Experience point loss has removed the incentive to adventure and explore.

Some of us who are currently out of game are sitting on the sidelines because of this too. Too much grind for too little benefit causes burnout.

 

There's rusty leather armor?

 

Probably.

 

@kaeshiva 's well-spoken comments are right on point and worth re-iterating.

 

No, it works for RP as you can decide what ever mechanics you want. Sure you war someone but the battles do not have to be serious pvp. You can RP scenarios without other hardcore pvp griefing you. You can set the terms of war as no loot. You can set it at no one dies, but you *knock them out* (low hit points). One just needs mature people in the RP guilds to have this. It worked excellent on Europa UO shard. Sure there will always be some asshat but for the most part its great.

 

a little LOOT would help

 

ya, those are some bad numbers. idk what kinda comp you have but my crystal ball says you may need an upgrade in your future
I'd submit that your computer stats are a far greater enemy to you than decay will ever be. THat does not however ignore the fact that the performance issues with SOta are real and very problematic.

Ya it sounds more like.. idk... life I don't RP btw; t least not in what I think of as RP. I play me in the world if that makes any sense to you.
I also do not look at Sota as being just an RPG.
I don't see why me not wanting to RP should impact those who do. Many people like to gather and stand around doing the latest dance steps or w/e, that's fine with me .. just not *my* cup o tea.
Nor do I feel impacted by those who have the desire, or time or w/e to grind away. You know.. some people actually like grinding.
The only thing I am against is the type of player that uses bots etc to acquire materials as that screws us all. Not being a coder.. I don't know how that's done... I just know it HAS been done.

Outside of that I think we really need to expand our collective consciousness and quit arguing that everybody has to play according to the constraints of our own playstyle preference.

anyway.. I've said enough in this thread..


Peace

 

Not being snarky, but could you point to who has suggested that "everybody has to play according to the constraints of our own playstyle preference" .
Trying to put it into the perspective of the OP.

 

Except the game has a cap of 200 on skills..
Is that not the intended reachable skill? why not put a hard cap on then?

And the games not even released yet.. and people are hitting these numbers already...

Honestly the hours put into to hit this are real, but not exactly crazy for a MMO.

Exactly.

*why do these players go this high!? * ...
Because for people that enjoy character progression... thats pretty much all there is to do?

Theres a reason so few games do it this way. Its not because SOTA is unique.. its because they are trying to re invent the wheel using triangle blocks.
Games dont do it this way because its so incredibly unappealing to the average player.

SoTA gets a lot of credit for being *unique * and *game changing* yet.. theres nothing in this game that hasnt been done already.
The only thing SOTA has going for it IMO is that its SETUP in a way they can do a LOT of good features, in one place, and do it right. But its a LONG way before i would consider the majority *done right* yet.

Death decay in all aspects is horrid in SOTA IMO And ive went into detail in other threads about how much of a turn off it is to a lot of players here now, future players, and people who tried the game.
And ill be honest, its one of the reasons i dont play SOTA in short bursts anymore, which leads me to play other things. Its become too punishing to just *Play the game*.
And unfortunatly if this is my *limit* due to personal time willing to be invested... then im missing out on a good chunk of the game, as well as end game PVP.. so it makes it even MORE unnappealing to me.

Its a bad system. Simply put. And the amount of time that went into TRYING to make it work and justifying it, could have gone into development of something actually enjoyable.

 

Here here! Signed.

 

Sometime after I manage to afford the dentist maybe If my computer stats matter more than how we define death in a rpg then I'm really in an uncool materialistic plane am I, I'd submit to change planes

To be honest the performance is improving... but I need more core stuff I can disable, I would like to be able to make my Avatar near sighted I'll post some feedback about that. I get peaks of 10-13 fps in some adventure scenes that have obviously had a few opti-passes. Didn't have that before, so we're going to get there

My computer is fine, its just a game. We should strive to keep as much people as possible from all possible walks of life, I'll never repeat it enough.

Some people would settle for horrid graphics by some standards if they can have smooth 60 fps+. I know I get motion sickness with less, and it makes me sleepy.

Decay well to me makes not one ounce of sense, like the oracle. As I said I'm not taking all of this too seriously... I take it as its part of the story.

