Fundamental Problems with Mabar, Crystal Cove

[Zaodon]

Turbine, the DDO community has reported fundamental issues with the design of the Mabar event, and now its clear that those issues were not resolved in the Crystal Cove event. Below is a concise summary of the flaws.

1. Party Loot
It was revealed in Mabar, and still remains in Crystal Cove, that loot from kills (bone parts in Mabar, doubloons in Crystal Cove) does not distribute evenly to party members, and in fact, seems to CLEARLY be biased to DPS classes over support classes.

Extensive, detailed testing (results are reproducible) quickly reveals that the more actual damage you do will "weight" or "skew" the loot distribution to you, even when grouped in a Party. We formed a balanced group (3 melee, 1 rogue, 1 sorc, 1 cleric), and did rigorous tests, and it was blatently obvious that the more points of damage you dealt, the more doubloons you got, with the Sorc getting the most (used Cone of Cold, Meteor Swarm, etc.), the melees and rouge generally on par, and the cleric dramatically, and I do mean dramatically in last place. The average for 1 hour of play distributed loot as follows: (copper, silver, gold)
Sorc: ~2500, ~1200, ~600
DPS: ~1600, ~800, ~400
Cleric: ~200, ~80, ~15

As you can see, the difference in the Clerics loot is enormous. This cleric rarely, if ever, did any DPS, and mostly just healed and buffed. There were times when he did cast offensively or melee, but we wanted to test, so we made sure he kept DPS to a minimum.

This needs to be fixed. You can program loot to be distributed based on DPS to non-grouped members, that's fine (prevents kill stealing), but DPS should 100% be ignored between group members. Please fix this asap. Saying "you should just solo" is not an acceptable answer for an event in an MMORPG. (MM stands for Massively Multiplayer).

2. The "Old MacDonald" Factor
While I understand that the Epic game mechanic in DDO, while sorely lacking in its own right, requires farming, non-epic items should not require a similar amount of farming. There is nothing "casual" about this event (or Mabar for that matter). It requires hardcore, dedicated, nose-to-the-grindstone farming to obtain items, to then run the quest portion, to then get the rare items, to then buy the unique items. This does not mean it should be EASY. It just should not be so GRINDY. A "Special Event" should be enjoyable, unique, entertaining. Not grindy. I think you're missing the boat (pun intended) with the Mabar/Cove mechanics of flagging, loot grinding, and item purchasing. If you simply gave us the quest (the actual Cove, with torches and kobolds), let us run it as much as we want, and provide all of the doubloons, crystals, etc. in the quest, then we could run it once, or 100 times, at our discretion, and at least make the Event as casual or grindy as we want. The entire mechanic of grinding to open the quest, then doing it to get some ingredients, then re-grinding to open it, and then re-questing to get more ingredients, etc. is mindless and poor design.

3. Limited Event
The limited amount of days the Event is open seems to make sense given the fact that you're calling it "an event", and not "a new quest". But rather than "turning the Event on" and then "turning it off" and confining players to enjoy it only in that narrow timeframe, it would be a far better design to allow players to initiate the Event on their own time, and come up with some other way to limit the total length, such as but not limited to: a timer per character, a timer per account, limited number of runs (maybe sell more "passes" thru the DDO store), etc.


These are the three fundamental flaws that I see with the overall design of these special events. I realize that you want them to feel "special" and you want to tie them to certain times of the year to celebrate certain "real-world" events (halloween, 5th anniversary of DDO, etc.) and you want to be careful not to introduce too much "good loot" or make it too easy to get. I'm all for having it be a challenge, for sure. But people love the Shroud (for example) and its not a time-limited offer (available 365 days/year, subject to raid timer of course), its not nearly as "grindy" (has a "flagging" mechanic, so once you "flag", you can re-run it), and loot is fair (chest-based loot, your loot is your loot, any class gets just as much as the next). I'm not saying these need to work like Shroud, I'm saying you need to do some work to make them feel more like an Event (which one would "attend") and less like we just took a temp job.

