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Author Topic: Impressions of Dungeons and Dragons Online  (Read 40661 times)
Alkiera
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Reply #105 on: December 26, 2005, 07:10:24 PM

What's the gameplay for a caster?

I've read lots of comments about twitchy melee, which makes sense, but how the wizards are played? I guess targeting is in and the spells are still on a quickbar. So how this twitch style applies to the casting part of the game? How is this different from the current mmorpg combat?

I'm looking for a straight description, not comments.

Spellcasting is, sadly, not very twitchy.  Select target, cast spell.  If someone hits you, make a concentration check or lose the spell(and the spell points).  I guess positioning matters for some AE spells, like the cone of Burning Hands.  If you're in the right spot, you can hit more, etc.

Alkiera

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Typhon
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Reply #106 on: December 27, 2005, 12:57:04 PM

I assume there is no friendly fire for something like cone of cold?
Bunk
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Reply #107 on: December 29, 2005, 08:02:44 AM

For those seriously wondering about gimpy combos in D&D - in P&P for me it was always the guy who took one level of Rogue for the starting skill points and the sneak attack, and then switched to whatever he was really going to play. When I DM, I simply warn my characters about unstable boulders that tend to fall from the sky on to such characters.

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shiznitz
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Reply #108 on: December 29, 2005, 08:40:13 AM

As long as the character's background was urban, it is a reasonable path. A farmer taking a first level in rogue doesn't work, though.

I have never played WoW.
DevilsAdvocate
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Reply #109 on: December 29, 2005, 06:03:52 PM

I assume there is no friendly fire for something like cone of cold?

Most of the D&D computer games I have seen used the rules from the books and included friendly fire from spell casting. So, that AoE sleep spell put everyone to sleep, including your allies (unless they were elves).

Definitely something worth verifying in this game though...
Velorath
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Reply #110 on: December 29, 2005, 08:10:01 PM

I assume there is no friendly fire for something like cone of cold?

Most of the D&D computer games I have seen used the rules from the books and included friendly fire from spell casting. So, that AoE sleep spell put everyone to sleep, including your allies (unless they were elves).

Definitely something worth verifying in this game though...


Most D&D computer games were single-player so if you fucked up you were only hurting yourself.  Allowing PC's to hit each other with AoE spells would obviously be a bad idea, and I think the devs have said as much in interviews.  I will miss the strategy involved in trying to hit as many enemies as possible while trying not to kill your own party members though.
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Reply #111 on: December 30, 2005, 12:02:50 AM

I will miss the strategy involved in trying to hit as many enemies as possible while trying not to kill your own party members though.

I think you'd need a turn-based game for that to work properly.  It'd be pretty hard to keep track of all your party members in real time and line your spells up to avoid hitting them.  It's hard enough just keeping track of which enemies are worth targetting and which the fighters are going to already have killed by the time your spell finishes.

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Reply #112 on: December 30, 2005, 12:09:25 AM

Friendly Fire is another name for a license to grief.
Xilren's Twin
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Reply #113 on: December 30, 2005, 06:11:08 AM

Friendly Fire is another name for a license to grief.

No kidding; even with damage spells coded not to hurt other players, earlier in the alpha they had to change code in taverns to prevent idiots from spam casting Grease causing noobs to get stuck in a continual fall cycle...

MMORPG players are nothing if not predictable.

Xilren

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Margalis
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Reply #114 on: December 30, 2005, 11:01:13 AM

Yeah, the second you allow friendly fire you can look forward to a rash of "AOE_GRIEFER" characters.

Now what might be nice is to make it on option that grants higher XP for quests, and people would only turn it on if they trusted everybody. Having it always on would be a disaster though.

vampirehipi23: I would enjoy a book written by a monkey and turned into a movie rather than this.
Samwise
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Reply #115 on: December 30, 2005, 11:33:59 AM

Now what might be nice is to make it on option that grants higher XP for quests, and people would only turn it on if they trusted everybody. Having it always on would be a disaster though.

