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Originally posted by Kurayamino

Imo, your suggestions for Cleave aren't muchr better then how ddo handles them.

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The point is that in 5 minutes, I think of 2 suggestions that would work better for cleave then what they do, maybe not MUCH better, but still better...in a mere 5 minutes...and it is only me, not a team.  I aint paid for this (the kick is challenging for the Graphic department(like the AE melee they dar epropose), and the other solution mean more programming work).  Yet, my suggestion at least respect the spirit of Cleave and the impact rulewise a LOT better then their messy way of handling cleave!

And I could just keep going on with others choices they made.

I still WANT DDO to be nice...and well, I dont think I overeact...I have been quieting folks, telling them ''DIE HERETICS" for like 6 months every time they mess up something badly and folks here say they dont like DDO...but eventually, there is a limit to the blind faith I can have in a team.

- Real time...*sigh*  fine...

- No XP for killing mobs...*shrug*, if you must.

- Soloers wont find this game fun...ok, can deal with that even if computers D&D products where always solo friendly.

- The death system dont feel or ressemble D&D in any form... Oh well, to bad.

- Eberron...I would pick at least 6 others world before this setting, but sure, why not.

- Cleave and other silly examples...are we even talking about the same game?

- Rogue as massive melee damage...did the Designers fall on their heads?

- Raiding!  But no explanation, no clarification, which mean they will just do what every setting with raiding does, shaft non-raiders!  Ok, now this is to much!  To arms fellow fans!  CRY HAVOC!  

Although a great interview, he politicianed a couple of questions.

How are they going to deal with Cleave?  He never really answered.  As he never really answered darkvision.

I am sure I will soon enough find out when I begin playing, just do not like it when a good question gets skirted.

Death penalty is a huge mistake. This is not like PnP in the sense that you automatically start out with a group of friends you can trust - in online games you start off with total strangers, hoping they prove to be reliable enough to group with again. We already saw in Everquest2 how much friction things like this can cause, I know a good dozen people who quit it mainly because of the exp debt system and its effects on game play and community. I don't know what keeps some people playing it, but everyone I have told about the exp debt system thinks it's the "most gay" thing in the online gaming universe.

Other than that, I'm with the DnD development team 100%. Screw PvP and solo players, they already have like a gazillion games available to them while I can count good group play games with the fingers of one hand. DnD ever only existed for cooperative group play, so that's what this game should be.

Cleave, as they deal with it, bring another new problem in itself.

Why would someone take Whirlwind attack?  You attack everyone around you (once) and lose your multiples attacks.  Or you can use that new cleave feat which make you do an AE melee attack in front of you and dont remove your multiples attacks (if cleave remove your multiples attacks, it is a serious nerf, instead of adding 1 attack here and there, it is now removing tons of attacks).

And we dont even start to consider the improve(s) to Cleave (Great Cleave or supreme cleave).

Whirlwind attack require you to take a heavy list of prime requisite feats as well...Cleave ask you for Power Attack, this is it, you can get cleave at level 1(any warrior or any human with a power base attack of +1 at level 1).  A level 1 feat making a level 12 feat useless? 

I dont say they cant work around this, but their are walking MUCH farther away from PnP everytime they do such silly choices, because now Whirlwind will not feel like PnP either if they find a way to make it nice and a "end feat" as it is supposed to be.

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Originally posted by Tweedle42
i believe he says if you die your soul becomes attached to a soulstone on the ground there. and you can wait and be picked up by a player, who would have to be in the instance with you since its all instanced, and take it to a resurrection shrine within the dungeon, like a bind point in a dungeon that your party members have to deliver you to.

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I'm glad you gave that explanation. When I read the Q&A (I've not been following DDO much), one of the first things that crossed my mind was "what if a total stranger picks up my soulstone ?". If everything is instanced then that alleviates the concern of someone gathering up soulstones to annoy players.

Is it the case that every aspect of the game where there is a chance of dying is instanced ? I can see I'll need to do a bit of homework and figure this all out, time to interrogate the FAQ I think

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Originally posted by ArKane

As of right now, their faq page still says the lvl limit is 20. So unless they've said something different in an interview/dev chat/forum post and havent updated it.....

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I was talking with one of the Turbine D&D employees at E3 and he let it slip out, then quickly corrected himself.  After asking him to come clean, he did admit that the max level was dropped from 20 down to 10 because Turbine wanted "room for expansion" which we all know means:  "They cannot put in enough content to fit levels 1-20, so they have to scale back the design in order to release."

Take that to the bank.

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Originally posted by Istivan

Although a great interview, he politicianed a couple of questions.

How are they going to deal with Cleave?  He never really answered.  As he never really answered darkvision.

I am sure I will soon enough find out when I begin playing, just do not like it when a good question gets skirted.

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He didn't just "politician" some of the questions, he did it to ALL of them.  Re-read the interview and tell me if you understand definitively what he is talking about.  If you do not, then that means he is "politicianing" the answers.

