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Exploring Eberron: Back in the day
Welcome to February and Dungeons and Dragons Online's birthday month! Today's Exploring Eberron is on the long side, but I think you're going to find it well worth the extra time. To kick off our celebration of DDO's fifth anniversary, I chatted with some community members who have been around since the very beginning. We talked about what they loved way back then, what they love now, and how the game has changed over the years. You'll see some familiar names in this interview! Michael Diamond is a salesman, father and Dungeon Master going back the better part of 15 years. Michael is the mind behind Tales of Greatness, a D&D 3.5 blog that follows a group of heroes from level one to 20. Tihocan is the author of the Revisiting Paths and Shroud Loot Builder guides in the DDO forums -- if you don't have these bookmarked, remedy that! Jaggie is a Warforged Bard on the Thelanis server. She's a roleplayer and guild leader for The Fellowship of the Golden Night. Since her talents for all things DDO extend well beyond the monitor, her posts on the DDO forums often feature cookies, drawings, costumes and other such crafts that she enjoys making of this game. You know Sig and Anne Trent from DDOCast, but that's not the end of their community involvement at all. Sig is a committed fan of DDO and of all things D&D whatever the edition or publisher. A self-confessed rules junkie and fan of multi-classing and feats, he also writes for Open Design. Anne loves playing DDO and has been doing so for five years now. Over the years, she's been active in the community writing articles, advocating for new features, producing DDOCast and running its web site. So without further ado, skip past the jump to see what this group had to say about five years of DDO!
DDOcast host leaving to work for Turbine
The feel-good news story of the day comes courtesy of the long-running Dungeons and Dragons Online podcast called, crazily enough, DDOcast. Normally a show's cancellation (or in this case, hiatus) isn't cause for celebration, but this particular story has a happy ending since podcast creator and host Jerry Snook is closing up shop to go and work for Turbine in an as-yet unidentified capacity. Snook posts a lengthy farewell on the podcast's website, and he also hints that the show may go on with a new host. This Friday's show, episode 191, will be the last for the foreseeable future. Snook will also make the show's archives available to interested parties. "I will do my best to have the content available for as long as there is an interest in checking out the show and web site. It is also very possible that DDOcast will return/continue under new leadership," he writes.
DDOcast brings the goods on MyDDO, full respecs and more
If you're interested in playing Dungeons and Dragons: Online Unlimited (or already subscribe to the game) then this is a DDOcast that you absolutely shouldn't miss. It's packed to the rafters with information about upcoming additions such as MyDDO, the social website that we're sure will be as big a hit with players as MyLotRO.Something of particular interest to us is the discussion of Half-Orcs, although we're certain most players are excited to hear talk of full character respecs. The only thing that could've got our geeky blood pumping faster would be Turbine talking 4th Edition and the brand new Eberron books -- specifically concerning Mournland and the newly revamped Artificer class. Then again, we're not even sure their license covers any of that, but it would make for an interesting podcast nonetheless.Our plan? Boot up DDO sometime very soon and hit the play button on iTunes. There's nothing like a double-dose of Turbine goodness. Well okay, maybe some actual table-top D&D with old friends -- but what videogame can compete with something like that? It's practically inconceivable.
DDO Unlimited screens show off in-game store
Turbine has released twelve new screens for their revamp of Dungeons & Dragons Online, which will add the "Unlimited" modifier sometime after its current beta run. In our gallery, you'll find several looks at the various windows and interfaces in which the non-subscribing players will have the opportunity to purchase additional content piecemeal, while they play.It's pretty interesting to see a previously pure subscription style game go this direction, and we're very curious to see how it plays out for Turbine and the Dungeons & Dragons Online community. This business model shift could bring in a lot of new blood, and may in the long run bring about additional content that wouldn't have been possible to develop otherwise.If you really want to know more about the upcoming changes and exactly what they mean for DDO and its community, check out our interview with Turbine on the subject, our write-up on the topic by Massively's Colin Brennan or our recent Massively Speaking podcast with DDOCast host Jerry Snook. Can you tell we're interested in this one yet?%Gallery-66255%
Big news on the horizon for DDO
There have been a few hints lately as to a special "DDO-related project" in the works at Turbine, yet as expected, the details aren't released yet. In a recent post at the Dungeon and Dragons Online forums, Tarrant lets us know about the fate of DDO's preview server, Risia. Apparently, this special server was to be closed to internal testing only, for the aforementioned special project, but some issues caused Turbine to make the decision to close it indefinitely. You may remember that Turbine also made this decision recently with Lord of the Rings Online's preview server Roheryn, citing the exact same issue: enough people just don't play on the preview servers between major patches. Then what is this special project Turbine has been working on, anyway? Jerry at DDOCast has thrown out a few guesses, including the possibility of DDO heading to consoles or Risia being converted to a special server for something else, like an event? Possibly a special preview of Module 9? We don't know yet, but Turbine has stated that the answer will be coming very soon. Check out the rest of this post for more on upcoming DDO goodies, as well as a word puzzle for players to solve, giving even more hints on what's to come!
