Just as an ironic aside, I recently saw a well prepared, low level, dark elf anti-paladin serially mow down 4 opponents without surprising any of them.

great mechanical-magic knowledge will 100% trump any situation.

the discussion wasn't about people who knew how to get the wand of *OBLITERATES!* at lvl 11.

It was about 99% of the rest of the cf community.

####, just give em' dodge and that would even things out!!

There was a time long ago that I was of a similar philosophy to yours, but I've since come around to thinking that a better solution is to (taking your example), try to make D-Elf A-P actually good.

Witness the paladin class. There was a time that "Elf Paladin" was a punchline. Now, depending on playing style, you can easily make a case that an Elf is as good of a choice for a Paladin as anything.

Would things be better today if instead of making that effort we had instead made Elf Pal a 500 penalty character? I don't think so.

I would love to see better solutions than adjusting the XP penalty, w/regards to the "frail races" in general. So there's your homework...or semester project! "Make Dark-Elf Ap's rock."

I would love to see better solutions than adjusting the XP penalty, w/regards to the "frail races" in general.

The best way to do this generally isn't to throw some huge incentive at dark-elf AP all at once. That can work, but it can also break lots of other things. It's better than one alternative, however, that being diluting the best and worst options so that they are indistinguishable.

To get a tight balance (see elf paladin vs. storm paladin now vs. 5 years ago), you tweak the system, let it play out for a few months, refine your changes, and reassess.

That's exactly what we've been doing with d-elf AP and other previously unpopular combinations. There's no doubt in my mind that they're way better than even a couple years ago. Very recently, Edges have started to be another tool in that toolbox-- Edges exclusive to a character like d-elf AP tend to be either stronger or cheaper than usual. Evade is another step-- I'd barely want to practice it as a fire giant AP, but it's quite good on a dark-elf. It makes one of the dark-elf's supposed strengths (high DEX) into an actual strength. Makes sense IC, and it makes sense OOC, which was the tiebreaker vote on whether or not the AP class got the Evade skill at all.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

I'd honestly take an elf paladin over a storm paladin nowadays anyway, as would most other people (judging by the number of hero's of both without stats just impressions). Doesn't this make elf paladin that much better than storm paladin which already wasn't super?

>I'd honestly take an elf paladin over a storm paladin
>nowadays anyway, as would most other people (judging by the
>number of hero's of both without stats just impressions).
>Doesn't this make elf paladin that much better than storm
>paladin which already wasn't super?

Why do you think an elf is hands down better than a storm giant? I would say that a 2h storm and shield elf are comaprable --meaning that it depends on the dedication.

>>I'd honestly take an elf paladin over a storm paladin
>>nowadays anyway, as would most other people (judging by the
>>number of hero's of both without stats just impressions).
>>Doesn't this make elf paladin that much better than storm
>>paladin which already wasn't super?
>
>Why do you think an elf is hands down better than a storm
>giant? I would say that a 2h storm and shield elf are
>comaprable --meaning that it depends on the dedication.

Actually I think 2h elf is better than 2h storm, and that shield elf vs shield storm aren't even close. Shield elf gets better use out of healing/wrath due to higher mana and (I think) a wisdom/int based bonus to wrath and heal. Storm shield has giant resist. Shield deds aren't exactly bash meat, so an elf shield isn't going down to bash in the ways that say dark elf a-p does vs fire a-p. Giant resist isn't as big a deal when you get a lot of inherent (class) dam redux, so you're left with what as a storm giant advantage?

2h storm vs 2h elf is a closer race, but I came to the conclusion (based on my experiences) that elf with outtank storm. Mana is always a problem for pally's, so elf gets the edge there again. Being bash meat is a bigger problem for 2-handers (at least the un-virtued ones) but being a storm giant isn't going to help you land kills vs a storm, so I'd still take the better mana + wrath bonus + regen over higher strength (less likely to lose weapon until you get a no-remove) and the bash protection of a storm giant. Mostly because I'm comparing top end elf vs top end storm, so they've got the virtues and gear (Defiance) to cover those glaring vulns in the elf, where the storm doesn't gain as much and loses out on those inherent bonuses the elf gets.

