Neverwinter new pics - OH GAWD ITZ HEAVAN

[Crispy]

Where are you all anyway? Noone's on

Hardly anyone's been logging in lately. I think most of us just got burned out.

But with this new megapatch coming and the introduction of both Gauntlgrym and the first Module I think there will be a lot more coming back.

 

[Crispy]

1.5GB patch downloading right now. Is this it maybe?

Edit: Looks like this is merely a pre-patch patch.

 

[jagged-jimmy]

Finally completed the epic grey wolf on 3rd attempt. Crazy stuff... Before that my group always died and people started leaving after 1-2 tries. This time, some wizard was replaced by a second cleric right at the start of the run. I thought - should we even bother? Turns out: 2 clerics = easy straightforward win. Just click on anything that moves and don't leave the healing circle.

Trivia for GFs:
On my 2nd run - my knight's valor killed me outright. People probably stepped on boss dmg zones all at once. Went from like 25+k hp to wooosh. Interesting skill.

 

[Cool name]

Cryptic should implement better rewards for Foundry missions. There is some great stuff there, much better than Cryptic's own missions, but it is hard to do more than a single one a day when outside the daily the rewards are going to be utter crap and you are going to get far less XP per minute invested.

 

[jagged-jimmy]

Wait until you need to do 4 Foundries for the daily foundry...

 

[Gerrard]

I sent you the pants Crispy.

If anyone else wants scale/chain pants/shirt let me know (or even better send me a mail in-game so I don't have to go looking for your username later).
And if you end up feeling grateful feel also free to send me all your some residuum/arcane shards.

 

[Crispy]

Thanks, Gerrard! Now the shirt?

Side note: just tried the fire giant skirmish last night with a PUG. Yowch! It was fairly easy up until the final boss(es), at which it's like we hit a brick wall. Wiped several times, myself dying twice. I hate that. Pride myself on never dying. It didn't help that the cleric was utterly clueless, constantly yelling "HELP" in the party chat. Yeah, like the rest of us aren't running around wildly avoiding all that crazy red to get to your sorry ass.

Guess who quit the group first. Yep, that moron cleric. Ah, PUG's.

I really wish we could revisit skirmishes at later levels. That one would be great for a guild run.

 

[Gerrard]

Actually I sent both shirt and pants, don't know why I only wrote pants.

Is that the "Battle for the bridge" skirmish? Yeah, that was pretty tough, I had 2 groups quit before we got it (but you still get the credit for dailies for some reason, so whatever).

 

[eklektyk]

skirmishes should get epic lvl too
they're much more fun than dungeons and faster adrenaline pumping all time action and not walking simulator like some dungs[cragmire...]

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

I've been in Prague, and now I'm back.

Anyway, my vote is that we shall defend urism from smelly people.

 

[Cool name]

So according to the forums the patch will pretty much destroy Renegade Wizards.

I guess I will wait until they do release Warlocks.

Oh, yeah, and the ranger will not get cool extra pet.

I guess that means we will never get druids, half of whose entire point is 'Summon lots of fluffy shit.'

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

So according to the forums the patch will pretty much destroy Renegade Wizards.

Overreaction in my opinion. CW is getting nerfed, but it appears to be something you'll only really notice in PvP.

The main nerfs to Renegade are currently mystery quantity damage nerfs to Reaper's Touch (the 20 ft range damage bonus to At Wills) and Masterful Arcane Theft. Ultimately these are not going to cause the world to implode (your main boost to Steal Time damage is still your multiple generic AoE/Arcane damage booster feats and features; Reaper's Touch will hurt a bit but it won't end the world when your main tool is spamming encounters anyway, which you will do more now anyway thanks to Gladiator set bonus working at last). And as said, both of these have the quantity of change up in the air. Change to Chaos Magic is more nebulous I'd say. There's a chance it'll make the feat better when the heal is at a flat maximum and not scaled to your current health.

Ultimately I'd say Renegade is still the best tree when it comes to all-rounder performance. It improves your criticals, provides you with Combat Advantage spam, improves your Magic Missile, and helps you build up your limit break gauge. The changes for the class as a whole are that Chill DPS is a viable build now, and that other classes were buffed noticiably. The biggest nerf is that Ray of Enfeeblement is no longer the standard bread and butter damage spammer in PvP. Entangling Force is now more strictly about the control effect, which I do approve of as it was too much of a no-brainer in any non-group situation (and PvP, obviously), but I've been able to live without it with ease. Storm Pillar remains shit like it always was, just slightly more shit now.


