greywyndMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 7,155Arc User
They made it easier for alts. The system also requires you to put forth effort towards that alt.
I'm not looking for forgiveness, and I'm way past asking permission. Earth just lost her best defender, so we're here to fight. And if you want to stand in our way, we'll fight you too.
Also with the new overflow XP, the grind will bring power points to the alt. Or will that be the next thing people will beg for, account-wide power point unlocks.
..and the Verdict is... Neverwinter is not recommended for alts ...only for mains...thnx cryptic...Neveralt ...ahahahah
Sure you can alt. Plenty of people use all sorts of trashy alts and let others carry them for AD. But if you want end-game viable alts, then, like the epic dungeon RQ, you have to earn it.
..and the Verdict is... Neverwinter is not recommended for alts ...only for mains...thnx cryptic...Neveralt ...ahahahah
Do you know that basically EVERY topic you have created has been a complaint about the game, or a request to make it easier? Just saying....
Someone mentioned EQ1 above...you want to talk about a boring grind....HOURS upon HOURS of sitting...LITERALLY SITTING..in a cave waiting for 1 guy to spawn, so your 5 man team can kill it, then sit down and wait 10 minutes for it to come back. Someone down the hall screws up and pulls more than they can handle? They just die right? Oh no, they run to the zone line (loading zones we safe spots mods couldnt breach). Once they zone, they come back and kill EVERYTHING IN THEIR PATH. No biggy right, you just die and come back? Yep, except that A) you had to run to your corpse, naked (and blind, cause the game was notoriously dark), and you just lost probably all your XP for the day, plus some...possibly losing levels.
Honestly, NW is a cakewalk in comparison. Is it exciting to run the campaigns repeatedly? Nope. But that is the F2P model in a nutshell - make things just annoying enough to force people to open wallets.
Someone mentioned "Customer is King"? As soon as they lose enough players, they will change. Till thn, they won't have a reason too.
Or just alternatively, make the signet of patronage cost (significantly) more, but it unlocks boons. The thing is, yeah it indicates how much time you invested into the game, but lately (especially SOMI and M13), we haven't gotten any actually decent boons since ToD pretty much. And most people will just not get those boons because the quality of the boons doesn't justify the time it takes to get them. My main is 17k and I still don't have all SOMI boons for god's sake.
In DCUO the main thing you go after is feats; feats give you skill point and skill points give you stats. In that game when I left groups wanted players with over 200 SP and players complained it was hard to get some older feats that would help them get 200+. Getting feats in that game is way more of a grind than this game.
I took 6 months off and when I came back in under two months I completed 2 characters STK/SOMI without any issues in about 2 months and CoA as well. I also completed Chult on 3 characters during that same time. STK takes about 30 minutes, CoA about 10-20 minutes and Chult 1 day out of the week roughly 1-2 hours and I was done. I did not do the campaign during the weekends as I focused on dungeons, mostly t9.
The grind is not that bad. I know a few players new took their new character through all of the campaigns in roughly 2-3 months.
If you want to complete all campaigns up to STK, save up 8500 zen and buy the campaign completion token with a 15% off coupon or wait until the services are on sale.
I bought 2 of those during the 50% off sale in November for my HR and SW.
There are options and the grind is not that bad. If you want to talk about a grind, go talk to anyone who played EQ back in the day, that was a grind. This is a joke and not that bad.
I come from EQ1 back in the day and no game in todays world would make it as it was then. If you as I come from that background we are not a good example for what we consider dueble when it comes to grinding (hell epic weapons took 6 mounth easy not to mention shawl quest that was insane). The downtime between fights was 90 % and when you died you lost exp that could take days to recover yea that was hardcore grinding for sure.
What you say is true but the other side of the coin is how many more player would you get by making things easer for them to reach the end game without to much grinding compared to those willing to grind/pay.
Looking on succesful games and given that the wide playerbase do not have time to play every day and most of them only a couple of hours when they do 5-6 month time or 200€+ is most likely not the best way to go.....
