U82 Preview 1 - Monster DR Rework

[l_remmie]

@Tonquin nice work so far. I'd hate to have sift through all the menusia on these boards for the few positive feedback posts.
@axel15810 gave the best short answer at 1 hour mark addressing how this will affect the newer player at low levels. I concur with him, and more to the point I think using the difficulty settings rather than a characters' level is the best approach.
What many of the forumites are forgetting, PnP and DDO are both about how be presented with a scenario and how to best deal with it. Most of us OLD school gamers will observe, adapt & overcome.
Any player that has relied on their single sentient weapon that has a gazillion buffs on it must now start looking at a 2nd or 3rd weapon. IMO a lot of the old weapons will now have more value to handle individual scenarios. Heroic and legendary greensteel are prob the easist way to get decent secondary weapons with specific DR breakers (just an example)
I think the baseline change is long overdue & staff should pursue more of these big swings to the game.

Forcing people to do the shroud another 600times will kill the game. Making LGS weapons is beyond grind.
DR should be advertised and decent methods to bypass it should be available for all players NOT just the whales.

 

[SpartanKiller13]

The alternative is a more reasonable implementation of DR. There's a happy middle ground between negligible DR and 50% but 50% is far too much.

Maybe make it a scaling % that is based on quest difficulty with 10% on casual/normal, 15% on hard, 20% on elite and 25% on R1 with +1% per skull above that.

That's one of the problems with SSG's design philosophies in general. Any time they try to correct something, they typically swing the pendulum much too far to the other side and end up creating the opposite of the problem they were fixing.

So you'd like higher BPS and lower everything else? Given basically everyone is running in Reaper. Works for me, I just don't want it low enough to ignore.

-30% sometimes but with a bunch of extra DS, better DS boosting, etc still leaves this as a significant overall buff IMO - at least how I build.

Not sure it's worth the coding hassle (now it's monster x difficulty instead of per-monster), but if it's easy I'm for it.

 

[nobodynobody1426]

I poked at this just to be sure and Karliath, Kor Kaza, and Aurgloroasa, each just have Dr/Magic. The Truthful One does indeed have Bludgeoning DR.

What other Raid boss's have that kind of DR? Those are the things with monstrous HP and while quest mobs getting double HP feels terribad, it won't end the game like doubling raid boss's HP will.

 

[Jaspar]

With the upcoming HC like lantern event, they'll get a lot of data on how new characters with fresh gear are effected by the DR changes (along with how the melee, caster, and ranged changes effect leveling). The event will probably be a gold mine of data.

We will pay attention. Will they?

Their history of listening to reasonable feedback doesnt bode well.

 

[jotmon]

~Snip~
Player DR is unchanged and will function how it does currently.
~snip~

this is bad.

Absorbing % is where it should be for mobs and players, currently bs like absorbing 10 DR when getting hit for 4k is pointless garbage,

With the changes happening it seems asinine to ignore player impact on DR and only focus on crippling damage to mobs without DR breakers.


We don't care for excuses or being ghosted as to why players are being ignored in this pass, we want a balanced playing field.

 

[Diaari]

What other Raid boss's have that kind of DR? Those are the things with monstrous HP and while quest mobs getting double HP feels terribad, it won't end the game like doubling raid boss's HP will.

Not sure if this is what you're asking but DR/magic just means that you need a magic weapon to break DR. AKA, you won't be breaking DR if you hit them with a masterwork long sword.

 

[Bjond]

What other Raid boss's have that kind of DR? Those are the things with monstrous HP and while quest mobs getting double HP feels terribad, it won't end the game like doubling raid boss's HP will.

Trash is what terrorizes and kills pugs and it's got DR.

If your team can keep a lid on trash and other mechs, you will eventually succeed. Most of our lead strategies revolve around taking care of trash so DPS can safely glue to a boss. If we give specific duties to players, it's for taking care of trash.

If you really want to "get gud" at a raid, find strategies for trash/mechs. Ripping the boss's head off and punting it through the goal posts before trash+mechs ziberizes everyone works, but it's not the only way to beat a raid.