I agree, that would be extremely cool.

"I have not actually recommended many games, and I'll go on the record here saying my track record is probably best in the industry." - schild
Big Gulp
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Reply #116 on: January 02, 2006, 08:38:34 AM

Sounds good, but it also sounds like it's pretty much group mandatory, which clears it off of the list for me.  I've got max 3 hours to play on any given night, and I'm frequently interrupted in that time (making dinner, laundry, etc).  As such I tend to annoy any party I'm in with my constant AFK's.  On weekends I can buckle down and do group stuff, but that just isn't an option for me on weekdays.

CoH and WoW allowed me to do some useful stuff solo.  It sounds like DDO doesn't.
Typhon
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Reply #117 on: January 05, 2006, 07:28:38 AM

Friendly Fire is another name for a license to grief.

Agree that this has absolutely been the case in MMOs to date.  DDO seems to be taking a new slant on thing, I was wondering if they were going to try their hand at this as well (especially as this was a big part of the experience of the PnP game).  Hard choices and all that. 

I got to think that someone will come up with some penalty/reputation system at some point that allows for friendly fire to be reintroduced into these games, which will end up creating a deeper game.

A most extreme measure would be something financial, like a security deposit on an apartment.  Pay a month up front, when you go to quit, if you have a bad reputation you lose the deposit.  As you reputation gets worse and worse, you are required to put more into the security deposit.  I'm not sure I'd play that game, but I bet it would reduce the griefing (course, it might generate some lawsuits as well).
Hoax
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Reply #118 on: January 05, 2006, 09:25:53 AM

Having now seen this game being played I have to say...

What the fuck?

We've all had debates about whether WoW's gfx are good/bad/ugly/simple but damn DDO looks terrible.  That "feel" to the world we talked about WoW and FFXII having?  It has none, it should have some because as far as I could tell every quest took place in some instanced hand-made zone.  But no, it looked boring, hell after watching 4 hours off and on I kept thinking my friend was doing the same quest only to find out it was different.  Hopefully at later levels things start getting really really impressive, which I can imagine they would but the level1-2 stuff just looked uninspired at best.

The mobs looked assy too, the spell graphics were boring (look out purple balls! Oh noes here come the green ones!) but I really had stopped paying attention at that point.

So that was gfx, which is about all I observed.  Although I did notice some other things:

-Gear was boring at least at lower levels (but with only 10 I think you get a lot of time out of each level) +2 chainmail?!  I mean sure that is how all rpg gear works but at least give it a cool name or something.  I know that is classic DnD but I have a hard time getting excited even when I'm upgrading from Green to Purple in WoW despite the nifty gfx change and statline goodness.  Plus one just doesn't motivate me.

-The combat, which I was excited to see, is fairly twitch, I mean you have to aim if your shooting a bow, kind of and when you are melee'ing you run around possibly even faster then WoW and click that mouse diablo-style.  But the combat looks dumb, the things that make WoW's combat look artificial are even more exaggerated in DDO.  It was really bad because my friend was fighting tiny mobs like kobolds, spiders and metal dogs(?) but his swings had so little to do with the mob (although they flash red if you hit them) that it really did not look good from where I was sitting.

-Finally, barrel breaking, ugh less is more.  In diablo it was all good because the more thing you could click on the more fun you were having.  But somehow it just didn't work in DDO although it could have been that somehow his character kept missing the barrels or they wouldn't die for 3-4 hits (not sure if it was lag or what).  That was not fun to watch.

I can't comment on the mechanics or the ui or anything truly insightful having never played the game myself.  My friend was really enjoying it, but he also has a two foot high stack of DnD books on the floor near his comp so take that with a grain of salt.

