ambisinisterrMember, Neverwinter ModeratorPosts: 10,462Community Moderator
edited May 2013
Cryptic maps are the balance standard.
Foundry missions as they were allowed effortless superior experience and drop values.
They were NOT correctly balanced.
They want the Foundry to give the best possible rewards but they can't supersede Cryptic's standard of balance.
People who make and played content as intended suffered. Sadly exploiters tend to ruin things for everybody...
So from this point forward It's got to be a question on how to improve Foundry rewards without allowing exploit missions to exist.
I'm not told that by Cryptic. Players can't abuse the game and the system.
You can power level...by zerging content.
Everything else in your post in totally irrelevant by this one statement.
Essentially, it's perfectly fine to farm and zerg CRYPTIC content, but not player made content. In essence, play our way and not yours.
And for the record, I already said I'm totally against breaking a risk-vs-reward ratio and exploiting game mechanics, but I'll repeat myself just this once.
What I'm trying to say is....people making maps with lots of fighting required to get through them(kinda like the game's dungeons) over the time limit for the daily restrictions and heck....let's go with as long as possible are now considered violations. Big old honking maps chock full of bad guys that can not only fight back, but even stand a chance of killing you are suffering simply because of some arbitrarily created and enforced "xp per time unit" formula that got pulled out of someone's bum. That's totally not right and as I said before, hypocrisy.
I'll also repeat the fact that I'm not a farmer. I really don't like repeating content over and over again. But now I have to repeat content, because Foundry quests simply don't have a proper or balanced reward ratio for my time investment, and another thing I really don't like is being told how to play and have fun or people that tell someone else how to have fun or play a game. I'm firmly on the side of "let the individual decide their level of involvement and fun". These foundry changes.....aren't fun. Really they're not. But I don't blame you, you're just an employee. It's your job to support the company that pays your salary. Unless you're a volunteer forum moderator, in which case.....oops?
Occam's Razor makes the cutting clean.
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thecainMember, Neverwinter Beta UsersPosts: 0Arc User
People who make and played content as intended suffered. Sadly exploiters tend to ruin things for everybody...
So from this point forward It's got to be a question on how to improve Foundry rewards without allowing exploit missions to exist.
I'm sorry, but that's no excuse for a blatant, vicious nerf that has all but sworn the Foundry to death. Exploiters will always exist. You find out who ran exploit maps over and over (talking past 4 times), then you ban them for knowingly exploiting, and van the creators of said maps. It shouldn't take more than 3 times to test a map for exploits and cheats. The thing is, the admins have to be diligent with their duties. They'd rather be lazy than do the jobs they're paid to do, and as such, the Foundry must suffer.
You can try and apologize or spin their antics in whatever ways you wish. You do not hurt the majority because of the minority. You do your job as an admin and you punt the exploiters. You don't turn moderation into a turn key operation with the most minimal amount of effort put forward. You should know there will always be exploiters, they should have been expecting this. They took the low road in combating it, and now we're all suffering for it.
My problem with this discussion here is that it assumes facts that I am not seeing in the game. Drops, in the foundry quests I do, have not changed. I get the same number of greens, scrolls and potions. I also have not noticed a very substantial XP decrease, either.
So, either people only consider ogre farming quests and falsely assume it is the same for all foundry quests, or these claims are the result of innocent misinformation or deliberate attempts to misinform.
guardiousMember, Neverwinter Beta UsersPosts: 4Arc User
edited May 2013
Reminds me of the ST issues when this happened and the same statement you just made imivo was the truth of it. They took out the repeated grind xp/bonus on the way they are earned. Only so much per day and in calculating damage vs return damage doesn't compute to a particular variable nothing is gained taking out the grind pits like those in ST had. In the end ST foundry is alive and kicking and being still used daily even thou the reward output was taken down in limitations of consumption. But it worked and everything is fine, I have no doubt that is exactly what transpired here.
All they ended up doing was taking out the short mission xp pits as they did in ST, but people will complain anyways, funny thing is, this game isn't hard to level in to begin with or get items for a free game on top of that , so meh ***** to ***** I guess.
My problem with this discussion here is that it assumes facts that I am not seeing in the game. Drops, in the foundry quests I do, have not changed. I get the same number of greens, scrolls and potions. I also have not noticed a very substantial XP decrease, either.
So, either people only consider ogre farming quests and falsely assume it is the same for all foundry quests, or these claims are the result of innocent misinformation or deliberate attempts to misinform.
Then you obviously take your time doing foundry missions because I did the map Orc Slayer 1.8 (No it's not an exploit map look for it urself its a normal dungeon) and if you kill them on a normal speed half the mobs will not give any exp/drops.
Then you obviously take your time doing foundry missions because I did the map Orc Slayer 1.8 (No it's not an exploit map look for it urself its a normal dungeon) and if you kill them on a normal speed half the mobs will not give any exp/drops.
My rogue alt does not kill on normal speed, he kills about twice as fast as my other characters. Have you been running this same quest over and over?
Sarcasm usually works better if it plays with actual facts. . I do plenty of foundry quests on my characters, both combat and story ones, and I am very sure that there are just as many greens, scrolls and potions as before. If there are limitations, they only apply to borderline problematic foundry quests.
so you are telling me you are not getting whites as final chest rewards? And that drops/exp are on par with non-foundry content?
