Illithid Invasion - Constructive Feedback

[Onyxia2016]

This event has sparked a lot of angry discussion. I also allowed my disappointment to cloud my perspective resulting in some forum rage. My apologizes if anything I said offended anyone. It was never my intention. This is not a post to continue that mindset.

The discussion for the event ranges from worst to best event ever. In such situations I find the truth is somewhere in-between.
Limit discussion to the event itself and not the four free quests. For all intents and purposes these quest will be release on Wednesday 11/8 regardless of the event outcome. One is not dependent on the other.

Please leave your love/hate for the event at the door.

The goal is to provide constructive feedback. Above all else remain civil and objective.

Participation - As with anything of this nature there are those that wish to participate and those that do not.

• Having the Thrall champions (flavor only, do not contribute to event completion) in non-reaper levels forces participation to some degree. These are not re-skinned champion models. It has been confirmed by many, myself included, they are much more powerful.

Suggest limiting them to reaper only or scale them to match existing champions.

• Reaper only Illithid spawns, unfortunately this is a limitation in the game. There has to be away to prevent players, well above a quest level range from running them with zero challenge just to find/exhaust the spawns and in doing so ruining the event for everyone else. The reaper level lockout is the only solution currently. Non-reaper players should have a way to participate in the event. No one should be force to play in a manner they do not wish to regardless of reason.

Suggest using the scaled champions from above in non-reaper quests to reveal hints as to where Illithid's spawn via global announcement. A global counter with a high kill count would be a good mechanism. Something in the order of 7500 or even higher as it should not be a quick hunt. Think of this as intel gathering for those willing to brave reaper levels to combat the Illithids directly. If the champions are of equal difficulty to normal champions, this would not affect game play for those wishing to exclude themselves from the event entirely.

Reward - Most people like to get something to commemorate an event. An "I survived Illithid Invasion 2023" shirt so to speak

• As mention at the start the four new free to play quests are not a reward for the event. They are available regardless next week.
• Participation is the reward. To some this may be enough, others may want something tangible within the game, it is all 1's and 0's in reality.

Suggest adding something to the remanent vendors, or a new temporary vendor, that can be purchased with remanents. Cosmetic cloak or a Illithid pet. The ideas are endless.


When posting it helps to provide a suggestion that potentially addresses a short coming. This actually helps put you in a constructive mindset to be heplful as opposed to only pointing out a perceived negative.

This is also a place to provide positive feedback as well for elements that were done well.

Hunt type events can be a lot of fun. Unraveling the rules and locations versus being told to go to X and kill Y is a change of pace. ​

​

Hopefully this helps to set the tone for this post and additional feedback.

 

[Kathwynn]

My criticism has been that at the end of this event. It unlocks content for the end game player. That it is reaper focused. That those that either do not play at reaper levels or do not do so regularly are still stuck with the psionic thralls. Something that I have yet to figure out why.

My suggestion for to the SSG is to make such event more relevant to players. Perhaps cosmetics, special mounts, a pet, or something along the lines of getting something that is relevant to most players.

An ability to opt out would be good as well. Think along the lines of the mimic hunt.

While I understand SSG is trying to keep almost 20 year old game with a d**n near antique of a game engine both relevant and entertaining. This event was a miss for me and judging from forum posts. I am not alone in that thought. I hope going forward that SSG will take a good look at what work, what hasn't, and try to do better for the next such event.

 

[Praun]

My primary issue with this, and all events really, is the fact that SSG has this odd desire to force these events on everyone. Not everyone wants to be challenged. Some people just want to chill out and play the game.

I have a barbarian who is on his 3rd life as a barbarian. I have no desire to be a completionist, AT ALL. I want to make the strongest pure barbarian, rogue, or sorc as possible. In fact, I have at least 6 or 7 different alts all above level 20, some on their 2nd life. I'm old school and don't care for multiclassing. I enjoy building the character, as much as running it. I like playing around with the different trees to explore the character's versatility.

I've built a fairly impressive barbarian on Cannith, Praunrage Murder Machine, and he lives up to his name. I've had people on their 25th life brag about how fast he can layem down.

Last year he was on his 2nd life at level 4 during the Maybar event. He couldn't get into the quests, but he could farm for keys ... and farm for keys he did. I could get anywhere from 4-9 keys on every run. I didn't know this was odd till other guild mates started complaining about how hard they were to get. I jumped around in some of my other alts to do a quick comparison and they were right, Praunrage was getting FAR more keys than any of my other alts. He could even get keys faster than a level 19 undead slaying palidin.

