One of the things I loved in EQ was that almost all gear was tradeable and very few had level requirements. Making level 1 characters and giving them end game gear was always super fun. Has anyone heard what Pantheon is going to do regarding gear? If so, please link the video or article where Pantheon states their intentions
This is probably one of my greatest concerns with Pantheon, not the fact that you could trade all your gear to level 1 character. I am scared of pretty much all gear being tradeable to anyone in a modern MMO, I think this is a dangerous path to walk. In the Everquest days there wasn't a ton of people playing it and gold farmers were not a thing. But even in those days you had people farming items all day that everyone wanted to make money so you either had to buy it or you were out of luck. Now you are going to have gold farmers and who knows how many times more people playing. I worry this game will follow the path of early FFXI where if you don't find a way to farm money, buy gold, or craft it, you will have no equipment as you level up. There is not going to be much adventure if every boss in the game is being farmed by higher level people for money.
So I don't mind if they make gear tradeable and useable by level one characters but I feel most of it should be account locked. Either that or at least make it unique so you can only have one of them on you at a time. The unique thing can still be exploited by having a bunch of alts to transfer the items to but it at least would slow people down a little. As usual I know this won't be a popular opinion, but I had to put it out there because its a very real worry that has happened in other games. Maybe there is piece of the puzzle I am missing that would stop this from happening but to me it looks extremely exploitable.
Evade said:One of the things I loved in EQ was that almost all gear was tradeable and very few had level requirements. Making level 1 characters and giving them end game gear was always super fun. Has anyone heard what Pantheon is going to do regarding gear? If so, please link the video or article where Pantheon states their intentions
Based on what they have said in the various streams, gear does not have level requirements to work, but will be more effective if you are of the "proper level" for it. For instance, you can "twink" a low-level character wwith a high level sword, and you will still be able to use it; however you will need to be of the "appropriate level" to be utilizing it to its maximum effectiveness. They said that they don't plan on having requirements to equip gear, but that they support having level requirements for procs and clickies.
Kalok said:Evade said:One of the things I loved in EQ was that almost all gear was tradeable and very few had level requirements. Making level 1 characters and giving them end game gear was always super fun. Has anyone heard what Pantheon is going to do regarding gear? If so, please link the video or article where Pantheon states their intentions
Based on what they have said in the various streams, gear does not have level requirements to work, but will be more effective if you are of the "proper level" for it. For instance, you can "twink" a low-level character wwith a high level sword, and you will still be able to use it; however you will need to be of the "appropriate level" to be utilizing it to its maximum effectiveness. They said that they don't plan on having requirements to equip gear, but that they support having level requirements for procs and clickies.
So very much in the same vein as EQ... Nice
Kalok said:Evade said:One of the things I loved in EQ was that almost all gear was tradeable and very few had level requirements. Making level 1 characters and giving them end game gear was always super fun. Has anyone heard what Pantheon is going to do regarding gear? If so, please link the video or article where Pantheon states their intentions
Based on what they have said in the various streams, gear does not have level requirements to work, but will be more effective if you are of the "proper level" for it. For instance, you can "twink" a low-level character wwith a high level sword, and you will still be able to use it; however you will need to be of the "appropriate level" to be utilizing it to its maximum effectiveness. They said that they don't plan on having requirements to equip gear, but that they support having level requirements for procs and clickies.
If this comes to fruition, a twink with higher-level gear will still be far better off than using level appropriate gear mostly because that higher level gear will scale up as the twink levels up thus negating the need to replace any of the gear in the process. So if you are twinking out a Paladin and you give it some plate armor from level 35 mobs, a big honking hammer, etc it can just stay in that gear until level 35+.
The other half of this coin is buffs. Will buffs scale down to be 'level appropriate'? If you don't do both, the gear could be junk and the buffs will overcompensate. As a person who twinked a dozen characters in EQ1, putting level 50+ Shaman buffs on a level 1 ShadowKnight twink (naked at that) made it an unstoppable killing machine for as long as the buffs stayed active.
As far as I know scaling is still the plan when it comes to twinked items instead of level requirements, and that the vast majority of items will be fully tradable and not soulbound/account bound/no-drop.
Aradune said: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 weigh 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.
