Originally posted by Azrile

{mod edit}

 Bad reputation on a forum I do not post on? Sorry sir but you are making things up.

Depending on what a cleric is doing to DPS the best use of spell points might not be to heal poorly performing DPS. Sometimes letting one die makes a good point.

Originally posted by AlBQuirky

 

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Originally posted by KingsIsle
Wizard101 has a free to play area that you're invited to enjoy for as long as you want. Where most games limit your free play by time, we limit it by location. 
If you wish to explore beyond Triton Avenue, you will need to purchase time in the game with a Membership, or individual areas in the game with Crowns.

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Interesting slant on "F2P". You can run wizards forever through the same few hours of gameplay as long as you desire. You get 10 free levels to play. You get to explore TWO areas (Unicorn Way and Triton Avenue) for free. You give just a very small taste of the game "for free". In other words, "Try this blue pill, kiddie, it's free." Later on: "What? You want more blue pills? Time to pay up now."

 

What do you care. Not your kids. This is your whole marketing plan, isn't it? Suck the kids in and let them bug, whine, and plead with the parents for the money for you? Even after you "subscribe" or "pay by area", there are pets to be bought, houses to be bought, mounts to be bought, clothes/outfits to be bought, etc. Kids are competitive, comparative, and looking to fit in. Way to capitalize on that.

2 Streets (areas) for free. A few hours of playtime. Give me a 14 day free trial anyday of the week. I *KNOW* what I am getting into there.

All I can say is you fooled a lot of people. You got rave reviews from many publications. You got awards. You have a good game. I had fun. I would pay to play, if it weren't for your sleazy marketing scams. You don't nickel and dime, you $5 and $10. I'm not going to fight to fight with my children for every "cool item Suzy has."

Now let's see the "pat response" that gold can be earned in-game. How long does it take to make the 5,000 gold to purchase the first house? It's not "fun" to tell your kids, "We are the have nots. Sorry about that." This is supposed to be a game, not an object of stress.

Like I said before: Not your kids, not your problems.

 Maybe you could use the game to help teach your kids some life lessons. Like let them earn money from you to pay for things in game.  Gold can be earned in game and is really quite easy to accumulate.

The game and marketing are not sleazy, you are just using it as a babysitter instead of teaching your kids things. Stop blaming KingIsle for your problems. It is not like they forced you to download the game or let your kids play it.

Originally posted by Warlaorm

I liked the review, was well written and I agree with most of what was stated. On the subject of the community though I have to disagree. The community does have it's min maxers. As a whole though I'd have to say that those min maxers are just a big a gift as a curse. Take World of Warcraft, try to ask a serious question in trade or general chat and get a logical response........won't happen. The advice channel (on the server I played on anyways) would almost always get sound advice.......That might not seem like a HUGE deal, but for new players comeing into a game with such a steep learning curve, those min maxers can sure help. Over all I think the community is good, sure they have some rude people but nothing compared to games like WoW. The reviewer is correct though, play what you like. If you've never played D&D or D&D Online though, a cookie cuttuer spec/build might be a good idea until you have a better understanding of the game and what is or isnt' needed.

 

 It is a good idea to learn a bit beforehand. I could see a new player making a cleric and investing heavily in the heal skill(makes sense that heal would be good) only to find out that it is a complete waste of skill points. Some feats are a waste and should be avoided. Some people like to learn on their own(some of us had no choice there) but not everyone does.

Originally posted by ropenice

To edit my above post, not talking about epic content, or needing a certain lev cleric or rogue, etc-or the high level quests that have secific needs-just the usual, n/h quests that just need full group. People in the game have been very helpful answering questions about building a stronger character, choosing feats or directing to good forum posts about class-but more inclusion of newer players would go a long way to improve their play and game.

 

 A big problem with vets and newer players is game speed. Turbine is horribly slow at adding new content, this has led older players to playing the game at a speed that destroys the fun of new players. These days when i make a new character I rarely even group before level 6 or so because I know I can solo most quests faster then if I get with new players who want to experience it for the first time and they should be able to do so without a player zerging ahead killing everything and ruining the fun of doing it for the first time.