So, I took him out there and beat some undead down, and had almost 100 keys farmed for my mates in about 7 days.

He's no slouch.

Now, the other day, I go out to do a quest I've soloed DOZENS of times ... and faceplant, well before the end fight, because of these overpowered Thrall Champs (TC).

I was actually shocked, and a bit embarrassed I must say. I thought maybe I hit a bit of lag, so I grabbed a Favored Soul and went back with my game face on, only to face-plant at the end fight.

***!?!

So, these TC are WAAAAYYYY overpowered. Like, it's not even funny how overpowered these things are ... unless you are a spellcaster who can do an instakill on them. Otherwise, you are buggered.

That's breaking the game and forcing us into a playstyle we don't (or can't) do.

So, in essence, those of us who have a VIP literally can't use the main benefit of it (opening quests on H/E on the first run) during this event.

So, yeah, this was not thought out very well.

Look, I want people to enjoy this game as much as I do.

Have your Hardcore Event, different Festivals throughout the year, and surprise events as much as your little heart desires.

Just, please don't force everyone to engage in them.

Is that really too much to ask?

 

[Ahpuch]

To open, Thanks OP. I think your post touched on a number of key points. Certainly there are somethings that could have been better. Your recommendations for toned down champions (especially in hard and elite) and a better lockout than using Reaper are the 2 key ones for me.

A couple other things SSG could do next time:

1. Mystery reveal - I assume that SSG wanted us to figure things out so they didn't over describe what was happening to make the mystery solving part of the event. However, that just leaves a lot people confused and frustrated and "read the forums" does not seem like what they should have to do. I don't mind that it started as a mystery but as the event progresses the game could do a better job revealing it to those players who are frustrated. The NPC could improve his text over time to give people a better understanding. This tracks with that NPCs understanding growing as the event progresses.
2. The big thing is a completion board that lists the quests that have had Illithid Invaders as well as exhaustion status (% to hide actual number required). Users should not need to rely on the forums for data that the NPC seems to be tracking according to their text.

But I will add that if the choice was to give us what we got or realize that all these "improvements" made the event un-codeable in the time allowed, I will take what we got over nothing.

Some of the criticism that one gets depends on how one defines an "event". If an event is a time limited dungeon(s) that allows thematic loot then I can see how this is a complete miss. For me an event is something that the server experiences together and has to work as a team to overcome an obstacle. So for me this event is a win. I have it as "one of the best" events because it is the first in a long time that hits that mark. Crystal Cove, Festivult, Mabar are less events for me because they are only about time limited thematic looting. It doesn't matter what the rest of the server is doing on those events (unless I want to buy or sell mats on the auction). I am certainly happy with the experience/participation over the reward/memento and I have enjoyed the experience (so far).

I think there is room for all events. If I have pushed back (too hard) on some posts its because this seems like the first event in a long time that meets my preferences. Complaints that it is not another Mabar/Crystal Cove makes it more likely we get more of what we always get and less something different.

 

[droid327]

The only tweak I would suggest is limiting the number of simultaneous Thralls that can spawn in any one pack. That's the only thing that I think really breaks this event....getting 4-5 Thralls at once, each one a multiplicative scalar on the others, so the difficulty starts to skyrocket. If they scaled evenly between 1-3 at once, I think that'd provide the appropriate level of challenge - while also providing a disincentive to train packs together, which is something else I know the devs want.

If Thralls occasionally dropped Chests that contained a single Card, like Mabar and Crystal Cove champs did, I think that'd satisfy everyone upset about the lack of immediate reward for fighting Thrall mobs, too.

 

[TedSandyman]

There is no doubt the reward is all end game. But I would suggest everyone try Pilgrim's Peril at least on normal if they get close enough in level. I am firmly of the opinion that actually playing the game because you think it is fun is the real reason to play DDO. And at least one of the quests is fun enough to warrant a play through per life. And if you run it on normal or hard at level 28 it can still help you get to 30 with XP. So it isn't like it can't help you even if you dont plan on camping out at end game.

It is a fun quest that makes you think a bit and adds some new twists.

