Twinking and Mentoring can't happen in the same game. We won't get to have any of these rare awesome items because of mentoring. Put it on a lev 5 and it will have a regen rank of 2 vs 100 on a max lev character. THAT is the main reason I hate mentoring. (regen numbers are made up, just using as an example)
I wish Brad would have done a pole: Do you want to be able to twink, or would you rather have mentoring? To see which one wins. (side note: wow never had mentoring and had 13 million subs at one time)
I don't see why people can't just make a twink to hang with their 'low-level-plays-3-hours-a-week-friend'.
Instead, we can't have nice things like Fungi Tunics and get mentoring crapola vs twinking.
I do NOT plan to "retire" (delete/throw away/Progeny) a character and start over just to "be more power than a normal character of the same level" i.e have a "twink"
I will have a Cleric, Enchanter, Ranger, Summoner, and Necro all going at once and each will vary in level.
I will likely Never mentor. I will just log in a character that will fit in the group that is "looking for more" Lev 10-14.
I remember FINALLY getting a Cloak of Flames and i created a monk and put two Wu stix in his hands and had an absolute BLAST leveling it. Mentoring/item scaling crushes the life out of that type of fun.... sucks
Evil Eye Bag, Box of Abukar, Rubicite Breastplate, Ykesha, and Jboots were just a few of the similar items that fall into this catagory. What made them great was an extremely useful benefit both on high level and low level characters alike. Extremely rare tradeable items help define a good economy in any mmo unfortunately crybabies and pvp'rs ruined this concept because they considered it unfair. I would be extremely happy if these concepts were put back into industry, but the company needs to have a strong enough backbone to standup to the waves of tears that is sure to come.
Naim said:Twinking and Mentoring can't happen in the same game.
Twinking and Mentoring were both available in Vanguard SoH. Not that many people participated in mentoring, but I think that was because people really didn't understand it. Twinking however was common. They can run independent of each other. Gear scaling, as you mention can work in different ways - some limited, others more robust. I suggest we get clarification on gear scaling before addressing mentoring.
I liked using the caravan system, especially for alts.
Naim said:Can someone explain this caravan system? i only played VG for a month before quitting
It was a pretty horrible idea imo, and allowed you to travel with people offline and then magically appear with them somewhere else, effectively circumventing both the need to travel and the time and risk that should be associated with it.
I see it as a totally unnecessary system tbh, but if it was to be implemented with ways to prevent abuse, it could work. For instance, you should have to be offline for a while for it to take effect. The offline player should come back into the world without mana/stamina, and probably consume food and drink as well. This will prevent exploitations.
Naim said:Twinking and Mentoring can't happen in the same game. We won't get to have any of these rare awesome items because of mentoring. Put it on a lev 5 and it will have a regen rank of 2 vs 100 on a max lev character. THAT is the main reason I hate mentoring. (regen numbers are made up, just using as an example)
I wish Brad would have done a pole: Do you want to be able to twink, or would you rather have mentoring? To see which one wins. (side note: wow never had mentoring and had 13 million subs at one time)
I don't see why people can't just make a twink to hang with their 'low-level-plays-3-hours-a-week-friend'.
Instead, we can't have nice things like Fungi Tunics and get mentoring crapola vs twinking.
I do NOT plan to "retire" (delete/throw away/Progeny) a character and start over just to "be more power than a normal character of the same level" i.e have a "twink"
I will have a Cleric, Enchanter, Ranger, Summoner, and Necro all going at once and each will vary in level.
I will likely Never mentor. I will just log in a character that will fit in the group that is "looking for more" Lev 10-14.
I remember FINALLY getting a Cloak of Flames and i created a monk and put two Wu stix in his hands and had an absolute BLAST leveling it. Mentoring/item scaling crushes the life out of that type of fun.... sucks
I'm not quite sure how you came to the conclusion that twinking and mentoring can't happen in the same game. Twinking refers to giving your alts nice items, mentoring refers to scaling your character's level down to another player's level so that you two can group together. They're in no way directly related to each other. EQ2 and Vanguard had both of these systems in place and they work fine.
the reason I say that twinking and mentoring can't happen in the same game is because I have already read (from brad or devs, can't remember who said it) but items will scale down in level in Pantheon. That cloak of flames on a lev 1 might give 1-5% haste instead of 36% haste.