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synolMember, Neverwinter Beta UsersPosts: 0Arc User
Some of us argued this with Star Trek Online. The problem is that we're trying to write stories for a game that kept adding mindless grind after mindless grind where the goal was to shoot people in the face. At some point, some of us had to accept that we are writing stories for a different kind of game.
The folks grinding the Foundry are simply playing the Foundry like the devs designed most of the game to be played. Maybe I'm wrong, since I have yet to play NW.
How much of this game, in general, is about a rich story and how much of it is rinse and repeat?
The games storyline is complete rubbish and not in any way interesting. Almost all of the campaign foundry quests I have played are far far better than anything the game devs made.
For all the people complaining about not being able to abuse the foundry for the xp quit playing this game. dungeons and dragons is about the content not just skipping through. go put some effort into lvln and stop *****ing
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ravenousfireMember, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian UsersPosts: 12Arc User
Cryptic maps are the balance standard.
Foundry missions as they were allowed effortless superior experience and drop values.
They were NOT correctly balanced. They want the Foundry to give the best possible rewards but they can't supersede Cryptic's standard of balance.
People who make and played content as intended suffered. Sadly exploiters tend to ruin things for everybody...
So from this point forward It's got to be a question on how to improve Foundry rewards without allowing exploit missions to exist.
That balance standard allows for a group of five to effortlessly destroy a dungeon and red dragon with minimal work, just so you know, with a Cleric 4 levels lower than the quest... The fact that I can take challenging situations and make them trivial with a button click really doesn't inspire me on the 'balance' factor of this game.
Effortless experience is one thing which I think everyone here has agreed was unacceptable, but those maps are easily identified. If you're running from 20 mobs that will mob and insta-kill you if they catch you, not really effortless in my opinion...but that's a matter of perspective.
So instead of banning the exploit maps and allowing the loot drops and xp to keep it's normal rate, they made it much less than Cryptic balanced areas, where a simpler solution would have been to limit the number of elite mobs that could be placed within a certain proximity of each other so that people couldn't stack 50 mobs on top of one another and let people group aoe them. This is a solution that keeps theme with Cryptic's own dungeons.
Did you seriously think that response was a valid one? So sorry, too bad, exploiters ruined it for everyone... Do you believe that a solution like that is good for this game? Penalize everyone for the actions of the few...that's not even close to a good business model, I have read multiple posts about not penalizing players for playing the game 'it will drive them off' but that's exactly what's going to happen with heavy handed tactics.
Maybe no-one cares about the MMO player's philosophy, but just some insight. People are going to find the best way to do something, for power-leveler, power-gamer types, this means anything less than the best way is a waste of time. That mode of thought has become prevalent in MMO's these days, I see it all the time, not just in this game but every game now. I cannot believe that Developer still do not understand this is a large base of players' approach to the game. If the way you present isn't equal to or better than another alternative, the players will toss it aside and not look at it. Only a minority actually put the emphasis on story and flavor (that doesn't mean people don't care about it, but they don't prioritize it over stats, gear, leveling speed, etc.).
One day developers will learn to appreciate exploiters as a means to tighten up their product and make it a better experience for everyone.
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ravenousfireMember, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian UsersPosts: 12Arc User
For all the people complaining about not being able to abuse the foundry for the xp quit playing this game. dungeons and dragons is about the content not just skipping through. go put some effort into lvln and stop *****ing
There is no 'effort' expended to level in this game. It's extremely easy to level a character in this game...to the point of being boring.
Also, Dungeons and Dragons at it's heart was a hack and slash system, just for dungeon crawling...and the 'content' in this game is the same as any other, grab quest, kill mob, pick up item, interact with npc/item get shiny object to put on character. It is no different than any other MMO...
lol i don't even understand why they nerfed it. Who cares if people were exploiting it. Now they won't gain xp and will feel no progression unless it's a gear upgrade. They ruined the fun for themselves lol.
As far as items, you get green items for sneezing in this game, blues are barely better than their green counterparts if better at all (a mass majority add to stats I don't like)
They should change the items back to being balanced with Cryptic created content and not be worse, the xp nerf was necessary though I gained way too much xp just trying to do a quick "real" Foundry map.
That being said, there really needs to be a way to add tradeskill nodes and chests on maps that give loot, to try an encourage players to explore "real" maps. Just put a limit on how many you can place on a map. As well as the ability to add simple vendors to larger Foundry Quests. (to unload junk)
For all the people complaining about not being able to abuse the foundry for the xp quit playing this game. dungeons and dragons is about the content not just skipping through. go put some effort into lvln and stop *****ing
Ok, full stop! Enough of this D&D is BS we keep hearing. You know what D&D is? It's a set of rules that allow conflict resolution via dice and a set of logic driven hard stop definitions that is SUPPOSED to be arbitrated by a Game Master. It has been used by many to tell stories but it has also been used by the same people and others as nothing more than an excuse to sit, roll dice and claim to have killed legions of monsters. IT IS NOT A STORYTELLING TOOL! Stop trying to claim it is as a basis for why the foundry must be policed a certain way.
1: Cryptic has shown their stance to be that the Foundry was to be on par with or better than their own content.