Vandraad said:Kalok said:Evade said:One of the things I loved in EQ was that almost all gear was tradeable and very few had level requirements. Making level 1 characters and giving them end game gear was always super fun. Has anyone heard what Pantheon is going to do regarding gear? If so, please link the video or article where Pantheon states their intentions
Based on what they have said in the various streams, gear does not have level requirements to work, but will be more effective if you are of the "proper level" for it. For instance, you can "twink" a low-level character wwith a high level sword, and you will still be able to use it; however you will need to be of the "appropriate level" to be utilizing it to its maximum effectiveness. They said that they don't plan on having requirements to equip gear, but that they support having level requirements for procs and clickies.
If this comes to fruition, a twink with higher-level gear will still be far better off than using level appropriate gear mostly because that higher level gear will scale up as the twink levels up thus negating the need to replace any of the gear in the process. So if you are twinking out a Paladin and you give it some plate armor from level 35 mobs, a big honking hammer, etc it can just stay in that gear until level 35+.
The other half of this coin is buffs. Will buffs scale down to be 'level appropriate'? If you don't do both, the gear could be junk and the buffs will overcompensate. As a person who twinked a dozen characters in EQ1, putting level 50+ Shaman buffs on a level 1 ShadowKnight twink (naked at that) made it an unstoppable killing machine for as long as the buffs stayed active.
Yes, buffs will scale down.
As far as twinking and gear, they said something about putting in reasons to NOT hand your gear to lower levels as you levlel up and get better gear, but they didn't elaborate on what it would look like.
Damacon said:This is probably one of my greatest concerns with Pantheon, not the fact that you could trade all your gear to level 1 character. I am scared of pretty much all gear being tradeable to anyone in a modern MMO, I think this is a dangerous path to walk. In the Everquest days there wasn't a ton of people playing it and gold farmers were not a thing. But even in those days you had people farming items all day that everyone wanted to make money so you either had to buy it or you were out of luck. Now you are going to have gold farmers and who knows how many times more people playing. I worry this game will follow the path of early FFXI where if you don't find a way to farm money, buy gold, or craft it, you will have no equipment as you level up. There is not going to be much adventure if every boss in the game is being farmed by higher level people for money.
So I don't mind if they make gear tradeable and useable by level one characters but I feel most of it should be account locked. Either that or at least make it unique so you can only have one of them on you at a time. The unique thing can still be exploited by having a bunch of alts to transfer the items to but it at least would slow people down a little. As usual I know this won't be a popular opinion, but I had to put it out there because its a very real worry that has happened in other games. Maybe there is piece of the puzzle I am missing that would stop this from happening but to me it looks extremely exploitable.
Grimseethe said:I hope gear does have level requirement, otherwise people will just twink and be OP for their level.
Will also stop people doing pve content because they can just have one main to farm or buy gear and give it to alts or other low level players.
These are valid concerns and are the reason that gear level requirements were introduced into MMOs post-EQ.
My understanding is they are going the "recommended level" route, which means the gear sort of has a soft level requirement. Once you reach that level the gear is full strength. Until then, the powers are scaled down.
I support twinking, so I suppose this is a good compromise. Roleplaying wise, I guess I can find it hard to imagine a weak commoner being able to fully wield an extremely powerful item, so you can make a Lore reason why this is supported.
Twinking helps build the economy. I agree Plat/Gold sellers ruin that and I'm all for strong regulations preventing that practice. Level Req. and No Drop was a way to combat that, but it did sort of ruin the economy. In EQ most items could be worn at any level but affects didn't work until you reached a certain level. The items power scaled to your level a bit to, so while a level 1 with raid gear is better than your normal level 1 he wasn't doing insane damage.
EppE said:Twinking helps build the economy. I agree Plat/Gold sellers ruin that and I'm all for strong regulations preventing that practice. Level Req. and No Drop was a way to combat that, but it did sort of ruin the economy. In EQ most items could be worn at any level but affects didn't work until you reached a certain level. The items power scaled to your level a bit to, so while a level 1 with raid gear is better than your normal level 1 he wasn't doing insane damage.
Yep I agree twinking does actually help an economy somewhat, but in a non instanced game you can create a monopoly on items which does nothing but hurt the economy. If there is a rare item everyone wants then simply make sure no one else but you gets that item. You can then price it at whatever you want forcing people to either buy gold to obtain it or farm money some other way forever.
You could simply say "oh well the group who does the most damage on a boss get the drops" so it could be contested but is that really what you want. Like 30 groups of people sitting around a single boss trying to steal it from each other, that is what happened in early FFXI. I don't want see every good piece of gear being fought over like a scrap of food in a horde of starved animals. Its one thing if its a raid boss and if one raid wipes the other gets a chance but with regular bosses its just going to suck.
