What ever happened to the was it 90 hour or 70 hour rule

Feedback, bugs, and general gameplay related discussion.
Thrand
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What ever happened to the was it 90 hour or 70 hour rule

Postby Thrand » Wed Apr 05, 2006 5:10 pm

< 432h/432H 353v/353V >
< P: std > time
It is 8pm, on the Day of the Sun
The 34th Day of the Month of Flamerule (Summertide), Year 576.
Time elapsed since boot-up: 91:04:44
Current time is: Wed Apr 5 10:07:31 2006 (EDT)

< 432h/432H 353v/353V >
< P: std >
Tida starts casting a spell.

< 432h/432H 353v/353V >
< P: std >
Tida completes her spell...
Tida utters the words, 'oculoinfra uizuguburuhl'

< 432h/432H 353v/353V >
< P: std > who good group
Listing of the Staff
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
<None>

There are 0 visible staff member(s) on.

Listing of the Mortals!
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
[22 Cle] Malrushi (Grey Elf)
[50 Lic] Nekelet }-Lifes Bane-{ Shades of Twilight (Human)

There are 2 mortal(s) on.

Total visible players: 2.
Record number of players on this boot: 74.

< 432h/432H 353v/353V >
< P: std > who evil group
Listing of the Staff
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
<None>

There are 0 visible staff member(s) on.

Listing of the Mortals!
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
[38 Dir] Yayah (Orc)
[48 Ill] Lamas -Twisted eye- Hordes of Darkness (Yuan-Ti)
[27 Psi] Millicallarriz (Illithid)
[50 War] Gura (Troll)

There are 4 mortal(s) on.

Total visible players: 4.
Record number of players on this boot: 74.

??
Thilindel
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Postby Thilindel » Wed Apr 05, 2006 7:26 pm

This is an ongoing problem for over a couple months at least. Very sucky :(
Latreg
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Postby Latreg » Thu Apr 06, 2006 4:24 pm

where is that rule written and rules are made to be broken ;) guess it makes people exp and roll up alts
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Eilistraee
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Postby Eilistraee » Thu Apr 06, 2006 4:50 pm

It was never a hard and fast rule, and served more as a guideline for mercy. There's tons of content on the MUD, the most recent reboot was even in danger of being postponed because a player located a super rare load at the 92nd hour, but needed several more hours before it would be able to be utilized.

They didn't want to hold everybody else up though for this rareload item, so suggested I go ahead with the reboot.

There's lots of content. I'm sorry if a long boot means that a piece of content you're working on is less accessible; but there's plenty of other fish in the sea.
Eilistraee
Gura
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Postby Gura » Thu Apr 06, 2006 5:09 pm

the problem is we've utilized all the content on this mud for the last 5 years. most of the content that is left untouched is outdated, substandard and frankly useless to the remnants of the playerbase.
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Ifin
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Postby Ifin » Thu Apr 06, 2006 5:39 pm

I think Gura touched on a major problem of the MUD these days. Referenced in other threads, ie what would make this game interesting, etc.

Even at 80 hr boots, for the most part a majority of the content lies untouched. On normal times, people just get excited for Izan's. Then maybe Swamps if you need priest eq, Cloud's for a little bit but I personally started thinking it was a waste of time going up there. Then there's some side zones like Seelie/Spob/BC once in awhile, cuz' they take a little longer and the people you normally take to those zones probably have that eq. Then zones like Magma/IC2 that you have to plan for getting harder and harder to do these days.

Then you check for invasions which are the fun things left. My personal list of group zones at the bottom, the other ones only get touched if someone pretty new wants to try to form for it our someone needs something for a quest eq.

There's a lot of content, but no incentive. Sure it can be fun to do Ice Crag (though now not even doable w/a quick pick up group cuz of remo changes) and Jot, but for high level players that already have eq there they risk high level xp loss (again, problems that have been repeatedly brought up) and sometimes more headache than fun.

A zone like Izan's eq distribution totally messed up the risk/reward/fun factor for a lot of other zones. It's not even that hard of a zone. With a solid group it can be done in 60 min - that's like the same time as Scorps/Seers/CC/Full TTF or something. Choking Palace IMHO is the one zone left challeging for a bored playerbase, but for some reason people don't want to step up to the challenge seriously (perhaps b/c stats have already gotten out and again, the "not worth it factor").