[Hafeal]

Good points, well stated.

[dopey69]

#1. /signed

#2. / not signed seems fairly fast to me and all the game is a grind


#3 / signed although it will be back again and again and again so lots of time to fit it in


edited due to reading dissorder

[Eladiun]

/not signed

[Zaodon]

/not signed

Why do you think support-oriented players should be penalized for grouping?

[Jaid314]

Why do you think support-oriented players should be penalized for grouping?

because all they have to do to not be penalized is throw a single AOE spell. it doesn't even have to be maximised, empowered, etc. just throw a fire storm, or a greater shout, or a cometfall, or whatever, and there goes the disadvantage.

[Chai]

I agree with 1 and 3 (kind of on the fence) but disagree with 2.

1. Absolutely. The issue here with this is that more party members could possibly = more pikers getting loot for little to no work if they change it to be an absolute even division of loot. which is the lesser of two evils? I think your cleric should get at least something close to what the "DPS" got.

2. People have been getting epic quality items out of a few hours worth of "grind." They are hardly putting forth the same amount of work they would normally put in playing the regular game to get the same quality item in the event.

3. I think the "events" should happen a few times per year, and people can take part in them at their leisure. They should be staggered so that they are not happening at the same time. If they are left on too long, this loot now floods the entire player base. It should be a chance to get one or two nice items without being able to totally gear your toon in a matter of a few days.

[nolaureltree000]

EDIT: seems im wrong here, disregard this whole post.

actually, my biggest complaint is that whole event is basically a disguised marketing scheme for shared bank accounts or new/renewed VIP membership.

so i need alabasters to begin crafting epic brawling gloves for my level 20 monk. which would require me to enter the cove at somewhere around level 4 it looks like. but according to the the description at the cove entrance, if i enter the cove at 5 or more levels below my character level, i wont pull any gems. so that means i need to grind out these gems on a lower level toon. alright cool, no problems.

but the gems are bound to account...so i cant mail them. that means i need to either buy a shared bank account or buy a month of VIP membership to transfer the gems between my toons.

so basically, i cant craft anything (or anything i want) on my level 20 toons unless i spend some RL money. i guess you could argue that turbine didnt want gems to be sold on the AH or something, but it seems unlikely that they didnt consider the money generating aspects of this system.

idk, i hate to be one of those guys that complains about everything turbine gives us though. ive been wanting to buy a shared bank account for awhile now, so i guess ill end up getting one. its just moderately annoying that im being 'forced' into it for this event.

[Eladiun]

Why do you think support-oriented players should be penalized for grouping?

Yes, I hate clerics and other support characters....bunch of no good pikers. I kid... you want details, sure.

1) Extensive Detailed Testing...consisting of one group of 6 over an hour. I'm glad you don't work for the FDA. All this point does is prove you do not understand random and that you do not understand testing. It's pandering to bring attention to points 2 and 3. Besides if you had detailed test results filling a bug report would be the way to address it.

2) There is nothing "casual" about this event (or Mabar for that matter). It requires hardcore, dedicated, nose-to-the-grindstone farming to obtain items, to then run the quest portion, to then get the rare items, to then buy the unique items.

That statement is totally false. You could buy a compass for 50 TP and run the event twice and have enough gems and doubloons to make a level 20 Tier 1 item. In the course of 6 hours a couple guildies had multiple level 20 items. The level 20 tier 1 items are the equivalent of raid loot. Any casual player would be ecstatic with the item as it would likely be the best item they own. A fully upgraded item does require a grind. It however is an EPIC item and therefore not casual. Casual != EPIC. The cove opens 20 minutes after it closes. It's extremely fast compared to previous events. There is almost unnoticeable grind to get the event going. A casual player could participate w/o leaving the dock. However, it's actually fun to kill in the instance tho. All the kill steal/off level stuff from Mabar has been addressed.

