Getting weaker the higher level you go

[Amorais]

From the get-go I did Elite difficulty quests up until about level 10, when I found my character fiinding things harder and harder. I just had a really close call in Fresh Baked Dreams on HARD, not even Elite....

Every single mob in the windmill was a champion. All the hags, all the dretch - every one.

You can't move, there's no space to avoid the AOE and you can't get out.

Poor old Flagon did his best but got annihilated. My poor doggie also got almost instantly killed. I managed to luck out by JUST managing to recall before the sisters came downstairs.

At level 12 my character is now easily weaker overall than at level 4-5. It seems to be a thing with MMOs. The higher level you get the weaker your character is. It's annoying. Just wanted to vent a bit.

Also, the forums look a lot nicer now!

 

[Phoenicis]

Objectively, you are not weaker. You have more HP, Better AC, do more damage.

Comparatively, however, is a completely different story. The mobs largely scale up faster than players do.

Complaints, years ago, about the game being way to easy led to the addition of champions to hard and elite difficulties. On live servers the mobs can't really keep up with past lives, optimized gear sets and stat tomes.

On HC, you are dealing with the game closer to the way it started, no past lives, random (though far better than it used to be) gear and few, if any, stat tomes. The mobs, however retain all the bonuses.

Honestly, if you find the champions to rough, you either need to move down to normal difficulty or farm the gear sets necessary to mitigate the mob boosts.

 

[Amorais]

I meant comparatively obviously...

the whole champion mechanic sucks in my opinion. It basically makes Hard+ a random difficulty level based on how lucky you are. Normally they aren't so bad but on lower levels I can easily cope with them but on higher levels, due to the lack of linear scaling, I end up getting 1-shotted sometimes by a random mob. I remember once in HC6 my hire, my pet and my character were instantly one-shotted by a random will-o-wisp champion's chain lightning doing over 700 dmg to everyone. I went in again with another toon and breezed it as there were no champs in it.

Its all a bit too much cheese sometimes with mobs. I just wish the scaling was better.

 

[Tarinia]

It seems that also on other servers people noticed, that after the update content is (much) harder then before. Till now its not confirmed by the devs, but especially raids and reaper are the main issue at the moment- of course it could be in fact every difficulty range affected.. you should look and present screenshot from situations like above to convince devs to help...
Tarinia

 

[Tarinia]

You can't move, there's no space to avoid the AOE and you can't get out.

You always should buy a teleport rod from shop for hopeless situations like this.

Tarinia

 

[JaynChar2019]

It seems that also on other servers people noticed, that after the update content is (much) harder then before. Till now its not confirmed by the devs, but especially raids and reaper are the main issue at the moment- of course it could be in fact every difficulty range affected.. you should look and present screenshot from situations like above to convince devs to help...
Tarinia

Yes things are getting out of hand!

 

[Br4d]

This is the way MMO's and RPG's in general are supposed to work. Your character gets more powerful as they level and gear up. However the world more than matches that progression to make your acquisitions of power meaningful and to add a greater chance that your play skill matters.

If you get real power creep that makes the world progressively less challenging as you advance then the game becomes less interesting and further acquisitions of power become less of an incentive to play the game.

This is a fundamental issue with DDO that I think the devs do not fully understand. The sale of new power does not add longevity to the game it just narrows the player base over time as people yawn out.

 

[Aerendil]

Fresh Baked Dreams tower is a murder hole. Always has been on higher difficulties. Best approach is to move up a platform or fight on the stairs; if you stay on the bottom, you just get rained down on and subject to AoEs (including the new champion mob AoEs).
Not much you could have done in that respect except unleash hell via AoEs of your own (or crowd-control). If that wasn't an option, then you're kinda screwed. :(

But yes, as others have mentioned, you become comparatively weaker. But each class has certain levels where they wax or wane.
I actually find 1-7 to be the hardest. *shrug*

 

[RangerOne]

I have found that levels 10-16 are a bit of a slog and agree with the OP. Then my power (Perceived or real) rises again. 20-23 go fast and feel good and then it's back to the doldrums until around 27 or 28. Perhaps it is gear related. Perhaps we are all insane.

