Christmas

Hi guys,
I'm going to the Czech Republic for two weeks this Thursday, and there's a lot of stuff I need to prepare and loads of work to do before I leave so I probably won't be online much, if at all, until this weekend. My schedule will also be busier than usual while I'm in CZ (even though I'll have a few days off) this time so I might not get to play much. I'll try to pop in occasionally though.
Have fun, take care  and if I don't see you for a while, Merry Christmas. :)
Mic

Stuff to run

Hi guys,

Just thought I'd let you know what I intend to run in the near future so we can try to plan some semi-scheduled or regular runs if any of you need shinies from the same quests. Yes, we all know that my and Hannah's times are quite unpredictable, but we could at least give it a go, we do usually play on Friday nights and weekends when we're not walking/visiting people.

Fens - quick EH runs for gloves and bracers seals and shards
Chronoscope - I need two seals and shards of Gem of Many Facets. Now that EH Chrono is so easy it hardly requires any leadership skills, I wouldn't mind starting some groups. ;)
Devil Assault - EH, large Shroud ingredients and epic tokens
Shroud - hard runs, I'm a bit reluctant to pug this now and I'm not sure how quickly groups will fill as interest in Shroud has dropped quite a bit lately, but it's still a good source of ingredients, loot and renown
Demonweb chain - I need to flag a couple of characters for CitW so I can pike on aLiclan runs :)

I also have two level 16s and one level 8 that I want to cap so anything around those levels is fine. I can play with 16s at any time but I'm leveling my 8 with Hannah so would probably only play that one when she is on and up for it, too.

Mabar is on

Just in case you didn't know, Mabar is now on and should run until the 6th November at least, possibly a little longer as Turbine have said they would extend it a bit to make up for the delayed start.
It's pretty much the same as before except the graveyard instance is now divided into a few level ranges and you can select which level range you want to enter. The dragon fight is exactly the same as before. As for the loot, the items are the same as well but there is an additional level 24 upgrade for all of them and the 24 versions of the handwraps, the cloak and the robe/docent aren't too shabby.

For more information check out the wiki: http://ddowiki.com/page/Mabar_Endless_Night_Festival

M.

Quiet

Hi guys,

Looks like we're having a bit of a quiet period with Hanne playing some new single player games, also I've had a pretty busy week at work (and I'm still going to be busy for a couple days) and I think we might have lost Tangy to boredom or maybe another game as well, at least for the time being. I think some people might be checking out Guild Wars 2, I hope at least some of them come back. :)
I'll be back when I have more time to play though and I have some gear farming and leveling plans for Ganthra, my fighter I've brought over from Ghallanda. I might be bringing one or two more toons in the near future and I'll be trying to find the time to play them.

So hopefully see in you game soon. :)

M.

Back

Hi dudes, Hannah and I are back from holiday now. Looking forward to catching up with you guys in game soon!

M+H

Ship buffs lost again - how to help

Hi dudes,
So with today's "hotfix", Turbine managed to wipe out all ship buffs again, for the second time over the last 4 days (the first time was when the expansion went live and Hannah spent some 200k plat renewing everything).

I'm not going to waste time ranting about how unbelievably useless Turbine are and suggest a way to help fix the damage at least partially instead. They are now offering a discount coupon on ship amenity purchases in the store as a "compensation". It's worth 900 TP and can be used once per account, which is a joke for a guild like ours and doesn't even begin to cover the losses, but it still saves a little bit of plat.

If you want to help, please go to the store, put a Greater Experience Shrine contract (wa week's worth) in your cart and apply a "Ship01" coupon when you check out. The XP shrine is the most expensive amenity in terms of plat so it makes the most sense to use the coupon on it. The coupon is worth 900 TP and the shrine is 600 TP so you can try to fit in some more amenities in (the discount can't be used on anything else afaik) but, to be honest, there isn't really anything worthwhile you can buy for 300 TP or less so you could just spend the whole coupon on the shrine and not bother about anything else.
Then add the contract to buy a Greater Experience Shrine and put it on upper deck where the old one was. If it's already there, use the contract to add another week to it. If it's already full (more then 5 weeks), save it for later and use it in a week or two, but with our current number of active people I'm not even sure we'll put the 5 weeks together. I foolishly spent my coupon on another server because I thought it was 1 per server but I'll pay the plat to renew everything else.

