Asheras wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 12:38pm:



Maybe.  We will never know for sure because the gear they released in MOTU was stupid easy to get.  I had the 3 piece cleric set in a little over an hour.

They changed the grind from gear to XP with the pack.  If epics were still shard, seal, scroll and once a day in MOTU, replacing all the gear would have taken longer and kept people running older epics for interim items. 

It took less than a month to gear up all my characters.   Hell, even the hard to get items were farmed out.  Everything was BOE and farmed to ransack.

Eladiun wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 12:48pm:


I agree with you on the once a day thing.  The players need something to stop them from killing the game for themselves.  The once per day epic runs helped with that.  It made it better to have more toons and do more things. 

The seal/shard/scroll mechanic was crap though.  And I'm saying this as a guy who had 3 sets of red dragon armor, 3 full abashai sets, 2 claw sets, eTorc, eMariChain, etc.  About the only thing I never completed that I wanted (besides the pratically impossible eRoSS) was an eSoS.  I put in my time on it. 

I did not like that MoTU loot had so many random attributes and had only one tier of item.  (I like the EN/EH/EE version concept)

I do like that it was dropping complete items. 

The ability to ransack the chests and grind out multiple 3rd run lists on the chains did make it too easy to get the loot, however.

Asheras wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 1:08pm:


Asketes wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 1:47pm:


It had it's pro's and con's...  The randomness sucked the fact that you could run one e-Von or 100 to get that SoS was bad.  The drop rates were too easy to manipulate by Turbine has anyone even seen a eRing of Spell Storingor the dozens of crap shards and seals that seemed to drop with a huge frequency.   The fact that scrolls were farmable by only one or two classes hurt the system.  On the other side, the system encouraged grouping.  It encourage running multiple different quests each day.  It was hard to get gear so for a while at least items felt special.  It took time which kept the content in play longer.  It was also really exciting when you finally got all the pieces and built an item.

Personally, I much prefer farming gear to farming XP. 

Eladiun wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 1:58pm:



Agreed.

Eladiun wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 2:05pm:


uggghhh . . . asking people "what do you need" and them replying "XP" made me want to punch a baby.

I still find ways to keep myself entertained but I completely understand people abandoning this game.

Asheras wrote on Apr 28^th, 2013 at 9:26pm:


Use logic.

Were you playing the game in September 2009, which is when F2P began?

At US night time, you had a minimum of 5 market instances and once players got going, you had three instances in Meridia.  Sometimes, there were double digits of instances in the Market, and not just during events.

If you logged in during US morning hours, there were three instances in the market.  MINIMUM.

VIPs have left the game in droves.  Read the DDO forums.  How many VIPs on this forum LEFT the game?  Stainer, a diehard DDO player, started this forum so he could speak his mind.  Stainer enjoyed DDO so much, that he created his own forum to talk about it.  Stainer has QUIT playing.

Now, if you log in during US morning hours, there is one instance in the market.  One instance in the Harbor.  I don't remember the last time I saw two or more instances in Meridia, probably spring of 2010.

There are other sources that provide numbers on DDO.  The DDORACLE uses the API and prints out numbers.

The DDORacle lists there as being 3,200,000 characters in the game.  Then, when you look at the numbers there is a little over 600,000 being active.  Active as being defined as logging in within the last six months.

What percentage of players do you think have MULTIPLE accounts?  The percentage is very high.

How many on this forum created multiple accounts so they could get the Cube companion?  I bet quite a few of you did.  If the companions ever do something, that is when I will get one.


How many LFMs do you see?  Do you complain about there not being enough LFMs?

notajedi wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 2:43pm:


I like this part.

NOTpopejubal wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 2:47pm:


I thought that Stainer left for tractors, but let's ask him.

Stainer, how many hours per week do you play an mmo other than DDO?

notajedi wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 2:43pm:


I don't suppose if I told you this isn't my forum, and you can look at join dates and see I didn't join until it had been up for over a year, you would believe me would you?

Because you are that stupid.

stupid
stupid
stupid

Bigjunk wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 2:56pm:


Everyone in RG wants that 30 resist trinket, so it's worth running if you can finish it. It's not a guarantee finish for any guild on ghallanda (exploits notwithstanding) which means that there absolutely is a challenge at end game. Besides, it's fun.

I do agree about grinding out destiny xp - that's no fun, so I don't do it.

http://ddowiki.com/page/Draconic_Soul_Gem

Looks tradable . . . I think you just me some incentive.

notajedi wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 2:43pm:


Yes.  I've been playing since early 2008.  The harbor and marketplace were flooded with level 1-6 toons right after F2P.  What is your point?

You will never again see multiple Meridia instances.  Not because the game is dying but because Shroud is barely relevant anymore.  In 2009 it was still the primary gear raid in the game.  Every toon needed at least 1 shroud weapon and 1 or 2 shroud items.  I've run shroud maybe 2 times this year.  In 2009, I was running it twice a day.  Along with ToD too.  When was the last time you saw multiple Amrath instances?  Shit!  The game is seriously on the decline.

(BTW, you do realize that back in 2009 there were no airships and the only way to get places, unless you had a Royal Guard Mask or could cast/scroll teleport, was to run through the marketplace a lot, right?  Now with guild airships the only time I go in the marketplace is to run a quest there or to get to House Cannith.)

Some VIP's have left the game.  Some new ones have joined.  Some switched to Premium and still play.  Again, what is your point.

(BTW Part 2:  Stainer did not start this board.  You are really sounding stupid now.)

OK.  How does that 600,000 compare to last year at this time?  Or 2011? 2008?  Also, revenue <> active accounts, per se.  This is not the old subscription model.  VIP subs are not the only measure of revenue or success.  I am a VIP.  I know of 4-5 guildies and friends who are Premium and spend more on the game per month than I do. 

You seem stuck in the past when the cap was 16, Shroud was king, and people hung out in the marketplace between quests instead of on their guild ships.  Did you fall asleep at the keyboard and miss the last 4 years of DDO?

I think the following things are a pretty big part of the problem:

Raid Bypass Timers
Removal of the Epic quest timer
High drop rates on EH and EE GH gear

The shit did get farmed out way too quickly. 

Without bypasses people would have reached 1st 20th runs on or around April 19th at the earliest. 

Many people had the new dragon armor, fully upgraded, by the end of the first weekend.  No way that happens with the 1 day timer and raid timers in effect, unless you had 6 or more toons ready to roll and a stack of comms from CiTW already in the bag. 

In contrast, how long was it before we had the first set of Cormyrian Red, Cormyrian Green, or Eberron Red (back in the day)?  It was too fucking easy.  I had 3 sets by the end of the first week, and I play 20 hours per week or less. 

Old epics were too grindy.  This is too easy.  There is a middle ground.  They need to find it.