Speaking as a player of D&D since the 1970s, and a PnP player of many, many RPGs (from Top Secret to Gamma World to all the versions of D&D, GURPS, etc), I am NOT the target audience for this game. From the first game I played PnP, the awe and wonder of pen-and-paper roleplaying was that we were immersed in another world -- a broad, expansive, fleshed-out world, where we could mingle in the politics of different families/clans/nations; where we could try to get our own place, build our own Keep; where we could roam the countryside looking for adventure and hopefully do things that have significance.
D&D ONline has no world whatsoever to explore, nothing of what drew me into roleplaying in the first place. ONLY if D&D for you is just running DungeonQuests over and over again would this game appeal to you. We don't play D&D for the combat -- we play D&D for the roleplaying, for the ability to impact a fantasy world, to save the village, to FIND the village in the first place by exploring. Over the years my players have founded their own religion; spent a record 9 years in one campaign, playing once/week every week, culminating in the freeing of several races and spanning literally hundreds and hundreds of miles and ruins, cities, the Undermountain (mine, not the Forgotten Realms), and more.
D&D Online offers... none of this. Do NOT say that they are targetting PNP players. They would have to actually develop a WORLD (like Origin said, in a catch-phrase that was perfectly suited to the spirit of pnp roleplaying: "we build WORLDS", not "we build one city and a few dozen instanced dungeons for you to run with your pals").
Originally posted by spydermr2 Speaking as a player of D&D since the 1970s, and a PnP player of many, many RPGs (from Top Secret to Gamma World to all the versions of D&D, GURPS, etc), I am NOT the target audience for this game. From the first game I played PnP, the awe and wonder of pen-and-paper roleplaying was that we were immersed in another world -- a broad, expansive, fleshed-out world, where we could mingle in the politics of different families/clans/nations; where we could try to get our own place, build our own Keep; where we could roam the countryside looking for adventure and hopefully do things that have significance. D&D ONline has no world whatsoever to explore, nothing of what drew me into roleplaying in the first place. ONLY if D&D for you is just running DungeonQuests over and over again would this game appeal to you. We don't play D&D for the combat -- we play D&D for the roleplaying, for the ability to impact a fantasy world, to save the village, to FIND the village in the first place by exploring. Over the years my players have founded their own religion; spent a record 9 years in one campaign, playing once/week every week, culminating in the freeing of several races and spanning literally hundreds and hundreds of miles and ruins, cities, the Undermountain (mine, not the Forgotten Realms), and more. D&D Online offers... none of this. Do NOT say that they are targetting PNP players. They would have to actually develop a WORLD (like Origin said, in a catch-phrase that was perfectly suited to the spirit of pnp roleplaying: "we build WORLDS", not "we build one city and a few dozen instanced dungeons for you to run with your pals").
I agree whole heartedly with this. I have been playing PnP for over 20 years now and it has always been a Campaign that interested me, not random adventures. Dungeon delving and adventuring is fine as a fill in, but a campaign that stretched over many lands, cities and NPC's is what brought D&D to life for my group.
Anyone ever been to a gaming convention like GenCon? That is a place where gamers go to be apart of something larger than a one party event. I have been to Conventions where there were tournaments that had 20+ players at a time and like 6 DM's running 4 to 5 parties simultaneously. Events where parties interacted with each other. NOW THAT WAS FUN.
I really feel Turbine missed the boat here. They focused on the fact that people play PnP with a small group of friends and figured that was the key. What they don't realize, at least for my group, is that if we could play PnP D&D with 100 people at the same time with like 20 DM's and be able to interact with everyone throughout different quests, adventures or campaigns...WE WOULD!!. However, that just isn't possible to do on a Saturday afternoon at my house, so we play with 6 players and a DM who runs tons of NPC's for us to interact with, because he has to.
I love the D&D interface, but in my opinion the creators of this game were afraid to put out a game where everyone can interface with everyone else because the vocal majority in the MMO player genre whines too much about how hard, how challenging, how many griefers there are, etc., and so they decided (like many other games) to eliminate the potential for those issues by over using the current trend of instancing. Instancing brings its own set of problems to MMO's in an effort to avoid issues instead of solve them.
I personally can't wait for Vangaurd. It "appears" that the folks at Sigil understand that instancing and "low risk for high reward" methodologies actually hurt the community that is the whole point behind a Massively Multiplayer game. I just hope they carry through with their promises.
Originally posted by hadz Originally posted by matraque The dungeons are similar because we haven't leave town yet ? so we still have to fight in sewers ?I hate to break it to you...but in this game you NEVER leave town (except for the occasional quest outside the gates). But you are stuck in Stormreach and its sewers forever.
Thanks for the info, but honestly i don't care.
So far, i'm having a BLAST with my guild. Stormreach is kinda big actually so there's plenty of content for now.
Can't wait for expension... this is gonna kick ass
Well i was in beta but not at all impressed but an email from my old guild leader in EQ1 saying 5 of them will want to try D&D online made me buy it.
It was fun to see the old crowd together but we seems to be hit by the same thing-"why are we paying for this when it been done many times in the EQ series with much more extras"?
Yes we all know EQ series and its clones are badically D&D/LOTR hybrids .But the fact is they offer much more to justify the monthly fee.Exploring,crafting,dungeons/questing(only part D&D has),raids.This makes a mmorpg and justifies the cost.
The combat is not even as good as CoH,EQ2 or WoW.The graphics is oldish even on full setting,you are stuck in a city doing quests in a small group,there is almost no exploring,no crafting,the dungeons which is suppose to be its big seller are half as intresting as EQ1/2 ones.
In short only good thing i can say is the roles of the classes are better defined then any other mmorpg.
It seems to have less to offer then GW.Which brings me to the monthly cost.I simply cannot justify paying the monthly cost for this game considering what other pay to play has to offer.
Problem is turbine tried to keep to the D&D rules but also diverted from it going basically half way only.
Of the 4 of us from my old guild of EQ1 all have said they will not pass the free month(2 never even came).
OFC i am happy for those that love the game but not for me.
Originally posted by hadz Originally posted by matraque The dungeons are similar because we haven't leave town yet ? so we still have to fight in sewers ?I hate to break it to you...but in this game you NEVER leave town (except for the occasional quest outside the gates). But you are stuck in Stormreach and its sewers forever.
Stuck in sewers forever eh? You must make a killing in the lottery seeing as you can see the future and all. Just because the game takes place mainly in Stormreach right now doesn't mean they will never branch out and add other cities or even continents to the game. There is no arguing the game is light on content to start off, but I have had more fun with guildies and PUG in this game then I ever had in any other MMO to date. For me fun is the deciding factor in any game I play.
Originally posted by hercules Well i was in beta but not at all impressed but an email from my old guild leader in EQ1 saying 5 of them will want to try D&D online made me buy it. It was fun to see the old crowd together but we seems to be hit by the same thing-"why are we paying for this when it been done many times in the EQ series with much more extras"? Yes we all know EQ series and its clones are badically D&D/LOTR hybrids .But the fact is they offer much more to justify the monthly fee.Exploring,crafting,dungeons/questing(only part D&D has),raids.This makes a mmorpg and justifies the cost. The combat is not even as good as CoH,EQ2 or WoW.The graphics is oldish even on full setting,you are stuck in a city doing quests in a small group,there is almost no exploring,no crafting,the dungeons which is suppose to be its big seller are half as intresting as EQ1/2 ones. In short only good thing i can say is the roles of the classes are better defined then any other mmorpg. It seems to have less to offer then GW.Which brings me to the monthly cost.I simply cannot justify paying the monthly cost for this game considering what other pay to play has to offer. Problem is turbine tried to keep to the D&D rules but also diverted from it going basically half way only. Of the 4 of us from my old guild of EQ1 all have said they will not pass the free month(2 never even came). OFC i am happy for those that love the game but not for me.
This is what DDO has (on my server Thelanis) that justifies $15/mo that other games don't have.
The ability to turn away powergamers, because this game is targetted to casual gamers. Meaning no long powergame like grind that only powergamers can achieve in a reseanable amount of time.
The ability to turn away the 1337 crowd that speak in 1337 tongue, because most of the players are in their 30's-40's and don't put up with it.
The ability to turn away the PvPers who turn the game into a min/max competition.
The ability to turn away the people who love repeatable raids that give you really good loot. This reduces farmers in the game and selfish people that only care about getting the best loot.
Those example alone are enough reasons for me to pay $15/mo for it. There are still those people as described above in this game, except for the 1337 people. I haven't seen them yet. But all those people or at least the vocal ones have already stated they are leaving the game, because it doesn't cater to them.
While I liked being able to explore a world, build player cities, and wage war over them; I feel it is a worthwhile trade off to have a more casual and mature oriented game and give all that up to turn the immature crowd away that mostly dominates the examples as given above.
