A Small Collection of Thoughts

[AkromaAoW]

Hi all,

It's been a while since I last wrote, so I thought I'd share a few thoughts and observations.

- I still enjoy the game with all its blips, nerfs, and changes.

- I purchased the new shadowfell expansion. It does seem to go against the "free content for vip" thing, but I don't get this much fun for the dollar anywhere else, so I'll live with it and hope that it helps extend the life of DDO.

- The forums sure are dull anymore. Ren, where are you? Someone needs to breathe some new life into this thing.

- LFM's frequently seem to show groups in progress, and that's generally not the kind of group I'd like to join.

- Emmaline and I should probably start putting together our own groups again. LFM should probably read - Fun, no rush group, all optionals, we kill and break everything! Any class welcome!

- The game seems to have become pretty easy to play on settings below elite. Perhaps that's why LFMs show groups in progress a lot.

- Speaking of Emmaline, the Mrs. and I have pretty much keeping to ourselves in DDO-dom for some time. Our kids sometimes play with us, or other family members join us. Otherwise, we do see Talonkage, and whoever he has with him, every now and again.

- I haven't joined a raid in a long time. I get an offer once in a while, but I just don't know if my laid back attitude will mesh with a raid party these days.

- Related to raids, I'll admit that I'd like to have some of the raid commendations.

- I am slowly climbing up the crafting ranks. I like what I can craft, and I'd like to see more crafting options in the future.

Well, that's it for now. I'll end by saying that I hope I gave you 30 seconds of forum entertainment, and by saying "Hi!" to anyone that still remembers me.

Cheers,

E.

[DrawingGuy]

Actually, the main reason for "in progress" LFM's is the built in grouping system on quests now. Unless your party is set to private or is full, it automatically posts an LFM for that quest. I have not further investigated to see if they got rid of the 'late join' penalties to encourage joining these parties, but I do find this to be a pretty good feature.

As for the ease of content now, the AC changes they made had a huge impact. If you were below the narrow 20 AC band for a quest, content was tough. Above it, you could breeze through it. The AC change now places a percentage curve across the whole band. This makes it drastically easier for those below band characters, and a bit more difficult for the above band (alas my Monk now must use potions and scrolls to solo a quest). As you can hit the sweet spot without all out max gearing like you used to have to do, almost anyone can reach effective survivability on up to Epic Hard content.

Now for the forums being dead... yeah, pretty much. But I blame more for the horrible new forums (stupid color settings - seriously black text on dark gray? Mangled interfaces with entry forum access being a useless text list to far too many sections to drive any conversations). Needs work - but would love to see it become more active again.