As for the other amenities:
+2 Ability (Str/Con/etc.) Shrines and Greater Energy Resist Shrines - I'll buy a week on each for now and increase that when I have some more plat - I'm pretty broke at the moment.
Crew members - dtto, they're not expensive plat-wise so I expect it won't be a problem to renew those.
Shroud crafting Altars (Invasion and Devastation) - these are seldom used so let's leave the slots free for now, if anyone wants to use them, just buy 1 week.
Guild chest - seldom used but I'll buy one when I have some plat.

Thoughts on expansion after the first two days

Just re-posting what I said on the official forums, in case someone's considering buying the expansion or resubbing and is wondering whether it's worth it.

The new content itself seems very impressive. I love the HUGE new areas, the graphics, the music and the atmosphere. I haven't seen all of it yet and I've only done a handful of new quests, but what I've seen has been very good so far, well designed in true Turbine tradition.

The bugs are plentiful, some of them are quite annoying and I can understand how they might put some people off, but after some polishing and a few patches it'll all be fine. Yes, all of this should've been done before the release, the QA sucks etc., but those who love the game will get over it.

Nerfs don't bother me, as long as my characters are still fun to play, I'll adapt.

Expansion - important bugs, changes and what not to do

So as we all expected, the new expansion, despite the fact it looks like it's running more or less smoothly at first sight, is full of bugs and issues. In this thread I'll try to summarize the ones I think are important, to help people avoid some frustration and disappointment.

In general, I would advise that people hold off making significant changes to their characters, like respeccing, TRing etc. Turbine has a long history of breaking things that already worked fine. Personally I'm just going to run around in the new content and marvel at the new graphics for a couple days until they release one or two hot fixes that will address the most important issues.

So these are issues I want to point out. I'll expand the list as I discover new bugs :) Feel free to suggest stuff that you think should be added here, poke me in game or use the comments here:

• Don't use the free Lesser Reincarnation from Kruz, it seems to deactivate some favour rewards and, more importantly, tome benefits:
• http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=379394&highlight=tomes
• http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=359681
• http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=362163
• The +4d6 extra sneak attack damage part of Rogue Deadly Shadows capstone is broken. It still adds the +2 Int though iirc. Think Temro has one or two pure rogues so they'll be affected.

A small update

Hi dudes,
As you've probably noticed, I haven't been online much, a consequence of a busy period at work combined with some nice weather combined with renewed interest in some of my other hobbies. I usually play less over the summer, which is probably going to be the case again this year, but I will keep popping in. If I remember correctly, the big expansion is coming out on Wednesday next week so I expect to spend more time online then to explore all the new shiny stuff (and all the new annoying bugs that are inevitably coming :p). EDIT: It's actually coming out today, the scheduled downtime is 11am to 4pm UK time, although where they manage that and whether the game's actually playable afterwards remains to be seen. The latest version of the release notes can be found here. For those who don't follow DDO news, here's a very brief list of what's new in the expansion:

• New areas, quests and raids set in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting
• Druid class
• Epic levels and epic destinies, level cap increase to 25
• Some significant changes to the combat and metamagic mechanics

It also seems that one of our longest serving members, Khyr, who's been on hiatus, is starting to play again a bit, which is great news. Welcome back, Khyr!

See you in game soon.