DDO is targeted towards hack and slashers that just want mindless combat. That's all instancing is, mindless combat.
The REAL draw of PnP D&D was the fact that you could ROLEPLAY. When you killed an orc cheif the orcs fled in fear, when you killed an innocent person you were hunted down, when you did some action the DM made consequences for you. PnP D&D was not instanced combat but a dynamic interaction between PC's and the DM.
The target audience of DDO is hack and slashers, not PnP D&D players.
-BTW Almost every MMORPG lover I know has played PnP D&D, so quit with this "MMORPG players aint D&D fans" crap.
--When you resubscribe to SWG, an 18 yearold Stripper finds Jesus, gives up stripping, and moves with a rolex reverend to Hawaii. --In MMORPG's l007 is the opiate of the masses. --The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence! --CCP could cut off an Eve player's fun bits, and that player would say that it was good CCP did that.
Originally posted by spydermr2 Speaking as a player of D&D since the 1970s, and a PnP player of many, many RPGs (from Top Secret to Gamma World to all the versions of D&D, GURPS, etc), I am NOT the target audience for this game. From the first game I played PnP, the awe and wonder of pen-and-paper roleplaying was that we were immersed in another world -- a broad, expansive, fleshed-out world, where we could mingle in the politics of different families/clans/nations; where we could try to get our own place, build our own Keep; where we could roam the countryside looking for adventure and hopefully do things that have significance. D&D ONline has no world whatsoever to explore, nothing of what drew me into roleplaying in the first place. ONLY if D&D for you is just running DungeonQuests over and over again would this game appeal to you. We don't play D&D for the combat -- we play D&D for the roleplaying, for the ability to impact a fantasy world, to save the village, to FIND the village in the first place by exploring. Over the years my players have founded their own religion; spent a record 9 years in one campaign, playing once/week every week, culminating in the freeing of several races and spanning literally hundreds and hundreds of miles and ruins, cities, the Undermountain (mine, not the Forgotten Realms), and more.D&D Online offers... none of this. Do NOT say that they are targetting PNP players. They would have to actually develop a WORLD (like Origin said, in a catch-phrase that was perfectly suited to the spirit of pnp roleplaying: "we build WORLDS", not "we build one city and a few dozen instanced dungeons for you to run with your pals").
I rarely ever quote and entire message but this guy hit the nail on the head. I've said this in different ways since I played in Alpha. I've played D&D/AD&D for over 20 years now and what he says about his PnP experience is much like mine.
This game has such a limited scope of interaction, a microscopic world and absolutely no soul.
Seriously, how many times in your games did you say "I use my shield!" or strafe to avoid some special giant attack? Never. I let either my dice do the specials for me or my character did it via dexterity or other abilities that my character had. It did not depend on my use of a mouse or keyboard.
Anyway, make your own decision about the game but do it fast cause this thing can't last long without some serious help.
Originally posted by PyscoJuggalo I'm sick of hearing this God dammed argument.
DDO is targeted towards hack and slashers that just want mindless combat. That's all instancing is, mindless combat.
The REAL draw of PnP D&D was the fact that you could ROLEPLAY. When you killed an orc cheif the orcs fled in fear, when you killed an innocent person you were hunted down, when you did some action the DM made consequences for you. PnP D&D was not instanced combat but a dynamic interaction between PC's and the DM. The target audience of DDO is hack and slashers, not PnP D&D players.
-BTW Almost every MMORPG lover I know has played PnP D&D, so quit with this "MMORPG players aint D&D fans" crap.
Okay there Mr. ICP. Do you cry everytime someone says something you don't want to hear? If you don't want to hear the argument than don't click on the threads. Cursing like a little school boy doesn't intimidate me either. When I say DDO is targetted for the small group, casual player; that is a fact I am providing for you knuckleheads that don't seem to know how to research Dev discussions and journals. You obviously never played this game either. There is nothing mindless about going through a dungeon where you can get killed instantly by a trap.
Who ever said MMORPG players aren't DnD fans? I am a MMORPG fan and a DnD fan. If you learn to read you would also know that I like both types of games if done right (instanced and non-instanced). The bonus for DDO is that they are a niche game that cuts out all the kiddies like you that like to whine and cry on the forums all day, because they can't solo, pvp, powergame, or run around a persistent world when they were told from the very beginning that you wouldn't have that.
You obviously never played this game either. There is nothing mindless about going through a dungeon where you can get killed instantly by a trap.
I have to repeat your own words back at you.
You obviously never played the game if you don't think there is nothing mindless about DD0's dungeons.
Why? because you don't get to do them just once, you have to do them multiple times because there are not enough quests, for each level, to level you up unless you do them multiple times.
Even given that fact you also have to take into account that almost ALL of these dungeons look the same.
Anyway, dig yourself in, get used to this crappy game as it sits now and when you find a real game that is truely D&D then you'll be much happier. I certainly expect more from my games than this boring mess.
Originally posted by PyscoJuggalo Okay there Mr. ICP. Do you cry everytime someone says something you don't want to hear? If you don't want to hear the argument than don't click on the threads. Cursing like a little school boy doesn't intimidate me either. When I say DDO is targetted for the small group, casual player; that is a fact I am providing for you knuckleheads that don't seem to know how to research Dev discussions and journals. You obviously never played this game either. There is nothing mindless about going through a dungeon where you can get killed instantly by a trap.
If you are going to state that the Devs are stating exactly who this game was targeted for, then please provide links to prove this. Don't just make statements that say we don't know how to research... Maybe we don't, maybe we do, but if you are going to make a statement, back it up.
Originally posted by PyscoJuggalo Okay there Mr. ICP. Do you cry everytime someone says something you don't want to hear? If you don't want to hear the argument than don't click on the threads. Cursing like a little school boy doesn't intimidate me either. When I say DDO is targetted for the small group, casual player; that is a fact I am providing for you knuckleheads that don't seem to know how to research Dev discussions and journals. You obviously never played this game either. There is nothing mindless about going through a dungeon where you can get killed instantly by a trap.
If you are going to state that the Devs are stating exactly who this game was targeted for, then please provide links to prove this. Don't just make statements that say we don't know how to research... Maybe we don't, maybe we do, but if you are going to make a statement, back it up.
Quit being lazy and go look for yourself. I have much better things to do then to provide a link so you can easily click on it. It is not that hard for you to do some research and if your 55 yrs old and still don't know how to do research than I feel really sorry for you. It must have been a hard life.
Why aren't you asking the people that are bad mouthing the game to back their statements up with a link? That's what I thought. Your being biased and are wanting me to prove that the game is targetted for a certain crowd, but don't require a link when people make statements at how bad this game is. If you want a link you better stop pulling double standards.
Here is a link for you. Go search ddo.com If you can't find what you need there, you weren't worth the time to convince anyways.
I must be crazy, because I'm doing leg work for someone who is incapable of doing it themselves. I checked the ddo.com and couldn't find it. They changed the site since Beta and the FAQs and removed the Dev discussions and such. So your just going to have to take my word for it, just like your taking other peoples word for it that the game sucks. But if your logical at all I can break it down for you.
It takes 90 hours to get from lvl 1-10 playing only the quests that get you the most experience and repeating those over and over untill 10. Turbine intends to publish content once a month. Assuming the content patches will be no more than 90 hours also, you can then divide 90 by 4 and get 22.5. This means the game is targetted towards the casual crowd that plays no more then 22 hours and 30 min a week. Turbine said there won't be an endgame, but instead constant content patches to keep the story and game going. Any logical person would then conclude that they are targetting the person who plays around 22 hours a week, because anymore hours will leave you without something to do for part of the month.
Try soloing quests your own level in this game till lvl 10. It won't happen, because Turbine made the dungeons group oriented. Therefore, you get a casual friendly, group oriented game. That's just using logic and nothing written from the Devs, which I guarantee you they did.
You can go from lvl 1-10 doing the quests in the appropriate order, which not many people do, and not have to repeat a quest. However, if you want more than 1 character you are guaranteed to repeat the quests. I've done most of the quests 4 or more times. Does it get boring? Yes sometimes, but I still have to think about where the traps are and bring appropriate classes along or we will get killed. That doesn't make the quests mindless though. The dungeons don't look the same either. People who say this has rushed through the dungeons without looking at them and enjoying the ride. Most likely done several quests that were lower level them then, which made it easy to do. There are many possibilities why the dungeons get boring. The dungeons are no more boring after being repeated than killing the same mob over and over again like in other games.
