Illithid Invasion - Constructive Feedback

[JustHavingFunBro]

Extremely underwhelming, and the thralls add no value to this event.

And our reward for putting up with this? More legendary quest that add a gambling component to the game. And we know those distillers will show up in the shop very soon. BTW, how many legendary quest do we need?

 

[Neain]

My feedback

TLDR: I like that the event happened, just a few things that I think could have been done better.

I like that this one-time event happened. I would like to see more of them. I do have a few issues with how this one was carried out, but am really happy that the event itself happened. Thanks for all the Dev work that went into this!

That out of the way, here are the things that I felt/feel were/are the issue (or the very least, the issue for me).

• Level range: I understand (after reading the forums) that the r1 was so that you couldn't have max-level characters just stomping on the low-level Illithids, but from a lore standpoint once an invasion point has been found... wouldn't we go find Elminster or some other totally OP character to do some high-level magic to close the invasion point?
  • Maybe the solution to this would have been that you could kill it as many times as you want, but each character/account only counted as a single kill. This means that once it was found (maybe even lock that part to reaper so that someone leveling has to find it), they 'call in' the Illithid slayers to deal with the problem and now you have to have a bunch of people participating instead of just a small number of people rerunning that quest.
  • Or to really keep it community-driven instead of this secret "we won't tell you anything" approach that the devs do seem to like (a chance to do a significant amount of cold damage. really?), maybe have a far larger number of mind flayers be needed to kill, and a 0.1% or 0.01% chance every time that a reaper spawns, that its instead a mind flayer? that would keep it focused on the community killing them instead of this treasure hunt that I doubt most will be participating in (either because they do not want to, or are just completely the wrong level to do so).
• Locations: I had no idea where they spawned after seeing the message (I missed most of them btw)
  • maybe once it was found, the NPCs could at least say that it was found in "Quest X", even if they don't have a more specific location.
• Champion Difficulty: We spent how many years to get our current level of champions ironed out to be where they were wanted... did we really have to inflict a new set of untested and unbalanced champs on the entire player base?
  • Either be able to opt in (and have that count toward Illithids showing up, or drop a single card rarely, or many other ideas that I have seen here on the forums)
  • Maybe even just limit their buff to how many are around instead of a timer that seems to go up as I hit the monster. It feels like the buff goes up each time I hit it once, leading to my Vanguard seeing a tiny few numbers that are larger than zero, followed by sitting there for 30 seconds of seeing 0s for my main hit.
• Champion Lore: I felt that this was really lacking. I kept seeing 'psionic thrall' over things that... shouldn't be able to be dominated. Iron Golems, Kopru (when the final Kopru boss was unaffected and would have fixed the issue), Vermin, etc.
  • I understand that it would be far more work to exclude those and really do give SSG a pass on this one, but it did feel a bit immersion-breaking.
• Progress: I managed to help kill the one in Spies in the House, and after a bit, I was unsure how long this was going to take and was getting a bit tired of running it.
  • maybe even just have messages at the 75%, 50%, and 25% points (preferably with the quest name) in the global announcement? if it's going to be a server-wide event, then, in theory, someone is keeping track of it (at least, how worn down, scared, worried, slow, etc. many ways to describe that they are getting low on people coming through this rift) and that's how we are getting this notification in the first place.

 

[Kathwynn]

Extremely underwhelming, and the thralls add no value to this event.

And our reward for putting up with this? More legendary quest that add a gambling component to the game. And we know those distillers will show up in the shop very soon. BTW, how many legendary quest do we need?

This whole event has been just a circus of monkeys without purpose and not nearly as entertaining as watching paint dry. So, until Wednesday? when this thing is over. I am going to be doing other things. As that really is the only real way to opt out. Not really viable, but still the best way for me to avoid this... event entirely.

I can only hope that in the future that should SSG have another such event that they will do better. Yeah, I know, but I am an optimist. So I try to hope that something will get better or improve. Sometimes it even happens.. LOL

 

[DYWYPI]

The purplish hue doesn't have the best of contrast ratios between the 'relative luminance'. Personally, I don't particularly care for the event so I'm not "hunting", but some people seem to like it.

I think the Global announcements could have been improved or enhanced. For example, when someone first discovers a new "Illithid Invader" there could be perhaps something similar to the Hardcore League personalised "Player X, death announcement" across the screen, but instead "Player X, has found an Invader". Or maybe give the dungeon level or general zone, when one is found, etc.

Having an Illithid Invader, appearing within the quest 'Rainbow in the Dark' by the Russian roulette "clock puzzle" is genius. Flimsy, was that your idea...?

 

[Praun]

Yeah, I've been watching the gnashing of teeth, and beating of chests over Ilithid in the Rainbow in the Dark quest with great joy.

