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Team: Strawberry Pancakes
Main: shawn - mccall
Level: 2411
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Post Cost Of Core Skills
Not good. I decided to poke around on my level 0 alt and it was hell. 2 levels = 2 skill levels. That means that an F2P is useless. Not to a p2p, but in general, making the game far less attractive. It also makes characters almost completely unable to fight another AI at their level without spamming SSSs like it's going out of style(spamming said SSSs was the only way I could level at all).

I don't see it as a minor slowdown to character progression more like a disincentive to try and progress at all. Player progression only turns exponential once you hit around level 200. The system planned to replace the current one indiscriminately targets all progression be it gradual or exponential. Which curb stomps anyone who isn't already in a high end setup.

I see what you're trying to do with it, but I feel the problem would be better remedied by vastly increased commod, item, and gear requirements per level. As it is on live training is too easy not because of the speed with which you level, but because of the ease with which skills are acquired.

Let's use Olympus as an example. I have to get 5 kills on top end ubers to get a single t21 skill, we have challenge and supply(of shards) stopping someone from grabbing all the skills in a day. We have slowed down progression without harming anyone, which is ideal.

Now the current system in the nexus. Leveling is now based on the law of diminishing returns, which really kills motivation and morale. This causes people to get apathetic toward the game and it's exponentially increasing annoyance for skills.

Now what I think should be done to resolve this is set costs as they are on live with labor intensive hoops people have to jump through to get said skills. Use things that are available at that level, but somewhat difficult to obtain. In the nexus this could be hard to find commods like space oats.


In example; Level 1 of piloting in the nexus could have a mission agent in need of whiskey ask for you to bring him X space whiskey and in return he teaches you to operate some more complicated vessels(while he's drunk off the whiskey you gave him).

Make these missions appear in certain bases and use an easily written up model to essentially fill in the blanks on mission texts then slap them in bases offering varying things. So like you might train Piloting 1 in cadet academy, but the piloting 2 mission would appear at janitor's outpost in the nexus asking for nuclear waste, then you would have to bring space oats to the volcoms for level 3. It would add a lot more depth to exploration as you would have to seek out "teachers" for each respective skill, then fulfill a task in return for their services.


Once you got into like tech 8+ skills you could have them start asking for exponentially more commods, or for you to hunt down certain rare items and gear for them, or even have escort missions where they will train you in the next level of a skill in return for safe passage to another base.

Another added bonus to this would be more missions to occupy someone's time and keep them playing and having fun longer as the missions provide a player with direction, and something to do when bored.



I mean hell I can't program or do content because I don't know how, but would obligingly write out all the mission text and requirements for you to approve and implement.

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thats because most graphic designers are squares :mrgreen:

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Last edited by shawn_mccall on Sun Aug 28, 2011 1:39 am, edited 1 time in total.

Sun Aug 28, 2011 1:07 am
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Team: Strawberry Pancakes
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Level: 2411
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
TL:DR; It allows for progression to advance according to the amount of skill a player has or how much they are willing to grind to get better ingame, instead of the power level fest it is now and will even more be with the intended replacement plan.

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andezrhode wrote:
goett wrote:
All oly ships look way to geometrically conservative for my tastes.

thats because most graphic designers are squares :mrgreen:

goett wrote:
Fired bullets taste like candy.


Sun Aug 28, 2011 1:13 am
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
/me is clapping :D

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Sun Aug 28, 2011 10:49 am
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
Maybe something you're not noticing is all the missions in Nexus now that give a full level of XP as a reward in addition to the XP you got from killing stuff.

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Sun Aug 28, 2011 2:27 pm
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
JeffL wrote:
Maybe something you're not noticing is all the missions in Nexus now that give a full level of XP as a reward in addition to the XP you got from killing stuff.



Ah, I was just killing stuff, but what happens when players run out of missions? To level effectively essentially every mission ingame needs to offer 1 or more levels which would actually make power leveling less expensive and, arguably, faster.

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andezrhode wrote:
goett wrote:
All oly ships look way to geometrically conservative for my tastes.

thats because most graphic designers are squares :mrgreen:

goett wrote:
Fired bullets taste like candy.


