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Mod 6 changed this game significantly
HappyPandaTao
Member UncommonPosts: 4
Disclaimer: The following is my own opinion and I'm not interested in trying to convert people to my way of thinking. If you are a current NW player and have a different opinion that's fine. The world would be a boring place if we all agreed on everything. Also my comments are relevant solely to PvE. I don't do PvP.
First some background:
My main toon is a DC (the cleric class for any non-NW readers out there) and has been since the official launch date so I've stuck through thick and thin daily with this game for a long time. I've played both as a Divine Oracle (more solo-ish oriented) and Anointed Champion (more group oriented). And I've played all 3 Feat trees. My favorite Feat tree has been the dps tree but I found something to enjoy in all 3 versions (Virtuous/Faithful/Righteous).
I have 3 artifacts at epic level in various stages on the way to legendary. All epic armor sets and epic artifact equipment. This was my past gear until Mod 6. Now I run keeping only the artifact weapon and the artifacts. Everything else is blue level 70 gear with level 8 radiant enchants socketed (all of them close to leveling up to rank 9) and a soulforged I'm close to getting to greater soulforged status though I'm currently not using the soulforged because I need the hp the blue gear gives. My DC is based around a crit build so I've always tried to keep my crit chance and crit severity numbers up. That means I typically run with a Greater Vorpal (on the way to Perfect) and assorted companions to boost my crit stats (also a black dragon ioun stone at epic level).
The crit build helps not only my crit dps but also allows for crit healing as well. I tend to play a more hybrid dps cleric than most dps clerics in that Healing Word never leaves my bar. In parties I use it in 60-70 dungeons and skirmishes to give in-combat constant, fast HoTs to everyone. I always liked it even prior to Mod 6 because I like seeing the PUGs I ran with "topped-off" in hits point. Since Mod 6 dropped and they took away all the other group's in-combat regen options I feel it is even more helpful (Healing Word also tics faster than any other in-combat HoT heal available in my experience.)
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Mod 6 observations:
I waited until Level 70 before posting because I wanted to give the game a chance. The difficulty levels with this new mod are off-the-scale. It's not unusual for larger common enemies to one-shot players constantly. Even the smaller common mobs can take hits out of a level 70 player down to 1/4th health in 2 hits (sometimes in only 1). Don't get me started with bosses or Heroic Encounters.
Now as a DC in some sense I'm luckier than other classes. I can self-heal and regen is always available in combat or out of it if I'm willing to slot Healing Word. DCs also get 3 long-range dodges. And while you are dodging you are immune to mob's or bosses damage. I take advantage of that dodge immunity constantly.
My problem is that casual play has gotten so difficult the game is no longer fun for me. This is a first.
I understand the reasoning behind the difficulty increase. The devs are trying to "future-proof" the game to account for increasing levels of player power over the coming years. This isn't a bad thing but I wonder if the road getting there for many players like me has become so unfun and punishing these players are packing it in and moving on to other games. I know I'm seriously considering moving on to some other MMO. If Wildstar goes F2P I might look into that. Skyforge also looks interesting.
There are actually disputes between factions on the official NW boards between those who are upset at how unfun the game has become for Mod 6 - lots of grind in addition to off-the-scale difficulty increase for level cap toons and those whom are afraid this means devs will nerf the new difficulty which they absolutely love. Truthfully I don't think the devs ever will nerf the difficulty. It would make the point of "future-proofing" for challenging gameplay moot. In short I'm increasingly coming to the conclusion that the game's future loyal playerbase will be those whom like the thrill of constantly being on the edge of being one-shotted. Sort of like players on this board who bemoan the fact there are no more MMOs who impose perma-death on a toon if you die. The thrill of "real consequences" to playing is gone they say. I do get why these folks say that - it's just that I'm not one of them.
Oh...and one other thing. GF class is pretty much dead. Not saying this as an opinion but rather just saying that the population base of GFs has fallen so low that since Mod 6 dropped I can count less than 10 times I've run a PUG and seen a GF in the group. Never - to my surprise I admit - have I seen a player base so quickly abandon a class en masse. It's like someone flipped a switch and suddenly *poof* no more GFs. They must be on the NW endangered species list from what I can tell. My BF's main was a GF but since Mod 6 dropped he got so disgusted with the changes to lifesteal he quit the game completely. He wasn't about to spend more money to level up a Paladin he said. He said he regretted spending money on the game (especially on leveling up his Lifedrinker enchant) only to see his class's role being done better by the Paladin.