David Eck is notorious for doing this.  Go back and re-read some of his other interviews and you'll see what I mean.

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Originally posted by Metalslave
I never had much faith in D&D being treated right when the inevitable MMOG became a reality and these Q&A sessions makes for depressing reading. There will be no freedom to roam around and explore the world. The combat system is different. The magic system is different. Death, feats and racial abilities, different. I'm assuming the list will continue as the Q&A sessions do.

Is there anything other than the logo to suggest that this is actually D&D?

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Well... no. The strength of PnP games is in the NPC interactions, the incredible variety of possible settings and opponenets (anything you can imagine and model with the rules) and the social aspects. As well as the fact that the characters could change the world as they played and the stories they went on were THEIR stories, not just stock missions assigned to them.
No computer game (yet) has these strengths.
It will have its own strengths and I, for one, and very glad the designers have decided to play to these strengths and steer clear of the weaknesses rather than trying to force a bad workaround.

To give you a comparison, for a long time architects tried to make modern buildings look like buildings made 100's of years before. Frank Lloyd Wright said "What are you morons doing? You arent limited by wood and stone anymore, we have STEEL! Why not use it!?"

There is no way a CRPG can re-create the strengths of a PnP RPG, but by capitalizing on their own strengths, they can build a darn fine game.

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Originally posted by quix0te
"It will have its own strengths and I, for one, and very glad the designers have decided to play to these strengths and steer clear of the weaknesses rather than trying to force a bad workaround."

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Whoa...

Who decided that the core features of D&D are suddenly weaknesses? And there are no alternatives other than 'bad workarounds' in dealing with them?

This game will be marketed as Dungeons & Dragons Online. I don't think it's unrealistic to expect at least similarities between the two games and right now, it looks like they're 'steering clear' of those.

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Originally posted by Metalslave

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Originally posted by quix0te
"It will have its own strengths and I, for one, and very glad the designers have decided to play to these strengths and steer clear of the weaknesses rather than trying to force a bad workaround."

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Whoa...

Who decided that the core features of D&D are suddenly weaknesses? And there are no alternatives other than 'bad workarounds' in dealing with them?

This game will be marketed as Dungeons & Dragons Online. I don't think it's unrealistic to expect at least similarities between the two games and right now, it looks like they're 'steering clear' of those.

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Well, apparently the game designers have decided it. And I agree. And you are focused on a few features (cleave and spell points) and ignoring the fact that 90% of the game remains unchanged. Now spell points is a pretty big change, but I think its smart of them. It tells me that they think fun>blind adherence to PnP ruleset.
While you may not buy the game and decry the lack of fidelity to PnP rules, I think they are less concerned about you than about me, who would buy the game, and then tell all of my friends to avoid it if they cant make it fun to play. Or the kid who never played PnP but has played three or four other MMORPGs and isnt going to put up with forced downtime (or possibly major xp penalties for death, but thats another story).
If they are making changes to the PnP rules, I'm working off the assumption its not because they woke up after a bad coke binge, but because they tried to make it work and the playtesters were reporting no fun/game balance issues.

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Originally posted by Anofalye

Cleave: They are going to make your next melee attack an AE melee strike in a little cute looking arc. (This dont allow to stack an extra attack on 1 target, it is only good against weaks opponents that can be down in 1 blow)

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Cleave doesn't work that way in DnD anyway...IF you Drop a creature (take it to 0 or less HP) Then you can make an immediate attack on another creature within reach...per 3.5 rulerook, page 92. This ability would be useable once per round. or per the timer.

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David Eckelberry
DD Online’s combat system doesn’t make use of some pen-and-paper elements, largely thanks to being an online role-playing game. We aren’t turn-based, we don’t have “rounds” of combat, and thus Cleave can’t give you an extra attack in a round that you down a foe. When examining feats such as these, my goal is to produce the intent of the original feat (or skill or effect), while making the necessary adaptation for good videogame play. In the specific example of Cleave, use of this feat allows the character to make an area effect melee attack in a small arc in front of the character.

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As per the whirlwind attack feat, that allows you to attack EVERY creature surrounding you, not just the one next to the one you just attacked, aka, the cone for the DDO Cleave would be a 10-15 degree cone, not a 360 degree attack... I think the great cleave feat would broaden the cone to 30 degrees or so...it has the potential to be better in DDO IMO. As you will probably use it more often. Whirlwind attack with a reach weapon can be devastating.

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Originally posted by netboyz

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Originally posted by ArKane

As of right now, their faq page still says the lvl limit is 20. So unless they've said something different in an interview/dev chat/forum post and havent updated it.....

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I was talking with one of the Turbine D&D employees at E3 and he let it slip out, then quickly corrected himself.  After asking him to come clean, he did admit that the max level was dropped from 20 down to 10 because Turbine wanted "room for expansion" which we all know means:  "They cannot put in enough content to fit levels 1-20, so they have to scale back the design in order to release."

