i like it, me personally i hate exping :P so making it less of a tiresome act looks good to me, i like the idea of the rank changes although i dont understand exactly what u meant
Personally I like the idea of the changes. Maybe though, since it would be easier to level up, rolling should be harder or stat totals should be lowered to make chars less powerful and more geared towards ranks, therefore making ranks useful to get and randomers less powerful? (this one's for you sancho!)
I've also always liked the idea of all chars needing the same exp to level up. Mages have always needed too much, and thieves way, way too little. I consider myself experienced in knowing where to level, and how to do it fast, and even then, a caster will take a CONSIDERABLE difference in comparison to a thief or barbarian. In fact, I did a good aligned barbarian to 25 in some 15-16 hours a week ago, and that furthers my belief for exp changes needed.
Sorry I'm not helpful but I felt like commenting on your ideas.
I have some friends in the EQ2 beta. The thing they like best is that they can choose how they gain experience. They can go slaying monsters, over, and over, or they can do quests to gain experience. If the same time spent on the quests was spent just killing random mobs, the experience gained from both is about equal. I'd like to see a lot more quests for the individual that are in-depth, that require time and patience to solve, but award large amounts of EXP in-tune with the time input to complete the quest.
Perhaps this idea is more for creators/imps, but it is something I would like to see added and is quite directly related with the exp tables.
There are some good ideas here. I have thought for a long time that individual-quest-based experience/ranks would be a huge step forward for the MUD.
However, these changes so radically change the make up of the MUD I predict that a lot of people will want to quit similar to the way they did when the experience tables changed a few years back.
While redoing ranks is a great idea, top-heavy experience tables are not.
This would frustrate newer players undoubtedly and lower the player frequency in lower level zones, where much of the MUD can be absorbed by people new to the game, and I suppose that brings up another point:
Where are the new players?
I would like to hear the voices of players that have recently begun playing.
More experienced Arctic players will roll with the punches, but I have heard the voice of the masses and they scream "MAKE CLASS RE-VAMP A PRIORITY!"
My personal opinion (and I don't expect or want a reply to the off-topic part of this post) is to continue re-vamping the classes and inproving the "tactile" experience of the MUD.
This is a great idea. A zoning character is so much more useful in the ranks anyway, level 20-30 is just a long drag of pointless killing to make your character useful and keep yourself from being stunned or blinded in every major zone fight.
Sancho's idea also rules. I think it would be awesome if you could spend some time figuring out keywords and doing little side quests and actually gain good exp for using your head. Its too easy to stack a character with good gear or good spells and go whack harder than normal mobs to level up faster. Also newer or neutral players might not have access to that type of equipment/spells, and furthermore they might not know enough about the game to know exactly what zones to hit for killing exp as they level up.
Exp quests would rule, but something would have to be implemented like EQ has...where as you normally can't repeat the same quest over and over. This would prevent more experienced players from abusing and spamming the quests to keep newer players out of it.
On a final note, any idea when we'd be looking at a pwipe? Obviously you dont know how long it will take you to finish what you have to get done to do it, but do we even have a time frame?
As far as the experience change proposal I don't really have an opinion as of yet. I do however have some feelings on the rank change.
It sounds cool to have a more quest-based rank system, but I forsee some problems with it. First, if it will be set up how I think it will - where you are required to kill some end mob or do some quest or a combination of both, then this will make ranking for experienced players very fast. Most players could probably do the solo ranks in 2 hours (to 10) and then the 2man ranks in another 2 hours (to 20). Once the group ranks come in (30+), if you are the group leader, I can forsee easily gaining on average 2 ranks an hour until the really hard ones come in. Now you did say that the bar would be set to about rank 30 so it seems this issue has been forseen.
However, another big issue I see with this rank system is that for less experienced players it could become very difficult to rank. For example, you hit rank xx and are told to slay the might dragon argentine. Well for pretty much anyone but bsp or wild you're never going to be able to attain this rank. Neutral players for sure won't be able to. Maybe something to remedy this is to set up 2 or 3 different possibly quests to do per rank, so that if you can't or don't know how to do one of them you can always turn to another.
I also believe that a rank system like this would stagnate ranking groups. Currently, no matter what rank you're at, you can always go ranking - killing any and all rank mobs you want and you KNOW eventually you will gain a rank. With the new system if I get stuck on a rank (say I hit rank 60 and the next quest is to kill both cyan and suun) then I may never complete that rank the rest of the wipe. So at this point I pretty much give up on gaining any more ranks and stop grouping. These inputs of course are all based on my own vision of what the new rank system will be like, maybe you have already worked out these kinks.
If the ranks become more quest oriented and are geared towards the average player perhaps they should be less money reliant... I remember when I was trying to get ranks, the only reason I could afford my rank purchases was because of all the zones I had to do to get the rank points in the first place. If this new rank system allows people to get rank points without having to steamroll zones day after day, then they should be able to afford them without having to steamroll zones for money!
I like the sound of these proposed exp changes, especially the part about individualized ranks--I think it will do a lot to promote having fun while ranking and eliminate the mindless grind of it (unlike the current method of simply spamming rank mobs endlessly).
I do have a question tho, which has less to do with the exp system but does relate to the BAR... where exactly do you see the BAR in terms of spells? It's pretty clear that new players will have no idea where to go to get spells, but I would also suspect that many of your 'average' players who have been around for 2 years or so have little idea where to load all but the most basic spells, and still rely on buying most of their spells (assuming they manage even that). Even experienced players have a tendency to not 'spell up' until after hitting 28, simply because most loads require a group of that level (or higher) and a good bit of zone knowledge to attain them. I realize that a lot of spells shouldn't be in the hands of everyone, but I would like to see more spells load in the normal course of zoning. Obviously this is a hard thing to balance, but I feel that this is another huge gap between new players and old, as well as between neutrals and clannies, not to mention that it'd be rather odd to see rank 20 druids and mages running around with their only area spells being earthquake/entangle and fireball (i.e. none that are useful in groups).
Of course there will be always a gap between new players and old. Thats why they are new players! :-)
One big problem is foresee with this ranking system is the aforementoined steamroll of every zone thing.
A solution for this could be that for example for a rank you gotta do more than one zone/mob.
Lets say to attain rank 14 you gotta solo 10 zones.
That would solve these problems.
A dont think that evening the xp curves are a good idea.
Every class has its strength and weaknesses.
For example, warriors worth nothing without eq and they decay their gear, while mages dont. But mages has the weakness of required more xp to balance this.
I think its fine balanced and shouldnt be touched.
Decreasing mage xp will increase the number of trash pkillers again.
Trash pkillers can kill any ranked char at lvl 25 with some luck, and with lowered xp, these trash pkillers would be constantly at lvl 27-28, increasing this problem a lot more.
One thing I was hoping for in Aristox's post is about clan management.
Seems like this one major point is still missing from the plans, although clans are the top fun in the mud and clans are controlling the mortal power of the mud, all the time. Just take a look at Warcraft3, clans are useless there gameplay wise, but since they got implemented, the playerbase of that game has raised drastically.
However, another big issue I see with this rank system is that for less experienced players it could become very difficult to rank. For example, you hit rank xx and are told to slay the might dragon argentine. Well for pretty much anyone but bsp or wild you're never going to be able to attain this rank. Neutral players for sure won't be able to. Maybe something to remedy this is to set up 2 or 3 different possibly quests to do per rank, so that if you can't or don't know how to do one of them you can always turn to another.
I also believe that a rank system like this would stagnate ranking groups. Currently, no matter what rank you're at, you can always go ranking - killing any and all rank mobs you want and you KNOW eventually you will gain a rank. With the new system if I get stuck on a rank (say I hit rank 60 and the next quest is to kill both cyan and suun) then I may never complete that rank the rest of the wipe. So at this point I pretty much give up on gaining any more ranks and stop grouping. These inputs of course are all based on my own vision of what the new rank system will be like, maybe you have already worked out these kinks.
Here's an idea.
Let's say there are 100 ranks. Put in like maybe 10 or 20 that are only attainable through certain quests (like kill Cyan). So, if you happen to receive that quest at a stage of rank 30 or 40, you can still go on ranking through other quests and killing rank mobs. However, once you reach a certain point, say rank 80, it is required for you to fulfill that particular quest to go on.
Furthermore, you can go on collecting other quests as you go even if you're unable to fulfill the first one you receive.
It doesn't completely solve the problem of people getting stuck at a certain rank, but if you lower the limits to reach a higher rank before people get stuck, I think it should work out fine.
First of all,
my compliments to staff for continuying to try to improve this game.
I think these changes are at least in part coming forth because of player suggestions and complaints, so thanks for listening to us as well.
I have 2 comments to the proposed changes:
Aristox wrote:
Step 1. Lower the xp to get to 1xp considerably.
Will all the skill levels and 'hidden stats' that are currently attained during leveling stay the same in the new system? I.e. will a level 30 tank still have the same saves, resists, bash modifiers, max skill levels as this wipe? If this is so, this will mean that the mob vs player battles will become easier, since 1x will be attainable faster. Of course rank affects do help a lot in the endgame elite battles as does great equipment, but there's a reason people are shouting for a 'ranked basher' instead of a 'ranked basher with at least +10 bash rank and -3 save vs spell rank'. So, if I am correct in how the game works, if 1x is attained faster without changes to level based character stats, or mob difficulty, a lot of zones will become easier. I am not saying this is a bad thing, but people should realize this.
Aristox wrote:
Each player would get a
specific set of clues to what they need to do to gain their next rank and for the most part no 2 characters would have to do the
same thing at the same rank.
As people have mentioned before, if the rank quests are too individualized this will have a big effect for neutrals to gain ranks. Already this wipe, as a clan zone leader, I have a big say in which zones are run for a lot of clannies. This usually means I run zones I gain from more often than non-leading clannies. This is even more the case for neutral players, who hardly have a say on what zone is run if they don't have the right connections or friends. Nowadays it's not like if you shout for a group you get to pick out of 5 options. It's either go with the one response your shout brings, or stay soloing.
So, if people are dependant on very individual rank quests that need 6+ groups, neutrals will have a disavantage to clans, who get groups easier and can steamroll through zones. I am a bit afraid for the situation where someone shouts 'looking for someone that can lead Shayds' 10 times a day 2 weeks in a row....