Comments
Where are you going that you're having so much trouble? If you're trying to do the top tier areas in random greens, then of course that's not going to end well for you. Before module 6, Cryptic made it impossible to even try that due to gearscore requirements. Now they let you try and see what happens. If you're frustrated that you can't solo Icewind Dale in random greens, then your problem is somewhere between your keyboard and your chair.
But if you're getting two-shotted in Sharandar or tier 1 epic dungeons, that's a different problem entirely. Which is why I ask: where are you going that the mobs are so insanely hard at level 70?
First thing I want to say is that I have played this game for 15 months. My characters are decent and my main is a GF. I agree with everything the OP has said about the game. Mod6 has changed the game from being casual friendly to casual unreasonable. The OP didn't even mention that after the initial armor rush, there are very few ways to legitimately earn the items you need to progress in the game such as adding refinement points.
Now why have the Guardian Fighter class fallen off a cliff? Because the class was boring to play in the first place and now it's even harder to be a tank in Neverwinter than before!
Control Wizards have CC and ranged DPS, Righteous Clerics can have ranged DPS, Trickster Rouges can turn invisible and have DPS, Hunter Rangers can trap and have ranged DPS and all the Guardian Fighter has is a slight increase in damage reduction (No HP advantage and other classes can build to achieve the same level of tankness and retain reasonable DPS!).
Here is the problem, the mobs have a TON more HP then they used too and the Guardian Fighter just take longer to do the same work. The Guardian Fighters shield mechanic is now out dated. When a Guardian Fighter takes a hit that's strong enough, you have to remember they only block 80%, there's still a chance the Guardian Fighter will die in a hit or two! Why in the world would a reasonable person choose to keep playing such a class? The only reason I am is because Ive invested too many hours and tons of money on my character. Those who were smart enough to catch on fast enough took the sane route and joined the fun as a DPS'er. The game is just much more fun and alot less difficult that way.
The most ignorant response I keep hearing to this disaster of a mod is learn to play! This game isn't hard to play, but getting gear is hard to do now without established money. Tough time to be a new person joining this game, that's for sure.
I suspected something like this would happen. It's why I'm currently not touching my high level characters.
I'm leveling a new paladin while the devs balance things properly. Hopefully by the time my Pally reached level 60 things be less grim. (Which is plenty of time for them at the pace I'm going. I made the character when the update launched and he's only level 13 right now. :P )
GF's were completely useless when the game launched too, then they grow to be a bit more useful, now they are back to square one judging by the sound of it. (A shame too, since my "main" is a GF, although my DC's pretty much taken over that role in the last couple of months.)
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/
Let's keep a few things straight here. Module 6 didn't just nerf guardian fighters. Quite the opposite: the class got the biggest buff relative to other classes in a patch that I've seen in any theme park MMORPG. Ever. The main highlights quoted verbatim from the patch notes:
1) Damage of powers has been increased by 20% across the board.
2) Weapon damage increased across the board. Average increase of roughly 50%.
Remember that weapon damage doesn't just mean a vanilla auto-attack. Many (all?) other powers scale with weapon damage, too.
Module 6 brought a number of other goodies for guardian fighters, too. Great weapon fighters got 20% increased weapon damage and some other goodies. Other classes got nerfed as much as they got helped.
But the class was so far out of line with all the rest that, even after such huge buffs, there's a case to be made that the class is still underpowered. Before module 6, guardian fighters were just shy of useless. Now they're much better, or at least much less bad. So don't claim that module 6 ruined the class.
So what did module 6 change that makes things look so bad? Two things:
1) The game is a lot harder than before. Before, you could do any old stupid thing and win because combat was absurdly easy. Grab a class that only deals half as much damage as the others? No problem, you still win; it just takes longer than for other classes. But now the difference between a bad class and a good class can be the difference between losing and winning rather than winning slowly versus winning quickly.