I could be wrong, but I haven't seen many hero storm 2handers lately, so it seems that people are agreeing with me.

>I could be wrong, but I haven't seen many hero storm 2handers
>lately, so it seems that people are agreeing with me.

I don't think you're sufficiently accounting for the difference between the resistances/vulnerabilities/immunities of each choice. . . not to mention 5 points of con. A storm paladin is a freakin' rock.

Personally, I think it's finally about to where it's a matter of style/preference -- IMHO, a storm paladin is a lot better PK-defensively, an elf paladin a little better PK-offensively, but then, offense often beats defense. I know I could rack up a lot more kills with an elf than a storm (and probably more still with a human, truth be told), but I also know I would die a lot more with the elf.

Something you have to keep in mind in your accounting is that for years storm was the choice for paladins. I'm sure I've played literally hundreds of levels and hundreds of hours of storm paladin -- if I was going to make a paladin tomorrow, storm would be automatically disfavored just from anti-novelty. I know a lot of veteran players are in the same boat.

Basically survivability isn't something I weigh as heavily as the ability to land kills because it's much easier to survive than to seal kills in general. I can dig the anti-novelty thing though, I'm so far to the other end (always trying to play something novel) that it hurts me. I have to make a conscious effort not to roll a dark elf ap, or a unique ranger combo, or whatever other novel idea I come up with every time I start a new character.

You also have to figure gear in there a bit in terms of defense as well. I don't know about anyone else, but I definitely can keep better gear longer as a storm paladin than an elf paladin. This in turn gives me more offense and leads to kills.

Storm shield with wooden shinpads, black dragon hide, shield of darkness, heart of brimstone, righteousness up.

I don't know of any searing light weapons evils can use

"New payment options w/ Iron Realms"

I assume this storm shield is Maran and has Boots of the North, for example.

f

I'd say if I wanted to really go the PK offense over defense route, I'd play a midrank dwarf and level sit for a while. Just high enough to have a decent shot at a virtue and maran powers, while low enough that I can jump ranking parties and catch mages without ABS and people without divine saves or 1200 hp.

Just my 2 cents. Fordurn + full set of pwent = pile of corpses.

Meant to ask this before actually, when a fire a-p was landing a ####load of deafens on me. When a-ps were adjusted to have int matter more for spells was it just a general boost to the smarter races or did duergar/fire get a downgrade too?

"Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens." - Jimi Hendrix

There was a number of times I had way beyond divine saves (like -70ish with gear then bless crusade and prayer on top of it) and on average it still only seemed like 1-3 attempts to land the spell then totally crippled for 10 hours. I tried using damage wands but they are useless at high levels. This was also in the midst of spamming iceneedles which lowered int to a degree.

I mean it was great to see kharg fail 10 sleep attemptes in a row taking needles everytime but then one or 2 deafens and bam what was the point of even bothering to fight.

I think it would be nice if deafen caused successful casting to be unlikely and weaker rather than impossible. Kinda like everything else?

Here's something interesting. Got deafened once, not even sure how or crcumstances or whatever, but fighting a bard I didn't hear his song lyrics, but I get the effects. If I recall correctly if you're deaf you get no benefit from songs, so I guess just the downsides. Deafen acting more like manacles would be interesting, but to be fair you'd have to down worldbind too. Think I'd be happier if "dumb" races using those spells better have a four-leaf clover tied around a horseshoe jammed up their ass for any reasonable chance of success. Your human and halfies get a decent chance, and d-elf/arial you better have some damn good saves.

"Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens." - Jimi Hendrix

-

Given the downsides of deafen, it'd be much more tactically interesting if you weren't affected at all by bard songs.

Would be cool to deafen yourself in order to fight a bard.

>Given the downsides of deafen, it'd be much more tactically
>interesting if you weren't affected at all by bard songs.
>
>Would be cool to deafen yourself in order to fight a bard.