But maybe I misunderstand the plans or are there several options a player can choose from that will counteract these problems.
But, new things to try out are always welcome as far as I am concerned.
Going to try to answer everyone individually (I wont be doing this all the time, just now) so bear with the long post.
siris
Getting to higher level will be easier for randomers yes, but they aren't having a hard time now. One of the goals here is to get the targets of those randomers to high level faster so they can defend themself more easily.
Aeclasic
The rank changes are currently purposely vague because the system isn't fully designed yet. I dont want to give too much information and then have it change.
Corey
Stat rolls would likely stay the same, although there might be a few minor changes to the race based side of it. I dont forsee any lower in the stats that can be rolled. Yes, people can xp fast now, but some can't. What I am hoping happens is we move the game slightly away from the trek that is level 1 to 30 and more into the trek that is ranks. In trying to do the shift , I think we need to shorten the path from 1 to 30 a lot.
int 21h
The clues will be given by certain mobs sprinkled throughout the world and you will have a command to display the ones currently required of you without talking to the mob. So something like a rank tasks command that display what you need to do. The clues will get harder as the quests get harder. A rank 1 task might be 'Go kill 5 bugbears', now all you need to do is find the bugbears. A rank 50 quest might not even mention a zone or mob name, but would just give a geographic location and idea at the target 'Bring down the man full of riddles beneath the village.' I am terrible at writing clues (that is why I let others do it), but you get the idea. The rank task list will update when you complete things as well, so you know if you did it.
Sancho
Die.
Rurh
The costs and available ranks will probably change, but that is the easy change here. The hard part is getting the system for ranking designed and ready to go. We can worry about the purchases later. The rest of your post made zero sense to me, maybe you should lay off the crack pipe a little.
greg
Are there tons of people in the lowbie zones now? As for new players, it is tough to draw them into a text-based, pk, pwiping game where most of the other players are real jerks to anyone and everyone they dont know (even some people they do know). I think this change will allow new players to get their feet wet a lot quicker and get up in levels before the randoming jerks find them. I guess we are listening to different people (I listen to anyone that talks to me), but I dont hear screaming from class revamps so much as tweaks to make the classes a little more balanced. Scouts have been on hold for a while now (I got a new job, got engaged, etc) but they aren't dead. These changes (ranks and exp) will probably take me about a week to code, but the ranks have to be fleshed out first and everything settled before I start. I handed the design phase past the initial ideas off to other imms and I will just chime in when necessary. While they do that leg work I am going to continue to work on minor class tweaks and probably get back to scouts soon.
Solana
I agree with your zoning statements. I think the newer players will also find the higher level zones a lot more interesting than the lower ones. Ranks dont make you a good player, but if you are ranked you have the tools to play in the big zones without the minor annoyances (getting blinded, stunned charmed as much) that can get everyone killed. Exp quests is a long term thing that you should start seeing more of sooner or later, hard to work out details right now. I dont have a time frame for a pwipe and even if I did I wouldn't tell everyone until there was under a week left. I hate giving out that info because people plan their life around (quitting, going on pkilling sprees, etc) and I would just rather you played the game. I will say I dont forsee a pwipe before the first of the year, that is all I can assure you of now. Even that can change though if things go better than planned.
mike
As for gaining early ranks quickly, that is part of the plan. I think the experienced players will get to rank 50 or 60 pretty fast in the new system. The less experience players will find their way to rank 30 and then move slowly toward 60 the rest of the wipe. With the real experienced players getting close to 100. The idea will be institute a measure of control over the ranks such that we aren't going to require a mob like Cyan, Suun or Argentine until rank 80 or 90. Yes there will be points that people will get stuck and I am going to put in a system of appeal where you can ask an imm to reset you to a different rank if the one you are one is too hard. There will of course be penalties associated with abandoning a rank, but nothing too severe. I dislike 'rank groups' that just plow over zone after zone racing for the next rank for everyone in the group. I think the new ranks will cause more small group ranking, where clans take a few groups out and hit a few zones for individuals and then move on. It will become more of a personal quest than just follow-clan-leader as he drags you to rank glory. If a rank task/quest is too hard for the rank we will change it of course, but that will require feedback from players on what is too hard/too easy.
edwai
Good point, the prices will be adjusted I am sure when we get to redoing all the rank purchase options. Not really sure what specifically will change yet, we probably wont do that until the first or second week of next wipe.
Arthelas
Well, I did recently up all the mage loads quite a bit and I think druids are currently in a good spot for spell loading. Clerics I will have to take another look at, but they dont seem too bad off. We change the spell load system every wipe to a degree. Mostly we try to change where the top end spells are loading and adjust where the middle range spells have a chance to load. I think next wipe we are going to move more toward a middle ground on spells, right now they are a bit too skewed toward high end mobs loading okay spells, we will back off and move those okay spells into a more diverse group of locations. This is all done at once during the first week after a pwipe (sometimes during the downtime between wipes if we have one). The BAR for spells is a hard balance, I am not sure it will ever be perfect. I will be adjusting learn rates next wipe somewhat, with faster leveling there are going to be more casters studying books at higher levels and thus failing things at level 30. Even with the new relearn books there will need to be a higher chance to learn spells on average to compensate for the faster leveling.
kmark
People wont be steam rolling these as easily for sure. The system just wont be setup to allow that. As for clans, yes a clan system is still in the works, this post is about experience changes though, not clans. I dont think the clan system will go in at the start of next wipe, probably mid wipe.
blehbleh
I dont think people are going to be getting stuck as much as you think. I know for a fact the 'big' mobs are going to come at the really high ranks because I am not going to let the system allow someone a 'Kill Cyan' task at rank 40 or 50 (or even 75). I addressed the problem of people getting stuck earlier in this post as well.
curlyboy
Yes, most of this comes from player feedback and as usual the squeaky wheel gets the grease. The hidden stats change every wipe, they wont be getting worse in general as part of this, more than likely they will get better in some cases and worse in others, staying right about even with current overall. I think characters at level 30 are fine right now powerwise, there doesn't need to be much changed on the un-seen stats to tweak them. Clans will ALWAYS have it easier at ranking, nothing can be done about that. I have addressed the problem of people getting stuck earlier, so read the whole post for an answer on that. I actually think this will slow clans down a bit, which isn't all that bad. Now they will have to focus on pulling individual people up in ranks rather than doing the whole group at once. They will also have to be more coordinated about getting people together to do tasks that overlap (one has to kill moultar, one has to kill yurak, they can do both in one pass). Solo/neutral players I think will end up with more of a goal for themself, I know I would see it that way. If I have a rank to kill Sarson(probably wont be until later in the ranks anyway), but I dont know where/who that is, I will try to figure that out through any means I can. I would then try to get a group together to kill him and keep trying until I do. Of course, not everyone is like me, but that is how I hope things will work out for neutral people.
Keep em coming, I will try to answer what I can (work permitting).
I guess I talk to Rurh too much but this seems to mimic a conversation we had in irc one day.
I THINK what he was insisting was that if u get 100k a kill in patience and can level insanely fast when a big bad pker comes strolling in and whacks you the loss isn't nearly as significant as it is when u lose hours of your play time due to a death. Now to many this isn't a big deal however when you are one of those few who is not very well liked, starting over again and again is not a very fun thing to do. With easier xp tables getting whacked wouldn't cost u 2-3 even 8 hours of your life re-xping, not to even touch on the fact of re-equipping.
In short, "less loss means less wrong" or whatever it was he said, (I think) translates into while getting pked still sucks it won't hurt quite so bad.
Anyways I started babbling, if I'm wrong feel free to correct me.
But nor is that a linear relationship. If there's no loss there's no fun. If it's too hard, then it's no fun. The trick is the balance.
Which depends on:
1) The reason for death (pk or soloing soth)
2) The person's clan affiilation (do you solo for 2 huors and get 2M, or group for 2 hours and get 8M).
3) The individual person (how much patience does the person have, how much free time, ability to acess risk potential effectively)
I thought the 1/2 xp loss from pk was a good step, along with the bonus xp.
And I think this is a good step too.
My only real concern is, What if it turns out to be too easy? Would you just adjust the tables wipe-in-progress, wipe, or just leave it till next wipe? Or other?
That sudden leap of the BAR from level 27 to rank 30 sounds scary!
Are there any plans on changing the rolling process when you create a character? My first character was a warrior with 16 str, 9 wis, 16 con played him to 14th level before i was told those stats were pitiful. Then spend a week rolling and rolling and rolling a new one with decent stats.
I'm not to excited about the pwipe itself (eg. deleting my characters), but it would sure take the sting out of it, if you could reroll a little easier an be able to play right out of the box, and for new players to create usuable characters more quickly.
I'd like to see the system we have now, but at 6th level you can increase 1 stat but decrease another one, but have the stats are set in parellel with each other:
eg. raise str by 1 automatically lowers con by 1. Raise int by 1, automatically lowers wis by one, etc. That way mages could not pump int at the expense of str they do not need and warriors could not pump str at the expense of int, etc.. and you could only pump one stat once, etc.
I've never gotton above 27th level, and from what Sancho and other's have said, thats where the fun starts, so the rest of the ideas sound good to me, as long as its not too easy (i kinda like how its hard to get to 30th, but not to hard now)...
its genius!
yes everyone will have high level trash characters, but EVERYONE will have high level trash characters. when some trash kills me, i get to log on my pkilling characters and hunt them down. that is arctic at its best to me. fun and excitement. i cant wait for it to wipe.
I personaly love the idea.
Gives more people a chance to enjoy the end game of arctic
I also like the idea of quest ranks.
In a few of th examples that Stox gave especially the Sarson one you can see how quests will drive the exploration of the mud for newer players at least. People asked for a "wish item" or info on zones that are rarely explored. Maybe through the use of these rank quests people can be pointed to new zones new mobs or things that have been unfound/unexplore for a while. As some said the clans will have a ranking advantage because of more game info but by the time a new player has obtained rank 60 or 70 as stox said he would hope they would toward the end of a wipe there game and zone knowledge will have vastly improved leveling the playing field and increasing player v player competition.
in all i love the ideas
this post has made me interested int he game again =)
[color=blue]My only concern with the rank system would be that some people would only want to do their rank quest when they're in a group, which could screw over others. It'ss not a question of game knowldge after awhile, it's more of a top-dog deal. Also, this change might make the game too easy, which would be bad as arctic was always meant for the more experienced mudder' or however that line goes.[/color]
Well since its unanimous... I'll get a hold of you stox and let you know the last day of the quarter/finals so that u can schedule the pwipe around me.