With 15000 zen you get a level 70 character and all boons up to SOMI done. Get those items at 50% off and the price is now 7500. That is not bad considering how much of a grind it is to get to level 70 and get all of those boons.
I know plenty of players that have paid their through this game. I know others who grind and been unlucky and eventually put $$$ money to improve their character, I'm on the later end of the spectrum. I got annoyed playing for hours on end only to get HAMSTER after HAMSTER after HAMSTER with keys and drops. 50% odds alway seem to fail for me, I had use coal wards on almost all % items.
You know what happened, I bought stuff and now things just go proce for me with 3% and even 1% on my character. I was a 14.5K DC before I finished her off and now she is creeping up on 17K.
Players have options; you can pay your way or grind. I did both. I paid my way on 2 character completely. Than my GF, CW and DC I grinded out all but IWD campaign because of the HAMSTER experience I had on my DC and decided never to run that campaign. SOMI and STK I did after I got the CoA weapons on my CW and DC. GF I don't remember if I bought it or completed after I got her the teak weapons, it been a while now.
The nice thing is if you finish a campaign you can grind out a bit more and get a discount token. I did that on my DC for my CW and it make STK so much better and I completed 2x faster.
Out of all the campaigns, the worst ones from my experience were all of the ones in IWD zones. All others were a bit of a joke.
In DCUO the main thing you go after is feats; feats give you skill point and skill points give you stats. In that game when I left groups wanted players with over 200 SP and players complained it was hard to get some older feats that would help them get 200+. Getting feats in that game is way more of a grind than this game.
I took 6 months off and when I came back in under two months I completed 2 characters STK/SOMI without any issues in about 2 months and CoA as well. I also completed Chult on 3 characters during that same time. STK takes about 30 minutes, CoA about 10-20 minutes and Chult 1 day out of the week roughly 1-2 hours and I was done. I did not do the campaign during the weekends as I focused on dungeons, mostly t9.
The grind is not that bad. I know a few players new took their new character through all of the campaigns in roughly 2-3 months.
If you want to complete all campaigns up to STK, save up 8500 zen and buy the campaign completion token with a 15% off coupon or wait until the services are on sale.
I bought 2 of those during the 50% off sale in November for my HR and SW.
There are options and the grind is not that bad. If you want to talk about a grind, go talk to anyone who played EQ back in the day, that was a grind. This is a joke and not that bad.
I come from EQ1 back in the day and no game in todays world would make it as it was then. If you as I come from that background we are not a good example for what we consider dueble when it comes to grinding (hell epic weapons took 6 mounth easy not to mention shawl quest that was insane). The downtime between fights was 90 % and when you died you lost exp that could take days to recover yea that was hardcore grinding for sure.
What you say is true but the other side of the coin is how many more player would you get by making things easer for them to reach the end game without to much grinding compared to those willing to grind/pay.
Looking on succesful games and given that the wide playerbase do not have time to play every day and most of them only a couple of hours when they do 5-6 month time or 200€+ is most likely not the best way to go.....
With 15000 zen you get a level 70 character and all boons up to SOMI done. Get those items at 50% off and the price is now 7500. That is not bad considering how much of a grind it is to get to level 70 and get all of those boons.
I know plenty of players that have paid their through this game. I know others who grind and been unlucky and eventually put $$$ money to improve their character, I'm on the later end of the spectrum. I got annoyed playing for hours on end only to get HAMSTER after HAMSTER after HAMSTER with keys and drops. 50% odds alway seem to fail for me, I had use coal wards on almost all % items.
You know what happened, I bought stuff and now things just go proce for me with 3% and even 1% on my character. I was a 14.5K DC before I finished her off and now she is creeping up on 17K.
Players have options; you can pay your way or grind. I did both. I paid my way on 2 character completely. Than my GF, CW and DC I grinded out all but IWD campaign because of the HAMSTER experience I had on my DC and decided never to run that campaign. SOMI and STK I did after I got the CoA weapons on my CW and DC. GF I don't remember if I bought it or completed after I got her the teak weapons, it been a while now.