Sun Aug 28, 2011 2:34 pm
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
The Nexus is very anti-farm. Almost every AI spawner in there has a fractional XP modifier between 0.1 and 0.25. If you're trying to grind level in there, it's going to go extremely slow :P

Post Nexus we're looking at XP rewards for most missions and we're going to increase them a lot. Just for example, if you spend 10 minutes looking for Glass Matrix for a Paxian exploration mission -- it better be worth a level or two of XP.

Calypso

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Sun Aug 28, 2011 3:50 pm
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
Really need a bit in a tutorial or early mission that states that early levels are best had by doing missions then.

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Sun Aug 28, 2011 4:39 pm
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Team: Olympus
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
Do you think new players are going to try to grind though? I'm asking because there is ALWAYS a mission for you while you're in the Nexus (from level 0 to level 20, literally impossible to NOT have one). I know every time I've started a new MMO, the last thing I did was try to grind levels if at all possible. The grind is very boring compared to questing.

The only players I really see trying to grind their way out of the content are returning players. So should I really tell players "do missions, don't try to grind"?

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Some people want to love their god. Others want to "love" their god. Mmmmm.... adum.....
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Sun Aug 28, 2011 7:19 pm
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
Guess I am used to the grind after a years of SS. Thinking about it now in allot of mmos its almost impossible to grind at low lvls, if at all. So probably not as counter intuitive as my SS warped mind thinks.

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Sun Aug 28, 2011 9:34 pm
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
WoW = Grind fest in the beginning.

Either way though, this would be a greatly improved way to acquire certain skills.

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Neba wrote:
BLACK PEOPLE DON'T GET RICE

andezrhode wrote:
goett wrote:
All oly ships look way to geometrically conservative for my tastes.

thats because most graphic designers are squares :mrgreen:

goett wrote:
Fired bullets taste like candy.


Sun Aug 28, 2011 9:40 pm
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
Calypso wrote:
So should I really tell players "do missions, don't try to grind"?


Yes, BM. It'd help a lot for any player that potentially came from WoW or games with lots of grind in the beginning.

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Sun Aug 28, 2011 10:29 pm
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
Where is this 'lots of grind in WoW' coming from. I've played through all the starter experiences on both Horde and Alliance and all of them are extremely quest based -- yes you can grind if you want to, but it's inefficient. And after the quest restructuring with the latest expansion the entire game can be played from 0-85 with absolutely 0 grinding.

Calypso

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Some people want to love their god. Others want to "love" their god. Mmmmm.... adum.....
<< OMG It's my head in a jar!!!


Mon Aug 29, 2011 9:06 am
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
It depends on the person really. There are always people that play the game for the lore, then there are people that play for the end-game experience only.

Traditionally, it's faster but less efficient to grind through mid-level to high-level content than waste time with missions etc. that give rewards that will just be replaced end-game. For most games anyways.

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Mon Aug 29, 2011 11:23 am
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
biggee531 wrote:
It depends on the person really. There are always people that play the game for the lore, then there are people that play for the end-game experience only.

Traditionally, it's faster but less efficient to grind through mid-level to high-level content than waste time with missions etc. that give rewards that will just be replaced end-game. For most games anyways.


What he said.

If I level to 1800 asap, while I will spend more money than I'll make(pimping out ships, etc), when I do get to endgame, I shall be able to solo James Watt and get a Wattage Aug BP, which is worth at least 50b. I have made back twice as much as what I spent PowerLeveling. I can also solo all of the non T21/UZ ubers too. And have T20 bases. And be able to afford my Prawn/PosWave+ in the same time.

I spent 25-30b setting everything up.

It's worth it in the end.

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Mon Aug 29, 2011 1:00 pm
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Post Re: Cost Of Core Skills
My information on WoW may be bit dated due to quitting over a year ago, Calypso. When I played it though, I found I could level much faster by using a hunter/warlock to attack things above my level, rather than doing quests. If they have gone entirely to quests though I suppose that makes my point a bit moot though doesn't it?

_________________
Neba wrote:
BLACK PEOPLE DON'T GET RICE

andezrhode wrote:
goett wrote:
All oly ships look way to geometrically conservative for my tastes.

thats because most graphic designers are squares :mrgreen:

goett wrote:
Fired bullets taste like candy.


Mon Aug 29, 2011 1:58 pm
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