I think that's the concern @Honkin raised by going through each raid to check for B/P/S and Bane. Tonquin confirmed there's nothing in a modern raid with that so your solution is to either add an arti to your group for buffs

My solution will be punt, not buff. Why? Buffing a pug for DR is a non-starter. There's a high likelihood they'll die and rebuffs are absolutely not happening. Then there's getting them to admit to needing a buff, which can only be done by gatekeeping the DR with "link your weapon".

If I have to gatekeep, I'll pick the one that breaks DR, not the one that I need to buff. Yes, there are enough hitting LFMs that we can pick and choose. If there are only non-breakers, I'll bring my bard-bot -- that's more help than 3x non-breakers.

I'll also take the easier route and insist on metalline+align to simplify gatekeeping rather than tracking and dealing with multiple individual DR breaks during raid night (which is a serial sequence that often has no pauses for recruiting more).

I expect raid LFMs will have "link your metalline" just to simplify the GK. Do the devs really want a player base that insists on metalline+aligned for every single weapon or it will be considered worthless junk?

Oh yeah, ain't we got fun now. So. Much. Fun.

 

[SandeebaRezYouriOfSarlona]

Weird, I don't remember that part of game design classes and none of my mentors ever ascribed to that thought process

but i'm sure they were just all wrong

As I've spent over 25 years of studying RPGs and their mechanics specifically in an academic way out of a belief that their should be academic field of study dedicated

This change is about incorporating 5e rules into DDO, which is based on 3.5e. In 3.5e DR acted as a flat reduction in damage if you didn't have specific types like magic / blunt / good / etc, it was a barrier players had to overcome to deal damage to a monster. In 5e this was changed to damage resistance, where a monster took half damage from specific sources or if certain conditions were not met. They are radically different systems and not interchangable.

The problems here is that the SSG developers are trying to convert DDO's 3.5e system into the 5e system without redoing all the 3.5e DR that already exists. This is terrible and introduces all the insane issues like many monsters having DR /- and therefor having an unbreakable 50% global damage reduction. It also introduces the issues of base weapon types (PBS) being non-interchangeable and unfairly penalizing entire playstyles and classes. Most everyone is going to lose their sentient gems the moment they switch from slashing to blunt, or piercing to slashing and so forth.

Uh, in 3.5 the while point was for the physical damage types to NOT be interchangeable.
In fact, the whole DR system was about "needing the right tool for the job." At the time 3.x was designed, a player would be an idiot for using exclusively a single weapon. Yes, specializing in a single weapon was absolutely valuable, but players had to maintain versatility because their main shtick being countered was guaranteed to occur. Never be a one trick pony.

DR was a complex system behind the scene to make for a pokemon types like system of rewarding correct attack types while also allowing different weapons to interact differently.

Using DR as a flat percentage subverts everything the DR system was designed to do. So I can agree that the proposed DR changes are horrible.

I also note that DR has not worked properly in many years.

 

[f1b041b3]

To combat the DR, we will have to change weapons types, not just a case of making a different weapon type and fill it with sentience. One way to help, will be to get rid of heroic feats improved critical slashing\piercing\bludgening and replace it with improved critical(that applys to all) Otherwise we are giving up what well could be 25% damage, by losing the crit profile to these individual feats, just to beat DR for an extra 25% damage. Also as far as i know, there are alignment augments we can use, but no slashing\piercing\bludgening augments, these have to be added, or in essence, you are just adding 25% HP to mobs and raid bosses that already have 10 million+ hp. Dont add extra feats for these bypasses as certain classes are feat starved anyways

While consolidating improved critical feats and enhancements would be a welcome change, swaps, especially for weapons of different types, would still be a huge dps loss for many builds. Take swf vkf for example - if you're not using a dagger or kukri, you automatically lose at a minimum 5% attack speed, 20% doublestrike, 20 melee power, several points of attack and damage, +1[W], and any bonuses from being centered if you splash monk.

Even if you're on a build that's a little more flexible, it doesn't change the fact that needing a "golf bag" of dr breakers is an exercise in tedium. People accept added challenge when it's enjoyable and equitable, so find another way.

