My warforged wizard noob toon

I enjoy playing warforged characters as you can probably tell. I wanted to roll a wizard, so I created this one and have been going through all the early level content trying to level this one up.

I was surprised and happy to learn that ddo.com allows you to look up your character, much like wow does on their battlenet site, so here is my current build and state of my toon.

I was hoping some of you more experienced players could take a look and make suggestions, observations. I decided that I would research as much as I could on equipment, stats and try to optimize the wizard in the correct way, but since DDO is based on D&D 3.5, it can get kind of technical at times, so I have decided not to let that get in the way of my enjoying the game. I think that there are opportunities to change out feats and respec, much like I used to when I was playing Dark Age of Camelot, but I may be wrong about that. Still, any suggestions or observations from the community will be appreciated. Last night I ran through Misery's peak once more with a random PUG and had fun earning xp. I had forgotten what a long quest that was. We shall see how much progress I make this week.

DDO vs. Wow- Revisited

The Drow of the Underdark are a new area of exploration in DDO

Recently, while looking online for info on mmorpgs, I came across this old blog post talking about why DDO can never compete with World of Warcraft. This is not a new comparison or analysis by any means, but since I have played both games, and have been doing so again of late, I wanted to address some of the points against Turbine and DDO which the author made so long ago.

He writes, "There are a number of things blizzard got right with WoW that DDO just doesn’t. In theory DDO should be a brilliant online game- it’s got the power of the most popular and advanced RPG fighting system behind it, the storytelling power DnD is famous for and it’s got all this in an online game with enormous character uniqueness and customization capability."

So why doesn’t it work ? scale. He goes on to compare the games in terms of scale:

"In WoW you are questing out in the world – you don’t even enter a dungeon until level 15, as you quest you meet other players, some will help you with quests some will just pass you by but 90% of all the things you do happen outside in the world. You’re interacting with people all the time."
This may have been true 2 years ago when this post was written, but in the post-Cataclysm era, I find that it is simply no longer true. In fact, there may be more players now logging in daily to raid and do PvP content, but for a long time most will sit in capital cities, or queue for a dungeon and battleground, leaving most of the open world barren in comparison.

"In DDO every time you start a quest, you get cut off from everybody who isn’t in your party (so if you solo quite a bit while leveling to get used to playing your class – you may as well be playing diablo – the fact that it’s online becomes irrelevant)."
This is also untrue, well not the part about DDO being mostly instanced, but the fact about it being less mmorpg than wow as a result. As a matter of fact, a lot of the dungeons in DDO are simply undoable or too hard to solo which requires either using hirelings, or other players. Luckily, the social function built into the game by Turbine allows you to easily and quickly find other players looking for groups and looking to run dungeons with you, most of which will be divided by level, making it convenient to find a party. Once you do, it is nothing like a single player dungeon crawl, rather a fun interactive and co-op experience.

This is why, perhaps, I’ve yet to see a mount in DDO (I think they don’t exist) – while in WoW they aren’t just nice – they are incredibly useful. Because you’re traversing the world, what fantasy hero doesn’t ride on his quest ? Well unless you’re Tolkiens hobbits – nobody else wants to walk everywhere. It also means to get between areas you have to fly/take a boat. You can’t walk and explore because the city exits lead to combat zones – that don’t have another exit.

Well this is true, but as a guildie once said to me when I mentioned mounts a while back, "who needs mounts when you can just teleport?" This is really true, Stormreach is a huge city, but to see most of the content would take a really long time playing the game, and to traverse to other parts of the world, all one has to do is join a good guild with a functional air ship and use it to port in and out of places, at least that's what I and many others do. It would be cool to see mounts, but as DDO is based on Dungeons and Dragons 3.5 rule sets and that game is meant to be played as a collective of players in a party, they are not really needed in DDO.