I see what Malthros is getting at, and its true. I can totally see certain leader top dog types leading their clans around all night hitting the ranks that THEY need, and not giving two shits about the "fodder" members of the clan.
A side effect of this might be that other non important members of the clan might be forced to start leading. This could be good in a way.
OR - join newer, smaller clans or even form some of their own, shrinking the 30+ member clans into a more competetive nature. Some decent player in a major clan is often an excellent member in a smaller clan.
"One man's trash is another man's treasure..." or something similar could apply.
great call stox, just reading this is making me want to come back and play more. even this current wipe so i can polish up for when these changes come into effect
I have some friends in the EQ2 beta. The thing they like best is that they can choose how they gain experience. They can go slaying monsters, over, and over, or they can do quests to gain experience. If the same time spent on the quests was spent just killing random mobs, the experience gained from both is about equal. I'd like to see a lot more quests for the individual that are in-depth, that require time and patience to solve, but award large amounts of EXP in-tune with the time input to complete the quest.
Perhaps this idea is more for creators/imps, but it is something I would like to see added and is quite directly related with the exp tables.
-Sancho
I don't like this idea because it seems to me that it will favor clans. Clans share way too much nowadays.
I also believe that a rank system like this would stagnate ranking groups. Currently, no matter what rank you're at, you can always go ranking - killing any and all rank mobs you want and you KNOW eventually you will gain a rank.
Untrue. There is a "stagnation" in the current rank system, eventually you get to a point where you can not get any more ranks unless you start killing some pretty hard mobs.
I think next wipe we are going to move more toward a middle ground on spells, right now they are a bit too skewed toward high end mobs loading okay spells, we will back off and move those okay spells into a more diverse group of locations.
I think this is the best thing I've heard all wipe. Right on!
Maybe with clan disbandings and smaller clans being created, more and funner wars among smaller memer'd clans will erupt? This could be a lot more fun!
o my gawsh!11111 did the immortals finally realize making the game harder is just driving away players which are the most fundamental, intrinsic aspect to arctic???? no way!!11111 that's ardkore!
I can see the fight over Xak Occuring 3 hours into the wipe next wipe. lol
I pretty much like all the ideas here, but thought of this one in addition to the others. In regards to XPloss on Character Death. Every "new" player will tell you how much XPloss sucks, and then the old timers will say "haha noob, you suck, deal with it" but how about a (seemingly) simple change.
Make is so that you only lose the current 1/4th 1/6th whatever it is at now once you have a set amount of playtime on your character.
First day of playtime Death = 0xploss
Second Day of Playtime Death = 1/40th of level
Slowly Building up to the current amount after 5-10-40 however many days of playtime. This would allow new characters to take more risks and not say F THIS after they get killed as a level 1 and lose the 800 xp they spent 3 hours getting off pigeons.
Edit: Also, Anything you can do that makes more PK happen would be a positive change. Zoning is boring.
I can only kill steamroll the same zones with the same people so many times before it becomes mindnumbing. I logged in the other day and people asked me to heal DKO, a zone which I've probably done 150 times this wipe and I almost fell asleep. There was no excitement in Turning the revenant for the easy kill, I'd done that several times already, it was just, oh, well, that will get this done faster, cool. Tsu isn't Scary anymore, I had little fear of "screwing up" and a mage getting onestabbed. Hell, We did trin on like 5 and it wasn't even exciting.
The thing that makes this game fun for me is having something to lose. Zoning is boring, because most likely, if you die, you arn't going to lose anything except for a small amount of xp. PK is interesting because people have better AI then Mobs, and have much more interesting reactions to fighting than mobs. Fighting a mob entails, oh, we have enough people to do that zone? ok, lets do it. Fighting People entails very much more.
If most people liked zoning over PK, i would think that less people would be promoting a change to make less zoning required in the game to get to a point where you can stand a chance in a PK situation.
Finally, I never said others should share my opinion, I simply stated mine. If you want to say otherwise, feel free, but I don't think namecalling is an appropriate way to discuss differences in opinion.
I can see the fight over Xak Occuring 3 hours into the wipe next wipe. lol
[color=blue]Isn't that about how long it takes groups like bsp to get to a high enough lvl to (pre)learn heal? :)
I do remember playing during a pwipe like 3-4 years ago, and the first titled person came in like 20 hours or so. This wipe it was a coupel days wasn't it?[/color]
Yeah, it's gotten more difficult now.
Hopefully we roll it back a little and make the game a bit more interesting for everyone by allowing them to get into the more challenging high level zones without having to join a massive clan or die horribly three rooms in because they aren't high enough level to manage it.
I'd like to see these changes foster a new wave of exploration in the higher level zones that are not commonly done.
is a level 30 on the current xp system going to be the same thing as a level 30 on the new xp system? (hp, saves, etc) i dont see why it wouldn't be, but i just wanted to ask.
i guess the only "issue" i see is, why do we have to make everyone super hero's in order to make "balance"
so what i see is next wipe, we're going ot have 1000's of level 30's running around and then the numbers will decrease as the rank's increase (900 rank 10's, 800 rank 20's etc) as an example. i dont see why making it so everyone can achieve level 30 is a fix to balance.
achieving level 30 is a ... big achievement! at least until next wipe. now the goal for "new" but not "newbie" players will be what, rank 50? rank 60? what rank # distinguishes you from the rest? what will someone be able to say? I mean, maybe it doesn't matter to most people, but attaining level 30 for the first time was a FANTASTIC feeling for me. just wonderful! its not something just anyone can do, and I did it. i'm sure everyone knows that feeling.
well now what will it be? instead of calling it "the grind from 23-28" it will be "the grind from rank 36 - rank 52"
dont get me wrong, i do like the changes stox is suggesting or doing, but I dont see how making everyone level 30 and rank 40 will make the balance equaled out. i mean, is randoming so big a deal that everyone needs to be made level 30 rank 20 just to stop it? i walk around all day and night with tons of decent "pk target" gear on my level 17's and 20's and 25's, but i *never* get attacked *EVER*.
maybe i'm just lucky.
shrug. this is just like Everquest. (the reason i use EQ as the example, in the beginning, there were dragons, that you could basically walk right up to after killing X amount of mobs, the dragons had 32,000 hp, and hit for 250ish or so. then the new expansion comes out. new dungeon with a new dragon. you have to kill X amount of mobs, then walk right up to the dragon, who now hits for 750, and has 150000 hp. NOTHING is different between these 2 battles, except the players hit harder, the mobs have more hp and the mobs hit harder) Instead of making things "harder" to figure out or "new" you just make the same old shit 1000 times more powerful and expect it to balance itself out?
i dont see it happening.
just my opinions. i like the idea of changing things, but if all your going to do is make it so everyone can get the highest level so that everyone is equal, the elite players wont find any fun in that. if some loser who steals all the keywords and cant lead brogs, has a level 30 rank 40 because he's good at typing "follow"..... then what is there to achieve......
just seems to me the "goals" for "elite" players are being severly reduced by these changes. i guess thats the only method of defense for the people who cant hang, ruin the people who can, so that those who cant, are equal to those who can. i'd hate to see that happen to a game such as arctic.
shrug.
burn me up with your flames, i welcome them! muhaha
just my opinions. i like the idea of changing things, but if all your going to do is make it so everyone can get the highest level so that everyone is equal, the elite players wont find any fun in that. if some loser who steals all the keywords and cant lead brogs, has a level 30 rank 40 because he's good at typing "follow"..... then what is there to achieve......
just seems to me the "goals" for "elite" players are being severly reduced by these changes. i guess thats the only method of defense for the people who cant hang, ruin the people who can, so that those who cant, are equal to those who can. i'd hate to see that happen to a game such as arctic.
I think the "elite" players will enjoy these changes quite a lot. The "elitist" players won't. The whole point of playing is to have people to play against. You don't prove your eliteness by outleveling someone, that's just grind. You can prove your eliteness by collecting a great set of equipment and then doing something with that. Too many people misunderstand that the reason clans dominate is not beacause they have level 30 characters, but because for the most part they know what to do with them. Who cares if its easier to get to level 30, that will just give us more people to fight against. There's no fun in attacking a level 20 enemy, but a lot more fun in attacking an enemy who has a chance of fighting back (although we try to make that chance as slim as possible).
i highly doubt Everyone will have a level 30 character, even with the changes.
and suf is right. just because a newbie is level 30, it doesnt make him an even match for a level 30 experienced player, or anywhere close to even. it does level out the playing field some though, and that equals more competition.
competition is good right?
My highest level character this wipe is level 23.
I am awesome. Scurry in fear.
The main reason for this is my lack of time, plus the horrific amount of experience I've needed to gain levels since level 20 just makes me sad. I think changing the curve so that things get difficult around typical large group zoning levels will help people get into the fun of the game more quickly and could foster an increase in the size of our playerbase, which is one of our primary goals.
We want to take care of the people we have playing first, but we also want to keep the mud attractive to newcomers.
Hell I'd be happy with something as simple as unmaxing everyone for all zones every so often. Say everytime there's a foom or the mud is reset you unmax everyone.
NOTHING is different between these 2 battles, except the players hit harder, the mobs have more hp and the mobs hit harder) Instead of making things "harder" to figure out or "new" you just make the same old shit 1000 times more powerful and expect it to balance itself out?
Welcome to the majority of fights in any RPG. Whats the difference between toede and ariakas? Yup. Shit hits harder, shit has more hit points. Sure, some stuff rescues in some fights, and theres some neat tricks sometimes, but those tricks aren't necessarily exclusive to high content: the high content just has more hps, and hits harder.
I basically quit the mud for the most part even tho I have a titled pal. The reason? I just got sick of all the grind I had to do just to lvl a char from 20-25 and since they are basically weak at those levels I could not have any fun in the big zones.But with a change this massive even I (who has sworn never to touch the mud again) will be a hopeless addict again.
