Equipment Stat Changes

Archive of the Sojourn3 Gameplay Discussion Forum.
Bipple
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Equipment Stat Changes

Postby Bipple » Mon Jul 14, 2003 3:08 am

I'd like to make a small request in regards to the mass equipment changes which apparently have started to happen. Ideally everything would be changed at once but as this is apparently not happening can you please inform the players what zones are effected when a set a changes goes in. It was really annoying having to re-ID everything we're wearing and in our bags just to see that smoke invasion equip all changed. I have little interest in repeating to ID the same items again and again every time I log in to see what set of stuff was modified.
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Postby Gerad » Mon Jul 14, 2003 7:05 am

I agree.

yeah.

n stuff.

post items changed.

yeah.

beer.
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Postby Dalar » Mon Jul 14, 2003 4:59 pm

u would think after 2 years of players bitching about this that gods would do this. oh well, plat sink for the gods! yay
It will be fixed in Toril 2.0.
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Postby Nekler BlazingWolf » Tue Jul 15, 2003 6:04 am

or you could always wait till they announce that the changes are finished before you worry about re-identifying everything.

or find a bored chanter....
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Postby rylan » Tue Jul 15, 2003 6:30 pm

Well I've been trying to hold my tongue about the downgrade to the smoke invasion orb until the rest of my eq gets cut into little stinky dog food bits.... but this seriously makes me wonder what the non-extremely rare hard to get items are going to be made into: 3 week old liver pate? It was already behind in stats compared to all of the other much easier to get/quest orbs.

Are all of the good stat items going to be relegated to zones that take 5+ hours and require multiple step quests with rares? A lot of people (including myself) are already turning down zone requests because they don't have the time to do stuff like spob or seelie or clouds, and even then odds are it'll be a lot of time with nothing to show for it except the loss of 400 align points.
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Postby Zen » Wed Jul 16, 2003 2:04 pm

The occurance of uber zones lately is already discouraging and frustrating. For me personally, the fun factor of any zone drops off the map after 2-3 hours. For the most part, I do not have the time RL or the stamina in the game to do 12 hour zone marathons, and many are in the same boat.

Granted, there is nothing wrong with the occasional extreme zone, but ramping up the difficulty vs. reward ratio in a way that considers elite zones to be the normal is troublesome. Myself I would rather see an extremely difficult 3 hour zone with three rewards than a 9 hour zone with 7. It certainly seems that the trend in areas and stats lately is catering to the players who can spend the most time, not necessarily the most skilled. On a side note, I would ask if group size vs rewards is being factored into the equipment scale? If it takes 15 ppl to get 4 items, as in the case of smoke invasion, should those items be even more uber than the zones that give more rewards for the same 15 ppl?

Anyway, I'm done ranting. Updates on the equipment rebalancing in the news would be welcome, as would adjustments to more than one zone at a time. Regardless. the hard work of all the areas ppl is greatly appreciated.

-Llandrien
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Postby Savras » Wed Jul 16, 2003 2:51 pm

So... you guys want eq from a zone that takes 1 hr to be the same as a zone that takes 6 hrs? That sound right or fair?

And you're correct Rylan, good items should come from zones that are harder. So no, you're not going to find good items in easy zones. Anything else doesn't make sense.

Llandrien, if you can't find 2 hrs to put into running a zone, do you think its fair to get the same reward as someone who does?

All zones are calculated considering a standard full group, and is based on hard zone statistics rather than variables such as group composition and level.

Most major eq dropping zones (ie stuff 90% of your are using) are going to be converted in the next batch, within a month. Stay tuned... We'll find a place to post a list of the zones affected.
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Postby Ashiwi » Wed Jul 16, 2003 3:55 pm

Yes, more work should be put into getting better items, but with that said, there's really something to this 'variety' thing. Different people enjoy doing different zones for different reasons, and the way zones have been shaping up lately with these zones designed to take four hours or more, that's where the heavier end of the equipment on the game is going to be. Will Jot still retain some of the higher end equipment after the zone changes? Will Crypts (a very quick zone)? What about the lower end of the high level zones, will there be much point in going to them when everybody knows the equipment in SPOB blows it out of the water?

As much as the game needed some sort of system in place in order to avoid equipment inflation and increase variety in equipment available, unless heavy duty changes are made to many of the older, favorite zones on the mud, those favorite zones will sink into obscurity, with no reason to go to them anymore because compared to the newer zones all their equipment sucks. Once the changes are made to the older zones, they will no longer be the "favorite" zones of memory, they will be the newer, bastardized versions of something which used to be.