I've played DAOC, SWG, GW, COH, EQ, WOW, and EVE and I like DDO better than all of those, except pre-nge SWG. I met some people on the ddo.com beta forums, got to know them, created a guild with them and I play pretty much only with them. So there are about 10 of us that know each other pretty well from just playing a game and it feels like it's just us in the game, which is exactly what the Devs were aiming for. Check the Dev journals on this website actually. I think they are still there.
Either way, this game is for a niche group and many will not like it, but I do and it pisses me off when someone says the game I like is crap, because of the way the game was made. I don't go to other game forums that I have played bashing the game, because it didn't cater to me and I just want the same respect in return.
That will never happen, therefore I am being reduced to flaming, which I hate doing and I think is very immature. So I have to sink to everyone elses level of immaturity to try and beat them at their own game.
Okay there Mr. ICP. Do you cry everytime someone says something you don't want to hear? If you don't want to hear the argument than don't click on the threads. Cursing like a little school boy doesn't intimidate me either. When I say DDO is targetted for the small group, casual player; that is a fact I am providing for you knuckleheads that don't seem to know how to research Dev discussions and journals. You obviously never played this game either. There is nothing mindless about going through a dungeon where you can get killed instantly by a trap.
If you are going to state that the Devs are stating exactly who this game was targeted for, then please provide links to prove this. Don't just make statements that say we don't know how to research... Maybe we don't, maybe we do, but if you are going to make a statement, back it up.
Quit being lazy and go look for yourself. I have much better things to do then to provide a link so you can easily click on it. It is not that hard for you to do some research and if your 55 yrs old and still don't know how to do research than I feel really sorry for you. It must have been a hard life.
It seems rather obvious to me that you do not have any links to provide... Therefore your posts and comments are worthless. If you cannot back up what you say, then keep it to yourself. And by that, I mean that you need to be able to show us where you got this information. It is not our job to verify your statements, it is yours to back up what you say.
Why aren't you asking the people that are bad mouthing the game to back their statements up with a link? That's what I thought. Your being biased and are wanting me to prove that the game is targetted for a certain crowd, but don't require a link when people make statements at how bad this game is. If you want a link you better stop pulling double standards.
People who bad mouth this game are giving "their" opinion... You were telling us what the Devs are trying to do... In otherwords, you are telling us what others are trying to do. Therefore you need to back up what you are saying...
Here is a link for you. Go search ddo.com If you can't find what you need there, you weren't worth the time to convince anyways.
Originally posted by nthnaoun I must be crazy, because I'm doing leg work for someone who is incapable of doing it themselves. I checked the ddo.com and couldn't find it. They changed the site since Beta and the FAQs and removed the Dev discussions and such. So your just going to have to take my word for it, just like your taking other peoples word for it that the game sucks. But if your logical at all I can break it down for you. It takes 90 hours to get from lvl 1-10 playing only the quests that get you the most experience and repeating those over and over untill 10. Turbine intends to publish content once a month. Assuming the content patches will be no more than 90 hours also, you can then divide 90 by 4 and get 22.5. This means the game is targetted towards the casual crowd that plays no more then 22 hours and 30 min a week. Turbine said there won't be an endgame, but instead constant content patches to keep the story and game going. Any logical person would then conclude that they are targetting the person who plays around 22 hours a week, because anymore hours will leave you without something to do for part of the month. Try soloing quests your own level in this game till lvl 10. It won't happen, because Turbine made the dungeons group oriented. Therefore, you get a casual friendly, group oriented game. That's just using logic and nothing written from the Devs, which I guarantee you they did. You can go from lvl 1-10 doing the quests in the appropriate order, which not many people do, and not have to repeat a quest. However, if you want more than 1 character you are guaranteed to repeat the quests. I've done most of the quests 4 or more times. Does it get boring? Yes sometimes, but I still have to think about where the traps are and bring appropriate classes along or we will get killed. That doesn't make the quests mindless though. The dungeons don't look the same either. People who say this has rushed through the dungeons without looking at them and enjoying the ride. Most likely done several quests that were lower level them then, which made it easy to do. There are many possibilities why the dungeons get boring. The dungeons are no more boring after being repeated than killing the same mob over and over again like in other games. I've played DAOC, SWG, GW, COH, EQ, WOW, and EVE and I like DDO better than all of those, except pre-nge SWG. I met some people on the ddo.com beta forums, got to know them, created a guild with them and I play pretty much only with them. So there are about 10 of us that know each other pretty well from just playing a game and it feels like it's just us in the game, which is exactly what the Devs were aiming for. Check the Dev journals on this website actually. I think they are still there. Either way, this game is for a niche group and many will not like it, but I do and it pisses me off when someone says the game I like is crap, because of the way the game was made. I don't go to other game forums that I have played bashing the game, because it didn't cater to me and I just want the same respect in return. That will never happen, therefore I am being reduced to flaming, which I hate doing and I think is very immature. So I have to sink to everyone elses level of immaturity to try and beat them at their own game.
Again, this is just your opinion as to what the Devs are trying to do. You may be right, and you may be wrong. Unless you can provide some input from the Devs, it will always be an opinion. Not fact or fiction, just an opinion.
Originally posted by nthnaoun DDO was designed to target the pnp audience. The pnp audience were a small group of friends, hence group play in DDO. The pnp audience played at most a few times a week, hence the limited content at launch. This game is 20 hours or less a week casual friendly. The only game targetted to that audience in the MMO genre. So it is my opinion that they deserve their own MMO without people complaining about it all the time. DDO devs plan to add content and updates at a pace that will satisfy the above targetted audience. In other words if you decide to play this game in a way that it wasn't designed, then you have no reason to complain. All this was laid out for people to see before the game goes live. I don't see the point in complaining about it. So to you newcomers that are wandering if this game is for you, well I offer the above two paragraphs as a truthful answer to that question. For all the complainers and the rest of the people that have something negative to say about this game, it was all revealed to you before you decided to give it a try. They are offering everything they said they would. There is no reason to complain over that. This game gets an A+ from me for fullfilling the needs of who their targetted audience is and not worrying about the audience who they are not targetting. I'm really sorry if your not part of that audience, but I assure you that there are many MMO's out there that do target you and many more soon on the way that you will like...or find something to complain about.
Umm, no it wasn't. I have been in the PnP crowd for over 10 years now I feel completely steam rolled on this one.
At a pace that will satisfy who exactly?? Most people weren't satisfied with the content that was there at release, let alone find the pace of future content satisfying.
The game gets a D- from me, and I DID try it in the beta extensively.
- Scaris
"What happened to you, Star Wars Galaxies? You used to look like Leia. Not quite gold bikini Leia (more like bad-British-accent-and-cinnamon-bun-hair Leia), but still Leia nonetheless. Now you look like Chewbacca." - Computer Gaming World
Originally posted by nthnaoun I must be crazy, because I'm doing leg work for someone who is incapable of doing it themselves. I checked the ddo.com and couldn't find it. They changed the site since Beta and the FAQs and removed the Dev discussions and such. So your just going to have to take my word for it, just like your taking other peoples word for it that the game sucks. But if your logical at all I can break it down for you. It takes 90 hours to get from lvl 1-10 playing only the quests that get you the most experience and repeating those over and over untill 10. Turbine intends to publish content once a month. Assuming the content patches will be no more than 90 hours also, you can then divide 90 by 4 and get 22.5. This means the game is targetted towards the casual crowd that plays no more then 22 hours and 30 min a week. Turbine said there won't be an endgame, but instead constant content patches to keep the story and game going. Any logical person would then conclude that they are targetting the person who plays around 22 hours a week, because anymore hours will leave you without something to do for part of the month. Try soloing quests your own level in this game till lvl 10. It won't happen, because Turbine made the dungeons group oriented. Therefore, you get a casual friendly, group oriented game. That's just using logic and nothing written from the Devs, which I guarantee you they did. You can go from lvl 1-10 doing the quests in the appropriate order, which not many people do, and not have to repeat a quest. However, if you want more than 1 character you are guaranteed to repeat the quests. I've done most of the quests 4 or more times. Does it get boring? Yes sometimes, but I still have to think about where the traps are and bring appropriate classes along or we will get killed. That doesn't make the quests mindless though. The dungeons don't look the same either. People who say this has rushed through the dungeons without looking at them and enjoying the ride. Most likely done several quests that were lower level them then, which made it easy to do. There are many possibilities why the dungeons get boring. The dungeons are no more boring after being repeated than killing the same mob over and over again like in other games. I've played DAOC, SWG, GW, COH, EQ, WOW, and EVE and I like DDO better than all of those, except pre-nge SWG. I met some people on the ddo.com beta forums, got to know them, created a guild with them and I play pretty much only with them. So there are about 10 of us that know each other pretty well from just playing a game and it feels like it's just us in the game, which is exactly what the Devs were aiming for. Check the Dev journals on this website actually. I think they are still there. Either way, this game is for a niche group and many will not like it, but I do and it pisses me off when someone says the game I like is crap, because of the way the game was made. I don't go to other game forums that I have played bashing the game, because it didn't cater to me and I just want the same respect in return. That will never happen, therefore I am being reduced to flaming, which I hate doing and I think is very immature. So I have to sink to everyone elses level of immaturity to try and beat them at their own game.
