I'm aware that there are many here who don't actively play ddo, so any "slowpoke.jpg"s here are probably appropriate for me, but... in recent months I've been becoming more and more disillusioned with basically everything about DDO

(if you don't want to read my laundry list of rantish stuff, then just skip to the end and help me out here if you can, please )

• Seems like with every update, there are more server-related issues--more DCing on my end, more "Connection to server has been lost" before I can even zone into the game, and of course just more lag in general. Seems to me that of any MMO I've played, DDO has more server-related issues than any other.
• Progressively more pay-to-win things in the game. I was fine with the "old" model where you could get VIP or spend TP on classes/adventure packs/XP potions at the most... I mean sure, XP pots are sort of "pay to win/money grab" but every recent addition since MotU has been amplifying the problem up to 11. For example, instead of VIPs being able to access everything, they have to pay for expansions now... you can now pay to get insta-xp (via otto boxes), tomes are now pretty much only available from DDO store, among other things which I'm probably forgetting right now
• Stagnation of old content. I like what they did to TBC over the years by adding an epic version which actually expanded the content, to an extent. But aside from that, Turbine's done nothing to make the other 99% of old content relevant. For the most part, people just ignore packs like Necro 3, Restless Isles, Reign of Madness, Threnal, and others, becuase they're simply not worth running for any reason. Sure, you could say Necro 4 and GH are epic now, but Turbine did a horribly sloppy job of "updating" them... virtually no changes to any of the quests, just higher xp/higher damaging mobs and "oh now it's epic!  " Relating to this issue is power creep; yet another reason not to run older content when new stuff clearly outclasses it in every way. This problem of irrelevant older content wouldn't be so bad except...
• Horrible rate at which Turbine releases new, fun content. Comparatively speaking, DDO doesn't have that much content when put side-to-side with other MMOs, and Turbine really isn't doing anything to remedy this. As a result of this and the boring old content, the game gets old quickly, especially since TRing is the only real replay value
• Known issues crippling the game to the point of unplayability and overall just looking sloppy. I find it funny how the ladder bug is so old that Turbine doesn't even dignify it by mentioning it in their known issues  ... but even on the subject of known issues, it's pitiful how many basic gameplay features have been compromised, and which Turbine puts on display for everyone to see. A challenge objective being unable to be completed? Long-known issues relating to enhancement descriptions? Clunky interface problems? Items not working as they should? LFM panel being broken until you use the "who" tab... this has been an issue for how many months now?  Little things like this really pile up and make the game a whole lot less enjoyable than it was when I first started

Any one of these issues would be enough to make any sane person step back and think... wait a second, maybe this isn't so great of a game. I suppose you could call me insane for staying with the game for so long, expecting it to get better. Shame on me. But what's worse is that these are all rather important points, yet what does Turbine do instead of working on them? ...release Warlocks! Yeah, an entirely new class which creates its whole unique set of issues, including inconveniencing any completionists, lagging up the server even more, (potentially) altering (what remains of) the economy, horribly unbalancing the game, and aggravating anyone who realizes that Turbine should be working on things that... you know... actually matter  .

And relating to that, a couple more things which bother me:

• Lack of class balance, and omnipresence of "flavor of the month" easy-button builds at any point in the game. I used to believe that DDO encouraged build creativity, what with multiclassing, but I don't think that's the case anymore, knowing that for almost any archetype, there's 1 or 2 builds which can do that better than any other, so why even bother trying anything else?
• Lack of communication and competence on the devs' part. Ya know, I think the reason why the devs don't work on issues actually plaguing the game is because they spend all their time ruling the forums with an iron fist and contemplating ways to make the game even more money-grabby...
• This one's actually unrelated to the rest, but the DDO community for the most part is pretty bad. For one thing, I despise how many people absolutely rely on voice chat to communicate anything (in any other MMO where I'm in a group, I have the liberty to listen to music/podcasts/etc/have a conversation with a friend/simply enjoy the ambient sound, whereas here, people expect you to adjust to their playstyle... really, how hard is it to simply type a quest name?). For another, I've noticed that people here are divided into the "too stupid to live" category or "too elitist to need a group" category; there is no middle ground. Usually. Mostly all guilds I see are the exact same, and there are maybe one or two that consistently have quality, respectful players whom I can appreciate. Maybe the community thing is a problem with MMOs in general, dunno. What is problematic though is this vicious cycle: having a good group never hurts, yet the community is small; DDO is a relatively unpopular game; Turbine doesn't do anything to try to change this; community stays small (and fragmented, due to the presence of what, six servers?) So we're typically stuck grouping with the same group of people in a laggy lagfest... I've been thinking a server merge would be a great idea for a long time now, but of course Turbine's not going to do that because it'd exacerbate the lag problem, probably. Can't say in my 5 years of playing that I've made 1 good, constant friend/questing buddy, which is unique amongst games with DDO's size population.