3) EVENT -something that happens or is regarded as happening; an occurrence, especially one of some importance.

This is a live event. The old live events lasted 3-6 hours or until someone sneak-humped a GM and they got angry and canceled the whole event. They were laggy. Only a few dozen people got the event prize out of thousands participating. This is a huge improvement and guarantees that anyone who want to participate get as reward.

Events happen for a short period and go away. It's why they are events. This isn't put in place so you can grind a couple of each item out. Pick and choose which ones you really want. Five days is long enough that anyone can grind out at least one event item for themselves.

So.../not signed

[Jaid314]

1) there is no such thing as a support class that cannot contribute offensively in DDO. not a problem. now, if you want to argue that there's a definite difference between, say, casters and the group of people known as "anything that isn't a caster", i might agree. but support classes? there's no such thing in DDO. the cleric is not a "support class", they're a class that could just choose to solo everything, but sometimes they let you come along and do some of the work. likewise with favored souls and even bards. even melees can hit multiple targets if they so choose (get yourself a two-handed weapon, cleave, improved precise shot, or just run around everywhere attacking). but pretty much, there are two types of people in this event: those who get the easy button, and those who can't cast wail of the banshee. 'support classes' are only further disadvantaged if they refuse to do anything other than support, since the option is there for them to help kill stuff.

2) the quest is fun, you don't have to kill so much as a single mob once you get into your first cove (and not even before that if you just buy a compass from the store). you don't even have to stay in the event area to know about when the cove is open, as far as i can tell. you can quite literally do nothing but the quest, and it isn't even a huge sacrifice to do so, since the stolen gemstones give you so many doubloons anyways. not to mention the major holdup for anything meaningful is the dragonshards.

3) it's no more limited than normal DDO. if you have time to play DDO, you have time to play the event.

/not signed.

[Zaodon]

1) there is no such thing as a support class that cannot contribute offensively in DDO. not a problem. now, if you want to argue that there's a definite difference between, say, casters and the group of people known as "anything that isn't a caster", i might agree. but support classes? there's no such thing in DDO. the cleric is not a "support class", they're a class that could just choose to solo everything, but sometimes they let you come along and do some of the work. likewise with favored souls and even bards. even melees can hit multiple targets if they so choose (get yourself a two-handed weapon, cleave, improved precise shot, or just run around everywhere attacking). but pretty much, there are two types of people in this event: those who get the easy button, and those who can't cast wail of the banshee. 'support classes' are only further disadvantaged if they refuse to do anything other than support, since the option is there for them to help kill stuff.

2) the quest is fun, you don't have to kill so much as a single mob once you get into your first cove (and not even before that if you just buy a compass from the store). you don't even have to stay in the event area to know about when the cove is open, as far as i can tell. you can quite literally do nothing but the quest, and it isn't even a huge sacrifice to do so, since the stolen gemstones give you so many doubloons anyways. not to mention the major holdup for anything meaningful is the dragonshards.

3) it's no more limited than normal DDO. if you have time to play DDO, you have time to play the event.

/not signed.

1. These Events are in public areas, so no Blade Barrier. Oops, there goes 98% of a clerics DPS. Thanks for playing. And you simply cannot assume only level 20 clerics run this event. That is poor logic. A level 8 group (with cleric) means the cleric is healing, not DPSing.

2. While the quest is good, the flagging mechanic is still poor. Another poster brought up off-peak hour play times, and inability to process 20,000 map pieces to even open it.

3. Obviously wrong, as you cannot even play it today, as its turned completely off, and it will be off after March 1st. I don't even think you thought about that before you posted it.

[Postumus]

1. These Events are in public areas, so no Blade Barrier. Oops, there goes 98% of a clerics DPS. Thanks for playing. And you simply cannot assume only level 20 clerics run this event. That is poor logic. A level 8 group (with cleric) means the cleric is healing, not DPSing.