Free to play done wrong
DDO because they don’t have a subscription fee pushes the store in your face all the time. True you can earn store points just from playing but that comes pretty slow and so far I’ve spent mine all on healing potions. If you don’t buy you will soon find you cannot compete with those who do. That ultimately slants the game in favor of those with the most cash to burn instead of those with the most skill – and it annoys the hell out of you – especially as a newer player.

I don't think this was ever true, although it is true that a f2p player would find it virtually impossible or would take forever to achieve the same gear or progress than a p2p using mostly the game's "favor" system, now that the game has more a freemium model, the online store is hardly "ever in your face" it is up to you if you want to buy adventure packs or locked classes, but if you prefer to play for free, there is a lot of free content that is still accessible and you can still have a ton of fun playing the game without dropping a dime into it. Is there a competitive advantage? Since there is no PvP to speak of, except for brawling in the taverns as a diversion, I don't feel that there is any significant advantage accrued by VIP players, they simply get parts of the game that are not available to the f2p, and since dungeons can be ran in different difficulty levels, there is content for everyone to enjoy even the newest of players.

Another knock on DDO is a perceived lack of lore, in comparison to the vast game world and overarching back story, but most of the wow players I know don't really care about lore anyway, don't more than half skip reading quest text in favor of going out to grind? Don't get me wrong, I like Blizzard games and I feel the need to play wow from time to time because it is a fun and polished mmorpg, I just don't feel that DDO is lacking in lore, or development of lore in the game, especially now that the Forgottem Realms have been incorporated into DDO, who knows what other DDO settings and staples Turbine will surprise us with next?

MMO Report No More

I was sad to hear that G4 is cancelling the MMO Report. Though I was often at odds with silly host Casey Schreiner, mostly because he tended to focus on his ego more than on the games he was spotlighting, it's always bad when an avenue for reporting on this often overlooked game genre is closed.

Though the MMO Report used to give more coverage to more big name mmos like wow and Rift and waaay too much coverage to SWTOR before that game came out, and though it often sourced material from massively, it was still a good source of news. I will miss it. Check out the video of the last show.

Running challenge dungeons in DDO with my Warforged

It's been a long time, yes I have been gone a long time and things didn't pan out in terms of me playing DDO, but now I am back, because I am on xmas/winter break from grad school. I plan to update daily, if not every other day, as I play more and more DDO, which is one of my favorite mmorpgs (the others being World of Warcraft and good old Dark Age of Camelot)

But I digress. Earlier tonight I was doing the Proof is in the Poison challenge dungeon with my level 6 warforged. What I didn't know is that this dungeon would be extremely hard to finish on elite, and that it was a long adventure. Fortunately, I didn't undertake it alone, I went in with a bard who brought along a hireling, and later (after I died a few times) we invited some extra muscle.

Unfortunately, the power went out in my place went out for some strange reason (could be that the mini heater I was using sucked up all the electrical juices since it's so freaking cold) and as I screamed in disguist, NOOOOOOO, the room went pitch dark and all my xp went out the window. Considering how long this dungeon takes, even on normal settings, you can imagine I was upset, my party probably all died, although they may have made it all the way through as my fellow bard was a pretty resistant and highly skilled player from what I could tell, maybe they finished it. I guess I will never know. I was kicking myself for a bit because I could have gained a while half a rank of xp had I completed the quest since we were running it on elite!

Curiously enough, I have been scouring youtube and the web for DDO content and tutorials, and though there is a lot of significant content online, the best video I found on this specific dungeon was put together by Total Biscuit. If you also play other mmorpgs, most notably wow, you are already familiar with TB's style, but I found it interesting that he attempted (successfully unlike myself) to two-man this dungeon along with a warrior tank for muscle over a year ago.

 His bard has the ability to heal itself and that's what my PUG friend was doing the whole time on our dungeon run, although I was not aware of it at the time.

Mind you, as he points out, Bards are not the only healers in DDO, but they can solo some instances, especially if they are using mystical armor like he was. TB does as a better job of explaining it in this video, but it's a bit of a long one, so make sure you have time to watch the entire thing. I had to stop it right before the end as I did not want to spoil the entire adventure. I am sure I will be attempting to complete this dungeon, preferably on elite for bonus xp in the days to come. Cheers!!

