Please fix this EXPLOIT!

[askrj1]

The "good old Crucible" was pretty easy to macro. My question is: How much of each "tower" run could be macro'ed?

ps. I do not approve of macros in gaming.

I don't approve of macroing either. Regardless, I wouldn't say WK is "impossible" to macro without knowing exactly what people would try to use to achieve it, but I think there are enough variables in it beyond just running in a set pattern talking to non-moving NPCs to make it rather impractical to try to macro, plus you would need 3 toons for an effective farm of the whole map.

On that note I believe SSG's (or previously Turbine's) stand on macroing is they're ok with a macro set to some repetitive tasks such as item exchanges and perhaps random loot crunching, but someone should actually be at the keyboard if a GM drops by to check the automation. This basically makes the old cruci entrance macroing while you were working/sleeping a complete violation. To prevent similar cases that they are otherwise unable to police all of those optionals have been set to no longer grant XP.

The most probable answer would be that SSG have no "fix" the optional and little to no additional resources that can dedicate for a long term fix (for now) for the decay issue, and also do not have the resources to police opt farming. They're also not keen to blanket nerf optionals to keep some incentives for players to sidetrack in quests. Was that the full intention of the devs? Maybe not. Is it an explicitly bannable exploit/offense at this point? I doubt it.

I do try to avoid farming WK excessively especially when on builds that can handle content fine, but it's a reality that not everyone can easily find XP otherwise, and many quests are only "efficient" after you add RXP into the equation and if your current build/stacked toon can faceroll the quests. Druid's Curse and High Road for example are still relatively miserable XP even with BB active, and can easily turn ugly for an ill-prepared player or group. If WK was nerfed hard enough to be not worth the time running these people will likely just revert to running daily chains like VoN3/4, Spies, etc. People still do those now if they don't have sands or don't want to burn WK. They're not going to spend an extra hour or half per quest they cannot realistically handle efficiently.

[Forzah]

I don't approve of macroing either. Regardless, I wouldn't say WK is "impossible" to macro without knowing exactly what people would try to use to achieve it, but I think there are enough variables in it beyond just running in a set pattern talking to non-moving NPCs to make it rather impractical to try to macro, plus you would need 3 toons for an effective farm of the whole map.

Generally, it's very challenging to come up with a macro that is guaranteed to work when there is randomness involved. You need to have a way to subtract information from the environment and then take actions depending on the information. This is essentially the same as creating artificial intelligence, so good luck with that!

Another option is creating a very conservative set of deterministic actions that works for any scenario occurring in the quest. The actions need to be such that you keep yourself alive at all times, and also hit at least enough times so that a mob is guaranteed to die, regardless of whether it already died. The latter is extremely tedious to program, if not impossible, and would be much slower than playing yourself.

[askrj1]

Generally, it's very challenging to come up with a macro that is guaranteed to work when there is randomness involved. You need to have a way to subtract information from the environment and then take actions depending on the information. This is essentially the same as creating artificial intelligence, so good luck with that!

Another option is creating a very conservative set of deterministic actions that works for any scenario occurring in the quest. The actions need to be such that you keep yourself alive at all times, and also hit at least enough times so that a mob is guaranteed to die, regardless of whether it already died. The latter is extremely tedious to program, if not impossible, and would be much slower than playing yourself.

I'm aware of those, just didn't want to go into too much detail, and it's still not impossible per se just not efficient.

I'm guessing the thing devs really wanted to root out was the just ability to totally put it on an afk bot loop like Crucible and Shadow Crypt, and which I find WK an unlikely candidate as such.

[Iriale]

As a side note: Im starting to see how some of you are still failing LN raids. You cheese your way through epics farming XP using methods like this in a rush to get to the end, rather than using a slightly slower XP method which nets you some relevant gear drops, then show up to our raids in your pixelated skivvies. It has gotten to the point where fully automatic machine guns with raise scrolls for ammo arent fast enough to keep those characters propped up. Some in this thread still believe this to be the fastest way to make their character endgame ready, when really all it did is put the number 30 into your level field on your character sheet.

Many times I think you have many reasons in your criticism, but here you are comparing apples with oranges. Nowadays there is no epic gear of relevance that drops in the saga quests. What gear are you going to get from eveningstar, high road, wheloon, stormhorns...? Everything is terribly out of date. The good gear is achieved with the lv 30 quests: RL, age of rage, wpm, etc. And anyway it's ML 29 gear, which does not help level up the character in epics. The only epic items not outdated are in the epic quests of wmp and other tales, and they are clearly insufficient and restricted to very few builds. Most of my characters have zero use for them, to give an example.

