Neuter the Hounds

[Garthog77]

Party wiped in "a small problem". Someone got attacked by hound and all he said in group was "it me". No one knew what the hell that meant until we all started dying from questwide dot. That mechanic is absurd, and whoever originally suggested that should have been immediately fired along with anyone that OK'd it. I don't play on live servers anymore since I don't like what has been done to epics, and with this nonsense, I wont play hardcore either. The devs seem determined to turn this game into a different game that I don't want to play.

[Karthunk]

Dont be deceived by the fact Cordovan bans me monthly. Ive been playing since launch. I am level 23 on HC and have yet to feel the need to complain on the forums, because I am a competent player.

This whole edgy thing that you're trying to do isn't working well for you.

[Episkopos]

This whole edgy thing that you're trying to do isn't working well for you.

[TedSandyman]

I couldn't agree more. Personally I played a lot and enjoyed hardcore in season one, and then seasons 2-4 all had "gimmicks" that just made the experience way less fun in my opinion, homogenizing builds as you're forced to meet certain requirements to counter mechanics that are introduced for the first time ever in a hardcore server. Season 5 was great, I got my footprints, played a bunch of fun and diverse builds, made it to (the very bottom of) the favor leaderboard, and really felt like they were bringing hardcore in a better direction.

I just don't understand as a company, or as developers, why the idea of introducing non-playtested mechanics for the first time on a HARDCORE server makes any sense. I don't blame them at all for having bugs and issues, because that's expected if you're rolling something new out: I don't blame them for having this season's mechanics really punish "slow and steady" playstyles, soloers, trying to grind gear solo, and having builds that aren't completely focused on "I have high max HP and good burst damage.", because while I don't think that's a good decision I get the logic behind making it and think it's an understandable approach, much like changing the lockout from +4 to +2. And I don't really like or care about the cosmetics that much, but I was still planning to aim for 5k at least just because I really enjoyed HCL1 and HCL5.

What I do blame SSG for is trying to have these gimmicks in hardcore league in the first place. For the month leading up to HCL6 dropping SSG staff would be consistently coy about any mechanics coming out, so that when the league dropped anyone who didn't happen to choose a build that excels at bursting down high HP boss mobs needs to reroll or make sure to group with people who did choose those builds. I just don't understand why they feel the need to add these massive features to the hardcore leagues that completely change how they play instead of having it be hardcore with a little twist.

In any case, I got my first jiggle-hound death today, activated my teleport item as soon as I saw the hound spawn poorly and died before the item finished getting halfway. I could reroll into an FvS and wait a few weeks to a month for them to finish using us as beta testers and have the hounds slightly balanced, but it still isn't going to be fun, so I'm just doing my loot character transfer back to Cannith and calling it good. I'll come back to HCL if they have another season where there isn't some tedious gimmick that forces you to play in a certain way, but until then I'll have fun playing DDO and not "DDO, but what if there were random hounds too".

Why did they do it? Ignorance.
Why wont they change it? Pride.

[Aelonwy]

I just don't understand as a company, or as developers, why the idea of introducing non-playtested mechanics for the first time on a HARDCORE server makes any sense.

It doesn't.

I don't blame them at all for having bugs and issues, because that's expected if you're rolling something new out:

I totally do. They are capable of testing, they just don't. Or they want it to be a SURPRISE, and SURPRISE we ARE the testers.

What I do blame SSG for is trying to have these gimmicks in hardcore league in the first place. For the month leading up to HCL6 dropping SSG staff would be consistently coy about any mechanics coming out, so that when the league dropped anyone who didn't happen to choose a build that excels at bursting down high HP boss mobs needs to reroll or make sure to group with people who did choose those builds. I just don't understand why they feel the need to add these massive features to the hardcore leagues that completely change how they play instead of having it be hardcore with a little twist.

I don't like it either, and for most of us its unnecessary because the game is difficult enough at level starting from scratch. The best season to me was the mimics but then I come from a PnP background where mimics can be ANYTHING including a bedroll. Thanks Dave I will never forget that session... I'll be in my 80s with dementia afraid to get in my bed because it might eat me.

[misterski]

It doesn't.