As for the event, I think they tried their best to make it as inclusive as possible. Yeah, you do have to run the quests on reaper, and that made some not want to do it, but there kind of had to be some kind of level lockout to keep it from being trivial to kill the Illithids. If you want ALL levels to be able to participate, then you have to have some way of keeping level 32s from running the level 5 quests and one shotting the Illithids. They could have probably worked something else out, but the reaper level lockout was easiest. And maybe they were thinking it might get a few players to try reaper. Like it or not, (and I'm closer to the not) reaper is the present and future of the game. You can ignore it and still have fun, but that is where most of the players are now.

Also, many wrongly thought the event was limited to level 34 but that isn't true. I had the opposite problem. All of my playable characters were too high a level to help with phase 2. I think a lot of this misconception was due to the secretive nature of the event. The devs didn't want to give away anything and let the players have the joy of discovering the secrets on their own, but it led to some misinformation and some harsh words in the forums.

I don't feel that the event was for me specifically, so I understand the sentiment. But I also think there is a LOT of unfair critisism on the forums. Every event isn't for everyone. Some are going to like any given event and some are not. I don't think you can ever get away from that. It just stings a bit more when it is a once ever event.

 

[Alrik Fassbauer]

It unlocks content for the end game player.

This is what came into my mind the other day, too.

No matter how much I participate with my low level and mid level characters - I only end up unlocking quests for the end game player base, not for me (unless I belong to this player base as well by having an end game character as well).

This creates within me a feeling of "this is unfair".

And I think that this is where most criticism comes from.

Future events should *heavily* try to avoid that !

 

[vryxnr]

All of this is "in my opinion" and is thus subjective to whether something is good or not. My positive list may be someone else's negative list, and vice versa.

Positives

A new event of world wide proportions that will mark the beginning of a new chapter in DDO story through-line

Atmospheric change making it obvious that shiz is going down, it's not locked away in one corner inconsequentially, it's all over Eberron! It's an actual game wide event.

A mystery! Where are they going to strike next? This information is not fed to us, so we have to figure it out ourselves, bringing (most) of the community together in cooperation to locate and drive back these alien forces.

Intent to spark cooperation. This event cannot be done completely by one person on a single character. It requires many over many level ranges to accomplish the tasks at hand (driving back the invading Illithid forces). I like this. It makes the game feel more like an actual world.

Negatives

Very little in game information. I do not like hand-holding, but there is so little information in game that it leaves most people lost and confused. I'm even ok with little or no hints to locations, but the only in game notification that something is happening is the changed skybox and global announcements that don't say anything truly pertinent that also only appear if you happen to be online when they happen. I'd have preferred an announcement the same way other events and areas unlock and start, with the GM narration, text, and public zone quest objective, and perhaps in game mail from the NPC we're supposed to talk to. Furthermore, having either the global announcements hint at the location of the one found, or have the NPC's dialogue update more regularly to include the location of invasion points already discovered would have gone a LONG way to alleviate player frustration.

Duration before exhaustion. If each phase increases the number of invaders that need to be killed to exhaust, because you start an invasion slow with scouts, then ramp up as needed, that makes sense. HOWEVER, phase 1 invasion kill requirement was SO LOW that very few people could actually participate in a way that felt like a real contribution. This meant that if you were living in the "right" timezone, were not online at a specific time, and were not lucky enough to happen upon a, invasion spawn point, you got left with disappointment and the feeling of being left behind. The day one "invasion" was so sparse and over so quickly that I lost interest in hunting for locations and didn't really do much for phase 2.

Having the time between invasion phases be 2 real word days, instead of based on a server's progress, while it can make sense from an invasion meta standpoint ('we're on a schedule and we're keeping to it" said an illithid Elder Brain somewhere), it really drags it unnecessarily and exasperates the above point, where only those in specific time zones online at specific times will be able to truly experience the event, everyone else is SOL and can only look at the sky and fight the thralls that may or may not actually do anything. There is no point exploring quests for potential invader spawn in locations because it all changes at a specific time of day every 2 days. Just wait for the timer to reset and do nothing still because only those online at that time get to enjoy the experience of searching, finding, sharing, building community, and killing them.

Progress updates. At the moment this is being done solely by the player base. Good for us, but the entire player base does not use the forums/discord/etc. There is no meaningful way to tell if killing the Psionic Thrall champions is doing anything or not. When an invasion point is exhausted, it only tells you when you approach it. Having this information more readily available (even if only via the NPC dialogue tree) would also help alleviate some frustration.

