Update 15 Release Notes

= Release Notes: Update 15 =

Welcome to the Release Notes for Dungeons & Dragons Online! These release notes were posted on Monday, August 20th, 2012.

= News & Notes =

The village of Eveningstar has fallen victim to a strange disease and all evidence points to a corruption of nature!

New Adventure Pack:Song of Druid's Deep
Trace the origins of a corrupting plague back to the dark and twisted depths of King's Forest. Seek out the powerful druid Halsaime for answers but tread carefully, for you are not the only one searching for him. Contains 4 hand-crafted adventures for characters Level: 17 (Heroic)/23 (Epic). Head for the east bridge in Eveningstar to begin your adventure!

Introducing Monster Manual
Begin your mastery of Dungeons & Dragons creatures with the Monster Manual! Each Monster Manual volume features entries on monster types from elves and warforged to wraiths and kobolds. Skilled adventurers can earn great rewards including cosmetic pets, Turbine Points, useful consumables, and XP.
 * The Prologue volume, featuring five dungeon inhabitants, is available for free to all players.
 * Volumes 1 is available to Premium & VIP players.
 * Volume 2 is available to VIP players, and available for purchase in the DDO Store for Free and Premium players.

Menace of the Underdark in the DDO Store

 * It is now possible to purchase Menace of the Underdark content in the DDO Store using Turbine Points!
 * As promised, as of Update 15 all Stones of Shared Experience have evaporated from the game world and are no longer available to use.

New Challenge - The Ruined Keep: The Daybreak Ritual
Check out a new challenge variant for The Ruined Keep! Evil Druids have noticed that the Ruined Keep is a source of power, and are trying to take it for their own! Battle wolves, bears, mudmen, and more! Be rewarded with Copper Thumbs, used in some new challenge reward recipes! This challenge is part of the Eveningstar Challenge Pack, and is located next to the other Ruined Keep challenge.

Challenges

 * The Eveningstar Challenge vendors have some more named treasures to trade for.
 * Players can exchange Cormyrian Challenge items with the barter NPC of that item level range to receive a portion of the ingredients of each type for that item’s recipe back.
 * It is now possible to speak with the Challenge Token Vendor in Eveningstar and be taken directly to the Eveningstar Challenge Pack in the DDO Store, rather than just to Universal tokens.
 * Spell casting monsters in challenges from levels 15 to 24 will no longer cast Power Word Stun or Otto's Irresistible Dance.
 * It is now possible to repair the Ballistas and use them during the Ruined Keep: The Sunset Ritual challenge.
 * Obtaining the first three Ballista Parts in The Ruined Keep challenges are now easier; some others have shifted in location.
 * The Ruined Keep challenges now scale monster numbers more appropriately based on the size of the party.
 * The most powerful optional bosses in the Ruined Keep challenges now display a warning before they are encountered, and need to be approached very closely in order to engage them.
 * In the Ruined Keep Challenges, the War Wizards now grant you 100 points for protecting them until their Spell Wards are created.
 * The Extractors of the Kobold Chaos Challenge are no longer affected by Invisibility and Stoneskin.
 * Pets can no longer carry torches outside of Challenges.

Classes

 * Druid
 * Druids using wildshape should be able to get weapon effects from two handed weapons now.
 * Removed some stuttering from druid wildshape attacks.
 * Adjusted the damage of the Druid Wolf companion the other direction. It should now be neither terrible nor over powered.
 * Mobile attacks in wolf form now animate better.
 * Wolves now turn in place better.
 * Shred should animate properly.
 * Attacks which inherently hit twice, such as momentum strike, will now operate for druids in both bear & wolf form.
 * Whirl wind attack will now function/animate for druids in both bear & wolf form.
 * Tremor will now animate properly for bear form druids.
 * Shadow Dancer ability Oncoming darkness now functions correctly for druid bear and wolf forms.
 * Druid's Wolf companion's rage now works, and has gained a 3 minute cooldown.
 * Produce Flame now alerts the player if you are out of range.
 * Pass Without Trace now scales correctly.
 * Animal Growth is now valid on your wolf in a Brawl.
 * Body of Sun cooldown is now 15 seconds.
 * Increased the size of both the wolf and the winter wolf wildshape forms. Wolf is 120% original size. Winter Wolf is 130%.
 * Monk's Eagle Claw attack is now organized as a Special Fire Attack.