 

[Lordpiglet]

I think that's the concern @Honkin raised by going through each raid to check for B/P/S and Bane. Tonquin confirmed there's nothing in a modern raid with that so your solution is to either add an arti to your group for buffs (you probably had on already on repeater) or bring scrolls to use on PUGs. I don't think its that big of a deal for moderately coordinated pugs. For uncoordinated ones yeah I could metal/algin being an issue.

Tonquin only checked some raid boss. A raid like threats has multiple red names bosses that have to be dealt with, sometimes in small groups. The marilith should have a DR (good/cold iron) and the skeletons have bludgeon. Bludgeon,good,cold iron may be all you need, but the wiki doesn't have DR information.

 

[Sarlona Raiding]

Thank you! I will update the wiki. I was going off the entry for dracolich and not actually running around whacking them to check.

Yeah generally you would expect dr/bludgeoning there and that is what the wiki said when I checked. But since most ranged have blunt in the quiver, it's not something that it would be easy to identify unless you don't break blunt dr already.

Your strawman doesn't hold up. If someone doesn't know (or care) they need a DR breaking weapon, then they're likely already doing subpar damage. 50% of subpar damage is a non-contributor. And how do they learn they need DR? Because raid leaders ask them for it. Just like raid leaders ensuring multiple players who aren't gonna be a soulstone can break light DR in Relentless.

I've joined hundreds of Relentless raids and have never once been asked if I can break light dr. The majority of the time there is a paladin tank and it's automatic, but I have been in raids with fighter or barbarian tanks where it's fully reliant on shiradi procs and there are short phases of dr followed by longer phases with no damage reduction. There is definitely no consistent ongoing light damage sometimes and currently it goes fine when that happens.

The issue raised shouldn't be ignored. As raid leaders we will do our best to educate people, but the # of open spots varies from 0 some weeks to 6 open spots every so often. Alot of the random people joining aren't interested in using discord which is fine. And I have to figure out all the details for many raids and many enemies in those raids. I just checked wiki yesterday for threats and learned it's already wrong about the boss requiring bludgeoning dr.

Everyone has their own style but I am not going to come down on someone that isn't breaking dr. I will note that our dps is low and what is needed to bypass the dr. If it gets to the point where I have to be picky, I won't be running raids because I was in a leadership role at work for many years and didn't like coming down on people then even when it was absolutely necessary and appropriate - I certainly don't want to do it when I am trying to have fun and people simply don't have the information or time to make all the necessary changes the day this release is out.

Presumably the core of the raiding group and a decent percentage of pug raiders will break dr and if so we are probably fine, but this change definitely introduces a risk that raid leaders get frustrated and raiders get frustrated if things don't go well.

I have been raiding and leading raids for many years. There is zero chance 100% of people joining raids are going to break dr unless SSG makes it easier. It may improve as time marches on, but a few years from now it will still be an issue that may or may not get noticed depending on how overall group dps is.

I think what I am going to start doing is discussing with our core group what dr all the enemies have and trying to figure that out. And ask people to help identify all the sources of dr.

From what I can tell the big 4 are going to be good, silver, cold iron and adamantine. That will cover most of the 50% dr situations. For PN who cares about quaspiel because half the time it dies too quick and regens anyhow. There might be other angels in the new raid - we will have to figure that out to see if we need evil.

Buy my thinking is to tell people to prioritize silver, cold iron and adamantine and I will play an arti for a considerable time and grant alignment to everyone where it's needed. But as a group we need to firm up what dr breaking is needed and put out a small guide for people - my guess is one will be in the wiki and/or someone will work hard to be the first person to publish a doc on it.

Easy button solution is making your main weapon viktranium with cold iron + good and then a deconstructor for adamantine and an augment or feat for silver. It may not be optimal, but alot of people are looking for easy and that is easy.

 

[Ilvati]

Tonquin only checked some raid boss. A raid like threats has multiple red names bosses that have to be dealt with, sometimes in small groups. The marilith should have a DR (good/cold iron) and the skeletons have bludgeon. Bludgeon,good,cold iron may be all you need, but the wiki doesn't have DR information.

