Do Not Separate Avatar Exp Pools on Same Account

Discussion in 'Feedback Archive' started by Black Tortoise, Mar 30, 2020.

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  1. Black Tortoise

    Black Tortoise Avatar

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    @Chris I heard a terrifying rumor today that I would like confirmed or dispelled. The rumor in /uorb chat is that you plan to keep avatar exp pools separate on the same account, in order to prevent exploitation of noob quests adding millions to the account's exp pool. This is related to today's release of 10x exp for quests.

    Do not do this. I have my alts planned out to use the shared exp pool, and my playstyle depends on it. I am a crafter before I am an adventurer, and this change will prevent me from playing the game in any feasible way. I fear it will render my alts useless, and I see / hear of no way to reclaim their skills and exp pools on my main avatar.

    Simply put:

    Black Tortoise is the primary exp earner, though Black Tortoise spends relatively low producer exp. I use GM cooking, and GM Gathering skills to generate exp for the two alt crafters I have. Black Tortoise is adv level > 100, and can generate significant producer exp from Gathering. I also enjoy that a lot.

    Pitch Tortoise only generates producer exp from milling and smithing, maybe a wee bit from carpentry and blacksmith. Pitch Tortoise is GM a bunch of things, and has spent mammoth amounts of silver getting there. This alt is completely dependent on Black Tortoise for exp. Its very low adv level, and I can not imagine having to earn exp alone with this alt. The alt is rendered useless, IMO, except to sport cool outfits.

    Obsidian Tortoise is similar, except even more GMs, and spent even more gold and silver. And she has a cooler outfit.

    If exp is no longer shared between these alts, then I have some avatars with decent-but-millions-away-from-complete skills, but no real way of getting more exp. I certainly can not finish GM'ing all the masterwork/enchant skills with their compromised ability to earn exp.

    ----

    From what I hear, the "post mortem" goes as such:

    * Todays release includes 10x exp today for quests, and since its double exp time, its more like 20x exp. Rumor has it this was unintentional, and Atos did not know this was being released.
    * Some folks decided to "exploit" this new feature by creating alt characters, doing intro quests which yield uber exp, then deleting the alts.
    * Atos realizes this is unhealthy for the game experience, and decides to remove shared exp pools to "solve" the problem.

    Your ability to release with unknown features baked in is extremely alarming, and erodes my trust in future releases. Your decision not to roll back the 10x exp until there is a better solution, and instead to drastically change my alts accounts, feels reactionary, unfair, and scary. I fear that all the work I put in this year is a waste! I feel reluctant to invest further.

    ----

    BETTER OPTIONS:

    1) Roll back the 10x exp for quests change, and figure out a solution that does not involve changing how exp pools work. If you think its worth the consumers' time to punish the exploiters, go for it, but I question that judgement as well (cus Id find greater value if you develop features than work on code to remove exp from their accounts for one day of this).

    2) Limit the 10x quest exp only to that avatar, and dont share quest exp across accounts. Make no changes to how adventurer (killing mobs) exp works, or most especially, how craft exp works. Only change how quest exp is factored in. This sounds complex though.

    3) Only allow one avatar to earn the initial exp for a quest. Subsequent alts completing the same quest get very reduced or no quest exp. E.g., if Black Tortoise completes an Outskirts, he gets all the exp for it. When Pitch Tortoise completes the same Outskirts, he gets exactly the same experience except no exp for the quests (all other exp earning, like killing a mob, or harvesting cotton, stays the same).

    Your decision to do something destructive to our accounts sounds more like you are concerned with the ease of the solution for yourself, rather than your concern for the consumer. Please roll back the 10x feature and figure out a solution that doesnt change other aspects of the game, like exp pools. You need to keep the consumer in mind and make as little changes as possible for us, even if it means a lot more cognitive load for you. You may benefit from professional consult on your release processes to prevent such things in the future.

    I think youre otherwise great devs, and I love this game very much. I cant keep investing in SoTA if such destructive decisions can be made whimsically.

    [The above has been edited for less reactionary grumpiness, and increased clarity.]
     
    Last edited: Mar 31, 2020
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  2. Black Tortoise

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    @Chris If you do move forward with screwing up every single player's alt exp pools to make the fix easier on yourself, then I would ask for the following:

    A free service voucher, or some kind of in game magic potion, that removes 100% of the exp from all crafting skills, and adds them to the main pool of the account to be used by any avatar.

    Also, about 10000 silver ingots and about 5000 gold ingots, because there is no fucking way in this universe I am acquiring all that masterworking supply again. I made these numbers up, you probably need to give us way more.

    The idea of leveling the skills up with this system is also quite scary, so you can go ahead and let the service voucher / magic potion also just give me instant GM skills with this new exp Ill have.

    Then Ill be very freaking sad as there is no reason for my alts (except to model cool outfits).
     
  3. Black Tortoise

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    @Elgarion Im told by another rumor in /uorb that Chris wont even see this message, and I consider this a true emergency.

