More on XP

Posted by Himura on 06/13

Well, now that the system is here to stay, a few things that should be looked into.

By making the xp diff steeper among lvls, as to prevent the higher lvls from scavenging one-round kills that gave enough xp for the effort, there is now little point to go after mobs that are actually higher than you in lvl. For example, as a lvl 45 char, swarthy nets me 22k, wheras the ticket seller will give me only 18k.

The xp to effort ratio, should be linked to roughly what it was before. For example, i can reap the same xp killing a rhino by killing one and a half captains, or 5 wildebeests. Killing 5 wildebeests will take me 2 rounds each, with roughly 20 hp loss, whereas killing a rhino will force me to drain almost all my mana and hps, and still make it a toe-toe fight. I know not all mobs compare equally to a char-type, but the past ratio should be looked into (this is not referring to lvl 50 mob comparisons, but comparisons with mobs outside the range).

Whatever you decide to implement, i strongly urge you all to thoroughly test it before implementing it. It is ridiculous when something obviously flawed is installed, such as the steeper xp decline. A little bit of testing could have pointed out the flaw, but it was installed even without that much care. This is a community, and as leaders of the community, i urge you to be more responsible with what you do.

Test muds are here for a reason. It would be nice to invite some of the older players to a test mud to test the new code (of any kind, really) and listen to the feedback before integrating it into the main mud. Us bored lvl 50s will, i'm sure, jump at the opportunity to test the mud, and we'll be able to bring more perspective into the new coding, and help hunt some bugs before having it integrated into the code. Nobody is pressing you to make change, heck, we don't even nag for the delay in skill trees anymo

Treat this mud with respect. Some regard this as their home within their h omes, and find comfort being in familiar surroundings, mechanics, and whatnot. If you are going to remodel the structure, be at least as considerate as to show blueprints, or, in this day and age, give us a simulation of what the changes will bring.

From: Himura Saturday, June 13, 02:56AM

Another note:

Lvl 45+ mobs were worth that much xp, imho, because they were RARE. There are tons of high lvl players online, and not enough xp about. In the old scale, i relied on aliases to check for repop every tick, for fear of losing them to others. There were and are, only so many mobs yet so many players that need xp. You can't simply fit everything into one big smooth curve because it looks nice. Gotta consider the consequences of removing even more xp from the players.

The best solution is to simply get rid of the new and replace it with the old, i'm sure Ea! must have a copy of the old code -somewhere- :P But you should also try to see how much xp there was before the change, and how much there is now at each lvl. Place more mobs, up their xp, and whatnot. I have no idea why you chose to go through with this as shaky as it is, and not given it enough testing and tweaking before you all unleashed it.

From: Yvonne Saturday, June 13, 11:59AM

Just one thing-how do you know how much effort the imms put in trying to test a change like the new scale? I think they've put forth plenty of good arguments as to why the new xp scale couldn't be run on the testmud, couldn't be tweaked offline, etc. etc., but no one ever seems to remember that. What, am I reading a different set of board posts from everyone else? Secondly, the only problem I can see with the new xp scale is the fact that not all of the mobs are updated for the new scale, which the imms have said many times is being done, and if you check the welcome board, is actually being done at a pretty rapid pace.

Yvonne

From: Xanitia Saturday, June 13, 02:37PM

Has anyone stopped to think that maybe less focus needs to be put on experience? Before this change, people ran as quickly as they could to level in as little time as possible, killing mobs 25+ levels above them because the xp was that much more worth it. The new xp scale has been put in to better balance the game. If you had never played here before the new scale, I am sure you would not see any problems with it, but would instead see a game where the immortals put a lot of time into keeping the game balanced. Give the immortals a chance to fix the bugs in this and find the center of balance in this scale - instead of whining, give them some support and constructive criticism. And experience is not the only aspect of this game, either - so chill out some and just enjoy the game, go with the flow of change, and adapt. Everyone was all up at arms when the changes to the fight system went in, but the only thing the whining got anyone there was stress and less of a desire to be here, whereas the contructive thoughts improved the game. If you REALLY cared about this place, you wouldn't abhor the changes so much and whine when things are (sometimes drastically, yes) different from before, but -gasp- work WITH the immortals in testing the changes as they come and give some positive feedback on how it can be approved. I'm sorry, but I do not see whining about something as evidence that you care greatly about this "home away from home", but that you care more about yourself and your own selfis interests.

Xanitia

A newbie created to test the balance starting from a low-level instead of evaluating it as a high-level used to easy experience.