Originally posted by ropenice

Originally posted by Rokurgepta

For the reviewer i must say please do not encourage people to build wizard/paladins. While you might feel that it is your time and money, which is fine if you solo, do not start whining when high level groups do not take you because your level split makes you a bad caster, bad fighter and bad character. Even a great player can build a character that is not much use.

 

You do not have to follow the "munchkin" group, oddly 5+ years of DDo and I never heard them refered that way let alone to the amount you claim they are. Might be a server specific term. But you should never tell people to build horrible characters that do waste that persons time and money.

 

The  paladin/wizard multi was probably tongue in cheek-at least I hope so-but it does highlight one reason people leave the game and population never gets too high. The higher you level the more snobby and elitist the gamers get and it gets hard to get in a group. Most quests on normal or hard can be easily beat without a min/max group-especially if people know how to play their character, but most groups you see forming on the social panel require vets/TR or all these other unneeded requirements. For example, I saw Waterworks quest at 4th level on hard accepting only TR's, byoh, etc. -Me as wizard and 2 fighterss easily did the whole thing on hard at 4th with no problem.

The unnecessary elitism turns people off the game because it makes it hard to get in groups and learn how to play better. Also Ive been on plenty of these min/max groups that have been wiped so many times half the group quits because they run through zerging with no strategy, to save 5 or 10 minutes-but end up costing more time or never finishing it-I'm looking at you Vile Apopcraphy quest. If the vets on the game would relax and be more inclusive many of these newer player would become p2p and become good players giving a better community and more income to game so they can make it even better.

 

 Most of the people you see booting are what vets call Fake Vets. They put up LFMs stating know the quest or no newbs or some other dumb thing and then when you join them you see why they want someone who knows the quest, because they never bothered to learn the game. Those people give knowledgable players, be they vets or new, a bad name.

They act elite to try and get one elite person in the group who can carry them. DDO in general requires 2 people for most quests on hard and even elite in most cases. The game is not hard, but poor builds will make the game less fun and waste other peoples time.

The reason you see TR only groups is they are trying to avoid death so they do not lose any % of their EXP, problem is so many TRs are people who got carried to level 20 that they add nothing to the TR group. I have seen more people who are TR not know what they are doing then I have run into newer players who do not know. At least the newer player will usually ask a question if they do not know.

Originally posted by grimfall

Originally posted by GreenWidow

Originally posted by Rokurgepta

For the reviewer i must say please do not encourage people to build wizard/paladins. While you might feel that it is your time and money, which is fine if you solo, do not start whining when high level groups do not take you because your level split makes you a bad caster, bad fighter and bad character. Even a great player can build a character that is not much use.

 

You do not have to follow the "munchkin" group, oddly 5+ years of DDo and I never heard them refered that way let alone to the amount you claim they are. Might be a server specific term. But you should never tell people to build horrible characters that do waste that persons time and money.

 Have to agree with everything said here.  The best character builds are on the forums.  People have listed exactly what they took and more importantly, if you do a little reading, they explain WHY they made the choices they did.

With a small time investment of reading and educating yourself on the game you can make a character not only accepted by  groups but also be much happier with the character you play.

DDO is set using the 3.0 ruleset...partially.  But it is VASTLY different from pen and paper play.  There are reasons for this which only reading and learning the game will help you better understand. 

Barring that, come to the Orien server and ask for Heliotrope and if I'm online I'll be happy to hop in a dungeon with you and explain as much as you'd like.

I have to totally disagree with this post.

The best thing about the game is the character customization... by letting other, lazy and basically stupid players dictate to you how you should create your character makes the game just vanilla crap.

There are guilds without mindless drones seeking the easiest way to do everything creating characters and parties, but you'll need to find them to enjoy the game to the fullest.

 

 If they were lazy and stupid they would not spend the time they do making all the characters they have. Sorry but you are 100% wrong to call players you do not know names. Makes me think you spent a lot of time in DDO being rejected for parties with your 8cleric, 6 fighter, 6 wizard.

Originally posted by TheCrow2k

I did Enjoy D&DO playing it for almost a year and I stopped playing about 6 months before F2P came in. But I truly despise the setting of Eberron, it just feels very dry and soulless both here and in the PnP version.

If they were really so hellbent on avoiding Faerun, then Darksun would have been a far more interesting setting IMHO and they could have achieved a lot more with it.

