Investment into skills is definitely a hefty portion of what keeps "newbies" out of combat I'd say. Assuming no purchasing of credits from any source and a starting lesson pool of 150 (can't remember the number for the life of me) you end up with 2535 lessons at demigod, which is approx. 1.5 skills at trans. Probably call it 1.25 what with the usual basic investments in the guild's secondary skill/other things that guilds have you train up.
After that, it's credits, which I don't mind. Let's assume our hypothetical player purchases 1000 credits, binds them, and turns them into lessons. This gives them another 8500 lessons to play with, which is just shy of another 5 skills at trans. This would give them their class skills, and then three skills of their choice at trans. Assume Combat, Discipline, and Resilience/Discernment (assuming they wish to be in combat).
At this point, what's folks opinions on the viability of each of the archetypes/guilds as it stands? Are six skills at trans enough to make you an actual threat as a combatant? Does it depend on class? Are there runes/artis that are absolutely still required at this point? Hate to sound this way, but I'd like to think that at a $300 buy in, you could at least compete and have a decent shot in a 1v1 fight against someone. This is assuming, of course, good curing/stancing/parrying/all those other little things that one needs.
Hello! I admit I haven't read this entire thread, just the first few posts, and then the last couple pages. That said, I thought I would chime in from a different perspective--I tried playing Lusternia, oh...gosh, 2 summers ago or so. I didn't even finish novicehood before I lost interest, and only picked up playing again maybe a week ago, so I'm fairly close to a newbie!
I have looooooots of experience with other MUDs, and with IREs in particular (on the order of 6-7 years by now) and I like to consider myself very proficient at scripting with my client. I've built multiple systems for half a dozen games over my MUD career, and have variously enjoyed or avoided PvP in nearly equal parts.
I've been working nearly non stop for the last several days to build a
system of my own, and while some of the mechanics in Lusternia are
novel, I didn't find any of them particularly daunting or
game-breakingly difficult to grasp. Now, this may well be a function of
how I build--it's entirely possible my 'outline' simply meshes well with
the fundamentals of Lusternia's mechanics. But either way, I've written
a functional system from the ground up in under a week. Granted, I'm
still gathering lines, but I feel that all the framework is in place to
handle all of the various mechanics now.
I've also been working hard at leveling up and slowly gaining skills in-game. I have been making pretty steady progress! We have a guild and commune credit sale that are helping a lot, and I'm nearly trans two skills. That feels like a much more daunting task, -but-, I feel that this impression stems mostly from the fact that I don't really have anything else to do to break the tedium. I keep being told I can't even go spar and test and experiment and start learning until I learn X Y Z Q J V K and W too.
So anyway! From the perspective of a 'new' player like me, reading about that age-old debate between investment vs. complexity, I'd like to highlight a point that is often overlooked and that I feel is really the fine line between the two.
In my strong opinion, there is a very bold line between being 'combat effective' and 'able to practice'. Again, in my opinion, the latter is the far more important of the two. Even if 'combat effective' requires 1298774836981 credits, and years upon years of time invested...if you can practice and work toward being proficient prior to that point, people tend to stay interested and engaged, and want to keep working at it and making progress.
To help illustrate this point, I'd point out other games--Midkemia Online vs Imperian, for those of you who are IRE fanatics. The 'entry barrier' for Midkemia is ridiculously low. You need a little over 120 lessons in one general skill, and most classes need a single trans skill after that, to have all the core tools to fight with. The other skills tend to offer things like easier ways to achieve the same goals in a fight, rather than alternatives that dramatically change the 'playstyle' of the class. On the other hand, Imperian tends to require one trans to learn your basic 'core' attacks, and then another skill that has your actual kill method, and then another that gives the edge (usually combos with your core attacks) to make your kill possible. While in both games, you can't really compete at the upper tiers until you tri-trans, I think the difference between the two methods is rather blatant.
So in short, in my opinion, the 'resolution' to the skills vs complexity debate is to lower the 'entry barrier' and raise the 'efficient' barrier, if that makes sense. Hopefully considerations like this will play into this major overhaul!
That's some of what I imagine we hope to accomplish. Lowering the entry barrier is absolutely crucial to this part of it. As far as practicing, you can. You just might have to be careful about the target.
One thing which concerns me in a bit is the combat skillset. I understand how important it is, and in that I actually have my issue with it. Warriors (and monks) will tear through anybody without any skill in combat. With it trans it's a lot harder for them to fight. I have to question a skillset whose primary purpose is to stand as basic defense against another class.
Basically, I feel that a basic set of stances and parry should be available by capable, at the latest.
But yeah, overall I echo the things said. Make those basic, essential to combat skills easier to attain, so that people don't NEED to trans this and that to fight. Just to get little benefits, or utility skills. The crucial stuff needs to be readily available.
You really -can't- practice without the essential skills right now, at least not as a Moondancer. Even if I practiced sticking aeon for example, I don't have toad curse--what would I do with it? Each class has certain skills that are necessary to -play-, never mind compete. Usually, prior to learning those skills, there are low-level gimmicks you can use (for example, going back to another game since I'm not familiar with Lusternia much--low-level deathknights and diabolists in Imperian can try to run down hunger and win that way against equally low-level people), but these have nothing to do with your 'real' kill, so you just -can't- get out and practice. Essentially, the whole class changes once you hit that magic threshold--and if it's too high, it's discouraging to the point where it's just not worth it a lot of times, for a lot of people.
