Search Posts
If you're feeling up to the work, I would suggest citing where to find more information elsewhere in the guide - few people sit down and read through guides in the order it was written. The easier you make it to bounce around the guide chasing a train of thought, the more use the guide will get. (And that means fewer repeated questions in chat!)
I'm not sure I agree that such a scenario would be a problem. Perhaps I should stay out of the conversation, but the entire theoretical problem seems to be based on the idea that the majority of players would rather have 4 characters and pay for one than work as a part of a group. I do not believe that to be the case. I guess I'll just let you all hash it out, but it all feels like unwarranted paranoia to me.
Honestly, a player who logs his character on daily to queue up crafting tasks is clearly an active player - if he doesn't want to pay for more XP to get better at these crafting tasks, I don't see a problem with that. They still 'bought' this character to develop - are we arguing that if they stop the XP flow to their character, they should not be able to access it at all? It feels that way, in particular if you are stopping a crafter character from accomplishing what he is made to do. I would say that as long as an account still has at least one active subscription (one character gaining XP) all characters on the account should function normally. This is what seems right and most logical, to me. (Also, I have always had the impression that this is the design intent.)
I would favorite this 100 times if I could.
I do not believe that spells or maneuvers currently increase ability scores - but I do believe having them do so would make sense. I agree that too much of a feat tree could be an issue, but I think we could reasonably break down the crafting skills into a few different specializations in the same way that a fighter has weapon specializations, a wizard has a school, and a cleric has domains. (Do rogues have anything like that right now? Hmm.) And yeah - the table balancing is currently our big issue now. Adding more things is bound to complicate it, but hopefully it will be mostly helpful.
Today is the day that I make more than one thread. It's a strange feeling. I have become convinced that acquiring Feats as the exclusive way to increase Ability Scores is not a good idea. This is certainly a biased opinion, because as a pure crafter I find the notion of training Armor or Attack feats to increase my ability scores somewhere between annoying and and rage-quit inducing. So I've been thinking of things that I believe could help alleviate this problem. - Before I get a bunch of people jumping on me to make sure I am aware that the current ability score requirements will be tweaked: Yeah, I know. These are ideas I want to talk about. Crowdforging and such. Anyway - At first I was thinking perhaps it would be better if we simply had more feats under each role, to at least allow us to feel like we are not having to stretch outside of our discipline to advance. If - for example - we added a few feats to the smeltmill that grant Constitution while also granting a minor bonus (reduced refining time for Ingots of all kinds, perhaps) then at least I wouldn't be spending XP unnecessarily on Shield Bash or something else I will get absolutely no other use out of. Perhaps (for refiners) there could be feats that increase the chances of getting a bonus + on their recipes. I still like the idea - fleshing out the idea of being a Smelter from a 1-feat progression to one where you can further specialize seems like an idea with value. (Obviously the idea would extend to other refining and true crafting, as well.) But then it occurred to me that while Spells and Maneuvers cost XP to learn, crafting recipes do not - and perhaps they should. After all, right now there is no reason for a crafter not to learn any recipe they come across and qualify for. Perhaps recipes should cost XP to learn, and perhaps we should get incremental Ability Score gains from Recipes, Spells, and Maneuvers alike. Why not gain a little Personality from learning Burning Hands? Why not some Wisdom from learning Aid? Why not some Strength from learning Pot Steel Plate? I believe this would be good for the game - to make the Ability Score gates more easily handled - and more importantly, because it makes sense that these are the things that advance you. I'm curious if anyone else has had any similar ideas, or if anyone sees any glaring holes in this. (And 'golly, that would be a lot of work for GW to implement' doesn't count as a hole. Any change will require work from the development team - it's up to them to decide if it's too much.)
I'm pretty sure the math is fairly straightforward. 4 characters 6 months into the game could likely defeat any one of us starting on day 1 of EE and playing for 5 years. The biggest power-gap comes down to equipment - and I'm pretty sure at 6 months they could use Tier 3 equipment. (No, I haven't checked those numbers.) That said, playing intelligently and having high stealth/perception will always be advantageous - but they will not change the damage and HP numbers beyond Surprise! which means they aren't going to let you automatically win, either.