The nice thing is if you finish a campaign you can grind out a bit more and get a discount token. I did that on my DC for my CW and it make STK so much better and I completed 2x faster.
Out of all the campaigns, the worst ones from my experience were all of the ones in IWD zones. All others were a bit of a joke.
It comes down to what can this game offer compared to other games. New games has a higher allure then old games and old games all suffer from players having to farm their way to the new content.
Now if 1000 players start to play NW and you can make x% stay or x% leave because the grind is to much how do you find that balance.
If you get players to be longterm costumers the chanse that they will pay more then a few willing to pay x amount to get all boons etc or x players finding the grind tolerable.
Then you have the old players that want to start alts but rather change to a new game because the grind is to much or the price is to high to pay for it.
All old games need a new influx of players as old players move one for x reasons and the steeper the price is and the longer the grind takes the fewer stays.h If you find it tolerable has very little impact on how the total amount of new players will react.
If the player base decline (and they are) most likely the existing system is most likely in need of a change.
Cryptic has the numbers on how many of the new players pay x amount to buy expansion tokens we don´t but from the ones i lured to play this game I am pretty certain that the grind and they money you need to get all the boons, comapanions etc is making an all to high % of them quit.
2
adinosiiMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,294Arc User
I have kind-of given up playing more than one alt. I do have lv 70 alts of every class, but they are all undergeared and lacking boons compared to my main ... but, well...it doesn't bother me. The game is so alt-unfriendly anyhow that I only have time for my main.
There are all ready to much of game that players can skip past and all that causes is people that have no clue how to play there class. Then they wonder why they get kicked from dungeons or can not find party's to run with or why there item level is so low.
that has always been part of the game. it always will be part of the game. we are talking about passing boons to alts from a toon that has already completed the campaign. if it's an alt odds are the person at least has some idea of what they're supposed to be doing and what is needed to make a successful character. not talking about giving a first time player a complete free pass. (although in the name of keeping newer players I think we should give them a partial free pass past some of the older content) the biggest obstacle to new players is figuring out that they need to upgrade enchants and how their pet works and the mount system. things that are a little hidden. when I started this game the enchant thing was a mystery to me (even with the little quest) and the ah.. it took me ages to figure that out. I had figured out how to play the adx before I had figured out how the ah worked.
there is already so much overwhelming about this game even more so now than when most of us started playing that if we want to keep an influx of new players something HAS to be done to simplify it. this thread isn't really about that. it's about making it alt friendly so we aren't tied to one toon without months of grind to get another toon up to speed. yes people will have to learn the new alts mechanics but so what. people DO learn. it's what makes the game have legs.
but it does tie in to newer players. for all of nws numerous and onerous faults do we really want them to go under? because this game is getting long in the tooth quite literally. every mod the entry fee becomes months higher for new players wanting in on newer content and the older content becomes harder to run because most are in the newest content. it's a game of catch up that seems pretty darned impossible to the true new player. at least with alts you likely have a ton of things you can hand me down to make it easier to catch up. the new player has months/years of grind ahead of him...
I went to pc for awhile thinking I'd have no problem but as a completely new player but without a lot of resources it's nearly impossible. I put some money into my pc toon. 3 or 4 hundred bucks and it got me no where. not even close to bis. (I also couldn't manage the controls very well so double doomed, not sure if that's beside the point or not...) I ended up just coming back to xbox because I wasn't willing to put the kind of grind into that was required (especially since I'm rich on xbox) but if that had been my only option and I didn't have xbox to lean back on it's likely I'd have just moved on to something else that was a newer release. I don't want to be terrible. I don't want to be carried. I want to carry. lol
that experience makes me a bigger advocate of the newer player than I'd have been otherwise.
a huge part of the problem is all the new content is aimed at their long established player base and ignoring the long established players who are happy not aiming for bis and newer players. while yes i do think the high end players should get a nod I think they need new content that is relevant and farmable for the lower level toons as well. there should be a N version of all the things they release.
+1 I think this post summons it all up in a nutshell.
Well written with a good experience how it works atm, it comes down to either die as a game slowly or adapt...
