus destiny points for old tomes of fate, not fate points) and by giving +20 LR hearts instead of +5s.

I don't see any great cost to SSG for doing these things and they would be greatly appreciated by the community. Except of course by those who seem set on arguing against the community being helped through this as a matter of principle.

[wax_on_wax_off]

After some back and forth on this and trying to justify the tiering and unlock levels presented, I think the system overall would function better (and be better received by quite a few of the more dismissive voices) if the T5s were unlocked at level 29.


I'm all for some 'treats' being reserved for at cap play, but currently, this would already be the Scion feats, augment sets, and newer legendary S/S/S, as well as the final Epic feat - this is enough "held back" from the ever-TRing crowd in my opinion, but I'm more interested in what effects this could have on grouping.

With more of the 'endgame' optimized gear being moved to level 30, the performance spikes many saw at 29 which would have filled the gap left in your pattern are reduced already, and for many people, their journey through the game involves minimal time spent at the cap as they continue working on their billion-exp grind. 29-30(and really 20-30 itself) can be achieved in a very short space of time for some people and often these are the people requesting more toys to be held back until cap, while for others this may be a few days of play, and allowing some of the more fun T5s to be used during that is just a win for basically everyone without unbalancing anything.


If this structure goes live as shown, I could see people being more reluctant to take level 29s into raids and even some mid-high reaper questing which further shrinks the pool of players there, another consideration especially for those who aren't moving through epic levels as fast. This could leave people at 29 with fewer available groups, and also hinder how fast the groups for endgame content fills - basically not ideal for anyone and a step back over what we have currently. In static/regular friend groups this distinction doesn't mean much but it'll have potentially negative effects on the LFM crowd and I can't really see it being a positive for anyone currently. I'd be interested in hearing what benefits leaving the T5 to unlock at 30 is supposed to have on the game overall.

Obviously, progression past level 30 is pure speculation at this point, but extrapolating the tier+core/feat/destiny feat pattern out to 40 also really highlights the weird and slightly awkward-looking gap at 29, for what that is worth too.

I would like to see everyone's quest XP reset making an Epic TR more enjoyable. Or even better a special Epic TR Heart that resets all quest XP for everyone (in addition to the +5 or +20 Lesser heart).

[elvesunited]

I would like to see everyone's quest XP reset making an Epic TR more enjoyable. Or even better a special Epic TR Heart that resets all quest XP for everyone (in addition to the +5 or +20 Lesser heart).

'
You know that would be a potential money maker. A tome of forgetting. You forget all quest favor and are reset back to 0 for all favor on sale now for 1000 DDO points.
YOu'd have to re-earn all favor rewards but all quests would get the first time bonus.

[Shadowperson]

I need a release date. I need to know if If I have time to TR or not.

[DRoark]

They could have improved things by getting rid of the ED toggles entirely, and making them passive like PLs. You don't
"forget" 30HP, but you somehow forget +3 Jump when you TR. But nope, they had to go backwards and down, and just
skip common sense, and everything else we asked for, like fixing the list of posted bugs.

Between the Mantle lockouts, and making things L30, they did a GREAT job of both not listening to anyone, and neutering EDs.

*Golfclap*...

[Arkat]

I need a release date. I need to know if If I have time to TR or not.

November 3rd...if all goes well.

[Shadowperson]

November 3rd...if all goes well.

Thanks

[Dandonk]

November 3rd...if all goes well.

And even if it doesn't...

[DRoark]

There is no incentive with U51. You can either constantly grind through tiered play, or skip the EDPs entirely, and suffer for NOT wanting to suffer.

Someone asked earlier why they hadn't addressed certain questions. There's a reason. They have no way to defend an update designed this badly.

[Loromir]

And yes, tier 5 should be moved to 29lvl, your strange silence will not make players change their minds

Actually...I think 29 is too high. I've been suggesting 28 all along.

I've not played this game in 10 days. My longest break since I started over 11 years ago. I've been VIP almost the whole time.

This issue is the number one reason I've become so jaded. I want to play, but they are flat out ignoring the player base on this one.

If this goes live with T5's gated at level 30...I might be done for good.