Goblin Squad Member
|
Well, that changes things.
Nothing seems to prevents the killer from removing everything, then dropping the stuff he doesn't want to carry. If items drop into a pile accessible by everyone, they might be taken faster than the 5 minute ninja loot timer. If dropped items just vanish, it might be a reasonable tactic just to deprive your opponent of stuff. For the killed character, it doesn't change much - he lost everything under the old rules. I'm just not sure defeated players will be more encouraged to return to their corpses.
I do like the 25% losses and the item decay on threaded items, even if it raises the cost of dying.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Yay for item de-cay!
Agreed. I'm not a crafter - I get bored with it - but my crafter friends will be very excited about this.
Not overly thrilled with my entire undestroyed, unthreaded inventory being available to be picked through. I see the logic in it, but the little girl inside me is jumping up and down screaming, "Mine! Mine! Mine!"
Goblinworks Executive Founder
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Yay for item de-cay!Agreed. I'm not a crafter - I get bored with it - but my crafter friends will be very excited about this.
Not overly thrilled with my entire undestroyed, unthreaded inventory being available to be picked through. I see the logic in it, but the little girl inside me is jumping up and down screaming, "Mine! Mine! Mine!"
According to the River Freedoms, "You have what you hold."
The changes are worth some though; the penalty for having someone drop in PvE has changed from the recovery spell to a significant gear loss, and PvE death penalties have gotten worse in general.
One solution to the loot rights issue might be that if two or more different parties are involved in the same kill, both of them know that looting the body within 5 minutes will flag them for aggression from the other, and either one can quit-claim those rights. (If one party has a vastly superior local force, it isn't much of a loss to them to risk being attacked; if they are roughly equal, it seems like a very meaningful player interaction for the buzzards to fight.)
|
Goblinworks Executive Founder
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Wait... when item durability drops to 1, there's no longer any reason to thread it other than to keep it out of the hands of one's opponent, right?
If an item isn't threaded, there's no drawback to it having a low durability...
The market for cheap throwaway items seems greater than the market for durable items. Art imitates life!
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Wait... when item durability drops to 1, there's no longer any reason to thread it other than to keep it out of the hands of one's opponent, right?
If an item isn't threaded, there's no drawback to it having a low durability...
The market for cheap throwaway items seems greater than the market for durable items. Art imitates life!
Good one, Markets will thrive greatly.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Wait... when item durability drops to 1, there's no longer any reason to thread it other than to keep it out of the hands of one's opponent, right?
If an item isn't threaded, there's no drawback to it having a low durability...
The market for cheap throwaway items seems greater than the market for durable items. Art imitates life!
It's certainly not greater but there is a market for it. In Darkfall there was farming gear, and PVP gear. Farming gear had high durability, PVP gear had just high enough it wasn't likely to break in the middle of a battle. So 5-15 durability as opposed to 100+.
The 100+ items always sold for much more though, because you take 100+ durability gear, use it to farm back the value of the gear and then some, and then throw it in a PVP bag once it gets to 5-15 durability.
I envision things working much the same in PFO.
The big question now is can you repair a .63 durability sword up to 15 or does it have to go all the way back to max? Or the equivalents of those numbers in PFO.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Wait... when item durability drops to 1, there's no longer any reason to thread it other than to keep it out of the hands of one's opponent, right?
If an item isn't threaded, there's no drawback to it having a low durability...
The market for cheap throwaway items seems greater than the market for durable items. Art imitates life!
Assassins will love this (assassin's mask)!
|
Goblinworks Game Designer
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
A durability zero item is unusable but remains in your inventory, rather than simply evaporating (it may be renamed to "Broken [gear item]" or something similar to explain why you can no longer equip it). If it's a fairly standard item, you'll probably just want to trash it at that point because it'd be just as expensive to get a new one as to repair it. But if it has some rare enchant or other customization, it may still be worthwhile to repair it from zero rather than replacing it.
