How do we help?

I blame myself for even queuing as healer lol. I built her for dps only but got into too many 4 dps runs to not do a minimal healer build. But we would never have done 3 dps and tank run with that player.

and overall i think more and more will realize they need to have the basics for any support role on any character they run, and what would be nice and further facilitate the support role is make at least one armory available for purchase via Destiny Tokens, or even have say a support only armory as a reward from the Support Mentor.

Absolutely. My worst alt has never trolled. I have all the gear and augs to do so and even chose dual role (ish) capable artis so he could. But no 2nd armory means I don't. Swapping gear and all that over while not using a single sp in the right place isn't worth it

my hope here is that enough people will like the idea enough that a dev sees it and adds it to a "work on" list.

When faced with this situation I go full nerd mode and ask people to use specific abilities. However, that requires knowing the actual names of most, if not all, useful abilities in the entire game. You can fudge a lot of them by knowing the game's labels, i.e. [group power heal] or [pull]. And you can suggest abilities with the proper function heading, even if you can't recall that Celestial's [Priority Heal] is called "Renew".

Combining ability suggestions with concise explanation of mechanics, is the only way I've had a decent success rate. I have had a decent success rate. Never tried it on seven people simultaneously though, and I probably would've left after suggesting a youtube channel or something.

Here's the thing though; this is not a player job. The game's deepest systemic issue is the reliance on existing players to guide and retain new players. Until the resources behind the game are better directed, this can't change.

The armories thing is a perfect example. If you give someone one armory, maybe you can sell them a second one. Sure, ok, that's true. But, if you give someone two armories there's a good chance you can sell them an artifact. If the needed resources were directed into integrated tutorial instances* and players were given that second armory, I believe the investment could be recouped by people paying to develop their second role more often.



* Videos are great, but people both need to actually learn to do it, and not be taken out of their game only to feel like they have to attend a class before they continue playing.

There is no way to help

The game does not provide tools to help. What would be great is a mentor chat for one & The game needs to test players in a solo environment with mechanics so they learn on there own pace and overall better tutorials for things like artifacts and roles

These are the things new players fail at the most. They would have some random artifacts that is not helpful to there role or thinking there role does something more powerful or something and not knowing a role does specific things then just attack

I'm seeking help!!! I,ve only been playing DCUO for a few week after work & on weekends. Grinding solo but thats how I learn the basics. Lvl 28 (i think), a mix of green to purple gear. At work now and can't remember much more at the moment. Casual gamer. My main & only toon is an Ice Hero, raid virgin, group virgin focusing on Tank buid because I've never been a tank before in gaming. WOW was my only other MMO, some time ago. I think i've learnt as much as I can alone other than the rest of the content and I'm hoping to get a mentor, in my time zone preferably (Australian East Coast - Brisbane +10) who I can start hanging with in game to learn a LOT more from.

The most frustrating thing about this... is that on playstation, communication without a mic takes forever. It's not really on DCUO, its a console thing, but it makes this very hard. I think all of the ideas on here are good ones. In the end, the biggest change won't be because we do more tho I do believe we do need to do more, but will depend on DCUO's actions going forward. My fear is that even if they like and see these types of ideas that they won't have time to do them as endgame players expect new endgame content..particularly since this last change pushed back new true endgame content for a couple of months.

Dadflower, good luck. I'm an atomic tank, but definitely not on a similar time zone. Hope you are able to find someone. Maybe look in the looking for leagues here or on the DCUO discord. There are some helpful people in leagues.

Hey Dad, welcome to the game. I'm in the same boat (haaa more puns) as Steamboat and not in your time zone. There is a section on here dedicated to players looking for a league, absolutely make a post in there. A lot of us can help you with your build and at least point you to the right place to find the knowledge you need to get going. With ice tanking, all you really need to know is shields rule them. You'll want to use 1 skill point to grab "hard light shield" in the iconics section. Not sure what weapon you've chosen, but can get by with like 3 or 4 sp (skill points) in that tree. After that, you'll want to spec either hybrid or superpowered depending on your playstyle. The added 5% dominance of hybrid is nice and can usually keep your power bar full as long as you're weapon tapping/ comboing. But if you feel like you can't land enough hits, spec superpowered and your power pool and power return gets a little better. Ice is one of the few powers I've never played tho so hopefully you can watch one of Obsidian Chills videos on youtube about it.

