Update 14 Expansion Open Beta Release Notes

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Release Notes: Update 14 Expansion Open Beta

Welcome to the Update 14, Menace of the Underdark Expansion Beta Release Notes for Dungeons & Dragons Online! These release notes were posted on Wednesday, June 6th, 2012. These notes are subject to changes and additions.

News & Notes

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Of Special Note

Forgotten Realms Campaign

Players can now journey into the Forgotten Realms! Note that in this strange new land, familiar objects may appear differently than you're accustomed to! The "Campaign System" can now be found in Forgotten Realms content in addition to Korthos Island, to help Eberron immigrants arriving in Forgotten Realms learn where the basics are (particularly in cases where features they know and recognize in Eberron might look slightly different in Faerun). Forgotten Realms mailboxes appear as carrier pigeon message boxes. The mail map icon remains the same. Rest and resurrection shrines of Faerun bear the symbols of Forgotten Realms deities. The Rest Shrine bears the moon symbol of Selune The Resurrection Shrine bears the sun symbol of Amaunator

Level Cap Increase: Epic Levels

Players can now advance into Epic levels! You may now level your character to level 25. Character levels 1 - 19 are now known as "Heroic" levels. All levels 20+ are considered "Epic" levels.

New Expansion

The Menace of the Underdark Expansion is now available! The shadow of Lolth has cast darkness over the kingdom of Cormyr where heroes struggle to stem the unrelenting tide of the Drow forces. The hopes of the Realms lie with champions from Eberron, whose world has become entangled in Lolth's schemes, bringing them to Faerun where they will make the final stand against the Queen of the Demonweb! Featuring a multitude of epic adventures, unprecedented new wilderness areas with challenging objectives, a host of dungeons and more! Explore deep into the King’s Forest and defend the village of Eveningstar from Lolth’s Drow legions! Venture down into the Underdark and confront Lolth’s elite followers in the Drow city of Schindylryn! Journey to Lolth’s home plane in this Raid quest, battle demon hordes and confront the spider goddess herself as you attempt to stop her scheme! To purchase this expansion, visit our purchase page by clicking here. Multiple purchase packages available!

Important Open Beta Note: To access Menace of the Underdark Expansion content on Lamannia, your account must have purchased the Expansion as we test account-level permissions prior to the launch of the Expansion. Purchase of the Expansion during Open Beta will enable your account to access MOTU in the Lamannia environment.

Introducing Epic Destinies!

Take your character customization to the next level with our new Epic Destinies system! Included with purchase of the Menace of the Underdark Expansion, this Epic level enhancement system brings all new abilities, attacks, and opportunities for glory!

• Epic Destinies allow you to obtain new special buffs, boosts, and attacks as you level up in them.
• The shortcut to open your Epic Destinies UI s Ctrl-E
• Upon reaching level 20, any XP you earn will count towards your character level and your Epic Destinies simultaneously! You may continue to advance to character level 25, while earning XP towards an Epic Destiny at the same time. After reaching character level cap, you may continue to advance Epic Destiny XP, and to level up additional Epic Destinies!
  • You may only advance the XP of an Epic Destiny so long as you are level 20 or higher.
• Only one Epic Destiny may be active at one time, but you may change between the Epic Destiny of your choice by speaking with a Fatespinner! Fatespinners are located in the town of Eveningstar and in the Marketplace of Stormreach. Speak with the Fatespinner at any time to switch which Destiny you are currently earning XP towards and utilizing. You may speak with a Fatespinner as often as you want to switch active Destinies.
• Each class may access Epic Destinies that are closely associated with their sphere of influence:
  • Arcane (Artificers, Bards, Sorcerers, Wizards) may select from:
    • Draconic Incarnation
    • Fatesinger
    • Magister
  • Divine (Clerics, Favored Souls, Paladins) may select from:
    • Exalted Angel
    • Unyielding Sentinel
  • Martial (Fighters, Monks, Rogues) may select from:
    • Legendary Dreadnought
    • Grandmaster of Flowers
    • Shadowdancer
  • Primal (Barbarians, Druids, Rangers) may select from:
    • Fury of the Wild
    • Shiradi Champion
• Players may continue to advance in further Epic Destinies that neighbor their sphere of influence. Use the map view to visualize how near or far other Destinies are to your current one!
• You may pay platinum to the Fatespinner to respec an Epic Destiny at any time, though subsequent respecs increase in cost (this cost increase resets after 3 days). You may also purchase a respec in the DDO Store using a Loom of Destiny.
• As you progress in Epic character levels, you will earn Action Points that can be spent in the Epic Destiny system to acquire Twists of Fate! Players may select particular aspects of one of their Epic Destinies to retain, regardless of which Epic Destiny they have active!
• It is possible to advance every type of Destiny over time, regardless of your starting class. By using Twists of Fate, you may retain your favorite parts of multiple Destinies!

To purchase the Menace of the Underdark expansion, visit our purchase page by clicking here. Multiple purchase packages available!

Important Open Beta Note: To access Menace of the Underdark Expansion content on Lamannia, your account must have purchased the Expansion as we test account-level permissions prior to the launch of the Expansion. Purchase of the Expansion during Open Beta will enable your account to access MOTU in the Lamannia environment.