But, yes, there may very well be a pretty brisk market in extremely-low-durability items that nobody bothers to thread, and if it happens to get destroyed on death, well, threading would basically do the same thing.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Encumbrance: I can see that I will multi box a third, untrained toon to be a pack mule. I might even name him "Mule" just for the Lolz.
Looting and SADs:
Well it is nice to see an actual number 75%. This means that a SAD of 75% or more will be rejected, unless.......
Question: When we SAD, can we see the unthreaded items? More specifically, can we see the present durability of the threaded items?
The reasons I ask should be obvious to those who knw me by now. But for those that don't, if I can see that my potential victim's threaded items are one death away from destruction, that could change the leverage of the SAD. I may in fact be able to push to or exceed that 75% maximum.
Over all seems to be a sound system. I like the item decay and the usefulness of crap gear on the thrift store market.
More importantly, my own crafters will be busy repairing our gear and a portion of our loot will directly support our own repair needs. That is just the type of consumption I was hoping for as a way to dispose of our less valuable loot.
Can't wait to hear about caravans in an upcoming Dev Blog.
Great Dev Blog
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Even though I abhor getting ganked, it is one of the dangers of playing in a PvP environment. I have also thought the cost of death has been pretty low in the mechanics introduced so far. This blog entry seems to make death a bit more costly, but adds some long term benefits to the game, item durability specifically.
The good thing to me is the mechanics apply to dead and rotting bandit corpses as well as deceased do-gooders! So bandits beware!
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Looking back at the wizard blog it looks like wizards will have their belt and wondrous item slots already taken by spell component pouches and spellbooks. So that leaves only backpacks. How important are cloaks going to be?
Regardless, I like the effect of wizards not being able to lug around huge amounts of loot in this system.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
I was just reminded by another post, what impact does the Outlaw Flag have on the looting system?
Do we get to recover some of that 25% normally destroyed without the Outlaw Flag?
Well, you did gain "Bandits can more confidently choose their targets based on an assessment of their carried wealth, since they know they'll see most of the potential loot instead of a small portion." You need more buffs?
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Well, you did gain "Bandits can more confidently choose their targets based on an assessment of their carried wealth, since they know they'll see most of the potential loot instead of a small portion." You need more buffs?I was just reminded by another post, what impact does the Outlaw Flag have on the looting system?
Do we get to recover some of that 25% normally destroyed without the Outlaw Flag?
Seeing loot is for the SAD.
Drop bonus if for the SAD refusal.
There is only one buff, the rest is just the way it is.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Will there be a way to repair in the field? If not, that seems like a huge disadvantage for attackers during a siege.
I think a large army will have a repair contingent along in the supply train. Most armies do, and the supply train also becomes one of the army's vulnerabilities. Look up the Battle of Tours" where Charles "The Hammer" Martel's army won when a sallying party of Martel's forces flanked the army of Abdul Al-Rahman Al-Ghafiqi abd destroyed the rear guard and supply camp.
The same could conceivably happen in the largest battles in the River Kingdoms, but will not happen for quite some time.
|
Goblinworks Game Designer
|
Repair is liable to be just as slow as crafting (though likely with a proportional time discount if the item isn't totally damaged). A city that expects a brutal siege soon will need to start laying in stocks of spare gear. Defenders may wind up gambling that it will be a short siege (so they have everyone arm up with the best gear to start) or protracted (so their defenders keep the best stuff in reserve for a final push once the enemy has taken significant losses). That's one of the reasons why crafting queues take time and have limited size: having someone wrangling your crafters and refiners to make sure you have reasonable stocks of necessary items is liable to be a major asset for a settlement (both for dealing with PvP and escalations).
We haven't revisited spellbooks since the change to item decay, but it's likely that spellbooks will take decay but also be far more likely to be repaired. The physical housing of the book is, after all, not as important as the physical housing for a sword; the information inside is the really important part.
And, yes, wizards may find that having less carrying capacity is a tradeoff for fantastic magic power. But we're aiming to make the various slots useful enough for all characters that it's never an easy choice to use containers instead of capes, belts, and wondrous items.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I love what I'm reading! I still have some worries about this threading concept though, I say you just axe it! Or maybe limit the threading to only a handful of items.
