>>Once again, this is not accurate. Stat levels are also reflected in the stats critters get. As new things come out, GMs aren't going to just go "stats will stop mattering after 50 ranks" if players can hit that easily and have it go as far as 100+.

Okay, take a deep breath, read everything I said, and then post again. Until GMs weigh in on this, that's conjecture. That's speculation. That's thinking the moon is made of cheese without reading the countless textbooks that say it's not. Please show me quotes, texts, anything that suggest that critters are based on the -SPECIFIC- players who have 100 points in each stat.

On the subject of why it actually doesn't matter: it doesn't. All SvS contests with critters are in favor of the attacker. Defending could be the only problem, and that only happens from -HUNTING TOO HIGH.- You yourself acknowledged this. Don't make me quote you, bruh, I'll do it. At level, all SvS contests are successes, so there's no need to neuter the system in that favor.

>>To not do that would be bad design, because it would leave no room for character growth/development in the system.

Okay now you're talking about a completely different thing. There's a hard cap to ranks. What new developments are there gonna be in the system? Are GMs gonna introduce new creatures for like 1750+ players? Are they making World of Warcraft raids? Dungeons? Everything is conjecture until it's not. All I know is the current facts: PvP is the most significantly affected, everything else can be changed by fixing a few small things on other systems. Why ruin it for everybody who passionately PvPs in favor of things that can be changed in a way for -EVERYONE- to have cake, eat, fight it, do whatever they want with it.

>>As new systems come out, GMs are factoring in the range of stats/skills people can reach more because GMs are conscious of the fact that they're not just developing for an end-game of people hitting 400ish in skills and mid 50s in stats, and instead expecting people to hit 1k+ skills and reach 100+ in a stat. Look at crafting for an example of scalability, where you keep earning tech slots until 1,200 ranks and stats influence a percentage of a RT reduction chance happening vs outright reducing things like combat. Do you sincerely believe that if stats can hit 100+, and GMs expect people to hit 100+, that they're going to just cut stats off from mattering at a lower point of entry?

Thank you for not reading anything I wrote. Alright... be honest, are you one of those people who argue just to argue? Because none of what you're saying makes sense anymore. At this point, it sounds like you're more in favor of general stat tweaks for critters, which is understandable and I sympathize. I'm going to bring this last point up and then, if you choose to ignore it again, I am not going to debate it further, because it's clear you're living in your own little world. Until the GMs can say -FOR CERTAIN- that they are basing all new creature release stats on the people who train every single weapon and every single armor and every single skill, then it is blind, empty, blithering conjecture. It means nothing. It means less than nothing.

Crafting and combat are apples and oranges, and if you think they should behave similarly, I've got bad news for you in terms of your fervent arguments against "cookie cutter builds."

>>Put on an imaginary GM hat here and re-read your statement. "Stats don't matter when you hunt at level because your stats are always better." Does that seem like good design? If you were a GM, would you be cool with that, or would you go "Well, we need to reassess how stats on critters work so at-level hunting is more of a challenge and people don't just snap debilitations at minimum."

No. It's not great design. I agree. You are right. But it's hunting. Players do it to gain more ranks so that critters are easier, and then they can go on to critters that are harder, which will then become easier, and on and on. PvE isn't anything special in this game. That's not a TDP design problem, that's a DR design problem. You want PvE to be more challenging. I get that. Why not introduce more challenging creatures that offer something other than the -SOLE- reward of more ranks and TDPs? Maybe items? Crafting recipes? Further quests and designs and stuff? It's not hard to get creative here.

>>I'm not sure how someone who wants a robust/exciting/challenging PvP system is also in favor of a system that goes "just train everything so you hit 100 in all your stats then you'll be on the same level as everyone else."

Well, see, there's the linchpin of why everything you're saying is wrong. There's the fulcrum. There's the centerpiece. There's the turkey on the Thanksgiving table. If this argument was the Dark Tower series by Stephen King, what you just said would be the Dark Tower itself, the connection between worlds, the monument to Gan and his kith, thankee sai, that brings together all realities and all events, past and future. Here it is:

You don't PvP.

You're not sure about what I'm talking about because you've never experienced what I am talking about. You don't know what I'm talking about, and you don't care to find out how big of an issue this is to people who -do- know what I am talking about. Every guild plays according to their strengths, and every TDP is a means to an end, not an end itself. There are plenty of inherent flaws between guild and PvP encounters that make it more exciting and enjoyable. Limiting TDPs is another unnecessary addition to existing problems.

<<Everyone's telling me to ignore you but I'm just gonna give you the benefit of the doubt.>>

Well I appreciate it for what it's worth, I wasn't trying to troll or anything, just throwing a different angle out there... really I don't have a dog in this fight, as you said, so whether it remains status quo or a huge change happens, doesn't affect me much. So in that, you've made me see your point: even if the way things are now aren't ideal, it's been let go too long that changing significantly is going to cause more harm than good. I mean there is room for change I think, but as for how much, what can be done... dunno.