2: Cryptic has stated they want players to play the content they enjoy.
3: PWI is in business to make money off this title and as such they want the whole pie, meaning every player who plays to enjoy the game.
4: Story is a VERY subjective term and as such can mean anything from what you tell you kid at night to go to sleep which lasts 5 minutes and relies heavily on their imagination all the way up to the epic of the lord of the rings which currently takes more than 4 books, 6 movies totaling over 20 hours of film work and counting, an laundry list of table top and video games including it's own MMO and more. Your standard for story is not the only one and as such you are in a poor position to dictate to anyone else what they have to include.
5: We have been repeatedly told this is a band aid and as such there is supposed to be a permanent fix that reduces the limitations of this, thus telling unhappy players to stop speaking up during beta is counter to what Cryptic wants right now.
If you have something constructive to add please feel free but until then this rhetoric of how anyone who doesn't play your way is simply unnecessary and only paints you as a fool and a ****** bag who is out to ruin the fun of anyone else.
Do you crave a good old fashioned dungeon crawl? One where the dungeon tells it's own story? The Dungeon Delves campaign is just for you! Start with my first release: NW-DQF4T7QYH Any cave can lead to adventure!
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kamaliiciousMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 0Arc User
Cryptic maps are the balance standard.
Foundry missions as they were allowed effortless superior experience and drop values.
They were NOT correctly balanced.
They want the Foundry to give the best possible rewards but they can't supersede Cryptic's standard of balance.
People who make and played content as intended suffered. Sadly exploiters tend to ruin things for everybody...
So from this point forward It's got to be a question on how to improve Foundry rewards without allowing exploit missions to exist.
Having just run the first two quests in Kammallicious' campaign, Banreth Curiosities (sorry for any misspelling on that) I find it horrible that even there I suffered from the XP nerf. These two quests are laid out VERY akin to Cryptic pacing, and have a very specific vibe of being in line with the content in the live game, and yet even in them I found my XP to be shut off during fights towards the end of the map because surprise surprise, it's been a few minutes and we've hit the XP cap.
I guarantee you, running a live quest under the same conditions that exist for the foundry currently would result in lots of lost XP. This is very specifically why this issue needs to be resolved and telling us that "it's fixed, we relaxed the restrictions" is total BS.
Cryptic, here's an idea for your QA department, load a internally designed map like the Merchant Guild Hall in the tower district into the Foundry, and run through it. I guarantee you will see a DIRECT correlation of just how bad the XP nerf is on Foundry content.
Maybe Cryptic should try my quests, since I specifically tried to replicate Cryptic's balance (to the point where it even says that in the campaign description) of combat difficulty and combat/non combat time ratio. My quests have more dialog possibilities than Cryptic's, which means they should actually be a bit slower since some people would read the various dialog options to get some extra lore/information. There are zero stacked encounters, I have spacing between them, lead new encounter types and areas with easy encounters exactly the same way Cryptic does, place some easys in among the moderates, and ramp up to a hard encounter or two (not stacked) at the end of the quest as my "boss".
It would be interesting if someone actually recreated a Cryptic map as suggested. With a youtube or something video of a run through a map it wouldn't be terribly difficult, since you could see the encounter difficulty and type.
I don't see a need to bash the nerf because it was done for the simple reason that exploits were going to create in-game problems...here's a few as example.
First being able to rapidly level a character creates a level gap between players that just ran UGC and players that actually play the Neverwinter storyline. Which, if I were Cryptic, I would have a problem with this because I didn't just spend x amount of time and money creating a game for people and they don't even play it. It's a matter of tact and principle as consumers to respect the wishes of the company when it pertains to their product (especially when you didn't pay for it). If you use their product in a manner they do not deem fit, then they have the right to do something about it.
Second, along with the level gaps, you have people that are exploiting the UGC for gear and treasure. If you cannot grasp what this would mean to the in-game community then you obviously have not played enough MMO's. This type of exploitation creates what we call a broken economy. And it is already happening in the beta, and you can see it when people are spamming "want to sell" (WTS) items for ridiculous prices. Which just opens the door for the proverbial "Chinese gold farmers" and jackasses that prey on new players. So if you don't want a game where your chat box is filled with spammers trying to take your money, then something had to be done.
Third, the game was intended to bring D&D to life in MMO format. DDO was a horrible adaptation, but with the Foundry, Neverwinter sets the bar for gaming standards with the use of UGC. I'm sure Cryptic doesn't want a player to level cap after 6 hours of playing the game without really touching the story they created. You sure as hell cannot do that in table top D&D starting from level 1. Real D&D players know it takes months and years of gaming to level up when playing by the rules. So in Cryptic's defense they don't want UGC to completely nullify their intended play-through experience for us players.
Now I'm not saying that there should not be a reward for playing UGC...which there is in the form daily Foundry quest reward, but we should still get some form of loot from the UGC quests and campaigns. Cryptic said the nerf is not permanent, but just temporary while they get it sorted out. I would imagine the sort out will come with a depreciating loot and XP table for players when running UGC. This would ensure that a player couldn't just power level through UGC because there would only be a set amount of XP and gold piece value of loot a player could earn each 24hrs before running UGC would result in no rewards except the actual "story experience" (not leveling XP) that the author wanted you to have.