Using difficulty settings to facilitate level limits. Reaper was supposed to be a bonus and the game was not supposed to be balanced around it... yet here we are, using reaper as the central mechanic to this event. I consider myself a mid-reaper player, but I do not expect others to be fine with what was supposed to be a challenging option being "forced". It's one thing in hardcore, where that is the point (challenge for cosmetic rewards), it's another thing on softcore for an event given past statement about reaper not being what the game is balanced around.

Advertising pre-event. Again, I actually enjoy a good mystery and figuring stuff out in game. I'm not good with "press releases" containing easily misinterpreted information (is the event the level 34 quests? Are they just a reward? Will they unlock regardless of the event? Or will they only unlock on server that complete the event? Are the Cards only doing to drop during the event? Or are they part of the quests that will become permanent and thus the cards will be a permanent reward from them as well?)... I'm also not good with information being spread out across multiple platforms with certain details not appearing on them all (how long this will last, for example, was not included on the DDO website but was includes on other social media apps, and from what I hear those apps get more updates than the forums/main website news section does).

I'm sure there's a bunch I'm missing, but I've been staring at my screen for too long to think straight at the moment lol.

 

[Mordenkainen]

I think this needs to be mentioned again: please update and revamp Reaper so that it becomes a stream-lined "mainstream" part of the game.

Because Reaper is now defacto the "normal" way to play. I think more Reaper is now done then N/H/E in regular everyday gameplay. This event is tacit acknowledgment by the devs that Reaper is the norm and not the outlier.

 

[Kathwynn]

I think this needs to be mentioned again: please update and revamp Reaper so that it becomes a stream-lined "mainstream" part of the game.

Because Reaper is now defacto the "normal" way to play. I think more Reaper is now done then N/H/E in regular everyday gameplay. This event is tacit acknowledgment by the devs that Reaper is the norm and not the outlier.

The day the game goes completely reaper. Will be the same time I will reconsider my sub and whether I will continue to play.. Sorry, Reaper and me do not agree and there are players out there that feel the same. This game has a small enough game base as it is. It is not like WOW or Skyrim with a huge player base and budget to soak up that kind of loss. At least not in the short term. For many players reaper is not the normal. Nor will it ever be for player like myself. That is just my perspective and opinion. Your mileage may vary.

 

[Mordenkainen]

The day the game goes completely reaper. Will be the same time I will reconsider my sub and whether I will continue to play.. Sorry, Reaper and me do not agree and there are players out there that feel the same. This game has a small enough game base as it is. It is not like WOW or Skyrim with a huge player base and budget to soak up that kind of loss. At least not in the short term. For many players reaper is not the normal. Nor will it ever be for player like myself. That is just my perspective and opinion. Your mileage may vary.

So I used the word Revamp.

To spell it out:

Reaper Solo = Normal

Reaper Casual = Hard

Reaper Standard = Elite

Reaper Hard = Reaper 2 (old scale)

Reaper Extreme = Reaper 5

Reaper Insane = Reaper 7

Reaper God = Reaper 10

 

[Praun]

I think this needs to be mentioned again: please update and revamp Reaper so that it becomes a stream-lined "mainstream" part of the game.

Because Reaper is now defacto the "normal" way to play. I think more Reaper is now done then N/H/E in regular everyday gameplay. This event is tacit acknowledgment by the devs that Reaper is the norm and not the outlier.

You live in a bubble of Reaper players.
Almost everyone I play with doesn't do Reaper.

I'm glad it's there for those who like it, but please don't force that upon everyone or assume that everyone plays Reaper.

The day the game goes completely reaper. Will be the same time I will reconsider my sub and whether I will continue to play.. Sorry, Reaper and me do not agree and there are players out there that feel the same. This game has a small enough game base as it is. It is not like WOW or Skyrim with a huge player base and budget to soak up that kind of loss. At least not in the short term. For many players reaper is not the normal. Nor will it ever be for player like myself. That is just my perspective and opinion. Your mileage may vary.

YES!!

When they revamped the Epic Trees, which literally borked the versatility of ALL my alts, I dropped my VIP for almost 8 months. Forcing this overpowered (almost WOW-like) version of D&D on us, where a single player can do EVERY quest objective ... isn't a game I want to play.

I certainly won't pay to play one.

Since I've already invested money in most of the packs, I will still play, but if they force a Reaper playstyle on the whole game ... SSG won't get any more $$$ from this guy.

So I used the word Revamp.

To spell it out:

Reaper Solo = Normal

Reaper Casual = Hard

Reaper Standard = Elite

Reaper Hard = Reaper 2 (old scale)

Reaper Extreme = Reaper 5

Reaper Insane = Reaper 7

Reaper God = Reaper 10

... no, just no.