I do like the idea of making all class's require the same exp to reach the same levels even tho I can see how that might make trash casters alot more common.But overall I could find nothing I disliked and even love most of it.Im only shocked aristox even bothered to tell us in advance that he was planning to do it =)
I don't believe any game should make it hard for the veteran player to advance past the newbie aspects of the game.Once a player has seen all there is to see at the lower levels I believe they should be allowed to put in their time to get past them and then be challenged later when the rewards and risks are very high (and fun).Plus this change will allow neutrals like myself to enjoy the possibility of ranks and such without having to get the help of all the stuck up clans who have always been WAY too full of themselves =)
I also noticed some people think that this will make it too easy for clans.Clans will always have it easy since the nature of clans are to make such things easier.IMO all this change will do is make the playing field even again since it will allow small clans and neutrals to achieve some of the rewards that make playing the game such fun.I see it as aristox rewarding those loyal players who don't have the time or who are just sick and tired of the endless grind.
I rather the grind be for something important rather than for some weak ass levels like 20-27.Basically why not make the right levels hard because of the rewards rather than to just hinder clans (and thats why it was soo hard from 20-27).The only difference between 20 and 27 for most chars is a little more power and a few guild spells/skills.
The difference between 20 and 27 is quite a bit in terms of saves, hp, etc. All contributing to zones you can do.
When the XP tables were changed back in the day, it was not to hinder clans but to hinder Trash. It was thought that the more time you spent on your character, the less likely you were to trash it with riskless Pkills, etc.
Game play from 20-27 is more or less the same from level to level.Yes there is a big power difference between a lvl 20 and 27 but you don't really get any rewards for all the endless hours you spent.For the veteran player 20-27 holds nothing that 1-20 didn't already give you other than guild spell/skill and some more power.Ranks just offer more of a reward for gaining them than going from lvl 26 to 27 ever could. So I don't see why gaining lvl 27 should be such a major pain in the butt.
I have been playing for about 4 years now and I have only had 1 lvl 30 char. I will be the first to admit that that was probably the best day I ever spent on the mud and it was such a thrill.But after that first 30 char I just don't don't see why I have to do the same mindless crap over and over again for no real reward.The first time I did it I was very driven but now a lvl 30 is just another level and once I reach it I have even MORE exp to get to 1xp.
Im not saying it should be very easy to get to lvl 30 or anything. But I do believe that it should be alot easier for veteran players to get to the levels where the REAL rewards finally come into play.Simply I believe lvl 20-27 is just too damn hard for the rewards you get.Any veteran player can get from 1-20ish in a day or two with some hardcore lvling so why should 20-27 be any harder?
I'll go along with all of Aristox's suggestions, raising the "BAR" by lowering exp, making ranks easier to come by and less big-clan centric etc. However, I'd like dying to not lose your place in your rank. The reason being I'm a big risktaker and die alot despite being a member of a big clan. Actually I die because I solo or tempt fate by trying things on less than I should. Lately I cut back on the trying new things part and die less because of it, but the game is less fun. When I die the experience loss (8 mil) takes 1-2 hours to get back but the rank exp loss is much more harsh, I'm not sure if it's even intended to be this way.
Will alignment affect the Rank quests in terms of difficulty? In my experience, Ranks were always harder on neutrals than good aligned characters, and chose my alignment accordingly. Will this be reflected in the new rank quests?
One potential problem I see is the is the ambiguity of certain tasks.
"You had to kill 5 hobgoblins. You found and killed them, fine. Sorry pal, we had in mind some other hobgoblins from some other zone, go explore more". For me, that would be extremely annoying.
Similarly, killing every major dragon just to find out which "Nasty Ancient Great Wyrm" you were to slay might be quite tedious. I'm not against the vague and subtle hints, but only for as long as the riddle has just ONE correct answer (perhaps a difficult one, but strictly one and one only) and all the others are CLEARLY incorrect.
As a practical example, I was exploring a (low) zone some time ago and a mob asked me to bring a quest item. I knew where to get it and spent an evening trying to figure out the keyword to return it - all in vain. Some time later, a friend informed me that the zone had an item with [i]exactly the same name[/i], which was the correct solution to the quest.
(For those interested, I hope I don't give away too much information saying that "the clove of garlic" from Wayreth shop was the [i]incorrect [/i]item.)
[color=blue]This would be kinda dumb, but they could always do like the quest system like in some ROMs where you have [/color][color=red][Target][/color][color=blue] in front of the monster you'd have to kill. :P
As far as killing somethign like a 'Nasty Acnient Great Wyrm", there are a few mobs that could fit that description, so perhaps any of them could be used. :)[/color]
As another idea, perhaps the quests should not be necessarily limited to killing a particular mob. I guess, getting a particular item (or even any item with some particular qualities) may be an interesting quest task. Finishing a zone quest (whether it includes killing some mobs and/or getting some items or not) may also be used as a rank quest task.
Examples:
1) Get any auto-wb item (rank 1)
2) Get any rentable +dam (+1 or more) item, except weapons (rank 15)
3) Get any auto-fly or auto-wb or auto-det-invis or auto-invis item (rank 10)
4) Get a gazer's eye (rank 75)
5) Free the old wizard from his captivity in the land of merchesti (rank 5)
6) Get a "dark shadow" charmie (rank 30)
In case of items, it adds additional diversity and more multi-player interaction to the quests, since the players now have an option to either
a) Learn the zone(s) and wait for the appropriate item to load;
b) Kill the current owner of the item (or steal the item);
c) Trade or borrow the item from the current owner.
Finally, the rank quest item should probably be taken away from the player and not be loaded back into the game for 1-3 days. Sounds like "driving the wedge (C) Aristox", doesn't it?
We are still designing the rank system and I dont want to talk about it in this thread. So please start a new thread if you want. We will certainly consider any ideas you have, but we aren't really at that point in the design yet.
Oh, interesting ideas. I too hate leveling up to high levels with a passion although its easier for me then some of my friends as I know where to go and what is usually not hit by others. Still, I do miss the old experience tables. Would suck having crappy weap skills at level 20 though because of gaining so fast.
I think one thing people should take into account is that the bar is where players of two years experience will be at, not newbies. Think of where you guys were after two years and Rank 30 probably doesn't sound all that special, especially if you managed to get into a clan, you probably got to 30 in one wipe. I'm not all that hot on the quest for ranks stuff, but whatever. It'll be fun as well.
Well I've read most of the posts on this subject and felt I would give my 2 cents worth.
First a little background on my own playing exp.
I began playing arctic around the 2nd pwipe I suppose or maybe 3rd.
I have never joined a clan, although I almost joined the KOS once as they seemed the easiest to join and were newbie friendly. However, Life stepped in and that didn't happen. I have had several characters reach level 25 and a few got higher. one even hit level 29 for about 20 minutes.. but then I died in Blacken and well that was that.
So it seems that I am firmly in the NUETRAL category.
I know several zones although they are all low or maybe mid level.
I have been to a few of the high zones a few times over the years when I joined an impromptu group probably being led by some mage hoping to pop a book. This I am sure is in complete opposition of clanned players who probably spend most of there time in High level areas, as seems to be the case by the equipment that occasionally appears in the stores.
My longwinded point is that that I have noticed that a huge portion of the game is VERBOTIN to a character less than level 25 and even at level 29
I wasn't able to go to many zones.. as the aggro mobs would just crush you in a few moments. So I am firmly in support of lowering the bar for a character to reach 1xp. This would make more experienced players more ready to take you into a group as you are far more useful at higher level.
The lower levels are just a pain for those who know little of the realm. as you end up doing the same zones over and over. The fear of death from senseless DT'S or from walking into a zone that just
is so much tougher than you are, at the lower levels keeps exploring to a minimum. Then If you do manage to go to a new zone. Often the book or weapon that pops there is NOT there. Unless you are with someone that knows the zone you would never know that something nice was to be found there. This is another point tho and perhaps should be addressed in a different spot.
Was just thinking about stuff and figured that if the xp tables to go down, they should not go down as far as they were 6 years ago or whenever they changed. With the addition of all these new zones getting xp is still pretty easy. Lowering it to the old standards would make things a little too crazy I think and some mid level zones probably won't get hit because people get high levels a little too fast.
I just started playing again and the process of leveling to the 20's was boring, but after that one you start grouping it gets ok. Leave 25+ top heavy, maybe minimize it a bit. In two playing sessions of a few hours each I got bout 11 milion experience, so its not really bad right now. The lower stuff sux though.
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
yeah! easier to level chars to random with and not be called trash for me and friend1 and friend2!
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
i like it, me personally i hate exping :P so making it less of a tiresome act looks good to me, i like the idea of the rank changes although i dont understand exactly what u meant
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
Personally I like the idea of the changes. Maybe though, since it would be easier to level up, rolling should be harder or stat totals should be lowered to make chars less powerful and more geared towards ranks, therefore making ranks useful to get and randomers less powerful? (this one's for you sancho!)
I've also always liked the idea of all chars needing the same exp to level up. Mages have always needed too much, and thieves way, way too little. I consider myself experienced in knowing where to level, and how to do it fast, and even then, a caster will take a CONSIDERABLE difference in comparison to a thief or barbarian. In fact, I did a good aligned barbarian to 25 in some 15-16 hours a week ago, and that furthers my belief for exp changes needed.
Sorry I'm not helpful but I felt like commenting on your ideas.
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
Can you define these 'rank clues' a little more?
Something on SCORE output?
You should kill a great big green dragon in a certain zone that blah blah.
Or something else?
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
I have some friends in the EQ2 beta. The thing they like best is that they can choose how they gain experience. They can go slaying monsters, over, and over, or they can do quests to gain experience. If the same time spent on the quests was spent just killing random mobs, the experience gained from both is about equal. I'd like to see a lot more quests for the individual that are in-depth, that require time and patience to solve, but award large amounts of EXP in-tune with the time input to complete the quest.
Perhaps this idea is more for creators/imps, but it is something I would like to see added and is quite directly related with the exp tables.
-Sancho
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
Well I hope the rank lists that one can buy, will change.
