U60 Preview of Preview 2 Lammania XP Changes

[somenewnoob]

Torc

i hope you remeber to delete sprint boost number 1 tool of zerg's
rember about abundant step from monk
sprining attack and sprining attack from tabaxi iconc ( dont worry most ppl bought it so you can nerf )

Heh yep. I just did a few heroics 14/2/2 wiz/barb/rogue and invis + blood tribute + sprint boost..... zoom zoom!

 

[somenewnoob]

I think i remember something like this happening. Alot of the player base left for an extended period.

I can say I spent some time installing some other games yesterday when it was clear that this was the path they are going, feedback be damned. Even if I don't stop entirely, going to be playing a lot less.

But like I said earlier......if they wanted to slow progression.......people not wanting to play the game.......WIN!

 

[Kritikal]

I can say I spent some time installing some other games yesterday when it was clear that this was the path they are going, feedback be damned. Even if I don't stop entirely, going to be playing a lot less.

But like I said earlier......if they wanted to slow progression.......people not wanting to play the game.......WIN!

That's one way to combat lag.

a. XP changes go through
b. people quit
c. less people on server
d. less lag.

On a different (although similar), note, roughly 60 pages of posts deriding this change. This takes into account the (roughly) 5 posts that are ok with this change. I believe that surpasses the IPS nerf thread.

 

[Dunspartacus]

Wow 60 pages of posts for U60, it would be thematic if it wasn't so worrying. That aside I heard an interesting suggestion from someone I was in a group with the other day, not sure if it's been mentioned here. Why not make optionals add a % increase to quest end exp similar to how conquest/ransack/tamper work? Like say in the quest sacrifices killing the arcane skeleton could increase the final exp by 5% or whatever number is reasonable for how long/difficult the optional is. No idea if thats feasible, just thought it would be more incentivizing than the amount they give now.

 

[Fisto Mk I]

I believe that surpasses the IPS nerf thread.

IPS nerf led to the fact that the players almost completely stopped using the IPS.
XP nerf will cause players, at least some part, to stop playing and leave the game.
If it's target for SSG... well, then good played!

 

[Mordenkainen]

Wow 60 pages of posts for U60, it would be thematic if it wasn't so worrying. That aside I heard an interesting suggestion from someone I was in a group with the other day, not sure if it's been mentioned here. Why not make optionals add a % increase to quest end exp similar to how conquest/ransack/tamper work? Like say in the quest sacrifices killing the arcane skeleton could increase the final exp by 5% or whatever number is reasonable for how long/difficult the optional is. No idea if thats feasible, just thought it would be more incentivizing than the amount they give now.

Solid idea, never thought of optionals that way. It's kinda stupid you get random xp in the middle of a quest. Make Optionals give bonuses to the overall final xp.

Sadly, they've already decided what they're going to do weeks ago.

Mark my words. None. None of the suggestions here will be implemented in the final draft. The final draft was completed weekes if not months ago.

 

[calouscaine]

Solid idea, never thought of optionals that way. It's kinda stupid you get random xp in the middle of a quest. Make Optionals give bonuses to the overall final xp.

Sadly, they've already decided what they're going to do weeks ago.

Mark my words. None. None of the suggestions here will be implemented in the final draft. The final draft was completed weekes if not months ago.

I think you might be right there. There hasn't really been any acknowledgement of really any of the ideas presented forth, just some changes to the original numbers. So I am betting they are just going to do what they already have in the works regardless. . .which makes me wonder why they posted a discussion for it in the first place.

 

[Spook]

Of course they were the engineering was done already - best we can hope for is a change in numbers or a delay in release.

 

[somenewnoob]

Of course they were the engineering was done already - best we can hope for is a change in numbers or a delay in release.

And worth repeating.......all that work was already done by the time this was posted.......all that work, coming up with the plan, coding, etc...........all done while they DIDNT KNOW you couldn't get conquest in many many quests!

 

[Sarlona Raiding]

So its now based around Agression bonus instead of conquest.

Correct me if I am wrong, maybe its me not comprehending properly? If I run quests on Elite.

So in quests I normally zip through, if I stick about to get the required (now 25%) kills for aggression, I still lose 80% XP?
(Old 95% First Time gone+10% Old aggression=105%).

And in quests I normally zip through, if I stick about to get Onslaught (now 50% kills) I still lose 60% XP?
(Old 95% First Time gone+15% Old Onslaught=110%).

If I run them on Reaper difficulty, due to the bravery +50% extra, then the loss goes down to -30% if I achieve agression, and -10% if I achieve Onslaught.

All this assumes I spend extra time in the dungeon. Just checking if I am missing something, as extra time spent for less XP sounds even worse than extra time spent for the same XP.

We will really need to wait until the next preview to understand the full scope of changes since the following is not included in this preview:

1) Torc is planning to make it easier to hit each monster bonus tier
2) Some tech debt is being removed so that conquest will be available in all or nearly all quests

Those changes will significantly impact the math - not only because it will be easier to hit conquest resulting in a 30% increase in xp vs hitting conquest now, but because we should be hitting higher monster tiers in many more quests.