As you go through revamping all the equipment in each zone, are you taking into account that all high level zones should have some reason which draws players to it, in order to maintain a level of variety for zoning players, which is one of the factors that helps to maintain interest and drive?
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Postby Deltin » Wed Jul 16, 2003 4:09 pm

as per usual I agree with Rylan
personally I worked hard for my falcon boots, what appears to be happening is a reaction to the increasing number of high level players. The zones needed for the boots where difficult and caused many deaths for me and others, but then again someone who was level 50 was semi rare. As it has been said many times the new players will be the ones really affected. I guess I don't understand the purpose of the downgrades. There will just be more and more high level players heck some people have 3 or 4 or more level 50 characters. It's not just the levels it the knowledge of how to do the zone. I'm just using falcons as an example, if it's too easy to do add more parts to the quest, make claws not always load or make something different load, teeth or fur etc. For me personally I played hard for alot of the gear that I have, and to have it down graded is a slap in the face.
There is a ton of gear in the game no arguement there. Perhaps the restring ideas could be used to get rid of some of it, example you turn in 3 neckguards and get one value raised by 10% plus some plat fee and new ansi, so for 3 you could have a 22 hp neckguard OR a 20 hp with a -2 sv one, well you get the idea and certain items you wouldn't be able to do it with. People who don't need gear and bid on it will continue to do so as people who don't won't. It really won't change people's bidding habbits much i don't think.
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Postby Zen » Wed Jul 16, 2003 7:24 pm

Savras wrote:Llandrien, if you can't find 2 hrs to put into running a zone, do you think its fair to get the same reward as someone who does?


Thank you for the informative tone of your post Savras.

To clarify my meaning, I think a zone smaller yet still difficult zone with fewer, high quality rewards is preferable to a brutally long zone with more high quality zone. Somethings will always need to be long, challenging and involved, but equipment, difficulty and zone size do not necessarily need to be ever escalating. I'm not saying Tiamat should be a 3 hour zone, just that the fun factor for the long zones drops off severly.

Call it a personal preference, but I enjoy zones that can be done without having to hold a 12 hour keyboard endurance race. My point is simply that zones don't have to be longer to be harder or to deserve uber equipment.

On an 8 hour spob run, wich is a well done and fun zone aside from being long and grueling, a 15 person group will spend about 17 player hours per item gained. Take the same group, and give them a zone with 2 items and 3 hours, and they will spend 22.5 player hours per item. It's something to think about.

Longer doesn't necessarily mean harder, it just means less fun. So in a word, yes I think someone who does two hours in an elite zone can get the same reward as someone who does 12 hours, and the 14 ppl who walk away empty-handed from that run will be happier than the 8-9 ppl who walk away empty handed from a 12 hour run.

-Llandrien
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Postby Savras » Wed Jul 16, 2003 7:49 pm

You have some good points, Llandrien, but in the end, the design of the zone is based more on the zone builder than the eq system (which is what this thread began as). With the new eq system, there will be a quantitative way to drop good eq in shorter zones, its just coincidence the latest batch of new zones to come in tend to be... endurance tests :twisted:

Generally, however, its pretty much a fact that in an 8 hr zone you'll be fighting a lot more mobs than in a 1 hr zone. The new calculator takes into account the eq dropping fight as well as the route to get there and the physical parameters of the zone itself. Generally the longer zones have more brutal stats in all these categories so have a greater ability to drop better eq. Thats all logical I hope.

This doesn't preclude a short zone with a good item, and if there's enough interest, I'm sure some ppl will want to build them. Its just that its human nature for zone builders to want to build "The Biggest Baddest Zone Ever". *cough* SPOB was originally designed as a short zone, believe it or not.

