Posted by Wuss on 04/09
xp is tedious, no doubt about it. no matter which way i go around it,
it's the same. yeah, it's not hard, not even at higher levels -- you can
easily tack 1 lvl or so in an hour of mobkill. But it sure as hell
is tedious.
grouping helps, because then you get to keep yourself busy for a longer
period of time before waiting to regen/repop, but it doesn't really reduce
time or work -- you just get to delude yourself a bit that you're actually
socializing or something when you aren't.
face it, if i wanted to socialize and be chummy with people, i'd go offlin
e. i'm here to have fun, and babbling with others when my sole purpose
is to create an equipped lvl 50 pker is pretty silly.
not to harp on the other folk who are here for their own reasons, but
xp is too much a chore, regardless of your knowledge of the mud. i persona
lly had no problem with powerlevelling -- this is, after all, a beta
where ppl look for different things all the time.
if anything, i think quest xp should be upped greatly to make them more
than worth their while. currently a quest means nothing more than 3 relat
ively easy to kill mobs -- good for some last-minute laze, but not more.
The xp scale should be looked into. The non-decreasing xp for lower-than-t
he mob kill was nice, my lvl 2 chars can hit-flee death will thank yous
and level in 3-4 regens. The same should, imho, apply to higher level char
s as well -- it's frustrating to have your gear beaten to smithereens
and lose tons of hps to get 60-80k in return.
wuss
From: Wuss
Wednesday, April 07, 02:14PM
jeez, look who hasn't written on boards for a while, that's
the second time this week i've 'wrote' instead of 'append'ed.
wuss
From: Myrella
Wednesday, April 07, 05:47PM
From: Leatherface
Wednesday, April 07, 08:25PM
I agree, xp is a pain in the ass. It would be good to be able to regain
xp lost without needing a tform monkey and a group every few xp runs
to replace no-repair eq. Mob kill really does take the fun out of it for
me (for Sandra and others who may say the same thing 'yes, I like eq
and I am not saying that mobs should be taken out ;)
I like the quest xp idea a lot, and think that death xp loss should be
lowered, for sure.
(shrug) What I like or think dosn't matter though -=Yet? ;)=-
Leatherface.
From: Maus
Wednesday, April 07, 11:30PM
Mmm, I'm thinking and writing on the fly, so this might be a bit
long-winded, but bear with me.
I think the problem of tedium, and of the comparative difficulty in
levelling different ranges of characters (ie low range, midrange, high
range) isn't so much that the xp scale is out of whack, but that
the ratio of character spiffiness vs. mob spiffiness isn't a straight line
but rather peaks at several points in a character's development and
levels or hits troughs at other points.
For example, a character increases rapidly and radically in capability
between 1st and 15th level. At 1st level, a character is the weakest
of the weak, and will have a hard time killing anything above his/her own
level. At 15th level, a character is eligable for advanced weapon skills,
can easily have 100 or close to it in their primary fight stat, have
negative ac, a few nifty spells, etc etc. Put it this way-a level 15
character is much more powerful than fifteen level 1 characters.
Whereas that level 1 character had difficulty killing much beyond his
own level, a level 15 character can kill anything his own level or below,
and can often kill mobs a great deal higher than his own level with little
trouble. This makes for quick leveling.
It seems clear that level 15 is a rather large peak. However, between 1
and 15 there are also many smaller peaks. For instance, level 2 gives
you your first fight skill. Level 5 gives you a basic weapon skill.
Level 10 gives you stats. The impression, therefore, is that between
1 and 15 a -lot- is happening.
There are similar peaks after level 15, most noticably 25, for mages, and
35 for everyone. However, these peaks are more spread out, thereby
giving the impression that not much is happening. Therefore, while you
may be levelling just as fast at level 27 as you did at level 9, it
seems like nothin' much is going on, so it's boring. You're doing the same
old things you've been doing for the past 10 levels, give or take a few,
nothing's new, and you wish the process could just be speeded up.
N.b. the reason high level mobkill can be so deadly dull is because
after level 35 there are -no- more peaks to attain. Level 50 is a
nominal peak, of course, but except for things like hp, mana, a
the hittable, and whatever nifty gear your higher rent may allow
you, a level 50 character is fundamentally no more powerful than a
level 35 character. A well made level 35 character will have the same
abilities as a level 50 character. This isn't to say that a level 35
char will be able to compete with a level 50 char, but this is where
things like the hittable makes a difference.
