Update 53 Release Notes

Here are the Release Notes for Update 53: Hunter and Hunted, released on Thursday, February 24th, 2022!

Of Special Note:

New Adventure Pack: Hunter and Hunted!

The Wild Hunt want you to join them...as prey! This new Adventure Pack is FREE to VIPs and available in the DDO Store! Hunter and Hunted includes two dungeons and a raid at level 32 on Legendary difficulty. The quests are level 7 on Heroic difficulty. The NPCs are located in a small public space accessible through The Hut From Beyond in The Harbor.

The Anniversary Event has returned!

The Anniversary Event is back to celebrate DDO's 16th year! Get started towards the back of House Phiarlan by finding Gnoa Bn'for. To celebrate 16 years we are giving away a selection of Bound to Account cosmetic outfits! Once per day characters can speak to the Anniversary Djinn outside of the Anniversary Dungeon in House Phiarlan to select their choice of Red, Blue, Green, Pink, and Silver. Each character can pick an outfit once per day, and there is no limit to the number of outfits you choose other than the once-per-day-per-character limit. The Anniversary Djinn will be available for players to acquire these cloaks through December 31st, 2022. The Anniversary Event runs through March 20th, 2022!

New items to barter for this year include masks and capelets that match our free coats. We have also added the following previous anniversary gifts to the Anniversary Event Barter Vendor:

• The Sentient Jewel of the Dragon
  
• 15th Anniversary Commemorative Cloak
  
• Robe of Celebration
  
• Medium Armor of Celebration
  
• Heavy Armor of Celebration
  
• Medium Docent of Celebration
  
• Heavy Docent of Celebration
  

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More Free!

The following races and classes from the core D&D Player's Handbook are now permanently free for everyone in DDO:

Races:

Dragonborn
Drow
Gnome
Half-elf
Half-orc
Tiefling
Wood-elf

Classes:

Druid
Monk
Warlock

Players who have already purchased these races and classes will receive a Greater Elixir of Discovery for each of the races and classes they own prior to the release of Update 53. Speak with Jubilee the Discoverer on the bottom floor of the Eberron Hall of Heroes to get one Bound to Account Greater Elixir of Discovery for each feature you had previously purchased. You may only claim each feature's Elixir once in total (across all characters and servers), so please use caution if you play on multiple servers. These Elixirs cannot be claimed on any active Hardcore worlds.

ALSO: VIPs now get daily Gold Rolls on Daily Dice for the remainder of 2022 (through 11:59pm Eastern (-5 GMT) on December 31st, 2022)!

News and Notes:

Classes

• Absolute Zero now applies its frozen crowd control to Fire enemies that are immune to Death, instead of letting the Death effect bounce off and therefore having no effect.
  
• The Druidic Oath system now only alerts you about breaking your Druidic Oath if you become oathbreaking from a state where you are not oathbreaking, preventing over-spam of its alert.
  
• Druidic Stoneshape now works with Dire Bear.
  
• Strength Domain now only bases your Reflex Saving Throws on Strength if it is higher than your Dexterity.
  

Combat

• Failing a Concentration roll now generates feedback on the avatar.
  
• When the feat Elusive Target triggers it now displays a visual over your character's head to know it has applied.
  
• Artificer Iron Defender Pets and Druid Wolf Pets have had some of their animations adjusted. Some animations that were not scaling with attack speed now do, and some animations that were missing (and therefore caused pets to stand around confused) have now been connected.
  
• A variety of effects that provide a full Heal now work on Undead players.
  

Enhancements

• Almost all existing enhancements for Artificer Iron Defender and Druid Wolf pets are now granted automatically as those pets go up in level. (The ones that are not automatically granted are specifically called out below, all other existing ones are). The level they gain them at is the same as the previous Minimum Level for those Enhancements.
  
• For Iron Defender pets, Alignment enhancements are not automatically granted, as they are mutually exclusive. You can now talk to any Artificer trainer to select your Pet's Alignment, which is now displayed as an effect on your pet. Your selections remain until changed or until you Reincarnate. The Chaotic selection continues to provide the Breaker of Boxes behavior.
  