Crafting

 * Deconstructing an item's effect that is higher than +5 in enchantment value now yields more raw materials. Each + value higher than +5 will yield a progressively higher amount of raw materials up to a +12 value. For example: Deconstructing a +8 value effect previously gave the same amount of ingredients as a +5 value effect, or 16d3 lesser essences and a chance of 1d5 greater essences. Deconstructing a +8 effect now will give 40d3 lesser essences and a chance of 2d4 greater essences.

Enhancements

 * Warforged Healer's Friend now reduces the Positive Energy healing penalty for being in Living Construct form instead of acting as a multiplicative Positive Energy healing amplification effect. The enhancement now grants a bigger overall bonus, but is no longer quite so front-loaded: Warforged Healer's Friend: Benefit: Your Living Construct penalty to Positive Energy healing is reduced from 50% to (40/30/20)%. The enhancement has also been reduced in AP cost from 2:4:6 to 1:2:3.

Epic Destinies

 * Unyielding Sentinel: Hardened now correctly provides up to +10 AC.
 * The tooltips on Archmage 2 through 5 spell levels have been corrected.
 * The cooldown on the Grandmaster of Flower's Epic Moment, Everything is Nothing, has been increased from 180 seconds to 300 seconds.
 * Fatesinger
 * Reign and Aria no longer disengage auto-attack
 * "Masquerade" now works
 * The Judgment ability from the Exalted Angel Epic Destiny can no longer blow up players. Also, an extra "e" appearing in the name has been sacrificed.
 * Non-bards may now correctly twist Fatesinger Songs, if they also take Allure or Lucidity.
 * Legendary Dreadnought: Combat Brute now correctly grants +50% damage against helpless targets while active.
 * Text for Pulverizer clarified to indicate it does not work with handwraps.
 * Aria now correctly reduces threat by 15/25/35%
 * Fatesinger: Tailwind, Fragment of the Song: Clarity, and Fragment of the Song: Valor now grant traditional Inspire Courage bonuses to the party, in addition to personal bonuses to the Fatesinger.
 * O Fortuna now grants the party an additional +1 saves vs Fear. Aria and Fragment of the Song: Clarity each extend Song duration, in addition to other effects. Tailwind now instead grants the party a +1 to hit, and the Fatesinger an additional +1 damage with missile weapons.
 * Exalted Angel:
 * Ascendance reworded to make it clear that your personal health requirements are waived while Ascended, not the health requirements of your allies or enemies.
 * Astral Vibrance now has the correct icon in the Exalted Angel tree. (The ability itself always had the correct icon.)
 * The Grandmaster of Flowers enhancement Perfection of Body (Rank 3) now properly prevents you from failing Fortitude saving throws on a natural one if your total Fortitude saving throw result is high enough to pass the save. * The Grandmaster of Flowers enhancement Perfection of Mind (Rank 3) now properly prevents you from failing Will saving throws on a natural one if your total Will saving throw result is high enough to pass the save. * The Grandmaster of Flowers enhancement Perfection of Soul (Rank 3) now properly prevents you from failing Reflex saving throws on a natural one if your total Reflex saving throw result is high enough to pass the save.
 * Fury of the Wild: Fast Healing now stacks with all other damage-over-time effects.
 * Turn of the Tide now correctly allows Fatesinger to save vs Will, even on a roll of 1.
 * Shadowdancer:
 * Shrouding Strike charges should be a bit clearer to understand. Each rank of Shrouding Strike or Shrouding Shot allows you to store 2 charges. You gain one additional maximum charge when taking Cloak of Shadows, Shadow Manipulation, Consume, and Shadow Form.
 * Shadow Training 4's Dimension Door is now properly restricted to 5 uses per day.
 * Corrected an issue with sneak attack dice.
 * Corrected grammar errors in several Epic Destiny tooltips.
 * Draconic Incarnation enhancements no longer erroneously give a stacking +2 bonus to the DC of your tactical feats.

Hirelings & Class Pets

 * Epic Hireling Sledge's Boulder Toss has been changed to Primal Scream.
 * The wolf no longer constantly hamstrings.
 * Tarlov Snowtrack's Mass Camouflage icon is correct now.
 * The Druid's wolf now does more reasonable damage.
 * Pets should now follow you home.
 * Corrected another issue that was allowing pets to try and escape their masters when changing instances. Bad doggies!
 * Fixed a typo in Selis contract description.

