Stream response

darkheart · May 2019

So since they closed the mimic stream thread pretty quickly, what did you think of the responses from Mr. Foss? Happy with his answers, felt he evaded questions?

And where do you see direction game going from just this scaling response ?

Feedback welcomed.

kemnimtarkas · May 2019

Listening to the vid on playback.

So in the Good column:

Free stuff in a pack coming on Thursday to all PC players. Yeah.
The main man is talking to his customers. That's always a good thing - whether he addresses all concerns or not, the alternative is silence, which is always bad. Also - he promised to do more of these events. Again, I see that as a good thing.
Foss specifically said healer companion issues will be fixed...but maybe not on Thursday.
"Maybe" a toggle switch for bringing back portraits.

In the Neutral column:

Big "patch" coming on Thursday with some scaling issue fixes. Karzov supposed to be fixed at some point (maybe/maybe not in Thursday patch)........Yeah(:?)
A vague reference to maybe aligning loot tables with level of difficulty (in line with scaling). It was brief, it was not a promise - more details are needed.
Rollback to M15 is out of scope and NOT happening. I see it as a neutral, not good or bad thing - others may disagree.

In the Bad column:

No new class or race announced yet. Going on 5 years soon still missing basic D&D races and classes.
It sounded like Foss quite literally was pointing his finger at the players as the reason/excuse for how big and bad M16 has been (YOU guys asked for these changes - all we did was GIVE you what YOU wanted).
Doesn't sound like the devs perceive extended dungeon runs (60 minutes or more) as being a bad thing....NEWS FLASH - it's a bad thing.
Some talk about potential "modifications" to some classes - sounds like maybe more nerfing for Barbies - the example Foss called out.
Updates to SH and MW game elements won't be addressed until at least M17.

baronstragen · May 2019

I agree with the above, also in the Bad column should be added: No fixes to companions and their dumbness-acting. They tend to lag over 400' behind and bring mobs to you, if they don't die. Their AI is clumsy and slow and mostly unintelligent.

neidanman · May 2019

For me 30 min is about the max I want to expect a run to take. I might play for a couple of hours at a time sometimes, but I want to be able to break at least every 30 min or so max if I want to, without having to leave a run to do it. Also in M15 quite often I'd run etos/elol/cn etc depending on if I just wanted a quick 5-10 min runaround etc. Everything now is taking way too long so I pretty much am just doing expeditions now and hoping things change in future.

kinamara · May 2019

I agree with most of what was said by the first response. Tough extending dungeon runs not really bad in my book, as long as they bring the rewards for them in line with the time and difficulty levels they give us ending up with a total of 1k rp total at the end plus maybe some silver and 3-4k rad if your rng hates you in the chest is pretty much a kick in the nuts for stuff that is much hard and takes much longer to complete.

As for the free stuff.... I disagree completely it is all useless stuff for the most part, if we are expected to test the game on live we should be compensated at the very least with useful stuff though they are also doing a double rad event for use i guess that is likely good for many people me not so much since i am already sitting on millions of rad as it is.

All in all though it is whatever words mean little I will know how I feel better on thursday when some action happens and i can see what that action is.

wilbur626 · May 2019

Capes

Unknown · May 2019

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kinamara · May 2019

iamsmokingone#2455 said:
player:"why should i upgrade gear and enchants if they are just gonna get scaled!?"

foss: "cause that new dungeons comin out and you're gonna need em"

wow, i love foss

I cannot stop smiling

Yeah,,,I still want to know if them saying barovia is gonna become not scaled is just the overland area or if it includes castle ravenloft.

arazith07 · May 2019

-It's nice to hear that they are in a state now where new classes can be a thing.
-I look forward to seeing what fixes come with this week's patch.
-Hopefully with the item level scaling adjustment/fixes, people won't be so against the mechanic.
-Glad to hear that they don't want 40min+ dungeon runs

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hustin1 · May 2019

While on the one hand I found it gratifying that they're working scaling hard, I didn't care for the response re: soloing. I interpreted it as, "suck it up, it's an MMO".

Tom was pushing the Master Expeditions pretty hard. My experience with them is that they're so tedious that I simply don't want to do them any more. I ran some a couple of days ago and halfway through I was thinking of just logging off right then and there. Slogging through to the end felt like a chore. Tonight, like last night, I'll be playing something else -- something that's actually fun.

