The Totally NEW Team Corwin Thread

Most of your voices are still hard to understand, because you speak so fast. :lol:

Especially peter's ? I don't think he (if this voice belongs to him) has changed the headset in 10 years …


I'm still kind of sad that i didn't get the 10th Anniversary of the game … But on the other hand, it was my worst year, and I still had lots of fun with SWTOR (even although that was already waning there, because of changes I didn't like …)

My father recruited me for garden work - which means that I'll have to be ready earlier than in my usual Saturdays. Which means that I'm out for today (or tonight, depending on time zone).

On the other hand my character Alrih - who is a first-lifer - got her level 9 during this week (the last bit was a Daily Dice roll).
She didn't take it yet, though.

So ... - not all is lost.

We'll have some toon swapping to do then.

1) DA run. The guy that needs the farming most won't be there, but everyone can always use tokens.
2) Mains for a Chronoscope. Alrik doesn't need the XP. Don't want to start White Plume since that's fairly new content that Alrik probably hasn't run. As long as we get it knocked out before the free quests run out (end of May), we're good.
3) Alts for the Keep? Alrik's lowest toons are lvl4 so we're catching up to him on the alts anyway. I don't know if everyone's ready for alts yet, though. I guess we'll find out and call an audible if we have to.

Important ! New Random Loot revamp on Lamannia ! : https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/515037-U46-Patch-2-Random-Loot-Revamp

Extract from there :

Minimum Level of Loot
When you open chests in content or complete quests, the level of random loot you roll will now exactly match the instance level of the content you are completing. For example, if you are in a level 3 dungeon on Elite, you will get level 5 loot and no higher.

Items and effects that previously increased the minimum level of random loot - such as the Greater Dragonmark of Finding - now increase the quality of that random loot instead. Jewels of Fortune are no longer available in-game and in the DDO Store, and in their place where they were available in-game you will find Treasure Hunter's Elixir's of the same magnitude instead. Unused Jewels of Fortune can be traded in for 2 of the same magnitude Treasure Hunter's Elixir in the House Cannith Crafting Hall, in the same place you can trade in spare Tomes for Dragonshard Fragments. Currently consumed Jewels of Fortune will provide the same effect as an equivalent rarity of Treasure Hunter's Elixir when this patch goes live.

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New Warlock Pacts : https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/515036-U46-Patch-2-New-Warlock-Pacts
[In short : 2 evil ones, only 1 good]

Preview Patch list (several rather important changes there, too) : https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/515035-U46-Patch-2-Preview

The loot revamp brings back armor material types like Mithral or Adamantite. The old dual-effect prefixes from MOTU-era loot, as well as the much-loved Thaumaturge Staves, are back as well. Normally wooden weapons like quarter sticks can also drop with silver, etc material types (good news for the resident stick bard of the group). Also it appears from the comments in the thread that Disruption is back (possibly Smiting/Banishing as well I hope).

The new Warlock pacts are there solely because I recently TRed Mirys into a Warlock. Cold looks like it'll be a solid alternative to Fire Warlocks; maybe not as much synergy with Tieflings, but still pretty strong. Celestial (electric) looks underwhelming though, and Abyss (undead/negative) not much better.

Alrik Fassbauer said:

Most of your voices are still hard to understand, because you speak so fast. :lol:

Especially peter's ? I don't think he (if this voice belongs to him) has changed the headset in 10 years …

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I'm changing headset about once per year. They rarely last longer than that. I think part of your problem understanding what we are saying is related to Teamspeak. I only use this for the Friday gaming sessions and finding appropriate voice settings has been a problem. Others have also mentioned that the voice from my Teamspeak seems to be cutting out from time to time.

I'm using Discord when playing with some DDO friends from other guilds. I don't have the same sound issues there. I'm also using Skype and other voice programs without sound issues.

So it's Teamspeak which is the culprit. However, I don't speak much when playing so late on the Friday runs so it's a minor issue. I haven't bothered to get to the core of the problem. It's not related to the actual headsets I'm using. My internet connection is 300 mbit/s so that's not the issue too.