You really -can't- practice without the essential skills right now, at least not as a Moondancer. Even if I practiced sticking aeon for example, I don't have toad curse--what would I do with it? Each class has certain skills that are necessary to -play-, never mind compete. Usually, prior to learning those skills, there are low-level gimmicks you can use (for example, going back to another game since I'm not familiar with Lusternia much--low-level deathknights and diabolists in Imperian can try to run down hunger and win that way against equally low-level people), but these have nothing to do with your 'real' kill, so you just -can't- get out and practice. Essentially, the whole class changes once you hit that magic threshold--and if it's too high, it's discouraging to the point where it's just not worth it a lot of times, for a lot of people.
There are viable ways to damage kill as a Moondancer, and it's not just by taking Astrology (though if you do take Astrology, you just need some Moon, some Wicca, and up to Meteor).
But that wasn't my point. My point was that practicing now is mostly a waste of time since even if I got good at damage killing or whatever else, I wouldn't be able to kill top-tier people with it, and would need to completely relearn and retrain myself once I learned things like toadcurse.
But that wasn't my point. My point was that practicing now is mostly a waste of time since even if I got good at damage killing or whatever else, I wouldn't be able to kill top-tier people with it, and would need to completely relearn and retrain myself once I learned things like toadcurse.
You're missing the point, here. Toadcurse isn't your only viable kill method. That said, I highly doubt you're going to be going 1v1 with any high-tier people anytime soon (not doubting your ability here, mind you - it'll just take a lot of experience first).
Also, the things you do in groups is incredibly different than the things you do in solo.
(p.s. - Yes, you can damage kill high-tier folks. It will just take lots of practice, cunning, and tracking of their priorities.)
It bothers me that lots of folk are saying they're excited for the overhaul because it will make it easier for new players to get into combat. While I admit that no one actually knows what the overhaul entails outside of the admin, unless there's some major common skill reshuffling (please, admin, please either lower the cost of things like tumble, focus mind, and focus spirit), breaking into combat will still require a pretty hefty investment. Honestly, I think the investment requirement for Lusternia is the biggest combat limiter, not the complexity.
I really hope the admin figure out a way to make the skills easier to obtain or not required at all.
I don't know about other, but my saying I am glad that it makes it easier is based on the fact that it was originally stated that it was one of the goals of the overhaul.
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EveriineWise Old Swordsbird / BrontaurIndianapolis, IN, USA
It also makes it easier on the coders who, at the moment, are dealing with legacy systems they didn't write and that cannot be modified easily (as I understand it).
Everiine is a man, and is very manly. This MAN before you is so manly you might as well just gender bend right now, cause he's the manliest man that you ever did see. His manly shape has spurned many women and girlyer men to boughs of fainting. He stands before you in a manly manerific typical man-like outfit which is covered in his manly motto: "I am a man!"
Daraius said: You gotta risk it for the biscuit.
Pony power all the way, yo. The more Brontaurs the better.
There are other reasons to learn multiple forms of combat right now other than just the immediate satisfaction of killing people.
Your coding skills will improve and your understanding of how to write systems will be instantly useful when the new format comes in.
You will have a transferable understanding of various afflictions, yes a lot are going, but not all, and you'll be able to put some relativity to now as to how things work.
Your general awareness in combat, tracking movement, knowing when you're in trouble and overall reflexes will raise through practice, practice, practice. Looking through some of my early logs I was utterly confused and had no clue wtf was going on half the time, I'd spend 30 seconds trying to hit targets either dead or long left the room for example.
Also locations aren't going to change, get use to combat in the battlefields that exist, especially bubbles for Domoths and revolts, they'll be the same post overhaul and it's key you know how to move around them quickly and get use to certain chokepoints.
The divine voice
of Avechna, the Avenger reverberates powerfully, "Congratulations,
Morkarion, you are the Bringer of Death indeed."
You see Estarra the Eternal shout, "Morkarion is no more! Mourn the mortal! But welcome True Ascendant Karlach, of the Realm of Death!
This was interesting. Reading this after coming back from 2 years of absence.
Here goes.
I read the first 2 pages of this forum, that seemed to be on topic, then it got super complex and everyone started arguing about how each class can do whatever. What that must mean, if everyone can jump on the argue bandwagon, is that the classes are obviously incredibly complicated. I would personally love a revamp to combat. I've been trying to come back and play for a while now. But I can't seem to do it. I come back every few weeks to 15 news updates about the new skills, items, or whatever. It's just gotten way out of hand. But I'm not telling you anything you don't know. Here's where my opinion comes in: I went away from Lusternia because it was too time consuming and too expensive to keep my character combat viable. Instead, I went to WoW... even though I don't enjoy it nearly as much. The reason it's easy to stay with WoW and there's such a large player-base is because it's "cheap" and "easy". I don't mind paying a couple hundred dollars over the course of several months to play a game and be decent at it. I have so much trouble getting back into Lusty strictly because I'm having a hard time rationalizing the fact that I'm going to have to invest at least another 500 dollars to become a top tier combatant. WoW = 50 dollars and 15 bucks a month. Lusty = 500 dollars and 50 bucks a month. I know that artifacts are a way to make money but there's got to be a way to keep lower level combatants interested in combat without being "meat shields" or paying a few hundred dollars to learn their skills.