Introducing The Druid

Challenge the Drow of the Underdark as a Druid from the wilds of Eberron! Starting with Menace of the Underdark, DDO’s first shape-shifting class, the Druid, will be available as a premium playable class -- and free to all VIPs! Proficient with staves, daggers, clubs, sickles, and more; the Druid is a powerful caster who is able to fill a variety of party roles.

• Take the Druidic oath and get closer to nature - Druids must avoid metal armors & shields in order to retain their nature-influenced powers.
• Harness animal instincts to transform yourself into one of the Druidic wildshape forms!
  • Wolf
  • Bear
  • Fire Elemental
  • Water Elemental
  • Winter Wolf
  • Dire Bear

Each wild shape has its own specialized set of spells to cast!

Important Information Regarding Druids:

• Newly created Druids may not utilize Veteran Status.
• You may not convert a high level character into a Druid using +1, +3, or +5 Reincarnations. You may use Lesser / Greater Reincarnation to respec your Druid, as well as True Reincarnation.
• Druids are not eligible to receive the benefits of the Stone of Experience.

Eveningstar Challenges

Five new Challenges are now available in DDO! Visit the town of Eveningstar and Eveningstar Cavern to check out these new Challenges! Available with purchase of the Menace of the Underdark Expansion, or free for being a VIP!

• Help the Dryads to defend their grove from the evil Drow invaders
• Fight beside War Wizards and Purple Dragonknights as you work to reclaim a ruined keep
• Prove your worth to the denizens of the Underdark in their brutal arena

A new Daily Challenge Token vendor has been added to the town of Eveningstar!

Other Challenge Changes

• Daily Challenge tokens have been streamlined. You now receive Universal tokens from the Daily Challenge NPC. These tokens are valid for 1 use on any Challenge in DDO, regardless of Campaign setting or Challenge variant.
• When a star objective is achieved, a party wide message occurs rather than only notifying the person who got the star.
• Kobold requisitions now only work in their intended challenge. No more Kobolds wandering about the Cannith Enclave.

Questing

The questing panel has been redesigned to provide more clear guidance regarding your questing options.

• Non-epic quests are now known as "Heroic" level quests. If a quest has Epic levels available, you can click the "Epic" tab to access them.
• Epic quests now offer a range of difficulties, accessible by selecting the "Epic" tab in the Quest Panel. Note that during Open Beta, only "normal" Epic difficulty is currently available for all forms of Epic quests. Do not select other difficulties at this time.
• You can now additionally access party-forming tools from inside the questing panel. Players may now allow their party to be an "open" party where other players may join/leave at will without needing to apply to join the party first. These "public" parties can even be set to have no specified leader.

Public parties are called out in the LFM, and can also be disabled from displaying. Any Public parties will display the current amount of time the quest has been active by the existing party members to provide better guidance of how far along the quest may be.

• Feedback notifying you of your current bravery streaks & eligibility has been improved.
• There is now a column in the Adventure Compendium that displays the number of active LFMs for each quest. This column is sortable.
• There is a new drop-down menu on the Create Party Panel that allows you to specify a max party size for your group. Once your group hits this size, the LFM is automatically delisted.

Classes

• Artificer
  • The Artificer ability "Revive Iron Defender" is now a subfeat of "Unleash Iron Defender."
• Monk
  • Specific quest items can now be equipped without causing monks to become uncentered.
  • Some DDO Store purchased Rod items now do not uncenter monks when held.
• Rangers
  • Rangers are no longer prevented from casting while affected by a Quell's Intercession.
  • Entangle, Animal Growth, Magic Fang, and Pass Without Trace have been added to the Ranger spell list.
  • Rangers now receive Precise Shot for free at level 4.
• Wizard

Pale Masters in undead form no longer need to breath. Warforged Pale Masters are now immune to rust damage, from sources like Rust Monsters or deconstruct.

Crafting

• Green Steel Altars are now 50% more forgiving when you change your mind and 98.7% less mysterious!
  • Green Steel Altars now use barter-style crafting, with searchable and publicly listed recipes.
  • Green Steel weapons, equipment, and shards can be deconstructed to gain back approximately half of the ingredients required to make an item of the same tier. You get twice as much for Dual Shards or items imbued with Dual Shards.
  • Deconstruction of Green Steel requires Yellow Dopant, a rare drop from the Shroud end chest. Higher difficulty levels provide more chests and better chance to get Yellow Dopant.
  • It is now possible to obtain an Essence of Cleansing by deconstructing a cleansed Green Steel item using Yellow Dopant
• Incredible Potential can be restored to Tower of Despair Rings, wiping the ring clean so you can imbue it with different effects.
• Various changes have been made to the potential of Cannith Crafting shards, so the shards now match the potential of effects on randomly-generated loot. Note that some effects that previously only existed in the Cannith Crafting system may now appear on randomly generated treasure!
• Shroud Deconstruction note goes here.

Creature Companions

• Creature Companion Cosmetic items now work with all Companions.
• Corrected descriptions on several Companions and their associated tricks.

