The Gaming Den

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sat Oct 10, 2009 3:43 am

Well, DDO is now 'free' to download and play. I just made an account, and I'm going to give it a go as my download and install are now finished.

I'm not really sure what I want to make. Human something with armour, and weapons.

There's an ability for Clerics to wield longswords, and I'm betting that some of the best end-game content one handed melee weapons are longswords, since I recall hearing about it the last time I was reading DDO related stuff. Of course, that could all have changed.

"Battle" Clerics seem to still be considered sub-par builds, so I'm guessing that most of the characters tend to hyper focus their abilities in order to encourage the mentality that a group has to be more than the sum of its parts.

I'm betting that making just a stock "fighter" with THF and sword and Board, that the game will not give me a gimped character by end-game. And I'll be able to learn something of how the game is different/similar to tabletop D&D.

For DDO I've seen people call rogues "shitty" for not making hyper-focuses Trapsmiths, burning all of their low level feats on stuff that gives bullshit +2 bonuses to sensing or disabling traps per feat. So, the game isn't quite like the tabletop.

NineInchNall · Post by **NineInchNall** » Sat Oct 10, 2009 4:28 am

If it's any kind of good, I may join you. So don't hold back with the musings.

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sat Oct 10, 2009 4:09 pm

Well, the graphics look decent.

And the characters are more dungeon crawlers than anything else.

So stuff like a blaster wizard are pretty common, and Clerics aren't able to break the game in half, since the classes get tweaked as time passes.

Every character gets a bunch of extra bonus feats; things like +20 hp at level 1, so that you don't die under a stiff wind.

Anyway, http://www.ddo.com/ is the link.

Apparently playing around with builds isn't too hard; but finishing your build takes more time.

I'll probably roll a Fighter early on.

There's probably too many fighters at end-game; but I tend to be pretty decent at tanking after a while in other games that I've played, it's just a skill that you learn, and adapt to the game you're playing. Keep mobs on you, keep them off the squishy casters.

Fortunately, Clerics can wear full plate; and many of them wear a shield and use a wand, so they're not as squishy as a wizard is.

DragonChild · Post by **DragonChild** » Sat Oct 10, 2009 4:54 pm

DDO is sorta decent. If a Den group gets going up, I'd be happy to join in. Currently I have a cleric on Khyber, and that's it. I'd be happy to reroll elsewhere (I've wanted to try a bard or maybe a spellcaster).

The biggest thing to realize going into DDO is that it's less like an MMO, and more like Diablo. There's no auto-attack, you have to chase enemies around clicking on them, etc. It's not a great game, but it's certainly not bad for free, and it doesn't charge you to stay competent like other free-to-play MMOs.

"Battle" Clerics seem to still be considered sub-par builds, so I'm guessing that most of the characters tend to hyper focus their abilities in order to encourage the mentality that a group has to be more than the sum of its parts.

I'm currently playing a battle cleric. I worked fine in a party, with the understanding that I wasn't a tank. I was more of a cross between a bard and a DPS fighter - I dealt a shitton of damage, had lots of heals mid-combat when the primary healer got overwhelmed, gave the party amazing buffs (bless is awesome, and Sound Burst is fucking amazing in DDO), and had no problems rushing back to defend the healer, challenging enemies one on one. Really, where the build absolutely shines is soloing - I've so far had no challenges, let alone problems.

For DDO I've seen people call rogues "shitty" for not making hyper-focuses Trapsmiths, burning all of their low level feats on stuff that gives bullshit +2 bonuses to sensing or disabling traps per feat. So, the game isn't quite like the tabletop.

Traps in this game are obscenely gygaxian and deadly. It's my primary complaint. A rogue who can't take care of traps is going to get the party killed, guaranteed.

CatharzGodfoot · Post by **CatharzGodfoot** » Sat Oct 10, 2009 5:36 pm

DragonChild wrote:Traps in this game are obscenely gygaxian and deadly. It's my primary complaint. A rogue who can't take care of traps is going to get the party killed, guaranteed.

Doesn't that make soloing as a non-rogue a bit...impossible? Or do clerics still get the trap detection spell?

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sat Oct 10, 2009 7:19 pm

You can solo as a cleric early on with no real problem.

I'm playing on Sarlona, but I'm still only level 1. I'm still in the starting town doing some quests over to get the reward items more than once. >_>

What is Khyber like in terms of players DragonChild?

I'm pretty sure that 'economy' is almost non-existant; unless I haven't found an auction house or something yet.

shau · Post by **shau** » Sat Oct 10, 2009 8:16 pm

I heard you only had a free game up to level 4, then you had to pay.