I know it 'could' happen in the same game, but the devs have already said they aren't going to give a lev 1 36% haste. ( they did not use those exact words, just using that as an example) They are going to scale items to be "more appropiate" for the level wearing the item.
Naim said:but items will scale down in level in Pantheon. That cloak of flames on a lev 1 might give 1-5% haste instead of 36% haste.
I think that (and i dont know for sure) more refers to mentoring only, i could be wrong but what they wanted to achieve by this is a mentoring system that doesnt make the person who mentors stupidly over powered for the level so the content isnt compromised for everyone else who is trying to enjoy a challenging game. I am a big fan of encouraging mentoring and also implementing it in a way that means that the person mentoring is at most equal to a "standard" geared player at that level. Mentoring is not a means to power level and shouldnt be, it is to bring more people together and hopefully not make content easy.
I know you advocate for having maximum stats for a level one player i am quite the opposite and would prefer it is scaled as well, not to the same degreee as mentoring, but i think there should be some penalty on an ultra powerful weapon / armour in the hands of a low level by means of scaling based on skill levels.
this is always a hot topic! :)
We should try to keep this thread on track right? How items will scale and twinking our players is probably already a discussion opened somewhere else. And if you have a real problem with twinking in Pantheon then you are only assuming things because they haven't discussed their full intentions yet. They've stated they want most items to be tradeable in order to help the economy. Yes, they want to scale items but if they scale items too far then the items won't sell and that would be going against the whole reason why they want items to be tradeable in the first place right? From the sounds of it, they don't want a level 1 holding a level 50 sword and getting full benefit from the item. I don't think a level 1 will be soloing a level 50 dungeon so there should be no problem there. A level 21 soloing even a level 35 zone, IF possible, should probably not be a concern at this point in time because there is a good chance there wouldn't be much of a difference IF at all but also because we don't know exactly how they plan on scaling items back. One last thing, something that would help this concern though is not how much the items will scale back but what sort of bonus effects these types of items have. Scaling back strength and dex is a minor thing when the item has a clicky or a passive on it that can benefit the player for many levels. There are numerous clicky effects that can't be scaled at all so items like these would be great for twinks no matter what.
Back to the discussion sorry, I think there are a lot of tenets that the game holds that support your desire for lack of a better word. They want items to be memorable. They want players to look forward to obtaining certain items. They also want players to hold onto items and not discard them every 2 days. They want most of the content in Pantheon (I mean like 80% game content) to be focused around grouping so that should give plenty of opportunities for obtaining great items like the Fungi. They want the game to be challenging. They want some quests to be epic and lengthy and challenging. They also want raiding but it seems they want the core game to not be about 'end game' content and/or raiding. I think ALL of this really supports your idea of having these items that are great that are also items that players can hold onto and benefit from for many levels later.
EQ1 had these items as well as VG so I would like to believe PRF will continue this trend.
One final note. I think a lot of people worry about the current trend in MMOs where you outgrow your items every other day. But most of these MMOs have you doing a 20 quests in a half hour usually soloable, where every 3 quests you're getting a new item. Of course you're going to replace your sword in a handful of quests when you're doing this amount of quests. Pantheon though won't be like these current MMOs. We won't be really soloing to get our levels. We won't be doing a 200 quests a day. In VG they had MULTIPLE quest lines that you might do 6 quests where each quest rewards you an armor piece but it might take you an hour or two to finish each step/quest. HL, Wardship, Swamp were all like this where you might do a handful of quests that last you a handful of levels as well as a week or 3 of your time. You could easily go from level 17ish and start HL which would give you a decent set of armor with a VERY nice chest and legs AND a great weapon and finish this around level 22 maybe? And have use of all this gear all the way until you start the Wardship line which was maybe around 30 and then start it all over again. Wardship prolly could last you from 30ish to 40something depending on when you did Wardship. (vanilla wardship was brutal and could literally take you 15 levels AND a month before you finiished your entire set of armor).