I realize this is getting long, so I'll make my second point.
The xp scale as it is currently implemented doesn't allow for this
model of character developement, in which characters experience peaks
of capability, but rather assumes that characters are getting linearly
better with every level. To use my previous example, a level 15
char is fundamentally equally powerful as a level 24 char. Therefore,
it behooves the level 15 char to kill mobs which are designed for
the level 24 char to kill (this is not a specific example, it's
merely illustrative), whereas the level 24 char is probably not that
much better at killing those same mobs than the level 15 char. However,
the level 24 char has gotten used to the quick levels he got when he
was killing mobs far above his level as a spry young level 15. It's
becoming harder and harder to kill mobs above his own level because
he isn't becoming more capable, the number by his level in score is
merely rising. Therefore he resorts to killing the same mobs he's been
killing, levelling slows down, and he gets frustrated.
Again, please realize that this was all off the cuff. I realize this
is likely disorganized and hard to follow, and if anyone's interested
I'd be happy to try to clarify any of the points. I might just try
to write it out more clearly for the next LT.
Maus' player.
From: Maus
Thursday, April 08, 12:48AM
Also, before anyone jumps on my back and says "My level 45 Widget-wielding
Spellslinger levels faster than he ever did at level whatever"-- I realize
that my previous post was full of total generalizations, and will in no
way represent the experience of every single character on Legend. Certain
types of characters experience peaks at different points than other
characters. And, of course, certain types of characters are just wimps :P
However, I think in general, my model holds true.
Maus' player
From: Wuss
Thursday, April 08, 01:42AM
mmm, i agree, there is no character progression beyond a few levels.
lvl 1, you're simply pathetic, i don't even bother -- i just hit xp
rooms and be done with that silly level. a character is waaaaaaay too
helpless at level 1 -- there should be SOMETHING, imho, other than
wary/agg that can be done. shooting is a joke, as we all know, at lvl 1,
and pointing wands don't come handy if you're doing solo :p
at level 2, if you are dex-anything, you just learn kick, and you're set.
that skill should probably be moved to a higher level IF we get something
else -- backstab/kick/flee with somebody that can learn the skill naked,
you are set to level fairly fast. From here, the levels are mostly for
rent -- at lvl 12 or so you can hit 100dex, and i'm fairly sure the other
combat stats aren't that far behind. Not to mention 100 is overkill anywa
y -- from experience, 60 is plenty.
so you go on and on, until you hit 35, after which point your character
has really 0 room for improvement in the 'feel' arena. sure, you
get a better hittable, hps, mana, more spell levels, more rent, etc, but
from my experience, your char strategies are pretty much stuck after 35.
So what do we do? Skill trees! yah! but before we actually get to skill
trees, why not introduce at least some of the skills that will be
implemented under skill trees? If the entire system is going the wazoo,
why not add a dozen more things that are 'planned' without their little
'getting more proficient' in them perks? Look at pkill. Rarely do
you see a pkill fight where pkers actually ponder over what skills to use.
I mean, c'mon, people friggin headbutt each other when they KNOW the other
person is 100 con as well.
anyway. and, regarding unclanning -- there should be simply a quest that
allows a character to unclan, that takes RL days to complete. Unclanning
should be an option for anyone at any time -- probably a system where the
mud keeps track of how many times you've been info'd (left/right) and
reflect that in the RL days it takes for one person to unclan or something
wuss
From: Davien
Friday, April 09, 12:48AM
Gotta agree with Maus on this one, and Wuss for that matter.
I pretty much have the feel of characters by about level 30 though
it does vary with class, but they rarely get that much better
after level 35. My hitters generally swap blue things for bone
things, copper things for crusty things etc, which helps with
those big mobes that have to be killed to get any sort of exp
but the people themselves don't actually feel any different.
In point of fact, a level 29 sniper/surgeon of mine was 40Kish
away from level in Tara the other day so I took on the woman
there just to see if I could and she was pretty easy really. Sure
it took some time, but the result was never really in doubt.
I guess I just want to say that I think this thread is right
on the money, but I don't really have any good suggestions on
what to do about it. Well, workable suggestions anyway.
Davien Holyoake.
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