I didn't expect the part about the Chultan Tiger to come up, but then I use the Rebel Mercenary instead as I have a free account-wide one from a Zen promo many moons ago. To that end, though, I have a similar gripe with respect to the Red Slaad, Cantankerous Mage, and especially the Will o' Wisp. This ties into one of my largest gripes with respect to Mod 16: the killing off of CC builds. I've tested it on my CW and being a CC build is no longer viable with all these changes. A CC build relies on keeping control powers up all the time, but having control bonus removed from companions and losing Recovery makes it untenable. It was a perfectly valid build in Mod 15, just not "preferred" in group content since it doesn't deliver optimal DPS -- and, to be blunt, as someone who runs dungeons maybe 1% of the time, I couldn't give a rat's behind which class role dungeon runners would prefer I have for the CW that I solo with.

All of the three companions mentioned above cost Zen to acquire. The Will o' Wisp is a $25 item (I believe it was $30 when I bought it). I don't care for having roughly $50 of companions rendered useless for their original purpose and I really don't care for having a perfectly valid build rendered moot for the benefit of grouped players that I don't encounter.

I would really have liked an answer as to how -- or whether -- the devs plan to deal with this.

sandukutupu · May 2019

32:15 No rollback, so stop asking for this people!
49:00 No scale for Barovia, part of Thursday's patch
53:10 Latency issue finally addressed ... I was on Twitch and only asked about 40 times then she fields the question from someone else. I bet you don't even read the Twitch chat Julia.

adinosii · May 2019

I am extremely disappointed...but now I understand why scaling was implemented this way - to cater to the PvPers by providing a more "level playing field". Good for them...by reducing gear differences, skill will matter more in PvP....I mean, who cares about PvE anyhow?

Another thing I found interesting was the attitude..."we wanted to". For example, LoMM was not released right away because theu wanted us to play MEs for a while.

News flash...it is not supposed to be about what you want...but what your customers want.

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aratech · May 2019

iamsmokingone#2455 said:
player:"why should i upgrade gear and enchants if they are just gonna get scaled!?"

foss: "cause that new dungeons comin out and you're gonna need em"

wow, i love foss

I cannot stop smiling

"Okay, sir. And what about the other 99.9999999999999999999% of the game?"

strixblitz64 · May 2019

adinosii said:
I am extremely disappointed...but now I understand why scaling was implemented this way - to cater to the PvPers by providing a more "level playing field". Good for them...by reducing gear differences, skill will matter more in PvP....I mean, who cares about PvE anyhow?

Another thing I found interesting was the attitude..."we wanted to". For example, LoMM was not released right away because theu wanted us to play MEs for a while.

News flash...it is not supposed to be about what you want...but what your customers want.

so pvp is why we casual solo players are getting floored by trash mobs? if you want to cater to pvp thats fine but keep it in the pvp arena only.

krzrsms · May 2019

#1 the only thing keeping the mod 16 changes in place is the devs stubbornness in the face of their ineptitude. So, no the playerbase that feels there should be a roll back is right to keep asking for it, especially being this close to the mod in question. Its not like we're asking to go back to mod 6, where 10 mods of changes and new content have been added. They haven't even released the new dungeon yet!

So yes #1 remains, please roll back to mod 15 for the character build changes and essentially everything other than the substance of the new campaign itself. It would be better to take the new campaign offline for amonth and retool it for the older game design than it would to continue limping along burning bridges with every type of player other than the ones that haven't stepped foot outside UM and that will likely bail in a month anyway.

The rest of the stream was worthless from concept to execution. Quite obviously not meant to communicate with the playerbase but to once again broadcast their edicts from on high. They're not open to addressing concerns, and actively ignoring people from every level. I was reserving judgement to see if their intentions were genuine even though I was naturally cynical. Unfortunately they managed to take an olive branch and turn it into fuel for the fire instead of making a change of direction.

arcticblitz · May 2019

I too am disappointed with the outcome, Thomas Foss had a golden opportunity to really show that he had heard the player base and act on it. Whilst I wasn't expecting a roll back on the scaling (i don't think any reasonable person would). I would have at least expected them to specifically address the stat capping.

At a bare minimum If you are capped out on a stat at level 80 , you should be capped out on the same stat when scaled to level 70 or below. Ideally We should be scaled to the equivalent stats 3 - 5 levels above the zone/dungeon level ie. in a level 70 zone we should have equivalent stats to a level 73 - 75 (with our capped out stats of level 80 being capped out at the scaled level)

aratech · May 2019

krzrsms said:
#1 the only thing keeping the mod 16 changes in place is the devs stubbornness in the face of their ineptitude. So, no the playerbase that feels there should be a roll back is right to keep asking for it, especially being this close to the mod in question. Its not like we're asking to go back to mod 6, where 10 mods of changes and new content have been added. They haven't even released the new dungeon yet!