The Min/Max crowd did piss me off also, getting booted from a group because you had the audacity to make a Human Fighter/Cleric instead of the "superior" Dwarven Fighter/Cleric got very old very fast.

I am actually really hoping for another D&D MMORPG (probably the only thing that will get me back to playing fantasy genre MMO's) one day soon, but with no end in sight to the Turbine Vs Atari Vs Hasbro legal battle over the intricacies of the franchise rights I doubt we will see it anytime soon.

 

 I agree the min/max crowd that boots for not having the right race(they think) for a build is silly.

Originally posted by deathtripp

Originally posted by Rokurgepta

For the reviewer i must say please do not encourage people to build wizard/paladins. While you might feel that it is your time and money, which is fine if you solo, do not start whining when high level groups do not take you because your level split makes you a bad caster, bad fighter and bad character. Even a great player can build a character that is not much use.

 

You do not have to follow the "munchkin" group, oddly 5+ years of DDo and I never heard them refered that way let alone to the amount you claim they are. Might be a server specific term. But you should never tell people to build horrible characters that do waste that persons time and money.

 

 In my view, he wasn't encouraging people to make a wizard/paldin, but rather, he was encouraging people to play what is fun for them, instead of playing what other people tell them is "good". Personally, I don't make my character to be useful to other players or their party; I make it for me to have fun (which can indeed include being useful). Of course, if you are constantly dying, being slain by monsters, and/or being refused from a group because you don't have the class and skills a party wants then you may not have much fun. You claim one does not have to follow the "munchkin" group (I've never heard that word either, but I'm also no DDO vet) , but then you essentially state that unless they do, they will not be joining your group with their "bad character". It seems the reviewers point holds true. I think the review was solid, as I think DDO is solid.

Green-Widow said "the best character builds are on the forum" , and that's great, but I like to play the game for myself, deciding on what is the most fun for me, which may not exactly be "the best" build. However, I do agree that one should probably do a little bit of reading about how to build a solid character; I just don't think they should be given an entire build and told what to do. Overall, a good, seemingly accurate review.

 

 There are good reasons for not building a character that has limited use in parties. I have odd characters that i solo with and group with guildies who know what I am trying or know me well enough as a player to know that even my gimp might have a purpose. People should not expect pick up groups to group with and then carry through some 10 wizard 10 paladin that fails to be any use at high level content.

1. This is a team game, building for that is not a bad idea.

2. Poor builds lose their fun quickly, if you have not played to high level you may not have noticed that the game gets a little tougher and poor builds will not be able to perform their primary function well if they multiclass poorly.

3. You do not have to build according to the forums or what other people want, but if you build something that lacks synergy you will get refused from groups and will find most of those characters fail to perform well past level 10. DDO is a pretty easy game and especially easy until the early teen levels. You can make a horrible build and see no issues the first 10 or so levels and think you built the best character ever.

For the reviewer i must say please do not encourage people to build wizard/paladins. While you might feel that it is your time and money, which is fine if you solo, do not start whining when high level groups do not take you because your level split makes you a bad caster, bad fighter and bad character. Even a great player can build a character that is not much use.

You do not have to follow the "munchkin" group, oddly 5+ years of DDo and I never heard them refered that way let alone to the amount you claim they are. Might be a server specific term. But you should never tell people to build horrible characters that do waste that persons time and money.

Originally posted by lordalberonn

One thing not covered is those with hireling clerics. While it is easy to forget they are there, it is usually a good idea to spread the healing around. I am sometimes guilty of forgetting that I can have my pocket cleric heal others, but I have been working hard to correct that. If you are the only one  in a small group that has one, it does behoove you to keep on top of things. I have heard that the AI was recently tweaked so the healer hirelings will heal your teammates, and I'll be checking that out when I can.

 It has been tweaked but it is very buggy and unreliable right now.

Originally posted by Joarnaj

Perhaps you've done this but I usually find awesome info through google searches. For instance, "fighter build ddo," "tempest ranger ddo," "barbarian dps build ddo," or searches of that nature.

 

Currently I have been using the following build as a solo character. I'm not following it exactly (probably won't take more than 2 or 3 levels in Rogue) but doing the basics and, at least for the lower levels, it's been fun so far.