Again, this is just your opinion as to what the Devs are trying to do. You may be right, and you may be wrong. Unless you can provide some input from the Devs, it will always be an opinion. Not fact or fiction, just an opinion.
Your making a sound argument and that is why I am accomadating you. However, if you want to bring college level arguing into this, you should be aware that it is also taught in college that you don't have to back up what you say when it is common knowledge. What I said can be found under the features section of DDO on THIS website. But here is a clip from one of the journals that I found under features. I just started digging and I am sure there is more there for you to find out on your own.
MMORPG.com:
D&D has been around forever it seems. With the venture into the online world, is the focus on getting the table-top game people into the mmorpg arena, or adapting D&D to the mmorpg crowd?
Ken Troop:
D&D Online is focused on creating a fun online RPG experience that you can play with your friends. We dont compare ourselves to other MMPs DDO takes you straight to your adventure (no endless running to get where you want to go), offers quest-based advancement (no sitting in the same place for hours grinding for XP), and creates a private adventure for you and your friends (no random interference or grief from strangers).
Our development touchstone has been to create an online experience that captures that essence of the classic tabletop adventure session. But it has to be a fun online experience. When a straight translation of the pen & paper rules would hamper our ability to provide a fun online experience, we work closely with Wizards of the Coast to come up with a modification that maintains the spirit of D&D while satisfying the demands of the online medium
I was going to copy and paste more for the non-believers, but this website is terribly slow. I'm not going to waste 3 hours of my day copying and pasting what you can easily find for yourself in the features section.
You will not find them saying that the game is meant for people who play 22 hours a week or less. I am telling you from experience that if you want to play this game without ever having to wait on new content, that you will have to play no more than 22 hours a week. I have been to Iraq also, and I can tell you that it sucks over there. Do you need proof of that too? I didn't think so. Sometimes you just need to take the word of people who have experienced things you haven't.
Turbine has said that they are providing monthly content patches and are not adding a endgame because of it. So logically speaking, since the game takes 90 hours to reach level 10 cap, the game is intended for people playing 22 hours or less a week. If your going to argue with logic or someone who has and is playing the game then I have nothing left to say to you. I am not judging this game or providing a biased view. I am not spouting off that this game rocks or sucks. I am simply telling you how you must play and who this game was intended for so you don't make the mistake of buying it and coming back and complaining when you find out that you can't do any of the previously described things.
You are more likely to like this game if you play 22 hours a week or less with a small group of friends, than the guy who powergames, likes to solo, likes pvp, or likes a large persistent world to explore.
There is nothing left to be said. If you don't like this then tuff. I can't change it for you and I hope Turbine doesn't either.
Originally posted by nthnaoun DDO was designed to target the pnp audience. The pnp audience were a small group of friends, hence group play in DDO. The pnp audience played at most a few times a week, hence the limited content at launch. This game is 20 hours or less a week casual friendly. The only game targetted to that audience in the MMO genre. So it is my opinion that they deserve their own MMO without people complaining about it all the time. DDO devs plan to add content and updates at a pace that will satisfy the above targetted audience. In other words if you decide to play this game in a way that it wasn't designed, then you have no reason to complain. All this was laid out for people to see before the game goes live. I don't see the point in complaining about it. So to you newcomers that are wandering if this game is for you, well I offer the above two paragraphs as a truthful answer to that question. For all the complainers and the rest of the people that have something negative to say about this game, it was all revealed to you before you decided to give it a try. They are offering everything they said they would. There is no reason to complain over that. This game gets an A+ from me for fullfilling the needs of who their targetted audience is and not worrying about the audience who they are not targetting. I'm really sorry if your not part of that audience, but I assure you that there are many MMO's out there that do target you and many more soon on the way that you will like...or find something to complain about.
Hi there, I think the above is BS. I played and continue to play the PnP version, and i can't recall a single time i was unable to attack a fellow player or npc. I can't recall a single time when we were given a task and/or quest that we would just all suddenly morph into it (see 'cave') and morph back out again to town. I can't recall a single time where we couldnt travel to other towns/villages/cities/lands etc. I can't recall a single time where the monsters we fought or any other NPC did not adhear to the same rules we used, ie spell allotment etc (I hear the mobs in this game have unlimited mana to use)
Originally posted by nthnaoun I must be crazy, because I'm doing leg work for someone who is incapable of doing it themselves. I checked the ddo.com and couldn't find it. They changed the site since Beta and the FAQs and removed the Dev discussions and such. So your just going to have to take my word for it, just like your taking other peoples word for it that the game sucks. But if your logical at all I can break it down for you. It takes 90 hours to get from lvl 1-10 playing only the quests that get you the most experience and repeating those over and over untill 10. Turbine intends to publish content once a month. Assuming the content patches will be no more than 90 hours also, you can then divide 90 by 4 and get 22.5. This means the game is targetted towards the casual crowd that plays no more then 22 hours and 30 min a week. Turbine said there won't be an endgame, but instead constant content patches to keep the story and game going. Any logical person would then conclude that they are targetting the person who plays around 22 hours a week, because anymore hours will leave you without something to do for part of the month. Try soloing quests your own level in this game till lvl 10. It won't happen, because Turbine made the dungeons group oriented. Therefore, you get a casual friendly, group oriented game. That's just using logic and nothing written from the Devs, which I guarantee you they did. You can go from lvl 1-10 doing the quests in the appropriate order, which not many people do, and not have to repeat a quest. However, if you want more than 1 character you are guaranteed to repeat the quests. I've done most of the quests 4 or more times. Does it get boring? Yes sometimes, but I still have to think about where the traps are and bring appropriate classes along or we will get killed. That doesn't make the quests mindless though. The dungeons don't look the same either. People who say this has rushed through the dungeons without looking at them and enjoying the ride. Most likely done several quests that were lower level them then, which made it easy to do. There are many possibilities why the dungeons get boring. The dungeons are no more boring after being repeated than killing the same mob over and over again like in other games. I've played DAOC, SWG, GW, COH, EQ, WOW, and EVE and I like DDO better than all of those, except pre-nge SWG. I met some people on the ddo.com beta forums, got to know them, created a guild with them and I play pretty much only with them. So there are about 10 of us that know each other pretty well from just playing a game and it feels like it's just us in the game, which is exactly what the Devs were aiming for. Check the Dev journals on this website actually. I think they are still there. Either way, this game is for a niche group and many will not like it, but I do and it pisses me off when someone says the game I like is crap, because of the way the game was made. I don't go to other game forums that I have played bashing the game, because it didn't cater to me and I just want the same respect in return. That will never happen, therefore I am being reduced to flaming, which I hate doing and I think is very immature. So I have to sink to everyone elses level of immaturity to try and beat them at their own game.
Again, this is just your opinion as to what the Devs are trying to do. You may be right, and you may be wrong. Unless you can provide some input from the Devs, it will always be an opinion. Not fact or fiction, just an opinion.
Your making a sound argument and that is why I am accomadating you. However, if you want to bring college level arguing into this, you should be aware that it is also taught in college that you don't have to back up what you say when it is common knowledge. What I said can be found under the features section of DDO on THIS website. But here is a clip from one of the journals that I found under features. I just started digging and I am sure there is more there for you to find out on your own.
MMORPG.com:
D&D has been around forever it seems. With the venture into the online world, is the focus on getting the table-top game people into the mmorpg arena, or adapting D&D to the mmorpg crowd?
Ken Troop:
D&D Online is focused on creating a fun online RPG experience that you can play with your friends. We dont compare ourselves to other MMPs DDO takes you straight to your adventure (no endless running to get where you want to go), offers quest-based advancement (no sitting in the same place for hours grinding for XP), and creates a private adventure for you and your friends (no random interference or grief from strangers).
Our development touchstone has been to create an online experience that captures that essence of the classic tabletop adventure session. But it has to be a fun online experience. When a straight translation of the pen & paper rules would hamper our ability to provide a fun online experience, we work closely with Wizards of the Coast to come up with a modification that maintains the spirit of D&D while satisfying the demands of the online medium
What you said was not exactly common knowledge... But I won't take it any further... I don't recall ever saying you were wrong... I just wanted to know where you got the info from.
I was going to copy and paste more for the non-believers, but this website is terribly slow. I'm not going to waste 3 hours of my day copying and pasting what you can easily find for yourself in the features section.