Damacon said:Yep I agree twinking does actually help an economy somewhat, but in a non instanced game you can create a monopoly on items which does nothing but hurt the economy. If there is a rare item everyone wants then simply make sure no one else but you gets that item. You can then price it at whatever you want forcing people to either buy gold to obtain it or farm money some other way forever.
You could simply say "oh well the group who does the most damage on a boss get the drops" so it could be contested but is that really what you want. Like 30 groups of people sitting around a single boss trying to steal it from each other, that is what happened in early FFXI. I don't want see every good piece of gear being fought over like a scrap of food in a horde of starved animals. Its one thing if its a raid boss and if one raid wipes the other gets a chance but with regular bosses its just going to suck.
The better option is addressing the ability of players to monopolize any given items/content. Without near fully tradable itemization any real/deep player economy will be severly hamstrung from the start. Twinking and full tradability was by far the main reason EQ had such a rich economy.
Evade said: Making level 1 characters and giving them end game gear was always super fun. Has anyone heard what Pantheon is going to do regarding gear? If so, please link the video or article where Pantheon states their intentions
Item Level or Stat Requirements? - From Cohh Rogue stream. Aradune basically says "Items will scale down" and then talks about systems that will allow you to sacrfice or dismantle items for long term buffs or augments to your current gear thus slowing down the trickle down of high level items to lower level players.
Can you twink in this game? - From Cohh Monk stream. Aradune again says "Items will scale down". He then also mentions there might be some pass down of items through progeny system.
Buff and Item scaling - From Cohh Monk stream part 2. Joppa clarifies how the buff or item scaling will work on lower level players. He explains that when you equip an item it will not magically have lower stats listed on the item, and when you put a high level buff on a low level player it will not magically give them less stat than the same buff on a high level player.
He explains that due to the skill caps for each level, a low level player will not be able to take full advantage of the boosted stats on an item or buff because his correlating skill means he does not have the full proficiency to utilize the item to it's fullest.
Basically... The way I understand what he explains....
For example, if it is a sword... the low level player won't have high enough 'slashing' skill to hit for the full damage that this sword would be able to do, whereas an appropriate level player would have a higher 'slashing' skill and thus be able to hit for the full max damage.
Obviously, armour items would be tied to different skill types such as 'defense' skills.
With the stats on items or from buffs, the added 'stat' would still be the same value, but again due to skill caps that player will not see the same benefits from increased stats that a higher player would.
This suggests to me (Goofy's words here, not Joppa's) that for example a +strength buff might add +5 damage on your hits for each point of strength for a player with a high 'offensive' skill. But for a lower level player with a lower 'offensive' skill, they may only see an increase of +1 damage for each point of Strength. Likewise, a +wisdom or +intellect buff might add +10 healing/damage for each point of wisdom/intellect for a player with a high 'Alteration' or 'Evocation' skill. But a low level player with a lower 'Alteration' or 'Evocation' skill may only get +3 healing/damage for each point of wisdom/intellect.
So as the player levels up, and his skills improve... the stats from items and buffs would get progressively better. Which suggests that even without getting newer items, you will see a slight increase in your power as soon as you level up and your skills start improving and your stats start becoming more potent.
Joppa then also goes on to talk about 'Proc' or 'click' effects. The term Proc refers to when an item 'processes the effect' randomly or on an interval as you use the item. Whereas 'click' refers to the player actively deciding when to trigger the effect. These effects on items will have level restrictions based on the level of the effect in question. So if the effect is a level 30 spell, you may be required to be level 30 before the effect will Proc or be clickable.
As for Passive effects such as 'haste' or 'regen' effects on items, there is no plan to restrict this based on level.
Iksar said:The better option is addressing the ability of players to monopolize any given items/content. Without near fully tradable itemization any real/deep player economy will be severly hamstrung from the start. Twinking and full tradability was by far the main reason EQ had such a rich economy.
You can't really use EQ as a guiding stone in this regard, you are talking about a game that existed before the problems did and by the time they started showing up EQ had changed from its original format somewhat. The population of this game will be massive compared to EQ and gold farmers will be there from day one. You might be lucky if you are a group of people who can stay ahead of the rest, but in the long term you are going to have problems with new players almost guaranteed.
I would like to see items tradeable with the ability to twink as I don't think that is generally a bad thing but in a non instance base game you don't have many options. The ones I can think of are as such.
1. Make items unique which will not solve the problem but might slow it down
2. Make more rare boss items account bound so you can twink your characters but not sell the items
3. Make it so you can only obtain the items if you are in level range thus at least stopping some high level people from farming them. But you could still exploit probably by out of group high levels helping a lower level team.