Items

 * Clothing with armor effect prefixes/suffixes can now be disjuncted for Arcane essences.
 * Cormyrian Challenge scepters now properly have effects to boost spellcasting, rather than melee combat.
 * You may now trade in three of a faction's commendation at that faction's vendor for one commendation from any other faction.
 * The Duergar Waraxe now attacks with the proper animations.
 * Alacrity effects now state their bonus type for stacking purposes.
 * Set Bonuses that provide Spell Power now properly function.
 * Duplicate Spell Power effects have been removed from Cannith Challenge epic items.
 * Spell Power bonuses from items will no longer be lost upon death.
 * Potency effects on Crystal Cove pirate hats had incorrect descriptions. Their descriptions have been modified to list the correct values.
 * Madstone rage provided from madstone boots should no longer prevent players from performing a variety of activities. Madstone rage should now ONLY prevent casting, and casting scrolls. Innate abilities, drinking potions, stances, and stealth should all now work. Defensive stances will make you immune to madstone rage, or purge the effect from you if used, similar to other rage effects.
 * Pumpkin head should now appear in the correct location for druids forms.
 * The Earthcarver Shard can now be equipped in the off-hand.
 * The Manslayer effect on the Drow Smoke Goggles now functions properly.
 * Yellow Dopant:
 * The drop rate of Yellow Dopant has been increased.
 * It is now possible to find Yellow Dopant in the Tower of Despair raid, Vision of Destruction raid, and in Devil Assault on Heroic Elite, Epic Hard, and Epic Elite.
 * Yellow Dopant drop chances have been increased fivefold in the Shroud.
 * Yellow Dopant will appear 100% of the time in the special reward list for The Shroud on completions which are a multiple of 20.
 * Fixed an issue with punji stick traps not doing the correct damage.
 * There are additional new effects that can appear in random treasure.
 * Bugged versions of the Seal of House Dun'Robar have been fixed.
 * Drow Weapons which erroneously had no effects or minimum level have been fixed.

Monsters

 * Minotaurs should no longer slide around while trying to search for you. Other slidey monsters are still being wrangled.
 * Toned down the damage on spell casting monsters.

Quests

 * Getting sweet sweet loot from treasure chests is a noteworthy event, so there are now visuals/audio to suit the occasion.
 * Rest shrines on epic difficulties should now have the correct warnings regarding how often (or if) they can be reused.
 * Corrected a Trap issue that was causing many custom trap configurations to go haywire, this effected giant hold tor's blue dragon room in a lethal fashion, and many old epics.
 * When a non-leader is the first to enter an instance, it will no longer try to auto-post the LFM as Public if they have selected that option. Instead, the leader will get a confirmation dialog asking them if they want the public LFM posted.
 * Campaign System quests will only be bestowed if you are at least the level for where it is sending you (i.e. if a quest is level 17 and you are level 16, the Campaign System will no longer tell you about it until you level up)
 * Beyond the Rift: It is now more apparent that Elminster cast a spell at the Bebelith.
 * Reclaiming the Rift: Fixed issue where if you exited by using the Rift, you would be unable to recall out of the Demonweb.
 * Caught in the Demonweb:
 * Fixed the goddess of chaos. Again.
 * Ana is now immune to slippery surfaces and will not fall off the bridge near the loot area of the raid.
 * Lolth no longer tries to spawn monsters on falling players.
 * Portal Keepers will no longer try to hide out in the void of the Demonweb.
 * Ana no longer tries to follow unreachable people to her doom
 * Lolth's hand now moves more erratically - however the goddess of Chaos gets bored easily and the hand may leave quickly.
 * Phiarlan Carnival
 * Fixed an issue with the epic chest that was causing the end epic chest to remain locked on normal/casual difficulty.
 * The Snitch: It's no longer possible to accidentally buff Garos before you have to fight him.
 * Shipwrecked Shore: If you crash or logout before finishing your encounter with Jeets it will no longer leave your character stuck on the beach.
 * Spinner of Shadows: The quest now properly awards Epic Dungeon Tokens on Epic Hard and Epic Elite.
 * Removed a stuck spot in Sschindylryn.
 * A Mindflayer will no longer get stuck in a rock in the Underdark.
 * A Mephit should no longer get stuck in the ice of Aussircaex's Valley.
 * Trial by Fury - The chest dropped by Cho'az (optional miniboss) is no longer locked.
 * Monsters in Searing Heights should no longer get stuck inside rocks and other decorations.