Bringing up the equipment when it comes to Wiz king is out of place. Most of the WK farm is done before level 29.

If you want to reduce the WK farm what you have to do is improve the experience of the saga quests, which are more difficult to do in EE / Reaper, and also, do something with the first terminations in the ETRs.

There are many people who are not ready to play in EE / reaper, not without a group at least. You're not going to make them go to make sagas on elite just taking away WK. You're just going to frustrate them if you take away their means of getting xp. That does not mean that the sagas are giving too little XP for the time and effort they demand, of course.

[Iriale]

I do try to avoid farming WK excessively especially when on builds that can handle content fine, but it's a reality that not everyone can easily find XP otherwise, and many quests are only "efficient" after you add RXP into the equation and if your current build/stacked toon can faceroll the quests. Druid's Curse and High Road for example are still relatively miserable XP even with BB active, and can easily turn ugly for an ill-prepared player or group. If WK was nerfed hard enough to be not worth the time running these people will likely just revert to running daily chains like VoN3/4, Spies, etc. People still do those now if they don't have sands or don't want to burn WK. They're not going to spend an extra hour or half per quest they cannot realistically handle efficiently.

this, basically. More people would be willing to give other quests a chance if they had a better reward. The fact that they give bad experience even with bb discourages even people who are prepared to face them. And let's not say to those who are at risk of failing.

There is also a large number of people who do not have good epic equipment up to level 28/29. My TR partner is in that situation. And he dies a lot when we do reaper sagas, and complains a lot about it (yesterday I ended up getting annoyed by his complaints, they were tiresome, and I ended up playing alone in reaper and he going to do dailies xD). Then he reaches 29 and magic! his characters transforms into good characters. I've warmed his ears about the need to make some sets of epic items, but always says he has no space to make them with several characters ... Anyway, a problem, bad epic equipment, that I've seen again and again in epics. Like insisting on wearing the heroic RL items, when they no longer give enough defense in epics, and so on... yes, that silent avenger set is op, but at least be sure to bring other objects that give you better defense xD

[rehakp]

So this is "Please fix this issue of me. Noone likes me. I hate them fo that. Noone wants to play with me. Tell them to like me and make them to play with me".

You use strong words like "exploited", "cheaters" yet only cheater i see is you. You just mixed up small parts of 13 different screens from who knows how long period of time and/or how many servers and pretends its reality. Obviously left all the information that doesnt fit into your story. You literally limited your view of the world into small frame about 50x200 pixels in size.

Maybe i would start inside yourself if you want to find reasons that you "have to" play always solo.

[banjo174]

Lets find out!!

[Chai]

Many times I think you have many reasons in your criticism, but here you are comparing apples with oranges. Nowadays there is no epic gear of relevance that drops in the saga quests. What gear are you going to get from eveningstar, high road, wheloon, stormhorns...? Everything is terribly out of date. The good gear is achieved with the lv 30 quests: RL, age of rage, wpm, etc. And anyway it's ML 29 gear, which does not help level up the character in epics. The only epic items not outdated are in the epic quests of wmp and other tales, and they are clearly insufficient and restricted to very few builds. Most of my characters have zero use for them, to give an example.

Bringing up the equipment when it comes to Wiz king is out of place. Most of the WK farm is done before level 29.

If you want to reduce the WK farm what you have to do is improve the experience of the saga quests, which are more difficult to do in EE / Reaper, and also, do something with the first terminations in the ETRs.

There are many people who are not ready to play in EE / reaper, not without a group at least. You're not going to make them go to make sagas on elite just taking away WK. You're just going to frustrate them if you take away their means of getting xp. That does not mean that the sagas are giving too little XP for the time and effort they demand, of course.

Most people who this type of narrative attempts to paint a picture of (the newbie, the ultra casual, the player who is not ready for harder content etc....) are those this narrative does not really apply to. They do not mind having the third or fourth best in slot item, and we can especially say this if they are folks who must use cheese ball methods like this to get XP because of inability to, or unwillingness to be bothered with, actually playing the entire game to gain XP.

The people who care about BiS, who are put off by "out of date" gear, are those who do not need to gravitate to this type of "means of getting xp." ---who are not going to quit the game if this was made to not be the META (remember, as stated 5x already, Im not asking for it to be removed, Im asking for it to not be the META method of gaining eXP).