• For both Iron Defender and Wolf pets, Threat Generation/Reduction enhancements are not automatically granted, as they are mutually exclusive. You can now talk to any Artificer or Druid trainer (depending on your pet) to select -40% Threat from Melee Attacks, +0% Threat from Melee Attacks, or +100% Threat from Melee Attacks. Your selections remain until changed or until you Reincarnate, and stack with all other sources of Increased or Reduced Melee Threat.
  
• The Bluff and Intimidate active abilities have been removed from Iron Defender and Wolf pets for the time being. We plan on returning these in a future update.
  
• Artificer Iron Defender Pets, Druid Wolf Pets, and Pale Master's Skeleton Pet now all have a baseline of 100% Fortification at all levels. This stacks with Gear and any Feats or Enhancements they have.
  
• Feydark Illusionist's Illusory Augmentation now correctly grants its bonuses if you have obtained Augment Summoning from a temporary source, such as gear or an augment.
  
• Hope for Success from the Favored Soul's Beacon of Hope tree now applies more reliably.
  
• Sacred Touch in Warpriest and Warsoul now mentions the typing of the buff.
  
• Eldritch Knight's Proficiencies now apply more reliably.
  
• Elditch Knight's visuals now change color depending on which Spellsword Toggle you have turned on.
  

Epic Destinies

• Fatesinger
  
• Cut the Strings' Death and Damage effects now respect their one second cooldown.
  
• Cut the Strings no longer fails if you are targeting someone behind you.
  
• Discord melee and ranged skills no longer scale with Spell Power AND Melee/Ranged Power.
  
• Discord Ranged skill now grants its 10 Spell Points when three chords are consumed.
  
• The Greater Shout SLA from Fatesinger is now considered to be Spell Level 6.
  
• Primal Avatar
  
• Carrion Swarm now has updated visual effects.
  
• Shadowdancer
  
• First Blood no longer kills you if you cast a spell on yourself.
  

Favor

• Warforged is now awarded on a per-server basis for 400 Total Favor, replacing the Drow race, which is now free. If you previously achieved 400 total Favor and unlocked Drow on a server then Warforged will automatically unlock when you log in with a character on that server that currently has at least 400 total Favor and had previously claimed the rank of Drow from Nyx. If you do not have a character with at least 400 Favor, earning the 400 Favor threshold and speaking to Nyx will unlock Warforged on that server.
  

Feats

• The epic feat Doubleshot has its correct tooltip.
  
• Mounting a mount will no longer turn off the Rune Arm Use feat, and will instead suppress your Rune Arm charge until you are dismounted.
  
• Bloody Footprints now display properly for the following Races:
  
• Warforged Male/Female Inquisitives
  
• Shifter Male (all styles)
  
• Tiefling Male (1 handed/1 handed shield style)
  
• Drow (both genders) (Inquisitive Style)
  

Items

• You may now Barter for Sands of Menectarun wilderness loot from Masei Mkembe's Barter Shop in Zawabi's Refuge if you have Antique Bronze Tokens to spare.
  
• The Reaper Shard Crafting recipes for Goggles and Glove now function correctly.
  
• Dripping with Magma now triggers once every 1 second instead of .25.
  
• Bowdlin (Collectible Trader) now correctly tells you that he distributes Red Augments and not colorless.
  
• Quality Spell Focus Mastery now changes from +1 to +2 at a slightly earlier level so more gear has the +2 version of the affix.
  
• Spell Penetration and Attack Augments now have corrected descriptions.
  
• The hardcore season five vendor was using old logic that assumed the player took their favor rewards in order sometimes preventing a player from claiming the "death follows you reward" if they hasn't already claimed Death Watches you reward . This has now been corrected.
  
• Certain legacy Healing Amplification effect tooltips have been modernized.
  
• Commendations from the various Eveningstar factions (such as War Wizard) are now Bound to Account instead of Bound to Character.
  
• Alchemical Elemental Attunement effects now each correctly work on both Melee and Ranged attacks
  

Monsters

• Animated Armors should no longer heal from Negative energy.
  
