Forums » General Pantheon Discussion

Time to best gear

    • 220 posts
    February 22, 2021 7:06 AM PST

    I’ve seen lots of discussion about time to max level, but I can’t seem to find anything contrasting it with time to best gear.

    If we assume that it will take somewhere between 3 to 6 months for a hard core 8hr+ a day gamer to reach max level, how long should it take that same gamer to acquire the best gear for their class stats wise from initial release non-expansion content?

    • 690 posts
    February 22, 2021 7:48 AM PST

    Do you mean in trade, crafting, or adventuring? Adventuring it should take the same amount of time as leveling to top.

     

    I think trade should take about half the time as leveling to the top, but it's really hard to regulate that. Buying cheap and selling for more is pretty op. Easy way to get around it is to make sure the absolute best gear can't be traded, and then it doesn't matter as much if traders can get the second best gear by half max level. In EQ p99 as a tunnel rat I had third best gear by level 20 or so, which might be a little too fast.

     

    Crafting too, there really needs to be a written amount of time the average player needs to get to top level, that can be applied to how much time you require for everything else. Crafting the best stuff should require personal access to the highest level climates/dungeons, which should prove as a natural limiter to crafters getting there too fast.


    This post was edited by BeaverBiscuit at February 22, 2021 7:51 AM PST
    • 1315 posts
    February 22, 2021 7:51 AM PST

    You bring up an interesting question.  Leveling is only a small portion of character growth.  In addition to gear there are skills, factions, wealth and as many non-combat systems as can be created. Having an idea the target amount play time for each aspect of game play relative to the time to reach max level would be interesting.

    In previous games I would say I spent maybe 10 hours at max level to every 1 hour spent leveling.  What I did at max level was all over the place though.  A significant portion was prepping for or running raids and that could be considered gearing.  I would also spend an absurd amount of time collecting random things that caught my interest.

    Elite Dangerous is a different bird where there really isn’t a concept of maximum level and you can pursue any number of different play styles.  Some of the play styles reinforce each other but not all do.  Having new spheres of game play other than standard adventuring progression creates huge amounts of game play with minimal additional work.

    FYI 8 hours a day, 7 days a week for 3 months is 672 hours.  I would be surprised if just leveling took that many game hours.

    • 3852 posts
    February 22, 2021 9:27 AM PST

    My assumption is that with rare exception a good piece of level 50 gear will always be better than a good piece of level 40 gear. Thus, getting the best gear in the game is something that cannot even start until maximum level. 

    Trasak is entirely correct - if one diviides the time spent on a game to time reaching maximum level and time to get the character very well developed - gear may be the smallest part of the latter.

    To make a single character close to "the best" may require a lot of extra time spent on gear rather than levels. Either at level-cap or before. But it may require a lot of time spent getting and improving skills - whether we have a character personalization system like AA or not. It may require time spent on Progeny. Or maybe not. It may require time spent on faction and reputation - and in some games and I hope here this is far from trivial. It may require time spent on harvesting and crafting. There is almost no end to the timesinks in a well designed MMO - what differentiates the best ones from the not-so-good ones is how much this feels like mindless "unfun" grinding rather than enjoyable gameplay.

    • 125 posts
    February 22, 2021 9:48 AM PST

    I also think you need to consider with the climate/acclimation system planned it is likely there will be different "best gear" for different situations/areas of the world.

    • 1860 posts
    February 22, 2021 11:00 AM PST

    There may be a dozen or more "best gear" armor/weapon sets (entire sets, not single items) per class with acclimation gear, resist gear, stat gear for various ability synergies etc.

    VR has made it veery clear they don't want just 1 "best gear" item.  


    This post was edited by philo at February 22, 2021 11:02 AM PST
    • 115 posts
    February 22, 2021 11:51 AM PST

    I dont think you will ever see BiS or Meta build also i am thinking your better gear will be a mix from mid level to  max level  group and raid content this will not be WOWs max level treadmill for Ilvl  repeat.

    • 287 posts
    February 22, 2021 1:07 PM PST

    I would like to see the length of time needed to get the best gear be somewhat in line with the timeline for the first expansion launching. Only a limited few should be able to truly max out prior to an expansion. Otherwise the game might be too stale for too many.

    • 220 posts
    February 22, 2021 4:00 PM PST

    *deleted until I can figure out how to condense my reply down to a manageable size*

     

     

     


    This post was edited by Nekentros at February 23, 2021 12:49 AM PST
    • 83 posts
    February 23, 2021 1:22 AM PST

    Well, I have a question in a manageable size, didn't Joppa say there won't be a "best in slot" (BiS) logic regarding itemization ? How will you know that you have achieved the "best possible equipment" ?