I am not waiting on any requirements - if they switched to Early Enrollment today, I would dive headlong into the game and grind my way through everything necessary to achieve my goals. (Which happen to be primarily Crafting.) The game would be more fun for me if I did not have to purchase unrelated skills in order to advance the ones that matter to my character. Just because I know that I will grind through an unfun set of requirements doesn't mean I will enjoy that process. I completely agree with anyone who told you that gear will be the key to advancement in this game - the keyword and crafting systems are some of my favorite things about this game. Just for the record, I would be totally fine with it if it required a full year of XP to reach Tier 2 equipment crafting. It isn't the time that bothers me, it is the -requirement- to extend my training beyond the sphere that my character would logically train in. (Yeah, immersion breaking. It's a common complaint.)
I absolutely see what the game is trying to achieve, and have been on board from the very beginning. The problem - and I'm willing to accept that is problem could be fixed by adjusting Ability Score gains/Ability Score requirements - is that right now the game does not allow you to focus. Single class power build focused? Sure, I'm looking for that - if you mean that the game as described by Goblinworks throughout the blogs. They spoke of a game with specialized characters working together towards common goals. That is not working right now. Can this be fixed without the changes I offered? I imagine so. But that's not going to stop me from presenting the ideas.
Yes, it does. If this is the case, then don't you think that any of the suggestions you just made would have a drastic impact on what feats a player might select? I believe it would have a dramatic effect on what you would choose, after the change. Like you said, if we were in Early Enrollment your past choices would be permanent - but at least if this became an option your future feat choices wouldn't be essentially made for you because you have to cross-train (to an insane degree) in order to qualify for higher-level skills. These ability score requirements are not going to get easier to meet. How soon before early enrollment will we have an idea of how our experience purchases will impact our long term characters? That's a reasonable question. I doubt they plan to remove any feats from the game, so it's not as if we have to worry about truly 'wasting' XP on feats, but that's about all I'd be sure of at this point.
It already is a hybrid. If we didn't want to get better abilities by smacking gobbos in the face, we wouldn't be using these gating mechanisms at all, we would just let the XP stand alone. I completely understand the idea of forcing players to actually play, but right now the game doesn't require that you play, it requires that you invest in a mad combination of feats in order to advance. It's far more work than play. MVP has generally been defined as the least game you can have while still having fun - right now, it is difficult to have fun because we are all too busy running headlong into gates that might as well be walls.
Right now there are two gates that are driving the game community mad: Ability Score requirements and Achievement requirements. Why? Well, because we have to cross-train far too much. I'm not sure we are all convinced that adding more skills (different cross-classing options, wee!) or rebalancing the numbers will do it- so I have an idea on how to fix this: it won't eliminate the 'grind' for that can never truly go away, but perhaps we can make it rewarding. We need a bigger carrot so we don't feel the stick hitting us so hard. My proposal is this: Ability Score gains from Achievements. There are a few different ways I could see this going: Option 1, Related Ability Score Gain for Every Achievement: Mineral Gatherer 1? You gain .025 Constitution. Mineral Gatherer 2? You gain .05 Constitution. - And so on. (Obviously the numbers aren't specifically important in my example. This seems flimsy to me, and in many ways is similar to simply blending the two Gates into one - not necessarily a bad idea, but if we're going to do that why deceive ourselves about it?) Option 2, Related Ability Score Gain at Set Achievement Points: Mineral Gatherer 5? You gain .5 Constitution. Mineral Gatherer 10? You gain 1 Constitution. (This is essentially the same thing, but spaced out more and therefore requiring higher dedication for the rewards.) Option 3, 'Spend' Achievement Points on Ability Scores: You have been a good little cleric, breaking skeletons and purifying their graves. You have 20 Divine Achievement points - and now you can spend them! Go see the Temple trainer, and she will increase an Ability Score of your choice from 10 to 11. For 40 Divine, she could increase one from 11 to 