Fair enough. I do think we need a way to see DR type on the mobs.

 

[Ilvati]

My solution will be punt, not buff. Why? Buffing a pug for DR is a non-starter. There's a high likelihood they'll die and rebuffs are absolutely not happening. Then there's getting them to admit to needing a buff, which can only be done by gatekeeping the DR with "link your weapon".

If I have to gatekeep, I'll pick the one that breaks DR, not the one that I need to buff. Yes, there are enough hitting LFMs that we can pick and choose. If there are only non-breakers, I'll bring my bard-bot -- that's more help than 3x non-breakers.

I can see plenty of people going that route. I agree on the barb bot (but that's what I do now....). I'll probably make an arti on my third account to help guildies that need DR for a given raid on a TR life-- I assume I'm not alone in this plan either.

 

[Seppi Pearlsmith]

Haven't played for awhile, came back to this ***.
Well... another several months of break incoming.

 

[Chacka]

Just to mention it: I hope you don't break the Titan raid with this change to the DR system. Other possible issues are gargoyles in general, who get 100/- DR when they start to regenerate – maybe that should be replaced with 100 % DR against all physical damage instead. And I wonder what happens to mummies and barbarians, who also get an xx/- DR.

 

[Shadow]

This update is awesome however these dr changes in theory are nice i want monster dr to matter but the current reduction is too high should be capped at 25% for good silver chaotic etc, and be around 10% for bludgeoning slashing piercing or you need to make DR Bypass options in enhancements to make up for the fact we cannot swap because of sentient weapons.

 

[mikarddo]

this is bad.

Absorbing % is where it should be for mobs and players, currently bs like absorbing 10 DR when getting hit for 4k is pointless garbage,

With the changes happening it seems asinine to ignore player impact on DR and only focus on crippling damage to mobs without DR breakers.


We don't care for excuses or being ghosted as to why players are being ignored in this pass, we want a balanced playing field.

Balanced playing field? Now, do you really?

As a a player my kill ratio is likely well above 1000:1. A balanced field would make it close to 1:1.

I most certainly do not want that and thus asking for a balance playing field vs mobs is completely off the table.

Mobs are weak so the players do not need a large buff.

 

[The Being]

Just to mention it: I hope you don't break the Titan raid with this change to the DR system. Other possible issues are gargoyles in general, who get 100/- DR when they start to regenerate – maybe that should be replaced with 100 % DR against all physical damage instead. And I wonder what happens to mummies and barbarians, who also get an xx/- DR.

Barbarians are a great thing to remember actually.
Once upon a time in the very near past (Update 39 wasn't even a decade ago!) player barbarians still had flat DR too. Game had scaled in damage to the point where that wasn't a huge help so they changed it to a percentage reduction, starting with DR 1/- (at second level) changed to 3% reduction and +1% for each additional barbarian DR beyond that. Many monsters still retain flat DRs that are inconsequential in current play, while some monsters have been tuned to have DR's that matter a bit more (like gargoyles when they shield up for healing).

Something similar should be in play for monsters where the magnitude of the DR also matters (beyond just selecting which penalty to apply in case of multiple DRs), and the start can be offset at a higher value than the scaling per point of DR. Perhaps starting at 20% and scaling to 50% as the numbers get higher. This obviously leaves the design open for effects that reduce or bypass x amount of the DR of monsters too (but consider carefully if they should be complicating gear tetris!)

---
Does this system have any consideration for Normal or Hard difficulties which have specifically easier time dealing with high DR enemies currently on live? (failing to deal damage through DR still allows for 50% or 25% damage respectively)

It sounds like this system is going to bring those difficulties to parity with Elite/Reaper, which may or may not be an increase in difficulty.

 

[The Narc2]

Fair enough. I do think we need a way to see DR type on the mobs.

I do think this would be a good suggestion considering the diversity of mobs currently in the game, and a way to make it easier for newer players to learn the dr breakers needed.

 

[Dandonk]

I do think this would be a good suggestion considering the diversity of mobs currently in the game, and a way to make it easier for newer players to learn the dr breakers needed.

Unlocked through the Monster Manual would make sense... oh, wait...