 

[Ahpuch]

Yeah, I've been watching the gnashing of teeth, and beating of chests over Ilithid in the Rainbow in the Dark quest with great joy.

We knew you would eventually enjoy this event.

 

[Frambo]

To involve the thralls more, have them drop a currency as well as trigger the spawns.

• Kill X number of thralls and a new Illithid spawns
• Thralls drop a new event currency
• NPC trader in Sharn will accept currency for cosmetics (or some relevant reward) or hints at spawn locations

To make the knowledge less forum dependant

• Have the above NPC reveal known spawn locations

To help involve more of the player base/prevent the Rainbow Scenario

• Increase the spawn locations
• Have Illithids remain for the entire wave
• Count the kill total server-wide, but make the number much higher (ie: kill 500 from any of the locations during this wave)
• Make difficulty level count for more kills (ie: normal = 1, r10 = 12)

I don't think this is perfect but I also think it alleviates some of the biggest gripes here. Even if you don't want to hunt and spam a quest for the Illithids, killing thralls is doing something to progress the event. Even if you don't want to play on reaper, you can still find an Illithid some where and add to the count, even if that would be much slower.
More spawns means a better level range of characters so hopefully nobody is excluded. Sure, high level characters could still spam everything low but with a high enough number and difficulty based incentives you'd be rewarded for going through higher difficulty making the reaper lock-out the best option. It wouldn't force reaper, but it kind of would

I actually think the event is fine, but with the hindsight of viewing the reaction these ideas could help calm a player base that is never happy

 

[Flimsy Firewood]

The purplish hue doesn't have the best of contrast ratios between the 'relative luminance'. Personally, I don't particularly care for the event so I'm not "hunting", but some people seem to like it.

I think the Global announcements could have been improved or enhanced. For example, when someone first discovers a new "Illithid Invader" there could be perhaps something similar to the Hardcore League personalised "Player X, death announcement" across the screen, but instead "Player X, has found an Invader". Or maybe give the dungeon level or general zone, when one is found, etc.

Having an Illithid Invader, appearing within the quest 'Rainbow in the Dark' by the Russian roulette "clock puzzle" is genius. Flimsy, was that your idea...?

Nope. We have many talented people on the team

 

[Lacci]

OK, I have to add one more thing: Yesterday I saw the first notification ingame that an invader was found.
So I thought "Great, lets go to the guy in Sharn and find out where it is"
But no, there isn´t even any dialogue that an invader was found. I was expecting him to hand out info where to go.
So it was really planned that players would have to publish this information on some form of social media ?

 

[DYWYPI]

I'd have possibly put an "Illithid Invader" in something like 'Genesis Point'.

I might have nearly been tempted to visit 'Rainbow in the Dark' to see one of those guys, if I had something in range. Assuming the puzzle simply worked on just one lever being rigged (with equal starting chance) and it didn't change position from the initial pull, or sequence didn't matter, the odds go; 20%, 25%, 33.3%, 50% and 100%. Alternatively: 16.7% for 1 in 6.

 

[paddymaxson]

I honestly don't think this event deserves constructive criticism. so here's what's wrong with it:
1. No participation reward for 95%+ of the playerbase
--Most people are never going to see the event illithids, therefore they're not participating in the part of the event that unlocks the dungeons
2. Your average player is now experiencing random difficulty spikes
--Random mobs now having a chance to be more difficult than reapers, groups of orange names now have a chance to rip an experienced player to shreds
3. No /real/ participation reward for all players
--You get nothing for actually participating in unlocking the dungeons, the dungeon unlocks either way
4. Even if you want to, participate, you probably won't
--There are people way more on the ball than the average player, they wil tap every illithid spawn before you even know they've found the spawn.

Terrible, awful design. Surely they could've done something better than this?

 

[Maael]

Not overly Thrilled by Orien Needing 50 kills just because we are the bigger server we also have a large population that doesn't want to participate we only have 6-10 people actively trying to complete the event. If left naturally we would never complete because 50 was just way to high of a time investment for the people actively doing it.

 

[Kathwynn]

Not overly Thrilled by Orien Needing 50 kills just because we are the bigger server we also have a large population that doesn't want to participate we only have 6-10 people actively trying to complete the event. If left naturally we would never complete because 50 was just way to high of a time investment for the people actively doing it.

Ouch

Only a few of my Guildies that are actually really doing any hunting. Those few guildies that are still participating. Generally run quests at r10 and are end game players. Among friends from other guilds either never participated or have since stopped. I can not speak about server wide, But I am thinking that actual participation is not as high as it was at the start.

 

[Onyxia2016]

Not overly Thrilled by Orien Needing 50 kills just because we are the bigger server we also have a large population that doesn't want to participate we only have 6-10 people actively trying to complete the event. If left naturally we would never complete because 50 was just way to high of a time investment for the people actively doing it.

