Discussion thread - Extended Subguilds

[number13]

I really don't want to piss on or piss off staff. I earnestly do appreciate that guys are keeping the game going. Still, I do feel targeted because the changes and/or clarifications aren't even publicity mentioned in this thread or an announcement thread.

It doesn't even really matter at this point, I guess. Three bumps to a single skill was always a lot less than what I was looking for, and the scale back to that is an inch too far for me to hold any interest in the system.  I would have much preferred a system that allowed people with 1 or more karma to roll a Veteran character, with across the board bumps to skills making them equal to a 5-day character, with the trade-off that the character couldn't be a magicker, have a karma race, or have an Extended subguild, and burned a special app in the process... in essence trading future potential for the ability to play something immediately that didn't require a single hour of skill grinding before the fun stuff began.

Maybe next year.

[Adhira]

No problem, I just wanted to clarify that this really wasn't a personal thing, it was a change across the board.  The no more than 2 bumps to any weapon skill came in shortly after we implemented this.  This was due to a mistake made by me in relaying the original intent.  This is still under discussion as originally weapon skills were targeted for a bump of one level of mastery only, so even at two we're above what was originally intended.

Skills like steal, hide, sneak etc we are considering as being similar to weapon skills and looking to cap those at 2 bumps so you will not reach mastery level from the get go but be pretty high up the tree in that regard.

Does this take away the grind? No it doesn't.  Sorry to say that I don't envision we will ever get to the point where there is no skill curve needed if getting your characters fully skilled up is what your aim is.

[Bacon]

How about putting a list of the skills that are limited to those two bumps in one post on the announcement thread so it's less likely to cause this sort of confusion and edit it as changes come about?



Skill bump requests will be considered for a total of 3 'bumps'.  Each bump will be for one 'level' of mastery. Only starting skills are available to be bumped.

Certain skills can only be bumped a maximum of 2 levels of mastery:

1) Weapon skills: slashing, bludgeoning, chopping, and piercing.
2) Sneak.
3) Hide.
4) Steal.

Something like that? Are those the only ones? Also, is that a total of 3 "bumps" period across all skills? Or 3 bumps max to any skills save for those with the two limit?

[Thunkkin]

Feedback (not criticism!): Bumping three skills from novice to apprentice, bumping one skill to journeyman and one to apprentice, or bumping one "not special" skill to advanced is not anywhere in the same ballpark of power and usefulness as extended subguilds such as Outdoorsman or Slipknife that cost the same amount of points. I understand that staff may not be seeking to make all options equivalent, but I just can't imagine any scenario in which three skills at apprentice would be worth a special application. The chore of grinding (for me) is getting retarded-to-branch skills to tick over to Master from Advanced so that my character can finally have access to some of the basic skills of his/her job. I would rather use a subguild to get access to one of these skills from the get-go than use a skill bump to save me an incredibly small amount of effort to get to apprentice/journeyman. Granted, not all options are going to be equally appealing to all people, but the skill bumps option as implemented is completely unappealing.

Keep up the awesome work, though. I'm very excited about the new subguild options and I look forward to applying for one some day!

Also: I wish there was an extended subguild equivalent for physician.

[Potaje]

Also: I wish there was an extended subguild equivalent for physician.

This yes, I agree and had thought about that. Maybe even with some access to them as a specialized field of interest to slightly more than basic knowledge in cures and materials.

[number13]

I'm half-inclinded to app for a 3 bump to poisoning, just to see it added to the list. 

[Bacon]

Also: I wish there was an extended subguild equivalent for physician.

This yes, I agree and had thought about that. Maybe even with some access to them as a specialized field of interest to slightly more than basic knowledge in cures and materials.

That would be very cool.

[jstorrie]

Sneak and hide progress so quickly, and with so little risk, that this is kind of a non-issue anyway.

[Old Kank]

We're taking feedback, we're looking at balance and seeing how things are used.  ...  Does this take away the grind? No it doesn't.  Sorry to say that I don't envision we will ever get to the point where there is no skill curve needed if getting your characters fully skilled up is what your aim is.

I was under the impression that the idea behind the skill bumps was to allow players that lack the time/inclination/desire to play Byn n00b #47 to skip the grind and start out further into the skill curve.  If that's the case, I don't think skill bumps are doing it.

Here's why I feel that way:

Without getting into the codey details, the only skills that make sense to have bumped are also the skills that don't scale well with bumps.  The rest of the skills aren't worth the price of the bump, so it becomes a lose/lose proposition.