I totally do. They are capable of testing, they just don't. Or they want it to be a SURPRISE, and SURPRISE we ARE the testers.



I don't like it either, and for most of us its unnecessary because the game is difficult enough at level starting from scratch. The best season to me was the mimics but then I come from a PnP background where mimics can be ANYTHING including a bedroll. Thanks Dave I will never forget that session... I'll be in my 80s with dementia afraid to get in my bed because it might eat me.

Ooooh, devious. I likes it....

[captain1z]

Seriously why is DPS the ONLY thing that matters? .

A tad bit off topic and not directly squarely at the OP but more at the general sentiment.

You can read 100 threads and you will find

49 that say melee dps is pointless.
49 that say casters are pointless
1 that appreciates the benefits of lag
And 1 demanding a festival to celebrate Broccoli and Nat Gann

I do agree in part that all but end bosses shouldn't be immune to some form of control, even if you gotta shattermantle the heck out of them first but threads are being posted that melees are useless and the same about casters so if everything in the dungeon is vulnerable to CC except these random spawn hounds (that are basically Reaper 2.0) I get it.

Like any DM, if the players continue to breeze through all your dungeons using the same tactic, youre very tempted to make future monsters immune to it.

In reality though, a more flexible DM might take the complaints of his players into consideration, turn the red name to an orange name and just give it a challenging spell resistance. Not impossible....but challenging.

Also, if I really wanted to be evil, I'd make it so anytime a hound becomes helpless, he automatically summons 2D4 insect swarms.

[KoobTheProud]

I've done a lot of thinking about it and I'm done with HCL this season.

I just don't like zerging and never have and there is no point to playing a format where zerging is required.

We'll see what they do next season. Maybe that will be interesting and not force particular play types.

[Mofus]

I hope the devs are having a meeting about the egregious DoT Hound bugs.

If they can't fix hounds spawning incorrectly and being unattackable/unkillable the DoT needs to go. Remove the DoT leave the vulnerability. Why are they not Orange-names so we can use CC? Seriously why is DPS the ONLY thing that matters? Why are they champions that never drop champion chests?

And spare me the legalese. If they could not work out or fix these issues then putting them in the game at all was bad-faith with the player base especially on Hardcore. They know how players spend money to advance characters or make them more durable... these bugs seem tailor made to waste peoples' time and money. Prove to me it wasn't intended, because I am loosing goodwill in this game and this company.

Agreed and signed, Was in a quest last night where a hound bugged and could not be attacked, almost wiped the party if not for d-door.

[Goldenlogic123]

It doesn't.



I totally do. They are capable of testing, they just don't. Or they want it to be a SURPRISE, and SURPRISE we ARE the testers.



I don't like it either, and for most of us its unnecessary because the game is difficult enough at level starting from scratch. The best season to me was the mimics but then I come from a PnP background where mimics can be ANYTHING including a bedroll. Thanks Dave I will never forget that session... I'll be in my 80s with dementia afraid to get in my bed because it might eat me.

i disagree with this totally alot of us come to play hardcore simply because we want more of a challenge. Regular servers are boring as all heck with way overpowered chars who steam roll all content. There are regular servers for those who dont want to push the boundaries let us that do have hardcore. We dont ask to make regular servers a challlenge which they are not they are a joke.

[Jaxtan]

i disagree with this totally alot of us come to play hardcore simply because we want more of a challenge. Regular servers are boring as all heck with way overpowered chars who steam roll all content. There are regular servers for those who dont want to push the boundaries let us that do have hardcore. We dont ask to make regular servers a challlenge which they are not they are a joke.

It's the bugs. Challenge, fine. But have bugs that make your "challenge" unkillable and therefore unplayable? That's irresponsible.

[Goldenlogic123]

It's the bugs. Challenge, fine. But have bugs that make your "challenge" unkillable and therefore unplayable? That's irresponsible.

i totally understand about the bugs that is gamebreaking. what i dont like is people coming on here saying hounds need a nerf and they are stupid op which they are not. They require some strategy and technique along with proper character building. Most of the people playing now understand that the hounds themselves outside of bugs are fine sometimes little more than irritating when your in the middle of another fight.