Understanding decay and un-learning skills -

I have hesitated asking this because I read a post a while ago where the person asked about decay and was just blasted....but I will be brave...

1. I really want to understand how decay/death works. If it has been asked/answered please just point me to it and I will go read!
Amplification: I die and lose 'x' exp. I die again and lose 'x' exp and a random skill point. The next day I play all day and dont die. The third day I play and die and immediately lose a skill point. Why don't I always lose a skill point? I keep 1million in my pool - even after death - why am I losing skill points at all? Do skill points decay if I don't play at all?

2. How does un-learning work? the skill slowly goes to zero? What happens to the exp 'lost'? If they make a change to combat and say "ok , everyone can un-learn range for free" how exactly does that work? Lets say I have 3 million in Ranged, does my pool go to + 3million? Do I get to move exp from one skill directly to another (because if I still have to raise a 'new' one I honestly cannot see the point of un-learning anything)

Thanks in advance...

 

You have a total XP penalty that is generated by how much xp you have trained in skills. Now these skills that are above 40 start generating decay. The decay get's gradually higher as the skills get up towards 100. At 121 skills become 200% decay.

Now this is varied depending on how high your skills are across all of the skills. The totals are then added up and that is your daily Decay. Now there are two systems that are on top of the decay system. First being you can only loose 1/2 of your total generated decay pool on resurrection. This can further be mitigated by another r1/2 to a total of 1/4th your decay by receiving a resurrection from another player instead of using an Ankh. Now your Decay pool is generated over time. This means the maximum Decay you can generate is 24 hours. This means that if you don't die at all for 5 days strait you'll still only have 24 hours of decay. Next say if you died once and then died again. You would have already 1/2'd your decay pool. this means you will only take another 1/2 of the existing pool. This means 1/4th of the originating pool. Another death would be 1/8th of the original pool then 1/16th.... so on and so forth. So the penalty gets less and less the more you die in rapid succession.

Now ... say you die .... and loose 1/2 your decay then die again 12 hours latter. this means you'll take another full 1/2 decay. Hope this helps with understanding how the decay is generated.

Funny note ..... Until level 70 it's pretty much impossible to loose more xp than your daily bonus for logging in.

 

Set a skill to untrain - usually 50% unless it is on the 100% unlearn list.

Use the Obsidian Item of Unlearning - 90%. They cost 3 COTOs at the potion merchants.

 

If you are losing a random skill point with a million plus pool, then you do not have your skills above 40 set to maintain.

Train
Maintain
Not train
Unlearn

Someone will correct me if I missed something. But set skills to maintain when you satisfied with the level but do not want to train anymore.

 

FYI, in R50, all adventurer skills will be 100% unlearn.

[edit] It's my opinion that all skills should be 100% unlearn all the time.

 

Unless something changed and I missed it, double-decay for a skill begins at 101. I was also under the impression that every skill that is maintained decays. The amount of decay, I thought, was contingent upon the skill level. So, whatever xp cost normally associated with advancing a skill(at its current level), is applied to the overall decay per hour, and the xp cost will increase as the level gets higher. At 101, that cost to maintain that skill is doubled. I don't remember the release number when this happened, but I want to say around 36 or so.

 

Here is where @Attenwood had answered a question in regards to decay....

excerpt:

Robert Frost: How is the xp loss due to death decay actually calculated? IE, what factors determine how many pool xp's are lost?
Decay acculumates a max of 24 hours of decay so being away from the game for a week is no different than being gone for a day. Half of the decay is applied per death. Skills under 40 suffer no decay, skills 40-80 suffer reduced decay, 80-100 normal decay, 100+ double decay. Decay amount roughly equates to the pooled experience X number of hours applied X 0.0001.

R44 Postmortem Missed Questions

 

ok - this is helpful. I'll check my tree when I get home but pretty sure everything is set to maintain. (not that high level...90 with 13 gm).

Still confused on the un-learning. So we know Release 50 will have 100% 'give back' - but all that means is you put your skill to 'unlearn' and eventually it hits zero and any experience points in there goes into your pool right?

I still do not see how this is helpful as raising skills isn't helped by un-learning another. ...I cant take my 1000 points in Earth and move it to Water. I am still going to have to train every skill up. 1.5 million pool or 4.5 million pool it is still going to take a long time...

 

When you unlearn a skill, xp goes back to your XP Pool(Adv or Prod) Sometimes the staff makes a change that is undesirable to those who took the time to learn a skill. So, in this instance they will let you unlearn a skill at an accelerated rate, and give you back all the xp you invested in the particular skill. Normally, when you unlearn a skill, you only get a portion of the skill back and it takes a lot longer to untrain the skill. I'm not sure of the exact percentage of xp you normally get back, but I think it's somewhere around 80%. Maybe someone can clarify what the actual percentage is. Hope that helps!