On to corpse looting rights! Ultima Online was almost (if not) perfectly spot on in the way it handled this. If you were murdered, the murderer never really had looting rights - he could loot you but his criminal flag would refresh every time he grabbed an item. If a player was killed by a warring guild, the victor had full looting rights until the body decayed. If a murderer or someone flagged as a criminal was killed by any other player anyone had looting rights. No one had the right to loot a fallen innocent player (whether he died from a player or npc), so looting an innocent player always gave you the criminal flag.
Looking back Ultima Online was so ahead of the times - I'm so glad PO seems to be honoring some of its innovative ideas.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
@nevy, the idea behind threading is that you can't thread everything, well not at higher levels anyway. Low level your likely to have crap anyway so threaded or not won't matter much. At high level, when you have to choose, thread armor or weapon (simplistic example) it really becomes a choice. I don't feel it is needed to throw the whole system out. Threading will help those who die retain specific items they really want/need. Doing away with it could potentially leave someone naked and penniless if they have nothing "in the bank."
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Not a huge fan of the quantity of what is lootable by a bandit. Seems to swing things a little too heavily in their favor. But, I'll keep thinking about it and we'll see how it goes down in game.
Thats why there will be the SAD mechanic. You can avoid being killed if you give the dog a bone. Although, in a fantasy game like this, nothing really explodes when you die so everything should be dropped.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Little Black Backpack by Stroke 9
Don't expect to get your bloody black backpack back...
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Not a huge fan of the quantity of what is lootable by a bandit. Seems to swing things a little too heavily in their favor. But, I'll keep thinking about it and we'll see how it goes down in game.Thats why there will be the SAD mechanic. You can avoid being killed if you give the dog a bone. Although, in a fantasy game like this, nothing really explodes when you die so everything should be dropped.
Which means most bandits will SAD at 50% or more, which is harsher than I imagined. Plus, you die, the bandit loots what he wants, deletes what he doesn't. I can't see a single way to avoid that. Like I said, my off the cuff response is that 75% is too much, but I'll keep thinking about it and we'll see how it works out in game.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Which means most bandits will SAD at 50% or more...
I was under the impression SADs were only for Coin, not items.
Outlaws use a new mechanic we are working on developing called stand and deliver, which allows the Outlaw to demand money from their victim through a trade window.
... the bandit loots what he wants, deletes what he doesn't.
It will take time to take things off of your corpse and then destroy them. The Bandits would probably be better-served to spend that time getting away from the scene of the crime before any Enforcers show up...
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Which means most bandits will SAD at 50% or more...I was under the impression SADs were only for Coin, not items.
Outlaws use a new mechanic we are working on developing called stand and deliver, which allows the Outlaw to demand money from their victim through a trade window.... the bandit loots what he wants, deletes what he doesn't.It will take time to take things off of your corpse and then destroy them. The Bandits would probably be better-served to spend that time getting away from the scene of the crime before any Enforcers show up...
Only 3 seconds are needed to loot a corpse, no time at all really.
If SAD only offers coin then it will be pointless and not bothered with. Yes it says money, but is that assets or coin? Not clear enough.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Which means most bandits will SAD at 50% or more, which is harsher than I imagined. Plus, you die, the bandit loots what he wants, deletes what he doesn't. I can't see a single way to avoid that. Like I said, my off the cuff response is that 75% is too much, but I'll keep thinking about it and we'll see how it works out in game.
I came to the exact same conclusion. SADS have been made somewhat less substantial than just using the advantages of stealth and ambush that comes with the Outlaw Flag, and kill for the 75%.
Originally I was planning on making SAD offers of 20% for flagged travelers, and 40% for unflagged travelers. Now that I know we are giving up 75% as a maximum, I will up my amounts to 40% for flagged and 60% for unflagged.
My other two questions still stand:
1. When we SAD, can we see the unthreaded items? More specifically, can we see the present durability of the threaded items?
