The metagame of figuring out the math behind the game is something a lot of players enjoy. For other players, they want to focus less on doing math and instead become more immersed in the game. I think its a key thing for the niche this game is being developed for that it not include item levels, color coding item levels, or tool tips that litter your screen every time you mouse over to tell you all the mathematic formulas of the game. I'm pretty sure that is also what the majority of players here are also wanting, and its most likely clear to devs that is the case as well. I suppose a lot of these topics are interesting to pass the time while people wait for more info, but there are certain choices that so clearly go against the spirit of the game that I find it silly sometimes reading the threads here.
@Liav
I don't want to argue for 5 pages either, and I realize we'll usually never agree, but, my counters to you are not only to convice you specifically to change your stance/viewpoint, but, maybe other supporters who are reading who may also share a similar viewpoint (or the slight chance that a developer reads it and cares). And, you're incorrect that I don't care about DPS, or maximizing it - I just don't agree that the information has to be explictly laid out for me to figure it out.
We both agree that we want a difficult game, where we differ is I want a difficult/harsh/challenging world along with challenging encounters which includes figuring things out - where you focus mainly only on specific challenging mob encounters with the virtual world element a far distant second (if considered at all) based off your post history here. So, having all item information readily available to you for an encounter helps you maximize your pontential for that encounter; whereas, I feel that having the players figure out what's best adds another layer of depth/skill/knowledge of the game. Basically, it provides another opportunity for a veteran to shine, the community to come together to discuss what's best, and/or teach a new player what items are best and why.
Also, I'm not sure what you're getting at with the item effects - I'm assuming procs? if you're meaning how does a proc add into the DPS of an item versus an item with better damage/delay without one, this is where we would disagree, I'd rather the player figure that out versus a spreadsheet/tool-tip telling me.
And, /agreed with your final thought - neither of us are wrong, but, based off most of our differing opinions in nearly all threads we want a very different version of Pantheon, even if we agree on the challenging game aspect. My guess is we'll end up somewhere in between on our spectrum and we'll see VG 2.0 with some Pantheon differences sprinkled in.
Raidan said:@Liav
I don't want to argue for 5 pages either, and I realize we'll usually never agree, but, my counters to you are not only to convice you specifically to change your stance/viewpoint, but, maybe other supporters who are reading who may also share a similar viewpoint (or the slight chance that a developer reads it and cares). And, you're incorrect that I don't care about DPS, or maximizing it - I just don't agree that the information has to be explictly laid out for me to figure it out.
Apologies, that isn't what I was intending to imply. You've made it fairly clear that you find optimizing your play to be something you care about, I was just specifically referring to how explicit stats are.
Raidan said:We both agree that we want a difficult game, where we differ is I want a difficult/harsh/challenging world along with challenging encounters which includes figuring things out - where you focus mainly only on specific challenging mob encounters with the virtual world element a far distant second (if considered at all) based off your post history here. So, having all item information readily available to you for an encounter helps you maximize your pontential for that encounter; whereas, I feel that having the players figure out what's best adds another layer of depth/skill/knowledge of the game. Basically, it provides another opportunity for a veteran to shine, the community to come together to discuss what's best, and/or teach a new player what items are best and why.
I agree to an extent, but I think you're reading a little bit too far into it. The problem arises from the fact that sometimes stats have very minor influence, and optimization can't be reasonably arrived at this way through "feeling".
I will go back to my previous example of Accuracy and Critical Chance. We both know what these stats do conventionally, but letting people know that these stats exist and what their soft/hard caps are doesn't take away from the fact that optimizing yourself is still a process that only elite players will know.
In EQ2, a few years ago they documented all of their stats and their influence on your character. Even after that, people still were not optimizing themselves. In summary, I don't think that documenting some of the math and formulas behind various stats is going to trivialize or significantly impact the challenge and depth of the game.
Spending thousands of hours parsing things to find this out yourself is not particularly challenging anyway, it's just tedious. This is another important area where I think our opinions diverge a little bit. I generally file game mechanics that give players knowledge or execution barriers into two categories: challenging, and tedious. I do not find tedium to be desirable in anything except very limited circumstances. Farming the same named placeholder for 70 hours isn't challenging, it's tedious. Getting your guild to come help you kill a mob that requires knowledge and execution, that is challenge.