One critical question....! Do i need to sell my house or get a loan to buy the campaign boosts for all my alts ...?
Maybe 5-10 hours of work and you can get your campaign boons done. Not selling a house. Honestly $100 is not all that much. If you get it a 50% off, it is only $50.
2
adinosiiMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,294Arc User
Making boons account-wide would be a very, very bad move.
It would mean even more people with high-IL alts and no idea of how to play their class. The situation is bad enough right now.
Making boons account-wide would be a very, very bad move.
It would mean even more people with high-IL alts and no idea of how to play their class. The situation is bad enough right now.
Kinda miss the disagree button, as it's a convenient way to inflate my ego without actually writing.
Jokes aside, sure we'd get more people who don't know how to play their class, but currently the game is still way too alt-unfriendly. It's kinda funny, honestly.
Before Storm King's Thunder, I wouldn't have cared either way... but after suffering through that slow and tedious campaign, I fully support the idea. No one should suffer SKT even once, let alone multiple times.
As much as I like the idea, I just don't see an account-unlock happening because it would cut into the sales of campaign completions. Why else would they even design SKT in a way that each time you unlock a new area (four of them), you need to do one of each daily there until you can even progress to Day 2? Why do you need to kill 30 trolls? Why are most of the trolls on the farthest island in SoMI? Why can't anybody in Lonelywood fish, even though they live in a port town?
Making boons account-wide would be a very, very bad move.
It would mean even more people with high-IL alts and no idea of how to play their class. The situation is bad enough right now.
I never understood this argument.
All boons combined are around 1.4k IL ( don't remember exact number ), that will not make any alt even close to high IL. Boons giving IL makes no sense anyway and if removed will also fix the inflation from guild boons and i am certainly not a fan of those.
An mmo where you can't play more than one character is a bad mmo and having competent alts in NW is pretty much impossible for the average player. Removing the pointless insane grind to get campaign boons won't fix the problem but at this point what is the reasoning behind character gating anything related to campaigns still? I don't think *because baddies* is a valid argument to justify any player unfriendly change or refusal to tweak a horribly designed aspect of the game. Campaigns were already a chore with Icewind Dale and with ToD it was already too much grind, ToD was 9 mods ago.
I myself would like to play one of each class, grinding for AD for 6 months to get a fresh char into end game-ish gear territory i have no problems with. Grinding dailies for hours for 4 months for boons? No way in hell and no, i will not pay to access buffs from content i've completed 2 years ago. I refuse to grind old boons ever again and i'm not playing a character without boons ( completionist, what can i say ) so that means i'll have to stick to the 3 characters i do have with all boons unlocked which increases my chances of getting fed up at some point from the lack of variance and quiting tenfold.
Grinding boons more than once is insulting and discouraging especially to newbies. At some point a newbie has to decide between grinding absurd amounts of AD for next enchantment/gear tier or spending hours doing dailies for boons for months just to bump their IL enough to reach the next content threshold. The time/effort required to do either is unreasonable and both need to be addressed, boons are simply way easier and faster to fix with next to no downsides.
1
greywyndMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 7,155Arc User
Anything that has an effect on how a character is played, how effective they are, should be included in the il. This includes boons that add, oh, stats or other game influencing effects. Which is pretty much all of the boons.
I'm not looking for forgiveness, and I'm way past asking permission. Earth just lost her best defender, so we're here to fight. And if you want to stand in our way, we'll fight you too.
I have never understood the "no because baddies get ilvl" argument either. Let's look at my own alts for example: - They get 500-590 ilvl from pvp boons even though I haven't pvp'ed in years. - My main keeps passing Primal/Hunt gear down the line. - Enchants aren't bound and are transferable (to look beefier). - Almost everything can be bought in this game, including enchants, artifacts, rp, wards, pets, mounts, hunt lures... with small exceptions like omuan carvings and ampoules. - That 1.4k ilvl coming from boons isn't mightier than a credit card. In fact, a credit card also solves that problem.
In short: I would still be a terrible Guardian Fighter, but I would look good.