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Margalis
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Reply #119 on: January 05, 2006, 01:34:28 PM

When the NDA goes away I'll have a lot to say about this. Until then  NDA

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Strazos
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Reply #120 on: January 05, 2006, 06:25:50 PM

-Gear was boring at least at lower levels (but with only 10 I think you get a lot of time out of each level) +2 chainmail?!  I mean sure that is how all rpg gear works but at least give it a cool name or something.  I know that is classic DnD but I have a hard time getting excited even when I'm upgrading from Green to Purple in WoW despite the nifty gfx change and statline goodness.  Plus one just doesn't motivate me.

Don't be like that. You, I, and everyone else here knows that it really doesn't matter what name they drop on newb gear, as it's all trash anyway.

Besides, in DnD, only the super uber stuff deserves to have a real name.

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Margalis
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Reply #121 on: January 05, 2006, 08:17:43 PM

I don't think I'm breaking any NDA stuff here because this is more about D&D itself, but I was confused by the number of weapons that all did the same thing but had different names.

If you look at how many 1D6 weapons there are, it seemed like tons. What's the point of this? Is it for example that some classes can use Rapiers and some other swords and at later levels those weapons differentiate more? Because as far as I could tell there were a whole bunch of 1D6 weapons that all had basically the exact same stats.

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Velorath
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Reply #122 on: January 05, 2006, 09:02:13 PM

I don't think I'm breaking any NDA stuff here because this is more about D&D itself, but I was confused by the number of weapons that all did the same thing but had different names.

If you look at how many 1D6 weapons there are, it seemed like tons. What's the point of this? Is it for example that some classes can use Rapiers and some other swords and at later levels those weapons differentiate more? Because as far as I could tell there were a whole bunch of 1D6 weapons that all had basically the exact same stats.

Well there's somewhat of a difference in D&D in that some weapons are piercing, some are slashing, and some blunt.  Also, while I don't know how things work out in DDO in the upper levels, in D&D you can become increasingly specialized in specific types of weapons.  A character with 12 lvs. in Fighter could have Weapon Focus, Greater Weapon Focus, Weapon Spec., and Greater Weapon Spec., giving them +2 to attack and +4 to damage with their chosen weapon.  So maybe a Rapier and Long Sword do the same damage, but in the hands of a character specializing in Rapier, the Rapier will do more damage.
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Reply #123 on: January 05, 2006, 09:46:06 PM

There's also the fact that some weapons are "light" whereas others aren't, so some weapons are better choices for (say) rogues with Weapon Finesse, or dual-wielding rangers.  Also, no character is proficient with all weapons - almost anyone can use a club that does 1d6 damage since it's a "Simple" weapon, but for the most part only monks can use kamas, which also do 1d6 damage but are "Exotic".

In PnP the fact that some weapons are better for some characters allows the DM to guide which characters get items - for example, if I think the fighter needs a little damage boost, I might be more likely to throw a magic longsword into the next big treasure hoard the party finds, knowing that since he's a longsword specialist they'd have to be nuts not to give it to him.  Conversely, if the cleric hasn't gotten a new toy in a while, I'll make it a mace since that's a stereotypical cleric weapon.  Et cetera.

Even with completely random treasure generation (which is actually what the D&D rulebooks recommend IIRC), having differentiation like that makes for more interesting dynamics when loot is being divvied - different items are worth more to different characters based on stat/race/class requirements, so it's possible for two characters to swap items of similar objective value with each other and each feel like they've gotten the better end of the deal.

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Margalis
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Reply #124 on: January 06, 2006, 01:41:10 AM

OK that makes some sense. I also some some random website where it had stuff like certain weapons are harder to use in enclosed spaced or something like that. That may have been AD&D - I've never understood the difference.

I had some D&D books and AD&D second edition but my friends and I always played very loose and fun rather than rules-Nazi style so I don't remember much about the rules. We would just make up weapons and such.

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Velorath
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Reply #125 on: January 06, 2006, 05:04:28 AM

OK that makes some sense. I also some some random website where it had stuff like certain weapons are harder to use in enclosed spaced or something like that. That may have been AD&D - I've never understood the difference.