The majority of your sp needs to go into dominance. That's how you'll strengthen your shields. Head and bottom augments and generator mods should also be all dominance. At least till you get your sp up and then can play around with a battle build for solos or duos.

Don't be afraid to fail. There will be some people complaining. But you will meet someone that will help. Tanking is probably the hardest aspect of the game early on. It requires a lot of game knowledge and really needs a lot of skill points. But you'll acquire those as you move along.

Just remember, have all your shields on your loadout. Hard light too. For artifacts, wait till you can get circes mask, manacles of force, and either mystic symbol of the seven or everyman prototype. Do not waste nth on anything else. I'm sure Obsidians video will tell the best combo but it may have been made prior to Circes mask coming out and that is absolutely made for fire and ice. I use it on my rage toon and think it's pretty great. Feel free to message me on here if you've got questions. Chances are, I don't know the answer but I'll find someone who does for you

A role specfic pack given to players is a good idea but a tutorial mission is a great idea. I think putting it right after you are officially invited to join the LOD or JLA might be a good spot, there can be some confusion with new players/toons about where to focus next then anyway. I kinda think "end of game" content should be locked until then as well but that's a bigger discussion I guess.

Forced internships is (no offense) and awful idea. This is a game for fun and nothing like that needs to be forced on anyone. At the end of the day every player deserves to be able to play their toons their own way even if it makes pub and event raids a mess sometimes.

100% agree on videos. You shouldn't have to send your players out of the game to show them the basics of playing your game.

100% agree on armories as well. If you have a game that "requires" playing both solo and in groups to fully experience and have a build system like DCUO has, then you need to give players the ability to switch roles for free. Granted a lot of players will just use these for an additional style and not for role changes. As a lazy DPS'er that's what I use mine for, but still if they gave the additional armory after a tutorial mission where new gear and new info was given maybe that helps the situation.

Seeing this topic back on top, it reminded me of a thought i had previously. Entering Stat-clamped instances, it really almost does NOT matter what gear you have on or even if you have any. The instance itself will provide a player with the most basic stat of any role they choose. Any knowledgeable player in that role would be able to function with the stats provided by the Stat-clamped instance.

Check it out yourself.

So now we know it's not the gear nor the stats. Skill points, artifacts and augments, yes, they will make for a more effective player. But a new Tier 2 player won't have any of that in abundance.

I think it really comes down to just learning the powers. Does a healer know what a group heal is? a priority heal? Why is sorcery healing different from Electric? Does an earth tank know you can't combine Brick and Jackhammer for tanking?

I just recently looked at Chill's newest video on water healing. Now, Chill may be more directed at end game players and most of what he says may go way over the head of a new player but the basic stuff is still there.

And for this Clamped content, up to the alert level, that should be more than enough. There are only a few out-lier boss attacks that would fail for a tank or healer. At a raid level...honestly, it's the mechanics. If the players have a basic grasp of how to function in their roles, It's not paying attention or knowing what the mechanics that kills the group.

And there are no well-done videos out there that explains raid mechanics. I think that is what is really needed. If I were one of this youtubers, I would do that. Most raid videos I have seen are mostly bragging videos or too confusing because it was mostly a video of a normal raid. The raid video has to be run knowing its for tutorial purposes, with the coordination of the players in that group.

Ha, yeah forced is never great. But just trying to think of some tactics other games use to get players headed in the right direction. But something as small as changing Constantines arti mission to have different/ newer/ better choices would be clutch. Or making the vendor so they're listed in order of popularity maybe. Or seperate tabs that show troll ones only, might based, prec, yada yada.

I know when I came back from a break, I was confused. I had already played the game for years and I was like woah ok I don't know what any of this means anymore. Surprisingly, I figured out augments quickly and didnt go the rainbow route but that was 100% because of previous experience.

I still think a "might based dps" pack would be awesome and super helpful. One for every role, albeit a tad generic but enough to get players building in the right direction. There isn't a more depressed sigh in the world than when I tell a new player that they've leveled up the wrong augs and artis. Just a soul crushed "ghuhhh" noise everytime.

Personally I think all we need to do is have patience and be more communicative with newer players. I understand the frustration when folks don't understand their role or content they are playing, but we all had to learn the same way.
I think you also pointed out a few great points in regards to potentially fixing the current tutorials. The early game doesn't prepare you for understanding raid mechanics or how to function in a group, or even what you should be doing in your given preferred role. I would love to see maybe a few simple mission just go through a more in depth idea of what a player should be doing in any given role, which would also help give players a better idea for what powers they potentially want to play as well.

