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XP gain/progression - wrong direction (opinion)

Discussion in 'Release 34 Feedback Forum' started by Study_Break, Oct 4, 2016.

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  1. Study_Break

    Study_Break Avatar

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    Ok with the last R34 release they made some good/bad changes but overall I think the game is going in the wrong direction and making me less likely to play long-term or recommend this game to friends.

    Positives:
    - Group XP buff, finally makes grouping up worthwhile, now getting group XP gain equal to solo XP gain in previous release, much more fun grinding CPs with friends
    - Attempts at new skills (all are broken but at least they're trying)
    - New armor (pathetic stats but again they're trying)

    Negatives:
    - At the R33 post-mortem they said this isn't a grinding game - come on, that's all this game is, a social grinder solo / semi-MMO, but the recent changes are making it much more so
    - HUGE recent skill gain nerf - anyone else notice? 4x less skill gain so you have more XP in your pool, now you get the joy of casting the same spell 4x as much, costing your 4x the regs, to get the same skill gain - less important for us with a bunch of GM skills already but I sure wouldn't want to start playing this game today
    - Proposed skill/XP loss upon death - just forces more grinding, nuf said

    What is the point of slowing down progression so dramatically?
    - GMing a skill means you're half way to cap (200)
    - Diminishing returns - significantly less spell/skill buff 100-120 compared to 80-100 across the board, yet HUGELY increased XP requirement, I imagine this continues to 140, 160, 180, 200...
    - This alone fixes the progression issue because character power/level is asymptotic, at some level the amount of time invested in the game will result in negligible skill gain/character improvement, so you reach an essential steady-state across the board, when you do gain a skill level there is minimal actual improvement in skill/spell power
    - By nerfing skill gain/progression you hurt the newer players/casuals over the hardcore players, making it that much more difficult for them to catch up

    Just a guess, but these changes are likely because there's just not enough content in the game. How long can the higher-end guys grind the same control points before losing interest? Slow down everything to prevent this ... possible solutions? New content (obviously). Or better yet ...

    Dynamic content - I would really love to see this, make each zone scale to average group character level. Right now our group is realistically only playing 1% on the content of the game because nothing else makes sense doing in terms of progression. If each zone scaled to our level, we could have fun exploring the ENTIRE map, finding zones we enjoy playing while still maintaining progression. I would imagine this would be easier than developing all new content, giving players things to do while new content is being developed. All that effort spent on world building is wasted once you significantly outlevel that zone as I'd venture to say no one revisits them. With dynamic content it would be worthwhile to explore all areas giving us more content to play without having to invest in new world/content development.

    As usual, just my $0.02.
    Massive Trauma
     
    Last edited: Oct 4, 2016
  2. Mugly Wumple

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    Remember the formula. It takes a percentage of your XP pool. If your XP pool is 4x as large then the skill advancement is the same. 0.4% of 100 is the same as 0.1% of 400.
     
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  3. Study_Break

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  4. Horance

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    I'm not sure to understand the issue with the change to the xp pool.

    The players who don't lock skills won't notice any difference. The pool will just get be bigger. Previously you were stabilizing around 12k xp in your pool and now your're stabilizing around 48k xp.
    This is very appreciable, since when dying you'll lose 50k xp, mainly from your pool, and you will not lose xp in many skills, leading to lose levels in 10 skills or more, like we experienced on the QA server.

    For the players who are locking skills, you just need to build a bigger pool. If you used to build a 1 million xp pool, then consume from 1 million to 0 xp, you just need to build a 4 million xp pool and consume from 4 millions to 3 millions, then start again.
    Sure, you need more xp to build your initial xp pool, but you only need to do it once. Moreover, in this setup, you'll never lose any level due to skill decay.
     
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  5. Themo Lock

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    200 is not the cap, there is no cap. It is however, pointless. If determined to do it, you can get ADV level and every skill in 3 separate trees to level 80 in about 2 weeks which will pretty much make you as strong as you are ever going to be. Already everything is so fast and easy that people are sitting around waiting for something to do. The slower transfer from pool to skills was just to prevent confused people from ending up with empty pools by default, which will soon mean that their skill levels go down. Skills should take LONGER to train. GM should be an epic, meaningful achievement .. not a few hours work.
     
  6. Mugly Wumple

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    I was reiterating what Chris said.
    To quote the aformentioned post
    " Your pool fills up to be about 4X larger and that 1/10th of 1% is then applying the same as the 4/10th of 1%."
    While it may take some time to build up your XP pool, in the end skill advancement should eventually be as it was.
     
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  7. Arkah EMPstrike

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    The new armor's benifit is in that its the only light armor with damage avoidance, and high durability. Somone like me who is light armor melee, it looks appealing.

    Before persistance skill gain was set to 4x to match the accelerated xp gains and it was a bug it was still that high. Its better for when decay hits as well.

    Progression is quick. 40 is 75% of the power of a 100, and 80 is 90%. This is on a curve because it creates a softcap, 200 is not intended to be reachable within a couple of years. and you capable of doing endgame content by 60-70.

