Temple of Elemental Evil is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way through Stormreach to the potion vendor, but that's just peanuts compared to Temple of Elemental Evil.
I've said before that Dungeons & Dragons Online is a game that I mostly play in relatively short sessions, due to it being comprised mainly of instanced dungeons that last anything from 20 minutes up to an hour or so. At times I will run several of these in a row, but not always - A single dungeon often provides enough adventure for one day, and so the experience is different from more open world MMOs where natural break points are less frequent, coming mainly when I'm done with a quest hub or even an entire zone. This is one reason why my DDO runs tend to stretch over more days than those of most other MMOs.
Temple of Elemental Evil is different. Released in 2015, this is one of several times when the two D&D MMOs both released content updates on the same theme at around the same time, and since Neverwinter offered up four entire zones it always seemed to me rather underwhelming that DDO only had two dungeons. That was before I stepped into the first part of ToEE and realised just how big these dungeons are.
I spent something like two and a half hours in the Temple today and finished exploring most of the first level and a small part of the second, and obtained one of the four keys needed to progress. It's true I'm only level 7 - barely on-level for this place - and so was taking my time through each encounter, but even allowing for that it's by far the largest instance I've ever played through in this game or, quite likely, any other MMO. It feels rather reminiscent of the original Blackrock Depths in World of Warcraft, a throwback to a vanished era of instance design when these were not rapid linear runs but full fledged expeditions that took hours to complete.
Whether or not it's a good thing that this kind of design is seldom seen nowadays is open to debate. ToEE is certainly not an efficient source of XP - I've obtained some from ongoing kill quests and mini-bosses but since most of the XP in DDO is only given upon completion of a dungeon I could spend many hours more in these halls before I reap that reward.
If it's even doable solo and at this level. A comment on my last post from a fellow blogger did say that this is probably the hardest on-level dungeon in the game, and I can now believe that. That said, I've been running without a hireling so far and my experience of Delera's Tomb is that they can make a big difference.
Still, it's not as if I prize efficient levelling at the best of times and thus far I've enjoyed my time in the Temple immensely. It's more like an instanced zone than a standard dungeon, and offers multiple paths through its many (many) hallways. Now that I've mapped out the route to the Earth Temple I'll be able to hit that first objective much more quickly in future forays into this place, which does me leave me feeling I've achieved something during these initial explorations.
I'll know not to walk in front of a ballista again, for one thing. (Perhaps the most embarassingly avoidable death I've had in a long time.)
It'll be a while though before I return to the Temple, and to DDO, as I've finally come to the end of the third day of this game. Even allowing for the time I've spent in ToEE I've made very little progress during these last 24 hours - going from level 6 (4/2) to level 7 (4/3) - and it seems more likely than ever that this game, even more than Lord of the Rings Online, will be the one with the longest road to max level.
I've finished this run on a high note though, and I will be back. Temple of Elemental Evil has been a very different experience from other dungeons in DDO, and more different still from much of what is offered by other MMOs, and any game that can deliver such unexpected diversions from the norm is a game that's worth exploring further.
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