 

[Lacci]

Few things to consider:
- Hard adds 1 level to the quest, elite adds 2 levels. So if you do a lvl 10 quest on elite, you´re doing a lvl 12 quest.
- while you level up, so should your equipment. Without knowing your build or your items, I speak from my experience that I often run around at lvl 10+ with a couple of lvl 5 items or so.
- and then, you´re not getting weaker at higher levels, but you encounter a larger variety of monsters with different capabilities, best example beholders. The higher in level you get, the more your character has to be prepared for different situations.

And of course, you can get unlucky with a tough combination of champions.

 

[Necrometer]

I meant comparatively obviously...

the whole champion mechanic sucks in my opinion. It basically makes Hard+ a random difficulty level based on how lucky you are. Normally they aren't so bad but on lower levels I can easily cope with them but on higher levels, due to the lack of linear scaling, I end up getting 1-shotted sometimes by a random mob. I remember once in HC6 my hire, my pet and my character were instantly one-shotted by a random will-o-wisp champion's chain lightning doing over 700 dmg to everyone. I went in again with another toon and breezed it as there were no champs in it.

Its all a bit too much cheese sometimes with mobs. I just wish the scaling was better.

Will o wisp champs seem like they may be bugged, from my day's questing. I've been doing harper chains in ES. In Druid's Curse and Lost in the Swamp, I have died 3 times from wisp champions stacking damage. They don't even have to hit me with MM or lightning, if I'm in any sort of proximity to them, the stacks add on. Literally 10 sec into a fight, I've got 7 or 8 stacks of dot. That can't be right, can it?

 

[The Narc]

From the get-go I did Elite difficulty quests up until about level 10, when I found my character fiinding things harder and harder. I just had a really close call in Fresh Baked Dreams on HARD, not even Elite....

Every single mob in the windmill was a champion. All the hags, all the dretch - every one.

You can't move, there's no space to avoid the AOE and you can't get out.

Poor old Flagon did his best but got annihilated. My poor doggie also got almost instantly killed. I managed to luck out by JUST managing to recall before the sisters came downstairs.

At level 12 my character is now easily weaker overall than at level 4-5. It seems to be a thing with MMOs. The higher level you get the weaker your character is. It's annoying. Just wanted to vent a bit.

Also, the forums look a lot nicer now!

Get rid of your Flagon and use the level 8 favoured soul Nimith, even after the favoured soul nerf these AOE casters will still clear rooms faster than most average single target build. Wait for everything to come to you stay calm in the windmill and have a spell absorption item or two(very feasible and easy to acquire by level 12!!).

 

[Mesmerin]

I find that only the mobs at the bottom, not the witches agro when you zone in, as long as no one in the party jumps.

 

[calouscaine]

From the get-go I did Elite difficulty quests up until about level 10, when I found my character fiinding things harder and harder. I just had a really close call in Fresh Baked Dreams on HARD, not even Elite....

Every single mob in the windmill was a champion. All the hags, all the dretch - every one.

You can't move, there's no space to avoid the AOE and you can't get out.

Poor old Flagon did his best but got annihilated. My poor doggie also got almost instantly killed. I managed to luck out by JUST managing to recall before the sisters came downstairs.

At level 12 my character is now easily weaker overall than at level 4-5. It seems to be a thing with MMOs. The higher level you get the weaker your character is. It's annoying. Just wanted to vent a bit.

Also, the forums look a lot nicer now!

I'd like to ask what sort of gear you have currently.
When I did favor farming, on hc at least, I spent the majority of my time farming gear and holding levels for a week or so, just to make sure I didn't get wiped on a quest on elite two levels below me.
It also makes a difference if you've bought something like stat tomes. . .sad to say, but it makes a really big difference.

 

[The Narc]

I find that only the mobs at the bottom, not the witches agro when you zone in, as long as no one in the party jumps.

This for the win, smart player here who knows the mechanics of the quest.