Well maybe your clerics.

[Irinis]

1) there is no such thing as a support class that cannot contribute offensively in DDO.

Bard 20 Spellsinger with no melee, just CC and healing, unless they already have a staff of shadow or a dreamspitter and took hold person. I doubt you could even kill CR12 mobs with Greater Shout alone without running out of sp, much less the CR20 mobs.

Weaker offensively than a cleric for sure.

[Jaid314]

Bard 20 Spellsinger with no melee, just CC and healing, unless they already have a staff of shadow or a dreamspitter and took hold person. I doubt you could even kill CR12 mobs with Greater Shout alone without running out of sp, much less the CR20 mobs.

Weaker offensively than a cleric for sure.

considering you can *buy* an upgraded staff of shadow, i'm not feeling too much sympathy for the person who didn't bother getting one, but wants to have the benefits of epic items. and who also is supposed to be a caster spellsinger and doesn't have hold monster, and is also unwilling to spend the minimal amount of plat to swap for it.

and you don't need to kill the mobs. you simply need to deal some damage to them. heck, i've even gotten doubloons from stuff i didn't even damage...

[Aeolwind]

1) there is no such thing as a support class that cannot contribute offensively in DDO. not a problem. now, if you want to argue that there's a definite difference between, say, casters and the group of people known as "anything that isn't a caster", i might agree. but support classes?

/not signed.

I chugged 20 pots last night, on top of the event drink, and still wound up with less than 1/3rd the doubloons as the other 3 people in my party. Chain casting max'd/heigtened comet fall/flamestrike/firestorm, full pack every group + harms on the stragglers & implosions/destructions on the casters. I got equivalent drop rates when I would just run in and dp/df melee junk. It took me 20 pots to figure it out, but yeah, I got hosed lol.

Mabar is a bad example. There, I got 5 times the amount of junk as my friends thanks to Radiant burst. Too bad the **** in this one is bound so we can't even trade up to even it out some.

Thankfully, the gem drops go off some other mechanic, we had nearly the same amount.

[bryanmeerkat]

1) there is no such thing as a support class that cannot contribute offensively in DDO. not a problem. now, if you want to argue that there's a definite difference between, say, casters and the group of people known as "anything that isn't a caster", i might agree. but support classes? there's no such thing in DDO. the cleric is not a "support class", they're a class that could just choose to solo everything, but sometimes they let you come along and do some of the work. likewise with favored souls and even bards. even melees can hit multiple targets if they so choose (get yourself a two-handed weapon, cleave, improved precise shot, or just run around everywhere attacking). but pretty much, there are two types of people in this event: those who get the easy button, and those who can't cast wail of the banshee. 'support classes' are only further disadvantaged if they refuse to do anything other than support, since the option is there for them to help kill stuff.

Clerics are artificially nerfed in the Smugglers Cove part of the quest and there ability to solo is llimited at certain levels as they have no BB , which means they can only do expensive/ineffectual damage for those built to use BB as their primary dps.

[sweez]

Clerics are artificially nerfed in the Smugglers Cove part of the quest and there ability to solo is llimited at certain levels as they have no BB , which means they can only do expensive/ineffectual damage for those built to use BB as their primary dps.

I've had no problems getting kills with my BB-speccd FvS. Implosion and (max/emp/heightened) cometfall clean things up real nice. And anyhoo, actually killing the mobs outside accounts for maybe 2-3% of the dubloons I've earned. It's irrelevant.

[darksol23]

/signed

With regards to the limited factor, I wish the number of turn ins required to open the Cove could be tied to some population statistic when it resets, such as the average number of logged in players in the last hour or average number of players in smugglers rest in the last hour. Thus those playing during lower population times would not be disadvantaged. Maybe it is setup like that, but Mabar certainly wasn't. Last night's preview didn't get into the 3am+ eastern hours when the population starts to drop off so I wonder how long it will take to activate the event off-hours.