It's also hard to communicate with a person who only listens and don't speak himself. That means we probably speak at the same speed as we usually do. It's e. g. impossible to know if what we were saying was understood or not. So getting our attention via party chat when you want something explained is probably a good idea. We can even type in our suggestions to ensure everything is understood. It's like when playing a PUG.

What are you doing to break headsets so fast? (Yes this is me talking) The good headset I got for xmas lasted about 5 years; even the Logitech cheap ones weren't dying of their own accord. Mostly by being eaten by cats or sat on. I still have one of the old ones, and it still works.

I've had fairly bad luck with headsets. I've had cheaper Logitechs and some more expensive ones. They've all snapped exactly where'd you'd expect them to do so. That's not the same spot for every headset, but there's generally a weak spot somewhere in the band a little above the ear.

Or maybe I just have a swelled head…

Got an Alienware set recently because it was 50% off (rewards bucks kinda thing). We'll see if it lasts any longer than the rest.

Plans for tomorrow, assuming we have full attendance:

obligatory DA run (I figure another couple weeks of this should be sufficient)
White Plume 6's
time allowing- back to 3BC for Garls pt1 and pt2
take level 9

Okay, I'll try to get at least a first look into White Plume's before that. Luckily I had taken the full Friday as my vacation day, as Thursday is a holiday here.

Besides, I've had the first one of these infamous Indian Microsoft Error Messages phone calls.

Maybe I should try if my ancient headset still works, but I'm so afraid of hearing my own voice, it always sounds so horrible to me ! :lol:

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azraelck said:

What are you doing to break headsets so fast? (Yes this is me talking) The good headset I got for xmas lasted about 5 years; even the Logitech cheap ones weren't dying of their own accord. Mostly by being eaten by cats or sat on. I still have one of the old ones, and it still works.

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The headsets are not always breaking. E. g. I had a wireless Logitech headset which I loved except for the fact it was very susceptible to interference from wireless networks. So it kept resetting for 2-3s every minute. Quite annoying. So it had to go. After that I only get wired headsets.

I've bought some light and functional headsets and they tend to break often. Maybe one reason is that several persons are using them so they get adjusted daily to different head sizes.

To avoid having headsets break in the frame I decided to purchase headsets with a metal frame. Those were sturdy, but heavier. Worst of all was that these tend to press on my ears and become uncomfortable after awhile. So these were ok for Skype, but not playing for hours on Teamspeak.

I managed to find the perfect combo between sound quality, comfort, weight and durability. Unfortunately my wife tripped over the wire of that headset and broke the USB plug. This headset is out of stock so I can't get the same one. I can get spare parts from USA, but at a price similar to buying a new one.

Then I bought the ones I have now (Razer something). These have good comfort and quite sturdfy, but the sound quality isn't the best. So I guess I will replace these one day when I get a chance.

Finding the perfect headset is like finding a needle in the haystack. The ones I love tend to break and the durable ones tend to not have good enough sound quality or become uncomfortable.

I just love my Sony headset on my Samsung Galaxy pad. Wireless, great sound and very comfortable. Unfortunately they are using Bluetooth. Will check if my PC can connect to them

You can get a USB receiver if your PC lacks built in bluetooth. Most newer laptops usually have bluetooth as well; heck even the POS I got from work has bluetooth. Probably doesn't work, and if it does, it won't after an update; I had to crack the admin account just to keep the damn cellular internet working. It goes down every time Windows updates.

That run we did was exhausting for me. At 5 in the early morning we had finished Garl Part II and that was when I didn't have any nerve to go on anymore.

Price For Freedom was in my eyes nothing but a terrible, long slog. It has reached its place among my personal top 5 most hated quests very quickly.

The other quests were done quite fast and were fun. Quite a number of deaths included.

The number of Named Loot I got from all of this was astonishingly low. When I'm getting Named Loot so easily in the Borderland Keep's quests and its Wilderness so easily that I have to resell them almost immediately (except when there's a Mystic Boost or how it is called), the other, higher level quests are not graced with Named Loot in my case. I was grateful that Peter passed 2 items to me. That made the total number of Named Loot I got from the run to 3.

However, Peter pointed me towards the Leather Gloves Of The Snake from the "Big Deal" quest, which means that I'll go farm it there - which is not bad, because I like that quest.