Naim said:the reason I say that twinking and mentoring can't happen in the same game is because I have already read (from brad or devs, can't remember who said it) but items will scale down in level in Pantheon. That cloak of flames on a lev 1 might give 1-5% haste instead of 36% haste.
I know it 'could' happen in the same game, but the devs have already said they aren't going to give a lev 1 36% haste. ( they did not use those exact words, just using that as an example) They are going to scale items to be "more appropiate" for the level wearing the item.
I think you need to understand that mentoring has nothing to do with twinking. Items scaling down has nothing to do with mentoring. Mentoring is simply creating the possibility for high level players to have the ability to group with low level players.
Dullahan said:Naim said:Can someone explain this caravan system? i only played VG for a month before quitting
It was a pretty horrible idea imo, and allowed you to travel with people offline and then magically appear with them somewhere else, effectively circumventing both the need to travel and the time and risk that should be associated with it.
I see it as a totally unnecessary system tbh, but if it was to be implemented with ways to prevent abuse, it could work. For instance, you should have to be offline for a while for it to take effect. The offline player should come back into the world without mana/stamina, and probably consume food and drink as well. This will prevent exploitations.
Definitely aware of potential exploits and will of course watch people use it in alpha and beta and adjust or tweak accordingly.
I understand that it's a new system to some, deemed unnecessary by others, etc. A version of it was in Vanguard -- it originated from me but how it worked may have changed post-launch, this I do not know.
It really falls into a larger category of features/mechanics we could label something like 'Keeping groups together and supporting community vs. Making Pantheon too easy, accommodating, etc". This category is an important one, has been growing over time, and we expect to be making lots of tweaks and changes to systems that fall into this group in alpha and beta (indeed even yanking a system entirely if necessary). Whatever we end up with, I hope the majority of the community will like or at least understand why it's there, but of course we won't be able to make everyone happy.
The reason, of course, is that these two goals often contradict or interfere with each other or at least appear to. This makes them extra important to not just think through but test vigorously in alpha/beta and make changes. And that's of course because both are important goals for Pantheon: that the game is challenging and group oriented but that we also need to make a real effort to help people 1. find groups 2. join a group 3. stay in that group 4. return to the group if disconnected, logged off, etc.
In general if we don't take a proactive stance regarding groups (and onboarding in general) then we could end up making it too frustrating to play the majority of Pantheon's content (which is group oriented). For example, we *must* avoid situations where a person logs in and spends more time trying to find a group or reunite with a group than actually playing the game in a group. And I think most will agree that's been a serious problem in more group-oriented MMOs. And I think people might be much less tolerant in the current era than they were, say, in 1999. Especially younger players.
The Caravan system is meant to address the following scenario: You and your friends are having a great time and then log off for the night. The next night most of the group returns, but you know that you can't play that night. But that night the group members that did log in decide to move from one end of the world to another, taking some time to do so if we do our jobs right and make both an epic world and travel meaningful.
Normally you'd then log in, say hello to your guildmates, find out they were far away, and then try to re-unite with them. You'd run to them, or teleport if you could. With the Caravan system, if you attach yourself to the group caravan before you log out, then when you log in next you'll be given the option of either appearing where you last were when you logged out *or* appear *near* wherever your group saved the caravan location.
Now, just based on the above rough description, probably anybody in our community could easily start poking holes in it, identifying exploits, and even simply make the argument that such a system is too 'easy' or 'hand holding' for a challenging game like Pantheon. But that's actually great and why I'm willing to talk about a future system earlier than later.
I think we have a pretty good handle on potential exploits. We're going to put together a list of restrictions (two being: You can't appear somewhere you've not traveled to before; if your group is in a dungeon, you'll likely appear at the dungeon entrance and then your group will have to use other abilities to attempt to get you to them, etc.)