On a side note about the challenge of Neverwinter. Cryptic could make the game a little more challenging by implementing some more of the mechanics from the 4th edition when it comes to cooldowns on potions. In D&D a single round of combat consists of your's and the enemy's actions (i.e. standard, move, and minor), and a single round of combat is generally 6 seconds in real-time. Taking this into account a 6 second cooldown on potions would be acceptable. Personally if I there was a 6 sec CD on potions I think the number of times players have died during a quest would rise exponentially. In any case, the point of the open beta and the nerf was to get exactly just this; a reaction from the players to help them figure out what to do. So cheers for Cryptic, and here's to a speedy and fair resolution.
Amendment: Potions have a 12sec CD I just noticed...so perhaps instead of a longer CD, lower the amount healed by a potion.
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kamaliiciousMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 0Arc User
First being able to rapidly level a character creates a level gap between players that just ran UGC and players that actually play the Neverwinter storyline.
On a side note about the challenge of Neverwinter. Cryptic could make the game a little more challenging by implementing some more of the mechanics from the 4th edition when it comes to cooldowns on potions. In D&D a single round of combat consists of your's and the enemy's actions (i.e. standard, move, and minor), and a single round of combat is generally 6 seconds in real-time. Taking this into account a 6 second cooldown on potions would be acceptable. Personally if I there was a 6 sec CD on potions I think the number of times players have died during a quest would rise exponentially. In any case, the point of the open beta and the nerf was to get exactly just this; a reaction from the players to help them figure out what to do. So cheers for Cryptic, and here's to a speedy and fair resolution.
There currently is a level gap, the other way.
There is already a cooldown on potions, it's longer than that.
Have been playing Foundry quests for several days and haven't noticed any sort of item nerf. Getting items such as scrolls, potions, money off of 90% of the mobs in my opinon. I've gotten a decent share of green items for my level and several blue crafting items. While the XP may have been cut back, I gained enough bubbles for it still to be a noticeable gain.
So, at least, for me, the quests seem to be working as intended. I guess I'm playing the game as Cryptic intended and am not zerging through? I notice a lot of people have also seen no sudden change in loot, so it's a bit hard for me to see the validity of jumping up and down, screaming with nerf rage over something which doesn't seem to be as severe or widespread as some posters are claiming. It feels incredibly knee-jerk right now.
Count me in as a player who plays the Foundry quests for content and a change of pace. I never was into farming or exploiting, so I'm happy with how Cryptic is handling this issue. /shrug.
I don't see a need to bash the nerf because it was done for the simple reason that exploits were going to create in-game problems...here's a few as example.
First being able to rapidly level a character creates a level gap between players that just ran UGC and players that actually play the Neverwinter storyline. Which, if I were Cryptic, I would have a problem with this because I didn't just spend x amount of time and money creating a game for people and they don't even play it. It's a matter of tact and principle as consumers to respect the wishes of the company when it pertains to their product (especially when you didn't pay for it). If you use their product in a manner they do not deem fit, then they have the right to do something about it.
Per Cryptic Farming does not equate to Exploits. They have said this on numerous occasions and consider it two separate issue, it is only a few players who feel the need to lump the two together. And I agree 100%, Cryptic has every right to make changes to their product to protect their vision. Just as I as a consumer have every right to tell them how I feel about that change and make it known that if they choose to continue making such changes it will create a product I and others have no desire to play. Lost revenue talks very loudly when making decisions regarding your product, I have every faith Cryptic will take that into consideration.
Do you crave a good old fashioned dungeon crawl? One where the dungeon tells it's own story? The Dungeon Delves campaign is just for you! Start with my first release: NW-DQF4T7QYH Any cave can lead to adventure!
Amended my earlier post to reflect the potion comment. The point about the level gap was that Cryptic doesn't want people to just level cap without playing their story, and experiencing the game they created. UGC should not be a means to the end, just stuff to keep you entertained rather than having to grind the same dungeons Cryptic created. More or less to keep people from logging in to just run dailies and then logging out.
Yeah, it seems that the people who complain about it the most are the people who are mad they can't just power-level through, or accumulate massive amounts of riches through UGC. Cryptic should not reward players who have that kind of gaming mentality.
I know that might seem like a silly argument to make, but I really enjoyed the mobs dropping the little items (potions), and the very occasional blue or green.
Let me know what you all think, if you agree or disagree.
Before the nerf I actually manged to GET blue items. Since the nerf, I have barely gotten green's, not to mention virtually no ID scrolls. This makes me a sad panda.
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kamaliiciousMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 0Arc User
edited May 2013
I've been keeping track of my potion use on my Foundry only character: I started keeping track at level 12 and 7-8 bubbles. I am now level 13 and 7-8 bubbles. Down 5 potions from when I started keeping track. For a Cryptic content the expectation at those levels is positive accumulation of potions.
Before the nerf I actually manged to GET blue items. Since the nerf, I have barely gotten green's, not to mention virtually no ID scrolls. This makes me a sad panda.
Pretty much this. As pointed out elsewhere, the XP gain is irrelevant for most of the game. Once you hit 60, who cares? But the items are always helpful, and foundry content ought to drop scrolls and potions at the same rate I would get in official content too.