If rank 30ish is fairly easy to get, I couldn't imagine a hundred people running around who are auto_steelskin.
Frankly I like the idea, not because of that it'd help neutrals against randomers so much, but the reflection that this is a pk mud.
The basis of my arguments against randoming is the loss. Less loss means less 'wrong' in this case.
It might go to far, but I'd like to see!
RE: New System Ideas
There are some good ideas here. I have thought for a long time that individual-quest-based experience/ranks would be a huge step forward for the MUD.
However, these changes so radically change the make up of the MUD I predict that a lot of people will want to quit similar to the way they did when the experience tables changed a few years back.
While redoing ranks is a great idea, top-heavy experience tables are not.
This would frustrate newer players undoubtedly and lower the player frequency in lower level zones, where much of the MUD can be absorbed by people new to the game, and I suppose that brings up another point:
Where are the new players?
I would like to hear the voices of players that have recently begun playing.
More experienced Arctic players will roll with the punches, but I have heard the voice of the masses and they scream "MAKE CLASS RE-VAMP A PRIORITY!"
My personal opinion (and I don't expect or want a reply to the off-topic part of this post) is to continue re-vamping the classes and inproving the "tactile" experience of the MUD.
Thanks for the post, Aristox.
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
This is a great idea. A zoning character is so much more useful in the ranks anyway, level 20-30 is just a long drag of pointless killing to make your character useful and keep yourself from being stunned or blinded in every major zone fight.
Sancho's idea also rules. I think it would be awesome if you could spend some time figuring out keywords and doing little side quests and actually gain good exp for using your head. Its too easy to stack a character with good gear or good spells and go whack harder than normal mobs to level up faster. Also newer or neutral players might not have access to that type of equipment/spells, and furthermore they might not know enough about the game to know exactly what zones to hit for killing exp as they level up.
Exp quests would rule, but something would have to be implemented like EQ has...where as you normally can't repeat the same quest over and over. This would prevent more experienced players from abusing and spamming the quests to keep newer players out of it.
On a final note, any idea when we'd be looking at a pwipe? Obviously you dont know how long it will take you to finish what you have to get done to do it, but do we even have a time frame?
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
As far as the experience change proposal I don't really have an opinion as of yet. I do however have some feelings on the rank change.
It sounds cool to have a more quest-based rank system, but I forsee some problems with it. First, if it will be set up how I think it will - where you are required to kill some end mob or do some quest or a combination of both, then this will make ranking for experienced players very fast. Most players could probably do the solo ranks in 2 hours (to 10) and then the 2man ranks in another 2 hours (to 20). Once the group ranks come in (30+), if you are the group leader, I can forsee easily gaining on average 2 ranks an hour until the really hard ones come in. Now you did say that the bar would be set to about rank 30 so it seems this issue has been forseen.
However, another big issue I see with this rank system is that for less experienced players it could become very difficult to rank. For example, you hit rank xx and are told to slay the might dragon argentine. Well for pretty much anyone but bsp or wild you're never going to be able to attain this rank. Neutral players for sure won't be able to. Maybe something to remedy this is to set up 2 or 3 different possibly quests to do per rank, so that if you can't or don't know how to do one of them you can always turn to another.
I also believe that a rank system like this would stagnate ranking groups. Currently, no matter what rank you're at, you can always go ranking - killing any and all rank mobs you want and you KNOW eventually you will gain a rank. With the new system if I get stuck on a rank (say I hit rank 60 and the next quest is to kill both cyan and suun) then I may never complete that rank the rest of the wipe. So at this point I pretty much give up on gaining any more ranks and stop grouping. These inputs of course are all based on my own vision of what the new rank system will be like, maybe you have already worked out these kinks.
changing ranks
If the ranks become more quest oriented and are geared towards the average player perhaps they should be less money reliant... I remember when I was trying to get ranks, the only reason I could afford my rank purchases was because of all the zones I had to do to get the rank points in the first place. If this new rank system allows people to get rank points without having to steamroll zones day after day, then they should be able to afford them without having to steamroll zones for money!
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
I like the sound of these proposed exp changes, especially the part about individualized ranks--I think it will do a lot to promote having fun while ranking and eliminate the mindless grind of it (unlike the current method of simply spamming rank mobs endlessly).
I do have a question tho, which has less to do with the exp system but does relate to the BAR... where exactly do you see the BAR in terms of spells? It's pretty clear that new players will have no idea where to go to get spells, but I would also suspect that many of your 'average' players who have been around for 2 years or so have little idea where to load all but the most basic spells, and still rely on buying most of their spells (assuming they manage even that). Even experienced players have a tendency to not 'spell up' until after hitting 28, simply because most loads require a group of that level (or higher) and a good bit of zone knowledge to attain them. I realize that a lot of spells shouldn't be in the hands of everyone, but I would like to see more spells load in the normal course of zoning. Obviously this is a hard thing to balance, but I feel that this is another huge gap between new players and old, as well as between neutrals and clannies, not to mention that it'd be rather odd to see rank 20 druids and mages running around with their only area spells being earthquake/entangle and fireball (i.e. none that are useful in groups).
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
Of course there will be always a gap between new players and old. Thats why they are new players! :-)
One big problem is foresee with this ranking system is the aforementoined steamroll of every zone thing.
A solution for this could be that for example for a rank you gotta do more than one zone/mob.
Lets say to attain rank 14 you gotta solo 10 zones.
That would solve these problems.
A dont think that evening the xp curves are a good idea.
Every class has its strength and weaknesses.
For example, warriors worth nothing without eq and they decay their gear, while mages dont. But mages has the weakness of required more xp to balance this.
I think its fine balanced and shouldnt be touched.
Decreasing mage xp will increase the number of trash pkillers again.
Trash pkillers can kill any ranked char at lvl 25 with some luck, and with lowered xp, these trash pkillers would be constantly at lvl 27-28, increasing this problem a lot more.
One thing I was hoping for in Aristox's post is about clan management.
Seems like this one major point is still missing from the plans, although clans are the top fun in the mud and clans are controlling the mortal power of the mud, all the time. Just take a look at Warcraft3, clans are useless there gameplay wise, but since they got implemented, the playerbase of that game has raised drastically.
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
However, another big issue I see with this rank system is that for less experienced players it could become very difficult to rank. For example, you hit rank xx and are told to slay the might dragon argentine. Well for pretty much anyone but bsp or wild you're never going to be able to attain this rank. Neutral players for sure won't be able to. Maybe something to remedy this is to set up 2 or 3 different possibly quests to do per rank, so that if you can't or don't know how to do one of them you can always turn to another.
I also believe that a rank system like this would stagnate ranking groups. Currently, no matter what rank you're at, you can always go ranking - killing any and all rank mobs you want and you KNOW eventually you will gain a rank. With the new system if I get stuck on a rank (say I hit rank 60 and the next quest is to kill both cyan and suun) then I may never complete that rank the rest of the wipe. So at this point I pretty much give up on gaining any more ranks and stop grouping. These inputs of course are all based on my own vision of what the new rank system will be like, maybe you have already worked out these kinks.
Here's an idea.
Let's say there are 100 ranks. Put in like maybe 10 or 20 that are only attainable through certain quests (like kill Cyan). So, if you happen to receive that quest at a stage of rank 30 or 40, you can still go on ranking through other quests and killing rank mobs. However, once you reach a certain point, say rank 80, it is required for you to fulfill that particular quest to go on.
Furthermore, you can go on collecting other quests as you go even if you're unable to fulfill the first one you receive.
It doesn't completely solve the problem of people getting stuck at a certain rank, but if you lower the limits to reach a higher rank before people get stuck, I think it should work out fine.
Re: Proposed Experience System Changes: Next Wipe
First of all,
my compliments to staff for continuying to try to improve this game.
I think these changes are at least in part coming forth because of player suggestions and complaints, so thanks for listening to us as well.
I have 2 comments to the proposed changes:
Step 1. Lower the xp to get to 1xp considerably.
Will all the skill levels and 'hidden stats' that are currently attained during leveling stay the same in the new system? I.e. will a level 30 tank still have the same saves, resists, bash modifiers, max skill levels as this wipe? If this is so, this will mean that the mob vs player battles will become easier, since 1x will be attainable faster. Of course rank affects do help a lot in the endgame elite battles as does great equipment, but there's a reason people are shouting for a 'ranked basher' instead of a 'ranked basher with at least +10 bash rank and -3 save vs spell rank'. So, if I am correct in how the game works, if 1x is attained faster without changes to level based character stats, or mob difficulty, a lot of zones will become easier. I am not saying this is a bad thing, but people should realize this.
Each player would get a
specific set of clues to what they need to do to gain their next rank and for the most part no 2 characters would have to do the
same thing at the same rank.
As people have mentioned before, if the rank quests are too individualized this will have a big effect for neutrals to gain ranks. Already this wipe, as a clan zone leader, I have a big say in which zones are run for a lot of clannies. This usually means I run zones I gain from more often than non-leading clannies. This is even more the case for neutral players, who hardly have a say on what zone is run if they don't have the right connections or friends. Nowadays it's not like if you shout for a group you get to pick out of 5 options. It's either go with the one response your shout brings, or stay soloing.
So, if people are dependant on very individual rank quests that need 6+ groups, neutrals will have a disavantage to clans, who get groups easier and can steamroll through zones. I am a bit afraid for the situation where someone shouts 'looking for someone that can lead Shayds' 10 times a day 2 weeks in a row....
But maybe I misunderstand the plans or are there several options a player can choose from that will counteract these problems.
But, new things to try out are always welcome as far as I am concerned.
Arne
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
Going to try to answer everyone individually (I wont be doing this all the time, just now) so bear with the long post.
siris
Getting to higher level will be easier for randomers yes, but they aren't having a hard time now. One of the goals here is to get the targets of those randomers to high level faster so they can defend themself more easily.
Aeclasic
The rank changes are currently purposely vague because the system isn't fully designed yet. I dont want to give too much information and then have it change.