I don't remember who said it but it has nothing to do with the in-game economy (in my post) but creating certain artifacts to be obtained by gold or other points. It might be useful to implement an honor system (or reputation?) used for PvP events (domoths, raids, revolts, arenas, wargames) that uses some kind of currency that can be cashed in for credits or even used as its own currency. This give pvper's, like me, something to work toward instead of just logging in, reading changelogs and waiting for someone to raid. It would also help lower the "combat 'interest' bar". As far as skills go, that's not really my department. I'm just thinking along the lines of how to revamp combat (outside of changing classes) in a way that helps new players learn it, encourages young players to continue playing, and keep old players constantly working toward a goal. Right now, at demigod, the only real "goal" I have to reach is "work more hours so I can buy more credits". I can guarantee I'd be on significantly more if I knew that playing 50 arena wins could help me earn a rune of tobacconist and it would be a lot easier to get younger players involved if they could use their [reputation?] to learn skills faster. I'm just throwing out ideas. There are a ton of things that can be done to revamp combat and really increase population. They're on the credit level, skill level, and complexity level.
Long story short, everything in this world is based around a reward system for doing well. Right now, Lusternia has no reward system for any sort of pvp whatsoever, and while I realize that's not entirely what the game is about, it's one of the reasons I love it.
Rewards in WoW: Do better, get better gear. Do better, be more competitive. Rewards in SWToR: Earn more EXP at low level pvp "warzones" = You can level your character up in "warzones" alone. Rewards in Lusternia for raiding Nil: Kill imps, empower supernals = nothing for me.
I've said a lot of things that probably don't make sense but I'm just coming off a 15 hour night shift at an emergency clinic. Cognitive thinking is my enemy right now.
Edit: Also, our combat system shouldn't be geared around coders.. Also, also, look at how even "talk" about a combat rework brought up some "old dead players".
I really wouldn't use WoW as a great example for PvP. Grinding for bigger numbers in an eternal arms race that's capped by the maximum potential of your gear, competitive at the more about certain classes and setups.
Gear is only fun to stomp over casual players who you're forging a greater divide from in random battlegrounds and forced world PvP scenarios.
I do think the xp (read 1-99 xp, not essence) should be raised for killing other players though in Lusternia, it'd be nice if they ever do put in org curios for PvP quests (raiding enemy planes to give turn ins) to be a way to generate them. Just remember to make said curio set something fun to collect not another HOLY SHIT THIS IS ESSENTIAL to further the divide of has and has not. General PvP should be its own reward though, there's enough organised PvP scenarios (flares/revolts/domoths/nodes) that reward participation and organisation. Sure there's a lack of personal reward, but at the same time this is still a business. If WoW was F2P you can be damned sure armour and weapons would be up for sale.
The divine voice
of Avechna, the Avenger reverberates powerfully, "Congratulations,
Morkarion, you are the Bringer of Death indeed."
You see Estarra the Eternal shout, "Morkarion is no more! Mourn the mortal! But welcome True Ascendant Karlach, of the Realm of Death!
1
Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
WoW doesn't even attempt to make the game balanced until you hit max level with premier gear. Using it as an example to argue rewards isn't going to get you far.
Alright.. Maybe I should have clarified in case I didn't say it enough.. I'm really just throwing out ideas. I wish you replied to the post with some merit instead of saying that WoW doesn't have any validity. What I was saying is that in any world, there's always the idea of rewards for forward progression. Look at any successful iPhone app, any successful MMO, any successful game franchise. Please don't argue against the example I'm using to make a point. Please just tell me whether or not the point has validity.
Besides, in regards to this:
"WoW doesn't even attempt to make the game balanced until you hit max level with premier gear. Using it as an example to argue rewards isn't going to get you far."
It could pretty well be argued that combat isn't balanced unless you're a demigod with trans'd skills.
What I am saying - right now, in world and arena pvp have no real goal or any tangible reward for defense and raiding. It's hard to muster up people for defense when they don't really have anything to fight for except because they love to RP that they love their city. It's possible that there could be a system out there that IRE could design that would reward players for being present in combat for defense and in raids. Like I mentioned earlier a Celestian trainer says to you "Oh, I see that you have become a hero of Celest. Let me teach you up to *this many lessons." (idk, just an example)
Secondly, in regards to this being a business. I can almost guarantee that 200 people buying 200 dollars worth of merchandise is a lot more money than 30 people buying 500 dollars worth of merchandise. Which all goes back to the questions - How get newer players to come in? How do you get them to stick? How do you keep older players happy? The answer can't be "moarcreditsismoarbetter".