Yeah, it seems that the people who complain about it the most are the people who are mad they can't just power-level through, or accumulate massive amounts of riches through UGC. Cryptic should not reward players who have that kind of gaming mentality.
Some of the most vocal regarding the issue have pointed out that Cryptic has stated they want players to play the content they enjoy. This means they could care less if you play or enjoy their story if you are playing and as such paying. As I said before, XP is next to irrelevant as more time is spent playing any MMO at cap that is ever spent during the leveling process, though for alts and characters the player wants to play in an alternate method it is a slap in the face given that Cryptic has said the rewards would be equivalent or EXCEED their own content.
Look, I'm not looking for the gain a level every time I hit a button but it would be nice if I didn't have to work 4 times as hard to level on UGC as I do on their content. And while I agree, that the diminishing returns SOUNDS like a good fix in concept in reality it punishes anyone who happens to kill quickly.
Do you crave a good old fashioned dungeon crawl? One where the dungeon tells it's own story? The Dungeon Delves campaign is just for you! Start with my first release: NW-DQF4T7QYH Any cave can lead to adventure!
It would be interesting if someone actually recreated a Cryptic map as suggested. With a youtube or something video of a run through a map it wouldn't be terribly difficult, since you could see the encounter difficulty and type.
Funny, I was in the midsts of deleting a character to relieve another problem and figured "hey, I'll play up to the first indoor dungeon crawl they send you on and remake it" when I brain farted... just deleted my main.. just under 30 levels and 10 levels of crafting all out the window.. complete with gear and everything.. took me a good 10 minutes to stop the whole "I can't believe I did that" rant..
Expect a duplicate to a Cryptic level from me in the near future.. one of the early little dungeon crawls. Lord knows I have a character slot open now to do the research..
Do you crave a good old fashioned dungeon crawl? One where the dungeon tells it's own story? The Dungeon Delves campaign is just for you! Start with my first release: NW-DQF4T7QYH Any cave can lead to adventure!
Yeah, it seems that the people who complain about it the most are the people who are mad they can't just power-level through, or accumulate massive amounts of riches through UGC. Cryptic should not reward players who have that kind of gaming mentality.
I don't think that is the case. I have done every zone on my main character, and most of the quests (there are some left in the last zone), read everything, listened to everything. I enjoyed the ride, and I'm currently going through the quest line with another character. Actually, I have a character that is 20+ for every class (my main being 60).
Given the choice, I would level my alts rather through UGC and have fresh experiences. As it stands, my second playthrough of the story is just "follow the sparkles", there is no actual sense of immersion. It's like reading a book a second time right after you finished it. Now imagine reading the same book five times in a row, back to back.
Before someone says that it's the same in every MMO: No, actually, it isn't. Besides having different factions and race-specific starting areas, there are usually multiple same-level zones that you can choose from, so you can mix up things.
Ok, I published it, Coanunn's Cryptic Fun House NW-DERYEIGYH. This has only a little decoration and is not decorated to exactly match the dungeon it is a recreation of. A few notes:
Due to "budget" I was not able to include 3 different respawn points and healing fires as the original has.
Due to some differences between the pieces we have access to and the ones used to create the original my dungeon is larger than the original Cryptic dungeon, this spaces the fights out and should slow the pace of combat
Due to a lack of true control over encounters the encounter with the skeleton archer who pops out of the crypt by himself has been removed, and the encounter directly behind him has been moved up a notch of difficulty to compensate
Due to no boss option, the final fight has a respawn and summons the adds though they do not dissipate on killing the boss as they do in the original. You have to kill the boss and his adds. Also the fight while set to the hardest I could is still a touch easier than the original
So there she is, go test it and post your findings.. Let's see if any of you have loot and xp issues with a dungeon not just made in Cryptic style but that is as EXACT a replica of the VERY FIRST dungeon they have you run in the game as I could make with the foundry.
Enjoy.
Do you crave a good old fashioned dungeon crawl? One where the dungeon tells it's own story? The Dungeon Delves campaign is just for you! Start with my first release: NW-DQF4T7QYH Any cave can lead to adventure!
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damoniiMember, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian UsersPosts: 9Arc User
edited May 2013
I cannot believe what I am reading in this thread...
I installed this game and so far it has been a breath of fresh air in MMO gaming, much closer to pen and paper DnD then any other MMO I played. I did a few foundries (to be fair i picked the top rated ones) and they had great stories and give me hope for tons of new content constantly being churned out for this game.
Then I read this thread, plagued with absolutely asinine remarks from people that honestly I would rather HAMSTER off and play something else then ruin this game that has so much potential.
I like to play games for interesting adventures and stories.
I like lore.
I dont care if its end game or leveling, its the adventure.
I hate farming.
I think rare loot should be something you feel proud to have not something everybody must have.
I have already seen some "gearscore" HAMSTER posted in chat and despair for those fools.
This game so far is perfectly catered to the gamer like me who wants to have fun. If you want a game where you have to grind and spend weeks trying to achieve a goal then go and find one don't try to force this one to be it. So far the only ****ed thing in this game is the amount of idiots that play it.
Please Devs don't listen to them, yes it is true there are more of them with more disposable income (usually because they are NEET's and have no obligations) but everyone already caters to the epeen seekers. You do not have to follow suit. I beg of you keep the game about story and adventure with loot as fun things you find.