Why is this still running anyway? It's for an edition of DnD WotC wants to kill, and its reputation is so bad that have to advertise it as being free. Why even bother with it?

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sat Oct 10, 2009 10:50 pm

Yep, and you buy the "level up" things in-game, with in-game currency.

Or you can buy them with real cash.

The funny thing is that ingame money is nearly valueless, you can seriously get 100~ gold doing the newbie quests. I've got a level 2 cleric with about 5 platinum, and some gold. His gear sucks, but that's expected.

Playing an Elf Cleric isn't a bad deal either. All of the best 1H melee weapons are swords, and you get proficiency in swords, rapiers, bows for free, just b/c you wrote down Elf on your character sheet.

I'm actually picking "caster" abilities when leveling up; stuff to increase my heals, spell points etc. but using weapons and buff spells most of the time. The occasional heal is tossed out as well.

traverse · Post by **traverse** » Sat Oct 10, 2009 11:14 pm

shau wrote:Why is this still running anyway? It's for an edition of DnD WotC wants to kill, and its reputation is so bad that have to advertise it as being free. Why even bother with it?

I never really heard anything about it being a bad game, just bland in comparison to the big name MMOs. So, for it's population, F2P/micropayments was the natural step to keep afloat. I understand that it's a very profitable model for MMOs.

That being said, I tried it a couple of weeks back, and deleted it the next day. It is quite bland, in comparison to anything. I rolled up a fighter on Khyber, and it was very 'core books and a campaign setting' fighter-y. One thing I was surprised by was the fact that very few people had out of character names. Probably 1% of the people I encountered.

But it had all the signs of a bad campaign. The DM (who drones on whenever you enter a new location) is not really the best with storylines. Meaningless magic items are handed out at every opportunity. Outdoor zones become are grindfests interposed with coffee breaks every five minutes at the nearest 'resting stones'. All the secret tunnels, sewers, jails, warehouses, and basements under every city make me wonder what mad genius planned out how all these fit together, and just how to keep the cities from collapsing in on themselves. My fighter just stands in front of locked things, so mystified by their inner workings that he can't even bring himself to strike them. And particularly fancy doors won't come off their hinges, no matter how much I run into them or click, so that I can take them into town and sell them.

(Mileage may very. It's an incredibly quick download.

)

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 2:46 am

The Fancy Door stealing is needless; you can get all the raw cash you want just repeating dungeons and selling the rewards, or the loot.

I've already figured this out at level 1 and 2.

Locked things being "unopenable" is.... sadly pretty common in MMOs. It's to 'encourage' people to bring along rogues. Mostly b/c rogue players by and large tend to blow, with a few notable exceptions.

I don't mind the meaningless magic items. Heck, that's how I know that I'm in Eberron. Nearly everyone seems tons of BS magical gear; there was a 200-year war that just ended, and weapons are literally a glut on a market that no longer really wants weapons. So adventurers are literally in a buyer's market.

Some items are actually useful, and you'll see many players running around with the 1st quest items; firey melee weapons, or a wand of some kind. I'm an Elf Cleric, and got the Longsword b/c it has decent DPS, and I figure that when I can get a bow that's decent, that I'll start to hang back more, and will have better gear anyway, because the wand sucked, and the sword was much better.

The greataxe is very good too.

Honestly, the game is a lot like Diablo, or Dungeon Siege.

CatharzGodfoot · Post by **CatharzGodfoot** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 3:04 am

Yeah, I really get a Diablo vibe from it. I tried playing a halfling rogue, and so far everything is a breeze.

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 3:59 am

Yeah, also, once you realize that there is an auto-attack option; it's called Attack, and everyone gets it at level 1.

I really like being able to strip down to no armour, sneak up on Sahaugin, and shank them with my Monsterous Humanoid Bane Sword (it's basically a +1 +1d6 weapon vs Mon Humanoids). Now, I'm a cleric with 10 str, so my to-hit, and damage are not what say; a fighter or barbarian can achieve.

Also, don't spend your Enhancement points immediately. Sometimes there are good abilities; like say +2 to a stat; but cost 2 action points. So, you give up +1 to a skill, or something. I'm seriously considering re-specing, and getting the +2 to longsword damage Enhancement; since I use them a lot, and I don't really run out of Mana. I started with an 18 Wisdom, 10's in everrything, and 14 dex.

DragonChild · Post by **DragonChild** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 4:04 am

Doesn't that make soloing as a non-rogue a bit...impossible? Or do clerics still get the trap detection spell?

