U55 Preview 3: Itemization

[Lynnabel]

Howdy folks. There's a lot of itemization in any expansion, and this one containing a level jump means there's a lot of moving parts.

Isle of Dread Overview

Isle of Dread will contain two major groups of items: Pirate themed standalone items and Dinosaur Bone crafted items. Generally speaking, the pirate stuff will be whole items dropped in dungeons, and dino stuff you'll need to craft and craft upon. This expansion will also contain new Augments, new Sentient Artifacts, and Raid loot.

Item Power Levels

Items follow the CC Curve. CC will also be adjusted so players can craft levels 31 and 32 shards again. This will use existing shard ingredients so if you had some crafted before you'll be able to add them now.

Yes, this means that CC at level 32 will have higher ilevels than level 31 quest items from Isle of Dread. As an item's min level increases, its power level also increases.

Raid items and Minor Artifacts will continue to get a boost in their effective power levels. This means that raid loot at level 31 will be better than CC loot at level 32, with Minor Artifacts being better than raid loot.

Pirate Stuff

These items will drop fully realized in dungeons. This means they'll have a name, a theme, effects, and a specific appearance. Very much standard named loot here.

There will be 5 main sets in Isle of Dread and 1 overall set - think like Ravenloft here. The goal of these sets is to provide meaningful alternatives to Sharn and Ravenloft's 3pc sets. Each 3pc set will contain an Armor (or docent), a helmet, and a cloak - this is partially because this way we can match art assets together. There is also a larger set like the Adherent of the Mists set in Ravenloft, anything else not in the 5 main sets will be here.

In Legendary, each Pirate item will have one Dinosaur Bone augment slot (see below for details).

Augments

Level 32 augments are going to be added to global treasure tables, and a subsection of those will be available for trade with Randall Lyric for Isle of Dread ingredients (Randall will also trade level 8 augments for Isle of Dread ingredients, as some of you may have guessed). There will also be new named augments in Isle of Dread that drop as treasure which will be minimum level 8 or 30.

Distribution of these new augments is a little different than how they normally drop in content. Usually we place them in as Named Loot, but in this expansion, they are all grouped together and have a small chance to drop from any chest in the expansion. This means that if you are looking for a specific augment, the best way to do that is to just play Isle of Dread content at the appropriate level range rather than looking for a specific chest.

Artifacts

Artifacts in this content pack will be level 31 have 4 max Filigree slots, which means if you haven't found a Perfected artifact you'll soon be able to use a variety of alternatives.

Dino Crafting

As you explore Isle of Dread you'll collect Isle of Dread ingredients (such as fossilized dinosaur teeth). You can use these to craft Isle of Dread augments. Isle of Dread augments only go into Isle of Dread augment slots. There are 5 main types of augments: Fang, Scale, Horn, Teeth, and Set Bonus (okay that last one is a little meta but it really is just a set bonus slot).

Blanks consist of all weapon types, all shield types, helmets, cloaks, and all armor types (yes, including docent). Here's how the spread of slots shakes out:



The Set Bonus slot allows you to put that item into one of the 5 Isle of Dread set bonuses. This means that you can theoretically have that set bonus with all 3 of your items being dino bone crafted. Or none, and you just use standalone items, or a mix - totally up to you.

Augments will clearly state which "version" of the slot they're in. For example, this means that yes, there are 3 types of Scale Slot (armor, weapon, and regular) but this denotation will appear in the augment slots display and the augment's description to help prevent confusion.

To craft augments, think like Slavers - you turn many disparate ingredients into a standalone augment and then slot those directly. Unlike Slavers, this will use the new augment system, so there will be both unslotters and destroyers available (unlike previous crafting systems which, once done, were permanent).

The bonuses available are split by slot type - this means that Scale (Weapon) will have a different set of options than Scale (Armor) or Fang (Weapon) and so on.

This crafting system only exists in legendary! At level 7 (the level of heroic isle of dread's items) you'll just be finding the pirate stuff.

There are 6 total ingredients from the Isle of Dread: 4 quest fossils, 1 landscape fossil, and 1 raid ingredient (Black Pearls). There are 5 augment types: Scale, Fang, Claw, Horn, and Set Bonus.

Scale: requires quest ingredients
Fang: requires quest ingredients
Claw: requires landscape ingredients
Horn: requires raid ingredients
Set Bonus: requires raid ingredients

You may barter for the non-raid dinosaur bone crafting blank weapons from the dinosaur bone augment trader (the blue border weapons). The 6 artifacts available (all of which are helmets with a set bonus slot) will drop in any chest in Isle of Dread like all Artifacts tend to do.

The raid will drop the raid tier versions of the weapon blanks, the dinosaur bone armors/helmets/accessory blanks, as well as Black Pearls.