And to all the people that want to disagree with me, "May you spend eternity eating meals cooked by an elf and served in a dwarfs codpiece".
Comments
Foundry missions as they were allowed effortless superior experience and drop values.
They were NOT correctly balanced.
They want the Foundry to give the best possible rewards but they can't supersede Cryptic's standard of balance.
People who make and played content as intended suffered. Sadly exploiters tend to ruin things for everybody...
So from this point forward It's got to be a question on how to improve Foundry rewards without allowing exploit missions to exist.
Everything else in your post in totally irrelevant by this one statement.
Essentially, it's perfectly fine to farm and zerg CRYPTIC content, but not player made content. In essence, play our way and not yours.
And for the record, I already said I'm totally against breaking a risk-vs-reward ratio and exploiting game mechanics, but I'll repeat myself just this once.
What I'm trying to say is....people making maps with lots of fighting required to get through them(kinda like the game's dungeons) over the time limit for the daily restrictions and heck....let's go with as long as possible are now considered violations. Big old honking maps chock full of bad guys that can not only fight back, but even stand a chance of killing you are suffering simply because of some arbitrarily created and enforced "xp per time unit" formula that got pulled out of someone's bum. That's totally not right and as I said before, hypocrisy.
I'll also repeat the fact that I'm not a farmer. I really don't like repeating content over and over again. But now I have to repeat content, because Foundry quests simply don't have a proper or balanced reward ratio for my time investment, and another thing I really don't like is being told how to play and have fun or people that tell someone else how to have fun or play a game. I'm firmly on the side of "let the individual decide their level of involvement and fun". These foundry changes.....aren't fun. Really they're not. But I don't blame you, you're just an employee. It's your job to support the company that pays your salary. Unless you're a volunteer forum moderator, in which case.....oops?
Occam's Razor makes the cutting clean.
I'm sorry, but that's no excuse for a blatant, vicious nerf that has all but sworn the Foundry to death. Exploiters will always exist. You find out who ran exploit maps over and over (talking past 4 times), then you ban them for knowingly exploiting, and van the creators of said maps. It shouldn't take more than 3 times to test a map for exploits and cheats. The thing is, the admins have to be diligent with their duties. They'd rather be lazy than do the jobs they're paid to do, and as such, the Foundry must suffer.
You can try and apologize or spin their antics in whatever ways you wish. You do not hurt the majority because of the minority. You do your job as an admin and you punt the exploiters. You don't turn moderation into a turn key operation with the most minimal amount of effort put forward. You should know there will always be exploiters, they should have been expecting this. They took the low road in combating it, and now we're all suffering for it.
So, either people only consider ogre farming quests and falsely assume it is the same for all foundry quests, or these claims are the result of innocent misinformation or deliberate attempts to misinform.
All they ended up doing was taking out the short mission xp pits as they did in ST, but people will complain anyways, funny thing is, this game isn't hard to level in to begin with or get items for a free game on top of that , so meh ***** to ***** I guess.
Then you obviously take your time doing foundry missions because I did the map Orc Slayer 1.8 (No it's not an exploit map look for it urself its a normal dungeon) and if you kill them on a normal speed half the mobs will not give any exp/drops.
My rogue alt does not kill on normal speed, he kills about twice as fast as my other characters.
so you are telling me you are not getting whites as final chest rewards? And that drops/exp are on par with non-foundry content?
The games storyline is complete rubbish and not in any way interesting. Almost all of the campaign foundry quests I have played are far far better than anything the game devs made.
That balance standard allows for a group of five to effortlessly destroy a dungeon and red dragon with minimal work, just so you know, with a Cleric 4 levels lower than the quest... The fact that I can take challenging situations and make them trivial with a button click really doesn't inspire me on the 'balance' factor of this game.
Effortless experience is one thing which I think everyone here has agreed was unacceptable, but those maps are easily identified. If you're running from 20 mobs that will mob and insta-kill you if they catch you, not really effortless in my opinion...but that's a matter of perspective.
So instead of banning the exploit maps and allowing the loot drops and xp to keep it's normal rate, they made it much less than Cryptic balanced areas, where a simpler solution would have been to limit the number of elite mobs that could be placed within a certain proximity of each other so that people couldn't stack 50 mobs on top of one another and let people group aoe them. This is a solution that keeps theme with Cryptic's own dungeons.
Did you seriously think that response was a valid one? So sorry, too bad, exploiters ruined it for everyone... Do you believe that a solution like that is good for this game? Penalize everyone for the actions of the few...that's not even close to a good business model, I have read multiple posts about not penalizing players for playing the game 'it will drive them off' but that's exactly what's going to happen with heavy handed tactics.
Maybe no-one cares about the MMO player's philosophy, but just some insight. People are going to find the best way to do something, for power-leveler, power-gamer types, this means anything less than the best way is a waste of time. That mode of thought has become prevalent in MMO's these days, I see it all the time, not just in this game but every game now. I cannot believe that Developer still do not understand this is a large base of players' approach to the game. If the way you present isn't equal to or better than another alternative, the players will toss it aside and not look at it. Only a minority actually put the emphasis on story and flavor (that doesn't mean people don't care about it, but they don't prioritize it over stats, gear, leveling speed, etc.).
