Crowns of Mastery!

Estarra

The idea stemmed from a brainstorming session with the Envoys and I think they're really cool. I know only a couple of people have gotten them right now but let me know what you think. Could they be improved upon? Should more crowns be added? If so, what areas?

Shaddus

These are an absolutely AMAZING artifact, and I think they're a great deal, too. Tbh, I'm pretty sure some of these will be overly purchased (kephera/illithoid and Mudd), and some will be underpurchased (Shallamurine). Maybe a slight price adjustment based on this after a short period of time?

Tremula

I want Shallamurine so badly. I want it to look pretty.

Shaddus

Estarra said:

The idea stemmed from a brainstorming session with the Envoys and I think they're really cool. I know only a couple of people have gotten them right now but let me know what you think. Could they be improved upon? Should more crowns be added? If so, what areas?

Maybe ignoring weather conditions in that area, or weathersight, or the ability to use a prints-type skill, or an increase in experience gained for the squad?

Versalean

Edit: Misread, apologies

CyndarinAscends

Needs a crown of Astral, then I'd bite.

Demartel

We brought up Astral when it was discussed. It was decided against.

Scanlan

Just have wearing it increase the rate of insanity, but get the same buffs....so crazy twice as fast but doubly powerful?

Falaeron

I'm glad that Astral isn't available tbh.

Ciaran

Make  a torc of mastery for each sphere, 200cr.

CyndarinAscends

Lol, why would you not want astral. These things just provide PvE buffs to areas where you don't need them.  

Think about it, it's a 750 credit artifact for buffs to a single area. This is a luxury PVE artifact only min/maxers who have something to get out of it will purchase. This artifact is for the "haves" with a bunch of credits already, and have extras to spend on luxury niche artifacts. The thing is, those people (like me) already have maxed out damage and high resistances. We can already bash the catacombs and the kephera hives without any real risk. We already have whips. If you're going to make something so niche that only those with 10k worth in credits and have run out of things to buy will consider it, the artifact has to actually give them something useful or that they don't already have

What does a crown really offer? Summon resistance in the waste facility?  When has that ever been useful.

It's a cool idea, but even with a bucket of extra credits, I wouldn't buy it because there's just no reason to, and I've bought really useless stuff like the scroll of laurels. 

Just my 2 cents.

Xenthos

Actually, with weighted buffs, the "haves" don't need them.  They provide no benefit to me at all really (already capped).  But I was told that this thing wasn't designed for people like me, so that's fine then.  If someone wants them, by all means!

There are more things coming mid-month, and I'm looking forward to seeing what they are.

CyndarinAscends

Right, that's my point. The people who can afford these don't actually need them. Who are these designed for if not the credit rich? 

Maybe if they were like 200 credits each I could see some people picking them up before some more essential arties, of which there are many that I would suggest before a crown.

Tremula

I'd guess someone like me, who isn't credit rich but has a decent supply every so often. If I have, say, the Crown of the Kepheran Hives, I can bash them much faster and easier than I already do, increasing my gold income and allowing me to reach the same tier as you all sooner. I'm going to guess this was for the midtiers.

Enyalida

CyndarinAscends said:

Lol, why would you not want astral. These things just provide PvE buffs to areas where you don't need them.  

Think about it, it's a 750 credit artifact for buffs to a single area. This is a luxury PVE artifact only min/maxers who have something to get out of it will purchase. This artifact is for the "haves" with a bunch of credits already, and have extras to spend on luxury niche artifacts. The thing is, those people (like me) already have maxed out damage and high resistances. We can already bash the catacombs and the kephera hives without any real risk. We already have whips. If you're going to make something so niche that only those with 10k worth in credits and have run out of things to buy will consider it, the artifact has to actually give them something useful or that they don't already have

What does a crown really offer? Summon resistance in the waste facility?  When has that ever been useful.

It's a cool idea, but even with a bucket of extra credits, I wouldn't buy it because there's just no reason to, and I've bought really useless stuff like the scroll of laurels. 

Just my 2 cents.

I wouldn't want astral because it's the only area set in which the benefits would be more than PvE. 

I don't really see the point of these either. They help you bash better, which increases your gold and essence output per unit of time.... but you'll take so long to generate enough gold to make back the credit cost, and how much essence do most players really need? I think the people this targets are those who want to see their gold numbers go up even if their overall worth goes down. Like, if you want that extra gold, put those 750 credits on the market and you'll make more gold than you'll need ever. 

Falaeron

Yeah, I wouldn't want these for astral because it would be useful for quite a bit of PvP when these things look to be designed for PvE/RP.