4. Crafted gear is equal or close to anything you can find in the wild and easy to make plus flooding the market so you have no need to go to any dungeons other than for exp.
5. The idea I have not thought about that hopefully VR has or someone can think of haha
Damacon said:I would like to see items tradeable with the ability to twink as I don't think that is generally a bad thing but in a non instance base game you don't have many options. The ones I can think of are as such.
1. Make items unique which will not solve the problem but might slow it down
2. Make more rare boss items account bound so you can twink your characters but not sell the items
3. Make it so you can only obtain the items if you are in level range thus at least stopping some high level people from farming them. But you could still exploit probably by out of group high levels helping a lower level team.
4. Crafted gear is equal or close to anything you can find in the wild and easy to make plus flooding the market so you have no need to go to any dungeons other than for exp.
5. The idea I have not thought about that hopefully VR has or someone can think of haha
6.) Random or at least semi-random spawn locations (i.e. Lord Big Loots most often spawns in the Lord's Chamber spawn but also has a small percent chance to spawn in many other places in the zone).
7.) Multiple locations in the world to obtain very similar (if not identical) drops (stat wise).
8.) Equivalent crafted gear that is difficult/expensive to make (requiring destroying 2 or more valuable/rare drops for materials).
9.) Lockout timer/flagging for some rare drops in addition to the item(s) being "lore" or 1 per character at a time (i.e. Someone who has looted a FBSS cannot loot another for a week or longer even if they got rid of the first).
10.) Ensure more common but slightly lower quality alternatives exist in the world, undercutting the market for the better version should it try to stray too far in price.
11.) Any combination of the above and/or ideas others might think of that don't break the significance of items. Failing that refer to #5 again.
Iksar said:Damacon said:I would like to see items tradeable with the ability to twink as I don't think that is generally a bad thing but in a non instance base game you don't have many options. The ones I can think of are as such.
1. Make items unique which will not solve the problem but might slow it down
2. Make more rare boss items account bound so you can twink your characters but not sell the items
3. Make it so you can only obtain the items if you are in level range thus at least stopping some high level people from farming them. But you could still exploit probably by out of group high levels helping a lower level team.
4. Crafted gear is equal or close to anything you can find in the wild and easy to make plus flooding the market so you have no need to go to any dungeons other than for exp.
5. The idea I have not thought about that hopefully VR has or someone can think of haha
6.) Random or at least semi-random spawn locations (i.e. Lord Big Loots most often spawns in the Lord's Chamber spawn but also has a small percent chance to spawn in many other places in the zone).
7.) Multiple locations in the world to obtain very similar (if not identical) drops (stat wise).
8.) Equivalent crafted gear that is difficult/expensive to make (requiring destroying 2 or more valuable/rare drops for materials).
9.) Lockout timer/flagging for some rare drops in addition to the item(s) being "lore" or 1 per character at a time (i.e. Someone who has looted a FBSS cannot loot another for a week or longer even if they got rid of the first).
10.) Ensure more common but slightly lower quality alternatives exist in the world, undercutting the market for the better version should it try to stray too far in price.
11.) Any combination of the above and/or ideas others might think of that don't break the significance of items. Failing that refer to #5 again.
I like number 9 the most and I think they already have number 10 in place from what I have seen of the streams mobs drop lower grade gear. The main problem is the FBSS or weight reduction bag type items that everyone wants and you know there isn't going to be multiple close versions of it that is why I like 9. But yeah one of the main problems FFXI and EQ had was there just wasn't enough decent lower grade gear. All the gear was either no stat poop gear or the really good rare items that made a huge difference.
12. Another one is to have long chain quest gear that's comparable to some of the more rare drops
Damacon said:EppE said:Twinking helps build the economy. I agree Plat/Gold sellers ruin that and I'm all for strong regulations preventing that practice. Level Req. and No Drop was a way to combat that, but it did sort of ruin the economy. In EQ most items could be worn at any level but affects didn't work until you reached a certain level. The items power scaled to your level a bit to, so while a level 1 with raid gear is better than your normal level 1 he wasn't doing insane damage.
Yep I agree twinking does actually help an economy somewhat, but in a non instanced game you can create a monopoly on items which does nothing but hurt the economy. If there is a rare item everyone wants then simply make sure no one else but you gets that item. You can then price it at whatever you want forcing people to either buy gold to obtain it or farm money some other way forever.