I would apply this same logic to stats. Provide the documentation, and the challenge of figuring out what is best will still require people to invest some effort, just without the tedious components. Even with very explicit documentation, barring literal item levels, people still won't optimize simply out of ignorance. IF the game is developed properly (in line with its tenets), then we will also be using various stat configurations situationally.
Raidan said:Also, I'm not sure what you're getting at with the item effects - I'm assuming procs? if you're meaning how does a proc add into the DPS of an item versus an item with better damage/delay without one, this is where we would disagree, I'd rather the player figure that out versus a spreadsheet/tool-tip telling me.And, /agreed with your final thought - neither of us are wrong, but, based off most of our differing opinions in nearly all threads we want a very different version of Pantheon, even if we agree on the challenging game aspect. My guess is we'll end up somewhere in between on our spectrum and we'll see VG 2.0 with some Pantheon differences sprinkled in.
In regards to the item effects, I honestly can't remember specifically what I was alluding to. However, we'll just go with procs for the sake of this example.
A player will invest the time to figure it out, and those results will probably be published in spreadsheet form online. Nobody is going to invest hours and hours into figuring this stuff out only for their self gain. Half of the desire to figure these things out comes in the form of being considered a god among men when you publish your results.
All they would need to do would be, honestly, pretty simple:
Short Sword of Ykesha
Damage: 8 - Delay: 24
Proc: Ykesha (5% chance on melee hit)
This is literally exactly what EQ did, except they exempted the "whatever % chance on melee hit" bit. Just that tiny bit of information is good enough.
I don't think we want as different of a Pantheon as you think. Vanguard documented their stats reasonably well, although due to the spaghetti code and general bugginess it was often very difficult to figure out the formulas behind the scenes with 100% accuracy. There was a window in Vanguard that displayed, for instance, your melee crit chance in a X.YZ% format, which is exactly what I want. If they could just go a step further with their documentation I would be happy.
@Liav
Appreciate the reply, and, I think you're 100% spot on. Your point on "tedious" gameplay is where are opinions often differ. I view what you consider tedious as necessary to create the timesinks (player investment) that allow for meaningful gains and creation of a virtual world. But, you look at the tedious 70 hour camp as a 100% negative, and, it could have been if viewing solely from a did I get my item viewpoint. But, I'm not framing the 70 hours invested and saying it was more challenging to kill the Frenzied 100 times versus 1 time, but I want the side benefits that occur as a result of that timesink. I had plenty of people that helped me try to get my FBSS for months that I still remember today. And, trying to get the item sucked bad, but grouping with the people to get it - didn't. And, once I did get it, they shared in my elation. Shared hardships often form stronger, longer lasting bonds than any shared successes.
Back on point though, our views on itemization is just purely preference. VG's character menu that you could run your cursor over to see your %crit or spell crit, etc. didn't ruin the game for me by any means, I just prefer the alternative.
One of my main issues with FF14 was the idea of ilvls. Other players are quick to judge you if you are not on par with the average raider's ilvl and groups would use ilvls to judge you. Although I can understand why developers would use it to save time, it affects the player community. Ideally I want unique gear sets for endgame. I hope the Pantheon Dev team will figure something out for the players.
Honestly, ilvls are a product of a very santized design. Its really based around everyone acquiring the same items or at least, universally, items that yield that same stastics.
I would really hope that there is enough versatility in the way you play your class, specialize your build, and what items you equip to make something like that irrelevant.
I'm just throwing my hat in the "No colored items" crowd. I don't need the game to tell me what is rare, common, uncommon, ultra rare, super ultra rare, vendor trash, or whatever the designations are. This isn't our first rodeo.
Also against item levels.
I'm pretty much against the premise of this entire thread.
Move to RnF.