It seems like the price per bump should be based on the risk of practicing the skill.  As jstorrie pointed out, sneak and hide go up so fast and so risk-free that having them bumped is, at best, a convenience, and having them "bump capped" seems kind of absurd in that light.    The same is true for cooking, forage, scan, listen, crafting skills, and a handful of others.  I understand the staff doesn't want a bunch of haphazard uberthieves popping out of char gen, but let's be honest:  Anyone with the karma to afford the skill bumps has the experience to quickly and reasonably max out those low-risk skills if they want to.

I'm not being critical of the skill bump policies, but having played with them a little bit I feel comfortable saying they don't fit my needs; I can only think of a couple of skills that I would consider bumping in the future, and I doubt I'm alone in feeling that way.

Rather than focusing on specific skills, I think it might be more useful to either allow skill bumps to entire categories (manipulation, stealth, etc.) or predetermined combinations (sneak/hide, forage/cooking, etc) so that the cost of the bump would be more worthwhile.

[Dar]

I agree to be honest. I cant really see myself asking for any skill bumps short of weapon skills. But when those skill bumps will begin costing CGP? Forget it. Sorry. Not for a character that's liable to die in 10 hours. But having the option in itself is still nice, I'm pretty sure there 'are' players out there with a steady habit of having most of their characters to be very very long lived and skipping on some annoying contact/crafting spammage.

[RogueGunslinger]

Yeah, I'm definitely in agreement with the posts above. I can't imagine using these.

[Malken]

If you're allowed to apply for a half giant (3 karma), I think you should be allowed to apply for an advanced weapon skill (3 karma as well..), since, let's be honest, a half giant can be just as dangerous in the hand of an irresponsible player (which shouldn't happen in either case due to the number of karma required..).

Also, like the previous poster said, you can bet that if you're going to be losing 3 karma or more to boost your skill to such an advanced level, chances are that you're not going to go and play it stupid. If the fact that you have karma because you're actually trusted by the Staff to play such a boost responsibly, then the fear of wasting such an amount of karma should do it.

[Dar]

it's possibly that one of the reasons why skills like sneak/weapons,steal are capped to 2 improvements, is because if you give them 3 bumps, and it'll put them past the level they would be otherwise capped at. Which is a logical and clear reason why cap them. Doesnt change the fact that the cost of the bump is not appealing enough for any skill except the very few.

[BleakOne]

Personally, although I don't have a lot of Karma, I still like the skill bumps. It would be nice to get 2 bumps per CGP or something, but one still seems good to me.

[Gunnerblaster]

Sorry - I'm a bit late into the conversation but I wanted to ask; how is Karma going to be issued/accumulated?

Let's say I have 3 Karma, does that turn into 3 CGP? Or is there going to be some sort of factor of 1 karma = 2 CGP? If not, I wouldn't even be able to use some of the CGP-required subguilds without completely sucking up all my CGP or simply not having enough.

I also vaguely remember someone mentioning that the CGP will 'recover' by 1 per month. Is that statement correct?

[RogueGunslinger]

Yes. Yes.

[Kismetic]

Instead of all these numbers, can we divide it into categories of the highest level a skill can be bumped?  Easier for brainz

Ex:


You have 3 points.

Available skills are:

Master     Advanced     Journeyman

contact    skinning     bludgeoning weapons
barrier    listen       steal
etc.       kick         dual wield
          ride         etc.
          stuff w/ wood
          etc.

choose listen journeyman
That skill will cost your guild 2 CGP.  (y/n)


Some brainz are nommier than others


Also, I think skill bumps, if anything, provide an interesting addition to your background, outside of "got my <generic guild skill training> done down at that place over there."

[BleakOne]

I've always wanted to bump my 'stuff w/ wood' skill. 

[number13]

My impression was you pay 3 points and receive the Advanced level for any skill, 2 points you get the Journeyman level, 1 point you get Apprentice.

Just dawned on me that some skills start at apprentice rather than novice. Let's say for a given guild, race, and starting location a character starts with Apprentice rope-making.  If you dumped three points into that would the skill then rated as Master?

I ask because it might be the source of my confusion concerning the two skills I tried to app. I was shooting for Advanced, but maybe staff thought I was asking for Master?

[Is Friday]

They reset all of your skills to novice before you receive any bumps. Advanced is as far as you can go. Weapon skills, sneak, etc. only go to journeyman.

[Nyr]

This is a trial period.  There may even be restrictions on the trial period that were not necessarily envisioned for the actual implementation (which will spend accrued CGP as you assign it--a lot different than the system that is being tested out and definitely limited).

Sorry - I'm a bit late into the conversation but I wanted to ask; how is Karma going to be issued/accumulated?