I thought this was a discussion about suggestions and ideas combat overhaul not "everyone talk about what they don't like about everything" forum.. I'm just trying to be helpful. I'm sorry if my opinion is wrong..
I imagine you may have hit some nerves citing another game as a grounds for comparison. I do not like WoW either, and agree it is not the best example. Lusternia is not 50 dollars a month, no idea where that came from.
There is another thread started for ideas/suggestions, though here should also be a suitable place. Your concern is a PvP currency, which is fine, though if this leads to griefing it will cause issues.
I had hoped ( and still do) the goal of the overhaul is to increase those in combat, though the current system appears to be........... I will avoid commenting.
Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
Pro tip: If you ware "throwing out ideas" and one of your ideas is World of Warcrafts system of PVP rewards, people are going to reject your suggestions based on your example. You're using an example to support you idea. The logical conclusion is you wish to model it after your example. This is why it's called an example. Plus then you went on to further compare Lusternia to WoW in regards to balance.
Lusternia attempts to balance all aspects of PVP. You actually can compete at level 80 with a handful of trans skills, and be successful. It's difficult but player skill is much more of a factor here than WoW, where your success is 2% player skill and 98% what equipment you farmed. There are plenty of people who will disagree, but as I did it for many many years, I know it to be a simple, factual truth.
Which brings us to why PVP currency is bad. It will 1) amplify the power creep that already exists, as the admin will have to add more and more farmable bonuses to keep the PVPers interested and engaged. 2) Those that have will have more, those that don't have will be without. This is just the general rule of PVP perks. Those who can do well, do well without the perks. The perks just make the gap impossibly wide.
Unless the rewards are benign (read: no benefit to PVP), rewards just cause problems. If they are benign, no one really pursues them. Certainly not the avid PKers.
Personally, I am outright opposed to the mainstream MMO market of endless farming for items and bonuses. It works great for the games that do it, but one of the reasons people play here and not there is that there is no endless farming for items and bonuses here. You don't have to kill 100 super mobs to get the splendour robes you wanted so you can then go kill another 100 even bigger mobs to get the special hat you need to kill 100..so on and so on. Trying to model this game after the mainstream MMO market will make the game more "successful." It will also kill the spirit and intent of the game outright.
1
Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
THE SOLUTION is found in conflict mechanics that are engaging yet not discouraging. Which sounds far easier to find than it is. People love the conflict mechanics in the game in general
Like I said before, I'm not sure what the solution is but I definitely didn't say it was gear. Combat mechanics is a significant problem but I'm also talking about that point Estarra made "lower the bar for entry into combat. This could be numerous things. The thing I'm talking about is helping low level players invest more into combat without pumping in credits. As an example, you could earn reputation or this currency in productive pvp circumstances. What that means - earning it in domoths, revolts, assisting/killing an enemy in your territory, or ranked wargames/arenas (i don't remember much about those). The reward doesn't have to be great so that it's the end-all-be-all of combat but if it's possible to earn 5 credits every week or two, that might be considered worth it for young players to get involved in defense, domoths, and revolts. There could be a credit cap of 12 credits per IG year (1 per day) which would be equivalent to the events that the admins throw where you get 1 bound credit every time you log in. When I was a young player, I wasn't sure if I wanted to invest in Lusternia, but every opportunity there was available earn credits, I took it, no matter how small. A combat reward system that rewards players for being involved (not just making kills) in pvp sanction events (not griefing) could be beneficial to the game. I could explain the way I could think it would work. The reward system doesn't have to be huge, or extravagant, but noticeable to lower level players.
@Malarious, the 50 dollars per month is what I found myself spending. I wasn't complaining about the number, but those numbers were my personal spending.
Don't know how old the program is but for 25 a month you can have an iron elite membership, 5 lessons everyday you log in per character, 100 credits (which increases by 5 for each successive month), 25 dingbats, and higher experience gain.
We could tone down costs to enter combat, but half of that is REMOVING skills, rather than lowering them. There are just plain too many skills right now needed for that, but the way the overhaul is currently done does not lend itself to the easiest transition. We will see though, it is still possible.
0
Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
The number of skills is fine. Achaea has just as many and they aren't suffering. Jacking with things that aren't broken distracts from the real problem and the real solution.
Malarious is right. If you just implement a PVP currency system into the current combat system, it won't simplify combat and make it more accessible. Newbies will see the rewards, start drooling, jump in and get slaughtered because they don't know right from left. And then leave feeling dejected... which is the same thing that happens to newbies right now. Sure, one of the major barriers of entry to combat is the sheer amount of lessons you need to spend to get certain abilities. An argument for lowering that cost so that newbies can join in is great, however, it should not be implemented as a PvP currency, since that only creates a spiral of despair where newbies who don't have skills to PvP can't win in PvP so can't get the new currency/rewards to get the skills they need to PvP to get the currency... etc
Making things like revolts give personal benefits to everyone who participated even if they didn't land kills would be a bad idea as well - the idea of the positive feedback loop causing a lopsided conflict scene is one that is not (yet) proven with empirical evidence, but which is logical, and also fairly widely agreed as an actual phenomenon in the game. We don't want to create a situation where it is simply more advantageous in a mechanical sense for newbies to join the "winning" org, and thereby depriving the struggling orgs of even their share of new people.