I'm pretty sure this has been shot down specifically for this reason. Being able to deafen yourself as 100% songproofing would be close to an "I win" button against bards, with no way for the bard to counter it.

But deafen has some pretty nasty downsides and there aren't a ton of "deafen preps" in the game.

I hate the term "I win" button. Yeah, in a raid you won't hear the bard. Similiarly speaking, you won't hear anyone. You won't hear your groupmates tell you they need healing or they're about to word. You won't hear your allies who just got jacked outside the area and are now being spelled up. Etc. I could see some interesting dynamics if you totally broke all communications in a raid for some benefit.

>But deafen has some pretty nasty downsides and there aren't a
>ton of "deafen preps" in the game.

In a raid deafen has disadvantages, certainly. If you made this change, how could a lone bard possibly win against anyone who is deafened? I'll refrain from using the phrase "I win button" but honestly I see a change like this as making it virtually impossible for bards to win against anybody who preps with deafen. And the disadvantages are not very significant for solo non-mages.

So :

grep 'deafen' from the area files.

Tag on "crimson scourge" or whatever other extra maledicts here, and make it interesting. Sure, you could prep deafen, but you'd also be prepping with other maledictions and it becomes a matter of whether or not its really worth it...

Obviously an AP isn't going to deafen himself in a solo fight since then he'll lose % points.

Man, how about checking out the current xp for certain classes. With the additions over the years certain classes have become insanely tough. As well as certain races, some have way too much of an xp penalty compared to others, imho. Thanks

PK ranges and thus extra costs are obsolete anyway.
The future is PRG games with unlimited pk range, especially for low player counts.
Restricted PK range creates many problems (mostly outrange influence, and gods' protection for pesky actions). That is not good when a level 1 character throws birds to heroes.
PK ranges usually creates RP and interaction problems as well.
People tend to communicate mostly within their PK range for obvious reasons: they travel and fight together. The people outside their range "almost do not exist" (with exceptions).
Many levelsitters experienced that problem when your old friends rank through, make heroes and you somehow lose a connection with them.

The systems where everybody can fight everybody look much better, but of course, some significant changes should be applied to the leveling system, so more experienced characters still have some advantages and additional skills but they aren't incredible.
One of the best examples is the level system from TES4:Oblivion. I wish that something similiar would be done for CF.

Anyway, for CF all is lost, nobody is going to make such big changes to the game

Elder scrolls you play against the game, not other people. Now imagine when you go get all sorts of buffed up and go fight a rat. That rat is a newbie, seem fair?

The only way to do rangeless systems is to go levelless. I've tried some of these before and it breaks down into two catagories. Mindlessly retarded PKfests, and knitting circle RP marathons. If you argue that you can still have levels... no. There will always be some asshole who didn't get things his way today so he's going to take his level 51 character and go multi-kill every newbie he can find. I'm sure that'll help keep people here...

"Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens." - Jimi Hendrix

>Elder scrolls you play against the game, not other people.
>Now imagine when you go get all sorts of buffed up and go
>fight a rat. That rat is a newbie, seem fair?

As fair as level 42 vs hero. But we live with in CF.

The key feature of levelless systems that the difference between a newbie and an experienced char is not extremely huge.

In TES4:Oblivion you, technically, don't have levels. But as you raise your skill percentages you can unlock a few new abilities (not many) and increase primary stats which directly change your hps, for example.
All that sort of differences may be adjusted accordingly to make it fair.
For example, a newbie with con=1 may have 100hp and an experienced char with maxed con=100 may have 200hp. He will be stronger than a newbie, but two grouped newbies may provide some challenge. The good thing about such systems is that you have most of your skills at low levels, though at low percentage.
Still you can start to play some role in the game as you aren't a dummy bot without skills.
When you gain experience you may get a few additional perks but most of income comes from better percentages on your skill set.


>The only way to do rangeless systems is to go levelless.

Like in Oblivion.

>There will always be some asshole who didn't get things
>his way today so he's going to take his level 51 character and
>go multi-kill every newbie he can find. I'm sure that'll help
>keep people here...