 

[Dalvias Stonecrusher]

I used these minimum requirements and benchmarks:
- always have a FF and death block item.
- level 5 fey set (4 piece minimum, with ghostly and blurry items)
- level 10 RL weapon
- level 15 sharn gear
- level 20 Borderlands gear and weapon. I farmed 7 pieces here to cover all major defense and stats, again ghostly and blurry being mandatory).
- level 23 TF weapon
- level 24 upgrade TF weapon
- used mostly borderlands gear to cap.
- level 29, RL weapon and fey weapon then farm your end game gear.

Along the way upgrade where you can. If you can afford augments and shards make the investment.

 

[CBDunk]

There are significant 'power ups' for most characters at levels 2, 5, 10, 15, 20, 23, 26, and 29. Some, especially multi-class, characters will jump significantly at other levels, but for the most part those are the big milestones with smaller increases in between.

Monster difficulty is more chaotic, and can vary significantly by quest even within a given level. However, there are clear overall increases in the rate difficulty ramps up starting at levels 5, 10, and 20.

One BIG problem for first life characters is that several of the character power jumps are largely due to GEAR. Basically... you'd need to run the Ravenloft quests repeatedly to get the Ravenloft gear which makes your character strong enough to run the Ravenloft quests more easily. Ditto all the level 29 gear that makes characters viable for Legendary content.

Running Keep on the Borderlands is a good way to quickly get a basic foundation of newbie and 'epic newbie' (i.e. level 20) gear. The free Ravenloft weapons at 10th and 29th level are another good way to 'keep up'. Beyond those, the best places to get gear vary somewhat based on character type and player preferences.

All that said... I'd suggest just shifting your target quest level for a while. That is, if base level 10 quests are giving you trouble shift down to base level 9 or 8 at the same difficulty. There are plenty of quests at most levels to just do new content on elite at whatever level seems viable and get enough XP to level up. Eventually, if things start seeming too easy then shift the base quest level up one or two. If you can manage Reaper 1, which is very difficult on most first life builds, even at four levels below current (i.e. running base level 8 quests at character level 12) that is usually going to be the fastest way to level up. Basically, do the highest difficulty you can manage (Elite or Reaper) at the highest base quest level that doesn't 'feel' too difficult for your character.

 

[Frantik]

Fresh Baked Dreams tower is a murder hole. Always has been on higher difficulties. Best approach is to move up a platform or fight on the stairs; if you stay on the bottom, you just get rained down on and subject to AoEs (including the new champion mob AoEs).
Not much you could have done in that respect except unleash hell via AoEs of your own (or crowd-control). If that wasn't an option, then you're kinda screwed. :(

But yes, as others have mentioned, you become comparatively weaker. But each class has certain levels where they wax or wane.
I actually find 1-7 to be the hardest. *shrug*

Sorry for the very late reply... i was searching for something else and stumbled upon this thread.

Fresh Baked Dreams can be tricky for newer players at level. I have tried a number of strategies and for the Windmill (tower) I find the best one is to fight downstairs. This has two benefits: (1) easier management, the enemies come to you, and (2) I have never killed Morgantha before the end (as she comes down when you need her to come down), so I always get the 2nd named chest end fight.

 

[vryxnr]

Don't think of it was "enemies are leveling up too!", but instead think of it as "these more powerful and dangerous enemies and quests were always there, I just wasn't strong enough to face them. Now I am stronger, and thus I am able to take on these bigger challenges and survive".

You can still enter lower level quests and dominate them. Those still exist too. Living out that super dominating power fantasy just doesn't give you more experience/power as it's so far below you now.

 

[FaceDancer]

I remember when my first toon hit epic level. I hopped into the wilds of the Borderlands & that turned into a sobering experience as a pack of wolves nearly took me down. All of the sudden... goblins and gnolls were scary again. I recently did an epic reincarnation and now it is MUCH less intimidating. That's partly due to having a good collection of items to start with @ lvl 20. plus my character is just more enhanced in general, and I"m now a less bad player...