NAOCFAC (not an official comment from the areas forgers): Anyway, downgrades ARE going to happen and while the comments posted here are worthwhile and read, I'm afraid theres not much you can do to completely prevent it. Generally, if you look at a piece of your eq, its one of the best in the slot, and it was very easy to get, expect it to get dg'd.
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Postby Bilraex » Wed Jul 16, 2003 8:15 pm

i look at my smoke orb, its the best for a cleric type in that slot, it sure as hell wasnt easy to get, but yet it has less hp than a nebbie.
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Postby Dlur » Wed Jul 16, 2003 8:38 pm

Just think what a nebula's stats will be after they finish downgrading that if you put it into perspective of the smoke invasion orb...
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Postby Sylvos » Wed Jul 16, 2003 10:14 pm

*strikes up a violin*
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Postby Bipple » Wed Jul 16, 2003 11:28 pm

While on the subject the rumor going around is that a side goal of the changing the stats on equip is to reduce the overall HP of the players from equip by 20% (IE the best pieces of new equip will be 20% lower hp wise than the best HP on current equip). It's also said Hit dam will be oppositely effected in that it will be greater than it currently is. Any chance you can actually clarify this, if it is a the intention I believe the players should have been informed before any stats were modified (not just those who are friends with the people doing the changes).
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Postby Dugmaren » Thu Jul 17, 2003 4:19 am

Equipment Trends

Hitpoints will be dropping. Hit / Dam will be increasing. Special Procs, protections, divinations, class abilities will be harder to get and you will see less of them. If it was harder to get, it will have better stats.

Hit / Dam is increasing because it will make adjustments easier for code when melee is being tweaked, and because at the moment, melee damage is laughable.

Hitpoints will be dropping because the current values are higher then need be (SPOB can be done with no HP equipment), and to amplify the difference in tank vs. caster hitpoints.

Special procs, protections, divinations (di/dm/d_evil,good etc), Class abilities (hide, sneak etc) are decreasing because in our opinion they should only be on powerful or special items. Every level 20 and his dog shouldn't be walking around with swords that shoot fireballs.

The Equipment System

The equipment system provides area builders with a quantitative method to arrive at equipment statistics based on the difficulty of getting said item. By using a well defined system we can finally build zones that provide a reward suitable to the risk involved.

I will not discuss the specifics of the system as I have no desire to argue the merits or problems with it at this stage. You're going to have to trust me that it has been made and broken and re-made more times then you can imagine and countless hours have been spent perfecting it.

Zones Take Too Long!

So what, you want me to NOT add new zones just because they don't fit into your time schedule? Seriously, I agree with you - as a mortal I've never done Bronze Citadel because I don't have the patience to tie myself to my computer for 8+ hours. BUT, that doesn't mean everyone plays the same way I do, so those long zones are there for the people who enjoy doing epic zones.

Shorter, harder zones can and will be implemented as time permits us to complete them. They will have comparable stat values if they are hard enough to compensate for being short, but the people that build zones do it for free, in their spare time, and if thats not fast enough for you, too bad.

Dugmaren
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Postby Todrael » Thu Jul 17, 2003 2:07 pm

Bronze Citadel was my favorite zone ever, even though it took upwards of 25 hours to finish it for the first time, if you include our failed trips. I've spent a really long time on this mud, and done most zones 50+ times. Some of them, like Jot, I've easily done over 150 times.

My biggest problem with massive eq changes will be that I have likely owned any item that might be made better than what I'm wearing right now. I've abstained on hundreds and hundreds of bids for items that are top notch because there were people in my group that needed them, that could use them immediately. Will I now have to do all those zones another 50+ times so I can get what I never thought I'd need?

I have a list of eq that I want that would be a direct and unequivocable upgrade to what I'm currently wearing. It's never gotten smaller than 5 items at any point in time, though what those items have been has changed quite a bit. My eq set will never be done. Not ever. I know of perhaps only 5 people that could say they're even close to having every item they want.

I've given away or passed up so much, because I was content with what I had. I thought I had what I needed. It just doesn't feel right to keep playing once that's all taken away. Why not actually change the zones to make them harder, like has happened to so many of the favorites in recent times? Are ATDs now a thing of the past? How can you possibly calculate the difficulty of a zone when it's so very different for evils vs. for goodies, or with a rogue/folder or without? How much is Loki's eq worth if you do all of jot vs. if you fold from smoke to the palace? How long until another massive eq change?

That last one is important. A game without change is a game in stagnation. Eq is constantly compared to all the counterparts by the players, but only if there /is/ something comparable. Nobody complains that an item is too easy or too hard if there's no other item like it. But more time breeds more zones, more and more eq, more and more things to compare. With time, it's possible even this new formula won't be good enough. What then? Change everything around once more? Force people to do every zone in the game just another 20 times to keep that spark of feeling like 'the best'?

Or should we stop caring about eq? What about the people that use it to define a portion of their enjoyment of the mud?

