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Questioning my decision after signing up

DomoclusDomoclus Member Posts: 28
in Dungeons & Dragons Online

I became a paid customer because I enjoyed the trial and actually enjoyed the game quite a bit until my character hit level 5, and until I got to the Marketplace area. This is when grouping became a must for most missions.

The problem with running group missions is that it is impossible to follow the story and the in-game dungeon master’s narration.

The other morning I ran a relatively long mission (about forty minutes long) with a group of six people, where a mad alchemist had to be stopped from poisoning the city’s water supplies.

The experience I had consisted of me following my group, hacking at baddies, looting the chests, assisting my group members with healing and revival – no problem with that. However, I didn’t trigger any of the progress points, didn’t have a chance to have a dialog with a single NPC, and each time the narrator was still explaining what was going on the baddies would already be attacking, so there was no time to ponder the quest story.

This way we completed most of the objectives, and at the end I didn’t have a clue as to why the alchemist turned out to be a huge monster, or as to why he wanted to poison water in the first place.

To me, this is a major show stopper. A number of times I had to rerun some missions with an AI hireling after successfully completing them with a players group. For example, I completed Waterworks all by myself, to actually learn about what they were searching for in the sewers. However, with the later missions this becomes a pretty impossible task.

Basically, if any of you veteran players have an advice as to how the game should be played to be enjoyed on all levels, action and story alike, I would like to hear it.

 

P.S. Another game with a similar game mechanics, GuildWars, handled group missions in a much more elegant way. Each piece of the story was delivered as a cinematic sequence, and it wouldn’t be skipped until each of the group members either skipped it or decided to watch it until completion.

 

Comments

  • DomoclusDomoclus Member Posts: 28

    Of course, I have a simple solution to this, which I'm sure could be implemented with minimum effort from developers.

    When creating a group, there can be a special option which if enabled would basically make the game pause each time the narrator tells the story or during NPC dialogs. To un-pause and continue the game each group member would need to click Continue button, or the game would resume automatically e.g. after 1 minute (to prevent nasty players from locking the progress for everybody). This would allow each new player to experience and learn every new mission a couple of times, before he/she would become accommodated with it.

  • lorechaserlorechaser Member Posts: 124

    It's the same in every game out there, but the problem is that DDO has a lot more to miss, and you want to see it.  ;)

    I have a couple recommendations - 1. Post your LFG with a tag of either "new player, want to slow run dungeons" 2. Get in a good guild.  I had no trouble with just saying to my guild "Hey - I haven't run this before, do you guys mind going slowly?" and getting a great response.  They'd usually show me around, give me tips, etc. 3. Look for RP/Permadeath groups.  They usually don't mind running slowly, and sometimes even want to rp through it, which gives you plenty of time.  ;)

    Who am I?
    @Lorechaser on CoH
    Badjuju, Splinterhoof, Plainsrunner on WoW (Moonrunner)
    Shyy'rissk on SWG (Flurry)
    ClockworkSoldier, HE Pierce, Letnev on Planetside
    Gyshe, Crucible, Terrakal on DDO
    And many more.

  • PapadamPapadam Member Posts: 2,102

    It will become much easier when DDO:unlimted release.

    1. There willl be alot more people to group with at lower levels and not just old time players rushing with alts

    2. Dungeon scaling will make it much easier to solo quests or do them with smaller groups

    3. You can now buy a hireling (or even several) while inside a dungeon so if you feel its to hard just get a cleric from the store or something.

    But DDO is a group game and soloing is alot harder and slower than grouping.

    If WoW = The Beatles
    and WAR = Led Zeppelin
    Then LotrO = Pink Floyd

  • Bill_PardyBill_Pardy Member Posts: 196

    If you are interested in the Permadeath guilds that were mentioned earlier you can take a look at the link in my signature. We can still zerg with the best of them in low level quests we have run a lot but we always slow down for new players :) 

    Permadeath in DDO = players manually delete their characters on death. The guilds usually play slower and with a big focus on strategy & teamwork.

    --
    DDO Permadeath guilds

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