The game has multiple difficulties for the same dungeon: Solo, Normal, Hard, and Elite. Normal is for the "I'm good at solo" characters, and Solo is for the "I suck at solo" characters. In the easier difficulties, traps are less nasty, and they tend to at worst, prevent you from receiving a bonus or force you to dodge spikes and such. I've had to run down halls fighting kobolds and dodging spikes, or been unable to unlock hidden chests, for example. In harder difficulties, intended for groups, they can be extremely nasty. I think they're STILL there as avoidable hazards, but it's stupidly easy for the entire party to go the way they don't "have" to go and end up killing everyone by mistake when the trap activates.

What is Khyber like in terms of players DragonChild?

No clue. There is ,however, an auctionhouse. The prices on it are horribly inflated.

I heard you only had a free game up to level 4, then you had to pay.

Not true. You can either buy an item with Turbine Points (which you pay for OR can earn small amounts of in-game. I think you earn enough to get this item for free from just hitting level 2) OR earn this item randomly from a quest. It's relatively easy to farm, and the vast majority of people don't even have to farm it, they just get it before they need it.

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 5:01 am

Going to re-roll on Khyber btw.

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 9:12 am

To test it out I went with the elf cleric idea as well. I'm ubernoob in Khyber.

Roy · Post by **Roy** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 12:44 pm

Where to begin... I'll just go down the line. Long post is long, fair warning.

Longswords are ok, in that they are a decent and common weapon, and at lower levels you should be able to get a good one easily. But they are not the best melee weapons. That honor goes to kopheshes. Why? 19-20/x3 crits, combined with the fact that insultingly few enemies that are not naturally immune to critical hits have any sort of fortification whatsoever. And the ones that do only have like 25% or 50% or some shit even when facing CR 40 devils.

Sword and board is still gimp. No surprise there. The reasons are even exactly the same, sans the addition of Animated shields. What may surprise you is that using a two handed weapon is also gimp. Not by as much, but terrible attack speed defeats the whole fucking point of it as dps.

You do not need to 'hyperfocus trapsmiths' in order to get traps. Simply maxing your ranks and having a half decent associated stat will give you at least an 80% success rate even when going after traps several levels higher than yourself. There are a few crazy traps that are exceptions to this rule but they are all optional and groups that know better will not expect you to get them anyways. It helps that tools give up to a +7 bonus to Disable Device and Open Lock.

There aren't that many Fighters at endgame. Remember how I said SAB and THF are gimped? Well that's because process of elimination only leaves TWF as a viable build. So you either need a base Dexterity of 17 or 19, or you need to be a Ranger. Anyone who lacks access to stat tomes must automatically default to the latter. Remember, the reasons TWF is made of Fail are:

Can't afford to keep both weapons up.
Lose to hit for no gain.
Lose damage for no gain.

But you can just farm for gear as much as you want, you don't take large penalties on attacks, and you can easily have a bunch of different weapons to deal with damage reduction. None of that applies.

In any case you are not going to be able to build a 'tank' as a new player. You will need far too much rare and expensive raid loot to have an AC that does anything at all, you'll need some more rare gear to get your Intimidate high enough to keep mobs on you, and chances are that 'squishy caster' has almost as many HP as you along with Displacement and Stoneskin so not only does he not need the help he's probably intentionally drawing aggro on himself to make mobs dance in his Fire Walls.

So why are you there? Sustained DPS. Even though nukes do approximately triple the damage they did before without counting critical hits and metamagic feats a good melee is still likely to at least not be too far behind damage wise while also not being limited by a blue bar. And with Rope Trick and such gone that does actually matter sometimes, especially in the endgame stuff which is full of things that have a fuckload of HP. This makes the endgame stuff extremely melee centric, provided of course you are a DPS build.

There is an auto attack. It's not a good idea to use it since you're likely to hit things you didn't mean to but it's there. You can also just hold attack down.

As for traps... they're the things that scale the most on higher difficulties. It is not at all unusual for a trap on elite to one or two hit kill anything level appropriate. You do almost have to have a Rogue for those, but most of the traps can be timed through.

And elves? They suck a barrel of cocks. I am not fucking kidding. Get out now, before it's too late. Human is your only real option for a Cleric.

Remember how I said SAB, THF, and elves were made of Suck and Fail? All of them COMBINED ain't got shit on ranged weapons, especially bows. Just using a bow for anything other than shooting otherwise inaccessible mobs and the odd pull is likely to provoke snickers, at least. Actually being an archer is not only going to be ineffective, but is going to mark you as a gimp. Want to know why? Well, just shoot one. Watch your attack times. Now melee and watch your attack times. See the problem? Now try kiting in a party. Warning: This may get your character banned from further partying.