True.

Also the Troll role has INTENTIONALLY been transformed into having more emphasis on debuffs than on being a power battery. Players have many more methods of recovering power than they did in the early days.

The issue here is just as much about expectations than it is about reality. Controllers are not "Power healers".

As to xxHellstrokexx's original point, I would suggest that leagues might agree on unofficial "Mentors" by role who have experience to take newer players under their wing and help guide them through content starting with Duos where they can take their time without worrying about a larger group, then alerts and Raids. The mentor could double up in a support role with his or her mentee in a league run on a raid or two...and then the newly minted support player can solo.

This would undoubtedly teach the newer player AND could also be a lot of fun and reinforce the basics for the Vet

Patience goes a long way. Unfortunately, it's become a lost virtue these days. Which means it can only help a small percentage of new players. I posted in the tank discussion thread going on right now about one of my (I'm pretty knowledgeable about most in game stuff) elite tank training experiences. Some players are just so rude so fast. And about the dumbest stuff. Like oh dear lord, I'm so sorry that add tapped you twice before I could walk across the map to scoop him up. Thanks tho for just standing there instead of moving him closer. But I digress lol.

I feel for the devs, they're fighting a battle on like 4 fronts lately. Elites are mad about the ease of the game, the casuals are made that the elites get fancier stuff, the new players are mad at the old players for leaving them in the dust, and the old players are mad they've been clamped to stop leaving the new players in the dust. And now lack of knowledge is very apparent. Prior to clamp, no one cared if someone was mediocre. Obviously they still cared if they were terrible. A decent healer could supplement a squishy tank. Even a troll could help them out. Or if the healer wasn't great, we'd add a shield to our loadout. Now those aren't options so that's what we and the devs have to figure out.

Someone mentioned that there aren't any/ many actual tutorials anymore. Just end game build vids. No real walk thrus. That's what I think of when I think tutorial mission. Use something that already exists and slow it down. Explain what is happening and what needs to happen. Make it a daily for awhile or something. Would need to pay out very well but repetition could be all a new player needs to head out prepared. It can't be just a voice over, they need to be shown.

I said elsewhere that I just started tanking elites. The whole reason I made a tank and now troll in the 1st place was to be a better player by understanding more about the other roles. I main a healer so I never knew what they were doing/ expected to do. For almost 8 years actually. That's a long time to be playing the game amd barely know the tactics required for the other roles. Even dps, I had never really done it till like 2yrs ago now. There was so much to learn amd the whole time i just thought it was simple as can be.

That's the problem with the CR skips and all of the scaling gear... you also skip past a whole lot of content that had a chance to instruct you on some things... be they mechanics, role necessities, how powers work, etc. Once upon a time you would get gear at a specific level by running certain content. This was later changed to scaling. Because of these two things there is a HUGE gravitational pull toward end game levels. This isn't necessarily a bad thing when it's a player who is speed-leveling an alt... but for the new players who've never actually endured certain alerts and raids while at level or even just went through the natural progression in the game this can be a problem.

As to the OP, unfortunately there is only so much you can impart before you're just talking to hear yourself talk. Some people don't understand what specific powers do, or how they get modified by artifacts, etc. I also get this is a game about super heroes and super villains, and some people use it to imagine themselves being their favorite iconic heroes/villains... but when you mix the two and get some DPS trying to be Wonder Woman while using Mesmerizing Lasso and the Lasso of Truth artifact while you are trying to tank an instance, it gets extremely frustrating... and when that person dies, you silently hope that nobody actually revives him or her so you can finish the fight properly.

Perhaps a tool tip in the game referring people to the forums here regarding the roles? Yeah, I know it's not much and you can't force people to follow it but it will at least give them a reference.

Re: Skipping content.

Even when I left 2 years ago.... If you went into a league that wanted to help you..one of the ways they did that was to help you be able to skip content. I've played this game since late 2011, and regularly played from 2013-2019. I still have raids I've never attempted. Some raids I've done a bunch, some I never got to go into at all.

I've skipped a bunch too or played only the event version when I was lower level and never went back to being the normal. I imagine a lot of players that aren't feat or SP hunters do this with or without the CR skipping. No offense to the designers but not all of them are very enjoyable ways to spend 15-30 minutes.