I didn't really notice I had so many questions until I was finished. I'll wait and see what the answers are.
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Postby Deltin » Thu Jul 17, 2003 5:06 pm

Todarel it's probably easier to change the items to better fit the zones then it would be to change the zones to better fit the items. If the zones were upgraded instead of the gear down graded etc I think the impact on the current player base wouldn't be hit so hard.
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Postby rylan » Fri Jul 18, 2003 12:40 am

I guess my main concern is, are we going to just see packs of high level caster fights just to increase the 'difficulty' rating in zones to justify the eq? Sort of like having a zone with 20 rooms of jot invasion gatehouses.
I may be wrong, but I also get the impression that rareness of items don't seem to allow for increased stats (smoke invasion orb). As Deltin and others have mentioned, even though a lot of people use certain items, it doesn't mean they were 'easy' to obtain in the first place.

Just a side note/concern. Yes spob can/is done without +hp eq, you just end up having the mages all dying multiple times. Zones and mobs have been tweaked to increase the amoung of area damage that groups take, presumably to offset the higher hps of PCs. Mages are going to get discouraged pretty quickly (mostly from the loss of xp) if they're getting toasted left and right in zones because they lost 300hps from the changes and now can't take 2 clouds or get killed in 1 hit from a mob.
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Postby Corth » Fri Jul 18, 2003 11:44 am

This is a good positive step...

Can someone post a list of the changes when they occur?
Having said all that, the situation has been handled, so this thread is pretty much at an end. -Kossuth

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Postby loshaenar » Tue Jul 22, 2003 11:42 pm

one issue that deeply concerns me with this change of eq stats is the talk of adjusting quest items. Despite this blanket 'We will rock you - 20% on everything' policy, you simply can't give such a generalised appraisal of equipment that can take people different amounts of time to get. Getting an item from a zone run...even if it is smoke invasion (sorry ryls) can in no way be compared to an item like the silver bands. I don't care if johny rogue can do the dscale gaunts quest in an hour...so discourage him! put 'farming dickhead' as a set title for him or something... but please put a little thought into this whole 1 size fits all arguement. Everyone puts different amounts of time and energy into this place, including you admins.... i don't know how many times this has been said.. but we can't all commit 5/8/12 hours at a stretch to zones each day so that we fit into some prescribed system of elite eq'ness. You are going to (and have already done in some cases) introduce these uber items that only those with this sort of time can get. There's nothing to be said about this, those people who manage to get something out of that deserve everything they get, but surely we can have some further thought on whether quest items should also be ground through the 'shevometer'.

bring it

loshe / tai.
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Postby Stamm » Wed Jul 23, 2003 12:01 am

Having read what Dugmaren's said, I really don't see any big problems...

But one thing I've noticed about Sojourn equipment is that there seems to be a 'best item' for each slot for each class. For that to work there has to be a choice between different stat adjustments.

For example an invoker should have to choose between getting max_int or getting hps... as far as I can see just now everybody goes for hps and if object a has the same hps as object b... then they take the one that has the better second effect.

I'm a bit of a perfectionist, and while I'm not exactly an old hand here, I am trying to think of the future, and I'd like to be a very good tank, hopefully I can look forward to making hard choices between equipment, and not having to go for specific items, the same items all other tanks wear, because that is the best item, there's no doubt about it.

As for not being able to get powerful items if you don't have the time to do 8 hour zones, well, the quest system here is fantastic, you can get, instead of one item from a zone that takes 8 hours, several items from lesser zones and quest them for one item of similar worth. I'm sure Dugmaren will take that into consideration though. And as long as Sojourn doesn't go the Duris route of equipment (extremely powerful stuff) then it won't matter significantly to the group if you have that really spanky Tiamat item, but it will make a difference to you personally.
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Postby Dugmaren » Thu Jul 24, 2003 6:30 am

Todrael
If you customized yourself towards top end gear it is very unlikely you will suddenly need to completely re-equip yourself. The hardest equipment to get will still be the best, if you were wearing easy to get powerful gear, then yes you will probably have to adjust your equipment set.

Changing zones instead of equipment is being done, but rarely. We are trying to represent the work that was already done for the equipment. ATDs are not a thing of the past. For a zone that is harder for evils or goodies - that depends on why. If it is harder because of ultravision there is no change, ultravision is a racial modifier, and balanced by other racial modifiers. Mobs that are aggressive only to evils would make the zone harder for evils, and could possibly effect evil only equipment from the zone (making it better).

