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Re: A Gnomish Essay on xp Functions
Posted: 31 Dec 2007 12:31 PM |
*Vainly attempts to turn the undead horse*
Heh... couldn't resist folks. :) |
Famous last words:
Mykal> it's my new wireless router.
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Re: A Gnomish Essay on xp Functions
Posted: 31 Dec 2007 02:04 PM |
*Vainly attempts to turn the undead horse*
Heh... couldn't resist folks. :)
Even I'm starting to feel the same way. |
"Absolute precision buys the freedom to dream meaningfully." - Donal O' Shea: The Poincaré Conjecture. |
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Re: A Gnomish Essay on xp Functions
Posted: 01 Jan 2008 04:59 PM |
I think so too, though I'd appreciate any thoughts on my last question.
If you made the xp amounts so little for a low-level person in a high-level party, then kept a separate track for kills made as an individual or lower level party (where the same character clearly had a bigger role), couldn't you then solve the problem of giving low-level PCs a free ride in a big party while keeping appropriate xp rewards for killing monsters that were of an equal challenge?
Or is it just too much hassle? I only bring this up again because Paul indicated he was thinking about a couple of ideas, and of course, I'm curious.
Other than that, and I'm hardly about to fall on my sword about that issue, I think the current xp system for Vives has worked well, as I"ve said before. |
The world is a fine place, and worth fighting for...
-- Ernest Hemingway |
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Re: A Gnomish Essay on xp Functions
Posted: 01 Jan 2008 05:39 PM |
I'll take a crack Imperious - I would think that you learn how to kill a monster with a party, and then go back and do it yourself when you have a pretty solid plan for how to kill it on your own. The risks have been substantially reduced. It feels like an achievement, don't get me wrong, and I love tackling things like this (substitute "area" for "monster" and its the same feeling - reaching a place in the server that you could only ever reach before with a good-sized party working together is great fun when you finally make it there alone, or make it back there alone... though not quite making it kind of sucks of course).
Finding risks to take and then surviving them is so basic to solo play... with Vives 1 being the size that it is, you can usually find something out there that you've never fought with or without a party, and that's pretty much what you have to do to get the kind of XP rewards you described. Vives 1 is big enough for that to work out. Might be different on a smaller server w/ a correspondingly small XP pool. But anyways, that's my sense of it. Maybe the bonus for beating things on your own is you don't have to split up the treasure : ). |
"What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about dying."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means lying in the ground with dirt on your face and holding your breath forever."
-Burt Reynolds, "The End" |
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Re: A Gnomish Essay on xp Functions
Posted: 01 Jan 2008 05:46 PM |
Paul/Others with more knowledge of the system than me:
I know this has been discussed earlier in the thread, but I had an idea and wonder if it made any sense.
One of the frustrating things for me (though I completely understand the reasonong for it, as Paul made a good argument earlier) is that when I'm in a large party and kill something, I get only a small XP reward for it, but then when I come back myself (perhaps much later or simply getting lucky or whatever), the system rewards me as if I've killed it for the xth time and get much smaller xp, which can be deflating if I've done something clever/tricky/lucky to beat it.
I suspect this would be a huge pain but is it possible to track kills by levels, such that if you were in a party with 50 levels, you would get X xp for killing a monster, then later if you were in a party with 10 levels (perhaps by yourself), you would get xp as if kiling it for the first time? Then each kill in each different level party would track differently?
So, in a large party of 50 levels, I get xp for killing a dragon. If that same party comes back and kills another dragon of the same type, I get xp as if kiling it a second time, then a third, etc.
But, if I killed the dragon in a smaller party (say total of 10 levels, for example), the system would count me as killing it for the first time and I would get appropriate xp, then xp reward would degrade as that same party of 10 levels killed another dragon, etc.
This seems an interesting way to represent the different kinds of experience one might get between killiing a monster in a larger group and by one's self. It would seem to be a good way to limit the sort of "free xp" a lower level gets when partying with a large group, but still preserve the reward and satisfaction of killing a tough monster finally by yourself.
Maybe you could set up different xp categories for each monster? So, for a dragon, maybe 1-20 level track, then 21-40, and 41+? A goblin might have a category of 1-3, and then 4+, with the xp differences being much smaller since the challenge is so much smaller to begin with?
I haven't really thought this through. Just throwing it out....
Most people I think will agree something needs to be done resolve this issue, and in a way this would help. However there are two problems with this approach.
Firstly, from the point of view of the builders, this equivalently halves the number of monster types that can form the combat pool. In other words, if the monster type would give say, 200xp before the rate of xp from this monster drops to the minimum (based on estimations or averages of the level of character, and summation of a finite series). Then it will instead give 200xp at low levels and perhaps another 100xp at higher levels. This could potentially create a distribution of levels amongst characters with a few characters at very high levels, and the rest at very low levels.
Second, it would not really solve the problem. This would require Paul, (or whoever else is writing the system) to estimate the levels at which characters are going to attempt the encounter. For example he might decide that each monster will be approached first by a group of characters of average (mean) level equal to 40-60% of the monster's challenge rating, and then again by a single character with an average level equal to 110-130% of the monsters CR. If you fought the monster as a party at a low level, and then approached the monster again before you have reached this level ( when your level was equal to or just below that of the monster) you would still gain a very small amount of xp.
Important to note, is the fact that the vives system, and indeed, any system that creates a 'plateau', will actually rely on small xp rewards for tough challenges to create this effect. The scenarios which I believe should be avoided, are those where either a character can eventually gain the same (or similar) amount of xp for killing any creature in the game (which encourages the slaughter of livestock), or worse, where killing a tough monster actually grants less xp than killing a less powerful monster (which is annoying). These principles also apply to other activities for which xp is to be rewarded.
PS. These scenario's would not occur using my system. :P |
"Absolute precision buys the freedom to dream meaningfully." - Donal O' Shea: The Poincaré Conjecture. |
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Re: A Gnomish Essay on xp Functions
Posted: 01 Jan 2008 06:38 PM |
Locking thread on account of it being a pulverised dead horse.
Please start a new one if you still wish to continue the discussion. |
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