    Please ensure your dev team reads my request above: please do not alter shared exp pool for producer exp! It will completely ruin my long term play strategy!!!
     
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  4. Storm Silverhand

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    @Black Tortoise im pritty sue they know who the culprits are , they will be delt with .
    Daily Message: Quest 10x XPs have been disabled for the time being due to a handful of players exploiting an issue. The few players that heavily exploited the issue will be dealt with and XP's removed. Tomorrow we plan on rolling out a change to remove the sharing of pooled XPs between characters. Existing pooled XPs will be usable by any characters on the account but future xps will only be usable by the character that earns them.

    that say it all
     
  5. Black Tortoise

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    Thanks Storm. Im personally completely disinterested in any exploiters of this new "feature" for the time being. I am only interested in the destructive choices made to the entire community, on a whim, as a response to the exploiters.

    It is my belief that this ranks as one of the worst decisions in the game. It appears to be made completely whimsically! And its the sort of "advanced beginner" developer choice to reduce their personal cognitive load in a bug fix, at the expense of all of the consumers.

    Absolutely terrible consequence. I believe my play style is destroyed by this. The solution is asymmetrical to the crimes committed.

    Id like to know what, exactly, is stopping this from affecting quest exp rewards only.

    Here is another angle: IMO, this is quite likely the worst MMO ever made for questing. Its also one of the worst MMOs for killing monsters or group raids. It strikes me, however, as one of the best MMOs for crafting, building, creating player scenery, player content, etc. In the "medieval sims" aspect, this game is a huge win! I am absolutely smitten with all of the "non adventure" aspects of this game, to the point where I forgive how blatantly bad the quest/adventure portions of the game are. But now - one of the most major aspects of producer/crafter gameplay is being destroyed due to an exploitable, "accidentally released" "feature" (so many air quotes!) of the pitiful quest system. That gives me some pretty intense uncertainty about the future, and Im extremely uncertain about the decision making that both caused this in the first place, and came up with this nuclear solution.
     
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  6. Jezebel Caerndow

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    Atos did not want to do this in the first place. He was smart enough to know this was going to get exploited. It was exploited before as well when attenuation was not account linked and people were attening with main then with alt. It was a stupid idea in the first place.
     
  7. Khal Drogo

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    Shared pooled XP was a bad idea from the start ... You start a new char , basically born into a new world with billion xp ? Doesnt make any sense ....and not surprised people found a way to exploit this .
     
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  8. FrostII

    FrostII Bug Hunter

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    @Chris (although I doubt you'll read this.... but hey -hope reigns eternal).

    If I were you -I'd approach this from the angle that you alluded to - with however much banning it takes.

    I'd allow no second chances for this type of exploit.

    To me, it's as simple as this:
    Anyone who recognizes the potential to quickly raise their shared XP's pools via an alt's creation/gain/deletion, also knows full well that gaining that xp on one char - only to transfer it and then delete the char and recycle - IS NOT INTENDED.

    I would afford ZERO 2nd chances and nip the problem in the bud as fast as it happens, and GET THE WORD OUT on the Forum and In-Game (the same place you put your "notice") to warn anyone who contemplates doing the same - that the account that holds the alt will be ban'd.

    That, in itself would take care of your problem in short order. In the meantime, go thru your code and separate Quest XP's from Normal XP's while you hold off bringing back the 10x xp's Quest xp's ONLY.

    Simply explain why you've postponed (for a short time, since the actual solution of separating quest from normal xp's should be that difficult) as you've done in the game "notice"...

    Please do NOT take this quick fix "shortcut" - of removing ALL shared xp's regardless of Quest related or otherwise.

    Please do NOT take all alt shared XP's away from the 98% of us who DON'T exploit.
    Deal with the less than 2% who know full well that what they're doing is NOT INTENDED.

    If this doesn't remind you of the fiasco created, way back when, with the CP exploit that should have been handled differently, then I don't know what would.... 'Nuff said.
     
    Last edited: Mar 31, 2020
  9. FrostII

    FrostII Bug Hunter

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    What was a stupid idea, Mac ?
    Having alts share Adv Pool xp's ?

    They didn't, Khal. It's only an exploit with regards to QUESTING xp's being shared, not NON-QUESTING xp's being shared.
     
  10. Jezebel Caerndow

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    The sharing of pools. I mean if you had all the possible exploitable things thought about and solved, which would be a lot of work, then it would be nice. But soo many issues came from this. First, I can make an alt on macs account and unlearn all skills on mac and transfer that to an alt who would be level 10 with 8.5 billion exp. Then there was the first time craft thing which I THINK they thought of and did that to account, not character. Then there was the attenuation at first was not account bound, so someone could atten on main then get alt attened going 2x beyond the limit we had. They fixed this 2-3 months after the fact, but I dont think many knew about it. Now there is the quest exp thing. Who know what other problems could come from this. All this effort and time could have went towards other things in the game if it was just kept simple and each toon was separate.
     
