Difficulty

''This article is about quest difficulty. For the difficulty of skill checks and saving throws, see Difficulty Class.''

Difficulty
There are six different quest difficulty settings in DDO. Starting from easiest, these are Casual, Solo, Normal, Hard, Elite, and Epic. Higher settings are more challenging but often more rewarding in terms of Experience, Favor, and loot from within the quest. Not all quests are available at all difficulties.

Initially, only Casual, Solo, Normal and Epic difficulty are available to Free To Play and Premium players who have never completed that quest before. VIP subscribers also have access to Elite (Update 7). Completing a quest on any difficulty unlocks all difficulties up to and including one setting higher (Completing Epic will unlock hard and elite).

While in a party, the first player to enter a quest can usually choose from any difficulty that any of his teammates has unlocked.

Quests which features Solo difficulty are now Solo-ONLY as of Update 3. This is because Casual replaced the Solo setting as the lowest setting on all quests except those that featured only Solo and added Casual to all quests that originally featured nothing below Normal.

Solo

 * Solo difficulty is only available for a small amount of selected solo-only quests.
 * Favor is 1/2 of Normal, dropping fractions.
 * Main quest XP is 0.5 to 0.8 × Normal.
 * There may be fewer and/or smaller encounters than Normal (Tho you can no longer run these quests on normal to tell anymore)
 * The quest's level may be reduced by 2 levels for purposes of generating chest loot. Rewards from the quest's giver are unaffected and still rewarded as if you ran the quest on elite.
 * Enemies and traps are lowered in difficulty.
 * Difficulty Scaling does not apply. The dungeon is already easier due to other factors.
 * Enemy misses become Grazing Hits on raw die rolls of 19.
 * Some enemy special attacks, like scorpion poison, have no effect.
 * Rest shrines can be used every 5 minutes.
 * You must solo. You cannot have teammates or hirelings.
 * You must solo. You cannot have teammates or hirelings.

Casual

 * Favor is 1/2 of Normal, dropping fractions.
 * Main quest XP is roughly 0.45 to 0.5 × Normal.
 * All enemies encounters are of the same size and CR as normal, and have the same abilities, but they are heavily scaled down as casual is heavily adjusted down by Difficulty Scaling.
 * The quest's level is reduced by 1 (if possible) for purposes of generating chest loot and comparing against the party's level for XP adjustment. Rewards from the quest's giver are un-effected.
 * Enemies and traps are scaled down in difficulty "by about two levels" according to an interview with Community Representative Tolero.
 * Rest shrines can be used every 5 minutes.
 * In some dungeons, there is an additional pair of Shrines somewhere.
 * There is no XP penalty for re-entering the dungeon, though the XP bonus for not re-entering at all can still be lost.
 * Some chest loot that is guaranteed to appear at other difficulty settings has only a chance of appearing. On average the droprate is reduced by 50%.
 * Optional XP bonuses are worth double their normal values.
 * Casual is intended for solo players, or groups looking to enjoy the storyline while not worrying about the combat.
 * Casual is intended for solo players, or groups looking to enjoy the storyline while not worrying about the combat.

Normal

 * Difficulty Scaling is in full effect for smaller teams, unless the quest is a raid.
 * Enemy misses become Grazing Hits on raw die rolls of 17-19.
 * Rest Shrines can be used every 15 minutes.
 * Most normal difficulty dungeons are most evenly balanced against a party of four players. However most quests are also designed to be soloable on normal as well due to scaling. Parties above 4 will notice increased damage and hitpoints levels above 100% base due to Difficulty Scaling. If it's a raid, 12 players are still recommended, but often not required.
 * Normal difficulty is intended to be the default choice for the large majority of players looking for a balanced experience.

Hard

 * Favor is 2 × Normal.
 * Main XP is roughly 1.05 to 1.08 × Normal.
 * There may be more and/or larger encounters than Normal.
 * Enemies are always a higher CR, and have far higher statistics designed to challenge more prepared parties.
 * Enemy spell casters often have more and higher level spells.
 * The quest's level is increased by 1 solely for purposes of generating better chest loot and comparing against the party's level for XP adjustment. Rewards from the quest's giver are un-effected.
 * Traps are greatly increased in difficulty. Both in terms of damage dealt, save DC and skill DC needed to disable them. They are intended to challenge decently-geared rogues of appropriate level.
 * Hidden doors and Lock DCs sometimes scale up a few points.
 * Difficulty Scaling is in full effect, but has less effect then normal, unless the quest is a raid.
 * Enemy misses become Grazing Hits on raw die rolls of 15-19.
 * Rest Shrines can only be used once.
 * Hard is intended for full well balanced groups of 6 players, or 12 if it's a raid.

Elite

 * Favor is 3 × Normal.
 * Main XP is roughly 1.10 to 1.16 × Normal.
 * There may be more and/or larger encounters than Hard.
 * Enemies are always a higher CR then on hard, and have far higher statistics designed to challenge very well seasoned veteran parties.
 * Enemy spell casters often have more and higher level spells and somtimes even gain the maximize feat.
 * The quest's level is increased by 2 (compared to normal) for purposes of generating chest loot and comparing against the party's level for XP adjustment. Rewards from the quest's giver are un-effected.
 * Traps are massively increased in difficulty. Both in terms of damage dealt, save DC and skill DC needed to disable them. They are intended to seriously challenge decently-geared rogues of appropriate level.
 * Hidden doors and Lock DCs sometimes scale up a few points.
 * Difficulty Scaling is in full effect, but has less effect then normal/hard, unless the quest is a raid.
 * Enemy misses become Grazing Hits on raw die rolls of 15-19.
 * Rest Shrines can only be used once.
 * There may be more and/or larger encounters than Hard.
 * The quest's level is increased by 2 solely for purposes of generating better chest loot and comparing against the party's level for XP adjustment. Rewards from the quest's giver are unaffected.
 * Certain quests will feature more difficult unique required objectives only on elite. A good example is In the Demon's Den. See it's quest page for details.
 * Elite is intended for full well prepared well balanced groups of 6 players, or 12 if it's a raid.

Epic
Main article - Epic
 * Enemies, traps, bosses and sometimes even objectives are massively scaled up, see main article for full details.
 * Only level 20 characters may enter.
 * Quest level is always set to 25 for the purposes of granting guild renown.
 * Favor is 3 × Normal (same as Elite).
 * Quest is worth no XP due to maximum character levels being required.
 * Enemies have Epic Ward.
 * Orange named enemies have Deatblock.
 * You may not re-enter the quest if you exit, recall or release.
 * Should you suceesfully complete an epic quest, you must wait 16 hours before you can run it again.
 * Epic was originally intended to be a massive step above elite quests, and purely for the "best of the best". These days it's been tweaked downwards to just slightly harder then a level20 elite quest would otherwise be, and thus very doable by wide range of players.