Oh yea :(
Raidan said:@Liav
Appreciate the reply, and, I think you're 100% spot on. Your point on "tedious" gameplay is where are opinions often differ. I view what you consider tedious as necessary to create the timesinks (player investment) that allow for meaningful gains and creation of a virtual world. But, you look at the tedious 70 hour camp as a 100% negative, and, it could have been if viewing solely from a did I get my item viewpoint. But, I'm not framing the 70 hours invested and saying it was more challenging to kill the Frenzied 100 times versus 1 time, but I want the side benefits that occur as a result of that timesink. I had plenty of people that helped me try to get my FBSS for months that I still remember today. And, trying to get the item sucked bad, but grouping with the people to get it - didn't. And, once I did get it, they shared in my elation. Shared hardships often form stronger, longer lasting bonds than any shared successes.
Back on point though, our views on itemization is just purely preference. VG's character menu that you could run your cursor over to see your %crit or spell crit, etc. didn't ruin the game for me by any means, I just prefer the alternative.
In regards to the 70 hour camps, I'm a person who enjoys consistency.
For instance, when I did the grinding in Vanguard to get PotA t3 armor and epics, I probably invested dozens of hours into all of that mining, Diplomacy, and whatever else. I actually enjoyed that though, because when I put the time in, there was a somewhat guaranteed result associated with the number of hours I put in.
What I didn't enjoy was how I could camp Raster for 70 hours, kill him, then some asshole comes in after me and gets him to spawn in under 30 minutes. I agree that time sinks are necessary to stall players in games, but I think a lot of the tedium can be resolved by just having some guaranteed milestones or benchmarks along the way of an intended timesink. A good example being that, in Vanguard, while doing all of those hours of grinding, every time I finished another piece of gear it felt very much like an accomplishment.
Either way, like I said, I don't think we're completely on the same page, but not completely off of the same page either. It's no big deal, and I'll play the game regardless.
What I didn't enjoy was how I could camp Raster for 70 hours, kill him, then some asshole comes in after me and gets him to spawn in under 30 minutes. I agree that time sinks are necessary to stall players in games, but I think a lot of the tedium can be resolved by just having some guaranteed milestones or benchmarks along the way of an intended timesink. A good example being that, in Vanguard, while doing all of those hours of grinding, every time I finished another piece of gear it felt very much like an accomplishment.
I'd have to agree with you here. It's one of the reasons I really like games that incorporate some kind trade-in or alternate path for occasions like this. If you like to camp and relish the thrill when named finally pops and on the 50th spawn that item is finally dropped, great! But to avoid that catastrophic luck of the draw that some of us have (see above) allow for 10 more common loots from a few named which can be turned in for the required quest item. Or purchasing the item with some alternate currency, or some more arduous faction-based requirement, or something. Those who love to camp can, and those who prefre the more systematic approach can as well. In the end, both will likely spend roughly the same time (if it's designed well), but each will have the fun they prefer having, and pure dumb luck is less a factor of frustration.
Something like this could be used particularly well in the case of quests, freeing up bottlenecks or contention for a specific camp that several people are attempting to get thru.
Feyshtey said:What I didn't enjoy was how I could camp Raster for 70 hours, kill him, then some asshole comes in after me and gets him to spawn in under 30 minutes. I agree that time sinks are necessary to stall players in games, but I think a lot of the tedium can be resolved by just having some guaranteed milestones or benchmarks along the way of an intended timesink. A good example being that, in Vanguard, while doing all of those hours of grinding, every time I finished another piece of gear it felt very much like an accomplishment.
I'd have to agree with you here. It's one of the reasons I really like games that incorporate some kind trade-in or alternate path for occasions like this. If you like to camp and relish the thrill when named finally pops and on the 50th spawn that item is finally dropped, great! But to avoid that catastrophic luck of the draw that some of us have (see above) allow for 10 more common loots from a few named which can be turned in for the required quest item. Or purchasing the item with some alternate currency, or some more arduous faction-based requirement, or something. Those who love to camp can, and those who prefre the more systematic approach can as well. In the end, both will likely spend roughly the same time (if it's designed well), but each will have the fun they prefer having, and pure dumb luck is less a factor of frustration.
Something like this could be used particularly well in the case of quests, freeing up bottlenecks or contention for a specific camp that several people are attempting to get thru.
I loved the VG method of item drops and it gave meaning to my time invested. That was a huge deal and still is to me.
I remember the EQ camps and spawn times were fun at times and not so much at other times. Drops would not happen and or KSing would be rampant in some areas. I think the option you descroibe would work.