So in the worst case scenario of hitting no monster tier at all you lose 45%, but that seems unlikely with the planned changes. In the best case scenario you are gaining 55% in cases where no monster bonus was possible, but now you can get conquest bonus.

For example in eyes of stone today the most common outcome is discreet bonus for 5% extra xp. With these changes conquest will be possible so if you hit conquest you lose 5% discreet, lose 95% first-time, lose bravery 100%, gain delving 150%, gain conquest 100% for a net gain of 50%. If you only achieve onslaught you would break even and if you get aggression you lose 25% and with no bonus at all you lose 50% (which is actually the real worse case - losing discreet/devious and getting no additional bonus - but that seems unlikely for most players to me).

I am an optimist looking at that possible 50% gain, but when I test eyes of stone out next preview I'll post my results. I do kill alot of enemies in there but typically skip 2 optionals in there plus some enemies in the library depending how quickly I find the salve. So I want to see what the #s are next preview the way I run it now vs the extra kills.

I suspect the carrot will win and most players will end up earning more xp and improve xp/min vs. today, but again I am an optimist by nature and looking at that upside potential which I am almost always able to find and achieve when the community is complaining about something.

 

[Spook]

You give them too much credit. Unless they can do something systematically they are not going to go through every quest in the game and calculate the numbers of mobs on the critical path. They will pick out a handful of outliers eg Von Chain, Tangleroot, castle ravenloft and the rest will be left alone as it would be an enormous task to do it properly.

Remember any time you deviate from the critical path it is less xp/min even with the proposed changes

 

[Rull]

Wow 60 pages of posts for U60, it would be thematic if it wasn't so worrying. That aside I heard an interesting suggestion from someone I was in a group with the other day, not sure if it's been mentioned here. Why not make optionals add a % increase to quest end exp similar to how conquest/ransack/tamper work? Like say in the quest sacrifices killing the arcane skeleton could increase the final exp by 5% or whatever number is reasonable for how long/difficult the optional is. No idea if thats feasible, just thought it would be more incentivizing than the amount they give now.

That's... what optional XP is? Optional XP is already defined as factor of base XP.
Killing the arcane skeleton in Sacrifices gives 20% of the quest XP.

Like you suggest, it's additive, meaning that if you get +80% bravery +100% first time and +25% conquest, the +20% from the Arcane Skeleton is simply added to that.

The difference with conquest xp is that optionals get their XP rewarded instantly (instead of 325% of 540 = 1755xp at the end, you get 20% of 540 = 108xp right now and 1647xp on quest finish) and optional XP doesn't reward reaper XP. But as far as non-reaper XP goes, the end result is the same 1647+108 = 1755.

The reason optionals are relatively bad XP is because the other bonuses are so high. You get +300% from all kinds of bonuses, so 400% total, and an increase from 400% to 420% just isn't much.

 

[Neain]

You give them too much credit. Unless they can do something systematically they are not going to go through every quest in the game and calculate the numbers of mobs on the critical path. They will pick out a handful of outliers eg Von Chain, Tangleroot, castle ravenloft and the rest will be left alone as it would be an enormous task to do it properly.

Remember any time you deviate from the critical path it is less xp/min even with the proposed changes

Realistically it's not doom, and based on their past performance these last couple of years I'm gonna go and predict that it's not gonna be nearly as doomy as we all are afraid of, but also won't meet the expectations of our full optimists. I would have rather seen a bunch of the different things proposed to slow us down in a quest, but this seems to be what they are going to go with. let's calm down a little and wait to cry doom until the next preview drops and things are a bit more clear.

 

[Dunspartacus]

Realistically it's not doom, and based on their past performance these last couple of years I'm gonna go and predict that it's not gonna be nearly as doomy as we all are afraid of, but also won't meet the expectations of our full optimists. I would have rather seen a bunch of the different things proposed to slow us down in a quest, but this seems to be what they are going to go with. let's calm down a little and wait to cry doom until the next preview drops and things are a bit more clear.

Thats fair, until we see what the final numbers look like we don't know if this will even wind up being a negative, heck maybe the numbers will be in our favor after some tuning. Hopefully we get some new info soon.

 

[Griglok (Karatemack)]

I know others have commented on this, but I wanted to reinforce that another positive change the development team could consider would be to provide a wider level range before applying XP penalties. This applies in two ways:

1. From the Wiki:
   
   
   
   Can you adjust this so that you can run with a character up to 5 or 6 levels above your own in heroics?
   
   
   
2. From the Wiki:
   
   
   
   Can you adjust this so that you can be +3 over the quests effective level without adjustments to xp?
   
   These changes would go a long way to encourage grouping and would have the added bonus of de-segregating the game a bit. Right now, the level spreads are so wide apart from 1 - 32 that it's difficult to stick with a solid group of 6 throughout an entire life due to real life conflicts with playtime. Changes like this would also make some of the other XP adjustments more palatable, especially if coupled with permanent buddy boosts.

​

 

[Ahpuch]

...