Many of these factors total up to the simple fact that the game just isn't fun, at least any more. I feel like DDO's been on a downward spiral since at least 2012... sure, good things have been added from time to time, but it's not enough to counterbalance the bad. I wouldn't bother posting this to the DDO forums because everyone would probably defend Turbine without any factual basis (echo chamber ftw?), and/or I'd get b& for questioning the authority... and also because generally, I've noticed you guys here know what you're talking about. Not trying to brownnose or anything; just stating my observation.

(so for those who TL;DR'ed, just help me out with by possibly answering my two questions; for those who read through all that, sincerely thanks)

If you do continue to play, why do you play? What is there that's still fun or worth staying for? Am I missing something here or am I just a ?

Generaly, if the game isnt fun for you anymore, dont play it. It is really that simple.

However your delusion may come from the Vault - I know that after I started participating on the main forums and then on the Vault, I became unhappy about the state of he game. It went away few moths after that and I was enjoing DDO again, but ultimately, RL became more demanding and long story short - I play DDO less and less, but enjoy it when I do. Your experience may differ.

As to adress some of your questions:

After I switched to gaming notebook with SSD, any signs of DCing, connection losting and zoning disapeared. I rarely get a lagg and when I do, its clearly server based. But as I said - I rearely get it. Once an active week maybe? I am no tech expert, maybe the problem is, that DDO became more HW demanding over the years, but getting a decent gaming computer fixes almost every of these issues by my experience.

Pay to win - I dont really give a shit. Actual gamig skill cannot be bought and the rest just means that someone will be better in PvE game.Seriously, why give a shit? Its PvE, not PvP. And if you are playing DDO as PvP, then you are doing it wrong As long as expansions and paying for them goes... I may be trained by othr mmos too much, but it seems normal to me.

Old content stagnation - I dont ignore any pack, that is fun for me (so I do ignore Threnal) and I dont really feel the way you feel. But it depends on the point of view.

I completely agree that TRying is the only replay value. I enjoy running various and diferent builds trough the TR wheel, changing my game style as much as possible (my assasin is trying to run every quest for devious bonus), but ultimatly, I am taking some time off DDO, so it odesnt start to bore me.

Known issues - there is literally nothing that makes the game unplayable. That said - It pisses me off as well, that so much stuff is simply overlooked, non functioning, left to rot. I am all in favor of skipping one update of content and just do one update of known issues fixing. I literally thing that majority of the gaming populace would love that.

Flavor of the month builds - alway been there, Why play anything else? perphaps you want different past life then the one they offer. Or like me, you dont care about the fact if you build is the single one most powerfull one, but you care more about having fun with it and enjoy it. After all - you really dont need the stromgest build to solo EE.

Yeah devs are incompetent. As far as that iron fist goes (lets call it ham fist instead), thet what Vault is there for.

Hmm.. If you havent made a single good, constant friend/questing buddy, I would say that the problem is on your part. I made several.

5 Foot Step wrote on Jul 19^th, 2015 at 1:28am:


The greatest game to ever suck ass.

Honestly I think the game still has elements that make it the same entertaining game it was when I started playing 5 yrs ago.  But there are changes in general that hit me where I live.  The game system changes to armor for example didn't sit well with me, it bothered me that they went away from direct d20.  I get the reasons and the result isn't all that bad - but it still not the original that I signed up for back in the day. 

There have also been community changes.  For example drunk raids died on Kyber - and those were a great time.  Not turdbine's fault at all, but still makes things less interesting.

The main thing is that I don't see any improvement in lag.  They don't seem to take it seriously at all.  I get that it's hard.  But you need to do what's hard to compete for entertainment dollars.  Other games don't see the same issues.  I've been playing MechWarrior Online (thanks to the Vault) and that is running just fine from a lag standpoint.  They've got their own issues, but they also seem to care about fixing them.  Bottom line is that turdbine has a really easy job.  Their job is to visably show they are working to address community concerns (which have been lag for years and years - and ladders for some unknown reason) while putting out new content at reasonable cadence.  That really boils down to demonstrating that they are doing a couple lag improvements per update - which isn't happening.  We'll see if they are working it over time, but in the primeitime runs I've done recently I haven't seen improvements.  So there will be no new money for them from me anytime soon.  So just my half cent worth of cock-off.  Have fun all and see you in game.