Now because almost everything is purchasable, I cannot agree with those players who believe the real reason why boons shouldn't be account-unlocks is because "baddies get ilvl". Of course they get ilvl, but only so much, and neither does having deep pockets translate to being good at this game like in my example. In fact, giving those boons as account-unlocks would probably make those inexperienced players slightly more effective in group content.
That's why the only argument against that I can side with is that the game needs money... and since I really like Neverwinter, that part is perfectly fine with me. Also I think that if somebody really gets interested in a new class, they won't mind grinding the campaigns or escalating them with patronage tokens/campaign completions if they truly want to learn and play that class. The only problem is that it takes months and you still need to juggle real life at the same time.
Finally, grinding campaigns isn't necessarily that educational. I have completed all campaigns on one of each class up until SKT and, while it was a fun experience, I don't feel like it really taught me enough how to effectively build or even play any alt class to their best ability. The skills that are used in solo stuff can often be different from what is needed in groups, and when you have nobody to compare yourself to when solo, there's sometimes no clear indication if you're undergeared, the content is a bit hard, or if you've problems in your build and playstyle.
Instead of campaigns, what I believe is more useful is doing group content, talking with experienced people, vigorous testing, and trying to stay updated on new information. This is how you get from being a baddie to being okay... not grinding your boons in solitude.
the thing is, this issue is self-correcting. If you're a bad player, and you're gimping the group, you'll just get booted. that's why we have the kick option. people will give you advice, if you fail to follow (and therefore improve), they'll alt+f4 you so hard your PC will shut down, or something.
terribly phrased jokes aside, that's how it works. i got invited into cradle on my 12.3k OP to replace someone higher geared because i know how to survive. that higher geared paladin kept falling off and dying, while not using bane or circle or really anything, so he got booted. same applies for every class. if you're a terrible DPS, people will tell you that you need to fix something you're doing wrong (eg GFs never pressing tab, jesus christ this one's annoying), and you should do your best to improve, if you intend to play endgame content. if you don't improve, people won't invite you on that toon into higher tier content, so you'll have to do lower tier content to improve.
i'm for this. partly because it's muuuuch more alt-friendly, partly because i'm just really, REALLY annoyed by how much time it would require to get all the boons, which were boring the 1st time i did them, let alone the 2nd or even 3rd or 4th.
and yeah, i may learn how to play solo by grinding boons. solo and group content isn't nearly the same. eg on my GWF i run movement speed feats and reaping strike and stuff for solo, on my GF i use fighter's recovery, on my OP i use SW and smite and stuff, and if i used those powers in group content i'd get kicked literally every time. that's how it works.
Boons should be account wide. Running multiple toons through the same campaign is not fun at all. By the time they all finish, new Mod coming out in a few days.
Boons should be account wide. Running multiple toons through the same campaign is not fun at all. By the time they all finish, new Mod coming out in a few days.
Life is so much fun when you get free boons and item level with no extra effort.
Boons should be account wide. Running multiple toons through the same campaign is not fun at all. By the time they all finish, new Mod coming out in a few days.
Life is so much fun when you get free boons and item level with no extra effort.
The phrase is "extra effort", you put in the work before so this is in fact like taking a new driving licens for each new car you buy....
In the end what gives more money to Cryptic wins if free boons attacts more players to the game that in end pays more money then having fewer people that feels the need to pay for progress in form of boons to new alt.
I do not have the numbers for it but as this game grow old having things that makes it easer for old players to stick around might not be a bad idéa....
Comments
Someone mentioned EQ1 above...you want to talk about a boring grind....HOURS upon HOURS of sitting...LITERALLY SITTING..in a cave waiting for 1 guy to spawn, so your 5 man team can kill it, then sit down and wait 10 minutes for it to come back. Someone down the hall screws up and pulls more than they can handle? They just die right? Oh no, they run to the zone line (loading zones we safe spots mods couldnt breach). Once they zone, they come back and kill EVERYTHING IN THEIR PATH. No biggy right, you just die and come back? Yep, except that A) you had to run to your corpse, naked (and blind, cause the game was notoriously dark), and you just lost probably all your XP for the day, plus some...possibly losing levels.