Corey
Stat rolls would likely stay the same, although there might be a few minor changes to the race based side of it. I dont forsee any lower in the stats that can be rolled. Yes, people can xp fast now, but some can't. What I am hoping happens is we move the game slightly away from the trek that is level 1 to 30 and more into the trek that is ranks. In trying to do the shift , I think we need to shorten the path from 1 to 30 a lot.
int 21h
The clues will be given by certain mobs sprinkled throughout the world and you will have a command to display the ones currently required of you without talking to the mob. So something like a rank tasks command that display what you need to do. The clues will get harder as the quests get harder. A rank 1 task might be 'Go kill 5 bugbears', now all you need to do is find the bugbears. A rank 50 quest might not even mention a zone or mob name, but would just give a geographic location and idea at the target 'Bring down the man full of riddles beneath the village.' I am terrible at writing clues (that is why I let others do it), but you get the idea. The rank task list will update when you complete things as well, so you know if you did it.
Sancho
Die.
Rurh
The costs and available ranks will probably change, but that is the easy change here. The hard part is getting the system for ranking designed and ready to go. We can worry about the purchases later. The rest of your post made zero sense to me, maybe you should lay off the crack pipe a little.
greg
Are there tons of people in the lowbie zones now? As for new players, it is tough to draw them into a text-based, pk, pwiping game where most of the other players are real jerks to anyone and everyone they dont know (even some people they do know). I think this change will allow new players to get their feet wet a lot quicker and get up in levels before the randoming jerks find them. I guess we are listening to different people (I listen to anyone that talks to me), but I dont hear screaming from class revamps so much as tweaks to make the classes a little more balanced. Scouts have been on hold for a while now (I got a new job, got engaged, etc) but they aren't dead. These changes (ranks and exp) will probably take me about a week to code, but the ranks have to be fleshed out first and everything settled before I start. I handed the design phase past the initial ideas off to other imms and I will just chime in when necessary. While they do that leg work I am going to continue to work on minor class tweaks and probably get back to scouts soon.
Solana
I agree with your zoning statements. I think the newer players will also find the higher level zones a lot more interesting than the lower ones. Ranks dont make you a good player, but if you are ranked you have the tools to play in the big zones without the minor annoyances (getting blinded, stunned charmed as much) that can get everyone killed. Exp quests is a long term thing that you should start seeing more of sooner or later, hard to work out details right now. I dont have a time frame for a pwipe and even if I did I wouldn't tell everyone until there was under a week left. I hate giving out that info because people plan their life around (quitting, going on pkilling sprees, etc) and I would just rather you played the game. I will say I dont forsee a pwipe before the first of the year, that is all I can assure you of now. Even that can change though if things go better than planned.
mike
As for gaining early ranks quickly, that is part of the plan. I think the experienced players will get to rank 50 or 60 pretty fast in the new system. The less experience players will find their way to rank 30 and then move slowly toward 60 the rest of the wipe. With the real experienced players getting close to 100. The idea will be institute a measure of control over the ranks such that we aren't going to require a mob like Cyan, Suun or Argentine until rank 80 or 90. Yes there will be points that people will get stuck and I am going to put in a system of appeal where you can ask an imm to reset you to a different rank if the one you are one is too hard. There will of course be penalties associated with abandoning a rank, but nothing too severe. I dislike 'rank groups' that just plow over zone after zone racing for the next rank for everyone in the group. I think the new ranks will cause more small group ranking, where clans take a few groups out and hit a few zones for individuals and then move on. It will become more of a personal quest than just follow-clan-leader as he drags you to rank glory. If a rank task/quest is too hard for the rank we will change it of course, but that will require feedback from players on what is too hard/too easy.
edwai
Good point, the prices will be adjusted I am sure when we get to redoing all the rank purchase options. Not really sure what specifically will change yet, we probably wont do that until the first or second week of next wipe.
Arthelas
Well, I did recently up all the mage loads quite a bit and I think druids are currently in a good spot for spell loading. Clerics I will have to take another look at, but they dont seem too bad off. We change the spell load system every wipe to a degree. Mostly we try to change where the top end spells are loading and adjust where the middle range spells have a chance to load. I think next wipe we are going to move more toward a middle ground on spells, right now they are a bit too skewed toward high end mobs loading okay spells, we will back off and move those okay spells into a more diverse group of locations. This is all done at once during the first week after a pwipe (sometimes during the downtime between wipes if we have one). The BAR for spells is a hard balance, I am not sure it will ever be perfect. I will be adjusting learn rates next wipe somewhat, with faster leveling there are going to be more casters studying books at higher levels and thus failing things at level 30. Even with the new relearn books there will need to be a higher chance to learn spells on average to compensate for the faster leveling.
kmark
People wont be steam rolling these as easily for sure. The system just wont be setup to allow that. As for clans, yes a clan system is still in the works, this post is about experience changes though, not clans. I dont think the clan system will go in at the start of next wipe, probably mid wipe.
blehbleh
I dont think people are going to be getting stuck as much as you think. I know for a fact the 'big' mobs are going to come at the really high ranks because I am not going to let the system allow someone a 'Kill Cyan' task at rank 40 or 50 (or even 75). I addressed the problem of people getting stuck earlier in this post as well.
curlyboy
Yes, most of this comes from player feedback and as usual the squeaky wheel gets the grease. The hidden stats change every wipe, they wont be getting worse in general as part of this, more than likely they will get better in some cases and worse in others, staying right about even with current overall. I think characters at level 30 are fine right now powerwise, there doesn't need to be much changed on the un-seen stats to tweak them. Clans will ALWAYS have it easier at ranking, nothing can be done about that. I have addressed the problem of people getting stuck earlier, so read the whole post for an answer on that. I actually think this will slow clans down a bit, which isn't all that bad. Now they will have to focus on pulling individual people up in ranks rather than doing the whole group at once. They will also have to be more coordinated about getting people together to do tasks that overlap (one has to kill moultar, one has to kill yurak, they can do both in one pass). Solo/neutral players I think will end up with more of a goal for themself, I know I would see it that way. If I have a rank to kill Sarson(probably wont be until later in the ranks anyway), but I dont know where/who that is, I will try to figure that out through any means I can. I would then try to get a group together to kill him and keep trying until I do. Of course, not everyone is like me, but that is how I hope things will work out for neutral people.
Keep em coming, I will try to answer what I can (work permitting).
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I guess I talk to Rurh too much but this seems to mimic a conversation we had in irc one day.
I THINK what he was insisting was that if u get 100k a kill in patience and can level insanely fast when a big bad pker comes strolling in and whacks you the loss isn't nearly as significant as it is when u lose hours of your play time due to a death. Now to many this isn't a big deal however when you are one of those few who is not very well liked, starting over again and again is not a very fun thing to do. With easier xp tables getting whacked wouldn't cost u 2-3 even 8 hours of your life re-xping, not to even touch on the fact of re-equipping.
In short, "less loss means less wrong" or whatever it was he said, (I think) translates into while getting pked still sucks it won't hurt quite so bad.
Anyways I started babbling, if I'm wrong feel free to correct me.
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Aristox:
Aye, I read your answer to mike. It's the same as mine. =P
Well, the first half of it anyway.
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Haley:
Basically yeah.
But nor is that a linear relationship. If there's no loss there's no fun. If it's too hard, then it's no fun. The trick is the balance.
Which depends on:
1) The reason for death (pk or soloing soth)
2) The person's clan affiilation (do you solo for 2 huors and get 2M, or group for 2 hours and get 8M).
3) The individual person (how much patience does the person have, how much free time, ability to acess risk potential effectively)
I thought the 1/2 xp loss from pk was a good step, along with the bonus xp.
And I think this is a good step too.
My only real concern is, What if it turns out to be too easy? Would you just adjust the tables wipe-in-progress, wipe, or just leave it till next wipe? Or other?
That sudden leap of the BAR from level 27 to rank 30 sounds scary!
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you still need to lay of the crack pipe! lol
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Are there any plans on changing the rolling process when you create a character? My first character was a warrior with 16 str, 9 wis, 16 con played him to 14th level before i was told those stats were pitiful. Then spend a week rolling and rolling and rolling a new one with decent stats.
I'm not to excited about the pwipe itself (eg. deleting my characters), but it would sure take the sting out of it, if you could reroll a little easier an be able to play right out of the box, and for new players to create usuable characters more quickly.
I'd like to see the system we have now, but at 6th level you can increase 1 stat but decrease another one, but have the stats are set in parellel with each other:
eg. raise str by 1 automatically lowers con by 1. Raise int by 1, automatically lowers wis by one, etc. That way mages could not pump int at the expense of str they do not need and warriors could not pump str at the expense of int, etc.. and you could only pump one stat once, etc.
I've never gotton above 27th level, and from what Sancho and other's have said, thats where the fun starts, so the rest of the ideas sound good to me, as long as its not too easy (i kinda like how its hard to get to 30th, but not to hard now)...
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its genius!
yes everyone will have high level trash characters, but EVERYONE will have high level trash characters. when some trash kills me, i get to log on my pkilling characters and hunt them down. that is arctic at its best to me. fun and excitement. i cant wait for it to wipe.
i'm so happy.
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I personaly love the idea.
Gives more people a chance to enjoy the end game of arctic
I also like the idea of quest ranks.
In a few of th examples that Stox gave especially the Sarson one you can see how quests will drive the exploration of the mud for newer players at least. People asked for a "wish item" or info on zones that are rarely explored. Maybe through the use of these rank quests people can be pointed to new zones new mobs or things that have been unfound/unexplore for a while. As some said the clans will have a ranking advantage because of more game info but by the time a new player has obtained rank 60 or 70 as stox said he would hope they would toward the end of a wipe there game and zone knowledge will have vastly improved leveling the playing field and increasing player v player competition.
in all i love the ideas
this post has made me interested int he game again =)
Can't wait for the wipe.
-Dan
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[color=blue]My only concern with the rank system would be that some people would only want to do their rank quest when they're in a group, which could screw over others. It'ss not a question of game knowldge after awhile, it's more of a top-dog deal. Also, this change might make the game too easy, which would be bad as arctic was always meant for the more experienced mudder' or however that line goes.[/color]
re: Too Easy
I can assure you the game won't be "too easy". Instead, It strikes me that the goal will be much more directed, but it certainly won't be easy to hit.
edit
I'll add that since most of the early ranks will be soloable endeavors nobody is going to get screwed by leaders before hitting the BAR.