The theory behind the overhaul is to fix the mechanical complexity of the combat scene, where you need to keep track of 101 different vectors, values and abilities in addition to the usual tactical and strategical knowledge and experience needed to pull off combat objectives. We're not yet close to seeing how the new system will come out (with only 1 archetype overhauled so far). PvP currency systems from MMOs aren't going to achieve this objective of simplifying combat.
I do agree with you, Lerad and Malarious. The main problem right now with the combat system is the amount of skills and probably the amount of afflictions as well. I'm merely throwing into the pot a whole new suggestion that could have potential. And like I said before, I think the trick is to do a currency system that's relatively small but still large enough to notice. To avoid creating a situation where it's more advantageous to join a winning org, you make the points weighted, or you reward players for fighting in arena battles. Simple things like that. If you used a system that yielded a maximum of 1 credit per day, you're making a novice feel like they're accomplishing something.
I do agree though that you're both correct. The problem is not being effective without investing a bit of money into your skills. So the solution is to either think of a way to lower amount of money needed to be effective, OR increase the rate at which you can climb that skill ladder.
Just a side note - this is how the pvp "currency" thing looks in my head right now. 100 reputation points can be traded in each weave for 1 credit. Up to 12 credits per IG year. 20 reputation points earned by being in a city when a revolt ends. 5 reputation points are earned for each death that occurs (even allies) in the room you're in. 1 reputation point is earned for each minute spent in allied or contested territory (I.E. sitting on Nil while Celestians attack, or being a watcher in a revolt) while an enemy is in that territory. 5 reputation points are earned by assisting in a kill while defending in a raid, revolt, or domoth. 10 reputation points are earned by landing the killing blow while defending in a raid, revolt or domoth. 10 reputation points are earned by defeating someone equal to or within 5 levels of you in any 1v1. 5 reputation points are earned by participating in an arena event. You could also have everything weighted - The following example doesn't work well but is just an example of how to weigh rewards to prevent moving to the "winning side": rewards = reward * (allies/enemies)
A currency system that does reward skill, but for the most part, rewards participation and visibility. The rewards aren't large enough to be spammed or taken advantage of but to the 18 year old college student who has no money, are a god-send. Either way, it's something interesting to think about. It doesn't break IRE's bank and it rewards participation more than sheer might.
But yeah: TLDR summary. Rewards based on participation rather than skill, small rewards that aren't enough to cause problems but still enough to cause participation. All-in-all though, I think Lerad and Malarious are both correct. Skill and affliction rework are the most necessary to lower the bar for participation. This would be an interesting time, however, to implement something like this.
"'Cause the fighting don't stop till I walk in." -Synkarin's Lament.
2
Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
Well after playing other IREs, I think the over simplification of combat is a misdirection from the real issues of conflict. The "barrier" isn't any lower there than it is here. Achaea's is actually higher to be at the top tier (stat arties are so bonkers). I have no defensive arties, and no single Lusternian can damage bomb me to death 1v1 (without healing). This is not true in Achaea, where a heavily artied monk/whatever can damage bomb a non artied level 100 with relative ease, and there are a lot of artied to the teeth high tiers out there doing just that. So I would also argue that we don't have balance disparity between regular joe pker and min/max Jane. We have to ask the question "why is Achaea's PK playerbase still largely active and engaged?" The answer is not, "because it's cheaper," or "they give out free shit to the newbies just for playing." I'll go out on a limb and state that their solution is a simple one: RAIDING IS ENCOURAGED AND ENGAGING. That game, all by itself, defeats the myth that lots of raiding will crush the playerbase. This argument can be supported by our own history and pk population. If you remove avenues for people to fight one another, it doesn't matter how much you change the skills and the costs.
I know direct comparisons to Achaea are generally frowned at, but it's a highly successful MUD and also from IRE. We can take some clues from them.
Now, I will say I think some mechanics could be simplified. Namely wounding needs to go and momentum and kata need to be put down. There are definitely aspects that are more complicated than I think they need to be. But no matter how cheap and simple you make it, you aren't going to retain a pk playerbase if you don't make the conflict mechanics engaging. In fact, simplifying it too far will dissuade the committed pk players because there is no challenge, and super simple mechanics can lower the ceiling to a point where skill is less of an influence than equipment/arties/class/etc.
At any rate, once you hit level 80, you can buy a credit a day without much trouble. Once demigod, you can get several a day. So I don't see what problem this suggested mechanic is solving.
So uh, I am not sure if this is the spot to suggest an idea I've been thinking of for the combat overhaul... but here goes!
I think something that makes combat difficult to balance (and I would imagine it would equally be an issue for the overhaul) is grouping. The modern state of conflict-system and raid combat generally revolves around 2 huge stacks of players sitting in rooms next to each other, trying to break up or beckon the other side until one has an advantage, and then they go in and basically just pile on afflictions and damage on a single target from each side. While arena combat is a very different story, usually 1v1, 2v2, or 3v3, the actual moves used matter more, and the combinations of moves, since you usually can't just damage someone down. In other words, these are two very different games.