So in the worst case scenario of hitting no monster tier at all you lose 45%, but that seems unlikely with the planned changes. In the best case scenario you are gaining 55% in cases where no monster bonus was possible, but now you can get conquest bonus.

For example in eyes of stone today the most common outcome is discreet bonus for 5% extra xp. With these changes conquest will be possible so if you hit conquest you lose 5% discreet, lose 95% first-time, lose bravery 100%, gain delving 150%, gain conquest 100% for a net gain of 50%. If you only achieve onslaught you would break even and if you get aggression you lose 25% and with no bonus at all you lose 50% (which is actually the real worse case - losing discreet/devious and getting no additional bonus - but that seems unlikely for most players to me).

Getting the best XP seems optimistic to me. And to get that you will need to spend more time going off track. And those that like to use their stealth skills, Social Skills, or quest knowledge* to avoid fights will definitely get the worst case scenario or have to change their game play from what works today. So if you play an AOE capable character it maybe be no worse. But some characters, who are playing the way the game has been intended to now, will do noticeably worse. I don't think those characters should be penalized by a questionable change.


* Note - I am not talking about generating Aggro and ignoring it. I am talking about avoiding mob aggro entirely through various means in the game.

 

[Falkor]

I made an account only to come here and share my perspective. That is how strongly I feel about these upcoming changes, and how bad I believe they are. It's as bad as I've ever seen, and SSG has taught me how to have tempered expectations.

In game, there has not been one single player who has expressed anything positive about this change.

It's a universally hated change.

It makes people spend more time in quests that they have already run a hundred times or more.

- Please explain how forcing people to go slower through content they've already played is a wise business choice?
- Please explain how bulling forward with this plan will increase the player population?
- Please explain what exactly the goals with this update are, because there has been zero clarity and moving goal posts.
- Please explain why you would implement these changes when the overwhelming majority of players are against it?
- Please explain your decision making process about the game, when you have admitted you don't really play it or know it?

Most of all, please explain how these changes improve the FUN and ENJOYABILITY of the game for a wide variety of people who approach it differently? Especially when almost everyone is against those changes?

Is this another all-too-common instance where SSG has already made its choices and is going to force this down our throats regardless?

Or will this be one of the rare instances where SSG actually listens, and in doing so, regain some trust and respect with the DDO community?

Speaking for myself, I'm already playing far less than I was a year ago. And while I won't quit playing if these changes go through, I certainly won't be leveling up alts or going through the grind cycle. My plan is to leave my end game alts there, and have a few toons to run with friends for grins when I feel like logging in. I'll be joining the ranks of weekend raiders and am otherwise done.

I simply refuse to use more time to play the same content repeatedly. It's already a horrible grind that I don't really enjoy, just tolerate. What makes it enjoyable is running content with friends. But most people are grinding up one toon, and its rare to be in the same level ranges as my friends to be able to group with them. With the increase in level cap and growing spread in levels, it's gotten even more difficult.

I also have not spent any money on this game since Feywild because there are too many decisions that waste the time of players. Utterly destroying peoples TIME AND EFFORT, their very life, making that worthless ... is a horrid way to treat people and disgustingly disrespectful. Until that attitude changes, and subsequent decisions about how to treat the customer base also change, I will never spend another dollar on this game.

I'm not the only one, and if SSG takes a moment to read the tone of this thread, there will be many more joining the non-paying-player-club.

For the love of Lloth, do some basic marketing. Do some basic research. You people are missing out on so many opportunities that it's a storm of facepalms. And then you cry about having no money.

It's because you don't do the basic sales and due diligence to bring it in. You don't listen to the player base. Any marketing junior in college can observe these basic practices and SSG's lack of them and the predictable results.

Really simple business decisions. But decision making at SSG seems, at best, critically flawed.

 

[Kimbere]

Kind of funny how many people still don't seem to realize that Lammania is NOT a test server.

It's a preview server, which in SSG's case generally means that's how they give us a sneak peak of what nerfs and bugs they're getting ready to screw us over with.

By the time it hits Lammania, it's pretty much a done deal. We're lucky if they even bother to make minor tweaks to anything there before it goes live, no matter how much constructive and/or negative feedback they get on Lammania and here on the forums.

If they truly cared about the community's feedback, they'd solicit it while a change was still in the idea or planning stage versus waiting until after they've already sunk dev time into changing the code and putting it on Lammania. They never do and that should tell everyone exactly how much they really value our opinions and feedback.

 

[Falkor]

Kimbere, there have been a very few rare instances where population outcry has gotten them to reconsider and make changes. I can only count the number of times that has happened on one hand. Let's not hold our breath, yet hope for the best.

 

[Kimbere]

Kimbere, there have been a very few rare instances where population outcry has gotten them to reconsider and make changes. I can only count the number of times that has happened on one hand. Let's not hold our breath, yet hope for the best.

You are correct. There are exceptions and outliers, but as a whole, SSG's track record on things like this is pretty bad.

Sure, I hope for the best, but there's a saying about that. Hope for the best, plan for the worst.

Typically, SSG lands on the plan for the worst side of the equation.