Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Neverwinter: 'Mistakes Were Made with This Release' says Lead Designer
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
Newly appointed Neverwinter Lead Designer Scott Shicoff has penned a new article on the official site. In it, Shicoff acknowledges missteps with the release of Module 6: Elemental Evil. After taking community feedback into account, the next game update will bring the first in a series of improvements to Elemental Evil and the game itself.
Shicoff mentions several key areas the team will be looking into over the next several weeks:
Overall difficulty
XP rewards in the new zones and campaign zones
Invocation
Hourly quests
Zone re-use
Removed dungeons
Campaign zone levels
Items missing slots/stats
And more...
Cryptic is committed to bringing the updates and changes in the above to players for testing as soon as possible once the evaluation of the action items is complete. Lastly, Shicoff has created a special forum thread for players to provide even more feedback to the team with regard to the issues above.
Read the full letter on the Neverwinter site.
)
Comments
Once again I'm glad that I didn't jump into the new end game content right away. (Not that it matters, since TSW stole my attention away from Neverwinter again for the time being anyway)
It's good to hear that they're acknowledging their mistakes and are working on them though.
My SWTOR referral link for those wanting to give the game a try. (Newbies get a welcome package while returning players get a few account upgrades to help with their preferred status.)
https://www.ashesofcreation.com/ref/Callaron/
Wise words, amigo, wise words!
But... but... "Maces are Iconic!" :P
As soon as I heard that, I knew this update was going to be the trainwreck of the century. Cryptic doesn't get it and making a statement like that just proves they don't even understand the basic fundamentals of D&D.
Banegrivm
Leader of the 1st Fist of Light
www.1stfistoflight.com
You know the Paladins can use swords just like GFs, right? The maces thing was just to give them a little distinction. You don't have to use them if you don't want to. (I sure don't :P)
It's like going into a rage because a store sells one thing you're not interested in. Just because it's there doesn't mean you have to use/buy it. :P
My SWTOR referral link for those wanting to give the game a try. (Newbies get a welcome package while returning players get a few account upgrades to help with their preferred status.)
https://www.ashesofcreation.com/ref/Callaron/
Banegrivm
Leader of the 1st Fist of Light
www.1stfistoflight.com
Well maces are iconic... In fact for most depictions of Paladins maces, hammers and other blunt implements are VERY common.
Even in DnD (Heck... Most games i have been part of have had a paladin with a hammer or a mace...)
Should they have made Clerics more like the Paladin... and the primary mace weilder... Sure.. They did not go that route and no matter how much wood "you" have for minute and explicit replication of every aspect of FR lore... Most people think that Neverwinter is adapted from NWN (or if they are a bit older BG) and are completely unaware that there is even such a thing as a pen n paper RPG... .. . Their first contact with a Paladin was most likley a plate wearing nutter with a hammer...
Ergo... Paladin+hammer=iconic... Like it or not.
This have been a good conversation
I summarized this expansion in an post started by someone who had just returned to the game and couldn't believe that state of the latest module (Mod 6)
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/430916/page/1
My comments copied again here:
A thorough detailing of the latest changes would take a few pages.
Essentially they have raised all end level zones by 10 levels, meaning that players in the middle of gear acquisition have been blocked off.
There are new 60-70 leveling zones, but apart from one, these are just renamed lower level areas populated by higher mobs. Even the one new zone has reskinned instances from other areas.
The 60-70 leveling quests are mind numbingly awful. Some of the most boring content I have experienced in years of gaming - and that's saying something.
This latest Mod 6 is unbelievably bad, even taking into account some of the dubious decisions and pretty awful quality that this game has experienced in the past.
Even players who have stuck by this game appear to be leaving in numbers because of this latest Mod, which offers nothing new in terms of end level content.
Once you have raised your character from 60-70, then you are back in the old end level zones that you where effectively blocked from by their level increase. Running the same content as before only with yourself and the mobs all 10 levels higher.
Add this Mod 6 to the list of worst game expansions in mmo history, and it won't be out of place.
I'm with JudgeUK here. The mistakes made were far from trivial. Minor issues are generally expected in a project as complex as an MMORPG. But the issues that mod 6 have raised are simply staggering in scope. Numerous, grievous errors that eclipse many competitors past gaffes. It will surprise me if such a catastrophic mistake isn't a foundation that could kill this game unless some major corrective action is taken on the part of the developers. The only product evolution that may have been worse might have been New Coke.
One thing is certain, I will have to give Scott Shicoff credit for his skill at understatement.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
Holy Avenger....mace.
Are you talking the sh**ty 4th edition of D&D? I mean we obviously know you are talking the *****y Cryptic edition of D&D.
But I cant think of any iconic pictures, or text for that matter, with D&D Paladins that used anything but a sword.
"I understand that if I hear any more words come pouring out of your **** mouth, Ill have to eat every fucking chicken in this room."
No i mostly played during 3:d ed but that was not really the point... The point was that culturally (a weird concept i know....) Paladins and hammers/maces are fairly well linked and since most people i come across these days think that DnD is a set of computer games... And as you know... Paladins sort of can be found outside of DnD these days... So for every year less and less people care one iota about our mouldy old books from the days long gone...