No, dude, you're wrong.  The progenitor of DR was Beerman (and he deserves a bunch of credit for making the game fun to a bunch of us in the 2010-2013 timeframe).  And when his shift changed DR died.  He (and the Banned Group in general) were the heart of DR.  And when that fell apart it was a hit that at least I felt.  Might not be the same for all, but it was a mover for me.  As much as I dislike turdbine for the community shit they've pulled lately (crane - FFS jerry you POS), I have a hard time pulling them into a shift change of a small town PD. If anything they can be faulted for not embracing some of the more adult oriented theme runs that the server pops have come up with.  And like I said, they haven't done shit about lag that I can tell.

I mean holy shit - how can you run a business where you know EXACTLY what your customers want and then just ignore it.  FFS, at least lie to us in a convincing way.  Pretend that you care about lag in a meaningful way.  Obfuscation is just urine in the eye.  Which is what is happening. 

Tried to do raids tonight on 2 servers (argo and kyber) and got into 3 in 7 hrs - chrono, shroud, and vault.  Which is what I expected, but just shows that if you're not in channel or guild you aint gonna raid.  And that probably means the game is hurting for new players.

Revaulting is right. The bottom line is to have fun.  If DDO is that for you then do it.  My main point is that many of the fun aspects of the DDO community are what we have lost over the last 2 yrs.  Pug raids are few and far between.  I can go run solo shit forever.  Sometimes fun, sometimes not.  But overall the game pop decline means fewer options for multiplayer quests for PUGs.  And that is a loss all will feel eventually.  I really think lag is the key.  I don't know the key to lag.  But it seems like something that can be solved.  And if they won't do the hard work, new content (the shiny new thing) will only keep folks distracted for so long. I hope they get there shit together as DDO is a great game with more PC diversity than you can shake a stick at.  But it's nearly unplayable at times now due to lag and they need to fix that to make it fun again.  Its a game for FFS.  Make it easy and fun to play!

5 Foot Step wrote on Jul 19^th, 2015 at 1:28am:


I always played DDO in third person, and I don't really give a shit about IP, if the game is good I'll learn it. (Still enjoying PoE)

Payday 2 is kinda fun with a semi-relevant build system.

DDO is dead to me though.

well for starters i know quite a few of the people who say they don't play any more still play but say they don't because they think it makes them look cool or something, im not saying all or even half, just quite a few. the ones who actually don't play still hang around because they think giving people shit and trolling all the time somehow makes up for having no social life.

Revaulting wrote on Jul 19^th, 2015 at 4:55am:


Yes, though to be clear Turbine as it is now can't fix it, the code is "pizza boxes and dirty clothes dorm room wrecked" not "car hit a tree at 90 MPH wrecked". It's all just 1s and 0s, sack the current "leadership" and maybe (but maybe not) some of the staff, and they could turn it around in a year or less. But what producer lasts a year in DDO?!

5 Foot Step wrote on Jul 19^th, 2015 at 6:21am:

Uh...isn't it?

For me the last rennaisance of DDO was the new paradigm set by the expansion, with interest waning prior to a minor resurgence following Epic Gianthold, TP code trading and widespread exploits.

Edit: I haven't logged into the game for over a year and I doubt I'll ever log in again.

Sasha wrote on Jul 19^th, 2015 at 12:43pm:

or more new raids that take 25minutes to solo first attempt

having played destiny for the last 9 months, I think the main problem with DDO, and I'll get flack for this, is the Grand Canyon of difference between someone logging in for the first time, and a completionist doing Korthos quests with twink gear.

In a game like Destiny, there's a brief period where you don't have the best guns, or all of the calss abilities unlocked, that lasts about a week.

After that, the improvements are extremely incremental from gear or playtime, it's 99.9% differentiated by how good you are at playing Destiny, not how much loot you have, or how many times you've reincarnated. This is true in both PvE, and PvP.

I'm not saying Destiny is a perfect game or it will never have issues with longevity (in fact, it does to some degree for the people who truly do not like PvP, in between updates), but it does a good job of handicapping, like the game of golf. Golf is a game where your 98 year old grandpa, your 18 year old little sister, and a PGA pro can all play together and have a meaningful game, because of the handicap. Destiny is like this by and large, and means skill level except for the very hardest parts at the highest difficulties is irrelevant, but more importantly your gear is largely irrelevant too. What really matters, is if you're willing to learn and get better. If you are, gear and grinding time wont hold you back.

DDO needs more of that.