    • 690 posts
    February 23, 2021 5:08 AM PST

    Adonhiram said:

    Well, I have a question in a manageable size, didn't Joppa say there won't be a "best in slot" (BiS) logic regarding itemization ? How will you know that you have achieved the "best possible equipment" ?

    Because it is the best at doing what you need in the particular situation. The set with the best cold resistance and lots of strength is best in cold areas for strength-wanting characters.

    • 115 posts
    February 23, 2021 5:22 AM PST

    There is No BEST  because whats Best for you is not always best for me even if playing the same class at the same time on the same content. VR is not trying to force players into a class set that favors a single build the world will not work that way. Worlds have diversty.

    • 2752 posts
    February 23, 2021 9:54 AM PST

    Vixx said:

    There is No BEST  because whats Best for you is not always best for me even if playing the same class at the same time on the same content. VR is not trying to force players into a class set that favors a single build the world will not work that way. Worlds have diversty.

    I mean, there IS a best no matter what content is being done based on desired goal. Two rogues focusing on DPS vs the same content are going to have a best toward meeting that end, but if one rogue is instead focused more on CC or debuffs then they might have a different best. 

    • 287 posts
    February 23, 2021 2:48 PM PST

    Vixx said:

    There is No BEST  because whats Best for you is not always best for me even if playing the same class at the same time on the same content. VR is not trying to force players into a class set that favors a single build the world will not work that way. Worlds have diversty.

    I hope that ends up being true.  We don't have enough info to go on but one thing is obvious: If the game shows us our damage/heal output in actual numbers then there will be parsers to graph that data.  If there are parsers there will be DPS and HPS expectations of raid members.  And if there are performance expectations there will be BiS.  There is no way around it.

    The solution is somewhat simple but unpopular and, in the long run, ineffective: Don't ever expose damage/heal numbers to players which, by extension, means don't expose health, DPS, attack speed or any other raw numbers. 

    Even without being told how much damage per attack and what the attack delay is for that Long Metal Thing of Stabbity, we will be able to figure out how well that item performs against a similar item.  Rankings will occur.  Once enough data is collected we can assign an educated guess to the item's stats and use that to plot any given item's effectiveness.  And we're back to BiS for every slot only now we have to refer to 3rd party web sites to judge gear drops or crafted items.

    Players are free to play as they prefer, of course. But if the game includes any form of raiding or even competitive group play, there will be BiS.  And if you're a member of one of those groups or raids you will be expected to gear up accordingly.  Fail to do so correctly or fast enough and you will be replaced.  VR's only way out is to avoid putting boss mobs in the world and make PRotF truly a casual game.

    • 1281 posts
    February 23, 2021 6:10 PM PST

    Pantheon shouldn't have 'best gear' or 'best in slot' because there will be different scenarios requiring different gear. But if you want to say time to have a full suit of raid gear then I would say probably double the time to max level. Someone raiding 2-3 times a week may have enough DKP to get 1 or 2 items a month depending on what is common or rots etc.

    • 83 posts
    February 24, 2021 2:13 AM PST

    BeaverBiscuit said:

    Adonhiram said:

    Well, I have a question in a manageable size, didn't Joppa say there won't be a "best in slot" (BiS) logic regarding itemization ? How will you know that you have achieved the "best possible equipment" ?

    Because it is the best at doing what you need in the particular situation. The set with the best cold resistance and lots of strength is best in cold areas for strength-wanting characters.

    Yes, that's what I understood too, but I am not sure how that will be implemented. What I hope is that there won't be "best in slot" websites (as raidloot.com or alike for Everquest) which literally tell you what to wear at what expac/level. Takes away the dream factor...


    This post was edited by Adonhiram at February 24, 2021 2:13 AM PST
    • 810 posts
    February 24, 2021 7:58 AM PST

    BIS for your main build will be more of pantheon's meta I am guessing.  Changing glyphs as needed to survive anywhere. With this I imagine it would be entirely up to luck on the actual raid drops.  The crafted items can hopefully be farmed to some degree so you could grind those out with a small raid group then protect the crafter in some deep dangerous forge. 

    I honestly think if this is your goal, it will happen quickly since they keep claiming Pantheon's focus is not on raiding so I think motivated people will get high powered gear perfect for their main build rather easily. 

