Dungeons & Dragons Online Update 12 Preview

Turbine’s recently announced Update 12: Vaults of the Artificer update for Dungeons & Dragons Online is the subject of a new two-page, hands-on preview over at Ten Ton Hammer. Because they’re entirely new to the game, the article focuses mostly on challenges:

There are four Challenges, which means that there are four maps. Each Challenge also has three rules variants, which tweak some rules and have optional objectives. The Challenges can also be played on Epic level. All of the Challenges are timed, so you’ll need to keep moving. Within each Challenge, there are objectives that you’ll need to achieve. As you progress through the Challenge, you accumulate points. When you get enough points, you get a star. You must get at least one star to get any xp and items. For each star you get, you receive Favor with House Cannith. Between DDO Update 11 and DDO Update 12, players will now be able to get enough Favor to unlock the Artificer class to play. You can track your progress in the Challenges by opening up your Adventure Compendium, where a new tab has been created for Challenges.

Once you enter a Challenge, you will need to work fast to achieve the objectives. To help you out, you can get powerups that will drop during the Challenge or you can get one from a Cannith Supply Vault. You can only access a single Cannith Supply Vault per Challenge, and you will need a token to do so. To get the powerup, you just run through it. My personal favorite was Quad Damage. Sweet. You can also receive time extensions whilst in a Challenge.

I was run through two of the Challenges by Fernando Paiz and Erik Boyer. The first was Dr. Rushmore’s Mansion: Behind the Door. This Challenge was an Assassination Challenge, wherein your purpose is to penetrate the mansion and kill at least one boss of Rushmore’s party. Needless to say, there are quite a few bosses lurking around. The map is huge and there are multiple paths a party can take. Most doors are sealed and you’ll need to find crests to open them. As we passed by paintings, phantasmal creatures would spawn and attack us. One item that cracked me up was in the mansion’s restroom, where a rest shrine was available, but it was the toilet paper dispenser.