You will not find them saying that the game is meant for people who play 22 hours a week or less. I am telling you from experience that if you want to play this game without ever having to wait on new content, that you will have to play no more than 22 hours a week. I have been to Iraq also, and I can tell you that it sucks over there. Do you need proof of that too? I didn't think so. Sometimes you just need to take the word of people who have experienced things you haven't.
You are right here... You will not find them, the Devs, saying this game, DDO, is for gamers who game less then 22 hours a week. Which, by the way, is what you said. And talking about Iraq and an MMO is not really fair... And you are right, you need to take the word of those who have experienced things you haven't. My question is... what are your credentials? What makes you the one to believe?
Turbine has said that they are providing monthly content patches and are not adding a endgame because of it. So logically speaking, since the game takes 90 hours to reach level 10 cap, the game is intended for people playing 22 hours or less a week. If your going to argue with logic or someone who has and is playing the game then I have nothing left to say to you. I am not judging this game or providing a biased view. I am not spouting off that this game rocks or sucks. I am simply telling you how you must play and who this game was intended for so you don't make the mistake of buying it and coming back and complaining when you find out that you can't do any of the previously described things.
Actually, Turbine has not said that they are going to provide monthly content... What they have said if I remember right, is that they are going to provide updates every few months. If I am wrong here, please show me where they have said that they are providing "monthly" content.
And again, you may be completely right on who the game is for... I never said otherwise, and if I implied that, I apologize. I am just saying that this is your opinion... Not fact.
You are more likely to like this game if you play 22 hours a week or less with a small group of friends, than the guy who powergames, likes to solo, likes pvp, or likes a large persistent world to explore.
There is nothing left to be said. If you don't like this then tuff. I can't change it for you and I hope Turbine doesn't either.
Actually, I hope turbine doesn't change it either... I would rather see DDO stay like it is... Give Turbine a chance to get LOTRO right.
I was going to copy and paste more for the non-believers, but this website is terribly slow. I'm not going to waste 3 hours of my day copying and pasting what you can easily find for yourself in the features section. You will not find them saying that the game is meant for people who play 22 hours a week or less. I am telling you from experience that if you want to play this game without ever having to wait on new content, that you will have to play no more than 22 hours a week. I have been to Iraq also, and I can tell you that it sucks over there. Do you need proof of that too? I didn't think so. Sometimes you just need to take the word of people who have experienced things you haven't. You are right here... You will not find them, the Devs, saying this game, DDO, is for gamers who game less then 22 hours a week. Which, by the way, is what you said. And talking about Iraq and an MMO is not really fair... And you are right, you need to take the word of those who have experienced things you haven't. My question is... what are your credentials? What makes you the one to believe? Turbine has said that they are providing monthly content patches and are not adding a endgame because of it. So logically speaking, since the game takes 90 hours to reach level 10 cap, the game is intended for people playing 22 hours or less a week. If your going to argue with logic or someone who has and is playing the game then I have nothing left to say to you. I am not judging this game or providing a biased view. I am not spouting off that this game rocks or sucks. I am simply telling you how you must play and who this game was intended for so you don't make the mistake of buying it and coming back and complaining when you find out that you can't do any of the previously described things. Actually, Turbine has not said that they are going to provide monthly content... What they have said if I remember right, is that they are going to provide updates every few months. If I am wrong here, please show me where they have said that they are providing "monthly" content. And again, you may be completely right on who the game is for... I never said otherwise, and if I implied that, I apologize. I am just saying that this is your opinion... Not fact. You are more likely to like this game if you play 22 hours a week or less with a small group of friends, than the guy who powergames, likes to solo, likes pvp, or likes a large persistent world to explore. There is nothing left to be said. If you don't like this then tuff. I can't change it for you and I hope Turbine doesn't either. Actually, I hope turbine doesn't change it either... I would rather see DDO stay like it is... Give Turbine a chance to get LOTRO right.
I'm not going to argue about this anymore and I don't think you want to either. What you want are straight forward, no bullshit answers, and that is the language I share with you. I am a gamer who has played multiple MMO's since the year 2002 (see bio for games played). I have never flamed a game for something I didn't like, but I always will be truthful with people about what a game has or doesn't have. I hope that is enough to be trustworthy. I am not a fanboi as some people call those that support a game and I will answer any question truthfully even if it means it is negative towards the game I play. I answer truthfully, because that is good ethics and morals to do so.
For example: I may like and support this game, but if someone asked me if you have to repeat all the same dungeons you had to on your previous character, I would say yes. This would hurt the possibility of me bringing in more players, but it would provide a truthful answer for a curious gamer wanting to know. I may like this game and it might suit my playstyle, but I am not naive and I know for certain that this game does not suit your typical MMORPG player.
I created this thread to inform people of the type of crowd that would possibly enjoy this game the most, so that people would stop wasting their money on the game expecting a persistent world and etc. and then coming on the forums and complaining about not getting what they expected.
I never played pnp DnD, but from what people have told me of it, you played with a small group of friends and there wasn't any PvP. I have heard some cases after playing DDO of where creative DM's created some brief PvP content to where two groups compete for the same Dungeon, but this was not the standard. I would have loved to have seen DDO take place in the Dragon Lance setting and have an explorable world and such, but I can see the logic in keeping it instanced so that they keep the feel of having a small group of friends going on an adventure a few days a week, which is what I meant by the pnp crowd.
I say again. From what I heard of pnp, I wish that DDO could be a direct duplicate of it, but they chose not to and informed their potential customers of that ahead of time, which leaves me no reason to complain, since I knew what I was buying before I played it. The choices aspects of pnp and the large world of pnp are appealing to me, but so is the small group feel and the casual feel of meeting up with a group of friends for a few hours a week. I feel that it carries the casual, small group of friends feel, which is good enough in my book to play over the other MMO's out there, which have left me disappointed in the community aspect. The community of every MMO I have played were elitist min/maxers and were pretty immature. Even SWG had this and their community was pretty good. DDO, by having limited content scares away that crowd and hopefully will keep the casual mature crowd in its stead. From talking with other like minded people, I have came to believe that my hopes will come true and that after hearing the complaints from the not so like minded people, I have also come to believe that I was right in my evaluation that the other crowd will leave the game.
Whether or not you want to believe me is your choice. I simply want to answer honestly what DDO really is, so that we can reduce the amount of flaming threads on this forum that I come to for mature discussion on this game. All I get on this forum right now is childish rants flaming a game on things that were told to the community before beta started. They are complaining about them like they didn't know about it. The Dev journals and Q&A articles on this website are no secret and neither was ddo.com. Both had all the information a person needed to find out that this game was made to be small group oriented and quest based with nothing else other than socializing to do. If a person is not smart enough to do research on a product they are buying then they shouldn't get upset about a product and flame them for it, when they could have prevented the unhappy experience by doing some research first.
I feel like I am ranting now and will close up this thread with an offer. If anyone wants honest replies on what this game has to offer or anything else related to DDO, go ahead and ask.
I feel like I am ranting now and will close up this thread with an offer. If anyone wants honest replies on what this game has to offer or anything else related to DDO, go ahead and ask.
I clipped most of this post because my reply really hasn't much to do with what I snipped...
I have a simple question, then a statement...
Question... If 22 hours a week is considered a casual gamer... what other categories are there other than Hard Core Gamer? It seems to me that 22 hours a week is quite a bit of gaming. If you break it down... Playing every day, it is over 3 hours a day, playing 5 days a week it jumps to over 4 hours a day, and playing only 3 days a week it jumps to over 7 hours a day. Now the PnP games that I played in were only once a week, and rarely twice a week. And we played for about 3 to maybe 4 hours on average each session.
Now the statement... I get really tired of people comparing DDO to the PnP game. If you have ever played the PnP game, you can see that DDO is not really like PnP. And I will only give some obvious reasons... PnP...Starting Hit Points a lot lower than DDO. PnP turn based combat, DDO is not... etc... So I wish that everyone would refrain from trying to compare the two. Including the Devs. They freely admit to making changes to the PnP ruleset to accomodate the MMO world. Let's just talk about what DDO is. And not what it could be...
Originally posted by Ian_Hawkmoon I have a simple question, then a statement...
Question... If 22 hours a week is considered a casual gamer... what other categories are there other than Hard Core Gamer? It seems to me that 22 hours a week is quite a bit of gaming. If you break it down... Playing every day, it is over 3 hours a day, playing 5 days a week it jumps to over 4 hours a day, and playing only 3 days a week it jumps to over 7 hours a day. Now the PnP games that I played in were only once a week, and rarely twice a week. And we played for about 3 to maybe 4 hours on average each session.