Ultimately we have to try system(s) that help groups/guilds stay together in our large world with limited teleports. Obviously we cannot force everyone in a group to be logged in the entire time the rest of the group is in order to stay together -- life just doesn't work that way, especially as much of our community is older with more responsibilities, jobs, spouse, kids, etc.
So our goal (shared with the dev team and community) is to think about systems like the Caravan system and any other potential systems/mechanics/features that help keep groups together, the community together, but then also keep the game challenging, travel important, etc. It's easy to simply say, well, a lot of the time, at least on the surface, those two goals are at odds with each other or incompatible. I don't accept that, however. I think if we're careful, think these things through (an opposed to just voicing opposition in a reactionary manner), think outside the box, and believe that most or all of these challenges are solvable, we can really break some new ground and end up with an MMO full of community, grouping, RL friends, guilds, etc. that is also rewarding and challenging as all heck.
I like, for example, how Dullahan responded, although I'd like to see more: he said he didn't like it, didn't think it was necessary, but could work if designed properly to avoid exploits. Perfect!
If it is truly unnecessary, then we'll find out before release and yank it.
And if we talk about such systems before implementation and testing, then maybe we can avoid most issues ahead of time.
And then during actual testing we can find and address those pesky issues that oftentimes don't rear their ugly heads until people are actually playing the game.
'nuff said for now -- as is often for me I wanted to answer the Caravan system question specifically but also illuminate that it belongs to a larger part of Pantheon's mechanics and features, those being the group intended to help people play together, find friends, make new friends, interact with and find a reason to be part of the community. And then get people thinking, hey, how can we all do this without chimping out the hard core MMO we all want?
NEXTLEVL said:Naim said:the reason I say that twinking and mentoring can't happen in the same game is because I have already read (from brad or devs, can't remember who said it) but items will scale down in level in Pantheon. That cloak of flames on a lev 1 might give 1-5% haste instead of 36% haste.
I know it 'could' happen in the same game, but the devs have already said they aren't going to give a lev 1 36% haste. ( they did not use those exact words, just using that as an example) They are going to scale items to be "more appropiate" for the level wearing the item.
I think you need to understand that mentoring has nothing to do with twinking. Items scaling down has nothing to do with mentoring. Mentoring is simply creating the possibility for high level players to have the ability to group with low level players.
Yes, everyone please check out the FAQ first and then if you still have questions, post 'em.
In a nutshell, a twinked item will scale down from it's intended level to the level of the person using it. This is a bit more complicated than it may sound because you have to weight what makes the item a good one and then scale down according to that weight. It's easier with, say, stats... if the item should have +10 Strength when used by a player at or above its level, then it's not hard to make a formula that scales that value of 10 down to what it should be. Other aspects are more difficult, like procs, or other more esoteric but powerful features the item may have. Some things simply may not scale and turn off. Other aspects we may be able to come up with a decent formula and scale down accordingly.
To answer a question that came up, yes, the item, in general and most of the time, would be slightly better than the average item that player would have. Define slightly? Too early, too many variables, but we will address it.
And of course, there will be many incentives for players to *not* twink an item, mostly positive incentives, making it more worthwhile to trade the item in, sacrifice it, augment it, etc. This should slow but not eliminate twinking. Then, through expansions and such, we continue to introduce more powerful and interesting items. This could also involve re-vamping certain zones, keeping track of a shard's age, and a lot of other tricky next-gen stuff.
Mentoring, as some mentioned, isn't really related to the above. When you Mentor you become the level of the person you are mentoring. This will occur either by scaling or by making you the same character you were when you yourself hit that level. There will be restrictions, many of which are pretty obvious -- trade will certainly be restricted. In general, the idea is to help a new player learn the game. It's also a way to spend time with a friend who started Pantheon later than you. It is NOT a way to powerlevel a newbie or help them bypass content.