Combat

• Armor Class curves have been adjusted and rebalanced to better scale with high level and Epic level content, and to be more meaningful at lower levels:
  • The amount of Armor Class provided by various items, character abilities, spells, etc has been updated to be in line with these changes. Monsters also received adjustments to their armor classes to be in line with the changes.
  • Dodge has been modified to provide a % based mitigation instead of single points of Armor Class.
    • Many feats and items will now give dodge as a percentage.
    • The word “dodge” will appear over head when a character has successfully mitigated damage using dodge.
    • This new dodge percentage bonus is capped by the max armor class bonus on your armor. This cap only applies to passive bonuses, and temporary buffs may break your cap on a case by case basis.
  • There are now six types of armor:
    • Light Armor: Leather and Chainmail
    • Medium Armor: Scalemail and Breastplate
    • Heavy Armor: Half Plate and Full Plate
    • Armor values have been adjusted to better balance out each type of armor. Armor and max dex bonus values are higher on higher level equipment. These appear in random treasure. Existed named items of this type have been retroactively upgraded. That includes ones you already own.
• A new form of damage mitigation has been added to the game: Physical Resistance. It provides a % resistance against blunt, slash, and piecing damages, but is granted through multiple sources (items, feats, enhancements) and stacks with itself. Character sheets will now show the Physical Resistance Rating of the player in the same area as other types of resistances.
• Character sheets now include a tip to indicate how well protected you are against enemies of your CR, based on a combination of your AC, Dodge, and Physical Resistance Rating (PRR).

Other Combat Feat & Enhancement Changes

• Cleave: now has a 5 second cooldown and deals +1[W] additional damage.
• Great Cleave: now has a 5 second cooldown and deals +2[W] additional damage.
• Whirlwind Attack: now has a 5 second cooldown and deals +4[W] additional damage.
• Frenzied Berserker Supreme Cleave: now has a 3 second cooldown, and deals +2[W] additional damage.
• Combat Expertise: should now grant 15% bonus AC. Increases spell cooldowns to 3x normal.
• Defensive Fighting: should now grant 5% AC bonus and a -5% to-hit penalty. Increases spell cooldowns to 3x normal.
• Precision: +5% to hit. Increases spell cooldowns to 3x normal.
• Resilience: to-hit penalty has been removed, should simply grant +4 to all saves now. Increases spell cooldowns to 3x normal.
• Point Blank Shot: +5% to hit.
• Power Critical: Provides +2 crit confirmation, and an additional +2 crit damage (similar to "Seeker +2", but as a feat).
• Dodge (Feat): now grants 3% Dodge bonus.
• Uncanny Dodge: passively grants +1% Dodge at levels 4/6/8/12/16/20. Active now grants 50% Dodge, has a longer cooldown, and no longer has a counter.
• Improved Uncanny Dodge: passively grants +1% Dodge at levels 4/6/8/12/16/20. Active now grants 60% Dodge, has a longer cooldown, and no longer has a counter.
• Mobility: now grants 2% Dodge bonus.
• Spring Attack: now grants 2% Dodge bonus.
• AC action boost: now grants 5/10/15/20/25 respectively.
• Armor Proficiency: now gives the user a set amount of Physical Resistance based on that type when the armor is worn. This will eventually scale with the users BAB, but in Open Beta it is a set amount as follows:
  • Light armor is 5
  • Medium armor is 10
  • Heavy armor is 15
• Shield Mastery & Improved: Shield mastery and Improved have been reworked. They now give physical resistance.
  • Shield Mastery: -Now gives +3% double strike chance if you’re using a shield
    • Buckler Small: 3
    • Heavy: 5
    • Tower: 10
  • Shield Improved Shield Mastery: also includes +5% double strike chance if you’re using a shield
    • Buckler Small: 5
    • Heavy: 10
    • Tower 15
• Two weapon defense should now grant 5 Physical Resistance.
• Stalwart/Siberys stances should now grant 10/25/45 Physical Resistance and 10%/20%/40% AC bonuses.
• Monk earth stance should grant 0/6/12/20 Physical Resistance and 5%/10%/15%/20% AC.
• Mithril Body Docents you equip provide armor equivalent to Chainmail. This is treated as metallic light armor. You have a 15% arcane spell failure chance, -1 armor check penalty to certain skills, and a +5 maximum dexterity bonus.
• Adamantine Body Docents you equip provide armor equivalent to Full Plate. This is treated as metallic heavy armor. You have damage reduction 2/adamantine, a 35% arcane spell failure chance, -5 armor check penalty to certain skills, and a +1 maximum dexterity bonus.
• Lesser Mountain Stance Martial Arts Stance: The unyielding mountain stance focuses on endurance and defense. Lesser Mountain Stance grants +2 Constitution, a 5% boost to AC, 3 physical resistance, and a +25% Insight bonus to melee threat generation, at the cost of -2 Dexterity and -10% movement speed. While in Lesser Mountain Stance, you gain 'Get Hit Effect: Gain 1 ki.'
• Mountain Stance Martial Arts Stance: The unyielding mountain stance focuses on endurance and defense. Mountain Stance grants +2 Constitution, a 10% boost to AC, 8 physical resistance, and a +40% Insight bonus to melee threat generation, at the cost of -2 Dexterity and -10% movement speed. While in Mountain Stance, you gain 'Get Hit Effect: Gain 1 ki.'
• Greater Mountain Stance Martial Arts Stance: The unyielding mountain focuses on endurance and defense. Greater Mountain Stance grants +3 Constitution, a 15% boost to AC, 12 physical resistance, a +55% Insight bonus to melee threat generation, and the critical multiplier of all weapons you use is increased by 1 on rolls of a natural 19 or 20, at the cost of -2 Dexterity and -10% movement speed. While in Greater Mountain Stance, you gain 'Get Hit Effect: Gain 1 ki.'
• Ultimate Mountain Stance Martial Arts Stance: The unyielding mountain focuses on endurance and defense. Ultimate Mountain Stance grants +4 Constitution, a 20% boost to AC, 15 physical resistance, a +70% Insight bonus to melee threat generation, and the critical multiplier of all weapons you use is increased by 1 on rolls of a natural 19 or 20, at the cost of -2 Dexterity and -10% movement speed. While in Ultimate Mountain Stance, you gain 'Get Hit Effect: Gain 1 ki.'
• Stalwart Defender: Defensive Stance You may expend a Fighter armor boost to become a bastion of defense, gaining a +2 Competence bonus to Strength and Constitution, +10% maximum hit points, a +1 Competence bonus on all saves, 10 physical resistance, and a 10% bonus to Armor Class from armor and shields. You also gain a 25% Competence bonus to threat generated with your melee attacks. While in this stance, you move 10% slower.
• Stalwart Defender II: Improved Defensive Stance You may expend a Fighter armor boost to become a bastion of defense, gaining a +4 Competence bonus to Strength and Constitution, +15% maximum hit points, a +2 Competence bonus on all saves, 25 physical resistance, and a 20% bonus to Armor Class from armor and shields. You also gain a 50% Competence bonus to threat generated with your melee attacks. While in this stance, you move 10% slower.
• Stalwart Defender III: Superior Defensive Stance You may expend a Fighter armor boost to become a bastion of defense, gaining a +6 Competence bonus to Strength and Constitution, +20% maximum hit points, a +3 Competence bonus on all saves, 45 physical resistance, and a 40% bonus to Armor Class from armor and shields. You also gain a 75% Competence bonus to threat generated with your melee attacks. While in this stance, you move 10% slower.
• Defender of Siberys: Defensive Stance You may expend a Paladin armor boost to become a bastion of defense, gaining a +2 Sacred bonus to Strength and Constitution, +10% maximum hit points, a +1 Sacred bonus on all saves, 10 physical resistance, and a 10% bonus to Armor Class from armor and shields. You also gain a 25% Sacred bonus to threat generated with your melee attacks. While in this stance, you move 10% slower.
• Defender of Siberys II: Improved Defensive Stance You may expend a Paladin armor boost to become a bastion of defense, gaining a +4 Sacred bonus to Strength and Constitution, +15% maximum hit points, a +2 Sacred bonus on all saves, 25 physical resistance, and a 20% bonus to Armor Class from armor and shields. You also gain a 50% Sacred bonus to threat generated with your melee attacks. While in this stance, you move 10% slower.
• Defender of Siberys III: Superior Defensive Stance You may expend a Paladin armor boost to become a bastion of defense, gaining a +6 Sacred bonus to Strength and Constitution, +20% maximum hit points, a +3 Sacred bonus on all saves, 45 physical resistance, and a 40% bonus to Armor Class from armor and shields. You also gain a 75% Sacred bonus to threat generated with your melee attacks. While in this stance, you move 10% slower.
• (Class) Armor Class Boost I Activate this ability to receive a +5 Action Boost bonus to Armor Class for 20 seconds.
• (Class) Armor Class Boost II Activate this ability to receive a +10 Action Boost bonus to Armor Class for 20 seconds.
• (Class) Armor Class Boost III Activate this ability to receive a +15 Action Boost bonus to Armor Class for 20 seconds.
• (Class) Armor Class Boost IV Activate this ability to receive a +20 Action Boost bonus to Armor Class for 20 seconds.