One more thing. Dexterity is a weak stat. This shouldn't surprise anyone as its main property was boosting Initiative slightly, which does not exist there. That leaves it as boosting the even more meaningless than in D&D AC, and boosting Reflex saves. Except that there are even more things that boost saves in DDO than in D&D, the Reflex saves from enemy casters are not that high, and the Reflex saves from say... elite traps you aren't going to hit anyways because they're like 40 or 50 or even higher.

About the only people that boost Dexterity are:

Rogues, because it's ok with Evasion. Strength is still their main stat though.
DPS melees, for the TWF feat line.
Any build with a single level of Monk and access to the uber equipment required to actually tank.
People that don't know any better.

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 3:37 pm

Well, only level 2, so dumping out isn't a huge deal.

I've been looking at TWF builds; and the Khopesh for rangers. I was looking at how to make a ranged build.

It's... sort of hard. The best thing that I saw was something that used Repeater Xbows between your manyshot cooldowns in order to achieve something like 300-ish DPS (considered 'low' by end-game standards; but high enough to be viable since you aren't taking any damage while doing so).

So, the question now is...

Human Fighter with TWF and Oversized TWF to use two Longswords? Or should 2 levels of Ranger be squeezed in there? How about Barbarian for Rage?

I have to see how the Rage mechanic works, and see if dipping for a level of Barb gives appreciable benefits.

I'm guessing that many people who are TWFers dump their str and get Weapon Finesse as well, right?

So, here's a "leveling" plan:

Level 1: ..... Fighter? Ranger?

Human: Get Weapon Finesse; and crack out Dex; you'll hit well for now.

If Fighter: Get TWF?
If Ranger: Wait until level 2; and get TWF for free; you also get Favored Enemies: Pick something that is good at end-game.

Apparently Evil Outsiders, Undead, Construct, Giant and Elemental are some of the more common ones.

(http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=206502)

I'm not sure what I'd pick. Either something that's common and that I'll be grinding on at End-Game; or something that is really tough, and every advantage will help.

Level 2: Either Ranger: get TWF for Free Then start massing Fighter; a level of Monk (for AC boosts; Roy isn't the only person who has mentioned "High AC" and "Monks" in the same statement; the DDO boards also say something similar).

Feats that look good:

The TWF Tree
TWF
ITWF
GTWF

Oversized TWF... I see a lot of people with dual longswords; they probably have this. Dual Khopeshes also are well regarded, so OTWF is a good idea from what I understand.

"Build" Idea

Ranger 1 [Human, 1st lvl; FE: [somthing]] = [Weapon Finesse, ... Dodge? Maybe some other bullshit Pre-Requisite feat]
Ranger 2 [TWF for free]
Fighter 1 [Fighter 1; 3rd Level] [Oversized TWF; TWF Defense]
Monk 1 [Notting, just Monk AC stuff? Lose 1 BaB]
Fighter 2-16 [8 feats;

Srsly, the Fighter levels give 8 Feats to spend on TWF related stuff.

As well as improving your Intimidate checks; Giving you Sunder armour or Trip boosting stuff; I'd say Sunder armour over Trip, since Trip has a check, and can fail; While Sunder armour is a flat AC penalty against your target.

Going to try out human ranger. Scaled-Eagle is what I'm gonna try for their name.

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 5:31 pm

I got my hands on the DDO cahracter generator:

http://www.rjcyberware.com/DDO/DDOCharGen.zip

I'm looking at Human; with these feats

TWF
ITWF
GTWF

OTWF (dual longswords)
TWF-Defense (?)

Power Attack
Weapon Finesse

and the following Enchancements (which burn up Action Points; I have no idea how many a character gets; something like 70 total?)

-Ranger Dexterity 1 [lvl 2 Ranger; AP cost 2]
-Human Adaptability: Dex (+1 Dex) [lvl 5; 2 AP]
-Greater Human Adaptability (+1 more Dex)

So, +3 dex there; plus every 4 levels; Plus "tomes", plus gear. I 'should' be able to hit 30-some odd Dex.

If I go for 6 levels of Ranger (>_>) I can get +1 more dex, and an other TWF feat. I'm not sure if that's a 'bad' idea or what though. What I 'gain' in picking up more Ranger levels; I lose by not getting as many overall feats; and delaying when I can get my level in Monk.

Granted, you need to earn in game currency to even access a level of monk.

-Human Versatility 1-4 (costs 1, 2, 3, 4 Action Points) adds +1 to +5 to basically all dice rolls for 20 seconds; there's probably a cooldown; if it's 1/rest, then it's bullshit

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 6:34 pm

So Anyone know what the compensating factor for Drow LA is?

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 7:24 pm

No idea, look up the compendium?