Dino Crafting Flow: TLDR

So, that was a lot. To help with the massive walls of text above, here's a relatively simple 6 step flow of how we intend for players to interact with this crafting system:

1. Players arrive in isle of Dread, collect dino bone bits (ingredients 1-4) from the quests and landscape. They can then trade in those bits for a weapon (assuming they aren't able to randomly stumble upon a blank in their questing).
2. Players can then craft up the Scale and Fang for their weapon using their existing ingredients.
3. Players can do the landscape encounters for the ingredient for their Claw slots
4. Players can do the raid for the ingredient for their Horn slots
5. The raid also drops upgraded weapon blanks so they can get an upgraded weapon with cool funky alternate art
6. The raid also drops dino bone accessories and armor so they can start replacing their Isle of Dread stuff with customized gear if they'd like to do so

Anyway, that's the overview. Please feel free to explore all of the loot available during this preview and let me know what you think!

New for this preview:

• Black Pearls now drop in small amounts in several very-cool very-tough Wilderness Encounters. This means that if you don't want to raid, there's a path for you to complete your dino bone weapons. The raid will be faster, though!
• The Artifacts have been reshuffled to be non-helmets.
• The drop rate of all ingredients has been drastically increased (approx 2.5 per elite chest -> approx 5.5 per elite chest)
• There are new Dino Bone Augments to craft (there will be even more changes before release that just barely missed this preview).

Known Issues and Important Notes:

• Several items have placeholder icons and descriptions
• The Dino Bone augment trader is not in the game

[Arkat]

• Black Pearls now drop in small amounts in several very-cool very-tough Wilderness Encounters. This means that if you don't want to raid, there's a path for you to complete your dino bone weapons. The raid will be faster, though!
• The Artifacts have been reshuffled to be non-helmets.
• The drop rate of all ingredients has been drastically increased (approx 2.5 per elite chest -> approx 5.5 per elite chest)
• There are new Dino Bone Augments to craft (there will be even more changes before release that just barely missed this preview).

Good changes. Thanks!

[apocaladle]

"Black Pearls now drop in small amounts in several very-cool very-tough Wilderness Encounters. This means that if you don't want to raid, there's a path for you to complete your dino bone weapons. The raid will be faster, though!"

Woo!

I always liked the idea of raids being harder but get loot much faster and non raids still keeping up in gear but much more grindy.

[CeltEireson]

From those of us who don't really raid I'd also like to say thanks for the changes.

[droid327]

New for this preview:

• Black Pearls now drop in small amounts in several very-cool very-tough Wilderness Encounters. This means that if you don't want to raid, there's a path for you to complete your dino bone weapons. The raid will be faster,

I award you a million points! This is how design should always be - raiding is preferable, but not the sole and exclusive way to participate in various crafting economies. Because some of us just dont raid, and that's ok.

So...Threads in Wilderness encounters next?

[Assassination]

Well done Lynnabel.

[mikarddo]

Good call on the Black Pearls.

I now see Horn: Profane DC and Horn: Sacred DC which is very nice, but Horn: Quality DC is absent.

Is that an oversight or is there a reason that one is not present as well?

[Khimberlhyte]

So since unslotters and destroyers will both be available, will this be yet another ongoing cash grab like augments and sentience toolkits? I find that type of extortion to be an exceedingly player unfriendly mechanic, right up there with the shard teleporters in Stormhorns and Wheloon.

[GramercyRiff]

So one of the best additions to this game just got better. At least this part of the xpac is something to look forward to unlike the EDs.

[Sam-u-r-eye]

I am very happy with loot changes.

Having a non-artifact dinocrafted helm lets me save up reaper shards to make it +2.

In the future it will remain customizable which is really fun.

<3

[Zeklijan]

An alternative to raiding is very welcome!

[Entyri]

Very cool crafting system. An alternate to raiding is very nice, though tough and wilderness dont usually go together. Wonder what thats about! I didnt see anything when I was running around doing the quests so must be at least slightly rare.

The 5 piece set seems kinda strange to me. 2 of the bonuses, spell dcs, and all stats are both found on a single item (or an augment), and the profane prr doesnt stack with the reaper boost. Doesnt seem like a 5 piece set to me. Seeing stuff like amplification, or artifact stats/spell dcs, curse immunity(flavor text?), or sneak attack all make a little more sense to me.

The lack of quality stats really hurts. They are so few and far between having some more options would be nice. Not crafting but on a couple of the items.
Other stats that we are very short on: insightful doubleshot (only reasonable source of this conflicts with all the dread sets), quality deadly, quality deception, quality seeker. Obviously not all here and now, but more of these down the line would be nice.

Can we also give tanks something to play with? Tanks havent gotten a gearing change since feywild. Thats a kinda long time for a kinda important role. Making the heart a soulforged augment of abosrb 1 curse / min similar to sentinel and stacking would let the tanks play with new artifacts and change stuff around.

Craftable artifacts is really really nice. I like the flexibility in their slot too, but they have to scale to artifact values, and the raid weapons really should scale to raid values. Might be able to be done by using an "adjusted" internal level on the item that the augments look at to decide scaling? I am never willing to underestimate ddo spaghetti code again though.

Thank you!

[Seph1roth5]

Definitely like the changes to augments re: black pearls (tiny ships?) and mat drop rates.