2) Before module 6, the queue held open one group slot for a guardian fighter. That meant that every queue group had to have one. There weren't exactly a ton of them before module 6 hit, either--which is why other classes typically had to wait half an hour or so for a queue to pop, while guardian fighters often got in almost immediately.
This sort of worked for guardian fighters, but it was a disaster for everyone else in the game. Allowing paladins to fill the tank slot means that groups no longer all need a guardian fighter. And it means the slots can get filled faster so that, once everything shakes out, damage dealing classes won't have to spend more time waiting in the queue than actually doing group content.
So what is to be done? Unlike the stupid "why can't I solo level 73 mobs at level 60?" whiners, guardian fighters at least have a case. Most classes have a good dodge mechanic to avoid damage, and guardian fighters don't. If you only take 2/3 as much damage when hit, but get hit twice as often because you can't dodge, that's no good and the "tank" class can end up dying more easily than than the glass cannons.
I don't think that giving guardian fighters a dodge to match several other classes is the solution, as class diversity makes the game more interesting. I'd prefer to see blocking made more effective. As I see it, the biggest problem is that the 80% damage reduction is erratic. You have to start blocking long before the attack hits or you won't get the damage reduction at all. It's also narrowly directional, which makes some area attacks nearly unblockable--in addition to undodgeable because the class can't get out of the way fast enough.
To make it more effective, I'd like to see it closer to blocking in Cryptic's first game: Champions Online. Make it so that a block thrown up a hundred milliseconds before the blow lands can block it, rather than requiring blocking so far in advance. And if blocking needs to be directional at all, at least make it a wider direction. Perhaps make guard block any attacks that don't give directional combat advantage damage.
Anyone who says that Guardian Fighters got buffed don't play the class. The stats were buffed massively for level 60 but get's the same extreme stat curve that everything else receives up to level 70 where you can't see it period. Second if anyone has it worse then Guardian Fighter's and their outdated/bugged skill mechanics, its the Paladins who can't mitigate the outstanding damage they are receiving.
The content did not get harder the mobs hit harder, that mean's more to Tanks then the other classes. Get to level 70 and play the class, then go to the games developers and ask that Guardian Fighters and Paladins get the AC boost they need to more effectively do their job (AC also got nerfed under the new stat curve).
Your post had great points. I'll add pass those along too, thanks.
I've leveled with all of the new "leveling boards". It's the experience of level 70+ gameplay for me that this post was specifically about. My experience is from running the T1 dungeons and skirmishes. 9 out of 10 fail. Even as a DC I run through pots and kits. The T1s and skirms have been so bad I haven't even bothered with attempting T2s or Tiamat. The leveling 3-man dungeons and skirms Master of the Hunt and Dread Ring I did not include when I made my opening statement. The fact that your damage output gets worse the higher your level makes the whole experience tedious for me.
I stand by my statement that for me the game difficulty (while I understand the reasons for it) have also transitioned the game from being very fun for me to play daily for the past 2 or so years (since Day 1 of release) to being not fun in the least. It's a grind. My post doesn't mention lag, rubberbanding and bugs because even though they're numerous I know eventually that will get fixed. My observation is that the kind of gamer playerbase for the future of this game will be a different one overall than the one that's supported them so far. It is no longer for casual gameplay unless said casual is also very patient with the high one-shot kill rates in dungeons, skirms or soloing.
Perhaps it will get easier once everyone has the Elemental blue set. But to get to the blue elemental set you have to go through a slog of tedious and punishing and for me - no longer fun - gameplay. The nature of the game has changed with Mod 6. Again, not trying to convert people to my way of thinking on this issue. Just stating my own experience of Mod 6 so far from a Level-capped toon perspective.
As someone who got to 60 only a few days before mod 6 arrived, I really got blasted. I didn't have quality gear before mod 6, and after, I was even more anemic. The side effect of removing the Daily Dungeon and Daily Skirmish as a source of ADs (for me, anyway) has sidelined me completely, trying to get ADs through Leadership. Thanks to Quiz' breakdown in another thread, I am getting 1,200 to 1,500 a day and my Leadership is creeping up. And that is a combined total of 3 characters (2 are sub-30 with only 2 crafting tasks available). I've crept up to about 45,000 ADs, and starting to get in the range where I can consider actually purchasing something. Just ID scrolls put a pretty steady demand on ADs for normal adventuring.