You could simply say "oh well the group who does the most damage on a boss get the drops" so it could be contested but is that really what you want. Like 30 groups of people sitting around a single boss trying to steal it from each other, that is what happened in early FFXI. I don't want see every good piece of gear being fought over like a scrap of food in a horde of starved animals. Its one thing if its a raid boss and if one raid wipes the other gets a chance but with regular bosses its just going to suck.
Everquest had no level requirements and none of this happened. There was no monopoly on items
Evade said:Damacon said:EppE said:Twinking helps build the economy. I agree Plat/Gold sellers ruin that and I'm all for strong regulations preventing that practice. Level Req. and No Drop was a way to combat that, but it did sort of ruin the economy. In EQ most items could be worn at any level but affects didn't work until you reached a certain level. The items power scaled to your level a bit to, so while a level 1 with raid gear is better than your normal level 1 he wasn't doing insane damage.
Yep I agree twinking does actually help an economy somewhat, but in a non instanced game you can create a monopoly on items which does nothing but hurt the economy. If there is a rare item everyone wants then simply make sure no one else but you gets that item. You can then price it at whatever you want forcing people to either buy gold to obtain it or farm money some other way forever.
You could simply say "oh well the group who does the most damage on a boss get the drops" so it could be contested but is that really what you want. Like 30 groups of people sitting around a single boss trying to steal it from each other, that is what happened in early FFXI. I don't want see every good piece of gear being fought over like a scrap of food in a horde of starved animals. Its one thing if its a raid boss and if one raid wipes the other gets a chance but with regular bosses its just going to suck.
Everquest had no level requirements and none of this happened. There was no monopoly on items
Yeah it actually did happen a little bit with certain items that everyone wanted like weight reduction bags, FBSS, Ghoulbane, and the Dark Reaver off the top of my mind. But you also got to realize Everquest was one of the first MMO's, there was no gold farmers and it had a tiny tiny tiny fraction of the population compared to modern MMO's on launch. The no level requirements and from what I have seen the lower tier gear that drops off regular mobs will help a lot for keeping Pantheon playable. But if you make items that everyone wants then there is going to be people farming them for money its just a fact unless you find a way to stop it. Me and Iskar were talking about ways to avoid it, if they have some of those in place it should help a lot in evening out the playing field a bit. But if its exactly like EQ then yeah there is going to be certain items if not the majority of items that are being farmed for money by gold farmers. Gold farmers do not fear using hacks/bots to help them, nor do they fear being banned so they will steal your mob/train you, and they will be there all day/night because its thier job. But mainly you will not 100% know if they are gold farmers because they sell thier gold on a different characters obviously so will be hard to call them out a lot of times.
Iksar said:Damacon said:I would like to see items tradeable with the ability to twink as I don't think that is generally a bad thing but in a non instance base game you don't have many options. The ones I can think of are as such.
1. Make items unique which will not solve the problem but might slow it down
2. Make more rare boss items account bound so you can twink your characters but not sell the items
3. Make it so you can only obtain the items if you are in level range thus at least stopping some high level people from farming them. But you could still exploit probably by out of group high levels helping a lower level team.
4. Crafted gear is equal or close to anything you can find in the wild and easy to make plus flooding the market so you have no need to go to any dungeons other than for exp.
5. The idea I have not thought about that hopefully VR has or someone can think of haha
6.) Random or at least semi-random spawn locations (i.e. Lord Big Loots most often spawns in the Lord's Chamber spawn but also has a small percent chance to spawn in many other places in the zone).
7.) Multiple locations in the world to obtain very similar (if not identical) drops (stat wise).
8.) Equivalent crafted gear that is difficult/expensive to make (requiring destroying 2 or more valuable/rare drops for materials).
9.) Lockout timer/flagging for some rare drops in addition to the item(s) being "lore" or 1 per character at a time (i.e. Someone who has looted a FBSS cannot loot another for a week or longer even if they got rid of the first).
10.) Ensure more common but slightly lower quality alternatives exist in the world, undercutting the market for the better version should it try to stray too far in price.
11.) Any combination of the above and/or ideas others might think of that don't break the significance of items. Failing that refer to #5 again.
I've been a strong advocate of #7 for a long time. If the ring of peppermint scent drops only from the Dark Elf, then everyone who wants the ring of peppermint scent will be camping the poor Dark Elf, including gold farmers and guilds.
If the ring of peppermint scent drops from all tier 5 bosses (maybe with a slightly different % from boss to boss), then it doesn't matter who you are fighting ; you might get a ring of peppermint scent. It makes it more difficult to gold farmers or a guild to monopolize a sought after item, unless they are willing to camp EVERY tier 5 boss at ALL times.