I know quite a few (more or less) non-coms who have said they're interested in buying these, if not now then at some point in the future. You can't really use the "you'll never make a return on the investment" argument because you could say that about pretty much all of the trade arties, the squad arties, things like the mask of esteemed beauty etc., yet people continue to buy them.

Just because you don't see the value in these things doesn't mean that the value isn't there for anyone else.

Enyalida

I can and do make that argument for all of those things, which is why I don't buy them. If an artifact's express purpose is (like the gloves of harvesting) just to make gold more quickly, it's pretty simple math to figure out how much time you need to put in to break even on your credit investment. That people buy them anyways indicates that they either haven't done said math, and/or they have excess resources driving down subjective credit value. Some of the trade artifacts (And trades themselves) add RP/mechanical value outside of the direct time-to-gold(-to-credits) value, and are therefore more sound purchases for someone interested in getting full value from their credits. 

What'd I'd place as the real value of these artifacts is the enhanced ability they give the purchaser to defend areas tied to their RP against other players, through increased combat statistics that both make little difference and are a net loss for PvE in terms of value unless you put in lots of time in that area. So, I'd expect that the Hives crowns will be the most popular, as more people care about the hives than any of the other areas. 

Falaeron

Falmiis said:

Just because you don't see the value in these things doesn't mean that the value isn't there for anyone else.

^^^^

CyndarinAscends

What? The value is actually quantifiable. Enyalida is definitely right about that. Sure, that's a difficult argument to make for some artifacts that just have PVP value, but that's not the case here. 

If a non com had 750 credits and was trying to make their bashing more efficient, I'd tell them to save up a little more and get a divinus whip and a level 2 crit rune. Way more bang for your buck.

If they were a lot cheaper, I'd probably agree that they could be valuable to non coms grinding stuff out. They're just so expensive to be so niche that you're just better off spending credits on other artifacts that do the same job, but better, and in every area.

(assuming smite isn't some kind of god mode bashing attack)

Falaeron

How can you quantify the enjoyment someone will get out of RPing being a master of an area?

Enyalida

You're right, it's priceless. The price should be increased to 5000 credits to even come close. 

Sakaki

Can't see myself getting one, I don't bash enough to make use of the resistance/stat buffs, plus I'm already 12 or 13/13 on all influence types except revolt/amnesty for ALL areas.

Synkarin

Look, if you don't think it's worth the 750 credits, don't buy it. Nobody is forcing you too, you aren't required to have it, and it won't really set you back if you don't have it. 

Other people -have- already bought it, so they obviously think it's worth it to them. 

Just as I thought it was worthwhile for myself to get gloves of harvesting. I don't regret it in the slightest. 

CyndarinAscends

The whole point of this thread was asking for feedback. So feedback was given.

Enyalida

It would be nice to have a similar kind of artifact for an area, but instead of having the buffs (of dubious use, as pointed out), they interacted with avenger somehow to make it easier to defend areas that don't enemy. They would have to cost less depending on the area, but I'm thinking something like a 'Diadem of the Defender' for say... the Hifarae hills, that allowed you to hit people through avenger protection on a limited basis there, to try and hedge them out of disrupting your quest/killing mobs you protect. It could also put a temporary defense aura on important npcs, or prevent any attacks on those npcs while you are in the room with them. 

The Crowns of Mastery sort of have that feel to them, as their utility powers only really work to try and defend the area. 

EDIT: On second thought, the idea about preventing attacks on named NPCs if you're present (or near) works pretty well, because it would then force the aggressor to attack (and declare) you to remove you. It's not a perfect idea, but hey. 

Lerad

Any change or tweak or exception or consideration or anything at all to do with Avenger needs to be game wide, not tied to artifacts. I'm not sure how tying Avenger exceptions to an artifact can even be contemplated.

The Crowns of Masteries are more of a RP artie than a PvE artie. As pointed out, the PvE "returns" are hardly worth the credit cost. As it is, however, the crowns are there for that feeling of being big and buff in the area, backed up by actual (though meaningless, if you want are already min-max'd etc) mechanical benefits, but more importantly, backed up by official, system-side messages (as opposed to delusional, self-subbed messages). 

It's not meant to give you an actual heads and shoulders, unbeatable advantage in the area. Chances are a midbie who CAN benefit from the crown will still get outbashed by an experienced basher, even if the basher is not fully min-max'd, crown or no crown. The midbie can tell the experienced basher, though, that they actually have the Kepheran Queens under their psychic control. Nyah nyah.