Ox
Tralyan said:I'm just throwing my hat in the "No colored items" crowd. I don't need the game to tell me what is rare, common, uncommon, ultra rare, super ultra rare, vendor trash, or whatever the designations are. This isn't our first rodeo.
Also against item levels.
I'm pretty much against the premise of this entire thread.
100% agree No Colored Items / items lvl or rating please
One of the things I miss most from Original Dungeons and Dragons once D&D3.X took over is all the crazy magic items. Each was one-of-kind, with an odd combination of powers, awesome to discover and amazing to own. Magic items in D&D have only gotten more homogenized and boring, now with 5.0, you can play without them, you don't even need to care.
Old school magic weapons addressed the huge imbalance between melee and casters, but even wonderous items with a themed medley of smaller powers worked into the story telling and puzzle solving.
I would prefer the "medley" approach, with a variety of related, useful, but less powerful abilities and bonuses, not all of which may be obvious upon discovery.
I wouldn't mind items that gained power over time as they were used and new abilities discovered, but which reverted to base form if passed to another owner.
No, I don't think this a very good use of developer time, except possibly as expansion material, but abilities or bonuses that remain hidden until discovered may not be out of bounds.
I certainly want owning magic items to mean something, and not just be expected increases in numbers.
My take is: the concept is understood by the developers. Along with; that twinking is fun (Joppa), and an item obtained at level 10 is fun to have still be valuable 30 (more or less) levels later (Agreed with Cohh).
IIRC some of the concepts initially thought about by players as far as it pertained to mentoring was: that all items would scale down when mentored down (un-twink) OR, that Items obtained early on would have the capability to get better as you got better in skill or behave differently from collection of AA points (like, but not like a labyrinthian skill tree that plagues some games).
To the OP's point, I interpret one of the concepts as "provenance". It's a term used in "the antiques roadshow" where an item alone is only worth so much, but if the person can show some "Provenance" or the story behind it, like photo's or how they got it or a signed letter from a famous person or artist saying "take this blank corner of paper I accidentally cut off, love you" or the like makes it worth ALOT more, sometimes priceless. Similar to the idea of seeing what you know is a epic or multi group item on another player just by looks and being able to olge it and admire it. Because you know it came from THAT particular place from THAT particular event that kicked your butt the 5th time you tried it and as a new player, maybe 2 years from now I will see that event as new since I am doing it for the first time and take my shot and get that thing as I progress through the game, and those after me that join as newbies 3 years later will see that same event as new as they play 1-2 years into the game, etc etc.
To me, I see the question as : what to do with all the old stuff- keep it as a trophy? thats an argument for increasing and bloating bag/storage space or something else, maybe scrap for crafting or scrap with oomph to keep a magic gemthat can be placed/crafted on something else to still "keep" the old item instead of letting it rot, or sell.
Ooo a post from the past.
Item level and gear iLevel. Yeah. No thanks.
As with most controversial aspects, this is fine in some games. Games where loot showers down and comparing/swapping happens every fight. I enjoy those games, though, for me, they become tedious in the end-game gear-perfecting grinding and boss-fight cycle.
As with most controversial aspects, I'm not saying it's not fun, but that it seems to get into *every* game these days and not for the good of the players, but because it is easier to monetise and/or make addictive.
As with most controversial aspects, I'm desperate for a game that *doesn't* follow the modern trends, especially when it comes to competitive-esque gamifying as opposed to building a fantasy world with meaning.
I think VR has a good group on this. They've said many times they want gear to feel special, have prestige and not to be thrown away every level. They've said items won't have a level but will scale somewhat to avoid too imbalancing an effect from twinking.
Implied is that you won't need some kind of item level or gear iLevel to compare to, shame or exclude others. People who like to do that can still do that without the game normalising it for everyone.
The item level is not a problem as long as the game does not become item level-centric like WoW or FF14 Online. Even WoW Vanilla had already item levels but nobody cared about it because there was a huge variety of items and attributes and trinkets. So it happened easily, that a blue trinket from a 5 man instance was better than purple trinkets from a raid.