We hope the system helps the community, specifically allowing vertical support, e.g. higher levels helping out noobs in a balanced and fair way. Of course, you could still make an alt and start playing with your friend. Regardless, your friend that is new to the game, or just some random person you feel like helping out, will need to find friends and socialize. The Mentor system is just one part of that. It will always involve real people, though... you won't see Mercenary type systems where if you can't or don't feel like interacting with real people you can hire NPCs to help you out.
NoobieDoo said:Back to the discussion sorry, I think there are a lot of tenets that the game holds that support your desire for lack of a better word. They want items to be memorable. They want players to look forward to obtaining certain items. They also want players to hold onto items and not discard them every 2 days. They want most of the content in Pantheon (I mean like 80% game content) to be focused around grouping so that should give plenty of opportunities for obtaining great items like the Fungi. They want the game to be challenging. They want some quests to be epic and lengthy and challenging. They also want raiding but it seems they want the core game to not be about 'end game' content and/or raiding. I think ALL of this really supports your idea of having these items that are great that are also items that players can hold onto and benefit from for many levels later.
EQ1 had these items as well as VG so I would like to believe PRF will continue this trend.
One final note. I think a lot of people worry about the current trend in MMOs where you outgrow your items every other day. But most of these MMOs have you doing a 20 quests in a half hour usually soloable, where every 3 quests you're getting a new item. Of course you're going to replace your sword in a handful of quests when you're doing this amount of quests. Pantheon though won't be like these current MMOs. We won't be really soloing to get our levels. We won't be doing a 200 quests a day. In VG they had MULTIPLE quest lines that you might do 6 quests where each quest rewards you an armor piece but it might take you an hour or two to finish each step/quest. HL, Wardship, Swamp were all like this where you might do a handful of quests that last you a handful of levels as well as a week or 3 of your time. You could easily go from level 17ish and start HL which would give you a decent set of armor with a VERY nice chest and legs AND a great weapon and finish this around level 22 maybe? And have use of all this gear all the way until you start the Wardship line which was maybe around 30 and then start it all over again. Wardship prolly could last you from 30ish to 40something depending on when you did Wardship. (vanilla wardship was brutal and could literally take you 15 levels AND a month before you finiished your entire set of armor).
Well said, I think you've explained our position and looking at EQ 1 and VG is never a bad idea to get a least a general idea or feel of what's to come.
But yes, as many have said and the FAQ talks a bit about, items are going to stay around longer than what's experienced in many of the newer more casual MMOs. They will have cool names, names with context and possibly even lore, and you won't outgrow them rapidly. The item could be situational and very useful in one region but mediocre elsewhere, so you'll want to keep it around. It may be part of a future quest and something you need to trade in to be rewarded with a better item. You may be able to augment it using the crafting system most likely, allowing the item to grow in power as your character does.
Of course we want a vibrant player driven economy too, with items traded, bought, and sold. We also love the thrill of obtaining a new item that may be better, or more versatile, or for many reasons be of value. I bring this up because if we went too far and designed the game so that items stuck with you for too long, that thrill of item drops would almost go away.
And on the other extreme, we've seen MMOs where you replace your items so often you never become attached to them, the thrill of earning them is diminished, etc.
So the answer, as it is so often, lies in the middle of both extremes.
Aradune said:In a nutshell, a twinked item will scale down from it's intended level to the level of the person using it.
@Aradune - Thank you for the replies. Very helpful to the conversation.
I realize we're in the "far to early to say" stage, and you are likely simply speaking in general terms while not meaning to set a definitive rule, but let me just raise a red flag on the quoted item. As a level 35 character, if I can gain experience while grouped with 5 level 40 characters (without mentoring), and are able to bring down a level 40 encounter and I recieve a level 40 drop, it makes no sense to me whatsoever for that item to scale down to level 35 when I equip it however minor that scaling might be. It seems like at worst the scaling of items would begin at the fringe of the range at which players could group and still recieve xp.
