What are somethings that would increase your goodwill towards the game?

[Yeet]

Gordo understands. Without serious change, what we are witnessing may not be 'the end' of ddo... but a long-drawn out dying horse being beaten by Dandok while exclaiming 'Why isn't MM repaired?!'

When it comes down to it, I have the exact same perspective as Gordo. IMO, DDO's only chance at longevity is to be purchased by a dedicated team that loves this game and has the vision, resources and skills to promote it and take it further.

Ideally one that isn't beholden to share holders ... I think that is one of the biggest issues facing this team. The profits are going to shareholders instead of being re-invested into this IP.

The way it is, isn't working. And has barely worked for a while.

Carthage is on fire, and Nero is playing violin.

 

[Oliphant]

Teleporters to MD quests.

 

[Titus Ovid]

A massive increase of the quality threshold across the board and a change in the management strategy.

Titus.

 

[Fizban]

Since the game is unplayable on some servers, and they might be looking to do some PR, what are somethings you would like the developers do/work on?

Personally, I want to see old content getting updated to match the current standards, like every update just give an older pack some refreshed items, and to see the developers be more transparent with how some of their systems work, particularly around drop rates.

I am not a super fan of refreshing old content however, I would be ok with adding epic or legendary raids to old heroic raids. I think that old content has value at its level and should remain as is overall.

What I would like to see:

• Continue adding new content to include just a few singlular standalone quests.
• Additional expansion into Forgotten Realms to include a new city maybe the size of Tantris, Waterdeep, Shadowdale, or the biggest city in Cormyr
• I think that all quests should eventually be migrated to having 40% or more of its total XP come from optionals. Example: Quest A gives a total of 100,000 XP (60,000 from base quest completion & 40,000 from all optionals)

 

[Ungermax]

The XP grind will never be changed. That IS the game. When someone stops chasing a mythical end goal, just playing is great and XP matters less.

The XP curve is set this way to encourage sales of tomes, XP pots and other boosts. It's deliberate to provoke sales.

Hell will freeze over and be ruled by flying pigs before the XP curve is changed.

So you're saying there's a chance....

 

[Archest]

include server transfer with vip sub.

 

[Dandonk]

After fun lag in slayers, I can say that I would appreciate something to make up for lost pot time.

 

[Purr]

I am not a super fan of refreshing old content however, I would be ok with adding epic or legendary raids to old heroic raids. I think that old content has value at its level and should remain as is overall.

What I would like to see:

• Continue adding new content to include just a few singlular standalone quests.
• Additional expansion into Forgotten Realms to include a new city maybe the size of Tantris, Waterdeep, Shadowdale, or the biggest city in Cormyr
• I think that all quests should eventually be migrated to having 40% or more of its total XP come from optionals. Example: Quest A gives a total of 100,000 XP (60,000 from base quest completion & 40,000 from all optionals)

I think most of eveningstar right now is pretty empty. We could do with a few more houses or businesses that opened up and had a few questgiver/quest ports like anvil fire in house D

 

[Fizban]

I think most of eveningstar right now is pretty empty. We could do with a few more houses or businesses that opened up and had a few questgiver/quest ports like anvil fire in house D

Eveningstar is a small town in Cormyr and from my view point has a lot of quest givers, vendors, and other types of NPCs. Yes, you can always squeeze more into but a big city on the size of Stormreach in FR is what I would like to see.

 

[Sophie The Cat Burglar]

Sophie the Cat Burglar will be given an exclusive white, blue, and silver cat suit with a bullseye on the left butt cheek and a white tail that works like a Cannith Spare Hand with a DC equal to her level times 200. She will also receive exclusive white cat ears, 50,000 tons of high explosives, blasting caps, detonators, an endless Cherry Fruit Smoothy of speed +200%, a throwing dagger that does a million points of damage per hit, a green augment of +2000 Sophie bonus to sheltering, complete immunity to magic of all kinds, elevated to Goddesshood, and be given a plane of existence over which to extend her benevolent and wise rule, inhabited by mermaids, flying horsies, and sylphs. She will also be given any other silly things she wants not otherwise mentioned in this contract, in perpetuity, forever and ever, ha ha ha, she wins.

 

[Ungermax]

Playable Kobolds. Get on with it!