That's no different from killing 42 level characters at 51.

You can change CF so new characters will start with level 42. Then the whole system will be effectively "rangeless" because all characters will be in PK. Still you will have some room for improvement as you get more experience.

If you want to have all characters equal then it will not be an RPG but a different sort of a game. (Chess, Quake, Starcraft, Warcraft 3)

My example wasn't like a 42 vs 51 (which is fair enough, I've killed plenty of heroes at 42), it was like a 5 vs 51. With the type of system you're suggesting there couldn't be a wide margin of difference between a starting character and a maxed character, which means on a character who age dies at ~400 hours (about average) about 390 of them will be nonranking. Character turnaround would be extremely high turning the game into just a pkfest. Then there is the fact of mobs. The newbie academy would be half as tough as Hell? Doesn't make a whole lot of sense. You're right though, it would turn the game into something like Quake, and if I wanted that I'd go play it. Well, probably Unreal, but you get the point.

"Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens." - Jimi Hendrix

The key feature of levelless systems that the difference between a newbie and an experienced char is not extremely huge.

That's entirely a design choice, and has nothing to do with whether or not you're using levels. If we wanted there to be little difference between a level 1 and a level 51 character, we could give you hero-like HP/mana/move at level 1, with only small increments, and move most of the skills very early in development. We don't want that, for reasons Karel covers well, but it has nothing at all to do with the concept of a level.

A number of MUDs offer classless/levelless systems. Generally, it shifts the focus more heavily to the skill system, which is usually open-ended, and designed to reward unlimited time investment. On the examples I've seen, they openly discouraged PK, but if it did happen there's no question that an experienced character could completely paste a newbie. ("Classless" also usually means "All characters fight the same way", but that's another digression.)

If you want to have all characters equal then it will not be an RPG but a different sort of a game. (Chess, Quake, Starcraft, Warcraft 3)

Right, which is why we don't want to move 90% of the way in that direction.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

>A number of MUDs offer classless/levelless systems.
>Generally, it shifts the focus more heavily to the skill
>system, which is usually open-ended, and designed to reward
>unlimited time investment.

And botting to the point of insanity. The bot I had that spammed skills all day and all night for one of these types of muds was ridiculous. I managed to rack up like 500 hours on a character in about a month. These sorts of places are also don't (can't?) have age death, so even after all of that I was still thousands of hours behind the other people.

>On the examples I've seen, they
>openly discouraged PK, but if it did happen there's no
>question that an experienced character could completely paste
>a newbie. ("Classless" also usually means "All characters
>fight the same way", but that's another digression.)

The one I played had pk, and it got considerably LESS interesting the more skilled the characters were. 2 newbs could duke it out for hours without even being capable of hurting each other. 2 demi-gods (that denoted a certain skill level in base skills) would have fights that didn't finish the first round. It was a stupid system.

>If you want to have all characters equal then it will not
>be an RPG but a different sort of a game. (Chess, Quake,
>Starcraft, Warcraft 3)
>
>Right, which is why we don't want to move 90% of the way in
>that direction.
>
>valguarnera@carrionfields.com

>>A number of MUDs offer classless/levelless systems.
>>Generally, it shifts the focus more heavily to the skill
>>system, which is usually open-ended, and designed to reward
>>unlimited time investment.
>
>And botting to the point of insanity. The bot I had that
>spammed skills all day and all night for one of these types of
>muds was ridiculous. I managed to rack up like 500 hours on a
>character in about a month. These sorts of places are also
>don't (can't?) have age death, so even after all of that I was
>still thousands of hours behind the other people.

Once I'd driven a very bad broken car.
So cars are stupid and bad.

My only problem with this in terms of CF specifically is that CF's areas are designed to fit the current level system. In your world, there wouldn't be as vast a difference between storm giants on kiadana and kobolds in the kobold warrens (there couldn't be, since to be fair there couldn't be that huge of a power migration, IE, you'd reward with additional tactics but not "overpowering" tactics).