I guess I don't understand why Pantheon has taken the stance of "We don't Want people to twink, we are doing everything we can to discourage it"
90% of the people here came from EQ1. a game where you can twink. It's not like a Fungi Tunic dropped like water. You either had to get an Good Group to even get to it or be very rich.
What's the point of money if I can never use it to buy a Fungi or Cloak of Flames. I wasn't able to get a Cloak of Flames until a YEAR after Kunark went live.
A year later, we were close to having Velious. Twinking doesn't happen Right Away. Twinking happens AFTER your main has been thru the main content and has most of the armor he needs to be good at healing raids etc.
Twinking happens AFTER you get a lot of money. To me, it was more fun to start a lev 1 wizard with +2 INT rings or the +15hp/mana (player made jewelry), a sevants cap, and Oracle Robe, etc
These items are Not "best in slot" items, they were just decent, Good, Twink items. Twinking is FUN for those that earn the right to be able to do it. The Right being: I have played the game long enough that I can afford to start my new toon out with gear instead of a cloth robe.
It basically takes an expansion to make twinking a real thing. If you remember, a Fungi and CoF were NOT easy to get. Those items shouldn't be scaled to be useless.
There can also just be Lev requirements on some gear as well. But you don't have to go overboard with that either. CoF and Fungi held value for YEARS because they could be used on a lev 1 character. With items scaling, it make the fungi valueless.
Can we shed some light on this? Why, when most of the players here are EQ1 Vets, do you want to take away Twinking from those that want to do it. I will likely never mentor. I will just have 6-8 toons going and one of them will fit into groups of various levels. I can teach Noobs how to play on a lev 10 wizard just as easy as Mentoring my over powered Lev 50 Cleric.
Naim said:I guess I don't understand why Pantheon has taken the stance of "We don't Want people to twink, we are doing everything we can to discourage it"
While I agree with you that twinking is a fun and compelling thing, and that it does support a strong economy, it's well worth pointing out that you're not quoting VR. You're quoting Amris, and Amris does not speak for VR.
I was actually paraphrasing what Brad said just a few posts up:
aradune said:
"And of course, there will be many incentives for players to *not* twink an item, mostly positive incentives, making it more worthwhile to trade the item in, sacrifice it, augment it, etc. This should slow but not eliminate twinking"
to me I read: we don't want people to twink, we are doing everything we can to discourage it"
We really should try to be nicer to each other - we are all on the same side even when we disagree on specific issues.
On the topic of twinking - I think some of the disagreement is because we don't all define twinking the same way.
Giving a level 1, or level 10, much better gear than a new player would have because you already have the coin for it from a high level - or because you crafted it - is one thing. Giving VERY overpowered items that let that level 1 or 10 breeze through content easily and perhaps solo group content is a very different thing. Especially since it would allow the twinked character to group with new players and speed THEM past content. This is where the issue is, not simply letting a second character get to high level too fast.
Mod Edit: Remove quote from deleted reply.
@ Dorotea -- Absolutely right. Being able to discuss doesnt have to include the personal attacks.
@Naim - Then dont put it in quotes. Regardless, I dont agree with your assessment. "Doing everything" to discourage it would include a hell of a lot more than item scaling. I really dont like the notion of item scaling. But I dont know what it'll look like, so I dont know how bad I might think it is. I can't form a definitive opinion until I actually see it, and it would be irresponsible of me to make blanket statements defining the opinions or intentions of the devs who've never said anything of the like. If they really wanted to do everything, they would put level limits on every item, or make everything no drop. They instead appear to be trying to strike a balance between "everything they can", and avoiding the ability to completely trivialize low level content for low level characters. I may not like it, but I can respect it.
Edit: And honestly I really like the idea that we can sacrifice items for perks. I sometimes just dont want to deal with trying to sell things to other players who probably arent interested anyway, and having an option between selling for pennies to a vendor or getting some other benefit is really interesting. I cant wait to see that one in practice.
Maybe we can step back from the cliff for a minute?