Reincarnation

 * Corrected an issue where newly created characters were not receiving their one-time free lesser reincarnation.

Skills, Feats, & Abilities

 * Archer's Focus now remains with you when zoning.
 * The three weapon-type specific Overwhelming Critical feats have been merged into a single feat that affects all weapons used by the character. Weapon Focus is no longer required:
 * Overwhelming Critical
 * Prerequisite: Cleave, Great Cleave, Improved Critical (bludgeoning, piercing, slashing, ranged, or thrown)
 * Benefit: When rolling a 19 or 20 on an attack your critical damage multiplier is increase by +1.
 * If you had multiple copies of Overwhelming Critical, you will have a free feat respec available to replace one of them at Fred.
 * Characters who were missing an ability point at level 24 can speak with Kruz to perform a free lesser reincarnation and have the missing point granted.
 * The epic feat, Improved Sneak Attack, now grants +3d6 sneak attack as intended.
 * All epic feats now mention that they're epic feats in their descriptions.
 * Inspire Excellence no longer has a shared cooldown with Inspire Courage. It has also been changed to no longer be six subfeats with lengthy cooldowns - a single use will now grant a +2 Competence bonus to ALL ability scores to yourself and nearby allies.
 * Characters with the Trapmaking feat should once again have a chance to scavenge trap parts when successfully disarming traps.
 * Warforged now properly make their saving throws against magical poisons on a roll of natural one if their total Fortitude saving throw result is high enough to pass the save.
 * Monks with the class feat Diamond Body now properly make their saving throws against magical poisons on a roll of natural one if their total Fortitude saving throw result is high enough to pass the save.
 * Improved Feint is once again trainable.
 * Fixed an issue where paths were bestowing uncanny dodge/improved uncanny dodge at too early a level.
 * Vorpal Strikes now functions as a toggle as described, and correctly applies its Vorpal effect to unarmed attacks. The slashing damage is now correctly only applied when the toggle is activated.

Spells

 * Heroes Feast is now working correctly! Eat hearty!
 * Conjure Bolts now conjures a stack of 1000 bolts per cast.
 * Flaming Sphere is now a smaller sphere that actually deals fire damage.
 * The Artificer spell Ablative Armor now also protects against force damage.
 * The Magic Missile ward from the Shield spell now properly has a minimum duration of five minutes.
 * Summon Nature's ally IV icon has been corrected to show a glass spider.
 * Snare now has a maximum 20 second duration vs players.
 * The Implosion spell no longer triggers various Shiradi Champion or other Destiny effects that could make you implode instead of enemies.
 * Fire Shield's web immunity once again lasts as long as the damaging portion of the spell.
 * Shillelagh:
 * No longer removes the material properties of weapons or makes them blunt.
 * Now stacks properly with epic level weapon base dice.
 * Aura spells and lantern archons now correctly obey line of sight restrictions, and no longer apply their effects through walls. This affects both monsters and players.

UI

 * Runearms will now be shown under the weapons tab in the inventory "list" view.
 * Combat feedback for 0-damage hits on enemies will now include damage reduction and resistance information where appropriate.
 * Fixed an issue that caused the quest UI to say "Ok" instead of "Enter"
 * The "you don't own this yet" panel has been updated to be more informative. It now additionally highlights features that VIPs get free access to and how to become VIP where applicable.
 * Mass Camouflage no longer affects your focus orb indefinitely.
 * Red and yellow borders appear again in the auction house.
 * Fixed the alignment on the favor and grouping windows.

Other

 * VIP characters now move 10% faster in public spaces! This movement speed boost stacks with all other movement boosts in public areas.
 * Fixed an inventory crashing issue.
 * The in-game cinematic after Spinner of Shadows should no longer contain a pre-order ad.
 * The Forgotten Realms skyscape has been updated to be more lore appropriate: Look up in the sky, it's the tears of Selune!
 * Characters should no longer go invisible when changing between instances.
 * Skipping the Korthos Line through Jeets will no longer trigger Campaign System lines while selecting your reward items.
 * Removed a sink hole behind a house in Eveningstar that adventures kept twisting their ankles in.
 * Loot bonuses have been optimized to have a more noticeable effect on extremely high level chests.

= Known Issues =

Known issues are now available, click here!

Source: http://compendium.ddo.com/wiki/Release_Notes_Update_15_Official and http://forums.ddo.com/showpost.php?p=4653003&postcount=6