Mic :)

Build Your Guild

So today I actually took the time to read what the Build Your Guild event is all about - when Tangy leveled up and got us 70+ k renown, I was intrigued!
Apart from the renown bit, there's an XP bonus for grouping with guildies so I thought it might be time to do some leveling together again. Unfortunately we seem to be a bit scattered as for level ranges, I have a level 10 and level 16, Tangy is 12, not sure about others. Anyway, this is what I'm currently looking to do on my characters, give me a shout if you want to join me for these or any other XP runs:
Reckluse 10 - VON flagging on elite, level 8 Necro tombs on elite, possibly Threnal
Micron 16 - Fleshmaker elite, any other Orchard quests for sigil bits + Litany once I get full sigil, Crucible elite, other GH quests on any difficulty including Tor elite and normal with dragons, Siegebreaker series and others - not too picky.
EDIT: According to this, there's also a +25% XP bonus starting on the 10th of May. Apparently it's on until Sunday inclusive.

Challenges

Hi dudes,
As we have started running the challenges in House Cannith lately, I thought I'd throw in a couple useful DDO Wiki links. Turbine have apparently got into the habit of adding a new crafting line with almost every update and it's difficult to keep up. There is now Cannith crafting, Shroud crafting, Challenge crafting, Alchemical crafting, Stone of Change crafting, Epic crafting, Crystal Cove crafting and god knows what else, each with is own freaking ingredient types. They really try hard to make people spend some TP on ingredient bags. :p At least they make use of the barter box interface fairly often, which makes things a bit easier.

Anyway, if you want to craft challenge rewards, you need to run certain quests, each of which drops a different ingredient.
Basic info - an overview of the challenge rewards, what quests you need to run for which ingredients
Weapons - a more detailed overview of weapons that can be made with all levels and tiers and a listing of all available weapon types.
Ingredient trading - the ingredients can be exchanged for different ones at a 2:1 rate, so you could for example spend more time farming one easy challenge and subsequently trade the ingredients from it for a different type that drops in a harder challenge.

Going to CZ for two weeks

Yes, it's that time again, I'm going on holiday to my homeland tomorrow (Friday). I'll be busy, but knowing myself, I will pop in occasionally albeit maybe at strange times so you might not see much of me at the usual times. If I don't see you, be nice to each other, behave and have fun. :)
M.

Trading for TP or expansion codes

I've been seeing quite a few trade posts like this one lately, where people trade unique/named/rare in-game items for Turbine Points codes or, in this case, the expansion code. Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe these things can only be bought for real life money. You pay $$$ and pass the code, you get shiny loot, more or less buying-from-platfarmers style.
Needless to say, I won't have any of that in the guild - I've added it to the no-no things in our recruitment thread.

Guess what

We've recruited another Danish person. Chatuyscha, Xarazeen and Znutar are his toons (levels 15, 14 and 8 respectively I think, all of them TRs). He used to play on Ghallanda and now has started anew on Thelanis. No, Chataya who joined a couple days ago isn't an alt of his, it's another person with a similar name.
Hannah and I are going to Derbyshire tomorrow night, so we won't be on much this weekend. If you see Chatuyscha online, say hi and invite him to groups if doing stuff in one of his characters' level range.

Level 70, a new member, the return of the Danes and epics

So last night we had our global level 70 announcement, go us! Thanks to everyone for their contribution. When I next log in, I will put an Altar of Devastation on the ship, which means we will now be able to craft tier 3 Shroud items without setting foot in the Shroud (assuming we have the ingredients of course :)) - there are tier 1 and 3 altars on the ship and tier 2 can be crafted in the Shavarath Battlefield. We are also technically a Large Guild now and we can use items that have large guild augment slots (see this Wiki page to find out what you can put in these slots).
We also recruited a new member yesterday, his name is Chataya and he hails from Poland. He's a new player and has only one character at the moment, a level 8 rogue (a halfling!). Be nice to him and invite him to groups if you're doing quests in his level range.
Apart from this, our current number of active accounts has gone up a bit since a couple of our migrating Danish players have made an appearance. Get in the game to say hi to them before they disappear again!

Also, now that epic scrolls are dropping again and the Easter XP galore is over, we are planning to do more epic runs. We are currently running House P (Snitch, Big Top), House D (Bargain, Tides), Red Fens (Last Stand, Fathom) and we can do other quests as well if people need them. With any luck, I'll cap Micron soon and we'll be able to have a go at Epic Devil Assault guild runs as well (we are missing a high DC crowd control caster at the moment).