    People keep saying Pantheon won't have best gear, but since VR is throwing magic items at lvl 1s my guess is there will be an underlying ilevel type thing going on for ease of statting.  Raid level gear, meaning actually raiding contested and the gear crafted that requires a raid to either farm raid trash for drops or protect the crafting furnace, will be the best.  There may be a few quests for class items such as an epic, but I strongly assume that too will be a raid required item at some point.  (hopefully not the contested named but simple trash)

    Given other threads you may need multiple raid level items per slot to have the BIS for everything, but people will do it.  Ironically this means raid guilds will keep content on lockdown longer since they will need 5x the drops for themselves to alter builds. 

    • 101 posts
    February 25, 2021 10:01 PM PST

    Never. The goal post should always move before 97.5% of players are even at the content where the best can be found.  Better yet we are always a few expansions behind the best.

    • 37 posts
    March 1, 2021 10:07 AM PST

    I'm hoping it's near impossible to get all the best gear for a class.  Being in the right place at the right time should be a rarity.  Getting very good gear I would hope would take weeks if not months.  I also hope that we won't know what the best gear is.  You may think you have it until player xyz is in the right place at the right time and gets something better.

    • 2756 posts
    March 4, 2021 2:46 AM PST

    There's a whole game-philosophy debate around chasing BiS gear, how the game does it and what influence it has - what kind of game you end up with.  In my not-so-humble opinion early EQ had it pretty much right in that you didn't *need* whatever was considered BiS to be effective.  Max level gear wasn't suddenly obsolete compaired to max level + 1 gear when a new expansion came out.  There were no gear 'levels' and +4 strength wasn't radically better than +2 strength.  Worth going after, but not a literal game-changer.

    WoW got this wrong when common items in an expansion would completely invalidate your previously hard-gained top-tier gear.  Games where you are constantly changing gear because of randomisation are pretty annoying too.

    I'm hoping Pantheon will have a good enough variety of 'good enough' gear that there won't be the usual meta-setup BiS chase.  'Best' will be situation and dependent on playstyle.  'Best' will be an ideal and not a necessity.  There shouldn't be any sets or pieces that feel 'required' in order to do certain content.  There should be trade-offs and balances to gear that mean what you wear is a choice and making the right choice is part of player skill, even.

    You should even have to change gear when situations change and adapt your gear like you have to adapt your playstyle.

    To answer the OP: However long it takes to get to max level, it should take something like the same amount of time to feel you are getting close to 'best' gear, then maybe the same again to get a good variety of 'best' gear for all situations.
    Each expansion should extend this, but not as far as you might think, since I'd like expansions to not be as 'vertical' as WoW.  'Old' gear should not be instantly obsolete.  There shouldn't be a hyperbolic increase in difficulty that requires gear to be hyperbolic in power.


    This post was edited by disposalist at March 4, 2021 2:58 AM PST
    • 24 posts
    March 5, 2021 6:57 PM PST

    I never got in to raids in eq1, but there were plenty of "best items" and people carried around multiple sets of items. I was a "merchant" so I bought and sold some of the best obtainable equipment in eq1 and there were always commonly highly sought after, very expensive items that everyone wanted.

     

    In eq2, i raided 4-6 times a week for years, there was no one player who had all the best gear, period. The only person who was guaranteed BiS gear(which was swappable depending on the situation) was the main tank, didn't matter if it was only 1 stat better, they had first dibs on anything usable. Our main off tank got items at a 50% dkp reduction. Also, in eq2 it was IMPOSSIBLE for any single person to ever have the "best" gear no matter how hard you tried. You could have all the best raid gear, but a low level noob might have the BiS item that you will never, ever, ever get known as a mythical item, which was super powerful and only 1 would drop per server and there was no set mob for it.  There would never be a better item than a mythical

    • 945 posts
    March 6, 2021 9:39 AM PST

    If the RNG is anywhere near EQ RNG you will likely never have best in slot before new content comes out because there will be multiple highly contested items with high RNG and quest items that will require serious aid from others.  Even when you had full raid drop gear in EQ, there was always another clicky to farm as well as a lot of situational equipment (specific resistance gear) and with that, there's the acclimation system to take into consideration.  It will be highly unlikely for a single person to have BIS in every slot in this game.

    disposalist said:

    WoW got this wrong when common items in an expansion would completely invalidate your previously hard-gained top-tier gear.  Games where you are constantly changing gear because of randomisation are pretty annoying too.



    This was literally why I quit playing... they had it down to a literal calculation of when to release new content JUST as the majority of players were finally getting to a comfortable level of equipment to where they felt as though they could finally stop grinding.  I wouldn't have minded so much if the new content was free, but it was all money driven.


    This post was edited by Darch at March 6, 2021 9:42 AM PST