Honestly, NW is a cakewalk in comparison. Is it exciting to run the campaigns repeatedly? Nope. But that is the F2P model in a nutshell - make things just annoying enough to force people to open wallets.
Someone mentioned "Customer is King"? As soon as they lose enough players, they will change. Till thn, they won't have a reason too.
The thing is, yeah it indicates how much time you invested into the game, but lately (especially SOMI and M13), we haven't gotten any actually decent boons since ToD pretty much. And most people will just not get those boons because the quality of the boons doesn't justify the time it takes to get them. My main is 17k and I still don't have all SOMI boons for god's sake.
I know plenty of players that have paid their through this game. I know others who grind and been unlucky and eventually put $$$ money to improve their character, I'm on the later end of the spectrum. I got annoyed playing for hours on end only to get HAMSTER after HAMSTER after HAMSTER with keys and drops. 50% odds alway seem to fail for me, I had use coal wards on almost all % items.
You know what happened, I bought stuff and now things just go proce for me with 3% and even 1% on my character. I was a 14.5K DC before I finished her off and now she is creeping up on 17K.
Players have options; you can pay your way or grind. I did both. I paid my way on 2 character completely. Than my GF, CW and DC I grinded out all but IWD campaign because of the HAMSTER experience I had on my DC and decided never to run that campaign. SOMI and STK I did after I got the CoA weapons on my CW and DC. GF I don't remember if I bought it or completed after I got her the teak weapons, it been a while now.
The nice thing is if you finish a campaign you can grind out a bit more and get a discount token. I did that on my DC for my CW and it make STK so much better and I completed 2x faster.
Out of all the campaigns, the worst ones from my experience were all of the ones in IWD zones. All others were a bit of a joke.
New games has a higher allure then old games and old games all suffer from players having to farm their way to the new content.
Now if 1000 players start to play NW and you can make x% stay or x% leave because the grind is to much how do you find that balance.
If you get players to be longterm costumers the chanse that they will pay more then a few willing to pay x amount to get all boons etc or x players finding the grind tolerable.
Then you have the old players that want to start alts but rather change to a new game because the grind is to much or the price is to high to pay for it.
All old games need a new influx of players as old players move one for x reasons and the steeper the price is and the longer the grind takes the fewer stays.h
If you find it tolerable has very little impact on how the total amount of new players will react.
If the player base decline (and they are) most likely the existing system is most likely in need of a change.
Cryptic has the numbers on how many of the new players pay x amount to buy expansion tokens we don´t but from the ones i lured to play this game I am pretty certain that the grind and they money you need to get all the boons, comapanions etc is making an all to high % of them quit.
I think this post summons it all up in a nutshell.
Well written with a good experience how it works atm, it comes down to either die as a game slowly or adapt...
It would mean even more people with high-IL alts and no idea of how to play their class. The situation is bad enough right now.
Jokes aside, sure we'd get more people who don't know how to play their class, but currently the game is still way too alt-unfriendly. It's kinda funny, honestly.
As much as I like the idea, I just don't see an account-unlock happening because it would cut into the sales of campaign completions. Why else would they even design SKT in a way that each time you unlock a new area (four of them), you need to do one of each daily there until you can even progress to Day 2? Why do you need to kill 30 trolls? Why are most of the trolls on the farthest island in SoMI? Why can't anybody in Lonelywood fish, even though they live in a port town?
All boons combined are around 1.4k IL ( don't remember exact number ), that will not make any alt even close to high IL. Boons giving IL makes no sense anyway and if removed will also fix the inflation from guild boons and i am certainly not a fan of those.
An mmo where you can't play more than one character is a bad mmo and having competent alts in NW is pretty much impossible for the average player. Removing the pointless insane grind to get campaign boons won't fix the problem but at this point what is the reasoning behind character gating anything related to campaigns still? I don't think *because baddies* is a valid argument to justify any player unfriendly change or refusal to tweak a horribly designed aspect of the game. Campaigns were already a chore with Icewind Dale and with ToD it was already too much grind, ToD was 9 mods ago.