I had some D&D books and AD&D second edition but my friends and I always played very loose and fun rather than rules-Nazi style so I don't remember much about the rules. We would just make up weapons and such.

D&D is actually the same thing as AD&D now.  They haven't produced any basic D&D stuff in a long tme, so when they released 3rd edition they decided to just call it D&D.
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Reply #126 on: January 06, 2006, 05:33:30 AM

-Gear was boring at least at lower levels (but with only 10 I think you get a lot of time out of each level) +2 chainmail?!  I mean sure that is how all rpg gear works but at least give it a cool name or something.  I know that is classic DnD but I have a hard time getting excited even when I'm upgrading from Green to Purple in WoW despite the nifty gfx change and statline goodness.  Plus one just doesn't motivate me.

Don't be like that. You, I, and everyone else here knows that it really doesn't matter what name they drop on newb gear, as it's all trash anyway.

Besides, in DnD, only the super uber stuff deserves to have a real name.

This is something I expect all MMO and non-D&D players to bitch loud and long about.  You're not going to have sword doing 2-5 damage at level 1 and then another sword that does 200-355 damage at level 10 (40) on your 7000HP warrior.  At most you're going to have a 1d6+5 sword with some specials on it on a 200 Hitpoint Fighter.

  Uber for D&D, but a huge yawnfest for the kiddies that have grown-up with Final Fantasy/ EQ/ WoW's over-inflated numbers. (Bigger numbers equals bigger OOOOHs!)   I hope expectations for success are tempered in this, but know they aren't.

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shiznitz
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Reply #127 on: January 06, 2006, 10:41:21 AM

200HP at level 10 is impossible. Fighter get d10 hit points and barbarians get d12. Even with +4 per level from an 18 constitution, no one is getting to 200HPs at level 10 without cheating.

I have never played WoW.
Alkiera
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Reply #128 on: January 06, 2006, 10:54:45 AM

200HP at level 10 is impossible. Fighter get d10 hit points and barbarians get d12. Even with +4 per level from an 18 constitution, no one is getting to 200HPs at level 10 without cheating.

Probably not, no.  but 150 isn't out of the question for a barbarian, and when he uses his Rage, he should be well over 200.  But yeah, the average level 10 character will likely have between 80 and 150 hp... the fact that melee weapons typically do 1d6+str+magic bonus is balanced around that... and that by lvl 10, most melees attack 3 times per round, heck, even a wizard gets 2 attacks/turn at that point.

Of course, magic by level 10 is getting pretty powerful, with spell like Cone of Cold doing 10d6 cold damage to a 60ft-long cone.  Enough to put a serious hurting on anyone who doesn't make the reflex save, or have cold resistance equipment.  But magic has definate drawbacks.

Alkiera

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Reply #129 on: January 06, 2006, 11:18:05 AM

200HP at level 10 is impossible. Fighter get d10 hit points and barbarians get d12. Even with +4 per level from an 18 constitution, no one is getting to 200HPs at level 10 without cheating.

Pedantic much?

The point of the comparison was that other games fighters have x thousands of hitpoints and in DD0 no one is breaking low hundreds and if that would cause mental issues for the average mmogtard.

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Samwise
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Reply #130 on: January 06, 2006, 11:19:28 AM

200HP at level 10 is impossible.

In PnP, you can do just about anything as long as the DM is cool with it.   wink

I'm fairly certain that it could even happen in DDO if you really set your mind to it.  For example, I reckon you could get your Constitution all the way up to 24 by level 10 as long as you picked your race and class right and sacrificed all your other stats.  And that's not even counting magical enhancements.

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Reply #131 on: January 06, 2006, 11:49:35 AM

OK that makes some sense. I also some some random website where it had stuff like certain weapons are harder to use in enclosed spaced or something like that. That may have been AD&D - I've never understood the difference.

