Comments on: Dungeons & Dragons: Still Online, Also Free

By: Clandian07

Clandian07 — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 17:44:14 +0000

Oh, cool! I didn’t know that Dungeons and Dragon is still being played. Well it’s true, I was swept away by grinding
warcraft gold and raiding in Warcraft so I was not really aware that D&D still exists. Good thing to know since I’m thinking about trying it out as well.

By: geldonyetich

geldonyetich — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 18:58:13 +0000

So, the Fileplanet Beta is being offered, and the NDA is lifted.

Personally, I’m thinking “Free with Micropayments” is a very good price for Dungeons and Dragons Online. It was never a bad game, it just never quite had that virtual-world appeal that entices one to pay $15/mo. It was always more Guild Wars than EverQuest.

So, to a great extent, this new pricing system feels like I’m really meeting Dungeons and Dragons Online for the first time. As if, up until now, it’s been living a lie. DDO: Unlimited is very much a contender for being my main MMO squeeze.

By: Dominic White

Dominic White — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 19:04:34 +0000

Also, I’d love to see this business model applied to all MMOs. Everyone wins, really. If you just want something to play for free for a while with friends, you’ve got it. If you plan on playing it exclusively, you can subscribe to get everything, but if you want to expand when you want and permanently, you can do that to.

No doubt some people will complain about people paying money getting the better product, but these people need a short, sharp slap and a reminder that you don’t get multi-million dollar games for free without being a filthy pirate.

By: Dominic White

Dominic White — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 18:39:17 +0000

Now that I think about it, I won’t be surprised if there’s a huge migration of players from the EU to US version.

The EU version you have to pay for as a boxed product, and then pay monthly for, wheras the US version gives you about 1/4 of the game (ooh, shades of shareware, perhaps?) free, and gives you the option to either subscribe to get it all (and at a faster rate than the EU version, as the US one is run by the developers themselves and not a third-party publisher), or buy content in chunks as you want to use them.

There really seems to be no real advantage to sticking to the EU servers.

By: Serondal

Serondal — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 17:07:28 +0000

I actually played this game for about a year and REALLY enjoyed it. I played as a dwarf warrior and really got the feel of BEING a dwarf warrior. Stout and standing still in door ways blocking enemies as my party mates fire spells and arrows over me. Standing still actaully MATTERED because it gave you a bonus to your defense ect. Very good game indeed.

By: Solar

Solar — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 09:34:45 +0000

Table top RPG will always win due to the flexibility players can take with the rules system (whichever system you play), auto balancing rules and excitement as the game unfolds. Of course this completely relies on the experience and ingenutity of the GM and players to give the right balance for the game. While online/computer based RPGs have stringent rules (patch to patch variation of course), the main advantage is being able to get together to play across the globe. To have something even close to table top play is a bonus due to familiarity more than anything else. Looking forward to this.

Psychopomp re URL name: Have you wrote something in the ‘website’ option? Otherwise I’ve no idea.

On other info:
Got relative confirmation that you can set up US account as long as you purchase a US game and register Turbine account with US flag.

By: Psychopomp

Psychopomp — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 04:10:02 +0000

“It is still a real roleplaying game”

Well, at least *one* of the detractors can admit that. The holier-than-thou “4th is all combat lolz” got annoying. Fast.

“the DM doesn’t so much run the game as administer the system, with players guaranteed a certain amount of character advancement and loot.”
This is really all down to DM’ing style, there *are* those of us who run 4th edition, who consider the rules to be little more than guidelines, just as we do with every other system.

All in all though, I *still* prefer non-d20 based systems, 4th just solved a lot of my gripes with DnD.
Namely, 1)players treating their alignment as the definition of their character, and not the other way around, and
2)MASSIVE BALANCE ISSUES. Seriously, what the hell is up with multiclassing in 3rd/3.5?

Edit:Also, inspired by MMO’s=/=as deep as them
Last I checked, the only choices you got to make with your characters in MMO’s is what gear you take, and where to put your talent point.

There’s still dizzying amount of possible characters in 4th edition, when you add multiclassing into the mix.

Paladin/barbarian <3

Edit 2:Why is there a URL in my name?

By: Stromko

Stromko — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 00:17:06 +0000

I played 4th ed for about six sessions (over the course of maybe 8 weeks or so) with one of the local groups at the community college. It just didn’t scratch that tabletop itch.

Taken alone it’s a pretty good system. It’s designed to give an almost predetermined amount of joy, with the rest depending on how much you like spending time with your gaming group. The DM doesn’t so much run the game as administer the system, with players guaranteed a certain amount of character advancement and loot. It’s all level-locked, with each level being only a few percentage points better than the previous so that one PC’s never much stronger than any other. Each has one or two clearly defined, narrow roles(such as DPS or crowd control) and so they must depend on the other party members. A bad GM who follows the rules can still give a good play experience with 4th ed, it’s much easier to run to give players the experience they expect.

This would be well and good, but 3.5 is no longer supported and no longer being licensed (or so I’ve heard), so for anything new, it’s 4th edition or.. something else. That’s not to say the books are spontaneously combusting and forcing us to buy new ones, whoever’s running the publisher now lacks that power thankfully. I’m lucky enough to have a choice between playing in a 3.5 Eberron campaign or a 4th edition generic or Forgotten Realms campaign every week. Sponsored events are of course going to be all about pushing 4th edition now, but if you can find a group outside of that then you should still have a choice.

As a marketing decision, 4th edition is genius. It gives all those WoW players something to do every weekend aside from raiding. It is still a real roleplaying game, and if it attracts new players I’d give it kudos, but it’s a more narrowly defined and level-stepped experience than I’m used to.

By: Psychopomp

Psychopomp — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 20:16:55 +0000

@Badger

If it’s dull and un-flavorful, you’re playing with a bad DM.

The problem with 4E isn’t 4E, it’s that many people won’t give it a fair chance.

By: Funky Badger

Funky Badger — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 19:12:36 +0000

4th Ed’s already a simplified version of MMO-of-the-week. Very dull and un-flavourful. If that’s even a word.

(Clerics in 3rd Ed are just about the hardest characters you could want to pick)

By: Mentalepsy

Mentalepsy — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 18:56:10 +0000

Well, you have more experience with it than I do. I only played the first solo tutorial mission. I mostly stealthed it and ignored the monsters and breakable crates, which of course meant that I missed out on a good bit of XP. Granted, a group is going to kill everything anyway, so it probably doesn’t matter that much.

By: Tei

Tei — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 18:43:39 +0000

@Mentalepsy: My point is…. you get reward all the XP only trough the success of the group. If you play poorly, tryiing to get more XP from the mission, and the group fail, you fail. So the group sucess is the thing that is important, any other individual bonus are cool, but is not the focus of the game. Note: I could be very wrong, cause I am a newbie on the game.