DDO is new again

DDO is new again, at least for me since I have been running instances with my warforged Barbarian in Stormreach.

Usually I hook up with groups looking to run instances in hard or elite mode, but last night I think I finally got what I have been looking for, for a long long while: a DDO static group. Me and three other players committed to running a chain, and I am halfway to level 6.

Though I had been in some of the dungeons before, and undoubtedly so did some of the other party members, the good thing about DDO is that it's a game with a great deal of replayability. We ran  Protect Baudry's interest, Irestone Inlet and a few others. I have also spent some time hunting down collectors in Stormreach. Ten Ton Hammer detailed a long time ago the importance of doing such quests, for me it was more a chance to get rid of items dragging down my inventory.

One thing I would advise any of you wanting to try out DDO, I am not sure about Underdark because I have not tried it, but at least in Stormreach, do try to join a guild as soon as you can, and if your guild is high level and has a ship, even better. I find that I am not that great at reading the map or remember where things are, so having the ability to transport anywhere via the ship is one of the greatest benefits of joining a guild. Who needs mounts when you can teleport?

Happy adventuring, and I will keep you posted on the progress of our static group.

Leveling up my Pally alt in the DDO early game. Korthos anyone??

So I decided to re-roll a human palandin, mostly because it bugged me that I had to idea how to do a proper build with my warforged barabarian, and I wanted to do a 24 point build from scratch. But boy I had forgotten how much it sucks to be level one. I did the tutorial quickly, just to get a starter weapon, and because I don't know if there is any other entry way to Korthos.

Doing the low level quests is a lot easier if you team up, so me and Cornholio the Great teamed up and knocked off a few in succession and quickly leveled all l the way to 2. I know so much more now than when I started playing the game: the proper use of hirelings to aid in dungeons for example, and even what feats and skills to take that help out my class.

DDO, unlike other games has an advantage since there is so much online, in terms of guides and documentation. Many old games like DAoC, but to name one, have fewer resources, so it makes it easier to look up walkthroughs and helpful hints online.

Of course, if I just wanted to automate the character creation process I could have just used the excellent DDO Character Generator made available by the good folks over at Mortal Voyage in the Argonnessen server. Their Perma-Death guild was featured in the latest (and last) edition of Massive Online Gamer. There's a link to this great newbie tool over at their website: www.mortalvoyage.com.

 Anyone know of a good starting guild for my alt??? Look me up in Orien if you wanna get down with my pally!!

New Year, time to get caught up with Stormreach

credit: ashlock.org

Hey guys, I know it's been a long time between updates, and I do apologize for this, but it was the holidays so things got a little crazy around here. Now I am back in 2012 resolved to bring you more info. about our favorite games, looking forward to getting back into DDO.

Honestly, Nov-Dec was a blur, in so far as gaming. I really didn't do as much as I wanted to. I think I logged on to DDO once in the past month, but that was only because I downloaded the game to my external drive to see if I could run it on my old laptop. I was surprised the answer was yes, though it tends to lag from time to time which was annoying. Truth be told I have been spending more time in the DAoC battlegrounds, but given my free trial for that game will be running out in about a week's time, I don't think I will be resubbing.

Also this year, I resolve to do more creative writing, and to this end I am reading the DDO novel "The Shard Axe" penned by fantasy writer Marshiela Rockwell. I've only glanced at the first chapter, but I hope to consume it all within the next couple of weeks and post a review of it here. The reason I am doing this is twofold: I have been working on a DDO themed novel of my own set in Stormreach of course, and I find this one to be a good source of inspiration. It is readily available in paper and e-book format through Amazon or through your favorite hobby/bookstore. So go out and get a copy you will be glad you did! I will update this blog more with my progress on my book and my other writing endeavors, as well as the progression of my warforged toon on my server. Stay with me!!