Upcoming Changes to Skill Nodes

strumslinger · April 2016

Based on community feedback - believe me, there has been a lot - we're making changes to skill nodes to combat botting. I know these changes may cause some players to be upset, but as we continue to improve the quality of life in Neverwinter, changes like these need to be done.

http://www.arcgames.com/en/games/neverwinter/news/detail/9923543-neverwinter:-upcoming-changes-to-skill-nodes

two30 · April 2016

"For those looking to utilize skill nodes for something beyond professions, we are increasing how often they drop Insignias. Insignias are used in the recently improved mount system that was part of the Neverwinter: The Maze Engine expansion. In addition to being available in skill nodes, bound, uncommon Insignias will now have a chance to drop from most critters. Both of these updates will give adventurers more options to further customize their mounts."

Love this. Bound-to-account would be even better, but this appears to be a significant improvement.

phoenix1021 · April 2016

While more insignias are nice at the moment, one of my characters has already come to the point where they are basically trash. Once you have all your slots filled, character bound insignias are only "useful" to put into the stronghold coffers for a measly 5 gem points. If there are going to be more insignias in the future, maybe you should think about giving alternate uses for them. (like refining other insignias, making them unbound or being able to put them into enchants/artifacts for rp, or something like that)

rafaelda · April 2016

Would be soo more simple to Bound all drops from nodes to characther or account . . .
but as always you will remove some RP from game again...

lirithiel · April 2016

...or you can just kill off the bots in one foul swoop by making RP from skill nodes BoA. The solutions are right in front of your eyes but you keep looking right through them and never seem to learn from your countless mistakes.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: the only items that should be character bound are those that you get as quest rewards. Everything else should be made account-bound, with the exception of dungeon drops, which should be Bind on Equip.

fdsakhfduewhfiuf · April 2016

My fear is that refinement items from leadership tasks will be next. If this is really about botting it is a logical consequence.

I agree that insignias should be bound-to-account. Otherwise they will quickly become trash.

qualron · April 2016

phoenix1021 said:
While more insignias are nice at the moment, one of my characters has already come to the point where they are basically trash. Once you have all your slots filled, character bound insignias are only "useful" to put into the stronghold coffers for a measly 5 gem points. If there are going to be more insignias in the future, maybe you should think about giving alternate uses for them. (like refining other insignias, making them unbound or being able to put them into enchants/artifacts for rp, or something like that)

"like refining other insignia's" would work but the later in that quote would defeat the purpose of what the changes where implemented for in the first place, Botting RP. Unless they where bound also.

Unknown · April 2016

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landelmer · April 2016

So you are going to destroy the middle class. Soon the only way to obtain RP will be from the Zen market in the form of Blood Rubies.

Just make the skill nodes bind on pick up to account. Then there will be no incentive for botters to farm these items.

Although I believe the real goal is to force players into the Zen market for all RP

Please just quit the lies and make Neverwinter a subscription based game. That seems to be where you are going.

landelmer · April 2016

Another thing you may want to consider is that most of the whiners in this game are p2w. They need to be #1 and are instuting barriers to entry by whining about everything.

Since XB1 does not have bots are you guys going to stick it to us as well? What is next the RP from leadership? Before you take that away from us make the leadership RP bind to account.

How much more do you expect us, YOUR CUSTOMERS, to take before we find a different way to pass the time?

rifter1969 · April 2016

OK.. I haven't really chimed in on these things... but i going to take the plunge now....

Why is that always your response to botting? "We're taking this out... we're taking that out..."
I mean really? So you go ahead and punish everyone?
If this game uses the same engine that STO uses why don't you do the same thing that STO with their version of skill nodes?

Put a mini-game in!
STO has had the particle scanning game in for... years!!!!
Sure at first.. people hated it... but... it does serve the purpose. I mean you have a Sine curve that randomly changes and you have to match another Sine curve up to it.

Can't you do something like that here? Sure go ahead and make it medieval/fantasy themed... but do you always have to remove items from the game?

Adding the insignias to drop more often is a good thing, don't get me wrong, I'm not totally negative.
Because they really don't drop all that often from the ones that are supposed to have them.. (Dreadring, Sharandar, etc)

kievitz · April 2016

Looks like the right direction, but yes the obvious BoA solution was dismissed, why, one can only wonder.

Most posts/discussions referring to botting nodes, have always brought the BoA option out very clearly.

zman81420 · April 2016

The solutions this company comes up with is such a joke. Skill nodes now? This game is looking more and more like a concentraction camp. Who will survive it the players or the developers or neither? How about instead you fix all the broken <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> in game you dump on us and leave broken.

urabask · April 2016

landelmer said:
So you are going to destroy the middle class. Soon the only way to obtain RP will be from the Zen market in the form of Blood Rubies.

Just make the skill nodes bind on pick up to account. Then there will be no incentive for botters to farm these items.