But the best way I've found is to run the short duration tasks, Protect Caravans (2h, 100 AD, 40 Leader). I've parked all characters at a campfire, log in and pray, and start crafting. Two hours later, I log in and repeat the process. I've not moved any of my characters, except for the odd side trip to the AH or Mailbox. It's not really playing, though. The 2 hour duration tasks allow me to take advantage of 3 or 4 Invocations, which is still a major part of my AD income.
This game as it currently stands isn't worth the effort. I even paid for PWE ZEN card in anticipation of mod 6. I've not redeemed the code, yet. I'm not sure if I'd rather have 2000 ZEN in STO, PWE or NW. I may have eaten my $20.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
What about the happy hour things they do? With skirmishes for instance you get 1,000 AD for every match you do during the hour. On my new character (level 18) I've already got 20,000 AD almost entirely from doing those.Mod 6 broke all of the Skrimishes and dungeons for me at every character level. Last time I checked (about a week after the mod), they weren't any listed in the Alt-K queue thing for 2 characters, and only the single Hunt skirmish for my 60 level (now 67). It sounds like that has changed (been fixed), and I need to look at that again.
Problem is, there's very little re-playability in this game. The quests are incredibly linear, with nothing 'new' to experience. While this might be a bit nostalgic for the second character, it becomes mind-numbing (at least for me) by the third repetition. That's why I decided to just park all my characters by a campfire and grind the ADs as I described above until I had enough to continue with my main. But this game is grinding my interest levels away. Fast.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
i just started playing NW.. 2 weeks ago and i have GF level 45..now people say its dead or at least useless class.
i also found the game to be very grindy and a cash grab..12 slot bag cost you like 4-5 euro..while 12 slot bag is free or dirt cheap in other games.
if you want to run dungeon more than once you need to buy key to open final chest..you kill last boss but you wont get rewarded unless you pay up.
upgrading your companion and artifacts etc..cost a lot..massive massive grind if you want to do it through playing the game or open your wallet and pay like 5 euro to upgrade your companion to uncommon imagine the cost of higher levels.
a decent mount cost 40 euro almost equal to cost of the whole new game.
its horrible cash grab game.
Hmm. I don't have any 60+ level characters, but I have three active ones and all the right skirmishes/pvp matches come up correctly, and i get the correct bonus. Last night I did three skirmishes, taking no longer than 15 minutes total, and that's 3,000 AD just like that. At the weekend the snow event thing meant an additional skirmish at all levels, and that was giving loads of high quality runes that'd each sell for 50-500 AD.
I totally agree about the linear thing. They should at least have different quest lines for each race or class to limit the monotony.
Yes, yes it is. I play from time to time, so am no where near as knowledgeable as others who have posted about the game. I entirely rely on the theorycrafting of long-time players to help me out. This time around, I found little or no incentive to get up to speed. And the entire Mod 6 design seemed like a precursor to more cash shop stuff. Make harder content:--Sell buffs or new companions, or artifacts, or whatever.
So, i spent a few hours and realized that Mod 6 had sucked the fun out of the game and quietly tip-toed away.
I think the complaints about being a cash grab are a bit unfair since the game has no subscription model alongside f2p. Lots of games like Rift (or far, far worse, ArcheAge) have a subscription that don't give you any in game currencies, so you still have to pay extra for mounts and unlocks and things.
Neverwinter allows fairly easy generation of astral diamonds, which can all be used to get extra dungeon keys, etc. It can be used to get mounts and stuff too, but that would be a bit of a grind.
I think they're too stingy on bank slots, bags, etc. It'd be better if you could buy a base pack (say £20/$30) that gives a large number of permanent account unlocks. They offer some of these that provide mounts and things on all characters, but there could be more.
If you want more storage space, try mailing things to yourself. You can't do that with character-bound items, but you can with account-bound or unbound items. Mailbox space isn't infinite, but a few dozen mail messages at 5 item slots per message is a lot.
Yeah I've been doing that. I realised I could when I wanted to transfer some stuff from one character to another, and saw that any character could access it. I don't know why they don't just give more bank space when you can do this.