A lot of it's min-maxing.  Will your crit-spec'd rogue get more mileage out a d6-damage rapier that threats on 18-20 or a d8-damage longsword that only threats on 19-20?  Or will the weapon's special abilities be useful to you in cheesy ways (entangling, disarming, whatever)  Or do you get free bonuses for being a particular race or having a particular deity that you wouldn't normally get, so you can burn proficiencies elsewhere?

I personally go with a more stylistic approach.  My dwarven priest in our local Geek-Night pen n' paper game burned a feat to pick up warhammers (even though he got free martial weapon proficiency when he switched to Warpriest at 8th level) just because that's what I wanted him to use from Day One.  If I were munchkiny, I would have taken a free Greatsword proficiency the DM offered since it's my diety's favored weapon, but it just didnt' work for me.  Or dwarven waraxe since I get to treat it as a martial weapon instead of an exotic weapon (and would have made it infinitely easier to find a figure in the local hobby stores, which seem to have a dearth of hammer-carrying dorfs in stock)

Also, some of it has to be consideration of what kind of magic weapons you think you'll have access to--are you hoping for a Battleaxe of Bad-ass Buttwhoopin' or the Shortsword of Sneaky Mean Dirty Rotten Stuff?

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Reply #132 on: January 06, 2006, 11:57:36 AM

Murgos got the point.  I knew I should have put in a disclaimer that I drew the fighter's HPs out of my ass because damned if I remember what dice they use, I played Mages.

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Reply #133 on: January 06, 2006, 12:04:33 PM

What can you expect?  They're geeks, they live for finding discrepancies in minutia.

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shiznitz
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Reply #134 on: January 06, 2006, 02:31:47 PM

What can you expect?  They're geeks, they live for finding discrepancies in minutia.

It's minutiae since you decided to pluralize discrepancy.

I like to fuck little boys.

I have never played WoW.
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Reply #135 on: January 06, 2006, 02:45:02 PM

They're geeks.

Hi, I'm Kettle.  Would you like to give me a rim job?

"I have not actually recommended many games, and I'll go on the record here saying my track record is probably best in the industry." - schild
shiznitz
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Reply #136 on: January 07, 2006, 04:50:52 PM

What can you expect?  They're geeks, they live for finding discrepancies in minutia.

It's minutiae since you decided to pluralize discrepancy.

I like to fuck little boys.

Nice mod edit on that last sentence. Not terribly cool.

I have never played WoW.
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Reply #137 on: January 07, 2006, 04:52:49 PM

I'd been wondering if that were a mod edit.
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Reply #138 on: January 07, 2006, 05:27:44 PM

What can you expect?  They're geeks, they live for finding discrepancies in minutia.

It's minutiae since you decided to pluralize discrepancy.

I like to fuck little boys.

I may not stop laughing for days.


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Samwise
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Reply #139 on: January 09, 2006, 05:39:20 PM

200HP at level 10 is impossible.

Now that the NDA is lifted, I can try to actually work this out with real numbers:

- Pick dwarf as starting race and max Con.  (Con 18 + 2 racial bonus = 20)
- Take Toughness as your first feat.  (+3 hp, +1 per level)
- Take 10 levels of barbarian.  That's 120 hit points from your Hit Dice, since DDO just gives you max HP instead of rolling for it.
- Put both your stat increases into Con.  (Con = 22)
- Take the dwarf and barbarian action enhancements that boost Con.  (Con = 24)
- You also get +20 hp at first level in DDO (Heroic Toughness or somesuch).

So that gives us 120(Bbn HD) + 70(24 Con = +7 hp per level) +20 (Heroic) + 12 (Toughness) = 222 hp at 10th level.  And that's not even counting magical enhancements like Rings of False Life.

Wouldn't work in PnP, though, even if you got really lucky rolls.

"I have not actually recommended many games, and I'll go on the record here saying my track record is probably best in the industry." - schild
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