All equipment is based on the minimum requirement to get it. You don't need to kill the trolls on the grid to get Loki's equipment, so the power of the equipment from Loki completely ignores the difficulty of killing the trolls. Massive equipment change will probably be seen in the next month. Don't hold your breath, we're trying, but some of us have exams, some of us are on vacation, and things never seem to work out on time.

The value of equipment is based on the risk in getting it, not its comparison to other equipment. Thus as the game advances there will be no need to re-evaluate stats for this reason.

Rylan
Fight difficulty, although one consideration in equipment value, is by far not the only consideration.

Rareness definately factors into the calculations.

Loshaenar
Class ability, skill, and group makeup play no part in the calculations. There will be no bonuses because your group can't pick a lock - plan better next time. Please put a little thought into it? Considering the thousands of hours that have been put into the system this is both pretentious and insulting. As for the last if you truly believe that someone who spends 2hours should receive the same reward as someone spending 12, then you'll have to convince me.

Dugmaren
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Postby Bipple » Thu Jul 24, 2003 6:46 am

I'm just trying to understand the system as you mentioned the difficulty part is based on the minimum effort put through to get the item as opposed to comparison to other items. Just to pick a random example say Jot or Musp rares that load on Grid. These items are usually fairly decent and sometimes even top of the line and yet the majority of them are on single mobs which a group of 5 people can quite easily lure and kill without killing anything else (this would be true for normal load or invasion if the lurer is good). Could it be assumed that equipment from the end of the zones Loki/Surtur would be greatly superior to the grid equipment taking into account the minimum number of giants which would have to be killed in order to get them? I assume some degree of added stats would be allowed as the items are rare but being rare doesn't really increase the difficulty, only the frequency players are able to obtain the item. Rare items all eventually become fairly common so logically that would screw the whole balance of the system up if they were allowed to be superior.
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Postby Daz » Thu Jul 24, 2003 6:59 am

heh, its funny now that this is happening - my main incentive to leave was frustration at not being one of the people who was invited to the 10 hour zones because i wasnt a cheery person.

ah well, the mud is taking positive steps, its a shame you had to stick your head under the quicksand to realize you were in too deep.
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Postby Valke » Thu Jul 24, 2003 8:32 am

:cry: Hi people!
"Every level 20 and his dog shouldn't be walking around with swords that shoot fireballs." with time, this will happen anyway, Id rather EQ Miplits parot though.

IMHO, change nothing about casters/EQ and up the hit and damn for warrior, rogue, ect. I do not want to go into a zone with 100 less HP, I die enuff already. And I do think people are tired of Expn. Seems that the game will become harder and for a lesser reward until the changes actually become the norm. Like some have said, "why not add harder zones?" Make more of them and so forth. No one is gonna complain about more zones being added, hell if anything! it will increase the diminishing Pbase! I think these changes will affect more people in a negative way, cause a few more to leave. If a few more people left the evil side then there would only be goodies left. What if the gods lightened up on the requirements of new zones, participated in helping the new builders with editing, and stop being so damn anal. Perhaps more zones would be added, thus giving players more to do, and adding back to the Pbase. Why are gods working at downgrading/upgrading stuff when they could be educating, helping, advertising, and most of all working at getting back the most important thing of this game! People! Ya, gods are busy blah blah, gods dont have time blah blah, gods do enuff already blah blah, well get new ones, More than a few people would love the chance to help out, and would work at the game just like some of the bigger gods once did, when it was new to them. Heh! who am I to give advice though?

Back to my point.
Changing the game like this should not be a priority at this time. Listen to the mudders opinions for a change, maybe they arent so stupid!! There are better ways to add to the game, several of which do not take away from the game at the same time. Wanna add to the game then ADD, allow others to influence as well, and ADD to the game.

Grp......................"Confusion has consumed my logic."
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Postby Ashemiem » Thu Jul 24, 2003 1:08 pm

A good, oh 8 months ago, I decided to try something out. I swapped out my two rosewood discs in favor of an earring of the waters and a tiny golden earring. I swapped out my rings of eldritch fires in favor of tiny ruby rings. And I swapped out holding my two nebula's in favor of wielding the BFH (big f***ing hammer).

That's a loss of 220 hitpoints folks. I'm an elf, so my hitpoints aren't that great to begin with. I'm one of those stubborn good aligned elves, which means I miss on the cheesy eq like silver bands and whatnot.