Kenseificer

Another build idea for Reckluse's 3rd life. This one's an odd hybrid, which I find appealing in a way, and even though I still like the Misanthropic Bard build I contemplated some time ago, this is much closer to what I had in mind for Reckluse as I was planning to roll him back in 2009 when I was coming to the US servers. It was my intention to only have one character in the US while waiting for EU toons to be transferred and as such I wanted it to be a fun to play, self-sufficient all-rounder - I knew next to noone here and imagined I would solo a lot. Even though I'm no longer in that situation now, I still like the idea and this dude should meet the requirements - he's not exceptional at anything, but decent in several areas and capable of looking after himself. People won't be dying to get him in their raid groups but, frankly, he doesn't care a lot. :)

Having played barb18/rogue2 at cap for a while now, I know for sure it's not for me. The speed and the DPS are nice, but since I don't like waiting for groups and tend to solo/short-man a lot, it's pain in the bum having to dismiss rage whenever I want to use a clicky/scroll or disable a trap. This build will be able to do pretty much everything the barb can do, the DPS won't be far off and it will be able to heal up and use stuff on the go. It even gets to use repeaters, which was my original plan for the first life (as the character I had in mind was mildly inspired by the Stranger), only repeaters weren't as viable then as they are now so I went with ranger and bows in the end.

What this build can do:

Melee - Kensei II using scimitars - I have a few and want to make use of them. I have a Kensei II on Ghallanda and while they lack the hp or hate gen to properly tank, the raw DPS is okay.

Ranged - repeater goodness including Improved Crit Ranged and all the artificer bits. No Improved Precise Shot though. Ranged will mostly be used to get rid of distant casters or archers and to stun high HP things with wounding of puncturing.

Skills - with some buffing and gear swapping, all traps but the most difficult ones will be doable. Maxed UMD for Heal, Restoration, Displacement, GH, Raise Dead etc.

Self-heals - full dragonmarks enhanced with metas for healing in battle, no fail Heal scroll usage. Concentration not maxed though so scrolls will primarily be used to top-up between encounters.

Evasion

Figther 12 / Artificer 6 / Monk 2

Halfling, Lawful Neutral

Strength - base 14 - 44 consistently with Power Surge and ship buffs, 52 temporarily with Titan's grip and Rage

Dexterity - base 16 - final 26

Constitution - base 16 - final 26 (28 if I manage to get Epic Brawn's Spirits as I'm hoping to)

Intelligence - base 14 to fit all the skills in, put item on for traps and ranged damage

Wisdom - base 12 - final 22

Charisma - base 8 - final 16 with item on for UMD

The Strength score assumes a +3 tome which I don't have at the moment but intend to do some farming for. Will also need a +3 Wisdom to offset the -1 on Epic Brawn's Spirits if I ever get that. Dex and Con include +3 tomes I already have.

Feats and leveling

1 - Artificer - Least Mark

2 - Fighter - bonus: Weapon Focus Slashing

3 - Monk - Maximize; bonus: TWF

4 - Monk - bonus: Toughness

5-7 - Artificer - Lesser Mark, bonus: Point Blank Shot

8-18 - Fighter - Greater Mark, Imp Crit Ranged, Precise Shot, Empower; bonus: PA, Imp Crit Slash, ITWF, Weapon Spec Slashing, GTWF, Greater Weapon Spec Slashing

19-20 - Artificer

HP = 574 unbuffed assuming Epic Brawn's Spirits and Epic Ring of Stalker with stuff slotted in them

AC = low 50s self-buffed - not nearly enough for endgame but okay for farming; if I feel like it, I could spend some time farming additional AC gear to make it a bit more interesting; not sure I can be bothered though. :)

Saves
Too lazy to calculate the exact values right now, I'll do it later. Fortitude won't be a problem, Reflex should be okay, I'm only a bit concerned about Will again, considering I will solo a lot and won't have my own FoM.