I think that for 'now' since I don't have access to 32 pt builds; and only have 28 build... that I'll see if I can make a successful spell-caster.

Just a plain old healbot cleric. That can get into groups easy.

Or maybe a Wizard. 18 Int, and then the rest in Con/Dex should be enough. I'll try to use Summons and ranged attack with a bow, or wand.

Psychic Robot · Post by **Psychic Robot** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 9:13 pm

I recall disliking this game because the leveling was ridiculously slow and everything was an instanced mission. I'd like to hear how the TGD guild does.

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 9:21 pm

Yeah, instanced dungeons are a pain.

They are also tedious. You can grind the same dungeon quickly, and often can repeat the quest to get new/different rewards. Meaning either more cash to spend; and you will be spending lots of cash later on from what I see. The things that you can all buy online at the DDO store are things that you can earn in-game from what I see.

Often you don't have to spend X time getting to a dungeon , you just run to it, and go inside.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 9:31 pm

How does the classic Cleric Archer build look?

Just looking at the character builder thing, elven clerics get the lion's share of bonuses that can be used on bows. Not just with their spells, but also with enhancements, whatever they are.

I can see why fighters would be regarded as viable, though. The 10% speed bonus to attack as a capstone ability and that enhancement bonus that increases your speed factor by 15 to 30% looks nice as ice.

Are there ways to boost your caster level? Not so much spellcasting level, but caster level. Mostly to squeeze extra bennies out of the cleric's spell list.

As for items... you seem to have a lot of slots to play with, but the prevailing problem is that a lot of those slots are going to be used for stat-boosting items. How many tomes do you get and what are the stat-boosting items displacing as far as kickassery goes?

Perhaps my impressions are wrong, but it looks like a persistently (not with persistent spell, just casting repeatedly)-buffing elven cleric could outdamage any other kind of archer.

Also, how does summon monster look? That any good?

And about how many enhancements can you expect to level up? Is it fixed over the course of your life or are we talking about a really long grindfest here?

I also want some hot haste-on-haste action. Whatchoo got for Lago? Does that stack with that fighter haste crap?

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Sun Oct 11, 2009 11:33 pm

Like shit. This has been summarized in previous posts.

You can't do real damage with ranged weapons.

Clerics don't get the same type of buffs.

Clerics are a decent soloing class. Need a decent build though. My first battle-cleric was a snafu imo. I should have massed str; or just gone for a different class/build.

I'm working on a Wizard now 18 int, 16 Con, 10 str; the funny thing is that I can actually fight shit in melee. Mostly b/c computer games are more forgiving since you can spam attacks and don't force you to wait forever for your piddling damage to add up on a helpless target.

Also, I love spamming Hypnotism.

Also, you can out manuever enemies if you're fast, and they're slow.

Getting Expeditious Retreat, and other speed buffs are a decent idea if you're a melee character, and you're good with your character positioning and manouevering. If you're a keyboard turner, you won't have the chops to do this though. Maintaining mobility is a good way to improve survivability.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Mon Oct 12, 2009 1:13 am

All right, human it is.

Though why would you go with khopeshes? Since this character doesn't have MWP it doesn't matter whether they burn a feat for that or scimitars, but I'm just wondering what makes 19-20x3 better than 18-20x3.

But anywho.

Human Cleric 20

1 Weapon Proficiency: Scimitar, Extend Spell
3 Quicken Spell
6 TWF
9 Oversized TWF
12 Improved Two-Weapon Fighting
15 Greater TWF
18 Improved Crit

I do have an example stat array but I'm not sure how important constitution and intelligence are.

But anyway. Initial stat array:

18 Strength
12 Dexterity
8 Constitution
8 Intelligence
16 Wisdom
10 Charisma

All of your stat bonuses go into strength.

First 5 levels, fill up on the metamagic feats that you're going to use later on.

Level 5, invest in Adaptability: Dexterity. This brings your dexterity up to 13.

By level 6, snag a pair of gloves of dexterity +2 (or the equivalent). This will qualify you for the TWFing chain. At levels 6, 7, and 8 you'll be eating a -2 penalty to attack for your scimitars, but what the hell, right?

At level 13, you should have spend the whopping 12 AP to grab yourself both the cleric and human's charisma-boosting abilities. This qualifies you for the Divine Might chain. This also means that your ass will need to scare up some Tomes to complete the stat requirements for the chain.

I don't see this character being stronger than a sword-based class specced for DPR in the melee DPR department, even with various silly buffs up. They take quite awhile to catch up, I suppose, probably around level 13 or so.

Also, Use Magic Device and Summon Monster. Those any good?