Keep in mind things like item balance and gear scaling have numerous updates during beta. The developers are looking for a certain "feel". A lot of stats are simply placeholders until they see it in action then tweak it to fit their feel. The argument of "twinking should or should not be allowed" comes from two different areas of reasoning. EQ1 was a very slow pace, while Vanguard was much quicker. The desire to twink in Vanguard was much less (imo). We (well, I at least) cannot recommend item balance and scaling changes until I'm playing ... err testing ... the game in alpha/beta.
Feyshtey said:@ Dorotea -- Absolutely right. Being able to discuss doesnt have to include the personal attacks.
@Naim - Then dont put it in quotes. Regardless, I dont agree with your assessment. "Doing everything" to discourage it would include a hell of a lot more than item scaling. I really dont like the notion of item scaling. But I dont know what it'll look like, so I dont know how bad I might think it is. I can't form a definitive opinion until I actually see it, and it would be irresponsible of me to make blanket statements defining the opinions or intentions of the devs who've never said anything of the like. If they really wanted to do everything, they would put level limits on every item, or make everything no drop. They instead appear to be trying to strike a balance between "everything they can", and avoiding the ability to completely trivialize low level content for low level characters. I may not like it, but I can respect it.
Edit: And honestly I really like the idea that we can sacrifice items for perks. I sometimes just dont want to deal with trying to sell things to other players who probably arent interested anyway, and having an option between selling for pennies to a vendor or getting some other benefit is really interesting. I cant wait to see that one in practice.
Maybe we can step back from the cliff for a minute?
They aren't doing everything to be sure, but they are doing quite a lot. By adding augmenting (on top of everything else) and making it bind an item to a character they are going pretty far to discourage it. We all know augmentation becomes the standard, this will likely cripple the end game item market quite a bit (especially for lore items) on top of further stopping twinks. Honestly item scaling done well is plenty enough for it to not be a problem.
Also a bit concerned about these buffs/sacrifice perks but i'll wait for more details.
Naim said:
I guess I don't understand why Pantheon has taken the stance of "We don't Want people to twink, we are doing everything we can to discourage it"
With all due respect, this is simply false. I guarantee you that even with many systems and options encouraging people not to twink, there will be plenty of twinking. The idea is to control the rate of item inflation (or is it deflation, I always forget) and not have it spiral out of control, exceeding our ability to refresh and add to the game new items, etc.
To me twinking is incredibly unhealthy for the game. It leads to a rift between non twinks and twinks in groups and changes people's priorities, maybe non twinks want to go to a dungeon to do a certain quest but twinks don't care about that because they have better gear already. Twinking just leads to a more streamlined powerleveling culture where experience gain becomes more of a priority beacuse you can just buy or trade your alt character a full set of gear.
The core tenants of challenging group play and unmitigated twinking do not combine well together. Even the stance they have taken now to allow item scaling still disincentivizes players from trying to acquire level appropriate gear if they are twinked because it will supposedly be less powerful. Even situational gear packages for twinks could becomes standard for various climates or environments.
Not having level limits on items places a higher importance on the items that come from the end game, and therefore the end game. Lower level items that are inferior versions of higher level counterparts will have a very low value, the only low level items that will retain value will be items with unique effects that are not present on any higher level gear. This seems like a bad thing for the economy.
Hopefully the attempts to control item inflation are successful but I fear that the players will always find a way to game the system. There will just be certain items that are ideal for twinking that do not get sacrificed for buffs or whatever other system is in place, and these items will distort the low level game in an unhealthy way in my opinion.
Naim said:
I was actually paraphrasing what Brad said just a few posts up:
aradune said:
"And of course, there will be many incentives for players to *not* twink an item, mostly positive incentives, making it more worthwhile to trade the item in, sacrifice it, augment it, etc. This should slow but not eliminate twinking"
to me I read: we don't want people to twink, we are doing everything we can to discourage it"
A prime example of swinging the "pendulum" that Brad was talking about and dealing with extremes because trying to understand it accurately takes too much effort. Don't let your personal biases get in the way of seeing the truth.