 

[Ryiah]

Ideally one that isn't beholden to share holders ... I think that is one of the biggest issues facing this team. The profits are going to shareholders instead of being re-invested into this IP.

I'm assuming you're referring to Enad Global 7, right? Because Daybreak and Standing Stones Games don't have stock.

In all seriousness? The sale of DDO to a new group that will invest heavily in infrastructure, advertising, and content. SSG is unable to manage this game properly and its disdain for its customers, marketing, PR, and management of the lag issue has created too much distrust in this company for it to manage such a storied franchise.
They need to be bought out. D&D deserves so much better.

At that point you should just make a new MMO to get away from the technical debt that this one has undoubtedly accrued over nearly two decades.

 

[Bjond]

Playable Kobolds. Get on with it!

I play with Kobolds all the time. They're particularly good at holding up archery butts.

make a new MMO to get away from the technical debt that this one has undoubtedly accrued

DDO is approaching zero value from a "sell it to someone" point of view. Let's say I want to buy DDO and make it into a "modern" game. There are three potential pieces of value: sw, players, and D&D license.

SW has hit zero value and needs to be punted completely. It's absurdly easy to release near-zero bugs and keep it there in any SW base, but they can't seem to manage it. Entire base likely needs to be rewritten from scratch with quality coders and modern sw engineering practices; ie. at least modern as of c. 1990.

Player base does have value, but the way D&D fans leap onto new content, I don't think it's worth extra effort to transfer DDO players to a DDOv2 via any kind of support for existing characters or content; eg. 20k? odd DDO players v millions of BG3. Yeah, I'd punt the 20 for even a piece of the millions.

That leaves the D&D license as pretty much the only value, which could be significantly reduced by any active controls, oversight, or royalties due to WoC. It's a pig-in-a-poke and it probably meows.

So, that leaves the only viable DDO as the current DDO; ie. life-support and milk it or most likely exactly what we're seeing. Continuation of existing practices while trying to keep their revenue stream as happy as they can manage. Change has risk. For a failing business, big change is terrifying regardless of how obvious the need from the outside.

Best case I see for DDO is conversion to another client/server engine (unity, unreal, etc) via an initial (maybe AI) automated pass on the art and that would only happen if someone just *adores* the game and wants a personal project.

 

[Ryiah]

Best case I see for DDO is conversion to another client/server engine (unity, unreal, etc) via an initial (maybe AI) automated pass on the art and that would only happen if someone just *adores* the game and wants a personal project.

I've heard of cases where a modern engine is made to hook into the original to be the renderer and everything else is left alone.

 

[nenetteblackmoor]

Stop padding the ML with unnecessary effects.

 

[Bjond]

I've heard of cases where a modern engine is made to hook into the original to be the renderer

That's roughly what I was talking about, but it's not a snap-in lego-block. It can take a fair effort and the resulting visuals can have issues that chase people away if you're unwilling to iterate over the conversion until the process produces results that don't need to be hidden in the uncanny valley.

 

[nenetteblackmoor]

That's roughly what I was talking about, but it's not a snap-in lego-block. It can take a fair effort and the resulting visuals can have issues that chase people away if you're unwilling to iterate over the conversion until the process produces results that don't need to be hidden in the uncanny valley.

Isn't what DDO needs not better graphics, but better design sense?

DDO's design either looks like it was thrown together by a sleep-deprived designer who’s hit a wall, or like something straight out of a daydreaming middle schooler's sketchbook.

The Legendary Sword of Shadow and the Armor of Sunset had really awful designs.

 

[Bjond]

Isn't what DDO needs not better graphics, but better design sense?

IMHO, their server code needs a total rewrite or at least liberal application of a machete.

DDO art was old on release date. It's landscape art is pretty amazing considering what they have to work with, but the character art is horrific. I'm not an artist. I should never be able to look at a game character and think "I could have done better when I was 10."

Take a look at Aion if you want to see what good game art looked like back then. It's gorgeous.

Art brings in new players. Amazing server code does not. However, bad server code lags them out and curb-stomps them until they leave.

 

[paddymaxson]

Personally....for me:

No new content till some of the performance issues are fixed
Some good QoL features
Catchupg mechanics/fairer monetisation so I don't feel like asking people to play the game with me is hanging a millstone round their necks.

 

[Geezer]

BACON, Everythings better with BACON. Even lag