Stephen Cheney's page

I'm starting a new thread to try to have a productive discussion on this, as the other thread is already pretty heated. Let's please stop arguing about whether or not the system is leashing and talk about the pros and cons of potential solutions to what you don't like about what's going on right now.

The threat system we have right now is very simple. As Ryan pointed out, better AI has not previously been a priority, so, like a lot of our systems, only what we considered minimum viable AI was implemented.

There are a lot of things that seem simple to describe, but would be days or weeks of work on the part of our AI programmer. Our AI programmer wears several other programming hats, so asking for something hard to program means some other area of functionality that he's working on gets delayed. So I reserve the right to note that proposed ideas are much harder than you think, such that if you really, really want to push for them to be crowdforged, something else would probably get delayed. That's just the reality right now.

There are also variables in the system that I can change by just adjusting a spreadsheet, and I'll note those by bolding them. These are the things that, if something seems popular and well reasoned, I can just change and you'll see it in a build soon.

There is a much more complex AI system written up in draft form, but it hasn't been vetted by programming, so some ideas might just get "that's very similar to what we want to do, so I'll convey its popularity to the rest of the staff." :)

So the actual rules creatures are following right now:

• Creatures notice you when you get within 20 meters (shortened by being in stealth), and this immediately gives them 50 threat towards you. They immediately share this with all other creatures within 15 meters. (Known issue that one-shotting them at range keeps them from ever sharing this initial threat.) I'm not sure whether they get this initial threat on spotting you if you damage them from more than 20m, or whether they just share the threat generated by the damage you dealt.
  
• Damage you deal to the creature and damage dealt by the creature to you is converted to threat at a 50% rate (e.g., if you do 100 damage, it gets 50 threat). This is the only way to add threat currently other than the initial perception range.
  
• Creatures lose threat at a rate of 15 per round (actually tracked as .25 per tenth of a second). In combination with the 50% damage to threat rate, this should mean that if you're doing less than 30 damage per round (aka 5 dps) to the creature, and it's not hitting you, it will eventually give up and go home even if you're significantly injuring it over time. If they just got the initial threat, and have never hit you or been hit, they should give up after 10 seconds. (If you're positive you're doing more than 5 damage per second on average, and it's still giving up, please give us a write up on exactly what kind of enemies and situation that's occurring in, as that's a bug. Also, if you're sure something got initial threat and gave up sooner than 10 seconds, that's also a bug.)

That's pretty much the whole of the system right now.

We did try a simple method of sharing threat regularly with the group rather than just on initial aggro. It resulted in an unfun situation where in an actual group, all the monsters would always focus fire on whoever had the misfortune to pull aggro on one creature. In the design, they're meant to share when they hit certain milestones (like hitting half HP or less) rather than constantly, but that was complicated enough to implement that it didn't make it into the priority list yet.

So please give us your thoughts, and please keep it constructive. I'd consider posts phrased something like "I suggest X. As I understand it the ramifications of that would be Y. I think it's worth it because or Z." to be the most helpful. ;)

Since this was the number one question on general chat yesterday, and we currently aren't displaying it in the UI, here are the things you need to buy for the various roles that are currently available.

Keep in mind that the feats you start with are placed directly on the characters so you don't start naked with no attacks whatsoever, but they don't come with the supporting proficiencies. Even though it looks like you must have a proficiency because you're obviously using that weapon or wearing that armor, as far as the trainers and achievements are concerned you still need to buy it. So even if it looks like you're already a level 1 in your role, you still need to get a few things to get that achievement.

A lot of the requirements are general feats, and are consequently available at the Dreadnaught, Skirmisher, War Wizard, Occultist, or Seminary. Only the role-specific feats are on the role trainers. So don't just go to your role trainer and expect a one-stop shop; check out the general feat trainers for your bread-and-butter feats.

Right now, the achievements only key off of one specific feature and armor feat (e.g., you have to buy Unbreakable to level up Fighter, not either of the other two armor feats). In a later build, you'll level up with any of the appropriate feats at that level.

Power doesn't quite work yet to actually increase your Power, but you still need to buy it for achievements.

Some of the listed feats may require ability scores and world achievements of their own. So you may sometimes not be able to reach the next level until you do some things in the world or buy other things to raise an ability score to qualify for the feats first.

With all that in mind:

Fighter
1. Fortitude defense 1, Heavy Melee 1, HP 1, Power 1, Trophy Charm proficiency, Heavy Blade Proficiency, Heavy Blade Specialization 1, Unbreakable 1
2. Base Attack 1, HP 2, Power 2, Unbreakable 2
3. Fortitude defense 2, Heavy Melee 2, HP 3, Power 3, Unbreakable 3, Heavy Blade Specialization 2
4. Base Attack 2, HP 4, Power 4, Unbreakable 4
5. Fortitude defense 3, Heavy Melee 3, HP 5, Power 5, Heavy Blade Specialization 3
6. Base Attack 3, HP 6, Power 6, Unbreakable 5

Rogue
1. Reflex defense 1, Light Melee 1, HP 1, Cut-Throat 1, Power 1, Swashbuckler 1, Light Blade proficiency, Rogue Kit proficiency
2. Base Attack 1, HP 2, Power 2, Swashbuckler 2, Stealth 2, Perception 1
3. Reflex defense 2, Light Melee 2, HP 3, Power 3, Swashbuckler 3, Stealth 3, Cut-Throat 2
4. Power 4, Swashbuckler 4, Stealth 4, Perception 2
5. Reflex defense 3, Light Melee 3, Base Attack 2, HP 4, Power 5, Stealth 5, Cut-Throat 3
6. HP 5, Power 6, Swashbuckler 5, Stealth 6, Perception 3

Wizard
1. Willpower defense 1, Arcane attack 1, Evoker 1, Power 2, Mage 1, Spellbook proficiency
2. HP 1, Power 4, Mage 2
3. Willpower defense 2, Arcane attack 2, Evoker 2, Power 6, Mage 3
4. Base Attack 1, HP 2, Power 8, Mage 4
5. Willpower defense 3, Arcane attack 3, Evoker 3, Power 10
6. HP 3, Power 12, Mage 5

Cleric
1. Willpower defense 1, Divine attack 1, HP 1, Glory 1, Power 2, Crusader 1, Focus proficiency, Holy Symbol proficiency
2. Fortitude defense 1, Base Attack 1, HP 2, Power 4, Crusader 2
3. Willpower defense 2, Divine attack 2, HP 3, Glory 2, Power 6, Crusader 3
4. Fortitude defense 2, Power 8, Crusader 4
5. Willpower defense 3, Base Attack 2, Divine attack 3, HP 4, Glory 3, Power 10
6. Fortitude defense 3, HP 5, Power 12, Crusader 5