Good we're getting some depth out of this, but since it sounds so much like life, and since we obviously have one already, why would anyone want something that sounds like life when we're talking about an aetheric avatar ressurecting at a phallic ankh after praying to some mysterious lord of virtue while visiting its total nemesis in a va... I mean dome shaped confirmatory. Things need to make sense, the new generation of players want freshness, they want coolness and they want truth.

We should step UP already, I know some will say its too late blabla doom thee all... but its never too late, and never say never, do as I say but not as I do and everything will be fine

I am a different breed, no pride nor remorse, I live half in both worlds. I put myself aside, my frustrations I do not force them upon anyone, my needs for a "lord british" old school RPG... thats not important.

Hearing a call for help in the clamor and noise, now thats skill, thats important.

Listen to your loyal backers, get rid of ALL mechanics that do not fit the coolness, the freshness, and the truth of the magnitude of genius that is becoming the legacy of King Gariott.

You see brother, of course its a hybrid of many games, mini games, social games but all in all you have to understand that the prosperity of this endeavor rests not upon our old battered shoulders. We all play a role, if some people's role is being the evil who uses bots to gather then sells it for real money to go to the baths, then it is their karma.

I am also most like you, I do not get disturbed by trivial things, but to take a very real example if I'm with someone I love and I know someone keeps calling them on their cell phone although they have seen each other not long ago and are going to meet later I would get all upset.

I'm strange like that I feel things, I balance the usefulness of something with the harm it can possibly do.

In that case if the person takes 30 minutes on this harmful portable microwave to explain something and the person I'm with finishes the conversation with a hurried tone and says yes you already told me all that, then I'll hold a peculiar grudge at the third party.

You see @Solazur if I go play with you, I won't be a snob about my roleplaying, I'll just be myself and balance my role, each role is multidimentional and we're all in this together.

It's not about the fact that "anyone's" playstyle is better than another, its about finding our roots, thats what those speculative discussions are for even if they show no apparent result. At the root of it all, there was a playstyle that is inspired by D&D, Tolkien, Dragonlance, Monty python even !

That RPG essence, which is the co-creation of our dev team and of King Gariott's legacy, is what we must humbly bow to, all of us, including the devs.

Then it becomes a matter of choice, no playstyle is forced right now, but no roleplaying root or whatever you want to call it is available as a choice.

Why is that bad ? Because it will send a strong message... I let you guess which, or if it will send mixed messages (even worse).

The new generation of gamers will make or break our dev's vision. We must evolve.

 

It is not intended to be reached. Chris said so himself. Leveling that high is a fool's errand. I do agree that a decisive cap is better than having an uncertain one.

 

+1

+10

+100

 

It was seriously NOT thought thru before being implemented .
Get rid of it quickly, and then decide how death will somehow be "meaningful" .
The longer this asinine decay system is in place, the more people are turned off and turned away from SotA, and many have spoken here....
It needs to go asap, period.
Then find something that makes death "meaningful" - if indeed it needs to be "meaningful" - in a freeking game for pete's sake, before there's nobody here to experience it.
Nobody likes putting time into raising skills just to do it over again, and again, and again.... That scenario is just not sustainable.

 

Sorry but, nobody is hitting theese numbers, not even close
You know how much XP it takes to take one of the cheaper skills to 200 ? , like 16,709,249,906 xp
Expensive skills like Train Intelligence require 167,092,499,063 xp to hit 200

Getting skills to 130-140 is easy. Maybe even 150.
But after that lolz.....

 

I really sympathize with those trying to level higher. Long boring hours of grind. I feel it. The only question is how long will take before one realizes that if the fire burns the best solution is get out of the fire.

I am not a fan of the soft cap either, but ignoring the soft cap is the real problem. If there was a hard cap nobody would be complaining about not being able to get beyond it. That is the truth of this debate.

 

Shhh...Sinder! Keep it down! Don't you know that even WHISPERING the words, "dance parties" can invite the wrath of the Oracle!?

 

Didnt read the last three pages, most post let me facepalm.

This endless complaining about death decay is ridiculous.

It's pure evidence of people approach and true incentive to play the game.
Progress.

I loose my progress - mimimi.

You should also loose your inventory and gear!!!

Including Artifacts!!!!!!

Due to the renaming of the thread :

No it does not stop me exploring and playing, it encourages me to not to die and makes the whole thing more challenging and meaningfull.