As an additional note, I must say that Elite or Reaper difficulty is often a bit too much for my (currently main) character, Alrih. I have often problems/difficulties in finding traps. Maybe it's because Alrih has 2 or 3 levels of a Favoured Soul as well.

Regarding Alrih, I guess that she has level 10 by now, being a firstlifer. She already had level 9 before the Friday run, but didn't take it so that the level range with the other chars would not be interrupted.

I saw that you were running White Plume on Alrih before the session started. You're already going to be gaining XP far too quickly as a first lifer so running that toon outside of the group will only make matters worse. That said, if you don't care about the very real possibility of having to run quests for 0XP, then there's no problem.

The combination of FvS levels plus 28pt build plus lack of gear is going to cause you to struggle a bit with some traps, even if you're just running elite. So it goes. We'll deal with it because that's what good parties do.

One thing you might consider is checking your extensive roster for another toon with trapping skills. The XP curve between 1st lifers and 3rd lifers is right at double which means that you could swap back and forth between two toons and keep up XP-wise with the group. It would be an additional complication for the poor bastard that Keeps the Book, but I expect that moron could probably make it work. It wouldn't be a huge undertaking to run one of your other toons up to lvl9 as several of us have other alt toons in the lower levels that could help if you needed it.

dteowner said:

One thing you might consider is checking your extensive roster for another toon with trapping skills.

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I have one sitting there at level 10, from the Veteran III Event ( a tiny event from last year's anniversary, characters could start at level 10). He's Rogue 8 Cleric 2 and fits way better for that. His name is Artflam, and he is in the list : https://www.rpgwatch.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1061601552&postcount=80
I haven't played that one much within the last months.

Alrih was originally *not* intended to be a trapper ! - but instead as an experimental quarterstaff Thief Acrobat build. The Favoured Soul levels were meant to experiment with the "Favoured Weapon" from Aureon - the Quarterstaff.
Alrih just grew into that role as a trapper, but that was never intended by me.

As soon as you reach level 10, I might switch towards Artflam if you need a trapper. Alrih will remain my experimental Thief Acrobat, then. Just for fun.

The other possibility would be that I'd switch into another role, and someone else would be the trapper. In my list I have a few characters at level 8, for example Senha, a Sorc. She does have Favoured Soul levels as well, though.

Most of my characters are there for experimenting with builds. They are there just for fun. That's why I have only very few pure builds.

I could try out a pure rogue trapper as well, but Artflam was intended by me to be one (his Cleric levels were meant to be for survival - especially self-healing and remove poison / disease (Illness) ).

I have an Artificer sitting for many years at level 11. I don't even remember anymore what he was built for. (Aracaram)

The only other almost pure Rogue I have is meant to be an Assassin. (Tirinha)






Thread from the forums : A guild seemingly kicked almost empty by an officer before he left : https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/515097-Whatever-happened-to-the-Adventurer-s-Guild

Trapping is really heavily gear dependent; without the best search and disable items you can get for your level, you'll struggle with traps in most quests. Though if the Favored Soul level came at 1, you may be seriously short on skill points. Rogue/Artificer multiclass builds always take a Rogue/Arty level first, to get the mass of bonus skill points. Without them, it's nearly impossible to catch up. Most multi-class trapper builds tend to be for classes like Bard or Ranger that get a ton of skill points, or Wizard and Alchemist which are INT-based and get a ton of skill points. I've ran both a Wizard trapper and a Ranger Exploiter (Ranger with trap skills and able to do practically everything), although those were ages ago.

Price for Freedom is definitely one of the less liked quests for me as well. I spent nearly the entire thing trying to do an aggravating puzzle up above the roof. It was still better than running the quest normally. Even so, I still ended up dying once in the end fight.

We had the further complication that Peter and my spells are not compatible. My best spell kills his, so we were severely handicapped in that way. We all died multiple times.

It might be a good idea to keep the two sorcerers split then, if your both counteracting each other. Since you're an ice sorc, you'd work well with JM's Wizard, since you won't wipe out her webs (though CM can handle that too! ).

I agree, we need to think about complementary groupings where we support each other, rather than damaging others spells when we cast ours.

I'm seriously thinking of subscribing for a limited time - is it possible to get a time-limited subscription for 1 or 2 months ?