I myself would like to play one of each class, grinding for AD for 6 months to get a fresh char into end game-ish gear territory i have no problems with. Grinding dailies for hours for 4 months for boons? No way in hell and no, i will not pay to access buffs from content i've completed 2 years ago. I refuse to grind old boons ever again and i'm not playing a character without boons ( completionist, what can i say ) so that means i'll have to stick to the 3 characters i do have with all boons unlocked which increases my chances of getting fed up at some point from the lack of variance and quiting tenfold.
Grinding boons more than once is insulting and discouraging especially to newbies. At some point a newbie has to decide between grinding absurd amounts of AD for next enchantment/gear tier or spending hours doing dailies for boons for months just to bump their IL enough to reach the next content threshold. The time/effort required to do either is unreasonable and both need to be addressed, boons are simply way easier and faster to fix with next to no downsides.
- They get 500-590 ilvl from pvp boons even though I haven't pvp'ed in years.
- My main keeps passing Primal/Hunt gear down the line.
- Enchants aren't bound and are transferable (to look beefier).
- Almost everything can be bought in this game, including enchants, artifacts, rp, wards, pets, mounts, hunt lures... with small exceptions like omuan carvings and ampoules.
- That 1.4k ilvl coming from boons isn't mightier than a credit card. In fact, a credit card also solves that problem.
In short: I would still be a terrible Guardian Fighter, but I would look good.
Now because almost everything is purchasable, I cannot agree with those players who believe the real reason why boons shouldn't be account-unlocks is because "baddies get ilvl". Of course they get ilvl, but only so much, and neither does having deep pockets translate to being good at this game like in my example. In fact, giving those boons as account-unlocks would probably make those inexperienced players slightly more effective in group content.
That's why the only argument against that I can side with is that the game needs money... and since I really like Neverwinter, that part is perfectly fine with me. Also I think that if somebody really gets interested in a new class, they won't mind grinding the campaigns or escalating them with patronage tokens/campaign completions if they truly want to learn and play that class. The only problem is that it takes months and you still need to juggle real life at the same time.
Finally, grinding campaigns isn't necessarily that educational. I have completed all campaigns on one of each class up until SKT and, while it was a fun experience, I don't feel like it really taught me enough how to effectively build or even play any alt class to their best ability. The skills that are used in solo stuff can often be different from what is needed in groups, and when you have nobody to compare yourself to when solo, there's sometimes no clear indication if you're undergeared, the content is a bit hard, or if you've problems in your build and playstyle.
Instead of campaigns, what I believe is more useful is doing group content, talking with experienced people, vigorous testing, and trying to stay updated on new information. This is how you get from being a baddie to being okay... not grinding your boons in solitude.
terribly phrased jokes aside, that's how it works. i got invited into cradle on my 12.3k OP to replace someone higher geared because i know how to survive. that higher geared paladin kept falling off and dying, while not using bane or circle or really anything, so he got booted. same applies for every class. if you're a terrible DPS, people will tell you that you need to fix something you're doing wrong (eg GFs never pressing tab, jesus christ this one's annoying), and you should do your best to improve, if you intend to play endgame content. if you don't improve, people won't invite you on that toon into higher tier content, so you'll have to do lower tier content to improve.
i'm for this. partly because it's muuuuch more alt-friendly, partly because i'm just really, REALLY annoyed by how much time it would require to get all the boons, which were boring the 1st time i did them, let alone the 2nd or even 3rd or 4th.
and yeah, i may learn how to play solo by grinding boons. solo and group content isn't nearly the same. eg on my GWF i run movement speed feats and reaping strike and stuff for solo, on my GF i use fighter's recovery, on my OP i use SW and smite and stuff, and if i used those powers in group content i'd get kicked literally every time. that's how it works.
In the end what gives more money to Cryptic wins if free boons attacts more players to the game that in end pays more money then having fewer people that feels the need to pay for progress in form of boons to new alt.
I do not have the numbers for it but as this game grow old having things that makes it easer for old players to stick around might not be a bad idéa....