As noted on the code changed board, effective NCR the experience given for cabal raids and retrievals will be a little higher when the MUD thinks that a successful attempt was made against tougher odds.

Some time ago, Daevryn wrote some code to allow the MUD to make an educated guess as to the difficulty of a raid. After having let that run for many months I think we're satisfied that it's accurate enough to do something with, so going forward characters will receive the following for a successful raid or retrieval:

500 for an ordinary attempt.
1k for a win against opposition.
2k for a win against significant opposition.

Will edge point milestones be at (say) 10 retrievals or 5000 cabal exp?

When I as an Orc help some guy in some other cabal (read empire) retrieve from a different cabal (Outlander/Fort) I get retrieval XP. Do I also get a notch toward the edge points that come from hitting various retrieval benchmarks?

Thanks for any light you shed on the subject.

Can I ask, does the opposition have to show up?

Does cabal experience matter for anything other than a measure of worth on a PBF?

nt

Also considering that many mid-level players in cabals prefer level-sitting, hence discouraged from retrieving with this kind of reward :)

nt

Even if it's the train approaching :)

But seriously, maybe I just don't get the idea. Either you get 500 exp on ranking mob (no risk involved) or 1k exp on tough retrieval (risking loot & con), but getting fun in the process, of course :) So if you need exp - you go kill some mobs, if you need fun/edges - you go kill some cabal defenders.

You also have the statistics available, see how often tough level-sitting cabal mid-rankers are up for retrieval. People like Soliah, Niji, Fessara or Raeth. Niji even killed himself over mobs to avoid ranking up, I'm sure he did not enjoy retrieval exp :)

"Cabal XP" was never intended to be an efficient means of ranking. I hope that's evident. But considering that participating in cabal wars is usually obligatory if you're caballed, then getting XP for doing so can serve a dual purpose.

If your primary objective is to gain levels then ranking is the way to go. This specific change wasn't meant to change that, but rather make that fringe benefit of doing what one is already probably supposed to be doing a little better, especially if/when proper ranking isn't viable.

I don't know about the characters you listed specifically, but obviously if someone is deliberately trying to avoid getting XP to "level sit" then yes, this change doesn't interest them much and that's fine. If someone really doesn't want to level up, they can always go mob die, suicide, etc.

I'm not particularly worried that this change is going to encourage people not to raid/retrieve. If someone were avoiding cabal wars solely to dodge the XP, that may very well be crappy cabal RP and a cabal IMM could step in and heckle them for it, too.

I think you're right though in that you probably didn't get the point of the change. It was one of many relatively minor tweaks to help increase the over all pace of the game, that's all.

Totally valid from the broader scene viewpoint

IMO it's a good thing that people aiming to level sit can't help but accumulate exp as time passes. So giving more exp for what is almost obligatory activity is, in my opinion, a good thing, even if they'd rather have level sat for longer

That would certainly boost the effort.

Though if we did that I'd probably want to do it at the expense of edge points elsewhere.

Oh, is that torches and pitchforks I see in the distance?

nt

NT

For common retrieval you get rewarded with your cabal powers. For tough retrievals - some edge points.

In any case it seems that getting the currently required retrieval numbers nowadays is somewhat unlikely.

During the deepest low-number night, you two log on and set your devious plan into motion.

Raid, retrieve, raid, retrieve. 20 times over.

Muahahaha.

During the deepest low-number night, you have highest chances of being booted or stripped of edges for that kind of behavior :) Because most likely that would be 2-3 imms per person online :)

how do you figure it's arranged?

In my early CF days, I occasionally retrieved several times back to back with no in-range opposition, and enemy heroes were raiding again and again. Or I was one of the heroes raiding.

Cheating is forbidden. The staff tells cheating from fair play by eye.

Over the years I've regularly found myself repeatedly taking items only for lowbies to repeatedly retrieve, and sometimes I've been that lowbie.

It would happen without any ooc connections. Just imagine a hero raider that hero defenders don't show up against, or do show up but escape alive. Raider will come back for another shot at them or to shame them into defending. But they won't be keen to retrieve, and will likely send lowbies.

It's why as a scion I sometimes handed the orb to some Orc to down. If heroes were on but wouldn't try to defend or retrieve, I would eventually make it impossible for their lowbies to do it for them.

But it's not as if this stuff doesn't get logged and we can't simply deny/site ban anyone who does this.

Since they never had their item and if you managed to retrieve they lost it again immediately anyhow. I could sometimes get in more than half a dozen retrievals in a day.

Don't know what that's like now that Empire is large and in charge.

By being on ALL the time and able to retrieve.

Basically allowed their heroes to be off doing Hell trips to get the gear to be beastly.

So thanks?

My money is on the idea that the people who were playing fort and fighting Tiamat are now playing Empire and exploring hell. I mean sure I racked up a LOT of retrievals, but I had done similar thing on previous characters. I don't know if Ychram was my first character to break 50 retrievals but he certainly wasn't the first to break 25.