Other Combat Changes

• Fixed some debuffs improperly interrupting the charging of Runearms.
• Corrected an issue where creatures or characters appeared to "slide" while doing some combat animations.
• Weapon sets can now be equipped while underwater.

DDO Store

• Various fixes to description errors in Hireling contracts

Events

• Crystal Cove will now show the right objective amount of 100, not 150.
• Text descriptions for the Pirate's Cunning & Stalwart Trinkets have been updated to reflect the amounts they were actually giving.
• The tooltip for Pirate's Port now reads correctly.
• Kobold Gems no longer take damage.
• It is no longer possible to teleport party members above the Bogwater Tavern slide.

Enhancements

• Enhancement categories text no longer refer to "Damage Amplification", and correctly refer to Spellpower.
• Several enhancements that impact combat bonuses were updated with the new Combat changes. Please see the Combat section of these release notes for further details.
• Blood Rage properly gives +4 Strength and Constitution during the third stage of rage.

Guilds

• Instructions for disbanding your Guild are now clearer.

Hirelings & Class Pets

• More hirelings have been added to the game to support high level and epic content.
• Iron Defenders modules have been converted to "collars". All class pets (artificer dogs, druid wolves, etc), now use "collars" to obtain extra gear-based abilities. Note that currently, only Iron Defenders are capable of utilizing breath weapon collars. All existing modules have been renamed "collars".
• The amount of hit points class pets receive has been adjusted to be more appropriate for their level throughout gameplay.
• Fixed a Hireling text error in which Nimeth Celibel listed Holy Smite incorrectly as Mass Aid.
• Maloren the hireling has yet again been retrained to cast healing spells.
• Benefits UI for pets now displays tooltips properly.
• Fixed an issue where some hirelings would go brain dead and try to freeze up the quest instance. Bad hirelings, bad!