I must have missing where it was stated that different servers had different kill quotas. Not saying it isn't true, just I did not see it.
This could go to show that the devs were anticipating a much large player participation and thought they needed to increase the quota on high populated servers. Had the event been released with some of the suggestions mentioned that may have turned out to be a great decision on their part. Hindsight is 20-20.

 

[Onyxia2016]

Now that this event is drawing to a close, and while it was not an overwhelming success let use at least appreciate the effort to try.
I am reminded of two quotes by Thomas Edison.

“I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.”

"There's a better way to do - Find it."

Keep in mind that we, the players also have a part to play in creation of events. It is our responsibly to provide feedback in a manner that is actionable. The devs do not create events just to have something to do. They do it for the players. Good, bad or indifferent we can all agreed that they tried.

This event has been dissected many different ways and in the end we see that the core concept of the event was not bad. The devil was in the details. If just a few elements were changed the outcome might very well have been different.

I look forward to the next event with hope and excitement.

 

[Fhrek]

let use at least appreciate the effort to try.

Not enough... there is three events in a row with major flaws.

Crystal Cove needs urgently an update to make it more solo friendly (DDO has no in-game population to heavy duty pugs)
Night Revels had the Haunted Halls thing, the overprice and BtA scale thing
Ithillid Invasion wasn't a success either

Are they really trying?

 

[Onyxia2016]

Are they really trying?

While those events could use some tweaking, they are for different reason than the Illithid Invasion.
The fact that they do not share the same design flaws is proof that they are trying, otherwise they would be the same.

Trying does not mean succeeding. So in my opinion they are trying.

 

[Maael]

I must have missing where it was stated that different servers had different kill quotas. Not saying it isn't true, just I did not see it.
This could go to show that the devs were anticipating a much large player participation and thought they needed to increase the quota on high populated servers. Had the event been released with some of the suggestions mentioned that may have turned out to be a great decision on their part. Hindsight is 20-20.

Yea Orien is a 50 kill count server it wasn't so bad early on but in the later stages of the event it's getting tiring.

 

[Col Kurtz]

Ouch

Only a few of my Guildies that are actually really doing any hunting. Those few guildies that are still participating. Generally run quests at r10 and are end game players. Among friends from other guilds either never participated or have since stopped. I can not speak about server wide, But I am thinking that actual participation is not as high as it was at the start.

that sux.. added to that is the random lvl a spawn will pop in.

its lottery luck to have character the spawned invasion dungeon lvl, even on a big server... people cruise through lvl's in DDO & our alts are bank mules now. No one is gonna spend an hour sorting equipment to run an alt for a spawn that doesn't even drop loot.

some have made Iconics to help with high heroic spawn hunting.....that's prob the least painful way to help( but that wont cover 70% of heroics still)

 

[Liy]

Definitely have some complaints on this one. I am not a big 'event' person as it is but I liked the idea of getting the extreme dungeons because I like the more challenging content. What I don't like:

1. Having no idea or clue as to where these 8 illithids might be in the entire game. Do you realise how many quests there are in this game??? Seriously, trying to scour hundreds of questions for one tiny little purple dot to find an illithid that we then have to farm out 30 times is NOT fun. Especially when the illithid is in the dumbest possible place like behind the Rainbow in the Dark RNG gate. There should be some form of hint system that gives us a level range, roundabout location (without telling us of course, maybe a riddle), or just something to narrow down the field. I was done with the illithid hunting after phase 1 because it was so boring trying to check tons and tons of quests that I never play anyway just to find the stupid things and literally have no idea where to even start. No pattern, no rhyme or reason to their locations, nothing....

2. Thrall Champs! I am on board with 90% of all the comments here. These things are way overpowered and dumb. They ignore dodge, they one shot you no matter how much defenses you have, and you can't do any damage to them. I have heard mixed reports about making them helpless allows you to do full damage but I have no ability to make them helpless and can't confirm. Some say yes, and some say that's not true. Either way, leave them in the extreme dungeons bc that's literally what we are asking for with the word 'extreme' but take them out of our normal quests.

I also agree with a lot of the comments about maybe thrall champ chests that drop cards or some kind of reward system that gives players some kind of instant gratification for participating or being able to survive the stupid champs or finding the illithids. There are tons of people that could care less about this event but have to participate anyway; why not give them something for it. Then there are some people that have spent hours and hours grinding out illithids so the rest of the server can enjoy the new dungeons - give them something. I have a guildy that spent 12 hours grinding Rainbow in the Dark - literally the dumbest location possible because no one wants to sit in there and die 200 times to a falling floor just to get 30 illithid spawns.

Think the idea behind this was great but missed the mark a little. Let me know when we have a thread about the extreme dungeons and I'll get in on that one too...