As Kiryan said in another thread, adding a new zone one at a time would just degrade the amount of times it'll be done, perhaps the MUD would have benefitted from packaged zones, so that the eq would have been stabilized across a couple of zones instead of every new zone eq tries to one-up the next, b/c that's the only way it would be done these days.

Adding stuff like xp tokens at the end of zones would provide a non-eq incentive for those people who already have eq from mid-high zones to take lower lvl people there, or rearranging eq placement, or perhaps implementing more quests that take items from those places, or I don't know.

And then on a separate topic there's also the question of beholders. I don't know if they changed in the last two weeks, but they seem ridiculous, almost like melee changes or something need to go in first before fighting them. I also don't understand the logic of how doing a zone like Hulburg pre-beholder changes = same eq as post-eq changes (ie dragon stuff) (ie thought out risk/rewards) (though I'm not advocating d/g'ing eq or anything, as that just adds to eq instability but still)

Small-Mid-Level Zones (can be mostly twinked 1-5 people):
- A'Quarthus Velg'Larn (AV)
- Brass
- Citadel
- Demi
- Griffon's Nest - Kralgar
- Ice Crag Vault
- Labyrinth
- Lizard Marsh
- Moon Temple

Mid-Level Zones (most can be small-manned/twinked or are not particularly hard 3-8 people):
- Airship Vault
- Blood Bayou
- Elemental Planes of Fire/Air/Astral
- Jot
- Musp
- Oakvale
- Orcish Hall of Plundar
- TTF 3-item (borderline)

Mid-High Level Zones (not really twinkable, but don't require super group):
- Avernus
- Cloud's
- Crypts
- Ice Crag 2 1st Level
- Scorps/Seers
- Southern Forest
- Swamps of Meilech
- Tarsellian Forest
- Tower of the Elementalist
- TTF Complete

High-Level Zones:
- Bronze Citadel
- Cave City
- Choking Palace
- Dragonspear Castle
- Ice Crag 2 Complete
- Izan's
- Hulburg
- Magma
- Myth Drannor
- Seelie
- SPOB
- Tiamat
- Zaor
Lilira
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Postby Lilira » Thu Apr 06, 2006 6:08 pm

This is merely a question. I have absolutely no idea how hard this would be to implement, but it might help with some of the boot issues.

Would it be possible to set "Random Repop timers" on the large 1/boot quest mobs, as well as zones?

Say I quest a 1/boot mob. His timer resets upon time of questing and he can repop anywhere from 5 hours to 90 hours after being quested?

Oh look! Seelie was done, but the timer could be set to where if there isn't a boot anywhere from 3 to 7 days it repops randomly and can be run again? Same with mobs that have pretty rare items for quests. Make it random so people have to run in and check on them constantly instead of "Aww.. someone beat me to that damn tattoo, guess I'll wait til next boot and try to snipe it first..."

That would take the burden off the imms for reboots, saving them for adding new code or whatever is needed.

Perhaps start requiring it in the new zones as they come in until the old stuff can start being revamped?

Like I said... just an idea.
Last edited by Lilira on Thu Apr 06, 2006 6:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Naled
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Location: Netherlands

Postby Naled » Thu Apr 06, 2006 6:20 pm

Lilira wrote:Would it be possible to set "Random Repop timers" on the large 1/boot quest mobs, as well as zones?


Think some mobs or items already pop like that. But I think it's a good idea to do this with all quest mobs. The mud is dead now after everybody is done hunting rares.
Ifin
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Postby Ifin » Thu Apr 06, 2006 9:57 pm

Repopping zones is great for a long boot time, but after my last post I'm thinking of new ways to spur people to under-utilized zones; there's a pretty big gap between people who need stuff/can learn from those zones, and those that have all/done all.

Checking rares is great, but most good rares can be solo'ed/very small grouped. Although zoning isn't the one-item that everyone MUD's for, I think that zoning spurs a greater amount of people to stick around to playing the MUD and not get bored than single-questing does. I remember when I didn't know how to lead/thought I could get people to follow it would be way boring to just sit around waiting for something to happen, or waiting to be asked, which makes the game !fun and so why play?

Another suggestion would be to put like a special quest piece 10% load or something at the end of each zone. Then maybe it can all be combined in different ways to upgrade some items, and the combos aren't known so zones would have to be run repeatedly. This is more challenging and involves more people, gives a chance of incentive for those with everything and want the best of everything a reason to still hit up those smaller zones. Even a small upgrade and the hard-core players will still be motivated.