[DeltaBravo]

For me theese changes are awesome and made alot more sense..

Iam still missing a few Augments or crafting options for it to really be perfect..

Options iam missing :

Parrying.
Quality ability bonus. and false life.
Inisghtfull Seeker / deadly/ accurcy/ Spell focus/ tactical DCs/ false life.

But theese can be handle other ways.. But it would be very very great as i cant see a way for my build atleast without haveing to go with a few slavelords items to sort out the +3 quality ability bonuses. ( But i really like the new changes.)


On a side note.. as i was going trough my gear setup i realised Perfected Jidz-tet`ka have armor bonus +14 i.. I think this should be addjusted to a shiled bonus as the +14 armor bonus is not really up to the speed of game anymore since all armors even cloth have a armor bonus. .


Cheers Deltabravo..


GREAT WORK THERE!!!!

[Bjond]

Consider posting the stats themselves. In order of usefulness for comment: set bonuses, line-item values, then locations for each line item.

[Jerevth]

I'm curious for the reasoning that shields won't be made "Set" capable?
Ravenloft shields carry a set bonus as dropped. Since the set bonus for IoD requires a crafting component, and that being rooted in Raids to accomplish, perhaps shields can be adjusted to include the set bonus as well? This allows a little more flexibility in gearing considering the requirement of three items to establish a complete set.

[QuantumFX]

First, there aren't enough enchantments for making a melee set with any of the artifacts.

Some already in game options that could really help alleviate this include:

• Enhancement/Insightful/Quality bonuses to Combat mastery
• Enhancement/Insightful/Quality bonuses to Doublestrike/Doubleshot
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Ability Scores
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Accuracy
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Armor-piercing
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Assassinate
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Deadly
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Tactics
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Sheltering
• Relentless Fury
• Extra Action Boosts
• Extra Rages
• Extra Smiting
• Enhanced Ki
• Extra damage dice for stances (EK/Inquisitive/etc.)
• Energy Absorptions

Second, add the **** Dread Isle's Curse set to the Dinosaur bone shields and orb.

Third, where are the **** spell lore augments?

[EinarMal]

"Black Pearls now drop in small amounts in several very-cool very-tough Wilderness Encounters. This means that if you don't want to raid, there's a path for you to complete your dino bone weapons. The raid will be faster, though!"

Woo!

I always liked the idea of raids being harder but get loot much faster and non raids still keeping up in gear but much more grindy.

I wouldn't get too excited until you see the "small amounts" drop rate. Technically reaper fragments drop in small amounts also I run reaper a lot and have like 15 of them haha.

[ThomasHunter]

Hello dev team!

I'm quite looking forward to playing the IoD content in a few weeks. I've been enjoying two new Tabaxi characters in the meantime!

One issue that I wanted to address was hearing Lynnabel on Strimtom's stream a couple of weeks ago (thank you for taking your person time for this as I love hearing from the team!) and when Lynnabel addressed the grind of the new crafting system. It went something like, "it's kind of grindy like Slave Lords". I'll admit that this made me quite bummed out. I've only ever been able to make a single Legendary Slave Lords item (which was admittedly very cool) and while I am close to a second, that's about it. I suppose this is a tangent of not having a single sentient item "finished" as I usually send equipment to different toons as needed.

Obviously, this is an issue of mine as an "altaholic". I also realize that you're not building for my particular enjoyment for this issue and that it's no doubt a difficult line to develop around. However, my plea is to ask that the whole system - as part of a paid expansion - be a little more alt-friendly. I'm realistic to know that I won't have a dino crafted item for all of my many toons, but being able to reasonably work towards several to help fill in slots would be really nice.

Quick brainstorm idea - could you add additional ingredients as a bonus weekend even?

Thanks for reading,
Taleisin

PS - I typically don't check out Lam, so this information/plea is strictly based on the Q&A with Strimtom

[DeltaBravo]

First, there aren't enough enchantments for making a melee set with any of the artifacts.

Some already in game options that could really help alleviate this include:

• Enhancement/Insightful/Quality bonuses to Combat mastery
• Enhancement/Insightful/Quality bonuses to Doublestrike/Doubleshot
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Ability Scores
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Accuracy
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Armor-piercing
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Assassinate
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Deadly
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Tactics
• Insightful/Quality bonuses to Sheltering
• Relentless Fury
• Extra Action Boosts
• Extra Rages
• Extra Smiting
• Enhanced Ki
• Extra damage dice for stances (EK/Inquisitive/etc.)
• Energy Absorptions

Second, add the **** Dread Isle's Curse set to the Dinosaur bone shields and orb.

Third, where are the **** spell lore augments?

I would love to see some of theese also.. But alos would love to see some of em.. that are not in augments also to come in augements.. Its not only for me.. But the gear tetris is getting out of hand .. and is overwhelming for newer players.. I dont even want to think on how many crafting systems. DDO have , and if a new player have to learn em all. Giveing the option to create allmost everything in a few systems. ( Dino crafting, augment system, CC, filiegree.) is a very welcome for all.. But specially for the newer players.

Cheers DB