One day developers will learn to appreciate exploiters as a means to tighten up their product and make it a better experience for everyone.
There is no 'effort' expended to level in this game. It's extremely easy to level a character in this game...to the point of being boring.
Also, Dungeons and Dragons at it's heart was a hack and slash system, just for dungeon crawling...and the 'content' in this game is the same as any other, grab quest, kill mob, pick up item, interact with npc/item get shiny object to put on character. It is no different than any other MMO...
As far as items, you get green items for sneezing in this game, blues are barely better than their green counterparts if better at all (a mass majority add to stats I don't like)
They should change the items back to being balanced with Cryptic created content and not be worse, the xp nerf was necessary though I gained way too much xp just trying to do a quick "real" Foundry map.
That being said, there really needs to be a way to add tradeskill nodes and chests on maps that give loot, to try an encourage players to explore "real" maps. Just put a limit on how many you can place on a map. As well as the ability to add simple vendors to larger Foundry Quests. (to unload junk)
Fun 15-20 Minute Heavy Combat Quest with a difficulty slider. Hand crafted environments and encounters.
Code: NW-DSVCX8LD4
Thread URL: http://nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?257391-Protect-the-Caravan
Ok, full stop! Enough of this D&D is BS we keep hearing. You know what D&D is? It's a set of rules that allow conflict resolution via dice and a set of logic driven hard stop definitions that is SUPPOSED to be arbitrated by a Game Master. It has been used by many to tell stories but it has also been used by the same people and others as nothing more than an excuse to sit, roll dice and claim to have killed legions of monsters. IT IS NOT A STORYTELLING TOOL! Stop trying to claim it is as a basis for why the foundry must be policed a certain way.
1: Cryptic has shown their stance to be that the Foundry was to be on par with or better than their own content.
2: Cryptic has stated they want players to play the content they enjoy.
3: PWI is in business to make money off this title and as such they want the whole pie, meaning every player who plays to enjoy the game.
4: Story is a VERY subjective term and as such can mean anything from what you tell you kid at night to go to sleep which lasts 5 minutes and relies heavily on their imagination all the way up to the epic of the lord of the rings which currently takes more than 4 books, 6 movies totaling over 20 hours of film work and counting, an laundry list of table top and video games including it's own MMO and more. Your standard for story is not the only one and as such you are in a poor position to dictate to anyone else what they have to include.
5: We have been repeatedly told this is a band aid and as such there is supposed to be a permanent fix that reduces the limitations of this, thus telling unhappy players to stop speaking up during beta is counter to what Cryptic wants right now.
If you have something constructive to add please feel free but until then this rhetoric of how anyone who doesn't play your way is simply unnecessary and only paints you as a fool and a ****** bag who is out to ruin the fun of anyone else.
It would be interesting if someone actually recreated a Cryptic map as suggested. With a youtube or something video of a run through a map it wouldn't be terribly difficult, since you could see the encounter difficulty and type.
First being able to rapidly level a character creates a level gap between players that just ran UGC and players that actually play the Neverwinter storyline. Which, if I were Cryptic, I would have a problem with this because I didn't just spend x amount of time and money creating a game for people and they don't even play it. It's a matter of tact and principle as consumers to respect the wishes of the company when it pertains to their product (especially when you didn't pay for it). If you use their product in a manner they do not deem fit, then they have the right to do something about it.
Second, along with the level gaps, you have people that are exploiting the UGC for gear and treasure. If you cannot grasp what this would mean to the in-game community then you obviously have not played enough MMO's. This type of exploitation creates what we call a broken economy. And it is already happening in the beta, and you can see it when people are spamming "want to sell" (WTS) items for ridiculous prices. Which just opens the door for the proverbial "Chinese gold farmers" and jackasses that prey on new players. So if you don't want a game where your chat box is filled with spammers trying to take your money, then something had to be done.
Third, the game was intended to bring D&D to life in MMO format. DDO was a horrible adaptation, but with the Foundry, Neverwinter sets the bar for gaming standards with the use of UGC. I'm sure Cryptic doesn't want a player to level cap after 6 hours of playing the game without really touching the story they created. You sure as hell cannot do that in table top D&D starting from level 1. Real D&D players know it takes months and years of gaming to level up when playing by the rules. So in Cryptic's defense they don't want UGC to completely nullify their intended play-through experience for us players.
Now I'm not saying that there should not be a reward for playing UGC...which there is in the form daily Foundry quest reward, but we should still get some form of loot from the UGC quests and campaigns. Cryptic said the nerf is not permanent, but just temporary while they get it sorted out. I would imagine the sort out will come with a depreciating loot and XP table for players when running UGC. This would ensure that a player couldn't just power level through UGC because there would only be a set amount of XP and gold piece value of loot a player could earn each 24hrs before running UGC would result in no rewards except the actual "story experience" (not leveling XP) that the author wanted you to have.
