One thing that always struck me as being a little inconvenient is not knowing exactly what a skill/spell you have does.

Offensive skills can't be used on yourself.
Spells make you lose percentages in it if you do.

This results in a rather interesting situation where you as the user of these abilities know far less about their effects than the person you've used them on.

Knowing how much boneshatter will reduce str/dex at a given level, knowing how long impale will last, knowing exactly what effects arcing lightning on pillar does, or what web or grease exactly does when cast on someone else depending on the echos, or what kans/kot will do to str/dex etc....

For example, I played an assassin to 40 and had no idea that an axe kick with an echo will reduce stats until someone told me that it did much later with a different character. I still don't know for certain how much cause I have no way of testing it other than waiting for an assassin to attack me and use it in combat until he gets the echo.
I found out what a hero kot/kan does in the forums, I don't know for sure what they did with my lvl 40 assassin. I learned kans scream echo is a slow effect on the forums, I learned blindness dust lasts 8 hours on the forums... I learned... you get the idea.

I think I actually learned a lot more about assassins from reading logs of people who fought assassins and reading forum discussions than I did playing one, which to me doesn't seem quite right.

The forums... It's always been useful, I learned a lot of things from the 'other' forums. But I see stuff posted there that I know to be incorrect all the time, who's to say the guy who answers my questions knows what he's talking about? Who's to say any of the things I think I know now about assassins are correct?
You could change kot/kans to do -1 str/dex each tommorrow and even if I was playing an assassin, I would have no idea unless one of his enemies were feeling charitable and told me, 'Hey, guy who just tried to kill me, maybe you shouldn't use that as much anymore. It does one increment of...'

Of course, moment it happens people will scream murder on the forums, so I will likely find out that way, but such measures are inherently OOC, there's really no good way for someone to ask IC what a given ability does, nor do I want to put someone in the position of having to say something along the lines of

'Oh yes, your 43rd circle boneshatter makes me lose eight err... increments of strength and dexterity'


So I'm proposing adding a command, a way for you to test spells/skills/communes on yourself to determine it's effects, or if doing something like that would involve too much coding and echoes maybe adding a 'demonstration' command to guildmasters where they will use a given skill/spell on you at the exact same level that you could use it at and it won't trigger a yell or initiate combat.
Maybe for lag skills add an echo like,
'You hear your heart beating twice before you're able to move again',

Adding something in each cabal as well for call abilities? Inherants? No idea.

Of course, if this feature is by design, you like the fact that people are never quite certain of what they can do, please just ignore this post.

PS. I do realize that finding an aim buddy would probably negate the need-if there even is a need, for something like this, but I felt that this would put everyone on even ground at least regarding knowledge of what your stuff does, and not penalize anyone for choosing to not use ooc sources of information such as the forums or aim friends. Definately would make it easier for people new to CF with no connections to get a grasp of the game.

>One thing that always struck me as being a little
>inconvenient is not knowing exactly what a skill/spell you
>have does.
>
>Offensive skills can't be used on yourself.
>Spells make you lose percentages in it if you do.
>
>This results in a rather interesting situation where you as
>the user of these abilities know far less about their effects
>than the person you've used them on.

A sniper might spend thousands of hours learning his job. He knows how to gague the elements and how they will affect the trajectory of his bullet. He knows how to stay concealed etc etc. But he sure as #### doesn't know what it feels like to get tagged in the head or chest.

A boxer knows how to jab, hook, and uppercut. When he uses these skills against an opponent he notices that it hampers and or injures the guy but until he has had it happen to himself he doesn't know exactly how it affects someone.

This is the job of echoes and helpfiles. They're intended to communicate the basic effects in a qualitative kind of way. If you find helpfiles that are outdated or insufficient for this purpose (Axe Kick is a good example), you can email helps@carrionfields.com and someone will look into touching it up a bit.

For example, I played an assassin to 40 and had no idea that an axe kick with an echo will reduce stats until someone told me that it did much later with a different character.

The echo about the bones cracking is probably the hint the designers were counting on. In general, those sorts of injuries come with lasting effects.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

I really just saw it as a balancing issue.

People who do use the forums and have aim friends know exactly how certain things affect their opponents, those who rely only on the information gained within the game have a much harder time obtaining that same information.

I thought something like this would just even the field out a little more.

In the sense that I like to know the exact numbers of maledictions just so I know how much -str or -dex I can slap on in a fight, to see if that is enough to make them drop their weapons etc. And I figured other people would want to know too, so I put it all in my assassin faq thingo. I don't see this as number crunching, I see it as smart pk'ing, especially for an assassin who can hide and can often inspect a foes gear before attacking to see if they are wearing +str gear, wielding heavy weapons in relation to their str etc.

Also, I think even if you don't work out the exact numbers but just have a feel for it, you will reach a point where you must know just for the sake of knowing Just because without that your knowledge of the class would feel..incomplete.

Rom.

There's a lot of hassle in what you're talking about and I'm
not sure it'd be worth it in the end.

The only way this could happen would be if the result of the
command showed you something similar, but not exactly the same,
with a quite a bit of randomness tossed in, to the real result.
(Enough to give you an idea, but not so much that you can alter
variables and reverse engineer every skill's equation.)

It could happen, maybe, but I don't think that is something
we're going to find the resources for any time soon. Sorry.

However, this does give me an idea which won't go as far as
what you're after, but might be more likely to actually get
in the game.

Qaledus
qaledus@carrionfields.com

ps: We're always open to reviewing helpfiles if you find one you
just don't think accurately reflects the skill. E-mail me if one
crosses your screen.

doesn't it strike you as odd (read: wrong) that your enemy knows what you can do better than you? That someone who has no training in what you know can have more specific information?

it has never made sense that someone (a character) is taught something, show how to do it, then does it, over and over, learns everything to know about it, but doesn't actually know what it does.

somehow or other a character should be able to know what it is actually doing. a dagger specialist should know exactly what -str or -dex or other affects that a hurl torso does, or a hurl leg, or a hamstring, etc. the victim surely knows, exactly. so it's not that theinformation is kept secret. it's just being withheld from the one person who should know it!

always been something wrong with the system in that regard.

>doesn't it strike you as odd (read: wrong) that your enemy
>knows what you can do better than you? That someone who has
>no training in what you know can have more specific
>information?

Not really.

I can kick you in the balls all day long and I'll know it makes
you vomit if I kick you a certain way and makes your eyes water,
but only you know what it's like to be kicked in the junk all
the live long day.

.

It was added, as I understand it, to prevent people from doing things like I would do in the first age. Namely, I'd get dragged into good old 1212 and griped at by a certain imm who shall remain nameless, then as soon as nobody was around, kill myself to get set loose. Then I'd go and get my stuff from the pit later. Also killing yourself was (at the time) a way to lose a flag without penalty.

Neither of these things is possible anymore. I don't see why we couldn't just go back to being able to cast harmful spells on ourselves.

That being said... finding an assassin or muter or mace spec mob isn't incredibly difficult these days, and while it might not tell you the exact effects that your character does, it will certainly give you a pretty good idea of what a skills does. On the other hand, fighting these sorts of mobs can be just plain dangerous and asking for a mob death, which is why I endorse this idea. Police officers have to get tazed before they are allowed to use a tazer in the field... why? Because they need to know what it feels like. It's certainly not an exact parallel, but I could see your guildmaster using each non-automatic ability on you when they teach it to you, for similar reasons.

Just don't type in "demonstrate assassinate" heh.