The trouble with any combat system is that it needs to be balanced for these two games, instead of being able to focus on one, and that is a difficult thing to do. I think it may be possible to make a system that limits the amount of people fighting each other in a room. When a conflict starts, each person must declare which city's banner they will fight under, and choose a leader for that banner similar to a squad. Points will be gained for the banner from kills and influences in the case of villages, and in the case of aetherbubbles, points would be gained from kills, bombardments, and constructs. The banner who reaches a certain amount of points first, or who have the most points after an allotted time would win.
With this banner system, it would be possible to limit the amount of combatants actually allowed to fight in each room to the first 3 to enter from each banner. If 4 or more people from the same banner are in the same room, everyone who entered after the first 3 would be peaced in that room. If one of the first 3 leave the room, then the next in line takes their place. If you have recently attacked someone, or been attacked, you would have an aggression timer that allows you to attack them and only them above the usual limit of 3 per room, so that you can chase them down should they escape. If you attack someone else or some amount of time passes, then you will lose your aggression permit on the person who escaped.
Ideally, this would encourage people to organise under whichever banner they wish to support, and then only 3 people from each side would be able to fight in the room, making blobbing not so easy to do. I do realise that it would be possible to have each person under their own city's banner would allow up to 18 active combatants in a room at a time (likely 9v9), but then the points would be divided, so it would have a drawback also. This would still have a hard limit of 9 people from each side in a room though, instead of 20.
I am not really sure if it would work out, but I do think the concept is worth thinking about at least, the basic idea being that we could make combat more balance-able by limiting the amount of people actively fighting each other in a given space. I hope that makes sense!
Limiting players by room is a bad idea, it means that if newbie x enters the fight before me under the Seren bannner, I'm peaced and ascendant-artifacted players 1, 2, and 3 will wail on my team while I have to stand by with my hands tied. In the end, anyone new would be discouraged from participating so that the most experienced and polished fighters can continually occupy the fighting slots. Similarly, certain classes that are powerful in burst and small combat will pull even further ahead of less synergistic classes.
There are ideas earlier in the thread for trying to balance group fights without making 1v1 impossible. My favorite (and the most plotted out, I believe) is making more of the affliction mechanics work like warrior wounding, where you have to build up points towards affs. That way, you can apply a mechanic exactly like the already existing warrior mechanic wherein after a certain number of people hit the same guy within a set period, everyone's affliction point strengths are nerfed, to discourage grouping up and focus firing people down one at a time.
EDIT: To clarify, if it's a 6v6 situation, you'd want to have two people on your side target one fellow, another two target a second fellow, and the last group do the same with a third guy (or split it more). If you do that, each target receives 200% damage and afflictions (full attacks from two opponents). However, if a third person joins in clumping, perhaps now that target only receives 250% offense total from those three. Each person is only hitting at about 80% of their full strength! As more people pile on, it becomes more and more inefficient until each new opponent isn't adding any net offense, the side that manages dividing their resources better will be killing their targets more efficiently and quickly. However, in 1v1, none of this would come into effect, so we could balance as normal!
Clearly, that wouldn't work in our current binary-affliction setup, or in the current overhaul setup - without some minor modifications that have been earlier outlined, this kind of sliding-scale combat could easily be worked in and modified to our little heart's content.
Comments
I have looooooots of experience with other MUDs, and with IREs in particular (on the order of 6-7 years by now) and I like to consider myself very proficient at scripting with my client. I've built multiple systems for half a dozen games over my MUD career, and have variously enjoyed or avoided PvP in nearly equal parts.
I've been working nearly non stop for the last several days to build a system of my own, and while some of the mechanics in Lusternia are novel, I didn't find any of them particularly daunting or game-breakingly difficult to grasp. Now, this may well be a function of how I build--it's entirely possible my 'outline' simply meshes well with the fundamentals of Lusternia's mechanics. But either way, I've written a functional system from the ground up in under a week. Granted, I'm still gathering lines, but I feel that all the framework is in place to handle all of the various mechanics now.
I've also been working hard at leveling up and slowly gaining skills in-game. I have been making pretty steady progress! We have a guild and commune credit sale that are helping a lot, and I'm nearly trans two skills. That feels like a much more daunting task, -but-, I feel that this impression stems mostly from the fact that I don't really have anything else to do to break the tedium. I keep being told I can't even go spar and test and experiment and start learning until I learn X Y Z Q J V K and W too.
So anyway! From the perspective of a 'new' player like me, reading about that age-old debate between investment vs. complexity, I'd like to highlight a point that is often overlooked and that I feel is really the fine line between the two.
In my strong opinion, there is a very bold line between being 'combat effective' and 'able to practice'. Again, in my opinion, the latter is the far more important of the two. Even if 'combat effective' requires 1298774836981 credits, and years upon years of time invested...if you can practice and work toward being proficient prior to that point, people tend to stay interested and engaged, and want to keep working at it and making progress.