So while I don't think its a bad idea in general, if someone was going to start their own game, I do think it'd be a huge overhaul if you wanted to implement it in CF. If anything, I think the concept of ranking really hurts roleplay. But, its a little far in to start rethinking CF's core structure.

Oooh boy.

A lack of PK ranges creates as many problems as it solves. It makes for a different kind of game; it's not a panacea. If the whys of that aren't clear to you, we'll agree to disagree -- I've had this argument from both sides in years past and doing it again holds no interest to me.

I think it's interesting that you loved the level system in Oblivion -- I've never actually talked to someone else who even liked it. Even people I know who love that game can't stand that one particular piece of it. Again, just goes to show -- different strokes for different folks, and there's no answer in game design that pleases everyone.

That's not new to computer games, of course. Pen-and-paper systems had it long before, but generally you're just replacing the concept of a 'level' with other metrics like individual skills, etc. Players don't want equality between characters-- they want the strength of their character to reflect their skill and accomplishments in some fashion.

As for PK ranges, while Dwoggurd is right that they come with problems of their own, they avoid the notable problem of a level 51 Maran getting bored and shwacking any (Red Aura) who dares walk out of the Academy. Griefing acquires a whole new scope when you offer the opportunity of unfair fights.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

Of course they aren't new. But most of them have poor implementation.
The first time I saw a mud (called Arctic) that has no pk ranges I think in 1995. That mud is even older than CF.

Unfair fights would be if you make CF level 1 vs CF level 51.
But you aren't obligated to do so. The level 1 character may be as strong as 42 level characted in CF against a hero. And the way from 42 to hero can be made much longer.
You well get system where people may invest time for perks (called RPG) and at the same time fights will not be extremily unfair.

There alwasy can be safe place for a complete newbies like a mud school before they step into the real world.

But you aren't obligated to do so. The level 1 character may be as strong as 42 level characted in CF against a hero. And the way from 42 to hero can be made much longer. You well get system where people may invest time for perks (called RPG) and at the same time fights will not be extremily unfair.

Sorry, you can't do both meaningful perks and minimal development.

If development is highly meaningful, you end up with a system where someone with enough perks will trash a newer player. CF is towards this end of the spectrum, but not so much. An experienced player can reach the top level in tens of hours if they focus on it, much shorter than many MUDs. The skill system is capped, not open-ended. Equipment is 'capped' because it's a finite resource-- you cannot create endlessly better equipment.

As development becomes less meaningful, you move away from an RPG model towards something akin to Quake where the system enforces character equality, and there's no reason to invest in a character. Incentives for quality of play go down, because your effort isn't rewarded with anything of note. As this happens, griefing goes up because the game lacks the ability to meaningfully punish or restrict the character.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

>Sorry, you can't do both meaningful perks and minimal
>development.

It depends what is counts as meaningful perks and what is counts as minimal develpoment. For me, going from 42 to hero is meaningful perk and for others maybe not. Anyway, that is not the thing I want to argue about.

In fact, majority of characters in CF most of their time spend in the world "42-hero". So they are effectively in "rangeless" system. I don't want to discuss if it is good or bad, my point is that it is possible to make a quality rangeless system and it is possible to go futher and create levelless system (replacing it with skill percentage for example, or something else).
A rangeless system I consider as a system where you don't live in several parallel worlds but in one common world instead. While the value that a levelless system can bring is having most (or all) your skills at start and later you can improve them. Open skill system is not required, it can be capped as well. I can't speak for all, but I would rather have I'm an many skills with low percentages than start with a few skills and spend half of levels just trying to the point where my skill set matches the character idea. For example, if I'm a conjurer, I would like to actually conjure and right now I have to rank almost through half of my levels to get my followers. If assassin, I actually want to assassinate and right now I have to rank through 2/3 of my levels to get there. For me it makes more sence to have assassinate skill at the start (with low percentage) and improve it through use.

First I can see the appeal of a system like this, I just don't think it would work out very well.

If you were to recieve the majority of your skills at the start of a characters life and they would then improve with use, I see two possible outcomes.

