So... no balance changes for U78?
- Thread starter cocopufff
- Start date
Sarlona Raiding
Well-known member
It sounds like they are planning to do something, but they didn't have the plans flushed out enough to include in the producer's letter.
Timeline is TBD.
Timeline is TBD.
J1NG
I can do things others can't...
Any pass for spellcasting is going to be a huge undertaking, since it means even if done in batches rather than all in one go, you need to have a plan for change on a scale that covers a large variety of classes, at least half of which can "cast" a spell of some kind that may want changes to not be deadweight in terms of use. And that's if they just change things without creating anything new, to say nothing of getting it all done in one go.
If they finally see that they need more spells, then new spells will need to be made too. And spell graphics, spell effects, which spellbooks, etc all need to be done and that won't be a quick thing, even with a plan in place.
Given this update is way too soon for something that's this encompassing, I would imagine that we won't be getting anything regarding casting balance changes out for this upcoming Anniversary update.
J1NG
If they finally see that they need more spells, then new spells will need to be made too. And spell graphics, spell effects, which spellbooks, etc all need to be done and that won't be a quick thing, even with a plan in place.
Given this update is way too soon for something that's this encompassing, I would imagine that we won't be getting anything regarding casting balance changes out for this upcoming Anniversary update.
J1NG
Smokewolf
Frequently banned member.
More likely that there is no answer.
It's a bit weird to me to think they haven't been working on casters at all this whole time. Your comment implies that they would just be starting this, but it's not like complaints about the state of casters is new. They've been promising an Archmage pass for literal years at this point.
Blaster
Well-known member
DDO’s year was set back in December if not November. Any real pass would be an undertaking that’d impact a year’s plans, so odds are we won’t see anything resembling like what players have suggested until 2027 at least.
If you read the post on the Producer’s Letter, you’ll see Tolero address other long-standing tweaks like a reaper pass and how they didn’t make it into this year’s schedule.
Honestly, what happens in DDO is up to the dev team’s desires, not the players. I didn’t see anyone specifically clamoring for a drow graphic pass, but we’re getting that first because that’s what the devs want. It’s their game, not ours.
If you read the post on the Producer’s Letter, you’ll see Tolero address other long-standing tweaks like a reaper pass and how they didn’t make it into this year’s schedule.
Honestly, what happens in DDO is up to the dev team’s desires, not the players. I didn’t see anyone specifically clamoring for a drow graphic pass, but we’re getting that first because that’s what the devs want. It’s their game, not ours.
Alternative
Sarcasm elemental
Listen here, casters were nerfed because they were clearing rooms on r10, which was making barbarian players mad. Do you really want to have mad barbarians around??
Lazuli
Well-known member
barbarians are always mad anyway.
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If the caster pass is going to take a long time, the strange thing is that they are not already reserving time for it, since otherwise they will not be able to include it this year. And if they are going to do it in small steps, why isn't there a small change in each update. Starting with the r7+ nerf. That doesn't take long to change.
Lagin
Well-known member
From a common sense PoV, they have limited resources, eg, the 2026' expansion is partly based on assets already in-game. Makes pefect sense. Is it what we want? Most likely not.
As to any balance issues, look at the last 5 years, melee sucked, casters ruled. in comes a balance push. Now we're on the other side of that knife blade.
I totally agree with your stement "it's their game" and to go back to my point about available resources, that is the reason why.
I for one am happy they're still open. So I'll take that vs maintenance mode any day.
They didn't talk about the balance pass for Finesse-based weapons in their 2025 producer's letter, it seems odd to say that no discussion there = no plans or changes.
A mage balance pass doesn't have to be a massive undertaking. Sure, doing it completely would, but there are a lot of little incremental changes that would take little to no development time. Raising damage on underperforming spells (all the force ones for example), adding a strip for necro clerics/wizards, raising MCL on key divine spells to make their scaling better, giving Epic Strikes more damage, replacing Exalted Angel's SLAs with better ones... none of these are hard and none take much time at all.
Torc
Systems Developer
So I can't really get to much into it since everyone is very busy with the 20th anniversary but I'll try to sum up the situation. This probably going to be a fire and forget post (at least for a week or two), so sorry if I don't follow up much till after the next patch.
