Something about training has been bugging me.
Trained skills like armor use and spell research can be trained by anybody but vary in cost by profession. Based on the costs themselves, cost differences by profession, and the diminishing returns in training one skill, it looks like skill training was originally intended not to be capped. For example, a wizard might 4x train in spell aiming or a warrior could 4x in weapon training, in both cases advancing at a rate of 2/1, 4/2, 8/4, 16/8, etc. Certainly they would need to sacrifice a lot of other skills to do this pre-cap, presumably skills that are fairly critical to today's game.
Given the self-regulating nature of increasing costs and diminishing returns, why limit how many times a skill can be trained by level?
I understand this question has been asked many times, both here and in several of the profession folders. The last answer I saw was something like it would be too unbalancing. What are some real examples? I believe this would actually work toward restoring balance at cap, where the number variance is the highest in the game, and would be difficult to take advantage of before that (maybe a little at the lowest levels). If keeping a professional mastery is essential, guilds should augment skills (rogues are a great example, warriors not so much).
I also understand this is not easy to implement - I'm just posting in favor of the idea, and wanted to see what others think.
KANDOR
DAID
Re: Uncapping skill training
12/11/2015 12:42 PM CST
I wonder if you are asking for skill ranks to be entirely uncapped or if it's the "number of ranks per level" you want uncapped.
Under your example, say a level 50 wizard could be 4x in spell aiming with around 200 ranks, but then could not train further for life. Or they should be able to train it forever, at any number of ranks, so long as they keep paying for more ranks.
I think with lores in particular most of the benefits are designed under the assumption of a maximum number of ranks a player could ever get. CMans and other such things (SHIELD and ARMOR specializations) are likely to fall into this category as well.
Of course, one is free to not want to have to pick and choose their specializations, but it seems to me a lot of things were designed this way on purpose.
From my own perspective, I doubt anyone would really like my argument, but it's this: pures can triple-train spells, and I see a large percentage of advice for, say, training sorcerers that's like "TRIPLE IN SORCERER BASE." Personally, I don't find it to be very compelling advice, and I think really limits the profession; players are free to make their own training decisions, but consider that people new to the profession hear this so often, and if they follow (what I consider to be) bad advice, they'll not end up seeing much of the depth at all, only because certain voices are relatively loud.
It's not clear people would train as much CMans as, say, a warmage if they can 2x+ in a weapon skill. The benefits of earth lore to Strength would also be probably even worse than they already are.
Yet another area would be the market of certain items. This doesn't justify anything but it would certainly get a lot of players upset I believe. Consider the self-knowledge of Champion's Might that Kaedra bid about 300m for at RtCF; this item is worth significantly less if her character had many other decent ways to get more CS. Most enhancives of combat numbers can easily fall under this guise.
I think one of the main benefits to the present system is that, at some point, your character is actually required to become more well-rounded rather than doing the same-old thing all the time. Again, it may be bad to require it but it seems like a good thing to me, and is generally worked into so many systems.
Particularly professions like rogues that in fact are partly unique not just because of the low costs for many skills, but the unique ability to triple-train in those skills. If anyone post-cap could pick locks as well at a rogue -- even at a large TP investment, I can again see some players getting upset.
The balance of near-cap, cap, and post-cap creatures would surely be thrown off if people could 4x in a weapon or spell aiming, etc, right?
On the other hand, I think there's some merit in this for extremely post-capped players, who have almost nothing worthwhile to even train. There are only about a handful of characters in this boat, but even so it's kind of like "the new hard cap" and unless any of those players quit out of boredom, with time, more people will approach that domain. Whether or not this is the best solution I'm unsure, but it's definitely a solution, and eventually it would be good if it was resolved somehow.
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>Daid: Pretty sure you have a whole big bucket as your penny jar. You never have only two cents. :p
Under your example, say a level 50 wizard could be 4x in spell aiming with around 200 ranks, but then could not train further for life. Or they should be able to train it forever, at any number of ranks, so long as they keep paying for more ranks.
I think with lores in particular most of the benefits are designed under the assumption of a maximum number of ranks a player could ever get. CMans and other such things (SHIELD and ARMOR specializations) are likely to fall into this category as well.
Of course, one is free to not want to have to pick and choose their specializations, but it seems to me a lot of things were designed this way on purpose.
From my own perspective, I doubt anyone would really like my argument, but it's this: pures can triple-train spells, and I see a large percentage of advice for, say, training sorcerers that's like "TRIPLE IN SORCERER BASE." Personally, I don't find it to be very compelling advice, and I think really limits the profession; players are free to make their own training decisions, but consider that people new to the profession hear this so often, and if they follow (what I consider to be) bad advice, they'll not end up seeing much of the depth at all, only because certain voices are relatively loud.
It's not clear people would train as much CMans as, say, a warmage if they can 2x+ in a weapon skill. The benefits of earth lore to Strength would also be probably even worse than they already are.