Re: re: Too Easy
It sounds good, I like it.
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Well since its unanimous... I'll get a hold of you stox and let you know the last day of the quarter/finals so that u can schedule the pwipe around me.
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I see what Malthros is getting at, and its true. I can totally see certain leader top dog types leading their clans around all night hitting the ranks that THEY need, and not giving two shits about the "fodder" members of the clan.
A side effect of this might be that other non important members of the clan might be forced to start leading. This could be good in a way.
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OR - join newer, smaller clans or even form some of their own, shrinking the 30+ member clans into a more competetive nature. Some decent player in a major clan is often an excellent member in a smaller clan.
"One man's trash is another man's treasure..." or something similar could apply.
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Bah, I was hoping no one would see my hidden goal of driving a wedge between members in large clans!
Gosh darn kids.
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great call stox, just reading this is making me want to come back and play more. even this current wipe so i can polish up for when these changes come into effect
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I have some friends in the EQ2 beta. The thing they like best is that they can choose how they gain experience. They can go slaying monsters, over, and over, or they can do quests to gain experience. If the same time spent on the quests was spent just killing random mobs, the experience gained from both is about equal. I'd like to see a lot more quests for the individual that are in-depth, that require time and patience to solve, but award large amounts of EXP in-tune with the time input to complete the quest.
Perhaps this idea is more for creators/imps, but it is something I would like to see added and is quite directly related with the exp tables.
-Sancho
I don't like this idea because it seems to me that it will favor clans. Clans share way too much nowadays.
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I also believe that a rank system like this would stagnate ranking groups. Currently, no matter what rank you're at, you can always go ranking - killing any and all rank mobs you want and you KNOW eventually you will gain a rank.
Untrue. There is a "stagnation" in the current rank system, eventually you get to a point where you can not get any more ranks unless you start killing some pretty hard mobs.
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Arthelas:
I think next wipe we are going to move more toward a middle ground on spells, right now they are a bit too skewed toward high end mobs loading okay spells, we will back off and move those okay spells into a more diverse group of locations.
I think this is the best thing I've heard all wipe. Right on!
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Maybe with clan disbandings and smaller clans being created, more and funner wars among smaller memer'd clans will erupt? This could be a lot more fun!
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With so much good stuff to look forward to, I'm surprised people are still playing "this wipe" still!
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o my gawsh!11111 did the immortals finally realize making the game harder is just driving away players which are the most fundamental, intrinsic aspect to arctic???? no way!!11111 that's ardkore!
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Can't let a guy go away in peace, can you.
I can see the fight over Xak Occuring 3 hours into the wipe next wipe. lol
I pretty much like all the ideas here, but thought of this one in addition to the others. In regards to XPloss on Character Death. Every "new" player will tell you how much XPloss sucks, and then the old timers will say "haha noob, you suck, deal with it" but how about a (seemingly) simple change.
Make is so that you only lose the current 1/4th 1/6th whatever it is at now once you have a set amount of playtime on your character.
First day of playtime Death = 0xploss
Second Day of Playtime Death = 1/40th of level
Slowly Building up to the current amount after 5-10-40 however many days of playtime. This would allow new characters to take more risks and not say F THIS after they get killed as a level 1 and lose the 800 xp they spent 3 hours getting off pigeons.
Edit: Also, Anything you can do that makes more PK happen would be a positive change. Zoning is boring.
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Edit: Also, Anything you can do that makes more PK happen would be a positive change. Zoning is boring.
There are quite a few people who just like to zone.
But since you find it boring, obviously these people should too.
Talk about egocentric.
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My Opinion: Zoning Is Boring.
I can only kill steamroll the same zones with the same people so many times before it becomes mindnumbing. I logged in the other day and people asked me to heal DKO, a zone which I've probably done 150 times this wipe and I almost fell asleep. There was no excitement in Turning the revenant for the easy kill, I'd done that several times already, it was just, oh, well, that will get this done faster, cool. Tsu isn't Scary anymore, I had little fear of "screwing up" and a mage getting onestabbed. Hell, We did trin on like 5 and it wasn't even exciting.
The thing that makes this game fun for me is having something to lose. Zoning is boring, because most likely, if you die, you arn't going to lose anything except for a small amount of xp. PK is interesting because people have better AI then Mobs, and have much more interesting reactions to fighting than mobs. Fighting a mob entails, oh, we have enough people to do that zone? ok, lets do it. Fighting People entails very much more.
If most people liked zoning over PK, i would think that less people would be promoting a change to make less zoning required in the game to get to a point where you can stand a chance in a PK situation.
Finally, I never said others should share my opinion, I simply stated mine. If you want to say otherwise, feel free, but I don't think namecalling is an appropriate way to discuss differences in opinion.
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Try doing harder zones!
Let's not turn this into a flamewar, jerks.
Eyes on the prize.
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Try doing harder zones!
Let's not turn this into a flamewar, jerks.
Eyes on the prize.
Or not doing the same five zones over and over again!
I'd get bored running on a treadmill, too.
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I can see the fight over Xak Occuring 3 hours into the wipe next wipe. lol
[color=blue]Isn't that about how long it takes groups like bsp to get to a high enough lvl to (pre)learn heal? :)
I do remember playing during a pwipe like 3-4 years ago, and the first titled person came in like 20 hours or so. This wipe it was a coupel days wasn't it?[/color]
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Yeah, it's gotten more difficult now.
Hopefully we roll it back a little and make the game a bit more interesting for everyone by allowing them to get into the more challenging high level zones without having to join a massive clan or die horribly three rooms in because they aren't high enough level to manage it.
I'd like to see these changes foster a new wave of exploration in the higher level zones that are not commonly done.
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is a level 30 on the current xp system going to be the same thing as a level 30 on the new xp system? (hp, saves, etc) i dont see why it wouldn't be, but i just wanted to ask.
i guess the only "issue" i see is, why do we have to make everyone super hero's in order to make "balance"
so what i see is next wipe, we're going ot have 1000's of level 30's running around and then the numbers will decrease as the rank's increase (900 rank 10's, 800 rank 20's etc) as an example. i dont see why making it so everyone can achieve level 30 is a fix to balance.
achieving level 30 is a ... big achievement! at least until next wipe. now the goal for "new" but not "newbie" players will be what, rank 50? rank 60? what rank # distinguishes you from the rest? what will someone be able to say? I mean, maybe it doesn't matter to most people, but attaining level 30 for the first time was a FANTASTIC feeling for me. just wonderful! its not something just anyone can do, and I did it. i'm sure everyone knows that feeling.
well now what will it be? instead of calling it "the grind from 23-28" it will be "the grind from rank 36 - rank 52"
dont get me wrong, i do like the changes stox is suggesting or doing, but I dont see how making everyone level 30 and rank 40 will make the balance equaled out. i mean, is randoming so big a deal that everyone needs to be made level 30 rank 20 just to stop it? i walk around all day and night with tons of decent "pk target" gear on my level 17's and 20's and 25's, but i *never* get attacked *EVER*.
maybe i'm just lucky.
shrug. this is just like Everquest. (the reason i use EQ as the example, in the beginning, there were dragons, that you could basically walk right up to after killing X amount of mobs, the dragons had 32,000 hp, and hit for 250ish or so. then the new expansion comes out. new dungeon with a new dragon. you have to kill X amount of mobs, then walk right up to the dragon, who now hits for 750, and has 150000 hp. NOTHING is different between these 2 battles, except the players hit harder, the mobs have more hp and the mobs hit harder) Instead of making things "harder" to figure out or "new" you just make the same old shit 1000 times more powerful and expect it to balance itself out?
i dont see it happening.
just my opinions. i like the idea of changing things, but if all your going to do is make it so everyone can get the highest level so that everyone is equal, the elite players wont find any fun in that. if some loser who steals all the keywords and cant lead brogs, has a level 30 rank 40 because he's good at typing "follow"..... then what is there to achieve......
just seems to me the "goals" for "elite" players are being severly reduced by these changes. i guess thats the only method of defense for the people who cant hang, ruin the people who can, so that those who cant, are equal to those who can. i'd hate to see that happen to a game such as arctic.
shrug.
burn me up with your flames, i welcome them! muhaha
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just my opinions. i like the idea of changing things, but if all your going to do is make it so everyone can get the highest level so that everyone is equal, the elite players wont find any fun in that. if some loser who steals all the keywords and cant lead brogs, has a level 30 rank 40 because he's good at typing "follow"..... then what is there to achieve......
just seems to me the "goals" for "elite" players are being severly reduced by these changes. i guess thats the only method of defense for the people who cant hang, ruin the people who can, so that those who cant, are equal to those who can. i'd hate to see that happen to a game such as arctic.
I think the "elite" players will enjoy these changes quite a lot. The "elitist" players won't. The whole point of playing is to have people to play against. You don't prove your eliteness by outleveling someone, that's just grind. You can prove your eliteness by collecting a great set of equipment and then doing something with that. Too many people misunderstand that the reason clans dominate is not beacause they have level 30 characters, but because for the most part they know what to do with them. Who cares if its easier to get to level 30, that will just give us more people to fight against. There's no fun in attacking a level 20 enemy, but a lot more fun in attacking an enemy who has a chance of fighting back (although we try to make that chance as slim as possible).
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i highly doubt Everyone will have a level 30 character, even with the changes.
and suf is right. just because a newbie is level 30, it doesnt make him an even match for a level 30 experienced player, or anywhere close to even. it does level out the playing field some though, and that equals more competition.
competition is good right?
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My highest level character this wipe is level 23.
I am awesome. Scurry in fear.
The main reason for this is my lack of time, plus the horrific amount of experience I've needed to gain levels since level 20 just makes me sad. I think changing the curve so that things get difficult around typical large group zoning levels will help people get into the fun of the game more quickly and could foster an increase in the size of our playerbase, which is one of our primary goals.
We want to take care of the people we have playing first, but we also want to keep the mud attractive to newcomers.
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Add ASCII p0rn if you want to keep it "attractive" to newcomers.
-Sancho
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We're working on that.. so hard to find ASCII models, though.
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Hell I'd be happy with something as simple as unmaxing everyone for all zones every so often. Say everytime there's a foom or the mud is reset you unmax everyone.