12, etc. A similar setup would exist for the other types of Achievement Points as well, meaning that you could spend your time doing whatever suits your fancy and whatever Achievements you gain could be spent in one place or another to increase your Ability Scores. This should go a long way towards removing the grinding feel, and allow players to do the things they want to do. This could also be changed to simply adding the ability to spend from your Achievement Points as a whole - meaning that Divine/Crafting/Adventuring points all count the same. This makes it less nuanced, but it might be better on the balance when you consider how many more things you can do to gain Adventuring points than Divine points. (That said, since you can choose your Ability Score increased, it really shouldn't matter which point 'pool' this would come from.) In case you cannot tell, this is my favorite of the ideas. It seems like a great way to return meaningful decision to the equation. (I still think you should be able to train a bunch of different feats if that's how you want to increase your ability scores, but you shouldn't feel you MUST do so.) You will not be able to advance any faster, since the XP-rate handles that just fine, so this will not give any player an advantage over another. Also, I think being able to see the Achievements giving them something instead of just acting as a barrier to advancement will have a positive effect or player morale. ;) Another note I'd like to make is that although I talk about 'spending' points, I think it would upset people if they suddenly didn't qualify for something just because they opted to increase their Strength. (Then again, meaningful choices?) I think a spendable point pool based on your achievement points would be more likely to succeed with the player-base. Thoughts?
I think there is a definite need for some numbers to be rebalanced - and when more skills are in to help round out ability score gains, that should help tremendously. That said, I've been thinking it might be a good idea for the devs to determine what an ability score point is worth (in XP) and make a series of feats designed only to increase them. I would vote for this being an expensive, but achievement-free option. I think it would be especially useful for characters who do not want to cross-train for roleplay purposes. (Or simply for a cleaner looking feat list.)
I thought it was 2.5 years to maxing out a Role - not maxing out every combat skill within one... My bigger concern at this point is the mandatory cross-classing in order to advance your ability score points. This ignores it, but that will add a lot of XP and time to this.
Lovely - I'll do what I can to help keep this up to date. ;)
You can read the game map now. There is now a tab for settlement maps! My Steel Wire +3 now takes 111 minutes to craft, rather than 26 hours. This is an improvement. Also there is an auction house and banks and stuff. Edit: Also SKILLS WORK.
Yeah, you make spellbooks as an artificer - they require tanning and apothecary refined materials. (For the simplest of them, anyway.) Also yes, cleave -can- run into the rep reducing issues, but only if your ally stands right in front of you while you are attacking. (Since it only effects a 60 degree area in front of you.)
You could easily die to superior firepower, even spamming cure. - Okay actually that is presumptuous. I have no idea if constantly self-healing could effectively prevent the damage dealt by a player or two, but it seems unlikely to me, considering the rate of healing versus the rate of damage I have seen. A single player out to kill you would be unlikely to succeed, perhaps, but an organized group is just as much likely to take you down, unless they are not attempting to use Immobilize, Knockdown, or anything else that will slow you. Even with many stacks of Freedom (which generally only last a brief time in any case) someone is going to 'roll' well and stop you from fleeing. (Unless you get lucky - in which case, good for you!) Honestly, these tactics seem like simply intelligent things to do, as a trader. It's not as if they should be expected to walk around with no survival skills in case they get ambushed. That said, I do support Focused existing, simply because it seems like it would be the optimal choice for many things that would require Concentration checks in the PnP game.
I'd gladly make a trade for it, but I am uncomfortable offering 'dibs' on anything right now - especially when I have no idea how long I will have to test the new crafting system out. ;)
I apologize for teasing you, but it was a bit funny. ;) @sspitfire: Awesome. Too bad I don't know where to find a +2 Weak Varnish recipe. In fact, if you traded me the +1 recipe (I thought you had...) then the game ate it, because it was missing from my inventory(ies) when I went looking. Not sure what happened, there.
