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DDO Goes Solo
Gamespot reports on efforts by Dungeons and Dragons Online creator Turbine to add soloable content to the gameworld. They have added a new difficulty level to the existing missions ('solo'), which will allow players unwilling or unable to form a group to successfully complete tasks. From the article: "Turbine has also adjusted the experience requirements for leveling up. The change heavily favors new players, cutting the necessary experience points to get to level two by half. However, the requirements for levels four and up will only be decreased by 10,000 points."
I wonder if they'll be offering an offline version of their game for those who only want to play solo?
I was talking to a friend the other day about how I don't play WoW because a) I just don't have the time, and b) the later missions pretty much require that I always have to have a group with me.
The problem with that is finding said group, organizing them, keeping them there long enough, before I decide I need to go to bed, blah, blah, blah.
But when I was playing Oblivion, I actually thought it would be nice to have other people around to chat with or trade things with (like "I'll restore charges on your weapon for some potions"), or just chat about things in game or otherwise. Some really good discussions I've had came around through old MUD gaming while talking to guild members about Friends or religion or politics.
What we decided is that the fun of MMRPG's isn't necessarily grouping together - it's just the shared experience. I'd be perfectly happy never having a group of people with me on a quest, but just being able to chat or trade with them as I chose.
So, I'd love to see a MMRPG with mostly solo quests that can ramp themselves up if you have a group to provide a challenge - but don't *make* me try and herd these cats you call other gamers if I don't want to.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Q: What's geekier than playing board games with friends?
A: Playing Dungeons & Dragons with friend.
Q: What's geekier than playing Dungeons & Dragons with friends?
A: Playing Dungeons & Dragons with strangers.
Q: What's geekier than playing Dungeons & Dragons with strangers?
A: Playing Dungeons & Dragons with strangers, online.
Q: What's geekier than playing Dungeons & Dragons with strangers, online?
A: Playing Dungeons & Dragons alone, online.
Though thankfully, LARPing still has all that beat hands down.
I'm willing to bet, from personal experience, that most D&D players already have at least a few proficiency slots used up in going it "solo."
This sig isn't original enough, it's time to come up with something witty...
What this really means to me is that unfortunately, Turbine's got a bad product on its hands (again) and now they're entering survival mode by just giving up and altering the game they made. You know, when game gets old, its normal that it receives an overhaul to give it some fresh air but...at the beginning like that ? hum...scary...
:)
In fact, im pretty sure DDO can be quite a cool game with various strategies..meant for the true D&D fan at heart. The cold hard fact is that people dont play online to play the way they do on the table with P&P. They just wanna bash stuff, get loot and fat xp
I said it when turbine came up with AC2 and I'll say it again, they need a game that offer an immersive solo player experience and not only for the beginning of game, for the WHOLE game. You know, another poster said the same thing in this thread. When i go online, what i like to do is chat with my guild, trade with people and go hunting on my merry own or maybe with two or three personal friends. I rarely have more than two hours in a row so I cant afford big groups with lots of coordination, nature calls, laundry breaks and knockings at the door, not that its bad, but on the large scale, thats very time consuming.
playing a mmo for me means interacting with people not being forced to be with a big bunch of PUGs just because my quests forces me to group. That is immensely why wow is so successful. Sure for high end instances you are forced to group for the majority of the quests, you can solo them if feel like so.
People keep saying that soloing quests defeats the purpose of playing a mmo but i disagree, I like to play alone or with close friend but I like mmos because I can interact with people. that is what mmo means to me.
If you look like your passport photo, you're too ill to travel. - Will Kommen
with the fact they have another failed game on their hands.
The one constant in Turbines two games since the original Asheron's Call is that they fail to acknowledge the warnings of their fans. Turbine has many loyal fans from their Asheron's Call game and most are willing to try anything new Turbine comes out with. Yet at the same time Turbine fails to exploit this valuable commodity and instead ignores them and even at times insults them.
I remember quite well Turbine representatives dismssing the claims that D&DO did not have enough content to launch, was not friendly to players who may want to solo or find themselves in that position. Combine this with a game world which is player unfriendly, meaning all areas are instance, with no real activity other than the dungeon crawl, and it exaggerates the games inherent limitations. Simply put, there is nothing to do other than group.
Yes I know the idea of D&D is to play with others but that ignores the reality of gaming today. If players want to game together there are many other ways they can do so and most of them allow for much more player interaction than an internet MMORPG. The best way to have a successful MMORPG is to appeal to the broadest possible number of players. Purposely excluding potential players is always a road to disaster and Turbine went down the road full speed.
Hopes for LOTR (MEO or whatever its current name is) dimmed significantly when Turbine emphasized the group play as a focus. The classes provided are meant to support each other but not necessarily be soloable. Some classes don't appear to have any real potential outside of groups. If this makes it to production it will yet be another game with limited appeal and a short life.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
I can understand the attitude "I just want to play, don't make me work". In essence this is a call to eliminate the concept of character advancement. You start at some level of capability - and never get any more powerful. Developers would have to focus on making new and interesting quests. So you could be a 10th level fighter, or a 10th level thief, or any combination of 10 levels - but that's as far as you ever advance.
Or you might start out with the highest level of skill in one category - but if you want to have skill in more than one thing, you have to earn it. So for DDO, you might start as a 10th level sorceror if you want. (Or a 3/3/4 fighter/wizard/rogue if you prefer.) You could reach 20th or 30th level by training in a second and 3rd class - but 10th is the highest you could ever go in any single class.
Hmm - that actually sounds like it would be the simplest way for DDO to do to quickly expand their game - it doesn't require any additions to skills - just add some harder quests for the higher level characters. Then they could experiment with a server that allows people to start with 10 levels, and exceed the 10th level limit via multi-classing. See how people like the idea.