2. what impact does the Outlaw Flag have on the looting system? Do we get to recover some of that 25% normally destroyed without the Outlaw Flag?
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Only 3 seconds are needed to loot a corpse, no time at all really.
That's three seconds to open the corpse. There's still the time you spend browsing.
Looting your corpse is a three-second action that's interrupted by any damage against the would-be looter (both the three-second timer and the act of browsing through your surviving inventory can be interrupted).
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
It will take time to take things off of your corpse and then destroy them. The Bandits would probably be better-served to spend that time getting away from the scene of the crime before any Enforcers show up...
If I have the flagging and timing correct. From the last attack, the 1 minute timer begins and the Attacker Flag will then be dropped. With that attack, the Outlaw flag had been spent as well. Even if the 3 seconds of looting counts as "attack time", which it should not, the Enforcers will still only have 1:03 minutes to arrive before all they find are unflagged characters standing around saying, "It wasn't me".
|
Goblinworks Executive Founder
|
If I have the flagging and timing correct. From the last attack, the 1 minute timer begins and the Attacker Flag will then be dropped. With that attack, the Outlaw flag had been spent as well. Even if the 3 seconds of looting counts as "attack time", which it should not, the Enforcers will still only have 1:03 minutes to arrive before all they find are unflagged characters standing around saying, "It wasn't me".
It will take time to take things off of your corpse and then destroy them. The Bandits would probably be better-served to spend that time getting away from the scene of the crime before any Enforcers show up...
Nope- it's the Outlaw flag the Enforcers care about; you shouldn't get the Attacker, Murderer, or Villain flag in that scenario, unless you're murdering and looting travelers rather than engaging in banditry.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
This line caught my eye:
"... it's probable that items you've acquired more recently will be more likely to survive."
Going back to the discussions by folks who want to ruin bandits' days, I can imagine pairs of dedicated people swapping many worthless items back-and-forth until they've made sure the valuable stuff they're carrying is in the destroyed 25%.
I also don't yet see much reason not to fill your inventory with rocks or whatever tiny useless items you can get your hands on, and just throw one or more away when you get something worth keeping...and then start swapping with a friend to move that item to the "gonna break" section of your little black backpack.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Keep in mind that the 75% is only what is being carried on the victims' persons, which is probably not all that much - the real loot is in the caravans, which I'm guessing will not be so generous in their payout and/or a lot more difficult to loot effectively.
And why can't we just kill the driver, hop on the wagon and ride off into the sunset? Maybe wagons will have a 100% loot in that case.... That is unless you pay the toll for using my road.....
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
I am sure if people start "swapping to aquire new junk" it will just be put on a random or by value of the items. I hope they don't count swapping items with a friend as "acquiring new stuff." I can't wait to start playing so everyone can see exactly how things will work. Maybe bandits won't be that big of a deal at all. Learn where we are and avoid those areas.
If you consider in Eve, if you tracked patterns of what systems had large ships lost and pods killed, you knew where to go and where not to go. Then again I could be wrong and since everyone is convinced us bandits are the way to go and no one plays crafter and harvesters and we all just keep attacking each other.
The other way to stay safe from bandits....hire guards. Keep combat ready people on hand to guard your wagons and such. Someone else had the idea of "runners" where instead of using 1 or 2 big caravans that are easy to track and SAD, spread the load out over 50-100 single guys and run for the hills. We can't catch the all.(queue Pokémon theme song LOL)
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
If I have the flagging and timing correct. From the last attack, the 1 minute timer begins and the Attacker Flag will then be dropped. With that attack, the Outlaw flag had been spent as well. Even if the 3 seconds of looting counts as "attack time", which it should not, the Enforcers will still only have 1:03 minutes to arrive before all they find are unflagged characters standing around saying, "It wasn't me".
Ah, I hadn't considered that side of it, that the "long-term" flags can be dropped moments after other flags expires. You're right, the Attacker flag would expire a minute after combat. If you were on controlled lands you might have the Criminal flag that drops after 10 minutes.