1> The casting system is really big and complicated to touch, so working on it takes a larger chunk of time compared to other things.
2> We've been in a bit of a time crunch because we had to throw so many cycles last year at figuring out lag, and we still aren't quite done with that, and are still digging out as we try to hit the typical milestones of "hey new stuff" every x months.
3> There is an extra complexity that the reaper system has been supporting the "We are a large powerful group of adventurers who want to be challenged". It's aged a bit. More and more players are pushing into it as a solo environment at high skulls and we want to preserve the top as "it's really good idea to party here" place in the game for general content. It mostly still is with some dungeons at least. Anyway there is a desire to review reaper, maybe add some features and move the global reaper player relationship around which would affect how we might move the player to player relationships around.
4> We are gonna try to break things up so things get to you quickly. The soonest thing will probably be some spell school DC relief so we're still figuring out the amount and how it's located in meta. There is much more we want to do, but again, don't want to get into it yet because we aren't sure how it'll all break out yet.
-T
1> The casting system is really big and complicated to touch, so working on it takes a larger chunk of time compared to other things.
2> We've been in a bit of a time crunch because we had to throw so many cycles last year at figuring out lag, and we still aren't quite done with that, and are still digging out as we try to hit the typical milestones of "hey new stuff" every x months.
3> There is an extra complexity that the reaper system has been supporting the "We are a large powerful group of adventurers who want to be challenged". It's aged a bit. More and more players are pushing into it as a solo environment at high skulls and we want to preserve the top as "it's really good idea to party here" place in the game for general content. It mostly still is with some dungeons at least. Anyway there is a desire to review reaper, maybe add some features and move the global reaper player relationship around which would affect how we might move the player to player relationships around.
4> We are gonna try to break things up so things get to you quickly. The soonest thing will probably be some spell school DC relief so we're still figuring out the amount and how it's located in meta. There is much more we want to do, but again, don't want to get into it yet because we aren't sure how it'll all break out yet.
-T
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Leesun
Well-known member
Blessed Torc, may you at least say if Archmage and/or Arcanotechnician are being considered for a pass?
That also has to do with quest design, if all of the are mostly designed to just dps everything don't requiring any other role to success, some builds will be able to solo them on high skulls. Increasing mob HP is not enough for some builds.
cdbd3rd
Well-known member
Blaster
Well-known member
Today on Fridays at Four, Tolero reiterated what Torc said and there's balance stuff coming, it just couldn't be locked down to a specific timeframe so it was left off the Producer's Letter. She didn't know if it'd come out in chunks or all at once, but if Torc says in chunks, I'd be inclined to believe him, but things can change.
Reaper trees are also being looked at by (newer) members of the team, but it's not clear how connected that work would be to caster or other balance work. It's possible what Tolero mentioned was stand-alone. (Again no timeframe, thus not in the Producer's Letter.)
Reaper trees are also being looked at by (newer) members of the team, but it's not clear how connected that work would be to caster or other balance work. It's possible what Tolero mentioned was stand-alone. (Again no timeframe, thus not in the Producer's Letter.)
Thanks for shedding light on what's going on behind the scenes, greatly appreciated!
Nickodeamous
Well-known member
I personally think that casters need a pass. It doesnt need to be relegated to "hey melee guy, open the door, so I can one shot the mob in the next room". I think we are past the time where we need to just revert the R7+ nerf. That was a sledgehammer when you added in the crappy adj to the EDs. Honestly, i was all kitted out on my second main to run one of the behemouth casters, including dino crafted items, attuned weapons, etc and then the proverbial sledgehammer hit, which honestly forced me to try something else (which I am very happy with, but still loved the idea of having 1 melee, 1 caster, and 1 tank, which was my original plan).
I dont like changing builds. It's not my thing. I really wanted to have a second main as a caster. But alas, it's very good for racials, but endgame is utter meh to me. Im sure some are still decent, but from what I have seen in the raids as of late, better luck next time if you wanna play as a caster. SSG should really put some time into buffing them.
I dont like changing builds. It's not my thing. I really wanted to have a second main as a caster. But alas, it's very good for racials, but endgame is utter meh to me. Im sure some are still decent, but from what I have seen in the raids as of late, better luck next time if you wanna play as a caster. SSG should really put some time into buffing them.