And of course, they're giving a free respec anyway so it's all good.

 

[Mangoose]

skirmishes should get epic lvl too
they're much more fun than dungeons and faster adrenaline pumping all time action and not walking simulator like some dungs[cragmire...]

Skirmishes and dungeons are both boring with their over-reliance on HP bloat as "difficulty." And yet the game isn't twitch-based enough to let you smash through with DPS classes only. It feels weird to say, but WoW dungeons (the 5-mans, not raids) were paced better while still dishing out sufficient challenge. If I fight 3 waves of the same minions, and there are 3 more exact same ones coming, you might as well just end the fight early.

Also it's kinda weird because Cryptic doesn't really have HP bloat in STO and CO (from my limited experience).

I'm starting to feel suggestions that F2P isn't the best model as there is way too much focus on cutting corners... Perhaps such games should start out P2P with concrete plans for a F2P transition.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

I'd say it varies a lot between dungeon bosses. The pirate boss was a good tough fight that got the blood pumping.


Also there's a couple of actual HP bloat bosses in CO, namely Destroyer at the end of NemCon and the last stage of Resistance (which is REALLY hp bloaty, since you aren't even targeted most of the time).

 

[Cool name]

Detailed answer.

There's also Steal Time now giving only a single stack of arcane regardless and a bunch of really weird 'now count as DoT' that we do not know what the bleep means.

The thingie I see is that most people who were playing a renegade built were going for OMG ALL OUT DPS. I.E: They did not want to play a CONTROL wizard, they did want to play PEWPEWPEW wizard. At least that's my excuse: I did like that kind of build because I really want to play a Warlock and kill monsters dead with glorious PEW instead of worrying about whether the Priest is getting pounded and shit. Pewpewpewpew... The priest is dead? Fuck the priest. PEWPEWPEW! I WANT TO SEE MY NAME ATOP THE BLEEPING DPS SCOREBOARD!

The patch is kind of trying to force them to play at least as much control as pewpewpew, and to be honest that doesn't sound so fun. There is no scoreboard for 'most monsters controlled' and shit. I need to see big pretty numbers next to my name to feel I was useful. Control is kind of a not very glorious role in this game.

I guess I will try a chill build or something. I did have some fun trying that ice twister thingie on my TAB slot. Freezing lots of monsters at once was kind of cute, if not very useful.

 

[Crispy]

BC, play what feels right with your CW. Don't chase the numbers or the build o' the day. Because if you do you might find yourself stuck in a less-than-optimal setup for your skillset as a human player.

When I started gaining access to the Paragon path with my GWF in addition to some of the more expensive powers, I tried to switch my rotation to them in order to achive what I thought would be a more effective build. Turns out it felt so awkward and mis-timed that I couldn't even survive tough fights much less come out generally unscathed as I often do now. It's because my timing was just off; the powers that I had parked in favor of the new ones just "felt right" to me and I simply learned that I was more effective in keeping them. I re-adjusted my feats to match (maximize their effectiveness) and got back into the groove again.

It just so happens that the upcoming changes to the GWF are going to go even further towards my effectiveness so it's definitely a win-win for me, or at least I think it will be.

In short, let the class's abilities choose you -- don't let your choices be dictated by what seems to be better on paper.

 

[Gerrard]

And of course, they're giving a free respec anyway so it's all good.

Doesn't include stat re-reoll though.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Well, my method of doing DPS is fairly the same after this patch, since I must be one of the few people who regularly use Sudden Storm and don't have Entangling Force or RoE (or more accurately called Special Beam Cannon with the way people used it) slotted. The biggest hit to my DPS is to Magic Missile, I'll still stack Mastery just fine (I never even noticed Steal Time gave full stacks, since it's fairly trivial to get and maintain them). Of course, I feel jelly about Rogue damage counters, but I do hold up my own in Codex Cool Squad runs fairly well thanks to being AoE focused.

Also what I want is a Paragon Path with Disintegrate as a Daily uber-DPS limit break. Or just make Maelstrom deal the kind of damage it should, given how it's extremely hard to target.