Items

Spell Power

The spell damage amplification system (including bonuses from items and enhancements) now uses a Spell Power rating to determine how much damage you deal with spells. In most cases, each point of Spell Power increases the base damage of your spell by 1%. (For example, casting a spell with 100 Spell Power will result in double damage.) Unlike the old damage amplification effects, Spell Power is not restricted by spell level, and bonuses to Spell Power of different types stack, following standard D&D stacking rules. (An Enhancement bonus and an Alchemical bonus will stack, but only the greater of two Enhancement bonuses will apply.) The bonus damage from Spell Power is not multiplied by metamagics such as Empower Spell or Maximize Spell. Items and enhancements that granted damage amplification to specific damage types will now provide a bonus to Spell Power with spells of that damage type. (For example, an old Combustion V item that used to grant +20% damage to level V or lower Fire spells will now grant a +48 Equipment bonus to Spell Power when casting any Fire spell.) Potency effects grant Spell Power with any spell, as expected, but generally have lower values than specific effects. Sources of Spell Power include:

• Enhancements:
  • Enhancements such as Flame Manipulation or Pale Master now grant Spell Power to the appropriate spells equal to twice their old percentage values.
• Items:
  • Items with old permanent damage amplification effects now grant an Equipment bonus to Spell Power.
  • Any weapon that has a Spell Power bonus also grants an Implement bonus equal to 3 times the enchantment bonus of the weapon. A +5 weapon will therefore grant a +15 Implement bonus to Spell Power with all spells. Any effect that increases the enchantment bonus of the weapon (such as an Artificer’s Enchant Weapon) will also increase the Implement bonus.
  • Any item with old temporary damage amplification effects now grant an Alchemical bonus to Spell Power when used (an Inferno item will now stack with a Combustion item).
  • The Xachosian Eardweller now grants a +25 Psionic bonus to Spell Power with all spells (it now stacks with all other effects instead of temporarily replacing them).

Other Item Changes

• Ingredients and Collectibles are now weightless.
• Docents can no longer generate with race restrictions, because that would be silly.
• Random treasure can now generate up to level 25.
• The power of generated treasure at low levels has been increased to more closely match the level of the chest it comes from.
• Many new prefix and suffix mutations can now appear. Go forth and discover them!
• New rare mutations can appear. These rare mutations can include multiple effects on one prefix or suffix. Go forth and discover them too!
• Equipment Icon Borders have been changed:
  • Randomly generated items now have green borders on their icons. Note that this color has been darkened since Beta 1 to be less obtrusive.
  • Some rarer random items with more powerful abilities will have a teal border.
  • Event and Challenge item rewards have a blue border (unless that item is level 20 or higher)
  • Named items have a blue border.
  • Raid items have an orange border.
  • Epic named items have a purple border.
  • Epic raid items have a red border.
• Newly purchased DDO Store Spirit Cakes will now resurrect all nearby hirelings within a radius of the one who consumes the cake.
• Corrected the description of Smiting on several named weapons.
• Restricted Race items will no longer have UMD 0 and be unusable through UMD when a character is copied to Beta. This will not retroactively fix items which were already affected.
• Shields and armor will no longer go missing when copying a character to Beta.
• Fiery Detonation, Freezing Gale, Acid Torrent, and Electrifying Blast have had their descriptions updated to appropriately reflect their higher saving throws. They have also had their area of effect reduced to a more appropriate size, as they were unintentionally set very large.
• The Icy Raiments no longer use the description of the Enlightened Vestements.
• The upgrade recipes for Toven's Hammer no longer refer to it as "Tobin's Hammer".
• Greater Halfling Bane now properly deals bonus damage.
• Items that grant Fire Shield have had their descriptions updated to denote that Hot and Cold cancel each other out.
• The Templar's Bastion and Epic Templar's Bastion are now made of Mithral.
• Items acquired from scarab turn-ins in the Necropolis have had their minimum levels adjusted downwards.
• Rahl's Might has been returned to its original size.
• Ring of Troll's Regeneration now gives +2 natural armor instead of normal armor.
• Potions of Healing and Rods of Healing from the DDO Store now have proper minlevel usage restrictions.
• Sap should proc for 30 seconds if the player can get a sneak attack viable hit in
• Docents with minimum guild levels can now be equipped by Artificer pets.
• Typo corrected in Dusk Heart's description.
• Corrected the spelling of house Deneith on a dragonshard fragment.
• Typo and grammar fixes to the Archivist's Set.
• Eldritch Runes that grant skill bonuses have been updated to better describe which groups of skills they impact.
• Once Belashyrra's Scepter is exchanged as quest reward, it changes its name to "Belashyrra's Cleansed Scepter."
• Corrected spelling errors in the Xoriat Insanity Sword's description… it's not THAT crazy.

Mail & Auctions

• Players can now buyout on the Auction house while having the maximum number of bids.

Monsters

• Several new and exciting monsters have arrived in the DDO ecosystem, particularly in Forgotten Realms content.
• Disembodied eyeballs have met their match - blind effects now kill them!
• Updated the Water Elemental's Freezing Spray debuff icon to match the new Freezing Spray spell.
• Mudmen can now actually throw mudballs instead of vaguely mudball-like rocks.
• Drow warriors with scimitars now correctly deal Slash damage.
• Forgotten Realms Drow look different than Eberron Drow. Complete with mohawks!
• Glowing red eyes have been added to Drow in the Forgotten Realms.
• Xoriat gargoyles are immune to Flesh to Stone.
• Mesmerized enemies from spells such as fascinate and hypnotize will no longer teleport
• The valid hit area for Greater Thaarak hounds has been adjusted to be more in line with the body size and shape of the monster.
• Shaverath devils now hate half-elves and half-orcs along with all other player races.
• Toven should be a lot more "with it" these days.
• Nauseated enemies should no longer teleport.