Upgrades in this fashion seem more earnest than sitting around checking if a piece of metal has loaded every couple minutes.
Lilira
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Postby Lilira » Thu Apr 06, 2006 11:40 pm

Ifin, I was thinking of it being more in line for those people who have problems finishing quests because of others who farm quest items.

Also, zone repopping would affect those smaller zones that are done as well, since even after 90 hours in, some of them with quest items have been done.

I would absolutely love to see a token for XP that loads in the zone "vaults" (final fight, vault, whereever the goodies are), but make it so the item CAN NOT LEAVE the zone. This will prevent people from handing the tokens to their billionth alt, and maybe encourage them to bring the alt along next time. :P

Lilira gets the shining amulet of knowledge from the corpse of Izan.

Lilira invokes the shining amulet of knowledge and a golden glow surrounds her.

Congratulations! You receive experience.

(Load 10 of the things in Tiamat *nods at herself*)

Or better yet, make 10 amulets randomly load around the realms in zones. Then of course people will do other zones to try and find them! Its a constant treasure hunt that people will never really get bored with cus it won't be trumped by newer EQ coming out.

Also it would be a nice replacement for XP grind, as well as help with the death loss during zones. I hate the XP grind.. my kits on my characters are fine the way they are for the most part, so you can bet I'd jump all over one of those amulets. (Just not if Pidi is bidding on it too. *whistle*)

Again, as previously stated, its just an idea.
Brandobaris
Staff Member - Areas
Posts: 163
Joined: Mon Aug 29, 2005 10:33 pm

Postby Brandobaris » Sun Apr 09, 2006 8:54 pm

Ifin wrote:A zone like Izan's eq distribution totally messed up the risk/reward/fun factor for a lot of other zones. It's not even that hard of a zone.

I am always open to hearing suggestions and areas of improvement for my work. Any player is welcome to mmail me if they find a problem with anything I've done, and it will be looked into. To date, every specific concern that was made known to me for Izans has had some action taken to address the concern, including stats and difficulty.
Tasan
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Postby Tasan » Sun Apr 09, 2006 9:21 pm

Basically the problem with Izan is the same problem with SPOB. You give out top tier rewards in too many slots and make nearly every other zone obsolete. The worst part was how you happened to do it. By slamming large groups of mobs together to up points based on the completely broken EQCalc. After the 4th warrior mob in a room you are not increasing difficulty much by adding 8 more. The calc allows for diminishing returns on eq, but not on points given from fights involving large groups of mobs. With 3 invokers, rooms of 12 warrior mobs are a joke. Rooms with 7 corporeal casters? Cake with nightmare or un/holy word. The only actual difficult parts in the zone are entry and exit.... but i digress. Don't take this as an attack Brando, you used what was available to get the best rewards... much like most other area writers.

The newer zones seemed to come in and have a complete lack of review once Dugmaren left. No one stepped up and asked "why should there be top level items for many slots from a single zone?". This never occurred back in the old days. You had many zones with 1-3 really great items and the rest were filler. Now you hit 3 zones for an entire week with the same 15 people and can fully equip 1 new high level character in gear. Quests become more and more time-consuming/tedious to complete for gear that is really subpar compared to the zones you can do in 2 hours. Things are out of whack and the playerbase is suffering from a lack of anyone seeming to listen(as far as areas as a whole goes).

It's been far more than a year since the spob/izan threads for unbalancing the rest of the game, and nothing was really done. No wonder people leave in droves when the game becomes completely stagnant.

Redistro eq, fix some of the epic quests and for the love of god, tell people when you change things and take some real feedback like when the object changes came through. Listen to the players, they are the ones who are going to tell you what is reasonable and what isn't.
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Ifin
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Postby Ifin » Sun Apr 09, 2006 9:33 pm

In reponse to Brandobaris,

I wasn't slamming Izan's as a zone (hope my comments wasn't taken as a slam), the pop change was great, fixing the patrols so entry is exciting were two great changes. Izan's is one of the funnest zones in the MUD due to its non-stop smiting action.

And some of the best eq in the zone being as rare as they are doesn't necessarily skew to the risk vrs. reward benefit way to the reward side. Izan's itself is a great zone.

The problem is that so many different pieces of end/near end-game eq lies in one zone, and groups that go up there disregard the rarity due to the fact that a couple of other guaranteed good items load each time, as opposed to a zone like Cloud's where you get either nothing or something (in terms of "wanted" items), and that diminishes the other content if people just need to go to a small handful of available zones to outfit their character.

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