So yes #1 remains, please roll back to mod 15 for the character build changes and essentially everything other than the substance of the new campaign itself. It would be better to take the new campaign offline for amonth and retool it for the older game design than it would to continue limping along burning bridges with every type of player other than the ones that haven't stepped foot outside UM and that will likely bail in a month anyway.

The rest of the stream was worthless from concept to execution. Quite obviously not meant to communicate with the playerbase but to once again broadcast their edicts from on high. They're not open to addressing concerns, and actively ignoring people from every level. I was reserving judgement to see if their intentions were genuine even though I was naturally cynical. Unfortunately they managed to take an olive branch and turn it into fuel for the fire instead of making a change of direction.

I maintain my opinion that if they don't change their ways and very soon, in 10 years time, NWO will be held up as a cautionary tale to other MMO developers and publishers of "this is what happens when your Devs team ignores customer feedback, destroys their sense of progression, and demands that the player base will accept and like it, while forgetting they're not the only game in town."

In summary: what we are seeing here is nothing short of the Devs and the project leads actively declaring war on their own player base.

As such, the only viable response is, once again: stop buying Zen. Encourage everyone you know. Stop buying it. Stop even trying to trade for it on the exchange. The only thing that will penetrate the ivory tower echo chamber the devs are in is watching their coffers plunge screaming into the red so much it looks like an artistic interpretation of Lostmauth dive-bombing a party...

iamsmokingone#2455 said:
Watching this stream has actually given me a lot of faith in this game. I've been playing it for over 2 years and I've done a guide on mmominds for the cleric class (formerly Devoted Cleric) for almost as long. It's very reassuring to me to see the real people behind this game, and be able to arbit their character for myself. After seeing this my only worry is we will be back to players gear making them far outpower their skill. I lul'd when julia read off someones name and it had 420 in it and she just smiles, she's cool in my book just for that alone. And foss is the lead designer, he seems kind of detached from the game, and that really makes me feel good about it, because he is THE MAN, and he has the wisdom to not meddle too much with the game.

kickiusassius · May 2019

Massive disappointment. Commenting why would be a waste of time as it's clear they hear us but not listening.

Not even sure I'll play VIP key collecting simulator.

Laters......

abn173d2003 · May 2019

I watched the stream today, and honestly, it felt as if it was more scripted than anything. Here is what I personally took from it.
#1. Do you guys really think we bought half of that? there were a lot of wording your way around questions.

#2.How long do you think you will have the remaining content creators? You have lost Nova, Northside, and galactic to name a few. How long will it take before you loose Kali gold, and god forbid Rainer. Rainer has done more for your community than 90% of the people i have ever seen, and all you give him is a few words on a post? Really?

#3. yes I understand that you are saying there is a big patch coming Thursday. That being said, we need DETAILED patch notes to get a good grasp on what you are trying to do. And please for the love of god don't say and numerous other things. Your Playerbase is not dumb, but trying to dig through everything to find what you have patched take a lot of time away from the players. the more time they spend searching for your patch changes, the less they will want to play or test other things.

#4. More content also means having more dungeons per mod. maybe it would have taken longer but undermountain is the dungeon of all dungeons in D&D. it is supposed to be 5 dungeons in 1 massive dungeon.

#5. I know this one is not related to the stream, but if you have devs who are supposed to communicate with the players and provide feedback to them. You might want to look a little closer to it. Asterdal is amazing at it from what I have seen. others...... yeah right.

#6. Stop the madness and lets get to the point.

baronstragen · May 2019

If the whole scaling issue was based on "PVP", why not just scale it in there then? 90% of the people are PvE orientated, and I remember a game from the 2000's that rhymes with "Build Oars" that SCALED PVP ONLY WHEN YOU ENTERED IT. @mimicking#6533 I suggest you take some notes from that game.

aratech · May 2019

baronstragen said:
If the whole scaling issue was based on "PVP", why not just scale it in there then? 90% of the people are PvE orientated, and I remember a game from the 2000's that rhymes with "Build Oars" that SCALED PVP ONLY WHEN YOU ENTERED IT. @mimicking#6533 I suggest you take some notes from that game.

Because that would have been the logical thing to do. And Cryptic at this point has gotten so badly into the habit of throwing the babies out with the bathwater that there's a large group of infants forming an underground society in the sewer system...

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drinkvernors · May 2019

This was the first stream from Cryptic I watched. From the stream process view:
1) Know what is being patched the week of the stream and what is not. Have a list, answer questions based on facts on the list.
2) Spend less time at the start of the stream explaining why you are 'performing' the way you are (facing microphones). Listeners want to know about the game not the production.
3) Report on Forum trends, what were the chief concerns (by percentage) since the last stream. Show that you listen.
4) Present info as a project review session. These were our top 30 issues, here is where we stand with them. Show how the company/devs are progressing toward their goals.