I would still like to see another path of some sort, where training in a focused manner has some sort of benefit (but is still sub-optimal, yes, you're not putting in as much time, you shouldn't be equivalent to someone who does). The increased drain when rolling fewer skills seems like an elegant solution. Doesn't step on anyone's toes if they do like to train wide, but gives more focused trainers something (hey, I'm not getting all these TDPs, but I'm progressing a little quicker!).

Well, and this is just a personal pet peeve, I wish some skills didn't provide as much to the TDP pool... zills, I'm looking at you. Just so weird, imagining everyone just wandering the Crossing, snapping their little finger cymbals together. But I digress.

>>You are my sunshine, my only sunshine
You make me happy when skies are grey
You never know, dear, how much I love you
Please don't take my TDPs away.<<

Hahaha.

"Brace yourselves, Squanto is going to bleh blah fart fart bleh.." -the player of the character formerly known as Pureblade

<This is exactly what makes this game so clearly successful for so many varieties of personalities as being demonstrated in our inability to agree on a simple thing like TDPs 100% across the board with one another.>

I would definitely miss this aspect if it was removed somehow and everyone just had a single optimal build and way to train. If pvp was basically you're a 40th barb, oh I know exactly how to play against you. It doesn't matter what options you made training your character. You're just a 40th barb. If I can figure out how to beat one 40th barb I can beat them all the same way. I wonder if that could be a possibility?

I actually don't even care about PVP. People in this thread have claimed that stats do not matter for PVE but that's not accurate at all. I mean, mentals for one....Of course stats matter for other aspects than just PVP.

I'm not even that high circle but my total skill ranks is way above the average player of my circle. People here have claimed it will only hurt HLC but I don't think that's accurate either.

All I know is that guy sucks at cookie-cutting because his crafts are not at level enough overall.

"Brace yourselves, Squanto is going to bleh blah fart fart bleh.." -the player of the character formerly known as Pureblade

Uzmam - can you tell me what kind of stat contest I need to set someones hello kitty collection on fire? That's all I really care about.

Also, all this talk of cookies is making me hungry.

>>Fear vs Will<<

When we all have the same stats, it will be awesome as we perpetually nullify one another!

"Brace yourselves, Squanto is going to bleh blah fart fart bleh.." -the player of the character formerly known as Pureblade

>>Racial choices are arguably meaningless at the end-game right now, because it costs all races the same number of TDPs to raise every stat to 100. (And based on my testing, race has almost no effect on post-100 stat costs.)<<

sorry to double post but this is so wrong it hurts all over.

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>>Discoteq21: Racial choices at end game actually matter more than anything because of the incredibly punitive cost associated with training a stat.

>>Discoteq21: sorry to double post but this is so wrong it hurts all over.

The point I was trying to make is that race has a much lower effect on TDP cost past 100, proportionally speaking, than it does on stats up to 100.

It costs a human 1500 TDPs to raise one stat from 100 to 101. Having a modifier of +1 or -1 increased or decreased the TDP cost by 50 TDPs. That's just a 3% difference.

Now compare that to the cost of raising stats from 99 to 100. For a human, the cost is 297 TDPs. Having a +1 or -1 modifier increased or decreased the TDP cost by 49 TDPs. Proportionately, that is a much bigger difference of 16%.

But regardless of how you would characterize the magnitude of the effect of racial modifiers on post-100 stat training, it remains true that race is a nonfactor if the goal is to train all stats to 100, because the TDP cost is the same for all races when training stats evenly.

There are arguments you can make for leaving TDPs as they are. Encouraging diversity in skill and stat training, however, is not one of them.

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Again sorry for the double post.... but when your character is staring down mortality, I.E. you have limited TDPs left to gain you have to make hard choices. Eventually those post 100 stats cost too much too "train all" even via over training skills. Look I'm not going to pretend to know what the answer is for this particular game. I DO know that a lot of people are throwing around terrible ideas and suggestions and not examining the big picture.

I don't care whats suggested or implemented as long as a vast majority aren't screwed over in the process.

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>PvP stuff

There are solid PvP-centric arguments in favor of defining "end game" (i.e. lowering skill and/or stat caps) depending on what the goal is. It's easier to balance around an end game (1750/200 isn't end game so much as what the system will support), there's more people to fight (yay), and it makes player skill matter more than character skill in addition to making stat decisions more meaningful. I mean, I can think of a number of times I've wished I could have a spar with people beneath or above my character(s), but they simply weren't a fair match.

This all assumes, of course, there's end game content. In other RPGs, that's usually gearing up and customizing your character to take down the biggest enemy. That's clearly not a thing in this game, so there'd have to be something else like new interactions with the game world (subsystems) unlocked at cap. I don't know what that means... Maybe quests to unlock powerful customizable traits or something, like, I dunno, innate resistance to certain damage types, hindrance reduction, weapon RT reduction or other ways of becoming more mighty outside ranks. Maybe new creatures that drop special rewards but require certain unlocked traits to hunt effectively? Stuff that only works on creatures, stuff that works on PCs... Just spitballing.