And of course, they're giving a free respec anyway so it's all good.

Doesn't include stat re-reoll though.

My guess is that that'll happen when stat re-rolling becomes a thing.

 

[Cool name]

BC, play what feels right with your CW. Don't chase the numbers or the build o' the day. Because if you do you might find yourself stuck in a less-than-optimal setup for your skillset as a human player.

When I started gaining access to the Paragon path with my GWF in addition to some of the more expensive powers, I tried to switch my rotation to them in order to achive what I thought would be a more effective build. Turns out it felt so awkward and mis-timed that I couldn't even survive tough fights much less come out generally unscathed as I often do now. It's because my timing was just off; the powers that I had parked in favor of the new ones just "felt right" to me and I simply learned that I was more effective in keeping them. I re-adjusted my feats to match (maximize their effectiveness) and got back into the groove again.

It just so happens that the upcoming changes to the GWF are going to go even further towards my effectiveness so it's definitely a win-win for me, or at least I think it will be.

In short, let the class's abilities choose you -- don't let your choices be dictated by what seems to be better on paper.

I tend to do that on class-less MMOs: I experiment a lot and come up with some really WTF builds no one can use but me and have still a lot of 'RP Flavour.' But class based MMOs do scare me. I am a very social player (I mostly level through raids/PvP/battlegrounds/etc, rarely I touch the plot because, yeah, plots in MMOs are terribad and given how much I like to try different things I am rerolling so much I know the dialogue by heart my first week is over) so having a not uber-optimized build gives me nightmares as I am affraid no TOP player will want to party with me.

I have been experimenting a lot on an account I did make just for that so that you guys do not need to reinvite me every time I re-roll. Mostly with Clerics, though: Parties do seem to be much more 'friendly' to weird clerics than weird wizards. (i.e: You have Astral Shield and high CHA? Okay, you are in. No, no, your remaining skiills do not matter as long as you throw your blue circle on time.) With Wizards people does get really nitpicky, maybe because there are too many wizards currently on the game. I met a high level wizard guy who was routinely thrown out of parties because he was playing a non-'cookie cutter' build. Game population seems to be pretty scary.

Edit: Also, PvP in this game is pretty broken. Every time we lose it seems to be because two dudes just sat at the campfire for the whole match. Every time we win it seems to be because two of their dudes did. I have yet to play a single battle that's a proper 5vs5. You get glory all the same so, like, why bother? -__-U

 

[J1M]

Knowing what I do now about the epic dungeons, I can't understand why anyone would be building a crit wizard or how that build idea became so popular. Maybe it was good for pvp or something.

If I could completely reroll my stats I would focus on WIS, action point gain, and recovery at the expense of everything else.

I'd be interested to see an 'ultimate chill dps' build that will take advantage of chill affecting bosses now.

 

[Cool name]

It is a spike damage build. Those are always popular as they are great on PvP, do work quite nicely in PvE, and do not have a lot of subtlety to their use: Enemy player on sight? THROW MASSIVE NUMBERS AT THEM to kill as many of them as you can before they kill you! Trash mobs on sight? THROW MASSIVE NUMBERS AT THEM and then clean the survivors. Boss on sight? THROW MASSIVE NUMBERS AT THEM and hope the clerics have 100% uptime on Astral Shield. It's a sledgehammer, and Cryptic games are rarely sophisticated enough to not have the sledgehammer be the prefered/most efficient tool.

The 'cookie cutter' party being 1/2 TR, 1/2 CW, and 2 DC was pretty much that taken to the extreme.

I guess there will be a lot of players rolling Warlocks when they finally come out.

 

[Mangoose]

Chill didn't affect bosses before?

FFS Cryptic

 

[J1M]

Chill didn't affect bosses before?

FFS Cryptic

It was applied, but also instantly removed. This made the snap freeze talent better against bosses.

 

[Wild Slop]

I lost enough glory (~4,000) to buy a nice piece of armor before I realized it caps at 25,000. Use it or lose it.


Another contest : This time its the Hero of the North Pack priced at $199.99 (A $700 value )

" Braundlae's Best " is the answer being spammed, I didn't bother to do the D&D wiki lookup this time.

 

[Gerrard]

The Gauntlgrym thing is also up on the preview server, but you need to be in a guild to go there.