On a side note about the challenge of Neverwinter. Cryptic could make the game a little more challenging by implementing some more of the mechanics from the 4th edition when it comes to cooldowns on potions. In D&D a single round of combat consists of your's and the enemy's actions (i.e. standard, move, and minor), and a single round of combat is generally 6 seconds in real-time. Taking this into account a 6 second cooldown on potions would be acceptable. Personally if I there was a 6 sec CD on potions I think the number of times players have died during a quest would rise exponentially. In any case, the point of the open beta and the nerf was to get exactly just this; a reaction from the players to help them figure out what to do. So cheers for Cryptic, and here's to a speedy and fair resolution.
Amendment: Potions have a 12sec CD I just noticed...so perhaps instead of a longer CD, lower the amount healed by a potion.
There is already a cooldown on potions, it's longer than that.
So, at least, for me, the quests seem to be working as intended. I guess I'm playing the game as Cryptic intended and am not zerging through? I notice a lot of people have also seen no sudden change in loot, so it's a bit hard for me to see the validity of jumping up and down, screaming with nerf rage over something which doesn't seem to be as severe or widespread as some posters are claiming. It feels incredibly knee-jerk right now.
Count me in as a player who plays the Foundry quests for content and a change of pace. I never was into farming or exploiting, so I'm happy with how Cryptic is handling this issue. /shrug.
Per Cryptic Farming does not equate to Exploits. They have said this on numerous occasions and consider it two separate issue, it is only a few players who feel the need to lump the two together. And I agree 100%, Cryptic has every right to make changes to their product to protect their vision. Just as I as a consumer have every right to tell them how I feel about that change and make it known that if they choose to continue making such changes it will create a product I and others have no desire to play. Lost revenue talks very loudly when making decisions regarding your product, I have every faith Cryptic will take that into consideration.
Before the nerf I actually manged to GET blue items. Since the nerf, I have barely gotten green's, not to mention virtually no ID scrolls. This makes me a sad panda.
Pretty much this. As pointed out elsewhere, the XP gain is irrelevant for most of the game. Once you hit 60, who cares? But the items are always helpful, and foundry content ought to drop scrolls and potions at the same rate I would get in official content too.
Some of the most vocal regarding the issue have pointed out that Cryptic has stated they want players to play the content they enjoy. This means they could care less if you play or enjoy their story if you are playing and as such paying. As I said before, XP is next to irrelevant as more time is spent playing any MMO at cap that is ever spent during the leveling process, though for alts and characters the player wants to play in an alternate method it is a slap in the face given that Cryptic has said the rewards would be equivalent or EXCEED their own content.
Look, I'm not looking for the gain a level every time I hit a button but it would be nice if I didn't have to work 4 times as hard to level on UGC as I do on their content. And while I agree, that the diminishing returns SOUNDS like a good fix in concept in reality it punishes anyone who happens to kill quickly.
Funny, I was in the midsts of deleting a character to relieve another problem and figured "hey, I'll play up to the first indoor dungeon crawl they send you on and remake it" when I brain farted... just deleted my main.. just under 30 levels and 10 levels of crafting all out the window.. complete with gear and everything.. took me a good 10 minutes to stop the whole "I can't believe I did that" rant..
Expect a duplicate to a Cryptic level from me in the near future.. one of the early little dungeon crawls. Lord knows I have a character slot open now to do the research..
I don't think that is the case. I have done every zone on my main character, and most of the quests (there are some left in the last zone), read everything, listened to everything. I enjoyed the ride, and I'm currently going through the quest line with another character. Actually, I have a character that is 20+ for every class (my main being 60).
Given the choice, I would level my alts rather through UGC and have fresh experiences. As it stands, my second playthrough of the story is just "follow the sparkles", there is no actual sense of immersion. It's like reading a book a second time right after you finished it. Now imagine reading the same book five times in a row, back to back.
Before someone says that it's the same in every MMO: No, actually, it isn't. Besides having different factions and race-specific starting areas, there are usually multiple same-level zones that you can choose from, so you can mix up things.
So there she is, go test it and post your findings.. Let's see if any of you have loot and xp issues with a dungeon not just made in Cryptic style but that is as EXACT a replica of the VERY FIRST dungeon they have you run in the game as I could make with the foundry.
Enjoy.
I installed this game and so far it has been a breath of fresh air in MMO gaming, much closer to pen and paper DnD then any other MMO I played. I did a few foundries (to be fair i picked the top rated ones) and they had great stories and give me hope for tons of new content constantly being churned out for this game.
Then I read this thread, plagued with absolutely asinine remarks from people that honestly I would rather HAMSTER off and play something else then ruin this game that has so much potential.
I like to play games for interesting adventures and stories.
I like lore.
I dont care if its end game or leveling, its the adventure.
I hate farming.
I think rare loot should be something you feel proud to have not something everybody must have.
I have already seen some "gearscore" HAMSTER posted in chat and despair for those fools.
This game so far is perfectly catered to the gamer like me who wants to have fun. If you want a game where you have to grind and spend weeks trying to achieve a goal then go and find one don't try to force this one to be it. So far the only ****ed thing in this game is the amount of idiots that play it.
Please Devs don't listen to them, yes it is true there are more of them with more disposable income (usually because they are NEET's and have no obligations) but everyone already caters to the epeen seekers. You do not have to follow suit. I beg of you keep the game about story and adventure with loot as fun things you find.
And to all the people that want to disagree with me, "May you spend eternity eating meals cooked by an elf and served in a dwarfs codpiece".