Good time to return to DDO?

[nunayobidness]

Last few times I tried returning to the game, was a bust. I stopped about 18 months ago because there were many service outages.
Also hard to join groups. Still have some level 30 toons on Thelanis.

[Memnir]

Grouping is still difficult for some, but content wise, this is a very good time for DDO. Ravenloft is phenomenal, and Sharn is coming up soon.

But, nothing ventured - nothing gained. Give it a try and find out firsthand.

[whoolsey]

Last few times I tried returning to the game, was a bust. I stopped about 18 months ago because there were many service outages.
Also hard to join groups. Still have some level 30 toons on Thelanis.

no, game is a mess, lag is crippling, grouping is hard outside the us prime-time (or the mental space of some)

[banjo174]

I am still looking for a better MMO than DDO. No other MMO comes close to DDO's life span at least for me. Sure, I can go enjoy another MMO for half a year, maybe even a full year, but nothing can keep me interested as long as DDO has.

[Hobgoblin]

I am still looking for a better MMO than DDO. No other MMO comes close to DDO's life span at least for me. Sure, I can go enjoy another MMO for half a year, maybe even a full year, but nothing can keep me interested as long as DDO has.

hear hear

[SerPounce]

DDO is an outstanding place right now. Don’t be fooled by the forum downers, there’s less lag and fewer bugs than any other time I’ve played, and the recent content is top notch. I’ve even been seeing more people online lately.

[askrj1]

Thelanis is still alive, might depend on timezone. If you've been around a year and a half ago there shouldn't be too much catching up to do.

Content wise Sharn's coming up so that's something to look forward to, content hasn't been too shabby Ravenloft onwards.

[banjo174]

DDO is an outstanding place right now. Don’t be fooled by the forum downers, there’s less lag and fewer bugs than any other time I’ve played, and the recent content is top notch. I’ve even been seeing more people online lately.

It isn't something that can be denied though. DDO does experience far more lag issues than a lot of MMOs. But even so, DDO is the one MMO that can keep my interest for the longest period of time.

DDO has FPS issues,
DDO has Load screen locking issues,
DDO has total lockup issues where the entire instance is totally unplayable,
DDO has rubber banding issues when the instance doesn't full load,


Aside from lag, DDO doesn't have any customer service for tickets. It is to the point, where it is faster to do a quest that took you any amount of time, 5 minutes - 2 hours to complete, just to find out it can't be completed due to bugs, just reseting and re-doing. It is faster to re do it, opposed to submitted a ticket, because there is no customer service anymore. Those are glaring facts about DDOs current state.

That all being said. DDO is still one of the best MMOs out there, because of the customization, and the TR system. They both add a ton of life span to this game.

[OneMadBarb]

I came back 3 weeks ago from a 5 year break really love the changes and new content. DDO will always have some issues but compared to many other MMO it has something many others just cant provide.
I play on Cannith and there is plenty of people to group with, PUG's can be hard to form at certain hours so try to find a guild with plenty of members to find groups.

[Ausdoerrt]

Lag-wise, the game's in better shape than 1,5 years ago, on my end. Some places still do freeze up in a big group, e.g. Thunderholme. But load times have been better, lockups fewer, and toon-swapping faster, especially since the most recent maintenance. YMMV, of course.

Gameplay-wise, new content over the past 1,5 years has ranged from 'decent' to 'great', and there's been a lot of it, so you'll have a lot to catch up on. Mines of Tethyamar is one stellar adventure pack, for example, and I'm sure you've heard it all about Ravenloft. New races and enhancement have also been cool, and the class and enhancement tree adjustments are almost done, so there are lots of new toys to play with. I'd say SSG's focus on new content has been a good decision.

Grouping-wise, it's about the same as always. It's a 13-year-old game, so naturally you'll have mostly vets playing with an occasional newcomer. Getting a group for 'in vogue' content and 'daily grind' content is a breeze, getting one for anything else is not bloody likely. I've never set foot on Thelanis so can't comment, but I'd imagine it's similar to all other servers. If you were on Khyber, I'd be happy to offer some company for questing in off-hours.

So it comes down to whether you want to play or not. I've been enjoying my last several weeks after a 6-month break, so far. Dusting off old toons, running ancient quests for favor and new content for the experience. No idea whether it'll last, but hey, as long as you're having fun, right? And if you jump in now, you'll still have a bit of time to get some cool stuff from the Anniversary Event Challenge.

[nunayobidness]

Thanks for the input. I'll give the latest version a try.

[droid327]

Thanks for the input. I'll give the latest version a try.

Fortuna audaces juvat

[Bjond]

DDO is an outstanding place right now. Don’t be fooled by the forum downers, there’s less lag and fewer bugs than any other time I’ve played

That's disheartening. I regularly run into serious bugs and/or design flaws and (somewhat of a shocker for me) no one has tackled the parser issue, which is critical for character improvement once you're out of the newbie stage in any MMO. I really shouldn't be stumbling on stuff like this as a new player.

The lag issues I see seem to be pure SSG. Pings to large sites (google, amazon, facebook, etc) run around 7~15ms for me. SSG runs about 90ms, which is about double what a 1st-tier site on the wrong coast would be, but fine for an MMO. However, I still get huge 20s non-responsive issues when playing; ie. nothing updates for 20s then it will suddenly catch up. Could be packet drops (SSG using cheap 3rd-tier provider) or server issues.

[Jaxtan]

Have played and subbed for 6 months, bought all the expansions, really enjoyed the customization. However, the game is really only good with grouping, and there isn't enough of grouping. Plus lag for me has gotten worse the last couple of months, to the point of dying because of it. And when not in a group, dying means having to start over and waste 30+ minutes getting back to where you died. I recently un-subbed because of the limited group action, and there are much better solutions for soloing.