Let's say I have 3 Karma, does that turn into 3 CGP? Or is there going to be some sort of factor of 1 karma = 2 CGP? If not, I wouldn't even be able to use some of the CGP-required subguilds without completely sucking up all my CGP or simply not having enough.

I also vaguely remember someone mentioning that the CGP will 'recover' by 1 per month. Is that statement correct?

You don't have to vaguely remember, you just have to read!  

Now, back to skill bumps.

Option 2: Skill Bumps

Players will also have the option to spend their CGP 'bumping' their base skills.  This will give them the option to bump starting skills one 'level' of mastery per CGP spent.  Only starting skills are available to be bumped (so if you branch something from using CGP, you can't spend CGP on the branched skill). Skills that are available to everyone with training (like ride, pilot and watch) would be available for bumping.  Some skills will be limited/restricted from being bumped. For instance, weapon skills will not be bump-able more than one or two at most. Offense/defense will not be an option.

This has not been a surprise or anything, we have had it up on the board for 6 months now.  The trial system has been in place for a couple of months now.  The actual system plans to use all possible CGP (karma + a special app, if you want) for skill bumps.  The trial system is set to use only special apps for skill bumps.  The trial system is also in place to only use the special app portion of this entire system, with proper limits in place.

Examples:

If you have 8 karma and you put in a special app, you can app for a psionicist with three (3) skill bumps.*  
If you have 7 karma and you put in a special app, you can app for a mul with three (3) skill bumps.*
If you have 6 karma and you put in a special app, you can app for a void elementalist with three (3) skill bumps.*
If you have 0 karma and you put in a special app, you can app for a human warrior with three (3) skill bumps.*

*All skill bumps hold to any stated rules and are done by staff members manually.

There is a hard limit of three (3) skill bumps per app, and these skill bumps are unrelated to your karma level.  This is unlike the envisioned system.  As far as I know, the vision for this system has not changed to the point where one will only be able to do 3 skill bumps after its actual coded implementation.  

Future examples:

If you have 8 karma, you can app normally for a human warrior and apply eight skill bumps.*

*All skill bumps hold to any stated rules at that time, and are done within a coded system.

This does not mean we won't move all of the existing restrictions over to the coded system.  However, this also does not mean we will loosen any of the restrictions on the coded system.  It simply means that this is a trial system, and changes are going to be considered carefully for its impact on players now as well as its impact on the CGP spending system in the future.

[Bacon]

I like the idea of being able to do as many bumps as you have CGP (karma) to a non-karma race/guild so long as you don't go over the limits set for specific skills.

So, if one had 5 karma and was apping a human warrior they could put a total of five bumps toward skills but no more than 3 on any skill and no more than 2 on a single weapon skill, sneak, hide, steal. That's kinda how I was envisioning it going in.
Could do one bump to contact, one to a weapon skill, one to skinning, and two to ride with five karma if you wanted. I figure if you're trusted with more karma, you're not going to break anything by being able to do more bumps to a normally non-karma character. Or, if you wanted to do a karma race/guild, then that comes out of your points first before any bumps you might have the karma to do and wish to do.

[jstorrie]

Yeah, I'm definitely in agreement with the posts above. I can't imagine using these.

Likewise. Most non-combat skills are rather trivial to cap through normal living-your-PC's-life. The skill bump system - both as temporarily implemented, and as eventually intended - only seems attractive for players who want to be better at killing, in one way or another.

[Maso]

It's not really all about killing...there are plenty of skills that aren't combat that might not be trivial for a particular character concept. I think it's great...it means that characters can finally be app'd with at least some kind of experience to show for their X years on Zalanthas...whereas as it stands (or at least until recently)...you can roll a 35 yr old character who can't do anything. I'd be quite happy bumping cooking and other crafty skills, as well as stuff like listen, climb, forage, scan, hunt, slight, contact etc etc. It just means your character can start the game...not completely useless for the first couple of days. Which tends to just be embarrassing (especially contact...omg).

[A Large Bag]

It's not really all about killing...there are plenty of skills that aren't combat that might not be trivial for a particular character concept. I think it's great...it means that characters can finally be app'd with at least some kind of experience to show for their X years on Zalanthas...whereas as it stands (or at least until recently)...you can roll a 35 yr old character who can't do anything. I'd be quite happy bumping cooking and other crafty skills, as well as stuff like listen, climb, forage, scan, hunt, slight, contact etc etc. It just means your character can start the game...not completely useless for the first couple of days. Which tends to just be embarrassing (especially contact...omg).

Right. It'll be nice to be able to make a character that can do their crafting skill they're supposed to be somewhat experienced with to some kind of useful degree from the get go. Or skinning, climb, forage, scan, hunt...etc. This is totally not just for "people who want to kill".