What was the result of losing that many hitpoints? Well, my search is a bit slower w/o the int from the nebbies. Wisdom didn't change a bit without the rosewood discs. Oh, and I died just about as frequently as I did with my typical CasterEq(tm) set.

All it takes is some adjusting. Don't worry about the downgrades; it happens and you can adjust to the changes. Myself, I'm kind of curious - will the eq overhaul finally correct the odd skullsmasher bug?

Cheers folks, it's not the end of the world. People who quit over losing 100 hps from gear probably were close anyways.
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Postby Ashiwi » Thu Jul 24, 2003 1:21 pm

Before you scold the staff for making changes like this because they're "not listening to the players"... try to remember that it's the players who have been bitching about the imbalance of eq power in zones for a long, long time. Isn't that amazing? The staff listens, but because the individual players decide they might be adversely affected by the changes then suddenly it's the staff's fault for being such assholes to even consider something so lame. Bitch about the problem, bitch about the fix. NOBODY on here remembers all the bitching that was done over equipment power balance?

Believe it or not, people were surviving with a lot fewer hps for a long time. When a game is too easy it loses a lot of what makes it fun.
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Postby rylan » Thu Jul 24, 2003 1:26 pm

Dug, thanks for the patience in going through this thread.
I guess my only other question is, will you guys accept constructive suggestions or reasons why we think something should be a little differant after the changes are put in. :)
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Postby Dugmaren » Thu Jul 24, 2003 5:41 pm

Bipple
Being rare allows for more powerful equipment, as does killing more giants (ie Loki/Thrym). The fact that rare items will become common doesn't matter, the point is these rare items are harder to obtain in the first place.

Valke
We're not working on making it easier to build zones because we finished that part already. Packages for helping new builders create zones from just ideas to actually loading them on the main mud, with extensive FAQs that we add to all the time, are handed out to anyone who expresses interest in the creation process.

Currently I have over a dozen people building zones, many of them close to completion. And no I won't ease up on requirements, balance, spelling or anything because I take a certain amount of pride in the zones that are let into the game. As Ashiwi mentioned already in the post, the main reason this is being done is on request from many many players.

Rylan
The system assigns a point value that can be spent on any piece of equipment. While the point value is non-negotiable, what we do with it is, for instance we could make a wrist bracer 3dam // 2dam 7hps // 1dam 14hps // 20hps. All four of these options fall within the point value, so all are valid, in this particular case many class representatives were asked for their opinion on which final value to use and that option was chosen. If after the changes you can get a LOT of people that use the item to appeal to us, there is the possibility we will change it.

Dug
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Shevarash
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Postby Shevarash » Thu Jul 24, 2003 6:53 pm

I think it's kinda funny that this thread is getting more replies than the one directly below it. :)
Shevarash -- Code Forger of TorilMUD
Jorus
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Postby Jorus » Thu Jul 24, 2003 11:43 pm

Yeah, sounds good to me.

I for one have faith that Dugmaren has a firm handle on what is and isn't balanced eq.

Also, those of you fearing that quick zones will suffer an instant downgrade everywhere and that good eq will only come from a 99hour zone shouldn't worry too much.

The way I see it, your 6-10 hour zone featuring a fair amount of risk (eg, scorps/seers) has enough potential "points" to have several top or near top-end items (lets see, a nice mask, an earring, leggings, about body wear, other stuff I can't remember right now).

A 1 hour zone featuring a decent bit of risk (crypts) however, only has the stuff for two "wear em if you can't get anything better" items (gemstone ring, darkstone amulet) that are a step above the stuff that is safely obtainable with a 5-man group (MS neckwear, onyx/bluestone rings), and a quest item for some near top-end eq as well as a few rarely used odds and ends. Though I guess the gemstone ring is one of the better hit/dam rings out there.

TF, done end-to-end without sneaking past fights takes 3-4 hours and yields a very top end item (eldritch), and two good items (armor, bracers) as well as quest items for some other top-end equipment.

I won't say that I think those three zones are balanced in relation to eachother, but I do think that if all three were approved originally it will continue to be possible for short zones to have good eq (just not several pieces of it).

I wouldn't expect to ever see items as good as those in scorps in a zone that can reliably be done in 1 hour, though. If it's a 1-hour zone that gets enough "points" for such a good item, the only fight in it HAS to be a huge enough pain to justify that. I don't see that kind of fight taking place in one hour every time (sure, it might go quick one try, but another time might be a repeated spank).