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NOTHING is different between these 2 battles, except the players hit harder, the mobs have more hp and the mobs hit harder) Instead of making things "harder" to figure out or "new" you just make the same old shit 1000 times more powerful and expect it to balance itself out?
Welcome to the majority of fights in any RPG. Whats the difference between toede and ariakas? Yup. Shit hits harder, shit has more hit points. Sure, some stuff rescues in some fights, and theres some neat tricks sometimes, but those tricks aren't necessarily exclusive to high content: the high content just has more hps, and hits harder.
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I basically quit the mud for the most part even tho I have a titled pal. The reason? I just got sick of all the grind I had to do just to lvl a char from 20-25 and since they are basically weak at those levels I could not have any fun in the big zones.But with a change this massive even I (who has sworn never to touch the mud again) will be a hopeless addict again.
I do like the idea of making all class's require the same exp to reach the same levels even tho I can see how that might make trash casters alot more common.But overall I could find nothing I disliked and even love most of it.Im only shocked aristox even bothered to tell us in advance that he was planning to do it =)
I don't believe any game should make it hard for the veteran player to advance past the newbie aspects of the game.Once a player has seen all there is to see at the lower levels I believe they should be allowed to put in their time to get past them and then be challenged later when the rewards and risks are very high (and fun).Plus this change will allow neutrals like myself to enjoy the possibility of ranks and such without having to get the help of all the stuck up clans who have always been WAY too full of themselves =)
I also noticed some people think that this will make it too easy for clans.Clans will always have it easy since the nature of clans are to make such things easier.IMO all this change will do is make the playing field even again since it will allow small clans and neutrals to achieve some of the rewards that make playing the game such fun.I see it as aristox rewarding those loyal players who don't have the time or who are just sick and tired of the endless grind.
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The grind will instead just be on the rank level...
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I rather the grind be for something important rather than for some weak ass levels like 20-27.Basically why not make the right levels hard because of the rewards rather than to just hinder clans (and thats why it was soo hard from 20-27).The only difference between 20 and 27 for most chars is a little more power and a few guild spells/skills.
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
The difference between 20 and 27 is quite a bit in terms of saves, hp, etc. All contributing to zones you can do.
When the XP tables were changed back in the day, it was not to hinder clans but to hinder Trash. It was thought that the more time you spent on your character, the less likely you were to trash it with riskless Pkills, etc.
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Game play from 20-27 is more or less the same from level to level.Yes there is a big power difference between a lvl 20 and 27 but you don't really get any rewards for all the endless hours you spent.For the veteran player 20-27 holds nothing that 1-20 didn't already give you other than guild spell/skill and some more power.Ranks just offer more of a reward for gaining them than going from lvl 26 to 27 ever could. So I don't see why gaining lvl 27 should be such a major pain in the butt.
I have been playing for about 4 years now and I have only had 1 lvl 30 char. I will be the first to admit that that was probably the best day I ever spent on the mud and it was such a thrill.But after that first 30 char I just don't don't see why I have to do the same mindless crap over and over again for no real reward.The first time I did it I was very driven but now a lvl 30 is just another level and once I reach it I have even MORE exp to get to 1xp.
Im not saying it should be very easy to get to lvl 30 or anything. But I do believe that it should be alot easier for veteran players to get to the levels where the REAL rewards finally come into play.Simply I believe lvl 20-27 is just too damn hard for the rewards you get.Any veteran player can get from 1-20ish in a day or two with some hardcore lvling so why should 20-27 be any harder?
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I'll go along with all of Aristox's suggestions, raising the "BAR" by lowering exp, making ranks easier to come by and less big-clan centric etc. However, I'd like dying to not lose your place in your rank. The reason being I'm a big risktaker and die alot despite being a member of a big clan. Actually I die because I solo or tempt fate by trying things on less than I should. Lately I cut back on the trying new things part and die less because of it, but the game is less fun. When I die the experience loss (8 mil) takes 1-2 hours to get back but the rank exp loss is much more harsh, I'm not sure if it's even intended to be this way.
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Will alignment affect the Rank quests in terms of difficulty? In my experience, Ranks were always harder on neutrals than good aligned characters, and chose my alignment accordingly. Will this be reflected in the new rank quests?
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This is a good question. It would suck to have to kill holy mobs of the same alignment for Paladins and DKs, heh.
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Current plan is to either make the rank tasks handed out by guild or by alignment (not both). Not idea which yet.
Either way we will avoid putting holy mobs in the way of people that should not kill them.
Obscure hints
One potential problem I see is the is the ambiguity of certain tasks.
"You had to kill 5 hobgoblins. You found and killed them, fine. Sorry pal, we had in mind some other hobgoblins from some other zone, go explore more". For me, that would be extremely annoying.
Similarly, killing every major dragon just to find out which "Nasty Ancient Great Wyrm" you were to slay might be quite tedious. I'm not against the vague and subtle hints, but only for as long as the riddle has just ONE correct answer (perhaps a difficult one, but strictly one and one only) and all the others are CLEARLY incorrect.
As a practical example, I was exploring a (low) zone some time ago and a mob asked me to bring a quest item. I knew where to get it and spent an evening trying to figure out the keyword to return it - all in vain. Some time later, a friend informed me that the zone had an item with [i]exactly the same name[/i], which was the correct solution to the quest.
(For those interested, I hope I don't give away too much information saying that "the clove of garlic" from Wayreth shop was the [i]incorrect [/i]item.)
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
[color=blue]This would be kinda dumb, but they could always do like the quest system like in some ROMs where you have [/color][color=red][Target][/color][color=blue] in front of the monster you'd have to kill. :P
As far as killing somethign like a 'Nasty Acnient Great Wyrm", there are a few mobs that could fit that description, so perhaps any of them could be used. :)[/color]
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
Clarity in the riddles given will be a point of focus in the creation of said riddles, you can be sure.
Quest variations
As another idea, perhaps the quests should not be necessarily limited to killing a particular mob. I guess, getting a particular item (or even any item with some particular qualities) may be an interesting quest task. Finishing a zone quest (whether it includes killing some mobs and/or getting some items or not) may also be used as a rank quest task.
Examples:
1) Get any auto-wb item (rank 1)
2) Get any rentable +dam (+1 or more) item, except weapons (rank 15)
3) Get any auto-fly or auto-wb or auto-det-invis or auto-invis item (rank 10)
4) Get a gazer's eye (rank 75)
5) Free the old wizard from his captivity in the land of merchesti (rank 5)
6) Get a "dark shadow" charmie (rank 30)
In case of items, it adds additional diversity and more multi-player interaction to the quests, since the players now have an option to either
a) Learn the zone(s) and wait for the appropriate item to load;
b) Kill the current owner of the item (or steal the item);
c) Trade or borrow the item from the current owner.
Finally, the rank quest item should probably be taken away from the player and not be loaded back into the game for 1-3 days. Sounds like "driving the wedge (C) Aristox", doesn't it?
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
We are still designing the rank system and I dont want to talk about it in this thread. So please start a new thread if you want. We will certainly consider any ideas you have, but we aren't really at that point in the design yet.
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
Oh, interesting ideas. I too hate leveling up to high levels with a passion although its easier for me then some of my friends as I know where to go and what is usually not hit by others. Still, I do miss the old experience tables. Would suck having crappy weap skills at level 20 though because of gaining so fast.
I think one thing people should take into account is that the bar is where players of two years experience will be at, not newbies. Think of where you guys were after two years and Rank 30 probably doesn't sound all that special, especially if you managed to get into a clan, you probably got to 30 in one wipe. I'm not all that hot on the quest for ranks stuff, but whatever. It'll be fun as well.
Re: Quest variations
In case of items, it adds additional diversity and more multi-player interaction ...
c) Trade or borrow the item from the current owner.
also adds a new excuse to scam.
"oh no, I don't want to keep your huma's shield, I just need it to get this rank... oh yeah I'll return it, trust me"
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
Well I've read most of the posts on this subject and felt I would give my 2 cents worth.
First a little background on my own playing exp.
I began playing arctic around the 2nd pwipe I suppose or maybe 3rd.
I have never joined a clan, although I almost joined the KOS once as they seemed the easiest to join and were newbie friendly. However, Life stepped in and that didn't happen. I have had several characters reach level 25 and a few got higher. one even hit level 29 for about 20 minutes.. but then I died in Blacken and well that was that.
So it seems that I am firmly in the NUETRAL category.
I know several zones although they are all low or maybe mid level.
I have been to a few of the high zones a few times over the years when I joined an impromptu group probably being led by some mage hoping to pop a book. This I am sure is in complete opposition of clanned players who probably spend most of there time in High level areas, as seems to be the case by the equipment that occasionally appears in the stores.
My longwinded point is that that I have noticed that a huge portion of the game is VERBOTIN to a character less than level 25 and even at level 29
I wasn't able to go to many zones.. as the aggro mobs would just crush you in a few moments. So I am firmly in support of lowering the bar for a character to reach 1xp. This would make more experienced players more ready to take you into a group as you are far more useful at higher level.
The lower levels are just a pain for those who know little of the realm. as you end up doing the same zones over and over. The fear of death from senseless DT'S or from walking into a zone that just
is so much tougher than you are, at the lower levels keeps exploring to a minimum. Then If you do manage to go to a new zone. Often the book or weapon that pops there is NOT there. Unless you are with someone that knows the zone you would never know that something nice was to be found there. This is another point tho and perhaps should be addressed in a different spot.
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
I'm willing to try anything once. Just keep the old system handy in case this one blows up in all of our respective faces? :)
Re:Proposed Experience System Changes Next Wipe
Was just thinking about stuff and figured that if the xp tables to go down, they should not go down as far as they were 6 years ago or whenever they changed. With the addition of all these new zones getting xp is still pretty easy. Lowering it to the old standards would make things a little too crazy I think and some mid level zones probably won't get hit because people get high levels a little too fast.
I just started playing again and the process of leveling to the 20's was boring, but after that one you start grouping it gets ok. Leave 25+ top heavy, maybe minimize it a bit. In two playing sessions of a few hours each I got bout 11 milion experience, so its not really bad right now. The lower stuff sux though.
Hi