SSG has taken steps in the past historically to curb tactics like this, like first time completion bonus and XP ransack (which is clearly not working here, and why it is farmed in the first place).

The "what about the casuals" narrative which always seems to appear in these discussions is simply incorrect, and lacks understanding of what new players and casuals actually care about - AKA: its not the new players or the casuals who farm the same optionals in the same one quest over and over again until their eyeballs bleed, and argue over what is META and what isnt. If SSG chose to fix this today, no casuals, and no new players would quit DDO over it. Chances are those groups wouldnt even be aware of the change.

Now the metagamers on the other hand....

[Iriale]

Most people who this type of narrative attempts to paint a picture of (the newbie, the ultra casual, the player who is not ready for harder content etc....) are those this narrative does not really apply to. They do not mind having the third or fourth best in slot item, and we can especially say this if they are folks who must use cheese ball methods like this to get XP because of inability to, or unwillingness to be bothered with, actually playing the entire game to gain XP.

The people who care about BiS, who are put off by "out of date" gear, are those who do not need to gravitate to this type of "means of getting xp." ---who are not going to quit the game if this was made to not be the META (remember, as stated 5x already, Im not asking for it to be removed, Im asking for it to not be the META method of gaining eXP).

SSG has taken steps in the past historically to curb tactics like this, like first time completion bonus and XP ransack (which is clearly not working here, and why it is farmed in the first place).

Have to say that in this I do not agree with you, Chai. I have carried enough people on elite-reaper dungeons to say that there really are many toons who are not prepared to play in those difficulties. And it really is not our business to say how they should get their experience, nor is it healthy, with the stupid level of grind currently, to put more obstacles to improve their characters.

If there is something that fails, it is not WK, but the amount of experience that can be achieved by playing in higher difficulties a greater variety of quests (lower than doing dailies), and the fact that the first terminations are somewhat exploited by methods that although legal are arguably little ethical (some what devs should be more concerned than amber temple or WK xd)

[kelavas]

I agree 100%, it's too easy to get epic lives + xp, although it can be repititive, if you run with a fast group/5 minutes with a 50 pot, you can get from 20-30 in 12 hours alone. 100k/run with 50% (pot)+10% (vip)+5% ship+ 5%voice.

[LOOON375]

Run the quest.
Do all the optionals
Don't pick up the Phylactery.
Recall.

It's not like this is some giant secret You're still doing the whole quest just like when people would recall from the Shroud before clicking the altar.

Bingo

[Chai]

Have to say that in this I do not agree with you, Chai. I have carried enough people on elite-reaper dungeons to say that there really are many toons who are not prepared to play in those difficulties. And it really is not our business to say how they should get their experience, nor is it healthy, with the stupid level of grind currently, to put more obstacles to improve their characters.

If there is something that fails, it is not WK, but the amount of experience that can be achieved by playing in higher difficulties a greater variety of quests (lower than doing dailies), and the fact that the first terminations are somewhat exploited by methods that although legal are arguably little ethical (some what devs should be more concerned than amber temple or WK xd)

The narrative that there are a bunch of newbies and casuals whose DDO happiness hinges on getting XP this way is not just exaggerated, its entirely made up in the first place.

The newbies and casuals typically get thrown under the bus when the METAgamers want to keep the cheese in the game, but understand its a contradiction for them to publicly advocate for it themselves. So we see these "please, think of the kittens" posts pop up...

One such contradiction is the narrative of "obstacles to improving their characters" as advocacy IN_FAVOR_OF keeping it the way it is - WK is just that, and obstacle to improving ones character - as you yourself argue there is no relevant gear there, and these "newbies and casuals" arent doing much to learn about all challenges the rest of the game has to offer if they are holed up in one quest farming the optionals the entire time.

[Iriale]

The narrative that there are a bunch of newbies and casuals whose DDO happiness hinges on getting XP this way is not just exaggerated, its entirely made up in the first place.

The newbies and casuals typically get thrown under the bus when the METAgamers want to keep the cheese in the game, but understand its a contradiction for them to publicly advocate for it themselves. So we see these "please, think of the kittens" posts pop up...