Yet another area would be the market of certain items. This doesn't justify anything but it would certainly get a lot of players upset I believe. Consider the self-knowledge of Champion's Might that Kaedra bid about 300m for at RtCF; this item is worth significantly less if her character had many other decent ways to get more CS. Most enhancives of combat numbers can easily fall under this guise.
I think one of the main benefits to the present system is that, at some point, your character is actually required to become more well-rounded rather than doing the same-old thing all the time. Again, it may be bad to require it but it seems like a good thing to me, and is generally worked into so many systems.
Particularly professions like rogues that in fact are partly unique not just because of the low costs for many skills, but the unique ability to triple-train in those skills. If anyone post-cap could pick locks as well at a rogue -- even at a large TP investment, I can again see some players getting upset.
The balance of near-cap, cap, and post-cap creatures would surely be thrown off if people could 4x in a weapon or spell aiming, etc, right?
On the other hand, I think there's some merit in this for extremely post-capped players, who have almost nothing worthwhile to even train. There are only about a handful of characters in this boat, but even so it's kind of like "the new hard cap" and unless any of those players quit out of boredom, with time, more people will approach that domain. Whether or not this is the best solution I'm unsure, but it's definitely a solution, and eventually it would be good if it was resolved somehow.
Check out who's dying any time! https://twitter.com/GSIVDeathLog
>Daid: Pretty sure you have a whole big bucket as your penny jar. You never have only two cents. :p
SHAYD11
Re: Uncapping skill training
12/14/2015 03:12 AM CST
>I can again see some players getting upset.
This is Gemstone IV, players are going to get upset regardless. If they dont change anything, if they do change anything, it doesnt matter. Someone is going to be irate.
>Consider the self-knowledge of Champion's Might that Kaedra bid about 300m for at RtCF; this item is worth significantly less if her character had many other decent ways to get more CS.
I dont believe this is true, its human nature to always want more. If you make 25k/year you want to make 40k/year. If you make 25mil/year you want to make 40mil. No matter what people will always want more.
To the idea the OP had, I dont see them doing it. I would personally love it if they did though. Imagine real goals post cap, instead of choices like huh got my main stays done now I guess ill max out climbing. So exciting.
This is Gemstone IV, players are going to get upset regardless. If they dont change anything, if they do change anything, it doesnt matter. Someone is going to be irate.
>Consider the self-knowledge of Champion's Might that Kaedra bid about 300m for at RtCF; this item is worth significantly less if her character had many other decent ways to get more CS.
I dont believe this is true, its human nature to always want more. If you make 25k/year you want to make 40k/year. If you make 25mil/year you want to make 40mil. No matter what people will always want more.
To the idea the OP had, I dont see them doing it. I would personally love it if they did though. Imagine real goals post cap, instead of choices like huh got my main stays done now I guess ill max out climbing. So exciting.
RUFUSMORAY
Re: Uncapping skill training
12/15/2015 01:17 PM CST
If the real desire is to allow continual expansion of skills without limit. IE Instead of max 202 ranks your max is infinite. (As opposed to training an infinite number per level until cap. IE at level 50 you could 4x to 202 or whatever.) If the cap doesn't exist how do you reconcile warrior A at cap who has been there forever and decided to put 200 extra ranks in TWC for +200 AS with Warrior B who just reached cap and doesn't have that 200 extra points. I understand the point costs get restrictive but given that you can learn TPs infinitely you could do something like that. Now you need an enemy balanced to create a challenge for the +200 warrior that doesn't ruin the other warrior's end game and play. (Toss that enemy in an invasion and it becomes havoc.) So while yes the prohibitive increasing costs would make it somewhat limited the balancing act definitely becomes hard. This further becomes difficult with things like Lores where the Cap on ranks is a limiting factor in and of itself that is designed to keep things balanced. If a user could max all lores... or in a few instances where there is no limit to increase their lores beyond cap the balance is also throw out of whack.
I like the idea of continuing to advance skills/abilities/stats... past a certain point because it gives you something to work on. The problem is it breaks previous areas of the game and such. I'm more in favor of a system where bonuses to skills/stat and such are tied to an item that only works in a certain area. Allowing for more epic feeling fights etc without the broken nature of dis-balance in already existing areas.
KANDOR
Re: Uncapping skill training
12/15/2015 09:31 PM CST
Let's say Warrior A and Warrior B are both level 100. They both are double trained in THW, doubled in cmans, etc. Warrior A has been capped several years longer and has tripled, then quadrupled, his weapon training. He hasn't increased any other skills. If he has +200 AS, so what? With the years of training has he earned the ability to take down his opponents in one fell stroke? (The critter might just EBP it, anyway, or hit first.) It'd be easier for a warrior to do this than, say, a ranger or even a paladin. Trying to balance the end-game is a pretty tough nut to crack, because even though there are a lot of capped characters, it's the cap - there's still really nowhere else to go. This would change a lot of that, but it'd also create new and mutant builds pre-cap, and even at the lowest levels. If it's a real big deal, give the post-cap hunting grounds a higher upward variance in skills. Sometimes you'll run into a real monster but since you're capped, what else is going to challenge you? An invasion? :) You're usually running a bounty, anyway. Let's say Warrior C has been around the same time as Warrior A, but spread his TPs out to give better-rounded skills, better defense, and more cmans. He'll survive longer against the real monster than Warrior A.