But if it is any comfort my personal opinion on the matter is that we can blame Blizzard for the strong bias... They did a VERY good job of cementing that image with WC3 and onwards... (i kid you not.. i have heard many a young tell it as gospel that blizzard in fact invented the paladin class...) so when they said iconic... i think they meant in a wider cultural sense and not DnD in particular... Again it might sound weird but it makes sense on a macro level...
This have been a good conversation
You must be very young then. When I played first edition and beyond, clerics were iconic for maces and hammers and paladins for sword and board. WoW changed that perception as it was the first truly popular D&D style game to come out with the paladin defaulting to a two handed hammer.
Yeah, I don't have any tabletop rpg experience but all the clerics I remember in the DnD universe (Baldur's gate, icewind dale, neverwinter nights, etc) are blunt weapon wielders.....so I don't know what all the crying is about.
Indeed.. i am not even 40 yet.... So by DnD terms a mere youngling...
Now i will repeat...
"so when they said iconic... i think they meant in a wider cultural sense and not DnD in particular... Again it might sound weird but it makes sense on a macro level... "
And no matter how you spin it you can not change the fact that in my youth... in the groups i gamed with... we had a fairly high amount of paladins with hammers... So... Typical canon or not... it was a thing... Why this was.. I have no flacking clue... But it is not a stretch to assume that these people would feel that a good paladin in Neverwinter would have a hammer.
I agree it would have been more natural to have clerics use maces... they did not go this route for some reason.
This have been a good conversation
Banegrivm
Leader of the 1st Fist of Light
www.1stfistoflight.com
Haven't bought the expansions yet. Loving the base game. Bunch of bugs came with the patch....please fix soon!
Proud MMORPG.com member since March 2004! Make PvE GREAT Again!
Played: UO, LotR, WoW, SWG, DDO, AoC, EVE, Warhammer, TF2, EQ2, SWTOR, TSW, CSS, KF, L4D, AoW, WoT
Playing: The Secret World until Citadel of Sorcery goes into Alpha testing.
Tired of: Linear quest games, dailies, and dumbed down games
Anticipating:Citadel of Sorcery
Cryptic may be half baked dip sticks but the greed part is 200% perfect world who owns cryptic now. Im pretty sure if they had a sub option without a huge insane cash shop this game would of gotten much stronger reviews and playerbase but paying 30 bucks for a horse or 10 dollars for a bag or more is a joke and exactly why so many free to play games get instantly written off regardless of quality. I personally think neverwinter is a decent game overall for quality and action combat but I quit playing it long ago when they made the artifact grind and pay to win features with that. Not to mention the 100s of lock boxes that drop constantly every hour and the server broadcasts who got a mount or a pet etc. Game reminds me of going to a bookie rally during the super bowl...
The game needs to be perfect for one to put up with the persistent Pay to Win crap in it.
If you wanna end-game PvP, you have to either exploit/bot (which many do), farm like crazy (think about it as a full-time job), or P2W your way to proper gear. Combine this to ZERO catch up mechanics (no seasons etc. like in WoW), and any new player is behind 2 years vs. established PvPers.
So yeah. The very foundation of the game is rotten, impossible to fix because the game survives on milking idiots and whales. These games should not even be allowed to exist IMO, it should be illegal to exploit your playerbase like this, but yeah, "pay" with your wallet and just enjoy a proper subscription MMO like WoW or Wildstar.
QFT.
Paladins only use swords pretty much, and the Holy Avenger was pretty much THE sword of choice for any self respecting Paladin, the only ones to use Maces, were pretty much Clerics as they were prohibited (with one exception) from using edged weapons, of course, in D&D Clerics also wear heavy armour, and don't use Cloth armour at all.
Pretty much agree with everything you said.
They made quite a number of "mistakes" on the console version as well considering people are losing their shirt in the AH, the lag is so bad you can't complete a dungeon without a wipe (and yes it's on their end with COGENT their server providers) and their zen purchase issues to name just a few.
Sounds like they need new management in all of the departments.
Oh and to those who keep insisting on the subscription, subscription doesn't guarantee a good game, that's a logical fallacy argument. They could have made their F2P shop like Rift's and made a huge impact instead they chose to go the way of SWTOR and others like that with their billing model.
Wow... glad I decided to sit the last few modules out.
Icewind Dale pretty much cooled me to this game(see what I did, there?). Just WAY too much RNG. I played ID about a month and a half on one toon and couldn't loot the final piece to the armor set. Went to another toon, and got that piece on the second day.
The baby Yeti pet, particularly after figuring out that it was a Russian Nesting doll of RNG's to get it, felt like a slap in the face, and I haven't been back to spend any serious time in the game, since.
Run a quest; the yeti may or may not show up in the end.
The yeti may or may not drop a yeti treat.
The baby yeti may or may not appreciate you for giving it to them.
...development team may or may not have been flipping off their players as they added this code into the game.
Kinda a shame; the gameplay is pretty fun. I still find the levelling game to be pretty enjoyable, but in light of TSW improving their game, and ESO going B2P, I haven't had any time to try the new class.
This game was and will be plagued until the day it closes, by the fact that Cryptic/PWI put this game out fast and cheap, skipping an unbelievable amount of D&D lore and mechanics, putting out 1/3 the game they should have.
The rampant lock box gambling and other failings of Cryptic/PWI games only add to shame and disappointment in another wasted IP/title.