Now the statement... I get really tired of people comparing DDO to the PnP game. If you have ever played the PnP game, you can see that DDO is not really like PnP. And I will only give some obvious reasons... PnP...Starting Hit Points a lot lower than DDO. PnP turn based combat, DDO is not... etc... So I wish that everyone would refrain from trying to compare the two. Including the Devs. They freely admit to making changes to the PnP ruleset to accomodate the MMO world. Let's just talk about what DDO is. And not what it could be...
Enough from me...
First you question. For MMO's 22 hours is casual, but if you play DDO less than 22 hours a week, which a lot of the people I talk to do, you will be fine and will always have something to do. If you play more than 22 hours a week and are only playing 1 character, then you will be waiting on content from what I 'hear'.
I don't have statistics to show you, but most of the MMO gamers play roughly between 30-60 hours a week. It is a second life if not a first for many. It is a popular hobby for gamers and DDO is not very friendly to their playstyle. MMMORPG.COM did a poll on how many hours a week people play, so you should be able to find your results there.
As for your statement. You have every right to be upset about the comparing of DDO and PnP. DDO has qualities of PnP, but is not PnP. DDO is actually more like your Forgotten Realms video games than PnP. The biggest things DDO takes after PnP is the ability to be played casually and being small group oriented. The rest has been altered somewhat into a PnP/MMO/console game hybrid.
I like it, but I would have rather had PnP with graphics for DDO. What I will probably do is either play LOTRO when it comes out as with most my guildmates or play NWN2, which holds true to the particular chosen ruleset and is free, while still having the casual roleplaying feel. Going off of hearsay on NWN by the way. I have never played it but only hear good things about it.
Alot of PPl complain about the content being repetitive when u create a new toon, this is pretty much true of any mmorpg out thererigh now, your going to run pretty much the same content. It would be neat if they could randomize the traps in each dungeon and perhaps include special monsters that could randomly pop up unknowingly each dungeon to add more variety. As of yet I believe DDO has a fair amount of content compared to other mmorpg's the problem is its not like other MMorpgs in the sense that u can waste time farming for items in the world environment, pvp, or craft. SO many of the hardcore players with lots of time on their hands will burn through characters so fast they will simply get irratated. I expect to see more content added but this is not a game that demands u to speed through it like WoW. But if u recall WoW did not have much end game content when it first hit shelves so I expect this game will add more, but I pray they will not have 40 man raids
Comments
Speaking as a player of D&D since the 1970s, and a PnP player of many, many RPGs (from Top Secret to Gamma World to all the versions of D&D, GURPS, etc), I am NOT the target audience for this game. From the first game I played PnP, the awe and wonder of pen-and-paper roleplaying was that we were immersed in another world -- a broad, expansive, fleshed-out world, where we could mingle in the politics of different families/clans/nations; where we could try to get our own place, build our own Keep; where we could roam the countryside looking for adventure and hopefully do things that have significance.
D&D ONline has no world whatsoever to explore, nothing of what drew me into roleplaying in the first place. ONLY if D&D for you is just running DungeonQuests over and over again would this game appeal to you. We don't play D&D for the combat -- we play D&D for the roleplaying, for the ability to impact a fantasy world, to save the village, to FIND the village in the first place by exploring. Over the years my players have founded their own religion; spent a record 9 years in one campaign, playing once/week every week, culminating in the freeing of several races and spanning literally hundreds and hundreds of miles and ruins, cities, the Undermountain (mine, not the Forgotten Realms), and more.
D&D Online offers... none of this. Do NOT say that they are targetting PNP players. They would have to actually develop a WORLD (like Origin said, in a catch-phrase that was perfectly suited to the spirit of pnp roleplaying: "we build WORLDS", not "we build one city and a few dozen instanced dungeons for you to run with your pals").
I agree whole heartedly with this. I have been playing PnP for over 20 years now and it has always been a Campaign that interested me, not random adventures. Dungeon delving and adventuring is fine as a fill in, but a campaign that stretched over many lands, cities and NPC's is what brought D&D to life for my group.
Anyone ever been to a gaming convention like GenCon? That is a place where gamers go to be apart of something larger than a one party event. I have been to Conventions where there were tournaments that had 20+ players at a time and like 6 DM's running 4 to 5 parties simultaneously. Events where parties interacted with each other. NOW THAT WAS FUN.
I really feel Turbine missed the boat here. They focused on the fact that people play PnP with a small group of friends and figured that was the key. What they don't realize, at least for my group, is that if we could play PnP D&D with 100 people at the same time with like 20 DM's and be able to interact with everyone throughout different quests, adventures or campaigns...WE WOULD!!. However, that just isn't possible to do on a Saturday afternoon at my house, so we play with 6 players and a DM who runs tons of NPC's for us to interact with, because he has to.
I love the D&D interface, but in my opinion the creators of this game were afraid to put out a game where everyone can interface with everyone else because the vocal majority in the MMO player genre whines too much about how hard, how challenging, how many griefers there are, etc., and so they decided (like many other games) to eliminate the potential for those issues by over using the current trend of instancing. Instancing brings its own set of problems to MMO's in an effort to avoid issues instead of solve them.
I personally can't wait for Vangaurd. It "appears" that the folks at Sigil understand that instancing and "low risk for high reward" methodologies actually hurt the community that is the whole point behind a Massively Multiplayer game. I just hope they carry through with their promises.
Thanks for the info, but honestly i don't care.
So far, i'm having a BLAST with my guild. Stormreach is kinda big actually so there's plenty of content for now.
Can't wait for expension... this is gonna kick ass
eqnext.wikia.com
Well i was in beta but not at all impressed but an email from my old guild leader in EQ1 saying 5 of them will want to try D&D online made me buy it.
It was fun to see the old crowd together but we seems to be hit by the same thing-"why are we paying for this when it been done many times in the EQ series with much more extras"?
Yes we all know EQ series and its clones are badically D&D/LOTR hybrids .But the fact is they offer much more to justify the monthly fee.Exploring,crafting,dungeons/questing(only part D&D has),raids.This makes a mmorpg and justifies the cost.
The combat is not even as good as CoH,EQ2 or WoW.The graphics is oldish even on full setting,you are stuck in a city doing quests in a small group,there is almost no exploring,no crafting,the dungeons which is suppose to be its big seller are half as intresting as EQ1/2 ones.
In short only good thing i can say is the roles of the classes are better defined then any other mmorpg.
It seems to have less to offer then GW.Which brings me to the monthly cost.I simply cannot justify paying the monthly cost for this game considering what other pay to play has to offer.
Problem is turbine tried to keep to the D&D rules but also diverted from it going basically half way only.
Of the 4 of us from my old guild of EQ1 all have said they will not pass the free month(2 never even came).
OFC i am happy for those that love the game but not for me.
Stuck in sewers forever eh? You must make a killing in the lottery seeing as you can see the future and all. Just because the game takes place mainly in Stormreach right now doesn't mean they will never branch out and add other cities or even continents to the game. There is no arguing the game is light on content to start off, but I have had more fun with guildies and PUG in this game then I ever had in any other MMO to date. For me fun is the deciding factor in any game I play.
This is what DDO has (on my server Thelanis) that justifies $15/mo that other games don't have.
The ability to turn away powergamers, because this game is targetted to casual gamers. Meaning no long powergame like grind that only powergamers can achieve in a reseanable amount of time.
The ability to turn away the 1337 crowd that speak in 1337 tongue, because most of the players are in their 30's-40's and don't put up with it.
The ability to turn away the PvPers who turn the game into a min/max competition.
The ability to turn away the people who love repeatable raids that give you really good loot. This reduces farmers in the game and selfish people that only care about getting the best loot.
Those example alone are enough reasons for me to pay $15/mo for it. There are still those people as described above in this game, except for the 1337 people. I haven't seen them yet. But all those people or at least the vocal ones have already stated they are leaving the game, because it doesn't cater to them.
While I liked being able to explore a world, build player cities, and wage war over them; I feel it is a worthwhile trade off to have a more casual and mature oriented game and give all that up to turn the immature crowd away that mostly dominates the examples as given above.
I'm sick of hearing this God dammed argument.
DDO is targeted towards hack and slashers that just want mindless combat. That's all instancing is, mindless combat.
The REAL draw of PnP D&D was the fact that you could ROLEPLAY. When you killed an orc cheif the orcs fled in fear, when you killed an innocent person you were hunted down, when you did some action the DM made consequences for you. PnP D&D was not instanced combat but a dynamic interaction between PC's and the DM.
The target audience of DDO is hack and slashers, not PnP D&D players.
-BTW Almost every MMORPG lover I know has played PnP D&D, so quit with this "MMORPG players aint D&D fans" crap.
--When you resubscribe to SWG, an 18 yearold Stripper finds Jesus, gives up stripping, and moves with a rolex reverend to Hawaii.
--In MMORPG's l007 is the opiate of the masses.