A) The skills don't work well at all at the beginning and you need to spend significant time to make them reliable. So your assassin CAN assassinate as soon as he is rolled but he will fail 99.99% of the time. Thus, long lived characters, say with 200+ hours, will still have a very large advanrage over new characters because of the practice they have put in.

or

B) The skills are reliable, or reasonably so, at the start of a characters life and there is less incentive to improve the skills because they work well right out of the box. If this is the case I don't see how you end up with anything but a mindless PK mud, there is no reason to invest time and effort into a character if the pay off is so small or the need does not exist.

Maybe something else could come out from it, but this it what I see as happening. I just wish low level characters would just get smitted every now and then for Sh*t talking to heros then who cares if you can't pk them

>First I can see the appeal of a system like this, I just
>don't think it would work out very well.

Define what is "very well".
It is hard to estimate a system in vacuum, compare it with ROM(CF) system.

>If you were to recieve the majority of your skills at the
>start of a characters life and they would then improve with
>use, I see two possible outcomes.
>
>A) The skills don't work well at all at the beginning and you
>need to spend significant time to make them reliable. So your
>assassin CAN assassinate as soon as he is rolled but he will
>fail 99.99% of the time. Thus, long lived characters, say with
>200+ hours, will still have a very large advanrage over new
>characters because of the practice they have put in.

Right now your assassin can't assassinate at all at the beginning.
He needs to spend significant time to get to the point where he can make at least first his attempt.
What is proposed: you actually can assassinate at the beginning, though with low chance. How low? It is a question of implementation, right answer will be as low as needed to make system work well.
Older characters will have advantage, how huge it should be it is also a question of implementation. You can make it larger, or lesser. I'm personally wouldn't mind if all chars would be equal at all. Then the player own skills make the game. But I don't propose that because we discuss RPG games, where people want to have advantage coming not only from their skills and knowledge, but from direct time investment. So they actually want to have some difference between newbies and experienced chars and I don't mind it.

But keep in mind, if you will make it too large, you would have to implement PK ranges (so new characters will not be completely wasted) and the result will be CF-like system.


>or
>
>B) The skills are reliable, or reasonably so, at the start of
>a characters life and there is less incentive to improve the
>skills because they work well right out of the box. If this
>is the case I don't see how you end up with anything but a
>mindless PK mud, there is no reason to invest time and effort
>into a character if the pay off is so small or the need does
>not exist.

Again, if you like to have advantage from time investment, not only from player's skill then the system can maintain that difference.
But the whole question is not connected to PR atmosphere. Mindless PK mud comes not from skills out of the box but from the players approach to RP. There can be mindless PK mud based on any system. In fact, you have many mindless PK muds around here based on levels + PK ranges system.

>
>Maybe something else could come out from it, but this it what
>I see as happening. I just wish low level characters would
>just get smitted every now and then for Sh*t talking to heros
>then who cares if you can't pk them

>A lack of PK ranges creates as many problems as it solves. It
>makes for a different kind of game; it's not a panacea. If
>the whys of that aren't clear to you, we'll agree to disagree
>-- I've had this argument from both sides in years past and
>doing it again holds no interest to me.

Since I don't see your arguments against it and I provided some of my arguments all I can say:
"A lack of PK range creates much less problems than it solves."
If the whys of that aren't clear to you, let us stop at that.
It is not that I have just came to that idea yesterday. I had thoughts about it many years ago, and it is not the first time I write about it, please give me some credibility, I'm not a complete fool.

>I think it's interesting that you loved the level system in
>Oblivion -- I've never actually talked to someone else who
>even liked it.

And that proves it is bad.

>Even people I know who love that game can't
>stand that one particular piece of it.

I'm not a fan of Oblivion implementation details (exact numbers or primary/secondary skills distibution), but the whole concept is very good. And I'm talking about the concept here, details can be properly adjusted.

Its probably better to take a look at PvP oriented graphical MMORPGs that have no classes/levels to see the ups and downs of such a system.