    Dynamic content is on the way for episode 1 in the form of roving encounters, dynamic spawners, and city invasions as well as pvp "control points"
     
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  8. Barugon

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    Once your pool gets to be about 4x larger, your skills will be drawing experience at the same rate they were before. In other words, it normalizes. Not a nerf, just an adjustment.

    If they left it where it was and then turned on decay then they would get a whole bunch of people screaming about losing a level in various skills the first time they die (which is what happened on QA). This way, they give it a bit of time for your experience pool to normalize, they turn on decay, you die and the experience for decay is (mostly) pulled from your pool.
     
  9. aseltine

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    In others games, which we shall not mention, you hit your hard level cap, and then you improve through gear which can only be obtained through group activities. Perhaps they were on to something, I for one have no desire to solo grand forever in this game, it is too boring.
     
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  10. Themo Lock

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    You already do that here, the only reason people keep grinding is to race each other.
     
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  11. Snazz

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    It's also so you aren't 100% capped (other than gear upgrades)

    XP is always usable, instead of every other game where expansion opens up XP again. Sure the curve is rough, because it would be nuts to be linear
     
  12. manufacturedsoul

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    Not sure how this can be achieved now. Seems that boat has already sailed...
     
  13. Snazz

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    Surely nothing like early UO.

    More like later UO
     
  14. Study_Break

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    So if your pool was 1,000,000 xp, previously you would get (0.004 * 1,000,000) = 4k xp per cast. Now you need to save 4,000,000 xp to get the same 4k xp per cast.

    So previously you needed a much smaller XP pool, and that pool was applied much faster to skill gain, as each cast at a lower XP pool. How can you possibly say it was not a nerf? You need to grind up 4x the xp to apply the same skill gain per cast, wheres before you would have already GM'd that skill before wasting hours farming up 4m xp, and started on your 2nd or 3rd GM skill. If you start training a skill before earning the 4x XP pool, that means it will take you up to 4x as many casts, cost 4x as many regs, take 4x as long ... Whoever thinks that's not a nerf must frankly be in the same universe as Donald Trump!

    If you guys are okay with it, so be it, I already have 37x GM and pushing skills to 120 (which is now a *****), and some of my guildies have nearly 60x GM skills. Too fast? That's a matter of perspective. Maybe. But we play more than anyone else and have figured out how to maximize our gains. These nerfs hurt us less because we already have much higher skills, it will take everyone else now 4x longer to catch up. Whereas if they left it the way it was, people would have a much easier time catching up due to the diminishing returns at higher skill levels.

    And skill decay with death is frankly idiotic. Who is that going to hurt? Us at the top end grinding CPs at 1.5m xp/hr or the lower level archers and melee guys barely surviving 2-3 skull zones? Either way all it means is more wasted time grinding XP, rewarding those that can do it efficiently and hurting those who can't.

    Not quite the dynamic content I was referring to, see OP. I'm talking about every zone, so we'd have a reason to go back to the old 1-2-3 skull zones which otherwise would never be used again.

    Massive

    (Yes, Hillary 2016!)
     
    Last edited: Oct 5, 2016
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  15. Themo Lock

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    60 GM's eh, you are really not going to like the next thing that is getting fixed then >.<
     
  16. Lazlo

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    Skills shouldn't all use the same xp distribution formula anyway. A skill like basic weapon proficiency is used thousands of times more than a skill like summon elemental, so if they both use the same formula, there is no way to adjust it so that either blades doesn't drain xp too fast or summon elemental doesn't get enough xp per use. If people are encouraged to "just play", there shouldn't be skills that won't progress beyond beginner levels with normal play.
     
  17. Study_Break

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    We'll see. I keep holding out thinking it will get better, in some ways by making groups more viable than solo XP farming it's a step in the right direction, but we're just farming the same two CPs with nothing else to really do at the moment. You must be extra special if you know what's coming that the rest of us Dev+ members don't, or you're just a troll. If it's that bad then might be time to move on, can't say the game is all that fun and honestly as things stand I wouldn't recommend the game to my friends to play, better to wait for actual release in hopes it turns into something better. They had to go persistent to keep people playing, but we all know it was way too early.
     
    Last edited: Oct 5, 2016
  18. Themo Lock

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    Well there is a reason why most people lock skills off at 80 instead of GM (well, 2 reasons). When decay is fully functional it is going to cost a fortune in exp to hold on to them. And yes, i am extra special (it's the beard).
     
  19. Study_Break

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    What's the other? If decay is that bad, you think people are going to keep playing and grinding it out over and over? From the last test server the xp loss was minimal, a nuisance at best. If it is much higher people just won't play. Bad idea either way, imho. You're the only one I know that's locked skills at 80, who are these other "most people?" None of the guys I know who have been playing a long time do it.
     
  20. Themo Lock

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    It's waaay higher with that many GM, i hate decay as well. The other reason is active skills are just not worth the raise in focus cost compared to the tiny gains. Innates are about the only thing worth going crazy on :/
    EDIT: decay has never been turned on at its intended rate, it was going to be this release but people lost their minds on QA
     
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