 

 http://forums.ddo.com/showpost.php?p=2357938

 If you do take rogue I suggest trying to max rogue skills. They are very helpful on a splash character IF you can afford them skill point wise.

Originally posted by ARHicks11

Originally posted by Rokurgepta

4. Barbarians not only get power attack,specialization and strength to their attacks they have access to extra power attack damage that a fighter does not. Personally I play a fighter/barb that gets Kensai 2 and the first level of barbarian PRE. I can rage and use Kensai power surge. Barbarians have more strength and a better power attack due to enhancements.

Fighters do not get this amazing critical you claim. They can get +1 to crit threat range. This makes for more crits but nearly the numbers you claimed of 3 out of 4 swings being a crit. No weapon in DDO has a 75% crit hit chance.

  [Mod Edit]

 Your numbers are all wrong.

Raging barbs at high level get much more strength bonuses due to rage and PA then a fighter. Rage potion stacks with rage. My multiclass fighter/barb has more stength and damage then your fighter. Your fighter using a shield and bastard sword does less damage than ANY two handed barbarian. Are you aware Barbarians are raging to over 70 strength in ddo? That is not short term buffs, that is sustained for up to 25 minutes between shrines while a fighter can not hit that number for more that 10 minutes. Strength is damage. No one is losing 16 AB. You are making up numbers or simply mistaken. If you play high level content you KNOW that the 8 AB barbs lose is not important with a 50+ str or more. That 8 AB matters to lesser melees. Fighters and barbs are built to hit on a roll of a 2.

Barbbarians get more critical damage then a fighter because the barbarian crit multiplier is much higher for their PRE Frenzy Berzerker. I suggest you read about it on the forums or the DDO Wiki and see that a Barbarian can hit for a higher amount on any hit then a fighter.

Critical accuracy the feat and the enhancement DO NOT give you more critical chance they only add to your roll IF you roll for critical. That roll is going to be a crit if you already have a high to hit bonus and every barbarian does.

Full plate armor is the WORST armor in DDO. It is nearly impossible to build a character that uses full plate and has a high enough AC for high end content. A fighter using full plate and a shield is not doing good damage. No matter how you try and break down the numbers a fighter using a two handed weapon and a Barbarian using a two handed weapon are better than any shield user.

I am not being mean or insulting you when I tell you that your game knowledge on these classes is wrong. You are not understanding what barbarians get and it seems you never played one. Please stop giving false information to people asking questions.

Originally posted by ARHicks11

Originally posted by Rokurgepta

 

 So much bad information I feel the need to fix it.

Ranger, the reason ranged is poor is due to low damage. Graphics and pathing are not really issues that make ranged bad. The reason ranged is bad is because people without a clue think they should be able to do fighter and barbarian damage and do it from 300 feet away. Accepting the fact you trade big damage for mobility would make people realize ranged has a place. But stupid play makes people not understand.

 

Barbarians do not suck. They do great damage, they have a lot of hit points and they move faster. Rage is a great skill and the enhancements make it great too. Fighters can do big damage too, but they have a more limited time frame to do it because their buffs are shorter.

 

Bards can fight. Only people with limited gameplay and knowledge consider them a poor mans anything.

Fighter not always best as a twf kopesh user. If you were( I know you do not want to) to play a half orc they get no benefits from TWF like the do from THF. ssuming all fighters are best as one thing is wrong.

Clerics/Favored Souls can be played as fighter types but if you do not heal you are not a cleric. You are wrong saying you heard they are not liked. They are not liked when played bad, they are loved when played well. Anyone playing a cleric and focusing only on fighting is wasting his character since you can build a much better fighter using the real melee classes.

 

If you can not give accurate and good help you should simply direct a person to a place that can.

1) Instead you did the reverse.

2) Fighters don't have buffs outside of action points. They get stance, buts no buffs. They do more damage than any offer classes due to Kensai and high confirm criticals. My Kensai fighter does more damage than 2-handed Barbarian the same level due to critical hits.