--The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence!
--CCP could cut off an Eve player's fun bits, and that player would say that it was good CCP did that.
I rarely ever quote and entire message but this guy hit the nail on the head. I've said this in different ways since I played in Alpha. I've played D&D/AD&D for over 20 years now and what he says about his PnP experience is much like mine.
This game has such a limited scope of interaction, a microscopic world and absolutely no soul.
Seriously, how many times in your games did you say "I use my shield!" or strafe to avoid some special giant attack? Never. I let either my dice do the specials for me or my character did it via dexterity
or other abilities that my character had. It did not depend on my use of a mouse or keyboard.
Anyway, make your own decision about the game but do it fast cause this thing can't last long without some serious help.
http://www.greycouncil.org/
Okay there Mr. ICP. Do you cry everytime someone says something you don't want to hear? If you don't want to hear the argument than don't click on the threads. Cursing like a little school boy doesn't intimidate me either. When I say DDO is targetted for the small group, casual player; that is a fact I am providing for you knuckleheads that don't seem to know how to research Dev discussions and journals. You obviously never played this game either. There is nothing mindless about going through a dungeon where you can get killed instantly by a trap.
Who ever said MMORPG players aren't DnD fans? I am a MMORPG fan and a DnD fan. If you learn to read you would also know that I like both types of games if done right (instanced and non-instanced). The bonus for DDO is that they are a niche game that cuts out all the kiddies like you that like to whine and cry on the forums all day, because they can't solo, pvp, powergame, or run around a persistent world when they were told from the very beginning that you wouldn't have that.
You obviously never played the game if you don't think there is nothing mindless about DD0's dungeons.
Why? because you don't get to do them just once, you have to do them multiple times because there are not enough quests, for each level, to level you up unless you do them multiple times.
Even given that fact you also have to take into account that almost ALL of these dungeons look the same.
Anyway, dig yourself in, get used to this crappy game as it sits now and when you find a real game that is truely D&D then you'll be much happier. I certainly expect more from my games than this boring mess.
NWN is a far better game for PnP players.
http://www.greycouncil.org/
If you are going to state that the Devs are stating exactly who this game was targeted for, then please provide links to prove this. Don't just make statements that say we don't know how to research... Maybe we don't, maybe we do, but if you are going to make a statement, back it up.
If you are going to state that the Devs are stating exactly who this game was targeted for, then please provide links to prove this. Don't just make statements that say we don't know how to research... Maybe we don't, maybe we do, but if you are going to make a statement, back it up.
Quit being lazy and go look for yourself. I have much better things to do then to provide a link so you can easily click on it. It is not that hard for you to do some research and if your 55 yrs old and still don't know how to do research than I feel really sorry for you. It must have been a hard life.
Why aren't you asking the people that are bad mouthing the game to back their statements up with a link? That's what I thought. Your being biased and are wanting me to prove that the game is targetted for a certain crowd, but don't require a link when people make statements at how bad this game is. If you want a link you better stop pulling double standards.
Here is a link for you. Go search ddo.com If you can't find what you need there, you weren't worth the time to convince anyways.
I must be crazy, because I'm doing leg work for someone who is incapable of doing it themselves. I checked the ddo.com and couldn't find it. They changed the site since Beta and the FAQs and removed the Dev discussions and such. So your just going to have to take my word for it, just like your taking other peoples word for it that the game sucks. But if your logical at all I can break it down for you.
It takes 90 hours to get from lvl 1-10 playing only the quests that get you the most experience and repeating those over and over untill 10. Turbine intends to publish content once a month. Assuming the content patches will be no more than 90 hours also, you can then divide 90 by 4 and get 22.5. This means the game is targetted towards the casual crowd that plays no more then 22 hours and 30 min a week. Turbine said there won't be an endgame, but instead constant content patches to keep the story and game going. Any logical person would then conclude that they are targetting the person who plays around 22 hours a week, because anymore hours will leave you without something to do for part of the month.
Try soloing quests your own level in this game till lvl 10. It won't happen, because Turbine made the dungeons group oriented. Therefore, you get a casual friendly, group oriented game. That's just using logic and nothing written from the Devs, which I guarantee you they did.
You can go from lvl 1-10 doing the quests in the appropriate order, which not many people do, and not have to repeat a quest. However, if you want more than 1 character you are guaranteed to repeat the quests. I've done most of the quests 4 or more times. Does it get boring? Yes sometimes, but I still have to think about where the traps are and bring appropriate classes along or we will get killed. That doesn't make the quests mindless though. The dungeons don't look the same either. People who say this has rushed through the dungeons without looking at them and enjoying the ride. Most likely done several quests that were lower level them then, which made it easy to do. There are many possibilities why the dungeons get boring. The dungeons are no more boring after being repeated than killing the same mob over and over again like in other games.
I've played DAOC, SWG, GW, COH, EQ, WOW, and EVE and I like DDO better than all of those, except pre-nge SWG. I met some people on the ddo.com beta forums, got to know them, created a guild with them and I play pretty much only with them. So there are about 10 of us that know each other pretty well from just playing a game and it feels like it's just us in the game, which is exactly what the Devs were aiming for. Check the Dev journals on this website actually. I think they are still there.
Either way, this game is for a niche group and many will not like it, but I do and it pisses me off when someone says the game I like is crap, because of the way the game was made. I don't go to other game forums that I have played bashing the game, because it didn't cater to me and I just want the same respect in return.
That will never happen, therefore I am being reduced to flaming, which I hate doing and I think is very immature. So I have to sink to everyone elses level of immaturity to try and beat them at their own game.
Umm, no it wasn't. I have been in the PnP crowd for over 10 years now I feel completely steam rolled on this one.
At a pace that will satisfy who exactly?? Most people weren't satisfied with the content that was there at release, let alone find the pace of future content satisfying.
The game gets a D- from me, and I DID try it in the beta extensively.
- Scaris
"What happened to you, Star Wars Galaxies? You used to look like Leia. Not quite gold bikini Leia (more like bad-British-accent-and-cinnamon-bun-hair Leia), but still Leia nonetheless. Now you look like Chewbacca." - Computer Gaming World
Your making a sound argument and that is why I am accomadating you. However, if you want to bring college level arguing into this, you should be aware that it is also taught in college that you don't have to back up what you say when it is common knowledge. What I said can be found under the features section of DDO on THIS website. But here is a clip from one of the journals that I found under features. I just started digging and I am sure there is more there for you to find out on your own.
D&D Online is focused on creating a fun online RPG experience that you can play with your friends. We dont compare ourselves to other MMPs DDO takes you straight to your adventure (no endless running to get where you want to go), offers quest-based advancement (no sitting in the same place for hours grinding for XP), and creates a private adventure for you and your friends (no random interference or grief from strangers).
Our development touchstone has been to create an online experience that captures that essence of the classic tabletop adventure session. But it has to be a fun online experience. When a straight translation of the pen & paper rules would hamper our ability to provide a fun online experience, we work closely with Wizards of the Coast to come up with a modification that maintains the spirit of D&D while satisfying the demands of the online medium
I was going to copy and paste more for the non-believers, but this website is terribly slow. I'm not going to waste 3 hours of my day copying and pasting what you can easily find for yourself in the features section.
You will not find them saying that the game is meant for people who play 22 hours a week or less. I am telling you from experience that if you want to play this game without ever having to wait on new content, that you will have to play no more than 22 hours a week. I have been to Iraq also, and I can tell you that it sucks over there. Do you need proof of that too? I didn't think so. Sometimes you just need to take the word of people who have experienced things you haven't.
Turbine has said that they are providing monthly content patches and are not adding a endgame because of it. So logically speaking, since the game takes 90 hours to reach level 10 cap, the game is intended for people playing 22 hours or less a week. If your going to argue with logic or someone who has and is playing the game then I have nothing left to say to you. I am not judging this game or providing a biased view. I am not spouting off that this game rocks or sucks. I am simply telling you how you must play and who this game was intended for so you don't make the mistake of buying it and coming back and complaining when you find out that you can't do any of the previously described things.
You are more likely to like this game if you play 22 hours a week or less with a small group of friends, than the guy who powergames, likes to solo, likes pvp, or likes a large persistent world to explore.
There is nothing left to be said. If you don't like this then tuff. I can't change it for you and I hope Turbine doesn't either.
Hi there,
I think the above is BS.
I played and continue to play the PnP version, and i can't recall a single time i was unable to attack a fellow player or npc.
I can't recall a single time when we were given a task and/or quest that we would just all suddenly morph into it (see 'cave') and morph back out again to town.
I can't recall a single time where we couldnt travel to other towns/villages/cities/lands etc.