Quests & Adventures

Epic Difficulty

• All quests that offer Epic difficulty options are now accessible via a new tab in the quest panel called "Epic".
• All quests that offer Epic content now feature it in multiple difficulties! Note that during Open Beta, do not select difficulties other than "Normal". Other difficulty options will be available later during Open Beta.
• Party scaling now applies to Epic difficulties (with hard and elite receiving little or no scaling)
• Epic Dungeon Tokens are natives of the world of Eberron, and will not appear in the chests of Forgotten Realms.
• Epic monsters on hard and elite are now resistant against death if their CR is above 20. This ward is called “hard to kill” and acts as a death ward until the targets hps drops below 50% which removes the ward. The ward doesn’t restore after the monster heals.

The Ruins of Gianthold

• The dragons fought in Gianthold Tor will now reward more dragonscales on higher difficulties.
• The artisans in Gianthold who craft Dragonscale Armor have refined their craft. New versions of the Blue, Black, and White Dragonscale items are now available here.
• Dragonscale Armors from Gianthold have been increased in power to be more appropriate to their rarity and prestiege. Although their minimum level to equip remains at 14, they now may be useful for characters up to level 20.

Three Barrel Cove

• Avast! The denizens of Three-Barrel Cove now be holdin unique treasure fer intrepid level 4 - 6 land lubbers to find. Track ye down eighteen new items in both the adventure area and from quest rewards.

General Questing Changes

• Traps on casual difficulty will no longer behave as if "hard" difficulty had been selected.
• In the quest journal for Attack on Stormreach, the player is now directed to find Yorrick Amanatu specifically in Lordsmarch Palace (instead of just ""Plaza"").
• Removed a stuck spot in Sins of Attrition
• An unbreakable jug in Whisperdoom's Lair can now be broken. Smash!
• Hirelings no longer get stuck in some parts of the Butcher's Path.
• Iron defenders have been removed from Schemes of the Enemy.
• Fixed an issue where Epic fragments were not dropping in Offering of Blood
• Debuffs no longer persist after leaving the Litany of the Dead.
• Corrected a display bug with Crateos's death animation in the Snitch.
• An unbreakable jug in Whisperdoom's Lair can now be broken. Smash!
• Remodeled a door so monsters and players will not get stuck so much in Lordsmarch Plaza
• Fixed a glitchy ladder in the Caverns of Shaag
• The Shiny Shilling - now with less stuck spots!
• Removed a stuck spot in Stealer of Souls. Except the poor poor dragon souls... they're stuck there unless someone can rescue them!
• Dackle now functions as a ranged combatant.
• In the Forgotten Realms, every third completion of a quest chain will now provide a reward list with a 50% chance for each item that could have normally appeared in that list to appear. Completions which are not the third or a subsequent multiple of three have a 25% chance for those items to appear.
• Newly obtained Rings of Elemental Essence from the Phiarlan Carnival quest series now have Corrosion III.

Races

• Warforged Monks with the Perfect Self feat who become Lawful Outsiders no longer lose their Living Construct traits.

Reincarnation

• Characters may perform a True Reincarnation so long as they are level 20 or higher.
• Several Spells will no longer disappear upon reincarnation.
• Extra Pre-purchase items are no longer being re-granted upon reincarnation.
• Reincarnating Wizards and Artificers are now allowed to pick spells while levelling up regardless of past class history.