Just seemed like an interesting concept. There are already so many difficulties trying to balance near and post-cap that I can't see that being a huge issue.
Just seemed like an interesting concept. There are already so many difficulties trying to balance near and post-cap that I can't see that being a huge issue.
DAID
Re: Uncapping skill training
12/16/2015 04:17 AM CST
The design time for more and harder post-cap hunting grounds essentially defeats at least some of the purpose of a reason they made the cap in the first place.
I'm not totally opposed to the basic idea here, and it's certainly an interesting thought experiment, but I'm also playing devil's advocate in terms of why I don't think it would ever happen.
Check out who's dying any time! https://twitter.com/GSIVDeathLog
>Daid: Pretty sure you have a whole big bucket as your penny jar. You never have only two cents. :p
I'm not totally opposed to the basic idea here, and it's certainly an interesting thought experiment, but I'm also playing devil's advocate in terms of why I don't think it would ever happen.
Check out who's dying any time! https://twitter.com/GSIVDeathLog
>Daid: Pretty sure you have a whole big bucket as your penny jar. You never have only two cents. :p
GAROFALOA
Re: Uncapping skill training
03/11/2016 02:59 AM CST
Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong but I was always under the impression that it was character file corruption issues that caused the powers that be to cap things.
DAID
Re: Uncapping skill training
03/11/2016 06:54 AM CST
I don't know. I assumed it was because once non-empaths got past something like level 130 in GSIII, the only reliable way to advance further was lockpicking. The solutions were basically either a cap, to forsake people after a certain level, or to continue to build more and higher level hunting grounds accessible by less and less characters.
There were several characters over around level 250 that I can recall (Jadall, Malok, Driszzdt...and I'm not spelling some of these correctly).
The deathbot will come back eventually.
>Daid: Pretty sure you have a whole big bucket as your penny jar. You never have only two cents. :p
There were several characters over around level 250 that I can recall (Jadall, Malok, Driszzdt...and I'm not spelling some of these correctly).
The deathbot will come back eventually.
>Daid: Pretty sure you have a whole big bucket as your penny jar. You never have only two cents. :p
ARCHIGEEK
Re: Uncapping skill training
03/11/2016 10:50 AM CST
The cap was put in place for a number of reasons. To me, the most notable was that it had become just about impossible to design anything that would be viable/usable/fun for the huge level range that had developed over time. Development of just about everything was taking too much resource because it had to work at such a high level spread. File corruption was probably something that was considered, though I have never heard of it happening because of high level. Warden had pretty good vision of the future of GS, and if you think about it, he and the rest of the GMs did a pretty masterful job of a major overhaul of Gemstone.
Kerl
Kerl
OM1E5GA
Re: Uncapping skill training
03/11/2016 12:03 PM CST
Not to mention invasions had to involve critters so high level only a hand-full of players could participate beyond triage. I remember hearing about one from the pre AOL days where they had to wait for Lord Strom to log in and take out some of the critters...
Starchitin
A severed gnomish hand crawls in on its fingertips and makes a rude gesture before quickly decaying and rotting into dust. A gust of wind quickly scatters the dust.
Starchitin
A severed gnomish hand crawls in on its fingertips and makes a rude gesture before quickly decaying and rotting into dust. A gust of wind quickly scatters the dust.
RATHBONER
Re: Uncapping skill training
03/11/2016 01:32 PM CST
>Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong but I was always under the impression that it was character file corruption issues that caused the powers that be to cap things.
This is the reason for the cap on the number of items on a character.
This is the reason for the cap on the number of items on a character.
GAROFALOA
Re: Uncapping skill training
03/11/2016 05:53 PM CST
I knew about the item limit. Years back when they had the test server open to test the Linux servers I went in got a huge pile of experience points and just went to town practically maxing everything and apparently I broke myself doing so... Probably not related to what the original poster was talking about but they told me don't Max everything out or I was going to break myself again...
KRAKII
Re: Uncapping skill training
05/10/2016 10:23 AM CDT
Rathboner is correct about the personal inventory cap.
Level cap was because when one of those people reached 300th level, it would wind up causing a "divide by 0" in one of the experience formulae, and that is considered A Bad Thing" in the computer world. <nod>
Level cap was because when one of those people reached 300th level, it would wind up causing a "divide by 0" in one of the experience formulae, and that is considered A Bad Thing" in the computer world. <nod>