Add to that a little bit of #6, and you have yourself something going. Also, make unique items obtainable only through lenghty questlines to water down monopoly a bit...
Raids should give very strong items, but again, have the drops shared among all similar tier raid targets to help combat camping and monopoly.
It wouldn't solve everything, but it would help. Would also make playing the game a bit more organic to play ; if the item you want can drop anywhere, you can explore everywhere, and not only play in the Dark Elf's cave for 3 weeks because you've been unlucky with your ring of peppermint scent drop. During those 3 weeks, with a different drop system, maybe you've helped a few guildmates with lenghty quests, and got your ring of peppermint scent from the Fat Gnome instead of the Dark Elf.
Ludek said:Iksar said:Damacon said:I would like to see items tradeable with the ability to twink as I don't think that is generally a bad thing but in a non instance base game you don't have many options. The ones I can think of are as such.
1. Make items unique which will not solve the problem but might slow it down
2. Make more rare boss items account bound so you can twink your characters but not sell the items
3. Make it so you can only obtain the items if you are in level range thus at least stopping some high level people from farming them. But you could still exploit probably by out of group high levels helping a lower level team.
4. Crafted gear is equal or close to anything you can find in the wild and easy to make plus flooding the market so you have no need to go to any dungeons other than for exp.
5. The idea I have not thought about that hopefully VR has or someone can think of haha
6.) Random or at least semi-random spawn locations (i.e. Lord Big Loots most often spawns in the Lord's Chamber spawn but also has a small percent chance to spawn in many other places in the zone).
7.) Multiple locations in the world to obtain very similar (if not identical) drops (stat wise).
8.) Equivalent crafted gear that is difficult/expensive to make (requiring destroying 2 or more valuable/rare drops for materials).
9.) Lockout timer/flagging for some rare drops in addition to the item(s) being "lore" or 1 per character at a time (i.e. Someone who has looted a FBSS cannot loot another for a week or longer even if they got rid of the first).
10.) Ensure more common but slightly lower quality alternatives exist in the world, undercutting the market for the better version should it try to stray too far in price.
11.) Any combination of the above and/or ideas others might think of that don't break the significance of items. Failing that refer to #5 again.
I've been a strong advocate of #7 for a long time. If the ring of peppermint scent drops only from the Dark Elf, then everyone who wants the ring of peppermint scent will be camping the poor Dark Elf, including gold farmers and guilds.
If the ring of peppermint scent drops from all tier 5 bosses (maybe with a slightly different % from boss to boss), then it doesn't matter who you are fighting ; you might get a ring of peppermint scent. It makes it more difficult to gold farmers or a guild to monopolize a sought after item, unless they are willing to camp EVERY tier 5 boss at ALL times.
Add to that a little bit of #6, and you have yourself something going. Also, make unique items obtainable only through lenghty questlines to water down monopoly a bit...
Raids should give very strong items, but again, have the drops shared among all similar tier raid targets to help combat camping and monopoly.
It wouldn't solve everything, but it would help. Would also make playing the game a bit more organic to play ; if the item you want can drop anywhere, you can explore everywhere, and not only play in the Dark Elf's cave for 3 weeks because you've been unlucky with your ring of peppermint scent drop. During those 3 weeks, with a different drop system, maybe you've helped a few guildmates with lenghty quests, and got your ring of peppermint scent from the Fat Gnome instead of the Dark Elf.
But wouldn’t it also make it damn near impossible for a non gold farmer to obtain the item through camping it themselves?
Its basically solving a problem by creating another. I think there are better solutions out there like items being unique/account bound (tradable within characters on the same account) or items that come with lock out period IE loot a flowing black silk sash, the account can’t loot another 1 for a year or whatever
Ludek said:I've been a strong advocate of #7 for a long time. If the ring of peppermint scent drops only from the Dark Elf, then everyone who wants the ring of peppermint scent will be camping the poor Dark Elf, including gold farmers and guilds.
If the ring of peppermint scent drops from all tier 5 bosses (maybe with a slightly different % from boss to boss), then it doesn't matter who you are fighting ; you might get a ring of peppermint scent. It makes it more difficult to gold farmers or a guild to monopolize a sought after item, unless they are willing to camp EVERY tier 5 boss at ALL times.
Add to that a little bit of #6, and you have yourself something going. Also, make unique items obtainable only through lenghty questlines to water down monopoly a bit...