I think a decent metric for "risk" in a zone is the percentage variance in times it can take similar groups to complete the zone. I've seen crypts groups that go up to 6hrs after resulting in a spank without calling in a backup group. In my books, crypts qualifies as a fairly high-risk zone (no teleport, have to win a fight to get in). I've also seen 4-hour scorps/seers CR's, but this doesn't neccesarily mean it is _as_ high risk, since the zone itself tends to take upwards of 4 hours. TF, OTOH, while it frequently has spanks, has a very quick CR (especially with our new spells for corpses).

A zone whose time-to-completion can unexpectedly triple or quadruple is "high risk" a zone whose time-to-completion varies by under 50% isn't of such high risk. A zone whose time-to-completion varies by under 10% is very low risk.

I think variance in eq obtained from a zone also counts towards risk, provided that the loaded eq can't be trivially checked without doing the zone. What is at "risk" is a chance of departure from the optimal time:reward ratio in both cases.

IMO dying is a risk factor, again making the time:reward ratio less predictable for some.

Difficulty, OTOH, I have a bit more trouble with. I guess difficulty could be crudely presented as the BASE time to complete a zone if nothing goes wrong (no deaths).

I'd place things like alignment change requiring a known amount of correction under difficulty and not risk. By that token, a zone isn't always as difficult for one race/class/alignment as it is for another. The risk is usually more similar, though.

The above are probably crude measurements, but IMO, risk and difficulty aren't always the same thing. Risk can make things go catastrophically wrong, even if it very rarely happens. Difficulty means things can often go wrong, but in ways that are only minor delays.

Regards,
Jorus
beldim
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EQ balance....

Postby beldim » Fri Jul 25, 2003 5:21 am

Ok I accually got Tired of reading some of thise nonsense.

How could anyone take from what was posted in the news that Equipment would Be all alike?

The point system will just bring items Up or Down to the place they should be. Not make everything the same.
But I hope it opens up the options to classes, Its old seeing the same EQ on every player.


This has needed to be done for years.
Ever since the EQ downgrades, There needed to be a Point system
Every new zone tried to trump the last and EQ is out of controll.

all the while the old EQ that used to be nice and cherished, was either not even done or placed in a container and forgotten.

Githyanki Gauntlets for example

Originally AC10 +5+4? is that right? its been a long time.
reduces to AC10 +2+1, Not bad, but when you can quest +3dam gauntlets in a day, whats the point.

Another one....

GCD 3D5 +3+3 Procer, for a near soloable weapon is alittle extreme.

Something that really bothers me about this also is its dice are better than alot of the longsword in the realms.

I would like to see a baseline for weapons Dice implemented.
After all we are loosley based on AD&D.

All but the most powerful daggers should be around 1/2 the dice of all but the most powerful longswords.

Instead a warrior suffers with a 2D7 +2+1 or 3D5 +3+1, and more recently 4D4/5's It has been getting better, But some of the Daggers are out of hand.

It would help to balance the warrior class if they did the damage they should.

Im not saying all daggers are over powered, if you put the time and effort into a quest or if the Zone warrants its power thats great.

But etched/GCD quests are to easy IMO for what you get.

I just used those 2 weapon types as a comparison.

I play both classes regularly in multiple game systems/platforms/MUDs
and its disapointing to me to see warriors reduced to just a tank now on Sojourn, atleast we are tanking again, I remember when warriors didnt do much with 2khp fire elementals running about, being healed by Clouds and Fireballs. :)



Well I hope my oppinion didnt make to many enimies



Im very exited about seeing the Equipment issues dealt with
Kudos to those who took the steps to impliment this and
Thanks to all who are putting thier personal time into this
change.
Ionari
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Postby Ionari » Sat Jul 26, 2003 8:54 pm

Valke wrote:Id rather EQ Miplits parot though.


ROFL!

Other random observations and comments:

Seems a lot of hoarders i mean, rarehunters out there could be squelched if these rares came with 'friends' to protect them.

What happened to the Tako Demon Claws? They sure got the vaseline treatment. No one ever goes there anymore. Just one example out of dozens.

As with any piece of eq, once 100+ pieces of it are in the game, it gets downgraded. There's nothing that can be done.

You can make any zone nearly impossible to do and it's elite eq will proliferate to the masses in time where it's value turns to shit. That's life.

Io

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