Enhancements

Kensei II + pre-reqs

Scimitar Mastery II and Scimitar Specialisation I

Battle Engineer + pre-reqs

Extra Dragonmark IV

Halfing Dex II, Figther Str III, Monk Wis I

Racial Toughness II, Fighter Toughness IV, Tortoise I

Artificer Wand/Scroll Mastery II

Improved UMD I

Skills
Full ranks in UMD, Search and Disable. 12 ranks in Open Lock and a wee bit in Concentration, Balance and Tumble.

Gear
Head - Min II +45 hp +6 con skills (also considering Epic Chimera's Crown and making a Min II cloak instead)
Goggles - Tharne's
Neck - Shintao / Verik's / Torc / Silver Flame
Trinket - Epic Brawn's Spirits (Blood Stone until I get that)
Cloak - Air Guard / Conc Opp (both with +5 charisma skills), might make one with int skills, too
Armour - DT robe, 10% heal amp, 20% heal amp, +3 Dodge
Belt - Knost's (GFL, +6 Con) (can also aim for Epic Spare Hand with +6 Con and GFL slotted)
Bracers - Fabricator's (Resistance)
Gloves - Fabricator's (Str)
Ring - Epic Ring of the Stalker with slotted +6 Dex & +1 exc Con (Tumbleweed until I get that)
Ring - Kyosho or Warchanter with crafted +2 exc Str or an Int ring for traps/ranged dmg
Boots - Striding / Anchoring

Scimmies - Min II, Lit II, Rad II, one day maybe Cannith crafted boss beaters, too
Repeaters - Lit II, WoP

There is potential for improvements in this gear setup of course, but knowing how good I am at farming, I'm staying down to earth and planning for stuff that I might actually get at some point.

I'm pretty excited about playing this. If I had the points to buy a heart, I would probably start leveling it straight away.

The build could be adjusted to work without the dragonmarks, freeing up 5 feats and 10 AP and giving up some self-sufficiency for additional offensive/tactical abilities. I would probably spend the feats on Oversized TWF, Stunning Blow, Precise and Improved Precise Shot and one other. The AP would be spent on the Stunning Blow enhancements.

Egg hunt rewards

Just a note on the egg hunt rewards, if you have some blessings left, you might want to consider not getting the highest (Ultimate) aura and turning your blessing in with the tier IV (Major) aura on instead. It seems that the most common reward for Ultimate aura is the +2 stacking supreme ability pot that lasts 10 minutes, while the usual reward for Major aura is a Medium XP pot that gives +10% XP for 6 hours. Don't know about others but I consider the XP pot a much more useful reward.

Calendar out, Tweets in

Hi guys, I've got rid of the Calendar widget. We don't do a whole lot of scheduled runs so having a Google calendar was a bit of an overkill. I've set up a Twitter account to just post quick messages any time I decide to do something specific. It's much faster than faffing with the calendar. If anyone's interested, I can also share the username and pwd with other people so you can post your own runs. I think this is better for when people just want to quickly check if something's going on - you don't need to go to Twitter, you can just check the widget here on the blog.
Also planning to retweet interesting DDO related stuff, like nice sales in the store etc.

This weekend

Hi guys, we've had to postpone the stuff planned for this Friday until next week - I didn't realize we were going to Derbyshire for the weekend. I might (just might) be on on Thursday and we could do something together then, but I've had a super busy week at work, so I'm not really sure.
Anyway, we've hit level 65 now, we're on a roll! Three cheers to Oss and his renown pots. :p

DDO Expansion coming this summer

An expansion to DDO has just been announced. It's - supposedly :p - coming this summer and it's going to be set in the Underdark underground realm in Forgotten Realms, looks like we'll be facing Llolth, the spider queen.
Also level cap raise to 25 and druid class.

http://www.ddo.com/underdark/

A thread on the official DDO forum in which people have been compiling all available info and clues so far:
http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=358499

Discuss on here or on the TNB forum if you like :)

Personally I'm quite excited. :)

Mic