3) Bards can't wear medium armor unless they get the second version of war enchanter. They can't heal well and they have a small pool of mana. They get few enhancement to boots healing, but compared to the cleric, they are a poorman's version of the class. Some bards twf and other thf, but some use a tankish version. The only thing that shines is their singing, but that has nothing to do with them failing at everything else mentioned. Without darkleaf or mithril equipment, a bard has a hard time casting spells unless you are using light armor. Currently, I play a War enchanter who does nice damage, but can't stay in the frontlines for long due to low fort, low HP, and few protection spells. Most bards are wand-whippers.

4) See above as to why Fighters beat out most classes in terms of damage. TWF with Kopesh with a high confirm critical makes you a whirling death. Most TWF builds feature at least 12 levels of fighter for Kensai. Ranger damage is situational since they have to fight a favored enemy. Rogue is as well since they can't backstab everyone. Barbarian damage is short term while a Figher can apply strength/specialization/power attack to everything. And if the creature can be critical hit then his damage output explodes.

5) First, your fourth sentence contradicted the rest of your paragraph. Second, I've seen the attitude in game for myself as well as on the official forums. They are hated, especially if they ignore their healing duties as most people associate FS/Clerics with healing.

 4. Barbarians not only get power attack,specialization and strength to their attacks they have access to extra power attack damage that a fighter does not. Personally I play a fighter/barb that gets Kensai 2 and the first level of barbarian PRE. I can rage and use Kensai power surge. Barbarians have more strength and a better power attack due to enhancements.

Fighters do not get this amazing critical you claim. They can get +1 to crit threat range. This makes for more crits but nearly the numbers you claimed of 3 out of 4 swings being a crit. No weapon in DDO has a 75% crit hit chance.

Originally posted by warmaster670

Originally posted by ARHicks11

No, it isn't. I'm not sure what illogical math you are doing, but the game started with 15 servers and now it has 7. It's population dropped. It didn't rise above it's original population. Rather as i said early, it's a resurgance of old players.

 

Not sure what math your doing, since number of servers doesnt mean jack when it comes to population, a game could have 100 empty servers, doesnt mean it has more people than a game with 7 servers.

 I wonder what he thinks of games that run entirely on one server. Guild Wars must have no people since it runs on one server.

Originally posted by gothmog56

here is a resolution,if the boxes are UNOPENED take them back and redee the crowns. he did not ask for a refund,your reply shows you do NOT even listen.but you know what your reputation  is showing in the game.its EMPTY.when i played a few years ago it was packed,i went back yesterday and i was ONLY person in start town.

 Actually your reply shows you did not read the OP. He clearly says they would not return any money, that means he asked for a refund.

Originally posted by gothmog56

hate to tell you this he does NOt have to prove a thing,he can quit playing as he did. its HIS money. you have to ask yourself if they thinki its worth losing a custoer over.

 Hate to tell you but by buying 60,000 crowns they already got all the money they were likely to ever see from this guy. My guess is he spent more than the average person on this game.

Why would they give him back crowns he allowed his kid to spend without paying attention to what his kid does? My guess is this situation is typical for him, he does not monitor his kid.

Originally posted by ARHicks11

Originally posted by arthur567

Well Im kinda new to DDO I started with a human fighter then I bought monk then a pally but I saw my monk's build was bad without 32 point build so I ddecided to create amonk when I get 32 point

My questions are

For human which one is better fighter 2 handed or pally 2 handed (also i need the stats that I need to rais ewith dps pally)

 

Which monk should I choose shintao or ninja I had ninja but since I saw I cant heal myself I been thinking if shintao is better

and what stats should I raise If i choose ninja or shintao. 

 

NOTE: I dont want to be WF nor orc

 

Ranger: Unless you play Tempest TWF, you are going to suck. Range attacking in this game is a joke due to the mechanics, pathing, and graphics.

Barbarian: Suck. They get a huge pool of life and DR, but compared to a Fighter with high critical, they pale in comparsion.

Bard: They only buff and wand whip. Occasional, you'll fight, but rarely. They are a poor man's Cleric/Favored Soul if you used a shield and become a war enchanter.

Fighter: A fighter is better played a TWF Kopesh Kensai type, but a Kensai tank, THF Kensai Fighter, and Stalwart Fighters are good.

Paladin: Can be played as either a tank, a smiter/divine might, or a demon hunter.

Clerics/Favored Soul: Can be made into a War Priest, but I hear they are extremely disliked in this game because they focused more on melee than healing.