Although I believe the real goal is to force players into the Zen market for all RP

Please just quit the lies and make Neverwinter a subscription based game. That seems to be where you are going.

If obtaining RP from skill nodes was significant part of your RP this change will not affect you much. Nodes don't drop much and the amount of time wasted opening every node made them inefficient. An increased drop rate for enchants from mobs helps the type of player that relied on nodes.

The people that are going to be affected moreso by this are the people that were relying on cheap stacks of r4s/r5s on the AH. They're going to see a significant increase in the cost to upgrade artifacts and enchantments. PWE can't increase the drop rate on enchants to the degree that would maintain the kinds of prices we're used to now.

And that's the thing, prices for gearing a character are still very high but not having to invest significant amounts of time and effort to get stacks of r4s/r5s to refine artifacts and enchantments made the rest of the grind reasonable. I'd like to know what price PWE thinks is reasonable for RP because as it stands we're probably going to see the price of refining artifacts and enchantments quadruple.

defiantone99 said:
Lowering the amount of RP needed per rank to refine enchantments is something we would also like.

Found it a bit disconcerting that they didn't say anything about plans for this. They don't seem to ever plan ahead when making big changes like this.

Unknown · April 2016

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zebular · April 2016

strumslinger said:
Based on community feedback - believe me, there has been a lot - we're making changes to skill nodes to combat botting. I know these changes may cause some players to be upset, but as we continue to improve the quality of life in Neverwinter, changes like these need to be done.

http://www.arcgames.com/en/games/neverwinter/news/detail/9923543-neverwinter:-upcoming-changes-to-skill-nodes

Sounds good. My only quam is that these and more things need to be Bound to Account when acquired. Actually, I strongly feel that almost everything in game that is BoP should be BtA on pickup. All Bound refinement items need to be changed to BtA and these insignias should be as well. Of course, there's exceptions... yet things like this and most all equipment in game should be BtA until equipped. This change would be the perfect time to usher in an overhaul of the Bind mechanic to make it more player friendly and in-line with what the Community has been asking for, for quite some time now.

enyo1989 · April 2016

And again a slap in the face for lower geared people and lower stronghold guilds...

How to get the high amounts of gems for strongholds? The amount from professions are to low...

rayrdan · April 2016

thanks god im rank 12 . Tin foil hat on: some peeps knew it about this at least a couple of days before. Rank 5 went for 6K to 13K yesterday.

phoenix1021 · April 2016

Wow prices for stacks of rank 5 enchants already gone up to 35k from 5k. Yeah, it's gonna be pretty hard to get epic and higher artifacts now. I hope you do it like with the AD reduction, that refining costs and gem costs in the stroonghold are gonna get reduced in a future update.

thefabricant · April 2016

Lol....the price of upgrading gear is about to rise to that of xbox.

hmdq · April 2016

Why not BTA??? Oh cryptic....the price of ranks 5 exploded! And again only the "insider traders" who have benefited! In fact my theory is that 99% of bots and exploits begin from within the office. My 5 cents.

Unknown · April 2016

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Unknown · April 2016

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hmdq · April 2016

defiantone99 said:
The prices went up yesterday. Somebody leaked?

Since this game there is always someone who has some inside information or is friends with someone ends up benefiting. Cryptic investigate this type of conduct and dismiss any cheaters. In fact in a serious country and if we were talking about this person shares (insider) would be arrested.

So again I say that for my theory 99% of bots and exploits are born from within the Cryptic making it in analogy to a "dog chasing its own tail".

rayrdan · April 2016

defiantone99 said:
The prices went up yesterday. Somebody leaked?

thats my point..the prices yesterday was already the double than normal.

hmdq · April 2016

rayrdan said:

defiantone99 said:
The prices went up yesterday. Somebody leaked?
thats my point..the prices yesterday was already the double than normal.

4x today and increasing...shame this company.

darthtzarr · April 2016

Wait... so can't bots as easily start killing monsters for Enchantments and Runestones?

andorrabell · April 2016

Welp, now people can make AD from selling this stuff I suppose instead of just botters, but buying it is going to be more expensive. Strongholds Gem collection is probably most affected.

Overall I'm wait and see on how this will affect me, I really like the idea of being able to pick up more uncommon insignias. WE will see where the AH lands, but right now I hate myself for any and all rank 4s I've sold to vendors.

wixxgs1cht · April 2016

Yeah the fact that this info leaked is hilarious. Just as hilarious as the costs for refining stuff will become.

aulduron · April 2016

The only good thing about this change is that I can now free up the 4 bag slots my kits take up. I'm just glad that most of my artifacts are already mythic. I certainly won't be making any new tons. Those poor new players (if there are any) will never catch up to us.

hmdq · April 2016

There is a good side of course, but there is a hateful side in this whole story.

Upcoming Changes to Skill Nodes

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