Skills, Feats, & Abilities

Poison & Diseases

• Changes have been made to the way that Poisons and Diseases behave in the game to be more inline with D&D rules:
  • All Poisons and Diseases are now classified as either natural, magical, or supernatural.
  • Diseases
    • Paladins are immune to natural, magical, and supernatural diseases through the granted feat "Divine Health"
    • Purity of Body grants immunity to all natural diseases, but not magical or supernatural ones.
    • Disease wards grant immunity to natural diseases, and an Enhancement bonus to saving throws against magical diseases. Additionally Disease Ward prevents the wearer from failing saving throws on a roll of a natural 1 (this renders the wearer immune to ability score damage from magical diseases with a DC of less than 7 + their Fortitude save).
  • Poisons
    • Monks with Diamond Body gain a +10 bonus to saving throws against magical poisons, and do not fail saving throws against them on a roll of a natural 1 (this renders you immune to ability score damage from magical poisons with a DC of less than 11 + your Fortitude save). You have Poison Resistance: 10 against poisons that deal hit point damage.
    • Proof against Poison grants immunity to natural diseases, and an Enhancement bonus to saving throws against magical diseases. Additionally Disease Ward prevents the wearer from failing saving throws on a roll of a natural 1 (this renders the wearer immune to ability score damage from magical diseases with a DC of less than 7 + their Fortitude save). Additionally you gain Poison Resistance 10 against poisons that deal hit point damage.
  • Races & Creatures
    • Warforged are naturally immune to sleep, energy drain, nausea, sickness, exhaustion, and paralysis effects except those which physically hold them in place. You are immune to ability score damage from natural poisons and natural diseases, but are vulnerable to those that specifically affect wood or metal. You gain a +10 Racial bonus to saving throws against magical poisons and magical diseases, and do not fail saving throws against them on a roll of a natural 1 (this renders you immune to ability score damage from magical poisons and magical diseases with a DC of less than 11 + your Fortitude save). You have Poison Resistance: 10 against poisons that deal hit point damage. If you transform into a different type of creature, you will lose these benefits until you return to your Warforged form.
    • Bonuses from multiple racial/class type resistances stack, so a Warforged Monk 11/Druid 9 would end up immune to natural poisons and diseases (including ones that specifically affect wood and metal, since those are covered by the Monk and Druid feats), would have Poison Resistance: 30, and would have a +20 bonus to saves against magical poisons and diseases (rendering them immune to ability score damage from magical poisons and diseases with a DC of 21 + Fortitude save or less). As expected, those that cease being living constructs through a transformation effect will lose these traits, gaining traits appropriate to their new creature type. (Warforged Monks will retain these constructs traits even if they acquire Perfect Self.)
  • Other Changes:
    • The Neutralize Poison spell will grant immunity to all natural and magical poisons for 3 seconds per caster level. The Extend metamagic will apply to this aftereffect.
    • The Remove Disease spell (and Paladin ability) will grant immunity to natural and magical diseases for 6 seconds per caster level. The Extend metamagic will apply to this aftereffect if the spell is cast.
    • The Divine Cleansing enhancement will grant immunity to natural and magical diseases and poisons for 12 seconds per caster level.
    • The Heroes' Feast spell grants immunity to natural poisons, and grants a +1 Enhancement bonus to saves vs. magical poisons per 3 caster levels for 1 minute per caster level.
    • The Panacea, Heal, and Mass Heal spells will not grant lingering protection, but will cure poisons and diseases as before.
    • SPECIAL NOTES ON MUMMY ROT: The grand-daddy of all diseases, Mummy Rot is a terrible fate, which previously was able to be worked around with immunity items (which didn't prevent the curse, but prevented the disease from applying ability score damage). Being exposed to Mummy Rot will no longer immediately apply the full curse - you'll have one minute to get a Remove Disease before it fully incubates and applies its supernatural curse and disease to you. The lingering effects listed above that provide immunity to magical diseases will also prevent this initial application of Mummy Rot.

Other Changes

• The Construct Essence feat now functions correctly if you log in while dead.
• Damage amplification enhancements such as Ranger Devotion I or Force Manipulation III have all been converted to use the Spellpower system instead of flat percentages (that interacted in unusual manners with various metamagics and enhancements).
• Spell damage is now much easier to predict - at 100 Spellpower, you will be doing twice the base damage of the spell.
• Metamagics such as Empower Spell and Maximize Spell add 75 or 150 Spellpower while active.
• Precise Shot now has a subfeat called Archer's Focus. While using Archer's Focus you gain an additional 10% weapon damage to ranged weapons, and every 5 seconds that bonus increases by another 10%, to a maximum of +30%. Lasts 15 seconds. Moving breaks this effect. Does not stack with multi shot.
• Barbarian Rage and several other active feats can now be activated while moving without being interupted.
• Fixed an issue that was preventing Improved Feint from triggering a weapon attack.
• The Construct Essence feat now functions correctly if you log in while dead.
• Great <ability> feats now all affect the correct ability score.
• The Slippery Mind feat will no longer break Defensive rolls.

Spells

• Spike Growth
  • Damage was increased from "1d4" to "1d4 per caster level", to a maximum of 10d4.
  • Cost reduced to 12 SP.
  • Description now properly states that a reflex save halves the damage.
• Numerous low-level spell buffs with a duration of 1/minute per caster level have had their durations changed: they are still 1/minute per caster level, but they now have a minimum of 5 minutes. This includes the animal stat buffs (such as Cat's Grace), Jump, Bless, Expeditious Retreat, nightshield, Protection from Evil, Ram's might, Shield, and Tumble.
• The music of Otto's Irresistible Dance has been made less "techno"-ish, and more appropriate for the time period.
• Artificer spell Deadly Weapons now works on ranged weapons.
• The Level 6 Artificer Spell, Deadly Weapons, has been updated to work as intended: It now adds +1 base weapon damage. (A weapon that deals 1d6 damage per hit will deal 2d6 damage per hit instead, while a weapon that deals 2d4 damage per hit will deal 4d4 damage instead. This affects the base dice associated with a weapon any time they are rolled.)
• Spells no longer interrupt on autorun.
• The spell Displacement is now self-only.
• The Heal spell is no longer flagged to accept the Heighten metamagic. While it can be used offensively against undead, that use is significantly rarer than using it to heal allies, and being flagged as heightenable was increasing spell point costs of the spell regardless of target.
• Prismatic spray no longer turns earth elementals to stone.
• Eladrin Ghaele summons should no longer have the possiblity of going teleport-crazy.
• Fix a bug causing cone AOE spells to hit some targets twice.
• Corrected the duration description on Hypnotism's tooltip.