From the game/question view:
1) If the stream subject is only Undermountain than say so and keep focus. If it is 'what did Mod 16 do to the game' than you need to address *all levels* not just folks in the final/newest areas of the game.
2) 'Players wanted more levels' - Item levels or character levels??? You gave us character levels - how does that help a 'new' level 70 ITL 8600 character get through 15 campaigns before Undermountain? How does he *not* become level 71 and scaled by just doing the next area (Maze Engine)?
3) There was no mention of non-quest/dungeon bug fixes. i.e. where are we with the exchange of 10 power points for 400000 AD?

Format looks hopeful, just needs to stay focused and deliver clear factual responses.

aandrethegiant · May 2019

I disagree with some of the above comments.

The Good:

1. JULIA! Julia gets it. She is one of US. "We missed the big picture. " She made Mr Foss say: "We blew it". She kept Foss focused and made him answer questions that PW/Cryptic brass NEVER HAS. Highly impressed. The fact she is working much more closely with the Devs is the most positive takeaway I got from the day. And it bodes well for the game long term. I give her an A+.

2. Mr Foss. Mixed bag. HUGE kudos to Foss for being the first member of brass to answer unfiltered raw questions LIVE, since way back at game launch in 2012 when I posed REAL QUESTIONS on my own podcast to the game creators. My questions were hidden and in your face, and they trusted me somehow, but Devs answered just about every question. It was a huge boon to the playbase during launch and I felt some of that magic/un-comfortableness again here for the very first time since game launch.

Mr Foss sat there and was open, and came across as a busy man that wants to hear feedback and follow-through. He admitted he blew it when it came to listening to the community's big picture. He committed to continued work on bug fixing and he was apologetic and thankful to the play testers. THIS WAS NEEDED IN 2012-2013. But if Mr Foss backs it up with continued bug fixing its a huge win for the community and the longevity of Neverwinter and Tyrs Paladium and our alliance.

The bad side: Catering balancing to improve PVP. This was a losing argument for the dev team in Alpha. Playerbase was always majority PvE as is D&D. Globally, MMOs hold a PvP majority base. PW/Cryptic never understood this and balancing the entire game to improve the PvP experience is a risk at this juncture in the 9 year resume span of the Neverwinter devs. The game was never built to do both well. PW/Cryptic has always wanted both to be able to co-exist and be viable. And maybe it should, right? Jury is out on this direction imho.

Near future focus: Continuing to tweak scaling issues, monster power, and character spawning issues. Will hold off on console release to focus on PC fixes and tweaks. Admitted they tackled too many system changes so they want to polish them before going to the console. Really good idea. Shocking to hear. This team feels more on it and inclusive with the playerbase than the Alpha team was. I think this approach is a very good sign for the game, IF they followup. Continuing these streams in exactly this format would do wonders for the community.

A+ to Mr Foss for admitting faults and for his determination to want to get it right. And yes for actually being a player himself.

The Bad: Progression needs work. The age old PvE and PvP balance debate lingers!

Best question/comment asked but not answered: Old dungeons, make them worth running again !

Outlook : Very positive. This format was brilliant. They answers a lot of questions head on. More then they ever had. They dodged character building/progression questions. MOAR of these type of streams will bode extremely well for playerbase morale in the community.

Outlook for our guild Tyrs Paladium and our Neverwinter Fellowship alliance: Long term very good. We can handle the additional challenge because of our willingness and ability to team up! We are built for camaraderie, fun & teamwork from the ground up.

I think by the next mod we'll see a BOOST to guild membership and alliance membership throughout the playerbase game wide due to the increased challenge. However more work definitely needs to be done to fix progression before that can be realized.

We COULD NOT have gotten a better stream than the one we did. They are committing to more of these and tons of bug fixing to make it right and shape the future in the way we would like. I thought Juilia and Foss did excellent with all they had on their plates. Straight up. Just my 2 coppers.

demonmonger · May 2019

I'll keep this in line with the topic. Stream response. I was disappointed with the quality of the stream, the repetitive verbiage that no one wanted to hear.. the lack of connect or care with what we the players want...

What I would like to see...

Rogue improvements
Stealth becomes a toggle
Party stealth becomes an option
Stealth makes all attacks critical 100% no matter someone's anti crit measures.
Ability to see the rune traps at a distance in master expeditions
Ability to set traps.

They say the give us what we ask for... mmm ok I'm waiting.

Stream response

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