 

[Col Kurtz]

so , did a few r1 lvl32's w my buddy today w my Warlock...the Squid Champs seem to be High DR only to melee's.. ruin melts em like butter , and do force AOE spells do well when theres a few that spawn at once.

Im sure all the casters know this...it's just a bummer melee has to suffer w them when running solo

 

[vryxnr]

so , did a few r1 lvl32's w my buddy today w my Warlock...the Squid Champs seem to be High DR only to melee's.. ruin melts em like butter , and do force AOE spells do well when theres a few that spawn at once.

Im sure all the casters know this...it's just a bummer melee has to suffer w them when running solo

On the other side, they are immune to mind effects, so a casters normal method of crown control (mass hold, disco balls, prismatic spray) don't work... however, physical sources of crowd control DO work (stun, trip, etc).

 

[Col Kurtz]

On the other side, they are immune to mind effects, so a casters normal method of crown control (mass hold, disco balls, prismatic spray) don't work... however, physical sources of crowd control DO work (stun, trip, etc).

yup..adrenaline strikes knock em down 100% of time

 

[Sqrlmonger]

I am fine with most of the event aspects.

I just think the champs were a bit too much in several ways.

Too much physical damage mitigated (far more impactful than the save boost), too many champs converted (100%), and absolutely no benefit to the players immediately discernible.

I would make it so instead of 1/8th damage from melee with full stacks of their boost it was 1/4th and took twice as many stacks to reach that (i.e take longer to ramp up). I would only have half of champs convert into thralls instead of 100%, and I would have them spawn champ chests that provide a single random card for building a deck.

PS - There are definitely ways to kill them before they get stacks of their boost to minimize the pain they cause. But there are many times you just can't get to all of them fast enough. And then you have thee champ orange name with a giant sacs of HPs that are boring AF to kill. Overall it's genuinely just a poorly designed champ whose only redeeming quality is that they are (probably) going away after the event.

 

[seph1roth5]

The thrall champs are definitely beefier than normal champs. Maybe Fred could offer some kind of mind-flayer repellent? So people that don't want to deal with them could turn them off in non-extreme challenge quests? Would have to have everyone in the party have them I suppose.

It WAS a bit weird to have no reward of any kind. It also felt like the psionic thralls dropped chests/remnants at a MUCH lower rate, even though they spawned as frequently as champs. Would be neat to have a mind flayer coin/tentacle as currency and just have an event shop like mabar/snowpeaks/etc. Are we still missing a festive stat? Shouldn't be too hard to whip up some potions and other consumables, wouldn't need to be super fancy. Maybe more summon gems but lv 20 or 32 mindflayers or something.

 

[Kathwynn]

So I used the word Revamp.

To spell it out:

Reaper Solo = Normal

Reaper Casual = Hard

Reaper Standard = Elite

Reaper Hard = Reaper 2 (old scale)

Reaper Extreme = Reaper 5

Reaper Insane = Reaper 7

Reaper God = Reaper 10

Like I posted. Should SSG go through with that.. I will be making a decision. This is just a game among many.

 

[Mordenkainen]

You live in a bubble of Reaper players.
Almost everyone I play with doesn't do Reaper.

I'm glad it's there for those who like it, but please don't force that upon everyone or assume that everyone plays Reaper.

YES!!

When they revamped the Epic Trees, which literally borked the versatility of ALL my alts, I dropped my VIP for almost 8 months. Forcing this overpowered (almost WOW-like) version of D&D on us, where a single player can do EVERY quest objective ... isn't a game I want to play.

I certainly won't pay to play one.

Since I've already invested money in most of the packs, I will still play, but if they force a Reaper playstyle on the whole game ... SSG won't get any more $$$ from this guy.


... no, just no.

Dude... it's just a name change basically. You'll still be able to play N/H/E just get a bonus of Reaper Points at the end on top of XP etc.

 

[The_Apocalypse]

My main issue with the new quests is that they use mind flayers as the main antagonist. All of my melees have, at one time or another, died to the "mind flayer brain eat" instakill attack. Not sure what that ability is called (not seeing it on DDOwiki) or if there is a defense against it, other than playing a range- or spell-based character, but basing it all on an illithing adversary seems biased against melees.

Side note: If I am a warforged, how is a mind flayer "eating my brain"..?