In fact it makes exploring more challenging. Like it very much!!!

Adv Level 7x. Dont know exactly, dont care
No GM, no artifacts, nothing special at all, beside the Shroud maybe.

I play t5 and it's challenging
I cannot kill bosses

You all played too much and skilled to far.

It's like with encloned mines


Mimimi they take my progression effort away.

Cant hear anymore.

Powergamers allways drive the measures.

And.... ah forget it, all you do is wanting the game to be more themepark with multiple bindspots, easy travels, no death decay and such...


Oh you know what i do if you implement something with a timed debuff or turn it around and give me an XP Malus?

I just wait it out or quit my Session.
Dumbest system ever in a lot of MMORPGs
I then always just go afk or quit playing.

 

I honesty still do not think this can be called a soft cap. This system of rising the needed experiences for each skill level just lead to the general goal to achieve level 40 in most skills and if this goal is achieved the next goal is level 60 in most skills than 80…100…even if it might take for some avatars hundreds of years ( ) in the end everyone will have sooner or later all skills at level 200 if the avatars are not actively deactivate skill progress.
In my understanding a soft cap is something that needs your effort to stay above the cap but if you stop said effort you slowly decay back to the cap.
So to say everyone’s “goal” is reaching 2000 skills. All end contend is balanced to be a doable challenge for someone with 2000 skill levels. If you want you can continue to raise your levels to have e.g. 2500 skill levels simply by effort but if your effort stops you will lose as time goes by your gained levels slowly one by one till you are back at 2000 and this would be a soft cap.
The pre decay-system was simply endless progress as the +10% more experience per level with lesser and lesser gain is just a normal mechanic of hindrance to slow you down to play some more just as I think all level based games are doing. In all of these games the next level will need more effort than the one before and this is no cap except if the number of available experience is limited. (e.g. by fixed numbers of enemies in a game)
The only real cap in SotA is the max level of 200 per skill but as long as no one reached this level we do not know for sure if there really is such a cap.

Well as we are still in early access (or as I still call it alpha) they can implement all kinds of features even if it is just for testing….that’s why I think they do not have to scrap decay immediately even if I have to admit that they should reconsider the usage of decay in its current form. It is clearly recognizable that nowadays just a small part of the audience seems to accept a loss of experience as punishment for dying.
Long time I though decay was meant to be a soft cap but at least in its current implementation I think it is not working that way...maybe they should instead change it to a fixed value like 10% of your pooled experience but I do think this will not change the approval of the exp loss.
Maybe they should really stop decay and instead implement something like losing a random item out of your inventory on death that is added to your personal loot table of that region until you leave the area. E.g. you lose some mandrakes you were carrying and have to kill some enemies to hopefully regain them or leave the area and loose the items for good…I think more of a (temporary) loss is not accepted by the crowd as it's not encouraging them...it's just seen as an nuisance.

 

Actually, we do know. Chris already told us there is no cap on 200 but the calculation ends on skill 200.

A Soft Cap is a targeted limit where you still can progress beyond, but in a much less rewarding way. Lets say 100 is the soft cap and you get a gain of 10 STR from 80 to 100. The soft cap should kick in and you only gain 2 STR from 100 to 120. Or instead of taking the current math of level×1,1xx they should go for level×1,4 after 80 and level×1,8 after 100. So many ways to soft cap it better.
What decay does is creating a limit based on your playtime/death ratio. Many people will come on other caps, maybe you play less and never die, or you play less and die every day 3 times. But if you play alot and doesnt die at all, we have what we had befor decay. Thats why there are so many different statments about it, because everyone plays in a different way, but it does not change the fact that it is a broken system and creates alot of hate.

If i would still play, i had 100+ GMs in no time if i take it easy and decay would never stop me. But i stopped because this system is stupid, unplaned, senseless and i lost exp because of stupid bugs and unfinished, unbalanced gameplay. I dont care about lose progression or items or what ever, but there as to be a reason for this! Decay for bring down high tier gamer? Does not work! Decay as soft cap? Will unbalance the Player and is based on playtime/death! Decay to give your death a true meaning? Yes this works.

I think we all agree that they have to slow down the progress and we all agree that they have to put a soft cap on max skills in the whole. And we all agree that we need a penalty for death. But decay is not the right way to handle all 3 things.