• Relevant monsters in the new adventure pack "Hunter and Hunted" have been added to the Monster Manuals.
  
• Smaller crabs now play animations when crowd controlled.
  

Quests and Adventure Areas

• A new NPC is available in Eveningstar (near the mailbox), the Ball and Chain in Wheloon, the Blue Water Inn in Ravenloft, near the entrance from Eberron in the Feywild wilderness, outside of the tavern near the fountain in Sharn, in the Snapping Line Inn in Saltmarsh. Randall Lyric sells augments in exchange for local ingredients.
  
• Anniversary Event
  
• Some changes have been made to the +Cordovan and +Steelstar fights this year, and some new jokes, in-jokes, and secrets have been scattered throughout! We have also done work on the Kobold path, including replacing some kobolds with rats, thinning out some spawn numbers, and adjusting some aggro settings. Players should also no longer find themselves needing to run the kobold path a second time based on the state of Jeets' and Malicia's dialog.
  
• Meridia
  
• Clicking on the door in Meridia to The Shroud no longer tries to teleport you to Ritual Sacrifice.
  
• Ravenloft
  
• Typos have been fixed in Raven's Bane.
  
• The Red Fens
  
• Into the Deep - Fixed several sections of this dungeon that did not get their proper stat pass in Update 51.
  
• The Soul Splitter
  
• Soul Survivor - Captain Loren d'Lyrandar has undergone an avatar update.
  
• Vault of Night
  
• Fixed Veil's awkward appearance in "The Prisoner" Quest on difficulties other than normal.
  

Races

• Tiefling Infernal Resistance no longer drops on Death.
  

Spells

• Fixed an issue with spells that appeared "inside" of enemies when they were hard targeted that would cause the target to fail for the enemy. This fixes spells like Holy Smite, Chaos Hammer, Flame Strike, and others that are hard target spells.
  
• Lionheart and Reincarnate now properly take the Eschew Materials metamagic feat.
  
• Fire Seeds, Ice Flowers, and Burst of Glacial Wrath now take appropriate metamagic feats.
  
• Blur is back to being a 20% bonus.
  
• Meteor Swarm has had its screen shake and flash effect reduced.
  
• Acid Well now respects range limits for effects like Epic Defensive Fighting.
  
• Prismatic Strike's Daze is now an actual Daze effect instead of a stun effect.
  
• Tenser's Transformation no longer removes Eldritch Knight's Shield Proficiency upon removal.
  
• Spells should no longer block projectiles.
  

UI

• There are three new UI options:
  
• Show Filigree Descriptions (Default: On): When active, Filigree in items display their descriptions and when inactive only names are shown.
  
• Show Uncompleted Sets (Default: On): When active, set bonuses display both set bonuses you have active and bonuses that are inactive. When off, only active set bonuses are displayed.
  
• Prevent Heal Soft Targeting (Default: On): This toggle forces your healing spells to use your hard target or self-target and not your soft target.
  
• Several small adjustments have been made to Filigree and Set Bonus displays to make them easier to read.
  
• The Spell Selector window (for spells such as Teleport and Fire Shield) now remembers its position.
  
• The Quest Selection UI now spells Receive correctly in its tooltips.
  
• The Examination window now remembers its position.
  
• There is a new button to Delete All Confirmed Mail. Note that this will not function if any mail in your Confirmed tab has any attachments.
  
• The Empty Slots field of the sorted inventory panel now matches its background area better.
  
• The Reincarnation UI no longer tells you that Iconic Heroes must be level 28.
  
• Epic Hearts of Wood no longer tell you that you need Karma to Epic Reincarnate.
  

Miscellaneous

• Improved how the quest system reveals an objective when a monster is near a player in an effort to improve game performance.
  
• A change has been made that adjusts dungeon event processing for certain objectives in an effort to improve game performance.
  

Known Issues:

• The new dungeons and raid in the new adventure pack "Hunter and Hunted" do not have their proper experience set yet. The XP for running these quests will increase in the near future.