[Bradik_Losdar]

Turbine, the DDO community has reported fundamental issues with the design of the Mabar event, and now its clear that those issues were not resolved in the Crystal Cove event. Below is a concise summary of the flaws.

1. Party Loot
It was revealed in Mabar, and still remains in Crystal Cove, that loot from kills (bone parts in Mabar, doubloons in Crystal Cove) does not distribute evenly to party members, and in fact, seems to CLEARLY be biased to DPS classes over support classes.

/agreed
The event should be fun for all types of playing styles - not on just how much damage you can dish out. Really disuades folks to help other people (Sorry can't heal you! Have to bash this guys head to get my share!)

2. The "Old MacDonald" Factor
While I understand that the Epic game mechanic in DDO, while sorely lacking in its own right, requires farming, non-epic items should not require a similar amount of farming. There is nothing "casual" about this event (or Mabar for that matter). It requires hardcore, dedicated, nose-to-the-grindstone farming to obtain items, to then run the quest portion, to then get the rare items, to then buy the unique items. This does not mean it should be EASY. It just should not be so GRINDY.

Can't really agree here. Each of the items in question is much better than ordinary loot. There should be a fair amount of 'work' to be done to get them (and especially to make them even better!).

I've seen arguments just the opposite too - that 'epic' items in these events are too easy to obtain. But I don't agree with that either. These events are very short lived and do require (as the OP has pointed out) dedicated work to get. The window of opportuity is very small and if you miss it, too bad - no epic for joo! - unlike all other epic items which can be farmed/ground for year round. Which leads to...

3. Limited Event
The limited amount of days the Event is open seems to make sense given the fact that you're calling it "an event", and not "a new quest". But rather than "turning the Event on" and then "turning it off" and confining players to enjoy it only in that narrow timeframe, it would be a far better design to allow players to initiate the Event on their own time, and come up with some other way to limit the total length, such as but not limited to: a timer per character, a timer per account, limited number of runs (maybe sell more "passes" thru the DDO store), etc.

Honestly I don't know how you could get this to work. Both events are tied to specific 'dates' or 'events' if you will (hence the name). Mabar is a holloween style event and Smuggler's Cove, while generic date-wise, is currently tied to DDO's big 5th aniversary. Who knows when (or if) they will roll it out again.

Responses in green above.

[Zaodon]

Responses in green above.

The winter games (created for the olympics) have been turned on many times since. So, I know they will bring back Mabar, and even Cove, at later dates, which don't correspond to the original "date/event" they were designed to celebrate.

So, once you accept that the "event" will be brought back again "just because", its a simple leap to just say "hmm, ok, lets just introduce this into the game, change the mechanics, and leave it on."

My suggestion was something new: a non-repeatable quest. Or, repeatable a limited number of times, if you will. There is no such mechanic in DDO. Sure, you can grind a quest till you get 0 xp, but you can still repeat it as much as you want. Rather than making these "event" quests time-limited, make them repeat-limited. Then, if a new player joins DDO 6 months from now, they can simply do the Cove their allotted "20 times" (or whatever the number is) and move on with the game.

In fact, Turbine could then add even more features such as "buying a 10 more runs of Cove" in the DDO Store. Or even, "Hey, we decided to celebrate, so we added 10 free passes to everyone's account for Mabar and Cove." which lets us run it again in the future.

i.e. the area doesn't phase in and out, but yet its still "runable" only a limited amount. Or if "x times" is bad, then do "x hours/days". Whatever.

And again, it does not have to be easier or harder to actually get the items. Just different. And really, not all that different. All I'm proposing is removing the "20,000 map turn ins to open quest for 40 minutes" with "Quest is always open, go in, complete, get doubloons, crystals, etc. from the quest, not from a farm-like pre-instance wierd server-wide flaggy thing-a-ma-bob."