To help illustrate this point, I'd point out other games--Midkemia Online vs Imperian, for those of you who are IRE fanatics. The 'entry barrier' for Midkemia is ridiculously low. You need a little over 120 lessons in one general skill, and most classes need a single trans skill after that, to have all the core tools to fight with. The other skills tend to offer things like easier ways to achieve the same goals in a fight, rather than alternatives that dramatically change the 'playstyle' of the class. On the other hand, Imperian tends to require one trans to learn your basic 'core' attacks, and then another skill that has your actual kill method, and then another that gives the edge (usually combos with your core attacks) to make your kill possible. While in both games, you can't really compete at the upper tiers until you tri-trans, I think the difference between the two methods is rather blatant.
So in short, in my opinion, the 'resolution' to the skills vs complexity debate is to lower the 'entry barrier' and raise the 'efficient' barrier, if that makes sense. Hopefully considerations like this will play into this major overhaul!
edit to fix a typo!
Your coding skills will improve and your understanding of how to write systems will be instantly useful when the new format comes in.
You will have a transferable understanding of various afflictions, yes a lot are going, but not all, and you'll be able to put some relativity to now as to how things work.
Your general awareness in combat, tracking movement, knowing when you're in trouble and overall reflexes will raise through practice, practice, practice. Looking through some of my early logs I was utterly confused and had no clue wtf was going on half the time, I'd spend 30 seconds trying to hit targets either dead or long left the room for example.
Also locations aren't going to change, get use to combat in the battlefields that exist, especially bubbles for Domoths and revolts, they'll be the same post overhaul and it's key you know how to move around them quickly and get use to certain chokepoints.
The divine voice of Avechna, the Avenger reverberates powerfully, "Congratulations, Morkarion, you are the Bringer of Death indeed."
You see Estarra the Eternal shout, "Morkarion is no more! Mourn the mortal! But welcome True Ascendant Karlach, of the Realm of Death!
Here goes.
I read the first 2 pages of this forum, that seemed to be on topic, then it got super complex and everyone started arguing about how each class can do whatever. What that must mean, if everyone can jump on the argue bandwagon, is that the classes are obviously incredibly complicated. I would personally love a revamp to combat. I've been trying to come back and play for a while now. But I can't seem to do it. I come back every few weeks to 15 news updates about the new skills, items, or whatever. It's just gotten way out of hand. But I'm not telling you anything you don't know. Here's where my opinion comes in:
I went away from Lusternia because it was too time consuming and too expensive to keep my character combat viable. Instead, I went to WoW... even though I don't enjoy it nearly as much. The reason it's easy to stay with WoW and there's such a large player-base is because it's "cheap" and "easy". I don't mind paying a couple hundred dollars over the course of several months to play a game and be decent at it. I have so much trouble getting back into Lusty strictly because I'm having a hard time rationalizing the fact that I'm going to have to invest at least another 500 dollars to become a top tier combatant. WoW = 50 dollars and 15 bucks a month. Lusty = 500 dollars and 50 bucks a month. I know that artifacts are a way to make money but there's got to be a way to keep lower level combatants interested in combat without being "meat shields" or paying a few hundred dollars to learn their skills.
I don't remember who said it but it has nothing to do with the in-game economy (in my post) but creating certain artifacts to be obtained by gold or other points. It might be useful to implement an honor system (or reputation?) used for PvP events (domoths, raids, revolts, arenas, wargames) that uses some kind of currency that can be cashed in for credits or even used as its own currency. This give pvper's, like me, something to work toward instead of just logging in, reading changelogs and waiting for someone to raid. It would also help lower the "combat 'interest' bar". As far as skills go, that's not really my department. I'm just thinking along the lines of how to revamp combat (outside of changing classes) in a way that helps new players learn it, encourages young players to continue playing, and keep old players constantly working toward a goal. Right now, at demigod, the only real "goal" I have to reach is "work more hours so I can buy more credits". I can guarantee I'd be on significantly more if I knew that playing 50 arena wins could help me earn a rune of tobacconist and it would be a lot easier to get younger players involved if they could use their [reputation?] to learn skills faster. I'm just throwing out ideas. There are a ton of things that can be done to revamp combat and really increase population. They're on the credit level, skill level, and complexity level.
Long story short, everything in this world is based around a reward system for doing well. Right now, Lusternia has no reward system for any sort of pvp whatsoever, and while I realize that's not entirely what the game is about, it's one of the reasons I love it.
Rewards in WoW: Do better, get better gear. Do better, be more competitive.
Rewards in SWToR: Earn more EXP at low level pvp "warzones" = You can level your character up in "warzones" alone.
Rewards in Lusternia for raiding Nil: Kill imps, empower supernals = nothing for me.
I've said a lot of things that probably don't make sense but I'm just coming off a 15 hour night shift at an emergency clinic. Cognitive thinking is my enemy right now.
Edit: Also, our combat system shouldn't be geared around coders..
Also, also, look at how even "talk" about a combat rework brought up some "old dead players".
Gear is only fun to stomp over casual players who you're forging a greater divide from in random battlegrounds and forced world PvP scenarios.