Raids should give very strong items, but again, have the drops shared among all similar tier raid targets to help combat camping and monopoly.
It wouldn't solve everything, but it would help. Would also make playing the game a bit more organic to play ; if the item you want can drop anywhere, you can explore everywhere, and not only play in the Dark Elf's cave for 3 weeks because you've been unlucky with your ring of peppermint scent drop. During those 3 weeks, with a different drop system, maybe you've helped a few guildmates with lenghty quests, and got your ring of peppermint scent from the Fat Gnome instead of the Dark Elf.
Yep I don't mind if bosses spawn in mutiple places or some share some of the same equipment, but I wouldn't want all the equipment to be shared among bosses in the same level range. When a piece of gear is done right it makes sense for it drop of a certain mob, like you kill a giant spider and it drops a spider fang weapon something to that effect. You don't have to follow those rules with everything but it gives the game a lot more depth if it follows it most of the time. For raid creatures though, I think you almost have to have some of their loot tables shared since their will only be so many bosses to kill. In the case your talking about also no reason why a ring couldn't drop from a wide variety of mobs, unless it was the ring of peppermint scent that dropped from the Peppermint Soldier then it should probably be limited to him haha.
Evade said:Ludek said:Iksar said:Damacon said:I would like to see items tradeable with the ability to twink as I don't think that is generally a bad thing but in a non instance base game you don't have many options. The ones I can think of are as such.
1. Make items unique which will not solve the problem but might slow it down
2. Make more rare boss items account bound so you can twink your characters but not sell the items
3. Make it so you can only obtain the items if you are in level range thus at least stopping some high level people from farming them. But you could still exploit probably by out of group high levels helping a lower level team.
4. Crafted gear is equal or close to anything you can find in the wild and easy to make plus flooding the market so you have no need to go to any dungeons other than for exp.
5. The idea I have not thought about that hopefully VR has or someone can think of haha
6.) Random or at least semi-random spawn locations (i.e. Lord Big Loots most often spawns in the Lord's Chamber spawn but also has a small percent chance to spawn in many other places in the zone).
7.) Multiple locations in the world to obtain very similar (if not identical) drops (stat wise).
8.) Equivalent crafted gear that is difficult/expensive to make (requiring destroying 2 or more valuable/rare drops for materials).
9.) Lockout timer/flagging for some rare drops in addition to the item(s) being "lore" or 1 per character at a time (i.e. Someone who has looted a FBSS cannot loot another for a week or longer even if they got rid of the first).
10.) Ensure more common but slightly lower quality alternatives exist in the world, undercutting the market for the better version should it try to stray too far in price.
11.) Any combination of the above and/or ideas others might think of that don't break the significance of items. Failing that refer to #5 again.
I've been a strong advocate of #7 for a long time. If the ring of peppermint scent drops only from the Dark Elf, then everyone who wants the ring of peppermint scent will be camping the poor Dark Elf, including gold farmers and guilds.
If the ring of peppermint scent drops from all tier 5 bosses (maybe with a slightly different % from boss to boss), then it doesn't matter who you are fighting ; you might get a ring of peppermint scent. It makes it more difficult to gold farmers or a guild to monopolize a sought after item, unless they are willing to camp EVERY tier 5 boss at ALL times.
Add to that a little bit of #6, and you have yourself something going. Also, make unique items obtainable only through lenghty questlines to water down monopoly a bit...
Raids should give very strong items, but again, have the drops shared among all similar tier raid targets to help combat camping and monopoly.
It wouldn't solve everything, but it would help. Would also make playing the game a bit more organic to play ; if the item you want can drop anywhere, you can explore everywhere, and not only play in the Dark Elf's cave for 3 weeks because you've been unlucky with your ring of peppermint scent drop. During those 3 weeks, with a different drop system, maybe you've helped a few guildmates with lenghty quests, and got your ring of peppermint scent from the Fat Gnome instead of the Dark Elf.
But wouldn’t it also make it damn near impossible for a non gold farmer to obtain the item through camping it themselves?
Its basically solving a problem by creating another. I think there are better solutions out there like items being unique/account bound (tradable within characters on the same account) or items that come with lock out period IE loot a flowing black silk sash, the account can’t loot another 1 for a year or whatever
Not really...it only becomes a problem if there is nothing else to do but camping things. If the game is well designed with plenty to do to adventure, explore, work on skill upgrades, lengthy quests etc. (and then helping others in all those endeavours), then you should be either rewarded organically with the ring yourself through just playing the game, or with another item that you can trade for said ring, or sell to buy what you want.