Rogue: TWF assassin is the only path that said to be good.

The DDO Official forums has all kinds of builds, but you don't have to use the suggestion they give as almost any build will work. It just depends on what path you tank that will determine if you do well in the game.

 So much bad information I feel the need to fix it.

Ranger, the reason ranged is poor is due to low damage. Graphics and pathing are not really issues that make ranged bad. The reason ranged is bad is because people without a clue think they should be able to do fighter and barbarian damage and do it from 300 feet away. Accepting the fact you trade big damage for mobility would make people realize ranged has a place. But stupid play makes people not understand.

Barbarians do not suck. They do great damage, they have a lot of hit points and they move faster. Rage is a great skill and the enhancements make it great too. Fighters can do big damage too, but they have a more limited time frame to do it because their buffs are shorter.

Bards can fight. Only people with limited gameplay and knowledge consider them a poor mans anything.

Fighter not always best as a twf kopesh user. If you were( I know you do not want to) to play a half orc they get no benefits from TWF like the do from THF. ssuming all fighters are best as one thing is wrong.

Clerics/Favored Souls can be played as fighter types but if you do not heal you are not a cleric. You are wrong saying you heard they are not liked. They are not liked when played bad, they are loved when played well. Anyone playing a cleric and focusing only on fighting is wasting his character since you can build a much better fighter using the real melee classes.

If you can not give accurate and good help you should simply direct a person to a place that can.

Originally posted by ARHicks11

Originally posted by Rokurgepta

Originally posted by Murdus

Originally posted by ARHicks11

Indeed, the game is dead as I can hardly find anyone playing at times unless I go to certain servers.

This is false. Thelanis, Argo, and other servers have more groups than the game has ever had EVER.

I've been with the game since a month post release, the game has more players now that it is f2p than it ever did p2p (on a general scale of time)

 Not true. The game was more crowded about 3 or 4 months after the F2P was released. The population has slowly dwindled again since then and anyone who was around then should be able to see this.

 

Does it still have more then it ever had before F2P? Yes, but the game is no longer at its peak population like it was a year ago this time.

1) No, when the game first start and after content was put in the game was dwindling. People blew through the content in a month. Later on, several of the servers were taken. I know I was there. On official forums, the moderators would mod any negative post and poster would attack complainers cause people to avoid both the boards and the game.  As the game got more content, people came back, but left as fan as they came in because the content was still easy.

2) No, you know how I know. This was the same crap that was said several months ago on this forum and GAMEFAQs.com. They also said more servers were going to be made. It never happened. This game doesn't get more players, but rather players who are hurting on money come to DDO. They only come on updates. When they blow through the content, they leave. They've been doing this for the past 5 years.

 Maybe you did not understand what I posted.

DDO RIGHT AFTER F2P was introduced had its largest population ever. Since then the population is getting smaller but it is still larger then it was when the game was subscription only and maybe had 30K players left.

Sorry but you know not what you speak of. If you think DDO does not have more people now then it did 2 years or more ago you were not there. The game was dying and F2P gave it new life. Unfortunately that new life includes game play changes aimed at the simple minded and the dumbing down is now irreversible and permanant.

Originally posted by Greg2005NY
You cannot be smarter than kids. They play because they are young. You play because you does nit have anything to do. Istead of earning money and studying you just sit and repeat the same operation million times. Good luck hardcore ;) player - sit and play. I hope you will play all tour life.

 Instead of letting your child waste time on a game maybe you should make sure he studies. It would seem he has some obstacles to overcome there.

Some of us may not be smarter than kids, others of notice that kids do not run the world. Probably because they are not so smart as kids.

Originally posted by Murdus

Originally posted by ARHicks11

Indeed, the game is dead as I can hardly find anyone playing at times unless I go to certain servers.

This is false. Thelanis, Argo, and other servers have more groups than the game has ever had EVER.

I've been with the game since a month post release, the game has more players now that it is f2p than it ever did p2p (on a general scale of time)

 Not true. The game was more crowded about 3 or 4 months after the F2P was released. The population has slowly dwindled again since then and anyone who was around then should be able to see this.

Does it still have more then it ever had before F2P? Yes, but the game is no longer at its peak population like it was a year ago this time.