UI

New

• Many parts of the UI have been updated or refreshed to be more D&D-setting-neutral, rather than Eberron or Forgotten Realms specific.
• It is now possible to see your Epic Destiny XP in addition to your normal character XP at the bottom of the screen. You can now toggle your experience bar to show either character level progress, Epic Destiny Progress, or both.
• The game menu is now located in the lower left of the screen. Click the DDO dragon ampersand (&) to pull up the menu. You may shrink the menu to icon-only by clicking the eye symbol.
• It is now possible to save your UI layout/options between different characters, accounts, computers, and monitor resolutions! As of Update 14, when you log in for the first time you will initially find all UI layouts back at their default positions and sizes. To create and save a custom layout:
  1. Arrange your UI to your preferred layout and options for that character
  2. Save those settings locally by using “/ui layout save [filename]” in the chat window.
  3. Replace "[filename]" with an easy to remember name for that layout.
     • If you don’t specify a filename, then your layout will be saved under, or loaded from, the name Default_<resolution>.layout. For example, if you are running in 1440x900 resolution, your UI layout file will be "Default_1440_900.layout."
  4. You may save as many layouts as you like for any of your characters. Be sure to use different names so as not to overwrite an existing layout.
     • To load a UI file, type "/ui layout load [filename]" in the chat window.
     • Your UI layout files save to your Dungeons & Dragons Online -> data -> ui -> layouts folder. You may copy your ui layout files from this folder into other computers if you like, though we recommend that you make a new layout if the monitor resolution between those computers differs.

Changes

• Your character's last public area location is now shown in character select screen.
• The background of the Character selection screen will now change depending on whether your character last left off in Eberron or Forgotten Realms.
• Class levels are now listed following a character's total level on the Character Selection screen
• Several changes have been made to the basic game UI, such as hotbars and focus orb.
• Buff/Debuff icons can be left or right justified. The default is now LEFT justified.
• Platinum bank deposit window will no longer disappear in the right or lower side of the screen
• An "Assist My Target" key is now available. This option will cause you to automatically switch to hard-targetting the enemy of your target.
• When a bow/xbow is equipped, you will now see the proper attack bonus in the Inventory UI's detail pane when a character has an alternate ability mod feat, such as Zen Archery.
• Escape Key closing for windows now closes all panel windows when pressed.
• Negative effects are now shown their own row and with red borders.
• The Kundarak crafting hall entrance now has a pretty focus orb image showing the crafting hall.
• Updated the over-head icons for several public quest bestowers (particularly those associated with the Campaign system)
• Class levels are now listed following a character's total level on the Character Selection screen
• You will now get a floaty text notice when a buff wears off. This text may be turned off with an option in the UI Options menu.
• Dialog boxes (confirmations, messages, etc.) will no longer disappear when dragged down and to the right.
• Overhead damage text is now displaying properly again.
• The Account Bank window can once again be freely resized.
• Dragging items onto cosmetic armor button now equips them.
• The crafting, barter, and deconstruction Uis should no longer grey-out the clear button erroneously.
• The ingredients box should allow drag & dropping after a recipe completion.
• Floating health bars on monsters will no longer be overwritten by the current target's health bar.

Other changes

• The DDO game name and basic logo has been updated to be more friendly to multiple D&D universes. We're now "Dungeons & Dragons Online" with a new logo to match!
• A new forgotten realms background will be shown in character selection screen for characters that logout in that campaign world
• House Cannith has done some remodeling on the Cannith & Kundarak Crafting Hall doors so that they no longer blind patrons with the light of a thousand burning Fireballs.
• Auctions can now be bought out, even if you have reached your maximum bid count.
• Darmon Kosh's dialog options have been corrected for adventurers with enough Coin Lord patron status.
• NPC Imadra Khaine took some grammar lessons over the spring.
• Brother Kew in the Rusty Nail has been brought back down to earth and is no longer levitating.
• Game Tip #149 now lists the correct amount of XP bonus.
• Corrected a memory leak issue
• Optimized several game scripts and improved behavior between the server and client.
• Fixed a crashing issue when moving between quests or teleporting.
• Fixed a crashing issue that would occur when attempting to log out.

Graphics

• On the highest graphics settings, when facing the camera towards the sun, its rays will now beam down at you or peer through the trees with warm illuminating goodness.
• On higher graphics settings wheat, reeds, grasses, and other ground frills will now react when an avatar passes through them.
• New varieties of trees and grasses have arrived to DDO. These plants are native to the Forgotten Realms. The Druidic Gatekeepers ask that adventurers returning from the Realms not bring back plant cuttings so as not to disrupt the fragile Xen'drik jungle ecosystem with potentially invasive species of wild plants.
• Arrow trails have returned to following arrows. Rumor has it they were following the Grateful Dead for a while.

Ladders

• Fixed an issue that caused climbing to fail when attempting to walk onto ladders from the bottom rung. Note that there could be some ladders that were not fixed in this systematic pass, and should be reported with quest names and /loc
• Corrected an issue where characters who were swimming could not swim onto the first rungs of partially submerged ladder. Note that there could be some ladders that were not fixed in this systematic pass, and should be reported with quest names and /loc
• Fixed a different issue with ladders that would cause the character to rubberband back onto the ladder when attempting to dismount it. Can't stress this enough: there could be some ladders that were not fixed in this systematic pass, and should be reported with quest names and /loc

Audio & Sound

• An all new orchestral music score has been added to DDO!
• Combat and Ambient sounds have been re-categorized into their own sound channels, adjustable from the Audio UI Options panel
• Talbron the Warforged has a new voice.
• Ambient noises no longer follow you from area to area.
• Several Eberron quests that were missing their musical scores have been tuned up.

Known Issues

Known issues are now available, [DDO Forums]!