What you're suggesting is to basically do what MMORPGs have been doing for 10 years now. I sure would love for this game to be one of the rare ones to think outside the box regarding this.
Damacon said:Ludek said:I've been a strong advocate of #7 for a long time. If the ring of peppermint scent drops only from the Dark Elf, then everyone who wants the ring of peppermint scent will be camping the poor Dark Elf, including gold farmers and guilds.
If the ring of peppermint scent drops from all tier 5 bosses (maybe with a slightly different % from boss to boss), then it doesn't matter who you are fighting ; you might get a ring of peppermint scent. It makes it more difficult to gold farmers or a guild to monopolize a sought after item, unless they are willing to camp EVERY tier 5 boss at ALL times.
Add to that a little bit of #6, and you have yourself something going. Also, make unique items obtainable only through lenghty questlines to water down monopoly a bit...
Raids should give very strong items, but again, have the drops shared among all similar tier raid targets to help combat camping and monopoly.
It wouldn't solve everything, but it would help. Would also make playing the game a bit more organic to play ; if the item you want can drop anywhere, you can explore everywhere, and not only play in the Dark Elf's cave for 3 weeks because you've been unlucky with your ring of peppermint scent drop. During those 3 weeks, with a different drop system, maybe you've helped a few guildmates with lenghty quests, and got your ring of peppermint scent from the Fat Gnome instead of the Dark Elf.
Yep I don't mind if bosses spawn in mutiple places or some share some of the same equipment, but I wouldn't want all the equipment to be shared among bosses in the same level range. When a piece of gear is done right it makes sense for it drop of a certain mob, like you kill a giant spider and it drops a spider fang weapon something to that effect. You don't have to follow those rules with everything but it gives the game a lot more depth if it follows it most of the time. For raid creatures though, I think you almost have to have some of their loot tables shared since their will only be so many bosses to kill. In the case your talking about also no reason why a ring couldn't drop from a wide variety of mobs, unless it was the ring of peppermint scent that dropped from the Peppermint Soldier then it should probably be limited to him haha.
I don't have an issue with the spider fang weapon to drop from the spider of whoop ass only. But, make it the reward of a long quest line. That way the spider is useless to gold farmers unless they are just trying to grief people in their progression, and the weapon would feel a lot more unique if you've had to work for it. Same with the Peppermint Soldier. Maybe you had to work for a week for him to drop the ring, but make the drop the quest reward that is tied to you, not something that can be camped by everyone. Then, whether you want to keep the item or sell it is entirely up to you. The idea here is that unique items should be fairly rare, but potent. Make them enticing to work for, but not hidden behind a "kill 10 wolves" quest. The quest line should be lengthy. Then when you know you get only one of them, you think twice about whether you sell it or keep it.
There is nothing unique to a spider fang weapon that you've camped all week and got 6 of.
Ludek said:I don't have an issue with the spider fang weapon to drop from the spider of whoop ass only. But, make it the reward of a long quest line. That way the spider is useless to gold farmers unless they are just trying to grief people in their progression, and the weapon would feel a lot more unique if you've had to work for it. Same with the Peppermint Soldier. Maybe you had to work for a week for him to drop the ring, but make the drop the quest reward that is tied to you, not something that can be camped by everyone. Then, whether you want to keep the item or sell it is entirely up to you. The idea here is that unique items should be fairly rare, but potent. Make them enticing to work for, but not hidden behind a "kill 10 wolves" quest. The quest line should be lengthy. Then when you know you get only one of them, you think twice about whether you sell it or keep it.
There is nothing unique to a spider fang weapon that you've camped all week and got 6 of.
Yep I can get behind it coming from a quest to make it more unique and rewarding instead of just a random boss. I actually think I used the wrong word when I was doing that post I didn't really mean "unique" but "fitting". The spider fang weapon really only fits coming from a spider is what I was getting at in that example and same with if the peppermint ring dropped from the peppermint soldier. But like you said if you want to make it truly unique then a way better idea is to put it behind a quest with the Peppermint Soldier being the boss that spawns at the end of the quest or something like that.
We made all those rules and I think they would all help including what your talking about but I am not going to lie this is one area where I just prefer the newer MMO style of making gear from bosses no drop. You can make it account bound so you can twink your alts, but even that will give higher level people a reason to come back and kill certain bosses for drops they want. If its going to be like Everquest its already going to be bad enough that there is going to be a group camping every boss in almost all the dungeons at least stop high levels from doing the same haha.