One such contradiction is the narrative of "obstacles to improving their characters" as advocacy IN_FAVOR_OF keeping it the way it is - WK is just that, and obstacle to improving ones character - as you yourself argue there is no relevant gear there, and these "newbies and casuals" arent doing much to learn about all challenges the rest of the game has to offer if they are holed up in one quest farming the optionals the entire time.

too elitism, here, Chai. I did not expect that from you

[MaeveTuohy]

Run the quest.
Do all the optionals
Don't pick up the Phylactery.
Recall.

It's not like this is some giant secret You're still doing the whole quest just like when people would recall from the Shroud before clicking the altar.

Exactly.

People who do the so-called Wizard King Optionals are actually running the whole quest, even entering the treasure chamber at the end. They fight the monsters, pull the levers, make the jumps, get through the traps. Everything that is done in a normal, completion run. The ONLY thing they are not doing is ending the quest by picking up the phylactery.

Now, if the argument being made was that the quest optionals give too much xp, then we might have a relevant discussion on our hands.

[Chai]

too elitism, here, Chai. I did not expect that from you

Understanding that casuals and new players arent worried about BiS gear and cheesing XP is not elitism.

[Chai]

I don't approve of macroing either. Regardless, I wouldn't say WK is "impossible" to macro without knowing exactly what people would try to use to achieve it, but I think there are enough variables in it beyond just running in a set pattern talking to non-moving NPCs to make it rather impractical to try to macro, plus you would need 3 toons for an effective farm of the whole map.

People will try to say this is difficult, but in an EN WK, staying alive isnt tough, and running to a specific spot on the map, casting a firewall, and standing in it, is not difficult to macro.

It would actually be more difficult to do the pathing, as the floor dropping out in certain spots is more of a variable than staying alive in EN, or killing mobs in EN.

[Iriale]

Understanding that casuals and new players arent worried about BiS gear and cheesing XP is not elitism.

It depends on your definition of casual, really. It does not always apply with that name to people who play once every six months.

and I've met new players who have liked the game, and have been thoroughly applied to get good characters. Although I have to say that few have stayed when they have understood the length of the grind that awaits them xD. But while they lasted, some of them applied themselves thoroughly with dailies and so on. And some have resisted even lol

It's a limited view of yours, chai.

[Talam]

if you aren't seeing it on argo, then you aren't looking.

It's a pretty lame "exploit" (and it isn't an exploit, by the way) because you'll end up better off just running content once and done on elite or r1 and getting that sweet xp bonus. You'll level way faster than grinding out tedious optional xp on wiz king.

Also, those screen shots seem to be presented as if they're all happening at the same time, but it's pretty obviously taken one at a time. You will sometimes see a "wiz king optional" lfm, but it's certainly not a significant percentage of all the lfms on any server.

this.

[askrj1]

People will try to say this is difficult, but in an EN WK, staying alive isnt tough, and running to a specific spot on the map, casting a firewall, and standing in it, is not difficult to macro.

It would actually be more difficult to do the pathing, as the floor dropping out in certain spots is more of a variable than staying alive in EN, or killing mobs in EN.

I'm not saying it's difficult to play, and to a human player it can be truly trivial as long as they know how to play DDO and the toon is not a complete disaster. The discussion was that it's probably not efficiently macro-able between all the things you have to take into account for the quest. In theory, assuming no dropping floors or making extra pathing to avoid them you could of course make 3 toons that take a routine of running for 20s, stand still for 20s with a self heal and a firewall and run again until you're done with the objectives that's perfectly possible to automate. I just don't believe it's practical to fix up something like that and have it reliably farm the quest for you for good amounts of time.

Also, pertaining to your casual vs metagamers, you realize not all players and characters exist in those poles. In fact your hardest metagamers wouldn't even be in WK, with a good static party they're probably rolling content with higher skulls, or solo all their low reapers. Your metagamers would unlikely still be trudging through WK unless they needed to cap quick or was rolling up an alt. But your more than casual players with a dozen or two pastlives on a sub-prime or flavour build without a good static party isn't going to faceroll their EE/R1BBs.

Maybe they don't run all their lives on WK, but it wouldn't realistic to expect them to not cheese some easier XP to lessen the pressure of hitting up challenging content. This isn't about newbies and casuals who hit cap without "knowing the game", some of these people may have already done most if not all the quests available before but would rather not hit them up again for a slower progress through levels.

[HungarianRhapsody]

Now the metagamers on the other hand....

The metagamers already have all 36 Epic past lives (or at least as many as they care about) and don't need this tactic.

You get 0RXP in Wiz King on Normal.