I do think the xp (read 1-99 xp, not essence) should be raised for killing other players though in Lusternia, it'd be nice if they ever do put in org curios for PvP quests (raiding enemy planes to give turn ins) to be a way to generate them. Just remember to make said curio set something fun to collect not another HOLY SHIT THIS IS ESSENTIAL to further the divide of has and has not. General PvP should be its own reward though, there's enough organised PvP scenarios (flares/revolts/domoths/nodes) that reward participation and organisation. Sure there's a lack of personal reward, but at the same time this is still a business. If WoW was F2P you can be damned sure armour and weapons would be up for sale.
The divine voice of Avechna, the Avenger reverberates powerfully, "Congratulations, Morkarion, you are the Bringer of Death indeed."
You see Estarra the Eternal shout, "Morkarion is no more! Mourn the mortal! But welcome True Ascendant Karlach, of the Realm of Death!
Besides, in regards to this:
"WoW doesn't even attempt to make the game balanced until you hit max level with premier gear. Using it as an example to argue rewards isn't going to get you far."
It could pretty well be argued that combat isn't balanced unless you're a demigod with trans'd skills.
What I am saying - right now, in world and arena pvp have no real goal or any tangible reward for defense and raiding. It's hard to muster up people for defense when they don't really have anything to fight for except because they love to RP that they love their city. It's possible that there could be a system out there that IRE could design that would reward players for being present in combat for defense and in raids. Like I mentioned earlier a Celestian trainer says to you "Oh, I see that you have become a hero of Celest. Let me teach you up to *this many lessons." (idk, just an example)
Secondly, in regards to this being a business. I can almost guarantee that 200 people buying 200 dollars worth of merchandise is a lot more money than 30 people buying 500 dollars worth of merchandise. Which all goes back to the questions - How get newer players to come in? How do you get them to stick? How do you keep older players happy? The answer can't be "moarcreditsismoarbetter".
I thought this was a discussion about suggestions and ideas combat overhaul not "everyone talk about what they don't like about everything" forum.. I'm just trying to be helpful. I'm sorry if my opinion is wrong..
@Malarious, the 50 dollars per month is what I found myself spending. I wasn't complaining about the number, but those numbers were my personal spending.
Making things like revolts give personal benefits to everyone who participated even if they didn't land kills would be a bad idea as well - the idea of the positive feedback loop causing a lopsided conflict scene is one that is not (yet) proven with empirical evidence, but which is logical, and also fairly widely agreed as an actual phenomenon in the game. We don't want to create a situation where it is simply more advantageous in a mechanical sense for newbies to join the "winning" org, and thereby depriving the struggling orgs of even their share of new people.
The theory behind the overhaul is to fix the mechanical complexity of the combat scene, where you need to keep track of 101 different vectors, values and abilities in addition to the usual tactical and strategical knowledge and experience needed to pull off combat objectives. We're not yet close to seeing how the new system will come out (with only 1 archetype overhauled so far). PvP currency systems from MMOs aren't going to achieve this objective of simplifying combat.
I do agree though that you're both correct. The problem is not being effective without investing a bit of money into your skills. So the solution is to either think of a way to lower amount of money needed to be effective, OR increase the rate at which you can climb that skill ladder.
Just a side note - this is how the pvp "currency" thing looks in my head right now.
100 reputation points can be traded in each weave for 1 credit. Up to 12 credits per IG year.
20 reputation points earned by being in a city when a revolt ends.
5 reputation points are earned for each death that occurs (even allies) in the room you're in.
1 reputation point is earned for each minute spent in allied or contested territory (I.E. sitting on Nil while Celestians attack, or being a watcher in a revolt) while an enemy is in that territory.
5 reputation points are earned by assisting in a kill while defending in a raid, revolt, or domoth.
10 reputation points are earned by landing the killing blow while defending in a raid, revolt or domoth.
10 reputation points are earned by defeating someone equal to or within 5 levels of you in any 1v1.
5 reputation points are earned by participating in an arena event.
You could also have everything weighted - The following example doesn't work well but is just an example of how to weigh rewards to prevent moving to the "winning side": rewards = reward * (allies/enemies)
A currency system that does reward skill, but for the most part, rewards participation and visibility. The rewards aren't large enough to be spammed or taken advantage of but to the 18 year old college student who has no money, are a god-send. Either way, it's something interesting to think about. It doesn't break IRE's bank and it rewards participation more than sheer might.
But yeah: TLDR summary. Rewards based on participation rather than skill, small rewards that aren't enough to cause problems but still enough to cause participation. All-in-all though, I think Lerad and Malarious are both correct. Skill and affliction rework are the most necessary to lower the bar for participation. This would be an interesting time, however, to implement something like this.
There are ideas earlier in the thread for trying to balance group fights without making 1v1 impossible. My favorite (and the most plotted out, I believe) is making more of the affliction mechanics work like warrior wounding, where you have to build up points towards affs. That way, you can apply a mechanic exactly like the already existing warrior mechanic wherein after a certain number of people hit the same guy within a set period, everyone's affliction point strengths are nerfed, to discourage grouping up and focus firing people down one at a time.
Clearly, that wouldn't work in our current binary-affliction setup, or in the current overhaul setup - without some minor modifications that have been earlier outlined, this kind of sliding-scale combat could easily be worked in and modified to our little heart's content.