And that's worth quite a bit of credits. How much? Well, that's up to you to decide. I personally feel 750cr is a decent place to be. Could be cheaper, but I wouldn't suggest by much more. After all, it's not really that great if everyone and their mother has multiple crowns. At 750, the min-maxers feel it's not worth their money, so they won't buy too many (certainly not for the more "useless" areas), and at 750, the midbies and rpers who would actually want these in large numbers... well, they'll have to grind for super long to get it.

In short, think of it as a reward for grinding - not as a tool to help you grind. The very perspective of looking at these as investments that are supposed to yield an equivalent return in resources is backwards. These are meant to be pretty bells and whistles that you spend your hard-earned grind (or your actual paycheck, of course) on, in order to pimp out your character.

For Estarra's original question about how they can be improved - going further down the RP route is probably the best bet. My idea of each crown unlocking its own typecast, or ambient message, or other things along the lines of the area-wide message (which is pretty cool, btw) will solidify the artifact's actual purpose and give it some extra oomph. For example, give a decent typecast for a Tosha crown, and you can bet a certain dog-ambassador will be sorely tempted to grab one (though whether he will is entirely up to him) etc.

Ceros

If the idea is primarily centered around RP, then some could things could be done when interacting with the mobs there.

You could have the major NPCs (or even minor, I suppose would be fine) do an occasional custom emote whenever someone with a crown walks into the room. You could base this off of enemy status (IE, if enemied to kephera, they're afraid of you. If allied, they cheer for you - kind of thing).

You could also make a few rooms specifically dedicated as a "mastery rooms". A small place where only a crown wearer can find entry. Something simple for the sake of RP. I don't know what they would look like, but for 750 credits, some of those special things might push RPers to purchase.

Right now, that's a little much for me for what it actually does but I like the idea.

Synkarin

Yeah, giving people an artifact so they can bypass avenger, even on a limited basis, defeats the purpose of avenger in the first place.

Oh - on Prime you're protected -except for when someone pays enough to grief you-

Like Hifarae Hills, some Seren can buy the artifact and then just grief any Glom trying to do their epic quest with impunity. Talk about lame. 

For the mechanical benefits you're actually receiving in the area, 750 is a steal. 3/12 universal buff/resist/regen/influence, awareness/specs, fast teleport, smite, own channel to speak with people. To get those general mechanics all around, you're looking at 750 credits just for the full set of lvl 2 regen runes. Yes the difference is you have them all the time, but you have the lvl 2 regen runes + lvl 2 universal buff/resist runes + specs + influence runes + quickening ring etc. 

It's up to you to decide if that's worthwhile or not. To some people it is, to some people it's not, but you want to talk 'math' and 'numbers' - there are the numbers.

Ceros

Synkarin said:

Yeah, giving people an artifact so they can bypass avenger, even on a limited basis, defeats the purpose of avenger in the first place.

Oh - on Prime you're protected -except for when someone pays enough to grief you-

Like Hifarae Hills, some Seren can buy the artifact and then just grief any Glom trying to do their epic quest with impunity. Talk about lame. 

For the mechanical benefits you're actually receiving in the area, 750 is a steal. 3/12 universal buff/resist/regen/influence, awareness/specs, fast teleport, smite, own channel to speak with people. To get those general mechanics all around, you're looking at 750 credits just for the full set of lvl 2 regen runes. Yes the difference is you have them all the time, but you have the lvl 2 regen runes + lvl 2 universal buff/resist runes + specs + influence runes + quickening ring etc. 

It's up to you to decide if that's worthwhile or not. To some people it is, to some people it's not, but you want to talk 'math' and 'numbers' - there are the numbers.

I didn't think about the fast teleport, and awareness specs. Yeah, I guess that is a good price. I'd like to see just a little more RP incorporated into it, personally. Nothing big and obnoxious but something from the game side.

CyndarinAscends

Shrug city, man. I'm not going to argue about any given individual's perceived value of anything. Slap 1000 credit price tag on flaming hot garbage, I'm not going to tell you what to think about it. As I've said, this thread was specifically created to ask for feedback. My feedback is the price point does not match with what the artifact offers, and for those seeking bashing buffs, there are better options and as is, I would not recommend this artifact. 

I find the whole "just because you don't find value in it," argument to be distracting, nonsensical BS in a thread requesting feedback specifically about how to improve it. So I really don't understand why people are trying to dismiss people responding to the request. Stop policing, let people provide feedback as requested plzkthanks

Synkarin

Feedback on the feedback is being a turd

gotcha