  11. Elrond

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    Since 2 x XP started i spent/lost about 18 million gold on mats from other players/npc to boost my craft xp , i find it very troubling that few players found a way to exploit something and gain craft xp so easily . I hope Chris is thorough and removes all xp from people who abused his gift ...and that loophole is closed for good.

    This would be a good time to push for more transparency also ... a producer level and adventure level ranking in leaderboards would be nice.
     
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  12. AoiBlue

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    I think you should have to choose between sharing XP Pools AND sharing Quest Data OR share neither.

    Simple solution.

    Also you should be able to select whether or not to share Virtue stats between your alts while you are at it.
     
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  13. Nevyn Waldail

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    your characters aren't seperate alts though they are all you, just in different avatars.
     
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  14. FrostII

    FrostII Bug Hunter

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    Yup, but since this issue (the alt QUEST xp exploit) has been identified (and some banning took place), I see no need (as do many others) to execute Chris's current plan and throw the baby out with the bathwater.
    The xp sharing has been used and appreciated by all the honest players, who shouldn't now be punished because of a couple of bad apples.
    Just delay the quest 10x until you fix the questing exploit, as above......
     
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  15. FrostII

    FrostII Bug Hunter

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    Yes, we DID see quite a few alts at UT - now didn't we Mac .....
     
  16. Lace

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    I can understand @Black Tortoise .

    Playing Devil's advocate here, and not sure how widespread this issue is

    • On pledge levels or via the store you get extra player slots which were not useable for years.
    • We get the new characters slots, but they share virtue--deal breaker for me personally for using ..
    • Game goes free to play so now character slots don't mean anything unless you want to share your homes, but stuck with shared virtue, but at least you have shared xp pool that in perfect world is not exploited.
    • Games says crafting specializations coming (for nearly a year coming) but you can only specialize 1 per character
    • Crafters either make new accounts, buy extra character slots and grind up xp in preparation for crafting specialization
    • Crafting specialization comes, but guess what now one toon can do it all, no community head's up given after one year of saying pick 1.
    • Some crafters continue to grind on their single account, unlearn on their shared slot toons and pump it into their main -- Some crafters continue with their shared xp pool on single account which they PAID for either from their pledge or by buying in the store. Other crafters use other accounts, or simply carry on with their main standalone.
    • 10xp for quests drops and the exploits begin
    • Proposed change no shared xp anymore, those with multiple character slots who for over one year based on minimal communication for crafting changes touted for a year had tried to plan for in the best way are now told sorry bout your luck. The slot you paid for is now useless and guess what that character is less valuable than a free account you can make since you have to share virtue.
    While the original backers have had to take some slaps in the faces, this is a pretty big one now being dealt with the whole original concept of getting extra character slots, that with the game going free to play had already made those pledge level perks or bought slots less attractive.
     
  17. Lace

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    Leader boards for adventure level can create huge problems for the PVP community and much griefing. You cannot see peoples levels when inspecting them, these should not be made public. We have to deal with big brother all the time in real life, I do not want it in my game time.

    The leaderboards we do have kills over time for pvp and fishing over time are not flat line leaderbaords like a level. # of xxx crafted, harvested over time fit that model however.
     
  18. Jezebel Caerndow

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    Perhaps, perhaps not.


    Yes and none of them are on the same account. None of my accounts have more then the main character on them.
     
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  19. kaeshiva

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    Personally I found the 'shared experience' feature for characters on the same account to be another disincentive to create same-account alts. Not only was it unrealistic for character development but the virtue sharing, property sharing etc. friends list sharing more often than not just resulted in confusion. (Who is this person on my friends list? Has this lot marker really been claimed by someone else or is it just the alt on the same account, various issues with deco ownership, etc.)

    I sympathize with Black Tortoise here, who has built his entire empire around this mechanic and is using it in pretty much the only reasonable way TO use it, having one character 'feed' others. While I dislike the mechanic and find separate-account-alting makes a lot more sense ( although the continuing degradation of performance and increase of memory/cpu use has made logging concurrent accounts more and more awkward). However, the knee-jerk reaction to remove an entire system because people found a way to exploit it is concerning.

    Honestly, even though I personally have no use whatsoever for 'shared exp', would never create a same-account alt because of all the hassles I feel it causes, the system exists, has existed for a long time, and people are using this system in the only reasonable way I can see it intended to be used (alts leech main). Simply saying that 'new exp gained must be used on the character' is not a solution; even refunding all of the experience on the alts via unlearning pots and putting it all back on the main isn't a solution, as the material costs of developing crafting are astronomical. There's simply no fair way to dismantle this system without serious repercussions to players who have been using it.

    Instead I'd look at a way to separate quest experience so it has to be used on the character that earned it. On the other hand, that might be a lot of effort - I'd also say that our population is relatively small. How many people are doing what Black Tortoise is doing? A dozen? It might be easier to just change the system, and find the handful of individuals who are really going to lose out with this change and work with them to figure out a way to compensate them for time/materials lost.
     
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  20. Elrond

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    I dont understand ...how would an adventure level leaderboard grief pvp players ?
     
    Last edited: Mar 31, 2020
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