I can't recall a single time where the monsters we fought or any other NPC did not adhear to the same rules we used, ie spell allotment etc (I hear the mobs in this game have unlimited mana to use)
----
MMORPG's I've Played: World of Warcraft: 10/10 - Rappelz: 7/10 - Ragnarok Online: 8/10 - DnD Online: 2/10 - Runescape: 6/10 - LotR Online: 5/10 - Anarchy Online: 7/10 - CoV: 8/10 - Rohan Online: 8/10 - Guild Wars: 7/10 - Flyff: 8/10 - Warhammer Online: 8/10
My HARDCORE Story
Your making a sound argument and that is why I am accomadating you. However, if you want to bring college level arguing into this, you should be aware that it is also taught in college that you don't have to back up what you say when it is common knowledge. What I said can be found under the features section of DDO on THIS website. But here is a clip from one of the journals that I found under features. I just started digging and I am sure there is more there for you to find out on your own.
D&D Online is focused on creating a fun online RPG experience that you can play with your friends. We dont compare ourselves to other MMPs DDO takes you straight to your adventure (no endless running to get where you want to go), offers quest-based advancement (no sitting in the same place for hours grinding for XP), and creates a private adventure for you and your friends (no random interference or grief from strangers).
Our development touchstone has been to create an online experience that captures that essence of the classic tabletop adventure session. But it has to be a fun online experience. When a straight translation of the pen & paper rules would hamper our ability to provide a fun online experience, we work closely with Wizards of the Coast to come up with a modification that maintains the spirit of D&D while satisfying the demands of the online medium
What you said was not exactly common knowledge... But I won't take it any further... I don't recall ever saying you were wrong... I just wanted to know where you got the info from.
Have fun with DDO...
I'm not going to argue about this anymore and I don't think you want to either. What you want are straight forward, no bullshit answers, and that is the language I share with you. I am a gamer who has played multiple MMO's since the year 2002 (see bio for games played). I have never flamed a game for something I didn't like, but I always will be truthful with people about what a game has or doesn't have. I hope that is enough to be trustworthy. I am not a fanboi as some people call those that support a game and I will answer any question truthfully even if it means it is negative towards the game I play. I answer truthfully, because that is good ethics and morals to do so.
For example: I may like and support this game, but if someone asked me if you have to repeat all the same dungeons you had to on your previous character, I would say yes. This would hurt the possibility of me bringing in more players, but it would provide a truthful answer for a curious gamer wanting to know. I may like this game and it might suit my playstyle, but I am not naive and I know for certain that this game does not suit your typical MMORPG player.
I created this thread to inform people of the type of crowd that would possibly enjoy this game the most, so that people would stop wasting their money on the game expecting a persistent world and etc. and then coming on the forums and complaining about not getting what they expected.
I never played pnp DnD, but from what people have told me of it, you played with a small group of friends and there wasn't any PvP. I have heard some cases after playing DDO of where creative DM's created some brief PvP content to where two groups compete for the same Dungeon, but this was not the standard. I would have loved to have seen DDO take place in the Dragon Lance setting and have an explorable world and such, but I can see the logic in keeping it instanced so that they keep the feel of having a small group of friends going on an adventure a few days a week, which is what I meant by the pnp crowd.
I say again. From what I heard of pnp, I wish that DDO could be a direct duplicate of it, but they chose not to and informed their potential customers of that ahead of time, which leaves me no reason to complain, since I knew what I was buying before I played it. The choices aspects of pnp and the large world of pnp are appealing to me, but so is the small group feel and the casual feel of meeting up with a group of friends for a few hours a week. I feel that it carries the casual, small group of friends feel, which is good enough in my book to play over the other MMO's out there, which have left me disappointed in the community aspect. The community of every MMO I have played were elitist min/maxers and were pretty immature. Even SWG had this and their community was pretty good. DDO, by having limited content scares away that crowd and hopefully will keep the casual mature crowd in its stead. From talking with other like minded people, I have came to believe that my hopes will come true and that after hearing the complaints from the not so like minded people, I have also come to believe that I was right in my evaluation that the other crowd will leave the game.
Whether or not you want to believe me is your choice. I simply want to answer honestly what DDO really is, so that we can reduce the amount of flaming threads on this forum that I come to for mature discussion on this game. All I get on this forum right now is childish rants flaming a game on things that were told to the community before beta started. They are complaining about them like they didn't know about it. The Dev journals and Q&A articles on this website are no secret and neither was ddo.com. Both had all the information a person needed to find out that this game was made to be small group oriented and quest based with nothing else other than socializing to do. If a person is not smart enough to do research on a product they are buying then they shouldn't get upset about a product and flame them for it, when they could have prevented the unhappy experience by doing some research first.
I feel like I am ranting now and will close up this thread with an offer. If anyone wants honest replies on what this game has to offer or anything else related to DDO, go ahead and ask.
I feel like I am ranting now and will close up this thread with an offer. If anyone wants honest replies on what this game has to offer or anything else related to DDO, go ahead and ask.
I clipped most of this post because my reply really hasn't much to do with what I snipped...
I have a simple question, then a statement...
Question... If 22 hours a week is considered a casual gamer... what other categories are there other than Hard Core Gamer? It seems to me that 22 hours a week is quite a bit of gaming. If you break it down... Playing every day, it is over 3 hours a day, playing 5 days a week it jumps to over 4 hours a day, and playing only 3 days a week it jumps to over 7 hours a day. Now the PnP games that I played in were only once a week, and rarely twice a week. And we played for about 3 to maybe 4 hours on average each session.
Now the statement... I get really tired of people comparing DDO to the PnP game. If you have ever played the PnP game, you can see that DDO is not really like PnP. And I will only give some obvious reasons... PnP...Starting Hit Points a lot lower than DDO. PnP turn based combat, DDO is not... etc... So I wish that everyone would refrain from trying to compare the two. Including the Devs. They freely admit to making changes to the PnP ruleset to accomodate the MMO world. Let's just talk about what DDO is. And not what it could be...
Enough from me...
Question... If 22 hours a week is considered a casual gamer... what other categories are there other than Hard Core Gamer? It seems to me that 22 hours a week is quite a bit of gaming. If you break it down... Playing every day, it is over 3 hours a day, playing 5 days a week it jumps to over 4 hours a day, and playing only 3 days a week it jumps to over 7 hours a day. Now the PnP games that I played in were only once a week, and rarely twice a week. And we played for about 3 to maybe 4 hours on average each session.
Now the statement... I get really tired of people comparing DDO to the PnP game. If you have ever played the PnP game, you can see that DDO is not really like PnP. And I will only give some obvious reasons... PnP...Starting Hit Points a lot lower than DDO. PnP turn based combat, DDO is not... etc... So I wish that everyone would refrain from trying to compare the two. Including the Devs. They freely admit to making changes to the PnP ruleset to accomodate the MMO world. Let's just talk about what DDO is. And not what it could be...
Enough from me...
First you question. For MMO's 22 hours is casual, but if you play DDO less than 22 hours a week, which a lot of the people I talk to do, you will be fine and will always have something to do. If you play more than 22 hours a week and are only playing 1 character, then you will be waiting on content from what I 'hear'.
I don't have statistics to show you, but most of the MMO gamers play roughly between 30-60 hours a week. It is a second life if not a first for many. It is a popular hobby for gamers and DDO is not very friendly to their playstyle. MMMORPG.COM did a poll on how many hours a week people play, so you should be able to find your results there.
As for your statement. You have every right to be upset about the comparing of DDO and PnP. DDO has qualities of PnP, but is not PnP. DDO is actually more like your Forgotten Realms video games than PnP. The biggest things DDO takes after PnP is the ability to be played casually and being small group oriented. The rest has been altered somewhat into a PnP/MMO/console game hybrid.
I like it, but I would have rather had PnP with graphics for DDO. What I will probably do is either play LOTRO when it comes out as with most my guildmates or play NWN2, which holds true to the particular chosen ruleset and is free, while still having the casual roleplaying feel. Going off of hearsay on NWN by the way. I have never played it but only hear good things about it.
Alot of PPl complain about the content being repetitive when u create a new toon, this is pretty much true of any mmorpg out thererigh now, your going to run pretty much the same content. It would be neat if they could randomize the traps in each dungeon and perhaps include special monsters that could randomly pop up unknowingly each dungeon to add more variety. As of yet I believe DDO has a fair amount of content compared to other mmorpg's the problem is its not like other MMorpgs in the sense that u can waste time farming for items in the world environment, pvp, or craft. SO many of the hardcore players with lots of time on their hands will burn through characters so fast they will simply get irratated. I expect to see more content added but this is not a game that demands u to speed through it like WoW. But if u recall WoW did not have much end game content when it first hit shelves so I expect this game will add more, but I pray they will not have 40 man raids