Things I Hate About Update 12

There really isn't much that I didn't like about the update, which is good right? That's how it is supposed to be. There were a few things though so let's get down to it.


Shared Platinum Bank Account

When I first heard about this I thought it would be great...but the execution ruined it for me. Even at its cheapest this feature will still run you close to 5 dollars of your hard earned cash (and almost seven at the other end of the spectrum). Why would anyone want to spend that much money for a feature that can essentially be used already?

While I'll stand by the shared bank account until the end of times, this shared platinum vault thing is a waste of your money. If you want to share money between your characters just draft up a letter, it will save you money that you should be spending on adventure packs anyway.

Homunculus Enhancements

This one is appearing on both the positive and negative lists...and this is really just a nitpick issue but still...why can't a lawful homunculus destroy boxes? I get that they're trying to draw some parralell between destructive impulses and the chaotic alignment, but I really feel like the Hunter of Boxes enhancement should have been separate from the new alignment enhancements.

Earthgrab

DAMNIT! Quit nerfing this move please. *sighs* Earthgrab is one of my favorite things to exploit. First they lower the criticals on helpless victims, and now they don't even count it as a paralysis effect. Don't get me wrong, that's helpful if you are fighting clerics who can cast curative magics, but most of the time this wasn't an issue. I agree that this should have been changed, I'm merely bummed out because I loved exploiting it. Oh well, time to find something else.

Things I Like About Update 12

Wow, this one was a biggie. There happens to be quite a lot that I like about this update so let's just dive right in ok? (Note: I'm not even going to try to cover challenges just yet, those are getting their own post).

Character Renaming
Oh thank Pelor...sorry I mean Arawai...THIS is something I feel should have been included in the game a long time ago. Yeah, ORCSLayer69 may have seemed like a cool name for your human barbarian at one point but...well, that was before you realized the way you capitalized things helps to explain the origin of the half-orc race.

Spells
A few spells and their descriptions have been cleaned up, but what I like most are the changes to Flame Arrows and Conjure Bolts. The former can finally use masterwork arrows as a spell component AND lasts until logout (as opposed to the end of the instant). Suddenly I'm starting to consider taking it a lot more. As for Conjured Bolts, well, I don't know if you've played an artificer or rogue mechanic yet, but those repeating crossbows EAT crossbow bolts in droves. Well, now you no longer have to take up several of your slots just to make sure you don't run out in combat...they stack to 1000! Now if only they'd let us stick them in quivers too...

Items
Oh my wizard, no longer will you need be afraid of holding onto those motes of night and winter until the next festival...because they changed the weight on a lot of these items. I think the most notable change happens to be to the essences. At higher levels you require so many of these it hurts my mind sometimes, and that means that people with low strength (most of your archetypal crafters) suffer mightily by having to carry hundreds of them. But not anymore, thank you Turbine. My weak ass bard is grateful.

Pet
Um, I don't care about the other ones they introduced...I just love that I can make my defender destroy boxes again. I happen to HATE going around and breaking my boxes with my artificer...mostly because it takes a long time to do so with my bolts and I happen to be too lazy to switch to unarmed (even though I hotkeyed it). Now my pet will do that for me, resulting in a bonus to xp.

Clarity
So many things have been tightened up, in particular they did a nice job on the monk stances. Not that I play a monk anymore, but still, good job guys.

Hirelings

Poor hirelings

There are two things I like that they changes about how these guys operate. 1) Arcance casters will no longer rush into melee to use their ranged spells...oh thank god. 2) The little floating indicator thing (this goes for pets too) really helps my impatience. I used to hit those command buttons over and over again, now I can stop when I realize he's heard my command.

Now that I think about it, I guess I was the DDO Navi "Hey! Listen! Look! Come Here! Listen! Look!..."