I am totally fine with the current amount of Stamina. It is easy to calculate the attacks I can use out of 100, for one thing. There seem an awful lot of jumping for major changes every time someone sneezes lately. There is a fine line between jumping every time someone sneezes and being unresponsive. I'm fine with these conversations happening, even if (perhaps especially if) they don't end up resulting in changes. People get persnickety when they don't feel heard.
I am completely fine with the AI as it stands at this stage of production. That said, if we do feel that mobs need to be better at pursuing their attackers, I would suggest: A) Adding the ability for a mob to regain Threat immediately upon reaching 0. From what I can tell, they are currently unable to register threat until they return to their spawning point. This should prevent the Pull-Leash-Chase tactic from being possible, so the mob stays engaged as long as it receives more than 5 DPS. B) Share 50% of gained Threat with creatures within 15 meters on each hit. (So, 25% of total damage.) This should make it easier for other players to draw aggro (in comparison to the previous experiences where the mobs focused down the initial player) while preventing a player from focusing on a single mob and having the remainder of the enemies return to camp, ignoring the fight. The remainder of the group should still return if the player is doing low damage, just above 5 DPS, but if they were doing significant damage then the entire group would respond to them as the greatest threat. This seems like it would be more challenging behavior to cope with, especially in reaction to attacks like Whirlwind. C) Increase the Threat gained from 50% to 60% (for example) to prevent Killing-At-Range by Attrition. I have been able to repeatedly fire Distant Shot at an enemy (Risen Fighter Adventurers are my best example) and have them consistently lose Threat at a greater rate than I can increase it - therefore typically they will move about 5 meters before reaching 0 Threat and returning to their spawn point. As long as I continue attacking I will eventually be able to kill them without them ever coming to me, because (presumably) my DPS is lower than 5, but still great enough to prevent them from regenerating health. This would prevent those situations, if set to the correct percentage. I do not know how difficult these would be to implement, but this is what comes to mind. Edit: Also, thank you for giving us something else to talk about while waiting for the patch. (At least, that's what I'm doing...)
I believe that hexes without escalations in them are not intended to be a significant threat to a solo adventurer - and they have not been. That said, I have walked into escalations hexes and gotten absolutely mauled if I did not have a group to back me up - kiting or no. Even with a group in a high-level escalation, it was likely for us to lose one or two players if we made a mistake in our approach. Considering that the entire purpose of escalations is to increase risk (and reward) this seems like the system working properly. Do certain things need tweaked? I'm certain they do. But in general I believe the way things function now makes sense. If the world needs to get deadlier to make the players more challenged - I'm okay with that. But I don't think it is nearly the severe issue it has been made out to be.
How can we consider what we do not know? We can't - but that's okay. I trust Goblinworks to give us the information we do need to help them make design decisions. We cannot take the project from them, making every decision for them, so we can only let them share their considerations with us when they feel it is needed and will help us all achieve the overall design goals.
Make no mistake - I would love to see this List, simply because I am pretty well obsessed with this game and its development. But at the same time I do not believe that having this made fully public would be good for the community. There is a limited amount of information we can collectively take in and effectively respond to as 'advisors'. At some point, you need to package things in broader terms and let people know that these things will be coming but they depend on so many factors that talking about it just doesn't make SENSE yet.
We are the people who helped fund it, we are not their managers. We get to help prioritize by telling them about the things we consider important, not by demanding they reveal every step of the creation process. There is only so much that can be asked of someone trying to get something done, and asking them to sit down and explain to you what they will do and in what order is just too much. Would you order a custom wooden chair from a furnisher and then walk into his shop all through the work, badgering them? We agreed on a curve to the back of the chair - I see a lot of straight pieces, which one will be the back? Are you sure that's going to be strong enough? Looks a little thin. Wait hold on, can we make it a little taller? How much longer is that bevel going to take? I really want to see the finished product. Why haven't you sanded these burrs off yet? Looks pretty uncomfortable...
|