Take that to the bank.

 

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You know, I really wasn't into PC gaming at the time, but I have to wonder if there was this much nitpicking and whining over rules when say, the original Baldur's Gate was going to be released.

And as we all know, even though BG was different from all other D&D computer games that came out before it, it didn't exactly fail.

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Originally posted by darquenblade
You know, I really wasn't into PC gaming at the time, but I have to wonder if there was this much nitpicking and whining over rules when say, the original Baldur's Gate was going to be released.

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There was indeed a lot of banter on the internet regarding Baldur's Gate and its adherence or definition of the rules prior to it coming out. There were features that the purists did not like, and on the flip side there were aspects of gameplay that did not make sense to those who were not familiar with the rulesets.

In the end Baldur's Gate stood on its own feet. Let's see what comes of DnD Online, because if we're honest, there's no avoiding the sorts of debates that accompany any game where there are high expectations. That's just the way the online community seem to be, and after roughly ten years of the internet being a mainstream feature of our world, it doesn't look as if things will change in that respect.

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Originally posted by Tweedle42
[...]

also, he said you can travel from your soulstone a short distance as a ghost. with that it seems you could drag mobs back to near a shrine, and continue to resurrect yourself and throw yourself at a mob if you wanted to take some exp loss over and over.

one other thing, if your limited range ghost-walk becomes linked to the carrying player. an intrepid adventurer could scout rooms ahead of the party with teamspeak or such. unless the mobs are triggered by someone walking in the room or something.

so.. you dont get "stuck" as a ghost, no.

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Figuring out how the infravision works should be quite easy - the characters would see better in dark environments, just like it's been done in NWN (the screen brightens, but all is in monochrome).

I'm not particularly happy with spell points - NWN proves it is possible to use slot-based spellcasting in a real-time environment. Why fix something that isn't broken?

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Originally posted by quix0te

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Originally posted by Metalslave

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Originally posted by quix0te
"It will have its own strengths and I, for one, and very glad the designers have decided to play to these strengths and steer clear of the weaknesses rather than trying to force a bad workaround."

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Whoa...

Who decided that the core features of D&D are suddenly weaknesses? And there are no alternatives other than 'bad workarounds' in dealing with them?

This game will be marketed as Dungeons & Dragons Online. I don't think it's unrealistic to expect at least similarities between the two games and right now, it looks like they're 'steering clear' of those.

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Well, apparently the game designers have decided it. And I agree. And you are focused on a few features (cleave and spell points) and ignoring the fact that 90% of the game remains unchanged. Now spell points is a pretty big change, but I think its smart of them. It tells me that they think fun>blind adherence to PnP ruleset.
While you may not buy the game and decry the lack of fidelity to PnP rules, I think they are less concerned about you than about me, who would buy the game, and then tell all of my friends to avoid it if they cant make it fun to play. Or the kid who never played PnP but has played three or four other MMORPGs and isnt going to put up with forced downtime (or possibly major xp penalties for death, but thats another story).
If they are making changes to the PnP rules, I'm working off the assumption its not because they woke up after a bad coke binge, but because they tried to make it work and the playtesters were reporting no fun/game balance issues.

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That's precisely correct, i've been reading the turbine forums since early in its development and simply put the example was a mage of level 1 has 1 or 2 spells at level 1.  depending on feats and intelligence bonuses.  Well, firing off that one spell goes quick, and in a dungeon that has sometimes many creatures they run out of spells really fast.  so they worked with WoTC and this is in fact an alternate method within the D&D ruleset.  Put out with the Arcanum book that was published by WoTC.  That it discribes the use of spell points.  And that is in fact what Turbine is using.

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Originally posted by darquenblade

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Originally posted by netboyz

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Originally posted by ArKane

As of right now, their faq page still says the lvl limit is 20. So unless they've said something different in an interview/dev chat/forum post and havent updated it.....

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I was talking with one of the Turbine D&D employees at E3 and he let it slip out, then quickly corrected himself.  After asking him to come clean, he did admit that the max level was dropped from 20 down to 10 because Turbine wanted "room for expansion" which we all know means:  "They cannot put in enough content to fit levels 1-20, so they have to scale back the design in order to release."

Take that to the bank.

 

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I'm sorry, but I call bulls**t, my friend.

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Darquen... Read here , at the start of DDO they will only have up to level 10.  there is even a new sublevel system that they have implemented.  Its different but imo i don't think its all that bad.  Somewhat understandable of an mmo.  they of course will be bringing the cap up as they release expantions and more content.  If anyone is expecting the full out 1 to 20 plus epic then they are going to probably wait another year or so before they expand out to that point.  unless that changes, considering they have moved the november release date up to january of 2006. 

But supposedly they are doing this to concentrate on more content for these level ranges.  don't forget that each of the instanced adventures in DDO are hand designed adventures just like in a D&D pnp mod.  These are not just some random generated dungeon.  But a full blown adventure mod.