A little devil's advocate here, but it's worth talking about. Plus, I'm someone who's grown bored of the grind a number of times over the years, even though I'm not that interested in what happens with TDPs per se. Shiny toys usually bring me back, not ranks, and the community holds me when the new toys start to dull.

Throughout this argument I've been agreeing with Warb's posts the most. I feel like maybe I'm more used to this sort of thing because I've played enough MMOs outside of DR where level caps(actual designed level caps not system caps) and numbers resets(through gear) factor more frequently than it has in DR and I think my general feeling toward the TDP change is this:

If someone told me that the time that I spent backtraining weapons, armor, and just training my character in general for the past 13 years off and on were going to be "wasted"(we do love to exaggerate when it comes to changes in this game)but I could be playing a more inclusive and balanced game, one that allows GMs to actually plan around a designed range and doesn't make me feel like I need to put more time in than anything else in my life...

I'd take those 13 years around back and shoot it myself.

Just as Warb said I'm in the PVP camp where even at my middling level of skill it's a ridiculous pain to find a fair match. I don't hold animosity over people that have put more time in or people that have put less. The only thing I care about and that I'm surprised other PVP people don't care about is having a greater number of people to fight where it can be designed so that player skill is the much greater defining reason for a win versus time invested.

And on the PVE side we've already seen possibilities of an end game that can be designed in the duskruin that just passed. It was fun and challenging to kill things for tangible rewards and forced people in different guilds to consider strategies for killing things that they hadn't actually thought to use much previously like thieves getting much more use out of their ignite ability in order to beat the timer. DR can definitely become a much more interesting game if we cull past terrible design decisions that hinder balance and have created x year long gaps between players.


As a player of way too many games, just as annoying as it is when people don't want to put time/effort into their character's results, it's similarly as much a pain to deal with when people feel like the time they've chosen to invest is sacred and untouchable.

Just like us players, the GMs have spent years both as players and on the dev side in DR. That time is just as important to them so we can probably pull back the outrage and know that our investment is being considered when designing a new system.

It is legitimate and fair to be upset if you do end up losing TDPs due to an adjustment. (Nobody knows that anyone will be losing TDPs yet. The opposite may happen for a great many people.)

It would benefit the thread as a whole most likely if people avoided terms like "waste of time" or implied that the training of those ranks was utterly pointless or that they, personally, are experiencing the equivalent of Armifer beaming down into their house and beating them senseless with a frozen trout.

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Thayet
@thayelf // http://thayette.tumblr.com

"But you must know that if corruption is powerful enough, it's not corruption at all — it's law. Unspoken, unwritten, but law." — Robert Jackson Bennett, City of Stairs

It would also benefit this thread if people quit responding to those concerns with "Well, you still have your ranks". It only serves to ignore and invalidate those concerns. I do agree that there is nothing more to be said on either side until Armifer shares more information.

I thought I gave a pretty viable solution honestly lol. There wasn't even any snark involved.

Monster Elec

You hear the distant echo of a savage Horde snarling in barbaric disapproval of your deeds.

Hi.

Figure out a way to express your own opinion in a constructive manner without the overly aggressive attack on other posters.


Annwyl
Message Board Supervisor

If you've questions or comments, take it to e-mail by writing me at DR-Annwyl@play.net.

>>Maybe TDPs all day everyday really is a better game? It certainly sounds like it is the only game for many DR players. <<

It sounds like your gripe is with something other than just TDPs, but you haven't outright said it.

I train skills to be good at them. I do happen to also like rewards! :) TDPs are nice little side rewards. Not much else is unlocked with more skill after a very low point, other than just being able to tackle more difficult tasks (example crafting) or hunting grounds. But the tackling more difficult things is always just a means to an end: to keep skills gaining.

I, personally, would be fine with circle granted stat points (all the way to circle cap) and removal of TDPs if gaining ranks unlocked more cool things.

"Brace yourselves, Squanto is going to bleh blah fart fart bleh.." -the player of the character formerly known as Pureblade

I think I'm indifferent between changing the way TDPs are granted and using stats (or skills for that matter) logarithmicly so that the extra benefit of having higher numbers is less.

Mazrian

>>Just as Warb said I'm in the PVP camp where even at my middling level of skill it's a ridiculous pain to find a fair match. I don't hold animosity over people that have put more time in or people that have put less. The only thing I care about and that I'm surprised other PVP people don't care about is having a greater number of people to fight where it can be designed so that player skill is the much greater defining reason for a win versus time invested.

I don't PvP in DR, almost entirely due to the barrier to entry. It may not even be the majority of PvP players, but I don't understand their exclusionary nature. We have a small community compared to other MMOs as is, so if you're into something like PvP, which inherently requires at least one other player to fight against, the absolute best thing would be to increase the number of participants. Reduce the barrier to entry, narrow mechanical variances at the different tiers of play, widen the pool of possible participants. As more players get involved, now development time is warranted and maybe PvP can stop being an afterthought.