But later, the they removed almost all attributes and they started to "missuse" the average player item level as a kind of a second progression path. And they started to block you from content when your avarage item level was not high enough. It was one factor why the game became less fun to me.
Cheers
From what I understand after watching most of interveiws, recored Live streams and gameplays where devp answered some question about items :
1. there 2 typs of items . Normal items and Magic items.
2. There is Bounes for set armor.
3. Crafting gear doesnt have grades A , B , C etcs.
There are various plusses and minuses to item levels and they generally depend on what the item level is used for - if anything. More minuses than plusses.
If I had to pick out the thing I want most not to see it is content "gated" by item level. Something generally based on the game calculating a combined item level for a character calculated based on all of that character's items. I am not too worried about Pantheon preventing characters from entering dungeons or other content based on this use of item level - I just do not see them doing it. Thank all of the Gods. But I do not want the game to calculate any item level at all since that will make it far too ubiquitous to have announcements such as "Looking for more for Kobold Queen Caverns - must have item level of 127 or higher."
I abhor item levels. Coming from old school crpgs like Neverwinter Nights, when you play on a competitive server and you chance upon that "Knight-Errant's Blade" and it says "item level restriction - 20," and you're level 2, you feel defeated. So it makes you want to sell the item.
Now, if you recall the monk video we had in the past, there was a monk vendor that sold bo's. Well, some bo's were 10copper, some were 10 silver, and some were 1 gold. So don't quote me on this, but I think the only difference in the item sheet is price, damge, ki cost (or equivalent depending on class), and there's no subtext for iLR (you compare the low copper cost items with the high gold cost items for the difference to be certain). When you level up, I believe the only thing that you acquire are new skills and feats, and there's no item level minimum.
"So, do you think Pantheon should adopt an ilvl system for item creation? Does the ease of balance outweigh the boringness of having every item feel too similar? Is there a way to do item level while still allowing for devs to inject flavor and life into the items?"
If they DO have a system for item creation I'd like to to stay on their end only. I don't want to see anything about item level or item rarity on my end as I play. I enjoy learning about items on my own, by being in the world, experimenting with them, comparing them with other items I've found (or friends have found), etc. The moment the game starts doing the comparing of items for me is the moment I start to lose interest in items at all.
Yeah, it is more of a system to prevent crazy level twinking. VR will not have the WoW ilvl where you go from green to blue to purple of the exact same item by increasing the ilvl of the item.
They mentioned in the past something more like item tiers. Those items would have a range of stats based on all sorts of things of course. They said they want people to be upgrading junk (my words clearly) magic items every 15 levels or so but have the real magic items often kept beyond that. Effectively you would likely upgrade from say steel to mithril or whatever the metals will be on your weapons and armor as you pick up or craft all the junk magic items with more stats on them. Someone else may have gone in the dungeon and got lucky enough to have a proper magic item that may be a steel sword with a cool magical effect worth keeping through the mithril tier.
I personally would rather the game focus on having multiple balanced swords to do different effects, ideal for different mobs, rather than having multiple swords for different level ranges. Faster more accurate swords vs heavier higher damage / armor piercing swords vs silvered weapons ideal for werewolves vs magic damage types vs etc. That ship has sailed though from what I can tell we will be rocking the stat sticks.
Should Pantheon have ilvls? I, personally, don't think so. Mainly because I think it will be useless in this game.
When considering the LAS design plus the stated goal of having stats affect different attributes and skills (ex. strength could raise melee attack power as well as fire damage), I can't see there being a best in slot.
I'm imagining three people with the same class having completely different builds. Wizard1 could be a pure fire build, wizard2 a pure ice build, and wizard3 a hybrid fire/ice build. They would want very different stats on their gear. For one a level 40 dungeon drop might have the best stats for their build, while another would want a drop from a lvl 50 dungeon in that same slot.
Having ilvls on gear wouldn't help those three people pick what is best suited to maximize their chosen skills.
I really hope they don't ever put in a gear score system, I like the way they said stats will be meaningful and I feel a gear score system just promotes dumping insane amounts of stats onto an item. I would hope that awesome weapon or piece of armor you worked months to attain will hold value longer then til the next expanison where some random trash mob drops an item twice as good.